#Sports Betting YouTube Trolls | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

nationalhoranleague · 4 years

Text

Sixteen | Doubt

Chapter Song: Us (Acoustic) - James Bay

≫ Everly - Monday, February 1, 2016 ≪

It was blistering cold out, but it was welcomed this morning. There was something about the cold air that brought along a certain kind of clarity to my thinking. It was early still, the sun wasn't to come up for another hour and a half. I have never been, am not, and will never be a morning person. I love sleep more than anything or anyone on this earth, Sidney included. But since my injury, a full night's rest has been harder and harder to come by.

The glisten of the holiday season has long been faded, my family has returned to work from their holiday breaks, and Sidney was knee-deep in the playoff run, leaving little time for himself, let alone me. I was left to my own devices and there were next to none to be left to. I had read every book that both Sidney and I had in our possession, watched what felt like all of the makeup tutorials on Youtube, and even attempted to remake some of Julia Child's classic recipes. Not being able to skate was driving me to the brink of insanity and boredom.

Behind me, I could hear the back door creak open and then quickly shut. I listened as Sidney's sleepy body shuffled across his back yard over to where I was sitting with my back to him. He leaned over the back of the pool lounge I had wandered over to this morning and pressed a warm kiss to the side of my face.

He shoved a warm mug into my chilled hands before sitting down into the chair next to me. He sighed, took a sip from his mug, and then closed his eyes as he settled himself into the metal chair.

For a long time, we were quiet, the only sounds being of the cold wind blowing around us and the pool cover in front of us rustling in the wind.

"Why are you awake?" I asked quietly, causing him to open his eyes and look at me.

He sighed. "I rolled over and you weren't there," I turned back to watching the trees swaying in front of me.

We sat quietly for another bout, in fact, we were quiet for so long that I was nearly halfway done with my coffee by the time Sidney broke the silence. "So, are you ready to fess up?"

"To what?" I asked, playing dumb with him.

He scoffed. "Don't play coy with me, Everly Grace," Clearly, Sidney is not a morning person either. "I know when something is bothering you. You're tossing and turning all night, you've been up before 6 pretty much every morning since your injury, you're not eating normally, and you've been in a mood since I've been back from my road trip." I exhaled heavily. "I'm worried about you. Did I-" He sighed. "Did I do something wrong?" He asked, his voice soft.

"No! Sid, no! I-I'm fine."

He laughed sadly, shaking his head at me. "You didn't even believe that yourself. Now, what is bothering you?"

I sighed. "Sid, not being able to skate has driven me to the brink of insanity."

"Oh, honey,"

"I have been skating since I was three, Sidney. I know nothing but figure skating. I have never, until this past year, not been able to skate whenever I wanted. Two injuries within a year is a lot to deal with, mentally and physically." I sighed. "Maybe it's too much?"

Sidney was quiet for a minute, letting the realization of what I had just said set in. It was a lot to take in and if he had said the same to me, I would have been just as stunned. Even I was shocked. Sure, I had been tossing the idea of quitting skating around in my head for weeks now, but saying it out loud made it feel like a plausible idea. "How long have you been thinking about this?" He asked incredulously.

"Since Christmas," I confessed. "Is my body going to let me do this anymore, Sid? I mean for God's sake, I've had two knee injuries in a year! A year! I'm falling apart at the seams!" I paused, briefly. "But how could I quit? I have nothing better to do. I have absolutely no backup plan. I bet my whole life on a career that could be over in the blink of an eye." I looked over at him. "Did I mess up, Sidney?"

Sidney shook his head. "You didn't mess up, you followed your dream and have made an amazing career out of it. An amazing career. You still have so much to do, I know it in my gut."

I half smiled at him. "I don't know, bubba."

Sidney stood up, practically unfolding himself from the pool chair, he reached a hand out to me, pulling me up from the chair. "C'mon, let's go in. It's freezing out here." I followed him across the backyard.

"I thought you were Canadian?" I asked, teasing him.

He faked a soft laugh, clearly not amused with my chirp. "Why did you sound like that one vine?" I tossed my head back in true laughter. I was sure that if it wasn't for my obsession with vine references, Sidney would have no idea what a vine even is. "I thought you were American?" He mocked.

Once inside, Sidney made a beeline for the coffee pot, desperately needing a warm-up for his mug. I found a comfy spot in the window seat of the breakfast nook. He refilled his mug before making his way over to me, sliding in behind me, pressing his back to the wall. I settled comfortably in between his thick legs and dropped my head back against his chest.

"Oh, my love," I sighed. "I don't know what to do. Tell me what to do, Sid."

"No," He said, confidently. I tilted my head up to look at him, confused.

"No?"

"No, I'm never going to tell you what to do with your life, Ev." I smiled softly at him, before returning my eyes to the window which now painted a portrait of the sun rising over the trees in Sidney's backyard. "I can, however, offer some advice, if you'd like."

"Okay, shoot, Crosby,"

"I've been doing some reading since I don't know anything about figure skating," I grinned. Sidney is, by a mile, the sweetest, most caring man I had ever met. It only made sense to me that he would research and learn more about the sport that made me the person I am today. "The first qualification event for PyeongChang is the 2017 World Championships, so you're technically in the position right now to be able to take an entire year off from skating. And, for what it's worth, I think you should. Give yourself the time to heal up both psychically and mentally. "

"Yeah, I mean, I agree with you," I began slowly. "But, I don't know what I would do with myself for a year, Sid."

"Well," He began hesitantly. "I don't know if you would be interested, and I don't want you to think this is a handout, because it's not. You just-" He sighed, clearly struggling to find the right words. I turned around to face him now. "You just know me so well, and we have the same passions and work ethic and I can't think of anyone else I would want to do it."

"Okay, what is it?" I asked, now a little on edge because I was completely unsure of where he was about to take this conversation.

"I have a spot open on the foundation board."

I gasped. The foundation was Sidney's pride and joy. Even while in the middle of trying to clinch a playoff berth, he was still heavily involved in the planning of his upcoming hockey school and charity events in both Nova Scotia and Pittsburgh.

"Sid, are you sure?"

"I'm 100 percent sure, I just want to make sure that this is something you want to be involved in too."

I nodded eagerly. "Oh! I would love to,"

"Yeah? Thank God! When can you start?"

I laughed, before launching myself into his arms. I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled his lips to mine.

Liked by jeffskinner, taylorcrosby29, smellymelly, and 36,998 others.

everlygcassius: In December I sprained my ACL and as many of you have probably noticed, I have been off of the ice since. Tomorrow, I will be cleared to make my return to the ice. However, I have decided that two injuries in a year have been too much for my knee, my heart, and my mental health. I will be taking a step back from skating until 2017. I am looking forward to healing myself and returning to the international stage as a powerhouse in Helsinki for the World Championships!

≫ Everly - Sunday, February 7, 2016 ≪

For once, since my injury, Sidney was awake long before I was. In the past week, I had been able to calm down tremendously, thus allowing me to sleep in longer than the sun. I had officially accepted the position with Sidney's foundation and had informed my agent, Eva, family, and the rest of the world that I would be taking a break from skating. Most everyone was supportive, except for a few rude trolls here and there. However, I was happy and that was all that mattered to me.

I was missing skating already. But, I'm so looking forward to getting to know myself outside of the world of figure skating. I'm looking forward to finding something I was passionate about, something I enjoyed doing. I'm looking forward to having a short, busy summer with Sidney, who had recently collected his 900th point and a playoff berth in one fell swoop. I'm looking forward to working closely with Trina and the other foundation board members. I'm looking forward to so many things and amazingly, none of them pertained to skating, making me feel oddly at ease.

"Good morning, sleeping beauty," I perked up, seeing Sidney sliding himself between his bedroom door and the door frame. "Want to come down? I'm making breakfast, I thought we could have an 'us' day since we haven't had a lot of time together recently."

He was right. He had been traveling just about every other game recently and was typically only home late at night or early in the morning, all but forcing me to stay at his house if I wanted to spend more than 15 minutes with him. "Yeah, are pants required?"

Sidney titled his head in thought. Suddenly, he stepped into his bedroom, where I was still buried away underneath his heavy blankets, and dropped his sweatpants on the floor, leaving him clad only in his boxer briefs. "No,"

"Good," I proclaimed, standing up on his bed now, showing him that I only had on one of his t-shirts and a pair of black lacy boyshorts.

He cackled, before coming over to my side and lending a hand up to help me down from the bed. I placed my feet on the cream carpet and began to reach for my cell phone on the charger. Sidney swatted at my hand, making me eye him curiously.

"No cell phones," He pointed over to his nightstand where his phone was still plugged in and resting on the wood.

"Okay, yeah, I like that."

It was late. Neither Sidney nor I had bothered to replace our pants, check our phones, or brush our teeth for the entire day. We had eaten our weight in junk food, had a dance party, taken two naps each, switching between little spoon to big spoon, and watched countless Disney movies. The day was both greatly needed and appreciated by us.

Sidney held onto me tightly, keeping me from rolling off the side of the couch. Our legs were tangled together, probably as equally as hairy. His face was pressed into my hair, allowing his vanilla ice cream scented breath to fan over my neck. My face was tucked into the crook of his strong arm, serving as a surprisingly comfortable pillow.

"Ev," He whispered. "Are you awake?"

"Yes," I responded giggling.

"You know I'm proud of you, right?" I froze, not knowing how to respond. "I would give anything for you not to be having to go through this right now, but I'm so proud of how you're handling yourself with grace and looking at the situation optimistically. You make me want to be a better athlete and person." He paused to let out a long yawn. "I can't wait to spend the rest of my life admiring the hell out of you, Everly Grace."

Read Change on the Fly here!

Let me hear your thoughts!

Do you prefer to read on Wattpad?

15 notes · View notes

the-digital-communique-blog · 5 years

Text

Trolls under the bridge

The concept of trolling is an interesting one. I certainly would never condone the online bullying and belittling that happens over the internet but it must be hard to decipher sometimes. The banter that my friends and I use to communicate could easily be taken out of context by somebody who didn’t know we were friends. Olweus (cited in Boyd 2014, p. 131) defined bullying as an act requiring aggression, repetition, and an imbalance in power, and must contain all three of these factors. Trolling takes a similar mentality online by using controversial online messaging to creating discord and emotive responses (Urbandictionary 2019, n.p.). It is interesting to think about whether trolling meets all of Olweus’s criteria, and I would argue that in a lot of cases trolls are not acting aggressively. But does that mean that it is not bullying? To me bullying is more about how the other person feels, and whether the act continues after the victim has expressed a desire for it to stop.

