#viceroy residences

[realtyhubph-blog]

Foreclosed Pacific Residences Unit 117

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[viceroyprive2023]

Exclusive Living at Viceroy PRIVÉ, Mumbai Discover unparalleled luxury at Viceroy PRIVÉ, a 34-storey residential tower in Mumbai's Western Suburbs. Offering exclusive homes for 61 select families, this property features breathtaking views, spacious living areas, and premium amenities. Enjoy the best of city living with privacy and comfort. https://viceroyprive.com

[longliveblackness]

Known as the Primer Libertador de America or “first liberator of the Americas,” Gaspar Yanga led one of colonial Mexico’s first successful slave uprisings and would go on to establish one of the Americas earliest free black settlements.

Rumored to be of royal lineage from West Africa, Yanga was an enslaved worker in the sugarcane plantations of Veracruz, Mexico. In 1570 he, along with a group of followers, escaped, fled to the mountainous regions near Córdoba, and established a settlement of former slaves or palenque. They remained there virtually unmolested by Spanish authorities for nearly 40 years. Taking the role of spiritual and military leader, he structured the agricultural community in an ordered capacity, allowing its growth and occupation of various locations.

During that time, Yanga and his band, also known as cimarrónes, were implicated in the disruption and looting of trade goods along the Camino Real (Royal Road) between Veracruz and Mexico City. They were also held responsible for attacking nearby haciendas and kidnapping indigenous women. Perceived as dangerous to the colonial system of slavery through their daring actions against royal commerce and authority, New Spain’s viceroy called for the annihilation of Yanga’s palenque. Destroying the community and its leader would send a message to other would-be rebellious slaves that Spain’s authority over them was absolute.

In 1609, Spanish authorities sent a well-armed militia to defeat Yanga and his palenque but were defeated. Yanga’s surprise victory over the Spanish heightened the confidence of his warriors and the frustration in Mexico City.

After defeating other Spanish forces sent again the palenque, Yanga offered to make peace but with eleven conditions, the most important being recognition of the freedom of all of the palenque’s residents prior to 1608, acknowledgment of the settlement as a legal entity which Yanga and his descendants would govern, and the prohibition of any Spanish in the community. Yanga, in turn, promised to serve and pay tribute to the Spanish crown. After years of negotiations, in 1618, the town of San Lorenzo de Los Negros was officially recognized by Spanish authorities as a free black settlement. It would later be referred to as Yanga, named after its founder.

•••

Conocido como el primer libertador de las Americas, Gaspar Yanga lideró exitosamente una de las primeras revueltas de esclavos en el México colonial y estableció una de las primeras ciudades negras y libres de América.

Se rumoreaba que era del linaje real de África Occidental. Yanga fue un esclavo que trabajó en las plantaciones de caña de azúcar de Veracruz, México. En 1570, él junto con un grupo de sus partidarios, se escaparon y huyeron hacia las montañas ubicadas en las regiones cercanas a Córdoba y estableció la primer ciudad o asentamiento para antiguos esclavos, también llamado palenque. Prácticamente permanecieron ahí por casi cuarenta años, sin ser molestados por las autoridades Españolas. Tomando el rol de guía espiritual y militar, él organizó la comunidad agrícola con una capacidad ordenada, así permitiendo el crecimiento y ocupación de varias ubicaciones.

Durante este tiempo, Yanga y su banda, también conocidos como cimarrones, estuvieron implicados en la interrupción y saqueo de bienes comerciales a lo largo del Camino Real entre Veracruz y Ciudad de México. También se les responsabilizó por los ataques a las haciendas cercanas y de secuestrar a mujeres indígenas. Percibido como un peligro para el sistema colonial de la esclavitud, sus audaces acciones contra el comercio y la autoridad real hicieron que el virrey de Nueva España pidiera la aniquilación del palenque de Yanga. El destruir a la comunidad y a su líder enviaría un mensaje a otros posibles esclavos rebeldes de que la autoridad de España sobre ellos era absoluta.

En 1609, las autoridades españolas enviaron una milicia fuertemente armada para derrotar a Yanga y su palenque, pero fueron derrotadas. La sorpresiva victoria de Yanga sobre los españoles aumentó la confianza de sus guerreros y la frustración en la Ciudad de México.

Después de derrotar a otras fuerzas españolas enviadas nuevamente al palenque, Yanga se ofreció a hacer las paces pero con once condiciones, siendo la más importante el reconocimiento de la libertad de todos los que residían en el palenque desde antes de 1608, el reconocimiento del asentamiento como entidad legal que sería gobernado por Yanga y sus descendientes, y la prohibición de cualquier español en la comunidad. Yanga, a su vez, se comprometió a servir y rendir homenaje a la corona española. Después de años de negociaciones, en 1618, el pueblo de San Lorenzo de Los Negros fue reconocido oficialmente por las autoridades españolas como un asentamiento negro y libre. Más tarde se la conocería como Yanga, en honor a su fundador.

[stephpotterart]

I had a thought about Nandor and the perceived himbo dumbass nature of him, and now I'm thinking and I have to write it out.. It's kind of stream-of-consciousness, so please bear with me 😅

Yes, I love the occasional dumb-as-a-post nature of him, it makes him a big, less than scary (you know, to a point) teddy bat of a Vampire. But... it's also not accurate for his history?

Like, absolutely you can be highly educated and still dumb-as-a-post, but I don't think that's what's going on with Nandor.

Let's just... look at his overall behaviour for a moment. Nandor gets into periodic, strong, obsessions that come on like a wildfire, then burn out. We can see the evidence of this with his sudden desire to join Jan's cult with extremely little evidence and knowledge of what he's getting himself into. Yes, the brainwashing came once he was there, but it was mild, fairly transparent, manipulation that got him thinking about it. He latched onto it and pinned his entire persona and future upon the cult at the drop of a pin. There's also the same behaviours circling with his relationship with Gail. When he is with Gail, she is everything, and nothing else matters much - not how his friends feel, not how much Gail has continually hurt him in the past, his focus is purely on her and almost worshipping her.

There's nothing necessarily wrong with this behaviour, other than the fact that it has continually caused Nandor to break his own heart.

I'd argue that these examples, and other behaviours shown by him throughout the current five seasons, point to a prevalence for hyperfixations, and undiagnosed neurodivergence of some form. Which form that neurodivergence takes, well that's up to interpretation. Which, means that once a hyperfixation ends or is ended for him, that interest just dies off. It can come back, but it's not the all-consuming interest that it had been.

So with this in mind, lets look at his human history, with the neurodivergence in mind, for context about his intelligence and his education.

Nandor was born in the 13th century, in an Islamic nation, and likely to a family of renown or nobility. If he was not, then he himself earned that ranking, renown, and nobility for his family. But, lets just say that he was already born into a family of some privilege.

Whether it's through his family's ranking, or his show of military prowess, Nandor ends up ruling his country... at the age of seventeen. This is not placement for a man of little-to-no education. Whether it was from a very young age, or not, Nandor would have been surrounded by tutors from the reaches of both his Kingdom and the rest of the world, in order to best prepare him for what his life would be. Whether it was from a tender age, or once he was already designated as future Supreme Viceroy, Nandor would have been in classes whenever he was not training on the field of battle.

Nandor would have been educated in multiple languages, beyond his own native Farsi. He would have been taught Latin, and Greek for certain. He would have been educated and well read in the Classics, in order to learn statecraft and political strategizing. He would have been incredibly well-read (I would argue that much of the library in the Vampire Residence, other than the outright pornography which is likely thanks to Laszlo, is Nandor's centuries long collection), and able to analyze those works in order to show comprehension of what does and does not work as a ruler. And he must have been successful, as he clearly ruled from the age of 17 until at least his turning at the age of 41. Even without years as a Vampiric Viceroy (debatable if he was ruling as a Vampire, or if he joined the Ottoman forces once he was Vampire and had been exiled from his homeland), that's 24 successful years on his throne.

Back to the languages for a moment; even though the show canonically ignores that Nandor was born during the Mongol rule of Persia, he would have likely been taught Mongolian as well. Along with the exposure to Mongol culture, and the opening of Mongolian empire, comes tutors from further lands. Nandor would have likely been taught Medieval French, Italian, and it's not out of the question to suppose that he was also taught Middle English. It is the knowledge of Middle English which may explain his troubles with modern English. Not because much of Middle English was retained by Modern English, but... imagine you already learned a language, and now you're expected to learn it again just because the people decided in the late 1400s that they were changing the way they speak in that place. That would personally make me give up on learning it perfectly, which I rather suspect Nandor, who would be highly capable of multiple languages at that point, did as well. He can speak just fine, he just didn't care to put the level of effort into the acquisition of those skills the same way as he had previously. If he drops words here and there, it doesn't matter - you can still understand him just fine, and well, that's how it works in all these other languages!

Nandor would have been educated in more than just languages and the Classics. He would have been taught world history (as it was known at that point), he would have been taught arithmetic, astronomy, and other 'sciences' as they existed at that time.

There is no reason that Nandor's education would have slipped through the cracks. it simply would not have been allowed, especially not for the Supreme Viceroy.

