#i remember a lot of the basics but would need a TON of refreshing to attempt something like this

[featheredadora]

hello! hope you're having a nice day

i have been interested in keeping a pet canary for a bit, but i don't know about any good care guides for them, do you perhaps know one? (it's aight if you don't or if it's too much information to write)

Hi there!

I think canaries are wonderful and really sweet little birds, so it is nice to hear people appreciating them!

That said, I'm afraid I don't really have a specific guide to point you to, sorry! I remember before I got Sunshine for my nan I spent a few months reading just a ton of different guides about canaries (I found it quite overwhelming combing through so much info tbh) but that was more than three years ago now, so I don't really remember which resources I found particularly helpful.

In any case, if you are interested in some thoughts from me personally, I've put some stuff beneath the cut:

In terms of info I have from my personal experience (you might already know all of this, sorry), a lot of the care is not dissimilar to other kinds of birds. Sunshine eats a diet of canary seed mix, superfine pellets, and a range of veggies (he in particular likes to have a piece of tenderstem brocolli clipped up every day. But he also loves romaine lettuce, and chop made from kale, peppers, carrots etc).

Cage-wise, the bigger the better, with an emphasis on length over height - but super important to get very small bar spacing, because canaries are so small that there is a risk of them getting their heads stuck otherwise. Lots of natural perches of differing widths too, and I would personally include a flat perch as well, for variety.

But my experience with Sunshine has also been different from my other birds in lots of ways too! My other birds like to stay out of their cages basically all day, whereas Sunshine prefers to stay in his cage for the bulk of the day. He asks to be let out (usually just a couple of times a day) and will then fly and play around the room for a while, but he then returns to his cage and is happy to play about in there for a bit.

In terms of toys, I have heard that canaries 'don't really play with toys', but this hasn't been my experience with Sunshine. He needs lighter, easier toys though - his favourites are a string of sola wood discs, a paper pinata toy, and a willow ball stuffed with crinkle paper which he likes to pull out.

I've also found that his nails grow a LOT faster than my other birds, so we take him to the vet for a nail trim every few months (if you can do this yourself at home, that's probably better, but Sunshine gets super stressed out if ever we try to grab him). Oh and one last thing, he LOVES having baths. More than any other bird I've known. Annoyingly, Sunshine refuses to use a proper bird bath and will only use his water pot (so I have to clean and refresh it multiple times per day), but I would still say getting a nice little bath for your friend is important!

So yeah, sorry I couldn't be of more help! As with any bird, the best possible advice I can give is to get them registered with a good avian vet for their regular check ups, and also to make sure your house is bird proof (safe for them during out-of-cage time, but also safe from items which could give off fumes, like spray deodorant, candles, most non-stick cooking stuff, etc).

This ended up being both super long, and super basic, sorry! But in any case, thank you for giving me chance to talk a bit about Sunshine (who I love and adore), and I hope you and your future little friend will be really happy together!

[open-hearth-rpg]

Glossary Index: Great RPG Mechanics #RPGMechanics: Week Nine

I love over-produced rpg books, I love chunky rpg books, I love beautiful rpg books. But more than anything else I love books that actually work at the table. Books with sensical organization, clear call outs for information, important rules repeated, and with key references gathered together. There are games that I love, but in spite of their presentation. I’m not going to name names– but there’s one big indie title I ran for two and half years straight and every single session I couldn’t find key info. 

A few years ago I applied for a job involving checking indexes (I didn’t get the position, last in a long series of those rejections). But one of the best parts of preparing for those interviews was discovering Nancy C. Mulvany’s great Indexing Books. It’s a dynamite read for anyone with any interest in how books are indexed. It’s a practical and illuminating volume. (For a deeper history of the index, see also Dennis Duncan’s Index, a History of The).  

RPG Indexes are vital to me when I’m trying to use a book at the table. I die a little inside every time I flip to the back of a game I’m running and find them missing. People who make rpgs, playbooks, character sheets, etc need to think about how these things actually get used. 

Which brings me to the wonders of the glossary index. I first encountered this in 13th Age, my favorite d20 emulating fantasy rpg. I adore 13th Age– especially for the smartness of how it is put together. The glossary index there contains a lot of elements– ones smartly chosen. For example what an attack bonus is and how to calculate it, what it means for a spell to be a battle spell, how the different range bands are read, etc. But my favorite bit– and the one which I often go to is the definitions of the different conditions. There are nine of them (few than a lot of other games (see Mutants & Masterminds)) but I can never exactly remember what they can do. 

The 13th Age Glossary Index points you to where you can find the info and gives you a quick answer if you’re just looking for a basic point. It’s also extraordinary well-written, tight and yet echoing the great authorial voice of the rest of the book. It had to have been a ton of work, but it is amazing. I don’t need this for every book, but for core books, it’s a definite value add. I hope the new Trail of Cthulhu 2e from Pelgrane also uses this approach. 

The other recent rulebook which does this is the amazing Apocalypse Keys from Rae Nedjadi and Evil Hat. It uses color and a small sideline to help call out the glossary entries. It’s great and a welcome addition to a game with a large set of moving parts. It’s also a great way to get a refresher when you go back to read through the game when you go to play it again after a break. 

I remember the extensive front of the book glossary and terminology guides which filled White Wolf core books from the 1990s on. Leaden and filled with nonsensical terms and ideas– a road bump to actually getting to the rules and the text. You’d be forgiven for just ducking out when you saw like five pages of terms, maybe split into sub-categories. Does these have to come at the front? Maybe we could have placed them as an appendix? Is it that intimidation an attempt at legitimacy? 

In any case a glossary index, like those in 13th Age and Apocalypse Keys, is a crafted and smart tool. It comes from people playing and thinking about what people would need to look up at the table. It’s great and I know several modern rpgs which I wish would have had one. Star Trek Adventures, I’m looking at you….

[crystal-in-nagasaki]

crystal NOT in nagasaki, singapore: part three

Hello, and welcome back to part three of my Singapore and Thailand travels. In this part I'll pick up where I left off on day 6 in Singapore (of about 10).

This morning, we of course went to get breakfast at a hawker center. I found at my breakfasts with my Singaporean host family that it's pretty normal to eat what I would consider lunch or dinner foods for breakfast, like soup and noodle dishes. With the exception of obvious breakfast food like kaya toast, it seemed that breakfast food could really be anything.

For this breakfast we ate a noodle dish called cheung fun, originating from the Cantonese province of Guangdong in southern China. It's made by filling a wide strip of rice noodle with meat and/vegetables then served in broth. The cheung in cheung fun means intestine, not because it's made of intestines, but because it looks like them. The more you know! Anyway, it was of course delicious.

After our breakfast of hot noodles, my friend's mother brought us a sweet treat which ended up being one of my favorite foods of the whole trip. It's called pisang goreng, meaning fried banana. It was soooooooo good. I still dream of it even now.

After this delicious breakfast, I split off with my American friend again and went to Singapore Botanic Gardens to see the tropical flora and fauna (and try to hunt down some wild otters.)

I admittedly became obsessed with these grass-cutting robots, which I nicknamed "grass roombas," so I feel the need to include a picture of one here. They were all over the park and I thought they were so cool and really shows how advanced Singapore is technologically!

Despite it's reputation as a city-state, Singapore is home to a lot of interesting wildlife including huge monitor lizards and wild otters. I found this big monitor lizard sunning himself by a pond, and I saw many more in Thailand as well.

I heard stories from my Singaporean friend that wild otters could be found in the nature reserves of Singapore, so I was really excited to find them. She said they can even be pests to Singaporean residents, sneaking into public ponds and pools and even eating pet fish. I finally spotted a huge group of them in the Botanic Gardens swimming and playing in a big lake. The little chirping noises they made were so cute! I'm really glad I got to see them in their native habitat.

At this point we were sufficiently sweating from the tropical heat, so we met back up with our Singaporean friends to grab a lunch of Indonesian fried chicken, called ayam penyet. I got coconut milk to drink, which came in a large coconut. You could also scrape out the flesh and eat it. It was so tasty and refreshing!

After this, I broke off with another Singaporean to go to something I had really been looking forward to: an ice cream museum. This was basically just a ton of colorfully decorated rooms with all-you-can-eat ice cream (and a little bit of educational content.)

At the entrance, you can create your own nametag, and making some kind of ice cream pun was encouraged. For example, I saw names like Kanye Zest and Brad Pittstachio. I can't remember what name I chose, but I remember trying really hard to come up with a pun and couldn't think of anything. If you think of a good one, let me know!

After putting on our nametags, we continued into the first room which had a beach-y vibe. We also received our first ice cream. There were two choices and I picked pink guava. It was really good!

After finishing our first round of ice cream, we moved into the next room, in which all four walls were covered in letter magnets that could be moved around. There were prompts on the walls like "where are you from?" and "what is your dream?" My friend arranged the letters into "live in Tokyo" and I put down "open a cat cafe." This is earnestly my impossible dream that I daydream about when I pretend money and other obstacles don't exist. But anyway, this room was really fun, and I liked reading what other people had left as well!

The next room was set up to look like a retro diner (but still pink of course.) There was a bar, jukebox, and fake vinyl records hanging on the wall. In this room we chose to eat a twist of peppermint and vanilla frozen yogurt. This was easily my favorite ice cream of the day! Frozen yogurt is much more popular back in the states, so it had been a long time since I had it. It was delicious.

From there, we walked down this aesthetic hallway and grabbed some instagram-worthy pics before heading into the next room.

The next room was decorated with huge colorful popsicles sticking out of the walls, and we received a similar size and shape of ice cream to enjoy. These ones came in traditional Asian flavors like pandan and red bean. I got pandan since I was learning to love the flavor on this trip.

In the next room were some swings and playground equipment. Am I an adult? Yes. Did I enjoy swinging on the giant banana-shaped swing? Also yes.

My friend also told me that the playset was designed to be a cute version of another famous playset in Singapore that's shaped like a dragon! I'll post the other one for reference.

Next we walked through a few more aesthetically pleasing spaces, like this dimly lit one, and a banana tunnel.

Then we entered another room which offered a Barbie-themed ice cream. It was vanilla flavored, but colored a bright pink. It was yummy!

One of the last rooms was arguably the museum's main attraction, the giant ball pit filled with (non-edible) sprinkles. I haven't been in a ball pit in a loooooong time, so I did admittedly flounder about a bit, but it was really fun to throw the sprinkles around and pretend I was in a giant sugary wonderland.

That was about it for the ice cream museum. It was a bit expensive, about $50 and mainly existed for instagram photo-ops but hey, I loved walking through all the pink rooms and eating copious amounts of delicious ice cream. I did find the place a bit...dirty. There were lots of kids running around and climbing on stuff, so I wish it was cleaned a bit more often. But overall it was fun and I recommend it!

I'd like to talk briefly about just two more things before I wrap up this part! That night after the ice cream museum, my friends and I went to the Night Luge, where we could race carts down a big colorful hill. The carts aren't motorized and you just use gravity and a brake to control it. You can take a ski lift to the top and then ride down several times. It was really fun!

The next night I went to the Night Safari, the world's first ever nocturnal zoo. Have you ever visited a zoo during the day and found that all the animals were asleep? At the Night Safari, you enter the zoo after nightfall and can enjoy seeing various nocturnal animals up and moving about. It was very dimly lit so the visitors could see without disturbing the animals, so I wasn't able to get many pictures. The pictures I did get were very blurry because of the slow camera exposure at night.

My favorite animals were the fishing cats, a type of nocturnal wild cat known for their fishing ability. I spent an almost embarrassing amount of time watching them stalk up and down the river banks, trying to eye fish to catch. They were so cute! Here's one very crappy picture of one of them:

I also got this cute picture of a sleeping tasmanian devil. I guess nocturnal animals aren't always awake all night!

Okay, that's all I have for part three of my Singapore travels. I think there will be one or two more parts about Singapore, and then I'll share about my time in Thailand, which was much shorter. Thanks for reading and stay tuned for Singapore part four!

[harryhandstan]

HIIII happy (late) 4th of july!!

you are literally the sweet person to ever exist i can’t believe its been like 2 years since we last spoke. its crazy how time flies

oh noooo im sorry that happened to you :(( im glad ur doing better and taking good care of yourself 💓💓 wishing u a speedy recovery!

alsoooo good luck with house hunting! that must be so exciting!!looking for a new place to call home and making new memories in it! i just know youll find the most beautiful homey and perfect place!! im manifesting for u

im doing well!! not much happened except for school stuff but i just went to my first ever pit concert a few months ago! i saw the driver era (only because i thought ross lynch was hot lol) i didnt know what to expect for pit but i didn’t expect to stand for 8 hours straight 😭😭 AHHHH ALSO im seeing taylor swift in a few weeks and i literally cannot wait!!!!

im always thinking about u! talk to u soon!! good luck 🍀 love youuuuuuu!!! 💗💓💓💞💕

-🧸

happy late 4th of july to you too bestie!! I hope you had a great day!!

