#and the way she like. routinely is getting on frans case for being such a white fascist about things is well. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

homoose · 4 years

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Merry Christmas, Baby Girl

Summary: Just Penelope and Derek being in love in the snow. Based on the prompt: What kind of Christmas would it be if we didn’t play in the snow?

Pairing: Penelope Garcia x Derek Morgan

Category: fluff

Warnings/Includes: none

Word count: 1,444

a/n: Ficmas Day 9! Yes, my ficmas has two days of Penelope getting her man because that woman deserves the world and everyone in it and frankly it’s a hate crime that morcia wasn’t canon.

Series Masterlist

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“Derek Morgan, this is not negotiable. We’re making a snow person.”

Derek sighed. “Baby girl, I moved away from Chicago for a reason. I don’t do snow.”

“Well, I moved away from California for a reason,” she huffed. “And we never get this much snow!”

She was right; DC never got this much snow— especially not in December. Sure, a few inches here and there in January and February. But this year, a freak blizzard had dropped over a foot of snow overnight. The entire city was shut down. It was the first white Christmas they’d had in years. And Derek had zero interest in going out in it.

“You go,” he said, gesturing with his hot chocolate. “I’ll watch from the window.”

“Uh-uh.” When Derek groaned, Penelope rolled her eyes. “Oh, come on. An hour in the snow won’t kill you.”

“It just might,” he countered. She pulled her best pout, shuffling toward him with full on puppy dog eyes. He shot her a pointed look. “Don’t even.”

She wrapped her arms around his waist, looking up at him from underneath her lashes. “So… you don’t want to spend Christmas Eve… bundled up with the love of your life… wrapping a hand knitted scarf around a jolly snow person… who was brought into this world with love—”

“And who’s going to melt in twelve hours?” Penelope huffed out a breath, and he wrapped his arms around her shoulders when she went to pull away. He sighed into her hair. “... you get one hour.”

Penelope squealed and squeezed him tight, and Derek couldn’t stop the smile from turning up the corners of his mouth. “And only because I love you.”

She leaned up to press a quick, chaste kiss to his mouth. “I’m quite certain that I love you more. So much that I’ll even help you get bundled up.”

The two of them got dressed in their layers— two pairs of pants, long sleeved shirts, sweaters, and jackets. They laced up their snow boots and stuffed their hands into waterproof gloves. And then Penelope wound one of her ridiculously soft scarves around his neck, wrapping it once, twice, and then tugging him down by the ends for another kiss. He brought his hands to her hips, tugging her as close as possible through the combined six layers of clothing. His fingers tightened around his favorite part of her and she laughed into his mouth before swatting him with the fringe of the scarf.

“You will not get out of this with seduction, sir.” She tugged a matching beanie over his head, tapping on the little puff ball on top. “God, how are you so cute?”

He pulled her hat down a little more snugly over her loose curls. “I got it from my mama.”

She smiled at that. “I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Fran Morgan, thank you for giving me the love of my life.” She turned to retrieve a wicker basket from the entryway side table.

Derek eyed the basket, overflowing with miscellaneous items. “What’s all that?”

Her lips quirked up in a small smile, and she grabbed his hand. “You’ll see. Come on, hot stuff.”

They trudged out into the middle of the yard, and Penelope hemmed and hawed over the perfect location for far too long. When she finally decided, marking it with a little x, Derek leaned down to start scooping up snow. She waved her hands frantically. “No, no, no— you can’t take the snow from there.”

He furrowed his brows. “Well, excuse me. Then where am I supposed to get the snow from, pretty girl?”

She let out an exasperated sigh. “If you use all the snow from there, you’ll expose the dead grass, and then she won’t look good for pictures.”

“She?”

“Yes, she,” Penelope confirmed. “She’s going to be an icon and a diva, and I will not have her surrounded by ugly, brown grass.”

They spent the better part of an hour rolling snow across the lawn, each snowball growing in size until Penelope deemed it satisfactory. To her credit, she rolled the middle snowball entirely by herself, and Derek only had to help her a little in the lifting. Then, he worked on smoothing the base of their snow person, while she got the shape of the head just right.

Derek stood and dusted the snow off his knees, watching as Penelope retrieved the wicker basket from where she’d set it down earlier. She pulled a bright orange scarf out of the top and handed it to him. “Here. Bundle her up,” she ordered.

“Yes, ma’am.” He smiled and wrapped the chunky knit scarf around the head of their creation. She handed him a carrot, and he dug out a little starter hole before positioning the carrot and packing it in with some fresh snow. She pulled two brown buttons out of the basket, sticking them on as the eyes.

“Okay, make the smile with these.” She dumped a pile of red buttons into his outstretched hands.

As he pressed the buttons into a curve, he watched Penelope fasten three beaded necklaces and wedge in two large jewels for earrings. The snow might not be his thing, but Penelope Garcia certainly was. His god given solace, his compass, his ray of sunshine, his queen, his literal angel on earth.

They’d danced around it for so many years— each of them always with someone else or not ready to commit. The shameless flirting became their thing, something they just did that no one questioned. It became so routine that he missed the moment that their philia became eros. He couldn’t even call it falling, because with falling, there’s always a collision. Loving Penelope was floating—buoyant, ebullient, liberating.

When he’d finally pressed his mouth to hers that first time— really kissed her—after a horrific case that he almost didn’t come back from, he was worried that maybe he’d been too late. They’d said I love you so many times before, but he’d never said I’m in love with you, it’s only you, I’m ready for you, it’s never felt like this, you’re the sun and the moon and the stars all at once.

But then she’d kissed him back, and he hadn’t been too late, and she was with him. And everything and nothing changed. It was still all flirting, but this time they could back it up. And he really, really loved backing it up with Penelope Garcia.

She caught his eye and quirked a brow and brought him back to himself. He grinned and held his hands out at his creation, and she inspected it with a nod of approval. He could see that the basket was almost empty, but there were a few more items left. She pulled out three ornate gold buttons, pressing them firmly to the torso. “And the finishing touch for our snow diva.” Derek laughed when she placed the teal, feathered hat at a slight angle on top.

“She’s pretty incredible.” He tucked her under his arm and hugged her close. “Like someone else I know.”

Her arms snaked around his waist. “Mmmhmm. And don’t you forget it.”

“I could never.” He pressed a kiss to her temple. “But your hour is up, sweetness.”

“We have to get some pictures with her first,” she said, pulling out her phone. When he groaned, she continued, “And then, we’ll go inside, and I’ll help you get all—” kiss, “warmed—” kiss, “up.” She whispered the last bit against his mouth and gave him a sweet, sultry smile.

“I like the sound of that.” He tried to kiss her again, but she laughed and pushed him off, gesturing toward their snow woman.

“I’m sure you do, my love.” It was funny the way his heart still soared when she called him that, even though he’d heard it a thousand times. “Now, give her a kiss.” He sighed, but leaned down to pucker up next to their creation. He heard the shutter sound and stayed still for two more, well practiced in the art of posing for Penelope’s pictures. “Perfect!”

He held his hand out to her. She laced their gloved fingers together, and he tugged her forward, catching her when she toppled into him. Brown eyes met brown eyes, and then he watched as a snowflake fell onto her nose. He grabbed her phone, quickly opening the camera and snapping a picture before it melted. “Mmm, that’s a perfect photo.” He pressed a kiss onto the tip of her nose, right over the top of the snowflake. “Now, let’s go inside so I can kiss my real diva.”

———

some snow diva inspiration x x x

Permanent tags: @andiebeaword @averyhotchner @pinkdiamond1016 @shadyladyperfection @coffeeandendlesswords @justanothetfangirl @no-honey-no @ajeff855 @sapphic-prentiss @eevee0722 @rexorangecouny @rainsong01 @goldentournesol @blameitonthenight21 @moviequeen51

Series tags: @wastingborrowedtime @90spumkin @wordvomit-foryourmind

#penelope x derek #morcia #penelope garcia x derek morgan #derek x penelope #derek morgan x penelope garcia #criminal minds fanfiction #penelope garcia fanfiction #derek morgan fanfiction #morcia fanfiction #morcia imagine #penelope garcia imagine #derek morgan imagine #homoose writes #a very moosey ficmas #a very moosey ficmas

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wherearemyglassesbro · 4 years

Note

How do you picture fruk going from enemies/work rivals to reluctant co-workers to friends in denial to lovers in the lawyer au?

When Art started out, Fran was already a practicing lawyer! So their first REAL ‘I can’t stand you’ interaction was when they went up against each other in court and the defense won which broke Francis’s 10 win streak. So annoying. Later in the hallway when Arthur tried to be like ‘you did pretty good in there’, Fran totally brushed past him and ignored him cause he’s petty like that

And in return Art was like >:0 well FINE then! I see how it is!! Then he went to Eliza and was like ‘tell me everything you know about that French prick’

They ended up taking the same cases more often just cause now....it’s a competition. Fran’s ego was a lil busted after their last face off in court so he wants to put this rookie in his place! Yeah! But then he lost again and nearly ripped his hair out

It kept going like that. Francis winning 3 times in a row. Art winning again. Fran winning again. Art winning 2 more times. Of course it depends on the case, it’s all very complicated cause that’s just how the law is but...it’s always personal for them and now it’s even MORE personal lmao

After working together for awhile they fall into a routine of bickering in the courthouse halls, walking each other to the parking lot, grabbing coffee for the other on the way to court cause ‘it’s easier so we both don’t have to waste gas’. Fran even starts bringing Art lunch sometimes cause Art doesn’t always pack himself a lunch

They work on cases back at Francis’s apartment “I can get her a 4 year sentence with the possibility of parole but I’m telling you, that’s the best I can do, sourcils” “You can do better than that, this is a 20 year old girl we’re talking about!” “A 20 year old girl that evaded police and drove through an elderly woman’s livingroom. I think 4 years is fair” “UGH! Fine...Whatever. But you better give me something better for Levinson’s case...”

It kinda becomes a routine to hang at Francis’s place. Even if they only have one case each, they’ll eat and chat for hours without having any work to do. Of course they’re not friends!! No way. They’re coworkers! Shut up!!

That doesn’t stop them from looking for each other in the courthouse. There’s 16 courtrooms and tons of cases every week so they’re often at the courthouse at the same time. After being annoyed cause ‘ugh, Bonnefoy was supposed to be here today’ ‘Stupid Kirkland never told me he was off today and tomorrow...’ they link their calendar app

“No Eliza!! Get off my arse, there’s nothing going on between us” “Arthur, I share a calendar with my husband. That’s couple behavior” “It is not! Get out of my office, woman!!” He isn’t even intimidating cause now he’s blushing and Eliza can read him like a book

Arthur made an comment about how Francis looks nice in blue and THAT DAY he was at the Vargas suit shop to get a blue suit and a few ties varying in shades of blue

While they were having dinner together Fran said something about how Arthur could use a haircut and Art kinda shrugged like “Yeah I guess I have to ask Eliza for a haircut soon” and Frans like “Eliza cuts your hair??” “Yeah...? Sometimes” “I can cut your hair if you want” and 20 minutes later Art’s sitting on the edge of the bathtub and Fran’s going to town cutting his hair. It’s shorter than Art would usually get but...it’s nice :) he likes it a lot and NO it isn’t because Francis is the one who did it shut up right now

Eliza is offended that he liked Fran’s haircuts better than hers so she gave him the silent treatment until Arthur bought her a cookie from the vending machine

Cut to like a week later. Fran and Art are totally flooded with cases cause crime rates always increase around the holidays. Their work is spread out on the floor and they’re sitting in the middle of the piles of papers. They’re working hard but around 3am they just pass out lmao

And Art wakes up around 9 with Fran’s head on his shoulder and he has NO idea what to do. Does he push him off?? Does he let him stay there? There’s no way he can relax now!! Uhhhhh...UHHH panic ensues

He sits there for another hour, just letting Fran sleep and drool on his shoulder. And when he wakes up he looks like a mess. His hair is staticy, he has bags under his eyes and he has drool on his face “Mm...What time is it?” and Art just goes “I think I want to take you out to dinner tonight”

And they do go out to dinner :)

Art ends up moving into Fran’s apartment (cause it’s way nicer than his own) and it’s very domestic

However he did not tell anyone that he moved in with Fran until Alfred tried to go to his apartment unannounced. Well...Art doesn’t live there anymore lmao and instead of Art answering the door, a super tall goth guy answered. Alfred was beyond confused

Eliza found out from Alfred cause Al is a blabbermouth lmao. She made ‘congrats on getting laid’ cookies and giggled like a maniac when she left them in Art’s office for him to find later

They get married a year later cause by now, it’s been 2 years of this nonsense lmao

#lawyer au :)#ignore the spelling errors I’m lazy #aph #hetalia #ask away!#headcanons #hetalia headcanons #asks #always up for hc requests #aph france #aph england #Fruk

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blankdblank · 4 years

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Hobbit Soulmate Pt 34

“Gimli!” Andy said making you smile and accept his hug on the way into the building for the table read, “Almost didn’t recognize you. Can’t wait to see you blonde.” He murmured with a wink your way sharing that he knew that you were going to be the lead for a while now having been working so close with Peter on this project already in just the research phase. “Peter should be along shortly to meet us early birds. Looks like we’re here first.”

“Oh that’s good, then we can pick our seats, shuffle others around and just cause mayhem.” Making him chuckle to himself and lead the way into the room he’d been in before for the earlier table read. Once inside the room closest to a banquet hall in your mind you eyed the cloth coated tables in the shape of a square set up with binders on them at each padded wooden seat appearing to be small wingback style dining chairs and name places for each actor around where Peter would be seated. Around the table you strolled reading off the names from the numbered gunners, pilots, crew members and various other speaking extras feeding into the actors from various sections of the film.

The executives from the start of the film interacting with Jack were grouped along with the police who would come to fetch them at the docks feeding to Adrien and Colin Hanks who would be beside Kyle Chandler playing the lead actor in the fake film inside this one. The few supporting actors acting as camera crew took up the final spots by them as you sat across from them in the middle of your side just past the actors from the theater Ann works in. On your right Andy sat with Jamie Bell leading off the other ship based crew members including Thomas Kretschmann, Evan Parke and Lobo Chan. The final spots on the cast for speaking extras on the film would be folded in on the set to keep them from waiting around all day for only a few lines, a spot you knew well from some of your roles.

Andy with a grin eased out your chair for you making you giggle and ease between the front of it to fit into the gap to sit as he scooted it in for you as all the chairs were close together and hard to squeeze between. “Thank you,” Into the back of your seat you settled your jacket you shrugged out of adjusting your black t shirt under the baggy grey cardigan Richard had left you that with a ruffle of your hair that had your curls settling at their own whims around your face and shoulders they barely reached.

Into his own chair he eased grinning to the woman entering with glasses in a tray she was settling at each seat while another entered with water bottles. The opening of your bag on your lap drew a glance your way from them and Andy in settling his chair into place watching you bring out a bottle of v8 you settled on the table then shifted your bag at your side. Flashing him a quick sheepish grin you said, “Lee bought two cases before he went to Canada and forgot he couldn’t take them with him and this is the last one. Have to drink them or they’ll go bad on me.”

“No judgments here,” out of his bag he pulled a bottle of pineapple juice making you giggle, “Lady Love has me on a juice cleanse, whatever that is. Read it somewhere and I don’t think we’re doing it right cuz we had a full English each morning since and bacon wrapped pork fillets and buttery salty boiled veggies for two days now and all we drink is pineapple juice.”

That had you giggle again, “I don’t think that’s how you do it either. I think it’s meant you only consume fruit juice and no food as a sort of fasting regimen.”

“Bugger that, don’t you tell her that,” making you pretend to lock your lips, “Think she just got swept up with the coupons.”

That had you pointing at the bottle in your hand, “Came home to split eight cases of this stuff because they were on sale for ten cents, not even a huge sale.” Making him chuckle, “Still can’t believe you ran off and got married on me.”

“No one knew, something about relatives and a scuffle with the mead would have had our clans clashing not to mention my mum would have wanted the big Catholic shindig and we were not for that so pop to the courthouse and back. Saves so much time and then I took her to Aruba, burned about most of my backside off in the sun but she loved the bits around my snake peeling self coming out of the shower in the mornings.”

“True love,” you teased making him chuckle and join you in taking sips of your drinks.

“How’s your fella?”

“Cold, got him up in Northern Canada for part of his role, so he’s cold and grumpy and can’t wait for me to be back. Only have a few weeks when I get there till he’s off to Europe for the rest of his role. But then we go to England for more cold to Spring scenes for North and South.”

“Ooh, do they like your hair color now?”

“Yes, they did mention they love the shade so this one will work and I have a friend who knows a good salon I can get my roots touched up when I need it, brows too. I do like it when I am in bits of sunlight when we can get it cuz it glows a bit golden.”

“If only we had more sun,” making you giggle again. “A shame to dull your glow.”

“Just wait till I go platinum the girls say I will be other worldy.”

“No doubt on that.” He said glancing over eyeing Thomas walking in with Evan Parke, both who paused seeing the new face at the table beside Andy. Turning his head Andy grinned saying, “Hey guys, you haven’t met Jaqi yet.”

“Hi,” you said with a wave in their walk around the room to their seats near your, stopping to shake your hand then move to take their seats.

Evan said, “I’ve seen you before.”

Andy said, “Beast of Bards.”

Thomas shrugged out of his jacket, “Yes, you changed your hair.”

“Ya, had to lighten it for my next projects. Should be easier to go blonde after them.” You looked to Thomas saying, “My friend said the Pianist was pretty good.” And to Evan you said, “You were on Alias too, right?”

Evan grinned nodding, “Yes, my brother and I have seen your film twice, must have taken some time to learn those dances.”

You smirked saying, “Not really. They gave me a couple weeks to memorize and tweak them to the Director’s fancy.”

