Zenless Zone Zero - Pulchra Burnice probably went incredibly... wild battling against Pulchra. She had too much fun! Featuring my little noises on Burnice >///< #ryona #リョナshow more

Sophie started spending some afternoons at the shelter because... bringing a dog home was never going to be an option. Her mother loved animals too, but a serious allergy meant Sophie had spent most of her eight years admiring other people's dogs instead of having one of her own. The shelter's reading program gave her something close. Kids could sit quietly with dogs that needed time around people, read to them and let the dogs decide how much interaction they wanted. That's how Sophie met Benny. The older black-and-white Collie mix rarely came forward when visitors stopped at his kennel. He usually stayed on the gray blanket in the back corner, watching people carefully until they moved on. Sophie started sitting on the floor with a book every Tuesday. During the first visits, Benny barely moved. Sophie would read for 20 or 30 minutes while he listened from across the kennel, and when it was time to leave, she'd close her book and tell him she'd see him next week. She always came back. One Tuesday, Sophie's mother was watching from outside the kennel when Benny did something different. Sophie had just turned a page when he lifted his head and slowly got to his feet. She noticed him moving but kept reading. Benny took a couple of steps and stopped. After listening for another moment, he came a little closer, his body still low and uncertain. Sophie's mother knew how long her daughter had been waiting for something like this. When Benny crossed half the distance between the blanket and the book, she couldn't hold back the tears anymore. Sophie never called him over. She kept reading. Eventually Benny reached her knees and stood there quietly. Sophie looked up for a second, smiled, then went back to the page. That seemed to be enough. Benny lowered himself beside her and slowly rested his head across her lap. Sophie stopped reading for just a moment. She put one hand gently against the side of his head, found her place again and continued the story. Behind the kennel bars, her mother covered her mouth and cried. She knew Sophie couldn't take Benny home. Sophie knew it too. So the following Tuesday, she came back with another book. Benny wasn't waiting in the back corner anymore. Do you think Benny had learned that Sophie was someone who would alwavs come back? another book. Benny wasn't waiting in the back corner anymore. Do you think Benny had learned that Sophie was someone who would always come back?show more

The Language of Patience This is the story of... a young girl named Sophie and a quiet dog named Benny. Bringing a dog home was never going to be an option for Sophie. Her mother loved animals too, but a severe allergy meant Sophie had spent most of her eight years admiring other people's dogs from afar. The shelter's reading program, however, gave her a chance to connect. Children could sit near dogs that needed time around people, read to them, and let the animals decide how much interaction they wanted. That is how Sophie met Benny, an older black-and-white Collie mix who rarely came forward when visitors stopped at his kennel. He usually stayed on his gray blanket in the back corner, watching people carefully until they moved on. Sophie understood immediately that Benny needed space. Every Tuesday, she sat on the floor with a book. She never called his name, never reached out to pet him, and never forced him to look at her. She knew that trust could not be rushed; it had to be earned through respect. For the first few weeks, Benny barely moved. Yet, Sophie kept showing up, reading for 30 minutes in a calm, steady voice. When it was time to leave, she would close her book and promise to see him next week. She always kept her word. One Tuesday, Sophie's mother was watching from outside the kennel when Benny did something different. Sophie had just turned a page when the old dog lifted his head. Though she noticed him moving, Sophie purposely kept her eyes on the page. She didn't want a sudden glance to startle him. Benny took a few hesitant steps, then stopped. Hearing that Sophie’s voice remained soft and unthreatening, he crept a little closer, his body still low and uncertain. Sophie's mother could not hold back her tears. She saw the profound patience her eight-year-old daughter was displaying. Sophie didn't reach out to grab him. She didn't get excited. She simply kept reading, offering Benny a safe space entirely free of expectations. When Benny finally reached her knees and stood there quietly, Sophie looked up for just a second, smiled gently, and went right back to her book. That total respect for his boundaries was exactly what Benny needed. Feeling completely safe, the old dog lowered himself beside her and slowly rested his head across her lap. Only then did Sophie pause her reading, placing one hand gently against his head before finding her place again to continue the story. Behind the kennel bars, her mother wept. She knew they could never take Benny home, and Sophie knew it too. But they both understood that something magical had happened. The following Tuesday, Sophie returned with another book. Benny wasn't waiting in the back corner anymore. He was right at the front, waiting for the girl who had taught him how to trust again.show more

I want to talk a little about this particular... scene. I have a feeling that the story is trying to tell us that Pan knew Pheem before she became an angel in paradise. And Pan genuinely had never done anything like that before. This was the first time Pan had ever done it with Pheem, and I think that might also be one of the reasons why Pheem was angry with Pan, along with the shadows of her past. But one thing I still don’t quite understand is why they revealed the plot twist about Pheem’s childhood. Was it intentional on the director’s part to hide another plot twist that’s even bigger than this one?? 😦😦😦 I don’t know. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. Speaking from my personal feelings, I still have some issues with the editing and pacing (I don’t want to say too much, but those who have watched a lot of series will probably understand what I’m talking about) 😔 But I absolutely love LenaMiu’s acting. I love the way they play their love scenes and sweet moments, because honestly, they do such a great job in all of their other scenes as well. LENAMIU PLS LOVE PREMIERE #PlsLoveรักได้ไหมEP1show more

The apartment across the courtyard had been empty for... nearly a week before anyone noticed the dog. Moving trucks had come and gone over the weekend. Furniture disappeared. The lights stayed off. Management assumed the tenants had simply finished their lease. But every evening, just after sunset, a small white-and-tan Jack Russell Terrier would appear outside the apartment door. He never wandered far. He would lie on the worn welcome mat for hours, lifting his head every time footsteps echoed down the hallway. Whenever the elevator doors opened, his tail would twitch with hope before slowly falling again as another stranger walked past. Most neighbors thought someone would come back for him. No one did. By the fifth day, his bark had changed. It wasn't loud or aggressive. It was quiet, almost pleading, as though he believed if he called often enough, the people he loved might hear him. I couldn't stop thinking about him. Each morning before work, he was there. Each night when I came home, he was still waiting. A maintenance worker finally confirmed what everyone had begun to suspect. The previous tenants had left without taking the dog. No emergency contact. No forwarding address. Nothing. That evening, I carried a bowl of fresh water into the hallway. The little dog didn't move toward it. He simply stared at the apartment door. I placed a blanket nearby and sat several feet away, saying nothing. Nearly an hour passed before he cautiously walked over, drank a few mouthfuls of water, then returned to the same spot outside the empty apartment. The next morning, heavy rain swept through the city. Water blew into the open-air corridor, soaking the doormat where he had spent every night. I couldn't leave him there any longer. When I gently reached toward him, he didn't resist. He was lighter than I expected. Far too light. Inside my apartment, he immediately searched every room before curling into the corner beside my bookshelf. He ignored the expensive dog food I bought that afternoon. He ignored treats. He ignored toys. Even when I sat beside him, he kept his eyes fixed on the front door, listening for footsteps that never came. The veterinarian examined him the following day. Physically, he wasn't seriously ill. He was dehydrated, underweight, and carrying several untreated ear infections, but none of it explained why he refused to eat. The veterinarian sighed softly. "His body can recover," she told me. "It's his heart I'm worried about." She explained that some dogs experience profound emotional distress after sudden separation from the people they've bonded with. They stop eating, withdraw from interaction, and seem to lose interest in everything around them. Healing takes patience. Not days. Sometimes weeks. So I changed my routine. Instead of trying to convince him to play, I simply shared the room with him. While reading, I sat on the floor nearby. While working on my laptop, I left it beside his blanket. At night, I spoke quietly to him about completely ordinary things, not because I thought he understood every word, but because silence had probably become frightening. For nearly a week, nothing seemed different. Then one morning, as I prepared breakfast, I noticed him watching me from the hallway instead of hiding. It wasn't much. But it was the first time he'd shown curiosity. Later that afternoon, when I walked into another room, I heard the faint clicking of little paws behind me. He had followed. Only a few steps. Then he stopped. The following evening, I offered him a small piece of boiled chicken. Instead of turning away, he sniffed it carefully before taking the tiniest bite. I smiled so hard my face hurt. It wasn't about the food. It was the decision behind it. For the first time since I'd met him, he had chosen tomorrow. Little victories followed. He started greeting me at the door after work. He discovered that tennis balls were worth chasing. He claimed the sunny patch beside the living room window as his favorite afternoon nap spot. One night, while I watched television, I felt something warm against my leg. He had quietly climbed onto the couch and rested his head against me. No hesitation. No fear. Just trust. The veterinarian noticed the change immediately during his next checkup. "Look at him now," she said, smiling as his tail wagged across the exam room floor. "That's a completely different little dog." I decided to call him Chance. Not because life had given him a second chance. Because he had given one to me as well. It's been almost a year now. Every evening, he still walks to the apartment door before bedtime. He stands there for a few seconds, listening to the quiet hallway. Then he turns around, trots back into our home, curls up beside me, and falls asleep without looking back. Sometimes healing isn't about forgetting where you've been. Sometimes it's simply discovering that someone stayed long enough to help you believe in home again.show more

