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mistyfoxxy · 2 years

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Luz finds out Willow likes Hunter and inspired by Hooty, tries to play matchmaker.

Oh. Oh?

Luz hadn’t realized it at first, but mama was putting things together now! A wicked smile graced her lips and she thought about the many advantages she had against the two witches.

For starters, actually being in a situation like this before. Sure she hadn’t realized at first that sweet potato had feelings for her, but now she knew what to look for. Hunter most definitely had feelings for willow.

She had been watching Willow for quite some time now to see if the feelings were mutual. She had even watched some ‘10 signs your crush likes you back’ videos to make sure she had it right.

And from what she could tell.

From the body language of the beautiful Willow Park, she most undoubtedly felt the same. She was just better at hiding it.

Luz had always noticed when Willow stayed behind the rest of them. Any time Hunter was at the back of the train. Expression of speech of course. But this. What she had witnessed today? And all the evidence from before? Oh this was it.

Willow Park liked Hunter back!

And Luz Noceda was about to figure something out for the two of them. Just you wait.

“What are you doing?”

“Ah!” Luz fell flat on her face at the sudden appearance of Gus by her side. She had been standing at the door to the kitchen, watching the grimwalker and witch interact. It was sooooo cute.

Willow had been assigned to dishes that night and Hunter offered to help. The two were at the sink talking about the Hocus Pochs movie they had watched the night before and how awful it was. Laughing and cutting up. Willow had even splashed him with some water from the sink. And the two had broke out into a playful fight.

Which Gus interrupted when he startled the heck out of Luz.

The blonde tall boy and short dark haired girl, now many feet apart from the other stared at Luzs lifeless form on the ground.

Ok she wasn’t lifeless. But the embarrassment at getting caught had definitely made her feel that way. She needed a cover. And fast. “Do y’all need any help?” She asked quickly. Now layed down with an arm propping her head up. Trying to look as cool as she could.

She heard and saw Gus from the corner of her eye groan and walk around her. A slight chuckle was heard from the younger boy.

“Is there any of my famous mustard ravioli left over?”

“Oh. Yeah there was plenty left over. I think it’s on the second shelf of the fridge.” Willow answered innocently. Grateful for the distraction.

Luz frowned. She was sure if the two had gone on just a few minutes longer! They’d have kissed or SOMETHING. It’s how it happened in the movies! But no! It was just like those movies. Someone interrupted the kiss.

Of Luz knew anything, life was not a movie. It wasn’t planned out and happily ever after boom!

But she could help with that. She had talked to her sweet potato about it the night before but she didn’t seem to be on board. Something about Willow being wayyyy out of Hunters league. Which would be true for literally anyone else’s case. But Hunter? No. He was the sweetest. Like a lost little cub or something that needed love and security.

They could have that with eachother. She just knew it!

Which led her to this.

“Hunterrrr I need to talk to you about something.” Luz started.

Hunter looked between the human and plant witch. Unsure of whether or not he should leave his captain.

Willow smiled softly. That only gave Luz more hope. “It’s ok. There’s only a few left. I can handle it.”

Hunter nodded and promised to return before walking out the kitchen.

He was quickly pulled to the bathroom. “Eep! Luz, what was that for?” He reprimanded.

“I know you like Willow.”

“Huh? W- no. What? I- what, wait how? I mean. What do you mean?” He tried.

Luz cocked her head to the side and smirked. “It’s obvious. And I’m pretty sure she likes you too!” She squealed excitedly.

“I- what? No there’s… no way.” Hunter stated defeatedly. As if he had contemplated this idea in his head hundreds of times before and always came to the conclusion she didn’t like him… like that. Well he had most definitely.

“Oh there is way.”

“And how do you know?” Hunter asked with narrowed eyes. “Did you go through her diary or something?”

“What- no I would never! Ok well I did go through Amity’s once but that’s not the point! Here. Watch this video.”

“Ten signs to tell your crush has…? Really? This will tell me?” Hunter asked a little skeptical but Luz could see the excitement in his eyes.

She nodded excitedly too. “Andddd I think I could set you two up!”

“Set… us up? Like- like on a date?” The blondes eyes widened and his cheeks started turning red. The obvious intrigued boy started grinning like someone who was in love.

Oh my.

What if he was in love with Willow?

She felt the need to run circles around the house in excitement. No Luz, calm down. Don’t read into it!

His grin dropped. “No.”

“No?”

“I- I don’t want to do that to her! I want her to date me because she wants to, not because she was set up.” He emphasized the last two words with great charisma.

Of course he wouldn’t want to do that. She thought this might would have turned this way. But she had also thought he’d have been more on board with this. Ughh why was this so hard! It worked when Hooty did it for her and Amity.

Yes she was gonna murder that loving bird tube at first but in the end…. She was very grateful.

Besides. Amity would protect her if all else fails.

Right?

“Luz… don’t you think you should let them deal with that on their own?”

“But Amity.” Luz whined. “It worked for us! They just need… a gentle push, you know?”

Amity sighed and rubbed her girlfriends back. Luz had told her about the signs and her talk with Hunter. Even if Willow did like the ex golden guard, Amity knew from experience Willow could handle herself. Willow wanted to handle things on her own. That would be… wrong. But she also knew once her girlfriend made her kind up about something, there was quite literally no stopping her. “Do what you want. But know that I won’t be supporting you with interfering. Me and Willow… just started patching things up. I don’t want to ruin that.”

The human turned to her girlfriend and smiled. “I understand. I just want them to be happy. Together. I won’t interfere too much. I promise.”

Amity smiled back and placed a kiss on her girlfriends cheek before heading to her bed. She wanted to reread The good witch Azura series again. She figured tonight would be a good night to start.

And Luz made her way downstairs. She snuck to the living room and saw Willow and Hunter on the couch together. Watching the Planet Earth documentary in wonder.

They were already together in the living room- oh. It would take quite a minute but if she was correct, that show started at eight and would end around nine thirty. It was eight fifty-four now. This gave her plenty of time. All she needed was stealth and help.

But who would help her… Amity already said she wouldn’t. Gus… maybe but she wasn’t sure. Vee? Would Vee help her set the two up? Mama?

No. This was fine. She didn’t need Willow attacking anyone else if this fails. She fits this.

Now where did she hang those extra lights?

“Guys! There’s something wrong with the garden!” Luz tried.

“The garden?” Willow asked worriedly. “What do you mean?”

Hunter jumped off the couch and ran to the window. Looking out to see if he could see the problem.

Not from what he could tell.

He looked back at the two girls and shrugged.

“I’m serious. I think you might want to check it out.” Luz nodded her head as if that was the best idea and ran up the stairs.

Willow narrowed her eyes. Ok Luz, just what do you have planned?

Willow looked over to the confused blonde. Something told her he had nothing to do with this. But the realization that seemed to dawn on his face said he knew what it might have been.

“I’m… im sure she’s confused. I doubt there’s something wrong. Besides you take such great care of them as it is.” Hunter tried to sound convincing, but it came out as… defeated?

“I. I want to check it out. Will you come with me?”

Hunter blushed a bit. Fear of something loomed in his eyes. But it wasn’t quite… fear she saw. Maybe he was nervous or worried about something?

She quickly slipped on her shoes she found by the door and a coat. She then threw Hunter her other coat she had hanging up as well.

“I can wear this?” He squeaked out.

She giggled and nodded.

They then made their way out the back door and walked towards the garden.

It was… not messed up. Nothing was wrong.

I’m fact, it was the opposite. It was beautiful. Like those fireflies Luz and Camila had shown them. But lights hung around the greenery and plants. A few candles were lit even. And a table with some fruit and that dessert called ‘cheese cake’ she loved so much. She gasped when she saw the paper hearts hanging around and started giggling.

Hunter did the opposite. He had no idea what to feel. Anger? At Luz for obviously doing this when he asked her not to? Or embarrassment because Willow was smiling like this was the sweetest thing and Hunter hadn’t been the one to do it in the first place. He groaned. He didn’t want to lie to her. Titan when he got his hands on that human-

“This is beautiful! Luz did a good job for us, don’t you think?”

Huh.

“Say what now?”

Willow smiled and turned towards him. Grabbing one of his hands as she looked up at his blushing face. Her eyes were lit in mirth. The lights illuminated her features perfectly.

All thoughts were lost in his mind. He could get lost in this witch’s eyes for centuries and not care for the world around him.

“I think you’re pretty amazing.” He stated unconsciously.

“Oh you do?” She teased.

He gasped and pulled back slightly, only to be tugged back towards her in a tight hug. “I think you’re really amazing too.” She whispered softly. “And I’d like to see where this goes.”

“Where… this goes?”

“Yes. Me and you. Together. Like Amity and Luz..? If you want.”

Hunter gulped. Was she being serious. “Wait you like me too? Like… like like me?”

“I like like you.” She smiled.

He started laughing and swiftly lifted her up in their long hug. Her feet left the ground and she pulled her head back in a fit of giggles.

She then leaned down and budded their head together softly.

Luz smiled from the window, a devious, joyful smile on her face as the two hugged and danced around. She felt like- like her babies were frowning up so fast.

And she would love to see another day!

Maybe she could do something right. Well, two things right. She thought as she glanced at her sleeping girlfriend.

#huntlow #huntlow oneshot #lumity #willow park #hunter noceda #Luz noceda #prompts #amity blight #Gus porter #my stuff #hope you like itttttt

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lampmanliveblogs · 2 years

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I’m honestly kinda surprised they allowed the posters with Lilith to be up for more than a week after she turned traitor. I’m even more surprised by the fact that Lilith thought they’d let them stay up. Come on Lili, I thought you were supposed to be smart! You betrayed your Emperor, you think he’s gonna let the fanart of you stay up?

I guess we also know the name of the mysterious Brass Watchman from the intro whose actual title I definitely didn’t know beforehand. He’s the Golden Guard! Real name, Sam.

g-get it? Like Uncle Sam. From that famous poster…?

According to Lilith, the Golden Guard is a a teenage prodigy who got special treatment even though he’s just a brat. This is said with clear resentment. It kinda reminds me of how Lilith thought of Eda when they were young. Lilith was jealous of Eda’s greater magical power and skill. It seems to me that Lilith’s dislike of this Golden Guard may stem from her own feelings of inferiority, that she feels that no matter how hard she tries, there is always people who are just better than her.

So in summary: neither of the Clawthorne sisters are doing particularly good right now.

Okay, so this is kinda interesting. Luz wants to take on bigger bounties than the puppies and cutie pies they have been catching. She wants to go after the Selkidomus, a terrible sea monster! And Eda tells Lilith that she thinks Luz COULD take on some of the bigger bounties… but they can’t afford to mess up even once at this stage.

For one thing, I think it’s really cute that Eda has such faith in the abilities of her apprentice that she thinks Luz could take on some tougher monsters. But at the same time… Eda’s powerless to protect her if something goes wrong.

An interesting bit of lore as well; Luz can’t eat a lot of the foods available on the Boiling Isles.

”That’s rough. buddy.”

Okay Zuko.

Not gonna lie, that made me laugh.

Uh oh.

Luz, having come to the exact opposite conclusion I did feels like she’s a burden to Eda and that she needs to do something to get things right. Namely, by going after the biggest, baddest bounty around.

Unbeknownst to Luz however, the Golden Guard is aboard the ship she’s boarding. The captain nods to him, which makes me think it might be a trap of some kind? If that’s the case then I’m worried.

”A good friend would respect her wishes. But a better friend would help no matter what!”

Just Hooty continuing to be the best character, nothing new to see here folks.

Eda is being wonderfully passive aggressive towards Lilith, which she honestly kinda deserve. To Lilith’s credit, she is taking it pretty well and had decided she should try and make it up to Eda. Specifically, by brewing a Scrying Potion to take a peek inside the castle. Because I guess that would help?

I mean… I wanna know what’s going on in there because that’s where The Plot lives. But the Emperor isn't doing anything to Eda right now. Does Eda even know about the Day of Unity?

WAIT! Does Lilith know what the Day of Unity entails?

Look at this nerd. Luz never does anything half-heartedly. If she’s going on a boat, she’s gonna dress up like a pirate, gosh darn it!

I think I’m gonna have to cut it here for today folks. It’s getting late where I’m at and I have work tomorrow. Hopefully, I’ll be able to continue blogging and we’ll see what adventures Luz finds on the great big boiling sea.

In the meantime…

Ba-dee-ya! Say, do you remember? Bad-dee-ya! Dancin’ in September!

#the owl house #liveblog #the owl house liveblog #toh s2e1 #separate tides

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charizardstolemynickname · 1 year

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EPISODE 20 PEOPLE!!

I wrote down notes again so I didn't miss anything and it was 2 pages, in my smallest handwriting so- THIS WILL BE A LONG POST

I will split them up into their respective scenes

Collector + Belos opening scene:

I completely forgot about the door building for a minute not going to lie, love to see it again though

EATING PALISMAN?! HE EATS THEM!? Did we know this?? I remember the DESTROYING, NOT EATING

"I can't wait to get out of this prison", now Mx Collector cosmos shadow guy, what does that mean

Speaking of the Collector, the whole time he has been so, kidlike, I wonder why, I hope we find out

Amity's parents + the kids scene:

WOAH! What does that threat mean Mrs. Blight, what deal do you have with your husband, and why does "The kids to play a more active role in Blight Industries" MEAN and why is it a threat!?

We love Mr Blight here, shoutout to Amity's dad

CATs meeting scene:

"This is just a trick to get me to wear clothes" WELL ITS NOT WORKING!" Hooty I love you, so much

"You might be a titan but you are still a little guy" THAT'S WHAT I'M SAYING EDA, King is just a baby!!!

"What? Only a few people would get eaten, even then, just the small ones!" DARIUS, my icon, my inspiration, love you

EDA HAS TO JOIN A COVEN?!! NOOOO, SHE IS FAMOUS FOR BEING A WILD WITCH!

..An egg? Okay well the following explanation makes sense, for a minute I thought her literal palisman would be an egg, however I am too impatient to wait for it to hatch WHAT IS IT

"But as exciting as saving the world sounds, its not nearly as romantic as going on a rescue mission to save your girlfriend" BROO, Eda you are so right, Eda is the real number 1 fan of Lumity

WHY IS THIS IMPLYING ONE OF YOU 3 (Luz, Eda + King) IS GOING TO DIE?! I'm with King, STOP THIS TALK, IT IS NOT GOODBYE

My found family loving heart sobbed at that frame of them 3 hugging with the view

HELL YEAH! CATs! Poor Darius, he is suffering

Luz on her mission:

DARIUS INSISTED ON A SECURITY ESCORT!?! AWWW, I knew he cared!

WILLOW AND GUS?!?! YEAHHHHHH

HUNTER?!?!?! Darius really wanted the best security for Luz if he went with the like, Ex Golden Guard

He definitely begged Willow and Gus to come with, I can see it

...I'll be honest I am still not 100% sure what a Grimwalker is, I assume it has something to do with death and control and Belos, but I don't know

THE BLUSH!!! I love Lumity so much, my little children

"We can shout as loud as we want but money always shouts louder" I DIDN'T EXPECT SUCH A HARDHITTING LINE, Well said Emira!

"she'd probably say something dorky but also sweet" Amity the simp, confirmed (/lh)

"AND I'M NOT LETTING THE WORLD END BEFORE WE GO ON A REAL DATE" ....they are so gay, I adore them, it hurts

WHAT SORT OF PETNAME IS SWEET POTATO! Wtf Luz (/lh)

AHHHHHHHHHH (excited scribbles) THEY KISSED!!!!

"Oh Crikey!" LUZ!?!?

"I can't believe I just did that" "I can't believe I just said that! Oh Crikey!" I'm in hysterics over this, jesus christ

Eda + CATs on the ship:

Eda and Raine banter, the immediate "Jealous I'm going to be a better coven leader?" from Eda to lighten the mood is 10/10

EDA IS GETTING A REAL SIGIL!? NOT A ILLUSIONIST ONE?! NOOOOO

"Isn't it cool we get one last adventure together?" EDA THIS IS WHAT I'M SAYING, THIS SOUNDS LIKE GOODBYE

Back to Luz & co adventure to talk to Amity's parents:

The King and Collector connection is fascinating to me, clearly the Titans have some sort of connection to whatever the Collector is

Amity's dad needs therapy, love him WOAH KING IS GIVING HIM THERAPY?! damn.

