What do I mean by that? I mean that the media everyone loves is not for me. All the franchises we know and love have been tarnished by writers who didn’t love them to begin with, starting with The Force Awakens and most recently with Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League.
One thing that I’ve noticed the past few years as this has happened is everyone saying to go with eastern media instead, and that it’s been thriving with movies, anime, comic books/manga, video games, etc. I see comments like this it all the time on Reddit, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook. Usually it’s regarding criticism of AAA studios or Hollywood.
I’ve tried different kinds of these things, and none of them just to do it for me. At the end of the day, I like American media plain and simple. And no I don’t mean that in a bigoted way towards eastern culture, it’s just what I know and what I grew up on as a Mexican American, and those included stuff like Star Wars, Mass Effect, Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, WWE, Marvel, etc.
I’ve tried manga, JRPG’s, Korean/Japense movies and anime, and I’m sorry but none of them hit the same for me. Sure they’re good by objective standards but me personally it’s just not the same. And this is where I feel between a rock and a hard place, and it’s borderline depressing.
It’s almost like if I can’t enjoy anything anymore. I can’t enjoy western media now because it’s all been ruined. Hollywood writers ruining franchises, companies like Sweet Baby Inc forcing wokeness into games, nothing that I’m interested in is fun anymore.
But then on the other hand I’m seeing everyone else enjoying all these forms of media but they’re not fun for me because I’m not into eastern culture like the rest of the people are.
I chose to post this here because this one of the very few subs that actually has civil discussions. Am I being too negative, am I just too close minded, is there anyone else who can relate?

Me (24F) and my boyfriend (26M) just started living together. I’m starting to feel a bit unsure about him. I’m not sure if it’s one thing or a cluster of things. Both my boyfriend and I are pretty “innocent”, like I grew up religious and never had sex with anyone, he’s not religious but he never slept with anyone or did anything sexual other than kissing (he only briefly dated one girl on and off), the longest he dated her was 4 months and they kept breaking up, they didn’t really do anything other than kissing, he never met her parents, she never slept over, they didn’t have restaurant dates or anything, and she never had dinner with his parents either.
Him and I started dating and we did all these things, we were best friends for 2 years before dating, I was dating another guy for a while, he said he always liked me, even when I was dating that other guy. He’s very very affectionate with me and sweet and loving and caring. We dated for a bit and then separated because my ex was very mentally devastated, but then got back together after 5 months. We’ve been dating for 8 months now and moving in together. However, recently I have been having some doubts, I’m not sure if these are normal doubts or it’s just because I’m not super experienced with relationships?
Here are the reasons I have doubts: - When we started dating for the second time, I saw that he would visit pages on Reddit like jennaortegalust, madisonbeersofine, and florencepughNSFW. This made me feel weird and I asked him, and he said he used to search those when he was single and this whole relationship thing is new to him so he’s not used to not doing those, but he did stop and hasn’t looked at those in months (from what I know).

• He looked up his ex a couple times a month when we first started dating. Her and him were hanging out when him and I first started seeing each other and he didn’t want to hangout with her and I wanted a relationship with him, so I told him to tell her he’s dating someone else now (he told her that and stopped talking to her). I found out he searched her up in instagram a couple times the following months. I get it, people get curious, I search up my ex from time to time as well. But his ex is kinda petty so she randomly blocked him on instagram and everything, and then I saw he was looking at her sister’s profile a couple times? And he searched her family up in Facebook. We were dating for four months by this point. He only looked them up once or twice a month the first five months we were dating but I still feel weird? Especially looking at her sister’s profile after his ex blocked him? He did hangout with both of them a couple times in the summer before we got together so it could have been just curiosity. It looks like he hasn’t really looked them up since January or February but I still feel a bit icky. Does this mean he wasn’t over his ex when we started dating even though he swore he was? Even when him and I were friends and not dating those few months, he said he was trying to cut her off because he just can’t be himself or open with her as she seems too polite or fake. But then why search her or her family up when we started dating?
  
• He can lie about these things to make me feel better like he’ll be like “I was over her the second time we broke up” but then why look her up at all. He does look up a lot of things out of curiosity but I still feel weird. And also the looking up celebrities thing, but he hasn’t done that in 6 months.
  
• He has expressed he loves me multiple times but does not say it outright. We’ve only been dating for 8 months so I guess it’s fair.
  

I just want to know if these are valid concerns and a reason as to why I’m unsure about him? Other than that, he’s such a loving and caring boyfriend, constantly cooking me breakfast and showering me with love and kisses. Also he basically wanted me to move in with him so bad that he kept saying he’ll do all the chores and garbage and everything. I used to feel really attracted to him and I used to think I loved him.
But because of the reasons above, I just don’t know how to feel, I do want to be with him, but I do wish he didn’t do those things, but then again it could be just me growing up conservative. I’m scared I’ll lose feelings for him and just won’t think he’s that pure (not everyone’s definition of pure but I grew up pretty conservative). My ex would barely go online and was very into the outdoors, so I don’t know if I’m comparing my bf to my ex in terms of how often they go online and just look up things. I did talk to my boyfriend about searching up his ex before, he said he did it out of curiosity and after a while you just forget about exes and stop doing that, and he told me how he was over her the second time they dated, because she was flaky and too polite with him where he didn’t know her properly and couldn’t be open with her, and did tell me multiple times he wanted to stop hanging out with her while they were hanging out but didn’t know how to say it to her (he told me this even when we were friends, not dating), as she can be quite emotional and was suicidal at one point. Anyway, not sure how to move forward, I don’t know if I’m overreacting or if these are valid reasons. I feel bad as he’s so kind to me and constantly takes care of me and looks after me, he even said I was the only girl he ever thought about saying the L word to (again, didn’t say it outright, but talked about how he wanted to say it to me). Sorry if this post is a bit long, but any advice is helpful.
TLDR: I’m feeling unsure about boyfriend because he looked up ex, and looked up NSFW celebrity pages on Reddit once or twice, and doesn’t say “I love you” directly.

Me (24F) and my boyfriend (26M) just started living together. I’m starting to feel a bit unsure about him. I’m not sure if it’s one thing or a cluster of things. Both my boyfriend and I are pretty “innocent”, like I grew up religious and never had sex with anyone, he’s not religious but he never slept with anyone or did anything sexual other than kissing (he only briefly dated one girl on and off), the longest he dated her was 4 months and they kept breaking up, they didn’t really do anything other than kissing, he never met her parents, she never slept over, they didn’t have restaurant dates or anything, and she never had dinner with his parents either.
Him and I started dating and we did all these things, we were best friends for 2 years before dating, I was dating another guy for a while, he said he always liked me, even when I was dating that other guy. He’s very very affectionate with me and sweet and loving and caring. We dated for a bit and then separated because my ex was very mentally devastated, but then got back together after 5 months. We’ve been dating for 8 months now and moving in together. However, recently I have been having some doubts, I’m not sure if these are normal doubts or it’s just because I’m not super experienced with relationships?
Here are the reasons I have doubts: - When we started dating for the second time, I saw that he would visit pages on Reddit like jennaortegalust, madisonbeersofine, and florencepughNSFW. This made me feel weird and I asked him, and he said he used to search those when he was single and this whole relationship thing is new to him so he’s not used to not doing those, but he did stop and hasn’t looked at those in months (from what I know).

• He looked up his ex a couple times a month when we first started dating. Her and him were hanging out when him and I first started seeing each other and he didn’t want to hangout with her and I wanted a relationship with him, so I told him to tell her he’s dating someone else now (he told her that and stopped talking to her). I found out he searched her up in instagram a couple times the following months. I get it, people get curious, I search up my ex from time to time as well. But his ex is kinda petty so she randomly blocked him on instagram and everything, and then I saw he was looking at her sister’s profile a couple times? And he searched her family up in Facebook. We were dating for four months by this point. He only looked them up once or twice a month the first five months we were dating but I still feel weird? Especially looking at her sister’s profile after his ex blocked him? He did hangout with both of them a couple times in the summer before we got together so it could have been just curiosity. It looks like he hasn’t really looked them up since January or February but I still feel a bit icky. Does this mean he wasn’t over his ex when we started dating even though he swore he was? Even when him and I were friends and not dating those few months, he said he was trying to cut her off because he just can’t be himself or open with her as she seems too polite or fake. But then why search her or her family up when we started dating?
  
• He can lie about these things to make me feel better like he’ll be like “I was over her the second time we broke up” but then why look her up at all. He does look up a lot of things out of curiosity but I still feel weird. And also the looking up celebrities thing, but he hasn’t done that in 6 months.
  
• He has expressed he loves me multiple times but does not say it outright. We’ve only been dating for 8 months so I guess it’s fair.
  

I just want to know if these are valid concerns and a reason as to why I’m unsure about him? Other than that, he’s such a loving and caring boyfriend, constantly cooking me breakfast and showering me with love and kisses. Also he basically wanted me to move in with him so bad that he kept saying he’ll do all the chores and garbage and everything. I used to feel really attracted to him and I used to think I loved him.
But because of the reasons above, I just don’t feel that love for him anymore or strong romantic feelings and just don’t think he’s that pure (not everyone’s definition of pure but I grew up pretty conservative). My ex would barely go online and was very into the outdoors, so I don’t know if I’m comparing my bf to my ex in terms of how often they go online and just look up things. I did talk to my boyfriend about searching up his ex before, he said he did it out of curiosity and after a while you just forget about exes and stop doing that, and he told me how he was over her the second time they dated, because she was flaky and too polite with him where he didn’t know her properly and couldn’t be open with her, and did tell me multiple times he wanted to stop hanging out with her while they were hanging out but didn’t know how to say it to her (he told me this even when we were friends, not dating), as she can be quite emotional and was suicidal at one point. Anyway, not sure how to move forward, I don’t know if I’m overreacting or if these are valid reasons. I feel bad as he’s so kind to me and constantly takes care of me and looks after me, he even said I was the only girl he ever thought about saying the L word to (again, didn’t say it outright, but talked about how he wanted to say it to me). Sorry if this post is a bit long, but any advice is helpful.

Hello everyone! I apologize for this being a long post but I'm hoping it will expedite this process in the end.
A bit about me to get out of the way! I'm 21F, I've been RPing for ten years now, and I'm in the CST time zone. I'm also chronically ill and typically cannot predict when I'll be unable to write. You can expect RP responses from me to come somewhere between immediately to 10 days, but I try to reply daily or every other day depending on length.
How I write: - My preference is novella or advanced lit - Looking for at least 500 words per post (I prefer 1,000-3,000+ words) - 3rd person - Past tense preferred - Descriptive responses - Please give at least 2 things my character can react to per response - I'm looking for plots that won't fizzle out once the characters get to know one another (plots should have direction)
Where I write: - Discord - GoogleDocs
What I write: - Supernatural/Paranormal - Grimdark - Mystery - High/low fantasy (for high fantasy, I prefer to double) - Horror - Adventure - Romance (not as a standalone) - Political (not as a standalone) - Comedic horror - Or a combo of these! - Overall I like spooky elements - I like sweet mundane moments but I don't do sol
What else I'm looking for: - Friendly communicative ooc - Must be all 🏳️‍🌈+ friendly - Character or plot driven RPs - Playing multiple characters is preferable - Nuanced characters - Worldbuilding - Character development - 90-99% SFW
My non-negotiables to make sure I'm not wasting your time!: - No controlling my characters - No one over 31 or under 19! - No GMs - No keeping plot points secret intentionally - No self inserts - No canon characters or real people
Other things I like: - Planning ideas OOC - Send me some music! - Unique ideas+ characters! - Exploring our characters' psyche - Symbolism - On the nose names - Irony - Doubling! - Flowery writing - Drawing/making music for characters
For References: - I typically sketch my characters and use AI to generate them based on the sketch - I personally won't use celebrity faceclaims (nor will I RP as an IRL person) but I don't mind if you use faceclaims - I love picrew as a tool because I am often very specific about how my character looks!
My favorite genre tropes: - High stakes - The Chosen character - Unlikely friends - Ancient secrets - Mythical beings - Antiheros - Spiritual gifts - Discovering truths - Fish out of water - Returning to origins
My favorite character tropes/archetypes: - Antihero - Femme Fatale - Rebel - Lovable Rogue - Everyman - Mysterious Stranger - Mad Scientist - Repressed Identity - Creative Underdog - Hardened Survivor - Comedic Duo - Eccentric Artist - Reluctant Hero - Flawed Hero - Inflexible Hardheaded Hero - Misanthropic Adventurer - The Curmudgeon - The Henchman - The Dumb Luck Character
I would love for you to send me a plot based on our common preferences!! DM me if interested!

