#i mean post malone was here last weekend that still happened

[missbaphomet]

Fortnight

Artist: Taylor Swift feat. Post Malone

Album: The Tortured Poets Department

Track Number: 1

Year: 2024

Resources: The official music video, Genuis (for lyrics and misc. supporting details), addictioncenter.com, my friend with a music degree

This is my personal interpretation! I do not claim to be objective or that this is the only interpretation! This is simply one possible interpretation and what I am getting from this song!

[Verse 1: Taylor]

I was supposed to be sent away But they forgot to come and get me

I was a functioning alcoholic ’Til nobody noticed my new aesthetic

But you’re the reason

And no one here’s to blame But what about your quiet treason?

The album opens with an allusion to mental health facilities, and closes with a song titled after a woman who was institutionalized for a period, so I'm sure we can expect to see more of this going forward in the thematic elements of this album. This verse, to me, is establishing the emotional turmoil felt by the singer in another failed relationship. She appears to be suffering a depressive episode bad enough that she feels she was supposed to be taken in for her health, but they forgot.

A 'functioning alcoholic', per the addiction center, makes up about 19.5% of alcoholic and are defined by the ability to maintain jobs and relationships. These types of alcoholics tend to have depression, but are less likely to suffer from other co-occuring issues. I feel this line is meant to express that she developed a dependence on alcohol, but was able to maintain some front of normalcy which prevented others in her life from noticing, pushing her deeper into her alcoholism until she lost the 'functioning' part.

She blames this on her unnamed former partner. With the addition of the last couplet, she seems to imply that from an outside perspective their falling out had no guilty party, but she then revealed some perceived sleight from her partner, or 'quiet treason' that destroyed their relationship.

[Chorus: Taylor]

And for a fortnight there, we were forever

Run into you sometimes, ask about the weather Now you’re in my backyard, turned into good neighbors

Your wife waters flowers, I wanna kill her

This failed relationship seems to have been a flash-in-the-pan, intense but short-lived type of affair, with a fortnight being two weeks long. The pair still seem to live in the same general area, and in fact are neighbors. They don't speak about their dead flame, but also never get past small talk and pleasantries.

I believe in this instance, 'your wife waters flowers' is an alternate form of the phrase 'to water your own grass', derived from 'the grass is greener where you water it', meaning to nurture what you have instead of searching for something better. I believe the substitution of flowers here is meant to emphasize the status quo, picket fence appearance of the ex's relationship. The ex appears happy and put together with a dutiful wife, which illicits rage from the singer who directs her jealousy towards her.

[Verse 2: Taylor & Post Malone]

All my mornings are Mondays stuck in an endless February

I took the miracle move-on drug, the effects were temporary

And I love you, it’s ruining my life I love you, it’s ruining my life

I touched you for only a fortnight I touched you, but I touched you

Mondays are widely regarded as the worst day of the week. They are the start of the typical work week, and have a negative connotation of either being slow or being the day when all the problems that happened over the weekend show up, making them seem to have more issues than other days. February is the shortest calendar month, so having an 'endless February' emphasizes the feeling of time dragging on further, leading to the feeling that even the shortest time frame seems infinite. As a side note, February also has Valentines Day, a holiday for lovers, on the 14th, falling at the end of a fortnight.

There is no 'miracle move-on drug' or equivalent, so I interpret this as the mentioned drug merely being the realization that it's over, which would be a 'hard pill to swallow' or a 'bitter pill'. However, this didn't seem to stay long, as the effects of this realization were not long-lasting.

The singer is obsessive over this relationship, to the degree she is losing her ability to function, as referenced by a 'change in aesthetic' in verse 1. She is literally ruining her life. As short as the relationship was, it did happen, and she finds some amount of solace in the fact that she 'touched' the Ex.

[Chorus: Taylor & Post Malone]

And for a fortnight there, we were forever

Run into you sometimes, ask about the weather Now you’re in my backyard, turned into good neighbors

Your wife waters flowers, I wanna kill her

And for a fortnight there, we were together

Run into you sometimes, comment on my sweater Now you’re at the mailbox, turned into good neighbors

My husband is cheating, I wanna kill him

Over time, the pair seem to be growing closer again, moving from surface level pleasantries to more personal conversations and even visiting each other.

As for the line about wanting to kill her husband, that seems to be a recurring theme in several songs such as Florida!!! from the same album and no body, no crime from evermore. This could be indicative of the singer moving on slowly, turning her anger from the the wife to her own husband.

[Bridge: Taylor & Post Malone]

I love you, it’s ruining my life I love you, it’s ruining my life

I touched you for only a fortnight I touched you, I touched you

I love you, it’s ruining my life I love you, it’s ruining my life

I touched you for only a fortnight I touched you, I touched you

The effect of this song being sung in canon seems to imply mutual feelings between the Ex and the singer. It almost seems that in getting closer once more, this is a moment where they admit their mutual regret at how the relationship ended, but both have come so far now that they can't change the past.

[Outro: Taylor & Post Malone]

Thought of callin' ya, but you won't pick up 'Nother fortnight lost in America Move to Florida, buy the car you want But it won't start up 'til you touch, touch, touch me Thought of calling ya, but you won't pick up 'Nother fortnight lost in America Move to Florida, buy the car you want But it won't start up 'til I touch, touch, touch you

Again sung in canon, the singers grieve the lost opportunity, acknowledging the fragile position they stand in: they ignore each other's calls, but if they allow themselves to stray, they could have the future they want. Neither is willing to take the first step, so both remain in the same situation.

In this instance, I believe the music video is intended to be more artistic than adding additional context to the song, but there are some very distinct choices that are interesting.

Taylor reveals facial tattoos when wiping her face, implying the impact he had on her behind the facade of normalcy

Taylor wears what appears to be victorian style mourning garb before she and Post show connection

Post appears in several scenes without his tattoos. I'm not entirely sure the significance of this, but it is worth noting. Someone theorized in the comments of the music video it's to show Taylor sees the real him, but thematically that doesn't really track for me.

Asylum imagery, including physical restraints and a nurse administering medication

The music video is shot in black and white with the exception of some colored shapes between Taylor and Post during one segment.

[princesscas]

So no hugging, props or touching in general with the cast at the next Creation SPN con. And now a panel with J2M at the Texas con SXSW is cancelled. 

This is getting concerning :/ 

[feckin-zicons]

Squids, Dancing, and Dirty thoughts... Not necessarily in that order or all at once.

