#I’ve seen so many of my friends in their late 20s/30s leave 5+ year relationships because suddenly they’re having talks with their partners

[upsidedownwithsteve]

hi emmy! i hope this isn't weird but i just wanted to tell you that your writing has made me sooo much more confident in asking for what i want out of my relationships. i owe you big time, thank you so much for everything you share with us 💜

this is such an amazing message to get! I love this. and you’re so right in doing so! get what you deserve! tell potential partners what you expect from relationships! love languages, future plans, wants, needs! they’re all so important!

please don’t read books and watch movies and think these types of men/women/relationships only exist in fiction. no one is ever perfect but understanding what you want - and deserve - from a relationship is so !!! and then communicate that. verbalise it.

and if that person says no or can’t promise you those things, it’s okay to move on.

i’m so happy for you baby 🧡

[thedevilliers]

thank u so much to @wa-royal-tea and @the-royals-ts4 for tagging me!! i had to put some photos on top cause I physically could not make myself answer as emi without any photos sldkjfssf

ALL questions and ALL 60 answers under the cut bc i don’t want to make u guys scroll for 30 years😪

1) What is your favorite sport?

My favorite sport is horse riding and horse jumping! In case you were wondering, I’ve won many medals!

2) What is your favorite color?

Depends! I like yellow, red, blue, baby blue, baby pink, pastel and pearl aqua! My favorite favorite ones have to blue, since it matches my eyes, and yellow! Because yellow is pretty.

3) What is your favorite movie?

My favorite movie is Dignity and Bias! Starring my favorite actress Ciara Dameley. It’s a movie I watch whenever I’m bored or I need comfort. I’ve seen it like, over thirty times!

4) Taken? Single?

I’m currently in a relationship!

5) What would be your perfect day?

Hm. Okay! First, I wake up late, so at around nine a.m.! I take a shower, get ready and have my favorite breakfast: french toast! With strawberries and chocolate syrup. Then, I get to spend the entire day with my horses Cookie and Peanut with my dog Horsey. And! A date with my boyfriend to close the day.

6) Are you a night owl or an early bird?

Early bird! I wake up every day at around seven a.m.

7) Do you think you're smart?

I do! I could definitely be smarter, though.

10) How do you like to be comforted when you are sad?

Hm. I like hugs! My mom always just holds me very close and touches my hair.

11) Where do you want to be in 5 years time?

Hopefully graduated from university! Also maybe living in my own apartment with my dog Horsey.

12) Do you have any regrets?

I don’t think so!

13) Who are/is your best friend(s)?

I have two best friends! First, Paula Joyner. My best friend since first grade! The other one is my mom. I can talk to her about everything and anything.

14) What was your dream last night?

I don’t dream! Or very rarely. I don’t remember.

15) Who in your family are you closest to?

I’m close to both my mom and dad!

16) What is one thing people don't know about you?

Hmm... my dad says I can be too easily swayed and convinced, but I don’t think so!

17) Best present ever given to you?

Horsey! And my horses Peanut and Cookie. Oh, and my Monacan limited edition of Dignity and Bias.

18) What is your favorite food?

Strawberry tarts.

19) Earliest childhood memory?

I remember the first time I had to go to first grade and had to leave Horsey behind! I cried all the way to school. I refused to go in without Horsey!

20) Do you have a crush?

I guess so, my boyfriend!

21) If you could live in a different period, which one would it be?

My mom gave me all the old queen and kings from Gardania’s diaries and King Gideon and his mother’s life sounds interesting. I guess that one? Just because I know there’s missing history details!

22) Any nicknames?

My family and friends call me Emi. Some people at school call me Lia, but it’s not often.

23) Introvert or Extrovert?

Introvert!

24) Favourite book?

Dignity and Bias, of course!

25) Hobby?

Horse riding and baking! My two favorite things.

26) Beach or pool?

Neither! I can’t swim and I’m scared of deep waters. I also don’t like sand, it gets everywhere!I like buying bathing suits, though, they’re cute!

27) First kiss?

Oh, uhm. It was outside my house with my first boyfriend. Even if we aren’t dating anymore, we’re still friends!

28) Favourite subject?

My favorite subject is Math!

29) Age

I’m 16! My birthday is coming soon, though. Just a few months to go!

30) Full name

Emilia Victoria Diane de Villiers! Victoria after my great grandma and Diane after my mom!

31) Pets?

I have three! My dog, Horsey, she’s fourteen, and my two horses Cookie and Peanut.

33) Fave song?

I like everything by Zola Lee. She’s really good! I actually have tickets for her concert in a few months! I’m going with my boyfriend.

34) Where do you live?

I like in Gardania with my parents!

35) What/who do you miss?

I miss my grandma.

36) Which school(s) do/did you go to?

I’m currently attending Ludgrove Academy, I’ll be a Junior soon!

38) Tattoo?

I don’t have any!

39) Done anything illegal?

Um, no!

40) Fav TV show?

My favorite show is Brooklyn 199!

41) Do you know any celebrities?

Yes, a lot of royals! Do they count?

42) Dreams/wishes?

Hm, that I win my national horse jumping competition in a few months!

43) Are you very competitive?

I’d say yes, I am.

44) Greatest gift (could be a physical gift or a spiritual gift)?

I’ve said it a few times but really, my dog Horsey! She makes me really happy.

45) Greatest accomplishment?

All competitions I’ve won with my horses Cookie and Peanut!

46) If you were stuck on a desert island, who would you be stuck with?

My mom! She’d somehow get us out of there.

47) Zodiac sign

I’m a Scorpio!

48) Where were you born?

In Gardania!

49) Sexuality?

Straight!

50) What color are your eyes?

Blue! Like my mom and grandma!

51) What color is your hair?

Brown, like my dad’s hair!

52) Do you want/ have kids?

I’m not sure, I guess? I’ve never thought about it. It’s not something I think about at all.

53) when is your birthday?

My birthday is November 13th!

54) Current mood?

I’d say... fine.

55) Do you send goodnight or good morning texts to people?

I do! To my boyfriend and anyone I’d be texting with, like my best friend!

56) What do you want to be when you grow up/ what is your occupation?

I’m not sure at all!

57) How long do you sleep for?

I go to bed at around nine or ten p.m. and wake up at seven a.m., so... nine hours?

58) How long does it take you to get up in the morning?

Not long! I’m awake within minutes.

59) How long does it take you to get ready?

Very long, since I change my mind on outfits all the time! I try and have my outfits ready since the night before.

60) Meyer Briggs personality type?

I’m INTP!

[impala1967dwinchester]

Jensen Ackles: Green Eyes Meet

*Not My GIF* 

Paring: Jensen Ackles x Reader 

Pov: Jensen Ackles  

Rating: Adult Mature 

Warnings: Sexy Jensen, Green eyes addiction. Swearing, self-image problems, 

Summary: Jensen had never really liked his bright green eyes, but that ended after he met his new personal assistant on the Supernatural Set. Her green eyes grabbing his attention immediately, maybe he did like his green eyes afterall.  

Word Count : 1,653

Since I had been a kid I never liked my bright green eyes. Never was teased for them but the constant fawning over by girls in high school was annoying. That feature was like a crooked nose that everyone noticed and wanted to talk about behind your back, and sometimes in front of you, to you.

When I was a senior in high school my girlfriend was only with me because of that one feature, she had paraded me around to her friends, and family. Showing me off like I was a prize possession a toy. Not her boyfriend the boy she “loved”.

It was like my green eye was the only thing that people saw. Not my work, my thoughts, my personalities. Nothing. In college which was a fucking nightmare, there was another girl her name was Dorothy, she was so cute at least 20 years ago she was cute.

Her personality, her style everything about her was adorable. But yet again a failed relationship all because she was only there for my eye, yet again I have paraded around to parties, functions. Made to feel like she really “loved me”.

I again broke up and went through that motion. Finally, after 20 years I was not an adult but I was getting jobs. I did do a few modeling jobs, acting was sprinkled in too. Then what seemed like a big boom of celebration I was cast in the show Supernatural with a lifetime friend now Jared.

Years Later

Casting and building Supernatural was the best time of my life. A show that was dedicated to two brothers trying to save the world. A fan base that was amazing, best friends for the first time that wanted to be my friend because of me and not what I looked like.

Onset we all had our own personal assistant. Misha had an older woman in her late 30s her attitude every day was to make Misha smile and laugh, be in the goofy mood that every day had been presented.

Jared had another young woman late 20s. She was a fan of the show before we really hit off on the CW. She had gotten the job when she wanted to do an internship, and of course, with Jared being his normal passionate loving, caring person he loved her and always brought her to lunch she was more of a friend if Jared then his personal assistant.

I on the other hand had gone through what seemed to have been at least 6 or 7 younger, and older women. I guess you could compare it to prince charming trying to find Cinderella, every single girl had to size every girl had to have the position.

There was Ashley a young girl, she had brown shoulder-length hair, a straight smile, blue eyes, but she was all over the place with very bad ADHD. She simply wasn’t made for a schedule type of job, but I still made sure her reference papers were nicely written more focused on her great skills rather the ones that needed work.

There was Rebecca, she was middle-aged women, her two adorable kids was all she ever talked about but she was tired and could never keep up with the many types of different things we were always doing.

There was Annie. A straightforward mess of a person, she had a very bad RBF always thought I had done something wrong. I was very quick to say “I need a new personal assistant!”

There was Jessica. A sweet 20-year-old girl, a shorty with an attitude, and a very bad temper with everyone expect with me. I knew that would never work, so yet again I had to ask HR to find me a new PA.

There were Mrs.Miller older women in her late 40s. She was organized, and very sweet but she was sadly was only doing this job while her husband was out of a job. So she went which was quite sad, but I again had to ask.

Then there was Y/n. Her personality was all I ever wanted in a PA. She made life so easy, always at my trailer before I was with a coffee in hand for me and herself. An inquiry of what the day was packed with, always had my lines and would chat with me during lunch. She was exactly what I was looking for. Only after 5 years of yearning and wanting someone with the correct skills.

______________________       Jensen A.    ___________________________

After another 5 years, Y/n and I had the best friendship I have with anyone since I met Jared and Misha. She so sweet and kind, she’d pick me up drunk from the bar, or go with me to premiers of literally anything. We’d go out to see stupid horror movies or funny romcoms. We were like the best of best friends. We were definitely in the hall of best friends.

The many times I had come to Y/n rescue after douche bag dick heads had fucked her over. Leaving her at dinner by herself, driving her home to watch something, and eat a whole tub of ice cream. I was her rock and she was mine.

I never noticed that she and I had the same colored eyes until about two weeks ago when she had on this bright purple jacket. Her eyes popping with the contrast. She was the most beautiful that day she wore a purple jacket with a black turtleneck with a pair of cargo pants and lace-up boots. Just as beautiful as the first day I had met her and every day after that one.

She smelled of peppermint and roses, her makeup light and cute. The pink hue to her cheeks was so adorable. That day we had a few scenes and then an interview and that was it. I drove her home that night and slept blissfully.

As the weeks went on my need to be closer and always around Y/n grew stronger. We’d sit down for lunch and sit down next to her instead of in front of her. I’d bring her coffee during a rough patch.

But one day I think she started to catch on, she’d stop me every day and hug me, like it was the end of the world.

A knock on my trailer door

“Jensen, do you mind if I come in?” Her voice was timid and tired from a day worth of work.

“Yeah, of course, you can come in Y/n.” I got up and opened the trailer door. Her small built frame came into view. Today I hadn’t seen her but once in the morning and now. She was wearing a blue crop top, black pants, a pair of vans. Again such a beautiful as the first day I saw her.

She came in and sat down in her regular seat. She didn’t have any papers on notebooks with her. She probably just wanted to sit in silence enjoying the time together.

“Jensen, how was your day?” she asked.

“Y/n, my day was perfectly fine. How was yours?” This was odd, a normal conversation. This wasn’t what I was used to with her.

“My day was tuff. Do you mind if she just lay down for a minute was something on the tv? Too many thought going on right now.” Her words shy, it sounded as if she were going to cry.

I wrapped my hand around hers and dragged her towards the back of the trailer, a spot where we would relax after a hard day's work, talk about things, do what we wanted to do which was just sit down and watch something. She plopped down and pulled her shoes off, and sat beside her laying my arm out so she could lay down.

If others were to see us like this they would say that we were a couple. Something that I would love but I knew better, she knew better right?

“Jensen, thank you,” She said after a while. I hummed in response, the clock wrote 9:30 on it. It was late but I had clothes here so if we did end up falling asleep here it wouldn’t be the end of the world.

Another hour went by, and Y/n got up. She faced me, sitting crisscrossed. Breathing in deep she began to speak, so I turned off the sound to the tv.

“Jensen, You are the best friend I have ever had. Something I don’t want to ruin with what I’m about to say, I’m going to tell you the truth about how I feel, how I’ve felt for the past five years. It’s hard for me because of course, I don’t know where you are emotional and everything, so here it goes. Jensen, I fell in love with you 5 years ago. I fell in love with your personality, your character, your passion, your love for others, your fans. I love fell in everything about you. This could ruin everything we have but I ho..”

She just looked so beautiful at that moment after so many years of loving her from afar. Jared had seen me fall in love with her, told me to just tell her, I was scared I’d ruin the friendship we had built. So I kissed her, cutting her off mid-sentence.

“I have loved you since the beginning too Y/n. You’re the smartest, most caring person I have met in a long time. You are so beautiful sorry I cut you off but I have been waiting to do that for a long time you know.” I said with my hands still pushed into her sides

She giggled, and leaned her head against mine, and hummed in response. And for the first time I felt like I was living my dream, I was with the person I truly love and that loved me back.

Tag List- @akshi8278​

[okay-victoria]

Love of My Second Life: Tanya & Romance

This is both my take on why, despite seeming like the easiest and healthiest relationship to write, TanyaxVisha is up there with TanyaxMary in difficulty level for pulling off successfully, what I’ve seen go wrong in fanfic so far, and what needs to make it/any romance go right.

Where to start, where to start...um, a warning, for obvious reasons I’m going to have to talk about sex.

The Age Difference

This has the joy of being a bit creepy on both ends of the spectrum! Yay.

Visha Being Creepy

Visha is probably 5 - 6 years older than Tanya. While as more mature adults that age difference is relatively negligible, Tanya being 17/18 and Visha being in her early 20s doesn’t make it suddenly a non-issue. If you and a coworker, both in your first job out of college, went to happy hour and you met his/her significant other and they were a senior in high school, would you feel good about that?

The age-of-consent laws in bygone eras may help your case for why in-story characters give a pass to such things, but it doesn’t really help explain it to your readers. Unless I’m missing something, no one is reading this story from 1920s/30s Germany, and so it needs to have the relationship explained in a way that tries to work for modern standards. Additionally, I think people tend to mix up age-of-consent with “people found this generally appropriate”. A 19 year old dating a 59 year old violates no laws in the United States, but that doesn’t mean that most people are going to consider it a loving and healthy relationship without any proof. Even your in-story characters are probably going to have some thoughts.