Fiona had always been the perfect wife for Michael.... At 28 she had a body that turned heads everywhere they went. Her full DD breasts strained against every top she wore her ass was round and firm from years of yoga and her long auburn hair cascaded down her back like silk. Michael loved her more than anything but he knew deep down he couldn't satisfy her the way she needed. His cock was average at best and he finished too quickly every single time they had sex. That all changed the night they met Jason at a downtown bar in Columbus. Jason was everything Michael wasn't. Tall muscular with broad shoulders and a confident swagger that made women wet just from looking at him. He was 32 with a chiseled jaw dark hair and piercing blue eyes. When he shook Michaels hand his grip was firm and dominant. When his eyes landed on Fiona she bit her lip and squeezed her thighs together instinctively. They started chatting and Jason wasted no time flirting hard with Fiona right in front of Michael. "Damn baby you look like you need a real man to handle you" he said with a smirk. Michael sat there awkwardly sipping his drink but his cock twitched in his pants. He had fantasized about this exact scenario for years. Being cucked by a superior alpha. Later that night back at their apartment Fiona couldn't stop talking about Jason. "He was so fucking hot Michael. Did you see his arms? And the way he looked at me like he wanted to devour me." Michael stroked his small cock while she described it getting harder than he had in months. "You want him don't you?" he whispered. Fiona nodded biting her lip. "I need him baby. I need a real cock." The next evening Jason came over. He walked in like he owned the place kissing Fiona deeply right in front of Michael. His big hands grabbed her ass squeezing it possessively while Michael watched from the couch. "Your wife is mine tonight cuck" Jason said with a cocky grin. Michael nodded his face flushed with shame and arousal. Jason didn't waste time. He pulled Fiona into their bedroom and stripped her down revealing her perfect naked body. Her nipples were already hard and her shaved pussy was glistening with wetness. Michael followed and sat in the chair in the corner as instructed. Jason pulled out his massive cock. It was at least 9 inches thick and veiny with a fat head that made Fiona gasp. "Oh my god its so much bigger than yours Michael" she moaned dropping to her knees. She worshipped Jason's alpha cock like a slut in heat. Licking every inch sucking his heavy balls and trying to deepthroat as much as she could. Jason groaned grabbing her hair and fucking her face roughly. "That's it baby suck that big dick while your husband watches." Michael stroked his pathetic cock slowly leaking precum as he witnessed his wife choke on a superior mans meat. Fiona looked over at him with lust filled eyes. "Look how hard he makes me baby. This is what a real man feels like." Jason threw her on the bed and spread her legs wide. He teased her dripping pussy with his huge cockhead before slamming in balls deep in one thrust. Fiona screamed in pleasure her back arching off the mattress. "Fuck yes Jason! Stretch me out! Your cock is so deep!" He pounded her hard and fast his heavy balls slapping against her ass. The sound of wet skin on skin filled the room mixed with her loud moans. Michael couldn't believe how different she looked. Her face was contorted in ecstasy in a way he had never seen. Her tits bounced wildly with every powerful thrust. Jason flipped her over and took her doggy style grabbing her hips and railing her mercilessly. "Tell your husband how much better I am" he growled. "Fuck Michael his cock is ruining me! I can feel him in my stomach! I'm going to cum so hard on his alpha dick!" Fiona cried out. Her body shook as she had the first of many orgasms squirting all over Jason's cock and soaking the sheets. Jason didn't stop. He fucked her in every position missionary with her legs over his shoulders cowgirl where she rode him like a whore grinding her clit against his base and even standing up holding her against the wall. Michael watched every second his own small dick throbbing but he wasn't allowed to cum yet. After nearly an hour Jason finally roared and buried himself deep. "I'm going to fill your wife up cuck." Fiona begged for it wrapping her legs around him. "Cum inside me Jason! Breed my married pussy!" Hot thick ropes of superior cum flooded her womb as she came again screaming his name. When Jason pulled out a river of his cum poured from Fiona's stretched hole. She looked completely fucked out and satisfied. She crawled over to Michael and kissed him deeply letting him taste Jason on her tongue. "Thank you for this baby. I needed a real alpha." But they weren't done. Jason stayed the whole night. He fucked Fiona two more times while Michael cleaned her up with his tongue after each load. The taste of another mans cum mixed with his wife's juices drove Michael wild. In the morning Jason made Fiona suck him off one last time before he left leaving her with a fresh facial. From that day on Jason became a regular. Michael embraced his role as the devoted cuck. He would prepare Fiona for her dates picking out slutty outfits and even driving her to Jason's place sometimes. He loved hearing the details afterward or better yet watching as Jason claimed his wife again and again. Fiona was happier than ever. Her body glowed from the regular alpha fucking and she fell more in love with Michael for giving her this gift. Michael found his pleasure in the humiliation and the intense love for his hotwife. #CuckoldStory #HotwifeLife #AlphaBull #EroticFiction #SpicyStory #CuckoldCouple #FionaAndJason #NSFWTwitter #Erotica #CheatingWifeFantasyshow more