"I'm going to spend more time with my kids, get to know them" AHHHH I am an Amity Dad fan, if he has 1 fan its me, if he has 0 fans, I'm dead

HOMOPHOBIC AMITY MUM?!?! Oh, no, not homophobic just against Luz, well, you win some you lose some

BELOS KNOWS?! AND HAS EYES ON EDA!? I swear if Raine actually is a double spy and IS being controlled by the plant coven lady or something I will go insane

"Was it the power of believing in myself?" "No! It was the power of science! But you almost had it sweetie" AHHHH LOVE HIM

AMITY'S MUM KNEW?! SHE KNEW WHAT THE DAY OF UNITY WAS?! Bro, you aren't going to be treated well, YOU ARE GOING TO DIE YOU DELUSIONAL PRICK

Woah, Luz what was that yellow power thing?!? WHAT WAS THAT!?

NOOO!!! HUNTER, this is definitely kidnapping, in every sense considering Hunter is a kid

Mr Blight being just a fan of his jetpack until he realises what it means, I love him, I adore him so fucking much

Question, what coven is Amity's Mum from, I thought it was abomination too but the ghost thing and the talking into gem thing made me realise she probably isn't, and I have forgot what she is in

"You're always welcome in our home" AWWW SUPPORTIVE DAD!!! I am a sucker for supportive parents

WOAH NO! Hunter, its lovely to see you, as always BUT WHAT HAPPENED!?

WAIT LUZ DIDN'T GET TO HEAR SUPPORTIVE DAD COMMENT! NOOOOOO

God damn it Luz, always 1 step ahead, poor Hunter is so lost

AND THAT CONCLUDES, Episode 20 reaction. Finished. I am pleasantly surprised at this episode, it had so much packed into it and I even missed things out as it would have been too long

I have so many questions and cannot wait to have (most of them hopefully?) answered next episode

#the owl house #the owl house season 2 #the owl house season 2 spoilers #eda the owl lady #luz owl house #toh #toh spoilers #amity owl house #toh king #toh luz #toh amity #toh gus #toh willow #toh hunter #LOVE AMITY'S DAD #luz the owl house #lumity!!#king owl house #ONTO THE SEASON 2 FINALE

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pyroclastic727 · 4 years

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Owl House said fuck capitalism

So this episode was interesting. Lilith pretty much killed her sister. Why the fuck would she do that?

Even more interesting: why is Belos like that? How did Hooty put his head through one of those guards? Who the fuck is the Titan, and why does everyone like him? And how are these all tied together?

This episode was a metaphor for capitalism

...and another delicious step towards radicalizing the youth into dismantling this fucked-up neo-feudal system.

We’ll start with Belos.

Emperor Belos is a weird name, don’t you think? We all thought it was spelled “Bellows,” but it wasn’t. In fact, it’s five letters, starts with Be, ends with os, and describes a megalomaniac emperor that restricts people’s freedom in order to accumulate wealth for himself.

Sound familiar?

Emperor Bezos Belos created capitalism. He saw the beauty of magic and decided to make himself the most powerful.

Belos created a system that destroys the masses and boosts his power.

I’m dipping into fan theory a little, because the fan theory fits. We know that people get branded with coven magic that makes it so they can only specialize in one area. We know that Belos is the most powerful witch in the Boiling Isles. We know that the excess magic, magic created by restrictions, has to go somewhere.

It’s the same system that many viewers see all the time. A job takes up all your day and tires you for the night, so you can only do one skill for the rest of your life. Jeff Bezos is the most powerful man in the United States. Excess money, money taken by restrictions, has to go somewhere.

The magic goes to Belos, like how the money goes to Bezos. Belos created capitalism, and he won it.

The guards aren’t real.

Look, we’ve never seen their faces. They’re all the same. Why would you work so hard to get to the top, just to become a nameless, faceless killing machine?

Oh, also Hooty stuck his face through one. There is nothing under the armor.

Why? Well, it’s the same reason you see all those celebrities going around flaunting their wealth and bragging about how hard they worked. Like all those songs about how they grind every day and work harder than everyone else while you’re out clubbing, and that makes them dope. And then you take a closer look at them and see that they had a small loan of a million dollars fueling them, or an entire talent agency behind them, or their dad was a famous country star in the 80′s.

They’re fake. They’re hollow. They’re a ploy created by the capitalist emperor to try to delude you into working harder.

Let me put this into perspective. I guarantee that every single one of you has heard stuff like this: “Hard work makes you successful.” “I put in the work, and that’s why I’m successful.” “If you work hard enough, then you can be as successful as Mark Zuckerberg.”

And unless you’re a robot or really lucky, I’m sure all of you have failed at this. Maybe they told you that hard work would make you good at math, so you spent 22 hours a week working on calculus, only to pass it by 3 percentage points and have it destroy your perfect 4.0 GPA. Maybe they told you that if you talked to people enough, then you would make friends, so you spent a lot of time talking to people, only to end up lonely and friendless. Maybe they told you that if you did well in school, you would get a good job, so you spent all your time working hard to be a good student, and then ended up in a soulless, dead-end job.

The guards are there to delude you. Look, who really gains from you being productive? The answer is the ruling class, the CEOs, the government, the bourgeoisie. It has always been that. All you get from working is a paycheck that lets you survive. They get a paycheck that lets them get rich. Just like Belos gets the magic and productivity of the specialized coven witches.

The guards are there to trick you. The truth is that nobody can join the Emperor’s Coven. It’s just there to make you think that hard work will make you successful. Then you spend your entire life working hard, trying to prove to the person in charge that you’re worthwhile. You give your whole life to the Coven, and they give you nothing.

Magic is supposed to be something you pursue for fun. Being skilled at things, being good at something beautiful...that’s supposed to be something you do because you want to. But they took that and made it into a source of productivity. It doesn’t matter if you make good content. All people fucking care about is if you upload the day of premiere, if you make a lot of content quickly, if you maintain a million different conversations with strangers who expect you to be the most interesting person in the room. They don’t care how it hurts you. They don’t care how you crack from the stress. How you cry when you think no one can see you, and then you check your phone and someone can see you, someone did see you, and you have to put on your face and be the charming, magnetic person they want you to be. (oh by the way that’s why I wasn’t online much last week)

And it ruins it. Suddenly you can’t watch The Owl House without being stressed. You can’t make any content. You can’t make spells as powerfully as you want to. Your passion is replaced by perfectionism and insecurity, a voice telling you to keep being the best at what you do, or else they’ll forget you and let you die.

There’s also the Titan.

So nobody has mentioned him before, because in addition to the Boiling Isles being a hellscape full of witchcraft and queerness, it’s also full of atheists.

But suddenly we have people saying all this shit about him? Shit like, he gave witches the gift of magic, and then they learned to use it in a civilized manner, since being uncivilized was disrespectful?

I mean, first off, that’s fucking wrong. The island gives people magic. The island, which just so happened to be shaped like a titan-sized human. But the island/titan gives everyone all types of magic. Hell, even Luz gets to use magic, and she’s human.

It sounds really fucking familiar. (tw for discussion of homophobia and colonialism and misogyny). It sounds like when the news is on and they show some Tr*mp supporter talking about how fetuses have more rights than people and it is their holy duty to take away a woman’s control over her body and force her through unbearable pain and into an 18-year commitment she didn’t want to make. It sounds like all the times people tried to say homosexuality should be illegal, citing a single line in a book written two thousand years ago and heavily edited by a European king. It sounds like all the times people said God wanted them to conquer, to own the entire earth, to force the other races into pain to support them.

This is that bullshit thing people do where they commit awful sins and justify it by citing the will of God.

Or, it’s the Coven using religion as an excuse for evil.

Look, the Emperor’s Coven is clearly colonizer-coded. Saying that people’s original form of magic was wild (and showing a picture with the same joyous, rowdy energy of an 18th or 19th -century Black or indigenous party), and that it was God’s will for them to be “civilized?” Sounds like that thing that powerful white people did where they went and murdered people and forced them into their twisted capitalist system. God, gold, and glory, is what they said, because history books just love to omit the gore.

Lilith is passing the abuse cycle along.

You know, like a good little colonizer. God I fucking hate her. She’s a MILF, in the sense that she’s a Mother I’d Like to Fling off a cliff.

Ah, enough screaming about how much I want to drown Lilith in a tub of Hooty’s mucus. Let’s go into why I want to do that, and how she took the evils of capitalism and just...adopted those.

So, Lilith is sick and twisted for what she did to her sister. But, uhh, that’s the point. You see, there are so many other people out there like Lilith who would do the exact same thing, if given the chance. These are the people who do mean things when the teacher isn’t looking, and then act nice and try to frame you. These are the people who will hate you if you’re better than them. These are people who would do anything to bring you down, if you dare outperform them.

It’s greed, my friends. The mental illness that capitalism blesses us all with.

Lilith herself said it: she dedicated her entire life to the Coven. What she wanted was to be the best. And she almost was...except for her own sister. Someone who lived with her, annoyed her at home, bested her at school. Someone she could never beat, no matter how hard she worked. And her sister was younger than her, too! How insulting was that? Lilith wanted to be the best, and someone in her exact situation did better than her.

Lilith was insecure. And it consumed her.

But why? Why does insecurity consume her? I mean, no one can be motivated by insecurity forever. Well, not unless someone conditions it into you.

The lovely thing about the capitalist system is the morals it teaches you. Things like: “You’re only useful if you’re the best.” “Being school smart makes you smart, while being social smart or sports smart or creative smart or fandom smart is worthless.” “Your worth can be quantified by numbers and is based off arbitrary measures like your income or your grades.” Things that can and will drive us crazy if we let ourselves believe them.

And it did drive Lilith crazy. She got so twisted by a society that said being good at magic is her only worth. Look, Lilith used to be good at things, probably. She was good at sports. At times, she slips up and does an okay job of being Eda’s sister. She has a powerful presence when she’s in a room. And she’s wicked good at manipulating people.

But that didn’t matter. Lilith bought into the lies. She let herself believe that magical skill was the only way to measure her worth. And since she needed to be the best, she hurt Eda for it.

The beautiful thing is, Eda didn’t buy that. "It’s my power, kid. And before you showed up, I spent my whole life wasting it.” Is what Eda said, as she used up the last of her power, the last of her life, to save Luz. In her final moments, she proved that she’s not like them. She’s stronger than them.

None of this matters. Not magical prowess. Not the hierarchy. Not the promise of joining the Coven and having more power than anyone else.

The only thing that matters to Eda is her family. Her real family. Her Luz, King, and Hooty. And by extension, Willow, Gus, and Amity. Those are Eda’s real reason for fighting, for dying: to protect them. Look, there’s no way she would’ve come out of that fight alive. She has a family, and her love for them is stronger than greed or jealousy or capitalism.

Lilith never understood that. She thought the water of the womb was thicker than the blood of the covenant. Or, that the water of the womb and the blood of the covenant are stronger than the bonds of found family. She thought it didn’t matter if Eda loved, her, only if the Emperor loved her. Fucking bitch.

And now, a little something to worry about, before we go. Amity Blight. The girl who wanted to join the Emperor’s Coven more than anything, who dedicated her whole life to doing well in school, to being the best, to being perfect.

And then she met Luz. She fell for Luz. Now she’s in a tricky place, where habit and conditioning want her to join the Emperor’s Coven, but her heart wants her to do the impossible and destroy capitalism.

She wasn’t in this episode. Funny that being injured and unable to work ended up saving her from watching her future mother-in-law die. So she bought some time.

But Luz’s true mom is dead. This is the second mom she has lost, and she’s only fourteen. As powerful as King and Hooty are, Luz needs Amity. Luz needs Amity to support her and help her get back her mom.

So Amity has to make a choice. Fear and insecurity, or love and a high chance of death?

She’ll probably choose death. Because that’s the message that this family-friendly show is giving us kids. Fuck capitalism. All you need in life is to do what makes you happy and be with the ones you love.

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ordinaryschmuck · 3 years

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What I Thought About "Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances" from The Owl House

Salutations, random people on the internet who most likely won’t read this! I am an Ordinary Schmuck. I write stories and reviews and draw comics and cartoons!

When Dana Terrace did her AMA on Reddit, a fan asked what we could expect for the new season. To which she replied by listing five things:

Parental conflict

A lot of emotions

Island exploration

New characters

...There's a fifth thing in there. You just got to look closely.

Now, when Dana mentioned parental conflict, dozens of fans assumed she was talking about Alador and Odalia, which, I mean...valid. They were the only two parental figures who presented any real conflict, and the idea of Camila being involved seemed implausible due to Luz being cut off from the human world. But no matter how you perceived that line, one thing’s for sure: No one expected Eda and Lilith's mother to be a source of conflict!

Yup. Today we met the woman who created two of the (former) greatest witches in all of the Isles. Was her introduction welcomed? Or did she give the Blights a run for their money for the "Worst Parent(s) of the Year" award? Only spoilers can answer those questions, so keep that in mind as we go in-depth with "Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances."

Let's review, shall we!

WHAT I LIKED

The Flashback: Already, this episode comes out swinging by giving us so much information! We get an explanation of what Eda goes through when cursed (which is horrifying), the reasoning behind her gem, the revelation that Eda ran away from home, and the reveal of how she got the portal door. The best part is, none of it feels rushed or forced. Eda's curse and the portal are integral threads to this story, both in this episode and in future ones. Tying them together sets up Gwendolyn's determination to cure her daughter while showing Eda's determination to escape her mother by skipping town into another dimension. There's also a sense of mystery in how and why the portal was in their backyard. And judging by how we got all of this incredible information in episode FOUR of the new season, something tells me we'll get answers to those questions sooner than we might think. This was such a strong opening to the episode. Despite giving so much information, it makes fans like me want even more. Which is an A+ in my book.

Gwendolyn: Yeah, might as well step out the gate in saying that I like Gwen...but I can already see how others won't. Immediately, she sets herself up as a mother who would do anything and everything to cure her daughter. That aspect of her character is perfect, and it quickly won points from me in terms of liking her. It's just that Gwendolyn's disregard of what Eda wants and the complete dismissal of Lilith are aspects of Gwen that are certainly going to rub some people the wrong way. Especially if those kids come from households where their parents are a lot like Gwendolyn. I was in the same boat of hating her too for a while, but thankfully, the last act saved her.

First, there's that scene where Gwendolyn threatened the lives of the demons for not only screwing her over but making things worse for Eda. It's one of those "Hell hath no fury like a mother scorned" moments that I always love to see.

Then there's the fact that Gwendolyn learns her lesson and, more importantly, apologizes. Not many actual abusive mothers would do that (Looking at you, Odalia), so it's nice to see that she makes an effort to make amends. Oh, and by the way, since I mentioned it, don't go around calling Gwendolyn abusive. She isn't. Or, at least, not to my eyes. If anything, she's a lot like Sara Fitzgerald from My Sister's Keeper (The book. Not the movie. The movie sucked).

In that story, Sara makes controversial choices that result in her youngest daughter Anna getting the short end of the stick due to putting all attention towards her eldest Kate. But here's the thing: KATE HAS CANCER! So while Sara's choices are beyond questionable, you can understand her point. And if you don't, well, I'd see how you would react when in her shoes. Trust me when I say that situations like this aren't always cut and dry. It's the same with Gwendolyn. She's far from "Mom of the year," but you understand where she's coming from. She wants to do what she can to help Eda, even if her methods could have been better. But that's just how I feel, and I can't speak for everyone who dealt with mothers far worse than her. If you refuse to forgive her, I'll understand. But to me, I consider Gwendolyn a worthy addition to the series.

(Plus, she just radiates Grandma energy when interacting with Luz. It's cute, and therefore I must love it!)

Luz: This season is on FIRE when presenting Luz!

I adore that the first thing we see her doing in this episode is sleeping after, most likely, another all-nighter to find a new portal. It proves that she has a determination made of iron and an intense dedication to getting back to Camila. In fact, it's that dedication that works as a perfect way to build a connection between Luz and Gwendolyn. They both want to reconnect with their families and are willing to do whatever it takes to do so.

Regardless, despite so desperately wanting to see Camila again, I'm glad that Luz still has common sense when it comes to helping Eda. She quickly sees that Gwen's cures are doing more harm than good, and it's great that Luz is the one to call malarky on the whole thing. No one had to spell things out for her because she's smart enough to notice that everything Professor Warlop is marketing feels a lot more like the fake medicine real people sell in the human world. It's a testament that despite having a big heart and the best intentions, Luz still has the intelligence to know when something is up and put a stop to it. And, again, let's hope that more people pick up on that.

Lilith: ...who would have expected Lilith of all characters to have most of the emotional moments in this episode?! I sure didn't!

