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cavehags · 5 years

Note

do you have any articles you’ve read that accurately explain why you hate weddings and why they’re bad for women? i agree but i find it so hard to put in words so i need some ref

anon I want to have these resources for you!!! I do!!! but I have never found many compelling articles on this topic, and not for lack of trying. so I’m gonna try and gather up the ammo myself by going topic-by-topic, if I can. my hope is to give a holistic view of just some of the many, many harms marriage imposes on women. cw sexual assault, pedophilia, misogyny, abuse, basically everything bad.

i think a lot of people see marriage the way it’s practiced by 20- to 30-somethings in the coastal united states today as pretty much the only relevant snapshot of the tradition. if you’re a certain type of person, weddings make marriage look pretty good! most people enjoy lavish parties that someone else paid for. and almost everyone has, knowingly or not, been exposed to a lot of propaganda that states that a wedding is the happiest day of a couple’s life, that women in particular are or deserve to be in a state of bliss on their wedding day, and that all the trappings associated with weddings, from purchasing expensive dresses to purchasing expensive tablecloths, are fun expressions of the couple’s creative side. obviously this is marketing dialed up to eleven and none of it is true. further, people like to argue that because brides tend to take the more active role in wedding planning, therefore weddings are in some way a feminist practice (????). this is total nonsense. for a start, weddings put women on display as physical objects–just think of how much marketing goes into the idea that a bride should look perfect on her wedding day, with a dedicated stylist and hairstylist, a team of friends and relatives to get her dressed, and a dress that cost at least $1,600 on average (i’m not linking to theknot dot com but trust me, that’s what it says). don’t forget that there will be a photographer and a videographer there to capture the bride at her most beautiful. and you only have to google “wedding crash diet” to see how how beauty standards of thin bodies are a singular focus of obsession by the wedding industry.

putting women on display for their physical apperance disturbs me. enforcing the idea that finding a man produces the most beautiful day of a woman’s life also disturbs me. and marketing that pretends that the happiness of a couple is in some way connected to how much they spend on a big, dumb, sexist party also disturbs me. but that’s just weddings.

i could put aside my issue with weddings if weddings weren’t just the first day of marriage. because my real issue is with marriage. so anon, i’m going to take you on a tour of everything that sickens me about marriage to put all my wedding hatred into context for you.

marriage is an ancient practice and misogyny is embedded in basically every variant of marriage ever practiced in the world. the commercialized, commodified weddings practiced by affluent couples in the west today just put some gloss and propaganda on the old tradition. but the skeleton of the tradition is really fucking ugly and hateful towards women. and the more you examine how marriage plays out today, the more you see that that hasn’t gone away. and it never will.

let’s start with the basics. historically, marriage as an institution has reinforced the myth of male superiority by giving tangible structure to what was previously just a notion–the notion of gender roles. if a home contains one man and one woman (often a girl, really, but i’ll get to that), then it naturally follows that a man’s role is to contribute x, y and z to the household, while women contribute… uh, a through w at the very least. and often x, y and z too. so you’re immediately left with a society where men are expected to be active and women are expected to be passive. that mandated passivity erodes choice and freedom and consent.

many forms of early marriage permitted men to have multiple wives while women were of course tied to their one husband. across the board, the minimum legal age for marriage has been lower for girls than for men, since long before anyone understood fertility patterns; though it may have been stated in some cases that this is because women “mature faster,” the real reason is that men were expected to have established themselves and their wives were expected to be young, inexperienced and virginal. across the world, married women have often been treated as if the act of marrying a man symbolizes passing from one guardian to another; this is clear even from an extremely common ritual still practiced today–the changing of the bride’s last name to match her husband’s. and worldwide and throughout histories, legal systems have granted husbands the right to control their wives and everything in their orbit. this includes the practice of marital rape.

girls and women have always been denied choices and agency through the constraints of marriage. child marriage is an obvious example. in many parts of the world, girls as young as seven years old (which was the minimum in the united states in 1880, btw) have been forced to marry adult men. marriage is the only cultural ritual practiced in large numbers today that transforms what would be viewed as sexual assault on a child one day to a private family matter the next. child marriage is slavery and still takes place in 50+ countries today, including the US. child brides, who are often from poor families, are thrust out of their homes generally because their parents are looking to eliminate the financial burden of raising a girl. but in their new marriages, they are subject to violent rape and domestic violence, dangerously young pregnancies that put fatal stress on their developing bodies, and a host of inequalities in the law that permit their husbands to do whatever they want with them. marrying eliminates any chance of a young girl enjoying her childhood or pursuing an education. her life prospects are reduced to a short lifetime of unpaid domestic labor and sex she can’t consent to.

further, marriage between partners of any age is wrapped up in the idea that men must control women and girls’ sexuality. some have argued that the practice of marriage is commonplace for no other reason than to keep women’s sexuality in check. naturally, then, what we’re left with is a longstanding tradition of marital rape. throughout history, in many places, rape of a married woman was legally considered a crime against her husband and not the victim herself, as she was his property. extending that logic reveals that no husband could be found guilty of assaulting his property. so marital rape was commonplace, and was not even viewed to be a crime in many parts of the world until the twentieth century. through marriage and the misogynistic laws surrounding it, a very chilling sentiment was normalized: the concept that men are entitled to sex with the women in their lives. that perspective has not yet been fully destabilized. in a 2018 study of 4,000 british adults, a quarter of participants reported that they don’t believe marital rape is rape.

some other quick hits… the extremely widespread practices of paying dowries and bride prices further reinforce how marriage is understood as a transaction over a woman. and i wouldn’t want to overlook how the structured gender roles enforced through marriage resulted in trapping generations of women inside their home, where they were expected to do all the household labor and reproduce for as long as their bodies could support it. think of all the work those women could have done in the world, and all the worldly experiences that they might have had, if they were not trapped in their homes based on the idea that only their husbands had the right to experience the world.

marriage is a religious tradition that was eventually adopted by the state. but we already know that many religions were constructed by and to the advantage of men, and they are full of quite misogynistic traditions, including the ideology that shaped marriage rituals over the centuries. the state recognizes marriage and grants certain privileges to married couples that others don’t have access to. often these privileges can be life-saving, as in the case of the benefits pertaining to medical insurance. the legalization of gay marriage, and before that, interracial marriage, expanded the prospects of who was eligible to reap those benefits. however, there will always be limitations on who can enjoy those benefits–and use them to survive–so long as they are extended to married couples only.

and then suppose that a woman has decided that she’s seen enough injustice in her marriage and she would like to divorce. research shows that women face a great deal of gender-based scrutiny in divorce courts, and when men sue for custody–which occurs in a minority of cases–they generally win. and in cases of abuse, divorce is a costly obstacle to a woman escaping with her freedom. some abused women have said that the time-intensive process of divorce put them off of leaving. the regimented structure of marriage was a trap that subjected those women to a greater degree of violence.

so! all this being said, i am adamantly against marriage. i cannot see a version of the practice that doesn’t just slap a shiny coat of paint over a violent tradition that has restricted women’s rights to a horrifying degree and continues to do so today. so when i see weddings treated as romantic and aspirational and objects of envy in the media, i’m left feeling disgusted that this tradition is so often painted as good for women. wedding magazines are marketed to us. there are new startups emerging every day that promise to make the wedding-planning process easier, more fun, more romantic. i just can’t see the romance in women’s continued subjugation.

anyway. i hope this was helpful. there are lots of BOOKS you can read with plenty of history on marriage: i just read who cooked the last supper?: the women’s history of the world by rosalind miles and there’s in depth discussion of the many abuses women were subject to under the laws governing marriage. you might even look to the wikipedia page for criticism of marriage to start more research.

#wedding hate #also believe it or not i wrote this mostly in a stream of consciousness so my ability to entertain counterarguments is quite limited #and along the same lines - any fractured sentences are one hundred percent my b #marriage

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terrifictomholland · 4 years

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I have a request, could you do a au where the reader is more of a bad girl and gets caught in detention with Peter Parker, they both dislike each other at first hearing all about each others reputations but soon band together to escape out of detention stealing their phones while the teacher is sleeping, they exchange numbers and at school the next day the reader acts flirty to him and the whole school is basically shocked (Ned and mj mostly) anyways thnx and luv u 💕

Hi! Im so so sorry for how long this has taken, but it’s here now and I hope you’ll enjoy it! 💕 I love you too!

You'd been caught graffiti-ing on school property, earning you once again, detention. With a heavy sigh you plonked down in your regular chair in the classroom where the detention was held. You surveyed around the room, seeing a few kids spread out across the room, until your eyes landed on one Mr. Peter Parker, now you were intrigued as to why he was there. You smirked slightly, getting up, heading over to him and sitting down in front of him on his bench, seeing the way he looked up at you with a slight scowl.

"Aw did someone forget to bring the good teacher an apple this morning?" you mocked, hearing you antagonize him only made his scowl deepen. It was positively adorable. "Shut up," he growled and you let out a giggle,

"That's the best comeback so far you've come up with," you commended and he rolled his eyes, "So why are you in here? Aren't you the school goody-two-shoes?" you commented casually watching him tense up from the corner of your eye making you smirk.

You loved pushing his buttons seeing how easily he riled up. "None of your business," he bit out clearly flustered and you shrugged getting off his desk going back to your usual seat.

You'd decorated a seat which you always sat at, always adding to it, doodling straight onto the desk. You didn't bother with any homework, believe it or not you had a bit of a photographic memory, not that you let anyone know that. You had crafted your persona very carefully to make it seem like you didn't give a flying fuck about anyone or anything.

Essentially you acted like a bitch. It wasn't hard to fool everyone either seeing as how you almost always wore black and every single pair of jeans had rips in them. You were a bit goth with your looks, a piercing here and there and a few small random tattoos on your arms. Deep down, it wasn't who you were, but you'd spent a lot of your childhood being put through bullying, so when you transferred schools to Midtown it was like turning a new page and beginning a new chapter.

At your old school you'd been bullied over being a straight A student and being a teachers pet so now you were rebelling from that with all your might.

The first time you'd laid eyes on Peter Parker he reminded you so much of the girl you were at your old school. The shy, sensitive, always eager to please, naive and doe-eyed girl and it brought up ugly memories for you because he represented all of the things you once had before those bullies came and made you their victim and full of bitterness.

You used to be a glass half full kind of girl, now you were a glass half empty kind of girl instead. That wasn't to say you hadn't gone to therapy to process and deal with your bullying, you had. Extensively so, but you were still having a hard time letting go of grudges.

Which also made it more difficult for you to make friends once you had moved to Midtown, you only really had one friend and that was MJ. She shared the same kind of self-deprecating humour, though there was a lightness to her which you saw in yourself too, and just her way of looking at the world intrigued you.

Of course the two of you easily and quickly bonded because of your shared likes and interests. That was how you had met Peter and Ned, Peter's best friend in the whole world, through MJ. You broke out of your doodling, looking at the clock which hung on the wall, seeing that only 20 minutes had passed. You let out an insufferable sigh, scooting further down in your seat.

You vaguely felt someone watching you so you turned your head seeing Peter staring at you with an intensity you didn't even know the boy had in him. It shocked and pleased you at the same time. His gaze never wavered as you met his, mouthing "what?" to him seeing how his nerves almost got the better of him. In true Peter fashion, he looked around him before throwing a wadded up piece of paper to you.

You couldn't help the eye roll that escaped, was he five years old? Sending you actual notes in detention? You unfolded the paper seeing in a relatively neat handwriting play hooky? Your eyebrows went up to your hairline and you weren't far from falling off your actual chair. Peter Parker wanted to play hooky?

Your eyes met his with an abundance of mischief, giving him a nod and you skipped over to his desk once more, "What's the game plan Parker?" you asked seriously, seeing the way he gulped and let his eyes dart around the room for a way out. "Well uh, we could use the front door?" he squeaked, you could practically see the sweat drip down his temples and you hummed, "well that's not very creative," you said slightly dismissively and he huffed. "Does it have to be creative? Mr. Dell is already fast asleep," he countered and you grinned at him proudly, "Fucking finally Parker, there we go!" you cheered grabbing his hand letting him almost trip over his chair as he grabbed his backpack. You easily fished your phones out of the box Mr. Dell had on the desk, the two of you slipping out of detention relatively unnoticed.

The kids who were in there didn't give two shits who came or left. "Hey what's that supposed to mean?" he asked defensively as the two of you left school ground and you let out a groan, significantly slowing your pace as you walked, turning to face him seeing how uptight he was. "That you're finally showing some back bone! Or, in a much more crass way of putting it, you finally grew a pair," you deadpanned seeing him flush,

"What'd you do this time to end up in detention?" was what came out of his mouth. You lifted a shoulder up in a half-shrug, "I improved the school." "Meaning?" he implored and you let out a small giggle, "Graffiti-ing," "What awful and horrible crime did you do?" you asked before he had a chance to say anything about your illicit business.

You saw him wringing his hands uncomfortably and swallow harshly as couple of times, his eyes darting everywhere but on you.

Without a reason why or knowing why, you placed a gentle hand on his shoulder seeing him jump up at the unexpected touch. "Shit, what did you do?" you asked worriedly, all of your pretenses dropping and you found yourself feeling genuinely concerned for him, it was obviously something bad judging by the way he was acting. "I uh...um, I might've punched Flash," he started meekly, "In the face," he rushed out and you weren't faking your reaction this time, your eyes wide as saucers. "Nice," you complimented seeing him looking at you both horrified and preening at your praise. Hmm, interesting.

"I've wanted to deck that guy since I first saw him," you admitted and Peter did the most surprising thing yet. He fucking laughed. Like full on laughed, knee-slapping kind of laughter. "Are you sure he didn't deck you?" you questioned seeing his reaction as he wiped his eyes finally settling down. "I'm quite sure he didn't. I'm far too aware of him ever getting the upper hand," he said confidently which just stumped you. Getting the upper hand? "What are you talking about?" you were even more confused, watching him with furrowed brows.

He turned serious now and chewed his lip, "Nothing," he said at last. He could tell you didn't buy it, but you let it go for now. "Where did you have in mind we go?" you asked instead, "W-why do I get to decide that?" he asked suddenly back to his nervous self, "Because you were the one who wanted to play hooky so you get to come up where to go," "Oh...well, have you ever gotten the subs from Mr. Delmar’s deli?" he asked and you felt your mouth tug up in a grin, "Good thinking Parker," you praised and he gave you one of his own grins.

It was like a punch to your gut, his smile was fucking blinding, heat crept up in your stomach at the sight of it and you felt your cheeks heat up which you tried to hide - no one could know that you thought Peter was hot. He didn't notice your inner turmoil as he walked a few steps in front of you, chitchatting about the most random things.

Something about some science-y thing which you honestly couldn't keep up with right now as you tried to clear your head. Once you saw the Delmar's Deli sign you felt yourself let out a sigh of relief. "What do you want?" Peter turned to you, you rattled off your usual, hearing Peter get the same. Offering you a tiny smile and he pulled wallet out, paying for the both of you, "I can get my own food," you said but it was in vain, "Consider it my way of saying thanks for playing hooky with me," he let out a small laughter which made butterflies erupt in your stomach and you gave him a soft smile in return.

"Thank you," you said earnestly seeing the tips of his ears turn red, "I think that's the first time you've ever been nice to me," he observed and it felt like he doused you with a bucket of water at that. Did he think you were mean and cruel? He did sense something wrong now and he watched you with an imperceptible look, "Hey, what's wrong?" he asked quietly as you got your subs.

