#2019 scavenger hunt

[meraus]

the porn bots really are evolving

[scavhunt]

Apropos of nothing, the Judges have decided that “points” are now a physical fiat currency. Please submit a prototype with a suitably grandiose design and at least one anti-counterfeiting measure. [Hamilton points for a One Point Note. An additional Lincoln points for also designing a Full Points Note.]

—Scav 2019, Item 183

[holylulusworld]

Kinktober 2022

Just like in 2019, 2020 & 2021 I am going to post a kinky, fluffy or scary one-shot from October 1st till October 31st 2022.

All upcoming stories got added now.

Please consider none of the stories are available until the set release date. Titles may change (all titles are working titles until release date.). The release date may change.

All stories contain smut, gore or horror elements. Please head the individual warnings for this event!!!

FANTASY/SMUT/FLUFF

October 1st: Irresistible Scent

Pairing: Alpha!Dean x Omega!Reader

Kink: Marking kink

October 2nd: Revenge served cold

Pairing: Andy Barber x fem!Reader

Kink: Cuckolding

October 3rd: Like Hell

Pairing: Alpha!Soldier Boy x Omega!Reader

Kink: A/B/O

A/N: requested

October 4th: Dance for me

Pairing: Demon!Dean x Stripper!Reader

Kink: Cock warming

October 5th: Forbidden Lust

Pairing: Stepdad!Bucky Barnes x fem!Reader

Kink: Homewrecker kink

October 6th: Mr. Orgasm (1) - Wrong Turn (Mr. Orgasm)

Pairing: Cultleader!Jensen Ackles x Author!Reader

Kink: Sex Cult

October 7th: Molded to perfection

Pairing: Steve Rogers x SextoyDesigner!Reader

Kink: big dick fetish

October 8th: Always daddy’s good girl sequel to Daddy’s good girl & Still daddy’s good girl

Pairing: John Winchester x fem!Reader

Kink: Daddy kink

October 9th: Best costume ever sequel to Is that a costume? & Where is your costume

Pairing: Wolverine x fem!Reader

Kink: Ripped clothes fetish

October 10th: Her concubines

Pairing: Dean x Fairy Queen!Reader x Sam

Kink: Feather play

October 11th: His favorite

Pairing: Alpha!Negan x Chubby(Omega)!Reader

Kink: Public sex

October 12th: Too much

Pairing: Nomad!Steve Rogers x fem!Reader

Kink: Cunnilingus + overstimulation + facesitting and a hint of beard burn

A/N: idea by @elle14-blog1​​

October 13th: Bearded Beast

Pairing: Andy Barber x fem!Reader

Kink: Beard fetish 😈

October 14th: Asgardian Possession

Pairing: Loki Laufeyson x fem!Reader

Kink: possessive behavior/possession

A/N: idea by anon

October 15th: Her big bear

Pairing: Alpha!Sam Winchester x Omega!Reader

Kink: Size kink

October 16th: Got milk?

Pairing: TFatWs!Bucky Barnes x pregnant!Reader

Kink: lactation kink

A/N: idea by @elle14-blog1​​

October 17th: Perfect ending sequel to New Discoveries & Greenest Green

Pairing: Jensen Ackles x fem!Reader

Kink: Roleplay

October 18th: Put it there

Pairing: Stucky x fem!Reader

Kink: Strap-ons

October 19th: Tight places - sequel to Cramped

Pairing: Soulless!Sam x fem!Reader

Kink: Claustrophilia

October 20th: Dad Jokes

Pairing: Andy Barber x fem!Reader

Kink: Dirty Talk

October 21th: Enemy Mine

Pairing: Biker!Bucky Barnes x fem!Reader

Kink: Exhibitionism (implied)

October 22nd: The strongest

Pairing: Dean Winchester x fem!Reader

Kink: Strength kink

October 23rd: Mustache Monster

Pairing: Lloyd Hansen x fem!Reader

Kink: Gunplay

October 24th: You, me, and your hands tonight 

Pairing: Dean Winchester x fem!Reader

Kink: Quorofilia / Hand Fetish

October 25th: Normal, not boring

Pairing: Endgame!Steve Rogers x fem!Reader x TfatWs!Bucky Barnes

Kink: Breeding kink

A/N: idea by @elle14-blog1 & anon (Bucky)

October 26th: The gigolo

Pairing: Escort!Tony Stark x fem!Reader

Kink: Paid sex

October 27th: Scavenger hunt

Pairing: Winchesters x fem!Reader (Dean, Sam, John, not Wincest)

Kink: unuasual sex toys & foursome

A/N: idea by @moosekateer13​

October 28th: Weather Goddess 

Pairing: Thor Odinson x fem!Reader (X-Men)

Kink: Hyperspermia & Cum fetish

October 29th: Take my breath away

Pairing: CEO!Bucky Barnes x fem!Reader

Kink: daydreams

October 30th: Praise me like you should

Pairing: Sam Wilson x fem!Reader

Kink: Praise kink & dirty talk

A/N: idea by anon

Halloween Specials: ANGST/SMUT/HORROR

October 31st: His prey

Pairing: Nomad!SteveRogers x Innocent!Reader

Kink: stalking

A/N: idea by @elle14-blog1​

October 31st: Carved

Pairing: Demon!Dean x fem!Reader; Sam x Girlfriend!Reader

Kink: Knife play

Find all other Bingos and Special Events here: Special Events

[oftlunarialmoon]

75 Agere Journal Prompts MEGALIST

Ciao lovelies! The first time I wrote about Age Regression Journals was in 2018, a whole 4 years ago (that feels weird to say omg). So I thought, since I’ve had 4 years to compile it for myself, I would share my MEGALIST of 75 Age Regression Journal Prompts with you all!

For more info about Agere Journaling, see THIS POST from 2018.

For Nightsong’s article about Vent Journals, see THIS POST from 2019.

For 8 Journal Prompts, see THIS POST from 2019.

And finally, for 52 creative writing prompts/quaintrelle prompts, see THIS POST from 2019.

And now, let’s begin this list!

75 Agere Journal Prompts - MEGALIST

*PS* scroll to the bottom, for pictures of examples from my personal journal! 

Draw yourself a kawaii bento lunch!

Write down any chores for the day as a to-do list or sticker check off list

Design a smol outfit

Make a playlist for your littlespace

Draw portraits of your stuffies

Write your headcanons for your comfort characters as caregivers

Write down some animal facts from different parts of the world that interest you!

List items that are your favorite color

Make a magazine collage with a specific theme

List ideas you want to do in certain seasons

List your favorite agere nicknames

Write down any agere headcanons you have for fictional characters or OCs

List stuffie name ideas

List all your current stuffie names

List your favorite phone apps for littlespace

Make a tier list of your opinions on different types of candy

Draw what your favorite characters would look like as stuffies

Invent a new kidcore fashion trend

List 5 facts about your favorite sea animal

Design your Jolly Roger if you were a pirate

Draw yourself as a Pokemon Trainer

List how you deal with stress in agere methods

Write out any recipes you can make while regressed

List crafts you’d like to make

Make a page about your morning routine when regressed

Make a page about your night time routine when regressed

Write out any rules or guidelines you have when regressed

What’s on your Agere/Littlespace Movies list?

