#walmart success story

[apcseo]

Walmart Redesigns Its Logo After 20 Years: A Symbol of Innovation and Legacy

Walmart is taking a bold step forward with an updated brand identity, which will be unveiled for the first time in nearly two decades with a new logo. The new logo reflects both the retailer's rich history and its evolving future. The new look, revealed on January 12, was inspired by the company's founder, Sam Walton, drawing upon nostalgia but also signaling growth and commitment to innovation.

A Modern Take on a Classic Design

The new logo takes on a chunkier, more robust font, much like the typeface Walmart used between the 1980s and early 2000s. This is actually inspired by trucker hats made famous by Walton, a rather subtle nod to the brand's humble beginnings and enduring legacy. The iconic yellow "spark" symbol is kept, but this time paired with a darker blue hue. This updated color palette brings a fresh, modern look to the table while staying within the visual identity that consumers are familiar with and recognize.

Unveiling this new logo comes as part of the larger rollout of a rejuvenated visual system for Walmart. The new design will be incorporated on Walmart.com and the retail company's smartphone application in January before being disseminated to each of its 10,500 stores, the majority of which will undergo renovations consistent with the enhanced brand identity.

A Timely Rebrand for a Thriving Retail Giant

This updated logo is timely, coming when Walmart is basking in the afterglow of its second successive year of solid growth. William White, Walmart's senior vice president and chief marketing officer, pointed out that the redesigned logo marks a company evolution, which does not alter the core message that serves the present as well as the future customer. The rebrand is the polar opposite of the last time Walmart changed its logo in a major way in 2008, when it was struggling to regain sales while other big-box retailers like Target were gaining momentum.

During this moment, Walmart trimmed down the company's logo as it eliminated the star and blended the words together: "Wal" and "Mart." Such a move would have been part of 2008's mission to modernize the brand in an attempt for Walmart to take on a different wave in its course. Today's rebrand will come at an easier time since it is succeeding during a great season.

Walmart's Ongoing Success and Future of Growth

Walmart has been doing well in several segments, and this is reflected in the company's latest earnings report. The retailer reported a 5% increase in sales at US stores open for at least a year and an 8% increase in profits. The three factors that have helped Walmart are its expansion in the grocery business, competitive pricing strategies amidst inflationary pressures, and significant investment in its online presence. The company's US e-commerce sales recorded a tremendous increase of 22% in the last quarter and proved the potential of digital innovation in its long-term growth.

Walmart Rebranding Not Just Aesthetics: 

Walmart is on the way of transformation to provide customers with ease of shopping whether it is done online or within the stores.

What's Ahead for Walmart?

As the new logo rolls out across digital and physical assets of the brand, Walmart might well be indicating further changes that lie ahead. This is where adaptability toward emerging trends like online shopping and evolving consumer behaviors makes all the difference for a brand like Walmart. The new logo at Walmart will be a way not just of reminiscing about its glorious past but getting ready for an excellent future when innovation blends with tradition without any difficulty.

For the consumer, the new logo reminds them of Walmart's continued commitment to delivering quality products at affordable prices, while staying ahead of the curve in the ever-evolving retail landscape.

For Apppl Combine, strategic brand evolution is a key to building lasting connections and achieving sustained growth. If you're looking to elevate your brand identity and carve out a unique space in today’s competitive market, we’re here to help. Let’s work together to turn your vision into reality and craft a compelling brand story that resonates with your audience, builds lasting trust, and drives long-term success. Reach out to us today, and let's begin your brand’s next chapter.

This post was originally published on: Blogger

[starfish-spencer]

Me, @slimylizalfosman, and spideyroos (Discord) got into a conversation on the psych server about how modern social media could play into the Psych universe. Here's what we came up with:

Shawn and Gus start a bro podcast together but it is actually very successful

People love their friendship and chill respectful vibes

They also have a joint YouTube channel where they film themselves screwing around and doing usually illegal things. It's a miracle their channel hasn't been taken down yet.

You can tell when Gus edits the videos vs when it's Shawn.

Shawn makes those loud, bright, clickbaity videos with titles like WE SPENT 24 HOURS INSIDE A WALMART (*GONE WRONG*) (*ALMOST DIED*)

They do food vlogs where they travel around and eat at different Santa Barbara restaurants.

They also upload an ASMR video just like the Psych 2 promo

Shus becomes the Psych universe's version of Phan (Dan x Phil)

Lassie hated all social media until Jules convinces him to try it out. He has seven whole Instagram followers and he is thrilled about it (four of them are Jules and her alt accounts).

Jules has a cute aesthetic YouTube channel where she makes vlogs, makeup videos, cat videos, etc.

Lassie doesn't have a YouTube channel. He just guest stars in all of Jules's videos.

Her subscribers love him. They also start to wonder if the two live together because he shows up in every video. He's just. Always at Jules's place.

Lassie does make a YouTube channel eventually but he never posts anything. He just uses it to comment on all of Jules's videos and she pins his comment every time.

He tried to make videos but gave up after they kept getting taken down (His dead clown story and crime scene vlogs violated YouTube community guidelines, for some reason).

The four of them do collabs sometimes and it's always chaotic. They gain a bit of a cult following and have a decent sized fanbase.

Gus is an avid Tumblr user and has quite a few hit posts and a ton of followers

He has about a dozen side blogs for all his fandoms and special interests

Gus and Jules's blogs are very aesthetic and organized.

Lassie's there for the Clint Eastwood fandom and he posts random Civil War facts

Shawn is a Tumblr shitposter

He also argues with people on Reddit for fun

[reading-writing-revolution]

(via The Walmart Effect - The Atlantic)

The two new working papers use novel methods to isolate Walmart’s economic impact—and what they find does not look like a progressive success story after all. The first, posted in September by the social scientists Lukas Lehner and Zachary Parolin and the economists Clemente Pignatti and Rafael Pintro Schmitt, draws on a uniquely detailed dataset that tracks a wide range of outcomes for more than 18,000 individuals across the U.S. going back to 1968. These rich data allowed Parolin and his co-authors to create the economics equivalent of a clinical trial for medicine: They matched up two demographically comparable groups of individuals within the dataset and observed what happened when one of those groups was exposed to the “treatment” (the opening of the Walmart) and the other was not.

Their conclusion: In the 10 years after a Walmart Supercenter opened in a given community, the average household in that community experienced a 6 percent decline in yearly income—equivalent to about $5,000 a year in 2024 dollars—compared with households that didn’t have a Walmart open near them. Low-income, young, and less-educated workers suffered the largest losses.

[julysn]

ponder [connor lassiter x ariana]

𝓢ynopsis ⋆ Ariana hears about the Akron AWOL. She has many thoughts.

𝓦ord 𝓬ount ⋆ ≈560

𝓘ncludes ariana feels guilt, mentions their relationship pre-unwind, probably ooc but i haven’t read the books in two years so that explains it

𝓝otes ⋆ hi :3 uhh idk. thinking a lot about conari. this is my interpretation of them. posting this while i’m supposed to be in spanish ngl.

this is kinda bad so be gentle

Ariana just doesn’t know how to feel.

She sits on the couch beside her parents, eyes glued to the television, her heart heavy. The news was broadcasting a brand new story, one about someone she knew—quite well, actually.

Connor.

He was everywhere—newspapers, magazines, the news, social media, absolutely everywhere. No matter what Ariana did, she couldn’t escape him. It was like he was haunting her, haunting her decision to stay back and not run away with him.

And now, all she can feel is.. nothing.

She doesn’t know what to feel, how to feel, and why she should feel in particular.

No one else had been in such a position before. Her ex-boyfriend, one she didn’t know if she truly loved, had an unwind order signed due to his misfit activities, and now he was famous. Famous for being so bold to shoot a juvey-cop with his own tranquilizer gun.

Where was he? Where had he even gone? Had he went into hiding, or was he on the run? Did someone find him and take him in?

She was worried. Yes, their relationship wasn't too serious—they never planned on getting married, they weren't truly in love. It was your typical teenage romance, yet.. she felt guilt begin to pool in the bottom of her heart.

Ariana could've gone with him.

She had responsibilities, things she had to do, and goals in life that could never be fulfilled if she had gone with him. But a part of her wondered.. what would have happened if she had gone with him? Would the entire juvey-cop-tranq-gun incident have happened? Would they have been caught immediately, and him get sent to be unwound? Would they have been able to go into hiding and stay as a couple for the rest of their lives?

Would they have been happy?

Their relationship before he went AWOL was fine. Typical, one might say. They spent time together, shared kisses, cuddled sometimes, and hugged. He had bought her gifts, and she did the same, even if her parents didn't particularly like her dating a misfit child.

Lost in thought, she excuses herself from the couch, unable to watch the news broadcast anymore. She didn't want to hear about the Akron AWOL. She didn't want to hear about the successful escape of Connor Lassiter.

Ariana trudges upstairs, moving slowly as she lets the news sink in. She couldn't process it, what was happening?

