#I wrote this like an article on my website so just pretend i’m well enough to be on my pc ok ?

[typenull]

While the climax of Dunmesh [here’s your warning for spoilers] gives us an extremely thorough look into Laios’s psyche and his own desires, we don’t actually know that much about Falin, despite her “death” kicking the entire story into motion. The only bits of Falin we get to see are through the lens of other characters, who inherently show us their own biased perceptions of her. I’d go as far to say that Falin is actually the character in Dungeon Meshi who’s true desires we know the least about!

We know with absolute certainty at least a few things: Falin is gifted with powerful magic, wants to follow behind and travel with her brother who she deeply respects, loves her friend Marcille, likes fruits and creams, loves insects and is curious about monsters, once again like Laios… most of the things we learn about Falin are things that she has in common with her brother, but what does SHE want, deep down? How does she feel about everything? I don’t think we’ll fully get an answer to that question before the manga is over. This is definitely on purpose though, and has even been hinted at in the text (which I’ll get to later).

In my opinion the main difference between Falin and Laios is that Falin doesn’t want to hurt anyone besides herself (for the sake of others, and she barely knows who that self is) and Laios wants to hurt anyone who he “doesn’t like” (anyone who endangers him and those he loves). Both of these feelings stem from the same shared events of their childhood where they both began to feel “disconnected” from humanity so to speak, but they reacted to it in opposite ways.

Where Laios stubbornly ran away and refused to deal with being hurt and surrounded by hurt, Falin, who we rarely see making choices based on any desires for herself (staying in the academy for 8 years after being sent by her father despite not thinking it’s for her, nearly agreeing to marry Shuro just so that she doesn’t have to deal with being asked later, etc.), doesn’t object to anything she’s subject to because the only person being “hurt” in these scenarios is herself, which to her is acceptable. She accepts the fact that she’s considered “othered” extremely easily, and this reflects openly in both her behavior and in the few things we know about her: she connects with and cares deeply for spirits despite being ostracized, admires insects and monsters like her brother, and is even fine planning to take on a job that’s revered in her hometown. To Falin, being “othered” is more normal to her than the alternative

The only people in Falin’s life that make her feel like *more* than just an outsider are Laios and Marcille. As a result Laios and Falin end up with similar sounding mindsets on the surface; "As long as [the people I love] are okay, I don't care about anything else" — but underneath, they actually manifest completely differently! Where Laios “doesn’t care about people”, Falin cares deeply about them despite barely being treated as one.

The only *active* decision from Falin we see that most obviously reflects her deepest desires is her choice to die for those she loves, which I think says a lot about her.

I think that if Laios is “a human who wants to become a monster” because he hates humans due to his past, the most obvious foil to him is Kabru, “a human who wants to destroy monsters” because of his past in Utaya (and feeling like a monster himself). Thinking of them as two ends of a spectrum, in the grey middle ground of this is where I think I’d put Falin.

She’s simultaneously a human made subhuman, a monster made to follow Thistle, a “ghost” of her former self haunting Laios and Marcille — she really IS the absolute epitome of a “chimera”.

The Lion cursing Laios was the “hinting in the text” I talked about earlier: forcing his deepest desire into something seemingly impossible to achieve, a chimera. The surface level conclusion when reading this is that Falin won’t be revived, but I seriously don’t think it’ll be that simple in the end. After all, a chimera is multifaceted.

My hope for the final chapter of Dungeon Meshi is that, *if* by some chance Falin is revived, she will finally have to grapple with not only having to look deep within herself to answer all of these things for her own sake, but also with having the one opportunity in which she chose to use any sort of agency to act upon her deepest desires not only be completely reversed, but also hurting so many people in the process. When Falin is revived in the Red Dragon arc, she doesn’t even remember sacrificing herself for her friends — but she promises Laios to never do it again, falling back into her typical submissive obedience. How would she react the second time? Will we even get to know? Something tells me, probably not.

[hermannsthumb]

Gonna request some camb0y newt who has Hermann as a regular follower who may or may not be requesting used clothing from Newt...😳

this one is less h0rny and more dumb and I died every time I typed newt’s screen name but (ALSO THE FACT THAT TUMBLR KEPT BLOCKING THIS MESSAGE....unbelievable) 18+/not sfw below cut

-------------------

The whole thing only started because of the kaijus.

It seems foolish to place the blame on them, considering the severity of the damage they’ve caused in every other aspect of life, but it’s the truth. Hermann was never brilliant at romance even in the best of times; he never knew quite the right words to say, or quite the right way to kiss, and certainly not how to keep men interested enough to come back for more than a date or two. Then the end of the world came, and the jaeger program ate up what little free time Hermann had, and dating simply fell to the very lowest tier of his priorities. He had work to do. He had lives to save.

Unfortunately, his libido continued to run rampant.

Masturbation could only get one so far, though Hermann was undeterred and tried almost anything: dildos, vibrators, expensive lubricant, a paid subscription to a high-quality pornography website. He cancelled this after a week, when he realized none of its featured men--though undeniably good-looking--fit his particular area of interest. Besides, it was far too impersonal. Hermann did not like spending half of his time watching a video or scrolling through a photo gallery wondering what that man was doing now, or whether or not he’d enjoyed himself, or what he was like in person... In a fit of desperation, Hermann picked up a subscription to another website that promised live men 24/7. And, well. To make a long story short, Hermann is pretty sure he’s in love.

The object of his affections is twenty-something and stocky, a good few inches shorter than Hermann (he’d wager, anyway), with a chestful of tattoos and a voice that’s almost high enough to be grating. Hermann has seen his face only fleetingly, but it’s enough for him to know it’s a highly agreeable one. He’s got a nice sense of humor, seems intelligent enough, and the glimpses Hermann’s caught of the bedroom he streams from (at the perfect time of day, late enough that Hermann’s inhibitions are entirely nonexistent) indicate a healthy love of science fiction. 

Hermann is mostly in love with him because of how good of a show he puts on, though. Where Hermann fails in his use of dildos or vibrators and other nonsense, the man succeeds, and indeed excels, and he’s endlessly creative with dressing in lace and other funny little costumes. It makes for some very inspired jerking off on Hermann’s end. More importantly, it makes for a calming of his libido.

Hermann doesn’t know his real name, only his chosen screen name, though it doesn’t really matter: kaijulover69 is most certainly the man of his dreams.

Well. Nobody’s perfect.

“Tonight’s stream is dedicated to a very special fan for all his support,” kaijulover69 begins. He’s wrapped in a bathrobe, though Hermann has a feeling he knows what’s beneath it, and he flushes pleasantly with warmth at what’s soon to come. “And for what I’m wearing right now. You know who you are. Thanks again, dude!”

His lips are just visible on camera, and he grins coquettishly before slipping the sleeve off his right shoulder. Then the left. “That very same fan requested a strip tease tonight,” he continues, “and--well, I’ll let the rest be a surprise, huh?”

The belt is undone. The robe slips down to the bed, revealing the object of Hermann’s affections clad in nothing but a rather small pair of lacy black undergarments. (And a bloody expensive pair, at that--cost a third of Hermann’s weekly salary. It’s worth it.) You look very attractive, Hermann types encouragingly into the chat box, and hope it’s visible between the pleads for kaijulover69 to flash his face or pull his genitalia out already. 

He doesn’t appear to see any of them. “My week was pretty lame,” he continues. He begins to idly run his hands up and down his bare chest; Hermann mirrors the action on his own, enjoying the shiver he manages to elicit from himself even through two layers of shirt and sweater. “Work stuff has been kicking my ass. And--” His fingers falter. “Well, there’s this guy I really like, and we’ve kinda been...seeing each other, but I just found out he’s actually seeing someone else. So I guess it’s like, I realized I’ve been making all this shit up in my head?”

Who would ever turn down such a marvelous specimen of human? Hermann’s temper flares with a mingling of both righteous offense on the man’s behalf and a little bit of jealousy that he’s not the one who’s so captured his heart. He would like to knock some sense into them, whoever they are.

“But you don’t care about that,” he says, and forces a laugh. “You want to see me mess these up, don’t you?”

His hand drifts down to his panties, and he gives himself a squeeze through them.

“Please,” Hermann says happily, though he knows there’s no one to hear.

------

There’s an email from Newton waiting for him in his inbox the next morning. No subject.

Hey, dude-

Sorry I left you hanging yesterday. I was just a little shocked. Not shocked that you have a partner or whatever, of course you do, that’s totally normal, just that you never told me about them until now. I read over your latest article, and I just wanted to say what an utter load of--

“Hmph,” Hermann says, and quickly scrolls up and away from Newton’s annoying little rant.

Even as he does so, he feels a pang of guilt he doesn’t quite understand. Newton is shocked he has a partner: so what? And, er, so what if that partner isn’t quite as real as Hermann is pretending? The question came at him fast, and unexpected, and so very quickly into the switch from letter correspondence to email; kaijulover69 on his mind, Hermann panicked and wrote yes, I do have someone in my life. It’s not entirely a lie. Though Hermann holds no illusions about the nature of their dynamic, the man has certainly taken up the same amount of Hermann’s time and money that a real partner would. And besides--it’s easier. Less messy. Newton would probably try to set Hermann up with someone, or pester him about his sex life, or even--God forbid--try to offer him advice. (Once I blew a guy in the bathroom of this shitty dive bar, try that, he told Hermann a few weeks ago, and I always take my dates to the aquarium so I can talk about shit and look smart.) 

It’s also helpful in dissuading Hermann from his daydreams and illusions of dating not kaijulover69, but Newton; that, he fears, is an even grander pipe dream.

He skims Newton’s--rather poor--critique of his work, ignoring entirely his comments on Hermann’s partner, and types up a fast rebuttal. Kaijulover69 has another stream tonight, and he doesn't want to miss it.

--------

“The trick,” kaijulover69 pants, “is to just, uh, relax your muscles as much as possible. It’s easier when you’ve got someone doing it for you, obviously, but...”

His chosen method of masturbation tonight is a frightfully large tentacle dildo, wider and longer than any prick Hermann’s seen in his life. Hermann’s not sure if such a dildo would fit inside him; he’s not even sure if it’s going to fit inside kaijulover69. The man is rather compact. It’s stopped about halfway into his body, and even from the rather distant angle Hermann can tell it’s stretching him tight. 

“...I might’ve jumped the gun a little,” the man says, and bursts out into breathy laughter. “Should’ve, uh, should’ve gotten the smaller size. Or worked up to this one.” He works another centimeter into himself before his body goes taut. “Go--go big or go home, I guess?”

One hand moving steadily around his prick, Hermann uses the other to type an encouraging message: Excellent effort.

Kaijulover69 pulls the dildo out to the thinnest section, then once he relaxes, begins a rhythm of short, shallow thrusts. Each time, it goes in a little deeper. It’s very good to watch, and listen to as well; his little gasps, the creaks of his bedsprings, the spread of his legs widening. Hermann briefly considers how badly he would like to be the one pushing it into him and dragging out those sounds, and is surprised to find himself orgasming.

He tips generously once the stream is over: he does like to consider himself some sort of gentleman, and he likes seeing how excited it gets kaijulover69.

-------

The package arrives on an entirely ordinary Tuesday some three weeks later. Autumn has come, bringing with it a rather heavy series of rains, and Hermann is drenched and shivering when he finally ducks into the relative warmth of his flat. The knowledge of what the box tucked under his arm contains warms him considerably; he rented a P.O. Box for one reason and one reason exactly, not even daring to have his name attached to it. It’s gauche, he knows, but--isn’t it a bit like recycling? Kaijulover69 gets a fresh, exciting outfit from Hermann, and Hermann gets it back after he’s--well.

Hermann needs to unwind somehow. There’s nothing wrong with it!

The black lace undergarments are wrapped neatly up inside the box, with a sweet little pink bow on top. Attached to that is a simple handwritten card: To my number one fan! ❤️ There’s plenty more where this came from...

Simple, and innocently flirty. And so familiar it makes Hermann’s blood run cold.

“It’s not possible,” he says.

And yet--isn’t it? Hermann’s never seen his face--either of their faces--and the screen name--

There is no return address on the package, but a frantic search of its wrappings reveals its origin: stamped in black ink over frog-themed postage is BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS. “No, no,” Hermann mutters to himself, even as he reminds himself (unhelpfully) that plenty of people are from Boston. He tosses it to the bed and clacks over to his desk, clutching the card so tightly it crumples. Newton’s letters are all in the top drawer--he just needs--

The handwriting is a perfect match.

“Bugger,” Hermann groans.

[write-a-bad-romance]

Theocona Hurt/Comfort Request

Thank you for the request @delicateikemenmemes​! And thank you for notifying me about the link. It’s working now!

Disclaimer: This fic deals with Covid-19 and health workers fighting against the pandemic. I mean no harm towards real-life health workers, their families, and everybody whose lives are directly affected by Covid-19. I pray that all of us stay safe and healthy, wherever we are.

"Why not look this way, darling? I know you've been dying to see me for a week~"

"Hell no," Theo directed his eyes to the steaming mug of coffee by the desk lamp. The truth was, he'd rather die than being caught blushing at the sight of his not-boyfriend after what seemed like forever. "As if I'd been looking forward to your perverted face."

"Wah, so mean." Arthur pouted, his movements looking sluggish due to poor connection. Behind him stood rows of drab navy blue lockers and what seemed like a long-unused water dispenser. "And after all the trouble I went through to get to you."

Theo understood what he meant. He imagined the hospital staff, young and old, taking turns to use the dim, cramped room to video call home. He was lucky Arthur still managed to call him from his apartment once in a while.

 Their calls often leave no room for....friskier activities. Arthur moaned about not being able to show how much he'd been missing "Little Theo" and other obscenities the Dutchman pretended not to hear.

 Because, really, this was enough.

"So I was saying," Arthur continued, completely ignoring Theo's perpetual frown. "This bloke came in with a snakebite from a cobra. So, naturally, the boy ran around trying to administer antivenom to this poor sap."

"Listen to yourself, sounding like the epitome of an empath," Theo commented dryly.

 "Oh, the story didn't end there." Arthur waved, his hand a static blur on screen. "The lass who nursed him told me the guy had apparently gotten drunk and tried macking on his pet cobra."

 Theo involuntarily snorted a laugh despite himself. It felt good, he had to admit.

 "Aw, look, you're laughing!" The criminally handsome doctor smiled. "You look positively lush when you're laughing."

 "Shut up." Theo snapped immediately. “That’s not funny.”

Arthur's laughter rang free, a welcome sound in the desolate locker room.

"Remember the old gentleman who came to the ER saying he desperately needed a sick leave letter because he wanted to go on a holiday in Santorini?”

 "Yeah, the sod who dumped his entire life story on you, what about it?" Theo could not help but notice the distinctive dip in Arthur's tone.

"Well, he suddenly messaged me saying he quit smoking after considering my advice," Arthur flashed a reassuring grin. "That's great! His mum is high-risk after-all."

 "Uh-huh." Theo nodded, taking a swig of his coffee, hoping to calm his nerves.

"Today, you see..." Arthur trailed off, his voice trembling. "Today, there was this sweet old lady."

Don't go there, Theo warned inside his head. They would always come to this point in each of their conversations lately, without fail.

But he'd rather be there and piece Arthur together again after he collapsed.

"I think I've told you that we'd let the patient record messages before they get strapped to a ventilator, yeah? And she, um." The usually vibrant young man stuttered to find the words. "We had to retake it several times because she kept forgetting what she wanted to say. I mean, we couldn't blame her and— and then she finally said she wanted to talk to her granddaughter one last time."

Stop. Theo wanted to scream before Arthur could finish his story. Don't—

Arthur took a long, deep breath before resuming. "My mate sent it to her daughter since they're living across the country. We dinna' replay it."

No matter how Arthur changed the way he described his ordeal at the hospital every time, everything sounded the same to Theo. 

It's hard. We know it's supposed to be hard. And it still pains me every single time.

"Dr. Newcomb... Old Simon, you remember. For once, he didn't yell at us when he saw us slumping down in the hallway gutted and all." Arthur babbled, trying to erase the apparent dejection in his voice. "But hey, there's no better way to teach us 'rookies' to 'toughen up' for the job. We signed for this. We've made our bed, and now we gotta lie in it."

Theo could hardly take it any longer.

"Sometimes, Theo, I...."

"Enough," Theo shut him down. "To hell with that old fart and everybody else who keeps telling you how to do your job." he snarled.

