"Hello there"... If you get that reference then we're off to a good start haha. I'll start by saying that I'm looking to form a genuine connection with someone. I want to be able to hang out, voice chat, joke and laugh, and mess around with one another. Seeing where things go and hope that they lead into something serious because honestly, I want someone who I'd enjoy spending time with and know that they also love spending time with me. That being said, I just feel it's better to start off as friends, being open with someone and getting to know the real them. Take things slow, rather than jump head first into a relationship only to find out there's no chemistry.
​
Okay, a little bit about me:
I am Peruvian, aka a llama. I would say I'm a geeky homebody who's more introverted than extroverted but I am down to go out and try new things, with the right people of course. Personality wise, I would say most people would described as quiet or shy but if we click then you would see I actually enjoy listening and chatting about all sorts of things. I'm pretty much an open book when it comes to anything.
I would say I'm a bit of a hopeless romantic. At the moment, my love languages at the moment are Quality time and Words of Affirmation but I would love to be able to add physical touch to the list someday since I hear cuddles are nice and soothing. I believe in the "treat people the way you want to be treated" since I mean, who likes to be belittled. I mean, I'm sure there are some people out there but I'm not one of them so lol.
Physically speaking, I'm 5'2", 123 lbs, average/lean-ish built (if that's how you would word it lol), tanned skin, brown eyes, and black hair. I've been trying to workout a bit to gain some muscle. But if you're that curious as to what I look like, then here's a few pics I have.
On my free time, I'm either gaming (PC and Xbox), watching anime/reading a manga/webtoon, working out (whenever I can/am in the mood for lol) or doing chores. Some other things I like include: Star Wars (hence my reference at the beginning), Pokémon, Marvel, and drawing. I also used to do a lot of jujitsu and played a lot of soccer and I'm trying to keep myself active.
​
What I'm looking for:
Someone who's 21 or older. Someone who is loyal, caring, open about their thoughts and feelings and who is convey those thoughts and feelings, or any issue that goes through their head. I'm always open to talk about things as long as you're able to communicate. Or if you just need someone to listen, I will always try to lend you some company. As mentioned earlier, someone who'd love to spend time together, grow with, and just be able to have fun with. I would prefer someone who also likes gaming and/or anime so we can spent time together. It's not exactly a must but it would be nice to have those interests in common. I live in NY and while it would be nice you also did, I wouldn't mind a giving a long distance relationship a go if we click but I would like to limit it to at least in the U.S. Also, smoking/drugs are a big no for me.
​
Still here? Haha, cool. Since you are, I'll show you something I found a while back that I always find funny haha. But if you are interested in seeing where things go, don't be afraid to message me a bit about yourself and I'll respond when I'm free. As long as it's more than just a simple "Hey". If you prefer chatting somewhere else, I have Discord, Insta and Snap if one of those is more your cup of tea. I guess that about does it. Hope you all have a good day!

"Hello there"... If you get that reference then we're off to a good start haha. I'll start by saying that I'm looking to form a genuine connection with someone. I want to be able to hang out, voice chat, joke and laugh, and mess around with one another. Seeing where things go and hope that they lead into something serious because honestly, I want someone who I'd enjoy spending time with and know that they also love spending time with me. That being said, I just feel it's better to start off as friends, being open with someone and getting to know the real them. Take things slow, rather than jump head first into a relationship only to find out there's no chemistry.
​
Okay, a little bit about me:
I am Peruvian, aka a llama. I would say I'm a geeky homebody who's more introverted than extroverted but I am down to go out and try new things, with the right people of course. Personality wise, I would say most people would described as quiet or shy but if we click then you would see I actually enjoy listening and chatting about all sorts of things. I'm pretty much an open book when it comes to anything.
I would say I'm a bit of a hopeless romantic. At the moment, my love languages at the moment are Quality time and Words of Affirmation but I would love to be able to add physical touch to the list someday since I hear cuddles are nice and soothing. I believe in the "treat people the way you want to be treated" since I mean, who likes to be belittled. I mean, I'm sure there are some people out there but I'm not one of them so lol.
Physically speaking, I'm 5'2", 123 lbs, average/lean-ish built (if that's how you would word it lol), tanned skin, brown eyes, and black hair. I've been trying to workout a bit to gain some muscle. But if you're that curious as to what I look like, then here's a few pics I have.
On my free time, I'm either gaming (PC and Xbox), watching anime/reading a manga/webtoon, working out (whenever I can/am in the mood for lol) or doing chores. Some other things I like include: Star Wars (hence my reference at the beginning), Pokémon, Marvel, and drawing. I also used to do a lot of jujitsu and played a lot of soccer and I'm trying to keep myself active.
​
What I'm looking for:
Someone who's 21 or older. Someone who is loyal, caring, open about their thoughts and feelings and who is convey those thoughts and feelings, or any issue that goes through their head. I'm always open to talk about things as long as you're able to communicate. Or if you just need someone to listen, I will always try to lend you some company. As mentioned earlier, someone who'd love to spend time together, grow with, and just be able to have fun with. I would prefer someone who also likes gaming and/or anime so we can spent time together. It's not exactly a must but it would be nice to have those interests in common. I live in NY and while it would be nice you also did, I wouldn't mind a giving a long distance relationship a go if we click but I would like to limit it to at least in the U.S. Also, smoking/drugs are a big no for me.
​
Still here? Haha, cool. Since you are, I'll show you something I found a while back that I always find funny haha. But if you are interested in seeing where things go, don't be afraid to message me a bit about yourself and I'll respond when I'm free. As long as it's more than just a simple "Hey". If you prefer chatting somewhere else, I have Discord, Insta and Snap if one of those is more your cup of tea. I guess that about does it. Hope you all have a good day!