She shakes her head and heaves a sigh, pushing her bedroom door open and gently shutting it behind her. Then, she flops down on her bed, grabs a pillow, and buries her face into the soft plush, feeling her necklace press into her skin.

She looks down. It's a necklace that Connor had bought her for her birthday. She remembered what he had told her—he scraped some money together from his dwindling allowance to buy it for her. It was cheap, from Walmart, but it showed that he cared about her birthday. It was sweet.

Her eyes dart over to the whiteboard pinned up above her desk, notes about assignments scribbled in expo marker, polaroid pictures of her and Connor stuck to it with heart magnets. Pictures of them happy, pictures of them embracing, pictures of them sharing a light kiss.

Concern clouds her emotions, and before she knows it, she's crying.

Crying for a guy who was sent to be unwound.

[todayimfour]

IMMEDIATE FOLLOW-UP Please share Little Sun CG Moon thoughts as well please!!!

EEEEEEEE REGRESSER SUN HEAD CANNONS/kinda

This is in response to this post where I made a Cg Sun and Lil Moon Agere Board with lil headconnons bc I got inspired

Also sorry there's not much Moon... I uhhh don't have an excuse and I just realized that now. Sorry :3

- he's so high strung all the time, being smol is genuinely an escape for him. He's a carefree older toddler 3-6

- HE. LOVES. CRAFTS. (Supplies) paints, sequins, buttons, beads, twine, thread, glue, glitter, markers, crayons, pencils, you name it he's got a stach of it at his disposal at all times. Ready to make a *very pretty* mess hopefully on a piece of paper.

- he does his best to clean up after but there's usually a residue or a few markers that got left behind.

- he's kinda stubborn in a not bratty way.. ex: if he's hanging out with his favorite Glamrock, he never wants to leave! If he's building a block tower, he'll make the tallest one ever!! If he's got a crayon in his mouth and Moon tells him to spit it out, how can he? It's the best flavor!! That's a waste Moonie.. fiiiinneee :(

- he like to draw his friends and one time someone turned it around and said "imma draw YOU" it turned a playfull fight on who can draw who faster. (Side note, true story. I heard from friend after and I have his drawing if people wanna see it I'll ask him if it's okay I'll edit it in here)

- HES SO SILLY AND PLAYFUL. his favorite games are follow the leader *bonus points if the leader doesn't know they're the leader* he loves hide and seek too but sometimes he forgets to tell anyone that they're supposed to seek and then he gets sad

- he likes looking at balloons but hates when they make that gosh darn *balloon noises* they spook him when they pop too

- his favorite Glamrock is Monty. Full stop. No debate. No one's been able to get him to explain why, not even he knows, sometimes we just have favorites!

- no paci for him, he's a big boy!! Buuuutt... There's no shame in thumbs when he gets reeeeaaaalllllllyyyyyy sleepy and thinks no one's watching.

- speaking of: KEEP AN EYE ON HIM AT ALL TIMES!! Wether it's making a mess or climbing too high up on the jungle gym, if you don't keep an eye on him always he'll get up to something... He usually comes clean before anyone notices tho

- if you need him to sit still, GOOD FREAKING LUCK, but you may have some success with those ASMR slime videos. Don't let him watch too long tho because he may try to use the video as a tutorial.

- he absolutely loves those kids crafts kits you can buy at Walmart or target, never reads the instructions tho. It's usually just a fun time anyways, having a product at the end isn't necessary if he gets to be silly and make a mess.

~If this one feels more thorough than the lil Moon head cannons that's because it's a lot more accurate this time.. our alter Sun does regress sometimes and he's read though this for me to confirm he's okay with sharing and that's it's accurate! Some stuff that includes IRL friends have been made anonymous for their safety~

[darkmaga-returns]

10 stories they chose not to tell you this week.

The Vigilant Fox

Dec 01, 2024

10 - Cancer remission achieved with low-cost drug, a jaw-dropping case series reveals.

3 patients experienced complete remission after regularly taking fenbendazole.

But the cancer industry seems to hate it because it only costs about $11 per week.

Fenbendazole (FBZ) is a medicine originally designed to treat worms and parasites in animals. Its sister drugs, Mebendazole and Albendazole, have had remarkable success treating similar ailments in humans with few side effects.

The case series highlights the remarkable stories of three cancer patients who achieved miraculous recoveries with fenbendazole after exhausting all conventional therapies.

After analyzing these cases, the abstract concluded, “FBZ appears to be a potentially safe and effective antineoplastic agent that can be repurposed for human use in treating genitourinary malignancies.”

Adding to the growing evidence in support of fendendazole’s use case against cancer, an Oklahoma man credited his miraculous cancer recovery to the pet med after overcoming terminal small cell lung cancer, defying a less than 1% survival rate and leaving doctors baffled.

This story is truly remarkable. Watch.

(See 9 More Revealing Stories Below)

9 - Democrat Megadonor Says the Way Kamala Harris Blew Through More Than a Billion Dollars ‘Disqualifies Her Forever’

8 - Rothschild Billionaire Dies in Mysterious House Fire

7 - Australians Stunned by Professor's Warning on Sky News: “These Vaccines Were Not Vaccines…”

6 - Billionaire Democrat Describes “Alarming” Meeting with Biden Admin That Prompted His Trump Endorsement

#5 - Walmart Nukes DEI as Anti-Woke Crusader Sends “Shockwaves Across Corporate America”

#4 - Tucker Carlson Issues Chilling Warning About the Deep State’s Next Big Move

#3 - NIH Chief Confesses COVID Health Initiatives Were Completely Made Up

#2 - Half a Million Migrant Kids Lost in Biden’s Border Crisis

#1 - Elon Musk Says DOGE Will Audit the IRS

Share

BONUS #1 - Trudeau Bends the Knee to Trump at Mar-a-Lago After Tariff Pledge

BONUS #2 - Trump Nominates Kash Patel for FBI Director

BONUS #3 - Putin Gives Trump an Ominous Warning

BONUS #4 - Newspaper Editor-in-Chief Drops a Surprising Prediction About Lara Trump

BONUS #5 - The Shocking Truth About Skin Cancer: What You’re Not Being Told About the Sun

[centrally-unplanned]

I wanted to respond to this post from a bit ago, because I thought it was a good challenge. Certainly Japan is a wildly different country from the US, so the way it can be used sometimes as a "YIMBY model" can often be naïve. It is not YIMBY in many ways, for sure. Cowen sets out a list of ways Japan either isn't YIMBY or would have other reasons for its lower rents; as he puts it:

Yet the more I think about it, the more I tend to believe a very different proposition: Japan is in key ways a very NIMBY country, and its brand of NIMBYism has keeps real estate prices down. A corollary is this: YIMBYism gets much less credit for low Tokyo real estate prices, and furthermore the low real estate prices are a sign of something having gone wrong on the productivity side, in large part due to regulation.

So lets see how it holds up:

1. Japan has had very tough immigration restrictions.  This has eased considerably, but a) the stock matters not just the flow, and b) current Japanese migrants often are from countries such as Thailand and the Philippines, which fills in for some mid-level jobs, but does not massively boost rents.

Meh - True, though its more cultural then legal imo. But we aren't talking about Japan, we are talking about Tokyo. Tokyo has has large amounts of internal migration from the rest of Japan; meanwhile its not like NYC's net population has increased dramatically in the past 20 years from immigration. Unless immigrations have magic rent soil I'm not seeing this.

2. It is extremely difficult to learn written Japanese.  Among its other effects, this discourages high-value immigrants from settling into very high productivity service jobs in Tokyo or in Japan more generally.

Meh - definitely true! Japan needs language reform lol. But like above, immigration isn't magic rent soil, its about net people.

3. Various regulatory and legal decisions have prevented Tokyo from developing into the financial capital of Asia (haven’t you wondered  about this?).  I won’t go into all the detail here, this is the modern world so just ask ChatGPT.  I’m sure you all know that major financial centers usually lead to exorbitant rents, due to the opportunity cost of the land.

Boo - so I literally asked ChatGPT, since I was curious, and I got absolutely nothing - just vague platitudes and literally some of the other reasons from this list, like "It lacks immigration". I don't doubt some of this is true, but I don't think its a load bearing reason it isn't a financial center. Or at least don't be lazy and tell us what they are.

Which I think is relevant, to be clear - but I think might be a bit more endogenous than the article is letting on. The inability to financialize rents in Tokyo might in fact be a reason its less of a financial center!

4. So, so much of Japanese regulatory policy and culture is geared toward maintaining small retail businesses, super small in scale, and low in productivity.  They do not place much upward pressure on rents.  By the way, this is one reason why tourists find Tokyo so wonderful, but those enterprises lower productivity considerably relative to say Walmarts.  It is no accident that so many Japanese examples populate “Markets in Everything,” that they have cat and furry cafes, and so on.

Probably True - I think he is exaggerating, and like "culture" is doing a lot of work here, but its definitely true that Japan has large small business orgs that work hand-in-hand with government to shape the urban ecology for them. The big companies are doing their own thing of course, but I am open this idea for sure. Japan's business-political complex is very vast.