Apparently people like this? I am more confused than Liam is in this chapter. Which you know, makes sense bc this character only exists in my head, but also doesn’t at all bc I have no idea what goes on in there most of the time. Anyway this is for Zayn, Oxford commas, @stanmedusa who pointed out Zayn was also an Oxford comma stan, @redyellowberry, and their anon to started this mess. Also please imagine Zayn with his current blue hair, but also with his long Aladdin hair bc that’s what I’ve been doing and oh holy gods do I need that to happen. Please. Hair gods make it happen I’m begging

Same warnings as ever its 4AM, this is much longer than planned, and I have no interest in editing, making it sound coherent, or good. No, I don’t know about the squids either.

Parts 1&2 here

Liam would like to point out while he's not a stranger to feeling confused, he's still having trouble pinpointing how exactly he got to be Dance Mistress Irina Alinova's personal bitch. 

Ever since he accidentally interrupted one of the dance practises while looking for a missing prop for Director Corden, more and more of them started disappearing only to show up in the basement. No one else was interested in facing the Dance Mistresses' wrath, but Liam didn't mind the yelling. As long as Mistress Alinova didn't start throwing things, he figured he was safe enough. After all, it gave him the chance to see the blue haired ballerino again.  

Zayn Malik, the god in mortal form, the prima ballerino, the prettiest man Liam had ever seen, who had no idea who Liam even was. 

Liam had it bad. 

Liam had it so bad.

Liam had it so bad he tripped over thin air, spilled hot coffee over himself, and walked into a door when he thought he saw him at a Costas with Louis. The man he saw wasn't Zayn, thank fuck, but the entire sequence of events did give Louis more ammunition to tease him with. Stupid pretty boys with long blue hair and piercings sent from hell just to ruin Liam's life. Yeah, he was a goner. 

Louis dragged out the whole sorry story after Liam texted him about spiking his lunch and laughed himself sick knowing just how much of a mess Liam became around people he was interested in. They still didn't talk about Danielle. Which was a good thing considering the end of that relationship had Liam pretty much swearing off women for the rest of his life. No pussy was worth that mess. Dick though? Liam was willing to take that chance on Zayn, even if asking Harry didn't give him much information. 

According to Harry, Zayn had been around for a few years but mostly kept to himself or the other dancers. There was something about him throwing a fit a few weeks before Liam showed up. Upset about being forced to learn the choreography for Winston's show when it was just going to fail on opening night like it always did. 

Liam thought he had a point, considering. He didn't know what bananas, ballet, and really bad rapping had to do with King James VI but didn't want to voice that in front of the man playing the gay king. No one dared fire Zayn, considering he kept the whole theatre afloat, but it also didn't make many actors happy with him. Especially not Mizz Wendy Williams, who played Marie Antoinette in the play. Again, Liam had a lot of questions he didn't dare ask out loud. It's not like he was ever good at history, so it was entirely possible the two lived in the same time period. Or it was some sort of allegory that went over his head like the aristocrats wearing banana suits did. 

Louis always found his stories about his placement hilarious, but even that one had him wondering if there wasn't some sort of gas leak in their apartment. It wouldn't have been the first time, or the second. Most likely, it was the theatre that was growing some sort of mold that caused insanity if breathed in. Some of the things Liam had been forced to clean in the past few weeks were unspeakable. 

But even that probably couldn't explain Zayn Malik. Nothing could explain that sort of beauty and talent. Or those hands... and thighs... and fingers. Ung. Liam would love to get up close and personal with all of him.  

Either way, Liam had just been cleaning the mirrors in the practice room, humming along to Brandy and Monica on the radio, wondering if Niall was actually going to come down and help him instead of hiding away like a coward. Again. By the second verse, he'd given up trying not to sing along, not expecting anyone to come by. It was late, the dancer's practise long over, and Winston left screaming over an hour ago. Liam would have done a recce and skipped out on the last half hour if one of the managers wasn't sticking around still. Piers Morgan, an absolute cunt who treated the lads on probation like hardened criminals, and he was the prison warden. Despite, you know, most of the lads on summary probation, and Liam’s arson charge being the most serious crime out of all of them. 

Anyway, the last thing he's expecting is for anyone to come in while he's singing about the boy being his, rolling his body to the beat. Which is probably how he ends up tripping over himself when he notices Zayn leaning up against the open door, watching him. Watching him, in bright, tight, teal dance tights (were dance tights usually blue? They should be) that looked nice with his hair and complimented the gold tones of his skin. The skin he could see a lot of. Because he was shirtless. Because he was shirtless and had a lot more tattoos than Liam realized. Tattoos Liam wanted to bite. Not hard enough to make a mark or anything, that would be sacrilegious, but enough to make him make a sound. God, Liam hoped he was a moaner. Not that he thought he had a chance with Zayn or anything, but it would be a shame if Zayn was the type that stayed quiet during sex. 

Except he wasn't being quiet now, he was talking. And Liam was staring at him, like an idiot, not paying attention. Because he was an idiot. 

Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, why did this always happen to him? 

"Er, what?" Liam asked, desperately hoping he didn't sound as stupid as he felt right then, which was pretty fucking stupid. He probably looked even stupider than he felt and ruined his chances at ever-

"I asked if you were almost done? Was planning on practising more tonight," Zayn answered him. 

Zayn, Zayn Fucking Malik, answered him, and he was still staring at him like an idiot. Shit Liam say something.

"Pretty" 

Not that you idiot.

"What?" Zayn asked, looking confused and adorable.

Oh god, he was precious. Was that a smile? Was he smiling at him? Liam? Oh no.

"Pretty much, I meant. Pretty much done," Liam replied, wishing the ground would swallow him whole. "Just one more mirror, and I'll be out of your way."

There, those were words, sentences even. Now all he had to do was act normal and finish cleaning. Easy. 

"So, Brandy and Monica, right? You like R'n'B then?" Zayn asked him, walking into the room with a heavy dance bag, setting it off to the side.

Liam felt himself flushing as he turned back around to finish cleaning the mirror so Zayn wouldn't see.  "Yeah," he answered, trying not to peek at Zayn bending over as he rifled through his belongings. 

Those legs, Fuck. Liam wondered what it'd feel like to have them around his- 

"I didn't expect that," Zayn said, drawing Liam out of his filthy thoughts, and making him turn back around.

"What?"

"No, I- I didn't mean it in a bad way or anything. I guess I just expected you to listen to more rock?" 

Liam was pretty sure he missed half of the conversation somewhere. Was Zayn blushing? He was so pretty. Wow. 

"No, I like everything," he replied dumbly. They were still talking about music, right? That would make sense. Why was Zayn talking to him again? God, Liam couldn't handle this. "Do you like it? The music, I mean."

"Yeah, grew up listening to ‘em. My older sister was obsessed with Monica. So... Who's your favourite artist?" 

"Artist? Oh uh, I've been listening to a lot of Post Malone? How about you? What do you- who do you listen to?" 