Uma Musume: Pretty Derby - ROAD TO THE TOP
I wasn’t planning on checking out the 4 episode special for Uma Musume, but the amazing opening caught my eye and convinced me to give it a shot. As I started watching, it was clear to me that this show’s superb animation was supported by some incredible cinematography that helped build the narrative between its leads. As a fun exercise, I wanted to try to highlight some of the directing choices and break down how Uma Musume RTTT gets away with telling so little by showing so much.
Cinematography is the presentation of the visuals in anime. The arrangement of characters in a scene, the lighting, the focus on props or backgrounds: all of these can be encapsulated by “cinematography,” and put in a ton of work for the viewing experience. There are plenty of obvious instances where a show will employ cinematography, but even if you don’t notice it immediately, these choices can have an underlying psychological effect in how you experience a scene. You can dye a scene in blue to enhance the melancholy. You can cut away from a conversation to a nearby prop to reveal a character’s mental state. These visual techniques can easily go underappreciated, and Uma Musume thankfully has some fairly overt examples that we can analyze.
(spoilers for episode 1)
Episode one opens up with the Yayoi Sho, a GII race that introduces two of our main leads: Narita Top Road and Admiral Vega. Much of what I want to talk about in this race will come later. But let me give a brief synopsis of the race. Under a slight drizzle, we start off with Avec Blaze* in the lead. Narita Top Road, eager to meet the expectations of her fans and coach, puts on a burst of speed to take the lead. Admiral Vega, who also feels the need to win for a yet undisclosed person, quickly follows up on her heels despite lingering behind the pack. Though it’s a close affair between the two, Narita Top Road clutches her lead and wins the race. She cheerfully waves to the crowd while Admiral Vega regretfully looks on. The episode immediately gives viewers exactly what they’re here for: some hype horse girls racing.
After the OP, we follow Narita Top Road in her daily school life. Her training starts at dawn, and this is clearly a recurring affair since her coach advises her to take a break.** At school, Narita Top Road is the class president and is admired by her classmates. Between her coach, fans, and friends, there’s plenty of people who acknowledge her drive and expect great things from her. Admiral Vega, noticing a small injury on Narita Top Road’s thigh, brings her outside to put a band-aid on it. In the hallway, Narita Top Road and Admiral Vega confess to one another declare their respective determination to win the upcoming Satsukisho. While Narita Top Road professes her excitement to race along with someone she admires, the light from the windows is always illuminating her face. She is quite literally glowing. Meanwhile, Admiral Vega, who feels hesitant about befriending her rivals, seems to have her face framed in between the path of these light beams. She’s not poorly lit by any means: there is just a clear difference in how our two characters are illuminated. The light is so all over Narita Top Road that she is reflecting light. This light and dark metaphor will persist throughout the episode’s run.
We’re next treated to a brief origin story for Narita Top Road. What helps sell the flashback is the fact that the conversations with the trainer all take place at sunset. This is a great example of the “Against the Setting Sun” trope, where Narita Top Road and the trainer make a goal to conquer the Twinkle Series together. Sunsets can symbolize transitioning to another phase, and here it depicts Narita Top Road’s first step to becoming a pro. We’re also treated to a parallel from an earlier training scene, where Narita Top Road attempts to make a sharp turn from the outside of the pack. She struggles more in this flashback, staggering several times; there is a noticeable improvement in the training scene that took place during the present, where Narita Top Road only staggers once. The mirroring of her first training scene in this flashback confirms Narita Top Road’s consistent practice and diligence. Narita Top Road works from sunrise to sunset, and when you consider the previous paragraph on lighting, it becomes apparent that Narita Top Road can be associated with daylight.
While Satsukisho is expected to be all about Admiral Vega vs. Narita Top Road, we switch unexpectedly to a third character. The ordering of events here was initially a bit confusing for me: we start with a cocky smirk prior to cutting to the eyecatch, with the upper half of the face hidden. When we come back, the first thing we see is an eye: it is TM Opera O waking up at 2 AM, visibly distressed. Then, it cuts to a flashback where TM Opera O is returning to running after an injury. She is all bravado and speaks boldly of her destiny to win every race she enters. She proceeds to win consecutive races, backing up her claims, but is also shown visibly struggling during training. Even so, she proudly declares that her perseverance in the face of adversity is for the audience: TM Opera O lives to win and bask in the cheers of a crowd. This flashback in my opinion serves to humanize TM Opera O’s larger than life personality: behind her dramatic flair and proud sense of self is someone who worked incredibly hard to get back into shape and still experiences some stress about meeting the standards she set for herself. For instance, her introduction starts with just her mouth, hiding the eyes, which are commonly used to indicate a character’s true nature. Then the show cuts to that portion of the face (eye) that was missing in that first shot, suggesting that the TM Opera O waking up right now is closer to her true self than the more grandiose mask she wears in public. She’ll continue to play this theatrical character in the series, but her introduction serves to let the audience know early on that she’s had her own share of struggles and insecurities.
Finally, we get to Admiral Vega and what she’s doing in preparation for the Satsukisho. We cut to night time, where Admiral Vega leaves to go for a run. She and her roommate, Curren Chan, are placed in different layers (Admiral Vega slightly blurred in the front while Curren Chan is sharp and placed behind her). This arrangement highlights the contrast in their activities: as Curren Chan is clearly winding down the day by brushing her tail, Admiral Vega is off to train. As she runs along a deserted street with numerous streetlights, Admiral Vega refuses to step into them. In fact, she’s shown running away from the light. The connection to darkness suggests that Admiral Vega’s motivations could be unhealthy. Or, going back to her thoughts in the hallway, Admiral Vega’s avoidance of light could connect to her dogma that she does not need friends or rivals (in this case, Narita Top Road who is the light): she just has to win at all costs. Either way, the lack of lighting for Admiral Vega directly sets her up as the clear rival for Narita Top Road. In the very next scene, Narita Top Road practices in broad daylight to the cheers of her classmates. Lighting and the time of day will play a pivotal role in coloring the interactions between these two characters in the rest of the series.
And now we’ve finally arrived at the Satsukisho, a premiere GI race for our trio of leads. Before it begins, Admiral Vega and Narita Top Road meet in the tunnels leading to the racetrack. Even though they are in the exact same location with respect to the light from the exit, Narita Top Road’s face is illuminated while Admiral Vega’s face continues to be shadowed. These two are definitely rivals and antitheses to one another. However, TM Opera O appears from the top of the tunnel exit, the backlighting giving her an almost videogame-boss-like feel; these two were supposed to be focused on one another, but the more menacing opponent may be the one standing above them.
Even if the media has tried to convince you that it’s a close affair between Narita Top Road and Admiral Vega, the cinematography makes it clear that this is Narita Top Road’s race to lose. Despite her cheerful demeanor in training, Narita Top Road is actually very nervous. She’s the last to enter her start gate and, as her classmates and friends cheer her on, we get this shot of Narita Top Road seemingly caged in by her starting gate. These expectations that she’s desperate to meet are beginning to stress her out. As we start the race, you’ll see that many of the shots here mirror that first race, which Narita Top Road won: the stormy clouds and slight drizzle, the shot of her coach right before the dramatic last minute spurt from Narita Top Road to take the lead, and even the brief proximity of Narita Top Road and Admiral Vega give the impression that we’ve seen this exact race before.
But unlike the race at the start of the episode, TM Opera O arrives to steal the show! There’s an incredible panning shot that zooms in on TM Opera O as she makes a break for the lead, emphasizing her approach. But then she flies past the camera, and the shot becomes an inverted zoom away. Not only does this shot give the viewer the sense of being left in the dust like her opponents, but the upside down perspective makes it clear that this result is an upset and, dare I say it, has flipped expectations. TM Opera O snatches victory from Narita Top Road’s hands, shattering the projection of a repeat of the first race’s results.*** She rightfully basks in the glory she anticipated earlier in the episode.
At the end, Narita Top Road is devastated. While TM Opera O celebrates, Narita Top Road’s sweaty face is pushed to the background: it’s a very familiar position for Admiral Vega. The mirroring of shots throughout this final race really gives this single episode a sense of completion, and that we’ve come full circle in spite of the different results. Despite the loss, the episode ends with Narita Top Road’s refusal to give in: a literal ray of sunshine breaks through the clouds and illuminates her as she holds her head high. Her hopes for a GI win have yet to be dashed, and she’ll have three more episodes to get her revenge. Meanwhile, Admiral Vega finished a dismal 6th, and her posture here is even more slumped than in the first race. Maybe it’s an injury bothering her, or perhaps it’s from the increasing weight of her failed expectations physically pushing her down. We’ll have to see in episode two if she’ll be able to find the same strength to raise her head.
As you watch the next three episodes, you’ll find the same impeccable directing throughout. They’ll continue to mirror previous shots to help depict the evolving relationships between characters and utilize lighting to contrast Narita Top Road and Admiral Vega. There are so many awesome shots littered throughout the show and despite my qualms for some of the story elements, my attention was captured by both the stellar race animation and the thoughtful cinematography. Even if you’re not that interested in horse girls, consider giving this short ONA a shot.****
*Is her name actually Astral Blaze?
**There’s a fun pair of shots here between the coach and Narita Top Road, but I wasn’t sure what this could mean outside of (spoilers) some potential communication issues between Narita Top Road and her trainer in the later episodes.
***I really was hoping that TM Opera O being in the 12th position and winning was a cinematic choice referencing Narita Top Road winning the first race in the 12th position, but no it is an actual coincidence.
****This was supposed to be a funny post about horse feet but I got lost in the directing sauce.

