text:
{{Info/Personagem animangá

| nome              = Freeza
| nome japonês      = フリーザ
| série             = Dragon Ball Z,Dragon Ball GT e "Dragon Ball Super"
| imagem            = Freeza.JPG
| tamanho           = 270px
| legenda           = Freeza em suas quatro formas. Da esquerda para a direita: final, terceira, segunda e primeira
| primeira          = Dragon Ball Z cap. 44
| última            = Dragon Ball Super ep. 131
| criador           = Akira Toriyama
| vozes             =  Ryusei Nakao Ricardo Spínola (DBZ; DBGT; DBSuper, ep. 1-104) Tomás Alves (DBSuper, ep. 105-131) Carlos Campanile (DBZ, DBGT e DBSuper) Hamilton Ricardo (DBKai)

| raça              = Changeller
| família            = Chilled "(ancestral) "Rei Cold (pai) Coola (irmão) Kuriza (filho)  Frost (Raça imagem do 6º Universo )
}}
 é um personagem fictício da série de mangá Dragon Ball, criado por Akira Toriyama. Ele fez sua estréia no Capítulo # 247:  Namekusei, Frio e Nublado (An'un Uzumaku Namekkusei), publicado pela primeira vez na revista Weekly Shōnen Jump em 6 de novembro de 1989, como um temido tirano alienígena conhecido como "o ser mais poderoso do universo".

Apesar de não aparecer até à segunda metade do mangá, Freeza é amplamente considerado o antagonista mais icônico da série devido a servir efetivamente como o catalisador de muitos dos eventos descritos na história, como a chegada de Goku na Terra, os Saiyajins terem aterrissado na Terra e, posteriormente, os personagens principais irem para o planeta Namekusei. Ele também é diretamente responsável pelo assassinato de Bardock, pelo genocídio da raça Saiyajin e pela segunda morte de Kuririn, o que o torna o inimigo mais pessoal e significativo de Goku.

Criação e concepção

Freeza, um ditador alienígena que forçosamente assume planetas para revendê-los, foi criado no período da bolha econômica japonesa e inspirado em imobiliários especuladores, a quem Toriyama teria chamado de "o pior tipo de pessoas." Toriyama não se sentia atraído com seus personagens vilões, embora admitisse que Freeza estava perto disso. Por isso, ele prestou atenção especial à forma como Freeza se comportava. A maioria dos vilões tipicamente fala rudemente, por causa disso, Freeza ganhou um aspecto mais educado em contraste com sua inquietante crueldade. O nome do personagem é um trocadilho do aparelho freezer e por isso, os membros das Forças Especiais Ginyu foram nomeados como itens que normalmente seriam colocados em um refrigerador. A edição # 2 dos Shenlong Times, mostrou num folheto de bônus a alguns compradores do Daizenshuu 2: Story Guide que Freeza foi criado após a saída do editor de Toriyama na época, Yū Kondō.

Freeza possui seis formas de transformação, cada uma sendo muito diferente e mais poderosa do que a anterior. Está implícito que sua quarta forma é realmente a sua básica, com as outras três sendo transformações que suprimem seu poder para conservá-lo. Toriyama revelou que ele não pensava em fazer Freeza se transformar até metade da Saga. Ele disse que tinha o hábito de tornar os seus personagens gradualmente complexos, até finalmente torná-los mais elegantes, pois achava ruim desenhá-los, se sua aparência fosse mais assustadora. O autor confirmou que essa é a razão pela qual a terceira e mais horrível forma de Freeza só foi mostrada por um curto período de tempo, e brincou sobre as outras três transformações.

 História
 Passado
Freeza é o grande imperador do Universo. Filho do Rei Cold, no passado se aliou aos Saiyajins, que tinham derrotado os Tsufurujins e tomado conta do Planeta Vegeta (antes chamado de Plant), em suas conquistas pelo universo. Após um início próspero, tal aliança começou a ruir quando Freeza ficou sabendo da lenda do Super Saiyajin. Freeza então tratou de exterminar os saiyajins. Primeiro matou seu soberano, o Rei Vegeta em uma pequena revolta em sua própria nave, e depois após uma breve luta, matou Bardock que ao receber um dom de videncia, se dirigiu a nave de Freeza, atacando a todos os soldados. Irritado, Freeza  sai da nave e com uma imensa bola de energia "mata" Bardock (na verdade é revelado em um OVA de 2011, que ele voltou para o passado, e ele é o lendário Super Sayajin.), seus Soldados e o Planeta Vegeta. Dos saiyajins, apenas sobreviveram ao massacre o príncipe Vegeta, seu tutor Nappa, Raditz e Kakaroto (futuro Son Goku), os dois últimos filhos de Bardock. Levando ainda em consideração os filmes, também sobreviveram Turles, Brolly,Tarble e Paragus. Vegeta, Raditz e Nappa passam a trabalhar para Freeza, enquanto que Kakarotto vai para a Terra,
onde cresce sob os cuidados do velho Son Gohan e ganha o nome de Son Goku.

 Namekusei
O Imperador Freeza fica sabendo da existência das Esferas do Dragão e parte para o Planeta Namekusei, o lar de origem de Piccolo e Kami Sama. Ele, tal como Vegeta, objetiva a vida e juventude eterna. Em sua procura pelas esferas ele e seus soldados matam grande parte da população Namekuseijin. Enquanto isso chegam ao planeta Namekusei Bulma, Kuririn e Gohan, vindos na nave de Kami Sama, objetivando reunir as esferas de Namekusei para ressuscitar seus companheiros mortos na luta contra Vegeta e Nappa. E como não poderia deixar de ser, Vegeta também veio ao planeta, após se recuperar no Planeta Freeza Nº79. Kiwi é morto facilmente por Vegeta, e enquanto Freeza e suas tropas atacavam uma aldeia de Namekusei, Gohan intervêm e salva Dende. Dodoria o persegue, mas ele se encontra com Vegeta e é derrotado. Pouco antes de morrer, Dodoria conta a Vegeta que não foi um cometa que destruiu o Planeta Vegeta e sim Freeza. Depois de Dodoria, Zarbon luta com Vegeta e o  vence facilmente, após se transformar. Porém, Freeza pede para que Zarbon trouxesse o corpo de Vegeta à nave, temendo que ele possuísse uma Dragon Ball.

No entanto, Vegeta consegue escapar e danifica a Nave de Freeza, impedindo que ele e seus homens deixassem o Planeta. Com sua regeneração Saiyajin que permite que ele fique mais poderoso, após se recuperar de sua quase-morte, Vegeta aniquila Zarbon em sua segunda batalha. Após a morte de seu braço direito, Freeza chama as Forças Especiais Ginyu, que lhe trazem novos scouters. Após quase vencerem Gohan, Kuririn e Vegeta, eis que Goku chega em Namekusei e a Tropa de Ginyu é derrotada, tendo seus membros derrotados um a um por Goku e mortos por Vegeta. Enquanto isso, Freeza chega até o Patriarca de Namekusei, tentando descobrir, sem sucesso, o código secreto para utilizar as Esferas do Dragão. Nessa hora, surge Nail que se encarrega de atrasá-lo. Dende ensina o segredo para Gohan e Kuririn. Em seguida, surge Porunga, o deus dragão namekuseijin equivalente à Shenlong.

 Luta contra os guerreiros Z
Graças a Porunga, Piccolo é ressuscitado e enviado para Namekusei, aonde se funde com Nail. Vegeta, por sua vez, força Dende para que Porunga lhe conceda a vida eterna, por que achava que só assim seria possível vencer Freeza. Mas seu desejo não é realizado devido à morte do patriarca de Namekusei. Nessa hora, surge Freeza, furioso e disposto a matar os Guerreiros Z. No entanto, ele se surpreende com Vegeta que aumentou muitos seus poderes desde que chegou à Namekusei. Vegeta também é ajudado por Gohan e Kuririn que aumentaram seus poderes graças ao Patriarca. Apesar disso, Freeza ainda poderia derrotá-los na primeira forma, mas, então resolve assustar os Guerreiros. O tirano mostra sua primeira transformação, aumentando enormemente seus poderes e deixa todos assombrados. Enquanto isso, Goku está em uma sala de recuperação na nave de Freeza, já que ficou muito ferido após a luta contra as Forças Ginyu.

Kuririn quase morre após levar uma chifrada de Freeza, mas é salvo pelos poderes de cura de Dende. Gohan se enfurece e ataca Freeza, após seus poderes aumentarem rapidamente por causa da raiva, mas depois, é facilmente derrotado. Vegeta, por sua vez, fica paralisado de medo e não ataca Freeza, quando eis que surge Piccolo e decide lutar sozinho contra o vilão. Piccolo, com seus novos poderes consegue lutar de igual para igual contra Freeza. Mas, quando Freeza passa para sua terceira forma, Piccolo acaba derrotado. Dende também cura seus ferimentos. Vegeta, diante da imensa força de Freeza, pede para que Kuririn o ataque de forma que o deixe a beira da morte para que depois Dende o curasse. Dessa forma, Vegeta consegue um imenso poder. De início, Dende fica relutante em curar Vegeta, mas no fim acaba aceitando. Querendo assustar ainda mais os Guerreiros, Freeza, passa para sua quarta e última forma. Ao ver que Dende curava seus inimigos, ele o mata primeiro.

Vegeta, por sua vez, pensa que se transformou no Super Saiyajin, o lendário guerreiro que Freeza tanto teme. Porém, Freeza o humilha de tal forma, que faz com que o orgulhoso príncipe dos Saiyajins derrubasse suas primeiras lágrimas de pavor e desespero. Nesse mesmo momento, Goku chega ao campo de batalha. Com um raio disparado de seu dedo, Freeza enfim mata Vegeta, que já agonizante, pede para Goku vingar a morte dos Saiyajins. A luta entre Freeza e Goku tem início. No começo, a batalha parecia equilibrada, mas isto muda, quando Freeza revela a metade do seu poder, superando e espancando Goku. Quando o herói está prestes a perder, uma força de vontade extra permite-lhe utilizar o Kaioken aumentado 20 vezes. Goku utiliza o Kamehameha, combinado com o Kaioken, mas tal golpe, revela-se inútil para Freeza. Sem alternativas, Goku decide usar o seu golpe mais poderoso: a Genki Dama. Freeza percebe o golpe e tenta matar Goku, quando é impedido por Piccolo e os outros. Goku aproveita a chance e atinge Freeza com a Genki Dama. Quando a batalha parece acabar, Freeza reaparece, para a surpresa de todos. Irritado, ele fere Piccolo e ainda mata Kuririn. A morte de Kuririn, empurra a raiva de Goku a um nível insuportável. Goku se transforma no lendário Super Saiyajin, o guerreiro lendário que surgiria de mil em mil anos.