I'm sorry for the delay in answering this btw it's been storming here so my wi-fi has been in and out all day!

omg stop you're so kind to me I genuinely love talking to everyone and I consider you and many others here my friends so y'all make it easy to just repay the love I've been given!!

it's actually only been a year bub! I only know because I looked it up to refresh my memory about what we talked about before cause like I said a lot had happened and I couldn't remember if we'd talked since my accident. it was last year after my birthday and after harry's house came out. but really it's alright I don't want you to feel bad!

thank you so much for the well wishes ❤ I realized after that I left some detail out of what happened to me and didn't explain it very well, but if I ramble on too much just feel free to skip over it! basically not only was I kicked but I went flying about 8 feet across my yard too, which caused me to have a compression fracture on T11 of my spine. I also had a contusion on my right hip (which is just a really, really deep and bad bruise), which is where the point of impact was. I will (hopefully) continue to improve, but having arthritis still causes me to have a ton of pain if I do too much physical activity. that part of my spine is also partly collapsed and always will be, but my neurosurgeon said that as long as my arms and legs are still okay that I should just slowly start to get back to "normal" life and listen to my body as I go along! I asked if I needed to keep up with x-rays or anything over the years but he said my symptoms would get much, much worse if the collapse got any worse and I would know I need to come back to see him. he also said IF I would've had to have surgery that it would take like 12 pins and a huge rod to correct things so I'm so SO lucky that things weren't any worse!

thank you so much for helping us manifest!!! it means more than you'll ever know because it hasn't been easy so far trying to find a place 😔 we live in such a rural area in GA and we originally wanted to stay in the same town because I was supposed to start a new job in january and we wanted to be close to my work. I probably won't get to take that job now (which is a whole other long story), and since there are very limited options we're probably gonna have to broaden our search to surrounding towns that are slightly bigger! we ultimately want a house together, but I think we're gonna have to settle for an apartment for now until we can find the perfect place for us. anything would be better than here rn though!!!

idk if I've ever talked much about my dad to you but we have as no contact of a relationship as possible even though we live in the same house. he's the reason for my accident and so the day it happened and we were waiting for the ambulance to come my mom told him that we wouldn't be coming back to this house. but then we had no choice we didn't have the money or resources needed to go elsewhere. I was worried as I got better she would forget about that and slip out of that mindset, but thankfully she hasn't! she just told me tonight we'd probably go look at apartments next week and that she can't wait to get out of here. I could truly cry at the thought of having a safe, clean, and comfortable space away from him. it's what my mom, my siblings, and our dogs all deserve!

how is school going? how much longer do you have to go? and oohh I'm so happy you got to experience a concert in pit!! it's amazing but it is soooo exhausting I hope you got lots of rest afterward 😊 when I saw harry I wore my ankle support thing to my pit concert to because I knew my feet would be swollen the next day probably. and taylor swift that's so cool!! I'm very excited for you!! I hope you have the best time!!! where are your seats for that show?

I'm always thinking about you too!! seriously sometimes I'll just think about you or how you're doing so just know you're always getting any spare good vibes I have sent your way ✨ thank you thank you for the good luck!!! love you moreeeee 🤍

I was gonna tell you about getting to see stevie nicks and my road trip to see my little brother but I talked so much this time we'll save those stories for next time if you wanna hear about them!!

[ploppythespaceship]

Tbh I wish I knew more Java, cause I have a great idea for a Discord bot: roleplay manager & tracker. I know some D&D bots already exist, but they’re very much meant for D&D and only D&D. But if you have any other kind of group roleplay setting, those bots are fairly useless.

Like... I would love a bot that works like this:

A moderator can designate certain channels as RP channels.

Within one of those RP channels, users can start a thread with a simple command like !startthread.

Users can then designate themselves as active participants with !jointhread, which adds them to a reply order. They can then start typing up their replies as usual.

The bot can tell whose turn it is to reply next, and DM reminders to people if they haven’t responded in a designated amount of time.

When you’re finished with a thread, you can say !leavethread to remove yourself, and !endthread to finish it entirely.

Some other commands (which may or may not all be feasible):

!changeorder - to rearrage the turn order

!noorder - to set the thread as having no determined turn order, in which case the bot tracks if you were the last poster, and if you weren’t the last poster, how long it’s been since you posted

!skipturn - to skip your turn

!myturn - to show all threads where it’s currently your turn

!allthreads - to show all active threads and whose turn it is everywhere

!openchannels - to show which RP channels aren’t being used

!setremindtime - to change how long before the bot reminds you it’s your turn (you can say ‘never’ if you don’t want any DMs)

!hiatus - to set yourself on hiatus and disable all reply DMs (and !endhiatus to reverse it)

Some other common features from D&D bots would be nice too, such as the ability to keep track of characters and the ability to roll dice.

[your-coquette-queen]

I challenge you to tell me at least one thing you love about several of your rockstar crushes 😌

OK

PAUL STANLEY:

AAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH SO MUCH OML.

I think for him, it is largely because I can relate to him on so many levels. Whether that be how I feel around other people, issues that I have had with my family, or just my ideas on work ethic and goals, there are so many connections that I have to him. Also he was the first member I noticed when I got into KISS, and the person who really got me interested and wanting to learn and embrace the band!

Rachel Bolan:

I love his sense of humor, and how he is constantly in a good mood. He is always so sweet and it just lifts my mood.

Jon Bon Jovi:

THIS MASTERPIECE OF A CREATION TO THIS EARTH MUST BE PROTECTED FOREVER.

I love Jon becuase he is so sweet. He always looks so happy and he is so cute and quiet in interviews LIKE UGHHH HOW CAN YOU NOT LOVE HIM. THIS MAN IS A MASTERPIECE

Izzy Stradlin:

Izzy is basically how I present myself to the rest of the world unless you get to me. I'm very shy when I don't know someone and people kinda see me as mean or distant lol. Like Izzy, once you get closer and warm up, I'm actually a friendly person (kinda like on this mess I proudly call my tumblr page) You all make me fell comfortable so I feel ok to share myself with you guys😊

Bruce Kulick: I have one word that I can use to describe this man: RESPECT. I have so much respect for him. One of the reasons why 80's is my favorite lineups is because of Bruce. He was always the quieter member which is nice when you compare to the craziness of everyone else, but I think it contrasts well. Also his playing is amazing! But more than this, I have so much respect for how he chandelled leaving KISS, and any other stuff KISS had done concerning him. I think we all know about Peter, and Ace too, however Bruce did a really good job of talking about it, without portraying himself as either happy nor sad. Obviously it is hard when you have to leave something you have been a part of, however it is always nice when you can look back on it fondly ( in contrast to a lot of what Peter has said- Peter fans DO NOT come at me for that. you know it is true) I think that is one of the reasons why it is so hard to say something bad about Bruce. He has always been super positive about his experience in KISS and stuff that has happened, and has moved forward and done other awesome stuff too. Honestly with his positivity, it actually reminds me a lot of Alice Cooper!

Dave Mustaine:

AGAIN. I have a ton of respect for him. The fact that after he got kicked out of Metallica (which would go on to become one of the biggest bands), he was able to move forward and make his own band, of which would become one of the big 4 thrash metal bands along side Metallica. Also I just think he is really funny as a person and a great dad! He also faced a lot of issues that he had to overcome that I find really inspirational.

Rick Savage:

Sav is just a sweet beautiful masterpeice that I love with all my heart. Need I say more?

Zakk Wylde:

I think that it is awesome that this kid, who was a major Ozzy and Black Sabbath fan, could go at like 19 (or 20 I can't remember right now haha) to becoming Ozzy's lead guitarist, and would go on to become one of the most recognized, and influential guitarists of all time. I love his relationship with Ozzy and Sharon, it is so beautiful, and I think he is a really nice genuine person too! Also his wife is an absolute sweetheart. I also appreciate all the respect he has for Ozzy and the great relationship they have maintained even after he has left the band and created his own. THE FACT THAT HE CALLS HIM THE BOSS STILL

... AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH>

IN CONCLUSION

Thank you so much for this ask!

This was really refreshing to do! I feel like a lot of the time, all of us (DEFFINETLY including myself) start to like someone more so for their looks and start to forget what made us love them in the first place. It was really nice to just go back and think about when I first got into someone what it was the made me love them, instead of just focusing on the appearance. It brings me back to when I first got into hard rock music, and I was just starting out and here for the music, not really caring about the musicians looks.

OBV I still love how they look too, however it is fun to just appreciate them for their work.

Thank you once again, and I hope this was an adequate response😂

[duchessofostergotlands]

What's you opinion about duolingo. I am kinda interested in it. Is it worth the time.

I don't find it uses up much time because I tend to use it when I'm waiting for something else anyway and would just normally be sitting doing nothing. Like if I'm letting my tea brew for a few minutes I'll do a lesson.

I am enjoying it but I don't know if it's right for everyone. The way we were taught languages at school was very much like "here's the basics of grammar, once you've got that then we'll start speaking the actual sentences." Whereas unless I'm missing something (to be fair I have no idea how to use it properly so it could be the case) they pretty much just launch straight in with Duolingo. I do really enjoy the lessons themselves. They have lots of variation in learning methods so it's not just repeating a phrase like it was at school: for example they have a sentence written out and said aloud and then you have to pick the right words for that translation; they might have a sentence with a blank space for you to fill in; they have an audio of the sentence being said and then you have to write down in the foreign language what you hear etc. So it tests you on lots of levels and in ways that make things stick. I've taken some advice I read and now that I've tackled a few topics and I'm doing the harder stuff I will go back to the basic stuff to refresh myself, rather than just doing all the lessons for one theme at a time. But I do sometimes think they go too far when skipping out the basic stuff. Swedish pronunciation is really tricky so it would be great if there was a box that popped up to explain why a k is sometimes a sh or wh sound (thanks to @caneedan for explaining it to me). Or for example I'm now learning about the definite article and about plurals but they haven't explained the rules to me so I feel like I'm just guessing individual words instead of the wider rules. And having looked it up the grammar rules are quite straight forward in Swedish but the point is I would rather not have to look it up.

What I'll say is that I have learned more of a foreign language from Duolingo than I have anywhere else. I did French for 5 years at school and Latin for 6 and I learned a hell of a lot less than I have in a few weeks on Duolingo. That might partially be down to me wanting to learn but I honestly didn't think I could ever learn a language because my brain works by cramming in tons of information and then forgetting everything except for a few random things I find interesting as soon as it's not needed anymore. That's how I did all my school and uni exams haha. And languages are things you have to remember. So I am really pleasantly surprised at how well I can remember things. But I do think that for some people you might have to top it off with other sources or it may just not work at all.

[1010ll]

do you have any new recipes that you've learned recently? i remember you wrote something a while ago about carbonara and i tried it out for myself it was really fun!!

i love this 😭 im gonna write way too much idec! something that has changed since that post: my kitchen is worse. i have a horrible combi oven which has resulted in me accidentally eating raw chicken, because it had been in there for more than 2 hours at supposedly 230 °C and i was really hungry and thought it HAD to be done by then. also i have less time and less money lol. it has made me a bit sad, and less motivated to cook nice things but i also love food! which means these tips/recipes are gonna reflect that and might seem a bit dull but probably also relatable for a lot of people.   i’ve definitely made spaghetti carbonara a bit too much because it’s simple and require few ingredients! will still vouch for that one tip about substituting the bacon with roasted veggies and other types of meat.

last week i made risotto for the very first time, i think? which means i might be assuming a bit too much, but i think it’s a great dish that you can almost make with whatever you have in your fridge. i made it with roasted beetroot(needs A LOT of time to soften, lesson learned), carrots and parsley root or parsnip(idk the difference), dried rosemary and thyme, garlic and onion. i had some leftover sushi rice, which is great for risotto apparently(love versatile ingredients), roasted them in some oil and then added white wine and chicken stock and actually added a leftover parmesan rind i had in the fridge to give the ‘stock’ some flavour, a bit of nutmeg and then in the end some shredded gouda lol… it was surprisingly delicious and i didn’t even really care to cook the rice perfectly. it also tasted delicious 3 days later, which was a nice surprise. i bet there are tons of risotto recipes online, but as long as you have rice, some kind of flavoured water, i guess you could kind of add whatever you want of veggies and top with whatever herb you have around.

another type of porridge i consume a lot these days is hot oat porridge, which i’ve eaten since i was little and it was the first ‘dish’ i learnt to make myself and it’s cheap. some people really dislike the consistency and look but i don’t. it’s also very easy to customise. i put in whatever nuts and seeds(which are often cheaper than nuts) i have around: flaxseed, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, chopped almonds and sometimes a dollop of peanut butter. i let them simmer along with the oats. i like adding those elements because it gives it some texture and it keeps me more full throughout the day. it’s very important to me because i hate spending money i don’t have on fast-food when i’m not home and i hate being hungry. dried raisins, cranberries for a bit of sweetness and if i’m treating myself i’ll add some fresh apples cut into small pieces or some homemade berry compote(i use frozen) or brown sugar. if i had more money i’d use maple syrup but i don’t at the moment. i also add a bit of cinnamon and cardamom, dried ginger etc, whatever you feel like. some people also add milk afterwards but i’d rather spend my milk on my coffee.

a small tip: making chili flake / garlic oil. it’s really delicious, you could put it straight on pasta with some parmesan and pepper and it would be a filling meal. either chop the garlic really fine, grate it, microplane it, smash it to pieces. heat some olive oil until it’s quite hot, then remove from heat and add the chili flakes and garlic. if the oil isn’t hot enough you can just put the pan or pot back on the heat but be careful you don’t burn the chili flakes or garlic, as it will make it bitter. the longer it will toast, the less pronounced the raw garlic flavour will be, so when it smells toasted enough for your taste, take it off. i store it in a tiny glass jar and add it in stews, sauces, toasts, pizza, sandwiches etc. the flavour is very strong imo and everything it touches will smell like it. something to drink: i like strong foods and i like sour foods, which is why i like lemon/ginger based drinks. to make it even more winter friendly and easy to make, i like to grate unpeeled ginger(i hate slices of ginger, they do nothing for me and seems like a waste of ginger), lemon zest, lemon juice and mix it or blend it with some water/apple juice and honey and strain it afterwards. if you have a really nice blender you can just add all of it together with some ice. i’m basically making a large amount of ginger shot mixture. then when i feel like it, i can take some of the mixture and either drink it as it is, add more apple juice if i need a refreshing beverage or add hot water and more honey for when im cold. you could also add turmeric, chili, use less sweetener and other sorts of healthy stuff but i honestly do it for the taste so i don’t care about that that much.

something sweet: i posted earlier about cakes and someone mentioned swedish kladdkaka, which is a super delicious, cheap, brownie-like chocolate cake that is easily customized and hard to fuck up which is why i’ve made it since i was very young and is a go-to and i didn’t even know it was a swedish thing. if you like airy, light cakes this is not for your. this is sticky, sweet and almost like confection. you can add nuts, swirls of peanutbutter, tahini, actual pieces of chocolate, replace the white sugar with brown sugar, the butter with oil(you can be fancy and use a bit of olive oil) or use a mixture, brown the butter, you name it. the recipe i use is this: melt 100 g butter and let cool. mix 2 eggs + 3 dl sugar in a bowl until fluffy in one bowl. mix 1.5 dl flour, 4 tbs cocoa, 1 pinch of salt in another. mix the dry with the wet mixture and add the cooled, melted butter. this is the point where you’d add chopped nuts, chocolate etc. pour the batter into a cake tin lined with parchment (i use one that is 16 cm in diameters i think). bake the cake for around 30 mins at 150°C - 175°C degrees. check on the cake using a cake tester or a a knife. if the knife is clean after … stabbing it, it’s done! the cake will change it’s texture after cooling. this is a cheap cake, and if you like cake dough you might want to give it less time in the oven for a more fudgey texture. make it your own! there are no rules. last time i made this, i left it in for too long in my opinion but it was still delicious. also i literally have a shit oven with a round oven rack that goes in circles no matter what due to the microwave function, and the only ‘mixing’ equipment i have is a whisk and a spatula. no need for kitchen aids or  even electrical hand mixers.

