#GUYS LOOK WHAT I HATH CRAFTED | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

thespamman24 · 4 years ago

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I’m usual an easy going guy. However, I have limits, and when they are broken I can get very, very mad. Thankfully, these limits very rarely get broken. However, I start to lose my cool when I decide to order a nice, box of pizza for dinner and then twenty minutes later the pizza man shows up with a copy of Shakespeares unpublished masterpiece; it follows a young Vinetian prince named Selvitico and Mardico, the son of an aristocrat of a neighboring kingdom. The play is notable not just in that it is neither comedy nor tragedy, but in the way that he strays from all other Shakespearean comedies in it’s craft and story telling.

Act One. Scene One, a Crowded City Street.

Watchman: Hark! What stranger from the night goes here!

Levidico: No need to beware, for even though thy am a stranger to the night, I am a friend to the day.

Watchman: Hark! I said stranger from the night, not to the night.

Levidico: Well, it’s very hard to come up with these witty wordings on the spot!

Watchman: Hark! Excuses are for tired old men, and tired old dogs, and people that make excuses.

Levidico: Why you barnacle bouting son of a breaking borfins!

{He stabs him}

Watchman: Now it is time to reveal my true form!

{He turns into a watch}

Watchman: I am the watchman!!!!

Levidico: Aah, beans.

Watchman: It is time for you to catch these hands!

Levidico: Oh god, my worst weakness, clock puns!

{he dies}

Watchman: Yes! I am the watchman!!!!

Watchwoman: Honey, please come home!

Watchman: No!

Watchboy: Daddy! My bush has been stolen!

Watchman: I care not!

Ibradigigiooo: Shut up!

[he punches the watchman]

Watchman: Oh, I am slain! Oh tempora! Oh moores! Thou hast been punched, punched like a thief in the night, or a crook in the night, or a day in the night, or a night in the day! Oh! Thou shall breathe thy last breath and then thy shall breathe no more breaths! Though has used up all thy breaths! Though went to the breath bank for a loan but they said I was overdue on my payments from my last loan and now I’m in breathe debt!

[He dies]

Ibradigigiooo: Well, my work here is done.

[He dies]

[Levidico re-appears]

Levidico: Thee has becometh a zombie! Thee crave thy sweetnees of thous brains!!!! Thou brains!!!!

[Everyone screams, and then dies]

[Selvitico walks on stage with Astrastia, Rosylin, Haryambodius, two attendents, and Tim]

Selvitico: Why are there so many dead bodies here?

Haryambodius: Idk man, probably the plauque or something.

Selvitico: My god the white stuff on teeth?

Haryambodius: No. The disease

Selvitico: Aw. My god the disease?

Selviticos god: You called?

Selivitco: Yes, give me the disease!

Selviticos god: Whatever you say, boss.

[selviticos god gives him the disease]

Selivitco: Behold! The disease!

Astrastia: Isn’t that dangerous?

Selivitco: Silence, wench!

Astrastia: Why ist thou like this?

Selivitco: Thy sun is dumb and ugly, and thy is but a drop of ice!

Astrasia: Surely though jest!

Rosylin: [to astrasia] Oh sister, can you not see that Selivitco is in a fowl wind, to fowl to jest? He jests not.

Selivitco: Shut up! I jest! I jest so hard, thou wouldn’t believe it!

Rosylin: See? Thou has caught win of some fowl manner as of late, and for no other reason except maybe that your father turned into ten thousand rats!

Astrasia: Ah! But the sun!

Haryambodius: The sun! Dost it not peek through the blinds of the clouds?

Selivitco: Tis be true, but thou has not seen the last of storms and other such diseases wrought upon the skin of the sky. Boils and parasites, of which no leeches can conquer wrought even the highest of heavens, so that even the stars themselves are ill with fevers and maggots!

Astrasia: Ah! Why what blasphemy dost thou speak of!

Selivitco: Blasphemy? Thy hath no blasphemy but thy undergarments! Thy bones are paved with purity, it is the road that it paved with sin! However, your feet can not smell, and so you can not detect the stench of the street! But, thy can because thy dost have noses on thy feet.

[Everyone looks down to see that Selivitco indeed, has noses on his feet]

Haryambodius: It is a fool of a man who doth wear his noses like bracelets.

Selivitco: Why, but if noses were golden then we would all wear them bracelets!

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c4pricornc4ts · 5 years ago

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Sbi + Friends Rec List 3

This list is split into two sections; fanfics in the real world and fanfics in minecraft.

They are in order from fluffiest to heavy angst so if you want to laugh, use the top of each list, and if you want to cry, bottom of the lists. Thank you for all the support and as always, please message me if there’s anything wrong with the links and I will fix them. Enjoy!

Real World

Sisterinnit - amooniesong

2.1k 1/1 Family, Fluff

“Wilbur, do you know anything about babies?”

“Tommy, I am not giving you the talk on my stream.”

“Wha-- Wilbur!” Tommy scoffed, his familiar high pitched laugh blasting through Wilbur’s headphones and broadcasting into the ears of the twenty-four thousand people watching Wilbur. “That is not what-- I don’t-- I mean, what do they do? Other than just piss and shit and sleep?”

A Day on The Farms - Moonbear_Meliox

1.9k 1/1 Family, Fluff

They're farmers now

the art and (mine)craft of war - bluesandbirds

4.2k 1/1 Family, Humor

Tommy is a gremlin. An absolute, evil gremlin child and sometimes it's a curse to be related to him. But who is this Dream guy, and why is Tommy suddenly talking about him all the time? Alternatively: Techno, nobody is trying to steal your little brother, that would be kidnapping, please calm down.

ok maybe ghosts exist - itsjosh

1.2k 1/1 Humor

The ghost stream is as much of a success as it can be.

pick me up, take me home - meridies

24k 3/4 Family, Angst

With barely three hours notice, single father Phil receives a new child to foster. And unlike his two other adopted children, Wilbur and Techno, Tommy is seemingly hellbent on creating chaos. As their close-knit family begins falling apart, all four of them are forced to learn what it truly means to have one another.

Fever Dreams - RedHairedN3rd

1.5k 1/1 Family, Angst

Phil reflects on when his youngest had a fever.

Just a Fluke - kageyamas_meat_dance

4.4k 1/1 Angst, Hurt/Comfort

Tommy is going through it and isolates himself and everyone else gets really worried.

The child who is not loved by the village will burn it down to feel it’s warmth - ChipperDotChar

1k 1/1 Angst, No Comfort

Tommy gets tired of being insulted and treated like a toddler by the people he looks up to, and he’s also armed with a lighter.

A little pyromania never hurt anyone.

Kidnapped - MeltingAutumn

3.7k 2/? Angst, Hurt/Comfort

“Tubbo?” Wilbur finally shatters the silence with a gentle, broken voice. “Did, um… did you hear?”

Instead of replying, Tubbo bursts into tears.

A Loud Boys’ Guide To Unhappiness - soupstarsandsilence

3.8k 1/? Angst, Hurt/Comfort

Late one night, Tommy runs away. He's going to stay with Will (not that the older man knows it yet), and maybe while he's there he'll remember how to be happy.

Minecraft

family in all its forms - subwaywalls

6.8k 2/? Family, Humor

Philza joins Dream SMP, finds several children, and realizes he is the only responsible adult here.

A Survivor and His Bloodthirsty Son - CakeCleaner

7.4k 3/? Family, Hurt/Comfort, Angst

“You’re a strange one aren’t you, mate?” The piglin gave him a huff that sounded way too deep to be a child’s and an indifferent expression, his previously petting hands retreated back to his side and he stared the elder down with no hints of aggression or fear, as if he was the one dawning Netherite gear and not the other way around.

Or: Phil adopts a little piglin and said piglin grows up into what legends would whisper with fear as the Blood God

“You’re What!” - Thing_Of_Trash

300 1/1 Family, Humor

Tommy sees what's happening to his Older Brother and knows he has to take drastic measures.

A Winter’s Ball - Syverne

4.9k 1/1 Angst

Wilbur Soot, Tommyinnit, and Technoblade are invited, among others, to restart an old tradition of celebrating the winter solstice by attending a masquerade ball hosted in Manburg. This is the first winter's ball since the devastating volcanic eruption rocked the world and wiped out most of Earth's population - and had strange effects on those who survived. Despite worries that it might be a trap, the citizens of Pogtopia attend this ball under promises of a truce, and Wilbur comes face-to-face with an old friend whom he thought had long turned to hate him. or; Wilbur Soot and Jschlatt dance.

Turn Back Time - ErrorCode_21891711

3.2k 1/1 Angst

Wilbur didn't expect to find Tubbo and Tommy turned into children. An accident with potions leads to Tommy and Tubbo being turned into 9 year old children and it's up to Wilbur and the rest of the people of the Dream SMP to take care of they're youngest members until they find a way to either reverse what's been done or wait until it might wears off. They didn't expect to learn some unpleasant things about Tubbo and Tommy's past along the way.

Even the strongest can be weak - fan_fics_are_life

1.6k 1/1 Sickfic, Mild Angst

Technoblade wants to train Tommy but his health says no.

flower fields (and the bees that live there) - noahloveszombies

1k 1/1 Family, Comfort

niki, tommy and tubbo finally get away from the war.

or; niki becomes a big sister.

Father Goat & Mother Duck - Valkohai

6.3k 5/? Family, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort

Sometimes, a family can be found in even the oddest people. In Tubbo's case, those people were tyrannical dictators. Just his luck, huh?

Don’t hurt him - AlpineWasTaken

1k 1/1 Angst

Bad's skin crawled with discomfort and phantom pains as he stood firmly in front of Tommy.

"Don't hurt him."

“Show him the door.” - ViolentVioletEye

3k 1/1 Series, Family

Schlatt will do anything to protect his son. Even if it means becoming President for a nation he knows next to nothing about. He's been thrust into stranger situations. He can handle this.

Tar Filled Lungs and Bloodless Hearts. - gayblockz (lizandre)

1.7k 1/4 Angst, Hurt/Comfort

Cigarettes are merely a lousy distraction that keep him from doing what needs to be done. Cigarettes are a futile attempt at keeping warm. Cigarettes are the reason Manburg is still standing.

A story detailing Wilbur Soot's seven last cigarettes.

“It’s okay. I trust you.” - Lilian_nator

1.2k 1/1 Angst

"It's okay Wilbur. I trust you. I trust you will do the right thing."

mother drake (your duckling drowned) - anon

3.8k 2/2 Angst, Character Study

After the Manburg Festival, Quackity takes a walk alone. The thought keeps coming back to him.