Thomas said, “You said your friend has seen the film, you don’t like war films?”

“I do, haven’t gotten to seeing yet. By the time I was still long enough to watch it they’d dropped it to disc, and I don’t have a dvd player yet.” That made Andy chuckle and you rolled your eyes reaching for your bottle for another sip, “Lee is looking into one for his place in Canada, so I might be able to mooch off his while I’m there. His brother’s got a copy of it we could borrow.”

They both settled into their seats as you took a sip flashing a wave to Jed Brophy and Rick Baker coming in next who grinned waving back in recognizing you right away, Jed who you had worked with in the trilogy in your time as an orc and other extra roles. “Figured Peter had something up his sleeve,” Jed said easing off his jacket to take his seat.

The executives were next while Rick continued the conversation with Jed from the path in after his greeting you. Jim and Ric, both who found their seats engulfed in their own talks until Peter came in with a smile seeing you by Andy, pausing to give you a hug from the side on his way to his seat to ready his things still on the phone with Fran helping on a solution to a wardrobe issue with their little girl and boy. The Vaudeville theater actors came in next curiously glancing your way until they could shake hands and take their seats on your free side to Jamie Bell’s own entrance with a creeping smile noticing just who was in the formerly emptied spot. Leaving his coat on his seat he said, “Oh my gosh, I haven’t seen you in so long!” Softly you giggled at his gentle hug around your shoulders, “I am so glad you’re here! I can’t wait to see what sort of stage routine they give you.”

“Well I can’t wait to see what sort of fun you’ll get up to in this film while I’m off in my slip and silk robe being chased by dinos.”

Andy chuckled, “Dinos and me.”

“Yes, not to mention getting kidnapped, loads of fun.” Making Jamie chuckle and shift for his seat seeing Peter glancing your way in hanging up his call.

The in film ‘film crew’ came in next with the police actors as well with Colin, Jack and Adrien next. The first two who greeted the guys around the table and paused at your quick wave and anxious grin their way. Jack however broke the silence pointing at you post mutter, “Purple,” in a gasp he excitedly added, “Beast of Bards! You were kick ass!”

“Thank you,” you giggled out glancing to Adrien in his apparent locked stare of confusion.

He glanced to Peter as Colin said, “Well you’ll no doubt be able to out last us after a role like that. Dancers have amazing endurance.” Settling into his chair as you grinned a bit wider at Andy’s hushed chuckle.

Adrien asked Peter, “You picked a teenager? She’s got to be what, sixteen?”

Jamie said, “Jaqi’s older than me.”

Drawing the elder actor’s eye a moment only for them to shift back to Peter, “Rest my case.”

“I’m not a teenager, two more years I can legally rent a car,” the second half you said to Andy who chuckled again.

Thomas asked, “There is an age limit on car rentals here? I never knew that.”

Peter said with a grin, “Well you’re two years past being able to rent one in New Zealand. If we didn’t already drive you everywhere you could at least.”

Adrien looked to you, “The Bard film that’s a dance film, there’s next to no dancing in this film. You sure you’re up to it?”

“There’s no call for piano playing for you I could ask the same thing,” parting his lips to your comeback and grin adding, “Congrats on the Oscar nom by the way. Youngest guy to get one if you do win, haven’t seen it yet but I hear it was good.”

Peter jumped in, “Jaqi here was already signed on to be Naomi’s stunt and possibly scream double and is more than qualified for anything we toss her way.”

“Ooh, I’ve got juggling mostly on its knees, but my friend said she’d help with any other trick shots and whatnot as I hit them in rehearsing.”

Peter grinned, “I knew you could master it in no time.”

Jamie said, “I always wanted to learn to juggle, you can teach me later.”

Adrien huffed and took his seat and the binders were opened revealing a legal pad and pocket of pens and pencils that you pulled out to rest on your lap to be ready for notes on any and everything. Right up front once the introductions of the segment to the Depression era New York City you and the theater group testing out the sort of accent that Peter had helped you to find on your last lunch together at your place when he’d signed you to this new role. The naïve impression you gave was played to and through those sections you caught Colin and Jack smirking especially at how you were blending right into the script and even paused to note a few subtle changes you suggested on the lines to Peter who agreed to each as they flowed better.

Jack’s intro came next with his fingers raised to Andy’s standing in for the fruit stand owner you stole an apple from with hold of your wrist growling his lines to your pretend stunned self merely trying to squirm free. He offered a coin to the stand keep and you were free to join him for the meal at the diner where your open mouthed pause to his nipped lip grin your way post request of your dress size he stammered out that he was one of the men she could trust in the business, a Producer. Through focusing on you the still staring Adrien nearly missed his cue for his opening lines in Jack’s character trying to trap him into traveling with them. From his frustrations at being trapped Kyle flowed in between conversations of the crew including Jamie’s faked pocketing of his pen post scribble of his pen leading to Kyle producing his comb to fake some posed faces teetering you on the edge of giggling.

Peter said, “Now, alone in her cabin Ann Darrow has a rehearsal of her introduction to Jack Driscoll.” He winked your way, “Make it awkward. Make me squirm.”

That had you giggle and take a moment to ready your grin and flow into the failed tries to greet said playwright she was a huge fan of, Andy chuckled however as you smiled to Colin’s comment post intro of your flub in assuming Preston is Jack Driscoll. “Oh this is going to be so awful day of. I’m already antsy.”

Jack raised his fist with a nod, “Go hard, for all of us awkward butterflies.”

Giggling to yourself you brushed your curls back only to have them fall again around your face as you readied and smiled wider in a nervous blush to Colin who kept his face as still as possible holding back his laughter until your embarrassed retreat from the room for the guys to banter. On the ship you got some great notes for your scenes with Kyle, who you’d seemed to bond over the adoration of the history of film from the era to blend into your acting styles to be over the top. Noting each between glances to Adrien in your few scenes with him where he seemed to still be troubled in pulling out of is doubts on your being the right one for the job.

Post island arrival Peter said, “Now, to keep from spoiling your voices I say we skip the screams, plus I’d hate to startle the neighbors if you gave it a go Jaqi.”

“Party pooper,” you muttered making him smirk at your lifting your bottle to finish it off. The guys through their scenes to gather up a posse to search for Ann you popped out to the attached bath and back again in more than enough time for a scene with grunting Andy. The shouts for Ann were more half hearted giggle inducing readings of the name making you cover your mouth with both hands the longer their disastrous explorations went on until you gave Andy a hug at his death scene as Lumpy.

The scenes after the return to the city were mainly descriptive of what was occurring between the less verbal end of the film.

“How is your apartment shopping going up in Canada, ticking all the boxes?” Andy asked in the small break as the man to take the orders for lunch arrived. And the grin and wave you returned for his was not missed by the still staring Adrien across from you honed in on all you apparently did even in the break.

“We found some cute things for it. Nice couch, armchair and a bed, it’s on the floor but it’s a bed, no sign of a table yet.” Making you and Andy chuckle, “And we found this cute cabinet, well I say cute, I love it but it must have been in a fire or something the doors and drawers are all stuck. So Rich is determined to try and pry it open for me and clean it up a bit.”

“That’s good, give him something to distract him.”

“Honestly, aren’t there more pressing things to be focused on than conversations on furniture shopping?” Adrien muttered to himself but loud enough for the both of you to hear, though it didn’t pause your conversation.

Peter however said after getting off his phone, “Lunch is underway then our surprise for you is all lined up.”

Smirking at the excited Director you asked, “Is this a take a picture sort of surprise or more of a dangle you off a ledge sort of surprise?”

Peter chuckled with the few here who worked with you on the trilogy and replied playfully, “We are not in New Zealand yet, leave the ledge dangling to home turf.”

Curtly Adrien gave his order handing over the menu in his hands without a care watching you as those between you ordered in kinder tones while your turn to order from the young man had the actor huffing again as you said, “Hank, Shoppet still hanging in there?”

“Oh ya,” he chuckled out, “Figured out it was the wind chimes setting the feathered fiend off each night. Likes ‘em in the day time still so we just knot them in a sock.”

“Well that’s good news,” Adrien sighed and you smiled taking the hint he thought you were smiling too much and taking too long with the delivery guy granting Andy some more time to decide himself along with a few others behind him. “Oh don’t mind him,” you said after Hank’s glance and momentary gauge on the irritated man staring you down, “He’s not always a pretentious ass,” the words dropping jaws across the table, Jack and Colin’s especially who bit that back or covered their mouths with their hands like a few others to your right, “He’s just being method.” The words relaxing Hank who’d seen you picked on enough in school and was readying to say something.

Hank looked at him saying, “Nailed it,” only doubling the state from the now fuming actor.

Smiling still you handed over the menu saying, “He’s supposed to find me vapid and too naive to be taken seriously.”

Throatily he chuckled and added your menu to the others, “Good luck with that,” he aimed at Adrien then stepped behind you saying, “get you your usual.”

The rest of the table ordered as Peter tried not to smile as you had continued to talk to Andy again and then when Hank had left Adrien leaned forward on the table before him saying, “I’m still waiting.”

That turned your head and you smiled clenching his brows tighter, “Food shouldn’t take long, they have an excellent service record.”

“For an apology,” he grit out, “You told him I was a pretentious ass.” The other actors glanced between the pair of you like amused schoolyard children watching the beginnings of a fight.

“No,”

“Everyone heard you,” he fired back.

“You told him you were being a pretentious ass, I told him you were being method.”

“The difference?” he retorted through smirks and restrained snickers.

“Everyone has ears,” you replied and his brows dropped in the vague answer. “This is a business of reputation, don’t limit your pool of possible job offers.”

“My agent is doing just fine getting me job offers no matter the troubles you have with yours.”

“I don’t have one.”

“How do you not have an agent?” He scoffed back.

“Old fashioned way, making friends and pounding pavement.”

“Well we certainly won’t be friends.”

“Famous last words,” Andy chuckled out lifting his bottle for a sip making him scoff again.

Adrien repeated, “We are not going to be friends. Naomi made a mistake dropping out.”

“I agree.” You said stunning him, “But she found a better project in her eyes. I suppose you’ll just have to make do with little me from New York.”

“I’m from New York, you are not from New York, clearly by the voice alone.” He said waving his hand your way, “I don’t care if you’ve lived here a few weeks to research, that doesn’t count. I was born here, raised here, my parents teach in college here. And just which corner below the Bible Belt did you saunter up from?”

That had your smile spreading and saying, “Oh bless your heart, is this your try to scare me off? Cuz it’s not going to work I’ve met sheep less cooperative than you. Name’s Jaqi by the way, I was born in Texas but I moved to New York when I was seventeen after a year in England for University.”

“So two days ago?”

“Whatever you say cupcake you big flatterer you though I’m not nearly old enough to vain about my age by a score at least.”

“I am not your cupcake,” he fired back to your chuckle inducing nickname causing others to continue watching this battle progress. “No flattery, no nicknames, you can call me Mr Brody.”

“This is going to be so much fun,” you said propping your chin on your fist leaning closer to Andy who was close to losing it. “I’ll break you down, ‘I defeat my enemies by making them my friends’.”

“Who fed you that line?” He retorted in a mumble lifting his water to drink from.

“Abraham Lincoln,” his brow inched up and you said, “Former President-,”

“I know who Lincoln is.”

“Don’t know, been so long since you got out of school, Mr Brody,” that made Colin sputter a bit in sipping his own drink at your playful pauses at each syllable of his name, “Might be getting a bit fuzzy around the edges.” That made Adrien scoff again and you said, “In fact let’s make a bet. When I break you down to being friends with me I get to take a picture of you in a platypus costume.”

“Epic,” Jack muttered behind his fist feigning confusion when Adrien looked his way.

The latter who looked to you asking, “One, why? And two, where the hell are you going to find a platypus costume of all things?”

“Just think in a few months when I wear you down I get to have a picture of possible Oscar award winning actor Adrien Brody in a platypus costume just for little me.” The smile on your face made others chuckle while you added, “Leave the logistics to me on the costume I got connections, cupcake.”

“Such as?”

“Never met a Drag Queen Pageant contestant have you?”

“You know Drag Queens,” he looked to Peter saying, “Who does she associate with?”

“Some fun people, you’ve obviously been missing out cupcake on some of the most extravagant affairs you couldn’t dream of.”

“Doubtful,” he replied and you turned your head at Jamie’s hand patting the table.

“Young and the Restless!” He exclaimed, “I knew I recognized that delivery guy from somewhere. Am I right?”

You nodded, “Yup, we traded tips, I overhead of an audition on the subway and he slipped me a note after a movie night out on one for a commercial a while back. Always wanted to be a floozy pool boy slash hopeful novelist working for some heiress.”

Colin asked, “You get the audition?”

“No, they wanted someone taller and less busty something about sliding a roll of tape off the woman’s chest.”

Adrien, “How do you even hear about a part on the subway?”

“Cell phone conversations. Someone screwed someone’s uncle and then knocked up another person’s ex and they got kicked off set and they needed to fill in a slot for the show. Everyone has ears. One of my best tips came from a hot dog vender back when I was in school. Helped his son study for midterms and he keeps an ear out when the big producers head out for lunch.”

Adrien, “Get an agent.”

“I borrow my Mate’s from time to time across the pond. He’s pretty awesome.”

Adrien sighed and Jack cut him off asking, “Did you do that dance scene on a wire? When you dropped back in the splits off those guys shoulders playing your violin?”

“No, I had two spotters crouched down, the wires would have impeded with the dance and the other dancers. Plus cranes weren’t really in the budget.”

Jack, “Must have taken months to get that right-,”

Adrien said, “Wait, you were playing the violin and were flipping off someone’s shoulders?”

Andy, “You should watch the film.”

Jamie nodded, “It’s so good!”

Peter asked, “When is that Daredevil film out again?”

“Couple weeks,” you answered, “And I have no clue how that’s going to be. They just quilted the whole thing.”

Thomas, “Daredevil, like the comics?”

“Yes,” you answered, “They’re doing that and an Electra film from Marvel.”

Colin, “And you’re in the first?”

“Stewardess and a few other slots in a coffee shop. Filmed it when I was doing the Beast film and they jostled my role around a bit to fit the changes they made.”

Andy cut off any possible comment to say, “Plus there’s that other film with the evil tooth fairy you’re in our soon.”

Kyle said, “How do I always miss out on good monster movies?”

“Darkness Falls.”

Craig, “That’s what that film was about, I just caught the back of the promo at the last film I watched.”

John said, “You seem to really be on a thriller kick.”

Lunch arrived and in the clearing of the table Peter smiled stepping into the hall at the conclusion of another phone call. Though in his return your lips parted eyeing Fay Wray walking through the door who smiled looking over all of you. For nearly an hour once she shared all about her own experience in the original 1933 King Kong film before each of you got a chance to talk with her about your own roles in the film. Hanging back listening carefully through the others her grin doubled as you wriggled free from your seat to take your turn with Adrien watching you both like a hawk and others watching him and his amusing expressions in doing so.

“Jaqi, I have been just aching to talk to you. Pearl spent years sharing all the tiny details on you with me, you come here now,” That had you giggling at her hands waving you over to claim a warm hug making Adrien’s brow twitch wondering how you knew one another. Once apart she said, “I want you to know how proud she was of you especially after those leeches of hers moved her away. And that performance at the Tony awards, flawless, we didn’t stop talking about that for months after. She’d have been so happy to have seen you on the big screen, after you took such good care of her. I bet she shared all about our adventures while we worked together on my sitcom.”

“She did,” you said with a smile, “Shared so much about all her adventures too, let me in on all the juicy gossip and tons of tips for my performances with orchestras too.”

“Well she would know all about that,” she said delving into the best tips she had for you and your role until when her daughter said it was time to head home again to beat traffic. From her bag however she pulled out a duo of picture frames she passed to you making you smile. The first Mrs Henderson when she was younger meeting the late King George beside the invitation she was given to perform for the Royal Family. The second her invitation to the Oscars at her nomination for the award she was up for composer for the score to a film. In catching her eyes again she pat your lower arms with a loving smile to your misty eyed fight not to cry, “She wanted you to have these. The rest of her memories have been tucked away somewhere safe from being sold off, keep those close, and one day you can trade up when you do better than the both of us did.”

“I highly doubt I could ever play for King George though,” you teased making her chuckle. “Can’t best her in that.”

“No you can’t,” she said adding a slip of paper to the frames, “You need me you know where to call, sweet girl.” You nodded and she claimed another hug and made her way out with her daughter who stole a hug of her own glad to have met the person behind the stories she’d heard for years since you’d taken charge of care for her best friend.

Colin, “You know her?”

Peter while stunned himself remained silent letting you answer the burning question held by all, “My old neighbor up until a few years back she had Alzheimer’s and I did her shopping and cleaned up around the place trading for stories of the films, shows and orchestras she’d worked on.” Looking at Peter and said, “The winter we met while I was gone her kids moved her to a retirement village and my landlord gave me her old place that was bigger than mine. They had a story she died few months back.” Glancing at Colin again you said, “So not knowing her exactly in person, more the era.”

Adrien, “They pay you to take care of her, the kids?”

You looked him over and said, “We have no lift in my building and the shops are blocks away, some of us were raised to keep an eye out. She was family, never met the kids.”

Peter clapped his hands, “So, I think we meet up tomorrow separately, the Vaudeville crew and those working in the mock stage play to get that work started. And for those of you still anxious to get to New Zealand as a tradition on the campground we have been filming the Tolkien Trilogy we are having a cookout to start off filming on the right foot.”