But...Yeah. Lilith is the best thing in "Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances." On top of her seeking Gwendolyn's approval being relatable for some viewers, it's also really heartbreaking. I mean, listen to the shocked and hurt tone in her voice after finding out Gwen visited Eda regularly. That alone should give away how much Gwendolyn is important to Lilith and says so much about how strained their relationship became after the curse. Then there's that scene where she just breaks down, feeling both scared and torn apart by the fact that she experienced the curse in its full form and could do nothing to stop herself. It...stung. That's the best way to describe it. It stung seeing a character who is (mostly) cool and collective to become so vulnerable and broken. And, you know what? It's because of this that Lilith has won me over. I still don't think she should have been as forgiven as quickly as she was, but after learning what Lilith went through and what she's currently going through, I'm more than willing to be ok with her. And--I can't believe I'm saying this--I'm going to miss her being a part of the Owl House. She earned her place, in my opinion, creating entertaining dynamics with everyone. Sure, she'll make appearances every now and again, but I wouldn't mind a few more episodes with her being with the main group. But I'm positive the writers will have plans for her in the future and seeing how well she was written in this, I can't wait to see what they do next.

King Hoping to see his Dad Again: This was just a cute tidbit that ties nicely into last week's episode. Bonus points for that scene where King and Lilith get drunk off of Night Market ice cream. It got a good chuckle out of me, especially when Hooty was the one who ended up being the voice of reason.

Cursed Lilith: ...How does she look worse and more terrifying than Eda?

How Beast Keeping Magic Works: Not much I can say about this. It's neat to be given a visual explanation of how Beast Keeping magic works and how it's more than just controlling animals. Judging by the roof shingles, it can also be making objects more animal-like. It's pretty cool, and I hope to see more of how the rest of the magic from the prominent covens work.

Luz wasn’t the only human: To tell you the truth, this doesn't surprise me. Eda did say that every myth humans have is a bit of the Boiling Isles leaking into the human world, so why can't the opposite be true? However, the reveal of there being a famous human around many years ago presents many more questions, and possible theories, that deserve to be discussed in a future post. For now, I'll just say that it's awesome how this reveal perfectly transitions us to next week's episode, "Through the Looking Glass Ruins." We already know Luz is going to the library. But, seeing how Gus is going to be a prominent character in that episode as well, he probably wanted to tag along with Luz to study about the first human in the Boiling Isles. Only to then get sidetracked by some cool kids from Glandis. It's in the realm of possibility, thus proving how more serialized this season compared to Season One while still being somewhat episodic. Because even if "Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances" presents a lot for the overall story, it's still its own tale about family relationships and knowing how to truly be there for the people you love. Resulting in a necessary and cute episode that ends on a wholesome note without any major surprises like--

Creepy Clone Luz: ...

...Dana Terrace, you lying--YOU SAID CREEPY LUZ WAS A FARCE! IN THE SAME AMA, TOO! CURSE YOU! CURSE YOU AND YOUR SNAKE TONGUE, GOSH DANGIT!

...Alright, now that I got my overreaction out of the way, this was an amazingly well-written surprise!

Tricking fans into thinking that Camila is crying over the realization that Luz is gone, only to then reveal this...thing, is the best shock to the system that this series has done so far. Even better, it results in all the right questions:

Who is it?

What is it?

Where did it come from?

When did it get there?

How did it get there?

How does it know about Camila?

And why? Just, why?

To me, a series that presents all of these questions, and makes me excited for whatever answers are given, is a series that's doing something right. Because if I'm still reeling over something that lasts for a second, despite seeing the episode hours ago, that is a testament to how good a surprise really is.

WHAT I DISLIKED

Trust me, I want to give this episode the A+ just for that ending alone. But, there are some issues I have that are worth discussing.

Eda’s Outfit Change: I know. It's the nitpickiest of all nitpicks I could present. Particularly because Eda doesn't even look bad (although that's no surprise). The issue is that it feels weird that Eda's having this permanent outfit change in the fourth episode of Season Two. Or, to me it is, at least. Because I think that if you're going to give a small yet constant change to the look of a character, it should be done right away. Like, in the first episode of a new season. I highly doubt fans would question why Eda is wearing different clothes by then, so it wouldn't be too bad if the first time we see her, she’s sporting a new outfit. Again, this is just me, and I have no problems with the outfit itself. It just seems odd they would do this later rather than sooner.

Screwing with Eda: I...did not like this. At all. It was funny at first to see Luz and Gwendolyn lure Eda with Apple Blood like how Wile E. Coyote would bait the Road Runner with birdseed, but it quickly took a turn. Because I don't want to see Eda meet inconvenience after inconvenience from her mother and surrogate daughter. I like Eda, and seeing her happy makes me happy. If I wanted to laugh at a character's suffering, I would have picked Boscha, Mattholomule, Alador, and/or Odalia. This? This was just unnecessary cruelness to a character who doesn't deserve it. And it takes up a good chunk of this episode, making me question whether or not this would be the stinker I was fearing. Fortunately, the ending increased my enjoyment by several notches, but that doesn't change how this was the low point of "Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances."

IN CONCLUSION

Despite the road being rocky in the middle, I still consider "Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances" to be another solid A episode. The first and last few minutes have some quality writing that adds more to the characters, ongoing plot, and mystery that the series is building up. It's one of those important episodes you can't skip when watching a series, but given how it's keeping the new season's impeccable track record, I fail to see how that's a problem.

(Although, I am scared. We haven't gotten a stinker yet, and I really don't want it to be next week's episode. It's a Gus episode with sweet Lumity content on the side! That cannot fail!)

#the owl house #the owl house season 2 #the owl house spoilers #the owl house reviews #luz noceda #gwendolyn clawthorne #lilith clawthorne #eda clawthorne #what i thought about #creepy luz

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sepublic · 4 years

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King and Lilith's Similarities

Another thing I love about King is that, as a rather stark contrast to his cuddly appearance and demeanor… He’s arguably the member of the main trio who is the darkest, in terms of how far he’ll go to be selfish, to hold onto what he does have, or to get what he wants?

I think the thing about King is that his issues of dependency are the worst, not just because he’s the most insecure of the main trio… But I also think he’s the only one of them to have been alone alone, in a sense? Back home, Luz at least had her mother Camila, who while not always the best, was clearly loving and contributed a lot towards Luz being such the kind and open-hearted person she is today! Eda had her sister Lilith as well as that one friend from the Bard Track… And while she WAS alone for a while, she at least had Owlbert and Hooty as companionship!

But what did King have? We don’t know for sure what his life or backstory was like, but the implication seems to be that, at least for a while… He literally had nobody else prior to Eda! And it’d definitely tie into his issues of loneliness and attachment, and King’s concerns of being abandoned as seen in Really Small Problems… This would’ve likely contributed towards his Napoleon Complex and desire to be seen and heard, to make up for constantly being overlooked! And his desire to have control over others could be a means of keeping them close at all cost…

Because King is the one who’s gone the farthest to get what he wants. There’s leaving Luz behind to be a famous author, and then that whole mess in Really Small Problems! He IS trying his best, but amidst his more experienced nature with Luz… He really does sometimes come across as, like, a KID who was forced to grow up very quickly? The thing about King is that he’s the most prone of the trio –if not the only one- to be prone towards jealousy! He doesn’t have Eda’s self-confidence or Luz’s unconditional kindness. He’s probably been lonelier than either of them, and unlike the other two, King doesn’t really feel like he has any other talent or power that could help him get through in life…

…Which, as @fandomfan2000 brilliantly pointed out, is a LOT like Lilith! Both characters feel like they lack talent and skill to make up for their shortcomings. They’re both people who DO legitimately love and care for the people in their life… But they’ll sink to lower depths than anyone else to hold onto what they have, or even get a glimpse of that unattainable dream that they KNOW they’re not good enough to actually get on their own! Lilith and King are both people who will do terrible things, hesitantly or otherwise, under the impression that it won’t last as long, or everybody else has it so good, so why not let themselves have a turn at being happy and selfish for once?

King takes advantage of Eda’s half-cursed state to take over the Slayground. Lilith curses Eda for what she thinks is only a day (and will merely weaken her magic) to get into the Emperor’s Coven. King accidentally causes Willow and Gus to shrink, after holding onto the potion without necessarily intending to use it, but not getting rid of it either, and decides to briefly benefit from the situation. Lilith did… well, EVERYTHING she did in Agony of a Witch, and then there’s also disregarding Amity’s autonomy and integrity to plant that Power Glyph onto her neck without permission!

Both King and Lilith, if they feel their singular bond with another being threatened, if they think that other person is going off to leave them… They WILL react negatively to those other friends ‘stealing’ their companion of theirs! Hence Lilith’s dismissal of Luz and King, or King’s negativity towards Willow and Gus! They’ll do it to maintain their sole connection in life, because isn’t it already enough for that other person to be so confident and meaningful, to be able to make friends on their own? Aren’t THEY enough as a friend???

It’s an almost willful ignorance, a hesitant dismissal of the ones they know and love, because… Look at them, they’re so much more confident than me! They’re always happier, they can make it on their own and recover, with or without me…! I can’t say the same for myself, it’s not really MY fault I was born without the skills or talent they have… Surely it’s not so terrible for me to be selfish just this once? I’m always being left behind and suffering, I have no other CHOICE…!

…But in the end, King has to admit that he DID have another choice. That his own pain is not at all, even for the slightest bit, justification for prioritizing his own feelings over the others’ in such a blatantly-disregarding way. There’s prioritizing one’s happiness in life, and then there’s hurting the ones you love to get what you want! And while it takes a few decades, Lilith finally also turns around… Because by the end of the day, both characters are also marked by eventual regret that they try to hide, and/or don’t handle productively.

Perhaps not just by circumstance and process of elimination, King was the one to vouch for Lilith! He was there when she recounted HER side of the story, and a jealousy of Eda’s strength that he feels guilty over is something he can relate to! Obviously there’s also the fact that Lilith hurt him the least of the main trio, not to mention the necessity of having her as an ally and all, but….

…I think all of King’s prior moments of selfishness and arguable ‘backstabbing’ have led up to this moment. Led up to this moment where he understands Lilith, and thus KNOWS what she means, and can recognize that she’s genuine when she wants to make up for things… Because he’s been in the same place. Obviously he never went as far as Lilith ever did… But that’s also because he had such a loving and reliable support network of friends! Eda’s connection with the main cast is more of a support network than what she and Lilith had with one another as kids, admittedly.

And I think it’s funny. King is –probably- younger than Lilith, or at least has a more childlike mindset… But he manages to come across as more mature and experienced than her when it comes to these sorts of things! King is a character defined by contrast; He’s cute and fluffy and adorable, but wants to take over the world and open revels in bloodshed and violence! He comes across as sweet and loving but he can also be dark and selfish! At times King is childlike, but there’s also a tragic experience and maturity to him from an implied loneliness in the past…!

Like, I think I want to see King and Lilith get along more in Season 2, or at least… Sort of bond over the mutual feelings of inadequacy. Of justifying themselves of needing to do the ‘right thing’, but really it’s for their own sake? These two are selfish in a dark way, they’ll resort to terrible things and they have uncomfortable thoughts and feelings in their hearts that they don’t want to acknowledge, but aren’t predisposed towards handling either! I can really imagine King and Lilith seeing themselves in one another… Learning to be more mindful of their own actions after considering what the other does!

Maybe the two will even learn to open up to one another about their more uncomfortable feelings and the thoughts they aren’t so proud of! But at the same time, these two will make sure to hold one another accountable… Tying back to this idea of contrast, Lilith and King know each other least out of the trio-plus-Lilith, and yet they have the most in common! And in the way of antics, I can imagine King affording himself some smugness over being the one to teach the former Head of the Emperor’s Coven, and Lilith having reservations over listening to this plush toy of a person… But ultimately, there’s a certain bond and kindred connection there that they don’t quite have with the others! Just as each relationship one has with another person is unique and meaningful in its own way, and one wouldn’t necessarily judge or compare the others as being ‘more’ or ‘less’!

The thing about King and Lilith is… After doing a bad thing and hiding it, they’ll try to work to approach the issue in a way that absolves themselves of the blame without outright admitting to how they caused it; Again, see Really Small Problems, or Lilith cursing Eda! Both King and Lilith will let themselves feel smug and triumphant over what happened, even if they aren’t always proud of it… Because they see themselves as people who’ve had to work smarter than others to get where they were, and do the pragmatic, necessary thing because pride and integrity are a luxury of the powerful and talented! They see themselves as underdogs and define themselves the most by this ‘role’ in life…

Fitting, given all of the comparisons of King to a dog in the past! Not to mention Lilith and King are both, well, DUMB, dumber than the others in the cast at least! And some of that ‘dumbness’ comes from willful ignorance no less…! And they’ve both had experience enjoying the role of being a teacher and possibly abusing that authority… In particular, I think Lilith and King are the ones most fascinated with the concept of having power over others and using that power a bit irresponsibly, or turning a blind eye to any issues that come with their support of a cruel system! It’s like Lilith is a dark reflection of King… Both are characters who will flex a perceived superiority over the rest and mean it, given the chance! Both view the role of teacher as that of an authority figure.

They can also be, well, cowards- When King’s antics begin to backfire on him, he quickly runs back to his friends, and with Lilith… Well, there’s her using Luz as a Meat Shield, her relying on the curse and doing it against her vulnerable sister while she’s asleep… King and Lilith aren’t as confident as others and are more likely to buckle in to their own personal fear and anxiety, so it makes sense for them to buckle into fear in general; As seen with Lilith’s less-than-dignified scream when she’s suddenly ambushed by Eda in Sense and Insensitivity! And THAT was a King-centric episode, no less! It’s that common theme of King and Lilith seeing themselves as inherent screw-ups and doubting their own abilities as a result, which leads to them using the abilities of others, just as Lilith has to buy a curse made by someone else instead of casting her own!

It’s such a fascinating parallel that I’d really never considered, and again, I feel somewhat personally-beholden to @fandomfan2000 for this BRILLIANT comparison! I know I’ve compared Eda to Lilith in the past, and Lilith to Luz… But I think in the end, she might actually have the most in common with King, the more I think of it? Maybe I’m just caught in the high of this revelation, but it really makes me think about how the parallels between Luz, Eda, and King, with Amity, Lilith, and Kikimora/Belos… It’s not just a one-way parallel, that these connections can also cross overas well! Eda and Amity are talented, Lilith and Luz are more like ‘underdogs’… Belos and Luz could have parallels amist the ones they already have, and King and Kiki are both tiny little gremlins!

These parallels are arguably interchangeable, and it’s fascinating to me! These characters overlap in a lot of ways, it’s not that they’re connected to THIS one person… It really contributes to this idea of everyone being inter-connected, almost like a community or unusual family of sorts! And it makes room for a lot of fascinating, alternative pairings that one wouldn’t consider, as well as connections and possibly precedents in-universe to compare with others and speculate upon!

And, it makes me wonder if we’ve gotten the parallels wrong all this time… If it’s actually Lilith-King, Luz-Belos… And if so, how do Eda, Amity, Kikimora, and Hooty factor into all of this? Or if it’s not REALLY that simple as one person is connected to another, in the end, because these characters don’t fit into neat little roles, they’re still their own people irrespective of that and allowed to form other bonds and connections as well! King can’t keep Luz to himself, he has to acknowledge that she has her own friendships…

Just as Lilith must do the same with Eda! And by having these other relationships and shared connections with others instead of just THE one, it allows these characters to be truly fulfilled, because unless the one friend they have is a complete and total clone of them… There are others who will relate to them more on other facets of personality! And that ultimately ties back into the idea of people who are independent actually forming more meaningful bonds with others than those who are just dependent! That it allows people to form more of an identity, then just their single relationship with this particular individual!

#the owl house #owl house #the owl house king #the owl house lilith #lilith clawthorne #narrative parallels #character analysis

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mandareeboo · 4 years

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Unfinished Work #37: “Are You Afraid of the Dark?”

This was gonna be silly and fluffy! Mostly Lilith learning to live a more “relaxed” life in the Owl House, being roomies with Hooty, and fighting for a place to sleep. I was gonna have Lilith attempt to sneak into Eda’s nest one night, only for her to call Hooty and have them go off on a special adventure to make his Famous Chili, which was gonna end in a gag where Lilith stomped by a couple days later, covered in twigs, and said ‘I don’t care that it tasted good. You suck.’

Also wanted King to give a story about him and Eda having nothing and no one but the blanket Eda gives Lilith, and her being like “Alright I see your metaphor” only for him to squint at her and be like “Metaphor? It’s a blanket. Why do people always think things need to stand for other things? Sometimes, a blanket is just a blanket.”

———————————————————————————————————–

The faint glow of the hallway stretched its fingers across the room. It descended upon a sleeping bag, a sleeping human, and an awake demon. The demon cracked an eyelid, saw the figure in the hallway, and raised itself onto its meager height, snarling.

"Oops," muttered Lilith, immediately shutting the door. "Wrong room."

