#also I just thought the quotes from the podcast were nice

[blizzardsuplex]

When are you guys gonna save Roderick Strong from that company up in Connecticut? Aw, man. So...I would want nothing more than for Roderick Strong to come to AEW. [...] He knows he has a home in AEW, especially with me, Bobby, and Kyle, for sure. That would be amazing. - Adam Cole, May 19, 2022

The telenovela so far from (in order): AEW Unrestricted feat. Roderick Strong; AEW Dynamite, 09/13/2023; AEW Dynamite Grand Slam, 09/20/2023; AEW Dynamite, 10/04/2023; AEW Dynamite, 11/22/2023; AEW Dynamite, 01/03/2024

[Thanks for the help thinking of this, @scissormedaddyass! :) Just another GIFset to ponder/contrast what's said outside(ish) the world of kayfabe and the campiness that's done and said definitely within it.]

[bambi-kinos]

Beatles Reading List (Introductory)

Hi guys. So I saw a post floating around asking about "where to start" with the Beatles and how to find out more about them. Moeexyz's recommendation on it was to read fanfiction and this alarmed me a bit. Fanfiction just isn't a good source to get information about the band for one simple reason: fanfic authors change stuff for dramatic purposes all the time. It's just not a great way to get more information about them because fanfiction by necessity shifts things around for the sake of storytelling.

That Beatles iceberg is nice but the only way you're going to get a good picture of the Beatles is by doing a lot of reading of published sources. That's right. You're in for a lot of homework.

In an effort to combat misinformation, I asked the McLennon discord server to help me put together a rough list of introductory level books for Beatle fans that want to learn more about the band. These books are either a) read by me or b) read by someone I trust and I have included her quotes about the books she liked. I'll have color commentary talking about what they are and why they should be read. I do not consider this post finished! My server is constantly reading and discussing (we're looking at podcasts right now because they're the ones doing interviews with Liverpool citizens who were peers of the Beatles!) and they're being very gracious by contributing to this list. That means that this post may be updated in the future as I read more! If you want to keep up with updates then give my blog a follow, I'll post every time I update this list.

Some of these books are available on Archive.org but others can be gotten through your local library or through piracy. If you buy something, buy it used. Never pay more than $20 for a Beatle book.

The Whole Story

Anthology This is the documentary made by the band after John Lennon's death in 1980. It is both a documentary as well as a book (essentially a script of the documentary) which makes it very accessible. This is the version of the story that the band wanted to put out and includes interviews with Paul, George, and Ringo. They cover their beginning to their end. Anthology can be found on archive.org if you want to read it: https://archive.org/details/beatlesanthology0000unse_y2k8 The episodes are also available on Archive.org. If you search for "Beatles Anthology" and select "movies" option to search for videos then you will find it there. It's worth the watch and is all around the best introduction to the Beatles.

The Beatles - Hunter Davies This is the only sanctioned biography of the band. It's written in older language since it is contemporary to the 1960s but it's still very readable and a good intro. It is part of the media image that the band wanted to present at the time so you should make sure to think about what you are reading, who is saying what, and contemplate why he is saying it. It it still a great resource.

150 Glimpses of the Beatles - Craig Brown This is a short book that describes 150 anecdotes about the Beatles and what it was like to experience them. I recommend this because it demonstrates what a unique and personal experience the Beatles are while also demonstrating their global reach and how they became the most famous rock band in the world. It's a short read but a good one and there are many charming and thought provoking anecdotes in it. The story of the Beatles is just as much about their fans as it is about the band and you cannot understand one without looking at the other.

Books About Each Beatle

This particular section is a bit of a minefield. Many books written about the Beatles are of questionable veracity or just out and out wrong. (I can think of two that were written as blatant cash grabs and filled with libel that someone should have been sued over.) My recommendations on this may change so please check back from time to time! John Lennon

The John Lennon Letters - John Lennon, edited by Hunter Davies Primary source documents of the various letters and missives John wrote through his life. This may be the most important book on the list because it shows us who John really is: just another ordinary guy like us, trying to get through life. Also gives insight into his mindset as the decades pressed on.

The Making of John Lennon - Francis Kenny This is a very vital and heartbreaking read for people who want more insight into John. John Lennon is the most famous Beatle but he is also the one who's image is the most obscured and distorted. Francis Kenny is a Liverpool native who puts John in his proper context. To quote my server friend who read this one: Kenny, himself a Liverpudlian, takes into account how life in Liverpool in the first half of the 20th century shaped not only John but everyone he knew and his entire family. Mimi and Julia get a good critical view, and Uncle George gets his moment in the sun. He also lays out how class divides affected the Stanleys and then how Mimi took it out on John and Julia. He quotes a 1880s travel guide of London that said Liverpool was called "the New York of Europe," because of its economy and place on the ocean, and like in the Gilded Age New York that was happening concurrently across the ocean, Liverpool had pockets of wealth and splendor surrounded by poverty and rough living. Definitely a pro-read and a great insight into the culture and time John lived in. It does not fall into the pitfalls of hero worshipping John but Francis Kenny still treats John with sympathy and respect, hard qualities to come by when it comes to the cashgrabs written about John and his family.

John - Cynthia Lennon John's first wife, Cynthia, wrote two autobiographies about herself and John. This is one of them. It's a tough read in many places but a good one. Hers is a voice that doesn't shy away from John's flaws and actions but she also takes care to tell us why she and so many other people love him and remain loyal to him.

Paul McCartney

Many Years From Now - Barry Miles This is Paul's only sanctioned biography. It is formatted as a quasi-interview with Paul where there are interruptions of regular prose in each chapter. There are eyebrow raising moments where you can tell Paul is not quite telling the truth but it's important to read and identify these moments since Paul's habit of embroidering the truth is important to know and understand. Nonetheless it is still a lot more honest than I was expecting when I read it.

Paul McCartney: A Life - Peter Ames Carlin Probably the best Paul McCartney biography on the market. Peter Ames Carlin also did a similarly great bio of Paul Simon for people who are into that. To quote my friend Betty who read it: Paul gets to be a whole person here: the preternaturally talented boy wonder, the guy casting around for meaning, the less than attractive moments and qualities described without getting preachy or turning to [Paul Derangement Syndrome]. Carlin treats him with dignity instead of something to be gawked at and gossiped about. His (many) sources are cited at the end of the book. What I really appreciated was the ideas he put forth that I've only seen on Tumblr and not in Serious Official Biographies, which says to me he's writing as a fan and scholar and not a journalist trying to fill column inches.

George Harrison

I Me Mine - George Harrison Make sure to get the extended edition! George Harrison in his own words. There's a lot to say about this biography but it won't make much sense without context so I just encourage you to read it. George Harrison was, in my opinion, the best Beatle.

George Harrison: Behind the Locked Door - Graeme Thomson A good no bullshit biography about George Harrison. This covers his life as the material musician and the man seeking the divine. Graeme worked very hard to be respectful of George and his life, did extensive interviews with George's wife Olivia. Such a pro-read and definitely the best George biography written to date.

Ringo Starr

Photograph - Ringo Starr Ringo has stated that this book is his autobiography. In a few bumpers on the Beatles Sirius XM channel Ringo says that he doesn't want to write a biography like the others did but he was happy with putting this photobook together and essentially writing a bio through the captions. This is the closest that we will get for a biography for him as of right now. In time that may change but this is your best option. Piracy is the way to go when it comes to getting a copy of this, iirc it was a limited run and getting a physical copy might be very expensive these days.

Brian Epstein

A Cellarful of Noise - Brian Epstein/Derek Taylor This autobiography was ghostwritten by Brian's assistant Derek Taylor. It's not a tell-all but Brian talks about his youth and how he met the Beatles, including giving his own personal (and accurate) insights into each band member.

Conclusion

There are many, many books about the Beatles. Almost all of them offer something but most are about very niche periods in the Beatles history. When it comes to understanding the band I tried to put together a list where you can get an overview of the band and then read materials that either come straight from the Beatle in question or are not as biased as the competition. I am a McLennon shipper but for a post like this I did my best to recommend books that don't have that kind of bias in them so this is a list you can send to non-shipper friends haha.

In another post I will put together a history book list in the order of their timeline as a band, starting from the Quarrymen and on to the present. There is a LOT of ground to cover in a historical arrangement and it will take a while to compile. Please check back here regularly or give me a follow: whenever I update this post or make a new list, I'll make sure to post about it.

My plan is to make a website with all of this information that anyone can reference but it will take a long long time to make such a thing so put a pin in that one.

[cierraonline]

BILLIE IS DUMB!  WORKING LIKE A SLAVE AND NOT PAID! AND GOOSEBUMPS!

1 

“I have to burp.” 

“So burp, dummy.”

2 

“Are we ordering food?” 

“Didn’t you just have a sandwich?” 

“And?...Your point?”

3 

“Have you ever thought about killing yourself?” 

“Yeah…all the time when I was younger, you remember?” 

“Oh…yeah.”

Rolling…

Whatever the Fuck This Is Podcast 

Season 1 | Episode 1 

BILLIE IS DUMB!  WORKING LIKE A SLAVE AND NOT PAID! AND GOOSEBUMPS!

“Welcome to the first episode of ‘Whatever The Fuck This Is Podcast’ where we have no idea what the fuck we are doing...but it's entertaining so keep watching,” Plotted on the couch in whatever position made them comfortable on their Nickelodeon orange 87.8-inch modern velvet upholstered luxury sofa, presented the host of this new podcast, Siren Vixen and Billie Eilish.

“You already know who we are unless you...know...you’re slow,” Billie laughs. “Not that we have anything against slow people.”

“Yeah, I mean, I am married to a slow person so no discrimination over here,” Siren chimes in, causing Billie to quickly turn her head to the right to face her co-host.

“Huh?”

“Nothing,” Siren shook her head, turning back to the camera.

“Did you just call me slow!?” Billie’s ocean eyes widen, releasing a scoff from her mouth in disrespect.

“It’s not your fault,” Siren turns to her wife. “You were homeschooled.”

“Bitch! So were you!” The twenty-two-year-old exclaims with a humorous smile on her face. “In fact, you were homeschooled...with me...by my mother!” Billie quickly turns back to the front camera. “Don’t let this whore manipulate you to think she’s smart, because she is as slow as me.”

“So you admit you're slow?”

“No.”

“But you just said, quote on quote, ‘she is as slow as me,’ meaning you admit that you’re slow,” Siren points, using physical evidence against her partner.

“What’s ten times ten, Siren?” Billie raised an eyebrow, bringing up a time that clearly wasn’t her wife’s brightest moment.

“What’s a grape, Billie?” The brown-skinned girl fought back.

“Anyways,” Billie sighs, turning back to the camera, repositioning the microphone in her hand. “If you’re hearing a hyena scream in the background, don’t worry it’s just Finneas and Claudia laughing. For some reason, it was like our whole family wanted to watch us.”

“It’s because without us, they wouldn’t know what to do with themselves, bunch of losers,” Siren jokingly rolls her eyes.

“We are not a bunch of losers,” Maggie chimes in from her position behind the camera. “And we just like to be around you guys.”

“All I’m hearing are just excuses,” Billie smiles at her mother.

“Alright let’s start this motherfucker!” Siren yelled out randomly, causing everyone to look at her in confusion.

“Personality #2, sweetie...let’s use our inside voices, okay,” Billie pets her as if she was a cat that needed to be coaxed.

“Eww, don’t do that,” Personality #2 brushed her wife's hand off of her. “Let’s read our horoscopes.”

“Eww,” Billie gives a stank look.

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Be nice,” Maggie warns. The girls’ relationship had a love-hate dynamic, meaning they were obsessed with each other (one more than the other, Billie) but they were also each other’s bullies. Everyone who knows them really just shrugs it off, but those aka fake fans and blogs who don’t, just think they are abusive to each other. This leaves Maggie worrying about the girls being portrayed a certain way and trying to censor their dynamic a little.