Freshly back and awake after a twelve day stint for my first time there. I knew that I wanted to go in general, and while I didn't have a firm itinerary planned out, there was one main goal that I had in terms of sites within the country. The main video game that I play is Beatmania IIDX, and it has internal trophies which are represented as badges. Your profile allows you to assign up to five of them as visible when you start a new round, and there are badges to earn for playing at least one round in every prefecture in Japan, as well as every subregion. Getting the Kanto badge meant that I needed to play at least one round in Tokyo, Kanagawa, Saitama, Gunma, Tochigi, Ibaraki, and Chiba. After five days, I had that complete, and now I have a permanent record of this trip within the game itself. There was also a time-limited event to earn points in IIDX in order to exchange them for goods, such as a hat, or a towel, or a new account card and a poster, and I managed to get that taken care of in somewhat dramatic fashion. I did some other things too.
Primary general points
· Getting Suica set on the phone and using it was generally painless. There were only two times where I needed to summon the help of a resident JR employee to clear up an issue with the gate not reading the card for some reason.
· Most vocal interaction which I had was the opposite of painless, because I continuously kept trying to speak Japanese and failing, and most people would realize that I was completely failing at it and responded with English (some with full on sentences, others with just a few words). There were a few rare times that I was able to express my intent in Japanese, receive a response, understand the response, and reply as necessary, but that was rare. Once English was invoked, I would stay with it, because that's what they were expecting. I've been self-studying the language for more than twenty years in varying degrees of intensity, and while my reading comprehesion seemed sufficient enough for this trip, and while I didn't expect my speaking to be as good because I don't have any opportunity to practice speaking, I came away bitterly disappointed in my vocal and speaking comprehension in terms of my interaction with people there. Even within the trip I could at least overhear common chitchat better, but any time I needed to converse with someone for some reason, I usually needed to have things repeated several times and broken down before I finally realized what was being said.
· You are going to be asked about separately buying a bag with every non-food purchase. Accept or immediately present one that you are carrying to indicate how your purchase shall be bagged.
· I never once had my passport requested for presentation.
· Only once did a person volutnarily reach out to address me, and it was just to ask me where I was from in English. Otherwise, everyone left me alone the entire time.
· Weather through the period was ideal. Mid to upper 70F/25C range and only a few days where it was rainy, and even then it wasn't a downpour. A while ago I personally resolved to only wear suits in public and I purchased a new pair of Mephisto shoes after hearing reports of the extensive walking causing problems for traveller's feet and shoes. My attire help up well; there were only a few times that I needed to avoid sunlight to not get too hot, and I have no issues to report from the shoes.
· I only got X'd out of a restaurant one time, and I think it's only because I wandered into it before it was ready for service. Otherwise, I never once waited in line for food, I never once went to restaurant more than once, and all food was acceptably priced for the portion and excellent for the quality.
For these per-day recounts, I wrote them contemporaneously at the end of each day, so you'll need to forgive me for some writing being in present tense and other writing being in past tense.
Day 1 - Travel, Sugamo, Ikebukuro
Non stop flight from Chicago OHare to Haneda. 12 hours. Good thing I usually don't watch movies, because that just means that all I needed to do was binge a few to make the trip go by.
Pre-trip research led me to choose APA Sugamo as my home base for the visit, and I think that it was a very fortuitious choice. I'll have more to say about it later.
Some awkward encounters happened right away upon checking in here. I was at the nearby Family Mart to buy some things and I didn’t catch that he was making sure I wanted a bag until he repeated it five times. Yes, I’ll take it. Before getting there I was coming down to ground level after checking into my room, and when that person saw that I would have been the only other person going down to the ground, they ducked right back out. I was warned on both of these kinds of things happening, so I guess it’s good to have that immediately out of the way. It would turn out that people deliberately avoiding me was rare throughout the trip.
Despite not sleeping on the trip, I had freshly arrived and had no sense of being tired, so once I had my stuff down, I went off to Ikebukuro right away. No picture or video truly conveys how crowded these areas can get. It can only be experienced in person to be understood.
I soon found Round One Ikebukruo and went right in. So dense and loud. It’s entirely alien to me to see no less than ten IIDX machines in operation and all of them in use. I dumped the money into random tickets, as I foresaw doing, but now I have to wonder if that was the right thing to do, or if it’s tied to that location. I guess I’ll find out.
The forecast is for rain so I need to be in a hurry to figure out where I’m going to go. There might be only one day left for me to get my time limited toys.
Day 2 - Kawasaki, Kanagawa - Utsunomiya, Tochigi - Oomiya, Saitama
My body decided that it only needed four hours of sleep this morning. Without doing more research, I somehow decided to assume that more of the Round One locations were close to 24 hours of operation much like Ikebukuro. Answer: no. I hopped on the train early and went to Shibuya first, but it was very quiet, so I decided to get some of the travels out of the way today and headed south to Kawasaki. I still needed to dawdle for a while until Silk Hat opened at 900AM, and when I finally was able to get inside, I was only able to verify that their store had several allotments of the campaign goods and all allotments were out. Played one round on a monitor that was surprisingly blurry, and I don’t know why that would be the case with a lightning model, but it was, so that was enough.
After doing all of that, I resolved to try to go to Chiba and Ibaraki afterwards. I figured that with Kanagawa and Tokyo likely all out, going to the outskirts would make more sense. However, there was an injury on one of the rails that threw everything off normal, and the train I found myself riding was bound for Utsunomiya instead. Seeing as how I was going to go there eventually, I rolled with it.
It doesn’t take too long to move away from Tokyo metropolitan area before you encounter more forest like areas and rice paddy fields. Halfway through the trip I noticed that two older women suddenly hopped off while the train was waiting to go to the next stop, and I followed them when I realized they found the express line. Utsunomiya has a substantial size to its area and buildings but it was very quiet on the streets there in midday. Walked a mile to Sega GIGO, found that they didn’t even have the goods tracker up. All out. Interesting buliding for it having several neon signs, all vintage and authentic at that. Getting to there from the south meant cutting through Saitama, so I knew I had enough time to make one last attempt there. Research shown two stores being near Oomiya station, so that’s where I ended up. Taito Station was immediately visible upon exit, and they have two IIDX machines specifically with 20 gram springs, which is closer to my home setup and that much lighter than standard 50 gram springs. The final hour drew near and I made one last visit to that city’s Round One. Unlike nearly every other place I went to so far, it only had one IIDX machine. However, and maybe because of that, their goods listing didn’t show everything as out. One painful language exchange later, I was able to discern that what I wanted was available. When you spend more than 3000 yen in a single credit, the game wants to verify if you really want to proceed. It does it again at 6000 and 9000. Yes, I really do. But, having made that money dump I was able to get my hands on the e-amuse card and poster with fifteen minutes left before the deadline. Mission complete. By this point in the day it was exceedingly difficult to even look at the screen so I was ready to come home, but not before getting some goods at the Oomiya Book Off and redeeming what I could for points at Round One Ikebukuro. By the end of the day the only thing that I could tolerate doing was to buy some chicken and nigiri from the nearby train station. Good enough. At that point in the day my body felt like it wants to rock back and forth after all the train riding done today. But, it ended up being worthwhile after all.
One nostalgic feeling I had the most strongly in the day was at the Utsunomiya location where the smell of it triggered past buried memories of yesteryear. I think I want to attribute it to the stronger second hand cigarette smell but I’m not sure - all the same I felt its presence strongly there. Also, I don’t see Oomiya (or really Saitama itself) mentioned as a fun place to go, but it might serve as an acceptable alternative to Ikebukuro, only not as massive in scale of human quantity. Depending on how the trip goes in total I may end up back there for IIDX playing, at least if I don’t find any other place that has 20G springs.
Day 3 - Akihabara
With the travels out of the way, it was time to keep things more regionalized and stick to one area, and there is shopping that needs to be done, so it was off to Akihabara and to see how much of other posted tales hold true. The answer is that it is a lot of it. Kotobukiya can stand to open sooner than noon. Super Potato is indeed priced for a market which wants to snap up anything cheap - I at least found Xi for under 500 and felt that it would have been a bit silly to buy only that, but it didn’t make spending 2000 on one single issue of Arcadia any better. I had no idea that Hey Arcade was right next to both of them; while it was assuredly nice to be there and see the row of Cave shooters among everything else, something got messed up with my registration of my new eamuse card with everything else, so that quickly added to my stress. Having to carry around a few hundred dollars worth of crap with every step didn’t help matters. At least I was able to help a person recover their lost phone by applying a bit of logic to the situation and deducing it to belong to the only person there who looked French, as it was on the Lock Screen. They were relieved, yes. Then, rain came, and it was more than I was anticipating, and I left the umbrella at the room, particularly since I knew I’d be shopping this day. It also turns out to have not mattered much, because I went to visit Bic Camera so that I could get myself a hair trimmer while here, and that turned into me finding a bunch of Kit Kats available, so that meant a second bag. The wind kicked out the rain and my umbrella. In trying to get as many gifts secured as possible, I found some gachapon, but it needed 100Y coins, and I didn’t need paper money in the trip yet. After fighting with maps, I found an ATM to get cash, and got the gachapon. I came home late with feeling rather crushed about the day in that I couldn’t take pictures very well with having to juggle weather and bagging considerations. There were some nice parts of the experience to be sure but between that and more gawking at Super Potato pricing ($135 for PS3 Caladrius? $6000 for Pulstar?) and seeing similar markups on other goods, I don’t think it’s unfair to say that there is a reputation that this area carries and the pricing is there to go with it.
Day 4 - Laundry Day. Shibuya, Harajuku, Shinjuku
I was so drained at the end of Day 3 that I fell asleep on the bed immediately after ending the night call, which meant that I woke up at 0200AM to a room that was fully lit. This meant that I needed to look up how to resolve my eamuse problem or else I wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep. I did both. Awake at 0800AM meant that I had time to do laundry while I figured out what to do with the rest of the day. This meant that I was able to get more of Sugamo in pictures, and it was nice to be able to walk among the actual residences, and do other things like come across a school as it was actually in session. With them being close by and all in succession, I figured to get Shibuya, Harajuku, and Shinjuku visited. It turns out to have been a good day for it, as the temperature was perfectly cool and no rain came, and the sun came out only for a little bit. Shibuya somehow doesn’t seem quite as large in scope in person but the crowds were definitely there, and it is much more hilly than I anticipated as well. After wandering around and not seeing any arcade for a bit, I came across a series of coffee and cookie shops and remained strong to not indulge. It was there while looking at a Disney store (which gets tourists to take pictures of it for some reason) that the song Alone Again came on through the nearby public speakers. What timing. It drove me to finally get a treat for myself, and the frozen latte (black sesame and houji) and croissant (dark chocolate filing) were certainly good, it ended up costing more than the dinner I’d have later this day. I found a seclusion with a garbage can to eat the food and not carry the trash around, then an arcade soon after, and it was time to determine if I could fix the problem. Just like an easy click, it was. New to trash. Old to new. Done. Why did it have to be this way. Harajuku came next, and the environment there was distinct. This one in particular felt like it was an extended carnival atmosphere with the single tight knit market street and emphasis on fashion. A conversation with a freelance artist in the subway actually went well enough that I didn’t feel dumb. The same sensation carried to Shinjuku as well, only it was more spread out. Kabuki street was interesting to see in person, and I didn’t get any unseemly vibes from the place. Maybe it’s different later at night. A return home at a reasonable time allowed me to go down Sugamo’s market street a bit; most of it was closed, but it was interesting to come across the few remaining stores that were open by 0800PM, and more so the one that wasn’t. Coming back to the hotel I found a 24 hour ramen shop with nobody inside. The chef didn’t want to speak and only pointed to the ordering kiosk when I addressed her. The food came through a slot in the obscured window. At least her thank you as I left was a bit more warm, and the food was certainly delicious. To match with the matcha dessert that I bought from Sugamo station, I swung by a 7Eleven to get a drink, and found a milk tea for cheaper than a vending machine. The overhead music in the store was an instrumental version of Alone Again.
Day 5. Ibaraki - Mount Tsukuba, Miraidaira. Kashiwa, Chiba. Akihabara 2.
Awake at 0500AM on my own and knowing the current forecast meant that my envisioned plan for the day was quickly realized. Reaching the Tsukuba Express starting point from Akihabara needs you to get very far down into the ground before getting out into sunlight. I was on the ride early enough to see schoolchildren going about their commute, some of them being no older than ten and going about it unaccompanied. The people of Tsukuba seemed to be particularly helpful and cheerful that day, even despite my Suica issues at the gate. I didn’t ask his name at the counter but the man at the service desk was eager to speak with me about my career and what I was doing there. One asked where I was from on the way up to the summit and another caught my cable car ticket on the way down. There had to have been a few of them who saw my doing this climb in my business attire and thinking me to be a complete idiot if not outright mocking them for doing it that way while they employed the use of dual walking sticks and the like. I know I read some reports of the home stretch being difficult, but it did get pretty close to being an actual rock climb instead of a trail hike for that part of it. A quick stop to Miraidaira on the way back to get the Ibaraki play. The way the town center greets you upon leaving the rail gate struck me as incredible, as well as for how quiet it was. It was like walking onto a movie set. I did find the sweet shop after the play, and that was another painful interaction yet again. Oh well. Two quick stops down Tsukuba Express and one across from Tobu Urban Park line was enough to have a toe in Chiba, and I didn’t even need to leave the physical building of the train station to get to the basement level to find a machine for a play. Thank you, Kashiwa, you were great. Gunma is all that’s left. The descent from Tsukuba did take some earnest exertion, and after doing that the two stops, that put me back in Akihabara about when I anticipated; what I failed to anticipate is how much that place seems to drain on me. I think I just need to eat at an actual dinner time. Once I got back to Sugamo and had food it was a bit better, but while in Akihabara and being around that environment, and not finding things on a shopping list, I found myself just standing still and watching life pass me by. I hemmed and hawed a while for a maid girl’s hour of service for chitchat, but eventually I talked myself out of it because I just didn’t want potential trouble, just like her name. Komaru. I thought about doing this once just to say that I did, but I ultimately decided against it. You cannot go to this place with the expectation that you will find anything unless it is advertised and new. If you are looking for anything used, don’t count on it being there. You also cannot go there without having a strong resolve to not engage with the touts, because it becomes disheartening to see them do their job and blankly stare at the world when they're forced to stand out there and do nothing. Back to Sugamo to find a place that advertised Wagyu but the price they wanted was more than I wanted to spend. The ramen and seaweed & rice servings were fine, but they advertised endless drink and I didn’t receive that. All for $20? No, son. I did better than that elsewhere, I’ll know better now. Long day.
Day 6 - Tokyo Flea Market, Nakano Broadway, Ueno.
The weather couldn’t have been better for this weekend. I’ve read reports that the flea market held near the horse race track will be arbitrarily cancelled regardless of what is reported on the website, but my gut instinct told me that it would occur today, and it did. Turns out that a flea market is a flea market which is a flea market, no matter where it happens. Same allotment of clothes and stuff that few people really want to buy, although I was able to find myself some neckties at least. I probably overpaid based on what I saw later in the route, but that’s fine. They look nice. I settled on some shot glasses for a gift as well, but I’m surprised that I can’t ind something ornate that isn’t part of a sake set. Seated in the shade with a chocolate churro while rap music played in the background - it’s like I never left home. A woman came to sit across from me for the sake of sitting down; she was from Holland and today’s her last day in the country. Her husband came with food eventually. She had three weeks here and went to several places (allegedly, she didn’t list them out) and I asked her about Nakano Broadway. She didn’t make it there. It’s a good thing that I did - this is probably the kind of environment and market that people expect of Akihabara now, and maybe that’s how Aki was years ago, but it’s different from this. What’s more interesting is that Mandarake has a larger presence here than in Akihabara (so it seems to me), and their stores had floor after floor of any and every kind of pop culture product that’s been made in the past sixty years at least. Buttress that with extensive watch and jewelry stores and a slender arcade in the basement, and it’s a very well centralized microcosm of the country’s economy on the whole. I actually made a point to have dinner earlier than usual this time and found a place to serve some deep fried pork cuts served with rice and soup on the side. It was enough, and very well made. The day had not ended and my bag was heavy with several books purchased there, so I reported back to base briefly and decided to try visiting somewhere else, and settled on Ueno. Just as I arrived, a festival was underway where local teams of people made an elaborate show of carrying a home made shrine to a temple. Streets were officially blocked by police to allow the procession. In following the line I came up against makeshift food and amusement stands with the traditional toy gun shooting and goldfish catching. It appears that this is an official “start of summer” festival and I was able to watch it all happen in front of me. That was the good part of the day.
Day 7 - Tachikawa / Kunitachi. Shinjuku 2.
One of the games that I've never played is Beatmania III The Final. I've played some BM3 7th Mix years ago, but not The Final. I found a location that has one - World Game Circus in Tachikawa. In looking around that area before the trip, I saw that there was a nearby shinkansen museum, and not much else, so I figured that going to both places would make that walk worthwhile. Turns out that it wasn’t a museum in the proper sense of a dedicated building. Rather, it was a bullet train engine car on the side of a building that was unrelated, and that was it. A cute interaction happened here - when I approached the car, I heard some children running around inside, so I approached cautiously without knowing if I was encroaching upon someone else's alloted time or something. Once the children saw me, they gave a hearty irrashaimase as I entered, and the boy stamped a paper and presented it to me. Perfect. Despite it not being a typical musem, the card did have some interesting content, and it's good to see some kind of commemoration for their achievements and progression in that industry regardless. They have a lot to be proud about there. Off to WGC. Maps wasn’t lying about the walk taking twenty minutes. It's a good thing that I looked it up on streetview beforehand, because I otherwise would have walked right past it without knowing it was there. Then there it was, and there I confronted a past that I couldn’t visit again. Sure, I got to play BM3 The Final at last, but my timing was off, my hands were off, there wasn’t much I could do. Along with that I can say that I’ve played on a Beatmania II cabinet, and that was better than 5th Style at least. But that was it, that was all I could stand to do. It was right there and I couldn’t bear to put up with it more than a few rounds at best. Dream big, because only disappointment follows if your smaller dreams ever are fulfilled. I don’t know why finding IKEA back in Shinjuku was so difficult, but it took a while. I bought a bag, and then I bought a bag because the other bag was at the end of the register, which makes sense. I did feed myself before getting back to the Taito station to play some songs, but it still wasn’t good enough. All thumbs. Ended the day with laundry since the timing worked. Speaking of making dreams big, it’s time to cross another one off the list tomorrow. I can’t wait.
Day 8 - Takasaki, Gunma. Oomiya, Saitama 2.
It’s a good thing that I only needed to get to Ikebukuro to transfer over to the next stop, because that’s where that particular run ended for some reason. I wonder what was up. Speaking of things getting messed up on trains, I managed to find my way on a train that needed a separate ticket, which I didn't have. The conductor found me right away and had me disembark at Uraja for me to wait for the proper transfer. The weather forecast said there’d be rain, and the travel forecast said it would take two hours to get there, and neither lied. I feel like I had more people staring at me in Gunma than other places. I will say that I found the Takasaki station area to be rather charming, with the stores that it had inside and the emphasis on the music culture there. It’s one thing to offer a piano to the public to play, but it’s another to have a public willing to use it. This location had both. Having what was essentially a Bic Camera built into the facility was a nice touch too. The Leisure Land arcade was sandwiched between other floors that had its own offering of gaming stuff, so that was an unexpected bit of a fun thing to look through. The area was clean and sparsely populated, and it wasn’t picked clean of all matter of things that would normally get snapped up, so that was interesting. Finally, I made it over to the machine. They had separate fans for each location. I got the songs and then the medals came, and that’s that. Kantou Seiou. I would have stayed a bit longer but I wanted to have the medals show up right away, and my internet wasn’t cooperating, so that’s all I could do. I think there was an Internet cafe that I could have used in the facility, but I didn’t want to deal with an awkward conversation. I did get some Lawson on the way out, as well as some trinkets from the local Gunma-chan store as well as some mini croissants and some macademia cookie things. More vocal awkwardness. Omiya was one of the stops on the way back, and I found a place to serve omrice, so that’s another one off the list. No shoes allowed inside. The value wasn’t there but the service was good enough, as was the flavor. The machines with the 20G springs are indeed legit. Back home in time for some McDonalds, and that’s another food-checklist item marked off. Takoyaki mayo dipping sauce - somehow it’s both salty and sweet. While returning to the hotel, I did happen to encounter an argument amongst two teenaged locals where the guy ended up half-heartedly kicking the girl and getting her to cry. I wonder what their argument was about. I didn’t play hero, but someone else did so enough to prevent an escalation and called the police over.
Day 9 - Sugamo, Tokyo Sky Tree, Akihabara 3, Kanda
Up early enough to decide that I should at least visit the Sky Tree while I'm there just to say that I did, and that I should visit the Sugamo street market upon its open since it was right there in front of me. I'm glad to have done so. With everything open, this felt more like what one would think to expect from a flea market environment that's operated and supported by the local populace. Small stores were open both sides of the street that go on for many blocks, and some tents and tables were set up to sell second hand goods as well. I was able to find someone selling a US Morgan dollar and he wanted only 2000Y for it, so that was an easy buy. If I would have known better to anticipate this area, I wouldn't have felt compelled to buy kitchy tourist crap that is expected as gifts elsewhere. If you are looking for a place to idly shop around that doesn't get extremely crowded and has an authentic local feel to it, consider making a point to come here. Off to Sky Tree. Getting the combo ticket for the second deck was worth it just for the lack of crowds on the upper area. If you're going to come here, consider getting a phone selfie stick or something of the kind so that you can take pictures against the windows without the structure scaffolding obstructing your view. On the subject of shopping again, this might be another area to consider visiting just for the sake of the specialty stores to be found here, such as those for chopsticks or hairpins. To close out the day, my wife reminded me to look for something from the Square Enix cafe, so that meant swinging by Akihabara yet again. Since it is within a walkway, it was a bit of a pain to find this place even with using maps, but I eventually found it and got what she wanted to find. Played some IIDX at Game Panic, which was surprisingly small and the one machine that was avaialble to play had some 2P turntable issues, so that didn't last all that long. Dinner was at a nearby place that specalized in tofu, so that was a good ramen serving with that infused. For the evening, I wandered south to Kanda to get night pictures, and found it to feel pretty similar to Ueno.
Day 10 - Ginza, Tokyo, Kanda & Akihabara 4
Launrdry in the morning. I also wanted to say that I went to Ginza in my time here, and I didn't research anywhere to go to keep it a surprise. It was a bit warmer and sunnier than usual that day, and I stuck to the main road for most of the walk, so I can't say that I found too many points of the interest along the path that I walked starting from Yurakucho station and heading out that way. High class store for high class people, and that's too rich for my peasant blood. Similarly for Tokyo proper itself, I suppose I'd have to needed to wander far away from the Yamanote vicinity to find points of interest there, as I didn't encounter anything that was remarkably distinctive here in comparison to other areas that I have previously seen. Continuing north across Nihonbashi brought me to Kanda and eventually to Akihabara yet again, as if it was a magnet that pulled me inside every time. For the sake of trying a different place I chose to play some IIDX at the Leisure Land arcade there, and I'm glad to have done that, as those machines were probably in the best coniditon that I encountered within that area. Dinner was at Tenkaippin, which I didn't realize until after I placed the order was cash only. The clerk didn't request it beforehand but I voluntarily left my passport there to show that I would return, and promptly went to the same ATM that I had found days prior in order to get the cash to pay for the bill.
Day 11 - Haneda T3, Nishi Nippori, Nippori, Uguisuidani, Otsuka, Shibuya, Shinjuku, Ikebukruo, home.
The end. I resolved to take the subway over to Haneda today to get the one luggage over there and stored, and it’s a good thing that I did - there’s no easy solution for getting over there without encountering a crowd. If anything I wonder if Yamanote is actually better. Regardless, I got that much done. With the day left to go, I ventured to Nishi Nippori and I needed to summon the map several times to make sure I found the location, as it was as obscure as it could get. Just a sign on the ground for the third floor, a stairway that led to the back, an elevator that had no decoration, a single room that housed everything. Arcade PCB kits on shelves, joystick panels in exposed boxes, nicotine odor from years past - it was like I was transported to 1995 upon entry, beyond the fact that the games weren’t as old. Most of them, they did have a lot going for SF3 3rd yet. I was able to take care of some game business in a hurry since I was the only one there. It was a very pleasant respite for play in comparison to most of the other sessions. The region itself felt much the same as this arcade - old and well worn, as in well lived. Venturing south to Nippori led me to stumble upon a shrine and cemetery just by following some stairs. Usuigudani was cleaner but mostly had hotels as points of interest. Back home to buy some mochi while mochi was for sale in midday. Then to Otsuka, thinking that I would wander to Ikebukuro, but I ended up wandering back to Sugamo instead. Whoops. Meal at Sugamo, then back out to return to Shibuya and Shinjuku at night to catch evening shots, when I hadn’t done so before at these places. Good thing I did that to get Golden Gai area shots at night. With the night winding down, I decided to have one last IIDX play at Round 1 in Ikebukuro to symbolically end where I started.
Ending arcade comments
· Although the upkeep is generally better and more consistent than the US, some machines will have hardware issues here too. I was surprised by the blurriness with some of the LM IIDX machines.
· Densha De Go on the propert large cabinet is nice but quickly becomes very expensive.
· Bombergirl is OK enough and having the dedicated detonator button that pops up for hitting the base is a cute touch.
· Chase Chase Jokers feels rather clunky and I'm not sure what the game is trying to do. Interesting side screen concept at least.
· Nostalgia is delightful and would probably find a small fanbase worldwide if it had more exposure.
· Favorite IIDX locations are Taito Station in Oomiya for the light keys and Leisure Land Akihabara for the high quality of the LMs there. Honorable mention goes to the Game Versus loctation in Nishi Nihonbashi, but that might not be worth it for a dedicated trip unless you go there first thing in the morning.
Ending overall comments
This was a life altering trip for me, as would be expected. While I'm glad to have made the journey, as to be expected, I will only want to return after making an extensive redoubled effort into speaking and hearing comprehension, because I know that I came across like a blubbering idiot so many times, and it's truly aggravating because I generally know what I want to say and most of the words that are used to say it, but it just doesn't come out of my mouth properly when it needs to be done.
I welcome any questions you may have, as that will help for me to recall the memories and have me write them down.