Hell Hath No Fury - lavender_macaronss

900 1/1 Angst

“Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” Niki finds out about Wilbur’s plans, and she does not take kindly to them

The trial of Tubbo - EfoxKitty

11k 4/8 Angst, Major Character Death

It's finally over. They've won and L'Manburg is free once again. The president is dead and his tyrannical regime is over. But now they have to deal with a question: What are they going to do with Schlatt's right hand man? Tubbo, only a child, yet still a murderer. How can they fairly judge his involvement in the new government? By organizing a trial with Tubbo as the main witness/suspect.

#minecraft fanfiction #minecraft #tommyinnit #tubbo #wilbur soot #technoblade #techno #philza #schlatt #jschlatt #quackity #niki #nihachu #fanfic rec #c4pricornc4ts #fanfic #fic recs

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tsthrace · 5 years ago

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What does a girl do when she realizes she needs to cut an entire chapter from her WIP because it doesn’t fit? She posts it to tumblr.

So yeah, this starts to build a scary world that might look a little too close to our world. It might introduce you to this badass trauma surgeon, Dr. Griffin, who needs to make a quick escape. And then it might leave you hanging. Forever.

Well, not exactly forever. This is now Clarke’s backstory for my WIP. She’ll resurface years later on a church-turned-farmstead. Guess who’s the priest of this church? So yeah...

Content warning: mention of rape (but no rape itself) and just general hits-too-close-to-home: you know—fascism, totalitarianism, misogyny, toxic masculinity. Oh, and Clarke swears a lot.

It’s angsty. That’s what I do.

3,260 words. No tagging for Clexa, because Lexa doesn’t come on the scene yet.

It’s also posted over on ao3 if you’d rather read it there.

---

We all thought it couldn’t happen here, even as it was happening here.

Clarke had been running for so long that she wasn’t sure if she was still being chased. She had spent the last six years wandering through parts of Washington she never knew existed. First to an abandoned sawmill a few miles east of Mansford in the mountains. It was a glorified barn, really, but a community of refugees from Seattle had been gathering there, doing their best to patch up the building’s roof and walls. Then, there was still enough gas to transport what they needed if they rationed properly. But they were all adjusting to life without electricity, without phones, without any sense of who they were without those things.

She was there only three months when word came that a militia had materialized in Darrington and was registering children and looking for doctors and healers. Healers. That’s what they called women with Clarke’s skills. People who had gone to school for 13 years, who had prioritized their craft over their health, their family, their relationships for a grueling residency followed by an only slightly less grueling fellowship. They called men doctors, even if they were less educated, less skilled, and less practiced.

Fuck them. Clarke’s response had become reflexive. It was her internal response when the police came that first night of what some called the Resistance but what the police called the Riots.

Unrest had been brewing for months, but It was when the President “temporarily” suspended the First Amendment right to assemble that all hell broke loose. Thousands of protestors became tens of thousands, even in small cities like Spokane and Tacoma. Police traded rubber bullets for real ones, patrol cars for tanks, pistols for AK-47s. Dozens of people landed in Clarke’s hospital, some gone before they were taken out of the ambulance, ripped apart by the people sworn to serve and protect them.

That was the night two officers were trawling the halls of her ward, looking for “resistors” to arrest.

“They’re unconscious,” Clark said slowly. “They’re sedated because they’re waiting to go into surgery.” She knew it was a bad idea to talk to them like they were kindergartners, but she couldn’t stop herself. What these men were doing was sick. Her patients were here because of them. Some of them filled with bullet holes, their lives barely clinging to them, others with collapsed lungs caused by broken ribs, others with simple fractures who would be out to fight another day. But Clarke wasn’t going to tell these guys that.

“Is there someone else we can talk to?” The officer said. His name badge said Blakely. “Maybe your boss?”

Clarke felt her fingernails digging into her palm. “Officer Blakely—”

“Corporal Blakely.”

Clarke went on as if she didn’t hear him. “I’m the person with the highest seniority here right now. If you’d like me to call the Chief of Surgery...”

Blakely pulled out a pad and pen. “What’s his name?”

“Her name is Dr. Marris.”

Blakely scoffed but wrote down the name.

“Is there a problem?” Clarke bent a little to catch his eye with her glare.

“Not at all.”

After that night, everything changed. The President sent in federal troops. There were tanks outside police precincts, and men in uniform carrying AK-47s stood at every corner in downtown and Capitol Hill. They rode the light rail, searching for enemies and booting out anyone who fell asleep on the trains. Curfews were instituted. Clarke had to have her ID and a letter from the hospital ready after every shift. The same soldiers (or were they cops?) stopped her every night, even after the sixth time when everyone knew everyone’s names. She had written theirs down. Because fuck them.

Two months later, the Seattle PD renamed themselves Washington’s 1st Militia when the President had encouraged all “patriots and protectors of freedom to band together, arm, and fight for American values.” Police departments across the country took this as a rallying call. They traded their police uniforms for military fatigues. They tore off their city badges and replaced them with a thin blue line. Bros before everything else, even democracy.

They pulled her out of the OR as soon as she wrapped up a craniotomy. It was her third surgery of the day, and her hands were stiff, her scrubs covered in sweat. The two soldiers’ assault rifles startled her, but she’d seen enough gore in her time to know how to keep a straight face. Blakely was back, but this time he was dressed like he was serving in a desert war zone.

“Officer Blakely.” She remembered he was a corporal but fuck him.

The corner of Blakely’s mouth lifted in a sharp smirk. She watched as his eyes glided down her body. “Congratulations, Ms. Griffin, you’ve been recruited to Washington’s First. We are in need of fine healers like yourself.”

Fuck you. The words raced through her mind, but she kept her mouth shut. She understood by now that those words aloud could do nothing but put her in danger. “How can I be of service?” she asked evenly, looking him straight in the eye. She had heard rumors that the militias were taking medical workers from their hospitals and clinics to set up their own facilities, but she thought they’d only take men for their specialists and surgeons.

“You need to come with us,” Blakely looked down at the sweat stains under her arms.

Clarke didn’t move. “What kind of healers are you looking for?” she asked in her most neutral tone.

“A variety, ma’am.” Blakely’s jaw stiffened.

A small crowd of the floor’s staff had gathered at the nurses’ station, halfheartedly pretending to work while they watched the interaction.

“Like nurses? There are a lot of nurses here who are much better at their jobs than I would be.” Clarke laughed lightly and glanced at the nurses. “I’d make a terrible nurse.”

A few of the nurses nodded, their eyes smiling because smiling with their lips might bring trouble.

“We already have healers for that kind of work.” Blakely took in a breath and looked around the floor, frustrated. He knew he’d said too much. “Maybe we should go somewhere—”

“Then I can’t possibly think why you’d need me. I’m sure there are doctors who can meet your needs.”

“Ms. Griffin—”

“After all, there are two other trauma surgeons on staff here more suited to your, uh, preferences.” Clarke glanced down at Blakely’s groin.

“I was sent to find you, Ms. Griffin.”

The more he called her “Ms.,” the more her resolve solidified. “I just can’t imagine what anyone would want with little old me.” She covered her voice in maple syrup. “Dr. Lee and Dr. Bancroft are very fine surgeons, very respectable. Dr. Lee graduated top of his class from UW. I’m supervising his fellowship, and he’s very skilled.” Clarke let the words roll like waves along a beach on a calm day. “And Dr. Bancroft is who we call whenever we need a feeding tube done right the first time. His focus on fundamentals is exceptional—”

“They want you,” Blakely said more loudly than he intended.

Say it, she taunted him with a sharp look, though the words that came out were light. “I’ll call Dr. Lee. I’m sure he’d be more suitable to you—”

“Ms. Griffin—”

“You’d rather have Dr. Bancroft? Sorry. I thought you’d want the more skilled surgeon, but to be honest, we do perform a lot more feeding tube placements than major—”

“We know you’re the best.” Blakely growled, giving in.

Clarke had won, but she still felt empty. “You can’t even call me a doctor.”

“Protocol.” Blakely refused to look at her. “Come with us, ma’am.”

“Do I have a choice?”

“You can appeal on grounds of pregnancy or motherhood.”

Clarke scoffed. “Of course.” She didn’t even try to hide her disdain, though she knew she had to play along. She looked down at her scrubs. “I need to change.”

“Of course,” Blakely said. His smile was sharp, an insult. “Though we’ll need to supervise.”

Clarke bit down hard. She had not joined the Resistance, but she’d been obsessively keeping track of their Instagram posts at @emeraldcityjustice. Militiamen never raped, she’d learned, especially if the woman was white and of marrying age. They didn’t call it rape, though, they called it “sexual theft.” They were not to spoil another man’s property (or potential property), and that meant no touching. This restriction forced men to get creative, find new ways of dominating without ruining the goods. Resisting, the posts said, meant speaking the militia’s language.

“But I say unto you, that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.” Clarke had memorized some key verses, and she said this one loud enough for everyone around the nursing station to hear it. “Matthew 5:28. I think those are words in red. You know, Jesus. The son of God himself.” She would not let these fuckers anywhere near her.

Blakely squinted and his face turned to stone.

“The locker room is on the second floor,” she said. “You two are welcome to wait outside the door, if you like.” Clarke strode towards the elevator. Blakely glared at her a few moments before nodding at his partner. They followed her into the elevator. Clarke looked at her watch. 10:15 p.m. Shift change. The locker room would be packed.

“We need to sweep,” Blakely said as they stepped off the elevator and approached the locker room door.

Clarke sighed loudly. There was no use in arguing. Blakely nodded towards the key swipe. Clarke swiped her badge and a little red light on the handle turned green. Blakely opened the door then turned conspicuously so that his back was facing the opening.

“This is Corporal Blakely of Washington’s First Militia,” he shouted into the room. The volume of his voice made Clarke jump. “Private Cooks and I will be doing a sweep of this locker room in two minutes. Those who are not appropriately covered at that time will be taken into custody.” Blakely let the door close behind him and set a timer on his Apple watch.

Are you fucking kidding me? Clarke didn’t say out loud.

Five minutes later, Blakely and Cooks were back out in the hallway. Clarke knew they wouldn’t find anything. The locker room was a windowless space that was mostly concrete and tile. It had one exit, a fire hazard long ignored because that part of the hospital had been built 140 years ago. The only other door was a closet full of cleaning supplies.

Blakely nodded at Clarke to go inside.

“You have five minutes,” he said, fiddling with his watch again.

“I’d like to shower.”

“Four minutes and fifty-seven seconds. If you don’t come out on time, we will come in.”

Clarke swallowed and pushed through the door. Dozens of annoyed eyes lifted as she walked in. She just shook her head as she walked past them.

Because it was an old hospital, doctors—female doctors, even surgeons—shared the locker room with nurse supervisors, charge nurses and other medical staff who had seniority. (Male doctors, especially surgeons, did not share a locker room with anyone, of course.) It bothered Clarke on principle, but for the most part she liked being around the non-doctor staff, and it didn’t hurt to have a friendly relationship with the nurses when she was on the floors.

