#also fun fact that was the 11th book i read this year

[allylikethecat]

Update that nobody asked for: We were talking about books on here one night and I said I had started The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo and I have now finished it.

The verdict is that I liked it well enough, it was interesting but overall, I didn't like it nearly as much as Ninth House, HOWEVER the last 100ish pages were incredible and I wish the entire book had been as good as the last 100 pages. It's not one that I'm probably going to read again or am going to be aggressively yelling that people should read, BUT if you like historical fiction / historical fantasy, it could be worth the read. If you're planning on physically buying it, the hardcover edition is also very pretty with the sprayed edges.

[fortunapre]

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒𖧞 16+, swearing, mediocre writing, use of Y/n

𝐏𝐀𝐈𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆𖧞 oscar piastri x fem!reader

𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓𖧞 (scene ii) 1.7k

𝐀/𝐍𖧞 thanks for reading and sticking with me, as i’m writing this in listening to christmas songs. is that pathetic? ❄️ 𝐏.𝐒 i got the chess idea from Nicole’s interview on the Red Flags Podcast. Honestly, Oscar gives such chess-prodigy vibes.

Go back? (Scene i) click here

𝐖𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐀𝐟𝐟𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐬 𖧞 scene ii 𖧞 (𝐂𝐚𝐛𝐢𝐧 𝐅𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫)

Tuesday, December 11th

I woke up with my pillow on the floor and my blanket halfway off the end of my bed. I was a mess, but last night was easily the best sleep I’d gotten all year.

Last night, after a delicious dinner made by Nicole Piastri, I went straight to my room and cuddled up with a book. Granted, I never got past page 1 because I fell asleep immediately. The heat of my blanket against the cold and the hot tea I had made had me nodding off and slipping into a dream within seconds.

Now that I’m awake, I barely remember falling asleep or the dream I had. As a matter of fact, it took me a few seconds to even remember where I was.

After fixing my bed, I took my half empty cup of tea and walked downstairs to the kitchen to get a new cup but was instead met with a wall of muscle. This made me spill my day-old tea on whoever was in front of me and made me so surprised that I almost fell, if it wasn’t for the arms of said wall, holding me still. Once I gained my balance I looked at who I bumped into, fully ready to start apologizing.

“What, is this your first time with legs? Why do you keep walking into me?” I then realized I’d ran into the one person I was hoping to avoid.

“Shut up, Oscar. You’re the one walking into me. Maybe use your eyes for once.” I retorted, walking past him while shoving his shoulder. Oscar turned around, tongue in his cheek, obviously annoyed. Good.

“Yeah, sure.” He replied, following me into the kitchen. “I guess it’s also my fault I now have peppermint tea all over me, yeah?”

I just then realized the big wet patch on the front of his white tee, clinging to his chest. It took a lot of effort to look away from the outline of his muscles thanks to the shirt now sticking to his abs. Gross, I tried to convince myself.

Once I moved my eyes from his abs to his face I saw his expression. His eyebrows were raised and a smirk played on his lips. I just rolled my eyes and turned towards the sink to rinse out my mug. “Might as well have been your fault, you're the one standing in the middle of the walkway.”

He just rubbed his eyes out of annoyance and opened the fridge, giving up on the argument. I just ignored his presence and began making more tea, the smell of peppermint filling the kitchen.

The parents walked into the main room, all dressed and looking like they were planning on leaving.

“Are you guys going somewhere?” My brother asked from the stairs. Him and my sister looked like they just woke up and stood on the staircase.

“Yeah, me and your mom are heading into town with the Piastris. Did you guys want to come with me?” My dad answered. The twins excitedly ran back upstairs to get dressed, meanwhile I just shook my head, not wanting to go anywhere.

“No,” I answered. “I think I’ll just stay back and read or something.” I smiled at my parents hoping they’d understand.

“Oh, are you sure-” my mom began but Nicole stopped her.

“Oh, let her stay, mate. She’s obviously tired.” Nicole took my side. “Besides, her and Oscar can spend some time together. I doubt he wants to go shopping, huh?”

My eyes widened at this and looked between Oscar and his mom.

“Ok, hon.” my mom said, wrapping a scarf around her shoulders. “We’ll be back in a bit.” But I was still caught on having to stay home with Oscar.

“Wait. I didn’t mean-” I tried, but was interrupted.

“Alright, have fun guys.” Oscar quickly cut me off, with a smile to the group of adults. My eyebrows furrowed at Oscar’s words and his seeming nonchalance at having to stay home with me. I was staring at the side of his face, hoping he’d look at me because what the fuck. The twins raced down to the door in seconds, bundled in winter coats.

As the group left out the door Oscar turned his head and spoke so that only I could hear him. “Relax. The cabin’s big, stay out of my line of vision and we won't have a problem.”

Later that day, the rest were still gone, longer than I had thought. I was in the main room, on the couch, cuddled in a blanket, watching a random show on cable. It was insanely boring and as the couple on screen started making out under mistletoe, I went on my phone. Jeez, how long is this scene? I looked up and the two were still lip-locked.

From behind me, I heard Oscar walk out of his room, downstairs and stop right behind me on the couch. When I looked up he had a grimace on his face, watching the romantic scene on the television.

“What in the world are you watching? Christmas porn?” He joked, looking down at me. I just rolled my eyes at him and grabbed the remote, turning the tv off. “You keep rolling your eyes, they’re gonna get stuck.”

I almost rolled my eyes again but decided against it. “What do you want?” I asked sharply, wanting him to leave. “What happened to ‘stay out of my line of vision’?” I said, craning my neck to look up at him above me. He just smirked and stared at me.

“Nothing,” he finally replied, “I just was bored.”

“Yeah, well. Go be bored somewhere else.”

“You know you have to be around me all month, right?” He walked around the couch and jumped on the couch, stretching his legs over my lap. I shoved him off, making him almost fall off the couch but he caught himself. I looked at him and saw he had changed. Instead of a tea-soaked shirt, he was now sporting a black hoodie and gray sweats. The hoodie sleeves were pushed up, showing his forearms. On top of an outfit change he must have also taken a shower, given his hair was a bit damp, clinging to his forehead.

“Whatever,” I said finally. “It doesn't mean I have to enjoy it.” When he didn’t say anything I looked away from his outfit and to his face. His eyes were on my legs, eyebrows furrowed. Only then did I realize my blanket had moved, showcasing my comfy, yet small, pajama shorts. I warmed at his stare and quickly covered back up with my blanket.

He shook his head like he was trying to shake the image out of his mind. My cheeks were definitely red, but I ignored it, going back to my phone. Minutes later, oscar was still in the same spot and when his silence got unbearable, I looked up from my phone at him.

“Well?” I asked. He broke his gaze from the floor, looking at me. Still, he didn’t say anything.

“Let’s play a game.” he finally spoke. His voice had somehow dropped a bit lower and his eyes were boring into mine. “I’m bored.” He added.

“What?”I was confused. “What game?” I was fully expecting him to answer with a video game or monopoly but he surprised me.

“Chess.”

“Chess? Do you even know how to play?” My eyebrows shot up, as I asked him.

“Of course I know how to play.” His voice was still deep, and he still held his stare. I shivered under his gaze.

“Ok. Let's play.” I answered quieter than I expected. I had no idea what I was about to get myself into.

We sat on the floor, the chess board between us and I left the blanket on the couch, having gotten too warm. Oscar had let me be the white pieces, because ‘I'll need all the help I can get,’ according to him.

As I was about to move the first Pawn, Oscar stopped my hand. Right when he touched my hand to stop my movement, he immediately took it back and ran it through his hair.

“What?” I asked, confused. “I know how to play…”

“Yeah. I know you know how to play it’s just that…” he began. His hair was all messed up from running his hand through it. And damn if it didn’t look good. I never considered it fully, but in the back of my mind, I’ve always been aware of Oscar’s attractiveness. He’s a racing driver, he’s got to stay in shape and all that, so obviously he was… well. He was definitely in shape. And his brown hair and brown eyes were a nice pairing to his sharp jawline. I was in deep thought, mulling over Oscar’s looks, when a hand waved in front of my face.

Oscar was waving his hand in front of my eyes, breaking my trance. Instead of bringing up the fact that I was so obviously checking him out, he just held that god-awful smirk and motioned to the chess board. My cheeks grew warm, yet again.

“Did you hear me at all?” He asked, the corner of his lips tugged upwards, having caught my stare.

I cleared my throat and nodded. “Yeah, you said you wanted to do something else, but didn’t you just say you wanted to play this?” I asked. “We just got it set up, what are you changing your mind about?”

“No. no, no. That’s not what I meant. I meant, like, we should add a twist.” He replied.

“What, like strip-chess,” I teased. His smirk dropped and he grimaced.

“What? No! I meant we should ask the other person a question after every move.” Oscar said, surprising me.

“Um,” I thought about it. Why would he want that? I don’t have anything to ask. I thought to myself about possible questions he would want to ask. “Sure, why not.” He smiled at my agreement and rubbed his hands together like he was getting ready.

“Alright then, Y/N.” he said, “let’s play.”

(SCENE iii) click here!

pinterest-piece 𖧞 𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐚𝐟𝐟𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐬 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐬

[thepringlesofblood]

bonus content for those who read the taz: the 11th hour graphic novel and haven’t listened to the podcast arc

disclaimer: so. I lost my book about 1/4 of the way into this post. so the rest of it is just from memory (I did finish reading it several times, I just no longer have it to refer to). I wanted to post this before the next one comes out though, so here we are. If I find my book, I will attempt to finish up the details for the rest of the book. I cover some basic big things from memory, but nowhere near as detailed as the stuff I wrote down when I had the book to refer to. but in the meantime...let’s go!

by god they’ve done it again. 11th hr is a Lot and definitely the most plot-heavy book so far, PLUS they had to include the first lunar interlude where the boys had individual scenes. the result is frankly beautiful. we’re really hitting critical mass now.

as a result a lot more stuff got compressed, cut, changed, or skipped. i’m going to try to at least point out each difference, though there’s no way I could summarize EVERYTHING that got cut in one post. I’m going to be linking relevant episodes (& transcripts thank u tazscripts) instead, for things that are Just Too Much to include.

as always, this post is intended to be Fun and Cool Bonus Content for people who haven’t listened to the podcast, not a manifesto of stuff they “should have” included or a list of flaws. they had 11+ hours of content to squish into one graphic novel, that happened over a period of months. of course stuff got cut. and it’s stuff that was recorded in 2016. that’s eight years ago. of course some things are going to change.

tl;dr - I liked the dang book. you can be sad something wasn’t in the novel while still understanding why it isn’t. here is a list of the stuff that was changed, skipped, compressed, or cut, presented as cool facts & extra info for gn fans who haven’t listened to the podcast.

spoilers ahoy for the 11th hour, but I’ll try to keep spoilers for the rest of the series to a minimum or at least mark them clearly. At the very end I’m going to put a section of series-spoiler theories and observations, very clearly marked

Before getting into the nitty-gritty, there are a few MAJOR changes from the podcast I want to get out of the way first. This list also includes “stuff I remember but don’t have the book to refer back to on”

Several characters and a whole section of the map were cut.

I think this is the first time that any named, plot-relevant characters have been completely cut. The closest we’ve come so far was the bugbears, but they at least had a cameo in the photo in Lucas’ quarters. Luca, Redmond, and Stonefruit Farms fully don’t exist in the GN series.

the boys meet Redmond in ep 46, pt 6 of the 11th hr arc, having met his brother Luca at the end of the previous episode.

long story short, Redmond was the leader of the purple-kerchiefed ruffians and the brains behind the bank robbery, which The Boys had to go through with so that Redmond would help his lowkey-estranged brother Luca raise the temple of Istus from its decrepit state, as they were both devout priests of Istus. The whole key being in the vault thing is GN-only.