"Post Malone's sick, mate. I like most music I guess, but I've been listening to a lot of The Weekend."

"Have you heard his new album?"

"Yeah, it's sick! Do you-" Zayn was cut off by Niall running in out of breath. The bright orange tee that labelled him as one of the community service workers was wet and stained black. Actually.. all of him was soaked and stained black. Was that ink?

"Hey, Payno, are you done yet because we have a situation upstairs," Niall gasped out, hands on his knees, looking like he'd just seen his life flash before his eyes. 

"What the hell happened to you?" 

"There's a squid stick in the toilet." 

"There's a what?"

"A Squid! A giant fucking squid in the toilet!" 

Liam blinked in confusion, trying to wrap his head around why there would be a squid anywhere near the theatre let alone one of the toilets. Did Corden want live animals in his show now? Or Winston. It could be either of them. 

"Why do you need me?" he asked. "I don't know anything about squids."

Niall sounded like he was at the end of his rope when he replied, "You know something about plumbing at least!" 

"Not a lot! Enough to keep the water on at home, but I'm not a plumber." 

"Doesn't matter, we need your help, Ashtons gone to find some butter," Niall said, stomping back around, leaving behind a trail of watery black ink. "We'll meet you upstairs when you're done."

"Wait, what do you need butter for?!" Liam called after him but didn't get a reply. Butter? How was butter going to help?

A muffled giggle distracted Liam from his thoughts, and he was abruptly reminded Zayn was still in the room. Zayn, might as well be a god, was in the room, and Liam was just talking about squids in toilets.

Why him?

"I guess I should go see what they need help with?" Liam tried to say without sounding... Well, he wasn't sure what the proper response was in this situation or how to react to it. 

Zayn smiled at him, and oh. How was it possible he looked even more attractive now? 

Liam thinks Zayn said something about the other lads needing him and it sounding urgent, but really, Liam was in a daze until he also got a face full of ink... From another squid in an entirely different toilet. 

What the fuck.

Louis was never going to let him live this down. 

Really? Squids???

[lost-n-stereo]

A/N: For anon who prompted me “Hallie+Sunshine”. Have a little 4th of July summer fic :)

and the sparks start flying (like the fourth of july)

She gets invited on a camping trip the first week of June, and when she says an invite she means that she quite literally received an e-vite from Helena through Facebook. There’s a group page and everything, with people RSVP’ing and talking about what alcohol they are going to bring and which campsites around the state are the best.

It’s not surprising to see the usual suspects on the list of people going. If Helena is setting it up that means that Luke is definitely going, since they are engaged and it’s just sort of a given. If Luke’s going then Clark and Jason will tag along with their girlfriends, and if the girls go then all of their friends will too. It’s a bit of a surprise to Allie though when she sees Harry RSVP and she kind of wants to comment on his post about how boat shoes aren’t generally camping attire but it feels shitty and she doesn’t want to be a dick for no reason.

The trip is planned for Fourth of July weekend, which is a little cliché but she doesn’t mind all that much. She orders a new tent off Amazon and an expensive pair of hiking boots because she’s not sure where exactly they are going yet but she feels like she should be prepared for anything. Becca calls her and asks if they should do some bathing suit shopping before the trip and they spend the day trying on different suits and drinking their daily calories in the form of food court smoothies.

It’s one of those rare times that the fourth falls on a weekend, so she takes the Friday before and the Monday after off from work and thanks the gods above that she works with a majority of older people that don’t care about the holiday weekend. They decided on a state park that has campgrounds that will fit all of them, she thinks it’s nearing twenty plus people going at last count, and a giant lake with tons of water sports and activities to do. She heard a rumor that someone rented out the entire stretch of sites on one side of the lake so they wouldn’t be bothered. No one said it was Harry but she can make an educated guess that was his doing.

There’s an honest to god party bus taking a large group of people to the lake but she decides to hitch a ride with Elle instead. The girl has a kick ass Jeep with no doors and it feels good flying down the highway with their camping gear piled high in the back and old school hip hop blaring out of the radio. Elle takes a sharp turn into the campground’s parking lot and Allie laughs as her body jerks out of the open door and her hair flies into her face as they jerk to a stop.

“You’re an absolute maniac,” Allie says on a laugh as they unbuckle their seat belts. “I fucking love it.”

Elle just flashes a grin and gets to work on unloading her tent from the back of the Jeep.

“Need some help?”

Allie rolls her eyes at the sound of Harry’s voice behind her and he’s grinning and eating an apple with a pocket knife when she turns around.

“I think we got it, thanks.”

He just shrugs, throws her a wink before heading over to where a group of people are unloading cases of beer out of the back of someone’s pickup. The parking lot is a madhouse. People are everywhere and Allie wonders in amusement if Helena is currently freaking out because there definitely were not this many RSVP’s in her Facebook group.

As if she conjured up the woman herself, Helena rushes up to Allie with a panicked look on her face. There are people Allie’s never seen falling out of backseats in fits of giggles, girls running around in barely there bikinis and dude-bros in board shorts lining up shots on the tailgate of a truck. It’s like a very cliché music video set to the sound of Post Malone pumping from someone’s car speakers.

“Are you seeing this shit?”

Allie laughs and reaches behind the seat for her backpack. “Yeah, it’s nuts. Who even are all these people?”

“Friends of friends,” Helena says, rolling her eyes as she takes a headcount. “There has to be over fifty people here already. It’s a good thing Harry rented so many campsites otherwise we’d be totally fucked.”

It’s the first confirmation she’s heard of Harry being the party benefactor but it doesn’t surprise her at all. He was always the one throwing giant parties in high school. His parents even rented an entire hotel for their senior prom, not just a banquet hall but the entire fucking thing.

“Let’s just be thankful no families with children will have to be in a tent next to that.” Allie points with her chin to where Lexie is currently pushed up against the side of a Suburban with a guy kissing down the column of her throat. “So much for a low key camping trip, ‘Lena.”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Harry says, coming up to them with a Stella bottle hanging between his fingers. She wonders why he’s just randomly popping up when she knows his friends are here somewhere. Allie notices for the first time that he’s wearing flip flops, briefly stunned by the sight of his sort of bare feet. She’s not sure if she’s ever seen this man’s toes in the entire time they’ve known each other. The four years since high school have been good to him but that’s not a surprise. He has unimaginable wealth and a great job on top of that so she’s not shocked that he’s doing so well for himself so soon after graduating.

She went to school for accounting, ended up at a decent firm after graduating where the median age is mid forties, but she’s living in Brooklyn now which she loves and that’s what counts. Last she heard Harry was living in Manhattan but she doesn’t go that way often and someone like him probably wouldn’t be caught dead in her neighborhood.