The women’s eyes quickly went back to their tasks of leaving. Between the unrest and a new virus no one seemed to know anything about, the hospital, which was already under-resourced, had been over capacity for weeks now. Everyone was tired, stressed, and getting more and more afraid. They just wanted to get home as soon as possible. The later at night, the more aggressive the patrols got.

Clarke walked to her locker and took a few deep breaths as she quickly spun the lock to its numbers and pulled it open. She took off her white coat and hung it on the hanger inside. She pulled out her backpack and checked that her phone charger was inside. She pulled her wallet out and stared at her driver’s license for a long moment, not sure if it would be a liability. She decided to bring it, along with her curfew papers, and a used copy of The Obelisk Gate she’d picked up from Horizon Books a few weeks ago but never opened. Next, she stuffed her street clothes inside along with two sets of clean scrubs (only later would she wonder why she took the scrubs). Finally, she grabbed the two boxes of protein bars and four bottles of Gatorade that she kept there to keep her energy up on long shifts.

Clarke almost laughed at how much could fit in her small backpack.

She looked at her watch. Three minutes left. Shit. She almost forgot to switch watches. She pulled off the little cheap thing she used at the hospital and replaced it with her dad’s chunky but sleek metal piece. It was heavy on her wrist, but that’s what she liked about it. Somehow she felt safer with it on.

She swallowed. She needed to move, but to move meant everything would be different. She threw her shoulders back, lifted her hands in front of her, palms up as if making an offering, and took in a deep breath. It’s what she did whenever she was about to make a first cut. She closed her eyes, felt the ground solid under her feet, felt her heart slow to steady saunter.

Clarke smiled to herself. It was a heavy smile, sad and defiant. Fuck them.

She grabbed her backpack, slung it over her shoulder, and walked to the broom closet.

“You alright, Dr. Griffin?” A voice rang out. Veró, the charge nurse from the post-op wing, looked up as Clarke was about to go inside. Her eyes were nervous.

“I will be,” Clarke replied as she closed the door. “Take good care of yourself, Veró. Be safe. You didn’t see me, okay?”

Veró nodded. “You stay safe, Clarke.” She closed her eyes for a long moment. Her smile was heavy with concern. “I didn’t see nothing.”

Clarke held Veró’s eyes for a long moment, then nodded, stepped into the closet, and closed the door behind her. It was a small space, but large enough for two people to fit—a fact Clarke had exploited with Lu, a nurse from the Telemetry unit, several times. There was a small, dirty, pointless window at the top of the closet that she and Lu had covered with a tray from the cafeteria so that the janitors in their breakroom across the alley couldn’t watch them taking their break. During the day, thin streaks of light leaked in around the edges. Clarke was grateful it was so late and that the alley outside got so little light. The metal shelving served as the perfect ladder, sturdy and wide. She disrupted the toilet paper and big bottles of cleaner as she climbed, leaving hints of her escape, but there was nothing to be done about it. The top shelf was blessedly empty, too high up to be useful.

She pulled the tray out of the way to reveal a window that was smaller than she expected. She turned a small latch and pushed the window. It didn’t budge. She pushed it again, harder this time, though she didn’t have much leverage. Nothing happened. The shelf wobbled minutely under her.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

It held steady as she gingerly pulled her full body onto the top shelf. She barely fit up there. She checked her watch. She maybe had a minute. Probably less. Clarke hit the base of the window with the flat of her palm. Nothing. She hit it again. Still nothing. She took a breath and closed her eyes.

Please.

She hit it again and heard a tiny scrape. One more push, and the window swung open with an achy shriek. It might have been shut for decades. Clarke was lucky. The drop from the second floor window to the sidewalk was short. The alley swept upwards from 9th Ave., ending at the top with the fifth floor’s windows being at street level.

She was out, and she had no idea what to do. By now, Blakely and Cooks would have noticed that she hadn’t come out. Maybe they’d give her another minute. She remembered the Apple watch.

Her mind churned and tumbled. She had opened holes in skulls with drills and saws. She had cracked ribs to expose hearts that stopped beating in front of her eyes. But now, on this warm summer night on an empty sidewalk, she didn’t know what to do. So she ran. The hospital was a mess of old buildings connected by narrow alleys—easy to get lost. But Clarke had done her residency and fellowship here—spent nearly a quarter of her life here—and while she didn’t know the alleys, she knew the buildings, recognized the skyways above linking everything together. She slid from shadow to shadow in the direction of the interstate. It was an intuitive decision, the way she knew exactly where to find the bleeding in surgery.

She kept moving, the rolling rumble of the highway getting closer. Finally, she found herself at the parking garage and knew exactly where to go. She walked calmly through the first level reserved for people going to the ED. She was careful to avoid the security booth where Mitch would be. He was a good guy, and Clarke didn’t want to bring him any trouble. She moved quickly towards an emergency exit which brought her to a fire escape facing the interstate. During her first year as resident, she and Dr. Salem used to meet there to smoke a joint after a 30-hour shift.

She paused. Think. She pulled out her phone and scrolled through her contacts. Her breath caught when she came across her mom’s contact. You could have called, she could already hear her saying. We would have figured it out. Even if there was enough time for her mom to get from Whidbey Island to the city—and there wasn’t—it wouldn’t be safe. Anyone she called could be implicated and punished. Unless she chose to crawl back into the hospital, she was now an RRL, a Resistor of the Rule of Law.

This is moment everything changes. The thought cracked across her mind like lightning and disappeared just as fast. The thunder would roll on for years and years.

She closed her contacts and opened Instagram instead. She went to the @emeraldcityjustice profile. Her grin was grim as she hit the Message button. How ridiculous this world had become.

“Canada or the mountains?”

“What?” Clarke shook herself out of a haze. The driver hadn’t spoken since he picked her up from a dark corner under the interstate where @emeraldcityjustice had told her to go. They immediately turned east over the lake to Bellevue.

“You’ll have to decide at the drop point in Everett,” the driver went on. “They can either get you on a ferry to Canada or you can head to a refugee community in the mountains.” He glanced over his shoulder to the back seat where she was lying down to avoid facial recognition cameras on the interstate. “Do you want to escape or do you want to fight?”

THE END. THAT’S IT. I’M SORRY.

#the 100 fanfiction #clarke griffin #WIP backstory #clexa fic backstory #action

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imhereforbvcky · 7 years ago

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Make Me Believe - Part 6

Part 6 Senior Year: Spring Break Down to Recover

Masterlist - Series Masterlist - Part 5 - Part 7

Summary: You keep meeting Bucky Barnes in unexpected places around campus and he keeps acting like you know each other, like you’re dating. As your friendship grows, you find yourself wishing he’d do more than pretend. Warnings: swearing, drinking

Warnings: swearing, little bit o angst

Word Count: 1624

Author’s Note: I don’t know about this one guys. I keep tweaking it and it never feels quite right but here we are.

The mountain of pillows stacked in the corner of your bedroom had become a living thing; a veritable cocoon. Its warmth lulled you into a hibernating ooze, melting into the carefully crafted armor of isolation.

With some mindless sitcom streaming on your laptop just outside the protective shell, you’d absorbed your textbook into the blanket hiked high on your shoulders. The half-empty cup-o-noodles stood dangerously close, ready to spill at the next fallen pillow or carelessly stretched foot.

This shell-creature matched anyone’s expectations of a pre-med study session, but it did not match anyone’s expectations of you. Until this year, your studying had been surrounded by laughter and games. You’d remembered every second and had aced each test because it had all been time with Bucky. Up til now time with Bucky had been the currency of your life and you remembered every bit of it with painful clarity.

Now you cowered behind your fortress of cheap cotton and excuses. The poignant sting of your perceived rejections was too strong. It permeated too deep, metastasized to every area of your life. Your best friend had become too big in your life; a part of every piece you loved best about it.

Like a fool, you’d fallen in love with him. Now you had to extricate him from your life, find yourself again there at the center and try to heal the wounds you’d allowed yourself to make.

Life lesson learned the hard way: indulging in fantasies hurts like hell when the credits roll.

Deep into your distracted state, you didn’t hear the front door open, or your name echoing down the halls of your cramped apartment. Not until you heard the knock on your bedroom door.

“Nat, I already told you I’m not going with you to Steve’s. I’m studying tonight and I don’t want to s--” The words died on your lips when he peaked around the door with a beseeching look to those stormy blue eyes and that damn crooked grin.

And here you thought you’d been making progress.

“Not often I’m mistaken for a 130lb red-head.”

“Bucky,” you breathed. Finally. Painfully. Everything seemed noxious and wrong now when it came to Bucky Barnes. “How did you get in here?”

His eyebrows lifted and the warm familiar grin faltered for the briefest moment. His surprise at your coldness struck sharp and fast, but he masked it just as quickly. Casual as ever, he flopped onto your bed, making himself at home in your room, in your life, like it was nothing to him.

“Well hello to you, too.”

You shook the drowsy comfort of the last several weeks’ reprieve from your head. “Sorry. Hi.”

The smile that warmed his features ignited the coals in your chest that had just begun to cool. Something came alive again, something you had worked hard to quell.

He extended his hand, twirling his keyring around his finger once before catching it in his palm with a sharp clatter. “Spare key,” he explained.

“That was for emergencies,” you sighed, leaning further back into your wall of pillows. Apparently cotton walls were not a strong enough defense.

“This,” his eyes roved up and down your mound of cushions and your blanket cloak with criticism sharpening every feature, “is an emergency.”

“No, Bucky,” you rolled your eyes, unable to help the smile turning the corners of your lips under his attention. “This is studying for the MCAT.”

“Looks like you’re well overdue for a study break,” he jumped up, holding his hands out, waiting for you to take them so he could hoist you up and into his life again.

“Nu uh,” you pulled your blanket tighter around your shoulders and leaned further into the wall of pillows. “Your ‘study breaks’ never end with more studying, like they should. They end half-way across campus at a stranger’s house with a shitty beer and a headache.”

“It’s good for you,” he laughed, smirking proudly. “Look at you. You’re becoming Queen Troll of The Pillow Cave in here. You need some social interaction.” He opened his hands for you again.

“Excuse you!” you gasped in mock horror, drawing the blanket somehow higher. “This is a cotton cocoon. It is keeping me safe and warm while I metamorphose into a successful doctor free of your pestering!”

You said it with a smile in your eyes and a grin on your lips, but as they say, many a true word hath been spoken in jest.

“My mistake; I apologize,” he laughed through the words.

Some deep cavity that had been boring deeper and aching keener within him for weeks finally eased; soothed under the balm of your banter. He soared under the brightness of your smile and warmed in the glow of your affection once again.

He’d worried after your last night out; after the night at the bar, when he’d kissed you... You’d run and kept running and he feared he’d lost more than his chance. He thought he’d lost a friend.

When you let the blanket fall and finally took his hands, his relief was stronger than he’d expected. With the first genuine smile of the night clawing its way up from deep in his chest, he pulled you to your feet to stand just inches from him.