Also, Luca is a skeleton bc he was in the temple when it got rapidly old-ified, but dw he’s fine he’s just a skeleton. he gets better.

Redmond’s motivation for robbing the bank is that as a priest of Istus, lady of fate, he follows his gut feelings and intuition, and he had a strong feeling that whatever was in the vault would be the key to taking down the bubble.

they basically took all of the plot-necessary elements from Luca & Redmond and gave them to Ren. In the podcast, Ren actually blasts some of the purple-kerchiefed ruffians out of her bar after they get too rowdy. She isn’t involved with the robbery in the slightest.

Merle’s Temporal Chalice scene

in the podcast, it’s his arm being chopped off. or more specifically, grabbing a crystal that exploded and made him have to get his arm chopped off. 

Him running out on his kids is played kind of for laughs at first in the podcast. Merle is a heel for a lot longer there, bc the funniest improv is usually not the most ethical improv. They do talk about his life and the fact that he has a family, but the offer made by the chalice is for him to have his arm back

frankly, I think they made the right move in the GN. We get very little of Hecuba in the podcast, and I really liked seeing more of that conflict.

Roswell, my beloved

so, in 2016 when they did the podcast, the McElroys were at, let’s say a different place in their journey of learning about the queer community. which is to say that in the podcast Roswell’s pronouns were wildly inconsistent, in part due to them being a clay construct, in part due to them not being introduced with any pronoun in particular [though Griffin clarifies that he intends for Roswell to use they/them a little later on in the arc], and in part bc the boys just weren’t really familiar with the singular they. they tended vacillate between they/them, it/its, and he/him. we all learn and grow. 

in the book, thankfully, Roswell is 100% they/them. fuck yeah. related. The Boys are significantly worse people to Roswell in the podcast. like, significantly. we’ll get into it as it comes up more, I just want to signpost it here. 

e.g. Taako giving Roswell control of themselves and their command word is a GN original, in the podcast The Boys kind of “junebug” them around for large swaths of the last few episodes. also, a significant number of earlier loops involve them basically negging Roswell into believing that Isaak hired outside help (The Boys) with security bc they weren’t cutting it anymore (rude). I much prefer the geologists gambit they go with in the GN.

Diamonds

Paloma’s prophecies cost money in the podcast, so a lot of The Boys’ shenanigans (and a significant number of loops) are in pursuit of getting cash. which, in Refuge, is diamonds. Some examples: 

Before figuring out that you can’t take objects with you, the boys do straight up take some diamonds from the bank post-robbery. 

Taako gets Ren and a patron of her bar, Ash, to sign up and pay for a seminar/magic lesson he’ll be giving tomorrow (one of my all-time fav scenes). This leads to a touching scene at the end when the bubble finally comes down where Taako gives Ren a little certificate that says “first graduate of Taako’s Amazing School of Magic.”

Magnus tries to armwrestle a guy for cash (Merle’s idea), and though he rolls a 27 Strength check, the Goliath barbarian he’s rolling against gets a 28.

Paloma offers 1 diamond for a small prophecy, 10 for a big one. in the GN they aren’t differentiated, and one small prophecy just doesn’t show up as it’s not needed.

the taz fandom wiki has a handy list of all the prophecies she gives in the podcast

ok! let’s go!

Prologue (the bit before ch 1)

this isn’t in the 11th hour podcast.

the information we get about The Visitor in the 11th hour (from The Boys asking various Refuge residents) is that

Jack and June brought them to Refuge

or, they brought Jack and June to Refuge. We hear both things at different times.

they’re depicted in the statue as having a Red Robe and being kinda broad-shouldered.

Roswell never met them. At first they refer to The Visitor with he/him pronouns, but then mention “I say ‘he’, I didn’t know them”

they tended to keep their face hidden (maybe?)

that’s pretty much it

we learn about this interaction much much much much much later in the podcast, not as a scene that is played out, but abstractly as an event that happened, after we find out who The Visitor is. 

that said, I LOVE this scene’s inclusion and expansion. it makes total sense to me.

Jack is never described as having a sketchbook or being an artist. this will come back later. 

the final scene of the arc in the podcast is instead June giving Magnus some previous designs for the statue of Jack, June, & a Red Robe/The Visitor in the middle of town, with a version where the hood of the robe is down and the face of the Red Robe/The Visitor is visible.

Ch. 1

this is where the podcast starts at episode 1 of the 11th hr. 

boyland’s funeral is very accurate. his comically large family of 400 sons (mentioned in CK podcast) is why the Voidfish lights up like that.

the only real differences I could find were:

in the podcast what is erased is basically boyland’s personnel file. like, a report or write-up of who he is and his work for the BoB. johann writing songs about boyland’s life is new.

the only pronouns ever used for the voidfish in the podcast are they/them, it/its, and occasionally he/him. past taz graphic novels have used they/them. on pg 13 of 11th hr, both Johann and Merle use she/her for the voidfish.

I do not like this, but I have a suspicion as to why, and I don’t like that either. see spoiler-y observations at the end for more.

they merged this scene with a scene from the skipped lunar interlude before CK, where The Boys take cpt. cpt. bane’s “file” to the voidfish to be eaten.

 I described this in my other posts, but the two things relevant here are Magnus putting his hand up on the glass and vibing w the voidfish, and this exhange b/w Johann and The Boys:

Johann: When I, um, can I ask you guys a question?

Magnus: Sure.

Taako: Of course, Johann.

Johann: Are you guys really okay with, with this part of the deal?

Magnus: That we get forgot?

Taako: Which part?

Johann: Yeah, are you cool with like, if you beef it down there, the world just forgets about you?

Magnus: Well, I’m not planning on ever dying.

in the podcast, bc Avi isn’t there, Angus operates the cannons (Avi showed him how before he left). he is extremely nervous about it and about killing them on accident. once they’re in the orb taako casts stoneskin on himself “just in case”, but everything works out totally fine, though avi mentions when The Boys land that the stoneskin should’ve thrown off the trajectory.

the gn keeps the spirit of taako trusting no one without the angus psychological damage by having him just cast a better version of the spell angus cast, and I am a fan.

the leveling up stats aren’t right in the book, as I’m sure every dnd 5e nerd has already tweeted about.

they’re all level 10, so magnus should be a level 8 fighter and a level 2 rogue bc 2+8=10, while the other two boys are still just a level 10 cleric and a level 10 wizard bc they didn’t multiclass.

fantasy costco-wise: aside from the stuff they have in the book (all things they do own in the podcast, though hole-thrower and the feather-weight cuirass were from the fantasy gachapon), merle picks up matthias the living grimoire, magnus gets the magnetic charge and the tarantula bracelet, and taako gets the arcane trickster’s glove (no wiki page rip it just gives you some arcane trickster powers) and mockingbird gum.

they beat up the baby worms more before letting them go, it’s a full battle

Ch. 2

in the podcast, when they go through the barrier, they find themselves in an empty white space where they see an old woman holding the cup. she says “It’s you!” with recognition upon seeing them, and then says “find me” before they wake up.

important: every time the boys die in the podcast, they go back to this space briefly before waking up.

sometimes the woman gives a cryptic message, sometimes not, and in their later loops, the woman collapses, breathing heavily.

we find out in the end that this woman is June - she has a whole extended de-aging sequence later that they probably cut so poor Carey didn’t have to do a bajillion character models for June at different ages just for a few panels of dramatic effect.

pg 36 - to head off any dnd 5e nitpickers, Magnus does not have proficiency in rustic hospitality, since that’s not a skill. Magnus does have a character feat called “Rustic Hospitality” that he chose at level 1.

claiming to have proficiency in things you can’t possibly have proficiency in is a longstanding goof both in taz and among people who play dnd 5e in general, because it’s funny.

in the book, they intercut each loop with a scene from lunar interlude 3, and it works really really well. we’ll get to those scenes as they come up.

Is this the first time someone uses he/him for The Red Robe in the gn series? (Roswell says ‘his’)

in the podcast Roswell mentions having never met the visitor, and comments “I say “he”, but I don’t know.”

in the GN, when The Boys tell the director about The Red Robe in CK they use they/them pronouns and so does the director, but after this, even @ the end of the book after Taako guesses that The Red Robe they’ve been talking to isn’t the same Red Robe from Refuge, he and the other boys continue to use he/him for The Red Robe.

“Mystic Analysis”

he just did an arcana check in the podcast, I don’t think Taako had Identify as a spell, which is what the DND equivalent would be. 

they also don’t figure out that Roswell has a command word until much later, during the Diary Of Sheriff Isaak scene.

Griffin basically says “[they’re] an earth elemental, with a bird on [them], and earth elementals don’t generally have birds on them, so maybe it was just nearby when the spell was cast and got caught up in it”

Cassidy

in the podcast, she’s in jail for blowing up the temple of Istus, which she didn’t do.

GN Ren mentions later on that the temple got “un-built” which references how in the podcast the temple suddenly aged a matter of centuries in seconds, so from the outside it looked kind of explode-y. and cassidy is known for blowing shit up, so she was blamed. she also theorizes that it might be racism due to her half-orc heritage.

in the GN, cassidy’s arrested for trespassing on the closed mines, which she absolutely has done. it makes more sense, and eliminates a major plot point they cut from the book

she is otherwise pretty much the same, I love her very much

Paloma pretty much stays in her cottage in the podcast rather than sneaking around.

the fantastic exchange of “you guys have been here 45 minutes, what the fuck did you bring with you?!” “you should see what we can do in an hour!” is 100% verbatim from the podcast.

in the podcast, Ren is dead the first bank fire (and in most subsequent bank fires). she also wasn’t one of the bandits, or involved with the bank robbery at all

in fact, in the loop where The Boys were doing the bank robbery, she unexpectedly came in, recognized Taako, and almost blew their cover.

With so little time left on the clock, Taako cast Banishment on her to keep her safe and out of the way, but she made her saving throw - so it didn’t work, but she knew Taako tried to cast some spell on her, and there was a somber moment of her falling backwards trying to get away from him, tears in her eyes.

look it’s a good lil character moment

I can’t emphasize enough how brutal the first description of the bank fire and subsequent world-ending is. Griffin pulled 0 punches.

Magnus rushes in and he describes the scene like “you see a guy, who looks like this. they’re dead. you see two guards. they’re dead. you see a woman holding a tray of diamonds. she’s dead. you see this person, also dead. you see a dwarven bank teller. she might be alive, but it’s hard to tell, and if she was she is on the brink of death”

I think the boys, brogden, and maybe one of the purple-kerchief ruffians (which is how they are described in the podcast) survived the first one, and everyone else died in that bank. it felt so brutal listening to it the first time because you (and the boys) didn’t know about the loop yet, so it was just. horrifying.

I love how they pulled in off in the GN!!! the clock hands are just *chef kiss*

just before Griffin describes the destruction of Refuge, Travis interjects, “Ditto, did you base this on Majora’s Mask?”

while Griffin does not respond in the moment, he later confirms that Travis is correct.

Griffin’s description of the fiery deaths of The Boys: “And you’re being crushed by the shattered earth as it compresses down into the ground. And you hear an anguished scream come from something massive and furious, and all three of you have died…And there’s something about the dying that feels familiar.”

“and then you wake up.” hardcut to end of episode music. v epic.