McCosker (2014, p. 201) argues that acts of trolling should be examined through the correct cultural and geographical context to properly understand both the effect and meaning of act. This is an interesting point as cultural differences or even subtle differences in the use of language can change the meaning/interpretation of a message.

A case in point for me is Shannon Noll’s Facebook page. He gets an absolute barrage of comments and takes it all in good humour thankfully, I personally think they are hilarious but perhaps another viewer may not….

He was even good natured enough to make a sports bet add where he read out some of the comments.

youtube

According to Boyd (2014, p. 130) parents and journalists believe that social media significantly increases bullying, an assumption that is refuted by the data. This has led to a strong focus on teen suicide from the unquantified journalistic view that the majority of youths are bullied online (Boyd 2014, p. 131). McCosker (2014, p. 202) aligns social media conflict with agnostic pluralism, speaking to the necessity of having a contested space which allows for passionate debate and contested interactions. A study conducted on a short and highly provocative anti-Islam film found that interactions between the content creator, Dutch MP Geert Wilders, and those who commented was minimal (McCosker 2014, p. 206).

YouTube by numbers (Aslam 2019) link: 1.9 billion monthly active users 5+ billion videos shared to date 150 million hours of YouTube watched daily YouTube services 95% of all internet users

After conducting his analysis on YouTube commentary accrued on videos regarding the Christchurch earthquake and a flash haka, McCosker (2014, p. 213) describes YouTube as a “participatory space that incorporates and perhaps also accommodates conflict and cruelty”. The work of Thelwall and Sud (2012, p. 616) found that certain themes, such as religion, trigger lengthy discussion while other genres such as music and comedy were the least commented on. I think overall these works show that emotive subjects are far more likely to attract comment and debate, which also makes them a likely target for trolls who are able to find easy trigger points to gain a response.

References

Aslam, S 2019, ‘YouTube by the Numbers: Stats, Demographics & Fun Facts’, Omnicore, viewed 11 January 2019, https://www.omnicoreagency.com/youtube-statistics/

Boyd, D 2014, It’s complicated: the social lives of networked teens, Yale University Press, New Haven.

McCosker, A 2014, ‘Trolling as provocation: YouTube’s agonistic publics’, Journal of Research into New Mdia Technologies, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 201-217.

Thelwall, M & Sud, P 2012, ‘Commenting on YouTube Videos: From Guatemalan Rock to El Big Bang’, Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, vol. 63, no. 3, pp. 616-629.

Urban Dictionary 2019, ‘Trolling’, Urban Dictionary, viewed 11 January 2019, https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Trolling

#mda20009

35 notes · View notes

chaosd1 · 6 years

Photo

You know, when I reblogged that, it was mostly to showcase an issue that’s been present for YEARS, but keeps cropping up every now and then because most of Channel Awesome’s fans still think it’s 2010. If I had a Patreon dollar for every person who asked me something about “____ DOESN’T WORK THAT WAY!” despite that not being a thing I’ve done for over half a decade, I would probably not have to worry about paying off that damaged tire, or any future repairs to my car and/or PC. Long story short, they aren’t very good at letting things go.

I know people who want me to share my story are hoping for the same level of juicy gossip or levels of hypocrisy or betrayal that have accompanied so many of these other stories but I’m sorry to say it’s not quite that interesting, or even remotely “gotcha” in any sense of the word. If anything it’s more a reveal of how the company feels about its low-tier producers, and symptomatic of the larger issue that they clearly DON’T want anyone but the Chicago crew, or anyone that’s possibly bringing in their own audience. Remember when JonTron and PBG posted on Blistered Thumbs? I’m pretty sure they’re still kicking themselves over that one. As a bit of background, I always wanted to be on the CA site in some form, and by the time I had a show to offer up, I was already pretty close friends with a lot of the producers. In fact, it was Julien (Sad Panda) who decided to post up one of my videos in his schedule slot as a way to offer me a test spot. It was well recieved enough, but video games were almost always relegated to BT at the point, so off I went.

Despite being the more “respected” site by some audiences, all snafu’s aside, I felt that Channel Awesome treated Blistered Thumbs producers as second class citizens. Posting on there was like the Wild West. You put up whatever you wanted, whenever you wanted, and as often as you wanted, and hoped someone with a show that consisted of a three-hour long livestream split up into 15 minute increments wouldn’t end up pushing your video off the main page slider within the next few hours. It was very much for that reason I pursued some means to get myself listed on the main site by cleaning up the YEARS worth of spam and reported comments. After bringing it to the right people, I was permitted to post videos on the main site as well. It went well enough... for a while.

Once BT was shut down, a few of my friends (specifically MegaGWolf) were unceremoniously let go without an ounce of communication. (Most everyone on BT who wasn’t brought on to the CA “merger” had to find out via friends, as Michaud didn’t directly inform them.) Despite the promise of rebranding and stronger promotion, the BT audience didn’t really follow over to CA as the site didn’t really fit their desires, and the core CA audience was basically “NC, Linkara,and that’s it.” Views tanked and it was around the time I decided to move over to Youtube as the Blip waters were already pretty troubled.

At some point I started doing relatively well on Youtube, to the point CA felt like an annoying afterthought. I had to make special titlecards for CA as they had a ridiculous format I’d purposefully ignore later on just to see if they were paying attention. For example, the images were all supposed to be JPGS, though I always made them PNG, and since they were hotlinking them from my site anyway, WHY DID IT FUCKING MATTER?! It most felt like this ridiculous push for control and a power play that no one bothered to enforce anyway. Each time we scheduled we had to provide a link, a title, and a link to a special made titlecard. Did you have a special instruction or link you wanted to include when posting on CA? Good fucking luck they would ever include it, or spell half that shit correctly. Hell after a while, I figured it was pretty non-coincidental that after changing the title format from “MMO Grinder: Name of Game” to “Name of Game - ChaosD1,” views coming from CA were barely a percentile of the overall views I’d get from every other source. It wasn’t worth making them a stupid special title card and hopping onto a painfully broken scheduling site (a site that, by the way was designed for Sporting Events, and was so filled with non-updated dead links I occasionally would troll them by posting my category as “Blistered Thumbs” and “The Inebriati” both still available in the category dropdown menu. I’ll bet you they are still there to this day.

My issue didn’t come about until a sudden rule change. A rule I didn’t really have an issue with until the market started dying down, and my constant crushing depression over winter and my wife’s illness kicked in. Basically, “Post one video a month, or you’re stricken from the site.” later on that was changed to TWO videos per month and my show was almost always a ONCE per month deal. Seemed a bit suspect and draconian. There were people who didn’t post videos for several MONTHS that were still listed on the site, but they suspiciously had pretty strong followings elsewhere. Still I figured some form of warning or amnesty would take place to some extent. So in April of 2017 it was a pretty shitty month. Most of it was spent working on Eternal Crusade which was such a miserable slog none of us felt like doing much of anything else, there were no games to Sidequest for the suddenly required 2nd video per month, and I was pretty sure I was going to get some flak for it.Keep this in mind, I was WELL AWARE of the risk I was taking by not posting a second video, despite me rather often saying my show was monthly at the most. I figured they might know this, I’d get a warning, and that’d be the end of it. However, I was able to get out Eternal Crusade at the very end of April, but didn’t get around to posting it on the schedule until May 1st. May 1st rolls around, I check the site for any feedback and comments, and notice the video isn’t posted at all.... and I can’t access the scheduler anymore. One day late of posting consistently for 5 fucking years, and I’m locked out of the site like I stole a laptop from the studio. So I hopped on Twitter. Partially to express dismay, and partially because... I noticed I didn’t really have an audience on Channel Awesome anymore. I asked this very specific question and joked with some of the replies, most of whom confirmed my suspicion. They really only watched me on my site or my YT channel.

Still in talking with the CA chat in Skype, (I’d be on that Producer’s chat more often if I didn’t basically swear off Skype after Discord included screenshare. The producers and former producers really should make a Discord channel already.) they informed me that they’d probably reverse their decision if I just contacted Greg. While I didn’t think it was likely worth the effort, I figured I would anyway. Maybe pipe dreams of being included in an anniversary special some day. I just couldn’t wait to be the guy sitting slightly out of camera range in every shot with the one exception of getting to say “What should we do now, Critic?” for my first and only line in the movie. So I contacted Greg. It went a little something like this (for the Skype uninitiated, my words in Blue, Greg’s in grey):

So yeah, always fun to have to wait several days for a sentencing to the crime of being a day late on a post.

Of course, I cropped out the rest of the image, because the response without any contact in-between immediately afterward was this:

Yes I was being a sarcast there. I’m a sarcast... but when I’m last told “we’ll go through everything” and that is immediately followed up by “Sorry I took so long to get back, but... get lost scrub” I’m probably going to be a bit miffed about it. Of course this is CA and you can’t talk bad about them... or post something on Twitter they presume is talking bad about them, as this was the response to my sarcastic reply:

So yeah, Greg not quite understanding the concept of linear time (again I posted the tweet BEFORE I sent him the Skype message, not after) apparently you can’t even ask your audience where they still watch your videos most. They take it as a personal insult, like I didn’t enough appreciate those generous table scraps us low-tier producers had to fight over.

All things considered though, I knew the risk of not posting a second video in that month, and I valued my sanity over tossing out content for the sake of a suddenly imposed deadline. Could I have contacted Greg? Yeah, I suppose so, but why should I even have to? To be only a day late and have everything stricken without warning, like a robot looked over the feed and said “Well a month has passed, and there was only one so fired lel” without considering why, or even checking in on the employee in question, is the kind of corporate "numbers-only” bullshit that I swore off retail for. It’s fitting so many people in charge of Channel Awesome used to work at Circuit City is all I’m saying.