I had been trying to get past an issue for what seemed like forever and I finally found what the problem was, so I wanted to share my experience in hopes that it might help other users.
The initial catalyst to this was my desktop environment completely freezing and becoming totally unresponsive (not even able to access another tty session). After rebooting, first the fedora loading screen starts acting strangely and refusing to start. This was pretty simple to get past just by removing rhgb from the kernel boot parameters and running fsck (which is what it was complaining about).
Once I was past this, a reboot got me to the graphical login screen. Only now, once I logged in, the screen went completely blank. I was however able to get to another session on tty4 so I could start looking around. What I kept seening via journalctl -xb -r was that there was an initial crash with xdg-desktop-portal followed by a crash with maliit-keyboard. After that almost being started for the session crashed or errored. This is what I would see first https://pastebin.com/iQV4N1sQ. Getting a backtrace via gdb got me this https://pastebin.com/05Qj1YEU.
I searched for reports of similar behavior but couldn't find anything. Next I started uninstalling or disabling things to get the system to a more "minimal" startup, but none of that worked. I realized then I had done all this in haste without first installing debugging symbols so gdb would actually be useful. After that, then the problem was staring me right in the face: https://pastebin.com/x8tD44Db
Specificaly this error message: "No GSettings schemas are installed on the system". That seemed odd to me because checking dnf list installed said I had gsettings-desktop-schemas already installed. I search around for this error message and find a few mentions of running glib-compile-schemas could help but more importantly, it is looking for schemas in $XDG_DATA_DIRS.
I glanced in my ~/.zshenv file and saw I had added this because I was trying to setup flatpak so I could install spotify (which I discovered didn't have an arm compatible build):
export XDG_DATA_DIRS=${XDG_DATA_DIRS}:/valib/flatpak/exports/share:${HOME}/.local/share/flatpak/exports/share
Here's what went wrong: I uninstalled flatpak, but still had this line in my ~/.zshenv file. When I checked what $XDG_DATA_DIRS was set to in my tty4 session, it was only those two directories. I commented out that line, rebooted, and boom working system again.
I checked the value in my terminal now that I was back in KDE and it showed what I would have expected to see: /usshare/kde-settings/kde-profile/default/share:/uslocal/share:/usshare
So, not sure exactly where those things collided with one another, but that's the issue I ran into and how I got past it and back to my working system. Hopefully it might help someone that finds themself in a similar predicament..

5/15/24 co CEO Fortress announces closure of Fortress Mgt buyback from Softbank. Now Fortress is ready to roll at Novation Co NOVCQ a public company hidden by SEC Rule 15c2-11 with partners co investors Mass Mutual & sub Barings aka Babson Capital, Jefferies $JEF & White Mountain’s Capital $WTM & NOVCQ Board of Directors Barry Igdaloff’s Howard Amster & Whitney Tilson, Chuck Gillman, Jeffrey Eberwein, David Pointer, Tim Eriksen, Lee Keddie & Robert Pearse. These people are all connected and their 3 NOVCQ restructuring are all connected and advised by 3 third party professionals TPP Boulay Group, Olshan Law, Shapiro Sher. These TPP are no different then Sullivan Cromwell aiding the FTX scheme.
https://www.pionline.com/alternatives/fortress-mubadala-complete-acquisition-fortress-investment-group
World Leading Investors Fortress, EJF Capital aka FBR, MassMutual Barings, Jefferies, White Mountains Capital $WTM are about to create BILLIONS in Capital plus Hundreds of Millions in Cash Flow every year. This is how Whitney Tilson's pals Chuck Gillman, Jeff Eberwein and their co-investors siege control of Novation Companies $NOVC. Use SEC Rule 15C(2)-11 to drive share price down, while taking 16M or 10% of stock at pennies as partial board compensation. Equipped with 40M common shares of NOVCQ they are ready to make Billions plus Create $100Ms every year in cash flow in dividends/Mgt Fees. They have a world class roster of investors supporting them including; MassMutual Barings/Jefferies 40M and Fortress/EJF Capital 31.3M NOVCQ common shares (EJF formerly FBR is owned by White Mountains Capital $WTM). Fortress/EJF Capital also own $NOVCQ only Sr Debt to exit their 1st Ch 11 MD and was used in 2nd Ch 11 in DE filed 8/13/2024. Fortress/EJF invested a few thousand dollars in Off Balance Sheet entities Taberna Trups CDOs I & II/Kodiak CDO I, that hold NOVCQ only Sr Debt. After the 1st Ch 11 NOVCQ Board of Director Barry Igdaloff, Howard Amster hands Fortress/EJF Capital 31M shares allocated by Board at zero basis. This proves NOVCQ Board of Directors was not independent from Sr Debt Holders Fortress/EJF Capital. Sr Debt was a ruse including its use in DE Ch 11. DE Ch 11 was carefully crafted to provide short sellers a way to take tax free gains. The Board with little cash invested holds control of this former NYSE MREIT Novastar Financial Inc. traded under MREIT NYSE Exemption $NFI now Novation $NOVCQ.
Per WSJ Wesley Edens of Fortress is the new MREIT Subprime KING after restructuring Mr. Cooper $COOP and OMF One Main aka LEAF AIG and Citi Bank Subprime CaPersonal Lending unit, and RITM/NRZ and Dynex Capital DX. Manny Friedman Founder of EJF Capital formerly FBR Friedman, Billings Ramsey, is regarded as a leading MREIT expert. They control Novation Companies Inc. NOVCQ thanks to $NOVCQ Board of Directors who they have a past relationship. They renamed Novastar Financial Inc. former traded NSYE as $NFI to Novation Companies, which owns MREIT Novastar Financial Inc., renamed Novastar Mortgage inside 2nd Ch 11 in DE. A new 8-Member Board is waiting in the wings with new name/symbol. I have been told they have big plans for NOVCQ only operating unit http://healthcare-staffing.com HCS which owns and conceals Medmasa http://medmasa.com
I believe they will merge HCS/Medmasa with Jeff Eberwein Hudson Global $HSON to create quarter billion tax free BPO public company. Jeffrey Eberwein is the former NOVCQ COB/CEO that managed 1st Ch 11 in MD with Shapiro Sher. Eberwein is now COB/CEO of Hudson Global $HSON. This merger will monetize NOVCQ $730M NOLs just like both CH 11 the 1st in Maryland, MD & 2nd or last in Delaware, DE. Both used Sr Debt as ruse to execute both Ch 11s which have gone to great length to save NOVCQ $730M NOLs. 2022 NOVCQ triggered SEC Rule 15c(2)-11 which allows NOVCQ to remain public but conceals who is buying NOVCQ as only Expert Investors can accumulate NOVCQ like Putnam Inv. Goldman Sachs, Blackrock & David Dreman of Dreman Value Mgt. and Thomas Akin Talkot Capital fund owns 1.9M common. This SEC Rule is postured as way for small public company to remain public and not have the cost burden of SEC filings. What it really does is stops Retail bid/ask and allows Expert Investors in the know to front run a public company before rolling out true reorganization plans.
They are ready to change Novation Co $NOVCQ name and brand so as to eliminate any reference to the prior board or brand. This is how they roll. I believe they will present the new name/symbol and 8-Member Board comprised of Fortress, EJF Capital aka FBR people once Fortress Management close Softbank SALE of Fortress (DONE See Top 5/15/24 Announcement) to them and Mubadala Investment Company ex Fortress executive Rajeev Misra. Whitney Tilson close small cap co-investors Chuck Gillman, Jeff Eberwein are at the center. I’ve been told they do nothing but sure things. Former George Soros Investments Portfolio Mgr. Jeff Eberwein Wharton MBA, is ready to take $NOVC http://medmasa.com conceal behind http://healthcare-staffing.com & $730M NOLs. This 8-Member Board connected to past Board Members Jeff Eberwein, Chuck Gillman, Barry Igdaloff, Howard Amster I believe will merge Medmasa/HCS with Hudson Global $HSON (see Jefferey Eberwein Form 4s at $HSON & Form 4s filed at NOVCQ between April-Oct 2015 via his fund Lone Star Value Mgt.). Jeff Eberwein & his clan including Whitney Tilson/Chuck Gillman were introduced to the present day NOVCQ Board Barry Igdaloff, Howard Amster. Wes Edens, Founder of Fortress hide their identity behind Off Balance Sheet OBE Entities Taberna Trups CDOs I and II and former FBR Friedman, Billings, Ramsey now called http://EJFCap.com also hide their identity behind OBE Kodiak CDO I.
Fortress/EJF own at the same time both the only Sr Debt to exit 1st Ch 11 MD and months afterward 31M NOVCQ common (9M NOVCQ common shares plus 22.250M Ten Year Warrants. There are co-conspirators with NOVCQ board of directors that own 40M NOVCQ Common & MassMutual & Jefferies own 40M NOVCQ common shares. Novation Companies Inc. $NOVCQ submerged shareholder plans and value under SEC Rule 15c(2)-11 to sub penny stock that can only be traded today by Expert Investors defined by this SEC Rule. Fortress/EJF Capital paid almost nothing for OBEs yet they have spent at least $2M cash in the last Ch 11 in DE. They have every reason to do something big.
I believe that something will be splitting NOVCQ into two tax free public companies worth BILLIONS plus Hundreds of Millions in annual cash flow in MREIT Dividends & Lucrative Mgt Fees just like Fortress did a LEAF/One Main OMF, Newcastle that is New Residential $NRZ now Rithm Capital $RITM and $GCI formerly New Media NEWM and New Senior $SNR sold for over $2B. $RITM aka $NRZ in 2019 10K documented that shareholders paid Fortress over $250M in Mgt Fees annually, plus dividends. Fortress terminated the NRZ/RITM Mgt Deal for cool $400M (simultaneously changing Name/Symbol to Rithm Capital $RITM). NOVCQ Dark Horse are their plans for NOVCQ only operating unit HCS aka Medmasa http://medmasa.com concealed by CH 11 in DE. Medmasa NOVCQ only operating unit is http://healthcare-staffing.com NOVCQ former MREIT NYSE $NFI now named Novastar Mortgage is the Board, EJF Capital and Fortress ticket to monetizing rights (see Exhibit 2.1 of Q3 2007 10Q Service Rights Transfer Agreement Sec 5.04 that defines these rights as Cleanup Call Rights CCR well know to these MREIT experts) that control billions of rich, seasoned collateral assets ideal to be leveraged and securitized into MREIT dividend & like RITM aka NRZ another external management fee for Fortress and/or EJF. Fortress/EJF Capital then FBR did this with NOVCQ Board Barry Igdaloff, Howard Amster 2000-03 at Dynex Capital NYSE $DX. Ask Igdaloff helpers Thomas Akin former CEO/COB of DX he holds 1.9M of NOVCQ in his fund Talkot Capital. Thomas Bruce Akin sat on DX Board for years with NOVCQ Chairman Igdaloff. Igdaloff served 20 years on DX Board per DX 8K 9/3/2020.This is your chance to do what is right. ====================================== ALTERNATIVES
May 15, 2024 12:04 PM

