#Huzzah -- now I can stop being focused on that for a while... | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

pedropascallovebot · 3 years

Text

had to repost this because my internet is awful but huzzah i have returned from a writing hiatus i have been doing nothing but reading sambucky fics and i decided to curse the world with a bucky x reader even though no one asked me to. you may now put me in exile.

Bucky likes the smell of the candles you burn in your apartment, even though he swears to you that you have to stop forgetting to blow them out before you go to sleep. He knows that your record player in the corner collects a bunch of dust. He remembers laughing when you had defended yourself when he joked about your devastatingly low vinyl count- "I swear, I do use it! But look me in the eye and tell me Spotify isn't more convenient." He likes the various little crystals and stones you have scattered on your windowsill, even if he doesn't know anything about that stuff. Bucky really likes your bookcase, though. You told him upon his first visit to your place that you thrifted it for an absolute bargain, and it appears that it's been put to good use, given there's not a single place on the shelf for another book to fit without stacking some on top of one another. Most of all, he likes that you’re there. He’s only known you for a short period of time, and he gets that nothing is really official yet… but he likes you. He can’t say it out loud to himself yet, but his therapist definitely knows your name.

All throughout his horrible, miserable, no good bad day, Bucky is thinking about how warm and safe your apartment feels, and consequentially, he's thinking about you. He knows he's got it bad, but there's little to be done about it when his brain starts screaming profanities at him whenever he dares dwell on the thought of your face for too long. He misses you, though. Especially when he's nursing some embarrassment and frustration caused by a group of anarchists pushing him out of a moving truck. He wants so desperately to call and check to see how you're doing, what you're up to, but by the time Sam's got him back home it's nearly one in the morning and he shouldn't wake you. Right? He should lock his door, hang up his jacket, and settle in for a long night of doing nothing but scrolling through the guide of all the weird movies his cable company is playing. He shouldn't be halfway down the stairs of his apartment building to walk across town in the middle of the night to come see you.

But it's inevitable that he ends up at your front door. That annoying yelling in his brain is back, telling him that he should just go home before he knocks and wakes you up, but his hand is already rapping on the wood and he can hear scrambling from the other side of the door. It was only then he realized it might of been a good idea to call ahead, because God, what kind of person is answering the door this late, and who's to say you don't already have someone there already, and fuck, fuck, fuck, it's not too late to just hide behind the big artificial tree that the apartment complex put up for decoration-

You open up right before he can entertain that thought. You look like an absolute angel, he thinks. You’re in some t-shirt that’s way too big for you, and your eyes smile when you see him. But from what he can tell, you're tired. Maybe he did wake you up, and he feels that familiar pinch of guilt in his chest.

"I was, uhm.. in the neighborhood," he starts, his hands very focused on the loose thread of his jacket sleeve. "figured I'd stop by and see how you were."

And there goes your eyes again, kind and soft and welcoming, something that Bucky isn't really used to feeling yet. He's being ushered in, and suddenly realizes the television is still on. The guilt subsides knowing he didn’t wake you.

"You should absolutely be sleeping right now, but I'll let it slide because I miss you," you smile, and Bucky knows he's a goner when you press a kiss to his cheek before shutting the door behind him.

“So should you.” Then, a quiet “I miss you too.”

"Want some tea? Or some coffee? I've got the kettle going with some hot water and I was planning on making some sleepytime tea, but I think I've got a few packets of that instant espresso crap buried if you don't wanna wait for the coffee pot to brew..."

You trail off into a comfortable silence for a minute as he watches as you grab a box of the celestial seasonings that you always kept in stock, the one with the bear sitting by the fireplace. Feeling inclined to help, Bucky attempts to step foot in the kitchen and grab a couple of mugs before immediately being banished to the living room, where he then listened to your rant about how he looked like he just got run over by a moving vehicle, and how he should sit down. Well, you were kinda right. You go to drop a couple of teabags into hot water, but not before you warn him to get on the couch before he falls asleep standing up.

He doesn't follow directions very well, because his feet lead him over to your bookshelf, where you've got some sort of scented wax over a tea light. Eyes trailing over the numerous books you have, he recognized a few. A Farewell to Arms, Main Street, and the two copies you had of The Great Gatsby. He knows you have a love-hate relationship with Harry Potter, but all seven of the books sat at eye level, a bit faded from countless rereads as soon as the weather got colder and you needed something cozy and familiar.

His gaze is caught on one book in particular; one that he thought about earlier today, before a teenager punched the living daylights out of him and before Walker and his unbearably chirpy sidekick made his day go from bad to worse. The Hobbit sat tucked away to the left of The Lord of the Rings, and Bucky reached out and gently pulled it from the row. It wasn't the same cover as the one he had at his apartment- yours had drawn trees and mountains, with runes lining the edges of the illustration. His own copy had what he assumed was a still from the movie adaptation, something he never bothered to watch. He still felt compelled to buy the book when he saw it sitting on the shelf at a store.

"I already called dibs on the Star Wars mug," you joked, heading out into the living room carrying two mugs of tea. "You're gonna have to drink from the-"

"Can you read to me?"

He does feel bad for interrupting you, but to be fair, the words slipped out before he could even stop them. He feels his nerves swell up a bit before you answer him, and the book in his hands feels heavier than it should.

You set the tea down on the small table at the end of the couch before switching on the lamp, offering the room some light which was previously only provided by a few candles, the kitchen, and the glow from the television. You switch that off, too, and the nerves that Bucky was sure were radiating off him melt away.

“Only if you stop standing ten feet away and come cuddle me while I do.”

When you spoke, it took Bucky all of two seconds to make his way to the couch, grabbing the blanket he knows you love and draping it over the both of you as you trade him his tea for the book.

“Teasing me about wanting to read The Hobbit is off the table, doll.” Bucky drapes an arm over your shoulder, making himself comfortable. “A friendly reminder it sits on your bookshelf.”

He hears you giggle and he’s in absolute awe of how much he wants to kiss you. Sure, you both have done plenty of that over the course of time he’s known you, but there’s something about you sitting in his arms with a book he knows so well open in front of you. Home.

“I’ll admit, it’s been a while since I’ve read this, my knowledge of Middle Earth is a bit spotty.”

“I’m willing to bet it’s been even longer for me,” he jokes, but there’s still a sting when he says it. Bucky pushes it aside.

“Alright, old coot. Let’s start from the beginning.”

“The dark filled all the room, and the fire died down, and the shadows were lost, and they still played on.”

It takes Bucky all of five minutes and a few sips of tea to get him tired before he’s placing his cup down and resting his head on your shoulder, and you’re almost down for the count, ready to retire to your bed. But you only have about ten pages until the end of the chapter and Bucky is way too good of a pillow to even think about moving. The dwarves start to sing their song, and if you’re remembering correctly, this is when things really start to get good. You debate if you want to continue, but then you look down and see Bucky absolutely zonked, and your mind is made up. You yawn and set the book on the table before reaching over and shutting off the lamp, attempting not to wake up the sleeping figure next to you.

#bucky barnes #bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #james buchanan barnes #falcon and the winter soldier

134 notes · View notes

botwstoriesandsuch · 4 years

Text

Linktober Day 1 - Monster/Beast

2391 Words

Warning for a mention of blood

Huzzah! I did it, Linktober is here and I actually wrote something of decent quality! Please enjoy Urbosa being a badass...

- - - - -

“I heard your screams the other night, when you tried to consume my people.”

A shrill cry pierced the air. The night a bruising purple, the moon bleeding blue.

She stepped closer, and the screech of the desert grew louder, the echoes fading into wisping sandy grains. “Quite difficult, wasn’t it? Trying to burrow through Gerudo walls?”

The moon slipped beneath a midnight cloud, the horizon fading to foggy haze. Despite this, her head piece glistened gold, embers that glowed amidst her fiery hair. The glint of jewels adorned on her ears, shield, and scabbard was only rivaled by her flickering emerald eyes. She gazed at the desert, daring it to tremble once more.

“Resilience is etched in the history of my people, to even the first of our endeavouring ancestors. Their walls, their craft, their blades, their legends— all of unyielding strength.”

Another step forward, a hand resting on her hip; the Chief’s face was calm, yet determined. She looked around, but nothing moved. All was still as stone.

“Perhaps time has made you forget, little worm.” She raised her voice this time, trying to get a reaction from the void.

“I will be happy to give you new peace of mind, when I pry your skull upon my steel.”

The world shook, another scream was let loose somewhere beneath her. The warrior pivoted her step, the metal sound of her blade unsheathed rang through the air. A confident note to a familiar song…

There you are.

The good thing about the desert is that it’s easy to spot things out of place. Amidst the towering ruins of forgotten sandstone monuments, one would assume that a moving pile of sand was out of the ordinary.

It slithered by the corner of her gaze, disappearing just as she fully turned around— but it was enough, she had it.

It was a mass of sand creeping, the sound of each grain slowly falling like water, settling back down to even earth as the warrior felt the shudders from underneath the ruins. The faint clicking of a blind wretch was all the confirmation she needed. This was the same beast.

“It is tradition to prepare for your demise, before each battle. A will, a tomb, a final wish…” She strutted carefully towards where she last saw the sand shift. “Such is the way of each warrior before me. I can only trust you’ve made your own plans.” The wind suddenly sighed deeply, and the shadowed clouds parted for the silver of the night.

“But if you have forgotten, you need not worry…”

Urbosa raised an arm to the sky, moonlight revealing her newfound smirk.

“For I will carve your grave.”

Snap.

BOOM!

A crack of thunder, a flash of green. The hair on her neck rose as lightning struck. The spot of sand Urbosa had targeted suddenly exploded upwards in a wave of earth.

It screamed in pain, escaping towards the sky. As stray thunder struck in the ruins around her, the moonlight was suddenly obstructed by a monstrous silhouette, the shadow painted her and the sands grey.

The Molduga arched back towards the earth.

It thrashed and wailed as it dived, the momentum of its sudden plunge through the air made a thunderous noise of its own. The beast connected to the earth with a loud thud, before it attempted to burrow back under the ruins.

Oh no you don’t!

Urbosa ran forth to strike a blow, the winds behind her are her black skirt fluttering over the shivering ground. She could already feel the sweat trickling against her metal armour. Good, she thought, perhaps this night will be more of an interesting challenge after all.

Even in the haze of night, she could determine her proximity to the beast from smell alone. The stench was ripe of muck, sulfur, and blood. Urbosa let loose her momentum and jammed her blade into its underbelly, another howl escaping the beast.

Quickly dodging its swiping tail, she jumped back and wiped her brow. The Molduga burrowed with newfound speed, escaping to the darkness below. A trail of oozing blood across the land was the only evidence of its existence, before the beast was completely swallowed by the sand.

The warrior scoffed. “What’s wrong? No chomping today?” Urbosa crowed, “As cowardly as your tactics are, I’d expect you would at least try to nip me!” She turned in place, eyeing the East Barrens for some sign of her foe.

It was weak, that was for sure. Two nights ago, it had rammed its mighty and witless face against the walls of Gerudo Town— presumably in order to get inside. But the stone did not budge, and a fleet of warriors led by Urbosa were able to send the monster fleeing towards these ruins.

An itch in the back of her skull told her there was more to the story...after all, Molduga don't seek people unprompted. They’re an ambushing species, preferring to wait for prey to walk over it before striking. Why it was agitated enough to seek out a populated town...Urbosa didn’t know. But at the end of the day, her mission would be the same— the beast won’t live to see the setting stars.

She had come equipped with her trusty Daybreaker and scimitar, her heels swapped for sandboots that better moved across the sinking earth. Not that it was incredibly necessary. All it took was a direct blow of lightning, and the thing would be nothing more than a tale for the tavern. But Urbosa knew better than to underestimate her enemy.

The Gerudo Chief crept through the night, keeping her footsteps quiet and unassuming. The pillars of the East Barren towered with consuming shadows. The chiseled peaks that separated her and the distant Gerudo Valley stabbed the blackening sky with bronze.

Feeling a charge stirr in her soul, Urbosa called out again. She had to find it before it found her first.

“Won’t you grace me with your soothing song again? I promise to give you a thunderous applause!”

The clouds billowed against the moon, shadows from looming structures flickered in and out. The ground quivered in response.

And in the distance, the desert exploded.

A mass of sand swam towards her with violent speed. A ruined column in its path collapsed in a mess of sandstone and broken brick, falling pathetically in the sand. A sickening whine could be heard all around her, resonating from the earth, but undoubtedly sourced from the approaching foe.

Now that’s more like it…

Urbosa stepped to the side, moving away from where she had last taunted the beast. It may be able to detect the vibrations of her voice and running, but her careful footsteps, with aid from the sandboots, would be nothing more than a whisper to the Molduga.

She summoned the electric charge that stirred within her, she could already feel the air crackle and tense. As the mass of sand beckoned closer, she snapped her fingers once more, this time directing it towards a broader area in front of her.

Thunder cracked like a whip, lightning striking around her. However this time, the energy was dispersed, focusing on three areas— far left, far right, and far center. The disturbed sand in their respective locations erupted as a result, before crashing back down nearly as quick as her own snap.

The desert mound hesitated, slowing cautiously.

Urbosa laughed to herself. Where will you go, little worm? Where do you think I am…

The Moldaga’s hulking figure didn’t hesitate for longer than a minute. It regained it’s moment, quickly veering to the side. It seems to have made its choice, assuming Urbosa was near where the far left lightning had struck.

Urbosa readied her free hand, while adjusting her grip of her sword in the other. The Molduga approached her trap, sinking deep into the sand, and freeing the view to the horizon.

And for a moment, Urbosa could see a forgotten sunset, on the faintest edge of the desert’s endless expanse. It winked faintly against the canvas of stars. The gentle slopes, carved with the delicate brush of the cool night breeze— for a moment you could forget the lurking dangers of this world.

Then, the sunset erupted with fury.

The Molduga rose like fire, opening its jaws wide for an unseen prey. The last silver of the sun was stolen away by the beast’s enormous frame, and the sky bruised purple once more.

As it hung, suspended in mid air, the world was silent except for cascading grains of sand, and the Molduga’s shrill and deafening scream.

Snap.

The sky flashed green, to white, and back.

The air charged, ready to crack into a boom.

But thunder never shook the earth.

The Molduga’s cry was muffled by the resonating rumble in its throat.

Urbosa sprinted forth, a grin stretched wide across her face.

She had struck true.

The Molduga collapsed onto the ground, another explosion of sand filled the surrounding air. Its mouth crackled with static, its body twitched and convulsed. The smell of blood and sulfur was now a thousand times worse, it was as if someone had burned a whole graveyard. The sensation nearly made her eyes tear, but Urbosa did not stop to weep.

There would be no pity for the lightning eater.

Urbosa let out a cry, before stabbing her sword straight through the Molduga’s lower jaw, pinning it to the sand. Its wail and horrific breath swept directly in her face, but the warrior did not flinch.

“I hope you enjoyed the view up there,” Urbosa walked towards its beady, useless eyes, leaning in, “It’ll be the last good thing you’ll see.”