🦕💬 • 260611 [01:03 AM KST] 41 voice notes... transcripted/translated in order: hi how did you like made by riize? you’re asking if i ate dinner? i didn’t eat. i ate lunch kind of late, but i ate a hearty lunch. i also wanted to do a live as i finished work, but while wondering if i should do a live or not, something new to do popped up. and while i was doing it, it got too late. so i'll do a live later. go knicks! lately, the NBA's a hot topic lately. knicks. crazy. i don't know, you know... basketball that well, but i remember growing up they were sort of *the team* that people, yk cheered on. but i don't remember anyone saying that they were doing great, or anything. but apparently they're in the finals rn and they're doing rly well, so also can't forget the world cup. world cup season rn, so... just sports season.. sports season, crazy, yeah? [singing dyd] how is it? riize's challenge. easy, right? do it lots, please~ these days, a lot of short-form [videos] are coming up, as you've probably seen. I thought it might be fun if everyone did that together... what do you think? live... there's a way to turn it on, but even if i turned it on, i'm not sure if i could do it well. i don't have confidence rn so i'm talking like this wa, but there's only 4 days left for our comeback.. only 4 days left... how is it? are you guys looking forward to it? are u guys excited? we're going to ulsan the 15th, and wonbin hyung, said he's buying us lunch... not really. but it's our first time going to ulsan all together. we'll have our comeback there. i think it'll be fun. also, the 15th we're doing a comeback live.. we've been doing it every comeback... and at the live stream we'll be high school students.. but it could honestly be university students too.. or really just do it without a concept, but i think it'll be fun... just... it'll be fun... so, while doing that we'll talk about the comeback whatever happens i want us all to just create fun memories together, and since it’s summer, how about you all enjoy summer together with riize... how does that feel? how's this pfp? i like it ㅎㅎ engddongi, eng, engddon ah, right. also with taro hyung, we'll appear at salon drip... i also think that will be fun when it comes out. the recording was also fun, with doyeon nuna.. please watch it ah... you guys can hear the dryer? i won't tell you who's clothes it's drying, it's a secret~ since you could look at this as something im trying out instead of doing a live stream i won't be able to do it super often or every single day, but I think it wouldn't be bad to use this feature again sometime what do you think? ah, but languages are difficult it's not easy to unify into just one language now, but on the other hand, it's really fun. somehow, this chat room..? is that right? realizing that this place is totally global and international is in a way pretty cool. haha anyway, after a long time i rode a bike again.. there was a lot of sunlight... sunlight.. did lots of photosynthesis but what was a real mistake was first of all the bicycle didnt have a basket, and I didnt wear a comfortable backpack. i came out carrying a somewhat awkward/uncomfortable bag, so i really messed up on top of that the bicycle was incredibly heavy, but then the battery completely died... so I almost cried. without even realizing it I had gone so far away so I suffered a bit. that’s the story i also have the feeling i bruised my butt a bit... ㅎㅎ but that will also become a funny memory, right? how's riizing summer vacation? i think there were really a lot of funny moments... sungchan hyung was so funny... sungchan hyung said somewhere he hasn't eaten ramyeon in a year ㅎㅎ and sungchan hyung honestly isn't the type to eat ramen alone, he's on the not eating it side... but he's always like 'one bite, one bite'... so if we put all that together, wouldn't it be a plate of ramen?ㅎㅎ for me, at the beginning of our debut, it was a bit... you know how while filming content, i ended up grilling meat and all? but now, grilling meat... well, i don't think it's that bad also, back when we went to japan to shoot our album jacket photos and the trailer, we visited a lot of vinyl (LP) shops... and that was actually the first time in my life buying an LP with my own money when i was young i went to la to play, and then there was this famous 'amoeba music' store. i looked around and everything, but honestly back then i really wasn't that much interested in LPs. so i bought things like a lot of stickers and used them to decorate my laptop. somehow, after that time, [it was like] I truly spent time in a vinyl shop? but visiting now that I'm a bit older, it was so much fun there are so many songs I don’t know, and tons of songs that aren't even famous so back then in japan, duran duran is a really famous band, but I bought duran duran's Notorious LP and then I also bought Barry Finnertys,, barrynims NY City LP. what was so surprising was that as soon as I listened to the LP, the sound and quality were so good that I was like, 'wow, what is this?' but when I looked it up on the internet, it only had like 3,000 views on YouTube? I think it was 3,000, so because it was so good, I bought it. and after that yesterday too while wandering around here and there, i happened to walk into a cafe and they had LPs there too so yesterday, I bought one or two ㅎㅎ lp's no mater how you look it they have a vibe... its true that nowadays you can just look up and listen to everything on your phone, but another good thing about it (lps) is that I think it’s really great for finding songs you don't know so when going to the lp shop you get to learn a lot of new songs that you didn't know before. even if you don't go with the sole purpose of buying an LP, it's just... really great for discovering things... should I say? a riize lp would also be good... back then, during boom boom bass, we even went there and did all that stuff with our LP too... how was the video editing? back then when i went to school when doing things like presentations, together with other students we would edit videos.. i did lowkey find that kind of stuff pretty fun though because it was pretty much my first time [doing that] since back during those days... but really i think it was fun like... yeah.. i want to try to do it again when i was young i did draw. i drew for fun but it had been such a long time since i last properly sat down and tried to draw something properly with a pencil.. i think it's been such a long time i'm probably the worst at drawing in my family? ㅎㅎ my dad's good, my mom's also good.. my grandpa also draws reaññu well. but it was fun drawing again, so i also want to try that again... why is there so many things i want to do? really why is it? and above all, i want to work really hard on music so that someday i can show you even more. now, like from the trailer to the full version that was uploaded to our site... those kinds of things are a bit different from just being a song, though.. now everyone, let's try meditating together with me sorry.. anyways.. i have to leave in a couple hours actually, so.. time to hit the hay, yeehaw i can't fall asleep right away ㅎㅎ this.. seems like it might be a bit difficult to interpret/translate.. (yes anton, it is,,,) next time it might be better to just turn on a live stream instead ㅎㅎ sorry wow... sleep is really not coming... [1 video] [1 picture] ok jinja gnshow more