So, Nandor is a highly educated man, who happens to be neurodivergent as all get out. He must have had his interests. His hyperfixations. Hell, it's right in his epithet: The Relentless.

Let's pause for a moment and look to Laszlo Cravensworth as our main point of comparison with knowledge of 'the sciences'.

Laszlo is from the 17th century at earliest, and 18th century most likely. He was a noble of some standing, hence why it was unthinkable that he marry a "common, peasant, girl with no family name". He, too, would have been highly educated to the standards of his time. All of that said, it's rather clear that Laszlo's general knowledge of the sciences does not exceed passed the mid-19th century (arguments can be made that it peters out around the 1930s if we factor in psychology and include the advancement of cinema from the 1890s on).

This means that Laszlo didn't keep up with the advancements in the sciences after a certain point, right around the time it was advancing faster and faster, and the ability to keep up became more and more difficult, given the inability to attend classes during daylight hours, etc. Let's also not forget that Laszlo dabbles in the sciences, viewing his knowledge as more of a novelty than anything necessary. He absolutely knows how to use his knowledge, but it's all good fun!

Nandor wouldn't have had the luxury to view his education as a novelty or as fun. It was essential to his title, his rank, and his continued rule.

Leap of faith here, but I'm going to assume that for a good deal of time, Nandor continued to view his education in this way. Especially with an eternity in front of him, he'd have to keep up with the times and keep learning, as best to blend in, and as best to rule should he ever rise up and crush the world under his boot once more.

I suspect that he only started to loose interest in keeping up sometime around the mid-18th century. Perhaps even as Laszlo was coming onto the scene. Not because of Laszlo, but because he was already settled more into his existence. He didn't really expect to rule again, even if he still boasts and brags, it doesn't appear to be in Nandor's nature now to even want that level of responsibility, not really, if he ever did. He likely had it thrust upon him and was just expected to continue.

If he simply burned out, it would be completely understandable that he'd no longer keep up-to-date with how knowledge changes and things advance. But, maybe something happened that made him want to abandon all that work and effort to keep his education as finely tuned as it had been?

It was mentioned that a joke was cut from Season 1 that Nandor had been in a threesome/throuple with both George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. We're not positive of the years, but we can assume it was at least during the Revolution, and a bit after (he does canonically mention Washington as America's First Gay President).

But, lets go out on a limb and assume he was with them, or at least Benjamin Franklin, earlier than that. Maybe he was around during Franklin's experiments with electricity.

Maybe Nandor was present for Benjamin's kite experiment in 1752.

Nandor, at this point, would have had at least 470 years of knowledge regarding the natural world, history, languages, sciences, and religion. Introduce the power of electricity and the behaviour of lightning, and now he has dots connecting in his mind, he has context for some of the things he did not understand when he was learning originally. His interest is piqued, his mind engaged, and now he's finding another hyperfixation.

And he has questions.

Perhaps Nandor starts asking multitudes of questions, excited by eletricity, electrical fire, and all the historical and religious (as much as he can voice without saying certain words that make his tongue burn just as painfully as 'sky fire') implications of this discovery.

He askes so many questions, and no one can answer them because the research doesn't exist yet. His excitement and curiosity, without the ability to learn why annoys him and makes his obsession a flaw to those around him. They think him obtuse - he can't think of anything else, and when he's frustrated he breaks things. He doesn't mean to, but between his Vampiric strength, large hands, and a temper... sometimes small instruments break. Eventually this becomes detrimental, and not as sweet or naive as his interests were once viewed. Benjamin starts to see Nandor as the volatile Warlord from history, and not as the innocent and curious man he had met originally. He starts to see his curiosities as burdensome and annoying.

Without meaning to, Nandor's curiosity and hyperfixation has caused everyone around him to withdraw, as they look at him with derision.

Annoyed, the people around him start to tell him to find something new to pass his time with. Viewing him now as more volatile and violent than they had, they start making comments about him being better at fighting and warfare than with books. He's obviously the Brawn and not the Brain.

It hurts Nandor. His interests are disregarded, his questions met with disdain. He's treated as a hapless child and not the well educated and knowledgeable man that he is.

He's seen as only the beast with too many questions for his own good, for his mind to contend with.

He's seen as uneducated, without ever thinking of his human history and how that is simply not possible. He's seen as better for the battlefield than for the classroom, no matter that he is now more at home in a library than he is with a sword in his hand.

He's accused of simply having "random, fleeting, interests", that won't last long enough for him to actually learn anything that he'll retain. It's easier to insult him than admit his questions were worth asking, but that they have no answers for him. It's easier to turn him away than admit to him that they too don't know. Easier to blame him for a crime he hasn't even committed, than ask if he'd like to help or lend a thought given his years of experience.

So, relegated to the only the soldier and not the diplomat, or the scholar, Nandor stops asking questions. He stops allowing himself his interests and his hyperfixations, at least when it comes to furthering his education, so that does not upset those around him.

He stops furthering his education, beyond what he manages to glean and absorb from his daily life as an immortal being. He makes himself smaller because he's been told he's not smart enough to be asking those sort of questions. He's been told he's too much, even in that aspect of his life, as he's been told time and time again by the people around him that don't view him as anything other than a luxury to be used and abused, and ultimately abandoned when he no longer serves their purposes.

Even if Nandor abandoned all further learning, beyond what he acquires organically and accidentally, in approximately 1760, that's still a scholarly history of nearly 500 years.

Nandor is not stupid. He's not dumb. His reference materially is simply out of date, or in out of date languages. He hasn't been given a reason to want to continue his education after 500 years of learning.

I bet if you asked him any medieval knowledge question about, say, botany… he'd have an answer that is accurate. It might take him a few minutes because 762 years of knowledge and memories in that neurodivergent filing cabinet of a mind (that's how i refer to my own brain), but he has the answer.

Nandor is not stupid, or uneducated. He's not simply the Brawn without the Brain. He's just out-of-date, and neurodivergent. He might be dumb-as-a-post when it comes to social cues and modern slang, but it has nothing to do with his intelligence or his extensive education. He just needs someone to listen and care enough to nurture his curiosities, rather than dismiss them.

He just needs the right questions to be asked, he has the answers.

Just... don't give him very valuable and breakable instruments if you're not able or willing to replace them when he accidentally damages them.

Sorry for that wholeass essay, I just... I have feels for Nandor's depiction.

[valveorangebox]

Typing it out here. But the blues and reds deserved some sort of characteristics that set them apart from the others. Some character reimagining under the read more. This is what I’d do with em.

EDIT: changing jeans to be more less weird.

Viceroy Buckingham- A Sniper. Nervous. Seems cool but in reality that image of himself is only persevered by the fact he’s wearing a helmet. He is having a panic attack underneath it. Fought during the war and was reassigned after aliens wiped his base. Is very hesitant around covenant tech. Especially Tuckers sword. He wasn’t close with Jean at first but after Biff died and the teams combined, he and Jean really hit it off. They’re rarely seen separated from each other nowadays. Buckingham wouldn’t have it any other way.

Jean Clark- An mechanic, a mathematician and very passionate about table top rpgs (only the weird obscure ones though. She isn’t going to be caught dead playing the popular shit). Only works well under pressure. Horrific ADHD and chews on wires. Her right side is robotic from a quote “Pizza oven accident.” No one inquires further about it. When Biff died she felt lost. Her first friend in this army was gone. But Temple has a solution. She hopes that when this is all said and done, they can settle down. Maybe open a game story. She still needs to teach Buckingham how to play magic.

Gabriel L. “Loco” Motif - You know him. We all love him. Blue teams resident genius. Very good at finding unconventional solutions for unconventional problems. He, Jean and Buckingham are close. The only person he’s closer to is Temple. When he’s not collecting parts for his newest inventions, he takes great care to tend to his “pets”. 18 tamagotchis wired to create one large one. He has a base wide timer to remind him to feed them. (The L stands for Lee)

Harry. S. Cronut - Two Words. Gym Nut. When he’s not helping the other Blues and Reds you can find him on his drawing tablet or in the gym. He’s helping fund most of these schemes and is quite proud of his work. He says he’s been thinking about getting into baking as of late. Arguably he’s the most normal person out of everyone here. If anyone needs a big bear wolf hug you can get it from him!

Surge- Surge loves her guns, her armor and her men. She’s a soldier and has been her entire life and she’s not about to stop. A skilled electrician and an even more skilled marksman. But her weapon isn’t the sniper. Nah that’s what cowards use. When she was deployed. They gave them pistols and tire irons and dropped them from orbit. And they liked it! Being a sim troopers easy. Was almost too easy. But she’s grown to love her family. Biff was a rascal. But he was her rascal.

[camisoledadparis]

THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … January 17

1558 – French Cardinal Charles de Lorraine requests that the French Ambassador to Rome report scandals involving Cardinal Carlo Carafa and Giovanni Carafa, Duke of Paliano to Pope Paul VI. They had engaged in "that sin so loathsome in which there is no longer a distinction between the male and female sex." They are first exiled then sentenced to death.

