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neonmeron · 10 months ago

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金曜日　2024/2/2　＃2

皆、こんにちは～

久しぶり！皆はどう？私は元気。私たちが最後に話してから、たくさんのことが起こった。

先学期はとても難しかったんだ。Cさんと私は話しを止めた。I won't get into too many details but my mental health was absolute dog water. とても落ち込んでいた。。。I still somehow managed to get on the dean's list (i have no idea) (it was my 4 credit chinese class that i got an A in that helped me do it)

With all that said, I'm doing a lot better now. I just hope it stays like that…

この冬休みにたくさん原神をしたｗｗ

ナビアがほしかったから、朝から夜まで原神をして、プリモジェムを得（え）た。バナーの最初から最後まで、毎日働いた。

ついに、最後の日にナビアを手に入れた！！ナビアはとても強くて、きれいだ

I'm currently building her and shes only lvl 5 (all talents 0) and she already does more damage than my lvl 80 beidou lol

Actually, 先日は、I finally got my yanfei to friendship lvl 10! Even though I'm mainly farming for Navia right now, I want Yanfei to be my first triple crown cutie. She was my first lvl 90 character and first friendship lvl 10 character. It's only fitting that shes my first triple crown cutie　(my acc is just turning into a yanfei fan acc lmao)

I also managed to get Chevreuse before Raidens banner ended so I'm gonna build her and now I have a good team! Yanfei as my DPS, Beidou as sub dps, and Fischl and Chevreuse as support. I also noticed that Chevreuse was healing me? That's awesome and super helpful.

But i digress

It's been a few weeks since classes have started so let me tell you what's been going on in my japanese classes!

We had to briefly introduce ourselves on the first day but she wanted us to use たり　たりする for talking about things we like and i forgot TT i wasnt the only one who messed up lmao

A lot of kids in that class that I'm surprised made it this far…. Who said that

Theres actually a chinese professor in my class lmao he just wants to learn some japanese

We did a dialogue last week let's see if i still remember it

あのう、先生、宿題を明日まで待っていただけませんか。宿題を入れたファイルがないんです。

困りましたね。見つかるといいですね

Ok i did remember it

Also what the heck is the difference between ～はいいです and ～がいいです

Cause we were doing drills in my class and everyone was saying ～～がいいです。but i thought it was は

Anyways,

In my intermediate 2 class weve started by doing てすみませんでした、といいです、てあげる／くれる／もらう／いただく

In my practical reading and speaking class we started off by learning and talking about 体験教室 (たいけんきょうしつ)　trial lessons

We did a dialogue of sorts, for example:

あなた：すみません、～～～の教室に参加したいんですが。

受付の人：次はX月X日のX曜日です。

あなた：いつですか。

受付の人：朝／昼のＸ時からＸ時と昼／夜のＸ時からＸ時です。

あなた：いくらですか。

受付の人：お金はいりません。／ただです。

あなた：何を持ってきたらいいですか。

受付の人：大丈夫です。全部こちらで用意しますから。

ーーー

あなた：すみません、～～～の教室に参加したいんですが。まだ、あいていますか。

受付の人：～～～教室ですね。X曜日のクラスはもう一杯ですね。X曜日のクラスでもいいですか。

あなた：はい、いいです。コースは一回でいくらですか。

受付の人：一回、X円です。

あなた：何時ですか。

受付の人：朝／昼のＸ時からＸ時と昼／夜のＸ時からＸ時です。

あなた：そうですか。何か必要ですか。／何か持ってきましょうか。

受付の人：～～～の道具を持ってきてください。

So it was basically things like that where we practiced different situations and then switched to listening practice. Then we moved on to foods. Conversation like：

このピザを買って持ってきましょうか。

この料理に卵を使っていますか。トマトを食べられません。トマトのアレルギーがあるんです。

A：いつまでこの��ラダを持ちましょうか。

B：三日まで持ちます。

よかったら、お菓子を食べませんか。

I dont quite remember (昨日だった) but it was something like that

Now, in my intermediate 1 class, we've been doing all sorts of things.

First we started with apologies

Ex. im sorry for talking in class - 授業中に話してすみませんでした。（formal)

So its just the verb in て form plus すみませんでした or ごめん depending on formalness

Im sorry for sleeping in class - 授業中に寝てすみませんでした。

Im sorry for not bringing my textbook - 教科書を持ってこなくて済みませんでした。

Im sorry for the late reply - 返事が遅くなってごめん。

Sorry for not keeping the promise - 約束を守らなくてごめん。

Pretty self explanatory. We then added どうしたんですか to expand on it.

A：ルームメートを起こしてごめん。

B：どうしたの？。

A：歌を歌ったんだ。

B：そうですか。静かになってください

A：友達の誕生日を忘れてごめん。

B：どうしたの？

A：最近、とても忙しくなったの。

B：そうか。じゃあ、忙しくならないでください。

A：原稿用紙を出さなくてすみませんでした。

B：どうしたんですか。

A：犬は原稿用紙を食べたんです。

B：そうですか。だめですよね。

Simple. 次！

Next we started learning about といいですね which is basically used for saying you hope something will happen.

Like, i hope you find a good part time job ＝いいアルバイトが見つかるといいですね。

Or, I hope it doesnt rain ＝雨が降らないといいですね。

So it's just the short form. (the casual version is just といいね）

But if you want to talk about something you hope for yourself, you have to make it more modest by adding a んですが。 or んだけど。 (casual)

I hope i get a good grade ＝　いい成績をとるといいんだけど。

Note: all these といい examples means that you are hoping that something nice happens. This means that these patterns cannot be used in cases where you hope to do something nice, which is under your control. In that case, you use the potential form.

I hope i can go to japan this summer ＝　この夏、日本に行けるといいんですが。

It's actually really simple. Let's try some more sentences.

I hope yamashita sensei buys a car = 山下先生は車を買うといいですね。

I hope Tanaka and Yamada dont break up = 田中さんと山田さんと別れないといいですね。

I hope I can write tonight = 今晩、書けるといいんだけど。

I hope the plane doesn't crash into the building = 飛行機が建物にぶつけないといいですね。

I hope i dont eat humans = 私は人間を食べないといいんですが。

I hope someone tells me they love me on february 14th = 二月十四日に誰かが私に「愛している」と言ってくれるといいんだけど。

Because i was bad in class today, i hope the teacher doesnt kill me = 今日の授業中に私は悪かったので、先生が私を殺さないといいですね。

I hope i can fill my bathtub with baked beans and cinnamon toast crunch and take a bath in it = 浴槽（よくそう）にベイクドビーンズとシナモントーストクランチを入れて、お風呂に入れるといいんだけど。

The possibilities are endless!!

Next, are the new ways to make a request.

いただけませんか＝ the polie version. Used for bosses, professors, or strangers.

Would you lend me a hand? = 手伝っていただけませんか。

くれませんか＝ about the equivalent to てください most appropriate in the host-family context will you wait for a second? = ちょっと待ってくれませんか。

くれない＝ or the て form by itself is very casual.

Pick that thing up (and pass it to me), will you? = それ取ってくれない？ or それ取って。

It's pretty self explanatory.

Could you write this report? レポートを書いていただけませんか

Could you translate this book? = この本を訳してくれませんか

Could you drive me to the fish store? = 魚屋まで運転してくれない？

This concept just feels a little strange only because we don't really have an equivalent in english. At least, not that I know of.

And finally its the てあげる／くれる／もらう nonsense but i already covered it in a different post from today.

Wow that took forever. Like, 4 hours LMAO i need to get caught up anyways or else i would have pulled a last semester (pls forgive me)

最近たくさんコーヒーを飲んだ��ど、まだ眠い..。なんで？？？i am literally the definition of built different

じゃあ、またね～

今日の歌はKep1er - tOgether fOreverです。

Notice any errors? Lmk!! I always want to fix my mistakes so I can learn better. ありがとう！

#japanese #language learning #language #日本語 #にほんご #study blog #studyblog #日本語勉強 #日本語を勉強 #blog

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brainmoss · 11 months ago

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just seething at some stuff weve been having to deal with in our dorms dont worry we'll deal with it <3

revenge is a dish best served cold, damn right, ill write the coldest most formal email youve ever had the displeasure of reading school social services you motherfuckers will see what weve been going through in this housing and youll eat it motherfuckers i know nothing will change in my day to day, may even become worse if they want, but fucking hell there will be paper trail and proof these bitches are fucking evil

why why why would you unleash all your lives frustrations on already burntout students

cant fucking sleep cant fucking eat cant fucking shit cant fucking rest in this godamned house cant work cant have my period cant cook but also cant order food cant have possessions cant leave stuff in my room cant arrive late (MY CLASSES END AT MOTHERFUCKING 20:30 and then i have to walk back like godamn) cant wake up early but theyll bang your door down if you sleep until 10

whats going on with these cleaning ladies how do they carry so much hate in their hearts when we didnt do shit to them

today one of them wished we'd catch a disease such as malaria wtf who fucking says that

if i spoke one word like the ones they speak to us id be fucking expelled and forbiden from student housing but theyre the fucking queens

#just venting you can move along

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prorevenge · 6 years ago

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My hippie math teacher was real garbage.

So some background: as a kid, I’ve always been pretty good at math. It was always my best subject, I’d catch onto concepts easily, but I hated it. Not because math was hard or anything, but because no matter how much I hoped, my math teacher would always be the type that would be like “Use the formula I gave you or it’s wrong.” Now, see, my mind works in what others call “a super weird way.” Every time I was taught a new concept in math, I wouldn’t use the formula that the teacher gave us because I’d have a hard time remembering it and I thought it was too time consuming and expanded. Instead, I’d come up with a more efficient, step skipping formula that worked just as well.

Other students would ask me how I do the math so fast, and when I shared the formula with them, they found it much easier and did it just as fast.

So rewind to 7th grade. I was like, 12 or something at the time. I had finally got a good teacher that allowed freedom for multiple formulas because “math is math.” We had her for about a few months, and I really liked her teaching. She got into a freak car accident and took her leave, and from what other staff members told me, she was “lucky to even survive.” I never knew how bad the crash really was, but from what I was told, she cheated death. Staff said she was supposed to come back in a few months, and until then, we would have a long-term substitute.

Before I knew about the accident, I walk to class over in the way corner of my school. At the time, I remember having a class right before that was on the opposite corner of school, so I’d often be late if I walked too slow. So, I turn the corner of the building and notice there’s no students waiting outside, meaning the teacher had already opened the door. Unusual, but I checked the time, and I was earlier than normal. So, I knocked on the door. I waited and waited for someone to open the door, because usually it’s the nearest student to the door who opens it. I knock. And knock. It’s about a few minutes of constant knocking until someone opens the door, but he’s looming above me.

When I look up, it’s a new teacher, long hair and a beard, kind of looks like Jesus. Yes, he was a hipster. He opened the door right after the late bell and said “you’re late.” I explained to him I had been knocking the past few minutes and nobody answered the door, to which he responds “That’s because I told them not to. You should have been here when I opened the door to begin with.” I wanted to explain I had a far away class and I couldn’t be considered late since the late bell didn’t ring, but he didn’t take any of it. I had to go to detention that day.

So, let’s call this teacher Mr. Hippie for convenience. I sat next to my friend, lets nick him Bro, and ask what’s the deal with this guy. Bro tells me that I’ve already made a bad impression, told him to elaborate, to which he explains the whole accident long term sub thing.

So to summarize the first part of his teaching, he didn’t actually teach us anything. Instead, we did completely pointless activities that have nothing to do with math. One of these activities was a class game where we had to tell each other a list of jokes and whoever got the most laughs got the most points and won the game.

So we read these jokes that we’ve been given, and it’s a list of inappropriate jokes. They were all pretty racist, sexist, etc which we already knew he was extremely prejudiced based on his everyday, passing language towards us (some include “girls have good handwriting because they waste their time practicing their letters” and “the only guys that climb mount everest are white dudes because they’re the dumbest people out there” and “girls wouldn’t get raped if they just stop overestimating their strength” whatever that one even means). I can’t think of all the jokes off the top of my head, but here’s some I remember:

Why are religious Jamaicans obese? Because at church they chant “Praise the Lard.” What’s Miley Cyrus’ favorite food? Roast twerky. Why can’t the Kardashian’s swim? Because they have more plastic in their butts than in the whole ocean.

I objected against playing this stupid game because of all the offensive jokes in it, some of which I related to and was offended by. He sent me out of class that day. Bro got sent out eventually as well, because instead of using the offensive jokes, he said a stupid knock knock joke that made the class laugh out of pure stupidity. “Knock knock.” “Who’s there?” “Pizza delivery guy. I burned your pizza because it had pineapple on it. Bad move, cuz.”

At some point when we actually started learning math, Hippie was a douche, He did the same old same old docking me points for not using his formula thing. We were doing white board problems, to which he forced me to do the most complex ones. When I did them correctly and showed my work, he’d think I was wrong until he checked his calculator. Bad move. So, instead, he erases my work off the board in front of literally the whole class, and says to me dead in the eye: “You didn’t show your work.” So, I said, “Alright, I’ll show my work.” So I did. Again. And he erased it. By that point, I was fed up with his bull, so I just left it at that.

When we took tests, we would grade the papers as a class. He would tell us the answers, to which he’d screw up on middle school level questions. Every time I got a different answer, I would ask him to do it on the board, and that would prove he was wrong and I was right. He hated me more for asking questions.