something else i’ve been eating a lot for lunch is simple open faced sandwiches, and something that can really elevate those is: making your own mayonnaise(and toasting the bread). it can be challenging, but it’s really worth it imo and i can’t remember the last time i bought it in a store. i have a small plastic bowl, whisk and 1 egg yolk. something i can really recommend is buying pour snouts for bottles. i transfer my oils from their plastic bottles to smaller, old soda bottles because im cheesy like that and it’s really handy especially when making mayo. constantly whisking the egg yolk by hand and then adding the NEUTRAL oil ever so slowly. don’t be fancy and use cold pressed stuff or extra virgin olive oil because it will taste weird. i only ever fail when i try to use immersion blenders for some weird reason but i find it rewarding to do by hand anyways and i think it might be easier to make smaller portions that way. mayo needs acid and you can get it by adding regular vinegar, apple cider vinegar, balsamic vinegar, lemon juice, lime juice, pickle juice, citric acid dissolved in water etc. it’s really easy to customise! when im making banh mi, i add some sesame oil, soy sauce for saltiness and use lime as the acidic element. for more regular use i add a bit of mustard(also helps with the emulsion), for fries, i like adding some fresh garlic. something as simple as mayo, tomatoes, flaky salt and pepper topped with chives is really nice. i also really like using slices of boiled potatoes or boiled eggs(idk if that’s only a thing where i’m from), mayo and the chili garlic oil. it’s also great for making tuna salad. yesterday i made a really simple sandwich with a very simple tuna salad(tuna, mayo, yoghurt, lemon and pepper), arugula, basil, the garlic/chili oil, cream cheese, pickled jalapeños and onions, green peber, cucumber and tomatoes. you could leave out everything but the tuna salad and it would still be a great little meal.

another nice condiment that beats the supermarket stuff by far is homemade ‘pesto’. when i buy parsley from my local grocery store, it’s a gigantic amount that i in no way can consume in a week. first of all when buying fresh herbs i really recommend washing them, wrapping them in a damp towel and keeping them in a closed container. it will prolong their lifetime from lasting a day to a week(change the towel if it seems too wet). i once had some cilantro in my fridge for several weeks and still be fresh. anyways, when i buy that much parsley, i like to remove the tougher parts of the stem(which i use in stews/sauces! chop it up and sautee it along with garlic and onion), add literally just olive oil, water, pepper, garlic, and a bit of acid and then blend away! it keeps for a long time in the fridge and is also delicious beneath tomatoes/potatoes/cheese on open-faced sandwiches. if you want to be fancy you can of course add some type of hard cheese, nuts, seeds, dried tomatoes, whatever.

i know this is the longest text post ever, but as a last reminder, i really recommend watching pasta grannies on youtube. really simple recipes with focus on few, good ingredients that just takes some time and love.

[monkey-network]

The Odyssey of Spongebob Squarepants

A lot can happen as you grow up. Your tastes will change, you will have more responsibilities, and unless you can literally live under a rock, you can’t turn things back for yourself. So... after over 20 years, when the time keeps going in spite of yourself, does your past evolve and how should you feel about it? Spongebob Squarepants is a show so many have noted as the greatest of all time, but has grown to not be wholly beloved as its later years have not been as well received as it’s golden era. But I’m one to think: how has Spongebob evolved over time? What of this show makes it the greatest in my eyes despite thinking more about those vaunted first three seasons with its movie? Well, let’s roll back...

Back to the Past, To Remember Episodes that Sucked Ass

Despite what some may say, I don’t believe season 4 and 5 was where Spongebob started losing its mojo. There were definitely stinkers like Good Neighbors and Driven to Tears but the good ones definitely outweighed the bad. Not like the quality Golden Era didn’t have its duds, I really don’t like I’m With Stupid, Party Pooper Pants, and Spongeguard on Duty. Season 6 is where I say things surely falter, where for a good amount of time more episodes became unpleasant in retrospect. I noticed it’s more season 6 through 8 that people really take issue with. The Splinter, Boating Buddies, Pet Sitter Pat, the many we call the worst are some good time after the first movie. The first movie came out in 2004, season 6 was spring 2008 so it’s fair to say we had a grace period.

But it begs the bucking question: why did Spongebob stop being good? Numerous people have tried wrapping their heads around the decline citing reasons from flanderization, creative fallout and changes. Emplemon believed in his Spongebob video that the spirit of what connected the show to adults was severed due to merely become a cartoon for children, especially when Spongebob and Squidward’s dichotomy as adults was broken in later seasons. But you know what? I think I truly have the answer. It’s not so much production wise, but it certainly explains the many differing bad episodes that many have covered. It explains why I don’t like Sponge on the Run but we’ll get to that later. But a truth I’ve noticed, remembering and looking at Spongebob in its seperated eras is one I haven’t seen anybody talk about when it comes to why it could be considered bad:

The Plot Drives the Characters Too Much

The greatest episodes of Spongebob, I’m talking Band Geeks, Pizza Delivery, Ripped Pants, Chocolate w/ Nuts, Karate Choppers, etc., don’t have the premise take over the characters. Meanwhile the worst episodes always have the plot push the characters in noticeably different directions because it demands it. Spongebob is strictly a character based cartoon, and when you have episodes that, while can appear fitting on paper, force the cast to be somebody they’re not, people aren’t gonna be on board. Take the episode A Pal for Gary where Spongebob gets Gary a new pet that dangerously hates other pets only for him to be completely ignorant of Gary’s pleas and blames him in the end for banishing the monstrous Puffy Fluffy away. Reasonably, Spongebob is very much the asshole but unfortunately has to or else the plot would need to be seriously reworked. We can chock it up to poor direction but this is indeed a common occurrence for when Spongebob gets bad, not just in post first movie era. I’m With Stupid is a great classic era example where yeah, Patrick becomes an ignorant jerk but on paper, it works with the plot of him trying to please his parents. It does the job at the visible cost of the characters. We generally say the characters are bad but I’ve hardly seen people say the plots are bad like Family Guy where, despite also being character focused, the plots they have can go off the rails in favor of trying to get laughs and the sake of a status quo. The highlight of this problem lies with the coined ‘Squidward Torture Porn’

Squidward Tentacles can be a jerk. A real cynic, a character that’ll gladly try to bring down Spongebob’s childlike wonder in favor of giving him a dose of reality. The most memorable episodes of him are where him and Spongebob are in the same situation but have their clash of outlooks, with Squidward ultimately understanding Spongebob’s POV enough to have a moment of genuine happiness or a modest bit of karma. He’s indeed the most important character because adults grow to see where he’s coming from but at the same time wants to be on Spongebob’s side. The best provide Squidward the chance to understand differently and potentially enjoy a new perspective. The worst punishes him for simply wanting to live.

The plots of the worst Squidward episodes have Spongebob and/or Patrick actively antagonize Squidward because on paper, it makes sense to make someone like Squidward the punching bag like Elmer Fudd to Bugs Bunny or an egotistical asshole to the Warner Siblings from Animaniacs. But in the effort to do so, they never give Squidward the chance to fight back. It’s like they took the whole “No One Wants to be a Squidward” line and utilized that to make him the go to for misery based comedy without giving him any upside. Cephalopod Lodge, Good Neighbors, Choir Boys are stories designed around Spongebob ruining Squid’s life because... what? He doesn’t want Spongebob to be around every time of day? As a child, it can be some fun just seeing Squid get punished but for an adult, it can definitely be a turn-off. Some people see themselves in Squidward, for better or worse, so what’s it to them when Squidward is basically forced to suffer for no reason other than the plot demands it? Later stories give Squidward far more of a break, even some successes, but the idea of making him the butt of life’s joke is still leftover from the episodes that called for him to casually suffer.

The worst plots of the show can be the safest, the simplest, and pretty predictable because unlike the best where the characters are just allowed to make things happen, the story has to contain the characters in a way that’s fitting to who they can be but notably sacrifices who they were before. Why they got made is very up in the air, I’d have to listen to a ton of commentary to potentially pick that apart and I don’t have that much time. 

But it doesn’t the change the fact that the plots were never what made Spongebob good. And it doesn’t mean all those bad episodes make for bad seasons either. We could say there was a decline but that would mean giving up on the show merely because it lost it’s footing with more bad episodes than good for a few seasons. Because I believe 4 to 5 years after season 6, things got back on track even if things weren’t exactly the same.

Return to Form, Change in Energy

I don’t believe that Stephen Hillenburg’s departure was what proposed the decline, I’d say the show never really declined, just had some real potholes within three particular seasons. But I say it’s clear that the direction of the show shifted because you gotta understand, with or without Stephen the show has to be unique, has to have fresh ideas in the midst of potential competition despite being the most popular of the network. Even the trusted of Hillenburg’s team might’ve figured Spongebob couldn’t make lightning strike so rough patches might be expected. This is where Spongebob’s 2nd film, Sponge Out Of Water comes in.

I wasn’t as into this film with my first watch. I know it wouldn’t compare to the first film, but things felt segmented to where it hardly felt like a structured movie. Going back to it again, it kinda showed how Spongebob was going to evolve as a series. A lot of Sponge Out of Water lies in the characters getting into a more chaotic adventure than before. Spongey’s dream sequence, the whole Mad Max apocalypse, inter-dimensional dolphins, really told that the show post 2nd film would follow in its footsteps both in the stories and in animation.

It’s to say the golden era of Spongebob was more... grounded with itself. The charm of the characters was what made the plots unpredictable in nature but mostly not to a visible extent. Idiot Box, one of the greatest episodes, literally have moments where we see nothing but a box but the episode’s carried by the performances. Modern Spongebob, post 2nd movie, started to run all over the place. That’s not a bad thing but clearly a change of pace. I think it’s befitting to say the modern era got more cartoon-y where it’s way more expressive and the plots themselves go in unpredictable places in a way that all feels refreshing. It’s not the same as before, but well enough in it’s own time. It’s like Teen Titans ‘03 vs Teen Titans GO! The two have their clearly different tones but they’re appealing in their own way, only Spongebob isn’t trying to poke fun at its older audience like a snarky ass motherfu-

That is the thing as well that I haven’t seen many people consider when it comes to the modern era: it always tries to be fun. I can say an episode’s bad, but there are times where a bad Spongebob episode was enjoyable at least. It isn’t like modern Simpsons where you could tell they’ve been running out of steam and you’d just wish it died. It feels like the staff were given some time and space to make Spongebob back into as intended, even when most moments aren’t as strong or memorable as before. It can appear as just another cartoon for children but it never felt like it wasn’t Spongebob anymore, especially after the 2nd film and with Stephen Hillenburg’s consulting return. Unfortunately, only after a few more years is where say Spongebob’s going in a direction that I’m admittedly not fond off. It isn’t on par with The Simpsons, but it’s not as comfortable a fate.

A Spongebob Cinematic Universe

I enjoyed Sponge on the Run, but I don’t like it what it stands for. Many say it’s a poor backdoor for the spin-off Kamp Koral and I can’t help but agree. I’m not speaking for Stephen’s behalf nor will I shame everyone who comes to love this mini-series when it comes out, but I can definitely see where he was coming from with his abstain of spin-offs. Spongebob is a show that works, always worked, on its own. It has many characters that, to this day, they’re bouncing with to create new adventures and jokes. Now, I’m actually okay with giving some spin-offs revolving around the other characters; a show for Squidward would be hype as all hell. 

But Kamp Koral, by extension Sponge on the Run, feels less like a creator’s passion and more like a marketed decision. The fact that they scrapped a potential alien cat invasion movie all for a visually pleasing yet heavily derivative story tells quite a bit. It’s a movie that, compared to the previous, is just hitting certain beats; the plot again driving the characters instead of the other way around which leads to really off-putting moments. There’s fun to be had, but it feels superficial. And while I don’t think this’ll affect the next generation of Spongebob, the most recent episodes are good, but I have a bad feeling that it’ll be morphed into something Stephen genuinely didn’t want for the series and they do it because regardless of what the fans don’t want, they truly own the show now.

I was okay with Spongebob having its merchandise and a Broadway musical because the show helped make them work. After seeing SCOOB! and countless talks of making cinematic universes thanks not only to the MCU but stuff like Spider-Verse and Lego Movie though, it’s starting to feel more like an corporate sanctioned omen that I fear too much becoming a reality. But really, it begs one more question...

What Do I See in Spongebob?

I’ve said this when talking about the 1st Spongebob movie: “[It] works so well was because, speaking for adults, it is about embracing the you that you love as opposed to trying to be someone you aren't. You can grow up for taking that journey, but you don't have to be grown up all the time.” Even with its not so great history, Spongebob personally never comes off as a show that’s lost its identity. If there’s anything learned from the likes of Steven Universe and Family Guy, yeah, it’s that bad episodes or changes in tone doesn’t make for a buried series. Vast majority will definitely notice the difference between classic and modern Spongebob, but I don’t believe they’ll say it isn’t Spongebob anymore. I keep bringing it up, but it doesn’t feel like the Simpsons where you notice the burnout, the age of its existence in the late late seasons. Not that Viacom/Nickelodeon won’t hesitate the same fate because they can be fucking scum, but otherwise the show has run out of steam yet. 

What mostly concerns me though is that the charm of the show falls by the wayside with trying to expand it outside the show. Bog down the love by making unnecessary spin-offs that try to do what fanworks like the Spongebob Anime do for the hell of it in order to retain that all age appeal. They’ll feel like memes that age horrifically the moment it’s trending on Twitter. Again I don’t wanna speak over Stephen Hillenburg’s behalf but it feels like Nickelodeon gets potentially too ambitious with something that should be simple enough at the same time. We got some good hype back thanks to the Battle for Bikini Bottom Rehydrated, but that only could boost our spirits so far this year.