“Babe, your horoscope says, ‘Some vivid, intense dreams might reveal a lot about you and your motivations, which could increase your self-awareness and make everything easier for you,’” Siren reads off the daily horoscope for Sagittarius.

“I haven’t had any dreams lately,” Billie denies.

“You literally told me you had a dream about eating a burrito before the cameras came on.”

“Yeah but that’s not like a dream, dream.”

Siren had two choices: argue or leave it alone. Because what the fuck is a dream, dream that’s not an actual dream?

“My horoscope,” Siren sighs, rolling her eyes, urging the want to debate to dissolve. “Heightened intuition and ESP could lead to some interesting conversations with others who are blown away by your insights into their thoughts, feelings, and desires. ’”

“Why is yours so much better than mine,” A playful groan comes out of Billie’s mouth.

“Because I’m better than you.”

“Stop talking to me.”

“I literally have to talk to you...we’re doing a podcast.”

“Anyways, today we will be doing a storytime on how Siren started music, which you guys would’ve known but Amazon cut her scenes out of the documentary.”

“They said I was destructive...like what the fuck does that mean?”

“Bro, you literally were cursing every 3 seconds, raged out multiple times, and punched that son of a bitch,” Travis, Siren’s older brother and manager, spoke up from behind the camera.

“And they made the right decision.”

“Absolutely,” Billie nods her head.

“I was a wild child who just needed to sit the fuck down somewhere. But I’ll tell the story...well, what I could remember.....”

~~~

S I R E N.....

I get those goosebumps every time

Yeah, you come around, yeah

"Real 92.3, It's Siren Vixen and her 'Goosebumps' requested to play for the hundredth time today," Big Boy's Neighborhood host Big Boy introduces the song that's been playing all day on every hip hop station.

You ease my mind, you make everything feel fine

"Dude, 'Goosebumps' playing on every station ," Travis, my older brother, turns the dial of the radio in his car in a smooth motion, revealing that in fact, my song was actually currently playing on every hip hop music station.

"I wish something else would play," I groan, slightly banging my head against the passenger side window, watching the scenery warp from a clear image to a blur. "I'm tired of hearing my voice."

"Well, get used to it," Travis tells me from his self-appointed position as my manager.

"Why?" I move my eyes to my phone that vibrates in my hand. "I thought this was a one-time thing. It was supposed to be a joke, releasing that song on SoundCloud."

"Siren, the second you hit top artist on SoundCloud in a week over X and Ski's release is when this stopped being a joke. Your dope-ass song is playing on every radio station a month later."

"What's the difference from when basically everyone had my pictures on their phones and this?" Back when everyone was on Tumblr, I had a page called mydadisapornstar that went viral because of my looks and then my reveal of my diagnosis for Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), aka multiple personality disorder, aka like the movie SPLIT...but you know, less...creepy?

"This music shit is going to go somewhere," Travis shakes his head, making a right turn into our neighborhood, Highland Park.

Worried 'bout those comments, I'm way too numb, yeah

"Yeah, and how do you know?" I smirk at the ridiculous thought that doing music was just going to change my life. Like, come on! I only did the song because Billie was complaining that songwriting, recording, and mastering were hard. Now, if it was regular me (Personality #1), I wouldn't have said shit, but Personality #2 is a cocky son of a bitch who just had to open her mouth. And that turned into a challenge where Finneas made a random instrumental, and I had to write and do vocals. The song was done, and it was absolute trash, but everybody in the O'Connell and Vixen households thought otherwise. So, to prove to them it was a trash song, I posted it on my Tumblr page which someone reposted on SoundCloud and tagged me in. And now, a month later, people have taken this a little too far.

"Bro!! Don't make me beat your ass," Travis glares at me, causing me to laugh. "You have a music deal literally sitting on your desk from ACID & Interscope Music that you using as a fucking coaster for your Arizona. We are packing to go on tour with your girlfriend all over the fucking world. Do I also need to mention, that there's literally a fucking cameraman in my backseat recording for y'all two's documentary?!" With furrowed eyebrows, I quickly turn to the back and see a man with a medium-sized camera in his hand recording me and my brother.

"When the fuck did he get in the car?" I turn back to Travis in confusion.

"Personality #3 was here and kept weirdly flirting with him," Travis answers my question nonchalantly. This was a frequent thing in my life with having a fucked-up brain. I live my life being a host for two other personalities, Personality #2, aka Daddy, is this badass cocky son of a bitch vampire anime girl with severe anger issues, aka diagnosed with IED. Personality #3, aka Mommy, is the lesbian hentai addict and hypersexual who craves influential power to make others do what she wants...with consent. And then you have me, Personality #1, aka the daughter, the sixteen-year-old lab experiment who has no sense of reality, aka derealization disorder, born without a mother...I'm a surrogate baby. Permanent ink and piercings all over my body...because I'm a pussy who's too scared to actually bring a blade to my body.

"Sorry," I apologize to the cameraman, who waves me off in understanding? I don't know. All I know is he waved it off.

It's way too dumb, yeah

"Welcome to our crib," Travis pulls his blood rich-red Dodge Charger into the driveway of our home next to our dad's parked dark gray Dodge Charger.

"We don't really live here because we would never tell random people where we live and how to get to our home as if people don't know how to find landmarks," I sarcastically smile into the camera. "Also, did I mention I am not PG-friendly? Like, I swear like a sailor, I smoke weed pens almost everywhere, and I got my fashion sense from this one grunge hentai series character...meaning my clothes aren't appropriate for my age. So, to the editors of this documentary, I'm sorry for all the censoring you are about to be doing."

"Your parts of the documentary are uncensored and unfiltered," the cameraman speaks up for the first time.

"You can talk?" I look at him with wide eyes in shock. "Like deadass, since you've been in the car, you have not spoken. Are you allowed to?"

"No," he shakes his head.

"Jeff Bezos, don't fire him, he's wonderful at his job," I look into the camera until I remember something. "So what? y'all are just taking raw cuts from me...?" A smirk appears on my lips. "I feel so bad for y'all. Y'all are going to regret this."

"Get the fuck out of my car," Travis unprovokingly pushes me, causing me to almost hit my head on the window.

"Only pussies push little girls," I shove him back, turning around to get out of the car.

"Go cry to your mom, bitch."

"Why would you say that to me?" My tone lowers, with a pout on my lip. "You know I don't have a mom. Why are you being momist to me?"

"I don't have a mother either," Travis stops walking to look at me. Just imagine two people standing outside, just staring at each other, making no movement or blinking whatsoever. Then imagine from a distance of five steps is a man in all black recording while he's probably wondering what the fuck is wrong with us.

"Damn, so you never had titty milk?"

"Nah, I have. I got hoes for that," Travis bursts out in laughter, causing me to laugh too until I realize what he said.

"You fucking pregnant bitches?" I tilt my head. Let me tell you, Mr. Cameraman could not keep his composure and choked on his laughter. I should really get his name, but Mr. Cameraman sounds cool, lowkey.

"Yoo, what the fuck are y'all doing outside?!" A loud, belligerent voice enters the air, causing us to look at the source.

"That's my father, he was a pornstar!" I smile at the camera. "He's retired though...sorry ladies or guys if you're a cuckold. I don't discriminate. "Dad, tell them about your couch audition experience!"

"Shut the fuck up, Siren, and get next door!" The Italian ex-pornstar now porn film writer shouts at me, pointing to the next house over, the O'Connells' home. Aka my boo's house.

"He loves me, I promise," I turn back to the camera. "Dad, you have to be nice to me or they're going to think you don't love me." I walk over to my father and give him a hug, like I always do when I see him. I'm a daddy's girl. And a mommy's girl if you know what I mean...wink wink.

"Because I don't," He retorts in a serious tone. In his defense, his joking tone is serious; you just gotta know the vibe to know he's joking. "You're a pain in the ass sometimes," He brushes down my straight hair with his left hand.

"You love it." I smiled. Sometimes I just like being embraced by my Dad. It's comforting, especially after an episode.

"Okay, come on, the reps and management are next door," my dad turns us in the direction of my second family home with Mr. Cameraman following. See, my father and brother would knock and just wait for someone to answer...Me? I just walk in and make my presence known so I don't walk in on Mama Maggie and Papa Patrick doing the "tango" again.

"I'm home!" I take off my outside shoes and slip on my Pokémon slippers. Outside shoes inside the house are just one of my pet peeves, which is weird since outside clothes on the bed aren't, unless you were fucking active outside and now you're dirty, sweaty, and smell like expired milk. Or if you were sitting on a bus or train.

"They're in Finneas's room waiting for you," Maggie walks out of the kitchen, giving me a hug. I might've not had a traditional mom, but I always had a mom and her name is Maggie Baird, or Casting Director #2 if you're nasty...cause you know...she was on F.R.I.E.N.D.S....as casting director #2.

"First, sign the deal," my father holds out a short stack of papers towards me along with a pen. "You're done being difficult. Negotiation is done, and everything you unrealistically wanted you got. All you have to do is sign."

"100% creative control over music?"

"And your image."

"Will I get to be with Billie?"

"We're prepared to work in a duo formation," Maggie chimes in, still having her arms around me. "You guys will do individual and group interviews, performances and tour together.."

"Travis gets to be my manager?" From what I was told, if you don't have a manager then the label will give you one, but like why the fuck would I trust them to get me a manager, aka a stranger I don't even know? Like, do you even love your mama? But this was a separate deal I had with my dad. I wanted my brother so I can have someone I trust and know will look after me. Plus, besides my dad, Travis is the only one who really knows how to deal with my disorders to the full extent, and that means from feeling low to feeling explosive. But just between you and me, it's also because Travis is my smoking buddy ... .Because he buys...Free weed pens just hits better.

"Trial run..." My dad signs from previous conversations. It's just him being paranoid that there will be a time where Travis won't know what to do if Personality #2's IED episodes are to happen. For my dad, I'm guessing it's like raising four kids and having three daughters, so he had to learn how to approach and parent each of my personalities since we all have equal time being at the surface. So with me, Personality #1, my dad is laid back and chill. With Personality #2, he's more militant, which was kind of easy for him since he used to be a brat tamer. Personality #3 brings out more of his protective side. "But you need to know this isn't a baseball game; there's no missing until strike out. This is serious and can turn dangerous quickly."

"We know," me and Travis say in sync.

"Signing bonus?" I went back to my list of demands I was jokingly asking for, but they in fact took it seriously...but they don't need to know that.

"3.5 million."

"I thought I asked for 5?" I pouted.

"You're a flight risk," Travis speaks up, remembering what was talked about at the last negotiation meeting. "They want to know if your existence in the music industry is a wave or if you're a permanent figure. Which means you have to be consistent."

"Ugh, I hate consistency," I rolled my eyes.

~~~

“I wish everyone could have watched your part of the documentary,” Billie comments. “When the documentary came out and everyone watched it as a viewer, it was like this heartfelt ‘get to know Billie Eilish the teenager and singer’ movie. But I just hate how they cut your part out, so it made it seem like I was going through this new stage of my life and depression by myself with no help. And that’s not how it was. With the person who shall not be named, depression, feeling like I have no friends, you were there for it all and did things to make me feel better. I love the film, but I just hate that you don’t get enough credit because during our last years of being teenagers, you were dealing with making your own music even though you didn’t want to make music, touring, and dealing with my problems.”

“Filming and doing the documentary was weird, but I felt like that could’ve been the place where everyone got to know me and my other personalities. But watching the documentary and seeing not even one of my scenes was mind-blowing because it’s like, what the fuck have I been doing for the past two to three years then? Why force me to film some dark shit but not show it or at least tell me when it wasn’t making the final cut and this was now a Billie Eilish film.”

“Yeah, that was weird,” Billie agrees.