"Whatcha looking for?"

She turned to Eda, a bit sheepish. Lilith fully realized how bad this must've looked, but Eda hardly even seemed surprised, hands on her hips with that snaggle-toothed grin she'd adopted at some point. "Restroom?"

"One more down."

"So I've learned." Lilith paused, contemplating whether it was safe to ask. It was for the best, wasn't it? She wouldn't want to step on more toes tonight. "Where will I... be sleeping?"

Eda cocked her head to the side a little. "There's a perfectly good couch downstairs."

Lilith's jaw dropped. She hadn't expected luxury from this ratty old cabin, but a couch? Really? "You don't even have a spare room?"

"Gotta shed outside," she offered, shrugging a shoulder. "Only rooms I got are mine and Luz's, and I'm too old for couch-diving."

"You're younger than me," Lilith grit out. She could already tell that demanding anything that human had taken was a good way to get in trouble. Educated guess.

Eda snorted. "Tell that to my bad hip." But she waved a hand for her to follow anyway. Lilith watched with equal parts confusion and frustration as her sister lackadaisically combed through an old closet, just a-chattering away, like she hadn't very specifically made the fact that she needed to pee public moments ago. "Should be in here- aha! I'm a genius." Out came a fluffy brown blanket, which might've been welcome if it didn't reek of various rotten human foods and ripped from misplaced claws. "The official Bad Girl Coven Blanket!"

"Thanks," said Lilith, holding it out as far away from her as possible. "I hate it."

#Unfinished Work #The Owl House #Lilith Clawthorne #Eda Clawthorne #King Clawthorne #Luz Noceda #Writing

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vito-mendoza · 3 years

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Task: Character Playlist Deep Dive

Playlist: Vito Mendoza’s Character Playlist

Number of Songs: 15 (as of July 2021)

Length: 57:42 (as of July 2021)

Triggers: N/A

Track 1: When I Grow Up- The Pussycat Dolls

Even though the song isn’t an exact fit for his life, it sums up his childhood hopes and dreams of being a famous actor pretty well. He’s been dreaming big ever since he saw his fist trip to the movie theater to see Mission: Impossible. He’s had the drive to make it big for a long time, but the question of the hour is whether he has the skill.

Track 2: Miami- Will Smith

Despite the fact that he was born in the Philippines, Vito considers Miami to be his true hometown in many respects. It was the place where he spent most of his childhood, the place where he fostered his love of acting, and the place where he first started falling in love with life. Even though he hasn’t lived in Miami since he left for college in 2008, every time he returns to visit his family, he feels like he never left.

Track 3: Hello, Brooklyn- All Time Low

Vito moved to Brooklyn with one of his college roommates after graduating college in 2012. It was in Brooklyn that he really got into DJing and started to do it for money. Vito has always been the type to live life to the fullest, and this song is an expression of that sentiment. He made Brooklyn his second home and partied it up while he lived there.

Track 4: Beverly Hills- Weezer

Even though Vito has wanted to be an actor since he was 7 years old, he still has his insecurities about it. Specifically, he worries that he won’t fit in with actors who came from money. Vito wants to be amongst the elite, but comes from a completely different world, one without any glitz or glamor. This is part of the reason why it took him until 2020 to make his big move.

Track 5: Best Day Of My Life- American Authors

Vito considers the day he officially made his move out west to be one of the best days of his life. As much as he liked Brooklyn and the friends he made there, acting in student films and off-Broadway shows wasn’t where he wanted to be in life. He didn’t know anyone in California except his roommate, who he had only met in person once. Moving was his chance to start anew and fully realize his dreams.

Track 6: I Gotta Feeling- Black Eyed Peas

Once he decided to make the move out west, Vito fell in love with Santa Monica. The palm trees and beach reminded him of Miami, and it was close enough to L.A. that he could get to auditions with relative ease. From the first day, he had a feeling that he was going to like California. This song is meant to be an expression of Vito having a good time and making new memories.

Track 7: Go DJ- Lil Wayne

Vito has yet to land a full-time acting gig, so DJing has been his primary source of income. This is a song he’ll play to himself when he needs motivation. It’s a reminder to himself that if all else fails, people still think he’s good at DJing. After all, he wouldn’t be working at a club 4 nights per week if people didn’t like his mixes.

Track 8: Don’t Stop The Music- Rihanna

This song is one of Vito’s favorite songs to play in the club. It’s one of those songs that gets the crowd up and dancing; no one can resist a good Rihanna song. Acting is his first passion, but he relates to the message of this song: leaving the stress of life behind you and dancing to good music. It’s songs like this that remind him what got him into music in the first place.

Track 9: Club Can’t Handle Me- Flo Rida & David Guetta

This song is a combination of a pep-talk and a song to amp up the club. This is one of those songs that makes Vito feel like he’s on top of the world. Playing this song at Circle Bar makes him feel invincible. Even though he doesn’t live a lavish lifestyle like Flo Rida and David Guetta, Vito knows how to party and how to liven up a party through music.

Track 10: Sorry for Party Rocking- LMFAO

As a DJ, Vito goes hard and goes loud. His neighbors over the years, in both Brooklyn and Santa Monica, have had to put up with a lot of his musical antics. All he can ever really say form himself is “Sorry!” because he’s not going to stop anytime soon. Even though he doesn’t drink as excessively as LMFAO, nor does he hook up with women like they do, this song makes for another fun song to amp up the club.

Track 11: Sour Patch Kids- Bryce Vine

Being an adult is hard. Since moving to California, Vito has started to notice how much he struggles with money. Sometimes he needs to get money off his mind and just kick back and relax like he did when he was a kid. He feels very nostalgic for his childhood, especially the parts when he didn’t have any responsibilities or cares in the world.

Track 12: Crush- David Archuleta

Vito felt himself crushing on Verity shortly after their blind date. As time went on, these feelings only grew stronger. He spent the first two months of knowing her wondering if she shared his feelings or if this was all one-sided and hopeless. Despite these worries, his feelings didn’t wane. His crush wasn’t going away any time soon.

Track 13: What A Man Gotta Do- The Jonas Brothers

After a few months of hanging out and having little dates with Verity, Vito realized that he didn’t want to be just friends with her. Her kiss had him hooked, and he wanted more. He wanted to be with her, labels and all, and if she wanted him, he was all hers. Turns out all he had to do to make this a reality was ask.

Track 14: Only Wanna Be With You- Post Malone

This is another song that isn’t an exact fit but has an overall relatable message: wanting to be with one person and one person only. Even though he and Verity have led very different lives, they’re still able to get along and make their relationship work. He doesn’t care if he’s foolish for becoming this attached to her so soon into the relationship, because he’s happy and that’s all that matters to him. The reason this version is on the playlist rather than the original is because Vito is a bigger fan of Post Malone (he says “no disrespect to Hootie, though”).

Track 15: Let Me Love You (Until You Learn To Love Yourself)- Ne-Yo

Verity struggles with insecurity. She was in two relationships before she began dating Vito, and neither of them ended on a great note. Vito feels very strongly towards her, and not only does he want to show her that he loves and cares about her, but he also wants her to love herself. He wants her to see herself as the kind, caring, and beautiful woman he sees her as. He’ll gladly put his own insecurities aside if it means lifting her up.

#smrp:task

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primadonnalife-blog · 6 years

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Moving To Columbia South Carolina

Columbia, SC, is known for being "famously hot," with summer temperatures matching the enormous number of fun things to do in South Carolina's capital city. Whether you're headed to town on business or to drop off your college freshman at the University of South Carolina, here are 10 things to know about the new Southern hot spot so you'll fit right in. Columbia is the first city in the US named for Christopher Columbus. The name Columbia won over the other popular option, Washington.

The Soda City was founded in 1786, but you won’t see many 18th or early-19th century buildings there. That’s because two-thirds of Columbia burned to the ground during the Civil War when Gen. William T. Sherman entered the city in 1865.

Not only is Columbia the state capital, it is also South Carolina’s largest city. The 2012 census reports 131,686 residents within the city limits and 784,785 residents in the surrounding metro area. Columbia is located 13 miles away from the geographic center of South Carolina and situated on the fall line of the Congaree River. The city’s official nickname is “The Capital of Southern Hospitality.” According to areavibes.com, the cost of living in Columbia is 8.9% lower than the national average, which makes Columbia a very affordable city to live in.

Columbia is home to South Carolina’s largest university – the University of South Carolina. The school is a major player in the Southeastern Conference of NCAA sports with three conference titles. The university is also one of the city’s largest employers along with the South Carolina state government, Palmetto Health, and Blue Cross Blue Shield of SC. Major manufacturing facilities in the area include Michelin, Trane, and Bose Corporation. Columbia’s modern business landscape is quite different from the city’s early economic success and growth, which primarily came from the cotton industry.

Midlands Technical College - Midlands Tech is part of the South Carolina Technical College System It is a two-year, comprehensive, public, community college, offering a wide variety of programs in career education, four-year college-transfer options, and continuing education.

Public education in South Carolina has recently composed a state-wide goal known as the 2010 SC Performance Goal, in which all districts will strive to make South Carolina's students achievements rank in the top half of the US. Various programs like the District Open Enrollment, which affords parents the opportunity to enroll their child in any public school in a district, regardless of assigned attendance zone, the Virtual School Program, which allows more students the opportunity to take AP courses when they may not have otherwise been able to, and the Personal Pathway to Success, which allows and makes a student's education relevant to their aspirations and abilities, have been constructed in an effort to make a better economy and quality of life for everyone in South Carolina.

The Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center, which opened in September 2004 as South Carolina's only downtown convention center, 40 is a 142,500-square-foot (13,240 m2), modern, state-of-the-art facility designed to host a variety of meetings and conventions. The main exhibit hall contains almost 25,000 square feet (2,300 m2) of space; the Columbia Ballroom over 18,000 square feet (1,700 m2); and the five meeting rooms ranging in size from 1500 to 4,000 square feet (400 m2) add another 15,000 square feet (1,400 m2) of space.

Fort Sumter: The fort was annexed into the city in the fall of 1968, with approval from the Pentagon In the early 1940s, shortly after the attacks on Pearl Harbor which began America's involvement in World War II , Lt. Colonel Jimmy Doolittle and his group of now-famous pilots began training for the Doolittle Raid over Tokyo at what is now Columbia Metropolitan Airport 10 They trained in B-25 Mitchell bombers, the same model as the plane that now rests at Columbia's Owens Field in the Curtiss-Wright hangar.

Points of interest include Fort Sumter National Monument, Fort Moultrie, Fort Johnson, and aircraft carrier USS Yorktown in Charleston Harbor; the Middleton, Magnolia, and Cypress Gardens in Charleston; Cowpens National Battlefield; the Hilton Head resorts; and the Riverbanks Zoo and Botanical Garden in Columbia.

The historic Congaree Vista , a 1,200-acre (5 km2) district running from the central business district toward the Congaree River, features a number of historic buildings that have been rehabilitated since its revitalization begun in the late 1980s.

Not the kind of shagging that Austin Powers was talking about… The 'Carolina Shag' is a partner dance born in South Carolina This mixture of the jitterbug and swing dancing is a lot of fun and not too hard to learn—especially since South Carolinians practically learn it before they learn to walk.

Kiplinger Magazine recently named Columbia one of the “10 Great Cities to Live In.” Columbia has also been named a top mid-sized market in the nation for relocating families. You don’t have to go far to rub shoulders with celebrities, either. Columbia is home to a number of famous artists and athletes, as well as musicians including: Hootie and the Blowfish, Band of Horses, Samuel Beam (better known as Iron & Wine), and Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty.

As a result of its central location, comfortable lifestyle and temperate climate, Columbia enjoys a robust economy and was ranked 14th in BusinessWeek Magazine's list of "40 Strongest Metro Areas" in both 2009 and 2010. Columbia ranks in the top 25th percentile, nationwide, among the 366 metropolitan statistical areas (MSA) designated by the U.S. Census Bureau, and first in economic strength in South Carolina.

Columbia has a diversified economy that includes major employers such as Palmetto Health hospital system; Blue Cross Blue Shield of SC and its subsidiary, Palmetto GBA; the University of South Carolina; and the southeastern hub of United Parcel Service. There are 70 foreign affiliated companies in the region and fourteen Fortune 500 companies here including the corporate headquarters of SCANA.

The City of Columbia has also won an award from The International Downtown Association for its rehabilitation and adaptive reuse of historical buildings in the historic Congaree Vista, a 1,200-acre district running from the central business district toward the Congaree River. This area, until recently, was a visual blight to the entrance of downtown resulting from business closures or relocations to the suburbs. But, historic buildings now house art galleries, restaurants, unique shops, museums and professional office space while still retaining the historical perspective.

Columbia South Carolina has always had a lure about it and that lure as only grown in recent years. Its a great place to raise a family and has seen many family's relocating their. Make sure you look for good Long Distance Moving Companies to handle your relocation to Columbia South Carolina.

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oliveratlanta · 5 years

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101 things to love about Atlanta

A love letter to a city of many nicknames—just don’t call it Hotlanta

Unlike other American metropolises, it’s sometimes hard to determine exactly what Atlanta is, especially for outsiders or so many newcomers. Is it a business-friendly, big-hearted, mild-weather region that’s six times more populated than it was 50 years ago? Yes, Atlanta is that. A cradle for some of the most influential music—particularly hip-hop and rap—of the past three decades? Yep, that too. A burgeoning foodie wonderland? A southeastern mecca for the production of television and Hollywood blockbusters? A pastiche of gloriously unique, provincial villages masquerading as official neighborhoods? A cultural frontrunner and cautionary tale? Global magnet of opportunity? Still kind of a mess—but lovably so?

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, and that’s right, y’all.

So maybe that’s what’s special about Atlanta: It’s not yet finished, and never one-note. Rather, it’s a Brunswick stew of varying allures. It’s amorphous, restless, unwed to the past, intoxicated by its own prospects. Very little is sacred here but change, and instigators are more than welcome. Atlanta doesn’t know what it is yet, or exactly where it’s going, but it’s having a damn good time getting there. Let’s celebrate what’s great here, right now.

1. Inclusivity. The economic and cultural heart of the Deep South isn’t just accustomed to being diverse, it’s proud of it. See virtually any public gathering place intown for proof that humanity can peacefully coexist—and that Atlanta still has better things to do than hate.

2. Sky-high architecture. From the emerald towers of Sandy Springs’s King and Queen to the Georgia Pacific Tower’s illuminated stairsteps, the skyline is among America’s most underappreciated, especially at night. It’s not contiguous yet, with large gaps between poky clusters from most angles, but it’s distinctive and bold. And oh how it glows.

3. Easy-breezy climes. Sure, summer’s hotter’n’ Hades. But there’s Christmas shopping in flip-flops (sometimes), T-shirt weekends in January (occasionally), and bloomy early February (without fail).

4. After Hours at Waffle House: The 20-minute wait at 3:17 a.m. is plenty of time for random singing with other scatterbrained, post-bar strangers in line.

5. The prevalence of nature. Cicadas. And barn owls. Talking. At night. Among the giant urban oaks, in July.

6. Festival-a-palooza. Neighborhoods across the city have unbridled, borderline incomprehensible enthusiasm for getting together. Random gatherings invented on Facebook (looking at you, Lanta Gras) have ballooned into huge annual traditions with street closures and parades.

7. Bezos who? Amazon didn’t choose Atlanta, and Atlanta cared for five minutes.

8. It’s almost never hard to find a seat on public transit.

9. Kid-friendly. Little children growing up in Atlanta tend to think it’s amazing. That’s an impression bolstered by innumerable playgrounds and ubiquitous King of Pops, those delectable, homegrown frozen staples.

10. Random celebrity encounters. Like that time when André 3000 was shopping alone at the DeKalb Farmers Market, sans entourage, near the seafood section, all cool in his army jacket despite the July swelter and crush of onlookers, not too busy or highfalutin to shake everybody’s hand.

11. Yes, $100,000-something condos are prevalent—still—in desirable places across Atlanta. Many aren’t shoeboxes, either. And some count incredible views, particularly of central Midtown or downtown’s oldest streets.

12. Tech hub. Because Georgia Tech is a factory of coveted IT brainpower that’s more essential to the city’s business climate each year.

13. Westside escape. With its bridges, creekside vistas, and smooth, snaking pavement, the Proctor Creek Greenway trail is already otherworldly, in the best, most bucolic way. And it’s just a fraction of what it stands to be in coming years.

14. Long live the Clermont. A few years ago, neighbors were preparing to fight to save a local strip club from its new owners. It was a false alarm—the new owners view the Clermont as an asset. But that’s Atlanta.