The two of you left and started walking around aimlessly. "Do you think I'm mean?" you asked quietly feeling yourself overcome with guilt, "I think you're misunderstood," well..fuck, he saw pretty much right through you. "That wasn't an answer," you replied weakly.

"Well you've never been very civil toward me," he told you, avoiding your gaze at all costs, as if it was paining him to be this blunt to you, but you needed him to be. "I..i'm sorry," you said softly feeling remorse take over. "I just wanna know why? What did I do to you?" he asked and finally looked at you. You almost wished he'd look away because his gaze left you feeling very naked. Even though you were fully clothed.

"You represent something I have tried for a long time to run away from," you said playing with your chipped nail polish.

"What's that?" of course he'd want to know, which you couldn't blame him but you felt very exposed, telling the one person you never thought you'd share your whole life story to, but here you were.

So, you told him everything. About your first school, your aspirations, the bullies and how they put out your light and positivity and most importantly, your spirit. Peter sat there beside you quietly as you told him your story, and once you were finished you sneaked a glance at him. "You're not alone," he said after a moment and you kept watching him closely, swallowing as you waited for him to continue, "With being bullied I mean," he licked his lips and your eyes zeroed in on them, "I am too in a way by Flash," he said and you felt your heart crack.

"I'm sorry," he looked at you now giving you a small smile, "It's okay," he said gently and you shut your eyes, "I felt envious of you..that you could keep on being the person you are, while I had to change," you admitted after a few minutes of a relatively comfortable silence. "Who says you can't be that person again?" you met his gaze vulnerably,

"Me, that's who," "Why not?" "I just can't," you said quietly and your heart beat picked up when he put his hand over yours. "I hope one day you can," was all he said and it made tears spring to your eyes. You hated getting vulnerable in front of people, let alone Peter Parker, your one sworn enemy who wasn't your enemy at all anymore.

You wiped your eyes sneakily, but your sniffle gave you away still he didn't say anything which you appreciated. "I found you really annoying," you sniffled slightly and his eyebrows quirked up, "Oh?" "Because you constantly brag about the Stark internship," you mumbled, being only slightly jealous of him. He let out a tiny giggle. Yes, a giggle. "Are you jealous?" he teased and you scoffed, "What? No of course not," "Liar liar pants on fire," he smirked, all you wanted to do was kiss the stupid smirk off his face. Wait what? "You are," he said smugly looking at you and you felt your cheeks turn crimson.

When did you decide you wanted to kiss Peter? "Fine...yes, I am," you said seeing the way the smirk returned and it made desire burn in your belly. "You have no reason to be," he said after a moment. You looked at him seeing the earnest in them. "Hey," he mumbled after a little while, his hand snaking into yours holding it and it made your heart start beating faster,

"Thanks for trusting me enough to tell me about what you've been through," he said with such honesty and sincerity it made tears well up in your eyes again, "Thanks for letting me talk," you offered softly and the way his face lit up when he smiled lit you up from the inside out. "My pleasure," he smiled.

You leaned forward, closer to his face hearing the way his breath hitched and you felt as though your heart was going to burst out of your rib cage, but before you lost your nerve you very gently pressed your lips against his. His hand coming up, grasping you by the back of your head moving his lips against yours. You held onto his shoulders, loving the way he held onto you, keeping you close to him.

The two of you got lost in the kiss, tongues battling it out and exploring each others mouths, before eventually pulling apart. You kept your eyes shut just reveling in the way your lips were tingling and the calmness you felt wash over you. "That was fun," Peter said and you looked up at him seeing his cheeks turn pink and he was looking at you bashfully making you laugh,

"It was, we should do it more often." you winked and he let out a shy smile, nodding. "How about we swap phone numbers? M-maybe we could do this again some time?" he asked nervously and you couldn't help your grin, "This or the kissing?" you teased seeing his cheeks turn even more red. "U-um both," he said shyly and you couldn't stop the grin from getting even wider. You wordlessly handed him your phone seeing the way his eyes lit up and he easily added his number, fingers flying over the buttons. "I'll send a text to myself," he said bashfully and you nodded in encouragement.

"Well you're just full of surprises aren't you Parker?" you smirked and he looked at you tensely for a second, "W-what?" he squeaked, "Taking charge and asking for my number, hell you're even kissing me," you teased and he relaxed letting out a small laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. "Do you uhm, wanna do that again?" "Do what?" you played dumb just to see what he'd do. He let out a nervous breath before holding your face in his hands, kissing you slowly. Chapped lips moving against yours firmly and with pressure. You gripped onto the back of his head letting him lead and take charge of the kiss.

Oh yeah, you were definitely doing this again.

---- The next day when you arrived at school, there was a slight difference today.

You'd taken some of Peter's advice on board, and you begun the day with brighter clothes, a simple pale blue dress. It wasn't a lot but it was a start. You could feel the gaze of everyone as you walked the halls in school, but you kept your head held high and focused on Peter, MJ and Ned at the end of the hallway, by all of your lockers.

You couldn't help but the smile that took over your face seeing Peter there, remembering yesterday. "Hi handsome," you grinned, loving the way his cheeks turned scarlet, "Hey," he said, eyes darting around no doubt seeing the shocked expressions on Ned and MJ's faces.

It didn't even come close to the shock when you walked over to him with intent, kissing him deeply, pushing him up against the lockers. Vaguely, you heard everyone whispering and gasping that the two almost arch-enemies of the school were making out. Once you pulled away, seeing his wide eyes and swollen lips, "Having a good day?" you asked sweetly and he looked at you in a daze. "i-it's uh, it's pretty good yeah," he stuttered making you smile, "Good, how about we make it even better? Maybe play hooky?"

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fortheheavenssake · 4 years

Text

💙Humble Attempt Anon💙

*** All submitted by @anon-annoyed on @skippyv20

May 20

For fun and entertainment - gave the riddle a try

MM ANON ………

5 years old ‘ COVID security ………

There is video of Fauci stating a pandemic was coming I think it is 5 years old

transmission admission??………

Will China admit it knew more then started earlier? WHO?

1st. June. ……………

HMTQ People cover comes out

A pollution solution …………

Covid 19 has taught lessons in solving pollution problems

free at last………

PH? Free finally? Annulment?

kiss 💋 me 😱😱😱…………

HMTQ can get kisses from her 3 Cambridge grandchildren?

another Father???……………

Artificial’s real dna Father is announced?

Spanish,French and judo 😂😂😂……………

MM riduciliousness

lies,damm lies, and MM………

Damm. (archaic and original) a small, essentially worthless coin from India So

Money flaunting PR homes are lies

an expensive squat…………

The cost of pr using TP’s house is going to be an expensive bill to pay In terms of owed favor?

A Greece-y gamble. …………

A double word play on greasy person from Greece that MM took a chance on and will be burned by it?

“ is one sitting comfortably’ good, Once apon a time “

Apon is front eh Middle Ages meaning same as upon. Are we about to see a Middle Ages divorce reminder in this fairy tale of dread?

Great job! Love it! Thank you😊❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————

May 29

2nd attempt at a MM ANON riddle

First want to say my thoughts and prayers are with you dearest Skippy. May your family be surrounded by Light!!

MM ANON ………

looting/ shooting …………

DT;s statement

“ tic-toc Nanny”…………

Nanny doing the dance

“ ok! Charlotte, get Louis too” ………

Including Louis on the tic toc

“ George,do it properly “………

Charlotte bossing George around

W&K , It’s a challenging schedule ma’am” …………

Laughing at the Tatler article with HMTQ

” there having a bike day at Brands Hatch with Ducati “ ………

The whole Cambridge family went to track and rode bikes while PW rode Ducati

“ Nottingham cottage ma’am”…………

Prince Harry finally able to say he is there

“like old times ma’ am”……………

Prince Harry able to be honest about being at NC like old times with a pause of relief

” I’ll have a quiet word with Donald “…………

HMTQ having to give DT the details of the soon Anulment anouncments

“ not Philip, his diplomacy is wanting”…………

PP not handling the details since he is not delicate

“exiting times ma’am”………

Exiting the drama, announcing the A Nul ment and finally being free !!

“ one shall insist on compliance Christopher “

Insisting on being compliant with all the agreements for A Nul ment (hope so)

Wonderful! Thank you😊❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————-

June 8

Another humble attempt at the MM riddle

MM ANON ……

D.O.J.………

DOJ requesting PA to appear in JE court

A Stern retort. …………

Hmmmmmmmmmmm can figure anything for this one.

the sept. Soothsayer ………

Fortune teller - when Kate is due with 4th baby

A 14 day suicide for the trade…………

Tatler magazine has created a suicide for themselves with the Kate article

in court today ………

Is this regarding MM or PA? The demand for PA to be in court or that MM is in court …hmmmm

Beatrice tooo tu!! ……………

Beatrice looks to become a senior royal as she is showing great charm and ability

wonderful Wessex………

Sophia being praised for her awesomeness

more photos from Kate??? ………

All 3 kids will have a new picture released soon thus 3 question marks?

no fuss birthday …………

PP wants no fuss for his birthday on the 10th

“ shall one suggest a gathering of 8 .” ………

Cambridges are 5, HMTQ and PP make 7 and Harry makes 8??

” no, silly’ Balmoral?? ………

headed to Balmoral for the meet up of 8

MM desperatum iri videbatur……

MM desperate situation hmmmm hers or the BRFs?

Great! Thank you….I think MM is the desperate one….😊❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————

June 9

Riddle humble answer another attempt

MM ANON ………

everyone and their brother,brother ………

Trooping the Colors…PH will be there this Saturday?

wow!! What a photo Kate!!……………

A second photo coming like the umbrella one ?

little Louis gets a surprise ……………

Agree with PG that this is them telling him a baby is coming

a well rounded future of three( four) ………

Well rounded meaning the 4th will be a girl?

A birthday tic-toc dance…………

PP gets a tic toc dance for this birthday on the 10th

“ do Catherine , come and bring the children “…………

DoC bringing the children for Trooping the Colors mini even

“maybe a change of routine “…………

Trooping the colour change of routine will be at 2:00 AM - 5:00 AM Saturday, June 13

“ Both of you are an example hope”………

Sophie and Catherine are shining examples of hop for the monarchy

“ yes George,I’ll see if we can get to a match”

George is missing sports and hoping to see a match

Thank you…looks great!❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————

June 10

super humble attempt at the riddle (love these riddles so much )

MM ANON …

Gone……………

Covid 19 gone from New Zealand with a capital G

everything is now B&W……………

The protests and movements are making everything B&W

“ but’ tomorrow is another day”…………

Gone with the Wind famous line - echos of Carrying On

“ but old thing, I look like bloody Bela Lugosi” …………

PP complaining about something he was asked to wear

“ shutup Philip”………

Telling him to just get o with it

“ just Take the bloody picture “.………

PP famous quip at the photographer most likely said again

”they’ve hardly ever been on a train William “…………

Taking the train to Balmoral

“ yes , they’d be very excited 😜 “ …………

How excited the kids will be to ride the train

🎼we’re all going to the zoo tomorrow 🎼……………

Hmmmm can’t crack this one (PG’s the smart song one!! So grateful)

she lies for exposure………

MM;s never ending lies for keeping in the press

yachting’ secret exposure !! ……………

Ohhhh a yachting owned secret coming - a picture thus exposure

this time it’s explosive!! …………

It will be a big explosive exposure this time

“ great scoop Beth.”

Hmmmm can’t crack this one

Wonderful! Thank you😊❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————

June 14

Humble Riddle Attempt…THANK YOU MM ANON!!!!!!!!!

MM ANON ……

Adeleville……… Adele’s connection to Grenfell memorial and IT connecting to her….does Adele use Sunshine Sacks? hmmmm

Westfield?? ………… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westfield_Group the malls in LA The Grove are owned by this group https://caruso.com/ and I remember seeing the CEO in a pr fluff of IT

Charlottes delivery …………… Maybe referring to Baby 4 coming same as Charlottes. But not possessive plural hmmm

🎼grab the cash with both hands🎼………… Pink Floyds “Money” Dark Side of the Moon 1973…hmmm

another scam charity …………… BLM has been showed to be directly connected to Dems …scam?

she’s a race… ist …………IT is a race onto her self for sure and clearly is a ist..and JM is now going to turn

she publishes the book ………………… Will JM publish a book now? With all the skeletons?

we will destroy her, we have the tapes…… JM saying she has the tapes and will leak them?

“ no more Mrs, nice ma’am!! “ …………IT no longer Mrs???? TOOO exciting to think about….

“ ones gloves are orf Christopher ………… Hmmm https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/orf/ of disease of sheep to human. Could the sheep following IT finally be seeing the disease she is? And LG is able to move forward with final finals?

“ it was a very good year,old thing “……..PP telling HMTQ it has been a great year (period)

This is great! Thank you😊❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————

June 16

humble riddle notes - PG & LK THANK YOU I learn so much and am so grateful

MM ANON ………

Shetland lift-off……… https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-53049513

LIZA with a ‘ don’t know em…LM;s public facebook post that she has never met them

” it’s shopping Jim, but not as we show it……… PG & LK have linked to Star Trek, I have never watched that show so completely miss the reference and am so grateful to them for their interpretations. Interesting that it is half a quote. Does this have to do with MM mirror site? Maybe LK was right and the Jim reference is supposed to lead us to a person within the firm? Maybe Prince Edward’s youngest son?

“ matter of fact it’s all dark” .. everything to do with IT..dark and ugly …LK’s interpretation was enlightening and taught so much. Wanted to add that June 21st is also Father’s day in the United States.

first jet easy …………Jet return to Scotland so easy to get to Balmoral

Brexit,old white guys drinking a lot. …………LK & PG interrupted this I am lost

a moment of reckoning ……… According to the Cambridge dictionary “a time when the effect of a past mistake is experienced or when a crime is punished”

a virtual Wimbledon?? …………plans to show highlights from past games

Catherine to the rescue …… baby 4 to lift the spirits of all or maybe she will narrate/ host the virtual Wimbledon event? Or BOTH?

“ Ahhh , a relaxing night old thing “ …“Sydney’s provided a new box set” ……“Boardwalk Empire” ………“ bit violent old thing” ………“ Epic Philip!!”…… “ones usual Sydney “…“great!! No bloody tic toc. PG’s excitement was so fun to read and lifting THANK YOU for that PG, MM Anon and LK for these riddles and interpretations.

This is great! Thank you!😊❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

———————

June 16

riddle attempt humbly (Love how I learn through these, I now search the news for clues0 THANK YOU MM Anon!!!!!!!!

MM Anon

“she Ascot nothing on me” ………… IT only went to Ascot once and it was when Doc did not attend https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1296617/meghan-markle-news-kate-middleton-royal-ascot-megxit-royal-family-latest-spt

para-thanks William ……… PW visiting the paramedics to thank them first outing https://people.com/royals/prince-william-steps-out-for-first-official-public-duty-to-thank-first-responders-during-covid-19/

PC , LOST weight??…………That PC lost “dead weight’ of IT with 2 question marks meaning Artificial and IT…hope so!!!!

