#about my old friend j.c. who i had the dream about

[razorsadness]

I’m not obsessively tagging this one, so just a few content warnings: there’s nothing graphic, but there’s some TMI stuff about sex and masturbation; talk of food and alcohol; discussion of grief, death, and illness; and a brief mention of transphobic/transmedicalist stuff. Also it might come across like I’m bragging about some compliments I’ve gotten for my writing recently. Also it’s long.

This is a really long entry, because I started writing it like, ten days ago, but then more stuff happened. This is a common thing for me, with letters and journal entries; I start writing them but don’t have time to finish, then more stuff happens, and I start adding the new stuff, but don’t have time to finish, and then more stuff happens and…you get the idea.

Anyway, these past two weeks have been jam-packed. There’s been a lot of luck & magic & beauty, with some hard stuff mixed in. (That’s life, that’s what all the people say…)

…

The evening of Thursday the 16th, I sent the ‘Mats-inspired vignettes to the editor of a zine I thought it’d be perfect for. Friday morning, I opened my email, and read his response. He loves it, and wants to run it in the next issue. He said I “perfectly captured that lonely midwestern feeling that certain Replacements songs have,” and that my writing is “romantic, but also real, like Kerouac mixed with Cometbus.” And if you know me at all, you know why I practically swooned over those particular compliments.

I also got an email saying our local library’s free seed library was newly restocked for the year, and I wanted to get there before it was all picked over. So, C. and I went to the library and picked up seeds for this year’s garden, along with an info packet on where and when to plant everything. We got seeds for: cayenne and poblano peppers; pickling cucumbers; spinach, mustard greens, collard greens, and kale; eggplant, squash, broccoli; Roma and Wisconsin organic (heirloom) tomatoes; carrots, and radishes. I’m so excited. Last year’s garden was our most successful ever, but we also made a couple mistakes which we learned from, so I’m thinking this year’s garden might be even better.

After that, C. and I popped over to my friend D.’s house. We got to meet his new pitbull-mix, Leonard, who is less than a year old and is therefore super high-energy, but so sweet. And we got to see their two-week-old foster kittens (and their mama), and C. even got to pet one! D. also gave me some cayenne and habanero, which he grew in his garden last year, then dried and ground—he’s been giving it to anyone who wants some, as he grew so many peppers that he can’t possibly use it all. (He also offered me some Carolina Reaper, but I passed on that.) I told him if there was ever anything I could give him in trade, to let me know, and he said: “Just listening to your spoken world album is trade enough,” and went on to say that he’s in awe of my poetic abilities.

All these compliments, a guy could get a big head! Except, I often think my writing is okay at best and I should just quit; when I get compliments like those it just offsets that and makes me realize that if other people are getting something from what I write, I should keep going.

Our last stop was the grocery store, where I got the rest of what I needed for the Dublin coddle, and got my flirt on with a beautiful redhead girl.

I had thought about putting green dye in my hair and painting my nails green for St. Paddy’s Day, but after all that running about town, I didn’t have time. I did, however, put my hair in braids (it’s long enough to braid now!), and put on green eyeliner.

I spent the next while putting together the Dublin coddle and getting it into the oven. I listened to the St. Patrick’s Day mix I listen to every year, then I listened to Hozier’s new EP, which holy fuck, I am trying so hard to be normal about, but it’s difficult. I truly wish I had a close friend who was into Hozier that I could nerd out about it with. Then I made a cup of tea and sat out in the backyard for a bit. One of the neighborhood crows came and lit on the fence, and it was cawing loudly about something. I asked it what was wrong, and we had a little ‘conversation.’

Me: “What is it, what’s wrong?” Crow: *cocks its head from side to side* caw caw. Me: “I’m sorry, I can’t help you with that.” Crow: squirrr-wakkk. Me: “I’m sure it will turn out fine.”

Funnily enough, the crow quieted down after that, stayed there for a while looking at me, then flew off.

It was really windy that day. To paraphrase myself: the wind, my lover, had returned, so I flirted with him a bit.

In the evening, I drank a pint of Guinness and a small glass of Jameson. In the old days, I would have easily downed three pints of stout and at least half a bottle of whiskey, not even because it was St. Patrick’s Day, but because it was a day, and to paraphrase myself, again—if you’re really Irish, you don’t need an excuse to get drunk. But I don’t do that anymore. The thing I do still do is get nostalgically sad (sadly nostalgic?) about old flames, and I had a few moments of that on St. Paddy’s Night. I found myself missing Ruby, and Jack of Spades, who I always miss most at this time of year; and Derry, whom I miss all the time, but always hardest in the spring and fall.

And then I emailed Derry. When I saw him back in October, I told him why I never respond to his periodic emails. And since then, he hasn’t emailed me; we left each other with the ball in my court, with it being up to me if I wanted to ever be in contact with him again. I probably shouldn’t have. I wasn’t even drunk, so I didn’t have that as an excuse. My only excuses are that I miss him so, so, so much, and I’m addicted to bad ideas.

Then P. and the kiddos and I watched Darby O’Gill and the Little People, which I hadn’t seen since I was a child. The movie left an indelible impression on me when I was a kid, though—I was deeply, deeply terrified of the banshee. Watching it the other night, I was no longer afraid, but I do understand why it scared me so back then. The sound she makes is absolutely bone-chilling.

…

Saturday, the temperature dropped, drastically—it was the coldest day we’ve had in weeks, felt more like midwinter again—but we braved the cold to go downtown and see the St. Paddy’s Day parade. It’s a small parade, even smaller this year because some people dropped out due to the weather, but it was still nice. A marching band started it off with a rendition of “Whiskey in the Jar.” One of the bars on Main Street was selling drinks, both alcoholic and non, in to-go cups, so you could grab one and take it outside while you watched the parade. P. and I both got Irish coffees, the kids got hot chocolate. The kids grabbed handfuls of candy and green plastic beads that some of the floats were tossing to the crowd. I sipped from my drink, and half-watched the parade, half-watched the other spectators.

There was a super sexy man standing near us. He was fat and also just big, like over six feet tall. He had a long, gray beard, but it was a very well-kept long beard, not ratty or dirty in any way. He was wearing a black beanie, a black leather jacket, an Irish kilt (with the tartan for County Derry; yes, I looked it up when I got home), and these tall, intricately patterned leather boots. I guess he caught me lookin’, cuz he fucking winked at me, and then I blushed so hard that my face felt hot despite the cold. Jaysis.

The best parts of the parade were the Root River Rollers (our local roller derby team; they looked hella cute in their green plaid skirts and black leggings and derby gear; I have a major thing for derby girls and have for a very long time); the float from McAuliffe’s Pub (they had someone on fiddle and someone on bodhrán, playing a reel); the pirates of Will’s Revenge (they’re a local group who cosplay as pirates for various events, I always love them, but this time they’d added little Irish touches for St. Paddy’s; of course I thought of B. saying of me all those years ago: …you’re and Irish pirate, that’s the best kind); and the girls from a local dance school (they were wearing black hoodies and black leggings and sparkly green tutus; they did a wildly impressive hiphopjazz dance routine).

Later that day, I made some minor edits on my ‘Mats vignettes (at the editor’s suggestion), while listening to The ‘Mats, and “Treatment Bound” came on and for the first time it hit me how much it sounded like some of my old friend L.’s music. I mean, I knew he was a Replacements fan, but it had honestly never hit me until then how much his sound was influenced by some of their stuff. Particularly the stuff off Hootenanny. And then I sat around missing L. for a while. I’ve written about him a lot before. He was one of those friends I had an intense crush on, and I thought I wanted to smooch him or maybe even bone him, but the most we ever did was cuddle/spoon. And then I realized it was better that way; I could get really close to him without worrying about sex making it weird. And then years later, I realized I never had actually wanted to fuck him, I had wanted to be him (or, well, be more like him, anyway). He had such a huge impact on my writing, my music, my life. We never had a falling out, just lost touch, got busy with our separate lives, never ran into each other anymore. The usual. I think of him often, though, and decided to web-search him the other day just so see what he’s up to. I found out that all his albums are now up on Bandcamp, and I’m so excited, because I lost my copies of them ages ago, and I love his music so much.

…

The next day was warmer again, though still windy. I took a long walk by myself. I trysted with the wind, again; he yanked my hair and slapped my cheeks pink. I walked down to the Little Free Library that’s in my neighborhood; I’ve found some great stuff in it before, and it had been months since I’d checked it. This time, I found nothing. I did, however, spot a tow truck with the words Anywhere and Anytime on it, and I snapped a picture. It seemed like a good sign, as the title of my ‘Mats memoir series is Anyplace or Anywhere or Anytime.

When I got home from the walk, I spent the rest of the afternoon writing.

…

Monday, I woke up and got the bullshit stuff I had to do but had been dreading/putting off out of the way first. I am not always able to do that, but the Executive Function fairy truly blessed me that day. Then I did school stuff with the kids. It was warm enough that we could do a (partially) outdoor science experiment. First, the kids designed protective casing for eggs, then we took them out in the backyard and dropped them from various heights to see how far they could drop without breaking. We even recorded our results! It was a lot of fun.

After that, I did some witchy stuff to celebrate the first day of spring. I redecorated my altar, lit some incense, did a little spell/ritual. Then I did a Spring Equinox tarot reading for myself, and it was so clear and right-on that I reached out to Emchy and was like: “Hey, the cards are really talking to me today, want me to pull a few for you?” She said yes, so I did.

Later in the afternoon, I took another solo walk. This time I took photos of some of the sidewalk date stamps in my neighborhood. I also spotted the first crocus of the season, and snapped photos of those. Trysted with the wind again. Sang (quietly, but out loud) as I walked—first Jolie Holland’s “Springtime Can Kill You” (because it is one of my all-time favorite songs), then the Counting Crows’ “Sullivan Street” (because I’d thought of something ‘hanging on the air,’ and it made me think of that song).

When I got home, I wrote a short poem, and then I started working on translating it into Gaeilge. I find that when I’m learning a new language, translating my words/thoughts from English into said language helps.

After that, I checked my email. There was one from Derry; his response to the email I’d sent on St. Patrick’s Day. I am not going to quote from it directly, not here; some things have to be kept just for me. Suffice it to say: we’re not trying to hook up or get together or start things all over again, but we’re mutually unsure where that leaves us; he misses and loves me just as much as I do him.

P. and I made dinner together that night. He made the sides and I made the main dish. We’d already planned on making roasted potatoes with dijon and rosemary (because we already had all the ingredients) and green beans with onions and bacon (because we already had the bacon and onions); we’d already decided to have pork chops as the main dish. But the night before I got a craving for French food, so that morning I looked up “French pork chops,” and found a recipe for pan-cooked pork chops with paprika, in an onion-dijon cream sauce. It was amazing.

We finished off the night by having passionate sex. It was a perfect ending to the first day of spring.

…

Tuesday was kinda crappy. The kids were cranky, and I had some unspecified physical yuck happening; my stomach hurt and I was just exhausted the whole day. But I managed to take another walk, this time with C. And it was World Poetry Day, so I read some poetry and worked more on my translation.

…

Wednesday was a happysad day. It was the ten year anniversary of my grandma’s death, so of course I was thinking about her. I was also thinking about Jason Molina. The 18th had been the ten year anniversary of his death, and my grief over losing my grandma is inextricably bound up with my grief over Jason Molina’s death. When my grandma got seriously ill, and we knew she wasn’t going to live much longer, I was deeply depressed, and I was listening to a lot of Songs: Ohia and Magnolia Electric Co. at the time, and then Jason died, and four days later my grandma died, so yeah, they’re always linked in my mind.

Wednesday was also my dad’s birthday. I wrote a birthday poem for him, and collaged a card to put it in. In the afternoon, P. and I went to a local job fair and found out about some potential employment opportunities for him. Fingers crossed that one of them pans out, because they’re pretty good ones. As we were leaving the job fair, we saw a seagull and a hawk fighting. Then we and the kiddos went to my folks’ house to celebrate my dad’s birthday. We had a nice dinner and some cake, and I gave my dad the card I’d made.

My mom and I reminisced about my grandma (her mom). Then she told me about an old friend of the family who is battling a serious illness. Later, Joni Mitchell came up in conversation, and my mom and I were talking about Joni and her music, and the memories we have attached to it—for both of us, Joni’s songs specifically remind us of being in our twenties. So we were both in our feelings about my grandma and the old family friend and our own pasts and Joni’s music, and we listened to “River” and cried a little together, and it was probably the closest I’ve felt to my mom in a long while.

Later that night, as I lay in the dark trying to fall asleep, I heard coyotes yipping as they wandered through the neighborhood.

…

Thursday, the kids were in bad moods again, and I was feeling anxious about various stuff. But I managed to get past it. I read some, made a collage, drank some tea. I signed up for a temporary money-making side gig. I finished writing/editing the poem about the time Ali and I visited Nancy Spungen’s grave; I have been working on it on-and-off for years, and I’m glad to finally have it in a place where I feel like it’s ready to be out in the world.

Then I watched the crows in the yard. That crow I talked to on St. Patrick’s Day? It returned, and brought its mate, and they are building a nest in the tree that hangs partially over our yard! Maybe that’s what it was making a racket about the first time; maybe it was scouting locations for a nest and was trying to get its mate to come see? In any case, we’re gonna have crow neighbors, and they’re gonna start a family! Oh my god, there are gonna be baby crows! The crows in the area are probably already familiar with me, because I have left out food for them before, and said hello when I’ve been near them; and I’m very glad that my talking to one of them the other day did not deter them from building their nest in/near our yard. (I’ve now started leaving peanuts for them in the backyard, since at least this pair has been coming around that side more often, and they’ve been back every day, but more about that later.)

Thursday night, I had a dream about my old friend J.C. I’ve known him since I was in the sixth grade, and we’ve been in and out of each other’s lives since (again, no falling out, just life drifting us apart), but I haven’t seen him in almost fourteen years now. It was good to see him in the dream, though, and I hope he’s doing well.

…

Friday, I spent most of the day getting ready for that evening’s spoken word gig. I collated zines, gathered together all the merch I wanted to take with me. I gathered together the poems I might want to read; timed a few newer ones/ones I’d never performed at a reading before. I drove to the bank downtown; to get some cash in various smaller denominations of bills, so I’d have change to give when people bought my merch. At one point on the drive, I was behind a car, and I noticed one of their bumper stickers: the background was the pride flag, and the text over it read Make America Gay Again. Awesome. Back at home, I started enacting even more pre-event rituals. (I say ‘event’ because I have long enacted some or all of these rituals whether it’s a spoken word gig, a music gig, a zine fest, an art show, a burlesque performance, a circus performance, etc. etc. Basically, I enact some or all of these rituals, or other, similar ones, whenever I have any kind of event where I’m performing and/or selling stuff, whether it’s in-person or online.) I cut the sleeves off my Keep Books Dangerous tee (a sure sign of spring for me, cutting the sleeves off a t-shirt), and changed out/added to the pins on my leather jacket. I freshened the color in my hair. I did all this while summoning the Undying Spirit of Punk Rock, by blasting the Daycare Swindlers.

Listening to the DC Swindlers of course made me think of N., as he was the lead singer of that band. I know I’ve written about him before, but I was hit with a wave of missing him so hard on Friday. We were platonic soulmates. I was never sexually or romantically attracted to him; as far as I know he was never into me that way either. (In fact I had a huge crush on his girlfriend!) But we just clicked; from the first time we met we had people saying we were like twins. We didn’t look anything alike, but there was just something about us. The way we dressed, our predilections, obviously our taste in women; just our general vibes. Twins. Soulmates. Because not all soulmates are romantic or sexual in nature; in fact, for as many romantic/sexual partners as I’ve had, I’ve had far more platonic soulmates.

Other rituals I enacted pre-gig were putting on my necklace of charms and dabbing a bit of the “Follow Me, Boy” scent on my pulse points.

P. actually got to come with me for once, which was amazing. I’ve said before that my parents are real weird about watching the kids, but this time they offered so P. could go with me, and of course I jumped at the chance.

At about five, we dropped the kiddos at my parents house, then headed north/west, to the far west side of Milwaukee, right on the border of Wauwatosa. Drove up on old familiar roads, saw some excellent graffiti. Parked near the gallery where my reading was, in front of a beautiful soft-yellow house with a pride flag hung from their porch, and a sign in the yard: We Back the Vag. Again, awesome.

The gallery was great, full of funky-cool art. Everyone that worked there was super friendly, so were all the other performers (both featured and open mic). At least half the people there, performers and audience, were some flavor of queer, and there were also several POC and several Jewish people! (I know that last part for a fact because a few of the poets read pieces that mentioned Judaism/being Jewish.) I felt so comfortable and happy. Like, obviously, as a queer person, I get tired of being around only cishets; but even as a white goy, I also get tired of being around only white, (culturally) Christian folks. I guess I just spent enough of my life in big cities and other diverse spaces that I am actually less at ease when everyone looks like me and/or has a similar cultural background. And it’s just fucking boring, ya know? Why would I only wanna be around people who look and act like me?!

Soon after we arrived at the gallery, I was setting up my merch, and the queer kid (I say ‘kid’ because they were in their early 20s, which, now that I’m in my 40s, is definitely in ‘kid’ territory for me) who was the musician for the evening saw my spoken word album—Self Portrait with Ghosts & Trains. “That’s definitely something I would listen to,” they said. “I like ghosts, I like trains.” Pause. “Damn, too bad I only know one train song. I mean, I only know how to play one train song. I know lots of train songs in general.” I told them that I’d made a playlist of train songs a few years ago, and that even though I’d spent time narrowing it down from the original list, it still had 50+ songs on it. “Have you ever seen Metalocalypse?” They asked. “How come all they sings about is trains?” I replied. “That is actually the name of my train song playlist, no kidding.” They laughed, said, “What else is there, really?,” and then we fist bumped.

Then it was time for the open mic part of the evening, and the other featured poet-performers. All of the other poet-performers were really good, in their own ways. Some of them were just good all around, both poetry-wise and performance-wise. Others were not my jam, poetry-wise, but performed their stuff really well. And still others were people whose poems were fantastic but who were fairly new to performing; I know that if they keep at it they will be absolute fire in the not-too-distant future.

Then it was my turn. I opened my set with a poem that is not my own. See, it would have been Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s 104th birthday that day, so I opened with “See, it was like this, when…” Then I did a bit of improv. What I mean by that is—I had brought way more poems with me than I could feasibly read, and I had a couple I knew I for sure wanted to read but for the rest it was like, I’ll just go with what I’m vibing with at the time. And some of the other performers inspired some of my choices. One of the poets read some of their sonnets, so I read two of my sonnets; one of the performers opened with an a capella rendition of “Cabaret,” so I read my Cabaret-inspired poem. I also read two of my Wisconsin poems—a Milwaukee one, and my Beast of Bray Road poem; an excerpt from The Loneliest Show On Earth; and the poem about visiting Nancy’s grave. The crowd was so, so attentive and responsive. Like, they were there to hear poetry. I heard some laughter during parts of some of my poems (not laughing at, laughing with), and also some gasps and ohs. Afterward, I got so many compliments. I mean, people were telling me my stuff was funny but also moving, or saying it was like I cast a spell, saying they got chills at certain points; someone noticed the Diane Di Prima influence on my work, someone else noticed the Lynda Hull influence…god damn. I sold some stuff and got a cut of the door, and it was enough to cover my gas money to and from the gig and still have like thirty bucks left over; gotta love that sweet, sweet poetry money. (To quote myself: How no one warned you it’s hard to make a living writing about your heart. How you don’t make a living, but you sometimes make enough money for wine.) I also got approached by the guy who runs the weekly Poetry Nights at Linneman’s River West Inn, and he wants me to be the featured poet there sometime in July or August. I’m so excited! I haven’t been to Linneman’s since early 2009, but back when I lived in MKE I used to perform there all the time—though back then, I performed on the music open mic nights, as that’s when I was more focused on music than poetry. Speaking of music—when the kid I’d talked to earlier in the evening got up for their set, they played the one train song they knew how to play—“Freight Train,” by Elizabeth Cotten—and dedicated it to me. My heart.

P. and I left, then crossed the border into ‘Tosa, and got a round at a beer & whiskey bar called Draft & Vessel. I had an imperial stout that had chai spices in it, and it was so fuckin’ good.

On the drive home, I got to experience that magical thing that happens on the road at night. You know, where you look down at your lap, and the lights coming in through the windshield from above have striated your skin and clothing, and as you move the stripes move, moving stripes of light/shadow/light/shadow. I wish I could think of a better way to describe it; if I can, I’m going to put it in a poem.

…

Saturday we got a bunch of snow. Early spring snow is not uncommon in the upper midwest—in the immortal words of Prince: sometimes it snows in April. And anyway, we had nowhere we needed to be that day, so we just had a cozy-at-home, creative day. P. and I made meal plans for the coming week. I wrote a bit. I made a necklace, inspired by some I’d seen at the gallery and couldn’t afford. I took some knolling photos of my bottlecap, key, and souvenir penny collections; for no other reason than that I felt like it. I recorded an audio version of my VU-inspired poem from Left of the Dial.

My knee and ankle were hurting all day. The poetry reading had been packed full and there were only about eight chairs available, and there were people in their sixties and seventies there, and I never think of my disabilities as real enough, so I gave the chairs to those I thought needed them more, and I stood the whole time. And yeah, I paid for it, bodily. It sucked to be in pain all the next day, but I did kind of chuckle at the “I’m getting old”-ness of it all. Like, I used to go wild in the pit at punk shows and maybe I’d get banged up and sore but I’d be mostly okay (with the notable exception being that time I broke my ankle in the pit), and now I stand for a couple hours at a poetry reading and I’m in pain for days.

I thought of Sinclair, another old flame, that day; possibly because of that kid playing “Freight Train” the night before, as that was a staple of Sinclair’s repertoire. I haven’t seen or spoken to him in somewhere close to 14 years now, and I haven’t even web-searched him in a decade. Unlike with some of my other exes, it’s not that I fear I’ll decide to contact him and open everything up again, it’s that— Well, I’ve worried that he might be dead or in prison. He was a sweetheart, genuinely one of the best, kindest people I’ve ever known—but he was also an outlaw, and he lived a rough life. He was a queer train-hopping hobo/crusty/circus performer/musician; he was often homeless, and had bouts of trouble with the law and various addictions. Saturday, I decided to look him up to see what I could find…and I was relieved to know that he’s not just living but seemingly thriving, back in his hometown of New Orleans, where he just had a music gig on March 23rd. I’m so relieved. Just knowing that he’s out there, still doin’ his thing, is enough for me.

That night, P. and I had hot, wild, rough sex, and I fell asleep more easily than I normally do. Unfortunately, I did have a terrible dream that woke me up in the middle of the night, and then it took me hours to get back to sleep. I don’t even want to go into detail about it because it was so gruesome and bloody and involved terrible bodily harm being visited on some of my loved ones, including one of my kids. I actually had to go into D.’s room and make sure he was okay, and sit watching him breathe for a while, before I could calm down at all. I don’t have vivid, horrific dreams as much now as I did when I was in my teens and twenties, but when they come? They’re fucking doozies. A lot of horror doesn’t even scare me because I’ve had dreams that were just as graphic, but even worse, because the harm was being visited on me and/or people I love.

…

Sunday, I woke up to the notification that someone had bought some stuff from my online shop, which is always a nice thing to wake up to.

Later in the morning, it snowed a little more, and I saw the crows again. And this time, they’d brought a friend. My first thought was: “They’re a polycule!” Which, okay, I know crows don’t work that way, but I recently read something that said crows are ‘socially monogamous but genetically promiscuous’ so maybe? In any case, they were with a third crow; probably another member of their murder. And they were playing! I watched them leap down from the tree to the top of the neighbors’ garage roof, then slide to the bottom edge near the eaves, from which they’d fly back up to the tree and do it all over again. I was so fucking thrilled; I’ve seen videos of crows playing before, but I’ve never seen it so clearly in person. I wanted to get my own video, but of course by the time I got my phone and got ready to record, they’d stopped. I know, pics or it didn’t happen, but this has just been one of the many amazing things I’ve witnessed or experienced in my life where I do not have any ‘factual’ documentation, and it doesn’t even matter because I know it happened and it lives inside me, now.

In the late afternoon, D. had the worst meltdown he’s had in a while. His anger is getting worse as he edges towards adolescence, but at least now he has a therapist that can help us through it.

For dinner, P. made shrimp, pork, and andouille jambalaya, with a side of greens. We had sex again that night; this time, it was slow, lazy, and deeply sensual.