“Can’t let such a beautiful butterfly sit in her cocoon all her life.”

You knew he was teasing, that it was all part of the game when he spoke to you like this,flirted with you like this. It was just Bucky.

Typical Bucky to drag you from safety so close into his space that you could smell the sting of dollar store soap on his skin. So close his breath felt like your own, and the steady lift of his chest and the warmth of his air on your face when he said things like he did.

Resolved not to be an idiot, you glanced at your disheveled fortress of linens and reminded yourself that friends didn’t do this. You needed your ramparts. Boundaries.

“I’m decidedly a moth,” you argued, clearing your throat as you took a step back, trying desperately for any barrier. Even one of cotton. “Moths make cocoons. It’s a chrysalis for butterflies.”

“Only you would know that, hillbilly. I think you’re a butterfly.” His gaze lingered a little longer than it should, even with that stupid goofy grin it tugged at something deeper.

You rolled your eyes and watched as he finally turned with a lazy smile toward your closet.

“Well, you’re wrong,” you finally mumbled. “I made a cocoon because I’m a moth and I keep going right back to the flame that burns me.”

“Here put this on, there’s a dress code.” He ignored your grumbling and handed over your loudest pair of yoga pants and a pale grey top you would never wear together.

“What’s the code? Got dressed in the dark?” you teased, shoving the door shut behind him. You’d learned long ago it was useless to argue with him when he got these ideas.

After a final glance in the mirror, you felt about as ridiculous as you’d expected to and decided to lean into the absurdity. With a reptilian leap you sprang into the kitchen, hands on hips, striking a comically confident pose.

“The moth has emerged,” you announced, barely containing a giggle.

Bucky was less successful. A fit of hysteria struck him full in the chest. He’d missed this more than he had even realized, and he knew damn well that he’d missed you. Just not this much.

He sighed happily as you relaxed and strode toward him with a soft laugh. This could be okay again.

Turning back to the counter he took the two egg rolls from the leftovers he'd fished out of your fridge and lifted one toward you.

“Every moth loves a good fire,” he grinned as you took the roll with a deep breath, steeling yourself for the burn of more than just the hot chili sauce.

Sitting on the mismatched stools around your counter, Bucky squeezed your knee, lightly. “Hey I’m sorry if I made things… I don’t know, if I did something wrong last time,” Bucky forced out in an uneasy lilt.

You nearly sputtered on your mouthful. “S’nothing to be sorry for, Bucky.”

“You sure? Because it seems like you’ve been avoiding me since…” he paused, whether out of anticipation or regret you wish you could say. He hovered over the words, waiting for any signal; breathing slow, careful breaths while you made a great effort of dipping your egg roll again. Equally unsure; even more withdrawn.

Finally, you shook your head, still not moving your gaze from the idle work in your hands.

“I’m just sorry that I--” he stopped again, this time abrupt and intentional. Because he wasn’t sorry that he’d kissed you; not even a little. He was sorry he’d been drunk when he finally did it. And he was sorry for the way you reacted. He was damn sorry that you’d hidden behind books and a million reasons why not and that now everything just felt… off.

“I’m sorry things haven’t been the same,” he said finally, because it was true. He’d wished for better and gotten worse. Now he just needed you to help him put the pieces back, even if it hurt.

“Me too,” you breathed, because it was true. You hated not having your best friend by your side but you hated the pain of loving someone you shouldn’t even more.

One more night, you promised yourself while reaching for the tequila. Bucky tried to smile like it was any other Thursday night friend-date night, but every new word sank with the weight of closure rather than the levity of reconciliation.

Next Chapter >>

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #bucky college au #bucky fanfic #make me believe 6 #mmb 6

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fandomsandfeminism · 8 years ago

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William Shakespeare- the Bard of Avon, Legendary Wordsmith, was, in all probability, super queer. We're going to look at the evidence, read some lovely poems, read some raunchy poems, and generally just talk Shakespeare.

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Transcript below

Today we are going to talk about how William Shakespeare was super bisexual.

William Shakespeare- love him or hate him, you know who he is. This guy. The Bard of Avon. England’s National Poet. Good ole Billy Shakes. Willy “Dick Joke” Shake-a-Spear. He’s sort of a big deal. He was also super into dudes AND ladies.

So before we go any further, I do want to quickly address an important point- as I mentioned briefly in my Oscar Wilde and Walt Whitman video, discussing the sexual orientation of historical figures can be tricky. Modern terms and understandings of sexuality and sexual orientation are, well, modern. The word “heterosexual” wasn’t even coined until 1892. So, keep that in mind. If you were to ask Shakespeare if he was bisexual, he wouldn’t have known what that word meant.

So I’m not going to argue about whether or not Shakespeare would have personally identified with the label bisexual, or if he would have prefered pansexual or queer, or whatever, were he alive today. Rather, I’m going to argue that, from the evidence we have, Shakespeare seems to meet our modern definitions for bisexual- someone who is attracted to two or more genders, someone who is attracted to their own and different gender or genders, someone who is attracted to both men and women (and nonbinary people.)

We’re also going to be approaching this topic with the deliberate intent to disregard heteronormativity. Heteronormativity is an attitude which presumes heterosexual is the normal, default, and expected sexuality and that to assert anyone is anything else requires us to disprove beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are NOT straight first.

We will not be doing this. Instead, we are approaching the topic from a neutral standpoint. With ALL of the evidence, which modern label most closely matches what we know about Shakespeare, treating all labels as inherently likely.

So no, we’ll never be able to say with 100% certainty which label Shakespeare would have used for himself had those labels existed then, but we can talk about which label he would most likely fit today using what evidence we have.

So With that, let’s first talk about who William Shakespeare is, what we know about him, and the evidence we have that he was playing for more than one team. -

William Shakespeare was born in late April 1564 in Stratford upon Avon. He was baptized on the 26th, so he was probably born on the 23rd or 24th, but we can’t be sure. He was the son of a glover and was educated at a public grammar school. When he was 18, he married the 26 year old Anne Hathaway, who was already 3 months pregnant with their first child, a daughter named Susanna. 2 years later, the couple had a set of twins, a son Hamnet and a daughter Judith. Hamnet would die of unknown causes when he was 11, and inspire the tragedy Hamlet in some ways.

By the 1590s, Shakespeare had moved to London and took up acting, writing,and directing. He wrote 38 plays (some of which have contested authorship) and 154 sonnets. We aren’t totally sure about when all his plays were written, and there are multiple different versions of each play in existence (collected in what are called quartros and folios.) There is a whole interesting history about the publication of these plays that we won’t go into now.

He died April 23 1616 of unknown causes, leaving the majority of his estate to his daughter Susanna.

Shakespeare was well respected in his craft at the time, but was certainly not the legendary figure he is today. (And the fact that he is so worshipped today would make poor Christopher Marlowe just as mad as a bee hive) His plays appealed to members of all classes in society, exploring themes of nobility and the nature of the soul right along side fart jokes and fat jokes and dick jokes. A lot of dick jokes.

Now, despite all this, we don’t really know a whole lot about Shakespeare’s personal life. He didn’t keep a journal as far as anyone knows. Aside from some very basic legal documents, like his baptism, marriage, and death records, we don’t have a lot of contemporary sources about him. He wasn’t rich or noble, so despite his notoriety, no one was documenting his life very carefully. He wasn’t even consistent with how he spelled his own name (English spelling hadn’t been super formalized yet, and wouldn’t be until Samuel Johnson wrote his very popular dictionary in 1755.)

We know he was married, when he lived and died, when his plays were released for the most part, and what general times he lived in London (leaving his wife and children back in Stratford) -

So, how can we speculate about the personal life and desires of a man who died 400 years ago if we don’t even have as much as a journal to work with? His plays don’t help much- even if we accept that events in his personal life can and did impact his plays, such as Hamnet’s death being an influence on the play Hamlet, his plays are often based on earlier stories or historical events, and are too fantastical to base much biographical meaning on.

Quick Shout out though to As You Like It, which has a woman disguised as a man, using the name Ganymede, and then dressing up as herself to fake date the guy she has a thing for. And Twelfth Night which has even more cross dressing. And Merchant of Venice. And remember, that all the actors would have been men and boys originally. So, what I’m saying is that Theatre has always been pretty queer. And Shakespeare definitely had a penchant for exploring queer themes in his works at times. And, well, it’s not impossible for straight dudes to write queer characters or explore queer themes. But...it is something to remember.

However. We do have his 154 Sonnets. Poetry, my friends. Poetry is key. And I’m going to read you some of his poetry in this video. I’ll do my best.

The sonnets deal with love, and desire, beauty, and the passage of time. They all read as highly personal. And of those 154, The first 126 sonnets are addressed to a young man; the last 28 to a dark skinned woman. These are referred to, respectively, as the Fair Youth, and Dark Lady sonnets.

The poems are all dedicated to "Mr. W.H." (called the sole begetter of the poems, whatever that means), and who WH is, and whether or not he is the Fair Youth, or just a patron is the source much speculation and controversy. Is Shakespeare himself the speaker, or is there an imagined speaker? Again, we don’t know for sure. Though it does seem that the speaker and the subject are consistently the same for the first 126 sonnets, then the subject changes for the last 20+ poems with the same speaker.

And yall, these Fair Youth Poems are something else. Don’t let the haters tell you these are platonic. One of these Fair Youth poems? You’ve probably heard of it:

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st, So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

This is written to a man. And it’s very romantic.

Or look at Sonnet 20, when he clearly laments that the fair youth isn’t a woman.

This one is so great, I want to share with you the No Fear Shakespeare paraphrase of it. Because its a little easier to understand.

Your face is as pretty as a woman’s, but you don’t even have to use makeup—you, the man (or should I say woman?) I love. Your heart is as gentle as a woman’s, but it isn’t cheating like theirs. Your eyes are prettier than women’s, but not as roving—you bless everything you look at. You’ve got the good looks of a handsome man, but you attract both women and men. When Mother Nature made you, she originally intended to make you a woman, but then she got carried away with her creation and screwed me by adding a certain thing that I have no use for. But since she gave you a prick to please women, I’ll keep your love, and they can enjoy your body.

That’s just beautiful. I also want us to quickly enjoy Sonnet 52, which enjoys an excellent dick pun.

So look at this one for just a moment.

Pfffft. his imprison’d pride. Yeah. That means what exactly you think it means.

And yall, the poem I read to my husband at our wedding is one of the Fair Youth sonnets,

Sonnet 116

Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark, That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken. Love ’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle’s compass come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error, and upon me prov’d, I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.

Side note: Sonnets traditionally end in a rhyming couplet. You will notice that proved and loved do not rhyme though. They used to. The pronunciation of proved has changed in the last 400 years. From provd to proved. So provd and loved do rhyme. There’s actually a lot of examples of this in Shakespeare- rhymes and puns that break because of modern pronunciation.

