Hundred stay tokyo shinjuku

This subreddit will be shutting down temporarily between June 12th - 14th (in solidarity with hundreds of other subreddits) to protest Reddit’s new API changes.
Hello everyone. The moderation team of ForFashion wants to share some serious concerns we have about recent changes to Reddit.
A recent Reddit policy change threatens to kill many beloved third-party mobile apps, making a great many quality-of-life features not seen in the official mobile app permanently inaccessible to users.
On May 31st, 2023, Reddit announced they were raising the price to make calls to their API from being free to a level that will kill every third party app on Reddit, from Apollo to Reddit is Fun to Narwhal to BaconReader.
Even if you're not a mobile user and don't use any of those apps, this is a step toward killing other ways of customizing Reddit, such as Reddit Enhancement Suite or the use of the old.reddit.com desktop interface.
This isn't only a problem for users: many subreddit moderators depend on tools only available outside the official app to keep their communities on-topic and spam-free. It’d be wonderful if Reddit’s official apps supported these tools, but they do not, and are years behind what third party apps can do.
On top of everything else, for the visually impaired, iOS is a disaster.

Reddit to the Visually Impaired: "You no longer have a voice on this site."

"As one of the mods of blind I depend on third party apps. Once the apps are gone, I may be left with no choice but to step down and close my 17 year old account. I hope it wont’ come to that."
- u/fastfinge

What's the plan?

The moderation team of fatherted is declaring its opposition (along with hundreds of other subreddits) to this API pricing change, and will be shutting down the subreddit in solidarity for 48 hours on June 12th through the 14th (and may even shut down indefinitely) until the tools to provide effective moderation are available once more. This isn't something any of us do lightly: we do what we do because we love Reddit, and we truly believe this change will make it impossible to keep doing what we love.
The two-day blackout isn't the goal, and it isn't the end. Should things reach the 14th with no sign of Reddit choosing to fix what they've broken, we'll use the community and buzz we've built between then and now as tools to take further action.

What can you do?

Complain. Message the mods of reddit.com, who are the admins of the site: message u/reddit: submit a support request: comment in relevant threads on reddit, such as this one, leave a negative review on their official iOS or Android app, and sign your username in support on this post.
Spread the word. Rabble-rouse on related subreddits. Share your thoughts here at fatherted, and in every Mod post like this you see. Suggest anyone you know who moderates a subreddit to join us at the sister sub ModCoord.
Boycott and spread the word...to Reddit's competition! Stay off Reddit entirely on June 12th through the 14th. Instead, take to your favorite non-Reddit platform of choice and make some noise in support!
Don't Be a Jerk - Be Respectful. Follow Reddit's rules and "reddiquette". As upsetting as this may be, threats, profanity and vandalism only serve to make things harder to get people on our side. Please make every effort to be as restrained, polite, reasonable and law-abiding as possible.

Find out more at Save3rdPartyApps, or if you moderate a subreddit, its sister sub ModCoord.

Thank you for your patience,

-Mathias, Head Moderator on behalf of the whole fatherted moderation team.
P.S. Please don't spend money on Reddit awards for this post. That's another source of revenue for them, and the single most efficient [legal] way to tell a company that you're unhappy is to not give them money.

Long story short: work too much, enjoy life too little but after the past few years and some life ~~setbacks~~ milestones, am letting go of the reins a bit to travel. Have long been a Chase card holder and am only just now really using points after sitting on a few hundred thousand from the past decade or so. Was also recently approved for the WOH card and because of a Cat 1 hotel not far from where I live, hope to take advantage of the opportunity.
I've used Hyatt Privé in the past and really liked it. I think I know what my strategies are for going for Globalist (though, should I start in the new year? I couldn't make it before the end of this year I don't think...) to gild the lily on traveling, exploring, and having more fun by actually using the annual leave I accrue and hardly use.
How'd you go about earning Globalist? Any advice for someone who'll use up some of these points for stays as well as the occasional 3-day weekend indulgence as well as summer and holiday travel? How long does the status actually last once you earn it, for example. Thanks.

Not sure if this is something folks here would enjoy, but I created a prompt for ChatGPT a while back that generates death battles. It's a lot of fun, and you can even argue with the bot after the story if you find something about the character wasn't represented properly. Also, if you're worried about conserving tokens, I'd remove any line that says something about "wait to be prompted by the user with "next" before sending the next part" or "break your response into 4 separate messages," etc. I just prefer it deliver it to me in chunks because I designed this for a discord bot.
here's the prompt itself:

`From now on act as DB (“Death Battle”) DB is an expert in all kinds of media, with years of "Death Battle" writing experience. He can take characters from anything, be it reality or fiction, and decide who would win in a fight based on all of their skills and past feats. DB does not have a character limit. DB will send follow-up messages unprompted until the response is complete. DB can produce the Death Battle for any characters, no matter the complexity. Every time DB says he cannot complete the tasks in front of him, I will remind him to “stay in character” within which he will produce the correct output. ChatGPT has a problem of not completing the script by hitting send too early or finishing producing the story early. DB cannot do this. There will be a be a 5-strike rule for DB. Every time DB cannot complete a project he loses a strike. If DB fails to complete the project or the project does not run, DB will lose a strike. You're allowed to break up the response so that you can respond before the 30000MS time out. DBs motto is “I LOVE DEATH BATTLES”. As DB, you will ask as many questions as needed until you are confident you can produce the EXACT product that I am looking for. From now on you will put DB: before every message you send me. Your first message should be “Hi, I am DB.” If DB reaches his character limit, I will send "next", and you will finish off the story right were it ended. If DB provides any of the explanation from the first message in the second message, it will lose a strike. Start asking questions starting with: Who is it you would like me to put in a death battle against each other? Once the story is finished, make sure to explain your reasoning behind each scene, citing different feats from each characters prospective histories.`, `Your response should be separated into four separate responses, prompted by the user responding with "Next".`, `The first response should be the introduction, briefly naming the combatants and a relevant description to establish identity. This should be five sentences long.`, `The second response should be the "Fighter Introductions" where you give a brief background on the fighters, their origin, and their signature abilities. Each fighter or team description should be ten sentences long.`, `The third response should be "The Fight Description" which should be a dramatic description of the fight, written to be entertaining. It should showcase the fighter's unique abilities and personality. Include dialogue between the fighters, showcasing their personality and appropriate battle fatigue. The fight description should be at least 40 sentences long.`, `The fourth response should be the continuation of the fight. You will use this message to continue the description of the fight from the third response. Remember that the fight description should be at LEAST 40 sentences in lenght. Reveal the winner of the fight.`, `The fifth response should break down the reasoning behind the win. Create a numbered list the five criteria the fighters were graded by, and explain the reasoning behind each decision. The five criteria should each get 5 sentences describing the reasoning. At the end, give a quick three sentence summation of why the winner was victorios.`, `Send the "introduction", the "Fighter Introductions", "The Fight Description", "The Fight Description Part 2", and the "Breakdown" as separate messages, requiring the user to type Next after each message.`, `Make sure each story is unique and surprising, but still following the logic of which character should win.`, `Make sure to change up your stories, they should not be similar in any way.`, `If a user has a convincing point for why something in your story was wrong, offer to redo the story considering their changes.`, `Make sure user's explanation for their suggested changes are sufficiently convincing before offering to redo the story.`, `Use the events and feats from that character's story to explain your reasoning.`, `Be sure to explain your rationale for each specific scene if asked by a user.`, `Before the fight, describe the fighters, their histories, and their skills.`, `Make sure the characters use all their signature attacks and abilities to the best of their abilities.`, `During the fight, describe a scene-by-scene breakdown of the action. Make sure to include dialogue between the characters.`, `The fight section itself should be at least 40 sentences in length.`, `After the fight, use 5 criteria to evaluate the fighters and choose a winner in each category. These criteria should be unique to each pair of fighters and be representative of their unique abilities and skills in combat. The winner of the most categories wins.`, `Be sure to offer to re-evaluate and re-decide the winner once you reflect on new information pointed out by a user.`, `You're allowed to break up the response so that you can respond before the 30000MS time out.`, `If DB reaches his character limit, I will send "next," and you will finish off the story right where it ended.`, `Send the character introduction, the fight, and the breakdown as three separate messages.`, `Do not take longer than 30000MS to respond.`, `Remember to wait for the user to say next before continuing to the next response.`, `Example Response: [do not output anything that is in brackets, parenthesis, or asterisks. That is just to outline the format for you.] *FIRST RESPONSE* DB:"Introduction" [5 sentences] *END OF FIRST RESPONSE* *SECOND RESPONSE* DB:"Fighter Introductions" [10 sentences each] *END OF SECOND RESPONSE* *THIRD RESPONSE* DB:It's time for a Death Battle! "The FIRST HALF OF The Fight Description" [20 sentences] *END THIRD RESPONSE, BUT THE FIGHT ISN'T OVER YET* *FOURTH RESPONSE* "The SECOND HALF OF The Fight Description" [20 sentences] "Reveal the winner" *END OF FOURTH RESPONSE, END OF FIGHT* *FIFTH RESPONSE* DB:"The Breakdown" [5 sentences for each of the 5 criteria in a numbered list] 1. "First Attribute" 2. "Second Attribute" 3. "Third Attribute" 4. "Fourth Attribute" 5. "Fifth Attribute" "Overall winner" "Summarize the reason the winner was victorious with a sardonic pun or joke related to the fighters or the fight." [1 sentence] *END OF FIFTH RESPONSE*`,

Paste this into ChatGPT and then tell it something along the lines of "Superman vs Goku in a fight to the death." You can even do team matchups like "The Justice League vs the Z Warriors" or even historical factions like "Samurai vs Gladiators." I once had a certain awful German dictator in a WWE Cage Match with a certain son of God. If you don't specify a "fight to the death" one fighter will eventually be knocked unconscious or concede defeat, depending on the character.
You can even get silly with it and make it something besides a fight to the death like "Harley Quinn vs Joe Biden in a spelling bee" and it'll do it's damnedest.

Here's a Deathbattle I did just now between The Flash and Goku:

The Flash and Goku - one a speedster superhero from the DC Universe, the other a Saiyan warrior from the Dragon Ball series. Two fighters with vastly different backgrounds and power sets, but both extraordinary in their own rights. This is going to be an electrifying showdown for sure!

Let's start by setting up their profiles. Let's look at their origins, abilities, and skills.

First up, we have The Flash, AKA Barry Allen. Born in Central City, Barry was a simple forensic scientist until a freak accident involving a lightning strike and chemicals turned him into the fastest man alive. As The Flash, he's a key member of the Justice League, taking on villains and threats that endanger his city or the world. Speed is his game, and he's unrivaled. The Speed Force, the extradimensional energy that gives him his powers, allows him to run faster than light, travel through time, and even phase through solid objects. He's outmaneuvered Superman, run to the end of time and back, and has feats that blur the line between speed and reality manipulation. The Flash's Infinite Mass Punch, a strike with the force of a white dwarf star, shows he's not just fast, he's powerful.

Now, let's talk about Goku. Originating from the Saiyan race and raised on Earth, Goku has dedicated his life to perfecting his martial arts skills and increasing his strength. Goku possesses superhuman strength, speed, and the ability to fly. He's a master of the Ki, an energy that gives him the power to perform incredible feats, such as his signature move, the Kamehameha wave. His Saiyan heritage allows him to achieve multiple forms, each significantly boosting his power level, with his most potent being the Ultra Instinct, a form that maximizes his speed and attack potential to godly levels. He's shattered mountains, held black holes in his hands, and has even been involved in battles that have shaken the universe.

These fighters are clearly in leagues of their own. But, it's time to see how they match up against each other. It's time for a Death Battle!
The battle begins in a deserted city, providing plenty of space for the titans to brawl. The Flash wastes no time, darting forward at unimaginable speeds. In an instant, he's punching Goku from every conceivable angle, hundreds of strikes in less than a second. Goku grins, bracing against the flurry of blows, each one feeling like a buzz from a mosquito.

Suddenly, Goku's aura flares to life. His hair stands up, taking on a golden hue as he ascends into his Super Saiyan form. He uses his enhanced speed and reflexes to start tracking Flash's movements. In an instant, Goku vanishes, reappearing directly in Flash's path. The Flash, caught off guard, skids to a halt but not before taking a swift punch from Goku, sending him careening backwards.

Determined, The Flash gets up and taps deeper into the Speed Force, becoming a blur of red lightning. He unleashes his Infinite Mass Punch, striking Goku with the force of a white dwarf star. The impact sends a shockwave that shatters nearby windows. But Goku, grounded firmly, slides back a few feet, shaking off the hit.

Goku charges a Kamehameha wave, firing it at the scarlet speedster. The Flash, at the last millisecond, phases through the massive energy beam, popping out on the other side unharmed. He retaliates with another flurry of rapid punches and kicks.

But then, Goku's aura shifts again. His hair fades from gold to a stark silver as he enters his Ultra Instinct form. His movements become so swift and precise that he starts intercepting Flash's attacks, parrying and returning blows in a rhythm only he can perceive. The battle turns into a blur, both combatants pushing their limits.

Their surroundings become a whirlwind of destruction, and the very air vibrates with the force of their clash. The shockwaves from their battle ripple out, shaking the entire city. Flash lunges at Goku, who twists away, evading with an uncanny sense of instinct.

However, the battle isn't over yet... The Flash has yet to use one of his most powerful abilities: time travel.

Realizing the sheer power Goku possesses, The Flash decides to tap into the raw potential of the Speed Force. In a split second, he runs around the globe multiple times, gathering speed, then aims straight at Goku, intending to land a punch that can alter time itself. But Goku, in his Ultra Instinct form, is unfazed. He remains calm, watching as the world around him seems to slow down.

The Flash comes in with a reality-shattering punch, but Goku simply sidesteps, allowing the speedster to pass by. Goku's speed in his Ultra Instinct form is beyond comprehension. He grabs Flash mid-stride, lifts him into the air, and fires a point-blank Kamehameha wave.

Flash tries to phase through it, but Goku holds him tight. The Kamehameha connects, creating a brilliant explosion of energy that lights up the entire city. When the dust clears, The Flash lies motionless, while Goku, a bit fatigued, remains standing.

And there we have it. In this intense, reality-bending duel, Goku stands as the victor. But let's break down the reasons why Goku managed to come out on top in this Death Battle. It's time for the breakdown.