Fortress, Mubadala complete acquisition of Fortress Investment Group

LYDIA TOMKIWERIN ARVEDLUND

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Drew McKnight and Joshua Pack
Fortress Investment Group, an alternatives manager, and Mubadala Investment Co., the investment arm of Abu Dhabi’s $276 billion sovereign wealth fund, completed their acquisition deal May 15, and as part of the close, Fortress management now owns a 32% equity interest.
Mubadala owns the remaining 68%. The acquisition, through Mubadala Capital, is for the 90.01% of Fortress equity that was held by SoftBank Group Corp., according to a news release. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

RELATED ARTICLE

Mubadala seeks co-investors for Fortress in effort to clear U.S. security review SoftBank-Fortress deal turns attention to future arrangements with private equity firms
Fortress’s sale of majority equity was approved by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States after concessions were made to let Fortress keep data and technology in the U.S., the Financial Times first reported last week.
Fortress, which had $48 billion in assets under management at the end of 2023, said it expects the new joint venture to help it further establish itself in credit and real estate in both public and private markets. Fortress pointed to Mubadala Capital’s global network to help expand client relationships.
“This is a true landmark event for Fortress, for our employees and for the clients we serve,” said Fortress co-CEOs Drew McKnight and Joshua Pack, adding, “We have strengthened alignments of interest, put significant management skin in the game, and deepened our long-term partnership with Mubadala, one of the world’s most highly regarded investors.”
As part of Fortress management now owning a 32% equity interest, its management is entitled to appointment of a majority of board seats. McKnight, Pack and managing partner Jack Neumark were the largest individual investors in the buyout and were joined by about 150 members of the firm.
Mubadala Capital’s CEO and managing director, Hani Barhoush, continues to serve on the Fortress board, a position he has held since 2019 when Mubadala initially invested.
Fortress will continue to operate as an independent investment manager under its own brand and with full autonomy over its investment process and personnel.

1. ALTERNATIVES

I often think about Celebrimbor, and I simply can’t get over the obvious visual parallel with St. Sebastian. This is St Sebastian’s martyrdom: by Reni), and Mantegna).
Celebrimbor died thus: “In black anger [Sauron] turned back to battle; and bearing as a banner Celebrimbor’s body hung upon a pole, shot through with Orc-arrows, he turned upon the forces of Elrond.” (UT, p. 307–308)
The iconography (see drawings by peet, and Kaaile) is the same.
And this led me to wondering about what made Tolkien, a Catholic, decide to give his Elf who fell to Sauron’s manipulations a famous Christian martyrdom, and why St Sebastian in particular?
I don’t know enough about St Sebastian or Tolkien to do more than speculate.
First, as a hint of Celebrimbor’s feelings for fair Annatar. St. Sebastian has a strong gay association. This was so even at the turn of the 20th century: Oscar Wilde clearly loved St Sebastian and the associated iconography. Here he refers specifically to Guido Reni’s wonderful painting of St Sebastian. In The Picture of Dorian Gray, St Sebastian is highlighted in Chapter XI, the chapter about Dorian’s personal (and generally rather decadent) passions. St Sebastian also appears in Thomas Mann’s Der Tod in Venedig(Zweites Kapitel). I can see the whole thing as being a hint at Celebrimbor falling for Sauron in more ways than one, particularly given what we know of his seduction (the term used in LOTR, p. 1083) by Annatar in his “fair form” (Sil, Index of Names, entry Annatar; UT, p. 328). Sauron is said to have “used all his arts upon Celebrimbor and his fellow-smiths” (UT, p. 306). “All his arts” would include this: “Yet such was the cunning of his mind and mouth, and the strength of his hidden will, that ere three years had passed he had become closest to the secret counsels of the King; for flattery sweet as honey was ever on his tongue, and knowledge he had of many things yet unrevealed to Men. And seeing the favour that he had of their lord all the councillors began to fawn upon him, save one alone” (Sil, Akallabêth). To me, this passage sounds distinctly sexual, and also like something that Oscar Wilde could have written, with this imagery.
(I admit that having Celebrimbor fall in love with Annatar makes the eventual betrayal even worse. I also am aware that in one of the many different versions presented in The History of Galadriel and Celeborn, it is said that Celebrimbor loved Galadriel (UT, p. 324–325), but according to Christopher Tolkien, this “Celebrimbor is here again a jewel-smith of Gondolin, rather than one of the Fëanorians” (UT, p. 325), which is why I tend to take his characterisation here with a pinch of salt.)
The other thought I had is quite dark: rape. It’s an association that I personally feel imposes itself, in a way. “The arrow is a highly phallic image” (source) already, and there’s the image of Cupid’s two arrows, causing uncontrollable desire in one victim, and revulsion in the other. The result for the person who was shot by the second arrow was rape—or death (or transformation into a tree if your father happened to be (1) a god, and (2) nearby: Daphne). I’m not the first person to connect the iconography of St Sebastian with rape: see this (NSFW, nudity and violence) blogpost. This could be a very Tolkienian hint of what Celebrimbor suffered in his “torment” (UT, p. 307) at the hands of Sauron before his death—subtle, “clean”, deniable, but intriguing.
We know that Morgoth wanted to rape Lúthien (“Then Morgoth looking upon her beauty conceived in his thought an evil lust, and a design more dark than any that had yet come into his heart since he fled from Valinor. Thus he was beguiled by his own malice, for he watched her, leaving her free for awhile, and taking secret pleasure in his thought.” (Sil, QS, ch. 19)) and that, while the above passage implies that Morgoth only ever wanted to rape Lúthien and no other, that is not true: he also attempted to rape Arien, the Maia of the Sun, in order specifically to break her: “though he attempted to ravish Arien, this was to destroy and ‘distain’ her, not to beget fiery offspring” (HoME X, p. 405, fn omitted).
Sauron, meanwhile, is described thus: “Sauron was become now a sorcerer of dreadful power, master of shadows and of phantoms, foul in wisdom, cruel in strength, misshaping what he touched, twisting what he ruled, lord of werewolves; his dominion was torment.” (Sil, QS, ch. 18) I do not think that it would be either out-of-character for Sauron or “out-of-world” for the Legendarium (especially as Sauron used to be Morgoth’s second-in-command in Angband) to assume that Sauron raped Celebrimbor in order to break him or just because he’s an obvious sadist who would enjoy every last second of it, or had others rape Celebrimbor as grisly a method of torture—and then turned him into his banner to show the Elves what he’d done, and dishonour Celebrimbor even further in death.
(Note that it is a common misconception that Elves die when raped. As per HoME X, p. 228 (a text likely from the late 1950s: HoME X, p. 199), this only applies to married Elves raped by someone who is not their spouse: “there is no record of any among the Elves that took another’s spouse by force; for this was wholly against their nature, and one so forced would have rejected bodily life and passed to Mandos.” (Emphasis mine) This is confirmed by the fact that in a later (from 1959–1960: HoME XI, p. 359–360) text, Eöl rapes unmarried Aredhel and Aredhel survives: “Eöl found Irith, the sister of King Turgon, astray in the wild near his dwelling, and he took her to wife by force: a very wicked deed in the eyes of the Eldar.” (HoME XI, p. 409, fn omitted, emphasis mine) Note the same expression used to describe a rape.)
This post turned out longer than I planned. I’ve speculated on two possible associations that the imagery of St Sebastian and the character and story of Celebrimbor invite. Do you have other ideas? Why do you think that Tolkien chose this imagery?
Sources:

• Unfinished Tales of Númenor & Middle-earth, JRR Tolkien, ed Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins 2014 (softcover) [cited as: UT].
• The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien, HarperCollins 2007 (softcover) [cited as: LOTR].
• The Silmarillion, JRR Tolkien, ed Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins, ebook edition February 2011, version 2019-01-09 [cited as: Sil].
• Morgoth’s Ring, JRR Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins 2015 (softcover) [cited as: HoME X].
• The War of the Jewels, JRR Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins 2015 (softcover) [cited as: HoME XI].

Haven't messed with FL in about a decade but recently got the itch. My cpu back then wasn't great so I really couldn't really make a full song without it bogging down too much. Now I got a sweet gaming rig, figured I'd give the ole FL a shot again, but it's struggling.
Running the free trial version, so I can't open projects. That's fine, I gotta dust off the cobwebs first and get a workflow and some time in the software. I've had two major issues so far. Latency between my keyboard and Fl studio. tried two different keyboards and USB ports, still getting latency It's not much, but it's noticeable, and makes it pretty much impossible to find a riff just jamming along. And that's with all sounds, not just any particular synth. I've also had the program crash 3 times when there's nothing anywhere near taxing happening. Started a new empty project, a little 4x4 beat. 4 chord piano riff, a bass line with just the 4 lowest notes. 3 times while trying to find a sound for the lead riff and the program crashes. all 3 sounds that I was using were from FLEX. Since I'm using the free trial, I can't open things, so when it crashes, that's that whole project scrapped. Just trying to work some tutorials, but haven't been able to fully.
I'm new to all this, if there's some settings I can check or anything I can do that might help, would be great.
cpu specs if it matters
Asus tuf x670e plus wifi
Ryzen 7 7700x
Rtx 4070ti
32gb DDR5 ram
1Tb ssd
evga 1000 g5 psu

I (f23) grew up with a single mother who had chronic pain, financial issues and was emotionally unstable. I was happy my earlier years but around the age of ten I started getting harassed in school (had to switch schools) and my relationship to my mom got significantly worse as I started experiencing really bad mental illness. Because of my very severe depression I started losing a lot of hair and a lot of weight around the age of 12.
My mom’s side of the family is very small because both my grandparents had already passed away before I was born. My mom has 5 siblings but they either live in other countries or are really shitty people. I had no siblings growing up. My mom had me at 39 years of age so she probably couldn’t get pregnant again anyway.
My mom would seldomly speak of my dad but when she did she only spoke of him extremely negatively. And she almost only did it when it was to compare me to him. My dad spent three years in jail right before I was born and the way that she told me this was by pointing out that I was becoming exactly like him. She had told me that she had tried desperately to keep him in my life so that I could have a dad but that he wasn’t interested. She had also told me that I had several half siblings and of these she spoke neither positively or negatively. When I was 16 my mom died of cancer and I moved out on my own.
At this age I had started suspecting that what my mom had said about my dad was false as she was emotionally unstable and immature (clearly). I had a talk with my (shitty) aunt and she told me that she never understood why my mom didn’t want my dad in my life and that she never told her the reason. When my mom died my aunt called my dad and told him the news. He had cried and said that he was very sad for my situation. At this point I was sure that the truth of the situation had been altered by my mother. I was still unsure of what to do since my dad still didn’t reach out to me and didn’t seem to want to talk to me. I myself was going through way too much emotionally to reach out to him first.
Fast forward to like a week ago.
My (m42) half brother all of a sudden sends me a Facebook message asking to meet up. I was pretty stoked about it because I expected him to have some answers about this situation. We met up the day after and he was extremely sweet. He expressed so much sadness and regret over how things turned out. When I asked him what happened between our dad and my mom he had no answer. He told me that the contact between those two and the rest of the family just disappeared in an instant and dad never wanted to talk about it. I also found out that dad was very well liked by all of his kids and would sacrifice everything in order to make them happy. My half brother said that it wouldn’t be like him to just “give up on me” and that something must’ve happened.
As we sat talking we came to the conclusion that because of his past crime which had to do with money, he was riddled with immense shame. Apparently he was never the same after that incident and he was truly never happy again. My mom had told me that the reason they broke up was because he had accidentally left me in a hot car when I was a baby. The windows had to be smashed in order to save my life.
Both me and by brother assume that at that point he was probably so riddled with shame that he didn’t feel like it was right to fight my mom over me. That I would be better off without him.
The saddest part about all of this is that I’m never going to be able to ask him because he died last Friday of a heart attack. That was the reason my brother finally wanted to reach out to me.
I feel a tremendous amount of anger towards my mom for doing what she did. Not only did she make sure I would grow up having no contact with my dad, she also made sure I had no contact with that side of the family, and she also made me believe that he didn’t care about me. She also died when I was too young to really comprehend any of these things so I can’t talk to her about it. And I’m also never going to get to talk to my dad. My dad who probably felt so much shame that he felt like he didn’t have a right to be in my life.
I don’t know what to do now. I liked my brother and he basically invited me to be a part of that whole side of the family. I would like to join because that’s all I ever wanted, but at the end of the day those people are just strangers. I feel sad, angry and overwhelmed.
Sorry for ranting

