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deuce-duce · 3 years

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Am I...?? (Inwardly GASPS)!! Which Part...??

Today is March 2nd 2021 and I got my puter back and went to look at what I had last written on December 16th 2020. When I opened the file, it had been changed… dates had been obscured and certain things had been reworded… So… I have decided to go back through all of my previous posts to ensure the integrity of what I am writing stays that way! During this process I will be putting together a collection of my favorite quotes and post fragments. Which I will dub Rock and Roll’s Greatest Hits, if you live near me go buy airhorns Ill tell you why, When the greatest hits album comes out. What your about to read is primarily from Dec. 16th with a few changes or should I say… restorations?? Probably a little of both to be honest. Everything is still as it happened, I just add better descriptive words and fine tune the analogies so that they are easier to digest… My English teacher always told me that was what I was good at! Along with many others… who have said the same… not only do I understand it… I’m able to explain it in a way that others understand as well. ENJOY

On the seventh of December I woke up not too sure if something had occurred that night or not… as I have mentioned before they use a numbing agent that basically masks the pain until it wears off approximately 12 hours later… When I a woke on this day I was having moments of clarity and for some reason just couldn’t keep them to myself. talking to one of the staff members of the homeless shelter I expressed my destiny that I actually had one, that was going to bring me to greatness… then out of nowhere I just blurted out there is going to be a power shift!!!! And at that very moment I couldn’t believe what it was that had just come out of my mouth. I didn’t even believe it at first because the guy at the desk was like IDK… about… that… but when I went back into my room, the look on my roommate’s face said it all!! It seems as though those who pull strings and orchestrate a lot of this… put all of their eggs into one basket. I don’t know exactly what the terms of thee bet were but I’m assuming it had/has something to do with me not being able to control my compulsivity associated with my dissociation. Unfortunately for them I made a deal with God. It was while I was on quarantine and even though I was in a basement all by myself people kept F$%^&*!> with me. This is when I prayed stating that I would not falter, for my body his temple his craft and his glory. that I need to take care of myself and my destiny, for it is in his hands and I won’t let my selfishness or imperfections stop him from fulfilling his plan. Over and over again I have cried and cried about how fundamental and powerful this is all going to be. EFFIN CRAZY!! And now that I know without anyone telling me and it literally being given to me somehow is what is freaking everybody out. How do I know or how the hell did I figure it out!! I really couldn’t tell you and the only thing that is possible is that our Creator endowed me with such responsibility. Crazy!! (this was before I considered the probability of God being a woman, A mother, A Lover)

Low and behold one of my favorite artists Mr. Kid, Maniac, Rager, Wizard, Pursuer of Happiness Cudi dropped a new album entitled Man on the MOON Three. Ill have to say it’s a wonderfully made album! The album delves deep into who Scott is… I know the Fans are going to love it.

Rewind a little bit sorry for my hiatus just needed to stay focused and well as your aware have been led here not by accident and had some things that I needed to take care of before I started writing again. Not to mention I have been dealing with a lot only to know that I am who I am for a reason Rockstar Knights off MOTM3 has a lot to say concerning who I am and what I have realized as a result to my struggle. The Song is a collab with Trippie Redd and really encapsulates so much, that its hard to describe in words.

I had a very interesting conversation with my mother the other day and came to a pretty profound thought. 1st I was telling her how I was being told that I am too….!!! Smart!! Like WTF!! REALLY!! Is that even a thing?? But I didn’t let it get to me too much as it probably is the reason I face so much adversity, No matter the community I enter into. This is how I have explained it to her and a couple other people in the community as well as the Rasta Man in the PNW. The best analogy I could present is if a plant with a fire burning so big and so hot on one side of the plant, a fire so big and hot that it probably would kill most other plants, but not this plant. This plant had sooooo much drive and will to live that instead of giving up it grew in the opposite direction of the blaze. While the roots could withstand the blazing inferno becoming one with the heat and pain Upon the journey away from the fire (society) the plant developed different characteristics colors and attributes that no other plant had. Essentially that journey completely changed that plants physiology Psychology and possible its genetic makeup altogether. Now that the plant has grown so far from the fire (Society) that its all alone. Now theres a different kind of fire where he once thought was safe. But as he grows back towards the fire to escape the new blaze (tyranny) he realizes he will never be able to be the same as the fire he grew so far away from. Now the only option the plant has with death being imminent is to grow as big and bright as quickly as possible before it is engulfed on all sides.

All this taken into account along with factoring in the two major belief structures in the world one Being Creation or Evolution (The Big BANG) this plant which has defied all odds still shines brightly displaying its colors and unique characteristics no matter how dark the room may be it still continues to bloom! Is this a Divine will and plan or are we experiencing the next step of Evolution??? My honest opinion is its both! For the mere ability to adapt and change and prevail in situations others couldn’t dream of or even have nightmares about is truly remarkable and in my eyes is an act of GOD! Just as any evolutionary step would be. The crazier part is… he has no handle!! Nothing to grab on to leaving no way for anyone to grab hold and control! AYE….

I thought this all might just be me being stubborn or simply an idiot until for some reason I opened up my meme App. Something I never open or even look at and the first thing that popped up was a picture and quote saying that many told Marilyn Monroe that she was only beautiful because of the clothes and dresses she wore. It then concluded Marilyn Monroe did a photoshoot in nothing but a burlap potato sack. The photos and the message she sent were completely opposite of that which was being said by spectators. Now!! As scrolled to the second meme I was expecting something funny!! That wasn’t the case what I saw next was the upcoming alignment of the two largest planets in the solar system Jupiter and Saturn. Not only does their alignment happen only every 20 years but the proximity of this occurrence to the earth as well as the proximity to each other hasn’t been the same for close to 800 years… What does it all mean… IDK but The Christmas Star is what their calling the alignment and if your familiar with the bible is the star that the kings, from other lands followed to bring gifts to baby JESUS! Who knows what this alignment could usher in.?

So profound thought comes to me on a daily basis now it’s so strange the way that it comes it will just be momentary thoughts that will pass through my conscience and as they go by I latch on to it delve a little deeper and experience an overwhelming amount of… IDK what to call it but it feels very powerful so much so that it brings me to tears… I don’t know exactly what the future holds but I think that is what makes this so great! I just keep my mind open Like apple IOS Systems letting everything come and go as it pleases when something goes by that strikes me, I latch on and don’t let go. Its weird how it all happens.

Steve Jobs once said that if he had never had an acid trip that he would have never of come up with the operating system for Apple and after explaining to you what I do as a spiritual and destiny seeking process I believe was his thought process as well. This in of itself is what I think they mean when they say to keep an open mind. Just so you know I didn’t come up with that little bit about the late Mr. Jobs by plan it just came to me when thinking about how to have, use and keep an open mind.

The reason I explained this to you was because this is how I Pray! After I pray I sit still with an open mind allowing multiple ideas thoughts and perspectives to pass through my brain… until like an IOS operating system, something speaks to me… when I latch on to it, focus on what it means and what it will mean… “I Get Those Goosebumps Everytime” (Goosebumps, Travis Scott, feat. Kendrick Lamar, Birds in the Trap Sing Mcknight, 2016). This is how you know! A little extra for ya, when I went to look up the info for my first Hip Hop citation it was 11:11 lol there they go again… its really a cool feeling!

Can someone tell me if that APA or MLA…?? Ya know what!! Eff IT!! None of my writing is orthodox, besides I kinda like the way I did it haha

Kid Cudi’s new video just dropped and I couldn’t be more amazed with all of the hidden messages that are in there. He is officially the man on the moon. Passion pain and demon slaying like a maniac on the pursuit of happiness. Love that DUDE!!

That’s all I got for 12-16-2020 Five More Days…

LOVE & PEACE

Songs

Heaven On Earth – Kid Cudi

Goosebumps – Travis Scott, feat. Kendrick Lamar

Dirty Heads – Sound Of Change

Just so you know the only thing I added this time other the cleaning up what I had already written was the praying part. Although I originally remember that being the purpose as to why I wrote what I did looking at it today March 2nd 2021 it wasn’t there… have a great day everyone. Ill post this on 3/3/2021

I've added parts to the story on my business cards and will leave then random places, what you do with them is up to you but I think It would be cool for those who want to stop me to have to work extra hard just like they make me!!

LOVE

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despressolattes · 4 years

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CONSEQUENCES | CHAPTER NINE | LEGACIES/THE ORIGINALS

BOOK THREE IN THE SIDE CHARACTER/LILAH SERIES

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─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

She looked at herself in the mirror, touching the necklace dangling upon her neck. The pendant was rather large and in a noticeable and recognizable shape. The gem in the middle was made of obsidian with specks of lapis lazuli, and it glowed a light blue when it with light. She had it for as long as she could remember, Dahlia spelling it so she could walk in the sunlight when she finally came out of the cave she was desiccated in.

She only found out that the necklace had protective properties like that when she tried to take it off in public, wanting to conceal it as she walked through a village in the 1500s.

It was the only thing she had that made her her, and she didn't want to lose it somehow or get it taken. The minute the clasp was off and she moved the necklace, her skin began to burn, boil, and turn red. She put it on, wondering why it hadn't done that when she took it off while she slept. When she tried to take it off again within a building, she realized that it protected her against the sun.

All of her vampire ways she had to learn on her own.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ─── 1500s

Lilah stood slowly, confused and frightened. Her last memories flooded her mind, the spell Dahlia had performed, being stabbed in the stomach with a sword. She frantically grabbed at her stomach, but only dust fell to the ground. There was no wound, but she was dirty. Her white dressed was covered in black dirt and dust, which drifted off of her body as she moved.

There was, however, blood on the collar of her dress. She looked down on the floor, a trail of blood. Instinctively, she raised a hand to her lips, feeling the thick liquid. She took a step back, terrified of what was going on, but couldn't find a person or a body anywhere.

She slowly made her way to the cave's mouth, following the light to the outside. She looked around, noticing that her world looked unfamiliar to her. The village she had lived in was good as gone, no one living there anymore. She wondered what had happened to the settlement that her mother and father had been from, the one she had traveled so far from with Dahlia and Freya, separated. Freya had already been an adult by the time that little Lilah joined them, but the two of them were never allowed to form a bond.

All Lilah could remember about where she was, was that she was in Europe somewhere.

She had learned about control, about vampirism, about survival, all by herself. It took her a few months to even realize that she had been asleep for five hundred years. It shook her to the core, but she wondered if that meant Freya had survived like she had.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ─── 1600s

She began to be a bit reckless with her actions and her feedings as she went along. She learned she was somewhere in France where she took up the surname Desmarais, not that she really cared. She wandered around with her veins black and lips bloodied, uncaring since she tended to kill whoever was around.

In the cave she had been in where the journals that Esther made Dahlia give to Lilah. Stories of her mother and her father, Lorelle's journals. She became accustomed to village life, realizing she was in Ireland. She was able to acquaint herself with the times.

She relished in her new abilities, she was fast, strong, able to make people do as she pleased. She missed her magic, however, but decided that it was fine that she couldn't practice her craft any longer if it meant it was in exchanged for her freedom.

She tried to look for Freya for a bit. She asked about Freya Mikaelson, knowing of the immortality sleeping spell Dahlia had in plan for them, but no one knew who she was, but would ask if she was related to the Lord Mikaelsons, nobelmen who lived in Denmark with their sister Rebekah.

It was then that she realized her father and his siblings were still alive, whether by magic or by the curse she found herself under, they were alive. Soon, she'd hear others, those apart of her special community, talk about the violence and the running. The whispers in the wind she'd hear about the Mikaelson family was all she needed to become discouraged about knowing them.

She was on a blood binge when someone grabbed her, bringing her into an alley, pinning her against a wall.

"Are you trying to expose everyone?"

A girl stood in front of her in a beautiful gown that matched her flawless face. She had curly brown hair, voluminous. If there was a flaw on her, Lilah couldn't find it. She has a peculiar accent, definitely not native to France.

The girl looked at her suspiciously, before stating, "You're the Desmarais girl everyone talks about in the village."

"People talk about me?" Lilah asked.

"Yes, the young men talk about how you are beautiful and single, the young women talk about how you are kind and poised," the girl replied, before adding, "The witches talk about how you are dangerous and the vampires talk about how you ask too many questions about the Old Ones."

