#it was pounding over the implications in this entire quest

[kaeyachi]

I could barely sleep because I couldn't stop thinking about them. MY BRAIN IS SO LOUD AND I NEED AN OUTLET

so here is me somehow speed typing this cynonari analysis

Cyno ch 2 story quest spoilers below

Cyno is notably the type to run off and do things on his own. All of his friends have commented on it. Even the people of Sumeru have commented on it before. His friends and family have aired their frustrations or worries about this.

This is honestly to be expected because Cyno spent his youth basically as a social outcast. Even now, as an adult with friends he can count on, he seems to forget to ask for help or naturally chooses to handle his battles alone. Everyone seems to respect this, even with them constantly reminding him that he could ask for help...

...but not Tighnari.

Even before this update, we knew that Tighnari was different for Cyno. Tighnari is quite visibly his closest companion since they met in the Akademiya. Cyno treats Tighnari differently from the rest. Odds are, he was also the first person that Cyno invited to his secret base. We see them traveling large distances just to visit each other AND traveling large distances together. We see Cyno rushing to Tighnari in worry while in a competition in the desert. Tighnari is the one person that Cyno trusts when it comes to taking care of a traumatized child. Tighnari is also the one person he rushes to when he wants a companion. His anger upon hearing the fact that Tighnari was harmed is practically etched in my brain since I saw it.

In this quest, we see even more on how immensely this is reciprocated by Tighnari.

Tighnari doesn't ask if Cyno needs help. He also doesn't remind Cyno. Tighnari, unlike the rest, just goes for it- just goes to him. He just does it for Cyno without hesitation. He was quick to say that he should chase after Cyno TO THE DESERT. Despite everyone's worries for him, he still insisted and even stopped others (except us, the traveler) from following (he knows Cyno wouldn't want others to be there for something so personal). Had we, the traveler, not have been there, he still would have gone alone.

I mentioned it in a previous post, but Tighnari seems to suddenly have a one-track mind when it comes to Cyno's safety. Candace and Dehya were there, but Cyno was the one he mentioned. Cyno planned on talking to the "merchants," but Tighnari stopped him before he could finish the thought and approached them instead. Everything he did moving forward was to support Cyno.

And the best part? Cyno seems to expect this from Tighnari as if he's used to this. He lets Tighnari do the talking. He listens to Tighnari's solutions. He lets Tighnari protect him. Cyno, who is used to protecting and defending himself, lets Tighnari do anything for him without a fight.

For Tighnari's ancestry to be related to the lore of Hermanubis basically implied that Cyno and Tighnari meeting and being side by side is fated. Cyno's headpiece is quite literally a representation of Tighnarian ears. He will always have something of Tighnari with him wherever he goes.

Throughout this entire quest, we see how frequent it is that they both stuck together from the start. From eating fruits together while waiting for the sunset or sunrise at Cyno's secret base, to having codes to give each other secret messages on where to meet up, to having camping trips together, to finally sharing all of this with Collei, and now calling all of it a "family tradition". Whether you ship cynonari together or not, you have to admit that this is one of the most wonderful representations of unconditional love between two characters in the game.

Cynonari was already a powerful partnership before this quest, with scenes of them having what seems to be blind trust to each other from an outsider's perspective. This quest delved deeper as to how perfect the idea of Cyno and Tighnari being side by side really is.

#kaeyachi randoms #cynari #cynonari #look...my brain started hurting ok #it was pounding over the implications in this entire quest

[krawlernyannyan]

I caved and got into HI3 a little over a week ago and I haven't been posting about it but I just finished the new story chapter that came out today and the Serapeum plotline sent honest-to-stars chills down my bones, and I feel like I'm going to crumple into tatters if I don't talk about it a little (under a cut obviously because the patch only came out today)

Lotus Eater plots always tend get me on edge but something about the way Phase 1 plays out really got to me. The way that Serapeum's Union is intially presented almost like it's a zombie plague slowly enveloping more people, and then as the chapter progresses the new information making it clear it's somehow worse than that because everybody that's stuck in the Union wasn't tricked or forced into it - "they chose to stay voluntarily" is something that took a few minutes to really sink in but when it did, ough. Then you actually get into the Union and, like...

Helia's scenario is the one that's sticking out the most in my mind because even if she hasn't had a lot of strong characterization in the story up to this point seeing her be, just...completely pacified. The way she's already grown idle and content with spending an eternity fighting meaningless battles where she'll always win. The quiet disappointment and frustration she has when it's laid bare that she'll never actually get meaningfully stronger in here because eventually this library will run out of new material to experience and at no point in that infinity will anything have challenged her or forced her to grow. I had worms crawling all over me reading this sequence and it's so good.

Not to besmirch the other parts:

The way Coralie's independence, confidence, and drive keep her relatively sane but still makes her a target for the Union to warp those desires against her by letting her pursue an endless snipe hunt, letting her sift through a bottomless well of knowledge and sinking deeper into its sway all the while.

The way Senadina hasn't even formed enough of an identity for the Union to have a corruptive effect on her mental state, but her one basic desire of "find Serapeum and wake her up" is still enough for the Union to ensnare her by keeping her in a loop where she futilely tries to go deeper into the Union and winds up back at its start. The unstated implication that at no point in that loop did she think to abandon that quest to leave and get help (if you don't want to be there it doesn't force you to stay, after all) and just kept moving forward in spite of it all.

AND THEN

THE PART THAT KILLED ME

Is getting to the very end after Serapeum's woken up and realizing that even she wasn't immune to the corruptive effects of the hivemind she created in the first place, succumbing and becoming just the voice of the consensus. The realization that the source of the looming and tense dread that has hung over the entire chapter is a mere child. A lonely child that could sympathize with peoples' plights but not empathize with them, who only understood the world through a castle-sized library of books, trying to brute-force an understanding between people by reducing them to blank slates and turning their lives into just more books to read.

I'm not even going to get into the parts with Lantern but she's great in this too. The whole phase has this delicious tension throughout, my heart is honestly still pounding writing this all out. Part 2 Chapter 1 didn't really impress me outside of specific character moments but now that they've gotten most of the flowery exposition out of the way I'm actually really satisfied with the storytelling here and I'm excitedly looking forward to when we get the next phase in a few days.

#EZ: HI3 #HI3 #Honkai Impact 3rd #HI3P2 #Honkai Impact 3rd Part 2 #HI3 Serapeum #HI3 Helia #HI3 Coralie #HI3 Senadina #tagging for this game is a nightmare but we will strive

[schofieldturner06]

Ordeals for Elderly citizens: Creating the Right Make prohibited Method

Elders sounding for shop at work to preserve brawniness raft tone, climb endurance and amplification Independence. In Phim thuyết minh tvhay are a variety of early added benefits that exercises render, that cover to hold back the of age habitation longer and retention absentminded from ill. You involve to draw the terrific exert arrangement that fitly fits their ability and necessities. Right-hand hither are about concepts to perplex time lag of your begun. What They Tooshie Do The well-nigh crucial convention is to fair leave ample exercise that will plump for decent pedigree circulation to entirely the requisite organs, along with sustain musculus mass plenty. Muscularity masses tends to wasting completely through with the subsequently on phases of a somebody's life history. You bequeath necessitate to keep intriguing-acquired tissues by agency of both cardiovascular physical exertion sessions, extending routines and pounds coaching. In the starting, it is all important that you do a stock appraisal of the fourth-year ab initio, to check that he or she can do wholly the forcible exercises without having importantly job. Incredibly draining workout school term ass be prejudicious to the in oecumenical job of seniors. You rich person to front at their reaction by listening to their verbalizations and observing how they make out. If you receive kayoed approximately electronegative indications so much as meaning ventilation, luxuriant perspiring, deprivation of stability, saggy eyelids and fair to extreme point soreness, suitable outside final stage the hardheaded undergo. Becoming Pliable Work out forbidden routines bequeath accept to be over-embellished, which signifies that but unmatchable method acting is merely well-advised for a unmarried unequaled. You tin likewise correspondence knocked out maturation a pile Sir Thomas More efficaciously by supply the distinguishable shape of routines, pick of repetitions and sets and interval of equitable virtually every recitation. Use courses penury to hold to be highly adaptable, in the gumption that the regimens and variety of actions aline to each one mortal 7 days just about, relying on the reaction of the client. Your object glass is to keep back or hike versatility, ability and baron, if practicable, so the drill Sessions want to experience to be upped as the case-by-case receives far more strong and well greater. Finding a Specialiser If you take localisation to be a implicated Word or granddaughter quest presently after a elder citizen in your household, it is systematically appropriate to receive the vantage point of a specialist when developing your physical exertion method acting, so you john determine on the suited type and index that burst the prerequisites of the consumer. Experts dwell of dieticians, health nightspot trainers, physical therapists, Greco-Roman deity professionals, nurses and nutritionists World Health Organization will payoff a depend at if the computer programme is redress or as advantageously operose. Throughout the real world-class pair off of classes, you commode asking the dependant to helper you in aiding the aged go as a event of the various movements. Rightfield performance is of the essence to chance on the many targets and targets. Practiced direction is real important from meter to sentence, importantly in the of course of the moments when you're forthwith visualised to canvass the senior's reply to treatment method. Former Resources When defining the training political program, you buttocks look up to operate extinct DVDs that caters to aged citizens, examine on the profit boards and eff picture clips on the web. Be reminded that dieting regime and slackening are the former two factors that bequeath adequately direction the physical exercise be after for senior citizens. Elder citizens consume to induce bit forcible utilization to uphold muscleman tone, raise endurance and grow self-trust. In the starting, it is critical appraisal that you do a overall rating of the elder house physician at first, to insure that he or she commode do altogether the exercises without the motive of well issues. Exceedingly toilsome function forbidden john be adverse to the vulgar affliction of senior citizens. When defining the education programme, you posterior pertain to perform come out DVDs that caters to elders, go to on-melodic line forums and take in films on-course. Be reminded that intellectual nourishment design and eternal rest are the early deuce factors that volition sufficiently assistance the forge come out design for seniors.

#Phim thuyết minh tvhay

[theholycovenantrpg]

In the beginning was ISOLDE WICKEN, a GIFTED loyal to the cause of the HUNDRED-EYED GOD. She is said to be TWENTY-EIGHT and uses SHE/HER pronouns. In this New Testament she serves as a ALL-SEEING PRIESTESS of the HUNDRED-EYED GOD. Blessed be her name.

THE INDELIBLE MARK.

As the only Seer, Isolde was quickly given the status of All-Seeing Priestess within the religion of the Hundred-Eyed God. Her visions often depict the endings of things and are highly subjective. She is able to bear witness to the outcomes of different decisions, however it is difficult for her to focus on specific people and scenarios without a great deal of mental power and concentration since she can become overwhelmed by her Sight. Due to this, she may have to meditate for hours or even days before being able to give definitive details. It takes quite a physical toll on her and can render her incapacitated due to the fact that when she was a vision it is almost like being swept into a waking dream -- she has difficulty pulling herself from its overwhelming tide. However, many people within positions of power still seek to solicit her and utilize her gifts, hoping that they might obtain some control of their future. It is why her journalings are coveted and carefully guarded by those who are closest to her. As all who have suffered and survived the Blood Plague, Isolde’s scars are obvious and unsettling: her vision was heavily impaired and her eyes, once warm, dark and warm as they were, now look as though they are made of molten gold with similar colored tear stains falling along the curves of her cheeks.

THE HISTORY.

TW: VERBAL ABUSE, ABUSE IMPLICATIONS

From the moment she was nothing more than a beating heart, she knew what it was to be cursed. She knew what it was to never work quite right -- each breath seemed to make her lungs ache, every too-loud thump of her heart seemed like an offense against her, her bones seemed to grind against one another; Isolde was  an ever-evolving study of how intimate a person can become with suffering, with pain. Yet still, she learned to bear such things with an enigmatic smile and an endearing bat of her lashes, steps as light as naiad’s, laughter as bewitching as a siren’s. There wasn’t much choice in the matter given to her, the Wicken family being such an auspicious name within the confines of the Holy Land. Their name was a gilded one, murmured among the society’s elite, often with a mix of reverence or envy -- oftentimes there being a mixture between the two. Such a legacy necessitated perfection from every figure bearing the name; her parents were philanthropists and innovators, her cousins were highly regarded socialites, and she had no commendations to speak of. Isolde was bright, but not clever and personable, but not quite charming. In a world where excellence was expected, mediocrity was tantamount to the most abysmal of failures. And, as she looked at herself in the mirror, she could not help but shed a tear at the mundane creature that looked back at her with red-rimmed eyes.