But yeah. I love that poem. I love it and recited it at my wedding. And Shakespeare wrote it for his secret London boyfriend. Probably, ya know.

Now we need to talk about the Dark Lady. Based on the descriptions we have in the poems, we can conclude that this lover was a black woman, though like the Fair youth, her identity remains a mystery. This sequence of poems is not only romantic, but also much more explicitly sexual. Yes, more sexual that the repeated dick references we’ve already seen.

Sonnet 151 talks a lot about his erection, for example. Yeah take a moment to read this.

Yeah, so his flesh is pointing out his triumphant prize. Jeez, Billy. Calm down.

Also, the famous Sonnet 130 is written to the Dark Lady.

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips' red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head; I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some pérfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound. I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground. And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.

And this is a really sweet poem. It’s all about how even though the Dark Lady isn’t some idealized goddess- coral red lips and snow white skin and perfume breath- rather she has brown skin and wiry hair, even though she is a normal person unadorned by hyperbole, he finds her rare and beautiful and lovely all the same.

I also want to take a minute to appreciate Sonnet 135, simply because it is SO RAUNCHY.

Yall. Her “will” is so large, that he wants to put his “will” into hers. …like...God damn. Not only is that a pun on his OWN NAME, it is also very dirty.

Ok, so that’s a lot of poetry I just threw at you. I could probably go all day. I love the sonnets. But let’s move on.

Now, when the sonnets are brought up in the great Sexuality Debate, detractors will often go to this argument that we can not know if Shakespeare himself is the speaker, or if this private collection of over 150 poems is an extended exercise in dramatic storytelling- the speaker being an invented character who has no reflection on Shakespeare himself.

To address that, I will turn to the Scholar Arthur Freeman who answers more succinctly than I can. “I cannot think of any responsible editor who would dismiss the premise of homosexual, as well as heterosexual passion pervading [the sonnets],” Mr Freeman has written. “Why should Shakespeare alone be thought so committed to the ‘negative capability’ of his dramatic craft that all his most personal writings are treated as potentially artificial?

“And even if we insist on regarding the sonnets, wholly or in part, as a kind of long-term dramatic narrative... Why on earth would Shakespeare choose so often to impersonate a pathetically ageing, balding, lame and vulnerable bisexual suitor, abjectly whingeing about rejection and betrayal — unless the self-humiliation that surfaces again and again through these particulars were both genuine and cathartic?”

I will also turn to Professor Wells, who said: “When a poet whose name is William writes poems of anguished and unabashed sexual frankness which pun on the word ‘will’ — 13 times in [Sonnet] No 135... It is not unreasonable to conclude that he may be writing from the depths of his own experience.”

So, remember that we are working from a non-heteronormative starting place here. Taking all of the evidence we have, with all the needed grains of salt, what is the most likely explanation for all of the assembled evidence?

We have a poet who often wrote about cross dressing characters in his plays, exploring queer themes, who wrote over 100 love poems to a man, dozens to a woman, was married, and to some extent did seem to be drawing on his personal experiences in his poems?

Well.

Bisexual.

He was most likely bisexual.

Which is awesome. Glad to be in good company.

Now, Hollywood. Give me a buddy comedy about Gay Christopher Marlowe and Bisexual William Shakespeare being snarky best buds and causing mischief in Elizabethan England. Bonus points if Marlowe is a Crown Spy. I will give you all my money for this.

Thanks for listening! I’ll be sure to see all of yall down in the comments. If you enjoyed listening to this queer millennial feminist with a BA in English ramble for a while, feel free to subscribe.

#William Shakespeare #Bisexual #lgbt #shakespeare #shakespeare's sonnets

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popculturedwithmoviemike · 8 years ago

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My Favorite Movie Hitmen of All-Time This is a list of the best hitmen in film history. Hitmen have always been an interesting character for Hollywood. They are often enigmatic and highly dangerous, but also usually really awesome. My list takes many factors into consideration. How cool they are and how dangerous they are were two of the main factors.

1 - Léon - Léon: The Professional Can he be any cooler? He's quiet, he's got an awesome knit hat, kickass shades, likes taking care of his plant and he gets to hang out with Natalie Portman all day. Granted, she's like 12 in the film, but Leon never becomes creepy. His relationship with Mathilda is strictly platonic and he is more of a fatherly figure to her. Did I also mention that he has a bunch of badass guns and boy does he know how to use them? 2 - Jason Bourne - The Bourne Franchise No offense to Mr. Bond, James Bond, but Jason Bourne would destroy 007 (any of them) before his martini was finished being shaken (not stirred.) He's just lethal and the amazing thing is that it's literally a knee jerk reaction for him. Breaking bones is like breathing or blinking with this guy. He's also incredibly intelligent which makes him even more deadly. Jason Bourne doesn't even need a gun or a knife to work a dude over. He can use anything within his reach. It doesn't matter if it's a ballpoint pen or a rolled up magazine, if it's in Jason Bourne's hands, you're a dead man. 3 - John Wick - The John Wick Franchise Don't mess with a man's dog or his car. In John Wick's world, he's essentially a myth, a legend for fellow assassins to whisper about. You can see why. Wick is like a machine. Every bullet he fires hits its mark and he's just as deadly with close quarters combat. Like any good hitman, he also looks stylish doing it. As you will see with many of the people on this list, John Wick doesn't say much. He does his talking with his guns. 4 - Anton Chigurh - No Country for Old Men Man who hires Wells: [about Chigurh] "Just how dangerous is he?" Carson Wells: "Compared to what? The bubonic plague?" This quote perfectly sums up the level of danger that Anton Chigurh brings to the table. He truly is like a plague. A deadly virus that does not discriminate on who it kills. That's not to say Chigurh doesn't have rules. He does and that's what makes him such an interesting character. If you play by his rules, you live. Simple as that. The fascinating thing about Chigurh and his seemingly unstoppable evil is that even a force like him is not invincible. In fact, what almost take him out? A little old lady running a stop sign. 5 - The Bride - Kill Bill Vols. 1 & 2 "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned." Damn, they weren't kidding. You do not want to get on this woman's list because she will hunt you down and remove your eyeball from your optical lobe with her fingers. That's just her being nice. Most times she just chops you up into little itty bitty pieces. The Bride is the first female on my list, and easily the best person with a blade. 6 - Terminator - The Terminator Should The Terminator be higher on the list? Maybe, but he's a cyborg. He should be an unstoppable hitman. Terminator has cool sunglasses, rides a motorcycle and has a knack for delivering killer one-liners. I guess the only thing that knocks him down a few slots is that the first version of him is often thwarted by a teenage girl. The other problem with Terminator is that he lacks stealth and subtlety. 7 - Jules Winnfield - Pulp Fiction He recites bible scripture before he ices your ass. Come on, it doesn't get much cooler than that. Jules doesn't recite the scripture because he's overly religious and wants to be respectful to the soon-to-be-dead thug. No, he admits that the only reason why he does it is that he thought it was a "cold-blooded thing to say before I popped a cap in someone's ass." Jules also sports a pretty groovy jerry curled afro. 8 - Alejandro - Sicario Alejandro is the strong, silent type. Don't be fooled though, he's just as ruthless as anybody on this list. All you have to do is watch the end of Sicario and you'll understand what I'm talking about. The man is cold-blooded. I can't say I blame him given the circumstances. 9 - Sorter - Revolver The first hitman on my list that is a relative unknown. I doubt most people have even heard of the film, let alone the character. Sorter is played by the great character actor Mark Strong from the Guy Ritchie film Revolver. Unfortunately, Revolver is kind of a bad movie. Sorter is hands down the best part of the film. He's so cool that it's worth watching the movie just for him. Sure, he looks like an accountant with his bald head and thick rimmed glasses, but make no mistake, Sorter will punch your ticket faster that you can add 2+2. The guy took out three bad guys who were in another room just by sticking his gun through a hole in a wall and watching on a surveillance monitor. Come on, son. 10 - Smith - Shoot 'Em Up Smith just might be the most talented hitman on this list. He delivers a baby while in the middle of a shootout, he wastes a host of goons while having sex with Monica Bellucci and never skips a beat. You don't even want to know how deadly he can be with a carrot. Eat your vegetables, kids. Actually, you should see how deadly he is with a carrot. Not enough people caught this one when it was in theaters. 11 - Victoria - Red She's like 70 and still looks sexy in an evening gown. Oh, did I mention she likes playing with guns? I don't care that she's old enough to be a grandmother, she's still smokin' hot. Next. 12 - Vincent - Collateral The constant professional. It's just a job to Vincent. No hard feelings. The thing that makes Vincent interesting is the fact that there is a sadness to his character. Vincent is also rocking that gray head of hair to match his sharp gray suit. 13 - Ah Jong - The Killer I love The Killer. It's one of the best action films of all-time and includes some truly memorable scenes. Scenes that have been copied numerous times throughout the years by Hollywood. In fact, Shoot 'Em Up pays homage to The Killer with the scene with the shootout while holding an infant. Unfortunately, Ah Jong's story centers on a hit gone wrong. He accidentally blinded a woman and is trying to raise money to help her. Very admirable, but he loses major points in my book. 14 - Martin Q. Blank - Grosse Pointe Blank Don't be fooled by the boy-next-door looks, this guy is dangerous. The good news for bad guys is that Martin is trying to get out of the business and is having second thoughts about his choice for a career. He takes one more hit which also happens to be at his high school reunion. You thought your reunion was bad. Jason Bourne may not have much of a memory, but he clearly saw Grosse Pointe Blank and watched Martin kill a guy with a ballpoint pen and thought it might be a good skill to have. 15 - Michael Sullivan - Road to Perdition He's just a father who works for the mob to put food on the table. What could go wrong? Well, a lot. Sullivan soon hits the road with his young son by his side. One of the more unique father/son bonding experiences you will ever see. America's favorite average Joe actor has never looked more dangerous than Tom Hanks did in Road to Perdition. 16 - Angel Eyes - The Good, the Bad and the Ugly Has there ever been a more impressive and intimidating steely gaze than Lee Van Cleef as Angel Eyes in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly? Angel Eyes will stop at nothing to catch Blonde and Tuco. Walking away with the money would have been a nice bonus. 17 - Wesley Gibson - Wanted An average kid becomes legendary hitman who can curve bullets. How can he not be on the list? The only thing that keeps him from being higher is that his movie character can't compare to the graphic novel. 18 - Killer Joe Cooper - Killer Joe Boy, Joe certainly is an interesting character. I will never look at a chicken leg the same way again. I can't put Joe very high on the list because we don't really get to see him in action a whole lot. At least not in terms of killing people. He does look cool in that cowboy hat though. 19 - Mr. Goodkat - Lucky Number Slevin A hitman with a cool name and endlessly quotable lines played by Bruce Willis. It's pretty much a given he'd be on this list. Favorite quote: "Charlie Chaplin once entered a Charlie Chaplin look-alike contest in Monte Carlo and came in third; that's a story." Goodkat is kind of an enigma, but he's very entertaining. He often shows up just to reveal a little bit more information from a pretty twisty plot. 20 - Jackie Cogan - Killing Them Softly Jackie Cogan is a hitman for today's financial climate. Jackie proves that the current recession can have an impact on his profession. He can be very intelligent and puts a lot of work into his craft. He's a tad too talky for my liking though and that's why he finds himself lower on this list. 21 - El Mariachi - El Mariachi/Desperado El Mariachi is one of the more stylish hitmen around. He carries his machine gun in his guitar case and that just oozes coolness. Did I mention that he gets to have sex with Salma Hayek? 22 - Peter Clemenza - The Godfather "Leave the gun, take the canoli." With that line, Clemenza cemented himself as a legend of cinema. It's just a shame we didn't get to see more of this rotund rogue in action. Sure, he's not in the best shape compared to the other hitmen on this list, but he's just as deadly. Just make sure he's not in the backseat when you get into a car. 23 - Joe - Looper Joe's made a living killing people sent back into the past from the future. Not a bad gig considering he never has to see the face of the people he's killing. Until Joe realizes he's been contracted to kill his future self. You'd think that would make most people question their dedication to their job. Not Joe. 24 - Hanna - Hanna Has a tween girl ever kicked more ass than Hanna? Probably not. She's like a young, pretty female Jason Bourne. She's literally been conditioned to be a deadly killing machine since she was born. Until she realizes she wants to just be a normal kid. Can she turn off her deadly side and live a normal life? Let's hope not. 25 - Harlen Maguire - Road to Perdition Part-time hitman, part-time photographer that takes pictures of crime scenes. Whatever it takes to make ends meet I guess. You'd think with the money he's making Harlen can afford to brush his teeth or something. It was kind of refreshing to see the good looking Jude Law play such a slimy, vile character. 26 - Angelo Ledda - The Memory of a Killer Angelo is the oldest hitman on the list, but I respect my elders. Besides, he still gets the job done despite his age and failing memory. You have to respect anybody who can live to be that age in his line of work. No matter how good you are, I have to think the life expectancy isn't too great. 27 - Paul - Haywire In another movie, Paul might have become a legendary hitman. He looks slick and dresses cool and is kind of enigmatic, but he's with us for such a short time. Let's be honest, he also got his ass handed to him by Gina Carano. 28 - Chuck Barris - Confessions of a Dangerous Mind Is he a game show host, is he a CIA hitman or is he just plain crazy? We may never know, but Sam Rockwell plays the real life Chuck Barris with just the right amount of wackiness and sincerity to make the film work. 29 - Ray - In Bruges I love Ray, but the hitman game is just not for him. He seems like a nice guy with a big heart, I'm not quite sure how he got wrapped up in this, but it's not gonna work out. Ray's first hit goes horribly wrong and he finds himself in Bruges as punishment and as a way to lay low. For Ray, hell would be a better place to stay. Anything's better than F'n Bruges... 30 - Vincent Vega - Pulp Fiction I know what you're thinking, how can Vince be at 30 when Jules is all the way up there at 7? HE SHOT MARVIN IN THE FACE!! That's how. I'm sorry, that just can't happen. It's bush league. Then take into account that Vince died while taking a dump and I could make the case he shouldn't even be on the list at all. The only reason I showed mercy are those groovy dance moves.