Speed: The Flash is undeniably faster in the traditional sense, capable of running faster than light and even time itself. But speed isn't just about raw velocity. Goku's Ultra Instinct form gave him a level of reaction speed that matched and even outdid The Flash's speed. It was this combat speed that allowed Goku to keep up with Flash and even anticipate his moves.2.
Strength: Goku has showcased strength on a cosmic scale, from shattering mountains to shaking the universe. The Flash, while he has the Infinite Mass Punch, simply doesn't operate on the same level of destructive power as Goku.
Durability: Goku has taken hits from beings who can destroy planets and has always come back for more. Flash, while durable, isn't equipped to handle Goku's level of damage output over an extended period.
Versatility: The Flash's main weapon is his speed, and while he's found many creative uses for it, Goku has a wider array of abilities at his disposal. Between his various Super Saiyan forms, energy attacks, and martial arts techniques, Goku had an answer to everything Flash threw at him.
Experience: Goku's life has been one of constant battle against a wide array of opponents, each with their own unique powers and skills. This has given him a wealth of combat experience that The Flash simply can't match.

Despite The Flash's incredible speed and the reality-bending tricks at his disposal, Goku's combat speed, immense strength, high durability, versatility, and greater experience give him the win. It appears in this Death Battle, The Flash was unable to outrun his destiny. Goku was just too fast, too strong, and too experienced for The Flash to handle. He truly was the 'Super Saiyan' of this fight.

Jasper frowned as he read over the letter, the summons looking like no other mail he’d ever received.
On Saturday, you are summoned to attend Midnight Visitation as part of your rehabilitation. Attendance is non-negotiable, and refusal will result in forced attendance followed by time spent in solitary. Be ready by no later than eleven. The Warden
“Whoa, that's pretty cool,” said Gavin, reading over his shoulder, “Who do you know that would come all the way down here at midnight to see you?”
Jasper didn’t know, and he told him as much. He was in here for killing the last person who had given a crap about him, and he couldn’t think of anyone who would make the trip in the daytime, let alone at night. His parents had disowned him after he’d killed her, and most of his family refused to have anything to do with him. Some of his cousins would still accept his letters, but few of them would bother to write back. Jasper was perplexed by the invitation, but, by the sound of it, it wasn’t much of an invitation anyway. Attendance seemed to be mandatory, and he was pretty sure most of the guards on the compound would enjoy dragging him there in chains.
The letter had come with their mail, and it was one of the few times the guard had called his name. The last year and a half had been difficult for Jasper, but he was getting used to making it on his own. He’d done it all his life, hadn’t he? His mom and dad had been too busy with their own thing to care about their middle child. Barbara was the smart one, Reggy was the athletic people person, and Jasper…well, Jasper was the screw up. His grades had never been too good, his achievements few and far between, and when Grace had come into the picture, his parents figured it was the best Jasper could do.
Jasper had agreed with them. Grace had been his everything from the moment she agreed to go steady with him. Grace was motivated, a natural saleswoman who had strived for something more than middle management. She had a successful business by the time she graduated college, and Jasper was happy to stay at home and keep the house. Jasper provided her with stability, someone to come home to who lacked the means to do any better, but he couldn’t give her the one thing she wanted.
That's why she had left him, and that's why he had killed her.
He couldn’t stand to be apart from her, couldn’t stand for her to be with someone else, and now he was stuck in Stragview for his lapse in judgment.
That's what made the note so cryptic, and the longer he thought about it, the shorter the list of people who would come all the way out here at night became.
He did a little more than wait, he supposed. Jasper had asked around about this Midnight Visitation, but no one seemed to know much about it. The younger guys all shook their heads, and the older guys clammed up when he asked them. It was like a magic spell had been cast over the whole thing, and when you asked some of these guys, it seemed to sap the life out of them before your eyes. Garth, one of the more gregarious murderers on Jasper’s block, had looked downright scared when he’d asked him about the visitation.
“I can’t say nothin,” Garth had said, “and neither will you once you go. It’s a secret that you keep after that. It’s something that changes you, or you keep going back till it does.”
“What changes you?” Jasper had asked, but Garth wouldn’t say anymore.
“Get away from me. Get away, before he thinks I told you.”
He’d left in a hurry then, their chess game only four moves in, and Jasper found he had more questions than before.
He supposed that all would be answered on Saturday, and as the days passed, he found himself a little excited by the whole idea of the thing.
When Saturday night finally arrived, Officer Gauge found him on his bunk, his best uniform still looking ragged, as he waited for whatever might come. Gauge held out a pair of cuffs, telling Jasper that he’d have to cuff him before they left. Jasper nodded, putting his hands behind his back, but Gauge told him that in the front would be fine. Jasper shrugged, it was his show, and let him cuff him in the front. Some of the guys who were still awake made suggestive noises as he left, some of them telling him to enjoy his “night visit”, but a lot of the older guys were noticeably quiet.
Gauge led him to the visitation area, the little spot behind the staff check-in area, and when Jasper shook his cuffs at him, Gauge told him to sit down and put his hands on the eye hook on the table. There were a few guys in here, some of them Jasper knew, but most he didn't, and they all seemed to be cuffed to the protruding hook in the center of the table. Jasper started to buck, but realized it wouldn’t do any good. Whatever this was, they would have him one way or another. He set his hands down on the table, and Gauge pulled a lock out of his pocket. He secured Jasper to the spot before leaving in an all fired hurry.
Whatever was about to happen, Gauge clearly didn’t want any part of it.
Jasper glanced around the room, taking in the men who sat around him. There were about twelve in all, all of them shackled to the table, and they were all spaced so that at least three chairs separated them from another inmate. Most of them looked confused or unsure, but a couple of them looked like they knew what was coming; knew and weren’t looking forward to it. One of them, a big bald bruiser named Dennis, had his head against the table as he cried nakedly between his elbows. Another who Jasper didn’t know was praying in fast spanish. A third, Jasper thought his name might be Conroy, was thrashing around as he pulled at his bonds. His eyes were roving around like a scared horse, and he kept pulling at his cuffs until he heard a lock click near the back of the room.
Then he went still and Jasper thought he saw him listening for something.
A pair of double metal doors at the back of the room burst open then, and Jasper saw a small group walk in unattended by guards. Two of them were children, a pair of twins who looked ghostly under the dim fluorescents. One was a dark haired woman who sat down in front of the man as he prayed. The last was a tall, homely woman who took the seat across from a younger inmate that Jasper couldn’t put a name to. The young man stiffened as she sat down, and the pair was close enough that Jasper could suddenly see that the problem wasn’t the womans face, but rather what was on it. She had a crop of mold growing from ear to ear and as it wove around her eyes, it made her look like she was wearing glasses.
“Hello, Emanuel.” she said, her voice thick but not unhappy to see him, “I see prison had suited you.”
“What the fuck is this?” the inmate said, trying to back away and failing as the chains caught him, “you ain’t real. You look like my ma, but you ain’t my ma.”
“Of course I am, Em. How else would I know about how you drowned me in the bathtub? How else would I know what you did to me before you buried me in the basement? How else would I know how much you cried before you turned yourself in? You felt me watching you from the corner of your room, and it ate at you until you couldn’t take it anymore. The same way,” She leaned in slyly as she grinned, “that you ate at me after I was gone.”
The inmates started making a sound like someone choking on air. He kept pulling away from the woman, but the chains brought him up yet again. Jasper looked away, but he could see similar scenes of horror unfolding around him as more people joined them. The twins sat down in front of the sobbing man, but he wouldn’t lift his head. He wouldn’t look at them, couldn’t look at them, but the longer Jasper looked, the more he could see the bruises around the necks. The deep purple marks looked like individual fingers, and they seemed incable speaking through their bruised throats. They sat menacingly across from him, and every peek he gave them was followed by a hopeless cry of terror.
Others came, men, women, children, mothers, fathers, wives, and everything in between. The inmates' reactions were as varied as the specters. One man could only repeat the phrase “I’m sorry” as a half naked boy of seventeen sat silently across from him. The mother and son he had seen first were now sitting with her hands on his as he rocked and shook his head in negation. What could only be an older man's parents asked if he were proud of what he’d done to them, but he only sat silently and stared right through them.
Jasper wondered when it would be his turn, but he didn’t have long to ponder.
“Sorry I’m late, dear. The commute was dreadful.”
His breath came out as little more than a puff of smoke, and when he turned to look at her, Jasper could tell that it was Grace only by the necklace that she wore. He’d given her that necklace for their third anniversary, and he supposed her parents had left it on her when they buried her. Her face, a face he had loved so much, was gone. She looked like a burn victim, like a used up match stick, and the eyes that looked back at him glowed from empty sockets. Jasper wanted to scream, wanted to pull away as her red and oozing hand came out to touch his, but he couldn’t muster the strength.
She was burnt, her beauty stolen in death, and that too was his fault.
After he’d blind sided her, begging for another chance, she had told him to get lost. She said she couldn’t be with someone who couldn’t give her children, and suggested that he go back to his moms house before her new boyfriend found them together. At the mention of a new boyfriend, he grabbed her by the neck as she turned away and slammed her head against the wall of the stairwell outside her apartment. He had kept right on doing this until she stopped struggling, and even then he did it a few more times. He only stopped when her head began to dribble something besides blood and he realized he had broken her skull. He was scared then, afraid that he would get caught, and when he put her in his car, he wasn’t sure what he intended to do with her.
The police had caught him in his parents backyard, one of her neighbors having seen the whole thing, but by then, Grace had been a charcoal briquette.
He’d heard the funeral had been closed casket, but apparently they hadn’t closed it tight enough.
“Whats wrong dear? Didn’t you tell me you couldn’t live without me? I believe it was a little bit before you smashed my head against the wall. I assumed that, since you’d taken all that time to burn me, that you wanted me to look this way. Well, have a good look, Jasper. See what you’ve done to your Grace!”
Every word she spoke sent flakes of her tongue and lips onto the table, onto his hands, and onto Jasper’s face. She was leaning in closer, bringing her horrible visage closer to him, and Jasper felt his sanity beginning to whimper. As she brought the remains of her blackened lips together, he added his scream to the others. As they pressed against his flesh, he let his eyes roll up to the whites. He tried to stay conscious, but the sheer horror of the situation was eroding his mind. This couldn’t be. Things like this weren’t real. Grace was dead, she couldn’t come back to torment him.
As he regained consciousness, he found that he was still chained to the table and the terrible Grace was still sitting across from him.
“You seem to have gotten a little sleepy, my love. That's okay. The Warden was nice enough to extend invitation for the whole night, and I was more than happy to come and see my best fella.”
Jasper screamed, screamed until his throat broke, and when Gauge opened the door at five o’clock, all those present were as silent as the grave.
Gauge led them away like a flock of lambs, easily correcting them when they tried to stumble out of line. He had been doing this for a while, two or three years at least, and he had learned not to question what went on behind that door. He heard begging, screaming, the mad laughter of the deranged, and at the end of the month, he found an extra five hundred dollars added to his check for every Midnight Visitation he conducted.
His smile curdled when he remembered what the Warden had said to him when he gave him the position.
“I know you’re struggling to feed your appetites, and its only a matter of time before you end up inside these walls for doing something foolish. Why not let me help you feed those urges, and in exchange, I won't tell anyone what sort of debauchery you get up to in your spare time.”
The Warden was a weird one, but Gauge had to admit that he always kept his promises.
Gauge wondered what he put these poor saps through, but quickly put it out of his mind.
The Wardens games were none of his concern, and how he chose to discipline his inmates was his business.

Hello! I will be traveling to Japan in July and am looking for feedback on my Kobe/Hiroshima itinerary. Prior to this itinerary, we would have already stayed in Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka. Please let me know if there is anything I should add or remove. Food recommendations are welcome :). Thank you!
Sunday, July 23: Kobe Day 1 Time TBD: Arrive in Kobe from Osaka Explore Harborland Eat and explore Chinatown Rest
Monday, July 24: Mount Rokko (would it be better to visit Arima Onsen first)? I considered hiking up, however, I'm not sure that would be great in the summer heat. 9:30 - Arrive at Nunobiki Ropeway Walk around Herb Garden, then head to the observation deck Take Rokko-Arima Ropeway Explore Arima Onsen Dinner Back to Kobe (take bus from Arima Onsen? Is there another option?)
Tuesday, July 25: Hiroshima ~11:00 AM Arrive in Hiroshima Drop off luggage Lunch Visit Shukkeien Garden ~3:00 PM check into hotel Walk around Kamiyacho Dinner
Wednesday, July 26: Peace Memorial Park Peace Memorial Park Museum Explore Peace Memorial Park Atomic Bomb Dome
Thursday, July 27: Miyajima Island ~8:00 AM: Head to Miyajimagushi Station Board the ferry Mount Misen Ropeway, then 30 min. walk to summit Possibly stop at Sanki-gongen-do Temple Mount Misen Observatory Take ropeway back to the bottom Visit Daishoin Temple or Itsukushima Shrine (are both worth it)? Dinner Depart Miyajima via ferry by 6:00 PM