“She didn’t even get paid for it,” Travis spoke up.

“Wait! What?” Billie sat up from her position, looking back and forth between Siren and Travis with eyes that read shock. “You didn’t get paid for doing the film?”

“Nope!” She pops the ‘p.’ “They were like, since it didn’t make the final cut, there’s no need to pay me.”

“That’s so not okay.”

“It’s whatever,” Siren shrugged. “But I have the film, so I might upload it one day.”

“You should,” Billie nods her head in strong agreement.

“Well, that’s all we have for today’s video,” Siren turns to the camera.

“Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe,” Billie smiles.

“And we’ll see you next week.”

| welcome to the book I write & edit when high | 

𝓡𝓘𝓟 𝓐𝓝𝓖𝓤𝓢 𝓒𝓛𝓞𝓤𝓓 

July 10, 1998 - July 31, 2023 

𝑒𝓊𝓅𝒽𝑜𝓇𝒾𝒶 𝓈𝑒𝒶𝓈𝑜𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝓇𝑒𝑒 𝒾𝒹𝑒𝒶: 𝓌𝑒 𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝓈𝒶𝓌 𝒜𝓈𝒽𝓉𝓇𝒶𝓎 𝑔𝑒𝓉 𝓈𝒽𝑜𝓉 𝒶𝓉 𝓇𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉. 𝓌𝒽𝒶𝓉 𝒾𝒻 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒸𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉𝑜𝓇𝓈 𝓂𝒶𝓀𝑒 𝒾𝓉 𝓁𝒾𝓀𝑒 𝒶 𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓁𝒾𝓏𝒶𝓉𝒾𝑜𝓃 𝑜𝓇 𝒻𝒶𝓁𝓈𝑒 𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓁𝒾𝓉𝓎 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓁 𝑜𝓃𝑒 𝓌𝒽𝑜 𝑔𝑜𝓉 𝓈𝒽𝑜𝓉 𝓌𝒶𝓈 𝐹𝑒𝓏. 𝒯𝒽𝑒𝓇𝑒𝒻𝑜𝓇𝑒 𝓃𝑜 𝓃𝑒𝑒𝒹 𝓉𝑜 𝓉𝒾𝓂𝑒 𝒿𝓊𝓂𝓅, 𝓇𝑒𝒸𝒶𝓈𝓉, 𝑜𝓇 𝓅𝓇𝑒𝓉𝑒𝓃𝒹 𝒾𝓉 𝒹𝒾𝒹𝓃'𝓉 𝒽𝒶𝓅𝓅𝑒𝓃.

[discord-lurking]

Dungeons and Daddies Wiki Drama: A Greek Tragedy Told through the Medium of Forum Posts (Part 2)

Act 2: The Wax Melts, The Sea Beckons

In which the wings begin to fall apart.

Despite the drama unfolding over the November admin discussion post, wiki life continued. User posts showed cracks in the foundation. Something was rotten in the state of Wikia.

November 6th, 2023:

November 9th, 2023:

It seems that the administrators were deleting pages, instituting rigid new rules about how long a post could stay unfinished (and, apparently, what qualified as unfinished).

Enter anonymous wiki user Chekovsnakess.

November 23rd, 2023:

Chekovsnakess pointed out the issue inherent in the deletions- moderators wanted more people to engage with the wiki, but what's the point, when the page will get nuked?

Chekovsnakess: "The wiki feels more of the admins' wiki rather than a community wiki."

The admins didn't take well to this critique.

TwoRatner: "In no way have we, the admins, been hostile."

TheOneTrueGod41: "It can't be unprofessional if we absolutely mean it."

PawnSum: "Uh, you can't type fast or something? I can, so that shouldn't be a problem."

Also, iconic quote from PawnSum: "I literally broke my ankle and couldn't get home, so I understand what pain is."

PawnSum makes a good point- only they, a wiki editor experiencing mild criticism and a broken ankle, could ever understand true pain.

Opening a paragraph with "you also don't seem to understand that your opinions aren't facts" and closing it with "Please stop leaving and just stay!"

A masterpiece of salesmanship. Glenn and his high Persuasion rolls could only hope to reach the levels of charisma displayed by wiki administrator TwoRatner.

Other iconic TwoRatner quotes:

"Admins are like princiPALS after all, or a nice janitor."

"You want me to quick my job? I can't! I already paid for the funeral and now I need more money to feed my family."

After this, Chekovsnakess remained silent, perhaps choosing to disengage from fandom wiki drama and move on with their life. An unthinkable choice, to be sure.

More users turned to the forums to express frustrations with the wiki, falling on the administrator's deaf ears.

November 29th, 2023:

December 3rd, 2023:

With this, we segue to the moderator response to wiki user critiques: splitting the wiki into two websites with separate mod teams, one for season 1 of the podcast and one for season 2.

In haunting Anakin-like fashion, TwoRatner says "I promise to bring about a satisfying future to this wiki." A promise they would be unable to live up to.

December 2nd, 2023:

TwoRatner's attempt to bring peace to their new empire wiki would first involve mysterious user Largeo and a separation on par with the Great Church Schism of 1054. Equally important decisions with equally worldwide consequences.

TwoRatner made the generous decision to put this up for a community vote, with only one dissenter: Zilstreet.

Zilstreet pointed out the obvious criticism: wouldn't splitting a wiki for a single show between two different places make it confusing for casual browsers? What about characters that appear in both seasons? Was there a specific game plan?

This was met with a measured, thoughtful response from the administrators.

"When life gives you grapefruit, you make grapefruit pellets to shoot at your friends, because plastic pellets hurt." -HungerBunger, December 5th 2023

How dare Zilstreet not take into account HungerBunger's trauma and exercises in extending trust???

"It's very obvious. We clearly thought about this."

Indeed.

More users with suspiciously similar speech patterns chime in to support TwoRatner's proposal.

Interestingly, MotPot brings up jazz unprompted. Where have we seen that before? Honic Washington and The One True God 41, in Part 1.

Clearly, there must be a lot of overlap between jazz fans and D&D podcast wiki editors.

Marth8204 came out swinging, telling Zilstreet that they should be ashamed for having the audacity to ask questions about a drastic site change, but seemed pacified by TwoRatner's warning to "tone it down a bit."

TwoRatner imposed a deadline for users to vote on the change.

FunderStun also came out swinging- this time, against Gaycowboyrats (featured in Part 1) and... Amber Heard? Then they delivered this line: "There is no savior, so we have to be."

Again, poetry.

And again, I'd like to put a pin in the Gaycowboyrats reference.

Thus ended the split discussion thread, leaving me with more questions than answers.

Nicoh Watonshing seems to be referring to wiki security breaches. Was this an ongoing issue? Were admins getting hacked? If so, by whom? What could hackers possibly want from the wiki?

What happened between Brazil86 and TwoMarshall? What did Brazil86 do wrong? Are there any words in the English language that can strike as much fear in one's heart as "abnormally long Discord call"?

Note the TwoMarshall brother reference: this is very similar to references made by TwoRatner to a brother that died. How coincidental.

This period of forum volatility closely follows the themes established in Act 1: a strict, opaque sense of wiki justice, wiki moderator power as a status more important than wiki functionality, calling for more community engagement while largely ignoring community engagement when it happened, and making drastic changes in response to real or perceived wiki problems.

Here, we see more new administrator names pop up in the forums with similar styles of speech and occasional non-sequiturs, even after Honic Washington's (apparent) departure.

Here, we see new discontent in the moderator ranks- some apparent failure by Brazil86, and its severe consequences with TwoMarshall.

Here, we see two moderators (TwoRatner and TwoMarshall) with similar brother-related situations. Did TwoRatner switch accounts? Was this related to the alleged security breaches in the wiki?

Despite being active in the forums and wiki at large before this, Gaycowboyrats is now conspicuously absent except for the reference by FunderStun, who wants to remove Gaycowboyrats from his position of influence and "free" the fandom.

Has the Dungeons and Daddies wiki been subject to some kind of administrator security breach and subsequent overthrow, resulting in a schism?

Life seems to be giving this wiki a lot of grapefruit.

And when life gives you grapefuit, you make grapefruit pellets to shoot your friends.

Chorus:

A statement from Zil Street.

Interim attempts at community engagement by the administrators.

Stay tuned for part 3 tomorrow with the thrilling conclusion of the wiki split saga!

[pliablehead]

Heyo, what do you consider the top 5 must-watch EE interviews???

I AM SORRY I TOOK SO LONG TO ANSWER THIS and I think it's because I really don't have a proper answer!! So much of my deep dive into EE was done in one long hyperfixation spiral back when I was first getting fangirl-level into them, a good 6 or 7 years ago, and so I'm running into the problem of most of the interview content I've consumed all sort of homogenizing into one sort of blur of Lore that I've internalized and I am not doing a great job at separating out into its individual components! So, that said, the following list is probably not in line with what I'd actually ultimately believe to be the best, most crucial ones--it's just the ones my brain can call to mind at the moment. lol. BUT HERE ARE SOME:

serious/insightful: • Jon and Alex for Tape Notes podcast. (so not a must-watch so much as a much-listen, but there are a few individual clips from this on youtube in video form as well I believe.) RDF is my favorite EE album and I thought this was a hugely interesting look into their writing process and also had a bunch of cool personal stuff in it! Plus, I think it's a very good look at who the band are, like, "now" -- there's a lot of great content around from MA up through GTH, but by the time they were on album 4 and all like, 30+, and especially once covid hit and sort of changed the trajectory of like.. bands, in general, I feel like it's just been a different animal re: regular interviews etc. • this 2013 3-parter with Jonathan. It's been ages since I watched it but I remembered it almost immediately, and for some reason I'm remembering it as an oddly vulnerable Jon moment. just talking about things. (more good band lore! etc.)

funny/meme-y: • Mike and Jez at Isle of Wight. Unlike many others, I could not possibly count how many times I have rewatched this, and it is funny every time. The interviewer is a buffoon asking totally clueless questions and Jez is having absolutely none of it, he's just chomping his chewing gum the entire time, Mike's doing his best, it destroys me. • Mike and Jez look at memes. Less interview-y and more just #content but whoever edited this video did a TOP NOTCH JOB and it's one I often show to not-in-this-fanbase friends that can still be a fun look at the band and a good laff. • This very sweet one with Alex and Mike being interviewed by a literal child. Contains the infamous "Jeremy, and yes," which is one of my most quoted EE-related sentences ever • this Man Alive track-by-track, also audio only.. the BITS that Jon and Alex are doing. truly incredible stuff

just lads having a nice time :) : • the CAPSLOCK ON talkback - lots of pleasant band and lyric insight, and a great Jez cheese moment at the end • this livestream dot com session is some performing but some Q&Aing, so not really an interview proper, but the energy in the room is delightful alskdghj

other noteworthy bodies of work: • anything with Andy Backhouse. I'll be the first to admit that Andy can grate my nerves sometimes, he often feels annoyingly a little too simp-y or something, but the other side of that coin is that as a huge fan of the band he actually does always ask them questions that are like, Real, he Gets them, so it's guaranteed to be a notch up from just random music journos who are engaging with them on a more surface industry level. Nothing is more frustrating than watching an EE interview where the interviewer just so blatantly doesn't "get" EE's whole deal and doesn't know how to interface. Andy never has that problem ! • any episode of Chips of Chorlton that features them (I think Jon's been on twice and Jeremy once). Dutch Uncles are their friends and hearing them all shoot the shit in an extremely comfortable environment is suuuuch a pleasant and wholly different experience than when the lads are being Professional Music Band guys, even when the latter still consists of them doing fairly goofy things

A VERY LONGWINDED AND NOT ESPECIALLY COMPREHENSIVE ANSWER ?? !!!!! Ultimately I think I was the wrong man for the job. @hellkitepriest has way more of an archivist's nature sort of just intrinsically than I do, he can probably do a better and less ridiculous job akjdshglak

[crankyfemme]

Please talk to me about Joel and Tess I’ve been thinking about them all weekend

I don't even know if I have any coherent thoughts about them it's all just a wriggling mass of worms in here, screaming about their dynamic. (Update from after writing out the rest of this deranged essay: I did not mean for this to get so long and go off on so many tangents. I am insane. Thank you.)

