side blog

final version:

·         We’re closer to having successful vaccines for lung and brain cancer.

·         New chemotherapy breakthroughs have increased the 5-year survival for pancreatic cancer from 16% to 27% (and is getting better)

·         Scientists figured out how to link robotic limbs with the part of the brain that deals with intent to move so people don’t have to think about how they will move the limb, it can just happen.

·         Child mortality is down everywhere and it keeps going down.

·         Thanks to the ice bucket challenge the gene responsible for ALS has been found, meaning we are closer to an effective treatment. Let me rephrase that: we are close to getting a treatment for a very bad disease because a lot of people (including really hot celebrities) got wet.

·         A solar powered plan circumnavigated the world.

·         Michael Jordan donates 2mil to try and help bridge connection between police and the community.

·         Tiger numbers are growing.

·         And manatees.

·         And pandas.

·         Pakistan has made strides toward outlawing honor killings.

·         70,000 Muslim clerics declared a fatwa against ISIS.

·         Pokemon Go players went insane with placing lure modules near hospitals for sick kids.

·         California is now powering over 6 million homes with solar power, a record in the US (and that is the tightest shit)

·         Volunteers in India planted 50 million trees in 24 hours.

·         Apparently world crime as a whole has drastically declined as a whole in the last couple of decades.

·         Coffee consumption has been proved to help curtail cancer and suicide rates.

·         Speaking of coffee Starbucks figured out how to donate perishable food in a food safe way.

·         500 elephants were relocated to a better, safer and bigger home.

·         We made massive strides in Alzheimers’ prevention (my grandmother literally told me that scares her more than getting cancer this is very good news)

·         The ozone layer is repairing itself and all the work we did to get rid of those aerosol chemicals was actually worth it.

·         A new therapy developed in Israel could cure radiation sickness.

·         The Anglican church resolved to solemnize same-sex unions the same as opposite-sex unions which required a super majority of all three orders of the church (lay, clergy, bishop).

·         The Rabbinical Assembly issued a resolution affirming the rights of transgender and non-conforming individuals.

·         Precision treatments for cancer are hitting clinical trials and WORKING (as someone who’s had relatives with cancer this is the best news)

·         Dentists are once again providing free care to veterans who need it.

·         The Orlando Shakespeare Festival showed up with angel wings to block funeral-goers for the Orlando Pulse victims, view from anti-gay protesters

·         We may have cured MS

·         Rise Women’s Legal Centre opened

·         Death by heart disease has decreased by 70% in the United States

·         Two brothers saw color for the first time thanks to specially-designed glasses

·         Pope Francis spoke against society’s obsession with physical beauty while dedicating Mass to the disabled community (love that dude)

·         Portugal ran its entire nation solely on renewable energy for four days straight

·         A retiree is launching a project to transport 80 endangered rhinos to an Australian reservation to save the animals from poaching

·         An Afghan teacher has been delivering books via bicycle to villages that lack schools

·         Harriet Tubman is going to replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill.

·         200 strangers attended the funeral of a homeless WW2 veteran with no family

·         A teen battling cancer married his sweetheart

·         Bank firm pays for college tuition for the children of employees who died in the 9/11 attacks

·         New medicine has been shown to increase melanoma survival rate to 40%

·         Over 800 Boko Harem Hostages were rescued by Nigerian Army

·         Toys R Us is Offering Quiet Shopping Hour for kids with autism this holiday season

·         Volunteers made special tiny Halloween costumes for NICU babies

·         A 4-year old befriends a lonely man and helped him heal after losing his wife

·         Families grew

·         People survived c ancer

·         People overcame depression

·         Any kind of victory, even if it affects only one person,  is a victory

·         Now for the pop culture good news

·         LEONARDO DICAPRIO WON AN OSCAR! EVERYONE READING THIS LIVED LONG ENOUGH TO SEE LEO FINALLY GET WHAT HE DESERVED

·         There’s a new Harry Potter book

·         And a movie

·         Harry Potter has no plans on vanishing with time

·         This sweet father gave candy to passengers on a flight so his little girl could trick or treat on Halloween