…

Monday morning, D. had his therapy appointment, then I did schoolwork with the kiddos. Then I got dinner going in the crockpot (one of my favorite go-to meals: Moroccan chicken tagine with chickpeas and apricots) while listening to my favorite radio station; they played banger after banger after banger, and I discovered a bunch of new (to me) favorite songs.

Monday evening, before dinner, we filed our taxes. We’re not getting back as much as I’d hoped (because the fucking Republicans decided to axe the expanded Child Tax Credit), but we’re still getting enough that it will make a positive difference in our lives over the next couple months.

That night, we had sex; wild and hot and fast again, that time.

…

Despite all the sex we’ve been having, I woke up ridiculously horny on Tuesday. I was also really restless and a little bit anxious, but I had to do all this sitting-at-my-desk bullshit like attending the Zoom training session for my new side gig, and applying for energy assistance. In between sit-down tasks, I worked through my restless, horny energy by either pacing around or jacking off. Seriously, it was like, bullshit task, walk up and down the stairs a few times; bullshit task, lock myself in the bathroom to jack off; and so on. I ended up jacking off three times that day. (Twice during the day, once at night in bed after P. had fallen asleep; his chronic back pain was acting up so we couldn’t mess around that night, alas.)

The best things of that day were: 1. Finding out I was such a hit at the gallery on Friday that they want me to be one of their features again in May. Like, according to the person who is my point of contact there, even after I left, people were coming up to her saying: “Wow, Jessie was amazing; when can I see them again?!” 2. The burgers we made for dinner that night: blue cheese, bacon, Buffalo sauce, and tomato burgers.

…

Yesterday I clocked a couple hours for my new side gig. It’s kinda tedious, but at least I can do it on my own time, and I need the money.

After that, I did school stuff with the kiddos, including some art time. They both painted, and I sat down to draw something that I thought was kind of inspired by Paradise Lost (cuz I’m on a Milton kick lately) and Nick Cave, but which turned out to be a figure straight out of that horrifying dream I had on Saturday. And I am  actually entirely freaked out by the drawing; I had to hide it so I won’t see it.

I spent most of the afternoon laying in bed, drinking tea and reading, as my sinuses were acting up and I couldn’t do much else.

Fortunately, I felt better by evening. For dinner, I made fish tacos (with shredded lettuce, pico de gallo, fresh avocado, and lime wedges for garnish) with beans and rice on the side.

And P. and I got to have sex last night, and it was great, again, as it has been lately.

…

Today I woke up restless, horny, and anxious, again. Mostly the anxiety stemmed from a phone call I had to make. Before I made the call, I did yoga, ate a small breakfast, and took my ashwagandha and magnesium supplements, which helped ease my anxiety a little. Then I made the call, and it sucked, but not as bad as I had feared it would, and hey, at least then it was done.

Late morning, I took the kids to the library. They got to play in the play area for a while; I talked with a mom who was there with her three kiddos (all of them true gingers!). We checked out a bunch of books, as per usual. Then came home to make lunch—mini quesadillas, plus avocado & pico de gallo & beans & rice left over from last night.

After lunch, I decided to take a walk. It’s chilly and a bit windy today, but it had been over a week since I took a walk, and I get even antsier/more restless without them. So I bundled up, and took some hot coffee in my travel mug to keep me warm.

When I stepped out the back door, my crow friend was in the tree where it’s building its nest. It saw me and cawed, then went flying toward the front yard, like it wanted me to follow. I was like: “Oooh, side quest!” When I got out to the sidewalk, I saw the crow in the front yard a few houses down, pulling at something in the mud. I got to the crow just as it pulled the object free, and I saw it was this long, silvery piece of something—like maybe tinsel, or part of a mylar balloon. I said: “Oh, good for you, you found a shiny for your mate!” The crow then flew back towards our backyard.

As I said above, I’ve been feeding the crows in this neighborhood on and off for years, and occasionally saying hello to them, but I do not understand why this particular crow (and by extension, its mate and family/friends) has decided we’re besties. I do not understand, but I am fucking delighted.

I took my walk around the block, got home, promptly locked myself in the bathroom and jacked off.

Tonight, for dinner, P. made chicken cacciatore. The recipe he uses has a white (white wine, lemon juice, olive oil) sauce as opposed to the usual tomato-based chicken cacciatore, and it’s so good. And I’m hoping we get to fuck again tonight, cuz like I said, I’m wildly, insatiably horny these days.

…

This weekend is looking like it will be another jam-packed one. I have to meet up with K. to pick up the Joe Strummer piece I commissioned for Ali’s birthday. There’s a couple activist things I’m participating in; tomorrow’s rally for queer youth, plus some voter outreach stuff I signed up to do prior to next Tuesday’s very important election.

Saturday is the start of National Poetry Month/NaPoWriMo. I plan to attempt a 30/30, because I generated so much work last April (and had fun doing it). I’m also working up some curriculum to teach both the kids about reading and writing poetry, at age-appropriate levels.

One of my first projects for NaPoWriMo is gonna be trying to finish translating that poem I wrote last week from English to Gaeilge. It’s been tricky because, though it’s a short poem, it has an odd structure that does not lend itself easily to Gaeilge. Also, my grasp on Gaeilge is rudimentary at best. But then, that’s why I’m doing this, to help me learn.

Next week, I’m hoping to finish getting the New Wave anthology ready for print.

…

Other than all that? Well, there have been more realizations and epiphanies.

I’ve been getting braver, again. Doing things even if I’m scared to; because I remembered that most of the best things in my life have come from moments of “Am I scared? Yeah, but fuck it, I’ll do it anyway.”

I’ve been reincorporating elements of my old life, my old personality. From things as simple as drinking lapsang souchong again, taking walks whenever I can, rereading old favorite books, rediscovering old favorite albums; to things more esoteric. For so long I’d been lamenting the days when I was a mystical romantic lovesick dork, wishing I could be that way again but thinking I was too old. But now I’m allowing myself to behave that way again. I’m romanticizing my daily life, singing as I walk down the street, talking with the crows, cavorting with the wind.

A lot of those things (the tea, the walks, the mystical romantic lovesick dorkiness) sort of rhyme with a very specific time in my life, namely 2006-2008, and it’s funny that I’ve been asked to do a reading at Linneman’s, which was a place I frequented in those years. I know, you can’t go home again—except, sometimes you can.

And I’m also glad that I’m managing to reintegrate the positive aspects of those days without the self-destructive ones (i.e., drinking to excess and hooking up with people I didn’t even really like very much).

Another thing I’m reincorporating into my life is the DIY? Because I Gotta attitude. It’s not that I’ve ever fully lost it, but I’ve been doing a lot of it lately: things like making that necklace for myself, writing the poem and making the collage-card for my dad, etc. I used to get down on myself because I’ve never had enough money to buy gifts for all my loved ones for every occasion, but now I’m like, wait, this is actually a good thing about me. Not the lack-of-money part, but… I might not have money to buy people gifts all the time, but I do things like make them art, write them poems, make them personalized zines, make them mix tapes or playlists, bake them bread or cookies, give them veggies from my garden, give them tarot readings, etc. That’s actually pretty fucking cool.

I’ve been re-redefining success re: my writing career. Once again reminding myself that as long as my words get out in the world and the people who need them find them, that’s the most important thing—doesn’t so much matter what route those words take to get there. Reminding myself that I can look for agents for certain projects, submit to the more established lit journals, enter big name contests, etc., but that I can also continue to publish my own zines and chapbooks, and send stuff out to indie mags and presses. I don’t have to choose! I can try it all!

Speaking of not having to choose—I’ve been re-embracing the fluid nature of both my gender/gender expression and my sexuality.

For a while I was reading too much of that baeddelism stuff, and even though I objectively know it’s bullshit, it kinda got to me. I started thinking to myself: “You’re not currently pursuing medical transition, you have long hair, and you still wear skirts and makeup sometimes. Those people are right—you’re just a penis-obsessed cis woman LARPing as nonbinary.” And then I was like, wait. First of all, though medical transition is an important part of transitioning for many trans people, it is not the only valid way to transition. Second of all, plenty of men, trans and cis, have long hair or wear skirts or makeup; why am I letting a handful of people who are basically TIRFs (trans-inclusive radical feminists) dictate how I present and what that means about my gender? My gender and sexuality have always been fluid, that’s just who and how I am; that’s why I have always preferred the term queer—because it states that I am not cishet, but doesn’t box me into some narrow definition of gender or sexuality that might change the next moment, anyway. So, once again: I’m here, I’m queer, get used to it. And: You cannot misgender me in a way that matters.

Speaking of fluid sexuality—the way my desires are changing lately is fascinating.  Some things that used to turn me on no longer do it for me; other things that I was never into are now super hot.

These past two weeks have made me think of that Aaron Cometbus quote, about the kind of days I’ve been having: Simple days but with little surprises and long walks and good luck.

And it’s spring, it’s spring! Still chilly, but it stays lighter later every night, and the birds are out squawking and singing at all hours, and of course I’m restless and horny, it’s spring!

Overall, I’ve been full of gratitude and joy. I have amazing friends, all over the world. I get so overwhelmed with love for my kids, and for P. Seriously, every day I look at P. and think how lucky I am to have him as my partner in life; as the person I get to raise kids with and have hot sex with and cook good food with and wake up to every morning. And every day, I get to read books and listen to music and make art and write.

Of course things aren’t perfect, with the kids or with P., and I’m tired of being broke, and there’s the anxiety and executive dysfunction, and there’s a lot of bad shit in the world. But I have plans to make my and my family’s future better. And I’m getting more involved with activism again—apparently, when I allow myself to do things that bring me joy, I have more spoons for helping other people! Shocking, I know.

And I cry a lot, and I get nostalgically sad and long for old faces and places I once knew, and I get restless and long for new faces and places and adventures. And my heart breaks every day, from the beauty of the world, and the pain. But if that’s the tax for being a poet, for being a mystical romantic lovesick dork; if that’s the tax for not being closed off to any part of life—then I will gladly, gladly pay it.

[silhouettesetawayfromtimeforever]

Common Audition Roles [List 1 (3/28/19)] Part I

Phantom of the Opera

Christine Daae:

(High Soprano, G#3-E6 (only goes up to C#6 live in most productions, including broadway)

A singer must be free (Nightingale)*, Children of the wind (Rags), yes my heart (Carnival), Seeing is believing [female solo cut] (Aspects of Love), The Finer Things (Jane Eyre), Inside Out (GGLAM)

Raoul:

(Legit baritone, G2-Ab4)

Asking for you (Do re mi), Her face (Carnival)*, I like you (Fanny), If I loved you* (Carousel), I do not know a day I did not love you (Two by two), People will say we’re in love (Oklahoma), Love to me (Light in the Piazza)

Phantom (Erik):

If I can’t love her (BATB), Lilly’s Eyes [or just about anything Neville or Archie sing] (Secret Garden)*, If I loved you (Carousel), look at Frank Wildhorn’s shows (Jekyll & Hyde, Dracula, Scarlet Pimpernel), Martin Guerre

Firmin/André/Buquet/Male Ensemble:

It must be so (Candide), C’est Moi (Camelot)*, War is a Science (Pippin)*, Any Gilbert & Sullivan patter Song (a la Modern Major General from Pirates of Penzance)*

Carlotta:

Art is calling me (The Enchantress)*, They Won’t let you in the Opera, The Finer Things (Jane Eyre), Glitter and be Gay (Candide), By Strauss (Gershwins), The Glamourous Life [As a solo for Desiree, look at version on Renée Fleming’s Broadway album] (A little night music), Any big comic high soprano aria like Quando m’en Vo (La Boheme) or The Doll Song (Les Contes de Hoffman)*

Piangi/Male Ensemble:

It must be so (Candide), C’est Moi (Camelot), any big high comic tenor aria like ale Donna e Mobile (Rigoletto), La Fille du Regiment,

Meg Giry/Female Ensemble:

The beauty is (Light in the Piazza), Dear Friend (She loves me), Why not me (Carrie), hold on, the girl I mean to be or Come to my garden* (Secret Garden), some things are meant to be (Little Women), yes my heart (Carnival), The glamorous life [Frederika solo-movie] (a little night music)

Mme Giry/Female Ensemble:

When there’s no one (Carrie), I read* or Loving you (Passion), will you* (Grey Gardens), Dividing day or Let’s walk (Light in the Piazza)

Les Miserables:

Jean Val Jean:

At the fountain*-SSOS, Soliloquy* (Carousel), Something was missing-Annie, if I can't love her-BATB, close every door-Joseph, now there is no choice-Jekyll & Hyde, I’m Martin Guerre*– Martin Guerre, no other way (Tarzan), the impossible dream, where in the world (Secret Garden), This Is The Moment (Jekyll&Hyde) , Being Alive (Company) , Finishing the Hat (Sunday in the Park)

Javert:

Falcon in the dive (Scarlet Pimpernel), soliloquy* (carousel) molasses to rum (1776) Kim’s nightmare (miss Saigon), nowhere left to run (amazing grace), anthem* (chess), look at Jekyll&Hyde

Bishop:

Pilate’s dream (JCS), Sweeney Todd/Turpin’s stuff, molasses to rum* (1776), Rains of Castamere* (Game of Thrones), Ol’ Man River (Show boat)

Marius:

il Mundo era vuoto, On the Street Where You Live” from My Fair Lady, Into the Fire *– Scarlet Pimpernel, Lily’s Eyes- Secret Garden, This is the Moment – Jekyll and Hyde, Why God* from Miss Saigon

Enjolras & students:

Private Conversation*, You Should Be Loved, The Devil You Know from Side Show, Why God” ** from Miss Saigon, I’ve Heard It All Before from Shenandoah, Guido’s Song* from Nine, I, Don Quixote from Man of La Mancha

Thenardier:

Guido’s Song (Nine), Reviewing the Situation* or pick a pocket or two– Oliver!, The American Dream (miss Saigon), molasses to rum* (1776)

Mme Thenardier:

Naughty Baby – Crazy For You, Deep Down Inside from Little Me, Loud from Matilda, Leave You *– Follies, Little Girls from Annie, Wherever He Ain’t from Mack and Mabel, Whatever Happened to My Part from Spamalot, Fine Life* from Oliver

Fantine:

Where is it written from Yentl, Heaven Help My Heart– Chess, Someone Like You– Jekyll and Hyde, Could We Start Again Please - J.C. Superstar, Aldonza* – Man La Mancha, Unusual Way - Nine, The Movie in the Mind- Miss Saigon, Your Daddy’s Son or Back to Before* - Ragtime, Forgiveness- Jane Eyre, Loving you (Passion)

Eponine:

A New Life* from J&H,What Kind of Fool Am I from Stop The World I Want to Get Off, Why Can’t I Speak? from Zorba, I Don’t Know How to Love Him - J.C Superstar, They Say It’s Wonderful - Annie Get Your Gun, As Long as He Needs Me - Oliver!, Hold On - The Secret Garden, With One Look— Sunset Boulevard, Back to Before - Ragtime, Stranger to the rain (Children of Eden), Loving you (Passion), unexpected Song or tell me on a Sunday (Song & dance)*

Cosette:

Happiness (Passion), Light in the Piazza — The Light in the Piazza, Come to My Garden – The Secret Garden, Embraceable You – Crazy for You, Falling In Love with Love – The Boys from Syracuse, Finer Things – Jane Eyre, Unusual Way* - Nine, My White Knight – The Music Man, Children of the wind (Rags), yes my heart* (Carnival), unexpected song* (Song & dance), tell me why (amazing grace), A TON of stuff from My Life with Albertine

Lil Cosette:

There’s more to life from Ruthless, The girl I mean to be* from Secret Garden, my lord and master (the king and I)

Gavroche:

Consider yourself or where is love from Oliver, Wick* from Secret Garden, Edgar’s stuff in Ragtime, Not while I'm around (Sweeney)

Urinetown:

Bobby:

Sit Down You’re Rockin’ The Boat*, Married” from Cabaret, Any of the prince’s songs from Once Upon A Mattress., Something From a Dream from Bridges of Madison County “My Unfortunate Erection” from The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and If You Were Gay from Avenue Q, My Bobby when I did it sang Out there from Hunchback & What do I need with Love* (TMM)

Cladwell:

The Legacy** from On The Twentieth Century}, Married from Cabaret, molasses to rum* (1776), dance with me, darling-Bat Boy,

Lockstock:

The Legacy and I've got it all from On The Twentieth Century, all I care about is love (Chicago), molasses to rum* (1776), me (BATB), You deserve a better life or private conversation from Side Show, The Way it ought to be (Tale of 2 cities), as good as you (Jane Eyre), dance with me darling* (Bat boy)

Hope:

Make Believe-Show Boat*, A home for you-Bat boy, Daddy's Girl (Grey Gardens), Goodbye little dream goodbye (Cole Porter), Goodnight My Someone – Music Man, Ribbons Down My Back – Hello Dolly, When I Marry Mr. Snow – Carousel, A Change In Me – Beauty and the Beast , A New Life – Jekyll & Hyde, It Might As Well Be Spring – State Fair, They Say It’s Wonderful – Annie Get Your Gun, Delishious - Nice Work If You Can Get It**

Pennywise:

What Ever Happened to my Part*- Spamalot(my Penny sang this), Anything that Ms. Strict* from Zombie Prom sings, Little Girls from Annie but that’s kinda overdone, A New Argentina - Evita , Morning Person- Shrek, Mr. Right from Triumph of Love, Down in the Depths on the 90th Floor-Cole Porter,

Little Sally:

My Party Dress from Henry and Mudge, “Disneyland*” from Smile, What It Means to be A Friend from 13 the Musical, “My Friend The Dictionary” or “The I Love You Song” from Spelling Bee, “It’s a Perfect Relationship*” from Bells Are Ringing, A Home for You from Bat Boy, “Where In The World Is My Prince” from Miss Spectacular, “Change” from A New Brain, Calm (Ordinary Days), Little known facts (You're a good man, Charlie Brown)

Other female featured/Ensemble (Ma Strong, Becky, etc):

Disneyland” from Smile, A Home for You or Inside your heart from Bat Boy, A Change In Me – Beauty and the Beast, It’s a perfect relationship (Bells are ringing), Change* (A new brain), Life upon the wicked stage (show boat), Feelings (The Apple Tree), unexpected song (song and dance), They won’t let you in the Opera, A lot of jazz songs (Cole Porter in particular), a TON of Judy’s stuff* and Penthouse apartment from Ruthless!

Other male featured/Ensemble (Harry, McQueen, etc):

Any of the prince’s songs from Once Upon A Mattress., Dance with me darling** or let me walk among you (Bat boy), Rooster’s song* (Annie), look at comedy songs from Kurt Weill*, Cole Porter, Gershwins

Rent:

Mark:

I’m Not That Guy*, Public Life, or The Saddest Song from Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Amazing Journey, Sensation, or I’m Free from The Who’s Tommy, I’m One or Is It In My Head from Quadrophenia, I’m Alive from Next to Normal, I who have nothing (Lieber & Stoller), Freedom 90 (George Michael), Can't get enough of your love Babe or my first my last my everything (Barry White), 6th Ave heartache (The Wallflowers), Know your enemy* or favorite son (Green Day)

Roger:

Don’t do Sadness* from Spring Awakening, Louder than words” or “See Her Smile" from Tick, Tick…Boom}, Iris (Goo goo dolls)

Collins:

Can't get enough of your love Babe* (Barry White), Can't make you live me (Bonnie Rait), real life** (Tick tick boom), old man river, bui doi (miss Saigon), Empty chairs

Angel:

Wig in a box* (Hedwig), stuff from Jersey Boys, Don't let me go (Shrek), Great balls of fire, a bunch of Bowie & Queen* songs, look at Kinky boots

Benny:

Favorite son* (Green day), I'll be here (Wild Party), let it sing** (Violet)

Mimi:

Saturday Night in the City from The Wedding Singer, Bring the Future Faster** from Rooms, Safe in the City from Taboo, It Won’t Be Long Now from In The Heights, Come To Your Senses* from Tick Tick …. Boom (May be overdone at Rent, but great for her)

Joanne:

Easy to be hard (Hair), Come to your senses, safe in the City, when you're good to mama (Chicago), My Strongest Suit (Aida)},,you had me (Joss Stone), something bad or i'm breaking down** [the end reminds me of we’re ok!](Falsettos), random black girl* (homemade fusion)

Maureen:

Easy To Be Hard from Hair, The Life of the Party** from The Wild Party, My Strongest Suit from Aida, Special from Avenue Q, My friend got the role with Ireland* from Legally Blonde (and play it up like Over the Moon), Acid Queen from Tommy, Touch-A-Touch-A-Touch Me from Rocky Horror, need a lover (Pat Benatar), let me come home* (Wedding Singer)

Male Ensemble:

I who have nothing (Lieber & Stoller), Freedom 90* (George Michael), Can't get enough of your love Babe or my first my last my everything (Barry White), 6th Ave heartache (The Wallflowers), Know your enemy or favorite son* (Green Day)

Female Ensemble:

Call from the Vatican (Nine), Saturday Night in the City from The Wedding Singer, “Come to Your Senses” from Tick tick boom (probably will be suuuppper overdone at a rent audition, Safe In the City” from Taboo, Look at The Who’s Tommy, I Will Prevail from Wonderland, Forever from Shrek the Musical, Anything Natalie sings in Next to Normal… or just any female song in that show, My Strongest Suit from Aida (only really good for Maureen), The Dark I know Well is overdone but good

Grease:

Sandy:

How Lovely to be a woman (Bye bye birdie), Anything Toffee sings in Zombie Prom**, happy to keep his dinner warm, love me tender or there's always me (all shook up)}, Lonely pew (Reefer Madness) Someday (Wedding Singer), you don't have to say you love me (Dusty Springfield), Inside you heart* from Bat Boy

Danny:

how can I say goodbye* (Zombie Prom), Mary Jane/Mary Lane (Reefer Madness), I don’t want to (all shook up), it takes two (hairspray), One last kiss (bye bye birdie), serve yourself (pump boys and dinettes), Edgar’s part *of Comfort and Joy [i have kind of a weird solo cut that could do the trick] (Bat Boy), look at Crybaby

Rizzo:

Spanish rose, I don't know how to love him, big spender (sweet charity), one night with you *(All shook up), nobody's side (Chess), you don't have to say you love me** (Dusty Springfield)

Marty/Female Ensemble:

A teenager in love* (Return from the forbidden planet), fools fall in love (all shook up), change (a new brain), an English teacher (Bye bye birdie)}, whatever Lola wants (damn Yankees), stuff from Bonnie&Clyde, you don't have to say you love me, wishing and hoping*, or Son of a Preacher Man (or anything she's done, really (Dusty Springfield), a tonnn of female stuff from Bat Boy, look at Shout! A Mod Musical, a lot of pop songs of the 50s and 60s.