A partir daí, a luta toma outro rumo. Goku começa a espancar Freeza que se surpreende com o seu poder e o reconhece como o Super Saiyajin. Pela primeira vez, o nobre Imperador Freeza se sente humilhado e para não suportar a vergonha da derrota, lança um ataque sobre o núcleo de Namekusei, que começa a entrar em destruição e explodirá em cinco minutos. Além disso, Freeza resolve usar todo o seu poder e afirma que mesmo que Goku o vença, ele não sobreviverá, por causa da destruição de Namekusei. Uma super batalha então, tem início, com Goku e Freeza lutando de igual para igual. No meio da batalha, o Sr. Kaiô cria um plano e assim, todos os mortos por Freeza e seus homens são ressuscitados em Namekusei e transportados para a Terra, graças às Esferas do Dragão dos dois planetas, com exceção de Goku e Freeza. Goku resolveu ficar porque queria utilizar todos os seus poderes e ver até onde chegava a força de Freeza.

A última batalha tem início. Freeza percebe que mesmo usando o 100% do seu poder máximo, não venceria Goku pois, além do Super Saiyajin ser mais poderoso, o vilão estava gastando a sua energia e se enfraquecendo aos poucos. Porém, Goku decide desistir da luta e parte para sua nave, desprezando completamente Freeza. Em desespero, Freeza não pretende desistir e lança seu último golpe: um tipo de serra de energia (esfera da morte), que tem o poder de cortar qualquer coisa. Mas, mesmo assim não consegue atingir Goku e este, se mostra decepcionado com a última técnica de Freeza. Goku se desvia facilmente de todos os ataques até que um deles vem por trás de Freeza e o corta ao meio. Freeza é praticamente derrotado e fica a beira da morte, mas Goku em um gesto de bondade, dá um pouco de energia para ele. Goku então, tenta voltar para a nave de Freeza, já que a sua estava muito longe, mas Freeza ainda ri da cara do herói, dizendo que Vegeta a tinha danificado, mas Goku o ignora. Por fim, Freeza tenta atacar Goku por trás, quando ele se enfurece e lança um Super Kamehameha que supostamente destrói o vilão. Mais tarde, é revelado que Goku sobreviveu à destruição de Namekusei, saindo em uma das naves das Forças Especiais Ginyu.

O grande trauma
A luta em Namekusei lhe custou muito. Freeza já possuía um grande ódio pelos Saiyajins e um temor com relação ao surgimento do lendário Super Saiyajin. Na luta com Goku, Freeza passou por uma imensa humilhação, pois descobriu que não era o mais forte do universo e que para piorar as coisas, quem o superava era um saiyajin, e mais do que isso, o Super Saiyajin. Na Grande Batalha, Freeza perdeu toda a metade inferior e o lado esquerdo de seu corpo até a cintura, junto com seu orgulho. A decepção era grande demais, Freeza já não poderia suportar um ódio tão grande pelos saiyajins. Quando foi salvo pelo seu pai e teve seu corpo reconstruído via implantes robóticos, Freeza apresentava bruscas mudanças de comportamento, mostrando-se extremamente vingativo. Seu sorriso passou a significar uma sede de vingança e sangue. Só pensava em matar Goku, junto com todos os saiyajins e terráqueos. Antes de ir para a Terra, Freeza tinha certas alucinações, relembrando a luta que custou parte de seu corpo e vendo Goku por toda parte. Quando lembrava de Goku, ele estremecia, suava frio, ficava paralisado e apavorado. Esqueceu de vender planetas e aumentar sua riqueza; passou a viver com um único propósito: eliminar Son Goku.

 Vinda à Terra e primeira morte
Após a batalha violenta em Namekusei, onde acabou derrotado por Son Goku e tendo mais da metade de seu corpo mutilado nesta derrota, Freeza foi encontrado agonizando, em meio aos restos de Namekusei, pelo cruzador imperial de seu pai, o Rei Cold. Resgatado, foi reanimado e recebeu implantes mecatrônicos diversos. Com sede de sangue, ele veio ao planeta Terra para destruí-lo junto com toda a humanidade para humilhar Goku. Mas seu plano malvado falhou, pois ele foi impedido por Trunks, um jovem vindo do futuro que também era um Super Saiyajin como Goku. Primeiro, Trunks acaba facilmente com todos os homens que Freeza havia levado. Depois, ele parte Freeza ao meio com sua espada e o retalha, exterminando-o de forma definitiva. Trunks também aniquila o Rei Cold, destruindo o cruzador deles logo em seguida. No futuro de Trunks, quem derrota Freeza e Cold é o próprio Goku, mas logo depois o mesmo morre no futuro com uma doença no coração. As células de Freeza e seu pai ainda seriam utilizadas pelo Doutor Maki Gero em sua experiência na qual deu origem à Cell. De Freeza, Cell herdou a capacidade de sobreviver sozinho no espaço e a resistência a danos intensos, além de alguns poderes como o raio mortal.

 Ressurreição e recomeço da busca por vingança

Após a morte de Freeza, seu espírito foi mantido preso no inferno da Terra, onde foi torturado, sendo forçado a suportar excessivamente anjos e revivendo as memórias de suas derrotas nas mãos de Goku e Trunks. No entanto, vários anos após a morte de Freeza, dois de seus homens, Sorbet e Tagoma, coletaram todas as Esferas do Dragão com a ajuda da Gangue de Pilaf e ressuscitaram-no. Eles retornam para sua nave e usam sua avançada tecnologia médica para restaurá-lo em sua forma original. Freeza imediatamente jura vingança contra os Super Saiyajins, e assassina Tagoma quando ele sugere simplesmente para voltar a governar seu império. Após quatro meses de treinamento intensivo, Freeza alcança uma nova forma o "Golden Freeza" e parte para a Terra com seu exército. Na Terra, os Guerreiros Z combatem Freeza. Enquanto isso, Goku e Vegeta, estão em uma sessão de treinamento com os deuses Whis e Bills. Depois que o exército é derrotado, Freeza executa todos eles por sua incompetência quando Goku, Vegeta, Bills e Whis aparecem. Goku e Vegeta revelam suas novas formas como Super Saiyajins Deuses e a batalha contra Freeza começa. Embora a forma dourada de Freeza seja mais forte que Goku, a resistência dele ainda não conseguia suportar uma luta prolongada com esta forma, e ele é eventualmente espancado por Vegeta. Freeza destrói a Terra em retaliação por sua derrota, matando Vegeta enquanto ele sobrevive, mas Whis volta no tempo e permite à Goku matar Freeza mais uma vez. Freeza retorna ao Inferno, onde  mais uma vez encontra os anjos, para sua consternação.

 Participação no Torneio do Poder

Durante os eventos que antecedem o Torneio do Poder, Freeza se torna o 10º membro do Universo 7, assumindo o lugar de Majin Boo, uma vez que ele fica impossibilitado para lutar, já que Boo caiu em sono profundo. Goku visita Freeza no Inferno e pede-lhe que se junte ao resto do Universo 7 no torneio. Freeza concorda depois que Goku promete revivê-lo com as esferas do dragão após o Torneio. Enquanto isso, o Universo 4 descobre que Freeza voltou e contrata assassinos para matá-lo. Freeza ressuscitou por 24 horas através da Vovó Uranai. Goku encontra-se com Freeza, mas antes de poder se encontrar com os outros, eles são impedidos por um grupo de assassinos que estão querendo matá-los. Freeza mata a maioria dos assassinos, antes de atrapalhar Goku em um ataque de energia. Freeza toma um comunicador que um dos assassinos tinha e fala com os líderes do Universo 9. Ele tenta negociar um acordo para lutar pelo Universo 9, mas é interrompido quando Bills e Whis aparecem, e Freeza rapidamente destrói o comunicador. Bills acredita que Freeza está planejando algo, mas Goku garante por ele que não e os dois retornam para encontrar o resto de sua equipe.

No episódio final da série, após a vitória do Universo 7 no Torneio do Poder e o desejo feito pelo Androide nº 17que ressuscitasse todos os universos que foram apagados como o vencedor do torneio, Whis revive Freeza como uma recompensa do Bills pelo trabalho bem feito no torneio e estando diante dos remanescentes do seu exercito em sua nova nave em cima de um planeta desconhecido, ele declara seu retorno como o Imperador do Universo 7 novamente.

Dragon Ball Super: Broly

Durante os eventos do filme Dragon Ball Super: Broly, Freeza começa a reconstruir seu império enquanto decide usar as Dragon Balls da Terra, para assim realizar seu desejo de aumentar sua altura em cinco centímetros. Freeza recruta Broly e Paragus que o acompanham à Terra para encontrarem a última Dragon Ball, percebendo o potencial do primeiro. Isso inspira Freeza a matar Paragus para forçar a transformação de Broly em um Super Saiyajin, apenas para ser pego pela fúria de Broly depois que o último rapidamente derrotou Goku. Mas Freeza é salvo no último segundo por Gogeta, que frustra sua tentativa de matar seus ex-subordinados Chirai e Lemo quando eles usaram as Esferas do Dragão para salvar a vida de Broly com Freeza recuando enquanto prometia vingança.

 Soldados de Freeza

 Soldados Inferiores

Freeza possui um imenso batalhão de soldados, que na sua maioria apenas tem habilidades sobre humanas e servem para executar pequenos trabalhos como dominar planetas e servir de guarda, como é caso dos soldados Namole, Banan, Raspberry, Sui e Orlen.

 Soldados de Elite

 Kiwi
É um dos soldados da elite de Freeza, suas habilidades estão acima dos demais soldados sendo assim um dos melhores capangas a serviço do imperador do universo. Kiwi sempre foi rival de Vegeta por possuírem o mesmo nível de poderes, mas durante o confronto entre os dois em Namekusei, Kiwi não foi páreo para Vegeta que tinha aumentado seus poderes, e foi facilmente derrotado pelo Saiyajin. Kiwi é bastante arrogante e facilmente subestima seus inimigos, mas também tem um lado covarde quando confrontado por um adversário mais forte do que ele.

 Apur
Outro dos melhores soldados de Freeza, Apur se destaca não apenas pelo seu poder de luta, mas também por sua grande inteligência. Foi morto por Vegeta quando o saiyajin escapou de uma das cápsulas de recuperação da nave de Freeza.

 Dodoria
O braço esquerdo de Freeza e um de seus homens de maior confiança. Dodoria tem um comportamento  bastante ousado e vulgar em nítido contraste com a atitude mais refinada vista em seu companheiro Zarbon, mas  apesar de sua atitude e aparência medonha ele possui um grande poder. Ele é inteligente, mas muitas vezes deixa sua raiva obter o melhor dele. É um dos generais de Freeza e está acima de todo o exército perdendo apenas para seu companheiro Zarbon e para os guerreiros das Forças Especiais Ginyu.

 Zarbon
É um guerreiro de alta classe, muito elegante, sendo um dos melhores soldados de Freeza e também seu braço direito, é um de seus homens de maior confiança. Zarbon é um guerreiro de elite que valoriza a beleza e sua aparência física acima de tudo, mas por detrás de sua aparência frágil e refinada ele esconde um poder gigantesco. Possui a habilidade de se transformar, mas como ele se considera o "Amante da Beleza", não gosta de utilizar sua transformação devido ao fato de que quando se transforma ele se converte em um terrível monstro de aparência desagradável. Ao se transformar seus poderes aumentam infinitamente mais, prova disso é que humilhou e derrotou facilmente Vegeta que havia aumentado seus poderes e antes derrotado seus companheiros Kiwi, Apur e Dodoria.

