#PK: This is the worst thing anyone has said to me in a long while. Just kill me at this point. It would have been kinder | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

kayrogers · 4 years

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to all the girls i've loved before ][ p. parker

a tatbilb au

Paring(s): LJ!tom holland x PK!reader

Inspo: TATBILB cause Peter is a total soft boi and also I'm a slut for rom-coms

Word Count: 1700+

Warning(s): cursing and awkward kissing

Part: prologue | part ??

A/N: this has literally been a draft in my notes for like over a year, but college has been creatively hitting me in the stomach with a baseball bat so I only wanted to start it when I got a semi-break. Obvs updates will not be regular just like everything else I write because I am the worst, but I mean thanks in advance if ya read it!

‘ Dear [Y/n] [Y/l/n],

First of all, I refuse to call you [Y/l/n]. You think you’re so cool, going by your last name all the sudden. Just so you know, that only makes you one of the guys. That’s it.

Did you know that I didn’t stop thinking about our kiss every time I saw you in school for at least the rest of seventh grade? Sometimes I think you do. Because you always seem to know everything. And you always smile when you see me blushing like you know you’re the reason why. That’s what I hate about you. Because you do just know, or at least you act like it. You’re too cool to be bothered by anything, or be wrong EVER.

Well here are some things you don’t know that I think:

You swear all the time and say the grossest things. I’ve heard every dirty joke Flash has ever made, and you beat him without trying! And you just assume everyone will think it’s cute cause you’re a pretty girl and you curse. And if they don’t, who cares, right? Wrong! You care. You care a lot about what people think of you.

You always show us bugs you think are cool and it’s gross. That’s terrifying and I hate when you stick them in my face cause I’m grossed out. It��s rude.

You’re so good at everything. Too good. I have to try harder around the guys to be half as cool as you.

You kissed me for no reason! You knew Flash wanted to kiss you. Everyone knew that Flash wanted to kiss you. He made all of us spit-shake on not kissing you if we ended up in the closet for 7 minutes in heaven because he liked you. But you still did it. Why? I wanted my first kiss to be special, and with my future girlfriend. All romantic, you know? That’s what it was supposed to be. And it wasn’t any of that. Thanks to you it was the most un-special kiss it could be AND I got my ass kicked by Flash!

The stupidest part is, that kiss made me like you. I never did before. Didn’t think of you as anything but one of the guys. Flash has always said you’re the prettiest girl we know. And yeah, that’s true. But I still didn’t LIKE you. Missed the hook that every other guy was on in middle school. A lot of people are beautiful. Doesn’t make them interesting or intriguing or cool.

Is that why you kissed me? Cause I was the only one who wasn’t wrapped around your finger? Well it worked! Ever since then, I saw you. I mean really looked at you. Behind every scratch, bump, and bruise from whatever sport you were playing, I saw you. How you weren’t just beautiful, that word isn’t good enough. You just exist effortlessly.

And yes, I did go through the thesaurus for that adjective. You’re hard to describe, [Y/n].

After you kissed me, I liked you for the rest of seventh grade and almost all of eighth. It’s not easy watching you with Flash. It’s also not easy when he shoves it in my face all the time cause he doesn’t like me anymore. So thanks for that! But I get it, if I had you I wouldn’t be able to shut up about you either. You make him feel special. Because that’s what you do, right? You’re good at making people feel special.

But not me anymore. I haven’t really seen you over the past year. And any time I do, you’re with Flash. Your spell has worn off [Y/n] [Y/l/n]. I am proud to say that I am once again the only boy in school to not be hooked into you. All because I got too much of you at once and now I don’t think I’ll want to be under that spell ever again.

What a relief!

Peter Benjamin Parker ’

You felt your brows furrow, cheeks equally red from a shyness you hadn’t felt in years and slight anger. Clearly he wrote this years ago, but why send it now? Right after Flash cheated on you?!

Did he like you? Did he hate you? Why did you care? It was just Peter-fucking-Parker.

You purse your lip, placing the letter back on the desk. Your blood boiled, heart skipping a beat. Every single reaction in your body was opposing and you hated how much it affected you.

So what would be the best course of action? To act like it didn’t effect you at all. At least, that’s what you saw as the right decision. It’d be easy, just let Parker down and tell him you didn’t feel the same. Because maybe that’s what this was? Maybe Peter did fall back “under your spell” and now that you were finally single he had to tell you? That was the only idea which came to your mind anyways.

You looked over at your closet, eyes focusing on your favorite shirt. It was a white crew neck sweater decorated in the entomology of beetles, and you decided you would be wearing that to turn him down.

“Don’t like my bugs? Yeah okay, Dickhead.” You muttered and pulled the item out before forming the rest of the outfit which consisted of running shorts and sneakers. Classy, right?

You took a picture of the letter before folding it back up and placing it into the envelope. Why? Well not that you’d admit it, but you were never complimented like that before. And that part of the letter made you feel kinda nice actually. He paid attention to you back then, which could have been sweet once upon a time. Now? Now you didn’t know how to feel about it and that bothered you immensely.

Later, in school, You mulled over how you would confront the boy. It was weird, really weird. You and Peter hadn’t really talked since middle school and the most the two of you interacted in high school was you apologizing for Flash being a dick to him about 24/7. And now he was apparently infatuated with you once and you had to tell him that you didn’t feel the same. But as the clock ticked on, you knew you had at least one class with him and that was gym.

You anxiously gripped the letter in your hand, jogging along the track and looking for a familiar set of brown curls. It didn’t take long for you to catch up with him, spotting Peter and Ned half-walking the whole thing while the gym teacher wasn’t looking.

“Yo Parker! Wait up a second.” You called and his head whipped around, his eyes instantly going to your sweater.

‘Do bugs really bother him that much?’ You thought and held back a frown before shrugging it off. There were more important matters.

“Nice shirt! Is it accurate?” Ned instantly chirped up and you let yourself smirk, he always had such an excited demeanor in a way that could light up a room if anyone bothered to notice him.

“You think you’d catch me wearing pseudoscience? What the hell do you take me for?” That smirk grew into a smile as you spoke to Ned, not noticing the pale color staining Peter’s face. Because while you were focused on Ned, Peter was focused on you.

Specifically, the letter in your hand.

“You’re right, I apologize. What brings you over here anyways? You usually lap us twice by now.” You looked over to Peter while Ned talked, watching how he was unable to even look up from your hand.

“I wanted to talk to Peter, actually… alone?” You scratched the back of your neck while Ned let out a big ‘ohh’ and quickly made himself scarce.

The boy looked more nervous than you had ever seen him, running his hands through his hair so much that every knot could have been plucked out by now.

“What um- what’s up, [Y/n]?”

“Listen, I’m gonna make this quick to save both of us the awkwardness. I think it’s really nice that you think I’m one of the prettiest girls in our grade and stuff… but me and Flash just broke up and I really don’t see you that way-”

The only thing you heard from him was an exasperated ‘what?’ before practically watching the boy fall in slow motion. His eyes rolled to the back of his head and you gasped out loud when his head hit the ground.

“Oh my god, Peter!” Dropping to the ground after him, you immediately move his hair from his eyes and wave your hand in front of his face.

“Are you okay? Parker? Do you know your name? What day is it?” You gave a choppy version of the concussion questions your coaches asked after a particularly bad hit to the head, panic evident in your eyes.

‘Did I just concuss this kid?!’ you thought wildly.

Slowly, he sat up, taking a couple breaths while you kept your hand on his shoulder. “You weren’t supposed to see that,” he said exasperated and you watched his eyes grow twice their size as he glanced to his left.

Storming towards the two of you was a recognizable scowl, an envelope in her hand. Michelle Jones. She was MJ to you, once upon a time, but you couldn’t think of the last time the two of you said a word to each other.

“Oh god!” Peter rolled his eyes, grabbing your attention yet again.

In a blink, the boy had managed to grab your waist and pin you underneath him, one hand was gently caressing your head while the other wrapped underneath you. You couldn’t even take a breath before his lips were on yours, surprise flooding your system. His lips were soft and you hadn’t even realized how your body instantly reacted to him as if you had done this a thousand times before, kissing him in a quick but simple rhythm. But once your brain did register it? You grabbed his face, separating the two of you.

“Parker, the fuck?!-”

“Bye!” He blurted out before letting go of you and running off at a speed you didn’t even think was possible for him.

So this left you, alone, confused, and strangely breathless on the ground.

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taglist(s):

tatgilb -

permanent -

@ultrunning @jesseswartzwelder

#peter parker #peter parker x reader #peter parker imagine #tatbilb #tatbilb imagine #tatbilb au #au #spiderman homecoming #marvel imagine #spiderman imagine

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callme--starchild · 4 years

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You and Me Against the World

If someone managed to put Donald Duck and Paperinik on the same stage, they probably wouldn't know it was the same duck. Especially because of the impossibility of putting Donald Duck and Paperinik on the same stage.

Not surprisingly, Donald has been wearing the cape and mask for so long that he already knew how to get his way to keep his identity secret, being mostly Gyro's voice modulator which kept his speech impediment hidden. And if someone was sharp enough to decipher it or, in the worst case, remove the mask, he could easily choose to use his always faithful Car-Cans.

It wasn't easy work, and he recognized it. Now that he had earned his degree online and Della had returned from her boarding school, Scrooge had focused more on adventures, which kept him busier. He used to say that he wanted to go back to the old days and be them three against the world, and Donald could see how much his sister craved it.

But the truth was that he could perceive that it was Scrooge McDuck and Della Duck against the world, who were already an invaluable team while he was the miserable cannon fodder, always being the one who received the blows and the scapegoat when something went wrong.

And being Paperinik... wow, the duck didn't know where to start. Outside of polishing coins in the money bin, starting work in the Tower part time since he came of age, despite being a janitor, made him feel that he was part of something.

The pleasant talks with Lyla and Angus' comments against the local hero, coupled with his peculiar laugh, had become his second home. That was his second biggest secret, though.

Of course, his time has been reduced since the return of Della, who has insisted on recovering lost time. And while he could not blame her, between that and the adventures Donald has not had the time to visit it.

To visit him.

"Is everything okay, Old Cape?"

Donald stopped walking around the 151st floor, being invaded again by a deafening silence that, honestly, was driving him crazy.

He sighed heavily before pluming himself in the chair that the intelligence had previously prepared for him to massage his temple.

"Yes, yes, it's just..." Donald chattered, not knowing how to justify himself because not even he knew why he saw it as a life threatening problem.

And now that he thought about it, it was perhaps ridiculous.

"My sensors do not indicate any physical damage that deserves to be treated after your last adventure, and Evronians have not been seen in days…"

"'m sorry."

However, he spoke so suddenly that Uno did not know what to say, stopping his metal arms to focus on the sailor-dressed duck.

"Why, Hero? You haven't done anything that warrants an apology."

"But, I've set you aside lately. I've been venturing so much with Scrooge and Della that I presented less and less in the Tower unless Paperinik has to save someone helpless, imprison some evildoer or fight some Evronian." Don moved in his seat, raising his hand when he perceived that the AI would speak, "I know I don't show it much or I don't say it very often, but you are one of my best friends, Uno, and I don't want you to think that now that Della has returned, she will take your place or our relationship will become merely formal and..."

However, Uno began to laugh, and Donald took advantage of the moment of confusion to regain the breath he had lost and loosen his bowtie.

"Do you love me so much, Donald?" He made the gesture of withdrawing a tear, making a table appear with a glass of water so that the duck could cool and ignoring his blush, "is fine, it really doesn't matter."

"Re... Really?" Normalizing his breathing, he observed the sly smile on his partner's face.

"I mean, as long as you don't get hurt or your identity is at risk, I know you also have your life, Hero," that he missed him when he was going to venture? Yes, too much. But he couldn't be selfish and hook his friend to the tower even if he had the ability. "Besides, I am irreplaceable, your family does not know the wonders of artificial intelligence."

As if the smirk didn't say much, using the metal arms he pointed to himself, and Donald couldn't help laughing.

"Yes, you're probably right." In fact, the duck couldn't help feeling bad, it hurt to leave his friend on his own and he didn't know why; maybe because he was kinda chained to the Ducklair Tower—?

"I always have it, Old Cape." Very modestly, Uno appeared in a smaller orb in front of Donald, trying not to change color when he hugged him and attached him to his body. ”Let's watch Anxieties, okay? It's about to start and I don't want to miss this episode."