"About the who?" Lilah questioned.

"The Original vampire family," the mysterious girl replied. "The Mikaelsons."

"And what do you know of them?" Lilah questioned, looking at the girl suspiciously.

"I know that Niklaus and Elijah are evil."

Lilah's face perked up at Elijah's name.

"I know that they will do whatever it takes, no matter who gets hurt, for their own personal gain," she added, looking down with sadness. "I know they will kill when they are wronged."

"Is that not with all vampires do?"

"Not all have to," she replied.

"You're lucky I couldn't care less about those Mikaelsons. I'm merely looking for someone named Freya, not this Klaus and Elijah you speak of."

The girl let go of her.

"You must be careful with your actions before you expose us all and get us killed," she said, letting go of Lilah.

"We're vampires, we cannot die," Lilah said.

"They can still stake us, they can take away our daylight rings and throw us into the sun," the girl said as she began to walk away.

It was because of her that Lilah started to realize she wasn't like the other vampires. She had been staked before, while irritating the wrong person in a different town, and she had walked outside without her necklace before. She had survived both occurrences.

"What is your name?" Lilah asked her.

She turned around and smiled, "Katerina. I like your necklace."

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"You're crazy, you know that?"

Josh was standing at her door, leaning against her doorframe while she looked at herself in the mirror. She turned around to look at him, sending him a smile.

"It's in my blood," she shrugged, though Josh didn't know the weight of her words.

"Roman Sienna, huh?" Josh cringed, walking into her room and sitting onto her bed. "Of course you of all people, after you start to let a guy in, you get totally lied to and betrayed. Maybe it's karma for all the good guys you turned down all these years."

His teasing manner didn't go unnoticed, and Lilah picked up one of her makeup brushes from the top of her dresser, throwing it at the Rosza boy.

"Shut the fuck up," she laughed at him, going to sit next to him. She leaned her head onto his arm, wrapping both of her arms around his. "I'm still not convinced he's a bad guy."

"You keep saying that, but why do you think that?" Josh asked her. "You used to be the most suspicious of us all, never letting anyone, even us, in. And now you're rescuing the son of the woman who killed Hayley."

"I can't explain it," Lilah replied. "It's like... It's this feeling of familiar when I'm with him, like this isn't the first time I've met him."

"Maybe he has something to do with Picture Girl," Josh said.

Lilah gave him a stern look. "You think everything has to do with that girl in the photos."

"I wouldn't be surprised if everything happening right now has everything to do with that girl," Josh admitted.

Lilah huffed, standing up and holding out a hand for Josh. "Let's go gauge the damage I've caused, shall we?" she asked.

He took her hand, letting her pull him to his feet.

"You can gauge the damage you've caused, I've got a bar to run. We still have no applicants to come work with us."

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Lilah walked into the Abattoir—The Mikaelson compound—rather awkwardly. She went into the family room to see Freya, Keelin, and Nik, feeling relieved that she was the one she found. Her and Freya's bond had always been strong, partly because of how Lilah had childhood memories of the witch.

Nik was fast asleep in Freya's arms. Keelin looked between Lilah and Freya, nodding to her wife as she picked up their son and walked out. She smiled at Lilah in passing, and Lilah sat down next to Freya.

"You were like a Vampire Peggy Carter," joked Freya, her soothing and raspy voice calming Lilah's nerves as they both had their feet on the couch, facing one another. "The last time I saw you that protective over a guy, it was Elijah."

Lilah chuckled at the analogy.

"Has Josh called Roman 'Vampire Captain America' in front of you before? Is that where the Peggy Carter jokes are coming from?"

Lilah was glad that the air around her and Freya was light.

"You know, Lilah," Freya started, scooting closer to the girl. "Even though I met you when you were already a vampire, and you lived a lot of years on your own, and you did the growing up part all on your own... Whenever I see you, I see the daughter I didn't get to raise."

Lilah smiled, Freya brushing a hair out of Lilah's face.

"You came to this family as someone who looked like a little girl, trying her best to be an adult vampire in a big, bad scary world. And I know I can't take credit for the wonderful person you ended up being despite all the bad, but I like to think you're one of the things this family got right," Freya continued. "We all had our own lives taken from us, and this family hasn't done the best things, or even the right things at times, but taking you in makes me feel how I can only imagine Klaus felt taking in Marcel."

Lilah smiles at her words, trying her hardest not to be emotional.

"So, I trust you and your instincts. I know you're the most cautious out of all of us. Do you trust him?"

"There's a voice in my head telling me to," she said, repeating what she kept using as her justification for coming to Roman's rescue.

Footsteps could be heard, and they both glanced towards the sound to see Rebekah approaching.

"I see we let the traitor back into our home," Rebekah said, bringing her glass of alcohol to her mouth.

Lilah and Freya gave her a look, but Rebekah held her ground.

"What? She helped Hayley's killer's son escape from the Garden after he lied to her for a over a week about who he was," Rebekah said with her normal amount of dramatic, taking another sip of her alcohol, the ice clinging in her glass. "Lils, your taste in men is almost as horrible as mine was. Nik would've thrown Roman off the balcony by now, so don't be too upset that I merely threw him into a little prison underneath our home. Be glad I didn't board him up behind bricks and attempt to desiccate him."

With that, Rebekah smiled and walked away, back upstairs to her room.

Lilah and Freya looked at one another and couldn't help but laugh over what Rebekah had just said, in light of it all. It almost sounded like they were psychotic, but maybe they were. Maybe being crazy just ran in the family.

"So, what exactly happened? How did you guys figure him out?" Lilah asked.

"Rebekah loves herself a good gossip, and you wouldn't bring Roman around for her to meet. So she called that school he said he works for, the one that Nik sent Caroline a check for, and asked about Roman Bauer. But Caroline said that a Roman Bauer didn't work for them, a Roman Sienna does. Then Rebekah connected the dots back to the boy she saw around town during the time Hayley passed away. Then a simple locator spell on my part, and we knew where to find him," Freya explained.

Lilah nodded, chuckling softly at how nosey Rebekah could be.

"Part of it was for Hayley, and the other part was for you," Freya added.

"For me?" Lilah asked.

"He lied to you about his identity, so yeah, we were pissed off about what his mom did, and for what he was doing to you."

Lilah remained quiet. She was lying about her identity, too.

"Rebekah will come around," Freya promised her, wrapping an arm around Lilah. "I swear to you."

"Where's Lorelle?" Lilah asked. "Any updates on that front?"

Freya sat up straight, shrugging as she said, "She's been holed up in her room, seems to be a bit moody. Doesn't want to eat with us, barely talks to us. Still no leads on the White Oak coven, and I'm honestly not too sure how much we should trust her. But as someone who once had to earn the trust of my own siblings, I'm wanting to give her the benefit of the doubt that she's not here to stir up trouble."

"What about the pictures of that girl? I still have no idea who she is."

Lilah hadn't told anyone of the flashes she would see. Distorted voices and fuzzy scenes that felt like repressed memories, the feeling of deja vu she had when she was with Roman, as if she had already lived through it once before.

"It's like we should know her, but we don't," Freya nodded, but then she shook her head. "But I haven't been able to figure that out, either."

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Lilah walked upstairs of the compound, going to the room that Lorelle was staying in. She knocked, hearing her mother say, "I'm not hungry, Freya."

She entered the room anyways, pausing when she saw Lorelle sprawled out on the floor with endless grimoires open, like she was researching.

"L-Lilah Rae," she sputtered out, her eyes going wide as she stood up. "I wasn't expecting to see you."

"What're you doing?" Lilah asked her, sitting down on the floor and bringing one of the grimoires towards her.

"Well, I have magic, but I never really studied it," Lorelle explained, sitting down next to her. "So, I'm trying now."

After a moment of silence, she said, "You know, perhaps we should talk about—"

Lilah raised a finger to her lips, shushing her and then pointing to her ears, then swirling her finger in a circle to motion that the others could hear them.

"Not here," Lilah told her.

She looked at the grimoires on the floor, a ring amongst them, attached to a chain. She picked it up, looking on the inside to see engraving. The words "E. Mikaelson." Lilah's eyes involuntarily closed again, another fuzzy image in her head, the eerie feeling of deja vu once again crawling up her spine in the form of goosebumps.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

She was sitting in the passenger seat of her car, her emotions felt like they were all over the place. She found herself on the road to Mystic Falls, glancing down at the ring that was dangling from her neck. That same ring. She felt angry, but the anger slipped away to be replaced with grief and disappointment.

One thought was in her mind, "But I wasn't mad at her anymore, just disappointed she was here, and he wasn't."

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Lilah let go of the ring as she opened her eyes, tears falling down her face, watching as it fell back down onto the grimoire. She couldn't understand why she kept on having flashes of images and moments that she didn't remember herself. It was almost driving her crazy. She had one when she gave Roman clothes, when she picked up his bear, and now when she held onto her father's ring.

"Are you alright?" Lorelle asked Lilah, reaching forward and wiping her face.

"I'm fine," Lilah jerked away from her, wiping her face on her head. "I'm sorry, I-I have to go."

"Lilah, please don't—" Lorelle pleaded as Lilah stood up frantically. She copied her daughter, trying to step closer to her, but Lilah just pushed her arms away, using her vampire speed to run out of the room and the compound.

She got to her car, finding herself yet again trying to catch her breath. She was confused as to where this mental breakdown was coming from, but she felt it coming on since she got back from Mystic Falls. She felt off, like she was there but she wasn't fully there. Her mind was trying to make sense of everything in front of her, and while it was all normal, it just didn't feel right to her. Like it was all fake, like she was trying to wake up from a dream.

She didn't drive to her apartment, it just didn't feel right. She parked in front of Roman's apartment complex, wondering when she became the type to seek comfort from a guy. She wondered if she'd keep having those flashes of moments if she was around him more, since two out of three of them occurred with him. She wondered if he was the distorted voice and the fuzzy figure from her first flashback, when she had been giving Roman clothes to sleep in.

She knocked on the door, and the confused curly haired blond was practically tackled in a hug when he opened it.

"Desmarais?" he questioned, taking a few steps back to steady the two. "What's going on?"

She reached her hands up to his hair, running her fingers through his locks, closing her eyes, praying that something would come to her.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

She stood in front of him, watching as he looked up at her. He was still fuzzy, but Lilah was almost sure that the figure in front of her had to be him. She leaned down, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, engulfing him in a hug. One of her hands found his hair, softling running her fingers through his curls.

"What're you doing?" a distorted voice asked, his voice small.

"I'm a hugger," she replied. "And that is the fact you get to learn about me today."

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"I'm a hugger," she said softly, before saying louder and more confidently, "I'm a hugger!"

"You're a hugger?" replied Roman with the same volume, but ending the sentence to make it sound like a question.

Lilah let go of him, placing her hands on his shoulders as she backed away. She stared at him in awe and said, "I think you're the key to why I woke up outside of Mystic Falls."

Roman's eyebrows raised at her words, turning his head to the side in confusion. She just smiled though, feeling like she was making a break through with this mystery hole in her life.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

CHAPTER TEN

TAGS!

@akshi8278

DISCUSSION BOARD!!

· we're at 1k! despite SIDE CHARACTER reaching over 136k reads, every milestone still feels just as exciting as they did the first time i reached them. hopefully book 3 can see the same success as book 1.

· we get to see her friendship with katherine, which i have talked at before. how do we feel? Do we want to see more of Katerina and Lilah's friendship?

· we also see more freya lilah bond, as well as her with Rebekah. everyone's opinions on them?

· what do you guys think it means that lilah only gets fuzzy memories back when she touches things or does things that have connections to either her and elijah or her and roman?

· a lot happens in this chapter. thoughts? now that lilah has sort of figured out that roman is a trigger to some of her memories—though she'll soon realize he won't be the one to trigger her memories of Picture Girl—what do you think will happen?

· writing this chapter was so fun because i almost never touch on lilah's past. sure, we hear about chicago and stefan sometimes—though i've heard that a lot of people want me to write a 1920s lilah&stefan book. might just do lots of flashbacks in this book or in book four, which might be a lilah in tvd alternate universe type thing. and yes, this is me unwilling to just create a new OC to get attached to when I and a lot of other readers already love lilah.

