#and frankly a majority of the first 12 to 15 of those years was spent in adjoining or singular motel rooms in small towns | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

leebrontide · 4 years

Text

A true, 30 year, tropetastic, queer love story. (Part 1)

Pls open the link if you'd like to read a 30 year, trope-tastic true queer romance featuring pining, instalove, swords, childhood-friends-to-lovers and a happy ending.

We THINK the story begins in 1991. We know it starts at theatre day-camp for kids, a summer when we were both in elementary school.

The earliest memories are vague- I remembered a super cool kid from the older class with dark eyes who I was desperate to eat lunch with every day.

It's taken us years to reconstruct the timeline. We have figured out I did go to her house outside of camp that first year, because I remember her bird that tried to bite me. We can only guess at years based on camp themes.

Because we were little kids. I was 7. So we lost touch.

But here's the thing- we kept going to the same camp. She was always in a class ahead of me, because I'm a year and a half younger.

And every year- apparently without remembering we'd met before? We became summer best friends. Drawn together over and over.

But, being disorganized kids in a world of lesser tech, every year, when camp ended, we lost phone numbers- we lived a good 30 minutes away from each other, so I have to imagine our parent's weren't exactly heartbroken at the loss. It was a lot of driving.

In 4th grade, when I was 9, I made a new best friend, named Meredith. My parents heartily recommended the summer theatre camp to hers, and she was sent with me, the next year.

She, was older than me, so she was in Ty's class. & having excellent taste, also made friends with her.

The three of us played together all summer.

Then came the fall, and the inevitable lost contact. I remember being sad about that much more clearly, that year.

BUT, the big change happened when I was 10.

Again, sent to camp. Again, my friend Meredith was there to.

At lunch, I found them playing together. I went to introduce myself to the obviously cool older girl.

For some reason I tried to shake her hand? Little weirdo.

Ty reacts to me the same way- oh hey! Cool new person! I want to be friends!

Meredith looks at us both like we're out of our minds.

"You know each other. We played all last summer."

And suddenly, the spell of childhood amnesia was broken.

I DID know her. We were FRIENDS.

We HAD BEEN FRIENDS for years.

She LIKED ME.

SHE LIKED ME.

(love with memory disabilities is a trip, folks. And her lil ADHD kid brain was struggling right alongside mine)

We were elated.

But that wasn't the last shock to my little 10 year old heart that 5 week summer camp would bring.

Meredith was, and is, a poet. Somehow she had a habit, at 11 years old, of making up poems about people's eyes.

Weird stuff. I remember a pair of green eyes being compared to a deep sea, were the bones of drunken drowned sailors floated.

Very Anne of Green Gables.

And- I remember this part with perfect clarity. She turned to me and said, do you know who has pretty eyes? Ty.

We were crossing the stage, Ty was carrying a box of props like 15 feet ahead of us.

I said "does she?"

And then, ever the romantic I screamed "HEY TY TURN AROUND I WANNA SEE SOMETHING!"

She did.

And for the first time, I looked into the dark eyes I'd been drawn to for all those years, and saw them anew.

There's a reason cupid's supposed to have arrows.

I swear to you that this is true. It felt like an actual blow to my chest. Like a physical blow.

I was stunned. My little heart was hammering out of control.

I have no idea what I said, or did, or looked like after that.

But I figured out pretty quickly what that was. It was not subtle, even to a prepubescent nearly 6th grader.

But I was a pragmatic little almost-6th-grader.

This was a crush. Middle schoolers have crushes.

And they're supposed to fade over time.

I don't remember if I was worried that my crush was on a girl. I just remember the certainty that this was just a child's crush, and therefor nothing that would last or cause problems.

And when fall came, I lost her number again.

But this time I was devastated.

But, this time a hero saved the day! Meredith, sweet, wonderful, more-organized-than-either-of-us Meredith, still had the number.

And this time, I held on to it.

We became year round besties.

For the first year of adoring her year-round, I didn't worry about my little crush. It'd go away in time.

By 7th grade, it started to be a problem.

We were having sleep overs, and I started to feel guilty about how much I wanted to look at her and cuddle her all the time.

I don't think I told anyone right away. But Meredith was always the smartest of us three.

She's the one who proposed we play "wedding". She presided over the ceremony herself, and her little sister was our wedding photographer.

Oddly, even though I didn't know about this photo till years later, this is a game both of us remember playing.

It meant... something.

Image

I started to feel guilty. We were having sleep overs, talking every day on the phone. I wanted to look at her all the time- I wanted to be with her all the time. I wanted to kiss her, and started to realize she might be bothered by that.

I never wanted to hide anything from her.

So, I confessed my love. I didn't think of this as being especially radical or brave, but in retrospect, I'm impressed by 12 year old Lee's behavior.

She smiled brightly, and said she loved me to!

As her best friend.

I clarified my position.

She repeated that she loved me as her very best friend.

And these feelings were a bit scary and BIG, so that was all good. She still wanted to hang out all the time. Life was good.

By 8th grade, I was starting to worry. The crush hadn't worn off yet. Everyone told me these things wore off.

But I was more in love with her than ever.

And when Meredith moved to Nashville, we got even closer.

We joined the MN sword club. Made new friends. In the way of these things, a whole lot of them turned out to be some evolving variety of queer. Friends started coming out.

I barely needed to, my crush was horrifyingly obvious to all our friends.

Image

I promised you swords. The swords don't feature prominently, but the club was a major connection for us for years, and this detail has always struck me.

I'm not an especially good fencer. Especially then. I was constructed out of raw spaghetti noodles and moved like creaky budget claymation most of the time. I was calculating, but slow.

She was fast, and brash, and more skilled than me. She eventually beat some nationally recognized fencers. We called her "fiery Tybalt" because we're a bunch of big ol nerds who wanted to sound smart. She eventually took her name from that nickname.

Even at only 5ft tall, she should have beaten me handily and reliably. She could hold her own against much better fencers.

But we actually got BANNED from sparring together, because we were so evenly matched we could never get enough points for a win.

My one and only expertise in fencing was knowing her. But she knew me just as well, so there was a stalemate.

Our friends laughed at us.

I confessed my love again in 8th grade.

And 9th.

10th.

11th.

I never wanted to lie to her. It was important to me that she knew what I was thinking and feeling, but it was also important that I not burden her with it.

She always gave me the same answer. She loved me. She loved me SO MUCH.

What a shame she was straight.

Now, readers, let me remind you we're looking at two queer kids in the 90s at this point.

There were pressures at play.

When I was in 11th grade, she left for college. And she was far enough away that long distance calls were expensive. I couldn't call her every day.

What I remember most about senior year was being depressed and lonely.

But also, that after years of my family despairing of my ever learning to type, and eventually getting me the (then very expensive) dragon speech-to-type program so I could type my homework and not fail school- my contact with her was suddenly all in text. AOL messenger.

People have commented at all my workplaces about my typing speed. I type 120 words per minute now.

Specifically because it was the only way to talk to her most days.

I went to college the following year. We both got boyfriends. Both nice boys who liked and admired us.

BOTH broke up with us because we so obviously preferred each other over them. To an embarrassing degree.

The boy I was dating- bless him he only lasted 3 months- specifically told me "if I go out with you any more I'm going to fall in love with you. And you're in love with her."

Slick bastard.

He was right tho.

I couldn't be mad at him.

But this is when I started to really panic.

It'd been 6 years. My first crush was still absolutely roaring. Nobody else came close to tempting me.

And nobody else wanted to, when it became obvious they couldn't compete with her.

And she was still my best friend, so of course I told her. I told her I was miserable, because I was going to be single forever because nobody else would want me, because I was so in love with her.

She felt bad. She loved me so much. So much she'd been dumped to.

Such a shame she was straight.

I wouldn't find out till much later that that conversation had started something on her side, that, for once, she knew to keep from me.

She spent the next 6 months in intense contemplation.

She DID prefer me to all the other boys (and girls) who were chasing her in college.

And there were a lot of them.

She did think I was pretty, and she did love me. And she did want to be with me forever.

She'd been as dedicated to me as I was to her through this whole time. As caring, as invested, as, frankly, obsessed. Everyone could see it.

But she wasn't straight. She was bi.

And ace.

We wouldn't learn that word for many more years. All she knew was that the story of falling in love didn't match the love she was feeling.

But then she realized- she'd never felt the feelings she was "supposed" to feel for her boyfriend, either. She was not more attracted to him than to me. And he was a good looking guy. A catch by most any standard.

And she also hadn't loved him.

But she did love me.

So, my sophomore year of college (her junior year), we were preparing our trip to the Renaissance festival. A bunch of her friends were driving into town for it, and we'd see each other again at last. (we'd been back at school like 2 weeks, so naturally were desperate to meet up)

I am still flabbergasted as the next series of events.

She asked me out. On AOL instant messenger. After over 7 years of my pining, and adoration. After 7 years of choosing the pain of being near her and not being able to kiss her, over the desolation of not having her beside me

She very logically explained her reasoning.

I had a meltdown.

My poor room mate walked into our room to find me crying and throwing things at the computer screen.

I was convinced she was offering to date me because she felt bad for me. Because she loved me and wanted me to stop hurting and feeling alone.

So I turned her down.

That, friends, was HARD. REALLY HARD.

Thankfully, she was having none of it. She insisted it only made sense for us to date. I tried to stay firm. I refused repeatedly, all in that damned AOL messenger.

We reached a compromise- one date, at the Ren Fest, as a test.

And if it failed we'd never speak of it again.

Because the prospect of dating and breaking up was terrifying to us both.

If we were going to be together, we'd be defacto engaged. Neither of us could tolerate breaking up.

The weekend came- my college friends all knew, and accompanied me, made sure I was decked out in the best fair garb we could cobble together.

She drove up with her friends- including the ex- who had no idea what was happening. She had on her finest cape & boots & a swishy dress.

We could not manage to be alone together. Like it was a proper rom-com ridiculousness. All damn day.

But at least we were together.

She came back to my dorm that night, to spend the night, and drive back the next day.

Shout out to my room mate who stayed at her boyfriend's house that night. Love you, Lindsay.

We finally managed to kiss.

She abruptly decided kissing wasn't some weird thing people only pretended to like because it was normal, and was in fact an amazing wonderful thing we should do frequently.

I don't actually remember us deciding that the experiment was successful, and we'd be a romantic couple from then on.

Pretty sure the kissing melted my brain.

It was not like kissing my old boyfriend at all.

She went back to college the next day.

I do remember, that, MORE THAN ONCE, I nervously asked my roomy if this had all really happened. I was truly and genuinely concerned that I'd dreamed or fantasized the whole thing. I'd done both enough times before.

I couldn't just ask outright so I'd say something like. "Hey did anything- important happen yesterday?"

And she'd look at me like I was speaking some alien language, and tell me I was dating Ty now.

I wandered around in a dream-like stupor for a WEEK.

This is a good place to stop for now. More tonight. I need to go snuggle my baby and help my wife with lunch. 💖

Popping in briefly for the next installment.

All our friends knew immediately. Some of them- the newer ones, were confused because they had assumed we were always dating, on account of how blatantly in love we were all the damn time.

We decided tho, to hold off on telling our families. We decided to date a year first, to show that it was serious, and that we meant it.

It was a good year, full of the kind of pining that is regularly rewarded by happy weekends and spring breaks and summers.

The next august, before we went back to school, we each sat down our own parents. Hers were sort of "yeah ok whatever." I was not there for that conversation.

I went to my favorite restaurant with my own parents, and told them I was seeing someone. Dad was enthused. Wanted to meet him.

Well. I said. You have.

Because it's Ty.

#gay love #gay romance #romance tropes #ace love #nonbinary romance #romance tropes tropes love #coming out day 2020

36 notes · View notes

kevinbingham · 4 years

Text

“Not every liberal is the same, though the majority of liberals I know think along roughly these same lines”

https://www.facebook.com/thethinker42/posts/10155931022478700

Lori Gallagher Witt

January 7, 2018

An open letter to friends and family who are/were shocked to discover I'm a liberal...

This is going to be VERY long, so: TL;DR: I'm a liberal, I've always been a liberal, but that doesn't mean what a lot of you apparently think it does.

Some of you suspected. Some of you were shocked. Many of you have known me for years, even the majority of my life. We either steadfastly avoided political topics, or I carefully steered conversations away from the more incendiary subjects in the name of keeping the peace. "I'm a liberal" isn't really something you broadcast in social circles where "the liberals" can't be said without wrinkling one's nose.

But then the 2016 election happened, and staying quiet wasn't an option anymore. Since then, I've received no shortage of emails and comments from people who were shocked, horrified, disappointed, disgusted, or otherwise displeased to realize I am *wrinkles nose* a liberal. Yep. I'm one of those bleeding heart commies who hates anyone who's white, straight, or conservative, and who wants the government to dictate everything you do while taking your money and giving it to people who don't work.

Or am I?

Let's break it down, shall we? Because quite frankly, I'm getting a little tired of being told what I believe and what I stand for. Spoiler alert: Not every liberal is the same, though the majority of liberals I know think along roughly these same lines.