How could she see past the horror of her own reflection when her mother clutched her shoulder, nails digging into flesh, all too eager to highlight the faults that were to be found? Never did the great Lady Wicken dare to pass a chance to compare her daughter against the other socialites and heirs, sneering each time at how Isolde paled in comparison; a weed that marred the garden of carefully cultivated beauty. All the while her father acted as though his mouth had been sewn shut, content to look on, far more interested in what glitter of his next mistresses’ eyes rather than the bleakness that was to be found in his offspring’s. When one is told that their mundanity is a curse, that their excellence is passable and their accomplishments are subpar, it is difficult to believe otherwise. You have nothing to offer this world, little Isolde, her mother hissed into her ear, you have more to offer the worms in the garden, you have more to offer by withering away. It is difficult to imagine that there is a world of color when you are told - time and time again - that there are only muted grays. It took her a great while to realize that a sculpture is simply a block of stone before an artisan liberates the beauty from its marble confines -- a painting is a blank canvas until someone dares to bespeckle it with rich, vibrant colors. The realization dawned on her the moment that her tutor strode into her life with their great, bellowing laughter and ruddy cheeks. 

They liberated her from her stony confines, coaxing from her laughter so arresting that it would leave her with aching cheeks and streams of tears. It was through them that she learned how gentle hands could be more cutting than the blunt edge of a blade, how tender words could cause a more fatal blow than any strike to the heart. Slowly, deliberately, the colors of gray that had painted her world sloughed off like the blood and mud that blinded a warrior’s gaze; suddenly, her vision was clear and she could see the world with its vibrant, impassioned hues. She had been through the hell of her own soul and came through it wielding a sword of empathy and compassion -- how could she not want to aid others in their quest to do the same? But the moment that this red-flamed dream flared to life, it was dashed away. Not only was her newfound dream stolen from her, but the source of its inspiration too. In a fit of fevered, scarlet-colored tears her great mentor was stolen away. Crying out in anguish, she held their pale, limp hands in hers -- she begged and she pleaded, bargaining with the Hundred-Eyed God to return them to her, striking at their hollow chest in despair when her cries fell on ears of stone. 

The pain that befell her when the Blood Plague took hold of her soul was welcome. It was a relief to the numbness of her grief -- just as it was a relief for her parents to turn their backs to her, taking advantage of the opportunity to rid themselves of a daughter that they considered a blight on their name. Throughout the bouts of her fevered agony she clung to the one memory of her mentor that had been left to her; a delicately carved thing, gilded and as pale as bone. She should have died, and there was no denying that something within her did. However, as the fever abated, as those abhorrent parts of her soul were burned to ash, something took root in her. When she stepped forth upon the great green earth, with her eyes of molten gold, there was complete and utter clarity to all that she had endured -- and will continue to endure. The world had been born anew, just as she was; it was like a newborn fawn, attempting to rise upon its shaky legs while starved wolves encircled it. The calamity that could befall it might leave it in irreparable ruins. Her vision had been taken from her, but in its place she was able to bear witness to something far greater than that -- was granted a gift that allowed her to see the truth of the matter: the Wicken woman was tasked with shepherding the New Testament, with creating a world greater than the last. With a heart burning so righteous and pure, it was Isolde, and only Isolde, that could ever achieve it. 

THE CONNECTIONS.

ESTIENNE WICKEN: Half-sibling. They are her opposite in every imaginable way and yet the reality of sharing the same name as them is enough to cause bile to rise in her throat. Whatever lessons that her parents failed to instill in her as a youngling seems to have been easily grasped by Estienne. If they did not share the same aristocratic mannerisms and enigmatic smiles that are practically a Wicken trademark, she might have claimed that they were not related at all. But alas, the blood that runs in her veins runs in theirs as well. As Isolde builds her name among the Holy Land’s society, it seems that Estienne is determined to ensure that it is tied with theirs as well -- what could be more winning than spiritual recognition as well as political? The portrait that they paint of themselves incites within her an anger that is barely recognizable, because she has buried it for so long; it has festered like an open wound and the mere mention of Estienne’s name is like rubbing raw sea salt upon it.

ZADKIEL: Heartache. When he looks at her, she feels as though she is drowning. Not within her own despair, no -- this is a very nuanced sort of pain. In the throes of her fevered dreams, his face had appeared to her, lingering over her shoulder, the edges of his wings brushing against her cheek. It did not take long for her to place the pieces together. The look that painted his gaze when his eyes flickered between hers, the slight downward tilt of his lip, the palpable pounding of her heart and the ineffable ache that descended upon her. He had been tasked to be her guardian angel at one point in time -- and he had either forsaken his duty or failed at it. And to be honest, she is not entirely sure which possibility might be more cruel. What she is sure about is this: the fact that he dares to see her at all, to talk to her, and grow close to her and tug at her heart-strings so shamelessly is the most sadistic thing he could do. (Why, then, can’t she bring herself to make him stop?)

GADRIEL: Guardian. It was odd, initially, having a shadow with teeth -- stepping forth and knowing that a creature that once brought forth ruin hounded her steps. The guardian of the High Priestess was initially a means of the angels demonstrating their good will towards a religion that they would rather those within the kingdom of Caelum not ascribe to. It was made an all the more imperative position to hold once word spread of Isolde’s abilities; having an angel so close to a mortal that was so powerful could only be seen as leverage. But she has found that Gadriel’s presence serves as a comfort more than anything -- the angel’s rather stalwart protection of the Seer being the only thing she can depend on when in the throes of a vision. It is odd, she thinks, how much solace one can take in a creature so rigid that she seems to be rendered from marble. It is even more odd, then, how fond Isolde has grown of her.

ORIAS: Catalyst. She cannot help the singularly unnerving feeling of being a sparrow caught within the sights of a hawk whenever she steps into Orias’ line of vision. She feels their gaze upon her, fixated like an arrow, string taught and ready for release. Though they have never given her a reason to think that there was any animosity or maliciousness in their intent, she still remains attuned to the small details of the interactions. The way that their eyes seem to drink her in, the curl of their mouth, the merest twitch of their fingers are all meticulously noted and analyzed in the night, when the moon is high and the shadows pervade every corner of her room. There is something primordial that resonates within Isolde whenever they approach her, something ancient that yawns widely the longer Orias is within her presence. And Isolde refuses to be blindsided when it truly awakes.

Isolde is portrayed by Sydney Harper* and was written by ROSEY. She is currently TAKEN by LISSA.

#biblical rp #literate rp #rpg #lsrpg #new rp #w #g #isolde wicken #c #cw

[samsbastardzone]

Hey, you know that 35 d&d questions ask meme? I answered all of them.

This is a long ass post. Be warned. It took up seven and a half pages in google docs. Original post here.

1. A favorite character you have played.

Would have to be Zize Fortier, dragonborn gunslinger. Their tag on this blog is #zize and you can find their bio and info on my character page. Love that bastard!! He’s sweet and bratty and a total delight to play (we are such an OP party, y’all).

2. Your favorite character that someone else has played.

UM UM gonna talk about a few here. To be fair to people I play a *lot* of games with, I’m only gonna  talk about one PC per person.

- The bastard trio in my Wildemount game– @toomanyorphans ’s Nakoria, @overplannedbutunnamednpc ‘s Zier (also an NPC in the campaign Zize is in), and @glasyasbutch ‘s Nissy. They all really suck so bad but in SUCH funny ways. They’re varying degrees of self centered and awful, but we trust each other in this campaign, and those 3 players are SO funny in their RP.

- (RIP) Avri in my Wildemount game. They and Bly named each other,,,,  they were parent and child…… VERY sweet. huge goliath with tiny bird in backpack.

- @bekahdoesnershit ‘s Raini. Zize’s BFF, and her tag on that blog is rich. She’s SUCH a bitch but we love her.

- @bhissar ‘s Saela. She is a dream character for me to DM for– very little fleshed out backstory with room to explore, with still-concrete events in it. Consistent character choices and personality, to the point I can sometimes predict what she’ll do. Very cool aesthetically. And overall? EXTREMELY sweet. Baby, baby bird.

3. Your favorite side quest.

Either the one going on right now in amnesia, where we have to collect brain matter from big powerful elementals, or the stop we made at a family of vampires in Acarnya (the one I played Osfyr in).

4. Your current campaign.

There are five of those, with two on hold. 

-Wildemount, aka the Frozen Sick module from Explorer’s Guide to Wildemount (we’re almost done with that, my PC is Bly). 

-Amnesia campaign aka high level campaign: we woke up in hell with no memories! PC is Zize. 

-Hoard of the Dragon Queen module, near the beginning of that, PC is Pointy. 

-Horror campaign, only two sessions so far, but we’re trapped in an alternate dimension carrying out tasks for a creepy dude. PC is Vinny. 

-Kithan, where we’re high level monster hunting guild members searching  out ancient artifacts of the gods (campaign based on the Monster Hunter games), PC is Topaz.

-Silas, party is currently trying to help dragons free themselves and stop a… dude? No spoilers! I DM. On hold because I had too many campaigns going at once.

-Silas v2: extremely vaguely based on the plot of season one of the web series Carmilla. A tweaked version of the first arc the Silas party went through. On hold because it was played in person at school.

5. Favorite NPC.

I don’t really have any NPCs in my campaigns that I’m super attached to, except– Nikeo, a goliath rogue PC in Silas 1, had many adopted children. Three of them– kobolds– sometimes stand on each others’ shoulders, put on a long coat, and help out around their parent’s store. They’ve named themselves Koby.

As for favorite NPCs in campaigns I’ve played, I can think of… a lot. The first is Laurel, a blue dragonborn loner type who followed Osfyr and friends in Acarnya. They were kind of broody and dark, but they really drew me in. They were the first NPC we really talked to– they were sitting on top of the post office laughing at the mob scene of people protesting not getting their mail delivered.

I’d also pick Osfyr’s partners in that campaign– Yelkian, a backstory love interest I came up with, a flamboyant soft sorcerer. Jupiter, politician’s niece, who took pity on Osfyr’s attempts to seduce information out of her and let them succeed on both counts (seduction and information). Xerxes, extra AF rogue with a big loving family, who swept in after a fight on the back of an eagle-wildshaped Brysth (npc druid). 

There’s a blue dragon in the HOTDQ campaign that we don’t know much about. I really enjoyed the way @dungeonsanddraconicqueer played him. He’s just a dude! Lex’s warlock made a Deal with him to leave the town alone. We still don’t know the implications of that. It’s fine, guys.

And then, there’s Stewart the Skin Steward, a servant of False Mystra. Fun dude.  Very cavalier– nigh, enthusiastic!– about the fact that his entire city was made of skin. Something of a skin connoisseur, in fact!

6. Favorite death (monster, player character, NPC, etc).

Saela, hands down. She got breathed on by a dragon, yo. We then had to stop playing for 4-5 months because a player lost access to the Internet. I wrote a vision/speech from her warlock patron, the Raven Queen, the night she died, and basically didn’t touch it until I read it out in game. It involved a confession that the Queen was  tired of being a god, and showing Saela all the lives she’d touched. Then we used Matt Mercer’s rez rules for her. She came back– but it was her choice.

7. Your favorite downtime activity.

Fucking tinkering dude!!! I don’t get to do it enough as Zize and that is entirely my fault. @ morgan, eyes emoji

8. Your favorite fight/encounter.

I LOVE creepy shit. There was a train car with people dancing in it, and party members got enchanted to dance along and eat the food,  and the revelers were clearly in pain, and snuffing out a candle caused a reveler to disappear. Creepy shit!

In Kithan, we had to climb a staircase, and we timed it with produce flame which is a 10 minute duration cantrip, and we were climbing for 50 minutes. We started to see things in the edges of our vision. Then someone realized it was an illusion, and it all vanished. It freaked me out so bad.

In amnesia campaign, at level 19, we were traversing a cave, and our shadows started dripping the same black goop we were there to investigate. We killed one and it took down the max hp of the person whose shadow it was, and then they straight up didn’t have a shadow until they long rested. It really freaked us out, realizing the shadows were actually creatures, but they were like CR 1. Really effective use of a low level monster.

9. Your favorite thing about D&D.

The way it has something for everyone… the way it’s brought me so many friends… the way it’s inspired my OC creation like nothing else.

10. Your favorite enemy and the enemy you hate the most.

I’m not sure if this is asking about NPCs I’ve had as enemies, or any monster in D&D canon? The longest campaign I played in didn’t have long term enemies  per se. I’d say I was frustrated with the cultists that ambushed us last session in HOTDQ,  but I didn’t hate them! I just couldn’t seem to hit or dodge them. As for a favorite… probably False Mystra: the demon lord Orcus who’d taken over  the position, and therefore the duties, of Mystra, the god of arcane magic.  We killed it,  but then whoopso!! Our wizard lost her powers.

11. How often do you play and how often would you ideally like to play?

I play an ideal amount, honestly: four times a week, for about 2.5-3 hours a session. HOTDQ Tuesdays, Kithan and horror campaign switching off Wednesdays, Wildemount Thursdays cause we miss CR, Amnesia Sundays.