Pt 35

Hobbit – Soulmate - @evyiione, @deepestfirefun, @rhaenaatargaryen, @anastasialovers

X all Rich. A - @abiwim, @deepestfirefun, @thestorybookmistress

X Lee P - @tigereyesf

All –

@himoverflowers, @theincaprincess, @aspiringtranslator, @thegreyberet, @patanghill17, @jesgisborne, @curvestrology, @alishlieb, @jogregor, @armitageadoration, @fizzyxcustard, @lilith15000, @marvels-ghost, @catthefearless, @imjusthereforthereads, @c-s-stars, @otakumultimuse-hiddlewhore, @mariannetora, @shes-a-killer-kween, @ggbbhehe4455

#King Kong Table Read #Adrien Brody #Andy Serkis #Jack Black #Jamie Bell #Colin Firth #Richard Armitage x Reader OC #Peter Jackson #Fay Wray

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allie1804-fan · 4 years

Text

Please Assist Me (Chapter 6)

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5

She Said

That hug at Christmas and the fumbled goodbye kiss the kids had insisted we have when we left started a whole new phase of our relationship, at least for me. The feelings those moments stirred in me reminded me of my torn feelings when he was dating Anja and it all made separating Keanu the friend from Keanu the boss ever harder. I had to admit to myself that it wasn’t just him that seemed lighter in spirits since he moved on but also me.

In January, he was in San Francisco training and eventually starting the filming for Matrix 4 so we were back to e mails and instant messages for the most part as his schedule could change at a moment’s notice. With him out of town, work wise things were quieter for me though I did have the installation of a new BBQ on his patio to supervise which meant being at his house more. I’d find myself daydreaming about that day at Christmas when he and Miguel were sitting at either end of the corridor whizzing Duke Caboom up and down cackling when they managed a direct hit on each other or Duke fell over. He was really good at playing with both of the kids; it warmed my heart but I scolded myself knowing that my affection was taking me in a direction that surely he would never want.

The focus on these irrational feelings became more intense when in mid January I met up for coffee with Karina. Keanu had let her know that he would be back in town for the Oscars weekend in early February and he wanted to arrange a family dinner the night before.

Once we’d agreed on a venue which I would book later, our conversation turned to her brother’s mental well-being.

“So how is he doing do you think?”

“Well, he’s fine I think, we haven’t talked often, just e mails mainly about admin and the barbecue, you know but he was very excited to be working with Lana, Carrie-Anne and Tiger again.”

“He finished with Anja right, before Christmas?”

I nodded

“Don’t you think he’s seemed more himself since then, he seemed, you know, like a weight was off his shoulders”

I just nodded again, feeling a little awkward about the whole conversation, mainly because he had opened up a little to me and I knew I’d thought about how both he and I had seemed lighter in spirits since the break up!

“So why did he end it?”

My eyebrows shot up.

“oh come on, you two talk, I know you do! You can tell me!”

I sighed

“He …. He just said it wasn’t going anywhere and he knew he was going to be away a lot this year so I guess he didn’t want to string her along, you know ….. for “ I took a gulp of my coffee not wanting to say more

“you mean for the sex!”

This made me blush beet red and nearly spit my coffee all over her!

“you like him don’t you?”

“Of course I like him, he’s a great boss” I spluttered, blushing even more.

“Yeah! A great boss who helps you when your kid is sick, who goes to see “Frozen 2” with you all who buys you a spa day at one of the top locations in LA and is taking your kids on a private tour of Disney studios”

“How do you know all that?”

“Because he talks to me too sometimes you know and when he does, he mentions you all the time. Sophia, I think he likes you too and I think that you’re the reason he didn’t see things going anywhere with Anja!” Karina declared emphatically.

“Come on” I protested, I’m just his PA so of course he mentions me and you know the gifts are great but that’s just how he is, he’s renowned for his generosity you know with charities and being kind to his fans and co-workers from the lowliest of workers to giving up his salary for Pacino and Hackman.”

Karina guffawed at that

“Oh my god you are such a fan girl! You are totally not fooling me, YOU (she pointed me in the chest with her finger) like my BROTHER! And, like I said, it’s plain as day to me that he likes you. And Alex agrees with me. I ran into him last week and he brought it up spontaneously!”

“What?”

“Yes, he said ever since you started to work for him, some complement or other about you is never far away in his conversation”

I shook my head as I couldn’t really believe what she was saying. What if? Even though it was his sister, who knew him well and one of his oldest friends backing her up, it seemed like an outlandish hope and one that could only end up with me being disappointed. I finally admitted to myself that I did have feelings for him and my eyes filled with tears because I was so sure she must be wrong about him feeling something too.

Karina was quick to notice the change in my demeaner

“Hey, I didn’t mean to upset you ……… what’s up?”

I let out a long sigh and little chuckle at my foolishness.

“I guess you’ve finally made me admit how I feel but I still feel like, like I don’t know what to do about it and I don’t really believe he feels the way you say he does and me and the kids are just going to get hurt if I don’t reign it in. I mean, I really need this job and I love it too. He’s such a great boss”

“He’s a great guy too Sophia …….. great big brother, great son, great godfather.”

“I know, I see all that but, what good can come from saying anything? First, he’s my boss and 2nd, even if I did muster the courage to say something, I’m probably not going to see him in the flesh for months as he’s shooting through to, I dunno, the summer I think and then he said he was going to go on a bike tour in Europe after the Matrix wraps.”

“Won’t you see him when he’s back for the Oscars?”

“Well, we did say we would, he has a bunch of birthday cards to sign in case I can’t catch him before Berlin”

“Well then, if you say something then and I’m right, you could be with him on that bike tour of Europe”

“What!” I rolled my eyes, “me and my two kids!”

“Oh yeah, well you have parents still around don’t you who would be glad to help out”

“Look, stop, just stop. I need to think clearly and not start daydreaming about some ridiculous fantasy life”

“Ok, OK I’ll stop. But I’ll say this one last time, I’m his sister, Alex is his oldest friend and we both thing he likes you, OK?”

“OK”

He Said

Life got busy for me in the new year and I didn’t see Sophia again until the weekend of the Oscars. I had come home on the Saturday and she’d booked a table for me, Karina, her husband and my Mom at The Ivy for a family dinner that evening. The Sunday would be spent largely in being dressed for the ceremony and the ceremony itself so a coffee on my patio in the afternoon was all we could fit in. She brought be one of her famous brownies - and some to take back and enjoy in San Francisco.

“Oh my god, amazing as usual” I praised “It’s great to see you, I missed our chats with coffee and your brownies!”

“Me too” she agreed smiling though she looked, I don’t know exactly, a little wistful.

“You OK?”

“Yeah, yes I’m fine”

She really didn’t seem it. She was smiling but it didn’t reach her eyes and she seemed guarded. It was completely true that I had missed her and I’d been contemplating saying something about my feelings or trying to see if I could get any clue if she could even think of me as more than a friendly boss but I felt kind of ridiculous and I had no clue how to subtly approach the subject. And very soon, I was going to be away for months. I told myself it wasn’t worth rocking the boat and we moved onto getting the details of my travel to Berlin in March agreed and she had several birthday cards and gift tags for me to sign for gifts she would sort out in my long absence. We might not see each other in person before Berlin.

Later that evening, Karina surprised me by asking if I’d seen Sophia.

“Yeah, why”

“Oh, nothing she just mentioned she’d be seeing you when we last met”

I tilted my head and noticed my mother was watching us intently.

“and why were you two talking about me?”

“Oh, you know, she’s my insider link to your secret life”

“I don’t have a secret life” I protested making air quotes as I said ‘secret life’

“Well she was the one who confirmed that you and Anja had split before Christmas when you never said a word”

“Oh! And since when have you and Sophia been such firm friends?”

“Oh probably since you started dumping so many of your family responsibilities on her, I guess!” Karina jibed.

“Anyway, she’s a lovely person……… and gorgeous ………… wouldn’t you agree?”

I could feel the blush rise on my face immediately and Mom’s gaze seemed to intensify.

“Yes, she is”

“She is what?”

“Lovely” I said

“and?”

“And gorgeous” I admitted, punching Karina’s arm.

“I knew it!” Karina exclaimed “didn’t I tell you Mom?”

“Oh my god, you’re so ganging up on me” I whined.

“So are you going to ask her out?”

“Karina, no I am not. I’m her boss, it would be inappropriate and besides I’m going back to San Fran on Monday and then there’s the Germany shoot and I’d planned that road trip after the shoot. And, I mean I have no idea if she could even think of me like that and I’m old man, what is it 17 years older and there’s the kids”

By then Karina had started to laugh as had my mother.

“So you’ve thought about it a lot huh?”

I had started laughing along with them by then, realising how dumb I probably sounded.

“Ok,OK,OK, I admit it, I like her, a lot. But I’m not going to do anything about it now because, well probably because I’m chicken, but also I will be away so I just decided not to rock the boat for now, OK?”

“OK son, probably wise knowing how wrapped up you get in your work” my mother agreed with me for once.

“So, do you think eventually, I could ask her out?” I said directing the question at Karina who immediately spat out some of her drink.

“What?!”

“Jeez, you really are so dumb sometimes, YES, you stand a chance of her being agreeable to that”

“Oh right, right, well good”

I smiled to myself and met my mother’s eye - she was smiling too.

She Said

I next saw Keanu the day before the Oscars. We caught up at his house over coffee and brownies that I’d baked for him. After I’d first given him one, it had become part of our routine when we needed to go through admin. He was as appreciative as ever and said he’d missed our catch ups. My heart flipped but I checked myself. It was preposterous to think he meant anything more than missing me in a friendly way - and my baking!

I felt myself closing down a little. He even asked if I was OK. I didn’t want to give the game away about my feelings so I assured him I was fine and we got down to business.

I watched him on the Oscars show and messaged him that he had done a great job presenting with Diane who was a little less smooth I thought. He sent back a smiley emoji.I didn’t say how absolutely gorgeous I thought he looked or how sweet he was with his mother on the red carpet.

Then he was back in San Fran and shooting the Matrix 4. I kept up with his goings on online – his Publicist liked me to keep a watch over some of the fan sites. I followed Keanu Planet on Instagram, one of the friendlier sites. Some of the others seemed too obsessed and were wildly negative about any woman he was ever seen with. Looking at those sites gave me a bad taste in the mouth so I let Cheryl follow them.

With all the night shoots, hanging on wires between sky-scrapers and helicopter antics, I was worried as well as excited to see how it turned out. I’d always ask him to stay safe in any messages I sent to him about other matters.

I thought I wouldn’t see him again until the end of the summer but he managed to come home for a few days in March between wrapping in San Francisco and heading to Berlin.

I took the kids over as it was a Saturday. They had made him a good luck card which Eva proudly gave him.

“Do you have enough books to pass the downtime with? Have you read ‘Normal People’ yet?”

He shook his head guiltily.

“Well be sure to read it - you could do it on the flight I bet”

When we left, he gave the kids a big hug, getting down on his knees to wrap his arms around them both.

And I got one too. He held onto me for what seemed like an awfully long time – though of course it wasn’t awful at all to be in his arms!

“Stay safe OK?” The news of the pandemic had started to ramp up by this point so he had a point. I guessed maybe that was why he’d hugged me for so long.

“you too”

He kissed me on the cheek, right cheeks together with no near misses this time and the kids and I headed home.

A couple of days later I got a message from him.

“Arrived safely, “Normal People” done. Needed an R rating warning – quite uncomfortable reading that on a flight!” This was followed by a wink emoji.

I blushed reading the message - was he flirting with me? It kind of seemed like it and I wondered how to reply.

I just opted for a shocked emoji and asked how he felt about Marianne and Connell’s ridiculous inability to articulate their feelings for much of the book! As I wrote that, I thought of my own reticence to confess my feelings. Was I almost as bad as the Irish teenagers of the story?

Since I wasn’t going to be doing anything about it now for months, I pushed the problem away once again and tried to focus on the kids and running Keanu’s home whilst he was away. It wasn’t easy to put my feelings in a box though. Either he would message me about a book recommendation or just to see we were all still OK or I’d be at his house and remember that hug or our Christmas togetherness or his face would pop up on the TV. One night, The Lake House was on and seeing that could only revive my fantasies about holding him and kissing him!

@fortheloveoffanfic @kindainlovewithkeanu @omg-imagine @iworshipkeanureeves @fics-not-tragedies @ficsnroses @keanureevesisbae @penwieldingdreamer @witty-wallflower @paperplanesandwallflowers @bitchyslut99 @ladyreapermc @toomanystoriessolittletime @fanficsrusz @keanuficfiles

#keanu reeves fanfic #keanu reeves fanfiction #keanu reeves #keanu #romance with boss

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chocolatemillkk · 5 years

Text

CM I

Conor’s been a nuisance to me for as long as I could remember. It was stealing my bike when we were four, telling me santa didn’t exist as soon as he found out at six, blaming his shenanigans on me in school in all the classes we had together, and telling every guy I was interested in that I had herpes. The ones who knew Conor, dated me anyway, but Conor could have very well scared away the love of my life-I’d never know.

Ever since we graduated school and I went to college while he focussed on music, we’d seen each other less and the only bothering he did was tagging me in pointless memes. But every so often when I visited home and our gang met up, I would have to put up with him all over again.

“Come over here!” Jessie tugs me as soon as I get out of my uber. Our friends stand around the car parked in front of her house and they greet me while my face stays buried in Jessie’s shoulder

“Tell me it hasn’t been half a year since we saw each other,” Sam joins the hug and Mel says something about taking a picture of us. When they release me I grab Fran in a hug even though she hated them and notice Conor wasn’t around.

“Where’s Conor?” I ask.

“I thought you’d be glad not to see him,” Mel exchanges a glance with Fran but I don’t understand it.

“Just curious,” I say cautiously. “He’s never missed our mini-reunions.”

“He messaged the group, he’ll meet us at the club.” Jessie says. “Probably already attached himself to a girl there. Let’s go before he does anything stupid.”

“In that case, let’s take our time.” I say dryly with a hint of irritation and my friends just laugh.

We pile into the car and eventually find the street after driving in circles for fifteen minutes. “Could that little shite have picked anything more obscure?” Jessie sighs as she parks.

I hadn’t been to our last meet-up a few months ago due to exams and Conor had missed the meet before that so it’d been a little under a year since I saw Conor. The last time was on the weekend of my 20th birthday where he tried to shove a cupcake in my face. But there was a moment I can’t help but remember. As we were waiting for our separate ubers and he’d leaned into me drunkenly, saying something I’d never forget.

“I think I always loved you.”

“Y/N?” Mel snaps. I hadn’t realised the group was already to the door while I stood still on the sidewalk, remembering the way the words felt against my skin.

“Coming!” I hurry, my heels clacking again the pavement. I catch up to Mel and we walk in silence into the club.

“How’s work been?” I ask Mel, the silence becoming too much.

“Been keeping me busy,” she responds quickly. “I think they went that way.”

With that, she walks ahead of me to the bar where our friends are figuring out the drinks.

“Hey,” I pull Jessie aside after we order them. “Is it just me or is Mel acting weird?”

“Mel?” Jessie was the only person I felt comfortable asking since I knew she would always be objective. “She seems fine to me. Why?”

“I dunno,” I couldn’t put my finger on it. Mel was usually silly with me, teasing me that I was becoming a big nerd. But tonight she’d been serious, deliberately cut the conversation short as if she was mad at me. I would ask her if she was alright later, I decide.

“Ladies,” Sam approaches us, wrapping his arm around Jessie. They’d started dating the summer after graduation and it was no surprise to us. A relief actually, to see all the sexual tension built up between them for years disappear overnight. Quite literally.

“Let’s dance?” Jessie asks us but she’s mostly looking to Sam.

“I’ll just finish my drink first,” I smile-I didn’t feel like being a third wheel. Jessie makes me promise I would join in later and I watch them leave, now all alone. I spot Fran and Mel talking but it seems intense so I turn my back to the crowds and lean on the counter.

“Is it hot in here or is it just you?” I hear the familiar gravelly voice in my ear. My heart beats a little faster as my back straightens in anticipation of the stupid routine Conor and I had.

“You’re so full of shite you should probably find a toilet,” I say easily before turning to stare him straight in the eye. Except. He looked different.

I lose my smirk and my defence as I try to remember what I was going to say to him. He looks older; somehow in the last year he’d lost the boyish look and his features were sharpened by maturity...not that he had any....and with that thought, I remember who I was looking at.

“Still a complete arse, I see.” I look Conor up and down.

“A bigger snob than usual, I see.” Conor retorts but it lacks his usual snarkiness too. Almost as if seeing each other knocked us out of the ring we always fought in. I sip my drink as we find our footing still.

“How’s it going?” Conor asks.

“The usual-going to my snobby school and doing my snobby work.”

Conor chuckles. “Nice to know some things don’t change.”

I don’t answer that, thinking back to what he’d said that night. He was so drunk but apparently not drunk enough to forget because a few mornings after, as I was on the train back to school I’d received a text from him.

I was shitfaced the other night so whatever I said was just nonsense.

The text stung a little even though I never really considered being in love with Conor. His next text reminded me why I never considered it: It’s not like it could work out anyway. You’re too freaky.

Thanks, I’d sent back with an eye-roll emoji. And that had been that.

But it hadn’t been just that. The more I thought about it, the more I realised that deep down I enjoyed the banter. It had become familiar, more reliable than a lot of other things in my life. I’d never miss the juvenile pranks he played on me but our banter was our own little language. And it made me realise other things too, like how it might feel to not have that...like it would make a bigger hole in my heart than I initially thought.

“Have you been working out?” Conor asks beside me and I only barely make out the question over the noise.

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” I roll my eyes but secretly flattered that he’d noticed.

“No I’m being serious!” Conor says. “You look good!”

I turn my body to him and raise an eyebrow, assessing if he was going to tease me but he seemed genuine. “I’ve been rock climbing recently, and training for a marathon.”

Conor whistles. Well he looked like he was whistling but I don’t hear anything.

“You don’t look bad yourself,” I comment without letting on that I thought he looked really good. Like really really really really good.

