#99% percent of it is me being bad at games or making jokes | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

forthehpfanboys · 4 years

Text

Unexpected But Accepted

Pair: George Weasley x Reader x Fred Weasley: he/him.

Summary: Fred and George have been driving you bonkers. You try to get away for five minutes but find out they’re arguing over you. You snap when you see it happen right in front of you and punish Fred for sass. Basically, you fuck George, then suck off Fred.

Warnings: SMUT (MDI), poly, dirty talk, bondage, probably took this too far, oops, swears, way too long and probably not good.

Notes: Requested! Hope you enjoy!

~DO NOT REPOST ANYWHERE~

Your back pressed against the wall, your chest heaving with quick breaths leaving your lips. The small room was quiet and dark, allowing you to hear the pair of rushing footsteps that’d been chasing you for the past 10 minutes come down the hall. You covered your mouth, trying to hide your panting breaths into the skin as the steps came closer and closed your eyes in hopes of not being found in the small broom closet. Suddenly, one of your chasers spoke up, causing you to go rigid against the wall.

“Do you see him?” One spoke up while a sigh was released from the other.

“No. How did he disappear?”

You tried to sink deeper into the darkness without making a peep. Godric, if they found you, you’d never hear the end of it. You just wanted some peace and quiet.

“I don’t understand! Is there a hidden room we haven’t discovered?”

“I highly doubt it, Georgie. Let’s be real.”

“So should we split up?”

“Probably best if we just head to class.” Heavy footsteps trailed down the hallway, voices fading more with each step.

“Since when do you care about grades?”

“I don’t. Come on. We might bump into him on the way.”

You didn’t step out of the broom closet until you were 10,000 percent sure they’d left, allowing you to let out the breath you didn’t know you were holding. Shutting the door behind you, you leaned against it, wincing to yourself when your head smacked against the wood alittle harder than you intended. You didn’t like hiding from them, but you didn’t have much choice.

The two redheads had been acting differently lately and it’s been taking a toll on your mental health lately. You couldn’t have five minutes alone without them almost tearing eachother apart for your attention and, honestly, you just needed a break. Or maybe food. You haven't been able to eat in peace because of the twins antics. Hermione and Harry would bring you food while Ron, the forever charming redhead, laughed at your demise.

You’ve tried talking to them about what’s going on, but they always brush you off and ask if you wanna go do something somewhere and drag you away anyway. It wasn’t that they were being creepy or anything, it was just overwhelming you and you needed some serious (Y/n) Time.

It almost felt like they knew something you didn’t and it was frustrating beyond comprehension. Sure, you and the twins were close but fuck, it was almost like they made a bet to torture or something along those lines. Maybe it was a prank?

What you didn’t know is that you were kinda right. A couple days before this specific one, the twins made a bet after learning two truths that changed a few things within their brotherly bond. Truth one was how George's feelings for you changed from friend to lover. The second truth was how Fred's feelings for you changed in the exact same manner. The bet resolved over you, of course, and how they’d win you. More specifically, whichever twin managed to win your feelings, won the bet and you were the prize.

You looked both ways, checking the hallway to make sure it was empty before abandoning the hiding spot with a feverous sprint. Your footsteps echoed down the empty halls, your robes flapping behind you. You proceeded to multitask. You ran down the intertwining halls while debating on going to class or hiding away in your dorm. In the end, your feet decided for you. Before you knew it, you were sprinting up the moving staircase up to the Fat Lady.

“Cherry top.” You spoke quickly before she even had the chance to open her mouth. You ignored her grumble on how kids used to care about her singing and focused on walking through the empty room. You plopped yourself down on the couch facing gently crackling fire. A quiet sigh left your lips, hands going through your hair. “What changed?” you whispered to yourself.

“You really have no clue?”

The voice made you jump and turn around seeing.. No one? You felt the couch sink further closer to the ground and you were met with another redhead, allowing you to relax back against the plush cushions.

“Godric, Gin, you scared me.” You let out a meek chuckle and ran a hand over your eyes. “What’re you doing here anyway? Shouldn’t you be with The Golden Trio or something?”

“Or something.” She cast a smile in your direction. “I heard what’s going on between you and the two idiots. Figured you could use some help sorting them out.” The youngest Weasley tucked her feet in and turned toward you fully, the smile turned into a grin.

“I’d adore help.”

“I thought so.” She let out a chuckle. “Rumor has it they have a bet going. Lee overheard them arguing over it and who was winning.” Ginny’s grin turned into the classic Weasley Side Smirk. The words rolled around in your head, your nose scrunching in confusion. Arguing? They never argue. You tried to come up with a time where they actually fought and only mock up arguments made themselves clear. “People are saying it’s over a specific absolutely oblivious Gryffindor Quidditch player, others say it’s over who can burn the school down first-” Ginny laughed, shaking her head a little as she spoke.

“Quidditch player? Oh- Angelina, right? Yea, it’s pretty obvious they’ve been pining after her for a while. “ You forced out with a very small and very fake smile across your lips. You knew how the two pranksters looked at her. It only made sense they’d be after her, she was smart, great at the game and a looker. You swallowed hard. You were just the Keeper for Gryffindor, not a chaser or a seeker, just kept to the goals. It didn’t feel as special as the others. “But I don’t see how this involves me.” You could’ve sworn you heard her mumble ‘oblivious’ again, but she spoke up before you could even question it.

“So, you really don’t know?”

“Don’t know what?”

“Oh my Godric, you really don’t know?”

“Know what, Gin?”

“I thought they would’ve told you!” She looked down at her fingers, playing with her nail. Her long hair fell around her face like a curtain, no doubt hiding the grin. She was ignoring you on purpose.

“Gin, so help me, I will shatter your knee caps. Tell. Me.” You threatened, giving her a strong glare. Your glares could kill. Students and teachers alike knew your temper was not something to trifle with and made up for 99 percent of your detentions. You’re not one to throw fists first, but you definitely don’t hold your tongue. While the castle got nervous around you and you ralmost famous temper, the Weasleys did not give one flying fuck. They’d tease you until you die because they all knew you had a sweet spot for them.

“I mean, you're their best friend and you don’t know. Damn, that’s so.. Bad, yet just like them, wow.” She moved the hair away from her eyes. “Ok. Listen, the twins don’t fancy Angie, (Y/n). I think you need to consider both sides of the spectrum.” She paused, giving you an expecting look before sighing and going on. “They’re bisexual. Came out last year.”

“Oh, haha. Really funny.” You stood up, moving away from the couch to one of the towering glass windows. Pressing your weight against the brick wall, you gazed out, watching students rush to classes and others just goofing off. Ginny knew of your crush on the two red-heads, but she didn’t have to joke about it like this. “Now isn’t the time for jokes, Gin. “

“I’m serious, (Y/n). Think about it. They’ve been all over you, everyone has noticed.” Ginny walked over to you, resting a hand on your shoulder. She could tell you were gonna be on the fence no matter what the words, so she just sighed and retracted her hand. “I’d never joke about this. It could very well be you the identical idiots are drooling over.”

“They're really bi?” You turned to her, your eyes sparkling with hope.

“Honestly, (Y/n). Would I lie to you?” She snickered patting your back before heading over to the portrait hole. “Really, think about it. It'll make sense with time, i'm sure.” With that, she popped through the hole in the wall. With a final creak of the portrait shutting, you were left alone in silence, rolling her words in your head.

Ok, maybe it did make a small, tiny, miniscule bit of sense, but why didn’t Fred and George tell you? You sighed, your hot breath fogging up the glass. Maybe they didn’t want you to know. Maybe they thought you’d call them freaks or weirdos, but you’d never. You remember when you came out to them as (s/p) and they didn’t judge you at all.

You wanted to scream when you heard the creak of the entrance opening again. For fucks fucking fuck, even without the twins there you couldn’t get alone time. You needed to think, especially with the new info Ginny told you.

“There ya are, (Y/n)! We’ve been looking for you everywhere!”

Your eyes focused on the reflection in the glass pain, a groan leaving your lips at the sight. Of course. Speak of the devil and he shall appear.

“Hey.” Your voice was stiff, revealing how you felt deep down. Frustration and irritation. You noted how the redheads both stepped closer to you. One gently pulling you by the hand to sit down in a chair not too far from the window while the other taking the seat across you, shooting you a soft smile.

“Ok. What’s wrong?” Fred spoke, his back slouching in the chair, his arms crossing over his chest. George was standing next to you with a cocked eyebrow, a soft smile on his face.

“Yeah, we know you (N/n). What’s going through that pretty head of yours?” George ran his hand through your hair before squatting next to your seated form. You could vaguely smell his cologne. You turned to George, missing the glare from Fred.

“I.. Just stressed, is all. Exams coming and not getting enough sleep.” It wasn’t fully a lie, so.

“Are you sure you’re not sick or something?” Fred stood up and walked over, the back of his hand reaching out to press against your forehead. It was halted when a matching pale hand grabbed his wrist.

“Fred, I think if he was sick, he would’ve said something along those lines. It’s just stress.” George’s voice held a barely noticeable amount of venom as his grip tightened ever so slightly on his older brothers wrist. The death glares they exchanged as Fred whipped his hand away from his younger twins grip had you raising an eyebrow in question.

“So you're a doctor now?”

“Can you stop with the attitude? I’m so sick of it!”

“You’re sick of it? I’m sick of you! I was just gonna check if he had a fever.”

“Don’t touch him, Fred.”

“I was just checking if he was ok!”

“Well, you don-!”

“Ok and I’m putting an end to this.” You stood up and shoved your way between them, pushing them away as you stepped forward. “What the hell has been going on with you two? This is- Godric- you guys are driving me nuts.” Before they knew what was happening you were ranting. “Seriously! I can’t even shower without you guys trying to be there! Like just- What is going on? This week feels like a year and I’m drowning in Wealsey cologne and fancy candy from Honeydukes-” Your hands were running through your hair sporadically, which the twins both thought was adorable, but knew now wasn’t the time.

Fred and George looked at each other as you went on.

“Please. Just- It hurts so much to see you too fight and it makes me want to punch something- literally anything- because you guys are my everything! Just fucking talk to me! Please.” Your chest was heaving when you finally finished, your entire body getting warm.

“Everything?” They turned to you, everything matching up insync.

“..What?” You felt even hotter than before. Wait, did you actually call them your everything?

“Aw, don’t playdumb now, (N/n)! You said we’re your everything.”

“You’re hearing things, Fred.”

“Hmm, no. I don’t think we are.” They stepped closer.

“Ah, well, I.. never said that, Georgie. Very simple.”

“Do we have to go back to fighting over you?” Fred joked as they separated and began to advance toward you. The twins trapped you between them, one on both sides. George rested his arm on your shoulder while Fred shot him a teasing smirk, his nose scrunching up. “Cause we’ll do it, princey, don’t tempt us.”

You don’t know what came over you, maybe it was your built up tension or your anger issues, but you grabbed them by the ties of their uniform and yanked them over to the staircase leading up to the dorms. You pressed them against the wall just before the stair cases and trapped them there with your body.

“Do it and fucking see what happens, Weasley.” One hand tangled their ties together, your other hand coming to press against the wall by George’s head. The boys’ faces erupted into a blush, causing you to smirk. “You two have been driving me absolutely nuts these past few days. I dare you to push one more button.” You tried not to act surprised by how your voice dropped. Fred’s tongue swiped across his suddenly dry lips and George turned even redder.

“Oh yea, (L/n)? What are you gonna do? Give us a stern talking too?” Fred smirked, his eyes trailing down your figure, then back up to your eyes. He was challenging you. You got closer to his face, your voice dripping even lower.

“I could tie you to the bed and fuck your brother right infront of you, make you watch him get what you oh so desperately crave.” Your head was cocked to the side, your eyes dark with something Fred had never seen before.

“Well, that was unexpected-” George all but whispered before he swallowed thickly, his hand coming up to cover his face.

“But damn, so accepted. Who knew he was so dirty?” Fred groaned out. His hand wrapped around the back of your neck to pull you into a kiss. You released the ties and favored running your fingers through his hair, grabbing onto a few locks and giving it a tug.

“Should we confess or should you guys just keep kissing?” George spoke up from the sidelines, fidgeting with his hands. Fred separated from you and got him the classic Weasley Side Smirk.

“I think he knows now, Georgie, come on!” Fred yanked his tie free and slipped free from you and proceeded to run up the steps, skipping 2 at a time. You took this time to appreciate his mile long legs. “Hope your good at keepin’ your promises, (L/n)!” He called from the top of the steps. With a laugh, you gave George a short kiss, grabbed his wrist and led the blushing redhead up the stairs.