Facebook keeps on suggesting (aka promoting) Liberal, Communist, and Socialist pages on my news feed, and it's annoying. A few minutes ago, I just had the misfortune of seeing an unfunny meme about UBI. C R I N G E. 😭
I don't know why it does this. I only follow Conservative/Republican pages in Facebook, so I have no idea why the algorithm keeps on putting woke pages on my news feed. 😑 It's been a hassle blocking these pages every time they appear. What's funny though is that if you look at the comments of the posts from these pages, you will see many conservatives and other non-liberals posting their funny and snarky comments. 😆

After a 1940 defined by gathering strengths and refinement across the feature, the early months of 1941 bring a few troubling portents behind-the-scenes for Fox's affectionately termed Grainy Gladiator. Nothing ruinous in itself, but signs of an upcoming radical shift away from what the character represented to start.
For one, the April issue of Adventure Comics (#61) brings with it a new cover feature, Ted Knight AKA Starman, courtesy writer-artist Jack Burnley. Already the second lengthiest entry in the book at nine pages, Starman quickly managed what neither Sandman nor Hourman could during their respective years as star attractions and upgraded to a full thirteen pages by his third appearance in #63. For context, Sandman only went from six pages to ten with its upgrade, while Hourman has remained rockstaedy at eight pages, and neither took down another non-superhero supporting feature to justify the page increase like Starman did Barry O'Neil and Mark Lansing. Moreover, from Starman's second appearance on, he is only drawn by Burnley; writing duties now belong to the Sandman's own Gardner Fox.
Which loops in with two other issues at play over Wesley's tossing, turning figure. Starting with issue #61, available online sources no longer fully agree who wrote what for the Sandman feature. You must understand, outside superstar figures with major pull like the creators of Superman or Batman, very few creative teams are properly credited in these Golden Age comics - my credits the last few posts have all been crossreferenced across numerous wikis and databases who owe their credits to investigative work by fans like Jerry Bails back in the 1960s. Such work was sadly not exhaustive, and while a few places (like DC Continuity Project and Wikipedia) state or else imply Fox stayed on as writer for the next few issues, from June to November there is no consensus as to who penned the stories.
I shouldn't be surprised if Fox's involvement terminated with the March issue, for April also saw All-Star Comics shift its format slightly, with Fox writing all nine interior stories for the 64 page mag in addition to his duties on the longer Starman feature. Man would have to work double time to keep pace, even if Sandman didn't drop to eight pages with #62 in May. Either way, Fox is certainly gone following #64 in July, as that issue features the final story drawn by regular artist and co-creator Creig Flessel, who departs to work on Shining Knight later in the year. As I say, things are changing fast for Sandman, and not all changes seem necessarily for the better. Best, however, to take the stories on their own level before drawing any final conclusions!
^{Coverage note: This entry goes to July rather than June for the sake of my sanity. If I stopped midway through the year, I'd only need cover seven features here, but the back half of '41 would require coverage of eleven. A nine-nine split feels much more feasible.}

• ADVENTURE COMICS #58 (January)

Orchids of Doom - Gardner Fox, Creig Flessel, Chad Grothkopf

Once again, a socialite friend to Wes and Dian is at the center of a minor mystery with big implications - namely, how can Pedro Nogades, father to Carla, rightly claim he breeds otherwise purely wild orchids in captivity? Investigating as the Sandman, Wes and Dian find a dead man in the Nogades greenhouse with his head stripped to the bone, and in following another fellow who sniffed an orchid before promising a shipment of such to some ruffians on the bad side of town, see his own face dissolve to bare skull. A visit to the police chemist reveals the orchids on the dead men's persons were laced to release a deadly flesh-eating gas on exposure to natural air, which is enough probably cause for Wesley to enlist Carla's boyfriend Bill in staging a raid on the Nogades manor. Some close shaves and fisticuffs end with the group discovering a diorama of the local coast, laid out to assist enemy agents in an invasion. Pedro is put away and the orchids revealed as concealing microfilm copies of the coastal plans, but how do we square the mystery that started it all? Simple: Nogades was no botanist, and called the flower by the wrong name when concocting his cover story!
An alright yarn to kick of the calendar year. As per usual when Fox tries for a somewhat complicated mystery, he's no adequate means of tying off loose ends other than large blocks of text, but it's lively and keeps the situation evolving with decent justifications for mid-story action and dragging Bill along for further fisticuffs. Hooking the entire mystery on, "Oh, the bad guy misspoke," is a tad lame, if understandable in the context of Fox's passion for slipping general knowledge flexes into his stories. Flessel and Grothkopf get some good mileage out've the skull imagery that crops up whenever the flower kills, and I rather like the brief bout of fisticuffs towards the end. The minor social awkwardness when Bill gets in the car with Wes and Dian is pretty good too, and I'm sorry to report I can't add this story to the "Wesley getting shot" count, as the bad guy only plugs his hat. Kinda funny having a Golden Age Sandman story involving orchids given Neil's own pre-Sandman work with Black Orchid, innit?

• ADVENTURE COMICS #59 (February)

The Story of the Flaming Ruby - Fox, Flessel, Grothkopf

There exists a ruby of blazing red, which has driven men to rage and madness wherever it appears, and today it sits in the hand of a young man in the local jeweler's shop, who flashes it cross Dian's vision. Later in the evening, she wakes in a trance consumed with the urge to kill her father, stopped only by Sandman as he rushes in from investigating a similarly queer case. A bank teller friend from his private life has found himself driven to steal from the vault and deliver it to some crooks on a lonely road every night, all after one of those men flashed him the ruby. Wes and Dian are unable to stop this night's transaction (on account of the ruby briefly turning Dian against Sandman), but seeing the gem in action gives Wes an idea on how to counteract its effects, and go into battle during the next drop armed with blue cobalt glasses. A brawl puts down all the blackmailers except one, but Wes opts instead to go after the head of the operation, knocking him out and lurking in the dark to catch the last as he reports in, revealing the bank teller! Turns out the ruby DOES have hypnotic properties and was used to assist their robberies, but the teller - hoping by playing at the victim to lure Sandman into his cohorts' midst and rub him out - spoke as if he remembered the whole experience, where Dian forgot herself on every exposure. Oops!
Same basic mystery structure and resolution type here as last month, complete with overly-wordy explanation, although I find the hook of pitting Dian and Wesley against one another gives it a minor leg up, as does the relatively straightforward nature of the criminal operation compared to planting microfilm in deadly flowers. There's a more even balance between the rush in bust 'em up style of crime-fighting the feature has developed and the stealthy skullduggery I think suits the character best, with nice action art to match each. Dian has some silly faces whenever she wakes from her hypnosis, and the four panel sequence of Wes halting her murder attempt works pretty well. This is, unfortunately, the final pencil-inking collaboration between Flessel and Grothkopf, and much as I've kvetched over the second man's solo work, I'm sorry to see the back of him in this capacity. When the two were in proper tune, they were the best artistic team Sandman enjoyed yet.
(Stop dodging bullets, I want to see you gunshot.)