The sailor laughed fondly and rested his chin on the warm orb, listening and feeling its buzzing as the soap opera began.

On the other hand, Uno could not concentrate over the warm and finally relaxed face of his partner, staying curled up against his body.

As long as Donald doesn't get hurt during an adventure, or if a happenstance occurs that puts Paperinik's identity on the tightrope, it would be fine. He always had multiple satellite cameras to make sure of that, and somehow feel accompanied by him.

(And yes, he had finally managed to learn the expression of the tightrope, as well as others that his companion had taught him. After all, he learned fast, and had a large database with him.)

Hiding his 313 in a large bush next to the ruins of the mansion, Paperinik took his X-Transformer out of the trunk before stepping away from Villa Rosa, listening to the thump of his boots against the concrete.

"Where did the attack was, Uno?" universally, the hero cursed himself for having been distracted again by reading Fantomius' diary while adjusting the shield on his wrist.

"In the central park, fifteen minutes from your current position." Showing his point of view, the hero could see the coordinates on the shield, and paused abruptly at the entrance to the city to press a button.

He knew that his little car had an anti-gravity button, or that he could turn to the springs of his boots if he wanted a safer ride, but none of those objects were quiet at close range and, in addition, the Evronians were not as stupid as other petty criminals he faced on a daily basis.

He could simply go for the 313 once he defeated the aliens and go home once everything was resolved.

"You're about to arrive, PK."

Donald smiled sideways. 12 minutes apart thanks to the incredible technology of his X-Transformer.

"Roger, thanks!"

Uno's next comment, however, was overshadowed by one of the classic monologues of a nearby Evronian who pointed a gun at a young pair of ducks.

This would be easy.

"Your sister?"

The superhero nodded, removing his mask and growling under his breath. He sat in the chair that the artificial intelligence always prepared for him when he returned from a mission.

"Yep, she apparently had a problem with her boyfriend, her emotions were full of skin and that must have attracted them. They're fine, but it was difficult for me to leave them on the porch of the mansion" sighing, the duck let out an ''m upset' without bothering to remove the voice modulator.

"And you don't care if she wants, I don't know, an advice, let off steam and see you're not there?" Donald looked up, his partner's gaze focused on him as he began to stretch his body.

"I told her I would go out and see the houses for sale. But you're right, I should go. It's getting late, and I still have to pick up 313, and there I left my clothes" at that moment, the duck put on the mask again before getting up, wavering, from the chair.

"Do you need me to take you? I'm sure Master Everett didn't mind if we use one of his electric cars" a small orb appeared next to the hero, who smiled in thanks.

If both felt an accelerated blood pressure, neither of them said anything.

"Thanks Uno, but I could use this route to patrol the city, and I wouldn't feel bad about some technological help."

But Donald did not know what invaded him at that moment when he did something that never went through his thoughts and placed a small kiss on the orb.

The duck's cheeks were painted pink under the mask, as if the fact that Uno's orb will change color was no more embarrassing because, if he didn't know his friend's features and gestures, he would have thought of Due.

"I knew you loved me, Hero, but I didn't know how much." Trying to lighten the mood, the artificial intelligence laughed, nervousness lacking in not having it in his system.

"I, er, I'm sorry," he said, concentrating on the squeak of his boots against the ground until he found himself in the elevator, silent as he made his way to the secret entrance.

"You know I couldn't get mad at you even if I wanted to, Old Cape."

It was Uno's last words before Paperinik taken the grappling hook from his suit's belt and point it to a nearby ceiling.

It should be noted that this little accidental kiss had been recorded in the intelligence's database, and he doubted being able to get rid of it easily.

Nor is it that he will need to do it. Paperinik, Donald Duck, was his friend and partner, the person next to whom he defended the planet.

While they were against the world, the other would be fine.

Until Della Duck's pregnancy was discovered and things began to change.

The sailor was reluctant when he handed the X-Transformer to Uno, holding a duffel bag on the other arm.

"What do you mean, will you stop being a hero?"

If he was already confused by the fact that Donald was so attached to him,

(more than usual since the incident of the kiss, which was not unpleasant for anyone after speaking.)

he knew it was a bad omen when he considered that the duck was not exactly the affectionate type.

However, Uno was not sure how much when the visits to the tower were reduced and PK less monopolized the news during the last months.

"It will be the best," the sailor spoke, a raspy voice making his speech more difficult, "my sister was sent on a mission to space, but she has not returned and her kids have already hatched. One of them took 48 minutes to be born... I have to stop seeing for myself and start seeing for them."

"I could take care of them in the Tower. I could expand my database with the care they need, alter the Tower and make it hatchlings-proof" on the face of the AI was a crooked smile, trying to ignore the unknown fail in his system.

Possible was not.

"Thanks, Uno, but I want them to grow safe, my house may be small but it has what it takes. The last thing they'll need 's to lose their uncle because a Paperinik mission went wrong. I mean, Evronians were already defeated, so..."

He yawned, openly showing his tiredness. As if showing himself demonically calm and not showing signs of anger was bad enough.

Uno fought against the willpower that he did not knew he possess when the image of Scrooge McDuck was presented.

Though he did not quite like his friend's uncle for the accidents that caused him in the adventures (as if PK's injuries were not enough before Donald's gradual clumsiness), having hacked the mansion's cameras when they both argued for him sponsoring Della's mission during the ducklings hatching week had not been a good idea.

And that Donald was emotionally weakened didn't mean he could be triggered off.

"But you're tough, smart and sharp, you'll be fine—"

"Look at me, Uno," the duck pointed to himself, and the aforementioned was able to see how old and exhausted he looked, his eyes swollen and reddish through the hyperspectral cameras and his askew feathers, "I'm not as young as I was eight years ago, and my nephews need my full attention, I'm sorry."

Literally the intelligence did not perceive the moment when his smile was erased. The failure in his system was getting bigger and less possible to ignore.

Donald's voice had broken.

"I understand, but... could I meet them one day?" His metal arms didn't stop his friend when he ran and hugged the orb tightly, rubbing his feathered cheek against the glass.

"One day." Smiling sadly, he said nothing when the non-biological hands rubbed his back. "Thank you for always being there, mate."

"Whatever for you, Old Cape..."

The adult sighed heavily and reluctantly moved away from the artificial intelligence, holding the duffel bag tightly.

"I'd like to stay longer, but I have to go with Gyro and hand him the gizmos, and I promised Panchito and José that I wouldn't be out for long."

As he spoke, the speed with which he approached the elevator decreased, especially when he opened it for him.

"See you later, PK."

The sailor's sad smile expanded, and said goodbye with a slow wave.

"Goodbye, Uno..."

That night, he and Lyla Lay were the only entities aware of the Paperinik's retirement by the official source, but Uno did not want to know if it was made public to observe the new episode of Anxieties and the Donald's recordings present in his database.

He was fully aware of his failure when he perceived an unrecognized moisture in his orb, unable to clean it with the metal arms and the electricity of the Tower began to fail.

He was not a fool to recognize feelings, but he had never expected to possess them. It still was the two against the world, yes, but now they would do it each way.

That didn't mean he liked it.

#ducksanta2019 #triumphing in life #as always #el's fanfiction #paperinik #duck avenger #donald duck #uno #uno pkna #duno #della and scrooge are only mentioned #ducktales 2017 elements #not the main focus tho #headcanon biased

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kanerboo · 5 years

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okay so... i’m just kind of needing to work out my thoughts about the blackhawks in writing for a bit, so everyone can ignore this or choose to disagree or whatever, I just need to kinda get things out of my head and get my thoughts down in some order.

1) our recent performances: the thing about this, which is something i’ve kept reiterating, is that apart from that horrid game against the flyers, we have actually NOT BEEN PLAYING AS BADLY AS OUR SCORESHEETS SUGGEST. this is the main thing that’s so baffling to me. on paper, this team is not a bad team. on ice, this team is not playing like a bad team either. and YET!!

an example below, from the carolina game yesterday, after 2 periods of play. all of our possession metrics were positive (from this tweet). and yes I know corsi is not a great stat, but it also kinda lined up with my eye test where we actually weren’t playing badly, at least for the last half of the first and throughout the whole of the second.

and yet we couldn’t buy a goal to save our life. we came close a number of times. kirby hit iron. saad came close a few times. we had a flurry of chances from the top line, and during a PP, and from nylander. and through it all mrazek, who is, let’s put it that way, not such a great goalie, was making himself look like fucking brodeur or roy with some crazy saves. when carolina was up just 1-0 through a PP goal, we literally could have pulled even or gone ahead any number of times. and the puck just was NOT GOING IN.

I DO. NOT. UNDERSTAND.

and how many times have I seen this story happen already in fewer than 10 games? it happened against the caps where we played really well and lost because we were up against a goalie standing on his head. it happened against vegas where we played our best game of the season, possibly the best game i’ve seen them play in a whole year, and still lost because of a goalie standing on his head, and to me it’s just like, how long can this go on before the players start getting demoralised that they’re doing everything right and they’re working hard and nothing is going their way? and the worst part is, that point might be happening NOW, especially based on what patrick said in his postgame last night.

2) our special teams: ok it makes absolutely zero sense to me why our special teams are so terrible this year, when we shored up our PK in the offseason and we had the league’s best PP from like what, mid-january? I know we couldn’t continue the way our PP had and eventually it’d regress towards the mean, but this isn’t even their “mean”, it’s back to the putrid days of Q. there are times it shows signs of life, like a couple of sequences against carolina, but again, when that happens, we can’t find a goal. I still don’t understand the rationale between putting nylander up on PP1 and demoting dylan to PP2 - I feel like if we had success with that particular PP1 unit last season with 19-88-17-12 then maybe we should try that? I do get maybe they’re trying to create some balance across both PP units since saad and kubalik are firing now and putting dylan there gives them some additional firepower, plus the PP1 unit had such a huge chunk of TOI during last season’s PPs and it was getting pretty unbalanced there, but come on. at this point something HAS to be done already.

as for our PK - stanbo made some really good moves in the offseason, and acquiring carpenter has been one of them. he has been great on our PK - and we know this PK can be amazing, we’ve seen them kill four minute minors and we’ve seen them score shorties - and then there are times they just completely seem to collapse. I DO NOT FUCKING UNDERSTAND.

3) brings me to my third point. the coaches. specifically, marc crawford.

i’ve always liked jeremy colliton. I was a supporter of him when he first came onboard. he proved me right by leading us to the league best PP and league best points total from january onwards? something like that, I don’t remember exactly. anyway it was clear to me that by the end of last season the players had bought in to his system, they were settling into it and learning to play it well, and he’d earned their respect. and the hope was that with a full training camp he’d be able to get the team doing a lot more.

then they brought in crawford and i’m gonna be honest I hated that appointment from the start because he didn’t have a good rep with players and teams. there was an article I read about him, I can’t remember where and I can’t find it to link now, but he apparently used to treat players really badly, had shitty player management. and I didn’t like that.

and ever since he came in our lines have been fucked, our players look demoralised (but in all fairness this could be from that pattern of playing-well-and-not-winning - although if the lines and systems are instituted by crawford then fuck yeah he IS demoralising them anyway), and our special teams have gone down the drain. and from what I’ve learned, crawford is in charge of the PP and PK, so you know. you do the math.

you could argue colliton is still the head coach and therefore he should have the final say over his lines and systems. you wouldn’t be wrong either. but I personally find it hard to believe that a guy who managed to get us those PP and points in the second half of last season, who has shown serious hockey smarts and good leadership while managing the team during that time, someone usually intelligent and thoughtful when it came to his pressers and systems, is behind ALL of this bullshit.

HOWEVER. I will add that I don’t like the way he’s conducting pressers nowadays. it makes me feel like he’s throwing the team under the bus and I don’t like that AT ALL. and like I said it really surprises me because I find it hard to believe there’s such a difference from last season and this year. and I still really don’t think it’s a coincidence this season is fucking up with crawford behind the bench.

4) they need to play 91-19-88, they should have played 1988 together since at least three games ago, stop fucking experimenting with the top lines. we have two perfect, ready-made chemistry pairs that can feed off each other easy and play with almost anyone on the other wing. put them back together especially when this got us so much success last season.