Ch. 3 (i s2g they’re not all going to be this detailed the major plot differences are mostly out of the way now)

as mentioned, the scenes between each loop in the gn happen in Lunar Interlude III (transcript) (episode) - each of The Boys got to choose a scene to have in between arcs and Justin chose to have Taako give Angus magic lessons.

they’re all more abstract in the eps (Taako establishes a recurring time and place to give Angus lessons, and we get scenes from earlier vs later lessons, various shenanigans, etc.) but the major points are actually pretty much the same, just condensed into one scene in the book.

also taako giving magic lessons in his quarters makes 100% sense, but in the podcast they did it in the cafeteria, and that’s where the LUP is burned into the wall. significant? potentially.

in the podcast angus had made some macarons for taako but forgot to flavor them (he nailed the texture though which is hard to do in a macaron) so he asked taako to prestidigitate them better and then scorching ray happened and blasted em to shreds.

LUP. dude. I thought it was an acronym when I first heard it, bc in the podcast, Griffin says “So your staff, you lost control of it and you blasted the letters “L-U-P” into the wall.” Seeing it in cursive, all gorgeous and capitalized like a proper noun? knocked me the fuck out.

another dnd 5e tiny detail: in the gn, the description for Angus’ first wand says “wonderful stocking stuffer for the young sorcerer in your life”

i could have a whole conspiracy board about this.

skip this if you’re not super into dnd 5e mechanics

the difference (in dnd 5e) b/w a wizard, a warlock, and a sorcerer is:

wizard: gets magic from study and practice - taako is a wizard bc he studied spellcraft and learned how to do it.

warlock: gets magic from making a deal with something/someone far more magical than themselves - garfield is a warlock, so his magic stems from a deal he made with something (the devil??)

sorcerer: has innate magic within them.

this could come from a myriad of places, but usually from heritage or bloodline - maybe your great-grandfather was a god or a dragon or a demon or a djinn or something, or maybe your mom touched a weird rock as a kid and got magic powers that she passed onto you when she had you.

in the podcast, angus is only ever referred to as a wizard. makes sense - regular boy + magic training from taako = wizard boy.

but if he’s a sorcerer, the magic really was in him all along. is taako teaching him to channel it? does he know?

this also fits with a weirdly popular headcanon the taz community had for a while about angus secretly being a silver dragon (in dnd, color = different abilities, diff personality, etc, and silver ones like to shapeshift and pretend to be humans sometimes).

“draconic bloodline” is one of the most common sorcerer backgrounds - it basically just means ‘a dragon got involved at some point in this family tree, so now you can cast ray of frost’.

hmmmmmmm

end conspiracy theory

It is at this point that I lost my damn book. so. I’m just gonna post this bc the next graphic novel is coming out soon and I want to post it before then. If i find my book I’ll finish it up. If you have post-chapter 3 differences you noticed that aren’t already covered, feel free to reply/reblog with them!

Spoiler-y Observations Below!

CAUTION: contains spoilers for the rest of taz balance!

*voidfish speculation: my suspicion is that they’re using ‘she’ for the voidfish to foreshadow that they have a baby, so that makes them a “mother”? i call bullshit, but i’ve heard it used before as a justification for misgendering an enby who gives birth. obvs the voidfish is not a human being, people can have multiple pronouns, it’s not a 1:1 comparison, but i for one (as an enby myself) really liked the voidfish using they/them and feel oddly betrayed at them suddenly changing the pronouns. fingers crossed that there’s a different reason.

"what am statue” is low-key foreshadowing since magnus says it

merle knowing what relativistic time dilation is

LUP was burnt into the wall in the cafeteria in the podcast - lucretia would’ve seen it for sure. so they put it in taako’s room this time...

aw no ‘sorry about the cookies little man’

In 5 or however many years when gn series ends, someone should do a poll of people who only read the graphic novels and see if any of them pronounce “Lup” weird since they’ve only ever seen it written down.

hero wreathed in flames 0.0 I hope Joaquin is still there in the finale but I like the duality here

BATTLEAXEPROFICIENCYEASTEREGG

SNEAK PEEK AT THE HUNGER SNEAK PEEK AT THE STARBLASTER AAAAAAAA

257 - ‘I know him better than you could ever imagine’ because he created you? Oof ouch ow my bones. also....the magnus that made the cup was a very different person from magnus now. it’s not what Julia would want - the cup never met julia, obvs, and does not know the ways she changed him for the better.

Bottom of 327 - sweet Angus boy are you drawing something on that orb?

Istus is like you’ve been serving me your whole lives without knowing it in the podcast - maybe a bit too much foreshadowing for the GN

[goodticklebrain]

Good Tickle Brain's 10th Anniversary!

Today is the 10th anniversary of Good Tickle Brain! I can't believe it's been 10 whole years since I decided to start sharing nerdy Shakespeare comics online in the hope that other people might find them mildly amusing.

Ironically, my 10th year running Good Tickle Brain has also been far and away my roughest. I've posted barely anything this year, due to a particularly challenging combination of injury, chronic pain, increased family care responsibilities, and mental road blocks. But I'm still here, and I'm still committed to making Shakespeare fun and making fun of Shakespeare through the power of stick figures. (Also the chronic pain has mostly cleared up, so that's helped a lot.)

Assuming I can get my brain to cooperate and life doesn't throw me any more curve balls this year, I'm hoping to have my long-awaited comic book compilation of Hamlet out in time for the holiday season. I'm so proud of the work that has gone into it and I can't wait to get it into your hands.

As Good Tickle Brain moves into its 11th year (it goes to 11!) I hope to figure out a sustainable schedule that allows me to post new comics regularly again without short-circuiting my very tenuous work-life balance. Thank you all so much for continuing to read and share my work. I hope to continue to create more of it for you to enjoy over the next 10 years!

Look at where we are...

Look at where we started...

The fact that we're online is a miracle.

[violencewithwings]

January 2024 reading wrap-up

If you’ll notice, I read very few books this month (especially compared to December, but even compared to my usual 6 books minimum a month). I am currently in the throes and insanity of first love, so I might not read much for the first few months of this year. I do miss reading, but how am I supposed to fall in love with book men when I have a gorgeous, sweet man right in front of me?

Books read ˋ°•*⁀➷ 4

Books DNFed ˋ°•*⁀➷ 0

Five-star books ˋ°•*⁀➷ 4

Fourth Wing (reread) - Rebecca Yarros

January 11th, ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I’ve been anticipating this reread for a while. I couldn’t wait to be re-immersed in the world and see how differently the book read after reading Iron Flame. I was not disappointed, and in fact, I gave this book a higher star rating than I did on my first read. This world is very easy to get obsessed with and immersed in, and I still love Violet’s character so much. Rereading this book also made me appreciate Xaden’s intimidating front so much more than I did originally. I was able to fully sink into the present in the book instead of worry about what was coming, and I really enjoyed it.

Rereading the end of this book made me realize that most of the issues people complain about “popping up” in the second book (aka Violet and Xaden arguing) actually started at the end of the first book pretty much as soon as they got into a relationship. This shifted my perspective of the second book quite a bit, honestly. This was also the first book I tabbed as I read as well, so it was a new and fun experience for me. I can’t wait to read the next book.

The Lightning Thief - Rick Riordan

January 21st, ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

So, fun fact: this was my best friend’s favorite series when we were in elementary and middle school, but I had serious anxiety as a kid and couldn’t read anything more tense than Amelia Bedilia until I was about thirteen. I tried reading this series about four years ago but it kind of bored me? Reading it now, I’m completely unsure why, but I digress. Me and my brothers are watching the show, and being in my reading era, I decided I wanted to read the books too, and now the four of us are reading the books together as well 😆

This book was so much fun. Percy’s inner monologue took a little bit of time to get used to since I’m used to reading books from the perspective of teenage girls and adult women, but he was a very fun character to follow. I’ve always loved Greek Mythology, so getting to read a modern book with the gods was very intriguing. I thought the world was very immersive and the characters were fun. I can’t wait to see how this story progresses over the next few books.

On a side note: I can’t imagine Percy as anything other than Walker with his curly blond hair and blue eyes. Annabeth was a bit harder since Percy describes her so often in the books, but she’s kind of just a blurry haze in my head 😂

The Sea of Monsters - Rick Riordan

January 24th, ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

If you’d told me I was going to be eating up a middle grade book series this year, I’d have laughed in your face. This book was so good. Tyson has to be my favorite character in the whole series so far. He’s so adorable 😭

This book, like most middle grade books, was slightly predictable. It doesn’t help that I’ve gotten probably at least one spoiler for each book, but that didn’t make the reading of it any less fun. Percy and Annabeth’s relationship is progressing a bit, and I love to see it. They trust each other a bit more in each book.

One thing I really loved about this book is that it was only 280 pages 😆 I needed a short read tonight that I could wrap up before I went to bed, and this delivered! I’m chomping at the bit to read the next book, but alas, it’s still on hold at the library. I’ll get my hands on it soon enough…

Destroy the Day - Brigid Kenmerer

January 29th, ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book was everything and more I wanted out of a final book in this series…I mean…COME ON! For one, I LOVE Harristan, and we got a whole lot more of him in this book. I was eating those chapters UP!

Corrick and Lochlan had a lovely bonding in this book after being at odds with each other for the entire series, so that was nice! I really appreciate that they were able to get over their hatred for each other eventually and become really close friends 😭 the last chapter with them at the end is so near and dear to my heart, you don’t understand.

I won’t get into the nitty gritty of this plot because that was on the back burner in this story. What I LOVED about this book was the romance Harristan got. He and the person he ended up with were two characters I had been hoping something would happen between for a while and then out of nowhere - it happened! I squealed when they kissed for the first time. I’m so glad they got their happily ever after because that is truly all I ever wanted for them <3

I love this book. Read this series, I promise it’s good.

[starluvsx]

*ੈ✩‧₊˚༺𝙎𝙩𝙖𝙧𝙡𝙪𝙫𝙨𝙭༻*ੈ✩‧₊˚

haii, My name is Sarah and I've been writing on Tumblr for almost a year now I think(not consistently of course).I started out writing and reading on wattpad but now i'm here! I really like all kinds of music tbh but my favorite artists are probably Lana Del Rey, Tyler the creator, Pierce the veil, Playboi Carti, Mitski and The smiths. I love editing and reading (books recs are always appreciated!). i'm a big talker which is why im doing this in this format lol. I like to dress emo/alternative/scene I suppose.i also really love anime. some of my faves are probably jjk, Saki K, The Promised Neverland and Deathnote. I also(obviously) Love the triplets. i've been watching them since 2022 and went to see them in NJ, October 11th I think. fun fact; where they're from in somerville is only like a 20-25 minute drive from where I live and some of their videos are shot in places I go to often, same with one of their intros.i don't buy a lot of merch cause i'm broke ash but I have a tour shirt, a fresh love shirt and the original space camp launch package thing. okay your probably annoyed with my talking so l'll stfu now, Happy reading!

[anti-judy]

I'm doing that Nikolai chart reading finally, IDK these are fun lol

His looks kinda cray cray btw but it's kinda similar to mine in someway so maybe it's why I relate to his literature lol

So to start off with - he has a LOT of aspects towards his sun, and his chiron squaring his ascendant. Im just mentioning this first cuz it relates to both the author and the character since they both had identity issues in life, and with your sun heavily aspected it does lead to a feeling of "otherness" in someone. This was a pretty big part of his life and work, so it's worth mentioning.

He has a scorpio ascendant, which could lead to a sort of strange impression people get when first meeting him - he also has a stellium with Uranus, Saturn and Neptune, which all add completely different energies to this. 2 are in Saggitarius, so he might come off as less 'welcoming' and with a leo in the 10th house it does add to the entertaining persona he had in real life and in the show (he was called a funny midget by his school friends when he was younger).

His second house is in Saggitarius, and with the ruler jupiter lying in the 5th house (which he did his work in) he did end up travelling a lot for his job. This isn't always an indicator of travel tbh, but he did gain value from this in his life.