15. Where it’s greater. With its transit connectivity, celebrated food scene, walkability, and perennial ranking as Georgia’s best place to live, Decatur gets it.

16. World’s busiest hub. With flights seemingly every minute from early morning until the wee night-time hours, the Atlanta airport is a stressful but handy launchpad of convenience, with a ridiculous wealth of nonstop flights to basically everywhere (hello, Dubai and Johannesburg). We’ll forgive a MARTA train derailment, that famous power outage, and perpetual TSA clogs.

17. Expats welcome. Because almost nobody on your street is actually from Atlanta, and that’s so normal it usually doesn’t even register. A common greeting for new neighbors: “So, where ya from?”

18. Can’t-miss Cascade. Especially in autumn, SW ATL’s Cascade Springs Nature Preserve offers ITP serenity to the fullest. Meander through 120 acres of trails, climb Civil War-era ruins, hop across a waterfall’s rocks. It’ll make even the most overstressed office dweller feel something akin to childhood awe.

19. Walkability. It’s getting vastly… better, in many places, from densifying EAV to the growing shopping avenues of central Buckhead. It’s happening, albeit slowly.

20. But... Atlanta’s still a major city where driving conveniences are largely possible, and lugging groceries on trains and such isn’t always an everyday hassle. Rush hours, however, are always plural, and Saturday traffic is, unfortunately, no joke anymore.

21. Trees of green. Friends flying in for the first time might say, “All I saw were trees—and then we landed.” A high compliment.

Curbed Atlanta

Atlanta’s canopy with the Buckhead business district at left, and Midtown/downtown at right.

22. Playspace. The restored, climbable treasure that is Noguchi Playscapes, the famed landscape architect’s work in Piedmont Park, was the only U.S. playground he completed in his lifetime.

23. Bungalows. The quintessential intown homes. Built to last, forever in vogue, and usually affixed with that most Atlanta of residential features: the generous porch.

24. Bearings Bike Shop. The community-focused nonprofit is teaching kids the value of hard work, the joy of exercise, and the viability of traversing a car-crazed city on two wheels.

25. Late-night stalwart. MJQ is a longstanding and culturally important club that welcomes anybody and everybody down into the rollicking, subterranean bowels of a former blues club. Chicago House in one room, a Whitney Houston singalong in the next.

26. Adios, Bravos. The pro baseball team left town for the monied ’burbs—and might very well have done Atlanta a favor (unless you operated front-yard parking lots). Nearby Georgia Avenue’s rebirth could show how large-scale adaptive reuse, married with new construction, can be a smartly executed replacement for storefront vacancies and so much stadium asphalt. Changes of this magnitude don’t come without gentrification fears, of course. But rows of beautiful, vacant old buildings—which could’ve doubled as a post-apocalyptic Main Street before, but are under renovation now—were doing Atlanta no favors.

27. The mother of all porch parties. Three cheers for the grassroots explosion of Oakhurst Porchfest. Founded in 2015, the autumn musical extravaganza counts 200-plus acts now, performing wherever volunteers offer their porches as stages. It’s community unification through music at its finest.

28. High Museum. The Southeast’s preeminent showcase for contemporary and classical art, housed in buildings designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Meier, is free for locals on the second Sunday of each month. How’s that for accessibility?

29. Viewrific, Part I. The approach from Douglasville on Interstate 20, over that hill, in fading evening light, the Land of Oz.

30. One of television’s best shows needed no other name than our city’s.

31. Georgia Aquarium’s bucket-list essential. For about the price of a car tire, you can swim with whale sharks downtown. And if you’re lucky, they’ll inadvertently bump you, with all the gentle power of a city bus in slow motion.

32. Curated graffiti. Running along the northern borders of Cabbagetown and Reynoldstown, Wylie Street is an ever-changing urban museum of eye-popping street murals, with a dash of biting social commentary.

33. Atlanta is where misfit street characters become local legends. Here’s looking at you, Baton Bob. And where art thou, Bicycle Shorts Man?

34. The Dungeon house in Lakewood Heights. Birthplace of OutKast, it was recently purchased by Big Boi. Hootie Hoo!

35. The Atlanta Beltline. Despite affordability challenges directly caused by the now-famous Beltline, the popular segments are socially magical, unifying things—Atlanta’s boardwalk, the Little Peachtree—and it’s barely reached adolescence at this point. Maybe one day, instead of sprawl and traffic, a mention of Atlanta anywhere in the world will conjure images of this mythical green loop. All dreamed up by a local college kid.

36. Sylvan Hills. The historic nabe between downtown and the airport is the prettiest neighborhood that half of Atlanta’s never heard of.

37. Scooter culture. Having spawned across the city in a year, the vehicles can be annoying, unsightly, and even dangerous for pedestrians and bicyclists. But the two-wheel zeitgeist beats all those lawbreaking riders driving alone in 4,000-pound street cloggers, right?

38. Raising the bar. Rooftop restaurants and bars have multiplied tenfold (roughly) in recent years, highlighted by Ponce City Market’s vintage amusement park in the sky and Hotel Clermont’s unpretentious new hang. About time.

39. Our iconic downtown library is by Marcel Breuer, someone cooler than Carnegie.

40. Path Force. The Beltline’s roving, specialized, applaudable police squad is consistently effective. Despite millions of visitors to the trails, the number of annual crime incidents can sometimes be counted on one hand.

41. John Portman. The late architect’s simple idea born in downtown Atlanta—the inner high-rise atrium, designed to cheaply cool low-income buildings—revolutionized hotel design around the world.

42. A growing legacy of rather badass sports statues. There’s Hank Aaron swinging through his record homer, shredded Evander Holyfield (currently MIA), sculptural Olympics remnants, Dominique Wilkins in mid-dunk, and that incredible Falcons sculpture.

43. Viewrific, Part II. The downtown skyline from that stoplight, facing west, where Freedom Parkway meets Boulevard. It’s the famed Jackson Street Bridge vantage point, immortalized in The Walking Dead Season 1 poster, panned out.

44. Park potential. Bellwood Quarry’s green space initiative could finally bring that side of town the Piedmont Park it deserves.

45. Commercial survivors. Poncey-Highland throwback DVD rental spot Videodrome and dive-bar stalwart Righteous Room are here to stay forever! Probably.

46. Road trips galore. From Atlanta, there’s a wealth of geographically and culturally diverse long-weekend options in all directions. Asheville, Savannah, the Gulf Coast, Charleston, Blue Ridge, Jekyll Island, Nashville, Charlotte, and the list goes on. Leave at lunch on Friday and reach them all by happy hour.

47. Church Bar on Edgewood. Before it was a tourist destination, the beloved Edgewood Avenue watering hole was just an unholy alliance of irreverent art, ping-pong, sangria, and a male former church deacon named Sister Louisa.

48. Atlanta United. In just its third year now, the club has scored a Major League Soccer championship and global headlines that declare this city, for once, an exemplar of fandom.

49. They don’t make ’em like Whittier Mill Village anymore. The semi-secret old cotton mill community includes 1800s homes, beautiful ruins, and Buckhead schools.

50. We took Snowpocalypse jokes—and are still taking them—in stride. Two inches of daytime snow paralyzed a major city, but hey, we made the front page of the New York Times! And inspired the creation of an SNL Weekend Update character called Buford Calloway, a “survivor.”

51. Lemony pepper wings. Order dry, with a little tub of hot sauce on the side. Graze the wing across blue cheese, and then dunk in the sauce. Bite big. And behold caloric Eden.

52. Bank of America Plaza. The world’s largest cigarette just happens to be the Southeast’s tallest building—and the ATL’s Eiffel Tower. (Sorry, Big Chicken.)

53. Purposeful art. With poignant murals, impressive permanent pieces, and a civil rights installation series where historical events actually happened, the Beltline’s Westside Trail artwork is stepping up the game. Ditto for the Eastside’s series, and William Massey’s awe-inspiring pieces made of garbage found on streets.

54. Viewrific, Part III. Sure, the ginormous chiseled Confederates are awkward at best, and embarrassing at worst. But evenings and sunrises atop Stone Mountain are religious experiences (literally, every Easter, with church services). Up there, find unparalleled vistas of so much rippling green, cast pink, with the glint of skyscrapers in the middle distance.

55. Adair Park. Blight and disinvestment didn’t diminish the beautiful old bones of this historic place.

56. The Atlanta Tech Village in Buckhead is the real deal. A tech hub that’s spawned big local companies—and a lot of cushy salaries.

57. Car-free lifestyles no longer seem crazy. Alternate transportation commuters are becoming more prevalent by the year—and proving that living without a car (gasp!) is possible in Atlanta. (See: the saddlebags and backpacks accessorizing business attire along the Freedom Park PATH Trail during weekday rush hours.)

58. No shortage of swingin’ highrise pools. It’s like a subculture unto itself, from late April to September.

59. We have the Southeast’s largest burial ground, and it’s beautiful. More than 100,000 people have been laid to eternal rest across Westview Cemetery’s 600 acres, which is centered around a gorgeously ornate mausoleum and chapel.

60. Lest we forget Oakland Cemetery. Atlanta’s oldest public green space is a historical, durable, accessible intown treasure that really knows how to party. For proof, see the long-running, multistage Tunes From the Tombs festival.

61. The National Center for Civil and Human Rights is > the NASCAR Museum that Atlanta “lost” to Charlotte.

62. Pittsburgh Yards. This southside Beltline redevelopment is centered on the creation of jobs in underserved places—instead of $3,000 apartments and $13.50 bespoke kale bowls—and it could be a game changer.

63. Buckhead’s tallest building, the Sovereign tower, still stands out, architecturally. And it could soon have a big blue modernist sibling.

64. Venturing OTP won’t actually kill you. Resurrected and richly historic downtowns are in abundance in the Atlanta suburbs. Like, everywhere. Find a half-dozen worthwhile day-trip destinations in Gwinnett alone.

65. The Atlanta splash pad, a social oasis and absolute godsend. And even better: More splash pads are in the works, from Vine City (definitely) to Chosewood Park (probably) and Kirkwood (maybe). About damn time, say toddlers across Atlanta.

66. Queer culture is thriving. That’s epitomized by Atlanta Pride, which is more massive than ever after almost 50 years (and now family-friendly, for better or worse).

67. English Avenue’s Mattie Freeland Park. Founded and controlled by neighbors, the tiny green space is a shining example of small but vital civic strides in historically troubled places.

68. The Chattahoochee River. A revived and unspoiled (if underused) resource for every season.

69. Insert here: A non-cheesy, non-obvious, pithy ode to the Varsity, that legendary fast-food drive-in—still the world’s largest after 90 years. Don’t mention “What’ll ya have?” Ah, never mind.

70. Music Midtown. For all its faults (overcrowding, lawn damage, neighbor inconvenience, lineups geared toward teens), the reborn multistage extravaganza is a dynamic and diverse musical showcase every September. Walk barefoot across lush Bermuda and dance like only 75,000 people are watching.

71. Ted Turner’s legacy. The media maverick and early Atlanta believer has been called an inspiration by people as disparate as Ted Koppel and Killer Mike.

72. The reinvigorated cyclorama. Once bedraggled, the restored cyclorama—one of America’s largest historical artifacts—is now in good hands, presented in a state-of-the-art showcase at the Atlanta History Center. That’s where it’ll be until infants of today are septuagenarians. At least.

73. Almost every Atlantan has some tale about the cast or production of The Hunger Games, The Walking Dead, Stranger Things, Baby Driver, etc. And hundreds of us have rented our homes for movie and TV shoots. Cha-ching.

74. Atlanta Streets Alive. The occasional street-closure sensation (with attendance routinely north of 120,000) illustrates a dream scenario, in terms of biking/pedestrian infrastructure and how cities of the future could yield to people over automobiles.

75. Inspiring architecture—seriously. In a few too-rare cases, large-scale design is getting quite interesting. Find several forthcoming examples on Howell Mill Road alone. And approach the Jenga-d facade of Midtown’s new lilli tower from any angle at twilight.

76. The Beltline’s Northside Trail. It’s a tucked-away, leafy, unsung jewel—with a rail bridge underpass that could stand as a top Beltline highlight forever.

77. Relaxed ganja laws in the City of Atlanta. Anyone caught with a bag of pot in the city can face—worst case—a $75 fine now. But even that’s left to the officer’s discretion. And judging by the pungent wafts from innumerable cars and so many porches, the memo on that was widely read among intowners.

78. The Goat Farm! Westside ruins turned artist hive. Now don’t let redevelopment gut its inimitable soul!

79. Where the expressions “Y’all!” and “Yo!” coexist harmoniously—and sometimes come from the same mouth.

80. Inman Park Festival. A late-April tradition for almost half a century, this fest is Atlanta’s greatest neighborhood showcase. It’s proof that even prestigious places need not take themselves too seriously.

81. These directions make sense in Atlanta-ese: “Head up the Connector, around the Grady Curve, beyond the Brookwood Split, past Spaghetti Junction, barely OTP, and then…”

82. Record shops keep it spinning. From the hippest gritty neighborhoods to the far-flung ’burbs, ATL vinyl is alive and well.

83. The original Lantern Parade. A luminous Atlanta Beltline tradition—now 70,000 strong—unlike any other.

84. Moonlight drives. The city’s nonsensical roadway design actually makes for more interesting (if impractical) drives, once you know where the hell you’re going. For a test run, take Ponce from the Majestic Diner to Decatur, late at night, windows down.

85. Because the Atlanta Hawks stayed put, right in the city’s heart. And now they’re trending like the team of the future.

86. Ansley Park. With its dizzying array of residential masterworks and unique country-club-under-skyscrapers vibe, this is aspirational living done right. Leafy and hilly at every turn, the neighborhood’s bounty of walkable green space options is almost unfair.

87. Those wondrous, weird accumulations of snow. About six times per decade, there’s a legit, if short-lived, snowfall. Added bonus: The city’s streets and parks are perfectly angled for sledding, for those rare Atlantans who actually own sleds or don’t mind embarrassing themselves on greased cookie sheets.

88. Midtown’s unyielding boom. Crane-watching (and counting) has become a pastime in Midtown. It’s the epicenter of intown’s metamorphosis, where soul-sucking surface parking lots go to die.

Curbed Atlanta

Midtown in summertime, as seen over Piedmont Park.

89. The “Atlanta’s Population Now” sign on Peachtree Road. Long a source of pride and bewilderment for this once modestly sized Southern town, the electronic metro population counter in front of the Darlington Apartments is climbing ever closer to 7 million. Fun fact: It was installed by a young billboard mogul named Ted Turner in the 1960s, when the metro’s population was about 1.1 million.

90. The potential of South Downtown. For far too long, Atlanta’s oldest, most captivatingly vintage streets have been forsaken by most investors, residents, visitors, and anyone else not headed to Magic City, a Falcons game, or the Gold Dome. Whether the trifecta of ambitious plans for the Gulch, Underground Atlanta, and Newport’s extensive portfolio can spring the district to greatness remains to be seen.

91. Castleberry Hill. Atlanta’s epicenter of authentic loft living and bohemian art galleries is also cool enough for a 2 Chainz restaurant.

92. The food. It ain’t all pulled pork, buttermilk chicken, and Frosty Oranges ’round here anymore. From Buford Highway’s international fare to Decatur’s award-winning menus and classic eateries like Busy Bee Cafe, you could live in Atlanta a decade and not sample all its eclectic deliciousness. “This year cemented the Capital City of the South’s status as a culinary force,” wrote Zagat in 2017, declaring the ATL the nation’s ninth “most exciting” food city.

93. Pre-dogwood hoopla. A sunny March weekend in Piedmont Park is like a city festival organized by the citizenry, with plenty of flying frisbees and open-container good vibes.

94. Palm trees. So what if they’re not native to Atlanta? Neither are you (probably). Some varieties really thrive here, punctuating front yards and restaurant landscapes in these subtropical climes.

95. The Fabulous Fox. It’s the site of Prince’s final concert and, when the wrecking ball loomed, legendary 1970s preservation efforts led by bands like Lynyrd Skynyrd. The glittering Fox Theatre is an Atlanta showplace like no other.

96. Viewrific, Finale. Southbound on Peachtree Road, just past Jesus Junction, that downhill vantage point captures something like a scene from the movie Metropolis, only framed by towering pines.

97. Pollen preparedness. A real downside of Atlanta’s otherwise glorious, floral springs are the swirling particles so thick they turn black cars yellow. Or streets into yellow-tinged rivers when it rains. Luckily, ATLiens aren’t fazed, popping non-drowsy Claritin, minding pollen counts on the news, or—in some cases—strapping on SARS-style masks.