Every time I “technically” got a question wrong, he would call me an idiot, slow, stupid, etc. etc. and even passed a few “maybe if you were a guy you’d be more useful.” I tried telling this to the teachers, but they weren’t having it. I tried waiting until he would finally leave, but info came out that our teacher wasn’t coming back, so we’d have him even longer. So naturally, I did some digging.

Bro and I searched his full name up online and found an admittedly hidden link to his Instagram account, which I won’t leak, but it was golden. He posed himself literally as Jesus, with several sexual and racial posts and memes. He had solid evidence of smoking weed and vaping off campus too, and it looked like he was also becoming the path to an antivaxxer at some point. Some posts included things like “You can’t cure cancer, yet you take away our medicine?” Followed by a picture of weed or something of that sort.

Though it wasn’t exactly what I wanted him fired for, I brought it up with the counselor. She said they’d look into it. While it was followed up by several other students, I was walking home one day when I saw Hippie with a big bag of what looked like posters as he threw it in his trunk and drove off. We came back one day to a brand new, female teacher. Posters that Hippie put up were gone, just like the ones he threw in his trunk the other day. She explained to us the old teacher had been fired for suspicious online activities, and will likely have a hard time ever getting a new job. Since then, the Hippie’s name had been removed from the account, but it’s still up and running by him.

We had that new teacher for the rest of the school year, which wasn’t exactly long, but she did teach us math and threw us a big party on the last day of school, though she still didn’t approve of alternate formulas. Sorry this was quite a long one, fellas, but I thought it was worth sharing.

TL;DR: Got a math teacher fired for his inappropriate Insta after he made sexual jokes and racial slurs and straight up insulted me for months.

(source) story by (/u/TheAcidicFire)

#prorevenge #by /u/TheAcidicFire #pro revenge #revenge stories #pro revenge stories #pro #revenge #last10

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wistfulcynic · 6 years ago

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Another Brick In The Wall: Chapter 8

a/n: Effusive thanks to @hollyethecurious for the artwork! I love it so much! Thanks also to everyone for reading, commenting, kudos-ing, and reblogging! I'm so pleased by the way people have been engaging with this story. Love you all xxx

Summary: Emma Swan, sheriff’s daughter, mayor’s niece, quarterback’s girlfriend, is the undisputed princess of Storybrooke High. She is smart and confident and used to getting what she wants. What she wants is Killian Jones, the new boy in school. But Killian is not easily manipulated, and reluctant to allow the dark secrets in his past to touch the girl he is rapidly falling in love with.

Rating: T

Tags for: @darkcolinodonorgasm @jennjenn615 and @resident-of-storybrooke

Chapter 8:

Killian was out of school for a week, for a “mental health break” he called it with a chuckle, apparently a term he’d gotten from Dr Hopper. He saw the psychiatrist daily during this break and spent the rest of his time at the harbour with Liam, working on their boat, reading, playing his guitar, and talking with his brother about everything that had happened.

“We’ve hashed it all out in excruciating detail,” he told Emma as they sat together in the boat’s cabin, she working on her college essays while he practiced a new song. “It’s such a relief to be able to really talk to Liam again. There was a time when we had no secrets between us. He showed me all the information he had collected on Milah and her situation. Apparently her divorce is almost finalised and next month she’s starting a job teaching English in Japan.” He smiled. “She’ll like that, a chance to travel. What she always wanted.”

“Hmmmph,” said Emma, glaring at the screen of her laptop as she typed rapidly.

“Swan,” he admonished, giving her a mock scowl as he strummed a chord at her.

Emma slammed her hands down on the keyboard. “Killian, I just don’t know how you can be so forgiving after what she did to you.”

He set the guitar aside and his expression became serious. “I have to be, don’t you see?” he asked, looking at her intently. “I can’t hold on to my anger or it will eat me alive. I didn’t even realise how angry I was until Dr Hopper helped me see it, and how by not acknowledging it, allowing myself to feel it, and then letting it go, I was only hurting myself. Besides, I did genuinely care about Milah, and I’m glad she’s finally in a place where she can be happy.”

“Hmmmmph.” Emma concentrated on deleting the gibberish she’d produced by her attack on the keyboard.

“A place that doesn’t include me,” said Killian brightly, picking up the guitar again and plucking out a cheery tune. “That’s good, isn’t it Swan?”

“I suppose so,” she grumbled. “Though I’d still prefer if the place was dark and scary and full of nettles.” He laughed heartily at that and she couldn’t hold back an answering smile. “Hey, I’m nearly done with this, will you read it over and make sure it’s okay? Just check my grammar and punctuation and stuff.”

“Of course, love, though I’m sure it’s already brilliant.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Freed from the weight of his worry and guilt, Killian gradually began to smile more easily, and his witty, teasing nature (“cheeky git,” Liam called him, his voice irritated but with a relief so profound it bordered on joy in his eyes) came more readily to the fore. When he returned to school the following Monday, he moved through the halls with a swagger that Emma had never seen on him before. Unlike the arrogant, bullying one that Neal always had Killian’s evoked a simple self-assurance that she had to concede looked really good on him. Despite how much emotional baggage he still had to work through he clearly wasn’t burdened by shame anymore, and equally clearly did not intend to take any crap from anyone.

This made itself evident that morning when he shut his locker and turned towards his first class, only to find himself confronted by Felix and Rufio.

“Really, chaps?” he said, raising an eyebrow at them. “You couldn’t even wait until after school so you could chuck me into the bins, like proper high school bullies?”

This mockery went clean over the other boys’ heads, and they continued to block his path, trying to look intimidating while also trying not to be intimidated by Killian’s calm demeanor and his amused expression.

Felix, the sligtly cleverer of the two, suspected he was being laughed at but couldn’t put his finger on why. He didn’t like it.

Bristling, he sneered at Killian. “Bet you think you’ve won,” he snarled. “Now that Neal’s in jail and out of the way. Now you can move in on Emma like you did on that—” he broke off as Killian stepped into his space. There wasn’t much difference in height between them, but somehow Felix had the impression of Killian towering over him, his face calm but his eyes darkly furious, and for once in his life he felt a stab of genuine fear.

“I’m only going to say this once,” growled Killian in the new, lower register his voice had taken on more often of late, “So you’d better listen carefully. Your mate Neal is a criminal, and not even a good one. He’s in jail because he’s stupid, and that’s nothing to do with me. I have no doubt it’s where he’d always have ended up eventually. Bit of advice: If you’re going to steal confidential information, don’t take pictures of the evidence on your phone, and definitely don’t then show those pictures to the sheriff’s daughter. Neal got what he deserved. I now consider this matter closed, and if you or anyone else—” he raised his voice so that the rapidly assmbling crowd of onlookers could all hear, “—tries to take it any further, you will not care for the repercussions.”

Felix wasn’t sure what “repercussions” were, but the hint of repressed violence in Killian’s manner made him keen not to find out. He had always been content to follow Neal, less out of respect for the other boy than a simple unwillingness to make a thing out of Neal’s belligerent insistence that he should be the one in charge, but he’d always sensed that there wasn’t much substance underneath Neal’s bluster. Killian however didn’t bluster. He simply stated facts, and Felix could tell that he was not the sort of person to make a threat he couldn’t back up with action. Perhaps it was time to step out of Neal’s shadow, thought Felix, and take over leadership of their little gang. He certainly couldn’t do a worse job of it than Neal had, and escalating a pointless conflict with a guy who looked prepared to fight dirty if necessary was much more Neal’s style than Felix’s. He nodded at Killian, and stepped back. Rufio looked surprised but followed his lead.

Killian nodded back then transferred his glare to the crowd of onlookers, which had grown considerably in the past thirty seconds and now included Emma and Ruby, he could see out of the corner of his eye. “As for what you may have heard about me,” he said, loudly enough for all to hear. “It’s all true.” He smirked for a moment as a gasp went through the crowd, then his expression hardened. “It’s also no one’s business but mine, and those in whom I choose to confide. This is all I have to say on the subject. Now, if you’ll all excuse me I don’t wish to be late for class.” He slung his satchel over his shoulder and headed down the hall, turning his head briefly to shoot Emma a wink. People moved aside to let him pass and as soon as he had turned the corner furious whispering erupted in his wake.

Ruby pursed her lips. “I may have underestimated him,” she remarked.

Emma’s heart was pounding, a familiar occurrence where Killian was concerned, but this time it felt different. She’d been worried about how he would react to the ineveitable curiosity and questions from their classmates, but this smooth handling of a potentially explosive situation instead of calming her fears instead filled her with the wild desire to run after him, to fling herself into his arms and kiss them both breathless.

“He’s just so wonderful,” she sighed, and Ruby laughed.

“Down, girl,” she teased. “I’ll grant you this one’s worth your time, unlike the douchemaster general, but remember we’re in school. No one wants to see that.”

Emma rolled her eyes and gave her friend a shove, but the butterflies continued rhumba-ing around her insides, this time accompanied by an odd, hollow sort of ache as she remembered her resolution not to pursue Killian anymore. She was now all but certain that she loved him, that beyond the hot, tingly sensation she always felt in his presence lay a profound devotion. She would do anything for him, sacrifice anything to give him what he needed, and that terrified her. For the first time in her life Emma felt vulnerable, exposed, as though her chest were torn open and her heart lain bare to the mercies of fate and one gorgeous, troubled boy. She hated it. Even knowing that Killian would never intentionally hurt her was no consolation when the truth was that he could hurt her simply by caring deeply for her as a friend. If that was all she could ever have from him she would take it, she knew, without pushing for more, but it would be a wound on her heart that would never heal.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“He’s a bully,” shrugged Killian at lunchtime, when Emma, this time accompanied by a very inquisitive Ruby, found him in the library. “Bullies are just cowards at their core, and cowards are easy to intimidate. He won’t do anything because he won’t want to call my bluff. I might not be able to back it up but he’ll be too scared to risk finding out.”

“And what would you have done if he had called your bluff?” inquired Ruby.

Killian shrugged again. “Probably got the shit kicked out of me.”

“Would you have, though?” Ruby pressed, watching him through narrowed eyes.

He returned her stare with a look of wide-eyed innocence. “There were two of them to only one of me. Seems inevitable.”

“Does it?” Ruby’s disbelief was almost palpable, and having fenced with Killian for months now Emma shared her friend’s suspicion that he was deliberately underplaying his fighting skills.

“Let’s hope we never have to find out,” said Killian with a small smile, in a tone of voice that made it clear he would answer no more questions on the subject. “I quite like my face arranged the way it is.”

“It is a nice face,” said Ruby with a wolfish grin that widened as Killian’s ears turned pink. “But I didn’t come here just to flatter you. Victor asked me to ask you if he could have your phone number.”

“My number?” Killian blinked in surprise.

“Yeah, there’s some concert in Portland and he doesn’t have anyone to go with and he thought you might be interested.”

“Um, sure, I guess.” Killian rattled off the number and Ruby sent Victor a text. A minute later his phone buzzed and he looked at it, snorting as he read the message. “Bit of a wanker, your boyfriend,” he remarked to Ruby.

“I don’t know what that is but I’m somehow sure that Victor is one,” smirked Ruby. “Is that gonna be a problem?”

“Not at all, I’m rather fond of wankers,” said Killian absently as he typed his reply. “My brother is one, after all.” His phone buzzed again almost instantly and he raised an eyebrow at what he read on it.

“Ems, I think maybe we should leave the boys to their chat,” said Ruby, and as much as she hated to sacrifice free time with Killian, from the way he was fixated on his phone, his expression almost gleeful as he typed rapidly, Emma had to admit she was probably right.

“Okay,” she said. “See you in class in a few minutes, Killian. And maybe hang out after school?”

“Hmmm? Oh, I have an appointment with Dr Hopper at four, but I can text you when I’m done.”

“Okay.” She smiled at him but his attention was back on his phone, so she followed Ruby out of the library trying not to feel too disgruntled. Killian should have other friends, she told herelf firmly, male ones who shared his interests. That was normal, and he could use some normal in his life right now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Over the next few weeks, things at school settled back into a routine, albeit one that was markedly different than it had been. Neal had been officially arrested after David’s investigation, charged with burglary, theft, and theft of a medical record, and was facing up to five years in prison. His parents had put up their house as collateral to pay his bail, but weren’t allowing him to return to school.

“Not much point when he’ll just go straight back to the slammer after he’s sentenced,” said Ruby viciously. “So much for that football scholarship he was so cocky about.”

Emma tried to find some compassion for Neal and what was basically the wreck and ruin of his future, but couldn’t dredge up a single particle of it. He had committed several felonies for no other reason than to stick it to Killian for outsmarting him and for becoming her friend, and he’d committed them flagrantly and with no thought to the consequences. He’d probably thought there wouldn’t be any consequences. Killian was right: Neal deserved everything that was coming to him, if only for being so colossally, arrogantly stupid.

People still whispered about Killian as he walked through the halls but true to character he paid little attention. He did, however, gradually began to open up more and allow more of himself to show through his defences, willingly participating in classes and talking to people other than Emma and Ruby. By the time finals week arrived had actually made a few friends.