I'm utterly obsessed with the way Tess is the one who calls the shots - just reblogged a post the other day about how Joel looks to her for decision-making, which mixed nicely in my brain with that quote from the podcast about Joel being "a little bit of a Frankenstein monster" that Tess is leading. This fermented in my brain with Joel's consistent characterization as someone who can't live for himself, only for someone else. As joking as it is, people are absolutely on the nose with the "acts of service being Joel's love language" posts. He doesn't know how to be a person unless he's orbiting another. (This also neatly parallels Ellie's greatest fear of ending up alone, but that's a whooooole nother essay.)

For a long time, Sarah was the axis around which he orbited, and that is why losing her led to a near suicide. Tommy managed to shift Joel's orbit around himself, to save his brother, which led to "all the things we did - the things you judge me for" from episode 6. This next bit is speculation, but I think it's fairly well supported by evidence from canon. I think that Tommy wasn't able to properly handle how Joel's trauma changed him, not okay with the level of violence Joel was willing to reach to keep Tommy safe, but utterly unable to lose the only family he had left.

(Continuing this Tommy tangent, sorry): he absolutely feels some level of responsibility for how fucked up Joel is now. If he had arrived just a little sooner, he could have saved Sarah, and Joel wouldn't be the way he is. Every time Joel does something morally reprehensible for Tommy's sake, Tommy thinks this is my fault. At least at first. They met Tess later, so there was no one else for Joel to orbit, so Tommy was the only option. And he was definitely there during and in the wake of Joel's suicide attempt, so he knows Joel cannot be alone. But the way they're surviving is fucking with him.

It's not until later, when Joel and Tess have become close enough for her to be Joel's new Person that Tommy can leave, which he does, of course he does, because seeing what's become of his brother makes him sick with guilt and anger. He couldn't leave until he knew for sure Joel had a Person to keep living for, but once that's a sure thing, he leaves. (There's another whole essay in here about Joel and Tommy being foils, where Joel must be devoted to a single person and Tommy must be devoted to some greater cause, but I've digressed enough. You came here for Joel and Tess. Sorry. I swear these thoughts are all related.) Back to Joel. Everything about him screams "experienced parentification as a child" and I know I'm still in speculation land but come on. He's several years older than Tommy and he became a father at a young age, and it's implied that he was a single father from pretty early on in Sarah's life (moreso in the game, but there's no indication they changed that for the show). Joel and Tommy's parents are never so much as mentioned.

Adults who were parentified as children have a hard time expressing and meeting their own needs, particularly emotionally, and have a hard time turning off their "caregiver" mode. Just for fun, I ran a quick search about parentification to refresh my memory, and I'd like to share a few sentences that made me insane: "A parentified child does not learn to distinguish their own needs and feelings from those of other people." Here's another: "In certain cases, some degree of parentification may have positive effects, such as building resilience and competency."

Who does that sound like? Joel "you were never gonna do it for yourself" Miller, that's fucking who. (For added derangement, rewatch the breakfast scene in episode 1, starting around 6:50 when Tommy comes through the door. "Awww, he loves you." "He's dependent on me. It's not the same." But I digress. Again.) ANYWAY: Enter Tess. Tess is fucking smart and ruthless about survival, Tess shares Joel's deep trauma of losing a child, and Tess doesn't have Tommy's angst about how Joel has changed from Before. She's exactly someone whose psychological profile can mesh well with post-Outbreak Joel's. She's resourceful and great at social engineering, and she quickly picks up on how Joel's mind operates. As the audience, we never get to actually see or hear how they met and grew close, but given how they are as people, I think it's likely that Tess initially saw Joel as a resource to use, then figured out more about him, and grew to actually give a shit - until she ended up giving a lot of shits. Too many, maybe.

She definitely knows she has power in their dynamic, that she can make the decisions and Joel will follow her lead, that Joel cares about her. The scene in their apartment kitchen where he sees her swollen eye and she already knows he's going to react the way he does, has her first sentence prepared so he'll sit back down. The casual way she allows him to tilt her head and pat at her face with the cloth? She knows his need to caretake, and she allows him a few moments to meet it, and then she gently redirects him and breaks the bad news about the battery to him.

She handles him emotionally like a fucking master pianist at the keys. (Follow along at about 53:25 in episode 1 if this next bit makes no fucking sense.) She starts gentle, reassuring, telling him "nothing's lost" after dropping the fact that Robert sold the battery. She matches Joel's energy when he stands, upset, saying "okay, fuck it, we get our money back and the battery" so he doesn't feel like she's being condescending or too calm about something that's a big deal to him. She approaches, makes physical contact with her hand to get him to meet her eyes, and lays out the logic - the goal is not out of reach, but will be unless Joel listens to her. And then she says "I need you to take a breath" and there's a quiet moment where you can see her exaggerating a breath for Joel to follow. (I think this is where I became unrecoverable, by the way, if it wasn't already back where Joel rolls over at her hand on his back to be her little spoon.) Notice the energy level in the room after that breath? They both continue speaking in lower, calmer voices. Even when Joel says "Well who'd he sell it to?" his tone is irritated without being loud and abrasive.

And then my favorite thing ever. "Now I promised Robert you wouldn't hurt him. But I would very much like for you to hurt him." Because Tess knows that she is Joel's Person, and what things Joel will do for his Person. She knows because she saw it back when it was Tommy. And Tess has no problem weaponizing Joel, unlike Tommy, who'd been driven away by that very thing.

The saddest part, to me personally, is that while Tess was able to understand that she was Joel's Person, she didn't let herself believe that meant love. Not the way she wanted it to. She figured that he had to revolve around someone, psychologically, but that didn't mean he had to love them. And Joel couldn't ever say it to her, because he loses everyone he loves. It's even more obvious with Ellie, later, when he so clearly loves her as a daughter and just cannot say it in such plain words. He loved Sarah, and she died in his arms, and he loved Tommy, and Tommy left him behind. So there's no way Joel was ever going to be able to be clear with Tess that he loved her, even though he so clearly did. Especially since Tess died before Ellie's presence in Joel's life started to heal the wound - "it wasn't time that did it."

God. I have no idea if any of this makes sense, I just had a million thoughts and feelings and went off on several tangents, but I've finally run somewhat out of steam and I did, in fact, talk about Joel and Tess like you asked. So I'm gonna call it a success.

Anyway, how was your weekend?

[zenithabovemarshland]

Reflections, listening to the March 2024 Forecast from the Astrology Podcast:

Pluto in Aquarius: Society forever changed by... tech?

Sometimes I feel like an emphasis on technology is made too strongly when we talk about Pluto Aquarius. @corvoidea forwarded me an awesome talk (link to part 1) from Steve Judd on Youtube, and at one part he says astrologers have in some ways missed the target by overemphasizing Pluto's quality of destruction over its quality of transformation. One example (of many) he gives is Pluto Capricorn, and how astrologers were saying that it will be the end of democracy and government, and what we got was corporate government instead.

Aquarius, in my opinion, will be about the relationship between the individual and society. Tech may be just one way in which we play this out, but I don't think it's gonna be all Terminator. (Austin always brings up the quote about not studying technology, instead studying how people behave around technology. And 100% this.) It's probably gonna be a lot more about labour and the kind of life we humans have the right to live. (UBI, anyone? Wouldn't that be nice.) Art is definitely a focal point of that, as we're seeing. There's a question of "legion", a collective, and also who is ostracized.

Augmented Reality, Class Consequences, and Saturn-Neptune

Bringing up Saturn in Pisces co-present with Neptune is really interesting. As they were describing the AR headsets, walking through rooms and having a window open on the side, I thought of those adaptable furnitures for shoebox apartments. Murphy beds that become desks, for example. Furniture that has many uses and fits in a small space. There were arguments about this furniture causing issues, that landlords could charge higher for smaller space because of such furniture. I wonder how this AR stuff can relate to that.

For many years Pluto will be in the bounds of Mercury in Aquarius, and then it will come to the bounds of Venus. I know I've referenced this video before on my blog but World Astrology Report did a video about how Pluto moving through the bounds of Aquarius last time played out. In France, when Pluto came to the bounds of Venus, there were issues with agriculture and the price of bread became out of control.

Anyway, as an aside, I was thinking about how I feel a keyword for the Saturn-Neptune energy could be "euthanasia". Easing misery and shame. Soothing or disguising indignity. How all this AR may be the working-class "luxury" that soothes the shit of society, or justifies being short-changed.

"But Dad, I Love Them!": Humans in love with non-humans

Chris says debates around human and non-human relationships will emerge in Pluto Aquarius, and Austin brings up what I was thinking, that these already exist. On a similar vein, Dan from World Astrology Report has argued that the Venus term of Aquarius could see VR porn that is tailor-made for each person, and thus a surge in porn addiction.

What I think is worth being brought up is how these debates will go within a society that, I believe, will encourage this kind of intimacy, but delegitimize and disparage so many other experiences of human-ness.

Coming into Pluto Aquarius we have the vicious attack on trans people, especially in the USA. Just in the last couple months, failed IVF is declared murder. We're seeing an ongoing dehumanization campaign against Palestinians in a genocide, and watching "first world" governments, corporations, and thought leaders (like gd Brene Brown, of all people) support Isreal in word and/or funding. We're getting all this AR tech, but I wonder how much of it is really going to be given to people who would seriously benefit from it, like people who need transplants, assistive devices, interpersonal/ social/ emotional support, etc.

In Canada, people who are relatively young and happen to be chronically ill have been applying for euthanasia for the last few years. (The first case I remember seeing in the news was in 2022, I think.) Because doctors do not take mystery illness seriously, because women's bodies are grand mysteries to medicine, and/or because these people can't afford to live with their illness.

So yeah. I agree that this is a very plausible debate to have. But I don't think it's going to be about whether we think it's "ok" or "socially acceptable", or that we need to define "humanity" to determine what is "human enough" to be in love with. I think it's going to be about how the only people who are encouraged to live full, loving lives are the heterosexuals who happen to not struggle with fertility, and people in hetero-presenting relationships with non-humans. The debate about human-ness will be there.

(Cool sub-argument begin brought up: debates about the experience of love. Some Leo being brought in here!)

[mischas]

pod thoughts/quotes

I swear this took me least two hours to actually watch fully from start/stopping for quotes and going back for context and then I had to pause for a few minutes while I made dinner. But that was incredibly cathartic, I must say. I feel like I’ll be ready to do a deeper dive on the podcast in the coming days but for now here are my thoughts as I watched.

07:30, re: “Whoever you want me to be” it’s interesting that Mischa says they shot her lines so many different ways to establish tone. As if Marissa really is so into her role as lead deb/social chair/etc when Sandy mentions the fashion show. Rereading the pilot script, I can see where this was changed in the direction once it came to shooting it.

16:42, “The thing about the sports or something” made me LAUGH re: hiatus because of baseball in 2003

@ ferris wheel scene, do they know this show is avail in hd? 🥴👀

24:15, re: 2x01 lawn chair scene “I was so frustrated with some of the character writing and not knowing how to play it at that point” omg “Didn’t know what to do with some of the writing” 

What kind of vapid ppl are listening to this drivel if this scene was their #1

31:57, Mischa didn’t know there was an SNL skit based off Marissa shooting Trey. IF ONLY I WERE SO LUCKY

33:28, I swear to christ 😭 Mischa has no recollection of Marissa’s various traumas (re: almost r*pe). And I don’t blame her for this, I think she had to keep this show out of sight out of mind for so so long for her own sake, but I hope being reminded of these things will help her perception of Marissa as more than a strung out angsty teen with poor decision making. She seemed so shook being reminded by Melinda that Marissa was sexually assaulted.