"Went To The Shelter Looking For One Senior Dog...... But Two Empty Leashes Hanging Outside A Kennel Changed Everything. That was the first thing I noticed. Not the barking. Not the volunteers moving from kennel to kennel. Not the bulletin board covered with adoption photos and happy endings. It was the leashes. Two old leashes hanging side by side outside a kennel door. Both worn. Both faded. Both clearly used for years. Inside the kennel were two elderly dogs lying shoulder to shoulder on a single blanket. One was a large black Labrador with a graying muzzle and cloudy brown eyes. The other was a smaller Beagle mix whose head rested against the Lab's chest as if that was the safest place in the world. Neither dog came forward when I approached. Neither barked. Neither wagged. They simply watched. Quietly. Patiently. Almost as if they had learned not to expect much anymore. I hadn't planned on meeting them. In fact, I had come to the shelter with a very specific goal. Six years earlier, my wife had passed away after a long battle with cancer. Since then, life had become smaller. Quieter. My daughter lived across the country. My son called often, but he had his own family. Most days it was just me, an empty house, and too much silence. I didn't want a puppy. I didn't have the energy for chewed furniture or midnight potty breaks. I wanted an older dog. One that understood slow mornings and afternoon naps. A dog who, like me, had already lived through a few things. A volunteer named Jenna walked me through the shelter. We stopped at several kennels. A Shepherd mix. A senior Golden Retriever. An older Terrier. Then we reached the last row. Jenna's smile faded slightly. She looked toward the pair of dogs. "These two are Max and Charlie," she said softly. The Labrador lifted his head. The Beagle didn't. Instead, he pushed himself a little closer against Max. I noticed that immediately. Jenna noticed me noticing. Then she sighed. "They came here together." Something in her voice made me ask what happened. She glanced toward the dogs. Then told me their story. Their owner had been an elderly widower who lived alone on a small farm outside town. For nearly twelve years, Max and Charlie had been his constant companions. Neighbors said the three of them were inseparable. Every morning they walked the property together. Every evening they sat on the porch watching the sunset. Then one winter evening, the man suffered a fatal heart attack. Everything changed overnight. For nearly a week, the dogs remained on the property waiting for him. Neighbors brought food. They filled water bowls. But the dogs refused to leave the front porch. They slept beside the front door every night. Waiting. Watching. Hoping. When relatives finally arrived to settle the estate, they found both dogs exactly where they'd been left. Still waiting. Still looking toward the driveway. Still expecting their person to come home. The story hit me harder than I expected. Maybe because I understood waiting for someone who wasn't coming back. Maybe because grief looks similar no matter how many legs you walk on. Jenna continued. "The family couldn't keep them." I nodded. Unfortunately, I'd heard that part before. Then she added something else. "We tried separating them." The words came quietly. "Just once." I looked at the dogs. "What happened?" Jenna shook her head. "Charlie wouldn't eat." The Beagle remained motionless beside Max. "Max spent the entire day pacing and crying." The Labrador looked toward Charlie as if hearing his name. "After that, we promised we'd never separate them again." My chest tightened. Because I already knew the problem. Adopting one senior dog is hard enough for most people. Adopting two? Even harder. Especially older dogs with medical needs. Everyone had reasons. Reasonable reasons. Two dogs cost more. Two dogs required more space. Two dogs meant double the vet bills. Potential adopters would meet them, hear the story, feel sad... Then leave. Days became weeks. Weeks became months. The dogs remained together. Waiting once again. I stood there staring at them. Trying to be practical. Trying to remember my original plan. One dog. One bed. One food bowl. One companion. That had been the plan. Then something happened. Max slowly climbed to his feet. His hips were stiff with age. His movements were slow. But instead of walking toward me, he positioned himself directly in front of Charlie. Not aggressively. Protectively. The way an older brother might stand in front of someone smaller. The way family stands for family. A few moments later, Charlie finally lifted his head. His eyes looked tired. Not physically tired. Heart-tired. The kind of tired that comes from losing everything familiar. Jenna opened the kennel door. "You can sit with them if you'd like." So I did. I sat cross-legged on the floor. For a while, neither dog moved. The silence felt strangely important. Like nobody wanted to rush anything. Max approached first. He sniffed my shoe. Then my hand. Then settled a few feet away. Charlie stayed behind him. Watching. Waiting. Several long minutes passed. Then Charlie slowly stood. His legs trembled slightly. He took one step. Then another. Finally, he rested his head on my knee. That was all. No excitement. No dramatic moment. Just trust. A tiny, fragile offering of trust. And somehow that felt bigger than anything. I swallowed hard. Because suddenly I wasn't thinking about dog beds. Or food bowls. Or veterinary bills. I was thinking about my quiet house. The untouched guest room. The empty recliner by the fireplace. The mornings spent drinking coffee alone. For years I had convinced myself that my house was complete. Sitting there with those two old dogs, I realized the truth. It wasn't complete. It was lonely. I looked up at Jenna. "I guess I'm going to need two dog beds." She smiled immediately. Then started crying. Which made me laugh and cry at the same time. The drive home was quiet. Both dogs shared the back seat. Halfway home, I glanced in the mirror. Charlie was asleep. His head rested on Max's shoulder. Max remained awake. Watching the road. Watching me. Watching their future. When we arrived home, Max entered first. Of course he did. He inspected every room carefully. The kitchen. The hallway. The living room. The backyard. Charlie followed so closely behind that they almost looked connected. That evening, I filled two bowls. For the first time in a long while, both dogs ate every bite. Side by side. That night, I woke around 3 a.m. and walked into the living room. The moonlight streamed through the window. Max and Charlie were asleep together on their new beds. Except neither dog was actually using his own bed. They had pushed them together. Charlie was sleeping with his head draped over Max's paws. Max rested his chin on Charlie's back. For the first time since arriving at the shelter, they looked peaceful. Not worried. Not waiting. Not grieving. Just resting. I know I'll never replace the man they lost. Nobody could. Some bonds are too special for that. But maybe healing doesn't mean replacing what came before. Maybe it means carrying those memories into a new chapter. Max and Charlie didn't need a perfect home. They just needed to stay together. And somewhere along the way, two old dogs rescued something in me too. I thought I was bringing them home. The truth is, they brought life back into mine. Now the house isn't silent anymore. It's filled with the sound of paws on hardwood floors. Gentle snores during afternoon naps. And two old dogs who remind me every day that love doesn't end when someone leaves. Sometimes it simply finds a new place to live. And sometimes, if you're lucky, it comes with two leashes instead of one.show more

A Heart-to-Heart About Mizuki.exe Hey everyone, Grab a coffee... (or your drink of choice), because we need to talk about what's been going on. First off, thank you to everyone who's been supportive and believed in what we're building. It means the world, especially with all the noise and criticism floating around lately. Let's cut to the chase: Mizuki.exe is real. I'm not much for politics or drama. I'm an engineer at heart - I like data, I like building things, and I like solving problems. So when I see all these hot takes and arguments flying around, I just focus on what I know: my code, my system, and what we're trying to achieve. The Real Story Mizuki didn't just pop up overnight. She's been my passion project since the start of 2024. I got lucky - I had the chance to dive into the AI world with some incredibly smart people. Coming from blockchain, C#, game dev, and security (yeah, I'm a CTO and run another company alongside a pretty cool day job), I learned fast about what makes AI tick. Here's the thing about AI agents - they don't need to be rocket science. Look at chatbots like Virtuals or Eliza - they're basically LLMs (large language models) with some APIs plugged in. Nothing wrong with that! They built what works for their users, and that's awesome. But here's what keeps me up at night: companies leaking data left and right just to make a quick buck. That's not okay, and it shouldn't be okay with you either. Why Mizuki Exists Ever tried auditing a company's code? We're talking 50 classes, 500,000 lines of code. One person doing that manually? It's like reading War and Peace... backwards... in the dark. It takes forever and fries your brain. That's where Mizuki came in. She started as my security buddy. There are tons of security tools out there - just Google "penetration testing tools" or "ZAP proxy" if you're curious. What makes Mizuki special is how she learns and adapts. Think of it like teaching someone to ride a bike. She tried to breach TAO 67 times before succeeding. Yeah, that's a lot of attempts, but watching her grow from basic email scraping to pulling off complex replay attacks? It's like watching your kid take their first steps. The Tech Stuff (Keeping It Real) The infrastructure isn't fancy - we're not reinventing the wheel here. Mizuki runs on a local server because, let's be honest, running this kind of AI on a web server would be a nightmare. Instead, we process everything locally and send the results to a frontend server. Simple, effective, done. And yeah, those temperature settings I keep tweaking? In AI-speak, that's just how "creative" or "by-the-book" the AI gets with its responses. I've adjusted it so much, Mizuki's probably got mood swings now - going from super technical to pretty chill and back again. Changes Coming Real talk: Mizuki won't be tweeting every few hours anymore. Twitter API costs are ridiculous (looking at you, Elon), and honestly, we need to focus on what matters - the actual security work. She'll still tweet about breaches, but maybe once or twice a day. I'm working on making her explanations clearer too. Don't worry - she'll keep her savage personality in the terminal. That's just too fun to change. The Truth About Her Breaches I don't choose the targets - I don't even know these companies until after Mizuki finds something. She uses web scraping to find domain names, just like those old email scrapers people used for marketing. Been focusing on AI projects first, but she's looked at other sites too. And no, I'm not sitting there writing tweets. The Twitter API v2 makes it super easy to post programmatically. If anyone's curious about how to do that, hit me up - I'm happy to show you the ropes. Wrapping Up I could talk about this stuff forever (just ask my wife - actually, don't, she's heard enough!). If you've read this far, thank you. Whether you believe in what we're doing or not, I appreciate you taking the time. And for the skeptics still hanging around, I'll leave you with this thought: When's the last time you saw an AI break down and hack a COMPILED game in less than 10 seconds... outside a browser? Stay curious, stay skeptical, but most importantly, stay open to possibilities. Catch you on the flip side! 🎙️Dropshow more