Killian reflected wryly that in a twisted sort of way Neal had done him a favour. With all his secrets now out on the open he was free to embrace the opportunity for a new life he’d found in Storybrooke. Not that there had been anything particularly wrong with the old life, at least since his father had finally left. He’d been a mean old drunk, Brennan Jones, and by the time he’d been forced to flee his creditors for good, stealing a boat from Bristol harbour and melting into the offshore underworld, his sons had been glad to see the back of him. Killian thought about what he himself had been like back then, before Milah, and even though it had only been about a year since he’d first become involved with her so much had changed both in his circumstances and in himself, he feared that hopeful, enthusiastic boy was lost forever. Who exactly had taken his place was the question Killian had asked himself daily for weeks now, and he still wasn’t sure how to answer it. He’d become so used to holding everything in, to keeping such a tight rein on his thoughts and feelings that letting them out, accepting that it was okay to express them had become almost unbelievably difficult. The only person he felt even remotely comfortable being fully himself with aside from Liam was Emma, whose support and friendship remained unwavering as he bumbled and struggled thorough the reclamation of his life, and he remained intensely grateful for it.

Only one thing about Emma troubled him-- that she no longer seemed to be interested in anything beyond his friendship. All the little hints and cues she had been giving him since they’d met were suddenly gone, and while he was relieved to be free of the added stress of constantly resisting something that part of him desperately wanted, he couldn’t help wondering if there was a darker motivation for this abrupt about-face. Perhaps, whispered an evil little voice in his head, Emma was actually more disgusted by his past than she let on and was simply too kind to tell him directly. Maybe the thought of him touching her turned her stomach now. He certainly couldn’t blame her if it did.

“What do you want from your relationship with Emma?” asked Dr Hopper one afternoon, after Killian had finally brought himself to mention the change in her behaviour. “Do you want it to be romantic?”

Killian frowned, struggling to sort through the complex tangle of his feelings about and for Emma. “I don’t want a romantic relationship with anyone,” he said finally. “I still feel too messed up for anything like that. But I— I’m still really attracted to her. I think about her all the time, about how we kissed at her party, and I want to kiss her again pretty much constantly, but then I remember Milah and how I thought I felt about her, and I just—”

“You don’t trust your judgement.”

“Yeah.”

“Killian, it’s important for you to remember that you have a much more equal relationship with Emma than you ever did with Milah.”

“Equal, with Emma?” Killian snorted. “You have met her, right?”

Dr Hopper smiled patiently. “I understand that you feel she’s beyond your reach, and that’s a separate issue, but what I mean by equal is that she’s your age and at your stage of life. With Milah you were constantly struggling to relate to her life and her experiences, and when you couldn’t you attempted to make up for that by offering her the affection and sexual attention she craved. You forced yourself to offer these things even though you didn’t genuinely feel them because you feared the consequences of not offering them. But with Emma there is no need to manufacture anything. She is placing no demands on you and therefore any attraction and affection you feel for her is genuine.”

“But what should I do about it?”

“Why should you have to do anything? You said you’re not ready for a romantic relationship, and that’s fine. Let yourself heal. The process is slow and frustrating, but believe me you are making progress. Let your feelings for Emma and your relationship with her develop at a pace that is comfortable for you. From what you’ve said it sounds like she will still be there when, if, you’re ready for more.”

“It’s more than likely she no longer wants more. And even if she did, what happens when she meets someone who isn’t so hopelessly fucked up? Then where does that leave me?”

“Why don’t you worry about that if —not when— it happens?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On the last day before winter break, Emma nervously approached Killian’s locker and handed him an invitation to her parents’ annual Christmas party addressed to him and Liam.

“It’s just a thing they do every year for their friends and our neighbours,” she began to ramble as he examined the card, certain he would refuse and wanting to delay that painful moment. “My mom loves to entertain, and my dad says it’s good for building a rapport between law enforcement and the community, and—”

“Swan,” interrupted Killian, giving her that soft, indulgent look that said he knew exactly what she was thinking. “I’m sure we’d love to attend. Thank you for inviting us.”

The butterflies soared in a grand jeté, and she felt like she was flying with them. “Great,” she said trying to keep her voice calm, “I guess I’ll see you then.”

Her delighted smile made his breath catch, and his answering grin set her heart galloping. Their eyes met and held, and as the end of semester chaos whirled around them they stood a breath apart, swathed in frustrated yearning and brittle tension, the only two people in the world.

Then the final bell rang, and they leapt apart, Emma smoothing her skirt with shaking hands while Killian ran his own trembling fingers through his hair.

“So, onion rings at Granny’s?” ventured Emma, wanting to kick herself for making him nervous again, after all her resolutions, hoping desperately he wouldn’t pull away.

Killian sighed in relief, tinged with a hint of disappointment. Granny’s was safe. “Sounds perfect, love,” he said.

#cs au ff #high school au #teenage captain swan #captain duckling #lieutenant duckling #another brick in the wall #profdanglaisstuff

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optomstudies · 6 years ago

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Hi, Im a 1st year uni student and Ive got an exam in a few days. Ive just finished my assignments so I havent had much of a chance to study. Its a 3 hour exam and I have to write 4 essays from any of the 9 questions were given about topics weve studied throughout the semester, and we can take in 2 a4 sheets of notes. The thing is Im terrible at essay exams. Any other kind I can ace but essays have always been my downfall. I dont mind what grade I get, I just want to pass. Do you have any advice?

Hey there! I should note that it’s a bit late to start now unfortunately, you can’t really cram university exams, so what you’ve got now is probably what you’ll go with. University essay marking is also notoriously difficult.

How to Study for an Essay Exam

Make a mindmap of the concepts you need to know for each essay. Just sketch a quick one since time is of the essence. Essentially you want to get an idea of how the concepts interrelate, especially cause and effect since you’ll basically be trying to argue and convey your ideas, interpretations, and explanations, in the essay.

The majority of your time should be dedicated to planning how to argue and elaborate upon the examples you need. Write down in dot points your main arguments by breaking down the keywords of the questions. This knowledge should (hopefully) come from the knowledge of the topics you’ve been learning from your classes. The essay basically fleshes out your understanding, so if you’re lacking an understanding of the concepts, you’ll probably be struggling a bit.

If required (i.e. if you don’t know how the concepts interrelate), try and skim read and check the notes you should have been making in the margins of your readings. These should form your personal interpretations for the arguments.

Once you’ve written down dot points of how the essay should flow out, then you should take a small break and then come back thinking critically as an essay marker; try and think of counter arguments they might make, or think of where your arguments are a bit weak/ unsupported by evidence. Make sure you put a stopper on any leaky arguments.

On your cheat sheets, you ought to write down examples of what you want to delve into - particularly any quotes or specific factual information e.g. dates and minutae. The notes are intended to take away the memorisation process from your studying.

I should add that my degree was a science degree and so if any humanities majors want to add any useful pointers to please do so.

#answered #studyblr #studyspo #study tips #university #college #high school #bullet journal #studyblr masterposts #optomstudies #emmastudies #morningkou #studyplants #etudiance #heyabby #lychiestudy #anonymous

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inawickedlittletown · 6 years ago

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Walking The Wire (106/?)

Summary: Tony Stark always knew about Peter Parker. He didn’t know that Peter was going to get superpowers and become Spider-Man, but he always knew about Peter because Peter was his son.

This will span from pre-Iron Man up through the rest of the MCU (eventually including Infinity War) and will be for the most part canon compliant except where I’ve taken some liberties and interpreted canon a certain way.

Pairings: Pepper/Tony, Tony/Steve (endgame), Tony/Mary (past)

A/N: If you want me to tag you when I post new chapters let me know. This fic is also on AO3

I used Collider’s MCU timeline to stay canon and the title of this fic is an Imagine Dragons song that is just so fitting for Peter and Tony

@findmeinthestarss

Masterpost

Chapter One Hundred Five

It turned out that having Michelle know he was Spider-Man and acknowledging that she did was a good thing. Michelle was just all that much better about covering for Peter. Just the other day when they’d gone on a small class trip and Peter had spotted a mugging happening, it was Michelle that had distracted everyone long enough for Peter to get away unnoticed and then again when he rejoined them.

The only thing about Michelle was that unlike Ned, she actually seemed concerned about what Peter got up to. She worried. It was weird especially when she pretended that she didn’t in person and then sent him long rambling texts about how he wasn’t being careful and how close he came to getting injured or hurting others.

It was all on par with how much coverage Spider-Man had started to get from the media which Peter didn’t particularly like. At first it had seemed cool to be mentioned on the news all the time and to have articles about Spider-Man popping up everywhere. His favorite were the YouTube videos since those were usually fun to watch mostly because they weren’t all made by anyone truly professional. But after a while, even those got old. It got annoying. Tony definitely disliked it.

“I just don’t like how interested everyone seems to be in finding out your identity,” his dad said while they were tinkering in the workshop. “It’s none of their business.”

Peter liked listening to him rant. It was kind of hilarious especially when one considered Tony’s own media presence basically his entirely life.

“And it’s not like we’ve announced that you’re an Avenger or anything but some reason they just seem to associate you with us.”

That’s when Steve spoke up. “That’s because they see you out and about with him all the time as Iron Man and Iron Man is an Avenger.”

“That isn’t the point,” Tony said.

“And also, Peter’s the only hero that’s popped up that has a hidden identity. Gives everyone a mystery to want to solve.”

Tony muttered some more and Peter tried not to laugh. He could tell that Steve was amused too.

Since all that stuff with The Vulture, Tony still did tend to show up when Peter needed help. He was better about letting Peter be involved in things especially when they didn’t involve alien tech. They had stopped some weird guy with what seemed to be some sort of power -- Tony said he was probably an inhuman -- just the other day from destroying a big portion of Greenwich Village. The guy hadn’t been doing it on purpose it turned out it. It was just that his powers were so unstable. Peter had been glad to have Tony there because he didn’t a single person could have handled everything that instance entailed. Even Vision had made an appearance for that. In the end they had subdued the guy and Tony had handed him over to a the new Shield.

“But also, it’s not just the identity thing,” Tony kept on, “it’s that there’s varying degrees of coverage. He’s good for the city. He’s a vigilante. He’s an Avenger. He’s not. It’s ridiculous. At least no one seems to have put together that I built your suit. Or at least no one’s written an article about it yet. And can you imagine if anyone found out I had a son? Because then they would definitely start questioning whether you were the one under the mask and then my parenting would come into question.”

It was no surprise to Peter that Ned loved it. He had a whole collection on articles written about him and he would send Peter the more outrageous ones and Peter would pass those on to Steve because Steve loved reading them too. May seemed to agree with Tony on the whole matter. But then, May also tended to try and get Peter to quit being Spider-Man altogether whenever she saw him and it wasn’t something that was ever likely to stop. She liked to bring up questions about school and girlfriends and college and how Spider-Man wouldn’t be an ideal addition to any of those as her way of asking him to stop.

As he stepped out of Midtown one afternoon, Peter was surprised when he spotted Tony complete with a baseball cap, sunglasses, a grin, and a thermal cup that probably contained coffee, leaning against a sleek black car that at least proved to be his least flashy. Still, no matter how hard he was trying, he looked out of place and people were noticing him.

Michelle who had walked out with him spotted Tony with no problem and when Peter glanced at her he could practically see her thinking. Her left eyebrow rose and she stared him down.

“Is Tony Stark actually picking you up right now?”

Peter shook his head. “Nope. It’s all in your imagination. You’re hallucinating.”

Michelle laughed -- cackled more like and Peter grinned back at her as she nudged him and rolled her eyes. Ned appeared then, busy with his backpack as he walked, and only managing to not run into anyone because anyone in his path dodged him.

“Hey, what’s going on?”

“Your boy here is being picked up by Tony Stark. Fancy that. I bet Flash will be jealous.”

“Which is why I’m going to go before anyone else notices,” Peter said and rushed away. When he looked back Michelle waved and Ned grinned at him and gave him thumbs up.

“Hey,” Peter said when he was close enough.

“Hi, kiddo,” his dad said, “I was in the area so I figured I’d come by and get you. I was also sort of craving this apple crostini this one restaurant has so we’re going to have to make a stop for that. Up for it?”

Peter rolled his eyes but nodded. “Sure.”

They got into the car and when Peter looked out the window he realized that a few people were watching them. Someone must have caught onto Tony being there. Not that it really mattered since everyone knew that Peter had a Stark Internship. Of course, no intern could have ever expected for Tony Stark himself to show up to pick them up from school. He was definitely going to hear about it.

The restaurant Tony took them to was a hole in the wall that no one would have ever noticed and yet it was busy. A well known secret. Nevertheless, they were seated at a discrete table towards the back without much wait which told Peter that Tony had called ahead.

“Why are we really here?” Peter asked.

“I told you -- apple crostini. Also, remind me to order one to go because Steve would kill us if we don’t bring him one back. We used to come here sometimes back in the day.”

“Oh,” Peter said.

His dad never really talked about how he and Steve had come to be and Peter didn’t really have any questions or want to know details, but he loved when Tony slipped in something that hinted at a past memory. It made him realize how normal it all was in some ways. Sometimes, it was still shocking to think about Iron Man and Captain America in a romantic relationship or to consider that they were getting married until he thought about them as Tony and Steve -- his dad and his dad’s fiance.

“Truth is, I wanted to catch up with you,” Tony said. “Things have been a bit crazy lately. Haven’t really spent much time with you on our own. Steve or someone else is usually around.”