"Woah, I didn't mean—"

"Listen up here, Arthur." He knew that wasn't the point, but Theo couldn't care less. "I can't bullshit my way and tell you everything is fine. I can't fathom one bit how all of you manage out there. You hanging on despite all that hell outside, that's just—"

"Theo," Arthur tried to soothe the Dutchman.

"No, Arthur." Theo was, in fact, at a loss for words. He knew he was rambling at the top of his boiling head. What he wouldn't do to save Arthur from the brink, and this was what he resorted to. "I know I can't tell you to suck it up and go on like a robot, but for fuck's sake."

For your sake,

"But for fuck's sake, be a little more caring to yourself." Theo managed to scale his tone down a notch. "The last thing I want is seeing you broken."

"Theo—"

"When you pull through," It's an if, not a when. "We will meet again when you win."

"Theo?" Arthur called, his glasses reflecting the light of his screen. Theo was glad he didn't have to see the tears he knew were budding in the corner of the man's eyes.

"When this is all over," he sighed. "I promise I'll come see you."

This time, it did the trick. Arthur seemed to calm down, easing back into his chair. Theo wanted to believe Arthur’s mouth was crooking into a smile.

"That's awfully sweet of you." He finally spoke. "Thank you, Theo."

Theo couldn't help but smile back, even if only for a bit. "Graag gedaan."

But the moment was cut short when Arthur suddenly looked towards the direction of the door. "Ah, bollocks. My shift is starting. See you again, old boy?"

Theo put on his signature deadpan face. His fit had drained more energy than he thought. "Sure."

"Don't you dare mess with some other bird while I'm away!" Arthur waved. "Ciao!"

"I should be the one telling you that, klootzak," He bit back weakly. "Welterusten."

Theo took off his headphones and threw them on top of his Macbook. In the privacy of his room, the man planted his face onto his dry palms.

He wanted to curse at his own clumsiness. Out of desperation, he yelled at the man who deserved his harsh words the least. At least, not this moment.

His old self back then had been too engrossed in denial and childish comebacks to let the frivolous doctor into his heart. Theo regretted it. Regretted it all now that there was a genuine possibility of not seeing him again. 

And possibly for good.

Theo wasn't a religious man, but he prayed for his brother often, prayed for others but himself. Never himself. But as he pictured Arthur walking out in full gear made him think if he wasn't a little too selfish this time.

So, he prayed. He prayed despite the selfish masses out there who refused to listen. He prayed in the face of a wall too high to climb, amidst the rising numbers, against what seemed to be an inevitable downfall. 

He prayed for a tomorrow where he'd still find him there.

Stay safe because I want to be alive at the same time as you.

Notes:

*1 The cobra incident is a real-life story from Asha’s (ashavazesa) friend who’s a co-assistant doctor. I wrote it into my fic with permission.

*2 The part with the recording is also taken from real life. I referenced it from this article from The Harvard Gazette website, which I highly recommend reading. It’s very eye-opening and heartwrenching.

*3 The final line is taken from lovelysuggestions with very slight changes . Big thanks to Emma & Maria for the quote.

Personal Comments:

Theocona, eh??? Well this was quite the challenge since I expected writing mainly from Theo’s perspective because I thought I wouldn’t be able tonail Arthur’s character properly. Thankfully, I got some help from @ashavazesa​ so everything went smoother than I expected.

But to be honest, this fic was... very hard to write. Yeah, I wrote the entire thing out of my own free will but even then I needed to take breaks every now and then to ground myself.

A little bit of background: I have a dear friend who currently has to work mobile from town to town. She’s not a health worker, but the fact that she’s out there meeting so many different people makes me anxious. There’s not a day I don’t think about her. In fact, most people here have no choice but to work outside.

I can ramble all day long about the depressing state my country is in right now, but I think I’d rather spend my energy on something else.

Sorry for the sudden rant. Thank you so much for reading until the end. 

[ofthelabyrinth]

Instructions: Always repost with the rules, answer the 11 random questions left for you and leave 11 more for the people you tag!

TAGGED BY: @moonwoken​

TAGGING: be gay do crime

questions i am answering

1. how are things going?

They’re going, man! They’re...going. I have the next two weeks off work which I’m not thrilled about (I actually love my job) but like...my bestie and I keep trading silly little gifts back and forth, so that’s cool. I think I’m mostly still reeling from the blow-out of a breakup and like...feeling like I don’t belong anywhere? Maybe my depression’s just kicking into high gear again but I feel like I’m not wanting/don’t belong anywhere but maybe work. Like everyone and everywhere else just tolerates me. IDK man.

2. if you were someone else’s muse, how would your mun describe you?

Depressed, spontaneous, fickle, lacking in self-esteem but always available to build others up, loves too quickly and too easily, book smart but so fucking stupid otherwise. :/

3. if you could only recommend me three songs, movies or books to get to know you better, which would they be?

Ooooo, this one’s kinda tough! Well, for starters, my go-to movie is The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and I feel like knowing it’s my favorite movie (and having seen it at least once, lol) really explains a lot of my personality. What Rocky Horror can’t explain, my favorite novel probably can: Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes. I really am haunted by this book. My recommendation for a “song” would actually be the whole Beetlejuice: The Musical album, but I think “No Reason” and/or “Say My Name” nicely encapsulates either my split opinions (former) or my energies (latter).

4. what was it that first inspired you to write? what inspires you today?

My sixth grade English teacher. He was very supportive of my writing and became a touchstone for inspiration in my life. I really started down that track after his class, and even though I’m not doing what either of us ever thought I would, his words still ring true. I don’t really know if I have any inspirations today, though, per se. Performers, I guess. Most of my strongest muses/writing have been born out of my fascination with the performer/s I’ve used for their FC’s.

5. if you had to put together a team of 5 fictional characters plus yourself to save the world, who would you choose and why?

Captain Katherine Janeway, Q, Commander Spock, Doctor McCoy, and Charles Xavier (PatStew). I’m going to be honest here: between Janeway and Q...we don’t need anyone else. Q’s powers and Janeway’s moral compass in combination with Janeway’s leadership and Q’s simp status will solve the problem on the then and there. I just happen to like both Spock and McCoy and think they would contribute a lot of flavor to the adventure, although we’d need Xavier to mellow shit out when all those hot heads start to collide--in particular, Patrick Stewart’s Xavier, since he fits the Star Trek vibe and would thereby have a little more sway with Q than otherwise.

6. what is your favorite fictional trope? least favorite?

My favorite...ever? Period? At all? In all of tropedom? Dark circus/carnival. The exact flavor of the circus/carnival/other travelling show as well as the degree of darkness doesn’t matter, I just always end up drawn in and stupefied by it. I think it’s a combination of the tonal juxtaposition (the light, bright, fun, easygoing, smoke-and-mirrors sensation of the show juxtaposed to the darkness and the horror) and my unending fascination with performance and performance spaces being used outside of their “traditional”/majority context. Backstage mysteries have the exact same effect on me, as do haunted theatres. My least favorite was formerly the misuse of the Persephone myth--twisted by modern, romantic minds into a love story where one isn’t existent in the original mythos--but it has since swung back to that of the unaware Mary Sue/Gary Stu. It’s a trope that can be fun when the writer is self-aware enough to perceive it, but it’s otherwise irritating beyond belief.

7. what unpopular opinion do you have toward the rpc or tumblr?

Soft-blocking is an exercise in pointlessness, as it rarely actually results in the blocked party staying away. This website is too glitchy to make that kind of thing work. Have conversations with the people you’d rather soft- than hard-block about the offense they’ve caused or just hard-black them, myself included.

8. if you could spend one day with your main muse (or your muse of choice), what would that be like?

Look, I’ll be real. My muse of choice? Very much not advertiser-friendly, as they say on YouTube. The things we would do would horrify people unaware of my sex drive and wild attraction to him. A night of debauchery on all levels--because we’d spend a night, not a day, that’s just the way his canon rolls--and if unreleased canon has anything to tell, it’s that I’d end up pregnant with his son and then probably die but it might have been worth it, especially if we can skip the reality TV show in the middle. So let’s just pretend I said I’d spend a day getting high with Jareth and wandering around the Escher room tripping the most balls ever.

9. if you found yourself in one fictional universe of your choosing, which would it be and why?

................. I’d either end up in space on Star Trek because I’m a lonely space gay or I’d end up in a creepy gothic castle singing and dancing--is it Rocky Horror or Labyrinth?--and perhaps legitimately feeling like the siren I long to be as people compliment my voice.

10. a character you’ve always wanted to write?

Mirror!Spock. I wrote him once and I loved it and I would love to write him again, but I don’t use AOS canon so finding people to write with is often difficult.

11. what are five things that spark joy for you?

Space, Rocky Horror, singing, my pets (did I tell you about my new dog?), Renaissance Festivals.

.

my questions for you

1. how have you been holding up lately?

2. what are three surefire ways to make you smile/happy?

3. who is your comfort character and what are they like?

4. explain your URL!

5. what is one article of clothing you love above all others and why?

6. what is your favorite kind of thing to write? what about your least favorite?

7. what is one belief you hold but do not often share?

8. if you could choose one person (alive, dead, or fictional) to spend the day with, who would it be and what would you do?

9. what is one piece of media that continues to hold your attention?

10. what drew you to writing on tumblr?

11. what is one thing you wish you got to talk about more often?

[atheistforhumanity]

The things i heard at church this sunday.

Hello Ryan 

I’ve been an atheist for about 14 years now. I’ve read the bible, studied its history and even studied other religions a bit. (All religions are equally wrong after all) In my opinion I was pretty good at discussing religion with theists. Although recently I haven’t been quite as passionate about it as I use to be. 

I attend a religious service from time to time and this past week they talked about something a bit different. They talked about historical evidence, “statistics”, and so called secular data to prove the bible is correct. The things they talked about include…

Secularist historians trying to prove Jesus didn’t exist but found more proof that he did. (Apparently they wrote books)

Archeological and historical evidence that proved events in the bible happened.

Numerous proven miracles and stats that show the improbability of a single one, but Jesus made hundreds happen.

This one was more open ended but….claiming scholars, historians, archeologists, and scientists have had countless failed attempts in providing inaccuracies in the bible.

There were more but they were mostly open ended statements about science that they didn’t understand so they think God must have done it.

(Unfortunately they didn’t provide resources for their information)

Now I know enough to know the guy talking was either making this up or copying another theists work. I’ve dealt with the general statements like “the bible is proven to be historically accurate” but this guy talked for 2 hours about this. I really like how you phrase your answers so I wanted to know. Do you know of these “secularist” authors. What kind of historic bible questions have you received in the past and how did you go about answering them. How can I sort the fact from fiction and are there any specific examples I can use to call them out on their claims.

Sorry this is a long post and I hope what I’m asking makes sense.

(Submitted by 1-am-that-1s)

__________________________________________________________

Hello, 

I am very sorry that I did not get to this sooner. Thank you for writing in and asking these questions, I think it’s important for everyone to hear. 

The great thing about sermons are that they don’t require you to show your sources. Furthermore, a priest gets to address a crowd full of people already convinced he’s an authority. So the question is whether this person is flat out lying or if they are correct? 

Well, that’s a trick question, because it’s neither. The problem with religious figures discussing scientific fields or work is that they know nothing about the process or the standards, and they generally lack critical thinking to begin with. I guarantee you that he is getting this information from websites and magazines of faith that deeply misreport things they hear in scientific communities. They are not receiving their information from academics, and if they do 90% of the time these people have been discredited in their field. 

For instance, if you do a Google search for archeology on the Bible, you’ll find a website like ChristianityToday. If you look at the link I provided, you’ll see an article about the top ten archeological evidence for the Bible. Here’s an example: Semitic Abecedary Found in Egypt. This is referring to a tablet found in Egypt that contained the Jewish alphabet. Christianity Today promotes this as proof of Moses writing everything down. Even though they say the tablet dates back to 1450 BC and Ramses II ruled in the 1200′s BC. Christianity Today got their information from The Times of Israel, which has more serious discussion of the find, but never outright claims it proves anything about Moses. 

This is how misinformation spreads through Christian communities. The faithful only need the slightest reassurance and they rarely will scrutinize such claims. I absolutely guarantee that this preacher is getting his information from some type of religious journal or magazine with no scientific credibility. 

So, is there historical evidence that supports the Bible? What people would call evidence is the fact that in the Bible they name real rulers and kingdoms etc. throughout the stories. They take the fact that we know some of these people existed as evidence that the events must have happened too. That’s not a logical conclusion. Just because King Herod existed does not prove that he sent soldiers to slaughter babies, which there is no evidence at all for. 

When the faithful get into discussions like this, they want you to prove a negative. Prove that there is no evidence. Well, you can’t show a lack of evidence to people who won’t expose themselves to the breadth of credible academics. The only thing you can do is ask them to present their evidence and determine if it is flawed or not. It’s usually not very hard. 

I can tell you this. Out of all the archeology and historical research that has been done over the centuries, no one has ever discovered anything that made the Bible more believable. Everything we know either directly disproves or presents facts that never line up to the story. I wrote a good piece on Jesus that illustrates this point. Basically, my entire post is about the complete lack of evidence for Jesus. Not a single contemporary figure or historian of Jesus’ time wrote about him. All available evidence points to him being fabricated out of thin air by his cult. No one has ever had trouble disputing biblical claims, and they definitely never became confronted with more evidence for the Bible. 

Let me just comment on miracles quickly. There has never, in all of history, been a single proven miracle. There are events which may not yet have solutions, but the lack of an explanation does not equal miracle. This comes from people truly not understanding the scientific method and the concept of proof. To prove a miracle, we would need all available information on the matter and the ability to observe, experiment, etc., be stumped, and THEN find a connection to a higher power. 

Look at it this way. Dark Matter is a catch all phrase for a phenomena that we do not yet understand. However, we don’t even have a handful of information on the matter. To say that dark matter is a proven miracle of God would be completely illogical. There are many things we didn’t understand and now we do. Black holes being one of them. We know a tremendous amount about black holes now, when in the past we weren’t even sure if they existed. 

Let’s look at it this another way. There have been some pretty famous magicians that have attempted to fool the world into believing they had real magical powers. Of course there are a host of psychics out there claiming to have real powers. However, these people always end up being debunked. A famous magician named James Randi is famous for debunking psychics and those pretending to do real magic. Everyone just thinks a miracle until it gets debunked. 

If you want to challenge people like this then go straight for their sources or their lack of critical thinking. They will far apart quickly if you can get answers from them. Although some will avoid giving their sources so they can’t be scrutinized. 

I hope everyone found this post helpful. And remember, if someone is claiming some amazing evidence exists that has never hit the mainstream there is a good reason for it! 

[raisedbyfandomwolves]

I have a prompt if it’s not too long! Supergirls phone gets stolen and CatCo post her text messages and they just can’t figure out who the 😏 (Mon-El) contact is. Thank you! -Cassie

Hi! Sorry this took so long and I’m not sure if this is what you envisioned when you sent me this prompt but I hope you like it!

--------

Kara's made mistakes; she knows it and she's not so proud that she won't admit it.

There have been big mistakes – thinking she can take on a rampaging Buroul without backup definitely counts – and little mistakes – picking up the wrong order and getting yelled at for it by Ms Grant for a whole hour – but no matter what, she's owned up to every last one of them.

This time though... This time, she really wishes she could just blame it all on someone else.

Maybe Alex. Alex had been the one who had given her the second phone in the first place, after all. “Consider it a necessary backup now that you have a second job,” her adoptive sister had said as she had handed over the device. “You never know when you'll need it.”

That moment had never really materialised and, minus checking the few DEO alerts that had gotten sent to it, Kara had ended up just using it when her own phone's battery was low or for random things like downloading games Winn had recommended trying.

And occasionally texting Mon-El.

It's a bad habit she shouldn't have allowed to take root, she realises in hindsight, but at the time it had seemed pretty harmless. She's a careful person, after all, and keeping track of two phones is a simple enough thing to do.

At least, that's what she had believed.

Right up until she had gotten into a huge brawl with a couple of alien mercenaries downtown and lost that phone somewhere between getting punched into a building and having a car tossed at her head.

Which in itself would've been fine if she had noticed and retrieved it before she had left.

Of course, she hadn't done that... and someone else had found it instead.

Someone who had managed to figure out that the phone belonged to Supergirl... and posted the texts all over the internet.

The internet had promptly and predictably imploded.