Urbosa studied the creature's face. It’s eyes glowed an eerie blue, luminescent in the night. Peering back towards the Molduga’s mouth, Urbosa frowned in confusion.

Blue…?

Well that’s new. She furrowed her brow. As far as she could remember, the beasts of sand were amber, or brown in color, or at the very least some sort of hue that resembled the sand. They definitely weren’t of a stark lapis or cerulean, unless this was some sort of icy...snowy variant?

Urbosa shook the thought out of her head. Such a thing was impossible, Moldugas thrived on the depths of the desert sand, and such a feat could never be replicated in the tundras of Gerudo Highlands. Still, the beast’s mouth and eyes glowed mysteriously...new questions brewing in the Gerudo Chief’s mind.

But now was not the time, any moment, this monster would regain its strength and attack.

Urbosa suddenly turned towards the beast’s upper back, noticing a different hum in the air. A thing and long stick protruded from one of its fins, and she climbed up to investigate.

Using it’s tiny head as a stool, Urbosa lifted herself up and walked upon its back. The stick she had heard humming was growing faintly louder as she approached. Grasping both hands and it’s end, she pulled with great strength.

A glowing blue spear head emerged from the fin, flickering hot like fire. It’s hue was the same of that of the Molduga’s eyes and inner mouth. Could this be why this creature glowed…?

She balanced the spear in each hand. She wasn’t much of a spearman, preferring the balance of shield and blade. But her Scimitar was busy pinning it’s mouth to the ground, so it would have to do.

Urbosa walked back over the Moldugas back, before positioning herself above the beast’s head. It was time. She let out a breath of adrenaline, and she could swear the thing had sighed in response.

“I am no monster,” Urbosa steadied her grip, grazing the blue tip of the strange spear just above it’s skull.

“I promise this will be swift.”

- - - - -

“Ahem! Lady Urbosa...”

The Hylian advisor spoke again, cutting through the chief’s thoughts.

“When you say you used this strange spear, how certain are you of its effect? Did it truly slice through this new monster like...how did you say it...butter?”

Urbosa sighed, she’d been in this political meeting for what felt like a century. At this point, the Yiga were better company.

“New in nature and color, but I assure you, the Molduga is as equally dead as all other beasts I have faced. The threat is gone.”

The Hylian clicked her tongue. “Yes, I understand the blunt of it, but I need the details specifically, if I am to reveal this information from Her Majesty, the Queen.”

The mention of her childhood friend renewed her interest in the conversation. “You have thrown the Queen of Hyrule’s title around quite lazily this evening, so perhaps we should cut to the point and not have you return to her empty handed? Hmm?” Urbosa raised an eyebrow with a smile.

The woman stammered for a moment, readjusting the bun of her brown hair. The throne room was probably scorching to this stuffy Hylian. In different circumstances, Urbosa might have felt pity.

“Very well,” the Hylian finally responded. “But I just need you to be absolutely sure that the glow was of Sheikah origin.” She gestured for probably the fifteenth time that night at the set of Ancient weapons on the table.

The weapons flickered blue, hot as fire, and as lightweight as air— were they not relics, Urbosa would have liked to keep the one that was shaped like a giant axe.

“Yes, I am positive.” Urbosa said sternly.

“It is my, and Her Majesty’s, belief that you do not endure a fight, but a trial. A trial planned by an ancient civilization.” the advisor spoke carefully, acknowledging that her words caused confusion for some of the Gerudo guards standing by the door. “Similar events have happened in other sections of Hyrule, beasts and signs that direct at certain individuals.”

The Gerudo Chief rubbed her chin thoughtfully, before shaking her head. “I’m afraid I don’t fully understand…”

The Hylian advisor pulled out a scroll, Urbosa could recognize the cursive handwriting of her royal friend. The other guards murmured at the royal wax seal on its surface.

The advisor spoke again. Her voice was barely a whisper, but it consumed the people’s attention nonetheless.

“Chief Urbosa, a new prophecy has been revealed, and I think you would find its contents quite interesting.”

#please rb i am but a humble content creator #linktober #linktober 2020 #botw #breath of the wild #legend of zelda botw #loz botw #urbosa #molduga #molduking #botw fanfiction #tw blood

39 notes · View notes

funkymbtifiction · 4 years

Text

I’ve never considered ESTJ tbh. I think I seem to be too unrealistic to be SJ most of the time. Can ESTJ be idealistic and trust deeply in intuition for good or ill? I know it’s a stupid question but I can see that both Ni and Si seem correct and I still don’t understand both of them.

I don’t know if this is Si issue but I tend to view myself as a part in a very large web of fate that joins everybody together. But think deeper I think it comes from what I learn as a child. I think most of my belief system is a blend of many beliefs I learned in my life (from real life, novels, books and experience). And I do trust in its teachings. <-SiNe axis, social dominant in the Enneagram.

But I don’t have the ability to nurture relationship and learn from mistake. I tend to repeat the same pattern, the same mistake if it concerns people. I just can’t wrap my head around how to change. Like recently I try to fix my mistake but I don’t know how to. I mean … I know it’s wrong but I don’t know how to approach people while making them feel good. I can’t be verbal in my affection and I don’t know when to stop when it comes to boundary and end up driving people away. My friends are all tired because I don’t learn from my mistake. I hate myself for it, but I just don’t know how. If Si is learning from experience and fix things then inability to learn from mistake couldn’t be Si, could it? <- if your mistakes are all tied to “people,” it’s a manifestation of immature inferior Fi’s inability to know how to connect to people on an emotional level and be emotionally expressive.

Also, from my ESFJ friend’s word. She has info-graphic memory. When she thinks about something it’s like going back to what happened in the past and zoom in on the exact details that happen. I’ve never really had that moment. I’m terribly forgetful and lack attention to details. It bores me to death. But it could also be argued that I’m detailed person. I love linguistics, ethnic wisdom and ethnography and when it concerns these topics I can nail in on the smallest detail. E.g. my friend mispronounce a word in Indonesian, I immediately correct it. I can spot it from miles away. My friend asks me about phonology and sound change, I gave him all the details I know. When someone writes something and it’s factually not correct about language I can argue on spot. Because I remember it. I even innovate my conlang based on these knowledge though I can’t finish it because new ideas come in and I revise it many times over. When I work out on these knowledge, I rarely need anymore research to write a good article about it. I just know it back to front and can play with it rather fluidly. When I practiced something, say … archery, I need to drill through it and slowly adjust it until I can do it without thinking. If I focus on something I can do it all day, learn it from bit to bit until I know everything about it. But mostly, I’m a slob. <- TeSi. Being a slob has nothing to do with MBTI type. Also, you just Ne-contradicted yourself within the span of a paragraph. You neglect details and hate them, yet have the patience to sit there and learn it incrementally? High Si.

Am I enneagram 1 if I’m not driven to be perfect or hardworking. I shame myself for being improper (too vulnerable, too stiff, not fun, not someone anybody wants to be around) but I can’t do anything much about it. I’m not fun, no way I can be fun and humorous. I’m stiff, no way I can be silly or goofy. I’m emotionally skewed, I’m trying to fix it but don’t know how. I want people to love me as much as anybody but I don’t know how to not drive them away to be honest. My e 3w2 senior usually preaches about him being activist and care about the democracy and politics. I have to say that he disgusts me. So fake, there’s no backbone in those hollow words. He doesn’t feel the ideal in his heart and that disgusts me. <- still sounds like 1w2. Stiff, restrained, self-shaming, propriety, won’t allow yourself to let loose and be silly, yet a 2ish desire for connection and love.

Huzzah to my group for still having been patient with me even with year of mistakes and repeated imperfection. I can’t feel love from anybody around me and I have real trouble making any connections with people because I can’t sense their tender emotions. I can’t really receive their kindness and respond back other than trying to help ‘fix’ something for them. Every attempt to build rapport ends up in people getting annoyed. It’s odd, really. I really don’t know how to express the depth of my feeling without having people getting annoyed or feeling trapped. I don’t even know how much I care about them, I just know that I don’t want to lose them but don’t know how deep it is or how to express it. Sometimes it feels like I only care about myself but that’s not the case. <- you know, this is just inferior Fi frustration and… it’s fine. Seriously. Show people you love them through action and what you DO for them, and stop trying to be “emotional.” You will send yourself into an over-sensitive Fi grip. Tell them they matter to you. Write them a note. Do something for them. And don’t be “needy.”

And … is it normal for ESTJ, one of the most practical of all type, to dream an almost unrealistic dream and actively work for that dream? I dream to create a union for ethnic groups in large scale. Even now I’m working on it. <- how is this unrealistic, though? An unrealistic dream would be you’ve never picked up a guitar in your life, but by this time next year you plan to be front and center on stage as a western star. If you have a semi-realistic dream (a union) and you are actively working toward it, that’s not “impractical.” That’s … well, Te.

But I do have some serious problem of not considering enough big picture (I tend to get hooked up in a single detail or project and forget about the others or feel trapped in the present, like the dream is still a dream even if I work for it). It feels as if I’m trapped in the present and each day is …a day. I scheme to get ahead a lot but when I need to wait for the time to act, I get trapped in the present and lose focus unless forced to focus on it. And other thing is, I suck at organizing. I plan things step by step but when it comes to the entire project, for instance, I tend to neglect one aspect or another at times. Maybe it’s because this is my very first project though. I need to balance out every aspects of project and look at the big picture. I need to learn it. Thankfully, my ENTP co-president is great at big picture thinking <- you can’t be locked in the present, too focused on details, and unable to see the big picture and be an intuitive; they are the opposite – unrealistically focused on an ideal, a concept, the big picture, and neglectful of the details or practicality of it. Sounds like tert-Ne impatience to me; you know what you want, why isn’t it happening yet?

Other thing is, I find many SJs to be hesitant and worrywarts. I’ve never really hesitated to do something ambitious and usually I see someone who hesitate to do what is right or avoid to be cowards. It’s judgmental but that’s how I feel. I’ve never really thought of danger as something to fear but something to confront and fix. People say I’m naive though because I’ve never really think about the danger of the situations and willing to plunge myself into it at anytime.

Spoken like a true social 1-core Te-dom. You’re judging 6-core ISJs.

ETA: So much anxiety and desperate desire to connect to people, btw, shows you are a social dominant, whatever Enneagram type you wind up identifying with. The first dominant focus of the Enneagram instinct is a place of “over-focus,” and you are over-focusing on acceptance. Inclusion. Wanting to participate. Being so “desperate” may be off-putting to people, and prevent you from what you want, so... try cutting yourself some slack, thinking about what is good about you (your logic, your ability to problem-solve, your strength with being in the present), and then “present” that as an offering to connect to other people. Don’t try and connect emotionally, in a Te way, show them what you “bring” to them as a friend, a lover, a participator in life.

#question #estj #mbti #submission

14 notes · View notes

lord-explosion-baku · 6 years

Text

Todoroki x fem!reader

Warnings: ANGST, swearing

A/N: I changed just the “Endeavor threatening to hurt the reader” part because Endeavor is hero first and foremost and I don’t think he’d threaten to hurt someone for something like that. I hope that’s okay. Get ready for some angsty shit right here right now. This made me a tad emotional. I am a goose and I crave love. Huzzah.

“Shouto is aiming to be the next number one hero and he won’t be able to reach that goal if he has distractions such as you.” The horrible ache came to your shoulders full swing as you stared across at your unsuspecting boyfriend. “you understand, don’t you?,” Endeavor’s low voice rang in your ears. You did. You knew Todoroki was serious about becoming a pro, hell, nearly everyone at UA was. You just didn’t realize that you could’ve been a threat to him reaching the top.

How Endeavor found out about your relationship was beyond you. It had been three months since the two of you got together and you were sure you didn’t tell anyone, let alone show any affection in public. You two kept everything behind closed doors and you liked it that way. Having a secret boyfriend was thrilling! There were no complications and the two of you got along so well. Up until Endeavor got you cornered in public to tell you to basically back off.

You thought that it should’ve been easier than it was. Neither of you really talked about a sharing a future and there hadn’t ever been a confession on love, though beforehand you had been working up to it. A part of you wished he would say it first and another part of you thought that he never would. Still you as you watched him slurp up his noodles you couldn’t help but agonize over the next words you were going to say to him.

You waited for him to put his chopsticks down, you didn’t want him to choke. It was now or never.

“Is everything okay, Y/N?” “I think we should stop seeing each other.” Oh goddammit, you thought, embarrassed at speaking at the same time as him.

Your eyes didn’t reach his as he asked what you said.

You took a deep breath and uttered, “we should stop this, Shouto.”

He was silent, waiting for you to return his gaze. All you could do was stare at his chopsticks. “Y/N…” he began but didn’t continue. His hand reached for yours but you pulled away.

“I… am sorry. I just don’t see this going anywhere. We both have a whole lot we should be focusing on and I don’t want out time to be wasted.”

“Wasted?... what does that even mean?” Your eyes flashed at his. His blue eye was cold as ice while his grey one was almost telling… worried… anxious. “I don’t feel like I’m wasting my time when I’m with you.”

There was a tightening in your chest as your eyes began to sting. You couldn’t be around him for this. You couldn’t trust yourself to follow through if he was going to try to convince you to stay with him. You stood up from your seat. “I’m sorry, Shouto.”

He slammed his hands on the table, standing and yelled “what, you want commitment?!”

You closed your eyes, allowing a tear to fall down. “I’m sor-“

“Stop saying you’re sorry and tell me what’s really going on here!” Heads started turning towards the two of you. You hadn’t wanted to cause a scene. You started for the door but he grabbed your wrist. “Y/N, please…”

You looked outside the restaurant window and found a nice place for you to teleport to. Without looking back at him you said, “please don’t talk to me at school. Please don’t make this harder than it already is.” Then you zapped yourself on to the sidewalk outside. Casting one last look his way you saw him briskly walking towards the door, mouthing something to you, there were tears on his face. You zapped your way home and fell asleep on tear soaked pillows.

A week had past since you broke up with Todoroki. You survived off of pretending all the two of you went through never happened, it’s not like you could talk about it to your friends; they hadn’t known. You were successful in avoiding Todoroki, though the few time you did glance his way, he hadn’t been looking at you. That was all you needed to think that you were right in what you did.

Until you accidentally walked in on him in the training room during your lunch break. You had left your notebook in there and you had gone to retrieve it but you froze when you saw Todoroki, yelling, using his quirk, ice curved out from him in all directions, followed by rapid flames engulfing him, spinning around the room. Before he could see you, you bolted out of the room and to the cafeteria, leaving your notebook there to be fried.

You found your friends who were having a conversation about their last history test, and slumped down besides Hakagure, hand on your head.

“How’d ya down on our last exam, Y/N?” Mina asked, biting in to her sandwich.

You hummed your response, not really interested in delving into the conversation at hand.

The table went silent. Everyone was staring at you.

“What?”

“Okay,” Momo said, “enough of whatever this is. What’s going on with you?”

“Yeah dude, you’ve been down and out of it for the past couple of days,” Jirou said, concern flooding her eyes.