So that’s it. Nothing major, something I basically brought on myself, but still a fairly telling story of how you’d be treated as a content producer on that site.

And to all the current and remaining producers that aren’t showing up to the studio every day, or have a sizable enough audience to make a dent if you were to leave... they don’t WANT you there. They do not care about you. You are a liability. The very second they have a logical-to-them reason to cut your ass from the site, they will. Why put yourself through all that stress for a job that makes demands of you, without even paying you, promoting you, or benefiting you in any way? You know they don’t care about that site now that they are where they are with their YouTube channel. (Currently there are two producers that haven’t posted since December, that are still listed on the site. I must have been a special exception, or maybe it doesn’t matter if you don’t have a video as long as you keep telling them you don’t.) You’re white noise to them. Stay or go. As much as you think it might, it probably won’t make a difference to you...

...but it definitely won’t make a difference to them.

#channelawesome

148 notes · View notes

scyre · 6 years

Text

ayy its ya girl c! i’ve done up a little draft with the slight changes that were made now that we’re living in the moden au!! please read more for ... more.

DESMOND SAYRE

monty might not love social media and technological advances but they changed his life. his family still sucked, always grasping for power and rejecting change, but at least he didn’t feel as alone... not when he could text his friends and get immediate answers back from them. not having the time to dwell and sink in self pity really helped him.

ya boy also didn’t have to live his life thinking something was wrong with him bc he wasn’t sexually attracted to people like he was supposed to. he had access to google, he learned what asexuality and the spectrum was, and he knew more about himself and didn’t have to just ... not know. i think this made him sleep around less, get to know people a bit more, and while he’s still not an open kind of guy he didn’t really date much. it did however mean he stayed with laurel way longer than he should have... put up with way more crazy than he would have in the past.

he has instagram but never posts. seriously, he has one post from a year ago. he does like things though and is always commenting on posts. sometimes nice, sometimes not. he doesn’t have facebook, twitter, youtube, or snapchat. he thinks the snapchat filters are dumb and ruin perfectly good pictures. he also hates selfies and thinks they’re dumb. why does he even have insta? it’s probably the only way to stay up to date on hogwarts gossip.

i do think because everything online can be so negative, and escalate so quickly, monty never would have came out and admitted that he was bisexual/demisexual except to the people he’s told in canon. it’s still something he plans on taking to his grave and obliviating out of anyone who knew. the gay shame is real. get a grip boy.

i think he’s definitely got the aesthetic of like... the guy with gauges in his ears, maybe he has his eyebrow pierced, and he definitely still has the nipple piercing. i think he probably has more tattoos, exclusively wears leather jackets, combat boots, and ripped jeans, and wears a lot of plain colored shirts or black shirts. he still loves black. he will always love black. he wears a lot of it.

he hasn’t appropriated a lot of muggle culture into his day to day. i feel like he only got a phone in the last year and is awful at remembering to check it. it’s probably an older model too because he didn’t care what they gave him and it’s slate grey with no case because he lives on the edge. yolo. he doesn’t have any muggle cars or anything like that but he definitely has a netflix account and television because why not. his favorite show would probably be something like the good place.

ya boy still flunked out of hogwarts because that’s just how his life goes. he’s repeating his final year and you bet ya ass people tweeted about THAT for awhile. we love vague tweeting.

PHOENIX VASQUEZ

phoenix’s childhood is still relatively the same; he was adopted by the vasquez family. however, adopting wasn’t as easy as it had been back in the day because lycanthropy wasn’t as frowned upon in this decade as it would have been before. while people didn’t love it, it wasn’t something that meant no other family was interested, or other people weren’t willing to bend red tape. which means nix didn’t move around as much as a kid because his parents were able to keep working at their jobs in the states!! they only moved to the UK when he was fifteen as his grandmother was sick. so basically he moved to and started going to hogwarts in year 5 instead of year 1.

personality wise, nix is very similar. he’s still very awkward, very quiet, and is a genuinely nice person to everyone he meets. he’s more often about his lycanthropy as his parents never begged him to keep it a secret and it’s not uncommon for him to be making werewolf jokes at his own expense. he thinks it’s funny.

technology!! nix loves snapchat. he’s not huge on technology bc he’s kind of a hipster -- he still uses ballpoint pens and notebooks, doesn’t own a computer and only has a dinky phone that texts and calls. no data. he can only use snapchat when he’s near a wifi hotspot so you’ll sometimes see him getting frustrated with his phone when it starts buffering and flopping. he DOES borrow a friend’s computer to upload podcasts though because he’s a podcaster!!! he has a podcast called ‘howlcast’ and he does reviews of mainstream media depictions of werewolves and compares them to the reality. he also interviews lycanthropy specialists, advocates, and famous lycanthropes to talk about the werewolf experience. he kind of loves it?? he puts out an episode a week and does a Q&A on twitter straight after the episode goes up for any fans of the podcast.

nix doesn’t have a luxury broom or any of those fancy toys that the rich kids usually sport. he likes his regular ‘ol magical broomstick and doesn’t think a suped up car is something that he needs in his life. he good.

modern 2018 phoenix also died his hair a bluey teal color! he thought it was fun and tbh he is living his best life.

LAUREL DIAN

laurel’s family aspire to be the kardashians. they have a b level reality show, think something on tlc so they have their little cult following that laurel l o v e s. she loves the attention and loves the perks that come with it.

her aesthetic is probably like.. forever 21 / hipster / hippe chick. she wears a lot of crop tops, high waisted skirts, floral prints, lace, etc. everything .. and i mean everything ... is accentuated with red lipstick. that’s her aesthetic x 100. she has an iphone with a bedazzled phone case and probably drives a really compact car. her broom would be luxury too and she’s definitely on tinder select looking for cute boys (or girls) to bring home with her.

as for social media.. she has her hand in a lot of different platforms. she prefers facebook over most of the other ones. she also loves pinterest and is always pinning home decor ideas, cooking ideas, etc. she’s a feminist and sjw when it comes to twitter. it’s not uncommon to see her beefing with someone on twitter because they’re trolling or being rude/racist/sexist/etc. she loves tearing people a new asshole when they decide to spread their hate online. fuck off trolly boys.

she’s been in two high profile relationships in her life. the first was with monty sayre and that was a fucking nightmare. a lot of their relationship was caught on screen and its cringey whenever people tweet her pictures of monty and his new fiancee, or share photos of the two of them from when they were together. she might have dumped him but that doesn’t mean that she wants to be reminded of it all the time

she still works with dragons and they are frequently featured on her instagram, snapchat, and on the show. some of them even have their own little cult followings. its weird but kind of beautiful,

PIPPA CARSTAIRS

pippa being born in the 2000′s is the best thing that ever happened to her. truly. britney? christina? pink? oh my god she’s living. she loves pop music, loves concerts, and has a passion for professional cheerleading bc it's a legitimate sport now y’all! it’s her dream to be a professional cheerleader. maybe in the magical world if quidditch has them now?? we just dont know.

her aesthetic is blair waldorf chic. maybe a little more revealing. she definitely still wears heels, ignores dress codes, and always has her hair straightened perfectly. she is very very good with makeup -- think contouring and all that jazz. she looks like a million bucks literlly every day. it’s incredible.

pippa has a luxury car. i’m thinking it’s probably an suv?? she definitely would want something bigger and not your typical girly girl car. i’m thinking a black cadillac escalade. she doesn’t have a broom bc she still hates flying and heights. fuck that shit. as for technology, she’s got it all -- snapchat, twitter, instagram, youtube, etc. she also definitely has a youtube channel dedicated to beauty tutorials and has thousands of dedicated viewers. she’s done everything from contouring, costume make-up, etc. her channel is especially popular around halloween as she does a special called ‘the twelve days of pippaween’ where she does different costume makeup every day for 12 days. her most popular to date is ursula from the little mermaid! she also definitely has the latest iphone, macbook, etc, and it’s probably all rose gold. she’s a rose gold girl.

currently in the middle of an instagram war with her ex boyfriend. they’re both shady as fuck with their vague posting on finstas and it’s mESSY. we love a good mess!!!!! (this good be a good wanted connection if someone wanted to be her messy ex for the AU!!)

ALARIC ROWLE

i feel like wizards having access to technology changed things significantly for rowle. he was able to track down his birth father’s parents much easier and probably moved back to the UK when he was much younger. he definitely learned more about the war and was drawn into anyone whose narrative reflected what he wanted to hear -- that his parents were martyrs and that the dark lord had been in the right the whole time.

he definitely kept dueling. when his hand acted up, i think he would have been so desperate to fix it that he would have given into muggle medicines and treatments. he probably wears a splint on his wrist and his wandwork isn’t AS quick as it could be but he’s still one of the top duelists in the country. seriously, ya boy was good. him getting to continue being awesome might make him less of a douche. maybe. he definitely competes bc glory and loves every minute of it. a rowle who is less grumpy and super cocky? we stan.

he’s definitely a reddit troll. i feel like there’s a death eaters subreddit or something and he basically lives there and talks to other death eater sympathizers, former, or whatever, and slowly await the return of the ‘great days’. think alt right but .. y’know magical.. ugly.

he still teaches dada bc initially he needed money to pay off some wicked crazy medical bills for all the specialists and acupuncture and weird shit he did to fix his hands. even with the money he earns when he’s duelling, he’s in debt up to his ears.

i think he still has the scars that marr his face though bc as much as he will use splints or salves on his hands he is not gonna fucking undergo plastic surgery in the muggle world. he’d rather choke.

ANSEM WARBECK

ansem warbeck deserves social media. he is living his best life. he is definitely the guy who is constantly using ‘find my iphone’ bc he lost it, has a cracked screen because he forgot to buy the shatterproof screen protector, and changes his netflix password weekly bc he can never remember what it was. he’s also the snapchat king. i’d say he has 100+ streaks with as many people as he can convince to keep it up and he sends angry snaps when you ruin his streaks. they’re like his babies. one time he was running a fever and still managed to make streaks. there’s no excuse.

he still works as a curse breaker but i feel like he’s really like... stepped up gringott’s social media game. i feel like he took it upon himself to get them an instagram and is always uploading picture of whatever ‘cool’ treasure they can find. griphook keeps telling him they’re going to get robbed if he doesn’t stop bragging but ansem never listens.

the warbeck family is probably one of the few that have not acclimated to the technological changes at all. they won’t have anything to do with electricity, social media, or anything of the sort and look down on people that do. so ansem with his luxury brooms and his waffle iron are basically sacreligious to his family and his mom always cries whenever he talks about these things. it’s a whole Thing and just reinforces that arson is the best and ansem is the Worst.

