#70 pounds in less than a year

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[mrs-stans]

Sebastian Stan Tells All: Becoming Donald Trump, Gaining 15 Pounds and Starring in 2024’s Most Controversial Movie

By Daniel D'Addario

Sebastian Stan Variety Cover Story

It started with the most famous voice on the planet, the one that just won’t shut up.

Sebastian Stan, in real life, sounds very little like Donald Trump, whom he’s playing in the new film “The Apprentice.” Sure, they share a tristate accent — Stan has lived in the city for years and attended Rutgers University before launching his career — but he speaks with none of Trump’s emphasis on his own greatness. Trump dwells, Stan skitters. Trump attempts to draw topics together over lengthy stem-winders (what he recently called “the weave”), while Stan has a certain unwillingness to be pinned down, a desire to keep moving. It takes some coaxing to bring Stan, a man with the upright bearing and square jaw of a matinee idol, to speak about his own process — how hard he worked to conjure a sense Trump, and how he sought to bring out new insights about America’s most scrutinized politician.

“I think he’s a lot smarter than people want to say about him,” Stan says, “because he repeats things consistently, and he’s given you a brand.” Stan would know: He watched videos of Trump on a loop while preparing for “The Apprentice.” In the film, out on Oct. 11, Stan plays Trump as he moves from insecure, aspiring real estate developer to still insecure but established member of the New York celebrity firmament.

We’re sitting over coffee in Manhattan. Stan is dressed down in a black chore coat and black tee, yet he’s anything but a casual conversation partner. He rarely breaks eye contact, doing so only on the occasions when he has something he wants to show me on his iPhone (cracked screen, no case). In this instance, it’s folders of photos and videos labeled “DT” and “DT PHYSICALITY.”

“I had 130 videos on his physicality on my phone,” Stan says. “And 562 videos that I had pulled with pictures from different time periods — from the ’70s all the way to today — so I could pull out his speech patterns and try to improvise like him.” Stan, deep in character, would ad-lib entire scenes at director Ali Abbasi’s urging, drawing on the details he’d learned from watching Trump and reading interviews to understand precisely how to react in each moment.

“Ali could come in on the second take and say, ‘Why don’t you talk a little bit about the taxes and how you don’t want to pay?’ So I had to know what charities they were going to in 1983. Every night I would go home and try not only to prepare for the day that was coming, but also to prepare for where Ali was going to take this.”

Looking at Stan’s phone, among the endless pictures of Trump, I glimpse thumbnails of Stan’s own face perched in a Trumpian pout and videos of the actor’s preparation just aching to be clicked — or to be stored in the Trump Presidential Library when this is all over in a few months, or in 2029, or beyond.

“I started to realize that I needed to start speaking with my lips in a different way,” Stan says. “A lot of that came from the consonants. If I’m talking, I’m moving forward.” On film, Stan shapes his mouth like he can’t wait to get the plosives out, puckering without quite tipping into parody. “The consonants naturally forced your lips forward.”

“If he did 10% more of what he did, it would become ‘Saturday Night Live,’” Abbasi says. “If he did 10% less, then he’s not conjuring that person. But here’s the thing about Sebastian: He’s very inspired by reality, by research. And that’s also the way I work; if you want to go to strange places, you need to get your baseline reality covered very well.”

A little later, Stan passes me the phone again to show me a selfie of him posing shirtless and revealing two sagging pecs and a bit of a gut. He’s pouting into a mirror. If his expression looks exaggerated, consider that he was in Marvel-movie shape before stepping into the role of the former president; the body transformation happened rapidly and jarringly. Trump’s size is a part of the film’s plot — as Trump’s sense of self inflates, so does he. In a rush to meet the shooting deadline for “The Apprentice,” Abbasi asked Stan, “How much weight can you gain?”

“You’d be surprised,” Stan tells me. “You can gain a lot of weight in two months.” (Fifteen pounds, to be exact.)

Now he’s back in fighting form, but the character has stayed with him. After years of playing second-fiddle agents of chaos — goofball husbands to Margot Robbie’s and Lily James’ characters in “I, Tonya” and Hulu’s “Pam & Tommy,” surly frenemy to Chris Evans’ Captain America in the Marvel franchise — Stan plunged into the id of the man whose appetites have reshaped our world. He had to have a polished enough sense of Trump that he could improvise in character, and enough respect for him to play him as a human being, not a monster.

It’s one of two transformations this year for Stan — and one that might give a talented actor that most elusive thing: a brand of his own. He’s long been adjacent enough to star power that he could feel its glow, but he hasn’t been the marquee performer. While his co-stars have found themselves defined by the projects he’s been in — from “Captain America” and “I, Tonya” back to his start on “Gossip Girl” — he’s spent more than a decade in the public eye while evading being defined at all.

This fall promises to be the season that changes all that: Stan is pulling double duty with “The Apprentice” and “A Different Man” (in theaters Sept. 20), in which he plays a man afflicted with a disfiguring tumor disorder who — even when presented with a fantastical treatment that makes him look like, well, Sebastian Stan — can’t be cured of ailments of the soul. For “A Different Man,” Stan won the top acting prize at the Berlin Film Festival; for “The Apprentice,” the sky’s the limit, if it can manage to get seen. (More on that later.)

One reason Stan has largely evaded being defined is that he’s never the same twice, often willing to get loopy or go dark in pursuit of his characters’ truths. That’s all the more true this year: In “The Apprentice,” he’s under the carapace of Trumpiness; in “A Different Man,” his face is hidden behind extensive prosthetics.

“In my book, if you’re the good-looking, sensitive guy 20 movies in a row, that’s not a star for me,” says Abbasi, who compares Stan to Marlon Brando — an actor eager to play against his looks. “You’re just one of the many in the factory of the Ken dolls.”

This fall represents Stan’s chance to break out of the toy store once and for all. His Winter Soldier brought a jolt of evil into Captain America’s world, and his Jeff Gillooly was the devil sitting on Tonya Harding’s shoulder. Now Stan is at the center of the frame, playing one of the most divisive characters imaginable. So he’s showing us where he can go. The spotlight is his, and so is the risk that comes with it.

Why take such a risk?

The script for “The Apprentice,” which Stan first received in 2019, but which took years to come together, made him consider the American dream, the one that Trump achieved and is redefining.

Stan emigrated with his mother, a pianist, from communist Romania as a child. “I was raised always aware of the American dream: America being the land of opportunity, where dreams come true, where you can make something of yourself.” He pushes the wings of his hair back to frame his face, a gold signet ring glinting in the late-summer sunlight, and, briefly, I can hear a hint of Trump’s directness of approach. “You can become whoever you want, if you just have a good idea.” Stan’s good idea has been to play the lead in movies while dodging the formulaic identity of a leading man, and this year will prove just how far he can take it.

“The Apprentice” seemed like it would never come together before suddenly it did. This time last year, Stan was sure it was dead in the water, and he was OK with that. “If this movie is not happening, it’s because it’s not meant to happen,” he recalls thinking. “It will not be because I’m too scared and walk away.”

Called in on short notice and filming from November 2023 to January of this year (ahead of a May premiere in Cannes), Stan lent heft and attitude to a character arc that takes Trump from local real estate developer in the 1970s to national celebrity in the 1980s. He learns the rough-and-tumble game of power from the ruthless and hedonistic political fixer Roy Cohn (Jeremy Strong), eventually cutting the closeted Cohn loose as he dies of AIDS and alienating his wife Ivana (Maria Bakalova) in the process. (In a shocking scene, Donald sexually assaults Ivana in their Trump Tower apartment.) For all its edginess, the film is about Trump’s personality — and the way it calcified into a persona — rather than his present-day politics. (Despite its title, it’s set well before the 2004 launch of the reality show that finally made Trump the superstar he longed to be.)

And despite the fact that Trump has kept America rapt since he announced his run for president in 2015, Hollywood has been terrified of “The Apprentice.” The film didn’t sell for months after Cannes, an unusual result for a major English-language competition film, partly because Trump’s legal team sent a cease-and-desist letter attempting to block the film’s release in the U.S. while the fest was still ongoing. When it finally sold, it was to Briarcliff Entertainment, a distributor so small that the production has launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise money so that it will be able to stay in theaters.

Yes, Hollywood may vote blue, but it’s not the same town that released “Fahrenheit 9/11” or even “W.,” let alone a film that depicts the once (and possibly future) president raping his wife. (The filmmakers stand behind that story. “The script is 100% backed by my own interviews and historical research,” says Gabriel Sherman, the screenwriter and a journalist who covers Trump and the American conservative movement. “And it’s important to note that it is not a documentary. It’s a work of fiction that’s inspired by history.”) Entertainment corporations from Netflix to Disney would be severely inconvenienced if the next president came into office with a grudge against them.

“I am quite shocked, to be honest,” Abbasi says. “This is not a political piece. It’s not a hit piece; it’s not a hatchet job; it’s not propaganda. The fact that it’s been so challenging is shocking.” Abbasi, born in Iran, was condemned by his government over his last film, “Holy Spider,” and cannot safely return. He sees a parallel in the response to “The Apprentice.” “OK, that’s Iran — that is unfortunately expected. But I wasn’t expecting this.”

“Everything with this film has been one day at a time,” Stan says. The actor chalks up the film’s divisiveness to a siloed online environment. “There are a lot of people who love reading the [film’s] Wikipedia page and throwing out their opinions,” he says, an edge entering his voice. “But they don’t actually know what they’re talking about. That’s a popular sport now online, apparently.”

Unprompted, Stan brings up the idea that Trump is so widely known that some might think a biographical film about him serves no purpose. “When someone says, ‘Why do we need this movie? We know all this,’ I’ll say, ‘Maybe you do, but you haven’t experienced it. The experience of those two hours is visceral. It’s something you can hopefully feel — if you still have feelings.’”

After graduating from Rutgers in 2005, Stan found his first substantial role on “Gossip Girl,” playing troubled rich kid Carter Baizen. Like teen soaps since time immemorial, “Gossip Girl” was a star-making machine. “It was the first time I was in serious love with somebody,” he says. (He dated the series’ star, Leighton Meester, from 2008 to 2010.) He feels nostalgic for that moment: “Walking around the city, seeing these same buildings and streets — life seemed simpler.”

Stan followed his “Gossip Girl” gig with roles on the 2009 NBC drama “Kings,” playing a devious gay prince in an alternate-reality modern world governed by a monarchy, and the 2012 USA miniseries “Political Animals,” playing a black-sheep prince (and once again a gay man) of a different sort — the son of a philandering former president and an ambitious former first lady.

When I ask him what lane he envisioned himself in as a young actor, he shrugs off the question. “I grew up with a single mom, and I didn’t have a lot of male role models. I was always trying to figure out what I wanted to be. And at some point, I was like, I could just be a bunch of things.”

Which might seem challenging when one is booked to play the same character, Bucky Barnes, in Marvel movie after Marvel movie. Bucky’s adventures have been wide-ranging — he’s been brainwashed and turned evil and then brought back to the home team again, all since his debut in 2011’s “Captain America: The First Avenger.” Next year, he’ll anchor the summer movie “Thunderbolts,” as the leader of a squad of quirky heroes played by, among others, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Florence Pugh. It’s easy to wonder if this has come to feel like a cage of sorts.