 Forças Especiais Ginyu

 Gurdo

Ele é o membro menor e menos poderoso das Forças Especiais Ginyu, fisicamente. Gurdo possui algumas habilidades psíquicas, incluindo ser capaz de parar o tempo durante o tempo que ele pode manter seu fôlego, este parece ser um dos principais motivos para que tenha se tornando um dos membros das Forças Ginyu. Ele parece ter um complexo de inferioridade, sendo o membro mais fraco, e se torna covarde e desesperado quando as coisas não seguem o curso esperado por ele, as vezes recorre a movimentos e táticas que a muito não tinha utilizado.

 Rikum

Ele é o membro mais extravagante das Forças Especiais Ginyu, é sempre visto fazendo poses em batalha e se comportando de maneira enganosa e pateta, não dando a perceber em  primeira vista seu grande poder. Ele é muito próximo de seus companheiros especialmente de Gurdo, que constantemente torce por ele em batalha e fica chocado com a sua morte. Apesar de agir de forma infantil Rikum é bastante inteligente, bem como sádico, ele gosta muito de brincar com seus adversários atraindo-os com insultos.

 Boter

Boter é o mais rápido membro das Forças Especiais Ginyu, e também o mais alto. Apelidado de "Furação Azul", muitas vezes realiza ataques combinados com seu companheiro mais próximo Jess, como o furação "Ataque dos Cometas".
 Jess

É um extravagante e vistoso membro das Forças Especiais Ginyu, Jess é de altura média em relação aos outros membros das Forças Ginyu. Apelidado de "Magma Vermelho", muitas vezes realiza ataques e poses combinados com seu companheiro Boter.

 Capitão Ginyu

Também conhecido como "Comandante Ginyu", é membro e líder do pelotão de elite mercenário, Forças Especiais Ginyu. Capitão Ginyu é muito leal a seus homens e a Freeza, e segue qualquer ordem que este lhe dá. No entanto, ele também pode ser bastante duro com sua equipe em uma missão, como mostrado quando ele repreendeu Jess duramente por deixar Boter e Rikum perderem para Goku, e fugir da luta. Ele gosta de justiça em suas batalhas, é também um dos mais poderosos soldados a serviço de Freeza.

 Transformações

 Primeira Forma
Em sua primeira forma, Freeza é um ser humanoide relativamente curto, embora com um grande crânio em forma de castanha com dois chifres que se projetam em ângulos perto de 45 graus. Ele também tem uma cauda com um fim cravado, que é relativamente espessa de largura, capaz de rachar o chão quando bater, bem como tendo três dedos. Freeza tem secções roxas na cabeça, ombros e abdômen e a cor-de-rosa em linhas aparecendo em seus braços, pernas e rosto, bem como sua pele lilás no rosto, pés e mãos. Ele veste pulseiras com cor marrom com linhas na parte da frente. Possui olhos vermelhos e os lábios escuros. Usa a mesma armadura de corpo superior e um short, assim como muitos dos seus subordinados (incluindo os Saiyajins). Durante a viagem, ele muitas vezes dá a aparência de fraqueza por exclusivamente usar um veículo espacial como transporte, deixando seus capangas para fazer o seu "trabalho sujo". Nesta forma, Freeza parece ser muito pequeno em altura, o que é mostrado sendo verdade nas raras ocasiões em que ele sai de seu veículo. Embora frágil em comparação com suas formas sucessivas, Freeza ainda possui força suficiente para destruir planetas.

Depois que é ressuscitado em Dragon Ball Z: O renascimento de F e Dragon Ball Super, Freeza treina bastante por quatro meses para liberar todas as suas habilidades ocultas (sendo essa a primeira vez que ele treina) e havia alcançado níveis muito mais altos ainda na primeira forma, sendo capaz de colocar Gohan em risco de morte, ao golpear seu coração com apenas um único golpe.

 Segunda Forma
Sua segunda forma é de aparência semelhante à primeira, porém muito maior, tanto em altura quanto em massa muscular, o que pode ser visto claramente nas suas áreas do peito e do estômago. Freeza afirma ter, no mínimo, o dobro de seu poder neste estado. Também crescem chifres mais longos, que agora em vez de irem para os lados salientes de seu crânio, eles tem uma curva acentuada para cima, em ângulos retos. Sua armadura não pode conter sua forma e se quebra, deixando-o com uma nova armadura natural, branca, cobrindo o peito e ombros. Ele tem seções roxas em seus ombros e abdômen, e gomos de laranja em seus antebraços e canelas. Nesta forma, ele lembra um pouco o seu pai, Rei Cold.

 Terceira Forma
A terceira forma de Freeza é a mais brutal, com um crânio extremamente alongado. Suas características faciais contorcem e mudam, com o nariz fundido em sua boca para formar um bico. Seus chifres originais recuam e agora estão na cor branca, irrompendo em pares ao longo do comprimento da cabeça. Dois pares de picos crescem fora de suas costas e curvam para cima um pouco, e a armadura em seus ombros arremessa-se para fora como ombreiras. Freeza afirmou que ninguém nunca tinha visto essa forma antes (o que nos leva a crer que Freeza, mesmo apenas em sua segunda forma, tinha sido mais do que suficiente para pisar sobre qualquer lutador que ele tinha vindo do outro lado do universo).

 Quarta Forma: Verdadeira
Esta é, sem dúvida, a forma mais reconhecível de Freeza. Drasticamente diferente de suas transformações anteriores, em sua forma final, Freeza regride de vez, com o seu antigo formulário de rachaduras, quebrando como uma concha, tornando-se um curto "lagarto", com seus chifres e picos desaparecendo e seu físico se tornando simplificado. Sua pele torna-se pura, sólida e branca com secções roxas na cabeça, ombros, braços, abdômen e pernas. Seus braços, pernas, rosto e cauda não são mais rosas junto com sua pele lilás no rosto, pescoço, mãos e pés. Todas as lesões tomadas em outras formas são curadas.

Esta é a forma que lhe permite atingir o seu pleno potencial e é também a forma original pela qual Freeza nasceu, sendo portanto sua "verdadeira" forma. Na verdade, de acordo com ele, os únicos que já lhe fizeram sentir dor em sua forma verdadeira foram Goku e "seus pais amorosos". Existe semelhanças entre esta forma com a primeira, podendo-se sugerir que, se necessário, Freeza poderia regredir à sua primeira forma diretamente, como um meio de suprimir o seu poder enorme. Quando lutou com Goku pela primeira vez, Freeza usou a metade do seu poder de luta até que seu adversário se transformou em Super Sayajin e o obrigou a usar o 100% de seu poder máximo. No entanto, o seu corpo, que era pouco acostumado a usar toda a sua energia, acabou sofrendo hipertrofia por expandir sua massa muscular para poder usar todo o seu poder máximo. Isso é um problema, pois interfere na resistência do lutador e acaba fazendo com que ele fique esgotado e sem energia, conforme fique nesta forma por muito tempo. Outros guerreiros como Trunks do Futuro e Cell já cometeram esses erros, mas no caso destes, eles ficaram mais lentos em velocidade.

Depois que Freeza é ressuscitado pelas Esferas do Dragão da Terra nos eventos ocorridos em Dragon Ball Z: O Renascimento de Freeza, o vilão aumenta em muito seu poder já não precisando mais ampliar e aumentar sua massa muscular, a fim de usar todo o seu poder máximo, com todos os efeitos negativos que ele tinha quando usava essa quantidade de poder, desaparecendo. Após refinar sua nova força, Freeza é capaz de acessar a sua forma final imediatamente com o máximo de todo o seu poder a partir de sua primeira forma sem precisar se transformar e passar por sua segunda e terceira forma. Ele ganhou essas habilidades em algum momento durante o seu treinamento de quatro meses. O poder máximo de sua quarta forma aumentou de tal maneira que chegou a ultrapassar os poderes mostrados de seres como Cell e Majin Boo.

 Mecha Freeza
Mecha Freeza (メカフリーザ) é Freeza reconstruído com melhorias cibernéticas por cientistas sob a ordem do Rei Cold após resgatarem o que restou dele ainda vivo, depois de ser arruinado fisicamente, enquanto pego na explosão do Planeta Namekusei depois de sua derrota. Toda a metade inferior do seu corpo e do lado direito de seu rosto foi substituída por cicatrizes e apetrechos de metal que cobrem o pouco que restava de sua parte orgânica. Essas melhorias permitiram-lhe ultrapassar os limites impostos pela sua forma totalmente orgânica, embora por quanto ou de que forma é desconhecida. No mangá original, Gohan mencionou que ele não estava nem perto do poder que ele mostrou contra Goku e que ainda faltava muito para ele chegar ao seu limite.

 Forma Dourada
Esta forma é um estado alcançado por Freeza no final do seu treinamento de quatro meses depois que foi ressuscitado em Dragon Ball Z: O Renascimento de Freeza após este ter conseguido liberar todo o seu verdadeiro poder latente e trazer para fora todo o seu potencial. Neste estado, Freeza é referido como Freeza Dourado (ゴ ー ル デ ン フ リ ー ザ, Gōruden Furīza) ou 5ª forma. Nesta forma, o poder de Freeza é capaz de dominar Goku em sua Super Saiyajin Azul com relativa facilidade. Esta forma, no entanto, drena sua energia muito (como quando ele usou 100% de seu poder em sua quarta forma) devido a ele não treinar o bastante para se acostumar com a nova forma, e assim, também é inadequada para um combate prolongado, com ele logo se vendo incapaz de competir com Goku e Vegeta.

Devido o seu treinamento de quatro meses e o ganho desta forma nova, Freeza ultrapassou os poderes de Cell, Majin Boo (todas as suas fases), Gogeta SSJ4 e de todos os vilões dos especiais de Dragon Ball Z (com exceção de deuses como Bills e Whis) e todos os vilões de Dragon Ball GT (apesar da série não ser canônica). Com isso, ele é atualmente um dos vilões mais poderosos de todo universo de Dragon Ball, superando Super Boo (com Gohan Místico, Goten, Trunks e Piccolo absorvidos), Super Janemba, Hildergarn, Baby Oozaru, Super 17 e todos os Shenlongs Malignos sem exceção.

 Freeza Negro
Esta é uma forma alcançada por Freeza somente no mangá, precisamente em: ''Dragon Ball Super: Granolah the Survivor Saga''. Durante sua busca para conquistar o maior número de planetas possíveis, Freeza acabou encontrando uma "Sala do Tempo" , também conhecida como Câmara do Tempo Hiperbólica. Nesta sala que é separada do universo principal, Freeza treinou por cerca de dez anos no total, permitindo-lhe superar a força de Goku e Vegeta e de suas respectivas formas. Nesta forma, a coloração branca se mantém no torso e numa pequena região abaixo dos olhos, enquanto o resto do corpo escurece.