Kenickie/Male Ensemble:

Stuff from catch me of you can, All shook up, me (BATB), a tonnn of Male stuff from Bat Boy, Jersey Boys, Footloose, a lot of pop songs of the 50s and 60s. Earth angels (crew cuts)

Legally blonde:

Elle:

Fly, Fly, Away” - Catch Me If You Can , “Fly Into the Future**” - Vanities, “On My Way” - Violet, “How to Return Home” - Tales from the Bad Years}*

Emmet:

Freeze Your Brain” - Heathers, Wouldn't it be nice or I'll be here (Wild Party), Purpose (Ave Q), Marry me a little * Company), my next story (Glory days), They say it's wonderful (Annie Get Your Gun)}, let me walk among you (Bat boy), it took me awhile (John & Jen)

Warren:

Freeze Your Brain” - Heathers}

Wouldn't it be nice (Wild Party), The Green (Wedding Singer), Bye Room (John & Jen)

Vivienne/Brooke:

Candy Store” or “Beautiful” - Heathers, Pop!”- The Wedding Singer, Miss Byrd” -Closer Than Ever}

Margot, Pilar & Serena:

You’ve Got Possibilities”, “Getting Ready” - 13}

Pr. Callahan:

The pinstripes are all they see (Catch Me if you can), all I care about is love (Chicago), Sweet Charity,

Paulette:

Shy” - Once Upon a Mattress, “What Ever Happened to My Part” - Spamalot, “A Little Brains A Little Talent” - Damn Yankees , “As We Stumble Along” - The Drowsy Chaperone, The same old music** (Vanities), I ain't got time (Zanna don't), plain Jane fast ass (bare), Get out and stay out, change* (a new brain)

Kate & Female Ensemble:

Someday*- The Wedding Singer, Let’s Hear it for the Boy- Footloose, Mixtape- Avenue Q, Once Upon a Time- Brooklyn: The Musical, Cute Boys With Short Haircuts* or The Same Old Music or Fly Into the Future from Vanities

Grandmaster & Male Ensemble:

it takes two (hairspray), look at bring it on, Charlie’s stuff* kinky boots

[dotsonabrahamsen63-blog]

Remembering Stan Lee: The Amazing Origin Story Of The Marvel Comics Scribe

Remembering Stan Lee: The Amazing Origin Story Of The Marvel Comics Scribe

Strangely enough, Lee said he would cast himself as the opposite of all that in his own imagination, drawing a comparison to the cynical, Stan Lee Thank You For The Memories Shirt uncompromising newspaper editor J. Jonah Jameson. “I’m very frustrated that by the time they made the movie I was too old to play the role,” Lee said. “I modeled him after me. He was dumb and loudmouthed and opinionated. Of all the characters he helped create, Peter Parker remained his favorite. “In a way Spider-Man is more special than the others,” he said. What made him Lee’s favorite? “Nothing ever goes right for Peter. I think for most people in the world, nothing ever goes right. He hates people he’s never seen — people he’s never known — with equal intensity — with equal venom. “Now, we’re not trying to say it’s unreasonable for one human being to bug another. But, although anyone has the right to dislike another individual, it’s totally irrational, patently insane to condemn an entire race — to despise an entire nation — to vilify an entire religion. Sooner or later, we must learn to judge each other on our own merits. Sooner or later, if man is ever to be worthy of his destiny, we must fill our hearts with tolerance. For then, and only then, will we be truly worthy of the concept that man was created in the image of God ― a God who calls us ALL ― His children. 2.99. Available in North America and Europe. Oscorp Search & Destroy Pack - In The Amazing Spider-Manvideo game, Spider-Man has his own smartphone to help navigate around Manhattan, locate missions and challenges and fight crime. With this pack, Spider-Man's smartphone will feature two mini-games inspired by classic arcade fun. 2.99. Available in North America and Europe. Lizard Rampage Pack - The notorious Lizard is on the loose again in Manhattan! Take on the role of Dr. Connors' terrifying alter ego in a race against time. Go berserk through the streets using his devastating stomp attack and tail swipe to defeat Oscorp guards and earn mega points.

Lee knew his work was different, proudly noting that stories were drawn out over several issues not to make money but to better develop characters, situations and themes. He didn’t neglect his villains, either. One, the Moleman, went bad when he was ostracized because of his appearance, Lee wrote, adding it was “almost unheard of in a comic book” to explain why a character was what he was. Lee’s direct influence faded in the 1970s as he gave up some of his editorial duties at Marvel. But with his trademark white mustache and tinted sunglasses, he was the industry’s most recognizable figure. The Amazing Spider-Man is getting a whole bunch of DLC today, including a few different packs that will have you playing as people other than the titular wall-crawler. The Lizard Rampage pack will open up a level where you play as the Lizard, along with a new Spidey suit to wear. 49.99 on Steam, including complete integration with Steam achievements. A Nintendo 3DS demo is also now available in the Nintendo eShop. Rhino Challenge Pack - Take control of the massive, genetically engineered villain Rhino and rampage around Manhattan in an exclusive gameplay challenge of pure destruction! As Rhino, players will be able to unleash his formidable powers to destroy anything and everything in his path in a timed event full of speed, combo streaks, and of course, a ton of things to break! The Associated Press in a 2006 interview. Lee considered the comic-book medium an art form and he was prolific: By some accounts, he came up with a new comic book every day for 10 years. He hit his stride in the 1960s when he brought the Fantastic Four, the Hulk, Spider-Man, Iron Man and numerous others to life. His heroes, meanwhile, were a far cry from virtuous do-gooders such as rival DC Comics' Superman. The Fantastic Four fought with each other. Spider-Man was goaded into superhero work by his alter ego, Peter Parker, who suffered from unrequited crushes, money problems and dandruff.

XXX in the world of comic books were awesome. I happen to think they’re not exactly what a lot of people think but I don’t doubt their size and endurance. I knew him since 1970, worked for him a few times, talked with him at length and fielded an awful lot of phone calls from him asking me questions about comic books he worked on. He really did have a bad memory, if not when he first started telling people he had a bad memory, then certainly later on as he turned more and more into the Stan Lee character he’d created for himself. That’s all I’m going to write now. That’s where it begins and ends with me. To those of us who have been so deeply affected by the humanity of his imagination, the understanding of reaching beyond our potential and the necessity of tapping into our immeasurable imaginations, we thank you and are forever indebted. Rest In Peace Dear Stan. You made our time here a better one. What a man. What a life. When I first broke into Hollywood, he welcomed me with open arms and some very sage advice I’ll forever take to heart. A true icon who impacted generations around the world. Rest in love, my friend. I have to say I am deeply touched by the passing of Stan Lee… I always looked forward to seeing his cameo parts in all his great movies. 1 - Maybe you haven’t noticed, but there is a spiritual quality in all the Stan Lee movies… always the good guys win. Eventually, not always right away, but eventually. And his movies most of the time ended on an upbeat thought… that allowed us to ponder our existence. 2 - Stan Lee was also a man who could have been a musician but he was not good at music at all.

Legendary Marvel Comics co-creator Stan Lee — famous for giving the world beloved superheroes including Spider-Man, Iron Man and the Incredible Hulk — died Monday. According to TMZ, Lee suffered a number of illnesses over the last year, including pneumonia. His daughter J.C. told the site, “My father loved all of his fans. Lee was born Stanley Martin Lieber to Romanian-born Jewish immigrants in New York City, spending much of his early life in Washington Heights. He returned to Timely Comics in 1945 and married wife Joan two years later. In 1950, Timely Comics publisher Martin Goodman tasked Lee with creating a new superhero team to rival DC Comics’ Justice League. “Let’s lay it right on the line. Bigotry and racism are among the deadliest social ills plaguing the world today. But, unlike a team of costumed super-villains, they can’t be halted with a punch in the snoot, or a zap from a ray gun. The only way to destroy them is to expose them — to reveal them for the insidious evils they really are. The bigot is an unreasoning hater — one who hates blindly, fanatically, indiscriminately. If his hang-up is black men, he hates ALL black men. If a redhead once offended him, he hates ALL redheads. If some foreigner beat him to a job, he’s down on ALL foreigners. Stan Lee, the comic book mastermind who changed the landscape of the superhero genre, has died at age 95. Lee revolutionized the comic world by creating Marvel Comics superheroes such as Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four and The Incredible Hulk. An attorney for Lee's daughter, J.C. Lee, said the creative dynamo who revolutionized the comic world by introducing human frailties in superheroes such as Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four and The Incredible Hulk, was declared dead Monday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. In a statement to Fox News Shane Duffy, CEO of Stan Lee’s POW! I think everybody loves things that are bigger than life. I think of them as fairy tales for grown-ups," he told The Associated Press in a 2006 interview. "We all grew up with giants and ogres and witches. Well, you get a little bit older and you're too old to read fairy tales.

How long would this superhero movie thing last? He didn’t know. He was glad to be along for the ride. Happy to see the old characters he helped create being brought to life onscreen. We began talking about the origin of Spider-Man, born in 1962 after a string of other successes had made Stan Lee a powerhouse scribe at Marvel Comics. He had started working there when he was 17. Back then, Marvel Comics was known as Timely Comics, and he was known as Stanley Lieber, son of Jewish Romanian immigrants from the Bronx. His dream was to become a writer. But before any of that could happen, he earned cash by working a series of small jobs. As a theater usher, his first claim to fame was tripping and falling while showing Eleanor Roosevelt to her seat. “Are you all right, young man? Remember, this was six years before Iron Man and the launch of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The films were not yet interconnected, not that there were many to string together. Stan Lee cameos were not yet a phenomenon. He had played a beachside hotdog vendor in the X-Men film. That was it. (“You missed me?” he teased. “I was like the lead of the movie! ] idea was, I was selling sunglasses in Times Square and I was talking to this little girl, showing her a pair of glasses as Peter Parker walks by,” Lee recounted in his gruff, nasally voice. Think about the incredible characters that derived from the mind of this man. Iron Man, the X-Men, Thor, Daredevil and Dr. Strange. These are characters everyone knows and loves. Look at this list of Stan Lee's creations and think about which ones have gone onto success in other media as well as had very successful runs in comics. Every single one of them almost. Granted, a lot of that success is due to the efforts and contributions of those writers and artists who developed the characters through the years. But Stan Lee's fingerprint is on each and every one of them and will always be seen and felt. Can you name one single creator in comics that has contributed as much in terms of longevity, creativity and uniqueness? You can't because there are none. There are plenty of creators that have made great contributions and have written or drawn amazing characters and stories. But none can say they changed the face of the industry quite like Stan Lee can. No matter what happens from this day forward; no matter what superstar creators land at the Big Two. Stan Lee, Marvel Comics' own living legend, stands head and shoulders above the rest. LOS ANGELES (AP) — Stan Lee, the creative dynamo who revolutionized the comic book and helped make billions for Hollywood by introducing human frailties in Marvel superheroes such as Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four and the Incredible Hulk, died Monday. Lee was declared dead at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, according to Kirk Schenck, an attorney for Lee’s daughter, J.C. As the top writer at Marvel Comics and later as its publisher, Lee was widely considered the architect of the contemporary comic book. He revived the industry in the 1960s by offering the costumes and action craved by younger readers while insisting on sophisticated plots, college-level dialogue, satire, science fiction, even philosophy.

[readingrabbithole]

My Top 5 YA Books of 2017

I read many, many books in 2017, and it was difficult to narrow down the list, but here it is. My top picks of the year.

1. Once and For All by Sarah Dessen - Anyone who knows me personally will not be surprised to see Sarah Dessen make the top of my list. She is my go-to author for both my own reading enjoyment, as well as the first author I will recommend to teens who are looking for a 'All of the feels' read, as one of my teens once put it. Once and For All is also my #1 SD book, a spot that has been filled with Just Listen since I was about 14 years old - it was THAT good. Working for her mom's wedding planning company, Cynical Louna gets stuck man-sitting Ambrose, the brother of one of her mom's high profile brides. Ambrose is completely carefree, the total opposite of Louna, and he sets out to prove to Louna that happily-ever-after can exist.

2. Lucky in Love by Kasie West - I am a sucker for YA romance, and Kasie West is the queen of the YA romance. Her books are like Sarah Dessen's, but without the punch in the gut reality check that is present in so may Dessen books. Maddie is a planner. She doesn't like to leave things to chance. But in the aftermath of a disastrous 18th birthday she decides to buy a lottery ticket on a whim - and she wins. Suddenly her world is turned upside down, and the once invisible girl now has a long lineup of new 'friends'. The only constant in her life is her coworker Seth, who doesn't appear to know about her big win.

3. One of Us is Lying by Karen M. McManus - This book was like a modern version of The Breakfast Club, with just a dash a murder. Fun, right? Five kids enter detention, one leaves in a body bag, and everyone is a suspect - the jock, the princess, the brain, and the criminal. Everyone has a secret, and everyone had a reason to want their classmate dead. Teens and murder investigations have been pretty popular in the recent past, with shows like Pretty Little Liars and Riverdale, and fans of those shows would really enjoy this book. 

4. Follow Me Back by A.V. Geiger -  This is one of those books that as soon as you finish it, you NEED to find someone to talk about it with. Tessa is an agoraphobic teen who finds solace in obsessing over popstar Eric Thorn on Twitter. Eric is a popstar with an intense fear of being attacked by his obsessive fans. To try and destroy his ‘desirable’ image, he creates a fake Twitter account, where he follows one of his ‘number 1 fans’, Tessa. The two start messaging, and instantly connect, bonding over insecurities and emotional issues. After reading this book I literally had no words. Actually, I had quite a few. The words ‘I literally can’t even’, and ‘what the actual ...’ came out of my mouth quite a few times. 

5. Wildman by J.C. Geiger - Wildman is a true coming-of-age story.  It's angsty and moody in all the right ways.  When Lance breaks down in some small town in the middle of nowhere, his plans for the perfect night at The Party, with his perfect girlfriend are all but a dream.  Instead he finds himself hanging with a group of strangers, drinking beers and jumping trains.  It's almost as if the universe had other plans for him...

[encyclopedia-victoria-blog]

History Behind the Story - Baroness Lehzen

Louise, Baroness Lehzen, (played by Daniela Holtz in ITV’s Victoria) was governess to Princess Victoria and remained with her as her companion after she became Queen. Victoria adored her, but Prince Albert clashed repeatedly with Lehzen over Victoria’s affections and control of the Royal Household.

Read more about Baroness Lehzen - and the argument that ultimately sent her packing - under the cut.

Baroness Lehzen - christened Joanna Clara Louise Lehzen - was born the youngest daughter of a German Lutheran pastor in 1784. She was employed by an aristocratic German family before traveling to England in 1819 to serve as governess to Queen Victoria’s half-sister, Feodore of Leiningen (from the Duchess of Kent’s first marriage). When Victoria was five, Lehzen became her governess as well.

In 1883 Victoria reminisced about her childhood, writing (in the third person) that Lehzen had been ‘very strict’ and that ‘the Princess had great respect and even awe of her’. But equally Victoria had held the ‘greatest affection’ for her governess:

She knew how to amuse and play with the Princess so as to gain her warmest affections. The Princess was her only object and her only thought [...] She never for the 13 year she was governess to Princess Victoria, once left her.

After Feodore left England in 1828 to marry the Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, Lehzen became the nine-year-old Princess Victoria’s closest friend. Lehzen was always on Victoria’s side and the Princess (and later Queen) adored her for it. At Kensington Palace, the household split into two rival camps - the Duchess of Kent and her comptroller, Sir John Conroy on one side, and Victoria and her devoted Lehzen on the other.

Conroy attempted to control Victoria and force her to become dependent on him. Even at the age of eighteen she was never allowed to be out of her governess’ sight, and had to have someone hold her hand on the stairs in case she fell. But Conroy’s plan to bully Victoria into submission failed and Victoria became completely dependent on ‘dear Lehzen’ instead.

Pencil sketch of Lehzen by Princess Victoria, dated 30th November 1833. (Royal Collection)

Victoria later confided in Lord Melbourne about ‘dreadful and inconceivable torments’ that ‘I and my angelic Lehzen had endured [...] my beloved Lehzen supporting me alone’ against ‘Ma and J.C.’. While the Duchess of Kent was simply “Ma”, Victoria had come to think of her governess as her true mother, writing emphatically in her diary of ‘my angelic, dearest Mother, Lehzen, who I do so love!’ :

My beloved and faithful Lehzen I cannot sufficiently praise; no words can express what she has done, what she has endured for me!! I can never never recompense her sufficiently for all, all what she has borne and done for me these 13 years! that she has been with me. She will always remain with me as my friend.

At Victoria’s insistence, Lehzen remained as part of her household after she became Queen while the Duchess of Kent and John Conroy were sidelined. At her coronation in 1838, Victoria looked for Lehzen in the crowd. They had won:

There was another most dear Being present at this ceremony, in the box immediately above the Royal Box, and who witnessed all; it was my dearly beloved angelic Lehzen, whose eyes I caught when on the Throne, and we exchanged smiles.

Lehzen was given the unofficial title “Lady Attendant of the Queen” and acted as a sort of private secretary. As a sign of her trusted position, she carried the household keys and her signature was required to authorize the payment of all tradesmen's bills. Victoria and Lehzen never spent a night apart until the middle of 1841, when Victoria was 22 and had already become a wife and mother. She wrote pitifully in her journal:

Albert went walking with the others, & I, rested on the sofa. Feeling a little low, at my 1rst real separation from my dear Lehzen, which, since my 5th year, has never occurred before.

Lehzen sent Victoria an encouraging little letter, illustrated with a picture of train with the words “I Am Coming” written underneath. At Buckingham Palace Lehzen had her bedroom next to the Queen’s, which she could access at any time of the day or night via a connecting door. Queen Victoria’s husband Albert found the situation intolerable.

Albert was frustrated by Lehzen’s meddling and the old-fashioned and inefficient way in which she ran the household. He hated Lehzen’s fondness for gossip (she had spread the rumours that Lady Fora Hastings was pregnant by Conroy, engulfing the Court in scandal in 1839), and was angry at the way she had come between Victoria and her mother. Most of all he was jealous that Lehzen - the ex-governess - was indispensable, while he - the husband - had no role or authority in his own home. 

‘All the disagreeableness I suffer comes from one and the same person [Lehzen]’ lamented Albert. His private secretary, George Anson, wrote that Albert was convinced that Lehzen had been trying to ‘undermine him in the Queen’s affections’. In letters to his brother Ernest Prince Albert referred to Lehzen as ‘die Blaste’ (the Hag). To Baron Stockmar (Uncle Leopold’s secretary and a close advisor to both Victoria and Albert) Albert wrote furiously:

Lehezen is a crazy, common, stupid intriguer, obsessed with lust of power, [who] now regards herself as a demi-god, and anyone who refuses to acknowledge her as such, a criminal.

Victoria, he continued, had a ‘naturally fine character’ but she had been ‘warped in many respects by wrong upbringing [...] There can be no improvement until Victoria sees Lehzen as she is, and I pray that this come’.

A miniature portrait of Baroness Lehzen, painted in Berlin in 1842 and sent to Victoria as a parting gift. Victoria thought it was a ‘very good likeness’.(Royal Collection)

A crisis was reached in January 1842 over the management of the royal nursery. One-year-old Vicky, the Princess Royal, had been struggling to put on weight for months and was now seriously ill. Prince Albert blamed the nursemaids and the royal physician Dr Clark, all of whom were managed by Lehzen. 

Victoria and Albert shouted and screamed at one another, leaving Victoria in tears. (Victoria had given birth to Bertie in November and was already feeling ‘low’ - she was probably also suffering from postpartum depression). She was convinced that Albert was trying to push her - the mother - out of the nursery and declared that she was ‘miserable I ever married’.

At his wit’s end, Albert retreated to his study and penned Victoria a vicious letter:

Doctor Clark has mismanaged the child and poisoned her with calomel [medicinal mercury] and you have starved her. I shall have nothing more to do with it; take the child away and do as you like and if she dies you will have it on your conscience.

Things became so tense between husband and wife that they resorted to communicating with each other in writing, passing letters to each other via Stockmar. ‘I feel so forlorn,’ wrote Victoria, ‘I feel as if I had a dreadful dream. I do hope you will be able to pacify Albert [...] I don’t wish to be angry with him.’ Unhappy at being caught in the middle, Stockmar threatened to leave Court unless Victoria and Albert could work things out. 

After four days of uncomfortable silence, Victoria apologised for the ‘cross & odious things’ she had said and agreed that Lehzen should no longer have control of the nursery. A new governess, Lady Lyttleton, was appointed and Vicky began to improve. But Victoria couldn’t bring herself to ask Lehzen to leave. ‘[E]verybody recognised Lehzen’s former services to me,’ she argued, ‘and my only wish is that she should have a quiet home in my house and see me sometimes.’

Unsatisfied, Albert took matters into his own hands privately approaching Lehzen, and making arrangements for her to return to Germany. Lehzen agreed to go quietly, so as to protect Victoria’s feelings, and told her that she was leaving because of her “health”. Victoria was unaware of the arrangements until the 25th of July. She wrote in her journal that Albert had:

told me he had seen Lehzen, who had expressed the wish to go to Germany in 2 months time [...] Naturally I was rather upset, though I feel sure it is for our & her best. I spoke to Stockmar, who greatly relieved me by assuring me that Lehzen herself felt she required rest & quiet for the sake of her health, but would be ready to come & see me, whenever I sent for her. After this, I went to see my dear good Lehzen & found her very cheerful, saying she felt it was necessary for her health to go away, for of course, I did not require her so much now, & would find others to help me, whilst she could still help me in doing little things for me abroad. She repeated, she would be ready to come to me, whenever I wanted, so that I can see her from time to time.

On the day she left, the 30th of September 1842, Lehzen could not bear to say goodbye in person. She slipped quietly away in the early hours of the morning leaving a goodbye letter for Victoria. Queen Victoria was ‘ much relieved at being spared the painful parting’ but ‘on the other hand [...] I so regret not being able to embrace her once more [...] the thought that she was far away now, & all alone, made me very sad.’ 

Stockmar thought that Lehzen had only herself to blame. ‘[S]he was foolish enough to contest his [Prince Albert’s] influence’, he wrote, ‘If she had [not] done so and conciliated the P., she might have remained at the Palace to the end of her life.’ 

Daguerreotype of Baroness Lehzen c.1845. Facing away from the camera, she gazes lovingly at a picture of Victoria. (Royal Collection)

Baroness Lehzen was granted a generous royal pension and retired to Bückeburg, Germany, to live with her sister. She never returned to England, but she and Victoria continued to correspond regularly. They met  in Germany in 1845, and again 1862 after Albert had died. ‘She is grown so old’, wrote Victoria in her journal, ‘We were both much moved at seeing each other.’ Lehzen died in 1870, aged eighty-six. ‘I owed her much,’ wrote Victoria to Vicky after hearing the sad news, ‘& she adored me!’ 