The ruler of his 3rd house is also in the 1st, which means that his sense of identity as a writer is tied to himself. It's also in saggittarius, which probably adds that energy to how he communicated in life (he's a silly guy what can I say)

His 4th house has pluto which tbh is rather ominious (i have this it's a give or take) - he was bullied as a child, but made only a couple of long lasting friendships (something very scorpio like)

Nikolai also has mercury here and he a novice writer back when he was young. He wrote a lot for his fathers theatre and tried to write his own poems book and get it published but it failed, miserably - this was probably a pluto lesson but it was also a mercury one as well.

His 5th house has both his sun and his jupiter - his father owned a theatre and it's where Nikolai started, so he was born pretty lucky there. He also has a large sense of identity in literature and writing, since his sun in this house centers his life here - the arts kind of was meant for him.

His 6th house house is an aries house, the ruler of which is in the 12th - unfortunately that means a lot of the work and routines he has can be rather chaotic, and maybe even secretive. It's also the house of odd jobs, which he did do - both in the show and irl.

Fun fact about IRL Nikolai, but he got a position as a history professor for a year and sucked balls at it. IDK if it's related to the 12th house entirely but it's kind of funny, since BSD Nikolai would do that too.

7th house venus might be an indication of how he thought about his relationships - might also be an indication of him being gay but idk thats jumping. We just know that he was, so that could be a sign. He never married or had children btw, so take all of those "oh your 5th house and 7th house mean you'll have kids" things with a grain of salt fr. I honestly think this just means he was rather zesty guy in his friendships - he had strong ones throughout his life, and also ended up killing himself because of some spiritual guy saying he was sinful (this is the house of open enemies afterall).

Also back to BSD, look at how he treats Fyodor bro.

His 10th house is in leo, which means that his career of an entainer was pretty fitting here. IDK not much to say, it fits him honestly.

11th house is in virgo with a libra moon - which is kind of sad, since despite being rejected so much by Russian society, he was someone who took a lot of emotional energy to actually communicate with others, especially friends (moon opposite sun might have this affect tbh, since his ego and self opposes his emotional well being)

12th house house seems to be a part of his downfall - he clearly is spritual, both in the show and IRL. Mars is weakened here, meaning that the drive someone would usually get from this planet is rather struggling because it's filled with that wishy washy pisces energy - which is why despite the planet being in libra, the 12 house energy might make any mars emotions seem more watery.

BSD Nikolai really got it spot on cuz wtf this dude needs to chill tf out sometimes.

Also, the north node is here, meaning his purpose lies here - which is great for him being a writer. Also not great when you take into account other factors, like his death and life having such oddities, honestly a lot of them outside of his control.

BSD Nikolai kind of shows this, he doesn't have a backstory besides being obsessed with Fyodor and a more empty purpose tbh.

IDK. Shit's wack. His is all over the place tbh.

He clearly is a guy who has a strong identity with what he's doing - entertainment, writing. But when it comes to the smaller details, like love and the self, there seems to be a big gap - he's drawn sort of all over the place. He also suffers from a chronic case of 'being unlikable' since no matter what happens, some government official has it out for him. Even stalin didn't like him and he was dead for like decades at that point.

BSD Nikolai reflects him pretty well tbh.

[bbarican]

july 30, 2023; 7:21 pm - life updates

hi, tumblr! its been a minute ~ how are you guys? isnt it so weird that july just decided to be a blip and is now over like it never actually happened even though it was a super busy month? either way, im here to update ya'll on how ive been and other things and if youre interested, just keep reading along; either way, i love you!

family:

bittersweetly, wala na kaming bisita sa bahay; ang weird kasi my mom pointed out na we had visitors nga pala ever since may, thats a lot of time to have people over at your house and to not have privacy; it is sad though to have the house this quiet again but i, glad for the memories we all made over the course of everyone's stay

i treated my mom to a mani pedi session yesterday and it was really nice and relaxing; i finally got my nails done again and im so happy!

other than the aforementioned, we dont have a lot going on except the fact that we're going to a lunch buffet on saturday so atleast we have something to look forward to

im just really excited for the rest of the year and what that holds for me and my family

personal life:

im in a much better headspace and i am truly grateful for whatever or whoever helped me along the way

july was tough kasi i kept pushing myself to my limit without really noticing and again its very bittersweet kasi a part of me is super proud na i can actually juggle so much but at the same time my mind was not doing okay

but im glad im better now; maybe it was just a bad and busy week but i know for a fact na hindi lang yun yung week na ganun sa buong buhay ko so atleast now i know i can actually handle it

i finished reading happy place by emily henry already and i love that book so much; it being about people around my age made it all the more relatable + its super funny + it hits a little too close to home knowing that im the same as the protagonist; overall, its such a great book and i wish i could read it for the first time ulit

been trying to download bumble again pero literally my phone wont let me kasi it always prompts me to fix my payment method sa apple id which is totally fine btw but it always ends up being in error so i just take that as a sign na downloading bumble is just gonna be a waste of time anyway

i need to buy clothes kasi 1.) i wanna invest in them (again, my mom has a point na i need to stop repeating my outfits as much as i do) and 2.) i have an event to go to on the 11th ata so i need to dress up for that

i also want to sell some of my stuff kasi day by day i just keep realizing na i have so much stuff and instead of throwing them away, might as well make some money out of them

work:

im relieved that work is better now; not as busy, but busy enough to keep me on my feet without actually killing me mentally

i love my officemates; i love how the board takers are back and that the noise is back too

na approve na din kaagad yung revisions namin for our community library project which means we get to go to ikea already and purchase the stuff we wanted to for the project

feels kinda weird din talaga to not have been able to go to the office for a week cause of the weather kaya tomorrow im really gonna push myself to go kahit na alam kong uulan parin kasi i just know im gonna be lazy as fuck if i dont go to the office nanaman

regarding our team building, again, im not so keen on pushing through with it this august kasi 1.) its raining, 2.) mahal na since we're booking for the same dates, and 3.) again, i have no idea what our budget is to begin with so its really hard to plan anything anyway

and yeah, thats it for my life updates ~ im beyond excited for august, so here's to making the last day of july super fun and productive and memorable in whatever way it could be

ingat kayong lahat especially since for sure uulan parin this week!

[ifoundheaven]

9/1/2024:

Journal Entry Seven

Life has been a lot lately. School started and I’ve fallen into the exhausting pattern of waking up, getting ready, going to school, going to practice, then staying up too late doing homework. It’s exhausting, but it is just how it is. Hand cramps from notes, crying because of stress, messy annotations, early morning stomach aches. It’s how it goes. 

School has been okay. There is a weird sense of doom that being a senior has left in my stomach. There are so many lasts I’m already experiencing. Senior sunrise was nice, the freshman I gave tours of the school were quiet and distant, my teachers are great, the workload is too much. School is school despite the seniority. It’s the same but with a lingering sense of dread never quite leaving me.

I got to experience my first football game in the student section. Four years of marching band made it so I’ve never been able to do that. I’m always stuck far away from everyone else, in an outfit far too hot for the weather, playing the high pitched trill of the fight song all night. It was fun, more fun than I ever expected it to be. I screamed the school chants so loud my throat still hurts. I love being in band. Getting to do the drumline cadences, playing stupid songs, goofing off with my friends, the pre-halftime performance rituals– it’s all amazing. I am glad I got to experience one game in the student section though.

Earlier today I started to cry because of Harry Potter, which is stupid. I saw a video about the movies and just burst into tears. The first time I read the books I was in 3rd grade. I remember waiting for my 11th birthday just in case, carrying the books with me everywhere, spewing facts about the novels constantly, always begging my parents to rewatch the movies again. 

I wonder if I am still that little girl or if I am a completely different person. 

I look at old photos and I don’t see myself. I see a little girl with a dorky smile, messy curls, wearing a Harry Potter shirt. It hurts to know that little girl went to school and got bullied, there is an innocence on her face. She doesn’t know it yet,  but two years from now everything is going to change. The bullying will get worse, she’ll end up in a mental hospital, she’ll have to transfer schools because the bullying was too bad. In this move, she’ll lose all her friends. But the girl in that photo doesn’t know that. She is happy. She copies all the notes in history because the renaissance is the coolest thing she’s ever heard of. She sees herself in a character for the first time. Hermione is awkward and nerdy, she has messy hair and struggles with making friends.

That little girl also doesn’t know that she’ll end up meeting all her best friends a few years later. She doesn’t know she’ll be a part of a band, a theater program, she doesn’t know she’ll be president of a club, she doesn’t know she’ll be in AP classes. She doesn’t know the good that will come after the worst of it all. I wish I could tell her to not give up after everything gets bad, to push through. I cannot change the past. That little girl with give up, but eventually she’ll pull herself up. Things will get better someday, not then, not in the next few years, but with time she will be herself again.

[fenimores-book-nook]

Day 13 of self care writing :)

December 11th, 2023, Monday 6:27 pm In my living room under a cozy blanket :)

Good evening, but not too late this time! Also, it's crazy to me that soon I won't be putting "2023" on these posts anymore. It's gonna be 2024 in like three weeks...that's insane. Being in December already makes it feel like this year has gone by really fast but looking back, I think I felt the opposite. It did feel crazy that I graduated from high school when I did in May and yeah, it felt super quick, but I think in those moments, I didn't feel that way. I guess it's just the weird way that time feels.

Christmas tree in my church's lobby area that I just really liked the vibe of with the sun pouring inside. :)

This past weekend has been pretty good, I think. Apart from kinda ahckjjds feelings, I think it was good. Today was a pretty good day too! It was my relaxing Monday but I wanted to be productive too. So I did some things around the house and finished up some Christmas gifts for friends! I'm big on homemade gifts, so for my close friend group, we're doing secret santa but I wanted to give a lil' something to all of them anyways, so I made these silly little hearts for them all.

Plus one for myself 'cause who wouldn't want a matching stuffed heart with a silly face on it with your friends? And for my secret santa, I have almost all the things I need for them, I'm planning on getting two more little things at my work tomorrow and then we'll be good! We're getting together this weekend and I'm very excited! I always love hanging out with my friendos. Some days it's literally all I need to be around them, and my mood goes from one to ten. <3

Staying on the topic of friends, I just performed in a community choir with some of them! Our concert was last night and I'm not going to lie, I was wanting to get it over and done with but I actually really did love being in it. It 100% helped that some of my old high school friends did it with me, including my close friends. Just look how snazzy we looked:

It was a lot of fun! :) There were for sure some parts during the practices where I really just wanted to go home; it's a community choir with a lot of people not in my age group and I think it was just harder to connect with people like I did in my high school choir. But I am glad that I got to do it with my friends and my old choir teacher AND my old band teacher. It was sort of a reunion!

And now, just because I have a need that I have to talk about books in every single post...I'm going strong in Iron Flame!! I think I finally got past the draggy beginning parts and I have, maybe 100-150ish pages to go? So, super close! (maybe I'm farther than that but oh well) It's crazy and amazing. Along with that, I've been re-reading the Heartstopper series because one: they're a comfort series for me and I love them with all my heart, and two: the fifth book is coming out soon and I thought it was a good time to have the past books events fresh in my mind! I've pre-ordered the fifth book and it says it should be delivering to me the day before I leave for Canada to visit family. Let's just hope it's right because I NEED TO READ THAT BOOK. And it would be awful if it got delivered and it just sat outside my house just waiting for me to come and open those new book smelling pages for a week. So, anyways. Love that series.