But of course it might all just be downstream of the rents; if rent is low, you can build whatever.

Overall, I think meh? But I think a better argument could be made - we do need more detailed understandings of how Japan's real estate market functions in relation to its urban planning. I see one or the other in a box a lot, but the interaction I think should be dug into more.

[thisaintascenereviews]

10 Albums That Changed My Life: 2000s Emo Edition

For the past few days, I’ve been listening to an audiobook version of 2023’s Where Are Your Boys Tonight by Chris Payne, and the book chronicles the emo / pop-punk scene between 1999 and 2008. It’s about the rise and (unfortunate) fall of the genre’s mainstream success, but it metaphorically comes straight from the horse’s mouth. The book has interviews from loads of musicians and important folks from the “scene,” such as Pete Wentz, Patrick Stump, Geoff Rickley, Buddy Neilsen, Anthony Raneri, Hayley Williams, JT Woodruff, Chad Gilbert, Chris Carraba, Andrew MacMahon, and many others.

Because I’ve been listening to the book, I wanted to start a new series in which I talk about ten albums that changed my life, and I wanted to start with 00s pop-punk and emo. I was at the right age when emo broke into the mainstream, so a lot of the big bands at the time were like gods to me. Some of these albums aren’t necessarily some of my all time favorites, but I still love them. For all these episodes, I also wanted to include a “bonus pick,” where I include an album that’s a rather obvious pick, because it’s an album I love and talk about all the time. That way, I can talk about ten other albums that I may not have talk about as much.

The aim of this series is to highlight albums that are important to me, but these albums are in no particular order. I don’t rank these lists, because some of these albums aren’t necessarily more influential than another. Each one of these albums is important in some way, but I wanted to highlight them regardless.

Bonus Pick: Fall Out Boy - Infinity On High

For the first bonus pick, I wanted to start off with an obvious one. I’ve talked about Fall Out Boy’s third album, 2007’s Infinity On High quite a lot. This is the album that got me into music, and to make a long story short, I had listened to a few alternative albums beforehand, but I didn’t truly get into music until I heard that record. This isn’t the first album I picked up, but it was the most impacting one, because it truly blew my mind. This is still my favorite album, although it’s interchangeable with Michael Jackson’s Thriller, but this record really opened my eyes to how unique and awesome music can be, especially alternative, emo, and and pop-punk. I can say so much more about it, but this is the album that truly started it all for me. Little did I know that picking this album up at Target on the weekend of its release that it would change my life.

Fall Out Boy - Take This To Your Grave

I’ve had a tumultuous relationship with the first couple of Fall Out Boy records, especially 2003’s Take This To Your Grave. Back before I would just order stuff online, or download music on iTunes, I would only buy music through retail stores, like Target, Best Buy, and Walmart. I remember finding Take This To Your Grave at Walmart for $9 back in 2012, and while I was a huge fan of them, I didn’t know their early stuff too well, especially their debut. I picked it up, and I absolutely fell in love with it.

Take This To Your Grave is the record that introduced me to the early 00s pop-punk scene, and it was a scene that I only vaguely knew. I was a little too young for it, but hearing their debut was mindblowing. In retrospect, Take This To Your Grave is a hardcore album disguised as a pop-punk album, because it has the ethos and energy of a hardcore record, but the songwriting of a pop-punk album. As a kid in my late teens when I really sunk my teeth into it, and with the “defend pop-punk” movement being huge, this record (and many more like it) worked for me. The lyrics just spoke to me, but I’ve always been a sucker for Wentz’s lyricism.

Over time, however, my relationship with the album soured a bit, partially because my taste in music was becoming more removed from the current pop-punk scene (and reckoning with the fact that a lot of that scene was very misogynistic, including some lyrics on the first couple Fall Out Boy albums), so I wasn’t as into them, and I championed more of the later work, as well as some of the post-hiatus albums. It’s come full circle now, because I really love Take This To Your Grave, warts and all. This is a record made by kids that just loved hardcore and pop-punk, so if you look at it as anything more, it’s doing the record a disservice.

Paramore - Riot

My first experience with Paramore wasn’t with 2007’s Riot, but it was with 2005’s All We Know Is Falling. That was the first album I downloaded on iTunes, back when iTunes was just exploding, but I somehow lost the album (I think it was due to losing my first account, or my hard drive crashed, something like that). I listened to the album pretty soon after, but in between that, Riot was released. Riot is the album that blew Paramore up to the upper echelons of the emo and pop-punk scene, and for good reason. I’m pretty sure I got this album at Walmart, but this record was the soundtrack to the summer of 2007. It came out right before my freshman year of high school, so I played it a lot.

Between Hayley Williams’ vocals improving tenfold between the debut and Riot, their sound having more of a “mainstream” sound, and emo / pop-punk being at the crux of its popularity, this record came out at the right time. It was lightning in a bottle, but they were truly something special. This record has some of the best hooks and vocal performances of any band in that scene at this time, rivaling Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance (the scene’s two biggest bands at that time, arguably). This is just a monster of a record, and one of the most pivotal and important records from that time, and it’s cool to see people still talking about them all these years later. They just won the first Grammy earlier this year for their 2023 record, so it’s awesome to see that success pay off.

The Academy Is - Almost Here

One of the most underrated bands in the emo / pop-punk scene of the 00s is Chicago’s The Academy Is. These guys didn’t get their time in the spotlight, or at the very least, they skirted with fame at the same level as labelmates and friends in Fall Out Boy. It feels like highway robbery almost, because their sound was just as good. Their first two albums really changed my life, but for different ways. I wanted to focus on their debut album, 2005’s Almost Here, because this album is arguably the more influential album compared to 2007’s Santi. Santi was a more eclectic and interesting album, but Almost Here was more influential, because it was a big influence to the mainstream rise to emo and pop-punk.

Vocalist William Beckett is one of my favorite frontmen of the scene, too, and he has such a good voice, especially here. Almost Here is a really catchy, clever, and accessible emo record that surely should have been bigger, but oddly wasn’t. I don’t know what happened, other than that the scene was just too saturated. There were just too many bands out there, and that’s one reason the scene began to disappear from the mainstream. There were so many bands that were vying for peoples’ attentions, but Almost Here is one of the best records of that era that not a lot of people, at least outside of people who were a huge fan of the scene itself, have heard.

Bayside - The Walking Wounded

Contrary to the belief of what “elder emo” TikTokers will tell you, there are more bands in the scene than Fall Out Boy, Paramore, MCR, and Panic. The scene is so much bigger than what you saw in the mainstream, and a lot of it began in New York, including the band Bayside. These guys got pretty big in the early to mid 00s, even playing some late night shows (a lot of bands did, which was super cool), and they’re still around now, but they’re not on the level they once were.

My introduction to them was 2007’s The Walking Wounded, which was their third album, but I found them through an Alternative Press compilation of with an acoustic version of a song from that album. I picked up the album, because I really enjoyed the song, especially Anthony Raneri’s lyrics and vocals, and the album surprised me quite a bit when I heard a pop-punk album with heavier guitar riffs than your average pop-punk album. This remains my favorite album from them today, although their newest album from this year is great, too, and really reminds me of the inventiveness I heard on that record. It showed me that pop-punk can be both catchy and heavy at the same time, and the record still rules today.

Forever The Sickest Kids - Underdog Alma Mater

In the late 00s, a lot of the emo / pop-punk in the mainstream started to disappear, and popularity waned for that style, despite a few bands still being popular. Paramore, Fall Out Boy, Panic, and MCR still reigned as kings and queens of the genre. A new challenger emerged, at least in the underground, and that was neon pop-punk. Retrospectively named for its bright and colorful aesthetic, as well as how catchy and pop-focused the music was, neon pop-punk was the early 00s pop-punk fun-loving cousin that didn’t really take itself too seriously.

One of the most important albums of that movement, and while it’s probably not the first album that you could call neon pop-punk, Forever The Sickest Kids’ debut album, 2008’s Underdog Alma Mater, is a big moment for the genre. This album is catchy, slick, energetic, fun, and a little immature at times, but it also doesn’t take itself seriously and knows what it is. I always loved this record, because as catchy and synth-laden as their music, they had some good hooks and riffs to match. They were more than just a vapid pop-punk / pop-rock band, and this record shows it. They should have been a lot bigger, but they kind of fumbled the bag by releasing mediocre albums after and then just disappearing by the 2010s, so it’s unfortunate, but their debut is still one of my favorite albums from the scene.

New Found Glory - Sticks & Stones

Outside of Take This To Your Grave, I wasn’t familiar with a lot of early 00s pop/punk and emo, but where that album got me into that style of pop-punk, New Found Glory’s 2002 record, Sticks & Stones solidified it. Funnily though, this wasn’t the first NFG album I heard, that would be 2009’s Not Without A Fight, but it took me a few years to go back in their discography and listen to the album with their most iconic song “My Friends Over You.” This is easily one of my favorite 00s pop-punk records, and it’s kinda for that song alone. This record is so much fun, and it’s one of the first examples of easycore, where pop-punk and hardcore breakdowns met. You can hear it on this record a lot, and it’s awesome, but even after listening to this album for the first time in over a decade, I still enjoy it quite a bit.