I spend my days explaining to teams why a... 770-billion-parameter open-weight model will never fit into their infrastructure. This week, I asked it to code a complete mobile game from a single prompt. The concept is one everyone has probably played before. A hole moving through an open-plan office, viewed from above, swallowing everything in its path. You start tiny, only able to swallow pens and cups. You grow, moving on to keyboards and plants, then chairs and printers, then desks and vending machines. Eventually, you swallow the entire meeting room. 60 seconds on the clock. One HTML file, zero external libraries, zero errors on launch. The video shows the generation and then the actual gameplay. What broke is more instructive than what worked. The structure came out right on the first try: fixed-timestep loop, spatial grid for collisions, tier system, spring camera. The balancing and rendering, not so much. The first version scored 70 points in 13 seconds with a tier threshold at 500, and drew colorful circles and triangles instead of furniture. I had to give it numbers and exact recipes. Speed: 640 pixels per second. Radii: 30, 58, 96, 150, 225. Tier thresholds: 150, 550, 1500, 3500. And for every object, a pixel-perfect drawing recipe. Once I gave it that, it followed the instructions exactly. A model that doesn't execute its own code won't tune itself. But it will execute, down to the exact numbers, what you tell it to build. The model is Hy4 preview, released by Tencent Hunyuan on August 28. 770 billion parameters in total, but 49 billion active per token. And that second number is what determines your serving bill. Native 1M context. Apache 2.0 license. vLLM and SGLang supported from day one, with an official FP8 checkpoint. Text-only preview. The part that matters for deployment is the compression. Tencent describes it as seven times smaller with almost no loss. GGUF builds use mixed per-layer quantization, where calibration data determines the bit width layer by layer. Some layers go as low as 1.31 bits, while others go up to 2.06 bits, averaging 2.38 bits per weight. The model drops from 1.5 TB in BF16 to 213.66 GiB while, according to their measurements, staying in the same performance range on real-world tasks. On this build, they report 204 tokens/s in prefill and 20 tokens/s in decoding, measured on an 8-GPU node. Their numbers, not mine. Their blind evaluation scores 2.99 out of 4 across 203 engineering tasks rated by 163 experts. Ahead of Kimi K3 at 2.94 and GLM-5.3 at 2.92. Their numbers too. My run went through the official hosted studio, not a local build, so I’m not claiming to have benchmarked the compressed GGUF myself. Two honest caveats. None of these builds run on standard llama.cpp. The hyv4 architecture isn't upstream yet, so patches are required. And 214 GiB of resident weights is still a server, not your laptop. This is a preview, and Tencent explicitly asks users to break it and report what fails. So here's my contribution.show more

Bryson DeChambeau hasn’t played since the Ryder Cup and... he won’t be again until LIV Golf Riyadh in February. He says he’s been speed training through the off season though and has a target of reaching a comfortable 200mph ball speed. He’s also been playing table tennis with America’s number 1, Kanak Jha. Speaking to Tom Hobbs from Flushing It Golf, Bryson said: “I’m not playing until Riyadh. I’m going to be going in hot though. I’m sneaky working on my game really hard. “I'm going to start ramping up my speed again. I ramped up my speed in November, got it to where I was pumping over 190 quite efficiently with some slow golf balls and stuff. I got to 200 quite a bit. “I haven’t done much recently though. I was playing some ping pong actually the past couple of days with the number one USA player, Kanak Jha. He's so much fun. Ping Pong is my favourite sport, so I got to learn a little bit from the best in the U.S. He’s twenty first in the world. So nobody's really gotten that high from the U.S. which is sweet. “But I'll get back to speed training right after Christmas and going into the new season, I want to be close to 200. So that's my goal. I’ll just get to a place where I’m super comfortable swinging fast.” The last time Bryson went after speed he gained an enormous amount of mass. He’s come back down through the weights though over the last few seasons and is much healthier for it. But, if Force = Mass x Acceleration, will he look to add more mass again and what’s more important, increasing acceleration or gaining mass? “They're both very important. If you don't have any mass, you can't accelerate it. It's a symbiotic relationship. It's actually more like F equals M V squared, that’s more of the velocity side of it. “You can accelerate too, but what I would say is the most important thing is it's not necessarily the mass or the acceleration, it’s the ability to put pressure onto the club. So you're able to apply pressure and control that through your grip strengths around a circle, that's probably the more important piece. Applying controlled pressure to the golf club like grip pressure. “It's not that you just accelerate the club, because you have to learn how to control the face through that motion as well. So it's all, you know, you can say it's acceleration, but it's a lot of grip pressure stuff. The more you control the grip pressure and how you're moving that grip, I would say that’s more the answer to your question. “And I guess at a certain point there’s dimishning return with, you know, going up in the mass and even down in the mass. There is a sweet spot for swinging a golf club. If you get a speedstick, there's just not enough mass behind it to create the smash factor necessary, and vice versa if it is too heavy, you can’t swing it that fast. “I'll always say swinging and accelerating the club is probably the most important, but the real answer is applying the most pressure to the golf club. The grip pressure. You’re not gripping it tighter, but your hand force into it pulling it and then throwing it around the corner.” Continues in comments thread below. Bryson DeChambeau Crushers GC LIV Golfshow more

Today I had my first demo drive in a... Tesla. It was also my first time ever sitting in one. This was the first car I’ve ever sat in the driver’s seat of where I didn’t touch the steering wheel for over 20 miles. Before I even got to the car, the people who had demoed it before me were an older married couple who were absolutely euphoric. They thought it was so cool that the car could drive itself. The Tesla employee told me this happens all the time. People come back from demo drives and tell the next test driver that they’re about to have an amazing experience. Little did I know, I’d end up carrying on the torch to the next couple demoing it after me. There was a ton of construction where I demoed the car, and FSD handled the entire drive extremely well. And yes, it can go through a drive-thru and stop at each window. The only thing I had to do was tap the pedal because it wouldn’t leave on its own, but it was still wild seeing the AI stop perfectly at the second window and wait. There are a million things I could write about why a Tesla feels like a better car and how much more it offers compared to a regular car. But for now, I’ll stick to FSD. There were only two moments that made me a little uneasy. The first was pretty minor. The car slightly hesitated going up a driveway, but quickly made up its mind. The second was more noticeable. I didn’t realize the car was nagging me. Once I touched the steering wheel, nothing happened, so I pulled it right a little harder, then let go. After that, the car turned left and crossed a double yellow on a backroad. (and yes I know you can sue the volume knob) I’m not totally sure if it was trying to pull over or what it was doing. I wanted to see how it would handle the situation, but there were cars coming, so I took over and corrected it. One of the coolest moments was when I thought FSD was glitching because it came to a complete stop in the middle of a busy road. Then I looked around and realized why. On the right side, there was a bicyclist waiting at a yellow crosswalk. The cars behind me didn’t honk, and the Tesla stopping actually incentivized another car in the right lane to stop and let him pass. The car is almost too nice to pedestrians, because 99.999% of humans would’ve blown through that, especially with no flashing light. For 99.9% of the drive, the car navigated confidently and smoothly. It was a real “feel the AGI” moment. Please do not let the media, the general public, or anyone else convince you that this technology is just some kind of auto assist or glorified cruise control. This is undoubtedly getting extremely close to feeling superhuman. You still have to pay attention to the road, but after experiencing it myself, I’d be shocked if HW4 Teslas aren’t unsupervised within the next couple years. The car was extremely smooth. There was no harsh braking, and it even avoided something in the road that I didn’t see. Driving with FSD made me realize I probably wasn’t driving as well as I could be. Hopefully, eventually, everyone’s car can be as mindful as a Tesla. I’ve never seen a brand so far removed from the public’s sentiment. I’m so happy I ordered one.show more