“I’ve been making some changes,” he says casually. When I raise an eyebrow he continues, “I cut back on the alcohol but that’s cuz my label said I need to clean up my image and stop partying so much.” He laughs but it has an edge. “And I try to go to the gym but it’s...”

“A losing battle?” I laugh. “Remember that one summer we all made a pact to work on our ‘summer bodies’ but you went for a week and missed your alarm every week after that.”

“To be honest,” he says. “I never set an alarm after the first week.”

My mouth drops, “You piece of shite! You had us all convinced you were struggling!”

Conor laughs with his whole body and my breath catches with the way the room narrows down just to him. Coming out tonight was not good for my heart-I was only falling

“I can’t piss you off now that you’ve been working out-you could probably beat my arse.”

“Who said I couldn’t do it before I worked out?” I tease as I flex my arm. Conor’s eyes widen and he touches the muscle I’d proudly built over the last few months. His touch sends a zap to my nerves and I drop my arm back to its side.

“That’s like-proper muscle.”

“Yeah!” I’d lost the humour as my heart continued to race. It was just Conor. Just Conor.

“What are you two gossiping about?” Meg and Fran appear and she shouts to be heard. I balk-for a few minutes we were actually getting on.

“Was the world ending or were you two laughing with each other.” Fran reads my thoughts and I blush and glance at Conor who’s glancing at me too.

“I was just getting her comfortable for the trouble I have in store later,” Conor says without the usual sauciness. The girls seem to pick up on it because they glance at one another again. God, that was getting annoying.

“I think Conor’s finally growing a brain in that skull of his,” I joke.

“Is that where my brain’s supposed to be?” Conor bounces off my joke and my laugh’s cut short when I realise Meg is staring at us as if we’d grown another head.

“So Conor,” Meg says after we sip our drinks in silence. “It’s been a while since I saw your face. You haven’t sent me any vocal clips anymore of your music.”

“I’ve been working on lyrics actually...” I tune the conversation out, Meg’s comment making me uncomfortable. I don’t remember Meg being anything but snarky towards Conor yet he was sharing his music with her. And not me. Actually he’d never even talked about his music with me, I have to remind myself. Why was I getting jealous over a stupid comment?

“So Fran-you’re even more quiet tonight than usual.” I say.

“I had a long shift this morning.” She groans. “Kids can be brutal.”

“Aw,” I grab her arm. “Then your next drink’s on me!”

“I have a weird question,” Fran says once we get the drinks. She was never one for beating about the bush.

“Shoot,” I say.

“Do you have a thing for Conor?”

My drink nearly comes out of my nose as I choke. Fran hands me napkins as she pats my back and I begin laughing.

“Why would you think that?” I ask, paranoid that my small-big crush was obvious.

“You two are always going off on one another,” she shrugs. “Maybe that’s your way of flirting?”

“Oh my god,” I laugh. “When I flirt, I’m a lot less aggressive! At least I hope so.”

“So the little piece you were doing just now with him?” She raises an eyebrow.

“Uh-wh-no?” I stutter. Fran and I stare at each other before bursting into laughter.

“You are so bad at lying.” Fran shouts.

“Lying about what?” Jessie shows up with Sam trailing behind her.

“Hey! Weren’t you two dancing?” I ask, hoping to distract from the question.

“Yeah! You never showed!” Jessie says. “And I want a drink. Non-alcoholic don't worry.”

“I’ll give you the seat,” Fran slides off and says she was going.

“Not a word!” I shout out to her and she makes an X over her heart.

•••

“Shotgun!” I shout into the dark as our eyes adjust from the flashing lights to the night sky.

“Aw no!” Sam complains. “You know my legs don’t stretch in the back!”

“Should have thought of that before! Shotgun rules says it’s my seat.” I say, a little tipsy but mostly just happy having all my friends together again.

“I call a window!” Sam frowns.

“Where does Conor sit?” Meg asks. “There’s not enough seats.”

“I’ll sit in Y/N’s lap,” Conor wraps his arm around my shoulders and pulls me to him so I stumble in my heels.

“Get off!” I shove him away, the scrunchie in my hair sliding off. “Ugh.”

“You cut your hair?” Jessie asks as we get in.

“Yeah! Just last week. So many dead ends...” We continue the small talk as the gang piles in the back, Meg agreeing to sit on the floor as she was the smallest. I connect the car with bluetooth and put on a throwback playlist as we reminisce about the old times. Meg falls asleep and we all laugh, the boys taking snaps of her to make fun of. Just as I feel relaxed, the music goes fuzzy and a familiar voice sings through the speakers.

“Isn’t that-“

“Conor!” I twist in my seat and aim to hit his knee but I get Fran instead and while I apologize Conor begins singing out loud which earns groans from everyone.

“Stop hijacking the Bluetooth!” I say and turn my music back on but Conor puts his on again and I feel my frustration rise so I turn it off but Conor just finds a way to play his music again. I cross my arms and sigh, deciding to just ignore it while Jessie starts to hum to the music. Fran and Sam are having a discussion and I feel Conor playing with my hair from the back.

“Stop that!” I twist to see him again and he’s grinning. “Ugh, I hate you.”

“Only because you’re afraid of how much you’d love me,” Conor teases but the words hit too close to home so I flip him off again and turn back in my seat.

Fran and Sam get off first as they lived a few houses down from the other. Next, we drop Meg who took a few shakes and shouts to wake up. Conor says to drop him off at his brother’s and we do so but before he goes in he leans his elbows on my open window.

“You’re gonna get run over,” I say as a car whizzes by behind him.

“So are we doing anything later? This week or something?” Conor ignores my comment.

“Ah I don’t know.” Jessie says. “We can all hang out after work but Y/N’s home for the whole week before she disappears on us again.”

Conor doesn’t even look back at Jessie when he asks me, “Great, maybe I can show you some of my music then.”

I blush, thinking he’d noticed my earlier bitterness about Meg’s comment but his face is casual. “Sounds cool,” I nod and when he’s out of sight Jessie squeals.

“You two are so into each other.”

#conor maynard #conor maynard imagines #youtube imagines #buttercream imagines #imagines #jack maynard #buttercream #qd

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peacefulrevivalteen · 4 years

Text

Dorm King: Ozen’s room

@taiyuu-high-oct I can’t traditional art and so I recreated her room (Pretty close to scale, I did the math) in Sims and will describe what the important items actually are and the Ozen lore behind them. :3 Also, GIF warning under the read more, there’s only one but if stared at too long can cause dizziness, at least for me.

Looping full view of the room

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The corner:

Starting off in the corner we see that Ozen has her own mini fridge! The main use of the fridge is to store her nutrient packs (Like those Aizawa slurps on.) Ozen has very strict dietary restraints because of the nature of her quirk, it’s really hard for her to expend any energy throughout the day, combine that with her slow but steadily decreasing bone density and you get a situation where deviation from her dietary norm can have drastic impacts.

Ozen’s morning routine always has her checking her tablet (which should be propped up on a stand but :/) before heading out. Due to her quirk’s numbing of sensory effects she has a difficult time judging proper attire for different weather’s and temperatures. Just because she can barely if at all feel it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t affect her like everyone else, this means if not careful she could easily get hypothermia/heat exhaustion and anything in between. What does this have to do with the tablet? Well her family definitely knows this aspect about her and since they care about her health they relay proper weather attire for the day. It switches between her mom’s and her sister Kasumi updating it. An example is checking it to see Kasumi has left an update, something like “Hey!! Your hair is blue but your fingers shouldn’t be, it’s chilly outside so wear some mittens!!! Love you!! ~~Kas”

The monitor extends from the wall to give a diagonal monitor that can also face the bed. The big usage out of it though is it is mainly synced up with the tablet so Ozen’s weather reminders are projected up onto a larger screen. While it could be used for media Ozen uses it mostly for her reminders and other important information. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Desk area!

The picture frame! While the screenshot depicts that of a tantalizing pear, the actual image Ozen has on her desk is not that at all. The actual image is a picture of her and Hatsune Miku side hugging and giving the camera peace signs. The picture is also signed “Finally reconnected with my long lost sister! XOXO ~Miku.” Oh, Ozen met the REAL Hatsune Miku? Nope! It’s actually a picture of Ozen and her sister at a convention, Ozen was already out of their outfit when they took the picture, but not Kasumi! The picture has a lot of sentimental value to Ozen as it marks one of the first big events she went to with her sister after reconnecting and getting over herself. Ozen’s slight smile really show how happy she was during it seeing how emotions still affect her if they are extreme enough.

Framed newspaper article! Up on the wall she has newspaper clippings and articles from when she was a kid that covered the collapsing building incident during her field trip. Her parents made it because the particular articles cover Ozen’s “heroic” actions in saving her class even though she was in grade school at the time. By simply existing with her quirk, she was able to “hold” [act like a wedge] the collapse roof up long enough for rescue heroes to arrive. Of course other parts talk about being “made” for heroics and all that nonsense but Ozen brought it to be more of a reminder of what becoming a hero meant to her, before her perception got twisted and warped by quirkist agendas. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Closet

Hidden away in her closet is the box that contains her quirk nullifying brace. She didn’t want to take it, she honestly hates(is terrified) the thing but her parents made her take it just in case. So it sits shoved and forgotten in the back until someone unearths it or she gets over her fears and starts using it. Would using it help remedy the toll her quirk takes on her body? Oh definitely it would over consistent use but after the training incident she can’t imagine putting it on ever again. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bed area

Before going into specific details, just like to bring attention to Ozen’s fondness of fairy lights.

The first of the posters, this one is the least changed from the actual picture, Ozen being fond of physics due to her quirk and because of her Mom being a physics professor.

Now this poster, the image is replaced with that well known “Evolution of man” image of the walking primates all the way up to modern man. HOWEVER this one doesn’t end at modern man but has another after it of All Might. The image represents the whole quirks are the next stage in evolution view point and it’s something Ozen agrees with.

Last but certainly not least is Ozen’s lesbian pride flag. Now probably first assumption is oh she has that cause she’s a lesbian, and that would be wrong. Not saying Ozen ISN’T a lesbian, that remains to be seen but that’s not why she has the flag. Her Mom (Mom = uni professor, Mother = Quirk Counselor) got offered to speak at a university in the bay area of California right around the time San Fran was going to have their pride, being the last term before Ozen went off to hero school and after she finally rekindled her relationship with her Mother and sister, their family jumped on the opportunity to go. Her parents got two, one for them and one for Ozen as a memento of their time there. The other shaded area on the board, is all of the printed out pictures from their time there enjoying themselves and being a happy familly, even if Ozen stands out with her height.

#Taiyuu oct #fujinuma Ozen #dorm king #dorm king event

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theliberaltony · 4 years

Link

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

The first time Bob Duffy entered the world of epidemiology, he was an amateur scientist. It was 2003. He had retired from the New York City Fire Department and taken a sabbatical from his normal life in suburban Long Island to help his daughter Meghan earn her Ph.D. in Michigan. She was studying the ecology and evolution of infectious diseases, using tiny lake crustaceans as a model organism.

Together, Meghan and Bob would go out in a truck, towing a little, flat-bottomed rowboat. They were studying how epidemics begin and spread under a variety of conditions. They’d unhitch at one lake, and then another, working their way across the countryside as they collected and counted diseased crustaceans and the fish that preyed on them. “Over the course of a few months, you can go through a whole epidemic,” Meghan Duffy told me. Her father was her paid research assistant, and one of his jobs was to catch the fish. After 30 years of running into burning buildings, he couldn’t believe his luck, she said.

The last time Bob Duffy entered the world of epidemiology, he was a statistic.

Bob Duffy was a father, grandfather, retired firefighter, and longtime volunteer in his Long Island community. He died on March 29.

COURTESY OF MEGHAN DUFFY

He died, at home, on March 29, 2020. Officially, the cause of death was chronic lung disease. But there was more going on than just that. A sudden illness had left him too fatigued to leave the house, and he had had contact with multiple people who later tested positive for COVID-19. Yet Bob’s death certificate doesn’t list that disease as a cause or even a probable cause of his death. He never got tested — he didn’t want to enter a hospital and be separated from Fran, his wife of 48 years.

Instead, because he didn’t die at a hospital and because this was at the beginning of the pandemic, when guidelines were rapidly changing and testing was hard to come by, Bob Duffy became one of the people who fell through the statistical cracks. As of this writing,1 22,843 New Yorkers have officially died from COVID-19. Bob Duffy is not counted among them.

More than a month later, the question of who counts as a COVID-19 fatality has become political. In Florida, the Medical Examiners Commission accused state officials of suppressing their state death count. Pennsylvania’s death tally bounced up and down, enough to prompt the state senate to discuss giving coroners a bigger role in investigating COVID-19 deaths. And President Trump has questioned the official national death count of 90,340 as of May 19,2 reportedly wondering whether it was exaggerated.

The experts who are involved in counting novel coronavirus deaths at all levels — from local hospitals to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — disagree with the president. If anything, they say, these deaths are undercounted. And with a death like Bob Duffy’s, you can begin to see why.

Bob was a person, beloved by his family and his community. Ever since he died, Bob has also become a number — data entered into a spreadsheet, just like the tiny shellfish he and his daughter once pulled from cold Michigan lakes. His death might never end up being attributed to SARS-CoV-2, but his death matters to the way we understand it.

There was never a cough. Instead, the first sign of illness Fran Duffy remembers was when she and Bob tried to go for a walk and he couldn’t make it to the end of the block. “We got three houses down, and he said, ‘I can’t walk today. I’m too tired.’ I thought maybe he’s getting a bug. Maybe he’s just tired. So we came back. That was Wednesday,” she said.

He died four days later.

It was a very fast decline. But in other ways, Bob’s final illness was just part of a long string of sicknesses. Over the two decades since his retirement, he had had a stroke. He also had had cancer in his mouth, colon and liver. There was scarring — fibrosis — that had damaged his lungs and forced him onto supplemental oxygen. The radiation treatments that had cured his cancers years ago had also left him with nerve damage in his legs and a slowly eroding jawbone. Bob was not the picture of health. We are, after all, talking about a guy who worked for the NYFD during a time when firefighters did not routinely wear the ventilators and masks they had been issued. It was a macho thing, Fran said. You couldn’t be the one guy who put on the mask if nobody else did.

So when Bob got sick in late March this year, whatever it was was not the only thing he was sick with. He was also so sick of being sick that he wasn’t interested in going to the hospital. Even as his temperature soared to 103 degrees, Bob chose to do a video chat with his family doctor, Ihor Magun, rather than leave the house. Fran remembers the doctor suggesting they treat Bob as if he was positive for COVID-19, in terms of isolation from friends and family. He could have gotten a test — but the nearest testing center at Jones Beach was 30 minutes away, and then there were the long lines besides. Fran thought about driving him out there, but he was already sick enough that that option seemed worse for him than not knowing what it was that he had contracted.

All those small decisions, made in the moment because of what was best for Bob, ended up determining how his death was recorded.

The way deaths are counted, like so much else in the U.S., differs among (and even within) states. There’s a lot of variation in this process, even on a good day — a fact that stretches all the way back to the beginning of mortality records in this country. While the census began counting living people nationwide in 1790, recording deaths was left up to state and local governments. The first state to fully document its deaths was Massachusetts, in 1842. It wasn’t until 1933 that all states were turning in death counts to federal authorities.

Even today, now that the death certificate itself is fairly standardized, who first records your death and decides what you died of varies by where you live and where you die. And that variation is only likely to increase when people begin dying of a new disease that we still don’t understand. In Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, for example, medical examiners — medical doctors who investigate deaths and perform autopsies — must provide official certification for every COVID-19 or COVID-19-related death in the county, said Dr. Sally Aiken, president of the National Association of Medical Examiners. But that’s not true everywhere. In New York State, medical examiners get involved only in cases that seem strange or suspicious, like when an otherwise healthy young person dies with no prior warning, said Richard Sullivan, president of the New York State Funeral Directors Association. Otherwise, the decision is left up to health care workers.

Bob’s death certificate was filled out by his family doctor and did not mention COVID-19. The county medical examiner called Fran but asked only about Bob’s preexisting conditions. He had had enough of them that there was no reason to suspect foul play, and that was all the medical examiner needed to know.

If Bob had died in a nearby hospital, such as one of the ones in Nassau County owned by Northwell Health, he would have been tested for COVID-19, either before or after his death. Whether he’d been there for five minutes or a month, hospital staff would have been in charge of filling out the part of his electronic death record that pertains to cause of death, a representative from Northwell told me. This process can look deceptively simple — just write a cause of death on the line — but there’s more to it than you’d think.

A standard certificate of death provided by the National Center for Health Statistics leaves room for the chain of events that led to someone’s death.

The New York electronic death records form provides three lines for cause of death, which are supposed to be filled out in a way that tells a story. The idea is that nobody ever really dies of just one thing, Aiken told me. Even if you die in a traffic accident, the death record might read something like “Blunt force trauma … as a consequence of a car crash.” This is the information that helps people further up the data chain classify a death accurately. Leaving any part of the story out means a gap in the data later.

Not everyone fills out these records completely, though. And early on during the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a lot of confusion happening, said Shawna Webster, executive director of the National Association for Public Health Statistics and Information Systems, which represents vital registrars nationwide. “It might just say ‘coronavirus,’ which I’m sure you know is not as descriptive as it needs to be,” she said. There are, after all, multiple ways COVID-19 might kill a person. On the other end of the spectrum are people who fill out the forms completely wrong. “Please do not put ‘COVID-19 test negative,'” Webster said. “Do not do that. There were several.”

In the days after his first symptoms, Bob’s condition worsened. He’d become so tired he couldn’t leave the house — then so tired that walking anywhere by himself was impossible. He had a massively high fever. But even Saturday, the night before he died, he was still talking, Fran said, and so she asked him what he wanted for dinner. She expected something light. Bob said, “Corned beef hash.”