Taking Back Sunday - Tell All Your Friends

Taking Back Sunday is one of the OG pop-punk and emo bands of the 00s, including New Found Glory, but I found their debut album, 2002’s Tell All Your Friends through word of mouth almost. This album was my all my favorite bands’ favorite album, especially in the 2010s “defend pop-punk” scene. Tell All Your Friends was a generation before mine, as I was too young when this record came out, but when I heard it, it blew my mind. I kept thinking, “This is what my favorite bands are influenced by? This is great!” There are loads of catchy hooks, one-liners, and mosh-ready instrumentation galore. These guys really helped to bring a new style of pop-punk to the forefront and you can hear the influence in a lot of records afterwards.

Panic! At The Disco - A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out

Panic! At The Disco’s debut album, 2005’s A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out, is lightning in a bottle; this record could only have come out in the mid-00s. It has a really unique sound, especially for the time, but it helped to catapult emo to the mainstream. Hell, “I Write Sins” is one of the biggest songs from that era, and it’ll be a song that people always remember, let alone gets played at emo nights across the country. Fever is such an iconic record, but it’s also a unique and interesting album that showcases Panic wanting to aim higher in terms of emo and pop-punk. The album is split into two halves — an electronic first half and a baroque pop second half, but it doesn’t feel jarring or strange.

It’s funny, because I remember downloading only a few songs from this album at first on iTunes back in 2007. I found the band through the Alternative Press compilation I’ve mentioned over and over again. I heard a live version of album closer “Build God, Then We’ll Talk,” and I loved it. I ended up listening to the rest of the album sometime later, but Fever is still such an iconic and nostalgic album for me. It still holds up all these years later, too, especially for its unique sound.

MCR - The Black Parade

Talk about another nostalgic album, because The Black Parade is very much another album that defined not only my adolescence, but the entire scene during the mid-00s. Fall Out Boy, Paramore, Panic! At The Disco, and My Chemical Romance were the big four of the scene at the time, but The Black Parade is really what cemented MCR on that list. Their first two albums were a darker version of the emo and pop-punk sounds that came slightly before them, and during their rise, but The Black Parade was a new sound entirely. Dubbed the emo Queen, these guys made an emo rock opera that really justified that description.

This record is huge, expansive, melodramatic, fun, dark, poignant, and incredibly interesting in all facets. I just absolutely love this record. I don’t remember how I found them, because I found them at the same time as Panic and Fall Out Boy (Paramore came last, as I found All We Know Is Falling a bit before Riot came out), but I was obsessed with this record as a kid. It’s one of those rare albums that I can listen to as an adult and still appreciate what it does on a purely technical and artistic level, because there are a lot of nuances that I didn’t pick up back then. It’s easily their best album to me, despite how they only put one more and disappeared (they still haven’t put out another album despite coming back a few years ago), and it’s the one that I always go back to.

The Cab - Whisper War

For my last pick, I wanted to include another “neon” album, but a bit of an obscure pick. The Cab were a band that were heavily involved with Fueled By Ramen, as well as Pete Wentz’s Decaydance imprint, even including both Patrick Stump and Brendon Urie on the main single for their debut album, 2008’s Whisper. Called “One Of THOSE Nights,” the song showcased what they were all about, and they had a really unique R&B and soulful take on neon pop-punk. Their vocalist had a lot of range, and reminded me a ton of Patrick Stump, but I just fell in love with how catchy and groovy that album was (and still is). It showed me that pop-punk could utilize more outside influences, and while The Cab never got as huge as the bands that they clearly were inspired by, they had a rather dedicated following in the scene, but they just never got as big as they really should have.

[taysdorothea13]

Does wrenny go to college?

she does! she graduates high school at sixteen with college credits already under her belt and a budding portfolio because she’s made a handful of things for taylor, gigi, selena, hayley, etc. that they’ve worn to premieres and just out and about. the most notable item made as a skirt that taylor was spotted in over the summer, it wasn’t anything elaborate, but it gained a lot of media traction because it wasn’t something flashy and it was something that anyone would be able to wear/style. wrenny prides herself on having styles that fit anyone in any walk of life. she has dressed that suit red carpets, shirts that fit every day life, suits that fit business meetings and fashion week. moral of the story is she’s accepted into pratt university, which is one of the highest ranked fashion schools in the country. it was never about the flashy school status though, she just wanted to get a degree in fashion that would only accentuate her credentials so she didn’t feel so much like she was using taylor’s name to get her start. she graduates at nineteen, with a double degree in fashion marketing and fashion design and at the same time as she really starts to build a company. she has a designer brand, she’s not going to sit here and say that she makes affordable pieces, but she’s also not… designer in the same of gucci or the row. she’s tactful and understand that’s some people can’t afford to spend ten thousand on a dress they’ll wear once, so while most of her pieces are in that ballpark price range, she does have simple skirts/shirts/shorts/pants available that are high priced than say target or walmart, but nowhere near the budget of typical celebrity income, it’s one of the reasons she has so much success so early on. taylor loves wearing wren’s pieces, and naturally she wears more of her expensive shit because she can afford it and it just makes sense for her, but once traction starts building when people find out it’s her daughters company, there’s an entire wave of press that absolutely rains praise on wren for being so unbelievably inclusive with size and price. and of course they all boast about how she graduated with honors at only nineteen years old and established this company by the time she was twenty-one. baby wrenny has a whole entire life to live once she learns how to fly

[theotherstephencobert]

Personal Inventory - What the hell happened over the last 7 years?

I have been contemplating it ever since I first became aware it was going on, and I am going to share a few insights into what I think happened. I am not sure even now that I completely understand why it happened, but maybe my putting it down into my Tumblr blog will allow me to see it in perspective.

What I'm talking about is this: I started a health, fitness and weight loss journey back in the summer of 2013. No formal diet, just get in some good exercise and eat healthy foods, lay off the fast food and carbonated drinks, make it a lifestyle change instead of a diet or a quick fix. For four years it worked: I went from a weight of 290 (almost certainly more than that before I started weighing myself weekly) to weight in the neighborhood of 215-225 lbs. I got fit enough to take bicycle trips to small towns 20-25 miles distant. In the scheme of things I added running to my journey and completed a number of sanctioned 10K's. 2017 started out as a banner year for my continued progress. And the, midway through the year, it turned downhill. My weight went up into the 220's then the 230's and then the 240's in the space of just four months. I still rode my bike and ran regularly, but all the progress I'd made with my weight loss just kept reversing itself. I found myself giving the whine of so many people in weight loss programs, "But I'm doing the same thing I've been doing for months [in my case,years], how come all of a sudden it's not working anymore???"

I had been through so much in those four years. I was enrolled in my local YMCA in 2014, and when I reported that I'd lost 45 lbs in the course of the year they did a blurb about me for their online newsletter, "Another Y Success Story". In the summer of 2015 I rode my bike to the small town of Clearwater, KS, some 17 miles from Wichita (a feat that my granddaughter Savannah was quite proud to tell her friends about). Just before Christmas of 2015 a car ran into my left leg in the Walmart parking lot; I had to take time off to heal but then got right back into the journey. Three months later a lowlife jerk ran over my left leg while getting away after robbing me of my change purse (with all of $6 in it). Again, some time to heal and then I was back in the swing of things. I rode my bikes hard and long, and rode them until they fell apart or were trashed. My response was to go buy another bike and get right back onto the road.

So what could have happened in mid 2017 that would make me lose all that progress and then eventaully put the whole journey on hiatus?

I am pretty sure this is at least part of it.

On June 2, 2017, near the end of a bike ride, my mother called me to tell me my father had died. This was the day before I had planned to run the 10K River Run, an official part of the Wichita River Festival, and (ironically) the day before what would have been Mom and Dad's 65th wedding anniversary. Dad had been in failing health, so the fact that he would die soon should not have been a surprise, but the news was still a shock to me. I told the desk clerk on duty at the hotel I manage; she was pretty good friends with my son Travis and called to tell him, and he suggested to his son Jordon that maybe Grandpa needed someone to be with tonight. So that evening Jordon joined me at the hotel and we were together that night and in the morning.

I have detailed the 2017 River Run on this blog and also on my Facebook page, and I will come clean about something here that I did not say on either site: I was wracked with guilt over the whole thing. I wrote about how Dad was very much a family man (which he was) and how I was honoring his memory by taking part in the River Run and River Festival with my grandson. The truth was, I was trying to cover up my feelings of, "My Dad is dead and my Mom just lost her husband of 65 years and I'm galavanting through downtown Wichita with my grandson playing Soccer Ball Billiards and chowing down on overpriced pizza and lemonade." I had been a notorious no-show at family get-togethers and holidays; part of that was I was so busy at the hotel that I didn't take time off for anything, but another part was Wichita is pretty near 1000 miles away from Knoxville by the preferred roads of travel and I was too broke (or too cheap) to afford the air fare or even the bus fare.