#john wick #hitmen

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hermanwatts · 6 years ago

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Sensor Sweep: Michael Shea, Hugh Cave, Walking Dead

Comic Books (Paint Monk): If you think I worship at the proverbial altar of Roy Thomas when it comes to Conan comic books, you’re right. I do. But it’s not undeserved. Not only was Thomas the man who worked to bring Conan to Marvel, but he also took his time with character research, developing all the nuances of the Cimmerian and making sure the Hyborian Age was portrayed by the most capable artistic staff the House of Ideas could muster (within budget, of course)! He scripted the initial run of Conan for the first 115 issues.

Sales (Cirsova): I don’t know that I’ve mentioned it here, but we have made some of the Wild Stars backstock available via our Amazon store. We had several damaged copies when trying to fulfill our crowdfunds–these have been made available at 1/2 SRP. I’ll note that while a few of these were pretty mangled, most of them were dents, dings and corner creases. While these would’ve been unacceptable to send to backers or for retail shelves [especially for comic folks], these are perfectly good readable copies if you want Wild Stars at a lower buy-in.

Zombies (Everyday Should be Tuesday): I have long been a fan of the comics and watcher of the show, but I haven’t yet dived into any of The Walking Dead novels. But with an impending trip to China and a good experience with Chu’s Lives of Tao books, Typhoon was the perfect book to start with. Chu takes the action across the Pacific, telling a story set after the zombie apocalypse hit China. If you think walkers are bad, wait until there are 700 million of them.

Publishing (Kairos): If you travel in the circles where this blog is read, you already know that yesterday Amazon nuked preorders for Jon Del Arroz’s and Declan Finn’s latest books. Amazon shut down Jon Del Arroz’s Glorified novel along with Declan Finn’s Deus Vult novel from publisher Silver Empire. Publisher Russell Newquist was informed that both books, which were scheduled to be released on November 1st, were removed from Amazon and Kindle.

Fantasy (Misha Burnett): I have been thinking a lot about Fantasy, and specifically about fantastic settings–settings in which the fantastic elements are integral to the world. And frankly, I’m not interested in writing stories set in some vaguely Central European kingdom in the First Millenium AD. The Tolkien/D&D/Swords & Sorcery kind of setting is one that I don’t really relate to. I’ve never ridden a horse or herded a sheep. I’ve never been in an actual stone castle, never fought using a sword or a mace, never fired a bow, and sitting around a campfire is something I do before I go inside and sleep in a real damned bed.

Science Fiction (Futurism.com): In 1982, director Ridley Scott graced the world with “Blade Runner,” the cult-favorite sci-fi film noir that painted a stunning picture of a bleak, distant future: November 2019. Since that starts, well, today, let’s compare our current timeline to the one in “Blade Runner.” Just please don’t bring back those insufferable jokes about hoverboards that flooded the internet in 2015 when we hit the futuristic date that Marty McFly traveled to “Back To The Future Part II.”

Authors (DMR Books): Dr. Timothy Willocks was born in Cheshire, England, to a working-class family. He graduated from the University College Hospital Medical School, whereupon he began practicing medicine. He did some time as an intern in a trauma ward before specializing in the treatment of drug addiction. Tim eventually grew tired of the stress and hassles involved with practicing medicine and turned to writing. Willocks’ first published novel was the noir thriller, Bad City Blues. His next novel, Green River Rising, was optioned by Hollywood.

Warhammer (Track of Words): In this instalment I spoke to legendary Black Library author CL Werner about his new Warhammer Horror novel Castle of Blood, which is available to order now in hardback, ebook and audiobook formats. It’s the first full-on horror novel released for Age of Sigmar, and promises to be very interesting indeed! Let’s get straight to the questions and Clint’s answers, to find out more.

Gaming (Dungeon Fantastic): GURPS DF has copper pieces ($1), silver pieces ($4) and gold pieces ($80). DF Felltower has its own devalued set. AD&D has copper, silver, electrum, gold, platinum, Rolemaster has coins from bronze to gold going by tens, and Dragonlance even has steel pieces (Hah*). Generally, though, those coins are the same everywhere. It’s rare for places to have extra coins.

Fiction (Mystery File): THEODORE STURGEON “The Ultimate Egoist.” Short story. First published in Unknown, February 1941. Collected in Without Sorcery (Prime Press, hardcover, 1949) and The Golden Helix (Dell, paperback, 1980; Carroll & Graf, paperback, 1989), among others. Reprinted in Human?, edited by Judith Merrill (Lion #205, paperback, 1954). I suppose everyone, at one time or another, has had the following fantasy: that the world you see, and the objects in it, could disappear if you simply decided that they no longer existed. That the facade of life revolves around you and you only. You don’t even have to admit it. I know you have.

Halloween (Jon Mollison): Tomorrow night marks the one celebration that traditionally brings neighbors together to celebrate as a community. Yes, we all grumble about early Christmas decorations and wish each other Happy New Year at parties, but Halloween is the one where you go out and meet your neighbors and share in a communal love of the macabre and candy and making little kids smile.

Fiction (Adventures Fantastic): He That Hath Wings” is one of Hamilton’s best works, so I was surprised to find that it hasn’t been reprinted very often. Fortunately, The Best of Edmond Hamilton is in print, although the cover illustration of the current edition (see below) isn’t nearly as good. Just so you know, I’m going to discuss this story in detail, so expect spoilers. The story concerns a boy, David Rand, whose parents were caught in what is only described as an electrical explosion, but they were exposed to some unidentified form of radiation. David’s father dies before his is born, and his mother dies a few hours after his birth.

Men’s Adventure Magazines (Mens Pulp Mags): Bob Deis and Wyatt Doyle — the editors and publishers of THE MEN’S ADVENTURE LIBRARY series — will have their latest book, POLLEN’S ACTION, at this year’s PulpFest. It collects the cream of the Samson Pollen’s high-octane action paintings for the men’s adventure magazines. They’ll also have a limited number of copies of EVA: MEN’S ADVENTURE SUPERMODEL. These are being produced exclusively for members of PulpFest. This special edition — predating the title’s wide release by several months — will look at actress, pin-up model, and men’s adventure magazine artist’s model Eva Lynd.

Comic Books (John C. Wright): Feserm or, rather, the scoundrel JBS Haldane, defines the terms fantasy and imagination incorrectly, even misleadingly, but the point still stands. I propose a clearer definition: One is mere wish fulfillment that excludes consequences and context, and hence is outside the moral order. The suave British spy who nonchalantly seduces any gorgeous woman seen, yet without fathering any bastards or breaking any hearts, is an example.

Fiction (Paperback Warrior): The character of Modesty Blaise was conceived as a comic strip in 1963 by British writer Peter O’Donnell. The success of the strip landed O’Donnell a film deal, and he wrote an early draft of the screenplay starring his sexy, female spy for a movie that was eventually released in 1966. A year before the movie’s release, O’Donnell adapted his unproduced screenplay into the first of 11 Modesty Blaise paperback novels in this highly-regarded series.

Fiction (DMR Books): It is in Michael Shea’s Nifft the Lean where the author really shines in the way of crafting some amazing and unique dark fantasy. While using a familiar Dying Earth type of setting, and a style of prose that one might compare to Clark Ashton Smith or Fritz Leiber at times, it is the inventiveness of the plots that set the stories apart. Although Shea continued the Nifft series later in his career, the original saga published in the 1982 DAW collection consisted of four main tales.