And now here she is, hiding from the rest of the world face down on her couch and alternating between cursing herself for her carelessness, trying not to die of embarrassment and wishing she had a combination of Winn's hacking skills and J'onn's telepathic powers just so she can destroy all the evidence and erase everyone's memories then pretend none of this ever happened. (Her one saving grace – whatever it's worth anyway – aside from the fact that she'd put a silly smiley instead of Mon-El's name and consequently protected his identity is that their texts had been more sweet and mushy instead of scandalous and inappropriate although some of his had definitely counted as suggestive in nature.)

In short, Kara is nothing less than a giant Kryptonian-shaped ball of shame and suffering at the moment.

The same, however, cannot be said for Mon-El, who had readily surrendered his own phone once they had realised it had been indirectly compromised and is now using her laptop to keep track of the madness with a gigantic grin on his face.

To say that he's the complete opposite of her and is actually enjoying this entire fiasco would be an understatement.

“'Supergirl's Superboyfriend?'!” he reads out yet another atrocious headline from some gossip website with the exuberance of a kid in a candy store. “Hey, maybe I should adopt that as my superhero name.”

“Absolutely not.” Her words come out muffled thanks to her current position so she forces herself to lift her head just enough that she can glower at him. “Again, no. It's mortifying. Don't you have any shame? And wouldn't you prefer to have a superhero name that's completely your own instead of one that's so... so... connected to me?”

“Daxamite,” he reminds her as he meets her almost lethal glare, his free hand pointing at his still grinning face that she very dearly wants to throw a pillow at right now. “As for your second question, I'd consider it an honour so I really wouldn't mind.”

“Well, it's mortifying for me then!” she growls, her cheeks burning so much she wonders if her face resembles a fire hydrant at the moment. “And I don't understand why you're so interested in all this! Didn't they have gossip back on Daxam?!”

“Nothing like this. I mean, everyone pretty much knew who everyone was sleeping with-” She cringes at that and turns a darker shade of red. “-so the gossip was more about other things like who'd gotten caught cheating at cards- Oh, CatCo's put out an article too!” he cuts himself off to announce the latest update, somehow managing to sound even more delighted than before. “And look, your boss even wrote it herself!”

A miserable groan escapes her and she buries her face in her couch again. Ms Grant had been beyond livid that someone had out-scooped her about Supergirl, never mind the fact that it had been the result of a complete accident, and Kara can only imagine what the woman has written much less planned next.

Luckily for her, Mon-El decides it's his duty to share the 'pertinent' details with her. “Wow, she managed to guess that I'm an alien too and there's even a photo of us although it's kind of blurry...” He laughs. “The comments are even better. They're saying I must be 'a real hunk' and 'totally ripped' among other things.”

Aghast, she raises her head again to stare at him, a confusing mixture of incredulity and possessiveness clouding her mind. “Why would they even be talking about that kind of thing?!”

“Well, you're Supergirl,” he replies with a faux sage-like voice although it's beyond obvious he's suppressing one hell of a smug grin. “It's only natural to assume you have excellent taste in men.”

She gurgles for over a minute, unable to vocalise a single coherent word due to being at a complete loss as to how to respond. Denying it feels wrong but agreeing is just unthinkable especially since he'll be obnoxiously self-satisfied about it until the end of time... and judging by the way he's now openly grinning at her, he knows it.

Stuck between two unpalatable choices, Kara opts to take a third option and drops her head back down again. Maybe if she gives it enough time, this will all just blow over and she can get on with her life like nothing had ever happened.

The laugh full of impish glee that bursts out of Mon-El just as she finishes that thought suggests she's not getting her wish anytime soon... and what he says next only confirms it in the worst possible way. “Hey Kara, guess what? Apparently it's called 'supersex' when we do it!”

...Screw this. National City can go find itself a new superhero; she's leaving Earth and never coming back.

(Eventually Winn is able to make it seem as if the texts had been part of someone's roleplaying account, whatever that's supposed to be, but it's still a good long while before Kara can bring herself to look any of her family and friends in the eye.)

[purplesurveys]

816

Gonna do a before and after of one of the first surveys I took when I was FOURTEEN. Fucking wild that I’ve been doing this for nearly a decade. Kinda my way of celebrating the fact that I’ve just been reunited with my old blog, which Tumblr has apparently changed the URL of. Baffled by the move but still stoked, and @a-zebra-is-a-striped-horse​ is absolutely the coolest person for being able to find it haha. Let’s gooooo 1. Are you registered to vote? No. I still have 3 years to go. < That’s so precious. I’ve been a voter for four years now. I registered the second I turned 18 and I remember being very excited to make it to the presidential elections because only a handful of people from my high school batch were 18 by the time of the elections. 2. When days go by, do you cross them off on the calendar? Only when I’m counting down for something. < This still sounds like something I would do, but I don’t really get to anymore because I have digital calendars on my phone and laptop now. 3. Are you currently counting down to something? If so, what? Summer vacation! 4 days left! < Again, so cute. There’s no countdown that exists because I honestly don’t know when it will be okay enough to go out like normal again, but I am waiting for Covid to go away or at least for a vaccine to be available.

No #4? 5. Ever got injured at work? What happened? Nope. < I sprained my ankle at one of the parking lots in school, while walking to my car. Worst thing was it happened in front of an ongoing rally, and I heard their chants slightly falter when they saw me fall. I tried to play it cool, but my foot clearly felt fucked and someone had to hold my arm as I hopped to my car.

6. What color is your roof? Brown. < Stop pretending like you have a roof, Robyn. The house has always had a rooftop.

7. Do you use MySpace or Facebook more? Neither. < I was still far too young when MySpace peaked so I never did get to participate in its glory days. I definitely use Facebook a lot more, then and now. 8. Last time you sharpened a pencil? When I took a diagnostic test last Monday. < Sometime in 2019 when I was still heavily into coloring and I bought several coloring books and a pack of coloring pencils. I loved coloring and wish I kept it up, but it was just a bit of a hassle for me to sharpen every ten minutes or so. 9. List all the people in your phone under T: Zero, zilch, nada. No phone. < A high school batchmade named Dani, a college colleague named Kate, and a couple of aunts and uncles whose contacts start with Tito and Tita.  10. How old were you when you got into text messaging? I once had a super obsessive text problem when I was 11, I think? < That would be the first time I got hooked with texting, but I got my first phone when I was 7 and was already texting by then. Mostly my parents and grandpa, but still. 11. Do you pay rent to your parents? No. < No. They’ve already told me they won’t pressure me to do so either, but out of gratefulness for taking care of me for 20+ years I have absolutely no problems covering some of the bills when the time comes. 12. What do you think of Obama’s new healthcare bill? I don’t know a lot about it. < Honestly, still same. That’s another country’s politics altogether and we have enough issues in our own nation as it is. I do pay attention to US issues that are more universal like LGBT issues, police brutality against black people, Trump as a person...but not the more in-depth ones like healthcare or student debt. 13. How many icons are on your desktop? 34. < Exactly half of that. 14. Do you spit or swallow? Get outta here!!! < Still can’t relate. 15. Ever wrote something on a bathroom wall? Nope. < Eugh no, public bathrooms are so nasty. I don’t usually touch anything in them other than the faucet. I’ve written on other things though, like the desks in school. 16. What’s your definition of a slut? Uh. < Someone who often has casual sex with a lot of people, is how I understand it. 17. If you use the word “slut”, do you apply it to men who do the same thing as what you listed above? Nah. < I don’t really use the word. 18. Do you dye eggs for Easter? I did once, in a children’s party. < Yeah, just that one time at my second cousins’ place when they were in the mood to paint on eggs and invited me and my siblings. 19. What did you do on the first day of spring? Never experienced spring. < We don’t have spring. 23. Are you currently crushing on anyone? No. < Yes. 24. What color hair did the last person you kissed have? NKSB. < LOOOOOOOOOL I spent like two minutes puzzling over this like who tf is NKSB??? Eventually realized this just meant ‘Never Kissed Since Birth’ oh my god 14 year old Robyn you were SO uncool. Anyway, her hair is black. 25. Do you stand up to say the pledge in school? We don’t have a school pledge, but we do recite our country’s pledge and yes, we stand up every time we say it. < Not anymore in university. Everyone just kinda does their own thing in college and we’re never gathered as one student body for anything, except for graduation. 26. Do you like your eye color? God no. It’s so boring. < I mean yeah it is a bit boring, but we kinda have no choice. Unless you go to West Asia which is nearing Europe as it is, nearly all Asians have brown eyes and black hair. 27. What brand of orange juice did you last drink? Zesto. < That’s the only brand of orange juice I’m okay with drinking, even eight years later. 28. Pens or pencils? Pens. < Still feel the same. 29. Last skirt you wore and why? My school skirt, because I have to go to school. < Omfg again, this is so precious. The last one I wore was my denim skirt, but it’s also been a while since I wore that because one of its buttons has since popped out and I never got around to having it fixed, leaving me with no skirts. 30. Last time you wore heels, what kind were they? A prom I went to. I actually have no idea what kind of heels they are so I’m just gonna say old-women heels. < They were stilettos, you dumbass. I also wore a pair of stilettos the last time I wore heels. They’re my favorite kind, so. 31. Shoes you wear the most? My Keds. < My pair of Onitsuka Tiger sneakers. . 32. Favorite quote at the moment? “YOU DUMB BITCH! I’M NOT HOLDING A MICROPHONE! ARE YOU FUCKING STUPID?” - CM Punk < Holy crap, I do not remember this quote at all and had to look it up on YouTube and – no regrets. Watching it made so many memories come rushing back lmao that clip is hilarious; Punk is the greatest. Right now I don’t really have a favorite quote. 33. What was the last magazine article you read about? I forgot. < It’s from the website version of the magazine, but the last article I read covered a viral Facebook post wherein someone had photoshopped the faces of The Big Bang Theory boys onto the traditional graduation photos of my university out of boredom. Article is here for anyone who wants to see how well the pictures turned out lol. 34. What do you think about communism? I don’t know enough about it. < I completely support the progressive youth orgs, especially the ones in my university, that are aligned with communist, socialist, and Marxist ideals. They speak the truth more than any other orgs, so I don’t shy away from defending them or promoting their ideals, especially on social media, even if it puts me in danger. 35. Are you planning on going to college? If so, which one? Of course. I want to study in Ateneo. < CAN WE CANCEL 14 YEAR OLD ROBYN?????? What a disappointment omg. You were always meant to be in UP, you weirdo. 22 year old me takes that appalling statement back lol I can’t even begin to imagine spending my college years in Ateneo. 36. What’s your favorite flower? Ugh I hate flowers. < Peonies and roses. 37. What’s the nearest beach? I think it’s like…600 km away + a 2 hour boat ride. < No it is not. There’s a beach I come back to in Nasugbu and that’s only 100 km away. 38. Ever been to Florida? Nope. < Still nope. 39. How old is your brother’s best friend? He’s probably 9 as my brother’s 9. < I don’t know if he has one and I don’t really care anymore. 40. What type of car did you ride in last? A Kia van. < Sksksksks this was referring to the school bus I used to ride omg :( I was last in our Vitara, when I had to go to the hospital to get some tests done back when I still had a pesky fever. 42. Are you excited for summer 2013? Fuck yeah. < I honestly don’t remember how it ultimately went, but apparently I was excited for it so that answers the question. 43. What class were your parents (ex. class of ‘75)? They’re the same age so batch ‘89. < There we go. 44. Are you in debt right now? For what? No. < Kinda-ish? I promised my sister I’d pay her for helping me out with iMovie (I wanted to make Gab a video for her birthday, but had never done it before), but I haven’t had the chance to do it since I only have big bills at the moment. She’s asking for ₱200 but I only have ₱1000s in my wallet, so I can’t pay her for now. 45. If you’re old enough, do you have a credit card? If you’re not old enough, do you want one when you’re older? I definitely want one. < Yep, still want one. Though I’ll need a crash course on how to use it because my parents never really taught me how cards work. 46. What color is your phone? No phone. < Apple calls it space gray but it’s really just black. 47. Have you ever had someone read a text message they weren’t supposed to see? Yes. < Yes. That person was me, and I accidentally read a text from my dad meant for only my mom when I was 5 because I had stubborn fingers that would click on anything. 48. What’s the minimum age you think someone should have a cell phone at? 10. < Holy cow, that’s a nope for me. I’d say 12 or 13. 49. Would you ever work night crew? Sure. < Yes. I’ve seen my girlfriend’s mom do it and honestly I find it pretty badass, especially because while everyone is stuck in traffic trying to get to work by 9 AM, she’s cruising down the highway on the opposite lane with no problem, to be home by 9 hahaha. 50. How old is the last person you texted? 41. < 22.

[hollowcrovvn]

The Ostensive Fumblings of Being Human (part 2)

Pairing: Connor x female!reader Rating: G for Gross Cute Crap Summary: Set two months after the ending of Detroit: Become Human, androids are living in government created “pop-up” communities while efforts are being made to integrate them into society. You are a grad-student volunteer with the Detroit Crisis Response Unit (DCRU), working to help with relief efforts… or at least, doing the work no one else wants to do. Which brings us to part 2.

(part 1) (part 2) (part 3) (part 4) (part 5) (part 6) (part 7) (ao3)

The moment kept playing in your mind, giving you little snapshot glimpses of his face when he saw your phone number written on the cup. His face, perplexed, but so curious as he took in your every word with such rapt attention. 

“Ugh… no.” you whined towards the ceiling, throwing your head back and sinking further into your sofa. Some TV series played ideally while you tapped a stylus on the screen of your tablet, opened to some notes regarding your most recent class. You risked short glances over to your phone. 

“Stop it.” you said to yourself, “It’s not a big deal and you don’t even know if he’ll text.”

You sat silently for a moment, nearly forgetting about it in the thrall of the TV and procrastination on your assignment when your eyes slowly drifted over to it again.

“Son of a bitch.” you huffed, throwing tablet aside as you got up and made your way across the small one bedroom apartment to your smaller bathroom. You needed a shower and some comfy clothes and maybe some sleep. 

Several minutes later you came out from the bathroom, towel drying your hair and feeling a bit more human with the cold no longer biting at your skin still from the damp outside. You weren’t looking, not really, your eyes just fell to the phone on the small kitchen table and noticed the screen was list with an envelope icon.

You managed to pretend not to be interested for approximately fifteen seconds before you were over, picking up the phone and trying to not think about how fast your heart was going as you opened the message…

… which was just from your DCRU supervisor reminding you to go to the DPD station downtown after checking in on site tomorrow.

You felt your heart fall and sighed as you clicked the message and set a reminder. Someone in Jericho had requested a number of open human-on-android violence cases as well as android-on-human and someone had to go get the stats. Most android cases were still considered “sensitive” so the only way to get the information was from the source. It was a placating act, something to make Jericho not so hostile to DCRU and their efforts, even if they could realistically do nothing about the numbers. You wondered if you would be lucky enough for it to be the same station Connor worked at.

You took your phone and headed off to bed, setting your alarm. It was nearly 11:40, which was not ideal if you didn’t want to be a zombie tomorrow. Sighing, you flicked off your lamp and curled up, closing your eyes and tucking in. Your breath began to slow and your body relax when suddenly the darkness behind your eyelids lit.

You opened your eyes a slit and saw the envelope notification with a question mark attached.

[ new sender ]

[ accept msg y/n? ]

You never hit “y” so fast in your life. 

[ from: DPDCNSL#317

Thank you for agreeing to continue corresponding with me. I am looking forward to the experience.

And thank you for the coffee.

Have a good evening, ---.

Connor ]

And then before you could respond the little dots indicating he was responding popped up immediately.

[ from: DPDCNSL#317

Lieutenant Anderson has informed me that saying, “I am looking forward to the experience” sounds “creepy”. I am looking forward to being able to speak with you more.

Connor ]

You smiled and quickly wrote up a reply-- which you waited a few minutes to send because… like that is what you did right? You didn’t wanna reply too fast… right? You killed some time, changing his name in the message box.

[ from: ---

You’re welcome. And pls don’t thank me for that pitiful excuse for bean water. Next time, I’ll get you a latte and you’ll never be the same again. ]

[ from: Connor

You are correct, but not in the way I believe you think.

Regardless, I would like that. You are studying at Wayne State, correct? ]

You froze, staring at the words with shock. How the hell did he know that?

[ from: ---

You pull up my file, copper?]

[ from: Connor

I did a search on the internet. You came up under the staff listing as a research assistant for Urban Studies. Is that correct? There is no image, so it could be another ---. ]

[ from: ---

Bit weird to be searching for someone you just met. ]

[ from: Connor

I agree. Lieutenant Anderson located the information and sent it to my terminal. I was… curious. I apologize, I do not wish to cause you to feel uncomfortable. ]

It didn’t really matter much. All the information on the website was basic things and any social media you had was hidden from the outside. It was harmless, as far as most things went.