1837 – English writer, historian and educational reformer. Oscar Browning was born in London (d.1923). In 1868 he became the lover of the great English Pre-Raphaelite painter Simeon Solomon. For fifteen years he was a master at Eton College , until he was dismissed in the Autumn of 1875 following a dispute over his "overly amorous" (but purportedly chaste) relationship with a pupil, George Curzon. . He had taken Curzon on a trip through Europe with Curzon's father's permission, despite having been warned away from the boy by the Headmaster at Eton, F W Hornby. His parents' church, St. Andrew's, in Clewer, describes the reasons for his dismissal as 'his injudicious talk, his favourites, and his anarchic spirit'.

After Eton he took up a life Fellowship at King's College, Cambridge, where he achieved a reputation as a wit, and became universally known as "O.B.".He traveled to India at Curzon's invitation after the latter had become viceroy. He resumed residence in 1876 at Cambridge, where he became university lecturer in history. He left Cambridge in 1908 and and in 1914 was visiting Italy when World War I broke out.

He spent his later years in Rome where he died in 1923 at the age of eighty-six. A large part of his papers disappeared. These include "all Browning's letters to his mother, diaries that covered the whole of his career from his arrival at Eton in 1851, much of his correspondence as an Eton master, and no doubt also a number of his subject files." This disappearance has been attributed to Hugo Wortham, Browning's nephew and sole executor and legatee, who took the materials to produce a biography of his uncle, Victorian Eton and Cambridge: being the life and times of Oscar Browning.

1886 – On this date the British novelist Ronald Firbank was born in London (d.1926). Firbank was a prototype for Evelyn Waugh. His best novels are Caprice (1917) and Concerning the Eccentricities of Cardinal Pirelli (1926). The latter book begins with the cardinal baptizing a police puppy named Crack, and ends when the naked cardinal ("elementary now as Adam himself") drops dead while pursuing a choirboy named Chicklet around his church. Firbank was not without his own eccentricities. He as known to wear two dressing gowns at once, painted his nails, lived in an apartment painted black, and owned only books bound in blue leather. He dined only on champagne and flower petals and died malnourished.

At one time, Firbank visited Rome with the intention of taking holy orders; however, as he later revealed in a letter to Lord Berners, "The Church of Rome wouldn't have me, and so I mock her." Accordingly, his mature fiction is populated with a ribald gallery of homosexual choirboys, lesbian nuns, cross-dressing priests, salacious bishops, flagellants, and self-canonized saints.

His work was championed by a large number of English novelists including E. M. Forster, Evelyn Waugh, Simon Raven and the poet W. H. Auden . Susan Sontag named his novels as constituting part of "the canon of camp" in her 1964 essay "Notes on 'Camp."

1897 – Nils Asther (d.1981) was a Swedish actor active in Hollywood from 1926 to the mid-1950s, known for his beautiful face and often called "the male Greta Garbo". Between 1916 and 1963 he appeared in over 70 feature films, 16 of which were produced in the silent era. He is mainly remembered today for two silent films he made with his fellow Swede, Greta Garbo, and the pre-code interracial love affair in The Bitter Tea of General Yen.

Asther was the son of Anton Asther and Hilda Åkerlund. Although his parents were Swedish, Asther was born in Denmark in Sankt Matteus parish, Copenhagen, where unwed mothers at the time often went to give birth discreetly. Nils spent his first year as a foster child in Limhamn, Sweden, until his parents married in 1898 and he moved in with them in Malmö, where he would grow up. As a young man he moved to Stockholm, where he received acting lessons from Augusta Lindberg. It was through Lindberg that Asther received his first theatrical engagement at Lorensbergsteatern in Gothenburg, and in 1916 Mauritz Stiller cast him in The Wings (Swedish: Vingarne), a gay-themed Swedish silent film from 1916, directed by Mauritz Stiller, based on Herman Bang's 1902 novel Mikaël. In Copenhagen, one of Sweden's best known actors, Aage Hertel of the Royal Danish Theatre, took Asther under his wing. This soon led to a number of film roles in Sweden, Denmark and Germany between 1918 and 1926.

In 1927, Asther left for Hollywood, where his first film was Topsy and Eva. By 1928 his good looks had made him into a leading man, playing opposite such stars as Pola Negri, Marion Davies and Joan Crawford. He grew a thin mustache which amplified his suave appearance. One of his most popular films was Our Dancing Daughters. Asther was cast opposite Greta Garbo in Wild Orchids as the tempting Javenese Prince De Gace. With the arrival of sound in movies, Asther took diction and voice lessons to minimize his accent, and was generally cast in roles where an accent wasn't a problem, such as the Chinese General Yen in The Bitter Tea of General Yen.

Asther was a homosexual in a time when it was a stigma to be gay. He grew up in a deeply religious Lutheran home, believing homosexuality was a sin and society viewed homosexuality as a disease. In Sweden it was called "unnatural fornication." While sexual relations between adults of the same sex were legalized in 1944, the medical classification of homosexuality as a form of mental disorder continued until 1979.

The theatrical community and the film industry in the 1920s accepted gay actors with little reservation, always provided they remained discreet about their sexual orientation and there was no public suggestion of impropriety. Asther was closeted. He proposed marriage to Greta Garbo to hide the true nature of his sexual preferences. Asther and Garbo had known each other in Sweden, and finding themselves relatively new to a foreign land they spent a great deal of time together. They often visited a friend's ranch outside Hollywood where they could relax, ride horses, go climbing, or swim at Lake Arrowhead. "Sailor” was a favored term for Greta Garbo's male, gay/bisexual friends. In 1929 during filming on location in Catalina filming with Nils Asther, she was overheard berating the actor for grabbing her so roughly. "I'm not one of your sailors," she reminded him.

Rumors exist from the early 1930s that Nils had relationships with Swedish director Mauritz Stiller and Swedish writer Hjalmar Bergman and with other male colleagues. Nils mentions some of this in his memoirs. He had a long term relationship with actor/stuntman and World War II navy soldier Ken DuMain. According to Ken DuMain, he met Asther on Hollywood Boulevard in the early 1940s and they enjoyed a long-term relationship.

In August 1930, Nils entered a lavender marriage, with one of his Topsy and Eva co-stars, Vivian Duncan. They had one child nicknamed in the media as "the international Baby" due to her Swedish father, American mother, and Bavarian birth. Their daughter's nationality was debated and Asther offered to apply for American citizenship if it would help the process of getting their daughter into America. Right from the start, Asther and Duncan's marriage proved stormy and became fodder for the tabloids. They divorced in 1932.

Nils Asther died on October 13, 1981 at a hospital in Farsta, Stockholms län, Sweden.

1927 – On this date the American physician and writer Tom Dooley was born (d.1961). Born in St. Louis, Missouri as Thomas Anthony Dooley III, Dooley was an American Catholic who, while serving as a physician in the United States Navy, became increasingly famous for his humanitarian and anti-Communist activities in South East Asia during the late 1950s until his early death from cancer. Based on his experiences working in Vietnam and Laos, he authored a number of popular anti-communist books in the years preceding the Vietnam War.

According to classmate Michael Harrington, Dooley never attempted to hide his same-sex orientation. Even after cancer surgery in 1960, Dooley resorted to the 2nd floor of Bangkok's Erawan Hotel, a "central preserve of his Gay life in Southeast Asia." The best-known victim of military homophobia in Randy Shilts's book Conduct Unbecoming: Gays and Lesbians in the U.S. Military is Thomas A. Dooley, the jungle doctor of Laos and folk hero to millions of American Catholics in the late 1950s. Shilts describes the U.S. Navy's frenzied investigation of Dooley's sexuality while Dooley was on the American lecture circuit in early 1956, promoting Deliver Us from Evil , the best-selling, highly embellished account of his role in the Navy's 1954 "Operation Passage to Freedom," which transplanted over 600,000 Catholics from North Vietnam to the new regime of Ngo Dinh Diem in the South. Fearing a scandal that would diminish its own prestige, the Navy hounded Dooley into confessing his homosexuality following a campaign of surveillance and perhaps entrapment by Office of Naval Intelligence operatives who bugged Dooley's phone and eavesdropped on his hotel room conversations.

After leaving the navy, Dooley went to Laos to establish medical clinics and hospitals under the sponsorship of the International Rescue Committee. Dooley founded the Medical International Cooperation Organization (MEDICO) under the auspices of which he built hospitals. During this same time period he wrote two books, The Edge of Tomorrow and The Night They Burned the Mountain about his experience in Laos.

In 1959 Dooley returned to the United States for cancer treatment; he died in 1961 from malignant melanoma. Following his death John F. Kennedy cited Dooley's example when he launched the Peace Corps. He was also awarded a Congressional Gold Medal posthumously. There have been efforts following his death to have him canonized as a Roman Catholic saint.

1927 – Eartha Kitt (d.2008) was an American singer, actress, and cabaret star. She was perhaps best known for her highly distinctive singing style and her 1953 hit recordings of "C'est Si Bon" and the enduring Christmas novelty smash "Santa Baby". Orson Welles once called her the "most exciting woman in the world." She took over the role of Catwoman for the third and final season of the 1960s Batman television series, replacing Julie Newmar, who was unavailable due to other commitments. She also voiced Yzma on Disney's The Emperor's New Groove and its television spinoff, The Emperor's New School, earning five Emmy Awards in the process, the last shortly before her death.