98. Local beer. Suddenly, it’s everywhere! A hundred varieties not named SweetWater.

99. That being said… a frosty glass, a SweetWater 420 on draft, a Saturday afternoon in May, counting passersby from a lively patio bar, and somebody, somewhere, just started strumming an acoustic guitar.

100. We’re not “Marthasville,” thank God. (One of this settlement’s original names.)

101. Still welcoming after all these damn carpetbaggers.

source https://atlanta.curbed.com/2019/5/29/18629884/reasons-to-love-atlanta

#OliverAtlanta

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objectivesubjectivity · 7 years

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My Top 50 songs of 2016...may not be what you’d expect

Yesterday, a good friend asked me what my top 10 albums of 2016 were and I honestly couldn’t name 10 albums that came out last year. Embarking on my quest left me little time to spend with new music, so in lieu of a traditional “best of” list, here is a list of 50 songs that, this year, surprised me, captivated me, or reminded me why I liked them so much in the first place. Most of them are not from 2016. Many of them are not even from the 2000s. All of them can be found on one of the 450 albums I listened to since starting my project in July.

Songs are in chronological order based upon when I listened to the album.

Key Entity Extraction I: Domino the Destitute - Coheed and Cambria

Wall of Sound - American Hi-Fi

Return of the “G” - Outkast

Eddie Vedder - Local H

L$D - A$ap Rocky

Careful - Sebadoh

Jumbo - Underworld

Giant - Matthew Good Band

Misunderstood - Wilco

Video - Ben Folds Five

When Paula Sparks - Copeland

The First Hit - Kevin Devine

I’m Allowed - Buffalo Tom

On Your Own - Blur

Starlings of the Slipstream - Pavement

Fill in the Blank - Jimmie’s Chicken Shack

The Only Thing - Sufjan Stevens

Only if for a Night - Florence + The Machine

The Face of the Earth - The Dismemberment Plan

Always Be - Jimmy Eat World

Peggy Sue - Blink-182

Rosie - Tom Waits

Same Drugs - Chance the Rapper

Into Your Arms - The Lemonheads

Oxygen - New Found Glory

Invisible Drugs - The Comas

Magazine - Pedro the Lion

Every Stone - Manchester Orchestra

Time - Hootie and the Blowfish

Diggin’ On You - T.L.C.

Remix for P is Free - Boogie Down Productions

Bitties in the BK Lounge - De La Soul

Golden Age - TV on the Radio

Little Maggots - The Matches

Jaws Theme Swimming - Brand New

Howwhywuz, Howwhyam - The Mighty Mighty Bosstones

21 - The Starting Line

Drive on, Driver - The Magnetic Fields

Do You Want More?!!!??! - The Roots

Finest Worksong - R.E.M.

Pretty Noose - Soundgarden

Let it Roll - Train

I Miss the Girl - Soul Coughing

Iz They Widin Wit Us & Gettin Rowdy Wit Us? - Busta Rhymes feat. Mystikal

3 Speed - Eels

Geronimo - Unwritten Law

You Are Invited - The Dismemberment Plan

Can’t Finish What You Started - Motion City Soundtrack

Breakdown - Mae

Frowning of a Lifetime - Hey Mercedes

If you’re interesting in hearing any or all of these tracks (sans De La Soul’s “Bitties” which is not on Spotify), here’s the Spotify playlist.

What I listened to last week:

Top 100 Contenders in bold.

Blink-182 - Enema of the State (PPP #23)

Wu-Tang Clan - Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)

Eve’s Plum - Envy

Errortype:11 - Errortype:11

Son, Ambulance - Euphemystic

Eve 6 - Eve 6

Motion City Soundtrack - Even If It Kills Me

MxPx - The Ever Passing Moment (PPP #24)

Mae - The Everglow

Miracle of 86 - Every Famous Last Word

Start Trouble - Every Solution Has Its Problem

The Cranberries - Everybody Else is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?

Melee - Everyday Behavior

Hey Mercedes - Everynight Fire Works

Albums listened to in total: 450

#2016 #top 50 #top 50 list #top 50 songs #best of 2016 #lists #collections #coabba

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topbeautifulwomens · 5 years

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#Danny #Wood #Biography #Photos #Wallpapers #awesome #eyelashes #fashionkids #fun #hairsalon #magazine #makeupbyme #makeupforever #outfit #swag

“Look at me. Fact or fiction, what do you see?” – Danny Wood

Please put any prejudice aside before entering: Danny Wood is a Kid no longer.

For one thing, he’s matured; for another, his new solo album, Second Face, is a soulful mix of R&B, pop, and alternative-tinged tunes that any serious musician would be glad to claim as their own. But getting a proper hearing hasn’t been straightforward when your past pedigree includes having been part of that 80s phenomenon, New Kids On The Block; it’s been far more of a Stumbling Block.

Despite NKOTB’s achievements (listing-breaking live show attendance and sales; superstardom on a global scale), the ‘manufactured boy band’ image continues to linger around the former members, which is a source of frustration for the talented Wood. “I will never complain about the ride and what I learned from it, but musically it definitely wasn’t what I need to haveed to be doing,” he says of that time. “The backlash was unbelievable, because we were basically shoved down America’s throat. It truly is one thing when you cut a compromise, but it’s different when you’re forced to do things that you know are just not cool, and not what you really want to do.”

“There wasn’t any blueprint” for putting together super-groups like there is now, Wood adds. “We definitely opened doors. When we were coming up, you couldn’t find any white kids who could sing and dance like that; it was unheard of.” They came by that crossover flavor organically: “Me, Donny, Jordan and Jon all started school when busing began in Boston, and we were bused to all-black schools throughout high school. I was in the minority at school, and you had to be street, you had to be smart, get along with everyone and be likable, or you were going to be in a world of misery.”

And it also helps to think of being in NKOTB as the world’s highest-paid internship. “I learned all the basics for what I do now. I dove into learning the whole recording process – producing, writing, engineering – from day one. ‘What does this button do? What does that button do?’…It was the ultimate learning experience.”

Wood had more lessons in store before he could release this album, including the loss of his mother and an ultimately successful custody suit for his son. He began recording in 2000 with producer Pete Masitti (whose credits include the latest single by Hootie and the Blowfish and the new Julio Iglesias, Jr. album). Inspiration, songwriting and actually capturing the work all ran smoothly – but then Wood located his past blocking his future.

“I had been recording steadily since 2001,” he recalls, “but it was really hard to get someone to believe in it. Everyone loved the record; all along, I never got any negative feedback from major people in the business. But no one wanted to take that step and commit to me. Then Paul Klein (president and CEO of Empire Records) came along, in late September 2002. From note one of hearing the first bars of Home, he said, ‘I’ll put this out.'”

Another angel arrived in the form of Jimmy Ienner (Donnie’s brother and a legendary music figure in his own right, having worked with luminaries such as The Eagles and John Lennon). “We met several years ago, and he always remembered me,” Wood says. “I was nice to his kids. Once I started doing this record, we hooked up, and he started giving me really good criticism. He helped me make this record sound like it does. He told me, ‘I want to help you out, because you have the talent to make it; no other reason.’ He never asked for anything. He’s like my musical consigliere.”

“I don’t have to sell a million for this to be successful,” Wood sums up. “If I can make a living, then that’s all I care about.

“Any preconceived ideas, throw ’em out the window. Musically, my past doesn’t have anything to do with this record. Give it a chance. Listen to the first song, and if that doesn’t hit you, I don’t know what will.

“This record has never been about dollars; it’s about being heard, it’s about respect, and ultimately, it’s about showing people that there’s more to me than what they think.”

If you never give Danny Wood and Second Face that chance, you’ll never know what you’re missing. So what are you waiting for?

Here, track by track, is Wood’s own take on Second Face:

Home: “It’s the first song and a pretty emotional one; if this doesn’t affect you, then I don’t know what to say. When my mom passed away — losing someone is always difficult and everyone deals with it differently, but sometimes we wallow in the ‘what-if’ and we forget what was so amazing about that person. I went through a whole lot of that. This helps keep that memory strong, and helps keep her with me. I actually took a lot of positive things away from her passing.”

When The Lights Go Out: “It’s a song about interracial relationships. It hit me really close to home, because my son is racially mixed, and the whole thing I went through with the custody suit – it definitely pertained. This song was one hundred percent relevant.”

Suburbia: “This is a song about how the suburbs can seem so good but they tend to have the same problems there than in the city. You can’t judge a book by its cover! It’s a very powerful song.”

Broke Me Down: “It’s about bad relationships, and how a person can tear you down from the person you are and turn you into someone you’re not. Andâ€¦I’d rather not be with you, than let that happen.”

Losing Myself: “That’s one of the only kind-of love songs on the album; it’s my message to my significant other.”

What If: “This is thee story of two people living on the street, and what they go through on a day-to-day basis.”

Goodbye: “That’s just about a relationship that didn’t work out, and you wished it had.”

Fall: “I don’t want to talk about what that’s about. That should be left up to people to interpret their own way. It’s definitely means different things to different people.”

Let It Go: “We tend to get caught up in our lives and let everything stress us out, and this is about how if we let those things go, life would be a lot more enjoyable.”

Get Away: “I think everyone can relate to this song, which is about dealing with the stress of everyday life. It can be anything, from someone raising their kids to working in a corporation. It’s just expressing that desire to get away from it all.”

Perfect: “People, when they first meet, sometimes look at each other and see everything they want in the other person. But then after time, it doesn’t turn out that way, and we have to learn that we’re not all perfect. And it also pertains to friendships; you have to learn how to accept people with their faults if you’re ever going to have relationships, whether it be friends or intimacy.”

Molly: “This is about someone I actually knew growing up and she ended up a stripper/prostitute. She was a beautiful girl. It was tough seeing someone grow up and have to have that kind of life.”

Wannabeme?: “I was sitting down one day thinking about past relationships; before the group and then being in the group, and how a lot of times I was pressured into having serious relationships that I didn’t want. So I lumped all those scenarios together in that song, which is something I think most people can relate to – even females going to meet the boyfriend’s parents, and all that – always being judged.”

Second Face: “I wrote this before my mom passed away, and while I was going through the custody suit. It was the first song I wrote for this record. When I moved down to Florida, I found out who all my friends were. People, man – it’s such a clichĂ©, but when you’re on top, everyone loves you. And when you ain’t on TV no more, or doing favors for them, or living around the corner where they can come and ask for money, people forget about you in the snap of a finger. That’s what this song is all about. And it’s true.”

Where You Are: “Trying to find that middle ground, trying to come together and work out all the difficulties in a relationship.”

Now: “When a relationship is on the brink: do we walk away? Do we stay together? When things are either going to be over, or someone’s going to have to bend somewhere.”

My Way: “For me, kind of my message to whoever is going to hear this. A lot of this record also came out of the frustration of past groups I’d worked with, or companies I worked for, or situations I was in – always helping people out and doing favors, and never getting anything out of it. This kind of says, ‘I’m not going to do that any more.’ I was producing groups and they were getting deals off my demos and then cutting me out of the album itself. It was not pleasant.”

You’re Not Alone: “That’s to my kids, for when I’m away. I always tell them you can put that on and listen to it and I’ll be right there with them.”

Name Danny Wood Height 5' 8 Naionality USA Date of Birth 14 May 1969 Place of Birth Boston, Massachusetts, USA Famous for

The post Danny Wood Biography Photos Wallpapers appeared first on Beautiful Women.

source http://topbeautifulwomen.com/danny-wood-biography-photos-wallpapers/

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jeroldlockettus · 5 years

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Why Is This Man Running for President? (Ep. 362)

Andrew Yang supports a universal basic income (a “Freedom Dividend”), the use of “social credits,” and a White House psychologist. (Photo: Stephen McCarthy/Collision)

In the American Dream sweepstakes, Andrew Yang was a pretty big winner. But for every winner, he came to realize, there are thousands upon thousands of losers — a “war on normal people,” he calls it. Here’s what he plans to do about it.

Listen and subscribe to our podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or elsewhere. Below is a transcript of the episode, edited for readability. For more information on the people and ideas in the episode, see the links at the bottom of this post.

* * *

Hey there. Hope your new year is off to a good start. Hope you haven’t broken all your resolutions yet. A couple quick announcements. First: next week, we’ll be resuming our “Hidden Side of Sports” series with a look at the mental side of sports. But also: in a couple months, we’ll be participating in the famous M.I.T. Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, which means we’ll have access to some of the sharpest sports analysts, coaches and owners, and athletes in the world. So: we want your questions for them. Send us the sports questions you’ve always wanted answered, on any aspect of sport whatsoever — the weirder the question, the better. Our e-mail is [email protected]. Thanks.

* * *

Andrew Yang is not famous. Not yet, at least — maybe he will be someday. But let me tell you his story. He’s 44 years old; he was born in Schenectady, N.Y., a city long dominated by General Electric, the sort of company that had long dominated the American economy. But which, as you likely know, doesn’t anymore. Yang’s parents had both immigrated from Taiwan, and met in grad school. His mother became a systems administrator and his father did research at I.B.M.; he got his name on 69 patents. Their son Andrew studied economics and political science at Brown, got a law degree at Columbia, and ultimately became a successful entrepreneur, with a focus on widespread job creation. In the American Dream sweepstakes, Andrew Yang was a pretty big winner. But along the way, he came to see that for every winner, there were thousands upon thousands of losers.

The economist Joseph Schumpeter famously described capitalism as an act of “creative destruction” — with new ideas and technologies replacing the old, with nimble startup firms replacing outmoded legacy firms, all in service of a blanket rise in prosperity. The notion of creative destruction has for many decades been part of the economic orthodoxy. And it’s undeniable that global prosperity has risen, and not just a little bit. But Yang — like many others — has stopped believing in the economic orthodoxy of creative destruction. As he sees it, there’s just too much destruction; and the blanket rise in prosperity isn’t covering enough people. We’re living through what Yang calls “a war on normal people” — a war that Yang fears is getting uglier all the time. And that’s why he has taken to saying this:

Andrew YANG: I’m Andrew Yang, and I’m running for president as a Democrat in 2020.

Stephen DUBNER: I can think of a million things that you personally, Andrew Yang — with your resources and abilities and so on — could have done other than running for president of the United States. And yet that’s the one you’ve chosen. So why?

YANG: So imagine if you were the guy getting medals and awards for creating jobs around the country and realizing that the jobs are about to disappear in an historic way. And all of the solutions involve really a much more intelligent, activated government than you currently have. And I went around and talked to various people being like, “Hey guys, anyone going to solve the biggest problem in the history of the world?” And I could not identify anyone who was going to run and take it on.

DUBNER: So you put your hand up and said, “I guess I will?”

YANG: Yeah. I’m a parent like you are. I’ve got kids who are going to grow up in this country, and to me just believing that we’re going to leave them this shit-show that I think is coming and not doing something about it struck me as really pathetic.

* * *

The conversation you’re about to read is in many ways a continuation of conversations we’ve had in multiple episodes over the years. Episodes like “Is the American Dream Really Dead?” and “Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?” Episodes like “Yes, the American Economy Is in a Funk — But Not for the Reasons You Think” and “Did China Eat America’s Jobs?” You may want to give those episodes a listen for a deeper look at the economics involved. But first: who exactly is Andrew Yang? Years ago, he worked as:

YANG: A knife salesman.

DUBNER: A knife salesman?

YANG: Oh yeah, Cutco, I still know the sales patter.

DUBNER: Let’s hear it.

YANG: What’s really dangerous is not a sharp knife. It’s a dull knife, because then you start putting elbow grease into, and that’s when accidents happen.

DUBNER: So here’s how I would thumbnail your story: immigrant kid, smart, got a good education, tried a few things in the labor force, including high-end lawyer, then some entrepreneurship, got involved with a company that was sold. So you cashed out, then took the nonprofit route to try to inspire other people to become entrepreneurs in places where there wasn’t a lot of drive for that already. And then during that process you got exposed to the way the economy was failing in large parts of America. But then instead of just saying, “Wow, that’s tough. But I got mine and I’m going to go back to my coast and lead my comfortable life, and for the people who are not leading this life — I wish them well, but I’m out of here,” you disrupted your life in order to do something about it.

YANG: As an entrepreneur, I feel driven to try and solve problems, and this seems like the greatest problem that we face. And you think, “Hey, if I bust my ass for several years, I have a chance to potentially accelerate the eradication of poverty and helping my country manage through the most difficult transition in decades. And I think if I put my heart and soul into it, I have some chance of making that happen.” And then if you don’t do that, you must be an asshole.

When he was 24, Yang landed a job in New York at Davis Polk, one of the most prestigious law firms in the world.