12. Your in game inside jokes/memes/catchphrases and where they came from.

Amnesia: Yocheved, the party barbarian/full time fish, has a secret third arm and/or a prosthetic ass. Cylthia, the druid, does arson (but actually). Relentless is a Crown paladin, so she puts her fingers in her ears when we do crime/lie. She also has a rod of lordly might that, immediately post amnesia, she made into a 32 foot climbing pole. Yocheved eats pounds and pounds of raw fish for every meal.

Wildemount: just the shenanigans and sabotaging each other that the Bastard Trio get into. Example: Nissy was tasked with buying Zier a cloak for cold weather and purposely got him an  ugly one. Zier then prestidigitated it to be a nicer color.

13. Introduce your current party.

Oh boy, I have 6 of those. Here goes. Keep in mind many of these characters are played and games are DMed by my friends who have OC blogs of their own: Raini and Ayen are bekahdoesnerdshit, Ezra, Nissy, and Roona are glasyasbutch, Horror DM, Lent, Eve, and Nakoria are toomanyorphans, Wildemount DM, Saela, Daecyne, and Cylthia are bhissar, HOTDQ DM is dungeonsanddraconicqueer, and Amnesia DM, Zier, Nyxi, and Sarril are overplannedbutunnamednpc. Not an OC blog, but Yocheved, Avri, Arbor, Thraf, Nikeo, and Whisper are mickgoesabsolutelyhamforbarbie.

Amnesia (Zize): Lent, tiefling paladin, former crownsguard who “fell” (became an oathbreaker), then un-fell when we lost our memories. Cylthia, tiefling/elf druid who can shift between tiefling and elf forms and loves setting things on fire. Yocheved, 14 foot tall nereid (fishfolk) barbarian with a dry sense of humor, is the party parent. And Raini, aasimar wizard, sass machine and Zize’s bff.

HOTDQ. My PC is Pointy. Ezra, quiet human paladin. Theata, moon elf rogue. Freya, sweet (human?) light cleric who sometimes misreads situations. Eve, 13 year old (!!) human warlock who kinda sucks, but like, she’s 13. Nyxi, motherly gnome bard who Is going to adopt Pointy. 

Wildemount (Bly): Alene, human barbarian. Quiet and with somewhat of a parent instinct. Some sort of Mysterious Backstory. Delta, aasimar rogue, similarly shady backstory? Unclear. Sticks with Alene. Nissy, drow rune knight, sucks. Zier, drow sorcerer, also sucks. Nakoria, dragonborn warlock, ALSO sucks. (Those three make up the Bastard Trio.) Avri (F for them), goliath bard and Avri’s guardian, died last session by falling on a floor full of knives. 

Horror campaign (Vinny): Roona, halfling bard, very impulsive, eats exclusively with her spoon that says ASS, and chills in Vinny’s fanny pack. Ayen, elven teenage warlock with a dark backstory. Sarril, Ayen’s not-dad, half elf beast barbarian who got it from his wife. Arbor, dryad  monk, who wears an all white plague doctor outfit at all times.

Silas v1 (DM), Original party before 1 left and 1 died: Hacka (RIP), human luchador-styled drunken monk. Nikeo (left), goliath rogue with so many adopted children. Inferno, fire genasi paladin/phoenix sorcerer with anger and impulse control issues. Saela, babiest aarakocra warlock of the Raven Queen. Hacka’s player now plays Voda, a stoic water genasi tempest cleric who cast Raise Dead successfully on Saela. Nikeo’s player now plays Whisper, a tabaxi astral soul monk.

Kithan (Topaz): Thraf, monsterborn (universe-compliant dragonborn) barbarian. Very social, very outgoing, very stupid, and very traumatized. Fucks majorly. Daecyne, sweet tiefling druid and Topaz’s good friend. Viosa, aasimar homebrew class I forget the name of, uses her small stature and allure to her advantage. Damur, half-orc eldritch knight, the party’s only braincell.

14. Introduce any other parties you have played in or DM-ed.

Acarnya. My PC was Osfyr. Soraphine, traumatized halfling bard. Azalea, human fighter. Durzuell, haughty high elf sorcerer. James, nerdy half elf wizard. Drago, erratic Russian dragonborn monk. Kairon, slightly edgy ranger/paladin (but we love him). 

Nordenheim. My PC was Cap. I will admit: we only played 2 or 3 sessions, so I don’t really remember  most of the other party members except Rory, a fire genasi ranger who almost burned to death.

Silas v2 (hopefully will continue; I DMed): Kysseris IV. Half-elf paladin, uptight. Tower 1-6, warforged wizard who crawled out of the desert and is looking for info on how he was made. Mae “Pock”, gnome rogue, very small and  sweet. Josh, human trickery cleric, kind of an asshole, but in a way that’s funny and hasn’t bled over into IRL annoying.

[school] West Marches campaign (Ner): by the nature of West Marches, there was never a consistent party, but a few stood out to me. Red Foot, a hyperactive kobold sorcerer who’s level 8 against all West Marches odds. Lyra, Great Old One warlock of Tzee’Mhor, an abomination goat that a party I was in accidentally created. Fildo Baggins, divination wizard who can only affect allies whose toenail clippings he has in his vial.

15. Do you have snacks during game times?

Hell yeah babey!!! I mostly play digitally, especially during COVID, and I need something to munch after DMing for a while. Shit’s exhausting.

16. Do you play online or in person? Which do you prefer?

Welp! Online mostly, since everyone I want to play with has the audacity to live far away, and now exclusively online because of COVID.

17. What are some house rules that your group has?

Our Amnesia party is so rich that we just don’t keep track of money. In Kithan, a lot of rules that make characters less powerful are just… abolished (like the bonus action spell rule). (The DM likes super OP characters so she can throw SUPER OP monsters at us.  My character has a necklace that gives 5 additional uses of channel divinity.)

18. Does your party keep any pets?

Nope. No opportunities for them. Zize’s party has a little water snake on the druid’s arm but I doubt that will last very long.

19. Do you or your party have any dice superstitions?

Absolutely. Cursed dice get j a i l.

20. How did you get into D&D? How long have you been playing?

Acarnya got me into d&d, it was my first campaign, and it was happening at the place I lived. I’ve been playing almost 2 years. (Critical Role inspired me to DM)

21. Have you ever regretted something your character has done?

Not sent a fucking letter to say goodbye to their boyfriend before the world-fate-deciding bullshit that was gonna happen and possibly destroy shit. It was fine in the end though!

22. What color was your first dragon?

Red. Man, that guy sucked, he almost killed Osfyr. We were investigating a monastery secretly run by dragons disguised as humans.

23. Do you use premade modules or original campaigns?

Original campaigns. I’ve never run a module before! I’m not opposed, but most of my campaigns came from ideas  that I had. I’ve never been short on ideas for a game.

24. How much planning/preparation do you do for a game?

As a player, I just open my character sheet and get out dice. As a DM, I try and think about what material I want to get through this session, and write some narration and/or stat things out if I feel like it.

For DMs

25. What have your players done that you never could have planned for?

A lot of times, Inferno has rushed into battle from what I’d built as a stealth mission, and gotten her ass and sometimes the party’s asses kicked. I should really have learned by now.

26. What was your favorite scene to write and show your characters?

Definitely Saela’s resurrection ritual and vision.

27. Do you allow homebrew content?

Yes! I’ll check it first,  but I’m all for expanding the boundaries. I homebrew items and monsters all the time, why shouldn’t my payers get to homebrew their shit?

28. How often do you use NPCs in a party?

Too often in my first arc. I had like 7 NPCs running around at all times (they were Carmilla characters). Super not recommended. I have 0 right now.

29. Do you prefer RP heavy sessions or combat sessions?

I’m still finding my groove with RP as a DM. I like encouraging my players to RP amongst themselves. I consider myself fairly good at combat on both sides of the equation, DM and player, so that’s always fun to me, especially when my players enjoy it too.

30. Are your players diplomatic or murder hobos?

I have one actively reforming murder hobo player, the rest are diplomatic. (The character, Inferno, is having a great growth arc. I’m super proud.)

For Players

31. What is your favorite class? Favorite race?

I fucking love genasi as a concept. Favorite class would have to be rogue or cleric, but gunslinger’s up there too.

32. What role do you like to play the most? (Tank/healer/etc?)

I  honestly don't have the patience to not play DPS. I love doing lots of damage. Healing is satisfying, support is satisfying, but there’s a reason I picked rogue twice and tempest cleric over other domains.

33. How do you write your backstory, or do you even write a backstory?

Sometimes the backstory is part of the character concept– especially for Pointy, because I had the name first, then went hmm why would she have this name. Almost always, though, more backstory gets written during the campaign when I have an idea. Sometimes a character will act in a way I don’t expect, and it’s fun thinking of a justification to fill backstory gaps.

34. Do you tend to pick weapons/spells for being useful or for flavor?

Mostly  usefulness honestly. I’ll make choices among several for flavor, but I’m a big proponent of using mechanics to build character. What I mean is, think about Magnus in TAZ Balance– his protection fighting style contributed a lot to the way Travis played him as a protective person. I love that shit.

35. How much roleplay do you like to do?

I like to do a lot, but unfortunately my  energy is pretty down lately so I haven’t been doing as much.

#zize #pointy #cap #bly #osfyr #ner #vinny #topaz #dm thots #meta thots #asks #amnesia campaign #hotdq #horror campaign #wildemount campaign #silasverse #kithan

[spootiliousrps]

Suspicious Natures

[An Ongoing RP with the amazing @fandomrp ] 

 // [Next]

Castiel pulled his cloak tighter around him to try and ward off the chill from the night air. It seemed that these late nights seemed to grow colder and colder. He paused just briefly to glance over the rolling hills before him before continuing his patrol of the armaments. It was late but it wasn’t as if he had anywhere else to be; he was the Knight Commander of the King’s Arms, he took pride in his work and nothing could pull him from it. He paused to nod at one of the guards as they passed each other but said nothing. How long had he served until King John? It had to have been the better part of a decade and now that he had passed his son was due to take over. Cas had only met the man briefly, but it was enough to notice the Alpha’s reckless nature. He obviously had his reservations about the boy’s ability to rule but it would not interfere in his duties. That is… if the newly appointed Monarch allowed him to keep his position.

No, Castiel would be fine. Even if he were demoted, he would take pride in training his replacement. Though there was no real worry that he’d be replaced, not unless… Well, not unless someone discovered what he really was… He was sure the younger Prince had figured it out long ago. Sam was far too intelligent for his own good, it worried him some time… But as far as he knew the boy never told anyone Castiel’s secret and for that the Knight Commander would be forever grateful. He had worked far too hard to gain his title. Of course, he couldn’t take all the credit; if it wasn’t for Hannah, he would have never discovered how to hide his scent so effectively.

He offered another murmur of greeting as another guard bowed in respect as Castiel passed, a bit too lost in his own head to really pay attention where he was heading.

King Dean was a strong Alpha, he considered himself to be fair and just, just like how he runs the Kingdom. Though if it wasn’t for his brother Sammy, he would be lost. He much preferred to be out with the King’s Cavalry actively protecting his Kingdom. He was walking through the fields above the Kingdom, looking down on what he ruled. As he walked he noticed the Knight Commander walking towards him. King Dean jogged up to him. “Castiel isn’t in? I’ve been meaning to have a discussion with you. How about we have it now?” He asked, as he held his hand out to the Commander.

Cas glanced up as his name was called, intense gaze falling on the man in question. He straightened immediately, tension obvious in his shoulder. “Your Majesty.” Castiel greeted quickly, fist pressing against the thin metal covering his chest as he bowed deeply. “I was not aware you were out for a stroll. I apologize for not sending an escort.” He hurried before the man’s words sank, causing him to frown, thankful that his low bow hid the expression. The King wished to have a discussion this late… it did not bode well.

“Oh no, no. I did not tell anyone.” King Dean smiled. “I prefer coming out here alone. You can straighten, Castiel. Unless you enjoy the reflection of your face in my boots.” Dean chuckled warmly. “There is no need to worry about this chat, it’s just a formality. We may as well do it now when we are both free, then try to find time in our schedules.”

The teasing had the Knight Commander flushing slightly as he did as he was instructed, lips still pursed in apprehension. “I… Understand your desire to be alone, Your Majesty, however, I do not think its wise for you to venture the grounds alone, especially with your recent rise to the throne.” He protested gently, unsure of Dean’s temperament when it came to question his actions in such a manner; King John certainly wasn’t too fond of it. Still, he fell in step next to the King. “I will be happy to discuss whatever you wish, My King, if you will allow me to walk with you.”