Not that she cares or anything because what Harry Bingham does with his time has nothing to do with her.

“Better hope you get your deposit back,” Allie quips as she grabs a bottle of water out of her pack. Harry holds up his beer and asks if she wants one of her own. “No, Harry. It’s like nine-thirty in the morning. And don’t even say it’s five o’clock somewhere.”

Harry chuckles and takes a deep pull from the bottle. She shouldn’t think it’s sexy how he licks his lips after but well, it is. He smirks a little like he knows what she’s thinking and she rolls her eyes.

“I wasn’t going to,” he tells her. “I was just going to remind you that it’s Friday, you’re not at work at that stuffy job you go to every day, and it’s a fucking holiday. Enjoy yourself for once, Pressman.”

There’s not an ounce of heat in his words but it still cuts a little because she has fun, thank you very much. She might spend a lot of time in her studio apartment and she may only have a small group of good friends but she’s happy and that’s what matters. Helena just looks between them with her eyebrows raised, as if she’s waiting for world war three to start right there in the parking lot but Allie just shrugs, grabs the beer from his hand and chugs the rest of it before using her thumb to wipe foam from the side of her lip. Her heart pounds a little as Harry tracks the movement with laser focus and then she’s the one smirking, pushing the empty bottle into his chest.

“Looks like you need a refill.”

The absolute shock on his face makes her feel better than it probably should and Helena’s jaw is practically on the floor.

“Well played, Pressman.” Harry tilts his bottle towards her in what may be a show of respect and leaves again without a word.

“What the hell was that?” Helena presses when he’s out of earshot. Allie just shrugs, asks Helena if she’d mind helping her grab her tent out of the back of the Jeep so she can set up camp somewhere.

***

It’s dark when the real crazy stuff starts to happen.

There’s a group of people running around naked because someone thought it would be a good idea to go skinny dipping in a national park. Allie is pretty sure there are supposed to be park rangers patrolling but she supposes it wouldn’t be hard for a certain someone to grease a few palms to keep them away for the night.

Speak of the devil…

“You look like you could use a drink.”

An ice cold White Claw drops into her lap and she gasps, her thighs bare since she’s just in a bikini top and denim cutoffs.

“What in the fuck, Harry!”

He just laughs, drops down beside her in a pair of bright orange board shorts and nothing else. “Just paying you back for that little stunt with my beer this morning.”

Allie rolls her eyes, pops the cap of the cocktail and drinks half of it in one go. “You deserved that. You’re always antagonizing me. Been that way since we were kids.”

“Bullshit,” he says but when she looks at him out of the corner of her eye he’s grinning a little, fingers playing with the string of his shorts. It’s fucking distracting. “Maybe I was flirting.”

Her cheeks heat a little but she knows Harry, has known him practically all her life. Maybe sometimes things he’s done could be considered flirting but that’s only because he flirts with everyone.

“I’m sure,” she says, finishing off the drink and tossing the can into a bin nearby designated for recycling. “Shouldn’t you be over there with your friends?”

“They aren’t as fun to fuck with as you are.” 

Allie points at him. “Ah! So you admit you like fucking with me!” 

There’s no denying his eyes go a little dark and then she’s wishing that she could take that back because now it just sounds dirty. She’s expecting a dirty comment in return but that’s not at all what she gets.

“Maybe I just like talking to you. Maybe…”

She tilts her head a little when he doesn’t continue. “Maybe what, Harry?”

His teeth scrape across his bottom lip a little as he thinks but then he shakes his head like he’s literally trying to erase a thought from his mind. He stands up abruptly, brushes a little dirt and sand off his board shorts and throws her a casual wink.

“It’s nothing. Have a good night, Al.”

***

She wakes up with the hangover from hell and finds herself cuddled in between Sam and Grizz.

“What the shit?”

Grizz mumbles a little, presses his nose into the back of her neck and she giggles. “Shhh, you’re so comfortable and my brain is heavy.”

It makes no sense at all but she also completely gets it because her brain feels heavy too. It’s hot as fuck in this tent, which she realizes now is not her own. She tries to piece together what happened after Harry left her the night before. Not that she got blackout drunk or anything but she did let Becca and Grizz talk her into Jägerbombs which are never a good idea.

Sam’s eyes blink open and then he smiles and it reminds her of the sleepovers they used to have as kids. She signs, asks him if he wants some coffee and he nods, so she gets up to go find the little brew pot that Helena said she was bringing.

She can see the row of little camp areas stretching all the way down to the end of the lake, each with its own barbecue and campfire area. Every site can fit three or four tents and the one she set her tent up in is shared with Grizz and Sam, Helena and Luke, and Becca. Grizz’s tent is huge with multi rooms and she knows it’s probably because he’s really into spending time outdoors, fishing and camping all over the state. What they are all doing this week borders somewhere on glamping, because she’s almost positive she saw someone set up portable solar panels to run some gaming station and a small television. 

There’s a pack of water bottles next to their makeshift “kitchen” by the campfire so she grabs one, empties it into the brew pot and waits for it to get hot so she can make coffee for her and her friends. Most of the campsites are quiet, which makes sense because it’s eight in the morning and the party raged until at least six this morning. When the coffee is ready she brings a cup to Sam, who puts a finger to his lips and nods to Grizz, who’s already passed out again. Allie grins, hands him the cup and signs have a good morning to him before quietly leaving the tent. 

“Top of the morning to you, Pressman.” 

Harry is helping himself to a cup of coffee from the pot and Allie rolls her eyes. “Don’t you have someone else to bug this morning, Bingham?” 

“I like bugging you more,” he says with a smirk and she doesn’t miss the way he doesn’t say maybe like he did the night before. It’s like he’s finally acknowledging the fact that he’s always trying to get under her skin. She used to think it was because he was annoyed by her but after last night she wonders if maybe she was wrong about that. “Cup of coffee?” 

Allie huffs and takes it from him. “I made that for me and my friends, if you couldn’t tell.” 

Harry puts on a fake pout, which makes his lips look really fucking good and she tries to ignore the little flutter in her stomach when she notices it. “I’m hurt, Al. I thought we were friends?” 

“Why are you even up this early?” She asks, ignoring the question of their friendship. It’s not that they aren’t friendly but they aren’t exactly hanging out on weekends either. Which...okay so she knows they are quite literally hanging out on a weekend right now but that doesn’t count. They have just always known each other, from him being in the same class all through school as Cassandra. She remembers one year when they were science partners and he was at their house once a week during the second semester to complete a project. Cassandra had complained about him being lazy and incompetent but Allie knows he put effort into it because she’d sometimes hang out in the kitchen while they worked and he was always putting in his own ideas just to have her sister throw them out. Which, if you know her sister, is par for the course on pretty much everything. 