[ from: ---

It’s alright, next time you can just ask me. Though I think to make it up, you can buy me the coffee. Only fair. :)  ]

[ from: Connor

I do receive a salary now, so that is a possibility.

--- it is now almost midnight. You should be resting as you have already lost two hours of the recommended time for sleep. I would recommend lowering your caffeine intake to 300mg per day to prevent further sleep disturbance.

Good night, ---.  ]

[ from: ---

You can pry my coffee from my cold dead hands, hippy.

Good night.  ]

Wildly specific advice aside, it was-- kinda sweet. That bit that you assumed was a joke about “receiving a salary” got a small chuckle from you. After waiting a few minutes though, it appeared that he was done messaging for the night.

Not too bad, you hummed to yourself, First potential friend outside of campus in four years. Adult humaning at last.

---

“Checking in on site” was just code for “bring us all our coffee order before you do any real work” and you did so as usual, dropping the cups off at the various desks, crowded into the small “conference” building. All of the DCRU’s own buildings were of the same shake-n-bake quality as the shelters put up for the androids. They did little to hold out the chill, but they kept out the damp. Several people had space heaters beneath their desks or blankets wrapped around their legs.

After dropping off the last drink, you made your way over to the desk of the person you liked most of all the superiors, chiefly because he would never ask you to bring him coffee. His name was Josh, and he had served as one of Markus’ companions during the start and the heart of the revolution. Prior to Jericho, he had been a university professor, which was something you found common ground with.

He was sitting still, as if staring off into the distance, but a quick note of his eyes would show them flickering back and forth. He was reading.

“You ready to do some real work?” he said, voice tinged with faint humor as he continued to scan through whatever files were working their way through his synthetic mind. You’d gotten use to this.

“Yes, for the love of Markus Christ.” you huffed, enjoying in the private joke. Since the revolution there had been no less than 112 articles official and amateur declaring Markus as an android “Messiah”. Based upon Josh’s word, this caused the actual Markus a great deal of discomfort, but still the metaphor stuck.

“I’m going to have to tell Simon that one.” Josh said with a laugh, finally turning his eyes to you indicating he was finished with whatever he was working on.

“But first things first.” he said, pulling out a tablet and handing it to you. It was one of his.

“You know most of these “deviant” criminal cases are still on lock down?”

You nodded.

“We’ve gotten clearance to have the files downloaded. Part of our agreements with the government involve… some explaining. I won’t sugar coat it. Some of these open cases are violent, resulting in death of the human or the android or sometimes both.”

You swallowed, eyes flicking to the tablet as if there would suddenly appear images but there was only a menu showing how to accept file download.

“... death can be a hard topic for anyone. Even more so for your people when it involves Android on Human crimes. You may see some disturbing things. You alright with this?”

“Of course!” you said, a bit quickly and a bit more defensively than intended.

“I mean that… I want to do anything I can to help. I know that… I know they are pressuring to have these androids turned over for prosecution.”

If Josh were non-deviant, he wouldn’t have tensed at the words, but he did. 

“Historically speaking, we haven’t given any android justice. I know this is important. Anything I feel is secondary to that… is what I mean.”

Josh smiled warmly, standing up and hesitantly patting your shoulder.

“You remind me of my old students, ---. I’m sure you’ll do what you can.”

You nodded vigorously, because you would. 

---

It was too far and too cold to walk the length of Detroit back towards downtown, so you took an automated cab. You’d tucked Josh’s tablet safely away in a rucksack over your shoulder and flipped through your phone idly.

You hovered over the message window with Connor for a moment before quickly sending off a few lines.

[ from: ---

Just so there are no surprises, I’m heading to the DPD station rn for unrelated stuff. Might see you! ]

It took you way longer than necessary to actually hit send, but when you did you were shocked that his response was almost instantaneous. 

[ from: Connor

Unrelated to what? Also, are you alright? Do you have an open case with the DPD? ]

[ from: ---

It’s all good. And meant I just happen to be that way as opposed to ya know, stalking. ]

[ from: Connor

“Stalking” does imply stealth, which would be in direct opposition of your current actions if that was the intent. I agree that your  actions do not constitute “stalking”.  ]

You huffed a sigh, but then were startled as the message pinged again.

[ from: Connor

Bit weird though.  ]

You felt a smile slowly form at one corner of your lips

[ from: Connor

That was a joke, in case it was too vague.  ]

[ from: ---

I gotcha ;)

See you in a bit maybe.  ]

And with that, you shut off your phone’s display just in time to exit the cab out front of the DPD building. Inside, the DPD had the same tell tale signs of the android revolution with its lack of noticeable androids. It was not until you got up to the reception desk that it dawned on you they both were identical. They were androids, they had just removed their LED. She was even wearing a name tag that said, Alicia in clear bold font. She was wearing regular professional wear, no Android identifiers in sight.

You’d heard the DPD had gotten on board relatively quickly with providing androids with pay, not wanting to lose the bulk of their staff. While the cleaning crews were absent, the receptionist turned up her face and smiled pleasantly,

“Good morning, how may I assist you?”

“Good morning!” you said, a bit too quickly, “My name is ---, I’m here from the Crisis Response Unit. I have a meeting with Captain Fowler.”

“Yes, we were told to expect you! Do you have your I.D.?” she said, and you were struck by how… friendly she was, as opposed to all the other ST300’s you’d encountered. You pulled out your “badge”, which was nothing more than an I.D. card with a special DCRU designation stamp inside a flip wallet. You passed it to her and she scanned it quickly.

“You’re all set! Just head right through these gates here and go straight back. Fowler’s office is the one in the middle with the glass doors, it should not be hard to miss, but if you get lost just grab one of the officers. They all should know all too well where his office is.” she said with a faint laugh at some private joke.

You nodded, fumbling to put your I.D. with a quick “thank you” before you headed through the gates. It was bigger inside than you expected, with several desks and lots of people working, standing and having their morning coffee or otherwise engaged. You noted the glass enclosed office towards the middle of the room and headed in that direction. There were three people already waiting inside and two of which you recognized immediately.

Captain Fowler was up, preparing to come open the door for you, but Connor beat him in a few brisk steps.

Hank was grinning at you in that suspicious way that you recalled from grade school… like he knew something you didn’t. In this situation, it was pretty unsettling. Did they find that parking ticket from sophomore year?!

“Good morning Ms. ---, please, have a seat.” Fowler gestured to the one other empty chair next to Hank, “These two suspect characters are Lieutenant Hank Anderson and his partner, Connor. They have been working the deviant android cases since the start.”

Connor politely offered you his hand, which you took. He squeezed gently, mischief glinting in those brown eyes before he let go and all but ushered you to your seat. Hank snorted.

“We’ve met.” Hank said, disregarding any pleasantries. 

Fowler looked surprised.

“We frequent the same coffee shop.” you added, “So it was a very brief meeting.”

“You’re lucky.” Fowler said, eyeing Hank with disapproval. Hank seemed oblivious, or more likely, immune.

“We’ve been informed that the ADA’s office is seeking to prosecute these androids. It is highly likely that they are being concealed among the deviants at the relief camp.” Fowler leaned back in his chair, “So, we’ve been told to assist you in whatever way you need.”

“Some of us are a bit too eager…” you heard Hank muttered under his breath. Connor’s eyes trailed on him slowly, making no expression you could see but Hank must have gotten the message because he grumbled and slumped back.

“I appreciate that, Captain Fowler.” you began, “Markus has agreed that his people will search into the population of their androids for these individuals. It’s a good start to integrate androids into the justice system.”

Though you had your own opinions regarding the effectiveness of that. How could any android expect a fair trial when a jury of their peers would most likely be full of humans? But that was a topic for another time and place.

“These files are sealed, so we are requesting a downloaded copy so that efforts can be made to locate these androids.”

Captain Fowler looked unconvinced.

“I have confirmation from the governor and the President’s staff approving this request, if you would like to see it. The governor also said you might like to call her office as well.”

“I think I will do that. In the meanwhile, if you’d gentleman escort Ms. --- to the break-room where she might be a bit more comfortable?”

Hank stood and gave Connor a hard pat, “All you buddy.”

He left without a second glance.

“Right this way. ---.” Connor said, Chief Fowler now too engrossed with his phone to notice Connor used your first name.

It was hard to contain a smile as you walked alongside the detective, following him to a small break-room.

“Coffee?” he asked and you nodded briskly. He poured some of the dark, strong smelling liquid into a mug that read “#1 Dad” and after considering for a moment, pot still in his hand, he poured another.

Bringing both he came to sit with you at a rickety table, stabilized by a half folded paper plate under one leg.

“Don’t think this counts.” you said, taking the mug in both hands, enjoying the warmth if not the overly strong taste.

Connor did not drink.

“You work with the Detroit Crisis Response Unit?” he said, getting right to the point.

“Volunteered. Don’t give me too much credit though. When I joined up, it was all about flooding relief. The Android situation was a surprise.”

“Do you dislike Androids?” he asked.

“Wow. Talk about a hot button topic, Connor. You sure you don’t wanna ask me what my favorite color is first? My favorite movie?”

“No. I would much rather know your stance on the current events seeing as you are working as a relief volunteer.”

Direct. You hid behind the lip of the mug, feeling his eyes keenly on you.

“Why do you wanna know?” you countered, taking a small sip.

“I’m simply curious as to how you feel about your current assignment.”

“I feel just fine.” you said, “I guess… well. Guess sometimes they just spook me. Just like most people.”

“I see.” Connor said, seeming to relax a fraction, “You are afraid of them?”

“Not “afraid” just-- reasonably cautious.”

Connor seemed to be processing this, tapping his fingertips against the mug in his hand and watching himself do so intently.

“You worked on “deviant” cases for awhile, yeah?” you began, “Are… do they make you nervous? Because that’d be understandable given what you’ve seen.”

“They-- did. Before. Now I realize it’s the same as humans. We’re all capable of violence.”

Before you could continue, another man walked into the break-room, smile slick as oil.

“Well, there you are, tin-can.” he said with a smirk, picking up the coffee pot and sloshing some of it onto the counter as he poured a mug full.

“Whose this?” he said, giving you a smirk.

“A liaison from DCRU.” Connor replied coolly, bringing the coffee mug to his lips.

“Is that even good for your health, Con?” the man asked, but Connor ignored him.

“And who is this charming fellow.” you asked, voice dripping with sarcasm.

“Detective Reed. Gavin, Reed.” he answered, giving you a wink, “Now I can see why Con here was in such a hurry to get his ring off before you showed up.”

Ah. That. That was. Not expected. Your blood ran cold, eyes immediately falling to Connor’s left hand as if you’d catch sight of a tan line or some other indicator that you’d been incredibly stupid.

“I got some super glue over at my desk if you need a quick fix.” he said, tapping Connor’s chair with the toe of his boot. Connor, looked somewhere between deflated and coldly controlled anger.

Hank’s appearance in the break room door thankfully put a halt to whatever was going on between the two men, his eyes fixing Gavin with a vicious glare.

“Don’t you have reports to finish, detective?” he said, circling in so that Gavin was forced to walk towards the door.

“Just tryin’ be a good wing-man for my bro, Connor.” he said, disappearing into the hall with a laugh.

Hank looked between you and Connor, noting the change in your demeanor, arms pulled in and looking anywhere but at his partner.

“Fowler uh-- got the call. You can come over to my desk and we’ll get you sorted.”

You hurriedly stood, fishing out your tablet so you’d be ready to download those files and get out of here as soon as possible.

Connor said nothing in his defense, but he watched you intently, searching.

“... thanks for the coffee.” you said, following Hank out.

---

Connor did not join you at Hank’s desk, which must not have been part of the plan because every few seconds Hank looked over his shoulder for him.

“Here. You should get a prompt to download any second now. There are photos, so if you’re squeamish I advised ya not look at the screen while they are downloading.”

You took his advice, letting the tablet drop unceremoniously to the desk as you leaned against it, arms crossed.

Hank was not scowling for once, but you were, brows furrowed tight and troubled.

“Look… ---, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t-- just don’t judge Connor before you get to know him. I know he’s a weird one. I know most people, hell even me, have this innate prejudice, but he likes you. Which is a big deal for him. He’s learning how this goes, so I don’t know-- maybe give him a break.”

“... did… did his wife die or something?”

Hank stared at you, eyes wide and confused.

“His wife.” he repeated, not so much a question but a confirmation of whether or not you were a rambling idiot.

“That detective! Gavin whatever-the-hell said that Connor took off his ring before I got here!”

Hank groaned, resting his face in his hand as he shook his head. The sound quickly turned into a laugh of sorts. He looked back up at you with that same mystified look he had before.

“You really don’t know. Kid, Connor took off his LED before you got here. That’s what Gavin meant. He’s an android.”

A lot, like a lot of things suddenly made sense now.

You sunk into a nearby chair, dazed.

“You really had no idea? With how fuckin’ weird he is?”

“I thought he was just… like, ya know. A hipster intellectual.”

Hank choked on nothing, busting into a loud laugh, “Well you ain’t wrong, kid!”

The tablet pinged, indicating it had finished downloading. Hank popped up, dismissing the file before you could pick it up.

“Like I said. Some gory stuff. I’d advise you get that to whoever wants it and not go poking around in it.” he handed you the tablet, “And for god’s sake, go talk to him before you leave. You’re the first person he’s been around that ain’t me and trust me, that’s good for him.”

You ran your hands over the tablet’s smooth sides, mind going a hundred miles a minute. You turned to leave and saw Connor coming back towards the desks, seeing clearly now the flashing LED he had replaced on the side of his temple.

His expression was blank, but you had dealt with enough androids that you could just faintly see the lines of nervousness and… hopefulness as he passed you.

You caught his forearm, touching the same place where androids connected systems.

“... I don’t dislike androids.” you whispered, risking a look at him through your eyelashes. He was-- smiling and it was so damn beautiful you felt the wall you had started constructing around your heart from Gavin’s words crack open.

“I’m glad to hear it.” 

You smiled, “Text me when you are ready to shell out for that latte.” and gave his arm one last small squeeze before heading out of the station.

[charlotte-codes]

This, Charlotte, is the internet ...

It was September 30th: day one, week one. 

I cycled across Bristol that Monday morning with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. I am not a seasoned city cyclist, so crossing the leviathan of roadworks at rush-hour was my first test.

Arriving at the DevelopMe offices unscathed, I quickly found my seat. Although we’d all met the week before at a social event organised by DevelopMe (a brilliant idea because I was less nervous having already met some of my fellow classmates) the room was very quiet and you could feel the tension of 12 career-changers psyching themselves up for what was ahead. 

Our teacher for the week was Keir, whose enthusiasm and sense of humour made us all feel relaxed and at home very quickly.

We started with a brief introduction to the internet. 

Now, I knew that the internet was not contained in a small black box à la the IT Crowd, but I had never really considered its complexity: a global network of computers that can communicate with one another at sub-second speeds is something that takes a while to get your head around.  

Although the fundamentals of the internet are fairly easy to digest, thinking about it too much at this point in my understanding is like thinking about the expanding universe - enough to make my brain explode and ooze out of my ears. So, we’re gonna leave that one for another day.

In the meantime, let’s talk about HTML and CSS, our topics for the first fortnight. This post will be an overview of what we learnt, I’ll get into the details in separate posts later on. 

HTML (Hypertext Markup Language)

The phrase that has stuck in my mind from our first week at bootcamp is ‘Progressive Enhancement and Graceful Degradation’ - which sounds suspiciously like a general life lesson, or an advert for a skincare range. For our purposes, it’s a way of making sure that every user can access the fundamental parts of your website no matter what browser they use or how slow their internet connection.

The first few days concentrated on writing HTML, which contains the important ‘content’ of the webpage. CSS is used to make it look good and also deals with accessibility. We’ll get into Javascript later, but that allows user interactivity. All three together constitute Front End development. My beginners understanding of this is that a Front End specialist works on the client-side stuff you see and interact with - whilst a Back End specialist works on the server-side stuff you don’t. A Full Stack developer does both.

In terms of HTML, you can split your code up like a human body: at the top is a <head> tag wherein you store all the metadata. Just like a human head, you can’t see what’s going on in there on the webpage itself, but it contains important behind-the-scenes information. The part of the page you see online is the <body> and you can dress this up however you want using CSS. 