• ADVENTURE COMICS #60 (March)

Mystery at Malay Mac's - Fox, Grothkopf

^{Hey, a rare post-Hourman, pre-redesign cover appearance! That's always nice. "Hello, officer? Yeah, coupla chucklefucks right here, the alley off Fourth, can't miss 'em."}
What's this? Dian breaking into a notorious criminal slumlord's safe in the bad part of town? A safe, as Wes discovers after he scares the lady off, filled to the brim with poison gas! Evidently not, as Dian is sound asleep when Wes arrives at Belmont manor to investigate, and a subsequent visit to Mister Mac reveals the only person who'd know the safe was booby-trapped is a local kidnapping organizer. Some blind, flailing fists turns up the girl, Dian's perfect duplicate, snatched from out of state to replace Dian and gain leverage over the cops. Too bad the kidnapper's made of strong stuff, knocking out Sandman and taking both woman for a ride to get back at Mac. Fortunately, Dian leaves Wes a trail of jewelry out the window, enabling him to follow and take down all the crooks with one throw of his gas pistol, revealing in the process 'twas Mac himself who tipped Dian's duplicate to his safe, in hopes of spoiling his rival's big plot.
Art-wise, this is probably Grothkopf's best work for Sandman to date. His tendency to exaggerate is translated into some properly goonish faces for the villains and really, really strong action poses, with some properly atmospheric shots sprinkled in for good measure. He cannot draw the gasmask for piss, but there's such an improvement I almost thought this was a Flessel joint before checking the wiki credits. Makes me wish we could see what he'd do if he kept on as a solo artist - free from the impulse to treat the feature as a cartoon, he produces damn fine work. As a story, this makes good time to mention my misgivings with Wesley's tendency to burst through windows and start swinging long before he thinks to use his sleeping gas. While it's great fun to describe and hype up as the mark of a madman who's even cooler as the badass normal than Batman, it also encourages a faster degradation in the character's identity. I'm sure you'll notice it's been yonks since lurking in the shadows and thinning the ranks by knocking them out in advance has factored into the stories. That Wes handles the bad guy by literally clonking him over the head with the gas gun rather than pulling the trigger speaks to the influence other, punchier superhero features have exerted over the strip.

• ADVENTURE COMICS #61 (April)

The Menace of the Metal Gun - Fox?, Flessel

From aboard a mysterious aircraft, a madman fires upon the city with a metal-melting ray that dissolves the skyscrapers into slag! Alerted to Doctor Borloff's activities, Wesley meets with swift defeat when the rogue scientist melts his gas gun and escapes in his cylindercraft to terrorize afresh. There IS a bright side, as seeing the ray firsthand gives Wesley some idea how to counteract its effects, and he sends Dian and her father warning for the local airforce to coat their planes in sand as a silicate buffer against the ray. Alas, only one officer heeds his message, leaving Sandman alone to get aboard the machine via his new wirepoon gun and defeat Borloff from within. For his brawling process, a good midflight fight is nothing if the hero gets tossed out an open door, but fortunately he can grapple onto the lone surviving plane, recover his bearings, zip back up, and put a stop to Borloff's dreams of world conquest once and for all!
Action is the name of the game here, and even without Grothkopf's inking enhancements, I think Flessel does a fine job on his own. I'm wary of the wirepoon in the future, as by year's end it will completely replace the gas gun as Sandman's sidearm of choice in further drift from the original Christman concept, but taken as a neutral in its debut, giving Sandman greater aerial mobility does lead to some cool shots and enhance the sense Wes goes stark bananas in the mask by pulling some stunts that would almost certainly pull his arms from their sockets in real life. There are, however, some particularly stiff action shots, and in one panel Flessel cocks up the design on the mask worse than Grothkopf last ish. Based on the opening vignette, Borloff decimated millions of innocent lives in addition to all the planes he melted out of the sky, making him easily the deadliest foe Wes has faced to date, and in turn making the "We did it, gang, everything is bright and peachy again!" ending sorta offputting. They'll have to organize mass funerals tomorrow, Wes. Show a little respect.

• ALL-STAR COMICS #4 (April)

For America and Democracy: The Grey Shirts - Fox, Grothkopf

In the top-level story, the JSA learn of their mission for the FBI: a group of Nazi insurgents known as the Grey Shirts are plotting subversive and destructive activities all across America, and are now posed to badly destabilize the nation in a series of disruptive attacks. Each is assigned a mission at critical points cross the nation, though given the widely-ranging disparity in their powers, their usefulness to the cause varies equally wildly. The Atom humiliates some goons spreading Nazi ideology at a single college, Hawkman barely prevents the destruction of an aviation plant in California, and Hourman's defense of an Oklahoma oil field ends with him toppling one of the oil towers to stop his quarry. Meanwhile, Green Lantern detonates a zeppelin secretly jamming radio transmissions nationwide, the Spectre casually annihilates some otherworldly vampiric globes sympathetic to Hitler's cause, and Doctor Fate uses his magic to out every single spy on the eastern seaboard. Uneven efforts or not, the group converge on the Grey Shirts' ringleader, and with a little help from Johnny Thunder, turn him over to good ol' J. Edgar Hoover's custody. Alas, Wesley does not get the blood he's thirsting after.
(Also Doctor Fate alerts Wesley to the identity and location of the ringleader before his mission starts rather than letting him figure it out on his own like everyone else. Prick.)
For his six-page leg of the assignment, the Sandman is off to El Paso, Texas to assist a local newspaper under threat from the Grey Shirts for printing pro-democracy and anti-Hitler editorials. Of course, this being Wesley Dodds on the job, he gets this information by roughing his way into the newspaper offices, then acts on it by beating on the guard at the Grey Shirts' camp and pounding down a band of brainwashed young men to prove he's a better American than them. After sending the wannabe Nazis for a whirl by running their bomb shipment off the road, Wesley doubles back to completely break the recruits' spirits, daring them to prove their hard enough by shooting an unarmed man in Hitler's name, chiefly himself. When none can cut the mustard, he marches them back into town with collars strapped to his car, and inspires the lot to join the Army to a few shirtless bars of "God Bless America."
Cripes but jingoism produces some heady results, doesn't it? I'm not sure I can rightly condone the ridiculous levels of patriotism on display here, even against such classically anti-American enemies as Nazis, yet at the same time, look at this and tell me it isn't the hardest shit you'll see all week. Again, though I've my misgivings about Wes as a brawler no matter how entertaining the results prove, there's something endearing about him being so raring for a fight his first move is to altercate the receptionist at the place he's assigned to defend. On the whole, Grothkopf's final Sandman contribution also shows refinement from his earlier works, the broader, thicker elements of his linework now tempers on a somewhat more grounded approach. Certainly the Sandman himself keeps a consistent look better than he does in any other issue published thus far this year. I DO notice he reused Flessel's design for the District Attorney wholesale on the newspaper publisher. Since he's going and heading out on a job well done, let's not hold it against him, eh?