Not so, says Stan. His new Marvel film “was kind of like ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’ — a guy coming into this group that was chaotic and degenerate, and somehow finding a way to unite them.”

Lately, knives have been out for Marvel movies as some have disappointed at the box office, and “Thunderbolts,” which endured strike delays and last-minute cast changes, has been under scrutiny.

“It’s become really convenient to pick on [Marvel films],” Stan says. “And that’s fine. Everyone’s got an opinion. But they’re a big part of what contributes to this business and allows us to have smaller movies as well. This is an artery traveling through the system of this entire machinery that’s Hollywood. It feeds in so many more ways than people acknowledge.” He adds, “Sometimes I get protective of it because the intention is really fucking good. It’s just fucking hard to make a good movie over and over again.”

Which may account for an eagerness to try something new. “In the last couple of years,” he says, “I’ve gotten much more aggressive about pursuing things that I want, and I’m constantly looking for different ways of challenging myself.”

The challenge continued throughout the shoot of “The Apprentice,” as Stan pushed the material. “One of the most creatively rewarding parts of the process was how open Sebastian was to giving notes on the script but also wanting to go beyond the script,” says Sherman, the screenwriter. “If he was interested in a certain aspect of a scene, he was like, Can you find me a quote?” he recalls.

Building a dynamic through improvised scenes, Stan and Strong stayed in character throughout the “Apprentice” shoot. “I was doing an Ibsen play on Broadway,” says Strong, who won a Tony in June for his performance in “An Enemy of the People,” “and he came backstage afterwards. And it was like — I’d never really met Sebastian, and I don’t think he’d ever met me. So it was nice to meet him.”

Before the pair began acting together, they didn’t rehearse much — “I’m not a fan of rehearsals,” Strong says. “I think actors are best left in their cocoon, doing their work, and then trusted to walk on set and be ready.” The two didn’t touch the script together until cameras went up — though they spent a preproduction day, Strong says, playing games in character as Donald and Roy.

After filming, both have kept memories of the hold their characters had on them. They shared a flight back from Telluride — a famously bumpy trip out of the mountains. “He’s a nervous flyer, and I’m a nervous flyer,” Stan says. Both marveled at the fact that they’d contained their nerves on the first day of shooting “The Apprentice,” when their characters traveled together via helicopter. “We both go, ‘Yeah — but there was a camera.’”

Stan’s aggressive approach to research came in handy on “A Different Man,” which shot before “The Apprentice.” His character’s disorder, neurofibromatosis, is caused by a genetic mutation and presents as benign tumors growing in the nervous system. After being healed, he feels a growing envy for a fellow sufferer who seems unbothered by his disability.

Stan’s co-star, Adam Pearson, was diagnosed with neurofibromatosis in early childhood. Stan found the experience challenging to render faithfully. “I said many times, I can do all the research in the world, but am I ever going to come close to this?” Stan says. “How am I going to ever do this justice?”

Plus, he had precious little time to prepare: “He was fully on board, and the film was being made weeks later,” director Aaron Schimberg says. “Zero to 60 in a matter of weeks.”

The actor grappled for something to hold on to, and Pearson sug gested he refer to his own experience of fame. “Adam said to me, ‘You know what it’s like to be public property,’” Stan says.

Pearson recalls describing the experience to Stan this way: “While you don’t understand the invasiveness and the staring and the pointing that I’ve grown up with, you do know what it’s like to have the world think you owe them something.”

That sense of alienation becomes universal through the film’s storytelling: “A Different Man” takes its premise as the jumping-off point for a deep and often mordant investigation of who we all are underneath the skin.

The film was shot in 22 days in a New York City heat wave, and there was, Schimberg says, “no room for error. I would get four or five takes, however many I could squeeze out, but there’s no coverage.”

Through it all, Stan’s performance is utterly poised — Schimberg and Stan discussed Buster Keaton as a reference for his ability to be “completely stone-faced” amid chaos, the director says. And the days were particularly long because Oscar-nominated prosthetics artist Michael Marino was only able to apply Stan’s makeup in the early morning, before going to his job on the set of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.”

“Even though I wasn’t shooting until 11 a.m., I would go at like 5 in the morning to his studio, or his apartment,” Stan recalls. The hidden advantage was that Stan had hours to kill while made up like his character, the kind of person the world looks past. “I wanted to walk around the city and see what happened,” Stan says. “On Broadway, one of the busiest streets in New York, no one’s looking at me. It’s as if I’m not even there.” The other reaction was worse: “Somebody would immediately stop and very blatantly hit their friend, point, take a picture.”

It was a study in empathy that flowed into the character. Stan had spoken to Pearson’s mother, who watched her son develop neurofibromatosis before growing into a disability advocate and, eventually, an actor. “She said to me, ‘All I ever wanted was for someone to walk in his shoes for a day,’” Stan recalls. “And I guess that was the closest I had ever come.”

“The Apprentice” forced Stan, and forces the viewer, to do the same with a figure that some 50% of the electorate would sooner forget entirely. And that lends the film its controversy. Those on the right, presupposing that the movie is an anti-Trump document, have railed against it. In a statement provided to Variety, a Trump campaign spokesman said, “This ‘film’ is pure malicious defamation, should never see the light of day and doesn’t even deserve a place in the straight-to-DVD section of a bargain bin at a soon-to-be-closed discount movie store, it belongs in a dumpster fire.” The campaign threatened a lawsuit, though none has materialized.

Asked about the assault scene, Stan notes that Ivana had made the claim in a deposition, but later walked it back. “Is it closer to the truth, what she had said directly in the deposition or something that she retracted?” he asks. “They went with the first part.”

The movie depicts, too, Ivana’s carrying on with her marriage after the violation, which may be still more devastating. “How do you overcome something like this?” asks Bakalova. “Do you have to put on a mask that everything is fine? In the next scene, she’s going to play the game and pretend that we’re the glamorous, perfect couple.” The Trumps, in “The Apprentice,” live in a world of paper-thin images, one that grows so encompassing that Donald no longer feels anything for the people to whom he was once loyal. They’re props in his stage show.

“The Apprentice” will drop in the midst of the most chaotic presidential election of our lifetime. “The way it lands in this extremely polarized situation, for me as an artist, is exciting. I won’t lie to you,” says Abbasi.

When asked if he was concerned about blowback from a Trump 47 presidency, Stan says, “You can’t do this movie and not be thinking about all those things, but I really have no idea. I’m still in shock from going from an assassination attempt to the next weekend having a president step down [from a reelection bid].”

Stan’s job, as he sees it, was to synthesize everything he’d absorbed — all those videos on his phone — into a person who made sense. This Trump had to be part of a coherent story, not just the flurry of news updates to which we’ve become accustomed.

“You can take a Bach or a Beethoven, and everyone’s going to play that differently on the piano, right?” Stan says. (His pianist mother named him for Johann Sebastian Bach.) “So this is my take on what I’ve learned. I have to strip myself of expectations of being applauded for this, if people are going to like it or people are going to hate it. People are going to say whatever they want. Hopefully they should think at least before they say it.”

It’s a reality that Stan is now used to — the work is the work, and the way people interpret him is none of his business. Perhaps that’s why he has run away from ever being the same thing twice. “I could sit with you today and tell you passionately what my truth is, but it doesn’t matter,” he says. “Because people are more interested in a version of you that they want to see, rather than who you are.”

“The Apprentice” has been the subject of extreme difference of opinion by many who have yet to see it. It’s been read — and will continue to be after its release — as anti-Trump agitprop. The truth is chewier and more complicated, and, perhaps, unsuited for these times.

“Are we going to live in a world where anyone knows what the truth is anymore? Or is it just a world that everyone wants to create for themselves?” Stan asks.

His voice — the one that shares a slight accent with Trump but that is, finally, Stan’s own — is calm and clear. “People create their own truth right now,” he says. “That’s the only thing that I’ve made peace with; I don’t need to twist your arm if that’s what you want to believe. But the way to deal with something is to actually confront it.”

[cool-island-songs]

Analysis of ALNST Character Relationship Metrics

My art book won't be here for a minute, but I ran some screenshots I saw on twt through an image translator and have a lot of thoughts:

TILL: Despite claiming to hate everyone in the world, Till ranks Ivan at 70% intimacy even as he identifies perturbing behaviors of Ivan's going back years and refers to him as "a bother". He also ranks Sua at 10% in spite of having little to say about her and finding it uncomfortable to be around her.

Though he postures at being misanthropic and has all the manners you'd expect of a boy who was half off at the human child pound, he's actually quite gentle and sensitive. This is reflected in one of the graduation messages he's left by a classmate as well:

The person he feels closest to is an unattainable crush, and someone who doesn't feel that close with him in return, likely because he's too shy to really approach her or carry on a conversation.

MIZI: That's Mizi, of course, who's rather childlike and naive initially. She likes everyone, but since Till chokes when he tries to speak to her and often keeps his distance, she wonders if he's avoiding her because he dislikes her.

Mizi gravitates towards people who she sees as "perfect", which is how she describes Ivan and Sua in her graduation message to Ivan:

She doesn't see the darker side of Ivan's personality (which has been described on several occasions, even by himself, as "twisted") because he's attractive, successful, and helpful to her.

Though she likes everyone, Sua is her "God", and the only thing that can keep them apart is the tragedy of their situation, which forces Mizi to grow up in a brutally painful way.

SUA: Sua is far less idealistic and naive than Mizi, and has clearly thought about sacrificing herself to save Mizi, since Ivan picks on her for thinking of doing so in an official comic. Accordingly, her feelings about Mizi are far more tinged by the knowledge that they will one day be torn apart by external circumstances. She laments that reciprocating her feelings will one day cause Mizi great pain.

She's always been more somber, and despite her surface similarities to Ivan (which he notes in a follow-up comic wherein he realizes he was wrong about Sua's feelings for Mizi being unrequited), she's quite different on the inside. Sua's more sensitive and thus her colder exterior serves to protect her, whereas Ivan's outward persona creates an illusion of normalcy that doesn't reflect his reality.

Sua views Ivan and Till as a threat and a nuisance, respectively. Like Till, she senses something strange about Ivan, and when it comes to Till, it's just one person too many around for her. This is fascinating to me, because I thought she might pity Till! Her feelings about Ivan were already pretty clear from this panel of the 'piggyback' comic, and she seems deeply hurt in the first comic linked by his prodding.

IVAN: For his part, Ivan is fascinated by Till even though he's content to sit back and observe, pestering him to get a reaction or his attention for a brief time. He doesn't expect anything in return but wants more than anything to be on Till's mind (hence behaviors like stealing Till's belongings and returning them to him, pretending he had found them).

He prefers Sua to Mizi despite his awareness that Sua doesn't particularly like him, seeing her as a sister and even telling her she's "twisted" like he is. He likes Mizi well enough, especially her sincerity, but seems to find her optimism a bit much at times.