Oxford,Oxford ……… Protests https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8428313/Black-Lives-Matter-protesters-march-Oxford-ahead-meeting-Cecil-Rhodes-statues-future.html

STIR-oid ………news that steroids help with sick Covid patients? https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/16/health/dexamethasone-covid-drug-recovery-trial-bn/index.html “Stirring an old remedy” “Finding value in an old medicine”

U-Turndinner…https://london.eater.com/2020/6/16/21292624/marcus-rashford-free-school-meals-coronavirus

falling tragedy …………UK headed to recession a tragedy from falling to the Covid 19 https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2020/06/how-uk-has-been-left-worst-all-worlds-over-covid-19 and/or the tragedy of IT is falling into place to a end!!! A NUL ment (hopefully)

the Paris peasants are revolting ……… ……… There are 2 spaces for answers to this one so thinking there must be 2 meanings : 1) the anniversary of Richard II’s chat with the Revolting Peasants at Mile End (1381), and of Owen Glendower’s declaration that he was allying himself with the French against Henry IV, in 1404. Perfidious Welshman. No wonder there are a couple of border towns on the English side where it’s still legal to kill a Welshman as long as you do it with a bow and arrow and at certain times of the day or week. And today https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/france-medical-workers-protest-unrest-and-fires-ensue/1879407 So happening on this day in past and present

“ we can still dress-up cabbage 🥬 “ …“Anne, my yellow ensemble”…“Sydney ‘ a photo”…“that’s a keeper, old thing” …“ here we go , tic-toc, the three of them”… “O, and Catherine!!” … “ ehhhh, And William “ … “ make it a double Sydney “… “ how entertaining Philip “ PP telling HMTQ they can still dress up for Ascot/his bday and she wears the yellow dress and PP thinks it is a good shot and then he sees all 3 Cambs o tic toc and Catherine and then William join in as well so he tells Sydney to double the drink and HMTQ is very happily entertained by it all.

You are doing a great job! Thank you😊❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————-

June 18

another humble attempt…..LOVE LOVE the riddles!!!!!

MM ANON ………

“NEVER………… No chance of IT returning to BRF

“ ………” mon dieu” …… “ “ My God (in french) President telling PC he can’t believe IT is still around and feels sorry for the BRF

🎼some sunny day 🎼……… Well Meet Again (Alternate) Vera Lynn a remembrance of her as she passed away

“ good to meet again Mr President “………HMTQ speaking with French President

air corridor ………Britons could yet take foreign holidays this summer as ministers draw up a list of countries who could be exempt from tough quarantine laws, Matt hancock confirmed today.

“ to be honest,he was an obnoxious old bastard” ……… Maybe Lord Hague being described ? https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-53061432

world beating cherry …trace testing hoping to be the cherry on top of COvid19 getting in control …https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/letters/boris-johnson-foreign-aid-dfid-coronavirus-test-trace-a9572941.html

non app- licable …… What does not applicable mean in court? “Not Applicable” or “N/A” is often seen on forms or in tables or for questions. It’s the answer you would give if a question did not apply to you. For example, if there were a question “What is your date of marriage?”, but you have never been married, you could answer “N/A”, because the question does not apply to you.

“ Bolt-hole. ………… Another markled celeb https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-8435543/David-Victoria-Beckham-LOSE-planning-row-neighbours-31-5m-London-mansion.html

self interest

………https://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/18525189.letters-triumph-naked-self-interest/ Something to do with Scotland’s feeling toward the UK serving their self interest

BOE- more money!! ……………https://www.wsj.com/articles/central-banks-pump-more-cash-into-economy-to-fight-recession-11592482055 Bank of England printing more money as many countries are.

pepper sprayed……… hmmm lots of stories of pepper spray by police hurting protestors was IT in the ned just a pepper spray on the BRF….annoying and painful but forgotten and healed up in a little bit of time….hmmmm

“ O Philip, it’s the last one “……… “Always Downton Abbey old thing”

HMTQ being bummed Boardwalk is doe and PP saying can always watch DA…..does this maybe mean that the gangster back room drama of IT is over and that they can go back to just living the DA life again…….We can HOPE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wonderful! Thank you😊❤️❤️❤️❤️

———————

June 20

another humble attempt at MM Anon riddle - LOVE YOUR RIDDLES

MM ANON

Hello!! ………… Welcome back to the family being together - a BIG HELLO!!

“ It’s a rally Jim , ……… “Mad Money” host Jim Cramer broke down what drove Tuesday’s market rally.

viva espana ………… People were singing this in SF along protests

🎼drink, drink, drink,🎼…………… “Drinking Song” or “Drink, Drink, Drink” is an exuberant song composed by Sigmund Romberg with lyrics by Dorothy Donnelly. It is the most popular piece in the 1924 operetta, The Student Prince.[1] It was a success for tenor Mario Lanza, who performed it in the 1954 movie, though the part was played on screen by another actor, due to a contract dispute.[2]

black wall……… History of Black Wall being destroyed 99 years ago and Trump trying to bring bring attention there by holding rally there

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jun/19/tulsa-1921-massacre-trump-violence-legacy

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-20/on-black-wall-street-hope-and-fear-as-trump-comes-to-tulsa

MM , another agenda!! ………… IT’s new agenda of BLM the never ending circling door of IT’s missions and agendas

bollotics …… this meaning fits all this for nothing to resolve it BLM feels like bollotics

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bollotics

Bollotics The art of defining why something can’t be done without any real reason - is a urban word for Red Tape, when everyone knows it is total bollotics that is preventing things from progressing and yet nobody can resolve it.Often found in the work place e.g. when a department refuses to allow a change because there isn’t a process for it, that is Bollotics, just do it and shut the **** up.by MowgliCub October 10, 2013

“ Kate and William,the children are with nanny “ ………… “ Dover Sole and lemon parfait old thing “………… cream caramel,and Irish coffee Sydney!! ………… “September 9th ma’am. …… “ Stay over Catherine “ –

Sounds like the family is celebrating and knowing the children won’t go back til September so asking them to stay in Balmoral for the summer

This is great! Thank you!😊❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

——————

June 21

Thank you! This is great😊❤️❤️❤️❤️

short attempt at riddle (LOVE THE RIDDLES)

MM ANON …

give us a hug…………PH is back and with the family? getting/giving a hug

Duchess of Cambridge Royal collection ………Her amazing photographs

in the footsteps of lord Lichfield ………… photographer in RF now is DoC https://www.theguardian.com/news/2005/nov/12/guardianobituaries.artsobituaries

EOS C700 Christmas present … … camera ready for Christmas present Camb baby 4?? https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home/products/details/cameras/cinema-eos/eos-c700

“slow the testing down”…………President Trump said that’s how you slow the spread stop the testing

Kung-flu…………… PT also called the COVID 19 this i his speech

Size matters………… School class sizes will be small in the fall

reopening NYC……… NYC opening up after Covid19 lockdown- IT going there?

“ get ya hair 💇🏽‍♀️💇🏼‍♂️cut” …………… hmmmm hair salon open

“ 🙋‍♂️🙋‍♀️🍺 “ ………… Everyone excited for the pubs to open - PW said he was

Rachel for president?? …………… LC said IT has presidential ambitions

archificial daddy day?? ……… hmmm no father’s day cause no real Archie

spotted in St Johns Wood………PH seen there? St John’s Wood An affluent district of leafy residential streets, St John’s Wood is known for Lord’s Cricket Ground, the headquarters of English cricket and a venue for domestic and international matches. The Beatles made many recordings at Abbey Road Studios and fans use the crosswalk outside to recreate the iconic album cover for photo ops. Boutique stores and chic eateries dot St John’s Wood High Street.London borough: Westminster; CamdenLondon Assembly: West Central; Barnet and CamdenPostcode district: NW8Sovereign state: United Kingdom

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where-is-my-pen · 6 years

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I saw someone claim, “There’s no evidence that swim with dolphin programs and closed-system habitats are detrimental to the animals.”

This, of course, referring to the various “Dolphin Encounter” programs offered by marine parks, and the state of the enclosures that cetaceans are currently house in.

First, let’s briefly tackle how Dolphin Encounter programs work.

You shell out a bit of extra money plus the cost of your day ticket to feed and/or swim* with the dolphins. The less expensive feeding option gives you a tray of fish to give to the dolphins.

*Depending on the facility, there is little to no actual swimming with the dolphins. You will get in the water with them in a wetsuit on an underwater platform and the trainer accompanying your group will go through a set routine and allow each of the guests to feed, touch, and possibly get towed by the dolphin. A photographer employed by the park is sometimes present to take pictures of the guests.

What are the risks?

Aside from being stressful and dangerous for the dolphins, there are health and safety risks for the guests involved. Zoonotic diseases such as tuberculosis and pneumonia can be passed between people and dolphins, and the water that the dolphins live in also happens to be the same water that the dolphins excrete (eg. poop and pee) in. Ingesting any amount of the dolphin water could lead to infection, such as MRSA or bacillary dysentery.

Aside from the risks to your health, there are the risks of injury. One of the more well-known cases of a park guest experiencing dolphin-inflicted injury is the young girl that got bitten by a dolphin at SeaWorld’s Dolphin Cove.

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The conclusion that most people came to in this case was that the dolphin got excited at the sight of the tray (which I believe you are supposed to keep out of the dolphin’s view, hence the angled border of the pool) and subsequently lunged for it and caught the girl’s arm in the process.

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In this video, a dolphin lunges in frustration after being repeatedly teased by the guest holding the fish just out of reach, in order to pose for a picture.

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This video shows Silvana Straccia, a swimming with dolphins at Bavaro Beach in Punta Cana. Starting around 2:20 in the video, one dolphin appears to strike Straccia in the face with it’s tail, and another rams her.

She explains in the video description: “ while the first one throws me water in the eyes, the other one comes behind and hits my chest, and sank me under the water. “ She was in the hospital for 8 weeks for broken cartilage, and claims that she was made to sign a form saying that any accidents to happen were not the fault of the park: “ They do the same routine every 20 mins surrounded by strangers, with noise, and orders.. non stop!!.. I was told that if he had hitted me with the nose I would not be alive.. so i was quite lucky in the end. Poor them.. who is the silly one??.. Us.. I will never do it again, and not for the hit. Nobody should and their business would be ended. THey earn a fortune with no responsabilities, as they made me sign a paper before entering, not being responsible for any ACCIDENTS! so you cant claim... “

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A dolphin swim experience in Miami. A dolphin charges at the man shown in the video and bites his forearm. It stops underwater in front of him, then heads back to the direction it came from, and appears to strike him with it’s tail flukes. The man floats on his belly and says “He bit me.” From the video description:

“Dolphin attacks my son while on summer holiday in Miami. South African family. Just come across this video from our holiday in Miami, Florida, and it made me feel sick as the day it happened and decided to post it onto Youtube, so you can see the ugly side of swimming with dolphins, don't think it's all fun. Be careful and remember, it's a business they're running. “

Another incident that I have to link because tumblr doesn’t want me to embed more than 5 videos: “Dolphins attack Josie” - 2 dolphins bite a woman during a “swim-with” session.

Captive cetaceans aside, wild cetaceans acting aggressively towards humans is not entirely unheard of. In fact, in many areas, entering the water with and/or touching wild cetaceans is illegal due to the risks to both human and animal.

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“Dusty” the dolphin was a local celebrity of sorts in Doolin, Ireland. Here he is displaying quite aggressive body language via tail-slapping several times before ramming the woman in the water. From the video description, “The dolphin is believed to have struck the woman in the kidney area with its nose, leaving her winded and shouting to be rescued.”

Dusty apparently frequently injured people.

Tumblr won’t let me embed more than 5 videos on a post, so here are more links to wild cetacean-human aggression.

"When Dolphins attack” - 2 wild dolphins harass a woman and the person filming.

"Wild Dolphin Attacks Swimmers In US Town” - A wild dolphin bites multiple people in a canal.

“Pilot Whale Attack - original version” - A man and woman jump into the water with wild pilot whales, even touching one. One of the whales grabs the woman by the leg a drags her under. They were fined $10,000, but battled it for 3 years and the claim was dismissed.

You can point your finger at the people getting hurt by wild dolphins and say “Of course they got hurt, they shouldn’t have been in the water!” What does that say about marine park’s swim-with programs?

“Of course the wild dolphins attacked, they aren’t used to people!” Then how do you explain the captive dolphins also lashing out at park guests? It’s well-documented that even wild dolphins will harass swimmers, and yet marine parks continue to introduce the circumstances that allow these incidents to happen.

#anticaptivity #anticap #cetacean #dolphin #pilot whale #captive cetacean #dolphin encounter #video

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smallpressdistribution · 6 years

Text

8 SPD Books to Cast a Spell on You...

IN THIS MONTH’S SPDCLICKHOLE by Trisha Low

This month’s #SPDHANDPICKED theme is SPELLS - Merriam Webster defines a spell as “form of words held to have magic power.” But in these times, magic spells aren’t just a way to wish ourselves away from this world, but also to amplify the absurdity of our times, perhaps even a way to point out what deserves changing for the better. Here are 8 books that can help show you how:

1. Alma Almanac by Sarah Ann Winn (Barrow Street Press)

"A lyrical scrapbook of skies, weather, stars, myths, recipes, rituals, and spells. From it, one can learn 'How to Haunt,' how 'To Preserve November,' and even find 'Instructions for Assembling a Bento Box Memorial.'... as insistent as an audio cassette of a woman's voice that 'whispers the same five words again and again. Promise me you won't forget.'"—Elaine Equi

2. Flemish School, Old Paris, & Night & Its Spells by Aloysius Bertrand (Quale Press)

"Written in the early 19th century, but mimicking life two, three and even four centuries before, the modern reader is presented with what a hall of mirrors does best: presenting both "sides" of an image--ugliness and beauty.

3. Ghostographs by Maria Romasco Moore (Rose Metal Press)

"Each of these stories is its own ghost: startling, uncanny, gone. Each one rattles its chains, smiles its terrible smile, gestures toward the others. I feel like this book was written, specifically, for me: the me that loves vintage photographs, formal constraints, hauntings, ephemera, poetry; the me that loves campfire stories; the me that's still a little scared of the dark."—Carmen Maria Machado

4. Boy into Panther and Other Stories by Margaret Benbow (New Rivers Press)

"Writing in heightened, magical prose reminiscent of Marquez and Toni Morrison, Margaret Benbow has produced the liveliest collection of tales you're likely to read this year, or in any year. BOY INTO PANTHER is bursting with incident and populated with an incredible cast of artists, priests, tailors, gypsies, new immigrants, cuckolded mushroom-hunters, and grieving widows-people of sorrow and persistence, all of them fighting for love, or lacking that, a scrap of dignity."—Lin Enger

5. Hum by Natalia Hero (Metatron)

HUM follows a young woman whose life is changed forever when, after being raped, she gives birth to a hummingbird. She must learn to cope with not only what happened to her, but with the bird’s persistent, agitating presence in her life. Natalia Hero’s debut is a beautiful and tormented magical-realist novella about surviving trauma, reclaiming oneself and what it means to heal.

6. Steel Animals by SK Dyment (Inanna Publications)

Hilarity and queer magic realism twist the throttle when Jackie, a loner with a secret bank-robbing persona, meets Vespa: sexy, sculpture-welding artist and collector of vintage motorbikes. Still planning elaborate revenge on a New York ex-lover, Jackie tests both her new relationship and the loyalties of her friends, a rag-tag gang of post-punk eccentrics, realizing how love changes hatred only after her scheme runs out of control. An innocent misstep and an encrypted mystery swings the romance into the dangerous orbit of a construction mogul intent on subverting corporate money at any cost.

7. Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars: A Dangerous Trans Girl's Confabulous Memoir by Kai Cheng Thom (Metonymy Press)

FIERCE FEMMES AND NOTORIOUS LIARS: A DANGEROUS TRANS GIRL'S CONFABULOUS MEMOIR is the highly sensational, ultra-exciting, sort-of true coming-of-age story of a young Asian trans girl, pathological liar, and kung-fu expert who runs away from her parents' abusive home in a rainy city called Gloom. Striking off on her own, she finds her true family in a group of larger-than-life trans femmes who live in a mysterious pleasure district known only as the Street of Miracles. Under the wings of this fierce and fabulous flock, the protagonist blossoms into the woman she has always dreamed of being, with a little help from the unscrupulous Doctor Crocodile. When one of their number is brutally murdered, she joins her sisters in forming a vigilante gang to fight back against the transphobes, violent johns, and cops that stalk the Street of Miracles. But when things go terribly wrong, she must find the truth within herself in order to stop the violence and discover what it really means to grow up and find your family.

8. Monster Portraits by Del Samatar and Sofia Samatar (Rose Metal Press)

"Fall into the wormhole of an imagination lit like fireworks. Sofia Samatar's storytelling never fails to enchant and MONSTER PORTRAITS lava-rocks Del Samatar's stunningly detailed images with the breathless depth of her vision to peek between bushes, beyond diasporas, into mirrors, and across time through the everyday monstrous grandeur—coy and aggressive, best-kept secret and plain as the second nose on a rugged face—often missed by the naked eye. Be ready to be beautifully ruined." —Samiya Bashir

All #SPDhandpicked books are 20% off all month w/ code HANDPICKED

#SPDhandpicked

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alishbakhanus · 3 years

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Wedding Décor: major mistakes

This article is for brides who have decided to get serious about wedding decor, both independently and with the help of specialists. (For there are few good specialists with an ideal taste, but there are a lot of "stampers" of identical designs and outright copyists of Western weddings.)

I'll make a reservation right away: there will be no talk about simple and cheap decorating with balls. It's about DECOR, i.e. about the stylish and thoughtful design of the entire wedding space, which has a specific concept and color palette.

I think every bride will agree that the décor should be:

- beautiful (aesthetic)

- stylish (different from the decor of other weddings)

- economical

However, looking at wedding reports, I almost cannot distinguish them from each other (except by color). The decor is everywhere. But style and beauty are not.

How can you avoid this? How can you spend less on decor without sacrificing quality?

Here are the main mistakes that decorators and brides alike make:

1. Decorate what is already beautiful

This primarily applies to the chairs at the banquet. VERY often, on already beautiful and self-sufficient chairs, bows are knitted in the back, which look (and are) absolutely superfluous. "And a bow on the side." Well, you need to somehow decorate the chair)

It is no less a mistake to tighten beautiful chairs in white covers. Covers are needed in two cases: to comply with the color palette of the wedding, or to disguise ugly chairs. ALL. Otherwise, forget about them. Chairs in covers do not give any "solemnity" and "festivity", but only create the effect "everything is like everyone else" and pull extra money from the newlyweds (covers must be rented, who did not know, the cost is from 50 rubles per piece)

The same applies to the hall. If the hall itself is already heavily decorated (a bright carpet on the floor, paintings on the walls, chandeliers, columns, curtains, etc.), you can save a lot on its design and do only with floristry, for example. But how miserable it looks when brides, in an effort to save money on the decor of such a hall, "decorate" it with cheap paper hearts and rosettes! So, you think that it would be better to do without decor at all.

Finally - a wedding in nature. There are places so beautiful that it is completely unnecessary to decorate them additionally. Nature has already created something that no decorator can do for you! There is no need to “finish off” beautiful views with a huge amount of details and colors! This oil is oil. But the simplest decor looks really stylish, which only emphasizes the splendor of the surrounding nature.

Save your money! Don't waste them on decorating something that doesn't need any decorations!

2. "Fit" style or color in the wrong room

I understand that choosing a restaurant or other venue for a wedding is a very dreary and difficult business, and it is far from always possible to correlate desires and reality. But the fact is the fact: the room dictates the style and color of the wedding. And you can't do ANYTHING with it. If you really want a wedding in a certain style - get tired and find the appropriate room. But do not hope to remake the hall for yourself! This is not possible, and it will cost you a lot of money to try. A rustic wedding will not fit into a modern interior. Delicate blue will not fit into the room, the main color of which is red.

Take a look at this example. The decorators were forced to almost completely cover the room with white cloth (and it costs a lot of money!) In order to inscribe a delicate blue into it. However, a very "active" red floor is not going anywhere. As a result, we got an incomprehensible mess:

3. Lack of style integrity

I will explain this point with a very striking example. In part, it overlaps with item 2.

So, what we have: a wedding in a very pompous, arch-classical hall.

Floristics, images of the bride and groom - to match (heaps of pink flowers, pretentious outfits).

And here, out of nowhere - details in the style of Love is. Bright, cartoonish, funny and ... completely inappropriate! As if snatched from another wedding. Moreover, ALL small elements of the celebration are sustained in the Love is style. Incl. invitations (and invitations are an expression of the entire style of the wedding, the quintessence). Well, the bride wanted it so much.

Guys, if you want to make a creative style, be true to yourself. If this is Love is, then there should be bright, cool, cartoonish EVERYTHING, from the images of the bride and groom to the bouquet! Otherwise, it turns out a hellish incomprehensible mishmash, in which there is no style at all, but there is only bad taste and inability to see the picture WHOLE, from the side.

If you are afraid of "not being able to withstand creativity" - do not take it! A creative wedding is not for all couples, not everyone can understand and accept an unusual style. But to do a CLASSIC wedding with details clearly far from the classics is beyond good and evil. Do the classics - be inspired by the classics and what is close to it (this is bohemian and shabby chic, for example, styling for the 20s - but you never know what you can think of!) And if you are already doing a stylized, creative wedding - again, be consistent! A creative wedding is always a great courage and a flight of imagination, I personally adore such projects - when they are really done from and to, and not by some "pieces".

Here is a vivid example of a COOL, thought out to the smallest detail and at the same time exquisitely simple style (which is especially nice - our, Russian wedding!):

Amazing atmosphere at this wedding! At the same time, the decor is minimal, and this only emphasizes the surrounding beauty.

4. Follow stereotypes

I'll make a reservation: I believe that wedding decor and decoration are elements of individuality. Those. all this is done so that the wedding is somehow different from everyone else. If the design is template and does not in any way distinguish the wedding from the sea of others - why pay money for it?

Following stereotypes in decoration makes hundreds of weddings indistinguishable from each other. Many "specialists" simply do not know how to work outside the box. They have standard design techniques - they are followed. Is always. It's beautiful.

There are several main stereotypes, I will list them all with examples.

a) If the colors of the wedding are chosen - they should be EVERYWHERE and IN EVERYTHING and the SAME.

This rule can still be followed if the colors are pastel, or the contrast is black + white (no options here).

But if bright, saturated colors (especially red) are chosen as the main ones, the wedding turns into a "wry eye".

Moreover, if a sharply contrasting combination of bright colors (blue + yellow, orange + purple, yellow + fuchsia) is chosen.

Moreover, if a photographer with contrast processing of a photo is chosen - you get tired of viewing such photos after 5 frames.

There are many examples of overloading wedding decoration with color.

The most fatal mistake is the load of contrasting color combinations of the images of the bride and groom. It is simply impossible to watch.

The second mistake is the selection of all accessories, clothing items and decor "color in color", without the slightest deviation in shades. It looks boring and unnatural.

At the same time, what a shame - a lot of time was spent on the selection of things exactly in color (I know how it feels!)

My dears! Flowers have shades. And it looks MUCH more beautiful and interesting when the wedding decoration combines just a few similar shades and colors, and not one pure color + white.

If you choose contrasting color combinations, this is very bold and awesome. Only these colors should be present in "wide strokes", here and there, in details - but not in a continuous field in any case! And the main bright colors should be softened by complementary, less contrasting ones.

Like this:

b) The arch for exit registration must be like this!

Variations are possible: Go to foreign sites, look at wedding reports. You will not see such arches there. But you will see these:

And such:

And often - not arches at all:

But in every first Russian report on the field registration you will see just such an arch! For local organizers and decorators have endless love for such arches.

Honestly, I was sick of this construction of fabric and flowers, plus a table swaddled in fabric. For me personally, such an arch is a symbol of triviality. Moreover, there are not just hundreds of alternative options - there are an infinite number of them, there would be a desire. And these alternatives can be virtually FREE for you! The price of your favorite arch is from 5000 rubles. ad infinitum, depending on the number of flowers and your willingness to part with money.

Once again: the arch for registration, and in general the decor is elements of the individuality of your wedding, and not elements of "do it like everyone else"!

c) The backdrop for the newlyweds is sacred!

Well, be honest: there is no need for this backdrop! Unless he's covering the hole in the wall. In all other cases - a waste of money. Don't listen to conversations that this will "make your table stand out"! The place of the young is always special, even if it is not decorated with anything at all - all eyes will be turned to it. After all, there is the bride and groom, the main participants in the celebration, those for whom all the others have gathered!

The worst thing (and very often happens) is when the design of the backdrop is lower in height than the ceiling of the room, i.e. a "second horizon" is created. It looks terrible both in life and in the photo.

But these shots are from a chic restaurant with a panoramic view. What a collective farm and cheap stuff turned the table of the young, and the whole room, mediocre decor! You can compare: next to the photo of the same restaurant WITHOUT wedding decoration. Impressive, right?

And finally. When preparing the decor, I highly recommend to visit foreign sites with wedding reports - it greatly expands the horizons and improves the taste. Unfortunately, domestic reports suffer from extreme monotony and lack of creativity.

However, I urge you not to blindly copy Western weddings! Get inspired by great examples, but come up with your own, unique, something that will then be repeated!

Courtesy: Best event halls in Lahore.

#event wedding weddingplanning weddingdress complex SEO WednesdayWisdom weddingvibes eventtroop CoronaVirusUpdates

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yulejotunn-blog · 4 years

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20 Up-and-comers To Watch In The Concrete Flooring Contractors Near Me Industry

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svetlanawagner-blog · 5 years

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Welcome to our income reports where we share ways we’ve been making money through the , the challenges and lessons we learned each month, and finally to celebrate successes however big or small. Though we have a few side hustles, we’re happy that the travel is our main hustle.

Life Updates

We ticked off a few big bucket list items in May. Reflection Canyon has been a place I wanted to photograph for years, and we finally made it out there and survived the storm. Sure, we had some near death experiences, but I suppose that made it one of the most memorable trips to date.

Also, on our recent press trip with Travel Texas, we got to explore Big Bend National Park. We love our National Parks, and we can’t wait to share more photos and posts about our big Texas adventure.

This post may contain affiliate links, where we receive a small commission on sales of the products that are linked at no additional cost to you. Read our full disclosure for more info. Thank you for supporting the brands that make Local Adventurer possible.

Originally Published: Jun 12, 2019

How We Made OVER $30.9K in May - Travel Blog Income Report

Why We Share Our Income Reports

If you’re new here, you might be wondering why on earth we would share something so personal. We’ve been hesitant to share our income reports for the last 5 years, and we’re super nervous about this post, but since we’re all about trial and error, let’s see how it goes! We’re putting out these income reports for these following reasons.

To Show You How We Make Income Blogging

We always want to be 100% transparent about how we make money through this . The amazing thing about the ging world is that every we’ve talked to does things a bit differently. There are also countless ways to grow and improve your business. When we started, we made most of our money through affiliate sales. Since then, we’ve shifted heavily to sponsored content. A big part of this is because my background is in sales and it’s what I’m good at. You can learn more about my sale method below. As time goes on, this will continue to change, but we want to share how we focus on our strengths to effectively meet our goals.

To Show You the Potential of Blogging

Whether you have a or are starting a , we want to show you that you can make a career out of ging.

Even if you don’t want to , there are a ton of ways to be financially and location independent and we hope to inspire others to go after it too. If you want to keep your day job, ging can be a great way for you to make some extra side money.

Esther started the 6 years ago and I joined her full time 3 years ago. Even until last year, our parents were worried about us financially, wondering when we would stop “playing” and start taking our lives and work more seriously. Neither of us ended up being “good Asians” (namely a doctor, lawyer, or engineer). It’s an unconventional job and where most people don’t understand all the work that goes on behind the scenes.

More: The Ugly Truths of Being a Travel Blogger told by Top Travel Bloggers

We love that our jobs give us flexibility in what we do, but being your own boss isn’t all that it’s cut out to be either. You have to be disciplined and work hard at your business to grow it.

If you’re not getting the results you want, again, keep in mind that we’ve been ging for 6 years now and the first month I tried monetizing my , I made less than $20. Give it more time and failing in the process is okay. I didn’t have the correct tools that are out now and a lot of it was trial and error. Consider it all an A/B test to figure out what will best work for you.

To Track How We're Doing

I’ve always loved sharing goals online and tracking them. Putting them out in the world (via the ) has helped me so much with accountability. Since we’re constantly tweaking trying to improve the , looking at these numbers will help us learn whether we’ve been making the right changes. It’s amazing to see how the sources of income have changed over time and to see where we still have room for improvement.

Ultimately, our life goal is to make enough to live on half our income (right now we’re at 30%), where the rest will go back into the community or support organizations we love.

Breakdown of Income for May 2019

In May 2019 we earned a total of $30,944.79.

Affiliate Income

Amazon: $615.01

Avantlink: $1,322.52

Commission Junction: $192.10

Misc (Ebay, Skimlinks, AWin, etc): $115.85

Sponsorships

Sponsored Product Posts: $25,031.22 *our fave marketplace lately: IZEA

Display Ads

Adthrive: $3,668.09

Income Comparison to Other Months

Total in 2019 Year Income: $121,964.86

Last Month Income: $21,714.49

Difference: 42.5% increase from last month

Expenses

Web Hosting: $19.95 (Want to start a ? Here’s how you can start a in 5 easy steps)

Keysearch: $18.60

Virtual Assistant, Social Media Manager, Subcontractors: $979.17

Teachable: $89 (check out their free weekly webinar)

Office Supplies/Services: $723.12

Test Products/Shoot Supplies: $466.93

*Taxes: $1,192

Insurance: $613.89

Travel + Meal Expenses: $1,451.07

$25,391.06

*Roughly 30% of your income will go to taxes at the end of the year. The number above shows the money set aside for taxes to offset how much we have to pay at the end. It makes it less painful at the end of the year.

May 2019 Blog Traffic Breakdown + Stats

Monthly Pageviews: 674,621

Daily Average: 21,761

Monthly Sessions: 517,803

Monthly Unique Visitors: 429,920

Social Media Followers: 321,144

Email Subscribers: 8,371

Goals for June 2019

Blog Goals

Get back to posting once a week. For real this time.

Update Pinterest photos for the top 25 posts.

Attend and follow up with IPW

Move servers and increase site speed

Life Goals

Start intermitten fasting

2 date nights (we keep putting this one off)

Finish a book

Workout or go to the climbing gym 3x a week.