• ADVENTURE COMICS #62 (May)

The Purple Death Ray - Fox?, Flessel

At the nightly planetarium show, a member of the audience screams and falls down dead, stricken by a litany of strange symptoms with no obvious cause. Wesley, believing the man was killed by a death ray, examines the auditorium's projector, only to find no obvious alterations or fault. Undeterred, he purchases himself a seat next to the murdered man's for the next show, which is now occupied by another fellow who received a last-second courtesy invitation. Acting quickly, the Sandman reexamines the projector from the shadows and finds a replacement bulb screwed into the socket pointed directly at the man's chair. With assistance from his wirepoon, Sandman swings down and wrenches the man from his seat just as the show starts, the bulb bathing his seat in deadly radiation. On learning the man is a former judge and the deceased a former DA, it's not long before Wes ferrets out the killer; it's the cashier, a former scientist sent to jail for misappropriating university funds years ago, out for revenge and now stopped cold.
See, while I'm skeptical about the growing presence of science-fiction elements in the series, they make fine fodder when they play to Sandman's strengths. Lurking high above a crowd of people seeking the answer to some deadly mystery is exactly Wes' bag, and plus or minus some strange mask drawings, Flessel captures that thrill of closely examining a big deadly machine in secret before it fires. I'd submit the page where Sandman saves the judge from the beam as an easy contender for best of the year thus far, and the shot where [Wes pushes Dian away from the killer's bullet](blob:https://imgur.com/7247f414-8a57-489f-a9bd-d85bc9e19a6a) is another fine piece of work. My memories of this one before sitting down to reread and write were a lot chillier, probably because I wish the series remained in crime pulp rather than raygun pulp, but a good outcome is a good outcome. Seriously, though, why is the mask going so bobble-eyed of late?

• ADVENTURE COMICS #63 (June)

The Voodoo Sorcerer - ???, Flessel

As Dian and Wesley tiff over his interest in an exotic dancer they know through a mutual friend, the woman's tail-lashing dance is interrupted when she sees a great glowing triangle materialize before her eyes. With the shock straining her bad heart, the Sandman brings her to boyfriend's house, where he reveals the triangle is a voodoo witch doctor's means of accusing someone of murder - just as news comes over the wire that the man the woman lashed with her costume tail has died! Smelling a rat, Wes rushes to the scene of the crime to find the taile barbed with poison quills, only for the titular sorcerer to bumrush him out the window. It's a big misunderstanding, thankfully: he's as shocked by the murder as Sandman, and only summoned the triangle on suggestion from an acquaintance, forgetting the dancer would know its significance through her partner. By happiest coincidence, this provides Wesley the solution to the mystery right quick, for only his friend's chauffeur would have motive, opportunity, and knowledge to frame his employers and their associates for the murder of a stock broker who owed them money.
Hmm, ah, see, on the one hand, it IS nice that the voodoo guy is innocent of everything except a lapse in judgement and the real twist is an unassuming little man exploiting the mystery and fears around his craft to cast suspicion off his person. On the other hand, eek, yike, zoinks! None good. Bad, even. Outside unfortunate depictions of non-white persons from the 1940s, the story's pretty weak for a murder mystery, as numerous elements are evidently known to the characters well in advance, yet only made clear to the reader right before they become relevant, like the exact identity of the murdered man. It's only eight pages, so there's little opportunity to piece information together on your own time, and as such it is heavily reliant on narrative cheats to generate cheap surprise. About the best thing here is the big page-dominating panel of Wesley swinging through the city on his wirepoon, unconscious woman tucked under arm. Kinda hard to convincingly raise my dander about what it means for the character and his feature when it's successfully operating on the long-standing principle of "masked mystery men swinging on a wire through skyscrapers looks really cool." S'like a solid fifth of the formula behind why Spider-Man is so enduringly popular.
(Also not a big fan of how Wes dismisses Dian from participating in the case without any adequate reason why. She calls him out over it, even, and nothing in the story justifies his decision to fly solo on this one.)

• ADVENTURE COMICS #64 (July)

The Unseen Man - ???, Flessel

Dian's purchase of paints from a local hobby shop includes quite the unusual accidental item: a paint that turns anything and everything invisible on contact. Determined to solve this mystery on her own, Dian investigates the shop with the dealer's cooperation, only for the dread Unseen Man to get the drop on her. Fortunately, Sandman is there to save her because he won't let Dian do anything on her own; unfortunately, Dian doesn't know Wes can see her attacker through his blue cobalt lenses and pulls him away, thinking him mad and letting the Unseen Man go free. As reward for her screw up, she's targeted in her home the next night, only for Wes to barge in again, having anticipated the only possible secret identity for the crook would make him likely to strike back at Dian. It is, unsurprisingly, the hobby shop owner, who Wes turns over to the police before heading out to patent his invisibility paint with the United States Army.
Alright, it's definitely not Gardner Fox writing anymore, because I cannot imagine Fox treating Dian so poorly. I gave her some dignity in summary, but this story is plain dumping all over her as a fussy, incompetent tryhard who fails at investigating on her own on account her womanly ways. Just look at the sheer antagonism between her and Wes; you two are partners, she's saved Sandman's skin like a dozen times, worn his costume and wielded his gas gun to do it once, even! Don't try to BS me into thinking Wes would run this paternalist "let me handle it, Dian, I wear the pants in this relationship" crap on her. You're only alive because she's worn your fucking pants. Otherwise, 'nother instance where the story and art alike don't give me much of note. I reckon Flessel was about done with the series with Fox gone and sorta phoned in his last few assignments. They're nowhere near the standard of his early solo artistic duties on the title. There IS another good wirepoon swinging shot, if one counterbalanced by a crummier instance with yet another weirdly-proportioned mask.