The final issue, from Visha’s end of the spectrum, is that even when Tanya is aged up to 18+ and has gained some secondary sexual characteristics, she is sometimes still presented as being an “eternal loli” who can be easily be mistaken for someone around 14/15, an age at which girls normally have some secondary sex characteristics, but distinctly immature ones. I imagine this problem stems from two places:

1) Scenes when Tanya’s lolidom is brought up are not the same scenes as the romantic ones, so the problem is not as obvious to the author and

2) Author forgets that “short+small boobs+doesn’t have wrinkles yet” does not actually result in people looking like they are mid-puberty. Without being really creepy, as women age, their breast tissue drops down and to the side, waist/hip/leg ratios change, and the face loses its baby fat, among other things. Writing that references Tanya as looking like a teen comes along with the unfortunate implication that she actually looks like she is still mid-puberty, and Visha...is into that, instead of being someone who is attracted to petite POST pubescent women.

These are all extremely fixable problems. Really, all an author has to do is make Visha acknowledge that it’s weird, and probably try to talk to Tanya about her reservations before she starts trying to seduce her. It’s the handwave that is the issue. For the last/puberty problem, unless there is some reason I probably don’t want to know about that the author only wants to write the relationship if Tanya looks 14, simply describe her as a petite but adult woman, and if you need to use her looking young as a plot point, have her make an effort to adapt her adult characteristics to suit or hope that nobody looks hard enough to tell the difference.

Tanya Being Creepy

While Tanya is physically the junior member of the relationship, mentally, she is the senior, and by a lot. Tanya knows this. While I don’t necessarily think Salaryman is the Earth’s most morally-pure man, I have a high enough opinion of him to think that he was not pursuing college girls when he was like 35. Tanya should also have a moment of thought over this, or the relationship needs to wait until Visha is closer to her late 20s, when she is approaching a similar level of life maturity that Salaryman would have felt was close to his own.

Even if you think that Salaryman’s logical side would have been eroded by his “but I’m a guy, I can’t help it, college girls are hot” side [I’m side-eyeing you], I think it’s very unlikely that living as Tanya, and being on the receiving end of that kind of stuff, wouldn’t make her reconsider her stance on it, at least a little.

I know, I know, Visha’s been to war! She’s not the same as some random college girl in 2020! While this is allowable as a partial justification, because it is true, it ignores a whole lot.

First off, maturity is not a straightforward drive. All parts of you do not mentally mature at the same time. If you want to write early 20s Visha as a mature-enough partner for Tanya, a bit of time needs to be spent on what Visha loses because of it - she never has, and never will, get to be that happy-go-lucky girl. While making fun of young women for being dramatic gossips, obsessing about non-serious things, etc remains a popular sport, thinking that you are doing Visha a favor by taking that time of her life away from her says pretty terrible things about how society values women’s relationships with each other. If you don’t mean for your fanfic to accidentally imply that, it’s something that needs some love & care.

Alternatively, you could write a story in which Visha, while being a competent adult, still gets space to explore her “girly” side. If doing so, you are going to have to make a really strong case for why Tanya is willing to put up with this, as Salaryman does not come off as someone who would judge it a good use of time & effort to be constantly letting his girlfriend rattle off about things he thinks are silly and immature - there’s a lot of other fish in the sea, why not find one that is a competent adult *and* isn’t often talking about things you don’t care about.

The Canonical Setup of Visha & Tanya’s relationship

Opposite Goals

In a nutshell, Tanya is presented as a person that wants to live a safe, boring, and non-notable life, is doing her best to get there, and is constantly failing and being stressed about it because she needs to figure out a new plan. Visha is presented as someone who has major qualms about Tanya as a human being, but has a nigh-worshipful respect for her heroic officer side.

This is a massive, and I mean MASSIVE problem. You absolutely cannot ignore that what makes the characters happy is diametrically opposed to each other. Can you overcome it? Yes, by slowly developing the characters towards a compromise, but you can’t just not acknowledge it and expect me to think this relationship has any hope of leaving both partners happy. Either Tanya never escapes her never-ending stress cycle, or she does, and the entire basis of Visha’s attachment to Tanya disappears.

This can be fixed by: 1) Tanya coming to terms with a new side of herself, one that wants to be that hero. This cannot just be a one-paragraph epiphany. Tanya is shown to hate when she thinks her internal self is being changed by her new experiences and she needs a lot of work to get to a point where she is willing to acknowledge this in herself.

2) Visha has to go through a rocky part where she second-guesses herself - she thought she wanted Tanya, but turns out, Tanya isn’t the person she thought she is? How and why does she decide that she likes the person Tanya has become? This is probably the easier route, but I think runs the risk of having an author have Visha *say* Tanya does all these other good things for her, but never really show it happening.

3) The happiest medium is probably one where Visha *mostly* adapts towards Tanya, so Tanya gets to live a quiet but not too quiet life, and Visha learns to love another side. As Visha is compromising more in this sense, a healthy relationship is going to include Tanya realizing what is happening and deciding to make an effort to appeal to Visha and not just be like “Take me as I am. Or don’t.” and Visha unilaterally decides to accept that.

Why Does Tanya want to be in a relationship with Visha?

Tanya betrays no actual emotional attachment to Visha in the light novels. While you can read in rationalization to the reasons Tanya gives to her actions, she herself does not believe that it is because of an emotional connection.

Canonically, Tanya is portrayed as liking Visha because of how well Visha passes the “usefulness” test. This brings up another MASSIVE problem - does Tanya, in any way, shape, or form, actually like Visha as an individual, or just  her ability to conform to the role Tanya wants her to play?

Look, I don’t need Tanya to be in LOVE with Visha in the way we usually talk about people being in love to believe that Tanya can be in a relationship successfully. I’m fully on board with a portrayal in which Tanya can’t quite summon that level of emotion. However, she needs to like and respect Visha as an individual person, and summon a level of emotion beyond friend with benefits.

IMO, it is really hard to do that without showing Tanya and Visha disagreeing on a major piece of Tanya’s philosophy and Tanya actually listening and responding positively to it, not simply agreeing to disagree because it isn’t worth upsetting her useful sidekick, or whatever. There needs to be character development of both characters - Visha finding it in herself to be comfortable rocking the boat, and Tanya having a compelling enough reason to change something that she has clung to for two lives.

Everyone wants to be a lesbian

While I get it, the Empire is not the exact same as Germany, and yes, I know that Weimar Germany was relatively sexually progressive, it’s really not something that a well-written romance should handwave.

“Weimar Culture” in many ways developed as a result of how WW1 went for Germany. If you have a story where WW1 doesn’t go that way for Germany, gay culture is unlikely to flourish to the same degree.

All that aside, Tanya isn’t someone that is going to easily shrug her shoulders and say “you know, sometimes you need to jeopardize your career for the sake of hot sex/love”. She’s pretty clear on which she prioritizes. A lesbian relationship is not going to help her here, and she’s going to be aware of it. She needs to struggle with that choice.

Visha not struggling to accept herself as a lesbian is also somewhat of an oversight. It’s pretty unlikely that a woman born in her time period would come to terms with that easily. Visha is also never shown being attracted to other women besides Tanya, which carries a weird “I’m only a lesbian for you” vibe that is like a gross parallel of a straight guy wanting a lesbian to be so attracted to him she can’t help it, she wants the D.

And now, we enter the realm of Tanya’s relationship with her identity and sexuality.

Tanya is shown to have mental qualms both about entering a straight or lesbian relationship in her new life. The reasons behind those qualms are not explored at all in the LN, but they should be in a story in which Tanya goes into a relationship.

No matter which path puberty takes her down, there is the issue of Tanya being comfortable having sex as a woman. Even if it is with another woman, it is not going to be particular similar to the way she had sex with women as a man. That type of thing is pretty tied up with our identity. Tanya hates having her internal, I haven’t changed identity threatened, and not being able to give sexual pleasure/needing to receive it differently is the type of thing that is probably going to come along with some emotional reservations on her part.

Again, sexual identity being a part of our overall identity, while Tanya may remain attracted to women, that means her identity is now as a gay person, not a straight person. Given her biases from both growing up in Japan and the state of gay rights in her new life, it would seem atypical that she would consider this a non-issue and it wouldn’t make her question her priorities or the type of person she thought she was.

But...The Sex?

Look, I get it, sometimes you wanna see certain characters bang. We’ve all been there.

While yes, I recognize that many humans make terrible decisions solely in pursuit of sex, and so it’s perfectly realistic to have Tanya and Visha do the same and say that’s why you’re handwaving everything else, it is an extremely lazy storytelling technique, especially since neither character seems likely to go to extremes for it.

Because people focus so much on sex appeal, unfortunately, they use it as a substitute for making a good case for the relationship. Visha/Tanya is so attracted to Tanya/Visha, that now they are willing to undergo character development, because the pulsing loins urge them to. Really?

Do at least some of it first, lay the groundwork for romantic attraction before you slam them with physical attraction. While it often works the opposite direction in real life, that undercuts the romantic side in fictional story-telling.

I also think that because of the focus on their attraction to each other, what ends up missing in all TanyaxVisha fanfics I’ve seen so far is the tension. That makes it boring, I don’t care about it, and the entire reason I don’t care about it is because the choice to handwave the inconvenient facts means there is nothing in the way besides Tanya being a dumbass, which you can only do for so long without it becoming boring.

They are both attracted to each other, and admit it to themselves. Neither sees any real problem with the relationship other than not knowing if the other person likes them, but they aren’t even hung up on it and mostly work on straightforwardly winning the other person.

When in doubt, blame it on The Patriarchy

As far as we know, Tanya isn’t pining for relationship, and never thinks about a romantic relationship from her old life. Combined with other things Tanya says, it is hard to imagine Salaryman ever had a “considering marriage” relationship - more like, he may have felt partnership had some desirable aspects, but probably never was able to compromise on his kind of extreme worldview enough to try to make it work with someone, just figuring he’d find “the one” one day that wasn’t going to make him compromise.

While of course, you should not need to change everything about who you are for a romantic partner to like you, saying “you should like me for me” and then putting in exactly zero effort to do things because you know they are important to your partner, even if they aren’t for you, is not one of the keys to a successful relationship.

While it is not a problem inherent to Tanya & Visha’s relationship like the above sections, it is a problem in all forms of how I’ve seen the relationship written. It fails to answer a fundamental question: WHAT CHANGED?

Why did Tanya want love/a relationship/a wife in this life, and not in her last? If she did want it in her last life, why did she successfully find love/a relationship/a wife in this life, and not in her last?

Unfortunately, skipping the answer to this question implies that nothing changed. The success is then entirely reliant and Visha, and that brings along with it a really ugly answer.

Visha’s professional I’ll-do-anything-for-you is equated to a personal I’ll-do-anything-for-you, and she very much accepts Tanya for who she is, through all the flaws that are definitely there and that presumably no woman in Salaryman’s life was willing to put up with. Tanya doesn’t have to undergo any character development to be capable of making the relationship work.

This has some really, really unfortunate undertones. It is the very reason why even legal-but-large age difference relationships often aren’t healthy, because the older partner, instead of trying to be someone capable of contributing to the life of someone their own age, decides it’s easier to find someone younger who doesn’t know better and is more willing to put up with their bullshit. That, then, turns into a creepy grooming undertone - you make the less experienced partner think this is normal.

It really isn’t normal or good that Visha should have to put up with a relationship in which she never discovers who she wants to be because she’s so caught up Tanya’s idea of how to live your life. That is borderline emotional abuse, I am sure no one intends it to be there, but without giving some serious treatment to character development, unfortunately, it is.

To me, this has some of the worst overtones of the worst types of male fantasy - My Manic Pixie Dream Girl is completely devoted to me, and instead of emotionally adding to her life and/or our relationship, she is completely fine with me substituting being a Strong Heroic Man who occasionally buys her Nice Things. She demands I change nothing of myself and completely agrees with my Logical Man worldview, no matter what she needs to change about herself to get there. She’s hot, and I get to simultaneously be a straight man and have hot lesbian sex. Even better, because she’s a “strong” woman who is capable in her own right, not only am I physically satisfied, but I get the ego boost of “earning” the submission and subordination of a woman who is better than most people, because she knows I’m better than her.

Honestly, the more I think about it, the grosser it gets, so as far as fanfic goes I just try to ignore it and understand that the authors intention wasn’t to bring along all this baggage. However, to truly write a good Tanya x Visha story that gets away from all these unfortunate implications is a big undertaking, and it’s really impossible for it to make for a compelling side-plot that doesn’t get much screentime.

I’m generally fine with handwaving issues for sideplots, but if Tanya is making decisions because of her relationship with Visha that are now affecting the main plot, it really isn’t something that *should* be handwaved.

Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.

[x-lulu]

gurl 1-99 I dare you😄

haha no if that's too much just 1, 2, 24, 32, 77, 85, 95

well I finally answered them all babe, took me a week haha 💗

1: 6 of the songs you listen to most? world away by tonight alive, you give love a bad name by bon jovi, amnesia by five seconds of summer, had enough by lower than atlantis, take it out on me by thousand foot krutch, if I could fly by one direction, I just named the first that popped in my head

2: If you could meet anyone on this earth, who would it be? YOU

3: Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 23, give me line 17? a wind came in off the harbour, bringing the smell of the sea

4: What do you think about most? I’m an overthinker with anxiety so yeah I think about everything a lot, so I wouldn’t know what I think about most

5: What does your latest text message from someone else say? just an okay haha

6: Do you sleep with or without clothes on? with, an oversized shirt and underwear

7: What’s your strangest talent? latin maybe?

8: Girls… (finish the sentence); Boys… (finish the sentence) I don’t know rock? I’m not really the kind of person that puts a gender in things

9: Ever had a poem or song written about you? uhm I don’t think so, now I feel unimportant haha

10: When is the last time you played the air guitar? I’m more an using a hairbrush as a microphone kind of girl

11: Do you have any strange phobias? probably, I’m scared of a lot of things

12: Ever stuck a foreign object up your nose? don’t think so

13: What’s your religion? officially I’m Christian, I’m a bit searching for what I believe in tho, I do believe in jezus but not like walking on water and coming back from the death, I might believe in the Greek gods and nature gods

14: If you are outside, what are you most likely doing? enjoying the fresh air, going for a walk/ride and look at cute animals

15: Do you prefer to be behind the camera or in front of it? behind

16: Simple but extremely complex. Favorite band? even if you kill me I don’t know what band to say

17: What was the last lie you told? I lied about not being sad

18: Do you believe in karma? I don’t know, sometimes, but like there are people who’ve done terrible things, where is their karma?