“If I was not born the eldest child, I would have joined the quests to search for far off lands. I feel the safest out here.” He explained. “But now I have you, to ensure my safest. That if you are loyal to me.” King Dean asked, raising an eyebrow. “You would never conceal your true actions, nor lie to the King would you?” He asked.

Castiel glanced at him once more, intense gaze narrowing at the implications. “I am loyal to the Throne, Your Majesty. You sit upon it. I am loyal to you just as I was loyal to your father. If I have given you any reason for doubt or concern, I will do what it takes to make things right. All you need do is name the task.” Castiel reassured, avoiding a direct answer in regard to his ‘true actions’ and ‘lies’. “It is my honor to serve this kingdom and the royal family.”

“Do not be so offended, Commander, or one could read into it. These are just formal questions, I am asking of the staff surrounding me.” King Dean hummed. He knew that Castiel was keeping something from him, but he wasn’t sure what it was. He decided to change tack and continue on with the formal questioning. “Throughout this transition period, I’m hoping you’ll take some slack, that I may cause, I am still trying to juggle many things, and as such, I may not answer your queries as quickly as my father.” He explained. “During this time I wish for you to follow your gut, or think back to what my father would have asked you to do. Will you do this?”

Cas blinked at the request, unsure of what to make of it. “Of course, Sire.” He mumbled after a moment’s hesitation. “I will do my duty with honor, have no doubt in that.” He encouraged with a nod. “I have a request, however, if you will hear me?” He offered, gaze shifting back in the direction they walked leisurely.

“Of course, Commander. But I do reserve the right to waiver the request if it is not suitable for a King to do.” King Dean smiled warmly, he watched Castiel walk, noting the softest of the cheekbones and narrower shoulder’s usually adorning Omega men.

"Of course, Sire." Castiel nodded, unaware of the King's attention to detail. "Ruling is a difficult job, one that I am certain you are already of aware of. But a King is only a great as his people. You are not alone in your power, Your Majesty. We are all here to help lighten the burdens of the crown. Forgive my brash nature, but this includes your brother. He may be young but he is wise beyond his years perhaps he could be of use in your transition to the throne." He offered, tensing slightly as he waited for the backlash the was undoubtedly coming. Castiel had a tendency to toe the line of insubordination but it had served him well on occasion.

I speak with my brother often.” King Dean hummed, he stopped walking and turned to Castiel. “He is helping with more... mundane matters at the moment. Is there a reason you wish for me to use my brother more frequently? He has a job of his own, that we both wish for him to attend to, and a good wife.” Dean hummed. “I do not wish to take too much of him time away from either of those matters.”

Castiel paused when Dean did, turning to face him as was proper. “Of course, Your Majesty, I would not wish to imply that you would.” He rushed, obviously worried he had offended the Monarch. “It is just that I have watched the two of you for the better part of ten years now. King John, God rest his soul, ensured that your brother remain on a very strict path and while I must respect his wishes, I fear that your brother’s talents and intelligence may not be utilized to their fullest. If allowed, I believe your brother would gain immeasurable honor in a more productive role. While a scholar is an honorable trade I feel his talents may be wasted scribing others’ words.” He explained before flushing deeply as he realized how it sound. “Though I, of course, would not presume to know anyone in the Royal Family with such familiarity.” He rushed. “I am merely making assumptions off a few rare observations of the boy.” When had he become so easily embarrassed? Perhaps it was just how warm it had suddenly gotten. The thought had him tensing as he realized that that couldn’t be right, the night had been chilled just a moment ago. No, it had to be the way the Alpha’s scent seemed to swirled around them in the evening air that seemed to heat him, making him realize that they were particularly close and causing him to take a step back.

King Dean eyed Castiel as he took a step back, as his cheeks flustered with warmth. “As you are so keen to hand out unwarranted advice, how about you give me advice. You are the Knight Commander of the King’s Arms. These following days, I wish to receive a full report on one of the men directly under you. Each day, until you have reported on each of them. Their strengths, their weaknesses, and where you would advise to place them.” Dean stated. “At dusk every night. Or, of course, you can explain why you refused to answer my question about whether you’re lying and telling me the entire truth of your actions.” Dean offered, with a wry smile.

Castiel’s stomach twisted almost painful at the words, eyes growing a bit wide in surprise. He could feel his heart pounding against his ribs noticeable as he quickly bent low at the waist once more. “Of course, Your Grace!” He rushed perhaps a bit too loudly. “I will have those reports ready and waiting just as you request.” He offered eagerly, pausing in his bow the action helping to conceal his worried look. “Forgive me for stepping out of line.” He added. “I meant no disrespect. It was wrong of me to assume you were in need of any such advice from someone such as myself. Though I fear I do not understand what actions you refer to, Sire. I try and conduct myself as honestly as possible.” ‘As possible’ being the key words. He had never lied to the man… Merely, provided a lack of information.

“Honesty. Yes, I agree. Yet you are not honesty about your entirety. You are keeping something from me. And as your King. If you do not wish to be demoted out of the Army, then I suggest, very wisely, that you provide all the information about yourself to me, right now.” Dean’s eyes narrowed, as he tried to piece together what Castiel’s secret could be. All he could imagine was that the Commander was an Omega, but that was surely untrue, his father would have noticed.

Cas’s brows furrowed as if confused as he straightened. “Of course, Your Grace. Whatever you wish.” He offered. “I was born Castiel Novak in a neighboring Kingdom, though I could not say which, to Charles Novak. My Mother died giving birth to myself and I do not know her name. I have too many siblings to name, most of which I couldn’t even if I tried fore I was very young when I was sold to a labor camp outside the walls of the city. After a few years among the slaves I presented and managed to escape by killing my direct caretaker and made a run for it. After a fortnight of scrounging for food I was collected by a small merchant train who cared for me until they reached your Father’s territory. I was left to care for myself with no money nor skills and thus began to gravitate towards the page boys who taught me to spar. Sir Metatron took notice of my willful nature and took me under his wing, educating me and guiding me towards knighthood. When the war broke out I served as a foot soldier beneath him, quickly rising in rank and glory on the battlefield. Until, of course, Metatron proved to be a traitor and fought against your father, may he rest in peace. Discovering this I led the rebellion against my mentor, ultimately slaying him and gaining great renown. Upon returning victorious in both the battle and the war I was given the title of Knight Commander and have served your father and your kingdom faithfully since.” He explained almost as if he had rehearsed the whole thing. He managed to keep an emotionless expression during the explanation aside from the small flash of pain that tainted his icy blues at the mention of his mentor’s death. “I hand pick each of the men in your service to ensure that history does not repeat itself and that the Kingdom’s integrity remains at its utmost strength. I wake early each morning to make my rounds, ensure my men are in peak physical and mental condition and assess any security issue that may pose itself. I eat my meals among my soldiers to boost moral and end my evening far past dusk after my final inspections. I find pride and satisfaction in my work which is why I have committed myself wholly to it. I have not, nor do I plan on marrying or having cubs for that reason. I am and will remain a faithful servant to the crown and while I hope this satisfies your curiosity, Sire, I respect your decision and have a list of men that I feel would excel as your new Knight Commander should you wish to replace me.” He offered with another bow.

// [Next]

#destiel #supernatural #Dean Winchester #Castiel Novak #Fantasy Kingdom AU #RP #Roleplay #m/m #ABO #A/b/o #a/b/o rp #Destiel prompts #destiel rp #dean/cas #dean/castiel #dean winchester/castiel #suspicious nature

[faintblueivy]

The Road Ahead of Us - Izuocha Fanfiction

I posted the link of this fic earlier for Izuochaweek. But thought I'd post the text post here as well. It was written for day 3 - Dungeons and Dragons! The link was already reblogged by @izuochaweek so I haven't tagged it again.

Hope you enjoy it!

Her hands are not as soft as they look.

He deduces, seeing her grip the staff, both the source and application of her power, with strength enough to turn her knuckles white. Her eyes glow with fierce, familiar determination, the one he has come to see a number of times in their journey together. Her clothes flutter and to any ordinary observer, the cause would look wind but from this close, Izuku is actually feeling the raw power emanating from her. Her lips are pressed into a thin line, brows furrowed and eyes narrowed in concentration.

He watches in awe as a mass of pink and white nothingness swirls around her, becoming thicker and thicker, slowly with each passing second. It steadily comes together, concentrating at a single point on the top of the magic staff, the white hot energy slowly shaping itself like an orb of power.

She takes a deep breath, her eyes zeroing on the large rock in front of them and yells out a loud “Release!”

The orb of white and pink speeds towards the stagnant rock, striking it with a loud boom and just like that, it shatters. Into pieces both small and large. But nothing similar to it's former massive form.

They blink, stunned at the immense display of power. She is panting, still gripping the staff tightly to her chest. But then turns to them, her eyes wide and expectant.

“I did it!” She screams, her face lighting up with a broad, wide smile that he's deeply come to adore.

Iida is the first one to return her enthusiasm with his own, loudly clapping and appreciating her efforts with a large smile. His blue eyes displaying the fondness and pride he holds for the girl in front of him.

“Yes,Uraraka! It was incredible!”

He tells her, the moonlight glinting off his glass but every word is truer than the last one.

Shouto stands there with a small smile and when she looks at him, he gives her a nod of acknowledgement. He is normally silent but his differently coloured eyes always express what he hides behind that impassive demeanor. And she understands that the gesture is nothing if not sincere.

She accepts it gratefully and then finally she turns to him, eager for his input regarding the feat she just performed and he steps forward, a large grin curling upon his lips in response to hers. There is a lot he wants to say, a lot he wants her to know but it doesn't matter at the moment. She's standing there, her excitement tightly coiled to hear his words and who is he to disappoint her.

“You were amazing.”

Suddenly she's smiling even more brightly than the stars above, a pink hue making her naturally pink cheeks appear even pinker. She is so beautiful beneath the night sky that the embers of the fire burning beside them look dull. As if they are shying away for her radiance and Izuku is completely aware of how his heart clenches at the sight of her unabashed smile.

…

It's late at night and the wind is chilling. He scoots closer to the fire in an effort to warm himself up. Well, today was his shift for the night watch. That's the reason he is sitting here, in cold, but he finds that he doesn't mind. His eyes are focused on any unnatural movements of the bushes surrounding them and his ears are trained on any similarly disturbing sound, his sword resting beside him.

Of all the things, he never expects something warm and soft to be draped over his shoulders. He almost squeaks when Ochako settles beside him, giving him a smile in greeting and extends her hands, palms completely out stretched to feel for the heat.

“It's cold here.”

“Yeah. It is.” He nods as he notices her without a blanket and then her hands return back to her side.

“Why are you out here though?” He asks, a little worried.

“Couldn't sleep.” Her voice is nonchalant but his eyes stray down to the way her hands fisted her skirt.

“Any specific reason?” he questions again, wanting her to bring out the issue that has been troubling her.

“Nope.” she denies but her eyes waver slightly and he knows she'll come out with it, now or later. It's fine for him though. As long as she can speak out her doubts.

They go silent once again, even though his mind is running the possibilities of her worries, her presence here eases him physically. His shoulders loose tension and his breathing goes calm. The way her eyes look up at sky, it seems to him that she is searching for something, an answer, a person? Or a destination perhaps? He's not sure.

He doesn't realise that in his quest to find the source that is making her anxious, he has been staring at her for a long while. He blinks when her hand waves in front of his face.

“Deku? Deku?”

“S-sorry! I was distracted.” He lets out an undignified yelp and she giggles, the sound of her laughter was soothing enough to stop his stammering.

“I can see that!”

He gives her a smile before they both settle down, leaning into the log resting behind them, reveling in the quietness of the surroundings and the warmth of each other.

As the cold increases Izuku could not help but notice the way how her body would shiver occasionally when a strong breeze would flow. And how pink and frosty her cheeks and nose looked.

“Come closer.”

He says even before he realises that he has. When she stares at him with wide, round eyes, the implications of his recklessly thrown words sink into him. And instantly, his freckled cheeks burn pink. 

“Y-you looked c-cold!”

He offered a loud explanation half expecting her to laugh at him but rather she turns her head to the other side, looking a little embarrassed and a soft “Ohh.” tumbles out of her mouth.

And without a word, she scoots closer to him, letting him envelope her in the blanket as well. The cozy warmth inside, immediately relaxes her. Though the sides of their bodies pressing against each other is an entirely different experience.

They neither dare to break the silence and nor do they look at each other. The forest floor and the dancing fires seemed more interesting to the two of them at the moment. But they don't make any effort to maintain distance. There is something between them - tentative but pleasant.

“Do you-” she starts, but bites her lip as if contemplating her words, after a second, decides to continue, “Do you think that we are doing the right thing? Is it the right path?”

As easy the answer was, he couldn't almost believe how hard it was to word it out and string them into comprehensible sentences. So he takes his time, carefully plucking words out from his vocabulary, wanting to express himself in the best possible way to quell her doubts.