Throw away account for this story. This is pretty massive, but bare with me, its all relevant. Names are obviously changed. Most of the people in this story are late 20s, to mid 30s.
So sit down. Buckle up and enjoy (i guess?)
Let's call this guy Zack, he was my best friend for almost 10 years. Zack was engaged to Emma for several years, and they had started dating shortly after Zack and I became friends. I had a boyfriend, Murray. Murray had also been part of this friend group for a similar length of time, but I'd only recently started dating him. During the pandemic Zack, Emma and me all moved in together. At the time of moving in together I had been with Murray for about 10 months or so.
When we moved in together Emma's behaviour became quite passive aggressive or even outright aggressive towards me. At the time I had asked Zack multiple times if Emma had a problem with me. He'd always come back to me later saying she didn't have a problem with me, and thought I was nice, but the response never sat well with me considering her attitude towards me.
Looking back on it I reckon her behaviour towards me was triggered by Zack's behaviour. Zack often made comments about how he found me really attractive for years, but I had always brushed him off. But Zack had started making "jokes" about us having a threesome (Usually me joining Zack and Emma) - in front of his fiance, in front of our mutual friends, in front of Murray. I'd made it explicitly clear that I was not interested in him and had even told him multiple times "I consider him like a brother", that the threesome "jokes" were making me really uncomfortable BECAUSE I am not interested in him and they had become EXTREMELY frequent.
This eventually culminated with Emma absolutely cracking the shits with me one day and screaming at me completely upprovoked. This was the first time Zack had personally witnessed her completely unprovoked aggressive behaviour towards me. This was also not the first time Emma had triggered my PTSD/trauma. Emma then gave me the silent treatment for two whole weeks (vacating rooms if I entered, literally ignoring me around the house etc)
After this, Zack and Emma had a lot of arguments (they had arguments before this as well) and Zack broke up with Emma. She shouted and screamed at him during their arguments, even before her last outburst at me (I hid in my room during this due to past trauma/PTSD). A few of them we had comforted each other afterwards (IMO as a friends) - we would sit and talk to each other about what had happened. Emma eventually moved out, about a month later because she just could not be a civil housemate towards me.
At this point it was just me and Zack living in the house, we'd watch TV shows together while eating dinners together. For me the logic was if we're ok with sharing dinner it'd be cheaper rather than buying AND cooking seperate meals - and I'd even shared this logic with Zack and he agreed. We also enjoyed the same shows - like I said we were best friends for almost 10 years, so what's wrong with watching TV shows you and your housemate/friend both like together?
This is where things really start getting spicy, because I discovered the utterly manipulative machinations Zack had been pulling, and the extent that he had gone through. It was actually horrifying to discover the lengths Zack had gone to and to find out exactly what he had been saying to other people.
After breaking up with Emma, Zack was out dating and seeing a bunch of other people and even dating a few people online. And commenting on how attractive he found some of our mutual friends. Not my business what he does - just an interesting point worth knowing considering what is to follow in this story.
Zack had been angling that Murray was a really bad partner for me. Pointing out some frankly really stupid shit about Murray to me at an ever increasing frequency. Granted some of it was valid... but also not my problem. As in not "hey you need to break up with your partner", but "this sounds like a you problem" valid.
Things like making inappropriate jokes, sharing very dark or explicit memes and photos on the discord Zack ran. Zack didn't want that stuff on his discord, which is fair... But not a break up worthy problem for my relationship? At one point Zack informed me he made me a mod on his discord to "manage Murray". At the time I was like yeah whatever, if I get @ I'll deal with it. I was never @ about anything on discord. I was not actively reading what happened or monitoring chats - and I had told Zack this when he made me a mod. I'm pretty sure Zack only did this to try and "expose me to Murray's behaviour". Whenever Zack came to me complaining about Murray's behaviour in the Discord - I told him it's his Discord, if he's breaking your rules, he doesn't need my permission if he feels Murray needs to be booted or banned for breaking his rules. Murray was never banned, though he did get muted a few times. At some point Zack removed me as a mod lol.
Zack also started complaining that Murray was sending him stuff in his DMs. Let's be real here - Zack had told him to DM him stuff rather than sharing it in the Discord, because while he did not want it on his discord, he thought the stuff Murray would said was fucking hilarious. Apparently he'd been seen looking at some of these NSFW messages from Murray at work. I asked Zack why he was opening up Murray's messages at work when he knows 90% chance its probably an NSFW image or meme. Murray also DMs me A LOT of these memes, pictures etc. - he would just find stuff and share it with people he thought would find it funny or interesting - so it's not like I didn't know/see the content of what was shared.
Zach would also complain that Murray would repeat himself if he wasn't heard/didn't get a laugh to something he said the first time around during conversations. Again. Not break up worthy behaviour? Like. Who doesn't repeat themselves if they weren't heard the first time around?
I'd also noticed that Zack had also started saying stuff like "So and so talked to me and they aren't happy with Murray". I will note none of these people, mutual friends, had said anything to me. I later pieced together from talking with people that Zack's strategy was approaching a person in DMs about an issue with Murray and if they had seen it. Said person would respond oh yeah sometimes (or whatever response it might be), and then Zack could take this response to another person and say "so and so came to me about Murray about x, have you had any issues" - and so forth until he could say "hey a bunch of people have this "problem" with Murray". This was pieced together well after I found out what Zack was doing.
Eventually I confronted Zack, asking him if he had a problem with Murray. I got "Murray is great, hes a good friend, I dont hate him etc etc". Again this was an answer didn't sit well with me. If he's a good friend and doesn't have a problem... Why did Zack constantly complain about so many issues he had with Murray?
A few days later I was catching up with another close friend, Mel. I asked if she thought Zack had an issue with Murray. And OMG did Mel unload. I was absolutely shocked and Mel was very apologetic that they had not said anything until now.
Apparently Zack had been making MULTIPLE private chats with a lot of mutual friends and had been trying to triangulate almost everyone I knew into breaking up my relationship with Murray. Zack had in his mind that I was in love with him, that I was in denial for my feelings with him. That I was constantly flirting with him. And had even frequently bought up that "once Murray was out of the way, then Zack could finally settle down with me and start a family" and that "He can see a future with me". And I'm not going to lie... not just friends I'd see regularly... but I had asked a few friends I hadn't had much contact with for a very extended time... and they showed me conversations of the above of Zack trying to convince people how horrible Murray was in an attempt to try and triangulate these people against Murray as well.
I felt utterly disgusted - not only for finding out Zack was ACTIVELY trying to break my relationship up, get everyone to try and isolate Murray out of the friend group, but he was also sharing very private stories that should be my story to tell people. When I say private. I mean stories of Murray and I having sex together - that I had shared with some friends, including Zack. I didn't even get to tell MY STORIES to Mel first, but also realising... how many mutual friends (close or otherwise) had Zack told his version of the story to that makes Murray look really bad? But also makes me look really bad too because how the stories would be framed/told?
And this is where the comments about him dating other people and commenting to me about mutual friends Zack found attractive come in. He thought Mel was attractive. But never told her, BUT he had told he frequently how attractive he found me. What a wierd way to try and pick people up I guess? Mel came up with the most amazing description of Zack tho - he was just swinging his dick around and seeing what would stick.
I tried to calm down before heading home and had planned to try and approach Zack about this calmly. But the second I saw him, I just saw red and I just laid into him about what I had discovered. He just sat there and started crying. I reckon I shouted at him for a good twenty minutes because there was just so much betrayal in what he had done. I have never shouted at someone like that and I'm not proud of it.
After that over the following days and weeks... Zack tried to convince me that it was other people that were trying to break up my relationship, not him. That the other friends were "drama mongerers, shit stirrers and just liked causing problems". He also started talking a lot of crap with the intent of getting me to console him... for the behaviour he chose to enact about my relationship? He would also constantly apologise and project his own behaviour on the friends he tried to co-opt into his manipulations. Eventually I saw through Zack's manipulations and word salad and was even able to start calling him out on it on the spot/in situ. He'd look absolutely shocked and gobsmacked when I started being able to do this. For someone who could talk non-stop and endlessly, it was amazing to have the ability to leave him at a loss for words.
Due to past abuse I could feel my brain trying to just go back to "status quo" and trying to gaslight itself - sharing meals, watching TV together etc. So i'd be flipping between being neutral and being absolutely pissed off at Zack. It was an absolute mind fuck. Especially after being in a manipulative and abusive relationship in the past - but in a way, having had that past relationship - I could actually recognise what was happening now?
I told Zack he needed to move out of the house, he didn't want to "because he was happy here". I told him he's the one that fucked up so he's the one that should leave. Why should I be forced to leave and be inconvenienced further because of what he had chosen to do?
I did EVENTUALLY get him out of the house after he dragged his feet for about 6 months, and during that entire time Zack tried to sweet talk, manipulate, apologise, project his behaviour and literally every trick in the book to gloss over what he had done.
After he moved out he BANNED me, Murray and two friends he targeted heavily as the "drama mongerers" in his attempt to break up my relationship out of his discord, unfriended me on facebook and twitter etc. and started sharing a bunch of memes and things about being the victim in the face of drama/lies and stuff (and god knows what he's ACTUALLY telling people in private). He made a copy paste "apology" to the friends he'd been calling "drama mongerers" (as in he wrote one apology then copy pasted it to everyone) - absolutely insincere, lazy and and just real POS behaviour.
I also later found out he's describing me as "creating drama to get attention", and even more amazingly... is now not only moved on and dating yet another girl, but engaged to her. I feel sorry for her... because she has no idea the absolute monster she is getting involved with.
As it is. I did later end up breaking up with Murray about a year or so later, but not for anything Zack tried to make us break up for.

A bit of story, I've been a lurker for a while now. I got into this by my friend who is a fighting game and Ramlethal fan. It began as just a interest in character design and now I have the entire Strive + Xrd OST on my phone and I somehow understand the entire lore. So I have decided to pick up Strive when it will (hopefully) goes on sale when Slayer is released or Summer Sale. This is gonna be my first fighting game that I actually gonna take effort in learning and hopefully it gonna be my gateway into the FGC.
More about me: I'm a PC player exclusively, I do not like consoles with the only exceptions being the DS and 3DS (because Monster Hunter) so I have been playing on keyboard for as long as I can remember. My most played game is League of Legends due to it being free and I have friends and Monster Hunter: World. I am not new to fighting games as I have over 100 hours on Mortal Kombat X. But I did not play any online matches, I just play the story mode and a lot of CPU fights so I have zero experience with player vs player matches. I have anxiety when it comes to online as I played Monster Hunter like a single player game and I have an irrational distrust of strangers.
What do I know already: Despite being a complete noob in this genre, I have been lurking around the FGC for a very long time. Long enough to understand it's lingual and phrases like DP for the Dragon Punch input, Tiger Knee, Rekka, Oki, Cross up, Footsie, Number Notations, Fuzzy guard and more. Basically, I did my research and now is looking to put my knowledge to the testing phase. I don't find motion inputs that hard but DP have given me trouble before in the wake up part.
Who I want to play and my reasonings: 1. Johnny: He's 100% gonna be my main. I love his esthetic and his story of being a pirate/cowboy/swordsman Robin Hood is really cool. Just Lean is the best song and I will not hear anyone out. A showoff with a heart of gold, I like him.

1. Elphelt Valentine: White hair clumsy woman with big booba makes my brain goes unga bunga and my heart swell. At first I was just gonna like her as a character but after I found out she have a Rekka. Yeah, I love her and with her personality being like super adorable makes me really want to pick her up. It's mostly the Rekka but it helps that she's so cute.
   
2. Bedman?: Playing as the Bed is gonna be the closest to play a non humanoid character here. I adore these designs as I prefer monsters, robots and stuff over humans as in league, I play exclusively monsters. I really like it's mechanic of an delay special after your normal special which I see can set up interesting situations. The Circle is an amazing track.
   
3. Leo or May: Charged characters, I tend to avoid them due to their input being super weird for me. But since that I want to take this game semi seriously, I have to learn them either for match up purpose or just for experience. But I do like both, May is cute and being affiliate with Johnny makes her a winner in my eyes and for Leo is just Hellfire, I love Hellfire.
   
4. Axl Low: If Johnny and Elphelt didn't exist, he was gonna be my choice for a main. Sweet cinnamon roll of a character, Axl Low is genuinely one of my favorite characters in terms of lore and personality alone and him being a Zoner will teach me to how to play as or against them. One Vision, that is an awesome super. What is with Japan and British people with time stop abilities? DIO and Axl?
   

Thank you for reading my rambling, I really want to play and hopefully get over my online anxiety with it. If you all have any tips and tricks for a new player such as myself then feel free to comments.

Show Poster by Amy Jean
Venue info
Tour Meetup Info
Stream - Streamus
Show Time: Doors 6:30pm CEST, Grace Cummings 8:00pm, King Gizz ~9-11pm (3pm EST, 12pm PST, 8pm BST, 5am AEDT)
Setlist:

1. Rattlesnake^a ->
   
2. Honey^b
   
3. Open Water^c
   
4. Pleura
   
5. Ice V^d ->
   
6. Cut Throat Boogie^e
   
7. Most of What I Like^f
   
8. Lord of Lightning >
   
9. Alter Me I >
   
10. Lord of Lightning^g ->
    
11. I’m In Your Mind >
    
12. I’m Not In Your Mind^h >
    
13. Cellophaneⁱ >
    
14. I’m In Your Mind Fuzz^j
    
15. Mars For The Rich
    
16. The Great Chain of Being
    
17. Dragon
    
18. Motor Spirit
    

a. Introduced as a song about snakes, Honey tease, Doom City tease
b. Sleep Drifter tease
c. With Drum Solo
d. With Drum Solo, Cut Throat Boogie tease
e. Sad Pilot tease, Jam with lyrics from unreleased song
f. Praise You tease and Sweet Home Alabama quote
g. Hypertension tease
h. Robot Stop tease
i. Motor Spirit tease and quotes
j. Grace Cummings shout out after
This setlist and all previous shows can be found at kglw.net. If you attended the show, leave a review and rating!
Join the setlist discussion on our Forum!
30 Day of Gizz Song History is over, check out the full list of song histories!
If you have Video/Audio you would like to contribute to the Archive. Please let us know and we would be happy to assist in getting it uploaded.
469 Shows since Vegemite (Oddments)

I love animals way too much, I seriously think it's becoming a problem and Idk what to do about it. In particular, I have a soft spot for dogs and rats. I have a family dog, he's 15, and I had 2 rats for a short time before they both passed. The rats were my first pet that were completely mine, I loved them so much but due to some really random circumstances that I as a first time rat owner was really unprepared for, I feel like I failed them so hard. I miss them, and I feel guilty a lot for not doing right by them. I was at college when they both passed, one got sick the morning i left and passed right when I arrived to move in to the dorm, and I was not there for my other boys passing either. Teddy, our family dog, is so old, but has so much life still left in him. I'm moving out of the family home permanently in August, and will be driving, which will be a difficult drive to make regularly, so I will likely only visit once a year, in the summer. There is a very high chance I won't be there for his passing either, and it hurts because he's been with us for so long, since I was 7 (preemptive grief I know).
Additionally, I'm currently in the process of fostering/adopting my own dog, which will be amazing for my mental health, and I love him so much and am excited for my future with him, but oh god this is where the title comes in truly! As I was doing research into dogs to adopt initially, It was fairly easy (as in it took a couple months but i did it) to narrow down the the kind of dog I was looking for, and I knew it would be a dog as I have always wanted a dog that is purely my own. Now, I've made it this far and i'm locked in on my decision for sure, logically I know I have a lifetime of dog ownership ahead of me.
But, I open facebook (to look for dog items) and see posts from a local dog adoption group I joined and seeing ALL the sweet pups available for adoption, and many to be euthanized, broke my heart in a million pieces and I wanted to rescue each and everyone, even though obviously I know that I can't because I can only afford one dog right now, and I've made my choice (and it is a good choice - well it's mine at least). But oh the dogs!!! Their sweet little faces, and the fact that they do not deserve any bad thing that's happened to them. I see a glimpse of cats or cat posts, my heart is filled with love and I often consider if everyone was right and I should have just got a cat instead of a dog, i do love them too afterall for reasons different to dogs. And it doesn't end there, I saw an email from a rat adoption page about a new litter, I always look as I only get them once a year (applied to adopt when I was looking for rats initially - didn't get off the waitlist until after I had my boys lol). My god these little guys were just so extremely tempting. It doesn't help that I still have all my rat supplies and miss my boys a lot, and though rats are still surprisingly expensive, less so than the dog i'm getting lol. God and the litter was so adorable too!
I just want to give so much love to all the animals and their sweet faces all the time, and it makes me so emotional that I have cried several times this week about it (ok maybe that's because i'm on my period - this whole post is likely hormone fueled). I love animals so much I feel so helpless from my inability to do anything else about it (time restrictions prevent me from volunteering at the moment). Just a rant I guess but if anyone has anything helpful to say please do! ❤️🐾