By the time you and George came up the stairs, Fred was already trying to disrobe. I say trying because he’d given up on unbuttoning his white polo and is trying to pull the still buttoned collar over his head. Watching the older twin thrash around in the stuck shirt made George and you erupt in giggles.

“Should we help him?” George asked his laughs.

“Nah, he can figure it out himself. Besides, I wanna kiss you.” You cornered George against one of the bedposts, not caring whose bed was whose and immediately pressed your lips against his. He let out a needy moan and pulled you closer, his arms around your neck. Your hands landed on his waist as your teeth nibbled on his bottom lip. You pulled from the kiss when a second pair of arms wrapped around your waist, which you prompt slapped away. “What did I say? Get on the bed, Freddie.”

The groan that left the older twins lips was lewd, causing you to chuckle and shove him away from your back. He reluctantly laid on the bed, sprawled out like a starfish, his bulge prominent against his dark uniform. Damn, he must really want you. The idea of one of the twins drooling over you had you hardening in your pants.

“Not like that, Fred. Back against the headboard.” You spoke, gently leading George to the bed and pushing him to side down on the edge. You untied the younger twins tie and with a kiss to his nose moved to his counterpart, climbing onto the plush mattress one he obeyed. You smirked down at the redhead as you plopped yourself on his lap, causing him to groan.

“Having fun, doll?” Fred spoke as his hands instinctively moved to your hips, pulling you closer. You pulled his hands away from your waist, kissed each wrist before tying them to the headboard with his brother's tie.

“You know it, babe.” You casted him a wink. Climbing off his lap and prompt ignoring his whine, you brought your attention back to the younger twin and dragged him into a kiss. “And how are you feeling, Georgie?”

“Perfect.” His voice was soft and airy, causing you to giggle.

“Oi. Stop being cute without me.” Fred spoke up, nudging you in the side with his foot.

“Shut it. This is why you're tied up.” You smacked his foot away and pulled George onto your lap. You kissed along his neck, your fingers trailing through his hair. His hands slid from your shoulders, down your flat chest to your belt, promptly undoing it and pulling it free from the loopholes.

“Oh, please. You love my teasing.”

“I wish you gagged him with his tie.” George snickered out. He'd thrown the belt to the side and was now unbuttoning your white button up shirt.

“I’m debating on it, actually.” You laughed out. You sucked a mark on the side of George’s neck and shrugged off your shirt once it was fully undone and threw it to the side. Your hands came up to undo George's shirt, but ended up just ripping a few of the buttons free. “Fuck it, I’ll buy you new ones.” You pressed your lips to his again, your hands sliding across the bare skin. Fuck. His skin was so soft, but you could feel the muscles under it rippling with a soft moan.

“You know we have magic, right? You could’ve just spelled his clothes away.”

You let out a groan and pulled away from George's lips and glared at the older redhead. You shook your head in disapproval and tsked at him.

“You gag him, Georgie. I’m gonna finish stripping.” You stated, giving the tall redhead a slap on the bum before standing up. You watched Georgie snicker and slide Fred’s tie free.

“Wait, no. We can talk this through-” Fred was interrupted by the tie being shoved into his mouth. “I’d apologize, but I’m not sorry, Freddie. Should’ve shut your mouth. Had the chance.” Geogie patted his shoulder and scooted back. When he turned to you, he blushed a brighter red than his hair. You were lazily stroking yourself, your boxers hanging around your thighs. “Blimey-” George choked out, licking his lips.

“Like what you see?” You chuckled, stepping closer to him. He eagerly nodded his head. The boy was holding back the biggest urge to drop to his knees and suck the soul out of you. You flashed him a smirk. “Come on, then. Strip, baby,”

He rolled onto his back, lifted his legs and all but ripped himself free from his constricting jeans. The enthusiasm made you giggle. Your eyes followed along the pale skin and you wanted, oh so desperately to count the freckles sprinkled across his skin. God, he was so absolutely beautiful and it was safe to say Fred was just as beautiful.

“Merlin’s fucking beard. You’re so beautiful.” You stepped over, running your hands along his toned legs. “Godric, I should use your legs as earmuffs some time.” Your confidence grew when Fred and George both let out a whine. “Ok. Here’s what I want.” You sat him back up and leaned into his ear, your hands slowly sliding up his thighs. You licked your lips when you heard the younger redheads breath hitch. “I want Freddie to have a nice view, ok?” You whispered, your hands hiking higher up his thighs before you dragged your nails down the skin gently. “Go to the foot of the bed, spread your legs and lean over to put your hands on the mattress.”

George slipped out from beneath you and went to the foot of the bed. He was half bent over, legs spread and staring down at his hands on the mattress. Following him around the posts, you stood behind him and ran your hands down his toned back.

“Oh, fuck, you’re freckles go down your back-” Your voice came out breathy and light. Your eyes looked between Fred, who was whining against the tie and the twin slowly turning red.

“Is that good?” George asked, his ears tinting a bright red.

“Of course. You’re so beautiful. Does Freddie have the same patterns?” Your thumb ran over a patch of freckles.

“Yeah. He’s got these little patches of freckles everywhere.” George turned his head to look at you, a smile on his face. You couldn’t help but giggle, your hands rubbing over his globes.

“Godric, I can’t wait to see.” Your dark eyes turned to lock with Fred’s, as a dirty smirk came across your mouth. He let out a little whine, his legs shifting on the bed, trying to get some form of simulation.

“Don’t get your hopes up.” George laughed, pressing his forehead to the bed. You gave his asss a slap, causing him to whine.

“Be nice to him.” You snickered, leaning over to kiss the back of his neck whine your hand trailed down his abdomen. Your hand wrapped around his wood, his hips bucked in response. “You’re so hard.”

“Obviously.”

“Do I need to tie you up, too?”

“Oh, no sir.” His voice dripped sarcasm.

“Georgie.” You warned while pulling your hand away. You sucked on your pointer finger and brought it to his entrance, gently pushing it in. He was chewing on his bottom lip, trying to stay loose and relaxed. “Be nice.” You leaned off his back, standing up fully. Your other hand grabbed his cheek and spread it while your finger pulled back some. After spitting on your fingers,you gently slipped in a second finger. Godric, his moans were so perfect.

George was shivering. Sure, he’d played around in the shower, but damn was it better with a person, especially when that person was your crush. You prepped the bottom for what felt like hours and he was just about drooling into the sheets.

“Merlin, you really wanna be safe, don’t you.” George moaned out when you pressed your fingers against his prostate.

“Well, yeah. I don’t wanna hurt you.”

“My god, you two are so gooey it hurts.” You both turned to Fred. He had a smirk on his face. Fucker had literally pushed the tie out of his mouth. “Get to it, (L/n).”

“For fucks sake, Fred.” You chuckled out, pulling your fingers away from his entrance. You held your own dick by the base before pushing the head in gently. George pressed his cheek against the bed, a whine leaving his lips. His freckle covered hands grabbed the sheets. His knees pressed together once you pushed all the way in him. “You ok?”

Your hands hopped from his hips to wrap around his midsection once he nodded. You let out a sigh of relief and placed a few kisses on the freckles scattered across his broad shoulders.

“I wish I was getting some of that action.” Fred’s head hit the headboard. This felt like he was having a wet dream and seeing it from 3rd person.

“If you kept your mouth shut, you could’ve joined us.”

Your hips pulled back slowly, your chin resting on George’s shoulder. The gasp that left his lips when you pushed back in had you shivering. You kept up a steady pace, your bottom lip trapped between your teeth. Groans, whimpers, moans, gasps- every noise echoed in the nearly empty room. George’s hand had found his dick between his legs and was shamelessly jerking it to match your hips.

“Godric, Georgie,” your voice so close to his ear had him moaning your name, “you're so tight, baby.”

Watching you fuck into his brother had Fred licking his lips. The older redhead desperately wanted to be in George's position and he was gonna throw something if he didn’t get some attention soon. He bounced his legs in dismay. His dick was painfully hard and throbbing in his boxers.

“I’m still here-” Fred did jazz hands against the headboard.

“And I'm busy, shut it.” You spat out as you rocked into George faster, who only grew louder beneath you. Your hands gripped his hips, your nails digging into his skin as you moved. George’s hand moved faster between his legs, which were shaking harder than an earthquake.

With a gasp, George came into his fist without a warning. A cry left lips, his hips bucking between your actions and his fist as he pressed his forehead into the bed. You kept the pace up, your own orgasm just around the corner.

“Almost there, Georgie. You’re so perfect.” You cooed in his ear, your teeth gently biting the tip of the cartilage. You moaned against his neck when you finally reached your own orgasm inside him. You stayed against him for a good while, just holding his sweaty form against his body.

You slowly pulled out and chuckled as George just kinda plopped onto the bed and climbed on the plush mattress with him. You ran your fingers through his sweaty hair and kissed his head.

“You did good. Are.. Are you falling asleep?” You laughed gently, watching the man's eyelids flutter. “Adorable. Love you, Georgie.” You shook your head when he mumbled out a quick ‘love you yoo’ and almost immediately began snoring. Fred cleared his throat, getting your attention.

“Yeah, yeah, I got it.” You crawled over to him, undoing his tie. “Did you learn your lesson?” Your hand grazed over his bulge, your noses practically touching.

“You know I didn’t, baby boy.” Fred cupped your face, his calloused thumbs ran over your cheeks.

You let out a mock sigh of frustration before shaking your head back and forth. You watched his pale hands go to his belt and rip it off. He threw it off to the side before undoing his pants and simply pulling his dick out over the boxers.

“Wanna take care of this for me? I did sit and wait patiently.”

“You didn’t have much of a choice.”

“Just suck my dick, won’t you?”

The bluntness made you snort but you dropped your head down anyway.

“I guess you deserve it.” You held the base of his dick and licked across the head, looking up at him with false innocent eyes. Fred ran his hands through your hair.

“Oh, yeah. You’re amazing.”

“I haven’t done anything yet.” You said between laughs.

“So get to it, dove!”

You rolled your eyes and took the tip into your mouth, your hand moving up and down on the base. The fingers in your hair slowly tightened, grabbing as much as he could. A moan fell from his lips as his head fell back against the wooden headboard with a thud. You licked along the underside of the head. It was clear he wasn’t going to last long.

You took him down to the base, gagging on the head hitting the back of your throat and began to pull back. About half way up, Fred pushed you back down, a needy whine leaving his lips. He used the hand in your hair to control your head going up and down.

“Amazing, dolly. Absolutely perfect.” He was just mumbling under his breath while he listened to you gag and whine around his length. He licked his lips as his hand somehow tightened on your locks. “Gonna cum. Swallow it, oh please swallow it.”

Your eyes were watering by the time he came down your throat, leaving you sputtering and choking. He gently pulled you off. He reached for the closest piece of fabric, which ended up being George’s shirt, and gently wiped himself down.

“I knew there was a reason I loved you.” Fred teased as he threw the cloth and pecked your swollen lips.

“Wow. Only here for my bj skills?” You raised an eyebrow. “And here I thought we had something.” You planted a soft kiss on his lips. He suddenly reached up, holding your face as he stared into your eyes. His entire demeanor shifted to serious as he spoke. “(Y/n). I can tell you right now, me and my brother-”

“My brother and I-”

“Shut it. My brother and I,” his voice was filled with sass again, “have never, ever, ever, eevveerr felt this way about another person. We both love you, we have for a while. Granted this whole thing is super unorthodox, but we care about you.”

“It’s true.” mumbled a half asleep George as his arms snaked around your waist. You couldn’t stop the smile spreading across your lips. “I know, Ginny was right.”

“She’s always right.” They said in unison.

“Now come on, let’s snuggle.” With that, George tugged you down next to him and Fred joined you. The three of you got cozy under a blanket and slowly drifted off, enjoying the body heat of each other.

The next morning, Ginny said ‘I told you so’ more times than you could count, but that was expected, even if you didn’t want to accept it.

#fred weasley x male reader #fred weasley smut #fred weasley #Fred and George Weasley #george weasley x male reader #george weasley smut #george weasley #Fred and George x male reader #x male reader #fred weasley imagine #george weasley imagine #male reader #Ronny Writes #fic #hp male fic #hp fic

999 notes · View notes

nico-idc · 4 years

Text

random vent because i'm numb rn and feel like it

This is a vent post, ill probably talk about su!cide, self h*rm, eating disorders and depression. I’ll also cuss a lot, and things will not be censored. Also, this may seem insensitive to people experiencing any of this, sorry about that. Dont read this if youre triggered by that.

Also, this is my experience with mental health. Everyone deals with it differently.