1. I believe a country should take care of its weakest members. A country cannot call itself civilized when its children, disabled, sick, and elderly are neglected. Period.

2. I believe healthcare is a right, not a privilege. Somehow that's interpreted as "I believe Obamacare is the end-all, be-all." This is not the case. I'm fully aware that the ACA has problems, that a national healthcare system would require everyone to chip in, and that it's impossible to create one that is devoid of flaws, but I have yet to hear an argument against it that makes "let people die because they can't afford healthcare" a better alternative. I believe healthcare should be far cheaper than it is, and that everyone should have access to it. And no, I'm not opposed to paying higher taxes in the name of making that happen.

3. I believe education should be affordable and accessible to everyone. It doesn't necessarily have to be free (though it works in other countries so I'm mystified as to why it can't work in the US), but at the end of the day, there is no excuse for students graduating college saddled with five- or six-figure debt.

4. I don't believe your money should be taken from you and given to people who don't want to work. I have literally never encountered anyone who believes this. Ever. I just have a massive moral problem with a society where a handful of people can possess the majority of the wealth while there are people literally starving to death, freezing to death, or dying because they can't afford to go to the doctor. Fair wages, lower housing costs, universal healthcare, affordable education, and the wealthy actually paying their share would go a long way toward alleviating this. Somehow believing that makes me a communist.

5. I don't throw around "I'm willing to pay higher taxes" lightly. I'm self-employed, so I already pay a shitload of taxes. If I'm suggesting something that involves paying more, that means increasing my already eye-watering tax bill. I'm fine with paying my share as long as it's actually going to something besides lining corporate pockets or bombing other countries while Americans die without healthcare.

6. I believe companies should be required to pay their employees a decent, livable wage. Somehow this is always interpreted as me wanting burger flippers to be able to afford a penthouse apartment and a Mercedes. What it actually means is that no one should have to work three full-time jobs just to keep their head above water. Restaurant servers should not have to rely on tips, multibillion dollar companies should not have employees on food stamps, workers shouldn't have to work themselves into the ground just to barely make ends meet, and minimum wage should be enough for someone to work 40 hours and live.

7. I am not anti-Christian. I have no desire to stop Christians from being Christians, to close churches, to ban the Bible, to forbid prayer in school, etc. (BTW, prayer in school is NOT illegal; *compulsory* prayer in school is - and should be - illegal) All I ask is that Christians recognize *my* right to live according to *my* beliefs. When I get pissed off that a politician is trying to legislate Scripture into law, I'm not "offended by Christianity" -- I'm offended that you're trying to force me to live by your religion's rules. You know how you get really upset at the thought of Muslims imposing Sharia on you? That's how I feel about Christians trying to impose biblical law on me. Be a Christian. Do your thing. Just don't force it on me or mine.

8. I don't believe LGBT people should have more rights than you. I just believe we should have the *same* rights as you.

9. I don't believe illegal immigrants should come to America and have the world at their feet, especially since THIS ISN'T WHAT THEY DO (spoiler: undocumented immigrants are ineligible for all those programs they're supposed to be abusing, and if they're "stealing" your job it's because your employer is hiring illegally.). I'm not opposed to deporting people who are here illegally, but I believe there are far more humane ways to handle undocumented immigration than our current practices (i.e., detaining children, splitting up families, ending DACA, etc).

10. I believe we should take in refugees, or at the very least not turn them away without due consideration. Turning thousands of people away because a terrorist might slip through is inhumane, especially when we consider what has happened historically to refugees who were turned away (see: MS St. Louis). If we're so opposed to taking in refugees, maybe we should consider not causing them to become refugees in the first place. Because we're fooling ourselves if we think that somewhere in the chain of events leading to these people becoming refugees, there isn't a line describing something the US did.

11. I don't believe the government should regulate everything, but since greed is such a driving force in our country, we NEED regulations to prevent cut corners, environmental destruction, tainted food/water, unsafe materials in consumable goods or medical equipment, etc. It's not that I want the government's hands in everything -- I just don't trust people trying to make money to ensure that their products/practices/etc are actually SAFE. Is the government devoid of shadiness? Of course not. But with those regulations in place, consumers have recourse if they're harmed and companies are liable for medical bills, environmental cleanup, etc. Just kind of seems like common sense when the alternative to government regulation is letting companies bring their bottom line into the equation.

12. I believe our current administration is fascist. Not because I dislike them or because I'm butthurt over an election, but because I've spent too many years reading and learning about the Third Reich to miss the similarities. Not because any administration I dislike must be Nazis, but because things are actually mirroring authoritarian and fascist regimes of the past.

13. I believe the systemic racism and misogyny in our society is much worse than many people think, and desperately needs to be addressed. Which means those with privilege -- white, straight, male, economic, etc -- need to start listening, even if you don't like what you're hearing, so we can start dismantling everything that's causing people to be marginalized.

14. I believe in so-called political correctness. Not because everyone is a delicate snowflake, but because as Maya Angelou put it, when we know better, we do better. When someone tells you that a term or phrase is more accurate/less hurtful than the one you're using, you now know better. So why not do better? How does it hurt you to NOT hurt another person? Your refusal to adjust your vocabulary in the name of not being an asshole kind of makes YOU the snowflake.

15. I believe in funding sustainable energy, including offering education to people currently working in coal or oil so they can change jobs. There are too many sustainable options available for us to continue with coal and oil. Sorry, billionaires. Maybe try investing in something else.

I think that about covers it. Bottom line is that I'm a liberal because I think we should take care of each other. That doesn't mean you should work 80 hours a week so your lazy neighbor can get all your money. It just means I don't believe there is any scenario in which preventable suffering is an acceptable outcome as long as money is saved.

So, I'm a liberal.

10 notes · View notes

thecollegefootballguy · 4 years

Text

The Top 25 Teams of the Decade: #4 Oklahoma

Hello everybody, we’re celebrating the arrival of the 2020′s by looking at the 25 best programs of the previous decade.

We’ve made it to the top five! If you’ve been reading this whole time thank you. Here’s the 4th best team of the 2010′s:

University of Oklahoma Sooners

Record: 109-25 (.813) Conference Titles: 7 Bowl Seasons: 10 Major Bowls: 7 Playoff/BCS Berths: 4 Final Top 25 Finishes: 9 Final Top 10 Finishes: 6 Final Top 5 Finishes: 4 Best Season: Maybe 2017

Oklahoma was an odd duck in the decade of the 2010′s. The Sooners were one of the most consistent winners in the whole decade, but they were never good to actually win a title. The computers put their best team in 2011, when OU only managed a third place finish in the Big 12, yet they won 7 conference championships, more than any team in these past ten years.

Oklahoma more or less picked up where they left off in the 2000′s. The Sooners were also one of the best in the previous decade as well, perhaps even higher than 4th place, after all they actually won a national title in 2000. Bob Stoops had built up his squad into one of the two heads of the Big 12′s two-headed monster of OU and rival Texas. Both teams spent those years competing with each other and a select few other programs for national championships every year. In fact, Oklahoma’s 8-5 record in 2009 was considered a shocking under-performance, and that was with Heisman contender Sam Bradford out for essentially the entire season.

With Landry Jones having established himself at QB, the Sooners were expecting a return to form in 2010. Business as usual in Norman. OU began the year ranked 7th in the nation after finishing the previous year outside the top 25. That’s a vote of confidence. After avoiding a slip up in Game 1 against Utah State, Oklahoma torched #17 Florida State 47-17 at home which should have righted the ship. However, the Sooners kept struggling through their non-conference schedule, beating Air Force by three points and only managing to scrape past Cincinnati by two. September wasn’t exactly a confidence-builder, and it didn’t bode well for Red River. #8 OU held off #21 Texas 28-20 and then thumped Iowa State 52-0. It wasn’t a pretty 6-0, but halfway through the year and Oklahoma was still undefeated. That’s as far as they got. The #3 Sooners’ first true road test was a cross-division visit to #18 Missouri, where they were handed a 36-27 defeat by the Tigers. OU put away bloodless Colorado to climb to 7-1 before falling to unranked Texas A&M at Kyle Field 19-33. Oklahoma washed down to 19th in the polls, but with Texas Tech rebuilding and Baylor barely better than average, the Sooners only had one team to worry about. #14 OU entered Bedlam technically as an underdog to #10 Oklahoma State, but Oklahoma’s knack for crushing their arch-rival’s spirit would carry over from the 2000′s into the 2010′s. The Sooners won 47-41 and OU entered a three-way tie atop the Big 12 South with the Cowboys and A&M. The tiebreakers broke Oklahoma’s way and the now-#10 Sooners were pitted against rival #13 Nebraska in the Big 12 Championship Game. In an emotionally fraught game, heightened by NU’s impending departure for the Big Ten, OU gave their nemesis one final kick in the ass with a 23-20 victory after coming back from a 17-0 deficit. Oklahoma was 11-2 and Big 12 Champions, nowhere near good enough to be considered for the BCS Championship Game, but they’d get the conference’s slot in the Fiesta Bowl. The #9 Sooners blew out an overmatched #25 Connecticut 48-20 in Glendale. Another top ten finish in the books.

OU was really aiming high in 2011. Oklahoma was the preseason #1 and expectations were as high as could be with such a talented roster. However, a black cloud surrounded the program as the year began after the death of linebacker Austin Box back in May. After the Sooners beat up Tulsa to start the season, several players announced their intention to transfer. The bad vibes weren’t translating to the field. OU once again handled #5 Florida State, this time in Tallahassee 23-13. Oklahoma pushed past Missouri and murdered Ball State to once again go undefeated into Red River. This time, the Sooners left no doubt as they ran #11 Texas off the field in a 55-17 slaughter. It should have been smooth sailing heading into OU’s end of October date with Kansas State, but Oklahoma was upset by a not particularly good Texas Tech squad 38-41 in Norman. It was the Sooners’ first conference loss at home since 2001 and basically ended the national title hunt then and there. #11 OU rebounded by blowing out #10 Kansas State in Manhattan and then breezed past A&M in their last meeting with the Aggies as members of the Big 12. Oklahoma climbed back to 5th in the polls but were then upset by #25 Baylor 38-45 led by eventual Heisman Robert Griffin III. It was their first EVER loss to the BU. The Big 12′s contraction from 12 to 10 teams mucked with the schedule, so Bedlam was again played in Stillwater. I’d say home field advantage had some role to play in what happened but I don’t think the outcome would have changed if it had been played at Owen Field. #3 Oklahoma State handed the Sooners their most lopsided defeat in the contest since 1945 when the Cowboys blew up OU 44-10. Statistically, 9-3 Oklahoma was perhaps a top five team in the nation, but they weren’t anywhere close thanks to their three losses which placed them tied for 3rd in the standings with the Bears. The #19 Sooners beat unranked Iowa 31-14 in the Insight Bowl to end their frustrating season with a win.

Rinse and repeat. In 2012 OU began the year ranked 4th in the AP poll, and really, there was no expecting anybody else to win the Big 12 with Brandon Weeden and Justin Blackmon gone from OSU. Of course, Oklahoma lost 19-24 in Week 4 to #15 Kansas State, this year’s “it” team in the conference. The Sooners rebounded by winning three in a row, including smoking #15 Texas in Dallas for the second season in a row 63-21. The “it” team in all of college football in 2012 was Notre Dame. OU had the misfortune of scheduling the Irish for that season and #8 Oklahoma fell 13-30 at home. The Sooners won three straight again heading into Bedlam, this time #14 OU scraped past #22 Oklahoma State in an overtime shootout 51-48. KSU held the tiebreaker over Oklahoma, and took the Big 12′s spot in the Fiesta Bowl. The #12 Sooners were relegated to the Cotton Bowl, where they faced off against an old foe. #10 Texas A&M was the hottest team in the whole sport by the end of 2012, and the Aggies smoked OU 41-13. A second straight year of disappointing 10-3 finishes and a ranking outside of the top ten.

The frustrating 2011 and 2012 seasons finally caught up with Oklahoma. For the first time since their national championship season in 2000, the Sooners began the year ranked outside of the top ten, with a #16 ranking in the AP poll. OU did well without the bright spotlight, taking care of the non-conference schedule including paying back #22 Notre Dame 35-21 in South Bend. Oklahoma had only risen to 12th in the polls before Red River. The Sooners were facing an unranked Texas team that seemed to be falling apart. Mack Brown’s tenure was coming to an end. A few years prior, a bad UT squad would suggest that OU would now dominate the conference, but upstarts OSU and KSU had so far thwarted Oklahoma’s ambitions. Of course Texas won, beating their rivals 36-20 to send Mack out on top. The Sooners went back into cruise control, beating hapless Kansas and a frankly overrated #10 Texas Tech. 2013′s upstart was #5 Baylor, who blew out Oklahoma 41-12. OU was knocked down from 12th to 22nd, but they won out in workmanlike fashion. The #18 Sooners capped the regular season with a 33-24 victory over #6 Oklahoma State, denying the Cowboys a share of the Big 12 title. 10-2 OU was selected to face off against #3 Alabama in the Sugar Bowl. The Crimson Tide spent the lion’s share of 2013 as the #1 team in football, only kept out of the BCS Championship Game by the the Kick Six, a play that many people didn’t even know was possible until it happened on national tv. The game was considered a foregone conclusion, but nobody told Oklahoma. The #10 Sooners shocked everyone, upsetting the vaunted Tide 45-31. Whether OU was the only team to ever catch Saban’s Tide asleep or their modern no-huddle offense really did just overwhelm Bama, that strong 11-2 finish was miles ahead of their previous two disappointing 10-3 campaigns. We can also thank Oklahoma for shocking Alabama into adopting modern offensive principles, so thanks for that.