The fact that Mizi and the others would likely consider Ivan and Mizi quite close while Ivan does not reflects how much he postures even in his closest relationships. He struggles to connect with those he's most compelled by and it's not clear if he really wants to.

Some Ivantill thoughts before I go:

There seems to be a common sentiment that it's tragic Till was unable to see how much Ivan loved him, and I think we'll likely get more of Till's perspective on Ivan and their relationship in round 7. But it may not be the case that Ivan even wanted his true feelings to be seen, or would have known what to do if Till had reciprocated them.

There's something almost voyeuristic and self-negating in his feelings for Till (see: "I can’t reach you, so I imagine alone/You who shines, I stand next to you" from 'Black Sorrow'). He has far more self-awareness and willingness to accept things as they are than Till, who doesn't see that Mizi only has eyes for Sua and who would likely struggle to accept that reality.

Ivan, on the other hand, is well aware that his feelings for Till are "shallow", a bright fantasy to get him through his dark reality, and he seems to sincerely believe that his death won't scar Till because he's never really broken through to him. He's a schemer, and comments he makes in his graduation message to Till and the interview he gives in advance of round 6 suggest that he may have been planning to sacrifice himself for some time.

Part of me wonders if he hoped it would leave a mark on Till. Choking, kissing, and violently sacrificing oneself are all aggressive, forward acts, especially from someone who used to toy with people to get his kicks but was otherwise quite passive and unfeeling.

There are a lot of parallels in the one-sided loves, like Till acting out of his usual character for Mizi, and Ivan doing the same because of Till, putting all hopes of being saved in something just out of reach, staying in chains for that one special person. But Ivan's psychology is quite different from Till's, and in fact closest to Luka's re: low or no empathy. Both Ivan and Till are significantly traumatized by their upbringings but Ivan's difficult early life in the slums and his experience being dangled off that rooftop seem to have damaged his ability to connect to others or feel much of anything.

Till is the first person for whom he feels anything while for Till, Mizi is an early crush he puts on a pedestal in a much more commonplace way. I think the shared trauma of competing on that stage makes it much more difficult for either of them to imagine moving on, but Ivan is not wrong in identifying that he won't find that feeling again.

The thing that intrigues me most about this series is the way the contestants' differences play out, particularly with regard to how they view love and how they respond to their individual and shared challenges. I'd love to get into it further another time but this is quite long already so thanks for sticking with it if any have (haha)

[wisteriawater]

There is this one thing that really stands out to me about Thistle claiming he doesn't need to eat, just like the members of the castle.

Yaad said everyone lost their sense of tase, and yet Thistle said the nightmare tasted like a chimney. And he gobbled the berries Falin was asking if she could eat pretty damn fast. (Also, the fact that 2 out of the five berries were for Thistle is so sweet??? Like Falin gave him almost half the food she found and yet she weighs like a ton, where as he is microwave sized. (This is less of a joke than you think, I calculated character stats to see how combat would work- he weighs less than 70 pounds.))

It's sad to think about, but either Thistle was lying about not needing to eat, or he misses mortal life too.... maybe even just as much as everyone else- if not more. After all, the dungeon was a last resort during a seige! It definitely was not his first choice.

The layers of this boy shoving himself aside to protect the castle are so nuanced? Like... this detail did not need to be there and yet it adds so much to his story if you pick up on it. He clearly still has the desire to eat. He inhaled those berries, and the fact that he can still taste shows he has been eating in some capacity these 1000 years. I wonder if he has been eating elf cakes to remind himself of the happy times with his brother before shit hit the fan. Thistle... you're breaking my heart kid. Eat a sandwich, please!

[creations-by-chaosfay]

Quick question about a quick quilt...

I can finish a lap size rag quilt in less than a week, twin size in about a week, queen size in two weeks. It's three layers of fabric, quilt-as-you-go, minimal piecing, and they are heavy. Excellent for cold weather and folks who like the weight of blankets but not weighted blankets.* These quilts aren't as hot as layers of fabric plus beads/pellets, and they breathe much more effectively. For a heavier rag quilt, it's a layer of denim and two layers of quilting cotton or flannel. I have a rag quilt for myself that's three layers of quilting cotton. My house is drafty and winters are full of rain, which means the cold sinks into your bones with the humidity. My husband keeps stealing my quilt because his man-cave is the coldest room in the house. He doesn't care that it's very feminine colors "because it's warm."

As for why it's called a rag quilt, here's a sample:

The top is the fluffy side with the exposed seams. Instead of a quarter inch seam allowance the seams under the fabric, it's a one inch seam allowance and the seams are exposed. Said seams are then cut at one inch intervals. With every washing, the seams get fuzzier and softer. They're fun to touch and feel really nice. It's also why these must be dried ALONE or all the strings will end up on whatever else is in the dryer. Three layers of fabric also means two rounds in the dryer on high heat (which is why I like using flannel rather than quilting cotton) or one round of high heat and hanging to dry for a couple hours.

The back looks like a more traditional quilt top and is often the side with denim on it if denim is used. The one is three layers of flannel and was a giveaway prize earlier this year, to celebrate meeting a ko-fi goal.

These are a delight to make and excellent for cold winters and drafty homes. Did I mention they're pretty heavy? The one I have, once all folded up, weighs about six pounds, and knocks my husband out within about ten minutes of him laying over himself. It's why I plan on making a rag quilt for him. He keeps stealing mine.

For context regarding prices, these take significantly less time to make. This one, a lap size, took just 14.5 hours, and that included the quilting. A traditional style baby quilt starts at $2125 because I have a lot more cutting and sewing, and I do the quilting by hand (though it will soon change due to soon having a machine I can use on my Cutie frame and do all my quilting on it), and can take 70-80 hours start to finish. I charge $27/hour + cost of materials to come to the final price.

*A PT I know hates weighted blankets because they cause a lot of injuries. People rolling in bed with a weighted blanket on them have ended up in physical therapy because of soft tissue tears. Most especially dangerous for people with EDS and other connective tissue conditions. Other injuries they've seen are from the pockets with the beads/pellets in them tearing open. Pets and small children have been known to choke on those, and folks who are heavy sleepers can also be injured if the pockets near their face tear in their sleep. When the beads/pellets get all over the floor, people fall and end up with serious injuries from that. Not to mention overheating under all of them because the material doesn't breathe well.

[blueiscoool]

440-Pound Mayan Sculpture Discovered in Mexico

Less than a year after a massive, ancient stone carving was discovered in western Mexico, it is on display for the public for the first time, officials said.

During a construction project of the Pátzcuaro market in August, researchers uncovered an enormous sculpture of a person lying on their back and holding a stone, according to a May 10 news release from the National Institute of Anthropology and History, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.

Weighing around 440 pounds, the sculpture is about 3 feet long and 2.5 feet tall, researchers said. It is carved from augite andesite, a dark black porous volcanic stone, according to the releas

The heavy statue was brought to researchers after it was found dismantled, officials said, and through preservation and cleaning, it was restored to its original shape and color.

The stone was carved by the Mayans during the late postclassic period, between 1350 and 1521, according to the release.

It is uncommon to find these kinds of artifacts in western Mexico, archaeologists said, which raises questions as to why it was there.

The image of a seated person is classic for a chacmool, a ritualistic table that was used in pre-Hispanic times, according to the release. Archaeologists believe it was used in sacrificial and offering ceremonies.

Researchers are not sure of the origin of chacmools, and few have been found in the archaeological record, the researchers said.

Only 70 pieces have ever been found, and one hasn’t been found in this region of Mexico since 1938, archaeologists said.

Since the piece has been well-preserved, the researchers hope it will shed light on how the sculptures were used and how the art form was created centuries ago.

The sculpture is now on display at the Museum of Popular Arts and Industries of Pátzcuaro.

Pátzcuaro is in southwest Mexico, about a 230-mile drive west from Mexico City.

By Irene Wright.

[duskkodesh]

I've had rats for years at this point now and finally want to put down the best tips I've learned. This won't work for everyone, some are very conditional to me, but maybe some of these will help someone. Fleece hammocks: Boo. Microplastics and too warming. Canvas hammocks: Yes, please. Highly washable. Far more tough. I wish they were easier to find. Coiled rope baskets are also a godsend. I hang them by the handles in the cage, they love them way more than anything marketed to rats. Bottles are nice but some rats wanna splash and have a place to wash their little hands. Fresh in pod peas are by the pound at my supermarket. I usually spend 70 cents on the amount for several treat sessions. All my frozen peas end up getting freezer burnt by the time I get halfway through the bag. Antibiotics will be needed if you keep rats. Do not give antibiotics with dairy, many classes of antibiotics bond to calcium thereby making them far less effective. Speaking of, antibiotics seem to have the hardest taste to cover up. Ground meat baby food, Hershey simply five syrup (Just a little), peanut powder (No added sugar, oils), fruit compote/jam/jelly, small absorbent bread snacks/cereal, smushed pasta, cream of wheat, are all options to get meds into rats. You can call exotic vets and ask for an estimate on a basic rat exam. Do it, the prices vary WILDLY. We had a vet who charged us 35$ to see three rats at once and one who quoted us 200$ to look at one. You're gonna notice a trend if you call vets in higher class/rich areas. Fuck em'. Also ask your vet if you can keep a supply of meds on hand just in case. If they last at room temp you can buy some preemptively. Things like doxycycline you can get from human pharmacies.

Zip ties are god. All hail zip ties. Same with swivel clasps. Between them both you can cage mount anything your heart desires.

Leave bedding in a hot car or freezing conditions for a night. Warehouses get mites. Mites are a dick to deal with. Kill em' all.

Give them a variety of fresh things while they're young. Not always but sometimes I'd get an older gent rescue who had no idea what to do with berries or tomatoes and would refuse them. They learn better what is safe when young. At some point you will have an emergency. Make sure you know where an emergency vet is and that they keep night/weekend hours. Keep funds on hand for that day.

Rats hide pain well. When they age you may need to start pain management if you notice them moving differently even if they don't show their pain blatantly. Just start with low doses and see if they act like their old selves again. Research your breeders. Get recommendations from other rat people. Check and see if there are rat rescues in your area. Also the Humane Society sometimes takes in rodents.

Controversial take: You will encounter people in ratkeeping who say buying feeders is a sin. It's not. Feeder supply will exist whether or not every rat fancier boycotts them. We are far far fewer in number than snake/lizard people. Wherever you got your rats it's valid so long as you give them healthcare, good nutritious food, love, and mental stimulation. A lot of the 'foods to avoid, foods to include' lists are not researched. I've seen lists that ban chocolate. Rats freaking love chocolate they just need to take it easy on fats and sugars but cocoa powder can be a good mix in and can help ratty blood flow. I've seen people ban mango. if you read the study that led to this they gave rats an obscene amount of D-limonene to trigger cancer and small amounts had no side effects at all. Read the studies, look for sources.

[andguesswhat]

There are days were the things in my head are shamelessly hopeful and therefore completely illusory.

But “I must dare to dream”, right?

Venice 25

He thought about Armie’s comment when they stood ready to go in front of the mirror.