Work only 40 hours a week (on weeks we’re not traveling)

What's Working on the Blog

The has been running well on its own. Jacob was on our friend’s Off the Pill podcast, which pretty much shut down our site for a few hours from the flood of traffic. We’ve also spent a lot of time updating our older posts, so traffic has been increasing even though the number of posts we’ve published has gone down significantly. It just goes to show that more posts doesn’t necessarily mean more traffic. Although, we do recommend you post often if you are in your first year of ging. I still can’t believe I used to post 3x a week for several years.

What Didn't Work + Lessons Learned

We need to get back to posting regularly, so we’re going to aim to post at least once a week again. We were also reaching the limits of our server, which generally made our site slow but also crashed our site after a flood of traffic. We’ll be looking for a faster solution this month.

You might also love

How We Made Over $21.7K in April 2019 – Travel Blog Income Report

How We Made OVER $32K in August 2018 – Travel Blogger Salary

The Ugly Truths of Being a Travel Blogger

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#FFB53A;#ff865c;#>TOTAL #><strong>What #localadventurer #travelblogger #blogincome #blogger #travelblog #blog #problogger #000 #ontheblog #professionalblogger><strong>Note:</strong></span>#ff865c;>TOTAL #blogging #000"

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lucyvivesnews · 7 years

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Revista Jet Set - August 2016

Where the interest in fashion born?

"Since I was little I had an obsession to disguise me, from there comes the passion to dress me differently. It's a way of expressing that I think is important."

Your arrival at modeling has occurred spontaneously...

"That's right, I started with a taste for photography. In Puerto Rico I posed for some friends artists, I uploaded those photos to the networks and it seems that the photos liked because some photographers began to look for me. Over time I wanted to take more pictures, dress, make-up, it became an exciting subject. Now that I arrived at Bogota, I started working on my portfolio."

Don't you have a taboo with your body?

"Unfortunately I don't have taboos with almost nothing and less with my body. I like to walk around naked, it seems cool to me. It'd be nice that one day no one would realize that one is without clothes and see it as something natural. It's important for me to show that to the people of my generation who need that security. "

How you handle that freedom of being a Vives?

"I am representative of my surname and I never stop having that in my conscience. But it could be worse if my dad and I didn't seem that much, he doesn't have taboos either. Although he is very careful as a father that never crosse the line of morbidity or eroticism. As long as he respects me and makes me respect, I can push my limits a little further."

Today most women look in the mirror and don't like what they see...

"They look ugly, fat, weird, and they wonder how much it costs to have a surgery. I don't feel that way, when I look in the mirror, the most important are my eyes because I realize how I feel, sometimes I look at myself and say: 'Oh, what sadness or what a good day ! because they shine.' "

You have been in the stage to sing with your dad, have you thought about dedicating to music?

"Everything I know I've learned from my dad, but it's a project that worries me because I have a lot of pressure. For the past two years, I've been sitting down and saying, 'I'm going to start my musical project 'and then there's a silence of about 20 minutes and I think,' But where to start?' "

Do you see yourself singing vallenato? “No, although it seems important to me that there is a woman who does it, but I don’t have the gift to sing with that feeling and put a whole soul in it. Although that music seems beautiful to me.”

So which genre would you like to sing?

“My dad always told me that the most important thing is to create a genre, your own sound and that’s what I’m doing. I like jazz, acoustic music and rap, who have an African American background. I try to mix those sounds with instruments that I like like the harp, the violin, the piano, the ukulele.”

What is your favorite song of your dad?

“I have faith (Tengo Fe) and What has the night (Que tiene la noche) that are part of the rock of my people”

When are we going to hear your songs?

“I’m working on my album, let’s go bit by bit. My dad is part of my team, this year he went to New Orleans and we sat down with my producer and heard the five tracks we have. I expected the worst because he’s very honest but he liked it. That gave me an impetus that maybe this is a good material. I composed all the songs, every sound, it’s my baby. The day I release my music I can’t look back. I hope in a year and a half to have it ready.”

How is Carlos as a dad?

He’s overprotective, by any phone I get a message or a photo of him and he says: ‘Look, daddy exists, don’t forget’ I’m the worst with communication, I have to admit it.

Do you look yourself as a singer or model in the future?

“What I want to be is an activist on women's issues, which is one of the things I study at university. There I focus on our right to equality, to freedom. I am against domestic violence and mistreatment from men.”

Where did this concern arise from the female equality?

“I was born in a family full of women and it has always been very interesting to see the difference between us, how we think. In my family, women say what we feel and we make ourselves respected, but for society that’s very rare. What seems strange to me is that they look different to a woman who says what she thinks.”

Why did you decide to study philosophy?

“My father gave me my first book of philosophy when I was very young, in that book Friedrich Nietzsche said that God doesn’t exist. I read it all the book because I loved it. This man said the most absurd things, but he argued them so well that in the end I agreed with his thinking and even ended up being an atheist. There I entered the passion of being able to say things, to express my reasons with arguments and to be able to convince many people.”

Are you still an atheist?

“No, thanks God I read other books of philosophy that convinced me that God exists. I am not very religious but I consider myself Christian. Now I have another vision that is not that evil God who punishes or judges.”

How are you doing at the university?

“I love my career, I’ve been two and a half year and there are four. I am part of many activist groups, I study in a community very open to the racial theme, which in the United States is now in full bloom. I live in a state where most of us are African-American and there’s a lot of jazz and blues. I have joined those groups to know how I can help, I love to be part of the protests. Every year there is a week of talks and in this I had the opportunity to share experiences with Congo women in Africa on clitoral mutilation and the burqa in Palestine. I talked about misogyny in the Hispanic culture. I really like to compare our situations.”

Do you also like acting?

“Yes, all that theme of dressing up and doing another character fills me. I did a lot of theater at school. I remember coming to my house and saying: ‘Mom, tomorrow I am José in the production of Carmen’ and I’d go with a tie and a mustache; And the next day I would say, ‘Tomorrow I am Francis Bacon’ and she was looking for another mustache.”

How did you assume the separation of your parents?

“It didn’t affect me as much as my brother Carlos Enrique. I have always been weird in my way of thinking, when I was 6 years old I wrote a letter to my parents asking them to divorce because to see them fighting wasn’t good. I said, ‘If you are here for me, don’t do it, if we are going to be together but unhappy, it won’t be better.’ For my brother it was different, he said this has to work. Maybe if in that moment I’d think what was going to come later, in the possibility of another woman and children, I would enter in a panic attack like Carlos Enrique. The good thing is that everything came little by little.”

How do you assimilate it now?

“Well, Elena and Pedro have a very fresh mentality on the subject. The other day Elena told me: ‘Margarita Rosa de Francisco is my mom, my mom is my mom and your mom is also my mom’ I said ‘She sees everything as an immense family and why can not it be like that, if at any moment all those people were important in my dad’s life?’ I feel cool and I don’t think that much anymore.

Do you have plans to come and live in Colombia?

“I was thinking about it, I even took my lease until December because I wanted to do another semester and go to Colombia. Sometimes I feel lonely and I think I can be here with my family. But I really don’t think I’ll come back yet. Now I want to see what campaigns I can work on, there are a lot of activist groups that need help with so much that is happening now in Europe, and I am in the age to do it.”

#lucy vives #interview

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newyorktheater · 5 years

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Four shows are opening on Broadway in March. Two of them are transfers from Off-Broadway that thrilled audiences in very different ways: “Be More Chill” and “What The Constitution Means To Me.” The other two bring to Broadway some beloved tunes — a revival of Cole Porter’s “Kiss Me Kate” and “Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations”

But as savvy New York theatergoers know, Broadway ain’t the half of it: For every “Ain’t Too Proud” on Broadway, there’s an “Ain’t No Mo'” Off-Broadway. Among the shows opening Off-Broadway in March:

Daveed Diggs in White Noise by Suzan-Lori Parks (Public Theater)

Playwright Suzan-Lori Parks – White Noise

Florian Zeller

Alan Cumming in Daddy by Jeremy O. Harris (Vineyard and the New Group)

Daveed Diggs in “White Noise,” a new play by Suzan-Lori Parks (Top Dog/Underdog); Isabelle Huppert in The Mother, a new play by Florian Zeller (The Father); Alan Cumming in “Daddy,” a new play by Jeremy O. Harris (Slave Play.)

Below is a selective list of Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off Broadway and festival offerings in February, organized chronologically by opening date, with each title linked to a relevant website. Color key of theaters: Broadway: Red. Off Broadway: Black, Blue, or Purple. Off Off Broadway: Green. Theater festival: Orange. Puppetry: Brown. Immersive: Magenta.

To look at the Spring season as a whole, check out my Off Broadway Spring 2019 preview guide and my Broadway 2018-2019 season guide

March 1

Ajijaak on Turtle Island (New Victory)

A “family-friendly First Nations spectacle.” Separated from her family in a Tar Sands fire, the crane Ajijaak makes her first migration from Canada to the Gulf Coast alone, discovering the strength of her song along the way.

Chained: A Victorian Nightmare: (FOST at Starrett-Leigh Building )

An immersive theater VR adaptation of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. Tickets sold only as an add-on to the FOST (Future of Storytelling) Story Arcade, which is described as a “pop-up, showcasing a… sampling of immersive, experiential, and multi-sensory exhibits.”

March 5

Daddy (Vineyard at Signature)

In the second Off-Broadway play by Jeremy O. Harris (who gained some notoriety with his Slave Play in the fall), Alan Cumming plays Andre, an older white art collector who befriends Franklin, young black artist on the verge of his first show. Their bond creates a battle of wills with Franklin’s mother.

The Cake (MTC at City Center)

In what sounds like a recent Supreme Court case, Debra Jo Rupp portrays a baker in North Carolina who refuses to create a wedding cake for a same-sex couple. The difference — one of the brides is the daughter of a dear friend, now deceased. The play is by Bekah Brunstetter (who writes for the TV series This Is Us.)

March 7

Fleabag (Soho Playhouse)

The play by Phoebe Waller-Bridge that inspired the BBC television series currently being shown on Amazon Prime.

Actually We’re F**ked (Cherry Lane)

In this play by Matt Williams, “four millennials gather every Thursday to order take-out, drink too much wine, and argue over how to unf**k the planet.”

Chick Flick The Musical (Westside Theater)

In this musical by Suzy Conn, four friends gather to unwind, watch a chick flick and play their favorite chick flick drinking game.

Chimpanzee (HERE)

A “non-verbal puppet play based on true events.” An aging, isolated chimpanzee pieces together the fragments of her childhood in a human family

March 10

Be More Chill (Lyceum)

Broadway transfer of the teenage cult musical about high school student Jeremy Heere who sees himself as a loser but then swallows a pill containing a supercomputer and becomes cool — but at what cost?

My review of Be More Chill Off-Broadway

If Pretty Hurts Ugly Must Be a Muhfucka(Playwrights Horizons)

In the village of Affreakah-Amirrorkah, no one questions that Akim is the one true, perfect beauty — not even her jealous classmates. But they’ll be damned before they let her be the leading lady in this story. A decidedly contemporary riff on a West African fable by Tori Sampson

March 11

The Mother (Atlantic)

Isabelle Huppert stars in a play by Florian Zeller (The Father) as a woman suffering from clinical depression and grasping for stability after her grown children move on to build lives of their own.

Southern Promises (Flea)

A revival of Thomas Bradshaw’s incendiary 2008 play: On his deathbed, a plantation owner vows to set his slaves free, but when his wife rejects the request chaos erupts on the plantation.

March 12

Ashes (HERE)

In a small village in the south of Norway, a young man sets houses on fire, and a writer seizes them as literary material several decades later. From Plexus/Polaire, the Norwegian/French avant-garde theater company that in January presented Chambre Noir

March 13

Surely Goodness and Mercy (Keen Company at Theater Row)

In this play by Chisa Hutchinson (“She Like Girls,” “Dead & Breathing”), a Bible-toting boy with a photographic memory befriends the cantankerous old lunch lady in an underfunded public school in Newark.

Hatef**k (WP)

In this play by Rehana Lew Mirza, passions ignite when Layla, an intense literature professor, accuses Imran, a brashly iconoclastic novelist, of trading in anti-Muslim stereotypes. But as their attraction grows into something more, they discover that good sex doesn’t always make good bedfellows.

March 14

Kiss Me Kate (Roundabout at Studio 54)

Kelli O’Hara and Will Chase star as warring ex-lovers forced to portray the warring couple of Shakespeare’s ‘The Taming of the Shrew’ in this third Broadway revival of Cole Porter’s 1948 musical. The winner of the first-ever Tony Award for Best Musical, the show features such familiar tunes as “Too Darn Hot,” “So In Love” and “Always True To You In My Fashion.”

Georgia Mertching is Dead (EST)

In this play by Catya McMullen, three 30-year-old women who have been friends since high school set off on a road trip south–with homemade female urination devices, too much pie, ill-advised sexual escapades–to celebrate and mourn a figure from their past.

Rogues Gallery (Broken Ghost)

Unleash your inner villain in this fully immersive evening of world conquest and inevitable betrayal!

March 18

Culturemart Festival (HERE)

Cannabis! by Baba Israel, 9000 Paper Balloons by Spencer Lott & Maiko Kikuchi,Songs of Sanctuary for the Black Madonna by Imani Uzuri,A Voluptuary Life by James Scruggs,Paper Room by Laura Peterson

Nantucket Sleigh Ride (Lincoln Center’s Mitzi Newhouse)

Written by John Guare and directed by Jerry Zaks (the pair behind House of Blue Leaves and Six Degrees of Separation) this new play stars John Larroquette as a New York playwright turned stockbroker revisiting a wild event that happened 35 years ago on that island.

March 19

Juno and the Paycock (Irish Rep)

Part of the theater’s season of Sean O’Casey, the play is a devastating portrait of wasted potential in a Dublin torn apart by the chaos of the Irish Civil War. When a handsome visitor arrives with news of an inheritance, the Boyle family begins to plan their new life, but their apparent salvation soon reveals itself to be the cause of their ruin

March 20

White Noise (Public)

Daveed Diggs (Hamilton) returns Off-Broadway in a new play by Suzan-Lori Parks, directed by Public Theater artistic director Oskar Eustis. Long-time friends and lovers Leo, Misha, Ralph, and Dawn are educated, progressive, cosmopolitan, and woke. But when a racially motivated incident with the cops leaves Leo shaken, he decides extreme measures must be taken for self-preservation

St. Peter’s Foot (UP Theater)

Mike and Roma think they made the right decision in not having children. Then a baby is left on their doorstep

March 21

Aint Too Proud (Imperial)

“Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations” stars Jeremy Pope (Choir Boy) as Eddie Kendricks, Ephraim Sykes as David Ruffin, etc. This new musical with a book by Dominique Morisseau helmed by the director of “Jersey Boys” follows The Temptations’ journey from the streets of Detroit to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

March 25

Accidentally Brave (DR2 Theater)

Actor and playwright Maddie Corman shares her true story of what happened after her husband was arrested on a shocking charge.

March 27

The Lehman Trilogy (Park Ave Armory)

Italian playwright Stefano Massini’s play, adapted by Ben Power and directed by Sam Mendes (The Ferryman!) stars acclaimed actors Simon Russell Beale, Adam Godley, and Ben Miles and the Lehman brothers and their sons and grandsons over nearly two centuries, climaxing with the end of the firm that bore their name in the crash of 2008.

Ain’t No Mo’ (Public)

In this satire by Jordan E. Cooper that began at the Fire This Time Festival, African-Americans leave en masse a country plagued with injustice.