· writing lilah's 1000s and 1500s past is fun because in side character, i always talked about it and never really went into full detail. and i've been writing lilah's character for two years now, and i think while she is a part of my imagination, she's really grown into her own being inside of my head to the point where things just seem right. it's not me just pulling things out of thin air, they feel right.

#mikaelson #the vampire diaries fanfiction #the originals fanfiction #elijah mikaelson #klaus mikaelson #hayley marshall #hope mikaelson

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vapormaison · 4 years

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Best of 2019 Future Funk Release 1/4: Toyama’s Love Island by Skule Toyama

A common argument I get into on audiophile and vinyl forums — that by virtue of interest and venue tend to skew boomer (who isn’t on discord now? Answer: Your grandpa.) — often revolves around the raison d’être of pressing future funk. In an earlier piece, I gave my opinion on the subject — but I didn’t really evidence the critique by many opposing audiophiles. As far as they’re concerned, I might as well be collecting Funko Pops — that is to say that these presses aren’t worthy of serious hi-fi consideration and are merely collector’s items. To their credit, when posting about my experiences with the genre, most of these aged audiophiles scratch their head not at the anime art on the box nor at the picture disks (usually reviled by the old-heads)— but at the oft-digital source itself. These guys are the ostensibly cool uncles with the dope music collection, after all.

While they often are a wealth of information on the analog format, and voracious consumers of early City Pop — a genre beloved by audiophiles, — forums like this tend to create feedback loops of retrograde understanding. Their enjoyment of all things analog turns them into intense luddites, often to the point where I question why they are interfacing with a computer in the first place, that dreaded source for the perceived decline of their hi-fi culture.

I’ve more or less given up on the prospect of turning them around on the subject of future funk. However, this summer, on a thread where we review recent vinyl purchases and upload lossless rips, I made a rather pedestrian post about how much I enjoyed Skule Toyama’s latest release — Toyama’s Love Island. And to my complete and utter surprise, my vinyl-to-digital rip of “Sunset Hasn’t Come Yet” brought all the boys to the yard. While I got my usual peanut gallery of “lol future funk, lol vaporwave, buy jazz” posts, its turns out more than a few Joe Boomers with vintage, $10k-valued Sansui stereo sets could vibe with this too. You know, the purely purists of the pure.

This caused me to consider for a time precisely why Toyama Love Island whispered to these boomers I share a particular corner of internet space with. What about it warmed the heart of these old men so cold to cold media? It obviously had to be something more than the mastering or the press itself. Most of these guys had been engaged in serious listening to absolute titans in their craft for forty plus years now. Many had studio experience themselves. Even now, I don’t have a really good answer. The best one I can supply is this: the warmth that emanates from Toyama Love Island can melt even the iciest heart. Cliche? No doubt. Apropos? Of course.

PART 1: THE MUSIC

Intro warms us up with a minute-long evergreen bit. By whom and what from— I genuinely don’t know (perhaps that’s the appeal for me personally, the mystery but also the universality)— but the punch line certainly feels nostalgic, and the horns do too.

Have a Good Time fronts the funk after a minute-long intro track. It’s an absolutely fantastic true open because of its principal horn loop that absolutely claws into your cerebral cortex and takes root there. Between listens, I found myself humming it while brewing a pot of coffee. While it’s not my favorite of the tracks on the album, its pure energy and catchiness is a master class on how future funk albums should inject you with an uncut hit of unapologetic brass funk within the first couple minutes.

Electricity takes the initial energy of Have a Good Time and subtly ratchets up the vibe with clever layering and a sweet progression. While my initial take on my first listen was that the bass was too muted (a slight boost from the hi-fi set of your choice can obviously erase that distinction quickly!) — I warmed to the mix after hearing how well it meshed with the following track.

Love Island serves as a sort of kinetic climax to the first quarter of the album and a great midpoint for the A-side, but the treble feels just slightly compressed and off-balance on the wax here. After fiddling with EQ and my pre-amp settings on the second listen, the track came through vastly better. My suggestion is to subtract here and there if you have a Japanese-built set that tends to run bright. After doing so on the 2nd listen, Love Island began to shine — and the distorted loops that seemed discordant on my initial listen were brought back into a more complimentary role with the rest of the piece.

Midnight Mall is my absolute favorite of the album because it just unabashedly brings the boogie with a pure, slap-worthy bass, crisp midrange from the intermittent horn flares, and absolutely atmospheric vocal compliments. Although Love Island is a strong title track, so to speak — I really do think Midnight Mall is the true baby-maker banger of 2019. For peak enjoyment, boost the bass a little on your stereo, add mood lighting and engage in the wholesome romantic activity (impassioned stares, hand-holding) of your choice.

Sunset Hasn’t Come Yet is the boomer whisperer. My guess regarding what makes this track appeal so authentically to the boomer crowd is the strength of its arrangement. You get a comfy arrangement throughout, a bass twang that sounds like its straight outta Miami Vice coupled with very moody Japanese vocals. For a future funk record, this feels like the track most in sync with its roots, creating a very authentic, fun sound.

Marsala’s effortless sonic transition from Sunset Hasn’t Come Yet’s stage is definitely a highlight of this album’s pretty flawless composition and arrangement. It feels very much like a palette cleanser for the album’s first half, and is perfect for an LP format — as you feel this transition writ large by the very nature of the format. The blaring synths feel like they would meld into place effortlessly with a Michael Mann-directed denouement to a period action-psych drama.

Flying Star is a soft reset to the album from a vibe standpoint, and is competent at what it does in the overall scope of the album. My only significant criticism of Skule Toyama’s output — which is somewhat present here — is that they don’t really let the vocals carry enough water. While exquisitely layered in relation to the rest of the piece, I want to hear the vocals take up a sort of primary mantle in the soundstage in a track like this. We get it in Flying Star’s middle third, but it does feel like a sort of pointless delay in gratification. A track like this has a chance to capture the listener and bring them into the sonic space. It comes just short of doing that.

Sailor Moon Rock manages to decimate that previous criticism by running at me and grabbing the tempo by the collar with an absolutely fire set of loops and immediately accelerate. I love it for that, and is definitely the B-side’s strongest composition. We get some no-doubt nasty guitar riffs and some iconic SFX that really bring this track together and make a B-side banger exemplar, reason enough to flip the wax.

Keep On Going brings us closest to a synth-wave composition that we get in the entire album on the track’s first third, but finds its funk at the ideal moment. It definitely succeeds in fleshing out of the B-side, and creates its niche on the project subtly but at the same time, at the risk of seeming hyperbolic — brilliantly.

Do Me definitely feels the most “Nu-Disco” of both the side and the overall album. It’s definitely one of those tracks that you can both happily wait for in the queue and then just revel in — knowing that while the record nears its conclusion, you get a track that just would not at all be out of place in a Shibuya nightclub circa 1979 or weave its way into a Haruki Murakami novel.

Outro is a perfect closing for the album, but I question the utility of making it the penultimate track instead with the inclusion of the bonus track. That said, it’s impossible not to vibe with the arrangement and layering of this piece. My hope is that when I die and arrive at the pearly gates (admission pending), St. Peter (recently taking up a hobby in DJing to pass eternity) will have a special edition pressing of that will have this as the final track on the wax.

Live Now! is definitely the track I feel coolest about. A good piece on the whole, just feels a bit out of step with the rest of the project. But I’m never going to look the gift horse in the mouth when it comes to the prospect of additional music, so a welcome addition nonetheless.

PART 2: VINYL EXPERIENCE

I really like the Toyama Love Island purple wax. This seemingly benign statement is no doubt going to incur a chorus of audiophiles in that forum criticizing me for this. Vinyl is not designed — as much as some will tell you, to be a perfectly neutral hi-res medium. There is natural warmth, scratchiness, minor distortion — et cetera. It also features natural imperfections that develop over time — like any piece of physical media. What’s more, some perceived hiccups on the overall master might actually be caused by a slight offset or error in the press, a common and natural occurrence when dealing with physical media like this. That’s why graphic equalizers were so prominent in vinyl hi-fi set in its late 1970s/early 1980s heyday. This is just an aspect of the vinyl experience.

Toyama’s Love Island features, in my view, a few of these imperfections. But these imperfections are nothing major — a quick re-equalization (oxymoronic, but I’m sure you know what I’m getting at here) a little fiddling around with the pre-amp here and there — these are natural to any experience and remind me why I became fascinated with the hobby in the first place — to maximize an audio experience. If every indie press gave that to me out of the box, well, what’s the point of the system that I own? It exists to provide a platform for a rich, diverse, and vibrant sonic experience. But the platter is just decorative without real warmth coming from the music, and Toyama’s Love Island brings that in droves.

My Pet Flamingo has a long (in vaporwave measurements, obviously) history of putting out quality physicals. Toyama’s Love Island builds upon this with a big’ol brick and a heaping slab of mortar. I’m also a big fan of MFP’s visuals. I’m not sure who they use to make the sleeves, but I think they’re generally constructed well, and the cover images that grace them never feel compressed or feature much in the way of artifacts. When you become deeply intimate with a vinyl sleeve, you start to notice these things — and I’ve never had this inkling when fingering a Flamingo release, so kudos to the label’s curation.

The mix feels exceptionally bright on my current system, and that has been a consistent point of curiosity with My Pet Flamingo releases. My guess is whatever they test their masters on is engineered by a British/American company not named “KEF” — think Cambridge, Wharfedale, McIntosh, etc — or a damper sounding Japanese unit like Technics or Yamaha. Again — I don’t see this as a problem, just a note to those running more traditional Japanese (80s Harman, Sansui, TEAC) or Nordic systems (B&O, Blaupunkt) that tend towards that end of the spectrum.

With obvious digital and analog appeal, Toyama’s Love Island is the closest thing to a “holistic” future funk release that I can think of — which makes me wonder why Skule Toyama’s hasn’t blown up yet. Only a matter of time, I’d guess — especially after earning a nod from this little outfit, I’d hope.

#future funk #bestof2019

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blue-opossum · 2 years

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Silver in Dreams List, i

Afternoon of March 16, 2022. Wednesday.

3 min 52 sec read.

Silver appearing in a dream is typically a more defined ocular response to the hallucinatory dream state and often marks an upward shift in co-occurrent metacognitive dynamics. It links to somatosensory phasing associations with skin in many cases. These links can be literal or analogical, as revealed in these 12 dream scenes.

I cannot include all silver references in this series. For example, coins have always occurred too regularly in my dreams to keep this list concise and engaging. This list focuses only on predominant silver attributes when marking a shift in ocular and metacognitive dynamics. These segments include only the silver references. There is much more content for some of these dreams.

1. I hold a large, flat, and somewhat oval SILVER snakeskin (that was impossibly in our cat's stomach) in our backyard. (Skin literalism and somatosensory catalyst in the final scene.) (March 14, 2022.)

2. A young woman (at a Menaht stage show) dances in a SILVER harem outfit reminiscent of a fishnet dress except for opaque paisley motifs. She moves through the aisle. (Skin analogy but also a precursor to a vestibular-motor transition.) (March 12, 2022.)

3. Protoconsciousness (on my right), as a man with an ambiguous identity, has SILVER paint on his right-hand fingertips. He accidentally touches a television screen while I watch it. He tries to rub it off but starts drawing lines (closer to me) on purpose. (Skin literalism. This scene precedes a metacognitive transition. I "find my voice" to tell him he is wrecking the screen after I anticipate/create his change of intent. A television screen virtually divides hallucinatory dream space from precursory consciousness. His act of drawing the vertical zigzagging line separates protoconsciousness and mental duality from emergent wakefulness.) (March 1, 2022.)

4. I passively serve protoconsciousness (until I deliberately increase metacognitive dynamics to "become invisible" and use a doorway to change my dream). I use a soup spoon to move hot molten SILVER metal from a cauldron and pour it evenly over a blanket over the back of a couch. (Skin analogy with a dream state literalism, because a blanket covers my body while I sleep. Somatosensory detail implies skin temperature, but I do not feel the heat from the cauldron. A previous scene involved moving small irregular logs. "Sawing logs" is a sleeping reference.) (December 30, 2021.)