So, If anyone doesnt know, I have depression and anxiety. And right now, I’m feeling numb as it’s often described by people with depression. But, numb isn’t a very good description. I can still feel. I’ll still smile if you tell me a joke, or if something funny is on a video. I’ll still cry if there’s something super sad. Emotion is just watered down. I feel it, but not as much as I should. Me and my boyfriend were talking, and i couldnt tell him I loved him. It’s not becuase I dont love him, but I just cant feel much of anything, so I dont want to tell him I loved him. Becuase If i did that, I felt as though I was lying. The funniest thing is, I randomly started crying. Still felt nothing, but hey, I had tears streaming down my face. Who fucking knows why.

I havent been doing to great for a while now, but this is the worst i’ve ever gotten. Ive never felt numb before. I mean, I’ve felt myself starting to go through the motions, but i’ve never gone completely numb before. And before this i’ve had a few mental breakdowns. Hell, I’ve sat in a corner twice in the past month or so doing nothing but sobbing and begging myself not to move so I dont grab something sharp and cut myself. (I did not relapse, don’t worry). and recently I completely broke down over simply eating a cereal bar, got through it, ate it. I’m good now.

Figures. That does seem to be my experience. Oh no, big bad issue one time, then magically I just talk myself out of my bullshit, and im fixed. Ha ha, yet I act like I have all these issues. I mean, I didnt even attempt to starve myself, just thought “oh, friends and family wont let me” and didnt. Had a breakdown about a year later, been fine since. Cut for a few months, went to therapy for a few months, stopped cutting. had a few breakdowns about a year or two later, then was fine. was suicidal for a while, went to therapy for a bit, was happy for months. Had breakdowns every now and then, fine now.

ha ha, first time I say alot of this is online. Figures. I’ve done that a lot too. My boyfriend has found out a bit about my depression through this site. Becuase I cant talk to my boyfriend about my shit, but hey random people on the internet! hear about my problems.

So on another note, I recently found a song that describes part of depression pretty well. It’s called “i’m not dead” by boyinaband. it’s linked below, I’ll copy paste the lyrics, and explain how I relate, and what the lyrics mean to me, becuase why not? (lyrics will be in bold)

undefined

youtube

I'm not dead

I'm not fixed, but I'm not giving up yet

Basically, this means that im still here, im still depressed, but I’m still trying to fight depression.

I'm sick of saying that I still don't have anything done

I hate telling friends I'm trying something just to give it up

I never commit to anything, I just say I’ll do something, then decide I dont want to.

I'm still unsure of my emotional state

I'm still incapable of focusing lately

I don't feel like creating

I'm tired of asking Google how to find motivation

I’ve been on break from writing for months now. tried to get back to it, lost concentration. I think this is self explanatory.

I don't think I've ever made

Something that's as good as I'm capable of

Ha, I dont put in enough effort and commitment to make something as good as possible.

I hate not having a reason to look my best

I only ever take care of myself with the intent to show the internet

I mean, I dont try to show the internet, but I only take care of myself when other people will see me.

If what made me successful was an imposed sense of stress then

I am so so glad that I hated myself

The only thing that makes me do things is extreme stress.

I didn't luck into this position

I struggle with decisions

I mean, im not in any high position, but I do struggle with decisions.

I wouldn't be my own friend

I'm too inconsistent

I’m inconsistent as hell. I’m in like 10 group chats, don't talk in any of them for months, then just show up like “hi, havent talked to you all in ages, but hi”.

Without immense pressure nothing ever gets finished

If these words make it to your ears it'll be a fucking miracle.

Yep. I went on whole rant about this on wattpad. Without pressure to do something, I don’t do it.

I'm fortunate to know more good people than most do

I wish I had more friends I could be physically close to

I dont personally have a lot of friends that dont live in my city, so the last line isnt an issue, but I do know a lot of good people”

I'm pretty good at like 20 different skill sets

At the expense of never being great at any one of them

I’m good at quite a few things. Drawing, math, even writing. But im not great at it. I’m average.

I wish this beat hit harder

I wish more syllables rhymed

I know 99 percent of people really don't mind

I dont personally relate to this, seeing as I dont make music.

I think collaborating forced me to finish things

'Cause I was terrified of wasting famous people's time

Oh yeah. Group projects would not get done if i wasnt scared of wasting my partner’s time.

I wish I could focus on what I define priority

I wish I was as grateful as I want to be

Dont really relate to these things

I wish I knew more people who were mentally stable

But if I did,

I wouldn't let them waste their time on me while I'm disabled

Oh yeah. Id love to have a friend who isnt depressed, but I wouldnt let them see that im fucked up becuase i dont wanna drag them down.

I feel alone

I know I'm not

I have a lot of friends, but I still fell alone in this world

I used to talk to lots of people.

Lately I've stopped

They didn't deserve it,

I've been a terrible friend.

But I couldn't bear to let myself become boring to them

I ignore group chats all the time. no reason. Probably shouldnt.

I don't let myself get my hopes up.

I love people who do.

Something good happens? what could go wrong? that is my thought precess.

I never know if what I say I feel is the truth

I have no damn Idea what I think, so its so hard to know what the truth in my head is.

I wish I didn't instinctively try to be less specific

So more people could relate, when they read along with the lyrics.

Not lyrics, but if i write/explain something, I immediately generalize things so its relateable.

I can be happy in the moment

I am not when I reflect

I smile watching youtube, but then I look back and think about how I wasted time.

I distract myself with gaming, waiting to get better

I hate it

Youtube will cure depression right? /s

I wanna do the most good, and prevent the most hurt

But I've gotta put on my own oxygen mask first

This is just an important phrase I try to remember when I’m down. for people who dont do well with metaphors, he’s saying that if you want to help people, you need to help yourself first.

I can't predict what I'll do.

I can never be sure

I am terrified of making promises any more

I can't face my work,

I feel sick from the word

I genuinely believe I'm capable of changing the world

Don’t relate much here, except for the more positive, upbeat tone the song takes on, and i feel that this part, the part above and everything below is dave fighting his depression.

I still think I can get better

I’m holding onto hope.

I still think I can create and get pleasure from it

I hope so, I want my art and writing to improve.

I'll keep aiming to make my emotion and my logic agree

The eternal stuggle. I always try to get the two to line up, it rarely works. I try to use logic more often though.

And become the best version of me

Always trying to improve myself.

I don't want to stop!

There’s alot this could mean. I dont want to stop creating. I dont want to stop fighting. I dont want to stop getting better. I dont want to stop living. I relate to all these things.

I’ll expand on this more later, it’s too late now for me to continue this

#cussing tw #swearing tw #tw suicide mention #tw self harm #tw eating disorder #vent post

5 notes · View notes

joysmercer · 5 years

Text

Brooklyn Nine-Nine 7x01 Final Thoughts

(7x02)

I want to preface this by saying that I was absolutely and completely against them even thinking about trying so early in the season and I was even more against the idea of a pregnancy scare, but although those things happened, this episode still managed to exceed my expectations tenfold. I loved 99 (heh) percent of it, and the stuff I didn’t was mostly due to me being a worrywart and not because there was something wrong with the ep. Let’s get started.

First of all, can I just say how happy I am that Amy verbally said that “[they] agreed not to start trying for at least a year”? After what happened in a certain episode last season, I was convinced that the writers had no idea how to handle this storyline properly (more on that later), but the acknowledgment that Jake and Amy mutually agreed to a time frame and had every intention of sticking to it is a really important step in correcting those wrongs, and I’m really glad they chose to include a line about it not once, but twice.

I also loved seeing the Sleuth Sisters back on screen together! Rosa’s attempts at calming Amy down and helping her were absolutely hilarious (“you know hat keeps me relaxed? kicking stuff” / “glub glub glub…is this helping?” / etc) and the fact that Amy went to her for help made me so happy. I especially enjoyed the bit where they were sorting through the weird pregnancy tests from a bodega—especially because it parallels a similar conversation they had in Grey Star Mutual.

Lastly, the scene at the end between Jake and Amy was lovely and soft and nearly perfect in how it was written and executed (more on this later, too). The part when Amy told Jake about the pregnancy scare and then proceeded to—convincingly—pretend to be bummed until he brought up his feelings himself was excellent: it’s clear from the way they spoke and acted that neither was feeling any pressure to say something they didn’t truly believe, which is why the end result—Jake saying he’s ready to start Trying—is just about as good as it could have been.

Miscellaneous stuff that made me grin:

These two episodes were a clear return to the form/style of seasons 4-5, and I am here for it!

I didn’t write much about the A-plot above, but it was good, clean comedy. Debbie is amazing, as were her interactions with Holt. The end scene between Jake and Holt was especially sweet, and I’m interested to see how their new dynamic progresses in the future.

Jake, concerned about his finances (when he asked Charles to download that app)? Growth.

My remaining thoughts about this episode in the context of season 6 and what I think about what will happen going forward with regards to the themes and issues brought up in it are under the cut. The vast majority of them are not criticisms (of this episode), but they’re not exactly glowing reviews either, so proceed at your own risk.

If we pretend the Joke in 6x16 never happened, this episode would pretty much have satisfied everything I wanted to see regarding Baby Talks. But, as I have mentioned before, I can’t see how that event could have possibly made Jake any more ready to start a family—if anything, it would have set him back a bit. I’m not going to get into why, because I’ve already discussed this issue elsewhere, but the reason I bring it up is that I think that it was—and still is—really freaking important to show Jake’s journey to being ready on-screen, something we haven’t actually seen yet. After such a, well, tumultuous few months, coming to that conclusion couldn’t have been easy, and there’s been too much buildup for the writers to just show this scene and move on.

When the clips to this episode were leaked a few weeks ago, there were 3 Big Things I was mad about: Timing, the concept of a Pregnancy Scare, and Amy having Second Thoughts.

With regards to the Timing, I still think it is much too soon after Casecation (per my calculations, 1.5 months at most have passed) to feasibly have Jake ready to start a family. This is also why it is really, really important to show his point of view soon: this whole storyline just doesn’t seem complete otherwise, and honestly, it makes me a little worried.

Personally, I still think that the Pregnancy Scare plot could have been avoided and that there were other, better ways for Jake to realize he was ready to start trying. While the episode made it clear that he wasn’t pressured in any way to say that he wanted to start trying (see above), hearing about Amy say “I thought I was pregnant” jump-started a part of his brain that probably would have stayed dormant for a little bit more time. I can’t be certain if this was a good or bad thing.

As for Amy having Second Thoughts, that is something Melissa Fumero mentioned in an interview but wasn’t addressed in this episode, and I stand by my earlier statement that this would be a truly bad thing to bring up this late in the game. What they showed in this episode, with Amy concerned that they don’t have a preschool lined up or whatever, is natural, but if they make her seriously question her ability to balance parenthood and her career obligations, I’m going to be really upset. Amy is canonically shown to plan out every single detail thoroughly, and she should have all of that figured out by now. A little bit of panic once she actually becomes pregnant is one thing, but second-thoughts and reconsidering is quite another.

The last bit of worry that I have is that, in a 13-episode season, Jake and Amy will take over a majority of the plotlines. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, except that it increases the possibility of other characters being sidelined in the process. I sincerely hope this doesn’t happen.

That’s it for now! Read my (much shorter) 7x02 Thoughts here.

#b99 spoilers #brooklyn nine nine #b99 #brooklyn 99 #peraltiago #jake x amy #jake peralta #amy santiago #7x01 #manhunter #b99: 7x01 manhunter #spoilers #c: jake peralta #c: amy santiago #p: screw light and breezy {jake & amy}#b99disc #cw discourse #myposts #myfinalthoughts

36 notes · View notes

loulougoingsolo · 5 years

Text

Memories...very hazy memories

At the ripe age of 40 years and 51 weeks (yup, I’m turning 41 in less than a week), I’ve become more aware of taking care of my brain. I’m very mind over body oriented, and although my brain doesn’t always do things in the simplest of ways, it is still my favourite body part. Only, it tends to be packed with unnecessary facts, memories, songs and all kinds of things that I could live without, and it’s sometimes a bit hard to find the important stuff.

So, today Rhett and Link go down the memory lane trying to remember exactly what they once said on GMM. With almost 1700 episodes, it amazes me that they can remember anything specific from all these years, but unlike an average person trying to remember their past, they have video evidence of everything. But can they actually remember anything? Oh, and I’ve linked all the episodes mentioned to this post, be sure to rewatch them!

I’m always at awe of those people in this fandom who can remember specific details about what Rhett and Link said years ago. I have, altogether, a pretty blotchy memory for things that are spoken - I remember visual things much better. And I remember things that I��ve actually understood and processed in my own brain. But if you’d ask me who is the exeption to Rhett’s rule “never tweet with #____life”, I wouldn’t have a clue. For some reason, I did think it might be #doglife, which is closer to the real thing than astronaut. Do I get half a point?