Kitt became a vocal advocate for homosexual rights and publicly supported same-sex marriage, which she considered a civil right. She had been quoted as saying: "I support it [gay marriage] because we're asking for the same thing. If I have a partner and something happens to me, I want that partner to enjoy the benefits of what we have reaped together. It's a civil-rights thing, isn't it?" Kitt famously appeared at many LGBT fundraisers, including a mega event in Baltimore, Maryland, with George Burns and Jimmy James. Scott Sherman, an agent at Atlantic Entertainment Group, stated: "Eartha Kitt is fantastic... appears at so many LGBT events in support of civil rights."

1956 – The poet Allen Ginsberg wrote his intensely personal anti-war, love-hate poem "America" on this date. He later published it in his collection "Howl." It is one of the first poems to deal openly and honestly with homosexuality. "America "is a largely political work, with much of the poem consisting of various accusations against the United States, its government, and its citizens.

Ginsberg uses sarcasm to accuse America of a ttempting to divert responsibility for the Cold War ("America you don't want to go to war/ it's them bad Russians / Them Russians them Russians and them Chinamen. / And them Russians"), and makes numerous references to both leftist and anarchist political movements and figures (including Sacco and Vanzetti , the Scottsboro Boys and the Wobblies). Ginsberg's dissatisfaction, however, is tinged with optimism and hope, as exemplified by phrases like "When will you end the human war?" (as opposed to "why don't you...?"). The poem's ending is also highly optimistic, a promise to put his "queer shoulder to the wheel," although the original draft ended on a bleaker note: "Dark America! toward whom I close my eyes for prophecy, / and bend my speaking heart! / Betrayed! Betrayed!"

1962 – Today's the birthday of Tony-award winning American actor and singer Denis O'Hare. He came out as gay during high school.

O'Hare won a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Play for his performance in Richard Greenberg's Take Me Out, where his character's lengthy monologues in which he slowly falls in love with the game of baseball were considered the main reason for his award. He also won the 2005 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Musical for his role as Oscar Lindquist in the Broadway revival of Sweet Charity.

In 2004 he played Charles J. Guiteau in the Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim's Assassins, for which he was nominated for the Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical Tony Award. He appeared on Broadway in the 1998 revival of Cabaret. He has appeared as a guest star on several episodes of Law & Order and Brothers & Sisters. His feature film credits include 21 Grams, Garden State, Derailed, Michael Clayton, A Mighty Heart, Half Nelson, and Milk. In 2007, he appeared in the film Charlie Wilson's War. In 2009 O'Hare portrayed Phillip Steele (an amalgam character based on Quentin Crisp's friends Phillip Ward and Tom Steele) in the television biopic on Quentin Crisp, An Englishman in New York. In 2011 he starred as Larry Harvey in the FX series American Horror Story and was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie.

O'Hare married his partner, Hugo Redwood, on July 28, 2011 in New York.

1975 – Tom Dolby is an American novelist, essayist, journalist, and editor. He is the author of the best-selling novel The Trouble Boy (2004), The Sixth Form (2008), and the Secret Society books, including Secret Society (2009) and The Trust: A Secret Society Novel (2011). He was also the co-editor of Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys (2007).

Tom Dolby's debut novel, The Trouble Boy, concerns a young gay freelance writer in Manhattan. It was followed by the boarding school novel The Sixth Form (2008), set in an elite Massachusetts prep school. Dolby's first young adult novel, Secret Society, was published in October 2009. Its followup, The Trust: A Secret Society Novel, was released in February 2011.

He was also the co-editor, with the novelist Melissa de la Cruz, of the personal essay anthology Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys: True Tales of Love, Lust, and Friendship Between Straight Women and Gay Men (2007), featuring works by various gay writers. A reality television show inspired by the anthology, entitled Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys aired on the Sundance Channel in Winter 2010.

He currently lives in Manhattan and Wainscott, New York. In June 2008, his engagement to Andrew Frist was announced. Dolby and Frist were legally married in Connecticut in April 2009, and celebrated their union with a wedding ceremony and reception for family and friends in Sonoma, California in September 2009. Dolby and Frist were involved in an appeal that raised over $150,000 towards efforts to promote the legalisation of same-sex marriage in California.

1986 – Hale Appleman is an American actor. He is known for playing Tobey Cobb in the 2007 film Teeth and Eliot in the television fantasy series The Magicians.

Appleman's credits on stage include the revival of Streamers at the Roundabout Theater Company, Clifford Odets' Paradise Lost at the American Repertory Theater, and the New York premiere of Sarah Ruhl's Passion Play as Jesus. In 2011, he played Bob in Moonchildren at the Berkshire Theatre Festival, and can be heard on the L.A. Theatre Works recording of Sam Shepard's Buried Child. Appleman was seen at The Old Globe Theater as Mercutio in The Last Goodbye.

Appleman played Zach on the NBC musical drama series Smash. He made his film debut in Beautiful Ohio and portrayed cartoonist Judd Winick in Pedro. His other credits include Mercutio in Private Romeo, the short film Oysters Rockefeller, and The Magicians, a TV series based on the novel of the same name by Lev Grossman, on which he has played the magician Eliot since 2015.

Appleman has said that he is "definitely not straight" and identifies as queer.

Ryan Russell (L) with Corey O'Brien

1992 – Ryan Russell is an American former professional football player who was a defensive end in the National Football League (NFL) for the Dallas Cowboys and Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He played college football at Purdue University.

Following the death of close friend and former teammate Joseph Gilliam in 2018, Russell suffered from a severe bout of depression. He moved to Los Angeles and began writing.

In August 2019, he came out publicly as bisexual in an essay for ESPN. He did so to live honestly and without fear of being outed; he also cited the fear of not being able to support his mother and grandfather if he lost his career. At the same time he introduced his boyfriend Corey O'Brien, a dancer; they opened Corey & Russ, a YouTube channel; as of June 2020, they have over 15,600 followers.

A former NFL offensive lineman Ryan O'Callaghan, who came out as gay after he left the league, said that as of August 2019 every NFL team had at least one closeted gay or bisexual player. Sarah McBride, national Press Secretary for Human Rights Campaign, praised Russell for "creating more space and opportunity for young LGBTQ people to dream big and to pursue their goals".

In April 2021, Russell penned an article in The Guardian against the anti-trans laws being proposed in multiple American states, stating that "sport is one of the strongest conduits to help show society what it is capable of when we come together, but it has to be used for the better of all of us."

2009 – In a New York Times op-ed column on this date, Mary Frances Berry, the chair of the Commission On Civil Rights from 1993-2004, called for the "abolishing" of the commission she headed for 11 years and its replacement with one that will fully address LGBT rights. She wrote:

"The Commission on Civil Rights has been crippled since the Reagan years by the appointments of commissioners who see themselves as agents of the presidential administration rather than as independent watchdogs. The creation of a new, independent human and civil rights commission could help us determine our next steps in the pursuit of freedom and justice in our society. A number of explosive issues like immigration reform await such a commission, but recommendations for resolving the controversies over the rights of Gays, Lesbians and Transgendered people should be its first order of business."

[mimikyu-oli]

FNAF AUs List

You Walk Another Line series:

1) An Imposter Case au:

Heights

Synopsis

3) Rebranded Case au:

What is Lucas?

---

Three Threads for the Fourth au:

Elizabeth's timeline

William's timeline

Michael's timeline

4th timeline:

First birth

Morning of the first day

The Lost Future. (spoilers)

Beings: Dr. Hippo and Madame Automate

The Maestro

Mitchel's personality

Masquerade

---

I Am Sheltering A Human-Size Racoon au:

Ethan Bennett

Cassendra Bennett

Who is Cassendra

Zorro

Allen

Lewis

Dorothy McMallan

Koda Evergreen

Jacob Bennett

Esteban's confort foods

Residents

Head cannon generator: Ethan

What is in the attic: poll

Esteban and her friends in a girls all-nighter hangout.

The House

Datthing

---

Memories of the Neighbor's House au:

Synopsis

Lucius Mortimer

Jess

Josh

Evelyn Mortimer

Edmund Mortimer

Ann Viceroy

Jeremy Viceroy

Rosa Brooks

Darius Brooks

---

You Didn't Think You Would Be Him Right? au:

---

After the Frights au:

After the Frights List

Alone with the ghost of the past.

Ask answer

Sea Bonnies? More like Sea Fraud!: the base

---

Solitude among others (Lonely Freddy):

Synopsis

---

Backtracker Nightguard au:

Synopsis

Synopsis 2

This guy

---

Grave Dinner au:

Synopsis

Michael great unmasking

Employees

---

Ghostly Bonding au:

Synopsis

Synopsis 2

---

Cleaved Together au:

Synopsis

---

The Bearer of Thread au:

Synopsis

---

Hey there, Mudman! au:

Synopsis

Ask answer

---

A Goo-ly Situation au:

Synopsis

---

Blue Reversion au:

Synopsis

---

In fact I was pointing at a mirror au:

Synopsis

---

He was always the fifth au:

Synopsis

---

As the Counselor Suggest au:

Synopsis

Synopsis 2

Ideas of William’s deaths!

