Let's just get this out of the way right now. My hundo streak ending didn't last long, because I caught 3 more this week. One from research, which I'll explain research at another time, one from ball blasting, which I will also explain at another time, and one from a raid. That raid one is a rather spectacular one at that. I was invited to a raid, I think in Japan and considered not doing it, but something told me to do it. It paid out in spades. I watched the CP run down, which is what happens in any raid. The one you battle has a much higher CP (oh yeah Combat Points) than the one you get to catch. Anyway, I watched it run down to 1474 which I know to be that particular pokemons hundo CP. I was pretty stoked that I got another hundo after going a week without one, but then when the catch screen opened up, I was shocked. It was a shiny. Now shiny legendaries are automatic catches, you just have to throw the ball, but I had to do this right and dropped a silver pinap berry which makes it a little easier to catch the pokemon but also gives you extra candy when you catch it. Once I did that I set my catch ring so that I would get an excellent catch and waited for it to attack. When it made it's move I spun my ball for a curve throw and let it go to glory, Excellent catch on a Shundo. I've been playing since about a month or so after the game started in 2016 and this is my first ever Shundo which if you couldn't figure it out, is a shiny hundo. I know a few people that have multiple shundos, so me only having this one makes it very special to me. I immediately made it my buddy so I can start walking with it and finding candy and candy XL so that I can power it up to a level 50 as soon as I can. I took a screen shot of right after it popped up on the screen.
Look at that, it's a thing of beauty. I honestly thought that I would never get myself a shundo. The easiest way to get one is through trading with a friend that is lucky, but even that way, I've only come close with a 98%, so the shundo was a pipe dream. I still don't believe this is going to change my shundo luck of course, I will go back to catching hundos and saving the shudos for the inordinately lucky people that play. I do have one more pictures with it's appraisal showing the IV, which I still have no idea what IV stands for, but that is the preferred term for the bars in the appraisal.
Oh, it wasn't in Japan it was in New Mexico. I completely forgot where I caught it since I get invited to raids all over the world now and most of them are from Japan. Anyway, shortly after taking that screen shot I changed it's name to Deoxyshundo, in honor of it being my first and only shundo. Yeah, it's the little things that excite me now.
I began working on the painting this week. I did mention that I was doing a painting right? Anyway, there is more to it than just a painting, but the entire thing has come with it's challenges and there has been some very big bumps in the road so far. For instance, I got all may paints out and realized very quickly that I didn't have any black paint. Black paint is very important in this painting so that was a huge bump. I finally got out to get some yesterday, but in the meantime I worked on what I could. Almost every technique that I'm using in this painting is foreign to me. It is very much outside what I would normally do, and that is rather exciting I have been taking progress photos, but I'm going to save those until I'm completely finished to unveil the whole thing to you. If things go well, I may be done by next week when I write this, so look forward to those photos then.
Also in the excitement or maybe this really isn't exciting, is dealing with my mom. A couple of weeks ago she was put on the actively declining list which meant that they were expecting the end to come very soon, but then she bounced back and was taken off in the middle of last week. One of those determining factors was her eating (really drinking at this point) and her bowel movements. Here comes the excitement. After a few days off of no bowel movements, which I rightly assumed was because of her lack of food intake, the came back and in a way that has made this week extra challenging for my stress. She has had multiple movements a day, and a couple of days ago it was as high as 5. Now these aren't simple bowel movements, they are pudding constantly expelling from the body. Let me tell you, I have no idea where it is all coming from. I know the body stores waste, but it seems that she is expelling everything like it is going out of style. Hospice sent extra wipes this week which I thought would get us through a few weeks, but I wiped (no pun intended) those out in a couple of days. I'm going to have to ask the nurse to order more tomorrow when I see her. That makes it a little embarrassing that I've gone through that many wipes in less than a week. Oh well, deal with the disasters as they come. That seems to be my motto right now.
Ok, some TV viewing pleasures for you. If you didn't know, the latest season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel has returned. Amazon prime is dropping 2 new episodes each week on Fridays, so if you haven't started the new season, you have 4 fantastic episodes to watch. This is one of the best written shows ever written, and I will stand by that statement. I highly recommend watching it, and if you've never watched it, you will now have 3 glorious seasons with 4 episodes of season 4 ahead of you. I did see from Alex Borstein that they have begun production on season 5 which will be their final season. I'm both excite and bummed, but all good things must come to and end, and I can't wait to see exactly how they wrap this whole show up. I'm telling you, it is a masterpiece.