Link is clearly more in touch with his memories, but I think his memory was also a bit easier to go back to because it was so much more personal. Who wouldn’t have some rules about personal space? I think it’s kind a nice to hear him say he has grown as a person, and is now less awkward about touching strangers in a subway. (No, that came out wrong. My bad.)

Another sign of personal growth is Rhett admitting he’s BSing 99 percent of the time with his opinions. I know he is, and being able to do that without a flinch is one of the things that make his jokes so great. But apparently, he can get a little awkward when reminded about his past comments. Also, Link is loving this just as much as I am.

You know what, I think my memory works a bit like Link’s: He doesn’t actually remember what he said, but what he said was originally the result of a thought process, and all he needs to do now in order to find his original comments is to rethink things, and come to the same conclusion. This way of remembering is probably one of the reasons why I never liked learning things by heart without actually understanding them. But Link is really good at this game!

I couldn’t remember much else from the mind map episode than the fact that Rhett had really thought about what he wanted for his mind map, and Link took a more comedic approach, and Rhett had actually added Link on the same paddle board with rest of his family, and that was the sweetest thing ever. Although no one got points this round, I have to say, if Antarctica is an island, wouldn’t that mean all continents are islands? How big can an island be before it turns into a continent? I mean...all continents are surrounded by water, and should therefore be islands. Right?

What does it say about me that I could remember exactly what Rhett said about Tom Cruise’s ball sack? But also, unlike on the other rounds, when Rhett is unable to access this memory, he now does the more Link-style thing of rethinking the ball situation and coming to a similar conclusion as he did in the original episode. He just really believes that Tom Cruise has a tight/smooth ball sack. But I do think he deserves to get a point for good this round.

(This is about as much ball sacks I can take for one day, I prefer not to think about them in any situation, celebrity or otherwise. Moving on.)

Oh, we are not moving too far, now we talk about farts. This was, and still is, a solid theory on what laughter is, and it should be put on a t-shirt. Of course Link remembers this, everybody remembers this. “Laughter is like farting out of your mouth.”

Memory tests make me nervous. I often say that my memory is photographic, but sometimes the photos are a bit blurry, and I can’t see all the details. Also, unless it’s something super interesting, my mind drifts, and I forget I was supposed to concentrate on a specific thing - which is something that happened while Rhett and Link read the way too long instructions to each memory test in GMMore. But I actually did remember the answers to the first test correctly.

The second test is something that I suck at. I tried doing the test like the guys did, by only listening to the sentences Stevie read, but my brain is unable to remember things this way. I did gather the basic idea of the stories, but nothing word to word. And like Link, when I heard the strange verb tread, my mind went to thinking about that. The funny thing is, I’ll probably remember the sentences better in a few days, at a moment when they are not only unnecessary but also distracting. And I may forever remember the camera was a Nikon D5600 DSLR, because I’ve now watched this episode twice and things like that stick to my brain like the ink seems to stick to those whiteboards. I also have a 10000 lb egg in my mind now. And the last four numbers of the final test round.

To end this post, here’s an accurate depiction of a kid who has finished their test first and can’t wait to show the teacher that he knew all the answers. I’ve been that kid. I’m still that kid to this day, on the Spanish class I take. That kid can be a little annoying at times.

#gmm #gmmore #rhett and link #gmm 1678 #remembering old comments #memory testing

21 notes · View notes

aestheticseungmean · 5 years

Text

I am GrOoT- Bang Chan

There is no limit to Bang Chan's childishness when he is around the people that he loves. Somehow, in the midst of his fame, I found a way into this exclusive circle of love and I get the best spot, the girlfriend spot. My favorite days are when Stray Kids get the day off and I get to lay around with my amazing boyfriend and sleep because I have a death grip and I won't let him work. Today was amazing day one out of the four-day-long break that JYP graciously granted for vacation.

Chan has worked hard for what he loves but even sometimes he has to take a break. But Chan is something different when he is on break. His entire mood changes from serious and stubborn to fun and giggly. And because it is break time, Chan was extra giggly today. I laid on my side of the bed minding my business when Chan started to poke my sides and cheeks. A giggle left both of our mouths as I squirmed.

"Y/n, I love your giggles!" A big smile formed across his face as he continued to poke me. "Ah, stooooooop ittttt." I pouted because it tickled and I don't like being tickled. "What do you want to do today?" The words were serene and soft. "I just want to love you to the moon and back." Although I couldn't see him, I could feel a smile spread on his face. "You do that everyday, why don't we do something different?" "Fine, let's watch a movie or get some food."

"Let's do both, I pick the food and my smol bean, Y/n, can choose the movie." I smiled and looked at him, he looked genuinely happy. He placed a kiss on my nose and got out of bed, dragging me with him. My feet carried me to the couch and I plopped down. While scrolling through Netflix, a few of the others came down. "Hey, Y/n! What are you watching?" "Hey, Jinnie~ I was picking a movie for Chan and I to watch."

"I want a relationship like yours. Anyway, can we join?" "Sure, just leave room for Chan so he can sit next to me." The boys nodded and took a seat on the couch, leaving room for their leader to sit next to his girlfriend. I finally chose Guardians of the Galaxy vol.2 since we had all watched the first one. Chan returned with 10 bags of popcorn which I thought was questionable how he knew the boys were out here. I raised my eyebrow and he giggled in response. "It is my father sense, it was tingling."

I rolled my eyes and patted the seat next to me, gesturing for him to sit down. About halfway through the movie, Chan started to think about a way to make the others annoyed. He silently formed the plan in his head without making it obvious that the gears were churning furiously. At the end of the movie, Chan and I woke the ones who had fallen asleep by using an air horn, Chan's idea of course. It was a joke to the others but Minho took it personally. "What the heck? Is this a freaking joke to you?"

The childish Bang Chan just laughed and sat back down, he pulled out his phone and started to play a game as he had grown bored quickly. Minho took the phone from his hands, clearly annoyed that Chan wasn't responding but that made him quick to respond. "I aM gRoOt," Chan said, clearly annoyed. So that is why he was silent, he was planning to become Groot this whole time. The boys and I laughed hysterically but immediately stopped when Minho grabbed the air horn and threw it out the window. We gathered at the window and watched a large box truck run over it.

With that, Minho stomped to his room and slammed the door shut. "Chan, I love you and your jokes but you should go make up for what you did." "I am GrOOt!" He argued back but I gave him that motherly look that I learned from his mom. Reluctantly, he sighed and started to walk into Minho's room. "IN YOUR NORMAL LANGUAGE PLEASE," I yelled before he got too far to be able to hear me. After an hour, Chan came back out and gave me a thumbs up signaling that the conversation went great.

I grabbed his hand and hugged him. "You are such a responsible leader and I love you." My mind flashed through all the moments that we had together. The good, the bad and the mediocre, and I loved each and every single one of them. He kissed the top of my head and softly mumbled, "I am groot." I broke the hug and looked at him a little annoyed. "Seriously, you couldn't respond un you normal language?" I knew I had hit something when I saw his playful expression falter.

Without another word, I made my way to our shared bedroom. Not long after I had settled into the bed, I heard the door open. "What do you want, Chan?" He handed me a plate of my favorite food and looked at me. "Y/n, I love you too and I'm sorry for saying I am groot. Just know that I love you with 99% of my heart." "Chan." I whined. He giggled and said, "The one percent of my heart belongs with the boys and my family. They need me too. But I love you most."

——————————

With that, he kissed me. It was a soft yet passionate kiss that showed how much love and adoration he had for me. When we parted, he grabbed a piece of my food and ate it. "Mine," I hissed. He pointed at me and repeated my words but in a loving tone. I giggled and finished my food. "Let's go to sleep." "Okay." And we fell asleep in each other's arms.

#bang chan #stray kids oneshot #stray kids #bang chan x you #bang chan x reader #chris bang #chan fluff #bang chan fluff

10 notes · View notes

justalittlelitnerd · 5 years

Text

99 Percent Mine by Sally Thorne

“A guy like that is strong in a way that’s deeper than muscle and bones, because he wears his softness on the outside. I think I met my ideal man when I was eight, and no one else has ever measured up.”

Title/Author/Publisher/Year Published: 99 Percent Mine by Sally Thorne | Published by William Morrow in 2019

Time it took to read: 1 day

Plot Summary: Darcy Barrett has traveled the world. She has spent her entire life on the move, no, on the run. From her overbearing twin brother. From responsibility. From her many failures. But mostly she’s been running from the most perfect man in the world, Tom Valeska. She met him when they were 8 and no man has stood a chance. But Tom is her brothers. 99 percent. When Darcy and her brother inherit their grandmother’s cottage with the sole stipulation that they fix it up and sell it Darcy finds Tom back in her life. And for once she doesn’t want to run away. Which sure is partly because she can’t find her passport (she swears her brother stole it). But Darcy also decides that 1 percent of Tom Valeska isn’t enough anymore. She will make him 99 percent hers.

Who would I recommend this to: Lovers of romance and The Hating Game and unique characters.

Similar Books: Christina Lauren’s Josh and Hazel’s Guide to Not Dating comes to mind simply because of the history and the friends to lover trope. I really loved this book so if anyone has suggestions let me know!

What I loved: Darcy. Her boldness. Her fearlessness. Her insecurity. Her complexity and her desires and just how deeply she feels for everything, but in particular how strongly she loves Tom. Tom. His strength. His protectiveness. His love for the Barnetts and his desire to be a part of their family and his fear that they will leave him. Patty. Because who doesn’t love a big strong man with a tiny dog?

What I disliked: Tom leaving for so long just when things were getting good. Darcy and her brother being assholes fighting over Tom like he’s a toy.

Quotes:

I’m still holding my hard stare with the alpha and I get a ping of triumph in my gut when he looks away first. I’m the alpha now. “We must go to the same barber, because you’re looking real pretty, too. Now, order something or get out.” The boss boy is not used to this from a woman and to his surprise he likes it. He chews gum in an openmouthed way, his avid eyes on my face. “What time do you get off work?” I imagine a Ken doll left out in the sun too long, and I step on that soft tan head like it’s a cigarette. “Not for a million years.”

Patty is a shiny shorthaired black and tan Chihuahua, with a big apple dome head. She’s got a judgmental narrowing to her eyes. I don’t take it personally anymore, but sheesh, this dog looks at you like you’re a steaming turd. It’s just her face. She remembers me. What an honor to be stamped permanently in her tiny walnut brain. I pick her up and kiss her cheeks. “What are you doing here so late, Tom Valeska, world’s most perfect man?” Sometimes it’s a relief to hide your most honest thoughts right out in plain view.

I can never decide if Tom’s hair is the color of caramel fudge or chocolate. Either way, yum. The texture is like a romance novel that’s fallen into the bath, then dried: vaguely sexual crinkle waves with the occasional curled edge and dog-ear. I want to jam my hand in it and make a gentle fist.

As his eye fixes onto my boot, the streetlight creates a black blade under his cheekbone. I’d click my camera right now. Now, as he looks at my legs and his lashes create a dark crescent shadow. Now, when those eyes cut to mine and there’s a spark of light in them, and another thought about me in his head. Then he looks away.

Get it together, Darcy. It’s not his fault he was born with your favorite kind of bones. He’s a sweet shy solid-gold human. Someone’s fiancé. You’re a teenage dirtbag. Leave him alone.

I look at the two empty coffee cups and feel the weight of his goodness and I want to tell him the truth in return. The thought of how a million people must abuse his kindness—myself included—makes me crazy. I want to walk two steps in front of him, wherever he goes, bulldozing the world a little flatter for him.

He smells like he always has: a blown-out birthday candle, sharp and smoky. It’s that smell in your nostrils when closing your eyes and making an impossible wish, and your mouth is watering for something sweet.

“Being messed with by Darcy Barrett? It sounds like she’s joking with me, but it feels like she’s telling the truth. And I never know which is right.”

If he keeps pressing me, I’m going to tell him what the problem is: Primarily, that I want to unzip his pants. Second problem, I’m the worst fucking person to be having these thoughts about an almost-married man. Third: I’m so jealous of Megan I’m going to rev the engine of a combine harvester and convert her into a bag of bloody grain. But these have always been my problems.

I dodge sideways toward the back door—I need air. I need sky and stars and cold; I need to sit on the rings of Saturn dangling my boots into the black universe to be alone, but he steps easily around me, and now I’m the one leaning on the sink. “Are you okay?” I want to grab him by the shoulders and check for physical damage. I’ll crack open his chest to check how bad his heart looks.