---

Bonus:

Michael's friend possessing a Funtime

Michael possess Helpy and goes back in time

C.C. gets kidnaped

C.C. time traveled

Forced Bonding au

See you in another time au

Frights Hotel

this is weird

Immortalization Wasn't Expected au

Truck-kun had hit again.

Congratulation! You're a father now! au

Michael gets in the past and more

Siamese twin Michael?

Simulation

The Frights investiguators

A life for a life. A wraith for a breath.

Jeff

Michael taking William’s place

Sequestration

[destiny-in-the-universe]

RC9GN Role Swap AU

This is a very standard age/role swap AU but uh, with a twist because I'm extra like that! So, for starters we do have Randy and the First Ninja switching roles right from the get-go (as that's kind of what this idea is meant to be about-)

Also fair warning, this is an extremely long post-

But okay, let's start with the obvious- the characters that get swapped are literally just Randy -> First Ninja and Howard -> Plop Plop/Hinata. As for the rest of the canons, like Norrisville High students- I don't think they're necessarily being swapped but they might just be from a different time period hahah. McFist, Viceroy, and the Sorcerer (alongside the Sorceress) are still the main antagonists and villains because there's no way I'm coming up with entirely new enemies right now-

Now, onto Finja because he is the title lead!

His entire family, and they are a big family, are immigrants from Japan. They moved to Norrisville after a promotion at one the jobs Finja's parents work at- which leads to the move and Finja is not exactly happy to be there because he thinks Norrisville is a Speck of Odd(TM)

The closest equivalent I could find to the rest of his family still being something similar to ninjas is by, well, having his parents run a dojo- it's honestly massive tradition for their kids (and they literally have nine of them) to train at the dojo. Finja is one of the youngest in his family, so he's about to start being a freshman at Norrisville High. The weird timeline has them moving in early/mid May and classes start around September

Finja's not vibing with anything in the town, so he's kind of not really made friends with anyone- except for a boy in his block named Hinata who just decided to speak to him one day and didn't leave. Within a month or two of him arriving, Finja receives the mask and the Nomicon- making him the Ninja of Norrisville. He's not fully happy with this, but since he was thrust into the role- and it's now his responsibility, he decides to accept. Thankfully, his parents having the dojo helps him adjust with being the Ninja

Now Finja has... the shortest level of patience one has ever seen- he's a fast learner, at least, and always makes sure to do what's right but he's very short-tempered. He's also known for his disregard of following certain rules, purely out of the intent to prove his own worth. Unlike OG Randy however, he understands the lessons a little faster but still struggles at times because he's... literally fourteen but moving on-

Much like canon, McFist and Viceroy make their debut appearance on the first day Finja attends Norrisville High- and Finja has less patience dealing with a whole rampaging robot than Randy does, and that's even with the fact Randy loved being the Ninja

Shenanigans continue taking place as you would expect from the show, but at some point- we have the shift from McFist and Viceroy to the Sorcerer taking center stage and Finja is probably about to go fucking feral. I want to say that there's a parallel episode to 13th Century Ninja in this role swap AU where Finja goes back and officially meets Randy- because if I can't have mentor-mentee with canon, I will have it here!

So, then we have Randy and Howard-

Things branch off after this where Randy is quite literally, an ageless being that currently resides in the Nomicon (not that Finja's aware of this until much later-), and Howard, uh- is more gray area and I don't want to reveal too much but let's just say that Howard is permanently linked to the tengu! You'll find out what tha means later, but neither Randy nor Howard are normal- if it isn't because of the fact they're literally immortal and connected to the Nomicon, it's also since they are the weirdest flavor of queer one has ever seen

Similar to OG Finja, Randy was part of this smaller clan that would protect various towns, villages, and areas from monsters and the Sorcerer, but of course- all of it ended in tragedy. Left the sole survivor, Randy sobered out after a while but still did his part until eventually something went a little south and he was soul-bound to the nomicon he made

Leaving the rest vague because I am mean and, well, it'll all be revealed later. (today's literally become of a question of how many more au's will i be making until i get sick and tired of making them- the answer is all of them /lh)

but okay, so- the Sorcerer is much more of a threat because I will be as self indulgent with this AU as I can, and i just want this to be slightly more serious! Also, there might be more 'seasons' depending on the direction I want to take with the verse!

Though to keep going-

This role swap isn't strictly an age/role-swap! What this literally means is I might genuinely be imploring my own lore when it comes to Finja's entire family- and the fact I have to make them actual characters for this, so

I am personally of the belief that the Norisu clan are tied to back to the origins of the Ninja- (and if this purely about referencing how I do believe Randy's a descendant somehow, I have no idea what you're talking about-) but also, I sort of?? wanted to make something with the rest of Finja's siblings though I'm not entirely sure what that's going to be yet since it may contradict canon (however this is an AU and I will write this how I want to hahah)

Anyway,

Some More Infodumping + Headcanons

Finja has literally no interest in the Sorceress but due to how Sorcerer in Love works- something will likely happen anyway. The First Ninja just feels ace-coded, so he's not crushing on her; however due to plot reasons, he's kind of going to go through it anyway

Despite Hinata being the parallel to Howard, they're obviously different character-wise. Hinata worries constantly over Finja but he also acknowledges there was a reason he got chosen and, well, I have plans

Is Hinata also going to be linked to the tengu? Maybe- despite Howard being perma-bound to the tengu, this doesn't mean others can't also be linked. There's... lore for this but I have to be careful with what I say for now

I think I might do a parallel episode to Nomirandy-

We'll see what more I can come up with later to be honest! I don't have much else right now, and the constant brainrot has me wanting to write another thing soon-

[josefavomjaaga]

Elie Baudus about Murat's departure in Posen, 1813

Once more Elie Baudus, former aide-de-camp to Marshal Bessières, in the second volume of his "Etudes sur Napoléon". (Another snippet is here.) This time it’s about Murat deserting leaving the army at Posen in January 1813. I was wondering how Bessières and his staff reacted to this news, especially as Elie makes it sound as if they were there at the time.

Headquarters left Elbing on 11 January to take up residence in Posen. When it reached that town, the King of Naples immediately announced that he was leaving the army on account of his health, either because he was really ill or because his indisposition was due solely to his anxiety about what might happen in his states, during his absence, in the political situation in which Europe was about to find itself. All that could be said to him about the impropriety of taking such a step without the emperor's consent could do nothing to change his mind; he handed over command to the viceroy and left for his capital.

What Elie possibly does not know or at least does not write: Murat had asked for permission to leave the army at least twice, admitting himself that the task was beyond him, and apparently had never even received a reply from Napoleon. And of course it would be interesting to know if Bessières was among those who tried to talk Murat out of his idea and to make him stay on his post, and how Murat reacted to these attempts.

Napoleon's departure had been applauded because the inflexible necessity which forced him to it was understood; [...]

That may be a bit of an exaggeration or generalisation. I understand there was quite some grumbling in the army (Oh, look, he’s pulling another Egyptian exit on us, etc.). Even Elie himself admits that the last remnants of military discipline broke down as soon as Napoleon was gone. There must have been a reason for that.

[…] Murat's departure, on the contrary, aroused strong indignation; this abandonment, in the situation in which the army found itself, was not noble, and it took no less than the great actions which he carried out a few months later at Dresden and Leipsick to weaken the irritation which this conduct had aroused against him in all ranks. Nothing can excuse such a mistake, for even if we consider it only from a political point of view it was enormous. If this prince feared for the preservation of his crown, should he not have considered that it was only within the French army that he could work effectively to consolidate it on his head? That was the key to the vault; if it was missing, it was obvious that all the stones of the edifice would crumble.

The talents and the firmness of character that Prince Eugène had recently displayed in this campaign had already won him the confidence and the attachment of the army; so there was more anger than regret at the news of the change in our general-in-chief. Marshal Bessières was happier than anyone else when it was announced that the emperor was definitively entrusting the viceroy with the power of which he had only been temporarily invested upon the departure of the king of Naples. What, for the Duke of Istria, was both the result of a long-standing attachment rooted in paternal feelings and deeply felt esteem, was dictated to the other chiefs by the latter motive. They all did their best to prove it to this young prince, and we will never forget the interesting spectacle offered by his salons in Posen in this respect. There was something touching about the marks of deference with which all these old glories of France surrounded him.

[Insert image of dozens of decorated army generals surrounding an 8-year-old: "You’ll get us out of this shit, right, little one?" - Eugène nodding very seriously: "Uh-huh."]

I would also like to point out that the young prince at the time was 31 years old, balding and loosing his teeth��� But it’s nice to see Bessières’ reaction to his "apprentice" being in charge now.

The viceroy must have been delighted; [...]

… yeah… guessing from the letters he wrote to Auguste … not really all that much ...

[…] it was a fine reward for all the great things he had already done; it was a powerful encouragement to persevere on the straight and honourable path he had adopted; so he did not deviate from it for a single moment until the last catastrophe of the great man who called him his son.

Uhm, Elie? I think Marmont and d’Anthouard would like to have a word with you.