Write about what you would do on a visit to the beach

List any animes you like when small

List your favorite agere books

Dear Past Me - What would you tell your past self?

Dear Future Me - What would you tell your future self?

List songs that make you regress

List your regression triggers (positive or negative)

Write about how you would comfort a friend in need

Write about your dream vacation

Make your christmas/birthday/holiday gift wishlist

List your fave agere video games

List your favorite stims

Write a letter to your favorite fictional character

Write a letter to a friend or family member

Play I spy and write down the categories and things you find

Make a page of your top 5 agere songs from the last month

List free activities you can do when regressed

Make a collage page from a coloring sheet and stickers

Play scavenger hunt with stickers of your preferred theme

Use a page to write down word games like word scrambles and mad libs

Fill a page with positive messages for yourself to read later

Write down tarot interpretations if you do tarot reading while smol

List ideas for kandi bracelets you could make

Declare a random day a holiday of some kind, write down how you celebrate it

Use a page to “braindump” all of your current thoughts, even if it’s babbling

Make a sticker collage inspired by your caregiver

Make a sticker collage inspired by the seasons

Trace your hand onto the page and give yourself fun nail art, tattoos, or accessories

Draw a race track for a toy car, add obstacles or scenery with stickers

Write a social media profile page for a comfort character

Make a “top secret” file with your stuffie’s secrets >:)

Make a collage inspired by yourself

Dedicate a page to facts about one of your special interests

Write a poem for your pet (or fave stuffie!)

Draw a scene around a sticker of your favorite animal

Draw the inside of a house and use stickers to furnish and decorate it

Draw a scene to play with your toys in

Try a mindful reset page (List problems you’re facing, then list more positive mindset changes to each one)

Document the stories you play out with dolls or toys

Write down “this or that” prompts in one color then answer them in another color !

Use stickers to tell a story or make a fun comic

Fill a page with word art, using any words that make you feel smol

Make a list of all of your OCs

Use a page to document Minecraft coordinates of your favorite builds

Draw the outline of a purse or bag, and use stickers to show what a character of your choice would have in their bag, or-

Use stickers to show what you would put in your dream agere bag!

Draw a face on a page in marker or pen, and use makeup to decorate it! (or face paint :p)

Examples From My Journal:

[spngeorg]

Episode 147 - 7.21 Reading is Fundamental

KEVIN! This poor kid... just add him to the list of Terrible Things Chuck Did.

We have a Leviathan Tablet and a new prophet to read it, which wakes Cas into a state of abject denial and depression of what he did, brings the angels back into play, and sets Sam and Dean on a big scavenger hunt for parts for a weapon powerful enough to end the leviathans.

Also, bees.

I think that about sums it up... oh and there's a lot of suffering of the personal emotional kind for everyone! Wheeee! Thanks, Ben Edlund!

LINKS!

The Superwiki page

My tag

Chuck is a real jerk

A reminder of why I don’t give too much credence to heaven/angel hierarchy 

Rewatch notes and general yelling from October 2019

Thoughts on bees and honey on a very very old post

Cas and games and bees by ladyofthesilent

A more recent post by ilarual about the bees and guilt

A post from s13 that covers how I see the tablets and their power

Rewatch notes from January 2018 (focusing on the thread of being sorry and playing sorry connecting back to 4.22)

Lizbob’s Dean and Cas are In Love series (part 1) (part 2) (part 3) (part 4)

Also, reminder that all my notes are on ao3 now! this week's notes can be found right here.

Listen now on Spotify, or wherever you enjoy podcasts!

[smoshgoshbefosh]

august 4th 🥺

What Smosh Videos were Posted on Your Birthday?

2007:

Quest for The Scooter- Smosh Main

2008:

No videos posted August 4

2009:

No videos posted August 4

2010:

No videos posted August 4

2011:

Worst Pickup Lines Ever!- Smosh Pit

2012:

Mutha Truckin Power Ranger- Smosh Pit

2013:

Sohinki Hogs Galaga (Raging Bonus)- Smosh Games

You Can't Cancel a Hit (SGA Spotlight)- Smosh Games

2014:

Teenage Mutant Ninja Smosh!- Smosh Pit

Erecting Penis Towers in Minecraft (Maricraft)- Smosh Games

2015:

Five Nights at Freddy's Four (Honest Game Trailers)- Smosh Games (All Honest Game Trailers were deleted)

2016:

Comic-Con Cosplay Scavenger Hunt (Squad Vlogs)- Smosh Pit

Insane GTA 5 Stunt Races (Grand Theft Smosh)- Smosh Games

2017:

Office Coffee Shenanigans (This Week in Smosh)- Smosh Pit

2018:

Joven Becomes a Puppet (Smoshventures)- Smosh Games

2019:

No videos posted August 4

2020:

Are We Smarter than High Schoolers?- Smosh Pit

2021:

Courtney's Boyfriend Reveal!- Smosh Main

2022:

Beopardy from Universal Studios Hollywood!- Smosh Pit

2023:

Washington Rap (Shorts)- Smosh Main

Our Pitch for The Next Quiet Place Movie (Shorts)- Smosh Pit

What Would Our Warning Labels Say? Let's Get Talking- Smosh Games

[thepastisalreadywritten]

It’s not easy to swim 175 km (109 mi.) when you’re starving to death. It’s not easy either to try to survive when you’re shedding body weight at a rate of 1 kg (2.2 lbs.) a day.

And it might be hardest — or at least most tragic — of all if you’re a nursing mom and your calorie intake has dropped so low that you can no longer produce the milk you need to care for your young.

As a new paper in Nature Communications reveals, all of those challenges and more are facing the world’s polar bears, thanks to vanishing sea ice in our warming world, denying the animals a platform that they need to hunt for seals.

If the trend isn’t reversed soon, the estimated 26,000 polar bears in the wild could start to lose their hold on survival before the middle of this century.

The researchers were less interested in establishing the fact of the bears’ food plight; scientists are already aware of that problem.

What they were more focused on learning was both how gravely the nutritional loss is affecting the animals’ health and the alternative food sources they’re scrounging for on land.

To do their work, the scientists followed 20 different polar bears in Manitoba, Canada, from 2019 to 2022, fitting them with GPS trackers and video collars and periodically tranquilizing them and analyzing their blood, body mass, daily energy expenditure — basically a measure of calories coming in versus calories going out — and more.

“The polar bears in Hudson Bay [Canada] are probably at the edge of the range at which they can survive right now,” says Anthony Pagano, a research biologist with the U.S. Geological Survey and the lead author of the paper.

“Most of the modeling work suggests that around 2050, they are going to be on land and away from their primary habitat [on the ice].”

The contraction in range of the Hudson Bay community is likely to be reflected in the ranges of the 18 other polar bear subpopulations scattered throughout the Arctic as well.

Across the arc of the study, the data Pagano and his colleagues gathered was troubling.

Weight loss varied from bear to bear, with the daily loss of 1 kg representing just an average.

Some of the subject animals dropped up to 1.7 kg (3.75 lbs) every 24 hours.