I somehow walk to the front door on my trembling legs and the cool evening air floods in. I will find the nearest ocean and walk in, all the way down to Atlantis, and inquire about real estate.

“I am throwing myself at her feet. Every minute of every day. She just doesn’t notice.” His hand cups the back of my head and my entire world is his muscles and the smell of his T-shirt. The wax-sweet smell of birthday candles and wishes and ugh, it’s going to hurt when he lets me go.

My stomach falls down an elevator shaft. Those words, spoken aloud in his voice, crackle through my synapses, and right now, I’ve never been more alive. I am heartbeat and full lungs. If you were mine. What a glorious thought to cross his mind; I never imagined it would. “What else would you do?” I’ve got that husky voice he likes. The animal in him is honest with me. “Everything. If you were mine, I’d do everything.” Our gold bubble locks shut, and a little universe fills it. The possibilities are infinite.

I have now found something I like better than sugar, and I’m an instant addict. Worse, a junkie. I’ve subsisted on his one-second glances my whole life, and now I’ve got his mouth on mine? I know what I’d do to keep him. He should feel afraid. The first touch of his tongue loosens my knees and I’m grateful that he’s holding me up. I shudder a breath out. He inhales it, changes our angle, exhales it back to me. Air is better from his lungs. Life is better with his kiss. The word mine is now something I need to make him understand.

“No one else is kissing you anymore,” he tells me in a conversational hush, not breaking our contact. “Your mouth is mine.” The thought is more than he can bear; now we’re twisting each other’s clothes and the kiss is like a conversation with no words—louder and louder, talking over each other: Listen to me. No, you listen to me.

Tom is sharing this secret part of himself; I’m bitten, spread, gripped, and I have never been wanted this intensely. He will kill and live and die for me. It’s big, what he’s feeling. All I know is, I’m his now. I put a hand on the back of his neck as he presses a kiss to my shoulder.

“Hey,” Tom says, and when I look up at him my heart unfurls. There’s no better word for it. It’s like a time-lapse photo of a rose opening whenever I think about how he is mine.

#99 percent mine #sally thorne #the hating game #books #book blog #book quotes #booklady #booklr #quotes #tom valeska #friends to lovers #romance #fiction #if you were mine #darcy barrett

1 note · View note

p-alex · 6 years

Text

it’s another one of those times where i read about certain people not cutting toriel some slack so i started thinking about why i like him more than her (and, on a broader level, what might cause that reaction in general), and the conclusion i’ve drawn goes like this:

toriel as a character is written in such a fashion that she’s frustrating if you don’t buy wholesale into her gimmick.

think about it like this: can you think of any moment during the game where toriel’s principles are questioned to any degree? the only instances of anyone even voicing something like discontent towards her that i can recall is her being rejected when she tries to propose peaceful human-monster relations after asgore dies and undyne going “oh my god!” during the “into the trash” bit in the postgame.

“wouldn’t that be enough?”, i hear you ask? no, not really, because the latter is an off-hand remark that she doesn’t even react to and the former... well, that’s gonna take a bit longer to explain.

see, the discussions about toriel’s decision to go into the ruins are really grating because 99 percent of the time, all parties involved, regardless who they side with, seem to think it’s the outcome of a binary choice. either toriel chooses to stick around in new home and talk asgore out of his rage or she goes to the ruins to stop the humans from getting killed.

i want to propose a third choice called “go to the ruins, wait for the heat to cool off and slowly work on convincing monsters that the war against humans is a Bad Idea”

“wouldn’t that take way too long?”, i hear you ask again, which i ask back: “how much time do you think toriel has at her disposal?” people seem to underestimate just how much time must’ve passed between them getting sealed in the mountain and being freed at the end of it. a total of eight humans fell down, seven of which during the timeframe that matters the most, and given that asriel got shot with arrows when he left through the barrier and society depicted in the end credits seems to mirror our own, it should be easy to assume that this whole thing took at least a few hundred years. the only ones implied to have lived throughout that entire timeframe are three in number, two of them don’t age and the last one’s a turtle, which are known to have long lifespans, so his lifespan’s probably absurd as well.

point being, time is hardly an issue. and there’s even more! as the mother of the child whose death caused this escalation in the first place, wouldn’t she have one hell of a trump card in arguments? wouldn’t anybody want to at least listen to a woman that, despite right in the middle of this disaster, is unwilling to let blood be paid with blood because no matter how heinous her son’s death was, the pain and anguish she felt was so great that she wouldn’t want anyone else to live with that burden?

then how come it feels like she never really tried to resolve this? the frustration comes in when you consider that toriel is refered to as the brain to asgore’s heart, yet all the smarts she could muster amounted to “locking up any human that falls into the mountain, only for them to slip through regardless despite her warnings”? it wouldn’t make sense for her to tell you less than the previous humans unless she somehow banks on reverse psychology by hoping that knowing less about how dangerous the underground beyond the ruins is would make you want to stay in the ruins more? and even within the ruins, she seems to have failed to communicate her point, since she just glares at that one froggit at the start to shoo him off and a later dialogue scene reveals that they’re terrified of her.

and to bring this back around to what she does in those neutral endings... why would she ever think anyone would listen to her then? i can buy that trying to bring up peaceful relations right after asriel‘s death is a dumb idea, and that she couldn’t handle the strain. but then asgore dies, right after a human shows up, and it’s then when she decides that they want to talk? did she not notice how much asgore was adored by his people? was all the time she spent talking with sans wasted on nothing but knock-knock jokes and asking him to keep an eye on you throughout your journey (while somehow missing that he’s so fickle that he outright admits to you that he would’ve killed you if she hadn’t)? she had a frighteningly large window of opportunity to do anything useful, but only decides to take action after it had passed?

which gets me all the way around to toriel being frustrating to think about. i don’t have any issue with believing that she wants the best for everyone and is, ultimately, a good person, but the way she seems to actively sabotage herself in the pursuit of her goals makes me wonder how anyone can consider her “smart” seeing how she rivals asgore in how boneheaded her decisions are in the long term. by comparison, asgore has tried to find a way past the barrier that wouldn’t require sacrificing humans (which failed spectacularly, but was, in fact, attempted) and was willing to die for a kid he’d known for five minutes just so someone could leave that place and do something about the issue at hand. but those shouldn’t be points that i’m giving to the guy predisposed to be your final roadblock. i should be looking at toriel and think to myself that she did what she could to ease the tension, but failed in face of all the pressure instead of as the anti-guts to asgore’s anti-griffith.

look, i don’t want to have issues with toriel’s character just for the sake of it. i’m not even going to pretend that i don’t have at least some bias for asgore despite how much of a fuckup he is. who knows, maybe i have missed something that would make me respect her more, and i really want to believe that i do. but despite having kept my eye on the fandom for so long now, i never felt like those issues i had were adressed to a satisfying degree. maybe the occasional piece of fanart that was willing to portray toriel’s approach as flawed at the very least, but those are few and far between.

either way, i figure i should just put this out there and hope for some interesting responses since this post is clearly way too long already and i still feel like i’m missing at least half my argument here.

#undertale #asgore #toriel #venting

17 notes · View notes

keywestlou · 3 years

Text

COCKFIGHTING.....AN ILLEGAL AMERICAN SPORT

Cockfighting never totally goes away. There is always a fight somewhere around.

The “sport” is illegal in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Illegal for spectators also, though only in 43 states and the District of Columbia.

Luis Blanco’s arrest yesterday prompted me to write about cockfighting as today’s lead topic. Luis is 54. A Key West resident. He also maintains a cockfighting operation on property owned by him on Rockland Key. A mere 5 miles north of Key West.

Though illegal, cockfighting can be found in the backwoods and mangroves. Blanco was breeding chickens to fight and holding fights at his Rockland Key property.

Cockfighting is referred to as a “blood sport” for obvious reasons. Whether winner or loser, the chickens bleed big time.

History tells us cockfighting is thought to be 6,000 years old. The first recorded mention of the sport is 1591 when Magellan discovered cockfighting in the Philippines.

The sport is popular among Latinos. Probably why there is always a cock breeding farm and game site in the Keys somewhere.

Blanco will probably do time. Cockfighting is frowned upon. His bail set at $50,000 suggests the seriousness of the charges.

Key West is part of Monroe County. Monroe County is home to all of the Keys.

It was reported thus past week that the highest property taxes in Florida are those in Monroe County.

It had to happen! Inevitable! A male who considers himself a female appeared in the female section of the Wi Spa in Los Angeles.

He was naked as were all the women. Some of the females were teenagers and children.

A woman customer saw him/her walking around naked with his “dick” slinging left and right. She shouted out, “He has a penis!”

The woman was upset.

The Spa refused to evict him. Spa management was aware he was a member of the LGBT community and considered him a woman also. The Spa felt it was duty bound to permit him use of the female section.

Surfside deaths now up to 11. One hundred fifty persons remain buried in the rubble. Search efforts continue. No one relenting in the search for survivors.

The $9 million repair work that might have prevented the collapse had a different number reported yesterday. The cost now estimated at $15 million.

Another interesting development. Thirty six hours before the building fell, a contractor was in the pool/lower area of the building. He was there with permission in order to prepare a bid for cosmetic restoration of the pool and the price of new equipment.

He observed cracks in the concrete, an exposed rebar, and a wet floor in the pool equipment room.

He took pictures. The photos telling. He gave the photos to the press. They were shown on the internet this morning.

I cannot agree with everything Blacks want. They forget certain things may require them to change rather than the white population.

Towson University recently conducted a symposium titled: “Antiracist Pedagogy Symposium.” Certain professors and students were of the opinion that what is considered proper grammar is racist. Racist because it perpetuated whiteness.

Those maintaining the view took the position that Blacks have their own way of talking and writing. The Black language referred to should be taught and used.

Blacks will probably see it differently. However, I have an opinion on the subject. To me what the blacks want is to be accepted into white society. They want to be white. The solution is simple. They should adopt “white methods.” It is the Blackswho seek change, not the whites.

The arrogance, stupidity, stubbornness, etc. has to stop as it concerns being vaccinated against Covid-19. The proof is obvious. It has arrived.

Somewhere between 99 and 100 percent coronavirus deaths are now by those who were unvaccinated.

Speaks for itself! Stop being a “show off” and get vaccinated! Your life and the lives of others have value.

It also was reveled this past week that it appears there may be a “lasting immunity” for those who were vaccinated with Pfizer and Moderna.

Unvaccinated…..Get vaccinated!

The Arizona audit is back in the news. New polling indicates independent voters oppose the controversial recounting of ballots by a wide margin. Overall taking into account the entire voting population, 1/2 oppose the recount effort.

Sean Noble is a top Arizona GOP operative. He says re the audit, “It’s a failure. It’s a joke.”

Another piece of news re the machines themselves being audited. Their has been concern the machines could not be used in any further elections. The present audit has misused, abused, moved, taken apart, etc. so accuracy cannot be depended upon.

Makes sense. The issue was raised about 2 months ago also. The problem was raised and explored. Same conclusion as to the sanctity of the machines. They could not be used again.

At the time, it was indicated the cost to replace the machines was $6 million.

Those who promoted the audit should be made to pay the$6 million. Not the taxpayers.

Tuesday again. Tonight at 9 my time, Tuesday Talk with Key West Lou. Join me. Fun time/serious time. I rant and rave about what I feel good is happening and that which I consider bad.

A quick moving half hour. www.blogtalkradio.com/key-west-lou.

COCKFIGHTING…..AN ILLEGAL AMERICAN SPORT was originally published on Key West Lou

0 notes

brandoncarlo · 7 years

Note

i respect why you rshit on the bruins so much cause like 99 percent of bs fans do the same for the same reasons. however, & i know its your blog but,,, i think maybe some people on here get offended when you shit on krug cause hes not as bad as you make him out to be & their emotions are linked to him being recognized for his good doings. i really LOVE your blog but torey is the reason i didnt quit hockey & when you talk bad about him it negatively affects me, i dont want to stop following you

No and i totally understand respect why people feel that way and i try to joke about how unfair i am to him. Like I made a post tonight about how Monte made a very obvious mistake and i was like “haha how can i blame this one krug.” i know he matters to people and I know I give him a lot of shit. I also know that while he’s a good offensive defensemen that i just don’t like those types of players when they aren’t defensively responsible and thats’ not Torey’s game and I understand that. But I don’t like the way he plays and I totally respect and empathise and understand that you are so connected to Torey and I honestly respect that so much. Like i don’t hate Torey. I joke about it but I don’t. I have a lot of good feelings for him. So I get where you’re coming from but you guys also need to understand you gusy don’t get the full story just reading through my blog. I’m sorry that it’s difficult for you but, and I made a post about this a while ago, people need to start coming to grips with the fact that sometimes their favs are not as good as they think they are and that it doens’t matter you can love a player as unapologetically as you want regardless of skill. People talk shit about Krejci all the time and he’s the player I would literally die for, I think about how much I love him and get choked up.But i also know a lot of people think he’s disposable and i’ve come to grips with the fact that, part of it is true. and i love him anyway.