“Work hours,” Harry says with a roll of his eyes. “No matter what I do or how late I stay up the night before I’m always up at sunrise. What about you?” 

“Same,” she admits. “I feel like a total bum if I sleep past ten.” 

They both laugh and she realizes they are actually having a conversation, even if it’s stupid and doesn’t really mean anything. But he’s not picking on her and she’s not throwing attitude back at his snark and it’s actually sort of nice. 

“So I hear we have a busy day this morning,” he says as he lowers himself into a folding chair that’s set up near the unlit campfire. “Helena has planned our day down to the minute, it seems.” 

Allie chuckles, pulls up a chair and sets it near him but where she can still see his face. “Sounds like my girl.” 

“Actually it’s my girl,” Luke says from behind her and they all laugh. “You made coffee? Allie, you’re a lifesaver.” 

When she looks at Harry she sees a little flash of disappointment in his eyes and she can’t help but wonder if it’s because it’s not just the two of them anymore.

She also wonders if the same look of disappointment flashes in her own eyes when Harry gets up, tells them he’s off to get ready for the day, and leaves her and Luke to wake up the rest of their friends. 

***

Her feet hurt. 

It was Helena’s idea to take a drive up the road to a hiking trail less than ten minutes away from the lake. And while Allie might have remembered to purchase new hiking boots what she forgot to do was break them in before wearing them. 

“You look miserable,” Harry comments as they move up the trail, which just seems to go up and up and up. He’s not even breaking a sweat and she sees well worn boots on his feet which surprises her. “When was the last time you went hiking?” 

“Um...never?” 

Harry chuckles and pulls her to the side, his hand on her arm as he guides her to a large rock just off the path. “Let me help,” he says, kneeling down in front of her and unlacing her boot. Helena passes by, eyebrows high, but Harry just waves her off, tells the group they will catch up. 

“What are you doing?” Her voice is far more breathless than she wants it to be but holy shit, Harry Bingham is crouched in front of her, picking up her sore foot delicately and placing it on his knee. 

“Helping,” he says simply as he unlaces her boot and works it off her right foot, followed by her sock. After repeating the same steps with her other foot, he places them gently on the ground before standing in front of her. “Lift your legs.” 

“Excuse me?” Her face flushes but he just smirks, grabs each foot and places them on his thighs with her knees together.

“You need to elevate your feet,” he explains as he positions her just so. “It’ll work, trust me.” 

They probably look ridiculous, him standing in front of her with a pair of dark sunglasses covering his eyes and his hair a ruffled mess and her perched on a rock with her feet on his legs. But he wasn’t wrong and after a few minutes she can feel the pain lessening by the second. 

“How long do I have to do this?” 

Harry looks down at his watch. “About fifteen minutes and we’ve been here for eight so get comfortable.” 

Allie laughs and tilts her head back. “You’re not sitting on the hardest rock known to man. My bony ass can’t handle this.”

“Your ass isn’t that bony,” he says but it’s not an insult, she can tell. It’s definitely a compliment, and a heated one at that.

“Spend a lot of time checking out my ass, Bingham?” 

Harry just shrugs, a little grin playing on his lips as he looks down at her. Her cheeks heat again and she rolls her eyes for something to do because she’s not exactly sure what to say back. The last thing she expected this morning was to be hiking with Harry, who’s apparently some sort of expert, and then have him basically admit to checking her out before. 

“We should catch up with everyone,” she says a few minutes later and he checks his watch again, nods and moves her legs carefully so she can put her shoes and socks back on. “Thanks,” she says quietly as she flexes her toes. “That really did help.” 

“You should trust me more often.” He puts a hand out for her to grab and she accepts, ignores the little electricity she feels when her skin touches his. It’s hard not to be attracted to someone like Harry, who exudes confidence in everything that he does. And he’s obviously not bad to look at even though he dresses like a future senator eighty percent of the time and wears his cockiness like a badge. He just keeps showing her these little sides of personality that she’s never seen before and frankly, it’s hard to ignore. 

They make up time quickly, thanks to Harry’s hiking skills and her mostly refreshed feet. When they reach the others everyone is standing at the top of the little mountain they just climbed, eyes focused on something in the distance. 

“What is everyone looking at?” Allie asks no one in particular but stops short with a little gasp when she takes in the view they are all gaping at. The entire lake is visible from their viewpoint, the crystal blue water shimmering in the mid afternoon sun. She can see their side of the lake, with people milling around the sites like little ants. There are boats pulling people on water skis and tons of water crafts making waves for people in floating inner tubes. The lake is surrounded by trees on three sides and Allie thinks it might be one of the most beautiful views she’s ever seen in real life. 

“This is breathtaking,” she says, mostly to herself, but then she feels a hand bump hers as Harry steps up next to her. 

“It sure is,” he says quietly, his eyes sliding from the view before them to her face and then back again. His pinkie touches the side of her hand just barely and the idea to reach over to hold his hand is sudden and unexpected. She doesn’t do it but she finds that she wants to and that confuses her even more.

***

“Fifty bucks says I can chug this entire bottle of Jack in under a minute!” 

Allie rolls her eyes as she passes by a group of guys that she went to high school with, all of them former jocks and not so bright. 

“Pretty sure fifty bucks isn’t going to be enough to get your stomach pumped,” she tosses back in their direction before heading towards the campfire that’s currently warming the majority of her friend group. 

After the hike they spent the day in the water, swimming and riding around on the Jet Skis that Helena had brought for the weekend. Harry offered to rent a boat to take them out but the boats were all rented out by the time they made it back to the lake.

“Tomorrow then,” he had said, dropping his credit card on the counter and winking at the girl making the reservations. Allie’d rolled her eyes and Harry had just laughed and winked at her too.

It’s hard not to notice that he looks really good right now, sitting by the fire with a bottle of beer hanging from his fingertips, his skin perfectly tanned from being in the sun all day. He’s wearing board shorts again but he finally put a shirt on, a white button down with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. It annoys her that he can make anything look good. 

The little smile he gives her when she walks up to the fire pit is almost too much to handle. 

“Need a drink?” Becca asks, pushing a wine cooler into her hand before she can even answer. Allie laughs, thanks her and lowers herself into a chair that just happens to be next to Harry. He smirks a little around the mouth of his beer but doesn’t comment on where she chose to sit down. 

“When do the fireworks start?” She asks Helena, who checks her watch before pointing towards the west of the lake, where there’s no trees and wide open skies. 

“They will be over there in about an hour,” she says. “They won’t be super close because they are technically lit in town but we’ll see the show pretty clearly.” 