 Parentes de Freeza Desconhecidos
 Kuriza, Filho de Freeza Freeza também tem um filho que se chama Kuriza, ele é citado no mangá Neko Majin e no game Japonês Dragon Ball Heroes, sua aparição acontece em dois episódios da série do mangá. Não se sabe muito a respeito de Kuriza, mas o seu nome é uma mistura de Freeza (Seu pai) e castanha (por sua cabeça ter um formato igual a de uma castanha). Algumas de suas técnicas são Raio da morte e Bola da morte, ele também tem duas formas, a primeira é igual a primeira forma de Freeza, já a segunda é igual a ultima forma de Freeza. Por mais que ele tenha sido criado por Akira Toriyama, não é considerado cânone na história original de Dragon Ball. Chilled, Ancestral de Freeza
Chilled é um Ancestral de Freeza que aparece no especial: O Episódio de Bardock (lançado em 2011) e também no game Dragon Ball Heroes, é um pirata que viaja pela Galáxia conquistando planetas. Diferente de Freeza, possui apenas uma forma, visto que não se transformou ao lutar contra Bardock e acabou perdendo o combate. O nome ''Chilled'' assim como o da maioria dos seres de sua raça, é um trocadilho para baixas temperaturas. Significando algo como: ''Gelado'' na língua inglesa.

Dublagem

Na versão original japonesa, Freeza foi dublado por Ryūsei Nakao e também em todas as outras mídias. No Brasil, Freeza foi dublado por Carlos Campanile em Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball GT e Dragon Ball Super e por Hamilton Ricardo em Dragon Ball Kai. Em Portugal, o personagem foi dobrado por Ricardo Spínola.

 Aparições em outras mídias

Em inúmeros episódios fillers do anime Dragon Ball Z e em Dragon Ball GT, Freeza fez inúmeras aparições, geralmente como alívio cômico, causando problemas no Inferno, tendo sido de alguma forma permitido a usar seu corpo, apesar de isso ser um erro dos produtores. Depois de morto, Freeza aparece no OVA O Plano para Erradicar os Saiyajins. No final da Saga de Cell, Freeza aparece no inferno onde junto com Cell, Cold e as Forças Ginyu, promovem uma revolta, mas são detidos facilmente por Paikuhan. Na saga de Boo, aparece no inferno assistindo a luta de Goku contra Boo, junto com outros vilões tais como Cell, Doutor Maki Gero, Cold, Babidi, as Forças Ginyu e outros e comicamente, esperando que Goku perdesse. No filme Dragon Ball Z: O Renascimento da Fusão - Goku e Vegeta!, Freeza é libertado do inferno devido ao distúrbio dimensional causado por Janemba. Ele vai a Terra para se vingar de Goku mas acaba sendo morto por Gohan. E em Dragon Ball GT, faz uma pequena aparição, onde, junto com Cell, luta contra o pequeno Goku no inferno. Ambos são facilmente derrotados.

Ele apareceu na maioria dos jogos da série Dragon Ball, quase sempre como o inimigo final de sua Saga. No jogo Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2, Freeza é dominado por Babidi e se transforma em Majin Freeza. Ademais, Freeza é um personagem jogável em Battle Stadium D.O.N e Jump Ultimate Stars.  A banda japonesa Maximum the Hormone criou, em homenagem a Freeza, a canção "「F」" em 9 de julho de 2008. A música, que fala sobre os atos maliciosos do personagem, se classificou em segundo lugar no ranking da Oricon. Ele também é citado na música "Goku" de Soulja Boy Tell 'Em. No mangá Black Cat, o personagem Sven Vollfied possui um adesivo de Freeza em seu celular. Uma caricatura de Freeza misturada com um Greys foi parodiada como um robô em um episódio de Abenobashi Mahou Shouten Gai. Em Yakitate!! Japan, no episódio Awaken!! Super Kuroyanagi!, o personagem Kyousuke Kawachii aparece como uma paródia de Freeza. Entretanto, seu torso era um freezer. No episódio "Operação: R.E.L.A.T.O. de KND - A Turma do Bairro, cada agente conta uma história diferente sobre a missão que realizaram. Na versão do Número 4 ele assume a forma de Super Saiyajin 3 e utiliza um golpe chamado Goma de Mascar para lutar contra a Molecada da Rua de Baixo que se transformaram em Freeza. Eles são derrotados mas vencem a batalha após assumirem a sua forma final. No mangá Neko Majin Z, paródia de Dragon Ball criada por Akira Toriyama, Freeza possui um filho chamado Kuriza que é o rival do protagonista Neko Majin.

Em 2003, Freeza apareceu no curta-metragem . Ele ataca os estúdios da Fuji TV mas é detido por Goku, Monkey D. Luffy e Astro Boy. Em março de 2006, Freeza e Goku apareceram em um curta original no , segmento do game show japonês . No curta, Goku impede Freeza de usar as Esferas de Namekusei. Como parte do game show, os participantes deveriam encontrar sete erros nesse segmento.

O personagem Frigo do mangá espanhol Dragon Fall é uma paródia de Freeza.

 Recepção
Freeza vem recebendo críticas bastante positivas ao longo do tempo e poucas negativas. No Top 11 de Vilões de Animes realizado pelo site "That Guy With the Glasses", Freeza foi colocado em sexto lugar. O site comentou que a cada evolução ele se torna mais feio e assustador, com a exceção de sua última forma. Ele foi mencionado como um dos personagens mais amados pelo público em um artigo do site GamePro. Em 8 de dezembro de 1999, no jornal estadunidense The Ledger, Freeza estava listado como uma das razões que deixam Dragon Ball Z violento. Um escritor do jornal comentou: "Em um episódio recente, gotas de suor se formam na testa de um personagem chamado Vegeta quando ele é estrangulado e quase morto por um vilão chamado Freeza. Em outro eu me lembro de Freeza usando um de seus chifres para perfurar um cara chamado Kuririn." Em relação a sua aparência, Freeza já foi descrito como "um andrógeno prateado gigante que parece um cruzamento do Xenomorfo de Alien com o Senhor Frio de Batman." O GameSpot elogiou Freeza por ser o vilão em Dragon Ball Z que mais se compromete com o mau. O site também marcou "matar" como seus gostos e "morrer" como seus desgostos. Em uma pesquisa recente sobre quais personagens de animes as pessoas odiariam ter como um veterano de sua escola, Freeza ficou em 1º lugar na pesquisa masculina e 2º na pesquisa feminina. Enquanto revisava os episódios 79-81 de Dragon Ball Z'', o Mania Entertainment comentou que "Assistir Freeza tentando inutilmente parar a enorme Genki Dama é espantosamente muito bom."

O canal AnimeCentral listou Freeza como o segundo melhor vilão de anime já criado comentando que "apesar de ser magro, frio, rosa e depois roxo, Freeza se mostra como o maior gangster do universo simplesmente ao torturar Vegeta". O mesmo canal ainda listou a luta de Freeza contra Goku como a melhor luta de anime de todos os tempos, comentando que "lutas não ficam mais épicas do que esta". Diversos itens de mercado como bonecos, pelúcias e fantasias foram feitos com a aparência de Freeza. Ele também já apareceu em capas de DVDs e estampado em latas de café vendidos pela empresa japonesa Pokka.

Personagens de Dragon Ball
Vilões em animação
Personagens que podem voar
Extraterrestres não humanos
Vilões
Antagonistas
Ditadores fictícios
Chefes nos jogos eletrônicos
Manipuladores de Ki na ficção
Personagens com superforça
Personagens com supervelocidade
Personagens amputados na ficção
Senhores da guerra fictícios
Assassinos em massa fictícios
Metamorfos fictícios

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
2018 30 Under 35 Profile: Brian Beaman
By Joe Nowlan - November 9, 2018 November 9, 2018
Brian Beaman
Network/Systems Administrator; Stanion Wholesale Electric
In 2006, soon after Brian Beaman received an associate's degree in informational networking systems from Pratt Community College in Pratt, Kan., he began a job there.
"I don't think it was even six months after I graduated that they had a position and my teacher recommended me for the job," Brian said.
He enjoyed the work and wasn't actively looking for another job. But one came to his attention anyway, he explained.
"The town I live in is pretty small. So for this type of job I have there are only maybe five or six places that have a similar job or require these services," Brian said. "A job opened up here at Stanion for essentially the same thing. And it paid better and had better benefits. So I applied for it."
He was hired at Stanion Wholesale Electric and started in 2012 as a system administrator.
While many in electrical distribution can tell war stories about a "disaster" of some sort—a construction site needing emergency replacement tools, for example, or a customer's warehouse roof being damaged by harsh weather—so too can Brian talk about technology-based disasters that have made him rush to the workplace.
"I haven't had any bad viruses here at Stanion," he said. "When I worked at the community college we had a really bad one and for three days I was working from like 8 a.m. to 3 a.m. I was walking all over campus and had to shut the computers down one by one all over campus. That was a mess."
While many in the electrical industry face constant learning and new product updates, Brian too has an ongoing learning curve.
"The biggest thing is that security is always changing. There is always some new security threat. There is some new way to mitigate that threat. Of course Windows changes a great deal. Windows 7, Windows 10. So you're always learning about those," he explained. "And there is always new stuff in the networking fields as well; faster connections, different types of connections."
Brian is the father of two children, a daughter, Carra, nine years old; and a son, Wilson, who is four. In his spare time, Brian is a man of many hobbies.
"Oh, man. I feel like I collect hobbies," he laughed. "I guess the main thing I do is I play bass guitar. I used to be in a band but I don't have much time for that anymore. But I do still play at the community college. We have a band that does live music for the big musical that they put on every year."
Along with a '91 Mazda Miata he enjoys working on, Brian has taken up beekeeping this year.
"It's my first year. A lot of times you don't get honey in the first year. The bees spend a lot of time building up the hive so we'll find out in a month or two if I get any this year," he explained. "I will probably keep some and maybe sell some at the local farmers market. You can also get beeswax out of it."
Q. What advice do you have for other young professionals in the electrical industry?
A. That's hard for me to answer because I don't work much on the electrical side, of course. As far as my position goes, basically it's important to always be learning. That is one of the biggest ones, trying to keep up with everything. I am kind of one of those who if I get interested in something, I dive in deep and do all kinds of research and learn all kinds of stuff about it. I'm one of those who is just trying to learn everything I can.
Q. What has changed the most in the industry in the past five years?
A. Most of the biggest changes I have seen on the tech side is how all the technologies are converging—where you used to have one box that did this and one box to do that. But now it is often just one piece of equipment that does all of those things.
In our server room, for example, when I started, we used to have three server racks full of servers and now we are down to one server rack that is only like half-full. The size of the equipment is getting smaller. Everything is multitasking instead of doing just specific things.
Tagged with 2018, 30 under 35
Joe Nowlan is a Boston-based freelance writer/editor and author. He can be reached at jcnowlan@msn.com.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