·         LET ME TALK ABOUT ALL THE KICK ASS MOVIES WE GOT THIS YEAR OH MY GOD

·         Kung Fu Panda 3, this franchise is still going strong despite that its about a panda played by Jack Black

·         Jungle Book. The amazing remake none of us saw coming

·         Finding Dory. I haven’t seen it yet but I’ve heard good things

·         Kubo and the Two Strings. Haven’t seen that yet as well but its Laika so I know it’s a masterpiece

·         Deadpool. The beautiful and super accurate R-rated marvel film

·         Captain America: Civil War. Seriously is the best marvel movie yet in my opinion I need more.

·         Zootopia. Oh don’t mind me I’m just a movie that tackled the issue of racism and not only game changed animated films but also made a billion dollars

·         The Hamilton Mixtape is coming out. Which is a bunch of artists singing songs from the musical (Sia, Usher, Regina Spketor, etc.) I’m excited.

·         A personal victory for myself, I joined Tumblr and met angels in blog form so…that’s uplifting.

·         And I met my favorite voice actor at a con which was a bucket list accomplishment.

Good Things that have yet to happen this year

·         Birthdays

·         Doctor Strange

·         Thanksgiving

·         Black Friday

·         Moana

·         Christmas

Good things that have nothing to do with the year but will hopefully make you feel better

·         Puppies

·         Chocolate

·         Rainbows

·         Rain (I like listening to rain it’s one of the most calming sounds)

·         Cartoons

·         Kissing

·         Music

·         Friends

·         FF: If you are a religious person you are an imperfect masterpiece

·         FF: If you are not then you are a splendid coincidence

·         Any year spent with loved ones be they family or friends is a good year. Trust me.

·         ”A laugh can be a very powerful thing. Why, sometimes in life, it’s the only weapon we have” –Roger Rabbit

#NeverForgetTheGood

Donald Trump stood there for 90 minutes and yelled belligerently into his microphone. Twenty minutes into the debate his sentences were incoherent and, as he is so skilled at doing, he managed to never actually answer the questions thrown his way, unless he was called out on it and given even more time to actually respond with something relevant to the topic at hand.

And yet here we are. The debate is over, Hillary has clearly won and shown the American people want an actual President should look like, and people still aren’t convinced. Hillary has been at this job for THIRTY YEARS. And yet, she still suffers from this ‘likability’ thing thanks to the GOP propaganda that has been smearing her name since the beginning of her career.

“But she’s a liar!” “She’s hiding something!” “She’s keeping secrets!”

Bullshit. Hillary Clinton is a high-ranking government official. Of fucking course she’s keeping secrets, that’s her damn job. If we knew ever last thing that ever went down in the State Department, we’d all shit ourselves. Those are just your own shitty excuses for not voting for her because she wasn’t your first option in the primaries. What, exactly, do people think will happen if Hillary becomes President? What would be the terrible awful outcome of that? I have never actually heard, specifically, what she would do that would ruin our country beyond repair. We all know what Trump would do. It’s his fucking platform, he’s not trying to hide anything there. But no one can actually lay out specifics on what makes Hillary so scary, other than the fact that she’s overly qualified for the job she’s being interviewed for.

I want everyone to know what Hillary Clinton did tonight. It isn’t just that she ‘won’ the debate; Democratic presidential candidates have been winning these debates on substance since 1980 and often, it doesn’t help them in the election. She went in there tonight with two objectives: 1) make people warm up to her personally and 2) make Donald Trump self-destruct. Donald Trump’s objective was to make people believe that he is a grown-up, or at least that he can pretend to be a grown-up for ninety minutes. 

I knew how it was going to go down as soon as she said, “Donald, it’s good to be with you.” I knew for two reasons. First: because she really meant it. She was genuinely pleased to be on a stage with him. And it’s not because she likes him. It’s because she knew she was going to fuck him up and she knew exactly how she was going to do it and she was really looking forward to it.  