5. A device resembling a calculator produces a tube of viscous SILVER adhesive. Some of it leaks through a tiny hole near the cap. (Something sticky infers tactility, so this is loosely a skin association. A "cap" might be my head and precursory cognizance of somatosensory phasing.) (November 21, 2021.)

6. Our whole house (other than the imaginary basement in this dream where we take refuge) fills up with SILVER glitter because of a "nuclear" glitter bomb. I consider it should not enter anyone's lungs. A long narrow gap between two floorboards allows minimal glitter to flow through from above. Each sparkling silver piece reflects bright light as it drifts to the floor. (In real life, as a probable influence here, glitter puffed out from a craft bag in a small "cloud" and got on our youngest daughter's face, hands, and arms, so this is a skin association as well.) (November 7, 2021.)

7. A woman wears a small green snake around her neck as a "necklace." However, it becomes a large SILVER necklace of numerous tiny concentric chains about twice the snake's size. "Oh, it's not a snake," I say, with no emotion. I watch the swirling motions of tiny pieces of silver as the concentric bands move and rotate. One area expands to the right side of the woman's neck for a short time before flowing back into its original shape. (This dream links directly to my somatosensory phasing response to REM atonia. I was sleeping with my right hand close to my neck in this instance. Skin association.) (February 4, 2021.)

8. While shopping with Zsuzsanna in an unknown store, I recall our youngest son, after picking up a shirt of about his size wholly covered with SILVER sequins. (Skin analogy. Transition.) (January 5, 2021.)

9. I focus on my hand (Metacognitive reaction to somatosensory phasing caused by REM atonia). I have a SILVER ring that used to be tight on my finger, but now it is far too big. I move it around over my finger and tell others (undefined protoconsciousness) about it. My hand might be shrinking. (Somatosensory phasing response. Skin and tangibility literalism.) (August 23, 2020.)

10. I am in bed on my back in an unknown residence (in daylight) though my dream self wrongfully perceives it as my current home. A SILVER pickup truck slowly enters the room from the left and parks immediately beyond the foot of "my" bed, perpendicular to it. (Because vehicles most often link to vestibular-motor sensation and imaginary physicality as a result of REM atonia, I can correlate, at least in this case, with the dream state indication of me being in bed, that the truck's color might correspond with skin.) (August 13, 2020.)

11. A magician pulls back a bedsheet, and a SILVER car is parked where a casket had been moments before. (Silver car, so possibly its "skin" here as well. A casket is often a metacognitive marker for REM atonia, either emerging from slow-wave sleep or after sleeping too long. A bedsheet also serves as a cover for the body while sleeping.) (August 1, 2020.)

12. A SILVER (and white) robot appears in a doorway. It enters the room where I sit. I have to fight it and become it. (Skin analogy. A robot is another example of the artificial physicality of dreaming, similar to a vehicle. A doorway marks a metacognitive shift, often deliberate when anticipating a change in dream state dynamics.) (March 23, 2020.)

#dream journal #meaning of dreams

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vankoya · 6 years

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Can you believe I stuck with a persona for a whole year? No, neither can I. But I have somehow managed to be Ivory for the entirety of 2017, and I deem that an accomplishment in itself. Here is to hoping I can stick with her for 2018!!

The past year has been interesting, to say the least. A lot of good shit happened; a lot of bad shit happened. But we made it!! I was away at university for a good five months of it, which was such an eye-opening experience and I am super excited to get back into my second semester at the end of February. Because of this, I definitely did not get to do as much writing as I hoped, but that’s okay!! Life happens like that!! I am wishing that this year will bring me more opportunities to write, and that while I am at university, I can manage my time better to fit writing in. Fingers crossed.

Thank you all for sticking through this year with me. I love all of you so much, and I am so proud of how far everyone has come. I hope each and every one of you has a fresh new year of exciting beginnings, loads of happiness and love, that inspirational drive you have been searching for, and above all, great health. I promise we are all going to kick ass in 2018!! We got this!!

Without further ado, let’s get to the sappy messages.

@vantesoleil – Hey, best friend. You don’t even use Tumblr anymore, but how could I make a post like this without including your bitch ass? Thank you for coming into my life almost two years ago now. You make every single day so much brighter, and I am beyond grateful to have you there to talk about everything and anything. Whether it is guiding each other through hard times as a shoulder to lean on, or thirsting over unspeakable things, or sending ugly ass snapchats, or blatantly sassing one another with the craftiest insults ever, or coming up with the wildest nicknames. You are my rock. You are my sunshine. I love you!!! Thank you for being an incredible, talented person!!!

@baeseoul – Katie, where do I even start? Most of our conversations are in complete caps lock, and are about sex toys or a certain someone whom we both adore with our whole hearts, and I would not have it any other way. We have always been in contact for the past few years, but it was not until the last two or so months that we have really connected and delved so much deeper into our sweet, yet nasty little friendship. You are hands down one of the most inspirational, talented, a goddamn hilarious people I have ever had the utter pleasure of meeting. I have never, ever met someone who can not only craft such unique, gripping fan fiction, but come up with the wildest fucking analogies for literally ANY situation. For example: “I slid off the fucking toilet and almost died. I shit you not, I was like a bumblebee in a particularly strong gust of wind.” Please. Thank you for being you. Thank you for being as hard a procrastinator as I am. I love you so much, even when you make up my author preferences in your head!!! (Who the fuck is Edgar!!!)

@versigny – Kappy, we are coming into our third year of friendship and it is so fucking cool to think about that. Three years of being friends. Holy moly. I cannot express how downright bloody happy I am that we had the chance to meet and become buddies. You are not only such a selfless, kindhearted, precious being, but you simultaneously manage to be so filthy-minded, meme-y, and absolutely hilarious. One of my earliest memories of when we were still budding pals in 2015 was when you messaged me, nervous about posting The Take-Home Test (and then you DID and it blew the fuck up and we could not BELIEVE you lured hundreds of people into the kink realm of armpits and it was fucking awesome.) I have adored watching you grow into such a stunning writer, and a brilliant human being in general. Seeing that you have messaged me, or sent me a 4:20am/pm snapchat, or replied to my tweet, or fucking anything that involves you interacting with me makes my day and I smile so, so much. I love you!!! (I think of you whenever I hear this heavenly song, but you know that already!!!)

@tayegi / @kingdomtae / @dailydoseofdia / @floralseokjin / @kittae / @the95liner / @kimtrain – I am grouping all of you together because I want to say the same thing to each of you wonderful, talented ladies. We came together over such a shitty occurrence. But, unbelievably, there was a bright side, and that was all of us becoming the most supportive circle of friends I have ever been a part of. All seven of you are immensely talented, and such beautiful, sweet people, and I am beyond honoured that I am friends with each of you. Thank you for always helping me through my shit, and thank you for coping with my randomly thirsty ass in the group chat. I love you girls so much!!!

@tayegi / @softshow-12 / @heungtanbts / @yuudetama – Lu, J, Hyun, and Yuu. You fabulous women will always, always have such a warm presence in my heart that is overwhelmed by love. All of us are crazy busy with real life and all that fun, adulting shit, but nothing will ever break the Holy Quintet. We are bloody invincible. Three years and still going strong as ever. Here’s to our New Year’s resolution of doing a Google Hangout this year, for the first time in two years!!! I love you, my cactus dildo babies!!!

@war-of-hormoan – Rams, you are too special to me. I am so glad to have met you last year, because you are such a delightful, supportive, and all-round fabulous friend. We are both so shitty at keeping in contact, but that is okay, because no matter how much time passes between our last sent messages, we always jump straight back into conversing like we were only talking five minutes ago!! I truly treasure you, and I am so proud of you and everything you have accomplished this past year. You are amazing, never forget that!! I love you!!!

And here is a special shout out to the most wonderful, talented people who I have had the absolute pleasure of interacting with and/or befriending over the past year(s), and admire more than I can express. I wish all of you the absolute best for 2018, and hope that your health and happiness is bountiful!!

#appreciation post #I love you all!!!!!#if I missed u pls SLAP me #I am so bad with things like this

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prinanalogicality · 6 years

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New Year’s Kiss

Hello all! I am indeed alive! I know I haven’t written much of anything as of late, that is because I am on break from university due to the holiday season. Like the cotton-headed ninnymuggins that I am, I forgot my laptop back in my apartment, in which I live on campus and that is over three hours away. May my laptop rip. But hey, while I am home I convinced my mother to let me use her laptop, so since I didn’t write wholesome holiday content, I am here to produce wholesome New Years content. Enjoy!

AO3 link here.

Summary: Virgil doesn’t understand what is so important about a New Year’s kiss. Logan shares his confusion, so he proposes an idea so they can both figure out what the fuss is all about. Or, the one where Logan uses science as an excuse to kiss Virgil, and maybe Virgil does too.

Pairing: Analogical. Logan Sanders / Virgil Sanders. Strap yourselves in laddies and prepare for some fluff.

"There is nothing quite as magical as a New Year’s kiss. Well, of course a New Year’s kiss with me is the pinnacle of magic, it is downright bewitching, but that is besides the point. For the commoners of the world, sharing a moment of love and passion with one another to welcome the new year with open arms and positive memories is simply fabulous. I could not imagine a better way to move forward in life than sharing a smooch with someone important enough in your life to be your chosen liplocking companion. Ah, just imagining dipping back a lovely dancing partner to sweep him off of his feet and kiss the breath from his lungs - it really butters my eggroll.”

Virgil raises an unimpressed eyebrow in Roman’s direction, feeling completely blase over the other side’s argument in favor of a New Year’s kiss. He should have known that coming to ask the romantic trait for reasoning behind the craze of a New Year’s kiss would just be the same explanation he gives for everything involving romance, which is that everything is magical and loving and like fireworks taking place in one’s circulatory system.

“Okay, how about you try explaining the concept to me without a bunch of overused and hyperbolic phrases.” He deadpans, pulling the sleeves of his hoodie further over his hands. His fingers take to fiddling with the frayed ends of said sleeves, tugging on the loosened threads subconsciously. Patton has noticed Virgil’s actions and has taken to fixing up the boy’s sleeves with a sewing kit, but with how often Virgil fidgets Patton’s efforts are for naught.

Roman returns Virgil’s blank stare with an indignant one, one hand coming up to rest upon his chest as he huffs. “What do you mean hyperbolic phrases? I am not overstating one single thing! You have come to me for an answer, an answer that I have already given to you, Han Woe-lo. What makes a New Year’s kiss so special compared to any other simple peck is that it is a sign that one wishes for their year to start with their partner. Through the marvelous act of affection with another, people are able to come together and welcome someone into a new chapter of their lives, and in light of the holiday, the new chapter is a new year. It is mighty romantic.”

With a roll of his eyes and his shoulders, Virgil rises from his spot on the stairs landing. “Look, yeah, you may be right. It may be a more fantastical experience than normal kisses, I guess. But still, I am not at all convinced. I would probably be more convinced if you didn’t describe every romantic encounter that way, but hey, sometimes the physical embodiment of creativity can even run short on descriptive vocabulary.” Turning away before Roman can see the slight smile playing on his lips, all due to Virgil’s teasing of the prince, he makes his way up the staircase at an unhurried pace.

“Excuse me, how dare you insult my creative ability. I know plenty of descriptive words, just you- ugh. If I cared enough about what you think then I would totally argue that I have loads of vocabulary words at the ready, but hah, joke’s on you, Tracy Turn-brat. I don’t care, and I especially don’t care that you do not understand the power behind a New Year’s kiss. Good day to you, sir. Good day!”

Virgil almost wishes that he had been facing Roman just to see how red-faced and heated the male had gotten, but he supposes listening to Roman’s voice rise several pitches throughout his little outburst is enough.

Within Thomas’s mindscape, there is a replica of Thomas’s apartment. Considering it is where the male sees as home, that is the home of the sides. Though each facet of his personality has their own corner of his mind, also referred to as their room, there is a place where each side can go without being affected by the functions of one another. Typically, they exist in the common area of the mind so that they can spend time with one another if they so choose. They are also able to influence Thomas from the common area, which makes existence easier so they do not have to actually interact with Thomas’s conscious mind to do their jobs.