I have watched the clock tick over as I sat here wondering how to begin. A long absence has spun cobwebs in my brain and remembering how to write and how to begin feels like learning to walk after months spent in bed; incredibly foreign and daunting.
Perhaps I should start by way of explanation; I was not the cause of the extended break in transmission, rather an error on behalf of our internet provider is where the blame solely lies. What was meant to be two weeks without the information highway whilst we upgraded our plan, turned into over six weeks, making me feel as though I was shut away in some cabin in the middle of nowhere, against my will.
At first I struggled with the lack of email, weather checking, blog reading and Facebook updates, but eventually, as with everything, I became accustomed to my technologically-reduced life. So accustomed in fact, that when my husband informed me the internet had finally been restored, it didn't even cross my mind to check my email, as I couldn't even remember I had one as I had instead kept in touch with friends and family by phone only for those six weeks. I had to rack my brain to remember which sites I liked to visit and what I needed to perhaps, catch up on.
So I have begun with a recipe that I made and photographed during the pre-blackout era, and I will endeaveour to get back into the swing of things and resume my regular weekly posts as well as catching up on all of the lovely blogs I follow as quickly as possible.
Have you taken a break this year, whether voluntary or due to circumstance?
Pulse together all crust ingredients in a food processor just until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Put tart pan on a baking sheet and press dough evenly onto bottom and up side of tart pan with your fingertips. Chill shell, covered, on baking sheet until firm, about 30 minutes.
Put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 170°C. Line shell with a buttered sheet of heavy-duty foil (buttered side down) and fill shell one third of the way up with pie weights.
Bake (on sheet) until edge is pale golden, 20 to 25 minutes. Carefully remove pie weights and foil, then bake until edge and bottom are golden, about 20 minutes more. Cool completely in pan on a rack.
Beat cream cheese in a bowl with a handheld electric mixer at high speed until smooth, then add crème fraiche and 1 1/2 tablespoons honey and beat until combined well. Spread filling evenly in shell, then top with raspberries. Heat remaining 2 tablespoons honey in a very small saucepan over moderately low heat, stirring constantly, until liquefied, then drizzle over raspberries. Serve with additional melted honey on the side.
cooking time: 30mins for pastry shells.
total: 1 hour & 8mins.
taste: 3.5/5. Fresh & simple with a touch of luxury.
I chose to add all the honey to the cream mixture (which I doubled - also used equal parts creme fraiche to cream cheese). Despite using a lavender honey I couldn't really taste the lavender, instead I would sprinkle lavender buds to increase the lavender flavour if you wish.
I made four mini tarts. I did find that the crust was a little on the tough side and I had to use some force to cut into it. Aside from that the fresh, tart raspberries work well with the sweet, luxurious cream and buttery crust.
would I make it again: No - although the flavour combo is lovely, hubby isn't a fan of tarts unless they are super amazing.
What fresh and delicious tartlets!
Welcome back!!! I was wondering when you would be sharing another delicious post with us. And it does look delicious. I love fresh raspberries and your photos are beautiful.
It's amazing how calming life is when you aren't constantly connected, isn't it? Well, that's how I find it anyway. I hope you enjoyed your break. Looking forward to more delicious posts!
Welcome back -- you were definitely missed. These look wonderful and something about mini tarts always tempts me even more than the large ones. OH and I totally know how you feel about blogging after long hiatuses. Even after a week of not checking my reader, the number of unread posts gets overwhelming (1000+). I've had to just mark everything read several times, but I can honestly say that I'm so glad I kept going. Can't wait for your weekly posts again!
I love the looks of the crust! I think I'll try it....raspberries are a favorite of mine and this makes such a pretty presentation. Also, love using lavender as a flavor!
Welcome back! I can't imagine getting used to a hiatus like that but it must have actually been quite refreshing!
these tarts look lovely, possibly because the thought of a fresh berry is so tantalizing to me at the moment!
gorgeous! YAY Spring and fresh berries!
So good to have you back! Was wondering where you were.
Wow! Stunning photography! This sounds and looks absolutely divine!!
Wow! Beautiful Photo! I am sure the taste is even better!
Welcome back. This reminds me. This year, I am making lavender honey.
Yay! You're back :) I so missed you posts. It must have been a nice feeling to be technology free for a while - I bet you had a lot more time on your hands, I know I would. I am so attached to my computer & the internet. A forced break would probably be good for me though. This tart looks beautiful! mmm, I adore creme fraiche. Lovely.
sorry for the out-of-your-hands trouble! i know that i absolutely can't stand to be without internet--it's my one true addiction, i believe! you're back with a bang, though--this tart looks so lovely.


Catherine reports that there's been a system turnover at the Atlantic Superstore sushi desk. The staff are the same, but the materials, boxes, and varieties are different. We ate our first batch of the new stuff yesterday, and it was markedly better, most noticeably the rice was very moist.
Having perhaps the only three year old boy on Prince Edward Island who is addicted to sushi, this is a Big Event in our household.
Written December 4, 2003 at 9:08 p.m.
Thanks for the tip, I'll check it out today.
So the little guy likes his sushi, eh? Very cosmo, Peter.
Riley, who is now almost 4, was addicted to sushi from about 2 years old until about 3. She still enjoys it now every few weeks, but does not ask for it as often. Does Oliver love hummus, olives and balsamic vinegar as well? These are all things that I never expected Riley to like, but she loves them.
When we were in Spain, Oliver became addicted to Olives, has his name would suggest he would. He does like hummus, but not as much as he used to. He does, however, like eating lemons.
Lemons? Eww. Back when I was a kid give me a fresh stalk of rhubarb and hold the sugar, and I was as happy as a lark. Mostly because I think it grossed Mom out.
Riley likes to eat lemons, too!
My five year old eats more than half the whole family's salmon or lamb when put on the table. Watched her eat 20 bucks worth of chops once. Considered getting some animals in the barn to keep her going. Have you considered making your own sushi? I was doing it for a while there. Not that different a trick from a roll your own…ciggie.
Jevon told me that if you roll your own (sushi) it tastes too much like seaweed.


text:
Q: Divisibility of polynomials over partitions This is a follow up from my earlier MO question.
Given an integer partition $\lambda=(\lambda_1,\dots,\lambda_{\ell(\lambda)})$ of $n$ where $\ell(\lambda)$ is the length of $\lambda$, associate its conjugate partition $\lambda'$. Denote by $\lambda''=\lambda',0$ found by appending one extra zero at the right end of $\lambda'$. Further, define the following numeric $b(\lambda'')=\#\{j: \lambda_j''-\lambda_{j+1}''>0\}$.
For example, if $\lambda=(4,2,1)$ then $\lambda'=(3,2,1,1)$ and $\lambda''=(3,2,1,1,0)$ and $b(\lambda'')=3$.
Consider the polynomials
$$f_n(q):=\sum_{\lambda\vdash n}(q-1)^{b(\lambda'')-1}\,q^{\ell(\lambda)-b(\lambda'')}.\tag1$$
Denote by $t_n$ the largest $t$ such that $q^t$ divides $f_n(q)$.

QUESTION 1. Is it true that $t_n\in\{0,1,2\}$?
QUESTION 2. (stronger) Is it true that the "infinite word" $\,t_1t_2t_3\cdots=0\prod_{k=1}^{\infty}01^{2k}02^k$?

A: Both are true and these follow routinely from Euler's Pentagonal Theorem (PT). We have
\begin{align}
A:&=1+\sum_{n=1}^\infty (q-1)f_n(q)x^n\\
&=\prod_{j=1}^\infty(1+(q-1)x^j+q(q-1)x^{2j}+q^2(q-1)x^{3j}+\ldots) \\
&=
\prod_{j=1}^\infty\frac{1-x^j}{1-qx^j}.
\end{align}
Consider it modulo small powers of $q$. Modulo $q$ we get $\prod(1-x^j)=1-x-x^2+x^5+x^7-\dots$, so the zeroes of the sequence $(t_n)$ are as you predict in Question 2 due to PT.
Modulo $q^2$ we get
\begin{align}
A&\equiv\prod (1-x^j)\cdot(1-q(x+x^2+\ldots)) \\
&=(1-x-x^2+x^5+\ldots)-q(x-x^3-x^4-\ldots)),\end{align}
and see where are $t_i$'s equal to 1 (that is, which coefficients of $x^i$ are divisible by $q$ but not by $q^2$). It is again as predicted in Question 2.
Finally to confirm the conjecture in Question 2, we should prove that the coefficients $[x^m]A$ which are divisible by $q^2$ (this happens when $m=k(3k-1)/2+\ell$, $1\leqslant \ell\leqslant k-1$ for certain integer $k\geqslant 2$) are not divisible by $q^3$.
We have modulo $q^3$: $$\prod (1-qx^j)^{-1}\equiv \prod(1+qx^j+q^2x^{2j})\equiv 1+q\sum_{j=1}^\infty x^j+q^2\sum_{s=0}^\infty\lfloor s/2\rfloor x^s.$$
Multiplying this by Euler's product $\prod(1-x^j)$ we get modulo $q^3$:
$$
[x^m]A\equiv q^2\left(\sum_{i=0}^k (-1)^i\left\lfloor\frac{m-i(3i-1)/2}2\right\rfloor+
\sum_{i=1}^{k-1} (-1)^i\left\lfloor\frac{m-i(3i+1)/2}2\right\rfloor\right).
$$
We substitute the formula $\lfloor x/2\rfloor=x/2-1/4+(-1)^x/4$ in above sums. Since $\sum_{i=0}^k (-1)^i+\sum_{i=1}^{k-1}(-1)^i=0$, and
$$
\sum_{i=0}^k (-1)^{i+1} \frac{i(3i-1)}4+
\sum_{i=1}^k (-1)^{i+1} \frac{i(3i+1)}4=(-1)^{k+1}k/2,
$$
we get the expression
$$
(-1)^{k+1}k/2+\frac14\sum_{i=0}^k (-1)^{m+i(3i+1)/2}+
\frac14\sum_{i=1}^{k-1} (-1)^{m+i(3i-1)/2}
$$
which is obviously non-zero for $k\geqslant 2$.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


For considerable time Azul Sailing have organised regattas in Spain for companies. Together in the sun and under the guidance of a professional skipper you'll sail a real regatta with fabulous, modern ships.
When organising a regatta like this Azul Sailing is offering a unique concept comprising of the contestants executing all functions on board of the competition ships themselves. In other words, it will not be a passive promenade at sea, but is a joint activity, where participants will take the helm in their own hands.
The skipper is specially trained by Azul Sailing and performs the role of coordinator rather than one of a ´chauffeur´. Our skippers practice regularly in order to meet our stringent and specific (safety) demands. Before you leave you will receive an elaborated briefing about the basics of sailing, the start procedure, the basic rules of sailing a regatta and of course all the information necessary for ensuring your safety on board.
You'll have the choice out off several yachts when sailing a regatta: yachts measuring up to 36 feet, offering place to a maximum of 6 people or yachts measuring up to 54 feet, offering place to a maximum of 11 people. If desired, Azul Sailing will happily take care of the catering.