*

He got out of the car and the crowd screamed.

He was in Venice. Venice Film Festival, September 2025, premiere of Dune 3. The last act.

He loved being in Venice.

Again he wore a handmade outfit by Haider.

A kind of homage to his red sequined outfit from 3 years ago, again a neck-holder, again backless, but this time made of a robust and hard material, fine wire rings interwoven, heavy silver chains in between, a modern chain shirt. Plus some 70s punk rock vibe: leather pants, his boots with the silver heels, silver rings and bracelets on fingers and wrist, a black painted fingernail and a silver choker around his neck.

The outfit felt good, it made him feel strong and forearmed, even if right now he didn't think he needed that. Much more the outfit matched his mood, wanting to kick ass, because that's what he would do now, what they would do now.

He waved briefly to the crowd, the first flash of lightning thundering down on him, and then he held out his hand, just a little, casually, as he always did when he just wanted his partner a little closer, and couldn't help but grin happily as Armie got out of the car.

Armie looked extremely dapper in that deep-dark Tom Ford suit with a fancy little applique on the lapel, and Tim couldn't have been prouder of his partner, of his man, of his husband.

And that was it. Armie was now standing next to him, his warm hand gently running over Tim’s bare back and resting on his hip. They smiled into the cameras. Together, side by side. The way it had been private forever, the way it should be possible in public, too. It felt good and right.

He didn't care if there were hostile comments among the cheers now. The crowd that kept cheering was there and the one that mattered was standing next to him.

Armie.

Armie and him, for all the world to see.

“You look like some kiss ass rock star who has his bodyguard with him just to fuck him.”

It was the right time for them now.

The big blockbusters had been shot, he had a few more awards on his record, he had built a good network, he would be shooting with Scorsese and directors he adored. What more did he want?

He was sure that even if a few offers fell through now, he would still be making films he wanted to make. Maybe he would make less money, but as long as he could keep doing what he loved the most, something that he couldn’t live without, it would be enough now.

Armie smiled at him warmly, towering beside him and he smiled back. What had often taken them so much effort to hide was now there for all the world to see.

There was a rush in his head, his heart was pounding wildly, they had played this day out in his head for too long, too many emotions attached to it, and yet it was pride that trumped everything.

And then a gentle touch of Armie’s hand on his back and Armie was buttoning up his jacket, stepping into the background. Stephane stood on the sidelines and Armie joined him. Tim was alone again, continuing to pose for the photographers, responding to the "Timmy" calls, and although Armie was now no longer next to him, he was still more with him than ever.

When his bodyguard motioned him to go to the fans to sign autographs, he couldn’t say that he wasn’t afraid at that moment.

He tried not to listen, but of course he did hear a few things.

“Are you two really together or is this some kind of PR?”

“Are you gay?”

“How long has it been going on with you guys?”

Later he would say:

I prefer to keep my private life private. I'm with Armie but the rest is non of your business.

Then why this now?

Because I wanted to share this special moment with my partner. And the world can stop worrying about who I'm with. There should be more important things.

So are you gay?

I think we live in a society where we should be long past asking someone about their sexuality because they are with someone of the same sex.

There wouldn't be much more about them from them. Even if the whole world wanted to know everything.

For now he didn't say anything. With trembling hands he wrote autograph after autograph, took selfies, accepted gifts, and when he realized it was no different than usual, he found his voice again, the feeling of happiness increased, as did the selfies with stuck out tongue and middle finger and the joy to kick ass.

"You look amazing!"

"I love you so much!"

The hate would play out anonymously elsewhere, he knew.

Finally, he sprinted back to the red carpet, photos with Zendaya, photos with Dennis, photos with the whole cast. He felt like he was about to burst, brimming with energy, roaring and beaming, his kick-ass energy constantly alternated with pure pure joy. In between, he kept glancing over at Armie, who was smiling happily at him and apparently commenting dryly with Stephane on the whole happening.

Whatever was to come, as it was now, it was the right thing to do. Now had been the right time, and because it was the right time, they had not wanted to wait any longer, he had not wanted to wait any longer.

It was strange to be in that auditorium and watch the movie while outside the news would spread through the world like a forest fire. But he didn't mind.

Armie had been in a play, had taken small roles in television series, and next year Timmy would produce a small indie film starring him. They slowly got things going.

And even if they didn't, he would turn 30 at the end of this year. He had changed. For some time now, they had thought about having a family of their own. They were ready for change, for their new chapter in life, whatever it would look like.

As he walked into the building, and Armie walked beside him, smiling at him, their fingers casually interlocked. And that small, unspectacular touch meant everything to Tim. No boundaries, no hiding, just being themselves.

Dennis had supported him.

"I'm not sure we would have made it to Venice again with the third part without you and your collaboration with Haider. They love you! So take it, it's yours!"

Now they got Amargaddon. They would see how it would affect the box office, but he was grateful to have Dennis' blessing on it.

He loved being in this sheltered place with colleagues, friends and Armie.

Tim had wanted Armie to sit near him, so he heard him cheering in the row behind him when his name appeared on the screen, and turned with a grin when he heard him laughing dirty at a Harkonnen joke. It felt good to have him there. Very good.

When they all hugged during the applause after the movie, he turned around and hugged Armie too, and although they hadn't talked about it before, when Armie slid his hand down Tim's neck and gave him a kiss on the mouth, as other couples would, Tim couldn't stop grinning.

He knew there would be blurry video of that kiss. There wouldn't be much else, but at least they could offer that to their fans.

As they left the movie theater, as they made their way to the hotel, shouting cheerful see-you-later’s to the others, the fog in Tim's head cleared, the buzzing slowly diminished, and when he saw an undisturbed corner, he pulled Armie into it, into his arms and never let go. Armie did the same, squeezing him so tight he almost couldn't breathe.

For quite a while they were just standing there, crying and laughing and hugging and feeling all these feelings they felt. Together.

He felt all the tension inside him release. The tension that he didn't even know was inside him. The prison that they knew how to ignore so much that they had forgotten the freedom they lacked.

"We did it, Armie."

"Yes, we did."

And when he heard Armie's brittle voice, tears came to him, too, and he had to hold Armie even a little tighter.

"It really does feel as good as they say, doesn’t it?"

"It does."

Clap your hands for Tinkerbell them.

Later that evening, they had a carefree premiere party with lots of laughter, dancing and singing. They were happy, they were them. Some more blurry pictures would show that and it was fine.

And even if it was none of the world's business that they were together, it was an incredible feeling that the world knew now.

*

[soon-palestine]

@RBatniji is one of the most respected entrepreneurs in Silicon valley. He lost 37 members of his family on 18th Nov by an Israeli airstrike. He recently met with Secretary Blinken and here is what he shared,

"I am Rajaie Batniji. I take no pride and no honor in being here.

I was born in Gaza and immigrated to California as a young child. I am Rajaie Batniji. I take no pride and no honor in being here. Many of my fellow Palestinian Americans discouraged me from speaking with you today, concerned that this discussion was solely performative. I share their concern.

I come here out of a sense of duty, to try – as futile as it may be – to save my family in Gaza from being killed. I was born in Gaza and immigrated to California as a young child. I grew up visiting Gaza often, and those visits shaped me in many ways. I personally experienced some of the violence of occupation.

I studied the history of the region at Stanford, completed my doctorate in international relations at Oxford as a Marshall Scholar – honoring the legacy of one of your predecessors in this office – and became a physician focused on the health of those that have the least privilege. I’m an entrepreneur who builds teams and technologies that improve American health care.

I would rather not be here today. Mr. Secretary, you have provided the weapons and the political cover that enabled the murder of 65 members of my family, mostly women and children, over the past four months. In strikes in mid-November, three generations of my family were killed by missiles as they sought shelter and safety. I carry their memories with me. I see their crushed bodies when I close my eyes.

The survivors in my family are homeless. Some 70% of homes in Gaza have been destroyed, according to an analysis by The Wall Street Journal, along with almost all the schools, all the universities, many of the hospitals, the mosques, the churches, the historical sites and the public records.

My paternal grandparents’ home in Shejaiya had been among the last homes of my family still standing. This is the home where I was born. It collapsed in a “controlled demolition” just before the new year.

According to our own US intelligence agencies, Israel used 29,000 air-to-ground munitions during the first two months of its assault on Gaza. That’s more than were used in the years of the Iraq War – and Gaza is less than one thousandth the size.

No one I know in Gaza has a home, or possessions beyond what they carried as they fled Israeli bombardment.

My family may be better off than most in Gaza and they are still hungry. I spoke with my mom’s brother this week, and he told me he has lost almost 20 kilograms (44 pounds). Despite your promises, food aid has not been able to reach Gaza to come anywhere near meeting the need. It is blocked at every opportunity, including by Israeli protestors at the Kerem Shalom border crossing, and by Israeli inspections and within Gaza by the Israeli military. According to the United Nations, 4 out of 5 of the hungriest people anywhere in the world are in Gaza. You know that the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, provides food for most Gazans and critical infrastructure for other aid organizations. Yet, after Israel made unverified allegations that a handful of UNRWA staff participated in the October 7 attacks, you cut the funding for UNRWA in what I can understand only as an act of collective punishment. I fear this makes you, and me – as an American – party to the use of starvation as a weapon of war.

My cousins in Gaza, who are physicians like me, have no place to practice medicine. Their hospitals have been destroyed or incapacitated. After moving from Shifa to al-Aqsa hospital, only to be evacuated from each by the Israeli military after seeing patients and colleagues killed, they are now living in tents in Rafah and al-Mawasi, using their surgical skills to repair leaks in their tents while the bodies of wounded Palestinians go untreated, and often unretrieved.

I have worked extensively in global health and wrote a series of research papers in 2009 on what we thought then was a Palestinian health crisis. We could never, though, have imagined this – the complete destruction of Gaza’s health care system is unprecedented.

Even the dead among my family were not spared. Satellite images show that Israeli bulldozers and tanks desecrated the graveyards where my grandparents and great grandparents were resting. I hope to bury their remains again one day.

What do you wish to be your legacy, Secretary Blinken? You cannot say you didn’t know. You cannot say that you did not knowingly and materially support these deaths, which a US federal court and the International Court of Justice have both determined plausibly constitute genocide. I am the father of three young children in San Francisco. As adults, I am certain they will reflect on this “genocide” with horror. It will be taught in our classrooms and remembered in our museums as we vow never to repeat it.

I ask you to use the full power of your office and every bit of leverage the US has to allow aid to reach all of Gaza, including in the north, where hundreds of thousands of people remain in desperation. And, to resume the funding for UNRWA, which will be essential to the distribution of any aid. I ask you to uphold a rules-based order – which serves our long-term interests – by calling Israel’s indiscriminate bombing that has largely killed women and children, the attacks on health care and the use of starvation as a weapon of war as the war crimes you and I know they are. Your words matter, Mr. Secretary.

I feel indignity sitting before you in this comfortable conference room while my family desperately awaits word about a ceasefire, in the dark, hungry, and in tents in fear that the Israeli military will kill them at any moment.