Pulp (Mystery File): Private eyes in detective fiction are as often as not hard drinkers, and some of them are awfully good at it. But few of them are as good at it as was Peter Kane. There isn’t a single minute in “The Late Mr. Smythe” in which he isn’t totally sozzled. I can’t believe that anyone could go through life the same way he does, in three stages: drunk, drunker, and completely plastered.

Greyhawk (Boggswood): A few posts back, I posted an Apocalypse map of Blackmoor showing what Greyhawks’ Blackmoor should look like with the towns and rivers properly placed. The map you see here is the one I used to site those locations.

Fiction (Black Gate): Bad guy, villain, evildoer, crook, criminal, and gangster. Fiction has a love affair with these characters ranging from low-level sneak thieves to wizards intent on destroying all life on Earth. In many cases, the villain is the driving force behind the tale. Where would fiction be without Lady MacBeth, Grendel’s Mother, Long John Silver, or Count Dracula? Though the villain is often the impetus, they rarely hold the place of protagonist in novels until recent times. A few famous characters did achieve notoriety, influencing fiction to this day.

Sensor Sweep: Michael Shea, Hugh Cave, Walking Dead published first on https://sixchexus.weebly.com/

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nancyknowsthings-blog · 8 years ago

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Taylor Swift’s Kansas City Shuffle.

Guys, guys, we've got it all wrong. If there is one thing we know about Taylor Swift it’s that we don’t know everything. Taylor is not an open book. She is perhaps the most followed celebrity globally and yet she stated in her September 8, 2014 interview with Josh Eells of Rolling Stones: “Swift says that's sort of her point. “People think they know the whole narrative of my life," she says. "I think maybe that line is there to remind people that there are really big things they don't know about." (http://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/taylor-swift-1989-cover-story-20140908)

Hear me out. Like actually hear me and don’t make me sound crazy. First, I am not a swiftie. I actually think Taylor is brilliant in the same way I think Beyoncé is brilliant, business savvy, in a boss kind of way. I would say I am a fan of them as an artist and as someone who has direction in their life. The kind that takes control and presents exactly what she wants and in the way that she intends it to be. I wish I had that kind of discipline in my own life.

I enjoy their music, sure, but to say I have the level of dedication that either of their biggest fans have would be a lie. I am a writer and I think I have an eye for detail. All of that to say I have no actual clue or idea of what Taylor is going through or what she means by most of her songs and or her image. All of this is conjecture and from the things that I wish to present in such a way that show my own opinion as a viable opinion in the face of all of the media coverage that surrounds Taylor Swift.

I think that Taylor has had a hidden, secret relationship with someone that we know nothing about. That is by design. This is who “Look what you made me do” is about. She even points out exactly who she is referring to. “I've got a list of names and yours is in red, underlined I check it once, then I check it twice, oh!” I metaphorically bet you if I were to get a copy of her album Red and looked closely enough I would find somehow, someway, a name that is underlined.

Guys she is a talented songwriter, singer, and artist, she is so dedicated to her craft that she leaves clues and I don’t think they are just for fans, I think they are for this hidden relationship person. Think about it, again she is one of the most talked about, photographed people in the world and she can’t just communicate the way we would. She was a teenager when she began her career and she has probably learned to keep a lot of things concealed.

Of course there are direct jabs at Kayne and Kim, Katie and other people. Maybe part of it is an angry call out. She got pissed and it was more of a: well I’m gonna go out and break all the records, “look what you made me do!” You're nothing to me. This is nothing to me. This isn’t gonna phase me because none of anything that is media hyped has ever phased me. I will rise up, I have every single time before this and I will, again, “I do it all the time.” It’s an anthem almost.

This is surface level though. She even states: “The world moves on, another day, another drama, drama But not for me, not for me, all I think about is karma” She is so used to the drama and the crap that is thrown at her and she is not scared to handle it, like a boss.

Except that, there is something deeper here, she hasn’t gotten over. It seems to me that she is directing this at a hidden someone while casually confronting all the obvious haters, because that part is not challenging at all, because, hey she is used to that drama. She can certainly have multiple meanings to her words and songs. She certainly has before. That is the beauty of talent.

This article shows her album Red in a light that has helped me to develop my theory. It was written of course on August 28, 2017 the day after the release of her video for Look What You Made Me Do: http://www.npr.org/2017/08/28/546359653/shocking-omissions-taylor-swift-s-red-a-canonical-coming-of-age-album.

In it the author describes how the album Red was such a turning point for Taylor. Read it, it’s a great review of the album. Then go listen to the album itself. There is so much there. Themes and subjects that she still explores in her 1989 album, maybe because she hasn’t let go of it all. She is still in the middle of it or maybe in 1989 she is beginning to let it go, beginning to come to terms with it. That is after all what art does, it allows the person to work through their deepest emotions in a way that expresses them to the world; right, wrong, or indifferent, anything and everything all at once.

All of Red is more than. More than casual, more than superficial relationships. There are deeper feelings to all of these songs than, I dated this celebrity guy and this song came about. Again I could be completely off base because I DON’T KNOW. I don’t know these people or where they were at in these relationships. I have no real insight into any of this, other than as a person that has been through a lot of deep life lessons.

It seems like there is someone that has been her anchor from way before Red. This is someone who she keeps going back to. They are more than what anyone thought, what they themselves thought, they are very near to her, so much so that she holds them so intensely tight and won’t let anyone see this one. This one is hers, this is not ours. I have my own ideas of who it could be but that is not for me to tell.

Flash forward two albums and we see the result of something that happened. There is a disconnect, a divide; time and whatever it is that we don’t know happened and the old Taylor is dead and she is coming at this person in a new way. I think it’s as a women scorned because as the saying goes, hell hath no fury like one.

You don’t get to where Taylor is by showing your whole hand. Maybe that is what she means by her being a snake, here we all are, looking this way and that for all the answers and in the end we are the ones being fooled because none of it is actually what is happening, yet again she slips out of our grasps. That my friends is a Kansas City shuffle. ;)

#taylor swift #beyonce #lucky number slevin #the rolling stones #npr #look what you made me do #conspiracy #theroy #NancyKnowsThings #snake #art #kim kardashian #kaynewest #kimye #katie perry

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endlessarchite · 8 years ago

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Announcing Contributors to the UDH!

Hey folks! I wanted to pop in today to announce a new twist on the blog that I’ve never done before: I’m adding a couple of fellow bloggers to the UDH team.

… Ok, so right away, I realize that’s kind of a lie, because I already posted one of Caroline’s posts this past month: 13 Must-Haves for Outdoor Spaces…

But I wanted to do it properly with an actual announcement too, to let you guys know more about what’s going on, and that other contributors are also in the pipeline.

Why Add Contributors to The UDH?

I realize how pretentious it is to both ask myself a question and answer it, but it did seem like I should in this case (maybe). It might seem like a random decision, which would then be fair to question. The answer has many personal reasons (that’s one of the answers, actually, ha!).

To better deal with unanticipated (or anticipated) hiccups.

The first reason is that mainly, from time to time, I get busy with a project that I am working on, but I have nothing worth posting about it until it reaches the next step. Or a project gets interrupted by something unexpected, like a plumbing problem, and while I’m putting out that fire (dude, I hope not literally), I have nothing to say (both because the frustration of it has made me silent/drunk or I’m internally panicking). Or for the first time since deciding to run the blog full-time, I am planning a vacation that will involve totally disconnecting from the backend duties of running the site (I tried to take a vacation last year and it was a disaster; I was gone for two weeks but didn’t really get more than a couple of true days “away”, and the mess I had to juggle when I got back added more stress than I relieved… pretty sure the site actually crashed, too, but I’ve blacked it out).

As a control freak, I also want to keep a somewhat regular flow of content on this site. When I first started blogging, there weren’t things like Instagram or Pinterest, so it made it less odd to have really short posts mixed into the longer tutorials; that doesn’t fit as well now. And simply being the nature of DIY home improvement tutorials needing to be somewhat long to go through steps properly (especially home repair), I spend a good deal of time whenever I work on the lengthier pieces (trying to make sure I’m accurate with instructions, if I have to look up manufacturer’s recommendations, etc.). The only way to make both sides of that coin happy (in my opinion), is to add a few more small DIY projects in advance. I could go ahead and try to create those myself for rainy days, and I am to a degree, but having enough of that requires a little more time than I seem to have anymore (someone, please tell me how I managed to renovate, go to grad school, run this blog, and have a regular job??… I can’t seem to remember how all that space existed). So, the simple solution is to add a great blog contributor (or two) who have some awesome ideas of their own to share. Thankfully, they’ve agreed to do that, and you’ll see these projects about once a month as long as I keep my shit together (I fully anticipate that this will be a learning process for me).

I like to experiment.

(My brain is already going to weird places; I’m tired.) Throughout this blog, I’ve thrown random things into the mix to see what works. I like trying new tools, new designs, new trends, new products. My writing style pretty much always reflects those moods. Doing these things is really the only way the blog has ever grown or kept me motivated to try again; some things work, and some things don’t. But I learn, and that’s fun for me. This is one of those things where I think it could be cool to add to the blog and see what happens… out of plain curiosity.

(I also wrote about a similar concept a long time ago, when I was in grad school; I read a book that really resonated with me that was all about taking these small steps to see where things go. Through experimenting, you can find momentum in the strangest places and build on it. I’ve tried it before, and that led me to invest time in my blog, to starting my own business, and more. It’s taught me to not be as afraid to try something and see if it works — paint my countertop: why not? turn a bowl into a light fixture? let’s see what happens!)

Also, on any given day, I will come up with an idea for a post but don’t have the time to research it well enough, such as a new design trend. That’s where my pal Caroline can come in. She will find cool design ideas, or a new artist, or take a new twist on a craft idea she did with a friend. Just seeing what she picks out of the same concept versus what I do has been really refreshing.

Burnout is just a thing; might as well embrace it.

As an enthusiastic home improvement addict with slight nerd tendencies, I love getting to do this. Every day. It’s ridiculously fun and cool. Even when it’s hard or things in my house break or it seems a lot more like a job than I ever realized (conference calls, signing contracts, constantly learning new tools as an entrepreneur, Facebook and Pinterest changing their rules or algorithms again, etc.). I don’t plan on jumping ship or totally burning out, but that’s not really a thing you can plan for either. In my heart of hearts, I’m a writer. I love storytelling. I love the journey this house has taken me on. I love connecting with people who are nuts for DIY like I am (both bloggers and non-blogging readers alike, despite how awkward I am to meet in person!). But writer’s block is a thing that still happens regardless of your efforts sometimes, and I’ve never found a successful way to avoid it completely. I can sense a difference in myself, my writing, and my creativity when I’ve had a chance to take a break and refresh. I need to feel inspired and sort of flush out the bad blockages that occur from time to time (ok, that metaphor was just plain gross and probably made you assume I was talking about plumbing again — mental blockages is what I mean).