Airline's Maddie Ennis is one of those kids you don't want to see stepping to the plate in a critical situation – at least not if you're her opponent.
The junior first baseman for the District 1-5A champions is clutch with a bat and has a propensity for going yard. She's one of the main reasons the Lady Vikings (24-4) have a shot of advancing to the LHSAA Class 5A state semifinals if they can get past Sam Houston (27-3) at 5 p.m. Friday at Sulphur's Frasch Park.
Ennis is one of the area leaders in home runs with 8 and she's batting at a .505 clip with a team-leading 41 RBIs for coach Reggie Digilormo. On Thursday evening, she was sitting at the Evangel-Archbishop Chapelle game at Frasch, adjusting to the atmosphere in an arena that can be daunting.
A UT-Tyler softball commit, Ennis said the opportunity to play for a state title is something the team has been preparing for all season.
Ennis has modeled some of her batting attitude this spring from a new arrival in the Ennis household – an English bulldog named Emma has joined a Cavalier Charles named Charlie.
"Emma goes full speed all the time. She is crazy," said Ennis of the 18-month-old pup she walks regularly in Brownlee Park.
Since she plays travel softball for Gerral Layton's Titans, Ennis has been a fixture on softball fields around the region for a number of years. She doesn't have many worries when it comes to hitting, but she was worried Thursday afternoon.
That job will fall to leadoff batter Makenzie Chaffin, an apparent expert at re-ponytailing.
Ennis wears a Columbia blue and a purple ribbon in her hair. The purple one, worn by all of the Lady Vikings, is in honor of teammate Kourtnee White's grandfather, who is suffering with cancer.
The Lady Vikings took a charter bus to Sulphur Thursday, stopping in Leesville to eat at Chili's. After a practice and watching a few games at Frasch, they planned to have supper at Saltgrass Steak House in Lake Charles.


Canine ear infections are common, especially in floppy-eared dogs.
Canine ear infections are common and can be extremely painful. Keeping your dog's ears clean can prevent infections, but you also may need a vet's help to keep your dog's ears healthy.
There are many reasons why a dog's ears get infected.
If your dog is showing symptoms of an ear infection, you might want to look inside his ear and see what it looks like.
Take your dog to the vet if the inside of his ear is red or smelly.
If left untreated, the infection can lead to other serious problems.
Consult with your vet if your dog starts scratching, but the inside of the ear isn't irritated or smell. That could be a sign of mild allergies or the start of an ear infection.
Take your dog to the veterinarian. Treatment will start immediately if your dog has an ear infection.
If the ear is full of wax, your veterinarian will clean it thoroughly. You will then need to apply drops inside the ear a specific number of times each day.
One of the best ways to prevent canine ear infections is to clean your dog's ears regularly.
Dogs that are particularly susceptible to ear infections — particularly breeds with long, floppy ears — need to have their ears cleaned weekly.
Use a very mild solution that does not contain high levels of alcohol and instead includes soothing ingredients such as aloe vera. You should use cotton balls with the solution once a week, unless your veterinarian advises otherwise. Consult with your veterinarian about cleaning products designed specifically for cleaning a dog's ears.
Canine ear infections are common and they can make your dog miserable. That's why it's vital to check your dogs ears regularly to ensure they stay healthy and free of infection.


text:
is a Japanese professional shogi player ranked 9-dan. He is the 17th Lifetime Meijin and also a former president of the Japan Shogi Association (JSA).

Early life
Kōji Tanigawa was born in Kobe on April 6, 1962. He entered the Japan Shogi Association's apprentice school at the rank of 5-kyū in 1973 under the tutelage of shogi professional , was promoted to the rank of 1-dan in 1975, and was officially awarded professional status and the rank of 4-dan in 1976 at the age of fourteen, thus becoming the second person to obtain professional status while still a junior high school student.

Shogi professional
In February 1979, Tanigawa won the  for his first championship as a professional.

Tanigawa's first major title match appearance came in 1983 when he challenged Hifumi Katō for the 41st Meijin title. Tanigawa won the match 4 games to 2 to not only win his first major title, but also to become the youngest player to ever win the Meijin title at the age of 21. The following year, he successfully defended his title by defeating  4 games to 1 in the 42nd Meijin title match; he was however, unable to defend his title once again title in 1985, losing the 43rd Meijin title match to Makoto Nakahara 4 games to 2.

On March 10, 2011, Tanigawa became the 4th shogi professional to win 1200 official games when he defeated Daisuke Nakagawa.Tanigawa's age of 48 years and 11 months made him at that time the youngest player to achieve such a result.

On October 1, 2018, Tanigawa became the fifth shogi professional to win 1300 official games.

Promotion history
The promotion history of Tanigawa is as follows:
 5-kyū: 1973
 1-dan: 1975
 4-dan: December 20, 1976
 5-dan: April 1, 1979
 6-dan: April 1, 1980
 7-dan: April 1, 1981
 8-dan: April 1, 1982
 9-dan: April 1, 1984

Titles and other championships
Tanigawa has appeared in major title matches a total of 57 times and has won 27 major titles. He has won the Meijin title 5 times, thus qualifying for the Lifetime Meijin title. In addition to major titles, Tanigawa has won 22 other shogi championships during his career.

Major titles

Other championships

Note: Tournaments marked with an asterisk (*) are no longer held.

Awards and honors
Tanigawa has received a number of awards and honors throughout his career for his accomplishments both on an off the shogi board. These include the Annual Shogi Awards given out by the JSA for performance in official games as well as other JSA awards for career accomplishments, and awards received from governmental organizations, etc. for contributions made to Japanese society.

Annual Shogi Awards
6th Annual Awards (April 1978March 1979): Best New Player
7th Annual Awards (April 1979March 1980): Technique Award
9th Annual Awards (April 1981March 1982): Technique Award
10th Annual Awards (April 1982March 1983): Distinguished Service Award
11th Annual Awards (April 1983March 1984): Special Award
13th Annual Awards (April 1985March 1986): Player of the Year, Most Games Won, Most Games Played
14th Annual Awards (April 1986March 1987): Most Games Won, Most Games Played
15th Annual Awards (April 1987March 1988): Player of the Year
18th Annual Awards (April 1990March 1991): Player of the Year
19th Annual Awards (April 1991March 1992): Player of the Year
22nd Annual Awards (April 1994March 1995): Special Award
24th Annual Awards (April 1996March 1997): Most Games Played
25th Annual Awards (April 1997March 1998): Player of the Year
26th Annual Awards (April 1998March 1999): Most Games Played
27th Annual Awards (April 1999March 2000): Most Games Played
30th Annual Awards (April 2002March 2003): Special Award
31st Annual Awards (April 2003March 2004): Masuda Award
34th Annual Awards (April 2006March 2007): Game of the Year

Other awards
1983, September: Kobe City Culture Special Award
1988: Kobe City Special Award
1989: Kobe City Government Meritorius Citizen Award
1991: Shogi Honor Fighting-spirit Award (Awarded by JSA in recognition of winning 600 official games as a professional)
1992: Kobe City Special Award
1997, June: Hyōgo Prefecture Honor Award, Kobe City Culture Honor Award
2001: 25 Years Service Award (Awarded by the JSA in recognition of being an active professional for twenty-five years)
2002: Kobe City Special Award, Special Shogi Honor Award (Awarded by JSA in recognition of winning 1000 official games as a professional)
2007: Hyogo Prefecture Culture Award
2014: Japanese Government's Medal of Honor with Purple Ribbons

Year-end prize money and game fee ranking
Tanigawa has finished in the "Top 10" of the JSA's  each year from 1993 to 2007, and then again in 2013. He also has finished in the "Top 3" eight times, and was the top money winner in 1997.

Note: All amounts are given in Japanese yen and include prize money and fees earned from official tournaments and games held from January 1 to December 31.

JSA executive
Tanigawa was selected to be a senior managing director of Japan Shogi Association for a two-year term at the association's 62nd General Meeting on May 26, 2011. On December 18, 2012, JSA president Kunio Yonenaga died, and Tanigawa was subsequently selected to be his replacement at a special JSA members meeting held on December 25, 2012. This made him the first JSA president from the Kansai region.

Tanigawa was re-elected as president at the 64th (June 7, 2013) and 66th (June 4, 2015) General Meetings; however, he announced on January 18, 2017, that he had decided to resign in order to accept responsibility for the JSA's handling of the 29th Ryūō challenger controversy. Tanigawa continued to serve as president until his successor was chosen at a special meeting of the JSA membership on February 6, 2017.

Video games
In the late 1980s, Pony Canyon released a line of Shogi video games for the MSX and Famicom featuring Tanigawa. The series was titled .

Notes

References

External links
 ShogiHub: Professional Player Info · Tanigawa, Koji
 City of Kobe 日本人の応援団: 谷川浩司氏
 tanigawa17.life.coocan.jp

1962 births
Japanese shogi players
Living people
Professional shogi players
Recipients of the Medal with Purple Ribbon
Professional shogi players from Hyōgo Prefecture
Meijin (shogi)
Ryūō
Kisei (shogi)
Ōi (shogi)
Ōza (shogi)
Kiō
Ōshō
Lifetime titles
Recipients of the Kōzō Masuda Award
People from Kobe
People related to Jōdo Shinshū
Ginga
Presidents of the Japan Shogi Association


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For over ten years the Ethical Fashion Initiative (EFI) has invested in refining production systems that enable production with community groups of micro-entrepreneurs in target countries.
Working in the luxury and lifestyle sectors supporting international companies such as Vivienne Westwood and Stella McCartney source high-quality and ethically-produced artisanal goods from some of the developing world's most difficult environments.
Chocolate by Kwaku Bediako – A Ghanaian fashion brand which draws inspiration from the rich Ghanaian culture, lifestyle, taste and preferences. The chocolate brand has grown rapidly in this past few years due to detailing, passion to become the best custom made menswear fashion brand in Ghana.