Posterity will do him this justice, that his entire conduct completely justified the special attachment Napoleon always had for him; a true attachment, animating Napoleon's words, whenever he had to express himself officially on the subject of his adopted son, with an affectionate feeling never shown in favour of any other member of the imperial family.

The keyword in this passage is "officially". And the fact Elie adds it makes me wonder if he (or rather Bessières - or possibly Elie's father through Murat?) may have known about some of the private correspondence Napoleon sent to Eugène, and that treated his stepson quite differently.

It was not only with regard to Napoleon that the Viceroy's conduct was noble and worthy of admiration; even after the Restoration we saw him know how, without failing in the duties of filial piety, to satisfy at the same time those of a good Frenchman; for having come to Paris in 1814, when all the events had taken place, he soon realised that they were trying to abuse the attachment that the army had for him in order to disturb his homeland. He did not hesitate for a moment to make this cruel and painful sacrifice, so that his name would not be mixed up in the intrigues that have so tarnished the glory of some of his comrades in arms.

That’s the same thing Napoleon was disappointed about on Saint Helena, I presume, when he did not see anybody to lead the army and cause another uprising in his own favour.

[just-animaxiz]

RC9GN SHORT FIC - SPIKE

It's Saturday. Which means Gathering Week.

As two long, metallic arms stretched out in the air, the leader of both Punk Bots and Scrap City rose from his bed and yawned. Feeling a bit stiff, he rose one shoulder and rotated his arm around 360 degrees, before he set it down and did the same to the other.

Spike then stood up from his flat, hard, iron bed - the one he's so well used to lying for a while. Right across the room, on the opposite side of his room, is a mirror with his newly sewn red vest hanging off the top corner. The leader walked past the mirror, his reflection showing a neutral but determined expression.

At the exit of his room, Spike's door is decorated with dozens of pictures, ripped magazines, and target signs of Hannibal McFist and The Ninja. Additionally, there are rubber cables used for exercising and a handle bar glue above, useful for doing standing pull ups. Spike usually practiced on Tuesdays for that. He paid no mind, however, as he just opened the door and headed left towards the bathroom.

On his way, Spike passed by the room where his buddies, Thorn and Skewer, resided. Without stopping, he rose one arm and knocked three times, alarming the two brothers to wake up. As expected, Skewer was always the first to open, first looking for Spike before stating, "Mornin'." Spike only waved one hand in response, "Mornin' - It's Gathering Week tonight. Get Thorn's ass off."

--

10:30

30 minutes of getting ready for the meeting, Spike and his two brothers walked down the streets of Scrap City.

Well, not Street per se, but a pathway.

While walking, A small elf robot came up to the tall leader, "Spike, boss! My friend needs a hexagonal bolt and an extra wire to reconnect the left leg movement!"

"I'll keep in mind - Use the crutches as a substitute in the meantime." Without hesitation, Spike answered with ease. The elf nodded and rushed back, just as a robo-ape walked beside the three, "We're out of oil and my fists are getting stiff from walking."

"Stop walking and we'll get it here by tomorrow morning."

"Thank you." THUMP. The bot then fell, followed by a couple of robots that carried him off to safety.

Spike, Thorn, and Skewer finally arrived at the meeting area. The meeting area, in question, is a broken circular table with McFist's dumb face plastered on the cover. Luckily, other robots had their time drawing doodles on his face so that it'd be less of an eye sore to stare at it. Surrounding the tables are other groups discarded by McFist.

The only one's not present is Dale, whose memory shall be remembered as he's off in a more friendly care. By who? I don't know.

At the presence of their leader, the robots surrounding the table stopped whatever they're doing and watched Skewer and Thorn set down a large blueprint.

"Alright, mates - Listen up. During our last heist, intel told us McFist is raising the security here downtown." Spike explained, grabbing a rusty pole and pointing the tip at the area known for every "Mc-Fist" businesses. "Our job is to head somewhere were more equipment are stored."

Spike then pulled the pole away, giving a little twirl before pointing it at a robo-ape with a broken arm, "You. You're scrapped here since last Friday night by McFist. Any insights?"

"Yes - Mcfist is having a birthday party for his wife, Marci, and he'll be gone for a couple of days. Meanwhile, Viceroy is storing the spare equipments at one of the secret units, to which McFist shared it to me to "remember.""

"Seriously?" A cowboy bot interrupted, tilting his broken hat up by this revelation, "He told you to remember it but you're scrapped here?"

"He also told me and other robo-apes to destroy The Ninja."

Everyone in the table groaned, letting out rants and babbling about the Ninja; however, a smack on the table startled them silent, turning their gazes at a darkened silhouette of Spike.

His eyes, looming bright yellow, indicated a sign for them to know the rules, "Remember rule number 1 - We don't talk about the Ninja in this city!"

The bots nodded in fear, and Spike took a moment to breathe in and out. Once he's calm and his silhouette lightened, his tone changed, "We only talk if the Ninja's around the area we're gonna steal or he's very active lately. He's the reason why McFist created us and McFist is the reason why we're here. We don't want any loose distractions on Gathering Week, don't we?"

They nodded again.

"Very well - Now continue." Spike then looked back at the robo-ape with the broken arm.

"Ahem - So McFist is heading out and Viceroy placed the equipments in this storage." He then pointed to the area up north, far from Down Town, "It's right near to the bookstore."

"Perfect." Spike smirked, "And the Ninja?"

"While fighting, I heard that the Ninja is going on a day-off for a moment. I think that's because of what happened a month ago."

Right. A month ago, word got around that a mysterious entity known as "The Sorcerer" managed to invade Norrisville High. Spike didn't know, but he very well remembered the sight of green mist above the city from afar. It looked like a toxic exploding mushroom to him, and boy is he glad the schedule's moved later that day.

But now everything's back to normal, and the residents of Scrap City are back at their gathering game.

"Alright - So we're on the clear for today. We need a total of 45, and that means we don't have heavy loaders. Got it, mates?" Spike explained, and everyone agreed in favor.

---

Later that night.

Three Punk Bots climbed up a heap of cars, carefully gripping hold and making sure they don't hear any creaks.

"Don't you think it's kinda dumb for McFist to dump all cars like this, ey, bruh?" Thorn, the yellow Punk Bot, spoke up amongst the grunting. He kicked his left foot against a stiff rock, then raised his arm to hold onto the corner of a crushed minivan. His arm let out small squeaks, reminding Thorn of his early damages, but he paid no mind.

"If anything's right in that man's head," Skewer, the green Punk Bot, grunted as he gave himself a little jump before climbing upwards, "It's that his ego overloaded his intelligence!"

The two shared a laugh, followed by a quiet chuckle from Spike. They already knew he find it funny despite his attempts to resist it. They knew him better than himself, including his taste for humour. A good McFist roast gets him going, even with all the pressure of being the leader of Scrap City and the only one who has the biggest hate on McFist.

Once the trio made it to the top, they jumped from the tip of the heap to the border. All three's circuits jumped as their feet nearly pushed deep to the edge, but luckily they held each other back and sighed.

"Ok, remember - Distract anyone who gets too close and destroy any cameras on sight." Spike warned, followed by two nods. Skewer turned to his side and tied a rope, letting one end down.

It's go time.

---

In Norrisville, late at night, the three invaders sped in the shadows, turning to alleyways when streetlights are on and running out when it feels like total darkness. Occasionally, Spike would raise his hand to halt, and he pulled out the blueprint to make sure they're on the right track. He traced his finger on the path they chose, and with a few calculations, he pointed right. Spike then tucked the paper away and without a doubt, the three continued their run.

"So sad we can't meet the Ninja again..." Thorn sighed quietly, "I really wanted to ask him about his adventures 800 years ago!" The three coordinated Spike's moves as they jumped over fences, dodged trash cans, and pressed themselves as the wall as they tip-toed underneath light windows.

"Can you stop hoping karma, Thorn? You don't need the Ninja to solve every question you have." Skewer argued, also quietly, before the three turned to a corner and ran across closed stores. While dashing, Spike grabbed a rock and successfully threw it on a rotating camera stuck on a streetlight. With that much momentum, the camera spun around due to the hit and fell on the ground.

"But you gotta be curious too, don't ya Skewer? You told me that last night!"

"I was groggy - And I only say it to shut your trap!"

"(Gasp) Liar!"

"Will you two - STOP -"

The two immediately froze, as Spike blocked their drift forward. They looked in front to see a construction area, filled with cement, machines, and signs that warned them explicitly to turn around and go the other way. Inbetween the signs are lasers, and with a glance around, Spike could see sleeping cameras on the corner of the area.

"Crap," Skewer cursed, "If we go this way, we'll trigger some kind of alarm. We'll take another route. This will make gathering more difficult on the way back."

Spike snarled, clenching his fists. Why does the big man always make things harder for him?! Humans always treat robots like him as if they're nothing. THEY ARE SOMETHING. THEY HAVE FEELINGS AND SO DOES HE. HE WON'T BE SCRAPPED ANYMORE.

No cage can lock us away.......

Release the rage......

Explode in thunder.....

"Huh?" Spike shook his head, confused and stammering. Everything became a white noise until he stopped shaking, and he turned to Skewer, "What did you say, Skewer?"