To me, Spongebob was certainly a game changer and now, while still popular, it is very much among the crowd. It’s not a show we’re worrying about compared to stuff like Infinity Train, Glitch Techs, the Animaniacs reboot, Primal, shows that are continually changing the metagame in what people want for a cartoon. We might notice stand out moments and we’ll continue making memes, but it’s fair to say we aren’t as invested in Spongebob socially as back then when, as I remember, new episodes or specials felt like an event and it was considered the best out here in our friend circles. Now when we say it’s the best, it’s asterisked. Many love Spongebob Squarepants, but notably aren’t too keen with all of it nowadays.

But to truly conclude, I say for everyone who reads all of this, 1st thank you, and secondly to give modern Spongebob a chance. I can’t recommend Sponge On the Run but these later seasons (nine to recently) actually feel like the show cleaned up itself after many touted that bad episode era was what made Spongebob fall. I don’t believe the show’s fallen because I shouldn’t have expected this show to be flawless. Not every episode’s a hit, but there is not only still good variety but episodes that feel right at home. Mimic Madness, Boo-kini Bottom, Squid Noir, Moving Bubble Bass, One Trick Sponge, and any episode with Plankton are actual joys to see and rewatch if I’m in the mood. The episode premieres are all over the place nowadays but it feels like the crew are given their time at least. And I think this is the path is where I’m content with about Spongebob: it just gets to be a cartoon.

I see so many people try to prop up shows as more than meets the eye. I mention Infinity Train and Steven Universe as the new game changers but I hardly see people just recommend shows that are simple, clean, knows what they are without trying to be anything more premise wise. We just get some quality entertainment with characters we’ve come to know, just for the sake of it. We get a cartoon in its bare essence. Spongebob gets to do its thing like it always has these past 20 years and I’m grateful for that. I’ve seen a variety of shows, but Spongebob always felt like a show worth sticking with even when I feel I’ve “outgrown” it. Not because I want to regress in growth, but as an adult I see now why Spongebob worked so well as it did and why it’s worth sticking with. Even after everything, the show’s made it it’s sole passage to provide us the core reason why we love Spongebob: the show always wanted to love itself for what it was as Spongebob Squarepants always loved to be himself.

And there will never ever be another show like it.

[elgaberino-mcoc]

MCOC WISHLIST INITIAL IMPRESSION PENI PARKER

Peni ends her run on the MCOC Wishlist at rank #528. 

Her official Champion Spotlight is here.

Class: Tech

We always predicted this would be a Tech champ, based on the fact she’s the only one who can pilot this mech. We were right.

Overall Build

We theorized maybe she could combine some of the abilities from Spider-Man (Stark Enhanced) and Hulkbuster’s kits. The spirit there would be some Shock, and a lot of durability and/or evasiveness.

The result here isn’t that.

There are similarities, certainly. Sparky has some limited power-control when you desperately need it, and Taunt lets you bait specials, which is similar to power control. Peni, meanwhile, has multiple Power control and gain abilities. Furthermore, Hulkbuster is incredibly durable, and the SP//dr armor’s Sync-Shield certainly gives her some manageable durability.

But the similarities end there. The main concept here seems to be that the robot is protecting the adolescent girl inside. So it absorbs and redirects as much of the damage as possible in order to protect her.

She Damages both Coming & Going

She has a ton of Incinerate damage on offense, and she also deals Power Burn damage when she’s blocking. 

Cool Dual-Immune

First, table stakes: she’s dual Poison- and Incinerate-Immune. This will be very useful in some corner cases.

Seem unusual in a tech champ? Remember, this isn’t Stark tech. The flavor says this immunity comes from the unique Oscorp tech in the SP//dr unit. 

Counterintuitive Durability Types?

Her Sync-Shield is another unique feature. It prevents Peni from taking any damage while it is intact, and only takes 20 seconds to refresh when it’s not. It also has the potential to Auto-Block, so it can save Peni from those times when you accidentally make her take a combo to the face. This is interesting since Auto-Block is an ability typically associated with Cosmic champs.

The weirdest, almost unfair thing? She’s immune to True Strike, True Accuracy, and True Sense Effects. This goes against the tendency to make classes weak to the typical abilities of their superior class: many of the True type abilities in the game are Cosmic. This would be like giving a Science champ debuffs that can’t be Shrugged.

And get this: the Sync-Shield comes on stronger at fight start if the opponent has boosted damage, proportional to the boost. So if her opponent has a 20% damage boost, her Sync-Shield gets a 20% durability boost.

Further, whenever the Sync-Shield is on and her opponent fills a bar of power, she gets Spider-Sense charges. The more of these Spider-Sense charges she has, the higher likelihood to spend them when she would be hit to instead Auto-Block, AND avoid any Stun she would have suffered, AND Resist any block-break, AND Power Burn the opponent. These abilities are not subject to ability accuracy, either.

Fight Controls!

Her S1 and S3 are Power controller attacks. The S1 allows her to gather more Spider-Sense charges, and the S3 allows her to strengthen her Sync-Shield up to a maximum of 200%. She also Power Burns with that Sync-Shield and Power Gains when she’s executing well-timed blocks.

Great Balls of Fire

The real fun happens when Peni has a lot of charges and launches her S2. All kinds of fire comes pouring out of this attack. Obviously against Colossus, Void, Peni herself, and other Incinerate-Immune champs, this will be useless. But for the majority of champs who aren’t Incinerate Immune, this will not only burn them in stacks, it will also make their block a punching bag for SP//dr, because her Incinerates remove Perfect Block and reduce Block Proficiency by 50%.

As if that weren’t enough, her Signature Ability applies Heal Block whenever the opponent fills a Power bar or regains more than 5% health. 

Whether Domination or Desperation

It appears the main way to play this champ is to cycle S1 until there are a lot of Spider-Sense charges, fire (literally) the S2 to begin burning down the opponent, then go whole hog slapping them whether they’re blocking or not. 

There are also several desperation plays to prevent the opponent firing an S3. Her S1 should do it, her S3 should do it, but on top of that, if she has a lot of Spider-Sense charges and her Sync-Shield up, she can just let them hit her and watch the Auto-Block Power Burn the opponent back down below 3 bars.

An Extra Gear

Pair her up with DDHK or Mysterio and she can Parry non-contact attacks when her Sync-Shield is up.

With (either) Howard or Mole Man she gets better against Size: XL opponents.

Pair her with Miles, Porker, or Spider-Gwen to start the fight with +4 Spider-Sense charges.

Future Champs Implications: Kid Punchin’

When asked why we probably can’t ever have Franklin Richards, besides the fact that his power is to be overpowered, Kabam creative director Gabe Frizzera said you can’t have Franklin in a fair fight with other champs because then, in his words, you’re just “punching a kid in the face.”

This pronouncement seemed to rule out future champs who are kids. 

Kids? Who would want to fight (as or against) kids?

It sounds odd till you realize people have no problem punching Miles Morales, who is basically a high school teenager, or Kamala Khan, who is debatably the same age. Peni Parker has the same feel. 

So who, besides Franklin, are some kids whose door of opportunity might have been opened a little by the arrival of Peni? 

The Runaways’ Bruiser (Molly Hayes) is just a kid, and Moon Girl (who is ranked on the MCOC Wishlist paired with Devil Dinosaur) is an adolescent as well. Peter and MJ’s alternate universe (Renew Your Vows arc) daughter Annie Parker, the Spiderling, is just a kid. Nova (Sam Alexander) is just a teenager, and it’s strongly implied that Dan Bi, the little girl half of Crescent & Io, is just that: a little girl. And it probably depends how you look at it, but Wolvie, the X-Babies Wolverine, could be considered a kid as well.

Those are just the ranked ones. Some Summoners would doubtless suggest the Power Pack members, the Eternals’ Sprite, and others that haven’t made the Wishlist yet.

Conclusions

Overall, this kit reads a bit like a defender. That mech is gonna do things to prevent you from hurting Peni. That said, whether she’ll be a good defender is in question. All it would take is some Armor Break or Unblockable and most of the tricky parts go away. She might be harder to fight using any Regeneration champ if she’s awakened, given her propensity to Heal Block and Incinerate Regeneration champs who ever dare to fill a single power bar.

But I predict there’s enough delightfully messy damage and sufficient avenues of fight-control that she’ll also be an enjoyable attacker. It doesn’t seem like it will require a lot of training and practice to properly time her kit on attack. With attributes reminiscent of Doom or Warlock, probably people will enjoy playing this champ.

[rigelmejo]

Observations when I study multiple languages at the same time:

Hello so good morning all. 早上好大家，我就着急啊哈哈....

I awoke today and my brain SPUN because I can read some Chinese, but I forgot how to say I woke up and got out of bed in chinese. I also just?? I suppose my brain worried and was like? “Do you even remember how to read french? do you even know any Chinese? Or is the new Japanese just overwriting old stuff?!”

I rationally know japanese probably won’t overwrite the rest because like - the first 5 months I studied chinese it just blocked out my French active recall unless I purposely used French a bit. But I didn’t lose any French as far as reading ability, and I got my French active recall back once I used French for a few hours/days. So it would be quite normal if my Japanese is recalled easier than my chinese for a few months. But my brain is like “we worked So hard to get to read what we Can read and say what we Can say we will be SAD if we lose it!!”

反正早上好我床上来了。我已经醒了。我不忘记很多的词。我着急为了没有的意思。我就找到一个翻译词典为了检查对的词。我猜不错。幸好！还我就可以阅读在法语，很好啊。今天我早阅读法语书一下，很容易。我没事。

My chinese may be a mess grammatically I know.

Anyway. I am. Thrilled I didn’t forget that many actual words. Universe help me if Japanese grammar starts fucking up my Chinese grammar tho. I mean I hope not because French never got fucked up; but to be fair to French I DID forget a ton of the conjugations when actually speaking/listening ToT I can barely recall French conjugations anymore unless I actively look at some textbooks or Le Français Par Le Method Nature to refresh myself. Likewise, I studied Japanese probably over 1.5 years ago now and since then, I’ve forgotten nearly all the verb conjugation endings I used to know with the exception of: ます、ません、じゃない、です／だ、じゃありません、ありまう、います、i know te form exists still though I completely forget what it’s for? Giving orders/suggestions? I forgot how adjectives conjugate but I remember they do? And I certainly forgot how words change when connected to their verb endings - I think there’s i and ru verbs? And they conjugate slightly different? And maybe nakatta is past tense negative, and katta is past tense positive (though I can’t remember if it’s katta or something else tta)?

Basically I forgot a HUGE portion of Japanese grammar. I also forgot Word order, I nearly forgot particles (I still have vague recognition of は、が、を、に、の、か). And I remember でも means but because it’s one of the few words I hear constantly and still catch. Also daijoubu (I may be spelling it wrong) for ok (I remember hearing it in YouTube and shows way more than any learning material I had, and I remember I’ve heard a similar word in thai dramas). 大丈夫／だいじょうぶ - using imiwa dictionary app I’m fairly sure that’s the word I’m remembering. Anyway I forgot... so much of my Japanese it’s like I just am relearning from almost scratch but with a vague impression it’s all familiar. I relearned these words/phrases lately which all sound extremely familiar now that I’ve heard them again: そうです、ここ、そこ、あそこ、駅／えき、子園／こえん, お電気／おでんき、今／いま、今日/きょう、あおい／青い、人/じん、話します／はなします、分かります/わかります、どこ、じゃまた.

Among the good things, I do remember most kana upon seeing them again, I think it’s just a few katakana i don’t remember unless I’m reading katakana then I recognize the word and remember the sound - like my name ミジョ/みじょ MeJo “mi-jo.” I always forget specifically ミ、シ、lol. I also forgot the way to extend vowels in katakana versus hiragana until I saw it again. And I still don’t quite remember why cake isカアク, but something else might be ice cream with a - like アーカイブ?

Anyway. Like I mentioned, this morning I read some French to assuage my fear and remind myself i can Actually still read French. I have not actually forgotten, even though my active recall is shot to hell unless I practice. And I did read, and aside from a few words I distinctly remember always confusing me and never looking up, I read fine. I’m fairly sure I read that novel easier than I’d ever read it before, even, catching more details this time than any time previously. So clearly my French reading skills are still fine, have been maintained, and if anything then over the years they’ve still marginally improved a bit.

I suppose my biggest concern with chinese is just... that I want to absolutely ensure my reading skill hits that vague “specific tipping point” that my French reading skill did. The point at which, once reached, your reading skill does not slip below “capable of grasping the overall gist of main ideas” and if you read every few days or weeks then also may continue improve over time. I remember in French, BEFORE I hit that “specific tipping point,” if I stopped reading for a while, then when I came back to reading things were harder to comprehend again and it took a bit of extra work to re-establish the foundations. But after a certain tipping point was reached, even if I didn’t read French for a few weeks or months, when I came back I had a basis of understanding that never fell below “at least able to follow gist of main idea” and often picked up any forgotten words within a few hours, then picked up new words to learn. And so I could continue “picking up where I left off” with learning instead of fighting with my reading skills sliding backwards. They no longer slid backwards, they only got “rusty” and then once polished up in a few hours, would resume improving. It’s the stage I want my chinese reading to reach, because once it reaches that point I will no longer worry I’ll forget the foundational skills - it’s decently doable to re-familiarize yourself with specialized words as needed (we even do it in English if say we read a psychology book for a class 4 years ago then pickup a new psychology class, etc). But it’s difficult to build the original foundation skills everything leans on. In Japanese, I never finished building it - I think I was finally starting to at 2.5 years in, then I gave up. As a result, I lost a significant portion of that foundation I had not finished building. At first I retained some of it, but from years of no review AND no continuing to finish building it, that foundation crumbled. So now I remember pieces of Japanese, but not enough to rely on. Whereas my French had enough time devoted to finishing the foundation, that now even if I take a few months or a year away from it, if I go back to speaking/reading/listening to French then the foundation is remembered quickly and I can start learning mostly where I left off and just jump to improving again (instead of needing months to relearn). While I can relearn/strengthen the basic things in French, I can also jump into books or listening or convos and know enough to just learn from doing, and still remember enough that I’m Capable of interacting with those things and comprehending enough To do them.