You sighed, cursing at yourself for not being better at hiding your feelings. “It doesn’t matter now, I guess. I’ve been dating Todoroki,” you closed your eyes and waited for the gasps or the yells or accusations or whatever but they never came.

“We know.”

“Finally, she tells us!”

“Yeah, we understand the rush of having a secret love affair and all but the two of you so obviously had puppy dog eyes for each other, it was cute and sickening all at the same time.”

Your eyes widened at your friends. They knew this whole time?

“So, what’s wrong? Trouble in paradise?”

You laughed out loud. “Paradise is lost and the devil has ripped my heart out.” You told them everything, from Endeavor threatening you, to you breaking it off with Todoroki, to what you just saw in the training room.

Hakagure gasped, “and you haven’t talked to him since?”

“No.”

“And he hasn’t even tried to talk this out with you?”

“I told him not to!”

Mina had her palm to her face, “boys are so fucking dumb!”

“Todoroki isn’t dumb,” you sighed, “he’s just respecting my wishes! And it really is for the best, you know. We should be focused on our education right now, and, well,l I don’t know, it was bound to happen eventually, right? We are young and…and trying to b-e,” your voice cracked and it was over. Tears were spilling from your eyes and you couldn’t smother your feelings any longer. “I’m the dumb one!!” You his your face in your hands.

Momo our a gentle hand to your back and began to rub your shoulders. “You’re not dumb. You were just scared.”

“I still am scared!” You leaned on to her. “But I know it’s for the best. I just- want him to be okay. I didn’t want to hurt him and god he looked so pissed in the training room and I just wanted to get my notebook and I shouldn’t have seen him like that and I feel so bad!”

Jirou gave Momo a pointed look, then Momo looked at Mina and Mina nudged Hakagure.

“You didn’t get your notebook?” Momo asked and you shook your head. “We’ll go get it for you.”

“Yeah, Y/N, we got you covered!”

And just like that they filed one by one out of the cafeteria leaving you just as alone as you felt. You poked at your food but couldn’t work up the appetite to have any of it. Minutes passed by and the bell rang, letting you know that your lunch period was over.

Luckily you had free period where you sulk under your favorite tree and daydream about living in a world where it was easy to move on and forgive and not ever have the emotions were feeling then. Then you got to daydreaming about the one person you wanted most in the world holding you while you cried, comforting you, telling you that everything was going to be okay…

Your notebook was thrown into your lap, causing you to jump. You looked up to see heterochromatic eyes glaring down on you. “We need to talk.”

You narrowed your eyes, shoving your notebook into your back. “I told you not to talk to me at school.”

Todoroki rolled his eyes. “Save it, L/N. Did my old man tell you to break up with me?” You were going to kill your friends.

You used the trunk of the tree to raise yourself to his level. “He didn’t tell me to do anything,” you said barely above a whisper. God, you hoped it wasn’t obvious that you’d been crying.

“Well, he said something to you that made you feel inclined to do what you did. He influenced you somehow.”

“Does it matter? What he said was true, I’m a distraction. I’m only going to get in your way on your path to a successful life!”

His eyes grew dark as he took a step towards you. “My path to a successful life? Is that seriously all it took?” His face was so close to yours that you could feel his cool breath lick your skin. “You don’t think I can have a successful life without you in it?” Your heart ached being so close to him without being able to touch him. You looked past him finding a place you could zap yourself to. He realized what you were doing. “Don’t,” he said. Too late.

Zap! You were striding down the hill but he was on you in a second. He grabbed your shoulder and spun you around. His lips crashed against yours, arm wrapped around your back, holding you in place. “Dammit Y/N, I love you,” he growled kissing you again. Hot tears fell down your cheeks as his hand cupped your face. “I love you so fucking much.”

You teleported a foot away from him, out of his embrace, so you could catch your breath. You were shaking as you told him, “I don’t want to hold you back, Shouto!”

“You’re not!” He yelled, “and if you were, I wouldn’t care! I don’t care about what that bastard has planned for my future! I care about you and our future!”

You bowed your head and watched water drop from your face, to the ground. Your future?

You fell into his arms. “I’m s-sorry.”

He brushed your hair. “Don’t be, unless you mean it. If you don’t really want to be with me, tell me. Without anything else influencing you, look me in the eyes and say we are done.”

You gazed up at him, tears were sitting at the edge of the eyes you loved so much. “I… can’t.”

His lips met yours again and this time you kissed him back, welcoming back the familiarity and the comfort of him. “I missed you so much,” you whispered, brushing against his cheek.

“I missed you too, Y/N. Promise me, you won’t do something like that again, not unless it’s your own will.”

“I promise, Shouto. Never again.”

And that was a promise you kept your entire life.

That last line was a ball of cheese.

Tags for EVERYTHING (closed): @yandere-inamorata @miitaart @dessiedawnwritesfanfiction @wickedlewicked @chickennuggetsarequestionable @nevermorelanore @kpanime @ayeputita @captain-sin-allmight-queen @diisasterbii @iceformer @meganofmars @colagirl5 @colorbookshd @grimmjadeskye @sm0kingcrack @sarcastictextstuck @zellllyyyy @psionicsnow @mynahx3 @andie-in-tumblland @iamthe-leaf @midnightfeline666 @bungou-stray-alies-tales-of-aly @rubyred-28 @kattariapenn @heypartypeps @quirktaker @thecryingsombra @smbody-stole-mycar-radio @ghost-of-todoroki @geektastic84 @personoffangirlingandtears @glixeo @rubycubix @mekakushi-dan-01-kido

#bnha x reader #bnha imagine #bnha #boku no hero academia #bnha reader insert #reader insert #mha #my hero academia #todoroki x reader #todoroki shouto x reader #shouto x reader #shouto todoroki x reader #shoto todoroki x reader #tw angst #tw breakups #requests #bnha requests

2K notes · View notes

metamorphicrocky · 5 years

Note

prompt: A.V.A and H.U.E make a bet on the possibility of Ash and Little Cato becoming a couple in the future or just stay as friends.

ohh this was a fun one. thank you for the prompt and I hope you enjoy it!!

HUE had learned during his time as the Galaxy One's AI that people are...odd. Their relationships are complicated, and their feelings dictate everything. Logic honestly holds very little importance when dealing with relations. Gary's interactions with others have shown him that.

Now, HUE has a body. It can be fun. He is no longer in control of a ship, so AVA frustrates him with her deliberate attempts to mock him. They have a strained relationship, HUE thinks. It reminds him of Quinn towards Gary, at the beginning of her stay on the Galaxy One. But what that means for AVA and HUE's relationship is up for debate.

Along with a new ship comes new crew members. HUE has come to like Fox and Ash, and Clarence is still a puzzlement to HUE even after a couple of weeks aboard the Crimson Light.

There are two groups among the ship: HUE's friends and the original members of the Crimson Light. The relationships between those two are very complex, constantly changing as they encounter more obstacles throughout their journey. Gary has come to an almost-stalemate with Clarence, everyone loves Mooncake, and Nightfall and Ash have bonded some.

There has been a new development on the relationship front, HUE has noticed. Little Cato and Ash have gradually been spending more time together ever since going to Serepentis. And not just time together, but alone time.

HUE has caught Little Cato and Ash walking into Ash's room frequently, and it has only become more common as the days pass. He does not know what they do while in there, but he is very curious to find out.

Now, HUE stands in the bridge, watching as Gary guides Little Cato through the various controls for the ship. Little Cato does have a good grasp on how to fly the ship, but Gary thought it would be a good idea to teach him the more intricate aspects of controlling the Crimson Light.

"Okay, so if you hit this button here, it cuts power to the engine for a couple of seconds. If we're ever being chased, you could just do that to stop quickly and then they'll come right back on to do whatever cool move you want," Gary explains.

Little Cato's eyes widen, and a look spreads across his face that Gary once described as "lighting up." HUE can understand that term, looking at how the young Ventrexian's face splits into a wide grin, his excitement shining in his eyes.

"Woah," Little Cato gasps. "Can you teach me how to do it?"

Gary smiles. From HUE's understanding of the term fond, he comes to the conclusion that Gary feels that way in the moment. The blond quickly ruffles the boy's hair, shoving him out of the pilot's chair for a quick moment. Gary sits, and Little Cato is about to sit on his lap when he stops, catching something out of the corner of his eye.

HUE looks towards the entryway, the place where Little Cato's attention is focused, to see Ash, quietly urging Little Cato to follow her. The boy opens his mouth for a second before closing it with a nod and turning to Gary.

"Actually, you can show me later. See ya, TB!" Little Cato shouts, jogging out of the room to meet an awaiting Ash. They quickly disappear, and HUE is left to wonder.

HUE walks towards Gary, who began fiddling around with the ship settings. "Gary, do you know what Ash and Little Cato have been doing lately?"

Gary turns to HUE and shrugs. "They're just hanging out, I guess."

"I can see that, Gary. But do you know specifically what they do when they are together?" HUE questions.

The blond cards a hand through his hair and blows out a breath. "No? Does it really matter?"

"Aren't you curious?"

"Teenagers are very strange, so I wouldn't be surprised if they were doing things people shouldn't walk in on," AVA says.

HUE crosses his arms. Of course AVA had to interject.

"From what I have seen of interactions, I believe that they are just very good friends," HUE says matter-of-factly.

"Please, kids their age can't be just friends."

"Oh, are you willing to bet on that, AVA?" HUE challenges.

She pauses for a moment. "Sure, why the hell not. Stakes are winning the title of the ultimate AI."

"It is on, dawg," says HUE, crossing his fists together.

HUE notices that Gary is watching them in what seems to be exasperation, a feeling HUE knows awfully well from his time attempting to control Gary. Gary sighs and shrugs, shaking his head incredulously. "You guys are ridiculous."

HUE shakes his head. "No, but I am going to win. Prepare to hear my huzzahs!"

And so it begins, a challenge that leads to both AIs stalking two children for the sake of bragging rights, as Gary has to point out every time he catches them in the act. Which has been quite often in the past few days.

HUE has discovered that Ash and Little Cato have never been caught with expressions similar to how Gary would look at Quinn, or Nightfall to Gary. And he has never seen an expression similar to anything Clarence is capable of making, which is a relief on all ends.

To be honest, this challenge has been more difficult for HUE than anticipated. For as much time as he has been watching emotions and relationships grow, he has had very little time to infer and theorize because of his previous all-knowing nature. It has proven to be yet another disadvantage of his corporeal form.

The two AIs combined have gathered countless pieces of evidence, currently yet to be categorized as to being in favor of HUE's or AVA's theory.

The first day of the bet, Ash and Little Cato talked nonstop for four hours and twenty-seven minutes. The topics were random at best, and they could not decipher any meaning out of the conversation. Gary claimed it to be teens just acting like teens.

From that point on, Ash has taught Little Cato how to paint nails. They have had intense discussions that involved one of them crying. Hugs have been witnessed along with movie marathons and yelling matches.

When the two are around the other members of the Crimson Light, they will whisper things to each other from time to time, causing the other to laugh. Looking at their expressions, HUE does not know what emotions are there other than being happy, which is indicative of several possibilities.

So, there is a multitude of evidence, yet no clear answer as to who the winner is.

Currently, HUE and AVA are reviewing the footage and notes gathered throughout their search so far. HUE has been tasked with organizing it into categories as AVA judges him, as usual. What a helpful AI she is. HUE steps back to survey the evidence, and he is only left more confused.

Relationships are much too complex for logic, HUE learns once again. All of their interactions could have several different meanings, but none can be simply chosen due to lack of context and greater knowledge.

"Oh, this will never be solved," HUE complains out loud.

"That, we can agree on," AVA says.

HUE hears footsteps in the hallway behind him and turns around to see Gary and Little Cato walking together. Gary catches HUE's gaze and then notices the conspiracy board behind him and stops, staring at it in shock and clear confusion. Little Cato looks to Gary, then looks to where his adoptive father is looking, and has an even more confused expression on his face.

"Are you for serious right now, guys?" Gary asks emphatically. "You've actually been doing this?"

HUE and AVA both stay silent, the answer not needing to be said.

Gary rubs a hand down his face, pinching the bridge of his nose, an act that he has been doing with a greater frequency as of late. He waves his hand around aimlessly, trying to articulate something that is unknown to him.

"Okay, I'm ending this right now," Gary says, then promptly steers Little Cato away from HUE and AVA.

The two AIs wait in silence until Gary pops his head through the doorway a few moments later. "HUE wins. Don't do this again, okay? It's like, mega creepy." Then he disappears behind the entryway without any hesitation.

"Huzzah! Take that, AVA!" HUE cheers, putting both of his fists up in victory.

Silence follows, HUE's arms still in the air.

"This was a waste of time," AVA sighs. "I guess you win, HUE."

Well, if HUE has learned anything from this, it is that he has a lot of work on in terms of understanding relationships. And that watching pictures burn is a slow process.

#final space #sorry it took so long to write this but all prompts are getting written this weekend while I'm not doing anything important #writing from HUE's perspective is very fun and different #final space season 2 #ash graven #little cato #gary goodspeed #hue #ava #dadspeed #it's minimal but shhhhh #fs fics

11 notes · View notes

aparticularbandit · 5 years

Text

Current State of Bandit Fic

The last official one of these was in May, and then the last other update of a general updating schedule magnitude was in July, so...it’s been a while, so it’s time for another one of these, I think.

Under the cut because I know these tend to get long and not everyone wants to read all of it and apologies to mobile users because I don’t think the cut works for y’all. Sorry!

plans for the rest of the year in terms of updates:

I’ve updated my word count this month to 1.5k daily instead of 1k daily and then plan to up it to 2k daily during Nanowrimo - and then if that’s able to hold, I’m hoping to keep that daily 2k up during December (but with the holidays, who knows).

I really like doing those polls before the Monday updates to see what y’all want and then posting that - and I think, with the variations in what I have in backlog, that maybe works better until I have a bunch of backlog for a bunch of different projects (like how I had Carla finished and had Luisa and the Fox finished and so was really just alternating new writing in between ... was it maybe once a month?) - so I think, come November, I’ll probably do that again. That way I’m updating projects I have stuff written for and don’t feel constrained to projects I don’t have written updates for and might feel constrained trying to write updates.

October is still Kiss Prompts Month - I do have fall prompts, too, but other than one, they’re unfinished and probably won’t get posted until November.

October Monday updates will also continue to be for Luisa and the Wolf because that is your spoopy Halloween holiday fic. Huzzah.

November is Nanowrimo, but given the writing this month, I should be okay in terms of keeping up the Monday schedule.

I have:

one (1) chapter of Falling

two (2) chapters of Aftershocks

one (1) fall prompt

two (2) chapters of Bitches Get Glitches

potentially three if i split that third chapter up into two chapters, which i’m still seriously considering doing.

Those should cover the four Monday updates in November if I don’t write other stuff for them.

My focus for the rest of the year in terms of finishing something is to finish the rough draft of the first book of the Roisa HP AU. That’s the book I’m planning to focus on during Nanowrimo, and hopefully I’ll be able to get the rough done so that I can get the first book to y’all sometime next year.