That may not seem like much when an adult male polar bear can tip the scales at 550 kg (1,200 lbs) and a female at 320 kg (700 lbs), but it can add up fast.

And with less available to eat, the hungry bears have to travel farther and farther distances to find their next meal.

The individual that swam 175 km — a young female — set the record among the bears studied, but another, older female also covered 120 km (75 mi).

The endurance swims in search of food are energy-intensive and often fruitless for the bears.

They are efficient hunters when they’ve got the purchase of ice beneath them, Pagano and his colleagues explain, but they are clumsy when they are going after seals and trying to swim at the same time.

That leaves them scavenging on land for foods they would not ordinarily eat — and getting little payoff for their efforts.

“Polar bears are feeding on ducks and geese — catching them when they’re flightless and molting — as well as on their eggs,” Pagano says.

Other foods on the desperate bears’ menus included berries and other vegetation, bones, antlers and, in one case, a beluga whale carcass.

None of that fare is as calorie-rich as a steady diet of live, blubber-packed seals.

Some of the bears vigorously sought out these alternative sources of nutrition; others opted for a different strategy: resting and conserving the energy contained in their body mass.

The latter approach costs stored calories, but so does the former, as all of the plodding and searching burns through energy too.

“The amount of body tissue they were burning to try and find those terrestrial foods was basically the same as what they’d get from eating those terrestrial foods,” Pagano says. “So there’s no actual benefit.”

The researchers were surprised to find that the bears were going through not just fat stores to compensate for the poor rations but lean muscle tissue too.

Pagano is not certain why their metabolisms would adopt that strategy, but he has some ideas.

“There's some thought that burning lean body mass might be more energetically efficient in some respects relative to burning body fats,” he says.

“Also, conserving their body fat might provide them better thermal regulation once the winter and the ice return.”

That seasonal freeze-over is shorter than it used to be — though not by a lot.

In the 1980s, polar bears were on land for about 110 days out of the year, with no need to eat terrestrial foods since the fat deposits they’d accumulate thanks to wintertime seal-hunting was enough to carry them the rest of the year.

Now they're off the ice for 130 days on average.

It’s a measure of the nutritional knife’s-edge on which the bears operate that just 20 days can make the difference between whether they live and thrive or starve and die.

The individuals most likely to perish when food supplies are poor are young adults — due to their less-developed hunting skills — and cubs, whose principal source of nutrition, their mother’s milk, can vanish in lean times.

“If females are fasting for extended periods, they will actually stop lactating,” says Pagano.

Full-grown bears are by no means immune to danger, however.

The authors cite earlier research predicting that the adult male population could decrease by 24% if the ice-free summer season increases to 180 days.

This is especially so given the enormous energy intake — about 22,500 calories per day — that the big males need to maintain their body weight.

Polar bears aren’t the only species menaced by these findings. Humans are in harm’s way too.

The more time bears spend off the ice and on land, the greater the likelihood they will wander into cities and towns in search of something to eat — and residents could easily be hurt or attacked if they get in the way of the hungry animals.

People might also even be seen as sources of prey.

“When polar bears are on land, they act like other bears and become omnivores,” says Pagano. “It does raise the potential for human-bear interactions.”

🆘🐻‍❄️🥺

[pleistocene-pride]

Teratornis is a now extinct genus of large bird of prey which lived throughout North and Central America as well as the Caribbean and possibly South America from the early Pleistocene to the early Holocene approximately 2.5 million to 8,000 years ago. The first scientifically known Teratornis remains were recovered from the la brea tar pits in 1909 by Loye Holmes Miller who named the animal Teratornis from the Greek teretos meaning "wonder" and ornis meaning "bird". Since then a large number of fossil and subfossil remains, representing more than 100 individuals, have been found in locations in California, Oregon, southern Nevada, Arizona, Cuba, and Florida. Today there are 2 valid species being Teratornis merriami and Teratornis woodburnensis and a third species Teratornis olsoni being possibly its own genus Oscaravis although this is up for debate. Reaching around 2 ½ - 3 ½ft (.75 -1m) tall, 25-50lbs (11 -23kg) in weight, with an 11-15ft (3.35 -4.67m) wingspan, teratornis ranks amongst the largest birds ever to fly being over a third larger than even the biggest extant condors. It shared many similarities to modern condors particularly in there wings which were well adapted for soaring. Teratorns short, stouter legs and more flexible pelvic girdle indicate they were well suited for walking about on land as well as jumping. Teratornis also possessed a long hooked beak and flexible wide opening jaws, indicating that in addition to scavenging on the carcasses of large megafauna these mammoth birds likely hunted some live prey such as reptiles, amphibians, fish, small mammals, and other birds, which they would have swallowed whole.

Art used belongs to the following creators

Teratornis: Peter Schouten

Teratornis: Mark Witton http://markwitton-com.blogspot.com/2019/08/we-need-to-talk-about-teratorns.html

Teratornis: Notiomastodon https://www.sci.news/paleontology/argentina-teratorns-10036.html

La Brea: Beth Zaiken https://bethzaiken.com/ice-age-fossils-state-park-sunset-scavengers

[ghostofbambifanfiction]

I just reread n00b. Can I just say how great it is!? I love your writing in it!

a preview of the next chapter for your kindness

Wizarding World Wars Homepage

HOGWARTS SECRETS SCAVENGER HUNT EVENT

24 HOUR CHALLENGE

Successfully complete 5 Hogwarts Scavenger Hunt challenges and collect 5 silver Quaffles for one month of unlimited Floo travel

Time Remaining: 23 hrs 16 mins 31 secs

...

Discord Server: WWW Marauders Alliance

Members: Ah-Idk, siriusblack, Bacon4Algernon, Wormtail, Josie

Channel: General Resumed: Monday 8th July 2019, 4:43 p.m.

====================

Wormtail: Guys guys guys!! Are you seeing this?!

Ah-Idk: Just saw it now. I'm free for a bit if everyone else is? No pressure on you @Josie if you're not available or only want to play on Wednesdays.

Josie: I've got a couple of hours to spare before I leave to meet my friend, so I can play for a bit.

siriusblack: Bacon get your arse home, I'm not passing up unlimited Floo

Bacon4Algernon: bugger off i'm busy and only josie calls me bacon YOU can't call me bacon this is not becoming a thing

Wormtail: It's part of your username?

Josie: Yeah guys Did you hear that? Only I can call him Bacon Only I am special

Bacon4Algernon: that is NOT i repeat NOT what i meant AT ALL you are DELIBERATELY misconstruing my words for your own illicit purposes

Josie: Do you ever ramp the energy down to anything resembling normal dialogue, or are you basically always Javert before he leaps off the bridge?

Bacon4Algernon: undermining me in front of the group pretending to have a friend that you "meet up with" as if you aren't a horned brute who festers like a wound beneath the earth's crust, both continental and oceanic time and time again, you tell these LIES

Josie: Call me Jean Valjean, I guess

Wormtail: Lol

Bacon4Algernon: i must insist that you do not reference french fiction at me at this time i am TRYING to set a romantic mood with someone here and it is extremely counterproductive to my efforts

Josie: Awwwwww, Bacon I knew you felt as I did <3

Bacon4Algernon: NOT WITH YOU

Josie: My sweet reine du drame

Ah-Idk: Because whoever heard of the words "French" and "romantic" being used in conjunction with one another?

siriusblack: For fuck's sake, your girlfriend can live without you for one fucking day 24 hour challenges won't wait, Prongs Shelve your frigidly polite over-the-clothes fondling and Uber back to the house I'll even pay for it, you left your debit card on your bed

Bacon4Algernon: so now having MANNERS is an issue?