Though Thomas lives in a one bedroom apartment, the sides exist in a mindscape, so things are able to appear differently than they really are. When opening the door to what would normally be Thomas’s bedroom, the room within the mindscape is actually Virgil’s. It does not affect the others in any way if they enter, and it looks like a normal bedroom, bed and dressers and all. A normal closet is Patton’s room, a study is Logan’s room, and a different closet is Roman’s room. That is the good thing about living in a mindscape, nothing about their home has to abide by true physics. They can change the structure of their home at any moment, if they so choose.

Reaching the top of the stairs, Virgil purses his lips in thought. Patton is likely to give a mushy answer much like Roman’s, if he gives an answer at all. Sometimes Virgil wonders if Patton simply acts naive or if he truly is that innocent, but he isn’t invested enough to figure the truth out. Patton is fine the way he is, whether he is more knowledgeable than he lets on or he is not. So, Patton is out of the question for Virgil to go to.

That leaves Logan.

Virgil supposes that Logan is a good choice. The male’s response will undoubtedly be entirely objective and will probably cover the psychological effects of human affection that he will manage to correlate to the excitement of new experiences, but it will be an answer. An answer that Virgil expects, but at least Virgil genuinely enjoys the company of the left brain-centric facet.

Logan’s droning can increase the heaviness of Virgil’s eyelids and lead him to hibernation, that is true, but that doesn’t stop Virgil from wanting to actively be around him. Sometimes, when he and Logan are on opposite sides regarding a topic, he even offers his own opinions, backed up by logical reasoning. The fire that blazes behind Logan’s eyes despite his cool and collected demeanor makes Virgil’s own fire flicker to life within his chest, a feeling that the male has come to associate exclusively with Logan. Roman frustrates the bejeebies out of Virgil, there is no denying that, but no one else can garner Virgil’s full, undivided attention quite like Logan can. Virgil oftentimes finds himself disinterested or distracted by his own mind in most situations, but conversations with Logan are always higher level and require thought and attention, something that Virgil finds himself giving to the logical trait easily these days.

Taking a few steps to the left so that he stands in front of Logan’s door, Virgil takes a brief moment to hesitate before knocking, the sound just barely muffled by his sleeves making contact with the door. Almost immediately, he second guesses his decision. What would Logan think of his question? There is a chance that he will find it unimportant and turn him to Roman’s direction, but Virgil has already been there. Should he change his question to something Logan would find more suitable, such as what stars are visible in the sky this time of year? That is sure to pique Logan’s interest, the male loves astronomy. Maybe that’s what Virgil should ask, but then again, he does sincerely want his own question to be answered. Virgil really hates how his mind is his own devil’s advocate.

It takes Logan only a few moments to answer the door. It is afternoon, so Virgil knows that there is no way the logical side was asleep. Most likely he was sat at his desk, reading up on some new theory or grading the tests that he gives to his classes. Virgil finds it quite endearing, really, how Logan has his very own world that he has crafted, one where he does things that he enjoys. If one is to open his closet, they would enter a school building, where Logan goes to tend to and teach students in a variety of grades, depending on his mood. It is amazing, really. Roman has done the same thing, building his kingdom, and even Patton has his own world, one where he is a father that lives in the suburbs. Virgil doesn’t have a false reality for himself, he has always been too nervous in order to do so. He does not want to create some Silent Hill or Resident Evil situation.

“Virgil.” Logan’s voice immediately garners Virgil’s attention, in which Logan raises an eyebrow at him. “Do what do I owe this visit? You do not come by my quarters often. In fact, it is a rare occurrence.”

Shrugging off Logan’s mild surprise, Virgil crosses his arms loosely over his chest, thumbs pressing against the fabric of his sleeves and pressing it against the side of his index fingers. “I just- uh. I had a question, so, yeah.”

The glasses clad male nods and steps back, gesturing his arm in a welcoming manner. “I see. Well, I suppose I could take time to answer whatever is on your mind.”

Virgil steps into the bedroom, breathing out a quiet sigh. He makes a beeline for the foot of the bed, where he plops down. Logan is right, Virgil does not come to visit him in his room often, but whenever he does Virgil sits in the same exact spot. Logan has long since stopped complaining about Virgil ruining his pristinely made bed. “Okay. So, uh. My question is- ugh. I just have to use the band-aid technique, let’s go.” Raising his arms to cover his eyes, the question is blurted from Virgil’s lips rapidly. “What is so special about a New Year’s kiss?”

Logan’s demeanor does not change in the slightest. Taking his place at his desk chair, he spins it around so that he is facing Virgil, pausing to take a moment for thought. “Hm. Though I am surprised that you would come to me with such a question, there is an answer. I would have expected you to go to someone like Roman, but I imagine you have already been there and you were exasperated by his skipping record player-esque reply.”

One side of Virgil’s lips creeps upward at that. “Pfft, yeah. I got the ‘it’s magical, love is so grand’ spiel and a couple new insults to add to the books. In fact,” Virgil waves his hands around for a brief moment, a notebook and pen appearing in his hands. He jots down Roman’s remarks and waves the items away with a snort. “There we go.”

Logan’s eyebrows drawl up in that way when he finds out he is right, the muscles in his jaw flexing just so as he tilts his chin up. His expressions are subtle, but Virgil can read him like a book. He is obviously pleased knowing both Virgil and Roman so well.

“Well. It is a phenomenon that I do not quite understand, but I can aim to remedy your thoughts. People crave acts such as kisses because they serve a purpose in connection. Oftentimes in the beginnings of relationships, lip to lip contact serves as a segway towards more intimate circumstances, whether those are sexual encounters or otherwise. Not only that, but due to the closeness involved, people oftentimes find themselves becoming more familiar with the mannerisms of their partner. Pheromones play a large role in attraction, and when in close quarters with another people are better able to sense and potentially crave subjection to such pheromones. Kisses serve as a form of reality because it builds trust and intimacy among participants. They become the metaphorical building blocks for relationships.”

Virgil nods. He knew all of this. Well, maybe not with all of the fancy jargon, but he knew the basic gist of what Logan is saying. That doesn’t keep him from listening in, though, particularly intrigued by Logan’s remark of the phenomena not making sense to him. So Logan and Virgil are both on the same page, wondering what is so special about a New Year’s kiss. Huh.

“So, the psychology behind a kiss coupled with the effect of excitement in a human must be what comes together to form the New Year’s kiss craze. When excited, the amygdala is triggered and chemicals such as dopamine are released, stimulating the frontal lobe of the brain. The prospect of a new year can bring about excitement, so people take it upon themselves to kiss another to increase their serotonin levels. I also do not quite grasp the great thing about a New Year’s kiss. Considering the fact that I have never experienced one myself, or a normal kiss for that matter, I cannot give a definitive answer for you. That would require experimentation and monitoring of the vitals.”

Blinking his eyes a few times, Virgil shifts in his seat. “Looks like we’ll both be living in the dark for the rest of our lives, huh?” He chuckles in a humorless manner, fingers again playing with his frayed sleeves. This time, a thread comes loose and he finds himself wrapping it around the tips of his fingers, watching as the skin changes colors.

“We do not have to.” Logan’s words come out a tad slower than before, and Virgil lifts his gaze to settle it upon the other. “As I said, it would require experimentation in order to discover the physiological result of what eludes us. In only a few hours the clock will be striking midnight, signifying the coming of the new year. I am willing, if you are, to participate in the experiment. In short, you and I will be kissing at midnight and gauge whether or not it appears to be out of the norm or not. Does that sound acceptable to you?”

Virgil simply stares at him for several long moments, and for once, he is glad that he has pale foundation on. It serves to cover the immense heat surging to his cheeks, though he is almost positive that Logan can still see it, though his expression does not read anything different. His expression is completely collected, lips pursed as he awaits Virgil’s response.

“I suppose I could ask Patton for his assistance. I find it hard to believe that he would turn down a chance at intimacy among the members of our group-”

“No, no. Don’t ask dad. I’ll do it. I mean, you can go to dad if you would prefer him, but I’ll do it with you. The experiment, I’ll do the experiment. For science, right?” Virgil’s fingernails scratch lightly over the back of his neck, the area becoming suddenly itchy as his anxiety kicks in slightly.

Logan breaks the eye contact that they had been holding, and Virgil watches as his jaw flexes, corners of his lips twitching minutely. “Excellent. Patton will want all of us within the living room of the mindscape for when the time draws near. I will resume my grading so that I may be finished and my mind shall be clear as our experiment approaches.”

“Good idea, I guess.” Virgil shrugs, hoping to come off nonchalant, standing up. He pats the bed to iron out the creases he had made before backing up towards the door. “So, that’s it? Because if that’s it I’m going to get in some sleep before Patton tries to keep all of us up for the next decade.”

The look he receives is one that he is unfamiliar with, from Logan or otherwise. It looks like a normal blank stare from Logan, but Virgil is too good at reading him to be fooled. The look is tender, more than tender than normal, and Virgil shifts from foot to foot and looks away before he can allow any butterflies to find their way to his tummy.

“All right. I shall see you at, say, eleven pm? Is that acceptable? That is the time Patton asked us all to meet for his celebration, I believe.”

“Yeah, that’s what he said. That sounds chill to me, so- I’ll see you at eleven.” With a small bow, Virgil turns and exits Logan’s bedroom, gently closing the bedroom door behind himself. As soon as the door is shut, he breathes out a heavy sigh, his eyebrows furrowing. Did he seriously just agree to kiss Logan? And he is completely okay with it? Honestly, Virgil finds the fact that he is okay with it more confusing than Logan bringing up the experiment to begin with.

For once in his life, Virgil doesn’t want to think. He doesn’t want to key into his thoughts that are running a mile a minute, asking why Logan wants to do this experiment and why Virgil is even excited to partake in it. He steps away from the door in favor of going towards his own, wanting to hole himself up and lie down to rest. Maybe, if he can do that, he will wake up and this will all have been some weird dream where Logan definitely did not suggest that they kiss.

Flopping onto his bed, Virgil glares at the ceiling.

He hates the disappointment that wells in his chest at the idea of this all being a dream.

“Virgil! Oh golly am I excited to see you. We are all going to have the best time ever, I just know it. 2018 is going to have so many fantastic things and the fact that I get to start it off with all of you is so- so-”

“Sublime? Remarkable? Superlative? Outstanding?” Logan supplies a few ideas, though his thoughts are drowned out by Patton’s outburst.

“Great! It is just diddly darn great, guys. Super nice.”

Logan sighs exasperatedly before turning his attention towards Virgil, who sits upon the left side of the sofa. Roman has settled against the right side, where he has his phone out and he is taking selfies of himself making a variety of facial expressions. With only a moment’s pause, Logan joins the two on the sofa, sitting closer to Virgil’s side so that they may engage in conversation.

Virgil notices that Logan does not mention the experiment once. Normally, when Logan sets his heart on a new experiment, he is a bit more energetic and he is always ready to discuss the specifics. This time, however, he engages in small talk with the other which makes Virgil feel suspicious, but he is not worried enough to actually ask about it. He also knows that Logan dislikes small talk. When engaging in small talk, Logan prefers to get straight to the point and highlight the specifics of what catches his interest. However, in this instance, they talk about mundane things such as the weather, the hot chocolate that Patton made everyone, and how grateful they are that Thomas is not drinking alcohol this year.

“The time is drawing near. Are you all excited?” Roman grins out at the group, his phone now face down on the table, per Patton’s request. He only knows the time because of the clock on the television, where they have a news station on that shows a countdown. It is currently 11:57, only a few minutes from when the ball is supposed to drop and signify the beginning of a new year.

“Heck yeah I am! Thomas is going to absolutely thrive this year, I just know it. He’s gonna win so many more awards and he is gonna make such good videos, ah. I’m just so excited!” Patton is the only one who answers verbally, and Roman does not seem bothered by the lack of response from the other two traits, instead turning his attention to the fatherly trait.

“Are you prepared to engage in the experiment?” Logan finally brings up the idea of what he and Virgil had discussed previously, and Virgil simply shrugs his shoulders, gaze looking anywhere but directly at Logan.