19: What does your URL mean? it’s just my nickname, I didn’t want to make it fandom related because I’m a multi fandom and I didn’t want to have to change my url a lot, I also didn’t want to put my real name because I don’t want people to find me who I know in real life haha

20: What is your greatest weakness; your greatest strength? my insecurity is my greatest weakness I think, I don’t know my greatest strength... maybe being a person who people feel loved and welcome by? Idk if people feel that way and idk if it’s a strength. If I’m gonna be poetic I have to say my greatest weakness and strength are both that I love someone with my whole heart, when I start loving you, I love you so much, I would do anything for you, but when someone fucks up, I’ll still love them even tho they don’t deserve it, so that comes with a lot of pain so yeah a weakness and a strength

21: Who is your celebrity crush? rudy pankow and dylan obrien

22: Have you ever gone skinny dipping? yes

23: How do you vent your anger? I keep everything to myself till I explode and start screaming

24: Do you have a collection of anything? music records, stones and just memories from places I’ve been to

25: Do you prefer talking on the phone or video chatting online? neither? If I’m comfortable I do enjoy video chatting especially in times like these where you can’t speak in real life

26: Are you happy with the person you’ve become? this is hard one, I’ve never been happy with who I am, I do like me better than who I used to be

27: What’s a sound you hate; sound you love? sound I love is when you’re walking trough the woods just the birds, can’t think of one I hate, I definitely have some they just don’t come to mind rn

28: What’s your biggest “what if”? what if I keep going through and it doesn’t get better

29: Do you believe in ghosts? How about aliens? yes and yes/maybe

30: Stick your right arm out; what do you touch first? Do the same with your left arm. my laptop and my pillow

31: Smell the air. What do you smell? flowers

32: What’s the worst place you have ever been to? xanten

33: Choose: East Coast or West Coast? uhm west coast? Idk haha

34: Most attractive singer of your opposite gender? harry styles is the first one that pops in my head

35: To you, what is the meaning of life? to find love, can be someone something, experience things that make you happy, enjoy it, learn, better the world

36: Define Art. creating something, it can have a meaning but it also can’t, a lot of people give it a deep meaning, which can be it, I just think art doesn’t always have to be deep are spectacular it can be someone making something because they have so much going in their head and they find peace in creating art and get inspired by their own experience, people also can it just do for fun, there are so many different kind of art and artists, I don’t think it can’t be defined

37: Do you believe in luck? I don’t know

38: What’s the weather like right now? rainy

39: What time is it? 9:54 pm

40: Do you drive? If so, have you ever crashed? no licence

41: What was the last book you read? a fanfic on Wattpad fight or flight by ffsumth

42: Do you like the smell of gasoline? yes 🙈

43: Do you have any nicknames? lu and lulu obviously, loesje , samantha, pinguïn, polar bear, you called me lulu bear hehe

44: What was the last film you saw? I don’t remember...

45: What’s the worst injury you’ve ever had? uhm ive broken a few things, my toes and my arm, but nothing really bad actually

46: Have you ever caught a butterfly? no, I don’t want to, I have seen some really close, they’re beautiful

47: Do you have any obsessions right now? again you haha, but like all the stuff I post on here are my obsessions

48: What’s your sexual orientation? I don’t know, I think straight, but I don’t know for sure

49: Ever had a rumour spread about you? yeah

50: Do you believe in magic? I’m not certain, maybe I do :) I do live by the saying ‘just because you haven’t seen it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist’

51: Do you tend to hold grudges against people who have done you wrong? sadly yes, like I won’t be mean to you or anything, but I will never ever trust you again, if I’m hurt I’m hurt and sadly I haven’t found a way yet to leave it behind, so I’m feeling a lot of pain and I’m never gonna forget that pain, so yeah...

52: What is your astrological sign? capricorn

53: Do you save money or spend it? uhm both? depends on how I feel and what time of the year it is, I have the bad habit to save it for a few months and then spend a lot of it

54: What’s the last thing you purchased? a apple pen so I can start trying digital art

55: Love or lust? love

56: In a relationship? with you hehe

57: How many relationships have you had? none official relationships, I’m just not lovable okay leave me alone haha

58: Can you touch your nose with your tongue? no oops

59: Where were you yesterday? home, school, therapy

60: Is there anything pink within 10 feet of you? a pillow

61: Are you wearing socks right now? no

62: What’s your favourite animal? polar bears

63: What is your secret weapon to get someone to like you? no idea haha, I don’t have one

64: Where is your best friend? at home, like 20min away

65: Give me your top 5 favourite blogs on Tumblr. this is hard so I’m just gonna name the first five that come in my head @nxsmss @rafej-cambanks @thegreatestofheck @chrlsgillespie @nedleed

66: What is your heritage? I don’t know 🤷‍♀️

67: What were you doing last night at 12AM? sleeping, I had to get up early today

68: What do you think is Satan’s last name? never thought about it

69: Be honest. Ever gotten yourself off? no

70: Are you the kind of friend you would want to have as a friend? Is it bad to say yes? I mean I hate myself but I do think I’m a good friend

71: You are walking down the street on your way to work. There is a dog drowning in the canal on the side of the street. Your boss has told you if you are late one more time you get fired. What do you do? save the dog obviously!!!!

72: You are at the doctor’s office and she has just informed you that you have approximately one month to live. a) Do you tell anyone/everyone you are going to die? b) What do you do with your remaining days? c) Would you be afraid? I think I would tell people, I’m not sure, but like so have people got the time to say goodbye the way they want to, I would travel the world I think, do everything on my bucket list, maybe some illegal stuff 🙈 (where no one gets hurt tho obviously), I don’t think I would be afraid... I mean I’m suicidal, I’ve literally been connected to death my whole life, if you understand what I mean

73: You can only have one of these things; trust or love. uhm trust I think? If I would have love but don’t have trust I wouldn’t really feel loved anyway, I do really want to experience how it feels like to be loved tho...

74: What’s a song that always makes you happy when you hear it? the first song that came to mind is love my life by Robbie Williams, I rarely listen to it, but the lyrics really gives a boost of happiness and confidence

75: What are the last four digits in your cell phone number? 51 54

76: In your opinion, what makes a great relationship? loyalty and trust, you don’t have to agree on everything or be interested in the same things, you do have to be there for each other

77: How can I win your heart? YOU ALREADY HAVE

78: Can insanity bring on more creativity? yes I think so

79: What is the single best decision you have made in your life so far? to get dogs

80: What size shoes do you wear? uhm 38 eu, 4,5 uk and 7 us

81: What would you want to be written on your tombstone? a loving ... I hope to be a loving daughter, friend, wife and mother, someone who was always there for others

82: What is your favourite word? fuck haha, no idk but that is definitely a word I use a lot

83: Give me the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word; heart. pain....

84: What is a saying you say a lot? enjoy the little things

85: What’s the last song you listened to? ignorance by paramore

86: Basic question; what’s your favourite colour/colours? uhm I do love black, I also like pastels and like a turquoise kind of colour

87: What is your current desktop picture? me and my friend

88: If you could press a button and make anyone in the world instantaneously explode, who would it be? no one, there are a lot of people who did wrong, the need to be in jail, but I’m not saying someone deserves to die

89: What would be a question you’d be afraid to tell the truth on? what goes on in my head, how I’m feeling

90: One night you wake up because you heard a noise. You turn on the light to find that you are surrounded by MUMMIES. The mummies aren’t really doing anything, they’re just standing around your bed. What do you do? scream probably haha

91: You accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow you with the super-power of your choice! What is that power? teleportation, I would travel the world haha

92: You can re-live any point of time in your life. The time-span can only be a half-hour, though. What half-hour of your past would you like to experience again? when I was in Ireland by the cliffs of moher

93: You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be? uhm this is a hard one, maybe seeing my father almost dying? (he is okay btw, we were lucky), I’ve had nightmares and anxiety ever since

94: You have the opportunity to sleep with the music-celebrity of your choice. Who would it be? I find this so weird to say for some reason... if I have to give a name it would be harry styles I think, because damn look at that man, but I don’t know, I would rather be friends with him than sleep with him tbh, I know you can do both haha, but idk I’m not like yes I want to sleep with him haha, I think I’ve read too many fanfics about him that I would find it awkward

95: You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere. You have to depart right now. Where are you gonna go? ice land or canada

96: Do you have any relatives in jail? don’t think so, not close ones anyway

97: Have you ever thrown up in the car? no, I got out in time haha

98: Ever been on a plane? yes, when I went on a trip to georgia in west asia

99: If the whole world were listening to you right now, what would you say? you’re all ignorant assholes haha, no idk what I would say, there are a lot of good people on this world I know, but man there is some fucked up shit, so maybe I would educate some people or it would have something to do with mental health, maybe about loving yourself or that it’s not a sign of weakness and that we should be treated as equals to physical pain, we should be taken seriously... I don’t really know, there are so many things haha

[ourrightside]

10 Reasons Why Carrie Bradshaw Wasn’t THAT Bad...

Sex and the City is the most elite series I’ve ever watched - and I was so excited to purchase the first season when I turned 18.

I would listen to my mom and my sister gossip about the show when I was younger and feel so left out. But, my mom would refuse to let me watch it until I became an adult. Thank god.

Being an avid fan now, I sometimes scan through Sex and the City articles on the net, and can’t help but notice dozens of articles filled with ‘Carrie’ slander - which kind of makes me nervous.

Although it was true that years ago girls were labeling themselves as the ‘Carrie’, ‘Samantha’ and ‘Charlotte’ of the group - the serious and less glamorous friend got stuck with being a ‘Miranda’; it is kind of an insult now to be deemed as a Carrie. 

As we all matured, we realized that being a Miranda is amazing and we should all strive to be just as successful - but Carrie Bradshaw is still a valid character and I’m here to prove why the “sexual anthropologist” is not all that bad. 

Now before I dive into why I totally get Carrie Bradshaw, I would just like to point out before hand that I am aware that she is just a fictional character and hopefully you are too. If you are not informed, then I apologize for this harsh revelation. However, let’s continue. 

1. She was average looking

While we can all agree that her physique only gets stronger and leaner throughout the series, she was still not exactly perfect looking. Despite her fit body, she was not model like or necessarily tall. She did not have a perfect nose. She did not have the biggest ‘lady parts’. She did not have the plumiest lips. She did not have perfect facial symmetry.

But, she was okay with it. And has mentioned that by the age of 30, she was over being uncomfortable with her looks and decided to move on.

Despite constantly bumping into models and having to accept that men can be total “modelizers” - especially in the capital of the world aka manhattan, she chose to embrace her natural beauty, which in turn has allowed her to walk the runway in her underwear.

2. She was selfish 

Yes, the new trend is to be selfish and say no - because that is ‘self love’.

If that truly is the case, then there was no denying then that Carrie was selfish throughout the series.

As human beings, we are selfish by nature. But since we now identify ourselves in societies with expected norms and values, being selfish disqualifies you sometimes from your environment. To avoid being lonely, we try to let go of being selfish or at least hide our selfish traits.

Unfruitfully so, our selfish instincts at times fail us - exposing our true colors. And whenever that happens, people aren’t too afraid of pointing out what you did wrong. It doesn’t make us necessarily evil, just makes us human.

To avoid being Freudian in this post, let’s just sum up that Carrie is harmlessly selfish at times - that includes being late to every event, asking her friend Susan Sharon if she could trade in her cashmere sweater birthday gift for cash, accepting a pair of 600$ shoes from her other super rich friend, and cutting off Charlotte’s possible infertility problem discussion to talk about her Manolos.

The list goes on, I mean - this is just classic Bradshaw behavior. However, this character cannot be deemed as bad. She was just under the spotlight, and if we were under it too, we would find out that we do have these moments as well without realizing it. We are not perfect. However, Carrie does reflect on her mistakes often, which is something we should be doing more. 

Sometimes, her selfish tendencies can really get out of hand. 

It was not okay when she got angry at Charlotte who did not offer to lend her money after she blew it all off on Manolo Blahnik shoes instead of rent. It was not okay when she threw away Aiden down the drain. It was not okay when she slept with a married man, even if it was ‘Mr. Big’.

We cannot shame her though because we all have hidden skeletons in our closets...it’s up to you however to peak in and see which faults make it or break it for you. 

3. She was a working woman 

No offense to chastity ball princess Charlotte, who wanted to be a housewife to any rich man who crossed path with her, Carrie Bradshaw was by all means an ‘all star’ business woman. Despite being unconventional unlike Samantha Jones (PR executive) and Miranda Hobbes (Harvard-graduate Lawyer), Carrie Bradshaw was a restless woman that worked in multiple fields all at once despite being so undermined.

She had so many tasks to tackle all at once while juggling multiple projects. She ran around between the fields of Journalism, Content Marketing and Public Relations. She was able to get invited into all the ‘fabulous’ events and meetings because of the hard work she invested in all by herself as a freelancer who lived in a huge place like New York. Carrie finally reached her goal at the age of 40, which was working at Vogue. She even wrote multiple books as well.

4. She was unconventional

Despite the show running in the early 90s, Carrie Bradshaw decided to be a sex columnist. She never gave up on her weird unconventional job and was proud of her career despite the looks or comments people would make. She had a weird exterior in addition to how upfront she was about the physical makings of life.

In addition, Carrie did not believe in marriage until she became a fiancée at the age of 40. She traded in a ring for a pair of shoes and a walk-in closet, unlike most women, who would rather get married in their mid 20 to early 30s with a huge rock on their finger. 

5. She was struggling at adulting

Carrie Bradshaw had a deluded concept of adulting that at least most of us had or still struggle with. She was not a healthy adult with financial stability and a well thought out regime. However, she still managed to be fabulous.

She had poor dieting habits, which made her sometimes skip dinner to buy Vogue instead. She believed that shopping and gossiping were the best types of cardio. She was not the cleanest and had a messy apartment at most times. She did not care about the way her living space looked like, which she later on freaked out about in fear of being judged as an imperfect adult according to Mr Big. She paid so much on shoes that she could no longer afford her rent. She believed that investments must be seen in her closet. She drank at least six dollars worth of coffee per day. She would smoke and drink way too much for a thirty year old woman.

6. She was a good friend

Carrie Bradshaw had so many friends that it almost put her PR bestie Samantha to shame. To be honest, Carrie may have not been a perfect friend, but she was as good as it gets realistically.

What made her so realistic in her friendships was her ability to be there for most of her friends’ hardships. She had her ups and downs with her empowered female group because sometimes they would feel like she was too problematic and vice versa. For the most part, it is impossible to be as passionate to your friends as you once were the first time you guys met. But what makes a friend a good one is that they never voluntarily try to find excuses to leave you behind.

Carrie’s love towards her friends in her good and bad times showed that she valued them like family. 

7. She was lost

Carrie was probably more lost than she would have liked to be. She had a tendency to dwell on what should have been and could have been. We all have regrets and sometimes she voiced hers out more than other characters within the show. She would sometimes yearn over the years that passed by her. She even went to extremes such as dating a college boy just to remember what it was like to ‘just kiss’. Rookie Mistake, Carrie.

Just like Carrie, as time goes by at any age, we look back at the spur of events that created our timeline and take note sometimes of which events we deem as either life-changing, traumatizing or both.

8. She was experimental 

She may not have been as promiscuous as her friend Samantha, but she was unarguably adventurous in all aspects of her life. Although the most obvious aspect may have been her outfits, her wild colors and funny textural accessories were just a preview on how eccentric Carrie Bradshaw truly was. She mentioned that her younger years were a genuine pursuit of fun in every shape or form, which most twenty-something-year-olds cannot deny.

She emphasized that she fears living life as a cautious person because of the hurt she has endured. However, she truly defined throughout the show what it means to be eccentric, empowering the ones who fail the experiments of life to get back on their feet. 

9. She was flawed

Carrie Bradshaw believed in the glass half full rather than half empty throughout the series. Despite being unbearably flawed to the point where her friends no longer wanted to listen to her problems, she decided to see a shrink which is something that would have been especially socially-unacceptable in the 90s. Carrie still overcame her mental issues and found other remedies which in turn has led her into accepting the way things played out. 

As we grow up, we, like Carrie, need a little bit of help in order to realize that temporary issues will fade away into lessons and the permanent ones that are out of our control can be accessorized into our lives accordingly to the way that we want it to look like.