I think of it like drawing - idk when it happens with a skill like drawing, I drew since I was able to hold things so I don’t know. But basically whether you draw everyday, or stop for a few months or a year then return to drawing, within a few hours of drawing again all your previous skill comes back to you. If you forgot something you’d learned, usually a few minutes or hours re-learning is enough to drag your skills up to where they were before. So you can quickly return to your former skill level last time you drew, and quickly start improving further. So each time you draw, you’ve retained your skill from before (mostly) and improve your skill, then that skill improvement carries over to the next time you draw. It’s great. In some ways, my French skill is like that - I quickly can get to the comprehension level I was at last time I engaged with French, can improve from there, and then the next time I engage with French I can pick up from the level to which I’d improved to. I may forget some specifics I didn’t use much or learn as well - specialized words, or ways to express myself I rarely use (so rarely reinforce), but if I re-study them it takes a few hours to get those back (instead of the months it took to learn the first time). I am so grateful my French is past that “specific tipping point” because it makes French way easier to retain a useful level in, and easier to pick it back up when i have time and improve it as needed in the areas needed and retain the improvements I make for the most part. In Japanese, I never reached that “specific tipping point” of having established enough of a foundation. So I lost a lot of what I knew.

With Chinese, I really want to ensure I’ve reached past that “specific tipping point” of enough of a foundation, before I give it less dedicated time. I don’t want to lose the chinese I’ve learned, since it’s a significant amount. And... even more than that, my chinese speaking and listening ability is in many ways BETTER than my French, because I worked on it, and I don’t want to lose those abilities either to the degree I’ve developed them. In French, i know I have very low levels of speaking/listening in comparison to my reading and they lag behind as a result - even once they reached the “specific tipping point” a year later than reading in French, they still lag a ton behind my reading (think A1-2 French speaking/listening skills, versus French B1-B2 reading skills). Meanwhile, I’ve been trying to make it so my listening/speaking skills only lag behind my chinese reading skills a little bit. And I’d like all of those skills to reach the “specific tipping point” where I am able to retain the majority of those skill levels, before I work on chinese less frequently.

I know myself. With Japanese, at 2.5 years in I was Just starting to hit the beginning of making that foundation I could retain later - I was just starting to read and comprehend the gist of the main plots in manga, to watch YouTube or play games and grasp the bare gist of what the main ideas was. In French, those skills started at about 5 months in, and I don’t think they hit “specific tipping point” of me being able to rely on keeping those skills perpetually, until 1.5 years in. With Japanese, as I said, i hit the beginning of building them around 2.5 years in, and just never solidified them enough to hit the “specific tipping point” unfortunately. With Chinese, at least in reading (since I’m only discussing reading skill in all 3 languages), I probably hit the beginning of building these skills at month 10-11. That was when I could start reading manhua without a dictionary, novels without a dictionary (and grasp the main ideas gist at minimum), and watch shows and do the same. Which again, is higher than Japanese even was at its beginning-foundation, as I couldn’t even Read novels or listen to Japanese audio on its own and follow the main idea. So I suppose, to compare the absolute beginnings of each foundation being built: in French it was month 3 (when I could start brute forcing through news/Wikipedia and comprehend some gist of main ideas), Japanese year 2.3ish (when I started brute forcing through manga and comprehending very roughly some main ideas), month 6-8 in chinese (when I started brute forcing shows and novels and comprehended honestly more than I can believe I managed to in retrospect, considering how much easier those still-challenging tasks feel now). Anyway... Chinese has seemed to take 2x as much time to improve compared to my French. I do suspect chinese normally takes native English speakers roughly the FSI recommended 4x as much time. I suspect my French learning plan was just not very optimal for my learning style, so it wasn’t as efficient. Likewise... I suspect Japanese should normally take roughly 4x to 5x longer to improve then French. I suspect mine took SO long last time particularly, because I did not even have a good study plan for myself until year 2 of Japanese study.

So... based on all that. I imagine my chinese will be very firmly where i want it’s minimum skill to reliably maintain the foundation of what I know, to be at.. year 2-3. Year 2, if I keep improving as well as I’ve been doing (and assuming if my French had been more consistent it would’ve been at the “specific tipping point” by year 1). And year 3 if I don’t always study as much, or it simply takes longer (so twice the 1.5 years French took). Which honestly... 3 years is still intensely fast as I see it. And, if I’m improving the way I think I have been, I can’t even imagine how ill be in year 3. Anyway... based on all of that... I think it would be a bad idea to pick up Japanese heavily until my chinese is past at least year 2. With my 1 year+ of French, at that point I was also studying Japanese, and they seemed to work fine as I studied both - the only thing was it slowed down my French progress. So I do think waiting to do anything heavy with japanese, until my chinese is a good play I’m ok to let it simply maintain for the most part, is probably a safer plan.

—-

Realistically... no reason I can’t lightly re-study Japanese though and Just like rebuild the beginnings of the foundation I had though, it was probably N4 starting into N3 when I gave up. So I could probably re-learn some old stuff without taking too much time from chinese. And then if my chinese is year 2 by then, that sure would be convenient. Lol this is all... me contemplating. When we all know the truth is, I’m going to do whatever I want to do in the moment, and see what happens o3o

I am gonna tentatively say though, I think as long as I don’t abandon Chinese for any length of time until at least 2-3 years in, it should probably be maintained at least though at where it’s at/gradually improve. I didn’t lose any French during the times I kept using it, even when studying Japanese and russian, the “specific tipping point” didn’t really matter until I stopped using French for months at a time. I am sure I will notice if another language study is slowing down my chinese study though, in which case I’ll pause the other language if I have a Chinese goal that needs more time for attention.

At the moment, my Chinese goals are going about as expected. I wish I could carve some more time for them, but I’m giving them as much time as they were getting throughout the fall - so it’s not like they’re getting any less time than usual. (I am just inpatient, and wish I was the kind of person with the time and focus to give them 4-6 hours a day lol).

[ruakichan]

State of Roo Gaming conglomopost:

Alchemy Stars (summer event):

120 pulls no Fleur. I has sad. Got trolled by two 6* in the same element even.  Outlook bleak. This is gacha life. Game took a look at my A3 water team and said I didn’t need him. Game doesn’t understand thirst. : ( I need him.

That said, I am here for the energy of Fleur and Brock as Those Two Guys, even more so as Those Two Guys Who Absolutely Should Not Be Left Alone Unsupervised.

Summer story’s pretty interesting, though I did get bored with a lot of the beach-life stuff as I do in every gacha that does summer events sans GBF.  I don’t particularly feel anything toward Beryl, unlike Eve; she’s very passive so we haven’t seen any of her personal thoughts or feelings about much.  Hell, half the reason I’m so salty about Fleur is cause he actually got more development than Beryl did so far, which made me like him more than just a pretty face!

Humor beats are still pretty spot on though. And at least this game really knows how to make events feel like events.

3 more days and I’ll be done with Stage 4 for Regal, THANK GOD. The dispatches are such an annoying time-gate. I have a ton of energy packs saved up so I should be able to clear out Stage 5 much more quickly. Looking forward to getting my first Eternal Silent Hunter!

I ran out of characters I feel like A3ing so now I’m just grinding to level up equipment.

I don’t know if I should get Barton (who I do not have) or Nemesis (who I need one more copy of to max breakthrough and thus have her skill set to pre-emptive) from the free ticket they give. This is one of the few times where both would technically be dick picks, but one would be useful for meta (Nemesis is one of my core Thunder units) while the other I don’t have but would like to. DECISIONS!  At least the ticket doesn’t expire. i’ll end up forgetting about it most likely

GBF (lotto drama):

Man that lotto drama whaoooo.  I’m mostly retired/seasonal in GBF these days (and my loss of reliable/fast internet in a week will just compound that due to ping/racing/refresh) so I don’t really care, but just whao.

That said, I think with this being people’s last straw shows that some people really don’t know how to give things up on their own and don’t realize it’s okay to fall out of love with something you once enjoyed or spent a lot of time/effort/money in.  I saw a lot of complaints about X or Y no longer having magic/fun etc for them any more, and they still stick around cause they keep hoping that it’ll come back, and I can tell you—it rarely ever does if you stick around.  It’s okay to move on. That sunk-cost fallacy just does harm until only bitter feelings are left.

As for me, I did come out with a T3. Picked Nehan cause I always go dick picks in gacha and I was clamoring for a Nehan unit back during SoR’s original run. Used the second one to go meta with G.Narm though since there was nothing left for me to really get, but I dislike Narmaya so she can just sit there in my inventory with all her other versions CAUSE SHE WON’T LEAVE ME ALONE I guess.

Did literally nothing else though; just no real time to play grindblue lately.

Exos Heroes (director’s notes):

Hahaha, the devs noted they were nervous about how people would react to the first Memorial Saga and I BET IT WAS DUE TO THE TWIST LOL but anyone who has used Rachel or came from Exos Saga weren’t gonna be shocked. Regardless, the translation referred to the story as from “Ramge and Rachel’s youth” and I laughed cause IT TOOK PLACE A WEEK BEFORE THE MAIN GAME’S STORY????

Hope the 2nd MS ends up actually giving rewards for side quests.

Thank god though that they are going to implement a give up section for tag battles. I no longer have to set up [my absolute most hated character in this game] as a sacrificial character any more and can set up some more proper teams.

Infinity Core is still shit but at least now they will be showing what you’ll be facing the entire week instead of day-by-day reveals. Half of the issue is playing a guessing game on what FCs you need to hoard in case their theme comes up and thus purposely limit yourself from actually achieving higher stages.  Still wish they’d just allow you to keep the stage you’re on if you already cleared it in a previous week. Why the hell do I have to redo the stage(s) every week if I already passed it? At least quick battle will be implemented to a limited degree.

Glad they acknowledged the biggest problem in the game: inability for new players to catch up.  The gap between vets and newer players never ever narrows due to all the time-gating elements this game has.  I’ve been around the block in a lot of games and the ones who have this gap never has good player retention and ends up shrinking just to a core base of cliques until the game dies. Too bad no solutions offered.

I was disappointed Blue Kaya doesn’t buff HP for support units, then remembered HP is the biggest problem in PVP so yeah, no, nevermind, good on them for realizing that. Didn’t roll for her since I went ham on the summer banners and defense scales poorly in this game due to the HP inflation.

... oh man, I got momentarily excited when I saw Saint West was getting SF3. Then remembered Rachel, while from Saint West, is the heir to Saint West’s throne, and is basically labeled as Saint West in everything else in the game, is actually the general for Lenombe. Fuck me. When will they buff him. I’m tired of facing SF3 nations and seeing my nation’s gimmick being told to pound sand cause they refuse to buff his nation even though he’s fallen way off the meta a long time ago. i think i will literally blow a fuse if greenland gets sf3 before lenombe

In non director’s notes news, I linked up Shadowbane to Lenombe. Luna and Garlond are pretty fun to use and I hope to eventually slap them onto my WR team for tag week to see how that works out, but they worked really well in Infinity Core. Glad I finally have a viable Frost unit I can use since who is Bathory? She doesn’t know me.

Dunno who I’d put in Rudley’s spot since I use him so that my Lenombe team has at least more than one chance to kill these tanky SF3 nations. Zeon is just useless now due to the prevalence of Misty and I tried out Misty and she’s okay, but she’s not the best synergy with Lenombe. I wish A.Zeon would get his FC already so I can pair him with Schmid to get the Vagabond SF bonuses... (but I’m thinking the outcry against the genderbends pushed that back RIP...)

AND FINALLY. FINALLY!!! YOU CAN GET R1 GEAR AT YORM SHOP. OH MY GOD. I CAN FINALLY GEAR MY CHARACTERS. NO MORE HATING MY LUCK. /bloodtears

[httpjeon]

❝ collateral damage ❞ pjm ― m.

― summary: you’re a simple bank teller and you certainly didn’t expect to be taken as collateral for outlaw bank-robber park jimin.

outlaw!jimin/reader ― ft. jungkook & taehyung | wild west!au | fluff, smut | 5.2k ↬ content warnings: basically pwp. kidnapping, guns, old timey bank robbery, referenced off screen murders (non-explicit), yoongi gets choked a bit, light thigh riding, sexual punishment, cunnilingus, dirty talk, light sir!kink, blow job, hair pulling, vague pain kink, pet names

a/n: this fic is part of the under fire collaboration for the summer smut project by @btssmutclub! be sure to check out the other writers’ fics for this collab! > disclaimer: i’d like to point out there is no real violence towards the reader in any capacity in this fic. she remains safe and unharmed throughout the fic, just spooked bc of jimin’s reputation as an outlaw and crimes!

→ blog masterlist      →collab masterlist

You huffed, covering your eyes with your hand like a visor as you stared out in the blistering heat of your city. It was hot enough to cook an egg out, no doubt.

It was a peaceful, small town that you had lived in your whole life. Everyone knew everyone and there was rarely a problem that arose.

"Mornin' _____!" The local mercantile owner, Yoongi, beamed at you.

The two of you had become good friends as your job at the bank was located right next door to the mercantile his family owned. Often, he would bring you little snacks during work and you frequently picked up your groceries and essentials from him.

"You hear they've up and found some gold nearby? I expect we'll start to get a lot busier now!" He smiled, mindlessly sweeping the front steps of his store.

"Oh really?" You hummed. "I haven't heard much. But with tons of towns popping up everywhere with the gold and silver bein' found, I guess it's hard to keep track. I didn't think there'd be some nearby here though!"

"Why? You wanna go and search for some gold?" Yoongi snickered.

"As if," You chuckled. "I'm doing well enough here, I don't need to risk my life for the sake of greed.”

"If you say so," He teased, finally turning and heading back into the store with a casual wave of his hand.

You sighed, wiping the sweat off your brow before turning on your heel to get back to work.

After that, it seemed Yoongi's prediction was right. You had people coming in, asking for loans and coming in to exchange their gold and silver for cash money.

Unfortunately, the peaceful reputation in your little town wouldn't stay that way for long.

Another terribly hot day that had you heaving against your desk — hoping the wood would somehow cool you down. The doors opened and several footsteps entered, making you look up.

"Hey there, sweetheart," A pretty-faced young man leaned against the counter.

"Welcome, how can I help you?" You asked, smiling up at him.

He had black hair that stuck to his forehead from sweat, a wide-brimmed hat on his head to shield his eyes from the sun.