Of course the strong finish to the 2013 season put OU back into the spotlight in 2014. Oklahoma began the year #4 in the country, and certainly looked like it as they skipped through September in fast motion. It was a bit too easy, and Oklahoma was brought back down to earth by #25 TCU, who would end up being the Big 12′s upstart “it” team in 2014 (sort of). The Sooners broke in new Texas head coach Charlie Strong with a 31-26 win over the Longhorns, but then fell to #11 Kansas State in a crushing 31-30 loss. OU took care of business against Iowa State as they should have, but was handed their third loss on the year at the hands of #10 Baylor in an embarrassing 48-14 blowout at home. For the first time since later 2009, Oklahoma tumbled out of the polls. They’d only stay gone for a week before wins over Texas Tech and Kansas carried the Sooners back into the top 25. They could save face with a surefire win over 5-6 Oklahoma State and a bowl victory to earn another 10-3 record. It wasn’t ideal but hey. Instead, OU was shocked at home by the Cowboys, falling 38-35 in overtime to again fall out of the polls. Oklahoma was pitted against #18 Clemson in the Russel Athletic Bowl and they were taken to the shed, losing 40-6. It wasn’t the last time they’d see the Tigers in the postseason, or the last time they’d lose to them. The 8-5 finish was the Sooners’ worst in the 2010′s. Though many teams would kill to have that as their floor, it wasn’t gonna fly in Norman. Bob Stoops was under fire with some people speculating that he was overstaying his welcome the same way Mack Brown had in Texas.

Stoops canned co-offensive coordinators Josh Heupel and Jay Norvell following the disappointing finish in 2014 and brought in Lincoln Riley with the hopes of breathing new life into the program. How’d that turn out? Well, it was a bumpy transition to begin with. OU had trouble putting away #23 Tennessee and were taken to double overtime by the Vols in Week 2. Oklahoma began the year ranked 19th because they were coming off 8-5 and not 6-6, but after a victory over #23 West Virginia 44-24 in the first week of October they climbed up to 10th place. The Sooners were beginning to really enter the 2015 Playoff discussion when the Red River Shootout rolled around. Of course, they were upset by Texas, falling 17-24. OU tumbled back down to #19 in the AP, but the schedule eased up which really allowed transfer QB Baker Mayfield to take control of the offense. Oklahoma annihilated Kansas State, Texas Tech, KU, and ISU by a combined 232-50 including a 55-0 shutout in Manhattan. The end of the season was a murderer’s row featuring the three top teams in the Big 12 but the Sooners were up to the challenge. The first leg featured #12 OU travelling to Waco against undefeated Baylor, Oklahoma won 44-34. The Sooners vaulted into the top ten with the win and entered a tie for second place in the standings. They were tied with the #11 TCU Horned Frogs, who were next up on the docket. OU managed to scrape by with a 30-29 win and were now tied with Oklahoma State, meaning Bedlam was a contest for all the marbles. #5 Oklahoma blew out the Cowboys 58-23 to emphatically seal their 11-1 regular season record and the Big 12 Championship. The Sooners entered into the Playoff as the #4 seed, they were selected to play undefeated Clemson in the Orange Bowl. OU wasn’t able to get any scoring going against former DC Brent Venables’ staunch defense and fell 17-37. Oklahoma finished 11-2 and 5th in the polls. It was a pretty good rebound season.

The Sooners had an interesting year in 2016. With the return of Baker Mayfield, OU was expected to contend to make their way back to the Playoff. #3 Oklahoma began the year in NRG Stadium against the defending Peach Bowl champions #15 Houston. The Sooners were upset by the Cougars 23-33, severely denting their repeat hopes to get back to the top 4. OU dropped down to 14th in the poll, and basically cost Oklahoma an appearance on College Gameday. In Week 3, the Sooners hosted #3 Ohio State in a game that was billed as a Playoff preview. Instead, the Buckeyes ended OU’s Playoff hopes with an emphatic 45-24 victory in Norman. A 1-2 September knocked Oklahoma all the way out of the polls and cast a shadow over conference play. Big 12 competition began in October with a trip to #21 TCU. The Sooners overcame the Horned Frogs 52-46 to climb back into the top 25. OU managed to put away Texas 45-40 and then more easily handled Kansas State. In a matchup of future NFL Quarterbacks, Baker Mayfield outdueled Pat Mahomes of Texas Tech in Lubbock in an incredible 66-59 boat race. After this win, Oklahoma began to really settle into form. The Sooners beat Kansas and Iowa State without much fuss, which wasn’t too remarkable, but once again the final three games featured the three other best teams in the conference. By now, OU had climbed back into the top ten, and were hoping they could take advantage of potential chaos in the last month to make a final push for the Playoff. The first matchup featured #9 Oklahoma hosting #25 Baylor, the Sooners won handily 45-24. The next week, #8 OU went to Morgantown and blew out the #10 Mountaineers 56-28. Bedlam was again a battle for first place against #11 Oklahoma State. #7 Oklahoma ran over their rivals 38-20 to complete a perfect 9-0 season in Big 12 play. They’re still the only team to have ever had a perfect record in conference play since going to 9 league games. Unfortunately for the champs, the Sooners only made it to #7 in the Playoff rankings. They couldn’t live down the two non-conference losses in September, which was justified in this case. As Big 12 champions, OU faced off against #17 Auburn. As you might imagine, the 8-4 Tigers were a bit overmatched. Oklahoma won 35-19, completing another 11-2 season capped with a ten game win streak and a final #5 AP ranking. After the disappointing few seasons between 2011 and 2015, the program appeared to be entering a Renaissance under Stoops having won back to back conference titles. However, Stoops shocked the nation by announcing his retirement. He retired as one of the winningest coaches in the game and held 11 Big 12 titles in 18 seasons.

Stoops’ young OC Lincoln Riley was promoted as head coach. Even as a coordinator, Riley was one of the hottest names in coaching circles, even attracting NFL attention. Now Riley was given the reigns to fully flex his muscles. The Sooners erupted out of the gate in 2017, destroying UTEP as they should have, and in their second game of the year, easily handled #2 Ohio State on the back end trip of the home and home 31-16. The win vaulted #5 OU firmly into the top four with renewed Playoff hopes. Baker Mayfield was lighting up the competition and Oklahoma could easily outpace all comers. Sort of. A Baylor team that had completely collapsed and would finish the season 1-11 nearly beat the Sooners in Waco. Two weeks later after a bye, #3 OU was upset 31-38 by Iowa State. Oklahoma handled business through the rest of October with wins over UT, KSU, and Texas Tech. Once again, the schedule toughened up in November just in time for a Playoff push. #8 Oklahoma outpaced #11 Oklahoma State 62-52 and followed it up with a 38-20 victory over #8 TCU. It was enough to push the Sooners back into the top four and cruised to an 11-1 regular season record with easy wins over Kansas and West Virginia. In an effort to keep the Big 12 from getting snubbed from the Playoff like they did in 2014, the conference reinstated the Conference Championship Game in 2017. Which in this case could have backfired if #2 OU lost to the #10 Horned Frogs who themselves had no chance of making the top four. Thankfully Oklahoma once again handled Texas Christian, this time 41-17. Baker Mayfield was awarded the Heisman Trophy for leading the most dynamic offense in college football. This might have been the best Sooner team of the decade, and had the best chance of winning the national championship, but their dreams ended in the Rose Bowl. In the best semifinal game in the young Playoff era, OU blew a three-score lead to #3 Georgia and then lost in double overtime 48-54. It was another bitter disappointment, but as far as first years for head coaches go, it was pretty good: 12-2 with a final #4 ranking.

Heisman winner Baker Mayfield was gone in 2018, but Texas A&M transfer Kyler Murray was waiting in the wings to make a seamless transfer of power. For the second year in a row, Oklahoma began the year ranked 7th in the nation and the favorite to win the Big 12. The Sooners had no problem mopping up FAU and UCLA before paying ISU back 37-27 in Ames. Army’s triple option got under OU’s circuitry and took Oklahoma to overtime before falling 28-21. The Sooners boat raced Baylor 66-33 to end September 5-0. The only way to beat OU, it seemed, was to somehow outscore them. And guess what happened when they met Texas at the State Fair? The #19 Longhorns managed to outpace their rivals 48-45, dealing a huge blow to #7 Oklahoma’s Playoff aspirations. It was enough of a let down to get DC Mike Stoops fired. It was a road bump for sure, but the Sooners rebounded quite well. OU never even fell out of the top ten and demolished TCU and Kansas State before outpacing Texas Tech 51-46. Oklahoma went down to the wire in Bedlam again, but once again prevailed over the Cowboys 48-47. To end the season, the Sooners only beat Kansas by 15, which is relatively disappointing and then overcame #12 West Virginia 59-56. This time, the Big 12 Championship Game came in handy, as #5 Oklahoma parlayed their rematch with #9 Texas with a 39-27 victory. Kyler Murray was conferred the Heisman Trophy, the first time two QBs from the same school won it in back to back years. OU was given a 4 seed and had to go up against 13-0 #1 Alabama. It was a disaster. OU fell behind 28-0 after just 17 minutes of play. If you didn’t turn the TV off after the first quarter, you would have missed a valiant comeback attempt. Oklahoma actually outscored the Tide for the remainder of the game, but come on, they started out behind by four touchdowns. Bama won 45-34 and the Sooners were sent home with another 12-2 record and #4 finish.

With Kyler Murray gone to the NFL, the torch passed to former Tide QB Jalen Hurts of all people. Once again, OU was in the mix in the preseason, carrying over their 4th place ranking into 2019. Things basically went as expected. Hurts put up Heisman numbers as Oklahoma torched their way through the competition through the first half of the season. The defense had finally come together under new coordinator Alex Grinch, who had taken over for the lackluster Mike Stoops. The Sooners outscored their non-conference opponents 167-59 before annihilating Texas Tech and Kansas heading into Red River. This OU made sure to put their rivals away in the regular season, beating #11 Texas 34-27. Oklahoma manhandled West Virginia before finally being upset 41-48 by Kansas State. November was another brutal stretch, which began with a 42-41 win over emerging thorn-in-side Iowa State. In the regular season conference championship, the #10 Sooners faced off against undefeated #13 Baylor. The Bears were the “it” team in College Football in 2019 and took a lead deep into the game before OU snatched victory from the jaws of defeat in front of a shocked Waco crowd. #8 Oklahoma squeaked by TCU 28-24 before putting away #21 Oklahoma State 34-16 to end the regular season 11-1 yet again. The Sooners needed a bit of help getting back into the Playoff. #6 OU beat #7 Baylor in the Big 12 Championship Game, again ripping the Bears’ hearts out in with a touchdown win in overtime. Thankfully, #4 Georgia and #5 Utah lost their Championship Games, giving Oklahoma their third straight Playoff appearance. Unfortunately they had to face #1 LSU in the Peach Bowl. If Alabama dominated the Sooners in one quarter bad enough to beat OU in the 2018 semifinal, the Tigers did it for the whole 60 minutes. Louisiana State completely lit up Oklahoma 63-28 with most of the scoring coming in the first half. 12-2 and another loss in the semifinals for the third straight year.

What a weird decade. Oklahoma’s spent most of the 2010′s as one of the best teams in College Football, but they were never the best. The Sooners’ best years from a pure quality standpoint were in 2011 and 2017. In 2011, OU finished 10-3 and third place in the Big 12. In 2017, they featured the best offense in football and came excruciatingly close to a trip to the Championship Game. Hey, two Heismans and SEVEN Big 12 Championships. It wasn’t a total wash.

Oklahoma will certainly carry their success into the 2020′s. If I had to put money on which team would win the Big 12 the most times in the coming decade, it’d be the Sooners. I think you’d put your money down as well.

I’ve spent the last paragraph of each one of these Top 25 lists speaking on how each team performed against their rivals. OU had no problem on that front. Oklahoma went 8-3 against rival Texas, though those three losses really stung. The Sooners went 8-2 against Oklahoma State in arguably the Cowboys’ most successful decade in program history. That’s how you dominate little brother. Unfortunately the rivalry with Nebraska ended with conference realignment, but Oklahoma did get the last laugh with a win in the Big 12 CG in 2010.

#college football #Oklahoma Sooners

5 notes · View notes

eldritchsurveys · 4 years

Text

873.