#wizard:modernau2018 #modern au 2018.

4 notes · View notes

pacsettravel · 6 years

Text

Headlinin’: 11/27/17

We’re having a huge sale today, so please go check that out! Seriously guys, this is the biggest one we’ve ever done. Go get it! :D Alrighty, on to this week’s main story...

MUCH ADO ABOUT DOGEN

I’d like to talk about balls. No, not the sports ones. The kind that are metaphorical, the kind that you have when you stand up for what’s right in the face of intense opposition. I mean, think about it: there’s stuff that takes courage, and there’s stuff that takes balls. Asking someone out to prom? Courage. Telling a Firefly fan to let it go, since Fox canceled their show fifteen years ago? That’s courage with a little bit of balls. Standing up to the bully ten times your size? That’s balls.

Bringing your baby to work with you when you’re a politician in one of the most male-dominated societies in the world? That’s more balls than you’ll find at a basketball tournament. [Washington Post]

Image courtesy Asahi Shimbun/Getty Images

Just look at this picture. Words fail me. Here, check out the video:

youtube

This is Kumamoto City Representative and certified bad ass mama Ogata Yuka and her son Dogen, who has a very nice hairstyle going for someone who’s only seven months old. She made the “mistake” of bringing her son to work with her, which resulted in many male members of the chamber crowding around her and demanding she leave - with some of them even demanding she apologize for doing so (even though Dogen was being a good boy and not making any noise).

According to her official bio, Ogata is a graduate of the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies and holds a graduate degree from George Mason University in Virginia. She’s also worked as a program officer with the UN’s Development Program in Yemen, which I imagine is not the UN’s easiest mission. After moving back to her hometown, Ogata became interested in local politics and ran on a campaign emphasizing support for working mothers, traffic/pedestrian safety, public health and welfare, and promoting tourism to Kumamoto. [Editor’s note: we’re working on a tour pitch or two, Ogata-shigi!- Team PacSet]

Fun fact: Ogata was elected when her first child was just 1 year old, and the day she brought Dogen to work was her first day back from maternity leave. Now personally, I would have appreciated a “Welcome Back” cake, a balloon bouquet... maybe some of Kumamoto’s famous Ikinari Dango* with a nice message written on it? Like this?

But hey, I guess a bunch of old dudes being rude is kind of like a welcome. I mean, isn’t that how the bullies welcome the nerds back to class in all of those teen movies? Sorry, I digress.

Although child care is provided in municipal assemblies in Kyoto and Akita (as the WaPo points out), Kumamoto’s model male citizens decided to get their pantsu in a bunch over this, eventually forcing Ogata to leave Dogen in the care of a friend before returning to the chamber.

In a statement, Ogata said that she wanted to bring attention to the tough conditions facing working women in Japan. She’s not wrong; numerous [Bloomberg/Benchmark] articles [Japan Times] have been written about Japan’s shortage in adequate day care facilities and how hard it is for women in the workforce. In fact, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has cited making the working world more friendly to women a priority, since Japan’s birthrate is declining and the benefits of being a mother are not all that attractive if you want to have a career/support a family in Japan. However, apparently Abe forgot to mention this to fellow LDP member and “guy at the pachinko parlor” Haraguchi Ryoji, who said that Ogata could be “subject to punishment for disturbing the chamber over a personal reason.” [Mainichi Shimbun] Which I guess I understand... I mean, I bet no one in the LDP has ever been in a scandal for personal reasons, right? (Fun game: Google “LDP Scandals” and see how many you can find in 10 minutes!)

The truth is that there is still a cultural stigma against working mothers in many social circles in Japan. Not too long ago, having a baby meant a women would leave work altogether and focus their entire lives on child rearing. Even today, mothers that go against the grain are often harassed by other mothers and people who aren’t parents at all but have so many opinions. Which is probably one of the reasons why Japan’s fleet of online trolls have since invaded Ogata’s Facebook page and are tweeting nasty replies to English language stories about her. Nice of them, isn’t it?

Regardless, we hope that Ogata-shigi keeps fighting for working women, that we are able to create the best Kumamoto tour EVER, and that Dogen can keep that clean, awesome looking hair forever. <3 Speaking of clean...

I’LL HAVE A WASH AND DRY WITH THAT YAKITORI

If you have traveled with us, you know how tough it can be to find coin laundromats in Japan sometimes. Fortunately, the effort to make them more common just got a massive (and I mean massive) push from a somewhat surprising source: convenience store (conbini) chain Family Mart. (LINE NEWS)

That’s right - one of Japan’s biggest conbini chains, the place where you get a meat bun when you’re hungry, a manga volume when you’re bored, and a Pocari Sweat when you’re drunk, is installing coin laundry! According to an official statement, the company is planning on rolling out the service quickly, with laundry popping up in at least 500 locations by the end of 2019. [Family Mart]

I’ll level with you guys: I’m trying to think of a negative angle to this story, and you know... there just isn’t one. The thought of being able to wash my clothes during FanFest while eating a lemon ice, buying breakfast onigiri for the next morning, and browsing the latest Shonen Sunday? What did I do to deserve this kind of joy?!?!?!?!

The best part? Because the competition between conbini chains in Japan is such a bloodbath, it probably won’t be too long before Lawson or Seven Eleven decides to try out Coin Laundry as well. Japan in the summer is all kinds of humid - keeping it clean is a concept I can definitely get behind.

TAKA IS NOT [ONE] OK [ROCK] WITH SMAP... KINDA

One guy isn’t keeping it clean this week in the world of gossip; ONE OK ROCK front man Taka sent shockwaves across the Japanese interwebs this weekend when he dissed recently disbanded J-Pop royalty SMAP during an appearance on Super Beaver singer Shibuya Ryuuta’s radio show late Thursday night. Although both of their bands specialize in rock and not the kind of J-Pop sound SMAP embodies, the two were discussing which song from the band they like most. Taka’s selection? SMAP’s 1993 single “Ten Dollars”:

dailymotion

This is a somewhat deep cut from the SMAP catalogue; it’s from when the group still had six members, and it wasn’t nearly as popular as SMAP’s turn-of-the-millenia hits Lionheart and Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Everyone in Japan has heard this song twenty million times oh god please make it stop**.

After the song played, Taka voiced a sentiment that many indie rockers, rappers, and artists in Japan have long thought but always been scared to say. SMAP is... eh. From the man’s own mouth: [Model Press]

“Actually, I hate them, really. I hate SMAP. They’re like Japan’s national group,” said Taka. He’s not exactly wrong; SMAP’s TV show was one of the view where western stars appeared regularly, and even Eric Clapton wrote a song for them. Yes, ERIC CLAPTON. Taka, probably realizing that the internet could twist such a comment out of control quickly, added: “No matter which group you’re in, whether you’re an idol, a superstar... we’re all just human... Being in a group like that shouldn’t be your WHOLE life - that’s tiring. So when I heard SMAP was disbanding, I was thinking, ‘Wow, they really worked hard to come this far...’” I can’t help but agree with Taka myself; to have a group be your entire life until you’re alone again - that’s truly a Mighty Long Fall.

Taka’s comments were also a reflection of the public’s sadness when SMAP disbanded - so much so that many thought the group should keep going. Indeed, artists in Japan that are popular are expected to devote their lives to their work to a degree that many in the west would consider horrifying (just ask any former idol star... ugh). For what it’s worth, many on Twitter and message boards in Japan agreed with Taka on this point.

Now if some of those nice, sympathetic folks would go help support Ogata Yuka... that would be awesome.

NOTE: I’m off on Japan Holiday next week, so this column will be on hiatus. We’ll be back in a few weeks with more goodies. Until then, be lovely to each other!

*About the Dango: The popular YouTube series Cooking With Dog (RIP, Francis ;_;) actually did a segment on how to make Ikinari Dango; check it out! We miss you, Francis the Dog... <3

**title edited for accuracy

3 notes · View notes

immedtech · 4 years

Text

What's on TV this week: 'Shenmue III'

Nearly twenty years after the first game debuted on Dreamcast, Shenmue III will be released this week on PS4 and PC. Fans of TV can pick through the flood of content arriving on Apple TV+ and Disney+ at the end of the week, or select something like a Bikram yoga documentary or Knight Before Christmas on Netflix. For movie fans, IT: Chapter Two is streaming via video on-demand, while sports fans can curl up with more college football. Let's be honest -- we're all waiting for Mandalorian episode three, right? Look after the break to check out each day's highlights, including trailers and let us know what you think (or what we missed).