YANG: I was making $125,000 plus a bonus of maybe another $25,000 or so. And I have Asian parents, so they were quite pleased with this state of affairs. And I thought, “Wow, this is really lousy job.” When I was growing up as a kid playing Dungeons and Dragons, I didn’t dream about being the scribe. I dreamt about going in the woods and killing something, which did not help my parents feel any better about my decision to quit the firm.

So yes, he quit what many people might see as a dream job. He got involved in an internet startup that combined celebrity and charity.

YANG: So we called it stargiving.com. And we got Hootie and the Blowfish and MTV and Magic Johnson to donate meet-and-greets with themselves to their nonprofits.

The launch of StarGiving coincided with the bursting of the dot-com bubble; the firm lasted just five months.

YANG: I mean, I was a very sad 26-year-old who still owed $100,000 in law school loans and had parents still telling people I was a lawyer even though I was not. And I joined another startup, and I was very worried that it was also going to go under. So I started throwing parties on the side as a side hustle. And then I also started teaching the GMAT on the side for a friend’s company. So I had three jobs during that time.

The job that stuck was the GMAT teaching — GMAT being the standardized test you take to get into business school. The company was called Manhattan Prep and Yang ended up becoming its C.E.O.

YANG: That’s right. So I personally taught the analyst classes at McKinsey, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley. And so imagine doing that for six, seven years and then seeing the country go to shit during the financial crisis. And then think, Well, I know why that is — because the smart kids have been becoming Wall Street bankers and management consultants while the rest of the country was getting hollowed out.

In 2009, Yang’s company was bought by the testing firm Kaplan, which was owned by the Washington Post Company.

YANG: We were acquired for low tens of millions. So I walked away with some number in the millions.

He soon left the Washington Post Company to start a non-profit called Venture for America, modeled on Teach for America.

YANG: Venture for America takes a recent college graduate, trains them with various business skills, and then sends them to work at a startup or an early-stage growth company in Detroit, New Orleans, Cleveland, Baltimore, a city that could use the talent. Then you work at that startup for two years, helping it grow. And at the end of two years if you want to start your own business, we have an accelerator and a seed fund to help you do so. It’s going to create 100,000 jobs around the country. We’ve helped create over 3,000 jobs to date, and dozens of our alums have started companies, some of which have now raised millions of dollars and generated millions in revenue.

DUBNER: So you said you hoped to create 100,000 jobs, and then you just said you’ve created 3,000 jobs, so that sounds like you’re a little short.

YANG: Well, create 100,000 by a certain date.

DUBNER: What’s the date?

YANG: So we had 2025 as our target date.

DUBNER: Okay.

YANG: So we would need algorithmic growth.

DUBNER: I gather what you learned about how the world worked outside of the coastal corridors and outside the Ivy League, and so on, was an awakening. Yes?

YANG: Yeah, it was for sure.

DUBNER: What was different in Detroit, in Pittsburgh, and elsewhere that you went, from what you imagined?

YANG: Well, so some of the structural force, and I’ll describe this — a company, it had a couple of very bright founders out of Brown University, and they got started in Providence. And the company starts to do well, hits its strides, doing a couple of million in revenue, and then an investor in Silicon Valley says, “Hey, you guys should come out here, and we’ll invest $10, $20 million in you. But you should really come here.” So then the guys say, “Well I guess we have to take that.” So that company goes from 100 employees in Providence, R.I., to zero employees.

DUBNER: And I can feel the mayor of Providence and the governor of Rhode Island thinking right now, “No, no, no, please don’t go.”

YANG: They were there. I mean the mayor — they were saying, “Please don’t go.” And the guys were like, “Well, you’ve got to do what’s right for your business.” And they went out to Silicon Valley and now the company has 100 employees in San Francisco. It becomes this really unfortunate dynamic that if you are an entrepreneur who’s succeeding in a place like Detroit or Providence or St. Louis, the goal is to get sucked up to the big leagues and wind up in San Francisco or Boston or New York.

DUBNER: But the other part is that what we used to think of as the backbone jobs of this country, the nature of that is changing really, really fast, due to technology and particularly automation. How much of that were you starting to see up close, and how surprising was that to you?

YANG: Yeah, so my thesis was that if you started a tech company in a place like Detroit that it would create additional jobs in that community that were not necessarily skilled jobs. But what I learned was that these companies, in order to be successful, did not need to hire huge numbers of people. That right now, the way businesses grow is that businesses grow lean and mean. They’re not going to hire the thousands of employees that industrial companies used to employ in a place like Detroit or Cleveland or St. Louis.

And it became clear to me that as much as I was excited about and proud of the work I was doing, it felt like I was pouring water into a bathtub that had a giant hole ripped in the bottom. Because we’re blasting away hundreds of thousands of retail jobs, call-center jobs, food-service jobs, eventually truck-driving jobs. And so my army of entrepreneurs, doing incredible work, starting companies that might employ 20, 30, 40 people, was not going to be a difference-maker in the context where that community was going to lose 20, 30, 40,000 retail jobs, call-center jobs, transportation jobs, etc. And I was horrified. I was flying back and forth being like, “What the hell are we doing? We are blasting communities to dust and then pretending like we’re not and pretending like it’s their fault, and pretending that somehow it’s unreasonable to be upset about your way of life getting destroyed.”

I had a wakeup call, a reckoning as you said. But then when Donald Trump became president in 2016 I was convinced that the reason why he won the presidency is that we automated away four million manufacturing jobs in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri. And we’re about to triple down on that by blasting away millions of retail jobs, call-center jobs, fast-food jobs, truck-driving jobs.

David AUTOR: I think if we had realized how traumatic the pace of change would have been, we would have at a minimum had much better policies in place to assist workers in communities that suffered these very severe and immediate consequences.

That’s the M.I.T. labor economist David Autor from our 2017 episode “Did China Eat America’s Jobs?”

AUTOR: And we might have tried to moderate the pace at which it occurred. And we also had a huge trade deficit and that meant we simply did a lot less manufacturing. So that meant that workers had to make a tougher transition out of manufacturing, into something altogether new. And I think that upped the challenge.

I think the other thing that we have to recognize, and that economists have tended not to emphasize, is that jobs aren’t purely income. They are part of identity. They structure people’s lives. They give them a purpose and a social community and a sense of relevance in the world. And I think that is a lot of the frustration that we see in manufacturing-intensive areas. And I think that that’s costly even beyond the direct financial costs.

It’s been tempting, especially from a political view, to blame all this job loss on global trade, immigrant labor, and offshoring. But Autor and most other economists agree that the much larger driver of job loss is technology and automation in particular.

YANG: So we automated away 4 million manufacturing jobs.

Back to Andrew Yang.

YANG: This is like the auto-manufacturing plants, a lot of the even consumer-goods, like furniture manufacturing in North Carolina, a lot of that stuff has gotten automated away. Now, I studied economics. And according to my economics textbook, those displaced workers would get retrained, re-skilled, move for new opportunities, find higher productivity work, the economy would grow. So everyone wins. The market, invisible hand has done its thing.

So then I said, “Okay, what actually happened to these four million manufacturing workers?” And it turns out that almost half of them left the workforce and never worked again. And then half of those that left the workforce then filed for disability, where there are now more Americans on disability than work in construction, over 20 percent of working-age adults in some parts of the country.

DUBNER: So the former manufacturing workers, a lot of them are on disability a lot of them are also especially if they’re younger men, they’re spending 25–40 hours a week playing video games.

YANG: Yeah so it did not say in my textbook, half of them will leave the workforce never to be heard from again. Half of them will file for disability and then another significant percentage will start drinking themselves to death, start committing suicide at record level, get addicted to opiates to a point where now eight Americans die of opiates every hour.

So when you say, “Am I for automation and artificial intelligence and all these fantastic things?” of course I am. I mean, we might be able to do things like cure cancer or help manage climate change more effectively. But we also have to be real that it is going to displace millions of Americans. People are not infinitely adaptable or resilient or eager to become software engineers, or whatever ridiculous solution is being proposed. And it’s already tearing our country apart by the numbers, where our life expectancy has declined for the last two years because of a surge in suicides and drug overdoses around the country.

None of this was in my textbook. But if you look at it, that’s exactly what’s happening. The fantasists — and they are so lazy and it makes me so angry, because people who are otherwise educated literally wave their hands and are like, “Industrial Revolution, 120 years ago. Been through it before,” and, man, if someone came into your office and pitched you an investment in a company based on a fact pattern from 120 years ago, you’d freakin’ throw them out of your office so fast.

The Industrial Revolution is a textbook example of creative destruction. Old technologies giving way to new; the rising tide lifting all boats. But history doesn’t actually happen that smoothly …

YANG: If you look at the Industrial Revolution, there was massive social change. Labor unions were originated in 1886 to start protesting for rights. There were massive riots that led to dozens of deaths and caused billions of dollars’ worth of damage that led to Labor Day becoming a holiday. Universal high school got implemented in 1911 in response to all of these changes. And it was a tumultuous time. I mean there was a whiff of revolution the whole time. And according to Bain, this labor-force displacement, this time, the fourth Industrial Revolution, is going to be three to four times faster and more vicious than that Industrial Revolution was.

So even for those lazy-ass people who are just like, “We’ve been through this before, Industrial Revolution,” be like, “Well, the Industrial Revolution was hellacious and it’s going to be three to four times worse according to Bain, who presumably you respect because they’re good at figuring this stuff out.” I mean if you look at government-funded retraining programs, the efficacy level, according to independent studies, is between 0 and 15 percent. And only 10 percent of workers would even qualify for these programs anyway. So we’re talking about a solution that will apply to between 1 and 2 percent of displaced workers. And that’s the kind of lazy crap that people are putting out there as a solution.

DUBNER: So if a revolution happens, how does it start, and what’s it look like?

YANG: So to me the rubber hits the road with the truck drivers. I mean there are 3.5 million truck drivers in this country, only 13 percent of them are unionized. The odds of there being a collective negotiation are very low. Eighty-seven percent of them are part of small firms of let’s call it 20 to 30 truckers, and 10 percent of them own their own trucks.

So think about that. If you borrow tens of thousands of dollars to be your own boss and be an entrepreneur and then your truck cannot compete against a robot truck that never stops — the odds then of these truckers showing up at a state capitol saying, “Fuck this, let’s get 30 guys together with our trucks and our guns” and show up and protest the automation of their jobs. So we’re disintegrating by the numbers. You can see it in our political and social dysfunction. Expecting that disintegration process to be gentle would be ignoring history.

DUBNER: Well even though revolutions do happen and armed violent revolutions obviously have happened, most bold predictions turn out to be wildly wrong. And usually there’s a lot less deviance from the past than predictors predict. So what makes you think you’re not wrong on this one?

YANG: I don’t know thousands of truck drivers, but I do know some. And they do not strike me as the sort who will just shrug and say, “Okay, I guess that was a good run. I’m going to go home now and figure out what job is there for someone who’s a 50-year-old former truck driver.”

But you also are going to see call-center workers, fast-food workers, retail workers — I mean there are 8.8 million people working in retail in this country. The average retail worker is a 39-year-old woman with a high-school degree who makes $11 to $12 an hour. When 30 percent of malls close in the next four years, what is their next opportunity going to be? So we have to start being honest about what’s happening where the market does not care about unemployed cashiers or truck drivers or fast-food workers.

And the biggest issue to me is that we’re measuring economic value in a very narrow, archaic way. We invented G.D.P. almost 100 years ago during the Great Depression. The government’s looking around saying, “Things are going really badly, we need a number for this.” And then Simon Kuznets comes up with G.D.P. and says a few things: He says we should not use this as a measurement for national well-being because it’s really bad for that. We should include parenthood and motherhood in the calculation because it adds so much value. And we should not include national defense spending in the calculation because—

DUBNER: If I remember my history, all three of those were ignored then, yes?

YANG: Yes, yes, yes. We’re like, “That’s great, Simon.” And now it’s our end-all, be-all. My wife is at home with our two boys right now, one of whom is on the autism spectrum. And what is her work valued at?

DUBNER: I’m guessing $0.

YANG: Yeah, about $0. And I know that she’s working harder than I am and the work she is doing is more important.

DUBNER: So your wife doesn’t really factor into G.D.P. In fact, she’s probably kind of a drain on it really, right? Because she could be out there where there’s opportunity cost of her not working.

YANG: She might be able to be a management consultant somewhere and that would be a much more valuable use of her—

DUBNER: So management consultants and the finance industry, financial services, banking, real estate. You argue that many of the most remunerative occupations in America are rent-seeking activities. Rent-seeking as economists use it to describe, basically, extracting value from transactions without really adding value. And you argue that many of the most beneficial-for-society jobs — teaching, nurturing, caring, creating, etc. — are the least remunerative jobs. How can you rail against that disparity while also wanting to bask in the benefits of the capitalism that set up those incentives?

YANG: Capitalism is a wonderful, magical, powerful thing. But it optimizes for capital efficiency and capital gains above all else, really. And that worked well for a long time, because in order for capital efficiency, workers needed to benefit, the consumer economy needed to benefit, the middle class needed to benefit. It’s like Henry Ford and his, “How can my workers buy my car?” But we’re now at a point where Ford does not need those humans to build that car and they can have markets all over the place and don’t really care what’s going on in their own backyard.

There are just these big changes afoot, and the question is how we’re going to manage them as a country. And that’s what I’m trying to answer. That’s why I’m running for president.

* * *

Until recently, Andrew Yang was running Venture for America, a non-profit that tries to persuade young, would-be Wall Streeters to launch startups in places like Cleveland, Baltimore, Detroit, and St. Louis. In 2014, he published a book about this effort; it was called Smart People Should Build Things. While the book pointed out the need for a dramatic overhaul of the American economy, it was for the most part an optimistic book. Last year, Yang published another book, called The War on Normal People, and it is not remotely optimistic. He argues that the American economy has failed most Americans, and that the American political class has failed them again by refusing to focus on the underlying fault lines in the economy.

This collapse in Andrew Yang’s optimism is what led him to run for President. He’s already been to Iowa and New Hampshire several times but, let’s be honest: he’s a very long shot in what’s expected to be a very crowded field. Let’s use Twitter followers as a proxy for the viability of some other possible Democratic candidates. Joe Biden has 3 million followers; Cory Booker, 4 million; Elizabeth Warren, 4.7 million; Bernie Sanders, 9 million. Mike Bloomberg has 2 million Twitter followers and over 40 billion dollars. Andrew Yang, meanwhile, has raised about $600,000, and has roughly 27,000 Twitter followers. But he also has ideas that he thinks will compensate. There’s one idea in particular that he’s banking on.

YANG: My first big policy is the freedom dividend, a policy where every American adult between the ages of 18 and 64 gets $1,000 a month, free and clear, no questions asked.

DUBNER: So the freedom dividend is your phrase for what most of us know as a universal basic income, yes?

YANG: It’s a rebrand of “universal basic income” because it tests much better with Americans with the word “freedom” in it.

DUBNER: Right, as nomenclature. The idea is the same.

YANG: So “universal basic income” tests great with about half the country. And then the other half of the country do not like it.

DUBNER: Because…

YANG: Because there’s—

DUBNER: It’s got welfare connotations?

YANG: Something along those lines. We tested a bunch of names and then when you had the word “freedom” in it, then all of a sudden testing shot up among self-identified conservatives. They hated “universal basic income,” hated “prosperity dividend,” all of a sudden “freedom dividend” is like “ding ding ding!”

DUBNER: What about progressives, liberals, Democrats?

YANG: Progressives, liberals, Democrats liked it no matter what the name was.

DUBNER: What were some of the other names that didn’t work?

YANG: “Citizens’ dividend,” “future dividend,” “prosperity dividend.” We had a lot of dividends.

DUBNER: I think of a dividend as a payout on an investment. What does it mean in this case?

YANG: Well, it’s a payout to ownership and we are the owners and shareholders of this, the most wealthy and advanced society in the history of the world. So this is a dividend for us. And there’s nothing stopping a majority of shareholders, a majority of citizens, from voting themselves a dividend. It’s been law in Alaska and it’s wildly popular in a deeply conservative state, where a Republican governor said, “Hey, who would you rather get the oil money: the government, who’s just going to screw it up, or you, the people of Alaska?” And the people of Alaska now love it, wildly popular, has created thousands of jobs, has improved children’s health and nutrition, has lowered income inequality, and it’s untouchable through many different regimes.

DUBNER: The Alaska dividend comes from oil revenues from the state, whereas the freedom dividend that would go to every person in the U.S. would be funded how?

YANG: So the headline cost of this is $2.4 trillion, which sounds like an awful lot. For reference, the economy is $19 trillion, up $4 trillion in the last 10 years. And the federal budget is $4 trillion. So $2.4 trillion seems like an awfully big slug of money. But if you break it down, the first big thing is to implement a value-added tax, which would harvest the gains from artificial intelligence and big data from the big tech companies that are going to benefit from it the most.