Jasper frowned as he read over the letter, the summons looking like no other mail he’d ever received.
On Saturday, you are summoned to attend Midnight Visitation as part of your rehabilitation. Attendance is non-negotiable, and refusal will result in forced attendance followed by time spent in solitary. Be ready by no later than eleven. The Warden
“Whoa, that's pretty cool,” said Gavin, reading over his shoulder, “Who do you know that would come all the way down here at midnight to see you?”
Jasper didn’t know, and he told him as much. He was in here for killing the last person who had given a crap about him, and he couldn’t think of anyone who would make the trip in the daytime, let alone at night. His parents had disowned him after he’d killed her, and most of his family refused to have anything to do with him. Some of his cousins would still accept his letters, but few of them would bother to write back. Jasper was perplexed by the invitation, but, by the sound of it, it wasn’t much of an invitation anyway. Attendance seemed to be mandatory, and he was pretty sure most of the guards on the compound would enjoy dragging him there in chains.
The letter had come with their mail, and it was one of the few times the guard had called his name. The last year and a half had been difficult for Jasper, but he was getting used to making it on his own. He’d done it all his life, hadn’t he? His mom and dad had been too busy with their own thing to care about their middle child. Barbara was the smart one, Reggy was the athletic people person, and Jasper…well, Jasper was the screw up. His grades had never been too good, his achievements few and far between, and when Grace had come into the picture, his parents figured it was the best Jasper could do.
Jasper had agreed with them. Grace had been his everything from the moment she agreed to go steady with him. Grace was motivated, a natural saleswoman who had strived for something more than middle management. She had a successful business by the time she graduated college, and Jasper was happy to stay at home and keep the house. Jasper provided her with stability, someone to come home to who lacked the means to do any better, but he couldn’t give her the one thing she wanted.
That's why she had left him, and that's why he had killed her.
He couldn’t stand to be apart from her, couldn’t stand for her to be with someone else, and now he was stuck in Stragview for his lapse in judgment.
That's what made the note so cryptic, and the longer he thought about it, the shorter the list of people who would come all the way out here at night became.
He did a little more than wait, he supposed. Jasper had asked around about this Midnight Visitation, but no one seemed to know much about it. The younger guys all shook their heads, and the older guys clammed up when he asked them. It was like a magic spell had been cast over the whole thing, and when you asked some of these guys, it seemed to sap the life out of them before your eyes. Garth, one of the more gregarious murderers on Jasper’s block, had looked downright scared when he’d asked him about the visitation.
“I can’t say nothin,” Garth had said, “and neither will you once you go. It’s a secret that you keep after that. It’s something that changes you, or you keep going back till it does.”
“What changes you?” Jasper had asked, but Garth wouldn’t say anymore.
“Get away from me. Get away, before he thinks I told you.”
He’d left in a hurry then, their chess game only four moves in, and Jasper found he had more questions than before.
He supposed that all would be answered on Saturday, and as the days passed, he found himself a little excited by the whole idea of the thing.
When Saturday night finally arrived, Officer Gauge found him on his bunk, his best uniform still looking ragged, as he waited for whatever might come. Gauge held out a pair of cuffs, telling Jasper that he’d have to cuff him before they left. Jasper nodded, putting his hands behind his back, but Gauge told him that in the front would be fine. Jasper shrugged, it was his show, and let him cuff him in the front. Some of the guys who were still awake made suggestive noises as he left, some of them telling him to enjoy his “night visit”, but a lot of the older guys were noticeably quiet.
Gauge led him to the visitation area, the little spot behind the staff check-in area, and when Jasper shook his cuffs at him, Gauge told him to sit down and put his hands on the eye hook on the table. There were a few guys in here, some of them Jasper knew, but most he didn't, and they all seemed to be cuffed to the protruding hook in the center of the table. Jasper started to buck, but realized it wouldn’t do any good. Whatever this was, they would have him one way or another. He set his hands down on the table, and Gauge pulled a lock out of his pocket. He secured Jasper to the spot before leaving in an all fired hurry.
Whatever was about to happen, Gauge clearly didn’t want any part of it.
Jasper glanced around the room, taking in the men who sat around him. There were about twelve in all, all of them shackled to the table, and they were all spaced so that at least three chairs separated them from another inmate. Most of them looked confused or unsure, but a couple of them looked like they knew what was coming; knew and weren’t looking forward to it. One of them, a big bald bruiser named Dennis, had his head against the table as he cried nakedly between his elbows. Another who Jasper didn’t know was praying in fast spanish. A third, Jasper thought his name might be Conroy, was thrashing around as he pulled at his bonds. His eyes were roving around like a scared horse, and he kept pulling at his cuffs until he heard a lock click near the back of the room.
Then he went still and Jasper thought he saw him listening for something.
A pair of double metal doors at the back of the room burst open then, and Jasper saw a small group walk in unattended by guards. Two of them were children, a pair of twins who looked ghostly under the dim fluorescents. One was a dark haired woman who sat down in front of the man as he prayed. The last was a tall, homely woman who took the seat across from a younger inmate that Jasper couldn’t put a name to. The young man stiffened as she sat down, and the pair was close enough that Jasper could suddenly see that the problem wasn’t the womans face, but rather what was on it. She had a crop of mold growing from ear to ear and as it wove around her eyes, it made her look like she was wearing glasses.
“Hello, Emanuel.” she said, her voice thick but not unhappy to see him, “I see prison had suited you.”
“What the fuck is this?” the inmate said, trying to back away and failing as the chains caught him, “you ain’t real. You look like my ma, but you ain’t my ma.”
“Of course I am, Em. How else would I know about how you drowned me in the bathtub? How else would I know what you did to me before you buried me in the basement? How else would I know how much you cried before you turned yourself in? You felt me watching you from the corner of your room, and it ate at you until you couldn’t take it anymore. The same way,” She leaned in slyly as she grinned, “that you ate at me after I was gone.”
The inmates started making a sound like someone choking on air. He kept pulling away from the woman, but the chains brought him up yet again. Jasper looked away, but he could see similar scenes of horror unfolding around him as more people joined them. The twins sat down in front of the sobbing man, but he wouldn’t lift his head. He wouldn’t look at them, couldn’t look at them, but the longer Jasper looked, the more he could see the bruises around the necks. The deep purple marks looked like individual fingers, and they seemed incable speaking through their bruised throats. They sat menacingly across from him, and every peek he gave them was followed by a hopeless cry of terror.
Others came, men, women, children, mothers, fathers, wives, and everything in between. The inmates' reactions were as varied as the specters. One man could only repeat the phrase “I’m sorry” as a half naked boy of seventeen sat silently across from him. The mother and son he had seen first were now sitting with her hands on his as he rocked and shook his head in negation. What could only be an older man's parents asked if he were proud of what he’d done to them, but he only sat silently and stared right through them.
Jasper wondered when it would be his turn, but he didn’t have long to ponder.
“Sorry I’m late, dear. The commute was dreadful.”
His breath came out as little more than a puff of smoke, and when he turned to look at her, Jasper could tell that it was Grace only by the necklace that she wore. He’d given her that necklace for their third anniversary, and he supposed her parents had left it on her when they buried her. Her face, a face he had loved so much, was gone. She looked like a burn victim, like a used up match stick, and the eyes that looked back at him glowed from empty sockets. Jasper wanted to scream, wanted to pull away as her red and oozing hand came out to touch his, but he couldn’t muster the strength.
She was burnt, her beauty stolen in death, and that too was his fault.
After he’d blind sided her, begging for another chance, she had told him to get lost. She said she couldn’t be with someone who couldn’t give her children, and suggested that he go back to his moms house before her new boyfriend found them together. At the mention of a new boyfriend, he grabbed her by the neck as she turned away and slammed her head against the wall of the stairwell outside her apartment. He had kept right on doing this until she stopped struggling, and even then he did it a few more times. He only stopped when her head began to dribble something besides blood and he realized he had broken her skull. He was scared then, afraid that he would get caught, and when he put her in his car, he wasn’t sure what he intended to do with her.
The police had caught him in his parents backyard, one of her neighbors having seen the whole thing, but by then, Grace had been a charcoal briquette.
He’d heard the funeral had been closed casket, but apparently they hadn’t closed it tight enough.
“Whats wrong dear? Didn’t you tell me you couldn’t live without me? I believe it was a little bit before you smashed my head against the wall. I assumed that, since you’d taken all that time to burn me, that you wanted me to look this way. Well, have a good look, Jasper. See what you’ve done to your Grace!”
Every word she spoke sent flakes of her tongue and lips onto the table, onto his hands, and onto Jasper’s face. She was leaning in closer, bringing her horrible visage closer to him, and Jasper felt his sanity beginning to whimper. As she brought the remains of her blackened lips together, he added his scream to the others. As they pressed against his flesh, he let his eyes roll up to the whites. He tried to stay conscious, but the sheer horror of the situation was eroding his mind. This couldn’t be. Things like this weren’t real. Grace was dead, she couldn’t come back to torment him.
As he regained consciousness, he found that he was still chained to the table and the terrible Grace was still sitting across from him.
“You seem to have gotten a little sleepy, my love. That's okay. The Warden was nice enough to extend invitation for the whole night, and I was more than happy to come and see my best fella.”
Jasper screamed, screamed until his throat broke, and when Gauge opened the door at five o’clock, all those present were as silent as the grave.
Gauge led them away like a flock of lambs, easily correcting them when they tried to stumble out of line. He had been doing this for a while, two or three years at least, and he had learned not to question what went on behind that door. He heard begging, screaming, the mad laughter of the deranged, and at the end of the month, he found an extra five hundred dollars added to his check for every Midnight Visitation he conducted.
His smile curdled when he remembered what the Warden had said to him when he gave him the position.
“I know you’re struggling to feed your appetites, and its only a matter of time before you end up inside these walls for doing something foolish. Why not let me help you feed those urges, and in exchange, I won't tell anyone what sort of debauchery you get up to in your spare time.”
The Warden was a weird one, but Gauge had to admit that he always kept his promises.
Gauge wondered what he put these poor saps through, but quickly put it out of his mind.
The Wardens games were none of his concern, and how he chose to discipline his inmates was his business.

Jasper frowned as he read over the letter, the summons looking like no other mail he’d ever received.
On Saturday, you are summoned to attend Midnight Visitation as part of your rehabilitation. Attendance is non-negotiable, and refusal will result in forced attendance followed by time spent in solitary. Be ready by no later than eleven.
The Warden
“Whoa, that's pretty cool,” said Gavin, reading over his shoulder, “Who do you know that would come all the way down here at midnight to see you?”
Jasper didn’t know, and he told him as much. He was in here for killing the last person who had given a crap about him, and he couldn’t think of anyone who would make the trip in the daytime, let alone at night. His parents had disowned him after he’d killed her, and most of his family refused to have anything to do with him. Some of his cousins would still accept his letters, but few of them would bother to write back. Jasper was perplexed by the invitation, but, by the sound of it, it wasn’t much of an invitation anyway. Attendance seemed to be mandatory, and he was pretty sure most of the guards on the compound would enjoy dragging him there in chains.
The letter had come with their mail, and it was one of the few times the guard had called his name. The last year and a half had been difficult for Jasper, but he was getting used to making it on his own. He’d done it all his life, hadn’t he? His mom and dad had been too busy with their own thing to care about their middle child. Barbara was the smart one, Reggy was the athletic people person, and Jasper…well, Jasper was the screw up. His grades had never been too good, his achievements few and far between, and when Grace had come into the picture, his parents figured it was the best Jasper could do.
Jasper had agreed with them. Grace had been his everything from the moment she agreed to go steady with him. Grace was motivated, a natural saleswoman who had strived for something more than middle management. She had a successful business by the time she graduated college, and Jasper was happy to stay at home and keep the house. Jasper provided her with stability, someone to come home to who lacked the means to do any better, but he couldn’t give her the one thing she wanted.
That's why she had left him, and that's why he had killed her.
He couldn’t stand to be apart from her, couldn’t stand for her to be with someone else, and now he was stuck in Stragview for his lapse in judgment.
That's what made the note so cryptic, and the longer he thought about it, the shorter the list of people who would come all the way out here at night became.
He did a little more than wait, he supposed. Jasper had asked around about this Midnight Visitation, but no one seemed to know much about it. The younger guys all shook their heads, and the older guys clammed up when he asked them. It was like a magic spell had been cast over the whole thing, and when you asked some of these guys, it seemed to sap the life out of them before your eyes. Garth, one of the more gregarious murderers on Jasper’s block, had looked downright scared when he’d asked him about the visitation.
“I can’t say nothin,” Garth had said, “and neither will you once you go. It’s a secret that you keep after that. It’s something that changes you, or you keep going back till it does.”
“What changes you?” Jasper had asked, but Garth wouldn’t say anymore.
“Get away from me. Get away, before he thinks I told you.”
He’d left in a hurry then, their chess game only four moves in, and Jasper found he had more questions than before.
He supposed that all would be answered on Saturday, and as the days passed, he found himself a little excited by the whole idea of the thing.
When Saturday night finally arrived, Officer Gauge found him on his bunk, his best uniform still looking ragged, as he waited for whatever might come. Gauge held out a pair of cuffs, telling Jasper that he’d have to cuff him before they left. Jasper nodded, putting his hands behind his back, but Gauge told him that in the front would be fine. Jasper shrugged, it was his show, and let him cuff him in the front. Some of the guys who were still awake made suggestive noises as he left, some of them telling him to enjoy his “night visit”, but a lot of the older guys were noticeably quiet.
Gauge led him to the visitation area, the little spot behind the staff check-in area, and when Jasper shook his cuffs at him, Gauge told him to sit down and put his hands on the eye hook on the table. There were a few guys in here, some of them Jasper knew, but most he didn't, and they all seemed to be cuffed to the protruding hook in the center of the table. Jasper started to buck, but realized it wouldn’t do any good. Whatever this was, they would have him one way or another. He set his hands down on the table, and Gauge pulled a lock out of his pocket. He secured Jasper to the spot before leaving in an all fired hurry.
Whatever was about to happen, Gauge clearly didn’t want any part of it.
Jasper glanced around the room, taking in the men who sat around him. There were about twelve in all, all of them shackled to the table, and they were all spaced so that at least three chairs separated them from another inmate. Most of them looked confused or unsure, but a couple of them looked like they knew what was coming; knew and weren’t looking forward to it. One of them, a big bald bruiser named Dennis, had his head against the table as he cried nakedly between his elbows. Another who Jasper didn’t know was praying in fast spanish. A third, Jasper thought his name might be Conroy, was thrashing around as he pulled at his bonds. His eyes were roving around like a scared horse, and he kept pulling at his cuffs until he heard a lock click near the back of the room.
Then he went still and Jasper thought he saw him listening for something.
A pair of double metal doors at the back of the room burst open then, and Jasper saw a small group walk in unattended by guards. Two of them were children, a pair of twins who looked ghostly under the dim fluorescents. One was a dark haired woman who sat down in front of the man as he prayed. The last was a tall, homely woman who took the seat across from a younger inmate that Jasper couldn’t put a name to. The young man stiffened as she sat down, and the pair was close enough that Jasper could suddenly see that the problem wasn’t the womans face, but rather what was on it.
She had a crop of mold growing from ear to ear and as it wove around her eyes, it made her look like she was wearing glasses.
“Hello, Emanuel.” she said, her voice thick but not unhappy to see him, “I see prison had suited you.”
“What the fuck is this?” the inmate said, trying to back away and failing as the chains caught him, “you ain’t real. You look like my ma, but you ain’t my ma.”
“Of course I am, Em. How else would I know about how you drowned me in the bathtub? How else would I know what you did to me before you buried me in the basement? How else would I know how much you cried before you turned yourself in? You felt me watching you from the corner of your room, and it ate at you until you couldn’t take it anymore. The same way,” She leaned in slyly as she grinned, “that you ate at me after I was gone.”
The inmates started making a sound like someone choking on air. He kept pulling away from the woman, but the chains brought him up yet again. Jasper looked away, but he could see similar scenes of horror unfolding around him as more people joined them. The twins sat down in front of the sobbing man, but he wouldn’t lift his head. He wouldn’t look at them, couldn’t look at them, but the longer Jasper looked, the more he could see the bruises around the necks. The deep purple marks looked like individual fingers, and they seemed incable speaking through their bruised throats. They sat menacingly across from him, and every peek he gave them was followed by a hopeless cry of terror.
Others came, men, women, children, mothers, fathers, wives, and everything in between. The inmates' reactions were as varied as the specters. One man could only repeat the phrase “I’m sorry” as a half naked boy of seventeen sat silently across from him. The mother and son he had seen first were now sitting with her hands on his as he rocked and shook his head in negation. What could only be an older man's parents asked if he were proud of what he’d done to them, but he only sat silently and stared right through them.
Jasper wondered when it would be his turn, but he didn’t have long to ponder.
“Sorry I’m late, dear. The commute was dreadful.”
His breath came out as little more than a puff of smoke, and when he turned to look at her, Jasper could tell that it was Grace only by the necklace that she wore. He’d given her that necklace for their third anniversary, and he supposed her parents had left it on her when they buried her. Her face, a face he had loved so much, was gone. She looked like a burn victim, like a used up match stick, and the eyes that looked back at him glowed from empty sockets. Jasper wanted to scream, wanted to pull away as her red and oozing hand came out to touch his, but he couldn’t muster the strength.
She was burnt, her beauty stolen in death, and that too was his fault.
After he’d blind sided her, begging for another chance, she had told him to get lost. She said she couldn’t be with someone who couldn’t give her children, and suggested that he go back to his moms house before her new boyfriend found them together. At the mention of a new boyfriend, he grabbed her by the neck as she turned away and slammed her head against the wall of the stairwell outside her apartment. He had kept right on doing this until she stopped struggling, and even then he did it a few more times. He only stopped when her head began to dribble something besides blood and he realized he had broken her skull. He was scared then, afraid that he would get caught, and when he put her in his car, he wasn’t sure what he intended to do with her.
The police had caught him in his parents backyard, one of her neighbors having seen the whole thing, but by then, Grace had been a charcoal briquette.
He’d heard the funeral had been closed casket, but apparently they hadn’t closed it tight enough.
“Whats wrong dear? Didn’t you tell me you couldn’t live without me? I believe it was a little bit before you smashed my head against the wall. I assumed that, since you’d taken all that time to burn me, that you wanted me to look this way. Well, have a good look, Jasper. See what you’ve done to your Grace!”
Every word she spoke sent flakes of her tongue and lips onto the table, onto his hands, and onto Jasper’s face. She was leaning in closer, bringing her horrible visage closer to him, and Jasper felt his sanity beginning to whimper. As she brought the remains of her blackened lips together, he added his scream to the others. As they pressed against his flesh, he let his eyes roll up to the whites. He tried to stay conscious, but the sheer horror of the situation was eroding his mind. This couldn’t be. Things like this weren’t real. Grace was dead, she couldn’t come back to torment him.
As he regained consciousness, he found that he was still chained to the table and the terrible Grace was still sitting across from him.
“You seem to have gotten a little sleepy, my love. That's okay. The Warden was nice enough to extend invitation for the whole night, and I was more than happy to come and see my best fella.”
Jasper screamed, screamed until his throat broke, and when Gauge opened the door at five o’clock, all those present were as silent as the grave.
Gauge led them away like a flock of lambs, easily correcting them when they tried to stumble out of line. He had been doing this for a while, two or three years at least, and he had learned not to question what went on behind that door. He heard begging, screaming, the mad laughter of the deranged, and at the end of the month, he found an extra five hundred dollars added to his check for every Midnight Visitation he conducted.
His smile curdled when he remembered what the Warden had said to him when he gave him the position.
“I know you’re struggling to feed your appetites, and its only a matter of time before you end up inside these walls for doing something foolish. Why not let me help you feed those urges, and in exchange, I won't tell anyone what sort of debauchery you get up to in your spare time.”
The Warden was a weird one, but Gauge had to admit that he always kept his promises.
Gauge wondered what he put these poor saps through, but quickly put it out of his mind.
The Wardens games were none of his concern, and how he chose to discipline his inmates was his business.