Blu-ray & Games

It: Chapter Two (VOD)

Suspiria (4K)

American Me

Dora and the Lost City of Gold

The Handmaid's Tale (S3)

The Boys Next Door

Cold War (Criterion)

Charlie's Angels: The Complete Series

Farscape: The Complete Series (20th Anniversary)

The Whole Nine Yards

The King of Queens: The Complete Series

Scarface

Betty Blue (Criterion)

Shenmue III (PS4, PC)

Football Manager 2020 (PC)

Golem (PS4)

Narcos: Rise of the Cartels (PS4, PC, Switch, Xbox One)

WRC 8 (Switch)

Still There (Switch, PC)

Sid Meier's Civilization VI (PS4, Xbox One - 11/22)

Lost Ember (PC, PS4, Xbox One - 11/22)

Tuesday

Ilizia Schlesinger: Unveiled, Netflix, 3 AM

No Time for Shame (S1), Netflix, 3 AM

The Flash, CW, 8 PM

The Voice, NBC, 8 PM

NCIS, CBS, 8 PM

The Resident, Fox, 8 PM

Bless This Mess, ABC, 8:30 PM

Ernie & Joe: Crisis Cops, HBO, 9 PM

Moonshiners (season premiere), Discovery, 9 PM

Arrow, CW, 9 PM

Empire, Fox, 9 PM

The Purge, USA, 9 PM

This is Us (fall finale), NBC, 9 PM

Inside the NFL, Showtime, 9 PM

FBI, CBS, 9 PM

Treadstone, USA, 10 PM

New Amsterdam (fall finale), NBC, 10 PM

Tosh.0 (season finale), Comedy Central, 10 PM

The Jim Jefferies Show (Season finale), Comedy Central, 10:30 PM

Wednesday

Mad About You (season premiere), Spectrum VOD, 3 AM

Castle Rock, Hulu, 3 AM

Bikram: Yogi, Guru, Predator, Netflix, 3 AM

Dream/Killer, Netflix, 3 AM

The Masked Singer, Fox, 8 PM

All Elite Wrestling, TNT, 8 PM

Riverdale, CW, 8 PM

Chicago Med (fall finale), NBC, 8 PM

Survivor, CBS, 8 PM

The Goldbergs, ABC, 8 PM

WWE NXT, USA, 8 PM

Schooled, ABC, 8:30 PM

Chicago Fire (fall finale), NBC, 9 PM

Modern Family, ABC, 9 PM

The Apollo, HBO, 9 PM

The Oval, BET, 9 PM

Nancy Drew, CW, 9 PM

NFL: The Grind, Epix, 9 PM

Chicago Fire, NBC, 9 PM

Single Parents, ABC, 9:30 PM

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (season finale), FXX, 10 PM

South Park, Comedy Central, 10 PM

Chicago PD (fall finale), NBC, 10 PM

Sistas, BET, 10 PM

S.W.A.T., CBS, 10 PM

Thursday

Mortel (S1), Netflix, 3 AM

No Activity (S3), CBS AA, 3 AM

Booktube, YouTube, 3 AM

The Knight Before Christmas, Netflix, 3 AM

Cheat (series premiere), Sundance Now, 3 AM

Explained, Netflix, 3 AM

Supernatural, CW, 8 PM

Grey's Anatomy (fall finale), ABC, 8 PM

Superstore, NBC, 8 PM

NC State/Georgia Tech college football, ESPN, 8 PM

Colts/Texans, Fox, 8 PM

Perfect Harmony, NBC, 8:30 PM

Legacies, CW, 9 PM

The Good Place , NBC, 9 PM

A Million Little Things (fall finale), ABC, 9 PM

Mom, CBS, 9 PM

Will & Grace, NBC, 9:30 PM

Evil, CBS, 10 PM

How to Get Away With Murder (fall finale), ABC, 10 PM

Mr Inbetween, FX, 10 PM

Law & Order: SVU, NBC, 10 PM

Temptation Island, USA, 10 PM

Coldplay: Everyday Life - Live in Jordan, YouTube, 11 PM

Desus & Mero (season finale), Showtime, 11 PM

Friday

Dolly Parton's Heartstrings (S1), Netflix, 3 AM

The Dragon Prince (S3), Netflix,3 AM

The Feed (S1), Amazon Prime, 3 AM

Brittany Runs a Marathon, Amazon Prime, 3 AM

Singapore Social (S1), Netflix, 3AM

Dreamworks' Trolls: The Beat Goes On! (S8), Netflix, 3 AM

High Seas (S2), Netflix, 3 AM

National Treasure (S3), Hulu, 3 AM

Narcoworld: Dope Stories (S1), Netflix, 3 AM

Nailed It: Holiday 2, Netflix, 3 AM

See, Apple TV+, 3 AM

Snoopy in Space, Apple TV+, 3 AM

Ghostwriter, Apple TV+, 3 AM

For All Mankind, Apple TV+, 3 AM

Helpsters, Apple TV+, 3 AM

The Morning Show, Apple TV+, 3 AM

The Mandalorian, Disney+

Marvel's Hero Project , Disney+

The World According to Jeff Goldblum, Disney+

Encore!, Disney+

High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, Disney+

Forky Asks A Question, Disney+

Titans, DC Universe, 9 AM

American Housewife, ABC, 8 PM

Charmed, CW, 8 PM

WWE Smackdown, Fox, 8 PM

The Blacklist, NBC, 8 PM

Hawaii Five-0, CBS, 8 PM

Charmed, CW, 8 PM

Fresh Off the Boat, ABC, 8:30 PM

Ready for War, Showtime, 9 PM

Dynasty, CW, 9 PM

Magnum P.I., CBS, 9 PM

Van Helsing, Syfy, 10 PM

Room 104, HBO, 11 PM

Comedy Central Presents Charles Gould / Sara Schaefer, Comedy Central, 11 PM

Black Jesus, Adult Swim, 12 AM

Saturday

Arkansas/LSU college football, ESPN, 7 PM

Oregon/Arizona State college football, ABC, 7:30 PM

TCU/Oklahoma college football, Fox, 8 PM

Twinkle All the Way, Lifetime, 8 PM

Blue Planet Now, BBC America, 9 PM

Lil Rel Howery: Live in Crenshaw, HBO, 10 PM

Saturday Night Live: Will Ferrell / King Princess, NBC, 11:30 PM

Sunday

Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj, Netflix, 3 AM

Packers/49ers, NBC, 8:15 PM

2019 American Music Awards, ABC, 8 PM

Dublin Murders, Starz, 8 PM

Ray Donovan, Showtime, 8 PM

Batwoman, CW, 8 PM

The Simpsons, Fox, 8 PM

Christmas 9 to 5, Lifetime, 8 PM

Bless the Harts, Fox, 8:30 PM

God Friended Me, CBS, 8:30 PM

Shameless, Showtime, 9 PM

Bob's Burgers, Fox, 9 PM

Watchmen, HBO, 9 PM

Supergirl, CW, 9 PM

Godfather of Harlem, Epix, 9 PM

Family Guy, Fox, 9:30 PM

NCIS: LA, CBS, 9:30 PM

The Walking Dead (fall finale), AMC, 9 PM

Back to Life, Showtime, 10 PM

Silicon Valley, HBO, 10 PM

Mr. Robot, USA, 10 PM

Madam Secretary, CBS, 10 PM

Mrs. Fletcher, HBO, 10:30 PM

Back to Life (season finale), Showtime, 10:30 PM

Rick & Morty, Adult Swim, 11:30 PM

All times listed are ET.

- Repost from: engadget Post

#ITlive #engadget #What's on TV this week: 'Shenmue III'

0 notes

gadgetsrevv · 5 years

Text

Why would Liverpool fans want a 6/10, erm, ‘ace’?

An ace 6/10 After John Cross gave Dele Alli 7/10 while Philippe Coutinho was rated at just 5/10 after playing such a small part in Bayern Munich’s 7-2 win at Tottenham, his Daily Mirror colleague David Maddock upped the ante with his player ratings.

In a classic of the ‘filing these early, didn’t really pay any notice to the opposition’ genre, Maddock merrily awarded one-goal, one-assist man Takumi Minamino just 6/10. Which made him exactly as good as the embarrassed, on his arse Virgil van Dijk on the night.

So it was odd to see the Mirror then bring us the ‘news’ that ‘Liverpool fans urge Jurgen Klopp to sign Red Bull Salzburg ace Takumi Minamino’.

Ace? Distinctly average according to your Merseyside man.

Yesterday’s news Nothing sells quite like Manchester United gossip, so there’s no mystery about the BBC’s choice of rumour to sell their gossip column on Thursday morning. We did the same ourselves except with, you know, new gossip.

Manchester United are ‘continuing to track’ James Maddison, ahead of a ‘potential £80m move’.

Latest football gossip: https://t.co/vjeuPS0Zxa #mufc #lcfc pic.twitter.com/Np9PIGyiEs

— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) October 3, 2019

The issue we have with the BBC’s choice of the Maddison gossip is that they attribute it to the Daily Mail. Click on the link and the clue that this gossip does not originate from the Mail comes as early as the fourth word, which is ‘reportedly’. By the fourth paragraph we know the claim actually comes from the Evening Standard – three whole days ago.

It took us roughly 30 seconds to work out that this was not new gossip and leave it out of our gossip column. Either the BBC simply didn’t bother (astonishing considering the size of their editorial staff) or they checked, clocked that it was an old story and just thought ‘f*** it, people will click’.

Mediawatch is not sure which is the most damning theory, but the fact that their second item of gossip is taken from the Manchester Evening News, which was relaying a claim made by the Transfer Window Podcast on September 30, means that we’re edging towards the ‘f*** it’ theory.

That’s hilarious Mediawatch holds a special place in its arse for media organisations who tell us when certain things are ‘hilarious’.

On Wednesday, The Sun online brought us this:

‘Tottenham flops trolled on social media with hilarious No Context Hearn tweets as rival fans go wild following Bayern Munich thrashing’

Consider us both confused and unamused. We are way too old for this sh*t.

Then on Thursday in the Liverpool Echo:

‘Trent Alexander Arnold’s ‘clever’ Andy Robertson decision as hilarious Liverpool bet renews’

Because there is literally nothing funnier than a friendly wager between two teammates about assists.

Hilarious adj Extremely amusing.

A history of violence Ever wondered what would happen if you put a middle-aged Millwall fan in charge of reporting on Tottenham for the country’s biggest-selling newspaper?

‘Could you imagine legends Dave Mackay or Graham Roberts saying nothing had they been part of Tuesday’s fiasco?

‘The Lilywhites back then, who were on a fraction of the pay but had a hundred times more heart and honesty than most of this current mob, would have ripped their team-mates to shreds – and not just with verbals.’

Paul Jiggins there. Still advocating footballers twatting each other in 2019.

Burying the lead That Paul Jiggins piece appears in The Sun newspaper under the headline of ‘They’re Tottenumb’ but by the time the online guys have got their click-hungry hands on all of those words, it becomes ‘Spurs spend decades trying to topple Arsenal as North London’s top dogs…now Poch’s flops have turned into them’.

27 paragraphs, in case you were wondering.

Where is the love? Christian Eriksen was incredibly naive on Wednesday. Making a public comment on swirling internet rumours means the media can repeat the swirling internet rumours they have been forced to ignore for legal reasons. Oh happy day…

And on Thursday The Sun are doubling down on those delicious rumours with this headline:

‘Eriksen DID give Vertonghen black eye in Spurs training ground incident… but it was an accident as duo blast affair rumours’

Two things are definitely unconnected and everybody is happy to make that clear, including The Sun, who are definitely not trying to profit from any suggestion otherwise. Oh no.