I often think about Celebrimbor, and I simply can’t get over the obvious visual parallel with St. Sebastian. This is St Sebastian’s martyrdom: by Reni), and Mantegna).
Celebrimbor died thus: “In black anger [Sauron] turned back to battle; and bearing as a banner Celebrimbor’s body hung upon a pole, shot through with Orc-arrows, he turned upon the forces of Elrond.” (UT, p. 307–308)
The iconography (see drawings by peet, and Kaaile) is the same.
And this led me to wondering about what made Tolkien, a Catholic, decide to give his Elf who fell to Sauron’s manipulations a famous Christian martyrdom, and why St Sebastian in particular?
I don’t know enough about St Sebastian or Tolkien to do more than speculate.
First, as a hint of Celebrimbor’s feelings for fair Annatar. St. Sebastian has a strong gay association. This was so even at the turn of the 20th century: Oscar Wilde clearly loved St Sebastian and the associated iconography. Here he refers specifically to Guido Reni’s wonderful painting of St Sebastian. In The Picture of Dorian Gray, St Sebastian is highlighted in Chapter XI, the chapter about Dorian’s personal (and generally rather decadent) passions. St Sebastian also appears in Thomas Mann’s Der Tod in Venedig(Zweites Kapitel). I can see the whole thing as being a hint at Celebrimbor falling for Sauron in more ways than one, particularly given what we know of his seduction (the term used in LOTR, p. 1083) by Annatar in his “fair form” (Sil, Index of Names, entry Annatar; UT, p. 328). Sauron is said to have “used all his arts upon Celebrimbor and his fellow-smiths” (UT, p. 306). “All his arts” would include this: “Yet such was the cunning of his mind and mouth, and the strength of his hidden will, that ere three years had passed he had become closest to the secret counsels of the King; for flattery sweet as honey was ever on his tongue, and knowledge he had of many things yet unrevealed to Men. And seeing the favour that he had of their lord all the councillors began to fawn upon him, save one alone” (Sil, Akallabêth). To me, this passage sounds distinctly sexual, and also like something that Oscar Wilde could have written, with this imagery.
(I admit that having Celebrimbor fall in love with Annatar makes the eventual betrayal even worse. I also am aware that in one of the many different versions presented in The History of Galadriel and Celeborn, it is said that Celebrimbor loved Galadriel (UT, p. 324–325), but according to Christopher Tolkien, this “Celebrimbor is here again a jewel-smith of Gondolin, rather than one of the Fëanorians” (UT, p. 325), which is why I tend to take his characterisation here with a pinch of salt.)
The other thought I had is quite dark: rape. It’s an association that I personally feel imposes itself, in a way. “The arrow is a highly phallic image” (source) already, and there’s the image of Cupid’s two arrows, causing uncontrollable desire in one victim, and revulsion in the other. The result for the person who was shot by the second arrow was rape—or death (or transformation into a tree if your father happened to be (1) a god, and (2) nearby: Daphne). I’m not the first person to connect the iconography of St Sebastian with rape: see this (NSFW, nudity and violence) blogpost. This could be a very Tolkienian hint of what Celebrimbor suffered in his “torment” (UT, p. 307) at the hands of Sauron before his death—subtle, “clean”, deniable, but intriguing.
We know that Morgoth wanted to rape Lúthien (“Then Morgoth looking upon her beauty conceived in his thought an evil lust, and a design more dark than any that had yet come into his heart since he fled from Valinor. Thus he was beguiled by his own malice, for he watched her, leaving her free for awhile, and taking secret pleasure in his thought.” (Sil, QS, ch. 19)) and that, while the above passage implies that Morgoth only ever wanted to rape Lúthien and no other, that is not true: he also attempted to rape Arien, the Maia of the Sun, in order specifically to break her: “though he attempted to ravish Arien, this was to destroy and ‘distain’ her, not to beget fiery offspring” (HoME X, p. 405, fn omitted).
Sauron, meanwhile, is described thus: “Sauron was become now a sorcerer of dreadful power, master of shadows and of phantoms, foul in wisdom, cruel in strength, misshaping what he touched, twisting what he ruled, lord of werewolves; his dominion was torment.” (Sil, QS, ch. 18) I do not think that it would be either out-of-character for Sauron or “out-of-world” for the Legendarium (especially as Sauron used to be Morgoth’s second-in-command in Angband) to assume that Sauron raped Celebrimbor in order to break him or just because he’s an obvious sadist who would enjoy every last second of it, or had others rape Celebrimbor as grisly a method of torture—and then turned him into his banner to show the Elves what he’d done, and dishonour Celebrimbor even further in death.
(Note that it is a common misconception that Elves die when raped. As per HoME X, p. 228 (a text likely from the late 1950s: HoME X, p. 199), this only applies to married Elves raped by someone who is not their spouse: “there is no record of any among the Elves that took another’s spouse by force; for this was wholly against their nature, and one so forced would have rejected bodily life and passed to Mandos.” (Emphasis mine) This is confirmed by the fact that in a later (from 1959–1960: HoME XI, p. 359–360) text, Eöl rapes unmarried Aredhel and Aredhel survives: “Eöl found Irith, the sister of King Turgon, astray in the wild near his dwelling, and he took her to wife by force: a very wicked deed in the eyes of the Eldar.” (HoME XI, p. 409, fn omitted, emphasis mine) Note the same expression used to describe a rape.)
This post turned out longer than I planned. I’ve speculated on two possible associations that the imagery of St Sebastian and the character and story of Celebrimbor invite. Do you have other ideas? Why do you think that Tolkien chose this imagery?
Sources:

• Unfinished Tales of Númenor & Middle-earth, JRR Tolkien, ed Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins 2014 (softcover) [cited as: UT].
• The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien, HarperCollins 2007 (softcover) [cited as: LOTR].
• The Silmarillion, JRR Tolkien, ed Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins, ebook edition February 2011, version 2019-01-09 [cited as: Sil].
• Morgoth’s Ring, JRR Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins 2015 (softcover) [cited as: HoME X].
• The War of the Jewels, JRR Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien, HarperCollins 2015 (softcover) [cited as: HoME XI].