The next weekend I went to Knoxville to join my brother David and his two adult sons to visit Mom; it was the first time any of them had seen me in person since my sister Carol's wedding in 1993, and in fact David's sons were 2 and 4 years old then. A running gag was that every hour or so my phone would ring, I would look at the caller ID and roll my eyes and everyone else would laugh. The people at the hotel were blowing up my phne because it was the first time in over a decade I wasn't there to put out the fires and answer questions: "Steve, where do we keep the light bulbs for those new lamps James bought?" "Steve, this guy has a reservation for two nights but he only wants to stay one night. What do I do?" (The laughs were a lot quieter when I got a call from an irate guest at 1:30 in the morning.)

I discussed my feelings of guilt with my sister Carol later on. She confessed that, the weekend I got together with Mom she was scheduled to take her recent high school graduate daughter Rachel to Colorado to apply at the Air Force Academy (not the sort of thing you can bail on or reschedule) and she was wracked with guilt that she didn't join us to visit Mom in her time of mourning.

Anyway… In 2006 I responded to my 27-year-old daughter's death by throwing myself into my work. I was salaried then and so I worked ridiculous long hours, at least once working over 1/2 the total hours in the two-week work cycle. I was running on fumes and fighting off exhaustion. So in 2017, in response to my father's death, I made the (I see now) stupid decision to just go on with my life like nothing had happened… "life goes on" and all that.

I made the mistake of not dealing with my father's death. The problem was, I had no idea how the hell to deal with his death. What was I to do? Sit down and talk with a friend or counselor about my feelings, maybe regularly over time? Go to a rock quarry with a sledgehammer and smash a lot of rocks? I suspect (it didin't seem this way at the time but I am very good at deceiving myself) that I self-medicated with food a lot more than I realized. Remember that "whine" I mentioned at the end of the second paragraph of this post? Truth was I was slipping back into my old habits of eating at fast food places and hydrating with fizz.

My father's death was just the start: Two years later my mother died, almost two years to the day of Dad's passing. I got the call from Carol the morning of July 1 as I was preparing to run the 2019 River Run 10K.) Of course 2020 was the year that damn COVID-19 shut down the world. Then in October of 2021 my ex-wife Teresa (with whom I'd been on good terms since our divorce) died of COVID. And then in February of 2022 my son Travis joined his sister and mother in death. I'd like to say he died of liver failure, but the plain truth is he died of too much whiskey. (As his mom's next of kin he had to tell the hospital not to resuscitate Teresa, and even though that was what his mother had told him her wishes were, he was despondent with guilt over it and medicated with alcohol.)

I was still exercising with the bicycle, but in the time after Mom's passing my weight climbed into the 250's and then into the 260's to 270's where they stayed for a couple of years. Then in mid 2022 my weight went over 280, was consistently there until the start of September when I for some reasom lost interest in recording my weight anymore.

It's been a year and a half since then. My bicycle had two flat tires and a rusted out drive train. My finances (or maybe I should say my priorities) wouldm't allow me to get another bike until just recently. My weight is now in the mid 260's… maybe I did something right between the Fall of 2022 and now.

But I still have to ask: Was the death of my father, and the deaths of other family members, the real reason my health and fitness journey was sidetracked? And if it was, have I REALLY dealt with it? Or like a chiming electric clock that no one replaces the batteries to, has the issue just grown fainter and fainter with time 'til it's at the point I just don't notice it now?

To anyone who took the time to read all of this: I welcome any insights or advice into what might really be going on here and how I might effectively deal with it.

[misscaia]

Seaside Gardens: Scenic Grayscale Coloring Book for Adults & Teens - 30 Coloring Pages Great DIY Wall Art Project for Spring/Summer Crafts

#1 Coloring Tip: When coloring grayscale illustrations, the darker the gray tone the darker your chosen coloring utensil should be!

*Provides a therapeutic escape from daily stress, promoting relaxation and mindfulness

*Promotes positivity & wanderlust with captivating landscapes & gardens from around the world

*30 Single-sided paper to prevent bless-through

*8.5" X 11" page size

*All coloring pages are already framed and ready to be displayed post-coloring

Embark on a journey to tranquil coastal paradises with "Seaside Gardens: Scenic Grayscale Coloring Book for Adults & Teens." Perfect for coloring enthusiasts with a wanderlust for beautiful natural landscapes and gardens, this captivating book transports you to exotic destinations around the globe. Immerse yourself in the serene beauty of seaside gardens inspired by Italy, Spain, England, Thailand, Mexico, and Japan, each page adorned with cultural motifs and native foliage that evoke the essence of these diverse regions.

Discover the magic of grayscale coloring as you bring these scenic landscapes to life with depth and dimension. Unlike traditional coloring books, grayscale shading provides a foundation that guides your coloring journey, ensuring your artwork transcend the realm of flat, one-dimensional coloring pages. As we grow older, we often have less time for creative activities and projects, with grayscale coloring you're able to achieve a masterpiece with depth in a quarter of the time! With each stroke of your colored pencils, vibrant hues blend seamlessly with the grayscale tones, resulting in stunning artworks worthy of framing and adorning your walls. Let "Seaside Gardens" awaken your creativity and transport you to enchanting coastal havens where every page tells a story of natural beauty and cultural richness.

_________________________________

DOWNLOAD INSTRUCTIONS

PLEASE NOTE - ***NO SHIPPING, DOWNLOAD INSTANTLY, JUST PRINT AND HANG!

TO BUY AND DOWNLOAD A DIGITAL ITEM:

1. Add the item to your shopping cart.

2. Click on the "Complete" button.

3. Go to the checkout page and proceed with the payment process.

4. Once the payment is successful, the item will be available for immediate download in your Etsy account. You can download the files by going to your Etsy Profile > Purchases and Reviews.

If you purchased as a 'guest', you will receive an email from Etsy containing the download links. If you cannot find the email in your inbox, please check your spam/junk folders, or social/promotions tabs if using Gmail.

5. Download the item and print it out as you prefer and frame it or use it as per your desire.

REFUNDS:

As digital downloads are non-refundable, please don't hesitate to contact me for any inquiries before making your purchase. If you experience any problems downloading your files after the purchase, I will provide assistance to resolve them.

After purchase, you can download the files by going to your Etsy Profile > Purchases and Reviews.

If you purchased as a 'guest', you will receive an email from Etsy containing the download links. If you cannot find the email in your inbox, please check your spam/junk folders, or social/promotions tabs if using Gmail.

_________________________

PRINT INSTRUCTIONS

You can simply print the artwork from your home printer. For best results, however, we recommend using a professional printing service (local or online) such as Staples, Walgreens, UPS Store, Office Depot, Target, Walmart, Poster Jack, Finer Works, Office Works, Vistaprint, Costco, Snapfish, Shutterfly, etc.

Please note that colors may vary subtly depending on monitor calibration settings, printout settings, and material types.

______________

COPYRIGHT

MISS CAIA artwork is for PERSONAL USE only.

DO NOT use our digital art files for reproduction in commercial use or resale in any form. You are NOT permitted to make alterations to our artwork, then use it for commercial purposes, or for resale.

[meandmybigmouth]

How much is the Walmart fortune worth?

The Waltons as a whole were worth an estimated $267 billion in mid-January, a Forbes ranking of America's richest families found. They were more than twice as wealthy as the Mars dynasty.

NOTHING SAYS AMERICAN ECONOMIC SLAVERY THAN A GOOD AMERICAN BUSINESS SUCCESS STORY!

[subliminalbo]

10 Years of Subliminalbo

Candice Swanepoel: Mindless Pet Annotated [ 1 ]

Originally published November 28th, 2013

"You've done well, Candice. Since launching Obedience by Victoria, women just can't seem to get enough of our products. Sales have tripled in the last month alone." [ 2 ]

"Thank you, Master," Candice replied. She was teleconferencing with her boss, who had put her in charge of the Obedience campaign. Candice had traveled across the nation to nine different Victoria's Secret flagship stores [ 3 ], spreading their new product and enslaving the minds of customers who were now feeling so much more loyal to the business [ 4 ]. But they weren't the only ones under the control of this new high-tech lingerie. Candice was, in a way, patient zero.

"As a reward for your excellent work, we've decided to take you off of the campaign. I'm sure we have other models who are just dying to wear Obedience by Victoria. [ 5 ]"

"Master," Candice frowned. "Does that mean...?"

"You no longer have to wear the lingerie, yes." he replied. "We have other lines for you to promote, we can't be wasting you on one thing [ 6 ]."

"Yes, Master, I understand." Candice nodded. A part of her felt worried to be released from her boss' control [ 7 ]. She'd been wearing this lingerie for weeks now and was quite fond of someone thinking for her [ 8 ]. It was just easier.