He was good looking, no doubt about it.

Behind him stood two other men near the door, as if guarding it, and a feeling of unease began to wash over you.

"I'm awfully sorry about this but," You gasped as he pulled out long-barrelled gun, pointing it directly at you. "How about you hand me that little box back there and give me all the money you got, sweetheart?"

"I..." You trembled underneath the weight of his glare and the gun.

"Hurry it along, darlin' we ain't got all day," One of the other men called, his hand on his gun which sat in its holster.

"A-Alright...just hold your horses," You grumbled, grabbing the box and placing it down for the man. He chuckled, lowering his gun as you finally opened the box for him to take the money from.

He eagerly stuffed fistfuls of cash into his pockets with a grin on his face. You thought you were in the clear, breathing a sigh of relief as he began to back off, showing no intentions of actually hurting you.

That is, until the door opened and Yoongi walked in with a smile.

"Hey ____—" He was cut off by one of the men aggressively grabbing him, wrapping their arms around his neck to choke him as he slammed your friend harshly against the wall.

"Don't hurt him!" You cried, rounding the counter to try and come to your friend's aid.

Unfortunately, the man who took the money grabbed you, holding the gun to your temple making you cry out in fear and shock.

"Now, you're gonna behave mister and let us leave in peace alright?" He hissed. You met Yoongi's eyes, noticing how red his face became with the lack of oxygen. "And we're gonna take this here girl as collateral. We're gonna get out of here and get nice and far, and if we make it out safely...we'll let her go."

"Y-You can't..." Yoongi choked out, no doubt worrying for your well-being.

None of the men seemed to listen. Yoongi was released, falling to the floor with a heavy thud as he gasped for air. He was too weak to do anything to stop you from being dragged out.

“Remember,” One of the other men mumbled to Yoongi, bringing his finger to his lips in a shush motion. “Not a peep.” 

The streets were bustling more than usual, on account of all the traffic picking up lately, and you were easily manhandled onto the horse tied out front of the bank. Jimin hopped on behind you, his spicy scent permeating around you. You were sitting sideways on the horse in front of him, boxed in by his arms as he held the reigns.

"This is...crazy," You grumbled as the man kicked the horse, making you jerk forward in surprise. Glancing over the man's shoulder, you could see his two lackeys following.

"Sorry about this, we planned just a clean ol' robbin' but..." The man shrugged, trailing off before clearing his throat and looking down his nose at you. "What's your name anyway?"

"Why should I tell you?" You grumbled, wondering why you were acting like a brat to the man who literally had a gun pointed at you moments before.

"Well I'm Jimin...Park Jimin,"

Immediately, your body stiffened as a shiver of fear raced down your spine. You knew that name. His wanted posters were posted all across town, all across the state no doubt.

He was an outlaw wanted in several states for various crimes — mostly robbing banks and trains. He even had a few murders under his belt.

Okay, so he could kill you at the drop of a hat. Maybe you should be on his good side and not piss him off.

"M-My name is _____," You stuttered out, suddenly very aware of how you were hanging onto the fabric of his plaid shirt in order to keep yourself stable.

"Well, nice to meet you, _____. I hope we can get along well," He smiled, a rather cute eye smile for a wanted outlaw.

Why did your abductor have to be cute?

Still, with the memory of the cold steel of his gun pressed against you, you had no hope of escape anyway. You could jump off the horse but that would no doubt seriously injure you at the speed you were going. Plus, he'd probably turn around, angry, and shoot you in the end anyway.

You sighed, making him chuckle against your back.

"Now, now sweetheart it ain't that bad," He said. "Ain't nothin' bad gonna happen to you with us, I promise. We'll just keep you around until the heat dies down and we'll send you on home.”

"Unless you want to stay~" One of his companions said, wiggling his eyebrows at you.

"Jungkook," Jimin scoffed, shaking his head but still smiling.

"Unbelievable," You whispered, noticing that you were beginning to slow down.

Looking around for the reason, you saw a little shack up ahead. It was out in the middle of nowhere, way off the beaten path, and you doubted you'd be able to find your way back to town because you had no clue where you were. Not like you were exactly paying attention to the route anyway. You didn't exactly frequent the outskirts of town, the desert was no place for someone like you — with the snakes and coyotes roaming about. You weren't very fond of the idea of being a wild animal’s snack.

Finally you came to a full stop and Jimin hopped down from the horse, holding his hand out for you. When you hesitated on it, he sent you a small glare that had you reaching down for him to help you. He kept his grip on your arm as he began to walk towards the house...or shack.

"Taehyung, you hitch the horses up, alright?" Jimin called over his shoulder, a short 'yeah' from one of the men came in reply.

You were tugged inside, which you were grateful for because the summer sun was literally 2 minutes from actually killing you. It was still hot inside but at least you were out of the sun.

The place was scarcely furnished — a worn couch, a little coffee table, and a couple sleeping mats. There were also some metal bowls sitting on the counter of the tiny kitchen.

"Have a seat, sweetheart, make yourself at home," His voice was soft but held a tone of authority that made a shiver travel up your spine. You were always weak to voices — that's why you liked to hear Yoongi talk so much.

At the thought of your friend, you frowned. You hoped he was okay and safe. Jimin dropped down in the empty seat beside you on the couch and pulled out a flask, handing it to you.

"Drink?"

Your eyes narrowed. "I don't drink."

"It's just water, darlin'," He said with a shrug, urging the flask towards you. "I know you gotta be thirsty bein' out in the heat."

"This isn't a trick?" You asked, eyeing him suspiciously.

"I promise it's just water," His voice and face turned serious as he said the words.

Sighing, you took the flask from him and turned it up — immediately you felt refreshed by the cool water. Taking a few mouth sips, you handed it back to him and thanked him which earned you a smile.

The door slammed open and the other two men came stomping in with groans about how the heat was killer. The one named Jungkook swiped some sweat off his brow before dropping to sit on the floor with a thud. The other, Taehyung, followed suit except sprawled out across the floor like a starfish.

"That floor can't be clean," You muttered, making Taehyung open on eye to peek at you.

"You worried about my health, honey?" He asked, a smirk gracing his lips when you narrowed your eyes in a glare.

"I'll have you know I can that floor meticulously every day," Jimin piped from beside you, taking another sip of water.

"Why do I find that hard to believe?" You shot back, crossing your arms over your chest as you eyed the dusty, dirty, scuffed floor the two men were laying upon.

"Why on Earth would I lie to you?" Jimin asked, raising a brow.

"Do you want the honest answer?" As soon as the words left your lips, Jungkook began chuckling from where he was leaning against the wall.

"Aw man, she's cute and funny," He muttered through his giggles. You felt your face flush at that, making you feel even hotter than you already were.

"Alright boys," Jimin stood up. "We should start getting ready for the night."

You remained seated, watching as the men began to bustle about. Jimin was in the kitchen cooking dinner, you assumed — which was weirdly domestic thinking about it. Jungkook went out to collect water and Taehyung was setting up the beds for the night.

"I guess you can sleep on the couch," He said when he noticed you watching.

"I can't believe this..." You grumbled, flopping back onto the couch with a sigh.

"Oh we're not that bad!" Taehyung pouted as he took a seat behind the small table in front of the couch.

You didn't offer a reply, only sighed.

The rest of the night wasn't anywhere near as bad as you expected. Jimin, Taehyung, and Jungkook laughed and joked with one another as they chatted. You ate some soup, which in the heat was torture, but it tasted good nonetheless and it felt good to have some food in your stomach. 

You were restless as you laid down on the couch that night. You could hear the even breaths coming from the three men scattered on the floor. It was strategic, how they were laying. Jungkook was sleeping right in front of the door so you wouldn't be able to get out. Jimin was sleeping right in front of the couch so you couldn't move without him knowing. And Taehyung was in between as an interception if you were to attempt to run away.

You were positive it was the worst night of sleep in your life when your eyes fluttered open, still heavy and stinging with exhaustion. Jungkook and Taehyung were gone and Jimin was sitting at the table cleaning his gun. He looked up when you sat up and smiled.

"Good mornin' sunshine," He grinned when you groaned in response. "What's the matter? Didn't sleep well?"

"I miss my own bed," You complained.

"Well that's just too bad," He sighed, placing his gun down. "We're keepin' our hands on you for awhile longer."

"This isn't fair!" You snapped, stomping your foot on the ground. "You stole the money, I don't want any part of this! I just want to go home!"

In the blink of an eye, Jimin was in your face, nose brushing up against yours as he glared.

"Better watch your tone, pretty girl," He growled, making your heart stutter in your chest.

Then as quick as he was there, he was standing and moving into the kitchen. You placed a hand against your chest and sighed while his back was turned to you. Your cheeks felt hot and you silently cursed him for being so damn attractive.

The longer you spent with Jimin, the more you began to see he wasn’t scary at all. He attempted to put up a front when he caught himself slipping but in the end, his true personality began to shine through.

“Jimin?” You asked one night while Taehyung and Jungkook were out. He hummed, looking up from where he was shining his boot. “Why did you become an outlaw?”

He scoffed, shaking his head. “What kinda question is that?”

“The normal kind?” You shot back, raising a brow.

“Well,” He cleared his throat. “Sometimes people do what they have to do to get by. I discovered a knack for thievin’ and I stuck to it. Simple as that.”

“Simple as that,” You scoffed, making him look at you with a frown. “There’s lots of things you could have done instead of stealing.”

“My decisions in life don’t concern you, little girl,” He snapped, making you flinch. His eyes were alight with anger at your words and you immediately quieted down.

He continued to glare at you for a minute, as if wanting to say something more, until the door opened and Taehyung and Jungkook came back in. Jungkook dropped onto the couch beside you and stretched his arms above his head until his joints popped.

"We're going to bed," Jimin snapped suddenly, making the other two look at him in shock.

"It's still early though!" Taehyung complained.

"You'll do as I say!" Jimin shouted, making everyone collectively jump at the volume.

Immediately the two scrambled to get into their sleeping arrangements. You sat on the couch, avoiding Jimin's gaze as he continued to glare at you as he placed his boots beside the couch.

No one uttered a word as Jimin turned the lamp out — casting the room in complete darkness save for the moon's light.

With a sigh, you collapsed onto your side and shut your eyes in an attempt to get some sleep as well.

"Wake up," Jimin uttered, shaking your shoulder until your eyes popped open in surprise. "Need you to go collect the water pails from outside. Taehyung and Jungkook ran off without bringin' them in."

You sighed as you sat up, blinking sleepily until you felt coherent enough to stand. Jimin was silent as he followed you out, watching you leave the house before turning back to sit on the couch and kick his boots off.

By the time you got inside, placing the water buckets down, Jimin was fast asleep on the couch with his mouth open. You stood and watched him for a second, eyeing the open door.

No one was watching and you could make a run for it. If you were quiet, Jimin wouldn't even wake up.

You squinted at him, feeling quite petulant over the problems he had caused you with literally kidnapping you and making your heart stutter in your chest over his stupidly handsome face. Sneaking out of the doorway, you tiptoed around the brush against the side of the building.

A sneaky grin crawled over your face as you heard the tell-tale signs of a snake warning you to stay away.

You dropped onto your knees and circled the creature until you got behind it. Reaching out with a steady hand, you quickly pinned its head and took hold of it to keep it from turning and biting you.

Then with a stealthiness that surprised even you, you snuck back inside and ever so easily dropped the snake into Jimin's boot.

Standing up straight and casting one last glance at Jimin, you turned and booked it out of the door.

The sun was still beating down, the summer heat making you break out into a sweat immediately. Your feet pounded against the ground with every step you took and you were quickly panting and running out of stamina — the heat literally sucking everything out of you.

You could have cried when you saw Taehyung and Jungkook riding up on their horses. There was no hope to escape; they'd already spotted you and you couldn't outrun their horses.

With a resigned sigh, you stood there and glared until Taehyung stopped beside you. He stared down with a brow raised.

"That was a close one, huh?" Jungkook uttered, saddling up on the other side of you.

"Hop on, don't be a pain," Taehyung muttered, though he sounded more bored than angry with your attempted escape.

You heaved a big sigh as you mounted Taehyung's horse, holding onto the back of his shirt as they rode back the short distance to the house. You could see Jimin was still asleep on the couch through the open door.

Jungkook was snickering as he hopped off his horse. He lifted his hand and helped you down off of Taehyung's and began to lead you inside the house, still holding your hand.

"Hey Jimin!" He shouted, taking both you and Jimin by surprise.

"What?!" Jimin shrieked as he sat up so fast it made your head spin.

"Almost had this one run out while you were gettin’ your beauty sleep," Taehyung muttered as he finally walked in, wiping sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand.

Jimin growled as he stood up, shoving his feet into his boots "This is—SHIT!"

"What?" Taehyung and Jungkook cried at the same time, watching as Jimin kicked his boot off, making it fly across the room and hit the wall.

The four of you watched as the poor snake slithered out of the boot and disappeared around the corner to the kitchen.

"There was a snake in my boot," Jimin muttered, glaring at his boot.

There was a beat of silence before Taehyung and Jungkook physically doubled over as they howled with laughter. You bit your lip to keep from laughing as you watched Jimin's bottom lip poke out in a pout.

After you all finished eating dinner, a rabbit Jungkook had caught earlier in the day, they decided to set back out once again.

"I heard that the law was starting to extend its search for us, turns out word’s gotten out we’re around the area, so I think it'd be a good idea to make sure there aren't any nosy people driftin' around," Taehyung said as he and Jungkook mounted their horses.

Jungkook slipped his hat on his head and gave you a little wave before taking the reins of his horse and following after Taehyung. You stood and watched, feeling Jimin's eyes on you, as the two vanished into the darkness.

"You know," Jimin said from his seat on the couch, voice a few octaves lower. "I don't really appreciate you making a fool of me today."

You felt a shiver go down your spine at the way he spoke, words full of unspoken promise. You could hear his boots against the floor as he walked up behind you, breath fanning over your neck. He swiftly pushed the door shut and turned you around, slamming your back against its surface.

You gasped, meeting his dark gaze, goosebumps rising over your skin at the look in his eyes; dark and lustful. Never before had you felt so drawn to a man — he was dangerous, charismatic, and so attractive that it almost made you crazy.