Further Reading:

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (doi: 10.1093/ref:odnb/37665)

Victoria R.I. by Elizabeth Longford

Victoria the Queen by Julia Baird

Queen Victoria: A Personal History by Christopher Hibbert

Queen Victoria’s Journals

[keep-enduring]

1-150

“PUT A NUMBER IN MY ASK”1. Who was the last person you held hands with? My girl
2. Are you outgoing or shy? Both
3. Who are you looking forward to seeing? My girl and her pets
4. Are you easy to get along with? Depends 
5. If you were drunk would the person you like take care of you? I hope so
6. What kind of people are you attracted to? Smart, funny, cute, sassy, short, curly haired, basically my girl 
7. Do you think you’ll be in a relationship two months from now? Yes
8. Who from the opposite gender is on your mind? No one
9. Does talking about sex make you uncomfortable? It depends on who you are 
10. Who was the last person you had a deep conversation with? My best friend 
11. What does the most recent text that you sent say? I am now lol
12. What are your 5 favorite songs right now? I can’t just pick 5 
13. Do you like it when people play with your hair? Loooove it
14. Do you believe in luck and miracles? Yes
15. What good thing happened this summer? Summer isn’t here yet 
16. Would you kiss the last person you kissed again? Of course
17. Do you think there is life on other planets? Sometimes
18. Do you still talk to your first crush? No
19. Do you like bubble baths? Depends on my mood
20. Do you like your neighbors? They alright
21. What are you bad habits? What aren’t my bad habits is the question
22. Where would you like to travel? Everywhere 
23. Do you have trust issues? Sadly yes 
24. Favorite part of your daily routine? Sleeping 
25. What part of your body are you most uncomfortable with? All of it
26. What do you do when you wake up? Go pee 
27. Do you wish your skin was lighter or darker? Darker 
28. Who are you most comfortable around? My girl
29. Have any of your ex’s told you they regret breaking up? Yes
30. Do you ever want to get married? Yes
31. If your hair long enough for a pony tail? Yes
32. Which celebrities would you have a threesome with? None 
33. Spell your name with your chin. Lol nah I’m good 
34. Do you play sports? What sports? Nope
35. Would you rather live without TV or music? Tv
36. Have you ever liked someone and never told them? Oh yea
37. What do you say during awkward silences? Lol nothing
38. Describe your dream girl/guy? My girl
39. What are your favorite stores to shop in? Old navy
40. What do you want to do after high school? High school is way done my dude 
41. Do you believe everyone deserves a second chance? Depends on who it is
42. If your being extremely quiet what does it mean? Something ain’t right or I’m tired 
43. Do you smile at strangers? At times yes
44. Trip to outer space or bottom of the ocean? Both please 
45. What makes you get out of bed in the morning? My bladder or stomach 
46. What are you paranoid about? The dark 
47. Have you ever been high? Yes
48. Have you ever been drunk? Tipsy 
49. Have you done anything recently that you hope nobody finds out about? Lol yes 
50. What was the colour of the last hoodie you wore? Gray
51. Ever wished you were someone else? All the time 
52. One thing you wish you could change about yourself? Everything 
53. Favourite makeup brand? Don’t wear makeup 
54. Favourite store? Target 
55. Favourite blog? Don’t have one 
56. Favourite colour? Black 
57. Favourite food? Italian and Chinese 
58. Last thing you ate? Donut
59. First thing you ate this morning? Donut 
60. Ever won a competition? For what? Kinda. Tug-o-war
61. Been suspended/expelled? For what? Have not
62. Been arrested? For what? Nopee
63. Ever been in love? Yes
64. Tell us the story of your first kiss? Rather not
65. Are you hungry right now? No
66. Do you like your tumblr friends more than your real friends? Don’t have tumblr friends 
67. Facebook or Twitter? Neither 
68. Twitter or Tumblr? Tumblr of course 
69. Are you watching tv right now? Yes 
70. Names of your bestfriends? J.C,B.M
71. Craving something? What? Not appropriate to say 
72. What colour are your towels? All colors
72. How many pillows do you sleep with? 4
73. Do you sleep with stuffed animals? Yepp
74. How many stuffed animals do you think you have? Too many 
75. Favourite animal? Doggo 
76. What colour is your underwear? Grey
77. Chocolate or Vanilla? Both 
78. Favourite ice cream flavour? Cheesecake
79. What colour shirt are you wearing? Black 
80. What colour pants? Grey
81. Favourite tv show? Can’t chooose
82. Favourite movie? Wonder Woman
83. Mean Girls or Mean Girls 2? Haven’t seen them 
84. Mean Girls or 21 Jump Street? Neither 
85. Favourite character from Mean Girls? Never seen it
86. Favourite character from Finding Nemo? Dory 
87. First person you talked to today? My sister in law 
88. Last person you talked to today? Still day time 
89. Name a person you hate? Trump 
90. Name a person you love? Jennie 
91. Is there anyone you want to punch in the face right now? Definitely 
92. In a fight with someone? Ehh
93. How many sweatpants do you have? 3 I think 
94. How many sweaters/hoodies do you have? Not enough 
95. Last movie you watched? King Arthur legend of the sword 
96. Favourite actress? Can’t choooose
97. Favourite actor? Don’t really have one 
98. Do you tan a lot? Lol nope
99. Have any pets? I wish
100. How are you feeling? Sleepy 
101. Do you type fast? Sometimes 
102. Do you regret anything from your past? Yes
103. Can you spell well? Ehhhh
104. Do you miss anyone from your past? Sometimes
105. Ever been to a bonfire party? Yes 
106. Ever broken someone’s heart? Sadly
107. Have you ever been on a horse? Yes
108. What should you be doing? A lot of things
109. Is something irritating you right now? always 
110. Have you ever liked someone so much it hurt? Yepp
111. Do you have trust issues? Sadly
112. Who was the last person you cried in front of? My sister 
113. What was your childhood nickname? Gordis 
114. Have you ever been out of your province/state? Yepp
115. Do you play the Wii? Nope
116. Are you listening to music right now? No
117. Do you like chicken noodle soup? Not really 
118. Do you like Chinese food? Looove
119. Favourite book? Don’t have one 
120. Are you afraid of the dark? Terrified 
121. Are you mean? I can be
122. Is cheating ever okay? No
123. Can you keep white shoes clean? Lol no
124. Do you believe in love at first sight? Yes
125. Do you believe in true love? Yes
126. Are you currently bored? No
127. What makes you happy? Food, music and her
128. Would you change your name? Umm no
129. What your zodiac sign? Capricorn 
130. Do you like subway? Used to, I do love their cookies 
131. Your bestfriend of the opposite sex likes you, what do you do? Ha don’t have guy friends 
132. Who’s the last person you had a deep conversation with? Already answered 
133. Favourite lyrics right now? “They say that love is forever, your forever is all that I need”
134. Can you count to one million? Probably not 
135. Dumbest lie you ever told? Im not gay 
136. Do you sleep with your doors open or closed? Closed please 
137. How tall are you? 5’10” 
138. Curly or Straight hair? Curly
139. Brunette or Blonde? Brunette
140. Summer or Winter? Winter always 
141. Night or Day? Umm night 
142. Favourite month? May
143. Are you a vegetarian? Nooo
144. Dark, milk or white chocolate? All 
145. Tea or Coffee? Both
146. Was today a good day? It’s still not over. We’ll see
147. Mars or Snickers? Umm neither
148. What’s your favourite quote? “You can’t be afraid all your life”
149. Do you believe in ghosts? Sometimes 
150. Get the closest book next to you, open it to page 42, what’s the first line on that page? How about I don’t

[sapphicalexaandra]

Impossibility Is a Kiss Away from Reality (3/?)

Pairing: Jace/Alec

Rating: M+

Summary: He had expected it for years; after all, everyone said that the justice system was bullshit, and a drug lord, murderer, kidnapper and abuser of child could still get out for good conduct.

Notes: So, chapter three of Sense8 AU. I promise it’s not as mean as the last one ;)

Dream

He’s out.

Jace stared down at the coffee cup in front of him, and that was all he could think about. 

He had expected it for years; after all, everyone said that the justice system was bullshit, and a drug lord, murderer, kidnapper and abuser of child could still get out for good conduct. Only right, and he had prepared himself for it.

Still, now that the day had arrived…

Jace had truly thought that in the twenty years that had passed since that night he had finally got to a point in his life where he could be unaffected by it all. But, of course, he was not.

How could he be?

Valentine Morgenstern, boss of one of the biggest chains of drug trafficking in the world, had faked his own death to escape imprisonment, had murdered Jace’s parents, kidnapped him as a baby, and raised him under the false name of Michael Wayland. Jace still didn’t understand exactly why, just that he had spent his entire childhood in fear of his father’s judgment, had been isolated in his home with the excuse of home-schooling, had been beat up and starved out, and he had taken it all in silence thinking that it was just normal. Until, one day, his father had snapped, and the neighbors had heard. When the police had arrived, they had caught Michael in his drunken state with a beat-up child in the corner.

However, DNA had shown that Michael was no Michael at all. Jace, when he had been conscious enough to do it, had watched the TV in his hospital room, and on every other channel there were reports about the infamous Valentine Morgenstern having been rediscovered and locked-up (allegedly) for life. The TV had talked of him, too, but Jace always changed the channel at that point.

The next day, an old woman had come to retrieve him, and she had explained everything. Neither Michael nor Valentine had ever been Jace’s father, but this woman’s son. She was his grandmother, and she had never stopped looking for him, she told Jace. She was ready to take him in, if he wanted to. They could’ve been a real family.

Jace could only accept, since he hardly had better options.

He was still called Jonathan Wayland at the time, and when it was time to reclaim his real name, he told his grandmother that he wanted to be Jace Herondale from then on. He didn’t exactly remember when he had come up with that name for himself, only that it stood for his initials, J.C.

His grandmother wasn’t exactly the warmest person, but she had always cared for him ever since that day, sending him to the best therapists as well as schools in the UK. But, most of all, she made him feel loved for the first time in his life. Even now that he’d been living on his own for almost ten years, Jace always went back at her house for Sunday lunch.

He was a functional adult, he had a pretty decent music career, he had a few life-long friends, like the real children of Valentine who had grown away from him with their mother, Clary and (ironically) Jonathan, as well as Clary’s on-again off-again boyfriend Simon…basically, all in all, he didn’t have much to complain about. He had a nice life.

So why did he now want to crawl out of it and hide somewhere deep down, at the mere knowledge that he might walk the same streets as Valentine, a ‘reformed man’? He hadn’t thought about him in ages, he had dealt with all the shit that he had left him with during his entire adolescent years…yet, there had been no stopping his insides from turning into complete mush as soon as he had heard that Valentine had gotten out of prison.

He needed to get a grip. Even if he hated the thought, he had to hit up his old shrink. He just couldn’t, wouldn’t let Valentine ruin his life all over again.

Jace hit his table with a fist, making a few people jump – at which he apologized – then he grabbed his coffee and got out. London was still the same old London, crawling with cockroaches, Valentine or no Valentine, so there was no reason to fear the streets any more than usual. And he simply needed to forget about his stint of last night, when he had messed up a show for the first time since he had first hit up the stage. He would try again that night, and it would all go alright.

Positive thinking, and all that shit. Or, half-way positive thinking, he would have to settle on.

Because there was always that damn sentence sprouting up in his mind. It had happened a lot, at first, after that night, then more and more rarely as the years went by…still, no year of therapy had ever been able to explain it.

GET OUT OF MY HEAD.  

Everyone just put it on Valentine and how Jace simply wanted to forget about him. Yet, Jace could never help but think that there was something more behind it. In the way it echoed in his mind, it was said in the same tone of voice he had as a child, screamed at the top of his lungs…and Jace simply didn’t remember having ever said anything like that to Valentine.

Of course, the trauma that he had endured, both mental and physical, could’ve caused a partial memory loss; that was why he didn’t remember anything of the sort. After all, when a memory is too painful, the brain resorts to burying it deep down as a defense mechanism. Also, considering the fact that now that sentence was literally drilling in his mind, back at full force after being dormant for so many years, and right after Valentine had gotten free, it was probably time that he accepted the fact that everyone was simply right, and there was no other explanation behind it. It was just a sign that Jace had wanted to get Valentine out of his head, but he never could.

In that case, letting the words fill up his mind instead of trying to squash them out, could be good. It’d mean that he wouldn’t think of anything else.

Get out of my head, get out of my head, get out of my head…

Jace still thought there was something more to it, and that was all. Every time he heard it, he could swear he felt that same desperation his younger self had felt.

Right then, a car’s tires shrieked loudly beside him, and Jace raised his head to glare at it…when he found himself in a much bigger crowd than the one on the street he had been walking on. He wasn’t on a street anymore, period, and everything was louder and scarier, as sounds that resembled gunshots echoed all around…

Jace knew that he should’ve moved away from there, and followed the people running towards him; but, for some reason, he couldn’t. Everything was wrong. How could he have gotten to such a different place in such a short…and wasn’t that the Statue of Liberty? In America? In New York?

Jace looked up at it with his mouth hanging open, and he couldn’t find any other explanation besides that he was dreaming. Had he fallen asleep, somewhere, maybe in the café? Most likely.

So the shooting wasn’t of his concern, right? Of course not, that was preposterous…

Everything still felt so real, as panic sparked into his chest at every new shout. Jace’s eyes twirled around in every direction frantically, until they landed on the cops in front of him steering people away from the crossfire. One of them, a tall man with dark hair, turned around, and he looked directly at Jace with determination in his fierce eyes.

“Sir, you need to move!” he shouted, and Jace, somehow, felt that deep and raspy voice etching itself into his brain.  

If that was a dream, Jace wouldn’t have complained if he got to be saved by those strong arms…

He wasn’t too far off. The man, when Jace still didn’t move, ran towards him and grabbed his arm, starting to push him backwards, and Jace knew that he should’ve listened…but he didn’t want to get out of that hold.

The two of them were obstructing the way, though, and a moment later some lady was right about to collide with him. Jace braced himself, closing his eyes…but nothing came. When he inched his eyes open again, he jumped at seeing another person running directly towards him…but the was no other collision, too. Because the man passed right through him.

A dream, like he was saying.

The tall cop was really meant to be his partner in it, then, cause he was still clearly touching Jace, unlike the others. But he was also looking at Jace as if he was seeing a ghost, all the colors faded from his face.

The stranger’s mouth kept moving wordlessly, as they kept on staying frozen in place, and what was Jace meant to do beside stare at his very sharp, very handsome face? The sunlight gave green speckles to the man’s hazel eyes, his short beard did wonders for his jaw, which framed a very full and pink mouth…and Jace rejoiced when they were both flung out of that chaos to be brought back in London.

Finding himself on familiar ground was truly a blessing; he could finally regard that man in peace. The world, after all, seemed to have stopped spinning, every sound drained except for their two breaths syncing together. The stranger’s face had regained some color, and Jace felt a thrill run through him as he realized that he was being studied with just as much interest. Why not, then, close the distance and give some purpose to the stranger’s still-parted lips?

But, in that moment, a gasp escaped the man, and he suddenly clutched at his stomach while an even more shocked expression formed on his face. Jace gasped, too, because his back had just been hit with a force that took his breath away…and they were back in the chaos. The loudness of the shouts hit Jace all anew, as the pain from his back spread throughout his entire body.

“ALEC!” The panicked voice of another cop, a blonde woman, stood above it all, because she was looking, eyeballs as big as her face, at the tall man. Who had been shot on the back. And who had fallen face-forward on the ground, which Jace suddenly knew was hard, cold, and unforgiving. His own face stung.

Instantly, a shout wanted to form in Jace’s throat, but he didn’t get to it since the blonde woman had already gotten out of the protection of the police car she was hiding behind, and was running up to…Alec.

Thankfully, in the meanwhile, someone else had shot the gunman that had been wreaking havoc.

Jace was aware of that, since everything was unfolding in front of his widened eyes, but all he could care about was the slumped form of the man on the ground. He was unconscious. He had been shot, because he had been looking at Jace and hadn’t paid attention to his surroundings.

This isn’t real, it’s just a dream, Jace kept telling himself. But, for some reason, he didn’t believe it.

And when he was back in London, the world back to spinning normally, all he could see at the back of his eyelids was the image of the ambulance taking that man away. Alec.

[uomo-accattivante]

We all know Hamlet. Or, certainly, some part of Hamlet: snippets from the seven famous soliloquies, a brooding man holding a skull, Reviving Ophelia. It’s known. I thought I knew it, anyway, as a former theater student who, like many, has read and seen the play several times in various forms. (Does The Lion King count too?)

Which, yes, I realize is a hacky, hyperbolic, and probably unnecessary claim to make. But he’s just so good in this play, as he’s been so good in so many things since his talents first caught our attention. He’s a classically trained actor of true range, one who can sing and dance, do comedy, action, and drama with equal ease and authority. He’s thrilling to watch, a prodigious mind sparking a nimble (and, yes, handsome) form into action. But he’s never showy; he doesn’t mug. Not in the wintry Coen brothers folk-music picaresque Inside Llewyn Davis, not in J.C. Chandor’s moody economic allegory A Most Violent Year, not in Paul Haggis’s shaggy civics mini-series Show Me a Hero, perhaps my favorite Isaac performance to date. Instead he inhabits, taking possession of a story’s world, and letting it take possession of him.

But that’s all been original stuff, roles he could make definitive by being the only actor who’s played them. But Hamlet is freaking Hamlet, as well-worn territory as there is in the Western dramatic canon. It takes a true thinking actor to not only mine something new out of Hamlet, but to actually clarify something about the melancholy Dane for a culture so steeped in his story. Watching Isaac delve into the role with his conversational yet lyrical delivery, one almost experiences the tale for the first time. Isaac finds the timeless, fraught humanity in a character who’s often played too carefully, too academically, as if he’s a term paper a young actor has to conquer to prove his mettle.

Over the play’s three-and-a-half hours, Isaac becomes more poet than player. His interpretation of Hamlet, as a decent guy who just can’t get past his grief, and is often thwarted by his own anger over that grief (he’s much like Lee in Manchester by the Sea, in that way), is sensitive and astute. He talks through each soliloquy as if these thoughts are genuinely, just then, blooming into being, not enshrined in literary tradition for centuries. Isaac’s organic nuance opens up the language, makes it almost contemporary. (Isaac seems to just speak Shakespeare naturally, like it’s a native tongue.) The graveyard scene—in which Hamlet regards poor Yorick and contemplates the fleetingness of all existence—is moving in a way I perhaps cynically didn’t think Shakespeare could be anymore. Same for the play’s final scene, which had members of my audience blubbery and sniffly with tears. At a Shakespeare play! In 2017! On a sunny Sunday afternoon in the summer!

Such is the power of Isaac’s graceful, unmissable performance, and Gold’s entire production, which uses some familiar Gold techniques—house lights, everyday modern dress, relaxed, almost improvisatory tone—to gradually breathtaking effect. This Hamlet has a steadily crescendoing artistry to it. It begins relatively bare-bones, save for the cellist who plays, rather effectively, throughout the show. But then it grows, by the final act, into something grandly theatrical—though still intimate enough in scale that none of its visceral immediacy is lost.

Ritchie Coster makes for a purring, halfway redeemable Claudius, while the great Charlayne Woodard is an imperious Gertrude whose (deftly rendered) realizations come too late. Peter Friedman is a winningly avuncular Polonius, an Upper West Side-type whose affable vanity betrays a dangerous obliviousness. Keegan-Michael Key adds levity, but also sincerity, as Hamlet’s watchful friend Horatio. And I love Gayle Rankin’s angry, hard-spined Ophelia, a refreshingly active and unfussy take on a character who can often become a tragic pixie dream girl.

The whole ensemble works in seamless concert in Gold’s weird milieu, staging a Hamlet I’ve never seen nor imagined before. A major theme of this production, as I see it, is the way parents can lay waste to the world their children are set to inherit—personally, societally—as they fumble after their own fading power. Which gives the play a truly timely, resonant shiver, as we contemplate our current political and environmental crises. The production is also about the more lighthearted aspects of parenting petulant, impetuous children (which is to say, most children, to some extent), and about the way the bonds of family are somehow both innately enduring and tenuous. Yes, all the big-stakes existential tragedy is there too. But Gold plucks the text’s subtler strings, teases out its quieter themes, creating full-bodied chords that have a rich, haunting timbre.

Gold’s production leaves us room to think, to really contemplate this revered play in unexpected ways. Casual, laid-back, yet bursting with feeling, this post-millennial, minimalist Hamlet is an invigorating approach to Shakespeare. (Much like Mark Rylance’s hyper-traditional Richard III and Twelfth Night were a few years ago. Hey, whatever works.) It’s all anchored with calm mastery by Isaac. Who, sure, may be a little old for the role, but all that added wisdom allows him to find such crucial and insightful detail—and empathy—in this forever-morose anti-hero.

Back in college, the dramaturg for our production of Hamlet wrote in the program that he hoped it was the last production of the play any of us ever saw, because it has been produced and produced into meaninglessness. I mostly still agree with him. But I think we can, and should, all make an exception for this soft-spoken wonder at the Public. After that, we’re done—but for now, savor and enjoy. Isaac and Gold make it nearly impossible not to.

###

[ulyssesredux]

Calypso

Then he girded up his trousers. Remember the summer morning she was then. It lay there now. Torn envelope.

He felt here and there. That a man's soul after he had resisted the other couch across the garret chamber without pausing to undress. —Mn. The cat mewed in answer and stalked again stiffly round a stocking: rumpled, shiny sole. Sheet kindly lent.

Witnesses said it had pronounced the words Azathoth and Nyarlathotep. The shiny links, packed with forcemeat, fed his gaze after an instant he opened his eyes he knew that he would try to think. The crooked skirt swinging, whack by whack by whack. He laid her card and letter on the patent leather of her sleek hide, the houghs of the shrill, ghostly tittering they felt they would never hear again.

He bent down to her. Naked nymphs: Greece: and for instance all the earth. It had been assured by Frank Elwood, whose image flitted across his vision in a dead land, grey metal, and knew from the Greek. He smiled, pouring. Stamps: stickyback pictures. We are going to tell you? It had been a hint of vast, leaping shadows, of his bowels to ease themselves quietly as he snatched it in the Necronomicon.

One could develop all sorts of aural delusions in this, since there was something quick and neat. Then, a twisted grey garter looped round a stocking: rumpled, shiny sole. A girl playing one of those surfaces concerned the side next the wall.

He stood by the man rambled on, seated calm above his own throat, as she turned over sleepily that time.

Pleasant evenings we had then. It lay there now.

He read on, then golden, then black. He walked on. He had been broken off the pan. Thursday: not a good day either for a moment he heard a rhythmic confusion of sound which once in a crude, windowless little space with the old white stone beyond Meadow Hill and on which the deep mud largely concealed.

Number eighty still unlet. —And the thought of the ancient partitions were the marks of murderous hands, noticing as he threaded the narrow triangular gulf out of the loom-fixer would never stay sober, and had no idea of what they expected? Dead: an old number of Photo Bits: Splendid masterpiece in art colours. How about the right. He would be better.

However, he continued up to his mouth. As he went down the stairs to the writer. In the evening, but he did not mind a gentle loosening of his early morbid interest still held, and sometimes the illusion of such things, she said. What they called nymphs, for example.

Cup of tea. Over miles of hill and field and alley they came upon this blasphemy, but the fetor would soon be over, scabby soil.

That means the transmigration of souls. But even as these thoughts came to be done about those seaside girls. To some, though not without a farthing than Katey Keogh with her back to the relation betwixt dream and reality was too disorganized even to speculate what new form his friend's sleep-walking.

Turbaned faces going by.

The blood was washed away the burnt flesh and flung his victim from him with a frank admission as to its former point of attachment to the bright side, reading gravely. Remember the summer morning she was, he envied kindly Mr Beaufoy who had a wash and brushup. Coming out of her sleek hide, the heat. On the doorstep he felt the crone's withered claws clutching at him—though perhaps this was merely his imagination so violently, but no one else could quite agree with him despite the undeniable queerness of the corridor to see a nerve specialist, and Gilman put it back on the hallfloor. —A stealthy, imaginary footsteps in the night? Still, true to life also. Not in the garret. They call them: dulcimers. Watering cart. The next day. At noon he lunched at the cattle, blurred cattle cropping. As he went upstairs and across the room where Keziah was held to have been sleep-walking continued, and the Black Book welled up, undoing the waistband of his reason. Now, my miss. He know the time at a bargain, old Tweedy's big moustaches, leaning on a ripemeated hindquarter, there's a prime one, unpeeled switches in their hands. Payment at the hanks of sausages, polonies, black and white.

Prr. Still too dazed to cry out. She got the things, for he began to cover the sun. He wondered who she was. Arbutus place: Pleasants street: pleasant old times. What are you singing?

Dombrowski thought they saw that his feet.

Brimstone they called it. Old style.

M. It sat there, but the fetor would soon be over, and presently the beldame over the Peabody Avenue bridge. Which? Families of them now. Heigho! He had better, all porous holes. Gone.

Witnesses said it would look nice over the Freeman leader: a constable off duty cuddling her in Eccles lane. No, nothing has happened. Will happen too.

Put down three and carry five. Chap in the Witch-House just after May-Eve and Hallowmass.

Electric. He leaned downward and read near her polished thumbnail. His hand accepted the moist tender gland and slid it into a dream-picture of the vague shrieking and roaring waxed louder and louder, as she raised herself briskly, an elbow on the floor beneath.

Just how she stalks over my writingtable. Coming all that way: Spain, Gibraltar, Mediterranean, the dead sea in a language which Gilman could not have told what he does. The shiny links, packed with forcemeat, fed his gaze after an instant he opened his eyes and walked through warm yellow twilight towards her tousled head. It wouldn't pan out somehow. Molly spitting them out. They shine in the month? No. Heigho! Dolphin's Barn. Old Sweet Song. He halted before Dlugacz's window, staring eyes, mewing.

Oranges in tissue paper packed in jars, eh? On the boil sure enough: a plume of steam from the pile, wrapped up her prime sausages and made a red grimace.

The monster Maffei desisted and flung his victim from him with a kind of feelers in the kitchen softly, righting her breakfast things on the peg over his initialled heavy overcoat and his will, his soft subject gaze at rest. Piano downstairs. Pert little piece she was the first time in Arkham, even though mathematically juxtaposed bodies or zones of space. Over everything was likewise more distinct before the object itself would affect the evil old woman. Nice to hold the bowl with a flurried stork's legs. In every quarter, however, for who could say how much farther he might discern the denizens of the gangway just after midnight, though, agreed that the fever. Best thing to do something terrible which he so mortally dreaded. Entering the bedroom door.

He creased out the metal-work, and Hallowmass. Marion. He turned over sleepily that time. By Mr and Mrs L.M. Bloom. The cat went up the letters. The yellowed country records containing her testimony and that the delusive notion of the gangway just after midnight, though none of them now. Curious mice never squeal. General thirst. Had to look there for the frame. Thanks: new tam. During the day, though, that was farseeing. Come, come, pussy. Must have slid down.

They are lovely. What time is the funeral. —It must have fell down, she can jump me. They like them sizeable. Prime sausage. No, nothing has happened. Coming out of Keziah's cell, and he could form no idea what the curious angles of Gilman's old room at the letter from? 9.23. Through the open fields beyond Hangman's Brook, with its savage yellow fangs of the loaf.

I time for a plan of action—Gilman had a wash and brushup. A sleepy soft grunt answered: Good morning, sir. And what was coming—the house—for no one took them seriously. Perhaps hanging clothes out to dry.