I appreciate that with the emergence of kirby as a center, possibly a second or third line centre, and that solid third line of ours, dylan has been kind of moved down the pecking order. but dylan has something no one else seems to have, and that’s chemistry with alex. I mean if I could I wouldn’t want to touch the third line either, and putting kirby on the fourth line is stupid when he’s so good and he’s not a grinder and he’s actually been holding up well even when centering patrick, but it’s just. i’m never the doom and gloom type when it comes to my team, but this, this I feel is dire. maybe because of the way we play hard and play well and can’t seem to score. but just throw 1988 and 1712 back together for a few games and see what happens. it’s also not a coincidence that once 1988 got put back together they started generating offence and SOGs - which they both weren’t in previous games.

5) just to end my word vomit: I hate all the stupid fucks who are saying to “trade toews” or “fire bowman” lbr here stanbo brought in some really good trades last season and in the offseason, and like I saw one of the beats say, one of the worst parts of this whole situation is that the people he’s brought in have actually been playing well and made a difference, but the team as a whole just can’t pull out a win. and the people saying to trade jonny? lmao yeah of course because the troubles of the whole team lie on ONE MAN’S shoulders, i.e. our captain who has been actually working his ass off? i’m tired of all the shit being thrown at jonny all the time. people expect him to score 100 points when he’s not that kind of player. he’s not patrick, never has been, never should be, they’re two completely different types of players, and people NEVER seem to get that. it’s like they think oh 88 gets 100 points so 19 should too. but 88 also doesn’t play on the PK or have to forecheck and backcheck and play a hard-wearing defensive shutdown game in addition to his offensive responsibilities. the fuck? sometimes I wonder if these people actually WATCH hockey, because they don’t seem to get this and haven’t for years.

ugh, needed to get that off my chest. sorry if you actually bothered reading the whole way through ig! i’m just sad and angry and really really want my blackhawks to do well. i’m still holding out hope - i’m not giving up on this team - but I really need them to show some results. oh, and maybe for marc crawford to get fired.

#hockey #chicago blackhawks #I have thoughts and feelings so let me spew them at you #pls ignore this if you have to #It literally is just my stream of consciousness word vomit

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andrewuttaro · 5 years

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New Look Sabres: 2019 NHL Draft

Rasmus Dahlin is a hard act to follow. I think part of the reason Alex Nylander went through such Sabres popular opinion hell was because he was the first round pick the year after Jack Eichel’s Draft. Maybe that’s me projecting because my little Sabres heart hadn’t been broken for a while at that point. I really only jumped on the Sabres wagon at the beginning of the decade so my biggest lived disappointment in this team was the 2011 First Round against the Flyers. Picking Alex Nylander was a curve ball that year and he didn’t pan out immediately. That failing to hit on high draft picks was part of then-General Manager Tim Murray’s undoing and part of what ruined rebuild 1.0. That’s not to mention how bad GMTM was for Nylander’s development thrusting him right into the AHL. You couldn’t put all that on Nylander. I hoped so hard going into this Draft that whoever gets drafted the year after Dahlin isn’t under that kind of microscope right away. Nylander had a tiny little renaissance during his callup last season but he’s still not quite there yet. He’s about to enter what-the-hell-are-you territory but to be very honest his name coming up in trade talks made me a little angry. Hold back your snide tweets, apparently they’re informing the real insiders! I can’t imagine anything like the Nylander Saga repeating itself, but this is the Buffalo Sabres we’re talking about.

The Draft last year felt like a coronation for Sabres fans but just because we’re not getting a generational talent this go around doesn’t mean this draft isn’t ripe for drama. Rewind back about a month and Buffalo was once again the home of the NHL Combine. The event that now will be in Buffalo for several years to come saw the genesis of a few Draft narratives for the Sabres. The most notable one is the Alex Turcotte story. Apparently Sabres brass interviewed Turcotte and… his dad? The reports were conflicting but Turcotte definitely represented a big blip on the radar. The young Mittelstadt-color-palate-swapped center is from Chicagoland and was probably not likely falling any further than 7 – Buffalo’s first pick. Turcotte was a popular choice to go to the Blackhawks in many mock drafts because of the Chicago connection. Jason Botterill and the funky bunch also interviewed one London Knights forward Conor McMichael. Sabres bloggers smarter than I say he was an intriguing option for the other first round pick... that’s if we have that second first round pick because with other teams wheeling and dealing for a week plus going into the Draft Jason Botterill was quiet. There had been rumors galore connected to Buffalo from Tampa to Vancouver which made the lack of movement that much more peculiar. Add onto all this the debut of a Vegas Gold look for the Sabres “Golden Season” instead of royal blue and it was a wild week going into the Draft.

Jack Hughes and Kappo Kakko went first overall as expected. The Alex Turcotte watch was short lived, but he didn’t go third overall to Chicago as many predicted. He had to wait all the way to number 5 when the LA Kings scooped him up. Conor McMichael went 25th overall to Washington but this is a Sabres blog so you’re probably waiting for some Sabres talk. With the 7th overall pick the Buffalo Sabres selected WHL center Dylan Cozens. Once again, smarter bloggers than I say that selection was solid because the first round of this draft was really three tiers: the top two, two through about ten and then everyone else. The Red Wings threw a curve ball and selected Disney Channel star Moritz Seider throwing off everyone’s top ten but for the most part there weren’t many surprises. I was on the Cole Caulfield bandwagon, but he probably wasn’t a wise choice at seven. When he began to drop I even entertained the idea of Botterill trading up with that second first rounder to get him, but this was not one of those drafts and he went 15th overall to… Montreal. Ugh. How about something funny? The Panthers picked goalie Spencer Knight with their 13th overall. That was funny too, but this joke is a Sabres joke: Cozens is the first WHL draft pick in Jason Botterill’s time as General Manager of the Buffalo Sabres. This is a real, deep-cut Sabres joke but there is some humor to that. I think the social media guy for the team knew it too because one of the first photos from them after his pick was Sam Reinhart greeting him. Sam is the last WHL guy to be drafted onto the Sabres. Again, it’s deep cut joke about how Botts hates the WHL so it’s not going to get the whole room but there you go: Humor. I’m not going to pretend to know how to project out Cozens because again, I’m not the smart guy in the room; but I will say it is great to start to replenish the center depth in the organization which dropped off a cliff only a few guys down the depth chart.

The Sabres used the 31st overall pick to… just make a pick. No trades in the first round. As Day One wound down the swell of energy that it may happen dissipated and they picked USHL Defenseman Ryan Johnson. I am all for picking lefthanded D to help build up that side of the defense but the buzz around the pick was a guy with a Russian name who will certainly make me regret not knowing his name. Johnson could’ve easily fallen into the second round, but the pick was in and another defenseman is in the pipeline. Trades, at least the variety from the Sabres, were scarce in the remaining rounds on Saturday. The Sabres traded some late round picks but no real consequential trades on Draft weekend for Buffalo put a little bit of a damper on it all for me. I don’t really subscribe to the idea the yet-to-be-announced salary cap number is really what’s stopping trades. PK Subban got traded to the Devils for a bunch of no names and low picks while we wondered if Sabres 3rd round pick goalie Erik Portillo is in fact named after a type of pepper. The lack of movement right now isn’t something worth panicking about but if we’re sitting here next Monday on Free Agency Day wondering if we’re crazy I’m not going to blame anyone for hitting the panic button. Botterill has signaled a renewed faith in Rasmus Ristolainen probably egged on by the new coach so… you can fall either way on whether the OG Rasmus needs to go. I lean toward trade him but that doesn’t have to be right now. We’ll address all this stuff in the free agency blog so let’s take a look at who else was picked. I mentioned Portillo and we won’t see him even in Rochester for a couple years but that’s fine, the goalie depth was beginning to get shallow. Botts said openly he doesn’t want to rush Ukko Pekka-Lukkonen who will probably make his Rochester Americans debut this coming season. That is smart and frustrating because goalies take a long time to develop when you do it right but… uh… did you watch the second half of last season? Part of that collapse was the goalie tandem coming back down to earth hard. Folks were clamoring for UPL, probably a little too hastily but that’s what eight years out of the playoffs will do to you. I am not particularly jazzed about the other three guys we got. You take flyers on guys that far down in the draft and the chances are better than not all three of these guys I am about to mention don’t make the NHL: Aaron Huglen, Filip Cederqvist and Lukas Rousek. Hopefully one of them is a diamond in the rough. Perhaps it’s unfair for us to be so underwhelmed. Sean Tierney at Charting Hockey placed the Sabres in a top six of teams who did well at the Draft. He’s worth follow if you want to understand how you can make a graph of average likelihood to make the NHL because Lord knows I can’t explain that.

Like, share and comment on the New Look Sabres blog. It’s great to be back at it. You can expect the post on the 2019-2020 NHL Schedule later this week. By the sounds of it that will be released by the league either tomorrow or Wednesday. We already have the preseason, season opener and home opener but I’ll save all that analysis for that blog. Then later on next week you can expect a Free Agency Recap. Normally by the fourth of July the action quiets down. Jeff Skinner happened in August last summer but hey, I’m not psychic. Thank you to everyone who responded kindly to me dropping off the map for a couple days. My wife and I had a family emergency that we needed to address so we put everything on hold. We’re back now and things are going to be alright. Your support means a lot to me and I hope if you ever need something I can be there for you as well. To lighten the mood: let’s hope we don’t need to be here for each other after a worst-case scenario offseason! Pieces are moving and for all the rumors the Sabres are in on this guy and that guy there hasn’t been a lot to actually talk about. I guess we’ll see. It wouldn’t be fun if we knew the ending, eh? Let’s Go Buffalo!

Thanks for reading.

P.S. That Moritz Seider was shocked to go as high as he did. The gif of his reaction is some precious draft video for the ages.

#NHL Draft #nhl #hockey #blog #buffalo sabres #rochester americans

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ed-al-elric · 3 years

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Pet Keepers Mount Pleasant. WARNING from former employees of Pet Keepers for current clients/ future clients and future employees.

Disclaimer: In an attempt to be fair, not over exaggerate and stay truthful this has been over tooth and comb to ensure nothing is not inconsistent with the facts of only our personal knowledge and experiences. If you bring your pets here I think it’s worth a read.

From me: (Most speaks of current day PK’s)

I implore you to take your pets elsewhere. The owners of this establishment are apathetic to there employees causing unintended mistreatment of the animals, specifically dogs. First off the owners opted to use COVID-19 as an opportunity to do tons of expensive remodeling, sacrificing there workers to do so. Meanwhile as there business picked back up they chose to keep a skeleton crew and actually demanded even more work of them.

I left due to Covid and loved my job with PK’s when the demands were equal to the pay.

How the work day was set up was rational at first. Having three employees at any time kept there system moving and even when the amount of dogs got in the 40+ range it was still doable.

How things got after my leaving they would have two employees for the back. One for bathing (let’s not even bring up that scam; if you have a long haired dog skip this place for your walk in bath, they don’t properly brush out your dog and can actually make the grooming process harder for your pet stylist. They basically dry in mats after the bath.) and the other employee for walking the dogs. That’s one person dedicated to walking dogs, cleaning cages, feeding, check ins and check outs. This means on many occasions the time your dog gets in the yard is drastically cut, as soon as your dog does it’s business it’s back to the cage. The people who work for this company are not uncaring, they love animals. However they are not given enough help to take the time for each individual animal to get the proper time and attention so that there time spent isn’t almost completely in a kennel. Even when I worked there, without cutting down to three then four employees sometimes this spoke true due to constantly being understaffed.

The worst however was the lack of care of there employees, one in particular whom worked for them 15+ years. This particular employee was going through family woes caring for an elderly relative and found themselves with no time to take a breather. When asked multiple times for time off they were given the smug response “we cannot justify hiring a new employee just so you can get time off” This particular employee was then left no choice but to resign. The owners in the last deed of complete apathy decided to blame them and make crude remarks on there appearance. Quote “Knew they were worn out because they looked like shit” For the record the individual who said this apologized to the employee but nothing on earth gave them the right to say it in the first place. This employee gave so much of there passion and energy to there business and this was the thank you they got. I’m dumbfounded.