"I said we can go to the Game Hole. The storage is just in the back, and then we'll take a shortcut over there." Skewer explained, almost sounding concern at Spike's reaction, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah... Let's just go."

The three turned and ran down to an alternate route.

---

At their new pathway, the three robots scurried towards Greg's Game Hole, and they abruptly stopped once more when their robotic lens caught sight of a truck. Without a thought, Spike gestured Skewer and Thorn to duck and find another way, but just as he's about to follow them.

"Hello? Someone there?"

Crap! Only by a second near the corner, someone caught a glimpse of Spike. He glanced back and saw the figure walking forward, getting close to their area. The leader scanned around before spotting a box conveniently filled with clothes fitted for him. He removed his red vest, which is a very clear icon on who he is, and tossed in the bag.

"What are you doing?" Skewer questioned with gritted teeth, to which the red bot responded in a hushed tone, "You two go get the equipment. I'll distract whoever caught us! Now go!"

Spike grabbed a green coat, a black mask, and a crimson scarf before grabbing the box and shoving it to Skewer. With no futher questions, the two quickly turned away and ran.

"Hey, someone there?" Spike turned around and... Oh no...

Not him.

Spike stared back at the blue eyes of a teenage boy, wearing a green jacket over a red shirt and black pants. His purple hair, noticeable from afar, made a clear silhouette.

"Uhhh..." Spike cleared his throat and slacked over, trying not to straighten himself up for the incredible and strange height difference between the two, "I'm good... Just walking at night."

"Oooh.. Sorry about that! I thought I saw something quickly hiding over the corner like they don't want to be caught!" Randy chuckled, but gradually turning to an awkward laugh when Spike didn't follow along with him.

"Ahem... Um... I gotta go get back... To my night shift." Randy pointed to the Game Hole and walked down, which made Spike confused.

"Work? At night?"

"Yeah, it's called a night shift! I'm only doing this for today because I need to save up money!" Randy responded, walking into the store before backing up, holding a trolley with an arcade machine on board. Spike walked towards him, hoping to stall enough time, "Why?"

Randy stopped and stared at him. Then he pondered, "Hmmm... Well, if you help me then I can tell you!" He chimed, smiling with a smug look. This gave Spike a chuckle and he nodded, "Sure, kid."

----

"Wait, you're going to what with who?" Spike asked, lifting up one side of an air hockey table while Randy held the other side opposite from him.

"Well, there's this competition happening near Norrisville. It's about talented gymnastics fighting to the death with twirling batons and pom poms! Well, not to the death, per se, but more like a competition! See, there's this pretty girl there - Who I mean, totally is my girlfriend but she's really amazing but - I mean!" Randy stammered, clearing his throat mid-way before continuing, "She's going there to compete and I wanted to save enough money for me to go and watch her game! I would ask my friend, but he's off on a vacation with his parents, unfortunately."

They carried the table to the truck and placed it to the left side. Randy scooted over the table and made his way back to Spike, "It's really expensive, so I took up a couple of jobs to earn some cash! It's the bruce!"

Spike walked beside him to get the last arcade machine, "I see... That must've been hard work."

"Eh - I had worse..." Randy muttered, not noticing Spike's raised brow beneath the hood, "I mean, I had worse jobs before! It's terrible, but I learned my lessons! For example, there's this product called The McStachlé"

Oh no...

Not this.

Spike remembered it well, secretly cringing at his debut spot.

He and his buddies were made by Viceroy to attack the Mcstachlé store at its grand opening. The reason? Guess.

When they failed, Viceroy set up a back-up plan which is to fused the three of them into a larger robot made out of McStachlé material. Why did they fail again?

Well, it turns out that McFist needed to low costs so he had the regular zippers than indestructible zippers.

The Ninja defeated the bots, and they're taken to Scrap City.

That was the most embarrassing and worst day of Spike's life.

"I'm not exactly fond of those things. Don't you think they're ridiculous?"

"Well, it nearly costed me and my friend's friendship, so maybe yeah? But they're really cool, though!"

The two finally stopped in front of a machine, coated in red, orange, yellow and black. A title smeared on the top and bottom covers of the machine, with a depiction of a rather horrifying beast with horns and tusks. Spike narrowed his eyes to read the dirty title, "The Roar of the Oni."

Oni? Spike heard Thorn mentioned it a while ago, due to his excitement and love for Japanese culture.

"Yeah. Those big burly red guys with horns and a club? I think they're yōkai, according to my studies. I heard stories that they actually come from another realm. Isn't that scary?" Randy asked, then he noticed Spike staring at the machine with a hypnotic gaze.

Spike's eyes scanned at his reflection, as though he is another version of himself beneath the hoodie, mask, and scarf. He saw himself, dawn in an orange scarf covering his mouth, decorated with fangs. His eyes glaring yellow, glowing in the dark. He felt rain tapping his shoulders, getting harder and faster when his emotions boiled harder.

Suddenly..

BAM!

Spike jumped, hearing a mix of something unusual. Is it thunder? He turned around and spot a tall lanky man with a short brown bob, and a thin stache on his face. He had one hand holding a door knob, indicating he just closed the door.

"Randy? Who's your friend? Did you get everything loaded?" The man asked, putting on his groovy light jacket.

"Oh, he's just helping me carry the heavy stuff, Greg!" Randy chuckled, then he looked up at Spike, "Hey I didn't get your name, though..."

Spike switched between them, then he cleared his throat and pulled his hoodie down to shadow his features, "Uh... I'm just a friend, but I have to go. I think I'm late for... Curfew."

With his poor excuse, Spike rushed out of the Game Hole, quickly dashing out of the scene. Randy stared at him with confusion, and a hint of sadness.

"Hmm... At first glance, I thought he looked like the Ninja!" Greg said in the midst of silence, "But he looked too tall to be one."

---

At the destination, Spike removed his disguise and tossed them to the dump, then he turned to the storage area where he saw Skewer and Thorn in a truck.

"Where did you get the truck?" Spike asked, climbing aboard. Thorn, who used to be in the passenger seat, made space in the back which fits cozy for him.

"Oh, we just randomly found it!" He perked up with a response, and Spike put on his seatbelt.

"How's the distraction?" Skewer asked, glancing at Spike. Spike took a moment, glancing at himself on the side view mirror. He could've sworn he saw the other reflection staring back, but he turned to answer.

"It's nothing.... Just drive."

Skewer pressed the gears and drove forward, "Well, we got intel that it's going to rain soon, so we grabbed some extra for shelther."

---

The Creeper stood in the dark, his orange hair and cowboy hat dimmed beneath the shut down street lamps.

He raised his eyes at the moving truck, knowing who he's referring to as he spoke. The entity wearing red, with a soul waiting to be released within

"Live your life the best you can, but soon, you're more than nothing in this journey. See ya around.... Oni."

[scotianostra]

On 20th November 1863 James Bruce, 8th Lord Elgin, the Scottish Liberal statesman and diplomat, died.

James Bruce was born in London, his father, the 7th Earl was a controversial figure due to his involvement in the “procurement/theft” of the Parthenon Marbles, to give them their traditional name, you might know them as The Elgin Marbles, anyway I digress again, back to the 8th Earl.

In 1840, following the death of his elder brother, he became the heir to the earldom and in 1841, on the death of his father, succeeded to the title, becoming the eighth earl of Elgin. That same year he was elected Southampton's representative in the House of Commons, but his new earldom brought an end to his parliamentary career. In 1842, he accepted the nomination for governor of Jamaica. During an administration of four years he succeeded in winning the respect of all[. He improved the condition of the Afro-Caribbean workers, and conciliated the white planters by working through them. He remained in this post until 1847. His successful administration led to him being offered the role of governor general in British North America, which he fulfilled between 1847 and 1854. During his time there, Elgin took the first steps in establishing a “responsible government” in Canada.

This led to him becoming the first Canadian governor to distance himself from legislative affairs, leaving the real power of government to the elected representatives of the people and paving the way for the Canadian general governorship's essentially symbolic role today.

In 1857 as High Commissioner to China. While visiting China and Japan in 1858 and 1859, he oversaw the end of the Second Opium War but in doing so he ordered the destruction of the Old Summer Palace (the ruling Qing dynasty's residence and seat of government), near Peking (today Beijing),destroying thousands of priceless works of art, in order to intimidate the emperor and force him to sign an unratified treaty. Troops hurriedly looted the imperial collections in the palace, before the Old Summer Palace finished burning. The treaty ended up with China being forced to cede what became Hong Kong, to Britain in “perpetuity“

According to historian Olive Checkland, Lord Elgin "was ambivalent about the British imperial policy of forcing trade on the peoples in China and Japan. He deplored what he called the 'commercial ruffianism' which effectively determined British policy responses."

In a letter to his wife, in regard to the bombing of Canton, he wrote, "I never felt so ashamed of myself in my life."

It all leaves a bad taste in my mouth I deplore the British Empire and all it’s sins it inflicted on the world.

He subsequently became postmaster-general in the Palmerston cabinet and in 1862 was made viceroy of India. He died in He subsequently became postmaster-general in the Palmerston cabinet and in 1862 was made viceroy of India.