“I mean, yeah, I guess. I said that I would do it, right? I’m not going to back out.” He presses his lips in a thin line and peers at Logan through his bangs, watching as the male’s calculating gaze meets his own. Logan is definitely trying to read him, to gauge how he is feeling, and Virgil feels a small bit of his resolve crumble, his nerves showing in the way his teeth make an appearance just to nibble at his lower lip. He tears his gaze away quickly, fixating it on his sleeves that are worse than before. He might have to ask Patton to fix them this time around, because the threads are coming out in small chunks now.

A hand wraps around his wrist and Virgil’s shoulders jump at the small bit of contact, lips parting and eyebrows twitching. “You really should find an alternative for yourself. I know that you have stated that you do not understand fidget spinners and cubes due to their immense popularity and that you have an affinity for coming off as unique, if not obscure, but I do believe that having such items would be beneficial. If not for your sake, for the sake of your clothing items.”

Before Logan had grasped his wrist and spoke, Virgil did not notice how close he had gotten. Throughout the hour that they have been speaking to one another, Logan has gotten much closer, close enough that Virgil’s knee is pressing against Logan’s thigh. At some point, Virgil had turned to properly face the male, his back now against the armrest and legs criss-crossed. He should feel cornered like this, being backed up to the corner of the sofa. But strangely enough, he doesn’t, and he doesn’t even take his hand from Logan’s grip.

Looking up, Virgil’s eyes meet with Logan’s, and wow. Their bodies are close, but their faces are even closer. Virgil has awful posture, and with how he is slumping forward towards Logan he is much closer. Logan typically maintains excellent posture, but this time he is actually leaning in close to Virgil, eyes filled with raw intensity. The look makes Virgil’s heart race, but not in a way that makes him want to run. It is quite the opposite, really. He is not used to seeing such pure emotion on Logan’s face. It looks good, and yeah, they all technically have the same face, but Virgil knows that each side has their own mannerisms that distinguish them from one another. They all use their facial muscles differently, they all give people different looks. And though Logan has never looked like this before, the look is somehow so Logan to Virgil that it doesn’t bother him or scare him in the slightest. He knows Logan. He enjoys being around Logan more than anyone or anything else.

“One more minute!” Patton’s excited squeal is nothing to Virgil as he feels Logan’s hand shifting from his wrist to instead gently rest in his hand. Unfurling his fingers, Virgil swallows thickly and feels Logan’s fingertips drifting across his palm before his other hand joins in, grasping Virgil’s other hand. Bringing them in, both of Logan’s hands cup Virgil’s, thumbs rubbing small circles into Virgil’s skin, no doubt an attempt to calm his nerves. The action is small, but in this moment it means the world to Virgil, knowing that he must look like a deer in the headlights. It is embarrassing, really, knowing what an open book he must be right now compared to how collected Logan is.

“Are you positive that you wish to go through with the experiment?” Logan’s words are soft, and he is so close that Virgil smells the hot chocolate on the other’s breath.

“I don’t think I have ever been so sure of something in my life.” Virgil’s eyes flicker from Logan’s eyes to his lips and back, and Virgil swallows thickly, teeth digging into his lower lip. Almost immediately, he can see Logan’s eyes honing in on the action and one of Logan’s hands reach up to caress Virgil’s chin, thumb gently pressing beneath the male’s lip to free it from between his teeth.

“You shouldn’t bite your lips like that. It can result in oral fixation, bleeding, and chapping of the lips.”

Even in a moment like this Logan finds time to harp on Virgil. Instead of rolling his eyes and pulling away, though, Virgil snorts and uses his now free hand to tentatively rest upon Logan’s thigh. “Trust me, my lips are just fine. Whether or not they’re chapped should be the least of your worries.”

Roman’s and Patton’s voices blend together as they merrily begin the countdown, cheer obvious in their tones.

“Five!”

“The least of my worries? Then what should be at the top?” Logan asks, a hint of amusement creeping into his typically cool voice.

“Four!”

“I can’t help but to notice that you didn’t even bring anything to monitor our vitals with, making this a flawed experiment.” Virgil grins.

“Three!”

“Well, you see, the lack of equipment was purposeful on my part. Do you know why?”

“Two!”

“I’d say it’s because you just wanted an excuse to kiss me.”

“One!”

“I’d say you are right.”

“Happy new year!”

It takes only a few mere moments for the two to close the gap between them, eyes closing as lips press together. It was slightly clumsy, considering they bumped noses, but neither seem to care as their lips make contact. It isn’t exceptionally long or grand, but it is just enough for the two of them. Logan is the first to pull away, and he even smirks at the way Virgil subconsciously follows him to continue the kiss.

Realizing what he had done, he leans back, face and neck undoubtedly flushing. However, Virgil cannot find it in himself to be embarrassed when he opens his eyes and is met with the sight of Logan practically glowing. The male isn’t full blown grinning, he isn’t yelling out his happiness, but Virgil can see it in the crinkles beside his eyes, the tender look he is receiving, the way Logan’s lips are stretched in a small sign of happiness.

“You know, your experiment is super flawed.” Virgil speaks in a teasing manner, his expression mirroring Logan’s.

“How so?”

“I mean. Obviously you didn’t monitor our vitals and all that jargon, but you know.” He hums, reaching up to brush his fingertips along Logan’s jawline. “Even I know that for an experiment to be done right, several trials have to be done. Not only that, but it isn’t like either of us have any past experiences to compare this to.”

“What are you proposing?”

“Looks like we need to repeat the experiment again, particularly on days that aren’t New Year’s. That way we know the difference, to see what is so special about a New Year’s kiss.”

Logan’s smile widens minutely. “What an astute suggestion. I most definitely agree.”

#analogical #logan sanders #virgil sanders #logic and anxiety #anxiety and logic #thomas sanders #sanders sides #new years fluff #analogical fluff #mine #my fics

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sylvaetria · 7 years

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Servitors

Source: [“Aspects of Evocation” by Phil Hine]

A Servitor is an entity consciously created or generated, using evocatory techniques, to perform a task or service. In the Western Esoteric Tradition, such entities are sometimes referred to as 'thoughtforms.’ Servitors can be usefully deployed to perform a wide range of tasks or functions on your behalf.

Servitors can be created to work with one particular situation or event or, alternatively, Servitors can be created which have a general provenance in one area, such as healing.

There are a number of advantages to using more generalised Servitors. Firstly, they can be regarded as 'expert' systems which learn from being given a task to execute - as if the more healing tasks you give a servitor, the better it seems to become at healing. Secondly, continued use of the Servitor, with successful results, builds up confidence in its activity on the part of those who use it. With a more generalised Servitor, anyone who knows its activation sequence (such as a mantra, sigil, or visualisation sequence) can employ it to work at a given task.

One example of this form of Servitor is the entity ICANDOO. ICANDOO (I-can-do) was created at an open group workshop in Servitor creation. The name of the Servitor was also its mantra for summoning it, and its general brief was to assist those who used it for overcoming any obstacles that crossed them. ICANDOO was created by a group of 12 people, and all of them used the Servitor throughout the day, to assist them with problems of one sort or another. In the design sequence, the Servitor was given the ability to divide itself holographically, so that each segment contained the powers and abilities of the original entity.

On a still further level of generalisation, you can create Servitors who have no specific function or provenance, saving that they serve to increase the success of one’s own magics. Such servitors can be used in both major and minor acts of magic, and are particularly useful in acts of enchantment, divination, or illumination.

Servitor Dependency

It is generally held that each usage of a Servitor serves to ‘feed’ it, and that each result which is rated as a success, serves to enhance its power. It is also a good idea to get into the habit of attributing any occurrences within the sphere of activity of that Servitor, to its work. This can lead to problems, though.

In 1992 I created a Servitor called Eureka. Its given sphere of activity was that of Illumination - inspiration, new ideas, the boosting of creativity and brainstorming in general. Initially, the Servitor exceeded all my expectations of its performance. I used it to stimulate new ideas for writing, lecturing and facilitating seminars & workshops. With a colleague, it became a focus for brainstorming - acting as a Third Mind arising from conversation. Each time we made a creative leap, or an idea formed became something workable in practice, the power of the Servitor was boosted. In 1993, the activity of Eureka was linked with the Neptune-Uranus conjunction with the result that, on April 22nd, as Neptune & Uranus began to retrograde, Eureka went offline.

The immediate result of this was that I suddenly found it much harder to get into a flow of creative thinking. It seemed that Eureka had become such a dominant element in the dynamics of my own creative process that, once it was removed, I found it much harder to get into the appropriate frame of mind. I had become dependent upon the Servitor. Eventually, the Servitor was recalled and disassembled in such a way that a ‘splinter' of its original power survived as a focus for illumination. Having been made wiser by this experience, I only occasionally use this fragment of the original servitor as a focus for creativity.

Viral Servitors

It is possible to instruct Servitors to replicate or reproduce themselves. Approaches to this include instructing the Servitor to replicate itself as a form of cell-division, replication which follows cybernetic or viral parameters, or to create a servitor which ‘gives birth’ according to particular parameters, such as time-units, astrological transits, or each time the target of the Servitor carries out a particular behaviour.

An early test of this concept was that of a Servitor dispatched to assist in the recovery of property being withheld from its owner. Once a set deadline had been passed, the Servitor began to generate a field of ‘confusion’ - lost keys, electrical blowouts & other minor but annoying problems. After a second set deadline, the Servitor began to replicate itself, so that the confusion field generated was intensified. As soon as the recipient of the Servitor returned the property he had been withholding from its owner, the Servitors ceased to function. Evidence of the Servitors’ action - the intensification of minor problems escalating into strange poltergeist-type phenomenon - was gathered by talking to associates of the target.

Viral Servitors are particularly appropriate for long-term enchantments, such as increasing the probability of one’s magic being successful, or being used in healing & general protection workings.

Servitor Design Sequence

01. Define General Intent

The first step in designing a Servitor is to decide the general sphere of influence into which your intention falls, such as healing, protection, binding, harmony, luck, divination, mood enhancement, success in ..., and so forth.

Defining your general intent will assist you if you wish to use symbols & magical correspondences in creating your servitor. For example, if you were interested in creating a servitor to act within the sphere of Healing, then you could assemble any associations, symbols, emotions, memories, etc. which you relate to the concept of Healing. By consulting a book of magical correspondences such as ‘777,’ you could build up chains of correspondences - planetary figures, scents, colours, planetary hours etc. How far you go in this direction is very much a matter of personal choice.

02. Defining Specific Intent

Here, you are creating the core of the Servitors purpose the Statement of Intent which is analogous to the Servitor’s aetheric DNA. Formulating the Servitor’s Statement of Intent may necessitate a good deal of self-analysis into your motivations, desires, realistic projections of goals, etc. As in all sorcery operations, it is appropriate to ask advice from your preferred form of divination. To continue the example of a Healing Servitor, an appropriate Statement of Intent might be:

“To promote rapid recovery and health in ...(name)...”

Once you have determined the appropriate Intent to form the basis of your Servitor, then the Statement can be rendered into a sigil, or glyph.

03. What Symbols Are Appropriate to the Servitors Task?

There is a wealth of magical & mythic symbols which you can draw upon when creating a Servitor, which can be used to represent different qualities, abilities and attributes. There is also the symbolism of colour, smell, sound & other sensory media to draw upon. In order to refine the ‘program’ which forms the basis for your Servitor further, you could embellish the sigil by adding other symbols.

04. Is there a Time Factor to Consider?

Here, you should consider the duration of the Servitor’s operation. In other words, do you want the Servitor to be ‘working’ continuously, or only at specific periods? Here, you may wish to take into account phases of the moon, astrological conjunctions or planetary hours, for example, which could be added into the Servitor’s symbolic instructions.

The Healing Servitor above, for example, was instructed to be active for a period of seven days, affecting its target recipient for seven minutes, at seven hour intervals. This instruction serves to reinforce the number symbolism & association with harmony.

It is also at this point that you should consider what happens after the Servitor has performed its task. It is generally held to be preferable that when a Servitor has completed its task, the Servitor should be disassembled by its creator. There are two approaches to doing this.

Firstly, one can encode a self-destruct instruction into the Servitor at the time of its creation, where the duration of its existence is defined in terms of the duration of its task, or the fulfilment of a specific condition.