Second: she called him Donald. She called him Donald all night long. Consistently and deliberately and for three good reasons. One: it reminds everyone that he has never held a position that gives him any right to a title other than “Mr.” Two: it seems friendly, but it also really pisses him off. And three: By calling him Donald, she avoided repeating his brand name.

This is the level on which Clinton and her team are working. Donald Trump has staked everything on his last name–the name he inherited from his father. It’s Trump this, Trump that, Trump the other. When he puts his name on a thing, it doesn’t say Donald anywhere, it just says TRUMP. TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP. Trump is a good brand name. It’s a noun, it’s a verb, it’s triumphant-sounding. “Donald” has none of those qualities. If she’d been calling him “Mr. Trump,” every time she said it, she would be advertising the Trump brand, which is of course the exact opposite of what she’s there to do. So she called him Donald. And he could not take it.

Without losing her temper, raising her voice, or descending to his level, she made that bastard reveal himself to the Jedi. She brought up things that are going to seem completely unsympathetic to voters, but of which Trump himself is really proud: like not paying any federal taxes (”That makes me smart,” Trump said), stiffing his contractors (”Maybe they didn’t do good work,” Trump said; “I took advantage of the laws,” Trump said), his repeated bankruptcies, the $14 million loan from his father (”A very small loan,” Trump called it). She noted that he exploited the housing crisis for personal gain (”That’s called business,” Trump said). She called him out for his racism; he responded by proving that she’s right (Trump, apparently, is aggrieved that he did not get a medal for opening a club that did not discriminate against Black people even though it was in a really nice part of Florida). When he made what to me was a cryptic jab about her “staying home” while he was traveling, she just smiled and said, “I think Donald just criticized me for preparing for this debate. And yes, I did. You know what else I prepared for? I prepared to be President. And I think that’s a good thing.”

He tried to talk over her. She ignored him. That was beautiful. One, because it’s exactly the way Trump should be treated, all the time; and two, because it made him even madder. His inability to get a rise out of her made him lose his mind. This is a man who wants to be President of the United States. And he spent an entire 2-minute segment begging people to call Sean Hannity so he could vouch for the fact that Trump was always against the Iraq war. Nobody would talk to Sean Hannity, he complained. Why would no one talk to Sean Hannity?

She was capable of actually remembering the original question and getting around to answering it after dealing with the human distraction standing next to her. He often seemed to completely forget the question seconds into his answer. At times, he was so busy talking over the moderator that he didn’t even hear the question. 

Hillary Clinton has been dealing with entitled, narcissistic, patronizing, asshole men her entire life as a Senator and as Secretary of State. She has skills in this area. She used them all tonight; and she enjoyed doing it. She looked like she was at ease, confident, and having a great time. She looked young. That was the way I put it to Mrs. Plaidder, and she agreed. She looked fresh, and energized, and exhilarated by the challenge. And that only made Trump’s “stamina” bullshit seem even dumber.

She stayed focused, despite his distractions. She dropped every bomb she came to drop at exactly the right moment. She used everything he bragged about against him. She made him too mad to put together a coherent sentence. And she smiled.

We knew she could to the job. We now know she can win this election.

During, I believe, the 2012 presidential election, people used to pass around a photo of Obama pointing forcefully at the camera with the caption, “Everybody chill the fuck out. I got this.” 

link

Niantic has also altered a bunch of things to somehow be worse in the new update including:

 removal of ALL footsteps instead of fixing the 3 step glitch

 decrease in spawn rate for all pokemon

 increase in fleeing rate for all pokemon

 pokeballs now are altered slightly so throwing niche mechanics must be re-learned and will now sometimes curve without prompting

 battery saver mode removed because why not lol

 nice/great/excellent catch bonus exp removed

 certificate pinning (WHY)

 scan radius for pokemon reduced by 30% so you see even less at any given time

removed any descriptions of the tracking mechanism from their website to prevent people from getting refunds

introduced a new (minor) update on iOS within hours of the last, presumably to wipe away the 1 star ratings on the current version