The URL? https://ift.tt/2oM4DUE

And yes, they’re a north London will.i.am tribute band.

Hard Times It’s not often that The Times make us laugh but their big claim that ‘Tottenham Hotspur fear that a disillusioned Harry Kane could join the growing list of senior players who want to leave in the summer’ has tickled us. Surely every club ‘fears’ that their best player will want to leave. The only club that doesn’t ‘fear’ that scenario is Manchester United and that is because their best player is Scott McTominay.

It is illustrated in the newspaper with a graphic showing that ‘Among teams to have played in the Premier League in 2019, only Brighton & Hove Albion have lost as many matches as Tottenham in all competitions’. So basically, Spurs are worse than Fulham, Huddersfield, Watford and everybody else. That’s what the graph says.

Spurs: Officially worse than Huddersfield Town. pic.twitter.com/aw3eYQJBEP

— Football365 (@F365) October 3, 2019

What The Times don’t mention: Tottenham did indeed lose 16 games in 2019 but they did play 39 times – rather more than Brighton’s 33 or Fulham and Huddersfield’s 30.

Welcome to a world where Manchester City and Liverpool are only really matched by Sheffield United, Aston Villa and Norwich. Let’s call them the Big Five.

Except Villa lost ten games, Norwich eight and Sheffield United seven in 2019. But forget that because TOTTENHAM ARE IN CRISIS.

Flip-flop From The Sun online’s piece about Martin Odegaard being a target for Arsenal among others:

‘Now Premier League giants have joined the race to land his signature, with Arsenal hoping he can be a long-term replacement for flop Mesut Ozil.’

Flop? Only Thierry Henry has ever been credited with more Premier League assists in a single season. Have some sodding respect.

High praise of the day ‘Man Utd starlet Mark Helm dubbed ‘next Wayne Rooney’ for stunning under-18 goal’ – Daily Star.

(By commenters on YouTube).

Recommended reading of the day Matt Slater on the growing battle for kit deals (£)

David Hytner on Tottenham and Mauricio Pochettino

Jamie Carragher interviews Brendan Rodgers (£)

(function (d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3&appId=1398786527091691"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); Source link . More news

via wordpress https://ift.tt/2oL8Rfa

#Gossip Why would Liverpool fans want a 6/10 #erm #‘ace’?

0 notes

tailsbeth-writes · 7 years

Text

Always the Sidekick - Prose

I wrote this piece for a genre fiction class at university, it’s a romantic short story. It’s one of the few stories I’m actually quite happy with and might even consider continuing.

Word Count: 2609.

The park had well and truly taken autumn in. Across the wet grass, lay leaves in shades of brown and yellow. The smell of pumpkin spice lattes was in the air, it really was the best time of year. Today my wellington boots had been taken on their first outing; their traditional green didn’t particularly coordinate with my red rain mac. However, I could not care less as my appearance was not my speciality. With my mousy brown hair complete with blunt fringe to my milk bottle glasses, I was not what you’d call typically attractive. I was content with my lot though, as long as I could get to my favourite bench with a notebook and pen, I was happy.

It was the best spot for people watching, it was right in the middle of the park. To your left was a large pond where children would attempt to feed swans and nearly kill them and to your right were the multi-courts where men would make fools of themselves on a daily basis in an attempt to woo the opposite sex, usually with dire results. I sat there for my lunch hour and marvelled at the awesomeness of humanity before my best friend Jenny arrived. I love her to pieces but thanks to her gorgeous good looks, my favourite bench became the viewpoint of frenzy for the sporting lads. She walked up in high heeled boots, a black tulip skirt which extenuated her curves precisely and a white chiffon blouse that didn’t leave much to the imagination. The cherry on top of it all was her blonde wavy hair which bounced lightly with every step.

‘April darling, how are we today?’ I loved the way Jenny spoke, so silly yet sophisticated.

‘I’m pretty excellent, how are you?’

‘So tired, rushed off my feet as usual. Glad to get a break.’

‘I just don’t know how you manage it, I wouldn’t dream of such a busy job.’

‘Well, April my dear, not all of us are content with spending our days in a library.’ Despite Jenny and I being the same age, she’s always spoke down to me a little. I never cared what she said about my job though, I loved it. Her job sounded like an absolute nightmare to me, she worked at a law firm which meant she was always busy and always had to look her best. ‘It’s all about reputation’ Jenny told me time and time again. Whereas at my work, I spent hours sorting out books full of magic and romance, I wore whatever I pleased and I got a full hour for lunch. With those stats, I’d never see the appeal of Jenny’s job.

‘What’s for lunch today then?’ Jenny enquired as usual, looking for the plastic lunchbox.

‘Roast chicken sandwich, last night’s leftovers.’ I handed it over to a starved Jenny.

‘Oh you treat me so well April!’ She declared before she took a huge bite out of the sandwich. From the size of her waist, you’d never guess Jenny had a massive appetite.

‘Are we still doing dinner tomorrow night?’ She asked between bites. Fridays were probably my favourite day. I had a half day at work, I’d pick up sushi as a treat on the way home and then I’d settle down to a good book or a Netflix marathon for the afternoon. The nights were usually planned by Jenny, with her job she managed to blag us theatre ticket most weeks. However, this dinner wasn’t one of our usual Friday nights. It was a set-up, a casual reminder that I was still single and apparently needed to find a boyfriend.

‘Was that tomorrow night? I forgot about that. I might actually be working.’

‘You’re kidding me right? Remember tick tock, you’re not getting any younger pumpkin.’

‘Thanks for that gentle reminder Jen, you aren’t ei-‘

‘April Louise Hollander, you are going to eat dinner with me and some lovely male company whether you like it or not! Trust me; I’m doing it for your own good. Also it’s a work thing, you’d be the bestest for coming.’ I knew there would be some form of blackmail; I was always the sidekick to her little plans.

‘As I’ve told you time and time ag-‘

‘April, just be there.’ She interrupts again. I’ve not paid much attention but she’s finished her sandwich and brushed off the crumbs. I didn’t even bother trying to reply this time.

‘I better get back to the office; they’ll be lost without me. Remember 7 o’clock tomorrow at that fancy Italian place, wear something nice. Ciao darling!’ And with that she marched off on her heels, already screaming orders down the phone. I had been looking forward to Friday, I was going to marathon Breaking Bad. Now I’d spend the afternoon trolling my wardrobe. Help.

Friday mornings at the library were always fun. A couple of classes from the local primary school would come in and if there wasn’t much work to do I got to help out with the kids. They reminded me of myself at that age, always raring to start a new book. I brought out a table full of new books and they cheered as they scrambled to find the best choice. Their adorable little smiles were enough to make my day. On the other hand, on my bus home I saw a bunch of students glued to their phones and tablets. I understood you could read books on those too but the majority of them were playing addictive games or swiping through possible mates like baboons. What happens to us as we grow up? Does the world of fiction lose its appeal to jabbing away at a piece of plastic and metal? I got off my usual stop and walked a few metres down the road to pick up my Japanese feast of sushi and bubble tea.

My flat was in the building next door, on the third floor. It was small and cosy, ideal for me and my pet fish Oscar, named after Mr Wilde of course. Normally I’d have got straight into my pyjamas, unluckily I had to choose a suitable outfit for Jenny’s high standards. Queue a clichéd montage of chucking clothes around my bedroom. Fashion was never my thing; I was about comfort and practicality not designer labels. I reckoned simple and elegant-ish was my best bet. As I turned to the mirror, I imagined an eagle-eyed Jenny staring back at me.

‘Are you really going to wear that tonight? Why do you even own that?’

‘I don’t actually care Jenny.’

‘Well you obviously care my dear; otherwise you wouldn’t be imagining me in your mirror now, would you?’ I let a little frustrated scream out. Imaginary or not, Jenny did have a point though. I did care. I’ve seen the looks of disgust that Jenny’s colleagues give me when I turn up to a champagne party in my doc martens and no make-up. This time it was almost like a date, she’d mentioned male company. I hadn’t had a boyfriend since university, three years ago. I genuinely did want to try, while I had Hermione’s smarts, I unfortunately didn’t have Emma Watson’s good looks. Tonight was going to be different; I ran out to Primark and bought a little black dress. I braved my contact lenses and risked burning my hair with my straighteners. Make-up wasn’t my best friend, but I tried my hardest to not make it look like war paint. I, of course, made a few April-esque touches, a deathly hallows necklace and forest green brogues. It might have just been a dinner date but as I gazed in the mirror, I could have been ready for a ball.

I definitely preferred London at night time. The twinkling street lights bounced off the reflective skyscrapers that melted into the indigo sky. My taxi driver wasn’t very chatty which I was thankful for tonight. My mind was too busy buzzing with expectations to talk about the weather. Jenny would giggle like a school girl over her carbonara at the dashing gentleman opposite her. Meanwhile I’d be enthralled in conversation with a boyishly handsome chap who happens to have a passion for Doctor Who. As I dissolved into my day dreams, I barely noticed the taxi screeching to a halt. Jenny practically pounced on me as I stumbled out the cab into the nippy air.

‘April, my darling, you’re a new woman! Where’s the milk bottles? And are you wearing make-up? I love, love, love it!’ She was grinning from ear to ear at my apparent transformation.

‘Aw, you’re very sweet.’ I felt my cheeks redden as she spoke.

‘I wish you dressed like this more often, speaking of which, where is this delight of a dress from? I never knew you owned such a thing.’

‘Primark, only a tenner actually!’ Jenny’s face dropped in repulsion, the idea of being seen dead in anything less than £50 freaked her out. Her grin returned as she took in my whole look once more.

‘Not my usual taste, but you work it.’

‘You sure I look alright? I’m way out my comfort zone here.’

‘Of course you look alright, more than alright! Do you not think you look fab?’ I had to agree with Jenny. I’d gone through my Cinderella transformation from drab to fab except my fairy godmother came in the form of Primark and YouTube tutorials. I gave her a courageous smile.