text:
The Restaurant Group plans to sell sites as it swings to a loss
Frankie & Benny's owner The Restaurant Group on Tuesday outlined plans to take the axe to chunks of its estate, as it warned that one-off costs have pushed the firm into the red.
The FTSE 250 casual dining group, which has been grappling with weaker consumer confidence, higher wages and business rates, booked a one-off charge of £115.7 million in the six months to June 30.
That is linked to a more "cautious view" on future trading amid Brexit and market uncertainty in its leisure business, comprising brands such as Frankie & Benny's, Chiquito and Garfunkel's.
The division has closed 16 sites since January and around 50% of the remaining 352 properties could shut when lease exit opportunities arise in future.
The Restaurant Group recorded a pre-tax loss of £87.7 million, compared with £12.2 million profit this time last year. Stripping out the exceptional costs, profits rose 35.7% to £28.1 million.
Shares fell 10.9p to 143.3p.
New boss Andy Hornby, who joined last month, was upbeat as he said the firm's other businesses — airport concessions, pubs and Wagamama — are all outperforming the market.
Group comparable sales increased 4% and Wagamama, which The Restaurant Group agreed a £559 million takeover of last year, led the growth with same-store sales up 10.6%.
Group comparable sales in the most recent six weeks rose 0.2%.
Chair Debbie Hewitt hailed "a really good performance in a very tough market".
Article Written by Joanna Bourke of Evening Standard https://www.standard.co.uk/business/the-restaurant-group-plans-to-sell-sites-as-it-swings-to-a-loss-a4227951.html
Photo Courtesy of Evening Standard