His plush, full lips met yours in a kiss that started off heated immediately, not wasting any time showing you what he wanted. You whimpered, reaching up to fist his dark locks and pull his body even closer to yours.

His hands became busy immediately, reaching behind you to pull free the buttons of your dress, the fabric pooling on the floor around your feet.

"So pretty," He whispered, gripping your waist and grinding his hard length, hidden in his jeans, against your hip.

You gasped, tightening your hold in his hair. Before you could deepen the kiss further, he was pulling away and pressing his lips against your neck. You moaned, tilting your head back to allow him more access. He reached up, cupping your bare breasts in his warm, callused hands and you whimpered — the rough drag of his palms against your sensitive nipples making your knees buckle.

He chuckled, working his thigh between your legs — your weight falling on his thigh to keep you upright. His jeans ground against your clothed heat as he continued to palm your breasts.

Tilting your head back against the door, he dipped his head down to take one of your perked, hardened nipples into the heat of his mouth. Holding back a whimper, your clung onto the back of his shirt as his tongue flicked the bud.

With his free hand, he gripped your hip and began to move you to grind against the firm muscle of his thigh.

"J-Jimin—" You whispered, eyes rolling slightly at the pressure against your clit. He pulled his mouth away from your breast and licked his lips, sharp eyes cutting up to look at your blissed expression.

"I think you should be punished, you know?" He asked, teasing tone apparent. "For trying to run away and for that mean prank you pulled."

"N-No...don't punish me," You whimpered, beginning to desperately grind against his thigh.

"Oh? You don't want to be punished?" He asked, straightening his back. The added height made him look more intimidating, especially with the way his sharp eyes were filled with hunger.

"No please," You whimpered, licking your lips as your core throbbed with need at the dominant energy he gave off.

"Then I think you owe me an apology," He whispered, lips moving to brush against yours.

"I-I'm sorry, Jimin," You gasped.

"Sorry for what?" He urged, tongue sneaking out to run over your swollen bottom lip — plump from biting it.

"F-For trying to run away a-and putting the snake in your boot," You whimpered, nearly sobbing when he sharply pinched your nipple.

He hummed, rolling the bud between his fingers. “Apology not accepted.” 

“What—!” You were cut off by him aggressively shoving you to your knees. 

“How about you really show me you're sorry,” Your arguments were cut off when he pulled his cock free from the confines of his jeans. 

Unable to help yourself, you leaned forward and enveloped the head of his cock between your lips. He hissed at the sudden contact, your tongue catching the precum beading at the tip. It was a little salty and slightly bitter but with the way his thighs trembled the deeper your took him, you could ignore the taste. 

His fist tangled in your hair and his head rolled back as he began to shallowly thrust his hips. He pressed against your gag-reflex and you pulled back with a cough. 

“You've got a sweet little mouth, you know?” He smirked, wrapping his fist around his cock and spreading the mixed saliva and precum along his shaft. 

You blushed, opening your mouth for him to slip his cock back inside. He groaned, eyes fluttering closed as you eagerly began to suck his cock. His grip in your hair tightened and the tinge of pain had you gushing into your panties. You whimpered around him, clenching your thighs together to hopefully ease the pressure forming between your legs. 

“Stand up,” He groaned, shuddering at the way you whined when his cock fell from your lips. 

Before you knew it, you were being pushed onto the couch, your ass in the air as he pulled your panties off. A string of wetness clung to the material as he pulled it from your legs. He groaned, catching it with his fingers and popping the digits in his mouth. 

“So sweet,” He growled, falling to his knees. 

He pulled your folds apart, exposing your clenching entrance to his hungry eyes. His cock throbbed when you gushed — sweet, creaming juices from your entrance. Unable to help himself, he leaned forward and slid his tongue over the expanse of your pussy. He could have came right then and there at the obscene cry of pleasure you emitted at the feeling of his tongue swiping over your clit. 

He chuckled, taking the swollen bud between his lips and circling his tongue over it until you were clawing at the couch beneath you. It was too much, your inexperienced body trembling at the overwhelming pleasure on your sensitive clit. 

“J-Jimin…” You whimpered, eyes rolling as you mindlessly ground your hips against his tongue. 

The introduction of his fingers had you letting out a long, drawn out moan as he sunk the digits into your spasming cunt. 

“Shit, you're tight,” He muttered swirling his tongue over your clit as he pulled his fingers back out, scraping over your g-spot in a way that made you sob. 

You cried out his name again, the only thing you could think of as the coil tightened in your stomach— winding up until your whole body was locked up. 

With a well-timed thrust of his fingers as his tongue circled your clit, you came. 

He worked you through it, wrapping his free hand around his cock to keep himself from cumming untouched at the incredible display of you cumming for him. Before long, your whines turned into those of overstimulation and he pulled back, getting to his feet. 

“Are you ready now?” He asked, nearly groaning as you arched your back for him — your swollen, gushing folds making him want to dive back down for another taste. 

“Yes sir, please,” He growled at the title and eagerly began to push into your tight entrance. 

The two of you cried out in unison at the feeling — him stretching you deliciously and the hot tightness of your walls enclosing around him. You were wet enough for him to easily sink in completely. 

“Look at you,” He chuckled, pulling back to quickly push back in. “What would your friends say if they knew you were letting a wanted criminal fuck your little cunt?” 

Your walls clenched at the idea and he chuckled, picking up his pace. He nailed your g-spot perfectly and you buried your face into the couch cushion to muffle the complete sobs of pleasure. He growled, not appreciating you attempting to quiet yourself, and wrapped your hair around his fist and yanked up until you were on your knees only. 

The change in angle has him fucking against your spot even harsher, and your eyes rolled back at the feeling. It felt like you were losing your mind, losing yourself on his cock. You were soaking his member, gushing and dripping down your thighs. The sounds emitted every time he moved within your cunt were obscene and you would have been embarrassed if your mind wasn't completely fogged over with pleasure. 

“They'll be back soon,” He grumbled, reaching around to find your clit with experienced fingertips. “Better hurry up darlin’ or else they might come in and see you creaming all over my cock.” 

His filthy words paired with the deft circles over your bud sent you over the edge. He let your hair go and oh bonelessly fell back onto the couch, trembling through your high. 

Before you could even get through the aftershocks of your orgasm, Jimin pulled out and wrapped his fist around his cock — working himself to his own orgasm. Ropes of cum splattered over your ass and you sighed at the feeling, licking your lips as you wished you could taste it. 

As you both came down, he dropped onto the couch beside you and sighed. Running his fingers through your hair, he pulled the knots that formed, from his pulling, free. 

“Let's get you dressed,” He muttered, smiling when you whined as his warmth left you. 

You sat up and allowed him to help you dress back up — just in time for Jungkook and Taehyung to come barreling in. 

“We've gotta go,” Taehyung growled, grabbing Jimin's pack off the floor and tossing it to him. 

“W-Wait!” You gasped as Jimin grabbed your hand and pulled you off the couch. 

“You go with Jungkook, he'll drop you off closer to town so you can get home,” Jimin muttered, watching as Taehyung and Jungkook swept the area to make sure their belongings weren't being left behind. 

“Wh-Where are you going?” You asked. 

“Probably gonna head on to the next state, get away from the heat here,” Jimin grunted as he mounted his horse. 

“Take me with you!” You cried, wincing when three pairs of eyes were on you. “I...I want to stay with you, Jimin.”

“Shit, you got it bad,” He chuckled, narrowing his eyes at you. “Cute little girl wanting to come with the outlaw, huh?” 

“I…” You suddenly felt embarrassed, realizing he most likely didn't feel any real attachment to you like you felt. 

There was a beat of silence, Jungkook and Taehyung mounting their horses. 

“Hop on then, baby,” Jimin chuckled, holding his hand out. “We've got a long road ahead of us. I'm sure you'll enjoy it though.” 

You grinned, fighting the stinging tears of happiness in your eyes as you took his hand and let him help you onto the horse behind him. You wrapped your arms around his waist and rested your head against his back. 

With a swift kick to the side of his horse, the three of you were off. You turned and watched the little shack disappear from view in the darkness and you realized you didn't even feel sorry about your leaving. 

Maybe one day you'd see Yoongi again but deep down, you knew you were excited for the new adventure ahead.

© httpjeon 2019. do not modify or repost.

[words-writ-in-starlight]

what's DFZ?

DFZ! DFZ! DFZ!

Okay, so, the DFZ series(es?) is kind of a catchall name for a couple of series by Rachel Aaron that take place in the same urban fantasy universe, the DFZ books and the Heartstriker books.  Urban cyberfantasy?  You could throw a lot of adjectives into that descriptor if you wanted to.

The general premise is that once upon a time Earth had magic.  A lot of magic.  Absolutely god-creating levels of magic.  And then, mysteriously, it all drained away some thousand years ago, leaving humanity to forget all about it while the creatures who needed it to live either withered away completely (spirits, gods, etc) or went into hiding and hibernation (also some spirits, dragons, etc).  And then, like a switch being flipped, it all came back at once in 2035, and suddenly humanity had a lot of magic to throw around and no idea what was going on.  That was a few decades ago at the start of the Heartstriker books, which are a couple decades before the DFZ books.

(Incidentally, I really like that choice.  It would have been very easy to write a novel about humanity getting magic back and running around like chickens with our heads cut off, and don’t get me wrong I would have read and adored that book, but setting things a little later means that magic is just Part Of The Deal and it’s so much goddamn cooler.)

Which brings us to the DFZ proper, also known as the Detroit Free Zone.  When magic came back, a lot of shit woke up really fast, chief among them A, dragons, and, B, Spirits of the Land.  Like the Lady of the Great Lakes, Algonquin, who was really, really not having it with every city in a hundred mile radius dumping pollutants into her water by the metric ton.  So she wiped most of the Great Lakes states off the map, and took over the ruins of Detroit to make the Detroit Free Zone, where the only laws worth mentioning are:

No murder

No dragons

No polluting the water

Anything else is pretty much free game.  So you can imagine that the DFZ gets to be a pretty interesting place pretty goddamn fast--the most magical city in the world, where anyone can do anything without fear of the law coming down on them, under the iron hand of a goddess who doesn’t much care for humans.

Anyway, if that sounds cool and you like any of the following, you should actually just trust me and go read these books without bothering with the rest of this post:

Immaculately well-constructed magical worldbuilding--the entire second book of the DFZ trilogy is basically “how to out-litigate a curse and the consequences of doing just that”

Humans Are Special trope, but in the “if you could all just slow down on the innovation we’d all be a lot safer” kind of way, which is a personal favorite

Dragons!  Lots and lots of dragons from all over the world!  This is an absolutely spectacular series for dragons, despite Algonquin’s best efforts!

Sentient cities!  The DFZ takes a while to get moving (magic takes time and big magic takes big time) but once she does, oh boy do I ever love her so goddamn much, get wrekt Algonquin

Magic Is Normal tropes coming out your goddamn ears, mixed with a healthy dose of Technology Is Magic (AIs can project stuff straight into your brain by hooking into your natural magical field and y’all...I’d kill for it...that’s so cool)

Really genuinely likable characters--Julius, Marci, Opal, and Nik are all completely fantastic and I would get drinks with any of them, and also the main romances actually enjoy each others’ company in non-romantic contexts, which is remarkably refreshing

Seers, and the finicky game of making the future jump the way you want it to jump while someone else who can also see the future is trying to make it jump the other way

Doesn’t that sound rad?  Yes, it does, I’m telling you that these books are amazing, the first DFZ book is called Minimum Wage Magic, and the first Heartstriker is called Nice Dragons Finish Last, go forth and read.  Either series is a great starting point, I actually liked reading the Heartstriker books after the DFZ books because I loved seeing Opal meet Julius, Main Character Boy for the Heartstrikers, as a competent and universally respected adult, and then getting insight into his brain which is just that one gif from Community with the pizza and the fire, all the time.

As per usual, more details under the cut.

So, magic comes back and Algonquin wreaks destruction and the DFZ happens.  Smash cut sixty years into the future for the Heartstriker books, starring Julius Heartstriker, the youngest and most regrettably tenderhearted dragon in the massive Heartstriker clan.  Julius’ primary problem in life is that he does not enjoy lying, scheming, manipulating, threatening, murdering, or power tripping, which means that his entire family pretty much takes carte blanche to kick him around like a soccer ball.  This comes to a head when his mother, Bethesda Heartstriker, puts a curse on him so that he can’t access his draconic form and dumps him unceremoniously into the DFZ, where dragons are executed on sight, with strict orders to find something to impress her, or else die quietly out of the way.

Julius, to his credit, throws himself into trying to become a Real Dragon as best he can, but he’s just so goddamn nice, he goes out and saves lives and makes bargains and enforced democracy instead of unilateral dynastic rule and falls in love with a human (hi Marci) and makes a name for himself as “the dragon you go to when all your other options would kill you or laugh in your face.”  It’s absolutely delightful to watch.  He’s doing such a good job.

Basically, the Heartstriker books go like this: Julius doesn’t like the way his world works!  And fuck you for telling him that he needs to be less kind in order to work in the world!  He’s not changing himself, he’s going to change the world instead, and because he’s very, very nice, he’ll even let you live there once he’s done!

Next up, the DFZ books, twenty years later, star Opal Yong-ae, who moved to the DFZ from Korea for reasons that become apparent later but mostly boil down to “freedom.”  Since Julius’ first arrival in the DFZ, a lot’s changed--Algonquin is gone, the Spirit of the DFZ is a sovereign entity who has her own motives and desires, and what was once a no-dragon zone is now a neutral territory governed by the Peacemaker, who you might remember as a twenty-four-year-old baby desperately out of his depth and is now a straight up force to be reckoned with, feared and respected around the world.  (I’m so proud of my son.)

Opal’s problems are that she’s a mage who hits like a tank when she’s desperate but can’t handle even the most basic tasks, and she’s scrambling to pay off a massive debt to her father in order to prove that she should be allowed to remain in the DFZ.  These are both old news.  The dead body she finds in an abandoned apartment that she’s been hired to clean out and get ready for renting, on the other hand, that’s a new, kicky, fresh kind of problem, especially once someone starts shooting at her about it.  