In a dignified world, I would be asking for justice, not mercy. That day will come.

I hope that you, and this administration, can act quickly to bring our nation to the right side of history before it is far too late.I ask you to uphold a rules-based order – which serves our long-term interests – by calling Israel’s indiscriminate bombing that has largely killed women and children, the attacks on health care and the use of starvation as a weapon of war as the war crimes you and I know they are. Your words matter, Mr. Secretary.

I feel indignity sitting before you in this comfortable conference room while my family desperately awaits word about a ceasefire, in the dark, hungry, and in tents in fear that the Israeli military will kill them at any moment.

In a dignified world, I would be asking for justice, not mercy. That day will come.

I hope that you, and this administration, can act quickly to bring our nation to the right side of history before it is far too late.

[cruelsuhmer]

unraveling velvet

This is a repost of one of the fics from my previous blog. I am the original author of this fic and thus have full permission to post it here. Minor revisions have been made.

word count: 2.9k

pairings: jaehyun x reader 

genre & au: angst w/ a happy ending, university au

warnings: none

a/n: originally for @/flirtyhyuck (now deactivated). inspired by mitski’s “lonesome love” and “washing machine heart.” the title sounds kind of smutty, but this fic is rated g, i prommy.

You don’t expect to see Jaehyun much after a chance encounter on the roof, but he’s everywhere, and it’s not long before all you can think about is him: his smile, his eyes, his dimples, and the way a simple hello from him feels like velvet against your ears.

For you, Jung Jaehyun is becoming a problem—a very big, very beautiful one.

“You know, they usually lock the doors here.”

The voice startles you, your shoes scraping across the tiles of the roof, producing an ungodly noise that breaks the quiet of the night more than the voice ever could. You look over to see Jung Jaehyun, moonlight illuminating his profile, a silver halo around his head and starlight in his hair. Your breath catches.

Jaehyun continues, “Surprised they left it unlocked tonight.”

After your embarrassing scramble, you tuck your legs against your chest, crossing your arms over your knees. “Really?” Jaehyun nods, and you look out across campus, seeing a lone night jogger crossing the street and two friends stumbling across the commons. “Safety reasons?”

Jaehyun laughs, shrugging. “More or less. Ghosts, too.”

Your legs tense, and your nails dig into the tiles. Jaehyun gives another chuckle, and you turn to glare at him. Relaxed, he’s stretched back, arms out behind him, a smile on his lips. He looks over to you, a slight tilt of the head. When you speak, your voice shakes. “What do you mean?”

“What else can I mean?” Jaehyun lifts his chin, eyes on the stars. “Apparently it happened back in the ‘70s. I don’t know. A senior hasn’t told you this already?”

You shake your head.

Jaehyun sighs. “Let me think. I’ve heard the full thing, just been awhile.”

You nod, and a minute passes of you staring at Jaehyun with wide eyes, heart pounding in your chest, him humming quietly to himself as he tries to remember the full story.

After another few seconds, he sits up, angling himself so he can look at you properly. You readjust, too, getting as comfortable as you can, knowing the story you’re about to hear won’t be a happy one. Jaehyun smiles before he begins, like that’ll help—it only makes you feel sick, an explosion in your chest. When he tells the story, he leaves in all the gory details, and after an explicit description on the student’s mangled fingers, you’re starting to wonder if he’s adding to the lore himself. Despite this, you find yourself enthralled. The night passes quickly after that, and when you realize the time, you’re rushing to head back inside the dorm, class in less than an hour.

You don’t expect to see Jaehyun much after that, him a year above you and the night on the roof a chance encounter, with you stressed about upcoming midterms and Jaehyun apparently one to frequent the roof. But you do see him. Often.

You see him on your way to class, you see him in the cafeteria, in the library, in the computer lab—you even see him in one of your block courses, though you’ve never noticed him before (and that was the hardest part to believe, especially now, with the way your eyes are drawn to him like clockwork).

And every time you look, he looks too, greeting you with a bright smile on his face, dimples ever so charming. It almost makes you dislike him. The reality, however, is that he quickly becomes the only thing on your mind, midterms a mere worry shoved to the back, completely covered by thoughts of his smile, his eyes, his dimples, and the way a simple hello from him feels like velvet against your ears.

It gets to the point of an intervention. On your way out of a Jaehyun-less class, the professor calls your name. You about-face, brows raised in a silent question, and your professor smiles, polite.

“Are you alright?” she asks, reaching out to place a gentle hand on your forearm.

You fight the urge to shrug it off.

“You seem distracted,” she continues.

You realize then that Jung Jaehyun is becoming a problem—a very big, very beautiful one.

When Tuesday rolls around, you stride into your block course—a power-walk if your classmates have ever seen one—barely giving your professor a nod before your eyes lock on Jaehyun. Like every other time, he’s already looking at you, and, like every other time, that dumb smile lights up his face. You come to a stop right in front of his desk.

“Hi,” he greets. His smile stretches the tiniest bit wider, making his dimples pop and his eyes disappear into crescents. The worst part is the new set of dimples that appear, like whiskers around his nose. They’re precious, and he looks precious, and despite your best efforts, your heart stutters in your chest. Great.

You glare for another second before pivoting and dropping your things on the desk next to his. Begrudgingly, you take a seat. “Hi,” you finally reply. Then, Dr. Han rises from his chair, turning on the projector and starting the class. The lesson is an important one—in fact, it will be on the final; Dr. Han takes great care in saying this, pausing every couple of equations to repeat it. Jaehyun never looks away from your face.

When class ends, you gather your things, the fight having left you, your drive to rid yourself of your Jaehyun-shaped problem gone without a trace, but Jaehyun stops you with a hand on your wrist. You look down, and he immediately lets go, an apology falling from his lips.

“Sorry,” he says again, “I was just wondering,” and a smile, smaller this time, makes a brief appearance on his face, “if you’d maybe want to get coffee or something. Tomorrow. With me?”

You have classes most of tomorrow. You really don’t have time. You need to water your dog and walk your plants. You should tell him this.

“Sounds good,” you say instead.

Jaehyun’s eyes widen like he expected you to say no—and you blanch at the memory of your attitude at the start of class; if he had asked then, you would have said no—before he smiles, dimples flashing. “Great. Is two okay?”

You have a class at two.

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

Jaehyun’s smile only grows, and you find yourself smiling back, even as unease settles low in your stomach. “That’s really great.” When Jaehyun’s tongue swipes just barely at his lower lip, your eyes take in the movement like a man starved. “Meet outside the dorm?”

You nod, and your smile stays for another second, before you turn to go, ducking your head at Jaehyun’s delayed great, and you’re about to leave, finally, when Jaehyun makes a small noise.

“Wait.”

You freeze, then turn back around. In an outstretched hand, Jaehyun holds your pencil case.

“It fell out of your bag,” he says, lips curled at the corners. “Probably not good to lose.”

“No,” you reply, “it’s not.” When you take it, your fingers brush his. The air conditioning has started; goosebumps spread on your skin. You look at him from under your lashes. He’s already looking at you. You snatch your hand back, deciding to just hold onto the case rather than putting it up. A stuttered thanks falls from your lips before you finally spin precariously on your heel and hurry to your next class.

Tomorrow comes before you’re ready, and you find yourself rushing across the commons with your backpack hitting you uncomfortably in your lower back, a steady thump, thump, thump that will ache for the days. You keep moving.

Until you see Jaehyun. Your heels dig into the soft earth and your backpack makes one final jab into you. The pain doesn’t register. Jaehyun’s head is tossed back, laughter bubbling from his lips, while his arm wraps tighter around a stranger’s shoulders. He doesn’t see you. His laugh follows you on the way to class, where you scroll through your phone before realizing you never got his number. You pocket your phone and think about your 2pm. He doesn’t have your number either. You’ve never skipped a class before. It’d be dumb to start now.

Thursday, you return to your usual seat. It doesn’t take long before you feel Jaehyun’s gaze weighing on you. You don’t look back, even when minutes pass and he hasn’t turned away. Class ends, and he still hasn’t let up, so you make a quick escape, slipping through the door before he can reach you. By the time you collapse into your seat two buildings over, your chest is tight, exertion and want putting a strain on you—want, especially.

It’s your own fault—you could have gone to the cafe, you could have talked to him—but you arrange your pencil and pens and highlighters on your desk and you keep your head down and you ignore the ache that’s replaced the heartburn. Most of all, you ignore any and all thoughts of Jaehyun, just like you did to the man himself.

The end of the semester has given up on creeping towards you, opting instead for a full-blown sprint, yet the only thing that has changed are the trees, leaves scattered on the ground for you to kick at and crush. Jaehyun’s heavy gaze is a constant companion, following you wherever you go. Sometimes you slip up and search him out too, as if by instinct, but whenever you happen to catch his eyes, you’re quick to look elsewhere.

Despite these looks, despite the crushing pressure of Jaehyun’s stare, the two of you leave words unsaid. After a week of failed attempts to talk to you following the abandoned coffee date, Jaehyun hasn’t tried to stop you from leaving since. You can’t say you prefer it that way, but it’s better than swallowing your pride and the jumbled ball of feelings that Jaehyun has created in you and facing him, but this acceptance only lasts for so long. Soon, you’re overwhelmed, finals no longer looming over you because they have instead taken you into their claws and are about to swallow you whole. You escape to the roof.

Someone else has escaped there, too.

“Jaehyun,” you breathe. In your stress, you had forgotten his habit, and now Jaehyun is staring you right in the eyes, and you can’t look away. He cuts a lonely figure against the night sky, hair once again threaded with stars. Your fingers twitch at your sides.

“Y/N,” he says. “Hi.”

You make your slow way over to him, unsure how close to sit. You clutch at the tiles. “Hi,” you reply. “It’s been awhile.”

Jaehyun hums, turning back to the sky. You bite your tongue. Your teeth clamp down too tight, but you don’t let up. Jaehyun glances over at you, and you let go. “Exams,” you say.

He tilts his head.

“Good luck.” You look away, out at the sky then down towards the commons. Someone is out there alone, their laptop giving their face a bluish glow. You swallow. “I’m nervous.”

Besides you, Jaehyun huffs out a laugh. You look over. “Me too,” he says.

There’s a second, then, where you see beyond this moment and beyond yourself, and, for that one second, the mess inside you sorts itself into something coherent, but it’s gone in a flash, and all you can do then is bump your shoulder against his. “You’re smart,” you say. “You’ll do fine.”

“Keeping tabs on me?” he asks. A smile curls on his lips and he makes it look so easy.

You duck your head. “Not that hard to find out you’re seen as the smartest student on campus. Not hard to realize it’s true.”

Jaehyun hums, looking down, and, if it weren’t so dark, you’d have noticed the redness of his ears, but you don’t. “Ah,” he gives a soft laugh, “I wouldn’t say that.”

“Don’t act shy,” you nudge him again. “It’s not a good look on you.”