Time fixed Candice's aversion to thought [ 9 ]. After a few days' worth of withdrawals, she no longer felt the urge for obedience [ 10 ]. With her mind finally cleared, Candice had a lot of questions for Victoria's Secret [ 11 ]. Like why they'd forced her to wear a hypnotic bra for twelve weeks [ 12 ]. So much had changed since Candice went under. Girls would stop Candice on the streets, and she would look into their eyes. Those empty eyes. And Candice knew that they were wearing Obedience, and she knew that it was her work that had taken this girl's mind [ 13 ]. "I love you, Candice. You are my idol," the girls would say, and Candice would remember all of those girls on tour. The ones who had just shown up for an autograph and had left with a new pair of underwear and an empty mind . And those girls had gone and forced their friends and family into mindless obedience as well. The campaign was so successful that CEOs of other companies were falling over each other to copy the Obedience bra's technology. Walmart had enslaved all of its employees to guarantee better service, and McDonald's was replicating the technology for food so that its customers would never eat anywhere else [ 14 ].

Candice was disgusted at this new world, and she knew something had to be done [ 15 ]. She first tried to take it up with her boss, but he was always too busy to listen. Then she tried filing a report to the ethics department of Victoria's Secret, but that too was met with no response [ 16 ]. Frustrated with her employer, Candice decided that she had to do something drastic [ 17 ].

Santiago Cruz was a young journalist trying to find her first major story to break through [ 18 ]. So far she was relegated to covering puff pieces like fashion at the Golden Globe Awards and the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show [ 19 ]. Candice had remembered Santiago from last year's show, but it was Santiago who approached Candice. She'd been focusing on Victoria's Secret in the last few weeks, after a friend of hers had gone completely off the grid reporting on the new line of lingerie. Santiago had an eye for conspiracy, and this really stunk [ 20 ]. So over coffee one morning, Candice spilled her whole story.

"They told me to try on the bra, and then... Well, everything felt so good. I just wanted to do everything they told me to."

"And you didn't know what it did? You didn't know that they were brainwashing you?" Santiago replied. She rarely looked away from her pad which she scribbled every possible detail onto. Notes on Candice's story, important dates, important names. This story was going to be huge.

"I didn't... And the worst thing is what they made me do. I had sex with so many men and women [ 21 ], and they made me go around passing out the lingerie, turning other women into something like me."

"That's awful," Santiago interjected [ 22 ].

"Yes. It's addictive too. After I was freed, I wanted nothing more than to go back. I wanted to be controlled. I wanted it so bad I even tried self-hypnosis [ 23 ]."

"But it didn't work."

"No."

As the interview wrapped up, Santiago asked if anyone in Victoria's Secret knew that Candice was talking to her. Candice told her about the ethics report she'd filed, but assured Santiago that no one knew she was going to the public with the story. The two women shook hands and Santiago promised Candice that justice would be served, then they went their separate ways. A few days passed before Santiago heard from Candice again. This time it was a text that read: New info. We need to talk. Meet me at our coffee place asap. Santiago said she was on her way, and as she left the office, she told her boss that she was going to check up on a new lead [ 24 ].

Santiago arrived at the coffee shop to find it mostly empty, except for the two baristas who stood stoic and guard-like behind the counter, and at a table in the back sat a well-dressed man with Candice, who sat on the floor next to the man, resting on her knees [ 25 ]. Unlike the man, you could not say she was well-dressed. She wore some gaudy kind of cat inspired lingerie [ 26 ].

"What is this?" Santiago asked Candice. "What's going on?"

"You're asking the wrong person," the man spoke up. "She doesn't say much anymore."

"Oh my God, Candice... What did you do to her?"

"My name's Ed [ 27 ], it's nice to meet you. We've reeducated Candice. And to answer your question, Miss Cruz, this is a trap [ 28 ]. For years reporters have been trying to out my company for one dirty reason or another. We're a blight to America's youth, we teach girls to be sexual at a young age... We just can't afford to have a brainwashing conspiracy on our hands so... I guess you'd call this the coverup."

"Candice," Santiago cried. "You've got to snap out of it!"

Ed smiled and ran his hand through Candice's hair. "Go ahead, my pet, you may speak."

"I was wrong to come to you, Santiago," Candice frowned. "Thankfully Master Ed was kind enough to take me back, and I'm sure he'd be happy to have you too, if you asked. We could be good kitties together!"

"No!" Santiago screamed. "I'll never put on your disgusting lingerie!"

"I'll make you a deal," Ed spoke up. "Surrender to me, and I'll let Candice go. Your mind for hers. Or... I keep Candice as my pet, and pull some strings for you. You'll have your own column, your own news show. You'll be able to do anything you want. All I ask is that you don't print that story."

Santiago looked into the empty eyes of a mindless Candice who was busy playing with the bell on her collar. Candice had trusted her to do the right thing. Santiago promised her that she would expose Victoria's Secret, and that this kind of thing would never happen to her again. But Santiago had only taken this story because she wanted her big break, and now she was being offered just that by Ed [ 29 ]. And Candice, she looked so happy.

"Okay," Santiago choked. "You can have her. No one will ever hear a word of this [ 30 ]."

"That's a good girl," Ed smiled [ 31 ].

[ 1 ]. This short was a kind of soft pilot to writing original characters, shifting the focus from Candice Swanepoel to reporter Santiago Cruz. It wasn't the most graceful transition. For example, it created this alternate universe in my series where Victoria's Secret is, inexplicably, a dominant political force responsible for the mass brainwashing of consumers. Obedience By Victoria would come up from time to time in my stories, but I mostly got around the absurdity of the plot by mentioning Victoria's Secret as little as possible after wrapping up Santiago's Story.

[ 2 ]. Consumers being targeted by mass brainwashing campaigns is an idea that I still find really compelling, partly because profit is the most logical motive for mind control, but also because there's just sort of this mundane evil to the whole scheme. Manipulating millions of consumers into submissive puppets to raise profit margins is very funny to me.

[ 3 ]. Yeah, again I don't really know anything about Victoria's Secret campaigns and have no idea where I came up with the number nine but I'm very surprised that Milwaukee was on the list.

[ 4 ]. Probably the worst example yet of telling the audience that there is mind control happening. These days I'd probably just be happy with Candice "spreading the product" (weird word choice too tbh)

[ 5 ]. I don't really understand the motivation to take the campaign away from Candice here, other than to create an inciting incident for the story.

[ 6 ]. From the mind controller's perspective, this just seems like a bad decision. How is Candice not supposed to blow the whistle here.

[ 7 ]. Ah man, I just hate interiority like this. I try really hard to not tell the reader what the character is thinking or feeling.

[ 8 ]. Subliminalbo cliche #3: mind control is nice, actually.

[ 9 ]. This is a stupid sentence.

[ 10 ]. Casually breezing over this harrowing experience right here in a single sentence.

[ 11 ]. Girl, same.

[ 12 ]. I am convinced that these are the four worst sentences that I've ever written in succession. I think it's meant to be understatement as a joke but it's just awful.

[ 13 ]. Classic subject-verb agreement error here. Fun fact, I was finishing up my first semester of freshman English when I wrote this.

[ 14 ]. So much to unpack in this one paragraph. First of all, it's like three paragraphs at minimum. But it's so weird that I didn't put any thought into what Obedience By Victoria is and how it works. Like, how is Walmart implementing mind controlling bras? How did McDonalds put inside fucking burgers? In future versions I think I made sure to note that all of these other companies were exploring their own research, but here I mostly just wanted to stress the sheer number of people who had been mind controlled since the last chapter and I didn't really care how.

[ 15 ]. Girl, same.

[ 16 ]. "Victoria's Secret's HR department" would have been less clunky language.

[ 17 ]. Why would she even try to handle it within the company? Like, what did she expect would happen here?

[ 18 ]. Hell of a way to introduce a new character. Literally just me explaining her archetype to the reader. I could have just pasted a TV Tropes page here.

[ 19 ]. In later versions of this story I focus a bit more on what Santiago actually does. In this first draft I saw her as a Buzzfeed journalist but later have her writing for Trespass, which is an ersatz Vice. Both have struggled in recent years, but Buzzfeed was such an easy target that I felt like Vice was more interesting to criticize. Anyway, I never actually say where Santiago works in this version because everything is surface level.

[ 20 ]. Subliminalbo cliche #4: the paranoid reporter who seeks out trouble because they suspect that mind control is everywhere.

[ 21 ]. I think this concept works better as a straight conspiracy thriller about corporate brainwashing but it's always about sex. What's funny is that I'm too young here to write confidently about sex so I just have the characters mention sex and that's the smut.

[ 22 ]. Don't like the word choice here. You don't "interject" when listening to a person talk about their trauma lol

[ 23 ]. It's nice to get a little bit of Candice's struggle after taking off the lingerie, but it's still really surface level stuff here. 2013 Bo is very committed to telling instead of showing.