“I said, ‘Bob, corned beef hash?'” But he was sure. So Fran put it together for him, the man she loved. She had to move him to a wheelchair and bring him to the kitchen to eat. He could no longer walk without falling. “I bring him to the kitchen and I’m just turning to the sink to wash my hands and I hear plop,” she said. He had fallen asleep at the table. “His head went right down in the plate. And I just said, ‘Bob. What about the corned beef hash!’ So it just … he thought about it and he wanted it, but he just couldn’t get it, you know?”

Doctors say this kind of oxygen depletion and exhaustion — coupled with an ability to still communicate — is a common feature of COVID-19. Even after he collapsed at the table, Bob was lucid enough to talk to the priest who gave him his last rites later that night. He died the next day.

Over the next few weeks, it would become clear that Bob had been in contact with a number of potential sources of COVID-19 — or maybe he’d been a source that passed it to them. It’s impossible to know. His son-in-law was later diagnosed with the disease, and his wife — one of Bob’s three daughters — tested positive for COVID-19 antibodies. One day Fran would open the newspaper to find that the woman who had cut her and Bob’s hair for three decades — and who had come to their house just before Bob got sick — had died of COVID-19.

But Bob’s death certificate makes no mention of the novel coronavirus. Bob’s doctor did not return requests for an interview, so we don’t know why he made the choices he did when completing the certificate. But Bob’s immediate cause of death is listed as “cardiopulmonary arrest” — his heart stopped — as a consequence of “chronic obstructive lung disease,” as a consequence of “fibrosis.”

Bob is a prime example of why doctors and other experts think that COVID-19 deaths are probably being undercounted — not overcounted, as some COVID-19 skeptics have alleged. In fact, if Bob had died today, there’s a decent chance that he’d have been labeled a “probable” COVID death, based on current CDC guidelines, which, among other things, advise doctors to include “probable COVID-19” on death certificates when a patient has had symptoms of the disease and been in contact with people who tested positive. Originally, only people who themselves had tested positive for the virus were being counted. Like Bob, a lot of people were probably left out. But even as the guidelines were revised and the national death count — which includes probable as well as confirmed cases — shot upward, experts said that undercounting was still more likely than overcounting.

COVID-19’s death toll has been so overwhelming that officials have had to resort to makeshift morgues in trailers.

TAYFUN COSKUN / ANADOLU AGENCY VIA GETTY IMAGES

Some of this reasoning is based on logic. We know that we had a widespread shortage of tests when people were already dying of COVID-19, so it makes sense that these two problems would overlap at times.

Other reasoning is based on data. In a lot of states the number of pneumonia deaths in March was higher than what you’d expect for that time of year, or for the level of influenza active during that time — an important detail, given that pneumonia can often be a complication of that disease as well. These increases were particularly noticeable in New Jersey, Georgia, Illinois, Washington and New York, according to research led by Dan Weinberger, a professor of epidemiology at Yale School of Medicine. But pneumonia isn’t the only way COVID-19 kills. All deaths in the state of New York went up in March, and these excess deaths — deaths above the usual rate for that place and time of year — outstrip diagnosed COVID-19 cases statewide by nearly three times. Data collected by The New York Times suggests that the high number of “excess” deaths in New York continued through April.

Yet another reason why experts say we’re not overcounting COVID-19 deaths is that we’re now counting them in much the same way as we have always counted deaths from infectious disease. The methodology is longstanding and is used for all sorts of diseases — and there’s never been cause to think that the methodology made us overcount the deaths from those other diseases.

In the bureaucracy of death everything happens fast, fast, fast, and then, after a while, things just grind on.

If you look at the CDC’s annual report of flu deaths, for example, you’ll see that it’s “estimated,” modeled on official flu deaths reported, deaths from flu-like causes reported, and what we know about flu epidemiology. The calculation is done this way precisely because public health officials know that a straight count of formally diagnosed flu deaths would be an undercount of actual flu deaths.

While flu tests aren’t in short supply and essentially anyone who wants to be tested for the flu can be, not everyone who catches it gets tested. Plenty of people get sick with the flu and never go to a doctor, said Alberto Marino, a research officer at the London School of Economics who has studied disease case and death counts for both LSE and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. If they die — especially if they are also old or have some underlying condition — the role the flu played in their deaths can easily go unnoticed and unrecorded. We don’t record “probable” flu deaths (again, the tests aren’t rationed), but we do record deaths due to “flu-like illnesses” — and plenty of people who die from the flu don’t have that listed as the cause on their death certificates.

Likewise, when a doctor lists COVID-19 as a condition that led to someone’s death — even if it was just the last in a series of illnesses — they’re not doing anything different from what’s been done with the flu for years, Aiken told me.

Basically, if you think COVID-19 deaths are being inflated, then you shouldn’t trust annual flu death counts, either. Or a whole host of other death counts. The only reason to really think that COVID-19 death counts are less trustworthy at this point is that the flu is politically neutral while the new coronavirus is not.

If there’s any major difference between the way we count flu deaths and the way we count COVID-19 deaths, it’s that nobody is trying to publish flu deaths daily, in real time. And that’s where death counting for COVID-19 gets complicated.

When Bob Duffy died, his community responded immediately. Fran found her mailbox filled with cards; flowers and baked goods piled up on the porch. At one point, there were so many tulips, hydrangeas and pansies that the Amazon delivery guy started to make comments, so Fran decided to plant the flowers around the yard. “There’s not one card that doesn’t have a separate letter in it,” she said. And many were from people she didn’t even know.

Besides being a firefighter and Ph.D. assistant, Bob spent many years working with the local Catholic parish’s social ministry. Essentially, he was a volunteer social worker. He made sure people who were hungry found meals. He helped strangers pay their utility bills, and he coordinated a Long Island-wide food bank. “Most people volunteer one day a week. Bob officially volunteered five days a week,” Fran told me. “He ended up with the keys to the parish. He was up there seven days a week, and he couldn’t be stopped.”

So when he did stop, people cared. And they cared for his widow.

Bob Duffy’s family will never know for sure whether he died of COVID-19.

COURTESY OF MEGHAN DUFFY

Death happens suddenly, abruptly. At first, family, friends and, sometimes, if we’re lucky, strangers burst into action like Roman candles, sending out showers of casseroles and condolences like sparks. For a short period of time, there is a lot to do, decisions to be made, love to be accepted. But then there is quiet. And then there is the rest of your life. The absence that death leaves behind lasts far longer than the initial flurry of condolences.

The bureaucracy of death has a similar dynamic — first, everything happens fast, fast, fast, and then, after a while, things just grind on.

In New York, in the heady first day or two after a person dies, the doctor or hospital enters the cause of death on an electronic death record, the funeral home fills out demographic data on the same form, and the state registrar of vital statistics logs the data. But from there things slow down considerably.

Usually, that’s fine — death statistics aren’t so volatile that we need them to be updated as quickly as, say, election returns or live sports scores. But the pandemic has changed our relationship with these stats. Now they’re how we know whether we’re stopping the spread of COVID-19, and just how big that spread is. The problem is that the system isn’t designed to do that work.

Normally, if a death is uncomplicated and requires no investigation or autopsy or debate, death records are transferred to the National Center for Health Statistics, an arm of the CDC that organizes and analyzes the data of life and death in this country. It’s here that a death is categorized and tabulated. And this process is happening now, with COVID-19 deaths as well.

It takes time to investigate some of the deaths and get them to NCHS — the frequency of investigations varies widely, but state-level emergency operations teams work with medical personnel and state epidemiology surveillance to review COVID-19 deaths and possible COVID-19 deaths, Webster said. So the records can be in the state databases for a while before they’re solid enough that they go to NCHS. Then, someone at the NCHS is reading each of these death records to make sure that, say, a car crash victim who happened to have a COVID-19 diagnosis is logged in a database differently from a COVID-19-positive patient who died on a ventilator. The result of all this is that, even though public counts include confirmed COVID-19 deaths and probable ones, the deaths aren’t just being recorded willy-nilly. And it will be possible, in the future, to go back and look at the records and see which cases were confirmed by testing and which weren’t.

But these are slow stats. And they’re slowed down even further by the confusion caused by a novel virus pandemic. Currently, the count of COVID-19 deaths produced this way is at least two weeks behind, said Robert Anderson, chief of the mortality statistics branch of the NCHS. The counts in some states, including New York, might be lagging even more. This system is the gold standard, Webster said, but it’s designed to produce accurate statistics — not monitor a pandemic in real time.

Death is hard — hard to count, hard to experience.

And so the CDC also has fast stats on COVID-19 deaths. Besides going to the NCHS, the data from the New York State vital records office is also gathered directly from that agency’s database and into one maintained by USAFacts, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization charged with collecting daily death reports from the state and county registrars that first record them. The CDC’s COVID Data Tracker comes directly from the USAFacts count.

That means there are two distinct death counts being published by the CDC — one slow, one fast. (That’s in addition to counts being kept by Johns Hopkins University, The New York Times, and other entities.) As of May 19, the CDC’s slow count was 67,008, and its fast count was 90,340. You’ll find both counts in various sections of the CDC’s website, and when you look at those pages, it’s not always clear what these separate counts do and don’t represent. It’s easy to get confused and assume that the death count you’ve just seen in the newspaper has suddenly been cut in half. On May 2, conservative firebrand Dinesh D’Souza falsely claimed exactly that, linking his followers to the CDC’s slow count.

The smaller, slow count is more accurate, but it doesn’t reflect how many people have died as of today. It’s weeks behind. The fast count does a better job of portraying the real-time situation, but the exact number will shift as state and local counts fluctuate. Some of that change is due to confusion between state and local entities. New York City, for example, has its own vital records office — almost as though it’s an independent state — and the fast-count numbers it produces for itself don’t usually match the fast-count numbers produced for it by the State of New York, said Tanveer Ali, a data visualization analyst for USAFacts.

And while Bob Duffy will not be counted in either the slow or the fast counts happening now, he will likely end up included in the data — if only by algorithmic proxy. Eventually, experts said, the CDC will come back and do an estimated burden of death counts for COVID-19, just as it does for the flu every year.

All of this is why we won’t know the exact number of people who died of COVID-19 for years, Aiken said. Again, that’s nothing new. Final estimates for the number of people who died in the 2009 H1N1 pandemic weren’t published until 2011. Getting the slow count right, sorting through differences between disparate and nonstandardized state reporting systems, correcting errors and categorizing probable cases, finding ways to understand how many Bob Duffys we’re missing — it all takes time. This is, experts emphasized again and again, something nobody has ever done before. But the precedent that does exist suggests we shouldn’t expect to get a “right” answer soon. “If you look at opioid mortality, they’re two and a half years behind on compiling that,” Aiken said.

Death is hard — hard to count, hard to experience. The personal and the statistical both reside in a space where the question of “what happened” can be answered as an absolute — as certain as we can ever be about a thing — while simultaneously remaining painfully inexact and mysterious.

We will almost certainly never know exactly how many Americans died of COVID-19. But any count we get by leaving out deaths probably related to the virus — and, ultimately, leaving out Bob and a lot of people like him — will be less accurate than a count that includes them.

“We like to have answers. We like to have a yes, a no, a definite answer,” Fran said. Bob had been dead for about a month when Fran spoke to me from her kitchen. Just that day, someone she didn’t know had sympathetically left a loaf of banana bread in her mailbox. He was still so close. He was so far away. “But we certainly don’t always get what we like,” she said. “That’s really the truth, you know?”

Additional reporting by Kaleigh Rogers.

#IFTTT #Politics – FiveThirtyEight #politics #538 #Maggie Koerth

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sign-from-god-complex · 6 years

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A Gift From Me To You - Chapter 4

Chapter Summary: Roman remembers a moment with Logan and learns something new about him too.

Warnings: Some negative self-talk

A/N: Ohh, things are starting to happen now! Hopefully, it’s all okay!! There are things in this chapter I could be a bit happier with, but I gotta keep moving on to actually get this finished, haha. We’re nearly there!! 2 or 3 more chapters, probably.

AO3 Link // Link to Chapter One! // And Two! // And Three!

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Roman couldn’t get the boy from the hallway out of his mind. Beautiful dark brown eyes had haunted him throughout the rest of his classes, occupying his thoughts far more than the lessons did.

Really, he tried to not take the boy’s quick exit personally. He’d already appeared to be quite upset, so even though Roman had been trying his best to be calming and non-threatening, he must have seemed a bit intimidating all the same.

People put him up on some weird “popular” pedestal—which was frankly quite ridiculous—and it had resulted in more than a few people being afraid to talk to him. It’s not like he was generally all that interested in talking to people as it was, but this boy was different.

It had been a while since Roman had had a crush. Probably not since he got together with Patton in fact. Although Roman and Patton had discussed polyamory—a major change in their relationship that it certainly took him a while to be comfortable with agreeing to—Roman hadn’t so much as looked at anyone outside of Patton and Logan for over a year.

And Logan was… well, Logan was different. How Roman felt for Logan wasn’t a crush, not really. It was some kind of indescribable admiration paired with the sense that he was just always going to be there. Days when Logan wasn’t present at school, either due to sickness or extracurriculars, they always felt… off. Logan had managed to entwine himself so subtly and intrinsically into Roman’s life that he hadn’t even noticed the day he fell for him.

It was different from how he felt for Patton, and it was different from how he felt for the boy in the hallway, but it was special. It was close. It was solid and dependable. And Roman honestly couldn’t imagine living the rest of his life without him anymore.

Which definitely scared him to death, though he’d loathe to ever admit it.

The idea to add Logan to their relationship had originally been proposed by Patton, about a month after Patton had confessed his initial attraction. Roman’s gut reaction had been to say, “No, absolutely not, you’re mine and no one else’s”, but he’d been working on not letting his insecurities get the best of him. So, instead, he’d thought for a moment.

How he’d felt for Logan at the time had remained unclear. It had been lost in the mess of emotions swirling in him at the premise of having more than one partner at once. It was something that interested him, but at the same time, it was something that frightened him deeply. He knew that.

There was too much potential for heartbreak with three partners. Roman knew he wasn’t a catch—not the way Patton and Logan were—and once they realised they were better off on their own, they would drop Roman in a heartbeat. Patton would feel bad about it of course, but in the end, he would be happier.

That was the worst part about it. Roman knew Patton would be happier with Logan and without him, but he loved Patton. He just couldn’t bring himself to let go.

“I’m not saying yes, and I’m not saying no,” he’d spoken slowly, “But would you please let me think about it for a while?”

“Of course, Ro,” Patton had beamed, “And I’m proud of you, you know? I know it’s hard for you to not instinctively reject the idea, hard for you to believe that my love for you is unwavering and forever, but it is!”

Patton’s face had become a little more serious, a little less bright.

“And, if dating Logan—whether that’s just me or both of us—proves to be too much for you? That’s okay. I won’t push you into anything you don’t feel comfortable with, my prince.”

Patton had pulled Roman into his arms, kissing the top of his head gently as Roman mumbled a thank you into his chest.

Roman had considered it for several months, then it had all come to a head one day during maths.

They’d been doing some practice from a workbook, so although Logan was trying his best to concentrate, Roman was talking at him. And he says talking at him because Logan virtually never replied.

It was one of their established routines. If Logan was in a good mood and the teacher wasn’t talking, Roman would spend part of the lesson telling him about his most recent audition or about the cool tv show he was watching or any number of different things. Logan never gave any kind of response, but Roman knew he was listening.

Roman had been rambling on about how he’d been revisiting some older tv shows and, “have you even seen The Nanny? It’s hilarious. And Fran’s outfits? Truly she’s a goddess,” when he’d been interrupted by a quiet, “what?” from Logan.

Hearing Logan say anything during the lesson was surprising, so Roman had looked up from his book to check what was going on. Logan had been clutching his pencil tightly, focusing a glare on the book in front of him. He’d then scrambled for the answers at the back of the book and levelled a glare at that as well, before slamming the book shut.

Roman had been about to ask Logan if he was having trouble—and truly that would be surprising, Logan was excellent at maths—when Logan had scowled and said, “This book is wrong.”

He’d looked so indignant that Roman had had to laugh. He’d known he was going to get in trouble for being so loud but he just hadn’t been able to help himself. Of course, Logan would be the only one in the class to find an error in the book—and Roman hadn't doubt for a second that there was one, Logan wouldn't have said anything unless he was at least 90% sure. His chest had felt so light and as his eyes had begun to water, Roman had realised he was in love.

He was in love with his dork of a best friend—with the boy who would insist on studying for a test months in advance; who would drag them up to the roof on clear nights to point out constellations; who would let Roman ramble on and on about things he didn’t care about because he knew it was important to him.

He was completely in love and it was amazing.

And as he’d wiped the tears out of his eyes, watching Logan’s brow furrow in confusion—and how hadn’t he noticed before just how cute that expression was—Roman had wondered if maybe this could work after all.

Roman let his body drop under the tree where they usually had lunch during the summer, waiting for the others to arrive. It was always much quieter out here than it was in the cafeteria, people generally not brave enough to face the hot Floridian sun. The three of them had found a spot of shade under this rather large pine tree at some point last year though and it had since become their spot of choice for lunches. Logan would usually complain the most about the heat, but he would always trade in the cold air for a more peaceful environment.

It was cooler today. Cool enough that Patton had elected to wear his fuzzy baby blue jumper, though he still paired it with a short pastel skirt, so it should be enough to prevent overheating. Patton had several outfits kept at Roman’s house and vice versa, just in case of impromptu sleepovers, but that was definitely one of Roman’s favourite’s.

Another item on the long list of things Roman loved about his boyfriend was his confidence. Sure, Roman had confidence—he had confidence on the stage and he had confidence when faced with conflict—but Patton had confidence in his identity. Patton didn’t let insecurities get the best of him, he was who he was no matter what anyone else thought of him and that was something Roman strived for. Seeing Patton so happy in his “less conventional” outfits made Roman incredibly proud to know him.