From another employee: (Speaks of PK’s in the time which we were both employed)

There are prior instances of the owners of Pet Keepers being highly apathetic to not only their staff, but the other boarding clients. Often, the owners would leave their own dogs at the boarding kennel on busy holidays or drop them off for walk-in baths on busy days such as Friday without even so much as tipping the bather one dollar (for reference, every dog earns the bather $1 on top of their general hourly pay). This could be argued as normal, but there were situations in which the employees and other dogs suffered due to the insolence of the owners. One particular event was when the entire floor of the main hallway of the back kennel was being remodeled on short notice during a weekend in the summer time, a time where there would be an influx of dogs. The contractors that were hired to remodel the hallway could only do weekends, and for some reason, the owner decided to not wait until a less congested, more convenient and less-stressful time to schedule the remodel. Due to this remodel, dogs of all sizes, with people paying based off of weight (in which dogs of larger weights would be put in bigger cages or runs, adding more to the cost) would be rearranged and “shoved” (for lack of a better word) into the bath kennel in smaller cages with less room. On top of that, the owners decided it would be a “wonderful” idea to drop their own three dogs off for the employees to not only take care of along with other paying clients dogs, but also rearrange and squeeze into an already crammed bath kennel that had minimal air conditioning and room for anyone to move around in. And to further clarify, we had medium dogs in small cages and large dogs in medium cages. We could not keep any dogs in any of the runs in the back kennel due to the remodeling, even when their owners had specifically paid for a larger weight dog and, in consequence, a run.

While working at Pet Keepers, we used several cleaning products in the start that adequately deodorized and disinfected all surfaces. These were Odo-Ban and Kennelsol. If you have worked in a veterinary office, or any other establishment with small animals, these products are easily recognizable as they are very popular and actually cleaned while maintaining a decent smell. The employees at Pet Keepers were properly trained in using these products to clean all surfaces (such as cages, runs, countertops, etc.) and the environment after a hefty cleaning session (such as during open hours on Sunday) reflected this. However, in mid-2019, one of the owners of Pet Keepers was gullibly persuaded into switching over to a new cleaning product, one that did no effort to deodorize or disinfect surfaces properly, and also did not allow for the disintegration of “crusted on” substances, so to speak. It also cost more, along with new equipment to use this cleaning product, equipment that could have been purchased through cheaper means and used for other, more effective products used previously. Cleaning habits at the workplace by the employees did not change, except for the introduction of this new cleaner and the phasing out of the old methods. “Surprisingly”, new bordetella (kennel cough) cases arose (occasionally) after switching over to this new cleaner, and the employees were being blamed despite using the new cleaner generously and maintaining routine habits from beforehand. It is questionable to me, as someone who has previously worked in a veterinary setting, why you would switch from a reputable product such as Kennelsol to one that was essentially hydrogen peroxide. Perhaps it was because Kennelsol wasn’t “whitening” enough. The equipment that had to be used with this cleaning product was low-quality, certainly not meant for use in a kennel or veterinary setting (where it would get used numerous times per day) and it would often break under normal circumstances and require new equipment to be mailed in and being way less cost-effective than anything used previously. Other employees found it routine to bring in other cleaning products (bought with their own money) to work to clean the surfaces that the “new and improved” cleaner was not able to touch. If they did not do this, often they would be blamed and accused for not cleaning surfaces, cages, etc. properly enough despite maintaining cleaning habits prior to introduction to the new cleaner.

On a separate occasion, two employees survived a traumatic car crash that caused minor brain injury in one. The two employees had to take a few days off of work after the accident to not only work out legal matters, but also confirm that no more serious injuries had occurred. Both were being seen by doctors at the time. When returning to work approximately six days after the accident occurred, a relatively new supervisor (not the manager of Pet Keepers, but a supervisor at the veterinary hospital next door) instructed that wet, heavy bags of rubber mulch be poured onto the yards and spread. Please note, that while “lifting heavy objects” is in the job description of Pet Keepers, this refers to dogs that may not be able to get up and down easily, not giant bags of rubber mulch. Also, the employees of Pet Keepers were never expected to maintain the appearance of the yards besides cleaning them after the dogs went out. Landscaping was never in the job description for employees at Pet Keepers, the owners frequently used a landscaping company multiple times a month, and the pay rate does not justify the labor that is required for landscaping work. The two employees along with the others working that day spread the mulch as instructed, causing one to almost pass out due to the frequent bending over and lifting that was required of this particular task. She later was informed by her doctor that she had suffered a minor concussion due to the accident and should not have been performing labor that extensive that soon after the accident occurred. While this employee should not have gone back to work so soon after the accident, she felt as if she had no choice because of how short-staffed PK was at that point, and also this was not a task that was normally expected of us, ever, prior to working there before the accident. On a “positive” note, during the renovations (that were performed during the COVID-19 pandemic, in which many small businesses went under and flat-out closed), fake grass was put down in place of the rubber mulch, adding insult to injury making everything done that day for nothing.

There were multiple times where dangerous dogs were boarded without consideration for the safety of not only other dogs, but the employees. PK does pride itself in boarding dog-aggressive dogs, and takes appropriate measures to ensure safety of all dogs of all sizes. No dog is taken out with another dog if it is not of the same family, they do not cross paths hardly ever, even when being checked in or out. Prospective employees of Pet Keepers are informed of the slant towards dog aggressive dogs when applying and interviewing for their positions. However, people-aggressive dogs are not a part of the expectations or commonly discussed when applying for the position. Despite this, the owners allowed multiple people-aggressive dogs to be boarded at their facility multiple times, causing injury and distress to the employees while the dogs boarded. Due to the nature of this boarding facility, with every dog needing to be taken out separately and always with the supervision of an employee, we must be able to put a slip lead on the dogs in order to lead them to their respective yards and ensure that they will not come in contact with any other dog. When you have a people-aggressive husky, or German shepherd, or any larger dog that can actually do damage to anyone trying to get close to them, it makes the job much harder and walks take much longer as other measures that would not normally be performed must be taken. On one occurrence, a people-aggressive husky bit the hand of an employee trying to get him from out of his run to go to a routine veterinary appointment. She was bitten so hard that the dog broke her finger, and she had to receive medical attention. Though the employee chose to not get workman’s compensation, some sort of adequate and meaningful compensation or attention would have been commonplace in any other job. She was also forced to come back to work too soon after this event considering that we were still short-staffed. On a separate occasion, a people-aggressive, anxiety-ridden German shepherd boarded in this facility with no consideration for employee safety. This is a dog that was aggressive when scared and would lunge at employees out of fear and aggression. When trying to check this dog out, he got loose in the kennel during the last walk of the day. Luckily, the kennel techs managed to sequester him and block him off from other dogs so that he would not cause injury to any passing dog during the walk. However, it still took all the kennel techs available that day to basically interrupt the walk and place a slip-lead on him to get him to the front. Again, I reiterate, this dog would lunge at employees when feeling threatened and aggressive, and the employees were not in any way trained to deal with this sort of situation, and we did not have adequate equipment to deal with these people-aggressive dogs, using only rope slip-leads to lasso the dogs in an attempt at control.

When hired-on, PK had next to ten employees, that slowly dwindled down to five. There were many times where it was required that 3-4 people would be working during a single day, not counting a receptionist. Obviously, with only five people, this would not be easy to accomplish, and the morale with the employees and the dogs decreased because of it. Requesting days off became a fruitless effort since no amount of scheduling could redeem or compensate the lack of employees, creating a workplace in which whenever someone took days off, they were essentially making workdays for other employees ten times harder with one person down and no way to reconcile or find a substitute. Normally, I would argue that most places of business experience times where they have higher turnover than hires, and it’s not entirely unusual for a business to find itself in a slump and lose people due to life circumstances such as moves, school, etc.. However, PK could not keep many worthwhile employees due to either difficulty of the job, or inadequate pay relative to the amount of labor. Many would find themselves believing it was not worth working somewhere for ten hours a day, from 7 in the morning until six in the evening, for less than ten dollars an hour.

In conclusion the lack of proper employee treatment, equipment, and staffing can and will effect the care of the animals regardless of intent.

#mtpleasant #Charleston #south carolina #petboarding

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junker-town · 4 years

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Bill Peters out as Calgary Flames coach after racist actions brought to light

James Guillory-USA TODAY Sports

Peters resigned from the team following an investigation into his use of racial slurs toward a former player.

Bill Peters is no longer the coach of the Calgary Flames. Four days after the news broke regarding his use of racial slurs toward a former player and following an investigation by the Flames organization, general manager Brad Treliving said during a news conference Friday afternoon that Peters had resigned from his position.

”Effective immediately, Bill Peters is no longer a member of the Calgary Flames organization,” Treliving said, noting Peters volunteered his resignation without prompting from the organization.

“Our review, for the most part now, I would say is done.,” Treliving said. “That information will obviously be turned over to the league, but we consider the matter closed.”

When asked what the Flames would have done had Peters not offered his resignation, Treliving said the team has a review taking place and “I don’t think hypotheticals are things we should get into right now. He’s resigned.”

An immediate follow-up question asked specifically if Calgary would have been inclined to fire Peters had the letter of resignation not been submitted.

“Same answer. He’s resigned. He’s no longer with us,” Treliving said.

Former NHL player Akim Aliu had said via Twitter that Peters had “dropped the N bomb” several times while they were both in the minors. Peters was the coach of the Rockford IceHogs at the time. Aliu played for the team, which is the minor league affiliate of the Chicago Blackhawks in the AHL, in 2009-10, during which time Peters used the N-word multiple times while in the locker room because, Aliu said, “he didn’t like my choice of music.”

Not very surprising the things we’re hearing about Babcock. Apple doesn’t fall far from the Tree, same sort of deal with his protege in YYC. Dropped the N bomb several times towards me in the dressing room in my rookie year because he didn’t like my choice of music. First one to

— Akim Aliu (@Dreamer_Aliu78) November 26, 2019

admit I rebelled against him. Wouldn’t you? And instead of remedying the situation, he wrote a letter to John McDonough and Stan Bowman to have me sent down to the ECHL. 20 year old on pace for 20 goals in his first pro year with zero PP/PK time was off to a great start in his

— Akim Aliu (@Dreamer_Aliu78) November 26, 2019

Pro career

— Akim Aliu (@Dreamer_Aliu78) November 26, 2019

The details of the incident, which were reported by TSN following an interview with Aliu, were also corroborated by two other former IceHogs players, Simon Pepin and Peter MacArthur.

Peters, who was in his second year as the Flames’ head coach, confirmed the incident happened in a letter of apology, which was sent to the Calgary front office and Treliving. He said in the letter, which did not name Aliu specifically, that “Although it was an isolated and immediately regrettable incident, I take responsibility for what I said.”

The letter, in its entirety, reads:

Please accept this as a sincere apology to you, and the entire Calgary Flames organization, for offensive language I used in a professional setting a decade ago. I know that my comments have been the source of both anger and disappointment, and I understand why. Although it was an isolated and immediately regrettable incident, I take responsibility for what I said. The statement was made in a moment of frustration and does not reflect my personal values. After the incident, I was rightfully challenged about my use of language, and I immediately returned to the dressing room to apologize to the team.I have regretted the incident since it happened, and I now also apologize to anyone negatively affected by my words.I am aware that there is no excuse for language that is offensive. I meant no disrespect in what I said, and it was not directed at anyone in particular. But, that doesn’t matter; it was hurtful and demeaning. I am truly sorry. I accept the reality of my actions. I do believe that we must strive to act with integrity, and to take accountability for what we say and do. This letter is intended to do exactly that; I hope it is accepted as intended. I appreciate the thorough review of this situation being undertaken by the Flames. It’s the right thing to do, and I support it fully.

Treliving said during the news conference Friday the investigation into the incident was thorough, and that he spoke with Aliu.

Treliving said previously that the Flames organization wanted to make sure they did everything right during their probe.

”This investigation we’re doing, I know everyone wants this done immediately and the world we live in is immediate. I hope you can appreciate we’re trying to do everything we possibly can to make sure we get it right and get all the information that needs to be gotten.’’

According to the article by TSN, Aliu was reluctant to come forward about the incident due to fear his career would suffer. He mentioned former San Fransisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick as an example.

“This isn’t me being bitter. I sat on this a really, really long time. It broke my heart, I think it made my career go downhill before it started,” Aliu said. “This isn’t to the degree of Kaepernick by any means, but if you play the race card, it’s most likely the end of your career.”

After the initial tweet by Aliu, more players began coming forward with details of Peters’ conduct. Peters, who is 53 years old, was the head coach of the Carolina Hurricanes from 2014-18. During that time, according to former Hurricanes defenseman Michal Jordan, the coach physically assaulted players, kicking them and punching them.

1) Never wish anything bad to the person but you get what you deserve Bill.After years making it to the NHL had experience with the worst coach ever by far.Kicking me and punching other player to the head during the game...