~ Self care writingsssss ~

(questions found on pinterest, of course)

What inspired me today? The fact that my friend group and I are meeting at the end of the week for our Christmas hang out and I still need to get gifts together, so I did some creating! Also, me wanting to be more *CreATivE* so I just went for it. (wrapping gifts is actually quite fun but I am not the best at it) (I also feel like I am not a creative enough person when in reality I am a very creative person and I just need to remember that)

Where am I putting my energy? I feel like this is kind of a hard question to answer simply because I'm not sure. I think maybe I could be putting more of my energy into some things but that's not the question. A lot of my energy goes towards my love for books, I think. And trying to think of ways to create art that I love and that I enjoy doing. Also, to my friends too, I think sometimes I focus too much of my energy on that, though, and it becomes something not good for me. But hey, it's something I'm working on and that's what matters!

Three highlights of my day. One, finishing up the last of my friends' gifts! At least, for this weekend. ;) Two, putting my own lil' silly stuffed heart I made as a tree topper for my baby Christmas tree. It looks so freaking cute. :3 Three, texting one of my besties that I missed her and we just chatted for a bit. <3

Someone I'm grateful for. My kitty cat, Delilah. :)) She can be a bit of a turd sometimes, like today how she knocked down one of my books on display and I couldn't get it back to how it was. But it's okayyyy. I love her and she always sits with me and gives me comfort. <3

One thing I did today that I'm proud of. Creating. I lack motivation for creating art a lot but I think maybe it's partly because I'm afraid that what I make, no one else will appreciate it like I do. But that doesn't really matter, does it? It's how I feel when I make it. So, I did some of that unique type of creating that I do today and I loved it. :)

This is an accurate representation of how happy I feel when I look at my books. :))))

Until next time lovely,

Thalia <3

[jessybarnes]

Congrats on 500 followers!!!!

5️⃣ and quotes

Hello, sweet anon! Thank you so much for your ask and for congratulating me! 🥰🥰

These were hard to narrow down, but I finally picked my top five favorite quotes. I've put them below the cut since it's a longer post. I hope you enjoy them! ❤️

1. "I choose to live, not just exist."

This quote was said by Metallica's lead singer, James Hetfield. He wrote a letter to the Metallica fans and this was written in that letter. Fun fact: I met Metallica on March 11th, 2019, and since James and Lars are my two favorite band members, I asked Lars to write James' quote on a piece of paper. Now, Lars is Danish, and when I had him write this quote for me, I asked him to write it in Danish! He did, and I've since gotten it tattooed on my left forearm. Here are pictures of James' letter, Lars writing the quote on a piece of paper for me, and then my arm.

2. "Embrace your differences and the qualities about you that you think are weird. Eventually, they're going to be the only things separating you from everyone else."

This one was said by Sebastian Stan, and it really speaks to me because I've never felt like I've really fit in anywhere. I've always been shy and kind of kept to myself and this quote is one I hold near and dear to my heart. Another fun fact: I took my little girl to meet Sebastian last year at New York Comic Con. She proposed to him in her photo op and I filmed the moment she met him during the autograph session. Click here to watch it! ❤️

3. "The best kind of love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds."

This is a quote from the movie The Notebook based on the book written by Nicholas Sparks. This is by far my favorite movie of all time, and I've seen it so many times that I can quote it from beginning to end. Yet another fun fact: I'm a former active duty Marine and was stationed at Marine Corps Air Station (or MCAS) Cherry Point in Havelock, North Carolina. One year for a charity event, Nicholas Sparks came to our base to sign books and take pictures. I was fortunate enough to meet him and tell him that I named my daughter after a character from the movie. Also, when I married my husband this quote was incorporated into our ceremony. Below is a picture of me meeting Nicholas Sparks.

4. "They say it is the first step that costs the effort. I do not find it so. I am sure I could write unlimited 'first chapters'. I have indeed written many."

The amazing J.R.R. Tolkien said this one. I am a huge Tolkien fan and have been since I was a little girl. I'm full of fun facts today: My dad used to read me the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy as bedtime stories, and a couple of years ago he gave me his original copies that he bought back in the 1970s. Here's a photo of them.

5. "You cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you."

One of the greatest writers, Stephen King, said this. Well, he's one of the greatest in my personal opinion anyway. He's been one of my favorite authors for as long as I can remember. I don't have any fun facts about him though, other than my grandma gifted me her entire collection of his works that she collected over the years. 🥰 One day, I hope to meet him and thank him for inspiring me to want to get my writing out there. I hope one day I become a published author.

Thank you again for asking me this! It was fun to share!

Do you want to ask me a 'Top 5' question? Click here to join my 500 Followers Celebration!

[gabenvrhappened]

MoviesOr... Red, White and Royal Blue

The first time I read about Red, White and Royal Blue, it was described as a soft porn book, like the TV shows Netflix usually makes, so I never really paid attention or wanted to read it. Then, Amazon Prime announced they would be adapting the book, and I got curious because reading is one thing, but seeing those two fine actors doing it, that's what I really wanted. So I watched some teasers, saw that it was going to be Rated R, and waited patiently (not much, as soon as the days were getting close) for August 11th.

What was then my surprise to see that there was nothing soft porn there? Maybe Amazon saw the potential of having a big LGBT+ movie and decided to make it more family-friendly? Who knows… I don't hate the idea, it's good to make it available for more audience, but I surelly kept thinking about what we lost. But that was the only thing that made me disappointed. The rest? Perfection. I didn't think I would enjoy the movie so much like I did. I didn't think it would make me smile all the way through like Heartstopper did days before. And it was fun to see what is usually a teenage theme — loving someone you can't have because they're in the closet — in a mature environment, especially involving politics and royalty.

In this romance story, we met two young politicians from two of the most famous, and controversial, countries in the world. Alex, from the all powerful and omnipresent United States, and Henry from the London weird and unnecessary for today's standards monarchy. The rest? Is history, and I bet they can make some.

The biggest reason the movie works so well is the casting. How sensational are the two lead actors? They're charming, and they work so well together, with their sexual tension and jokes. I already knew Nicholas Galitzine from the Handsome Devil movie (that I'm still not over the fact that it didn't end with a kiss), so I knew he would deliver, but Taylor Perez was a surprise for me. I never paid attention to him on the terrible The Kissing Booth trilogy, which is good. We didn't get soft porn, but we got an ass, and although it wasn't from Nicholas (what a shame), it was from Taylor, so all is forgiven. Another person who steals the movie is Sarah Shahi with her incredible role as the President's Assistant. Her presence is incredible and every single scene that she’s in is fascinating, charming and piercing. And I also liked Rachel Hilson's part, who I met in Love, Victor.

In all its perfection, and in its two hours of fair good pace and development, the only criticism I have for the movie is how things were resolved. Even though the focus was on the love of the two main characters, still, part of the tension was on how their love affair would have consequences, especially around the monarchy. Sadly, none of this was explored in the movie (I'm not sure if it's explored in the book as well, so if it's not, then it has the same flaw). It's impractical to think that people would march in front of Buckingham Palace to celebrate their love so easily, not when the idea of a Royal Family revolves around racist and abusive behaviors. I know it's a piece of fiction, and I know the political rules and games the movie portrays are far simpler than they are in reality, but still, the movie sets the tone of being placed in the world as we know it, so the way all is solved really makes the ending weaker.

Again, this is not that big of a problem, but I wonder if Amazon regrets not turning this into a limited series. Not only could those problems be solved, but they could have also extend the story a bit further and gain more exposure from the fandom. Even so, the highs are much higher than the lows. There are so many amazing scenes, like the falling of the cake, the New Year's party where they're the only ones standing for seconds, the museum dance, and the hug on the stairs when everything is falling apart. I felt like I was inside Taylor's song London Boy, and now I want a Royal Blue heart all to myself. God, how I love the English.

[mikumanogi-blog]

2023-02-11 “I need you? Ai nii Jyuu!!!” Tereblog 9 [ENG]

Yesterday was February 10th, in other words Ni (2) and Jyuu (10)

Bleh

Hello I’m Teresa

Thank you for meeting me on this blog today, I’m glad that we were able to meet (●︎´▽︎`●︎)

If you like feel free to read to the end!

 The other day I went to see the stage play of “Kingdom”

One of the third generation members, Umezawa Minami, was in this play and was playing the roll of Yotanwa. She was soooooo beautiful…😭

(I’m going to give away some spoilers so if you don’t want any please don’t read ahead ⚠️)

I was originally a fan of the manga and I really like it, and so when I saw Yontanwa appear on the stage I couldn’t feel anything other than overbearing fear…I was in awe of the way they were able to hide her beauty during the stage play so ingeniously.

Of course the acting of the entire cast, the lighting, the sound effect the outfits, there was so much power there and I learned that day that people can really become something other than themselves 😳 It was really amazing…no matter what scene it was, even though I was sitting in the audience, it felt so real. I really feel like I was in the forest, the city and on the battlefield.

 But out of all the things that they did so well I never thought the thing that would charm me the most would be the beauty of Yotanwa… I was especially overwhelmed the sword fighting scene! It was rought and wild, but for some reason it felt like I was watching a beautiful dance.

 She was so beautiful and cool.

 I’m so glad that I was able to see such a beautiful work and to have it be linked to Nogizaka46 makes it even more amazing.

 To be honest, before I joined Nogizaka46 (when I was a snotty little kid) the first time I saw Umezawa’s name was when she played the roll of Elizabeth during the “Seven Deadly Sins’ stage play. So this time, to be able to see her perform live makes me so happy.

 I’m still a rookie but I want to be like Umezawa-san, beautiful, capable and a beautiful idol. I’m going to do my best to get close, by even just a bit, to that goal!!!

I’ll be continuing to support this performance ☺︎

My favorite character in Kingdom is Ouki Shogun, the Ouki in the stage play was amazing 🫶🏻

 ( 'ω'o[ Announcements]o

“Nogizaka 46 picture book Nogisatsu VOL. 03” on sale now!

Ikeda as well as pictures that she took are many and scattered throughout the photobook 🥹︎💕︎︎

“General cover” and “Seven Net limited edition cover” has an random picture of Ikeda on it and so if you like please check it out.

In the Nogisatsu survey, there is a question that asks “a member you want to be reborn as” and so people that answer my name I’ll be watching for you.

 I wanted to talk about New Nogizaka Star Tanjou! but then I remembered that we’re heading into the final episode.

I knew the new series will be starting in April and I’ll be able to see the staff again but even saying goodbye temporarily is a little bit sad.

“Nogizaka Under Construction” and “New Nogizaka Star Tanjou!” there have been a lot of Nogizaka programs that we’ve been in over the last year. It’s not a matter of fact thing that we were given these shows and I’m very happy that we were able to participate in them.

 I was also able to do many photoshoots and for those I’m also very grateful!

Here is a behind the scenes shot from 20±SWEET 2023 JANUARY📷‪🫶🏻🤍 ̖́-

Ha shi re Bicycle ！！！

Starting today for the next 10 days there will be a live stream for “10th birthday live Blu-ray DVD sale & pre 11th birthday live special #Nogizaka46 fun TV” - ̗̀👏🏻 ̖́-

The first episode will have Manatsu-san, Kaki-san and me!

From now until the birthday live, make sure to check Nogizaka Streaming Now at 22:02o(>∀< )o

I wrote this blog while listening to a SPYAIR playlist on repeat. At this very momeny Sakuramitsutsuki is plaing.

Well then! Let’s meet again 🚴💨

#Tereblog #9 (Da-re ga koroshitakuu kuro-bin♪)

https://www.nogizaka46.com/s/n46/diary/detail/101156?ima=4755&cd=MEMBER

[carry-on-my-wayward-butt]

He did? Umm.. what happened exactly?