10. She was in love

Her love towards Mr Big was illogical - almost completely insane. But what made her character so special was the fact that she never continued her relationship with Aiden because she knew deep down that it was Mr Big all along and never gave up on it; despite all the signs that kept telling her that he was bad for her. He was at the time indeed bad news, which made her feelings towards him fluctuate between love and hate.

Now, the psychology behind her and Mr Big does not justify why you should call your ex right now so put your phone down, but it is something to think about. 

Carrie took the road not taken for most women, especially during the 90s where gender roles in love where still a bit rigid. While it is true that it is always easier to date lovers who make the effort to chase you rather than pursuing it yourself, the easiness does not create the ‘fairytale love’ that most of us strive for.

Carrie once described her love towards him as a crash rather than a crush. But if something deep down is telling you that someone is your person, shouldn’t that account for something? Shouldn’t we all just go for ‘ ridiculous, inconvenient, time-consuming can’t-live-without-each-other love’, and get it right just like she did?

- Nina xx (yasminasayyid)

[ferricadooza]

dig deeper tag game

i was tagged by the lovely @tempolarriefix, thank you serena!!

1. Do you prefer writing with a black pen or a blue pen? either or! the only stipulation is it has to be a uni-ball signo. best damn glide i’ve ever experienced.

2. Would you prefer to live in the country or in the city? if i could live with all of my friends on a huge farm out in the country, i 100% would. otherwise, probably the city. small towns are not my thing.

3. If you could learn a new skill, what would it be? cooking! i’m a terrible cook and i don’t much like it either, which makes it difficult to want to learn haha

4. do you drink your tea/coffee with sugar? tea, yes, but i usually drink my coffee black unless it’s really, really bad.

5. What was your favourite book as a child? nancy drew babey 6. Do you prefer baths or showers? definitely showers!

7. If you could be a mythical creature, which one would you be? a griffin

8. Paper or electronic books? if it’s a book, paper, but i’m not gonna print out all 500 pages of a fic to read, so those are electronic

9. What is your favourite item of clothing? my louis sweats

10. Do you like your name? Would you like to change it? i used to haaaaaate my full name because no one could pronounce it correctly, but it’s growing on me :)

11. Who is a mentor to you? probably my future therapist

12. Would you like to be famous? If so, what for? i want to be infamous. i want to be one of the most hated people in certain circles. probably for defending rpf lmao.

13. Are you a restless sleeper? not lately

14. Do you consider yourself to be a romantic person? mmmmmm no, not really. i think like most people i have my moments, but i think when it comes to relationships, i’d rather just like. have fun with someone.

15. Which element best represents you? fire, although scorpios are supposedly water signs haha

16. Who do you want to be closer to? my friends! most people will tell you i’m emotionally unavailable (which is true) but i’m working on it :) 17. Do you miss someone at the moment? @ltwalls2020 :(

18. Tell us about an early childhood memory. i went to visit my grandparents when i was like? 7 or 8? anyway, they live in texas, and i very vividly remember being on a tarantula farm and one of these massive,1ft diameter spiders escaping from its crate and there being mass panic all around me because it was venomous. when i brought this memory up to my mom when i was about twelve, however, she told me that it had never happened, so uhhhhhh guess i had a very realistic dream that i believed actually happened for 4-5 years. 

19. What is the strangest thing you have eaten? i had a coworker give me some dill flavored peanuts or something similar once and those were an experience, but i haven’t really eaten too many out-of-the-ordinary foods

20. What are you most thankful for? louis tomlinson

21. Do you like spicy food? yes! but i do have my limits haha

22. Have you ever met someone famous? i “met” dan and phil during their second tour if you consider completely freezing and not being able to get a single word out meeting someone

23. Do you keep a diary or journal? no, but i kept a pretty pretentious one (as you do) when i was around 16

24. Do you prefer to use pen or pencil? pen always, unless i’m drawing in which case i prefer charcoal

25. What is your star sign? scorpio

26. Do you like your cereal crunchy or soggy? crunchy

27. What would you want your legacy to be? an instigator, but a loving instigator 28. Do you like reading? What was the last book you read? iiiiiiii mostly read fics these days haha. last fic i read was if i had no love left to give by @kingsofeverything

29. How do you show someone you love them? spending time with them and listening

30. Do you like ice in your drinks? sometimes, but not always!

31. What are you afraid of? rejection, loneliness

32. What is your favourite scent? bakeries

33. Do you address older people by their name or surname? i don’t

34. If money was not a factor, how would you live your life? i would travel and write and visit all of my friends to my heart’s content

.35. Do you prefer swimming in pools or the ocean? pools...i’m afraid of the ocean

36. What would you do if you found $50 on the ground? it would depend on where i was. if i was in a store, i’d take it to their claims dept and leave it in case someone realized and came back for it. if i found it on the sidewalk, i’d pick it up and keep it

37. Have you ever seen a shooting star? Did you make a wish? yes and no

38. What is one thing you would want to teach your children? mmmmmm i can’t even imagine ever having children at this point in my life so i feel like i should pass on this one. 

39. If you had to have a tattoo, what would it be and where would you get it? i want ‘day by day’ in louis’ handwriting over the inside of my elbow

40. What can you hear right now? you missed my heart by phoebe bridgers and the diluted sounds of my mom on a conference call

41. Where do you feel the safest? in bed

42. What is one thing you want to overcome/conquer? my crippling self esteem issues 43. If you could travel back to any era, what would it be? ancient greece 44. What is your most used emoji? side eyes haha

45. Describe yourself using one word. idiot <3

46. What do you regret the most? ever believing i was straight

47. Last movie you saw? the fear of 13 maybe? great documentary!

48. Last tv show you watched? i’m currently rewatching the vampire diaries hehe 49. Invent a word and its meaning plumify - to humble brag

i’m tagging: @larryscurves, @ltwalls2020, @lightwoodsmagic, @gulsuyu, @chaoticlarents, and @liamslarents

[lovemesomesurveys]

1. How has covid affected you? Fortunately, so far neither myself nor anyone close to me has had it. My parents have been able to keep their jobs. My brother was out of work briefly when his job closed, but thankfully he was able to get another job a few months later with the same company. I’m able to stay home with the exception of my once a month doctor appointment, so I’ve been able to quarantine. I am very thankful we haven’t been affected terribly. However, it certainly has caused a lot of stress and anxiety to say the least. It makes scared. And sad. Everyday I’m afraid to read the news. I worry a lot about my family who like I said has been working this whole time during this, so they’re out there around other people all the time. I worry about people not taking the necessary precautions and not taking it seriously. I know people are tired of it so they’re started loosening up. I’m afraid there’s no end in sight to this anytime soon. :/ It’s also made me even more of a homebody than I already was since like I said I only ever leave the house once a month for a doctor appointment. Which, by the way, makes me very anxious. I’ve been in this house for most of this year, afraid to go anywhere or do anything. I don’t when I’ll feel safe to do anything.  2. What is a comfort show of yours ? Probably shows like The Golden Girls, Roseanne, The Gilmore Girls, Full House, Boy Meets World...stuff that makes me feel nostalgic.  3. Are you open about your past or do you not let anyone in? I’m pretty open in these surveys that’s for sure. I’m more closed off in person. 4. Favourite fast food joint? It changes. Lately, I’ve been into chicken tenders, fries, and cheesecake from Carl’s Jr. 5. Do you think we were put on this earth for a reason? Yes.

6. What is something you have done this year you’re proud of? Nothing. 7. Do u ever feel like surveys are usually the same questions? Too many of the same basic questions like about your relationship status and exes and who you last kissed.  8. What were you doing 10 years ago? Wow, I was 21 years old. I was attending community college. I had friends and a social life. I wasn’t without some of my health issues, but it wasn’t like it is now that’s for sure. 9. Do you call out Karen’s when they’re harassing a cashier? No. 10. Animal crossing , yay or nay? Yay. I love New Horizons. It’s the only Animal Crossing game I’ve played, but I’ve been enjoying it since I started playing back in like April. 11. Why do you like to do surveys? They’re like my diary entries. I’m able to express how I’m feeling and vent and ramble when needed. There’s questions that prompt and allow me to get stuff off my chest. They give me something to do, something to distract myself with, stuff to think about. And like diaries, I’m able to look back and see how things have changed and what was going on at different times.  12. Did you ever have a MySpace ? Yep. I was super into Myspace back in the day. It’s crazy how one day everyone seemed to just leave and migrate over to Facebook and that ended up becoming the popular thing and Myspace and was seen as lame.  13. Do you think breaks are toxic in a relationship? I wouldn’t say they’re toxic.  14. Do you have a YouTube channel? If no , would you create one? If yes what’s your content? I have an account, but that’s so I can subscribe, favorite, add videos to be watched later, and comment if I feel the need to do so. I’m not a YouTube creator. 15. Are you a math person? Nooo. 16. What’s the worse thing someone has said to you? Hm. 17. Have you ever befriended someone because you felt bad? No. 18. Would you ever date someone online? No. 19. Have you been ghosted before? Would you ghost someone? Yes, I have. And I’ve ghosted. :/ 20. When do you think things will be normal again? I don’t know. :/ I mean, I don’t think things will ever be exactly how they were pre-covid. Things are and will be different, we’ll have a new normal going forward. I just pray for the day we have it under control and better managed and it’s not this major threat and looming fear over us. That we’ll be able to go out and not have a high chance of catching something potentially life threatening or deadly. We’ll always be mindful of it and I think we should keep our precautions in place as our new normal, but things will be safer and not as strict. 21. Do you watch anime? No. 22. Biggest goal you wanna reach before 2020 is over ? Just get through it. 23. How old did/do you turn this year ? I turned 31. 24. Do you like tiktok? Yeah. I end up spending a lot of time on there.  25. Do you ever miss vine? I went on Vine and there are the classic funny vines that people still remember, but I’m honestly into TikTok a lot more. I spend more time on there and there’s people I follow who I’ve really taken an interest in and keep up with. There’s the funny side of TikTok and people tend to just think of the dance trends on there, but honestly there’s a really wholesome side to it that I really enjoy as well. 26. How are you doing, seriously? ”Do you have the time to listen to me whine about nothing and everything all at once? I am one of those melodramatic fools, neurotic to the bone, no doubt about it.” 27. Is there someone you want to talk to but you know you can’t? Not at the moment. 28. Do you make jokes to cope with your problems? Yeah.  29. Have you ever had someone call you their best friend but you didn’t even consider them a close friend? Yes.  30. Have you ever dealt with a pathological liar? No, I don’t think so. 31. Long or short surveys? Long. 32. If ur in school , are you doing it on zoom or in class? I’m glad I’m done with school and don’t have to do the zoom thing.  33. Would you ever have a pet rat? Noooooo. 34. Favourite memory with your best friend? I have countless favorite memories. 35. Favourite type of content to watch on YouTube? ASMR, vloggers, lifestyle. 36. Are you allergic to anything serious? Nothing serious, no. I am allergic to tangerines, but it’s not life threatening. 37. Dream job? I don’t have one. :/

38. Do you think dreams mean anything? Sometimes. 39. Fav clothing brand? Is Hot Topic and Boxlunch a brand cause I get majority of my graphic tees from them. Oh, I also love Adidas. 40. Do you miss anyone? My loved ones who have passed away.

[reminiscences]

another attempt at blogging

i started this tumblr a couple years ago at the same time kate did. i can’t remember why—i’m sure tumblr was in the news again for some reason. i guess it was before the great porn purge. i was talking about blogging again this week with my friend daniel, and i woke up this morning and he had sent me a blog he wrote on a new tumblr account early in the morning, so to continue my regression to the early 2010s, i too have rebooted tumblr, given it an era-appropriate name, and decided to give it another go.

the problem with having a newsletter is that i don’t think anyone wants to hear from me in their inbox daily, so i’ve become very precious about the things i write there. it feels like it has to really matter. i like blogs because they’re disposable and can be dumb and not your best writing. how many two-graf tumblr posts did i write in 2011 that were just thoughts i idly had during a statistics lecture? anyway, here’s the first blog, they won’t all be this long probably. 

When I think about eventually looking back at this year I think about what I want to remember from it. I will remember the first week of March. I’ll remember the last birthday party I attended in person at Branch Ofc, a perfectly serviceable Crown Heights bar that was very full of people. I’ll think about that night and how I showed up to the party with a Ziplock full of homemade salted chocolate chip cookies in my purse, how I shared them with a table where the birthday-haver and their friends sat. Breathing in the same air as the four dozen other people crammed into the bar. I can’t imagine it now. I like Branch Ofc because it is unpretentious without pretending to be a dive, unlike Sharlene’s, which tries too hard to mimic the aesthetic trappings of an authentic dive bar but is really just a normal Park Slope bar. Branch Ofc is just a bar where you can buy drinks, and it was an eight-minute walk from my old apartment. It used to be a bar with a photobooth and Big Buck Hunter but I think both of those are gone now. 

For a few days in March, it felt like people were preparing for a snow day. Everyone was slightly more on edge than giddy—but only slightly. “WFH but make it a coffeeshop” I saw on someone’s Instagram story, a selfie with four of their friends coworking somewhere in Bushwick, completely nullifying the point of a work-from-home edict. I ran into my friend Maddie at the renovated Key Food on Nostrand the next week. Maddie, her roommate and I were in the aisle with the Pop Tarts and the Oreos. “I feel like I should get those?” we asked each other, pointing at junk food. I wasn’t wearing a mask or gloves; nobody was. Some guy wearing a Cornell University Sigma Chi tshirt walked by us with the largest bag of dried beans I’ve ever seen in my life slung over his shoulder. That was a man who had never soaked dried beans in his life. I wonder if he ever ate the beans. We were a bunch of idiot 20-somethings blindly grabbing for cans of soup and Fritos for the end of the world. What were any of us doing there? Why was it imperative that day that I make and freeze a lasagna? Maddie’s roommate had fresh lasagna noodles from Eataly she wasn’t going to use before she left for her parents’ house, and she said I could have those. She brought them over for me and I idly wondered if you could get Coronavirus from someone else’s fresh pasta noodles or if the heat of the oven would kill the germs. I made my lasagna.

I’ll think about how March-to-May is just one long gray blurry streak in my head. I baked, I got into running, I said “running with a mask? No thank you, no more running for me,” I got a job, I felt bad about getting a job when everyone I knew in journalism was getting laid off. I did a lot of Zoom Zumba. At first I slept terribly, and then I started sleeping too much, and then I stopped sleeping again at some point during that stretch. There was a novelty to suddenly being inside all the time that made it feel like an excuse to get “really into martinis.” I got really into martinis. Then I stopped drinking for a couple months. Remember “Zoom happy hours”? 

The thing I use most as a means of setting apart different eras in my head is the music I used as a soundtrack at the time. I rang in the 2014 new year in my cute apartment on Westcott Street in Syracuse with my college boyfriend, drunk and blaring Cold Cave, before we walked down the street to Alto Cinco and got Mexican food and passed out. It was my senior year and I only had a few more months of living like this and I loved the small life I’d built for myself there. Of course, it couldn’t stay. When we broke up a year and a half later after he moved to New York, where I had been living for most of a year, I walked around the neighborhood near the Myrtle-Wyckoff stop, close to where we were living together, listening to Mitski’s 2014 album Bury Me At Makeout Creek. I sat in Maria Hernandez Park and watched a bunch of kids play Red Rover. I didn’t especially want to go home because I hadn’t taken an escape route into account when we broke up and somehow timed it out so that things ended after the first of the month, leaving me with three-and-a-half weeks of continuing to share an apartment with someone whose heart I had just broken. In retrospect it’s clear to me that I had just outgrown a relationship with someone five years older than me who hadn’t grown up at all, but I hear that Mitski album now and all I think about are the cold early April days of 2015 when no place and no person felt like home. There’s a line in First Love/Late Spring, by Mitski, where she sings “胸がはち切れそうで,” which translates to something like “My chest is about to burst (with grief).” My advice to recent college graduates moving to New York is to simply not do anything the way I did it. 