Josie: Jesus

Bacon4Algernon: you know i'd actually BE at home right now if she didn't feel so uncomfortable around you that she doesn't want to come over, yeah??!

siriusblack: Tell her to change her entire personality

Bacon4Algernon: SIRIUS

siriusblack: Then she can come over whenever she wants

Josie: Oh my GOD Stop it BOTH OF YOU THIS IS LUDICROUS

Ah-Idk: Agreed.

Wormtail: ^

Ah-Idk: I'm getting really sick of this.

Josie: Nobody else in this Discord, and I mean NOBODY, Bacon, since all-caps theatrics seems to be the only language you understand, is interested in dealing with this Cheryl Blossom bullshit

Bacon4Algernon: ??R??GF

Josie: We're here to play a game. A GAME. You're neglecting your brother and he's jealous so he's taking it out on your girlfriend, WE GET IT, people with bigger relationship issues than this one have sorted them out faster than you two just have a conversation and let us live

Bacon4Algernon: firstly, you don't own this server so stop throwing your weight around and setting rules like you're my mother or something

Josie: Your mother owns this server?

Bacon4Algernon: sdhgiksfhd NO AND SECONDLY my biggest problem with sirius is actually that he let YOU into this discord, mephistopheles so stick THAT where your peg's supposed to go

Josie: I'll keep your thesaurus-assisted admonishments out of your arsehole, thanks.

Wormtail: Lmfaooooooooooooooooooooo

Josie: And if your biggest problem with Sirius is that he brought me into the Discord, and not that he's treating your girlfriend like a fucking dishrag, then you're not a very good boyfriend and she should dump you like toxic waste.

Bacon4Algernon: EXCUSE ME??!

Wormtail: DAMN

Bacon4Algernon: what kind of UNFOUNDED ACCUSATION????YOU ARE LUCKY THAT SHE DIDN'T READ THAT

Josie: Then put your phone down and pay her some attention? Anyway, about this challenge

siriusblack: YES, the challenge

Bacon4Algernon: @siriusblack she just insulted you too and what, you don't care?

siriusblack: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Josie: I've already found one Quaffle in Filch's office. So we only need four more to get the Floo.

Bacon4Algernon: WHAT? HOW? THE CHALLENGE STARTED TWENTY MINUTES AGO I REFUSE TO BELIEVE THIS

Josie: I know it did, it only took me ten minutes. I've had a look at the noticeboard in the common room and one of the clues is definitely pointing to the lake, and I think another's directing us to Myrtle's bathroom, but I'm cool with heading wherever if anything else jumps out at the rest of you.

Ah-Idk: Checking now.

Bacon4Algernon: WAIT WAIT WAIT DON'T DO THIS WITHOUT ME THAT'S NOT FAIR

siriusblack: Come the fuck home, then

Josie: Or maybe DON'T throw your girlfriend over for a game???

siriusblack: Anyone have gillyweed?

Josie: Unless you genuinely never want to get pegged by anyone at all.

Bacon4Algernon: HAH I DO I DO

Josie: Want to get pegged?

Bacon4Algernon: I MEANT THE GILLYWEED HADES

siriusblack: I'll rephrase that Does anybody present and currently still loyal to the party have gillyweed?

Bacon4Algernon: SIRIUS

Wormtail: I've got some gillyweed.

Ah-Idk: I agree re: the lake, it seems obvious from the clues. Happy to head there if everyone else is.

Bacon4Algernon: STOP LEAVING ME OUT. I WANT TO PLAY it's not fair for you all to PERSECUTE me for being with the woman i like and could see myself loving in 8 to 10 months i'm trying to be an attentive boyfriend don't make this my sophie's choice

siriusblack: I just put food in my stomach, you prick

Wormtail: Weird way to say "ate" but ok

Ah-Idk: Sophie had to choose between her children, Prongs. Her literal children. The one she didn't choose died.

Josie: Oh for god's sake, we're not starting this again, I can't deal. What time are you due to get home?

Bacon4Algernon: who?

Josie: YOU, FLOOZY WHO ELSE?

Bacon4Algernon: idk satan she's got to go to a thing with her parents at 7 so after that

Josie: Fine. I'll be back from seeing my friend at 9ish, I can play then if everyone else is free.

Wormtail: I can play at 9.

siriusblack: @Josie You don't have to pander to Prongs, let's just take the lake mission now

Josie: Including every member of the party isn't pandering? It's being a decent fucking person.

Ah-Idk: Happy to play at 9, I've got chores to do this evening anyway and I can't face Prongs and Sirius arguing AND looming dirty dishes all at once.

Josie: Cool. So we're all sorted.

siriusblack: Sorted according to who, exactly?

Josie: According to me. Take issue with it, please, I beg you. Then maybe you and Bacon can bond over what a hellish, nasty bitch I am and be friends again, saving us all from further aggro.

siriusblack: Nice try, compadre But you know I can't stay mad at you for long

Josie: -_-

siriusblack: I wish I knew how to quit you

Josie: Thanks...Jake Gyllenhaal?

Bacon4Algernon: fine then i'll be back online at 9ish

Josie: Not going to thank me for anything, no?

Bacon4Algernon: thank you for what, keeping winged monkeys gainfully employed?

Josie: Thanks for that babe, love you too

[esrah-rah-rasputin]

Going through movies from the past that were set in the future, except that future is now our past (2001: A Space Odyssey style)

This is going to be a longish series so I'm going to make this a reblog chain, here's the current list I've made using IMDB. Here's the list lol

2019: after the fall of new york (1983) Defcon 2012 (2010)(edited) 2012 Ice Age (2011) 2012 (2009) tamala 2010: a punk cat in space (2002) 2010: the year we make contact (1984) 2009: lost memories (2002) 2002 (2001) 2001: a space travesty (2000) 2001: a space odyssey (1968) Equalizer 2000 (1987) Fantasia 2000 (1999) Death Race 2000 (1987)(edited) Cherry 2000 (1975) Blues Brothers 2000 (1998) Summer vacation 1998 (1988) Class of 1999 (1990) 1984 (1956) Class of 1984 (1982)

I've already watched Death Race 2000, and Defcon: 2012, so I'll put those first. I'd be lying if I said these were in any particular order

Death Race 2000

rating: 4/10

If you're going to watch this and enjoy it you need to know that it's a political satire from the start, and bizarrely funny. Unfortunately, it doesn't really make its point clear until the last five minutes, which is "America is gratuitously violent and there's no fucking reason for that" and "if anyone disagrees with that, hit them with a car"

The actual premise is "What if in the year 2000, America turned into a gratuitously violent, near-global state that celebrated each year with a cross-country race where racers try to hit as many people as possible. And also, what if there was a group who didn't like that and tried to stop it by matching a rebel leader's granddaughter in shotgun with the only two time winner of the cross-country race?"