She joins up with another Cleaner named Nikola Kos, who she mostly knows as “that scary guy in black” and is an absolute tank who is also secretly very soft.  Their dynamic is so much fun, very intensely “Small Chaotic Drags Big Exhausted Into Drama” with the added bonus that Nik is a very cool cyborg fighter type.  Opal is so determined that it verges on being completely unhinged and I would read 15 books about her.  Also, the third book is out, so that brutal cliffhanger at the end of Half Price Gods is a problem for Eight Months Ago Me, rather than Present Day You.

[greenwaymoney]

Stock marketing investing for beginners

Your first step into the realm of markets. 

You’ve seen all the hype around stocks, GameStop, Tesla, etc. You hear all this talk about call options and swing trading and complex analytical systems. There seems to be so much noise that it can turn you off from actually getting started in the first place.

Here’s the truth: investing does not need to be complicated. 

In fact, we can make it incredibly easy. This post is for those that have never invested in the stock market before. If you’ve already dabbled in the market or are a seasoned investor, stick around for a refresher.

There are a few things you should do before you invest your hard earned cash in the financial markets:

Determine your risk tolerance.

Decide how committed you are to research.

Going in without a plan pretty much ensures you won’t get what you want (how do you know what you want if you don’t decide that upfront?)

Risk Tolerance

You must decide if you want to be risk averse or risk tolerant. Averse means you want safer, more secure investments. Tolerant means you are willing to trade risk for a chance at greater reward. Remember, risk does not always equal reward. A lot of stock market research is focused on finding what are called “Asymmetric returns” where you can leverage your returns to far exceed your upfront risk. That is for another time.

If you are younger, you will probably be more risk tolerant. The older you are, the closer you get to “retirement”, the more you are likely to safeguard your investments. However, that is certainly not true in every situation. 

Commitment 

Do you want to be reading financial statements and browsing the news all day? Probably not. How committed you are to researching investments and stocks will determine how actively you manage your portfolio. Also remember, just because you spend hours on Discord looking at stock signals doesn’t necessarily mean you will outperform the market. Risk ≠ Reward (not always at least).

For the beginning investor I still recommend you do some basic research (like reading this post) but don’t worry about getting too deep into it. The important thing is to just start. That doesn’t mean you throw your money at random tickers though. Let’s get into how to actually invest in the stock market. 

How to get started

Disclaimer: this is not financial advice, this is just the opinion of a guy on the internet. Make sure to do your own research before making moves with your money. Cheers!

Once you’ve asked yourself some basic questions and conducted a little upfront research, you need to take these steps to start investing:

Open a brokerage account.

Contribute money you are willing to lose.

Plan your portfolio.

Make your investments.

Behold, the road to investing lies before you.

Step One: Open a brokerage account

A brokerage account is like a bank account for stocks (oversimplified). It gives you access to the securities (stock) market and allows you to make trades. You will hear about margin privileges, options trading, futures, and a lot of other terms. Don’t worry about those words too much right now; we’ll get to them. 

You can go with a simple, mobile-friendly brokerage like Webull, Robinhood, or Public. I’ve linked to Robinhood that will give us both a free stock when you download the app and make an initial deposit. 

You can also go with a more traditional company like Charles Schwab, TD Ameritrade, or Fidelity. It is really up to you.

Most of these brokerages offer commission-free trading which means you won’t be charged fees to place a trade. In addition, some offer fractional investing which means if a stock costs $100 you can buy 1/10th of the stock if you only have $10 in your account.

Ultimately, what brokerage you use doesn’t matter. It’s a matter of personal preference. Just make sure you like the user interface and that it isn’t too confusing. Wouldn’t want you to accidentally YOLO your entire portfolio into OTM call options, net yet at least :)

Step Two: Contribute money that you are willing to lose

Willing to lose? What do I mean by that? What I mean is that investing is least effective when it’s emotional. If your entire net worth is invested in the stock market, and the market takes a 10% dip, how is that going to affect your mental health?

Only contribute money that you aren’t going to need to pay for basic living expenses. Check out this article where we talk about how to reduce your spending so you can have more money for investing.

Step Three: Plan out your portfolio

You’ve opened an account and made your initial deposit. Now for the fun part, right? 

Here you need to decide what exactly to invest in. There are thousands of companies out there so how do you decide which ones to place your cash into? What I would do in this instance is invest in index funds which are like baskets of stocks. Index funds like Vanguard’s $VTI covers a large amount of stocks and will basically follow the movements of the broad market.

This is a more risk-averse strategy. The market usually returns around 10% annually and that’s probably what you’ll be looking at with index fund investing.

Starting with index funds is a great way to get yourself introduced into the stock market without exposing yourself to a ton of market volatility. 

Step Four: Make your initial investments

Now that you’ve decided upon your investment strategy. It is time to make those investments. The biggest thing here is to buy and hold. Don’t try to time the market, nobody can do that. 

Putting it together

Congratulations! You’ve successfully completed a major milestone in your financial freedom journey. Investing in the stock market for the first time is no easy task. I’m so proud of you.

Once you’ve gotten started in investing, you can begin to experiment with more sophisticated and complex trading strategies, but only if you want to. You definitely don’t need to do anything crazy in order to make good returns in the market. It all depends on your time horizon and investing goals. We’ll have more content coming out soon regarding investing so make sure to drop a comment and let us know what you think!

[purplesurveys]

1157

survey by hxcsingingsk8r

Phone Scavenger Hunt

First off, what phone do you have? I have an iPhone 8.

And what provider do you use? It’s a local one you wouldn’t know about, called Globe.

How long have you had your current phone? I can’t remember if it would be 3 or 4 years this 2021. Either way, it’s definitely been a while and I’ve been itching to upgrade. It’s too early to make such a big purchase, though.

Do you have any cases for it? Describe them. I have a clear case that I bought last year. Before that, I had a pink Otterbox case that I managed to destroy even though Otterbox is normally known for its durability. I just have a very unique ability to wreck everything I’ve ever owned lol.

How old were you when you got your first cellphone? I was technically 6, but it was meant to be a present for my 7th birthday. We threw a birthday party a month in advance because my dad had to fly back abroad for work before my actual birthday, but we wanted him to be present at the celebration so we decided throwing a party early was the best route.

What about your first smartphone? [If the answer is different] It was an iPhone 5S.

How old are you now? Dunno what this has to do with the theme of the survey but I am now 22.

Okay, move onto the scavenger hunt part

What is your lock screen picture of? It’s of Kim Seon Ho at a restaurant, lmao.

Home screen? It’s one of the shots from a recent promotional photoshoot Hayley did for Good Dye Young.

How many pictures are thre currently on your phone? This question just made me so anxious hahaha. I have way too many photos; and upon checking, it turns out I currently have 6,266. My god do I need to clean up my camera roll this weekend.

How many videos? I have 227. I have no idea it’s gotten to be this many; I barely use my phone to take videos. I’ll go ahead and delete some of them right now, just to give my phone (and its storage) space to breathe.

What is your most recent picture of? It’s a work thing...I guess I’ll explain it so it can make more sense. So one of our clients has got this Lent campaign going on, and to spread word about it we’ve tapped a handful of food bloggers to try out the offers themselves and post about their experience on social media. Now that we’re in the middle of Holy Week they’ve gone ahead and uploaded their own posts, and I’m in charge of taking screenshots so I can show to the client that the execution had been successful.

And the most recent video? It’s a private vlog. Every Sunday, or at least every other Sunday I take a few minutes to sit down and do a weekly video thing where I talk about my ~mental~ and ~emotional~ status, and it’s basically a way to be in touch with myself and keep track of my progress. Who knows, maybe I’ll actually get to uploading them one day.

Do you have any albums? If so, of what? Yeah. I have one for Cooper, one for Kimi, and a bunch of tiny albums I’ve made where I compiled 4–5 photos of friends to post on their birthdays.

What pictures have you favorited? I have a lot of favorited photos. There’s no required category for me to label them as such.

Do you have any shared albums with friends or family or work? No. I’m not sure if I can do that, or how to do it if it is allowed.

Do you have any alarms set? For what time and for what occasions? I have a bunch of alarms but only because they’re archived into the Clock app and I just haven’t gotten around to deleting them. When I was still new at my work, I used to have alarms set for certain work tasks I have to take note of every week – but now that I’ve gotten into the groove of things, I don’t need the alarms to be reminded about them anymore.

Check your weather app, what is the weather and temperature where you live? It says ‘Mostly Clear’ and shows a temperature of 26ºC.

Do you have the YouTube app? Do you have your own channel? I do have the app and my own account, but I never use it to post videos. It’s nice to have my own channel so that my homepage can be tailored to my interests.

Do you have an email app? Which one do you use? I just have the default Email app that comes with iOS, but I never use it because it’s so wonky. It doesn’t refresh new emails and it takes forever when it does, and it doesn’t always show the full thread of email conversations. If I absolutely need to check my email for something I usually have to pull out my laptop.

Does it say that there is an update available on your phone or any apps? Yes, it reminds me everyday hahaha. I don’t update unless Apple has been planning a big revamp with new features, though; and if the updates are just to address bugs, I disregard the reminders.

Go into your contacts, how many contacts do you have total? It says I have 178.

Name all of your contacts under the letter M: Feels a tad bit invasive, so I’ll just name five people I have under M: Lui, Kim, Patrice, Danika, and Andi.

Name all of your contacts under the letter U: I don’t have anyone under U.

Do you have any contacts that are businesses rather than people? Which ones? No, I don’t really use text to contact businesses. If I wanted to inquire or order from one, I usually head to their social media page.

Go into your notes, how many notes do you have saved? This is another one I have a hoarding problem with lol. My phone says I currently have 561 notes, though I’m fairly certain the biggest chunk of it comes from minutes I’ve taken down from work meetings. It was a whole lot less when I was still in school.

What kinds of things do you save in your notes? Like I said, I use Notes for taking down minutes from meetings. There are also a few surveys on there, from times I didn’t have internet and couldn’t post them on here.

Do you have any voice memos saved? What of? Yep. Some of them were recordings I had to do for journalism classes I was assigned to do voiceovers; some are interviews, also from my journ class; and the rest are of me rambling.

Do you ever use the calculator app? Pretty frequently for work.

Do you ever use the Maps app? Not really. If I needed directions, I would check out Waze for that.

Do you have any health/fitness apps? Which ones? I still have the Nike Training app from the very brief time I wanted to start working out earlier this year.

Do you have the Instacart app? The what now? I’ve never even heard of that.

What about a delivery service like Postmates, Uber Eats, Grubhub, Doordash? I have the McDelivery app for McDonald’s, but I also have other general delivery apps like Grab, Lalamove, and Transportify.

Do you have something like Venmo, Cashapp, or Paypal? I have the Paypal app but I never use it. I also have a couple of e-wallet apps just in case I’d have to use them as a payment method, since some businesses  I purchase from prefer certain ones. Ultimately, though, I use Grab’s mobile wallet the most often.

Do you use Bitmoji? I think I did before? I never used it all that regularly though. Didn’t see the point.

What other keyboards do you use besides English? Any? Filipino, Korean, and Emoji.

Which social media network apps do you have? Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Tumblr, TikTok, and Snapchat. So I guess I have all the main ones?

If you have Instagram, what is your handle and how many followers? I have a very private one I only use for work. I didn’t want it to have any followers but at present there’s Angela (because she asked to follow it this week) and Bea (idk why).

What do you typically post on the various social media platforms? The only ones I regularly post on are Twitter and Facebook, and on either I share life updates (if there are any) and memes; though on Facebook I have to watch out what kind of memes I share and make sure they aren’t too offensive because I’m friends with relatives, workmates, and media on there lmao. But on Twitter, I basically have no filter.

Do you make TikTok videos? I don’t make any myself, but I do enjoy going through the app.

Do you only add people you know on Facebook? Yes, for the most part. I’ve taken to adding people as long as they’re from UP or my high school even though I’ve never met them as well, but if I sense that they only added me to try and sell me insurance OR try to get me into MLM, then it’s an instant unfriend for me.

Do you have an app that tracks Instagram followers? No, because I don’t need to track my Instagram followers. I’m off the radar as off the radar gets.

Do you have a Snapchat? Yeah, it’s still on my phone just because but I literally never touch it anymore.

Do you ever take selfies with filters? What app's filters do you use? Eh, just before. I don’t really take selfies anymore, period.

Do you use any apps like Depop or Poshmark or Etsy? No. Out of these three I’ve only ever heard of Etsy, too.

What messengers do you use to talk to people? Any besides just texting? I have Messenger to stay in touch with family and friends; Whatsapp and Viber for work; and Telegram just in case my friends want to play games.

Do you have any photo editing apps? Which ones? I have this app called Foodie that has some pretty filters. Otherwise, since I’m not on Instagram anyway I’m never on the lookout for photo editing apps; no one ever filters their photos on Facebook and Twitter lol.

Do you have any games? Which ones? I do have a ton of games on my phone. I never play any of them, but I keep them just in case I get bored enough to start revisiting them. I have word games, drinking games, games similar to Heads Up! where one person will have to guess the word on the screen while the phone is on their forehead, and gimmicky games like 1010! and Candy Crush haha.

Do you have any rideshare apps like Lyft or Uber? I have Grab, which is a rideshare, parcel delivery, food delivery, and online grocery app all in one.

Now go to the actual phone app, whose phone numbers are saved as favorites? I don’t tag any of my contacts as favorites.

Who was your most recent outgoing call to? I can’t recognize the number, so it was probably a Transportify driver that I called to give him directions to my house.

Who was your most recent incoming call from? I also can’t recognize the number, but this time he was most likely a Grab driver.

Who was your most recent missed call from? Again, can’t recognize the number HAHAA

Why did you miss that call? On purpose? Were you sleeping? Busy? My phone is on silent 24/7, so I must have missed it while I was working.

Who is your most recent voicemail from and what's it regarding? We don’t have voicemail in the Philippines.

What was the last thing you Googled or searched on your phone? Candle tunneling and how to fix it.

What music app do you use? Apple Music? Spotify? Something else? I use Spotify, but I also availed of a 3-month trial on Apple Music earlier this year just because. I think it’s supposed to end soon but I have no plans to shift.

What playlists have you made on there? I have playlists called, “robyn discovers kpop,” “winding down,” “angst,” “not my loss,” and my personal favorite, “paramore but fuck you.”

Lastly, what is the most recent song/album you've added to your collection? What Type of X - Jessi.