5k Survey I

1. Who are you? >> I’m Mordred. 2. What are the 3 most important things everyone should know about you? >> I’m sensory-defensive and post-traumatic, I'm part of a multiple system, and I’m a fictional character. 3. When you aren’t filling out 5,000 question surveys like this one what are you doing? >> Taking way shorter surveys. When I’m not taking surveys at all, I’m posting on tumblr or pillowfort, reading, playing video games, researching video game lore, watching a movie or show, or trying to manage my hellbrain (which is a whole separate task in itself). 4. List your classes in school from the ones you like the most to the ones you like the least (or if you are out of school, think of the classes you did like and didn’t like at the time). >> I do my best not to think about school, the last bit of which was 15 years ago anyway. 5. What is your biggest goal for this year? >> I don’t make goals like that.

6. Where do you want to be in 5 years? >> It’s inconceivable to me to plan ahead that far. Even to think ahead that far seems silly and pointless to my very present-focused (and past-haunted) mind.

7. What stage of life are you in right now? >> Adulthood. Just the general “adulthood” between hectic young adulthood and transitional middle age. 8. Are you more child-like or childish? >> I’m not child-like or childish. I simply understand that the division between “childhood” and “adulthood” isn’t nearly as cut-and-dried as society has organised it for the sake of legality and social interaction, and I also understand that the desire to escape childhood and “childish things” is a conceit of the young, who wish to be seen as grown and independent creatures (which is part of development! it makes perfect sense). By the time you get to your thirties, it really stops mattering. You know you’re an adult. You know that being an adult means you have the freedom to do whatever you want (as far as leisure and play and stuff like that goes, I mean), which means you can sit in your pjs watching cartoons and eating sugar cereal if you like, and no parent can chide you for it, and your peers can fuck off if they don’t like it. (The “adult” part of doing that is knowing to stop after one and a half bowls of said cereal, lmao. It’s all a balance, innit?)

9. What is the last thing you said out loud? >> I don’t remember. 10. What song comes closest to how you feel about your life right now? >> I don’t think there’s any song that can capture that. Or, maybe there is, but I don’t know about it. 11. Have you ever taken martial arts classes? >> No. I’ve been interested, but frankly, I can’t afford anything like that. 12. Does your life tend to get better or worse or does it just stay the same? >> There is no set trajectory, like that. Life has high points and low points, and the majority of it is really spent somewhere in the middle. It’s just that we focus on the high points and the low points most often (and when the low points are particularly low, they often end up defining our entire existence, even when we’re in the middle or even at high points). 13. Does time really heal all wounds? >> It’s not time that does it. Time just always happens to pass while the healing is being done, so we figure it’s the most common denominator. It takes work to heal, not just passively sitting around waiting for it to happen. 14. How do you handle a rainy day? >> I bring an umbrella, if I have to go out. Usually I don’t, so I just... do what I would do normally? 15. Which is worse…losing your luggage or having to sort out tangled holiday lights? >> Obviously losing your luggage... 16. How is your relationship with your parents? Will you miss them when they are gone? >> We have no relationship. There will be nothing to miss. 17. Do you tend to be aware of what is going on around you? >> Yeah. Especially since I’m prone to hypervigilance. 18. What is the truest thing that you know? >> The truest thing that I know is that I don’t know shit, and neither does anyone else. We’re all just elaborately guessing about shit, and interpreting reality the best way we can. Which is great, really. The fact that we keep trying to understand shit is cool. Just... “the map is not the territory” kind of applies to a lot of the stuff we think we know. ...Or not, right? After all, what do I know? :p 19. What did you want to be when you grew up? >> I just wanted to be free. 20. Have you ever been given a second chance? >> Probably. 21. Are you more of a giver or a taker? >> I’m a fair amount of both, being, you know, a person. 22. Do you make your decisions with an open heart/mind? >> I make my decisions the best way I know how. Whatever that means. 23. What is the most physically painful thing that has ever happened to you? >> Menstrual cramps. 24. What is the most emotionally painful thing that has ever happened to you? >> Yeah, right, like I’m going to be able to rank that. 25. Who have you hugged today? >> No one. 26. Who has done something today to show they care about you? >> --- 27. Do you have a lot to learn? >> Of course. I don’t necessarily have to learn all of it, but it sure is out there. 28. If you could learn how to do three things just by wishing and not by working what would they be? >> I don’t think that would be of any benefit to me. As much as I balk at taking those long uphill journeys to skillfulness, I feel like those journeys are beneficial and aid one’s growth. I’d rather not just snap my fingers and have a djinni grant me abilities like that. 29. Which do you remember the longest: what other people say, what other people do or how other people make you feel? >> How what other people do and say makes me feel. 30. What are the key ingredients to having a good relationship? >> Meh. 31. What 3 things do you want to do before you die? >> I don’t have a list like this. 32. What three things would you want to die to avoid doing? >> I think I would rather die than be incarcerated. So I’d take the death penalty if I could avoid a life imprisonment sentence... 33. Is there a cause you believe in more than any other cause? >> Not particularly. 34. What does each decade make you think of? The 1920’s: Prohibition. Wait, was that the 20s or the 30s? 30’s: World War II. 40’s: The rest of WWII. 50’s: I just think of... all the propaganda images from that era. You know, all the... domestic Whiteness... also, weird foods like meat aspic. 60’s: Hippies and Woodstock. 70’s: The Vietnam War (and the protests). 80’s: Hair metal. 90’s: Grunge and weird television/movies. 2000 : Well, I was an adult for most of this decade, and more or less aware of the world, so I don’t have a succinct “concept” of the aughts the way I have for decades that I didn’t live through, that I only have historical knowledge of. 2010’s: ^

35. Which decade do you feel the most special connection to and why? >> I feel an emotional connection to the spirit of the nineties. I don’t feel like trying to organise my words to explain why, I feel like that would take a lot of energy right now and I still have fifteen questions to go. 36. What is your favorite oldie/classic rock song? >> I don’t have one particular favourite. 37. What country do you live in and who is the leader of that country? >> United States. Donald Trump is president, weirdly enough. If you could say any sentence to the current leader of your country what would it be? >> I’d rather not, thanks. 38. What’s your favorite TV channel to watch in the middle of the night? >> I don’t watch television in the middle of the night... 39. What Disney villain are you the most like and why? >> That’s a great question, but the thing about Disney villains is that I don’t relate to them as much as I just love watching them do what they do. Like, my favourite is Judge Frollo, but I don’t think it’s because I have anything in common with him. Or, hell, maybe I would burn down an entire city because I don’t know how to handle the fact that I really want to bone this superbly hot chick. (My actual favourite villain is Catholic Guilt.) 40. Have you ever been a girl scout/boy scout? >> Briefly. 41. If you were traveling to another continent would you rather fly or take a boat? >> I would rather fly. I feel like boat travel would take a particularly long time and I’m not into that. 42. Why is the sky blue during the day and black at night? >> Oh, you know. Science. (I’m not Google.) 43. What does your name mean? >> I’m not sure anyone really knows what “Mordred” means. 44. Would you rather explore the depths of the ocean or outer space? >> Outer space. 45. What is the first word that comes to mind when you see the word: Air: Astrology. Meat: Beef. Different: Strokes. Pink: Panther. Deserve: Entitlement. White: Power, unfortunately. Been reading about too many fucking Nazis lately. Elvis: Pelvis. Magic: Mountain. Heart: Head. Clash: Punk. Pulp: Fiction.

46. If you could meet any person in the world who is dead who would you want it to be? >> I don’t care about this. 47. What if you could meet anyone who is alive? >> I still don’t care. 48. Is there a movie that you love so much you could watch it everyday? >> Of course not. I did watch Event Horizon every day for like a month, but I was in the psych ward at the time. What the fuck else would I have done anyway? 49. You are going to be stuck alone in an elevator for a week. What do you bring to do? >> What do I bring to do?! That’s definitely the least of my concerns with a hypothetical like this. I can’t fucking survive in an elevator for a week, dude. 50. Have you ever saved someone’s life or had your life saved? >> Doubtful.

#surveys #survey #5000 question survey

1 note · View note

cmarionthewilkid-blog · 5 years

Text

C.O.N.S.U.M.E.D

What happens when we consume more than we need? What happens when our choices are influenced by societal pressures of how things should be? Part 1 of my reflective journal will aim to provide a glimpse at two weeks of a working mom, head of a house of five, who also coincidentally adds event planner often to her job tasks.

Day 1: I specifically started my consumption journal on Friday, October 25. The day before a large case competition I was hosting on campus. Day 1 starts like most every other day of my life. The 20 minute drive to daycare, followed by the usual ice cap pit stop at Tim Horton’s. This day is special though, with the pressures of ensuring everything was just right for our judges and sponsors. I stroll off to Ferme Beaulieu to spend $328 on gifts. I am thinking that at least I am buying local products (honey, herbs, ketchup aux fruits) and feel pretty great about that. But why do I feel obliged to buy gifts at all? Wouldn’t a sincere thank you be enough? I guess according to Jonathan Porritt (2011), I have fallen victim to consumerism at its best. Somehow, I feel OK about it though.

A quick stop at Dollarama for gift bags, disposable coffee cups (cringe!), and plastic plastic trays. Finally, a $148 trip to Provigo for snacks for the case competitors and coaches. Oops, did I mention the trip to the t-shirt printer to pick up the 60 red printed competition momentos. Let’s add the 250+ pages I printed that day! As I sit here and reflect on the necessities (needs) of running a case competition versus expectations (and wants), I come to the realization that most of what I have purchased is simply there to enhance image.

Day 2 (October 26): Tim’s ice cap (check!). 60 Donuts, 60 pre-packed lunches, 24 cans of Perrier, 60 cans of soft drinks, 40 coffees in disposable cups, 100 plastic glasses of wine. Today, I am completely influenced by materialism and keeping the “image”. Let’s keep in mind that I work for a business school and that comes with some rather large assumptions around how things are supposed to look and be. Not to mention, I am hosting five people from the company who is sponsoring the event, so I need to keep them happy and ensure the event lives up to their expectations. I am reminded of Amitai Etzioni, (2012) and his sentiments about “keeping up with the Jones’”. It is true, when one party sets a certain expectation, we all rise to meet, or better, exceed them.

Today; however, my biggest disappointment was food waste. The boxed lunches were good, but about 25% of people didn’t eat all their meal. Almost 100% of the people didn’t eat the dessert included. We don’t have access to compost, so it went to the trash. Above the clear environmental impact of my event, I am reminded of the fact that one fifth of the world’s richest people consume 45% of all the meat and fish (Shah, 2014). Despite the company providing compostable cutlery and cups, I feel guilty that I sent so many things to the landfill today. To top it all off, Sodexo served a less than stellar menu at the Gala dinner (veal sous-vide). I swear I wanted to eat it, but alas, two bites in and I am done. More to the trash. Exhausted and mentally drained, I wonder to myself where the balance between convenience and waste needs to come into play. Why can’t we have compost stations on campus?

Day 3 (October 27): But first, my ice cap! A friend’s child’s birthday party today so I scramble to get things together. I run to Provigo to grab stuff for mini pizzas to share (forgot my grocery bags, so plastic it is). My friend insisted on no gifts at the party, which I wanted to accept, but quite frankly couldn’t. I’m glad I didn’t because apparently no one else respected it either. I think about this social obligation more deeply (Goodwin, Smith, & Spiggle, 1990). I try my best to make a compromise, we opt for a movie day among friends instead of a traditional gift. I am hoping this small intrinsically motivated action may decrease future landfill waste in the future. Nonetheless, we are filled with waxed juice cups and plates. Back to the Provigo to grab something for the family for supper. I grab peppers in a plastic bag, sausages in a styrofoam package, pasta sauce in a glass bottle, cheese in plastic packaging and pasta in a cardboard box. Nothing much to compost or recycle unfortunately.

Day 4 (October 28): Monday and back to work. Ice cap, yup! I am starting to get quite the collection in my office recycling bin. My boss just commented on it. I guess it is a bit of an eye sore..haha!

Two trips to Provigo today. One at lunch to grab George’s bread, deli ham, Coaticook cheese, carrots and dip. Next stop on the way home from work for supper, chicken, baby potatoes and stuffing.

Day 5 (October 29): If you haven’t guessed by now, ice cap time! Today, my brother (who lives with us) did a fridge clean up. Sigh! I can’t believe how much stuff we threw away. Past date, wilted vegetables, moldy fruits. Why don’t I just throw money directly into the garbage can? Is it normal that the first thing I think about is wasted money? According to a study by Graham-Rowe, Jessop, and Sparks (2014), wasting money is indeed a major motivator to minimize food waste. Inspired by this revelation, I am determined to have leftovers for lunch and transform the chicken salad sandwiches tonight for supper. I don’t even have to stop at Provigo today! WOW!

Day 6 (October 30): IC (that’s all I will say). Wednesdays are always tricky because I am running around and teach a class at night. It is one of those days. I grab lunch at Subway (steak sub, chips and a drink) -> garbage.

Run to Provigo after work and grab steak, carrots, potatoes and gravy from Provigo and throw it in pot to cook. I also realize that I haven’t really bought any candy for Halloween for my students in case class. $65.30 later and we have meat and candies! I’ve also been putting out chocolates outside my office door for students.

Day 7 (October 31): Another ice cap to go please. I don’t even eat lunch today. Now I realize we have no candy for the kids. Drive to Walmart and $68.03, we’ve got goodies. No lunch again, and we go to a friend’s for supper. Off with the 4 year old trick or treating in the rain. She gets a pail of treats, we have 2 boxes of stuff leftover.