[ 24 ]. Eh, this paragraph is fine I guess. I just want to call out how quickly I accelerate out of the scene. We get a brief stretch of dialogue between the two and then a quick summary of everything else they said. It really feels like I'm just trying to get to the end of this story. I'm also not really sure why I went out of the way to mention Santiago's editor, just weirdly superfluous information here.

[ 25 ]. There are like eight sentences inside this sentence.

[ 26 ]. The story follows the manip again.

[ 27 ]. Though I don't name him explicitly here, Ed is based on former Victoria's Secret Chief Marketing Officer Ed Razek who was something of a minor celebrity in the model blogging space as the creator of the Victoria's Secret Angels. In 2019 Razek stepped down from his position at the company following misogynist and transphobic comments, as well as allegations of creating a culture of harassment within the company. So uh...I hate this story.

[ 28 ]. I kind of hate the way my characters talk to each other in these early stories.

[ 29 ]. She jumps straight to the rationalization, holy shit.

[ 30 ]. I originally envisioned this story as Candice trapped between two powerful wills, but it's pretty shocking how quickly Santiago folds to Ed. Later revisions have focused a ton on expanding this scene and showing that Santiago ultimately has no choice, but I don't really feel like she's in a corner here.

[ 31 ]. The verdict: my worst story yet. Under baked and ludicrously rushed, you can just sort of tell that I'm writing this as a quick caption to a manip. There are tons of unfortunate real world implications too with all of the Ed Razek stuff that went down at Victoria's Secret, it makes for an icky story that I'm really not proud of writing, but it is important because it marks my transition to original characters. Of all my stories, this is the one I've come back to the most to rewrite, and I've finally gotten to a place where I'm fine with it. If you've read all of this I recommend checking that version out because it really has changed a lot (though a quick glance through it and I'm already finding things I hate about it).

[grits-galraisedinthesouth]

Globalists are cultivatating professional thugs of anarchists whose goal is to usher in their so called "new world order" through the destruction of the world's cities.

It pains me to see people who look like me rewarded for theft, vandalism and even murder. Once upon a time in black culture, lawlessness was discouraged. Now, mayors (like the one in Baltimore) tell the police to give rioters "space to destroy." Morally corrupt Maxine Watters threatened jurors in Minnesota that a "not guilty" verdict in the case against officer Derek Chauvin would cause violence & destruction.

Two (2) of these gangs have names: Antifa and BLM. Antifa recruits students or entry level young professionals who seek career advancement. This first rung up the anarchist's ladder of success serves as an initiation into more sophisticated anarchist circles. It can lead to lucrative job opportunities and political appointments.

Participants are often rewarded with tenured teaching posts in colleges and universities. They also move up the ladder in various corporate and legal firms and they are positioned for political appointments.

BLM and the lower level "gangs" are made up of the nameless, disposable radicals meant to be sacrificed for "the greater good." Organizations like the NAACP and so called "black leaders" like Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Michelle & Barack Obama serve as plantation DRIVERS who are assigned to manipulate the minds of the "disposable" anarchists.

The collapse of American cities into lawless cities is strategic. It is no coincidence that over 400,000 Americans have fled "Gotham" NYC as it is destroyed from the inside out.

New York is redefining what constitutes an actual crime. The result is their statistics don't tell the full story of how failure to prosecute criminals has destroyed New York City and in turn, millions of lives. The dirty cop, DA Alvin Bragg only has dismal 49% success rate prosecuting crime.

A native New Yorker:

A silver lining to these fraudulent Trump indictment(s) is a bright spotlight on criminal INJUSTICE at the hands of dirty DAs, AGs, State's Attorneys, Judges and so-called special prosecutors.

Our American House of Representatives hosted a NYC field hearing for victims of violent crime.

Below please find heartbreaking testimonies of the victims. They are cautionary tales of how lawlessness has impacted everyday people around the United States of America. Sadly, the residents of these cities don't understand that they voted for their demise.

America's Lawless Cities

Seattle

Los Angeles

Philadelphia

Washington, DC

Portland

New Orleans

Chicago

New York City

San Francisco

Starbucks, Walmart, Cracker Barrel, Whole Foods fleeing due to "security concerns."

Portland, OR

"An open air insane asylum." Portland's Meltdown: "A Progressive Experiment That Has Gone Colossally Bad. Controlled Demolition."

Chicago, IL

Walmart Closes 4 Chicago Stores Shoppers complain but they just voted for another mayor who is soft on crime.🤦‍♂️

The company has pledged to offer more safety training for workers and clarify safety procedures, such as when to call 911, and making changes to store formats and layouts. The measures include “closing a restroom, or even closing a store permanently” where safety is no longer possible, according to a letter posted on the company website. 

Social Disorder Insurance Claims $2 Billion during a Historic Summer of Anarchy

"The most expensive outbreak of civil unrest in U.S. history, costing insurance companies an estimated $2 billion to cover protestor wreckage in the days following George Floyd’s death.

The sky high price tag comes from an assessment by Property Claims Services (PCS) published in Axios which has tracked claims related to social disorder since 1950. The company classifies any violent outbreak sparking more than $25 million in claims a “catastrophe.”

The $2 billion figure covering claims made from rioting across 20 states between May 26 and June 8 dwarfs the dollar-amounts doled out by insurance companies in the aftermath of previous periods of unrest isolated to individual cities.

“It’s not just happening in one city or state – it’s all over the country,” Loretta L. Worters, a spokesperson for the group told Axios. “And this is still happening, so the losses could be significantly more.”

Indeed, the initial Floyd riots merely kicked off a historic summer of anarchy sweeping the nation’s cities where

in Portland, Oregon, militant social justice warriors surpassed 100 days of consecutive terrorism. Protestors launched repeated assaults on state and federal law enforcement featuring mortar-style fireworks and lasers that can cause permanent blindness.

Protestors launched repeated assaults on state and federal law enforcement featuring mortar-style fireworks and lasers that can cause permanent blindness.

The only prior outbreak to come close to producing the same level of carnage as the 14 days of rioting after Floyd’s death, measured by insurance claims, are the 1992 Los Angeles riots causing $775 million in insured losses, or more than $1.4 billion in today’s dollars, according to PCS.

Consequent research on the nation’s pandemic of domestic terrorism this summer has further highlighted the breadth of the destruction. The map below shows where the nation suffered nearly 570 violent riots between May 24, the day before Floyd’s death, and Aug. 22, the day before Jacob Blake was shot in Kenosha, Wisconsin triggering a second wave of chaotic demonstrations reaching smaller communities."

Cracker Barrel Manager Killed During Robbery

An Inconvenient Truth: To neutralize the threat, you fire until the threat is neutralized.

[mdhwrites]

Diane and Kat: My Original Lesbians

Diane and Kat: The Bound Bands (available for free until the end of the 15th! A decision I made while writing this. XD) was my first original story. Released on August 5th, 2016, it was my first book ever released and worked on over the course of four months. Today I just feel like talking about them and what led to them.

So first... Going original wasn't my idea. It was something I was considering but it was actually someone else in the MLP Fandom that first talked to me about how they wanted to do original works. The two of us had tried to work together in the past, they liked my work and I like to attempt to collaborate. By the end of the day, I had the main concept for the two main characters already written up.

Now mind you, I say ATTEMPT to collaborate. I have literally had more success collaborating in the TOH fandom, the fruits of which no longer are publicly available, than I did in five years? of being the MLP fandom. I would always get brought on for a project, have a ton of ideas and write my portion quickly and then NOTHING WOULD HAPPEN. So for about a week the two of us lightly brainstormed and then it just kind of... died. I think maybe the first chapter had been written by me, maybe part of the second, but they never contributed to the writing of it and a lot of the brainstorming was primarily my own because of how fast my brain works.

The big contribution I remember they added was a piece of advice: "Don't make it about their sexuality." It's a line that stuck with me because you can actually see how it manifests in the second chapter. The mayor who is supposed to pay them is presented as a bigot trying to stiff them. However, his prejudice isn't because they're lesbians. It's the idea that couple adventurers get 'distracted' and so potentially did shoddy work, despite them having done the job just fine. A tongue in cheek subversion that also helps make it clear the sort of world they're living in. People will still try to short change and scam you but it's not going to be by sexual preference.

However, due to the collaborative nature of it, the story went fallow for a while. I think this technically first happened late 2015 when it was first brainstormed and my brain kept buzzing about it on and off but, well, I had other things to worry about like my declining mental health. It only really came back to the forefront when in March of 2016, Walmart threatened to fire me and something in me just... broke. I ended up having to quit due to the void it introduced in me and made plans to move to Colorado to live with my parents. At the same time, as a way to potentially try and make up for the lack of a job, I asked my friend if it was okay if I took Diane and Kat and ran with them. They said yes and so their story began.