For some fun viewing, Disney + debuted Free Guy on their streaming service this past week. I simply expected a goofy fun comedy, but it was really good and had a surprise touching storyline to it. When this came out back in the summer or so, I saw a few things about it being a vanity type project for Ryan Reynolds to satisfy some contract obligations with the film company and what not, and that it was kind of a throwaway film, but it really isn't. One of the great parts of the movie is Taika Waititi, who if you don't know is probably better known as a director from New Zealand, but gets the occasional acting gig, and he really pumps it up as the villain in this movie. On a side note, if you haven't seen Jo Jo Rabbit, do whatever you have to do to see it. I have become a very big fan of Taika's work and right now he can do no wrong. He is not only a good actor but a great director. He's also a really fun guy to follow on Instagram. Has some cheeky behind the scenes photos of him using a air blower to get a shot of, I'm not sure who it was to him, but it was to get that wind blown look in a photo. Anyway, this was about Free Guy, but I had to point out the greatness that is Taika.
It's time for Favorite Song of the Week and this week belongs to my all time favorite artist, so I'm assuming you already know that means this is going to be a song by Prince. In honor of the Estate announcing that The Gold Experience is going to be re-released on Record Store Day this year, I'm choosing the big hit from that album. It is with great enthusiasm that I give you Prince & the New Power Generation with "The Most Beautiful Girl In The World".
There isn't a day that goes by that I don't miss him, and think about what more he could have done musically. I'll just have to settle for all the unreleased and remastered music that the Estate is putting out.
That's about it for this week. I'm going to be working hard on that painting in hopes that I'll be done by next weekend so that I can share it with you. Despite the bumps, it has been a real fun experience, and such a pleasure to be creating again. Peace in and goodnight.
I'll just say that it's been a unique week. I got an email early this week from Medium telling me that if I don't have 100 followers on there by a certain time they are removing me from the partner program. That program was the one that if I chose, I could put my writing behind a paywall. I of course lifted all the paywalls from my stories since they never did the one thing they said they would which was promote my work. I have mixed feeling about this whole thing. On one hand I don't really care, which is more than likely that numb feeling I have towards everything, and on the other hand, I'm furious that they have no put a benchmark on things to be able to sell your work. They were supposed to be all for the small independent writer, but it looks like they only want the bottomline, which means some larger company more than likely bought them out. I still plan on finishing The Violet Dahlia, and I will post the final chapter there as well as here, but then I'm not going to post anything on there again. Seems like as good a time as any to leave that platform.
My mom began complaining about some pain in her back so I had to start administering morphine to her. This is apparently the next big step in how things will be going. I still don't know how many steps there are, I just no that this is a defining moment in her decline. Have I mentioned that I don't wish this on anyone? Other than that, things are going somewhat normal, which is good, but I am finding myself getting tired once again. I'll just have to work through it, because at this point I don't really see her going to that Hospice House again. I just remembered I have to call the social worker. They left a message this week but I was busy with something else and it slipped my mind until now. I'll call tomorrow, since it's Sunday.
Ok, you knew you were getting some Pokemon news, so strap in, cause this one is kind of fun. I've told you about the raids, so you have an understanding on those. I got an invite to a raid I think it was in, well I can actually look it up cause I still have the mythical pokemon from the raid. Just did and it was the Phillipines. One of things I may not have mentioned is, that when you go in the lobby of a gym, you have a set amount of time before the actual raid starts so you can invite people from your friends list. When I got in the lobby from the invite, there were 3 other people besides myself, and this particular mythical (legendary) is quite easy to defeat with 4 people. The time counted down and with 4 seconds to go one of the people left. Usually I would bail as soon as it got down to 3 but like I said, this one is rather easy, so I let the time runout and entered the gym for the battle. The two remaining people with me went in, but quick ducked out, which left me there to fight alone. If you remember what I said about legendary raids, you generally need a minimum of 4 people, which is true for the most part, but I was watching the damage I was doing and since I was going to waist a remote raid pass anyway, I was committed to seeing this through. I made a decision early on since I was alone, I was going to use only my best pokemon for that battle, so when all my pokemon feinted, I quickly revived them with a full revive, which I have amassed quite a few of and went back in with that battle group. I had to do that twice and with 19 seconds left I beat the pokemon which gave me the best one I had gotten from the raids which was a 98% IV.