The other approach to disassembly is to perform a ritual ‘reabsorption’ of the Servitor, mentally drawing it back from its task, taking it apart by visualization, taking back the original desire which sparked its creation, and taking apart or destroying any material base which you have created for it. Whilst classical occult theory has it that if you do not look after your thoughtforms, they will wander around the astral plane annoying people, there is good psychological sense for terminating the ‘life’ of Servitors which have completed their assigned task - that you are reclaiming responsibility for that desire-complex which you used to create the Servitor.

05. Is A Name Required?

The Servitor can be given a name which can be used, in addition to its sigil, for creating, powering, or controlling it. A name also acts to further create a Servitor’s persona. A name can reflect the Servitors task, or be formed from a mantric sigil of its Statement of Intent.

06. Is a Material Base Required?

The Material base is some physical focus for the Servitor’s existence. This can help to define the Servitor as an individual entity, and can be used if you need to recall the Servitor for any reason. Examples of a material base include bottles, rings, crystals, small figurines as used in fantasy role-playing or figures crafted from modelling compounds. Bodily fluids can be applied to the material base to increase the perceived link between creator and entity. This is very much a matter of personal taste. Alternatively, the Servitor can remain freely mobile as an aetheric entity. I tend to find that one-shot, task-specific servitors can be left as aetheric entities, whilst for entities which have more of a long-term use, a material base is often helpful. For others, it might be possible to link their use to a specific, identifiable, state of consciousness, which forms part of the core associations which one builds up for a Servitor.

It is also possible to link a Servitor to a specific smell, such as a perfume or essential oil, so that each time the oil is applied, the Servitor is activated. This can be particularly useful when creating Servitors for general Healing, Protection, or enhancement of a particular mood. A dab of the perfume can be put onto the Servitors material base, and the perfume should be inhaled during the launch of the entity.

07. Is a Specific Shape Required?

Servitors can be created to have any desired shape, from tiny homunculi to morphic spheres capable of extruding any required appendage. The shape you choose to identify with this particular thoughtform can add another level of representational identity to the entity. A common practice though, is to visualize the Servitor as a featureless sphere, pulsing with energy, glowing with appropriately chosen colours, into which has been impressed, its sigilised instructions.

#chaos magic #chaos magick #servitors #thoughtforms #long post

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cctv-aura · 5 years

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CCTV Installation, Suppliers, CCTV Dealers Mankurussi, Palakkad, Kerala

IP Security Camera

An abbreviation for internet protocol, this type of camera can digitally transmit signals to a computer via a network. A majority of the Cctv Dealers Palakkad have these models sold to commercial spaces. It does what a regular webcam can do, however the fact that these are specially used for surveillance is the main reason why they are given the term IP security camera or netcam. Certain models of this type of camera have built-in software that are able to analyze videos. The resolution on these are said by many, including Cctv Dealers in Palakkad to be considerably high along with its scalability.

CCTV Installation, Suppliers, CCTV Dealers Mannarkkad, Palakkad, Kerala

Day/Night Security Camera

There isn't much to explain with this one as the main description of it lies in its name. The Cctv Dealers Palakkad sell these camera types to places like museums, malls and other spaces that hold valuables and need round the clock monitoring. With the ability to capture videos during the day and at night through its infrared filter, this camera type is an ideal selection for spaces that need security services combing through the premises all through the day. Decreased light condition which is one of the major worries that people have when it comes to these cameras, is solved with the day and night security models. You can check out the latest models at leading Cctv Dealers in Palakkad.

CCTV Installation, Suppliers, CCTV Dealers Pattambi, Palakkad, Kerala

Thermal Security Camera

If you need a camera to be installed in an environment that is harsh or even dark, Palakkad Cctv Dealers will tell you that this camera type will make for the perfect buy. It detects the heat contained within the human body and captures its form and movement along with rough figures of all the other objects in the surrounding. Environment types that contain smoke, haze, dust and light fog are precisely where you should have these cameras installed. The Cctv Dealers Palakkad offers these cameras at excellent prices.

CCTV Installation, Suppliers, CCTV Dealers Kanjikode

Wide Dynamic Security Camera

To find the best deals on these cameras approach the best Cctv Dealers in Palakkad. Much like the the day and night camera and the thermal security camera, wide dynamic security cameras are able to adjust to various environment conditions as well as time in the day to capture objects and people. It is crafted to automatically adjust in accordance with decreasing light and increasing light. If the light is too bright it instantly balances out the over exposure and brings a contrast and shade to make the imaging more visible. If you have noticed, a picture you have click of people with light emitting from the background only makes the faces more difficult to view. For situations like these, this camera type does an excellent job in bringing balance to the imaging based on the intensity of light. The Cctv Dealers Palakkad are the ideal ones to help you out with more information on the same.

CCTV Installation, Suppliers, CCTV Dealers Shoranur

Wireless IP Camera

What makes this camera type so convenient is that it can be installed quite easily and without the need to be connected to a network cable. It can be easily installed by Cctv Dealers Palakkad and can be set up via WiFi. With its ability to detect motion, it quickly shifts to record sudden entries into a space or movement within an area. The cherry on the cake for this gadget is its ability to tilt and swivel which aids in maximizing the viewing ability. Another feature of this gadget that the wireless Cctv Dealers in Palakkad speak highly is its ability to adjust to decreasing light which makes it a package in itself.

CCTV Installation, Suppliers, CCTV Dealers Vadakkencherry

360 Cameras

While some of these look like a ball like bulb and others, like smoke detectors, these can record views from all directions. The Palakkad Cctv Dealers have an enthralling collection of these models. The images from each point on the single unit are stitched thus making the perfect all round viewing. You can also zoom into it do get better clarity on details. If placed in the center, these cameras need an unobstructed view, which is what many forget to keep in mind when installing them. In some of the models the lens requires a 120-degree to 140-degree field of view. Another way of using these is to have them set up at 90 degree corners of the room and that will help get you a direct view of a major portion of the room.

The Cctv Dealers in Palakkad in the city showcase a vast selection of cameras that you can make a choice from. Some of the leading brands that manufacture surveillance cameras are LG, UNV, Zicom, Sony, Bosch, Honeywell, Hikvision, CP Plus, Hi-Focus and Samsung. If not for the dealers that sell security cameras that capture colour, you can be sure to find black and white Cctv Dealers Palakkad too. The price for CCTV cameras in India depends on the type, as mentioned above as well as added features wireless signal transition, ultra-high resolution, thermal imaging, explosion proof housings and a lot more. In addition to this, these dealers also flaunt the other goods they have in their store such as bio-metric attendance recording systems. This machine requires one to place their finger on a scanner and it will record the finger or thumb print and match it with the recorded person's identification while tracking their log-in and log-out time. Many of these machines are installed right at the entrance of offices.

Now that you have a fair view of the various types of CCTV cameras available in the market, you can make up your mind more easily and decide on the one you want to have installed. The wise words, 'precaution is better than cure' stands true when it comes to situations that call for the need of a security camera. Safeguard your home, your office, your work space and anything else you hold dear to your heart. Let the notion of security cameras need to be installed only outside the house not cloud your judgement. Many of you may have heard of the term 'nanny cam'. These cameras keep a track on all the activities undertaken by the househelp especially when they are to care for your little one. Wait no longer to secure your space because danger never knocks before entering.

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windmill-ghost · 3 years

Text

I’m gonna start tagging my felting “craft analogous occurrence” since I’m on a kick right now and want to post more of my dolls.

#i've made more than i've posted here but i CANT take pictures because i usually make them as gifts and then... only remember to take a pic #after i give it away #wg speaks

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phaseinked · 6 years

Text

Serendipity in Life and in Markets

Source: Michael J. Ballanger for Streetwise Reports 08/15/2018

Precious metals expert Michael Ballanger draws parallels between serendipity in life and in the gold and silver markets.

I am back in the literary engine room after a two-week boating excursion into northern Georgian Bay complete with forest fires, travel restrictions and mechanical malfunctionsall part and parcel of navigating the ever-steepening learning curve of boating. As an individual trained in finance, nothing is more terrifying than turning on your marine generator only to see blue smoke pour out of the exhaust pipe. Being without battery power four hours from the closest marina is analogous to being up “Effluent Creek” without the proverbial paddle. However, the reason I used word “serendipity” as the title of today’s missive is because of a series of events that occurred last week while we were moored in the Massassauga Park, a boater’s paradise located near the Moon River as it empties into the bay.

Friends of ours awoke one morning to find that the generator/inverter on their big Chris Craft was acting up and after a series of attempts to rectify the problem, it was apparent that this was a non-fixable issue and they were forced to head into the closest marina to access shore power so the batteries would not die (which is a big no-no with $8,000 as a replacement cost).

Now, if you have ever been into the engine room of a big boat, you know that they are designed for tiny people with little hands and my buddy stands about 6’4″ and weighs somewhere north of 250 lbs. with hands the size of an offshore driller (which he was), so trying to trace the myriad of pipes and wires in a matchbox-sized engine room is nigh on impossible. So he arrived at the marina and it just so happens that the boat next to him is an American boat with a captain (Steve) that is a licensed boat captain and a master mechanic in his former life in Brooklyn, New York. Within minutes, this whirlwind of a man is down in the engine room and has located a faulty switch that is cutting power to the inverter so they disassemble it and jerry-rig it so it works and voila! Inverter problem solved. But wait. The next morning back at our anchorage in the park he tries to turn on the generator and it just coughs and sneezes and burps, and after he cleans out the filter and a few other checklist items, it is determined that the fuel pump is toastand we were located in a remote bay about a hundred miles from any supplies.

The definition of the term “serendipity” is “the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way” and what happens next is beyond the realm of simple “good luck” because you needed a domino-effect of simultaneous events (all positive) in order for this much-anticipated two-week foray into the wilds of Georgian Bay to NOT be terminated with a three-hour return to the home marina. My big buddy calls the chap that runs the mechanical service area of the marina and says he is texting him a picture of the faulty fuel pump and asks him if he has anything that could be substituted. It turns out that they have three used fuel pumps that just might fit a 25-year-old generator but how in the world are they going to get them to us?

Well, this is where the true wonderment of “serendipity” arrives in full splendor as it turns out that the marina owner flies a float plane and actually has a cottage about fifteen minutes away by dinghy AND that he is flying up in a half hour. They load the spare parts into the plane and they arrive at the cottage where they are loaded into the dinghy and are back on the crippled boat by noon. After a couple of tension-filled hours, the replacement pump is installed and the starter button pressed and after a few seconds of breathtaking suspense, the welcomed sound of a purring generator echoes the treed walls of Ritchie Bay and the circle is suddenly and miraculously complete.

What appeared as a vacation-ending disaster is magically transformed into the full embodiment of the title of today’s missive. What are the odds of a series of events such as I have just recounted ever actually repeating themselves? The occurrence and development of events that started with the happenchance of meeting a master mechanic at the exact point they arrive at the marina could only be matched by the happy and beneficial arrival of spare fuel pumps.

The relevance of this little anecdote to the current malaise affecting precious metals investors lies in the total absence of anything vaguely resembling “serendipity” in the behavior and performances of gold and silver for the better part of the year. I noted back in June that there appeared to be a plethora of reasons to be bullish of the precious metals, not the least of which was that July marks the beginning of the five best months for them from the perspective of seasonality. However, here we are once again in mid-August and spot gold has a taken a plunge to below the psychologically significant $1,200 level with silver threatening to violate $15, such that the seasonality trade, so elusive to capture in recent years, has once again proven to be a terrible timing tool. The much-heralded relative strength index (“RSI”), which has served me so well over the years, failed to act as a harbinger of impending reversal with plunges below 30 serving to stem the rate of descent but not the direction of price, which it has done pretty well over the years.