I know why people don’t like it. It’s also mostly a joke. And if I was being actually problematic in the way I talked about him id’ feel more responsible for changing how I speak about him. But all i’ve been saying is he has really bad giveaways, and he’s not defensive enough for my tastes. which are true. I also have been joking about some of the things i’ve been saying about him. So you don’t really need to explain to me why people don’t like it. I get it. But also there’s nothing I can really do about it.

#Anonymous

3 notes · View notes

softspotforstars · 5 years

Text

Oh wow. I just realized I haven’t posted in over a month! For some reason I thought I posted back around when I dropped Joey off at the trainer, but that must’ve just been my recollections of an Instagram post or two. So if you follow me on there, you’re likely pretty up to date with my goings on, but for posterity, I’ll give some more details about things here.

Let’s start with Joey since I know most people are here for the horsey stuff. Hawaii later? Sounds good.

So, I took Joey to the trainer a couple weeks later than initially planned. He was originally supposed to go at the tail end of April, but it ended up being put off until the first week of May since Trainer (J) had two shows back to back and wasn’t going to be on hand to watch him settle in. Knowing Joey, I wasn’t terribly worried that he wouldn’t settle well with whoever was watching the barn, but I can understand J’s apprehension, so I was totally fine with two more weeks of Joey cuddles.

So, on May 2nd, I took a half day off work and went to the barn and found Joey laid flat out in the hay unconscious, and knowing him, likely snoring. (I wasn’t close enough to hear, but if you remember the video of his gelding, you know snoring is in his repertoire.)

Afternoon naps are the best.

Oh hi, mom.

Do I have to get up though?

I went on and did my evening barn chores so I wouldn’t have to do them that night when I got back without him, then hooked up to the trailer and got all the windows and vents opened for him while waiting for K to get there to ride along for moral support/trailer driving coaching. I’ve only pulled the trailer 4 times or so and never with one of my own horses on board, just S’s (thanks S for guinea pigging your horses?) 😂 The drive over was uneventful minus the fact that the last 10 miles of interstate driving included an absolute gully washing downpour. I joked that Joey’s entire face would be drenched when we got there.

A couple days before this, I got the grand idea to practice loading with Joey because I couldn’t remember if he’d been on my trailer. I knew he’d been on K’s stock type that has all the open sides and room, but thought my small, dark, two horse slant might prove more scary. What I didn’t consider was that I wouldn’t be able to get Joey to back OFF of the trailer. Being his typical fearless self, he followed me onto my dark little trailer with little hesitation and he stood quietly beside me as if we were just standing in the field chilling. Zero percent nervous, not even terribly curious about things really. Just in a trailer. No big deal. Cool. Except he was NOT feeling backing off. At first he was like, sure mom, backing, I know this game. Then he realized he’d have to let his back feet drop off into the oblivion and he very calmly told me no. For 30 minutes or so. No escalation, no further nerves about being on the trailer, just resignation to the fact that we now live in the horse trailer.

As I mentioned, my two horse slant is small. If I hadn’t have the rear tack expanded I might have had a better chance at convincing him to back off, and it wouldn’t have been so tight to let him turn around in the trailer, but I finally gave up, looped the lead rope around his neck and got off the trailer to let him figure out how to handle the situation. Questionable logic possibly, but I think he’s proven capable of rational thought, so I figured why not let him figure it out. So he glanced over his shoulder at me, contorted himself into a pretzel and turned around. He then looked at me quietly and waited for me to grab the lead rope and encourage him to step down.

Or rocket launch off. Naturally.

So when we pulled in at J’s, I’d already decided just to let him pretzel and turn again and ask J to put that on the list of things that Joey needs to learn if he thinks he isn’t ready to ride and needs something else ground work wise to work on in the meantime. J said that the first couple of weeks he was there would be focused on ground work and that he would teach him how to back. I replied that he knows how to back, but the off of a trailer part was the crucial bit of the sentence and he just reiterated that he’d get a lot of groundwork first. Sounds good to me.

So, the interesting thing about working with a new trainer is that they have no idea of the owner or horse’s abilities at drop off. Not that I’m a seasoned pro or that Joey is the epitome of a cultured two year old, but honestly between my half ass effort and Joey’s general trainability, we really haven’t done half bad. But, since J didn’t know either of us from Adam, I think it’s safe to say that he probably proceeded with caution since he knows so little about us. So sure, by all means, teach my baby how to back. 😉

A couple days before he left-hand grazing the driveway with Cheddar.

After the weekend, I messaged J to check in and asked how Joey was doing, to which I got a “doing good and eating fine” message back. I’ve only known Joey not to eat once and that was when he had the infection/ran the super high fever after his castration, so yeah, I’d hope he’s eating. I had already determined that J was a man of few words, so I didn’t take it personally and went to Hawaii eager to return and see how groundwork was going on the 17th. On the 10th, eight days after I dropped Joey off, I received a short video clip that showed Joey trotting around the indoor with J aboard. He was low headed and quiet on a loose rein and looked more balanced than I’ve seen a lot of horses after 30 days, much less in this short of an amount of time.

I’d be lying if I said that seeing my kiddo going so well didn’t hit me right in the feels. I was a tiny bit sad that I’m missing a lot of his training, but I also know that that is just part of having a horse in full time training, even though I’m far from used to this scenario. Most of my emotion was sheer pride. I’ve always been the horsey friend with the least training skills, so to see my baby moving ahead of schedule after spending 99% of his formative time with me and me alone was validating. I give 90% of the credit for his trainability to damn good genetics, but that other 10% was me…doing something right? I spent the rest of Friday in Hawaii on a high. There’s nothing like being on a dream vacation and getting SO excited about what you have waiting on you at home.

So, after a week in Hawaii, I arrived back in Virginia and made plans to go see Joey first thing the next morning. I walked in the barn to see him tied and he watched me very closely. J was on another horse in the outdoor so I scratched on Joey for a few minutes (and teared up a tinyyyy bit to be honest…) before going out to say hi to J. Joey seemed 100% at home and like I’d just walked out of the barn five minutes before, not two weeks ago.

After finishing up with the other horse, J tacked Joey up casually like you would a broke trail horse and lunged him a few circles at all gaits in each direction before bridling him and mounting. Honestly I felt like I was watching a smaller version of Paige because he stood quietly while J mounted and just had the same general demeanor that I’m used to with Paige. He walked him around and flexed his neck a couple of times before reaching back and fooling with the saddle bags on the back of the saddle, making noise with the velcro on them numerous times while Joey just walked along unbothered by it all.

I had told J that Joey was laid back when I first met him then again when I dropped him off and had also said that he has a lot more whoa than go. J countered that several do until stalled and put on the alfalfa, then they get a little hot until they settle in. So I was pleased to hear that being stalled and on alfalfa hasn’t changed his disposition at all. J stated that if he keeps the same attitude as he has currently that Joey is the type of horse that he likes to train and that he’d much rather have one that quits unless you make him work vs. one that runs hot and has to be ridden down to get to a point of being trainable. I’m 100% not the type of rider who wants/likes a hot horse, so I agreed that I’d prefer Joey stay lazy as well since that’s what I’m used to with his mother. Willing to work if you ask, but otherwise willing to chill. I bred for that brain first, conformation and movement second, and color third.

This is one of the reasons I’m happy to have Joey in full training somewhere. A few friends have quipped that Joey is so easy I could’ve started him myself, which is debatable. I can see their point in that Joey is so easy, but by sending him to a professional I keep his willingness to quit from becoming a insistence to quit. CoughcoughRobin. I know where my strengths lie and training riding horses who don’t have holes in their training is far from one of them.

Anyway, after watching Joey walk and trot around the indoor, J kissed and Joey immediately bopped up into a little rolling canter so quietly that it surprised me. I didn’t even know if he was loping him yet at all so to see him effortlessly step into the lope made me grin. The balance and body control that Joey has already after two weeks in training is something I keep being surprised by. He’s always been this derpy little baby in my head, so to see him capable of something athletic looking for his stage of training made me happy. J quipped that he was going to start riding him in spurs the next week (which is now I guess) so that he can show Joey that he has faster gears than he’s currently volunteering. He said that everything up to this point has been about forward movement with steering and brakes, but I can see why he wants to use the spurs because even maintaining what I call Joey’s “lah-te-dah” trot and rolling canter is taking some pretty dramatic pony kicks. Naturally this doesn’t surprise me at all after teaching him how to go on the longe line as the gaits he’s given me have always defaulted to what is easiest. So I guess this week Joey is learning about how to adjust his speed and stride length now that J feels like he’s ready to accept spurs.

After demonstrating Joey both ways at all three gaits, J dropped the reins and grinned and said, “not half bad for two weeks.” I heartily agreed. I’d told J previously that Joey’s well being, mentally and physically, ranked over rushing him into things, so it was reassuring to see how easily things seem to be going and how comfortably Joey is adapting to working life. J again mentioned that he likes that Joey isn’t reactive or hot because that allows him to gradually increase the length of his workouts with gaining fitness in mind while still being able to teach him something with each ride. While I agree with the old adage that wet saddle pads make broke horses, it’s nice to see a trainer realize that it isn’t necessary to work one into the ground past their point of physical ability. Joey left his workout looking alert and engaged without looking warm or overworked.

Immediately after being ridden.

When I initially Talked to J about Joey I told him that I was hoping to eventually show in the ranch events at APHA shows and that my long term big goal was to ride him and look the part at the APHA World Show. When I told J that in January, he gave me a little spiel about how much training goes into a horse showing at that level and what qualities a horse has to have to be competitive in the ranch classes. This information wasn’t new to me, but once again, J didn’t know me or my horse from Adam, so I think he was taking my goals with a grain of salt. I haven’t brought anything competitive up again since that conversation, opting instead to let Joey demonstrate whatever skills he has to J over the course of time and let J make his own opinions about Joey’s possible future. I realized my goals might not be terribly far fetched when after mounting Joey and starting to walk circles, J looked at me and asked when and where the APHA World Show is held. I told him and he went on to ask me several questions about Paige and Tanner and trying to get a better idea of Joey’s breeding, so I think the wheels are definitely turning now that Joey has demonstrated that he’s more than a pretty colored gelding.

What do you mean I have to be more than pretty?

J has a show this coming weekend, so I’ll be going another two weeks without seeing the kiddo. Not that I can’t go down there on the week nights, but at this point I’m not the person that needs to be riding him, so I can make better use of my time by getting stuff done at the house and farm on week night evenings instead of driving over and watching Joey. It’s fun to see the progress in two week intervals honestly. Based on what J had said, I set my expectations low for the first two weeks and was more than pleasantly surprised to see Joey at the point that he’s at. Until then I’ll just keep watching the videos from Friday on a loop…makes sense, right? 😉

Baby Riding Horse Oh wow. I just realized I haven't posted in over a month! For some reason I thought I posted back around when I dropped Joey off at the trainer, but that must've just been my recollections of an Instagram post or two.

0 notes

frauzet · 7 years

Text

Caught #36

I hunker down and run my hand over the surface in front of me. The texture of the stone tickles my fingertips. After a slight increase of the applied pressure, the cold seeping out of the material spreads through my fingers. There is no crack between the single steps to fit a fingernail into. The whole stair is hewn from a single block. Just these few moments suffice for my fingers to start growing numb. Like on our way down the ventilation shaft, there is the feeling of warmth being sucked out of my body. Only this time it’s stronger. I can’t help the gasp that escapes me when I pull my hands away. The perceived drag can be chalked up to my imagination!

“What is wrong?” Ciner is immediately on alert.

“Nothing!” I declare shaking my head. I take the steps to the gate and nothing happens. The numbness vanishes as I flex my fingers. “Feels like it tried to feed on me!” I mutter under my breath.

“It?” the Sith asks. “You mean the tomb?” His brows draw together. “Interesting thought!” His gaze shifts from me to the gate in front of us and back again.

Kark! My remark hasn’t been meant for his ears. I need to guard my tongue better than this. A credit for his thoughts. I don’t like his current expression. No, not at all! There is no need to take any risks here and let him come to wrong conclusions. I have no idea what exactly the security footage shows. “I am pretty sure there were no sacrifices involved when my friend opened the gate,” I explain. On the other hand I don’t have a clue on how to open it.