— Michal Jordan (@TheBigCzech23) November 26, 2019

2) then pretending like nothing happened...couldnt believe my eyes what can happen in the best league.. happy that i dont have to go thrue that stuff on daily basics anymore.

— Michal Jordan (@TheBigCzech23) November 26, 2019

Those incidents, according to a story by the Washington Post, were confirmed by current Carolina Hurricanes head coach Rod Brind’Amour, who was an assistant when Peters was at the helm of the team.

Brind’Amour also addressed the reports prior to a recent Hurricanes game.

Head Coach Rod Brind'Amour addresses the media ahead of tonight's game pic.twitter.com/SSOQLLMi7o

— Carolina Hurricanes (@Canes) November 27, 2019

Former Hurricanes owner Peter Karmanos said during an interview with the Seattle Times that he would have fired Peters had he been aware of the incidents. He said then-general manager Rob Francis, who is now the GM of the expansion Seattle team slated to begin play in 2021, would have to explain how and why the situation was handled the way it was.

“I’m pretty upset,” Karmanos said. “And I have my calls in to Ronnie as well. I think he’s the one who’s going to have to tell people what he did when he found out that the coach had done these things.”

The NHL issued a statement indicating their investigation into Peters was ongoing.

Perhaps Aliu’s courage in stepping forward with the details of the racism aimed at him, and Jordan’s willingness to speak out about the physical abuse he and others took from an NHL head coach, will provide an avenue for other players to reach out to the NHL regarding their own experiences. Hopefully the NHL and the league’s teams not only take investigations into those seriously, but continue to do what is needed to change the toxic culture that exists within the sport.

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nedcanquen · 7 years

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NedCan fic: Mr 7th Floor

Surprise! I wrote something for the first time in months. This NedCan fic takes place in a professional services/audit firm AU that no one asked for and kind of came out of nowhere. It’s not finished because I’m not sure if anyone is remotely interested in an Audit firm AU - if you guys like it though, let me know and I’ll see about writing more. (UPDATE: Looks like there are enough plot bunnies to continue writing this).

Tags: Audit firm AU, Pining, Office AU, Slow Burn, Single POV

Photo by Alisa Anton

Notes:

APH Vietnam - Ha Ngoc Le APH Seychelles - Michelle Vel APH Australia - Jack Brown

Basically, the highest rank you can climb to in a professional services firm is ‘Partner’. After that it’s just variations of the title like ‘Managing Partner’ etc.

Mr 7th Floor

For the past three years, since the first sight of him in a shared elevator took his breath away, Matthew Williams has eagerly anticipated and dreaded the appearance of Mr 7th floor. It was actually ridiculous that he still mentally thought of tall-and-handsome-bicycle-maniac as Mr 7th floor (and that he seemed to have assigned the man a secondary ridiculous nickname on top of the first), because he did know the man’s name - Daan deBoer, Partner, Mergers and Acquisitions Advisory Services. Matthew was not a stalker, he was not…except he learned Mr 7th floor’s name by searching the corporate directory for all the names on said 7th floor and looked at all of their staff pictures until he found who he was looking for…

Okay, Matthew was a stalker.

A pathetic stalker. In his defense, he didn’t do it on his own? It didn’t take much encouragement though.

Anyway, he didn’t do more than that and besides, Mr 7th floor wasn’t a Partner then.

After learning Mr 7th floor’s name, Matthew went back to work, just as he had the day before when he hadn’t known of Mr 7th floor’s existence. Or at least tried to, because after he knew the man’s name it was impossible to avoid him - Daan deBoer turned up in several news interviews, in the firm’s magazine, and he was also easy to spot at every firm event Matthew found himself at. Even if he wanted to forget him it was impossible, because the firm was a micro world of its own and there was no escaping the consultants in advisory services, even at an audit firm where they were supposed to be the minority. Matthew was an auditor, like most people in his firm in a giant category called ‘Assurance services’, but the thing was, the Advisory folks were just obnoxious - they were loud, they were proud, and they made sure everyone knew it. With the amount of noise they made, you’d think that they won every inter-firm competition, they touted themselves for bringing in the most profits, doubled as models in every brochure, and could spend hours talking about something that meant absolutely nothing at all. They could draw diagrams like their lives depended on it too but in Matthew’s opinion, these diagrams didn’t really mean much once you scratched the surface of how nice they looked. The worst part was, they were paid better than anyone in Assurance, worked less hours in total, and still spent every waking moment complaining about how hard their lives were. They also all sat on the 7th floor.

Fucking 7th floor.

The thing was, his crush was perhaps acceptable three years ago when Matthew was just a green associate at PK&DE, one of the world’s largest professional services firms and having a laugh with his new friends - feeling appreciated and human for the first time in a long time because he was good at his job. But now, Matthew was supposed to be management, even if he was at the lowest rank of it. It still meant new responsibilities - (officially anyway, he had already been doing most of this as an Assistant Manager) he led teams, he maintained his relationships with clients well enough that that they preferred to give him new work over the competition (except Maplecorp, who had switched their auditors last year but his friend there assured him that it wasn’t personal), he encouraged young associates “don’t despair, it’s normal to feel overwhelmed but you can do this” and dear Lord now he was responsible for career coaching - people’s lives, whether they were promoted or not depended on how well he could defend them when performance review season came about. Sometimes Matthew was proud of himself, making manager in just three years was no mean feat, but oftentimes he was just fucking terrified and hoped it wasn’t obvious that he didn’t feel like he knew what he was doing. That at any moment now, Francis would walk in and say “There was a mistake, we like the other Matthew” (surely in a firm this size there were other Matthews). Most times he could lose the anxiety in the work, and the reliability he found in it.

Anyway, now Matthew was a manager. He wasn’t supposed to have goofy crushes on hot men who were Partners and who worked on the 7th floor. At least not in the way he obviously crushed on said hot man from the 7th floor.

Because everyone in his team knew about it.

Matthew heard Michelle bite down a laugh as a certain someone walked into the elevator right before the doors closed, and could feel the heat rush up his neck and burn his cheeks. Matthew looked over at her to distract himself, give himself something else to do than awkwardly pretend he couldn’t see the man who was standing right in front of him in that cramped elevator (who was a head taller than almost everyone else in there) and saw that Michelle, was thankfully not being too obvious about how she was holding back her laughter. Matthew clenched his jaw and frowned at the small screen above that showed the steady ascent to their respective floors.

‘Come on’ Matthew willed ‘Just make it to his floor already and get him out out OUT’

But with the morning rush the elevator stopped on almost every floor, leaving Matthew to stew in agony, until finally, FINALLY…he was aware of Daan deBoer shifting his shoulders, getting ready to walk out. Too soon, Matthew relaxed and looked down from his intense glaring at the screen, only to catch those green eyes regarding him curiously for a moment, before the other man nodded at him briefly and walked out. By the time they reached their own 12th floor, Michelle was shaking so hard that she burst out laughing the moment they stepped off the elevator.

“Ahahahah! Oh my God Matthew! Your moment! You had a moment!”

“Shhhhh! Shut up shut up shut up!”

The problem with spending most of his life at his job from a young age, with colleagues of a similar age, was that Matthew’s colleagues became his friends. This wasn’t really an issue except that it was almost impossible to keep secrets from them. Secrets were not on Matthew’s mind one fated 3 in the goddamned morning during the height of stock-take audit season after he discovered that some idiot didn’t know how to file things properly. At 3 in the morning, surviving off nothing but maple syrup and Red Bull, Matthew became prone to saying things like “this guy, this guy makes me forget how to count…” or “he wore a light orange shirt today, who the hell looks good in light orange? He does! He looked delish and I just wanted to lick him!…” Sleep deprivation is a bit like being drunk, but still okay, because if he open ed his mouth to talk about the numbers again he may have thrown himself out the window instead.

“Which guy?” Michelle and Ha dropped what they were doing and looked at Matthew greedily, desperately hoping for something different to sustain them through this painful season. And Matthew, in an equally desperate need to distract himself and not thinking that this would turn into a problem, let them convince him to pull up the staff directory and click ‘7th floor’ to look at every single staff photograph until they found his mystery man.

“I hope his surname isn’t Zembiro or something, it’ll take us forever!” Michelle had wailed. Ha laughed with her while Matthew blushed, all smiles, enjoying their harmless game as he clicked on another name, and then the picture. Arthur, their manager, looked over from his cubicle on the opposite side of their section at the noise, but went back to his work. That was the good thing about Arthur, he stayed with you, even if he did micromanage a little. The three smiled sheepishly and ducked back down.

“It’s not Hunter David.” Matthew confirmed with a more careful whisper, closing the window and moving onto ‘Daan deBoer, Manager’ and not expecting any kind of success, except...

“Matthew? Matthew come back to us!” Ha waved her hand in front of Matthew’s blushing face and didn’t get a response. “Well, I guess we found him, let’s see.”

Files and numbers forgotten, Michelle and Ha leaned so close to the laptop screen that Matthew was worried they’d disappear through it, like some cliche horror story.

“Really?” Michelle scoffed, sounding disappointed.

“What?” Matthew felt oddly defensive about his taste here.

“I mean…he just looks…mean.” She finally answered, leaning back with a huff of disappointed. Ha was still looking.

“You don’t even know him.” Matthew lamely defended (and neither do you, a little sleepy voice told himself but he ignored it). “And it’s not fair to judge someone on appearance alone.”

“No, it’s just…come on Matthew, he has a scar on his face, he looks like a Bond villain, how does he even win clients? Does he scare them into signing contracts?”

“I know of him!” Ha yells, which is actually uncharacteristic for her. “He’s the guy who won the two-point-five-million bid from Honda Corp! He’s like…CEO Honda Kiku’s only friend.” She managed to spit out. Matthew feels his jaw drop and Michelle does the same. Two-point-five million on one bid? Assurance rarely pulled in those kinds of numbers with just one project, but the nature of their work was completely different.

“What on earth is going on here?!” Arthur is stomping over with a particularly stormy look on his face and Matthew gulps.

“Uh, sorry Arthur, we’re mostly done we just needed a break. The numbers were starting to…”

“Blur together.” Arthur finished for him. He shakes his head and runs a hand through messy hair before sharpening his gaze at Matthew’s laptop screen. “Why is there so much noise here over Daan?”

Silence. Matthew can feel burning embarrassment overwhelm him and Michelle opens and closes her mouth several times, trying to think of some lie or excuse for him. But they’re auditors, they’re not supposed to lie and they’re too inexperienced to do it well so Arthur finally chuckles.

“Really? Daan? That’s what you all like?”

Matthew is now aware of two shaking heads and a set of hands indicating him and he feels warmer, if that was possible. “Traitors.” He can’t help but mutter, but it’s 3.15am so who cares about discretion?

Arthur just looks at him, shocked and amused. “Have you even met him?”

“No! And I don’t need to! Really Arthur, sorry for disrupting everything it’s just, we needed a break, I saw someone in the elevator, we got curious, it’s...just can we all forget about this? Please?”

Arthur sighs and shrugs. “Office crushes help us get through the day I suppose.” There’s confusion in his tone. “Daan is...good at his job.” Arthur adds lamely, as if he can’t think of any other compliment to pay him but Matthew can detect a certain jealousy there. He’s somewhat grateful that Arthur is gamely trying to cover up whatever he personally thinks of the man so that his own Associates can have their distraction, but it doesn’t look like Arthur hates Daan the way he growls about Francis, their Partner. “Uh...he has a particular type of...mercenary fairness to him?”

“Arthur! Stop please it’s okay!” Matthew is ready to die of embarrassment now, waving his hands in front of his manager to get him to stop. “I really don’t need to know anything about him, I just...you know what? I’m awake again! Let’s finish these numbers and go home.”

Michelle doesn’t seem to hear him as she adds. “Tall, scarred, and brooding is not going to be just a Manager very long if he keeps pulling in numbers like that…”

He wasn’t. Daan deBoer’s rise to Partner turned out to be the fastest in the firm. Matthew somehow knew that whatever quality it was that Daan possessed that enabled him to do that, was at the root of Arthur’s personal hesitance to fully endorse the man. Still, it didn’t stop Arthur from transferring and joining Daan’s team two-years later when he finally left Francis’ and joined Advisory as an Associate Director. Daan promoted him soon after that, so there was some kind of grudging respect between the two at least.