Day 8 (November 1): Day of the dead? I think so! Actually order breakfast with my ice cap at Timmy’s this morning. No lunch today. We decide to go shopping after work today as my brother has a 40% discount at L’Equipeur. $218.58 later, my husband enjoys new shoes, jeans, sport jacket, t-shirts, and a pair of sneakers for my mom for Christmas. Oh wait! Marlee needs new winter boots, so $86.22 later, we have new winter boots for her. I also see the cutest dress boots at Marshall’s (fake baby Uggs). I suppose these is what the marketers are hoping for. Top it all off with super for the family at Guido’s. (Wow! I have really been eating like crap!) Day 8 hurt the bank account! Day 9 (November 2): Maybe I should actually buy some groceries for my empty fridge. I sludge off to Provigo early Saturday morning to spent near $200. At least I have meat, veggies, fruits, and some of the other basics for my family to actually live on. Stop at Tim’s on the way home for the usual.

Day 10 (November 3): Beautiful breakfast with family (and an ice cap). Spent the day making food (soup, roasted chicken, pasta sauce, etc....). Trying to cut down on the restaurant stops this week. End up at the library with some dear colleagues from GSE503, so I think another ice cap is in order to stay awake (and leftover Halloween Candy).

Day 11 (November 4): Check that thought. Day went to hell, running late, dead tired, no breakfast, grabbed Rima for supper. Fridge full, but I don’t even care at this point.

Day 12 (November 5): Today is a new day! I started making iced coffee at home! No Tim’s! I actually did not spend $1 today! Why do I feel so great? Apparently it is something referred to as perceived consumer effectiveness (PCE). When is comes to sustainable buying practices, this PCE is influenced directly by guilt and pride. This becomes important because it means that as a consumer, my behaviours could be modified by using emotions (Antonetti, & Maklan, 2014).

Day 13 (November 6): Another no spending kind of day! Feeling all pride and no guilt! Maybe Atonetti and Maklan are on to something!

Day 14 (November 7): Last day of recording! No ice caps and going strong. My husband and I are feeling like we need a little extra family time, so we go out for supper at Mike’s with Marlee. We follow it up by a little Chocolat Favoris. I asked myself why we went to Mike’s again? What a waste! A quick stop by Provigo to grab snacks for my basketball girls. I make an orzo salad plus pull together fruits, yogurt, cheese and granola bars.

Stay tuned for Part 2 to see if I actually made some changes and what this whole process has meant for me. Until then, I leave you on this note: Waiting on the World to Change

REFERENCES

Antonetti, P., & Maklan, S. (2014). Feelings that make a difference: How guilt and pride convince consumers of the effectiveness of sustainable consumption choices. Journal of Business Ethics, 124(1), 117-134. Retrieved from www.jstor.org/stable/24033218

Etzioni, A. (2012). You Don’t need to Buy This. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/FN3z8gtDUFE

Goodwin, C., Smith, K.L., & Spiggle, S. (1990). Gift giving: Consumer motivation and the gift purchase process. In NA - Advances in Consumer Research. 17, eds. Marvin E. Goldberg, Gerald Gorn, and Richard W. Pollay, Provo, UT : Association for Consumer Research, 690-698. Retrieved from http://acrwebsite.org/volumes/7086/volumes/v17/NA-17

Graham-Rowe, E., Jessop, D.C., & Sparks, P. (2014). Identifying motivations and barriers to minimising household food wasteby. Resources, Conservation & Recycling, 84, 15-23. doi: 10.1016/j.resconrec.2013.12.005

Porritt, J. (2011). The trap of materialism. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/DtwXryPNciM

Shah, A. (2014). Consumption and Consumerism: Global Issues. Retrieved from http://www.globalissues.org/issue/235/consumption-and-consumerism

1 note · View note

mitchsmarners · 5 years

Photo

BLOOD IN THE WATER

summary: “I think we’re all going to have do some pretty terrible things,” Eddie said quietly. His hand came to wrap in Richie’s shirt, trying to burn out the violent grip of his father’s from earlier. “None of us have a choice in anything anymore. Whatever happened at Greta’s tonight-“ Eddie’s voice broke and he felt Richie press a kiss into his hair. “There isn’t a good and a bad anymore. There’s just die or don’t.”

[or: after the gruesome murder of his younger brother, Bill Denbrough is determined to bring about the end of the string of crimes in Derry no matter the cost. As stories unwind and fall apart, there’s only more questions as everybody’s lives hang in the balance.]

chapter count: 20/20

chapter warnings: graphic depictions of violence, mentions of past character death, mentions of past sexual abuse, major character death!!

Taglist: @honkhonkrichard, @hufflepuffkaspbrak @emmieliabedelia @reddie-for-anything, @reddiesetrichie, @beepbeepbitchard, @lemonadeandrice @mirandosky, @lunacuore, @fivxharmony

NOTE: I POSTED A SHORT CHAPTER YESTERDAY. YOU’LL WANT TO READ THAT FIRST IF YOU MISSED IT!!

[Prologue] [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17][18][19] [Read Full Story on AO3] [Playlist]

Stanley Uris walked towards the edge of the old Bunyan forest. It had a been an old childhood hang out for children of Devil members. Often during serious gang meetings, the kids would all gather together and run wild in the woods. Play at being gang members, pretending they knew a thing. As Stan took sight of Henry Bowers’ old beat up car, loving named Christine, and shook his head in disgust. Of course Patrick Hockstetter would take it upon himself to destroy what was left of their youth.

“So…” Ben said slowly, looking at the Henry’s car and started shaking his head. “Patrick’s the one doing all this? That- That doesn’t make any sense?”

“There’s got to be more than that,” Aurora said, rubbing uncomfortably at her bare arms in the cold night air. Stan ignored them, moving forward and yanking the unlocked door to the car open. He crawls inside and starts opening the compartments. “Stan… what are you doing?” Aurora asked lightly.

He pulls his phone out and presses a number on his speed dial. “Hey, yeah. Out at Bunyans. Yeah, yeah it’s Christine. Can you do your thing? Perfect.”

Ben and Aurora both blinked at him, then glanced at each other. Stanley seemed to give them little regard as he moved to walk deeper into the forest, turning the flashlight on his phone. Ben reached out, took her hand and they moved to follow Stan. They don’t move for long before they can see the distinct ominious colour of a fire burning. Squaring up his shoulder, Stan Uris lead the others into the clearing where they had spent countless hours growing up.

“Stanny boy!” Patrick Hockstetter cried, tossing his arms up in greeting. Beverly had blood dripping from her lip, and the fire light alone was enough for Stan to see the fear in her eyes. Stan found it hard to look at her, but his eyes quickly trailed away and towards the leather-jacket wearing lump on the ground on her right. Stomach churning horribly, Stan clenched his jaw and turned back to Patrick.

“Tozier.” Aurora said softly, immediately diving towards the body on the ground. She turned him over and leaned down beside him. Her hands found the bleeding wound on his stomach and pressed down on it. Richie didn’t move, didn’t make a sound.

“Is he dead?” Ben asked nervously.

“I….” Aurora choked up slightly. “I don’t know.”

“What the fuck do you mean you don’t know?” Stan snapped, pinching the brim of his nose but keeping his eyes glued to Hockstetter. Hockstetter was grinning from ear to ear, and Stan was dimly aware of Beverly crying in the background.

“I’m not a doctor, Uris!” Aurora shouted, as Ben came over to her. Ben took off his suit jacket, handing it to Aurora to press against the gun wound in Richie. Still no noises arise and Stan forced himself to tune out everything behind him.

“You won’t get away with this, Hockstetter.” Stan said fiercely, hands clenched angrily at his sides.

Hockstetter raised his brow cockily. “I never thought that I would. It’s all been done for the greater good. A new world order.”

“Ooookay,” Stan said, cracking into a disbelieving smile despite himself. “I always knew you were a little unhinged, but fuck man. You’re actually insane.”

Hockstetter flashed him a grin. “It’s all going to be okay, Uris. Things are going to change around here, she promised. We’re making the Devils something to be feared in Derry again. No more petty little criminals, that parents warn you not to date. No, no. People are going to cross the street to avoid us when this is all over. Isn’t that right, Bevvy?”

Stan and Hockstetter turned to her in unison. Beverly let out a small whimper, as even Ben and Aurora looked up from their efforts of holding Richie together, in order to watch the scene unfold. “I… I didn’t know anything, not really,” Beverly said through hiccups. “I just… this new world order shit, whatever the fuck it is. I wasn’t part of that, Stan, I swear, I just-“

“Soul her integrity for a couple thousand dollars, right?” Hockstetter waggled his eyebrows. “Betrayed your family, your best friend, took away the life of a thirteen year old girl? For a couple… thousand… dollars. Wouldn’t it have been better if you’d been doing it for a great cause?”

Stan swallowed at the bile that rose up in his throat, hands now clenched together so tightly that his nails dug into the palms of his hands. He didn’t doubt that he’d have marks in the morning, and he watched Hockstetter pull the gun out of his jacket. He walked towards Stanley and dropped tried to force it into his hands.

“I see the look in your eyes, Stanley,” Hockstetter said. “We’re not that different. you know. You wanted revenge. For Janie. For Richie. How hard is it for you to be standing here, with Richie right there, and having to listen to Marsh talk about how she’d only betrayed you all for money?” He curled Stan’s fingers over the gun. “Why don’t you get that revenge, Uris? Take her out. You know she deserves it.”

“Stanley, we don’t make those choices,” Ben spoke up suddenly from behind them. Stan didn’t turn around, eyes still glued to Patrick’s face, but he could hear Ben taking the steps towards them both. “That makes us no better than Patrick and everybody who was behind this. Betty, Greta, Audra, Richie… Nobody else needs to die.”

Hockstetter waggled his eyebrows as Stanley’s gaze didn’t falter. “You don’t have to kill her. You’ve got the gun, Uris. You could just as easily kill me. Marsh is still a little iffy, but you want me die. I can see it in your eyes.”

Stan raised one eyebrow. “If I kill you, I won’t get the answers I want.” He twirled the gun once then tucked it into his pocket. “So, why don’t you give me a little bit more information, and we’ll see if I’ll get rid of your extra baggage over there.”

Beverly squirmed against her restraints. “Stanley, Stan, please.”

“Shut up.” Stan said coldly, not even turning to looking at her. He raised his brow at Hockstetter. “You don’t have to talk. Frankly, I don’t really care what you do with her. Kill, or don’t. It’s worthless to me. But we’re taking Richie, and we’re leaving.”

“No can do, Stanny boy.” Hockstetter said with a shake of his head, looking almost regretful. “I wish I could, you know? But we’ve got strict orders from the boss. Tozier has to die.”

Ben blinked. “So, this has been about Richie this whole time? Isn’t that a little impractical?”

Hockstetter shook his head, grinning toothily. “Tozier was never on the hit list. No Devils were supposed to die, that was the agreement. Bevvy fucked it up with Janie and Tozier made his own bed.”

Stan shifted onto his heels, grabbing for the gun once again, and finally glancing over his shoulder to Ben and Aurora. Aurora still had the suit jacket pressed harshly against Richie, but Stan didn’t know if it was still bleeding. Didn’t know if Richie was even alive. How could he be, after bleeding for so long? His heart raced in his chest. Any plan he might have had been thrown out the window.

“What did he do?” Stan asked. Stalling, maybe. But also curious. Beverly had burned him- burned them all- and maybe Stan needed to know if Richie had too before he risked everything to save somebody who might already be dead.

Hockstetter smirked. “He’s been fucking her son.”

xxx

Bill Denbrough packed up slightly, watching as Sonia Kaspbrak walked into the cobwebbed filled room with him. His best friend’s mother had been never particularly intimidating to Bill, not even while growing up. A large woman, yes and extremely overbearing. But he’d never cowarded to her that way the Eddie had until very recently.

“I think the real question is,” Sonia smiled sweetly at him. “What are you doing here, William? Don’t you know what happens to good Derry boys who cross the city lines? Bad things. You know.”

Bill bristled, thinking of Georgie. Of Eddie Corcoran. He shook his head, narrowing his eyes at her. “I have a police bracelet on. They’ll be looking for me soon.”

“No they won’t,” Sonia said, voice still sweet and oh-so casual. “They have enough to worry about tonight, I’m sure. Henry Bowers is dead, that Tozier boy and Marsh girl are missing. You taking a little joyride outside of house arrest will be very low down on their list of priorities, I’m afraid. Most unfortunate for you, William.”

“How…” Bill crinkled his brow. “How do you know Richie and Beverly are missing? I don’t think… have the police even figured that out yet? How could you possibly know already?”

Sonia smiled at him, and Bill felt his hair stands up on edge. “Oh, sweetie, you haven’t figured it out, yet? I’m sure you will be the last. All your little friends will know by the end of the night. Even my Eddie. He’ll hate me for it, yes, but I did what I had to do.”