Interesting notes:

there is a nazi flag in the first five minutes, and a character duo who have nazism as their motif. Because it's a political satire and it's a mile marker to show the level of issues involved. However they do end up driving off a cliff and there's an extended explosion scene

disappointingly, the guy who's supposedly gotten in multiple car crashes and has several prosthetics has no physical evidence of that

surprisingly, he DOES look like he designed his own (fake) leather dom outfit, cape included, with only vague descriptions of what one looks like

there's the funniest fight scene ever about an hour into the movie between this guy and another guy (played by Sylvester Stallone) dressed like a 30s gangster, while sax plays

Defcon: 2012

rating: 2/10 generally, 7/10 if you're genuine about enjoying it

I'm 100% sure this was someone's film school project, and if you like the idea of a 2010 emo dystopia movie filmed almost entirely in an abandoned mall, with three out of *maybe* eight characters voiced by TTS, you'll like this.

The actual premise is "local tormented teen and co. go to a supposedly abandoned Earth to go scavenger hunting, but discover an underground human community, and the real way Earth was taken over (it involves imperialism)"

Interesting notes:

Pretty much every single scene without talking is overlaid with EDM and 2010 metal. The soundtrack's pretty good actually

One of the characters wears a CGI'd helmet, and I'm honestly impressed by the amount of effort put into editing it

I'm 90% sure the person who made this watched Battlestar Galactica from the filters over every scene

It's written like the person who made it has just learned they can say the fuck word and not get in trouble

I'm also pretty sure one of the cast members is the mom of another one of the cast members. Good for her

Shoutout to a couple throwaway lines about how colonization is bad and how in the story, the 2012 Mayan calendar thing actually has nothing to do with it (even though it seems like it initially). Surprisingly anticapitalist implications overall, I wish this was focused on more

Only problem I have with the movie is that I think it wrapped up too quickly, which seemed beyond the control of the people who were making it so I can't fault them for that really

[fxreflyes]

Prithee tell us about your favorite visits to museums, firefly. It’s a long and silent January night and your stories will keep madness from us. (To be read in the voice of a Dickensian child of 6 years old, sitting before the hearth.) ☕️

hey hey!! :) my favorite seafaring vessel, a joy as always to meet u here. fret not, i will not let madness consume you! <3

(the context for the voice definitely helped, i most certainly did read it in the voice of a dickensian child. i can hear the crackle of the hearth as i pen these words!)

oh where to start! this is a bit of a brain dump, but is semi-chronological and images included in the order of discussion

first, summer of 2016, going to the hermitage and making puns about all of the art! they were not good puns. i believe my brother called the statue below a "boar"ing statue. it was quite hot since we went in summer and we were very surprised that the musuem had no ac since there is generally some to protect the art from the elements. so twas a very sticky and humor filled walk thru some art that has seen quite a lot (pic 1)

fall of 2018, went to the met's heavenly body's fashion exhibit with 2 friends from high school. i love & still go to musuem's w one of them, she's v sweet. the exhibit took place in the part of the museum that is older and looks like a church, so it was v prescient!! (pics 2-4, the leather jacket was so cool)

spring 2019, went to the met again (can u tell i went to college in nyc) and to the frick for my art history class to do a scavenger hunt for the class. quite honestly the most fun assignment ever. it was going through the museums and finding the art and writing about it. there were 50 or so things to find out. we went 3 times total for 3 sessions of the hunt. went w my dad for one, he has said he wants to do more even now

fall of 2019 i went to the met's instruments of rock n roll and saw instruments from a lot of famous musicians! i have a bunch of pics of them, but was v fun i went w my dad and got a bunch of music taste from him so that was cool. i was v amused by this many headed guitar hahaha (pic 5)

winter 2020 i went to a black tie gala in an art musuem so that was v fun & festive!!!

ok covid took a hit to this list so fall 2021! natural history musuem in london! went w my brother bc he was doing his masters same time as i was studying abroad there. i mean it's gorgeous. my brother is v interested in rocks so spent a while in the geology section! lots of cool rocks.

feb 2022, went to the met around my bday! my bf flew to visit me. saw very cool swords. pictured below!

summer 2022, went to the Louvre and the musee d'Orsay! saw the painting of dante and virgil in hell which was v cool, i have always loved that one.

for the sake of brevity, lets go to feb 2023, went to the whitney to see my fav artist edward hopper and an exhibit on him! went w the same friend as i went to the met in 2018 w. went w my brother too. fav exhibit ever probably, just bc i love hopper and i have included my fav painting by him, new york movie! my mom had a book on hopper growing up on our coffee table so always read it

oh my this is not brief. the fire is dwindling! ill stoke it.

this summer! the prado in madrid! i love goya so seeing his work was just so cool. they v sadly didnt allow photography in the museum but saw his black paintings the ones w saturn eating his children.

i hope my little tales help stave off the madness <33

[fcble]

SOCIAL SNAPSHOT ! [ 2/5 ]

Fable’s YouTube channel currently has 1.6 million subscribers and 639 videos. The channel was launched in late 2017, though no videos were uploaded until the spring of 2018, when the group’s lineup was finalized and slowly introduced to the public. The majority of their content is split into five main categories, most of them containing smaller sections.

ON THE RECORD is Fable’s main variety show. The seasons air sporadically, often centering around large events in their career. Currently, there are five seasons.

경천동지 / TAKE THE WORLD BY STORM — The first season, which followed the group from the end of their debut preparations to the beginning of their debut promotions, ran for eight episodes in almost real time, from July to August 2018. It’s often used as a baseline for demonstrating the group’s growth. Common sentiments are “It’s so nice to see that Haksu and Andrew don’t hate each other like this anymore” and “Remember when they used to be scared of Jaeseop?”. They tried very hard to be funny and it was very obvious.

LIVE IN ASIA — Taking a bit more of a relaxed approach to variety, their second season was filmed during their first Asia tour. The six episodes aired in September 2019, shortly after the tour concluded. They split into four pairs to complete an almost Amazing Race-style scavenger hunt around the cities they were visiting. The winning pair was Kiyoung and Andrew.

겨울방학 / WINTER BREAK — The third season showcased Fable’s first company-sponsored vacation. They stayed on Jeju Island for a week and a half, filming the ten episodes that aired from January to March 2021. Since filming took place during winter, they spent most of their time indoors, except for one rather sad visit to the beach.

AROUND THE WORLD — During Fable’s world tour, they brought back the format of the second season. Season four is comprised of seven episodes, released from September to October 2022. This time, they competed in two teams. Andrew is a two-time winner, accompanied by teammates Haksu and Intak. Other highlights of this season include Eunsu’s brief participation via FaceTime, and guest appearances by Mingeun and Andrew’s families.

축제 2023 — Aptly named for the current year, the most recent season has twelve episodes, aired inconsistently from April to August 2023. In celebration of Fable’s fifth anniversary, the season accompanied the release of their second full album and its repackage, featuring conceptually related trips around Korea.