March 31

What The Constitution Means To Me (Helen Hayes)

Fifteen-year-old Heidi Schreck earned enough money for her college tuition by winning Constitutional debate competitions across the United States. Now, the Obie Award winner resurrects her teenage self in order to trace the profound relationship between four generations of women in her own family and the founding document that dictated their rights and citizenship. My review of the play Off-Broadway

Do You Feel Anger? (Vineyard)

In this play by Mara Nelson-Greenberg , Sophia is hired as an empathy coach at a debt collection agency

March 2019 New York Theater Openings Four shows are opening on Broadway in March. Two of them are transfers from Off-Broadway that thrilled audiences in very different ways: "Be More Chill" and "What The Constitution Means To Me." The other two bring to Broadway some beloved tunes -- a revival of Cole Porter's "Kiss Me Kate" and "Ain't Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations"

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sproutybjd-blog · 7 years

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Silicone Molds

Firstly, let me start by saying that I have an apology post in the works for Cubeco, the maker of the silicone molds I purchased last month. In a previous post, I responded to an anonymous confession about the price of my silicone molds. I had originally gotten them off of Taobao for around $10 USD for the cost of the base mold. After importing, they cost me around $55 in taxes, fees, packaging, etc. each. I had to price them around $75 to make up for that, and people weren’t happy with that price. The anonymous confession said that there were better, cheaper molds on Taobao for less than five dollars, and a reblog had a link to Cubeco molds. So I decided to purchase some Cubeco molds in order to lower the price of the molds for sale in my store, since it was a common complaint that they were too expensive. The cost of molds: Imagine I buy $100 in molds. The shipping cost will be $45, the cost to my Agent will be $35, since I am a business. I also have to file to have them imported, since they have to go through customs and must be declared. Then I have to pay the taxes, which I could never figure out if they were for the price I paid or the price I was selling for, so I always just did the price I was selling for. $35 in import duties and taxes, since I am a business. The cost of packaging $20 for that many molds, and a 15% failure rate (resin sticking to the molds during testing before they are sent out to people) and the price is significantly higher. In order to make a profit, business sources suggest that you buy an item for 1/4th to 1/2 the cost you plan to sell it for, everything included as far as packaging and fees. The cost to import a single mold that might have cost only $5 on Taobao could end up costing me around $30 to import it legally into the United States and after all Shopify/Etsy listing fees and State and Federal taxes, packaging, failure and return rates, etc. So in order to make any profit at all, I have to sell the mold for almost double that... Which I can’t, because no one will buy them for that price. So after all of the importing, etc, the profit margin is quite low. It is still slightly more profitable than making them myself, since I’m not an expert mold maker.

Now that the cost of the molds (which people say is too high and think I am trying to rip them off/con people into overpaying for the molds) is out of the way, let’s get started with the rest.

On March 6th, 2017 I purchased a large order from this Taobao shop: [Link] [Item] And I purchased around $200 in molds of various sizes. Here is a photo of some of the items I received. The items arrived April 12th, 2017. So far I have not many of them, mostly just the “Single Mold” that I purchased from another seller on Taobao, who allows reselling. The only molds I have sold from Cubeco have been the 12mm molds, because the previous single mold that I had did not include a 12mm. As of April 23rd, 2017, I have sold 5 Cubeco molds.

[Link] Around April 21st, I received a notification on Instagram that I was tagged by @cubeco000 there [Link], on a picture that says “I made this mold @sproutydoll” and I liked the image. At the time, I thought that this person was the original maker of the mold and was showing that they had made the mold. It wasn’t until April 22nd that I began receiving notifications that cubeco000 was tagging people and commenting that I had plagiarized them. I sent cubeco000 a message to see what was going on, and realized that they had sent me a message earlier in the day and I had not seen it, since it was marked as spam on Instagram. We spoke back and forth, but since cubeco000 doesn’t speak much English and I don’t speak any Chinese, I think there was a misunderstanding. I offered to credit them and remove the listings from my website and direct people to their Taobao if they wished to buy. Cubeco000 doesn’t have an English listing or a way for non-Chinese to buy the molds, but they said that they did not want me to sell the molds, so I was fine with sending people to Taobao instead. Cubeco000 did not respond to any of these messages besides accusing me of copying them, plagiarizing them, and stealing from them. They read the messages (IG marks read messages with a little symbol) and then went to make more comments on my Instagram images about how I was a cheater, a liar, a copycat, and plagiarizing them, and tagging my customers and other BJD people along the way.

In the PMs, cubeco000 doesn’t say much, but I think there is a misunderstanding. I am working with a friend to have cubeco000 write out what they would like, and what they feel is the issue in Chinese and have it translated so I can respond to it. For now, I will do a breakdown of the issues that were brought up in our DM. [Link to full conversation]

- I had not read the initial message from Cubeco000, since it was filtered as spam. When I sent them the first message on my end, it showed their message immediately after. I ask for proof, since the IG account is very new and had not posted many photographs or anything like that. Later on, cubeco000 provided sufficient proof [Link] with a mold master photograph, which I assume is made with a CNC lathe, something I had considered doing as well and find really fascinating (In the USA, the CNC shops near me all charge 500 an hour to design and use the machines, so it’s not something I can do yet!). - Cubeco000 also provided a photo of their Weibo, though I have no idea how to use Weibo. Apparently it is a Chinese blogging site. - “I am very sad about Nicolle, you made her think you did it” I am sure they are talking about Andreja from Nicolle’s Dreams [Link], and the mold I made her in June, 2016. [Link] which was a mold I had made from my own eyes, and is very different from Cubeco’s molds. I have always made my own eyes for selling to customers, with the exception of the 3d printing company I had tested out from China. I ended up not very happy with the eyes, since they weren’t made to the specifications that I had sent them, and ended up getting rid of them. Here are some of the first ones I made, round and flat and hard to use. [Link] and the mold for them was a two-part [Link] and the eyes I used for most of the other time[Link] and [Link] for the mold, before I tried to use the 3d molds from the beginning of this year. You can see how I usually make the eye bases by a lathe style attachment to my dremel, then using a tool to carve them perfectly round, then drill out the centers and fill it with clear resin until it’s the right height to make the eyes. Here is a link to the 3D printed ones that were too oddly sized [Link] and discontinued shortly after I got them. Here is a link to some new eyes, made the same way with the lathe as the originals, but these are as small as 4mm. [Link] -Cubeco000 sends an image of an article I did for Musume, [Link] that was done before October, 2016, six months before I had ever gotten molds from them. They highlighted where I had said I make my own molds (which, for production of eyes, I still do). I show them the photo of my own handmade molds, which are ugly and tend to be hard to work with and customers don’t really want that when they are buying molds. I went to fetch the link to my listing, which I had set up to say they were manufactured by an outside source before, but when I changed suppliers I didn’t add it to the new listing. -Cubeco000 asks about my 3d design, which again, I ended up not using because they were ugly. I proved that I produce my own bases with the tiny 4mm, 6mm and 8mm ones I had made last month. -Cubeco000 no longer responds to my PMs, but they are still submitting comments on my photos that say that I am a thief, a copycat, stealing from them, etc. Some others join in to complain about the price. It is upsetting to me that I am trying to resolve this and they would rather make a scene. I really don’t know what they want at this point. To be clear, their listing never said that they didn’t want resellers or foreign agents to buy. Shops like Tata’s Paradise on Taobao and Sunny’s World on Taobao are very clear that they don’t want resellers and won’t sell to agents, and they cancel orders that are large in order to prevent agents from buying to resell. If they would have said this in their listing, I would not have bothered to buy from them and kept my original supplier, who was more expensive but fine with resellers and agents. I have also never claimed to make these molds. The listing image is clear that it is made by Cubeco [Link] (I have removed the listing since cubeco000 requested that, so this is just a link to the image) and I have never tried to hide the fact that it was made by someone else and bought through Taobao and an agent. Here is a tumblr post about it [Link] and another [Link], the last one goes into detail about the cost of molds as well. I probably should have provided links, but in the past when I have been more open about my production and supply side of things, people have messaged me telling me not to list them, since it makes it easier for people to copy me or cut out the middleman, so I have been trying to be more business-oriented and not share all the details of things. Even when I made clothes before, I would openly share my patterns and got warned that it would be a good way to lose most of my sales or have shops copy me.

I honestly don’t know what they want from me at this point. The money I have spent on the molds is gone, and Taobao doesn’t offer refunds, and my agent doesn’t either. So far, every time I try to get molds for customers to buy, it becomes a nightmare for me. Any time I try to outsource the production of anything, it becomes a bigger hassle than making it myself. At this point, I am just going to issue an apology and offer a refund to anyone who wants them and will send back the cubeco molds. I’m just flat out of the money I spent on the molds, and the ones from the supplier before this one, since I had to sell those at a loss to even sell them at all. It will be some time before I can have new 3D printed molds made, which I have been working on for some time, but the print quality from places like Shapeways isn’t high enough for the fine details. I have been saving towards a 3D printer, which I’ve talked about on my Instagram and Facebook before, for when I am ready to print my own doll in 3D. I was looking at the Form2, which is around $3k+, so I am thinking I will just wait until then to offer eyes, molds, etc. It has taken a lot for me to run the shop for the past six months. I work full time for a school, and I go to university as well. Running my shop on top of that has been daunting, and it’s been a struggle all around. I can’t seem to devote enough time to the shop for it to flourish like it needs to. I am honestly on the verge of just stopping Sproutydoll, and when I am finished with my own doll design, I will start up again. It might be under a new name, I have come up with a few designs for a “Prisma Doll” with a diamond and holographic theme, but now I worry that people will think I am changing names to avoid drama, because I am a con, or something else shady. I am very tired of reading bad anonymous comments about my shop, about my work and about me. Everyone seems to think that I am a big player in the BJD world, that I am being shady and spiteful, and that my quality is terrible and I am overcharging. As a one-person operation, these comments really hurt me. I may just be too sensitive to be involved in this kind of hobby, since I tend to be a very quiet person anyway, and try to stay away from social media as best I can. I really do love making things and having other people appreciate the things I make. I don’t even mind when people have issues and want to get them resolved, but when people say hurtful things through an anonymous filter, it gets me down. When people call me a liar, a cheater, a copycat or a con artist, it upsets me. I love to see people’s photos of their dolls with my products, but recently there’s been a lot of drama and negative comments and it makes it impossible to enjoy the work I do. As it is, I get home from work at 4PM and will usually work on my shop stuff until around 8, then get ready for bed since I have to get up around 5 in the morning for work. All my free time goes towards making things, and as encouraging as it is to see when people share their experiences with my shop and the things I make, it’s hard to remember them when I’m dealing with the drama and the anonymous things that I have been dealing with lately. Even now, I have reworked the overall design of my doll several times (Hence her nearly six-month delay) because I worry what people will say that it’s too similar to this doll, or the joints kind of look like that doll, and that I am a copycat. Some days it’s hard for me to work on the eyes at all, since I still feel the comments that it’s too expensive, amateurish, and that this brand or that brand are a better deal. I look at other brands and marvel at how nice they look, and feel that I can’t ever match the quality, no matter how many hours I spend on an eye. I do suffer from perfectionism, so I am always trying to find the line between acceptable and overdone. It always feels like the things I do are not good enough, and that the things others do are perfect, and if I could just spend a few more hours trying to figure it out, mine would be perfect, too. This post is getting long, so I will end it here. I am working on an apology to Cubeco since I realize I did not make sure that credit was easy to find.

#bjd #sproutydoll

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narcisbolgor-blog · 7 years

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Sadie Robertson Reveals the Dark Secret She Hid From Her Own Mother Until Now& Its Empowering Women Everywhere

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With her passion for pursuing Christ and her zeal for “living original,” Sadie Robertson is a role model for our daughters through and through.

As a part of remaining true to herself and her fans, the 20-year-old has always been an “open book” about the good, the bad AND the ugly in her very public life…but this week, she’s opening up about a topic that she has kept a secret until now.

“Many of you know I am an open book. I share most everything I walk through, but what I’m about to share with you is a particular topic I have always hidden,” she wrote in her blog post titled “I Woke Up Like This.”

Sadie intros her vulnerable post with an admission that she’s going to be “awkwardly honest” because the “‘I woke up like this’ lie is an uncomfortable one” for her to talk about.

The Duck Dynasty star started by sharing the experience she had at a recent photo-shoot that was supposed to be ‘all-natural,’ only to be told by the photographer that she didn’t have ‘the look’ to pull it off:

“I was a little shook by the change of plans the director decided to make by taking one look at me and stating his infamous comment, ‘Oh, no. This girl does not have the face for a no-makeup shoot.’ Ouch. Then, they sent me off for two hours to get my hair and makeup done. Yes, two hours to get that ‘all natural’ look so it could appear that I just happened to wake up like this…FLAWLESS.”

Live Original

“Once they were finally content with the look they had created, it was time for the shoot—but I knew it wasn’t over there,” she added. “They would undoubtedly go in later to Photoshop and edit any and everything that didn’t fit their standard of beauty, such as all those mysterious red dots on my face some of us refer to as pimples.”

But Sadie had one big problem with them projecting her Victoria’s Secret beach-wave curls and perfectly satin complexion as ‘natural.’

“Number one it is not really ‘me,'” she shared. “It is just simply a lie giving everyone something to compare themselves to that they can never compete with. Shoot, I can’t even compete with it.”

She doesn’t want to be the “photo-shopped girl behind the window or the screen” giving girls yet another impossible standard to aspire to, particularly because she’s been “damaged by ‘that girl.'”

“Tbh, I woke up LIKE THIS!”…

Live Original

“It was images like that with false advertisement that sent me down a spiral of trying to obtain an image I did not realize I was never going to be able to reach, because it was not real,” wrote Sadie. “I could have never imagined how much it would cost me to attempt to reach the standard of today’s beauty.”

The “Live Original” writer then transitioned into the meat of her message by exposing a personal struggle that she has “always hidden,” even from her own mother, until now:

“To be completely honest, it is because I did not know how to speak confidently about something that stole my confidence. I’m sure the media is going to love to run wild with this, but it’s part of my story and I feel led to share after recently finding out that 97 % of women have struggled with negative body image issues. It broke my heart, and I truly want to help change that statistic. Warning to all and as you are about to see me speaking from experience, it is not easy to jump to that 3%, but it is possible.

I struggled with an eating problem connected to a negative body image for about a year. It was dark. It was ugly. It was insanely difficult. It was done in secret. It was hidden. I did not even tell my own mother until recently. I thought I had everything under control. Maybe you have been saying that same thing? I didn’t even realize this small problem that I thought I had under control was creating a ripple effect, creating more and more problems, ones I certainly couldn’t control. I became angry with the person I was becoming. My self-worth was demolished, and I began to lose sight of my true identity.”

For a young woman who appeared to be so grounded in her identity, Sadie admits her struggles with fear and anxiety were still very real threats.

“My fear didn’t just stem from one particular thing,” she explained. “It was more of a [byproduct] of the battle happening in my heart and mind. I was trapped in a battle that took place 24/7, and it was one that day by day began to defeat me. My mirror, my pictures, my clothes, and my view were my worst enemies.”

But interestingly enough, during this year-and-a-half timeframe when Sadie was facing one of the fiercest battles in her life, she was helping others forge ahead to victory, making her silent war that much harder to detect.