Bill tried to continue packing away from Sonia as she moved towards him, and ending up toppling backwards into a large red armchair. Dust flew out of it as it landed and he tried not to think about the spiders he was likely sitting in. Trying not to gag, he forced himself to look at Sonia. “Yuh-yuh-“

Sonia frowned unhappily. “I thought you’d out-grown that stutter, William. It is very unattractive.”

Bill blinked at her.

“I loved a man once,” Sonia started speaking suddenly. Bill fought the urge to roll his eyes. Of course she’s monologuing. Why am I not surprised? “He was a good man, I don’t care what anybody had to say about him. He had a vision for this town, he was going to clean up all that trash in the south side. They took him away before he could do it, but I knew… I knew I had to finish what he’d started. It would’ve been what he wanted.”

Bill leaned back in the chair as Sonia moved towards him, his heart feeling seconds away from exploding in his chest.

“He knew I would continue his legacy, and he put money away for me,” Sonia leered down at Bill. “Eddie Bear and I have been living off it since Frank left us, and then Eddie left me too. But that’s okay, because I will change this town. Eddie can hate me if he wishes, but I know I’ve done the right thing. I had to lie a bit, as I needed help that my Bobby didn’t. Had to have some those terrible hooligans on my side, do some of the more grunge work that I didn’t have time for.”

Bill’s heart was pulsing as he took in the confession, he felt himself trembling. How many afternoons had he spent in Sonia Kaspbrak’s house, even just since Georgie died-

Georgie.

“The Marsh girl was surprisingly the easiest. Didn’t ask any questions, simply wanted the cash. The others they were simple enough as well, just tell them that I would make the Devils feared again. And I will, certainly I will. Until I made sure they were all wiped out.” Sonia seemed to pull a gun from her purse, moving towards Bill before he snapped out of his frozen state.

“You…” Bill said, fuming and shaking. “You did this? You KILLED MY BROTHER.”

Bill dove out of the chair, slamming into Sonia Kaspbrak’s solid form. She stumbled and they both nearly fell, the gun clattering to the ground, Sonia managing to find their footing and tossing Bill away from her. Bill slammed against the unused fireplace, head smacking against the cement rock and sending more dust floating over him. Groaning, Bill slid down the rock and leaned against the dirty wood flooring. Lights flashed behind his eyes.

“You’re going to attack me?” Sonia screeched. “I could kill you! Kill you just like I killed your brother.”

Bill barely even had the chance to process what she had said, he was being shoved onto his back and his windpipe was being crushed.

xxx

Stan took another step towards Patrick, pressing them nearly chest to chest. “Hockstetter, there are three of us, one of you. And you gave me your gun. I’d really fucking like to see you stop us from leaving.”

Hockstetter’s moved up and down Stanley’s face, suddenly grinning once again. “I shot Tozier twenty minutes ago.. maybe an half an hour. He hasn’t moved once since he hit the ground. Take him. It’s not going to do you again good. I know where I shot him, and I know how long he’s been bleeding. Boy’s dead.”

“We’ll see,” Stan said sharply, nodding towards Ben. Ben moved towards Richie and Aurora, scooping Richie up into his arms. He was rather limp, Stan had to admit but he refused to let himself dwell on it. Aurora scrambled forward, pushing back down on Richie’s wound with the jacket.

“He’s not dead,” she said to Ben. “I promised Eddie we’d find him, I’m not fucking letting him die.”

Stan tossed the gun down at Patrick’s feet, knowing it was a bad choice, that he could turn around right now and Hockstetter would fire at his back. Nothing he could do about it, but the last thing Stan wanted was that gun. “Do what you want with Beverly. She became your problem the second she betrayed the Toziers. Kill her for all I care.”

Aurora and Ben stared gaped mouth, as Beverly burst into loud, messy, hysterical tears. Hockstetter looked overjoyed as his eyes danced. He moved toward Beverly, grabbing her and tossing her shoulder. He saluted to them as he broke through the clearing, Stan leading his own friends slowly through after him. He watched as Patrick shoved a screaming Beverly into the front seat, slamming her in. The car drove off.

Ben and Aurora put Richie into the back seat of Stan’s father’s car and Aurora crawled in after him, still trying to hold his wound shut. Ben closed the back door and looked at Stanley. “You coming? We need to get Richie to a hospital.”

“Hold on.” Stanley said, pulling his phone from his pocket and dialling. He pressed it to his ear, and smirked as the other person answered. “Hey, Patrick. How’s the get-away going for you? Driving fast… Yeah, that’s what I figured.”

Ben stepped away from the car, his hands clammy and his heart tense in his chest.

“You know, this is where it gets interesting, though.” Stan said, his voice full of humour though his face was expressionless. “While you were giving your big speech and explaining to me the things you and Beverly did? I’d have called Patty, she drove out here. She did a little magic work, you know how she does. She cut the brakes in little Christine. Knowing you as a person, and you’re desperation to get away, you must be going about 100 miles per hour down that road, right? So you’d be coming up on the Quarry right… about…”

There was sound of loud explosion far down the road, barely audible, but Ben couldn’t help himself from knowing it the sound of a car going through those small tree and vines before likely tumbling over the end of the Quarry.

“…Now.” Stan said as he hung up the phone and slipped it back into his pocket. Face still completely blank, he turned away from the street and towards the driving seat of his car. Ben stared in disbelief down the road to the accident he couldn’t see.

xxx

Eddie Kaspbrak kicked open the door to the Neibolt House, not even slightly out of breath and stumbled inside. He could hear the crashing and gasping from the other room and ran to the living room, even as the floor creaked and screamed under his frantic feet. He skidded into the room and let out a harsh gasp, as though the air was being ripped directly out of chest.

His mother was leaning over Bill Denbrough’s thrashing body, his legs kicking out frantically and hands clawing her arms. “MA!” Eddie screamed, tears starting to stream down his face. Sonia didn’t respond to her son’s voice- caught up in the kill, completely zoned out to anything around her except the victim under her hands. Eddie’s eyes fell to the gun on the ground and swallowed hard.

It was the sickening snap that echoed through the room, the way Bill’s legs stopped kicking and his hands fell limp beside his body, that broke through to Eddie Kaspbrak. Eddie drove forward and grabbed hold of the weapon. Closing his eyes and turning away, he fired.

When Eddie forced his eyes open, Sonia had turned around and was looking at him. A look of betrayal, and look of pain. Eddie pressed himself up against the wall of the room, watching his mother fall limply to the side, blood pooling out underneath her.

Eddie’s knees buckled and he sunk to the floor, still staring at the bodies in front of him. He heard the sound of feet rushing into the house and soon Mike Hanlon and Patty Blum both rushed into the room, freezing in the door way.

Eddie laughed, then.

“It’s over.”

#reddie #reddie fic #it fanfiction #FUCK #my writing #blood in the water #fuck fuck fuck

26 notes · View notes

officerofcybertron · 6 years

Text

Account Disclaimer

I've put this as its own separate page on my blog, but also wanted to make a post about it. I've thought about this for quite a while, spent a few frustrated/angry/upset nights debating with myself about this account and whether I should close it down or keep it going with a little 'disclaimer', and this is what I've come up with.

Warning Text Wall Ahead.

First and foremost I wish to state all is not what it seems with this account. This is not my only account, nor is it my only role play account, as I do have others. I do not wish to reveal or link to those accounts as I prefer to remain Anonymous and there are a couple of reasons for that.

One of those reasons is when others interact with this Ultra Magnus account I want them to think of it as Ultra Magnus not so-and-so playing as Ultra Magnus. I believe there is a certain amount of 'magic' that happens when the player behind the character is anonymous and it is truly fun to see people enjoying that. I don't want to ruin that for anyone who may enjoy my interpretation of the character.

The other reason I wish to remain anonymous is that, for me personally, it's rather intimidating to play a canon character. There are a lot of expectations. If I screw up I prefer not to have it follow me to my other accounts. Furthermore I do also, like a lot of people, suffer from some pretty severe anxiety and anonymity seems to be the best way for me to cope with it when it comes to playing as Ultra Magnus.

So what does this mean and why am I explaining it? Well this does mean in order to protect the identity of my other accounts I may, at times, feign ignorance about things I already have some knowledge on. Truthfully I agonized over this decision for quite a long while (this being the primary reason for my sudden absence) and came to a decision that I would go ahead with it, but I’ve decided I should be upfront about my intentions.

I do understand that this may leave some people feeling uncomfortable, and if that's the case and anyone chooses to discontinue, or simply not, interact with me there will be no hurt feelings on my part. I can understand how uncomfortable that would feel which leads me to why I'm explaining all this.

I have been a role player for many years and began role playing when role play forums were the thing. It was on a role play forum where I realized, and embraced, my passion for writing and specifically character creation. The main forum I used and later became a moderator of had it's usual set of rules, but a couple of unusual ones. The one in particular that pertains to my explanation was that the forum only allowed one account per person. It was pretty much based on the honor system and IP addresses at the time, but combined with the rule of only five characters per account, this was to help keep threads from being dropped simply because a person had too many characters to juggle. It was also a matter of contention that meant someone decided to break it.

After several years of building friendships with a few people, and having to deal with other people's anger/drama/rule breaking, it was revealed that a single person had 12 to 15 different accounts and no one had a clue. In a single post by the administrator revealing the truth of this matter a chunk of our user base suddenly became one person. The people whom I had befriended turned into the same people I'd had bitter and frustrating discussions with.

Frankly? It was one of the most confusing, frustrating, and painful things I'd ever experienced up to that point. It was almost like I had lost someone, that someone had died. We all joined the forum trusting that each user was a single person, trusting that people would follow the rule, only to have it blow up in our faces. Suffice to say it left a lot of trust issues and, eventually, was a major cause in a lot of later fights.

I admit, now, that we should have seen the eventuality of it happening, but we were all younger then and more than a bit naive.

That is the reason I want to be upfront and candid about the fact I do have other accounts you may possibly be interacting with. Despite my wish to remain anonymous I refuse, refuse, to put anyone through a similar circumstance as the one I and several other people experienced. It's possible I could make a mistake, respond via the wrong account, and if that happens I don't want people to feel like someone they knew and were possibly befriending had just disappeared. If I do so and I correct it, but anyone notices, I would like to ask that it remain private.

So I say again: If anyone, at any time, is uncomfortable with interacting with me knowing this I will not hold it against you or harbor any ill will towards them if they wish to stop interacting with me, or chose not to in the first place. I would simply like to take the time to thank you for taking any interest and for stopping by!

To those who are still interested in speaking/interacting with me I do want to say this: Though I may initially respond to you as Ultra Magnus might, stiff and official, once I feel a bit more relaxed, and feel assured enough to 'drop the act' you'll likely be shocked by how much of a goof I really am and I will always do my best to never ask redundant questions between my accounts if I do interact with you on another one; that would be rude of me to make you repeat yourself just for the sake of trying to hide.

I will always be 100% me. I'm always willing to listen if anyone needs an ear, or anyone needs to bounce some ideas off of my empty noggin'. I'll admit sometimes I may not be able to respond right away, particularly if I'm at work, but please feel free to leave me a wall of text venting about some jerk at work, a silly joke, or randomly moving everything around in Ultra Magnus' office by 3 centimeters to the right just to drive the guy nuts.

Truthfully I'm a great big scardy cat with a super gooey center that wants to have fun, but never at others expense. At least that's not my intentions, but I will never take it personally if anyone decides they need to cut off contact. Everyone has the right to feel secure in their corner of the internet; especially here on tumblr where things can get toxic.

So thank you very much for taking the time to read this and simply for stopping by.

'Till All are One

~Ultra Magnus Mun

P.S. I should totally do a tag U.M.M. or, Ultra Magnus Mun for short, just for the giggles because I could never, ever, see Ultra Magnus going “Ummm....”

#U.M.M. - Ultra Magnus Mun

3 notes · View notes

migleefulmoments · 6 years

Text

CrissColfer Musing #1

The head gang of CCers have created and spread the “ Darren’s Failing Health” Trope until I want to puke. They can’t shut up about Darren’s very active lifestyle is dangerous to his health. Of course their version entails contracts evil handlers, missions to destroy Darren and always the beard.

The questions we will be pondering today are

Does travel lead to health problems?

Can you get sick from being busy?

Does traveling to NOLA for the weekend risk one’s physical health?

Does traveling 12 days before your tour lead to health problems for everybody?

Will Darren break if he doesn’t “rest”?

I cannot start this discussion without discussing qualifications. Are the CCers who have created this trope actually even qualified to talk about Darren’s imperiled health or ANYONE’S health? NO.

According to their own admissions one is an immigration lawyer, one does something that includes PR work, one is a high school student. From the conversations that I have read the others aren’t medical pros either.

Am I qualified? I am a double boarded Nurse Practitioner who happens to be married to a professional pilot (airline and military)...no shit! I’m SUPER QUALIFIED to talk about this. The take away here is that none of the main CCers who have been assessing Darren’s health are qualified to make medical assessments. More importantly, It is NEVER appropriate to make a MEDICAL ASSESSMENTS on a stranger VIA SNAPCHAT, INSTAGRAM photos, OR INSTA-STORIES video. That includes ALL doctors, nurse practitioners and internet trolls.

Now let’s explore what they are talking about. Over just the last few days they have written the following: (me in italics)

“Nothing like burning the candle at both ends.”