If you want a well-trodden excuse for the poor tape action, look no further than the USD index, which has screamed higher since the Trump tirade against China went viral. Tariffs and economic sabre-rattling have forced markets to handicap a winner in the trade war arena and as I have opined in past missives, China’s currency will be massaged lower versus the USD to compensate for any gross shortfall in total revenue in order to offset the impact of tariff’s, while U.S. exporters get punished due to exchange rate disadvantages of shipping products more costly to European and Asian consumers. The most recent headline event is the crash in the Turkish lira, which is now threatening several major investment funds and more than a few banks over-exposed to Turkish bonds and other related assets. It resembles 1997 and the events in Thailand and a crashing baht. This event set off a series of events which resembled the complete opposite of “serendipity,” which took in the color and texture of a “Black Swan” event and was triggered by higher U.S. interest rates, contagion and debt default. This financial crisis resulted in severe recession and inflation and while the geopolitical backdrop was supposed to cause a recovery in the gold (and silver) price, it performed beautifully for those gold holders in Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia, South Korea and Indonesia; it had the opposite effect in U.S. dollar terms. Fast forward to 2018. Holders of gold in Turkey are currently enjoying the true safe haven utility of gold by insulating them from crushing devaluation of their currency’s purchasing power, just as it happened in Venezuela a few years before and Argentina before that. It is the very reason that China and Russia are moving to establish an alternative to the current reserve currency status of the U.S. dollar because it is the actions of the Fed which can resemble a financial weapon and is used against countries and/or regimes such as the late Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and Recep Erdogan of Turkey.

We in the West who have sought to protect ourselves from profligate fiscal and monetary policies of the U.S. and Canada have never really seen the impact of sound money investing because of the stranglehold the banks have on flows. They can choke off reserve currency availability for Thailand or Turkey, setting off currency-related death spirals in one keystroke, bludgeoning the USD higher through coordinated devaluations in the targeted countries (regimes). In this manner, the USD IS the safe-haven bid and all other currencies and other forms of money (which includes the ultimate form of money in gold and silver) depreciate against the USD. Gold and silver mining shares decline, precious metals funds get hit with redemptions, and believers in sound money principles suffer egregiously as sentiment melts away and investor psychology sinks into depression and capitulation.

As bad as it sounds and as difficult as it has been for gold and silver bulls, we are now in the same position today as we were in late 2015, but then again, we were there last June as well. The difference between December 2015 and August 2018 is that gold is $150 higher than it was then and global debt levels were not yet through the “red line.” (Actually, they were well into the danger zone but U.S. policy had not yet shifted into quantitative tightening mode.)

What investors desperately need is the confluence of a series of precious-metals-friendly events that result in higher prices that cause a simultaneous shift in momentum followed by sentiment. We need gold shares outperforming gold bullion and we need silver outperforming gold. The Gold-to-Silver-Ratio, which we shorted at 82.75 last April, remains a smidge under 80, which is actually a positive for the metals complex because if silver were collapsing at a greater percentage rate than gold, it would imply that a brand new down-leg was in the cards and we need that to move lower as well.

Just as serendipity in life can arrive over a multitude of positive events all linked side by side in rapid succession, that same good fortune can also occur in markets especially when all of the planets align in tandem. The planetary alignment of late 2015 is exactly where we are today but without that final reversal that flushes out the bears and energizes the bulls. Just as good fortune last week wafted into the life of a stricken boater, I would submit that a similar event in the lives of stricken precious metals investors is imminent. The preconditions for a continuation of the bull markets in gold and silver that began in late 2015 are solidly in place; the fodder is in the cannon; the powder is set. All that remains is the flint that sparks ignition and it is VERY close.

Originally trained during the inflationary 1970s, Michael Ballanger is a graduate of Saint Louis University where he earned a Bachelor of Science in finance and a Bachelor of Art in marketing before completing post-graduate work at the Wharton School of Finance. With more than 30 years of experience as a junior mining and exploration specialist, as well as a solid background in corporate finance, Ballanger’s adherence to the concept of “Hard Assets” allows him to focus the practice on selecting opportunities in the global resource sector with emphasis on the precious metals exploration and development sector. Ballanger takes great pleasure in visiting mineral properties around the globe in the never-ending hunt for early-stage opportunities.

[NLINSERT]

Disclosure: 1) Statements and opinions expressed are the opinions of Michael Ballanger and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. Michael Ballanger is wholly responsible for the validity of the statements. Streetwise Reports was not involved in any aspect of the article preparation. Michael Ballanger was not paid by Streetwise Reports LLC for this article. Streetwise Reports was not paid by the author to publish or syndicate this article. 2) This article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports’ terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports. 3) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article, until one week after the publication of the interview or article.

Charts courtesy of Michael Ballanger.

Michael Ballanger Disclaimer: This letter makes no guarantee or warranty on the accuracy or completeness of the data provided. Nothing contained herein is intended or shall be deemed to be investment advice, implied or otherwise. This letter represents my views and replicates trades that I am making but nothing more than that. Always consult your registered advisor to assist you with your investments. I accept no liability for any loss arising from the use of the data contained on this letter. Options and junior mining stocks contain a high level of risk that may result in the loss of part or all invested capital and therefore are suitable for experienced and professional investors and traders only. One should be familiar with the risks involved in junior mining and options trading and we recommend consulting a financial adviser if you feel you do not understand the risks involved.

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andreagillmer · 6 years

Text

Serendipity in Life and in Markets

Source: Michael J. Ballanger for Streetwise Reports 08/15/2018

Precious metals expert Michael Ballanger draws parallels between serendipity in life and in the gold and silver markets.

[NLINSERT]

Charts courtesy of Michael Ballanger.

from The Gold Report – Streetwise Exclusive Articles Full Text https://ift.tt/2MPt8r0

from WordPress https://ift.tt/2OGdpuR

#Uncategorized #The Gold Report - Streetwise Exclusive Articles Full Text

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goldcoins0 · 6 years

Text

Serendipity in Life and in Markets

Source: Michael J. Ballanger for Streetwise Reports 08/15/2018

Precious metals expert Michael Ballanger draws parallels between serendipity in life and in the gold and silver markets.

I am back in the literary engine room after a two-week boating excursion into northern Georgian Bay complete with forest fires, travel restrictions and mechanical malfunctionsall part and parcel of navigating the ever-steepening learning curve of boating. As an individual trained in finance, nothing is more terrifying than turning on your marine generator only to see blue smoke pour out of the exhaust pipe. Being without battery power four hours from the closest marina is analogous to being up "Effluent Creek" without the proverbial paddle. However, the reason I used word "serendipity" as the title of today's missive is because of a series of events that occurred last week while we were moored in the Massassauga Park, a boater's paradise located near the Moon River as it empties into the bay.

Now, if you have ever been into the engine room of a big boat, you know that they are designed for tiny people with little hands and my buddy stands about 6'4" and weighs somewhere north of 250 lbs. with hands the size of an offshore driller (which he was), so trying to trace the myriad of pipes and wires in a matchbox-sized engine room is nigh on impossible. So he arrived at the marina and it just so happens that the boat next to him is an American boat with a captain (Steve) that is a licensed boat captain and a master mechanic in his former life in Brooklyn, New York. Within minutes, this whirlwind of a man is down in the engine room and has located a faulty switch that is cutting power to the inverter so they disassemble it and jerry-rig it so it works and voila! Inverter problem solved. But wait. The next morning back at our anchorage in the park he tries to turn on the generator and it just coughs and sneezes and burps, and after he cleans out the filter and a few other checklist items, it is determined that the fuel pump is toastand we were located in a remote bay about a hundred miles from any supplies.

The definition of the term "serendipity" is "the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way" and what happens next is beyond the realm of simple "good luck" because you needed a domino-effect of simultaneous events (all positive) in order for this much-anticipated two-week foray into the wilds of Georgian Bay to NOT be terminated with a three-hour return to the home marina. My big buddy calls the chap that runs the mechanical service area of the marina and says he is texting him a picture of the faulty fuel pump and asks him if he has anything that could be substituted. It turns out that they have three used fuel pumps that just might fit a 25-year-old generator but how in the world are they going to get them to us?

Well, this is where the true wonderment of "serendipity" arrives in full splendor as it turns out that the marina owner flies a float plane and actually has a cottage about fifteen minutes away by dinghy AND that he is flying up in a half hour. They load the spare parts into the plane and they arrive at the cottage where they are loaded into the dinghy and are back on the crippled boat by noon. After a couple of tension-filled hours, the replacement pump is installed and the starter button pressed and after a few seconds of breathtaking suspense, the welcomed sound of a purring generator echoes the treed walls of Ritchie Bay and the circle is suddenly and miraculously complete.

What appeared as a vacation-ending disaster is magically transformed into the full embodiment of the title of today's missive. What are the odds of a series of events such as I have just recounted ever actually repeating themselves? The occurrence and development of events that started with the happenchance of meeting a master mechanic at the exact point they arrive at the marina could only be matched by the happy and beneficial arrival of spare fuel pumps.

The relevance of this little anecdote to the current malaise affecting precious metals investors lies in the total absence of anything vaguely resembling "serendipity" in the behavior and performances of gold and silver for the better part of the year. I noted back in June that there appeared to be a plethora of reasons to be bullish of the precious metals, not the least of which was that July marks the beginning of the five best months for them from the perspective of seasonality. However, here we are once again in mid-August and spot gold has a taken a plunge to below the psychologically significant $1,200 level with silver threatening to violate $15, such that the seasonality trade, so elusive to capture in recent years, has once again proven to be a terrible timing tool. The much-heralded relative strength index ("RSI"), which has served me so well over the years, failed to act as a harbinger of impending reversal with plunges below 30 serving to stem the rate of descent but not the direction of price, which it has done pretty well over the years.

If you want a well-trodden excuse for the poor tape action, look no further than the USD index, which has screamed higher since the Trump tirade against China went viral. Tariffs and economic sabre-rattling have forced markets to handicap a winner in the trade war arena and as I have opined in past missives, China's currency will be massaged lower versus the USD to compensate for any gross shortfall in total revenue in order to offset the impact of tariff's, while U.S. exporters get punished due to exchange rate disadvantages of shipping products more costly to European and Asian consumers. The most recent headline event is the crash in the Turkish lira, which is now threatening several major investment funds and more than a few banks over-exposed to Turkish bonds and other related assets. It resembles 1997 and the events in Thailand and a crashing baht. This event set off a series of events which resembled the complete opposite of "serendipity," which took in the color and texture of a "Black Swan" event and was triggered by higher U.S. interest rates, contagion and debt default. This financial crisis resulted in severe recession and inflation and while the geopolitical backdrop was supposed to cause a recovery in the gold (and silver) price, it performed beautifully for those gold holders in Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia, South Korea and Indonesia; it had the opposite effect in U.S. dollar terms. Fast forward to 2018. Holders of gold in Turkey are currently enjoying the true safe haven utility of gold by insulating them from crushing devaluation of their currency's purchasing power, just as it happened in Venezuela a few years before and Argentina before that. It is the very reason that China and Russia are moving to establish an alternative to the current reserve currency status of the U.S. dollar because it is the actions of the Fed which can resemble a financial weapon and is used against countries and/or regimes such as the late Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and Recep Erdogan of Turkey.

As bad as it sounds and as difficult as it has been for gold and silver bulls, we are now in the same position today as we were in late 2015, but then again, we were there last June as well. The difference between December 2015 and August 2018 is that gold is $150 higher than it was then and global debt levels were not yet through the "red line." (Actually, they were well into the danger zone but U.S. policy had not yet shifted into quantitative tightening mode.)

Originally trained during the inflationary 1970s, Michael Ballanger is a graduate of Saint Louis University where he earned a Bachelor of Science in finance and a Bachelor of Art in marketing before completing post-graduate work at the Wharton School of Finance. With more than 30 years of experience as a junior mining and exploration specialist, as well as a solid background in corporate finance, Ballanger's adherence to the concept of "Hard Assets" allows him to focus the practice on selecting opportunities in the global resource sector with emphasis on the precious metals exploration and development sector. Ballanger takes great pleasure in visiting mineral properties around the globe in the never-ending hunt for early-stage opportunities.

[NLINSERT]

Disclosure: 1) Statements and opinions expressed are the opinions of Michael Ballanger and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. Michael Ballanger is wholly responsible for the validity of the statements. Streetwise Reports was not involved in any aspect of the article preparation. Michael Ballanger was not paid by Streetwise Reports LLC for this article. Streetwise Reports was not paid by the author to publish or syndicate this article. 2) This article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports' terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports. 3) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article, until one week after the publication of the interview or article.

Charts courtesy of Michael Ballanger.

from https://www.streetwisereports.com/article/2018/08/15/serendipity-in-life-and-in-markets.html

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