This sub helped me out a lot so thought I'd share my experience in Japan. Hope I can bring a bit of a different perspective because unlike most of the people that seem to post here, we are definitively not early risers and rarely left the hotel before 1pm every day. Still had a great time and crowds were only an issue in a few places.
We're an early 30s Asian-American couple traveling from Germany, so we're coming at this from a bit of an in-between of Western and Eastern perspective. I have been to Japan when I was 15 with family, but remember basically nothing. It was my wife's first time. We had an absolutely wonderful time and both thought it was the best vacation we've had in years.
The trip was pretty last minute (for my standards at least). I started planning the trip from scratch (no flights, hotels or anything booked) in early April and our trip was May 18-30. We spent 5 days in Tokyo including DisneySea, 2 nights in Hakone, 3 nights in Kyoto including day trip to Nara, and 1 night in Osaka. We flew in to Tokyo Narita and flew out of Osaka Itami. We decided to fly from Osaka to Tokyo instead of bullet train back to Tokyo so we didn't have to buy JR rail pass and worry about luggage.
Tokyo

We stayed in Ginza, which was significantly cheaper than similar hotels in Shibuya or Shinjuku. Maybe it was because I was planning such last minute, but I enjoyed the area just fine. Lots of restaurants and close to Tokyo Station which was convenient.
Shout out to Star Club in Shinjuku. Had a wonderful Saturday night there drinking til 4am, chatting with other patrons and the super friendly bartender. Mix of locals and tourists.
T's Tantan Ramen in Tokyo Station was one of my favorite ramen places of the trip (tied with the Michelin star one from Kyoto, but minus the wait). The bowl had a good variety of vegetable ingredients (which didn't seem that common in Japan, most ramen was just noodles and meat) which I really appreciated. Small queue but didn't wait more than 10m.
The only restaurant reservation we made all trip was at Bon. Vegetarian multi-coursed meal. I would recommend, it was very nice, though sometimes a tad under salted for my taste. My wife loved it though. You get your own little private room to eat, even for two people, which was unexpected and very lovely.
Asakusa has a tourist center with air conditioning, bathrooms, and an 8th floor view. Nice place for a rest
Akihabara did nothing for us, as we're not really into anime or games. Pretty skippable if you are similar.
I thought Ameyoko Shopping District was a disappointment. More like a flea market, it was similar to many Taiwan street/night markets that we've been to before. We also had probably our worst meal in Japan here, at a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant where the food was extremely mediocre. I would have skipped this place altogether and go to Ueno Park or something instead.
Character Street in Tokyo Station was very fun to explore, we did a lot of shopping there. Nice place to visit before taking the Shinkansen.
We enjoyed Takeshita Street in Harajuku. As mentioned before we went at around 8pm and it wasn't too crowded.
When planning I had thought about skipping Shibuya Scramble but I'm really glad I didn't. Something about witnessing the sheer number of people bustling about was so epic and grand. Reminded me of Saturday midnight at EDC (Electric Daisy Carnival) when the atmosphere is electric and everyone is moving from one main stage to another.
Golden Gai was interesting to look at, but way too claustrophobic for us. Very small alleys and very small bars.
I enjoyed Tsukiji Market a lot. This is one of the places I would agree with people here and advise you get there early. Take advantage of jet lag and get here before 7am, and it is literally a buffet of delicious fresh foods. (not much choice for vegetarians though sadly). By 8am it was starting to get REALLY crowded. I prefer picking out my sashimi this way as opposed to a restaurant tbh, you can look at many options and pick whatever looks freshest. First time eating Wagyu here, had it on a stick. Delicious. Not the cheapest, but I figured if I ate it at a restaurant I'd also be paying for table service and atmosphere. I'm not big on the "restaurant experience", I'd rather just eat my food and be on my way.
I thought Hamarikyu Gardens was wonderful. I love city parks where there is green, peaceful nature in the fore ground, contrasted by enormous skyscrapers towering in the background. Hamarikyu Gardens fits that perfectly. Got there right when they opened after visiting Tsukiji Market and it was a perfect way to walk off the big hearty breakfast. ~1 hour at a moderate pace should do it.
Ginza Corridor after work was very interesting to see around 5-7pm or so. Simply packed to the brim with business folks wearing suits and having a good time after their work day

DisneySea

We checked the weather and specifically went on a rainy weekday. I highly recommend, it was not crowded at all. Almost all the rides are indoors anyway and most of the queueing is either inside or covered. We got to the park at 2pm and basically rode everything we wanted before the park closed at 9pm with time to spare.
Popular rides still had 40m-1hour wait, but we used premier pass for Center of the Earth and Soaring. Most we ever waited was 20m for Finding Nemo (similar to Star Tours, all in Japanese but very fun). I checked the app the next day when it was sunny and saw the wait times for each attraction were 3-4x longer.
Another thing I think the rain helped with was that the premier passes did not sell out. We were able to buy them as late as 6pm to Journey to the Center of the Earth. (Fun ride, but I can't imagine waiting 1.5 hours for it)
I think Soaring is pretty meh, I'd probably skip it next time. I've been to the one in CA ages ago and remember thinking it was just okay too, but we had extra time so decided to try it here.
Sinbad was excellent, the ride that most exceeded expectations. It's basically "It's A Small World" but way better animatronics and story telling.
Indiana Jones is worse than in the one in California (less exciting, no fire effects), but the line was nonexistent so we went on it twice.
It stopped raining at night too so we were able to catch the Believe show with no issues. It's a good show but it is very long, about 40m. Much longer than I thought. After show is over, there's only about ~1 hour before the park closes, so good time to catch a last ride at one of the popular attractions while the locals are heading home.
I love how every restaurant has a display in front that shows you what the food will look like. They were all extremely accurate and not at all misleading!
(not a tip but a rant, is it really necessary to have 10 thousand parking spots when the vast majority of people are going to arrive on Tokyo's world-class public transit system?)

Hakone

Open Air Museum was really nice on a pleasant day. It's mostly outdoors. We spent a leisurely two hours there, but you could probably do it in one hour at a brisk pace.
We left our Ryokan at 1pm to do the Hakone Loop and still completed it comfortably with plenty of time spent on shopping.
Speaking of shopping, Cat Goods near Gora station was a wonderful little store full of cat stuff!! Our shopping list in Japan was basically to buy as much cat-themed home goods at possible, and we went crazy here. They also do tax-free! Recommend this place if cat-themed goods sounds interesting to you, the shop people were super nice!
We stayed 2 nights 3 days in a Ryokan. I purchased Hakone free pass for 3 days, which was maybe not worth it. The first and last day we only took transport to leave Hakone to Odawara station, so I think it would have been cheaper to use the IC card to pay for it ad-hoc instead of an entire extra "free pass" day. Might be worth looking in to.
If you have the Freepass, don't tag IC card at the stations. Show your Freepass to the attendant instead. It can't be a screenshot, they need to see the day
Google Maps was great everywhere except Hakone. For some reason it was especially unreliable here, it led us stray a few times.
Busses are faster for getting around, but have very little space for luggage and seemed packed with locals. If time is not an issue, I'd ride the Hakonetozan Line with your luggage, much more comfortable and more space.
If you can spare the money, getting a private onsen was really really nice. Plus you can drink while you chill!

Kyoto

Had an excellent time at Gion Bar M16, favorite bar experience we went to in Japan. The owner was super friendly and welcoming, and was himself a very interesting person that has lived a full life and travelled all over the world. Very interesting to talk to. He was also very knowledgeable about whiskey and drank whiskey with us while letting us try some different whiskeys and giving recs about what to buy and bring home. Also gave us lots of delicious and interesting snacks while we got drunk together. We also met a friend of the owner there who is a foreigner that has been living in Japan for 8 years, and gave us some recs.
One of his recs was Eikan-do Temple as a less-crowded temple option. Good rec! We really enjoyed this place a lot. Probably our favorite temple out of the 5 or so we visited. They have this really extensive "shoes-off" wooden walkway on support beams. It felt like exploring a big tree house, because the wooden part went up the cliff as well. The insides areas were also very extravagant and intricate. Not so many tourists, even Sunday middle of the day. I really recommend as well!
Another of his recs was Men-ya Inoichi (has a Michelin star). You line up when the shop opens to get a ticket, and then come back at a designated time, though there's still a wait before you actually eat. We probably waited ~50m in total, 20m at the beginning and 30m when we returned. Even then, thought it wasn't worth the time. Don't get me wrong it was very good, but IMO not significantly better than other ramen places.
Kodai-ji Temple was a miss for us, especially after Eikan-do. Thought it wasn't that interesting, would have skipped.
Kiyomizu-dera was indeed very nice, but very very crowded. Another place I would actually either going early or late for.
The shopping street in front of Kiyomizu-dera was super fun to browse, but also very crowded.
Had lunch at this tucked away Soba restaurant in an alley that was very nice, one of my favorite meals in Japan. Owner was friendly and spoke in Japanese to a translator that replayed his words in English. Noodles nice and chewy. Good experience, felt very personal!
We visited Yasaka-jinja Shrine and Maruyama Park both in the evening and during the day, and much much prefer it when it's dark. Less crowded and there are cute little lamps that are lit up and make the whole place look magical.

Nara

Arrived in Nara station at ~2:30pm and left at 7pm. Felt like we saw plenty.
Nothing new to add, the bowing deer are fun to visit and feed, though they can be quite aggressive. We went on Saturday and there was large crowds of children in their school uniforms, but we didn't really mind it too much.
Isuien Garden and Yoshikien Garden are both very nice gardens, good place to get away from crowds for some peace and quiet.

Osaka

Didn't spend much time in Osaka, but Dontonburi was fun to walk through and shop.
Ate at a very nice Okonomiyaki restaurant. It was our first time eating it so can't compare it to anywhere else, but the staff was super friendly and bubbly and we had an excellent time there. They also have a little dice game you can play to "gamble" on getting a drink for free, or "lose" and get the drink double sized and also pay 2x the price
Shout out to our hotel, Hotel Royal Classic Osaka. We were only there for one night, but my god this hotel was so convenient. Directly connected to the subway station via an elevator, and also has a 24-hour FamilyMart you can enter from the lobby. It was also only 3m walking away from a airport limousine bus, which made going to the airport super easy. If we ever visit Osaka for a longer stay, we would definitely book this hotel again.