35:40, MB seems to be saying something else behind her expression about shooting on the Mount St. Mary’s campus for 3x24. What do we think she meant by this? Just that she was uncomfortable being paraded around in that skimpy school uniform? Or something else? This location doubled for Harbor, right? She also acknowledged feeling uncomfortable in the explicit Volchok scenes.

37:54, 3x25 model home pool scene, “Oh my god her tattoo, I can’t” I really thought this was Mischa’s tattoo they wrote into the script! I’m truly surprised they even cared about continuity at this point.

38:33, same pool scene “It’s nice when you have days where you can just, like, do stuff that’s not quite so heavy” and Mischa/Marissa deserved this so much more!!!!

44:25, they’re watching the d**th scene, and I have always thought Mischa’s arms look so weird just dropped back like that. It’s probably more realistic than if they were tucked in, but it’s always taken me out of the scene

I haven’t seen this scene in years. literally

I’m tearing up but only a little. It’s too melodramatic for me this time. I know what I’m supposed to feel but it seems so detached from reality that I can easily act like Marissa survives this. There’s almost 40 min left of this pod ep what are they gonna talk about

ok going back real quick i’m supposed to believe this happened to Ryan RIGHT IN HIS LAP AND HE’S CAREFREE AND DATES SOMEONE ELSE NOT EVEN A FEW MONTHS LATER? LMFAO PLS THIS BOY WOULDN’T BE ABLE TO EVEN SPEAK FOR LIKE A YEAR IF THIS RLY HAPPENED

“This is the culmination of their whole love story, it is” okay wait 🥺

“I don’t wanna see the part where he gets all emotional, I’m done now” real

49:31, Melinda: “Truth be told, there was a huuuuuge part of the audience that tuned in just for Marissa and the ratings did go down in season 4 because you weren’t there. I’m just putting that out there.” *elmo fire gif* 🫡 

55:40, 1x10 Missoni dress “They got the dress and I was obsessed, like ‘she has to wear this dress.’ It’s beautiful, like my dream dress at the time. That’s the way I felt about it. It’s all sparkly in person and just very Missoni. You know, after the fact, I became quite good friends with the family but this was like my first introduction to a Missoni piece and I was like ‘Oh my god I’m obsessed with this dress’ to the point where I begged them. This was like one of the first things they let me wear off set and it was my first date dress with, like, one of my ex-boyfriends. I was so excited I got to wear it out. It was special. So that dress has a special place in my heart, that’s for sure.”

1:01:40, fan question, “What do you think is the biggest misconception about Marissa? What’s the one thing that you just wish people would understand about her?”

“That she’s a caring– a very sensitive person. That’s the main thing about her, she’s just this sensitive and– that she wants to care for people and help them. she has a big heart like that.” 🥹

1:05:36 “Originally, they wanted her to be more like Legally Blonde.” 

Melinda, “Like bubbly?”

Mischa’s fucking face here lmao

1:06:00, to find Marissa’s character “They had me watch Kate Hudson in Almost Famous again and again, certain scenes.” Why is this actually making sense to me ljkhgf

1:07:04, Marissa at the party post-fashion show in the pilot was filmed many different ways drunk, “I remember I was asked to play that every way to Sunday. ‘Like now she should be fall down drunk, like she’s stumbling through the party’ and then there were takes where I was, like, completely composed. A little bit slurring my words. That was all find it as you go.”

1:08:10, “A lot of opposing types of direction” re: doug, mcg, josh

1:09:36, “Remember when they started shooting two episodes at a time and they would just hand me pages–I don’t know if you guys had as much of this– But they would be like ‘this is gonna be probably in the next episode and since we’re on this set we’re gonna give this scene a go so here’s a couple pages from what’s probably gonna happen’ and I’d be like ‘this is wild! what have you written for the next episode?’ You'd read it and be like ‘holy shit where are we going with this?’ so I remember a lot of that.” She mentioned this in the E! interview but hearing it again is super interesting.

1:10:27, fan question, “I wanted to ask you if there are any storylines you would’ve wanted to see more of for Marissa or if there’s anything you would’ve liked to have seen of Marissa explored.”

“Yeah, I feel like definitely the Alex storyline is what jumps to mind. I feel like that could’ve been explored more. Also there’s not a lot of her and her sister, really. You know? That could’ve been explored more.”

1:11:39, mentioning that the Alex storyline really was ‘her thing’ ie. something I’ve said in the past. The Alex storyline was the only one that was ever Marissa’s alone.

1:12:26, fan submission “Marissa was my favorite character. One of my favorite moments of her was midway through season 2 when Marissa shows up to the Cohen house with bagels and they take her in and comfort her.” real!!!! theeee sweetest scene of all time

1:17:20, Tacking on that fan question at the end about Marissa and mental health. Mischa has such an eloquent answer and to answer my own question from above I feel like this may change the discourse with which MB speaks about the character. At least I hope so. Love that caller for sending it in and honestly the pod for including it. 

“Obviously she suffers from depression and anxiety and all sorts of things. That’s what I was saying about the overdose scene. I do not remember what we think she’s on or what we really think her biggest problem is. Ultimately it’s rooted in mental wellness, isn’t it? I mean, so much of anything is. Any kind of addiction, it’s not really about just one thing or vice that she has. It’s about being at that age and being so overwhelmed about the world around you and not really feeling like she had the tools to cope.”

MC: “The episode is called ‘The Escape’. So she’s escaping that pain that she’s living through that the parents are oblivious to.”

MB: “Right. There’s nobody. There’s never, like, a counselor there or a teacher there. It does feel like she’s always grasping in different directions. It’s not properly defined and I think, maybe in today’s terms, we would handle that differently. But I definitely think that she’s going through all of it and searching for herself.”

Whew, you guys. I need to decompress. 

[a-mag-a-day]

MAG 22 (my beloved!) - still dying my hair

I was immediately "Oh, Martin sounds so nice! The voice fits so well!"

We now know again, where in the timeline we're at! 12th of March 2016! Which was, btw, a Saturday, lol! Yeah yeah, I know, it's a different universe, maybe they started their calendars a day off XD And I don't think, there is any way to tell, how many statements per month or something Jon got through. I really don't think that there was like a pile and every 10th statement is a real one. Sometimes he may have gotten through 2 a week and then 3 weeks nothing. I don't think there is any pattern or regularity to it. Not at this point at least. I can get behind that for S4 maybe…

"and you can vouch for the soundness of my mind, can’t you?" [beat] "That is beside the point." - Jon, you fucking asshole xD

"I like spiders." - Of course you do^^

"with a faint cracking sound, like stepping on an eggshell" - vs. a quote from MAG 6 "The closest I could come would be to say it sounded like… an egg being dropped onto a stone floor"

"I’m not exactly the smallest guy in the world, I know" - and I wanna concentrate on the "I know", he sounds so self-aware of this body type there but so dismissive at the same time. Like enough people already have pointed it out to him and he so fed up about it by now… God, I can imagine! I would very much like to use this bullet point to remind people that there is no one-single-absolute way to be fat and if you don't like someone's style then pls just block the user and move on.

"I swear the edges seemed to move. It was like a… like a, like an undulation, like, like they were being shifted by something." - Shifted by wriggling worms?

"I was heading home when I got to thinking, and I was worried I hadn’t really done enough investigation for you" - This is so painful. To think that Martin probably heard what Jon said about him in MAG 14 (like Jon won't want anyone get chopped up but he didn't care enough for Martin if it were to happened to him… And "useless ass") and then Martin also probably felt bad for declining to research anything on the Laura Popham, MAG 15, case… He's probably just going through the motions of wanting to prove himself (thanks Martin's mother!) and he really wanted to prove himself to Jon there (and he probably also didn't want to get fired) with the Vittery case and paid a very high price for that.

"I just wanted to take a picture of the thing. To prove to you that it happened – you’re always so quick to dismiss these statements and I wanted proof for you." - Awwww…

"That thing jumped literally 6 feet through the air at my face." - I know a lot of people use this when wanting to find out how tall Martin is, but I don't think that word can be taken so seriously. We don't know anything about by what measurements he goes. Does he mean the literal diagonal leap? But we don't now how far he was from the worm? Does he just mean the horizontal distance that lay between him and the worm? Or does he mean the vertical, like how high the worm had do jump to reach his face. Would you, when describing the vertical, just say your height as in top of your head or would you cut down a few centimeters to your face? Would you use the lowest point of your face then, so your chin, or the middle, like your nose, or…?

What is it with canned peaches and podcasts?

"I… like my job. Most of the time." - I already said that I had a boss like Jon for about 6 years and I feel this statement right there very much… I like my job. I just don't like having a target painted on my back for every shit my boss could possibly throw at me.

Jon is still so hard to read for me at this point. He obviously does care here but he remains so composed, he doesn't drop his facade of poshness, not even for a moment. But given his history with Mr. Spider, he feel probably a lot of that guilt bubbling up.

So my thought to this episode in general was: Finally shit's going doooooown!!!

This was the episode that did it for me. After that I couldn't stop thinking about TMA and really genuinely wanted to know what happens next. I really like Prentiss, I also really liked MAG 6, so it's no wonder that the next episode that was about the worms got me hooked. I guess you could say, they were… hookworms!!! (Also Martin, Martin is best! I was on Martin's side from the start. Always have been.)

Stuff is happening in the archives now!

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

EIGHT CRAZY NIGHTS is such a confounding movie.

I recently watched a batch of deleted scenes, of which I wasn't aware of until rather recently. I had once listened to its director, Seth Kearsley, talk about the picture on a podcast as well. Fascinating stuff all around about its production, and all the ins and outs, how they went about their decision-making, etc. Seemed like it was a fun movie for many of its crew to work on, and they seemed to be treated well too. RARE for an animated movie of this caliber, it seems.

It has gone down, almost notoriously, as being considered one of the "worst" animated movies ever...

Weirdly, when I was 11 years old, I was lowkey OBSESSED with this movie. I didn't even know it existed until it was out on DVD, and when I watched the whole thing through, I was hooked for some reason. Maybe it was because it was, at the time, a good-sized 2D animated feature that wasn't set in the past, a fantasy world, a sci-fi setting, or anything like that. EIGHT CRAZY NIGHTS wasn't IRON GIANT nor EL DORADO nor SPIRIT nor TITAN A.E. nor TREASURE PLANET... It wasn't like LILO & STITCH from the same year either, which is also a contemporary story, but that has aliens in it! And was family-friendly. This was set in the present, it was more for adults, it was just people being people with *some* cartoony elements (such as cute anthropomorphic deer and some of the exaggerated, if not demeaning character designs), it was even really semi-realistically gross in some parts (and not in the sort of, say, exaggerated REN & STIMPY way), it could've easily been a live-action Happy Madison production. But it wasn't. Many of the movie's detractors feel it should've just been done in live-action.

The movie is inspired by the Whitey character from one of Adam Sandler's comedy albums, and sometimes I feel the movie could've worked better with him as the main character and Davey a complex deuteragonist. Going through the deleted scenes, you could tell the crew went through a few ideas of just how far they wanted to push the exaggerated, cartoony stuff. What kind of jokes they thought could work or that they could get away with, etc. Certainly a cartoonish decapitation of a kid, and a monkey that explodes into a gory mess would've easily landed this thing an R rating, but they weren't going for that ultimately. You have this weird mix of a very dark and often mean movie, but it's also PG-13 and it doesn't go too far so it's more accessible to kids and still fits the bill of being a "warm holiday special" kind of movie. I do gotta give props to the filmmakers for wanting to make a big, mainstream Hanukkah movie in a sea of gazillions of Christmas movies, no matter the end result.