BY ◯◯, also known as the BYLINE SERIES is the solo content of each of the Fable members. The videos range from vlogs to covers to whatever else is on their minds. The upload schedules are determined by the members themselves. In order of popularity, the smaller series are:

BY HAKSU — As arguably the most popular member, it makes sense for his videos to perform the best. Haksu was also the first to start uploading solo content in late 2019. He tends to release a lot of song covers with a few much-beloved vlogs sprinkled in between. Andrew can often be found playing a piano accompaniment in the background.

BY BYEONGHWI — In some alternate universe, Byeonghwi is a YouTuber instead of an idol. He has a knack for being engaging on camera—a skill that also serves him well in his current career—framing shots, and editing it all himself. As a result, he uploads about once a month. Each video is an event, as they show off the ordinary lives of himself and the rest of the group.

BY MINGEUN — If there’s one thing Mingeun’s going to do, it’s cover a song better than the original artist, at least according to the comment sections on his few videos with their comment sections enabled. Most of his videos are vocal or dance—sometimes both—covers of kpop songs he likes, indie pop songs Andrew introduced to him, and whatever else he’s listening to at the moment. He has a few very popular covers, though most are not.

BY YEJUN — When it comes to Andrew’s individual videos, they’re almost indistinguishable from any of his livestreams. They all take place at night, and his nights are almost indistinguishable from each other as well. He goes to the twenty-four hour convenience store, he tries to write music, he stares up at the few visible stars in the sky—all captured in 480p.

BY KIYOUNG — Judging solely from Kiyoung’s videos, it’s very difficult to tell that his job is being an idol. Sure, the other members make brief appearances in his vlogs here and there, but most of them show off more of his life outside of work. Most of his friends aren’t idols, and their faces are carefully blurred out or hidden in each of his videos, making it look like he shares his meals with a bunch of apparitions.

BY INTAK — For a music producer, Intak makes videos with extremely poor audio. His are always ASMR-esque, but with a shitty phone microphone instead of a more professional one. He shows off his music production process, speaking as little as possible. He tends to leave it to the editors to write evocative captions for his accompanying visuals.

BY JAESEOP — Jaeseop’s videos come once every few months, usually immediately before or after promotions. It’s become a running joke that an upload from him means a comeback is right around the corner. Almost everything he shows off in his videos was previously seen in the more frequent uploads of the other members. When it comes to putting together his own solo content, he does not have a single original thought in his head.

BY EUNSU — A now defunct series. For a few months between when he started the series and when he left the group, he interacted the most with fans. He would give requested advice to fans based on his limited knowledge from his lived experiences. The comment section of his videos would often correct him, or argue that he should not be listened to.

LEGEND OF FABLE is another one of the group’s reality shows, produced in conjunction with Mnet. Its six episode run spanned from February 12, 2020 to March 18, 2020. Very loosely inspired by the Joseon era story The Tale of Cho Ung, the members played the roles of eight princes vying for power. Fitting in with their concept, their various activities somehow managed to extol Confucian values in the twenty-first century. The result of the casual competition was indecisive, leaving it up to the fans and viewers to debate who would have made the best theoretical ruler of Korea.

A second season was rumored to somehow follow Kim Manjung’s The Nine Cloud Dream and assumed to air some time in 2021. There have been no updates since then.

OFF THE RECORD is the overarching playlist for all of their behind the scenes content. This includes:

PLAY-BLE — Most of the behind the scenes content is within this series. Everything from MV filming to concept film shootings to recording studio behinds can be found here.

AIR-BLE — Extra broadcast videos is the second of the behind content categories. This is mostly just compilations of moments where someone turned a camera on backstage at a music show. It also includes a bit of extra content from their concerts, tours, fansigns, and other live performances.

STAGE-BLE — The more fun performances are also considered behind the scenes content. Normal dance practices, themed dance practices, live practices, part switch versions, etc. are all grouped together. The most popular of these is a Goblin (2016)-themed dance practice of their 2020 song, 꽃처럼.

The last category of content is all of their music videos. On very rare occasions, they’ll film music videos for their b-sides. It’s much more likely for them to release live or other similar performance versions. Their most-viewed video remains their 2020 breakout hit, 가자, sitting at 74 million views.

[the-rewatch-rewind]

Another new episode! Getting into the home stretch!

Script below the break

Hello and welcome back to The Rewatch Rewind! My name is Jane, and this is the podcast where I count down my top 40 most frequently rewatched movies in a 20-year period. Today I will be discussing number 8 on my list: Universal Pictures’ 1936 screwball comedy My Man Godfrey, directed by Gregory La Cava, written by Morrie Ryskind and Eric Hatch, based on a book by Eric Hatch, and starring William Powell and Carole Lombard.

The rich and spoiled Bullock sisters, Irene (Carole Lombard) and Cornelia (Gail Patrick), are participating in a scavenger hunt that requires them to find a “forgotten man,” so they race to a shanty town at a city dump. Cornelia gets there first and approaches a homeless man named Godfrey (William Powell), who finds her rude and condescending and therefore refuses to take her offered $5, instead causing her to fall into an ash pile. Irene is amused by Godfrey’s treatment of her sister/rival, and after a brief conversation, Godfrey is amused enough by Irene to agree to be her forgotten man. Irene is so grateful to him for helping her win the scavenger hunt against Cornelia that she offers him a job as the butler for their wacky family, and he accepts without having any idea what he’s in for.

I remember being introduced to this movie rather early in my foray into old Hollywood back in 2002. I can’t recall my exact first impressions, but I’m pretty sure I had seen it several times and was already kind of obsessed with it before I started keeping track of the movies I watched. Once I started keeping track, I watched My Man Godfrey six times in 2003, three times in 2004, three times in 2005, twice in 2007, once in 2008, twice in 2009, once in 2010, twice in 2011, once in 2013, once in 2014, once in 2017, once in 2018, twice in 2019, twice in 2020, once in 2021, and once in 2022.

The main thing that initially drew me to this movie was its silliness. Based on the movies I’ve talked about on this podcast so far, I think it’s pretty clear that I love to watch a bunch of ridiculous characters having a fun romp, and that’s what a lot of My Man Godfrey is. Angelica, the scatterbrained mother of the Bullock family, played delightfully by Alice Brady, is one of the silliest characters in any movie ever, and when I was a young teen, all she had to do was open her mouth to crack me up. Now I find some of her antics a bit grating, which they are definitely meant to be, but some of her lines do still make me laugh every time, like, “I’m positive I didn’t ride a horse last night because I didn’t have my riding costume on!” and “If you’re going to be rude to my daughter, you might at least take your hat off!” and, in response to Godfrey saying that he sold short to save the family from financial ruin, “I don’t understand, you sold short? You mean, gentlemen’s underwear?” My brother was particularly tickled by that last one as a child, to the point that when we played The Sims together, we created a character named Gentleman’s Underwear after that line.