They sit around for the next forty minutes drinking and laughing around the fire. Luke and Clark decide to have a rock skipping competition and Allie laughs as everyone scurries around to find the perfect flat rock to enter. Right before the fireworks are about to start Harry nudges her, leans over so he’s almost whispering in her ear.

“Want to find somewhere quiet to watch the show?” 

Everyone around them is either drunk, searching for rocks or both, and no one is paying attention when she nods, stands up and tells him to lead the way. 

They walk side by side next to the lake heading away from the party that’s already raging despite the fact that it’s barely ten at night. Allie practically chokes when they pass a couple full on having sex against a tree and Harry laughs, steers them away from the obnoxious moaning and towards an empty spot on the beach. 

“I should have bought a blanket,” he complains as he settles in the sand and Allie smiles as she drops down next to him. 

“A little sand never hurt anyone. Don’t be a baby.” He quirks an eyebrow at her and she giggles, which she only does when she’s this side of perfectly drunk. 

Harry is quiet as he pulls his knees up and sits with his arms dangling in between them. “You’ve been different today,” he says so softly she can barely hear him. “More like you used to be.” 

“What does that mean?” She’s sitting cross legged and stays that way as she turns so she’s facing him. He just shrugs which makes her roll her eyes. “You’ve been different too.” 

“Oh yeah?” He asks with a raised eyebrow and she nods. “How so?” 

She snorts, leans back on her hands which makes her knees touch the side of his leg. “If you’re not going to tell me, why should I tell you?” 

“What are we, twelve?” He says on a laugh and she shrugs, giving him a dose of his own medicine. He sighs, like it’s a total inconvenience to explain something that he started anyways. “You were fun. Carefree.” 

“It was a good day,” she says and he nods. “And you were flirting with me, which is new.” It’s a bold statement because maybe he wasn’t, maybe it was just like all the other times when he was flirty because he’s Harry Bingham and that’s just how he is. He charms, it’s in his DNA. 

Harry scoffs a little and shakes his head like she’s missing something. “Me flirting with you is not new, Allie.” 

The way he says her name does something to her, the way she can see his tongue when his mouth forms the word. They aren’t saying anything, just staring at each other when the first boom of fireworks sounds off overhead. Neither of them startle or even really acknowledge the show going off above them. She likes the way the colors flash across his face, bright blue and neon pink, and before she realizes what’s happening he’s leaning forward, pressing his lips against hers quickly in a surprisingly gentle and innocent kiss. 

He pulls away first, rests his forehead on hers with a little smile playing on his face. 

“What was that?” The words are practically whispered, breath feather light over almost touching lips. 

“Something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.” He doesn’t say anything else, doesn’t go to kiss her again, just smiles softly before pulling away.

Allie smiles too and pulls away, rests her hands behind her in the sand and settles in to watch the show.

***

“Where did you run off to last night?” 

The campsites are stirring the next morning with activity as everyone wakes up after the sun is high and the weather is warm. Helena is sitting by the campfire, a cup of coffee in one hand and her phone in the other. 

“I went for a walk,” Allie says carefully, not sure if she should say anything about what happened with Harry or not. They only shared one little kiss, and while it was wildly romantic with the fireworks sounding off above them, she’s not quite sure where they go from here. “What are you up to?”

Helena holds up her phone. “Trying to secure our boat for the day online. Harry already gave his credit card information to the rental place, I’m on hold.” 

It’s then that Allie can hear the hold music playing quietly from Helena’s phone which is on speaker mode. Allie snorts when she recognizes the song, some piano version of a top 40 hit, and pours herself a cup of coffee. 

A few minutes later a woman’s voice comes over the line, letting Helena know that she’s secured a boat for them that they can pick up in an hour. Helena thanks the woman and ends the call, stands up and wipes sand from the back of her shorts. 

“This place is too fucking sandy,” she says and Allie laughs into her coffee mug. “I’m going to start rounding up the usual suspects. You’re in, right?” 

Allie nods. “Definitely. I’ll get ready and meet you back here at ten.” 

She finishes up her drink and heads to her tent to get ready for the day. There are two options for swimming suits, the one she wore yesterday which was bright blue and white, perfect for the fourth. But she decides on the flashier suit she’d purchased just because it was beautiful in the store and she couldn’t help herself. She slides on a pair of denim shorts and throws a sun hat on for good measure. She’s just finished applying sunscreen when a throat clearing at the tent’s entrance makes her jump. 

“Jesus, Allie.” 

Harry is standing there, one fist up to his mouth as he takes her in from head to toe. And now she knows this bathing suit was worth the price tag because he’s looking at her like he never has before. 

“That suit..” 

Allie laughs quietly and looks down at the top, a white ruffled halter top embellished with gold jewels that sit right under her breasts. There’s an additional piece connected to the bottoms that wraps around her middle that is purely for show, the gold jewels trailing down her stomach to meet the top of her shorts. With her recently tanned skin the stark white of the suit pops, making her look even more sunkissed. 

“You like?” She asks with a cocked eyebrow and Harry nods slowly as he takes her in.

He looks around outside quickly before stepping into her tent. “That is by far the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen,” he says when he’s right in front of her. She inhales sharply when he gently touches the jeweled piece on her tummy. He’s making her feel all kinds of things and he’s not even touching her skin. 

“I’m glad you like it,” she says breathlessly and it makes him smile. Feeling a little bold she pushes up closer to him, leans up so she can whisper in his ear. “Wait until you see the rest of it.” 

Harry lets out a little groan that makes her giggle as she pushes past him. She’s not exactly sure why she’s being so bold, or flirty at all for that matter, but it’s like their kiss from the night before has unlocked something she didn’t really know how to admit before. 

She sort of likes him.

Half an hour later she’s got a beer in her hand as the boat floats lazily along the lake. It was big enough for a fairly large group of people and they are everywhere, laughing and drinking like it’s not before noon on a Sunday. Helena and Luke are talking quietly and kissing in a corner and Allie finds herself wishing for the first time in a long time that she had someone in her life to giggle and kiss whenever she wanted. 

“They are disgustingly in love, don’t you think?” 

Harry chooses that moment to drop down beside her, his chin nodding towards the engaged couple. 

“I think it’s sweet,” Allie says, her eyes taking in Harry’s board shorts and bare chest. A pair of Ray Bans cover his eyes as he lays down in the lounge chair next to hers and gets comfortable. He rests his phone face down on his stomach and Allie snorts. “You’re going to get a weird tan if you leave that there.” 

Harry just smirks and glances at her suit. “You’re one to talk, Pressman” 

Allie just shakes her head with a laugh. “I lathered myself up in sunscreen before we left. I think I’ll be okay.” 

Harry shifts in his chair and gives her a heated look. “I know, I saw.” 