However, since that fateful night, news of Matthew’s crush spread like wildfire amongst his own team (but thankfully not beyond that), because he finds emails from his colleagues linking to news articles that mention Daan deBoer. His phone gets sent messages with pictures of Daan from the firm’s sports day, looking particularly sweaty and good after the football match between Advisory and Tax. Michelle sends a picture of him cycling on the weekend with another laughing and blond gorgeous man (she puts a sad face emoticon afterwards). Matthew can actually live with that but it goes too far when Francis, the PARTNER in charge of his own team, sends him pictures of Daan shopping at the grocery store, clearly taken without the other man’s knowledge, since apparently they live in the same neighborhood, or at drinks sessions with other Partners. It never stops - Matthew’s team has decided that Daan deBoer is their personal distraction from work, and apparently they find Matthew’s blushing too amusing so they’re stalking deBoer for him, even though Matthew constantly tells them not to…it’s creepy. But because it doesn’t happen often, the warnings are left alone for months before some other stressful excuse begins and before Matthew knows it, he’s deleting new pictures from his phone.

He saves one though. Francis has managed to take a rather lovely picture of Daan deBoer looking at a bouquet of tulips in the store with a soft, faraway look. Matthew doesn’t feel right having it but every time he tries to do the right thing, his thumb hovers over the ‘delete’ button and the look on deBoer’s face makes him pause for too long.

Arthur’s email has three exclamation points next to it in his inbox, so out of habit, Matthew opens it first. Since Arthur’s transfer to Advisory, Matthew had prayed that Arthur never got drunk in front of his new colleagues and reveal his crush on Daan fucking deBoer or the strange fixation that Francis’ team had on him thanks to Matthew.

The email is short and not particularly sweet or salty, which means that Arthur is in a rush -

From: <Arthur Kirkland, DIRECTOR, ADV> <[email protected]> To: <Matthew Williams, MANAGER, ASSUR> <[email protected]> Cc: <Francis Bonnefoy, PARTNER, ASSUR> <[email protected]>

Subject: Project Oberon 2017 Proposal

URGENT

‘Need your updated CV for this proposal NOW - meeting in an hour to discuss’

“Project Oberon” - it is such a codename that Arthur would come up with. Proposals were given code names to protect potential client identities in case anyone carelessly spoke about work in public, and it was always fascinating to Matthew to see peoples’ naming preferences.

Right now though, Matthew looks at his watch and frowns, he hates last minute proposals and meetings but he’s lucky because he’s just finished the major audits and there’s a slight breathing space before it starts up again. It’s also curious and oddly exciting, Arthur has never invited him to a proposal meeting before, conflicting interests usually kept Advisory and Assurance working apart out of legal necessity and he’s not sure what’s going on with this but...if he can get some of his team members into this potential Advisory-led project, he can get his associates rare valuable experience in case they want the option to transfer departments later. Besides, he may not like how obnoxious the consultants are but it never hurts to have more friends in the firm. When Matthew finishes the necessary updates and sends it to Arthur, he notices another email from the man. ‘Congratulations on making manager. See you next week.’

Next week? Oh, the training course for new managers that was mandatory to attend.

Twenty minutes later after Matthew has sent his proposal CV over, along with some team members for consideration, Matthew is happily sipping his coffee as he checks his course registration details, noting who his classmates will be - training is easier when you know who you’ll be working with. Eduard from IT security services is going to be there, Yong Soo the new transfer from Korea who was joining the MNC team …it all looked quite pleasant actually until he read the name of one of the instructors for Day 3.

Matthew spit out hot coffee in horror at his computer screen even as he dropped the contents of the mug on his shirt and pants in horror. “Oh no…OH CRAP NO!” Matthew scrambles to save his computer from his coffee, turning it upside down and shaking the liquid out.

“Matthew?” Francis pops his head out of his office, wondering what has Matthew of all people, making such a commotion, his eyes widen.

“Ah, sorry boss, just had a little accident with the coffee, trying to save myself from a three-thousand dollar fine.” These crap laptops were not worth that much but that was IT policy for you.

Francis is an amiable Partner, known for being a genius but somewhat eccentric. The arguments between him and Arthur were stuff of legend because of that (well, and also because Arthur was his own brand of eccentric) - Matthew still remembers an audit file hurled so hard against the glass door that it had cracked (no one knew who threw the file) so it was a miracle they worked together for as long as they had. Still, Francis was fair to them, evidenced by still promoting Arthur after the file incident. Francis is full of energy and surprisingly patient and hands on when it comes to his team. He treats them to dinner after they finish every project (which is often Francis loves to cook and his wife Jeanne is such a wonderful lady that they love spending any time with her), gives honest heart-to-hearts when their morale gets too low, and he actually takes the time to get to know who they are as individuals - time that Partners don’t usually have. He has even spent weekends helping to tutor his more junior staff with their certification exams. However, Matthew has heard that once you become a manager, the kid gloves come off in a serious way. Matthew has just become a manager. Matthew is covered in coffee and may have ruined his computer that has EVERY piece of client work on it even though he’s backed up his files. It’s where he accesses the global databases and collaborative spaces, and files and...Shit.

“Take that thing down to IT before it actually becomes a mess.” Francis suggests. “And Arthur CCed me in on that email - get this sorted out quick because that proposal meeting is in a half hour and I need you there.”

Francis goes back into his room and Matthew bites back a groan.

IT says he’s lucky, it looks like no harm is done but they’ll keep it for a few hours anyway. The coffee has since cooled and Matthew feels sticky and disgusting. He does his best with the remaining five minutes he has in the bathroom to wash out the stain but now his shirt is wet. Shaking his head in hopelessness, Matthew calls Arthur from the privacy of the empty bathroom, hoping he can get a reprieve. No one else has a change of clothes that will fit and suddenly Matthew is irrationally upset at himself for actually being physically active and well, fit. But walking into his first meeting with those brash consultants while wet and bedraggled, and smelling of old coffee is a nightmare scenario to him. Matthew doesn’t care about what the consultants think about him and yet he does. He’s going there to represent his team, and represent Arthur’s trust in him…and he can’t even do that right.

Arthur doesn’t pick up, probably in discussion or who knows what. Matthew can’t just text him and not show up or leave without a word though, so he does what he’s always done, even with the tide of doubt in his head. He straightens his shoulders, takes a few deep breaths and prepares for battle.

The 7th floor is loud. That’s the first thing Matthew notices when he steps into their workspace. They’re yelling over cubicle walls at each other, laughing so loudly they can be heard from the other side of the floor, pacing or sitting on desks as they’re in discussion. Everything is flashier and some of these junior associates are wearing clothes that Matthew doesn’t feel like he can afford even now. He’s been to this floor before of course, twice before for quick errands and once to put a birthday present on Arthur’s desk in the wee hours of morning, but never in the state he’s in now. Entering the 7th floor also comes with a heightened sense of awareness. He’s always on the lookout for his Mr 7th floor, but thankfully has never run into him when he’s been here. It finally occurs to him for the first time since he’s received Arthur’s email that Arthur is on Daan’s team. Shit. He doesn’t know the worth of this proposal though, and chances are, unless it’s worth millions, Daan won’t be bothered with it and will be travelling or doing whatever it is that Partners do.

Matthew just shakes his head, takes a deep breath and goes to find the meeting room that was indicated in the email. He opens the door to find a flurry of voices - other consultants getting their computers set up, passing notes, drawing diagrams and timelines on the whiteboard. Arthur is deep in discussion with...of course.

Matthew wants to strangle them all, right here, right now, out of the embarrassment he feels. Arthur and Francis especially because there was no way they didn’t know, and granted, he should have known too but surely someone could have teased him to remind him? Actually, Arthur didn’t know that Matthew was covered in coffee and a sticky wet shirt, but Francis did. What had Matthew ever done to deserve this level of torture? The teasing had been exasperating before sure but always light hearted. This? This was too much.

Before too long, Daan deBoer’s gaze lazily moves over to him, then the man’s eyes widen and he does a double take. Matthew opens his mouth to explain but his Mr 7th floor beats him to it with a smirk and biting sarcasm.

“No one told me we changed the dress code and started allowing wet-shirt Wednesdays.”

As the younger team members burst out in laughter, Matthew feels his face heat up and his insides twisting. He also feels a cold fury at Mr fucking 7th floor and wishes he was never shallow enough to find the man attractive, but he still does because Mr 7th floor is and he has a deep and sexy voice to boot. He wishes his team let him forget about this stupid crush rather than encourage it, he wishes that it hadn’t escalated to the point where the man’s name and thought of meeting him would make him spill his own coffee...especially when he was going to meet the man that day anyway without even knowing it and find out that he was an asshole. Because yes, he may be covered in coffee and walking in here with pride but if Matthew saw someone like that walk into a room, he’d know that this person was having a crappy day and he’d go find a jacket or something.

Somehow the fury pushes Matthew forward with a hand extended, “Don’t get used to it, enjoy it while it lasts.” He bites out, before realizing what he’s saying, but hopefully he’s too angry for it to sound...wrong. Daan deBoer straightens himself, eyebrows raised in surprise as he shakes Matthew’s hand, even as the rest of the room bursts out into louder laughter and guffaws. Being in a room full of consultants is eerily reminiscent of spending any time with his brother Alfred, and somehow that calms Matthew down. He can handle these guys, he just has to mentally imagine that he’s dealing with a room full of Alfreds.

God help him.

Apparently acting like an ass to an asshole Partner is step one of getting by in Advisory because Daan deBoer just chuckles and nods. “Nice to meet you too Matthew. Just call me Daan.”

His brain is dangerously close to short-circuiting in its confusion over Matthew’s emotional state right now, so he tries to focus it. Had he even introduce himself? Daan doesn’t give him time to think about it though because he turns to the room. “Everyone, this is Matthew Williams from Assurance, he’s from Arthur’s old team and he’s the expert on Maplecorp. Arthur’s the lead for this proposal.” He gestures at Arthur and Arthur steps forward to whip some focus into this room - Matthew recognizes that expression and the set of Arthur’s chin when he’s in this mode.

“Right,” He says in his usual no-nonsense tone. “Maplecorp is expanding out into Europe, they plan to do it in a big way in a period of just one year. Why are we bidding? Because they dropped us as their auditors last year, so we finally can. Remember, we need to make ourselves distinct from the competition, and realistically speaking, there’s nothing that really separates us from them except,” He puts a firm hand on Matthew’s shoulder “We know them better than anyone else. They’re looking at buying over...”

Daan doesn’t stay long. Partners oversee several external and internal interests at once, but he also isn’t going home until they get a working draft to him that evening. This is in fact, the type of multi-million-dollar proposal that makes Daan deBoer feel uncharacteristically generous...according to his reputation anyway. The moment he leaves, the first of the team members to approach him is Jack, a jovial looking Manager from Daan’s team with a plaster over his nose and an odd resemblance to Arthur in the brows. He looks a little too happy but this thing about people brimming with barely suppressed and oddly hyper energy seems to be the norm here. “Hey there Matthew! I got my gym wear at my desk, I think we’re about the same size?” Matthew let out a breath of relief that he didn’t even know he was holding, a once over confirmed to Matthew that he should fit into whatever clothes Jack could offer. He follows him out to an odd corner and sees Daan’s room behind glass walls. The Partner is holding his cellphone to his ear, his back to the office, looking out his window, but somehow radiating tension in the way he’s standing. Since Daan can’t see him, Matthew risks a look, taking in as much as he can before turning to Jack. Daan’s desk is sparse, only the laptop is on it, but there’s a happy-looking bouquet of tulips on the corner of the desk, another on the shelf in front of the window, a few bronzed awards, a wooden ship on a back shelf with books and an antique-looking map framed up on the wall. There are photo frames that Matthew can’t quite make out but he’s a little surprised at how...warm that room actually looks. It’s the flowers that do that.

“Don’t worry about returning these today,” Jack smiles. “I’d hate to be stuck in wet clothes all day and we are going to have a loooong day.”

Matthew nods grimly. Proposals were intense and taxing in all the wrong ways - win none and all the people relying on you couldn’t work. But to actually win one...you had to go through hell and back and lay your soul on the table...at least that’s how it felt. A proposal was usually a week’s worth of work squished into a few days, and unpredictable - new ideas and concepts changed so quickly that the moment you thought you were done you had to start all over again. Hunting down the right talent to throw into the team makeup or get the right advice sometimes led to phone calls across the world, and you having to wait for these people to wake up. At the end of it all, the potential client could just reject you, and all your work wouldn’t come to anything...yet. Matthew just feels like he’s unfairly judgemental of the process because it taps on his more sensitive anxieties - giving someone else the power to judge him and his worth, to dismiss his sweat and blood to call it unworthy or expensive. It was like a dating auction gone wrong with a whole bunch of legal concerns thrown in but…

Matthew looks around on his way to the men’s room at the young and eager associates sitting at their laptops and making phone calls and realizes that this is how they earn their living. Arthur, Francis and countless of others had gone through this pain over and over again just so Matthew and others like him could work and grow. It was his turn to give back.