The Sith shifts his stance to face me. “And to how many percent — by your estimate — does ‘pretty sure’ translate to?” He is showing way too much of his teeth for my liking.

“137, more than enough,” I snap and he chuckles.

“Do not worry! As long as you honor our deal, I will do the same. It is reassuring to have another option if you fail, though.”

I can’t tell whether or not he’s joking. “Yeah, very reassuring!” Yet! I don’t have any clue yet, I remind myself. There are no obvious buttons on the two smaller statues guarding the gate.

“What can I say? I was foretold I would meet my key to this tomb. Now here you are, but destiny forgot to also deliver the usage instructions.”

At least he doesn’t need ab-usage instructions. Reassuring, my ass. “It’s not like I am a droid,” I grumble while I feel for any markings on the door itself.

Ciner nods. “I noticed. Droids usually do as they are told. And otherwise you reset them to factory adjustments. Getting rid of your bad habits would be a more tedious effort.”

The pot calling the kettle black! There is no point in risking my life and possible freedom just to make him scowl. Well, I try. “Lucky for you, that won’t be your problem, and lucky for me,” I say as I take off the backpack, “it won’t be mine either.” After short rummaging I raise the data pad in the air. “Someone realized it might be a good idea to keep the contents despite not being able to understand what they were. If this had been reset, we would be in trouble.” Or, in my case, in even more trouble.

Ciner’s mouth twitches in amusement. He got my point. Still. “There were no instructions on opening the gate,” Ciner points out. He has learned the map by heart. However he managed that in less than 15 minutes.

Giving the pad a rest on the top stair I stretch my back and crack my fingers. This might take a while. “Say, you had the brilliant idea to hide a bunch of valuable information behind a game for which you hold the high-score on various densely populated planets in several sectors.” I tilt my head to regard him. His pursed lips tell me he has trouble with the image. Not a gamer then. “If you are able to reach level 99 without breaking a sweat, do you seriously hide everything you got behind the third level?” His eyes widen. “I am pretty sure there is more to be found,” I affirm.

“Pretty sure? 137 percent?” Then more serious, “it does sound reasonable, though.” He observes me sitting down and booting the pad.

With a tap on the icon I start the game. “She was a genius, that much is certain!” A cough to hide the catch in my voice.

“Just out of curiosity. How many percent does ‘certain’ translate to?”

In the back of my mind Ce’na sticks her tongue out. I want to do the same. I am capable of rule of three, and percentage calculation and I am kriffing proud of it. I swallow my pride and concentrate on the game. Why would I even care about the Sith’ opinion of me? I’ll be rid of him as soon as we get back out of this tomb.

The first levels don’t require much skill, only about a minute each of the rest of my life. What’s not eaten up by the game, the steps are sucking out of my ass, which sounds weird when I say it like that. Marun’s injection did some good, but it hasn’t conjured any more flesh onto my bones. During level 5 I feel the cold creeping towards some more tender parts I am quite fond of. Since I can’t rule out I’ll get the chance to use them again, I take the break after level 5 to repurpose the backpack to a seat pad. My scowl is supposed to discourage anyone from making jokes about karking hemorrhoids. The days when I thought, people at age twenty were old, have gone past long since. By the time I reach level 12 Ciner already paced up and down the hall several times. Level 25 and he stops in front of me.

“How long will this take?”

I shoot him a quick glance. “Longer if you distract me at the wrong moment.” I don’t bother to wait for his reaction. Level 25 doesn’t make me break a sweat, but I have to keep an eye on the preview. Why does this kriffing game don’t have any save points? Ce’na loved it. I played a few times to humor her. I beat her at target practice. She annihilated me in this game’s battle mode. If she hid the info behind one of the last levels I might as well kill myself now. Only, she wouldn’t do something so impractical, would she? Her image in my mind shakes her head so hard her lekku fly. No, she would never overdo anything this much, not even if she found it hilarious. About half an hour till level 35. Where does impractical turn to useless?

“We don’t have all day!” Ciner’s feet roam outside of my field of vision, yet the acoustics in this chamber carry his muttered remark, words and meaning clear as crystal.

I look up to retort. “It’s so much cozier here than in my cell. You can’t blame me for dragging this out.” He makes a face which tells me he speaks sarcasmic, too. Only, getting ruffled doesn’t help with winning the game. With a blaring sound I lose one of my three lives. “Kark! Here we go. Two lives left. If I lose those, too, I’ll have to start all over again. You want this to be over? Stop karking distracting me for no karking reason. If that’s not too karking much to ask for!” I never made it past level 75. Do I dare hope she didn’t hide it past that? I visualize someone playing with her lek, gazing up through nonexistent eyelashes, managing the same effect nonetheless. A picture of pure innocence. 37 and one life already lost. I hate this game.

“Calm down! I know it takes as long as it takes.” The Sith draws a deep breath, leans against the legs of one of the statues, faces me. “I have a bad feeling. Maybe the shyracks are gathering to come back.” He looks towards the corridor we came through.

I rub the strain from my eyes and crack my knuckles again. “Kark them, this changes nothing. If they come back, we’ll deal with them — again! What matters now is that I win this kriffing game. Why don’t you guard the hallway, while I do my part?” I’d prefer to snap some over-sized lizard-birds’ necks right now.

Ciner hesitates, presenting me with the full force of his fire-bespeckled gaze. I’m probably the first slave to give him any orders. I don’t care. All I care about is my end of the deal. I pretend not to notice anything amiss. Signs of anger? Like what? Balled fists? Sorry, too busy unclenching my own. There is something I am even more proud of than percentage calculation, and that’s my karking word. I keep my deals. I don’t do kriffing breaches of promises. Yes, I told the Sith, I didn’t know how to open the gate. Still, that little detail lost importance along the way. I want my kriffing chance to be free again. I restart level 37. Out of the corner of my eyes I see Ciner amble over to the passage. He utters something under his breath, but the only thing I catch this time is ‘feedback loop’.

#frauzet's fanfic #AU:Caught

3 notes · View notes

silverwhisp · 7 years

Text

Only For Matchups Unless You’re Really Curious About Me.

I am a 22 year old, straight demi sexual male who is six foot one, who has hazel eyes, and charcoal black curly hair that can’t be straightened no matter what I try. I’m not all too concerned about what I wear but it always matches so I don’t look like a clown or something but I do enjoy dressing up in a jacket and suit when I can. I always get INFJ on the Myers Briggs Test and it never changes. Its called The Advocate if I recall correctly. One big aspect about me is my Asperger’s syndrome. A form of Autism that is on the higher end of the scale. It comes with one thing all forms of autism share and that’s over sensitivity to visual, sound, and touching inputs. That basically means my mind wants to process all that input it receives at once and refuses to filter out the useless input such as a car driving by as you are writing something in your home. This is one reason I struggle with large crowds if I am not allowed to leave. My mind it trying to process all the words around me at once and thus can get overloaded. My sense of sight isn’t as bad but I see allot of details in things most people would ignore. It also comes with a difficulty developing social skills and understanding social things. Social ques are a bit hard for me to read and I have a hard time introducing myself to people. Another thing that is hard for me is figuring out how I should show my empathy. It doesn’t happen often but there are times where my mind takes a moment or two longer to process an emotion I see someone having. I will react accordingly when my mind finally does process it. I also miss sarcasm sometimes or some jokes once in a while. I’ve gotten better at it now that I’m older though. I also tend to use certain textures as a stem to calm my nerves down. I really like running my fingers through hair when I am able. I only use my own to do so but would be very happy if a girlfriend would let me do that to their hair. All of this is linked to my Asperger’s syndrome. Another thing people should know is that I am honest and can’t lie worth a damn. I am so honest that sometimes I may sound like I’m being mean and all you have to tell me is that I’m being mean and I’ll stop and apologize. I have learned that If I can’t suggest ways to fix a problem, then I shouldn’t give my opinion on it unless its someone who is struggling with their emotions. Then I would just offer a hug or a shoulder to cry on. I may not have advice but I can always listen. I don’t judge people based on what they look like, who they love, or what they wear. What I truly care about is if you are a decent person. If you’re genuinely trying to do good, are doing, good, or are just kind I will be your friend without an issue. I am interested in the true you, not what you happen to look like or who you love. I couldn’t care about that. As long as you and your partner or partners are consenting adults and aren’t hurting anyone including each other, then do what you will. I’m very easy to get along with as long as you’re friendly and as I said above, a good person. Once you have a me as a friend, you have a friend that will stick by you through thick and thin. Just call and I will be there to help you as soon as possible. I will protect you with my life if need be. Ride or die is what I think they call it. I, unfortunately, am a bit distant to my parents. It’s not their fault and I cannot stress that enough. When my sister was nine and I was eight, her appendix ruptured thanks to her doctor’s incompetence. After that she wasn’t the same after that. She was prone to getting sick and having seizures if she was exposed to flashing lights. My parents had to pay all their attention to her as I was left to my own devices. It’s no one’s fault. It was a bad situation but it happened and now I don’t feel all that close with my parents. I am close with my sister though which is good. Now for hobbies. I have two hobbies. I love writing. I love it allot. I love writing stories, fan fiction, head canons and many other things. I find it so relaxing to do so. I have completed one fanfiction which is now creeping up on 50k views on wattpad and is just over 10k on deviant art in total. I love it allot. My other hobby is metal work. I am actually in college to become a blacksmith and I am loving it. The way I form metal to the shape I want is very satisfying to me. I do have other things I like mind you but those are the main things. I’d be willing to try new things if asked but if I don’t like it I will tell you as much. If you never try it how can you not like it truly so I’ll try things. Just if I don’t like it don’t expect me to do it again. I discovered two things thanks to this. One thing is that I am actually a decent sword fighter. I’m not amazing but I can hold my own in a fight. The second thing is that I love dancing. Slow dancing is my absolute favorite and would be down with just dancing for no reason other than to dance with someone. I am a great listener. You never have to worry about me judging you for anything you ever say to me. I will do my best to support you if you get emotional. I’ll let you sob into my shoulder and hold you if you allow it. And whatever you tell me stays between us unless I think it could threaten your life if I stayed silent. Trust me, I know what can happen if you stay quiet about your pain for too long. That experience has made me a better person though. I am so much happier and very relaxed about things now and try hard not to stress out too much. That’s another reason why I am so easy to get along with I suppose. Be being so calm is why I am pretty good with animals and kids to. I love helping people when I can. Helping them move some stuff, carry things, donating money to causes, and many other things. I want to try and make life good for everyone no matter how hard that may be. No need to give me anything in return just pay it forward when you are able. I also have an issue where if I really get into a song I’ll start singing it. The people that hear me say I am actually a decent singer but I don’t know. I’m not a good judge of my own singing skills at all. I love rock music, alternative music, some rap, and slow music. I especially love songs like Lullaby For A Princess. When it comes to my theme song I am torn between two. Move Along by All American Rejects and Mob Choir 99, specifically Nathan Sharp’s cover. My favorite musical Artist though is Adele. Especially with her song Skyfall. I would totally sing to my significant other if they wanted. Another small fact is I’d rather die on my feet fighting if I were faced with an enemy that wants me dead. I don’t care for fighting unless its needed but if you start a fight I will be sure t finish it. So be sure that you’re ready before trying to fight me. Likes: Writing, Metal Work, Video Games, Sketching, Dancing, Sword Fighting, Star Gazing, Good Food, Walking, Talking with Friends, Animals, Reading, Running My Fingers Through Hair, Cuddling, Having My Hair Played With, Music, Art and Helping People. Dislikes: Dishonesty, Hateful People, Large Crowds, Cheaters, Hazel Nut, Hurting People, Being Mean, and Politics. One last thing I should mention is my love of cuddling and that my body seems to be very warm no matter how cold it gets. I can wear short sleeves in snow and be fine. I love cuddling though I don’t get to do it ever. Just being able to hold someone close for a while really makes me happy as long as they don’t mind. I hate making people uncomfortable after all. I’d be one hundred percent okay with PDA if my partner was. If not that’s fine to. That’s all there is to say I suppose. I love helping people, hate crowds, have problems reading certain social ques and am really easy to get along with. One thing I need t mention is my favorite color. Its Crimson Red and my second favorite color is Naval Blue. Other than that you know me pretty well now. If you need or want to know more about me just feel free to ask. That’s all peeps.