(referring to this post)

my 11th grade chemistry teacher had an associates degree in liberal arts.

you know how in virtually every class you’ve ever had since middle school, your teachers made a big stink about the syllabus? she didn’t have one. this was her first teaching job, which she got because of her length experience as a substitute, not by her licensing qualifications. we were, at first, excited to have her, because she was a “fun sub” and we were 17 years old and stupid as all shit. we were the “normal chem” class in a system where the only other options were “honors chem” which was filled with children who actually know how to study (or cheat) and have an air of proper student activity, and “AP Chem”, which is clear enough if you’ve been an american student in the last 15 years.

she followed the mcgraw hill chemistry book in order of chapters, despite the fact that our state standardized tests did several of the chapters out of order. ever notice how you’ll suddenly be looking at chapter 11 when just last week you were on chapter 5, then the next week you’re on chapter 8? standardized testing is the reason. anyways by asking my friends in other classes who had chemistry teachers of relative competence, i was able to discern which chapters i should focus on, and while she was distracted with literally watching youtube videos all period, I was turning around in my seat and walking across the classroom helping my friends and enemies with the packets. (she was a two-packets-a-week kinda teacher.)

yes i said enemies too. the people i hated, i hated because they were sons of bitches i wouldnt piss on to put out a fire. i hated them so dearly i used to pray to god that they would bump into me so i could throw myself into the concrete and split my forehead open and get them expelled due to the blood-clause of our “zero-tolerance policy”. two of the kids in my class had, only the previous year, attempted to set my hair on fire.

i hated the teacher more. 

it gave me extreme pleasure to see her fume and clench her fists when a student would say “i need help” across the classroom and she would move to get up and they would say “oh not you miss, im waiting for vicky.” jesus christ the only time ive ever felt a comparable high was when i was at a halloween party in college where i was literally so zooted i couldn’t move.

it got worse over time, her getting more and more angry, my ego growing larger and larger. i was a huge bitch in high school, i really thought i was the smartest bitch in the room at any given moment. severe main character syndrome. imagine that kind of person actually being right for 45 minutes out of every day. can you even comprehend the kind of frustration that would create? in a room full of little sociopaths who dont give a shit about anything but getting this joke of a class over with so they can graduate? your first real teaching job and they look right past you, the teacher, to this annoying little shit whose grades are completely abysmal? how are they managing to learn anything from a child who can barely speak in front of more than 10 people? who turns cherry red in the face of literally every authority figure in the building except you? who can’t concentrate and stay still in one spot for more than five minutes? all of your other classes behave! they listen! they sit down and shut up and do the packets! so what fucking gives!!!

so you say “fine, since you all HATE ME so much i just won’t teach then!!!” on literally week fucking ten of teaching. and instead of prostrating themselves before you, begging you to like... point at transparencies and read directly from powerpoints i guess.

and they all collectively say “okay” and let the chipmunk child flutter between desks and help them memorize formulas and mnemonic devices and shit. surely her grades will suffer if she’s constantly dealing with other people and you’ll have justification that her horseshit is “distracting” and “a detriment to her studies”. she got bored gave up on that after two days after nothing changed.

then we did the midterm.

except at the end of the exam packet was something we never learned because again, she was going through the book chronologically. because i actually enjoyed the chem book (so much that i stole it when the year was up lmao), i knew the material.

it was about lewis dots/structures. i couldn’t tell you a damn thing about it today but in december 2010 i absolutely knew that shit. i didnt have too much of a problem with it in the exam, but the students who had gotten to that point were complaining and at first she pulled that “you should have been studying independently uwu” shit but the class was about to get loud during exam period so she shushed us and said that when we get to that point, just stop, and she’ll mark it correct during grading, no harm no foul just keep it quiet. one of the more confrontational students called horseshit and said theres no way we’re trusting that and there’s definitely no way anyone will keep an entire classroom cheating at the instruction of the teacher quiet.

i offered to teach it.

she scoffed, rolled eyes, said “sure fine but you can’t get your exam back” and i said “okay.” so when everyone was to the point in the exam, we piled them all on her desk and i used the whiteboard to briefly and quietly explain lewis dots, used the book examples and problems, and helped the other kids understand. there were a couple exam questions that were lifted straight from the book problems so i skipped those. while teaching i realized i had gotten a couple wrong which sucked :( it was an incredibly stupid experience overall, and no teacher worth the paper their certification is printed on would have allowed that to happen. and fucking yet.

anyways everyone but me got their exams back and finished it and many of us passed, only a few of them did particularly well.

discussing the chem exam with friends who also took the chem exam, many students found their anecdote about the lewis dots to be confounding, for you see, the exam we took was not, in fact, the midterm, but the god damned final.

she had us taking the fucking final because she didnt read the fucking folders which read “midterm” and “final exam” on them

she was reprimanded severely and we all had to take the exam on different days, in different classrooms, sitting very far apart. after that she hated me even more. like girl it was your fault lmao i am literally a teenager grow up lol. anyways you can imagine how much more fucking insufferable i became, knowing how miserable she was.

it all came to a head in february when some students were giggling quietly following a minor fuck up on her part regarding bellwork. they were making fun of her like “are you sure thats not tomorrows bellwork lol” and a friend next to me did the “hey i need help wait no miss not you sorry” thing and when i answered him, she solidly snapped. blah blah YOURE SOOOO DISTRACTING blah blah YOU THINK YOURE SOOOO SMART DONT YOU blah blah blah and she was like demanding i leave the room and shouting at the top of her lungs at me “ YOU POISON THE MINDS OF EVERY OTHER STUDENT HERE. YOU’RE POISONOUS VICTORIA, YOU’RE A VIRUS IN THIS CLASSROOM.”

i will never forget that line as long as i live. it was like crack to me. i moved to open the door to leave and the vp opened it first. he escorted me to the office and asked me what happened, then told me to keep my head down in class from now on, and that if i wanted to help my friends i should give them my number and help them out on our own time. i was like “bro thats really stupid” and he was like “thats all we can do right now but i promise we’re working on it”

i lasted the rest of the year giving smug smiles as we did packet after fucking packet for the rest of the year. they were all take-home work. i wasnt comfy giving my number to my enemies. the class camaraderie ended.

the final was altered. my class took a different final than the rest of the normal chem classes.

i started 12th grade and got a solid case of senioritis. i told that story to anyone who would listen. while it was happening, i obviously told my favorite teacher everything as it happened. when i mentioned it senior year he was like “oh yeah i forgot about her,

she was fired over the summer.”

[darklightmiwxo]

MIW history

Hello I want to make a history and facts post of MIW. I been a fan for a few months so I may miss some stuff out. New fans can check this out to understand more of the band.

Motionless in white members:

[IMG=OAA]

Name: Chris motionless (cerulli)

Full name: Christopher Cerulli)

Age: 34

Birthday: October 17 1986

Zodiac: Libra

Birth place: Scranton Pennsylvania

Height: 6'1

Role: main singer

Relationship Status: single

Chris says he doesn't want to get married.

Fear: heights and flying

Personality: a really kind person who cares for his fans he's funny and has a dad humor. Everyone just see him as a dad to them.

Interest: Chris really loves dogs. He plays video games halo and call of duty he plays it all the time. His fave bands is slipknot,marlin manson,korn,HIM,and more rock bands.

[IMG=EOZ]

Name: Ricky Olson (horror)

Full name: Richard Alison Olson the third

Nick name: Rick

Age: 32

Birthday: September 1st 1988

Birth place: Seattle WA

Lives: Scranton Pennsylvania

Zodiac: Virgo

Height: 5'6

Uni: he studied film production in college but dropped out for the band.

Role: rhythm guitarist and backing vocalist

Relationship status: taken by Jamie L

Fear: dying alone,being hated,failing

Personality: he's a calm sweet person he's very smart and also really kind. He's a good caring friend. However he can be a troll sometimes and mess around with everyone because he loves doing it. He loves his fans so much. He's a shy boy.

Interest: he loves to write,draw,edit,take photos, record videos,run his YouTube channel,create a mini sketch video to post on his channel, being a director,he loves cats and reading books.

Ricky fave bands is: muse,HIM,afi,slipknot,BMTH,Ariana grande,Ellie goulding.

[IMG=NEP]

Name: Vinny Mauro

Full name: Vinchenzo Mauro

Nick name: vin,chenzo,sachetti

Nationality: Italian American

Age: 27

Birthday: Nov 22 1993

Birth place: jersey shore Pennsylvania

Zodiac: Sagittarius

(he's also a Sagittarius Scorpio cusp)

Height: 5'6

Uni: vinny study computer programming but he dropped out of college to join the band in 2014

Role: drummer

Bands: MIW,suffer club,trap demon

Relationship Status: single

Fear: being hated by people

Personality: in most of Ricky vlogs vinny seem extroverted he is loud around friends and has lots of fun being silly. But in reality there is a side to him that isn't easy to see you can see it in his twitch stream. He's actually really introverted he said this himself. He's calming and sweet he interact with fans a lot and making sure fans respect each other. He loves to be alone in his room for many days avoiding human contact. Vinny mention being too shy to go up to new people but he is fine if people go up to him. He doesn't feel comfortable talking to new people. He likes being alone.

Interest: creating rap beats,playing video games,making music,dogs and cats,playing drums.

Vinny fave artist are: Fall out boy,paramore,korn,panic! At the disco,HIM,my chemical romance,arch enemy,maroon 5,emeiem,Ariana grande,dua lipa,Mack millo,doji cat,bring me the horizon,pierce the veil,sleeping with sirens,all time low,black veil brides,Rihanna,linkin park,green day,evanescences.

[IMG=XHH]

Name: Ryan Sitkowski

Age: 30

Birthday: Jan 8,1991

Zodiac: Capricorn

Birth place: Pennsylvania

Height: 5'11?

Uni: he dropped out of college to join MIW

Role: lead guitarist

Relationship Status: taken

Fear: spiders

Personality: Ryan is a chill person he's shy and caring to fans. He's also a troll he loves to mess around with his friends.

Interest: guitar,video games,trading card games.

Bands: the same as the rest of miw probably.

[IMG=QFE]

Name: Justin morrow

Age: 32?

Birthday: May 11th

Birth place: Caledonia, New York

Zodiac: Taurus

Height: 6'1

Role: bassist

Relationship Status: married

Fear: ?

Personality: Justin is a kind chill person who cares for his fans and his friends. He left ice nine kills to right away help MIW on tour. Justin is also a troll he loves trolling his friends.

Interest: videos games but not a nerd like the others,bass,cosplaying,putting makeup on.

Bands: the same as MIW

Motionless in white history:

The band started in high school of 2005

Chris,Angelo,Frank p,Kyle white being the first members of the band. Later after college and the bands demo releases Josh joined the band. Frank moved to bass. Micheal and TJ join as guitarist. Later on micheal left the band and Chris met Ryan. Ryan then joined as guitarist of the band. Chris met Ricky in 2009. Frank left the band and Ricky was the new bassist for MIW.

MIW got more popular in 2009 when they tour around the state's in a van. Tj left the band a year later to join escape the fate (Ronnie radke of falling in reverse old band and bless the fall singer Craig band) Ricky then became the new rythmn guitarist of the band. Ghost (Devin) join as the bass player of the band. During the infamous album creation Angelo was feeling ill he couldn't play drums well anymore he gets tired easily and his drum skills wasn't good at all he was eating bad that it make him weak. He couldn't drum anymore so he left the band. The band had other drummers help record their albums. Brandon was the touring drummer for the band till the end of the reincarnated album. The band met vinny and he became the new drummer he was in the reincarnated music video playing drums but you can't see him much in the music video. Vinny then became a member of MIW not a tour drummer anymore but a actually member of MIW. Josh left the band around this time. In the graveyard shift era after the making of the album the whole band kicked ghost out of the band because the fans told the band what ghost did to fans which was very gross. The band kicked him out and Justin from ice nine kills join the band as bassist then he quit ice nine kills to be working full time for MIW. Disguise is the first album where the whole current members of the band created songs without other people doing it for them.