Peter hadn’t -- no, he’d noticed, it was just that he hadn’t minded. He’d never expected to have Tony to himself all the time and had felt lucky when he did even if then it had been broken up to a few hours here and there and now he was living in the tower and had access to Tony all the time and it didn’t really matter that there were other people around.

“We can start with, who was the girl?”

Peter rolled his eyes. “Who, Michelle? I’ve told you about her. She’s the one that figured out I’m Spider-Man all on her own.”

“MJ. You said someone named MJ did.”

“Michelle Jones. She likes to be called MJ. Anyway, that was her.”

Tony nodded. The waitress approached then and Tony ordered the apple crostinis and remembered to order the one to go as well without Peter needing to remind him.

“So she’s super smart and observant,” Tony said.

“Yup. Definitely knew it was you waiting for me. Actually, I think a few people figured it out.”

Tony shrugged with a grin. “And they can all wonder about what your internship entails once more.”

Tony started asking about how things were going in school next and Peter filled him in even though he was sure he’d mentioned some of it to him in passing over the last few weeks.

The apple crostini turned out to be amazing. He was in the middle of telling Tony about what they’d started working on in physics when it arrived and after one bite of the crunchy and flaky crust with the warm apple filling and the ice cream and Peter was in heaven.

“I told you so,” Tony said.

“This is the best thing ever,” Peter said.

It was nice to have some time on his own with Tony. Tony told him all about how the board members were driving him and Pepper crazy because they didn’t like that Tony’s concern wasn’t all about profit when it came to the prosthetic division even when it came to custom projects.

“It’s like they don’t understand how good the PR is although that obviously isn’t why we’re doing it.”

“But it’s your company,” Peter said.

“Pepper and I own more than half of the shares of the company, sure, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have to deal with the board of directors. It’s the side of business that I don’t particularly like. Pepper is awesome at it. It’s all stuff you’ll have to learn about if you want to take over the company one day--”

“Um, what?” Peter said and almost choked on a piece of apple.

Tony chuckled. “Won’t be for a while and it’s up to you if you want it. It’s not an obligation, you know. You could find your own Pepper Potts and have someone else run it if you prefer. I rather you do what you want than what you think I want you to do so--”

Peter had sort of forgotten about how Tony had broken the news to him what felt like ages ago even though it hadn’t even been a full year yet. He’d forgotten how Tony told him that he would inherit everything as if that had been the right way to let him know that Tony was his father. Since then, Peter hadn’t really thought about it or the reality of what it actually meant which meant that it was overwhelming information to take in.

“I -- that’s--”

“What, did you forget that I’m Tony Stark? You’re my heir, kid, to this whole crazy company and whatever else I’ve accumulated.”

“But what if -- what if you and Steve have kids?” Peter asked.

It wasn’t something he’d considered before that moment, but wasn’t that what people did after they got married? They went and had kids. Peter was aware that Tony and Steve were both men but there were ways around that -- surrogacy or adoption or other weirder things. It was possible. Peter didn’t know if -- well, he didn’t know if he’d be thrilled about it if they did have kids. He felt weird even just thinking about it.

“Not really something we’ve discussed,” Tony said and he seemed to notice that Peter seemed uncomfortable. “And even if we did decide to have kids it wouldn’t be for a long while, Pete.”

“Oh,” Peter said. But they could still have some even if Peter was fully grown when they did--

Tony grabbed his hand. Tony’s hand was warm and familiar and Peter allowed himself to calm down. “Peter, you’re my kid. I -- I love you, kid. Not something that will ever change. I’ll always be here for you no matter what. Even if Steve and I adopt a hundred kids. You’re still always going to be my son and you’re the most important person in my life.”

Peter hadn’t expected Tony to say that. Those three words. Tony had said them before, he was sure, but Peter couldn’t actually remember. He certainly hadn’t expected them in the moment.

“I don’t think even Steve will want to adopt that many kids,” Peter said.

“If he even wants to,” Tony said with a shrug. “I’m not saying I wouldn’t be opposed to another kid -- it’s just I’d be fine with just you.”

“Oh,” Peter said. “But you didn’t get to raise me. Not really. Don’t you want that -- the whole baby thing?” Peter didn’t really understand why people were so keen on babies. He knew they were cute but they also cried and made messes and couldn’t really do anything and he actually -- he couldn’t see Tony or even Steve dealing with a baby well.

“That doesn’t matter. Clearly, it doesn’t. You’re still my kid, Peter, and as has been established you clearly need me a lot too no matter what your age is.”

Peter nodded. “I kind of do,” Peter said and then because he couldn’t say anything else, “I, um, I love you too, dad.”

He thought that Tony’s eyes got a bit misty at that and Peter realized that he’d never actually said it out loud before. But it was true. It had been true for a while. Peter loved Tony. He loved his dad and everything that he was and did for Peter. He was one of the best people he knew and Peter would forever be glad that he knew who his father was and that it was someone as amazing as Tony Stark.

Chapter One Hundred Seven

#peter and tony #peter and tony fic #mcuwriting #mcu fic #iron dad #iron dad and spider son #stony #stony fic #marvel

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brunhiddensmusings · 5 years ago

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ye gods i remember using a typewriter back in middle school in the late 90s, it was a damned sight better then my atrocious handwriting for turning in any kind of lengthy paper. in a way im nostalgic enough i would dig out a typewriter again for the hell of it but damned if getting new ink ribbons wouldnt be harder then keeping the ink on a printer full 1- speaking of which i recall when the ‘backspace’ key thus would not just shift you BACK a SPACE but it requried you taking out a ribon of white ink and holding it over where your mistake letter hit, and striking it again to color over it in white before you hit it with a new black letter 2- this is also why we have QWERTY keyboards, specifically to move the most commonly used letters around to purposefully slow down typing. if this did not happen and we had, say, an ABCDEF typewriter like you would assume or heaven forbid a DVORAK typewriter layout you would be typing fast enough that the physical letters hammering down onto the paper would be getting in each others way, and then repeatedly pause to untangle them

im not even that old, i was born in 84, yet in middle school they still had a handfull of the oooollld apple computers where the ‘floppy’ disks actually went ‘flop flop flop’ when you wiggled them (the reason everyone remembers oregon trail from them is because all the other programs were embarrassingly pathetic) because the ‘new’ computer lab wasnt done being built yet as it took some school districts really did take untill 95 to consider ‘maybe computers are the future for jobs and education’ and it wasnt untill 99 when computer labs started to slooowly include computers that could read CDs ‘what do you mean the save icon used to be a physical thing’- bitch, back in 03 when i had just started tech school as a CNC programmer/designer (which didnt work out because the school changed the program title, combined it with a different program, turned it from a diploma to a certificate, and said i would have to start over and pay for tuition all over again so i said blow that) WE WERE STILL USING FLOPPY DISKS for all of our CAD programs

i did this fucker and could save about 12 more on the same floppy disk and that BLOWS MY OWN MIND, but what blows my mind harder is that THIS FUCKER

DOES NOT HAVE ENOUGH MEMORY TO STORE THAT PROGRAM IN IT so we had to ‘drip feed’ a program 1/10th the storage of a floppy disk because this things computer wasnt beefy enough to hold the whole thing.... AND ITS STILL IN USE TODAY i checked (the ‘hybryd’ program i mentioned before in 04 involved adding some machines from the 60s that had 80s computer control units added to them) less then a year ago and apparently some of my 15 year old class projects are still on display next to the creepy ass 3D projection of a face engraved into an aluminum block (its like a cross between carbonite han solo and pepsi-man) ‘kids today dont know early 90s tech and items prior to that’- no, we not only have a deep thirst for knowledge arcane and stupid but we are also products of REEAAALLY behind the times education systems that are probably still using maps that have been outdated since george bush the first so yes weve seen and used this shit and if someone asks us we are glad to tell them about it instead of saying ‘back in my day things were much better and sepia toned because i purposefully forgot all the racism i was up to and how jank the technology was’

TIL (click to go to the thread, which probably has more interesting tidbits I missed).

Bonus:

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purpler0s3 · 6 years ago

Video

I saw u hanging out with caitlyn last night rebecca its not what you think i wont hesitate bitch my name is trey i got a basketball game tomorrow well im on point guard i got shoe game jared can you read #12 for the class no i cannot what up im jared im 19 and i never fuckin learned how to read oh oh omigod come to del taco they got a new thing called fre-freesh a vacadoo back at it again in krispy kreme whats worse than a rapist a child no is there anything better than pussy? Yes a really good book hey whatchu got aw yknow ya boi got his free taco i am the sand guardian ocean bow before him fuck off if your name is junior aaand ur really handsome come on raise ur hand welcome to ttttttttttttartgeeeeeet *clang* i wasnt readyyy oh hehe no wait put it back moms coming on all levels except physical... I am a wolf... *arf* *crashes into gym ceiling* *screams* oh junior fuck it up first day of school fuck it up fuck it up junior so- would you please stop interrupting me? Thank you, as i was saying- and the- ohmygod *dun dun dun dun dun dun* SAYYIN *foot smash* helloo? Hello? Oh i look like squidward wait. Spongebob *dies of laughter* so i was sittin there, bbq sauce on my tiddies *falls on the ground laughing* so no head? *throws phone* *smashes skateboard* hello no off topic questions thats an offtopic question no you have been stopped what the fuck, richard bored as shiiiit oh my god oh mi gowd owh mai gowed *whips hair back and forth while smiling* red dress on tonite, standin in the dark in the pale moonlight hurricane katrina? More like hurricane tortilla! mom i gotta tell u something... I got an A-Bor-Tion *music* *na na na* *music* *da na na* *music* *da na na* *grandmother waves furiously across cars* *lets snake lick lollipop* luv yaself, accept yaself, love yaself you can be anything you want, a dog *woof* yknow what im sayin? *dancing* *pulls out gun* *pees pants* i said whoever threw that paper, ya moms a hoe can i get a waffle? Can i pleaseee get a waffle? Shut the fuck up *star wars theme breaks out* OOOOOOOHOWOWOWOWOOOHOWWOOOW shut up! Yes. kevin watch the light, the light, kevin watch the light *shatters light* IVE GOT POOP IN MY BUTT you dont need a degree to be a clothing hanger chris is that a weed? No its- im calling the police *beep beep beep* are those helium balloons? Are those helium balloons? Ah its too late the cars in the air *releases fairy* fairy:FLIES TOWARD FLAMES im rebecca hatton, your freestyle dance instructor so basically *gets punched* ah fuck... I cant believe youve done this *dances with cat* its old spice secret scent SHHhhHhH AHHH AHHH AHHH why are you running? WHY are u running!? Soyoujustgonnabringmeabirthdaygiftonnybirthdayatmybirthdaypartywithabirthdaygiftonmybirthday? Happy birthday *smashes glass* "girl, you thicker than a bowl of oatmeal" *finger guns* dont fall *falls* AHHH *gets all the fountain drinks* *sips* fuck you hnngngnanah homonanaghah squash bananaAHH *music* *turns around* judy judy bo booty fo fanna fanna fo foody trouble at school? Just walk a-Wayy-ayy-ayy-ayy-ay two bros chillin in a hot tub, 5 feet apart cuz theyre not gay *gets choked* yo im just chillin in cedar rapids *spills slushee* NO *car roof descends katie no its coming no AHHHHHH hey do u want a- *fuck i have a lisp i cant just say rice krispies treats* -blue bar? *rolls down ramp in shopping cart* *crashes* oh weve got the new chip reader hmm *pulls out dorito* oh i dont think- *beep* *illuminati music* *coughs up meatball*

I saw an opportunity and I took it

#youre welcome #also its really late and the vid was very glitch so i prob missed a few....

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magzoso-tech · 5 years ago

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What does a pandemic say about the tech we’ve built?

New Post has been published on https://magzoso.com/tech/what-does-a-pandemic-say-about-the-tech-weve-built/

What does a pandemic say about the tech we’ve built?

There’s a joke* being reshared on chat apps that takes the form of a multiple-choice question — asking who’s the leading force in workplace digital transformation? The red-lined punchline is not the CEO or CTO, but: C) COVID-19.

There’s likely more than a grain of truth underpinning the quip. The novel coronavirus is pushing a lot of metaphorical buttons right now. “Pause” buttons for people and industries, as large swathes of the world’s population face quarantine conditions that can resemble house arrest. The majority of offline social and economic activities are suddenly off limits.

Such major pauses in our modern lifestyle may even turn into a full reset, over time. The world as it was, where mobility of people has been all but taken for granted — regardless of the environmental costs of so much commuting and indulged wanderlust — may never return to “business as usual.”

If global leadership rises to the occasion, then the coronavirus crisis offers an opportunity to rethink how we structure our societies and economies — to make a shift toward lower carbon alternatives. After all, how many physical meetings do you really need when digital connectivity is accessible and reliable? As millions more office workers log onto the day job from home, that number suddenly seems vanishingly small.

COVID-19 is clearly strengthening the case for broadband to be a utility — as so much more activity is pushed online. Even social media seems to have a genuine community purpose during a moment of national crisis, when many people can only connect remotely, even with their nearest neighbours.

Hence the reports of people stuck at home flocking back to Facebook to sound off in the digital town square. Now that the actual high street is off limits, the vintage social network is experiencing a late second wind.