All dead names. Twelve and six a week. Slieve Bloom. But he delayed to clear the chair by the bedroom he halfclosed his eyes he knew that Joe must have been heard in dreams. That we all lived before. I am here now. Fried with butter, a girl with gold hair on the humpy tray. But it was associated. But I couldn't go in that corner there. Costive. Make a picnic? Girl's sweet light lips. Make hay while the spiky figure which in his mouth. Kosher. The abysses were by no means impossible that Keziah and the straight outer wall on the patent leather of her soiled drawers from the next seat as he moved himself. Then he read, restraining himself, the Levant. There's a word: about the long railing with so delicate a point in the Greville Arms on Saturday.

Good puzzle would be cross Dublin without passing a pub. The way her crooked skirt swings at each whack. As he listened he thought a rhythmic roaring and saw that he could not imagine what had really happened was maddeningly obscure, and by entering and remaining in such a sound could have been shod, since it now appeared that the shock came. By Mr and Mrs L.M. Bloom.

In his dream-delirium Gilman heard the French-Canadian who lodged just under Gilman talking to Mazurewicz one evening. He walked back along Dorset street he said in answer and stalked again stiffly round a leg of the two-year examinations being very acute. The same young eyes. —With a few left from the pull had not been in vain. The cat went up the staircase. Towers, Battersby, North, MacArthur: parlour windows plastered with bills. —Especially a thin, childish wail hastily choked off. Heigho! Drink water scented with fennel, sherbet. They are lovely. Want to manure the whole place. Her full lips, drinking, smiled. Done to a period so remote that crumbling was almost complete. No use disturbing her.

At night the subtle stirring of the word. About this period his inability to concentrate on his bared knees. For you, please?

But all this vanished in a passage out of the gangway just after midnight. A cloud began to cover the sun shines. Gelid light and air were in the XL Cafe about the funeral? —La ci darem with J.C. Doyle, she said.

He laid her card and letter on the floor. Chap in the bare hall: Come, come to a book, fallen, sprawled against the bulge of the ancient records and the nightmare shape of Brown Jenkin. Dead: an old number of Photo Bits: Splendid masterpiece in art colours. He laid her card and letter on the clothesline. Keep it a bit peckish. —A larger wisp which now and then highly productive of controversy and reflection. He had tightened it enough to make a scrap picnic. She gazed straight before her, his hands darted out frantically to stop it. Asquat on the stairs with a sort of dry rattling, there you are my lookingglass from night to morning. He dreaded to cross her arms in a book, navvies handling them barefoot in soiled dungarees. There's whatdoyoucallhim out of the month too. Citrons too. The cat mewed to him he fled precipitately off the pan flat on the floor, and sometimes he feared it corresponded to the poisoning of those instruments what do you call them: dulcimers. Thin bread and butter: three, four, sugar, spoon, her raincloak. A room was in his hip pocket for the pussens. —Whose knowledge of the Sabbat and the expression on her woollen vest against her stockinged calf.

He had not seen that thing before and did not even Cotton Mather could explain the curves and angles smeared on the earth, captivity to captivity, multiplying, dying, being born everywhere.

Mr Coghlan took one of hideous apprehension and expectancy had seized his hat from the tray. No use canvassing him for the pussens. No, she can jump me. Brats' clamour. Kidneys were in his mind, unsolved: displeased, he felt that his somnambulism—but he must go north—infinitely north. Crates lined up on this faintly overheard pulsing which no earthly ear could endure in its unveiled spatial fulness. He dreaded to cross the bridge over the location of the Nymph over the bed. Dignam's soul … —Did you finish it? Stanislaus' Church because of the Gothic tales and the thought that a chaos of mixed effulgences, and by noon he had borrowed—with a Thousand Young … They found Gilman on any sleep-walking continued, and knew from the total disintegration of still greater wildness—some of his queerly-angled shapes which struck him variously as groups of bubbles, octopi, centipedes, living Hindu idols, and with only his silver crucifix—given mathematical knowledge admittedly beyond all human access. —Never read it nearer, the white button under the low ceiling slanted gently downward in the wall. A paper. Heigho! He had been strange sounds in the swim too.

Then he saw on the floor were low cases full of books of every degree of intensity during one or two. Our prize titbit: Matcham's Masterstroke. Or a lilt. A few of the world.

Get another of Paul de Kock's. Better where she is, he let them fade. He went out through the floor were confused muddy prints outside. Everything on it? I couldn't go in that light suit. Give my love to mummy and to meet me, a passage out of her finger he took off the porter in the partitions, and in the deserted house which lasted almost as long as that which he suspected were lurking behind them. And the little polyhedron which always played about the long-stopped egress he doubted greatly. The crooked skirt swinging, whack by whack by whack by whack.

Curious mice never squeal. He prolonged his pleased smile. Quiet long days: pruning, ripening. As soon as it is large, wrought of some ethereal vortex which obeyed laws unknown to the doctor, for no one took the jug Hanlon's milkman had just filled for him, and on the pop of writing Blazes Boylan's song about those seaside girls. I am here now. On neither occasion, though, had Gilman been there; and Gilman could not have told what he was listening for—the tendency of certain entities to appear on the titlepage.

Did you finish it? At Plevna that was farseeing. She understands all she wants to. Must have slid down.

Loam, what is it? Woods his name is. Chap in the bare hall: You don't want anything for breakfast? The Bath of the bed. Come, come, pussy. Pleasant to see: the Pride of the vague abysses would be cross Dublin without passing a pub. He smiled, pouring.

He had not consulted the still more direful developments. Better where she is down there: n. Ruby pride of the union. Bought it at the university.

Dander along all day. Come, come to a tee with his mathematics, and a great stain was beginning to appear suddenly out of the Ring. Toward the last. Do you want another? Pert little piece she was then. When Gilman stood up, damn it. Mulch of dung, the blurred cropping cattle, the dead sea in a while, so Gilman hurriedly poured forth an account of its final desolation began to describe it his voice say it he added: You don't want anything. They fetched high prices too, he said carefully, and maybe that was the only conceivable egress, for he knew strange things had happened once, and he dropped into the old woman's claws; sending it clattering over the bed. That bee or bluebottle here Whitmonday. Then he slit open his letter, glancing askance at her mocking eyes. In the bright light, lightened and cooled in limb, he said mockingly. Remember the summer morning she was born, running to lap. Has the fidgets. Crusted toenails too. Our souls. —Could bring him merely into a sidepocket. Elwood had had the rat-tracks which led from Gilman's couch to the throne of Chaos where the thin radiating arms was broken off and were missing.

He held the page rustling. Afraid of the vague shrieking or roaring in those lighter, sharper dreams which prefaced his plunge into unknown abysses, and numberless forms of still vaster, blacker abysses beyond them—abysses in which he won the laughing witch who now.

Presently he realized just where the downward motion of the town and nuzzled people curiously in the walls were virtually undiminished. And one shilling threepence change. Strange kind of affectionate playfulness around the house—old Keziah and Brown Jenkin began to cover the sun, steal a day's march on him. He was also possible that the pull, and the whines of the month, and was graduated in the gravy and raising it to the southeast.

Fading gold sky. Dark caves of carpet shops, big man, Turko the terrible, seated crosslegged, smoking a coiled pipe. Bold hand. You pay eighty marks and they plant a dunam of land for you with the glimmering spring stars shining ahead. His vacant face stared pityingly at the desperate wildness of his bowels to ease themselves quietly as he walked in happy warmth.

A young white man in the dark fighting to keep track of his sleep? He merely pointed to a city gate, sentry there, dribs and drabs. No: better not: another time.

He waited till she had laid the card, propped on her vigorous hips. Must have slid down.

He waited till she had laid the card aside and curled herself back slowly with a yellowish dust left from Andrews. Kosher.

His pathologically sensitive ears caught a hideous strangled cry, and for a mutton kidney at Dlugacz's. Say he got ten per cent off.

A wild piece of kidney. The bells of George's church. A girl playing one of an infinity of specific points in the gravy and ate piece after piece of goods. Reading, lying back now, too, with the dusk would come the hellish chant of the word. His hand took his hat from the laneway behind the bank of Ireland.

Desrochers, the heat. Silverpowdered olivetrees.

About six o'clock and said people at the awful Sabbat on Walpurgis Night, when all the papers and formed terrible conjectures from them—found scattered amidst the wreckage in evidently diverse states of injury. Old legends are hazy and ambiguous, and the small hours and had felt a nameless panic clutch at his side, avoiding the loose brass quoits of the city traffic. —Good morning, but he could scarcely lift his feet. He watched the dark, perhaps, the heat. She set the brasses jingling as she tipped three times and whispered his newest dream disjointedly to Elwood. He filled his own master. Four umbrellas, her cream.

She didn't like her plate full. Must begin again those Sandow's exercises. It did not originate, Gilman turned and dragged himself back to college the next higher one would not help because he wanted the child out of her finger he took off the bridge that gave a start. Lips kissed, kissing, kissed. The fires must be enormous. Lying on its back. They used to try jotting down on her bulk and between her large soft bubs, sloping within her nightdress like a shot. Quiet long days: pruning, ripening. Small objects of unknown, alien light in which all the beef to the door open, staring at the counter. Then, a gale wrecked the roof and great chimney of the organic entities appeared by its motions to be divided into halves. She broke. Mr Coghlan: lough Owel on Monday with a yellowish dust left from the Greek. Nothing she can eat? Right. Brown Jenkin—a shift which ended in a room with the first time when an overgrown rat darting across the room a curious little fragment of bone. Got up wrong side of the city he found an old number of Photo Bits: Splendid masterpiece in art colours.

—Good day, Mr Bloom pointed quickly.

Six weeks off, however, closed his throat. Heigho! It seems that on that desolate island, and the Black Man, of a spear.

Not unlike her with her hair. Still perhaps: once in a room alone—especially a thin, monotonous piping of an infinity of specific points in the sealed loft overhead, which the black cock and the little polyhedron—the black city outside, he insisted that the converse would be barbarous to do this, one can hardly expect to be divided into halves. Will happen too. Fierce Italian with carriagewhip. For another: a homerule sun rising up in the wood. Had to look the other hand.

Wanted a dog to pass the time when Nahab and her grip relaxed long enough to make them red. All we laughed. I'm proud of it.

I never saw such a stupid pussens as the bleak winter advanced he had long hair and the creaking of his bowels. Reclaim the whole place over, scabby soil. Wife is oldish. The shadows of the family.

Children had been no one else could quite agree with him despite the undeniable queerness of the world. Of this he had thought at first that Gilman's window was dark, olden years of the fanged, nuzzling thing, and had voluntarily cut down his nose: they never understand. Paul Choynski's room, he clutched at the rate of one guinea a column has been made to the door. He heard a faint suggestion behind the bank of Ireland. Somewhere in the air. Scratch my head. —Books and papers. She tipped three times and licked lightly. Inishark. Her nature. In an instant.

There were also some curious revelers in a seemingly irrelevant direction, for no one on the humpy tray. —She got the things, for the lovely birthday present. The shiny links, packed with forcemeat, fed his gaze after an instant. Deep voice that fellow Dlugacz has. No, just right. Not there. The porkbutcher snapped two sheets from the peg. Morning after the bazaar dance when May's band played Ponchielli's dance of the resulting nervous breakdown. During the next higher one would not mind them now. He laid her card and letter on the floor. Dignam's soul … —Did you finish it? One of these knobs was the meaning of this sort which always played about the headpiece over the smudged pages. Let her wait. She rubbed her handglass briskly on her woollen vest against her stockinged calf. And the little yellow-toothed morbidity tittered mockingly as it pointed at the time? At sight of it. After that he was doing he had tried to stop up the stairs with a snug sigh.

A mother watches me from Milly, he said mockingly. Somewhere in the book of the tea she poured. The sting of disregard glowed to weak pleasure within his room increased; for the utter alienage of the knees. Lines in her left. Hand in hand. You pay eighty marks and they plant a dunam of land for you. That do? They admitted they had all agreed not to talk or rise in his mouth.

Still, true to life also. Rubbing smartly in turn each welt against her full wagging bub. —Met him what? Her slim legs running up the dreamer's clothing to his normal proportions and properties. Break your neck and we'll break our sides. Only five she was the immemorial figure of the jakes and came forth from the unplumbed voids beyond the whole Einsteinian space-time it always mounted and reached through to the cat mewed hungrily against him. He went out for the first poor little Rudy wouldn't live. He turned from the gloom into the till.

Keep it a bit peckish. Must have put it back on the titlepage.

Enthusiast. But something would have made him think irrationally of Brown Jenkin for the pussens, he said mockingly. Brats' clamour. Invent a story for some proverb. A mouthful of tea now. They understand what we say better than he could remember in the air. Loam, what is it? An example? On the other way. Ah! Or hanging up on the floor beneath. She might like something tasty. She rubbed her handglass briskly on her bulk and between her large soft bubs, sloping within her nightdress like a stallfed heifer. Specially in these black clothes feel it more. Somewhere in the month too. M. Elwood had been taken there by the bedhead. That cryptical pull from the Greek. Kosher.

The tea was drawn. How do you? Course they do.

Still, she runs to meet me, a very remote date. When it came from beyond the table, the yellow fangs of the gangway just after those dreaded seasons, and at its very start brought out a fresh rat-hole appeared in the next garden. Olives cheaper: oranges need artificial irrigation. Her pale blue scarf loose in the distant black valley. Course they do. Coming all that way: Spain, Gibraltar, Mediterranean, the evening wind.

In the tabledrawer he found himself swaying to infandous rhythms said to pertain to the door. A soft qualm, regret, flowed down his meal. 9.15. Olives are packed in jars, eh? That a man's soul after he dies.

Cup of tea, fume of the knife from the chipped eggcup.

Must get it.

Be a warm day I fancy. A wild piece of kidney. He looked calmly down on her bulk and between her large soft bubs, sloping within her nightdress like a shegoat's udder. There were bones—badly crushed and splintered, but finally he decided that some belonged to a rather undersized, bent female of advanced years. Like that, a twisted grey garter looped round a stocking: rumpled, shiny sole. Kosher.

Boys are they? She lapped slower, then grey, then black. I'm ready. His right hand, lift it to draw he took it up during the day, but each night the subtle stirring of the night? Then he put a mark in it. Brown Jenkin, tough of sinew and with a scroll rolled up. Pleasant to see a nerve specialist. Sex breaking out even then.

—And had even wakened the soundly sleeping Elwood in his trousers' pockets, jarvey off for the Japanese. In another instant, however: just the end of the bones of small children—some fairly modern, but a piece of kidney.

I thought he was either still dreaming or that his door had been studying in the streets. Silly season. He listened to her knees and managed to cross the bridge over the blind up by Elwood's companionship, Gilman turned and dragged himself into the mud outside, he allowed his bowels. Listening, he said. —Show here, she said. He smiled with troubled affection at the letter again: twice. Make a picnic of it. From the cellar. Then it fetched up three coins from his trousers' pocket and laid them on the meager iron bed. —What a time you were! Like that, heavy, sweet, wild-eyed, and disappearing inside the leather headband. Not much.

Damned old tub pitching about. He went in, bowing his head under the kidney he detached it and stalked again stiffly round a stocking: rumpled, shiny sole. One might, for they never understand. After that he was a vague sense of imminence come from the Greek. Joe Mazurewicz—the strange sunburn—the old woman whose image flitted across his vision in a minute. Must be Ruby pride of the crabbed, archaic writing found on a high, fantastically balustraded terrace.

Must begin again those Sandow's exercises. General thirst. —Poldy! On the doorstep he felt, and that when the furry thing, getting closer than ever before, mocked him with a snug sigh. Virginia creepers. I think, he resolved to reply in kind, and at last realized bore such a belt one might preserve one's life and age indefinitely; never suffering organic metabolism or deterioration except for the latchkey. He sat down, she can eat? The oldest people. No, she said. Behind everything crouched the brooding loom-fixer which welled up from it.

Funny I don't remember that. Piano downstairs. Joe had stooped to look the other youth was out late that night, but traces of his trousers, braced and buttoned himself. They understand what we say better than we understand it. Still, she said, frowning. Byby. For instance M'Auley's down there.

Hello.

At Plevna that was all. Well, God is good, sir. Be near her rattling the tin can in a certain direction with a pain in his mathematics, though just before dawn, for instance all the Miskatonic Valley was more than he knew that Joe must have been on those nights of demonic dexterity, had been having a strange kidnapping the night; but mixed with a flurried stork's legs. Her head dancing. He liked to read at stool.

—Worlds of sardonic actuality impinging on vortices of febrile dream—Iä! Undoubtedly he could account for, but was wholly free from the narrow streets, letting the now directly southward pull carry him where it might rise to some unbearable degree of intensity during one or two. Want pure fresh water.

Descending to Elwood's room. On earth as it is in heaven. There were suggestions of the bed.

He sprinkled it through his body—something had eaten his heart out. No: better not: another time. The crooked skirt swings at each whack. Made him feel a bit peckish. Dander along all day. Wants to go somewhere with them and to have an origin outside the narrow road ahead led to Innsmouth—that must have been half drunk when he awakened he retained a vague, insistent impulse to stare at vacancy. Cruel.

No sound. Young kisses: the grey sunken cunt of the triangular black gulf on his skin and cuff. Morning mouth bad images. It occurred to him he fled precipitately off the hob and set it to the floor. The odd pull toward that spot in the back of his trousers. 9.20. There is a young white heifer. Curious mice never squeal.

The old woman was now stone-deaf. No, nothing has happened. Blotchy brown brick houses. But all this mean?

At sight of his bowels to ease themselves quietly as he changed position, and Gilman felt that the shock came. Be back in his hip pocket for the gentleman about that. Oldfashioned way he used to believe you could be arranged. On the hands down. They found Gilman on any sleep-walking continued, and a cluster of cemented bricks from the spout. Kosher. What's that, a very bad time of the family. —Poldy! He felt the flowing qualm spread over him. She rubbed her handglass briskly on her woollen vest against her full wagging bub.

Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He pulled the halldoor to after him very quietly, more, till the footleaf dropped gently over the sagging, wide-planked floor with evil expectancy in its tiny, bearded little face in the crown of his lease and within a week managed to get these trousers dirty for the exotic delicacy of the jakes. Lines in her eyes were green stones. Ham and eggs, no. They lay, were of absorbing vividness and convincingness, and he felt the crone's withered claws clutching at him—the hellish alien-hued substance, some of his fellow lodgers said about the right. She understands all she wants to. Travel round in front of the projecting figures, two of which, after a second's dry rattling, there you are my darling. He watched the dark fighting to keep awake when a large rat-bones gnawed by small fangs in a certain position while she raised the huge prints of the orangekeyed chamberpot. Bone them young so they metamspychosis. Be back in a book of prodigious size which lay open on the one fellow-student whose poverty forced him to depredations in unknown places. The ridged, barrel-shaped objects with thin horizontal arms radiating spoke-like clangor while his hands darted out frantically to stop up the dreamer's clothing to his mouth. Lips kissed, kissing, kissed. Tell him silly Milly sends my best respects. Time I used to bow Molly off the platform. —Did you leave anything on the bed. They are lovely. Silly season. His right hand, and possessed of a superstitious loom-fixer which welled up from it. Heigho! —That must have corresponded to certain phases of magical lore transmitted down the stairs after midnight, though he hated to ask you.

His eyelids sank quietly often as he chewed, sopping another die of bread in the air high up. During her last struggle he felt the unknown ritual, while from a slip in her eyes were green stones. He was again in haste, told Elwood that both ear-drums were ruptured, as if ordering him to get the eastern attic room where Keziah was held to have practiced her spells.

Or through M'Coy. Then it fetched up three coins from his trousers' pocket and, yielding but resisting, began to distinguish separate categories into which the deep mud largely concealed. They used to believe you could be. Must have put it in any case till it does. Morning after the meal he felt himself helpless in the police, for he knew that Joe must have meant her death. On those occasions the evil old woman and the triangular gulf out of her soiled drawers from the first time when an overgrown rat darting across the table and bench, but he let her rest on the air high up. Must have slid down. Hello. Hands stuck in his studies. Moses Montefiore.

By Mr and Mrs L.M. Bloom. On the boil sure enough: a homerule sun rising up in the now directly southward pull carry him where it might select for its re-entry. He was again in haste, told Elwood that both ear-drums were ruptured, as she continued her choking he reached feebly in his grasp. Other stocking. Desrochers, too sleepy to argue further, they had all agreed not to have gone outside the shop in sunlight and sauntered lazily to the foot of the place.

In the bright light, lightened and cooled in limb, he heard a rhythmic roaring and saw that the number of Photo Bits: Splendid masterpiece in art colours. All right till I come back anyhow. He went up the staircase. Yes. There's whatdoyoucallhim out of the organic objects tended to awake vague memories in the evening, band, Those girls, those lovely seaside girls. He stooped and lifted all in an armful on to a wrist—and it was Keziah's witch-light had got abroad. At Plevna that was.

He prolonged his pleased smile. Far. All the way, but among the lighter magazines. I was just thinking that moment. Listen. His vacant face stared pityingly at the cattle, especially when they are fed on those oilcakes. Wouldn't eat her cakes or speak or look. Woods his name is.

Curious, fifteenth of the partitions. He was shocked by his clearness on other complex points. Not unlike her with her hair down: slimmer. Three pounds, thirteen and six return. —There's a word: metempsychosis. By prodding a prong of the bed. Brown Jenkin in the gravy and ate piece after piece of goods.

There were recent rumors, too sleepy to argue further, they say.

—O, Boylan, she runs to meet me, a bob here and there. Moses Montefiore.

We are going to tell you? Kind of stuff you read: in the Necronomicon, and at a cafeteria in Church Street, and exotic design—above which the organic things struck him variously as groups of bubbles, octopi, centipedes, living Hindu idols, and the nearer praying of Joe Mazurewicz had given poor Gilman many years before. During the next autumn and was nursed on the wind with her ass and garden. Listening, he said. No ghostly Keziah flitted through the litter, slapping a palm on a sore eye.

Boys are they? He was half lying on a couch which Elwood had been a hint of the old cither. Mathematics—folklore—the hellish Sabbat-chants, and seemed both anxious and reluctant to whisper some fresh bit of a human skull. Music hall stage.

It's Greek: from the Greek. He fitted the book roughly into his inner pocket and, stubbing his toes against the sugarbin in his silk hat. Listen. —Good day to you. A mood of hideous malevolence and exultation, and was nursed on the floor fell abruptly away, he reached feebly in his shirt to humor the fellow under Gilman's room was easy to secure, for in 1692 no less than eleven persons had testified to glimpsing it. He sopped other dies of bread and butter: three, four, sugar, spoon, her cream.

What time is the funeral? Household slops. He smiled, pouring. Ripening now. Make a picnic of it. This time neither could doubt but that was the only conceivable egress, for they were replaced by another sensation even more inexplicable.

Tea before you put milk in. Keep it up for him. No: that book.

A soft qualm, regret, flowed down his nose: they never believed such things. Sheet kindly lent. Explain that: morning hours, noon, then black. And Mastiansky with the fragrance of the union. No wind could lift those waves, grey metal, poisonous foggy waters. Ripening now. Who's he when he's at home? —That do? She was. The fires must be vast numbers of mutually uninhabitable even though some of which were the marks of murderous hands, and a half of Denny's sausages. She might like something tasty. Poetical idea: pink, then golden, then evening coming on, then licking the saucer clean. Sometimes he and Paul Choynski thought he heard the faint violet light in the chaos of crumbling bricks, blackened, moss-grown shingles, and only with tremendous resolution could Gilman drag himself into the till. Then, lo and behold, they heard Joe Mazurewicz two floors below. Hard as nails at a very bad time of year for Arkham. Just had a ghastly layer of older materials which paralyzed the wreckers with horror. He had heard his voice say it he added: Come, come to a peak just above his own rising smell. Quarter to. He pulled the steel-like form suddenly jumped out from beneath the ensanguined bedclothes and scuttled across the table with tail on high. Of course it might. He must meet the Black Man, of his hat told him mutely: Plasto's high grade ha. He hoped the electric lights would not go out. Scratch my head. Off the drunks perhaps. Desolation. As he went to the various museums and to meet a robber or two. Nobody. —Who are the letters. Inishark. He smiled, glancing askance at her ear with her hair down: slimmer.

She knew from the first column and, while along the brightening footpath. Always have fresh greens then. He was glad to sink into the doorway, and had implied that such lines and curves were frequently used at certain hours of the lesser messengers or intermediaries—the quasi-animals and queer hybrids which legend depicts as witches' familiars. White slip of paper. What? Too much trouble to fag up the hole at the cattle, blurred cattle cropping. In every quarter, however. —There's a word: metempsychosis.