And yet... It worked on this fellow when they were 11 years old, so Sandler, Kearsley and his crew must've done something right! I can quote most of this, that's how obsessed I was with this movie circa December 2003-January 2004. With holiday money or something, I literally bought the VHS of it. We had it on DVD as well, but I bought a VHS for myself because back then, I did not have a DVD player in my room... So, a tape it was. It came with the live-action short A DAY WITH THE MEATBALL, starring Adam Sandler's bulldog at the time, much like the DVD.

So yeah, I find it a fascinating movie to this day, not because of its battlefield of tones (life itself is tonally uneven, too) or some of its truly strange sequences such as the one where the product placement all comes to life in the mall, but because of its history and also... The visuals are quite nice. IRON GIANT animation team involved (the boy Benjamin kinda reminded me of Hogarth anyways, of course I made the connection at a young age), and even the songs I find amusing. They got Alison Krauss to sing on at least one of them, so that's a plus. Some of the eleventh hour rushed stuff, such as the declining animation quality on the townspeople during the Bum Biddy bit, is fun to spot too. And I do overall like the premise of this movie; a relentlessly kind man who is overlooked by his community Odd Couple-ing with a total asshole who had a tragic childhood, in a sort of blah and miserable blue-collar town setting, some heavy stuff that this movie that - with more tact and less poopy jokes - could've really handled well.

I hate the term "guilty pleasure", but this could possibly be that for me. That's what I like about "bad" animated movies of the '90s and early '00s, there's usually something very interesting going on in it, whether it's through the seemingly-confused storytelling or the idiosyncratic choices in the visuals. I think with a slew of cheap live-action movies, those are indeed efforts at the end of the day, but with an animated movie... There's a lot more to it, and that it's a miracle one of these things even gets finished, let alone released. In live-action, it's just they shot a bit and did some post... With an animated film like this, a lot happens along the way, no matter the end product. It's easy to say "it's all negated by the script", but I think it's more complex than that... And that's part of what I find appealing about EIGHT CRAZY NIGHTS to this day.

[thequeenofmyownscreen]

I took time to watch the first season of “All Work No Play”

And then, after that, because a) I have no self-control b) I felt like I was missing on a lot of stuff c) I just could listen to Sam and Liam fuck around and talk about themselves and their lives for forever ??? d) I saw a Tumblr post detailing the facts we learn on the original “All Work No Play” episodes and just could not believe what I was reading... I listened to the original “All Work No Play” podcast only.

So under the cut, details of what I thought of each episode, and the glorious run of the 15 episodes podcast that started it all, really. But yeah, contrary to my preferences, it does not follow chronological order. Which is fine, because if there was a way to describe this experience, it's "drunk delightful clusterfuck", in my humble opinion.

Sword fighting : the start is awkward, the middle is epic, the end is awkward. So yeah, on parr with the rest. I do love a good pun, so the whole knighting sequence was hilarious to me : "I knight you Ser...Pent, Ser... Cumvent, Ser... Vival." I love Will Friedle dry sense of humour and wish we've seen more of him. The mini-movie was awesome ! Put some swords into actors' hands and it does not matter if they were bad at sword fighting (they weren't !), they will sell it with yells and tragic death scenes.

Tap Dancing : Sam doing the worm in that stupid colorful costume... I was expecting no less of him. Liam has NO coordination, this is true, and again demonstrated it in this episode. Courtenay Taylor was a necessary addition, because she knew what she was doing, and her "mom jokes" were unexpected and dry and hilarious. Sam tells the story of the birthday of Macaulay Culkin, whom he went to school with, and the birthday was this : they were in the biggest toy store in New York, which was privatized, and for 10 minutes all the kids could run through the alleys and get any game and toys they could want. Liam, hearing this story of privilege, boiling inside : "It is super fucking hard to be your friend and love you. I try and I try, and everyday you make it a little bit harder."

Rage Room : Liam can run a half-marathon (I'm not surprised), Sam can't (I'm not surprised). Sam is a night pooper and Liam a morning pooper and they both like to take this time to destress. Liam looks at the stars alone at night when in his backyard (relatable). Sam does not feel stress in general because he's weird. Rage room was fun but not as cathartic as the name would suggest, I think it's because rage cannot be in a controlled environment. But Stephanie Sheh was so fun, and seeing the bass fish get destroyed was nice. Also Sam has no darkness inside of him, and maybe he has no soul ? I would watch Sam and Liam take ayahuasca in Brazil, tbh.

Goat Yoga : this is a thing. Call me stupid, but while I think Yoga is a real thing, I think Goat Yoga is a scam and brings NOTHING to Yoga. But the goats were cute !! We learn that Sam got high with Snoop Dogg on his first week in L.A., that Liam once got arrested because he was too busy rehearsing a scene with an object that was not even a fake gun outside and being too good at it to notice the neighbors were calling the cops. And I'm just going to leave this quote here : "She's an anal sniper. She aimed my ass right at the cameras."

Creature Makeup : I barely recognized Alex Ward from the Elden Ring one-shot (he was so good in it), he seems really talented in his specialty. We learn that Sam nearly got himself killed by locking himself in a coffin and discovering after someone was sitting on it, and that Liam's aunt once saw her long-gone father talk with her child in the rearview mirror. Sam and Liam do want to make out with each other while wearing makeup that makes them look like the other. After hearing Sam talk about how snot accumulated in his latex mask, I do not want to do Creature Makeup personally anymore. But I do want to see the movie for which they shot the trailer !

Fire Spinning : Ok ok ok, I am but a simple wee lesbian, Marisha doing the fire spinning did things to me. Just hearing Sam and Liam talk about how cool she is and how she always has the best style is wonderful. What we have learn : Sam technically committed apostasy since he converted to Catholicism but "crossed his fingers the whole time", and on his wedding night he hurt himself so much by stepping on glass (Jewish tradition) that he had to go to the ER after.

Mame Cabinet : Felicia Day !!! I love Felicia Day. We learn that Sam might have more of a chance to develop Alzheimer’s thanks to his t-rex arms. Why was this the most emotional episode yet ? I don't know but the hug Liam gave Sam almost made me cry.

The Hot Tub with, like 12 people : Ok this was just fun as hell. I want to do this with my friends all the time !!! We learn that Courtenay CAN do the cherry trick of tying it up which is HOT, the S'mores Martini takes a century to do, and that the censored nipples of Liam are Sam's pixel face. Thanks Twitch !!

The original podcast : They're so young (it starts at December 2012)! Travis and Laura are mentioned on the very first episode, and so's Liam fear of skydiving. Malaysia is mentioned on episode 2, also Kit Buss ! Episode 2 is where they decide to do a “Laura Bailey harp music”, after they talk about how great she is. Also Sam and Liam are excited because they've decided to play D&D together, and mention Matt and his glorious hair. Sam asks Liam to pick his race and class : "- Can I just be the worst ? - You could be... A gnome !" I CAN'T BELIEVE I HEARD IT LIVE, THE INCEPTION OF SCANLAN SHORTHALT. Episode 3 is the recap of said session of D&D, and you know what's better to hear them screaming into their mics that they loved it so much ? A FREAKING EXCERPT OF THE VERY FIRST SESSION THEY PLAYED TOGETHER ! (there was even Marisha, who was - if I understand - helping Matt and not playing). Episode 3 is also the episode where we learn that if they were abandoned on an island, Liam and Sam would start to fuck "immediately" according to Liam, "48 hours later" according to Sam, who wants to search for help and shelter before fucking. I love the guests they brought in occasionally : it's so good to hear Mary Elisabeth McGlynn, to discover Jennifer Hale who's chill and funny and Roger Craig Smith who seems insane and is also funny as fuck, and to hear Travis and Laura bickering sweetly. Episode 6 is where we learn the very cursed fact that Liam did gymnastics when he was young, and was pretty flexible, so much in fact that he "could reach it" (Sam, not understanding, at first : "You could reach it ? what do you mean..."). About episode 7 I think this is where their lives became much more complicated ; from this one, I just love the recurring "we promise we're gonna do a podcast next week !" only to have the episode after that dated 3 or 5 months later. I loved the episodes they did at conventions, the questions and horrific and convoluted scenarios they put their friends through were funny. Episode 8 is where we learn that Sam's first and only fight, that he WON, was over tickets for Dave Matthews Band. "- We'd obviously like to nail Travis Willingham. - Of course !" Poor Travis ; in the episode with Roger Craig Smith, when put through a horrific scenario of a plane crash in the snowy mountains, he says "I immediately eat Travis Willingham" to the choices offered by Sam and Liam. That does not seem to deter him, since he later admits All Work No Play is his favorite podcast in the world, and he has listened to all the episodes. They do talk a little bit about Critical Role once they've launched the ship in 2015, mainly how is has changed their lives already. By Episode 13, they're not sure of what the format is anymore, and they nearly start reading their e-mails live. We learn that Liam has worked with Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford, and how he was very turned on by Harrison Ford. He also likes Gwendoline Christie “because she seems like she could wreck me, with weapons.” (fair). We learn that when Travis was courting Laura, he wanted to be on her level, so he read the books she was reading at the time... which were the Twilight books : “I've read. Every. Single one of the Twilight Books ! And because there were werewolves, at the end... I kinda liked it.” He went by himself to go see the third movie ; Laura wouldn't go with him because she thought the movies were so bad. By the way, the sound effect for Travis is SO ridiculous, and retrospectively I'm laughing so much more because of Travis Willingham's Yeehaw Game Ranch. Episode 15 is really the end : the show has no format anymore, it's either them reviewing cat videos or them doing podcasts recommendations to each other. But Liam and Sam still talk about their kids with incredulity and so much love. We learn that Liam wants his daughter to learn how to kill a man, to protect her, because he knows “98,7% men are terrible”. We end with a cliffhanger : “Hey, Liam, are we gonna get tattoos ?” Really, what more could you want ?

Overall, the podcast holds a charm from the not-so-distant past who is incomparable. But the VIDEO revival can allow so much more ! They did so many activities, some of them dangerous. Also the editing of the videos is a plus, because it allows things like "let's put cards on the screen to directly contradict what bullshit Sam and Liam are saying", or "Yeah, FAO Schwartz is definitely gone". I'm really glad I discovered another piece of the house that is Critical Role.

[butcherlarry]

Exercise Recs, Mel Brooks Edition 8

No fic recs this week, it’s ALL MEL BROOKS.  

Fun fact about me:  I love Mel Brooks.  His movies are a part of my childhood, which explains A Lot about me, and why my humor is the way it is.  I have fond memories of getting home from school in the fifth grade, and watching Space Balls so much that I practically had that movie memorized.  I remember singing songs from the musical version of “The Producers” in the back of the marching band bus (and we sang them ALL.  From “I Want To Be A Producer” to “Keep It Gay” to “Springtime For Hitler.” so loud, at the top of our lungs) with all my friends.  I remember watching “History of the World Part 1″ and FINALLY getting the Oedipus joke after we read that story in AP English.  I remember having sleepovers with my friends watching all our favorites:  “Robinhood: Men in Tights”, “Blazing Saddles”, “The Producers” (original and musical), “Young Frankenstein”, just to name a few.  When my close friends and I get together, there WILL be a Mel Brooks movie quote (multiple most of the time) spoken between us.  It’s just inevitable.  When my friends and I went on vacation to Las Vegas a few years ago, it was because Mel Brooks was doing a live show there, and we wanted to see him in person (It was great, top 10 best moments of my life).  

His works have also brought me comfort, especially “The Producers” musical sound track.  I’ve listened to it so many times throughout my life, especially when I’m feeling down.  It’s kept me company during long car rides when I was working on my disaster of a master’s project.  Before I got the job I’m at now, I was working some not so great ones.  In the job I was working before my current, I could listen to music or my podcasts while working.  That sound track really helped me get through the days that were tough for me.  So again, I love Mel Brooks. 