‘God damn it, I do look fab Jenny.’

‘Great, glad we can agree on that. The boys said they’re going to be a tad late unfortunately so we’ve just to head inside.’

‘Okay, after you.’ I followed Jenny’s lead. After all the commotion of my new look, I hadn’t taken in Jenny’s outfit for the night. Her hair sat in a subtle up do and a creamy fur shawl sprawled over her shoulders. Her dress was a figure hugging scarlet number, which finished just after the knees and her shoes were a classic pair of black heels. As usual, Jenny looked like an absolute bombshell. I felt rather lucky to be friends with someone so glamourous.

As soon as the restaurant door opened we caught the smell of the incredible menu. Chatter surrounded every table. The place was packed. It was a Friday night in London after all. Everything appeared to be draped in white; the tables, chairs and even the walls. Spaghetti Bolognese was off the menu for me then. We got seated straight away as we had reservations. Jenny briefed me on tonight’s mission; we had to show the representative from this company a good time essentially. He was bringing along an intern which is where I came in, I was the distraction while Jenny spoke business. Whilst this was technically work for Jenny, we agreed we were going to have a good time ourselves. Therefore the first order of the night was cocktails. Our waitress brought over two martinis and we clinked our glasses together.

‘Do you feel like you’re in Sex and the City right now?’ Jenny giggled.

‘You took the words right out my mouth.’

‘I think we could give Carrie and the girls a run for their money frankly.’ We chuckled as sophisticatedly as we could. A joint this fancy didn’t feel like it welcomed belly laughs.

‘Excuse me ladies, I do believe you’ve been waiting for us.’ We looked up from our drinks to see our delicious male company had arrived. Jenny got up to shake their hands.

‘You must be Michael? So nice to finally meet you. This is my friend April.’ Michael stretched a freshly tanned hand over to me, his chocolate coloured eyes slithering into mine. Behind him stood a tall redhead who smiled delicately at us.

‘Nice to meet you girls, this is Eric.’ Eric tottered over and shook our hands. His hands were slightly clammy, nerves were tugging at him.

‘Great to meet you both.’ I drank in his polite expression, it was very welcoming. We all took our seats, Eric sat to my left. His navy cord blazer grazed my skin as it fell on his chair.

‘What are we drinking ladies?’ Michael enquired. Every word was like silky caramel; Jenny stuck to every syllable while it was far too sickly for me.

‘Martinis, we can move onto a bottle of wine if you’d prefer.’ Jenny had to vaguely remind herself this was a professional dinner. Michael had other plans.

‘Of course no, martinis it is! Waiter!’ He glanced around and waved his hand in the air, Eric stared at his lap. He looked as uncomfortable as I felt. A baffled waitress finally came over.

‘Six martinis please!’ Michael demanded.

‘Why six?’ Eric innocently asked.

‘We’ve got catching up to do! It’s Friday night after all!’

‘Christopher Eccleston’s your favourite doctor? Really?’

‘Yup!’

‘Wow, very controversial.’ I sipped my third martini, never losing grip with Eric’s bubblegum blue eyes. They made my insides feel cosy. That could have also been the alcohol. Jenny had gone to sit at the bar with Michael to have shop talk. Her legs stretched in front of the bar stool to keep Michael at a safe distance. She’d got over his caramel tones and was getting to work.

‘So how long have you known Jenny? I wouldn’t say you’re typically matched.’ I rolled my eyes at the world’s most frequently asked question.

‘Most people think the same. We’ve been inseparable since primary school, she shared her dolls with me when nobody else would. I don’t think she quite realised what she’d got into. We’ve been through semesters abroad with nothing but letters to each other and we’re still going. I know she comes across as ridiculous most of the time but that’s part of the magic of Jenny. It’s just kind of amazing that over ten years later, we still meet at a park bench every day for lunch and it’s not boring yet. God, sorry, I’m babbling now!’

‘Nah, don’t worry about it. I think you two are sweet. A bit mad but sweet.’ I looked down at my drink, my cheeks felt rosy. Sensing my awkwardness, he changed subject.

‘Do you have a favourite park bench in mind? I’m a bit of a people watching enthusiast myself.’ My mouth may have gawped open a little. It was like someone had taken my day dreams and moulded them into my perfect man.

‘Seriously? People watching is my favourite thing ever. You know Waverly Park, how the path cuts right through the middle? The bench right next to the pond and multi-courts.’

‘I don’t think I’ve been there, I’ll need to check it out sometime. If you’d let me of course.’

‘Suppose, but I’ll have to share between the hours of 12 and 1 on weekdays.’

‘Those terms are fair enough.’ His endearing gaze turned me to jelly. His movements were careful, his long fingers ever so slightly rubbed up against mine on the table. He picked up my pendant and edged a smile.

‘Harry Potter fan?’

‘Yeah. I must seem like a massive geek with this thing on.’ I mustered hesitantly.

‘Oh really?’ He smirked and got something out of his coat pocket, a wallet with the Hogwarts crest on it. I let out a slight gasp. Eric laughed lightly at my shock. He placed the tattered wallet back in his coat.

‘Massive geeks should stick together, well I think so anyway.’ He declared. Before I even realised, the space between us was gone as he kissed me gently.

‘I could not agree more.’

#writing #creative writing #prose #original writing #original prose #short story #romance fiction #romance #short stories #university #writing blog #original story #tailsbeth-writes

3 notes · View notes

ecotone99 · 4 years

Text

[MF] Zeitgeist (or the Bum)

Wrote this a long time ago for a class. I was trying to have "fun" writing this.

You hit the mute button and cussed him out. You did that for a few seconds and then reconsidered. The chains were off. So you hit unmute and detonated the bridge: You cussed him out.

And you used all your best words too. You pulled the big guns, you used the compound words and compound sentences.

Then you used all kinds of rhetorical techniques, though you leaned mostly in the strategy of repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition. Of the prime, nefarious English words, glorious as they are, splendid at the feel when they come off the tip of the tongue from the depths of your abysmal throat.

And you got on a roll. You didn’t realize he had hung up. Not that it mattered. Because you were digging deep into your bag. You were going off. You were rediscovering everything in your college-borne repertoire. You used ontological expressions (You + are + a + [blank]!). Then you followed those with existential statements (You + are + one + [blank]!). You even managed to throw in a few theological combinations {Deity + damn + you + demon/devil + [blank]!) and Marxist styled idioms (You + bourgeois/capitalist pig + [blank]!).

Then you went historical. That’s right. Everything you ever said when complaining about the landlord who kept posting late-rent, ‘or-else,’ pre-eviction letters on your apartment door, and everything you ever used on your neighbors across the hall who let their dog drop shits all over your doormat, and everything you had ever invented during the football games you always watched alone and always used your rent money to bet on. You used it all. And everything was on the table. His wife, his kids, his dogs, everything. You used them too while emptying your rhetorical armory. And you struck every landing. Your words had pop. Everything was explosive. And even though your paragraphs had no logic (not that it matters in moments of explosive exposition), you were still telling the truth. It was your proud moment of oratorical barbarity. You were telling the truth, your truth, and in your soul, your dwindling soul, you knew you were doing the exact, right thing.

But let’s slow down. What happened to you?

Well, you got canned. You got canned, again. Other synonyms go as follows: Discharged, dumped, let go, dismissed, fired, screwed over.

When did this all happen? Well, it was midnight and you were on the road. You were just a quarter of the way to the city and you were hitting 95mph headed east on the 101. You were listening to Kendrick. You’re always listening to Kendrick and you were, of course, ‘singing’ along, and leaning hard into the lyrics, and pretending as if you yourself were performing on stage or in a music video.

You meant every word you repeated.

Then, suddenly, Kendrick gave way to an incoming call. Which of course, was the boss. You picked up. You were ready. You were about to tell him you were just about a minute away from the parking lot. But the boss goes and says one thing after another. He tried to sound like the good classic character of authority who’s full of understanding, who’s sympathetic to the trials of your life, who’s been there himself, who’s really hoping for good and bright things to happen to your young, hopeful life. He tried to tell you that this wasn’t personal. He tried to say it would be, for you, just minor setback, that’s all, just a minor one, small, infinitesimal, negligible, a blip. He tried to lay it on you that yours was a life brimming full of possibilities and opportunities ahead. This was just a little, baby, tiny setback. Barely a setback. That’s all this was. You will be fine, Darius. Just fine.

Right.

Then you cussed him (see introductory paragraphs). And then you tried threw your phone down the passenger side floor of your dying 94 Camry – your Camry of which has a driver’s side window that can’t be let down and a passenger’s side window which can’t be shut. Then you screamed. You had the right. You did. Then you punched your steering wheel a few times and swerved. Then you punched the dashboard and your radio and you swerved again. Then you tore your rearview mirror off and, in a moment of blank minded, righteous rage, you tried to throw it out of the passenger’s side window. But what happens is the mirror bounced off the glass and hit you back. Then you swerved, then you screamed, then you – ended up punching your own chin, loosened a tooth. But that calmed you down a little. The punch reset you. And for a time you just grinded your teeth and kept reciting in your brain that all that you lost was a gatekeeping job, that’s all. No big deal. That’s all it was. A gatekeeping job.

Just a gatekeeping job.

Then you started reciting that you lost a gatekeeping job.

Then you realized you had lost a gatekeeping job.

You lost that.

And thus you turned your thinking back to your landlord and all the golden eviction letters he was trying to swallow you with, and you turned your thinking back to your neighbor’s shitful dog, and you turned your thinking back to your mom and dad’s forthcoming disappointment; and then you turned your thinking back onto all rest of the facts that seemed to prove without a cosmic doubt about how very, very little you are.

And then you went on to remember that you have no weed at home. Because you had no roommate. Not anymore. She left. And that meant no more free oxy, no more free “candy,” no more simpler pleasures. Then you remember she took your PS4 on her way out, which was, ladies and gentlemen off the jury, a classic, dick move. She also took the TV with her along with your Bluetooth stereo. Not to mention, she changed the Netflix password and redirected all your streaming accounts to her array of email addresses. Not only that, she established her phone as the primary authentication device. What is meant to be said this: She went in on you. She knocked you out of the ropes. And then, on top of that, she had also taken all the Jameson and all the lesser booze out of the cabinet. But she didn’t drink any of it. No, no. What did she do? Well, what she did was pour out all the bottles into the sink, into the toilet, into the bathtub, and onto the bathroom floor. All of it. Drained. She left you dry. Just because she could. Just because she wanted to show you. And now your bathroom smells like a Boston sports bar. But all you have are empty bottles.