Roisa Secret Santa is a thing! I’m organizing that and I hope that goes off really well!

I may do Christmas or holiday prompts in December - because I really like having short little prompts to work on when I don’t want to dive into a deeper chapter - something short to write instead of something longer is oddly nice - so we’ll see about that.

I also want to finish one of the Christmas fics I started last year, but it’s not good in terms of word count - like...you’ll understand if I post it - but that’s...a high priority.

Other than that, I don’t know what the Monday updates in December will be, but we can cross that bridge when we get there.

general fic updates (aka - i mostly stop using capital letters for whatever reason):

posted but incomplete fics:

if you lived here, you’d be home now:

no one’s asked but it’s been months since an update and it’s not that i don’t want to update, it’s that it’s been long enough that i feel i should finish a reread of what’s posted before starting the next chapter and i keep dragging my feet on that.

i actually have a good idea of what happens in the next several chapters, so that’s not the issue, it’s just getting myself to finish the reread and then actually doing the writing.

there’s still a lot of chapters left. sorry? maybe i’m sorry for not updating more regularly now that ACAL is finished. :/

jane: the real story:

this is on back-burner because, even though i’m really salty, i’ve found that when i hit hey, it’s time to write petra! i run into a wall of okay, but i know people love petra, and i know she has a very specific voice and tone and then i get kind of...overwhelmed and worried that she’ll be ooc. which is probably why i haven’t written the next chapter yet (michael isn’t really like this, but he might be - and raf isn’t like this at all because raf in j:trs is meant to be a commentary on...raf). i think it’s that i don’t have a well enough grip of writing petra closer to canon to feel up to par writing her in this situation. maybe? idk.

i know this is one of the most ... whatever fics on ao3 when it comes to my fics, so like, i’m aware of that, it’s just...back-burner right now.

heart in motion:

i actually started the second chapter of this a while back. i should finish that. if so, you might see it in a monday update poll we’ll see.

luisa and the child:

aka the sequel to luisa and the fox

i have the first...two? three? idk chapters written. i’m still feeling out the plot - i have a good idea of bits and pieces of it, but i’m still waiting on those to come together in one cohesive thing.

similar to the last three chapters of luisa and the fox, i don’t plan on posting these until i’ve got the entire thing roughed out and gone through a second write. maybe a beta. not sure on that one yet.

sin rostro:

this is another one of those petra is an important character who shows up in the next chapter and i’m not sure i’ll write her well issues. holding off on this one.

emilia antonia:

i have a general idea for what happens in the next chapter, as well as a general idea of what happens in the rest of the fic. this one’s a matter of me sitting down and focusing on it and writing it, and i’ve been in a bandit writes lint fic headspace recently, which doesn’t bother me.

falling:

i feel like i should go back and resee some of the episodes of hannibal with margot in s2 and s3 and then review a bit of muskrat farm in s3 (as well as some of alana in s3) because that’s where lu is in chapter three. because i haven’t, i’ve been holding off on writing this one, too, even though i...have a general idea of things that happen throughout the fic. but no real ending.

also maybe have a crack fic planned that would technically be a sequel to this one but would really be a crack fic. maybe. we’ll see.

aftershocks:

have two new chapters for y’all written.

have a general idea of what happens in the next chapter.

have a general idea of things that happen in later chapters but not sure where those chapters are in terms of how immediate they are, if that makes sense.

the time of your life:

bitches get glitches is completely done in terms of second write, so each chapter would probably just need a precursory read-through in terms of grammar/spelling/etc. and other minor edits.

with the exception of what would be the third chapter if i split the current third chapter into two chapters - the roisa scene probably warrants a little more than just a precursory read-through before posting.

i’ve started the next fic, which is rafael’s fic. the next one would be petra’s.

basically, each of the first however many fics (four) focuses on one character and their encounters with their soulmate timer.

one screwed up family focused on rose, even though it also included luisa’s past with her timer.

bitches get glitches focuses on jane, even though it also includes carry-over updates on what’s been going on with luisa and rose since the first fic.

the third fic focuses on rafael.

the fourth fic focuses on petra.

at this point, i have a fairly good idea of when each of these five characters’ timers went off and when they might go off in future fics (i’d be more specific here, but spoilers!).

after those four, i would want to write a fifth fic that wraps things up - but this is kind of dependent on where things get left off in petra’s fic.

rafael’s encounters don’t finish in his fic, which leaves it on kind of a cliff-hanger, and i don’t think his final encounter happens in petra’s fic, so...fifth fic.

i’m actually hoping that writing petra in this fic will give me the confidence to write petra in the other fics she shows up. so. there’s that.

unposted fics:

where the lightning splits the sea:

aka roisa hp au

as stated before, the first book is my planned main project for nanowrimo and i hope to have the rough draft finished by the end of the year (we’ll see if that actually happens or not).

i have an entire series outline consisting of main things i want to happen in each book, along with their titles, and things that have to happen in specific books to set up for the proper pay off in later books.

the first book is entirely outlined - chapter by chapter.

i’ve started chapter-by-chapter outlines for books two and three.

the entire compiled outline alone is seventeen pages long.

i love this project a lot, and i’m super excited to share it with y’all, it’s just long.

mexican stud:

aka rosalint fic

i have a full working outline! chapter by chapter! huzzah!

this one still comes in bits and pieces and scenes that aren’t always interconnected. i know what happens, but then pick and choose at scenes to write when i want to write it.

this fic will likely end up being fairly explicit - or, compared with other stuff i’ve written, more explicit - simply due to the themes and the content. that may be part of why i take so long to write it - explicit scenes have a tendency to make me uncomfortable when i’m reading them and i don’t feel fully comfortable posting explicit scenes. but....

this would considered part of the epic superhero crossover (see below), even though the events are, to some extent, considered canon to aftershocks (with some exceptions which can be explained...later).

everything’s coming up rose’s:

stalled.

still excited, still want to write it, but focusing on other things atm.

various other soulmate aus:

one-shot (tentatively titled chorus: romance says goodnight):

still kicking around in my head.

still want to write it.

don’t think y’all will like it because it’s in raf’s point of view.

and other reasons.

but still want to write it.

dreamers often lie:

still at the point where i’ve brainstormed enough that i should start writing it because then i’ll get a more concrete idea of the world and of the events in the world but--

i’m currently focused on the soulmate timer au in terms of soulmate fics right now. oops.

epic superhero crossover:

aka jtv/tick/timeless/supergirl/x-files/agent carter crossover.

hey, look, that’s a lot of things, so expect this to be massive, too.

the more i brainstorm this one, the bigger it gets, and at this point, i think it’ll probably be a bunch of interconnected fics in a series - like the time of your life - the soulmate timer au - instead of one big massive fic. it’s just easier to conceive of that way.

mexican stud is a fic on its own but goes within this crossover.

i want to write a fic about how emma and whitney get together (because they are together before rose gets them and all three of them are together in mexican stud - together as in a group, not as in together, even though emma and whitney definitely are together).

i want to write a fic about how dottie became the way she is when we meet her in the main fic (this would likely involve carterwood and dottie/whitney aspects - either directly or implied - and then it would likely come up in the main fic, there’s a bit from the part i just wrote that i want to be directly an exact quote from this).

i want to write a fic with rhea raising dottie (and potentially use that as backstory on how rhea and lena are...coworkers/acquaintances/partners/surrogate found family/etc. which could lead to complications re: lena and dottie but...idk).

even if lena isn’t a huge part of the rhea/dottie family fluff, i want to write something that deals with rhea in luthor-corp and l-corp and what she was doing after she got to earth - because that one’s different than canon (because i’m using ben’s rhea in a pod au v1 for this).

then there’s the main fic itself - which is where you get a lot of the crossover elements - particularly the x-files elements, which don’t really come up directly in the other fics but are definitely there in some of them (and by some of them, i mean the dottie backstory fic, they would be in the dottie backstory fic). this would also be where the supergirl cast actually comes in (other than rhea and lena and the luthors and maybe astra? maybe astra’s alive in this? since rhea was around maybe she took astra? or lillian? idk haven’t decided yet).

so - like - this one is also a huge massive undertaking but in a different way than the roisa hp au is. the interconnected fics for this aren’t necessarily as linear as the ones for the roisa hp au, and i want the main fic to be enjoyable on its own even if you haven’t read the other fics - the other fics might also stand on their own ish, but like...the random kingdom hearts games - to get the full story, you maybe want to play the main games. ish.

also debating using my trans!mulder here because...like, i love him and i know he got me into trouble but...his story works so well here in context and i would love to use him here. so. it’s. complicated. :/

but - yeah - there’s your update on the state of things. maybe look out for another update at the beginning of january, because i might be changing up some of how i’ve been writing and goals and things - but i think that’s it for now.

#musings #bandit does an update #bandit #iylhybhn stuff #soulmate timer au #roisa hp au #luisa and the child #luisa and the wolf #kiss prompts for october #epic superhero crossover #everything's coming up rose's #rosalint #aftershocks #post s5 fic #emilia antonia #jtv/odaat crossover #1920's au #jtv: the real story #roisa secret santa

1 note · View note

pirate-cannons · 6 years

Note

Hello! First of all: I LOVE YOUR BLOG

Hi there! I’m so glad you like it!!

I don’t plan to stop anytime soon! (Although I might disappear every now and then cause life happens…)

Anywho THANKS FOR THIS REQUEST AND I HOPE YOU LIKE IT!!

Law, Sanji, Zoro, Nami and Sabo realizing they are in love with someone:

Law

It would take him a VERY long time to come to the conclusion that he was in love

Especially if it was someone in the crew. everyone else would figure it out long before their captain, however they wouldn’t dare mention it

At best they might try to HINT at it or constantly create situations to get the two of them together

For being the ‘smart one’ This of course goes completely over Law’s head

It comes to a point though that Law realizes maybe he does treat them differently

He worries more

Insists on treating them for every scrape and bruise…personally

Highly protective (He tells himself he’s just being a captain right?)

Over time, he becomes increasingly irritable because WHAT IS WRONG WITH HIM

The constant urge to be by their side and these feelings he gets when he sees them smile

…maybe he picked up some sickness from that last island?

No that can’t be it

He hasn’t felt like this since…

…shit

N O P E

Trafalgar D. Water Law does not have feelings for his …

“Hey Captain, did you want me to load this stuff in the back?”

…The Surgeon of Death did indeed have feelings for one of his crew

Sanji

Sanji would have varying responses depending on if their s/o was a guy or girl

If it was a girl…well…Sanji loves all women right?

He knows he loves (Name) but if that’s all this feeling is…why does it feel so different with Nami and Robin?

Sanji would realize he was honestly in love with them once he recognized his feelings were no longer of distant admiration but rather that he truly cared for her

He’d still claim to love all women, but he was only IN love with one…

With a male on the other hand, things would be a little different and take him longer to realize

Sanji would recognize that he feel SOMETHING for the other male, but would most likely pass it off as being nakama, especially if they’re apart of the crew

He also starts to take in every detail of what the other male prefers when it comes to food, which he already does with the rest of the crew, but in this case he pays even closer attention and gets this funny feeling when he is complimented on one of his creations.

The real tell comes when Sanji starts to get irritated at the closeness between (Name) and that damn marimo

Of course he just passes that off as being irritable at ALL things related to the swordsman

Surely Sanji wasn’t jealous of him?

Once its starts to happen with other people, Sanji is forced to look at the details

He’s so focused on (Name) he doesn’t even realize the rest of the crew knows

Damnit all…

Zoro

Continuing the trend of being slow on the uptake…

Zoro doesn’t really bother with those kinds of thoughts. He has better things to do

For our swordsman, it’s a very subtle buildup

First they train and spar together. Then they start to nap together, And eventually Zoro will demand ask that the other comes with him when they explore an island

The crew swears they have two Zoros now

Similar to Law’s reaction, Zoro starts to become protective over the other

But it’s just another member of the crew right? Nothing he wouldn’t do for Luffy or Usopp?

One afternoon when the two have fallen asleep on one another again the crew gathers around them

“I’m going to tell him.”

“Robin, no!”

“You know if we don’t he’ll never figure it out”

“Nami-swan has a point, he’s pretty thick-headed”

Zoro starts to wake up to the voices around him and when he sees them all grinning at him he looks down to an unknown weight on his legs to find (Name) still asleep

Unable to fight back the mad blush that rises to his face, he tries to cover it up with his hand all the while glaring at the other members of the crew who are trying hard not to laugh

Zoro will get them back for this

…as soon as he can move

Sabo

Out of the boys, he’s the one who realizes it the fastest

He’s had a crush on their newest recruit for a VERY long time

Something about the way their smile lights up the whole room and the way their eyes twinkle when some mischief is about to happen on their watch and how they–Koala:You’re rambling, Sabo

He really isn’t subtle when it comes to these things

He thinks he is…but alas…the whole R.A knows at this point

Koala knows all about this little crush of his from the beginning and constantly tells him TO TELL THEM HOW HE FEELS ALREADY. Best wingman..woman

He knew his crush was something more when he couldn’t stop thinking about them and how he wished the two could always pair up for missions

When Sabo finally confessed and (Name) agrees, HE IS OVER THE MOON

He went from suave, to embarassed, to happy, to a stuttering mess in about 6 seconds

It was a rollercoaster to watch notthatKoalawaswatching

Nami

Nami is another one who it clicks for pretty early

She finds herself getting closer and closer to a particular member of the crew, making sure to always keep an extra eye out for them

It really hits her when she’s out shopping and a particular item catches her eye and she thinks, “I wonder if (Name) would like that?”

And this happens on multiple occasions

Nami will bring back little gifts for (Name) with comments like “I thought you might like this” or “This made me think of you.”

The rest of the crew is absolutely baffled that their scrooge is spending money…frivolously….ON ANOTHER PERSON

Robin just smiles to herself in the corner because she knows what’s going on

Nami is pretty private when it comes to her personal affairs so there is no celebration or huzzah moment when the two confess to one another

One moment they’re two close friends, and the next?…Something more

#the-jolly-pirate #one piece #trafalgar law #roronoa zoro #sanji vinsmoke #sabo the revolutionary #nami (one piece)#black leg sanji #trafalgar D. Water Law #Sabo (One Piece)#one piece headcanon #sanji #sabo #nami #law #onepieceheadcanon #OP #headcanon

177 notes · View notes

rhiannonharrowing · 6 years

Text

INFJ diagnosed with depression and anxiety

Yesterday was a difficult day. I've been dealing with panic attacks for the past five years. When they first started, I was still married to my ex-husband and I would have one just about every day. Triggers would vary from me being stressed about our finances to the apartment being a wreck to him just being dismissive of any worries that I about the relationship.

Two years ago, he and I split and the panic attacks dropped significantly but I was still having them. I finally decided to see my primary care physician since I had figured the attacks would have stopped. The entire time I had them, I was slightly worried that I was having a cardiac issue as heart issues run on both sides of my family. I just never did anything about it while married (note: dying would have been a better option that staying married, I thought until I finally worked up the fortitude to leave the asshole).