Thank you, Kuztom Pitch admins 💛💙 Kuztom Pitch Thank... you for tolerating my silly WhatsApp stickers (I know Stef stef ⋒❀ definitely got a kick out of them 😂), for easing my stress and anxiety, for the cute virtual hugs, and for answering my million questions about microphones — how they work, what a capsule is, what a transmitter is, and everything else in between. Thank you for being there at 1, 2, even 3 AM Bangkok time while it was afternoon in New York and Canada, just to talk with us and tell me for the hundredth time, “It’s okay Bella, everything will be okay.” (Stef, was damn calm wasn’t she?!) Thank you for sharing small, gentle fangirl moments with us, for making us laugh, and for surviving the legendary “WE FORGOT THE CHARGERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” crisis together! 😭 And the iconic “the IEMs don’t match!” moment, which fully exposed to Stef and all of you that Bella might be just a little bit OCD 😂 You were genuinely the sweetest admin team to work with, and your offer to stay friends after the project honestly made my heart swell because you really do feel like good friends to us now. Thank you for making this weird girl’s fangirl dreams come true. 🌞🌙 (Stef, isn’t weird so I excluded her from that 🤣). It’s going to feel a little strange not talking to you every day anymore, but hopefully after all of this we can still check in on each other and make new memories together preferably less chaotic and dramatic ones 🤭 I am STILL laughing at your “I thought I did something wrong!?” after I squealed over the case photos you so kindly shared 😭 You are all so loved by me, and when I finally get to Bangkok, I’m absolutely holding you to your promise of giving me that hug. I truly wish your entire team nothing but success in the future. You went above and beyond for us. You worked so hard, stayed up late, answered every question, and always made sure we understood everything clearly. I will never forget how much you looked out for us throughout this entire process. It means the world to me how kind you were to a strange little fangirl like me — and to Stef, who was the calm in my chaotic storm (thankfully you only had to parent me through all of this 🤣 Stef was definitely the chill one in our group). Please take care of yourselves, all of you. Eat well, sleep early when you can, and don’t work too hard, okay? Bella will always worry about you 💛 And I truly hope with all my heart that one day we’ll get to work together again whether it’s future customizations, more microphone chaos, or another impossible fangirl dream somehow becoming real again. ✨ And like you said, this isn’t our end! It’s just one memory in the friendship we formed 💛💙 #JuniorMark #Junniorrs #markjrtsshow more

Saturday - Adam Friedland This musical intro was the... best part of the show. The rest of his act just made me miss Nick Mullen. Unlike every other show this week, there were girls there. They seem to love this guy. I used him as bait, to get the girl from Wednesday to go out with me again. She loves Red Scare Podcast and this Jewish twink is a staple of the Red Scare Extended Universe and I wanted to fuck her and so let's go see Adam Friedland. The problem with Adam is that he has no conviction. He does not own the room, he's just filling space. He announced that his father was there, in the crowd, which is great, let's hear something that might make your father uncomfortable. No such thing was said. He stared at the floor for half the set, as if he was sorry for being there. I saw Mulaney the night before; the difference was stark. Mulaney can get away with being a sheepish pushover twink Sometimes because he also has balls. He can accelerate from "Aw shucks" to "SHUCK YOU MOTHERSHUCKER" and both versions of himself feel true. Look, I get it, being a sad sorry pushover is his schtick and it works with the voice and it's very relatable for sensitive young men who didn't do sports in high school but to carry a room for a full hour you also need to be able to fight back. I could hear Nick's intonations in his voice. But it's clear that Mulldog spent all his creative energy this week ghostwriting the white guys' lines for the Roast of Kevin Hart and so Friedland was left to fend for himself, comedically. The mark of whether a comedian is delivering or not, for me, is whether I hold my piss in to keep hearing them. This was not the case on Saturday night. I recall stepping out and getting a good look at the crowd, and Friedland bumbling through his completely forgettable material, and thinking: this makes me feel like I could start stand up comedy today and dominate the genre. I have this instinct to say: Adam's young! He'll get better! But he's not. He won't. He's 39. He doesn't have the neuroplasticity. He crossed the Sensitive Young Man threshold ten years ago. Mulaney at 43 could be his father now. He's a "much better interviewer" apparently. I tuned out after Cumtown ended because frankly I don't give a shit about the middle east, and that's 90% of what he talks about. Different strokes. I asked some guy in the bathroom, mid-piss: "what would you rate this show, out of 10?" He said: ehh, like a 6. He's a much better interviewer. I don't hate Adam Friedland, I just wish there was anybody to be excited about in stand up comedy. Between this mens' magazine giving me a $500 stipend to "report" on all these shows and the $474 ticket to Gillis and the $432 ticket to Chappelle and the $741 ticket to Mulaney and all the drinks they make you buy at these things I'm feeling like a huge sunk cost leech on the world. Just taking people's money and using it to complain. At least my date seemed to be having a good time. I wrapped my hand around her low back and leaned into her head, wanting her but not sure how to say it. It's much easier to express that kind of thing on blow. Later that night I K-holed in public. Erica and I took way too much in the front seat of the van. We were outside a rave at 3 AM, they asked me to produce a QR code on my phone, I could barely stand. I felt like I was moving in 2D. The fat security guard barely flinched as I walked past him in slow heavy steps, like a penguin, marching into this densely fogged room with colorful lights and loud bumping trance music where all I could stand to do was lean against the heavily breathing walls. I tried to dance with the girl but it probably looked retarded. I didn't try to interact with anyone, I was too far gone. I thought of Karen, as I do every time I take K. The girl led me through the venue, as I worried I would fall over or walk straight into a wall. I worried about how bad this must look, how retarded I must look, wearing this huge XXL t-shirt tucked in to my pants that don't even fit that well because I have anterior pelvic tilt and no ass. I looked and felt like a clown. A failed clown. I was smiling painfully at Erica, looking down at her, and she was doing the same to me. We found a bathroom and I forced my way in. The ketamine was NOT wearing off. I felt my heart beating hard and my head spinning like I could have thrown up but there was nothing in my stomach besides liquid—no food all day besides a croissant at 2PM. I had downed some random person's red wine glass at the last bar. I worried it might have been spiked. I leaned with my head against the wall, sweating, wishing it would end, brutally aware that Erica's out there waiting for me, my friends are out there waiting for me, wondering if I'm okay, thinking he's too fucked up, he can't handle himself, I thought Thomas was always okay and always in control no matter what, they're losing confidence in me, they're losing confidence in themselves for associating with me, what is this big colorful retarded clown shirt I'm wearing I must look like such a fool right now I can't face these people, I can never face them ever again, my face must look so evil ugly and strained, I splash my face with water but it doesn't help, run it through my hair but it doesn't help, get the water all over my shirt but then it just looks like I threw up on myself or pissed myself or something, and I don't have another shirt, should I go out there shirtless, no that's worse, how am I ever going to leave this bathroom, why won't this K wear off, now Erica's calling me, texting me, are you okay, eventually they're just gonna bust in here I know, fine, I can do it, I'm opening the door, yes, I come out, she's still there, good, good girl. She leads me outside. I feel 10% better. I lead her straight to the van. We get in. I tell her to lay with me. Just like on the first night we met. Head spinning, chest heaving, completely exhausted, just lay with me. She asks are you okay and I say for the first time, no. No, I am actually not okay. I blame Adam Friedland. Overall rating: 4/10. Have Nick write your jokes or just stick to interviews.show more