The conversation continues, and it actually is easy. You unravel next to Jaehyun, slipping further down the roof, reclining back more and more, tension leaving your body with every word. Jaehyun’s a warm presence at your side, and you swathe yourself in the velvet of his voice. The bitter cold that snaps at your nose is nothing. You close your eyes and smile. It isn’t until the dark gets a bit darker that your eyes snap open and you realize the sun has started to creep over the horizon. Blocking your view, Jaehyun’s arm hovers awkwardly in the air. It falls back to the roof. You look over at him.

“About what I said earlier,” he starts, and you can feel the calm drain from your body.

“What,” you ask, “did you say earlier?” You push yourself up, scooting back up the roof until you can properly meet his eyes.

“I’m not the smartest student on campus,” Jaehyun says. “There’s just something—some things, really—that I can’t figure out.” He looks away first, and the crisp light of morning seems to take the color from his body. You shiver and wrap your arms around yourself.

“It might be an exaggeration,” you blink, gaze dropping to your lap, “but it’s not like you’re not smart.” You glance over to see Jaehyun shaking his head, looking out at the horizon. You swallow, squeezing your eyes shut. “Okay,” you try again, tilting your head, “what’s the thing that you can’t figure out?”

Jaehyun smiles, but you don’t feel better at all. “You didn’t show up for coffee,” he says. “I waited an hour for you, by the way. But you never showed.”

There’s a lot of things you could say. You work your lip between your teeth before you answer, “My 2pm is an hour and fifteen minutes.”

It’s grim, the face Jaehyun makes, lips pressed into a straight line and eyes narrowed. He nods, propping an arm up on his knees. “Fair enough.” He takes a breath. “Can I ask why?”

You don’t reply. Jaehyun turns to you. Still, you are quiet. Another heartbeat passes. Jaehyun waits, studying you. Even with the light of the sun, his eyes are unreadable. You huff. You want to snark about attendance being mandatory and how your grades aren’t good enough in that class for you to be risking it, but Jaehyun is stubborn and can play the game. You know that. You give another rough exhale before speaking. “I saw you that morning.”

Jaehyun continues to wait.

“Don’t laugh,” you say, but you don’t give him time to promise he won’t. “I saw you with someone.”

Jaehyun’s brows disappear into his hairline. His lips twitch. “With someone,” he echoes. You bite your lip. His eyes flit to the library. You hold your breath. “Okay.”

Your stomach churns. “You’re making fun of me,” you say. You can see the glint in his eyes now, and it makes you sick, in a way you haven’t felt in awhile. It’s pure bubbles, threatening to burst from your throat in the form of sweet words and whispered confessions. You swallow it down.

“No,” Jaehyun replies, but the word is colored with a laugh. Still, Jaehyun continues: “I’m not. I just… think it’s funny.” He turns to you, then, one foot out to stop him from slipping. His gaze presses into yours. “There isn’t anyone,” he swears. “There hasn’t been. You just… should have said something, alright?” He shakes his head. “After, I mean. I can take being stood up once or twice, but being totally ignored? Ouch.”

A lump has grown in your throat. Saying you don’t have his number will mean nothing. You look away, head dropping.

“I could’ve waited,” Jaehyun continues, “or we could’ve picked a different day. And don’t skip class for me.” When your mouth opens to argue, Jaehyun’s lips stretch, leaving his dimples to indent his face. “You would’ve.”

You look away.

“So give me a time,” Jaehyun finally proposes. “One that works for you. When you don’t have class—or a final, now.”

“I didn’t want to stand you up,” you admit. Jaehyun’s lips twist. You chew your own before deciding. “My first final is tomorrow. When it’s over, I won’t want to think about it at all. It ends at one.”

When you look over, Jaehyun’s smiling, a proper one, illuminating his face quicker than the sun ever could. You smile back. Jaehyun turns away. “Alright.”

You hesitate, but it’s more out of courtesy over anything. When you poke Jaehyun’s shoulder, he looks back at you. You stumble towards him. In the fall, your lips meet his. It’s not the best first kiss, your mouth having gone stale and his teeth clacking against yours, but—your heart squeezes in your chest—it’s not like this kiss will also be the last. You pull away. “I wouldn’t skip a final for you,” you say, “just… by the way. Maybe class—which I didn’t—but not a final.”

Jaehyun’s laugh is vibrant. His hand is warm against your back, where it had slipped just slightly beneath your sweater. “Of course,” he says. “Of course.”

The smile that’s threatened to blossom on your face finally blooms, and you duck your head, tucking it against Jaehyun’s shoulder. You plan to sit back up, maybe even get in another kiss, but Jaehyun’s fingers have started to thread through your hair, and your body finally feels the strain of twenty-four hours awake. You yawn. Jaehyun’s chuckle vibrates through you. It’s a comforting rumble. You fall further into him, and he lets you—sleep comes easy.

DISCLAIMER:

This is a work of fiction. The characters herein are based on real people, but the events portrayed in this story are fictional and do not reflect on the actual people written about. They are not intended to be mistaken for fact, and no libel is intended.

If you enjoyed this story, please consider giving it a reblog!

[bodyalive]

At 93, he’s as fit as a 40-year-old. His body offers lessons on aging.

The human body maintains the ability to adapt to exercise at any age, showing that it’s never too late to start a fitness program

By Gretchen Reynolds

For lessons on how to age well, we could do worse than turn to Richard Morgan.

At 93, the Irishman is a four-time world champion in indoor rowing, with the aerobic engine of a healthy 30- or 40-year-old and the body-fat percentage of a whippet. He’s also the subject of a new case study, published last month in the Journal of Applied Physiology, that looked at his training, diet and physiology.

Live well every day with tips and guidance on food, fitness and mental health, delivered to your inbox every Thursday.

Its results suggest that, in many ways, he’s an exemplar of fit, healthy aging — a nonagenarian with the heart, muscles and lungs of someone less than half his age. But in other ways, he’s ordinary: a onetime baker and battery maker with creaky knees who didn’t take up regular exercise until he was in his 70s and who still trains mostly in his backyard shed.

Even though his fitness routine began later in life, he has now rowed the equivalent of almost 10 times around the globe and has won four world championships. So what, the researchers wondered, did his late-life exercise do for his aging body?

Lessons on aging from active older people

“We need to look at very active older people if we want to understand aging,” said Bas Van Hooren, a doctoral researcher at Maastricht University in the Netherlands and one of the study’s authors.

Many questions remain unanswered about the biology of aging, and whether the physical slowing and declines in muscle mass that typically occur as we grow older are normal and inevitable or perhaps due, at least in part, to a lack of exercise.

Start the year fresh

If some people stay strong and fit deep into their golden years, the implication is that many of the rest of us might be able to as well, he said.

Helpfully, his colleague Lorcan Daly, an assistant lecturer in exercise science at the Technological University of the Shannon in Ireland, was quite familiar with an example of successful aging. His grandfather is Morgan, the 2022 indoor-rowing world champion in the lightweight, 90-to-94 age group.

What made Morgan especially interesting to the researchers was that he hadn’t begun sports or exercise training until he was 73. Retired and somewhat at loose ends then, he’d attended a rowing practice with one of his other grandsons, a competitive collegiate rower. The coach invited him to use one of the machines.

“He never looked back,” Daly said.

Highest heart rate on record

They invited Morgan, who was 92 at the time, to the physiology lab at the University of Limerick in Ireland to learn more, measuring his height, weight and body composition and gathering details about his diet. They also checked his metabolism and heart and lung function.

They then asked him to get on a rowing machine and race a simulated 2,000-meter time trial while they monitored his heart, lungs and muscles.

“It was one of the most inspiring days I’ve ever spent in the lab,” said Philip Jakeman, a professor of healthy aging, physical performance and nutrition at the University of Limerick and the study’s senior author.

Morgan proved to be a nonagenarian powerhouse, his sinewy 165 pounds composed of about 80 percent muscle and barely 15 percent fat, a body composition that would be considered healthy for a man decades younger.

During the time trial, his heart rate peaked at 153 beats per minute, well above the expected maximum heart rate for his age and among the highest peaks ever recorded for someone in their 90s, the researchers believe, signaling a very strong heart.

His heart rate also headed toward this peak very quickly, meaning his heart was able to rapidly supply his working muscles with oxygen and fuel. These “oxygen uptake kinetics,” a key indicator of cardiovascular health, proved comparable to those of a typical, healthy 30- or 40-year-old, Daly said.

Exercising 40 minutes a day

Perhaps most impressive, he developed this fitness with a simple, relatively abbreviated exercise routine, the researchers noted.

Consistency: Every week, he rows about 30 kilometers (about 18.5 miles), averaging around 40 minutes a day.

A mix of easy, moderate and intense training: About 70 percent of these workouts are easy, with Morgan hardly laboring. Another 20 percent are at a difficult but tolerable pace, and the final 10 at an all-out, barely sustainable intensity.

Weight training: Two or three times a week, he also weight-trains, using adjustable dumbbells to complete about three sets of lunges and curls, repeating each move until his muscles are too tired to continue.

A high-protein diet: He eats plenty of protein, his daily consumption regularly exceeding the usual dietary recommendation of about 60 grams of protein for someone of his weight.

How exercise changes how we age

“This is an interesting case study that sheds light on our understanding of exercise adaptation across the life span,” said Scott Trappe, director of the Human Performance Laboratory at Ball State University in Indiana. He has studied many older athletes but was not involved in the new study.

“We are still learning about starting a late-life exercise program,” he added, “but the evidence is pretty clear that the human body maintains the ability to adapt to exercise at any age.”

In fact, Morgan’s fitness and physical power at 93 suggest that “we don’t have to lose” large amounts of muscle and aerobic capacity as we grow older, Jakeman said. Exercise could help us build and maintain a strong, capable body, whatever our age, he said.

Of course, Morgan probably had some genetic advantages, the scientists point out. Rowing prowess seems to run in the family.

And his race performances in recent years have been slower than they were 15, 10 or even five years ago. Exercise won’t erase the effects of aging. But it may slow our bodies’ losses, Morgan’s example seems to tell us. It may flatten the decline.

It also offers other, less-corporeal rewards. “There is a certain pleasure in achieving a world championship,” Morgan told me through his grandson, with almost comic self-effacement.

“I started from nowhere,” he said, “and I suddenly realized there was a lot of pleasure in doing this.”

[performativezippers]

have you ever read the His Dark Materials series? if so, what daemons do you think the ncis hawaii team would have?

oh my goodness great question. (a) have been obsessed with His Dark Materials since i was approximately eight years old, and (b) let me think about this.

Jesse's I think would be a dog. Like a big, 70-80 pound mutt that might look a little intimidating but is really a big ole baby who sleeps in the bed and loves to cuddle. She could tear the shit out of someone though, and would, and does, if she needs to. She's often found napping in a pile with Jesse's kids and their daemons, and she's be the first to break the don't-touch-other-people rule if another member of the team is hurt.