He returns from the bathroom dressed in a clean yellow rugby jersey with green accents, a wallaby and an Australian crest on green, where Jack was from, Matthew assumed - and shorts that run to his knees. It feels odd at first thanks to the firm’s usual strict dress code, but he tells himself he’s got extenuating circumstances and he’s not meeting any clients today - nope, just a room full of consultants.

“Matthew, Daan wants a word.” Jack grins when Matthew returns his bag to him. “I’ll see you back in the project room.”

Matthew bites the inside of his cheek. Daan wants a word. He quickly messages Michelle that she’s welcome to his music collection if she never sees him again, before striding into Daan’s room with more courage than he feels. “You wanted a word with me?”

Daan is sitting in his chair now, leaned back slightly with those gorgeous long legs elegantly crossed. He’s not looking at Matthew yet, he’s distracted by something on his screen, a finger tapping his chin as he’s thinking of...something. Those green eyes flicker to him and his expression transforms to one that is more amicable. Matthew would believe it if he didn’t notice the stiffness still apparent in the man’s shoulders. “Matthew,” he smiles. “Have a seat.”

Stiff shoulders or no, death knell or no, Matthew has to fight the swoon over that smile. He sits and waits.

“I realize that what I said back there could be...misconstrued. I apologize if I made you feel uncomfortable.”

It took a second for Matthew to put what Daan was saying together. “Oh...” He trails off, not quite sure what ‘misconstrued’ means exactly in this context, it could mean a lot of things, but the asshole part of it wasn’t really, wait... ‘wet-shirt Wednesdays’, and what he himself had said after...oh, OH. “I was joking too! I mean...” It’s too late to take the words back because Daan is looking at him searchingly. “I mean I was pissed off but...I didn’t think that you were being forward or sleazy or anything like that. Please don’t worry about it.”

Daan’s expression hasn’t changed and Matthew feels like he’s being picked apart and assessed, which Partners tend to do, so this is an all too familiar anxiety for him.

“I pissed you off.” Daan eventually says, interested. “If you didn’t think I was being inappropriate, what else was it?”

Matthew can’t quite believe he has to explain it, but tries to wave the concern away anyway. Then he remembers his Teamwork training course from a year ago, ‘Don’t expect people to act as you would, put yourself into their shoes’. “I had a deceptively good morning,” Matthew tries to explain, “Which was quickly burned away by my own clumsiness and terror for my work laptop, which is still with IT at this moment. Then walking into a room to meet a lot of new people for the first time, representing Francis’ team, but covered in coffee and water and feeling sticky didn’t have me at my best, then you called me out on it, it was just…I was trying to make a joke rather than jump down your throat about my morning. I feel I would have responded differently, if I were in your shoes, and do what Jack eventually did. But I know that isn’t fair, we’re all different and I owe you an apology as well.”

Daan is looking at him again with that assessing look but nods. “I see. Well I can see how helping someone instead of joking with them may have gone down better for a first-time meeting. No apology needed. ”

Matthew is grateful that the issue seems mostly resolved. “I promise Daan I’m usually more...put together than this.” He doesn’t even realize he’s smiling with relief until he notices Daan is smiling back at him, more relaxed now that he’s not dealing with getting reported for sexual harassment.

“Don’t worry about it Matthew, we all have our off days.” Daan shrugs, eyes twinkling even if his smile is...it looks like he’s fighting to keep it from full-blown amusement. “And don’t worry about making a good impression here.” There silence for a beat before Daan quickly adds “Arthur’s known to be picky. I look forward to seeing what you all come up with tonight.”

That’s a dismissal if he’s ever heard one and Matthew doesn’t want to sit in there any longer than he absolutely has to. He smiles and leaves.

The moment he turns around though, he grimaces, grateful that the desks in this part of the floor are mostly empty. He hurries back to the project room and checks his messages.

Matthew: If I die, you can have my music collection Shell: ?? Shell: ??????? Shell: OMG Francis just told me you’re with Arthur and you’re gonna be there all day! Shell: IS 7TH FLOOR THERE?! IS HE HOT?! Shell: Of course you find him hot, ARE YOU TALKING TO HIM? Shell: HAS HE SPLAYED YOU OUT ON HIS DESK NAKED AN-

Matthew rips his eyes from his phone and silences her notifications. He absolutely refuses to read anything she’s going to send him today.

The brainstorming session goes well, and before too long, Matthew finds that working in comfortable clothes lets him relax in a way he never could before. It allows him to build an easy camaraderie with the giggling and exuberant consultants of the 7th floor, who all seem to be eager to take a liking to him.

Michelle is positively buzzing at the news that Matthew has FINALLY met the infamous Mr 7th floor. She’s even more excited at the prospect that Matthew may even end up on a project with Daan and even if he doesn’t...he’ll be seeing Daan during his training.

“No I won’t.” Matthew confidently responds.

“Are you skipping this round of training?” Michelle looks confused.

“No, but there are 50 new managers and 5 instructors on day three. Class will be split up between them for that simulation and Daan is an Advisory Partner. He’ll take the Advisory managers. I’ll probably end up with Yekatarina or Timo.” He reasoned, naming the Assurance Partners who were also involved with the week-long training.

Michelle just gave him a searching look and a wink. “Well I think the universe has finally gotten tired of your pining. Twenty bucks. I bet you twenty bucks you’ll be assigned to Daan deBoer.”

Matthew laughed and shook her hand. Easiest twenty he’ll ever get.

Matthew ows Michelle twenty bucks. He is also going to die because manager training Advisory style involves a lot of talking and sitting too damn close around a small round table to the object of his (still, unfortunately) affection, and Matthew... this was funny when it was an unreachable crush but now Daan is a PARTNER and not just any partner but possibly the lead Partner on a project he is going to be working on anytime soon and oh God why the fuck are there only a handful of these Advisory people to distract him and why are they all so damn giddy all the time? He understands that they share a floor and they all already knew each other, making him the odd one out but do they all have to look like they’re in on a joke that he has no idea about?

Daan for his part is stiff and stern, which didn’t surprise Matthew at all. The last time he had seen Daan with any kind of light heart was the wet shirt incident. His sternness didn’t seem to have much of an effect on these new managers though. Training is good and all but…

Matthew summons his courage and stays back after everyone else has packed up for the day. Daan is wearing that fucking orange shirt - a shade so light that it is almost unnoticeable but it makes him look fresh.

“Daan, why am I here? I didn’t apply for a transfer to Advisory.” Because honestly, there are few reasons he is the only non-Advisory manager here.

Daan nods but didn’t stop what he’s doing - staring at his phone with a frown before pocketing it and looking at Matthew. “What do you think of it so far though?”

Matthew shrugs. “I prefer the stability of audit, I think my associates wouldn’t give me as much trouble as the stories I’m hearing today and you can afford to pay my department for my time if we really do win Project Oberon.”

That smirk graces Dawn’s face again. “Has Francis been complaining about how cheap I am again? He's not the one who can talk.”

Matthew sighs. The firm encouraged cross-departmental projects and learning but had set up a cost structure where departments had to pay each other to use each other’s team members, it led to friction at times when people were tempted to other teams, but Matthew knew that the structure also created an incentive within the firm to share opportunities.

“No one complained.” Matthew lies. “I just like my own team, we're a close bunch.”

“Francis does a good job of fostering a team community.” Daan acknowledges. “And he doesn't fight to promote someone as quickly as he has you, usually, without a good reason. You have a lot of potential and we like potential and diversity in advisory, we’re always looking for the best. No pressure, but just consider it? You'll have a better springboard for yourself here, more diversity of work, better recognition and pay…” He trailed off and looked away, somewhat distracted by something and Matthew had this strange feeling that Daan wasn’t as sure himself, if Matthew belonged in Advisory, as his words imply.

Matthew put on the most polite smile he can muster. “You haven’t even seen me work. Not really.”

“Proposals are work.” Daan responds almost immediately, but Matthew is still suspicious.

“Well, thanks...but I’m happy staying where I am right now. If I change my mind…”

“You know where to find me.” The tone is so sure and encouraging, eyes warm, matching the small smile fighting its way to stay that way. It is completely at odds with his demeanour just a moment earlier. Well, Daan isn’t wrong, Matthew does know where to find him.

Does he ever.

More notes:

PK&DE is a spoof of the four current ‘Big4’ accounting/professional service firms: PwC, KPMG, Deloitte and Ernst & Young. These are known for providing armies of auditors (who mostly belong to a giant service called ‘Assurance’) who make sure that companies aren’t lying to the public, management consulting services (under a service called ‘Advisory’) who make money by advising companies on how they can work better and lose less money and Tax advisory services (under ‘Tax’) who help people navigate complex tax rules. There are other services but those are the main ones.

Real-life rankings between the firms vary by firm and even then, by country. Vaguely, PK&DE’s ranks are:

Associate (entry level) Senior Associate Assistant Manager Manager (considered first level of management) Associate Director Director Partner (junior) Partner (profit-sharing)

Matthew is fast-tracked like whoa - him making manager in three years is so not the norm (people tend to spend at least two years at the AM level alone even if they perform well).

Daan and Arthur are also fast-tracked promotion wise and Francis is older.

P.S. If you’re curious what the Wallaby rugby jersey looks like (is it too much of a spoiler if I ask you to pay attention to how form fitting it is? Probably).

#nedcan #nedcan fic

8 notes · View notes

entergamingxp · 4 years

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Player Killing created a “toxic environment” in Amazon MMO New World • Eurogamer.net

The developer of Amazon MMO New World has fundamentally changed the way player versus player works in the game after it struggled to find a solution for Player Killing.

In a post on the New World subreddit, a rep for Amazon Game Studios outlined concerns in the community about the impact of PvP on the player experience during alpha.

Previously, PvP was full loot and open world, with only outposts offering sanctuary. This meant everyone was vulnerable to attack at any time from players in the rest of the world. To attack, you flagged criminal intent. If you died as a criminal you’d lose all your gear and inventory. If you died to a criminal you’d lose all of your inventory but keep your equipped gear with durability damage taken.

It seems some players had their fun with this system, with high-level players killing low level players a lot – “sometimes exclusively”, Amazon said.

“This often led to solo or group griefing scenarios that created a toxic environment for many players,” the developer continued.

“To be clear, this behaviour was not shown by all PvP players, but enough to cause significant issues.

“We set out to build a compelling world full of danger and opportunity that begs to be explored. The intended design was never to allow a small group of players to bully other players. Based on what we saw, we realised that we needed to make fundamental changes and not just incremental fixes, (which we tried several times during the closed alpha).”

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Amazon Game Studios said it’s keeping PvP in the game, but it’ll work differently. “To be specific, by PvP we mean, fair fights that are organised, skill based, and opted into by all participants,” Amazon said. “Not PKing (Player Killing), which is a predatory behaviour that relies on exploiting another player’s lack of experience, progress, readiness, or willingness.”

The rep then admitted New World may not be the game for those who enjoyed PKing.

“So for those folks who desire that harsh PVP environment, New World may not be your favourite game, however, we do hope you enjoy the PVP we will offer.”

PKing is almost as old as online gaming itself (I must have been ganked hundreds of times in World of Warcraft), and is a common issue faced by developers. While some games embrace it – and indeed revolve around it – others seek to limit PvP in the way New World is now doing.

When it comes to MMOs, once common solution for this problem is to offer PvP-only servers those who don’t mind PKing can play in. But it sounds like this is not currently an option for New World.

“We are unlikely to provide PvP-only servers as it would divide our development resources and community,” Amazon Game Studios said.

“We could investigate this again at a later date but it’s not something we are going to support at launch. We believe that the changes and improvements we’ve made to the game since the closed alpha are far more compelling for the majority of players.”

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Now, in New World you have to opt into Faction conflicts and Wars for territory ownership. Amazon Game Studios said doing so will be extremely rewarding, with in-game bonuses and rewards up for grabs.