I did what I thought was impossible for me at this point in the game, I soloed a legendary raid. I figured it was the flukest of flukes and there was no way I could do it again. Well, I got a chance to leave the house yesterday and hunt down a raid in person. I didn't want to waste a remote pass for something that I might not win again, the other time I was all in since I had already entered the gym, I was going to lose the pass regardless, not need to do that on purpose. Well I found a raid and invited some people just to see if they would show up, but only one person did, and when the battle started that person bailed so I was alone again. This time I messed up and it cost me time so I lost, but since I was on location my in person raid pass was still good, so I revived all my pokemon and went back in. Ok for transparency the thing that messed me up was that I took a screen shot while I was fighting for proof that I was alone, but that came up for the edit screen on the photo and I freaked out and it took me a few seconds to get it off the screen which cost me valuable time. I didn't make that mistake the second time. I had to see if I could solo this legendary and it wasn't a fluke. Well it wasn't fluke and with 30 seconds left the legendary went down.
For those of you that don't play, right under that orange circle with the number 30 in it is where it tells you how many people are in the gym with you, as you can see there is no number there, which means I'm there alone. For further proof there is an achievements screen right after that, that gives random awards for things that people did. If there is more than one person in the gym multiple people will show up on that screen, here is the one right after that raid.
Final Strike is the default award when you are the only one in the gym. I actually soloed it again. I couldn't believe it. Usually the only people that can do that are trainers that are level 50 and have all the best pokemon leveled up as high as they can go which is also level 50. None of mine are level 50 and I myself am only level 44. The pokemon I start off with isn't even level 40, but is a shadow so it's hits harder than a normal pokemon. I'll get into shadow pokemon at another time. Anyways, I should never have been able to solo a legendary pokemon at all. I'm just a chump that takes the time to look up which pokemon are the strongest fighters against these legendaries, and change their fast and charged moves to the strongest against that type. I'd say I got lucky, which I still feel I did, but there has to be something more to it since I did it twice. Also I should say that you are stronger when you are fighting in person, hence the 19 seconds versus the 30 seconds. Also in the first one, for the brief amount of time that those other two people were in the gym they could have done some damage which would have helped me out, but that second time was all me. For anyone out there that plays and wants this new legendary while it's in the gyms, well, I use the same battle group for each version of this Pokemon, that one is the attack form, there is also defense, normal, and speed form. They are all weak to the very same pokemon, but they do fight differently, anyway back to my point. If you are worried about beating this pokemon but really want it, give me a heads up so I can Mega my Gengar and then send me that invite. I will give you the win, I just can't promise you will catch it. This one likes to run if you don't get excellent throws on each throw, but even then if it is a low enough cp, it will run. The hundo CPs are 1474 for normal and 1842 for weather boosted.
This is that second one, I changed the name to reflect that solo victory. It does happen to be a 3 star, not a great one, but I was going to keep this one regardless because of how impressed I am with that solo victory. Ok last pokemon related news. I did manage to catch the shiny version of that pokemon this morning. Once again, not very good IV wise, but since it's a shiny, I'm keeping it anyway.
Oh, I lied there is one more bit of Pokemon news. My hundo streak has ended, no hundos this week.
Ok, on to other stuff. I keep forgetting to mention this, but I found a keto friendly coffee drink. Most of the ones out on the market all full of sugar, but this one uses monk fruit and it's rather fantastic. I've had the caramel which is pictured, the vanilla, and the mocha. I have to say that the vanilla and mocha have a synthetic flavor to them, so I'll just stick to the caramel. I can't use this during a fast, but it will be good for a coffee treat with a morning meal from time to time.
Just thought you might want to give it a try. It's good even if you aren't doing keto.
Like I said last week, i'm beginning to feel that creative spark. Yesterday I went to a craft store and picked up a few things, canvases included, I have plan for something that I hope will be pretty epic, but I'm going to hold off telling you what it is for now. If things go well I'll be laying the groundwork for it this week and maybe I'll have something to show you in a couple of weeks.