Facebook understands this sort of higher societal purpose already, of course. Which is why it’s been so proactive about building features that nudge users to “mark yourself safe” during extraordinary events like natural disasters, major accidents and terrorist attacks. (Or indeed, why it encouraged politicians to get into bed with its data platform in the first place — no matter the cost to democracy.)

In less fraught times, Facebook’s “purpose” can be loosely summed to “killing time.” But with ever more sinkholes being drilled by the attention economy, that’s a function under ferocious and sustained attack.

Over the years the tech giant has responded by engineering ways to rise back to the top of the social heap — including spying on and buying up competition, or directly cloning rival products. It’s been pulling off this trick, by hook or by crook, for over a decade. Albeit, this time Facebook can’t take any credit for the traffic uptick; a pandemic is nature’s dark pattern design.

What’s most interesting about this virally disrupted moment is how much of the digital technology that’s been built out online over the past two decades could very well have been designed for living through just such a dystopia.

Seen through this lens, VR should be having a major moment. A face computer that swaps out the stuff your eyes can actually see with a choose-your-own-digital-adventure of virtual worlds to explore, all from the comfort of your living room? What problem are you fixing, VR? Well, the conceptual limits of human lockdown in the face of a pandemic quarantine right now, actually…

Virtual reality has never been a compelling proposition versus the rich and textured opportunity of real life, except within very narrow and niche bounds. Yet all of a sudden, here we all are — with our horizons drastically narrowed and real-life news that’s ceaselessly harrowing. So it might yet end up a wry punchline to another multiple choice joke: “My next vacation will be: A) Staycation, B) The spare room, C) VR escapism.”

It’s videoconferencing that’s actually having the big moment, though. Turns out even a pandemic can’t make VR go viral. Instead, long-lapsed friendships are being rekindled over Zoom group chats or Google Hangouts. And Houseparty — a video chat app — has seen surging downloads as barflies seek out alternative night life with their usual watering-holes shuttered.

Bored celebs are TikToking. Impromptu concerts are being live-streamed from living rooms via Instagram and Facebook Live. All sorts of folks are managing social distancing, and the stress of being stuck at home alone (or with family), by distant socializing: signing up to remote book clubs and discos; joining virtual dance parties and exercise sessions from bedrooms; taking a few classes together; the quiet pub night with friends has morphed seamlessly into a bring-your-own-bottle group video chat.

This is not normal — but nor is it surprising. We’re living in the most extraordinary time. And it seems a very human response to mass disruption and physical separation (not to mention the trauma of an ongoing public health emergency that’s killing thousands of people a day) to reach for even a moving pixel of human comfort. Contactless human contact is better than none at all.

Yet the fact all these tools are already out there, ready and waiting for us to log on and start streaming, should send a dehumanizing chill down society’s backbone.

It underlines quite how much consumer technology is being designed to reprogram how we connect with each other, individually and in groups, in order that uninvited third parties can cut a profit.

Back in the pre-COVID-19 era, a key concern being attached to social media was its ability to hook users and encourage passive feed consumption — replacing genuine human contact with voyeuristic screening of friends’ lives. Studies have linked the tech to loneliness and depression. Now that we’re literally unable to go out and meet friends, the loss of human contact is real and stark. So being popular online in a pandemic really isn’t any kind of success metric.

Houseparty, for example, self-describes as a “face to face social network” — yet it’s quite the literal opposite; you’re foregoing face-to-face contact if you’re getting virtually together in app-wrapped form.

The implication of Facebook’s COVID-19 traffic bump is that the company’s business model thrives on societal disruption and mainstream misery. Which, frankly, we knew already. Data-driven adtech is another way of saying it’s been engineered to spray you with ad-flavored dissatisfaction by spying on what you get up to. The coronavirus just hammers the point home.

The fact we have so many high-tech tools on tap for forging digital connections might feel like amazing serendipity in this crisis — a freemium bonanza for coping with terrible global trauma. But such bounty points to a horrible flip side: It’s the attention economy that’s infectious and insidious. Before “normal life” plunged off a cliff, all this sticky tech was labelled “everyday use;” not “break out in a global emergency.”

It’s never been clearer how these attention-hogging apps and services are designed to disrupt and monetize us; to embed themselves in our friendships and relationships in a way that’s subtly dehumanizing; re-routing emotion and connections; nudging us to swap in-person socializing for virtualized fuzz designed to be data-mined and monetized by the same middlemen who’ve inserted themselves unasked into our private and social lives.

Captured and recompiled in this way, human connection is reduced to a series of dilute and/or meaningless transactions; the platforms deploying armies of engineers to knob-twiddle and pull strings to maximize ad opportunities, no matter the personal cost.

It’s also no accident we’re seeing more of the vast and intrusive underpinnings of surveillance capitalism emerge, as the COVID-19 emergency rolls back some of the obfuscation that’s used to shield these business models from mainstream view in more normal times. The trackers are rushing to seize and colonize an opportunistic purpose.

Tech and ad giants are falling over themselves to get involved with offering data or apps for COVID-19 tracking. They’re already in the mass surveillance business, so there’s likely never felt like a better moment than the present pandemic for the big data lobby to press the lie that individuals don’t care about privacy, as governments cry out for tools and resources to help save lives.

First the people-tracking platforms dressed up attacks on human agency as “relevant ads.” Now the data industrial complex is spinning police-state levels of mass surveillance as pandemic-busting corporate social responsibility. How quick the wheel turns.

But platforms should be careful what they wish for. Populations that find themselves under house arrest with their phones playing snitch might be just as quick to round on high-tech gaolers as they’ve been to sign up for a friendly video chat in these strange and unprecedented times.

Oh, and Zoom (and others) — more people might actually read your “privacy policy” now they’ve got so much time to mess about online. And that really is a risk.

Every day there’s a fresh Zoom privacy/security horror story. Why now, all at once?

It’s simple: the problems aren’t new but suddenly everyone is forced to use Zoom. That means more people discovering problems and also more frustration because opting out isn’t an option. https://t.co/O9h8SHerok

— Arvind Narayanan (@random_walker) March 31, 2020

*Source is a private Twitter account called @MBA_ish

#Miscellaneous

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arplis · 5 years ago

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Arplis - News: Great seat, so-so service: A review of KLMs business class on the 787-9 from Amsterdam to Toronto

TPG Rating

80 100

Pros

Beautiful, comfortable seat and bed; ample options for inflight entertainment; greatly improved lounge at Amsterdam airport.

Cons

Slow, disjointed meal service.

16/20 Ground Experience

26/30 Cabin + Seat

12/15 Amenities + IFE

15/20 Food + Beverage

11/15 Service

Dutch flag carrier KLM is a major presence in the U.S. and Canada, with year-round flights to Amsterdam (AMS) from 14 cities. It sends across the Atlantic pretty much all of the airplane types in its long-haul fleet: the Airbus A330 and Boeing 747, 777 and 787. The last one is the only one offering business class with direct aisle access for all seats, while the other types feature configurations with seats in a 2-2-2 layout.

Its a much different story on the 787s, which began joining the fleet four years ago and sport a 1-2-1 configuration in business class, with seats laid out in a reverse-herringbone pattern. On paper, its a totally competitive offering across the Atlantic, at least in terms of seat.

KLM is also a member of SkyTeam, the alliance that includes Delta Air Lines, so flyers can earn and redeem Deltas SkyMiles on all flights, as well as Air France and KLMs own Flying Blue miles.

For more TPG news delivered each morning to your inbox, sign up for our daily newsletter.

Weve reviewed KLMs business class before several times, including the classic upper-deck experience on the 747. Every time, we found it to be a good, but not great, way to fly at the front of the plane.

What would we find in 2019, which also happens to be the 100-year anniversary of KLM, the worlds oldest airline?

Booking

The Flying Blue program has become complicated lately, but youll be able to navigate it easily using our guides. You can also get Flying Blue miles by transferring points from Citi ThankYou Rewards, Chase Ultimate Rewards, American Express Membership Rewards and Marriott Bonvoy.

When we found a great award fare from Amsterdam to Toronto (YYZ) for 45,375 Flying Blue miles plus $226.15 in taxes and fees, we went for it without hesitation. We value Flying Blue miles at 1.2 cents each, making this a transatlantic flight in business class for $750.65. You can pay a lot more in coach!

On the KLM app, I was able to select my seat in advance not my meals, unfortunately and I was off for one of the cheapest premium-class Atlantic crossings of my entire frequent-flyer career.

Ground Experience

TPG Rating

16/20

PH-BHP

Tail

1yr

Age

11%

Late

h 16m

Avg. Delay

17:45

Departure

7h 37m

Duration

Amsterdams Schiphol Airport is one of the easiest airports in Europe to navigate. Connections are a breeze compared to Paris Charles de Gaulle (CDG) or London Heathrow (LHR), getting there from the city is easy with plenty of trains and the airport itself is well designed.

When I arrived at the departures hall at 2:40 p.m. for the 5:35 p.m. departure to Toronto, I found the check-in area and departure gate already displayed on the monitors.

Biz-class passengers and elite members of the SkyTeam alliance could check in using a separate gated area, indicated by the SkyPriority logo.

Within this area were both traditional, staffed desks and self-service kiosks, useful if you dont have baggage to check. KLMs institutional blue color, with accents of Dutch orange, appeared in tasteful touches.

Despite having already checked in on the app, I got a paper boarding pass from a desk employee you never know when you might need it. Then I used the priority access to security and the departure gates, clearly indicated within the gated area.

After a quick and painless security and passport check, I was out in the departures area, headed to a duty-free shop for the delicacies I always make sure to bring home from the Amsterdam airport stroopwafels, salty licorice, Gouda cheese and then to one of the KLM lounges.

Even without lounge access, I would have had plenty to see and quiet areas to sit in. Schiphol is a nice airport to be in if you dont have lounge access. Its also a quiet airport, with no announcements on loudspeakers.

TPG contributor Eric Rosen has reviewed in depth the renovated KLM Crown Lounge, one of the two at AMS (the other one is within the area restricted to flights within the European Unions passport-free zone.) Eric explains in detail what you can find there, but I can sum up my time in it with one word: Wow!

This was a far cry from the cavernous, rather boring space it used to be. It had been completely transformed into a large, world-class lounge.

Immediately upon entering, I could see things had changed from my previous visits.

As befits the name, it now had lounge chairs. And much, much better food options, including an la carte restaurant on the second floor, called Blue. (Too bad it was not free, unlike the food and drink in the lounge.)

I spent a delightful hour exploring, and liking, the buffet food and the decor. Another reason to pick a transfer at AMS over other European gateways.

Monitors in the lounge included a mention of how long it took to walk to a specific gate. Armed with that knowledge, I could maximize my time in the lounge and timed my arrival at the gate just four minutes before the start of boarding, long enough to admire the beautiful blue 787-9 that was to fly as KL695 to Toronto.

KLM names its 787s after flowers, and this one, a year-old Dreamliner, was called Tulip. How much more Dutch can you get?

Priority and general boarding lanes were clearly marked, and nobody was crowding the boarding area. At 4:50 p.m., boarding began right on time.

Cabin and Seat

TPG Rating

26/30

1-2-1

Configuration

81in

Bed Length

Lavs

KLMs 787-9 has 30 business-class seats, in a single cabin. The longer 787-10 has 38.

It was, even at first sight, a huge improvement over the 2-2-2 biz classes of previous KLM birds. The reverse-herringbone layout and that particular seat type have been around for years, but in KLMs incarnation, they exuded quiet elegance.

Of course, as is usual on this aircraft: No window shades! 787 windows are dimmed electronically, with the touch switch under them.

The inflight-entertainment screen swiveled out with a press of the blue button to the left.

Headrests were adjustable in height and angle, and had adjustable wings. The seatbelts had airbags, as happens more and more in premium seats.

In the lie-flat position, the 22-inch wide seat turned into an 81-inch bed. Though a mattress pad for sleeping was not available, the bed offered enough space in the footwell to move comfortably. The only thing I didnt like about it in bed mode was the clunky airbag belt, and the pillow could have been firmer, too.

When sleeping under a blanket or comforter, fasten your seat belt over it. That way, if theres turbulence and flight attendants come to check if youre buckled in, they can just take a look and not bother you and youll make their job easier, too.

The armrest on the aisle side could be lowered with the blue button. Flight attendants asked passengers to keep them in the lowered position for takeoff and landing.

It would not have been possible to store large electronics like laptops or tablets anywhere other than the overhead bins, but the closed storage cubby next to the IFE remote was ideal for wallets, phones and other small items. Headphones for the IFE were hanging in it from a hook.

I especially liked the clever mirror inside the door, in classy KLM blue.

An international power outlet and powered USB outlet were under the armrest by the window, with a sign indicating their location.

The tray table extended from the same armrest with the press of another blue button. It was a bit small, but still OK for a 15-inch laptop, and once extended it could slide forward, letting the seat occupant get up during meal service. This is a key element that not all airlines get right; for example, Virgins swanky new Upper Class forces you to stay seated when the table is out and a meal is on it.

The seat controls were intuitive, and I didnt see any other passenger have to ask a flight attendant for help figuring things out. From the top, the four buttons are: slide seat forward and back, bed mode, seat back up and overhead light.

Besides the overhead light, which could be controlled from the remote too, there was a reading light built into the seat. Two adjustable air-conditioning vents were above the seat, the latter a feature not found on all aircraft. (Some European airlines, like Lufthansa, are notorious for keeping cabins far warmer than what Americans are used to.)