#matchups

2 notes · View notes

rycuccia-blog · 5 years

Video

The documentary, The Mask You Live in, is a documentary that focuses on boys and the problems of what is socially acceptable to be masculine. How boys are supposed to act and what role they play in society. They’re supposed to be strong and not show emotion such as sadness. The documentary digs into why boys feel the need to not share their feelings and how it can lead to issues. Men and boys share their stories about the problems with growing up as a boy and the troubles they go through trying to be someone they’re not, so they’re seen as masculine from their peers. This documentary helps show that gender is socially constructed because let’s say you’re a male and have a loud pitch voice, then people assume or joke that your gay because “gay people talk like that.” Or if you cry or don’t fight, you’re a sissy. Tony Porter, an educator and activist, was interviewed in the documentary and he say’s, “By the time a boy is five years old, he’s taught not to cry in public. He may do it still, but by the time he’s ten he’s perfected it and if he’s twelve and still crying, there’s a problem.” I thought this was interesting and I agree with him because when we’re young it’s more acceptable to cry and as you get older it becomes less acceptable in society, but it shouldn’t be this way, which also leads to the problem of boys being able to talk about their feelings and pain with someone. The documentary shows that boys don’t like to talk about their feelings and what their going through, which can lead them to become depressed. Depression can lead them to have thoughts to commit suicide, as some of the people interviewed had said. They have so much feelings and thoughts in mind that they can’t handle, and they feel they can’t tell anyone because then they’re seen as less masculine. If they’re depressed, they’re more likely to act out and show aggression. Which can lead to a tragic event such as a school shooting, as mentioned in the video.

Later in the video a group of boys are sitting in a circle with a teacher, who hands them a sheet of paper with a mask on it. The teacher has them write on the front how they present or show themselves to people and on the back of the mask write what they’re hiding or how they really feel. Most of the kids in the small group had written either sadness, pain, or anger on the back, which isn’t a coincidence. It brings up a good question, why do you think they hold back the pain. People are willing to listen to them, but they don’t want to talk about it. Is it because then they will be seen as less masculine and men aren’t supposed to show emotions?

Drugs and alcohol are seen to be excuses to be able to show emotion, hug friends, have sex with a girl and not feel afraid of what people will think. Drinking and doing drugs has become more socially acceptable, even though drugs are bad, boys and girls are starting to use more. It’s become expected of you to drink or do drugs and your looked down if you don’t participate. I’ve seen this myself such as if someone doesn’t feel like drinking, people make fun of them. It’s like if you don’t drink or do drugs your not cool. Drugs and alcohol can also be used as a way to help boys with their emotions without having to talk about them. They can drink or smoke marijuana and it will treat they’re loneliness or the psychic pain they’re going through.

The documentary also talks about technology and how boys’ brains are wired to technology. They’re was a statistic that 99 percent of boys play video games. The violence in video games can have an impact on boys because if they’re playing a violent video game for four hours a day and they’re taking their anger out on people they’re killing in the game; it’s got to have an impact. It raises the question does video games have a positive or negative effect. People say video game violence can lead boys to become violent, which is valid point, but maybe it’s a way to get they’re anger out instead of talking about it with someone. I never really noticed that boys don’t share they feelings, I myself has a hard time sharing my feelings and this documentary allowed me to become aware that lots of other boys are going through the same thing.

0 notes

nancygduarteus · 6 years

Text

I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

My old winter coat was a joke. I bought it on sale at a discount department store five years ago for around $70, and it has never really done what a winter coat is supposed to do. The wind whipped through it. The shell soaked up snow. The thin feather insulation constantly poked out.

Up until a few months ago, I’d never had the extra padding in my writer’s budget to dream of extra padding in my coat, let alone to purchase a new one. But then I had some unusual luck selling words. So when I came down with a cold one particularly chilly December morning, I boiled a cup of tea, blew my nose, wrapped myself in a blanket, and decided enough is enough. I’m 52 years old. If I’m lucky, I have another 30 years or more on this periodically frigid rock. Amortized over the course of what’s left of me, a well-made, long-lasting winter coat made both economic and health sense, I told myself.

I did a little research. Time and again, the Canada Goose Kensington came up as the 2018 editors’ choice for the best winter jacket for women. Yes, that Canada Goose—one of the most expensive coats out there, costing more than twice my first weekly salary in New York. There’s even a tumblr called “Canada Douche.” Normally, I scoff at the absurd excesses of luxury goods. But a Canada Goose jacket was not, I reasoned, a $250 Supreme sweatshirt that hipsters line up behind police-guarded barricades to purchase or a Birkin bag that starts at the price of a Nissan Versa. This was a quality winter coat made by a no-frills company whose first jackets, back in 1957, were meant for Canadian government employees who work outside in extreme temperatures. It remains the outerwear of choice for researchers working in the Antarctic.

I divided the price tag—$925, good lord!—by 30. It came out to a little less than $31 a year. I could always bequeath it to my daughter, who wears the same size, if I croaked before 82. The first outdoor-gear site I tried didn’t have my size. The Canada Goose site was sold out as well. So I did what almost any internet-connected American consumer would do: I went on Amazon and typed in “Canada Goose Kensington.” There I found the motherlode of Kensington jackets in many sizes, all available through a seller listed as “by Canada Goose,” which I assumed was the company itself.

This is where my story goes from wild Goose chase to goosed.

I chose dark green (“volcano,” they called it) in size small, placed it in my cart, and then spent two more days debating whether or not to pull the trigger. Aside from my children’s college educations, monthly rent, various medical procedures, and a few pieces of long-lasting furniture, I don’t generally spend that kind of money. I don’t own a home. I’ve never owned a car. Could I really walk around with that white Canada Goose patch on my arm? Maybe I could just cut it off.

One of my favorite activities is crossing the Williamsburg Bridge into Manhattan on foot, a windy journey on even the sunniest day. The coat would be an investment in my own warmth and physical well-being, even if I never travel to the South Pole.

Click! Buy.

The author’s counterfeit Canada Goose Kensington jacket (Deborah Copaken)

I had zero buyer’s remorse until the next day, when I got the confirmation email with the tracking information. My new Canada Goose coat was on its way from Singapore, by way of Hong Kong. Wait, what? Wasn’t the whole point that the coats were made in Canada? I checked the small print, and the seller of my coat was no longer listed as Canada Goose, but someone called Greg Adamserft. I clicked on the name, which took me to an Amazon seller’s page. At that point, Adamserft had only three reviews, all with five stars. (Now, weeks later, the page is riddled with one-star complaints.)

When the coat arrived, it was army green instead of the forest green I ordered. It was heavy, not lightweight. It didn’t fit. It smelled of chemicals. And the white Canada Goose patch? It looked off; it’s the patch on the right at the top of this article. On Canada Goose’s website, a page dedicated to the dangers of counterfeiting explains that every one of their products has a hologram label with a polar-bear image, a proof of authenticity. With a $925 pit in my stomach, I checked my coat. It had a hologram sewn into the seam but, sure enough, no polar bear.

[Read: Amazon may have a counterfeit problem]

Canada Goose’s website also had a search tool where you could type in the url of an online retailer, to check if it’s an authorized dealer. I typed in “amazon.com.” Immediately a big red X appeared: “This is not an authorized online retailer.”

I should have expected this. Amazon is rarely an authorized retailer of any specific brand. Instead, the platform allows individuals and companies to sell whatever brands they carry, a practice that makes the site largely the modern-day equivalent of a pneumatic-tube system through which sellers can zip off their products to buyers. By U.S. law, e-commerce sites such as Amazon and eBay are generally not responsible for what’s inside those whizzing cylinders, so long as they have procedures in place for dealing with complaints of counterfeits.

A glaring downside to this arrangement is that it has has inadvertently provided cover, in plain sight, for bad actors worldwide to create multiple digital storefronts selling counterfeit goods. When these people are caught and shut down, they can often pop up again under a different name. Today’s Greg Adamserft can easily become tomorrow’s Adam Gregserft in an endless game of online whack a mole. Often, the victims are people like me: those who might have been around long enough to use a pneumatic-tube metaphor, but who are generally unfamiliar with how sites like Amazon work in the first place.

A representative at Amazon I contacted for this story seemed surprised I would not know that the site itself is rarely the seller. I was surprised that she would not know I would not know this. Or that I would not understand that when a coat appears to be sold “by Canada Goose” itself, it’s not. And therein lies the rub. While plenty of consumers understand the rules of online engagement and are wary of fishy-looking third-party sellers, there are still many of us who once shared our first email addresses with our spouses—because why would you ever need your own email?—and fall right into the traps the counterfeiters leave for us.

The Canada Goose counterfeit page included a link to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Center along with an email address that lead me to Barry Elliott of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s Criminal Intelligence Analytical Unit. I sent him photos of my coat, and he sent me a new email the next morning at dawn: Canada Goose had confirmed my jacket was a fraud. I contacted the account for Greg Adamserft (I assume that’s not the account holder’s real name) via Amazon’s messaging system with Elliott’s findings, and Adamserft refunded my money. Adamserft did not respond to a later interview request.

The tag on the author’s counterfeit jacket has an incorrect hyphen in Canada Goose’s web address. (Deborah Copaken)

I wish I could say that was the end of it, but my Kafkaesque attempts to safeguard others from my misstep reflected just how difficult fraud monitoring can be online. Shortly after receiving my coat, I wrote a one-star review titled, “Do not buy a coat from Greg Adamserft!!!! He's selling counterfeits!!!!” This was was rejected for not adhering to Amazon’s guidelines. So I wrote another with fewer exclamation points: “Canadian police confirm this man is selling fakes.” This one was allegedly accepted on January 8, but it still has not appeared on the product page. (An Amazon spokesperson explained that, regarding the first review, Amazon does not accept reviews on product pages that are critical of sellers, only of products. As for the second review, the team says it is still looking into why it has not been posted.)

Meanwhile, between the time I received my counterfeit coat until the day I presented myself to the company as a journalist, Adamserft was still selling coats, even as the other one-star reviews flooded his seller’s page warning of fraud. Now, Adamserft’s privileges have been revoked, according to Amazon. The page associated with the seller’s name is still up, as is the page with the coats, but when you try to buy one, a note appears in place of the “Add to Cart” button: “Currently unavailable. We don’t know when or if this item will be back in stock.”

In a statement, Amazon said it has many processes in place to combat counterfeit products, including machine learning, automated systems, dedicated teams of software engineers, research scientists, program managers, and investigators. According to the company, more than 99 percent of Amazon pages customers visit have not received notices of potential infringement.

[Read: Knockoff appeal: counterfeits can boost sales of the real thing]

Counterfeiting is far from an Amazon issue alone. Elliott, who helps run Project Chargeback, a collaboration between the Canadian Anti-Fraud Center, credit-card companies, and banks, calls the fakery not only of luxury goods but also of strollers, tools, generators, and so much more a “huge problem worldwide” across e-commerce sites. “We have assisted over 40 thousand victims mainly from Canada and recovered approximately $15 million since January 2013 when we started Project Chargeback,” Elliott says. He reports that his team has also identified about 12,000 merchant accounts linked to four banks in China, one of which just lost their VISA privileges permanently.

That’s all on top of plain old credit-card fraud—scams that charge you multiple times or simply don’t deliver what you ordered. On the plus side, Elliott notes, if you use a credit card to pay for counterfeit goods, you should be guaranteed a refund when a product is verified as fake. “Only a small percentage of the public is aware of this,” he says.

According to Elliott, his office for Project ChargeBack in Ontario and the London City Police are the only criminal investigators in the world working directly with defrauded customers and banks to combat the online sale of counterfeit goods. There are some organizations, such as the National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center in the United States, that help various law-enforcement agencies work with companies themselves to protect their intellectual property. But that’s not the same as having a dedicated anti-counterfeit agency dealing directly with consumers and banks to recoup their losses. “Other countries have shown interest, but have not started up, including the U.S.,” Elliott says.

Earlier this month, on an unusually cold and windy day, I walked across the Williamsburg bridge in the new $126.98 coat I purchased to replace my fake Canada Goose, after a friend who owns one told me that it was “warm enough.” After crossing into Manhattan, feeling both snug and smug over having saved $800 that can now go to my youngest’s college fund, I wandered through SoHo, where I came upon a long, police-guarded line to get into a store. Must be another Supreme store, I thought. But upon closer inspection, no. It was Canada Goose. Because of course it was.

The store was packed. The line to get in was at least 40 minutes long. The temperature was hovering in the high 20s with gusty winds. For a moment, I was tempted to wait in that line and try on a real Canada Goose. To ask them if I might take that coat outside, if only for a minute, and feel what it would be like, on a frigid January day, to be completely enveloped in Arctic Circle-tested, super lightweight, wind and snow-resistant goose down.

But no, I said to myself. This is not Antarctica. Or even Canada or Chicago. It’s New York City. And in the new coat I’ve bought—on Amazon, of course—I’m warm enough to keep walking.

from Health News And Updates https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/counterfeit-canada-goose-amazon/581041/?utm_source=feed

0 notes