“I don't know.”

Wow. What a way to start.  

“Look-I mean, Uraraka-”

Smooth, Izuku, smooth.

“Well, I want to say that we don't know, about what the future has got in store for us. We don't know if we're doing the right thing even but what I know is this - we'll do whatever it takes to save everyone. If a battle is to come between the forces of the light and the dark then we need to recruit as many as we can, to support our cause. To stop them from taking innocent lives. We have nothing to guide us, except for those ‘dreams’ I have. Heck, we don't even know if those 'dreams’ I keep having are anything to believe.”

But as his eyes turn to her, Ochako could see that blazing determination burning in all glory.

“But they are real, Uraraka. They are real. All Might is real. I know it's hard to believe but it's the truth. We need to go forward on this path. We need more comrades. We need to recruit capable warriors, mages anything, anyone who'd be willing to support us in this quest.”

Izuku's fiery passion makes a smile grace Ochako's lips. He's always been like this. So determined, so eager to help and save people.

“Even a dragon?”

“Um, yes, even a dragon.”

They suddenly burst out laughing, their voices crinkling together in a pleasant sound, warming everything around in the vicinity.

When the morning finally rolls into existence, Shouto comes out of the tent to a scene of both Izuku and Ochako curled up into each other, huddled up in blanket. Izuku's barely awake but the scene is so precious that Shouto simply decides not to disturb it.

…

“So, the dragon's lair is in that direction? Are you sure sir?”

“Yes.” The frail man's voice wavered under the pressure of old age but the conviction shining in his wise old eyes made Izuku nod and smile then thank him.

As he pointed the direction to his group, ready to hike the mountain as the old man spoke again.

“Are you sure you want to find the dragon, my boy?”

Even though the question was supposed to sound like a warning, there was something knowing swimming in the smile of the old guy.

“Yes.” Izuku answered, unflinching and daring.

“Then it's fine. The dragon is not evil as the people make him sound. He's just a little eager kid wanting to make some friends and do manly things.  So try not be afraid of him, okay? You'll hurt his feelings. Oh-by the way, I should let you know! He has a friend now! A very powerful but violent warrior with a foul mouth who's quite protective of him. I warn you, my boy, he's more trouble than the dragon actually.”

Izuku stood there, with his jaw hanging open to the ground, huge round eyes unblinking, too stunned to react.

“W-wh-what?!”

Before he let out that shriek, the man was already on his merry way, waving to them and whistling to the wind.

…

Ochako gulps. The cave in front of them was large, frighteningly large. Okay, large enough to at least contain ten dragons.

Her hands are clammy, and her heart is pounding in her ears. She bites her lower lip in anticipation and dread. Her feet are cold, despite the fact that she is wearing her boots. Suddenly a wheezing sound echoes throughout the cave and Ochako jumps up in air a few feet, wonders if she should use her staff and simply float away. She is shivering, the fear gripping her insides tightly leaves a bitter taste in mouth.

Her eyes dart to her side to see her comrades and Shouto looks a little unnerved at the sight of the massive cave and the previously heard loud sound because his eyes are wide, and his forehead is collecting beads of sweat and his hand is hovering just above the hilt of his sword. Though she cannot see Iida, she knows he is as shaken up as they are.

Okay, Ochako, calm down. Calm down. You just have to go inside this cave - the dragon's lair, and convince the dragon to join our team, easy right? Right? Right?

She almost squeaks when the sensation of a hand brushing against her startles her. Her gaze flicks towards Izuku, he is smiling at her, a wide smile, a smile that seems to say 'You don't have to worry, I'm here now.’ She is astounded at the kind of effect he has on her because she finds herself smiling back at him, her shoulders slowly loosing the tension and her breath turning even.

She knows, he is as scared as the rest of them are. But he is strong enough to hide that fear behind his smile, his emerald eyes shining with warmth that never fails to convince people that everything will be alright. It is a powerful sensation. A faith that all of them depend upon.

Her heart tingles at the final smile he gives her before turning her head back on the target in front of them. His eyes narrow and the fire burning in them is daring. His hand is gripping his legendary sword in a fierce grip, ready for action.

“Everyone” his bold words prompt them to look at him, “-let's do this, together!”

Both Iida and Shouto return the gesture with a smile of their own - courageous and hopeful. Looking forward towards the future they want to capture. The future that they all want to protect.

Ochako understands. As long as they are together, nothing is going to stop them. They can overcome all the obstacles on their path, be it a dragon to befriend or to fight a dark guild wanting to take over the country. They might not know the path they are moving on, they are not aware of the events and hell they might have to face in the future.

But it's fine, as long as they have their dreams to guide them and each other to live for.

Here, I'd love to know your thoughts about this if you've not read it before!

#izuocha #izuocha fanfiction #izuku x ochako #midoriya izuku #uraraka ochako #bnha #dekuvity #dekuraka #boku no hero academia

[biofunmy]

CBD or THC? Common Drug Test Can’t Tell the Difference

In June of 2018, Mark Pennington received troubling news from his ex-girlfriend, with whom he shared custody of their 2-year-old son. She had taken a hair follicle from the boy, she said, and had it analyzed at a lab. A drug test had returned positive for THC, the intoxicating compound in marijuana; evidently their son had been exposed to it, presumably in Mr. Pennington’s presence. He was told that, from then on, he would be permitted to see the child only once a week, and under supervision.

“I was mortified,” Mr. Pennington recalled recently. “My jaw hit the floor. I just knew from the bottom of my heart I hadn’t gotten any THC in my son’s system.”

However, Mr. Pennington had been providing his son with honey infused with cannabidiol, or CBD, a nonintoxicating compound that, like THC, is found in varying amounts in the plant known as cannabis. THC is federally illegal, and until recently so was all cannabis.

But last December, the Farm Bill legalized hemp — cannabis that contains less than 0.3 percent THC. With that, CBD became legal. It can now be found at stores across the country, in everything from tinctures and massage oils to coffee and makeup. Mr. Pennington, who lives in Colorado, where growing hemp for CBD has been legal since 2014, worked for Colorado Hemp Honey, a company that sells CBD-infused raw honey across the country.

Mr. Pennington was despondent about possibly losing custody of his child, until he spoke with Frank Conrad, the chief technology officer and lab director at Colorado Green Lab, a scientific consultant to the cannabis industry. Mr. Conrad directed him to a little-known study published in 2012 in the Journal of Analytical Toxicology that showed that a common forensic drug testing method could easily mistake the presence of CBD for THC. In short, the drug testing lab may have erred; it was entirely possible that the CBD Mr. Pennington had given his child had caused the drug test to produce a false positive for THC.

Two chemists with Cascade Chemistry, a private chemical-research company in Eugene, Oregon, independently reviewed the study for The Times and confirmed the validity of the potential drug testing problem.

With Mr. Conrad as an expert witness, Mr. Pennington won equal custody. Now, on behalf of his son, he plans to sue the lab that did the drug test, to raise awareness of the problematic testing method, which could have broad implications for average Americans as CBD becomes mainstream.

“I can’t even estimate how many people this is going to screw over,” said Mr. Conrad, who has worked on a handful of cases similar to Mr. Pennington’s. (He is not working with Mr. Pennington on the lawsuit against the lab.) In one case Mr. Conrad consulted on, a couple in Florida was charged with marijuana possession after a CBD-infused gummy bear tested positive for THC. Another client was arrested for violating his parole after testing positive for THC, when he claimed he had only used CBD.

In every court case in which Mr. Conrad has explained the problem with this specific drug testing method, prosecutors have dropped the charges. “Anyone who’s on probation getting a random urine test — if this happens to them and they’re taking CBD oil, they’re going back to jail,” Mr. Conrad said.

Bruce Houlihan, director of the Orange County, Calif., crime lab and chair of the emerging drugs and opioids committee for the American Society of Crime Lab Directors, expressed concern. “If any labs are using this method, they’ll have to be careful,” Mr. Houlihan said. He added that there was no way to estimate how many drug testing labs might be accidentally mistaking CBD for THC, because forensic labs generally determine their methodology in house.

It is also difficult to estimate how many people in a year have suffered negative consequences, such as the loss of a job or parental rights, after testing positive for THC, because most drug testing data is private. Even data that is public can be difficult to parse. For instance, in many locales, official statistics around “drugged driving” do not distinguish between drivers who test positive for THC and those who test positive for other drugs, such as cocaine or methamphetamine.

Nonetheless, a drug test that identifies CBD as THC could have serious consequences. Even in states that have legalized marijuana, it remains legal for employers, child protective services, public housing authorities and other entities to test for THC. And in a survey conducted earlier this year by the investment bank Cowen, 7 percent of adults in the U.S. — 17 million people — reported using CBD.

The drug testing method in question involves a common chemical analysis device called a gas-chromatography mass-spectrometry, or GC-MS, machine. Most such devices require the drug testing lab to add a chemical to a sample in order to identify trace amounts of illicit compounds, in a process called derivatization. Labs can perform derivatization using a variety of chemical agents, but one of the most common is called trifluoroacetic anhydride, or TFAA.

According to the 2012 journal article, TFAA when used by a GC-MS machine was unable to discern between CBD and THC. If a person who used only CBD were given a drug test that employed this device, method and chemical, the results would falsely report the presence of THC.

Many labs have upgraded from GC-MS analysis to a more precise technique called high-performance liquid chromatography, Mr. Houlihan said. But tests using GC-MS are still common, he said, and many of those may be using TFAA.

“Most labs using GC-MS toxicology, you have to derivatize,” Mr. Houlihan said. “TFAA is a common derivatizing agent.”

Barry Sample, the senior director of science and technology at Quest Diagnostics, the biggest purveyor of drug tests in the country, said he was familiar with the problem outlined in the 2012 paper, but said Quest Diagnostics did not use that methodology. “We use a different analytical procedure,” Dr. Sample said.

However, a woman who was fired from her job last year following a urine drug test from Quest Diagnostics has claimed that a CBD product caused her to test positive for THC. Because she is in ongoing legal proceedings with her former employer, she asked to be referred to only by her middle name, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth had been taking the CBD product for a few weeks when she went in for a scheduled drug test. The company that produced the product is based in Colorado and appeared to be legitimate, she said, so she was shocked when she failed the drug test. “They were reputable,” she said. “They had their lab results on their website.”

Elizabeth has been in touch with Mr. Conrad, but he is not serving as a witness in her case.

CBD products sold outside of state-licensed marijuana dispensaries are not yet regulated. As a result, many products that claim to contain CBD in fact do not, or they may contain more than the legal limit of THC, according to testing done by the Food and Drug Administration. This could cause some CBD users to test positive for THC, and adds to the confusion surrounding THC testing generally. Dr. Sample said that this was most likely the problem with the CBD product Elizabeth had been using, and likely why her Quest drug test showed that she had used THC. But Elizabeth insisted that the CBD product she purchased did not get her high and did not have any THC.

“I didn’t break any rules, so I should not be losing my job,” she said, adding that she has struggled since her termination. “I’m nowhere near making the amount of money I was before, and I’m not really working in my field, either.”

False positives in drug tests are just one of many issues that have arisen as law enforcement authorities attempt to catch up with the rapidly shifting laws around the cannabis industry.

“Prior to opening up this whole industry, there was really no research done on these compounds, because it was illegal to do the research,” said Rodger Voelker, an analytical chemist in Oregon who helped develop the state’s regulations for the types and amounts of pesticides that can be applied to cannabis crops, as well as how to test for their presence in consumer marijuana products. “These compounds have been around for a long time, but people did not know much about the chemistries. Regulatory agencies are the slowest to move. It’s always reactionary.”

For instance, there is no accurate test or threshold to measure intoxication from cannabis; the best available tests can only show whether an individual has used marijuana within the last few days. This makes it nearly impossible to determine whether a person is driving while under the influence of THC.

“As the laws change and as policies change, we’re having to adapt our testing to keep up,” said Matthew Gamette, former president of the American Society of Crime Lab Directors and director of forensic services for the Idaho State Police. “That takes resources.”

Mr. Gamette has experienced the challenge firsthand. In early January, an Idaho state trooper seized nearly 7,000 pounds of cannabis from a truck, assuming it was marijuana. But the source of the cannabis, a company based in Colorado, insisted the plants were legal hemp, rich in CBD but not in THC.

The company sued the Idaho State Police, and the state spent almost a quarter-million dollars on new instrumentation to figure out how much THC the plants actually contained. The shipment remains in quarantine as the case moves through the courts.

“Even the states where it is legal for recreational use, like Colorado, are really struggling with this, because they’re trying to develop the methods, they’re trying to get up to speed on what they need to be able to do to comply with their laws,” Mr. Gamette said.

Back in Colorado, Mr. Pennington is also eager for law enforcement to better understand the science behind cannabis laws. Although he is grateful to have won his custody case, he is determined to use his son’s lawsuit against the drug testing lab to make sure no one else experiences what he did.