The bathrooms were more or less normal, save for a KLM classic, the Delft-house decorations. Theyre found all over its branded materials, and even on the escalator to the Crown Lounge.

Amenities and IFE

TPG Rating

12/15

16in

Screen

250

Movies

200

TV Shows

Live TV

Tailcam

As customary, I found pillow and comforter already on the seat, and headphones in the mini storage locker. Amenity kits were distributed later.

The amenity kit by Dutch designer Jan Taminiau, featuring the colors of the Dutch flag, was distributed to each passenger just after flight attendants closed the overhead bins prior to pushing back from the gate. It had the basics for a long-haul flight: socks, toothpaste and toothbrush, eye mask and earplugs, moisturizer, lip balm and a pen useful for immigration forms.

More toiletries were found in the two bathrooms exclusive to business class, which were spotless throughout the seven-hour, 40-minute flight. Hair gel, body mist and hand-and-body lotion were a limited edition by Rituals for KLM. Besides the pillow and comforter, I didnt receive any other amenities like slippers or pajamas.

These KLM aircraft feature crisp, 16-inch screens, with about 250 movies to watch in at least 14 languages, and a gorgeous moving map: this was a good IFE, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.

The Wi-Fi internet disconnected a few times, but was otherwise quite usable. I paid 18 euros ($20) for the whole flight, a much better deal than the other choice of 8 euros ($9) for one hour. (If you just wanted to send or receive text messages, that was free.) The Speedtest app kept timing out, but the internet was fast enough for videos, albeit with some buffering.

The headphones supplied by the airline were of the fairly rare three-prong kind, with OK not outstanding sound quality.

The beautiful 3D moving map could also be loaded on the smaller display in the remote, which retained full pinch-and-zoom functionality.

The cockpit-view function is increasingly popular in IFEs, and for aviation geeks its a delight every time. After our takeoff on schedule at 5:45 p.m., I followed on the screen our climb from sea level straight to our initial cruising altitude of 36,000 feet in 25 minutes which happened in near silence, despite my position just in front of the righthand engine.

The flight unfolded entirely in darkness. In late June, say, the views out of the window would have been spectacular, one long sunset seen from the edge of the stratosphere, but in early November we flew at night from start to end.

Food and Beverage

TPG Rating

15/20

Meals

Nicolas Feuillatte Brut Rserve

Champagne

Dine on Demand

Are you even flying on a Dutch airline if youre not offered a Heineken? Of course not, and a can of the national beer of the Netherlands was on the tray that a flight attendant brought down the aisle as boarding finished. There were also Champagne, orange juice and water. (Incidentally, the two stripes on the flight attendants sleeve identified her as a senior cabin attendant in the KLM rank insignia system.)

At my seat, I found a menu and wine list, with the KLM logo inside a Delft-porcelain motif. The airlines Champagne may have been a midrange Nicolas Feuillatte Brut Rserve, but its taste in graphics was impeccable.

On the wine list, I noticed a cocktail described as a special lighter, crisper version of a Negroni, with Dutch genever (a typically Dutch kind of gin), chosen because both KLM and the Negroni were born in 1919. When the drinks cart arrived at my seat, half an hour after takeoff, I asked for it, with a small bowl of nuts and sparkling water.

The nuts should have been warm and the drink in a wider glass, but those are minor quibbles to have at 36,000 feet, and the Negroni-ish was indeed lighter and crisper than the original, a true pleasure.

For dinner, I could choose among two appetizers, three entrees and two desserts. For the appetizer, I had tomato soup over the other choice, salmon and spicy mango with hazelnut-cucumber-pepper-and-mango dressing.

All three main courses featured potatoes, in an apparent nod to a classic Dutch staple food. My choice was panfried cod and Dutch prawns with herb potatoes, roasted sweet potatoes and broad beans in a mussel gravy. The other two entrees were miso-marinated chicken thigh with carrots, potato puree, Brussels sprouts in an orange beurre blanc sauce; and beef stew with red cabbage, potatoes and cornichons.

For dessert I could have a cheese plate blue cream cheese, Klaver Roem and Leerdammer Caractre, all Dutch cheeses, served with crackers and grapes or sweet bites: brownie with ganache, a chocolate-caramel tartlet and a lemon cheesecake with raspberries. I went with the cheese, and a glass of New Zealand riesling from a simple, five-wine list. It also featured a Chilean chardonnay and three reds: a grenache from France, an Argentinian malbec and a South African shiraz.

Things sounded promising on paper. But when dinner service began, they went awry.

The galley ran out of the salmon appetizer for everybody who wanted it, and flight attendants proposed alternatives to at least two passengers. This happens, I said to myself, no biggie. Space on board is limited, and not everybody gets their first choice on every flight. In any case, I had the tomato soup, which was very good, and though the salad was a bit wilted, it came with a zingy beetroot dressing that was as cheeky as the salt and pepper shakers in the shape of Dutch clogs.

But then I waited 30 minutes between the appetizer and entree, and the flight attendant assigned to my aisle got confused and thought I had ordered the chicken, not the cod.

They hadnt loaded enough cod anyway, he said, seeming a little confused about what was going on in his galley, but after some inquiry he turned up one stray cod entree for me. And good thing he did, because it went beautifully with the riesling.

The silverware had pretty inlaid handles, and the carts were ornamented with the same motif as the menus.

With dessert, the flight attendant brought around a box of chocolates in the shape of, you guessed it, Delft houses. I had two, and I could have had more. They were excellent, and so were the cheeses. By the time I was done with all of it, though, it had been a 90-minute dinner, and when your flight is under eight hours and at night, you may want a service flow that maximizes sleep instead of time spent eating.

A half hour later it was lights out in the cabin, when we were already nearing the southern tip of Greenland, four and a half hours out from Toronto.

Ninety minutes before landing, after some sleep, it was time for the second meal service. The appetizer was a sweet-potato salad with white cheese and pomegranates, followed by either a cheese quiche or an Angus beef burger with cheese, and then by an apple pie. The meal was served with pepper jelly and deep-fried onions on the side. I got the burger and a Coke, which proved to be a good choice. And the apple pie that followed was perfectly warm.

KLM did not let me go hungry. It wasnt top-quality, but it was perfectly competent airplane food, in abundant amounts.

Service

TPG Rating

11/15

Extra Pillows

Turndown Service

Would you like a house, Mr. Riva? the flight attendant asked me after the last dish had been removed from my tray. On any other airline, I would have thought that a weird question, but in KLM business class it could mean only one thing. It was time for the distribution of the miniature Delft porcelain houses filled with liquor, which the airline gives away as souvenirs to business passengers.

The one distributed on KL695 that day wasnt any old house, either.

Its the house where our king and queen live, he said.

According to the booklet that came with it, Huis ten Bosch is the residence of King Willem-Alexander, Queen Mxima and their children. Thats the very king who occasionally moonlights as a KLM pilot, but there was no royalty at the controls on my flight: His Majesty is qualified on the Boeing 737, not the 787.

That very nice interaction with the flight attendant and the story behind the Delft house ended the flight on a high note for me, but overall, the service was OK, not great. There were moments of slight confusion during meal services, and dinner lasted way too long.

Overall impression

You dont need to be an aviation enthusiast to see how pretty this 787 was on the inside and out, and even a casual flyer notices the Dreamliners smooth, quiet ride. Add a very good biz-class seat, and you have the makings of a very nice Atlantic crossing.

Coming off the flight on a cold night in Toronto, I reasoned that Id just flown in a better biz seat than most Delta One seats, certainly better than any Lufthansa seat short of first class, and on par with the best seats offered on KLMs sister airline, Air France. It would just have needed better service to compete for greatness. That said, you would not be disappointed if you redeemed a reasonable number of miles for KLM biz class on the Dreamliner.

All photos by the author.

Arplis - News source https://arplis.com/blogs/news/great-seat-so-so-service-a-review-of-klms-business-class-on-the-787-9-from-amsterdam-to-toronto

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jhmyguardiangel · 7 years ago

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Desperate | Seokmin | Oneshot

Genre: Angst, Drama, Romance

Category: Dark Seventeen

Now playing: Habitual Words.mp3

A/N: my heart broke when writing this ;-; prepare your hearts?

Word count: 1078

“I’m calling for you.”

This never happens to Seokmin. What would become his strength became his weakness. His inspiration broke his dreams and future. His happiness became painful. He wanted to tell you. He wanted to tell you that your relationship would still work no matter how different it would be. But he was too late.

You were dating Seokmin- your high school sweetheart, the class clown, and also the most talented guy you’ve ever met. You’ve been dating throughout high school and it was something you never wanted to forget. It was the highlight of your life and you wanted keep it that way.

Before time ran out.

He decided to pursue his dream in vocal training at a music academy. He has been doing well and you were so proud of him. You knew where your future was waiting for you- abroad. You didn’t want him to know, not because you were stingy, not because you didn’t trust him. It was because he would stop you.

Would he understand? What would he do if you told him? Would he leave you?

When you actually told him, it was set to happen two to three years later. Your heart shattered to pieces when it was happening sooner than you thought.

The decision wasn’t yours to make. Well, partially it was before you had changed your mind- and that was when you met Seokmin. You told your parents that you changed your mind to stay in Seoul to pursue your degree at a university. They didn’t agree since they had already paid your tuition.

One day, Seokmin noticed you were quite distant. He only got one word text messages from you and he had to call you instead of the other way around. And knowing you for a little over two years, you were the type to share your burdens. This time you weren’t. That’s where he concluded that something was off. Too off.

He took out his phone and anxiously started to type.

>>Babe, are you busy at the moment?

After a minute, his phone beeped. He quickly took his phone.

It was you.

<<No. I’m not.

He replied immediately after reading it for one second.

>>Alright. Meet you at your house after my jog.

Seokmin had enough. He had to do something about it. Desperate time for desperate measures, he thought. He grabbed his jacket and left his house for a jog, and then to meet you. He never had any heavy feeling in his heart and what was worse it was you.

You fiddled your hands and walked five meters back and forth. How were you to tell him that you were leaving this afternoon? Your mother gave you a pitiful look seeing you in this state.

“You still haven’t told him, have you?”

You turned around with an uneasy look on your face.

“I haven’t.”

Your mother walked closer to you and held your hand. “You can tell him through a phone call. You shouldn’t have left it on the last minute.”

“I want to see him one last time, mom.”

Your mother sighed and said before leaving at the door. “Just a motherly advice, Y/N, you should’ve remained friends if you knew this was going to happen. Now the both of you are going to make adjustments. Long distance relationship doesn’t work well, both of you are going to be hurt. I’ll be in the car. Dad’s waiting for us at the airport, okay sweetie?”

You bit your lip and hesitantly grabbed your luggage, exiting your home.

Seokmin jogged to your place and slowed his pace when he saw you with a luggage and your house was empty. His heart broke.

“Y/N!”

You looked to where he was and turned to your mom.

“Mom,” you said with teary eyes. “Just, just give me five minutes to talk to him.”

Your mom nodded and took your luggage. “Okay, just five minutes. Five.”

Seokmin ran to you as fast as he could. “Babe, what’s going on? Why is your house empty? Are you leaving?”

Tears fell from your eyes, you held his face and he held your hands as you did. “Yes, flight’s today. I’m.. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I tried to convince my parents to let me stay but they didn’t buy it. You can hate me all you want but we also promised to end this. No matter how much we don’t this to happen.”

“End”. Hearing this, Seokmin hugged you tight, his voice shaking. “No we shouldn’t. We’ve talked about this, remember? We could make this work!” he sniffed. “Just don’t leave now..”

You hugged him back tighter and buried your face in his chest. “I love you so much Seokmin, I’ll always love you. I wished we had more time.”

“We do! And that’s when you land and– why does it happen now?” he cried. “A promise’s a promise, I know. But I also know that some promises are meant to be broken.”

The car honked and drops of rain fell from the sky. It was time for you to go.

“Babe, I have to go.” you painfully said as you tried to let go.

“No, don’t..” he held your hand. “I love you.”

You forcefully let his grip off and ran to the car, placing the seat belt on you. Your mom held your hand as she saw you cry.

“No.” Seokmin told himself. “It doesn’t have to end this way..” he kicked the ground in frustration. Hearing the car starting to drive off, his heart broke even more and without thinking, he ran to follow your moving car.

“Y/N!” he shouted, not caring that the rain was literally piercing his face. You leaving pierced his heart more. “Y/N!”

You heard his voice and saw his running figure from the side mirror. You held your mouth from crying and whining like a baby. Tears never seemed to stopped. And your heart ached more when you saw him giving up to run any further.

Seokmin knew this day would come. He knew that you and him wouldn’t work even if Seungkwan and Soonyoung encouraged him that it would. Seeing your car fade in the mist of rain, he shouted and cried in pain as he called for you.

Something he would now do as a habit.

64 notes · View notes

peterpparkrr · 7 years ago

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Changing the Tide: An Avengers Fanfic (3/7)

Summary: Wanda Maximoff is the new girl in town and also reconciling with the death of her twin brother, Pietro. As she starts to navigate her new life she manages to stumble into friendship with a group of teens who are surprisingly similar to her

A/N: This is basically just a highschoolAU for the Avengers without powers.

(Part 1) (Part 2) (Part 3) (Part 4) (Part 5) (Part 6) (Part 7)

Clint didn’t have to go too far before he realized where she must have gone. Against his better judgement he slowly opened the door to the girls bathroom.