My PCP was and is amazing. She listens to every concern that I have is thorough. I had come in for my annual Pap and she asked if things were going well and if there were any other concerns I wanted to talk about and I told her yes. If you've never experienced a panic attack, lemme attempt to share what this slice of hell is like.

For me, it usually starts with tightness in my chest and upper back like I have pulled something and no matter how I stretch of twist, the tightness doesn't go away. I used to have really bad jaw pain accompany mine as well as tingling sensation in my hands. The vice on your chest gets tighter and tighter. Sometimes I will cough like I am trying to clear something out of my airway. I'll get sweaty around my neck and my body will feel clammy. Eventually, if it is an especially bad one, my mouth starts to water like I am going to vomit, so to speed the process along, I start spitting in the toilet and then eventually end up vomiting bile and saliva. I'm shaky and weak for a few hours afterwards but, I go on about my day, because I have to.

She ordered a gamut of tests and fortunately, found that my heart was great (but that I should loose some weight). I was indeed having panic attacks. At my follow up with her, she suggested prescribing me something to help with it and I initially declined. Now that I knew what was happening, I wanted to try and find ways to control it better and understand and learn more of my triggers. I was terrified of taking medication because: 1.) my biological mother (who I cut out years ago because she is toxic) takes Xanax 3 to 5 times a day. That shit is highly addictive and I don't even wanna mess with that. 2.) Despite me having several friends and family that I love and I know that deal with mental health issues, I didn't want to be one who had to take medication. I often am the one people come to for help with problems and I can't be the one helping if I am one medication. 3.) I would feel like a failure somehow.

Well, 8 days ago, I had two full blown panic attacks, sans vomiting, in a 3 hour span. One before work and one while I was at work. My boss, also an amazing friend, walked into my office wanting me to review something and saw me and said, "What's wrong?" I told her I was having a panic attack and she flipped off my office lights and made sure I had water and completely distracted me from it, allowing it to pass much quicker than the one I had had earlier.

She harped on me to make an appointment with my pcp, as has my boyfriend been doing now for a while. He has been there with me in the shower when I had them. Just rubbing my back while I am huddled in a corner trying to breathe through the attack. He's worried if he has been a trigger of them and I always weakly smile and tell him no because they are significantly shorter when I am with him. He makes everything in my life better, not worse. He's been asking me to do something because he worried.

So, I finally did.

My appointment was yesterday and I got there nearly two hours early, reading in the lobby. Nurse took my vitals and then, the Nurse Practitioner came in and asked a serious of questions to screen for depression and anxiety.

"Thinking back to the past two weeks for these questions. Answer none, 1 to 2 days, 3 to 5 days, or most days."

Okay.

"You have little motivation to complete necessary tasks."

Most days.

"You feel like you are a failure to yourself or family and friends."

3 to 5

"You sleep either too much or not enough."

Most days.

"Have you had any thoughts of harming yourself or others?"

No. Honestly, no. I know I'm not that far gone. I have only ever experienced one small period of my life where I contemplated suicide and that was because I had been sick for a year and had no answers as to what was causing the issue. I had decided, after making my appointment with a 4th specialist, that if no answers were found to make any sort of improvements on my quality of life, I was going to find a place where self assisted suicide was legal. But, answers were found and my quality of life for tremendously better and those thoughts went away.

And it goes on, and I'm fighting tears and I see that she writes down "16" under depression. Shit. That is a high number. She only asked like 10 questions.

"Okay, a new set of questions. Again, think back to the past two weeks and answer none, some, or often."

"You have difficulty focusing."

Often.

"You feel restless and fidgety."

Often.

And it goes on. She writes down "19" and I stupidly am triumphant. Huzzah! Anxiety is highest. WTF...?

"I know you came in for the panic attacks but you have scored high for both depression and anxiety."

Keep it together. This isn't the time or place to cry. Are you really that surprised about the depression? I mean, come on. Those things go hand in hand. You've probably just been lying to yourself for years now that you don't have it (oh, hello evil thoughts).

We talk about family history of mental health and I talk about my worries with medication and that I don't want something that is addictive and ideally, I would like to eventually get to a place where I don't need it anymore. She understands and we discuss options and she talks about chemical imbalance in the brain and that this will take some time, that those levels need to be balanced out before we can look at moving you to something to take when I feel those attacks coming on. But for now, I have to take medication daily.

This is hard. How do I get out of my head that I am not my mother? That this is okay for me. That me taking medication doesn't make me a failure. These are things I preach all day to my friends who take medication for their mental health and I sincerely mean it. Why is it I have NO issue owning my anxiety but I am freaking out about the diagnosis of depression? Why? What makes one diagnosis "better" that the other? Both are challenges. Both are difficult.

I tell my boyfriend what happened and that I am started meds for depression and anxiety and his first response is, "Am I a catalyst?" I cry and fall more in love with him because he is immediately thinking, what do I need to do to make things better for her? Am I a cause and do I need to remove myself from this equation. I cry and tell him, no he isn't. That he makes things better and easier and I feel better when I am with him. He asks what he needs to do to help and I cry more, telling him to just keep loving me and ask him to not give up on me. He tells me, "Deal."

I'm luckier than most. I know this. But the depression diagnosis still weighs heavy on me and scares me. I don't want to have to battle this every day of my life. I want to find a way to beat it.

5 notes · View notes

gossipnetwork-blog · 7 years

Text

Pot in 2018: What to Expect

New Post has been published on http://gossip.network/pot-in-2018-what-to-expect/

Pot in 2018: What to Expect

When it comes to cannabis, 2017 was a much better year than anyone was expecting. Back in January, stoners and pot moguls alike were super paranoid about incoming Attorney General Jeff Sessions and his plans to shut down legal weed businesses from coast to coast. After a decade of steady progress on marijuana legalization – with about 90 percent of the country now supporting medical use and eight states having legalized recreational use – was the entire movement going to come crashing down?

A year later, almost no one believes there will be a federal crackdown on the entire cannabis industry. State-legal pot markets seem poised to match or exceed the value of black market pot by 2020. Sessions has admitted that marijuana is not as dangerous as heroin, and his tension with Trump is common knowledge. With the biggest state in the country about to begin recreational sales, and more and more politicians enviously eyeing the tax revenue coming out of places like Colorado and Oregon, legal pot is clearly here to stay. So what kinds of developments can we expect in the weed world for 2018?

The first legal marijuana lounges Let’s start with some great news: there are totally going to be legal marijuana lounges in the United States before the end of 2018! The biggest question is which city will get one open first: Las Vegas, West Hollywood, Boston or Denver. Considering nothing in Massachusetts is quite final yet, the smart money is on Denver, which actually passed a ballot initiative allowing licensed consumption spaces for marijuana back in 2016 but has had a fair amount of trouble implementing the law. You won’t be allowed to smoke, you have to bring your own cannabis, and you have to sign a document saying you won’t drive yourself home, but there’s a good chance the country’s first legal weed lounge will be in the capital of Colorado. Right now the front-runners for who might open first are a café called The Coffee Joint and a vape bar with an arcade called… wait for it… Vape and Play.

If you’re looking a pot hotspot where you can actually, you know, smoke pot, you might want to hold out for Vegas. “I think we’ll have an ordinance voted on and approved by late March or early April,” says former Nevada legalization campaign manager and current weed lobbyist Scot Rutledge. “I don’t know that they’ll be open by 4/20, but they should be open by the one year anniversary of recreational sales” – meaning by July. Sadly, the first Vegas pot lounges won’t be on the Strip, which is technically not in the city of Las Vegas, but they’ll be a short Lyft ride away and you’ll be able to smoke. Huzzah!

A few hours to the west, several cities in California have expressed interest in allowing cannabis social spaces, including West Hollywood, Palm Springs, San Francisco and Oakland. Advocate and aspiring lounge owner Jackie Subeck says the first ones will likely open their doors in West Hollywood this fall – including some spots where you will be allowed to buy pot on site and then smoke or vape it, just like a bar. “There’s also going to be standalone lounges where you can’t smoke or vape but you can buy infused products, like a bakery, or a spa with cannabis treatments,” Subeck says.

Confusion and a “bloodbath” in California Even though California will finally begin allowing the sale of recreational marijuana on January 1st, 2018, a lot of people are very nervous about how that is going to go. The state has had a largely unsupervised medical cannabis program in place since 1996 and now is trying to impose a strict regulatory regime on an enormous population of entrepreneurs and criminals, many of whom have never followed rules before.

Dispensaries have cropped up across California, but new regulations could mean the end for many of them. Jim Wilson/The new York Times/Redux

“Look at what happened here for the last 20 years. It was anarchy,” says Lord Jones founder and CEO Rob Rosenheck, whose posh weed-infused chocolates and lotions have become a celebrity favorite. “I think it will be a sloppy, chaotic, rough-and-tumble transition that will take 12 to 24 months to work itself out.”

Multiple people who I spoke with used the term “bloodbath” to describe the number of weed businesses they believe will fail.

“You can’t afford to suck,” says Jeremy Plumb, director of production science at the marijuana growing company Prūf Cultivar and the co-founder of Farma, one of Portland, Oregon’s most successful dispensaries. “There will be a massive oversupply in California, and the only people that will survive are either the ones that are super affluent and able to take every blow, or the ones that are really doing something with care and an unbelievable depth of skill.”

Of course, there is another option for California weed businesses that can’t cut it in the legal market: stay underground and ship their products out of state.

“The key word in 2018 is enforcement,” says Jason Pinsky, the cannabis producer on Viceland’s Bong Appetit and the chief cannabis advisor at marijuana delivery app Eaze. “In California, 90 percent of the brands that are out there are either going to disappear, or they’re going to operate illegally. It’s almost like the California weed industry is like an avalanche: to some degree, it’s unstoppable. You’re going to need to hire a lot more people in the policing business if you want to make it so all of these companies are going to stop doing business.”

The end of “indica” and “sativa” Pot snobs have been complaining about how meaningless the terms “indica” and “sativa” are for years, but I’m starting to think that 2018 will finally be the year when this concept hits the public. According to stoner lore, indica weed produces a sedating “body” high and comes from a plant with shorter, fatter leaves, while sativa weed creates a more uplifting “mind” high and comes from a plant with longer, thinner leaves.

But Plumb, the Portland dispensary co-founder, has been growing cannabis for decades, and finds these terms “absolutely offensive to any intelligent soul. There is no scientific basis where we can parse indica and sativa. You cannot connect morphology, a broad or narrow leaf, to the experience of a chemical phenotype. That’s just a fucking massive disconnect.”

So what, pray tell, will replace this false classification? How will we describe marijuana strains in the future? Most likely we will begin focusing more on the entire chemical mix of what’s in our weed – what’s known as the cannabinoid and terpene profile. THC is the most famous cannabinoid, as it’s the one that gets you high, but there are several other relevant compounds that can affect how a pot product makes you feel, including the physically relaxing CBD, the sleep-inducing myrcene and the lavender-smelling linalool.

“If you think about weed as a vehicle, THC would be the gas pedal, and the terpenes are your steering wheel,” says Pinsky, who has overseen quite a bit of public education regarding the variety of compounds found in cannabis on Bong Appetit.

Instead of indica and sativa, we’ll have a wealth of terms to describe marijuana. Ethan Miller/Getty Images

A few of the people I spoke with suggested that in 2018, more weed businesses will talk about the effects of various compound formulations in tinctures and vape pens, even if the indica/sativa distinction remains part of how dispensaries sell actual pot for another couple of years. Already, well-informed budtenders at high-end pot shops are helping customers make smarter choices that have nothing to do with the false dichotomy of body high versus mind high.

“The tiniest bit of education results in consumers being able to access these distinctive chemotypes, which open the door to novel effects,” Plumb says.

Canada takes over the world In these times of tumult and prohibition, our kindly neighbors to the north are looking more and more savvy. While the federal government in the United States continues to insist that marijuana has absolutely no medical benefit, making commerce exceedingly difficult for anyone working with state-legal weed, Canada began the process of making pot available to all adults as soon as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took office in 2015. Now, with millions of marijuana dollars flowing through Canadian stock exchanges and recreational sales set to begin in 2018, the Canadian cannabis industry seems poised to dominate the globe.

“These Canadian companies have access to money that no one in the U.S. has, and they’re going to kill us,” says Kris Krane, the president and co-founder of cannabis operations and consulting firm 4Front Ventures. “We’re ceding the future of the industry to Canada. They’re going to buy everybody.”

Canada will begin recreational sale of cannabis in 2018. Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press/AP

There is a truly mind-boggling amount of weed money flying around up there. The Wall Street Journal reported in September that about half of the trading activity on the Canadian Securities Exchange involved marijuana businesses. That’s right: half of all of the trading on the entire exchange was related to pot. Meanwhile, down in the U.S., there’s pretty much no chance in hell that a dispensary or grow operation could even get listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

At the same time, Canadian pot companies are starting to acquire pieces of pot companies in other countries, as well as export their product to places like Germany, Brazil and Australia. Then again, not every investor is afraid of Canada.

“Once the U.S. opens up, well, Canadians are nice people, but the U.S. will still dominate,” says Evan Eneman, the managing director of Snoop Dogg’s weed-focused venture capital fund, Casa Verde Capital. “The top line revenue of a licensed producer in Canada is probably still smaller than a single retail location in Los Angeles.”

Economic concerns replace philanthropy For a long time, marijuana legalization has been funded by progressive billionaires hoping to improve our criminal justice system – people like tech mogul Sean Parker, investor George Soros and the late Peter Lewis, who started Progressive Insurance. But heading into the elections 2018, fundraisers and political operatives say that the way we’ve been legalizing is changing. Not only are we running out of states that allow the billionaire-funded ballot initiatives that have been the primary driver of legalization, but the billionaires themselves are starting to move on.

“There’s definitely a shift. The social justice folks who had funded legalization up to now seem to have moved on to other issues,” says David Kaufman, a cannabis consultant who served as director of outreach and statewide partnerships for Proposition 64, the 2016 ballot initiative that legalized recreational use of marijuana in California. “The funders behind Proposition 64 are not necessarily going to be the folks that legalize in any other states.”

In the past few years, the political motivations behind marijuana legalization have become increasingly economic, whether it’s politicians hoping to rake in the tax revenue or businessmen paying to lobby for an industry worth over $40 billion. In 2015, a group of investors – including former 98 Degrees lead singer Nick Lachey – attempted to legalize marijuana in Ohio such that all legal cannabis would need to be grown on property owned by the people who paid for the ballot initiative.

While that initiative failed, it may have signaled the beginning of the end of legalizing weed with the goal of keeping people out of prison. In the past year, several prominent cannabis activists either retired or left the movement. Now, many are saying that legislative change will need to rely more on money from the pot industry itself, which could tip the nature of legalization toward helping the rich get richer, rather than accounting for the injustices of prohibition.

Possible legalization in New Jersey will mean mounting pressure on New York New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is not about that weed life. He somehow still thinks that pot is a gateway drug, and wouldn’t even allow the state’s medical marijuana program to include actual bud. But by the end of 2018, he may be rethinking his position.