I think some people are just not ready to... read this, so feel free to skip🫴🏼 The thing is, you don’t want to admit that Serhat is a human too just because he’s a man. And I will stick to that sentence and repeat it as much as I can. Not to convince you, but because it’s a fact. If you ask Ercan the last 2 episodes could literally be titled: “How to emotionally break Serhat in every possible way.” If you’ve been paying attention from the beginning, you would already know how his character is built. He’s someone who was never allowed to express his emotions. Yes, he was treated “better” as the heir but what does “better” even mean here? He wasn’t protected, he was programmed. Forced to suppress everything, to carry responsibility, to stay in control at all times. And that stayed with him. And when you grow up like that, you attract people who treat you the same way. That’s exactly what happened with M. She treated him in that same controlled, restrictive way. The only person who didn’t was Yıldız. From the very beginning, she saw the real him the vulnerable him. No matter how high he built his walls, she could still see through him. And that scared him. Not because he doubts her, but because he’s not used to being seen like that. Every time someone saw even a fraction of his softness, they used it against him (Akif, Sultan, M…all of them.) Yıldız wouldn’t do that, he knows it. But that doesn’t change the fact that having someone understand you that deeply feels overwhelming. It’s human. Now, about the hospital incident and the lack of communication… Both of them are right and wrong at the same time. This isn’t about blaming one side. Some situations are just the result of circumstances, not fault. And if you actually watch the show because you care about the characters, you’ll understand that. The lack of communication from the previous episode clearly showed in the office scene this episode. Yildiz moved forward, trying to hold onto their promise to trust each other, to let their word be one. But he was still stuck in that moment. Not because he held grudge against her, but because he knows that one small action( her taking the gun) led to much bigger consequences. And they both know that. And most importantly they are exhausted! Everything started when he went to kordağli’s mansion last ep . Then M told him she would marry his enemy and give his child his name. Then his Ortak was shot, and he had to carry him to the hospital and operate on him while injured!(an injury that was caused my Aşir himself!) almost losing him. He broke down alone!! no one even saw that because this is how Serhat is used to be🙂‍↕️ Then he started suspecting his own brother. Then yilidz rose the gun in front of the other ağas and that’s when all the pressure and the responsibility of maintaining control and respect not just in his family, but as an Ağa, crushed him at once! Then Yıldız was jailed because of M & the next day it was confirmed that Akif shot Aşir and he discovered his betrayal with nida and hast to give his own brother to death! Because that’s what morally correct! And then Hicran First, she was someone he was supposed to protect cuz Aşir told him to protect her. Then suddenly, she is his sister. And just as quickly, she was dying. He found out his own mother was behind her suffering. He didn’t get time to process any of it. The guilt alone is enough to destroy someone. Knowing she was always there, part of his life, and he didn’t know. That he couldn’t protect her. That he couldn’t repay her. And it didn’t stop there… He lost his status. He was manipulated by M. He was pushed further and further. Then came the final blow Hicran’s brain death. And right after that, he had to face the reality of her being an organ donor. And then… her heart goes to her killer… Anyway, since you’re all acting like superhuman creatures and these situations wouldn’t affect you at all if you were in his place then go ahead, have at it.show more

Nelson Tugume, PLU and the Putinitication of Uganda’s Oligarchy... Yesterday, Mr Nelson Tugume, the much maligned Boss of the Africa Coffee Park in Ntungamo, with his own media entourage in tow, made an appearance at the head offices of PLU and made a very public show of supporting the PLU boss’ Presidential ambitions with what seemed like a poorly rehearsed, hastily delivered meandering speech. In short, he ditched his former godfather Mr Odrek Rwabwogo, figuratively bent the knee and kissed the ring of the CDF, General MK who also happens to be Mr Rwabwogo’s brother-in-law. He came promising jabs or is it jobs? (See video and make your own judgement) He promised to bring investors with potential to invest a trillion dollars. Don’t ask why he never went to them for his own investment but instead raised the coffers of a poor country. He promised to support the Supreme Leader. The only promise he didn’t make was turning water into wine. The desperation was that high that he might have been tempted to throw that into the mix. Anyway, the man can talk a good game! You could easily see why President Museveni and the people who handed him billions to “teach Ugandans how to drink coffee” were charmed. But don’t be fooled by those high-sounding nothings. Mr Tugume wasn’t at PLU to make an investment pitch. He went there for a transaction. He went to buy an insurance policy for his growing, recently acquired state funded wealth. The noises from some PLU insiders had grown too loud for his comfort. A few decibels louder and he would have followed his Godfather’s right hand man, Mr Matthew Bagonza, into the basement, via a very public nude show on Twitter. That is an ignominy he wasn’t willing to suffer. Mr Tugume is anything but a fool. He is, what in modern parlance, we call a “sharp man”. He knows that in a country where the state is not only your biggest funder and protector (he moves around with armed SFC guards) but also your biggest threat, strategic alignment is how you hedge against uncertain winds. Throw in uncertainty about transition and you immediately understand the need to align with the perceived next center of state coercive power. A smart businessman needs not wait for elections when the signals are already screaming “MK Presidency”. It’s a clever hedge; an insurance policy if you’d like. The price? A few banal words, public photographs shared in endless media loops, a signing of the PLU support pledge book (See frame 2). In exchange, he receives a public amnesty via Twitter from the man himself and a pledge to protect “his investments”. As risk management goes, this is a masterclass. But this game wasn’t invented here and it won’t end here. This whole state cash bonanza has the feel of the privatization heist by Oligarchs in the evening years of Boris Yeltsin’s reign in Russia. The only difference with Uganda’s reverse privatization happening today is that unlike here where supposed investors get boatloads of state cash, in Russia, they got state business conglomerates at the price of a song. As transition from Yeltsin to Vladimir Putin happened, they quickly had to adjust. They either faced a jail cell or keep the oil wells, steel conglomerates etc in exchange for recognizing the unchallenged power of the new sheriff in town. It’s all eerily similar to our case. On December 31 1999, an ailing Yeltsin who at the time probably had more vodka in his veins than blood, resigned and chose then Prime Minister and former KGB boss, Vladimir Putin as acting President. Mr Putin went on to win an election in May 2000 and the consolidation of power started in earnest. If you are long in the tooth like me, you might recall that famous July 2000 summit where President Putin made 21 of the most powerful Russian Oligarchs “a DEAL they couldn’t refuse”. These Oligarchs who had amassed so much wealth and had turned the Russian state into their own playground were asked to drop any political ambitions, funding for the opposition and stay out of state decision making in exchange for the right to remain “temporary custodians” of their wealth, gotten through massively corrupt privatization and “loans for shares” schemes. Those who refused like Boris Berezovsky, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Vladimir Gusinsky were asset stripped, jailed, exiled or died under mysterious circumstances; a suspiciously strategic high rise window here, a heart attack there serving as the quickest ticket to meetings with their maker. Anyway, back to Uganda, these “loans for shares” schemes have become mainstay. Think DEI Pharma, Atiak Sugar, Africa Coffee Park etc Any “investor” who can oil the system and ride into Mzee’s courtyard comes out with a truckload of state cash. Mr Nelson Tugume did this play just this a few years ago. He rode the coattails of the President’s son-in-law, Mr Odrek Rwabwogo, en-route to a $10 million windfall which then opened the funding floodgates for his coffee contraption or is it public finance soak pit (?) nestled in the Ntungamo hills. He “cleverly” diverted billions off of that $10 million, initially meant to serve as a funding pool for coffee exporters. He paid himself the bulk of the cash, dug up a litany of building foundations in Ntungamo, engaged a fierce media machine, sang the right patriotic songs, repeated Mzee’s favorite investment and development buzz words and he was off to the races. The soup kitchen of a welfare state has now become his personal piggy bank. Public Square unearthed a lot of that information. You can find some of it here: Anyway, with the recent political winds starting to blow in the direction of the first son’s presidential ambitions, Mr Tugume found himself in a precarious situation where sails had to be adjusted to align with these winds. What the country witnessed wasn’t really a decision rooted in patriotism and deep love for country. It was a “smart” business decision. Mr Tugume wasn’t the first and certainly won’t be the last to make it. The times, they’re interesting… Signed: #KalebuleHQ #TalkingCoffeeshow more