Within the body you’ll probably have a <header>, a <main> and a <footer>, which are fairly self-explanatory ways to break up a page. A lot of this stuff comes from traditional methods in printing, so if you imagine your page layout a bit like a newspaper, then considering how to split it up seems logical: for instance, you’ll probably further divide your page up into articles, sections and asides.

Within these sections you’ll have tags for various elements like paragraphs <p>, images <img/>, links <a>, headings <h1>, <h2>, buttons <button> and so on: again, it’s all wonderfully logical. Here’s some I wrote earlier - this is just part of the <header> on my home page: 

The above example is also styled and for the majority of the first fortnight of bootcamp we got to grips with CSS. 

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)

CSS is a little trickier, mainly because there are SO MANY THINGS and you have to think about accessibility and responsiveness (i.e how a screen-reader will understand your code and what it will look like on desktop and mobile devices - this requires the use of @media queries, which I’ve grown to really like because it is SO satisfying when they work properly).

Potentially one of the biggest challenges I found in CSS was positioning things evenly. When you start fiddling about with margins and padding, and forgetting what you’ve fiddled with, you start seeing issues arising on the page: maybe it’s an <h2> that just won’t align with the image underneath; or maybe it’s a <nav> bar that is squishing all the menu items too close together, and pushing them all a little off-centre.

Now, I’m mildly neurotic when it comes to visuals. I’m trained in visual analysis and I’ve spent the best part of the last decade explaining the composition of paintings and other images - why they have a central focal point, or why they don’t etc. etc. Positioning stuff correctly and with meaning is important to me.

So I became particularly enamoured with flexbox and CSS grid (and not just because I enjoyed playing Flexbox Froggy and Grid Garden). These do a large percentage of the positioning legwork for you and I found myself using them a lot for the project work that we did in the second week.

Some excellent resources for these can be found here:

https://css-tricks.com/snippets/css/a-guide-to-flexbox/

https://css-tricks.com/snippets/css/complete-guide-grid/

Week 2: More CSS and SASS

In week 2 we worked on a sample project.

The brief was to practice our HTML and CSS skills by building a pretend portfolio site for a commercial photographer. Our teacher this week was Ruth, who was also super cool and put us all at ease instantly.

The project consisted of a home page with a grid of featured photos and a nav that turned into a burger menu when reduced to a small screen. We also had to create a gallery page, a blog page (and a sample page for one blog post) and a contact page (to practice HTML forms). 

One of the main focuses of week 2 was using SASS to organise our code so that we didn’t have to repeat ourselves throughout the site.

At first I didn’t get on with SASS (it felt complicated). But being a fan of flexboxes, I spent some time creating a mixin that I was particularly proud of so that I didn’t have to create new flexboxes all the time (a mixin is like a function that can be reused by passing values into the variables - in this case, $justify, $align and $flexDirection):

Turns out SASS is super useful. 

And being a bit of a neat freak, I enjoyed putting all my code into separate files and tidying everything up. 

I was pretty proud of my site by the end of the week:

home page ... big screen

two sample posts on the blog page ... 

Every Friday, we have an individual review with one of the course organisers so that we can discuss how we are getting on. Both weeks I mentioned that I was tired, but in a good way! I was getting great feedback from my teachers too.

So far, so good. 

Downtime

Learning new information day after day is super tiring and it’s important to have a break at the weekends. 

So I’ve been kind to myself and made sure I get out into nature on Saturdays and Sundays and away from my desk. The temptation just to work through is there all the time - I love what I’m doing, so it doesn’t feel like work and I have to drag myself away from it in the evenings and at weekends. This can only be a good thing though, right?! 

The entire cohort are so friendly and everyone gets on really well. A few of us finished the first fortnight with a celebratory drink at Bocabar. 

Next week ... Javascript ... bring it on!  

[berniesrevolution]

JACOBIN MAGAZINE

On September 6, Dallas police officer Amber Guyger entered the apartment of her upstairs neighbor, Botham Shem Jean, removed her service weapon, and shot the twenty-six-year-old man, killing him. One week later, on the day of Jean’s funeral, a Dallas judge released to the press the results of a search warrant that claimed to find a small amount of marijuana in the slain man’s apartment. “There could only be one purpose for that,” family attorney Lee Merritt said of the search warrant. “The only purpose is to look for information to smear the dead. That is exactly their specific intent.”

For black residents of Dallas, it was a familiar story. From police dragging their feet in arresting Guyger to Guyger’s conflicting statements about what happened to the marijuana found in Jean’s apartment, it appeared the fix was in. “There’s a lot of anger in the streets,” Dallas Pastor Frederick Haynes told the Dallas Morning News. “We’ve seen this movie too often.”

In Texas, like elsewhere, it is extremely rare for police to receive any sanction — personal or professional — for killing another human being. As the Jean case lurches toward its seemingly inevitable, devastating outcome, there will be the usual calls for police reform; the handwringing about training and accountability. But a look at the trade journals, message boards, and public behavior of police shows that the authoritarian mentality runs so deep that even minor reforms will be met with an intractable, reactionary wall.

“Follow Commands or Die”

“I am going to say what no one else is saying,” police officer Travis Yates editorialized in 2016 in Law Officer Magazine. “Follow the commands of a police officer or risk dying.” After lamenting “the lack of submission to authority [that] is throughout our society,” Yates concluded: “The way I see it, we have two options to stop police use of deadly force. Police stop being police or . . . citizens can do what an officer says to do.”

Yates isn’t an outlier. In 2014, in the midst of the Ferguson uprising, veteran Los Angeles police officer Sunil Dutta wrote in a Washington Post editorial, “I’m a cop. If you don’t want to get hurt, don’t challenge me.” The victim of “outright challenges to my authority” while he worked his beat, Dutta warned, “here is the bottom line: if you don’t want to get shot, tased, pepper-sprayed, struck with a baton or thrown to the ground, just do what I tell you.”

This demand for complete obedience has real-world consequences. A 2011 investigation of the Seattle Police Department (SPD) found “a pattern or practice of using excessive force against individuals who express discontent with, or ‘talk back to,’ police.” A review of obstruction arrests — known as “contempt of cop” arrests — revealed the target of these police confrontations. In a city where black people make up 7.9 percent of the population, 51 percent of obstruction arrests were of black residents.

In one infamous incident, an SPD officer punched a seventeen-year-old black girl in the face for arguing over a friend’s alleged jaywalking violation. Several months later, a Native American wood carver named John T. Williams was shot and killed on a busy street during rush hour when he failed to turn around fast enough for an SPD officer. Williams was partially deaf. (Charges were never filed against the SPD officer who murdered Williams.)

The obsession with absolute compliance is an inversion of the rational order of things: in this case, it is the responsibility of the person being accosted by police to do and say the right thing, to be completely and totally accountable for all of their actions, real or imagined. The trained officer bears no personal responsibility for doing the right thing; they are simply an agent of violence and chaos acting on instinct — a difference between the police and the public enshrined in law.

Sometimes, it’s unclear even what constitutes compliance in the mind of a police officer. Video of the 2016 murder of Daniel Shaver, an Arizona man, shows a police officer with his AR-15 rifle trained on Shaver, who is face down on the ground in a hotel hallway. The officer screams contradictory commands at Shaver who tries to comply while begging police not to kill him. Then, out of nowhere, Officer Philip Brailsford opens fire on Shaver, shooting him five times and killing him.

Shaver had committed no crime, he posed no threat to Brailsford or any other officer present, he tried to comply with the officer’s impossible commands. He was gunned down anyway.

“Every Individual Is a Potential Threat”

Among the t-shirts marketed to police and their supporters online and at conventions — such as the popular “Black Rifles Matter” shirt and the classic “BDRT” (“Baby Daddy Removal Team”) shirt — is an assortment of warrior cosplay. Law Enforcement Shirts offers a confusing shirt featuring a Spartan helmet against an American flag backdrop and text reading, “Fate whispers to the warrior you cannot withstand the storm. And the warrior whispers back, I am the storm.” Another shirt features a skull with a Blue Lives Matter flag wrapped around it and the text, “I hunt the evil you pretend doesn’t exist.”

The police-as-warriors worldview appears frequently on cop websites.

“Being a police officer requires preparation for death, daily,” a popular listicle on the PoliceOnewebsite states. “Officers put on bullet proof vests and carry guns for a reason: they are ready for the fight, and unfortunately not every warrior comes home. . . . Cops are at war out there.” The article goes on to restate another major theme on police blogs and message boards: “People sleep peacefully in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.”

“Our officers often are thrust into the role of warrior to fulfill their obligation as guardians,” local police chief Chuck Jordan editorialized in the Tulsa World in 2015. “We are living in a world that is comprised of criminals who will visit violence on their victims as well as police officers without a second thought.” This is why Tulsa police must wear body armor and carry assault rifles and other “warrior equipment” — to protect themselves against the “ever-increasing levels of violence and types of weapons that we are facing.”

(Continue Reading)

[canadian-riddler]

How to Improve as a Writer When You Can’t Get Feedback

(or how I do it, anyway)

1a) Read stuff by people you look up to

Chances are when you look up to someone else as a writer, you have a general idea of what it is about them that you like so much.  You really like the way they build sentences, you admire their vocabulary, they’re really good at plot twists.  Surprise!  You can do all that too.  Take note of what they do and how they do it and then put your own spin on it.  If you DON’T know what it is, put some time to figuring it out.

1b) Read stuff you absolutely hate

Now why on earth would I tell you to torture yourself like that?  Simple: it teaches you how to identify mistakes.  Go through stuff you don’t like, think about why you don’t like it, and then do the exact opposite.

2) Stop posting stuff when you know it’s not ready

I’ve done it, you’ve done it, we’ve all done it.  You’ve got a story or a chapter or whathaveyou and you KNOW it’s not done.  And you know exactly WHERE it’s not done and you know exactly WHY, but you can’t be bothered to fix it.  You’re done, you’ve been working on it way too long, and you’re sick of it and just want to dump it so you can move on.  Stop doing that.  Grinding through the boring stuff is part of life.  Buff it until it shines even if buffing it takes you eighteen months.  Unless you’re going pro, the time it takes doesn’t really matter.  It’s done when it’s done.

3) Avoid using the same word multiple times in the same paragraph, or even on the same page if at all possible

This is a little bit of a stylistic rule I have, which I invented so that when I reread my own stuff fifteen thousand times I won’t feel like I’m having deja vu.  However.  Following this as a rule means that you MUST expand your vocabulary.  It forces you to stop using basic words and to start looking into creating nuance.  It also makes you sound smarter, which is always a bonus.  Use a thesaurus.  That’s what they’re for.

4) Create a dialogue with other writers

What I see a lot is people getting sad about people not talking to them about their stuff... but they never talk to anyone ELSE about THEIR stuff.  This happens SO OFTEN.  We’re all in the same boat here.  Stop getting salty over who’s getting to use the oars.  Chances are that person is someone who engages with their readers and other writers a lot more than you do.  You’re right, sometimes it doesn’t work.  But guess what?  While you’re attempting this step, you’re completing step 1) at the same time!  Net win for you!

5) Write characters how they are, not how you wish they were (that comes later)

There are a lot of posts on Tumblr telling you to project your heart out and make your favs do whatever the heck you want just because you want them to.  And if that’s your gig, then you do that.  But it won’t really make you better at writing, because you’re just writing yourself.  You know how you think and you know how you work.  As a writer your job is to tell the audience how someone ELSE thinks and how someone ELSE works.  Will there be some overlap between your fav and you?  Possibly.  But having them react to things in ways that you would or ways that you think would be good for drama isn’t you writing them.  It’s you writing a version of them you wish they were.  You can GET them to that place, but you have to build the bridge first, and the foundations of that bridge are the core character traits.

6) You need to have characters do things that you don’t like or don’t want them to do

It’s tempting, very tempting, to have your characters cry at all the right times or make up the next day after a blowout fight or do the morally right thing because it’ll give you a feelgood ending.  And you can write like that if you want to.  But it’s retracing a path you already know.  To become better at writing you need to brush aside that initial inclination to do something really obvious or cliche or angsty and think of some other direction you can go with it.  And then possibly do that again a few more times until you come up with something really special.  If you’re just going for one-and-done, banging out a whatever, go with whatever you think of first.  But if you want to improve you cannot take your first thought.  That’s the easy thought.  You don’t want that.  You think you do, but you don’t.

7) Tropes are not your friends (but they are also not your enemies)

Tropes are fun.  Tropes are easy.  Tropes sometimes get you a lot of pageviews really fast.  Because people know them, they’re familiar with them.  They know what to expect out of them.  Tropes are also a route a thousand people have already taken before you.  They don’t teach you anything.  Now, you might think I’m leading into ‘if you must use a trope, subvert expectations a la Episode VIII’.  I’m not.  There are so many tropes nowadays it’s hard to avoid them all, and subverting them all can be almost as bad as just plain using them.  So use them, but be mindful about it.  Resist writing them because they’re easy, but also resist subverting them as a convenient plot twist.

8) Read a little bit of everything

I don’t mean fiction.  I mean just plain articles.  Read a little bit about basketball, read a little bit about the Prime Minster of Australia, read a little bit about the greenhouses in Iceland.  You can do videos too or podcasts, but reading articles is generally a lot faster.  This creates a cache of knowledge that you can use later.  If you’re a writer who only writes about things they know very well, your stuff is going to end up very narrow in scope.  If you write a lot, it’s going to end up very repetitive.  You don’t need to become an expert, but if you only put pencils in your pencil case all you can draw with are pencils.  It’s good to have fineliners and oil pastels and copics when you need them, even if you only know how to use them a little bit.

9) Make personality psychology your new best friend

Personality psychology is a massive key to understanding how people work and, subsequently, a roadmap to strong characterisation.  Get familiar with the Big Five personality traits.  Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is also a good thing to keep in mind for character arcs, especially long ones.  There are several different classifications for personality (Myers-Briggs is another popular one, for example) but I like to use the Big Five (which is honestly really the Big Ten because each trait includes the opposite) because I find it easier to understand and remember.

10) Don’t take advice you don’t like as a personal insult

It’s not a personal insult.  Get mad over it if you want, but then think about WHY you got upset.  It’s probably because it pointed out something you already knew you were weak on.  Getting mad helps nothing, but doing something about what made you mad does.  And no, I don’t mean writing a really long rant about how the person who said something you didn’t like is stupid and doesn’t know what they’re talking about.  I won’t pretend I’ve never done it, but I also won’t pretend doing that accomplished anything other than making me look really bad.

11) Pay close attention to your character voice

A mistake you see a lot, especially from younger writers, is characters that all sound like exactly the same person.  Usually that person is the writer.  They only really know how to write in their own voice, with a bit of flavour from whatever characters they’re trying to do.  If you write some lines of dialogue without indicators (pronouns, names, epithets, etc) and the reader cannot tell who is supposed to be talking, your writing lacks character voice.  And the solution is NOT (ABSOLUTELY NOT) to give characters accents/overemphasise accents they already have.  That does NOT solve the character voice problem, it just hides it.  And that does not help you improve at all.  If you have five characters in your story you should be able to write them all a plain dialogue cycle and the reader should be able to figure out who is who without having to count the order of who was talking in the beginning.  You should also be able to lift one character from a story and transplant them in another where they have never been mentioned and the reader should still be able to follow who they are because of their distinct character voice.  This gets a lot harder in stories with large quantities of characters.  Struggle with it anyway.  It’s important.

12) You’re going to have to write more, probably way more than you ever wanted to

Yeah.  Getting better as a writer involves a metric ton of actual writing.  Sucks eh?  Staring at the keyboard doesn’t count.  Neither does refreshing your fav website eighty-nine times or staring out the window waiting for a spark of inspiration.  Just get to it.  The theory goes that if you want to get good at something, you have to spend at least ten thousand hours doing it.  That’s a lot of hours.  More hours than anybody really wants to comprehend or put themselves through.  But you’re going to have to do it and the best time to get started is now.

13) Remember who you’re writing for...

... and that person is yourself!  Writing for your readers?  Often an exercise in futility.  They love you, but they’re too shy to tell you so.  Sometimes too shy to let you know they even exist.  So you have to love yourself twice as much.  I mean your writing.  Love your writing twice as much.  It’s gonna be on your computer forever, after all.  Make sure you put as much love and care into it as possible so that when you accidentally open one of your documents five years from now, you can read it without cringing and ‘accidentally’ flinging your computer out the window.