She remembers him coming in after she put on her sunscreen, wonders how long he was standing there before he cleared his throat.

“Perv,” she says with a smile to show him she’s not mad and he laughs, a bright and loud sound that makes a few people look their way.

They spend the day eating, drinking and playing in the lake. By the time they dock she’s perfectly buzzed, warmed by the setting sun and the margaritas Elle made for the girls on the boat. 

“Let’s party!” Clark yells as he jumps into the sand and Allie rolls her eyes as everyone cheers as if that’s not what they’ve been doing all day. But it is their last night here so she follows her tipsy friends through the campsites until they arrive back at hers, which is apparently party central tonight.

Someone turns on music and Billie Eilish starts playing, a thumping bass beat that has everyone up and dancing around the now lit campfire. Elle stumbles up to her, a wide grin splitting her face, and Allie knows the girl is definitely tequila wasted right now which means she’s probably feeling on top of the world.

“Dance with me!” 

Allie laughs and lets Elle pull her into the crowd of people dancing to “Bad Guy” like it hasn’t been on the radio for the past two summers. She turns when she feels eyes on her, sees Harry sitting on the tailgate of Luke’s truck. His eyes are following her every move, and he doesn’t look away as he takes a pull from the long neck bottle in his hands. Even from this far away she can feel her skin heat when he licks his lips, eyes fixed on her like he doesn’t see anyone else. 

“Dude, I think Harry likes you!” Elle yells over the music and Allie stills, tears her eyes away from him to face her friend. 

“What makes you say that?” 

Elle shrugs, which looks ridiculous because she’s drunk dancing all over the place. “He hasn’t stopped looking at you since we got here. Go talk to him.” 

Allie pales, looks around to see if anyone is listening to this conversation. It’s not that she really cares what anyone thinks, and he has been flirting with her more than usual. But he’s a known womanizer and it honestly scares her a little to think that maybe this is just the norm for him. Flirting with a girl until he gets what he wants and where will she be then? In a surprisingly sober move Elle puts her hands on Allie’s shoulders and looks her in the eye. 

“Stop being afraid, Al.” 

Allie takes a deep breath and nods, stands up taller and squares her shoulders back as she heads to where Harry’s sitting. 

His eyebrows go up a little in surprise when she stops right in front of him, practically standing in between where his legs are open and dangling off the tailgate. 

“What are we doing, Harry? You kiss me last night and then never mention it, and now you’re watching me like…” 

“Like what?” He asks when she doesn’t finish her sentence and she melts a little at the deep and husky tone of his voice. “Tell me, Allie.” 

“Like you want to do it again and never stop.” 

He lets out a little breath of surprise as she steps in between his legs and leans up to kiss him. When he doesn’t immediately return the kiss she sort of panics but then he’s sliding down off the tailgate and pulling her into his arms to deepen the kiss. It’s not like the sweet kiss from the night before, it’s raw and full of emotion, his teeth nipping at her bottom lip until she’s weak in the knees. 

There are hoots and hollers around them as he continues to kiss her but she doesn’t care. Maybe it’s the faint tequila buzz she’s still feeling or maybe it’s just how drunk she’s getting off this kiss, the taste of expensive beer on Harry’s lips as he sips at her lips her right there in front of their friends. 

“Maybe we should rejoin the party,” he murmurs against her lips several minutes later and she smiles, reaches for his hand and pulls him in the direction of his tent one campsite over. 

“Maybe we should have our own?” 

He practically growls in agreement and follows behind her as she makes her way through the crowd. Elle winks her as they pass and Allie just grins, turns around to see Harry’s eyes lit up with alcohol and want, as they make their way over to his tent. 

***

The lake is quiet when she steps down to the shore the next morning. It’s still early, everyone getting some much needed rest after the debauchery of the night before. Even from Harry’s tent, where they spent the night making out (plus a little more) and talking until neither could keep their eyes open, they could hear the party raging from the next campsite over.

“Morning, Pressman.” 

Allie smiles when Harry comes up behind her, puts his arms around her waist and drops a kiss to her temple. “Good morning to you too.” 

“I didn’t like waking up alone,” he admits quietly. “I fell asleep with you in my arms, kinda wanted to wake up like that too.” 

The sentiment is sweet and it makes her heart beat furiously in her chest. “What happens next, Harry?” 

He kisses her cheek. “What do you mean?” 

Allie sighs, turns around in his arms so she can look up at him. “I mean, we’re on vacation. This weekend has been fun but what happens in two hours when it ends?” 

“Then we don’t let it end,” he says simply. “You swear like Brooklyn and Manhattan are two separate planets. We can do this, Allie. I want to.” 

She inhales sharply, surprised by how earnest his words are. “You do?” 

Harry rolls his eyes a little and chuckles. “Allie, I’ve liked you since high school. This shouldn’t be such a shock.” 

“I didn’t know,” she says but maybe she just missed it. Maybe all the flirting, every time he randomly joined in a conversation, maybe it wasn’t him being a womanizer. Maybe he really did just like her. “Why didn’t you just tell me?” 

“Honestly?” He asks and she rolls her eyes as if to say duh. “It just never felt like the right time. You were younger, your sister hated me. One of us was always dating someone else. And then life, you know?” 

She nods because she does know. “Well I’m glad you told me now. But I do have issue with one thing that you said.” 

His eyebrows dip together. “Oh yeah? What’s that?” 

Allie smiles as she leans up to kiss him. “Manhattan and Brooklyn are like two different planets.” 

Harry laughs and wraps his arms around her, dropping kisses from her mouth to her shoulder and then back up again. 

“Guess we’ll just have to compromise,” he says, turning her around so they can watch the sun shine on the still water of the lake. “Some nights at my place, some nights at yours.” 

“Sounds perfect.”

She settles back into his arms, enjoying the way the sun warms her face as it rises high in the sky, welcoming the new day.

[oliveiraveiro]

what we keep inside

part 1 of 3 of The Weekend

Open Heart, Rafael x F!MC

series summary: Casey and Rafael try to face their respective feelings and be honest about them to each other. With Sora in the picture, what can happen in short three days? What will happen after?

chapter summary: Not everyone will have fun at the Edenbrook gala.

tags/warning: pining, eventual happy ending, rafael x sora, suggestive thought, mention of alcohol, verbal fight

word count: 2005 / ao3 link / part 2

Friday night.                                

Casey is spending it like how she always did; drinks and karaoke with her friends.

Friday nights are always good nights. It marks the end of her week at work. It is when she can truly relax and decompress from her cases, aside from spending quality time with her friends who are as busy as she is.

So as usual, she was giddy, a half-drunk cocktail in her hand as she watched and cheered Elijah as he belted out the lyrics to Sunflower by Post Malone and Swae Lee.