Ok, time for Favorite Song of the Week and this time we are going back in the day. The first time I heard this song it blew my mind. This was one of those hits that defined a generation and changed things in the music industry. It also helps that these are the grandfathers of hip hop. No this wasn't their first hit, but this will always be my favorite song by them, so I am so pleased to give you RUN DMC and let's not forget Jam Master Jay with their hit "It's Tricky".
Come on, that is such a great song. Whenever I hear that I always miss Jam Master Jay. RUN DMC would not be who they were without him on the turntables.
That's all I have for this week, I won't have pictures for you, but I hope for an update on that art project next week so you can look forward to that. Peace in and goodnight.
Ok, just to get this out of the way early, my hundo streak is still going. I caught 3 more this week and one of which was a surprise. Yes, I know they are all surprises, but I have this small device that I can connect to the game that can spin pokestops and catch pokemon when I'm not playing the game. I generally use it in the morning when I'm on my drive so that I can focus on spinning the stops while it catches pokemon. Once I get to a location where I can stop and spend some time, I go through all the pokemon that it caught and check to see what they are, usually I get the surprise shiny, but this was my first hundo and it just so happens to be one that I really like and really really wanted.
That is a female Heracross, you can tell because of the heartshaped horn on it's head, the male has a two pronged pointy horn. Beside it having a slight difference in the sex of it, it is also special because it is a regional. That means you can only catch it in a certain region of the world and where I live happens to be one of the very few areas in the US you can catch it. It is part of the southern region which covers all of South America and the bottom half of Florida, Texas, and I believe a sliver of California. Heracross is also a pretty versatile pokemon as far as fighting goes so I use them quite often in raids and battling other players, Oh, I should point out that it can appear in the rest of the world as a raid boss which it did recently when the shiny was introduced. That created a whole stir because the removed it from the region when it was in raids so that you couldn't catch it in the wild. That's going into a real deep dive and I'm pretty sure I've hit the limit of your sticking with this, so on to other things.
Things are going rather smooth with my mom, I guess I've gotten into a groove, which will more than likely change soon. These smooth going never last very long, but this one is going longer than most.
Tried a couple of firsts this week. Since I extended my not so great eating one more week I was able to get a few more coffee drinks. I tried a cold brew first which was exactly like I thought it would be, which was wonderful. I didn't need to add my usually double shot of espresso to it to get that strong coffee bitterness to it. I also gave a ice caramel macchiato a try, and I liked it as well. To be honest though I don't know if I could tell the difference between that and a latte, but it gives me another option from time to time. I didn't add my double shot of espresso to that either so maybe that's the difference, just a stronger flavor. Oh on the home front I tried my normal morning shake differently. I would usually just use water with my Sunwarrior Warrior Blend and Collagen combo, but I tried it with 10oz of coffee and 10oz of almond mild and it was delicious. I did find that if I let the coffee cool down it was a bit better, since I put a few ice cubes in my shake. The melted ice with the hot coffee caused it to get a bit watered down, so I just planned ahead the second time I gave it a try and made my coffee about a half hour before I made the shake. I use the Dunkin Donuts Keurig French Vanilla cup for my just plain coffee. I can drink that even when I'm eating super healthy cause it won't spike my insulin in any way or have any calories. It's even good when fasting, which reminds me I need to get a new box tomorrow when I go shopping.
Ok, I've been thinking about a video that we could do for The Pepperoni Report and I'd like your input. We usually do a video with owners or a owner at the end of each season, where we just sit down with them and talk about how things are going, but I've been thinking that maybe this year we take questions and just sit down and answered those. Maybe give people a chance to get to know us a little better. So what I need to know from you, is this a good idea, or opening us up to a whole lot of things that we probably don't want? I haven't had a chance to discuss it with my partner yet, cause he was in a car accident recently and is still a bit mentally shook up, so he is taking some time to rest up and heal. We have plenty of time for this since the first video doesn't launch until March 14th. This would more than likely be our season finale video so it wouldn't go out until some time in June, I don't have the exact date yet, but I think that is when it would go out. Please leave a comment below (they work again, finally) and not on Facebook, since there are a lot of days I don't actually go on there at all.