“During this time I helped lead others into victory over their battles—but little did they know, I was staying behind on the battlefield,” she wrote. “I have heard it said that people develop eating disorders because it is something they can control in their life. That makes so much sense in my case, because during this particular time, so much in my life felt out of my control.”

Sadie then introduced the biggest “plot twist” to her story:

“It was the year after Dancing with the Stars. Shocker, I know. The girl who ‘did it.’ I went to Hollywood and didn’t go crazy for the world to see. I hear it said all of the time, ‘How do all of these young people go to Hollywood and just lose their minds?’ To be honest, I get it. I feel their pain. My struggles and confusion from it all just happened on the inside, rather than the outside for everyone to see—and that can at times make it even worse, because I was able to hide my ugliness on the inside, and that meant no one could call it out. There was no accountability.”

She continued that it’s often on the inside where “the enemy does his best work”:

“It distorts your view of beauty on the outside and the world around you. It distorts everything. Don’t hear me wrong, here—this isn’t really just another message of how your beauty on the inside is more important then the outside. This is a message highlighting how the extent of your ugliness on the inside is the very thing keeping you from experiencing the beauty on the outside.”

Sadie admitted that Satan’s biggest tactic with her was to get her to look at herself and her own imperfections more than her Savior. By getting her to obsess over her thigh gap, waistline and complexion, the enemy was able to take her attention away from the Cross:

“That was the enemy speaking, and when I came into agreement with those thoughts, it stole my perspective. I couldn’t see beauty in my creation, in exercise, in my sisters, in relationships, conversations, the weather, or in the GIFT OF FOOD for crying out loud. I allowed all of my ugly thoughts and insecurities to manifest a spirit of fear, jealousy and deception, and it stopped me from seeing the world around me clearly. My mom always says, ‘Sadie, if you are thinking everyone is looking at you, then you are thinking about yourself too much.'”

Because of this sobering wisdom, Sadie admits this is why she is now comfortable doing an all-natural photoshoot (even at 15 pounds heavier), because it is not all about HER:

“Here’s the funny thing—now I am happy to do an all natural photo-shoot, and the reality is, I am 15 pounds heavier then I was right after dancing with the stars. I literally cannot even wrap my head around how I was once able to get my hands to wrap around my thigh. Girls, hear me when I say this—you could search my heart and put me on a lie detector test, and I’d still tell you that I am happier, and have more joy than ever before. I drank a large mint mocha cooler this morning, while I worshipped and rooted myself in truth, and girls…I am feeling good. If it means being ‘less beautiful’ in the world’s eyes, that’s okay with me. As long as I still get to seek out real beauty—the kind that is found in God’s word, and is painted out in the world before me. I will gladly lay myself down at the feet of the Creator, not only to encounter more of the beauty He created in me but to experience the creation He surrounds me with.”

Sadie closes in charging girls everywhere to release their standard of beauty and embrace the one that God created by reading these Bible verses:

“Brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” Philippians 4:8

“Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.” 1 Peter 3:3-4

“I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.” Psalm 139:14

In bold “Live Original” style, Sadie commands, “Do not just read them once. Cover yourself in them daily, before you cover your face.”

Now that’s some Covergirl wisdom worth SHARING.

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=> *********************************************** Original Post Here: Sadie Robertson Reveals the Dark Secret She Hid From Her Own Mother Until Now& Its Empowering Women Everywhere ************************************ =>

Sadie Robertson Reveals the Dark Secret She Hid From Her Own Mother Until Now& Its Empowering Women Everywhere was originally posted by 16 MP Just news

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thesrhughes · 7 years

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Resident Evil 7 : Review

New Post has been published on http://thesrhughes.com/resident-evil-7-review/

Resident Evil 7 : Review

Why would an author write a Resident Evil 7 review? It’s a video game, after all.

Because this author plays a lot of video games. More on that in the near future.

(Also because I have access to a blog platform and the absurdist millennial belief that anyone cares a spit about my banal thoughts.)

The TL;DR version of this review is as follows: purchase this game. If you’re a fan of the franchise (which I’m not, really) or a fan of survival horror (which I am), you’ll love it. I might recommend waiting for a sale (I didn’t), since it comes in a bit short for its price point.

Alright, now for the long version.

Selling Point 1 : You’re Not Helpless.

I’m pretty sick of helplessness as a game mechanic. If a game is only scary because the player is helpless, it’s secretly not a very scary game. Anything can be scary if it’s done in low light with tense music and ALSO YOU’RE HELPLESS. This entire trend is even more absurd because, very often, the player character is walking around an environment often littered with weapons. Look, Outlast scared the shit out of me, despite having some of the most eye-rollingly ‘shock’ moments in gaming history, but at a certain point I started rooting for the monsters. The player character may be a journalist, but he’s a journalist walking through halls full of possible improvisational tools! Pick something up!

People and, by extension, fictional characters, have a tendency to create tools and even weaponry with pretty much whatever is at hand. They don’t call it ‘The Stone Age’ for fun, they call it that because the tools and weapons were made from stone. Human beings are so desperate for tools and weapons that we literally made them out of stone. But apparently our frightened avatars in modern horror games are too busy panting from terror to stop for a second and gather tools.

[/rant]

Resident Evil 7 assumes your character wants to make and use tools and weapons. That assumption changes everything. The environment is littered with resources, from big fuck-you-up guns to various chemicals and herbs to garden tools. It creates a more interesting dynamic than helplessness. Holding an ax gives you a sense of possibility, of strength. Swinging it gives you a sense of power. Whacking it into someone’s neck in a moment of desperate terror gives you an inch of control. Turning around to find the corpse mysteriously missing…

One of my favorite horror games ever was FEAR (and its sequel, FEAR 2.) It armed me from the start. The game handed its player a series of awesome, fuck-you-up guns. And then it peeled away the frail veneer of your confidence and dropped you into a situation far beyond your depth. Resident Evil 7 does something quite similar.

Selling Point 2 : A Dreadful Sense of Intimacy

The primary setting of RE7 is a sprawling plantation estate in rural Louisiana. It’s a family’s property. A fucked up family, but a family nonetheless. And the banality of that fact, the familiarity of a house’s interior, serves to create an unsettling intimacy. Family photographs, sports paraphernalia, book shelves, kids’ trophies, etc… the details of a family history are all there. There are even receipts and passive-aggressive sticky notes. And the player is pressured by game mechanics and curiosity to check everything, to look into every corner, to experience as thoroughly as possible this maddening juxtaposition of the familiar and the grotesque.

Perhaps this is what I like most about the game: the minimal scope. You are a lone human maneuvering through a minuscule slice of the globe. The massive, overarching lore of the franchise is missing. The vast scale of backstory is unimportant. This is a game about the protagonist and the antagonists and very little else.

Franchises tend to bloat. Scale expands and exposition piles up. This game, ‘reboot’ or not, solves that problem with a sharp, indifferent knife. It delivers what it needs: a tightly-focused story.

Selling Point 3 : Something For Everyone

Horror is lush with sub-genres. RE7 does its best to tap as many as possible.

Supernatural horror is immediately dangled in front of our faces. Body horror is omnipresent. Sci-fi horror is the franchise staple. RE7 even incorporates moments of splatterpunk and, of course, general action-horror. Oh, I almost forgot, there’s a whole SAW-inspired puzzle-solving section, too. Not to mention shades of Chainsaw Massacre throughout…chainsaw very much included. Which also reminds me that southern gothic archetypes and references are everywhere in RE7. There are also cosmic horror references, though that particular sub-genre doesn’t make any real appearances in the game proper.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that there’s something for everyone. And though the run-and-hide mode of helplessness horror isn’t an expressed requirement of the game, running and hiding is often the wisest course of action. So they’ve got that, too, if you like it.

One might worry that the ‘dash of everything’ approach might overclutter the game, but it doesn’t. It provides different levels to the gameplay and, what’s more, always seems in service to the story.

Selling Point 4 : Sadistic Antagonists

I saw an article online lamenting the ugly gameplay necessity of key gathering, narratively lampshaded with the idea that the antagonists want to make it hard for you to escape. The article pointed out that the antagonists didn’t bother reinforcing the walls, blocking the doors, or bricking up the windows. I imagined that such measures would take away some of the ‘fun’ for the antagonists. As much as they claim they don’t want to chase anyone down anymore, they seem to get a wicked joy out of doing just that. If they made it too hard to escape, they’d lose the ecstasy of chasing down the desperately hopeful escapees and butchering them!

Such is the rabid sadism of our front-and-center antagonists. Quite early in the game, during my second playthrough, I discovered myself gravely wounded by my pursuer. Instead of finishing the job, he set a healing kit down on the floor and cooed at me to use it. Once I’d patched myself up, he even gave me a headstart before coming after me again. So, in my mind, the key hunting has nothing to do with making it difficult for me to leave; it has everything to do with providing the antagonists with entertainment.

These batshit crazy sadists provide the main antagonism. Hordes of faceless monsters provide secondary, supporting antagonism (the ‘nameless goon’ variety, mostly.) And then, behind it all, there lurks a vast, faintly-inhuman force (oh, wait, I guess those cosmic horror references make some sense after all). Each layer of antagonism serves a purpose both to story and to gameplay. The front-and-center villains are charmingly psychotic and extremely terrifying. The nameless goons provide tense, strategic combat. And the terrible intelligence behind the whole show creates a layer of moral and intellectual questions the game would otherwise lack. It’s quite an exquisite array of enemies.

The Downside : It’s a Bit Pricey.

Currently, the game goes for $59.99, not including DLCs or soundtrack. My first playthrough took 10 hours, my second took 7. There’s an in-game achievement for managing it down to 4. Though it’s a bit replayable, if only for the sheer moodiness and the awesome realization of its setting, replayability isn’t its prime directive. I’ll certainly be prancing through it a third time, but I’m a particular sort of person. In the main, I doubt most people will go through it more than twice. So what that settles down to is that the base game provides, say, 10-20 hours of gameplay for a ~$60 price tag. No thanks.

It was worth it, for me, because I love the genre and I’m utterly sick of helplessness horror. I’ve played through twice and will be playing a third time at least. I enjoy the game from a gameplay perspective and from a horror theory perspective. I also sprang for the DLCs, not yet available for PC, which I hear add significant replayability–but we’re not discussing the DLCs, are we? No. We’re discussing the cost of the base game. And the cost of the base game, unless you’re a weirdo like me, is simply too high.

But I guarantee it’ll be on sale in the near future. So if you’re the patient sort, you’re in luck.

Final Thoughts

RE7 provides an excellent experience. It’s nerve-wracking, unsettling, frightening, and fun. In my original 10-hour playthrough, I sweated and panicked through the first 2 hours like a man on the edge. For the few hours after that, my mood shifted between anxiety and joy. Anxiety at every door, every corridor, and every corner; joy at my increasing competence at solving my dilemmas. Most of the last hour was spent in full action mode, all sound and fury and laughter. It was an incredible emotional journey.

In my second playthrough, I was more confident. My relatively eased anxiety allowed me to appreciate the setting and the art of the game more deeply. The narrative flow, the peaks and valleys of fear throughout the story, etc. It was during my second playthrough that I really fell in love with the game.

So, yes, it’s an exquisite game, an excellent bit of interactive horror media, and a decently written (if also unevenly written) story. My only dismay is at the price tag, a number I think is a bit high for people less fanatical about their devotion to horror media and video games than I am. But I suppose that’s for them to decide.

#biohazard #games #horror #monsters #resident evil #review #supernatural #video games

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itsfinancethings · 5 years

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October 31, 2019 at 06:33AM

In the storied career of America’s most famous mayor, the last five weeks have been quite a chapter. During a shouting match on CNN on Sept. 19, Rudy Giuliani denied and then, 30 seconds later, admitted to playing a central role in President Donald Trump’s efforts to get a foreign country to investigate his top 2020 rival, Joe Biden. Five days later, Giuliani went nuclear on a radio host during a joint TV appearance, shouting, “Shut up, moron, shut up!” as he tried to drown out accusations that he was making things up. Trump’s personal lawyer capped it off on Oct. 16 by pocket–dialing a reporter for NBC News and inadvertently leaving a lengthy message as he talked to an unidentified partner about potentially lucrative business in Turkey and Bahrain.

Some people were worried. Giuliani’s longtime associate Bernard Kerik says he keeps getting asked, “Is he O.K.?” Walter Mack, who ran an organized–crime unit for Giuliani back when they were prosecutors in Manhattan in the 1980s, says he wonders the same. Mack says if he saw him now, “I would talk to him as a friend and a fellow prosecutor, and just be certain he was getting good advice and that he was not losing sight of his own standards and morals.” Kerik, who was Giuliani’s top cop in New York and later served three years in federal prison for tax fraud and other crimes, talks regularly with his old friend. Giuliani, he says, is just “vocal” now that he doesn’t have to worry about “running for office.”

Photograph by Spencer Heyfron—Redux

But it’s a bewildering turn of events for a person who at one point in his career had been among the most admired public figures in the country. Giuliani was always colorful. As mayor, he was a New York archetype come to life: the fast-talking, Bronx-accented wheeler-dealer, complete with mistresses, sharp suits and primo seats at Yankee Stadium. And many loved him for being an iconoclast. He was the law-and-order mayor who cleaned up Times Square, a Republican who believed in gun control and gay rights, a self–described pro-choice Republican as at home at the city’s glimmering galas as at the televised perp walk of a criminal. With exuberant F-you energy, he seemed to embody the city itself. And for the brief post-9/11 moment when Americans were all New Yorkers, the whole country became Giuliani’s constituents too.

His latest brush with history is revealing a darker side, something that suggests not just Giuliani unbound, but untethered from the values he once espoused. And as the House impeachment inquiry accelerates, and witness after witness describes Giuliani as the prime enabler behind what Democrats say are impeachable offenses committed by Trump, Giuliani’s behavior may end up having historic consequences.

So what is going on with him? Interviews with those close to the former mayor, and those who have crossed paths with him in his work for Trump, say Giuliani’s transformation has a simple source: over the past 18 months, he has violated that unwritten rule of American public life that you can pursue money or political power, but not both at once.

There’s nothing particularly exceptional about riding the revolving door from having power to making money and back again, and for years Giuliani has pursued both with relish. After leaving the mayoralty, Giuliani cashed in with book deals; high-priced speaking engagements; and a lucrative, if murky, consulting business that counted Qatar, Purdue Pharma and a range of controversial foreign personalities as top clients. After a brief and failed attempt to get back into power as a candidate for President in 2008, he returned to the money game. By 2018, he was making between $5 million and $10 million a year.

Drew Angerer—Getty ImagesTrump and Giuliani walk out of Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, N.J. on Nov. 20, 2016

What’s different now is that Giuliani is doing both at the same time. In the 18 months since Trump hired him as his personal lawyer in April 2018, Giuliani has become a kind of shadow Secretary of State even as he has maintained his foreign consulting business. He has often been treated as a de facto envoy of the U.S. government while abroad, at the same time receiving lucrative consulting and speaking fees from foreign officials and businessmen.

His quest has been enabled by Trump, who entrusted Giuliani with Cabinet-level influence. When Energy Secretary Rick Perry pushed Trump in May to meet with Ukraine’s new President, for example, Trump told him to “visit with Rudy,” according to an interview Perry gave the Wall Street Journal. And an aide to former National Security Adviser John Bolton told congressional impeachment investigators that Giuliani was running a parallel foreign policy, outside the normal channels of U.S. diplomacy. Meanwhile, as Trump’s cable-news defender and then his personal lawyer, Giuliani remained technically a private citizen, unencumbered by long-standing ethics rules designed to prevent officials from using public service for personal gain.