When I heard that “History of the World Part 2″ was being made, I was fucking ecstatic.  It was released this week (3/6), and I’ve been watching an episode a day.  I’m not quite done with them (there are 8 total), but so far I have been enjoying them so much.  They are done in the form of multiple skits, with some skits being made into larger skits, just broken up throughout the episodes.  I have been having a lot of fun watching them.  I’m surprised my neighbors haven’t complained about how loud I’ve been laughing at them.  

So yeah, definitely give them a watch if you’re a fan of Mel Brooks :D  

Here is the obligatory photo of my latte:

It rained a lot near the end of the week, so there was a lot of water moving at the arboretum!  I thought this scene looked neat.

There was also a log with a lot of cool fungus growing on it that I had to take a picture of.

Here is a close up.  Kind reminds me of a clam shell.

I also finally got a picture of a white-breasted nuthatch!!  

One of these days, I will get a nice camera for close up bird pictures.  One of these days...

[moveslikeanape]

hey! it's been a few days again, since i still had a lot going on irl, but i'm the 🌟 anon--i thought i might as well come off anon since we've already been talking quite a bit through asks (which i didn't expect when i sent my first message haha, not that i'm complaining though). i hope you're doing well.

i agree heavily with what you said in your second paragraph. i don't know if you heard about this, but mark henn retired from disney last month, and he said on a podcast that he would've liked to stay until his 45th or 50th anniversary but ultimately his work just didn't feel meaningful anymore. and even though as i mentioned, i did enjoy encanto, i'm not really surprised. i think it says a lot about the quality of things lately that someone who worked for WDAS since 1980 and did so much important work for them would feel this way.

as for wish's songs, and specifically "at all costs", i read an interview with the songwriter the other day where she stated that she wanted that song to sound like a love song that could be played at a wedding, or a lullaby you could sing to your kids, so that when you see the movie and learn the actual context you're surprised by it. i suppose i can't say she didn't achieve her goal, but that's so far away from the purpose that songs in disney movies are supposed to serve! it just tells me that unlike phil collins or elton john, who wanted to write disney music, julia michaels just wanted to do her own thing and throw it into a disney movie whether it really worked or not.

some of the "art of" books are pretty detailed and have what i feel is a decent balance between production info and art, but others not so much... i've mostly enjoyed reading the ones i own for specifically disney movies, but the pixar art books i own tend to be very heavy on art and light on any other information. the hercules one is strange, though, because the author doesn't put much of his own writing into it, instead presenting the majority of the information by directly quoting the filmmakers, which makes it an awkward read. there are also comedic asides from the characters presented alongside lineart of them--for example, one page shows a reproduction of notes taken by one of the filmmakers, and below that is art of phil looking annoyed with text beside him that says "phil: yeesh, it's all greek to me! how am i supposed to read this chicken scratch?!". i've never seen anything like that in these kinds of books before. i did finish the art of animation book, though, and it was great! around 60 or so pages of it were dedicated entirely to the making of hercules and there were a lot of things in it that i didn't know.

to keep things on topic for your blog, i'd love to know your thoughts on the tarzan broadway show if you have any you'd like to share! i've always been a fan of broadway musicals but i don't know much about the tarzan one, other than that i remember hearing that terk was changed into a male character. which is interesting, because she was originally supposed to be a boy in the movie, wasn't she? also not the first time that's happened in a disney broadway musical, with the lion king again being an example here because of rafiki.

Hey, nice to meet you! I hope you don't mind that I followed you from my personal blog. And no worries, I completely understand life being busy… there never seems to be enough hours in the day. I'm doing well, thank you. Hope you are too!

I'd heard Mark Henn had retired, but I never heard what he said on the podcast! That's such a shame. It's hard enough watching this happen as a fan, I can't imagine being in his position.

Wow, that's completely insane about "at all costs". I'd probably be more confused than surprised, and even if I were surprised it wouldn't be a good one. And on top of that and the fact they're supposed to be written for the movie, they shouldn't be written with the intention that people would hear them before they see the movie… to me that seems like they truly did want them played on the radio, and have people want to see the movie to see what they songs about. I agree with you it seems like she just wanted to do her own thing, and also that she wants to deceive and trick her audience.

That's such a shame the Pixar books are like that. It definitely is nicer to have more info on the making of the movies. The Atlantis one is technically an "illustrated script", with a few notes here and there. Lots of great artwork, but I wish it went more in depth, especially about the Atlantean culture and language. I didn't know they did those comedic asides in the Hercules book! I've had it for years, but never actually gotten around to reading through it (really need to find some time to read through these books!) I'm glad you enjoyed the art of animation book though, and that you got to learn some new things about it!

As to the Tarzan Broadway show… I've been kicking myself for almost 20 years that I never saw it! I was in Albany on a trip during the Broadway run, but didn't have the time to make a quick side trip to see it, and been regretting it ever since. I also missed out on the production in Tuacahn, Utah last year (Josh Strickland reprised his role as Tarzan!) because I'd made a very big purchase around the time it was announced, and sadly couldn't afford to go. I did see a bootleg recording of it once, but it was so long ago I don't really remember it. Will have to rewatch it someday.

I know there were somethings that needed tweaking, but I'm not sure what could have saved it in North America. I know it's very popular in Germany (it's actually currently playing in Hamburg). Most of my experience with it is the album. I do love the new songs, especially Kerchak's "No Other Way" and Jane's "Waiting For This Moment". But my favourite has to be "Everything That I Am", when Tarzan learns about his human parents. If you only listen to one song from the broadway, I highly recommend it. The OCR has the one in the broadway sung by Josh Strickland, plus another version at the end of the album sung by Phil Collins.

One thing that's always bothered me is the song "For The First Time", a duet between Tarzan and Jane. It's basically Jane and Tarzan working through what they feel about each other and if it's reciprocated. There's nothing wrong with the song itself, I actually do love the song, it's just the subject and it's place in the musical. It comes after Strangers Like Me. In addition to the lyrics "Every gesture, every move that she makes…" etc from Tarzan, there's a new section in the song sung by Jane:

"I can't explain the way I feel Everything I wanted’s here And my heart is beating faster Every moment I’m with him I feel so complete I cannot deny what I’m feeling"

Which is sung to the same tune as "For The First Time". To me, that makes FTFT feel like going around in circles, it's basically an entire song to say what's just been said. I've always thought it would have been better to have a song where they both torn about what to do, a should I stay or should I go? song.

As for Terk, I've never read anything on why they decided to change her back into a guy. I remember thinking about Rafiki back when I first found out about Terk, they just can't keep their monkeys (apes) straight! I'll have to see if I can find out anything about that.

[shawnjacksonsbs]

There are lots of parts. Not all are consistent. And if I said it once, I’m likely to say a thousand more times.     2-11-23

 “Yes, ‘cause I think that, this is the thing that I said earlier about like, when I’m making anything that I’m making, whether it’s a podcast or writing or “United Shades”, when I’m writing it, I’m like “This is gonna change the world”. [Lol] ‘Cause you have to feel that way. You have to think that way. Otherwise, why you steppin’ out there!?

. . . . But then at the end, you just have to be, “I hope people watch [read] and talk about it.” – Kamau Bell

 I may have learned a new thing(?), or way(?) or. . .

Do we, do I, do any of us have the ability to remove ourselves from a scenario to better empathize with someone else when having a conversation, about their struggles?

Emphasis on “their struggles”.

If they’re different from us by race, religion, sexual identity, etc, why do we feel so strongly that we have to defend, or be defensive if we know, without a doubt, that we aren't part of the group that their venting about, although I have commonalities, such as . . . race, religion, sexual identity.

See where I’m going here?

Is it worth it, to just try, to emphasize with someone else?

I'm going to start trying to implement this “technique”, when the time and issue, or conversation allows.

Why wouldn't we want to relate to our neighbors?

Why are some people just hell bent on focusing on differences over commonalities?

I, for one, will never understand it.

 “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eyes.” - Antoine de Saint-Exupery (one of Mr. Rogers favorite quotes)

 The whole, "We are all just walking each other home", always pops in my head every time I hear, or think of people that hate on others for less than justice. Make sense? It's like be kind, until it's time to not be kind.

There are times throughout the life of us adults, that we realize we don't love everyone just as they are, and imagine that, as unfortunate as that is, it's either because of complete mental disability, or because they weren't loved just the way they were when they were young. (That's just my opinion by the way. Pretty sound educational guess if you ask me though)

It's also not worth arguing with someone that groups me in with haters. People like that are obviously in some feelings and haven't learned how to navigate them yet. That comes with time, understanding, wisdom, and of course - empathy. Right?

We’re all still progressing toward this, yes? Or trying to??

After listening to this specific episode, I caught myself wondering if I could do it. If I could try and have full blown conversations in hopes of finding some understandings, with people who obviously don't care for people “like me”, without actually knowing me as individual. My answer . . . I just don't know. It occurred to me right then that I should try.

It’s always nice to learn new ways and new goals to aspire to, and higher levels of caring and love to reach. Even if only in small degrees up, the direction is still up.

Note to self; I need to do research outside of Finding Fred on Kamau Bell and his works. He definitely sounds like an interesting guy.

The whole Finding Fred podcast, to me, is thought provoking, but this episode definitely had me in a deep thinking pattern the whole time.

You can find Finding Fred episode Kamau on IHeart radio. I’m sure there are other spots. That’s just where I listen. Lol no lol

I don’t know if this one is enough for you, but it was for me. Understanding can be . . .hard, but never impossible.

I wonder why different things affect different people . . . differently. Listening to this show, and reading or writing the things that I do, etc, etc, even though they appeal to me because of how they make me feel good or make me think about things that are. . . better, don’t appeal to some people. Why do you taste cilantro as soap?

It’s all just weird.

What a world we live in, and what a wonderful life we can have if we change the way we think about things. It all has to start right there.

Now, go out into the world now and share your love and your laughter with everyone you can, and you already know that I will be trying to do the same from my side!

 Until next time;

"The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

[hangovercurse]

Worst Firsts

You and Colson go on Worst First with Brittany Furlan and Tommy Lee.

Request: “Have Colson(mgk) and reader (who are dating) go on worst first with brittany furlan(lee).LOVE YOUR WORK!!!❤❤”

Colson X Reader

Warnings: Cursing, talk of sex (no actual smut)

Word Count: 1684

“Hello all you fine folks out there and welcome back to Worst Firsts. Boy oh boy do we have the show for you today. First off, we have my husband, Tommy Lee, with us here.” Colson banged on the table as you gave out a small cheer. Brittany continued, a small laugh sent in your direction, “We brought our favorite Tommy Lee two-point-O Machine Gun Kelly back on the show today!” You cheered for your boyfriend as Tommy banged on the table. “And for her first time on the show, we have the wonderful Ms. Y/N Y/L/N!” Colson shouted for you as Tommy continued banging on the table. “Thank you guys so much for coming, thank you for coming back Colson. I am so excited you guys are here today.”

“I love bein’ here.” Colson said into the mic, shooting Brittany a smile.

“When you asked us to come on, I was so fucking excited.” You said, Colson nodding with you.

“For real, bro. She was off the walls.”

Brittany continued, speaking to her audience, “If you guys didn’t know, Gunner here played Tommy in The Dirt way back in 2019, which released right before you two met, am I right?”

You smiled lightly, a slight heat rushing to your cheeks as the focus turned to you and Colson. Luckily, he answered for you, “yeah, we met literally like maybe 3 days after the premiere. That was such a sick time in my life.”

“Dude, I bet. You release a kick ass movie and then turn around and meet-“ Tommy started, Colson cutting him off to finish his sentence.

“The love of my life, yeah.” You smiled bashfully, Colson’s arm finding its way around you and pulling you into his side.

Brittany smiled at you two, Tommy’s hand reaching over to grab hers under the table. “So, this show is all about first times and, while normally we would talk about worst firsts, I gotta know how you two met.”