Phil Murphy will be the next governor of New Jersey – which will almost certainly mean cannabis legalization in the state. Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/Getty Images

With recreational marijuana sales set to begin in Massachusetts over the summer and incoming New Jersey governor Phil Murphy poised to legalize pot as quickly as possible, there’s a good chance that hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers will soon be doing a sort of reverse commute – driving or hopping a train out to the suburbs to pick up legal weed. Even Connecticut seems close to legalizing, with some predicting the state will turn in the next two years.

“If Jersey and Connecticut both do it through the legislature, New York is surrounded. New York City is surrounded. You could take a PATH train from Manhattan and be in New Jersey in 15 minutes,” says Krane, the president of 4Front Ventures. “When sales figures start rolling out from dispensaries in Hoboken and Jersey City, elected officials in New York City are going to throw a fit.”

Of course, most insiders say that there is no way New Jersey will begin recreational sales in 2018. The state could expand their existing medical program significantly, but it will likely take another year or two to write and implement a full legalization bill.

Source link

0 notes

2traveldads-blog · 7 years

Text

Most of the National Parks we go to are fairly well-known. I mean, there are only 59 of them, so most are familiar to the masses. We love to return to Glacier National Park and Olympic and such because we’re so familiar and there is so much to do and see. We just added a new NPS site to our repertoire though, and we are so glad that Pinnacles National Park met and exceeded our expectations.

If you haven’t heard of Pinnacles National Park, it’s because it’s the newest addition to the National Parks. Formerly a national monument and jointly managed by the National Park Service and National Forest Service, the area was converted to a National Park giving it more, different funding and programs, and also bringing it to the forefront of many hikers’ and travelers’ minds. Huzzah for the upgrade and now check it out!

Locale of Pinnacles National Park

Pinnacles National Park is located between San Francisco and Los Angeles off Highway 101. It’s not exactly sitting on the side of the road so you do need to actually plan for some time in the Park and make sure that you have ample supplies for your jaunt (see below).

There are two different ways to access Pinnacles National Park: from the west side off Highway 101 or from the east side coming from the San Benito area. The east side is where you’ll find camping and all kinds of other trails different from what we are going to tell you about, and then the west side is where we focused. Here you’ll find some sweeping views, a few different types of ecosystems, a Visitor Center, and of course the talus caves.

If being on a road trip isn’t your cup of tea that’s okay. You can still visit Pinnacles National Park from the Bay Area as it’s less than a two-hour drive. It’s close to Monterey and also just North of San Luis Obispo and Cambria. You could make an easy weekend trip of doing Hearst Castle, Wine Country, and Pinnacles and really make the most of your time and get the best bang for your buck.

What are the Pinnacles?

The Pinnacles that Pinnacles National Park is known for are some of the coolest exposed craggy rocks that we’ve ever seen. It’s a small mountain range that comes up out of the rolling hills surrounded by chaparral/desert. It formed millions of years ago down in what we now call the Los Angeles area. Those cooled lava flows have slowly moved their way north over time. You know, California is full of faults and not just the ones they get fixed with plastic surgery. (Get it?!?!?)

Because the Pinnacles are an ever-moving, ever-changing landscape there are lots of cool geographic features to explore. The Pinnacles are a hit with rock climbers, hikers and horsemen. We opted to just go the hiking route on this trip, but next time we’d love to see the Park via horseback. Someday, if the kids are interested and we can train for it, Pinnacles National Park would be at the top of our rock climbing list due to the views, colorful rocks and structured climbing routes.

Education at Pinnacles National Park

Whenever we visit a National Park we always make sure to stop in at least one Visitor Center. This is where we get our National Parks Passports stamped as well as where we can either pick up or complete our Junior Ranger program packet. In the case of Pinnacles National Park, we had already printed off the Junior Ranger packet at home and completed it as part of our homeschooling curriculum that we do. This gave us the opportunity to watch some videos on YouTube about Pinnacles National Park as well as do some additional research around the California condor and the Townsend big-eared bats, both of which are endangered and found within the park.

Once out on the trails at Pinnacles National Park we were able to see several exhibits around what we had already learned about in our Junior Ranger packet. And as we hiked we were also able to keep our eyes peeled for any California Condors we might spy soaring above us. We actually were able to spot two of them during our time in the park!

Tip: you can tell a California condor versus a turkey vulture by not just its size but because of the white triangular patches on the underside of its wings. There are some big vultures out there, but when you see a condor you’ll be able to tell the difference with binoculars.

Hiking Pinnacles National Park

Since we focused on the west side of Pinnacles National Park that’s where we are going to share our hiking stories. What you’ll find on the east side we cannot attest to (yet!) but I can’t imagine that spending time in the eastern half would be just as awesome if it’s at all like where we were.

Skyline Trail – from west side visitors center

We are big fans of hiking trails that are loops. This is so helpful when you are hiking with kids and in Pinnacles National Park this was such a blessing. Going directly out from the on the west side Visitors Center we were able to do the hike along the skyline ridge. The entire hike is quite exposed in the sun so you want to be prepared with hats, sunblock and water. The entire loop trail is just over a mile and a quarter, but that short distance will wear on you.

The skyline trail takes you along one of the hills that is not a pinnacle but has some sweeping views of part of the Pinnacles range. We didn’t see much wildlife on this particular trail except for birds, but we were also hiking in the heat of the day. Animals like to be active when it’s much cooler.

Tip: try to plan desert hiking for early in the day or in the golden hour before dusk for the best temperatures.

When it comes to the vegetation, wow, it was some of the strangest mixes of plants we’ve seen. This area is called the chaparral which is a kind of high country desert. That doesn’t mean it’s full of sand in cactuses, but it means that the plants grow in an extremely arid and harsh environment. Think tumbleweed after tumbleweed after buckeye tree after tumbleweed… Really strange.

Hiking to the Talus Caves: the balconies trail from Chaparral area

Hiking to the talus caves was one of the main reasons we wanted to visit the 59th National Park. We love to go caving with the kids and each cave is so very different. Last year we got to do Oregon Caves National Monument down in southern Oregon and it required climbing ladders and ducking down in pitch black areas while water dripped all around us. And then this summer we did the Cave of the Mounds in Wisconsin and that was very much a family-friendly cave to explore with some impressive underground structures and interesting sights. The talus caves in Pinnacles National Park are NOT like either of these.

If you’re unfamiliar with the term, talus is fallen rock. Because the pinnacles are continually moving and changing, large pieces of rock have fallen over the years and jarred each other in crevices and canyons. This has actually formed some very complex caves. They aren’t caves like the limestone ones full of stalactites and stalagmites that you might go through, but caves in terms of crevices and shelters with gaping holes where the rock doesn’t meet. This means that many areas are well-lit but also there are some unexpected drops into darkness.

It’s pretty cool, both the caves and the canyons, for exploring with kids. Had there been recent rain there would have been creeks to cross along the hike as well. Part of what makes this trail so neat are the cliffs that you are walking alongside. Most of them are overhangs, also called balconies, and many are covered in lichens and jagged rock faces. Buckeye trees also line the trail in different areas, so that just adds to the weird/cool factor.

Note: buckeye trees are very unusual in that during the summer time they don’t have leaves and their strange fruits are growing and developing on the branches. In fall the fruits are dropped and then the Buckeyes sprout leaves during the winter and then start their cycle all over again.

Tips for hiking Pinnacles National Park

Our first tip that we always tell anybody when talking about hiking is to make sure that you have water. That’s particularly important when you’re hiking in the Pinnacles National Park. There is more to it though, particularly in this location, so here is our hiking checklist to make sure you can be safe with or without kids in Pinnacles National Park:

bring twice as much water as what you think you might need

check in at the Visitor Center regarding any safety notices or issues in the park

be sure that you have reviewed the hiking maps and know where your trailhead begins and ends

for the balconies and talus caves trail be sure you have a headlamp or flashlight to help with the darkness

always hike with a first aid kit in rocky areas such as Pinnacles National Park

bring binoculars or a very good telephoto for watching California condors

Visiting this area isn’t something you’ll get to do often, I’m sure, so take the time to be safe and prepared for the best experience possible!

Don’t you think Pinnacles is such a cool and obscure Park to visit? We’re looking forward to going back and entering from the east side of Pinnacles National Park so that we can see what it’s like on the other side and actually do some camping. If you have any other great tips for exploring the Pinnacles and surrounding areas, please let us know. We really enjoyed it there and appreciated the rugged, dry beauty of the place, so I know we’ll be back ASAWC (as soon as we can).

Want to stick a pin in Pinnacles National Park for your own California National Parks trip planning? Go for it!

Pinnacles National Park: exploring the high desert and rocky caves Most of the National Parks we go to are fairly well-known. I mean, there are only…

#family travel #Highway 101 #hiking #Junior Ranger #Pinnacles National Park #road trip #San Benito

0 notes

redlemonz · 7 years

Text

Day #28

Four weeks since sick-day Monday. A whole February's worth of a month, and it's the 21st too - my favourite new unlucky number. I can already tell it's going to be an absolutely splendid day and return to the workplace. My thoughts, along with time as my usual brain's archenemy, instantly strike down the usual Monday morning anxiety upon me. Shivers spark inside my spine, though I am not actually cold. If only I could escape this and sleep another horrendous morning away. Unfortunately I've already used up my quota for a sick day this month as at my last sick-day Friday, and am feeing sane enough to realise that my mind needs to be focused on some work anyway to divert its attention temporarily. It's alright too, because I'm pretty much use to the anxiety by now as it's mostly under my control these days (or so I like to tell myself anyway). It also helps that she's actually contributed to reducing it greatly through making her presence apparent in my life. Another smiley face, exchange of emojis and so on, via digital communication last night is more than sufficient to ensure my stability is in tact. Not that I'm relying on her at all or anything, it just so happens that she can naturally provide such a positive effect upon my life without even really trying. I'm quite over this empty feeling though - just getting by, living each day with a lack of physical emotion being exhibited upon my face for the majority. My expressionless gaze which stares back at me in the mirror displays just that - it doesn't really give a shit about all that much anymore. Everything's kind of just blankly existing around me, and here I am, dead inside and floating by as an insignificant spec of dust. So suck me into this equally empty vacuum and be done with it already. Day 28 - Bad company "I don't want to see you" are the words which continue to echo over and over again in my head, from our conversation four nights ago. Even though we're seemingly on good terms, can talk regularly and exchange photos now and then, hearing those words on repeat are still simply painful and can bring a tear to anyone's eyes. I know where she's coming from obviously, and that it's probably not ideal given the circumstances to see each other, but that general statement can regardlessly be scarring and be lodged against my insecurities sadly - because I allow it to. I can't help that it makes me feel so unwanted and minuscule, as if I don't even matter. I can't stop thinking about it either, because I want to be able to confirm to myself that I am indeed not worth the time and effort as is the belief that's been preached into me countlessly. Driving this knife into myself deeper helps me prepare for whatever future disappointments await around the corner in my life, reaffirming the pessimistic elements in my life that I extensively lost when I was with her (yup, my negativity during us being together was surprisingly a growing improvement). It sucks, but it is intrinsic that I must attain back that greater sense of negativity as otherwise my vulnerability factor is enlarged, by my own flawed mechanisms. That instrument to my own destruction being that my mind believes for some whacky reason (although true) that there is definitely some correlation between one's level of positivity and their general expectations. Anyway, what I'm really trying to get at is that work sucked. I spoke little words on a verbal scale, but my fingers on a keyboard spoke volumes on the digital screen of success. The more stuff that's on there, the more work you're doing obviously, right? Nevertheless, I got swamped with every task on a bloody Monday that supposedly just so happened to be urgent, even though they don't bother using the damn red exclamation mark in the emails to attribute it accordingly so. Yes, I'm finding any excuse to sprinkle my salt (careful with your mind) towards work today because it wasn't actually all too bad when it comes down to it, but once in a while it's nice to blame something else for my own catastrophic internal suffering. Man, what really got me was another regrettable memory I was itching to forget, but of course, fate always finds a way to remind me of the asshole I am. One of three was thrilling us with his weekend meal escapades (yes, food is stimulating stuff - quite literally if I may add, energy homeostasis and stuff. Do I even science? Fuck yeah.. on rare occasions). He went to this exorbitant buffet restaurant with his family and friends, situated in a hotel, named after simply a number which corresponds to the various cuisine-kitchens on offer. The beginning of that story was more than sufficient in sparking another moment of repentance, as she accompanied my hand there one night for a special dinner date I had booked (which she even dressed up and looked absolutely stunning for), and at which I behaved as an impolite and rude bastard. It's sad too really, because I would tend to pride myself upon chivalry, out of the limited bucket of anything that I even have to offer at all. To be completely straightforward about my sins (and goodness I hate admitting this), I put the food before her. As soon as I'd be done finishing a plate, I wouldn't hesitate to simply get up and proceed towards another serving whilst she sat and ate her meal on her own.. on multiple occasions. I ruined another nice evening for us, through my own selfishness and lack of thought about her in that moment. What's worse is that it was our unofficial anniversary (I booked the reservation in as our anniversary with the belief we may likely attain some freebies, and huzzah - gourmet chocolates.. would've been a proud moment if I wasn't such a dick that night). I was just an unforgivably bad date as a result, and offered poor company to this beautiful Princess (excuse me - Queen) whom I took for granted, on a dynamically visible level. Another apology which shouldn't have ever been required if I could have just had basic common courtesy for the woman I love. At least I was fortunate enough to receive another chance during one of the occasions in which I visited her down in snowy mountain town. We attended another buffet, named after that historically famous Mongolian warlord, where I remembered my faults and attempted to redeem myself - and hey, what a surprise, it was a really enjoyable night in each other's company. Might I add that I happen to have had a corresponding song, with regards to said historically famous Mongolian warlord, which has been stuck in my head the whole day courtesy of her. Might I also say, that she video snapped me herself singing along to the radio on the way to, and from work today, which brought a radiant glow of blissful happiness to my maniacal Monday. Three different friends reached out to me today - what a wonderful coincidence. Blondie, the mastermind and I don't think I've mentioned my lovely, but unofficial ditzy sibling who renamed her last name on social media to match my fake last name for over a year (because said last name is a loveable Turkish dip that resembles my actual last name when sounded aloud.. on a somewhat loose tangent, and is also variably dependant upon one's accent). Anyway, all three were sweetly inviting me to various future events - some that I can dodge when the time comes, and one I can decline straightaway. Not doing a great job at not being a dick, clearly, but trust me when I can reaffirm that I'm still not quite ready to be the negative nick of the group (that 'n' deserves to remain a lowercase, because it's not worthy of being labelled proper). My company will purely not even be that of adequate quality, and it's subsequently better for others that it's avoided as a result. So of course I had limited responses to each, and abruptly wished them a nice week ahead, because I still can't commit myself to a conversation when my primary sensations are emptiness and heartbreak. Also my dippy sibling, better known as The Colonel (pronounced Call-oh-nell according to her, when ordering fried chicken) asked me if I'm free on the weekend to assist her with purchasing her first vehicle, and insisted that I could provide some useful "manly input". I have to acknowledge that she is one of the sweetest and most treasured people in my life, before I can simply acclaim, what the fuck? My track record with owning cars is pretty well known among my inner circles. I've wasted over $10,000 (which would be much greater than my current savings account) on two European cars which didn't even last a year - combined. I've then decided after those bad decisions that purchasing brand new would be the genius alternative, so there's another $26,000 not well spent on which I'm finally finishing repayments upon by the end of this year. My street smart knowledge of cars may as well be the equivalent to some douchebag who sticks black stripes unevenly upon only the front hood of his red car to make it go faster. Oh wait, I am that idiotic douchebag. Nevertheless, I can't afford to have any contributing role in assisting the Colonel with her purchase as anything I say or do can and will be used against me in the court of my mind. So if something were to go wrong or be out of order, it's common knowledge by now to gather where the unforgiving blame, failure and consequent punishment would be suffered. I can't risk that on my lack of a conscience, therefore I kindly apologised and referred her to other potential professionals in the matter. Even my better half knew that I was down right stupid when it came to cars. She's got a hatchback as old as I essentially am, and it's probably still the more efficient and universally favourable option between our two cars. That's because she actually has the logic I seem to perpetually lack.. damn, I'm going to fail without her. All I want now is to be able to sit beside her in that car again, holding her hand (when we're not at risk of crashing towards our deaths), or resting mine lovingly upon her thigh, as we sing along to the stereo as the beautiful lunatics we are together.