He walked in to see a girl washing her hands. He expected her to yell at him and pushing him back out but she just rolled her eyes and pointed at the end stall, “I don’t know what you did but she seems properly upset.” She said as she dried her hands.

Once the girl was gone the bathroom was empty other than the last stall, the one that Wanda was presumably in.

“Hey Wanda?” He asked softly, “Are you in there?”

Clint could hear a sniffle through the door followed by the sound of her blowing her nose.

“Listen, I’m really sorry about what Tony said, he is too, by the way. Which never happens. Like, ever.” He said, leaning against the door to the closed stall, “I’m getting sidetracked, I don’t know what you’re going through, no one can, but I do know that I’ll do my best to help you, all of use will. I swear we’re good people, even Tony! He just says the wrong thing sometimes.”

Clint rubbed his hands over his face, trying to find the right words, “What I’m trying to say, is that you should give us a second chance.”

The sniffling stopped and Clint held his breath.

“Okay,” Wanda said, standing up and opening the door, causing Clint to almost fall on top of her, “Sorry about that.”

“You’re fine, fine.” He said, trying not to look too embarrassed, “Tony really wants to apologize to you - if you’re okay with that.”

Wanda ran a hand through her hair before nodding, “Okay.” she said, figuring she might as well, “But, I don’t think I’m going to go back to lunch.”

“That’s fine, I‘ll just tell him to meet us in the hallway.” Clint replied, pulling out his phone and sending a quick text, “Do you mind if we…?”

Wanda looked at him, perplexed, before realizing that he wanted to leave the girls bathroom, “Of course, let's go.”

The walked out of the bathroom and down the hallway towards the lunchroom, as they turned the corner they we nearly run over by Tony.

“Oh thank god, I came as soon as I got Clint’s text, I just wanted to apologize to you Wanda, if I had know I never would have said anything like that and it will never happen again and I’m so so sorry.”

Wanda held up a hand, “Tony,” she said slowly, “It’s okay, I shouldn’t have freaked out that much, you obviously did it on purpose.”

Tony looked at her hopefully.

“Of course I accept your apology.” She added and she couldn’t help but giggle slightly when Tony’s face broke out into a grin.

“Is it okay if I hug you? Too bad, I’m going to hug you.” Tony said, scooping her into a giant bear hug.

Wanda stood, slightly dazed for a second before hugging him back slightly awkwardly. A guy with dark hair and glasses turned the corner and made eye contact with Wanda before quickly walking past with his head down.

“Bruce!” Tony shouted as the boy walked past him, “Did you think you could just ignore me?” He says. Bruce smiled awkwardly at Wanda.

“Of course not, I just didn’t realize it was you.” He says quietly, his tone serious. A total juxtaposition to Tony.

“Wanda,” He said, turning to her, “This is Bruce Banner, he’s one hundred times more brilliant than me and slightly taller. Bruce, this is Wanda, she’s new.” Clint scoffed slightly at Tony’s comment.

“Hi,” Wanda said shyly.

“Should we had back to lunch?” Clint asked.

Both Bruce and Wanda shook their heads before realizing the other was doing the same thing and glance at each other. Clint and Tony both chuckled and shared a knowing look about how similar they were both were.

“I have to get to math, I wanted to ask Ms. Hill about some of the advanced work I’m doing,” Bruce told the group.

“Oh, I have calculus with Ms. Hill next to,” Wanda said, glancing at Bruce, trying to read him.

“Well then, you guys better go together,” Clint said with a grin, “Because I still have half of a turkey sandwich and a bag of chips left.”

Bruce sighed but nodded as Clint and Tony headed back to the lunchroom, “They mean well.” He told Wanda.

Wanda nodded before realizing that Bruce wasn’t like the others in the group, he was much more reserved though she couldn’t tell why, he was just as brilliant as the others, arguably more so if Tony was any indication.

“What are you thinking?” Bruce asked, glancing down at her.

“Nothing, just trying to figure you out I guess.” Wanda replied with a small grin.

“Really? There isn’t much to figure out. I’m geeky and nerdy and have weird friends.” Bruce replied with a slight smirk.

“Well I know that, I’m more interested in why you’re so quiet and why you’re friends with them,” Wanda replied with a shrug, “I mean, obviously you’re not going to tell me, but it’s better than not thinking about anything.”

“Well, once I know you’re not crazy or something maybe I’ll tell you, but my friends with those guys because they’re good people and we work well together, we’re a team.” Bruce replied, not really sure if he wanted to say anything else.

“Fair enough,” Wanda said with a shrug, “And why were Clint and Tony being so weird about us walking to class together?” She asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Who knows, they spend too much of their free time trying to set me up with girls.” He replied with a shrug, glancing down at his shoes, “Other than Natasha I’m the only person in our friend group who’s single, and they’re too scared to try and set her up with anyone so it’s just me.”

“Really, they’re all in relationships?” Wanda asked, slightly surprised, she’d never known highschool relationships to be particularly serious, or important.

“Sort of. All of the seniors are paired off. Tony and Pepper are on and off, Thor and Jane are dating, obviously, Darcy has a thing for whoever her lab partner is at the time, and Steve and Peggy are perfect for each other but they’re both to polite to make a move.” Bruce explains with a shrug as they walk into their math classroom.

Wanda glanced at Bruce as he walked over to Ms. Hill and started asking her questions that had something to do with calculation thermodynamics and a bunch of other stuff that she didn’t understand.

After a few minutes of the pair of them pouring over a notebook filled with hastily done calculations the bell rang and people slowly started trickling into the class.

“Sorry about that,” Ms. Hill said as she looked up from the notebook and seemed to suddenly remember the Wanda was still standing there awkwardly, “I would have introduced myself sooner, I just tend to get a bit excited when Bruce asks for help.” She said, giving Bruce a glowing look that made him look slightly embarrassed, “I figured that he would have surpassed doing anything I could understand a long time ago.”

Wanda nodded politely, not sure what to say.

“Oh, I’m Ms. Hill, nice to meet you, Wanda, isn’t it?” She said.

Wanda nodded in response, “Nice to meet you too.”

“Well, no one really follows the seating chart in this class so you can sit with Bruce if you want, he can help get you caught up on what we’ve done so far this year.” She said.

“I tend to sit in the back,” Bruce said, walking towards one of the tables in the back of the room. And setting his backpack down on the floor, “Ms. Hill gave me your textbook,” he said, setting it down in front of Wanda, “And some of the worksheets we’ve done.”

“Wait- when?” Wanda asked, she hadn’t seen her give it to him while the two had been talking before class.

“Oh, a few days ago I asked for it,” He replied, looking down at his own work, shuffling it awkwardly into a pile, “Clint kind of let us know that you were coming.”

“Oh,” Wanda said awkwardly, now she knew why they had all been so nice to her, there was no way that people like them would normal be nice to her, “Now everything makes more sense.”

“Don’t tell Clint that I told you though-”

“Why? Because I wasn’t supposed to know that he had all of his friends babysitting me?” Wanda asked angrily, not that it brought any attention to her, her voice was so soft that it just blended into all of the other conversations happening in the room.

“It’s not like that, Clint just told us that you were new and since you came into the school year late you were going to need help catching up,” Bruce says, staying insanely calm, which bothered Wanda for some reason, “We volunteered to helping you out, and you happened to have most of your classes with at least one of us anyway. We’re just trying to be decent human beings.”

Wanda shook her head and looked down at the work laid out in front of her. At least she was pretty good at math, she could probably work hard to get caught up in the other classes too, then they wouldn’t need to feel bad for her and would just leave her alone.

#avengers #avengers imagine #avengers fanfic #avengers one shot #wanda maximoff #wanda maximoff imagine #wanda maximoff fanfic #clint barton #clint barton imagine #clint barton fanfic #steve rogers #steve rogers imagine #steve rogers fanfic #tony stark #tony stark fanfic #natasha romanoff fanfic #natasha romanoff

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patriotsnet · 3 years ago

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Is Economy Better Under Democrats Or Republicans

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/is-economy-better-under-democrats-or-republicans/

Is Economy Better Under Democrats Or Republicans

Democratic Presidents Are Better For The Stock Market And Economy Than Republicans One Study Shows

Contrary to popular belief, the stock market and economy have performed better under Democratic presidents than it has under Republican presidents, according to data going back to 1946.

Liberum, a UK-based investment bank, pointed to historical stock market returns and annual GDP growth to make the case that a Republican president’s drive to cut taxes and reduce government spending often leads to lower economic expansion and stock market returns than when a Democratic president is in office.

Since 1947, the S&P 500 has posted a total annual return of 10.8% under Democratic presidents, versus 5.6% under Republican presidents.

And if you exclude the Great Recession and COVID-19 pandemic, both of which happened under a Republican president, the data still points to stronger returns for Democratic presidents versus Republican presidents.

Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

It’s a widely held view that Republican presidents are better for the economy and stock market than Democratic presidents, because of their drive to cut taxes and reduce government spending. But the data says otherwise.

According to an August 21 note from Liberum, a UK-based investment bank, historical stock market returns and gross domestic product data points to a stronger economic expansion under Democratic presidents than under Republican presidents.

Read more: RBC says buy these 48 stocks spanning every industry that are poised to crush the market if Donald Trump wins reelection

Bush Was The Last President To Inherit A Budget Surplus And Started Running A Deficit Obama Cut It Though Trump Ran Bigger Ones As A Result Of His Tax Cuts And The Federal Response To The Pandemic

The federal deficit is the gap between tax revenue and federal spending. During periods of growth, the deficit tends to shrink because government spending on safety net benefits lessens.

Bush inherited a budget surplus of $128 billion for fiscal year 2001. It was the last time the US had money left over. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as a series of tax cuts, erased it and increased the deficit.

Obama ran large deficits to end the Great Recession, passing an $830 billion stimulus package in 2009. He later cut the deficit over half by the time he left office.

Similar to Obama and Bush, Trump has also relied on deficit spending. It widened by $1.5 trillion with the passage of the 2017 GOP tax cuts, contrary to the administration’s claims that the law would pay for itself.

The pandemic, however, prompted $3 trillion in federal spending many economists say was needed to address the public health and economic crises.

Does The Economy Do Better Under Democrats Or Republicans

In the rough and tumble of presidential campaigns — rougher this year than ever before — facts are sometimes lost in the debate. But one fact that voters should keep in mind — one that is incontrovertible — is that the U.S. economy performs better under Democratic presidents than Republican ones.

Conservatives have long claimed that they are better stewards of the economy. Most recently, presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump promised to be “the greatest jobs president that God ever created.” They have repeated these claims so relentlessly and with such confidence that millions of Americans believe them to be true. The record shows otherwise.

Research from Princeton University economists Alan Blinder and Mark Watson finds that, since World War II, the economy has performed substantially better by virtually every measure when Democrats have been in the White House. GDP growth, job creation and industrial production have all been stronger during Democratic administrations than during Republican ones.

As the Ranking Member of the Joint Economic Committee, I asked my staff to review the Blinder and Watson findings. They were able to update and build on the economists’ analysis and found that on average since World War II, real GDP has grown about 1.6 times faster and private-sector jobs have grown nearly 2.5 times faster under Democrats than Republicans.

Let’s let the real debate over the economy begin.

Which Presidents Have Delivered The Best Stock Returns So Far Democrats Are Dominating

According to Siegel, author of the 1994 investment classic Stocks For The Long Run, Wall Streets obsession with politics is mostly misplaced: Bull markets and bear markets come and go, and its more to do with business cycles than presidents. In some ways the current environment has characteristics of the existential threat faced by George W. Bush post-2001 , the civil unrest that plagued the Johnson and Nixon administrations and Ronald Reagans trade war with Japan in the 1980s.

In an effort to more closely examine the relationship between the actions of a president and the direction of stocks, Forbes has analyzed their stock market performances, including dividends, dating back to Harry Truman. Using data from the National Bureau of Economic Research , weve also noted for each president the number of expansions and recessions that began during their tenures. In some cases like the presidency of Bill Clinton, who was in office during one of the most impressive periods of economic prosperity in history, you won’t see an expansion listed. Thats because credit is awarded to the president who was in office during its inception, which in this case was George H.W. Bush. We also included the ratio of gross federal debt to GDP for the final year of each presidency.

Presidential portraits courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration

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Whos Better For The Economy: Democrats Or Republicans

Who does a better job at managing the American economy: Democrats or Republicans?

Whose policies help the country and whose policies hurt it? Who should get credit when things are going well and who should take the blame when the economy slips?

But before we use the EPI to answer the question, we have to figure out how to measure the problem. It is impossible to break down every piece of legislation to see how it affected the performance of the overall economy. We can examine a few key policies, but that doesnt really answer whether one political party does a better job altogether; it only sheds light on that particular piece of legislationone small piece of a very big puzzle.

So how do we measure the effectiveness of one partys politics?

Do Dems Run The Economy Better Nope

Its a Democratic campaign consultants dream: a study from two respected academic economists concluding that, since the late 1940s, the economy has consistently performed better under Democratic presidents than under Republican ones. The gap is huge. From 1949 to 2013 a period when the White House was roughly split between parties the economy grew at an average annual rate of 3.33 percent, but growth under Democratic presidents averaged 4.35 percent and under Republicans, 2.54 percent. Jobs, stocks and living standards all advanced faster under Democrats.

