Cold Dot Elementalist gaming

traeger's are smokers (and grills) and they have temperature probes that you can connect to an app to monitor things for long cooks to see if you need to add pellets or increase/reduce the heat. it's pretty convenient tbf

the smoke detector scene was in his apartment

The ending wasn't great but it was a fun watch in general.

coming out of my lurking quarantine to comment on this episode/season:

Things I liked:

• Character development as a whole was pretty decent. They touched a lot on toxic masculinity. I like that Hughie seems to have learned that he doesn't need to be physically strong to support the ones he loves and that sometimes it's okay to just be there for people in other ways, like his father was for him. I like that Butcher finally put other people above his own personal interests (but I will come back to this). I like that MM seems to have let go of his grudge and opened up to his daughter. Frenchie stood up to Butcher (I hate how they made it a joke, but that's Amazon). Ashley's quiet protest by deleting the Maeve footage was nice, too. Annie using her platform/voice instead of physical strength. I obviously think force is useful when necessary, but there's something to be said about standing up for things even when you physically can't.

• The continued paralleling to real world politics has been amusing. Homelander having his 'I could shoot a man on Fifth Avenue' moment. Soldier Boy being a walking propaganda piece much like the Model GIs of the 40s. Todd being your typical suburban lib-turned-chud because he feels like Homelander is speaking to him, yet Homelander would find him disgusting and unworthy of his attention, which mirrors the relationship between politicians and their supporters, though specifically Trump.

• Kimiko embracing her powers. This one is admittedly a little selfish. A depowered Kimiko running off with Frenchie and getting a happy ending would be nice, but I love Karen Fukuhara and I want her to stick around, and I think her getting her powers back was the only way for this to be feasible.

• A-Train getting put in his place by both Ashley, and his brother. Character is a real piece of shit.

• The Deep doing something useful for the first time in ages. I hate this character, he's a disgusting sex pest and a rapist, and deserves to get murdered, and the comic relief aspect is wearing thin with the octopus gag. But if they're going to keep him around, at least have him do things that advance the plot.

There's probably more, but this is getting longwinded and I haven't even gotten to....

The things I didn't like:

• Butcher might have had a growth moment, but it was shortsighted. Homelander is an existential threat and should be treated as such. Scorched earth means scorched earth.
• Black Noir finally getting character development, only to have him unceremoniously killed. The character is a mess and not a good person, but it just felt kind of wasted to not at least have a Soldier Boy confrontation.
• Soldier Boy's arc felt kind of like a pointless circle. They didn't really accomplish anything with him, and the most redeeming aspect is that Jensen Ackles playing an asshole was fun to watch. But he's ultimately right back to where he began and it feels like a somewhat lazy 'in case of emergency, break glass' moment.
• The classic trope of hot headed characters doing something stupid instead of just talking. If Butcher had told Soldier Boy about Becca/Ryan and such, there's at least a chance he'd be like "Alright I won't bash the brats brains in" and they could've done their fucking job and killed the genocidal maniac.
• The absolutely wild inconsistencies in Homelander's strength. We've seen the man move so fast he was able to save Butcher from an explosion. They've mentioned him being unable to be killed even with nukes. Yet Hughie on Temp V was able to throw him, and Maeve beat the shit out of him. With the Soldier Boy MacGuffin on ice, I really don't know how they're going to tackle him in the end.
• Maeve throwing the deadliest neurotoxin in the planet into the middle of downtown Manhattan without consequence. I won't be as mad if this actually gets brought up next season, but I feel like it'll be forgotten.
• We spent like 2 minutes watching Starlight power up just so she could accomplish what Maeve or Butcher would've accomplished with one good shove. I know she's not supposed to be incredibly powerful, but that moment could've been handled much better. If it was what broke Soldier Boy's shield, or if he actually got knocked down long enough for people to make it over and gas him, it would've looked way less pathetic.

Mostly I just felt like this season did very little to advance the plot. Homelander has Ryan, Maeve is depowered, Starlight is out of the Seven, and Noir is (allegedly) dead. But really, it feels like they're back to square one with an increasingly unhinged Homelander and no way to deal with him.

i wasn't aware of that actually, just read the court file. big fucking oof.

he used to do work as a coyote afaik. so technically, yes, but i feel like 'human trafficker' has different connotations.

edit: and apparently some other shit that i was not aware of that can be found by looking up Justin King's (his real name) court case.

♥

whatever you need to tell yourself to drink your vinegar milk

kefir tastes like it's spoiled and i've never seen someone drink it without making a scrunched-up face after. nobody actually likes it, you're all just pretending because it's good for you. i refuse to believe anything otherwise

there's a bit of a PR battle with Disney publicly opposing the Don't Say Gay law in Florida.

will smith is an insane scientologist that started a school to indoctrinate children into scientology with his equally insane wife who sleeps with her son's teenage friends.

they're both awful people.

it blows my mind that we're like a month into this conflict and there are still people that don't seem to understand why it's happening.

sounds like it's time for experimenting!!

dehydrate slices of tomato, grind them into a powder, and add them to your gnocchi dough 😎

i agree, but a lot of people that look up recipes aren't the type of people that cook often and a little guidance is a good idea.

i assume they're intending for you to use one of those shaker things and just kinda 'shake' out 4 'dashes' of the seasoning. this is however, ridiculous and no way to actually give ingredient measurements for any recipe.

it is barely a position of power, and yes, it is indicative of where the left is politically.

not really relatable. unpaid internships are usually done as some bullshit exercise to get free labor under the guise that they might later be hired. a voluntary internet cop knows full well their job is and always will be unpaid, and voluntary. if they're not okay with that, they don't have to be an internet cop. it's not difficult.

texas' official dish is chili con carne, which traditionally uses larger chunks of something like a chuck roast or other stewing cuts, and doesn't include tomatoes. it's usually a 'sauce' made of toasted and pureed peppers and stock.

that said, i like beans in my chili and i do like the tomatoe-y, vegetable filled version. they're not wrong though, it's just a different (and older, really) recipe.