“I get it, I’m just tired for him.” (Those damn BOUNDARIES again)

“I’m already exhausted from just watching him being exhausted…” (You should work on your stamina...that might help you get through watching him.)

“I want to close him in a room with a bed and not open it until he sleeps for a week straight.” (Unlike bears, humans don’t actually need to hibernate)

“ I absolutely know this one is important and for ACS but I want sleep for him so badly.”

“Also, trips to NOLA to pick up a new sponsorship is just ridiculous and risking his physical health. As is having him at that bar night after night when he is in LA....But we all know D’ physical and mental well being is not even remotely on their radar. If it was they would take one look at him and force him to sleep for two weeks and eat as he remains shockingly thin”. (***More on this one later because I can’t pass up this statement about the bar)

“He just came back for a trip overseas, he travelled back and forth in the country to please the tp and do his job, another major, important trip like this and only twelve days before the start of the tour isn’t the ideal at all. I know they don’t care about his health, but this is too much for everyone. He’s not a robot, he will break if you keep pushing him like you do. Then what? You could choose anytime and you choose now. That is what I’m asking myself.”

I have no doubt that this branch of the CC family- who cannot shut up about Darren’s failing health-also believe that going outside in cold rainy weather gives can make you “sick” or that sleeping in a drafty room makes you ill or swimming after eating will give you cramps. Taking a play from the CC handbook, I mean “WE KNOW that the CCers believe being outside in the cold rain makes you sick, sleeping in a drafty room makes you ill and swimming right after you eat will kill you”

Ok, ok, I’m sorry. I will be serious now. Where were we?

We KNOW that the CC tribe have no qualifications to diagnose Darren’s health and we know that NOBODY would ever do so over social media photos, but are they correct? Does frequent travel cause health problems? I mean we all know that if you sit next to Sneezy Smurf during a flight, you will be rewarded in 36-48 hours with SARS (cuz you inhaled Sneezy’s recently expelled body fluids into your own nasal passage...yummy ). It is also possible to get a blood clot if you sit in one position for too long. But does TRAVEL itself make you ill? Of course it doesn’t. Working from sun-up to sun-down is how people lived before technology made us sedentary in the last 40 years. Sitting at a desk all day at work and then going home to “relax’ with a glass of wine and playing on our phone all night or watching TV is a luxury of first world, white collar workers. Lots of people- Hospital nurses and doctors, construction workers, farmers to name a few- are on their feet all day at work. Does the world Darren does by going to music shows or the theater several nights a week or playing at the bar every single night- or even flying to NYC for a day and then NOLA for a weekend and back NYC and then to LA a few days later compare to a small organic farmer who works sun-up to sun-down 7 days a week using only a tractor and his own physical labor? Being active is not dangerous to Darren’s-or anyone’s health.

What IS dangerous to our health is sitting on our asses. In fact it is extremely dangerous to our health. Americans (I live here and I only speak of what I know) are dying because we sit around all day. Quickly off the top of my head...hypertension, obesity, high blood sugar, cardiac disease, vascular disease, fibromyalgia, low back pain, joint pain and depression are directly attributed to being sedentary. People are literally dying because they aren’t moving any more.

Now that we understand that being active is healthy and being inactive isn’t, let’s look at other people who travel a lot to see if we can find any clues about their health. Do I know anyone who travels a lot? Oh, my husband and the dozens of airline pilots I personally know. Hmmm, odd but not one of them is frequenlty ill or near their breaking point or has their physical well being in peril. And don’t forget...THEY ACTUALLY FLY THE FREAKING PLANE; Darren DOES NOT. While Darren is “traveling” to Australia or Mexico, he can sleep while my husband and his coworkers monitor a jabillion gauges and monitors.

The example that I hope finally shuts down this trope is John Kerry. John Kerry is currently 74 years old. From 2013-2017 he was the United States Secretary of State. During his time as SOS this 70-something traveled 1, 417,575 miles; visited 91 countries; traveled 596 days and spent 3,055.52 hours in flight. The SoS works 15-16 hour days in high pressure talks with heads of states from all over the globe. If John Kerry can do that much traveling and deal with that much pressure at ages 69-73 then I think 31-year old Darren Criss will be just fine traveling a tiny percentage of that and spending his work time talking to the Hollywood press about how he prepared to play a serial killer, sorting his friends into Hogwarts house for Buzzfeed and singing Teenage Dream and Duck Tales.

To the CCers who Can’t. Stop. Talking about Darren’s health: When you talk about Darren’s health- whether the risks of travel or the danger from his work ethic or his lack of sleep (because he never posts photos of himself sleeping so he must not sleep)- you sound ridiculous. You clearly have NO understanding of health, disease processes or frankly, the human body. Making ridiculous, nonsensical comments over-and-over-and-over doesn’t help your argument that you are so much smarter than the rest of us, you know....the “GA”. who can’t-or won’t- see the “truth” So really, I'm just looking out for you... helping you see reality through your CC colored glasses which are SUPER blurry and make you see things that just aren’t there.

#CC #CCblog #CC family #CCer #crisscolfer #darren criss #CC musings #viva las vegas #Looking through Criss-Colfer-Colored glasses

11 notes · View notes

boymeetsweevil · 6 years

Text

Alien!Reader crashing in Jimin’s backyard - brainstorm

Possible Genre: Comedy, Fantasy/Sci-Fi, Smut????

draft word count: 3.2k

Beginning/Context:

1[ (Alien!)You try to get support from superiors to visit earth and make a few human connections and form ambassadorship (is that a word idk) to create allies between people of earth and people of your planet. Superiors reject the proposal, writing humans off as barbaric and saying they have nothing to gain from a relationship with them even after you spent your whole scholarly life researching humans and poring through previous documents collected by other people who were researching them before humans became thoroughly taboo, so your latest knowledge is like 1999??? Funding gets cut off or something so you high jack an observation-pod to continue to study earth but end up crashing it when colliding with space debris. You land in the field one night behind Jimin’s gym in the mall while he’s closing. He investigates because he’s inquisitive, was a boy scout and a bit of a space nerd when he was younger and goes to see what happened. Finds what’s left of you encased in the slightly cracked safety orb that deploys when the pod is going to be destroyed by impact and he uses sheer brawn to crack it open.]

2[To minimize trauma and preserve brain and vital organs, your body takes on a neutral looking gumby-ish form. Still two legs because Earth and your planet and all other planets in that specific cross section of the galaxy are bipedal]

A) Jimin carries you back to his apartment and worries you’re dying because your skin starts changing in reaction to the environment once you’re exposed to the air after he breaks the vacuum seal in the safety pod.

3[the landing takes place around mid-summer???]

Your Appearance/Mannerisms:

4[in your home atmosphere, skin is rubbery opaque seafoam green texture]

B), but with the source material of Jimin’s hands initially after the crash, when your body realizes its no longer in danger, it restarts and adjusts to earth’s atmosphere and uses DNA from Jimin to create a analogous form for you

5[on earth your skin is translucent so can see blood]

6[has adaptive skin, can change at will if have copy source nearby]see 5+ B

7[black stripes appear over skin when aggressive]

8[thick blue pearlescent blood with tons of flakes of silver floating in around from heart]

9[pulse looks like a purple lightning strike when it gets fast enough]

10[a plum heart with silver lining inside that shed into the blood, but is constantly being repaired and regenerated so not to worry] see 8

11[sharp retractable teeth, vertical pupils perches on everything never sits normally EVER]

12?[hates jimin’s cat because Jimin’s cat reminds you of a breed of people from a different part of the galaxy who came and tried to invade your planet about a decade before you were born and your people just barely managed to kick them out recently and so there’s a lot of anti-cat alien sentiment on your planet and even though Jimin’s cat isn’t mean or anything, like its lazy and indifferent towards you but loves jimin, you still flip it the bird once you learn what that means]

13[Can only eat fruit and drink water with like a shit ton of table salt in it.]

14[All bodily fluids contain the silver sparkles although at much finer size than what can see in blood. Spit and sweat are translucent barring the silver and roughly same consistency as that of humans but pee and blood are deep black with the silver flakes] see 8 and 10

First Encounter:

C)You don’t wake up until 3 days later, when your body has finished completely reacting. When you wake up, he’s coming through his front door with groceries and you make really tense frightened eye contact for a super long time until he finally just shuts his bedroom door and sleeps on the couch. You thinks he’ll kill you because his muscles indicate he’s a warrior on his planet and you’re indeed trespassing (so like why not kill you amirite???). When you learns he’s peaceful, you walk up to him and slowly put your (new)thumbs in the center of his forehead to gain access to his thoughts and learn his language. He can feel you in his mind, inexplicably. First thing you says is “why do you think about breeding so much”.

First Meal on Earth:

D)Later you ask if he’s instead a breeder, because his voice is good for mating calls. He says no...but like confused. During the first few days you’re really weak and starving and he tries to give you so many things but you throw them up every time until he gives you a mango ( because he HATES them and he’s been trying to get rid of it since he bought it to try it and see what the fuss was about but, didn’t like it). And you don’t throw it up so he tentatively tries giving you broccoli and you throw it up, but he has some bananas he bought recently and you eat all of those and follow him around the kitchen but don’t talk (obvi) and soon you get really dehydrated and you’re like “take me to your ocean, human” and he’s like “the ocean is hours away what about this”. And he does some major googling and then wordlessly goes to the kitchen and dumps a half cup of salt in a gallon of water and shakes it for a while and then hands it to you and you tentatively sip at it and then chug it because THIS IS WHAT YOU NEED.

15[Mating is very simple topic where you come from and nudity isn’t really a thing since you only wear robes during special ceremonies, so you’re very open and always embarrass him by not knocking and/or walking in on him. HOWEVER, mating is also very perfunctory/not anything mindblowing which is why you can be nonchalant about it with him. Intimacy is really different from what it is on earth]

CLothes shopping:

E)The huge elephant in the room is that you’re naked way too often and Jimin is running out of sheets to throw on you whenever you walk into the room completely bare but every time he tries to get you to wear his spare clothes you’re like SORRY I don’t like you like that (see 15) and he’s like??? Just ??wear ?the clothes???? And you’re like still no, so then he goes and buys a wig (because you’re bald lmao i forgot to mention that) for when you both need to go out and makes you wear something so you can go to the thrift store and buy your own clothes because it’s weird that you kiiiiinda look like a woman and you’re naked (and frankly speaking he likes your body). You wear the wig but also skinwarp!!!! and you’re walking around with a wrinkled nose in a goodwill or something and you find some really ugly swimming trunks that probably belonged to a 15 year old boy from the 80’s and they’re oddly shiny and a weird material (but you love it because there is no fashion where you come from that is ever going to be compatible with current aesthetics) and you pick up like 4 pairs and then you see a stack of those dramatic retro shirts with wolves howling on them (or something) and you’re like “wow look at this beautiful artwork” and he’s like…REALLY? But he buys it all quick before you change your mind and now you walk around the house looking like a 10 year old boy in a wolf shirt and plastic-y swim trunks, but you still walk around naked sometimes its just less often.

???:

F)Jimin steps on your bare foot once with his socked foot lightly and you freak out and tell him the equivalent of “you’re not that type of girl” (see 15 + 16)

16[making contact with clothes on is really special and something you do with your betrothed or whatever not between acquaintances. You don’t like the idea of hookup culture because it seems like two people aren’t taking sacred oaths created by the “elder aliens” seriously]

F.5) when Jimin brings a girl home, you act very pitiful for him the next day thinking that she rejected his mating proposal because she went home and he’s like wtf no

17[You learn stupid phrases from earth tv. You love infomercials for their colors and loud voices and the weird ingenuity and often write down the ideas and whisper “I can’t wait to tell my superiors”. You also love watching daytime wine mom soaps.]

?Copmutre:

G)Eventually when you learn to use the computer. You’re still kind of childlike, so Jimin leaves a sticky note on the side of the screen with the url to a soap opera forum and you type with two pointer fingers very slowly the exact same thing on the keyboard every day and you learn to read and write via communicating with people on the forums about the shows

18[that’s the only work-unrelated thing you do on the computer]

G.5)You decide to use this as an advantage to further research and gather enough data to prove that humans are intelligent lifeforms worth allying with. Unfortunately...No technology on earth is advanced enough to record data for your superiors like you need to, though. You try to make do with writing by hand, but you hold a pencil like a dog and write like a two-year-old. Then you try to make observations using a fountain pen because it looks like the recording device you used back home. but obvi that doesn’t work :/

Gym :

H)Your muscles are weak and new from having just reformed and from only having walked around his apartment. He suggests you come to his gym one night and have you work out with him. You go but you’re sore the day after and whiny the whole time during.