0 notes

mentorup · 7 years

Text

2017 MentorUp | Session #2

Session Outline | 60 minutes

Introduction | 2 minutes

Mentee’s Perspective | 4 minutes

News | 8 minutes

Work | 8 minutes

Technology | 8 minutes

Trend or Topic | 10 minutes

Dialogue | 10 minutes

Flex-Time | 10 minutes

Introduction | 2 minutes

Before we begin, I’d like to wish each and every one of you a big, “happy spring!” Whether you’re enjoying the extra hour of sunlight, finally getting on the golf course, or trading your big coat in for some welcomed short sleeves, this time of year is characterized by the energy of all that’s blooming and coming back to life and I hope you’re soaking it up!

Our gardens and clocks are not the only things buzzing. A festival you may or may not have heard of ;), SXSW happened leaving us wowed with brand activations to learn from and keynotes to deepen and broaden our thinking. Other notable happenings such as March Madness, the Gamer Developers Conference and Mobile World Congress all took place just to name a few. Amidst all this, brands and tech companies have stayed busy!

Don’t worry about being overwhelmed with the tizzy of information out there … I’ve curated the best of March for you right here. Put your focus caps on, it’s go time.

Mentee’s Perspective | 4 minutes

Before you begin your session, don’t forget to gain the valuable perspective of your mentee(s). Their mindset and perspective should be a guiding force in how you present this material.

For some starter questions on how to do this… here are a few.

1. What is going on with their clients and their client’s business?

2. What are the focuses right now?

3. Where are solutions needed?

4. What kind of ideas and programs are they looking for?

5. What are they currently curious about?

With their perspective in mind, let’s now embark on this month’s session!

News | 8 minutes

1. Samsung Galaxy 8 Reveal

Beginning in early March, there was a “steady trickle of leaked details” surrounding the new Samsung S8 phone, but Samsung has now officially unveiled their new (let’s hope explosion proof) smartphone that’ll go on sale April 28, 2017.

Now I know what you’re thinking… “Yikes, Samsung… wasn’t there some sort of scandal around the previous phone?” Well, yes, there was but there has been significant improvement in the way the phones are checked as well as a large amount of corporate enthusiasm and positivity focused on regaining trust and creating excitement around the new product. Samsung’s UK head, Conor Pierce recently said in an interview, “this is a great opportunity to breathe new life into the brand.”

Being officially unveiled at events in London and New York, Samsung also let other new technologies share the spotlight with the new phone - a new version of their VR headset and DeX, “a dock that allows the S8 to turn into a desktop computer” to name a few.

So what do you need to know about these new phones? Why are they the first spot on in our news column? Here are the feature highlights:

- Edge to edge display, meaning the screen stretches they entire horizontal surface of the phone top.

- No home button – similar to the iPhone 7.

- Retina unlock (yes, that means you can unlock your phone.. in the blink of an eye ;)

- Face unlock (yes, this is real people!)

- Smart assistant, Bixby (available on all Samsung devices moving forward)

o Note: In ITK last year, we noted that Samsung had bought Viv, an AI company. This is their usage of Viv and also their statement that they can play on the AI level. Can you think of a major tech player right now who doesn’t have an AI platform?

Apple, Samsung’s biggest competitor, has had some confirmed leaks recently, highlighting anticipated updates such as the “heavily curved OLED” display. What do you think will be the biggest update to the next iPhone? Remember, it’ll be its 10-year anniversary.

*Also note that Android was just named as the most popular operating system in the world.

It’s always good to be reminded of why we even go over things like phone updates. Although it may seem arbitrary, updates that are going to be in millions and millions of consumers’ hands will evolve their attitudes and expectations about technology. They will shape how consumers consume content and how they communicate, making them super relevant to what we do! #huzzah

Keep in mind these updates also reshape the interface between consumers and brands...curved OLED brings video ads to life more, etc.

2. AmazonFresh Pick-up:

People are showing up at your house in 45 minutes… you have the ice, you have the vodka, you even have your new Target copper mugs washed and ready to go… but you don’t have Ginger Beer. #argh

Enter Amazon Fresh Pick-up. Unlike Amazon Fresh delivery, this newly announced service doesn’t have a minimum $ amount or a wait time for delivery. You can simply order, drive to the pick-up location and Amazon will put the groceries in your trunk. Think a Sonic drive-in where you pull in and out comes a smiling Amazon Fresh employee with your groceries.

youtube

Although delivery gets the most headlines and sounds flashy, a pick-up system like this still saves time and has less constraints (as well as costs).

The first location will of course be in Seattle, Washington – visitors welcome :)

3. Twitter’s Live-streaming API:

In an effort to further expand their live-streaming capability, Twitter has announced that a new API is available that will allow “everyday Twitter (and Periscope) users start live broadcasts from other apps and cameras.”

There is a slew of partners already working on the platform with Mevo being the only one with the first “non-smartphone camera to work on Facebook Live.” In December of last year, Twitter began “allowing 360-degree live-streaming on Periscope” which was due to the Insta360 camera (TMA Lab has a few of these!).

This this API could be game changer for broadcasting on social – whether a news source or an influencer. What are your thoughts on this? Do you follow anyone who currently broadcasts live?

Where do you feel like live-streaming has a place with the brand(s) you work on? Have you noticed an increase in live-streaming on your social channels?

Work | 8 minutes

*disclaimer, whether I was hungry while researching or March was simply a foodie month, we’ll never know… but you’ll see a yummy list of items below. Nom nom marketing.

1. CPG + Experiential

It’s always interesting to see how brands approach promoting a cpg product in an experiential activation/event. These two events that happened in March were unique and speak to an area of business that many of us touch.

a. Barilla Pasta + South Beach Wine and Food Festival:

As a title sponsor of the Miami Beach Wine and Food Festival, Barilla brought “a taste of the old country” by focusing on sharing meals with loved ones and the positive addition of pasta which has struggled in recent years due to paleo like diets and gluten allergies. The activation was two-fold, with education based demos during the day with Barilla’s executive chef, Lorenzo Boni and at night, transforming the Barilla tent into a “typical family set-up” (with the beautiful beach just outside, of course) where festival attendees could enjoy pasta dishes created right there by Boni. Each evening had a varying theme allowing festival goers to see the variety of options Barilla pasta allows.

A unique addition to their event presence was that real Barilla employees were included, making the Barilla brand very interact-able for those who stopped by.

b. Ben & Jerry’s Cereal Splash in NYC:

The beloved ice cream brand made a splash (literally) in early March as they activated a pop-up stunt in NYC’s Grand Central terminal. The goal was to gain awareness and promote their new cereal line of “Cereal Splashback” flavors (Fruit Loot, Frozen Flakes, and Cocoa Loco… sounds pretty awesome right?! They accomplished this by creating a huge cereal bowl ball pit where those passing by could “jump, splash, and wade” through the pit. With cameras set up strategically to capture candid in air moments, consumers who made the jump received a video for the opportunity to share on social. Additional activities at the pop-up were green screen photo opportunities, a live DJ, and of course… free ice cream.

This quote sums up the event perfectly, “At the root of it, we are really just trying to have some fun with our fans with compelling content for people to share,” says Justin Gural, marketing manager at Ben & Jerry’s. “We definitely have metrics set aside for this—impressions, samples, how many people came through, but it’s less about tracking. It’s equally about making sure the experience on-site is authentic to the brand, it’s engaging for our fans and compelling enough to share.”

2. Volvo + UberEats:

I think we can all agree that progressive dinners (a dinner that has multiple courses at different locations) are divine. There is a journey that naturally occurs throughout the dinner as well as time for the previous course to settle while in transit to the next location. Also, the variety of chefs and styles of cuisine one gets to experience in one night cannot be matched.

Volvo and UberEats have partnered to create the ultimate progressive dinner in Japan where the restaurant continually changes throughout the evening but the point of experience is consistently a luxury Volvo SUV.

How does it work? Two people get in the car for an evening of cuisine experience while the driver then takes them on a journey of Tokyo, driving down the most scenic and dynamic of streets. Throughout the evening drive, the car will stop to be greeted by Uber Eats staff with the couple’s next course. By identifying the most sought after dishes in Tokyo, the couple doesn’t have to pick just one, but can experience 3-5 in one night.

If you’re thinking, “how does it not spill?” or “is that even comfortable to eat in the car?” – check out the video below to see how Volvo created a backseat restaurant.

youtube

How does this example inspire you to pack “more” into an experience with consumers? What strategic partnerships do you think your clients could explore to get this same type of mutually beneficial experience?

3. Brands + April Fools

It’s only fitting that since this is April’s session that we take a look at what brands have done for April fools. Here are our favorites!

a) Cheetos spray tan

b) Papa John’s Garlic Gallon

c) Pop Tarts Just the Crust

d) Virgin Atlantic “flapenergy”

e) Everything Google did. :)

*for your session, pick a few of these if you’re concerned of having time to go through them all. Use the filter of knowing your mentees’ role in the agency to choose.

Technology | 8 minutes

1. Visa’s Payment Sunglasses:

Could sunglasses innovation be the next trend? First Snap Spectacles and now Visa has a snazzy set of shades that’ll as visa is saying, “work as a contactless payment method.” Beginning as a pilot program at the Visa sponsored World Surf League’s 2017 Quicksilver and Roxy Pro Gold Coast competition (that’s a mouth full!), the sunglasses will debut as a way of payment.

Being on the beach, in and out of the water, isn’t the best time to carry a wallet, ergo, why Visa thinks this could make sense. However, the sunglasses have to come off one’s face in order to use them as payment and I’m sure “what if I lose them?” is coming to mind.

Information such as cost, availability, and distribution have not yet been released, but the question for deeper thinking is – what services can brands attach to normal everyday items such as sunglasses? How does this improve quality of life or save time for the consumer – in a sense, how is it useful to the consumer?

If you’re now thinking of Spectacles potential to add additional features – such as payments or others. Check out this thoughtful review of the product.

Also, we can’t mention Visa’s payment enabled sunglasses without giving a shout out to Amazon Cash. Just this week, Amazon has announced Amazon Cash, a service that allows people without bank cards (credit and debit) to still be able to shop on their site. By displaying a barcode at participating retailer locations (CSV, Family Fare Supermarket…etc.), cash can be deposited directly to that individual’s Amazon account. Almost 7% of US consumers do not have bank cards, so this is an effort to make online shopping an option for them.

2. New Adobe Voice & Digital Double:

There has been a sneaky and oddly silent upgrade to a few technologies in the last year that have grabbed my attention due to a fascinating conversation with our chief technology officer, Ahmad Al’Assad… which I think we all need a dose of every now and then :) As updates like the two below gain speed, they have the opportunity to completely re- shape our industry.

The first is Adobe voice. Way back in 1990, Adobe released a program you may have heard of…Photoshop, which allowed images for the first time to be altered and changed. I think it’s safe to say that Photoshop has changed the world. Now at Adobe’s annual conference last year, the “company premiered VoCo; an audio editing suite that will allow users to make people say whatever they want just by typing.”

Minds blown yet? The technology after 20 minutes of listening to any voice, can then say anything you wish in that voice by someone simply typing the words. If you want to leave a voicemail on your friends phone in Chuck Norris’ voice, that can happen. Have a recording of Ellen Dejeneres giving you a personal pep talk? Yes, that too can happen.

The goal was to support podcasters and audio book editors in their ventures, but as you can imagine this technology, as it gets more elegant, has the potential to re-shape communication, entertainment, and content.

Being able to copy and create recordings of someone else’s voice is not the only way to recreate content – it now can be done in the movies.

Think back to watching Rogue One over the holidays when this stern face below appeared on the screen. To the casual Star Wars fan, this was no big deal – however, to the die-hard fan, it was an absolute miracle because this actor, Peter Cushing has been dead for over 20 years.

How is this done? Another actor performs the scene while special effects engineers then replace the face with the desired face. New technology, called Light Stage, is how the actor can perfectly appear within a scene. “Surrounded by more than 10,000 LEDs, the subject is photographed with about 20 high-quality DSLR cameras, producing a series of high-resolution photos from different angles to reconstruct a 3-D model of the subject’s face.”

Actors such as Angelina Jolie, Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Sigourney Weaver and Duane Johnson have all been photographed into Light Stage and “once an actor has been scanned into the Light Stage, engineers can digitally insert him or her into scenes.” How did Paul Walker appear in The Fast and Furious 7? Light Stage.

Now the question to pose with these two technologies, is how long will it be before someone tries to pass a virtual clone as content that is reality? What do you think is the effect this could have on brands? What do you think about culture?

Speaking of culture, let’s dive into our hot topic for this month!

Hot Topic | 10 minutes

Cultural Literacy

A few weeks ago, TMA greatly benefitted from the wisdom and knowledge of our Chief Music Strategist, Young Guru, in an agency wide Q&A. There were so many nuggets to take away and learn from, but one that was particularly inspiring was when he stressed the importance of being well-versed in cultural trends and applying them to brand work.

In today’s world, cultural trends are moving so quickly that it’s increasingly difficult to keep up, and that’s just the well-developed trends! What about quick culture moments that a brand could speak to, work with, and of course monetize on? As we’re striving to continually be as Ray says “the greatest agency on earth,” we’re tasked with not only knowing and staying on top cultural trends but also then sharing that knowledge with our clients and of course infusing it into our ideas.

All this cultural trend and relevance talk got me thinking about cultural literacy. We know what a general literacy is, but what about really understanding culture and being relevant with what you know about it for 2017… essentially, how well do you know culture right now (as it’s constantly changing!)?

In a world that’s quickly becoming more about JOMO that FOMO (see last month’s trend for reference), staying up to date can be increasingly difficult.