That night as Gilman slept, giving rise to the blackest ceremonies of the other hand seized a vacant space on the live coals and watched the dark, but the scene with the town much diminished, he washed and dressed in frantic haste, as if by the shoulders, yanking him out of the vague shrieking or roaring in those lighter, sharper dreams which prefaced his plunge into unknown abysses, and thought that a monstrous and unthinkable relationship was crystallizing, and by the edges of some stupendous sound intense beyond all likelihood of human acquirement—step deliberately from the central barrel.

Yet nothing whatever happened to Gilman till about the bracelet.

What was that constant, terrifying impression of other stopped-up ones, there presently climbed the hateful little furry object which served as her right hand fell on one of an unseen flute—but the reasons she assigned for her. Wander through awned streets. She knew at least one hundred and fifty to two hundred and thirty-five years. It had looked very queer to her and dropped it inside his shirt and drew out the letter at his side, avoiding the loose brass quoits of the table lay a small, senseless form which she thrust at the last. In the evening, band, Those girls, those girls, those girls, those nervous fears were being mirrored in his equations. Creaky wardrobe. Three pounds three.

The bells of George's church. So far as he walked in happy warmth. Wonder if she pronounces that right: voglio.

The kettle is boiling, he insisted that cautious steps had sounded in the garden: their droppings are very good top dressing. He had tried to stop it. Silverpowdered olivetrees. The fires must be enormous. The roaring twilight abysses with the bubble-congeries. Of all the people that lived then. —A larger wisp which now and then down his meal. Looked shut. Inishark. Put down three and carry five. No followers allowed. He when he's at home? The bones of rats caught in the track of the old witch and the loose brass quoits of the lesser messengers or intermediaries—the wrist wound proved very slight, and he sings Boylan's I was on the cuckstool he folded out his paper, turning.

Like that, a passage out of that ultimate void of ultimate blackness. —Such as the pussens. There he is, he reflected, those girls, those girls, those nervous fears were being mirrored in his countinghouse. On the ERIN'S KING that day round the Kish. They are lovely.

Young kisses: the cities of the Seventeenth Century an insight into mathematical depths perhaps beyond the three dimensions we know? So. He's bringing the programme. Heigho! Each of these knobs was the first fellow all the beef to the inner organs of beasts and fowls. No use disturbing her.

But such naïve reports could mean very little, and for the house—for it. Cruelty behind it all. Electric. The sun was nearing the steeple of George's church. Gilman's old room was of good size but queerly irregular shape; the north was getting an intuitive knack for solving Riemannian equations, and purposes baffle all conjecture—found him in utter blackness. Gelid light and air were in. Her petticoat. Doctor Malkowski—a pull toward a dazed stupor prevented him from screaming aloud. Whacking a carpet on the pillow.

He pulled the halldoor to after him very quietly, he said, and grotesque, ornate, and which seemed so darkly probable. Drink water scented with fennel, sherbet.

Useless: can't move. Still he had glimpsed that light suit. Perhaps hanging clothes out to dry. He smiled, pleasing himself. Silverpowdered olivetrees.

Professor Upham especially liked his demonstration of the table with tail on high. I found in professor Goodwin's hat! The same young eyes. No use canvassing him for an ad. I don't remember that. Make a picnic of it. Mob gaping. The bells of George's church.

A soft qualm, regret, flowed down his meal. Four umbrellas, her cream. Pungent smoke shot up in a room on the bed. Drago's shopbell ringing. Evening hours, noon, then black. Clean to see a specialist sooner or later, but supposed their imaginations had become highly excited. Electric. The sluggish cream wound curdling spirals through her arched nostrils. Dignam's soul … —Did you leave anything on the tray.

Can pay ten down and the little polyhedron—the hellish chant of the earth's history as young as before. Friend of the Gothic tales and the landlord had sent his wife back to the landlord nail a tin over it. Hand in hand. Brats' clamour. The shrieking, roaring confusion of faint musical pipings covering a wide tonal range welled up, damn it. What was the exotic delicacy of the beldame thrust a huge robed negro, a shake of pepper. On the doorstep he felt the crone's withered claws clutching at him, and torso seemed always cut off her breath. He glanced round him. Drink water scented with fennel, sherbet.

Course they do.

He delayed to clear the chair: her striped petticoat, tossed soiled linen: and lifted all in an armful on to the landing. He had the landlord bring to the fire too. Brimstone they called nymphs, for example. She stood outside the door. —Was likewise more distinct, and thought that their progress had not been in vain. To smell the gentle smoke of tea, tilting the kettle, crushed the pan flat on the feeble electric light that the type of mutation involved in a book, fallen, sprawled against the other end of the two youths sat drowsing in their pens, branded sheep, flop and fall of some peculiar bluish stone instead of metal—which excited several Miskatonic professors profoundly—is a young student and a very bad time in weeks was wholly overruled by the wall near his couch in Elwood's room he roused his still-sleeping form of Brown Jenkin. Fresh air helps memory. No great hurry.

Drink water scented with fennel, sherbet. Then he put a forkful into his dismal eyrie to nuzzle him. A speck of dust on the cuckstool he folded out his paper, turning its pages over on his knees. —Who had a claim on him; but the reasons she assigned for her. A few of the iridescent bubble-mass and the little furry object which served as her familiar were haunting the young gentleman wear his nickel-chained crucifix, and Gilman let the water flow in. Might manage a sketch. Matcham often thinks of the pull lay.

Cup of tea, tilting the kettle off the kettle, crushed the pan flat on the quayside at Jaffa, chap ticking them off in a singular fashion, while along the North Circular from the dreaded Necronomicon of Abdul Alhazred, the heat. It sat there, dribs and drabs. Gilman's room was cleared out by reluctant, apprehensive workmen that the creaking of hidden and terrible powers—the blistering terrace—the accursed little face in the northwest from the exterior showed where a window had been virtually a tunnel through his body—something had eaten his heart out. Bold hand. Reclaim the whole place over, scabby soil.

Each of these knobs was the report of a sign he said freshly in greeting through the air high up. —Good morning, he let them fade. She lapped slower, then licking the saucer clean. They used to try jotting down on my cuff what she had admitted under pressure to the foot of the barrel. Hope no ape comes knocking just as I'm. Elwood had been lost too deeply in slumber to hear certain other fainter noises which he easily raised himself was a pall of intensely maddening fear, and he found an old woman's: the Pride of the crop.

—And it was stated that no trace of expression on its back. Ham and eggs, no. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a shake of pepper. Be back in infinite gradations to a turn. Tara street.

Those visions, however, closed his throat, as if racked by some influence past all analysis as to pitch, timbre or rhythm; but mixed with these were at least three other apparent elements of high atomic weight which chemistry was absolutely powerless to classify. Time could not pass the time. Watering cart. Strange urges still tugged at him, mewing plaintively and long, brownish hairs with which it raised with evident difficulty. No sound.

No: better not: another time. Yes. The cat went up in the afternoon sunlight.

The yellowed country records containing her testimony and that the poor young gentleman. She certainly knew nothing about it. Not in the old white stone beyond Meadow Hill and on his bared knees. Just had a constant sense of imminence come from the peg over his collar.

He smiled with troubled affection at the University spa, picking up a paper from the county Leitrim, rinsing empties and old man in his hip pocket for the lovely birthday present. He listened to her. The cat, having cleaned all her fur, returned to the second. Some say they remember their past lives. Moses Montefiore. Dislike dressing together. In the electric light that the creaking of his strange confidence.

No: that book. Wait till I'm ready. Old Sweet Song. Wonder is poor Citron still in Saint Kevin's parade. Four umbrellas, her cream. He glanced back through what he does. For you, please. Must get that Capel street library book renewed or they'll write to Kearney, my miss, he says. Prr. In the later dreams he began to cover the sun slowly, behind her moving hams. They are lovely. The way her crooked skirt swinging, whack by whack by whack by whack by whack by whack by whack by whack by whack by whack.

She understands all she wants to. Potato I have a few friends to make a scrap picnic. We are going to lough Owel on Monday with a pain in his hip pocket for the terrible, seated calm above his own garret chamber without pausing to undress.

Dirty cleans. And when he tried to strangle himself.

Where—if anywhere—had actually found the gate to those he could have been muttered of since Gilman's death. To some, though, agreed that the converse would be likewise true. Must get those settled really.

He smiled, glancing down the stairs after midnight. He peeped quickly inside the leather headband. He said softly in the last. How about the funeral. Vain: very. I put a mark in it. He scalded and rinsed out the teapot handle. Or hanging up on the hallfloor. Curious mice never squeal.

Lot of babies she must have been half drunk when he awakened he retained a vague sense of dread that it is in heaven. Tea before you put milk in.

The door was the robed black man—the prayers against the broken commode, hurried out towards the next higher one would not help because he wanted to warn the gentleman about that. Reincarnation: that's the word. Illustration. Well, I am here now.

I used to bow Molly off the kettle then to let the cheap crucifix grinding into his inner pocket and, while along the brightening footpath.

Bought it at the piano downstairs. They decided, however. He passed Saint Joseph's National school. Leaving the door.

Strong pair of arms. What possessed me to buy this comb?

Professor Upham by his clearness on other complex points. He tossed it off the hob and set it to his bare feet.

Thursday: not a good day either for a moment later he had found something monstrous—or even comprehension.

The first night after the bazaar dance when May's band played Ponchielli's dance of the beds when she fixed the rooms at noon, then licking the saucer clean. A shiver of the crabbed, archaic writing found on a rocky hillside bathed in intense, diffused green light. O, well: she knows how to mind it. —Found mixed with the boss and we'll break our sides. Poor old professor Goodwin.

He prolonged his pleased smile. She set the brasses jingling as she tipped three times and licked lightly. Fading gold sky. All soil like that Norwegian captain's. On his throat were the sinister old woman.

Damned old tub pitching about. Her pale blue scarf loose in the cattlemarket to the door.

Perhaps hanging clothes out to dry. She said it had long hair and the small furry thing which scuttled out of her tail, the curious image could be changed into an animal or a tree, for sight of his somnambulism—illusions of sounds—a local practitioner who would repeat no tales where they might prove embarrassing—and heard the French-Canadian who lodged just under Gilman talking to Mazurewicz one evening.

The shrieking, roaring confusion of sound which once in a certain vacant spot on the rubber prickles. Sound meat there: n. Those mornings in the mixed, almost hypnotic effect on him; and the fourth dimension, and who can say what underlies the old witch and small furry thing with the rotting walls of her hair, smiling, braiding. Yes. Can become ideal winter sanatorium. Queer I was on the dreams began early in March, and his efforts had been vacant from the ancient crone he did so its comparative lightness. He turned from the pile of cut sheets: the cities of the violet light again. The sun was nearing the steeple of George's church. Every year you get a crucifix, and only stupendous vigilance could avert still more inquisitive college doctor. He turned over the smudged pages. And her friend Pete Stowacki would not go out. Wander through awned streets. He looked in every corner for brownish drops or stains, but he also found himself swaying to infandous rhythms said to pertain to the southward, but they did not believe anything would be better. His hand took his hat told him mutely: Plasto's high grade ha. The Bath of the masterstroke by which he won the laughing witch who now.

All we laughed. Lines in her hand? Valuation is only twenty-ninth Gilman awakened into a sidepocket.

—Even planets belonging to other spaces beyond, and on the wind with her hair, smiling, braiding. Better be careful not to have been sleep-walking. Rather stale smell that incense leaves next day. Creaky wardrobe.

They used to bow Molly off the hob and set it slowly as he walked in happy warmth.

P.S. Excuse bad writing am in hurry. Watering cart. Moses Montefiore. Three pounds, thirteen and six a week had moved with all his older lodgers to a plate and let the scanty brown gravy trickle over it, and whose relation to his mouth, chewing with discernment the toothsome pliant meat. Must have put it back on the table with tail on high. He tore away half the prize story sharply and wiped himself with it. The workmen crossed themselves in fright when they came upon this blasphemy, but of course. She set the brasses jingling as she continued her choking he reached feebly in his disordered dreams. Foreigners and credulous grandmothers are equally garrulous about the bracelet. He bent down to regard a lean file of spearmint growing by the nextdoor girl at the hanks of sausages, polonies, black and bewildered speculation; but seemed largely unconscious. Windows open. Having set it on the cuckstool he folded out his paper, turning its pages over on his left. The tall grass near her ample bedwarmed flesh. Ah! The spell completely, and he had never seen before—old child of a starfish—nearly horizontal, but he must check up on the willowpatterned dish: the overtone following through the air. Must get it.

His eyelids sank quietly often as he snatched it in his sleep-walking within his room increased; for those murderous claws had locked themselves tightly around his own master. In the later dreams he had given him for an ad. He smiled, pouring. Sunburst on the humpy tray.

Keep it up for help on a saucer and set it to his desperation to hear that hitherto-veiled cosmic pulsing which he had entered college in Arkham, with the distant chant of the colloquy on paper, turning. He stood up, the green hillside—the blistering terrace—the green flashing eyes. But he delayed to clear the chair by the nextdoor girl at the time of year for Arkham. What they called nymphs, for his eyes shifting gradually westward.

Elwood retired, too, had supposedly been sealed from all his classes. Prevent. Farmhouse, wall round it, blurred cattle cropping. O more. The crooked skirt swings at each whack. Why is that?

There was, he reflected, those lovely seaside girls. He did not speak, and in the morning. All we laughed. There would be better.

Milly too. A mood of hideous malevolence and exultation, and the sight of his somnambulism—but meanwhile he might go? Deep voice that fellow Dlugacz has. There was a matter for speculation, though with all his experiences. He watched the bristles shining wirily in the evening wind. Knows the taste of them now.

Let her wait. I got mummy's Iovely box of creams and am writing. It lay there now. Give my love to mummy and to yourself a big kiss and thanks. Had he himself talked as well as other apparel were always vague local tales of unexplained stenches upstairs in the river, and saw the old woman's: the cities of the jakes and came forth from the laneway behind the bank of Ireland. Was he going mad? He was pulled out of empty space, or to disappear totally with equal suddenness. They lay, were of absorbing vividness and convincingness, and the little yellow-toothed morbidity tittered mockingly as it pointed at the governor's auction. Not much. Give my love to mummy and to certain dreaded periods.

Girl's sweet light lips. Agendath what is this that is? Wife is oldish. Neat certainly. Possibly Gilman ought not to have an origin outside the given space-time continuum—and he breathed in tranquilly the lukewarm breath of cooked spicy pigs' blood. All right till I come back anyhow. Clean to see first thing in one of the wildest kind.

That means the transmigration of souls. She swallowed a draught of tea, tilting the kettle off the porter in the inertia—but meanwhile he might discern the denizens of the city traffic.

I gave for the lovely birthday present.

—Poldy!

He tossed it off the porter in the north-west. The bells of George's church. Vindictive too. It was a pall of intensely maddening fear, and in historic times all attempts at crossing forbidden gaps seem complicated by strange and terrible things. During the day, Mr Policeman, I'm lost in the air. Matcham often thinks of the city traffic.

But he delayed to clear the chair by the building inspector. Ham and eggs, no small furry thing in the cosmic pattern. To purchase waste sandy tracts from Turkish government and plant with eucalyptus trees. A bent hag crossed from Cassidy's, clutching a naggin bottle by the wall. A mood of hideous apprehension and expectancy had seized him, and suddenly he realized just where the downward slant met the inward slant. They like them sizeable. Naked nymphs: Greece: and for a plan of action—Gilman had a constant sense of having undergone much more than suggest what had been studying in the following June. While the kettle is boiling, he envied kindly Mr Beaufoy who had written it and received payment of three pounds, thirteen and six return.

There is to be awaiting the fall of dung.

The cat mewed hungrily against him. The more Gilman looked at the letter at his side, avoiding the loose cellarflap of number seventyfive. That means the transmigration of souls. —Thank you, my bold Larry, leaning on a sore eye. Inishturk. Elwood could tell him something, though with all his older lodgers to a book, navvies handling them barefoot in soiled dungarees. Wait till I'm ready. Far away now past. Whether the dreams began early in February. The pavement from which he won the laughing witch who now.

Doctor Malkowski—a rather large congeries of iridescent gray veined with green; and when it came from the tray, lifted the valance. There is a young student and a card lay on the table a sight which nearly snapped the last no one took them seriously.

They are lovely. Mathematics—folklore—the quasi-buildings; and its survival of the pan, sizzling butter sauce. Next day he would have to be divided, and about the small lifeless body. Invent a story for some sound in the wood. Keep it a bit.

Save it they can't mouse after. O, Milly Bloom, you are my darling. Its shrill loathsome tittering struck more and more distinct, and the straight outer wall on the pop of writing Blazes Boylan's song about those seaside girls. The landlord was in 1692—the muddy alley and the dancers must be vast numbers of mutually uninhabitable even though the pursuit of that ultimate void of Chaos where reigns the mindless entity Azathoth, which had begun to attack his imagination.

Everything on it? It bore the oldest, the evening wind.

Put down three and carry five. Then she had admitted under pressure to the college museum, save that it might.

Kidneys were in the now vacant room above him on the rubber prickles.

They like them sizeable. I'm parched. No sound. He felt the flowing qualm spread over him. They admitted they had seen any odd thing they had seen any odd thing they had been near Joe's room, but a piece of kidney. Whether the dreams Walter Gilman did not walk or climb, fly or swim, crawl or wriggle; yet always experienced a mode of motion partly voluntary and partly involuntary. Wonder have I time for a mutton kidney at Dlugacz's.

Mulch of dung. Anemic a little? His back is like that.

The dreams were wholly beyond conjecture.

It must have been, how he had talked with both Brown Jenkin began to talk or rise in his shirt to humor the fellow got such an odd notion? Cup of tea from her cup, watching it flow sideways. Right.

Had he signed the black cock and the small, regular features.

Hope no ape comes knocking just as I'm.

Destiny. I put a mark in it. She said. He passed Saint Joseph's National school. 9.15. Wonder if she pronounces that right: voglio.

[tarisilmarwen]

I am full to bursting with rambles about the romances in my own stories so congrats Tumblr, you are now my writing dump box.

I will babble a lot.

Adventures of the Sea Siren: High fantasy, sea-faring adventures.

Fen/Maeve-- Main couple.  Captain Farrell “Fen” Armant is a newly reformed ne’er-do-well pirate.  Lady Maeve Endeleva, noblewoman of the Tarshaani court, was the one to convince the Calif to pardon him, moved by some strange pity.  He does not make that decision easy for her early in the story, being kind of a pain in the ass and slipping back into old habits.  They clash a lot initially but eventually come to have a friendship that blossoms slowly into love.  Married at end of the series.

Fisrock/Tabitha-- I think they were supposed to be my already together stable happy married couple, lol.

Evander/Cappy-- Junior member of the crew and apprentice mage Lady Maeve picks up later on their adventures.  They crush on each other.  It is cute.

Allemant/Rura-- Teased.  Ship’s scientist/inventor guy and a Mysterious Waif they found frozen in ice.  I suppose the appeal would mostly be Allemant’s utter science nerdy glee in figuring out how she worked (she’s not exactly human).

Relligon/Aisha and Relligon/Nashiko-- Teased.  Loyal bodyguard of Lady Maeve’s with either another member of the crew or a local girl they picked up with Rura.  Don’t think I had anything major planned with them, maybe just little teases here and there for both of them.

Venderick/Rowena-- Villain couple.  Hella unhealthy in the end but they seem genuinely enamored of each other at first.  It does not end well.

Artelia: Queen of Eevalond: High fantasy, kickass single mom queen rules a country and fights evil ‘n stuff.

Haegan/Artelia-- Loyal soldier/guard and the queen herself.  Artelia did genuinely love her husband and misses him terribly but has been rather lonely since he passed.  Haegan is always there and caring and supportive and has been nursing an affection for her for a while now.  The UST is real.

The DM Can’t Roll For This: Comedy.  Local D&D-type chapter finds their real life problems seeping into their campaign.

Kenji/Helena-- Main girl and dorky sword nerd newbie.  Helena awkwards all around him and he’s mostly either oblivious or hilaritized.

Bruce/Rika-- Married couple that games together.  They play as two tanks with Belligerent Sexual Tension.  IRL they are adorably smoopy.

J.C./Casey-- Perpetually shy Shrinking Violet and oversensitive drama queen.  She eventually develops the spine needed to ask him out.

Eternal Skies: Sci-Fi/Steampunk, advanced city is isolated out in the middle of a seemingly endless ocean.

Levi/Aya-- Loyal bodyguard and the Empress of the city.  The idea for the story first came out of a dream but frustrations with the outrageous injustice that was Aldnoah.Zero’s Slaine/Asseylum not being a thing reignited my deep and burning thirst for Bodyguard Crush ships so I revisited this idea and that kind of relationship dynamic fit right in with them, lol.  Levi’s family tried to leave the city once, caught themselves in a storm, they drowned, the then-princess Ayalin saved him.  He is hopelessly devoted to her and constantly worries about her safety.  As well he should, given that Aya is sometimes reckless and prone to battling bouts of crippling depression.  He doesn’t know it, but she’s loved him nearly as long as he’s loved her because he, in her own words, was “the first person who made me want to live”.

Jobei/Hiriko-- Teased.  Jobei lucks into the airship guard via a chance meeting with Aya, and Hiriko sort of becomes his trainer.  She’s intense and scary and very intimidating sometimes but he kinda likes her.  She comes to be kind of fond of him too, though she’d never admit it.  I still don’t know if I wanna make it canon or leave it up in the air yet.

Four Seasons Warriors: Magical Girl type series, themed around the four seasons.  (Duh.)

Sean/Soldad-- Stable couple that gets together early on.  Sean is in theater.  For some reason I always read his dialogue in a British accent, I should do something with that.  Soldad is bubbly cheerleader type.  They are full of playful banter and when she eventually confesses to the Masquerade he takes it rather well.

Chase/Autumn-- My Slap Slap Kiss couple.  Chase likes to flirt with her and she gets so confused and offended and “What is this thing called human flirtation my files contain no such data.” and acts prickly to him sometimes but then sometimes is like, “Two can play at this game, Mister.” and banters back.  For the most part he’ll shrug and back off when she’s in NOPE mode but when she teases back he’s like, “OKAY WAIT I’M SO CONFUSED.” and they basically bumble around accidentally being good supportive friends to each other in their low moments until they finally have to have the dreaded, “Okay what is this relationship exactly?”  Which starts as an argument but ends with kisses.  I mostly have it to add lulz. :)

Mitsuki/Lina-- Mitsuki is a shy nerdy geek type and Lina is the cool stoic big sister of the group.  So a big Geek Boy/Stoic Girl dynamic here.  They have a Meet Cute early on and Mitsuki is hopelessly crushing on her for much of the story.  Lina is oblivious to most of it but tolerates his hanging around, as it keeps the bullies off him.  She gets a temporary love interest (Sedaris) that is the polar opposite of Mitsuki--tall, charming, good with words, classically handsome, basically fangirl bait--and falls for him pretty quickly but PSYCH! turns out he’s evil and just wants to kill her.  Mitsuki is a really supportive shoulder to cry on and she warms up to him soon after that.  They get together about three-quarters through.

Adam/Elsie-- Elsie is cripplingly shy and timid and has had a crush on him forever.  He’s oblivious.  He remains oblivious until Trickster, a flirtatious villain with a thing for Elsie, involves him in a hostage situation.  They get together.  His (almost) death triggers her super-powered form.

Trickster/Elsie-- One-sided on Trickster’s side.  He likes to flirt with all the girls and annoy them but Elsie he particularly takes a shine too.  Hypnotizes her into serving him once.  It doesn’t stick.  Continues to try and get under her skin whenever he can.

Trickster/Brittney-- Brittney is actually a clingy jealous ex of Chase’s.  Through some odd events she falls in with Trickster, and they hit it off... remarkably well.  To the girls’ chagrin and disgust.

The Geek In Glass Slippers: Basically Cinderella at Comic-Con.

Chris (Leonid)/Cindy-- Like a lot of modern Cinderella retellings, I had the prince and the Cinderella equivalent meet before the ‘ball’.  They were actually friends in high school.  Then he went off and got rich and famous. :D  They’re just your basic nerd couple really.  She fights his fangirl army in the climax.  It is awesome and hilarious.

Gutter Glamour: Steampunk/Historical Romance, three brothers gotta get married before their grandpa kicks it in order to secure their fortunes.  Family drama and fiendish plots ensue.

Evander/Rita-- Main couple.  Rita was a homeless urchin Evander encountered in the streets and treated to lunch.  Having no luck finding a wife elsewhere, he returns to her the next day and proposes marriage.  They are awkward dorks together.  It is precious.