So when I think about 2020, I do not want to associate any music I previously had fond memories of with this year. This is unfortunate because every musician I like who produces sad music has nothing but time on their hands now and they’ve all come out with new songs and albums. My recently played selections on Spotify look like a cry for help: Phoebe Bridgers, Bright Eyes, even Tigers Jaw. 

On Saturday I couldn’t sleep in. I woke up at 5:30 and watched the sun appear through my bedroom windows. I kept rolling over, trying to sleep again, but it was futile. Eventually I got up and got dressed, and left my apartment on foot. The walk into lower Manhattan is a few miles from my new place in Fort Greene. I walked west on Fulton, and then down Flatbush. It would have saved me ten minutes to take the Manhattan Bridge, but I’ve always regarded it as the ugliest of the bridges to cross on foot or on bike—last fall, I would walk home from Ben’s apartment over the Manhattan Bridge, and it was just so grey. You get an okay view of Dumbo, I guess, on the walk east, but it isn’t much to look at. When I got back to the Brooklyn side on those walks, I’d get on the A at High Street and take it back to Nostrand instead of walking the last couple miles. 

So I chose the Brooklyn Bridge this time. It was as busy as you’d expect it to be in a non-pandemic event. Instagram boyfriends took pictures of their girlfriends, who took off their masks for a few seconds for the right shot. I saw a couple taking engagement pictures in front of the lower Manhattan skyline. It felt so normal, pedestrians and bicyclists squeezing past each other at the narrow points. 

I was listening to Saint Cloud, the Waxahatchee album that came out a few months ago, turning it over and over in my brain like a rock you pick up at the beach and end up carrying with you on a long walk. The album, outwardly, has this gauzy blue-sky Americana vibe but when you listen to the lyrics of some of the songs it feels like peeling back layers of skin until you hit a raw nerve ending. Every song feels like a eulogy for this year. “You might mourn all that you wasted/That’s just part of the haul,” Katie Crutchfield sings on Ruby Falls. I got to the title track, which closes out the album, as I ascended the bridge. When you get baaaack on the M train, watch the cityyyyyy mutaaaaaaate, she sings. I guess she’s singing about New York. Is there another M train somewhere? I don’t know. I’m going to think about this stupid year whenever I listen to this album, I thought.

I got off the bridge at City Hall, surveyed the ongoing occupation movement there and the literal dozens of cops that had seemingly been deployed to stand there and, at best, do nothing. I walked down Centre Street, eventually winding through the little park by Baxter Street where two adults were playing ping pong, which felt like a socially distanced sport, all things considered. I walked down all those side streets in Chinatown as the sun struggled to break through the oppressive clouds. I walked by Nom Wah, past the salon Polly taught me will give you a very good $12 blowout, past that annoying bar where the bartenders are dressed like scientists, past the place where Kate and I got our auras read on her birthday in January, and ended up at Deluxe Green Bo. I ordered my spicy wontons in peanut sauce and ate them right there, the hot plastic container burning my knees as I sat on the sidewalk. 

Afterwards I walked by all my favorite places—the skatepark under the bridge, Cervo’s, Beverly’s (RIP), Little Canal, Jajaja, the Hawa Smoothie near the East Broadway F. The skaters were hanging out in Dimes Square. Everything had changed but standing outside Kiki’s, it felt for a second like almost nothing had. It was almost a normal Saturday on Canal Street. The sky stayed electric blue until I got back to Brooklyn. 

[having-a-freddie-time]

save me

summary: Y/N is trying her hardest to get out of an abusive relationship without telling anyone. However, she can’t always hide the bruises, especially from her best friend since childhood, Ben Hardy. Once he finds out, he tries his best to help her out without her getting hurt.

warnings: slight angst?, doctor talk, hospitals, cussing, lil bit of fluff. overall, nothing too bad.

a/n: i feel like four parts is a good buildup for the bomb to be dropped, right? i hope y'all enjoyed the last chapter. it was shorter than i anticipated but i think i got the point across?

word count: will put in later

•••••••••••••

Ben lied to the nurses at the nurse's station saying he was your fiance just so he could stay with you all night. Gwil, Lucy and occasionally Rami would stop by. Even Brian and Roger stopped by. When Ben was filming Bohemian Rhapsody, he snuck you onto set just so you could meet Brian and Roger. They instantly loved and adored you, which made them your grandpa figures. You'd joke with them and call them "gramps" or "papa".

On one particular day, you felt a wave of depression hit you hard. You loved having your friends visit you and all, but you still felt incomplete. Like there was something missing from you. You were on the road to recovery, yet you felt like something was still wrong.

Suddenly there was a soft knock at your door and in walked your neuro surgeon. He greeted you with a warm smile as he and his group of nurses walked in. It was a shame he wasn't Derek Shepherd. He was young, probably late late 20's early 30's. He was not bad looking at all, shiny dark brown hair, forest green eyes and the sweetest smile you'd ever seen. Sadly, he had a ring on his finger, which you respected.

"Good morning, Ms. Y/L/N. I just came in to remind you that you have a neuro checkup in a few hours. We're just going to get a CT to check the brain bleeds and how they're healing, then we're going to be asking you a series of questions. Otherwise, it's a pretty normal checkup."

He smiled sweetly and tapped away at the tablet in his hands. Nurses took your daily vitals, checked your incision sites and gave you your antibiotics to fight any infections that might appear. You had already gotten used to this daily routine that you could basically do it yourself, the nurse was just there to assist.

Ben had left to go get some breakfast for the both of you. The day you found out that you were finally allowed to eat solids, you begged Ben every morning to get you waffles from your favorite breakfast diner. You still ate the hospital food every now and then because it wasn't as shitty as people make it out to be. It wasn't like you were in some run down hospital, you were in the number one trauma center. They were number one for a reason.

Ever since you had gotten here, you felt safe and at home. Doctors and nurses treated you with such kindness that you were baffled. The staff always made sure you were comfortable and not in any pain. You tried your hardest not to be one of those pain in the ass patients. Nurses had told you horror stories of them having to deal with patients who had to stay as long as you had to. The craziest story you've heard was when a woman was here for five months and acted like she owned the hospital. You laughed and joked around with Anita on the daily. She was an older black nurse that had you laughing so hard you had tears. You made a mental note to send them gift baskets when you leave.

Although you had been pretty happy for a trauma patient, you had your depressing days. Days where Ben would just sit and watch you. He'd try to start a conversation but it was no point, you wouldn't even look at him. Doctors told him that it was completely normal for domestic abuse survivors to have these types of days and the only way to help is to just be there for them. You didn't argue when you were required to see the trauma therapist that they had there. He was a nice old man, very wise and really helped you realize so many things. You appreciated his quick wit and humor. He knew when to be serious and when to be a little goofy.

Ben came back into the room, setting your waffles down in front of you. You silently dug into the scrumptious breakfast before you and watched whatever was on the little flat screen before you. You had been moved to a more private room in the hospital. This area was more for big name people and since Ben was with you, you qualified for one. This private area kept paparazzi and unwanted people out. It wasn't much different from the other rooms, just more private.

"I have a neuro check up at 1 today, gonna get a CT and they're gonna ask me more questions." You mumbled before shoveling a piece of waffle, drenched in syrup and whipped cream into your mouth. Ben nodded as he ate bacon dipped in syrup.

"Did they say anything else about anything? Like if you would be released soon?"

You shook your head no and swallowed. They said it would take quite awhile for you to heal but you had been healing faster than anticipated.

"I think they just want to make sure I'm mentally and emotionally stable before they discharge me. Which I understand completely."

"You've been doing good with Dr. Smith?"

You nodded with a small smile lifting your lips. Ben mirrored the smile and continued to stuff his face with bacon and waffles. After about 15 minutes of the two of shoving your face with food, you were finished. Ben took your to go box and threw away, along with his stuff. You sat back into the bed, sighing softly and closing your eyes.

"I feel incomplete."

"What do you mean? You just ate."

"No not that way dummy!"

"Then what do you mean?"

"I miss my family. I wish they were here with me. Don't get me wrong, I love you and everything and you're the closest thing to family I've got but I want my mom and dad, and my brother. Now that Trevor is gone, I want to contact them."

"Then why don't you call them?"

"I'm too scared. I'm afraid they're angry with me and that they won't want to see me. I literally isolated myself from them for two years, Ben!" You exhaled and bit your lip. Your eyes dropped in sadness as you went into thought. You heard Ben move around then a second later he's laid up next to you.

He throws his arm lazily around you, carefully so he doesn't touch any of your incision sites and cuddles into you. You smile softly and melt into him. It wasn't uncommon for you and Ben to be cuddled with each other. Ever since kindergarten, you'd both take naps with each other. Your parents could have sworn that Ben was the long lost triplet you and your brother had.

Soon enough, you had both fallen asleep, light snores filling the silence that pierced your room.

▪▪▪▪▪

About 2 and half hours later you woke up to the sound of Anita knocking on your door. She walked in quietly, smiling at the sight before her. You nudged Ben to wake him up, it took him a second but he finally opened his eyes, rubbing them with his fists.

"Time to take you to your check up, hon. We'll be back soon."

You nodded and sat up, stretching your arms out. Ben transitioned from the bed to the chair, looking at you. You swung your legs over the bed and carefully stood up. Your balance has been a little off but it's a normal issue for you.

Ben held his arms out for you, in case you needed him. Anita walked over to you to move the metal rolling thing that had your I.V on it. Slowly you both walked to the wheelchair she had brought it. You plopped into the cushioned seat and situated yourself.

"I'll see you soon, Bear."

Ben nodded at you and brought his index and middle finger to his forehead, signing off to you. You giggled and mirrored his actions as Anita wheeled you out of the room.

As soon as Ben could see you were out of ear shot, he picked up his phone and made an important phone call. He bit his lip in anticipation, waiting for the person on the other line to pick up.

"Mrs. Y/L/N? It's Ben!"

•••••••••••

Finally you and Anita arrived to the CT machine. You stood up slowly while Anita situated your I.V. Dr. Peterson, your neurosurgeon, sat on the other side of the window, a welcoming smile on his lips.

"How you doing today, Y/N?" He asked into the microphone.

"I'm dog tired and wanna go home but otherwise pretty good. No headaches or anything. Vision is still a little bit fuzzy but we both know I need glasses." You said, giving him a thumbs up.

"That's good to hear. You ready to get started?"

You gave him another thumbs up as you laid down on the table. He nodded and pressed the button, which caused you to move backwards, your head going into the circle.

You sat there for about 5 minutes when you heard the speaker beep. The machine whirred and slowly brought you out of the machine. Dr. Peterson gave you a thumbs up, indicating that it was okay for you to leave.

Anita came in and quickly got you sat down and ready to go. You yawned and laid your head back on the chair, staring at the ceiling.

"Just meet me in the exam room, I'll go have get the results." Anita nodded and wheeled you into an exam room.

Once you got there, you sat down and waited patiently for him to come back with the results. You tapped your fingers against your thigh as Anita took your vitals and started a conversation with you.

"You know, cardio and general cleared you. All you need is to get cleared by neuro and psych. Then sometime in the next week or so, you'll be discharged."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes! You've been here for nearly two months. Your wrist is healing perfectly, your incision sites are perfectly fine. Now all we need is for your emotions and your noggin to be cleared."

You giggled at her word choice and smiled. You couldn't wait to get out, as nice as it has been, you miss your bed. Dr. Peterson walked in with a huge smile on his face. You hoped it was a genuine and not fake.

"I think I have the best news you've heard all week."

"Tell me!"

"Well Ms. Y/L/N, your CT results are in..." He took a dramatic pause as if he was about to announce who just won an Oscar for best drama.

"Your brain bleed is completely healed, you're concussion free and your brain function is the best it could ever be!"

Your eyes lit up in excitement as you couldnt believe your ears. You stood up and instantly wrapped your arms around his neck, squeezing him so tightly. You released and gave him the biggest smile, then you turned to Anita and did the same, all the while laughing and cheering.

"I can't believe it! I'm gonna get discharged soon!"

The three of you cheered and hugged. You had just heard the best news you could ever hear. You couldn't wait to tell Ben and finally be able to leave. Without realizing it, you had tears streaming down your cheek. Not because you were sad, no, because you were so happy.

"I'm so happy. Not only because I'm getting discharged soon, but because when I leave this hospital, I will be a survivor of domestic abuse. I won't have to worry about having to cover up bruises and scars and cuts. He's gone. I'm free."

You sobbed with pure happiness. You never felt so happy in your entire life. Anita pulled you into a tight but careful hug. She was the closest person to a mother figured that you've had in awhile. She felt the same amount, if not more, happiness that you radiated.

Dr. Peterson couldn't help but tear up to. He had to admit, working on cases with domestic abuse victims, sexual assault victims or anything like that, really hit him hard. He was so honored to have helped her to the road of recovery.

After the three of you celebrated and cheered, you finally were headed back to your room. Today had been pretty long and exhausted, but it was all worth it in the end.

Soon enough, you approached your room. Anita wheeled you in, not realizing that there were more people in the room. You had your eyes closed as you yawned and stretched your body out, from your arms all the way down to your toes.

Suddenly, you had heard a familiar voice echo throughout the room.

"Y/N, my baby..."

"Mummy...?"

•••••••••••••

taglist: @benhardyisdaddy @monochromedeacon @queenbbarnes @haileylansley @shesakillerquueennn @onexlittlespark @zcars777 @kate-player @beatlezrcool @likeit-or-leaveit @mrsmazzello @caborhapch @jacqueline1916 @thegarbage-queen

perm taglist: @benhardyisdaddy @haileylansley @queenbbarnes @beatlezrcool

[killian-whump]

WHookWeek: The F Word

Hello, and welcome to my TED Talk. I’m KW, and I’m the head mistress of the Killian Jones Bang Train. In honor of Wish Hook Week, I’ve been asked by absolutely no one to provide an in-depth look at our facilities and the special amenities and stations we’ve added to accommodate Old Hook, Wish Hook, and Detective Rogers.

First, allow me to say that we here at the KJ Bang Train have every sympathy for those who choose not to acknowledge the existence of Wish Hook (or his tengential other versions). We have a highly sophisticated protocol in place for such riders on the Bang Train, which we have tentatively titled, “Shut Up and Bang the Other One Then”.

However, for those of you who have adopted a “the more the merrier” or an “if it has Colin’s face, I’ll bang it” approach in your life, we have adapted and expanded all of our stations to allow for this exciting new addition to the KJ Bang Train. Please, come along with me for a veritable word wall virtual tour.

Current KJ Bang Train Stops

Aside from the last 30-40 years of their lives, Wish Hook and OG Hook both had the exact same experiences and relationships. As a result, nearly all stations service both Hooks concurrently - a fancy word that means at the same damn time. However, most stations do have special kiosks and exhibits relating to one Hook or the other. Let’s take a look...