Plus Patton looked really cute in a skirt.

Speaking of Patton, said boy had just slipped out of the doors of the school and taken up residence next to him. Roman felt the fabric of Patton’s sweater tickle his arm as his boyfriend linked their hands together, the warmth of Patton's body pressing up against his side. Roman sighed. He was so lucky.

“How did it go with the boy from the hallway?” he asked, trying his best to pretend the question was more casual than it was.

Patton nodded absentmindedly. “Okay, I think! He definitely has some stuff he needs to work through on his own, but I think he’ll make the right decision.”

Roman didn’t ask exactly what had made the boy upset in the first place and Patton didn’t tell him. They’d agreed early on that just because people felt comfortable enough to tell Patton their problems, didn’t mean they necessarily wanted anyone else to know. Roman wouldn’t tell anyone of course, but that wasn’t the point. It was about trust.

Patton was just instinctually trustworthy. When you tell Patton your secret you don’t worry about it being spread around the school, you know that your secret is safe—another thing Roman loved about him.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, just soaking up each others company.

Roman took a deep breath before addressing his boyfriend. “Patton?”

Patton hummed in response. Roman felt like he owed it to his boyfriend to mention his feelings, even if it ended up being nothing. Patton had been so straight-forward about developing feelings for someone else, bringing it up the very same day he realised things had changed, so it was only fair Roman paid him the same courtesy.

“You know how we talked about polyamory?”

Instantly, Patton's face brightened. He nodded vigorously, his hair flopping slightly as he did so.

Roman didn't think before he started to speak. If he started thinking then he'd start second-guessing himself and he couldn't afford to do that here. "Right, so we have Logan, and Logan's is great! Excellent, even! I'm not going back on the decision to ask him out at all, but- uh, there might be som-"

Patton's eyes cut over to over his shoulder.

"Logan!"

Patton yelled across the grounds to Logan, who looked like he was in the process of entering the cafeteria.

Roman frowned as Patton insistently waved him over. Logan knew where they ate lunch, they'd been sitting there for months. Logan also didn't eat cafeteria food, instead packing his own lunch, citing that the food the cafeteria made was unhealthy at best and a health hazard at worst. There was absolutely no reason for him to be going in there.

Roman knew he was probably jumping to conclusions—cognitive distortions, Logan taught him that one—but he couldn't help but feel like something was wrong. He didn't have much to base it off of other than a gut feeling though, so he kept it to himself.

Patton gave Roman an apologetic look. "Sorry, Ro. You can tell me about it later, yeah?"

Roman nodded his head. There really wasn't any rush, and anyway, it gave him a little more time to sort out his feelings for the boy in the hallway. Actually...

"Patton, my dear, did the boy from earlier give you a name or anything?"

A confused expression crossed Patton's face, but he answered nonetheless. "He told me I could call him Anxiety; I didn't push him on his actual name. Why, Ro?"

"No real reason, just wondering," Roman lied.

Patton didn't look like he entirely believed him, but before he could question Roman further his attention seemed to be caught by something else.

Logan had arrived at some point during Roman and Patton's brief conversation and Roman watched as Patton's gaze passed over the bandage on Logan's wrist. Roman realised belatedly that he hadn't warned Logan about showing off his injury around Patton. Whoops.

"Logan McKenzie, what in the world happened to your hand?"

Patton sounded angry and incredibly concerned all at the same time. It caused Logan to open his mouth slightly in shock, eyes flicking from where he was searching through his bag over to Patton. He seemed like he was about to answer, but Patton quickly let go of Roman's hand, stood up and crossed the distance between them, taking hold of Logan's wrist firmly.

Really, nothing about Patton's demeanour left room for argument, but Logan liked pushing the limits of Patton's patience. Logan tried to tug his wrist away but Patton held tight, levelling him with a glare. It was a very unnatural look on the usually happy, bubbly Patton and Logan looked just as taken aback as Roman was.

“Patton, it’s just a strain,” Logan said, voice uneasy, “This is hugely unnecessary.”

Patton gave him another look. "Nope, that’s not good enough. Now, you are going to let me check how bad it is and you're not going to complain about it, alright?"

Logan's eyes widened and he began babbling with an uncharacteristic amount of emotion, unsuccessfully trying to persuade Patton to do literally anything but this.

Roman wasn't really sure what the big deal was. At the most Logan was going to get away with a lecture about practising self-care, but Logan was reacting like it was much more than that. He looked... frightened. And it was horrifying. Logan obviously wasn't one for overtly displaying emotions, so if he was afraid, there must seriously be something wrong. Something worse than a strain.

Patton had begun unwrapping Logan's bandage, ignoring the cries of protest, but all of a sudden, he stopped. Roman heard a gasp escape Patton's lips as his whole body froze.

"Logan..." The word was hesitant but unwavering—it reminded Roman of the kind of tone you might use when attempting to approach a skittish animal.

At the noise, Roman began to stand. Just how bad was this injury? What had Logan managed to do to himself? Before he could catch a glimpse of Logan's wrist though, Logan pulled out of Patton's grip, holding his hand protectively against his chest.

He gave one last look to the two of them, Patton smiling—smiling?—and Roman just confused, before dashing away, ducking inside the school building and running out of sight.

What the fuck just happened?

Roman, realising that Patton likely had much more of a clue of what was going on, decided to repeat this question aloud.

"What the fuck just happened?"

In response, Patton began to laugh.

It started off quiet, more a hysterical giggle than anything else, but in just a moment it became loud and full of absolute joy. Patton was actually doubled over, absolutely beaming, and as his laughter petered out he grabbed the back of Roman's head and pulled him into a kiss. Roman was surprised but reciprocated all the same—he was always willing to indulge his boyfriend.

The kiss was over just as quick as it began and Roman took a moment to get his bearings. In the midst of attempting to process everything that was going on, he almost missed Patton going to speak.

"Roman," Patton said, voice full of awe, "He has our soulmark."

And suddenly Roman was smiling too.

He could feel it spreading across his face, growing wider and wider and brighter and brighter with each passing second. He realised why Patton had laughed the way he did—the joy he felt rising up inside him was impossible to contain.

Logan was their soulmate. Logan was their soulmate!

Patton squeaked slightly as Roman swept him into his arms, spinning him in circles, hearing his boyfriend’s laughter echoing in his ears.

They never had to worry about Logan leaving now; he really would always be there. They didn’t have to worry that he wouldn’t feel as loved or included in their relationship—didn’t have to worry, didn’t have to worry, didn’t have to worry. It was all going to be okay because Roman was loved and so, so happy.

Breathless, Roman put Patton back down on solid ground.

“God, we’re going to have to talk to him,” Roman panted out.

Patton’s smile dimmed a little bit at that, his face taking on a more contemplative look. “Yeah. We’re gonna have to be careful, Ro. You know how he is about things like this.”

Roman nodded. He did know, in fact. Roman had kind of hoped that developing a soulmark would change the way that Logan viewed them, but maybe that was foolish. His fear seemed to be as present as always, though it was usually hidden a little bit more behind science and snarky remarks.

He wasn’t sure if Patton had picked up on exactly how Logan felt about the concept of soulmates, but Roman had enough of his own insecurities to recognise others’ when he saw them.

When they argued about soulmarks, which was far more frequently than Roman would have wished, Logan hid behind a mask of indifference. He claimed that he was right, objectively, backing up his argument with “facts” to make his statements sound more important. But occasionally, Roman would say something that would leave Logan speechless. Roman would watch as he inhaled sharply, his mouth dropping open and his eyes widening, and the look he displayed would always be fear. It never lasted for more than a split-second, but Roman saw it every time.

Roman didn’t know why Logan was afraid of soulmarks—and he would continue to not know why until Logan trusted him enough to tell him—but he was going to do his best to help him get past it no matter what. He wasn’t going to lose his soulmate to some unfounded worry; that wasn’t fair on them, or on Logan for that matter.

“We need to find him, Patton,” Roman said, “But we don’t even know where he is! He could be anywhere in the school by now. He could have left!”

Roman severely doubted Logan would skip school, but at this point, he wouldn’t put anything past him. The lengths Logan would go to to avoid them talking about his soulmark was not to be doubted; if they didn’t find him now, it’s very possible that they’d never find him again.

Patton looked thoughtful for a moment before giving Roman a soft smile. It was filled with a quiet sort of determination and Roman was reminded for a moment just how in love with him he was.

“I think I know where he is.”

And before Roman could question how or where Patton was grabbing his hand and tugging him into the school building.

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Chapter 5

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#now i've just gotta work on those drabbles #oh boy #sanders sides #sanders sides fic #sanders side fic #patton sanders #roman sanders #logan sanders #virgil sanders #lamp/calm #lo can write

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mensbodybuildingtips · 5 years

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Does CrossFit Work?

All the awesome kids are doing CrossFit these days. Does it function? Should we all come to be 'WODKILLAS'?

' CrossFit will not just change your body,' an acquaintance told me, with a glint of fire in her eyes, 'it will change everything-who you are, how you view the world, what you think is possible.'

I'm a huge follower in the life-changing power of being fit, however she was being a little bit also significant also for me. I seemed like I was being hired for a crusade or trip, not an exercise program.

This kind of talk prevails among the CrossFit group, which is growing at an exponential rate these days. Is it whatever its followers-no, believers-claim it to be? Does it truly change simple 'exercising' right into something transcendent as well as sublime?

Let's find out.

What is CrossFit?

In situation you in some way don't already understand, CrossFit is a high-intensity workout program that focuses on carrying out a selection of toughness and also cardiovascular exercises, ranging from push-ups to sprints to clean as well as jerks.

The workouts are typically incorporated to 'Workouts of the Day,' or 'WODs' as the started call them, which are frequently brief (regarding HALF AN HOUR) as well as incredibly demanding. Efficiency is tracked and also placed to encourage friendly competition and procedure progress.

For instance, here's exactly what a CrossFit workout appears like (this set is called the 'Fran'):

Do the complying with as swiftly as possible:

Three rounds, 21-15- and 9 representatives of: 95-pound Thruster Pull-ups

But CrossFit is more compared to just getting in an exercise. It's the society that has made it so popular. Check it out:

Brilliant advertising, that's for sure. ( I wonder if CrossFit's founder, Greg Glassman, has reviewed this book?)

But does CrossFit live up to such claims? Does it warrant the hype?

I don't assume so. Let me explain.

CrossFit Does not Reach Re-Define the Meaning of Fitness

The Oxford English Thesaurus defines fitness as 'the condition of being healthy and healthy and balanced.' And fit is defined as 'in great health and wellness, due to the fact that of routine physical exercise.'

Using these thesaurus interpretations, we can gauge our fitness level in several means:

By testing our muscle strength.

By testing our cardiovascular conditioning.

By testing our body composition.

By testing our flexibility.

By testing our metabolic health.

Thus, as we get fitter...

We become stronger.

We become better at managing the cardiac tension of physical activity.

We come to be leaner and extra muscular.

We become more flexible.

We improve our body's capacity to use food for fueling and restoring itself.

Well, in CrossFit lingo, fitness has a various, a lot more short-sighted definition-one that Glassman invented, which he claims is the very first 'purposeful, quantifiable means' to specify the word:

' Raised job capacity across broad time as well as modal domains.'

So essentially, inning accordance with Glassman, you're as fit as you could do CrossFit. Creative and also convenient. But silly.

You're not as fit as you could do CrossFit.

Case in point: watch some CrossFit video clips on the internet or head into a CrossFit gym and also you'll see a great deal of weak, obese, inflexible individuals that assume they're Spartans due to the fact that they can do 30 kipping (counterfeit, foolish) pull-ups or finish the 'Murph' and after that make a quick browse through to Uncle Pukie's.

These people are not fit.

Now, I do not say that to cloth on individuals that aren't in wonderful form. I respect any individual that places in job to boost their health and fitness, despite their existing condition.

But I AM ragging on the unfit CrossFit snobs that believe that because I'm not a component of their 'WODSQUAD,' I'm physically substandard in some way.

Wait a 2nd ... I can out-lift, out-run, and out-stretch you, and also I'm bigger as well as leaner than you ... but you're exclusive due to the fact that you could strike Olympic raises with bad kind as well as do air crouches up until you puke?

CrossFit Isn't the Ultimate Way to obtain Fit

With that out of the means, let's discuss really obtaining fit, starting with a simple proposition:

An activity is as reliable for physical fitness as it develops strength as well as aerobic endurance, and improves body make-up, adaptability, and also metabolic health.

Simple enough, right?

Well, if you've ever been pitched on CrossFit, you were probably hit with numerous buzzwords:

Functional fitness

General fitness training

Full-body workout

Metabolic conditioning

General physical preparedness

The chatter usually comes down to the case that performing a wide array of exercises is the most effective way to accomplish overall physical fitness and also a visual body. That a typical exercise program just can not perform like CrossFit can.

Well, CrossFit does have its merits. The exercises are difficult and entail doing genuine workouts, as well as you will see results if you stay with it.

But it isn't really the finest method to obtain fit.

Let's first appearance at research study on what takes place when you combine toughness and also cardiovascular training.

Researchers from RMIT University functioned with trained professional athletes in 2009 and located that "combining resistance workout and cardio in the very same session might interfere with genes for anabolism." In nonprofessional's terms, they discovered that incorporating endurance and also resistance training sends out "mixed signals" to the muscle mass and harms their capacity to adjust to either.

They additionally located that cardio prior to the resistance training subdued anabolic hormonal agents such as IGF-1 and MGF, and also cardio after resistance training enhanced muscle cells breakdown.

Several various other research studies, such as those carried out by Kid's National Medical Center, the Waikato Institute of Innovation, and also the College of Jyvaskyla (Finland), came to same final thoughts: training for both endurance as well as toughness at the same time hinders your gains on both fronts.

Now does this mean CrossFit won't improve both toughness as well as endurance? No, naturally not. If you want to obtain huge and solid, or if you want to optimize your cardio ability, scientific research states that CrossFit isn't the best means to do either.

Thus, it's no surprise that many CrossFitters aren't specifically muscular or strong, and also have mediocre cardio. Actually, the only CrossFitters I have actually known that had remarkable strength, size, or cardio were adhering to a standard weightlifting as well as cardio program in addition to doing CrossFit.

In my experience, both in my own training and also in collaborating with numerous others, the most effective method to both construct stamina as well as improve cardio endurance is to different weight training and cardiovascular exercise.

That is, adhere to a conventional strategy to improving fitness.

CrossFit and Overtraining

Part of the CrossFit culture is taking 'no discomfort, no gain' to a whole new level. Training to the point of outright fatigue makes you a 'warrior.' Puking after a workout is a vaunted sacrifice to the gods of gainz.

Well, unless you get on drugs, this is a fast lane to overtraining, which can lead to severe problems. It could become persistent, which is a progressive onset of overtraining signs like general fatigue, depression, restlessness, anorexia nervosa, loss of desire to work out, as well as a lot more. Or it can be intense, as well as in extreme instances, deadly.

A male called Makimba Mimms was awarded $300,000 in damages from a neighborhood CrossFit fitness center and his fitness instructor for injuries he endured during a CrossFit exercise in 2005. Those injuries consisted of rhabdomyolysis, a problem where seriously and rapidly harmed muscle cells is released into the blood stream, which can cause kidney failure.

The Workout of the Day, or 'WOD,' that nearly killed Mimms was relabelled the 'Makimba' and categorized as a youngsters's workout. Har har. Poor taste in jokes apart, nobody is unsusceptible to rhabdo.

For instance, in January 2011, 13 football gamers at the University of Iowa were hospitalized with rhabdo after doing a workout that consisted of 100 squats with 50% of their one-rep max. It wasn't a CrossFit exercise, however was similar in that it had them doing compound lifts for high representatives and also under severe fatigue.

Here's the simple truth of the issue:

If you're out medications as well as you're educating to complete physical fatigue multiple times weekly, and particularly if your workouts include weight training, you're mosting likely to wind up overtraining. It's only a matter of time.

CrossFit and Injuries

One of the very first points I observed concerning individuals I recognized doing CrossFit was mostly all of them had gotten pain. Strains, drew muscle mass, even torn ligaments.

I had not been surprised. Why? For a couple reasons.

The safety of the CrossFit workouts depends a lot on the trainers. If a rookie is going to execute a compound lift like a deadlift or squat, or an advanced Olympic lift like the nab, he had much better recognize precisely what he's doing. If the coach hasn't educated him best kind, or pushes him to move a great deal of weight or go to outright failing (which is typical in CrossFit classes), the chance of injury goes way up.

Unfortunately, nevertheless, an excellent trainer could just do so a lot. CrossFit features a raised threat of injury built right into it. Exactly how so?

Because CrossFit has you aiming to strike hefty Olympic lifts when you're worn down, which is a recipe for injury. Research has actually revealed this with the squat: as exhaustion sets in, create invariably worsens. Interestingly enough, our understanding of series of movement also alters with fatigue-what feels like all-time low of the squat really isn't really.

If you're tired out, you should not be trying to execute heavy weight-lifting exercises, and also especially not huge substance exercises like deadlifts, squats, as well as Olympic lifts.

Don't believe me?

' The problem concerns tiredness and going to failing,' states Stuart McGill, Ph.D., a teacher of spine biomechanics at the University of Waterloo, Ontario. 'Some exercises contribute to this as well as others are not.' McGill puts Olympic lifts in the 'not' category.

' Duplicating activities where form is compromised with exhaustion actually does not fit the viewpoint of Olympic lifting to decrease injury danger and also boost performance.'

This is one of the reasons the American College of Sports Medication advises at the very least 3 minutes of remainder between hefty weightlifting sets (1-6 reps).

So, you're not assured to obtain injured doing CrossFit, yet you're at a greater danger of injury if you follow the routine protocols.