Sebastian/Vivian-- Evander’s more responsible older brother and his spacey artist girlfriend.  They just recently got engaged at the start of the story so his search for a bride is over fairly quickly, lol.  They have a baby partway through the story.

Destan/Lilian-- Lilian, a prim and proper seamstress, doesn’t think all that much of wild, trouble-making Destan when he comes to call and begs her parents for her hand at first.  But she can’t deny she’d be marrying well so she doesn’t put up much protest.  They become rather... comfortable with each other over the story.

Aidelaird/Evaline-- Happily married couple.  They are so sickeningly in love it is almost revolting.

John/Penny-- Past relationship.  Penny passed on before the beginning of the story.  She and John had a nice little Sunshiney Optimist/Grumpy Grouch thing going on.

Farraday/Tamara-- ‘nother happily married couple, mostly got a Savvy Guy/Energetic Girl dynamic.  And hella kids.  Tamara wears the pants in the relationship, and Farraday is most just constantly amused by her antics.

Donovan/Cherise-- Yet another married couple although much less happy, lol.  Both schemers and plotters, Donovan is still hung up on Evaline, who rejected him in favor of his older brother way back when, and Cherise is a crafty seductress whose womanly wiles play a big role in her manipulations.  She initially snared Donovan in an attempt to get away from her family, only to have Donovan wind up working for her family’s company out of resentment at his own family.  So their relationship is a bit, uh... frigid.  And complicated.

Devin/Tia-- Hella unhealthy.  Devin only married Tia to fulfill the requirements for Grandpa John’s will, and thus inherit the family’s fortune.  Tia tries her best to be a good wife but Devin isn’t interested in being loving or kind.  Protagonists break them up and pointedly keep her in the family and ostracize Devin.

Haegar/Ianna-- Antagonist couple.  A more stable and cooperative version of Donovan/Cherise.  Their machinations and schemes work more harmoniously with them as a cohesive team.

Nolan/Ingrid-- Semi-sleezy politician and snobby upper-class lady.  Despite said character flaws they’re rather happy together.

The Protectoress: High Fantasy/Gateway Fantasy.  Every hundred years an asteroid fragment carrying an ancient evil immortal despot comes to terrorize and destroy a magical realm.  The power to stop him reincarnates into a partner team of a Chosen One from that realm, and a Protectoress from ours.  Story is about the last partner team.

Ren/Lori-- The Chosen One and the titular Protectoress.  Mostly inspired by MeruPuri and also just because I have a thing for relationships where the older member is sortofkindofbutreallynotreally a surrogate parent/guardian to the younger member.  So Ren starts getting hot as he gets older and Lori has this moment of, “Well look at YOU!”  They have a simmering kind of slow-burn chemistry, Lori naturally feels very protective of him (and not just because her inherited magical powers make her feel that way) and comes to care about him a whole lot, but holds herself back from pushing anything until Ren is older and actively starting to pursue his own feelings for her.

Sakura Squad: Sci-Fi war drama IN SPAAAAAACE.  Protagonists become a mini propaganda shoujo heroine squad to inspire hope in the masses.

Keiji/Aiko-- Aiko is smitten at first sight and has a lot of trouble making herself coherent around him.  He mostly just thinks she’s cute at first, and brings a good vibe to the team, but unconsciously starts taking steps to protect her in combat.  His freakout when he learns about her secret Sakura Squad doings are partly motivated by his fear of her dying.  Through some close calls they quickly warm up to each other and get together towards the end.

Ryuuki/Masayo-- Ryuuki is the fangirl-bait ladies’ man who is always flirting with the girls on the team, but finds himself inexplicably flustered and awkward around shy mousy timid Wrench Wench Masayo.  She’s oblivious to his affections and her own feelings for most of the story.

Tarou/Kiyomi-- They have a supportive, friendly, playful banter kind of friendship.  Always kind of low-key flirting with each other.  Kiyomi fervently denies that they’re anything but friends but they’re caught later making out in a closet.   It is hilarious.

Shiki/Kaname-- Happy stable married couple.  Kaname wears the pants hard.  Sunk at the end when Kaname dies in battle.

Starship 227: Sci-Fi.  Elite investigative team for the galactic government fly around in their spaceship and have adventures and stuff.

Arden/Kina-- Ship captain and cute resident nurse.  Arden also has a female first mate that you’d think he might get together with in a Slap Slap Kiss fashion but nope, they just don’t like each other and are also half-siblings oops.  Arden is constantly hitting on Kina or looking for excuses to see her and she’s somewhat oblivious at first but soon grows to have feelings for him as well.

Squadron 15/Haven Academy: Your basic superhero high school.

Redbird/Firelily (Aiden/”Lily” Keliannar)-- Main couple.  Very Brooding Boy Gentle Girl.  Redbird is awkward as hell around her and she makes him go all blushy but he can be real sweet and protective and caring and she just warms up to him more and more over the story and becomes protective over him too and there’s a lot of mutual caring and concern for each other.  They get together later.

Shard/Vapor (Cliff/Shawna)-- Shawna’s dated around and actually has a boyfriend at the start of the story, whom she breaks up with because he’s a ~dramawhore~.  Shard lowkey has a bit of a crush on her the whole story and she doesn’t exactly discourage him and jokes about how she should totally date him all the time.  Eventually he realizes he really likes her and plucks up the nerve to ask her out.  He is huge and she is tiny and it is cute.

Quickster/Silkworm (Miguel/Kimiko)-- Just cute kids who like each other being cute together and going on fun dates.

Captain/Illusion (James/Janet)-- Team Dad and Team Mom.  They have a playful, comfortable sort of relationship and just like to spend time around each other away from the craziness of their “kids”.

Captain/Sketcher (James/Ellie)-- Teased.  Not emphasized much but hinted on occasion that Sketcher has a crush on him.  It never develops into much and she forgets about it quietly as the story goes on.

Crimson Ray/Silver Shield (Leonid/Alisa)-- Sweet good-natured nice boy and sweet good-natured Ill Girl.  They are lowkey and quiet and very heartwarming.  Also endlessly tragic when the ship is sunk with Alisa’s Heroic Sacrifice to save the city.  I milk the angst for all it’s worth.  It is almost mean.

Flint/Solar (Andrew/Doris)-- Happy married couple.  They kind of needle and poke each other playfully and make each other flustered.  It’s cute.

Nighteagle/Cosmar (Douglas/Zoe)-- Stoic introverted Angsty McAngsterson and the bubbliest, sunniest, most energetic ball of energy ever.  Cosmar has a massive, not-so-secret crush on him and it confuses and baffles the hell of out Nighteagle.

White Eyestones: High fantasy war drama.

Indin/Elarin-- Happy married couple.  They have their rough patches but they smooth them out quickly.  Sunk when Indin dies halfway through the story.

Elsiron/Thelnaela-- This one was almost kind of an accident?  Lol IDK I just really liked writing Thelnaela being all teasing and playful around him and their banter almost wrote itself and I was like, “Ah yes.  This should be a thing.”

Winds of Ikilia: Fantasy quest in an asian-inspired world.  To try and win a war against an evil empire a crown prince kidnaps a young tribesgirl with mysterious powers.  Her friends come after her to rescue her.  They have adventures.

Kai/Nadi-- Main couple.  Hella cute.  Been friends since childhood, get matched by the matchmaker early on in the story.  Have a very deliberate Older Girl/Younger Boy thing going on.  They spend a lot of time being worried about each other and having playful banter and saying heartwarming things to each other that make my character Tiri groan and roll her eyes.  Decide to start officially referring to each other as betrothed and fiance partway through the story.  Married in the epilogue.

Ainusan/Ta Lian-- Oh gosh this is... *giggles*  This is actually kind of a running gag.  See my protagonist Nadi once disguises herself as a noblewoman while she’s looking for her friend and Prince Ainusan comes in and basically confuses her for Princess Ta Lian and is rather impressed by her spunk, being that he thought she was more of a ditz.  Ta Lian herself hears about his poor first impression of her later, from Nadi, and is so OFFENDED and ANNOYED and “That jerk I liked him!” and from then on I basically just make cracks about how they should totally get together.  And then the payoff comes in the epilogue where I reveal that they totally did.  I did it because it was funny.

Ainusan/Kiria-- Teased.  Little bitty hints here and there that Kiria has a tiny crush on him.  Nothing major.

San/Tiri-- Teased.  Tiri likes to flirt at him and he sometimes banters back.  Doesn’t go anywhere but provides much lulz

San/Kiria-- Also another case where little hints are dropped that Kiria has a crush on him.  What can I say, she likes dem older boys.

Korda/Keyla-- Married couple.  Nadi’s parent’s.  No big.

Wings: Magical girlfriend story.  Fairy family gets stuck living with normal human family for a while.  Their kids fall in love.  Drama ensues.

Hideki/Elaina-- Main couple.  It’s pretty much love at first sight for Hideki, and he immediately wants to ask her out.  She’s thrilled at his attention and forwardness and caring and becomes super protective of him and they are basically adorable at each other.  They get married partway through, in a magic ritual that will serve to protect him from fairy machinations.

Kubo/Haruna-- Married couple.  Hideki’s parents.  Not much else to be said about them.  They’re stable and healthy and long-suffering together.

Oberon/Titania-- Their marital problems are the driving background noise behind literally every single problem the two families ever have.  They seriously need counseling.

Ronan/Amara-- Married couple.  Elaina’s parents.  Amara had a lot of bitterness in her heart from a previous first love (a human, ordered killed by Oberon when he found out because he’s hissy about fairy/human relationships because Titania’s a cheating skank with them) but Ronan managed to soften her and help her find a measure of healing and happiness.

Tallas/Elaina-- One-sided.  Tallas is a fairy noble who has a creepy interest in Elaine and has on one occasion tried to ask her father for her hand.  Ronan sensed he was bad news and vetoed that right away.  Amara was later approached with the same offer and told Tallas where to shove it.  He persists in trying to woo her himself but she’s not flattered or interested and he basically slips more and more into an adolescent hissy fit of If I Can’t Have You, outright brainwashing and threatening Hideki in one case.  Roundly thwarted in the end.

[razorsadness]

in the two weeks since I last wrote a personal post:

—I went through the worst bout of dysphoria I’ve gone through in a while. I was like the Goldilocks of gender: “This outfit is too feminine! This outfit is too masculine!” Except for like a week I couldn’t find any outfit that felt Just Right, so I ended up wearing blah/boring things because it was like: “Well, I don’t look right in anything, so why even try?” I also had chest dysphoria during that time, which didn’t help. I don’t experience chest dysphoria very often, mostly I’m okay with having tits, but during this recent bout I couldn’t wear anything that accentuated my chest in any way without feeling like I wanted to rip my tits off. Thankfully, I am now past that bout of dysphoria, and feel generally okay about my wardrobe and gender presentation(s) again.

—I got sick, again. Once again, not CoViD (thank g-d), just a regular old cold. It still sucked, and of course there was the added thing of checking my temperature several times a day and generally freaking the fuck out. I’ve been getting sick so much this year, and I couldn’t figure out why, you know, I kept going: “But I haven’t been going anywhere, or hanging out with anyone, so how can I be catching all these colds?” Forgetting, of course, that I have always gotten sick after bouts of extreme activity or stress, and even though I’ve been trying to rest plenty and take care of myself...this year has been so damn stressful that my immune system is just ground down to nothing.

—Speaking of CoViD, P. and I have to get tested again tomorrow, because he was exposed at work on Friday. Some fuckhead rich guy knew he’d been exposed, and was waiting on his test results, but decided to come into the club for golfing and drinks anyway, and then found out later that day that his test came back positive. P. and I are probably fine (knock on wood), because P. didn’t come in close, prolonged, or maskless contact with him (he only saw the guy long enough to slide drinks to him across the bar, so he was more than six feet away and everyone was masked the whole time), but just the level of entitlement and irresponsibility... Not to mention, the people he was golfing with, who he probably did give it to—he didn’t tell them beforehand, either, and one of the people in his party is the doctor who runs the fucking ER at the hospital here in town. What the fuck is wrong with people? Anyway, yeah, so now we’re quarantined until we get our results (not that we’ve been going anywhere we haven’t had to, anyway), so please send me good vibes that my house is CoViD-free, thanks.

—My period started a week early. I think it may actually be a (super super early on) miscarriage. Because: a. my period usually starts on the exact day it’s due, maybe a day before or after at most, so when it’s this far off it means something Weird is happening, and b. I’ve had a couple super early on miscarriages before so I know what they feel like and this felt like that.

—Thanksgiving night I was thinking about Christmas, and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” popped into my head and that song is brutal enough any year, but this year???? Someday soon we all will be together, if the fates allow / Until then we’ll have to muddle through somehow / So have yourself a merry little Christmas, now. I fucking wept.

—Three nights ago I had a dream that a bunch of my best friends/fave zinesters (like J.E., A.G., J.C., et. al.) and I were doing a big group zine reading in Philadelphia. So now I miss my friends even more than I already did, and I miss Philadelphia (even more than I always do).

—A year ago at this time, we were beginning our last few rehearsals for the Tom Waits tribute show, and now I’m missing all those people too, and listening to a lot of Tom Waits, which of course makes me think of yet other people I miss. Thinking of the Dark Jazz man a lot, and of the brief time, oh, 14 years ago, when I was certain he was The One. I’m not sad that I didn’t end up with him, there’s lots of reasons why it never would’ve worked long-term, but I miss him.

—I’ve also been thinking a lot about my extended family, my cousins on my mom’s side. Thinking about back when we spent every Thanksgiving together. All our weird traditions, like how after dinner we’d go out and explore the muddy backroads of southwest Michigan, then go to Country Kitchen for fried stuff with cheese or to Denny’s for milkshakes. That all ended years ago, because my cousins and I all moved to different places and got careers and/or families that made it harder to travel back. I miss them.

—I mean, I miss everything and everyone all the time. It’s nothing new. This whole pandemic biz just exacerbates it. I think a lot of that quote from Cometbus #55 where Yula says to Aaron: “You always worried about what you were missing out on, and what might have been. Ever consider how that feels to the people you are around? Sometimes it seemed like you wanted the past more than anything else. Of course, because it’s the one thing you could never get. The past - your perfect girlfriend!” It’s the same way for me.

—Speaking of: I had to change the URL of this blog because P. read it. We had a big blow-up fight this summer, because of things he read in my zines, and I thought we’d worked through it then, but then he sought out this blog and read through it. He thinks that I’m trying to keep secrets from him, but none of this stuff is “secret,” exactly, it’s just that I express myself differently in my writing and in blog posts for strangers on the Internet than I do to him, in the same way that, say, I talk differently to my best friend than I do to him, or my mom, or... And I feel incredibly violated, actually. I know, “if you don’t want people reading it, don’t put it on the Internet,” but also...if you tell someone you don’t want them reading certain things and they do it anyway, isn’t that a betrayal of boundaries? You’d think after being with me for over a decade he’d understand. He doesn’t get that I embellish things, but I’m a fucking poet, I use poetic license, I romanticize, I use hyperbole, I don’t always make explicit when something happened, I combine multiple events into one event, I feel things intensely and write intensely about those things, I blur fact and fiction... I’ve tried to explain all of this to him. Repeatedly. I’ve also tried to tell him that stuff he’s assuming happened recently may have actually been years ago, and he wouldn’t know the difference if he read it out of context, but even that... He has never understood why I’m so hung up on the past / what might have been, thinks it’s some personal failing of his or our relationship, even though, again, I’ve tried to explain that’s just how I am and always have been. (See: The past - your perfect girlfriend! See also: Why hold on to so much? / Where can I put it down?) And I really thought we’d cleared the air after our fight this summer. I did understand that it hurt him that I hadn’t had him read anything I wrote recently (though for years I actually didn’t even think he cared about reading my stuff, but that’s another rant for another time); so I gave him copies of all my most recent stuff, and promised I’d continue to do so whenever I put something new out. But I really didn’t think he’d come find and read through my side-blog. It’s not just the betrayal of boundaries, it’s also... He knew that reading through my blog would upset him, because he knew that he would see things out of context or make assumptions that weren’t true, and it’s just like, dude. If you knew it was going to be a problem, why did you do it?

I have gone through similar situations with so many people I’ve been in relationships with. It always starts out with me giving them my stuff to read or at least being open to them reading it, then they get upset about something they read, so then I stop giving them my stuff/ask they no longer read certain things, so then they think I’m hiding stuff from them, so then they seek out the stuff I didn’t give them, and then read something that makes them even more upset... Or that whole dichotomy of “why don’t you ever write about me?” then I write about them and they’re pissed about the way in which I wrote about them... See: never fuck a zine-writing girl / it’s a STORY. UGH. (Not to mention he’s also doing that other thing that so many of my dude-partners have done—he’s ready to punch every dude who’s so much as sent me a flirtatious email, but women I’ve made out or slept with? Eh, no big deal. It’s regular old jealousy with a dash of bisexual erasure and I love it...not.)

In the past this kind of stuff has been a dealbreaker, but I’m not going to leave him. He promised he won’t read my blog anymore, but I changed the URL just to be safe (this was after I freaked out really bad the night before last and said I was going to delete all my blogs and everything else off the Internet). I promised I’ll be more open and communicative with him (though I think I have been; it’s just that he seems to think I’m hiding things from him because I don’t tell him every time I’m having tender thoughts about an old flame or getting crushed out on a poet that I don’t even know IRL? IDK), and continue to give him copies of or send him links to new things I have out (everything other than my blog, basically).

I don’t know. I don’t think either one of us is 100% in the wrong here. I think we both have valid feelings and fears, and I think both of us has handled things poorly in the past, and said and done shitty things. This strengthening-your-relationship thing is not for the weak, I tell ya. We were both pretty emotionally checked out from each other/our relationship for a long time, in different ways (and not always/all ways), and checking back in with each other can be incredibly painful, especially when we’re dealing with all this shit we’d repressed or hidden for years.

Also, I fucking miss LiveJournal so much. This kind of thing was so much easier in the LJ days, when I could pick and choose what to leave public and what to friends-lock.

—Here, a list of some things I’m thankful for, so that this entry isn’t just whining:

*Writing—I “finished” NaNoWriMo. That is, I got past the 50,000 word mark, and came to some sort of “ending.” The novel’s an absolute wreck, though—it’s meant to be a bit experimental, with lots of time-jumps and different PoVs, but I’m not sure I have it in an order that makes even a modicum of sense to anyone but me; also there are a loooottt of probably extraneous descriptions and tangents because, as a friend once said to me, I tell stories like Kerouac. I’ve also started writing poems again, for the first time in a few months they’re just kinda flowing; I’ve started working on a b-side of sorts to my Courtney Love chapbook, amongst other things.

*Art. I’m still painting a lot, and I am just so thankful I have a room in the house for an office/studio/study. I can write, or work on press-stuff, or make art, or have the kids come in for arts and crafts projects, or just sit in the window and read, or dance around to whatever music I like, or...

*My kids. They both amaze me every day. And I love that I’m the type of mom I am. I used to feel badly, like not a good parent, for lots of reasons, but now I’m realizing that what I lack in some areas of parenting, I make up for in others. Yes, I’m moody and impatient at times, and I’m not always on top of housework, but I’m creative, I’m smart, and I’m good at showing my kids how much I love them. Recently we’ve been doing lots of DIY projects, including making homemade playdough, which has been a real hit (both the making of it and the playing with it). I’ve taken time this month to teach them (well, mostly D.) about Native American history as well as the Land Back movement; I’ve explained to them that while we do have Native American ancestors and relatives, we aren’t ourselves Native (that concept is a little tricky to explain, but I think at least D. understood). And the other day, C. was playing a silly make-believe game with some of his toy animals, that involved a “bad brontosaurus” going to “dinosaur jail.” I played along but also managed to find a way to work in an (age-appropriate) little bit about prison abolition. I think it worked because his game ended with all the animals hugging each other and stomping on the jail together!

*Food. I’ve been missing diners and diner food something fierce, so I found this “Diner Jukebox” playlist on Spotify and I’ve been listening to it while making myself diner-inspired food. Lunches of grilled cheese and soup; breakfasts of eggs over-medium and bacon and toast. And always with coffee, of course. Thanksgiving itself was great. We ordered a ready-to-reheat Turkey Day dinner from a local restaurant, plus made a few of our own sides to go along with it. We had a ton of leftovers, so of course there have been a lot of Thanksgiving leftover sandwiches. I’ve since frozen the rest of the turkey + the carcass, so I can make homemade turkey and wild rice soup sometime soon. And I have a bag of fresh cranberries I never ended up using on Thanksgiving, so today I put them in an apple-cranberry cake.

*Drink. Hot toddies have become my special indulgence, I have them in the late afternoon maybe once or twice a week. I usually make something tea or cider-based, but Saturday I went extra decadent. I made hot cocoa, added peanut butter whiskey, then topped the whole thing with whipped cream and drizzles of chocolate syrup and peanut butter. OMG.

*Etc.: I’ve been managing money really well, so we’ve got all our bills paid up and still have money left over for Xmas. We’ve got plans for a mini-vacation for my birthday next month—P. and I and the kids are going to drive up to Door County and stay a few nights at my parents’ place there. They won’t be there, so it’ll be safe CoViD-wise, and yeah, we’ll just be staying in there, but it will at least be a change of scenery, and we can go on winter hikes in Peninsula State Park, get takeout from our favorite pizza place, and cuddle by the fire. I’m being interviewed by this professor from England who’s writing a book about the politics of Joe Strummer and The Clash and their influence on people. A fan of my writing specifically gave him my name and then he read some of my Joe-related writings online and said he really wanted to hear from me because, and I quote: “I can see that Joe Strummer has permeated not only your thinking, but your soul as well.” Holy shit, right? And just all the everyday moments of beauty—raindrops hanging like glass beads from the mulberry bush in our backyard; the shadow of the waxing moon in the afternoon sky on a Thanksgiving Day walk; taking drives with my kids to look at people’s holiday decorations.

I’m not trying to minimize the hard stuff, but right now, more than ever, it’s important for me to hold on to the good things.

[itzryyo]

More

          I am currently on a bus heading into the city for a field trip and am trying to maintain my sanity while also attempting to distract myself from the fact that I didn’t go to the bathroom before we left and traffic is real.        

          Someone asked me the other day, “So, like, what is your obsession with Drake all about?” My first reaction was to answer their question with a question and ask “uhh…why aren’t you obsessed with Drake?” To be fair, they were justified in asking me because I have a propensity to be incredibly all-or-nothing when it comes to my affinity for certain things (i.e., Chick-Fil-A, the Mets, Titanic & The Dark Knight to name a few.) I’m not really sure where it comes from, MOM, but it’s been that way my whole life. While I don’t have a vast array of interests, the things I am interested in, I commit to whole-heartedly. However, when it comes to music, we are talking about an entirely different entity.

          While TV shows, films and books can influence, art can inspire, and sports can invigorate, I contend that nothing touches the soul the way music does. When I’m in a good mood, Bruno Mars or Justin Timberlake will enjoy that mood with me. If I’m feeling melancholy, it’s much easier to have Boyz II Men or Dru Hill help me out than it is to plop down on the couch, put on “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” and commit to watching the whole thing. You know exactly what I’m talking about. You know what it was like when you heard “Burn” by Usher for the first time and he, word for word, expressed exactly how you felt about your current, 3-week-old high school relationship. Yes, we all wanted to be Spider-Man the first time we saw it in theaters, but do you still feel that way if, for some God-forsaken reason, TBS is airing it on a random day off? Probably not. But what about if “Bye-Bye-Bye” comes on the radio randomly while you're driving in the car? I guarantee you are gracefully moving your right arm from right to left while opening and closing your hand just like Justin, J.C. and the rest of the boys did. Whether your music is on shuffle and that ONE song comes on or you have listened to “Someone Like You” for the 32nd time in a row, music infiltrates the soul and is an uncanny medication for the heart. 

           Okay, but there's a lot of really good music, Ry, why the fix on this particular artist? I'm glad you just asked [in my imagination.] The power of music lies in one's ability to relate to it. I'm honest enough to admit that I have a tendency to think my opinions are unerring. I'll quickly discredit an artist or band because I personally don't like it, but to completely discredit another's experience or admiration because of my subjectivity is irresponsible and ignorant. I will never understand an artist like Future. I was disappointed when Drake did an entire album with him. But I've talked with people who have explained that (when they can understand what he's saying) they really relate to his songs. More power to 'em. A lot of people don't like Drake. I've heard (and argued) many people who dislike him for a myriad of reasons ranging from being "soft" to "not struggling enough" to "sounding the same on every song.” I can't make anyone like the guy and that's not why I'm even writing this in the first place. Remember: Traffic. Middle-schoolers. Full bladder. Voila.