Stop 1: The Liam Jones Lookout Whilst technically a station, this small stop is more of a pause in the Bang Train’s route. We have never witnessed anyone actually getting off at this stop, aside from those few souls who forgot they were riding the Bang Train and thought they’d take in some brotherly love. Generally, these riders return to the Train a little shaken, having seen a bit too much brotherly love for their tastes. Still, the stop is here if anyone ever shows up to man the place.

Stop 2: The Millian Mile This gorgeous, scenic stretch of stations is the second largest stop on the KJ Bang Train’s route. We have canon-compliant banging, canon-divergent banging, and AU banging... all of which service both Hooks equally. We also have an additional station devoted to OG Hook for all your Underworld banging needs. Bang away, you tragic star-crossed lovers T_T

Stop 3: Golden Hook Gateway Don’t be fooled by this stop’s golden appearance. All that glitters is not always consensual. Or maybe it is. But it’s probably not. This stop caters to both Hooks equally, though one’s likely to have a slightly more positive experience than the other. AU bangings, canon-compliant FoeTP bangings, canon-divergent bangings... We’ve got all the dirty, filthy bangings you could possibly want here. Just make sure to wipe your feet before boarding the train again. We don’t know where you’ve been, you dirty fiend friend.

Stop 4: Tinkerhook Terminal This fun, spritely stop is the first of several located in our lovely Neverland Neighborhood. This stop caters to both Hooks with plenty of jungle bangings literally everywhere and anywhere bangings can occur. There’s also a special “Reunion in Neverland” Kiosk that caters solely to OG Hook and S3 bangings, as well as a Storybrooke Kiosk for any of your post-S3 bangings with either Hook (or both, we never judge).

Stop 5: Captain Pan Camps As soon as the Bang Train pulls in at this popular stop, you’ll be asked by our porter if you prefer the Dark Camp or the Light Camp. You’ll want to make sure you choose wisely, my friends, as there is a BIG difference between the two! Both cater to all of your Captain Pan bangings, albeit in very different ways. Both also have an OG Hook specific “Reunion in Neverland” Kiosk, as well as a “Wish Pan” exhibit that promises untold future wonders for both Hooks... or nightmares, depending on which camp you chose ;)

Stop 6: The Lost Boys Layover Stops are rarely as raucous (or dangerous) as this one, which is why we do not allow drop-offs with later pick-ups here. We used to, but no one ever seemed to return, or they showed up late and on death’s door from Dreamshade poisoning. Instead, the Bang Train will remain in station, ready for evacuation, for the duration of your visit. Make sure to check out the “Felix Fracas” exhibit and the Mess Hall, which serves a lovely foie gras. (Please Note: All of our Lost Boys are physically over 18 and mentally deranged.)

Stop 7: Tiger Lily Territory The last of our Neverland stops is a beautiful paradise of nature. Specializing in blow darts, Lost Boy evasion, and bangings, this stop also boasts a lovely Post-Series Kiosk dedicated especially to Wish Hook. If Wish Hook isn’t to your liking, shut up and bang the other one instead.

Stop 8: Hooked Queen Haven The third largest stop on the Bang Train’s route, and the largest non-canon stop, this station has a small Pre-Curse Carriage Ride to greet you as soon as you leave the Bang Train. This rollicking ride is the only part of the Haven that services both Hooks equally. From there, the station diverges down two separate paths. The left hand path is for Wish Hook, comprised of Pirate Queen and HQ Endgame stations, while the right hand path is for OG Hook’s continued pre-curse and post-curse Hooked Queen shenanigans and various AU stops.

Stop 9: Captain of Hearts Cave This rocky dungeon-like stop caters almost exclusively to OG Hook, though there is a small kiosk for those who choose to believe there was some banging attempts before the two Hooks’ paths diverged. Make sure to check out the “History of Male Submission” exhibit, which runs year round for absolutely no reason at all, unless you know what I mean, then you know what I mean, and would surely agree with its inclusion here. For no reason. At all. Have a nice day :)

Stop 10: Captain Gothel Grove This dark, ominous stop is definitely one for seasoned bangers only. Be sure this is where you want to stop before you get off the train, because once you’re here... Well, you might be here for a longer time than you’d like. This stop is exclusively for Wish Hook, as OG Hook refused to touch this stop with a ten foot pole, much to Mother Gothel’s disappointment. Warning: Don’t eat the mushrooms. Or drink the tea. Or... Really, just watch your back, like, the whole time. Forever. This one is a genocidal maniac.

Stop 11: Hookriel Harbor This stop was originally much smaller and in a different place on the route, but it was upgraded and relocated as of Season 7. While the original station was devoted solely to OG Hook bangings, the new and improved station now focuses more so on Wish Hook and Wish Ariel’s relations. There still exists a kiosk for OG Hookriel, of course, along with all the original content from the first incarnation of this much-loved stop. Old Hook also gets some love here.

Stop 12: Sleeping Hook Spot This quaint little stop is centered on OG Hook’s AU/Divergent bangings with Princess Aurora. There is a small kiosk for potential Wish Hook post-series bangings, just in case you have need of it. This quiet refuge is just the place to calm your nerves before reaching the next stop...

Stop 13: Captain Swan Central Station The largest and busiest stop on the entire Bang Train line, this bustling hub boasts all the amenities one would expect from a 5-star establishment - a coffee shop, a gym, a pool where ill-fitting suits just happen to fall right off, plenty of hotel rooms with only one double bed, etc. There’s also special sub-stations for Lieutenant Duckling, Captain Swan Threesomes (just slap a name on the end of “Captain Swan” and there’s a station for it), Captain Swan 2.0, and just about every other variety of this endgame ship that your dirty little heart could possibly desire. Make sure to check out the special year-round exhibit entitled, “How Many Hooks Is Too Many Hooks?” Spoiler: The answer is none. There is no such thing as too many Hooks for Emma to bang at once.

Stop 14: Captain Charming Cove If you’re looking for a bromance, you’ll have to look elsewhere... for this is the bang train. We got nothing but bangings here, and these two DO bang at this stop. Choo Choo, All Aboard! We also have an MPreg Kiosk for all your mpreg needs. Nobody judges here. All Hooks welcome.

Stop 15: Krakillian Kreek A watery stop full of nothing but HUGS!!! (And tentacles. Please mind the tentacles and keep an eye on your orifices.)

Stop 16: Old Hooks Home This special stop caters to Old Hook, and Old Hook alone. Anyone and anything you might want to have Old Hook bang - it can happen here. Granny, Lady Tremaine, Old Emma, Young Emma, you name it. There’s also Taco Tuesdays and free bingo every night.

Stop 17: Hooking Utensil Utopia This Rogers-centric stop boasts the finest beignets in the world, as well as some top-notch detective work if you’re into that kind of thing. Oh, who are we kidding? You’re here to bang some Hooks... and the Hooking Utensil stop has the sweeeeeetest banging this side of the Pancake House. Wish Hook is also welcome, of course, both pre- and post- Hyperion Heights.

Stop 18: Hook Coven Crossing Still need more Hook? We’ve got you covered. Here at Hook Coven Crossing, your Hooks can bang other Hooks... and still more Hooks... whilst banging still more Hooks... and then a few more. All the Hooks are here, and they’re all waiting for you each other! :D

Stop 19: Last Chance Alley We here at the KJ Bang Train like to see to ALL of our riders’ needs... and that’s where Last Chance Alley comes in. All bangable ships that don’t have stops of their own can be indulged in here. We have kiosks for Red Hook, Black Hook, Wicked Hook, Hookfire, Stubble Sandwich, whatever we call Hades and Hook (why does that still not seem to have a name? maybe Blue Hook? No, that would be Blue + Hook...)... All the smaller ships are here, along with Captain Floor, Captain Bondage, some interactive “Make Your Own Threesome” exhibits and a self-contained Orgy Pile! Make sure to top off your ride on the Bang Train with this one-of-a-kind stop!

Stop 20: Right Back to the Start... The KJ Bang Train is life. The KJ Bang Train is love.

[amuelle]

About my sister...

I hadn’t known not having her around and the idea of it was shattering. I could feel it in the depths of my soul. The comfortable place in my heart she used to occupy was slowly getting emptied out.  She had always stayed there, ALWAYS been there, so why was she leaving? She was taking her things one by one and for all my screaming and crying she couldn’t hear me because my sorrow took my voice. She just kept packing. At this point in our lives we were meant to be apart but separation should never be taken lightly or underestimated…..it hurts, its soul crushing.

We are six years apart my sister and I. We only have a few good traits in common but for the rest of it we are night and day. She takes nothing personally and I take everything personally. Her ability to communicate her feelings is incredible while I’d rather suffer in silence till the words find me and I’m ready to hear what others have to say about my feelings. She is a first born, a trail blazer and I am the sheltered lamb that was guided not to make my own mistakes. She was packing and getting ready to start a new life without me. I could not fathom HOW????

Why was she leaving me!???? Where was she going where she would be without me and why was she was she so excited? I have always been the sentimental sibling. Emotions have always led me and I’ve always wanted to be the one to hold us together. The three of us, my brother included have always had a rhythm. She was disturbing the rhythm and she wasn’t bothered. WHY WASN'T SHE BOTHERED?? She was leaving everything she knew for the great unknown. We had moved around most of our lives. The Lithebes of Moshoeshoe 2 became the Lithebes of Brookside Drive. After that the Lithebes of Asian Games then Lower Thetsane and Hillsview after that. Ultimately we settled as the Lithebes of Ngoana oa Lla. We had always moved as a family. Not this time.

Reflecting on this as a woman in my 30s I realise she always had to leave, destiny was calling. But for her leaving for Durban she wouldn’t have become a health care professional living out her purpose to help others. I wouldn’t have my nieces and I would have never had anyone to encourage me to pursue a career in construction. She had to leave to be the incredible person who would later effect so many incredible changes in my life and the lives of others. 15 year old me couldn’t have known that. All she knew was that the person who understood her best was leaving. The day of her departure grew closer and my voice got stuck in my throat more and more. I knew I needed her. I knew I needed to tell her that but I couldn’t. My mother loved me but didn’t understand me. My father was my father and he did all he could as a man more concerned with raising a lioness. They did their best. I still needed her the most. She was my sister. The benchmark for all my successful female relationships. I needed her!

I knew she would leave but I never expected to come home from school and find every trace of her GONE. I remember the terrible feeling of sleeping in our room alone for the first time in my life. It felt empty, her big oxygen sucking personality was gone. I was devastated and had no one to tell because her leaving was a good thing. It felt like I wasn’t allowed to feel sad about it. She had to go to varsity. There were adventures for her to have, people to meet and most importantly her life to start living. I missed her deeply. As everything at 15 this was new for me. It felt like no one could understand. How could they? I couldn’t explain that this person I was incredibly aloof to, understood me better than I understood myself. In our silence laid a deep understanding that could never be shaken. The bond between sisters is incredible and forged over lifetimes of loving each other without knowing.

Retrospectively, I should have spoken to my mother about it. My mother is the last of 7 and has 5 sisters. Her sisters left her, they got married, went to school, they all left home to start their own lives. She could have comforted me. At that time it felt as if no one could have comforted me.

My sister knew everything about me and I knew everything about her. I saw her at 13 fall in love with hip hop and basketball. I had seen her leave a whole life full of friends and start again every time we moved. I had seen her personality form. I saw her grow into this person I had never had to be without, who was now leaving me.

Sometimes in families we don’t talk about things and we fucking should! The reason I am so transparent with my nieces is because I know that terrible feeling of being left by one of the people you love the most. Even if they don’t want to leave, when they leave it feels like they want to. She had to carve her place in the world and in doing so she became more phenomenal than she already was. She would become the woman to support my dreams and nurse my broken heart. Helped me remember that I’m allowed to make mistake and that risks should be taken. If becoming a woman was like getting a degree on my degree certificate under my name it would read “with a special contribution from Matlaleng Lithebe”. I had to let her go so she could be who she was always meant to be however, it still HURT and she still left.

The first night she came home from Durban she smelt like sun, sea salt and she was glowing like a girl in her early 20s who had just found her purpose should. She had to do to so much work just be in a position to leave me and she was reaping the rewards. Family members wanted to marry her off while others had lost faith in her but she knew what she wanted and made sure they knew it too! She boldly went forward on faith and gut feel and it worked out.

My cousin and I picked her up from the bus station. We were never huggers until that day. That day we hugged. I could feel the frown forming on my forehead but I was still acting tough and it was too late to turn back. I wanted to cry but I had to pretend I was ok. I wasn’t. Her coming back to me meant more than she will probably ever understand. She has never been as sensitive as I am but that didn’t matter, I was vulnerable and she gave me the space to be. She was back. She was here for ME and I would appreciated every single moment of it.

That night when we got home she didn’t unpack, she put on her new pajamas and got into bed. We turned off the light and we talked about everything under the sun till 2 in the morning and it was a school night. I was waking up at 6 to go to school but the excitement of her presence would have never let me sleep. The all night conversations became a constant. Even when she moved to Joburg for her first job. Whenever we are at home or every time we sleep in the same room we stay up and talk like we haven’t spoken in years. We talk almost every day. She knows everything about me and I’m still learning things about her. Having an older sister is one of my blessings and I don’t take her for granted anymore.

Healthy female relationships are IMPORTANT! I know I’m blessed in a unique way to have the sister I have but it wasn’t always easy. All relationships need to be nurtured because like flowers they take time to bloom. Take care of your sisters, even if they aren’t blood. The women in your life who love you with specific intention add value. They want you to be the most phenomenal you that you can be. That shit is IMPORTANT! Its mother’s day on Sunday. My mother and father gave me my sister, they can’t begin to imagine how much I value her.

To my phenomenal sister, who is my whole hand of safety (hand of safety post still coming) and everything I could ever need in a human being, thank you for being you. Just as you are, you have changed the world with the quality of human being you are. I love you buddy!

Bisou…bisou

[justanothercinemaniac]

Epic Movie (Re)Watch #242 - Paul (2011)

Spoilers Below

Have I seen it before: Yes

Did I like it then: Yes.

Do I remember it: Yes.

Did I see it in theaters: No.

Format: Blu-ray

1) The prologue for this movie is particularly strong. For one thing, the name of the dog, “Paul,” stands out. It’s hard to watch this movie without knowing the title. And it shows that the film isn’t just making fun of sci-fi but playing in the genre. There’s a nice sense of atmosphere to the short prologue and it poses many interesting questions. Namely: what the hell just crashed on earth?

2) I appreciate how earnest Simon Pegg and Nick Frost come across as nerds in the movie. So often people who are enthusiastic about pop culture are portrayed as the joke, their existence is a joke. But with Graeme and Clive yes they can be funny but the joke isn’t the simple idea of, “Look at how funny the nerds are!”

3) Another line of humor I appreciate in the film is that while Graeme and Clive are often mistaken to be a couple, they’re never really uncomfortable with people thinking they’re gay unless they are in a situation with some homophobic assholes. And in that case the discomfort isn’t the threat to their masculinity but the threat to their safety. It’s a nice distinction from how these types of storylines typically go.