• ALL-STAR COMICS #5

The Mysterious Mr. X: The Kidnapper's Union - Fox, Cliff Young

The Justice Society are bored. Bored, bored, bored. Why are they bored? There is no crime. Not a single ruffian or scoundrel or roughneck lawbreaker anywhere in the city! Where did crime go? Crime has taken an enforced vacation, courtesy the plans of big crime boss Mister X (hats off), as prelude to his big plans for taking out the JSA and putting all his criminal enterprises back on easy street. It's quite the collection of rackets out against the superheroes - an arsonist ring for Flash, a jewel snatching gang for Hawkman, leader of the phony fortune teller underworld against Doctor Fate, even hard-pressing gym membership shakedowns for the Atom! Naturally our heroes triumph, though every one also encounters a strange little man idly strolling through their battlegrounds. He's so omnipresent despite his mousiness, he's even there when they convene at the police station to organize Mister X's (hats off) arrest. Except this unassuming slip of a man? He IS Mister X (hats off), and with the Justice Society having taken all the fun out've crime, he's turning himself in to live comfortably on the state's dollar in jail. WHOOPSY-DOODLE!
For his six-page part in the game, Sandman must contend against the kidnapper's union, who naturally enough have abducted Dian to get his attention. Not only have these lowlives taken Dian hostage (though she doesn't particularly mind), they've taken out phony accident insurance claims against themselves should the hero injure any of them en route to his untimely death! Nobody quite expects Wes to avoid the sniper-guarded roads to their remote hilltop hideout, though, and a quick wirepoon swing over the canyon (complete with Mister X - hats off - sighting) puts him right in the criminal den. From there, it's a simple biff wham boom to take down the punks and disarm their supporting fire. Alas, Sandman is once again only in the loop on the true nature of the threat against the JSA because someone notifies him from their own investigation, this time Flash via telegram. Let him do his own detective work, you pricks!
Right. You see these panels? You see Dian being calm and collected in the midst of a kidnapping operation? You see Wes trusting her with a submachine gun to keep watch on the fools who mean them harm? Yeah, THAT'S Fox writing Dian. Whoever's writing the Adventure feature at this time ought've taken notes. Artistically, Young makes a fine replacement for Grothkopf and Flessel in Adventure - he can match the first for goons, the second for action, manages a nice turnaround effect before Wes swings on his wirepoon, and even gives us a by-now all-too-rare heavy shadow shot on Wes and Dian. I'm a big fan of the lead kidnapper who calls the JSA the "Justiss Sassiety," and find this instance of Mister X (hats off) the second best in the book, behind only his appearance in the Hourman story, which I think speaks for itself. Probably the only time I'll express preference for something Hourman related over Sandman.
The loss of all three major contributors to the Sandman feature across early 1941 and the crunch down to eight pages has certainly made the Adventure Comics side of the Sandman line a rockier experience. It's still possible to derive enjoyment from the wonky mysteries and higher-concept criminals, but one must accept atmosphere and and particularity have been near-entirely sacrificed for generalized bombast and louder appeal. Don't misunderstand, I've become a fan of Wesley Dodds, Fist-Swinging Bullet Sponge, and my past praises for him aren't diminished by the realization of what this has done to his integrity as a character circa today's stopping point. The trouble is, while I enjoy this half-mad, impossibly reckless read on the character, it simply no longer bears any resemblance to the early days' lurking and creeping through the seedier parts of town. There's a great series of justifications running through the Sandman concept - he's no powers, so he uses the gas gun, so he needs the gas mask, which hides his identity so perfectly it frees him to wear the ordinary business suit, which highlights his vulnerability. Fling him around like a ragdoll who knows no fear of injury or death, although I'll clap for the bravado of it all, I must object if it means any notion he should be sneaky or cautious degrades.
Especially if it means the gas gun vanishes from the character. It hasn't met its final end just yet, but for this seven month block it's proven a very perfunctory aspect of the strip, hung by his side and occasionally brandished without acting as an integral part of the action or storytelling. The wirepoon has subsumed its function as the sidearm, and while I must stress there are plenty aces shots of Wes swinging that fully justify its prominence, taking precedence over the thing that makes him the Sandman, Crimefighter What Fights Crime By Putting The Criminals To Sleep plain rubs me the wrong way. Be awful nice i we could have both without the new toy putting the old out to pasture, y'know? It's not led to anything I'd full-throatedly object over just yet, but... ach, you'll see next time. Speaking of...
Next time! 1941 comes to a close as Wesley picks up another feature to his name, and also a stupid, ugly new costume!
(Previous write-ups: 1939, 1940 pt 1, 1940 pt 2)

Howdy!
TL;DR - I work as a casino dealer in the south and my job is very confrontational. I’m a stocky, softhearted ‘feminine’ guy that dreads confrontation. But I’m sick of the comments and harassment, so I want to learn how to bite back without losing my job.
Backstory:
Me - 5’8”, 230 lbs, hairy and bearded, but I have a soft personality and I do things that are traditionally ‘femme’, like spraying myself with rose perfume, focusing on my appearance at work, and wearing my my hair in high pig tails.
Being a dealer is already exhausting. Constant counting, following a bazillion rules, keeping a steady pace, watching for cheaters, and quick mental math while people are berating you, slamming the table, and occasionally throwing things at you.
“You asshole! I bet you get off on taking my money!”
“You’re a thief! You took money you weren’t supposed to!”
“You have a really shitty personality.”
Then you also get the anti-gay comments like ‘I lost all my money because you, a man, are talking about doing yoga and learning how to do the splits. Nobody wants to hear about that shit! It’s gross!’ Or ‘I’d suck your dick if I was gay.’ Or the weird gayness of straight men with these major ‘no homo’ vibes as they’re literally touching each others dicks at the table and then bragging about it to other players. That last line was just a personal vent. It’s weird. 😐
But then come the coworkers. I work with my very straight-presenting partner and we are openly a couple, so some of the comments/questions are based in ignorance (‘so are you the woman in your relationship?’). Others are more inappropriate. I have gone to HR some because they say things like ‘Do you want to go naked fishing with me?’ or ‘I have a hard 10 you can hold’ and then literally pressing his hands around his bulge to accentuate the shape of his penis. At work. While we were clocked in. Walking to our craps table. Both of them are straight, btw. They just think the commentary is funny because we’re ‘work bros’.
I’m a non-confrontational person but I have HAD IT. OFFICIALLY. So my friends are trying to encourage me to release the diva on these people. I’m working on it, like one guy playfully called me a mother fcker and I flipped my hair and said ‘it you’re gonna insult me, do it right. It’s father fcker, duh.’ Which got a laugh because the vibes were good. But when someone is being nasty and disrespectful, I just wanna go off and be like ‘Your hair looks stupid, you have terrible breath, you lost all your money, and your spouse is sleeping with one of my coworkers. So now what, bitch? You wanna catch these hands?’ 🫵🏼💪🏼👊🏼 And like…I wanna keep my job.
So, can you give me advice on how to read a bitch but not lose my job? Improv classes, maybe? Are there insult classes or wit classes? I am sick of these conservative southern people. If they can’t handle my shine, they can buy some god damn sunglasses.
EDIT: I love my job. I don’t want to quit. I just want to have a stronger personality to engage with these people.

My boyfriend has set strong boundaries around behaviors that affect his thoughts and feelings surrounding his body type and his weight. This includes things such as I can't touch most of his body, can't tell him he's handsome, etc. We've lived together for over a year and I haven't seen him nude or even shirtless once. All of this is to demonstrate he sets strong boundaries, not to complain about them. The strictness of them makes me sad but I respect them because it's clear they're a product of suffering from a lot of self-loathing.
There are certain boundaries or requests that we make that are the exact same but is completely unreasonable when I ask. For instance if I'm absent mindedly rubbing his arm he'll say "its fine I'm touching him just don't rub because it's sensitive." 100% makes sense, A+ communication, I'm glad he said something. Now when the roles are switched to exactly the same scenario, I use nearly verbatim the same words he uses, and then he gets personally offended, stops touching me altogether, and will say something like "I guess we just don't touch eachother around here." What gives man?! I genuinely don't get it.
Two nights ago he said something that hurt my feelings really badly and I needed a couple minutes to collect myself, I told him I needed a little bit of space. He stormed off to bed early and has been angrily pouting with a vague silent treatment ever since. I asked if we could talk about it this morning and he said "no we don't talk about things around here." Obviously echoing my need for some space before continuing conversation but in a ridiculous and childish way.
Is there any information or resources I could look into about how to navigate this behavior. There are so so many wonderful qualities that he has that surpasses my expectation for a partner. But when it comes to boundaries it's so lopsided that it's almost funny.
He's been in an emotionally abusive relationship before, ex-fiance had an affair, etc. So there's probably a lot of contributing history and resulting trauma to unpack here. Like I said, I'm looking for some sort of jumping off point to begin researching and thinking about how best to navigate this type of behavior pattern. Even giving this behavior pattern a name would be helpful. Anything at all, even an anecdote or advice is much welcomed.
Thanks!
TL;DR: My boyfriend sets strong boundaries but any boundaries I set is a personal offense. I believe it is behavior rooted in trauma from previous relationships. Is there a name for this behavior? Is there a source you'd recommend to learn more?