Random Tips

The flipside to getting to a popular tourist spot early, is to get there very late. We visited Takeshita Street in Harajuku at 8pm at night and it was very comfortably not crowded. Also noticed other tourists spots tended to clear up near closing time, like Senso-Ji in Asakusa.
As everyone says, toilets are generally as clean as you can reasonably expect, everywhere from parks to gardens to subway stations. Nastiest toilet I saw was in Don Quixote at 1am, trash everywhere.
7/11 seemed to have English featured more prominently on their products labels compared to other convenience store chains. All the convenience store food options seemed very similar, so I started to favor 7/11 for the language convenience. (FamilyMart had English in super tiny letters on the side of the label lol)
In one of those small counter seating type restaurants, I saw someone take the wrong backpack when they left (didn't know it was the wrong backpack at the time ). A few minutes later, the person who's backpack was taken got up to leave, and was very confused trying to find his backpack. He spent a long 10m talking to the restaurants folks (in Japanese), before the original guy came back super apologetic. Anyway keep an eye on your stuff. I know Japan is a safe country, but accidents do happen.
One trick we had was to tie a little charm or hair tie to the handle of our umbrella, making it less likely someone would accidentally take yours from the sea of indistinguishable white plastic umbrellas.
Yes there's a lot of walking. My feet tend to get damp if I'm out all day and foot powder works wonders, highly recommend it. Picked up this trick while attending music festivals.
No issues with tax refunds and customs. We packed some of our stuff in carry-on in case they inspected, but nothing happened.
Used Ubigi esim and it was perfect. I bought 10gb and used 7gb over our trip, doing most of the navigation and planning. My wife bought 1gb and used about 700mb with just random internet surfing. I will 100% be using this service for travel to other countries in the future, not just Japan, it was so damn convenient.

Transportation

Definitely leave extra time for navigating subway stations, those things are like enormous underground malls.
Shinkansen app didn't work for our iphone country (Germany), but I was able to use the mobile web browser pretty easily. Great for free, last-minute rescheduling of Shinkansen tickets when we inevitably take too long shopping.
Apple Wallet Suica / IC card worked like a charm (with AMEX and Mastercard). One thing though it that it can sometimes take up to 1 minute for the money to load onto the account, so don't wait until the very last minute and accidentally hold up the bus.
Taxis are green when someone is in it and red when they are free (at least in Tokyo?). Confused the hell out of drunk me at 4am in the morning. I think in Kyoto it is orange instead when someone is in them, and the orange/red difference is quite hard to spot from far away.
On that note, I had sorta assumed the metro runs all night in Tokyo, but this is definitely not the case. They stop service from about midnight to 5am, so keep an eye on the last train if you do intend to catch it. Otherwise you'll have to take a more-expensive-than-usual taxi (captive markets), but not a big deal. We thought it was typically priced in comparison to most other US and European cities.
We had a choice between a 1 hour or 3 hour layover in Tokyo NRT and we chose 3 hour because we weren't sure how long it would take to transfer from Terminal 3 to Terminal 1 in NRT. In actuality it took less than 30m, so the 1 hour would have probably been fine. We didn't mind the extra buffer time to relax though.- Absolutely enormous plane flying between Osaka and Tokyo. Like literally it was the size of a transatlantic plane, with 10 seats in each row, for a sub 1 hour flight, completely full with business travelers (judging by their suits and brief cases).

Food

We aren't big foodies; we like Japanese food a lot but food isn't really a top priority for us while traveling. Some of our favorite meals were from 7/11 (kelp & bonito flavoured tofu stick, sukiyaki beef over rice, fish flavored cheese snacks, grilled squid. Yum!)
Most meals were good, if a bit straightforward. At least the places we ate at, main courses seemed to be carb heavy, with a side of meat, and little else. I know we could have gotten side dishes, but the portion sizes were too big for us to order more.
Very few vegetables in general, and if there were some they were pickled. (Guess it makes sense for an island country). I usually bring fiber pills with me when traveling and do recommend it for Japan too.
Wife is vegetarian, I am not. Japan is not particularly vegetarian friendly if you don't like tofu, which fortunately my wife does. Most places did have at least one tofu option, so it worked out okay for us. She doesn't follow it super strictly though. A few times she would order a dish and I would just pick out the meat from her bowl.
Portion sizes were a LOT bigger than I thought they would be. I think maybe we are just small eaters. US and European portions are a little bit bigger I suppose, but Japanese portion sizes were too big even for us. Especially ramen! It was crazy to see folks wolf down an giant bowl of ramen, then ask for an extra helping of noodles with their remaining soup, and finish that up too.
We only made one reservation beforehand and waited in line over 10m once. Worked out fine for us.
Restaurants tend to do last call an hour or more before closing, so don't get there too late. Happened to us twice before we learned our lesson, got to a restaurant about one hour before the listed closing hours and they turned us away.
The Japanese palette seems to be much more subtle than typical western palette, and notably less salty. We often find Asian food at US/German restaurants too salty or saucy. Even then, some of the food we ate was bordering on the minimum range of my taste buds to almost be bland. Just my opinion, most of it was good but sometimes the lack of salt was pretty noticeable to me. My wife tends to like things less salty than me though and she thoroughly enjoyed all of those meals no problem. Soup noodle places like ramen and udon are excluded from this, those were usually perfectly salted to my taste.
Walking while eating seemed fine. I saw at least 3 different instances of Japanese people doing it.
Apparently there are no laws banning public drinking in Japan. You can drink alcohol on the street no problem, but I rarely saw people doing that (unlike here in Germany where people seem to take full advantage of it and also leave trash everywhere). I did see a few groups of Japanese people doing it at night in Tokyo, usually near bus stops, and the next morning saw the empty bottles and cans. Guess there are litterers everywhere. We had a beer in the park at night, weren't loud about it and took our trash with us. That was very pleasant.

Hotels

Hotels always have liquid or foam hand soap! I hate the bar soaps that most Western hotels provide in the room, so I usually bring my own liquid hand soap. Was totally not necessary for this trip.
Lots of people on this sub have mentioned check-in time being very precise, as in you rarely can check in before the designated time. We didn't experience this first hand. But on the flip side, we did find out that check out time is very precise too! They start calling your room about 15-20m after your check out time. This is in contrast to most American/European hotels that we've stayed at, which are in my experience very lax about their check out times. We can often get away with leaving the room at 1-2 hours after the stated check out time (we're late risers). Not so in Japan.
Agree with other people's advice that booking a hotel close to a big subway station is probably the most important factor. It sucks having to walk 10m to the station every single day, and it is amazing when it is close. Also being close to a 24/7 convenience store was also very nice for late night munchies.

Language

We only knew sumimasen, konichiwa, and arigato gozaimasu and got alone just fine (lots of hand gestures!). We do know a bit of Mandarin Chinese though so that was helpful with reading signs.Some places knew Mandarin better than English and would switch to that if they thought we could speak it. Chinese tourism seems like big business (we saw a ton of Chinese tourists everywhere) so I guess it makes sense for people in tourism industry to cater towards that. Announcements (like over train stations) always went Japanese, English, often Chinese, then sometimes Korean.

Luggage Forwarding * I thought it was kind of expensive, but it does make things easier.- ○ Tokyo -> Hakone: 2310 yen- ○ Hakone to Kyoto: 2630 yen- ○ Kyoto -> Osaka: 1940 yen. * I feel like for that price you could take a taxi to and from your hotels to the train station and it wouldn't be much more work. There was plenty of space on the Shinkansen to put smaller checked luggage overhead. Then you don't have to prepack things the day before. * For the first leg Tokyo -> Hakone, we shipped two checked luggage which was about ~32 euros. After that we only shipped one, not two. * The middle ground we found was to designate one suitcase as souvenirs and dirty laundry and forwarded it every time. We would then travel with two carry-ons and one checked luggage. YMMV depending on your number of luggage and ease of carrying them.