Angelica is far from the only silly character in this movie, and what I love about the whole ensemble is that each character is entertaining in a different way. Angelica is scatterbrained and doesn’t really care what’s going on, while her husband Alexander (played by Eugene Pallette) has lost track of what’s going on mostly because he’s so fed up with his wife’s ridiculousness. And then there’s Carlo (played by Mischa Auer) who is Angelica’s “protégé,” and I’m still not really sure exactly what that means. I can’t tell if it’s a euphemism, or if she’s like, supposed to be teaching him piano? We definitely see him playing piano, and eating, and impersonating a gorilla, and reading to Angelica, and that seems to be all he does. So unclear what his purpose is, but he is amusing. On the other hand, Molly (played by Jean Dixon, who also played Edward Everett Horton’s wife in Holiday) has the very clear purpose of being the Bullock family’s maid. Her dry, sarcastic wit is amusing in an entirely different way that I love very much. There’s also Tommy Gray (played by Alan Mowbray), a friend of the Bullock family who also happens to recognize Godfrey from their college days. Not wanting to reveal that he came from a wealthy Boston family, Godfrey says that he was Tommy’s valet in college, forcing Tommy to try to invent a story explaining why Godfrey wouldn’t have given him as a reference when the Bullocks hired him. Tommy seems like a relatively normal guy who isn’t particularly bright. Watching him flounder in that scene could have easily become uncomfortable, but they managed to portray it in a way that’s just silly. And his invention of a wife and five children for Godfrey adds to the confusion and tension behind the main romance in the movie.

If you’ve listened to previous episodes of this podcast and have an especially keen memory, you may recall that Gregory La Cava also directed Stage Door, which was number 31 on my list and came out the year after My Man Godfrey. I’m not sure how much say he had in the casting of both of those movies, but I enjoy that there are several people who appeared in both, such as character actors Franklin Pangborn and Grady Sutton, neither of whom was credited in My Man Godfrey but both of whom make memorable appearances. The most notable cast member the two movies have in common is Gail Patrick, who was Ginger Rogers’s main rival besides Katharine Hepburn in Stage Door and Cornelia Bullock in My Man Godfrey. In both of these, as in most of her movies, Patrick’s character is rather unpleasant, but Cornelia is a bit more complex than that, and she fascinates me. She’s bitter and spoiled and mean to her sister and can’t decide if she wants to seduce Godfrey or hurt him or both. After Godfrey tells her what he thinks of her, she tries to frame him for robbery by hiding her pearl necklace under his mattress, but he manages to find it and hide it better before the police search his room. Cornelia is so insistent that it must be under the mattress that the police get suspicious and ask why she’s so sure of that, to which she responds with the amazing and thoroughly unconvincing line, “I read that that’s where people put things when they steal them!” Shockingly, even after all of this, the story actually redeems Cornelia somewhat. Godfrey is able to save the family financially by pawning her necklace, and after he reveals this he tells her that he, too, was once a spoiled child, and that she has the potential to be a good person if she so chooses. Cornelia is visibly moved by his words, and while we unfortunately never see her again after that scene, I like to believe that she takes them to heart and stops being so awful going forward.

But as much as I love all the supporting characters, I don’t think I’d have watched this movie nearly as many times if not for the leads. William Powell brings just the right combination of sophistication and jadedness to the role of Godfrey, making it easy to believe that he was once a rich man but lost everything he had to a woman he loved who betrayed him. It’s beautiful to watch him rediscover his own purpose and humanity in response to the Bullocks’ kindness and choose to focus on the positive aspects of their quirks. When William Powell was offered the role of Godfrey, he agreed to take it only if Carole Lombard would play Irene, knowing that she would be perfect, and he was completely correct. Lombard absolutely kills it as Irene, flawlessly combining the dramatic naïveté of an overgrown toddler with a genuine desire to be a good and mature person. And the way Powell and Lombard play off each other is utterly delightful. Their first conversation sets up their dynamic beautifully – he’s rather amused by her, but she takes everything he says extremely seriously. Like when she asks him, “Why do you live in a place like this when there are so many nice places?” and he responds, “It’s because my real estate agent felt that the altitude would be very good for my asthma,” she doesn’t seem to know that he’s joking, and says, “Oh my uncle has asthma!” And he just rolls with it and replies, “No! Well, now there’s a coincidence!” This is already funny as written, but their delivery and facial expressions make it so much funnier. Then probably my favorite part of the movie is when Irene is sulking and trying to get Godfrey to notice her, but she mostly just comes across as ridiculous, and Cornelia is heckling her mercilessly. Godfrey is trying to act uninterested, but it’s clear from a few of his glances in her direction that he really does want to give her the attention she craves. It’s readily apparent from all of their scenes that they both thoroughly understood the assignment and knew how to play off each other. Powell and Lombard had worked together twice before and had even been briefly married to each other from 1931 to 1933. Despite the fact that things didn’t work out between them romantically in real life, they remained good friends, and seem to have only used their history to bring out the best performance in each other here. It is kind of funny that Godfrey keeps telling Irene that she’s way too young for him because it’s like, “You clearly didn’t think she was too young when you married her five years ago!” Mostly, though, it just makes me really happy as someone who has no interest in pursuing romantic relationships to know that it was Powell and Lombard’s post-divorce friendship that led to possibly the best movie that either of them ever made. It’s so encouraging to see the evidence that sometimes the relationship between two people can actually get better when they stop trying to make it romantic.

However, it took me a while to see things that way, because in the movie itself, Godfrey and Irene do end up together romantically. Once I learned that the actors were divorced in real life, my first thought was more, “Wow, amazing that they could still pretend to be in love after falling out of love.” In more recent rewatches, I’ve come to realize that the romance in the movie is very weird – which, to be fair, is quite usual for screwball comedies – but I think as an obliviously aromantic teenager it greatly informed what I thought romance was. Irene meets a nice man who helps her win a game against her awful sister and decides to be in love with him, so all she has to do is convince him that he’s also in love with her. Not understanding that romantic attraction was a thing that I was not experiencing, teenaged me thought that was how that worked: you just pick somebody and decide you have a crush on them, and if the other person has also picked you to be their crush, romance is born. Right? Apparently not. Anyway, in more recent rewatches, when it gets to the part where Godfrey tells Irene, “You’re grateful to me because I helped you to beat Cornelia. And I’m grateful to you because you helped me to beat life. But that doesn’t mean that we have to fall in love,” I’m like, “Correct! It doesn’t mean that! You don’t have to fall in love!” But the movie implies that Godfrey is suppressing his feelings for Irene because of the previous bad relationship that led to his homelessness, and it expects us to all be on board with the way Irene follows him after he quits and basically forces him to marry her. The older I get, the more this ending bothers me. I realize that it’s meant to be part of the screwball silliness of it all, and that it was inevitable for a movie like this to make the male and female lead end up together, but it’s like, can we maybe make sure that Godfrey is on board with that first? I can very much see their marriage going the same way as that of the actors who played them, with Irene and Godfrey ultimately concluding that they’re better suited as friends than lovers. But again, as a young person watching this movie, I thought their relationship was beautiful. Soon after I first got really into My Man Godfrey, my friend had a Build-A-Bear birthday party, and I named my bear Godfrey. I can’t remember who I was talking to or how this came up, but I remember making the declaration that if I was still single at 40, I would marry that Godfrey bear. So if you’re listening to this, consider yourself invited to our wedding in seven years. It probably won’t be much weirder than Irene and Godfrey’s wedding at the end of this movie.