Time for Favorite Song of the Week. This comes from an artist that at the time had to fight in order to put this album out, because it was contrary to every thing they did in the past. Marvin Gaye was known as the crooner love song singer with Motown, and when he wanted to make a protest album, they didn't want him to do it, because it might damage his image, but he fought and fought until they gave in, and it wasn't just the right decision for him, but it changed the way some record companies viewed the role in helping artist change society. Marvin not only wrote all the songs but produced the album as well, and in doing that did some things that were rather unusual. Doubling ones voice wasn't unusual, but basically singing a duet with yourself was, and that is in essence what Marvin did on this song. It has so many layers of his vocals with singing two parts at the same time as well as backing vocals as well, not to mention the fact that he used the Detroit Lions in the part where you here the crowd talking. That was the Detroit Lions back in 1970, maybe 69, not sure when he actually recorded the song. I am happy to present to you, Marvin Gaye with his indelible hit "What's Going On".
If you were wondering, no I don't have that album on vinyl. Yes, it is a goal of mine to find a copy of it. I will, just give me time.
Alright then, that is all I have this week. I have no real plans for this week, but I have found myself wanting to write again which is unusual for me lately, so maybe that will happen. The goal in mind would be to finish the Violet Dahlia, but we will see what happens. I hope you have a great week, peace in and goodnight.
I had a moment of creative thought this week, and I can't seem to get it out of my mind. I'm hoping this might be some sort of rebirth in my creativity, since it seems to have left me. Right now it's just an image in my head and I'm not exactly sure what to do with it, but it might come to me. If it doesn't, I don't think I'll be too upset since like I said, all creativity has sort of left me at this point.
I have a quick Ri Ri picture for you. This is her sleeping on a pillow instead of Morty's bed. I thought this was a bit odd until I noticed after taking the picture that she threw up in his bed. She's a bit of a butthead, but I still love her.
Ok, short Pokemon update. AS of lately I've had this pretty hot streak of catching hundos. It sort of all started with that one legendary I showed you from that really incredible day of 2 shinies and then that hundo from raids. Well last month with that one included I caught 7 hundos, which is really not the norm for me. I'm lucky if I get 1 a month,. Well I've already started this month off with 2, both were from research tasks, and both were almost exactly the same. They were this little one right here. both had the 611cp, but their sizes were slightly different. This was the first one which I caught on Feb 1st, the second was on the 5th.
As you can see, I also made this one a buddy, so that I can get those XL candies up to 296. That's the number of candies you need to get that to it's max level of 50. Back to the hot streak, since December I've caught 11 hundos, which is crazy to me, but I'll take it. Ok, that's all the Pokemon news I have for you.
I have 2 videos to put together for the TPR, well, I can only really finish 1 of them. The second one is our midseason special which we are filming separately for a few reasons, 1 we don't need to be together for this one, and well, I just can't get myself free to film anything else right now. I really don't see us filming tougher until maybe some time in March at the earliest, but that's ok. The videos we will have including this special should take us into April and maybe even May, so we have ourselves covered for a while anyway.
It seems the steady decline of my mother has taken a slight turn. Some of her strength and character are back. Not enough to say she has bounced back per say, but enough to lead me to believe she will be around a little longer than expected. I have no real idea how long that is, but for a while I didn't expect her to make it to today, so when I say longer, that could be 2 weeks or 2 months, I really have no idea. She is complete bedridden now, and in order to keep her a part of everything, I will carry her out to the TV room so she can somewhat participate. She has her bed in the old living room now, since they brought her a hospital bed, that kind of in a way keeps her involved, she can see the TV and hear the music, plus the dogs are always around her. The bed has kept me from accountability photos, since it's in the way of the shot I usually get, so those are put on hold for the time being. I'll get back to them soon enough. I guess this all comes down to, apparently I'm doing something right when it comes for taking care of my mom, what that is, I don't know that either. There is a lot I don't know about this whole process, so I feel that I'm getting lucky at a lot of turns here.
Ok, it's time for Favorite Song of the Week, and we are going deep on this one. This will also be sort of a preview for this up and coming Friday Night Vinyl. This one comes from my favorite member of the ground breaking Hip Hop group Wu Tang Clan, non other then ODB, Ol' Dirty Bastard, aka Dirty Dog, aka Big Baby Jesus. He was one of the true greats of Hip Hop and I miss what he could have done if he had lived. I give you ODB with his song "Shimmy Shimmy Ya".
Ok, I'm leaving this one short today since I can hear my mom being rather vocal which means she probably needs to be changed, Let me tell you the joy of that, or I won't and just leave it to your imagination. Peace in and goodnight.