“It’s honestly not much of a story,” you began, “Netflix had this party and we were both invited because we both had movies out on Netflix. I went up to him at the bar because I thought he was hot and we started talking and now, uh, we’re here.” Colson nodded as you recounted the memory.

“I was trying so hard not to fuck anything up though, because literally the entire night before she came up to me, I was trying to figure out how to talk to her.” Your boyfriend said, red on his cheeks.

Brittany sent you a mischievous smile, “so what happened after that? Did you give him your number, did he ask you out, something else?” The inflection in her voice and the wiggle of her eyebrows let you in on exactly what else she thought you might have done.

“Something along the lines of something else.” You said, a smile playing on your lips. Colson threw his head back in laughter. Tommy nodded with pride at you two.

‘Speaking of something else.” Colson began, making you look up to him in both confusion and panic, “This is all about worst firsts, right?”

“What are you about to say?” You asked him, a warning in your voice.

He giggled, “remember the first time we had sex in public?”

Brittany’s eyes went wide, “you two did what?”

Tommy asked, “first time?”

You leaned into Colson’s side, a blush rising to your face. “That was literally the most awkward experience of my entire life.”

Colson laughed at the expressions of the older couple, “okay, basically we were on tour in the middle of butt fuck nowhere and there was nothing in this town. No bars, no clubs, nothing.”

You continued his story, “but there was this tiny carnival. So, after the show we went in hope of something fun happening.”

Tommy laughed, “well something fun certainly happened.”

“After about an hour in we were bored and she was only gonna be on tour for a few more days.” Colson said, “so we figured we should make the most out of the lame ass carnival. And then we found it.”

“the photobooth.” You said, watching Brittany’s jaw drop.

“Him, I expect this from.” She pointed at Colson, “but you?”

You giggled, nodding your head, “It was her idea!” Colson exclaimed over your laughs.

“I hadn’t seen him in almost two months and was only on tour for two weeks, I had to make up for lost time and this was the only place that we could get any semblance of privacy.” You said, shoving Colson lightly as he grinned proudly at you.

“Wait so did you two get caught?” Tommy asked, intrigued.

Colson answered, “we didn’t get caught, per say, but as we were leaving this family came up to the booth. And I mean, there’s not a great way to hide that you’ve just had sex. We tried, but people still know.”

Brittany and Tommy laughed, the latter banging his hand on the table as he did so. “The look on that mother’s face. I thought she was gonna call the cops or something.” You said.

“Was it at least good?” Brittany asked to which Colson replied,

“we were in a photobooth, Brittany. No.”

Tommy chuckled, “I’m sure it was better than doing it on the tour bus.”

Your eyes went wide and a laugh tumbled from your mouth as you recalled the first time you and Kells had had sex on the tour bus. “We do not need to talk about that.” He looked down at you as he spoke, a look of warning in his eyes.

“Oh yes we do.” Brittany said, looking at you to speak.

“There’s not much to it, but as I’m sure you can imagine, the bunks are not the most spacious of beds. And Colson here is a six-foot-four giant who barely fits in the bunk as it is.” You began, giggling as Colson’s glare hardened on you. “Let’s just say Kells almost got a concussion because he hit his head so hard.”

Brittany laughed as Tommy spoke, “sex in the bus is difficult, dude. I get it.”

“Why didn’t you just go on top?” Brittany asked you.

Colson grumbled, “because she was “tired from her flight” and “didn’t want to get hurt.”” He used air quotes as he mimicked your words from the night, making Brittany and Tommy laugh.

“I sat on a plane for 9 hours to see you, the least you can do is top.” You said, shrugging as Colson let out a silent chuckle. “But yeah, it was not good.”

You continued to talk about other first times you’d had. You told the couple about your first kisses when you were younger, retelling the story of your first kiss in middle school when your braces got stuck on the poor kid’s lip.

Then Colson recounted the story of the first time you both went out on a boat together. “For context,” you started, “I am terrified of the ocean. I can swim but I refuse to go into any water that isn’t a pool.”

“We were out there with a couple of our friends and she was staying as far away from the edge of the boat as possible. And then some of our homies tried to pull her towards the edge and she freaked the fuck out.”

You pouted, “you fucking laughed the entire time it was not funny.”

“It was!” He exclaimed, “you were pulling away like a little kid.” You glared at him, “but, for the record because people are gonna think I’m a bad boyfriend, I made them stop. And then I dragged her towards the edge myself and made her sit with me.”

You then told the story of the first time you’d gotten a call from the hospital to come get Kells. “I was unaware that this was a normal thing. So, when I get a call at 4 am that he’s in the ER I was kind of freaking out. And then I get there and him and Rook are just sitting there messing around like two little kids.”

Colson chuckled, rubbing his face with his hands, “you were so worried when you first came in and then as soon as you saw us you got so annoyed.”

“What did you guys do that got you in the ER?” Brittany asked.

You deadpanned, “they were throwing knives around and Colson nearly cut off his finger.”

Tommy nodded, “nice.”

After a few more firsts, Brittany asked the final first worst, “what was the first or worst fight you guys got in?”

You looked at your boyfriend, trying to figure out what fight he’d pick. “The first big fight we got into was that night at the hospital that we mentioned earlier.” He said and you nodded in agreement. “Which I was totally in the wrong about.”

“Yeah. We got home and I literally couldn’t talk to him without wanting to scream.” You said.

Tommy tilted his head, “were you mad that he had gotten hurt or that he called you so late?”

You shook your head, “I was more frustrated than anything. Like I was fucking panicking because I thought something really bad had happened and he was treating it like a joke. But we talked about it and obviously we’re fine now.” You said smiling up at your boyfriend.

He grabbed your hand under the table, squeezing gently. “Yeah. That was also the first night I told you I loved you.” He said, nudging your shoulder with his own.

You rolled your eyes, nudging him back, “yeah, yeah. Don’t get all sentimental on me now.” You said, giggling silently.

Brittany and Tommy watched you, smiling like proud parents. “Alright folks, we’re gonna end this podcast here. Thank you guys so much for tuning in, thank you guys for coming.” She motioned to you two, “It’s always so nice to see you guys, love catching up with you. If you’re not already subscribed, you should do that. Leave a like, a comment, whatever you want.”

[destieldailynews]

Misha Collins Cameo Videos (Top Trending)

March 17, 2021

On Tuesday March 16, supernatural star Misha Collins released his first batch of cameo videos. In combination, these videos caused supernatural to trend once again across platforms. The most popular of the cameo videos are transcribed here with links (we will release another post summarizing the rest of the videos, which are mostly personal greetings.)

Still Beautiful & What Cas is Doing Now 

“Hey heller friends. Bridget wanted me to say hi, and to say [Cas voice] Still beautiful, still Dean Winchester. [regular voice] Shit! My Cas voice is rusty. I don’t know what I, how, Hogwarts house Cas is in. I know that I am a...flugmort. I don’t even know the names of the hogwarts houses, guys, this is not working for me. What do i think Cas is up to now? I think Cas is up there, with his sleeves rolled up, having a massive...ping pong championship in Heaven. There’s ping pong everywhere, that’s all people do now. It’s like, um, It’s like Forrest Gump when he was recuperating. Any words of wisdom to my fans? Stay happy, do your best”

link to video on twitter

Talking about Cas Coming Out (from CTE)

The prompt was: Could you please record yourself as Cas and talk about what his coming out meant to him? 

“I’m not going to speak as Castiel because [chuckle] Warner Brothers has specifically forbidden it. But I will tell you this. As the actor who plays Castiel I can say that the scene in 15x18 when castiel expressed his love for Dean was very important to me, and it felt like a really meaningful, deeply important conclusion to my character’s arc on the show, and I’ve heard a lot of people saying that it meant a lot to them, and that means the world to me. Umm, that's a conversation that i would love to have more of, but, uh thank you [wink] bye!’

link to video on twitter

Ideal Destiel Kiss?

“Hey Jess, I...I was not able to read your story because I just, I just don’t have time right now. I am trying to help a friend who has a very sick kid and it’s kind of taken over my day. But I, I will tell you this.  When I got your request to describe the ideal Destiel kiss, that’s not something I have put enough thought into. But I will tell you this: I am deeply gratified and grateful that Castiel got to have his parting words on the show. That, for me, was so so meaningful and I was so grateful that Cas got to have that ending. I hope you’re well. Sending love, bye!”

link to video on Cameo 

Destiel Reunion Hug

The prompt was: Since we were unable to see Cas rescued from the Empty & in heaven in the finale after his romantic confession to Dean & subsequent death, what would you have liked to have seen for Dean & Cas’ reunion if given the opportunity to decide yourself? 

“I’ll answer this question for you about Dean and Cas and a reunion. I would love to just see the most authentic, loving hug. I could imagine them just, like, grabbing each other and hugging.”

link to video on tumblr 

Cas’s Retirement In Heaven 

“Hey Caryn! I love that you are looking out for Cas’s posthumous well-being in Heaven. Is it posthumous...I guess he’s resurrected, and now he’s rebuilding heaven. I would say this about Cas and what he’s doing in Heaven: I think cas, sadly, will never retired, but I think that also for Cas, doing good work is what he would want to do in his retirement anyway, and I’m sure that he’s doing good work now. I think he’ll never stop. Bye...I hope the same is true of you!”

link to video on Cameo 

Theoretical SPN Revival 

“Hey Alex. I would love to one day get the band back together for a SPN revival of some sort, whether it’s a movie, or a limited run series, or just some little odd casts. Wouldn't it be fun to get together Sam, Dean, Cas, and Alex for a, I mean Jack, for a little, little chit-chat, vocal, audio, podcast? And it would be lovely, one day, to see, to have Dean discuss the impact of Cas’s comments, cause it was never really done. I’m sending you love. Bye!”

link to video on twitter

More Ping Pong

“[Cas voice] Hello Dean. [regular voice] No, no, no. Hello, Kyalin, how are you? I don’t know, I don’t know if you’ve thought about this at all, but I think Cas and Dean are probably playing a lot of ping pong in heaven right now. As you know, they’re ping pong fanatics. I hope that you’re having fun. I hope you’re having fun with your mom, who takes such good care of you. You’re a lucky one [wink] bye!” 

link to video on twitter

Thoughts on how Cas Helped People

“Hey Rich, thanks for your messages. Really gratifying to hear and of course I’m so sorry to hear that you went through such a rough stretch but I’m glad you’re alive, I’m glad these fictional characters helped you, and I...I’m just going to say i'm really happy that Cas got to go out sending a message that authentically loving who you want to love is something that can potentially save the world. That’s a nice message, maybe something to carry with us.”

Personal Congratulations and Poem Reading 

“Hey Fitz. I am wishing you a happy top surgery. What a monumental moment for you, that’s huge. Take care of yourself, rest up, be gentle in your recovery. And now I’m going to read you a paragraph, because I have been instructed to. This is from your friend Brook. [Cas voice] We are the last of all things. Come to me in darkness and daylight and aching. Come to me mourning: proselytizing. [regular voice] I can’t talk like Cas anymore [laugh] oh my goodness. Come to me, Sisyphus, we’ll roll this boulder back down the hill together. If we go fast enough it feels like falling or flying. I really don’t know what just happened to me [laugh] it’s rusty.” 

[italicized sections are quotes from the poem] 

link to video on tumblr

link to original poem and author's tumblr 

Request From MCR-Natural 

 “Hey MRC Natural Discord. I don’t...know what that is. The question is: what member of Team free Will would most likely get a stigmata and what would Castiel’s role be in such said scenario, and the answer is obviously Sam and the rationale is that, oh no, Castiel’s involvement is that he secretly used his angel blade to cause the stigmata, while Sam was sleeping. He numbed him with his magical powers and then secretly gave him a stigmata to help exacerbate his savior complex. Thanks, bye.”