I (25F) have a sister (24F). We got along fairly well. We always had a good relationship. We always promised to stick together through everything and me being someone who has anxiety, she comforted me. Here’s the thing.
I’ve recently broke up with an ex who has done nothing but hurt me. It was the absolute worst time of my life. I had to go to therapy and I was in and out of the hospital. My sister has a boyfriend. He doesn’t like me because apparently, he thinks I’m too sensitive and childish. He tells my sister that I’m faking all of my problems just so I could see her more. My sister lets him say these things about me and brushes it off as jokes. She laughs at them herself.
She doesn’t even answer her phone and she just leaves me on seen whenever I text her. When I was at the hospital, she never came to see me because “her boyfriend wouldn’t let her” and she would tell me to stop calling and texting her because she had stuff to do and to “go ask mom”. I cannot do that because my mom doesn’t care either. She’s made it clear many times and my sister knows that. I just have my sister. This was during the most traumatic time of my life.
My sister apparently got into a bad car accident a few weeks ago. Things weren’t looking good for her. I didn’t even find out about this until a few days ago and I was in a bad mental state. I couldn’t get out of bed or even eat. My mom called me and said to come down so I can see my sister because she wasn’t in good condition. I told her that I wasn’t feeling good and that “she has you” so she shouldn’t be upset. She yelled at me over the phone that she wanted to see me and her boyfriend didn’t care so he never came. I told her “how funny because she ignored me when I needed her the most all because of her boyfriend who doesn’t like me and now he doesn’t care?”
My mom told me to put the issues aside and just come see her. Something in me just…exploded. I hung up the phone and just started crying and crying. Getting out of bed hurt so I stayed there for most of the day. The next day, my mom called me. I picked up and asked her what was wrong. She coldly told me “I hope you are very happy because your sister just passed away and during her final moments, you couldn’t come down to see her when she needed you because of some petty problem you have”. She hung up after.
I couldn’t say anything. I just stuttered. I just cried like a baby. I knocked things down and just screamed and wailed. I felt nothing but guilt because I didn’t see her and anger because she let her boyfriend get in between us. I couldn’t help but scream until my throat went sore.
I’m writing this a day later to find out if I’m truly in the wrong or if my feelings were justified. I’m angry at everyone and miserable. AITA? Should I have gotten the energy to go see her?

Sunday, May 21 - Saturday, May 27

Top 10 Posts

score	comments	title & link
151	66 comments	[double standards] The "male housework list" or "honey do list" (the second shift) | Sources from Dr. Warren Farrell
92	37 comments	[discussion] Panopticon of iffiness
66	35 comments	[sexuality] Something I want to ask and I could be an ass for asking this. What is with the left's disdain of agency in dating and relationships??
62	5 comments	[discussion] George Orwell on Male Disposability
60	3 comments	[education] POSTPONED: the publication of the new Title IX regulations that cut deep into accused students' due process protections have been pushed back from May to October 2023.
52	69 comments	[masculinity] Question for the peeps in this sub: Do you want the bonding nature of men to change for the better or should we respect the way most men socialize, but encourage more “bromance” culture?
49	33 comments	[resource] Why does the homeless situation continue to get worse despite the government spending millions of dollars on it.
44	31 comments	[discussion] How are men's rights viewed in scandinavian societies?
24	8 comments	[resource] The peacock’s tail as a metaphor for ‘patriarchy’.
1	1 comments	[discussion] LeftWingMaleAdvocates top posts and comments for the week of May 14 - May 20

 

Top 10 Comments

score	comment
121	SpicyMarshmellow said >a lot of them will say "just start out as friends and if it's meant to be, let it grow from there." And I guarantee these same people will tell men that complain about the friendzone that they shoul...
99	AskingToFeminists said Basically, what happened is feminism. It has spent decades portraying men as sex obsessed monsters, and any form of male attraction as degrading. It pretty much took up the spirit of Dworkins "all het...
81	Oncefa2 said One observation by Farrell is that many of these tasks happen outside the home, which makes the word housework itself kind of biased. That's actually one of the (many) flaws with Arlie Hoch...
80	ChrongrariusWimble said "Why is there disdain for taking active agency with love and dating? Why are a lot of people subscribing to wanting relationships to just happen out of thin air?" This is because online discourse is ...
78	parahacker said None of the above. Men's isolation is a symptom, not a cause - and the cause is systemic and cultural bias. Things like assuming men are dangerous predators, media tropes about men, etc. You're not ...
75	TisIChenoir said We should let men be men, and that means accepting the way men tend to naturally behave. It's funny though that we go to great length to change society to accomodate women (as we should), but...
75	Your_Agenda_Sucks said Because 3/4 of homeless people are men, but we keep opening women's shelters.
64	a-man-from-earth said If I want anything to change, it's how society at large values men.
63	Maffioze said Great post. This doesn't even include the kind of work men do in order to be a confident, stoic and stable presence for women during times of distress.
62	TisIChenoir said First instinct? It's coming from the general point of view of women in dating. Basically, meeting people, dating, sex, is something that ",happens" for alot of women. It's not something they have to ...

 

there will be quotes in the graduation photo album under the student’s photo. But I still can’t think of something for myself, I want something funny, maybe a meme or a line from a song, it’s really difficult. If you have any ideas, I’ll be glad to hear ❤️

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worldnews

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• No_Zombie2021

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Regular walks strengthen connections in and between brain networks, according to new research, adding to growing evidence linking exercise with slowing the onset of Alzheimer's disease.
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One of the most difficult shots I've ever attempted, this is the moment the ISS transited the waxing crescent moon in broad daylight. Uncropped photo and video of the event linked in the comments.
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144p cake
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In Remembrance of our President, Angie

I want to introduce you to Angie, the President of the ClueSlayers team.
Angie was more than our team President, she was our cherished friend, and she recently passed.
I hope that I can describe who Angie was and what she meant to our team, so that you can better understand what a special person she was.
Angie was absolutely the heart and soul of our team.
She started the team last summer, after her former team's President decided to disband. Angie and a few teammates then formed ClueSlayers and went on to build a competitive team who loved to play June's Journey, but more importantly, grew to care and support each other.
Angie was always positive and supportive of every team member, and she really encouraged and showed us how to be fierce competitors while building solid friendships at the same time. I realize that these are virtual friendships, but we value these relationships and the friends we've made in ClueSlayers.
We are understandably grieving and hurting right now, but holding onto the wonderful memories that we have of Angie. She was warm, wickedly funny, patient, creative, extraordinarily kind (as Queen would say), and a strong leader. Angie showed us, through incredible strength, courage, and grace, how to persevere when real life intruded with its challenges and battles. In addition, it was always fun and interesting to read about her stories of big parties that her parents would have when she was a child, with the spreads of food and lively music and dancing, and of the religious practices that meant so much to her.
Angie never steered us wrong, whether in game strategy or in building a solid team through friendships. We call ourselves Slayers, and Slayers would often post individually about how much they loved our team. This was a heartfelt sentiment, and I attribute our closeness to Angie's example. She was not afraid to be vulnerable and allow us to get to know her. Angie created safety within the team, and we always knew our teammates had our backs.
She is and will be greatly missed. Angie was truly one-of-a-kind. I will be forever grateful that I had the good fortune to play on her team, but most of all, that I had the opportunity to get to know her and call her my dear friend.
Much love to you, Angie,
Julian