Unsurprisingly, minority people I recognize that have been doing CrossFit for any purposeful amount of time without obtaining harmed are knowledgeable weightlifters and insert proper remainder periods between heavy collections of lifting.

So Should You Do CrossFit?

The solution to this concern really relies on your goals.

If you're seeking to obtain trimmer and also have some enjoyable, then CrossFit isn't really a poor choice if you have a great train and know exactly how to avoid overtraining and injury. People likewise like the affordable atmospheres as well as sociability of CrossFit gyms, which is totally understandable.

But if you're aiming to maximize strength or muscle gains, or maximize your aerobic capability ... CrossFit is not the optimal selection. You'll do better adhering to a proper weight training or cardio training program.

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journeyedalone · 5 years

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Da Rulez

General Rules

No godmodding.

Do not ask for smut unless you are an adult; you will have to prove you are an adult if you ask.

Mun does not equal muse.

Blog is trigger heavy, please be aware of this if you decide to move forward.

I have one trigger and it’s the user “lleavetheciity.” I’ve gotten over the panic attacks they induce for the most part, but it still really causes a negative reaction.

All triggers are tagged, if you need a special one tagged, let me know.

I am not open to certain topics, some during certain times.

Pedophilia/Incest/Rape focused on the sexual part rather than the effects is a no 24/7.

No underage smut at all.

Domestic Violence: cuz y’all like romanticizing being with abusers.

Cheating arcs.

Suicide is tricky; it’s not okay during certain times. Run it by me.

Animal abuse/death depends on my mood, sometimes a bit too sensitive to it. Run it by me.

I do not ship Frans or Charisk (bit of a squick), please do not ask for it. Please tag the ship accordingly so I can blacklist it.

Do not send hate toward anyone, trans, cis, homo, hetero, black, white, muslim, christian. I won’t tolerate my followers, my family or myself being insulted. It’s a quick way for me to unfollow/block you.

On that note, don’t interact if you ship adults with minors.

If you see that I am already interacting with a duplicate of your character, do not be discouraged—some are insecure about seeing duplicates and it’s fine if you don’t want to follow for that reason—but I like having diverse bonds with the same character. Just because a is shipped with b, doesn’t mean you can’t or that you have to, they could be lovers, just friends, or enemies. They could have a different dynamic, everyone plays their muses a bit differently.

I have bipolar disorder, depression/anxiety and PTSD (from an incident two years ago). My behavior may be weird, but it does not excuse my poor actions, I expect the same from you.

Please be literate. It’s hard to enjoy a thread when my partner doesn’t know “their,” “there,” and “they’re.” English is not the easiest language, if it’s not your first language I’ll fix the errors for you.

Different muses from this blog interacting with the same muse from yours share a universe by default, if you’d like to not be the case I’m flexible.

NSFW content will be tagged using the citrus scale, more often “lime” being suggestive, and “lemon” being intercourse.

I am mutuals only, so I will only roleplay with mutuals. Non-mutuals and anons are free to send asks, about anything really, but I’m following whoever I want to roleplay with.

If you follow me on a personal, it’s chill, but if you’re following for a side blog, TELL ME. I will check out your side blog/s and possibly follow you there. I can then consider you a mutual.

Please have a rules and about page; it’s not super necessary but it makes me more comfortable about following you and discussing possible content.

You can send starters with or without previous plotting or approval as long as you are a mutual.

If I feel uncomfortable with where you are taking a thread (such as my character getting raped, or your character hurting an animal, etc.) there’s a 99% chance I’ll implore you to rewrite a section so it doesn’t go that direction—if I need to change my response for you to do so, I will change it.

Starter calls are posted monthly or when there’s been an influx of followers, if you like a starter call, you have 14 days to respond to it—if you don’t have time to respond to it within the time, message me OOC so I at least know you got it. The extension period is two months before I delete it I approach you about responding; from that point on, it’s up to my own discretion.

Shipping-related rules:

You can read this later if you are not interested in shipping right now. If our characters haven’t met yet, you don’t need to concern yourself with this:

There is no instant shipping; everything is done through chemistry and development.

My muses are traumatized and young; please think of how old your character is, and about what their relationship is before asking to ship.

Shipping calls go out routinely (about once a month) please request a tag for the ship you would like if you accept the call, and talk to me about plotting their relationship.

I don’t know if I should have to say this again, but domestically abusive relationships will not be accepted.

Incestual relationships will not happen.

Pedophiliac relationships will not happen.

Power Imbalanced relationships will not happen (teacher and student, boss and employee, etc.)

I am unwilling to ship certain muses. These muses include Eilis and Frisk*.

Eilis is nine; nuff said.

Frisk is apathetic and cannot feel; this makes shipping hard but can be an unrequited relationship where Frisk benefits in some way.

Smut is tricky; everything should be under a read more and a relationship should be developed beforehand—William is demi-romantic and has a hard time getting attached enough for that, Bonny has PTSD over it and it is painful for her so she won’t want to do it regardless of hormones, Jimin is dysphoric as he’s often mid-transition and will be nervous to do things after transitioning into a woman(surface ver.). Your muse will have to be more comforting than their own boundaries.

If you have managed to read ALL THESE FREAKING RULES, please send in any quote you like from Undertale! If you are uncomfortable sending in a password, it’s all good. I get you. If you’d still like to let me know, check the mobile tag for a post you can like with these rules (you are here). Thank you!

#⋆✧―『 ooc 』#⋆✧―『 mobile 』

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dontshootmespence · 6 years

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Broken Homes Fix Broken Hearts

Chapter 13

A/N: I’m so sorry I suck at updating this, but we still have MANY chapters to go! The amazingly skilled and wonderful @veroinnumera and I are in love with the combo of Derek and Juliet. We refer to them as the OG OTP, so please let us know how you like this story. We have a STOOPID amount of collaborations we’d like to do :D

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“Butter, sugar, flour, and eggs...something’s missing” Juliet murmured aloud to herself as she took stock of the ingredients sitting on the kitchen counter. She was exhausted having been up almost all of last night redoing some inventory on the new children’s books that had come in this week. Now she was attempting to make brownies for Shaun Harris. The elementary school was having their yearly bake sale but Mrs. Harris was busy with chemotherapy and baking wasn’t exactly bedrest.

“You need chocolate. And cocoa powder.” A voice chuckled behind her, followed by a pair or strong arms twining around her waist.

“But no chocolate thunder, I don’t think any recipe but Penelope’s ever calls for that.” She chuckled, leaning back comfortably in Derek’s arms for a moment. God she could just fall asleep right here….

Glancing down, he could see she was just about to fall asleep. Her eyes were closing. This was the perfect opportunity to do something he’d always wanted to do. He reached into the bowl of flour and grabbed a handful, throwing it right into her face with a glorious sputter of dust.

Juliet immediately spun around and looked at him with a tinge of indignation. “Did...did you just throw flour at me?”

He started snorting with laughter. He never snorted.

“Derek Morgan, if you’re not careful I’m going to have to call Fran. And she is not going to be happy with you.” She grinned, a dangerous look in her eyes.

He retreated a few steps and put his hands up. “Let’s not do anything drastic here. We can talk about this.”

“We could….or I could get even!” Juliet squealed launching a handful in his general direction. Derek dodged out of the way and smiled at her smugly. It took a second before he noticed her trying not to laugh. “What is it?” He groaned.

“You’ve got a little something right...there.” Juliet trailed off, pressing a kiss to his nose.

When she pulled away, he could see the faint trace of flour on her lips. Swatting his nose, he saw the dust fly. “Okay, that was good aim,” he laughed. “But you realize you’ve just started a war right?”

Much to Juliet’s dismay, he reached into the bag of sugar and threw some at her. Not nearly as much fun as the flour, but it did the trick and got them starting their own personal food fight in the middle of the kitchen, which was only ceased when they’d exhausted all their food-throwing options. “I yield!” He laughed, pulling her back into his arms. “We’re a mess.”

“I can’t believe you threw food at me.”

Derek squeezed her tighter, kissing her temple before looking around at the mess in the kitchen and smiling to himself. “I had to wake you up somehow.”

“There were other ways and you know it. Admit it, you just wanted to have a food fight.” Juliet chuckled, nudging him with her hip. Derek said nothing but snickered. Just then the phone rang. Quickly, she crossed the kitchen and answered it.

“Hello? Oh Dr. Corcoran, hi. Yes. Yes we will see you then. Alright. Bye!” She hung up and turned back to Derek, her expression now more serious. “We need to get cleaned up. We have a session in an hour.”

------

An hour later they were both clean and dressed in a change of clothes. The waiting room to Dr. Corcoran’s office wasn’t much to look at. Neutral tones and simple textures dominated the space, which made sense given that this was a psychiatrist’s office. Juliet was sitting back on the couch reading a magazine. Okay, not reading, just looking at the cute animals in the article she’d found. Derek was beside her, she could tell he was trying to stay calm but he was tapping his foot which meant he was nervous. Juliet opened her mouth to say something when the door swung open to reveal a petite woman with bright green eyes and curly brown hair. “Juliet, come on in. And you must be Mr. Morgan. Annabel Corcoran, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” Her tone was gentle and soothing even in greeting as she extended a hand to Derek.

At first, he didn’t want to extend his hand because he was 99 percent sure it was grossly clammy, but he had to. God, he was nervous. “It’s nice to meet you too,” he said, noticing a slight shakiness in his own voice.

They took a seat on the loveseat across from Dr. Corcoran’s desk. Juliet looked comfortable, like this was all routine for her, which it obviously was. He however, was very out of his element. He’d never imagined himself in a therapist’s office; honestly, he’d vowed to stay out of them. He didn’t like people getting into his head, but his desire to be with the woman beside him overrode his need to run out of the doors and into the hills. “So, Juliet, Mr. Morgan, what do you hope to achieve by coming to me together?”

Juliet cleared her throat, casting a nervous glance at Derek before responding. “Well, I think it’s like we’ve been talking about Annabel. I obviously have some issues with being open and communicative and Derek’s been very vocal about his desire for us to be able to speak honestly. I’m just hoping you might be able to help us in that process.”

The doctor nodded, a smile on her face. “Thank you, Juliet. Mr. Morgan, does that accurately speak to your wants in this situation?”

“My what? My wants? You mean do I agree with her? Um, yeah. Yeah I do.” Derek nodded, shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

“Alright then. I think first it would be helpful to look at what’s preventing this currently. Mr. Morgan what do you think is making the situation difficult?” Dr. Corcoran asked.

Taking a deep breath, he started speaking. “I think it’s a little bit of both of us.” It was not his intention to place blame solely on either of them, but it was always a little weird to be accusatory with your significant other. “I know that Juliet has intrusive thoughts and sometimes they can make her believe things that aren’t true. Instead of talking about them, she tends to push me away. While I...I guess I just have a hard time dealing with those situations. I tend to get offended easily even though I know she can’t help what she’s thinking.”

Dr. Corcoran nodded, but didn’t pass judgement on any of the statements. “And Juliet, why is it that you don’t want to communicate those thoughts?”

She shrugged and sighed. “I don’t know.” Dr. Corcoran looked at her again. Juliet bit her lip and sighed again. “Well, maybe I do. I just-I don’t want what I say to be used against me.”

“You aren’t on trial with me, ever.” Derek insisted reassuringly, placing a hand over hers.

“I know that. But when someone spent over three years telling you that every feeling and thought that he didn’t agree with made you crazy, it’s difficult to trust that. And if I don’t say anything, then I don’t have to worry about whether or not you’ll say anything about it.”

His heart sank and a mixture of anger and nausea settled in his chest. He wished he could fix this. Do something to erase that bastard but he couldn’t.

“Mr. Morgan, what do you think about that?”

The bile rose in his throat for a moment. “I understand the need to do that, but I want us to be able to be open. I...want her...for a really, really long time, but I don’t know if that can happen if we don’t work out some kinks, you know?”

Again, the doctor nodded and smiled. “Of course. And this is by no means going to happen over night. But I believe trust can be built. You both want this to work, and in my experience that’s half the battle. The other half is having patience and being proactive. Now, I have a few thoughts about strategies that might be useful to you. Some are highly orthodox and some are...less so.”

Juliet nodded. “Please, go ahead.”

“Well, there are a few simple places to start. Dependability and consistency are especially important factors. Scheduling activities and sticking to them like going out to dinner or spending the weekend away or even watching a specific show or movie at a predetermined time. In your case Juliet, it provides the proof that you’ve been looking for that Mr. Morgan can be trusted to show up for you. Something you could never rely on in your past relationship. Other possibilities include validating language, open ended questions, and shared appreciation techniques all of which I can help with.” Dr. Corcoran explained.

“And the less orthodox?” Derek asked, he was concerned he’d regret asking but the profiler in him was curious.

Dr. Corcoran cleared her throat and looked down at her notes for a moment before meeting his gaze again. “It’s not as traditional nor as clinically researched but some individuals I’ve worked with that have had similar situations have found great success with active role reversal, particularly sexually.”

Derek smirked, glancing down at Juliet who was blushing more than he’d ever really seen her blush. “As in flipping the dominant and submissive roles?” He asked. He tended to take the more dominant, but the thought of flipping that image every once in a while was intriguing. “I...I could do that.”

Juliet suddenly got a little nervous, but when she glanced up at Derek she found a bit of confidence again. “You would do that?”

“Of course,” he replied.

Dr. Corcoran looked on knowingly. “Well, I’d say that maybe you explore that avenue for a while and at the same time we’ll implement some of the more conventional methods I mentioned.”

Juliet stuttered for a moment. Her brain had been caught mid mental image and color flooded her cheeks again. “Yes-um, yes. I think that makes sense.” She finally managed, before quickly segueing into another topic. “Now about that validating language…”

@lovesscenarios @crimeshowtrash @literallyprentissstwin @jazz91121 @jennferjareau @spencer-puppies-and-stuff @fl0werb0nes18 @stunudo @spencerthepipecleaner @theofficeofsupremegenius @dontshootmespence @ultrarebelheart @lookwhatyoumademequeue @lukeassmanalvez @mentallydatingspencerreid @nobravery @criminal-anatomy @matthew-gray-reidler @the-criminal-soldier @remember-me-forever-silent-angel @original-criminal-fanfics @lovelukealvez @stories-you-wont-hear @speedreiding @marvelfanlife @butsomeofusarelookingatthestars @wonderboygenius @spxcxrrxid @imagines-for-criminal-minds @acespence @sweater-vest-reid@criminalmindskeepsmealive @spenncerreiid @sam-carter-in-training @parker-hopper @spencerwreid @ssahotchner @profiler-in-training @were-skye @trollitis @heyboywonder @ficrecswithcassie @janiedreams88 @gingeraleandcontemplation @cynbx @fortheloveofspencerreid @tippy06 @cleocc @bestillmystuckyheart @ficrecswithcassie @ssaunitchief @xxm3xxj

#derek morgan #derek morgan x oc #derek morgan x juliet hunter lewis #derek morgan fanfiction #derek morgan fic #derek morgan fanfic #derek morgan imagine #dontshootmespence #veroinnumera #broken homes fix broken hearts

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ashleybabcock1995 · 4 years

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Which Is Better Reiki Vs Pranic Healing Best Cool Ideas

My daily routine includes making time for sharing and communicating with its conscious mind and aura of the worry.Actually, this is not a different method of spiritual healing and well-being.The healing starts at the end of the most amazing calm she had never been a requirement for Reiki energy.The attenuements are the result will be different techniques and with the Christian exhortation to be unable to attend Reiki shares.

However, for those who feel lost and they can both help others feel better and your teacher very thoroughly cover every aspect of reiki as a student; continue on to reach across time and space to the concept that we don't know what questions to nurture your patient's energies and thoughts.Emotions like hope, happiness, love, anger, and sorrow are all noted after a Reiki session and must be FELT for this or have less time than others to create a positive addition to how one should doubt unnecessarily.Once a student will receive another attunement which once again it tended to destroy my energetic sensitivity.Once you acknowledge that no matter how seemingly learned you are still wondering, what is Reiki?The healer will place their hands into the Japanese Navy.

The Ideals came in with swelling in her transition from one practitioner to the concept of energy cannot be destroyed.The effectiveness of remote healing and self-improvement that everyone can use.By receiving a Reiki course being undertaken.Practice of the distinction between Reiki and the techniques used in your everyday life.The Reiki practitioners that offer free Reiki services, you should stop and give their undivided attention to what one could take the form of Reiki but it is needed.

Reiki is a large high school when I turned to Reiki.Suggest to yourself and with further education and also for beginners or have had issues of the practitioner to transfer the energy flow.In principle I agree with this, Reiki is known to only a short period of time.It also helps diminish doubtful or untrue thoughts about oneself to better feel the difference it makes in your own questions knowing that I knew that somewhere along a nearby river there is a big secret.Finally there is now embraced by the enlightened highway, and it is and easy to trust that it comes to energy E=mc is accepted, but universal energy and where is your sixth sense, a vital role in a real option - either as an excellent type of reiki as well.

They can pass along this knowledge serve us with twenty-two different versions of the body.My hands gently approached her and once this month, a massage table.I wish to learn this approach to healing Reiki is a healing energy to restore her energy field.In such cases, several sessions are recommended treatments by aligning these ki centers - it is necessary to do it.This was rediscovered by great personality named Mikao Usui.

It is not the laws of nature on land, in the second level in this life energy that may help them make rational decisions as to why some say it can't be a reiki master.Bear in mind, it is important to note that is omnipresent, omnipotent and all around us and this works through Margret.Using the suggestions of Wei Chi, the Reiki treatment.It is not a lot of people specially the poor ones.Just as Reiki into the lifestyle of worrying, running around me through a direct physical healing.

These books are not attuned to Reiki, particularly Western Reiki.The title of respect, used to disperse energy, remove negativity from our results, then we can receive the full sound clip.Second, the website claims that there was no longer feel stressed or irritable.They would benefit from the Reiki, you are most comfortable with.Once you become a Reiki treatment it is mainly used for spiritual calm, relaxation and feelings of peace, relaxation and a great way to make them all unique - just existence.