So, you go four to five more miles down the highway, and you start really thinking about it again, you start really thinking about driving off a cliff. You thought about how easy it could be. You wouldn’t have to worry about rent anymore, on top of everything else. You could stake your claim on that ‘Get out of Life’ free card. But then you figured the best opportunity to accomplish that kind of feat was forty plus miles headed the other way, headed west. You would have to not only turn around, but you would have to get on Canaan road in Thousand Oaks. You’d have to drive up and up and up to get into those nether regions of the canyons and then find the right spot where the shoulder rails were thin and weak and the drop was deep enough to guarantee the morbid victory that you would be giving unto yourself. In other words, that would take work. That would take will and a certain kind of courage. Not to mention, you wouldn’t be able to see everything on the road or in canyon. You wouldn’t be able to tell what kind of cliff you were on. So making the drop would be a gamble. Because you might just make it. You could survive. And with survival, well, that meant hospital bills, towing, psyche tests, phone calls to mom and dad, and god knows what else. And another truth is, you didn’t quite have the gas or the will to go forty miles and take care of it. You just got fired after all. So you didn’t have much will for anything.

So, instead, for a few miles on, you looked for anyone to cut off on the freeway. And what happens is, you get three of them. You get three to swerve, flash their beams, shake their fists. One even tried to get you back. But they didn’t know you had nothing to lose. So you took some gambles, made some maneuvers which, well – so what if you made him swerve into the shoulder and crash into the wall? You know this: He was driving a BMW and he had the bright, neon blue, LED lights. So he deserved it. You think, fuck him. You think, fuck all of them. You think, anyone with neon blue LED lights deserved to drive into a wall at 100mph. They all did.

But after this, what happens to you on the road is a realization. That’s right. A realization sets into you. A lump gathered in your throat. Your cervical spine got hot. The back of your skull tensed up: You were just a gatekeeper.

Just a gatekeeper.

And you were a real one. You were an actual gatekeeper (not the symbolic gatekeeper all the pale, glowing literati proudly - chest out, head high, shirts tucked - consider themselves to be). Meaning, you sat in a real shed and watched YouTube videos. Sometimes you trolled in the comment sections for the genres you possessed some inside knowledge of. Sometimes you pressed the gate button. Other times you fixed the ticket machine. But what you really did is drink coffee and use Facebook and Instagram to scour the digital sea to hate and admire all the lives you will never have.

Gatekeeper.

That was the job you could get a hold of. That was the job you couldn’t keep.

But forty miles away was just too far away, you tell yourself. Forty miles was just too far away to get to while you were sober.

So it goes. Next is, you exited the freeway and head toward one of the three Ralph’s on Ventura (that you know of).

Why? Why Ralphs? Because you need a drink. Wait, why Ralphs again? Because you needed affordable beer. And you needed affordable beer because you heard somewhere in a comment section or a tweet that one ought to, “Use affordable beer to quell the sensations of the absurd; use affordable beer plus cigarettes to negotiate the anxiety of the psyche in moments of inordinate upheaval.” Maybe you read it somewhere in a book somewhere, probably Carver. Not that it mattered where you heard it from. Because it sounded like a useful rule of thumb. In fact, it sounded like something that ought to be law.

Drinking was a matter of survival. That’s what you reminded yourself.

Then you reminded yourself that ‘survival,’ isn’t really the word for it.

But what you do understand is that cheap, affordable beer is all you can use to bring you to the one hermitage of the mind of which is called forgetfulness (or something like that). A peaceful state. You need it. Cheap beer is your route to get there. There are others, but you can’t afford them. You don’t have a roommate. She’s gone. So you need cheap beer. Cheap beer is what will help you get to sleep it all off and get on to the next day and the next and for as long as you have the money (and a liver). For a time, enough cheap beer will blot out the truth that you can’t call mom because you lost a gatekeeper job of all things (which could cause her to stress and thus, hurt her liver) and you can’t tell dad because he just lost his (his own gatekeeper job, and also his own liver). So, these be the circumstances where a drink – and many drinks - many, many, many drinks - is needed and required and demanded. For the sake of the soul. These be the circumstances where drinking it off should to be the law of land.

So, onto ‘Survival’ it is.

FIN

There's more, but...you know...whatever man. If you have anything to say about it (no matter how minute or major or offensive) let me know. If you would like me to read something of yours, let me know that too.

Stay healthy, people.

submitted by /u/cutdontburn [link] [comments] via Blogger https://ift.tt/2VOJy9y

#Blogger #Story

0 notes

legit-scam-review · 6 years

Text

The Weirdest Prediction Markets on Augur Right Now

Do you believe in God? Would you put your cryptocurrency holdings on it?

Augur, an ethereum-based platform for betting on the outcome of real-world events, aims to be a repository of crowd-sourced knowledge for journalists, investors and policymakers, as well as an effective tool for hedging against adverse outcomes.

But it’s also become one other thing: a hilarious place to troll.

Forums for questioning a higher power are just one of many markets that currently exist on the decentralized prediction market, developed by the non-profit Forecast Foundation and funded with one of the world’s first token sales in 2015.

That token sale took place before people were even using the word initial coin offering, or ICO, to refer to these types of crypto fundraising schemes, and the project went through the ICO boom in beta – with the developers testing and vetting one of the most hotly-anticipated launches in crypto history.

As such, when it launched on ethereum’s live blockchain last month, it briefly surpassed the most famous decentralized application, CryptoKitties, in terms of the number of users. Although enthusiasm has since dipped markedly.

So far, most of Augur’s markets – and the vast majority of the trades on the platform – deal with relatively vanilla topics like the outcomes of sporting events or the prices of crypto assets. But a few take a truly dark turn, gauging the likelihood that prominent figures will be assassinated or that terrorist attacks and mass shootings will occur.

Others, though, are just goofy, evoking the cryptocurrency community’s peculiar obsessions, wild rumors and the sorts of riddles a bridge troll might ask before letting you pass.

So here’s to the Augur users who have selflessly donated their time and potentially their funds – market creators post a bond in the platform’s native REP tokens, which they lose if a market is deemed “invalid” because the outcome cannot be verified – all just to brighten their fellow users’ days.

In no particular order, here are a few of the weirdest markets on Augur today.

Vitalik’s girlfriend

Vitalik Buterin, creator of ethereum, the world’s second-most valuable blockchain, enjoys the kind of wealth and notoriety few 24-year-olds have.

But does he have a girlfriend? And if not now, when?

These questions have vexed the crypto community enough to spawn a dedicated article – one that’s apparently been viewed over 18,000 times. And now, indelibly etched into Buterin’s own creation, there’s an Augur market for it too.

Buterin himself must confirm the relationship, according to the market’s terms, and the couple must have been together for at least one full day.

It’s worth noting here that (as with many Augur markets) nobody has bet on this one at the time of writing.

Are you there, God?

Ostensibly, Augur markets must be based on verifiable events, but Augur is a platform without moderators, so that’s become more of a guideline.

As mentioned above, the perfect example: someone has posed the question, “Does god exist?”

They’re apparently in no hurry to find out, as the market expires at the beginning of 2020. And the resolution source must be the “news media.”

The heathen users that initiated the market give the creator of the universe a 10 percent chance of existing. No money is at stake at the time of writing.

SAFU or not SAFU

Naturally, Augur users haven’t passed up on the chance to sprinkle the platform with their particular flavor of memes.

Titled “FUNDS ARE SAFU?” one market references a bizarre – but popular – YouTube send-up of Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao’s attempt to reassure users that their crypto holdings on the platform were safe.

Looking at the market’s details, however, it appears not to be a joke, but a serious – if vaguely worded – question about whether Binance will be hacked: “Will the security of https://www.binance.com/ be negatively affected such that there is a newsworthy loss of money?”

The market expired without any bets having been placed.

Does not compute

Competition is stiff, but the trolliest market currently active on Augur may well be this restatement of the liar paradox – the sort of query one might use to incapacitate a murderous supercomputer.

For the uninitiated, the statement “this sentence is false” is a paradox because, if the statement is, in fact, false, that means it checks out. So it’s true.

If the statement is true – by being false – then it violates its own premise: it has to be false.

Thinking about this paradox goes back to at least the fourth century BCE, making it one of humanity’s longest-running time wasters. Adding a pinch of circular meta-salt to this concoction, the market creator made the point of reference for this market Predictions.Global, a site that scrapes data from Augur.

The pee tape

The allegation that Russian authorities possess compromising material on U.S. president Donald Trump is one of the stranger stories to emerge from the 2016 election.

The existence of this compromising material – originating from a collection of documents prepared by a former British intelligence officer working (indirectly) on behalf of Democrats – is often known as the “pee tape” due to its alleged content.

But it hasn’t been proven.

Judging by an Augur market on the topic, though, chances are around one in four that such a tape will emerge before the end of Trump’s first term.

Betting volume on the market has been very low, however, at the equivalent of less than $60.

McAfee’s bold prediction

Many of the most liquid and valuable markets on Augur deal with the prices of cryptocurrencies.

So at first glance, it’s hard to see what’s remarkable about one particular market predicting that the price of bitcoin will pass $1 million before 2020.

But there’s a clue in the fact that it’s tagged “McAfee.”

The anti-virus-software-creator-turned-cryptocurrency-hype-man has published many inadvisable tweets. Topping the list, however, is one from late 2017, when he predicted that bitcoin would hit $1 million and reiterated a promise he’d made earlier to “eat my dick on national television” if he proved incorrect.

Yet another Augur market gets to the, um, meat of the story.

And that’s probably enough Augur for today.

Monkey with banana image via Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s){if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod? n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n; n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0; t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window, document,'script','//connect.facebook.net/en_US/fbevents.js');

fbq('init', '472218139648482'); fbq('track', "PageView"); This news post is collected from CoinDesk