Hey, so you ever get a birthday present that's so not your style, but you really can't return it because it'd be really awkward? Normally it's like, I dunno. Shoes, or shirts or something like that, right?
For me it was four fire-breathing horses.
Okay, so I should clarify. My dad didn't really give me four fire-breathing ponies to keep. It was more of a test for him to treat me like his son again.
See, I just recently got out of a Styx oath that would have led me to eternal damnation if I didn't fulfill it. It's a long story, but to keep it short: I swore an oath on the Styx to be a brave hero by my eighteenth birthday when I really should have just pinkie promised. But yeah. My dad, God of War and dad of the year took it well. …In that he pretty much said that I was a waste of space, disowned me and he'd personally hand me over to the Styx for eternal damnation.
Nice guy. Really should get into motivational speeches.
The night before, after riding the high of not having the threat of being sent to Super Hell I had a pretty bad dream. I mean, it wasn’t the normal David nightmare. It wasn't me killing endless hordes of monsters while my dad laughed at how pathetic I was.
Well, half of that. It was just my dad. To be honest, rather I’d take the monsters.
He was laughing at me, with that smug face of his, in that all-leather biker outfit with the shades that made him look even more like an asshole, as if that's hard to believe.
Oh, sorry. Didn't mean to cuss. Anyways yeah. Me and my dad. Not the best relationship, even by demigod standards.
He gave me a toothy grin, like a shark’s as he circled around me. I instinctively stood up straight, at attention. As much as I hate my dad, ticking off a god is a pretty dumb thing to do. Plus, I was pretty dumbfounded to see him here in my dream of all things.
“Well, color me surprised. To be honest, boy, I thought I'd end up taking care of this myself. So, congratulations on that front. But, sorry to burst your bubble, it might be good enough for ol’ Styxy but…it’s not good enough for me. But, you know, I'm a generous guy! Prove me you're a warrior. Do that, and I'll welcome you back in the family with open arms. I even got the perfect way for you to prove yourself.”
Without warning, he tossed me a set of keys with a miniature boar-headed keychain and a really big switchblade on the end of it. I fumbled with it before slipping it into my pocket.
“An oldie but a goodie. Used to let my sons prove themselves to me all the time with this one. Now, I'm sure once you see what I got planned you'll know the rules, considering you're a fuckin’ nerd. But in case you forget…”
He lowered his shades, revealing balls of fire as he glared right at me.
“Sundown. My temple. Don't be late or I'll toss you in the Styx myself. Well! Have fun, yeah? I'm looking forward to watching you fail this one, like your last quest. Now, get up. Clock’s ticking after all…”
“Gaah!”
I snapped my eyes open, falling out of my bed and onto the hard floor under me. As soon as I hit the floor, I could hear one of my many siblings start to stir from their sleep. Immediately, my sister Tiffany started to sigh as she shot up from her bed. I could see her pastel pink sleep mask perched on her head as she glared into the darkness of the early morning. She groaned in frustration, her words cutting through the quiet of the dawn.
"What the hell are you idiots doing?"
To be fair, I could see why she’d think that. Most of my siblings were fond of pranking each other every now and then. The chaos of the Ares cabin was unmatched from most cabins, except maybe Hermes. But, when you cut off her beauty sleep, the threat of an angry Tiff was usually was enough to make nighttime a truce. Usually.
My sister rubbed her eyes and looked down at me. I sheepishly gave a smile as I rubbed my head, still sore from when it hit the floor.
"Seriously, David?"
Tiffany got out of bed and silently made her way to me. She wordlessly held out a hand and I grasped at it as she pulled me up.
"Thanks Tiff. I had this dream, where Dad called me a nerd and was talking to me about testing me now that my Styx Oath is..."
I felt something hard and metallic poke against my leg, from my sweats pocket. I pulled out the unfamiliar object and to my surprise, there were the same keys from my dream. My eyes widened as I realized that my dream was a little bit more than usual demigod stuff.
"Oh. That...wasn't a dream."
She raised an eyebrow as she looked at the keys that sat in my hand. I played with the accessories, absentmindedly feeling the boar head and the switchblade knife. She leaned in, peering at the keys as the dawn started to rise.
"What the hell are those for?"
She looked to the keys, then back at my face, and then the keys again. She looked at me as if I just said that Kronos was about to come back and throw an ice cream party courtesy of the Titans.
"You're telling me Dad gave those to you or something? You're joking. Have to be."
I shook my head, but I could see why she thought so. I was pretty sure I was near the bottom, if not at the bottom of his list of favorite kids. If I was being honest, I was pretty sure he wanted me dead more than a few times.
"Tiff, you know that I'm not exactly Dad's favorite by a long shot. Why would I say something like that and risk him getting even mad more mad at me because of my lying? Dad disowned me, remember? He mentioned something along the line in my dream that if I pass his test I'd be treated as one of his sons again but he didn't mention what it..."
The gears started turning as I looked at the keys in my hands.
”A test…keys…sundown…oh no. Oh, no.”
I immediately pocketed up my keys and started putting on my shoes. No time for pants, sweats would do just fine, I just had to make sure to take my wallet with me, considering I was going to New York now. I had to be quick or this test was over before it even started.
"No. I...I think I know what it is. But if I'm right, then shoot I gotta get going then! Before our brothers take it."
In hindsight, I probably should have told Tiff a bit about my thoughts. But, the more I delayed the more issues that could have cropped up. I just had to make sure it was safe.
"Take what? Where the hell are you going?!"
I burst out of the cabin, staring at what was in front of our cabin. I felt a bit of nervousness bubble up as my thoughts were proven true. Tiffany was close behind me as she walked outside our cabin. I looked at her face and caught an expression of wonder as whatever she was going to ask me was forgotten. Parked in front of the cabin was a red and gold Harley. The seat was white leather and gave a sorta…humany vibe to it that I did not wanna think about. Only one thing came to mind, something I knew instinctively from the moment I saw it. Dad's War Chariot.
Or as the god of war would call it, his chariot.
"I...I think dad wants me to take his ride for a spin."
I ran my hand over the cold metal, and I realized what Dad meant about the “oldie but a goodie.” A while back, before the Second Titan war ended, and all of the children of the gods had to be claimed, there was a ritual all sons of Ares went through. It was something all my brothers did at fifteen. Drive around his Chariot and return it before sundown. It wasn't easy, my Godly siblings, Phobos and Deimos both loved to mess with whoever was in charge of the chariot at the time. And you had to deal with monsters too, but overall when it came to demigod stuff it wasn’t the most dangerous around. I dunno if that says a lot about how dangerous this life can get though.
But, shortly after the then-counselor Clarisse La Rue became the first girl to do it, Dad pulled the plug. I dunno if it was good ol’ sexism, someone totaling it, or dad not wanting to let all of his kids drive his ride, either way it wasn't super common nowadays. It wasn't like he stopped, but it was something given, not a right. Dad letting me do this was him at least giving me a chance to prove myself to be one of his kids, which was more than I expected to be honest.
I took a breath as I looked at Dad’s ride, feeling a pit of unease in my stomach as I started to climb in. If it wouldn't end up with me being tormented for the rest of my short life, I'd tell him no and go back to sleep. But, telling a god no, especially my dad is a neat way to be turned into a rodent. Or a fine red paste. Or a rodent that would be turned into said paste.
Tiffany's brows furrowed as she processed my words, a layer of disbelief on her face as she chewed over it.
You? He wants you to drive it? I...that...what the hell?"
I fought off a wince as she looked at me, then the ride, then back at me again. I could tell she was a bit annoyed. I mean, yeah from her perspective I was singled out by dad to do something she probably wanted to do for a while. I felt a pit of guilt in my stomach, it wasn't fair, really. But at the same time I had to do this.
"I mean, seriously? He must be out-"
She cut herself off. Calling my dad crazy was another way to get turned into a rat that would then be turned into a fine paste. Actually a lot of things carried the threat, my dad is kinda a jerk. I sighed, figuring I might as well tell her about why Dad was doing this. I didn't wanna hide it, but it's not like I like to talk about the fact that I've been disowned for two years. She knew, most of us did. But it's not something I like bringing up, because yeah. It sucks.
"I read a bit about previous Ares campers. He used to do this more often, at first only his sons did, but later his daughters could. I dunno why he stopped but, this isn't really like he's doing it because he's proud of me. I'm sorta disowned, remember? He said if I can drive the chariot, he'll take me back as one of you guys again. It's...more of a test to earn myself back into his good graces, I think.”
Tiffany listened to my explanation, not saying anything for a bit She looked a bit bothered about the fact that I was chosen to drive the Chariot, which again, not surprising.
"Ugh, I guess that makes sense."
I could hear the frustration in her voice as she crossed her arms. I winced again, preparing for her to resent or hate me. But to my surprise, I heard her add more in a softer voice.
"Well, don't get yourself killed trying to pass this stupid test, I don't want to have to explain to everyone why you're not coming back."
Her icy tone defrosted as she looked back at me with a bit of concern in her eyes. She seemed less annoyed and more worried about me, which was sweet. Not that I'd let her hear that. I hoped that maybe, dad would let her give it for a spin later down the road. If anyone deserved it, it would be her. I gave a nervous laugh as I took the keys out of my pocket.
"Of course, I passed my Styx Oath, didn't I? It'd be really dumb of me to die right after barely avoiding that, right? Oh, yeah. If Ellie asks for me, tell her about dad's little test he has for me. Hopefully it won't be too long but you know how it is with godly stuff. I should be back in time for us to hang out for the rest of my birthday once I do this for dad. I'll bring back something cool!”
I felt my trepidation fade away as I prepared to drive. Lots of my siblings dreamed of piloting the chariot. It wouldn't be right to reject the opportunity when it was given to me. And, who knows? Getting back in Dad's good graces (or as much as one can get in them) might help me out. At least I would have one less target on my back. As I sat down in the white leather seat, I put the keys in the ignition and instantly it began to morph.
OOC:Read this while listening to whats coming up
The front split apart into one steel horse that slowly split into two, and then four cream-colored horses that looked around with a cruel intelligence. The seat dipped, and warped before it became a horse-drawn chariot I was now standing in. The chariot was gold and blood red, adorned with the lovely images of people dying gruesome deaths, because Dad's taste in decor is somewhere between military surplus and serial killer, apparently.
“Okay…so, I need to get to Dad's temple before sundown. I don't know New York highways though, so how can I…oh hey! A gps!”
My fingers brushed against a touch screen set up on the chariot and punched The Intrepid into the coordinates. I gave one last wave to my sister before I lashed the horses and they immediately took off. I led them out of camp easily enough, but as we reached the highway they sped up to an impossible speed for a chariot. Their speed was even faster than any cars on the highway, rivaling the time that Aphrodite camper drove us to the beach once. I pulled back on the reins, trying to get them to slow down. Instead, they gave a rebellious snort and went even faster.
I would like to say that I embraced my inner Ares kid and relished the challenge. But I'm not going to lie, when you end up going past 80 MPH in a chariot, you tend to think you're going to die, fun fact. I screamed for most of the way, yanking and pulling at their reins so we could bob and weave through traffic.
It's a bit of a drive from Camp Half-Blood to New York City, I know it well, it’s a pretty common place for me to go for some monster slaying. But, up until now, I've been in the passenger seat while Argus drives. The speed of the horses really made the time go by faster. As we entered the city, the horses started to slow down and I felt a ray of hope as I started to steer them through the city. I gave a triumphant laugh as I looked down at my ETA. It was surprisingly quick, considering how congested New York can get. And I didn't see hide or hair of either one of my godly brothers, so I felt pretty good, all things considered.
“Huh. That's weird. There's not many cars today…my luck must be turning around!”
“Traffic update: Incoming Monsters. Rerouting. Cannot reroute.”
“Huh?”
Immediately, a massive boar the size of a garbage truck burst from a nearby alley way behind me. Behind the massive pig, two armored bank cars recklessly merged into traffic. One leaned out, revealing a gray-skinned human in body armor brandishing a shotgun.
“Of course! I had to open my big mouth! Is there anything that I’m going to have to deal with?”
“You are on the fastest route!”
“Well that’s just GREAT! Now I can be on the quickest way to the underworld!”
”Rerouting to: D.O.A. Records, Los Angeles.”
“Woah, woah, woah, no! Keep me on The Intrepid! The Intrepid!”
Seeing all these enemies together though, I started to put a thought in my head. They all had something in common, now that I saw them all in front of me. A boar was sacred to Ares, Spartoi too came from a dragon sacred to him. I put the pieces together as I saw the monsters come out of the woodwork and all to me. Now things made sense. The lack of Phobos and Deimos, the sacred beings to Ares, the lack of mortals on the street.
I didn't see my siblings because Dad wanted to mess with me personally.
Even now, I don't know if he wanted to test me in a Spartan way, or if he just wanted to get rid of me without kinslaying. Either way, I couldn't back down now. Not when I was so close. I snapped on the reins and the rebellious horses continued on their path, bickering and weaving left and right as they snorted and whinnied.
I heard the wiz of something traveling through the air and quickly moved out of the way. A metal feather hit the chariot, bouncing off the hull and onto the ground. I looked up and saw a few birds. They were black and crow-like, but their feathers had a metallic sheen, like iron. Their wings flapped and I heard the sound of metal on metal as they soared above me.
“Dad called in feather-shooters too? Come on!”
I steered left and right as I evaded the metal feathers shooting at me. The newcomers behind me quickly gained as I bobbed and weaved. I had to figure a way out of this, and fast. Problem was, I was quickly outnumbered and outmatched. I wasn't the best at archery, and my sword could shoot a blast of force, courtesy of the then Forgemaster. Main issue was it took a bit to charge, and I couldn't take them on so high up.
I couldn't run. I needed to fight out of this. But even if I could fight the two Spartoi and the big pig, the problem was the birds. I didn't have a ranged option…or did I? I looked to the horses, breathing embers as they huffed and pulled the chariot further on. Ares kids couldn't talk to horses, but these were godly horses. They seemed smarter than your average horse. Maybe I could talk them into behaving, the same way I got some of my siblings to listen to the plan during Capture the Flag.
“Hey guys, are you bored? I'm sure Dad and my brothers take all the good fights, huh? You know, if you guys continue fighting each other, I might lose this and you guys will miss out on a good fight.”
At first, I thought it fell on deaf ears. But then, they stopped their jostling and started to take a more unified path as we raced along the streets. Like I thought, they enjoyed a good fight as much as their owner did.
“That's what I like to see. Look, we're pretty surrounded right now. What do you say we rampage a bit before I take you guys home?”
An evil-sounding whinny came from the horses. I couldn’t really speak horse, but I took that as an okay and pointed at the birds above us. Did I feel stupid? Kinda. But as long as it worked, I couldn’t complain.
“See them? All yours. I'll cover you guys from the ground forces, and in exchange, you guys fall in line. Alright?”
A burst of fire came from one of the horses in response and I heard a loud squawk as it engulfed one of the feather-shooters. I breathed a sigh in relief as the rest of the birds started to scatter. They veered left and right in an attempt to avoid the flaming streams that were now sporadically being fired in their direction.
“Alright! Good job, I'll leave it to you!”
I gave a smile as I turned behind to my land-based foes, quickly gaining on me. I could hear the occasional woosh of fire as the horses fought the birds. One of the armored trucks caught up to my right and one of the spartoi leaned out of the vehicle. They aimed down the sights and pointed their shotgun at me.
“Sudden traffic in your area. You will be delayed by…five minutes. You are still on the fastest route!”
“Woah, that’s not fair! Come on Dad! A gun? Really!?”
I felt a tug in my stomach. It wasn’t something I could do a lot in a row without being exhausted, but I had some sorta pull when it came to weapons. When I gave a command, they were able to fall right out of their owner’s hands.
“Alright, let’s even the playerfield shall we?”
I held out my hand and they dropped it, the gun fell onto the ground, crushed by the wheels of the car. The second caught up to my left and once again, a spartoi leaned out of their car, weapon in hand.
“Another one!? Come on! How am I going to…”
I was jerked to the side as the horses suddenly veered right. At first, I thought it was the horses misbehaving again, but then a monstrous squeal came from behind me, rushing forwards.
Crash
I heard the sound of steel groaning as the boar rushed past the truck, pushing their truck out of the way as they aggressively charged forward. It was a good thing I managed to get out of the way, or else I would have been in trouble. I could see the spartoi shaking their fist as they spun out, their car massively dented with a massive gash in the armor. Now that I had to deal with two enemies, I decided to use the boar’s momentum to my advantage. I pulled back on the reins and the boar kept barreling on, too fast to stop as I made the chariot suddenly stop and then take a sudden turn away from the temple. The boar ran straight into a brick wall, seemingly dazed but otherwise okay.
”Rerouting...”
That temporarily took care of two of my enemies. Now that I had one to worry about, and my horses were pretty steady, I could start this fight in earnest. I kept one hand on the reins as I grabbed my Miku keychain. I unclipped it, and the keychain turned into a katana, with said keychain still on the bottom. It was my sword, Anime (I want to clarify, my friend Jules named it, not me). One of the Spartoi readied a spear and lunged at me. I parried it with my blade, and stabbed at their chest. I felt my blade plunge into their body. I pulled away at it, slashing at it again to tear it apart. To my disappointment though, the monster quickly reformed.
I don't know what I expected, to be honest. They wouldn't be much of an immortal soldier if they died after the first hit. But it bought me valuable time as we pushed forward. Almost as soon as its bones knit back together, it struck at me. I guarded once again, my sword starting to glow brighter and brighter with each strike. Our blades clashed and separated again and again for, I don’t know how long to be honest. I was putting up a good fight, but I just couldn’t gain the upperhand in that fight. For starters, if it was a monster or even a demigod it’d be ten ways to Tartarus at the moment. But, no matter how I sliced or diced it, the immortal soldier kept on coming back. Also, I just wasn't used to multitasking like that, I held on as tightly as I could, but the brief times I practiced Chariot combat with my friends Jules and Cel, I was either driving or fighting. Both at the same time was hard, and I was lucky that the horses were so cooperative.
I heard the whinny of one of the horses ahead as I looked back to the front. No sign of the birds meant that there was a few extra-crispy feather-shooters along the road somewhere, which was good news. But then, I looked out in front and realized that there was a big problem. One of the trucks we left behind somehow got in front of us, blocking the road with their car. Five spartoi were standing outside of the car, swords and spears drawn as they headed the chariot off.
At this moment, I knew I was screwed. I was too fast to just stop. And, even if I did stop, I’d have to deal with all the angry skeleton men chasing me down. I just winced, bracing for impact. But then, I heard a neigh as the horses pulling my chariot started to turn into steel and combined once more. The chariot started to shift, the creak of metal folding and turning. I quickly sheathed my sword as the reins turned into chrome handlebars which I gripped like my life depended on it. The chariot continued to morph until once again it was a motorcycle with flame patterns. I veered as left as I could, narrowly avoiding hitting the side of a nearby building as I sped past the skeletal blockade. I braked, motorcycle now turning back into the chariot form as I turned back and watched as the car that was chasing me slammed straight into the other.
The now pissed spartoi stumbled out of the wreckage and started to scream undead obscenities to each other. I couldn’t speak ghost, but whatever they said seemed to be pretty rude, because both sides started to unsheath their swords and get into an all-out brawl. One of the spartoi sliced the other in two, and they didn’t reform this time as their essence slid into their black sword.
Huh. Well, that was one way to deal with them.
“Whew! Good horses.”
I turned, ready to snap the reins once again, but I stopped as I saw what was waiting for me at the other end of the road. The boar, still very much on my trail stood in front of me. It pawed at the ground in front of it, and my horses started to do the same. I stared at the boar, unsheathing Anime once again as we stared off.
“Keep straight for…500 feet.”
The thing about boars is that they can be pretty deadly. They’re brutish and aggressive, and they go down fighting. You know the crossguard that’s near the pointy end of a spear? That’s so the animal doesn’t run up the spear to take you out with it. You don’t think them being that dangerous, but there’s a reason that dad’s symbol is a boar.
I had to make this quick, and efficient or I’d end up maimed, or worse. I snapped the reins one more time, and the horses started to dash down the street. The boar squealed as it barreled to me. I could see it get closer and closer. I grit my teeth, holding my blade in my right hand as it started to shine more and more brightly. My hand held onto the grip tightly, bracing for my next action.
I’d have one shot at this.
I miss, I’m dead.
I hesitate, I’m dead.
I don’t hit the vitals, I’m dead.
Time started to slow around me as I watched the boar rush at the chariot, enraged as it reached the point where there was no stopping it now. I could see the powerful muscles push and pull, the beast using all its power in an attempt to off me for good. I felt heat coming from the front as all four horses breathed a stream of flames at the swine. The boar kept on charging forwards, through the fire as the flames engulfed it. An angry squeal erupted from the inferno as it lept up from the sea of flames, still on fire as it used its strong legs to clear the horses and go straight for me.
Breathe in
I felt a sense of calm wash over me as I pulled my sword hand back. My blade shined brilliantly, even in the May sun. I watched it fall ever closer to me, the flames still eating away at the flesh. I stared into its ever-angry eyes, burning brighter than the flames surrounding it. I don’t falter. I’ve faced monsters that have crushed my bones. I don’t feel fear. I’ve fought creatures that could have killed me in five seconds. This is it. I need it to be perfect.
Breathe out.
SHING
I swung my blade and a rush of air followed it, making an arc that flew to the boar. I don’t doubt my skills. I simply watch, confident that this will end the monster once and for all. The blast, charged from my fight flew unimpeded. The beast’s chuffs turned into surprised squeal as it sliced the boar cleanly in two, bisecting it from the snout down. I sheathed my sword and put both hands back on the reins, eyes on the road as I barely watched what came next. The flaming boar started to fade into dust, still falling through the air until only a tusk was left. I held out my arm and caught it with my right hand.
“Oh hot, hot!”
I juggled it a bit with one hand before placing it down on the chariot floor. I grinned triumphantly as I realized what happened. Dad tried to test me, to see if I was “worthy” or he genuinely tried to kill me. Either way, I beat him this time, proving to him that I was more. That he underestimated me when we first met, that I was a brave warrior all along. In the end, I proved to him that I could fulfill my Styx oath even past what was expected of me. I laughed as I sped up, I felt pretty good about my victory. I wondered how his face would look, or if I could read his expression past his dumb sunglasses.
But as I rounded the corner, a terrifying sight came to my face as my glee turned to sorrow. I watched with horror as I realized Dad’s influence on the fight kept a more dangerous foe than any before at bay. Now that the fight was over, he had no reason to keep it around, and for once, I wasn’t sure if I could get through this unscathed. I gulped as I put my hands on the reins, not ready to face the impossible challenge alone. I hoped it wouldn’t break me as I prepared what little I had to fight this foe.
”There is an unusual amount of traffic in your area today.”
“Now you tell me…”
None other, than New York traffic.
I’d like to say that I did something else. Like I defeated an army of drakons on my way, or managed to fight off crazed demigods sent by my dad…but no. It was pretty much just traffic the rest of the way there. It was long and arduous, but I managed to make my way over to The Intrepid. After that traffic,I had to say, the amount of crazy drivers was almost San Francisco bad. I’d have taken as many spartoi and boars as dad could throw at me, if it meant I wasn’t drowning in the sea of cars. I drove down Pier 86, feeling a sense of relief as I got closer and closer to the aircraft carrier turned museum. As I got within eyeshot, I realized that dad said to take it to the temple, but not where to drop it off at.
It would be really stupid to end up failing just because I wasn’t sure where to leave dad’s ride. I got off the chariot, and was eyeing the prices of a ticket.
“Adults are thirty-six, Seniors and College Students…thirty four… Oh hey! Children of Ares get in free! Now, how do I wheel dad’s chariot through the front…”
Suddenly the side gate opened, lights flashing and clanging as it automatically retracted. The person standing in the booth waved me over and I hopped back onto the chariot, driving it by cautiously. They were dressed like a security guard, shades covering their eyes as they looked down onto their phone that they were absentmindedly playing with. Eyebrow piercings peeked out from behind the shades. They were tall, looked about early twenties, and seemed like your average bored museum guard, if not for that sorta godly aura I got from them.
“Take the chariot this way, Lord Ares will be at the end of Pier 86. Can’t miss him.”
I eyed the godling suspiciously. They seemed like one of those myriad younger and minor gods I saw when I was on Olympus. Not anyone I’d know, but if they wanted to stop me, it’d be annoying to get past them. They didn’t seem to be that dangerous, at least right now. But when you were a demigod, you learned to be wary of free handouts.
“Uh…look man, I’m going to be honest. I just got through some hellish traffic to get through here. So if like, you’re leading me into a trap or if my godly brothers are going to show up to try and take this, can you just start the fight and save me the trouble? It’s been a long morning, and I just wanna get this over with.”
I stared back at my reflection through their mirrored shades. Growing up, I always thought of myself as gangly and awkward. I could see my messed up hair, tousled from the wind. I stood tall, and although I wasn’t the buffest Ares kid around, you couldn’t call me skinny anymore. I looked almost heroic as I held the reins atop the chariot. Was that how I looked now? The godling shook their head as they chuckled, putting down their phone as they looked at me in the eyes.
“Kid, even for a god like Ares who likes conflict, you don’t do something like that in a temple. You can’t just attack his kid on his own grounds. Plus, it's part of the rules of war to respect neutralized zones. Trust me, you’re home free.”
“Oh. Um, thank you.”
He nodded and went back on his phone. I snapped on the reins and the chariot trotted along, even fire-breathing horses had to follow traffic laws apparently. I was on guard, not taking the godling’s words at face value. Mortals in a daze parted around the chariot, a few snapping pictures at me. I freaked out for a split second before I heard the tourists being in awe at what I heard to be a “vintage bomber”. Dumbfounded, I stopped for a brief second. It didn’t even have wings! But, I could see the mist shimmer around me and for a brief moment, see the silhouette of the plane around the chariot. It was an old fighter, a single propellor with flaming horse art on the nose.
“P-40B Warhawk? Alright, guess we’re working with that.”
I frowned a bit, trying to think if I knew that before this, from a school project or if it was more demigod shenanigans. I was never into fighter jets, but when you’re a demigod sometimes your parent’s godly influence shoves itself into your head and it’s always confusing when it does.
I drove the “plane” to the end of the pier, where I could see my dad sitting down on a barricade, blocking off a massive plane above him. It wasn’t used for war apparently, because I had no clue what type of plane it was. Looked cool though, it was really narrow around the nose end and the wings were all near the back end. He had a big wicked-looking combat knife in his hand that he used to clean his nails. He looked up at me, disinterestedly, before going back down to the knife.
“You’re alive.”
I couldn’t tell from his tone if that was a good or bad thing. It seemed… neutral. Like he was stating the sky was blue. But, overall I’d take that as a good thing, considering our last meeting. I spoke a bit warily, not sure if he was in a good or bad mood considering my victory.
“Uh, so Father. I’m finished with what you-”
“No. You’re not.”
“I’m not!? Do I need to do anything or-”
A moment of panic snuck up into my chest. For a brief moment I was afraid he was going to pull a twelve labors on me, but then he whistled and held out his hand.
“Not until you give me the keys kid, then it’s done.”
I hopped out of the chariot, the reins in my hand turning into keys as the horses went back into their motorcycle form. I somewhat clumsily tossed it to my dad, who grabbed it. He pushed himself off his perch, first making sure his motorcycle was unharmed. Then, he turned to me, eying me up and down as he circled around where I stood. I stood still, at attention as I felt my heart racing in my chest. I felt like a deer, cornered by a wolf just waiting to strike. Yet, the first pang of anxiety soon settled down. If he wanted to take care of me, he would have done so already. Or sent something more dangerous like a Drakon at me when I was driving. I felt my heart leap up into my throat as he clapped a big hand on my shoulder. The gesture wasn’t hostile, if anything, the motion seemed friendly. But his grip was anything but. His hand, like the claws of a tiger dug into my shoulder as he grinned at me.
“I have to say, I thought you were a lost cause, but look at you kid. Took you long enough, but I guess you have enough of me in you after all. Well, a late bloomer is better than being completely useless, but man! You were one of my most pathetic kids when you took that oath. I don’t think I had a kid as wimpy as you in a long time. Well, I’m glad my little nudge helped you keep that oath up after all. It would have been a waste of a perfectly good warrior if you didn’t shape up.”
I looked at him, dumbfounded. He helped me? He didn’t do anything! I wasn’t stupid enough to point it out, but I guess he knew what I was thinking as I felt his grip tighten as he growled.
“Come on, don’t give me that look, kid. Oh, don’t look so surprised. Tip of advice: don’t dip your toes into cards. You have a horrible poker face. Your mom was the same way. But, yes. I helped. Not that kids these days would understand. Parents these days are too soft, including most of us gods. Back in Sparta, we’d leave our kids to fend for themselves. Just give them barely enough food and let them hunt or steal the rest. If they end up dying in the hunt or starved, well that’s fine. They were too weak to do anything of note anyway. You should consider yourself lucky I was generous enough to just turn my back on you.”
He chuckled low, and my blood ran cold as he shook me. I shook my head, fighting off a wave of dizziness as he threatened to take off my arm.
“Oh, but that’s in the past! You passed your agōgē period, all by yourself. Now that is true strength.”
His evil grin widened as he gave me the closest thing to an approved look he’d ever given me. I furrowed my brow as I shook my head. This credit, it wasn’t mine to take, was it? Before I could think, I spoke what was on my mind.
“I’m sorry, but I didn’t do this by myself. Everywhere I went, I had someone to help me out. If it wasn’t for the help from my friends, I don’t think I would be standing here. I didn’t-”
My dad’s good mood instantly soured as his grin warped into a snarl. His grip, although somewhat friendly now seemed dangerously tight as he frustratingly interrupted me.
“Oh for the love of! I’m complimenting you, kid. Look. I don’t care about those other twerps one way or another. Allies are fine enough in war, as long as you don’t make them do all the work. Kid, you’ve gotten strong all on your own, like a true son of mine. Don’t deny you and me the kleos you rightfully deserve ever again. Shut up and just take the honor.”
“I…uh…yes, Dad.”
I was surprised that all it accounted to was a mild scolding. My dad, too seemed to calm down after I agreed with his words, as he went back to a smile. He put his hand back into his pocket as he started to walk up to his chariot. He ran his finger across the chrome finish, taking out a cloth and cleaning off my fingerprints from the metal.
“About your joyride. Not bad, not bad at all. It took you a bit to embrace your birthright, but you ended up not even scratching my ride. Nice. Nice. Saves me the trouble of buffing it out. Now, if you could only stop complaining at everything that opposed you. You’re a man, aren’t you David? Start acting like it. If you think a bag of bones and a pig are hard, just wait until your future. The stronger a warrior gets, the stronger their foes get. Make sure you’re strong enough to stand up against them before you end up a stain on the pavement.”
I heard the engine rev as he got into the seat. He threw a bag at me that I clumsily fumbled with before I fully caught it. I opened it, and a few golden drachmas shined back at me.
“Since your agōgē finished up, consider yourself un-cut off. Even I’m not heartless enough to leave a son of mine stranded in New York. Keep the rest. Feel free to hang around my temple, and help yourself to the gift shop if you want, it’s on the house, happy birthday and all that. Just don’t go overboard.”
He turned the motorcycle, wheeling it around so he could leave the pier. He turned around, giving me a few more parting words he shouted over the roar of the engine.
“Don’t think you’re done yet, David. You got a lot more to grow. Especially now that you can receive my blessings again. What, did you think that taking a good hit was all you can do? You’ll see sooner or later. See ya kid! Don’t disappoint me.”
He revved his engine one more time and took off, leaving me behind on the pier. As I watched my dad leave, I realized that with that resolved, the last of what made my Styx Oath so suffocating was finally finished. A part of me felt that I’d always keep the consequences of it with me. Either dad would continue to disown me, or I’d be horribly injured from my jobs. But, to my surprise, everything worked out alright. I worked as hard as I could, and now everything was over, truly over. I…wasn’t sure how I felt about it. I mean, like obviously I didn’t wanna have them with me for the rest of my life. But, for all of my oath’s lifespan I had the deadline looming overhead, and my expectation was that something would happen to me as a result. I was glad to have it over with, but I never felt that I could relax until now. The feeling of not having the anxiety of my imminent demise was something I wasn’t familiar with, and to be honest I still have trouble relaxing. As he disappeared into the afternoon traffic, I realized that, so too did my previous life.
Maybe…maybe I could afford to enjoy my life now after all.
OOC: And there we have it! The final David storymode relevant to this storyline! I meant to have this yesterday but I didn't see the modmail that gave me the okay until literally an hour ago oop. Which means that yes, the Chariot and Ares both are approved from the mods.
Big thank you to Tiffany's writer, angelspoint for helping me with her parts, I had a blast working with them! Hope you enjoyed David's Victory lap!