“This matters to people in the military,” Mr. Pennington said. “This matters to people who might lose their jobs. This matters to people who might lose their kids. This matters to people who might have to go back to jail. That’s the point of the lawsuit, stopping this form of testing. It’s unethical, with hemp in the marketplace.”

Sahred From Source link Science

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[savvyherb]

CBD or THC? Common Drug Test Can’t Tell the Difference

In June of 2018, Mark Pennington received troubling news from his ex-girlfriend, with whom he shared custody of their 2-year-old son. She had taken a hair follicle from the boy, she said, and had it analyzed at a lab. A drug test had returned positive for THC, the intoxicating compound in marijuana; evidently their son had been exposed to it, presumably in Mr. Pennington’s presence. He was told that, from then on, he would be permitted to see the child only once a week, and under supervision.

“I was mortified,” Mr. Pennington recalled recently. “My jaw hit the floor. I just knew from the bottom of my heart I hadn’t gotten any THC in my son’s system.”

However, Mr. Pennington had been providing his son with honey infused with cannabidiol, or CBD, a nonintoxicating compound that, like THC, is found in varying amounts in the plant known as cannabis. THC is federally illegal, and until recently so was all cannabis.

But last December, the Farm Bill legalized hemp — cannabis that contains less than 0.3 percent THC. With that, CBD became legal. It can now be found at stores across the country, in everything from tinctures and massage oils to coffee and makeup. Mr. Pennington, who lives in Colorado, where growing hemp for CBD has been legal since 2014, worked for Colorado Hemp Honey, a company that sells CBD-infused raw honey across the country.

Mr. Pennington was despondent about possibly losing custody of his child, until he spoke with Frank Conrad, the chief technology officer and lab director at Colorado Green Lab, a scientific consultant to the cannabis industry. Mr. Conrad directed him to a little-known study published in 2012 in the Journal of Analytical Toxicology that showed that a common forensic drug testing method could easily mistake the presence of CBD for THC. In short, the drug testing lab may have erred; it was entirely possible that the CBD Mr. Pennington had given his child had caused the drug test to produce a false positive for THC.

Two chemists with Cascade Chemistry in Eugene, Oregon, independently reviewed the study for The Times and confirmed the validity of the potential drug testing problem.

With Mr. Conrad as an expert witness, Mr. Pennington won equal custody. Now, on behalf of his son, he plans to sue the lab that did the drug test, to raise awareness of the problematic testing method, which could have broad implications for average Americans as CBD becomes mainstream.

“I can’t even estimate how many people this is going to screw over,” said Mr. Conrad, who has worked on a handful of cases similar to Mr. Pennington’s. (He is not working with Mr. Pennington on the lawsuit against the lab.) In one case Mr. Conrad consulted on, a couple in Florida was charged with marijuana possession after a CBD-infused gummy bear tested positive for THC. Another client was arrested for violating his parole after testing positive for THC, when he claimed he had only used CBD.

In every court case in which Mr. Conrad has explained the problem with this specific drug testing method, prosecutors have dropped the charges. “Anyone who’s on probation getting a random urine test — if this happens to them and they’re taking CBD oil, they’re going back to jail,” Mr. Conrad said.

Bruce Houlihan, director of the Orange County, Calif., crime lab and chair of the emerging drugs and opioids committee for the American Society of Crime Lab Directors, expressed concern. “If any labs are using this method, they’ll have to be careful,” Mr. Houlihan said. He added that there was no way to estimate how many drug testing labs might be accidentally mistaking CBD for THC, because forensic labs generally determine their methodology in house.

It is also difficult to estimate how many people in a year have suffered negative consequences, such as the loss of a job or parental rights, after testing positive for THC, because most drug testing data is private. Even data that is public can be difficult to parse. For instance, in many locales, official statistics around “drugged driving” do not distinguish between drivers who test positive for THC and those who test positive for other drugs, such as cocaine or methamphetamine.

Image

CBD products for sale in Wheat Ridge, Colo. CBD became legal with the passage of the Farm Bill in December.CreditMatthew Staver for The New York Times

Image

A demonstration of a Duquenois-Levine field color test for marijuana that resulted in a false positive for CBD.CreditMatthew Staver for The New York Times

Nonetheless, a drug test that identifies CBD as THC could have serious consequences. Even in states that have legalized marijuana, it remains legal for employers, child protective services, public housing authorities and other entities to test for THC. And in a survey conducted earlier this year by the investment bank Cowen, 7 percent of adults in the U.S. — 17 million people — reported using CBD.

The drug testing method in question involves a common chemical analysis device called a gas-chromatography mass-spectrometry, or GC-MS, machine. Most such devices require the drug testing lab to add a chemical to a sample in order to identify trace amounts of illicit compounds, in a process called derivatization. Labs can perform derivatization using a variety of chemical agents, but one of the most common is called trifluoroacetic anhydride, or TFAA.

According to the 2012 journal article, TFAA when used by a GC-MS machine was unable to discern between CBD and THC. If a person who used only CBD were given a drug test that employed this device, method and chemical, the results would falsely report the presence of THC.

Many labs have upgraded from GC-MS analysis to a more precise technique called high-performance liquid chromatography, Mr. Houlihan said. But tests using GC-MS are still common, he said, and many of those may be using TFAA.

“Most labs using GC-MS toxicology, you have to derivatize,” Mr. Houlihan said. “TFAA is a common derivatizing agent.”

Barry Sample, the senior director of science and technology at Quest Diagnostics, the biggest purveyor of drug tests in the country, said he was familiar with the problem outlined in the 2012 paper, but said Quest Diagnostics did not use that methodology. “We use a different analytical procedure,” Dr. Sample said.

However, a woman who was fired from her job last year following a urine drug test from Quest Diagnostics has claimed that a CBD product caused her to test positive for THC. Because she is in ongoing legal proceedings with her former employer, she asked to be referred to only by her middle name, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth had been taking the CBD product for a few weeks when she went in for a scheduled drug test. The company that produced the product is based in Colorado and appeared to be legitimate, she said, so she was shocked when she failed the drug test. “They were reputable,” she said. “They had their lab results on their website.”

Elizabeth has been in touch with Mr. Conrad, but he is not serving as a witness in her case.

CBD products sold outside of state-licensed marijuana dispensaries are not yet regulated. As a result, many products that claim to contain CBD in fact do not, or they may contain more than the legal limit of THC, according to testing done by the Food and Drug Administration. This could cause some CBD users to test positive for THC, and adds to the confusion surrounding THC testing generally. Dr. Sample said that this was most likely the problem with the CBD product Elizabeth had been using, and likely why her Quest drug test showed that she had used THC. But Elizabeth insisted that the CBD product she purchased did not get her high and did not have any THC.

“I didn’t break any rules, so I should not be losing my job,” she said, adding that she has struggled since her termination. “I’m nowhere near making the amount of money I was before, and I’m not really working in my field, either.”

False positives in drug tests are just one of many issues that have arisen as law enforcement authorities attempt to catch up with the rapidly shifting laws around the cannabis industry.

“Prior to opening up this whole industry, there was really no research done on these compounds, because it was illegal to do the research,” said Rodger Voelker, an analytical chemist in Oregon who helped develop the state’s regulations for the types and amounts of pesticides that can be applied to cannabis crops, as well as how to test for their presence in consumer marijuana products. “These compounds have been around for a long time, but people did not know much about the chemistries. Regulatory agencies are the slowest to move. It’s always reactionary.”

For instance, there is no accurate test or threshold to measure intoxication from cannabis; the best available tests can only show whether an individual has used marijuana within the last few days. This makes it nearly impossible to determine whether a person is driving while under the influence of THC.

“As the laws change and as policies change, we’re having to adapt our testing to keep up,” said Matthew Gamette, former president of the American Society of Crime Lab Directors and director of forensic services for the Idaho State Police. “That takes resources.”

Mr. Gamette has experienced the challenge firsthand. In early January, an Idaho state trooper seized nearly 7,000 pounds of cannabis from a truck, assuming it was marijuana. But the source of the cannabis, a company based in Colorado, insisted the plants were legal hemp, rich in CBD but not in THC.

The company sued the Idaho State Police, and the state spent almost a quarter-million dollars on new instrumentation to figure out how much THC the plants actually contained. The shipment remains in quarantine as the case moves through the courts.

“Even the states where it is legal for recreational use, like Colorado, are really struggling with this, because they’re trying to develop the methods, they’re trying to get up to speed on what they need to be able to do to comply with their laws,” Mr. Gamette said.

Back in Colorado, Mr. Pennington is also eager for law enforcement to better understand the science behind cannabis laws. Although he is grateful to have won his custody case, he is determined to use his son’s lawsuit against the drug testing lab to make sure no one else experiences what he did.

“This matters to people in the military,” Mr. Pennington said. “This matters to people who might lose their jobs. This matters to people who might lose their kids. This matters to people who might have to go back to jail. That’s the point of the lawsuit, stopping this form of testing. It’s unethical, with hemp in the marketplace.”

The post CBD or THC? Common Drug Test Can’t Tell the Difference appeared first on Savvy Herb Mobile Cannabis Platform.

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[celticnoise]

Last year, in an articles on this site, I argued that one of the problems with Sevco fans is that they genuinely don’t know who their friends are. I argued that Doncaster and Regan are amongst them; these are men who will literally do anything to hold the Sevco franchise together.

If it’s in their power then they’ll move mountains for the club.

They did in 2012, of course.

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I’ve written extensively on those days, about stuff that’s in the public domain but also stuff that isn’t.

I’ve researched this matter thoroughly and I know some things for sure and I can make a pretty good guess at some others.

It is my firm belief, based on what I know and have seen, that both Regan and Doncaster are at least partially guilty of assisting in the collapse of Rangers.

Doncaster then used that disaster as leverage in trying to get Sevco into the top flight, via the television deal he had negotiated behind the backs of the clubs.

The whole thing reeks and it always has.

Regan’s role has always been more opaque, but he was aware of what was going on at Ibrox at an early stage and because he and Whyte were already in communication over what became Resolution 12 it makes sense that he would have gone along with even the most hair-brained scheme over there.

A lot of people know this stuff.

There’s not much incentive for them to talk, but the information has got out anyway, in strategic leaks online.

I’d say a couple of thousand people at most are wholly familiar with that information and the ground it covers; that’s a lot within a small community – and the Internet Bampots are a small community – but that doesn’t matter if the media won’t touch the subject with a barge pole and so you can’t get it out there to the wider public.

I do believe full public disclosure of that information would wreck careers; these men couldn’t survive the rest of the country knowing, for example, that they knew Whyte intended to keep running up debts and then dump the lot overboard. Of how the face painter and the taxi company and the newsagents who were ripped off and will get pennies in the pound could have been saved from the hassle had the SFA and SPL leadership hit the brakes when Whyte told them what was going on inside Ibrox.

Instead they helped him do it.

I don’t just believe that; I know that for a fact.

And one of the people in the know about the full extent of it is Dave King.

He probably knows more than any of the Bampots do, and not only because he was on Whyte’s board.

Today the whole country has become aware that his knowledge goes deeper than that of the majority of the public.

Because Dave King  bought the Charlotte Fakeovers documents, for £50,000.

Those documents belonged to Craig Whyte.

Charlotte Fakeovers is the name given to the man who hacked Whyte’s laptop and stole them.

According to Donald Findlay, those materials were to be used for the purposes of blackmail.

Now they are in the hands of a man a South African judge called a “glib and shameless liar”, a man he urged us to disbelieve on every matter great or small unless it was supported by evidence. We know he has no respect of normative behaviours. We know he does not play by the rules. We know he is a man of appalling personal character.

We know he’s capable of anything.

Findlay does not make it clear where, when or why these details were obtained, but it was not for the good of the club.

Because Whyte still had this stuff.

King wanted it too. Why? Why would he? What did he intend to do with that information?

We know one of the things he used it for.

He leaked some of it to friendly journalists in his quest to take over Sevco.

He used it to firmly establish the links between Charles Green and Craig Whyte. so that he might destabilise the regime Green left behind him at Ibrox.

King made sure sections of that information did make it into the media and that helped collapse confidence in the previous Ibrox board and torpedoed the share price, which made it easier and cheaper for him and his colleagues to get a controlling interest.

But that’s not all the Charlotte Fakeovers documents contained.

Craig Whyte recorded conversations.

He kept extensive notes on meetings.

He saved every email.

The paper trails on that laptop could wreck many a career.

Amongst that stuff are the details of every email exchanged between him and the people who run football in Scotland.

There is at least one tape recording of a meeting between himself and SFA officials, and there are probably many more.

See, Whyte’s been doing this for a long time.

He knew this all might unravel, and would perhaps even end up in a trial.