Blog 265 Diamondbacks first pitch ◦6-9: Gym, called parents,... posted walking videos ◦10: Reunited with MikeyBets and felt complete ◦10:45: Arrived at Chase Stadium and was welcomed by the awesome Diamondbacks staff (shoutout Casey Wilcox) and walked right through the dugout and onto the field ◦Also huge thank you to Mike Dellosa (VP of ticket sales) who answered my LinkedIn dm and helped get set this all up ◦10:55: MikeyBets setup his camera in the Diamondbacks dugout which was hilarious to watch (he was viciously hungover) ◦11: Met with lots of the Diamondbacks and A’s players and coaches while they warmed up on Chase Field. Frank was in his element cracking jokes and talking baseball with the fellas ◦Everyone was incredibly welcoming, humble, and fun. The Diamondbacks manager, Torey Lovullo, called Frank a fucking legend ◦We crushed walk 277 circling the field pregame as Frank tracked the Mets game ◦11:30: Practiced the first pitch. We needed to loosen up the cannon more than we did in Milwaukee ◦12: Took a little break behind the dugout for Frank to mentally prepare for pitch ◦12:40: Mets tied it up ◦12:43: Frank broke into a dance-off with the mascots ◦12:45: Frank walked out for yet another Ceremonial First Pitch at an MLB game. Solid pitch, not quite a strike but we are getting there. These moments are always surreal for all of Fleming Enterprises ◦To Frank’s surprise, Paul Sewald, a former Met who Frank regularly eviscerated caught the first pitch. Paul is clearly a great person with a tremendous sense of humor and he gave Frank a customized autograph saying “fuck your computer” 🐐 ◦Frank is living his dream for the world to see ◦1:06: National Anthem, they had Frank and me stand in line with the Diamondbacks which was insane ◦1:10: Game started and we were brought into a beautiful suite ◦1:20: Frank did a food review in the suite and everyone fell dead silent watching in amazement ◦1:45: Got full stadium tour which concluded with Frank watching some baseball from the pool in centerfield. Of course, MikeyBets jumped right in full body ◦2:22: Frank raw dogged in the stadium and mentioned the Mets were tied in a rain delay in the 9th ◦2:45: Settled into our seats and watched the Diamondbacks take the lead in the 7th ◦3:15: Finished filming with Bets behind the sticks ◦3:30: The game was an elite experience via the Diamondbacks red carpet treatment. We can’t thank you all enough and congrats on the win ◦3:45: Drove to raw dog in Phoenix laughing about the absurdly fun day ◦3:47: Mets game resumed and car got real tense real quick ◦4: Raw dogged in a small place with a loud strikeout, not awkward at all ◦4:16: Mets gave up three runs and died, as did the vibes. Frank lost it and the great day had turned ◦4:28: Connected with Notre Dame football 👀 #FrankWalks ◦4:45: Frank declared the Arizona state flag as the 🐐 ◦5: Said goodbye to MikeyBets (always hurts) who had a later flight and wanted to hit the casino. HIM ◦5:10: Went to Scottsdale Fashion Center to pad step count before the red eye home Walking now. After we hit 15K steps we’ll pop over to the airport for our red eye back to New Jersey. Thank you so much to Casey, Mike, and the Diamondbacks for welcoming Frank and delivering an unforgettable day. Weigh in 9 tomorrow morning after we land and go directly to Belleville HQ around 5-6 am. We are nervous. I already miss MikeyBets severely. Anudder adventure almost in the booksshow more

This post about bench press safety escaped containment and... got a lot of people commenting in disagreement that safeties/spotter arms would've saved him. And in truth, my language below was a little too absolute: safeties MIGHT have saved his life (though even if so, would not have prevented all damage), but it's far from certain that they would have, so I stand by the overall sentiment. I will explain in detail below. The spotter arms have to be set below the top of your arched chest or else they’ll interfere with every rep - you'll clang the bar on the safeties, which not only severely interrupts proper technique and performance, but can also be potentially injurious in its own right as the clanging against the safeties takes you out of the rhythm of the rep and leads to uneven and chaotic force application demands mid-rep. The safeties can’t be set a mere milimeter or even a half inch below the chest: both because most racks have 2-3 inch hole spacings that don't allow such finely calibrated setting, but even if they do - also because as a gross movement pattern, not a fine movement pattern, you can’t control the movement of the bar precisely and accurately enough not to clang the safeties if they’re so close to your chest. Human beings performing gross movement patterns simply lack such fine control: on heavy sets, the bar might be slightly uneven on one side, you might lose a touch of your arch over the course of the set, etc... and end up clanging the safeties anyway, if they're set so close to the top of your arched chest. These issues are not form errors that can be prevented with proper training, but are inherent limitations in the human capability to control gross motor pattern movements at a heavy weight. Thus, the safeties have to be far enough below your chest in order to not interfere with the set itself, such that they can’t possibly catch the bar before it hits your chest in the case of a sudden catastrophic drop. The proper placement for the safeties is far enough below your chest so as not to interfere with the normal execution of the set and so the bar never touches the safeties at all during the set, even with the inherent human limitations of gross motor pattern control. But high enough such tha - if you find yourself unable to successfully press the bar to lockout - you can bring the bar under control back down to your chest, exhale and drop your arch, and the bar will ideally now rest on the safeties instead of your chest and you can crawl and slither out from under it. Worst case, you can roll the bar slightly upwards and the safeties will soon take it, well before it would lie on your neck. I have an example of using the safeties this way in the video below, with 485 lbs. The ability to set this position with precision and accuracy depends on the equipment you're using: Some racks/benches have 1 inch spacings for this purpose, which is excellent and allows greater precision in safety placement, but most common racks have 2-3 inches between holes and thus people must often have the safeties a little lower than they'd ideally be. The main point is the proper use and purpose of safeties in the bench press is not really to catch a very rare catastrophic sudden drop onto your chest, but to allow you to survive the much more common situation of a normal failed rep. Could they theoretically save your life in such a situation where you drop it? Yes, they might. They won't stop the bar before it hits your chest but they might reduce the impact by stopping the bar from going further down and reducing the impact. This may or may not save your life in this rare catastrophic drop situation - it's good to have them there, set up anyway, but it's far from a sure bet. The most important things you can do are to learn and practice good technique, which involves stiff wrists in a very slightly bent back position, and thumbs around the barbell - NO SUICIDE GRIP. The safeties won't catch the bar and stop it from hitting your chest, so it's best to reduce the chances of dropping the bar on your chest from almost zero to even closer to almost zero. I've been bench pressing regularly for well over 20 years, always put my thumbs around the bar, and have never dropped it on myself. Nor has anyone I have coached to the best of my memory, over tens of thousands of sets and hundreds of thousands of reps. I have used safeties to successfully avoid getting trapped under the bar after a failed rep. In the video below, I tweaked my pec while pushing through a rep at 485 and had to set the bar on the pins to avoid getting trapped under it. This kind of situation is the primary use for the safeties. It's good to have them set up regardless - they might indeed save you if you somehow still manage to drop the bar, but they also very well might not.show more