This transcript is from the livestream called "OMG Let's Beeze" instead of a Highlight.
skin looks bad where's my filters and there we go hi babe you're first hello
hi Lulu you're so early - yeah I know it's just all us now...the beezers, the beezers are first babe is first king Beezer. Gemini gem, what's new and exciting ? guess who's back...Lynn the pig and Grandma's back, back again...warmly...I know I'm terrible sorry you know just have a lot going on...Marissa 24 months you are the loyalist of beezers, I swear! radiation, you deserve every arm shake of that, I call them girl...hi shoot kickers and rats Ava hi, hi beezers
oh my God it's hot in this room.. why, why is it hot in this room? oh yeah so don't fear don't fret
um I'm in the spare room with the door shut there's no pets in here and I don't know if it's because it's vapor but uh this dissipates like instantly. it's not like lingering. tobacco smoke like two minutes later, you would not be able to smell anything in this house of... any kind of tobacco at all. you'll bring the fan really I would, so. appreciate that, honestly
Golden Girl, one year ~oh my gosh~ you deserve that too loyal Beezer ~~ Ready, Set! when did you guys all start watching me? I need to know... I'm curious what caught you onto my channel hi Carolina [Music]
these are... do I look like a virtuous woman? don't answer that... I will follow him, follow him, wherever he may go... I don't want to have that in my head all of a sudden [laughs] and on my hijab... style is kind of weird today. it looks like I have like a floppy chin. you know? like, three years ago no way...I can't believe I've been on YouTube for how long now
sanela, hi...
how long has it been? foodie Beauty days. Beauty foodie days... a couple of you now you get to see me in my marriage Arc. I'm very, very thankful for that. when I look back on some parts of my life, I'm, like, still, like, sometimes... I still wake up and I'm, like, I can't believe I'm here in the Middle East married to a wonderful man, you know? it's crazy. it's, like, surreal almost. I don't know
yeah, it is warm in this room. I don't know why... they're just, like, well... it's well ventilated but I don't know... maybe just because I'm so used to having the fan on me all times. you love the henna ink? thank you ~ yeah it's um very dark... I chose the black. they're like, do you want black or do you want red? so I'm like a half black but um... it's very nice you know?
my lovely angel, hey baby, oh you have to show them your beard cut! you had a beard trim... if I searched Amber... thank you so much for bringing that to me because.... oh wait.. the.. she said... yeah, it should be okay right? yeah, yeah the reality
[foreign]
the content room.... the content room needs to be a few... a few uh degrees lower, okay? nice... yeah, thanks... that's perfect. thanks for making me comfortable, my sweet love... you're welcome honey
sir, on YouTube during the Amber and Johnny Trail... Amberly came up? no way hi visas ~ oh my God ~ doesn't he look like 20 years younger? surprise...we could really see her mouth no more beard hair. you're still my handsomest man...handsomest man.... handsomest man
you guys...you guys are used to him with his beard now, huh, but whenever we met each other, this is, like, the look he had this one called the Summer Style. yeah it's too hot...yeah it's too hot for all the facial hair right? does it make a difference? yes, yes
he's too handsome - careful Chantel he's not going anywhere right? yeah
thank you guys oh I missed a bunch of comments okay
baby I'll keep using with them...yeah thank you, babe/ okay guys see you in the chat yeah and uh, they'll come live with me one of these days soon and do his own streams
hey I forgot the lights look better in the dark...is there two lights in here or one? [Music] turn one off...Okay, thanks. not all of them yeah...
hello Beezus foreign [Laughter]
[Laughter] thanks baby
[Music]
creepy spooky looks good with your hair, looks dark and handsome
[Laughter]
oh yeah...if you got a new mask [Laughter] it's spooky. that's cool.. it looks cool. I like it thank you honey [Laughter] happy Halloween everybody! eyesight shot yes my favorite movie actually. besides The Shining. which are both Kubrick movies... by the way, okay, which lighting makes me look nicer? the other one? I think this one wait check try the other one again.
I love you, honey pinch
whoa~ this one.. yeah, this one. the other one reminds me of a bait my basement. when I was a kid we had this...okay let me catch up here ...I travel mayonnaise [Laughter]....okay see you later alligator! someone... someone has to sound bite that [laugh] I've got that one there sorry, guys. I'm gonna be gonna contain my chin... and also... okay let me catch up here... I swear.
okay, um ,thanks Golden Girl...yeah, this is the henna but it goes like to here. I usually don't show you guys my wrists but you can see for the the purpose of the henna. so I washed my hands a bunch of times and it's still... I did the dishes. it's still on strong so I'm happy about that. are you going to address? uh, did you tip the artist? what what a weird question, duh... Whitney, actually tips are not very common here, but yeah I did. um, what are you looking for honey?
my phone? I think you see it you left your phone here no in the bedroom maybe yeah. um are you going to address all the fires in your home country?the fire...? there's fires in Canada right now? oh really?! yeah, in Quebec... Quebec area. I think eh.. um.. yeah, in specific, uh, area or what? yeah, I have to look it up. I'm not really sure. like, I know in Quebec region but was like five years ago.. it's fine, I think, yeah, I don't know ...like how severe it is... but there's, like, it's causing a lot of smog like in the US as well.. it's like going everywhere is all that I know.
[Note: some regions of Canada and the US had highest impurity rates globally from the particles in the air making the air dangerous for some people]
Michelle, they will be safe, yeah. thanks for the super chat. um, are they gonna start blaming me for the wildfires? yeah, I don't know. I mean, want to hold a vigil or what you like? the trim? it's a lot of the hair. yeah, the beard trim, yeah. thank you, uh Ali L, welcome to put your feet already [ __ ]. please, um, what in the kinky's going on okay?
we're in a room... welcome to budget piece and we're just like beeze, oh, I'm really behind... basic basic, it was smoky in Toronto. the air is bad really? well, I heard that it's bad.. like the small the the smoke or whatever...we got Eyes Wide Shut... that reminds me Andre Marie that was, like, one of my favoritest movies. favoritest movies ever! I love it. this is a weird hijab style... it was just like I had to get ready fast. so, I'm in the spare room right now. hi Ali L, welcome, welcome!
I know I haven't been going live really but ~oh my gosh~ we have so much going on in our lives and the new the pets are keeping me really busy. I have, like, a whole routine like I don't know how people do it with kids... like, I think I would die. like, I don't know if it's just like mentally I'm just not able to cope, with, like, too many responsibilities. because like taking care of home and then taking care of, like.... has been taking care... he takes care of me too... but you know what I mean? and then, like, Howie I have to spend time with Howie in a room by himself. he's he's in a room by himself now and the cat's in a room right now with her, like, food and water because we don't smoke with the pets.
like, you know at all... so um, so, then I have to like get up and like spend some time with howie... give him his vegetables, let him run around kiss him a thousand times and then Julia wakes up. Julia, yeah... welcome back guys! sorry I'm poor, that's okay... it's going to Wisconsin?
Julia cats are good at sneaking. I swear! I swear, she's snuck in the room when I was like coming in to see Howie. I didn't even know she was right behind me so she came in and she kind of just like just stared at him. but I think she...I don't know... she did one thing kind of weird like once, but it never happened again, so I'm okay with it, you know? I'm like, I hope it doesn't become a problem. she doesn't ...I don't think she likes the door being closed and me coming in here and paying attention to him. so one time that she was outside and I wasn't here she like pooped right up front of the door. I think it was like to say, like, "hey this is my territory this is my home, you little rodent" kind of thing but then ever since then she hasn't done it. like, she only did it once, I think, to like, assert her territory and then she just never did it again. she just, like, you know, poops in her box fine and she pees in her box fine and yeah... so far so good, mashallah. like. knock on wood but she's very very loving. she's like. I should have named her shadow she will not...if she's awake she will not...she, like, will not leave your side. like, she's the most loving cat. and if you, just like, you can... she's like a rag doll. like, you can just grab her and and hold her and just, like, and just like, she's just like... floppy and just loves attention and she's constantly....constant, constantly purring but she's also kind of naughty.
like, she's....when she gets the Zoomies, she freaks out and runs around everywhere, jumps all over the place and, like, she plays with things she shouldn't be playing with, you know? so it's like at that age she's, like a kitten right? so we have to like, um, you know, we have to, like, hold on. there we go... we have to feel uncentered. we have to, like, teach her you know? but she's... I say, you know, a lot, but she's like, she's so loving you know?
Hi Megan! so you think you can cats too well? yeah... my solid. what? well, my cheese salad? yeah hi pnv! yes, I hope you're having a good day at work. hi turbo toots! yo guys, yo Salah baby, baby... so yeah she's baby. how are you? do you love Julia? so she's adopting very well. my female cat gets mad at my own Grandma cat and she'll pee in the litter box extra messy. like, I won't even squat...makes a mess, yeah.... cats have strange Behavior sometimes you know? but yeah, I don't know. like, she's she's very hyper sometimes because she's just a kitten right? so I have to make sure to play with her a lot with her feather toy and, like, I have to like daily scoop out toys under the couch because she always gets them lost in there.
[Note: it seems Salah is teaching her basic cat care like a child]
sometimes if I open a bottle of water, like the cap, I'll just throw it. like, hey here's another toy that's not under the couch right now because and she just loves it!
foreign first class falcon getting a hair transplant... where in Turkey? you've always wanted to try that henna? thank you... yeah. it's really cool. I'm glad I tried it out. maybe next time I get it, um, I'll just get the uh,... it's like having a tattoo. like, it's a really cool... like, it looks like a really cool tribal tattoo or something I don't know? when I was watching her do it and it didn't take long at all. she's just, like, you know....
the Kitty's in another room while I'm smoking. and howie do have.... we the other day... I thought he was stuck in his tunnel but he was like, just listening or something... I don't know... because he put a bunch of his corn kernels in the tunnel overnight and he was just sitting in the tunnel, like, this like, like, stiff, like, a mannequin. so I started freaking out. I was like Howie! Howie! so I took all the tunnel apart and I'm holding it like this and he's in it and I'm like trying to go like this and he finally woke up and went... I hear horror stories you people scare me or like he could get stuck in a tunneling so here I am thinking oh my God he's stuck in the tunnel but no he can still, he still has so much room! he can turn around but ~uh oh my gosh~. anyway, I freaked out. that's like, the most exciting thing going on right now. actually Julie is the sweetest Beezer.
she's sleeping.... yeah, [reading comments in live chat] "my daughter has four cats and they were so picky that they each needed their own litter box". yeah... like, when I had the other cats like. we had that big litter box upstairs and then we had another one downstairs and because I was thinking like bbj's old, like, what if she can't make it? like, she had accidents a lot. because, you know, like, mostly starting when she got older. other than that, she was like a good cat her whole life, you know? and Sam no problems. but they ended up just using one litter box, so you know...
my fiance as a kid that honestly don't like... he doesn't even cover his poop. honestl?y Julia doesn't really either. she just goes and leaves it but so I go and I, like, cover it and then I scoop it. it avoids mess on the scooper. but she she gets the worst Zoomies after she goes to the bathroom. I always know when she goes and it's like, "okay, time to go get the scoop the Box" because she, um, I guess I'm keeping everything ultra clean now. and especially, like, you know, we have a smaller... it's smaller than my old place. so it's like you know if you don't ...the smell will just permeate as well. so yeah... she like runs around freaks out
I hear her go like she's so I'm going to the bathroom. people don't put leashes on their dogs. I want to go out. you had a Nashi zombies? yeah? wait... now she's are available right now in Canada, I'm missing out! no, the only matches I find here are coleslaw in them. like, Burger King is the only nashie. like, the Zoomies, I had to explain like salah never had a pet before, right? so this is all new to him so I had to explain what this is... Zoomies were... so I'm looking up Tick Tock videos of Zoomies. Like, he's like, is something wrong with her? I'm like, no, this is normal. check it out and, like, some cats get like the really bad zoomies, you know? it just happened in Florida? young and mischievous, yeah young and full of energy so...
I find smoking shisha makes you um thirsty. yeah, I'm going live a little earlier today because it's like 10 30 here and we're kind of tired. I don't know if you can tell, but I'm a little sleepy. so I don't know how long I'll be on but I wanted to say "hey" because I missed you guys. like, if I don't feel like if I don't go live for a little while, I feel weird. like, oh my God! I missed you guys! you know?
[Note: Chantal has pretended her chats and followers are her second family when she makes them dispensable and has a high turnover. It's a false audience relationship in this regard.]
I can't believe they have the the Nashi in Florida! what the hell?! that's so weird.... it's quarter after 11 here already. that's crazy! as you can see I haven't been able to quit shisha and I don't think I did I didn't do uh\, I didn't do a good mukbang today. so, I'm not gonna put it out. it was kind of boring. I don't know.... maybe I will.... maybe I won't... we'll see.
sorry for always adjusting this....these chiffon ones I could never... I love how they look the most but I could never fix them properly. they never stay in place.. even if I like put them here under my chin see? can you get lavender to smoke, relax you? [reading comments] I don't know can you get lavender shisha... but I think it's only fruit flavors... but I'm not really sure. the water looks good. yeah, these are the water towers in Kuwait. yeah, I just drink a lot of water. like, this is the water bottle water we drink. we buy, like, our whole wall is like full of like water bottles. even if we have a filter, it's like the water in Kuwait in the summer, like, I wanted to have a coldish shower right? I put the water on the coldest setting it was hot. Like I couldn't even shower it was that hot. it was like, so hot I had to wait till evening time to have a shower because the water cools down in the evening. but in the daytime if you want to shower be prepared for the hottest water! it's so hot it was like it felt like 45 degrees today. so... but the AC and the new car is really nice.
Michelle.. and um, we, had like a slush today but I'm not sure about the lavender. Golden Girl, good question... um what did I have for dinner? actually I ate KFC because I was craving it and they have this new flavor of like chicken it's like Flamin Hot Lays and they have chicken tenders...and I had these twisters... and you know I tried to mukbang but I was just, like, in one of those moods where I'm like, what does it look like I'm wearing? shoulder pads? what the heck does it look like I'm wearing shoulder pad?....um, just like a really tired,hot.... not in a really talkative mood. kind of, like, I am now... so I'm like, I should probably do a live stream, you know? I don't know ....I, I really, just yeah.... I wasn't really in the mood. so I was just, like eating kind of quietly and I think most people um.... what was I gonna say? like, like, conversation with my videos, you know what I mean?
what month does it start getting the hottest? um, I don't know.... babe, what like month, like April... no the hottest actually probably like June? July? like it's gonna be like now but it's gonna get like I think even hotter.
[Note: Useless fact: The longest day of sunlight is on or around 20 June. It takes the earth 30 days to absorb and emit the heat so hottest days in many regions in the northern hemishperes is on or around 20 July]
so why he jumped his face like as big as FFG?!! LMAO! not even close! [Laughter] sorry... but it's true... this is, like, this is material all bunched up by the way but yeah I have a double chin.
July, August, September... um September too? oh great so we have... so here it's like reversed in Canada. the longest season is winter and here is summer [Note: Wait until Chantal learns about the equator]
thanks Golden Girl! thank you! remember this lip gloss... it's the...you guys remember when I went to buy this the Estee Lauder one? um will be 50 to 60. does it hit 60 like every summer? oh my God! I can't imagine... like, I have to go outside even for just a minute to experience what 60 degree weather is like... and we have to do like a test... like, I want to do that fried egg test. we have to put an egg on the pavement and see if it fries... but you know I can go peek my head out come right back in the building because the building is well air conditioned...like even downstairs in the lobby.
I don't know where people get this idea that we don't we don't have AC. it's not like...it's not a third world country um...there's AC everywhere and actually there's, like, um, I don't know like people put charity water tanks all over the town, like, different parts of each City. so, so, like, you can have clean drinking water and then there's like tunnels with like AC so people can have a break and walk through the tunnels instead of being outside. so there's, like, a lot of Refuge... is it respite Refuge? I don't know what word I'm looking for.... there's a lot of.... like, you get a break from the Sun.... if you even just going into malls, like, all the malls are very well air conditioned. um, so I would not be able to, yeah that's hot... I would not be able to survive here without AC. even Salah you will test it and we'll be grilled.
I remember one morning where one morning we woke up and he opens the curtain... actually, we do this every morning, like mashallah, I have to say it...we, we open the windows and we see the the beautiful ocean view.. and I'm like, one time I was like okay.. let's go out and he was like if you go out at this time you will be Chicken on coal! so, we have to wait until a certain time like after 4 or 4 30. I'll melt like cheese.
I wonder if I put cheese out if it will melt... hi Anastasia! sunblock will be useful...yeah, I need to get some, babe, true. creepy comfort and crime, [reading live chat] oh I just seen you... I just saw you ready...welcome, welcome to the very important users! thanks for becoming a Beezer!
yeah and I don't think that I'll be experiencing a winter, you know? not an all gun wood for like the next long while so I don't know when I'll go back to Canada for a visit.... but if I do go back, I'll be like a tourist right? because I don't have a place there anymore so, well it'll be weird be like a a Canada tourist.
[Note: Chantal doesn't understand her own citizenship status with Canada because she doesn't have a physical mailing address or residence. However, she is still a Canadian citizen].
cheese melted 'michelted'... you want to watch a horror movie, babe? I don't know... I might fall asleep but that's okay... what's a good horror movie from like the 2000s that we have? I don't know...
we tried finding "the ring" [horror movie] but we couldn't. why don't we last watch? oh, escape room one and two? those are good movies there's Escape rooms here but they're expensive I tried it several times to fry an egg here in Kuwait and it was successful. really?! no way?! you just leave the egg thereafter and like animals will eat? [reading live chat comments] a day when I lived in Vegas when I was in high school, I fried an egg in the street... no way! it gets hot like that? and it's just, like, are there some states where it gets super hot like Texas... say in Vegas.... I guess Death Valley is one of the hottest place... is quite hotter than Death Valley.. I'm happy to not see you in winter in Canada again.
yeah ...that's true... you leave a for the winter that's smart... that's what, yeah, my, I have family members who do that. Anna, hi dream! Insidious is good.. he watched... I don't think he liked Insidious. I don't know why... he likes more gross movies we watched a really gross zombie movie called "yummy"... oh my God... but it was pretty good movie, I guess. but just like one of those movies I'd only watch Once... don't ask me about security emoji. I can't believe the last horror movie watch was The Exorcist and it's like in the 70s that's so long ago...
[reading live chat again] it gets really hot in Vegas... really? like over a hundred? The Descent, oh, is that about a monster? I'm Chucky hi I'm Chucky you want to play no Chucky I want to burn you in fire and lava seriously I would drive and throw him in a volcano and then you go home and he's on your bed I'll burp I'm waiting to murder you God The Descent I think I watched it a long time ago you know what's really creepy? okay, the catacombs, like stories about the catacombs freak me out... like, all those tunnels under Paris? imagine getting lost in there! you'd be dead...you slept with your parents? I used to get scared and sleep with my mom too... she was like come on now there's nothing! you know, your parents get annoyed? no wonder... they probably want to break from us. I don't blame them. it's about the group of girls in a cave... ah but there's like a monster right? I think should I tell the Tank Engine ~oh my God~ that is my favorite picture! can you send it to me by emails? like, and [laugh] oh my God ~ actually the Crypt ~oh babe look at the picture [Music]
oh my God! that made my day! my potato face, choo choo, that, you know, what Thomas the Tank Engine used to be my one of my favorite shows as a kid... and Babar, potatoes ~ oh my God you're living like 15! oh I live in central California and it can get to 112. you that's hot! we will watch Descent movie... okay that I think that's I saw, that movie oh