This new system is called PvP War, a 50 versus 50 PvP battle “by appointment”. Here’s how it works:

“Companies will declare War on territories they wish to take over, draft a roster of 50 combatants, and agree on timing for the battle. The War will take place on a protected battlefield, keeping anyone who isn’t confirmed to participate, out. This helps ensure a fair fight, without distraction. During the battle there are two sides, attackers and defenders. Defenders will protect their claim flag which sits in the center of their Fort. The Fort is equipped with storage, crafting stations, and upgradeable wall defenses. The Attackers will earn points during battle to upgrade and build siege weapons and towers. The War ends if the Attackers are able to break through the gates and claim the flag, or if time expires.”

The reaction to the news from New World’s community has been mixed, with some saying they saw it coming, others lamenting the change in a game that seemed designed for PvP from the outset.

“The game literally provided a path for this behaviour with the ability to play a bandit / player criminal; complete with consequences,” redditor MuhJordans said.

“The devs were actually very proud of this mechanic, they said over and over again on the forums that they were happy with it. They would joke about all the times ‘x’ person was criminal and how many people he killed. It was pretty cool, and they even provided metrics.

“Now they consider that predatory behavior? This is completely surreal. If loot loss was crushing, the obvious answer is to reduce it. If killing noobs drove too many people away, the obvious answer is to provide safer areas for them so they can grow to the point they are comfortable with the risk.

“Is this a knee jerk decision on part of management? Why spend 2 – 3 years making a ‘open world survival sandbox’ game with ‘PvP as the spine of the game’ to throw it all away in eight months?”

Redditor xhieron, however, praised the move, calling the previous system that enabled PKing “bad design”.

“That model is toxic by design, because the PKer’s fun comes directly at the expense of someone else’s fun. It’s not a zero-sum game, and it’s not competitive. MOBAs are competitive. I can lose a game of League of Legends and still have fun (and believe me, I’ve lost a lot). We’re not talking about that here. We’re not even talking about the fabled PvP escalation from the so-called glory days of WOW: you know, the I-gank-you, you-log-on-your-main-and-gank-me, I-summon-my-guild, etc., stuff. Even that, notwithstanding the fact that the fun of my guildmates retaliating isn’t really fun for me, among other issues, would be arguably somewhere between PK and PvP.

“But surprise, surprise, in the last round of testing, what was actually observed was griefing – targeted, malicious, repetitive – confirming all the worst fears of people who had looked hopefully on the talk of consequences and incentives and wondered if, again, they weren’t just being baited into being sheep. What we’re talking about isn’t PvP. It’s PK, and the article does a fantastic job concisely delineating the two. They’re not the same thing, and catering to the latter is not and has never been a successful strategy for MMO development.”

New World is due out 26th May. It’s not long before we’ll know if Amazon Game Studios made the right call.

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/01/player-killing-created-a-toxic-environment-in-amazon-mmo-new-world-%e2%80%a2-eurogamer-net/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=player-killing-created-a-toxic-environment-in-amazon-mmo-new-world-%25e2%2580%25a2-eurogamer-net

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lariosrbacreejw68insurance-blog · 5 years

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Claim on insurance after drink driving?

And this is from England.

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SOURCES:

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And this is from England.

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standingontheedgeinstilettos · 7 years

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You Souhnd Lahk You’ah From Lahndahn!

Hey Friends,

New Year! New Housewives! New Drama! And I have a new six month old baby which is why there is a fairly significant lapse in time between now and my last blog. As usual, let’s move past that quickly.

Ah, Beverly Hills. The 90210. Ladies, ladies, ladies. I can’t recall how long it’s been since the Munchausen accusation heard ‘round the world and the subsequent arguments which ensued before our very eyes, but here we are again. And it feels rather nostalgic, doesn’t it? I mean we have Lisa Vanderpump and Kyle getting laser beauty treatments on TV while discussing the current state of their vaginas.

You have your gratuitous Camille Grammar cameo, dropping square footage numbers left and right on her newly smaller Malibu mansion, with her lady-servant plating chicken on the bone. And Lisa Rinna is still talking about her haircut and Harry Hamlin’s arms circa 1982.

Oh, but there is newness too. And newness comes in the form of a doe-eyed moron, whose real name I am quite sure is either Sarah or Jennifer, but we’ll call her “Dorit” if that’s what she needs. If you’re reading this and you’re standing up, I’m going to need you to sit down. Take a seat because I’m about to lay something on you so hard. You guys, Dorit is SO FUCKING WORLDLY. She has been to other countries. I’ll give you a minute. You good?

So “Dorit” and her husband “PK” (name acronym for what I assume stands for “Pretentious Kook” or “PSugar KDaddy” or the like) are so worldly in fact, that even though “Dorit” is from Connecticut, she sports what may be the worst fake British accent we’ve ever had the misery of witnessing. She makes Lindsay Lohan sound like Eliza Doolittle at the end of the movie. She makes Madonna basically the fucking Queen Mother herself. I’m waiting to see these two on an episode of “America’s Most Wanted” a la the Armstrongs at some point in the near future because I’m telling you right now something ain’t right in the buttermilk.

The only thing we viewers have going for us is that “Dorit” had no idea what she was up against. She’s TV friends with Lisa Vanderpump so she thought she was safe. She thought she could get away with just flitting about with her bizarre fake accent, air-kissing Kyle, having dinner parties with the 8 most interesting people in the world, or her world at least, and talking about how Boy George lives with her in every interview. **If your claim to fame is that Boy George lives with you, I don’t know how to help** But fortunately for us Erika Girardi resides on our show. Erika Girardi, who has an accent all her own and is completely fluent in ‘Kunty,’ wasted absolutely zero time in calling out “Dorit” for being from Connecticut. And thus there has begun a quiet war between them where every battle is to be won by Lieutenant Colonel Erika Jane/Girardi.

I am going to focus on “Dorit” vs Erika through the entire blog entry because I don’t think any of us care about anything else that is happening on this show. Certainly not about Kyle and her fancy problems, or Lisa V with her TIRED double entendres (for Christ’s sake lady, know any other tricks??) nor Lisa Rinna and her Home Shopping Network grey duster.

I want, nay- I NEED to start with “PantyGate.” If you know me even just a little bit, you know that I never wear underwear. It’s a personal choice. I have no time for it, I don’t like how it feels, I don’t like lines in clothes, I just don’t like any of it at all. So when Erika did not wear underwear beneath her designer dress, I empathized. I mean, look what happened with Kyle. You could see nearly every inch of her Spanx. That is a fashion faux pas of the worst kind, and really should have been blamed for this whole incident because had Kyle chosen the correct form of underwear, or no underwear at all, Lisa V wouldn’t have playfully asked Erika to give Kyle her underwear and Erika would never have been forced to tell everyone she wasn’t wearing any so Lisa would cease lifting her skirt at the table. And really, now that I type this, it’s Lisa V’s insistence on shoving her nefarious nature down all of our throats which led us to this moment. The woman will do anything for a sexual innuendo and to start some shit.

So Erika says she’s not wearing any underwear, as she sits legs together, napkin over legs. Cut to “Perverted Knucklehead” chuckling coyly while sitting next to his wife, and then leaning over somewhat trying to get a better look! OMG. OMG, hell no. Helllllllll no. I don’t know exactly the proper way for a husband to react to being told the woman sitting across from him isn’t wearing underwear, but that was definitely not it. I’m trying to think of what my husband would have done. Run away probably, but he’s afraid of all women who aren’t me so he’s a bad example. Perhaps jokingly ask to switch seats with “Dorit” so you’re not directly across from Erika? Make a big, “WOAH! Didn’t need to know that haha, can I get another gin and tonic over here??” awkward joke and move on WITHOUT TRYING TO SEE HER VAGINA FURTHER??

If you haven’t been watching, and you guessed that he kept trying to see what Erika Jane is always slapping in her music videos, you win.

A wise man would never mention this again to his wife. And if she brought it up, a wise man would say, “I did not, would not look at your new friend’s lady bits at cocktail hour, now pass the peas please.” But a wise man “Punchy Kookoo” is not. He’s in the kitchen with “Dorit” and not only admits to looking for/at Erika’s box-o-secrets, but that he REALLY ENJOYED IT and COULD NOT STOP.

In the kitchen he said this. Where the knives are kept. And “Dorit” is all, “I mean, he’s a man for Pete’s sake, who can blame him??” And that’s how I know “P Kiddy” is paying this broad a LOT of money to say she’s his wife.

Cut to “Dorit” telling every housewife in history how Erika forced her husband to look up her skirt. She called Quinn and Lydia from Orange County. She dialed up Adrienne Maloof and left a voicemail. She drafted a telegram for Jill Zarin. She sent a Messenger Pigeon to Taylor Armstrong in Aspen, but poor little guy unfortunately chose suicide by flight-into-jet-engine over having anything to do with this lame-ass scandal.

Now alllllll the ‘wives are talking about “PantyGate.” “Dorit” decides to go as far to manufacture drama, thereby securing her spot on the show since they clearly need the money, as to buy Erika a pair of panties to present at the next event where everyone is there to witness the gifting. So when they all meet up to do some human puzzle activity, “Dorit” makes a prettttttttty big deal about Erika’s vagina, how everyone saw it, and how she may be best served in covering it up going forward. It made her husband “Pussy Krazed” super uncomfortable when he was trying really hard to stare at it.

I always say I would be the literal worst on this show. It’s because I don’t care about any of this shit. If this crazy lady with her accent made of a thousand accents came at me with that shit, I would be like, “Umm, that’s your incredibly embarrassing problem.” But maybe I actually would be good on this show, because that’s basically exactly what Erika said. It was awesome. And “Dorit,” God bless her, as she does with everything else in her life- she tried SO HARD. She really wanted this to be a scandal. But it just wasn’t. It was like this: Erika didn’t wear underwear, and “Dorit”’s husband thought that was awesome, tried to see up her skirt, told his wife he couldn’t help but look because it was freaking amazing and “Dorit” blamed Erika for her husband being disgusting. And it was all so painfully transparent. So much so that Erika was just like, “Gross, ok.”

Cut to Tuesday night’s dinner party at “Dorit” and “Practically Kitschy”s home where the most interesting people in the world gathered to talk about “The Haves and The Have-Nots” and who really killed JFK. Dorit wore the world’s shortest red dress and made a point to show her desperation by telling her husband to tell her she looked hot and that, unlike Erika, she was wearing underwear. Barf, lady. Lisa RInna somehow got invited, which I’m sure ultimately made her feel more punished than honored. She was given a severe tongue-lashing by “Pernicious Knave” about last season’s fight she had with his dear, fake friend Lisa Vanderpump. Lisa RInna tried to explain she’s turned over a new leaf and feels differently about life now that she knows people die. She brought up how Eileen has lost so many people including her mother right before last season’s reunion which Eileen did not tell anyone about as to not garner fake-sympathy that could somehow be used against her.

This did not please “Pro Knickers.” Not one bit.

“That is unfair!” he spat. “Those women deserved to know that your mother had just died!”

“Oy!” exclaimed “Dorit.” “I complete-lah agrah wit you-ah one hooondred percahnt!”

Eileen finds out about this peculiar stance against her choice to keep her mother’s death on an I-want-you-to-know basis and confronts “Dorit” about it at a one on one meeting between the two of them that I thought was going to take place with each in their own convertibles parked next to each other but ultimately moved to a random picnic table.

“All the other tables get picnics, and I get this? I wish I could fly into a jet engine.” – Picnic Table

Eileen explains rather clearly the conversation that took place between “Dorit,” “Party Killer” and Lisa Rinna and why it bothers her that they would pass judgement on how she or anyone deals with the loss of a loved one. And then “Dorit”s just like, “Whaht? I litahrally have absoloooootily no idir whaht you ah toolking aboot…..”

WTF is this chick on? Seriously, what is it? Is it some hybrid of Valium and Molly? Is she the love child of vodka and lithium? Because if she’s not on anything she is the worst, weirdest liar ever.

We end the latest episode with a bizarre (I know I keep using that word but it is consistently the most appropriate adjective) conversation wherein “Dorit” calls 45 year old Erika a “young girl,” asks how albums are made (isn’t “Poopy Kaka” a music manager or record producer or something?) and tells Eileen to basically “bugga ooff!”

Meanwhile, a sullen Camille Grammer quietly forks around her bone-in chicken breast wondering where she went so wrong.

�ȣR �

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