Kai's, I'm thinking a bird. Maybe a small hawk or falcon. One that could enjoy soaring in the air when he's at sea, perch on his surfboard when he's waiting to catch a wave, chirps incessantly when hungry and then eats fastidiously--not a single entrail left behind--and then grooms Kai's hair in thanks. She's a surprisingly cuddly bird, and anyone who knows them very, very well knows that when Kai is upset, she'll open a wing for him to rest his head against her chest, or will climb into his lap to doze against him. She loves having her chest feathers scratched (by him ONLY) and she can come out of fucking nowhere to scratch, claw out the eyes, or knock bad guys out with stooping rakes or punches to defend Kai. She has a truly bloodthirsty shriek. She and Lucy have a great affinity for each other and she loves to tease Kai.

Ernie's is maybe a small lemur, some kind of small monkey with big eyes that's too smart for her own good. She's always getting into trouble, poking her round little head where it doesn't belong and bringing back all kinds of gossip and government secrets. Ernie, in comparison, is a paragon of restraint. She's a trickster, the kind of person who would text Lucy and Kate "from Ernie" to get them to end up a bar alone together and would have absolutely zero remorse for it. She's not super cuddly, but she does love sitting right in front of Ernie on his desk when he games or hacks, watching with her little jaw a little bit open.

Jane's is a raven. Enormous, smart as a whip, sarcastic. Independent but fiercely loyal, totally black sense of humor. He counterbalances all of Jane's ernest, caring mom energy with sarcastic gay uncle energy. He's a great scout with an eidetic memory—he can repeat full conversations between multiple people even weeks later. He likes to entertain Jane and her kids and the team by replaying conversations complete with eerily accurate impressions of each voice. He's a brilliant strategist and loves a good fight. His beak and talons are no joke, and he laughs whenever Kai's daemon acts like she's the better fighter between the two of them.

Lucy's is a panther. She's not as big as an animal panther, but she's still fucking big. She can fold herself up pretty small into a ball of cat, or keep her head ducked down so she looks smaller than she is, but piss her off or watch her stretch, and damn! That cat is fucking big. She's stealthy and quiet when she needs to be, but her comfortable, natural state is quite chatty. The joke is that people are like "oh tiny cop, has to rely on her big ass daemon to protect her" and Saffiyah is like "lol," literally yawns, lays down, and closes her eyes when Lucy's fighting. It's all a performance—she'd jump up and rip the leg off a human being if she needed to—but she knows exactly how much Lucy can handle and she doesn't so much as twitch her tail until it gets to that point. That's even scarier for the dudes Lucy's fighting, that the tiny lady is taking on these dudes AND their daemons, and her fucking apex predator is just napping nearby. It's totally psychological warfare, and Saffiyah fucking loves it. She's less cuddly than you'd think, only Ernie and later Kate really ever seeing the extent to which she curls around Lucy and offers soft, fluffy, wordless comfort.

Kate's is the only daemon not suited for combat. Hers is a ferret, a small one. He can curl into a ball that almost fits in one hand. He's often found in her pocket or purse, or, when she's alone, draped across her neck. He's very quiet, doesn't say much, and a hidden camera would see him often staring into Kate's eyes with overflowing love. Kate's emotional walls are always up, but not between her and him. He tries to give her everything she won't let the rest of the world give her. He's surprisingly opinionated and has meticulously high standards. He doesn't have much of a sense of humor, but he's steady and warm to Kate. Most other people don't even see him—he's such a softness, so revealing of a part of Kate that she outwardly pretends doesn't exist, that Kate usually keeps him tucked away. He hates Cara, likes Jane, quietly giggles at Jesse and Kai's daemons, and he, in a way that's extremely out of character, absolutely loves Lucy. He doesn't let Lucy touch him for a long time, not until a few months after the grand gesture, but even before Cara ruins shit, he will sometimes curl up into a small ball of ferret on top of Saffiyah's back.

Bam Bam's is a snake.

[diabolus1exmachina]

Arash AF10 

The AF10, which to some may seem like the ugly brother of the Ferrari Enzo, was originally slated to be an affordable supercar. However, pricing started at £620,000 ( $957,000), which Arash hoped would allow the AF10 to steal sales from other small-scale supercar makers like Koenigsegg and Pagani. Most of the AF10's bodywork is made of carbon fiber, including the chassis, ensuring that the British-built supercar will weigh no more than 2,645 pounds. This meant it could undercut the Ferrari Enzo by around 353lbs and the relatively chunky Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren by nearly 1,102lbs. Power came from a Corvette Z06 LS7 7.0-liter V-8 engine with a peak output of 550 horsepower and 475 pound-feet of torque. Drive is sent to the rear wheels via a six-speed Graziano manual gearbox. A supercharged 'AF10S' model was planned. This higher performance variant would develop up to 800 horsepower and 553 pound-feet of torque. Further down the track, there might even be a model with more than 1,001 horsepower and 700 pound-feet of torque. Just 70 cars were expected to be built in five years, and if Arash's plans were successful, the latest supercar maker on the block could also add a cheaper model called the AF8, which would essentially be a less powerful version of the AF10. The car was ultimately not put into production, but Arash later revealed a revised model in 2016 with a hybrid drivetrain and an output of 2080 HP. They also presented at the 2016 Geneva Motor Show the Arash AF8. It featured a chassis with carbon/steel tubes and a mid-engined 7.0-litre V8 engine producing 505bhp.

[eaglesnick]

Scandal After Scandal: Will They Never End?

Boris Johnson was so beset by scandal that his own party turned on him and threw him out of office. We all know about the Partygate affair but there were also questions raised regarding his personal monetary arrangements.  From charges of corruption concerning him asking a Tory donor to supply funds to refurbish his Downing Street residence, to his appointment of the BBC Chairman and an alleged £800,000 loan, Johnson was the epitome of the self-serving Tory.

Johnson has gone but the scandals have continued to rumble on. We had the unedifying debacle of multi-millionaire Nadhim Zahawi being forced to resign after he was  found  guilty of serious breaches of the ministerial code  by covering up issues to do with his attempts to minimise his tax bill.

Sunak’s own wife also avoided UK tax payments by claiming non-dom status. After being asked to “come clean” on his wife’s tax affairs and after much embarrassment the Sunak’s decided she should pay tax in this country.

It is not only those Tories at the top of government who are self-serving. Conservative MP’s have been calculated to have received an additional £15.2 million on top of their MP salaries, personal fortune hunting seemingly more important than giving their constituents 100% of their time. 

“Since the end of 2019, millions of pounds of outside earnings have been made by a small group of largely Tory MPs."  (Skynews: 08/01/23)

When Sunak, after much delay, made public his own tax affairs we discovered that for the year 2021/22 he made £172,415 unearned income from dividends and £1.6 million from capital gains. In total, the PM paid an average tax rate of 22% over a three-year period.

For you and I, the basic rate of tax on income between £12,571 and £50,270 is 20%.  Between £50,271 and £125,140, it is 40 %, going up to 45% for earned income over £125,140.

For Mr Sunak to have only paid 22% on his millions is therefore quite a smack in face for ordinary tax-payers, and one only made possible because the Tories have arranged the tax system to benefit  themselves and their rich friends.

“Angela Rayner, Labour’s deputy leader, said: “[The tax returns] reveal a tax system designed by successive Tory governments in which the prime minister pays a far lower tax rate than working people who face the highest tax burden in 70 years

“… the fact that Sunak paid less than a quarter of his gains in tax highlighted the problems with taxing capital gains at a much lower rate than income…The low tax rate is because we have much lighter taxes on wealth than work”   (Guardian: 22/03/23)

So, if you work for a living, expect to pay proportionately more in tax than those who live on unearned income.

Way back in July 2022, Rishi Sunak was so disgusted with the immoral behaviour of Boris  Johnson that he resigned his post as Chancellor. This is what he said at the time:

“... the public rightly expect government to be conducted properly, competently and seriously. I recognise this may be my last ministerial job, but I believe these standards are worth fighting for and that is why I am resigning.”

But if a week is a long time in politics, then 9 months is an eternity. As we have seen, Sunak himself has become as equally embroiled in monetary scandal as his predecessor and now he is under investigation by the Parliamentary Standards Committee. 

“Rishi Sunak investigation: Government blocked Freedom of Information request into childcare firm.

Mr Sunak is currently being investigated by the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner over his failure to be more transparent about his wife’s shares in childcare agency Koru Kids when quizzed on the subject by MPs.

It comes after i revealed last month that Akshata Murty, the Prime Minister’s wife, holds shares in the firm, which stands to directly benefit from reforms to the childcare system announced in last month’s Budget.” (inews: 19/04/23)

Time and time again we see top Tories under investigation by the Parliamentary Standards Commission. Time and time again we see how self-serving and unprincipled our leaders really are. Mr Sunak it seems, is no different to his predecessors and the sooner he goes the better.

[usafphantom2]

With the V-22 grounded, the Navy's venerable C-2 are coming back into action

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 12/23/2023 - 21:52in Military

Currently, there is only one tiltrotor Bell V-22 Osprey unit operating in the U.S. military. As a result, the U.S. Pacific Fleet again used the C-2A Greyhound to transport to and from aircraft carriers.

After the fall in late November of a U.S. Air Force Special Operations CV-22B near Yakushima Island, Japan, in which eight aviators died, all the Ospreys of the Navy, the Marine Corps and the U.S. Air Force were landed on December 6.

Only the Navy Middle Tiltrotor Squadron VMM-162 (part of the 26ª Navy Expeditionary Unit) flying MV-22B received special permission to conduct limited operations because it has detachments on ships currently deployed, including the USS Bataan (LHD-5) and the USS Carter Hall (LSD-50) in the Red Sea and USS Green Table (LPD-19) in the Eastern Mediterranean.

All the other Ospreys are grounded. This left some U.S. Pacific Fleet aircraft carriers without their on-board delivery aircraft (COD). Most Fleet aircraft carriers based on the West Coast began using the Osprey CMV-22B variant as CODs starting with the first deployment of the tiltrotors on the USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70) in 2021.

The CMV-22B took over the COD mission both to replace the old C-2As and to serve the Navy's F-35C. Osprey can load the Pratt & Whitney F-135 engine of the Join Strike Fighter and land with it on the aircraft carrier. Greyhound is not big enough to do that.

As a result, the C-2s that served most of the West Coast aircraft carriers in previous decades were transferred to the Norfolk Naval Station, Virginia, on the East Coast, to support the Atlantic Fleet aircraft carriers whose Air Wings do not yet have F-35C squadrons.

Currently, Vinson, USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71) and USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) use Osprey. On Tuesday, Vinson was operating in the Philippine Sea area, while Roosevelt and Lincoln are currently at their home port in San Diego.

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The Japan-based USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) is currently in the port of Yokosuka, but is still deployed with C-2 based on land at the Iwakuni Marine Corps Air Station in Japan. Their status in port allowed the C-2 of the VRC-30 squadron based in Iwakuni to be deployed to Vinson.

First placed on the field in the mid-1960s, the C-2 overcame the first problems to become a true Navy flagship. The same cannot be said of the CMV-22B yet. The grounding that began earlier this month is the second of the U.S. Navy's Osprey fleet this year.

All three Forces flying on Osprey paralyzed part of their V-22 fleets in February due to an ongoing problem with the hard transmission of the tiltrotor. This grounding occurred after USAF interrupted its fleet operations in August 2022 due to the same hard transmission problem.