Meeting Taehyung:

I)Eventually you get bored in the house one day while he’s working from home and you manage to skin-warp yourself into him, although you’re a bit shorter. You all decide that when you get bored you can go out in the streets in his image if you keep it cool. You run into Tae while you’re at a grocery store with money Jimin gave you for fruit, and he’s like “hey bud” and tries to chat you up like you’re jimin and you’re like “who are you” but also think he’s very beautiful and when he touches your shoulder in a friendly manner you squeak and must remind yourself that contact between adults wearing clothes is platonic on earth. You run off without saying anything and he’s like hmmm but doesnt’ think too much of it. When you come home you tell him about it and mention how beautiful Taehyung is and Jimin’s like “he’s okay, I guess” and you’re like “wow you’re not gonna make a move on that?” So you ask him would it be alright for you to court him using Jimin’s image and he says no!!! and you’re like seems like a waste but okay >.>

19[Whenever you go shopping at a new place, you visit the store first and catalogue all their merchandise with your memory and find out things like tax and tip and when you figure out what you need. Then you go to Jimin very seriously and ask for the exact amount down to the 10 won and he obviously never has exact change so he rounds up and gives you like 20 bucks or something and you’re like “wow extra moneys”]

Frog:

J) the first time you see something you want but don’t need is when you see a frog in the window of a pet shop and you fall in love even though it’s actually the ugliest thing and you come to Jimin with big eyes trying to lie about buying more fruit even though you both know you don’t need more (maybe because you just went shopping and you gave him a way bigger number than normal) and he’s like “I know you’re not buying fruit” and you freak out like ‘I thought you said humans didn’t possess non-verbal data transfer abilities’ and he’s like “um well I do, what are you trying to buy” and you’re very ashamed for being caught in a lie so you confess with your head hung in shame ‘a frog’ and he’s like wtf um why don’t you tell me what’s going on and in the end he skypes you from his phone and goes to the pet shop and is like tell me what to do, so you tell him which frog as he angles his phone at the tank and he buys the frog and brings it home and you cry sparkly tears of joy (see 14). You try to name the frog Jimin because “he’s nice” but Jimin is so disgusted by the ugly frog that he’s like lol no what about swamp boy ™ and you’re like “WOW a great idea even though this species would technically not live in a swamp they’re truly found in…”

Computer:

K)After a few months of staying with him, you notice that he starts to get stressed out whenever bills come and you ask him about it and he’s just like “I don’t really make enough to live in this nice apartment and pay off my gym AND support and extra mouth” but he can’t kick you out and he can’t really move to a new place because he lives far enough from the gym as is and you can’t exactly go out and get a job. You feel bad for a while and try and look for answers when you come across an online gambling site. You’re not the best at technology, not like the people you know back home, but you manage to breach the site and find the game’s algorithm and then you ask Jimin to tell you the basics of poker when he gets home and he’s like…um okay I guess and then you basically hack the server so that you can always read what other players have in their decks and see what the computer’s deck look like for each game. After more research, You make a bunch of different accounts and make it so that it doesn’t look like the winnings are being wired to the same bank account even though they are and then win a few high stakes games with each account. Jimin checks his account semi regularly and when he checks it the next time he sees that there’s way more in there than there should be, he gives you a look and you’re like…just go with it and he’s like “...yeah actually. Okay.”

Body:

L)You hear him sing in the shower once he gets comfortable with living with you and you’re so drawn to the sound that you walk into the bathroom and slide open the door to hear better and he’s like what the hell and you’re like what? and then you look down and you’re like “hey, where’s your vagina and what is that thing, it looks like these animals we have back home”. And he’s like trying to be assertive about space but then he’s too curious and he’s like “if you guys don’t have this, how do you mate” and you blush and you’re like um….and then basically describe french kissing and he’s just -.- And then you’re like “wait what is that thing for” and he’s like “…its for mating???? and peeing” and you’re like that thing???? How? And he tells you and you’re like it goes inside???? and so you awkwardly try and take a look at yourself to see how something could go inside you and he’s like go do that somewhere else please and you’re like okay :) and when he gets out of the shower he feels like he should explain himself and he goes to the living room to talk to you he hears you making shocked sounds and is like ok and goes and plays music in headphones really loudly and then 10 moinutes later you come and find him and you don’t have any pants on and you’re like guess what and he’s like maybe we should talk.

Seaon Change:

M)In the fall he packs up his jeep and drives you both out to the field behind the mall where you crashed that night and you walk around so you can get fresh air and chat and he has you bundled up in more ugly kids clothing from the thrift store and he thinks you’re weird but cute.

M.5)Winter comes and you’re not really equipped for it because 1) your body didn’t account for winter when it reformed and 2) it doesn’t really matter anyway because your planet doesn’t get that cold. ever. and you can’t keep sleeping on the couch. Jimin doesn’t have a pullout couch because it’s a nice apartment but minimally furnished for 1 person so there isn’t really space for that. And you’re cold-blooded (sort of) so you become really heat seeking in the cold months, which means you whine about being cold all the time and sit by the tiny radiator for hours at a time until he sits you down and turns on the tv and cuddles you and you’re about to freak about and be like “I’m not your wife” (see 15,16, F) but he calmly talks you down and talks about how humans are social animals and touch is important and this will keep you warm blab la blah and eventually you’re like…okay.

20[In the winter its slower at the gym so he takes more days off which means he takes naps a lot and he can afford to do this with your extra income] see K

Nap:

N)You end up getting in bed one day during a blizzard and you mention that watching the snow outside the window was putting you to sleep and hes like “yeah” cus raining and stuff like fireplaces or snow always put him to sleep and when you get into bed your heart starts beating really fast and you both ignore the implications of that but anyway so your pulse flashes and the lining of your heart sheds more (see 8-10) so its like a blizzard and a thunderstorm combined under your skin and he watches the flow underneath your skin and reaches out to trace it and falls asleep and you fall asleep too and this becomes a pattern after lunch. You both like each other but no one wants to make a move because the alien/human thing feels like it would turn the other off

HankyPanky:

O)You’re watching TV one day and he comes home and sits down and joins you and you see actors kissing on your soap and you’ve watched enough soaps and had THE TALK™ (see 17 and L) so you’re both painfully aware of the tension in the room and your skin is full of silver flakes and flashes (see 8-10) and he kisses you but afterwards you’re like what if I get pregnant!!! (see L) and he’s like…if your new body is made based off human blueprint wouldn’t you get pregnant the human way and you’re like ummm I guess so you wait a few days because that’s how long it takes to show and usually it would mean that your skin would become opaque but it doesn’t and you’re like oh…we can do that all the time then :U

End:

tbc

OKOKOK this is really long and I’ve been sitting on it for so long and IDK like I’m going to try and turn it into a full blown fic but this is still an idea i want to keep so like please respect this for all it is

FYI:

things with numbers in brackets are pieces of context I want to establish to motivate certain vignette thingies

things with letters are the little vignette thingies

both have references to other vignettes or context points as needed to guide me

56 notes · View notes

stephenmccull · 3 years

Text

‘Kicking You When You’re Down’: Many Cancer Patients Pay Dearly for Parking

For cancer patients, the road from diagnosis to survivorship feels like a never-ending parade of medical appointments: surgeries, bloodwork, chemotherapy, radiation treatments, scans. The routine is time-consuming and costly. So, when hospitals charge patients double-digit parking fees, patients often leave the garage demoralized.

This story also ran on NBC News. It can be republished for free.

Iram Leon vividly remembers the first time he went for a follow-up MRI appointment at Dell Seton Medical Center in Austin, Texas, after he had been treated at another hospital for a brain tumor.

The medical news was good: His stage 2 tumor was stable. The financial news was not. When he sat down at the receptionist’s desk to check out, Leon was confronted by a bold, red-lettered sign on the back of her computer that read: “WE DO NOT VALIDATE PARKING.”

Below that all-caps statement was a list of parking rates, starting with $2 for a 30-minute visit and maxing out at $28 a day. Lose your ticket? Then you could pay $27 for an hour.

“To this day, I remember that sign,” Leon, 40, said of the 2017 appointment, which he posted about on Facebook. “These patients were people who were coming in for various types of cancer treatment. These were people who were keenly aware of their own mortality, and yet the sign was screaming at them, ‘We do not validate parking.’” (Hospital officials did not respond to requests for comment about their parking policy.)

JulieAnn Villa, who was diagnosed in March with her third bout of cancer, estimates she has spent “thousands of dollars” on parking fees during her years of treatment and follow-up care. She faces a transportation dilemma every time she commutes 6 miles to Chicago’s Northwestern Memorial Hospital from her apartment. Should she take public transit? Call a pandemic surge-rate Uber? Ask a friend to drive her? Or pay $12 to $26 (with validation) to park in a garage where each floor is named after singers like Dolly Parton and Frank Sinatra?

She was hospitalized for multiple days in April after spending 23 hours alone in an overburdened ER, because she didn’t want friends to pay to wait with her. “I almost drove myself, and I’m so glad I didn’t,” Villa said. “That would have been expensive.”

Long a source of frustration for patients, the costs of parking while in cancer treatment is finally drawing national scrutiny from oncology researchers and even some hospital administrators.

“If you want to rile up patients or caregivers or family members, just bring up parking costs,” said Dr. Fumiko Chino, a radiation oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York who studies the “financial toxicity” of cancer treatment, including costs not covered by insurance, such as parking fees.

Chino, who enrolled in medical school after her husband died of a rare neuroendocrine cancer in 2007, added, “For people who have to pay $15 to $18 every single time, which is what I remember paying, it really feels like the last straw, frankly — like kicking you when you’re down.”

Public transit is possible for some cancer patients in larger cities, but not for those too ill or immunocompromised. Others have accessibility issues. Many must travel to get care, making driving the best option.

Parking fees can have implications for more than just the patient. “Some patients say, ‘This is the reason I didn’t participate in a clinical trial, because I couldn’t afford the parking,’” Chino said.

At a time when hospitals and drug companies are under increasing pressure to diversify clinical trial populations, testing only patients who can afford high parking fees is problematic, Chino said.

There are some pilot programs to improve access to drug trials, and some charities, such as the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, offer travel grants, but accessibility remains a substantial barrier to cancer care, said Elizabeth Franklin, president of the nonprofit Cancer Support Community, which offers financial aid to patients and advocates in Washington, D.C., for “patient-centered” health policies.

“The true definition of a patient-centered health care system,” Franklin said, is one that allows patients to choose the best means of transportation. “It’s not making them go into debt because they’ve had to pay a ton of money for parking each time they go to the clinic or the hospital.”

Chino and colleagues published a short study in July showing that some cancer patients pay $1,680 over the course of treatment.

According to readership statistics released in late March, the study was the most read and downloaded article in JAMA Oncology last year, and it continues to prompt a lively social media response. A thread on Reddit has logged more than 1,100 comments, including many from patients in other countries voicing surprise at U.S. parking policies.

The researchers calculated the cost to park at 63 National Cancer Institute-designated cancer centers while receiving the standard number of treatments for each of three types of cancers: node-positive breast cancer, head and neck cancers, and acute myeloid leukemia, or AML. They did not calculate costs for follow-up appointments, blood draws, routine scans and immune-boosting injections.

They found that, while 20 of the hospitals provided free parking for all cancer patients, the other 43 had widely varying fees.

“The range was $0 to $800 for breast cancer,” Chino said. “That’s huge, and it’s not like the person who’s paying $800 is necessarily getting any better treatment.” The maximum charges for a standard course of therapy for head and neck cancer were $665 and for AML, $1,680.

Practices should change, Chino said, “to alleviate this strain for our patients.”

Of the 63 hospitals, including those where parking is free for cancer patients, 54% offered free parking for chemotherapy and 68% for radiation treatment.

The top daily parking rate, according to the researchers, is $40 at New York’s Mount Sinai Hospital. (A spokesperson for Mount Sinai declined to comment.) Chino’s own institution, Memorial Sloan Kettering, is not far behind; parking at one of its main garages begins at $12 an hour and maxes out at $36 a day. A spokesperson for the hospital said some locations do offer free parking, and all patients can apply for aid to cover parking costs.

A few colleagues scoffed when Chino said she was researching parking charges, she said, but a growing number of mostly younger oncologists are concerned about indirect costs that contribute to the financial toxicity of cancer.

“It seems ethically incorrect to nickel-and-dime patients for parking charges,” a trio of doctors wrote last year in an editorial published by the American Society of Clinical Oncologists. They acknowledge that most top cancer hospitals are in urban centers, where parking costs are often high and third-party agencies may operate the garages. “Nevertheless, in 2020, with our multibillion-dollar cancer center budgets, we as health care systems should do everything we can to help patients and caregivers,” the editorial said.

City of Hope National Medical Center in Los Angeles is one of the 20 NCI-designated hospitals that do not charge patients for parking. Dr. Vijay Trisal, a surgical oncologist who serves as City of Hope’s chief medical officer, takes pride in that distinction.

“Charging cancer patients for parking is like a knife in the back,” he said. “We can’t control copays, but we can control what patients pay for parking.”

While Trisal would never want a patient to choose City of Hope for the free parking alone, he acknowledges the policy gives his hospital a competitive advantage.

“You would not believe how many patients have said to me, ‘Thank you for not charging for parking,’” he said.

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

‘Kicking You When You’re Down’: Many Cancer Patients Pay Dearly for Parking published first on https://smartdrinkingweb.weebly.com/

0 notes

gordonwilliamsweb · 3 years

Text

‘Kicking You When You’re Down’: Many Cancer Patients Pay Dearly for Parking