4) Look, do I even need to talk about the on screen chemistry between Simon Pegg and Nick Frost? They have proved it countless times across film and television. They’re a legendary on screen duo. Abbott & Costello, Fred & Ginger, Gene Wilder & Richard Pryor, now Simon Pegg & Nick Frost. They’re great together always, even when the films may be a little less than stellar they are not. And Paul is no exception. Their chemistry is on point, they’re as strong alone as they are together, it just works. We spend enough time with their characters before Paul shows up that we clearly understand the relationship, something which is not only the result of strong writing but strong acting as well.

5) The waitress played by Jane Lynch is wonderfully supportive of the duo’s nerdy nature. She doesn’t make fun of them for their interests, she doesn’t see it as odd. She encourages it! And even when the two jackasses show up she’s supportive and only suggests they leave because she knows the bearded truckers could start trouble. I really like that.

6) Seth Rogen as Paul.

Being the titular character of a movie carries a to of weight with it. You have to be the most memorable part of the movie. Think of Beetlejuice, for example. That’s a lot to live up to. Our intro to Paul shows off much of his character and his down to earth nature (no pun intended). We get introduced to his crude and profane language, his sense of humor, and even a little bit of his heart. It is the latter of these things which helps make Paul a character and not just a gag. You understand his intentions, what he wants, what motivates him, and you can relate. It’s a bit of E.T., actually. He just wants to go home. We get to especially see this when interacting with Blythe Danner’s character later in the film, how vulnerable he allows himself to be and how he grows to care about the safety of others.

Seth Rogen nails it as the character. Rogen is no stranger to voice over work and sometimes I honestly forget I’m listening to him. This isn’t because he does anything particularly tricky to disguise his voice, but just because it fits all the above mentioned characteristics of the alien so well. It just works and I think the film is better for Rogen’s casting.

7) Jason Bateman as Agent Zoyle is a fun addition to the movie. Bateman plays the character as reserved and intensely focused, a straight man to some of his more chaotic counterparts. That’s where most of the humor comes from and Bateman’s precision with the role only benefits it.

8) Joe Lo Truglio and Bill Hader have a fun chemistry in this film and add a nice amount of life to the movie. They have fun with their characters and each other making it all the more fun to watch.

9) This film is just dripping with references to great sci-fi films, some subtle and some not so subtle.

Paul [asking for food at a gas station]: “Hey! Reese’s Pieces!”

10) Chekov’s dead bird.

(GIF source unknown [if this is your GIF please let me know].)

Paul showcasing his ability to heal things, even partially, sets up an important alien power of his that also leads to a great gag with his little snack.

11) The film does well with giving each character their own personality and arc. Bill Hader’s character specifically gets a well written storyline of drive and upward mobility. Not everyone would think to give him that storyline.

12) I like Paul’s planet.

Paul: “Everyone’s bi on my planet.”

13) I’m a sucker for these kinds of jokes. Specifically, how Paul was SUCH an influence on pop culture. That the stereotypical alien look came from his face so people wouldn’t freak out so much when they saw him, that he talked to Steven Spielberg (who does a voice over cameo as himself) about E.T., or that, “Agent Mulder was my idea!” I dig it.

14) Kristen Wiig as Ruth.

Wiig is charming and sweet in her portrayal of Ruth. She’s a nice addition to the film and is able to hold her own against the chemistry between Pegg and Frost. She doesn’t feel out of place or tacked on, even getting a really great arc of her own (scientific?) awakening. I appreciate that.

15) On a more personal note, I disagree with the idea that there has to be this complete divide between religion and science as the film largely presents it. You’re either one or the other which to me doesn’t make a ton of sense. Not to get too into my own personal beliefs but I believe in the idea of a creator behind the universe but that doesn’t undermine things like evolution or the big bang or anything else. But I think I’m getting off track.

16) There are some surprisingly strong action scenes in the movie. Often comedy that fall into a subgenre like sci-fi or fantasy rely heavily more on the comedy then set pieces. There’s nothing wrong with that if pulled off well, I just always forget that Paul has a number of well paced chase and action sequences too.

17) I like that the film takes time to develop the relationships with Clive and Paul as well as Graeme and Ruth. They fell organic, natural, and they’re not static either they grow and change. I like it.

18) It took me a while to understand this joke because I didn’t know what Mac & Me was.

Clive: Ever since I saw Mac and Me, I've dreamed about meeting you!

For those who don’t know, Mac and Me is basically an ET rip-off that is often listed as one of the worst films ever made that some see more as a commercial for McDonald’s and Coca Cola than a film.

Also that thing is creepy as hell.

19) Ruth trying out profanity throughout the course of the movie is fun to watch and actually, now that I think about it, mirrors my own attempts with cursing as a kid.

20) At its core, Paul is a fun road trip movie. It’s about going somewhere but it’s also about the journey. The trouble you face on the road and the friends you have to see you through it. It just also involves aliens and the government.

21) The country bar version of “Cantina Band” is nice.

22) I think the bar scene works because it’s basically the eye of the shitstorm. Everything the group has been running from - the truckers, Ruth’s dad, the government - all converges upon them at the same time. It makes for a fun and ripe conflict that’s interesting to see the characters deal with.

23) Is this some sort of crack about Bob Dylan’s current music not “measuring up” to his early stuff or whatever?

Paul [about his drugs]: It's pretty strong shit. I get it from the military. I think this is the stuff that killed Dylan. Graeme: Bob Dylan’s not dead. Paul: Isn’t he?

24) Random Keith Nash is random but nice.

25) Blythe Danner as Tara is a nice late addition to the film. Danner puts a lot of heart and soul into what is essentially a tragic character. A space alien landed on her dog, was taken away by the government, and she was dubbed a freak by society only for telling the truth, something which required years of therapy. But Tara’s no push over. Danner is able to make her strong, tough, and pretty funny when the opportunity arises.

26) The whole scene where the group has to escape the feds at the farm is the film’s best action sequence. It is incredibly well choreographed, tightly paced, and there is a wonderful escalation of insanity and action as the scene progresses. I really like it.

27) This film is Wilhelm Scream certified.

28) The movie is basically a big love letter to sci-fi movies created by the likes of Steven Spielberg and George Lucas. The previous mention of Reese’s Pieces, the fact that the mountain from Close Encounters of the Third Kind is where Paul goes to phone home, and the line from Jason Bateman, “Boring conversation anyway,” mirroring Harrison Ford’s line from the original Star Wars. It shows not only just how much those kinds of films meant to the filmmakers but also how important it is they express that love in cinema. I think honesty admiration always leads to great filmmaking.

29) Sigoruney Weaver’s role as The Big Guy is basically a glorified cameo but I love it. Her casting is pitch perfect. As soon as she actually shows up you know shit just got real. Why? Because it’s Sigourney Weaver! It’s Ellen Ripley for crying out love. She just commands the scene and the fact that the oft mentioned “big gun” from earlier in the film is literally just a big ass gun is great.

30) The twist that Zoyle is actually on Paul’s side totally surprised me the first time I saw the film but it adds a lot of rewatch value. It totally makes sense in a second viewing and helps deepen his character from more than just a standard gov antagonist.

31)

Zoyle: “Call me Lorenzo.” Clive & Graeme: “Lorenzo Zoyle?”

I did not understand this reference at all when I first saw the movie. I had to google it extensively. Apparently it’s a reference to the 1992 George Miller directed film Lorenzo’s Oil that’s a family drama about a sick kid and has nothing to do with sci-fi. So after I learned what the reference was I googled some more to figure out why it was a joke in the movie. Apparently it was Nick Frost’s idea.

“It’s just one of those things that I kind of like doing, that thing that you take one letter from the surname and add it to the forename and it becomes something completely different. It’s possible someone could be called Lorenzo Zoil.” (source)

32) Graeme’s “death” actually packed a punch with me watching this. You kind of figure he’ll survive, I mean we’ve seen Paul use his healing ability before, but still I think that it does pull at your heart strings speaks to how well the film does in making you care about these characters and their relationships.

33) THE SHIP FUCKING LANDS ON SIGOURNEY WEAVER AND THAT’S HOW SHE DIES! YES! I LOVE IT!

34) I really like the in-credits epilogue. Like, the ship taking off slowly is a good final gag and leads to the emotional finale of the film. But the in-credits epilogue ties up some loose narrative strings and feels a bit more finite than just everyone standing in the now empty field. I dig it.

Paul is a lot of fun. It’s not really the same level of genre comedy as the Cornetto Trilogy per say, but why even make that comparison? I only mention that because I heard someone at work saying this movie sucked because it wasn’t Hot Fuzz and I was like, “That’s your criteria?” It is a charming, earnest, fun, well acted, and enthusiastic comedy. It’s a good time with lots of great gags and character moments. I like it and hopefully you will too.

[dontdowhatisayandnobodygetshurt]

Since you've done all odd numbers.. even numbers?

OH DEAR GOD OKAY THAT’S GREAT!!! Thank you so so much for asking, amazing Anon!!!!! :’D Here we gone, it’s gonna be long again, so it’s below the cut!! Click read more to learn more randomness about me!!! X’D [questions from here]

2.have you ever found a writer who thinks just like you? if so, who?

Not exactly like me, no. That’s the good thing about art; nothing is the same! :D

4.would you have sex with the last person you text messaged?

LMAO NO

6.how many people of the opposite sex do you fully trust?

Not many. I tend to distrust men more with physical harm and I distrust women more with emotional harm. I have… trust issues. I trust my frens and some of my family members and that’s about it. oof. ^__^”

8.who would you like to see in concert?

If I’m gonna be risking sensory overlord… Coldplay!

10.would you ever want to swim with sharks?

HELL TO THE YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :DDDDDDD

12.what was the last thing that made you laugh?

My Dad just brushed Ria our German Shepherd and came in COVERED in fur X’D X’D

14.have any pets?

YES!! Three dogs (Ria the German Shepherd, Granger the whippet, and Maude the mutt/Pomeranian-ish), three chickens (Haymitch, Cinna, and Effie) and two ducks (Peeta and Katniss). Don’t worry, we named the poultry after Hunger Games characters to be ironic, since we have no plans to kill them and they’re spoiled AF. X’D

16.do you have piercings? How many?

I don’t! I wanted some, but… eh we’ll see. XD

18.what are you craving right now?

Intimacy. :’)

20.have you ever been cheated on?

No. And if I ever am it will absolutely destroy me. So yeah, if my future partner is reading this, please just… don’t. Break up with me first, at least.

22.do you believe in true love?

Meh. Maybe, maybe not. I don’t know. I hope it exists though!

24.do you like the snow?

I’ve never seen snow!! I WOULD LOVE TO SEE IT AND JUST FACE-PLANT INTO IT!!!!!!! :’D XD

26.is it cute when a boy/girl calls you baby?

Kinda depends on the circumstances??? but it’s usually it is pretty cute! ^-^

28.go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is!

Six million pounds of space dust settles on the earth every year.

ummmm…. thanks, I hate it? XD

30.what color do you really want to dye your hair?

BRIGHT FUCKIN YELLOW. PIKA PIKA MOTHERFUCKER!!! >:D X’D

32.talk about your favorite bag, the one that’s been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces.

I have this one bag that’s been with me since I was 8. It’s basically a glorified sack that creases every bit of clothing you put in it to hell and it has straps and rope ties and it’s navy blue and I love it!! :D X’D

34. what’s the weirdest place you’ve ever broken into?

My own goddamn house. Had to bust a window and everything. X’D

36.what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks.

Okay so my Mum exclusively buys black socks. Just…. black socks that you can’t even tell apart, but I can’t wait till I can buy the most RIDICULOUSLY CUTE HECKING SOCKS ON THE PLANET. I do like wearing socks, I do not sleep with socks on, but I think they’re great!! :D XD

38.do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it!

It’s p small and it has lots of art I can actually appreciate on the walls and it’s got a low ceiling and kind of a comforting, dark-but-still-sunny den kind of vibe. The booths are actually comfortable. A lot of wood and smokey colours. There’s a slate fireplace crackling somewhere. It smells strongly of coffee and vaguely of liquorice. There’s a spot at the back that’s mostly hidden from site, the perfect place to curl up and read a book while picking on a muffin that was reasonably cheap but the size of your whole hand. Closest place to heaven on earth.

40.what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today?

Not being able to breathe. Pretty much, ya.

42.think of a person. what song do you associate with them?

Sam aka myriadimagines. And this song, idk why, it just reminds me of her.

44.do you like poetry? what are some of your faves?

ASDFGHJKL ACTUALLY THIS THING THAT SAM HERSELF WROTE IS MY FAVE. I read it like a 2 years ago now and it still stuck with me and it’s so beautifully poignant I want to SCREAM. hello yes why are my friends so talented are they even REAL??????????

46.what are some of your worst habits?

I forget to eat and generally forget to take care of myself, I deny myself things I like for absolutely no reason??? I procrastinate everything, I bite my fingernails super low and also the skin around them bc I’m fuckin constantly anxious and can’t sit still, I overthink everything, I stay up way too late… honestly I could keep going, you get the point. XD

48.tell us about your pets!

OKAY SO. Ria is absolutely OBSESSED with her ball, and I mean OBSESSED to the point where she has no idea what to do with herself if you take it away and gets all anxious and whines and paces till you give it back. She constantly sheds and she does this sUpER CuTe thing where she wraps her front paw around your leg while you’re trying to walk and trips you. :))) Granger is either made of metal or a deflated pool toy and there’s no in between. She eats literally anything, including ants nests bc you know they must taste GREAT. She’s super stubborn. She gets smile wrinkles if you rub her neck. Maudie was rescue we got as a really small puppy. We only knew her mum but her dad must have been a Pomeranian bc she looks almost exactly like one. She has this thing where she bites you when you surprise her but really she’s a sweetheart. She’s mostly blind and deaf and has no idea where she is most of the time, I don’t think. XD The chickens are all idiots, the ducks are scared of me but still eat out of my hand when I offer them grapes. Haymitch likes to jump up on my back, Effie likes falling asleep on my lap, and Cinna pecks me a lot and leaves bruises but she lets me stroke her at night when she’s dozing off. :’)

50.are you in the minion hateclub or fanclub?

I think they can be funny… in small amounts. :/// Their laughs are pretty infectious, you gotta admit. XD

52.describe one of your friend’s eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of.

Wariness and weariness and beauty and a fierce want to be loved.

54.are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones?

YEEEEESSSSSSS. An Ouroboros (either sealed or pulling away idk), a blank line of my arm so I can write how many days I’ve been without a relapse bc I need to be held accountable for my actions, a black square with colours bursting out, I also really love blackout tattoos???? I want a bird on my middle finger. :)))) And maybe a smiley face near my collar bone. The quote “what a marvel life is.” I also want the word “promise” on me somewhere, idk where. Maybe a feather somewhere too??? AHHHH SO MANY MY DUDE!!!!!! :DDDDDDDD maybe even a Southern cross but I don’t want to be one of those wankers y’know XD

56.what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives?

Star Wars, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Mulan, Into The Spiderverse. Basically just my favourites lmao. XD

58.if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why?

Neither, eesh. Maybe the past….?? Maybe…? I guess it’d be pretty funny to grab “I’m a girl!!!” Matt and shake some sense into his thick skull. X’D

60.what are some things you do when you can’t sleep?

Oh boy. Throw a ball at the wall and catch it, try to write, have a panic attack bc I should be sleeping, read, play Pokemon, listen to music, pat my dogs, possibly cry… world’s my oyster. XD

62.who is the last person you told a secret to?