Chris history from high school to now:

Chris grew up in Pennsylvania. He met his friends who end up being the band members of the band he wanted to create he wasn't expecting to be the main singer. At a young age Chris started getting tattoos everywhere.

Chris cared about the band and just went for it.

Demos of the band was created. Chris is a perfectionist he wants the album to be perfect so he was judging everything in order to make a album he liked. Band members left but he didn't quit the band he try to find new band members and try to meet new bands. He worked hard for the band he carry the whole band and make sure the band was doing well. Chris thanks Ryan and Ricky for being the most loyal band members staying with him all these years and not leaving him. Chris had the fear of failing the band breaking up and Chris dreams crushing down but Chris didn't let that happen at all. And here we are today.

Ryan Sitkowski college to now:

Ryan dropped out of college to join MIW at age 17. He was new to the band and Josh didn't like him at all. Ryan was at a young age traveling all over the state with the band. Ryan haven't shared much of his life on the internet he kept it more private. Ryan got a girlfriend and then when the lockdown happen he started streaming on twitch to interact with fans and made a discord too.

Ricky Olson high school to now:

Ricky is the oldest of his siblings. When Ricky was young he was playing with his friends sports and something hit his tooth so half of Ricky teeth is fake. He mention he cry to his mom on the phone because of it. Ricky in middle school wanted to be in a band because his friends played instruments and he wanted to join them. Ricky in high school was a shy boy who had a few friends but they were mostly fake friends. Ricky Olson begin to play guitar and write stories because of the inspiration of Ville Valo from HIM. He became obsessed with HIM. Ricky was in a band in high school as the lead singer but was kicked out for sounding like Ville valo. One of Ricky dreams was to be in a band and also a film maker. In college he study film production. While also working in band merch booth selling band merch to people. But since Ricky was too shy he got yelled at for not speaking up and selling more. Ricky was in a bad time around 2008 and 2009. He share this in a blog years ago about this. He was in a lost place had a bad past and he was thinking of the past all the time and future worrying about failing the future he wanted to be in a band but he was so lost he had no idea what to do in his life. He would day dream about being in a band and then cry to sleep every night about his life. He had depression and gave up with everything in his life. He drank achoul every day. One day on his sister 16 birthday Ricky was drunk coming home from work to go to his parents house his sister was sleeping in her bed.

Tw// self harm and suicide attempt:

Ricky was laying in his sister's bed he cut his arm with a knife it was a lot Ricky was sobbing while watching the blood going down his arm to the floor his dad saw what happen and ask Ricky what happen. Ricky was sobbing and yelling he wanted to die many times. He passed out and went to the hospital he lost a lot of blood and the achoul level was really high he drank way too much. He almost died. He end up getting better and went to see a therapist. He went to see MIW with a friend. Ricky met Chris and the band thought Ricky was cool so he invited them to stay at his house. Chris text Ricky being like should join our band. Ricky would often say idk if I should he didn't know if he would be good enough for the band.

He later on join and quit college but Ricky mention still feeling depressed while in the band. Josh ballaz disliked Ricky when he joined too. 2 years later Ricky moved to rythmn guitarist but he wasn't used to playing guitar since he mostly did bass so he often made mistakes on guitar. He was still learning to play guitar. Things got better for Ricky. But his dream job was always filming he does some film stuff on tour and at home. Though he knew he probably won't be a film maker for movies like he dream of doing he makes whatever he can make. Ricky has stomach problems he often went to the doctor because of it.

Vinny Mauro childhood to now:

Vinny is one of the youngest children of his family. He has many siblings. Vinny mention on stream that he had a bad past. He mention that his dad would take achoul all the time and not give a fuck about vinny. Vinny mom would always go after Vinny. Vinny as a kid was a trouble maker he would disobey his parents and think it was funny. His mom would throw stuff at him and threaten him. His dad gave him a drum set so vinny end up learning to play drums he self taught himself to play drums. He listen to music and got into new types of music he likes all types of music. In middle school a girl that he liked asked him if he can play paramore on drums and vinny played it for her.

In high school vinny was a outcast and loner he made friends in his neighborhood but at school he had no friend. He didn't fit in with anyone. He mention in Ricky Olson podcast his high school life. Ricky ask him how he didn't find friends in high school. Vinny mention saying he didn't fit in with anyone he is also a shy person so he doesn't go up to new people. He was more a loner and was fine with it. Vinny went to uni to study computer programming but he didn't like it at all he was often bored he posted videos of him drumming on his YouTube channel. He knew a guy who knew MIW. MIW was looking for a drummer and they asked vinny to try out for drums in another country which was Australia. Vinny dropped out of college and told his parents what he was doing they weren't happy about that but he end up going over there trying out drums but he was very nervous. He met the band and then went to start drumming. Chris and Ricky were in the same room as vinny they were watching him play drums. Chris being very judgemental. He often scares Ricky when he's on guitar and Ricky fear to make a single mistake in front of Chris and vinny felt that fear. He even said I think I mess up a few times on drums. After he finish drumming. Ricky and Chris went to talk said not a single word and vinny was sweating so much thinking he made a mistake and he won't be part of the band. Later on Chris made vinny part of the band. Vinny became the tour member of the band then he became a member of MIW.

Years later vinny decided to interact more with fans since he had time to so he livestreams on twitch and has discord to interact with fans.

The lock down happen and vinny spend time interacting with fans. He lives with his friend in a house together. But something about vinny these few years mostly months to now that was starting to show. Vinny was suddenly showing signs of depression he often tweet depressing stuff but each year got worst for him. 2020 was the start of vinny's down fall. He had so much self hate he hated his hair,his body,his looks everything about himself he hate. He even tweeted saying I'm sad so I'm going to make a song. He release alone. Even he tweeted about something sad saying 2020 was a bad start for him and Ricky ask if he was ok and hoping vinny was just joking around. During December vinny had back pains because of a sneeze that hurt his nerves so vinny was in so much pain and he didn't see a doctor he thought he could fight it himself just taking pain meds to him. In Jan of 2021 the start of vinny down hill. He was in so much pain he couldn't leave his room or chair he couldn't even drum. He was very depressed. He hated life so much. A month later he got better and went back to streaming but still he was struggling there was some bad stuff happening anyway with him. The covid shot made him sick Saying he didnt eat anything for 4 days he felt like throwing up he even woke up in the middle of the night thinking he was going to do it and other stuff that made him depressed. Around April of this year small amount of fans notice something was going on with vinny he mention so much self hate about himself. In May he mention he was fine but a week later he said he was depressed and talking about what happen months ago and years ago. Sharing something about his family past and he stopped himself saying he doesn't want to get too into it. Vinny mention that he was eating food once a day because he felt like he is fat for over eating food all the time so he end up just eating dinner only everyday. He done it since the beginning of March and still is doing it. He wanted to loss weight. So he doesn't want breakfast and lunch but he eats dinner.

Around may vinny was in rock bottom he talk to no one at all even Ryan was 30 mins away from vinny and he ask him why he didn't go to see him and vinny said he didn't know why. Vinny mention saying he talked to no one for a week straight he also mention he isn't the kind of person to go up to people he said he's very introverted. he stopped streaming for weeks because he was doing bad. He said he felt burnt out and tired.

He took his break off social media for many weeks. Around this time many fans notice vinny was really not doing well.

Then he return to streaming around the 18th of June. Just to say hi he said he miss his fans but he plans to stream again a few weeks later. He mention that he have been avoiding all human contact and was staying in his room playing video games and drums all day still with the once a meal thing he does. Vinny said he's not depressed but people ask him about his depressing tweets and he said is it really depressing. Someone ask him why he is listening to sad music and he said am I not allowed to enjoy music. Now more fans are worried about him. Many more fans noticing that vinny isn't ok and he's hiding it.

That's basically all of MIW history I could give.

I will update and add more to the list later when something new happens. The vinny stuff is true I been watching his streams a lot and he mention those stuff so I just wanted to share what he said. I been a MIW fan for 8 months so I may not know Ryan and Justin as much as the others. Since they don't share much about themselves.

Hoping you enjoy this. Free feel to comment somethings I forgot to add.

Please don't argue about ghost ok. Ty

[popculturebuffet]

Uncle Scrooge by Don Rosa:  The Isle at the Edge of Time (Thank You Comission For Rosie Isla)

Hello all you happy people! Today’s review is a bit special as it’s the result of another review. See I had trouble finding a translation of the subject of last weeks’ mother’s day special, Family Ties. 

No not that one. I have Paramount+. I can watch all the Family Ties I want and that’s a fact that i’m pleased as punch about. 

No it was the story 80 is Prachtig, called Family Ties in the copy used, Della’s first major comics appearance and one that explains what happened to her in the classic continuity, one that clearly served as the foundation for her far more fleshed out 2017 versions personality and backstory. It also had Pinocchio in it for some reason, and spent most of it’s large run time on a meta comedy plot that had nothing to do with the reason anyone wanted to read this story in the first place.

But despite being a vitally important story, it never got an english translation, something that baffled me till I read the story and found cameos of the racist indigenous stereotypes from Peter Pan. In 2014. You may commence booing. Even with how weird the story was I simply couldn’t find the story googling it and the Della tag is too vast and deep to go spelunking in.

So what’s all this have to do? Simple I put out a post last month when neither I nor Kev, who wanted to comission it as part of Moons, Millionares and Mothers, my coverage of all three season 2 Ducktales story arcs, could find a copy and offered a review to whoever found it.  Weeks passed I got nothing.. then in the 11th hour I got a break as the lovely @rosieisla​ found a translation that was on this very site, one she seemed to have helped with. As a result I could do the review and as a man of my word, offered it up despite her clearly having not seen that part of the post and simply having done this to be nice. Still she gladly took up the offer and offered me my pick of two stories: The Carl Barks Story Back to Long Ago or this one. 

As for WHY I picked this one Back To Long Ago didn’t seem bad, i’m just not a fan of “The Cast is put in the past as their own ancestors” type deals. Or in some cases put the cast as people from that time period. It’s just not for me and is most often done in TV where it can get really goofy, Beverly Hills 90210 being a prime example of this, though Girl Meets World was no slouch in being embarassing... that being said I really need to finish that show and miss it. 

So yeah when put up against a story with two intresting hooks and FLINTHEART GLOMGOLD, even if i’ts not the version that’s my boy, it was no contest. So what are these hooks you ask? Well join me under the cut and find out. 

We open with a weird stylistic choice: This story has a narrator complete with caption boxes. Now for those of you familiar with comics or pastiches of comics in tv and film, this probably dosen’t seem like a big deal. It was a common thing in comics from their inception to 90′s to have caption boxes, big boxes of text narrating the action to help move things along faster. It did start to fade out by the 80′s and was gone by the end of the 90′s for the most part, replaced instead with first person narration. It’s the kind of thing you’d see most often in the Golden and Silver Ages, with stuff like tihs

It’s not a BAD device, it’s good old cheesy and bombastic fun and some writers did get clever with it.. like that time Chris Claremont used the narration to yell at a greiving cyclops after he lost a teammate early in his long and storied run on the uncanny x-men. 

This is a objectively weird scene that’s still somehow effective by the by. On the one hand it does come off as Chris Claremont essentally bullying Cyclops who already feels guilty for a death that was not in fact his fault as Thunderbird was told the plane he was attacking with fleeing villian Count Nefaria was about to explode and refused to listen.. and that they needed to get rid of either him or Wolverine as both served the same purpose and chose the non-white guy. 