He secured himself against that possibility by recording everything and everyone.

Dave King bought it all.

He knows who did what, where and when.

He knows who was involved and who wasn’t, and how deeply.

He turned at least some of that information over to the prosecutors going after Whyte but I suspect he kept hold of the bits that helped him more than them.

I suspect, strongly suspect, that he’s got enough to sink Doncaster and Regan and perhaps even guarantee that at least one of them, maybe both, faced some hard questions of their own in a courtroom.

Blackmail is a big word.

It’s a controversial word.

It is a legally dicey word, which is why I am not alleging that it’s a technique being used in Scottish football today.

But Findlay himself, in a courtroom, used it to describe what that information was to be used for … and although he didn’t say so, he’s entirely aware that Whyte himself intended no less. We have no reason whatsoever to believe that King didn’t plan the same. Indeed, what he did use it for could constitute tortious interference and share price manipulation at the very least.

There’s more though. History has taught us that at Ibrox there is always more.

Last month, this website reported that King came over for the Whyte trial and whilst he was here he and Regan met, in private, for an “off-the-record” chat which Regan said was about “general issues”.  Nothing to see, people, go on your way.

Except that it had come in the same week when the SFA waived the club through their European license process although the club didn’t qualify.

Hey, we’ll never know what transpired at that meeting but we’re in a place where it doesn’t even require much imagination to conjure up the worst scenarios.

King bought the ability to do it, and he was only able to because these men left themselves wide open to it with their conduct.

Even if what Regan and Doncaster did was legal – and I do wonder about that; it’s a question for people much smarter than me – the immorality of allowing a guy like Whyte to deliberately crash a football club, on their watch, stiffing creditors, wrecking it all, is astounding and these people could not survive that.

They allowed Whyte to keep on running the club when they knew full well the direction he was moving it.

It was only after details of his previous business dealings were exposed by Mark Daly and the BBC that they acted and then because they had no choice.

For those who wondered what the real function of the Pinsent Mason report was – the one into allegations that Whyte and Green had been working together, and which they let Sevco organise, effectively an investigation into itself – this is the answer.

The SFA knew an independent inquiry might turn up more than just a link between those two; it might establish what their own involvement was in the collapse of Rangers.

I cannot put it more bluntly than this;

From October 2011 at the latest, both Neil Doncaster and Stewart Regan knew that Rangers was going into administration and that the ultimate objective was some kind of phoenix company which would seek to dump the debts and emerge clean. Not only did they support this action but they were talking to Craig Whyte from that point onwards about how it could best be done, presented and sold to the football public.

Every single organisation with which Rangers were doing business from that moment on was being defrauded and the SFA and the SPL were knowing, willing, participants in that fraud. They said nothing to stop it. They did nothing to stop it.

Did they alert other clubs? Well we know that sometime early in November Doncaster got the SPL board together and informed them of a “developing situation” in Scottish football which he used on 21 November to push through the Sky deal, and collapsing the idea of FansTV.

The clubs were aware of something going on, but I’m not convinced that they were aware of how deep the hole was and I know for sure they weren’t aware of what was called Project Charlotte, the blueprint (which both Regan and Doncaster had seen and signed off on) by which Rangers would be collapsed, a new company born and its SFA membership and SPL place handed over to a NewCo wiped clean and able to compete as if nothing had happened.

See everyone knows Regan and Doncaster tried to sell that plan at the end; what few outside the Bampots are aware of, and what hasn’t sunk in yet to many others, is that they were involved in planning that for month before the fact … and they allowed Whyte to keep on going anyway.

The implications of that are enormous.

What I’ve just done here is show you the broad strokes of what they were involved with; King knows the fine details.

This is a blog which thousands of people read but the media would bring that story to the whole country, and both Regan and Doncaster would be gone.

Yesterday Craig Whyte was cleared of fraud in connection to the takeover of the club.

One of the reasons why he was never charged in connection with anything that happened after that point is a mystery.

If those charges ever follow – BDO are still trying to unravel all this, and they might well want those charges brought – the chances are that he will not be alone in the dock.

Don’t believe for a second that Sevco supports the removal of Stewart Regan.

They could have that simply by releasing this information.

In the last 12 months they have made a lot of noise in public and put pressure on him through the press – the media reports of their unhappiness were a not-so-coded threat – but the real squeezing was, and will continue to be, be done in private.

Unlike the fans, King and his board know who their “friends” are.

And as long as King holds their careers in his hands Regan and Doncaster are dangerously compromised. They cannot be trusted to act in the best interests of the game, when he and others can make them dance to a particular tune. The imperative for removing both of them is obvious.

When I published this article in November of last year there were a few disbelieving gasps, and then silence fell again.

I don’t expect that to change now, although we’re six months down the line and the truth of this is all the more evident.

Yesterday Alastair Johnston returned to Ibrox and a seat on Sevco’s board. The club is spending money at a rapid rate; King has publicly said that it’s the season ticket cash, the only major source of income they have. No-one in the SFA or the media has asked what he intends to do when the coffers are empty, but I have been writing about this unscrupulous barsteward long enough to know that he’s capable of any mendacity or underhanded act and that he views the people running our game as gutless worms.

Which they are. I agree with him on that, and because I do I can easily imagine what I’d do if I was in his shoes.

He will squeeze these guys like tubes of toothpaste if his club finds itself in serious peril … and we cannot count on them doing the right thing.

But who wants to do something about this?

As I said in my piece earlier today, calling on the SFA to do the right thing is laudable. It’s also toothless.

Scottish football is corrupt to the core.

This article is a reworked piece from November last year, but it is updated with new information in the public domain … in light of today’s official admission on STV News that particulars of this are true it’s become relevant again.

Please share this as widely as possible.

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New Post has been published on myweightlossfun.com

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7 Common Mistakes That Cause Weight Regain

Anybody that has tried to lose weight will know just how difficult the journey can be. Many people who do embark on a weight loss quest actually see some results. However, the weight usually comes back and when that happens, it can be highly discouraging and they quit.

Even people who have successfully lost a lot of weight and transformed their bodies have gone back to being their old, overweight selves. So why does this happen? Why do almost 90% of people who have lost weight see a weight regain after a year or so?

There are a few reasons for this.

While losing weight is difficult, keeping it off is much easier but only if you do not make the common mistakes that many people make. You should be aware that the more often you let your weight swing back and forth, the more inefficient your metabolism becomes and it gets much harder to lose the fat. So, lose the fat once and keep it off.

Mistakes People Make That Cause Weight Regain

1 – Going back on a caloric surplus

This is the most common mistake of the lot. Once you reach your ideal weight, you will need to consume your calories at maintenance level. There is no need to be at a caloric deficit anymore but you should not be at a surplus either.

You can find out the number of calories you should aim for at this link: http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

Always remember that the moment you consume more calories than you expend, the excess energy will be stored as fat. Losing weight doesn’t give you the license to eat whatever you want. You have to be ever vigilant over your diet and roughly know your caloric intake.

2 – You chose the wrong diet

There are many diets such as the Atkins Diet, Lemonade Diet and other fad diets that are effective but highly unsustainable. You can go on very low carbs for a certain period. Will you lose weight? Definitely. But what happens when you come off the diet and go back to normal eating?

The weight returns with a vengeance. The diet is only good for that short duration. It will not work in the long run… which leads us to the next mistake.

3 – Not inculcating the right habits

You absolutely must make it a habit of eating clean and exercise regularly. Only when your lifestyle involves healthy eating and activity can you hope to keep the weight off with ease. Many people struggle to meet their weight loss goals and once they achieve their desired body, they stop doing what got them there in the first place.

They stop eating right and exercise is the last thing on their mind. Once that happens, you can bet the weight will return. Diets do not last. Healthy eating does. Intense workout programs for 90 days do not last. An active lifestyle with regular exercise does.

4 – Swinging between extremes

It is very common to see people aim for perfection. The moment they slip up and give in to a temptation, they beat themselves up and toss the entire diet. It shouldn’t be this way. If you have been successfully watching what you eat and suddenly give in to a craving and eat 3 donuts, don’t sweat it. It happens.

Don’t automatically assume the entire diet is a failure and you don’t have what it takes. There will always be setbacks. These are just setups for comebacks. Acknowledge your mistake and stay on track while trying to be more focused and disciplined. Success is not linear. If you give up because of one small mistake, all the weight that you have lost up till that point will return. That will be time and effort wasted.

5 – Expecting overnight results

Weight loss takes time. You must accept this fact. Do not fret that the results are taking too long to come. If you have not reached your desired body weight in a month but you have lost some weight, you have been successful.

You just need to keep going. Depending on how much excess weight you carry, there will be a certain duration that you will need to go through. You can’t lose 25 pounds in a month. If all you can lose is 5 pounds a month, then it’s fine to wait 5 months.

There is no rush. If you quit because you do not see results fast enough, you will negate all your efforts and will see a weight relapse.

6 – Using food as a reward or stress relief

There is a saying in the fitness industry that goes, “Do not reward yourself with food. You’re not a dog.” It’s common for people to eat when they’re happy and eat even more when they are sad.

Don’t use food as a stress management tool. If you’re feeling down, do something fun or speak to a counselor. Binging on junk food will neither make you feel better nor solve the problem. Any happiness you feel will be very short term before disgust and depression sets in. It’s a vicious cycle will many negative health implications.

7 – Never being satisfied

There are always people who are never satisfied with their results. They can never be happy with their achievements. There is no time to smell the roses because they’re wondering why the roses aren’t big enough. As long as you are losing weight, you must be satisfied with your efforts and keep going.

Look at before and after photos of yourself. See how far you’ve come. Be happy in your own skin. You have achieved your goals. Do not obsess over fitness models in magazines or celebrities on the big screen. If you’re constantly looking at what you’re lacking, you will get demotivated and give up. Once that happens, it’s time to roll out the red mat. Your weight is going to make a grand return.

Take note of these 7 mistakes and avoid them. Once you have reached your desired weight, you’re over the hump. All you need to do is just be a little careful and not go back to your old, unhealthy ways. Eat right, keep active and be happy. That’s all you need to do.

Why ‘Biggest Loser’ Winners Often Regain Weight

#Best Diet Plans To Lose Weight #nutrition #weight loss #weight loss tips #weight regain

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Phil Ochs: I Ain't Marching Anymore

Though the cover shot of I Ain’t Marching Anymore is a graveyard of grim political rhetoric—Phil Ochs slumped against a wall of torn Barry Goldwater and Kenneth Keating posters, their slogans shredded and inscrutable—the back cover essays comprise a beatnik rhapsody for the ages. Written by Ochs and the critic Bruce Jackson, they deliver the sort of earnest, overly verbose salvo only a Greenwich Village protest-folk record could deliver: a dense scrum of cheers to the Movement, jeers at the invertebrates in Congress, and navel-gazings on the quest for truth in art, with a track listing and credits seemingly wedged in as afterthought.

Midway through all the eager pulpit-pounding, though, the 24-year-old Ochs takes a turn both petulant and self-effacing, listing the most frequent complains that have been lobbed at him in his short career:

There’s nothing as dull as yesterday’s headlines.

Don’t be so ambitious.

Sure it’s good, but who’s gonna care next year?

I bet you don’t go to church.

Don’t be so negative.

I came to be entertained, not preached to.

That’s nice but it doesn’t really go far enough.

That’s not folk music.

Why don’t you move to Russia?

Which is what you got in 1965 for leaping up onto a bench in Washington Square Park and warbling your dismay at the morning’s New York Times: you were branded an ally of the communist kleptocracy, back when that sort of charge might actually end your career. (Simpler times.) But Ochs didn’t argue these accusations; he reveled in them as proof of concept, his confirmation that he was hitting the establishment where it hurt. He labeled himself a “singing journalist,” not a folk singer like the rest of his Bleecker Street fraternity (Bob Dylan, Dave Van Ronk, Tom Paxton), and stuffed his lyrics with the up-to-the-minute topicality and op-ed lambasting of a newsman—championing a coal miners’ strike in Kentucky one verse, decrying Marines landing at Santo Domingo the next. He called the front pages like a guerrilla newsie, merging the sardonic wit of Woody Guthrie, the chatty candor of Pete Seeger, and the lone-gunslinger bravado of Hank Williams.

And in the troubled arc of Ochs’ career—in which he began as the voice of the antiwar movement and heir apparent to Dylan, then cooled into his also-ran, then sank a bitter and penniless outcast—these cries of unpatriotism were a rare constant. He died not even knowing their extent; decades after he committed suicide in 1976, at age 35, the Freedom of Information Act unearthed a FBI monitoring dossier on him, thick as a novel.