My Mum.

64.what’s your favorite food?

🍕 !!!!!!!! :DDDDDD

66.three songs you were recently obsessed with.

this one - this one - this one 

68. three favourite old songs

this - this - this

70.worst possible time to get horny:

lmao when both my parents are home and I have no time to deal with ittttt… occasions like that are the only times I’m sort of grateful I can’t get a boner and give myself away. XD 

72.do you believe in soulmates?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I don’t believe any relationship is “perfect”, though. There’s always gonna be difficulties.

74.who was the last person you cried in front of?

Dad. Oof.

76.is it easier to forgive or forget?

Neither. :))))))) Forget… I guess?? But really. Neither. :)

78.do you have trust issues? 

*inhale*

Y E S

80.would you go back in time if you were given the chance?

Nopeity nope nope. XD

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ASKING, ANON!!!

[nevthoughts]

5 Lessons from 5 years being single

This year will mark 5 years since I’ve been in a relationship. I’m not sure if that was intentional, I know I simply became uninterested in purposely seeking a new relationship after my last one ended, but I’ve also not just fell in to something either. Maybe COVID was to blame  or maybe it just hasn’t felt like something I really needed to do. 

Something I have become more aware of recently is how young I actually was when I started being in ‘relationships’ (if you can call them that as a teenager lol) and how intense they were, too much for my developing brain. It then carried on like that in to my early 20s. I would just fall in to things - which is also a lot easier to do when you’re in school/college and uni. The years of always being around people makes it hard not to end up in something with someone...But from this starting at (I’d say a relatively young) age and just falling in to things, they were never going to bring any good or do any good for my wellbeing and development which they didn’t and to be honest never really have. I remember talking to a friend a few years ago and she said something that was a big “woah” moment - which was “I just think you’ve never actually been treated nicely in the relationships you have had, so it makes sense why you probably aren’t as bothered because why would you want to possibly experience that all again - TRUTH.

I look back now on my teenage years/teen self and think yeah, you really should not have been in those situations. I fully understand why some parents have age restrictions for their children on when they can start exploring relationships. I only realised this had become a pattern that carried on in to my early 20s in the last year. Also in the last year I’ve started to feel more open to a relationship in the near future - the moment of realising “actually, yeah... I do want to find someone and settle down” - was both cringe and liberating. My brain feeling ready to be open to the idea of relationship again is a sign I’m moving through past hurt. I never want the relationships I’ve had in the past, I cannot have the same thing repeating. I realised the way I could help this (hopefully lol) not happen again was to explore who I actually am before presenting myself to another person. That wasn’t happening when I was a teenager. Mixed in with other things going on, finding out who I was (outside of boys lol) and actually just other people in general, I was very “them” focused and who I was didn’t seem as important.. I’d say when you reach the late 20s/early 30s, you do have to show up with a good knowing of who YOU are, what do YOU enjoy, what hobbies do YOU have - and the other person is bringing the same. I feel we should compliment another persons life, not become everything in it, which also requires feeling secure in self. Anyway, to the main point of this; 5 short lessons I have learnt from being single for 5 years:

1. Sometimes it is you! (sometimes it was me) I can look back on every relationship I’ve had and realise there’s always something I done that contributed to making something worse or something in the way I was, was not beneficial to the other person or the relationship. I also noticed that before each of these relationships, my intuition was screaming at me - I knew it wouldn’t end well or something about them was off - honestly, every single time and every single time I was right - so, that’s me not listening to myself > that’s a me problem.

2. “a wise man learns from others mistakes”

I’ve seen many relationships over these past five years and I’ve been able to mentally take note of things I know I will 100% be avoiding and the things I quite like and would like to put in/see in my own relationships. I have never grown up around a solid relationship - they are quite foreign to me. I’m an only child so I don’t have anyone before me therefore the people around me have become my point of reference - “take a bit of this, defo leaving that, I like how they do this, I will not be OK with that” etc lol

3.  Being single means I have more to give to friends & family

Being the single friend has meant I am able to babysit, show up speedily for friends going through a difficult time and able to help out more at work. One thing I have noticed/personally felt about relationships is that they seem to become quite insular, I have enjoyed being able to show up for various people and having the time to help.

4. Its quite nice only having to think of myself

I’m an easy-going person and compromise isn’t something I find difficult but it really is nice not having to do it lol! I wanna do something? Ok, off I go! 5. I owe my teenage self the time to explore fun & joy

Of course these things can be done with another but relationships require the capacity to give to someone else (guess this ties in with number 4) - but this is something I’ve felt I’ve always been doing - it always them before me. I don’t know where that came from or why that was my default setting but others have always been more important compared to giving to myself. I remember another friend once telling me “treat yourself sometimes!” after getting her a random gift. I owe it to that 14 year old to find out what really lights her/me/us up... Who knows who I’ll meet along the way!

For some reason, I’ve really wanted to buy roller-skates.

[0carkki0]

Dead character meme: by EastZombie (deviantArt), Jan 5, 2014, 9:54:42 AM Scraps This is a questionnaire for any character/s that has/have died. You can fill it out with one or more characters, and it should be filled out either by role-playing or by first-person answers. Because I hate writing pronouns to be both singular and plural, the assumption is that there's only person, when this questionnaire could work for more. Enjoy. 1. What is your name? Vivs: Vividatt. Nice to meet you. 2. Alright then. When were you born? Vivs: At Metrica Province Hinterlabs. It is notfar away from Rata Sum, our main city. 3. And when did you die? Vivs: Last year for the last time. I have died two times now. The first time took Place little after the Bloodstone Fen incident, which a year before the last time. 4. Now, for the big question, how did you kick the bucket? Be as explicit as you like. At the first time it was an ability to heal issue. Seliene, a human… friend of mine was there to stop me from becoming the world's nemesis after I... lost my senses to my other personality within my mind. We were both quite exhausted from fighting the whole day and it was time for that final strike. I did manage to destroy her heart, but since she was a Dragonhunter, she was able to keep herself alive till her arrow went through my head. After that I found myself from being judged by the judge of the afterlife. I was just hearing my judgement when the judge stopped judging and then told me that I was being summoned back in Exchange. That's when I woke up with Seliene's dead body in my arms. Second time… was when I faced the God of War and Fire in a battle where I wasn't prepared at all. He was actually just playing with me while we were fighting, and then finally killed me with his greatsword. I... would have stayed dead if it didn't bother me that Auriene, a dragonbaby at the time, had just tried to help me just before I died, and was caught. Well… AFter I came back to well… "life" it was obvious that my body wasn't living in a normal way anymore. It was and Still is in a state that shouldn't be able to live. But here I am. Feeling better than ever. 5. Are you upset about dying, or are you at peace with it? Vivs: I'm more upset by the fact that I had to come back. I knew that I couldn't be at peace knowing that Auriene was caught because of me. Then again, I may have come back as a ghost anyway... 6. If you could miraculously come back to life, would you? Vivs: Of course. First of all I could have progeny of my own, if I found a female asura that shared my views of... life with me. Secondly, the chances to die are higher than they currently are. Thirdly, I could feel pain more clearly. *smile* 7. Now that you’re dead, what do you feel was your greatest achievement in your life? Vivs: So far… Probably killing Mordremoth, an Elder Dragon of Plants and Mind. We had to enter inside of his mind to be able to kill him. ANd uh... kill a friend before Mordremoth took over his mind… 8. And your greatest regret? Vivs: Heh... I have a lot of those, but… the greatest one must be that I never told Taimi how I see her mind. Now… it's too late. I'm dead, sort of... Though, once an elder asura said that if you're able to think, you're alive. If only was really that simple. 9. Is there anything you wish you had done before you died? Anything at all? Vivs: It's my greatest regret. 10. If you could go back and relive one part of your life, would you? And if so, what part would it be and why? Would you do anything differently? Vivs: Ahh… There are so many… Probably that time when Seliene and I were inside my... lab. Let's say it was close I didn't lick her. *grin* 11. Did you have any beliefs regarding the afterlife during your life? If so, were they correct? Vivs: Not really. We have an Access to the Mists where all the deceased go, and thanks to our Gates, living may go too. We also have a lot of information about afterlife inside the Durmand Priory headquarters. … It's an Order I joined around when we were just learning more about the Elder Dragon's circle of life. 12. You can send a written message to one still-living person, who is it and what do you say to them? Vivs: Uhh… I'd rather write that after I was really gone, if you don't mind.   13. If your canon’s version of the afterlife allows it, are you going to be a ghost? Vivs: It might be fun. Going through WALLS... And people… Possessing people. And... I think I know who I would LOVE to possess… *grin* 14. Did you leave any loved ones behind when you died? Vivs: Yes. My friends. My Grandmother. 15. If it’s applicable to your canon’s afterlife, were you reunited with any loved ones when you died? Vivs: Not really. I was chasing after the memories of my life in the Domain of the Lost, before I met with the Judge. He sent me back after I did a little favor for him. 16. Did you have a funeral? If so did you see it? Was it nice? Did the people there serve the glory that is your life justice? Vivs: Well, there was no time for that. It didn't take that long after I was sent back here, but I was glad to see my friends after I awoke… I kind of dislike using that Word nowadays, thanks to Palawa Joko... but my friends were gathered around me and it seemed like they actually were sad that I had died. That little seewtheart Kasmeer Meade even shed tears for me. At least I hope she was crying for me... ^ w ^` 17. If it’s applicable, what happened to your body after you died? Were you buried, cremated, made into pencils, or was your body unrecoverable in some way? Are you an organ donor? Vivs: I have asked to burn my body if I die for good. 18. Was your death expected or unexpected? Vivs: Both. I'm sure Balthazar, the God of War and Fire, was expecting it. Me? No. And I don't think the others did either. 19. If you could go back and prevent yourself from dying, would you? Why or why not? Vivs: Of course. Like I said, I'd rather be alive fully for thereasons I already mentioned. 20. If you could to pick one person to die, and it had to be somebody you knew, would you pick someone? Why or why not? If you do pick someone, who would it be and why? Vivs: Me. For good. I don't like myself. And I'm sure a lot of people would be saved without me. 21. Where did you die? Did you die in a hospital, in an ambulance, in a car, in your sleep, in a factory, in your house, or where? Vivs: Crystal Desert, Elon Riverlands, Skimshallow Cove up at the spire. 22. What was your general goal in life? Vivs: It Still is saving Tyria, and my friends. Though, sometimes I wonder…. 23. Did you achieve it? Vivs: So far we have destroyed an Elder Dragon Zhaitan, Mordremoth and the Rogue God of War Balthazar. And of course the Lich King Tyrant, Palawa Joko. 24. If you were murdered, why did someone murder you and are you angry with your murderer? Did they see justice? Vivs: *remembers the fight with Balthazar* I'd say. 25. If you committed suicide, what drove you to kill yourself? Vivs: … What? Why would you think it was a suicide? It obviously wasn't, since he really wanted to kill me. 26. Are you happy with the live you lived, why or why not? Vivs: Don't you mean life I lived? Yes and no. A lot of mistakes. A lot of friends died. A lot of people saved and friends were made. Still, I'm sure my friends can continue the World saving even if I'm gone. 27. Name at least one thing you wish you did differently. Vivs: The study of the parasite minion. If I knew that THAT was the cause of all this, I never would have tried to summon it. 28. Did you die single or in a relationship? Vivs: *sigh* Single. 29. If you were in a relationship, do you think your significant other will move on? Do you want them to move on? If it’s applicable to your canon’s version of the afterlife, will you move on? Vivs: Of course. It would be unfair and stupid to expect them to stay loyal to me when I can't give progenies. I'm DEAD. My body Works completely differently from that of a living. Including the body liquids. 30. Is there a God? If so, did you meet him/her/it/whatever? Did you think there was a God while you were alive? Was he/she/it/whatever what you were expecting? Vivs: There were GodS. Six of them, actually. Dwayna, Goddess of life and air. Grenth, God of death and ice. Lyssa, Goddess of beauty and water. Melandru, Goddess of nature and earth. Kormir, Goddess of truth and spirit. And lastly Balthazar, God of war and fire. I've seen only two of them, though. Kormir and Blehthazar. Kormir I met when we were looking for ways to stop Balthazar, and that's when she told us that the Gods were all gone. Yep! I did feel a bit like they had like "fuck this shit I'm out" -kind of attitude… They just left. Why? Don't know, but she said that this was our problem to solve, so... we solved it. 31. Was your death significant to your canon’s plot? Vivs: Yes. I met Palawa Joko in afterlife, and I just had to tick him off before I returned. He somehow got free from the prison inside the Domain of the Lost and attacked… Taimi. It was… my fault she got nearly suffocated to death… 32. Was it necessary for your canon’s plot? Vivs: Of cousre! I just can't go on without causing a bit chaos here and there. Well, I suppose the Elonians are now free from the Lich's tyrannical grip, since he's now part of Auriene and her droppings. 33. Do you still have a physical form? If so, do you look the same as you did before you died? Explain any change. Vivs: I used to have very pale skin, but because I died by the God of War and Fire's greatsword, my sking got darker for the burns. My hair also got a little strange color reaction with death and magic... It's now purple, when it used to black. I think it turned white first, but because of the magic it took the color of purple. My heart beats rarely. WHen it does, it tend sto fill my lungs with liquid, which I then puke out. I also am not so sensitive to pain as I was while I was alive. But because of the parasite minion, my uh... greatsword of love is stuck in an erect position. 34. Did you go to another life? Vivs: Sort of. The Mists is a whole other World... 35. Do you think there’s any chance of you being reincarnated? Vivs: Could be. But I don't think that has anything to do with my current situation. 36. If you had the choice of being reincarnated or not, would you take it? Would being able to chose who you’re reincarnated as make a difference in your decision? Vivs: Of course. I would like to be reincarnated as a cat. 37. How long have you been dead for? If you don’t know, try to guess. Vivs: About a year and a half. 38. What is the worst thing you did while you were alive? Vivs: Ayy… Let's see… There's that… and then there's that… It has to be the massacre of asuras inside Rata Sum. 39. What’s the best thing you did? Vivs: Hmm... Killing Zhaitan. It gave hope to many people. 40. If you got to meet one dead famous person, who would it be, and why? Vivs: Easy. Snaff the Master Golemancer. 41. Would you describe dying as a scary experience? Vivs: To me it's like going to carnival. 42. If you had to go back to the land of living, and be alive as yourself again, would you live your life differently? Vivs: Deffinately. I would let someone else be the hero of Tyria, which people apparently call me. 43. Would your views on life change at all? Vivs: They would stay Small, since I wouldn't travel as much as I do now. I just have to go where the next opportunity of dying for good rises. 44. What where your last words? Vivs: If I remember correctly, I said "No, Auriene…" 45. If you could change your last words, would you? If so, to what? Vivs: Probably "BRB". … Be Right Back. 46. Do you have any last words for this questionnaire? Vivs: Don't worry. Being an undead isn't that bad. I can't drown, since I don't need oxygen to stay alive. I do miss the unbearable physical pain, though, and that moment when you can finally urinate after holding in for so long. XP Okay then. Rest in peace. 

I like thinking that he became a scourge after he was killed by Balthazar. X3 Sorry for bad grammar. ^^; I wrote this lateat night right after work.