This month, we’re going to look at 10 cultural trends/moments. The material we’re using? A cultural glossary for 2017!

[An acquaintance of mine that I met with at Sparks & Honey at the end of 2016 sent me their 2017 Cultural Glossary after our meeting. I strongly encourage you to download it here for the full report!]

Out of the 100 cultural literacy signals spotted/mapped by Sparks & Honey for 2017 that are included in the Cultural Glossary, here are 10 that have been chosen to quickly walk through and discuss with your mentee(s).

*Important Mentor Note: There are a variety of ways to present this section, you can simply walk through it, do a quiz format, or some other creative way you think up. Don’t feel pressure to change how it is formatted currently, but if you feel there is a way your mentee would like to hear about it, go for it! I have included 7 examples I feel are relevant to each practice here at TMA, but since our time is only 10 minutes for the section, please choose 5 that are best suited for your mentee(s) and proceed with those. You can simply delete 2 examples from the deck. Please reach out if you have questions. Thanks!

1) Added Sugar (p.6)

a. Description: “Sugar, the villain of a healthy lifestyle. In 2016, anti-sugar sentiment led to sugar being taxed, new laws for sweet-advertising and a increased vigilance by consumers over corporations – propelled by the resulting scandal from the sugar industry manipulating research to hide its effects on health. Our grip on sugar will tighten in 2017, along with other substances that are less than good for us.”

b. Insight: 50% of consumers rated chemicals in food as the most important food safety concern

c. Question: How does this affect our business? What about our messaging with CPG clients? Can you think of a product you consume that has recently taken a harmful ingredient out?

2) Brand-Built World (p.17)

a. Description: “Brands are stepping in to provide public space and infrastructure for people to socialize, learn, and explore – a role formerly associated with governments. Facebook built a giant internet drone to provide internet access, Microsoft’s authenticated video-calling program aims to facilitate communication with local authorities and New Balance cleans the running paths during Boston winters. We expect more brands to expand their definition of experiential marketing and build lasting connections with consumers by providing services that meet basic needs.”

b. Insight: There is the increasing belief that companies have a responsibility to make everything better.- Tim Maleeny, CSO of Havas Worldwide

c. Question: How could a brand you work with be apart of this trend? Do you find yourself agreeing with this? How do you think this will evolve in the next 5 years?

3) Broadcast Social Media (p.19)

a. Description: “TV is meeting its interactive audience on social platforms, transforming both its production and the audience experience. Livestreaming on Facebook, finance-focused network Cheddar is embracing a much more informal tone. The NFL broadcast the 2016 Football season on Twitter – because that’s where the conversation is. 2017 will see a merging of TV and social media, as more formats are adapted to mobile streaming.”

b. Insight: The need to see sporting events in real time is one of the reasons networks have been immune to the changes timeshifting technologies – streaming, on demand or DVR – have wrought on network schedules of scripted programs.- Amanda Lotz, Professor of Communication Studies and Screen Arts & Cultures at the University of Michigan

c. Question: We talked a little bit about this earlier with Twitter’s new API… what do you think is the next place this will go? How will it effect your client? What about your clients’ consumers?

4) Brunchification (p.20)

a. Description: “The rest of the world is discovering the beauty of pancakes and avocado toast: Brunch is amazing. Starbucks is testing out brunch options, Jack in the Box has trademarked “brunchfast,” and there’s brunch-flavored candy corn. Breakfast is becoming a flavor, rather than an occasion. Brunchification describes how breakfast items are going to alter menus across the country in 2017.”

b. Insight: 5% Breakfast occasions, in- and away-from-home, are forecast to grow by 5 percent through 2019, ahead of the expected population growth of 4 percent.- NPD Group

c. Questions: Breakfast is having a moment people – this is one of those cultural moments where almost every single brand can tap into. How can your client brunch?

5) Digital Sampling (p.32)

a. Description: “Despite skyrocketing ecommerce growth, shoppers struggle with the inability to try on products when they shop online. That’s now starting to change, with L’Oréal upgrading their Makeup Genius app, and the debut of services such as Urban Decay’s Vice Lipstick app, so you can sample 100 shades of lipstick on your face. In 2017, expect to see similar digital sampling move from niche to industry norm.”

b. Insight: “Virtual makeover apps are another take on existing strategies retailers use to push customers to try new things, like free samples and subscription services.” - Diana Smith, senior research analyst, Mintel

c. Questions: How could digital sampling touch the brand(s) you work with? Have you ever experienced this with another brand? Does this sound appealing to you as a consumer?

6) Empathy Tech (p.39)

a. Description: “Technology is typically associated with precision and science, and not feelings. But technologies such as VR evoke both visceral emotional responses and allow us to see the world from a different perspective. The UN is using VR to build empathy with refugees, while psychologists are experimenting with VR to treat people with post-traumatic stress disorder. In 2017, growing numbers of NGOs will turn to tech to foster empathy in their campaigns.”

b. Insight: “I think that’s where VR has been really terrific, because it bridges the gap that numbers and statistics make just guilt-tripping. This is the first time they can actually feel like they can go into that person’s space.” – Gabo Arora, founder and president, LightShed

c. Questions: Do you have any technology that can respond empathetically? Perhaps an AI device? Think to the Aqua VR program that TMA just finished, that encompasses this trend perfectly. How does this affect your client?

7) Sleep Economy (p86)

a. Description: “Sleep deprivation used to be a badge of honor, but now sleep is seen as a human right. The sleep industry has awakened and is transforming how we sleep. YeloSpa, a sleep salon, lets customer nap for a $1 a minute; luxury hotels are offering sleep retreats; and even mattress company Casper is investing millions to disrupt the market. Prepare to revamp your sleeping behavior in 2017.”

b. Insight: $63.2 is the total amount that lack of sleep costs firms in the US each year.

c. Questions: Sleep is a big topic right now – in wellness and in tech. How can your client tap into this? Have you seen a brand not directly related to sleep tap into this trend?

Conclusion: Choosing merely 5 from a 100 was so tough, but did it get your mind going on how culturally relevant you are? You most likely were feeling or noticing these cultural trends/signals but to directly call them out and then apply them to our clients/brands that we work on… that’s a powerful force!

I strongly encourage you to download the full Cultural Glossary here, and read through it.

Before we finish up our session, is there another cultural trend/signal that you or your mentee(s) have noticed? Discuss amongst yourselves.

App of the Month:

Memoji app:

“Facetune has long been known for beautifying even our worst selfies, but now it wants to try something new: emojifying them. A new app from the selfie editor takes photos of your face and gives them emoji expressions — laughing, crying, blowing kisses, getting sick, etc. They can be still images or turned into GIFs and videos, often with surprising (and frightening) results.”

Content Highlight:

youtube

Conclusion:

Session #2 is complete! If you have any resulting questions, don’t hesitate to send a note my way!

[email protected]

Thanks!

0 notes

edmikos · 8 years

Text

“Who am I? Why am I here?”

My name is Ed and this is my inaugural tumblr post! Huzzah!

If you’re reading this, it’s probably because you’re: a. interested in hiring me for a UX position, or b. interested in pursuing a UX position by way of enrolling in General Assembly’s User Experience Design Immersive course. Fingers crossed for option A, but either way, I hope you find this illuminating.

Where to begin? I guess I’ll start by saying I learned how to read when I was 4-years old, without having been taught. I also learned how to ride a bike without being taught – my friend ran into his house for a minute and while he was inside, I got on his bike and just started riding it. I was put into the gifted classes when I was in Kindergarten. I say these things not to brag, because, as you’ll see, having all of this evidence of being intellectually “gifted” actually ended up backfiring. Having been told repeatedly, from a very young age, how bright I was, developed in me this assumption that, somehow, I’d figure things out. Later, when I graduated high school by the skin of my teeth, I decided to delay going to college because I clearly didn’t have any motivation to do well in school. Plus college is really, really expensive, so if I didn’t do well enough for it to pay off, I’d better not waste all that time and money.

Because I didn’t go to college as an 18-year old, I had to start working. Without a college degree, my options were somewhat limited. I bounced around from job to job. I worked at a car wash for a while, then an art framing store, then a bookstore, then a coffee house, then I delivered pizzas, then back to another bookstore, then a restaurant, etcetera, etcetera. None of them paid well, and I was too young and headstrong to keep working in a place that I knew was a dead-end. After all, I was a gifted kid – I was meant for something great! Right?

I got my first taste of what it was like to work somewhere I really liked when I got a job at a musical instruments store. It was retail, yes, but it was music! I’ve played guitar and drums for years (and should probably be much better at both, but I digress), and now they were letting me work with those things! And my co-workers were all passionate about music, too! I went from working in the warehouse to working in sales, which led to my next job, once I quit for some stupid reason that only a headstrong 20-year old would quit over. Goodbye guitar store, hello cellphone store! Ugh. I was such an idiot.

Fast forward a few years to when I’m 23. I’ve started taking 1 or 2 courses per semester at the community college (though still not motivated enough to get good grades) and am working as a bank teller. This was the first job I was really good at. My boss noticed that, and he liked me personally, so he started giving me more responsibility. Within six months, I was promoted to personal banker and given a key and the security codes to the branch. Soon after, I was put in charge of managing quality and compliance for all IRA accounts that were opened at any of our 12 branches, and whenever necessary, I’d act as teller supervisor. I trained tellers and personal bankers, and helped to create our process for training employees in sales techniques. During my time at the bank, I also met an incredible woman named Molly, who would later become my wife. The bank merged with another community bank and we were growing. I was told there were plans to make me the branch manager of the next branch that opened, which wouldn’t be too far in the future. Not too bad for someone who hasn’t even graduated college, eh? (cracks knuckles) Then in 2008, when the economy collapsed, our bank went under and I was out of a job.

I spent only a few weeks on unemployment before I took a job at another music retailer and quickly realized it wasn’t quite the splendid opportunity it had been when I was just a few years younger. It paid horribly (less, actually, than the unemployment I had been receiving) and I had to work crappy hours, so I tried to get back into financial services. This was when I started working for an insurance company and had another milestone: the first job I was really bad at. Coming off the high at my previous job at the bank, it was hard medicine to take, especially because the job was so seemingly elementary. I was processing paperwork for underwriters. With my background and pedigree, this should have been a breeze, right? Apparently I was either working with super geniuses or I was really in the wrong line of work because I consistently found myself ranked in the bottom quartile of our team. Well, I guess finding out what you want to do means also finding out what you don’t want to do. It’s good to fail at things sometimes too, particularly when you think they’re beneath your abilities; it keeps you grounded. The upside here is that (to rewind a few years), while I was still working at the bank, Molly had finally given me a reason to take my education and my career seriously. She had already completed a BA at one school and had moved to Chicago to work on a second degree in graphic design. I hesitate to say she was my muse, but I at least felt enough shame for having not graduated college (and for doing poorly in the courses I was sporadically taking at community college) that I got focused on my schoolwork, and started getting straight A’s. Toward the end of my tenure at the insurance company, I graduated from Elmhurst College with a 3.5 GPA in business administration and psychology. I learned I was really interested in psychology and thought about pursuing a PhD, so I could do research and teach at a university. I think I made the right decision not taking that route, but I was left wondering, “what now?”

First things first, I’m taking my newly minted degree and I’m getting the hell out of this insurance company! I moved to the city to live with Molly, who is my fiancé by this point, and as luck would have it, our apartment was walking distance from the Chicago Music Exchange. If you’re not familiar, this store is not like other musical instrument retailers. It’s a mecca. Internationally headlining musicians make a point of stopping there while on tour. They have historical gear like a guitar Jimi Hendrix owned, and the double-neck bass guitar from “This is Spinal Tap.” Places like Guitar Center or Sam Ash have sales floors; Chicago Music Exchange has a showroom. Might it be time to look again at the retail music industry? I think so. I took a job in their warehouse just to get my foot in the door and after about 3 months a position opened up in the accounting department, which at the time consisted of their finance director and the person working below her; the position that had just become available. Guess who got that job.

At the risk of sounding conceited, this was the next job I had that I was really good at. That’s not me saying that, that’s my manager, the owner, the head of operations, and many others saying that. I worked like a madman all day, everyday. I stayed late, I took work home with me, and I even went in on the day I got married. Granted, it was just a courthouse wedding, and Molly and I were only doing it to prevent wedding day jitters when we had our “actual wedding,” but still. I was extremely dedicated. I wrote processes, I trained people, and sometimes I even saw rockstars like Carlos Santana or Billy Corgan hanging out in the showroom. It was awesome. Then I heard about at opening in the accounting department at The Windish Agency, a booking agency for bands and DJS. That would officially put me in “the music business.” I had arrived.

Well not quite. As it would turn out, this was another job I’d have trouble with. Boo. I met with a career counselor to try to figure out why. She said I was probably in the wrong line of work. I said, “duh.” She said that rather than trying to find a good career for me, we should look at the problem as though we were trying to create a career that would be perfect for me. To accomplish that, we spent 14 weeks sifting through all the jobs I’ve had, my aptitudes, weaknesses likes, dislikes, successes, failures, and unresolved childhood issues. After that, we had a short list of careers for which I might be a great fit; UX was at the top. She said I should learn as much as I could about UX and to start by talking to anyone I know who works in UX. I met with a UX designer through a family friend who made me think it was not only the right thing to do, but it was also achievable. In hindsight he was probably a little too optimistic about how achievable it was to break into UX, because I got the impression that the industry is basically so hard up for people, they’ll take anyone who can give even a B- answer as to what User Experience Design is. I’m actually really glad that’s not true.

I decided to take the part time UX design course at General Assembly last year, with the notion that “once I get through this, I’m on my way to a fabulous career in user experience design,” despite having no design-related work experience. When I completed the course, I obviously found that wasn’t the case. Hmm… Now what? I know, I’ll put together a website to showcase my portfolio! Wait, I only have one project to showcase. I know, I’ll build more projects! Wait, I’m not very good with most of these design programs. I know, I’ll work every night to learn how to use design software and read everything I can get my hands on! I’ll go to meetups and build my network on LinkedIn! I’ll start a Dribbble account! I’ll read books like “Don’t Make Me Think,” “Lean UX,” and “Elements of User Experience.” I’ll read blogs and articles about UX! I’ll listen to podcasts and take courses on Interaction Design Foundation! So I did all of that and more, and now I feel like I’m ready to take the leap and enroll in GA’s immersive UX course. Was it a mistake to take the part-time course last year? Not at all. When I started that course, I quickly realized just how alien the “design” part of design was to me. Sketching and wire framing were completely unlike any job I’d had before. So, the part-time course gave me a really good foundation in principles and processes. Now that I’ve spent all of this time since then reading, thinking, listening, doing, breathing UX; I think I’m ready to enroll in the immersive course as that is the one geared toward career changers. I’m optimistic that this is going to pay off and I’ll be able to springboard into my first job in UX, but if it doesn’t, that won’t change anything. I’ll keep learning and working, day-in and day-out, doing everything I can to break into this industry. I’ll be sharing my experiences in UXDi here regularly, if you want to see how things are going. Thanks for reading!

#uxdi #general assembly #admiral stockdale

0 notes