14) Don’t skip editing (and editing once is not enough)

There are so many stories out there with an author’s note that includes something along the lines of ‘oh yeah I just wrote all this in an hour and didn’t read it lol’.  Dude.  If you didn’t care enough to make sure your story made sense WHY on EARTH would you expect your READER to care about it?  Have a little respect for your audience and for your own stuff.  And judicious editing is important.  You have to actually LOOK for mistakes.  You can’t just read through it without actually getting any words through your eyeballs and declare your mission a success.  I promise you those mistakes are there.  They’re still gonna be there after your ninth edit.  Should you really edit nine times?  Of course you should.  Step 2) says so.

15) Stop selling yourself short

Go ahead and look up to other writers and wish you knew how to write like them.  But stop telling yourself you’ll never get there.  That thought right there is your biggest hurdle to doing it.  You’re good at some things and bad at others.  Wonderful.  Praise yourself for the former and work on the later.  You don’t have to be all ‘tortured writer’ and shrug off compliments because someone else does something slightly better than you.  Give yourself a thumbs up and remember all the stuff you do right.  The stuff you come up short in will join it eventually.

[thechangbin]

Open Book // Seo Changbin

Genre: Angst, Old Friends AU

Characters: Seo Changbin x reader

Warning: none

Summary: Changbin gets the attention of a famous journalist who just so happens to be an old important friend.

Word Count: 2,233

A/N: Wow, finally I wrote something again for this blog. This was inspired by prompt 474 in this website. I hope you enjoy!

For years, I’ve imagined seeing Changbin again and thought of different ways I’d approach the situation. I could fix my posture and do a subtle hair flip to show him how much prettier and confident I got in the past four years. I also thought about pretending to be on a call with a fake boyfriend and act like I’m happier than I’ve ever been. If those two weren’t going to happen, I decided I’d just pretend I didn’t see him at all.

The third option seems the most practical thing to do. I didn’t get prettier. I look exactly the way I did when we were in university. Confident? Please. I hardly notice half the things around me because the ground is all I ever look at. Pretending to have a boyfriend without having any proper experience would just give everything away, so that wouldn’t work either.

So when our eyes meet for the first time in four years in this cheap cafe, I mutter a curse. A fake call and ignoring him would be rude. Option one is my best shot. I take in a deep breath and straighten my back and shoulders. I raise my right hand and push a bit of my hair at the front to the back.

He blinks.

It wasn’t enough. I press my lips together, something I do when I’m nervous, and raise my left hand this time to wave a hello to him. When he waves back, I use that same hand to flip my hair again, but this time, with more power.

There’s a sound of something falling behind me. I turn around and see a man in a loose white shirt and black jeans with a brown apron over the front of his body on the wooden floor. The empty tray, which I assume he was once holding, lays at the bottom of a table near his head.

I stare at the barista who is clearly taken aback. Wondering why he’s on the floor, I turn back to look at Changbin, only to see his seat empty.

“God, you’re still clumsy, huh?” his voice says behind me. “Are you okay, sir?”

I whip back around and see him helping the man up. The barista nods and thanks him as Changbin bends down and picks up the tray to hand it to him. The man takes the tray from him and looks at me expectantly.

We look at each other for a few seconds, and I know someone has to do something because everyone seems to be waiting for it to happen. Changbin looks at me and nods his head to the man’s direction.

“What?” I ask him.

He releases a sigh. “I’m sorry in behalf of my friend here. She’s really clumsy.” He looks at me again.

The barista just nods and walks away, heading back to the counter, leaving the two of us alone. Our eyes meet again, and he shakes his head, groans, and walks back to his seat.

Following him, I ask, “What?”

“Four years we haven’t seen each other. Why do I still feel like we’re back in college?” he says and takes sip of his drink.

We sit in silence of a few seconds, enough for me to think about what happened and why he’s acting the way he is. All I did was flip my hair and- oh.

He must see my moment of realization because he raises his eyebrows and continues to sip on his drink, as if mocking me of my foolishness. I place my elbows on the table and hide my face in my hands.

“I’m so stupid,” i mumble.

“Yeah, you are,” he agrees.

I sigh. “I didn’t even feel myself hitting him! How?”

“Maybe because you’re so stupid,” he suggests.

I put my hands down and give him a look of disbelief. He shrugs at me with a small smile on his smug little face.

“Hey, you’re the one you said it,” he says.

I’d have to agree with Changbin here. It’s been four whole years since we’ve seen each other, with absolutely no contact, and it feels like nothing changed, as if we’re back in time.

The thought of this makes me look away and scowl at the floor, which earns me another weird look from my old friend.

“You gonna tell me about the whole hair flip thing you did?” he asks.

I look away in embarrassment as I feel the heat rising up my cheeks. I quickly push back my seat and stand up, earning looks from the people around us. Changbin looks up at me, amused.

“I’m gonna order a drink,” I say, leaving immediately so I don’t have to hear a reply.

There is no line at the counter, so I get to order straightaway. I fumble on my own words when I realize the barista I’m talking to is the same one I slapped beautifully in the face a few minutes ago. He taps in my order and I give him my card. As he swipes, I slide in an awkward apology.

“I’m sorry about slapping you earlier,” I manage to say.

He hands me back my card and just tells me to wait for him to deliver it over to our table. Accepting the fact that he isn’t going to be forgiving me any time soon, I simply nod and mutter an okay before taking my receipt and walk back to the table.

“So it’s you,” Changbin says when I sit down. He continues when I don’t reply. “You’re the famous journalist everyone is talking about. ‘The Observer’. The one who somehow knows everything about everyone. How did I not know? Oh right. Because last time I saw you, you were too dumb to even solve a simple math equation.”

“Can we just get to your interview?” I ask him, the stress a little too evident in my voice.

“How do you do it? How do you pretend to be so smart? Do you just do the interviews and have someone else write the actual articles? You’re not The Observer, are you? You’re just The Interviewer,” he says and laughs at his own joke.

I sigh and pull out my team’s card from my pocket. “The Observer is a team of journalists. Sometimes one or some of us do the interviews, and sometimes we do everything together. Can you get your facts straight for once? Or is that a habit you haven’t picked up in the last four years?”

He raises his arms in surrender. “Alright, you got me. You have confidence now. That’s new.”

I blink.

He thinks I have confidence. That’s what I wanted right? I wanted him to think I’m perfectly okay with my life without him, even after what we went through in college. That’s why I did the terribly awkward hair flip. Twice.

My drink is placed in front of me, and I thank the man before he leaves. I take a sip and immediately feel better as I feel the cool liquid on my tongue.

“We should catch up first and do the interview after,” he suggests.

“If it’s okay with you, I’d like to get this over with and leave,” I say.

Changbin frowns. “Why? I’ve missed you. There’s so many things we have to talk about.”

Although I want to keep a calm composure, my eyes betray me and instantly waters. I look down so he doesn’t see.

What does he mean he misses me?

“[Y/N], we have to talk about… you know. About what happened. Look. I knew you were part of this writing team thing. That’s why I did everything I could to catch your attention, something that would fit your criteria for an interview,” he explains.

I look up, not caring around the tears anymore. He leans back, surprised. I say, “How did you know I would come to do the interview?”

“Because I know you like an open book. You helped me write some of my best songs. Producing this new one was bound to get your attention,” he says. “[Y/N], I had to see you.”

“Well, now I’m here,” I say. “You got what you wanted. Just like you always did.”

“[Y/N],”

I wipe my tears and drink as much of my drink as I could. I close my eyes as I accept the brain freeze as it distracts me from him. When it subsides, I open them and look at him again.

“I’m gonna go now,” I say.

Before I can get up, he puts his hand on top of mine, freezing me on the spot. “Don’t go. Not yet. Please. We have to talk about what happened.”

“It was four years ago. It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“How does it not matter to you? What are you gonna do when you leave?” he asks.

“I’m just going to aggressively ignore that part of my life until it goes away.” I tell him honestly. “Like I always do.”

Despite the tension between us, he lets out a laugh. It’s so distracting, but it’s nothing compared to the warmth of his hand still unmoving above mine.

“That’s definitely not going to work,” he says.

I pull my hand away. “Oh yeah? And how do you know that?”

He takes my hand again and holds it this time with so much softness like it’s the most fragile thing in the world. He looks at it dreamily with a small smile on his face, as if he’s thinking about us from four years ago.

“Like I said. I know you like an open book. And you cried. You always try to ignore everything, but I know that never lasts for long. Four years is impressive. You broke off all contact with me and pretended I didn’t exist. But I bet you a thousand bucks you still think about me,” he says.

The feeling of his hands playing with mine makes me go weak. He looks back at me and locks our eyes, making it suddenly hard for me to breathe.

“And how do you know that?” I ask, silently scolding myself for how weak I spoke.

He stops moving our hands and holds our stare. “Because I think about you too.”

I let out a shaky breath. We stay like this for a few moments, I’m not quire sure how long. Before I can lose myself, I pull my hand away again, this time, off the table so he doesn’t take them once more. I ignore the feeling of wanting him to do it anyway.

I begin to get up again, and he doesn’t do anything this time but instead says, “You can go. At least I know I did my best to see you again. But if you really want to, then just go.”

I might be crazy, but I think I heard his voice crack. My eyes scan his face for any lies, his body for any sign of anything but this.

Every single touch of heartbreak and euphoria, he was there for me, and I for him. He was rude to people he didn’t like and pretended to be just the same to the ones he loved, but anyone who knew him like I did knew he was doing it to hide his true emotions. Seeing him crack just a little bit would be rare, but when it was just us two, everything was natural.

Never had I met a friend like Seo Changbin. He would never show anyone his lyrics but to me, and that’s when I saw all the parts of him he wouldn’t dare show. He was an enigma to everyone but an open book to me.

Maybe I didn’t understand what was happening at the time and forgot about not judging by the cover because when he tried to explain his side of the story, I didn’t bother listening. I didn’t buy it. I was stupid.

He’s right. I haven’t changed. I’m still clumsy as ever, I don’t have confidence, and I’m not as smart as I pretend to be. Most of all, the way I felt for him hadn’t changed a bit.

We had a misunderstanding, and I was stubborn. It’s about time I listen to his side of the four year old story.

“When did you learn to do reverse psychology?” I ask.

“I’m not trying to do reverse psychology. I’m just accepting the fact that you don’t want us to be anything again.”

“You’re doing it again!” I say.

“I’m not doing anything!” he tells me, his voice suddenly raspy.

It’s like I don’t know how to breathe anymore. His eyes are suddenly glossy, and if I think he’s doing what I think he’s doing, then I’m not sure how I can handle this situation. Never in my four years of knowing him had I seen him cry.

“Are you…” I start.

“Don’t,” he says.

“But… the iconic SpearB. The dark rapper. The-“

“Shut up.”

I try my best not to lose my cool. “Changbin. You genuinely want us to be okay again?”

He nods. “These past few years have been hell without you. I miss you a lot.”

“Alright,” I say, placing all of my things down and happily taking a sip of my drink. “Then let’s start this interview.”

We do just this, but it’s not for the article.

[obsessedauthorchan-blog]

Shakespearean - Chapter 18

Title: Revelation

For the first time ever, Jason was actually feeling pretty good about journalism class. He wasn't late, and he was pretty confident about the paragraph he wrote. When he arrived, he took his usual seat in the front row and waited for everything to begin. Clark was reading something at his desk, but he looked up when he noticed Jason sit down. "Hey, Jason. You look a lot better this week." Clark gave him a sly, shit-eating grin that Jason hadn't known he was capable of. "That wouldn't have anything to do with Tim, would it?"

Jason's eyes went wide, and his reply was anything but smooth. "Tim?" he asked with a scoff. "Psh, no, why would my good mood have anything to do with Tim? That'd be...," he trailed off when he realized that Clark really wasn't buying it and Jason didn't have anything better up his sleeve. "Shut up, Clark."

Clark laughed loudly, drawing the attention of a few of the students that were already there. "How was roller-skating, Jason?"

Groaning, Jason folded his arms on his desk and dropped his head on them, absolutely refusing to answer. Clark only laughed harder.

A few minutes later, everyone was there and it was time to start. "Alrighty, class, this week, you'll be reading aloud your paragraphs. We'll start with Jimmy, because since he's so comfortable in his chair, he must be really confident." Jason looked over his shoulder to see Jimmy frozen solid with his feet up on his desk. The now-blushing student made his way down to the front and the readings began.

Jason went somewhere around the middle, and he actually wasn't nervous. When it was his turn, he stood up, faced the class, and read his paragraph aloud:

"Once upon a time, there was a fourteen-year-old girl in Columbia named Toha. Her family was poor, so her mother sold her virginity in order to pay for what they needed. The girl was then trafficked to brothel, where she was forced to work as a prostitute. An organization called AIM was able to rescue her in only 22 days. By then, however, she'd been raped by 198 different men. The math equals out to 9 men per day. This fourteen-year-old girl was raped by nine different men a day for 22 days.  There are many girls like her all over the world, and most of them are never lucky enough to be rescued. AIM, Agape International Missions, has a saying: 'One girl is too many. One day is too long.'"

(A/N The above is a true story. You can buy bracelets that say '22' on them as a reminder and a way to spread awareness about human trafficking on the AIM website.)

Jason paused for dramatic effect, taking in the stunned, heartbroken, and, in some cases, bewildered expressions on his classmates’ faces. He then took his seat, seeing the sad, knowing look in Clark's eyes as they made contact with his. It made him uncomfortable, wondering just how 'knowing' Clark was in that moment.

****

Once everybody had read aloud their paragraphs, Clark stood back up at the podium. "Alright everybody. I have wonderful news for you all. There won't be any more writing assignments actually due until your final. Your midterm will simply be a quiz on a few more videos that I have to show you," he was interrupted by a groan from the entire class, making him chuckle for a second. "Regardless, you will still have plenty to do in the following weeks. I keep the midterm simple and easy because I want you all to focus on your Final.

"Using the topic that you already have, you are all to make a final presentation using one of the methods of journalism that we learned about in the video last week. A written article, a PowerPoint, a documentary, whatever you want. I have three other classes with different topics and the same assignments, and you, class, will be competing against them." Jason's eyebrows rose, as he was sure did those of the rest of the class. "The five best final presentations, whatever the form, will be submitted to a journalism contest that is run and facilitated by myself and over 100 other journalism professors and experts in this half of the country. The winner will receive a cash prize and publication for their presentation, and the two runner ups will also receive cash prizes."

Jason wasn't sure he knew the point of the class competing. He already knew that all of Clark's other journalism classes were more advanced than his, and there were almost certainly dozens of other more advanced classes competing, as well.

It was as if Clark had read Jason's thoughts, however, because he continued. "Don't think you don't stand a chance, though. I've been participating in the contest for all seven years that I've been teaching at this school, and I've had four of my students, one from this level class, win first place. I've had eleven students take second or third place, several of which were also from this class. You've got a chance, but not if you don't try. And you have to try anyway, because your final is 50% of your grade for this class."

Well, damn. Now Jason didn't have any excuses left.

"I have a sign-up sheet on my desk. Each of you need to pick a time to have a meeting with me in my office about your Final. You'll pitch your idea for your presentation to me, and I'll either approve or I won't. If I don't, we'll either work together to come up with something, or we'll just reschedule." Clark smirked. "If anyone is sure they've already figured out what they want to do for their project, I have three time slots open for later today."

"As for this week's lesson," he continued, "I have a question to ask you all. How many of you have said the words, 'I don't know,' in the last two weeks?" About half the class raised their hands, including Jason. Clark seemed surprised at how many of them there were. "Wow, okay, more than I expected. How many of you have said, 'I don't care,' in the last two weeks?" This time, every student raised their hand, also including Jason. Clark nodded sadly, not in the least bit surprised this time.

"You see, class, I subscribe to the belief that there is nothing shameful about not knowing something. Nobody actually knows everything there is to know, and pretending to is really just quite ridiculous. But you see, not caring, that is something shameful, in my opinion. If you don't care about something or someone else, or something that someone else does care about, how can you expect anyone to care about what you care about, or to even care about you?" It was an interesting question, and Jason wasn't sure how to answer it with an argument without sounding like a complete asshole.

'I'm just more important,' wasn't likely to get any approval.

"Treat others how you want to be treated, guys. It's cliche, but it's true. It's okay to say you don't know, but never say you don't care. Not knowing is human. Not caring... I'm not really sure what that makes you." After pausing a moment to let that sink in, Clark cleared his throat. "Again, the sign-up sheet is on my desk. Class dismissed."

Being the only one in the first row, Jason made it to the desk first. He hesitated for only a moment before going ahead and choosing the first open time slot for that day. Swallowing, he backed away from the desk and out of the classroom, wondering if he would regret the idea forming in his mind.