text:
The Underdog's on Top
The big Nashville labels turned him away, and the radio stations refused to play him at first. But now, with a number one album and the most loyal fan base around, Aaron Watson has become a country music sensation.
Andrew Roush
https://www.texasmonthly.com/the-culture/the-underdogs-on-top/
From the March 2017 Issue Subscribe
Aaron Watson, photographed on his property near Buffalo Gap on January 18, 2017.
Photographs by Wyatt McSpadden
It's a miserable night in Columbus, Ohio. The temperature is hovering just above freezing, and a bone-soaking rain falls continuously. College students are going out for the first Saturday night of the spring semester, emerging from stately brick houses and old shiplap homes, and congregating in loud masses at the bars and nightclubs along High Street across from the Ohio State University campus. The street food vendors are heating up their flattops, and cabs are beginning to flip on their lights. Meanwhile, seemingly every Stetson wearer in central Ohio is heading to the Newport Music Hall to see Aaron Watson, the latest country music phenomenon to emerge from the Texas Panhandle—and an upstart one at that. His 2015 album debuted at number one on the Billboard Top Country Albums chart; he's the first male country singer to have a number one record without a major label. The album is titled, appropriately enough, The Underdog. For years, Watson had been turned away by Nashville recording executives, who all said he'd have to change his sound if he ever wanted to succeed outside Texas. And yet here he is, with a number one album to his name, about to play to a packed house on a cold, wet night in the Midwest.
Before the show, Watson lounges in the back of his tour bus, his boots up on a seat, a grapefruit LaCroix in hand, ball cap askew because of his propensity to pull it off and rub his head while he talks. He's relaxed. He's not worried whether he plays tonight for two thousand or twenty; he just wants to play a good show, and if he does, he knows the word will spread. "Whoever shows up tonight," he says, "they're gonna go home and they're gonna tweet, they're gonna Instagram, they're gonna Facebook: 'Man, we had a blast at the Aaron Watson show tonight, and he hung out with us afterward.' " He remembers a show, years ago, in Ardmore, Oklahoma. He was about to hit the stage, and he texted his friend, business partner, and manager Gino Genaro: "What if no one shows up?" Genaro thought Watson was just having preshow jitters and tried to encourage him. But Watson wasn't kidding. That night, only one person showed up. Rather than play to her in an empty theater, they walked her to the bus, climbed aboard, and played a private acoustic set. Doesn't matter how many show up, he says, always give them your best.
There may be no more genuine singer-songwriter at the moment than Watson. He leaves no confusion about who he is: He loves Texas. He's a man of the cloth—denim—spreading the 5X-beaver-felt-and-barbed-wire gospel to the world. He likes writing songs about two-steppin' and wholesome good times, and he's not going to abandon that ethos for any quick shot at stardom by betraying his fans and deviating from his brand of country music. He didn't do it at 24, even when the music executives told him what it would take to be a star: sign on the line, agree to the terms, and we'll put the Nashville machine to work for you. Watson didn't want to achieve success that way—stardom isn't what he's after, anyway—so Nashville wished him good luck and sent him on his way back to Texas.
For the past eighteen years, he's picked away at his craft, recording albums at a furious pace—thirteen so far—on which he's written nearly all the songs. In that time, he's played 2,500 shows. On most days, he rises at 5 a.m. to write. He stays hours after performances to talk to every lingering fan. In short, he works like it's his job. "We work hard, and we ride a horse named Hustle," he says. When he discusses artists he admires, he often talks about their journeyman years. It's about putting in the effort, appreciating steady growth, and always making fans feel like part of the family. Meanwhile, his aim is to keep plugging away, keep building, have faith, and when he meets with success, try not to let it go to his head. So far, so good.
The vibe on the tour bus, as the freezing drizzle outside begins to pick up, can best be described as friendly and professional. The small traveling team that runs Aaron Watson the brand has been together for close to a decade, some for nearly fifteen years. While they prepare for the show, the lighting tech, sound guy, musicians, and manager chat, tell jokes, and watch football. They're happy to have the submarinelike bunks crammed into the 45-by-9-foot tour bus. After all, it's better than the Ford Excursion they took to their early gigs together, in tiny venues that paid a total of $250. They've come a long way since then. When he leaves Columbus in the morning, Watson will head back to Texas to prepare for his ninth European tour.
The tour follows the February release of Vaquero—his first album in the post-Underdog era. It is a hair poppier than previous offerings. When the single "Outta Style" came out ahead of the album release, it caused a bit of a stir. What, some fans wondered, were these handclaps? And that driving electric guitar? Was Aaron—gulp—going Nashville? Kyle Coroneos wrote on the site SavingCountryMusic.com that he wasn't all that impressed. "Shades of Bro-Country," he wrote. But he wasn't too worried. "Maybe it's the fact that the fiddle is so out front that you forgive some of the other stuff, or maybe because Aaron Watson is a natural underdog, you want to root for him."
His fans in Ohio don't seem concerned. Minutes before the show, they're packed in, pushing closer to the stage. The lights start to swirl, and the crowd is screaming like it's an Ohio State home opener before Watson, who has made his way in from the tour bus, even sets his Tony Lama boots on stage. When he does, a man in the crowd, dressed like a Cavender's catalog model, lets out an ear-splitting war whoop and lifts a Coors Light high above his black cowboy hat. Three songs in, everyone in the place—families with kids, college students on dates, gently swaying married couples—is singing along to a song about bluebonnets in spring. An Aaron Watson tune is solid, sturdy, well crafted, dependable. He riffs on the familiar, weaves in wordplay and funny twists like George Strait. Above all, he is authentic. What you see is what you get. At a time when everyone and everything seems overly marketed, when we're being constantly manipulated and sold to, the music of Aaron Watson can be awfully appealing. There's no gimmick, no pretension, there's certainly no irony. The notes may sometimes feel predictable, but boy, if they don't make you feel good. When the bluebonnet song ends, Watson tells the crowd: "We're gonna play some good old country music tonight!" And the place goes wild.
Watson at Perini Ranch, in Buffalo Gap.
Photograph by Wyatt McSpadden
Watson grew up in Amarillo, the son of Ken, a veteran injured in Vietnam, and Andra, who always made sure Aaron sang loudly at their little Church of Christ, where musical instruments weren't allowed and every bad note sung could be clearly heard. He speaks reverently not only of those timeworn church hymns but of his father's extensive vinyl collection. By age four, he was learning from his dad how to gingerly remove records from their sleeves, hold them ever so lightly with the palms, and lower them onto the turntable so as not to scuff, scratch, or smudge them. There were Willie and Waylon in the house, of course, but there were also the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. "Whether it was at church, or whether it was at home, the music my mom and dad surrounded me with was pure heart and soul," he says in that flat, nasal twang of the Panhandle. "And it had a huge impact on the artist I am today."
He learned his work ethic at a young age. He remembers one day in particular as "a defining moment in my life." It was a jeans-stick-to-your-thighs hot day in Amarillo, and a ten-year-old Aaron was on his hands and knees scrubbing toilets on a job with his dad. Across the street, his friends were swimming. Watson was decked out in yellow rubber gloves, working away, hating every minute of it, like anyone his age would. He jawed and complained, said he wanted to go swimming with his buddies. His father, polishing away in the stall next to Aaron, sat up on his knees and looked around the divider into the stall his son was cleaning.
"Son," he asked, "do you think your daddy wants to be cleaning toilets?" But that's how he took care of his family. God blessed him with that job, his father said, so he did it the very best he could. "My dad's goal in life is bigger than country music," Aaron says. "My dad's goal in life was to work hard, make an honest living, and love his family. What's better than that?" He thinks it's funny when people praise him for spending so much time with his fans after the show. It's a heck of a lot easier than scrubbing toilets.
As a boy, he also threw himself into baseball, dreaming of playing shortstop for the Houston Astros. He played in high school and later made the roster of the New Mexico Junior College Thunderbirds, in Hobbs, just across the border. He didn't think of baseball as a hotbed of life lessons at the time, but now he looks back and says that it shaped him, shaped his drive and his humility. "You win some, you lose some, but day in, day out, you give your best." And those are lessons he's trying to pass on now that he and his wife, Kimberly, have kids. His two young boys, Jake and Jack, play ball too. When he talks about their games, he gets animated, sits up, starts laying out strategy. To his boys, he emphasizes one thing: "Get up to the plate, and give it all you've got." It doesn't matter if the other team has some thirteen-year-old who can throw 70 miles per hour. You can't get a hit if you don't swing.
Watson during his debut performance at the Grand Ole Opry in March 2015. Photograph by Chris Hollo.
"Everybody said you'd never make it too far," Watson sings on his latest single, "with some poor boy playing on some pawnshop guitar." At eighteen, Watson, having saved up some money mowing lawns, walked into a pawnshop and bought a guitar. He wanted to start learning how to turn the lyrics bouncing around his head into music, to "put chords to it," he says. It's the guitar he still writes songs with. The timing was right because, later that fall, a back injury forced him out of baseball, and he became more serious about music.
After he left Hobbs, he enrolled at Abilene Christian University, where he took an introduction to guitar course. It was taught by Dan Mitchell, a local musician who's taught guitar for more than three decades and who Watson affectionately calls "Dr. Mitchell," though he has no doctoral degree. At Watson's first lesson, Mitchell asked why he wanted to learn guitar. Watson said he wanted to be a singer-songwriter. "Well," Mitchell said, "let's get to work."
One afternoon, Watson was sitting in a diner in downtown Abilene eating lunch with a friend. As he dipped his spoon into a bowl of gumbo, a pair of electric-blue, full-quill ostrich boots came through the door. Watson's eyes lit up big as saucers. The man walked up to the counter and ordered something Watson had never heard of: a cappuccino. After getting his drink, he walked over to Watson, who had been staring. What are you looking at, kid? the man asked. Nothing, Mr. Gatlin, Watson responded. Larry Gatlin, the falsetto voice of more than 30 Top 40 country singles, was impressed that this college student recognized him and sat down in the booth. Watson proceeded, as politely as possible, to interrogate Gatlin about his career and his songwriting. As their conversation wrapped up, Watson's friend chimed in. You should hear Aaron sing, she told Gatlin. He's got a good voice, she said, and he's a songwriter.
"I just remember looking at her like, 'I cannot believe you just said that.' " But he forgives her, he says. She's a California city girl—how could she have known that this man had written songs for Elvis?
Gatlin was annoyed Watson's songwriting hadn't been brought up earlier. He was playing a show that night at the Abilene Civic Center. He'd leave tickets at the box office for Watson, who should arrive an hour before the show. The meeting was fortuitous for both men. Watson would gain a songwriting mentor. And Gatlin had forgotten his wallet, so Watson covered his cappuccino.
That night Watson showed up early, and Gatlin pulled him backstage. Before he went on, Gatlin passed on some songwriting wisdom he'd gotten from his friend, Kris Kristofferson. "Write a thousand songs," Gatlin said, "then throw them away. After that, you'll be a songwriter."
They stayed in touch over the next year, as Watson began to gather song ideas. He started writing in earnest, sending cassette tapes to Gatlin for advice. Over the years, Gatlin had gleaned wisdom not only from Kristofferson, but Willie and Johnny Cash too. Now he was imparting it to Watson, one unapologetic critique at a time. "He ripped me good," Watson says with a grin. (They would share a bill years later when Watson made his Grand Ole Opry debut in Nashville. He'd be pretty nervous before that one.)
In 1999, with Gatlin's advice still fresh in his mind, he released his first album, Singer/Songwriter. He sold copies of the album out of his backpack, but it never reached the radio.
But his third album, Shut Up and Dance, released in 2002, received a lot of regional airplay. That got his career rolling. Watson started packing bars and dance halls across the state and soon drew the attention of a few major labels in Nashville. One label told him he'd have to change his sound and relocate to Music City. Another informed Watson he'd just be a regional act. At best. "I was heartbroke," he admits. "A little shattered." He drove home. His dad responded coolly that this was the same thing they told Willie for all those years, "and he finally made it at about 45 years old." Indeed, Red Headed Stranger, which vaulted the outlaw to stardom, was released in 1975, when Willie was 42. To a 24-year-old, this was astounding. Aaron said, "You mean I'll have to do this for another twenty years before I make it?"
"Yeah," his dad said. "If you want it bad enough."
There's something about Watson, something in his friendly, straightforward demeanor, his way of seeming interested in everyone who's interested in him, that defies music industry stereotypes. Watson himself likes to compare his music making to a family business—like, say, a hamburger joint.
"What do you want when you go in?" Watson says as he sits up straight, pulls down his ball cap, sticks his hand out, and begins enumerating on each finger. "You want a nice environment, you want good service and a delicious burger. And maybe buttermilk pie for dessert. With coffee." Deliver a good product, and people will keep coming back. "My fans, they don't want to hear somebody else's songs. They want to hear what I have to say."
"It's the heart of Texans," club manager Concho Minick says of Watson's music. "He's entrepreneurial, he's authentic." Minick is the president of Billy Bob's Texas, the 127,000-square-foot Fort Worth Stockyards institution and self-proclaimed largest honky-tonk in the world. The building, which at various times had been a cattle barn, aircraft manufacturing plant, and department store, opened as a music venue in 1981. Its opening act was Larry Gatlin. Since then, just about everyone of note in the country music world has passed through. But when Minick was organizing a Billy Bob's–branded music festival in Italy last year, he chose Watson as his headliner and ambassador. With nineteen shows on the books, Watson is a Billy Bob's favorite. He brings in the kind of people Minick thinks exemplify the place.
"If you drew up who you wanted to see in Billy Bob's on Friday or Saturday night, that's it," he says. "These are the people you see at church, or the corner store, or out with your hunting buddies." Over the years, he's seen the evolution of Aaron Watson into an emerging star, from the self-described Honky Tonk Kid (the title of Watson's 2004 album) to the Underdog and, now, the Vaquero. That success isn't a surprise to Minick. He remembers Watson packing three thousand into Billy Bob's back in 2010. He says Watson might soon be too big to play Billy Bob's. "That time's probably coming for Aaron, and we'll be happy to be part of his rise. I'm happy to see it. I really am."
For Minick, it's hard not to root for Watson. Since he took over as the president of Billy Bob's from his father in 2011, Minick has presided over seven hundred country music shows. In that time, he's received exactly two Christmas cards from performers. One was from Aaron Watson. And it wasn't just a generic greeting sent to a perfunctory list of associates; it was a genuine Christmas card from Aaron, Kimberly, and the kids.
That kind of personal touch has helped fuel Watson's career, and it's an approach that jibes with major changes in the industry. The rise of streaming music and social media has altered the fan relationship with the artist. People don't have to let the radio or the record store determine what they have access to anymore. Not only can fans buy their music directly from the source but now they can talk right back to the musician, and Watson embraces it. His fans know his family. They keep up with the boys' baseball games and haircuts on Instagram. They point out their favorite songs on YouTube—the comments are remarkably ebullient and notably personal—and Watson and Genaro pay attention. Watson can recite fans' social media posts off the top of his head, like the man who said he'd raised his sons to Watson music and just wanted to say thanks. Watson reads them partly because he cares and partly because he wants to build and keep a loyal following and not be just a flash in the pan.
Seven of his albums were produced by Ray Benson, of Asleep at the Wheel. In terms of old-school Texas credibility, that kind of pedigree would be hard to beat. Unless, of course, you add Willie. While working on The Honky Tonk Kid, Benson went over to Nelson's house to shoot some pool. He put an early cut of the album on the sound system as they played, and Willie asked to listen to it again. And again. If you like it so much, Benson offered, how about you play on the album? That's how Watson got to work with the voice that shaped his childhood, with Willie chiming in on the album's title track: "Thirstin' for knowledge, all hungry and green / Strummin' that six-string, just like Lefty did / Everybody loves the Honky Tonk Kid."
By 2005, things were going well, and Aaron and Kimberly started having kids: first Jake, then Jack, then Jolee Kate. They wanted four, and soon Kimberly was expecting again. One day in early 2011, they met with doctors to find out the sex of their fourth child. It was a girl, they were told, but there was something else. She would be born with a genetic defect called trisomy 18. Also known as Edwards syndrome, it meant that she would be born small and likely with severe disabilities that, according to doctors, were incompatible with life. Aaron and Kimberly weren't going to end the pregnancy. It was their baby, no matter what happened.
Julia Grace Watson was born prematurely on October 10, 2011. The kids were with them, and the Watsons stayed with Julia for the few hours that she lived. As Julia slipped away, Aaron sang "Blue Skies and Rainbows" and "Jesus Loves the Little Children."
It wasn't easy getting back to work after that, especially for a record called Real Good Time. Somewhere, Watson came across a quote from the mother of Lane Frost, a bull rider killed at the 1989 Cheyenne Frontier Days rodeo. It was an expression that the Frosts put on Lane's tombstone: "Lane wasn't perfect but he knew Jesus." Something, Watson says, opened up his heart when he heard that. A burden was lifted. He remembered his faith, remembered that all his work, all the tragedy, was in service of something bigger and better. He wrote a song for Lane's parents. He had no plans to release it, but a year later, Watson played the song for them in person at the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas. The song became an immediate fan favorite, and Watson eventually decided to release it. "July in Cheyenne (Song for Lane's Momma)" topped the Texas charts and won song and video of the year at the Texas Regional Radio Music Awards. The album debuted in October 2012 at number nine on the Billboard country charts—Watson's best showing yet.
Nashville had slammed doors in his face, told him to tweak this, to change that, and Watson was still going, more than a decade in, without changing and without a major label. Now persistence wasn't just a requirement; it was becoming part of his brand. Loyal crowds at rodeos kept coming, kept telling friends to come, and kept up with Watson at each stop. He was honing his craft, writing more songs—sometimes pulling over on the side of the road to do so—and keeping his fans happy. Whole families were listening to him. Kids were growing up with his music. One fan recently sent him a message on social media, when he announced he'd be opening this month's Houston Rodeo. It was a picture of Watson with a little boy, all duded up as a cowboy. This is you and my son, the fan wrote. He's a teenager now, and we're going to see you in Houston. Another fan commented that her husband heard the news about Houston and remarked: "You know, Aaron Watson reminds me that sometimes good things happen to good people who work hard."
One morning in February 2015, he was sitting at his kitchen table after he'd dropped his kids off at school. He was chatting with Kimberly, who was scrambling eggs, when his manager called. "Are you sitting down?" Genaro said. "You did it." His album, The Underdog, had just debuted at number one on the Billboard country charts, making him the first independent male artist to do so. "We jumped up and down, dancing around like kids," Watson says.
The experiment had worked. In the twenty-first century, a regional artist can also be a global one. Being unapologetically Texan isn't an impediment anymore. Because, Watson believes, there's something relatable about having pride in where you're from and something timeless in the image of a cowboy. "James Dean on the set of Giant in Marfa, Texas, would look just as GQ in 2017 as he did in 1956. It's just a fact," Watson says, sitting on his bus. "There's nothing more classic than a nice pair of boots, worn-out jeans, a white pearl-snap, and," he plucks a hat off the wall, "the Resistol hat."
"I'm proud to be from Texas," he says with a little fire behind his eyes. "Are you crazy? When I hear people in Nashville tell me I need to get away from that, I just say 'whatever.' Didn't Davy Crockett come here from Tennessee?"
The cover of Watson's 2015 album, The Underdog, which debuted at number one.
With The Underdog, its cover image of a sweaty Watson made up like a rodeo clown, the cowboy had won his buckle. After the initial excitement, reality set in. After sixteen years, he was now an acclaimed up-and-comer, and he felt he had to work even harder. For years, he'd been a draw on the rodeo circuit, a "dance hall and county fair act," as Genaro put it, but this was something else entirely. He was now the symbol of a new path to success in country music. The album got its own display at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum (in Nashville, naturally). For the past two years, signs at his concerts have been emblazoned in hunter's orange with the message: "Always believe in the Underdog."
The album's success was thrilling. "But it really made me go, 'Whoa. We're gonna be here for a minute,' " Genaro says. Now he and Watson are thinking about what happens five years down the road and further. Watson recently realized that he's probably written his first thousand songs. He's glad he didn't throw them all out. A few of them were pretty good, and he feels like he's still improving. "I really believe I'm just catching my stride as a songwriter."
Genaro has been with Watson for fifteen years, and lately they've been thinking about his legacy. In about a decade, when Watson's kids walk into their first college dorm rooms and tell their roommates that their father is Aaron Watson, country musician, what will the response be? "Oh yeah, I heard him on the radio"? Or, "Oh yeah, his songs really mean a lot to me"? Watson knows what he'd prefer. So before every show, as the nerves creep in, he says a prayer. He asks that he put on a good show. He asks that he bring his fans joy. "Especially these young kids. They've been following me for such a long time. They look up to me, and that's something you should take seriously.
"God's blessed me with the opportunity to do what I love and the platform to have a positive influence on those around me," he says.
The show in Columbus has been over for something like two hours. Men with push brooms are sweeping up 32-ounce beer cups from the emptied-out dance floor, leaving a sticky trail that glistens under the house lights. It's edging toward 12:30 on Sunday morning, and Watson is still standing in front of his merchandise table. There's one last fan who has patiently waited out an autograph line that had snaked up a set of stairs and deep into the balcony. He's sporting a jet-black cowboy hat and a puffy Carhartt jacket, and by the looks of him, he doesn't have a driver's license yet. Just a honky-tonk kid. He's telling Watson that he wants to write songs. He's asking for advice. Write, write, write, Watson tells him. And he passes along some songwriting wisdom that had once been given to him. "Write a thousand songs, then throw them away," he says. "Then you'll be a songwriter. When you've got something, send it to me. I'll give it a listen." And the young man didn't even have to buy Watson a cappuccino. God-bless-yous are exchanged along with a firm handshake. Then Aaron Watson heads off to hit the road again.
Andrew Roush, a Bastrop native, is a senior editor at New Mexico Magazine. He lives in Santa Fe.
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