But only a true American idealist could have written I Ain’t Marching Anymore. Ochs’ second album is a work of long-steeped fury at his country’s sins, naked in its scorn for a system showing its many fissures; still, it guards a flickering, tenacious hope that the nation can reach its potential to embrace, to empathize. It is a work of nationalistic heartbreak, the deploring of a terrible fate: the requiem of a romantic with nowhere to love. It is zealously leftist, so unequivocal as to smack of propaganda over poetry, almost wholly dependent on Ochs’ inculcating wordplay: with his twangy, octave-at-best vocal range, stevedore coffee shop strumming, and modest melodies, this album grabs your throat entirely on lyrical ferocity.

But to Ochs, there was no time for subtlety. The Lyndon B. Johnson administration was escalating involvement in Vietnam, ignoring countrywide demonstrations of dissent and returning body bags by the thousands; the racial friction of the South was exploding in bombings and riots; young Americans were still rudderless from the assassination of President Kennedy, mourning that era of profound hope and their purpose within it. Ochs absorbed it all and was a true believer in tuneful social reform; as he quipped in the program notes of the 1964 Newport Folk Festival, “I wouldn’t be surprised to see an album called Elvis Presley Sings Songs of the Spanish Civil War or The Beatles with the Best of the Chinese Border Dispute Songs.” But until the day that happened, Ochs was here for us, offering 14 brisk tracks of fingerpicked guitar and unvarnished tenor, distilling the world’s chaos into a frightening thesis: An era of optimism and social promise was not only ending, but taking alarming leaps backward. But, he stressed, there was still time to reverse course.

He sets his agenda firmly in the title track—an opener that rouses and incites despite a pallor of exhaustion, regret, and fear. Over a simple acoustic strum with a subtly agitated back-trill, Ochs travels the bloody scope of American warfare, gazing wearily through the eyes of a soldier whose obedience has cost him his humanity. He begins at the War of 1812, where “the young land started growing/The young blood started flowing”; then he grips a glinting bayonet in the Civil War, pilots a plane through Japanese skies that sets off “the mighty mushroom roar.” When Ochs’ warrior reaches the “Cuban shore,” and sees the missiles looming overhead, he grinds down his heels at last. “It's always the old to lead us to the wars/Always the young to fall,” he laments. “Now look at all we've won/With a saber and a gun/Tell me is it worth it all?” In a few breaths, Ochs not only decries the cyclical carnage of war, he explores the individual in bloodshed with clear-eyed empathy and lays a wrenching argument for ethical subversion. “Call it peace, or call it treason/Call it love, or call it reason,” he quavers, “But I ain't marching anymore.” Here, his oft-nasal voice betrays a slight Scottish lilt, the result of his Queens-based family’s brief stint in Edinburgh when he was a child—a warm, global topnote to his treaty. Upon its release, “I Ain’t Marching Anymore” became a ubiquitous anthem of the antiwar movement, and Ochs’ signature tune; when he performed it outside the Democratic National Convention in 1968, hundreds of young men burned their draft cards.

Ochs may have dropped out of journalism school (at Ohio State, where his fervent political columns got him demoted from the school paper), but he retained a penchant for interviewing strangers whenever he performed, from uptown street corners to dirt roads in the deep South. Early into Side A, on “In the Heat of the Summer,” Ochs recalls scenes from the Harlem riot of 1964, his reporter’s eye for detail gleaming in the “loudspeaker drowned like a whisperin' sound” and “uniforms shoving with their sticks/Asking, ‘Are you looking for trouble?’” While touring the summer folk festival circuit, he passed through Mississippi shortly after the abductions and murders of three civil rights workers—James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner—as they registered African Americans to vote. Ochs marched up to their neighbors, pen and paper in hand; their unease and obstinance informs “Here’s to the State of Mississippi,” a scorched-earth screed that implicates rural communities for resisting social progress and denounces the lack of education and options that perpetuate the spiral of intolerance.

“Talking Birmingham Jam” is a brutal lament of the violence in Birmingham, Alabama in 1963, when black residents demonstrated in opposition of the city’s Jim Crow racial segregation laws. In response, President Kennedy sent the National Guard to enforce integration in its schools, catalyzing the Civil Rights Act—and the city’s public safety commissioner, Eugene “Bull” Connor, replied with attack dogs, high-pressure water hoses, and club-wielding cops. “Well, all the signs said ‘Welcome In’/Signed by Governor Wallace and Rin Tin Tin/They said come along and watch the fights/While we feed our dogs on civil rights,” Ochs seethes in a conversational sing-song lifted from Guthrie, excoriating Connor and George Wallace. “You see Alabama is a sovereign state/With sovereign dogs and sovereign hate.” His words echo powerful ones Martin Luther King, Jr. penned the year before, though it’s not known how deliberately. “The silent password was fear. It was a fear not only on the part of the black oppressed, but also in the hearts of the white oppressors,” Dr. King wrote of 1963 Birmingham. “There was also the dread of change, that all too prevalent fear which hounds those whose attitudes have been hardened by the long winter of reaction.”

While I Ain’t Marching Anymore arrived at a fractious moment in American history, it also landed at a strong pivot for Ochs’ beloved Greenwich Village protest-folk microcosm: it was the beginning of the end for this bohemian idyll. Ochs had moved to New York three years earlier, where the same liberal ire that made him an outcast in Ohio ingratiated him instantly with the other young troubadours at the Bitter End and the Gaslight. He played peace rallies at Carnegie Hall with Dylan and palling around with Van Ronk and Paxton afterward at dimly lit poker tables, sprawling in shoddy apartments to tease out new songs. He crashed on the couch of Jim Glover, his college roommate, with whom he’d once formed a band called the Singing Socialists; Glover was now half of the sweetheart folk duo Jim and Jean. (If they sound familiar, their name and saccharine charisma—plus Ochs’ frequent irascibility toward them—were imported wholesale into Inside Llewyn Davis.)

Dylan and Ochs were the heaviest hitters in the New York scene, and their reputations preceded them; in this time, they were described by Melody Maker in England as the “king of protest” and “the president,” respectively. They shared a mostly cordial rivalry, one with the hierarchy firmly apparent. As the Ochs biography Death of a Rebel details, Ochs revered Dylan openly, but Dylan was mercurial in return; he once raved of Ochs, “I just can't keep up with Phil. And he's getting better and better and better,” but was also quick to call him a “turncoat” and “opportunist” for wanting fame as nakedly as he did. (Once, Dylan allegedly kicked Ochs out of a limousine, hurling the “you’re just a singing journalist” epithet back in his face as the final indignity.) But for several years, both musicians coexisted in the same topical nexus. They both flourished at the landmark 1963 Newport Folk Festival; Pete Seeger, upon hearing them perform at a counterculture newspaper office, predicted vast fame for both. In one of many overlapping lyrical examples, they both bemoaned the death of civil rights activist Medgar Evers in 1964: Dylan on “Only A Pawn in Their Game” (from The Times They Are a-Changin’), Ochs on “Too Many Martyrs” (from his debut, All the News That’s Fit to Sing). And both were well-known volatiles; Dylan was the imperious prodigy simultaneously enjoying and bemoaning society’s quick deification of him. Ochs, one year older, envied his recognition openly and had a likewise-sticky reputation as a hothead alcoholic, a handsome narcissist who’d beaten girlfriends and alienated friends.  

By 1965, Greenwich Village folk had begun splintering into their separate schools of folk ideology: Ochs believed folk songwriting should affect reactionary change in politics via blunt broadcasting of information and resistance, while Dylan teased out philosophical truths through personal ruminations, and daubing that canvas with larger social metaphor. That year, as Ochs continued to file his topical acoustic briefs sourced from Newsweek and The Village Voice, Dylan fully sniffed at it, “going electric�� at the Newport Folk Festival and releasing Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited. (Consider the former’s oblique Side A protest, “Maggie’s Farm,” a rollicking yet not-so-dissimilar bray of sedition as “I Ain’t Marching Anymore”—though, in this case, Dylan was protesting against protest folk.) Commercial favor tipped to Dylan’s rock rancor; it would not bend back toward Ochs’ bleeding headlines. As Christopher Hitchens summarized in the Ochs documentary There But for Fortune, “Phil’s very tough, grainy songs…were far more political and tough-minded than the much more generalized, accessible ‘Blowin’ in the Wind.’ There was a difference between people who liked Bob Dylan—anyone could like Bob Dylan, everybody did—and those who even knew about Phil Ochs.”

But serious-minded as Ochs was, he was not without his gallows humor—the secret weapon of I Ain’t Marching Anymore. “Draft Dodger Rag” is a droll riff on shirking the call to Vietnam, spry with the impishness of a boy claiming fang marks on his homework. Ochs spits out any and every excuse that will get him discharged from duty: “I've got a dislocated disc and a wracked-up back/I'm allergic to flowers and bugs,” he wheedles. “And when the bombshell hits, I get epileptic fits/And I'm addicted to a thousand drugs.” Not all his cop-outs have aged well, exactly, by progressive standards (“I always carry a purse” sets off a modern air-raid siren), but it’s an endearing novelty. And as with all Ochs’ songs, there is a galvanizing point staked into the sand: the draft fell disproportionately to the poor, the uneducated, and minorities. Another lighter offering, comparatively, is “That’s What I Want to Hear,” a call to arms for the exploited and whiny (inert liberals being a favored punching bag of Ochs’). “You tell me that your last good dollar is gone/And you say that your pockets are bare,” he sings at a sharp but not-unkind clip. Soon enough, “Now don't tell me your troubles/No, I don't have the time to spare/But if you want to get together and fight/Good buddy, that's what I want to hear.” It is a call to action but, notably, not to knee-jerk jingoism; mobilization is easy in the first flush of fear but resistance, if taken to conclusion, will always be a pyrrhic victory. Here, Ochs tapers one of his core, conclusively patriotic theses: that he, and his listeners, should be willing to lose some comforts to keep the world turning.

The most affecting moment of the album is “That Was the President,” Ochs’ eulogy to President Kennedy that speaks to the shattered disillusionment of his generation. It’s sung as softly as an echo across wooden pews. “Here’s a memory to share, here's a memory to save/Of the sudden early ending of command,” he sighs. “Yet a part of you and a part of me is buried in his grave/That was the President and that was the man.” It aches with lack of resolution; it’s a memorial to the idealism the president fostered, whose administration itself shuttered in unfulfilled promise of its progressive agenda. (There is more than a wisp of the paternal here; Ochs’ father also died in 1963.)    

Ochs’ music after I Ain’t Marching Anymore would be pocked by outside influences; he jealously watched less overtly political colleagues like Dylan and Peter, Paul and Mary reach national fame, and struggled to reconcile his ardency for social reform with his craving to be a star. He watched artists advance on his back; Joan Baez’s cover of his compassionate tune “There But for Fortune” charted in the Top 50 in both America and the UK, higher than he’d ever managed. Frustrated, he retreated from earnest topicality; his next full studio album, Pleasures of the Harbor, folded in lush, Sinatra-strings and ragtime piano, adding a poppier bend to his dour character studies of empty socialites and downtrodden flower vendors. He became disillusioned with demonstrating; he and his Yippie party cohorts staged a protest at 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, during which they nominated an actual pig for president (name: Pigasus), but the mirth ended in a massive, era-defining riot between protesters and police. He retreated from New York, his wife, and his daughter, drinking heavily, heaped his flagging idealism on the communist uprisings of Fidel Castro and the Marxist Chilean revolutionary Salvador Allende. His erratic creative path onward included self-funded, unsuccessful tours through South America and Africa (where he was arrested for performing at a political rally in Uruguay, robbed and strangled in Tanzania), and attempting to replicate Elvis Presley’s 1969 comeback show in Las Vegas with his own mystifying performance in gold lamé at Carnegie Hall. He dabbled more in symphonic pop and recruited Van Dyke Parks for a country-western turn (sarcastically called Phil Ochs’ Greatest Hits), all of which fell flat commercially.

Abetted by his rampant alcoholism and persistent writer’s block, Ochs slid into a bipolar breakdown; not even the end of the Vietnam War, and its ensuing celebratory concerts, could rouse him from his nosedive. He adopted an alternate identity called “John Train” and went on paranoid rants onstage, insisting he had murdered Phil Ochs and the CIA was after him. (The miserable irony of the FBI’s monitoring.) He slept on the streets, got arrested, attacked friends. On April 9, 1976, amid the gaudy patriotism of the Bicentennial Celebration, he hanged himself at his sister’s home in Queens.

But for a moment, Phil Ochs existed in pure conviction. I Ain’t Marching Anymore reminds us to resist the dangers of acquiescence, to take to the streets to demand the country that still persists in our hearts, even if it’s not before to our eyes anymore. It would be easy to stop marching in apathy or in defeat, but Ochs pushed for something greater: a righteous, excruciating, beautiful reclamation. Small wonder his powerful polemics have been covered and updated by the Clash, Neil Young, Jello Biafra: His fight was never just his, never just of his time. And in the right hands, it will never die.

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