****

Jason only had time to grab a quick lunch from one of the fast food places on campus before heading to Clark's office for their meeting. When he got there, Clark was just packing up his own lunch containers and wiping his mouth with a napkin.  Clark looked up to see him in the doorway and waved him in. "Come on in, Jason. Take a seat."

Sitting in the chair opposite Clark, he couldn't help but let out a quiet snicker.  Clark looked very confused, so Jason had mercy on him and gestured to the corner of his mouth. "You missed a spot, sir."

"Oh!" Clark quickly wiped it off with his thumb and used his tongue to clean his thumb. "Thank you, Jason. That could have been very embarrassing later." Clark cleared his throat and shifted his weight on his rolling chair. "So, I was a little surprised that you chose the first time slot. I had thought you would need more time to think about it."

Jason wondered what he meant by that, but he ignored it. "I knew that if I waited I'd lose my nerve and change my mind."

Clark didn't look confused at all. "Alright, well, pitch your idea."

Taking a deep breath, Jason took the plunge. "I want to tell my story."

"Your story?"

"I grew up on the streets. Something tells me that's no secret, but what is a secret is that I was trafficked by a small ring operating here in Gotham when I was eleven. The deaf girl I told you guys about at dinner that time was taken with me. We were separated and I never saw her again. I was forced to work as an underage prostitute in and around Gotham City, and I was moved often so that nobody got wise. When I was 16, they told me Jen, the deaf girl, was dead. They thought it would break me, but it just made me angry enough to fight back and I escaped. The only reason I even have a GED is because a man named Ra's al Ghul took me in, became my mentor, and helped me get on my feet enough to get a college education."

Jason paused for a second, letting it all set in, before he moved on. Something told him that Clark couldn't be too surprised by it all. He had known something was up for a while, and his demeanor while Jason had talked had told him that only the details were really new information. Either someone had told him or he pieced it together himself. He was a journalist, so Jason hazarded a guess that it was the latter option. "I want to write my story in the form of an online editorial in third person, without specifying that it is actually my story, though I have no doubt it will be obvious anyway."

Clark nodded, thinking about the proposal for a few moments. "Alright. But you know that if you win, it'll get published at a very well-known journalism website, and links to it will be dispersed throughout journalism departments all over the nation, and to news stations, as well."

Jason nodded. "Remember when you said last week that the world is bigger than we are?" Clark nodded. "When I escaped, I didn't go to the police. I was too scared of being found again, so I stayed on the streets. I've seen people's faces. I know people's names. I was deep inside this trafficking ring, and I know a lot about them. I never said a word, because I was too worried about myself. People all over the world don't know that Human Trafficking is a thing. People like Jen, who are either dead or still living as sex slaves, can't afford for me to worry about my privacy. People need to know, and nobody else can tell the story that I can."

"Huh," was all Clark said for several moments as he just sat there, contemplating Jason's answer. "Alright. Approval granted. But you reserve the right to change your mind about your assignment whenever you want. I know this must be very personal for you." Jason nodded and thanked him, standing up to leave, when Clark called his name again. "You could have asked for a different topic, or traded with someone. Why didn't you?"

Jason shifted his weight on his feet, but he forced himself to make eye contact. "I wanted to, at first. Then you said that thing about how a topic we didn't want would only make us grow. You were right. I've grown a lot more in just a few weeks than I have ever before." Clark nodded, thinking he was done, but he wasn't. "And I realized something. If someone else had the topic, I'm not sure I would have felt they were doing it justice. Like I said, nobody else can tell the story I can. I'm almost positive I wouldn't have felt satisfied with how anyone else represented Human Trafficking. I'm too close to the topic to release it like that."

Clark didn't say anything, so Jason opened the door. Before he could fully step out, however, a question came to him. "Hey Clark?"

"Yes, Jason?"

Jason hesitated, but he figured this wouldn't exactly be the most personal thing he'd said so far. "You're pretty close with Mr. Wayne, right?"

Clark narrowed his eyes slightly but nodded. "Yes, you could say that. Why?"

"I received the Wayne Scholarship this year, remember? I was wondering if you know... well..."

"If I know why he picked you?" Jason nodded, and Clark sighed. "It doesn't really happen the way you're thinking it does, Jason. Bruce doesn't read through every qualifying application and just pick his favorite."

Jason swallowed, nodding. "Yeah, right. I probably should have known. There's probably some board or committee or something at the Wayne Foundation that handles all that stuff. Sorry I asked. I'll just-"

"It isn't quite that formal, but I guess you could call it a committee if you wanted to. The qualifying applications are distributed among the previous winners of the scholarship, and they all pick one that they feel deserves the scholarship the most. Bruce then looks over those and makes an executive decision."

Jason stared at Clark, wide-eyed. It was in that moment that he remembered that Clark had won the Wayne Scholarship one year. "And do you have any idea which of the previous winners suggested me?"

"They're all distributed evenly among us and divided up at random. But you happened to fall into my stack." Jason's mouth opened to reply, but he couldn't think of anything to stay, so he just stood there, in the doorway, staring at Clark Kent with his mouth hanging open. "Bruce almost didn't pick you though. He was going to go with someone else."

"Why?"

"You have no formal education. To pick some kid off the street who'd never so much as taken a math class and shove him into a full-time collegiate education... Well, Bruce wasn't sure you'd be able to handle it, and if you couldn't it would have been a waste of the Wayne Foundation's resources, especially since another kid could have won that scholarship this year. GCU wasn't going to admit you either, for the same reasons."

Jason felt like his brain was short-circuiting. "So then... why did they all change their minds?"

Clark smiled, big and genuine. "Two things, your essay and Ra's al Ghul's recommendation letter. They were both quite moving, and they inspired Bruce to give you a shot. The fact that Bruce decided you were worth a shot meant that the school came to the same conclusion. He basically sponsored you with enough money that the school decided, 'What the hell? He can't do any harm anyway.'"

Jason shook his head. "I barely believe it."

"Well you should. Your essay was the best one of those I've ever read. You more than earned it, and so far you've proven to do a good job."

Jason swallowed around the lump in his throat. "Thank you, sir."

"It's Clark, remember?" Jason nodded and Clark smiled again. "I should probably tell you one more thing before you go, then it's time for my next meeting. When a student wins the Wayne Scholarship, such a large amount of money is invested that they are assigned a - well, the first word that came to mind was 'accountability partner', but that's not right, and liaison is way off, too. Let's call it - hell, how about a military term. I'm your supervising officer. Since I suggested you to Bruce, it's my job to make sure you stay on track with your classes. If you get a toe out of line, I'm supposed to gently persuade you to put it back where it belongs. I get all of your grades for all of your classes, and I'm supposed to make sure you do well enough in all of them to be worth the Wayne Foundation's investment."

Jason's eyebrows were so far up his hairline, they disappeared. "And what happens if I fail?"

Clark took a deep breath, a sardonic expression on his face. "Simply put, I get fired."

"Holy shit."

"Yeah."

"Well," Jason said, trying to wrap his head around way too much information. "I'll be sure to do a good job then."

Clark smirked. "I should hope you would do that anyway, but thanks for the affirmation. I appreciate it." 

Jason chuckled softly, unsure how he managed to find something funny in that moment. "Yes, sir. I should vacate your office before the next student gets here." Clark nodded his agreements. They said their goodbyes and Jason left, bumping into Jimmy on the way out. Shaking his head, Jason decided he needed another milkshake. This was definitely a good time for some comfort food. 

[english104]

Catfishing

Catfishing is a deceptive activity where a person creates a sockpuppet presence or fake identity on a social networking service, usually targeting a specific victim for abuse or fraud. The practice may be used for financial gain, to compromise a victim in some way, or simply as forms of trolling or wish fulfillment.

Students reflect on their catfishing experiences during COVID-19

Sierra Mihu just wanted something to pass the time.

The fourth-year biological sciences major felt bored during the pandemic, so she decided to download Bumble. This way, she’d combat her boredom and meet new people at the same time.

Then she met Brian, 24, from Lancaster. She swiped right and messaged him.

“He messaged back, and he was really nice,” Mihu said. “The next day, he messaged me and went out of his way to ask me how my exam was that day. He gave me compliments and was really nice.”

It seemed that Mihu had found a nice guy – someone she felt good talking to. After the two of them talked for a while, Brian asked for her Snapchat. Feeling comfortable enough, Mihu gave it to him.

It was all downhill from there.

“He said, ‘Do you want to see what I look like?’ in the messaging part of Snap,” Mihu said. “I didn’t really know what he meant by that, but I said ‘sure.’ He continued to send me a collection of photos of him, but it didn’t have his face in it.”

The pictures were risque shots of Brian, unclothed. This was Mihu’s first red flag that something might not be right.

“I was uncomfortable that he even did that because it didn’t seem like him,” Mihu said. “It didn't seem like this nice guy who would ask about my day and who would compliment me and have a good conversation.”

Then, Brian asked for photos of Mihu in exchange. She trusted her gut on this one and told him “no” – point-blank saying she didn’t trust him. He tried to prove to her that he was who he said he was by sending a mirror selfie.

Immediately, Mihu consulted with her roommates to show them the sketchy photo. There was a border around the picture, like Brian had taken a photo of another photo. She told Brian that she still was unsure, and he blew up.

“He got so angry,” Mihu said. “He was like, ‘What do you mean you don’t know that it’s me? I sent you a Snap; there’s no way I could be fake,’ pretty much gaslighting me, making me feel like the bad guy. Then he said ‘This always happens,’ which was another red flag.”

He tried to convince Mihu that his outburst was due to trust issues, saying the last woman he talked to saved his photos, then blocked him. Mihu was still nervous, citing human trafficking as one of her main concerns, and refused to send him photos.

Their conversations soon became awkward. Brian played the victim card and complained that Mihu thought he was ugly. Mihu ended up blocking him on Snapchat.

The next day, she was watching the MTV show Catfish – unrelated to her situation – and the host of the show did a reverse image search. Mihu was inspired.

“I was like, ‘You know what? Just out of curiosity, I’m going to do this image search, and the literal first result was a Twitter page of the exact same photo,’” Mihu said.

It turned out Brian was posing as a model from a different country. Mihu was catfished, or lured into a relationship from a fictional persona online.

Just last year, Americans lost $201 million to romance scammers, with Ohio having the No. 9 slot of most victims. The FTC reported that romance scams increased by 40% last year, up from $143 million in 2018.

Catfishing has been a growing epidemic during the coronavirus. In a study from SocialCatfish.com, a record 26.6 million people are using data apps in 2020, which is an 18.4% increase from 2019. Additionally, 31% of users said they are spending more time on dating apps.

But it’s not just dating where people are getting scammed. Reese Little, an Athens resident, lost around $40 from an online “bathing suit sale” that was offering a $5 sale. Then, the sale charged her twice for $20 for a membership that was hidden in the fine print.

“I was so mad,” Little said. “I can’t do anything about it. I couldn’t get a hold of the people, and I didn’t have the money to pay for a membership. That’s why I did the sale in the first place because it was only $5.”

Similarly scammed, Christos Ioannou, a sophomore at Capital University, wanted to build his Twitter presence by procuring the handle @Christos, which had been snagged by a Greek Spanish web developer well over a decade ago.

The man with the handle approached Ioannou to set up a trade: $100 for the handle. After setting up a GoFundMe, receiving several Venmos and contributing $20 of his own, Ioannou sent the man money.

The man promptly stopped responding, and that’s when Ioannou realized he was scammed. With the help of his mom and his bank, he was able to get his money back and refund everyone who donated, all within a week or so.

“At the end of it, I felt like a schmuck because there were so many red flags that I should have seen,” Ioannou said. “I fell hook, line and sinker.”

Mihu, Little and Ioannou believe the coronavirus pandemic has played a large role in the increase of catfishing and Internet scams.

“Ever since March, I’ve been much more terminally online,” Ioannou said. “I think it’s one of those things where, now that so many more people are not forced to be online, but a lot more of our social interactions are through social media, it makes it tougher. Not to mention catfishing specifically ... just thinking about all the people who are that starved for contact, I have to imagine that it’s gone up significantly.”

The Risks of Using Cat Fishing Dating Services

For people who do everything on the computer, from browsing websites to paying bills online, using social media and websites to look for love is a unique alternative to a real-life dating search. Well, now there is a new trend on the Internet that is out there circulating but it is not as new on the Internet world as you might think. This trend is called catfishing.

Catfishing on the Internet should not be taken too lightly. Catfishing can be found on online dating websites and it can happen in person too if you’re not careful in noticing the signs.  These online dating websites are a, “playground for identity thieves, hackers and other nasty people.”

What is a catfish?  “A catfish – or someone online who’s pretending to be someone they are not.” This is something to think about long and hard before anyone makes the decision of trusting these dating websites.

Mellissa Ferrari, who wrote the article called, “What Is Catfishing And How Can We Protect Ourselves” states, “Some catfish do so because they don’t wish to reveal something they see as potentially negative about themselves, and some do it just for the fun of it.” Ferrari mentions in her article, that catfishes are looking to, “coerce someone into doing something they wouldn’t normally do – like give money or send intimate photos – or are trying to gather enough information to commit fraud identity.”

https://thebannercsi.com/2019/03/06/the-risks-of-using-cat-fishing-dating-services/

What is catfishing and how can we protect ourselves?

What is catfishing on the internet

The term ‘catfishing’ is used to describe when someone has created a fake online identity with the intent to pursue someone romantically under false pretences.

Why do people catfish?

Some catfish because they don’t wish to reveal something they see as potentially negative about themselves, and some do it just for the fun of it.

Unfortunately, others have more alarming agendas, such as wanting to coerce someone into doing something they wouldn’t normally do. For example, to give money, send intimate photos, or are trying to gather enough information to commit fraud identity.

How can catfishing make you feel?

Even if the catfishing is not particularly sinister, it can still be extremely hurtful and frustrating when you’ve invested time in someone online, only for them not to be who you thought they were. It can also make some women feel very vulnerable and impact their ability to trust anyone again, especially if they have already suffered a traumatic break up.

Catfishing is a somewhat scary concept, however don’t let it stop you from using dating apps and sites. You just need to protect yourself.

Tips to avoid being a victim of catfishing

Never use the Internet for online dating while under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

Block anyone suspicious.

Don’t leave it weeks, but take time to get to know someone and check that things ‘add up’ before meeting-up in real life.

Do a background check – Google a potential date if you have enough details. You can also use searches created for potential dates as well, thanks to the increase of online dating apps.

Look for red flags, such as spelling mistakes and bad grammar on a profile when someone has stated they are college or university educated.

Be wary if they mention recent traumatic life events (such as the death of a partner or child) as many will fake stories such as these to make you feel you feel sorry for them and therefore be more trusting.

One of the biggest indicators of catfishing is when a person makes excuses to not meet you, won’t do a video call and even avoids all conversation about when to meet up. If they’re putting off a face-to face-date it could mean they have something to hide.

If a profile photo looks like a Hollywood movie star or model and appears too good to be true, use Google images to check the profile photo. If it comes up on another site that makes you feel suspicious, or it’s out rightly a magazine cover model, you are potentially being catfished. You can also use Catfish reverse image search apps.

Always remember, if it’s too good to be true it probably is.

And then there’s kittenfishing

Another thing to be mindful of is kittenfishing. It’s quite likely you’re even guilty of this yourself!

A much lighter version of catfishing, it is when someone embellishes or improves their profile to make themselves more appealing online – such as using a photo from ten years ago, adjusting their age or lying about their education or profession.

Generally, people who kittenfish aren’t meaning to be harmful. The reason for it is to present the best version of themselves they possibly can to increase their odds of meeting someone. This doesn’t make it any less annoying though when you meet them in person.

And if you are tempted to kittenfish yourself, just remember that at some point potential dates and future partners will uncover the ‘real you’. Therefore, a true reflection of who you really are is always best.

https://beanstalkmums.com.au/catfishing-can-protect/

#Risks #CatFishing #DatingServices

[photomaniacs]

7 Ways to Make Your Photos More Interesting http://ift.tt/2siI4CL

When I first started taking photos, I knew the importance of finding what “good” really looked like. I knew that there were a million people out there that claimed to be more successful than they were, and that my taste wasn’t refined enough and that I wasn’t experienced enough to know the difference between them and those that were truly great.

I found people at the top of the industry and read every article they wrote and watched every video or interview ever made about them. Then, when they mentioned someone they admired, I studied them too. Like a butterfly effect, I would break down and understand new artists and the most intricate shooting styles.