On the other htough it comes off just as much as Scott beating himself up in his grief and anger over the event and his perceived failings as a leader. It’s good stuff and shows why this run caught on as this was only three issues in. Also the rest of the issue features the X-Men fighting a giant cyclopian demon that Cyclops accidently freed in his rage by destroying the stone thing keeping him imprisoned. No really here’s the cover

Huh so tha’ts what Nifty’s dad looks like. Neat. Also I REALLY hope we get the X-Men fighting aliens or demons in the MCU. Unlike the XCU the MCU isn’t alergic to getting batshit.. and for the record Deadpool and New Mutants are the exception, not the rule.

My point that I swear I do have is that this was common practice for most comics.. but never really for Disney Duck comics. It popped up ocasionally, like with Scrooge’s introduction, but Barks and those after him never really used them that much. Sure they’d have caption boxes for flasbacks and what not but Barks and Co geninely only used this sort of thing to set up a story. The most i’ve seen it in a duck comic is life and times and even then i’ts usually only used for gags or to set up the passage of time, as the story IS covering decades and thus often needed to have montages to show time passing, and in the case of chapter 11, had to cover decades in the span of a single chapter, so it’s not like they had many other options. So even Rosa as a personal quirk didn’t really use these often. 

Rosa used this specifically because he felt the plot was complicated by the use of the international date line. As for what it is, it’s essentially a line marking calender dates from one side of the hemisphere to the others. To use the offical defentition from the National Ocean Service I found via a quick google:

“The International Date Line, established in 1884, passes through the mid-Pacific Ocean and roughly follows a 180 degrees longitude north-south line on the Earth. It is located halfway round the world from the prime meridian—the zero degrees longitude established in Greenwich, England, in 1852.

The International Date Line functions as a “line of demarcation” separating two consecutive calendar dates. When you cross the date line, you become a time traveler of sorts! Cross to the west and it’s one day later; cross back and you’ve “gone back in time."

Despite its name, the International Date Line has no legal international status and countries are free to choose the dates that they observe. While the date line generally runs north to south from pole to pole, it zigzags around political borders such as eastern Russia and Alaska’s Aleutian Islands.”

Rosa felt this made the story complicated.... and that... really isn’t remotely true. The narration is mostly used for gagas and really dosen’t clarify anything. it’s mostly used well in the opening.. but the actual explinations for the date line are clear enough in the story that even if I hadn’t looked the thing up, I still would’ve got it and i’m sure a kid would’ve too. It just feels like a weird thing to ruminate on, especially because he’s got actual things to make up for: while to his credit the native american characters he cribbed from carl barks are sympathetic, their culture respected and treated decently and used for a green aseop, their dialouge is stitled and sterotypical something he dosen’t even comment on (And these trades ewren’t THAT long ago) 

And of course it dosen’t help that he dosen’t even comment on using a common device in american superhero boooks.. in the same volume where he ONCE again makes an unwanted and outdated diatribe about superhero comics. I’ll probably cover the Super Snooper Strikes again so I can throughly tear this apart but higlights include: Calling superhero comics “Unwanted” just because he dosen’t like them personally, when people like me would disagree and they’ve lasted through a LOT of highs and lows, outdately saying they took over the American market as the only suitable comics which while true for a TIME,but by 2015 when this book was printed is laughably out of date, as non superhero works like The Walking Dead, Saga, and Scott Pilgrim were massively popular, one of my faviorite comics that is entirely slice of life and would go on to bea huge hit, Giant Days, re-debuted that very year. He also has the fucking gal to insult The Uncanny X-Men by name and I swear to god I did not know this when I made those references earlier, but as you probably guessed REALLY god me livid. 

And this is just on his COMMENTS on the story I can’t imagine just how bad the content itself is and having read the first few pages which come off as Rosa using Donald to essentially do an “old man yells at cloud rant” about superhero comics, I really don’t want to. Might make htis a patreon exclusive or again would do it on comissoin. You all make the call.... the point is I don’t likes his elitist bullshit about superhero comics, and this is clearly something that gets my hackles up as I just spent a good two paragraphs of an entirely unrealted review yelling at the guy for it. I don’t like when he does this and this authors notes entirley felt like an excuse. I GET the dark age of comics were bad, they REALLY were that bad, but I will NEVER accept painting an enitre genre as bad just because one work in it is bad. And I wont accept it from someone who himself writes about an often throughly unlikeable anti-hero for a living.  Scrooge may not have a gun on his gun on his gun or get to stabbing or have pouches, but he DOES finacially abuse his nephew, scoff at people’s personal troubles, and often refuse to use his wealth to help others in general. So yeah in conclusion Rosa really needs to say less about this subject. 

Okay so where were we.. right the story hadn’t even started yet. Jesus. 

Okay so our story begins with the narrator. Whose going on about time and what not. The main point of this speech about time is that it’s night in Duckburg and Scrooge is going to bed as, even being the workhorse that he is, he can’t keep going 24 hours. While he’s snoozing though something major happens and it’s the hook that made me pick this story along with the international dateline one.. an island rises thanks to volcanic erruption.. and the lava is GOLD. That’s just pure unabashed classic Duck Stuff: a mysterious treasure or phenominon of gold bound to bring scrooge in. 

But Scrooge isn’t stupid: the sun comes up and the world still spins while he sleeps, so he set up a satalite to monitor for this sort of thing. The thing naturally goes nuts.. and even more naturally breaks down becasue Scrooge bought cheap parts. A nice gag and a fully in character way to bring our antagonist into the picture, as the Satellite of Loaded falls in the middle of South Africa... right on the property of my boy Flintheart Glomgold. 

This is something Rosa brought up in his commentary for the story i’d never thought about. It turns out Glomgold being a citzen of Duckburg WASN’T an invention of the original Ducktales but the comics: some overseas had understandably moved him from his home country of South Africa. Him bieing in the same town as Scrooge instead of half a world away allows for easier setups and more intresting ones.

Rosa however being obdient to Barks Version of things, ketp Glomgold in South Africa like barks did, which was an .. ifffy decision given Apartheid had JUST ended at the time of this story. Not so much in the reboot as not only had apartheid been long gone by the time of the reboot, but that’s more fair. Still we do get some gorgeous vistas as a result as Glomgold’s minon goes to look at it and finds it’s from McDuck Mining company... Glomgold’s reaction is obvious. 

So on that note we cut to Scrooge rushing to Donalds house and forcing him awake and not telling him anything at first. Look his Ducktales Counterpart straight up kidnapped his donald in my last review, I’d call this a win. He also tries to dress Donald while explaning both his panic to find the crashed satlitle and what it found: the golden island. The end result of him dressing donald is worth a chuckle

So after Donald puts his shirt and little hat on our heroes get rollin rollin rollin what keep rollin rollin rollin who to Manilla. On the plane we get the scene I mentioned: The boys make a quip about Scrooge having lost a day and the group go over the international date line. It’s a fun little scene especially Donald trying to get paid early at the end. Classic scrooge and donald stuff without the abusive undertones some of their classic stuff has. 

Meanwhile Glomgold works out the data and finds out about the gold island, and his excitement accidently wakes a giraffe outside.. welll it was nice knowing him, Giraffes are the deadliest species known to man.. here’s an educational video t back that up....

So at Manilla Airport, Scrooge finds out abotu the south african crash, figuring he’ll get a laugh out of glomgold being there ... only for Donald to spot the Jet. Scrooge figures this can’t be anything good... now come on man maybe he’s just promoting his energy drink. 

As super sayin god super sayian as my witness, I will never get tired of Ultra Instinct Glomgold here. 

Scrooge isn’t so nice about that though and figures he better find out if Glomgold knows about the island and bribes one of the fueling crew for his uniform. He sucesssfully eavesdrops on Glomgold talking to his pilot, finding out from him exactly WHERE the island is. He ends up hilariously botching the mission though: when getting ready to leave Glomgold complains abotu the price of gas and that naturally causes Scrooge, just as cheap, to join in... and Glomgold to find out it’s Scrooge. The two wrestle outside the plane but before this can progress to a game of Naked Robber an airport security guy comes up and Scrooge cleverly claims that Glomgold’s plane has an infestiation, requring it to be quanrantined and allowing Scrooge to jet on.. thoguh not with an actual jet. With Glomgold seemingly dispatched, he can afford to save some money and take his time with a seaplane and I know just the man for the job. 

Oh nope looks like he’s busy. So one time related rambles later we meet Keoki, their asian pilot from the tiny island of Wookawooka.. and no that’s not a real place i checked... and no Fozzy dosen’t own it his check bounced. That being said it is a very well done represntation of someone from a smaller country: he’s doing this job to try and bring money back home, but being a seaplane captain just isn’t enough and his island is dying. Scrooge naturally is about as sympathetic as you’d expect, having apparently never even heard of the idea of a bonus when Huey, Dewey or Louie suggests it. 

Even less suprising is that Glomgold streaks by in his Jet:turns out Manilla was already overun with the bugs Scrooge claimed and Donald rubs it in that had Scrooge got a JET this wouldn’t of been an issue. 

So Glomgold easily beats them there, and to add insult and actualy injury to a cash based one, our heroes get blasted by golden lava on the way in and crash. Should’ve gotten launchpad... got the crashing professional. Keoki is dispondent as this means his people are doomed. He also dosen’t know waht staking a claim is when Scrooge mentions it and the boys bring him up to speed with the poor guy saying he wish he could for WookaWooka. Donald also makes a valid point about how greedy and heartlress scrooge can be.. and really billiionares in general.

No no YOUR the Grouch who refuses to have one drop of emapthy. Donald’s just pissed at your general selfish and terrible behavior. 

Glomgold glomgloats and has seemingly won... but naturally that rant that seemed extranious at the time about the date line comes into play: turns out the Island is on it, and since glomgold put his marker int he west, Scrooge simply puts his in the east which is a whole day before. Now GRANTED there’s nor eal legal prescendice for the intetaoinal date line itself , as noted above... but there’s enough witnesses in Scrooge’s favor that it simply does not matter anyway. Scrooge SEEMINGLY wins.

But Huey, Dewey Or Louie instead backs another claim: Keoki’s from earlier. While it was made in gest, he and the others along with Donald back it as witnsses instad. WookaWooka is saved and SCrogoe ends the story yelling at the narrator.

Final Thoughts: Don Rosa.. did not like this story, feeling it wasn’t one of his best and apologizing for it. I however.. really loved it. It’s not PERFECT: the narration feels not entirely necessary and the gag isn’t as funny as he thinks, though the payoff of scrooge saying “it’s time for this story to end” is fucking hilarous. I also feel it’s a bit too compressed: the story is only 16 pages and was only THAT long because Rosa added a few for exposition, a worthy addition. This feels like one of his 30 page adventure stories but slightly crammed into half the length. I also feel the golden island bit was BADLY underused as it’s such a cool setting but barely shows up in the story. 

But despite that.. it’s still a fun story: as is standard for Rosa the art is gorgeous and the humor is great. And unlike some stories where Rosa casually ignores how terrible scrooge is, here it’s his own greed and hubris that do him in: had he actually agreed to help Keoki, the boys likey would’ve let him keep the island but his own cold refusual to be a human being does him in, just as his cheapness nearly did. Flintheart is also decent here.. not the deepest foe but frankly most classical duck antagonists really aren’t all that fleshed out, and we still get some good bits with him. The dateline bit, while telegraphing that it will be important, as I said REALLY isn’t that hard to understand. All in all while i’ll agree with Rosa this isn’t his BEST, it’s still a really damn good story and one he shoudln’t be ashamed of. 

Tommorow: Green Eggs and ham is back for some train shenanigans! Kay. 

Saturday: The Tom Retrospective returns for it’s last detour! Eclipsa and Moon team up to stop meteora but grapple with diffrent wants: One to save her daughter.. the other to stop waht she clearly sees as an out of control monster. The result.. will only lead to tragedy and a hell of a two parter. 

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