I think adding some new, inspiring projects to the site will be fun. Fun for me to feel inspired from, and fun for you guys to get some fresh ideas!

I’ve started cooking.

*record scratch*

I know. Hell hath frozen over, and I bought an Instant Pot. Or the plain reality is that I’ve been wanting to save more money by cooking at home, and scrambled eggs on toast will only be delicious for so long (who am I kidding — it will be awesome, always). I have a few quick recipes from when I was in college and studied abroad — I had cravings for food I couldn’t find anywhere, and it created some things I still eat for dinner to this day when I am short on time. I have old recipes from my family, handwritten and handed down, and I’d really like to start learning them all, too. It was one of the things my Granny loved to do most when she was alive. And since I’m doing all of this anyway, why not share it from time to time?

great grannys handwritten cookie recipes

This blog has always been a very personal one, where I share a lot of ins and outs about what’s going on in my life. Cooking is something new I’ve added to that mix, but since it’s so new, I offered for one of my blog design clients to contribute some of their recipes as well (since my new Recipes page will be quite sparse by comparison to the 1200+ posts I have written so far about DIY). This will just give people who come to the site looking for food ideas to have a little more substance.

from Visiting Kit’s Black Feather Farm

Plus, she’s also giving me some new cocktail ideas to try. You know… for when that unanticipated renovation problem happens and I just really need to solve it with something other than beer or wine (or you know… throwing things).

To make room.

I guess in some ways, this is a way to try to bring some “balance” into time I’m at home for work/DIY versus time I’m at home to just enjoy my home. I’ve been setting annual goals with similar intentions and this is part of realizing that. Working from home is awesome, except when you have a really difficult time pulling yourself away from work. I’m pretty bad at shutting the computer off.

And that’s how I wind up having to wear things like this.

As my home and each room reaches more and more of a completed state (and no longer needs as many huge overhauls from where I first started), I’m going to be looking for the next big project. It’s on my mind a lot. I expect that this will also mean new homes to renovate, or investment properties, or maybe even something a little more unconventional than that. But I need room to do those things, to think about these things, both as a business and for my own sense of what the future holds. So, adding contributors is one of the ways I can make that space and breathing room to figure out what’s next (it’s more of a mental thing than anything else).

What this doesn’t mean…

There are marketers, PR email lists, and freelance writers who email bloggers in droves to ask to “contribute helpful articles” as a means to advertise for free. This isn’t what I’m intending to do with contributors. I consider that “fluff” content and hate reading generic info guides; I am a blogger, but also a blog reader, and I don’t want to put things on the site that I wouldn’t want to read myself. You’re only going to see the small number of people I have personally hand-picked to contribute their own trend posts, DIY tutorials, or recipes, similar to how I post things from my own point of view.

What this means for you

I know I’ve said it before, but it really can’t be said enough: I really like you guys (*virtual hug* – or if you’re not the hugging type, *awkward side-hug and a dorky high five*). As much as writing a blog like this is a very personal thing, I also know that this blog wouldn’t be successful without your support and encouragement. It means a lot. A kind comment has the power to make my whole day/week/month. So, I also decided to add contributors to give you guys more inspiration and give you guys more great content. And I hope you’ll enjoy that and embrace these folks who are adding their awesome DIY and recipe ideas to the mix at the UDH. You rock. And they do too. Y’all should meet.

What this means for the site

In the coming days/weeks, you’ll be seeing posts that introduce these folks to you as well as their first posts that are getting rolled out. You’ll also see a new link at the top in the menu bar to add Recipes as its own thing and one of my favorite recipes that I may even be eating tonight (it doesn’t make much sense to have it in the Project Gallery, anyway). You’ll also be able to discover a new Contributors page when that gets finalized (I still need to add a few links and then you’ll see info on everyone), which will have contributor bios and links to their blogs. This will be a way to organize posts for each person (so that you can see the posts that belong to a specific contributor if you decide you like them and want to see more of what they’ve done).

That’s all for now… I have a coffee pot with my name on it and some dogs who need snuggling. I’ll have some new DIYs for you very soon (including the bathroom mood board!) and hope you’re having a wonderful and productive week!

The post Announcing Contributors to the UDH! appeared first on The Ugly Duckling House.

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Announcing Contributors to the UDH! published first on http://ift.tt/2qxZz2j

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chocdono · 8 years ago

Text

Announcing Contributors to the UDH!

Hey folks! I wanted to pop in today to announce a new twist on the blog that I’ve never done before: I’m adding a couple of fellow bloggers to the UDH team.

… Ok, so right away, I realize that’s kind of a lie, because I already posted one of Caroline’s posts this past month: 13 Must-Haves for Outdoor Spaces…

But I wanted to do it properly with an actual announcement too, to let you guys know more about what’s going on, and that other contributors are also in the pipeline.

Why Add Contributors to The UDH?

To better deal with unanticipated (or anticipated) hiccups.

I like to experiment.

Burnout is just a thing; might as well embrace it.

I think adding some new, inspiring projects to the site will be fun. Fun for me to feel inspired from, and fun for you guys to get some fresh ideas!

I’ve started cooking.

*record scratch*

great grannys handwritten cookie recipes

from Visiting Kit’s Black Feather Farm

To make room.

And that’s how I wind up having to wear things like this.

What this doesn’t mean…

What this means for you

What this means for the site

The post Announcing Contributors to the UDH! appeared first on The Ugly Duckling House.

Website // Subscribe // Advertise // Twitter // Facebook // Google+

from mix1 http://ift.tt/2vNO8X5 via with this info

#mix1

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sherlocklexa · 8 years ago

Text

Announcing Contributors to the UDH!

Hey folks! I wanted to pop in today to announce a new twist on the blog that I’ve never done before: I’m adding a couple of fellow bloggers to the UDH team.

… Ok, so right away, I realize that’s kind of a lie, because I already posted one of Caroline’s posts this past month: 13 Must-Haves for Outdoor Spaces…

But I wanted to do it properly with an actual announcement too, to let you guys know more about what’s going on, and that other contributors are also in the pipeline.

Why Add Contributors to The UDH?

To better deal with unanticipated (or anticipated) hiccups.

I like to experiment.

Burnout is just a thing; might as well embrace it.

I think adding some new, inspiring projects to the site will be fun. Fun for me to feel inspired from, and fun for you guys to get some fresh ideas!

I’ve started cooking.

*record scratch*

great grannys handwritten cookie recipes

from Visiting Kit’s Black Feather Farm

To make room.

And that’s how I wind up having to wear things like this.

What this doesn’t mean…

What this means for you

What this means for the site

The post Announcing Contributors to the UDH! appeared first on The Ugly Duckling House.

Website // Subscribe // Advertise // Twitter // Facebook // Google+

from car2 http://ift.tt/2vNO8X5 via as shown a lot

#car2

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prolistsite · 8 years ago

Text

Announcing Contributors to the UDH!

Hey folks! I wanted to pop in today to announce a new twist on the blog that I’ve never done before: I’m adding a couple of fellow bloggers to the UDH team.

… Ok, so right away, I realize that’s kind of a lie, because I already posted one of Caroline’s posts this past month: 13 Must-Haves for Outdoor Spaces…

But I wanted to do it properly with an actual announcement too, to let you guys know more about what’s going on, and that other contributors are also in the pipeline.

Why Add Contributors to The UDH?

To better deal with unanticipated (or anticipated) hiccups.

I like to experiment.

Burnout is just a thing; might as well embrace it.

I think adding some new, inspiring projects to the site will be fun. Fun for me to feel inspired from, and fun for you guys to get some fresh ideas!

I’ve started cooking.

*record scratch*

great grannys handwritten cookie recipes

from Visiting Kit’s Black Feather Farm

To make room.

And that’s how I wind up having to wear things like this.

What this doesn’t mean…

What this means for you

What this means for the site

The post Announcing Contributors to the UDH! appeared first on The Ugly Duckling House.

Website // Subscribe // Advertise // Twitter // Facebook // Google+

Read more http://ift.tt/2vNO8X5 Areas served: Winston-Salem, High Point, Yadkinville, Mocksville, Advance, Clemmons, Kernersville, Greensboro, Walnut Cove, Statesville, NC, North Carolina Services: House painting, roofing, deck building, landscaping, Carpentry, Flooring, tile, hardwood, remodeling, home improvement, interior, exterior

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darensmurray · 8 years ago

Text

Announcing Contributors to the UDH!

Hey folks! I wanted to pop in today to announce a new twist on the blog that I’ve never done before: I’m adding a couple of fellow bloggers to the UDH team.

… Ok, so right away, I realize that’s kind of a lie, because I already posted one of Caroline’s posts this past month: 13 Must-Haves for Outdoor Spaces…

But I wanted to do it properly with an actual announcement too, to let you guys know more about what’s going on, and that other contributors are also in the pipeline.

Why Add Contributors to The UDH?

To better deal with unanticipated (or anticipated) hiccups.

I like to experiment.

Burnout is just a thing; might as well embrace it.

I think adding some new, inspiring projects to the site will be fun. Fun for me to feel inspired from, and fun for you guys to get some fresh ideas!

I’ve started cooking.

*record scratch*

great grannys handwritten cookie recipes

from Visiting Kit’s Black Feather Farm

To make room.

And that’s how I wind up having to wear things like this.

What this doesn’t mean…

What this means for you

What this means for the site

The post Announcing Contributors to the UDH! appeared first on The Ugly Duckling House.

Website // Subscribe // Advertise // Twitter // Facebook // Google+

0 notes

petraself · 8 years ago

Text

Announcing Contributors to the UDH!

Hey folks! I wanted to pop in today to announce a new twist on the blog that I’ve never done before: I’m adding a couple of fellow bloggers to the UDH team.

… Ok, so right away, I realize that’s kind of a lie, because I already posted one of Caroline’s posts this past month: 13 Must-Haves for Outdoor Spaces…

But I wanted to do it properly with an actual announcement too, to let you guys know more about what’s going on, and that other contributors are also in the pipeline.

Why Add Contributors to The UDH?

To better deal with unanticipated (or anticipated) hiccups.

I like to experiment.

Burnout is just a thing; might as well embrace it.

I think adding some new, inspiring projects to the site will be fun. Fun for me to feel inspired from, and fun for you guys to get some fresh ideas!

I’ve started cooking.

*record scratch*

great grannys handwritten cookie recipes

from Visiting Kit’s Black Feather Farm

To make room.

And that’s how I wind up having to wear things like this.

What this doesn’t mean…

What this means for you

What this means for the site

The post Announcing Contributors to the UDH! appeared first on The Ugly Duckling House.

Website // Subscribe // Advertise // Twitter // Facebook // Google+

Announcing Contributors to the UDH! published first on http://ift.tt/1kI9W8s

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