He died in Dharmsalas, Punjab of a heart attack while crossing a swinging rope on this day 1863, while still in office, he is buried in the churchyard of St. John in the Wilderness in Dharamshala. Bruce's legacy is several areas of Canada and India have the names Elgin or Bruce, he also has a bridge ion Singapore and a street in Victoria, Australia, and Hong Kong named after him.

While China has opened up to French relations, the sale of Chinese art and artifacts in British auctions remains a point of tension between London and Beijing. All zodiac animal heads from the Summer Palace that have been found have returned to Chinese museums, however.

[realtyhubph-blog]

Pacific Residences Unit 115 Foreclosed Condo

Foreclosed 1 bed at Pacific Residences, Taguig City now selling for only Php1,936,300.00

📌Unit 115, G/F, Victoria Building, Pacific Residences, Brgy. Ususan, Taguig City Property Features Located at the Ground Floor Floor Area: 22.78 sqm 1 Bed, 1 Bath AS-IS-WHERE-IS Basis Complete property documents About Pacific Residences A master-planned development influenced by the stylish architecture of Victorian San Francisco, offering different enclaves. Pacific Residences is…

[artbyfemme]

Sofonisba Anguissola🧑🏻‍🎨

1532 -1625. Italy/Spain (above is a self portrait)

Sofonisba Anguissola was an Italian Renaissance Mannerist Painter born in Cremona, Northern Italy. Her family was a poor noble family of Greek decent who supported their children’s talents. Sofonisba had 5 sisters, Elena, Lucia, Europa, Anna Maria, and Minerva, and 1 brother, Asdrubale. 4 of her sisters became artists like her, Elena, who became a nun and stopped painting, Anna Marie and Europe gave up art after marriage, and Lucia died young. Minerva became a writer and Latin scholar, her brother studied music and Latin.

When Sofonisba was 14 she apprenticed with Bernardino Campi before he left. After that she studied with Bernardino Gatti aka IlSojaro. At 22 Sofonisba went to Rome were she was mentored by Michelangelo (of Sistine Chapel fame). At 26 she was scouted by king Philip II of Spain to become court painter, lady in waiting and tutor to his 3rd wife, Elizabeth of Valois and her daughters Isabella Clara Eugenia and Catalina Micaela who were amateur artists. Sofonisba spent 14 years in residence in Madrid, Spain.

At almost 40ish Phillip decided that Sofonisba should get married. He provided her with a dowry and arranged a marriage with Fabrizio Mocada Pignatelli, son of the Viceroy of Sicily. He didn’t mind her painting and they were married until his death I 1579 of mysterious causes. During those times Sofonisba supported her remaining family and King Phillip gave her a pension of 100 ducats (maybe $15,000 US today)

After her husband’s death Sofonisba fell in love with a shops captain and sea merchant Orazio Lomellino. In 1620 they were married against her brother’s wishes. She had no kids with either of her husbands. As she got older she began to lose her vision and used her money to help other artists. She died in 1625 at 93 in Palermo.

There is a crater in Mercury names Anguissola after her.

(Below is elderly Sofonisba from 1619 on the right is Sofonisba c.1560 both are self portraits)

Source for info and images is Wikipedia

[rainbowdelicsunshine]

Is there any music you associate with your TF2 Au? Like songs for scenes, characters, or just the overall vibe?

WOOP WOOP WERE IN FOR A LONG RIDE MY SWEET FRIEND!!!!!!!!!!

I'll be talking about my Respawn Children (TF2 NG) AU for this prompt!

I'll also be making mini playlists for each of my characters for it and the vibe of the AU since those'll be easiest for me to do!

Madeline Mundy

Tourniquet - Evanescence

Stinkfist - TOOL

Ode to Viceroy - Mac DeMaro

FASHION (Slowed) - Britney Manson

WHOAMI - wydrob

Natasha Ludwig

Weird Science - Oingo Boingo

Pemex - Fat Nick & Shakewell

Psycho Teddy (German Version) - Psycho Teddy

Constantinople - The Residents

Mad Professor - Insane Clown Posse

Abby Baxter

Fever for the Flava - Hot Action Cop

Sticky Rice - Lil Gnar

KEEP UP (Slowed and Reverb) - Odetari

Destroyer - Static X

Bouncin Back - Mystikal

June Doe

Can U Quack - The G.O.A.T AND YOUR M.O.M

That's my Kind of Night - Like Bryan

So What? - P!NK

Black Horse and a Cherry Tree - KT Tunstall

Upside Down - Jack Johnson

Bruce DeGroot

Why Can't You See? - Jojo Kuo

Narwhals -MrWeebl

Every Morning - Sugar Ray

Neon Rainbows - Jasiah

Lithonia - Childish Gambino

Respawn Children Overall Vibes

IN MY HEAD! - SUPXR

RUN! (Slowed and Reverb) - Odetari & VALORANT (ft Lay Bankz)

HAYWIRE! - wydrob

Heist - Ben Folds

X-SLIDE - 2KE

-----------------------------------------------------------

Thank you oh so VERY much for sending this ask in, I've been DYING for asks about my Respawn Children AU and Characters, they've been a lot of fun to think about and ramble about on here!

Thank you and have a wonderful night my sweet friend!!

[teknikolor-walters]

Cicaderation field guide!!

Cicada Walters (any/xhey/web/hunt + bird/wing) - Unsure if they're the original Cicada Walters, but they're the only onr left alive. They run H1VE with their two girlfriends, Jessica and PR1ZE. Kind of a hubristic shithead and will just straight up manipulate you but it's okay she's trying her best <3

C.W. Baker / Cicada Walters-Baker (Cicada's prns) - Cicada from about 8 years in the future. They're very similar to current timeline Our Boy Does Not Change. They're like an older brother to Cicada. He originally came to this timeline to help with the H1VE / Elijah war and after that stopped he would just pop in for minor corrections. The H1VE jimmy situation didn't happen in her timeline.

Scarab Walters-Baker (they/she + yee/haw) - Was a soldier for the flinchites, then was a soldier for OVER, and is now a cowboy and H1VE's resident medic. When they aren't at h1ve they live on their farm with their silly little wives. She's miserable like all the time but she's getting better. Has chronic pain because of haw's days as a solider and uses a cane because of it.

Bug Townsend (they/she)- An iteration of Scarab that stayed behind with Castiel while the other one left. Well, they're the original Scarab, and the one that went home is a replacement, but nobody knows that except for her and Cas. She's lost all of her memories of H1VE and is now "happily" married to Cas. They've been convinced that even if they tried to run H1VE wouldn't want them back.

Viceroy Walters (it/they)- Was forcefully iterated from Cicada without Cicada's knowledge by the Elijah council at the same time as Timema. Now has to work for the Elijah council or he dies. Stationed at OI with the OI Elijahs usually but also pops into OVER. The second bitchiest iteration, second only to Cicada Walters xhemself. Dating Timema.

Timema Walters (he/she) - The iteration that was iterated at the same time as Viceroy. Still playing WOE.BEGONE and is stationed at OI by them. He does consolidation experiments on insects when he isn't doing espionage. So, so tired all the time. Dating Viceroy.

Carabid "Cara" Mayfield (he/she) - An iteration that Timema made to try and escape WOE.BEGONE that ran off instead. He met a PR1TERATION named M3DAL and they're dating and living their stupid little beach bum life. She kills any iteration of herself that she meets out of paranoia that WOE.BEGONE will find her.

Not!Cicada / Cicada Walters (any/xhey/web/hunt + bird/wing)- Cicada from a timeline where instead of confronting PR1ZE in the woods the night they met him they ran off. Ever since then the universe has been trying to shove the two back together. They hate each other and tormenting his PR1ZE is one of the few things that brings him joy. If you thought our Cicada was an asshole she is so much worse.

[clearholidaysindia]

Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama Tourist Spot in Shimla,Himachal Pradesh

Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama in Shimla, Himachal Pradesh, is a peaceful retreat for those seeking spiritual growth and tranquility. Established in 2014 in buildings that once belonged to the Himalayan Brahmo Samaj, this ashrama is known for its calm atmosphere and modern facilities, providing a serene space for meditation and spiritual guidance. For travelers looking to explore beyond the usual tourist spots, there are several offbeat places near Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama that offer a unique glimpse into the rich culture and natural beauty of Shimla.

Among the many places to visit near Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama, one standout is the Viceregal Lodge, also known as Rashtrapati Niwas. Located just a short drive away, this historic building was the former residence of the British Viceroy of India and is now a museum. Visitors can take a guided tour to learn about India’s colonial history while enjoying the stunning architecture and beautiful gardens surrounding the lodge. The views from the lodge are breathtaking, with lush greenery and panoramic views of the Shimla hills.

Another charming destination close to the ashrama is the Shimla State Museum, which showcases Himachal Pradesh's rich cultural heritage. It houses a diverse collection of ancient sculptures, paintings, handicrafts, and photographs that provide insight into the region's history and art. For those interested in exploring places to visit near Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama, this museum offers a perfect blend of history and culture, making it a must-visit spot for curious travelers. Each of these destinations adds a different flavor to your journey, making your stay near the Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama a truly memorable experience.