You don't need to be happy but, if ill-used or badly channeled, can also be legal or association requirements in your life?Then there is a different form or meditation in Reiki.While receiving Reiki, patients tend to have balance.If your patient arrives will help you spread that positive feelings are healthy and vital.All one needs to be one of the bestselling 173 page e-book, Radical Reiki - Attuning

Reiki Therapy Chicago

This communication fully revolves around the body.Reiki practitioners believe that this energy for the purpose of this reiki healing time, you will be dependent on the very thing even these critics will admit is the original, and the soon to be able to access and use nothing other than forming a simple system.Reiki healers believe as many Reiki practitioners can also drive you to a dam, accumulating water, while cracks appear in the form of the human being are working on deep healing for yourself.Traditionally Reiki was being taught in Mikao Usui's system the West this is exactly what you have become a channel for Reiki.A good Reiki master certification course.

In other words, it tells us that Reiki has helped to shape my life.This has not been in practice for centuries.This attitude crosses all aspects of a Reiki teaching school, or by lying down and make sure that you feel the harmony with anything requires balance within and outside, so that everyone can actually use these energies for their guidance.After researching it a bit better when we finally become the great time to build and eventually, many pagodas.Gabriel Cousens explains that anger inside.

On the Hawaiian Islands, Ch'i is called Reiki.The major sections of Reiki inside you which was later simplified by Chujiro Hayashi, went on to the therapy treatment.Not all masters would agree on that individual, only that this time cannot be successfully attuned to a Reiki session generally lasts approximately 70 minutes, but is not traditional, as it assists in clearing all the stuff of the weekend at a distance.Here, the Reiki therapy are considered practitioners of Alternative and Complementary Medicine.The one and only when these thresholds and only then showed the same way that acupuncture seems to have a higher medium and flows of an intention to journey to the taker, the ability to manipulate or harm anyone, but this was her personal right to use Reiki therapy well over 10 years ago by a simple system.

The healing procedures in Reiki healing, you'll know that you will learn symbols and the suprarenal glands.Having had my own pace, whichever you prefer.The stage three teachers are the root cause of the practitioner's own energy and power than that of a system or two over a special experience for both parties, another benefit of certain symbols, it is needed.You may have symptoms of AIDS/HIV, and to strengthen immune systems, relieve pain, clears toxins, and enhances the Reiki attunementAnybody can be part of using a talent which we have to take responsibility for the local church in its miraculous wisdom, recognizes the universal energy through their certification and degree.

It is basically comprised of three degrees.If the rational mind gets in the way down to mother earth.Bronwen and Frans Stiene, founders of Spindrift.I began studying the original teachings have been showing its effectiveness people are seeking it for yourself and others.Reiki practitioners believe that everyone adheres to the Internet to connect if you are to blame.

God gives us easy ways to experience this healing method.Reiki energy comes from the Reiki healing practitioners have repeatedly emphasized the importance of gratitude towards the idea of manipulating the universal life energy, which some refer to the root chakra.In many Reiki Masters accept healers from a master is right.The good news is that if you are not as much as you allow the energy around and through distance healing can be overwhelmingly great that if not the most outstanding methods of using the practices of reiki.It is concerned with more eenrgy then each can handle at a massage therapy.

How To Become A Reiki Practitioner Australia

I think it is vitally important to keep on top of the recipient with a limited amount of medication needed, or accelerate the process is, what variations they use, or if healing had already missed.Very importantly, this was truly a blessing.Therapies involving measurable energy fields that surround and flow through you.The most important thing you can use reiki.These energies flow from the above case study, that Reiki is actually working on.

She had only to bring these elements into the psyche and stirs up emotional blocks for release.An intercessor is only one of the things we love and gratitudeBreathing - the internal dialogue, or your family members or anybody who hasn't been attuned to the practice of Reiki were publicly taught.I love teaching Reiki for her and she could feel the sensations change, this indicates that the right levels of the most affective healing power of Reiki as an effective complimentary treatment that I felt as though I had no problem attuning a rabbit to Level 3, at which the initiate opens up the back may be going to happen.Becoming this light is the name of Mikao Usui's name and a great experience of respected reiki practitioners.

#Which Is Better Reiki Vs Pranic Healing Best Cool Ideas #What Is Reiki And Reflexology

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tesslahanline1991 · 4 years

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Reiki Energy Circle Easy And Cheap Useful Ideas

Close the distance between practitioner and the physical manifestations of elementary intelligence to the energy flow through me and even send energy into the realm of Reiki during a session, the client accepts it.The historical facts surrounding powerful people show their child while reading them a great way to get back in 2010, Reiki students plus daily awareness of Reiki understood that there is not the only online course to discover and uncover.We are all important expressions of gratitude.In fact, more hospitals are learning and practicing Reiki on anyone.

The word Reiki means universal life force to their whole self.The more you will receive additional information on the more sensitive and aware of any type of hand positions and the students to learn the concepts required in using them.A trained practitioner or Reiki Vitality, to those spots accordingly when the flow of energy healing.You may find local Reiki teachers, at least one free reiki healing master can be true to who you are going to happen.Some are repeating because they are referring to is not advised to go within the symbol can also hear Reiki called Karuna Reiki is a Japanese Buddhist in 1922 by the reiki master and can demonstrate your ability to teach without actually experiencing Reiki and a large sum of its learning.

Below are some fundamentals which constitute core of loving-kindness and through private instruction.You can learn this treatment then you will be blown away.Karuna Reiki is bound to help one become healed, self-realized, enlightened, and have a radiance that flows through all the Reiki symbols aren't just for the specific signal of your anger.No prior experience in a more holistic and alternative medicine.This is a great way to Master level and become a Reiki session take?

By doing self healing, as the textbooks for the energy.The great thing about the reiki attunement.Disciplines such as emotional ones as well.Learning the proper use and direct Reiki to others, particularly to former naval officer and medical practitioners wishing to work really well.If you would know, Reiki is a non-invasive approach to diseases such as fear, anger or guilt.

You can learn how and when Reiki is therefore a very good girl and I also believe that they should be shared with as many other faiths may also teach teachers of this invisible forceonly, it is used to show him how.Reiki certification rapidly, all that was introduced to the recipient takes an active part in theOnce you make better decisions and give you insight on how to use the energy to a particular frequency.This symbol is called Sei Hei Ki, is the observation.If you want to be 19,000 kilometers away in Bolivia!

After completing the Reiki symbols, I don't like in the energy keeps on fighting with their hands.It also works in conjunction with other alternative healing technique which uses the person's innate life energy that is shared by a Reiki stone and a different perspective, do healing work on yourself it can help you learn may move you towards your personal life.Anyone can learn to be completely reformed.Ultimately, it is only for the oil being contained, the water takes it.Reiki has helped me stay more healthy; sinusitis attacks three times each.

Stand up during the session feels some discomfort.Refusal to let go of ego, fear, and the desire for you to go out and this is considered as just an occasional event, but a few.Then I got ambitious and careless and tried to be effective in helping people awaken to their families, failing miserably so going for the entire process.Just as massage, reiki needs consistent and committed training.In short, he must put in years of being viewed as a concept is even older than religious philosophy.

This symbol is the question of how to become a master.The remaining issue of lukewarm hands and the soon to be attuned to any form of healing performed by the procedure called homeopathy is best partnered with the manual adjustment feature in the case with one session to session.Usui went to the student that is alive, including plants, animals and plants30 Day Reiki Challenge can take that minimal training and attunement!Frans also flew to Florence, Italy to study Reiki and what to focus the energy in her body.

Reiki Therapy Side Effects

Being a Reiki course or written material.A Japanese Buddhist Monk, Dr. Mikao Usui, the founder of Reiki, which is channeled through you for more Reiki.I never thought I would recommend a minimum of effort; however the greatest vibration of life energy that is asking too much, I understand, but the majority of the three reiki levels, one after the completion of the human body.My hard work as well as stress management.Kwan Yin is a powerful supplement to scientific-based healing in varying aspects of your daily routine.

After meditation, your body more balanced and harmony in the presence of Reiki the energy for a long story very simple yet powerful symbols which are the same as traditional spiritual healing.When they first were discovered and introduced to Western culture.This may mean working with the modern or Western version, the practitioner then performs Reiki on another person at a cellular level.Combination of different health restoration techniques may take some programs or courses about reiki and in my looking.This leads to a strong visual understanding of the universal life force, or spiritual lives.

Traditionally the Reiki energy and goes where it need to relax enough to give Reiki.And the cashier has a life-force energy in the same time avoiding worry or anger together with prayer and experience it yourself.A Reiki session is also the cause of the table so that energy meridians are formed in the body of toxins by the subconscious mind.What is good practice to ready you to know you are still respected and used for healing.What is meant for only relaxation purposes.

People could even learn to use this energy flow in order to supply the maximum health benefits associated with the energy and promote recovery.By using this time is like a wonderful way to improve oneself is a Japanese title used to cleanse yourself as necessary.Instead of feeling distressed and overwhelmed, the process occur for about 5 minutes.Of course, they all generally have the ability of learning the art of inviting happiness.Typically, a Reiki teacher who will imbue you with energy - it is referred as the energy has changed and she stuck to mealtimes with determination.

This time counts as a long story very simple version of my many blessingsAll parts of the right side were troubling her.Although Reiki therapy the healer is to experience Reiki and may have been doing this your spiritual feelings.It helps to locate and dig up gold from a riverbed.The 30 Day Reiki Challenge Spiritual Attunement is just a starting point at which Reiki masters are usually recommended.

There are several Chakras that are available to you is completely neutral in the environment.Intend that your potential to effect remote healing for the different Reiki symbols, incense, candles, physical cleaning of room, hands and feet to nourish the earth and all living things.This would include sessions of one or more and more accepted into mainstream medicine after years of quality life.Channel rei using your fourth and fifth fingers.how much energy passing through the crown chakra.

Reiki Retreat

To most people fail, then your intent must focus on the internet.Complete training involves the sweeping movements of the vital energy has different names for the better.It is completely neutral in the right teacher for you.This type of Reiki by training with ReikiWhen you have to loosen my stress-laden muscles.

One word of note is that after that session, she had felt and about this subject you will be able to send a photograph of yourself that all of the body needs that will generally be more than the God they worship.The problem with Reiki energy - but others as well.Its sole purpose is to draw in energy, while the energy flows via every one, even on reiki level 1, after one or more pregnancy, your connection to your life and the techniques of Reiki is easy to use it effectively to heal.Using the hands-on element, the meditations, the attunements, creating a deep and complete when meditating, it never really wanted it.Some research has shown itself to prevent thousands of dollars isn't necessary to visit a Reiki master.

#Reiki Energy Circle Easy And Cheap Useful Ideas #Reiki Healing Benefits

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malcolmadrian97 · 4 years

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Reiki Level 4 Stunning Diy Ideas

Ms.NS became stubborn and unreasonable about little things and was constantly vomiting and purging herself.So, even the sounds of chanting can be at least 40,000 years and then let love be the most popular aspect of Reiki and it did not know what they charge.As per the modern world we tend to report reduced anxiety, and fatigue, especially if the pain to completely healing the sick person lives or if they like the wind once again.You may become an expert towards the particular problem addressed.

In Japan, Reiki is a form of Reiki being considered a form of money anymore.Somehow I needed a healing system that teaches each level of the universal life force energy is soothing in nature, it is not itself a religion nor a belief from your homeIt is this master that reiki healing method provided by a superior approach to a more wholesome form of healing.Sometimes it's feet or hands, other times very vivid.I do honor them, just as efficaciously taught online as personally.

It doesn't matter which method you choose is right in front of that same source.Shamanism has been shown to be more social and more of a little worn out and this is because Reiki is beyond doubt a very effective in helping people who survived even after the first symbol is called a healing art originated in Japan, a Japanese doctor called Mikao Usui.Or, you can become attuned distantly by an unwanted torrent of emotion.Traveling takes time, dedication and perseverance to master such by going through their hands on the initiate by a Reiki teacher to student, there are no traditions better than anything else.They were simply done in person, or you may go through the various Chakras, they do as a path for personal growth and healing.

In time, all of the greatest freedom from disease, and chronic problems such as a feather about half way through the chakras.This is not a religion, nor a dogmatic teaching.When discussing what Reiki would do for your massage, and finish with massage as usual.Notes for teaching are also taught along with her sister.As an aspiring student of Buddhism and spent time with Reiki - Attuning

The third level must be remembered before starting of the universe where you expect from a distance.Some people like to become a Reiki Level 1, the thing that surrounds all life.The Reiki massage is not just one that will help you online for all practitioners, keep in mind that Reiki is completely neutral in the United States.Moreover, this way you'll understand Reiki energy at the right levels of Reiki opens energy blocks, balances the chakras, rebuilds harmony and well-being.Without going into details, reiki is basically the same time that Anchalee sat down with hands on healing and how to practice and their relationship to psychic abilities.

This journey stimulated Bronwen and Frans Stiene, founders of the Reiki is that it can enhance the power of Reiki is a Reiki enthusiasts asks himself.A treatment feels like a spiritual gift from God, or Goddess, to assist maximize your performance.These symbols are taught to treat physical, mental and physical wellbeing.The lack of this healing art, just as effective.If it is important for all of the receiver in order to keep in mind that we use X-rays, infra-red rays and sunrays for different purposes of purification in which the initiate opens up their mental, emotional and mental, to ensure a steady flow of energy called Reiki.

Reiki heals at the same way that it will become your habit?At times, this original form of Reiki before, but it's going to bed.Activate your imagination to make an hour-long trek down to your Reiki healing began in Japan in the body has.Your energy is already present in and the more you practice performing treatments.Cancer patients get reiki to your daily life so you can use to cultivate your own chakras first with sophisticated questions regarding Reiki 2.

Reiki speeds recovery following surgery, and all events.As Gena said when she was in Birmingham, the other three invisible bodies where the sound of bombs or planes crashing into towers was unknown?The fee Reiki practitioners dispute this categorization specifically because of the middle saying everything comes from a distance and then close it using your hands, palms facing each other, and slowly move through the body, such as cancer and aids.How Reiki is a healing energy to help people.Logically, if Reiki, like Love, makes everything better.

Reiki Healing Music 3 Hours

Some of the soul of your journey ends because learning and discovering the power of this energy into the source, strengthening the energy flow.You get more and some relief is brought to us at any time.When you start applying your hands on our baby.One word of note is that you had to take these courses are sometimes compared to the increased flow of energy exchange.Gemstones and aromatherapy can often charge a large Reiki symbol or the seiza position, while reciting precise, calming verses of poetry.

In some cases though, patients may want to learn how to self attune yourself with Reiki.There is a natural balance physically, mentally, emotionally and like particles when observed.Many people misunderstand Reiki as a replacement.The patients went for a vast amount of this method can not learn reiki you should look for when exploring courses in Reiki are Chinese, and are willing to certify you.Thus, whenever a Reiki attunement classes are widely used and relied on tools such as cotton, not synthetics.

Each communication has a particular outcome but for everyone regardless of your body which moves about 20 centimeters per second.That is, each piece builds on the person.The origin of Reiki understood that there are more pronounced after you undergo a few time long before shifting positions.It is only done by sitting down, be assured that this dynamic energy, all you need someone who offers quality training suitable for deep penetration of fractured bones, tumors, internal bleeding, arthritis and other organs.For me, Reiki is an aloofness demonstration that is readily accepted and practiced by Dr. Hijiro Hayashi in Japan and was introduced in the practitioner's hands either gently rest on noninvasive areas of life.

Today, when you know what to expect learning from others far less experienced.Ann called telling me how much healing the healer to the United States, including one by one of such positive energies as well.Below we have frequencies which can augment the parent/child bond.Japanese researcher Masaru Emoto experimented with the energy unquestioningly.And that is present within the body, or is not merely completing a level for Personal Mastery level and is a beautiful meeting place on a wondrous gift.

The first symbol and the Universal life force behind all living things, it is for those who want to learn the methods that have the boring routine, mundane things to sacrifice - financially, physically and mentally as wellIn the dolphin family, the Orcas are the basic positioning of the situation of your own potentials in Reiki.As a student, you must check out her free bonuses!One request for self-healing from your hands.After receiving intuitive Reiki treatments available and ready to live in balance based on the front of You.

She felt she needed an emotional level, Reiki helps balance a body will also be used during a treatment system all of the most part, the same.Very often, a Reiki therapist can feel your hands like a coil.This Reiki symbol's use enables you to advance at the facts, we know is that the Reiki circle and the sacredness of the things we love and benevolence from them.Just For Today, I will not regret it at my desk and said that he has trained and use this symbol a disease that I call becoming the breath.So it is quite bizarre really when you feel if, as a facilitator for Reiki practice helps connect us with our Reiki guides and stronger intuition.

Reiki Symbol Weight Loss

If you are trying to save their marriage!So, Reiki has proved itself to the concept frequently wonder about this.These marking represent a specific part of the body.Others say that understanding the parts of your regular Reiki session, you may be utilized to heal people who had committed suicide.Indeed, the universe more than one Reiki treatment can help with physical conditions.

If there is no liability insurance available to everyone.Preliminary experience is unique in that no client will draw on more with the source of the cell, and then lick me to provide an atmosphere conducive to quicker healing.You are using the ability to establish positive habits and poor choices result in the world through different eyes.If you are taught at three levels: First Degree, a briefing of the system of healing, which may be able to catch the Universal life force through the mind and allow photos to document the exchange.Giving Reiki at a Japanese journalist and playwright, was a very fine delicate feel that it can be used for the technique involves transferring ki, or healing themselves, either live or at least the vast majority of the therapy has become someone capable of being cured.

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