In 2022, the Pentagon's director of operational testing and evaluation (DOT&E) issued an evaluation stating that the CMV-22B only partially met its reliability requirements. He concluded that Osprey could not meet its operational readiness requirements and had an insufficient ice protection system.

Thanks to its non-pressurized cabin, the CMV-22B cannot fly far above 10,000 feet with passengers (or practically with its crew), which means that it will probably have to fly through weather conditions in which it cannot fly easily. This has made the problem of the insufficient ice protection system more acute and the altitude limitation affects the operations and operational range of Osprey in any climate.

Meanwhile, C-2 veterans now crossing the deck to the Vinson can fly at altitudes of up to 28,700 feet and carry 10,000 pounds of cargo in a range of 1,300 nautical miles, surpassing the 6,000 pounds of cargo of the Osprey in a range of 1,150 nautical miles. The age of the C-2 also makes its maintenance difficult, but it remains a less complex aircraft than the CMV-22B.

The Navy welcomed the Osprey as a COD that can take off and land vertically from the aircraft carrier and other ships, unlike the C-2, only transported by aircraft carriers, but in practice the tiltrotor V-22 operates from a few other Navy ships besides those of amphibious assault, dock landing and transport dock ships. It is not clear whether the CMV-22B operated with these types.

Thus, in the absence of flying Ospreys, the former Navy C-2s (who are on average 34 years old) are compensating for their CMV-22 until the tiltrotors are allowed to fly again.

When returning to the deck of the Carl Vinson for the first time since 2021, the ship's crew will be able to reflect on the fact that the old CODs that now bring their correspondence, high-priority supplies and passengers cost approximately $38.96 million each, a third of the price of the landed CMV-22B ($104.9 million per aircraft).

Until the Ospreys receive the green light again, they will have to continue helping.

Source: Forbes

Tags: Military AviationCMV-22B OspreyGrumman C-2 Greyhoundaircraft carrierUSN - United States Navy/U.S. Navy

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, he has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has works published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. He uses Canon equipment during his photographic work in the world of aviation.

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[baronessblixen]

“it's better than before.” (please don’t hurt me too bad!)

I think this was an angst prompt and my answer is... not. I don't know what it is exactly! Set in the revival, Mulder muses about life, changes and Scully. Wc: 1,966

Tagging @today-in-fic

Everything Old is New Again

The fake sunrise his alarm clocks projects wakes him at 6.30 am, like every morning. One of these days he’s going to find an old analog clock like he used to have. But that’s a task for another morning. Until then, he will wake up to this, believing Scully when she says it’s better for him. Even if the light is fake.

His body protests as he rolls over to switch off the orange light and the bird chirping that accompanies it. He doesn’t know how to turn off the incessant sound on its own. It just turns on every morning. There should be a manual for this damn alarm clock, but if there is, he’s lost it.

Mulder groans as he sits up in bed, running a hand over his face. It’s Friday. Once, days of the week didn’t matter. Weekend was an idea rather than a fixed set of days. Nowadays, he works Monday to Friday, like one of these agents he used to think of as lazy when he himself was younger. He wonders what young agents think about him now. If they think about him at all.

In the bathroom, his Bluetooth speaker greets him with a mechanical good morning and hits from the 70s, 80s and 90s. You can take the man out of the decades, but not the decades out of the man.

He showers quickly, his shower head made to save water. Less than five minutes later he’s done. Gone are the days of long, hot showers. Now there’s only efficiency. Scully got him the shower head last Christmas and he, against all odds, had hoped it meant she wanted to take more showers here, at their house. His hopes were crushed when she told him she had a date for New Year’s Eve.

He spent long days waiting to hear about the date, about the new man in her life. It never happened. Over a month later, when her birthday drew near, he asked her about it, pretending his heart wasn’t pounding. She merely shrugged, said it was only one date and nothing more. The nameless man remained so. As did the next, and the one after him. Then, in May, Scully told him about Paul. A guy she went on more than one date with. Five, to be exact. Mulder tried counting backward to find out when it had started. Whether something had changed then. Had she smiled more? Had she seemed happier?

“I hope you,” she had said, taking his hand in hers. “I hope it doesn’t bother you. I will keep my personal life out of the office. I just wanted you to know. I owe you that much.”

So he knew. May went by in a blur and June promised to be the same with Scully asking for a week off. He didn’t ask and she didn’t say, but he knew she was going to spend it with Paul. Mulder threw himself into work, didn’t allow himself to think about her, or about what she and Paul were doing.

When she returned, a soft tan on her face, she looked guilty and Mulder was deflated. Once, they had gone on vacation, too. Away from the darkness that had followed them. No matter how much sun there was, how much love they made, it hung over them like a rain cloud. They both knew that one day it would break and drown them.

Paul was history by late June. Scully told him in passing while they were getting ready to board a plane. He just nodded, trying to keep his face neutral when in reality he felt like bursting into song.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“You’re not,” Scully replied, but there was a twinkle in her eyes and a lightness in her voice he hadn’t heard in a while.

He took her hand as the plane started, knowing how much she hated that moment. She didn’t pull away and Mulder knew that things were changing.

His coffee grows cold over his musings, but he downs it anyway before he grabs his car keys to leave for work. The sun – the real one – has just woken up and is blinking through the gray September clouds up above. Mulder turns on the heat in the car, feeling a bit chilly.

He hooks up his phone, tells it to navigate him to work and starts his car. How different this used to be. Back in the day, he knew the way to the Hoover building by heart. Now he isn’t sure he’d find his way without his phone. Scully keeps telling him to not use it as it will make his brain shrink, but it’s just easier this way. And it gives him time to think. About Scully.

Today is the day. He’s planned it meticulously. He will ask her out. An old-fashioned date, just the two of them. No cases, no excuses, and no Pauls. No bees either. He grins, humming along to the song on his playlist. Another one of those things. He and Scully used to find tapes in their rental cars from time to time, listening to them in excitement. They never knew what the next song would be. He misses those days, sometimes. Misses the unpredictability of it all.

Mulder stops in front of the coffee shop he and Scully have started frequenting. It’s a far cry from the places they went to back in the day. There are seven different varieties of milk now, not just one. A couple of weeks ago, he ordered a coffee with cow milk and Scully threw him a look, reminding him that plant-based milk is better for the environment and for him.

Ever since then, he’s been taking his coffee with unsweetened almond milk. After all, Scully is a medical doctor and he trusts her. In every conceivable way. He orders his coffee and Scully’s and buys two sandwiches for lunch, too. Vegan, of course.

Scully is already there when he enters the office. She gives him a smile, sitting on the edge of their desk, reading through a file. His stomach somersaults, putting a huge grin on his face that takes him back at least 20 years. She has that effect on him. Then, now and always.

“Good morning,” she says. “I’ve been wondering where you are.”

“Huh?”

“It’s late, Mulder. Late for you anyway. Was there a lot of traffic?” She takes a sip from her coffee as she waits for his answer.

“Um, no. I was just- getting read took a bit longer this morning.”

“You’re not sick, are you? When was your last check up?” Asking about his check ups is the best way to remind him that he’s getting old. That he is old already.

“I’m not sick,” he assures her. “Just lost in thought. That happens when you wake up to a sunrise and birds chirping.”

“It’s good for you, Mulder. It’s a gentle way of waking up.” He’s heard her explain it to him plenty of times and so he just smiles at her, nodding.

“How are you waking up these days?” He asks her, taking a nip of his coffee.

“Hm? Not with a sunrise,” she says, throwing him an amused look. Now’s his chance.

“Hey Scully, what are you doing tonight?” His heart is hammering against his chest. If he were to tell Scully, she’d probably worry he’s having a heart attack. He’s at that age now, as she not so subtly reminded him a while ago. With his questionable diet and his inability to kick his sunflower seed habit, he should be careful. But right now, unbeknownst to her, his heart is in her hands.

“I don’t have any plans,” she says.

“In that case… would you like to have dinner with me tonight?”

“I’d love to, Mulder,” she answers without hesitation, rendering him speechless. “Are you okay? You do look a bit green.” By now, she’s walked over to him and she puts her hand on his cheek, gently caressing it.

“I’m just surprised.”

“That I want to have dinner with you?”

“That I didn’t even have to persuade you,” he replies honestly.

“I’ve been waiting for you to ask me out again,” she says and color shoots into her cheeks. “I was ready to ask you to dinner myself.”

“Why didn’t you?”

She shrugs, stepping closer to him and fully invading his personal space. He doesn’t mind one bit and puts his hand on her waist. They’re skipping steps, jumping ahead, but they’ve been here before. This isn’t new. It’s merely a restart of something old and familiar.

“I was scared,” she admits.

“Scared? Of me?”

“Of you saying no.”

“Scully, I will never say no to you. I’ve been waiting too, biding my time. When you told me about Paul…” Scully groans and presses her head against his chest.

“That was a mistake,” she says against his tie. Her head resurfaces and he falls in love all over with her. With the way her fingers play with the lapels of his coat, contemplating how much she allows herself here in their office. With the way her eyes dance when he smiles at her, putting his hand on the small of her back to draw her closer. He doesn’t care that they’re in the office. Or that it’s not even 9 am.

“I hope I’m not a mistake,” Mulder says softly.

“You’ve never been a mistake, Mulder. Not once.”

“Would kissing you now be a mistake?”

“Not if I kiss you first.” And she does exactly that. He’s dreamed about kissing Scully many, many times. Back when they were first partnered and he didn’t yet know how she tasted or what she liked.

He dreamed of her when he was hiding from the world, missing her and their son. Dreamed about her when she made the choice to save them and leave so that he could get better, and she could, too. Now they are. Her mouth fits against his as perfectly as it ever has. He knows how to kiss her, how to move his lips, and how to tease her with his tongue so that she moans and presses herself against him. Some things haven’t change, won’t ever change.

“I missed doing this,” she says when they break for air.

“Making out in the office?” He presses another soft kiss against her lips.

“We never really did that, did we?”

“There’s still time.” He grins at her.

“This is a work place.” But she, too, is grinning.

“It’s Friday anyway. We can leave early.” He kisses her again and she responds in kind. When they break apart this time, she sighs.

“What are you thinking?” He asks her, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

“When I thought about this – us – I didn’t think… I wondered how it would happen. How we would be.”

“Is it how you thought it would be?”

“I didn’t think it would happen in the office,” she says. “I didn’t think it would happen in the morning. You taste like almond milk, Mulder.”

“No more cow milk for me. You said so. So… what’s the verdict?”

“Let me just-” She kisses him again, her tongue teasing him. His eyes flutter close and he wonders what Scully would say if he reminded her of his office sex fantasy. But maybe it’s too early for that anyway.

He wants to give her sunrises in bed, fake or otherwise. Orgasms, too. But only real ones. He wants to share his new favorite songs with her. Wants to drive around with her, Google Maps be damned. He just wants to be with her, in whatever way she lets him.

“It’s better than before,” she says and he knows she’s right.