But who were they? (I actually have character profiles on a doc for them from that original drafting and there was a SEVERE temptation to just copy and paste for this)

Diane Maxwell:

A priestess turned sorceress who was almost killed by templars for having been found out to have incredibly powerful magic in her veins, she has a fairly serious, focused personality. She is mildly sarcastic, especially with Kat, and would be content in life if not for the fact that the teachings she was raised with push her to want to continue doing good. That and adventuring pays the bills. She wears a dress robe over normal leather armor and specializes in lightning and fire magics due to having an affinity to both and being shockingly bad at any form of healing magic, much to her own disappointment. Is awkward about public affection though it's purely a personal thing and has nothing to do with how deep her love for Kat runs.

Kat Wolfcry:

A self proclaimed knight who is the daughter of the chief to a barbarian clan, she is stubborn, enthusiastic and on the face of it what you would expect from a barbarian who is a bit on the shorter side, especially when compared to her tall girlfriend. Her fiery red hair and heritage hide who she really is. She cares about innocents more than any barbarian literally can for the job. She even almost failed the ritual to imbue herself with a wolf spirit because it required her to kill in cold blood a wolf she knew to become one with it. To give her the sort of magical rage a fantasy barbarian has. It was saving Diane from the templars and their lone journey to bring her back home from a failed pillaging raid that made her decide she needed to leave home and at least try to be a knight, even if she still fights like a barbarian. But uh... Just because she cares about innocents doesn't mean she's defanged. She just can't get mad 'for fun'. If you hurt people, expect her to be all too happy to show you why her clan was known for brutal slaughters of their prey, like a pack of wolves on a moose.

So there are your two bases. The classic dynamic of tank and sorcerer, though only the latter can only do field medicine so they need to be careful. Plenty of backstory potential and plenty of just general potential for good fun between the two, with their first book even mentioning old stories I had in mind for them because I was just so enthusiastic about the ideas I had for them.

So... Why only the one book?

Well, that kind of comes down to format? Amongst a lot of other things but something that has always made me nervous is that I conceptualized the series as being stand alone for the majority of the books. One might reference another book but you didn't need to have read it to get a complete story with whichever book you read. The only book that should have ever broken this would have been the final book in the series because it would have been a celebration of what had come first.

That's also why Bound Bands is the way it is. It was just meant to be a fun dungeon crawl that could be a part of a series, but didn't have to be. I literally have the layout listed on that old doc of 2 beginning chapters, four dungeon layers, three night chapters to serve as quieter breaks, then the boss and epilogue effectively. A simple but effective structure that was based on one main premise: A dungeon meant to stress and push whoever came in's bond with themselves and each other hard. I won't spoil why since you can go check it out yourself, at least if you're reading this when it comes out.

BUT this format is also kind of nerve wracking in that it means having to reintroduce a lot of elements of a character each time and avoiding repetition in that, finding new ways to introduce them and what not, is something my brain has hissed at me each time I've tried starting another book of theirs. I actually don't even know how much I have to worry about this since this style isn't actually something I ever engaged much with as a kid. I never read the old Sherlock mysteries as an example. I don't know how much they rely on you knowing who Sherlock is even if each story is standalone. I read series or single books as a kid, never something in this sort of field so it maybe is something I just need perspective on to help me out.

But just for fun, I'll share the immediate pitches for some of the books I'd considered:

Holy Town Mage Tournament: A small church town belonging to the same faith Diane used to be is holding of all things a tournament for black magic users. While normally something Diane wouldn't be a part of, two things push her to join. The first is the one favored to win, a mage who claims to be an archmage, which is no simple feat in this world. Diane should know: She qualifies as one after all due to having mastered the ability to duel cast. The other? A mute priestess who is the final opponent for the winning mage and her mother who are raising money for the town through this blasphemous act and who claim to have been friends with her father, Avatar Maxwell.

A Feral Circus: After a night of hard drinking that Diane skipped but that Kat went out to enjoy, Kat doesn't make it back to the room they were staying at. Meanwhile, the circus in town's beast master claims to have a new wolf as part of his menagerie who he shall reveal to all in one week's time. With it being the closest thing to a lead Diane has, can she infiltrate the circus and find Kat? And why is the beast master waiting so long to reveal his new prize?

(Side note: I always felt like I had an easier time to figure out stories for Diane to be the lead than Kat. *sigh*)

Test of Mettle: In the middle of a town lies a large stone rock with hundreds of nicks taken out of it by various warriors, knights and swordmasters who wanted to test their might against it. When Kat goes to do it though, she is stopped by an old samurai type who says that a barbarian has no place in testing themselves like this. When she tries anyways, she destroys her sword as if it were nothing. That's the last straw and Kat makes it clear they aren't leaving until she's not just hit the rock but shattered it entirely, with this easily being one of their earlier stories.

(Also yes, I watched the anime take on Thundercats. Why do you ask?)

And finally, of course:

Diane and Kat: On her first raid, Kat Wolfcry chooses a monastery on the edge of the lands dominated by the Kesral faith. It's an easy target but one with plenty of loot to make her father proud. She doesn't know that a squad of templars are there, having been brought in to judge Diane Maxwell, daughter of the old leader of the monastery, for her newfound black magic. They throw her in a well cell beneath the monastery as they finish getting the black powder that they'll be bringing back to the capital. Powder kegs waiting to go off and help start these two girls' destinies with a bang.

The one I've tried starting the most often is the holy town tournament one, with their true origin story of meeting and falling in love being the only other one I've actually tried to start. Feral Circus has always been LOW priority because it's the sort of story I'd want to do as like a fifth book since that one genuinely just removes Kat for the entirety of it while at least the holy town one is simply more focused on Diane. I've never forgotten them though. They always come to mind, asking for when their turn will be and I keep just not quite managing to return to them.

UNTIL NO- No. I don't have an announcement like that to make. I might try to sometime soon, and maybe publish some one offs I made for the two on Ao3, including when Diane first cast magic, but for the moment they are just the two lesbians I want to someday return to. As such, if you have questions about them and the like, please, let me know. I'd love to answer what I can and who knows? Maybe it'll help me get more motivated about them.

And since I did in fact decide to make their book free for a bit, a reminder that Kindle e-books do NOT require an e-reader. They are available to be read on literally anything with a browser. So if you're reading this, you can almost certainly pick it up and check out their first story: Diane and Kat: The Bound Bands.

[chilakillme]

I just need to vent lots of things regarding the Harry Potter reboot so bear with me

First of all WITH ALL OF THE POTENTIAL STORIES IN THE WIZARDING WORLD THEY DECIDED TO REBOOT THE OG THE WORLDWIDE LOVED ONE???? No marauders? No Hogwarts founders? No Tom Riddle origin story??? Like....how can they expect a random british boy to create the IMPACT Dan Radcliffe's face had on the world....like no. And also the only person of that cast that'll return will be Felton, I just know it.

And also, the movies are RECENT, yeah the first one is 20 years old but 20 years is not long enough to reboot a series that had the IMPACT Harry Potter had, like they still sell LEGOs and cutlery sets with the original actors face at my Walmart and they don't seem like antiques. Think about Indiana Jones or any other iconic character that has only been played by one actor, that's what Harry Potter should be (with exception for the play that most of us ignore) BUT NO THEY WANT A WHOLE NEW CAST

Now, the fact that JKR is going to be super involved and they're going to try to be as loyal to the books as they can is a blessing and a curse because of course having the author in a project like this is something fans love but we're talking about JKR and, she, you know, got herself into some messes recently and...yeah. But also, as much as I would love to see more of things that the og movies skipped and more depth to characters I still love, I can't help but think that it's going to turn into some political agenda (and I know everything is political but I'm talking about blatantly obvious political) or some kind of statement idk. Also, if it's going to be an almost book to screen copy they're going to run into a wall called plot holes and wonky worldbuilding.

As someone who read the books 11 times in a year because they had no friends in elementary school and revisited them constantly until a couple years ago, I can say that the series is full of plot holes and yeah they're going to need to fix that, but also some of the world building is just not done right, many things don't make sense or contradict themselves, and I'm not saying I don't appreciate the world we were given, I loved ot and still do, and I really appreciate the mythology, research and work that went into it but there's a point where some things just get ridiculous. (Examples: the secrecy things with wizards has some big questions to be solved, why are dentists unknown to wizards, do wizards know math or what do they do before hogwarts, the sirius black trial, why are the weasleys poor in the wizarding society, like there's really no sense in that (or at least I think so))

Also JKR should not go anywhere near the script, she wrote the scripts for the first Fantastic Beasts movies and then the third that was a little bit less of a mess had another screenwriter but by that time it was already too late and we all know how that went.

Also, this thing is going to need a gigantic budget but it's going to be a series and we know warner had some troubles or something recently (I don't remember all the details but yk, the discovery situation and them cancelling movies and originals from max). But the thing is that we could be looking at an amazon's lord of the rings situation where the firsts episodes were a success but only 40%-50% of viewers who started the series watched until the finale. And they want to make this a decade long project and I don't know if they're going to make it past season 4 even, but who knows I'm no expert in economics

Overall this shouldn't be happening but...