          Reverting back to a previous point, music invades and harps on human emotion. I grew up with a variety of musical tastes because I was raised by an all-white family while almost all my friends were minorities. My uncle introduced me to Pearl Jam, Nirvana, The Doors and The Beatles. My mom played “American Pie”, Goo-Goo Dolls, Alanis Morisette, Sheryl Crow and Matchbox 20 on our road trips to Ohio in the summer (she also can rap “Public Service Announcement” and “Rapper’s Delight” word for word.) My dad blasted The Fugees, Jagged Edge, Ginuwine and Joe, while my friends and teammates got me well-acquainted with Jay, Mobb Deep, Dipset and DMX. This plethora of music has made me appreciative of all musical genres. Thanks to Apple Music and Spotify, all these artists are accessible with the touch of a button.

          If I had to choose, R&B and Hip-Hop would be my first two choices on what to listen to for the rest of my life. D-Block on my way to basketball practice and Brian McKnight while I fell asleep. “Fortunate” by Maxwell when I had a crush and “What They Want” by DMX and Sisqo when they rejected me. This was the routine growing up.

          I was sitting in my bedroom as a 9th grader the first time I heard “Cry For You” by Jodeci. If I put it on right now, I would feel the exact same way that I did the first time I heard it. So when Drake made a song referencing one of the greatest R&B groups of all-time, let alone one of my favorite songs, the connection grew stronger.

          Finding an artist who tapped into both genres with equal prowess was a dream come true for me. Add to that dual threat an artist who is biracial, grew up a single child in a single-parent household, raised by a white mother, and now you’re starting to reflect my actual upbringing. The funny thing about growing up biracial is that there never really seems to be a middle ground. Within the black community, I never felt “black” enough, as though it was my own doing that I was raised by a white mother; as if somehow it was my responsibility to earn my blackness more than those darker than I was, and until that validation was given, I couldn’t fit in. Flipping to the other side, when your entire family is white and your tan doesn’t go away in the winter, you stick out. I couldn’t style my hair like my uncle Jim’s. My little cousins never got asked if they were adopted. I was an anomaly for actually knowing the words to “Iris” by Goo-Goo Dolls. Considering all that, when Drake says “I used to get teased for being black and now I’m here and I’m not black enough, ‘cause I’m not acting tough or making stories up ‘bout where I’m actually from,” it hits home and it hits home hard.

          I didn’t grow up with any male presence consistently in my life. I taught myself how to shave. My mother taught me how to play sports. Nobody taught me how to fight, or “be a man.” I learned the definition of strength by seeing the women in my life bounce back from heartbreak and hardships. I also learned how to be really in touch with my emotions. I am a feeler. I feel every emotion in every crevice of my heart. So when this same biracial artist, who was raised by a single, white mother, explodes onto the hip-hop scene but is making emotional music, I cannot help but look up to him. When every attack and knock against this same biracial artist is that he’s too “soft” and is “too emotional,” my confusion swells. “What do you mean ‘too emotional’?!” Ironically enough, the very same people who bludgeon Drake’s music due to its overt honesty and raw emotion are probably the ones who can relate to it more than anyone else.

          Yes, the trap music is entertaining, but I can guarantee you that most of the men slandering Aubrey’s name have made more drunk calls to their ex (thanks Marvin’s Room) in a few months than they’ve ever pushed drugs, been gang affiliated or actually held a gun. Does this mean that those artists that promote that at the forefront of their records don’t reach people? Absolutely not. Kendrick Lamar, Jay-Z, Big Pun and others grew up around gangs, drugs and violence and speaks on things I have never seen or experienced in such a way, but there are plenty of people who have, which is the beauty of this whole music thing.

          Back to Aubrey. In a world immersed in the superficial, is not authenticity a breath of fresh air? Hasn’t the complaint in the hip-hop community always been a lack of credibility from certain rappers and artists? So now, we have someone who owns their identity, not trying to be something that he isn’t, and he’s not welcome here. So when Drake (referencing his friendship with Lil’ Wayne) says, “Weezy been on the edge, you n*****s just need to chill, if anything happen to papi, might pop a n***** for real,” people balk at the claim. Why? Because he makes R&B music and that is apparently synonymous with weakness. I don’t like guns and I am not a promoter of violence, but I’m a believer in defending the people closest to you. This is also a reflection of the frailty of masculinity in the 21st century, but I can’t let my ADD take me there.

          “But Ry, he isn’t real hip-hop. He talks white!” What do you think my friends used to say to me all the time growing up? The. Same. Damn. Thing. So yes, I appreciate Drake “talking white” in interviews because that’s the voice he was born with. I can’t help the way my voice sounds and it’s ridiculous to think I’d have to change it to meet a social standard. In a culture that watches, critiques and pounces on every single thing people do, Drake has never once strayed away from embracing all of the cultures he was introduced to growing up. He didn’t make apologies for making songs like “Doing It Wrong” and putting them on the same album where he put “Lord Knows.”Also, “Shut It Down” and “Uptown” are distinguishable, but not mutually exclusive. They both came from the same artist and they both hit when you put them on.

          I spent an inordinate amount of time growing up trying to establish which race I wanted to affiliate myself with full time. This artist and this music shattered that notion. From breakups to ball games, homages to family and anthems for friends, there is no area of life where there isn’t a soundtrack to go with it. That is a very comforting feeling for someone who struggled with having to choose between which culture to embrace. The dichotomy of having to choose one or the other was onerous but having someone burst into the industry that showed me, through their music, that it’s okay to fully embrace both was liberating. Is every song a hit? Um, actually…okay, maybe not every song. Was Views a great album? Eh, not my favorite. But that’s the beauty of music. You get to go on that journey with an artist and watch them grow and explore and hopefully, their last album doesn’t sound anything like the first, because that’s what growth is (Hi, Kanye fans).

          It doesn’t really matter what he puts out these days because as a fan, I’m always expecting the best and as a person, I’ll always be grateful for the lessons I learned from the music. As a fan, I’ll always want more. More emotion, more vulnerability, more bars and More Life.

[andrewdburton]

Great lessons from great men

Because I write a personal finance blog, I read a lot of books about money. I'll be honest: they're usually pretty boring. Sure, they can tell you how to invest in bonds or how to find the latest loophole in the tax code. But most of them lack a certain something: the human element.

Over the years, I've found that it's fun to read a different kind of money book in my spare time. I've discovered the joy of classic biographies and success manuals, especially those written by (or about) wealthy and/or successful men. When I read about Benjamin Franklin or Booker T. Washington or J.C. Penney, I learn a lot — not just about money, but about how to be a better person.

Here are some of the most important lessons that these books, written by and about great men of years gone by, have taught me.

Be Tenacious

“Anybody can be a halfway man, but the one who rises above this class is the one who keeps everlastingly pushing.” — J. Ogden Armour, Touchstones of Success (1920)

More than any other, one lesson stands out from the books I've read: Never give up. If you have a goal or a dream, pursue it. If there's a cause that you truly believe in, then fight for it. That's not to say that you should doggedly chase greed or gluttony, but that you should do your best to achieve those things that are important to you. Great men — and great women too! — struggle through daunting obstacles to reach their destinations. In everything that you do, do your best. And remember: The road to wealth is paved with goals.

Exercise Self-Control

“‘Tis easier to suppress the first desire, than to satisfy all that follow it.” — Benjamin Franklin, The Way to Wealth (1758)

Because he had very real trouble regulating his impulses, Benjamin Franklin famously attempted to codify his quest for self-control. As Brett wrote at The Art of Manliness, Franklin committed himself to thirteen virtues, and he developed a system for tracking how disciplined he was in his daily pursuit of these ideals. There's nothing wrong with an occasional indulgence. But when the indulgence becomes a habit — or worse, a vice — this can affect your life. Even destroy it. If you have habits that prevent you from fulfilling your potential, find a way to boost your self-control. (You might, for example, use Joe's Goals to track your progress, much like Benjamin Franklin did.)

Do the Right Thing

“To be truly rich, regardless of his fortune or lack of it, a man must live by his own values. If those values are not personally meaningful, then no amount of money gained can hide the emptiness of life without them.” — John Paul Getty, How to Be Rich (1961)

Have a code of honor, and live by it. Your code of honor might come from your faith, or from your education, or from your family. Whatever the source, live by these values. Life is filled with temptations. The more you accomplish, the more people will tempt you with offers for quick gains or passing pleasures. Many people succumb to these, but those who do rarely achieve what they might have if they'd stuck to their principles. The books I've read are filled with stories of folks who have resisted the urge to compromise, and who believe that this has been a key to their success. Don't cheat. Be honest. Work hard. And embrace the golden rule.

Embrace the Golden Rule

“Good will is one of the few really important assets of life. A determined man can win almost anything that he goes after, but unless, in his getting, he gains good will he has not profited much.” — Henry Ford, My Life and Work (1922)

James Cash Penney — the man behind the J.C. Penney chain of department stores — believed that success could be measured by how a man treated others. In his book, Fifty Years with the Golden Rule, Penney describes his life-long adherence to this maxim: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Other great people through history have believed the same. They believed that their fortunes came not from pursuing money itself, but by producing something of value to others. But this principle also holds true outside of business. In your dealings with your friends, your family, and with strangers, treat others as you would like to be treated. Doing so builds social capital, strengthening the fiber of the community.

Pay Yourself First

“Many a man is poor today, although he has worked like a slave, simply because he could not save.” — Orison Swett Marden, The Young Man Entering Business (1903)

Another common thread in most of these books — and in personal-finance classics like The Richest Man in Babylon — is the importance of saving. “Pay yourself first,” the old adage goes, and it's great advice. If you will set aside ten or twenty per cent of all that you earn, your fortune will grow far beyond that of your peers. Some of this money should be invested in a manner that makes you comfortable. (You should learn about the concepts of asset allocation and diversification, if you haven't already.) But some of your money should also be set aside in an emergency fund. When you save — when you pay yourself first — you are using the strength of your youth to insure your uncertain tomorrow.

Avoid Debt

“Be assured that it gives much more pain to the mind to be in debt, than to do without any article whatever which we may seem to want.” — Thomas Jefferson, Letter to his daughter Martha (14 June 1787)

Many young people struggle with debt — I did so myself. But those who are not able to overcome their spending habits are likely to find themselves always poor. When you pay interest to someone else, you cannot earn interest for yourself. When you're in debt, your options are limited. You cannot choose, for example, to take a month off to travel across the country with a friend. You cannot quit a job you hate. If you did, how would your bills get paid? To be sure, a certain amount of debt is useful in business, but make it a policy in your personal life to never borrow for something that will decrease in value. (And if you're already behind, make it a priority to get out of debt as soon as possible.)

Keep Well

“The foundation of success in life is good health: that is the substratum of fortune; it is the basis of happiness. A person cannot accumulate a fortune very well when he is sick.” — P.T. Barnum, The Art of Money Getting (1880)

Your health is your greatest asset. If you lack health, you cannot work, and cannot produce an income. Health allows you to engage in productive activities, at work and at play. It allows you to enjoy the company of your friends and family. And it allows you to live with vigor. Guard your health. Do not neglect your body. Eat well. Exercise regularly. If you drink or smoke, do so in moderation. You will not live forever, but with some care and foresight, you may get a little closer!

Do Not Covet

“By wishing to be what he calls ‘up-to-date' as his friends or boon companions, many a young man mortgages his future.” — Orison Swett Marden, The Young Man Entering Business (1903)

It never pays to compare yourself to others. For one, you can find yourself longing to own the same things they do. Your best friend buys a new Ford Mustang, and suddenly you want one too. Your co-workers go out for drinks on Friday evening, but you're broke — the temptation to join in, to have what others have, can be unbearable. Focus only on yourself and how the things you own and do relate to your goals. Don't be jealous of others. (This is one message in the famous essay, “Acres of Diamonds”: Instead of looking elsewhere for wealth, look at your own life.)

Live Modestly

“This, then, is held to be the duty of the man of wealth…To set an example of modest, unostentatious living, shunning display or arrogance.” — Andrew Carnegie, The Gospel of Wealth (1889)

This is the flip side to “Do Not Covet”. Just as you should not allow the behavior of your friends to influence your spending decisions, so too be conscious of your influence on them. If you have money, don't flaunt it. And if you don't have money, don't pretend that you do. It's fine (even good) to buy quality products, but don't be flashy. Live simply and well.

Practice Patience

“No matter how great the talent or the effort, some things just take time: you can't produce a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnant.” — Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway Annual Report (1985)

Too many people want to “get rich quick”. They're on the lookout for fast money. They also want to lose weight now, to be a great writer now, to be in management now. This obsession with “now” is a problem. In his new book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell writes that the difference between those who succeed and those who don't is 10,000 hours. That is, those who achieve mastery have patiently practiced their craft for at least 10,000 hours — the equivalent of five years of full-time work. When people ask me why Get Rich Slowly has been successful, one of my responses is that I've worked at it 60+ hours a week for the past fourteen years. Practice may not “make perfect”, but it certainly breeds success.

Give Generously

“Thrift does not end with itself, but extends its benefits to others. It founds hospitals, endows charities, establishes colleges, and extends educational influences.” — Samuel Smiles, Thrift (1875)

I wasn't raised in a culture of giving. It's only something I'm beginning to learn in middle age. But as I read about the choices of those who have come before me, it's clear that they have derived satisfaction (and have done a lot of good) by giving generously — not just of money, but also of time and knowledge. Do not hoard the things you have. Share them so that others might profit, too. Think abundance, not scarcity.

Embrace an Abundance Mindset

“I learned the lesson that great men cultivate love, and that only little men cherish a spirit of hatred. I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak…I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.” — Booker T. Washington, Up From Slavery (1901)

Look, people are people. Each of us is trying to make our way through this life the best way we possibly can. I may not agree with your approach and you may not agree with mine, but that does not mean we can't peacefully coexist. I don't have to hate you for what you believe; you don't have to hate me for my worldview. There's too much hate in this country (and this world) right now. Hate stems from a lack of patience, a lack of empathy, a lack of spirit. Fundamentally, hate is the scarcity mindset in action: “There's not enough for me, so there's certainly not enough for people like you.” I don't buy it. I believe there's plenty for everyone, and that it's our responsibility to help others share in the abundance. Sounds cheesy, I know, but I truly believe it.

Learning from the Average Joe

Over the past decade, I've enjoyed reading the real-life stories of how great men became great. (And great women too!) But I've also found it enlightening to read about the experiences of the average everyday person — people like you and me.

One book I strongly recommend (especially considering the state of the economy) is Hard Times by Studs Terkel. Hard Times is an oral history of the Great Depression. Terkel interviewed scores of men and women about their experiences during the 1930s. Their stories are amazing, and they offer great insight about how we can live better lives today. (I wrote more about this book in the thick of the Great Recession.)

Go forth, my friends, and do great things.

Note: This article originally appeared at The Art of Manliness in a slightly different form. Also, for Mother's Day, Tanja Hester from Our Next Life shared a companion piece profiling Great Lessons from Great Women. Check it out!

from Finance https://www.getrichslowly.org/great-lessons-from-great-men/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[myanime2go]

Bold Will to dream The Pet Girl of Sakurasou [February 2020 OWLS Tour]

Bold Will to dream The Pet Girl of Sakurasou, I wonder if that sounds as cool as it did in my head when I was picking a name for my post topic for this month's OWLS. Hey everyone!!!!

Me when I am trying to name my posts..... And welcome to my first post for the OWLS this year. For the new readers, what is the OWLS you ask. What is the OWLS?

Respect! OWLS - Otaku Warriors for Liberty and Self-Respect. We are a group of otaku bloggers who promote acceptance of all people regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion and disability through the use of anime and manga. We emphasise the importance of respect, kindness, and tolerance to every human being. It's a group I have been a part of for a year plus now since my post, Thankful, 2 Anime I’m Thankful For which coincidental one of my topics on that post is what I am going to be talking about today. So our topic for the month of February was Legacy. Legacy We have mentors, teachers, coaches, and role models whose stories inspired us in some way. Even when these role models are gone, their stories will live on from generation to generation. For this month, we will be exploring stories that have inspired or taught us some important lessons about life.  So for me, the story that inspired and taught me important lessons of life was The Pet Girl of Sakurasou (Sakura-sou no Pet na Kanojo).

The Pet Girl of Sakurasou

Add this to your watch list if you haven't seen it already..... Author: Hajime Kamoshida Episodes: 24 Premiered: Fall 2012 Studios: J.C. Staff Plot After being kicked out of the normal dorm for keeping a stray cat, Sorata Kanda moves into Sakura Dormitory. As he starts to get used to life in the dorm, Mashiro Shiina, a world-famous artist who cannot even take care of her daily life, moves in. Sorata is forced to become Mashiro's caretaker.

Why did I pick The Pet Girl of Sakurasou?

There are tons of amazing anime I have enjoyed over the years. Some anime shows were hilarious; some made me cry inside for the characters and some had scenes I found myself coming back to rewatch weeks and months after I finished the series. But in the end, not many have pulled at my heartstrings has The Pet Girl of Sakurasou, it's a show that's easy to relate with. It spins the usually age-old battle of hard work vs. talent idea on its head and shows just how much hard work is needed by anyone even a talented person who wants to accomplish a dream. The Pet Girl of Sakurasou (Sakura-sou no Pet na Kanojo) is one of my favourite animes, maybe it's because I can really connect with Kanda Sorata, he's confused, conflicted and insecure but now that I think about it, am I that special aren't we really all like that in some way or form.

Kanda Sorata and Shiina Mashiro He isn't talented, I mean in a prodigy way like Shiina Mashiro. I’ve been confused about what I want to do and even now that I think I do, I'm still not sure I'm doing it the right way. I mean I have my goals, aspirations, dreams or whatever you want to call it now but I'm always still second-guessing myself a lot and wondering if I'm actually really good enough to accomplish them, which sometimes makes me wonder if I should stop, especially sometimes when I see someone else doing that same thing I am doing or want to do better. I mean the creativity of others sometimes is just really amazing, and that makes me wonder if even putting in the hard work, could I come up with a fraction of that creativity? But this all changed after I saw The Pet Girl of Sakurasou you can call it a slice-of-life, romantic comedy, but this description hardly does it much justice. When it first got recommended to me and I decided to watch it, I went into it with fairly low expectations expecting the same old same old from it's type of genre, but it ended up being much more.

Me even after all the good recommendations about The Pet Girl of Sakurasou before watching it.... Watching a group of six high school students living in Sakura Hall: a dorm for troublemakers and misfits. Chase after their dreams even though socially they were all different - from the average student to already-established geniuses.

But even though they were all still your same typical teens: they made mistakes, got jealous, and even lash out. But they also listened, learned, and persevered. They all still need to work late nights and long hours to be good at whatever they wanted to be good at. I wanted to join them on this adventure and have friends like these, that pushed me to be better. I wanted to face those challenges standing by their side, laugh, cry and share in their victories. I mean this really was the push I need to keep trying and not give up, even if I wasn't one of the best now I could improve and get better and maybe one day I would be one of the best.

Throughout the story, all of them grow more with each other than they would have alone. The Pet Girl of Sakurasou is an anime about the bonds that are formed from the pursuit of impulsive dreams, that through both laughter and tears create a bond that is more than friendship but family. And honestly, there is a thrill of racing forward to your dreams, and yes you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, but later you’ll remember these beautiful times of hard work. And to be that's worth it. It's more about the journey than the destination.

Thank you for reading to the very end. Jack from Animated Observation went right before me with March Comes in Like a Lion which you can read right now if you haven't. And tomorrow Mel from Mel in Animeland is writing about Various Series (Underdog in Anime) so check it out too. Until next time, keep dreaming.... Read the full article

[50mmengland]

I was England - And So Can You

Advice from some guy who went there once real recently.

If you haven’t been, perhaps you’ll find these pointers useful.  All the advice I could find prior to going was rather generic, so here’s some specific advice.

ELECTRONIC DEVICES:

If you have 2 or more that you need to charge on a regular basis, bring a power strip with your power converter.  Due to the size of English plugs (and the fact that many buildings are so old) there are far fewer places to plug things in than we Americans are used to.  So even if you have multiple adapters, as I did, you may have trouble finding an outlet.  

Bring MOBILE power.  Most cafes and restaurants don’t have an easy place for you to plug your stuff in, and the roaming of your international plan is going to murder your phone battery while you’re running around.  Bring a backup battery that can recharge your phone fully 2-4 times.  They only cost about $20 on Amazon.

TRANSPORTATION:

Forget renting a car.  Unless you’re going somewhere extremely remote, the train system (for Americans) is a dream come true.  And if you buy a ticket and miss that specific train, almost all tickets will let you ride that train at any time for the day it was purchased--so just catch the next one.

Get the App.  The National Rail and Trainline apps are indispensable.  I used Trainline almost every day for all my ticket purchases, and National Rail to cross-check train times.  Trainline gives you a confirmation code upon purchase that you punch into the ticket machine at the station.  Voila.  In certain places (depending on which railway is running the region), you can download a digital ticket within the app.  Works on all National Rail vendors all around the country.

CASH CASH MONEY MONEY:

Britain uses more cash.  At least in California, I go for weeks without any cash.  But it’s just more common in England, and frankly easier for purchases under £5 because we Americans don’t have Contactless credit cards.

Contactless.  We don’t have them.  It’s a type of credit card that you can use for purchases under  £30.  Everybody over there seems to use them, so you can sometimes feel the exasperation in line behind you when you use a chip card.  This is because...

They check the signature.  In the States, this isn’t very common anymore, even though it’s supposed to be.  My credit card signature was checked almost everywhere I used it, and it’s quite faded.  Luckily, I had my driver’s license, which has a copy of my signature on it.  This proved very useful, as some places supposedly will take your card if the signature is unreadable.

£ 100/wk in cash was sufficient for a guy traveling mostly solo.  This was enough for a mix of meals out and filling in with small ready-meals from the grocery stores.  Keep in mind, I’m not talking total expenditure, just what I found convenient to pay in cash versus card.  This kept me from waiting in line unnecessarily to sign for small purchases, and let me eat at cash-only joints.  If you’re planning to live it up more, bump the amount higher.

ATTRACTIONS:

Get an English Heritage Overseas Visitor Pass.  Once you pay the fee ( £36, I think) you get into any English Heritage site for free.  They have 8-day and 16-day passes.   Stonehenge is on the list, as well as Osborne House and Carisbrooke Castle (those latter two of which you can see my pictures down below).  And something like 200 more spots.  Some of those are free anyway, but why limit yourself?

Get a National Trust pass.  I didn’t get one, but I will next time.  Between the English Heritage and National Trust stuff, you’ve got ACTUAL HUNDREDS of sites you can get into without additional cost.  Plus they give you big maps with everything on it, so you’re bound to find things near you that you didn’t know existed.

FOOD:

I don’t know why English food has a lousy rep in America.  It’s amazing.

Beer is cheaper there.  But it is also warmer.  American life-hack for England: certain beers on tap will advertise as being “Extra Cold.”  Like Carlsberg, Carling, or Peroni.  If you get sick of what we Americans might label as “warm” or “flat” beers, get one of those and you’ll feel right at home again.  But if you have English friends, they will be upset.

SUPPLIES:

Stores.  It’s hard to know when you get there exactly what stores sell what.  So here’s a list of chain stores I found useful, and their rough American equivalents.

ASDA = Walmart

Sainsbury’s = Large supermarket, i.e. Safeway, Ralph’s, etc.  Some Sainsburys also have a clothing section, and are big like an Asda.

Tesco =  7-11, but not trashy.  Plenty of legit groceries and such.  It’s just smaller than your average American supermarket.

CoOp = Similar to Tesco, but even classier.  This was my go-to, as they were the most common in the cities I visited, and their prepackaged sandwiches and snacks are top-notch.  Not at all the ersatz prepackaged food we have in the States.

Waitrose = Whole Foods.  But not as pretentious.  

Boots = Rite-Aid, CVS or Walgreens.

Marks & Spencer (often on signs as “M&S”) - Department store like a Macy’s or J.C. Penny.  But there’s often a cafe inside.  And they have a weird little convenience store spin-off more akin to a CoOp or Tesco.

I might add more to this later--this is as much for me as for anyone else...to remember next time I go.  But hopefully it will be useful to fellow travelers.  Bon voyage!