There is another element to My Man Godfrey besides its silliness and unconvincing romance that makes it particularly fascinating. While most 1930s screwball comedies seem to be intended to help audiences temporarily forget about the hardships of the Great Depression, My Man Godfrey uses the Depression as a big part of the plot. The rich are portrayed as frivolous and ridiculous, while the homeless “forgotten men” are portrayed as resilient and noble. Godfrey reveals to Tommy that after having his heart broken, he intended to drown himself in the river, but seeing people living at the dump next to the river, determined to survive despite their circumstances, made him change his mind. The hard times even impact the well-to-do, with Alexander Bullock nearly losing everything in bad investments. At first it seems odd that Godfrey would use the money from Cornelia’s necklace merely to help the rich snobs, but then it’s revealed that in addition to that, he converted the dump he used to live in to a nightclub, creating jobs, and affordable housing. And all of that was possible because the jobless men convinced Godfrey to keep living, then Irene was nice enough to employ Godfrey as a butler, and Cornelia was bitter enough to try to frame him for robbery. I assume that doing something like that would not have been nearly as easy as the movie makes it look, but I appreciate that instead of leaning into the pure escapism of so many films from that era, My Man Godfrey says, “Yes, times are hard, but don’t give up hope. Things can improve unexpectedly at any time. And small kindnesses can add up to make a very big difference.” And that message continues to resonate 87 years later. So while this is mostly a very silly comedy, its genuine moments showing the importance of human connection help keep it from descending into complete and utter chaos like some other screwball comedies I could name.

And perhaps it was that touch of seriousness that led this mostly silly comedy to six Oscar nominations: Gregory La Cava for Best Director, Eric Hatch and Morrie Ryskind for Best Adapted Screenplay, William Powell for Best Actor, Carole Lombard for Best Actress, Mischa Auer for Best Supporting Actor, and Alice Brady for Best Supporting Actress. This made My Man Godfrey the first movie to be nominated in all four acting categories, which isn’t saying much because that was also the first year that the Oscars had four acting categories, but it remains the only film to this day to be nominated in all four acting categories without being nominated for Best Picture. And it was the only movie to be nominated in those six categories without winning anything until American Hustle, 77 years later. Of all the people nominated for Oscars for My Man Godfrey, only Alice Brady would ever win one, for In Old Chicago the following year. The director and one of the writers would each be nominated once more, also the following year, for Stage Door. William Powell had been nominated once before, for 1934’s The Thin Man, and would be nominated again for 1947’s Life With Father. But this was the only nomination for both Mischa Auer and Carole Lombard. Lombard in particular really wanted an Oscar and moved on to dramatic roles for a few years hoping that would help, but it didn’t. So she briefly returned to comedy before her career and life were tragically cut short by a plane crash in 1942, when she was only 33 years old. So, my age. I feel like, had Carole Lombard lived longer and continued to make more films in a similar vein, she probably would have made it into more than one of my top 40. The more I rewatch My Man Godfrey, the more impressed I become with her performance. This is one of the few old movies that actually has a blooper reel available, and that shows just how different her normal speech and facial expressions and mannerisms were from Irene’s. I have watched and enjoyed several of Lombard’s other films, but a lot of them are a bit too silly even for me, and I really wish she could have been in more of the still fun and kooky but not-quite-as-screwball-as-the-‘30s comedies that were just starting to become popular around the time of her death. But at least we get to see her in My Man Godfrey. Thank you, William Powell.

My Man Godfrey was remade in 1957, and I watched that version one time in 2003, reacted with, Ew, they ruined it,and have never rewatched it. Maybe I will someday, just to see if it’s as bad as I remember it. No offense to that cast – there was no possible way to reach the standard set by the original. Sometimes remakes are great, but sometimes the original was already perfect and shouldn’t be messed with, and in my opinion, My Man Godfrey absolutely falls into the latter category. So what I’m saying is, if this podcast has made you want to watch this movie, make sure you get the 1936 version.

Thank you for listening to me discuss another of my most frequently rewatched movies. Next week I will be joined by not one but two very special guests, to discuss the longer of the two movies I watched 30 times, which is going to be very fun, so stay tuned for that. As always, I will leave you with a quote from that next movie: “Wait up! Wait for me! Not you, I don’t even know you!”

[dayscrazed]

VALENTINE’S DAY MALEX FIC

Set in between Season 3 and 4, Michael and Alex spend their first Valentine's Day together! Alex writes love poems for a romantic scavenger hunt! Michael is into it and shows his appreciation. :) Fluff, fluff, mentions of past angst and more fluff! With sexy-time implications...

[blueboyluca]

Foremost among these, and the one most geneticists seem to prefer (even though I suspect many of them have never seen a wolf), is that wolves became accustomed to human company by hanging around their camps and picking up scraps of food from rubbish tips. As well as being dreary in the extreme, this explanation falls down simply because ‘domestication’ was already well under way by the time humans congregated in large enough settlements to produce sufficient waste to sustain an animal with the appetite of a wolf. Nor does it explain why, of all animals including coyotes, jackals, badgers and bears capable of surviving on refuse, none ever developed a bond of the strength and depth that comes close to matching that between human and wolf – in its modern incarnation, the dog. Almost nothing remains of human activity on the open plains, so evidence of cooperative hunting is always going to be hard to find. Only in the dank recesses of subterranean caverns can we find physical evidence of our distant ancestry. At Chauvet it is not bones nor teeth but paintings and those enigmatic footprints that are the lens through which we glimpse the live of our ancestors.

— Professor Bryan Sykes, The Wolf Within (2018)

Ray and Lorna Coppinger argued that the earliest dogs did not occupy a niche as hunting companions for humans. Rather, it is far likelier that dogs evolved to fulfil a much more prosaic, even pitiful, role: that of scavengers around early human settlements. ...I recognize that the idea of dogs coming into being on trash dumps is much less appealing than the alternative story of hunters picking up wolf pups that will help them pursue prey… But the truth is, for all that we love to imagine our ancestors as lords and ladies hunting on horseback, most of us have to face up to the fact that we are derived from a long line of peasants, eking a living from recycled remnants. And what’s true for us is most likely true for our canine best friends too.

— Clive D.L. Wynne, Dog Is Love (2019)

So here they are, the two camps. Sykes' position is sentimental in an annoying way, but also makes very good counter arguments. Wynne's outlook takes on this holier-than-thou tone, which is even more annoying. I find them both frustrating because to me it's very much a "nice dichotomy, IDIOT!! what lies outside it???" situation.

[tayfabe75]

"The easter egg hunts - when they stop being fun for my fans, I'll stop doing them. But they seem to be having fun with them. I think that with music, I'm always trying to expand the experience from just being an audio one. Like, if I can turn it into something that feels symbolic, or seems like a scavenger hunt, or seems like some kind of brain game that feels like it's more, then I think that's something to keep in mind as a goal, for me. I just want to entertain them on as many levels as I possibly can."

May 1, 2019: In an interview with Apple Music, Zane Lowe asks Taylor about her 'easter egg hunts', to which she explains that she uses them to elevate her music above a purely audio experience. (source)