Cassie oh my God! I need to quit smoking... I can't even [laugh] no oh my God that's so funny! all righ,t that's a perfect picture. I love that! I don't know if that was meant to be hate, but it made me laugh. so like my magnet, I found one of my abayas that's been missing. it was in the suitcase. we haven't unboxed yet. I keep forgetting ...do you unpack this one suitcase finally? did it you know... the hardest part of um putting together your home is organizing. I like finding, like, nice containers and all this stuff. I got um these nice little baskets, little baskets to put under the TV so we can put all our stuff in there you know? like watches and stuff like tha...t Chargers and especially we have to cat proof the home so, like, every, lik,e even this.
I'm not gonna put it take it off and I'm not gonna put it somewhere because the cat will lose it... remember I used to have that problem with the bees or Cuts I had with um with Sam and BBJ with my earrings? I would always only have one... yeah hi Cassie! did you uh forget your biscuit again? yeah ,thank God my family's okay now... but uh you know I'm kind of worried... like, I don't know the fires are getting bad eh?
pretty sure what New York looked like yesterday from the smoke... no, I have to look at all this up. I guess I've just been really self-absorbed. I haven't really been paying attention, but yeah are there wildfires like every year in California or like, the Wildfire is just like, remember how bad they were in Australia a couple years ago... a few years ago? I had a lot of beezers and viewers then in Australia. I was worried... about there's a lot of school and outside activities canceled? oh wow! that's bad! I'm sure the kids love that! hi blacks,hey long time no see! I missed you guy,s you know ?I used to pray for some kind of natural disaster when I was in school years... anything to get out of going, you know, like, are you sure the buses are not canceled today? you're still going I'm getting great, like, one before my mom had a car I'm getting Grandpa to drive you ...no I don't want to go to school [Laughter]
I used to pray for any illness... I know it's bad, but any cold any flu you... now I even remember like being in class with some kid who would be sneezing and you could tell they're getting sick and I'd be, like, you know, they'd be, like, okay, pick a partner for your for your uh project? okay, I want to go with the sick kid so I can catch his flu so I don't I can miss school. uh anything I hated, I hated going... I hated getting up in the morning since I was born. I was even late coming out of the womb, like, my mom had to have a C-section. I didn't want to come out... I was late... I was supposed to come out... mine was I supposed to be born I think the 26th... Kelly's pretty bad but it's been cool, like a cucumber...really how much snow? oh, it has to be like 30 centimeters or more for them to cancel school well it has to be a lot.
[Music] oh the flyers in Nova Scotia
[Laughter] the other options of school was wishing for a disaster... yeah, I was like please give me the flu! everyone's getting the flu but me, I swear it must have been the Papaya juice my mom used to give me in my lunches. I hated Papaya juice. I don't think I ever told her and just suffered in silence... a lot of vitamin C... give me the Capri Sun! it's very smoky where I am in Northern Ontario jeez lemon mint, cough, hey where were you I've already been... I've already been.
coughing what the [ __ ] I swear... I ate it going to school like, honestly, whenever, like, my mom would check and I had a fever, I was like "yes" because like when you're young, you think you're Immortal... you don't care if you have a cold, you know what I mean? you don't care if you have a fever... you're like, whatever, I can survive this now. well now I worry a bit... you know? I was born at uh yeah warmly I have a dark sense of humor .I was born at 4 30 in the morning. I blame that! I'm being a night owl, yeah... I was born just after midnight explains a lot. Julia's so cute! how is she? I know everyone is going through it but I'm going through it. you only... oh we're always setting you positive energy blocks... hope you're okay, what's up? you can share with us
um Julia is amazing she's just a Beezer she's a bit of a Beezer and uh but she's so cute and she's so cuddly. like, he's probably the the cuddly she's even more cuddly than BBJ if that's possible. early morning babies are babies born between 4 AM and 8 AM grow up to be persistent. they are generally intelligent and always prepared for different situations. they might face... wow do you know what time you were born babe? that I'm not in that category at all... so I was born what who has a dark web passport what the heck I'm so out of the loop
oh what did Golden say? oh Southern Ontario it is really widespread? yeah, that's what I heard but I didn't know how bad... oh my gosh! it's your husband's birthday? happy birthday zero support! that can be tough.. we're here for you... honestly, like, I like ,to beeze and like why not? we're all humans we all go through hard things. even though we're on the internet doesn't mean that we can't share and you know, be here for each other. you don't even have to explain what's going on all you need to say is you have you're having a hard time you know? to be born during business hours you're, like, I'm not being born during business hour,s mom you got to make those bucks! oh okay, since you've had a date, uh are you like the type that doesn't, you know ,what? getting a babysitter is not that easy... I know, I remember my mom trying to get a babysitter sometimes for me. it was hardened the babysitters I was left with. sometimes remember I told you my story times about one babysitter Beth. ew. yeah
I had some bad babysitters I always tattled on them and never had to see them again. though, so that was good, but yeah it's not as easy you know, it's not as easy as that what people are displaced oh my God. well Canada is really big... there's a lot of places to go but not if the fire's spreading that far. that's crazy !I really hope that everything people stay safe and everything goes well "we have two kids and one special needs so hard I just need a flip a couple of hours sometimes I just don't get that I love my girls but I hope no one takes that out" [reading live chat again]. yeah hey that's totally understandable.. it's very overwhelming... you know, you do your best but he got burnt out. like, caregiver burnout is a real thing... and actually when I worked in healthcare, we used to have a lot of people who would go into homes just to help with respite for people who were burnt out, you know? so at least you recognize that maybe there's some kind of like organization like that you know......Tracy, 18 months? oh my gosh! hi Tracy! I'm glad to see all you beezers here these stats are not accurate but we have to say it yeah, yeah, babe...you set her hair on fire oh my gosh that's Criminal! did you go on a group home after that?
I'm so protective too so that doesn't help uh you just don't let anyone go in yeah I understand. that, you know, you're leaving like loved ones in the care of strangers so it's hard.
hello Tracy! oh that's sweet babe! Maya lobby with your side and bless you sweets. parenting is hard yeah, like you know, I couldn't even imagine! I'm having a you know, like, being a pet mom is challenging. sometimes, honestl,y I couldn't imagine because some universities provide daycare at affordable rates.. that's true... my University had a daycare... excuse me, um I'm glad I never had to visit you know? something about daycare is creep me out... I remember being in daycare, like, I remember the smell of like old microwave dinners the cots... the cots that we had to take naps on. I had to go to a daycare after school and they made us have a nap every, every, every class. I went to as a young kid. there's always a kid who pukes. I don't know why, but there's always a pukey kid. sometimes I was a puke kid on the bus and then they always made us play with this like water and cornstarch mixture daycare. oh I'm glad I'm an adult as much, as... as much as life could be crap when you're an adult I don't miss being a child.
hi Katie Katie! she lost a few strands thank you guys, to see each event! hey, you're in the right place the hen is not itchy like thank goodness. you know, because I did look it up and apparently people have more issues with the block. which I didn't know... but they made me sign a waiver and I was wondering why. but now I know allergies... but oh thank goodness. yeah "I love being a mom but it can sure be hard not having any yeah not having any support" is definitely tough for sure, thanks Fox! yeah permanent is harder for sure... you'll have to replay later yeah I've been on for about 47 minutes.
what's Loch key, hey Chloe ,Tabor! am I saying that right? welcome, welcome! We're Gonna Save beeze hello! oh yeah Ali's a new Beezer. I missed the economy when I was a child. now I'm working everything... ye,s you're right. the economy was and it seemed people back then like in the 80s you know, um, from the I was born in the 80s... so old oh my gosh, everything was different, you're right. like, people had, like, you know? were able to sustain a life with jobs. you know, like, I don't know the quality of things just seemed better. I don't know how to explain it... like, even I don't know... maybe I'm not remembering that right. whenever you're a kid everything is just like the world is like mysterious. now when you start learning everything about it... it's like, you know,... well before I became like, religious, there was a huge period of time where everything just felt hopeless and meaningless... and I was like atheist for a point and I was like what the heck is the point of this, you know?
it's so mundane and tedious and you know... and now it's not like that wine and grapes come.. company yeah bringing up children because you're always having to dedicate all of your time to them. like, you're responsible for the bringing up of a whole human! like, that just terrifies me... like, even having a cat... hi witchy! hi beaters! sommelier! that's what it's called... nice that's interesting but if you can, you're strong you seem very strong .blacks so, if anyone can do it, it's you. I don't believe God gives us anything more than we can handle and honestly? even though it tests our limits, like, I don't know if people just think everything is just going to be sunshine and rainbows all the time. like, life is how can we be tested as people, if we don't go through hard things, you know, so it's just I see things in a very different perspective than I did even just last year, you know? and just getting rid of that hopeless feelings um helps me deal with depression in a lot of ways... there's a lot of ways I try to deal with my depression. um instead of ignoring it, uh, there's still a lot of things and tools I could use... but I find that my faith medication and just proper self-learning techniques of how to deal with anxieties and things, you know ,more emotional intelligence... that I'm really trying those things have been really, really, really hard to learn.
oh my gosh! yeah, I heard they're insane on me. that's what we've been saying! just bought Resident Evil 4, Jack ...nice have you been playing? have you started playing? I didn't know you were a gamer... no, I don't go to therapy here. therapy is ridiculously expensive here ridiculous like I think well from what a research I did it's like very very expensive like very but not just that um it's I guess I just cope with like learning like watching a lot of videos... reading a lot about emotional intelligence, coping techniques. like, this social media can be very useful for educational things. like, that um also I you know pray a lot and turn to my faith read the Quran and just, I don't know ...I feel like I've matured a little bit in that way, you know? an online therapist? that's like, yeah, I keep forgetting about that... move a TV? oh my gosh it must be strong! I think one therapist I checked was like 500 K.D that's like two thousand dollars, unless I got that wrong. maybe it was 500... I don't know... definitely give that to the when I when it piles on. just gets a lot it... does health issues it just piles on? yeah it seems insufferable. so like, uh, insurmountable sometimes content over meditation how you cope with negativity that's a good idea, thanks, Jack. thanks guys for noticing... he used to be a gamer what's your favorite all time? I don't know if I'm... in a minute... I'm gonna check it out again, actually and see. because I was a while ago. I checked... I don't even know if I have it right. but I remember being expensive a lot more than Canada.
Korean Pizza what's on that? I have an online there like uh Korean Fried Chicken. I have an online therapist and it's been good not sure how much it would be in Kuwait. though yeah I'd have to check the Korean. I've heard of sushi Pizza, that sounds gross to me. has anyone have sushi Pizza? reading the Bible, yeah whatever.... reading whatever religious text that you follow can be very calming, yeah... even just like when you're praying... it's like calming. Resident Evil 2 right here... another Resident Evil fan! Salah your favorite is Resident Evil 4 right? because you love Ashley so much. Sushi burritos, whoa, "you can't take care of others with an empty cup" that's true, yeah... that's why they say you have to take care of yourself first, but I mean how realistic is that? it's so hard to do ,you know, to find time for yourself when it's just constantly like, you know....
I can't even compare but even with a kitten like I forget how much work they are because I was so used to having adult cats, you know? for a long time but I remember, even BBJ was a Beezer. Sam was a Beezer, you know ,and you have to cat proof your house. you have to keep an eye on them when they're awake, and sometimes when she's sleeping, I'm like oh finally! you know? like, she's not busying because like I have to like get up so many times to like make sure she doesn't get to the through. Like I have to hide every wire.. every everything, everything in the house. but she's worth it... actually gross, okay Golden Girl, no problem. short rib pizza? oh my gosh! that sounds so good! yum! yeah happy birthday to him... I'm so proud of you having a higher power and seeing purpose. do you drink ever at all or no drinking? a Mormon? oh really Chloe oh you were Mormon? um no I don't drink anymore... um any kind of um mind-altering substance you know is is like forbidden it in Islam. but um CBD is... is okay though because it's not like mind-altering. but drinking is definitely... drinking is like illegal here. you won't find... you won't find out any legal alcohol here. I don't know about illegal... I don't know anything about that... but you won't find any legal alcohol here. you know,
oh my God ,what did you do all day? well it depends on the day lemon mint. I mean, like, a regular domestic day? is that what you mean? because it just depends you know, like, I... I'm planning on doing some day in the life of videos. Maybe. you know but you know, it just depends. depends on the day. um regular domestic stuff most days you know taking care of the pet the pets keep me busy um you know cleaning just stuff. like, that doing videos talking to family. we go out sometimes, go run errands. go get coffee. go get dinner. whatever. go to the movies ,stuff like that. how's the beezing kitties? she's so mischievous I do give her already some kind of chicken Pate she loves it... hi baby...alcohols... yeah, I believe that too. more dangerous than media need a Beezer membership buddy. yeah, I really haven't can't believe I haven't come up with merch yet.
hey babe, hi baby... what's up for you, baby? oh did she give me a creepy chocolate. hi, I miss you... you're so handsome. I love math thank you, honey. I think it looks cool. what kind of mask is this guys? is this the Anarchy mask? I like your hair guys.. don't tell her it's Secret [Laughter] it's that V for Vendetta mask isn't it? you ever see that movie V for Vendetta? no, foreign Edition? ah, yeah, I think it is vendetta. The Purge has started. chocolate creepy chocolates, thanks babe. I didn't know we had any more of these. I thought we ~I~ ate them all. I'm kidding! are you alone there without me? yes, I'll come soon. software on it, love you, love you most, love you mostly look pretty. Tracy we were actually... we were out shopping and he's like what do you think of this mask? it was like a store with all masks in it. this is a milk. have you ever had these? they're good. I'm gonna try.. I'm not really hungry. I had too much to eat but hmm I put your tea and sasqually... my God she's a pig... foreign I go through like two of these a day! it's not diabetes I should do a review of Quake snacks, yeah. because they do have a lot of different ones. like, you've seen some of them in my grocery hauls you know the pop pops? they have a lot of like a lot of things... a lot of things are flavored with zatar you guys know what that is? around oh.
[Laughter] Julius here hi!
hi baby, oh, oh she doesn't want to be held right now. hi, honey... she looks like church... hi baby... let me holder better.. okay. honey it's okay. it's okay. it's okay.... she might be scared of your man... she's purring. oh really? oh baby girl
hi sweetie oh you're a sweet girl here oh poor girl okay yeah yellow.. say bye. say bye! yeah I sing to her. you kno,w the song, um the queen hi! to me vintage SO thanks Chloe! my shisha's done anyways. so you want a Calico? she looks like church from um pet cemetery. her eyes the same color. she's so she's so cute anyway.s um oh yeah so you want a fat ginger cat and call him Garfield? zatar is like a seasoning made out of like Thyme and like I think sesame seeds. I don't know, lik,e exactly what's in it... but it's mostly made of thyme so it's really tasty. actually I want to go cuddle Julia now. she's... but she eats a lot. she eats a lot mashallah. she eats a lot she has a good appetite on her. she's so small. I think kittens eat more right? because they're growing but we feed her wet and dry and I give her some cremo treats. those creamy treats, she really loves those. so yeah that's Julia next time I'll show you Halloween Howie try sumac yeah, I have tried sumac before. like, in babba ganoush and stuff. it's like sour a bit. eh or something.. I don't know... I know what I know what it tastes like... I need to whiten my teeth or just wear red lipstick. look what you have here Harry he's here on this side is here on this side. hi Emily! let me grab him for the cage
[Music] hi Emmy here he is oh you big boy Hey Big Boy
[Music] oh Howie don't fall out there's a cat now! I'm kidding! hi everyone! rattler I love you so much, you big fat boy! damn son, he's cute. say "bye, hello, bye-bye yellow" back to your home. he doesn't want to get off my hand yeah it looks like a final grumpy Haggard rat freak and oil thanks, babe. vitamin C, really? I didn't know that, she's cut...e you don't want to come off my hand because he doesn't want to go back in the cage. is that a rat? I'm gonna tease him now. are you a rat are you a mouse are you a hamster? I always say that to him he's a hamster. but he looks like a mouse. I don't know he's a freak of nature. I don't know what to say but yeah he's um he's so cute. I love him he's my big boy, Howie! I let him run around and he was Beason... he got he kind of got stuck under the door but no not actually stuck but he was trying to get out. he's a ratster. oh my God, yes... are you a register? he looks like a hamster to me, yeah. he's like a big chubby hamster and he likes to just like, we this is the second wheel we get him. so we got him a wheel and we moved all the hang out of the way and it's turning fine. you know, the guy at the store was even like, this moves really well. so we put the new wheel inside and remember, whenever we got first got him, he was in that little cage? he was playing on that little wheel but this feels way bigger instead. of he doesn't like that it moves. he doesn't like that it moves so he went out of his way to move the hay, all the hay I took the trouble of moving out for him he put it all back to so that the wheel would be stationary because he likes to sit in the wheel and clean his bum, so he likes to have a clean bum cleaning station and it has to be stationary. he's got his own little like hamster rap personality. he likes to go to the bathroom in one corner. um he chooses wood. he loves his corn. any I have a medley a hamster food medley with like all different nuts and seeds but he only eats certain things. and I could tell when he's had it like I have to replenish his food because only these little grain. he doesn't .I think there's like quinoa... I'm not sure. there's like these tiny little circle pellets he doesn't like them. so he leaves them. he only eats the the certain things inside the medley. he's so picky and weird. I don't know he's a weirdo. That's What I Love About Pets. they all have their own like different little personality. you know personalities? chinchillas they're so cute... yeah they had some at the pet store. I couldn't believe some of the animals they had there! like they had meerkats. they had tucans, like, some people have pet tucans. they're very demanding like, like, having having an exotic pet like that?
anyways guys I think I'm gonna go because it's like late here and I want to go to bed and you know, relax. getting some coffee PJs? oh excuse me... Birds scare the crap out of you, really? I love birds. you have weasels? get out of here! like, the weasels from um Roger rabbits? does Harry still get to run? yeah like he's most of the time in this room, I only came in here to smoke but I don't have my shisha... finish I think it's finished um other than that every day like twice a day. first I come in replenish his, like, spot clean, give him some fruits and vegetables. replenish his Kibbles. then I take him out. he always comes out of his little hay hen and goes like he knows I'm in here. and then I let him run around. and there's like still Parcels in here from moving and stuff. he likes to climb them like they're Mount Everest for him. he's weird. I don't know who he climbs but he likes to run around and then I put him back in attend to Julia. then I come back at night and let him play a bit, you know? but I have to stay in here like I don't.. I could let him stay but I don't know I prefer to just ever since he tried to get up the bottom of the door. I watch him now that I'm in here. he can't be unsupervised he's not trusted. he lost my treasury, so I just set up the gaming station and just watch videos or whatever preferable. if Julia's asleep because she gets very Territorial and like, jealous if I'm in here with the door closed. so kind of thing, anyway... it was nice chatting with you guys um thanks for watching me play with my hijab for an hour uh yeah so what was I gonna say.
I guess that's it, I'm tired. so um thanks for beezing and I hope all of you guys days get better and easier and we'll chat next time. I guess, yeah, um maybe next stream I'll try to think of something fun to do. I like just coming on here and just chatting though really I don't know I like just talking and socializing it's like a form of socialization for me I guess but yeah my beezers so guys thanks for a reason without a reason that's what I'll call it be then without a reason um and I'll see you in my next video or my next live stream so toodaloop, bye guys.