And gain he did: where the salary of the actual Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, was $210,700 last year, until the past few years Giuliani seemed to enjoy a lavish, approximately $230,000-a-month lifestyle that includes six homes, access to private jets and 11 country-club memberships, according to his recent divorce–court filings published by the New York Times.

Giuliani says there’s nothing wrong with continuing his consulting for foreign clients while at the same time representing the President. “Of course I don’t mix the two things,” he told TIME in a phone interview. He said people pay him as a lawyer and security expert, and because he has “done some remarkable things that nobody else has ever done.” “Everything I’m doing now is similar to what I did in the past,” Giuliani says.

Pat Carroll—New York Daily News Archive/Getty ImagesAs the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, Giuliani oversaw big cases, and took credit for them

His critics say that is exactly the problem. As he jetted around mixing his access to Trump with his personal business, they began asking, Whose interests was he serving? America’s? Trump’s? His own? Much of the work that Giuliani has done remains undisclosed—few know which foreign interests are paying him, how much they’re paying or what exactly they’re getting in return.

But amid the many self-dealing scandals besetting the Trump Administration, Giuliani’s adventures went largely ignored, at first. And he might have happily continued his money power play but for one thing: Ukraine.

Things began going wrong around April, when special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe was drawing to a close. Fighting Mueller had been job one for Giuliani and had brought him closer than ever to the President. Serendipitously, Giuliani now says, he had uncovered another scandal. This one involved a series of conspiracy theories in Ukraine, including a search for dirt on Joe Biden’s son Hunter, who had been paid to sit on the board of a Ukrainian energy company when Biden was Vice President. This new scandal would come to obsess the President as he prepared to run for re-election.

It was while working to substantiate these conspiracy theories that Giuliani appears to have gotten himself into trouble. In August 2018, he had gone into business with two Soviet-born émigrés who have since been arrested on charges that they illegally funneled foreign money to political campaigns in the U.S. Their lawyer resisted a request for documents from the House impeachment inquiry in part on the grounds they have assisted Giuliani in other work for Trump.

Now Giuliani’s successors in the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan are looking into his own business dealings in Ukraine, including meetings he held with government officials there, according to reports in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal.

Aram Roston—ReutersGiuliani and his client Lev Parnas on Sept. 20 at the Trump hotel in D.C.

How much damage will come from Giuliani’s 18-month romp through the swamps of money and power is now the question of the Trump presidency. Current and former senior Administration officials worry that he has been putting unsubstantiated Ukrainian conspiracy theories into Trump’s head and that Trump doesn’t know or understand that Giuliani has business interests that may be served by some of the advice he is giving the President. Most of all, they blame Giuliani for Trump’s push during a July 25 phone call to get the Ukrainian President to investigate Biden, a 2020 political rival.

But Giuliani is confident Trump won’t turn on him: “He’s 100% in my corner and loyal to me as I am to him.” And for now, Trump doesn’t seem to be aware of, or at least worried about, what Giuliani’s murky mix of business and diplomacy may have gotten him into. “Rudy Giuliani’s a great crime fighter,” Trump said on Oct. 28 in response to a question from TIME. “He’s always looking for corruption, which is what more people should be doing. He’s a good man.”

At some point soon, Trump may face the reality of a trial in the Senate over charges he abused his office. Some of those allegations will be linked to Giuliani’s efforts in Ukraine. Giuliani’s increasingly erratic behavior suggests that his gravy train of easy deals tied to political power may come to an ugly end. The question is what else will come to an end with it.

No one believed him. It was October 2018, and Giuliani had just stepped out of a three-car motorcade into a light drizzle in the Armenian capital of Yerevan. An eager gaggle of government officials in dark suits deferentially escorted him as he walked toward a memorial to the Armenian genocide, while reporters live-streaming his visit asked questions about U.S. foreign policy. “I am not here in my capacity as a private lawyer to President Trump,” Giuliani said, “I am here as a private citizen.”

It was clear that no one intended to treat him like one, and that was just fine with Giuliani. Although he was there to speak about cyber–security at a Russian-led trade conference, his trip had all the trappings of an official visit. Armenia’s Defense Minister briefed him in private, and the government released a formal readout of the meeting. News reports identifying Giuliani as a White House envoy scrutinized his answers on whether the U.S. would formally recognize the Armenian genocide. Sharing the stage with Sergey Glazyev, a longtime adviser of President Vladimir Putin who has been under U.S. sanctions since Russia’s 2014 invasion of Ukraine, Giuliani dangled potential U.S. cooperation on cybersecurity with a Russian–led trade bloc. One Armenian who met with the former mayor said, “He may be the contact person between Yerevan and Washington.”

Giuliani told TIME his paid speech was “perfectly appropriate” and one of “over 1,000 speeches” he has given for a fee, but refused to discuss details. Giuliani has been known to charge as much as $200,000 for a public speech and up to $175,000 a month to be retained for security consulting.

Giuliani’s foray in Armenia is just one of his many gigs. Around the same time that he traveled to Yerevan, he was paid by a global consulting firm to send a letter calling for changes to Romania’s anti-corruption program, a position that contradicted the U.S. State Department’s stance. He attended an event by Congolese lobbyists that left them with the impression he would work with them on the Trump Administration’s position on sanctions on the country. His firm secured a $1.6 million deal to do security work in a Brazilian province in the Amazon.

After joining Trump’s inner circle, his dealings became more freewheeling. He regularly conducted business on his cell phone while holding court at upscale cigar clubs in New York and Washington, and after nearly two decades of work abroad, foreign officials, businessmen and journalists knew where to reach him.

But even as he has become an increasingly ubiquitous public figure, much of his work remains undisclosed. Even top government officials are often grasping for signs. White House officials were surprised, for example, when Trump seemed receptive to the possible extradition of Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish cleric who lives in the U.S. and is a political opponent of the current Turkish leadership, according to the Washington Post and New York Times. Giuliani told TIME he spoke to Administration officials about Gulen, but in relation to a client in a separate matter.

Giuliani says that the questions about his business dealings are “insulting.” He maintains that he is paid only for his expertise—not for representing foreigners or lobbying the Trump Administration, which would force him to register as a foreign agent. He left his law firm Greenberg Traurig in May 2018, and touted that he was working for the President for free out of patriotic duty.

Friends defend his business endeavors. “He’s always wanted to make money since he left as mayor, so what?” says Jon Sale, a former Watergate prosecutor who knew Giuliani when they both worked as federal prosecutors in Manhattan. “In a lot of circles, Rudy’s stature is not what it was. But I’ve been with him in some places and some parts of the country where people still continue to revere him. People come up to take a picture with him and for autographs and say, ‘Thank you Mr. Mayor for what you’ve done.’”

After winning election as mayor in 1993, Giuliani cracked down on crime, using often controversial tactics to “clean up” the largest city in America. But it was his response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks that made him an international celebrity. The destruction of the World Trade Centers terrified America, and his reassuring presence on the streets of the city made him an icon of resilience. In 2001, TIME named the “mayor of the world” the Person of the Year.

But if a successful political career had led him to the peak of power in his hometown, a lifetime of government salaries hadn’t made him rich. In June 2001, his divorce lawyer famously declared from the steps of a Manhattan courthouse that the then mayor had only $7,000 to his name.

After he left office, he cashed in on his fame. First he wrote a best-selling book, Leadership, and lined up hundreds of high-priced speaking engagements. In one period from 2006 to 2007, Giuliani made more than $16 million, $10 million of which came from delivering 108 paid speeches around the globe about leadership and security.

Giuliani also went to work for a variety of high-paying but controversial clients both as a lawyer and as a security consultant. His consulting firm signed a contract with Qatar around 2005 at a time when the Gulf state’s security forces were under scrutiny for letting the Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed slip away from the FBI in 1996.

Buoyed by the wave of goodwill and his celebrity, he launched a bid for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination. He quickly cemented himself as the early front runner, with 34% of likely Republican voters saying they would vote for him in a March 2007 poll. But his run imploded in the wake of questions about his foreign lobbying and liberal positions on social issues. His abrasive style and fixation on terrorism didn’t help, leading Biden to deliver the now famous line that there were only three things Giuliani ever mentioned in a sentence: “A noun, a verb and 9/11.”

After his run for the ultimate position of power failed, he seemed to fade from the headlines and turned back to making money. In his business as an international security consultant, he again took on controversial clients, including a Turkish gold trader accused of laundering Iranian money. He took several trips to Russia and former Soviet countries through TriGlobal Strategic Ventures, a secretive international consulting company that has provided image consulting to Russian oligarchs and others close to the Kremlin.

Having failed to win the White House himself, Giuliani may have been as surprised as anyone when his old friend Donald Trump’s unexpected election offered him proximity to Oval Office. Giuliani and Trump knew each other for decades. Both were raised in the outer boroughs of New York City, made their names in Manhattan, sought the limelight early in their careers and became regulars in New York’s gossip pages.

In 2000, at the Inner Circle dinner, a rollicking convention of big names and comedians, Giuliani wore a lavender dress and blond wig for a spoof video in which Trump leers at Giuliani and says, “You know, you’re really beautiful.” When Giuliani sprays perfume on his chest, Trump rubs his face in it. “Oh you dirty boy,” Giuliani says in a high-pitched voice, and slaps him.

Giuliani did not publicly endorse Trump until two weeks before the New York State Republican primary. But when he did, he was all in. It was Giuliani who went on all five Sunday-morning shows to defend Trump after the Oct. 7, 2016, release of a recording of Trump talking about grabbing women by their genitals.

Ironically his current position as unofficial envoy of the President came about only when he didn’t get the Administration job he had hoped for. After Trump’s election, Giuliani turned down top spots at the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security, hoping instead to be named Trump’s Secretary of State. Giuliani lobbied hard for the position, touting as credentials his 150 foreign trips to more than 80 countries as a globe-trotting consultant. But Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, were concerned that Giuliani’s celebrity would make him unmanageable at State. When it became clear Giuliani wasn’t going to get the job, he withdrew from consideration, saying he “could play a better role being on the outside and continuing to be his close friend and adviser.”

That role was a boon for Giuliani financially, but he still had the itch for real power. He saw an opportunity in Trump’s frustration with his legal team’s failure to protect him in the Russia investigation. For more than a year, Trump had been fuming, “I don’t have a lawyer,” invoking the memory of Roy Cohn, the notoriously ruthless New York attorney and power broker, according to the Mueller report. Trump said he wanted “someone who got things done.” In Giuliani, who had taken to television news shows to repeatedly attack Mueller, he found his Roy Cohn.

For months, Giuliani had a good run under Trump. Even while many close to the President warned that relying on Giuliani could be his downfall, the former mayor was able to carry out both his freewheeling deals and Trump’s wishes without restraints. As White House advisers came and went in a steady stream of firings and resignations, Giuliani endured. But it was ultimately his full-throttle pursuit of the thinly sourced Ukraine scandal that may have historic consequences for him, the President and the country.

In August 2018, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, a pair of Soviet émigrés based in Florida, entered Giuliani’s life. Parnas paid Giuliani a $500,000 retainer for what he said was legal and business advice for his fraud–prevention firm. Up until then, Parnas and Fruman had been unknown and unconnected. But soon enough, they were able to get access to prominent Republican circles, in part by flaunting their association with Giuliani.

They posted photos of themselves enjoying dinner at the White House, including photos with Trump. They shared photos of their breakfast with Trump’s son Don Jr. and drinks “celebrating” after the conclusion of the Mueller probe with the White House legal team. As they jetted around the world, they boasted of political connections that could open doors. “They told us they would bring Mayor Giuliani to the dinner with them if we honored them,” Farley Weiss, the president of the National Council of Young Israel, an umbrella group for a network of Orthodox synagogues, told TIME in an email. The group honored the two with an award in March.

Their lucky streak didn’t last for long. In early October, Parnas and Fruman were arrested at Dulles airport outside Washington after they bought one-way tickets to Vienna. They were charged with the federal crime of scheming to buy U.S. political influence by funneling foreign donations to politicians. Court filings alleged they distributed $675,500 in campaign contributions to at least 14 Republican candidates.

Unfortunately for Giuliani, the pair’s arrest shone a spotlight on their other dealings with him as well. Parnas and Fruman had been serving as middlemen between Giuliani and Ukrainian officials in Giuliani’s quest to dig up politically damaging information on Democrats for Trump. Prosecutors said they had lobbied then Texas Representative Pete Sessions to push for the ouster of the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, whom Giuliani considered an obstacle to investigating the Bidens. When the former mayor had to cancel his trip to Ukraine in May amid accusations of political meddling, Parnas reportedly went to Kiev presenting himself as a representative of Giuliani to seek out information about the Bidens.

And then there’s the question of the half million dollars Giuliani received from Parnas’ fraud-prevention firm. He has claimed he knows “exactly” where it came from. “I’ve seen the wires,” he told the Washington Post. (The money was reportedly briefly in Fruman’s account.) But it’s unclear how Parnas and Fruman had access to those kinds of funds. A TIME review of Florida court filings show that since the mid-2000s, they left a trail of bankruptcies, failed businesses, evictions and lawsuits for failing to pay back loans.

All this has put Giuliani in the sights of the same prosecutor’s office he once led. An investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Southern District of New York has been scrutinizing his connection to Parnas and Fruman, as well as his bank records and meetings with Ukrainian officials, according to the Wall Street Journal. Giuliani has denied any wrongdoing and said that prosecutors “can look at my Ukraine business all they want.” Giuliani insisted to TIME he is not in any legal jeopardy.

“I have to presume they’re innocent,” he told the New York Times about Parnas and Fruman. “None of those facts that I see there make any sense to me, so I don’t know what they mean.”

How consequential this particular aspect of the multifaceted Ukraine scandal will prove remains unclear. Testimony by multiple nonpartisan Trump Administration officials has shown that Giuliani was the main driver behind Trump’s efforts to force Ukraine to investigate the Bidens. To strengthen the case for doing so, Giuliani has touted an affidavit from a former Ukrainian prosecutor alleging he was fired in March 2016 for investigating the gas firm that employed Biden’s son. That document, TIME reported in October, was produced by the legal team for a Ukrainian billionaire currently living in Vienna who is fighting extradition to the U.S. This summer, his American lawyers hired Parnas as their translator.

One thing that’s clear is that Giuliani is already feeling the financial consequences of the Ukraine scandal. And he’s not happy about it. In his accidental voicemail to NBC News, Giuliani can be heard saying, “The problem is we need some money.” After a pause, he says, “We need a few hundred thousand.” The intense scrutiny of the House investigation has forced Giuliani to pull out of lucrative opportunities. He had been planning to return to Armenia this year for the same Kremlin-backed trade conference he had attended with great fanfare in October 2018.

But when word leaked out about his travel plans just days after the whistleblower complaint implicated him in pressuring Ukraine, it caused a public backlash. Just hours after confirming the paid speech, he reversed himself and announced he wouldn’t be going back to Yerevan after all. —With reporting by Tara Law and Sanya Mansoor/New York; Simon Shuster/Kiev; and Molly Ball, Tessa Berenson and Abby Vesoulis/-Washington □

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