I committed it all to memory, taking what made sense to me and leaving behind the rest. After 7 years, I slowly started to gain an understanding of my own style — mashed up and molded from some of the most well-respected photographers, painters, and artists in the world.

In this article I would like to share some of those gold nuggets of information that resonated with me and that changed and continued to push my art forward in new and exciting ways. Some of these ideas you will have heard of and I will reiterate their importance, others might pique your interest enough to give them a try.

Lets dive in.

1. Location

It’s the oldest saying in the book; “Location, Location, Location!’

This is for good reason. Simply by making it a point to place yourself somewhere unique, you are bound to get better shots. I remember the first time I went to Iceland. You could pretty much point your camera in any direction and press the shutter and get 90% better photos than most anywhere else. It was ridiculous.

Not only does the location help you in terms of visual interest in the photo itself, but when you are seeing somewhere beautiful for the first time it tends to inspire you and thus get you into a more open-minded and creative mood. This will always be good news for the work you are about to create. Remember: it doesn’t have to be crazy expensive — just find somewhere that makes you excited the second you see it.

2. Learning to Use Strobes

It took me the majority of my photography career to learn this superpower. When I did, it changed everything. Imagine: the ability to use only the most beautiful quality of light to manipulate any way you see fit. The higher-end strobes can literally overpower the sun. The creative control this gives you is immense. You can now decide whether you want something more dramatic or more dreamy. You can manipulate the light in order to convey any feeling or emotion you want.

In the most simplistic terms, your camera is just a light capturing box. So feed it the best light and those photos will grow up big and strong.

3. Subject

Most of us have been there before. We’ve had a great idea and made the effort to put it together and then we get there and realize that the subject is just the wrong fit. For the type of photography I like to shoot, it’s not all about getting the most beautiful person. It’s about finding someone who fits the emotion I want to convey.

I believe it’s impossible to be a great photographer without incredible emotional intelligence and self-awareness. When you meet someone for the first time, you have to be able to gauge how they make you feel. What emotion do they draw out of you?

Sometimes it makes sense to work with a seasoned model like my friend Crystal below. It certainly can make your life easier if you have someone who fits the bill and has a variety of unique poses and looks in their arsenal.

Other times it makes more sense to take the time to work with someone who isn’t a pro. It can go a long way in creating something that feels a bit more relatable to the viewer.

Regardless of who it is, try your best to get as much time with your subjects/potential subjects as you can. The more comfortable and familiar you are with that person, the more connection that you have, the better your images will turn out.

4. The Haze Machine

For the longest time I couldn’t figure out what created that atmospheric and moody look in people’s images. Was it dry ice? Lots of candles? A fog machine?

In this photo, I even tried spraying Fabreze in front of the lens and inevitably onto my good buddy, Donard. (Stay fresh, buddy, stay fresh!)

Eventually I figured out that it was a Hazer making this magic look! These machines can go a long way in completely changing the way the light falls on your subject and ensure that your space doesn’t feel too stiff and manicured. It can convey mystery and drama and is fairly simple to use.

A haze machine is different from a fog machine in that it’s not as thick and white. This makes it much easier to shine lights through and gives the added benefit of being able to actually see your subject instead of making it look like something’s on fire (which the fog machine is great for).

5. Building a Set

As I became more interested in strobes, I started to dabble and understand the value of a good set. This could be as simple as getting a couple of plants and a backdrop, or as complicated as a full-on build in which you create walls, windows, and bring in furniture to mimic the idea you have in mind. Regardless, the ability to be able to control your surroundings can be a huge advantage in creating a balanced and consistent look in your image. In the industry, we call this “production value”.

6. Tones

“Gavin, where them tones at, bruh?”

My friends love to rag on me about my obsession with tonal equity in an image.

However, this obsession is for good reason and was such a key element to making my images have the style and feel that I had always wanted. In fact, just by using similar tonal values within your images, you are going a very long way in creating a consistent look.

But what are tones? In photography, tones can be referred to as either:

1. The overall lightness or darkness of an area of an image-similar to luminosity, or 2. The color of all or part of an image, usually in relation to its warmth or coolness

One of the best ways to start understanding what you like is to pay attention to films you love. It might be a movie set in a snowy area in which they use blue tones to really help you feel the cold, or it might be a beach day in which red and orange tones are used to warm up the scene.

Spend some time figuring out a combination that makes sense to you.

7. Understanding Your Audience

The truth is that at the end of the day, “interesting” is subjective. All of this is simply my opinion because it has been firstly what’s resonated with me and secondly, my audience. I’m not going to be the guy who sits here and tells you to create work only for other people, because I’m a strong believer in the importance of listening to your gut and making something that you are proud of.

On the other end of the coin, I’m also not going to sit here and pretend that other people’s opinions of your work are irrelevant, at least as a professional. That being said, if your goal is to also make something interesting to other people, then it would make sense to understand those people, yet the amount of photographers that do not is significant.

Where do you want to go with respect to your career? If you want to be a fashion photographer, what do people interested in fashion care about? What are some other interests that are typical of this subset of people? What is lacking in the marketplace? What kind of statement can you make with your imagery that would resonate?

As you move forward with your photography, reflect on some of these things and how they might be able to benefit you. Take the ones that make sense and ignore the rest. If you can cultivate the ability to continually audit yourself and be aware of where you want to go and the gaps that still exist, that will be half the battle won. As I said earlier, this process took place over 7 years, so be patient with yourself and your abilities, yet stay determined and you will come out on top.

About the author: Gavin Doran is a Brooklyn-based photographer best known for his cinematic portraiture and dynamic lifestyle imagery. You can find more of his work on his website or by following him on Facebook and Instagram. This post was also published here.

Go to Source Author: Gavin Doran If you’d like us to remove any content please send us a message here CHECK OUT THE TOP SELLING CAMERAS!

The post 7 Ways to Make Your Photos More Interesting appeared first on CameraFreaks.

June 27, 2017 at 08:00PM

[cupidford]

denofgeek com/uk/tv/sherlock/46250/sherlock-33-nerdy-spots-in-the-six-thatchers

Oh cool! Although I’m pretty sure fandom caught most. (oh, and I was even cited in this one! as was finalproblem! how swanky!)

THIS IS INTERESTING THO:

10. The bus/flower scene was inspired by the same thing happening in real life to a friend of Mark Gatiss called, aptly enough, Edmund Moriarty: “His daughter was very young and he’d been up all night with her and he got on the tube to White City and this very beautiful girl started smiling at him and he thought ‘Still got it!’ and he got all the way there and got to work, looked in the mirror and he had a flower in his hair and that’s what she’d been looking at” Gatiss told the audience at a December screening of the episode.

Here’s the article, under the cut!

After taking a fine-toothed comb to new Sherlock episode The Six Thatchers (well, watching it with one finger hovering over the pause button) here are a few items of note discovered, in addition to a handful of discoveries made by some very fine Sherlock detectives elsewhere…1. We know that Lady Smallwood’s British Intelligence code name is ‘Love’, leaving the Holmes brothers and Sir Edwin to divvy up ‘Antarctica’, ‘Langdale’ and ‘Porlock’ between them. Porlock (as well as being a village in Somerset whence came S.T. Coleridge’s famed interrupting ‘person from Porlock’) was the alias of an agent working for Moriarty in Conan Doyle novel The Valley Of Fear. Langdale Pike was a character in The Adventure Of The Three Gables. But Antarctica? Perhaps that’s a fittingly chilly name for “never been very good with [humans]” Mycroft?2. It looks as though the opening credits have been updated for series four. They now feature a post-swimming-pool-fight Sherlock, Watson standing in what looks like a well and a lump of something odd in one of Sherlock’s posh Ali Miller teacups.

3. It’s hardly hidden, but there seemed to be plenty of focus on 221B’s skull décor in the episode, which was all about the impossibility of outrunning death. Symbolism! Additionally, the black fish mobile in Rosie’s nursery could either be foreshadowing the location of her mother’s death, or, you know, just some fish.

4. This is what John was typing in his “221Back” blog entry:

And we’re back! Sorry I haven’t updated the blog for such a long time but things really have been very busy. You’ll have seen on the news about how Sherlock recovered the Mona Lisa. He described it as “an utterly dreary affair” and was much more interested in the the case of a missing horseshoe and how it was connected to a bright blue deckchair on Brighton beach.

I’ll try to write everything up when I get a chance but it’s not been missing portraits and horseshoes that have taken up my time.

I’m going to be a dad.

I mean, I thought I’d spent the last few years being a Dad to Sherlock, but it really doesn’t compare. The baby runs all of our lives. Maybe not THAT different to [….] I’ve fought in two wars, my best friend once faked his own death but none of that [….] terrifying and amazing and the biggest adventure I’ve been on.”

5. There's a teensy error here, apparently. Look closely at the screenshot of John Watson writing his blog and the filename revealing him to be ‘typing’ into a static JPG image file is on display. Source: Daily Edge

6. In Sir Arthur Conan Doyle story A Scandal In Bohemia, Sherlock Holmes tells John Watson “You see, but you do not observe.” In The Six Thatchers, he makes the same complaint to baby Rosie Watson.

7. The number 626 bus, which John takes to work, is a real bus line running from Finchley to Potter’s Bar.

8. The advert on the side of John’s bus is for ‘Strawb Fizz’, sweets with ‘explosive flavour’. That’s not a real product as far as know, so must have been custom-made, but why? Could there be an explosion in Sherlock’s future? Or some strawberries...

9. As John gets off the bus with the flower behind his ear, a passenger can be spotted carrying a newspaper with a headline ending “…be in two places at once?” a possible reference to the case of The Duplicate Man that flashed up earlier on screen asking: “How could Derek Parkinson be in two places at the same time? And murdered in one of them?”. It’s never twins, remember.

10. The bus/flower scene was inspired by the same thing happening in real life to a friend of Mark Gatiss called, aptly enough, Edmund Moriarty: “His daughter was very young and he’d been up all night with her and he got on the tube to White City and this very beautiful girl started smiling at him and he thought ‘Still got it!’ and he got all the way there and got to work, looked in the mirror and he had a flower in his hair and that’s what she’d been looking at” Gatiss told the audience at a December screening of the episode.

11. The big hint for episode two, The Lying Detective, is spotted behind John’s texting partner ‘E’ at the bus stop. It’s a poster featuring Toby Jones in character as Culverton Smith, advertising either a new film, TV series or book featuring the character titled something containing the words ‘business’ and ‘murder’.  The words ‘coming soon’ and ‘he’s back’ are also clearly visible… (Watson also walks past a poster for The Book Of Mormon, but not sure that's strictly relevant here.)

12. ‘E’, the woman John meets on the bus, appears in the credits as Elizabeth and is played by Sian Brooke, who played Ophelia to Benedict Cumberbatch’s much-publicised Hamlet at the Barbican in 2015. Look away now if you don’t want a potential spoiler revealed: Brooke was also spotted filming scenes for episode two The Lying Detective, and is referred to by setlockers as “The Lady In Red”.

13. A tenuous one this, but here goes: when John is texting ‘E’ late and asks if she’s a night owl, she replies “vampire”. The Adventure Of The Sussex Vampire is a Sir Arthur Conan Doyle story about a dysfunctional family and a jealous, abusive brother attempting to do away with his younger sibling. Could her jokey answer be a clue to Elizabeth’s back story?

14. There may be a long list of things Sherlock Holmes doesn’t know about (former prime ministers?), but William Shakespeare isn’t on it (Conan Doyle’s “the game is afoot” catchphrase comes from Henry V, incidentally). In The Six Thatchers, Sherlock quotes “by the pricking of my thumbs” from Macbeth. Unless of course, he’s quoting from that other classic British detective writer, Agatha Christie…

15. The Power Ranger strapped to the front of Charlie Welsborough’s Ford was the Blue Ranger. Not sure if that’s relevant, but just being thorough.

16. The continued references to the Black Pearl of the Borgias are a connection to The Adventure Of The Six Napoleons. Said pearl was the treasure hidden inside one of six plaster busts of Napoleon in the original story.

17. Writer Mark Gatiss didn’t only borrow the premise of The Adventure Of The Six Napoleons from Conan Doyle for this modern update but also some names. Thatcher bust distributors Gelder and Co. were also the distributors of the Napoleon busts in the original story. Barnicot, Harker and Sandeford, bust owners, are also repeated between the two.

18. Toby the bloodhound proved a difficult co-star, as Steven Moffat told the Q&A audience in December: “It didn’t move! That was an immobile dog! You know that scene where they’re talking about the dog that won’t move, me and Mark [Gatiss] wrote that on the street to account for the fact the dog wouldn’t move. It just sat there like an ornament!”

19. Toby lives with Craig the hacker. In Craig’s room is a street sign for Pinchin Lane, which is where the original Toby the dog lived (with a Mr Sherman) according to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in The Sign Of Four. Source: Vanity Fair

20. This isn’t the first time Ajay actor Sacha Dhawan has appeared in a Mark Gatiss-written script. He played Waris Hussein in 2013 Doctor Who docudrama An Adventure In Space And Time and then the lead in that year’s The Tractate Middoth.

21. According to this website, there’s a real-life hotel in Tbilisi, Georgia called The Sherlock. Now you know.

22. Mary-in-disguise’s fellow plane passenger was played by James Holmes. No relation.

23. A close-up of one of Mary’s fake IDs reveals one of her aliases to be Gabrielle Ashdown. ‘Gabrielle’ was the fake name used by spy Ilse von Hoffmanstal in 1970 Billy Wilder film The Private Life Of Sherlock Holmes, and ‘Ashdown’ was the alias she used when pretending to be married to Holmes, then later alone in Japan. Source: Vanity Fair

24. The name painted on the boat Mary walks past in Norway, Flekkete Band, means Speckled Band, another Conan Doyle story title. Source: @ingridebs

25. Apparently the name on the boat behind, Løvens Manke, means Lion’s Mane, yet another original Holmes adventure reference, as spotted by Tumblr user Cupidford here.

26. We won't repeat them all here, but this terrific Tumblr page is full of links between Sherlock’s flurry of cases at the beginning of the episode and the original Conan Doyle stories. Find out how the man with the Japanese girlfriend tattoo relates to The Adventure Of The Red Headed League and many more.

27. Throughout the harrowing London Aquarium scenes, filmed in a single day, the team kept themselves amused by inventing facts about sharks, as relevant to their location. “Sharks like beans”, “sharks cannot spell” and so on…

28. Unlike that popular myth, sharks do sleep. In fact, the ones at London Aquarium have to be in bed by 2am, which made filming there difficult and is perhaps why it looks very much as though some scenes are set against a video screen of fish swimming rather than the real thing. “One of the things we did find hard was the aquarium,” said producer Sue Vertue, “which we tried for ages to work out if we could film everything in the aquarium and then we realised that sharks sleep at night. So we had to find another way around doing that.”

29. Mark Gatiss said at the Q&A in December that they had always planned for Mary to die sacrificing herself: “It was always going to be saving Sherlock.”

30. When Sherlock asks Mrs Hudson at the end to say the word ‘Norbury’ to him if she ever thinks he’s becoming “cocky or overconfident” he’s paraphrasing his literary counterpart, who asked John Watson in The Adventure Of The Yellow Face “Watson, if it should ever strike you that I am getting a little overconfident in my powers, or giving less pains to a case than it deserves, kindly whisper 'Norbury' in my ear, and I shall be infinitely obliged to you." Source: Metro

31. When Mycroft arrives home and sees the “13th” note on his fridge, it’s hidden underneath a menu for a Reigate Square takeaway restaurant. The Adventure Of The Reigate Squire is an 1893 Sherlock Holmes story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

32. Prompted by the note on his fridge, Mycroft makes a phone call and asks to be put through to “Sherrinford”. First introduced by Holmes scholar William S. Baring-Gould, Sherrinford is a hypothetical older brother to Mycroft and Sherlock. “I’m not given to outbursts of brotherly compassion. You know what happened to the other one” hinted Mycroft in His Last Vow. At this year's SDCC, Mark Gatiss, Amanda Abbington and Benedict Cumberbatch were photographed holding up signs saying "Thatcher", "Smith" and "Sherrinford". So we can expect to have the Sherrinford mystery solved by The Final Problem?

33. The therapist Sherlock sees at the end of the episode is Ella Thompson (played by Tanya Moodie), who formerly appeared as John’s therapist in A Study In Pink and The Reichenbach Fall. Who better to tell him what to do about John than the doctor who treated him for PTSD and grief?