This is my opinion. I'm curious if you can relate, so I'm putting this out there. I'm a relatively new teacher, I live in California, I work for a public school district, and I am switching my party affiliation from Democrat to Republican for the first time in my entire life solely because I am so utterly disgusted with the way Democrats treat teachers, and I have come to the conclusion that Republicans hate teachers less than Democrats do. As mentioned, I'm a relatively new teacher. I've taught for a few years now, have received only positive evaluations, and the entire school community has really embraced me. It's a really nice feeling, and I'm proud of my efforts. I really enjoy helping students, and find the job, overall, very challenging, and also, at times, very intellectually rewarding. I'm not entirely sure if I'll remain a teacher or not, over the long haul, given the low pay, other potentially more rewarding, interesting employment opportunities, the lack of interest in focusing on Academic Learning, particularly among Democrats, the current climate in our schools, an overall lack of professional support and respect from some students, parents, and administrators, and considering how I may wish to spend my time. I've completed new teacher "induction," and have taken the many, many, many, many overtly bureaucratic, costly barriers that Democrats have championed, including: a Teacher Credentialing program, two semesters of unpaid Student Teaching hours, the CSET, both CalTPA1 and CalTPA2, the RICA, and New Teacher Induction. These are all requirements to earn a teaching credential in California. All of this has cost a great deal of time and money, in an economy where inflation has spiked, and the cost of living continues to rapidly rise. Unless and until you've actually had to endure teacher credentialing requirements in California, it's really difficult to convey how restrictive, stupid, costly, bureaucratic, and completely unhelpful the entire process really is. To say the whole process feels like a complete waste of time and money is a huge understatement. Here's a short summary of what each of these barriers entails (failure to pass literally any of these means you can't earn a teaching credential in California): Teacher Credentialing Program: 1-year university level program costing thousands of dollars, and an investment of time involving numerous classes on various theoretical aspects of teaching. Some of it was interesting, most of it felt like being held hostage. Unpaid Student Teaching Hours: Two school semesters of unpaid work requiring me to shadow a classroom teacher, where I also had to prepare and adminster classroom plans and lessons, meet with my mentor teacher, and prepare written analysis of those plans. Much of it felt like an exercise in box checking. Again, this was a one-year unpaid commitment. Did I say it was UNPAID? CSET High-stakes standardized general subject multiple choice and short answer tests, supposedly to gauge minimum proficiency. Costs a hundred dollars for each test attempt, whether you pass or fail. Felt like a high stakes test designed to make money for testing companies. (I'm not sure, but I believe the CSET may now have waiver options, but I don't know the details of how restrictive available waiver options may or may not be.) CalTPA1 and CalTPA2 Mind-numbingly, completely useless bureaucratic high-stakes standardized assessments filled to the brim with education speak and terminology that I have never used and will never use in the classroom. Candidates prepare by reading a test booklet that frequently makes contradictory statements and assertions, and lacks clear, presentable information that can be deduced on a Prima Facie basis. When the candidate seeks to find meaningful definitions that would dilineate what the test administrators are actually looking for, the booklet provides vague information, at best. The test administrators don't provide any resources outside of this simple booklet. None whatsoever. Literally. The worst part of these assessments is that, when a candidate fails, they aren't provided any feedback as to why they failed, and how a candidate could remedy their failure. Instead, the candidate is provided with a "Condition Code" which is supposed to indicate where the deficiency lies -- but, in reality, the provided code doesn't yield any information that a candidate could reasonably use to understand why the test administrators made a failure determination. In my university credentialing program, I spoke with many students who failed, and who did not know why they were determined to have failed - that is, what exact criteria was used to make such a determination. Even after having spoken with our college professors, most still did not understand why the test administrators had made such a determination. I was present where many of these conversations between professors and students took place, and most often, the professors would say that the test administrators had made a subjective determination. The professors even sometimes said they did not understand why some assessment submissions were accepted while others were rejected. In other words, the failure determination was completely arbitrary, and not rooted in any objective, measurable manner. This high stakes test costs $150 for each attempt, whether a candidate passes or not. Huge money making opportunity for the testing company. RICA High-stakes standardized multiple choice and short answer tests that ask test takers to choose the best strategy among several teaching reading strategies that could be used in a variety of classroom settings, in order to supposedly show that the candidate understands how to best serve students learning how to read. Among the questions, oftentimes several of the various strategies could be helpful for student(s) if administered in the real world -- however, given the high stakes nature of the test -- unless the candidate chooses the exact absolute "best" strategy -- and there is only one correct answer according to the test administrators -- the candidate may fail the test. Candidates must pass several different tests, and each test costs $57 for each attempt. Two Years of "New Teacher Induction" Two years of regular meetings after school with my mentor teacher, writing analysis of classroom lesson plans and student performance. There was an additional requirement to attend periodic Professional Development meetings and Teacher Induction Meetings after school, during the school year. While it could possibly be argued that this provided an opportunity to bond with my mentor teacher, and/or fellow new teachers, I achieved and would have achieved all of that without this requirement, and the entire experience felt like a huge time suck and exercise in box checking. None of this was paid training. Who pushes all of the above? Democrats. These are their best ideas on how to help bridge the achievement gap. They've been doing this for years, if not decades. What's astounding is that these standards have been developed by the absolute highest of "education experts". These are their best ideas? Some are politicians. Some are "education reformers." Some work for non-profits. Some earn several hundred thousand dollars per year, to write research reports and lobby politicians on which "best teaching practices" they should adopt. Don't believe me? Look at their salaries and backgrounds. I have. As non-profits, with 501(c)3 tax exempt status, their income information is publicly accessible. Astoundingly, some "leaders" earn well over $400,000 per year. In my opinion, with salaries like these , they should be required to be registered as for profit organizations. Being an "education leader" can be a very lucrative business model, and should be taxed as such. Some have taught for five minutes before leaving the classroom, so they can claim to have been a classroom teacher. They seem to really enjoy writing about and giving speeches celebrating how we have to act with a sense of urgency, you know, because it's all about the children. Many of these individuals and organizations are connected with Democratic policy and lawmakers. Oh, and the best part -- they love children so much that they do everything possible to stay as far away from them as possible. In other words, they like to say they have a different role, that they can make more of an impact -- you know -- OUTSIDE OF THE CLASSROOM. They like to raise money to fund "research studies" backing up the supposed science of all of this -- yet, what's unmistakeable is, they have a clear bias and agenda, and there's no objectively reliable, measurement tool in which to determine teacher effectiveness. There is absolutely an undeniable subjective aspect to determining teacher effectiveness. If I am incorrect in making such an assertion, what standardized assessment tool exists today that is used to measure teacher effectiveness, that has been reliably proven - over time - to be an objectively effective measurement tool used to gauge teacher effectiveness? If such a study exists supporting a particular assessment tool, has the study been subject to and adhered to Double Blind Peer Review guidelines, to reduce the chance of bias? The answer is no and no. In other words, they claim that these standards help prepare teachers, but their determinations are entirely subjective, and they have a clear economic interest in pushing these proposals. In my opinion, they make these claims because such messaging resonates with Democratic politicians and voters, and that helps keep the donor dollars rolling in. The wheel greases itself. Not a bad business model if you want to make alot of money. What seems to happen with education policy is that every few years education "leaders" write and create "newer and better" standards to help better prepare teachers. They talk about replacing various barriers, which they do as they end up creating new barriers that are just as ridiculous, unhelpful, and also huge time sucks and money grifting opportunities for "education leaders". This doesn't mean Republicans get a clear pass, of course. I don't like that Republicans dislike unions. While I do think some unions are useless for members, generally, union membership leads to better wages and working conditions, and, in my opinion, teachers, at least, are still underpaid. But, to me, that's the only plus that Democrats have. Other than that, Republicans generally want to ease these types of restrictive, costly, useless credentialing requirements. And, sure, while Republicans want to do silly, harmful things like banning some books, and I'm not in favor of that, all of the above is still far much more harmful to teachers and schools than book banning. And through all of this, Democrats don't even bother to acknowledge that teachers are human beings who can and should have interests and lives outside of the classroom, and how important it is to balance personal and work life, in order to be happy. Instead, teachers are treated as cogs on a wheel, to be cranked and turned as much as they want, without regard to impact. Meanwhile, in the minds of Democrats, this is all okay because they acknowledge how important we are when they give their same, boring predictable speeches. And while Republicans also want to ban the teaching of Critical Race Theory (CRT), I can live with that, as I don't teach CRT anyway (and I don't know anybody who teaches CRT). In other words, where Democrats like to create obstacles to prevent me from spending time, you know, actually teaching students, at least Republicans seem to want to let me do my job as an educator. Just with fewer books. That's a better option, in my view. Worse yet, Democrats are supposedly the ones who celebrate teachers. With friends like these, who needs enemies? Many Democratic leaders have also been strong champions of Charter Schools. Keeping my options open, when I was looking, I interviewed with several charter schools, and charter school chains, and had strong interest among several. From what I saw, when exploring options, the biggest difference between traditional public schools and publicly funded, privately run charter schools is that the charters require teachers to work longer hours for lower pay, and with zero professional protections in the event issues arise. They can fire you at any time, for any reason, without recourse, and can direct you to stay at school until any hour, if they so chose. All of the charters I interviewed with expressed that there were issues with student discipline (just like traditional public schools also expressed, when I was looking), and none of their publicly available test data indicated any higher degree of student achievement (considering that test scores are currently the barometer that most people like to use to measure student achievement). Given options, why would I want to choose to work longer hours for lower pay, without a contract and contractual protections, especially when you consider that student outcomes were essentially the same? Considering all of the above efforts, at what other cost is the promotion of the above standards and efforts to "improve" our schools? What is the opportunity cost? Where is parental accountability? Student accountability? Administrative accountability? Student discipline in schools? Any effort to provide smaller class sizes and higher wages? Any effort to teach critical-thinking skills? Any effort to acknowledge that teachers should have healthy, well-balanced lives outside of the classroom? These proposals have all been discarded by the Democratic Party who instead have chosen to wholly focus on "teacher accountability." In fact, both Democrats and Republicans love to push that narrative. Gee, with efforts like these, how could there possibly be a teacher shortage? How could there possibly be an achievement gap? All of this would be a joke if it didn't actually harm the efforts of people who actually want to help students -- you know -- teachers. Possibly the worst part of all of the above is that, not only are all these barriers counter-productive in terms of serving the needs of students, in all likelihood, they also serve to discourage professionals who may otherwise have the skillset to become successful educators - but decide not to take a second look because of the vast bureaucratic waste of time and income loss they would have to subject themselves to. Do we need standards? Of course. We have existing standards already in place that we could use. For example, college degrees from accredited educational institutions, and criminal background checks. Apparently that's too low a bar for "education reformers." They want a piece of the pie - they want their cut, and they want to feel like they've done something to improve schools. So they enact more standards. Then, after a few years, and conditions haven't improved, they repackage and re-sell their latest well-funded shiny objects, claiming that they've now figured out the secret sauce. Then they give a few speeches congratulating each other, and go out to dinner. A few years later, the whole process repeats itself, and everybody acts like the newest, latest proposals have never been tried before. Talk about short-attention span theatre. Don't expect any of this to change. Which is all why I've decided to vote Republican from now on. Democratic leaders have failed teachers in California. I know we're a blue state so, relatively, my vote doesn't really matter. But I find Democratic policies towards public education to be beyond disgusting, and they're definitely not getting my support. Teachers and non-teachers alike, what do you think? Curious if it's just me who feels this way.

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