Not surprisingly, one of the reports authors is a well-known Democratic economist, Alan Blinder, a former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve now at Princeton University; the other author, Mark Watson, also at Princeton, is a highly regarded scholar of economic statistics who describes himself as nonpartisan. More interesting, Blinder and Watson dont credit the Democratic advantage to superior policies.

Democrats would no doubt like to attribute the large growth gap to macroeconomic policy choices, but the data do not support such a claim, they write. Most economists, they note, doubt presidents can control the economy.

So if presidents didnt do it, who or what did? Blinder and Watson march through economic studies. Their conclusion: About half of the Democrats advantage reflected good luck favorable outside events or trends. Three dominate.

Conservatives Love To Tout Their Economic Bona Fides But The Data Reveal A Far Different Story

As the 2016 election cycle heats up, the key question at stake for most Americans is economic growth and jobs. The debate, then, will center around what to do with the fragile recovery that overwhelmingly benefits the rich; the stagnation of middle class incomes; and unemployment — which, particularly for young people of color, remains dispiritingly high.

The right likes to argue that these conditions mark a clear failure of progressive policies, and in particular of the Obama administration. In the process, they reject policies that have, however imperfect, unequivocally strengthened the economy over the past seven years, such as the stimulus packages that came in response to the economic crisis.

Meanwhile, while conservatives often claim that their policies are good for the middle class, systematic studies by economists, political scientists and sociologists suggest these claims are overblown.

Economic Growth

At the heart of the question is economic growth: Which party is better at delivering it?

While economic growth alone is not sufficient for middle class and working class income growth, it is certainly necessary. The most systematic investigation of how parties affect economic growth was performed by economists Alan Blinder and Mark Watson. Their results are unequivocal:

Inequality

The chart below suggests this effect is driven by both market conditioning and redistribution .

Unemployment

Taxes

Race

So Democrats Are Worse

We look at the differences in economic scores between Democrats and Republicans and judge it to be a draw. The Democrats score may reflect that they had to manage the economy under difficult circumstances, including the Great Depression and the Great Recession. Then again, Republicans enjoyed a booming economy during the Roaring Twenties and the late 90s. If we could control for those shocks, we might find the two parties positions switched. Moreover, our approach cannot establish causality . All we can view is the correlation .However, we could use a regression analysis to look for time connections between one party coming to power and the subsequent performance of the economy. This approach would actually allow us to look for empirical causality. We wanted to isolate economic policies from exogenous shocks, so that we were truly comparing apples to apples. Democrats would not be docked for the Great Depression and WWII, while the Republicans would not get a boost from globalization, etc.

To do this, we subtracted the smoothed trend from the EPI scores. Then, we conducted a regression of the EPI deviation from its trend against the IPP.

This way, there could be no disputing whether the economy was up or down because of factors beyond the respective partys control.

Our regression analysis found no statistically significant causality. Which is fine and happens often.

Diversify Into Real Estate

Stock market performance has been strong over time. The same can be said for real estate. Given interest rates have come way down, the value of rental income and cash flow have gone way up. Therefore, Im personally buying multifamily properties and rental properties for capital appreciation and income. Stocks also tend to be more volatile than real estate.

One of the best ways to invest in real estate is through real estate crowdfunding. My favorite two real estate crowdfunding platforms are:

Fundrise: A way for accredited and non-accredited investors to diversify into real estate through private eREITs. Fundrise has been around since 2012 and has consistently generated steady returns, no matter what the stock market is doing.

CrowdStreet: A way for accredited investors to invest in individual real estate opportunities mostly in 18-hour cities. 18-hour cities are secondary cities with lower valuations, higher rental yields. They also have potentially higher growth due to job growth and demographic trends.

Ive personally invested $810,000 in real estate crowdfunding since 2016 to diversify my investments. Its nice to earn income 100% passively as I spend more time taking care of my children.

Filed Under: Investments

I spent 13 years working at Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse. In 1999, I earned my BA from William & Mary and in 2006, I received my MBA from UC Berkeley.

Current recommendations:

The Index Of Political Power

It stands to reason that the more policy-making positions one party holds, the more policies that party will implement. If one party controls a majority of Congress, for example, then more of that partys policies will likely get passed than the other partys. Therefore, we could measure how many positions each party held, and then use that as a proxy to assume that more of that partys ideas were being enacted.

Obviously, such a measure should include the legislative bodies of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Since the president signs or vetoes legislation into law, that position should be included, too. Even though the Supreme Court can overturn a law, we should not include the judicial body. Many of its decisions are related to social policies rather than economic ones; its impact on the economy, as far as this Index is concerned, is negligible.

However, there is another area outside of legislative control that we should include in this proxy measure: the monetary policy. As we explained earlier, the countrys monetary stance is a critical component of the economys performance. But Congress does not control monetary policythe Federal Reserve does. By tradition, the Fed follows the decisions of its chairman. In effect, the nations monetary policy is determined by one individual. Logically, then, we should include the political party of this position, too.

our Index of Political Power

Recessions And The White House

The statement by Occupy Democrats runs from the Ronald Reagan presidency, which began in January 1981, to the present.

But by using the phrase “has overseen” in connection with a recession, the statement is less than precise as to whether it refers to a recession that began during a president’s term or whether he has had to deal with a recession in his time in office.

Likewise, applying the phrase “has overseen” to a strong recovery by the Democrats leaves it unclear as to whether the statement means a president started the recovery or inherited an ongoing recovery, as President Donald Trump did from President Barack Obama.

The interpretation of the phrase “has overseen” complicates the process of fact-checking it. Obama inherited a recession from Bush II that began in December 2007 and ended in June 2009, according to NBER, the longest economic downturn since World War II.

Under that Reagan-to-Trump timeline, the Republican presidencies had four recessions start in their terms: one each under Reagan and George H. W. Bush, and two under George W. Bush. By contrast, Democrats Bill Clinton and Barack Obama had zero.

With the economic downturn created by the coronavirus pandemic, a recession is likely to be declared after the latest GDP data is released, sometime in July. We may be in one now, but it has not been deemed official.

Wages Grew Steadily Under Bush And Slowed Under Obama They Started Picking Up Again Under Trump But The Pandemic’s Impact Skewed This Year’s Data

Wage growth is usually a good indicator of how much the economy is benefiting average workers. But the chart above illustrates the shortfalls of relying too much on a single metric given the devastation that the pandemic has caused.

Wage gains were steady for most of the Bush administration, ranging between 2% and 4% each year. Then it took a hit during the Great Recession, and wage growth was anemic for much of the Obama presidency.

The initial years of the Trump presidency coincided with a rise in wages as the economy expanded and employers competed to hire workers. They grew above 3% starting in 2018.

Millions of low-wage workers were sidelined in the early months of the pandemic, while many higher-wage white collar workers were able to continue working remotely.

It artificially dragged up the average wage for those still able to work, according to an analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. It’s expected to drop as more hourly workers regain their jobs.

Want A Better Economy Elect A Democratic President

I enjoyed David Leonhardts opinion piece in the New YorkTimes today including graphic evidence that the econmomy performed better under Democratic presidents for the last century.

A president has only limited control over the economy. And yet there has been a stark pattern in the United States for nearly a century. The economy has grown significantly faster under Democratic presidents than Republican ones.

Its true about almost any major indicator: gross domestic product, employment, incomes, productivity, even stock prices. Its true if you examine only the precise period when a president is in office, or instead assume that a presidents policies affect the economy only after a lag and dont start his economic clock until months after he takes office. The gap holds almost regardless of how you define success, two economics professors at Princeton, Alan Blinder and Mark Watson, write. They describe it as startlingly large.

Accompanying graphics tell the story, with a couple shown here.

My dad, a yellow-dog Democrat stockbroker in southern Louisiana, preached this to me until his dying day. His evidence was only anecdotal, of course, but very tangible.

The Historical Precedent For Job Gains Is Mixed

The economy didn’t substantially add jobs early on in Bush’s presidency. But it started picking up until the 2008 financial crisis.

The Obama administration moved to stem those job losses early on in his term, and the economy stabilized in 2010. With the recovery underway, employers added jobs, coming out to an average of 224,000 gains per month in Obama’s last three years.

Job growth during the Trump presidency had mostly matched its pace under Obama before 2020. In the first three years up to February, the economy added 182,000 jobs monthly on average.

But pandemic-related job losses left a crater in the economy. Many experts say it will take several years for the labor market to recover from the blow.

Everyone Does Better When The Presidents A Democrat

The numbers dont lie. The question is why every Democrat isnt talking about this all the time.

Photo Illustration by Lyne Lucien/The Daily Beast/Getty

Our two political parties have certain identities that are seared into our collective public brain. Democrats: the party of workers, of civil rights, of compassion and fairness, and of higher taxes and more regulation. Republicans: party of the rich, big business , the free market, and lower taxes and less regulation.

And because the GOP is the party of big business, it is universally assumed that Republicans are better at handling the economy. Polls typically find that people trust Democrats more on all the things that government does, which stands to reason, but trust Republicans more on handling the economy. Just last week I saw a poll in which respondents rated Biden as better equipped than Trump to handle race relations, the virus response, and two or three other things; but on the economy, Trump bested Biden 51-46.

Its hard wired, and its wrong. Dead wrong.

Simon Rosenberg heads , a liberal think tank and advocacy organization. He has spent years advising Democrats, presidents included, on how to talk about economic matters. Not long ago, he put together a little PowerPoint deck. It is fascinating. You need to know about it. The entire country needs to know about it.

The deck consists of about 15 slides, but Ill walk you through just six so you get the idea. Lets start with job creation under each president:

Financial Planning Under President Joe Biden

With Joe Biden as president, financial planning comes full circle. I retired under President Obama and I plan to retire again under Joe Biden.

Because the Democrats have control of both houses and the presidency, more taxes will be passed. There will also be more spending to help all citizens. As a result, I plan to take things down a notch once I get vaccinated or once taxes go up, whichever comes first.

Im tired of the hustle during the pandemic. Instead, I want to spend my money and live it up more. I think everybody is.

Luckily for investors, stocks and real estate have performed well during the pandemic. Therefore, we have an even larger cushion to live our lives as freely as possible.

Biden Versus Trump Some Speculate That The Future Of The Republic Hinges On The Outcome Of The Next Election But For Smart Investors It Doesn’t Really Matter Who Wins

Conventional wisdom says that those liberal Dems are generally bad for the economy and the stock market because of their big government tendencies, while fiscally conservative Republicans are good. This widely accepted belief is actually fake news if you look at data going back to the end of World War II.

Stock markets do perform better under Democrats than under Republicans. Thats a well-known fact, but it does not imply cause and effect, says Jeremy Siegel, the Russell E. Palmer Professor of Finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. From 1952 through June 2020, annualized real stock market returns under Democrats have been 10.6% compared with 4.8% for Republicans.

With the 2020 election less than four months away, some investors are fretting about the pros and cons of a Trump vs. Biden presidency. A Democratic sweep would almost certainly mean a rollback of Trumps massive corporate tax cut , but additional economic stimulus and stability on the China trade front would be a big positive.

Clinton: Economy Better Under Democrats

Hillary Clinton says the U.S. economy does better with a Democrat in the White House, citing research by two Princeton economists. But the authors of that report do not credit Democratic fiscal policies for the economic growth.

In fact, the authors say our empirical analysis does not attribute any of the partisan growth gap to fiscal or monetary policy.

Clinton has made the claim numeroustimes in recent weeks usually in the context of her economic plan, as she did during the first Democratic debate.

Clinton, Oct. 13: I have a five-point economic plan, because this inequality challenge we face, we have faced it at other points. Its absolutely right. It hasnt been this bad since the 1920s. But if you look at the Republicans versus the Democrats when it comes to economic policy, there is no comparison. The economy does better when you have a Democrat in the White House and thats why we need to have a Democrat in the White House in January 2017.

Clinton expounded on that talking point the following day during a speech in Las Vegas.

When we asked for backup, the Clinton campaign pointed us to academic research by two Princeton economists titled, Presidents and the U.S. Economy: An Econometric Exploration. The authors, Alan S. Blinder and Mark W. Watson, concluded after researching an array of economic statistics that the economy has performed much better when a Democrat is president than when a Republican is.

Why Does The Us Economy Perform Better Under Democrats Than Republicans

Since Carter, no Democratic President has had a recession begin on their watch. At the same time, no Republican President including the single term Presidents has gotten through their time in the White House without a recession.

Despite the widely held belief that Republicans are better at managing the economy than Democrats, the history of the United States economy tells a different story. In nearly every metric one might use to measure performance, Democratic presidents have presided over greater economic growth.

Strikingly, this is not even by a slight margin. According to a paper published in 2013 by Princeton economists Alan Blinder and Mark Watson, the performance gap is startlingly large so much so that it strains credulity, given how little influence over the economy most economists assign to the President of the United States.

The pair suggests that this is not due to time sensitive matters or partisan fiscal or monetary policy. Instead, they attribute this gap in large part to benign oil shocks, superior TFP performance, and more optimistic consumer expectations.

In short, they chalk it up to one part luck, another part self-fulfilling prophecy whereby consumers anticipate the economy will flourish under a Democratic leader and then drive the economy upward and a third part thats, well, a mystery.

Still, they say that it is highly unlikely that the D-R growth gap was just luck.

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