So we have to look at what’s happening big-picture, where who are going to be the winners from A.I. and big data and self-driving cars and trucks? It’s going to be the trillion-dollar tech companies. Amazon, Apple, Google. So the big trap we’re in right now is that as these technologies take off, the public will see very little in the way of new tax gains from it. Because if you look at these big tech companies — Amazon’s trick is to say, “Didn’t make any money this quarter, no taxes necessary.” Google’s trick is to say, “It all went through Ireland, nothing to see here.” Even as these companies and the new technologies soak up more and more value and more and more work, the public is going to go into increasing distress.

So what we need to do is we need to join every other industrialized country in the world and pass a value-added tax which would give the public a slice, a sliver of every Amazon transaction, every Google search. And because our economy is so vast now at $19 trillion, a value-added tax at even half the European level would generate about $800 billion in value.

Now, the second source of money is that right now we spend almost $800 billion on welfare programs. And many people are receiving more than $1,000 in current benefits. So, we’re going to leave all the programs alone. But if you think $1,000 cash would be better than what you’re currently receiving, then you can opt in and your current benefits disappear. So that reduces the cost of the freedom dividend by between $500 and $600 billion.

The great parts are the third and fourth part. So if you put $1,000 a month into the hands of American adults who — right now, 57 percent of Americans can’t pay an unexpected $500 bill — they’re going to spend that $1,000 in their community on car repairs, tutoring for their kids, the occasional night out. It’s going to go directly into the consumer economy. If you grow the consumer economy by 12 percent, we get $500 billion in new tax revenue.

And then the last $500 billion or so we get through a combination of cost savings on incarceration, homelessness services, health care. Because right now we’re spending about $1 trillion on people showing up in emergency rooms and hitting our institutions. So we have to do what good companies do, which is invest in our people.

DUBNER: So what persuades you that that number, $2.4 trillion, could even be close to justified through the menu of savings that you just described? I guess more broadly, why should someone believe that this Democratic-inspired version of higher taxes — or new taxes, with a V.A.T. — and more income redistribution, why should someone believe that any more than Democrats disbelieve the Republicans’ idea of lower taxes and trickle-down economics?

YANG: Oh man. I mean, if you put $1,000 into the hands of a struggling American, it’s going to make a much bigger difference not just to that person but it’s also going to go back into the economy. If you give a wealthy person $1,000 they wouldn’t even notice. You could just slap it into their account and it would be a non-event. Everyone knows that putting money into the hands of people that would actually use it is going to be much more effective at strengthening our economy and society.

DUBNER: One easy argument against a U.B.I. is that if you give everyone a dividend like you’re proposing, $1,000 a month per person, all that new money in the economy will cause the kind of inflation that will render that $1,000 much less powerful. What’s your argument against that?

YANG: Yeah, so I looked into the causes of inflation that are making Americans miserable right now, and they are not in consumer goods like media or clothing or electronics.

DUBNER: Those are all still getting much cheaper.

YANG: Yeah, and a lot of that is being made more efficient by technology and supply chains and everything else. The three things that are making Americans miserable in terms of inflation are housing, education, and health care. And each of those is being driven by something other than purchasing power.

Housing is being driven by the fact in some markets people feel like they need to live in let’s say New York or Seattle or San Francisco to be able to access certain opportunities and then there’s not much flexibility in terms of their ability to commute like a long distance. Education, it’s because college has very sadly gotten two-and-a-half times more expensive even though it has not gotten two-and-a-half times better. And then the third is health care, which is dysfunctional because of a broken set of incentives and the fact that individuals aren’t really paying in a marketplace.

So if you put $1,000 into the hands of Americans, it’s actually going to help them manage those expenses much better. But it’s not going to cause prices to skyrocket, because you can’t have every vendor colluding with every other vendor to raise prices. And there’s still going to be price sensitivity among every consumer and competition between firms.

AUTOR: I think people should have a guaranteed minimum income.

That, again, is the M.I.T. economist David Autor.

AUTOR: Essentially, our system of income distribution is primarily based on the scarcity of labor, right, the most valuable asset you own is your human capital. And if all of a sudden, there was a machine that could do exactly what you did it wouldn’t be clear what skills would you sell to the market.

The idea of a universal basic income has been around for a long time, and you might be surprised by the political diversity of its supporters. In the 18th century, founding father Thomas Paine argued for a universal payout, representing our collective share of America’s natural resources. In the 20th century, the economist Milton Friedman pushed for a different version, called a negative income tax. Then and now, there is a common objection:

Evelyn FORGET: If you give people money for nothing, why won’t they just quit their jobs?

The economist Evelyn Forget studied the effects of a small Canadian experiment that paid out a universal income. Her finding?

FORGET: The finding was that primary earners really don’t reduce the number of hours they work very much when you offer a guaranteed annual income.

YANG: A neuroscientist in Seattle said something to me that really stuck with me. He said, “The enemy of universal basic income is the human mind.” And what he meant by that is that people are programmed for resource scarcity. They think, “Hey, there is not enough to go around. If you get it, I don’t get it. And then if we all get it, it’s somehow going to harm us.” And that’s what we have to overcome. We have to overcome this knee-jerk sense of scarcity that is baked into, in many ways, the way we’re trained to perceive value in money.

So that’s big policy No. 1.

Alright, and what’s big policy No. 2 for would-be President Yang?

YANG: No. 2 is digital social credits.

Which are what?

YANG: Digital social credits are a new way to reward behaviors that we need more of in society. So right now, the monetary market does not recognize things that we know are crucial to humanity, like caregiving and raising children, volunteering in the community, arts and creativity, journalism, environmental sustainability. We’re getting less and less of those things because the market does not care about them. What I’m proposing is we create a new currency that then maps to various activities that we want to see more of.

DUBNER: Give me a for instance of how it would work. Let’s pretend that I am a 58-year-old laid-off carpenter. Maybe you, President Yang, are already giving me a freedom dividend, which I appreciate. So talk to me about what digital social credits would do for me and how it would actually work.

YANG: Right. So you get a message on your phone saying, “Hey, a neighbor has had a shelf break and they could use some help repairing it.” And then you click on your phone and say, “Yeah, I’ll do that.” Then you drive over, repair the shelf, and then the person thanks you, gives you a hug. Takes a picture of it. And then you then get this digital social credit. Let’s say call it 300 points. So you have these 300 points and you’re like, “Okay that’s good.”

And then you get another ping, it’s saying, “Hey, your neighbor needs a ride and they don’t have a vehicle,” and you do. So you give them a ride and then you get some more points and then at the end of the week you say, “You know what, if I go to Cabela’s, I can trade those points for hunting gear or camping gear. I could use it to go to the local ballgame.”

DUBNER: Okay. And then the vendors who are giving their goods or services to you for those social credits, what did they do with the social credits?

YANG: They can take the social credits and go to the government and then the government can exchange it for money.

DUBNER: And what’s funding the money for the social credits from the vendors?

YANG: So, the U.S. government would be backing it, or foundations or various companies, because if you are a company you respond to this. I mean you’d enjoy the heck out of it and it would drive business to your establishments. But the great thing about this is you could induce hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of social activity at a small fraction of the cost. Because right now if I have 100,000 American Express points, how much does that cost American Express?

DUBNER: A thousand dollars maybe?

YANG: Zero, because I haven’t done anything with it yet. Before I redeem it, it costs them nothing, but I love my points. I look at them. They seem to have value. I could trade them in whenever I want. What you’d see is you’d end up building up a parallel economy around people doing things for each other. This is based on a practice called time banking that’s in effect in hundreds of communities around the country.

DUBNER: Time banking is one of these ideas that’s been around for a while now, and it’s met with some success in some places, but it’s certainly never been scaled up the way that you’re talking about. What makes you think that it’s attractive enough for enough people to want to use it and that it is ultimately scalable?

YANG: Time banking holds that everyone’s time has intrinsic value and that if I do something for you for an hour, I then get a time credit that I can then give to someone else to do something for me for an hour. And everyone can do something — watch your kids or walk your dog or move some trash or whatever the task happens to be.

So the obstacle to more widespread adoption of time banking has been the administration, because you need a person in each community who is tabulating and keeping track of transactions. And now with technology—

DUBNER: This sounds like a job for the blockchain.

YANG: Yes, you could have a public ledger on the blockchain. You could make this happen much, much more easily, much more cost-effectively. And there are people I’m happy to say who were working on technical solutions for this.

People like this:

Anitha BEBERG: My name is Anitha Beberg and I am the C.E.O. of Seva Exchange Corporation, which is an A.I. and blockchain startup that’s reinventing volunteerism using time banking.

The chairman of Seva is Edgar Cahn, who helped launch the modern concept of time banking and wrote a book about it, called No More Throw-Away People.

BEBERG: He came up with this in 1980, when he was actually given a diagnosis after having a heart attack at 46. And he was only given two years to live and maybe two hours a day to do anything. So what he was thinking about was, Hmm, what can I do in this world to still be useful? So he came up with the idea of time banking, where you give an hour of your time within a community and you’ll receive a credit of that hour, redeemable for something you need. So it’s a give-and-take system rather than a one-way volunteering.

Edgar Cahn obviously lived on, and so has time banking. It exists in a few dozen countries, usually at quite small scale; one of the larger exchanges, similar to what Andrew Yang is proposing, is a British organization called Tempo. It found that nearly 60 percent of its participants had rarely or never volunteered before. Beberg’s time-banking group, meanwhile, Seva Exchange Corporation…

BEBERG: Seva actually means volunteer in Sanskrit or service, to serve.

The Seva app is a spinoff of Timebanks.org.

BEBERG: What we’re doing is trying to create the largest volunteer exchange network.

How would it work?

BEBERG: We offer powerful motivators to retain volunteers.

Motivators like gamification.

BEBERG: It’s a lot more exciting to run up a score and earn badges especially if you’re doing good.

Also: skills-matching.

BEBERG: Whatever you’re passionate about or you’re highly skilled at and willing to offer, you get matched to the critical needs of either an organization or a person.

And rewards, via the blockchain.

BEBERG: Our digital social credits is called Seva coins. And they will be redeemable for more time. Or you can donate them. We’re also working with colleges for loan forgiveness and micro-scholarships for students.

Beberg and Seva have gotten some pushback from religious institutions.

BEBERG: They’ve said, “Oh, we volunteer for the sake of volunteering.” And I said, “That’s wonderful. The more people like that, the better, because now they can just donate those to an institution in need or give it back to the church for hours.” So every hour you give, another hour can go to someone else in need.

Those are the micro components of how Seva’s digital social credits would work. But it’s the macro view that makes this idea particularly attractive to a would-be politician like Andrew Yang.

BEBERG: We’re redefining work. So there are some forms of work that money will not easily pay for building strong families, revitalizing neighborhoods, making democracy work, advancing social justice. Time credits were specifically designed to reward, recognize, and honor that work that most people never valued before or felt valued for.

Andrew Yang believes that injecting all that undervalued work into the “real economy,” would solve a couple problems at once: it would give people access to more of the goods and services they need and can’t afford; and it’d boost morale by revaluing skills that the market no longer values.

YANG: Yeah, that’s right.

DUBNER: I don’t mean to be a skeptic or a cynic, but what makes you think that the best overseer of a big scaled-up time banking or digital social currency is the government itself?

YANG: I don’t think so. I mean one thing I’ll say, to quote my friend Andy Stern: the government is terrible at most things but it is excellent at sending large numbers of checks to large numbers of people promptly and reliably. The government would not be administering this at all. The best the government would be doing would be allocating social credits to various communities, who could then have the credits flow through nonprofits and NGOs and organizations that are closer to the ground that could administer it more effectively.

DUBNER: But ultimately, when all those vendors want to take in their DSCs, their digital social currency coins, whatever, and cash them in for real cash, it’s the government they’re coming to, it’s the Treasury they’re coming to, yes?

YANG: Yeah, yeah. So there is a government budget allocation. But the government budget allocation would be essentially proportional to population and then each community would be doing different things with it. Because something that would be effective in Mississippi would not be necessary in Montana or Missouri.

So digital social credits and a universal basic income, these are Andrew Yang’s two most prominent proposals in his Presidential campaign. There are, of course, many others, most of which align with a standard Democratic platform. You can see them all at Yang2020.com. I’d asked him his most outlandish position.

YANG: We should have a psychologist in the White House that’s looking in on the mental health of the executive branch, because it doesn’t make any sense to me to have that much power and responsibility without some sort of mental-health professional monitoring.

DUBNER: Did you have this idea before the current presidency?

YANG: I always thought so. I mean, my brother’s a psychology professor. I think it would also help destigmatize mental-health issues and anxiety and depression around the country, and just say, “Look, we all have struggles.” That includes people at the top of the government.

Another thing I think is really important is that right now we expect people to be sort of martyrs if they enter into government service, and then they turn around and become lobbyists to make a lot of money. We need to take advantage of the fact that the government can pay much, much more, and then just require people to not go back to industry afterwards. Because if you’re a human being and your stint is going to end in two or three years, you don’t want to be too harsh on the companies that could end up paying you and giving you lots of money later.

DUBNER: So you’re arguing for a $4 million salary for the U.S. president.

YANG: Yeah, because it’s true for presidents too. I mean, if you’re going to get paid a quarter of a million by some company after you leave office just to show up and schmooze and give a speech, then human nature is like, “Maybe I shouldn’t be too harsh on this company.” And I’ll say, this raise can go into effect for the president after me. I do not give a shit how much I get paid. But the president after me should get paid enough so that we know that they’re just looking out for us and not going to just speech it up afterwards.

DUBNER: You happen to be the Democratic-entrepreneur-as-would-be-President who happens to be running after the successful campaign of a Republican-entrepreneur-as-President who a lot of people agree, his entrepreneurship and CEO-ship have not contributed to a stable presidency or to a business-like presidency, etc. Does that not strike you as potentially terrible timing?

YANG: Well, the reason why Donald Trump in my mind won — aside from the fact that we’ve blasted away all these manufacturing jobs — is that many Americans are desperate for some kind of change agent. And if you look at it, there has been a thirst for that not just with Donald Trump but with Bernie Sanders’s outsized success, even to some extent with Barack Obama winning in ‘08, where the citizens of the United States have been casting about for some kind of change because they know that our government is failing us.

Donald Trump is a terrible president because he’s a terrible president. He’s not necessarily a terrible president because he was not steeped in our government for decades. And genuine entrepreneurs like myself regard Donald Trump as a bullshit marketing charlatan. So he gives us all a bad name. And the goal is to show what real builders and entrepreneurs would do to solve some problems.

DUBNER: If you were a bookmaker, what are the odds that you’re laying off for Andrew Yang winning the presidency in 2020?

YANG: I think the latest odds I saw were like 200-to-1.

DUBNER: Let’s pretend for just a second that you don’t win the presidency. But that you do impress a lot of people with your energy and ideas and vision. And you are invited to run as V.P. on the Democratic ticket.

YANG: One of the fun things about running for president is you spend time with other candidates on the trail. I have some ideas, but my vision is that there is a set of patriots that are all heading to D.C. to try and save this country. I plan to be in that group. And if it’s as president, fantastic, if it’s as vice president, also fantastic.

I just want to solve problems, man. I don’t really care about the seating chart. And someone said to me, “Hey, what if Joe Biden takes all your ideas?” I would say that’s fan-freaking-tastic. I’m not some freaking crazy person who has been measuring the drapes since I was 16 or any of that jazz. I just want to keep this country together for your kids and mine.

* * *

Freakonomics Radio is produced by Stitcher and Dubner Productions. This episode was produced by Harry Huggins. Our staff also includes Alison Craiglow, Greg Rippin, Alvin Melathe, and Zack Lapinski. Our theme song is “Mr. Fortune,” by the Hitchhikers; all the other music was composed by Luis Guerra. You can subscribe to Freakonomics Radio on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here’s where you can learn more about the people and ideas in this episode:

SOURCES

Anitha Beberg, c.e.o. of Seva Exchange.

Evelyn Forget, economist at the University of Manitoba.

Andrew Yang, entrepreneur and Democratic candidate for president.

RESOURCES

“Labor 2030: The Collision of Demographics, Automation and Inequality,” Karen Harris, Austin Kimson and Andrew Schwedel, Bain & Company (February 2018).

No More Throw-Away People by Edgar Cahn (Essential Books 2004).

Smart People Should Build Things by Andrew Yang (HarperBusiness 2014).

The War on Normal People by Andrew Yang (Hachette Books 2018).

The post Why Is This Man Running for President? (Ep. 362) appeared first on Freakonomics.

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