I(28F) have been friends with with Kevin(26M) for almost 4yrs. I’ve been with my boyfriend Daniel(24M) for 4yrs so naturally Daniel & Kevin became close like brothers. Daniel, Kevin & I have been living together for 3yrs. Kevin has been dating Natalie(22F) for less than a year. At first we loved having her over she was sweet,talkative, friendly and I was looking forward to having a new girl friend. Until we started to notice her toxic behavior. I’ll give some examples: she goes thru his phone, if he came to our house instead of hanging out in the living room with the rest of us she’d go to Kevin’s room and if he didn’t follow her she’d pick a fight, if he didn’t respond to her texts sometimes he did warn her ahead of time cuz he’d be busy with work, school or helping us out with something she’d blow up his phone and would cry and yell hysterically, if he had class on her day off she would sit in her car in the school’s parking lot for the 5hrs he’d be in class. What really concerned me was she went thru his posts, likes and comments on Instagram, she began to stalk and harass (a girl he actually knew not a random girl) cuz he made too many comments on her posts( long before they got together). She ended her friendship with Kevin cuz of Natalie’s harassment. After noticing this behavior we have asked him if he’s happy he admitted he isn’t but isn’t willing to give up on their relationship. We don’t want to butt in and give advice cuz we don’t think it’s our place and we don’t want her to think we’re advising him to break up with her. But later Daniel found out that she looks down on our relationship cuz of our sense of humor and how we shit talk to each other and she has called Daniel some derogatory names cuz after hanging out Kevin didn’t go to her car right away cuz he got caught up in a conversation with Daniel(not about her). The I noticed that when I would text Kevin about household related things (ie rent & chores) he wouldn’t text me but would tell Daniel the answer to my question and ask him to pass it to me. I admit I became paranoid that Natalie was stalking my social media even though she knows who I am and that I’m with Daniel but my concerns got the best of me so I blocked her. A few days after I blocked Natalie I tried to message Kevin on Facebook and it said “15 mutual friends. You and Kevin are not friends on Facebook” so I told Daniel and he questioned Kevin about it & he had no clue. It turns out that Natalie went thru his social media and unfriended me on all his accounts cuz I blocked her, she claimed she did it out of anger. I unblocked her and limited my contact with Kevin to ease her issues. But he hasn’t tried to add me back or replied to my texts but will still answer them thru Daniel, nor has she tried to apologize for going thru his social media. I felt like she put an end to our friendship so I sent him a lengthy text apologizing for blocking Natalie cuz I didn’t know it would trigger her, that I couldn’t continue being friends with him due to Natalie’s toxic behavior and me feeling unsafe & uncomfortable and I would block him to ease her issues. He replied saying that this is coming out of nowhere, howNatalie never had an issue with me, that she wasn’t stalking my social media, claimed I only blocked her after finding out what she said about Daniel, she’s never done anything to make me feel unsafe or uncomfortable and that she’s always been respectful. I haven’t responded. AITAH for ending our friendship?

Dear *real* you,
I know that my first letter to you was more of a sloppy introduction and venting, so I do apologize if I came across to you the wrong way. This time, after getting some rest and finishing off this workweek on a high note, I'm able to present myself (in written form) to you in a much better way.
We have yet to meet and to realistically get to know each other, so it's not like we're presently involved with one another. This enables me to have the freedom to share with you more of my historical background and how it's beginning to lead me and draw me to you.
If you've been following or have taken a quiet interest in anything or everything I've posted, you'd know that there was a recent ghost I'm currently tasked with slaying. I can assure you that he is no one for you to worry about. The universe already knows that he's wrong for me, which was why I'm under strict orders not to go out and replace him. Yes, eventually, things will work out for you and I to get together and build our own empire. For now, though, I'm clearing out all of my dead connections and this ghost was one of them. In a weird way, letting him go while not looking for you is actually beginning to ... draw me to you. And the way in which it happened was unexpected.
As part of my healing journey, the universe wants me to channel my energy into a deeply hidden and unlocked passion that I never really knew I had: MUSIC. I answered a question here (it was something about Tennessee) and my mind followed. My first stop was in Lynchburg, where I would appropriately lay my ghost's memory to rest in the most enjoyable way (the second greatest love of his life was American whiskey). Lady A's "Hey Bartender" would be the right musical score as I mix just the right amount of proof to silence him and remember him no more. My next stop would be Memphis.
I'm going to share with you one of the best dreams I've had. I was in Memphis (I've been through there years ago, so maybe it was a suppressed memory from more than 13 years ago) and ... well ... I don't remember exactly I was, but I was sitting at this magnificent, black, grand piano. The next thing I knew, I was playing the opening guitar riff to Guns N' Roses "Sweet Child O' Mine" on the keys. I was having fun and tickled those keys so easily! The jazz band playing followed along with me. But right before Axl Rose would start singing, I woke up. I can't read or write music (yet), but if I did, I would have immediately composed what I heard shortly after waking up while I still had it in my head.
Okay, so how does that relate to you? As I continued listening to that song, somehow my mind began to think of Elvis. Somewhere between missing those impersonators when I was in Vegas and wondering if anyone in jail actually does the "Jailhouse Rock", I thought of you and I living it up as we tour Graceland. On my own, I had no real intentions of ever going. But if you desire to visit there, I'm definitely up for the ride alongside you. Of course, in my theatrical mind, we look at all of his stills from past performances and we suddenly recognize another artist ~ Rick Astley. You know that popular "Never Gonna Give You Up" thumbnail that practically everyone was familiar with? Who was he trying to emulate? Elvis Presley, the Original Rickroller.
Then my last stop would be in Nashville. This time, I'll take you a little further back into my history, back into 2013. I lived in the South, involved with the Christian church, and I had the opportunity to be a part of the Girls of Grace tour that was hosted by First Priority. While the students were blessed with performances and testimonies from Moriah Peters and For King & Country, I actually got to meet a few of the recording execs and talent managers who worked in Nashville. One lady I spoke with was eager to meet my crush at the time, as I had bragged on how well he was gifted musically. I almost gave to her his cover of Club Noveau's "Lean on Me" that he performed for VBS that year (I somehow lost it in the YahooVerse). It turned out for the best, though, because I eventually learned from his closest friends and character witnesses that he really didn't want to "commercialize" his talent and wanted to keep it in the church. Oh, well. I then met an intern who took the time to explain exactly how songs were recorded and produced. Turns out, after all, that each part of the song (guitars, drums, vocals, etc.) are all recorded separately before they are put together, before the artist actually sings the song. What we hear is the COMPLETED product of many hours of rehearsals, retakes, and experimenting with different key and tempo changes.
In closing, I'll take you just a decade back into my history with the last ghost (I promise!). Before you, but also to date as of May 2024, this guy was the best one I've ever dated. The one thing I remember about him was his exceptional musical talent, how he could easily go from the piano/keyboard, guitars (electric, bass, and acoustic), drums, and vocals. I admired that about him. One night after we had dinner at Chili's and saw the premiere of Pirates of the Carribean, he brought me to his house (his mom lived with him, so it wasn't what you might be thinking). While he was in the bathroom, I noticed that he had carved out a little recording studio from the living room. I noticed the drum set, so I just ... picked up those sticks and started playing. He then picked up one of his electric guitars and started playing. His mom quietly came out from her room and leaned on the counter, watching us play. After we finished with our impromptu performance, we noticed her there and immediately began apologizing. She just laughed and went, "I was just enjoying the concert!"
Okay, back to the present ...
What's my point? With each of those connections that I had valued at one point in time, they spoke my language: *MUSIC*. What does the universe want me to reinvest my energy into chasing? *MUSIC*. This is also telling you exactly how you can reach me and how I can distinguish your voice, your energy, from all the rest. It's by you speaking my language.
Do I expect you to be somehow put off, intimidated or otherwise repulsed by my history? No. I already know that you have your own history with many (or few) women who, for one reason or another, just didn't work out. Yes, you have your own Jordan Davis story to tell me. Yes, at some point in the future, you'll be able to tell me "There wouldn't be no you and me right now if it weren't for the almost maybes." Yes, it will be worth waiting for.
Until then, just know that I'll continue to follow the universe and chase the music in me, marching to the beat of my own drum. When the time is right, and without missing a beat, you'll be able to pick up your own guitar and strum right along.
~ Me