Someone text me send memes funny videos music recommendations vent what ever at this point just trying to stay awake on my day off instead of sleeping

My Filipino-American friend finally convinced me to join Snapchat since that’s where she’s more active hahaha. I joined because she promised me that she’ll send memes and random selfies throughout the day. Apparently that’s what they mostly use in the states lol.
Snapchat isn’t really a big thing here in the Philippines, so I was hoping to meet new people from Reddit to add to my snap account lol. (Since my friends list literally just has one person on it right now).
About me: I’m a young professional, just about to reach the one year mark at my first job this June! I like coffee and tea, but I take both with milk. I take a lot of pictures of my dogs and my cat, and I love sending them to people. I probably won’t send you any of my selfies, since I’m rarely decent at home (I always have bed hair, and wear shirts with holes in them lol), but I will send pet photos and memes! I spend most of my time on Reddit looking at medical posts and book suggestions :> but most of the stuff I do in my free time is gaming related (PC).
I’m in a happy relationship so I’m only looking for friends and SFW interactions
About you:
I hope we have stuff in common! So we can relate more to each other. Of course I hope you’re willing to add me on Snapchat and are ok with sending random photos throughout your day (kinda like just “haha look at this meme/funny dog I found”). You can send me selfies if you’re comfortable with that! But please don’t force me nor expect me to send you my selfies :( Please send more of an intro in your first Reddit chat message to me :>
See you there!

Just a long, rambling vent so feel free to ignore.
So I matched with this guy on a dating app YEARS ago while I was visiting family for the summer. We followed each other on insta but never met or talked really. I would be on the dating app whenever I came back to visit and we would end up matching again each time, but nothing ever came of it. Flash forward four years later and I ended up moving to the city where my family lives and we ended up matching for a fourth time. He opened with some cheesy one-liner about how “the universe clearly wants us to be together, and who are we to tell the universe it’s wrong?”
We ended up texting and had our first date a few days later and we seriously hit it off. I mean sparks were FLYING. He was kind, sweet, funny, unbelievably sexy, and I felt we had such a strong connection. I’m usually not the type to do this, but we continued texting after the date and he eventually came over and we had sex that night. It was amazing and felt so intimate and right. I ended up seeing him a second time that week and we had sex again and had amazing conversation and I really felt our bond growing.
The following week he started to back off slightly, texting less frequently, but he also is busy and so am I. I knew he was still on the dating app but I thought nothing of it because of our connection and, for the first time in a very long time, I felt I could actually trust someone. And his messages were still really sweet and he was saying he was excited to see me again… but then I found out he gave me an STD.
Based on the timeline and the fact that I got a full panel done a month before I met him (all negative) and I hadn’t slept with anyone else in almost a year, I’m pretty sure it was him. I disclosed and he took the information as a shock and was basically MIA for the entire following week, saying he needed time to “process.”
After about a week, I saw an anonymous post on Facebook in a group in my city called “Are we dating the same guy,” asking for information about him. Several women commented about how through the years he’s been a womanizer, manipulated them for sex, lied, cheated, and even has a child that he never mentioned.
I was so shocked and hurt, especially since we weren’t talking as much at this point and I was terrified I was being ghosted or played out again, that I cut things off and told him I no longer wanted to pursue a relationship with him. He admitted that he “wasn’t a good person in the past but that [he] really was trying to change all that” and that he was honest with me from the start and was serious when he said he was trying to find his person and settle down and start a family. He also admitted he was talking to one other girl… I do know that we weren’t exclusive at that point and we were still just getting to know one another, but that hurt me nonetheless. I believed him, but I was still so afraid of getting hurt again that I still cut things off.
After a few days of not talking and taking a breather and thinking about it, I realized I have a bad history of ending things before they really even have a chance to begin because I’m so afraid of getting my heart broken again. I tried to apologize for my (admittedly harsh) reaction and explained that it wasn’t right for me to project my fears and past traumas on him and that I believed he was being honest, and that I was really hoping to talk and fix things, but he won’t respond to me.
I always seem to fuck everything up by self-sabotaging a good thing just because I’m afraid of reliving past mistakes. Im so afraid I’ll never find someone who will want to put up with me and that I’ll be alone forever. I feel like I’ll just never be good enough.

The perfect example is the "mInOrItY hUnTeR zOrO" meme, don't get me wrong it was kinda funny when it first started its rounds. By my fucking god the act like it's peak comedy, I just saw a post on one of the One Piece sub Reddit's that was just a picture of a black Mihawk saying how fast would Zoro have beaten him if he looked like this. And every comment bar one or two was "lol first chapter", like can you come up with something even somewhat clever? Nope just another Minority hunter Zoro post.

Bit of background. I met my now girlfriend about 6 months ago. I slept with her once, and then desperately tried to get her on a date for ice cream, to go longboarding, to do anything to get her time and there was nothing but crickets on my end of the line. All that effort in those texts ignored, because there was someone else she had a one night stand with previously (I slept with her after this) but she was basically holding out for him and waiting for him to get back to her.
When he didn’t give her attention she needed and she realized she wouldn’t be able to string him into a relationship with her 5 year old…. She then hit me up.
I’m really struggling with feeling like I’m just an option that became a relationship. It actually hurt being ghosted like that. I recognize as well it’s largely my ego that’s bruised but I wanted some input from strangers…. A different perspective.
Aside that, she’s very loving and loyal and funny it’s just this feeling you weren’t their first choice. Do you build with that?

... People here are unable or unwilling to lower their standards?
I know it's hard and I wouldn't say I'm any better at it. It is hard to constantly admire and be envious at what others can get while you have have to "settle" for less. My problem is that while I would happily lower my standards for something casual and hookup, though I wouldn't enjoy it, I find it much harder to not have standards for a relationship. After all, this is the person you will be seeing day in day out.
I went on a date the other day. Girl was below-average looking, little overweight etc. Not really my type but I went regardless. I certainly wouldn't say no to her, not in my situation. It didn't work out in the end as I wasn't what she was looking for. The funny thing is that if you are not massively into her, a date that doesn't work out does not make you feel bad at all. What's even worse however, was throughout that date, I was eyeing other more attractive women. This I feel is far worse. Could you imagine being a relationship and doing this? I can imagine many men doing this and simply having to admit that they settled.

Hey, tbh I know the chance of finding a person to match with is low here. I'm an extrovert so I can be friends most of the people. I'm looking for like minded people to talk too daily about anything. A little about me: - my field of work involves in animal health and medicine. - I’m funny, sarcastic, open minded, reasonable, calm, chill, 90% of the time happy, extrovert (can connect and be in the same vibe of different people with different characteristics), and usually never run out of ideas for a conversation. - my hobbies include working (who doesn't love to work with animals), gaming (been playing less in the couple of years), music, movies (tell me your top 3), and also traveling (I visited a lot of countries, maybe even yours 😁) - I'm Capricorn ♑ (if it matters) - people I'm intrested in (it matters): confident, knows what they want, take care of themselves and have goals.
So if you are interested hmu 🤙 it doesn’t matter where you’re from. Don’t text “hi” “hey” and if you don’t know a good conversation starter here are some tips: - send me a meme your ashamed to show anyone else. - tell me 1 lie and 1 truth. - Ask me a random question and I'll ask you one.
And if your still here and isn’t interested I still appreciate the time you put for reading this. Also I'm down to send a selfie of myself if you are too. Hope to hear from you 🤗