Casey had a blush on her cheeks that she has been feeling for about an hour now, and she had been smiling more than usual.

She keeps on telling herself it was just the drinks, but she knows deep inside that it had something to do with the brown-eyed man sitting in front of her who decided to join karaoke night tonight.

They were broken up, sure, and he is seeing someone else. But the times they hang out together, even just as friends, still made her happy. He still made her happy.

She steals a glance in his direction, only to find him already looking at her. They both smile at each other, and Casey blushes even more. She can only hope it was not too obvious.

“We’re friends with such singers, aren’t we?” she says with a smile.

“I certainly am. You really did good with your rendition of Famous. Always a Raleigh Carrera fan.” Rafael answers with a teasing grin.

Before she can flush even more, thankfully, Jackie interrupts. “Casey, you gonna buy a new dress for the gala tomorrow?”

Oh, right. The gala. She almost forgot about it already. She quickly noted her wardrobe in her head before answering no.

“I think I have a few that should work for the attire,” she smiles at her, glad for the needed distraction. “Are you? You should definitely check out my closet first, I have a gold formal dress that you’d absolutely love.”

Jackie smiles gratefully at Casey. “I will, thank you.” She turns her attention to Rafael. “How about you, Superman? It’d be nice to see you in a tux.”

“Oh, no, I’m not going.” Rafael says, shyly.

“What? Why not?” Casey was quick to ask him. “You always attend Edenbrook events. This has to be the biggest one yet!”

“Yeah, Raf. The fanciest, too. And the fact that the hospital won’t spend a dime on it is a plus in my book.” Jackie adds.

As soon as the word ‘fancy’ was said, Casey understood. She looks at Rafael with a small frown but does not try to speak again.

“Not the ones that require me to wear a tuxedo. Sorry, Jackie.”

“Aw, man, come on. I was hoping you’d join me to find one to rent tomorrow.” Elijah pipes in, now off the makeshift stage and back to join them.

“I can accompany you, sure, but I still won’t go. You guys know that’s just not my thing. But I do hope you have fun for me.” Rafael gives them a genuine smile.

Jackie is about to speak again, but Casey catches her attention and gives her a look to drop it, and she nods just a little.

“Well, if you change your mind…” Elijah says simply.

“Sure. I’ll…try to think about it more.” Rafael agrees. He ends up meeting Casey’s eyes, and he immediately gives her a sheepish look.

His mind is most likely not going to change, and they both know that Casey knew that. Reassuring him, she smiles and gives him a small wink.

She is just about to speak again to try and change the topic, but Sienna decides to join them again then, inviting her for a dance.

Casey agrees, letting Sienna take her hand, and before she can pull her into the dance floor, she gives Rafael a knowing look.

He smiles up at her again, his eyes lighting up at the familiar gesture, but Casey was pulled away by Sienna before she could see the also obvious elation in his eyes.

Saturday night.

To say that Casey looked beautiful is an understatement.

She is wearing an emerald green dress, matched with some black high heels that Rafael thinks can definitely be wielded as a weapon if needed. It only added to how sexy she looked. Her red hair is more wavy than her usual do, but is still swept to the side. She is wearing quite some makeup, but it suits her well, and all that is on Rafael’s mind as soon as he saw Casey tonight was how stunning she is.

Sure, attending this gala was far from how he planned to spend the night. But what happened already happened, and he is here now. He is more than thankful to be graced by Casey’s appearance.

He continued watching her rub elbows with some big-names, long enough for he himself to feel uncomfortable. Only then he realizes that he has been alone with his drink for quite a while now. With how much Sora tried convincing him that it will be such a great idea to attend tonight’s event, that it will be such a terrific date, he naturally expected her to be by his side. But only god knows which important person she is schmoozing with right now.

For maybe the twentieth time tonight, he lets out a sigh, finishing up his drink. Elijah! Yeah, he can probably try to find him.

Just as he is about to take another look around the room, Casey takes up his view. She gives him a friendly smile.

“Hey, stranger,” she greets. “Something wrong with your drink?”

Realizing that he is frowning, Rafael quickly schools his features, and for the first time tonight he grins.

“Something like that. I probably need something stronger, or-- actually I think beer is better.”

Casey laughs softly. “Not sure if we can find a pint, but we can probably help ourselves to a glass of whiskey. Or five.”

“Getting cozy with the rich and powerful exhausting you?” He asks her, seeing through her smiles and laugh, eyebrows furrowing again in concern.

“Barely starting and I am already very exhausted.” She sighs, easing off on the charm. “And you? You don’t look like you’re having a blast either.”

Rafael is grateful that she did not directly ask him what made him change his mind on going. But well, that is who Casey was. She hated confrontation as much as he did, which is why they were still friends, despite recently going through a breakup.

“Yeah, you know I’d rather be staying at home.” He sighed softly, looking down at his drink for a moment as he debated whether to tell her more or not. “Sora insisted that we attend. It was supposed to be a date, but…”

Casey nods as Rafael trails off, seeing how he is unhappy tonight, even more with talking about why he was. Still, she is unable to bite back a comment. “A date, huh?” she repeats.

Rafael chuckles, quick to realize what she means by that. On their first official date, he is the one who told her that he and the word fancy just do not fit together nicely.

Now he was here in this fancy gala, in a fancy tuxedo although rented, drinking a fancy drink. Casey can sense his discomfort, but although him being here tonight is not ideal for him, she thanks the stars in the night sky. He looks so dashing and handsome.

If he looked good in his casual clothes, he is mighty fine in black tie. It takes all of Casey’s concentration to meet his eyes the whole time and not check out his body and think about getting rid of his jacket, his bow tie, his vest, then proceed to unbutton his dress shirt slowly, all the while running her hands along…shit.

“I know,” he sighs. “At least I got to see you and spend time with you. And…the others…later.”

She grins at that, making sure she focuses on his face this time, nodding a little. “Come on, I know where they are. Elijah’s hell-bent on making everyone try playing poker tonight.”

Rafael gives her a surprised look, although he already starts following her.

“There’s a table labeled broke players only, I promise.” She clarifies and they laugh together as they head towards the rest of the gang.

“This was supposed to be a date night, Rafael! Surely you can’t possibly be mad at me that I’m upset to find you hanging out with your friends and ex-girlfriend.” About an hour later, Sora almost shouts as she follows Rafael out of the hospital.

Are you serious? Rafael thinks to himself, but he bites back his tongue. “I’m not mad, Sora, I just don’t think that was necessary or appropriate--”

“Why? Because you still like her? You don’t want me kissing you when she’s around?”

“You call that kissing? You could’ve sucked the lips out of my mouth! In public!” Rafael tries his hardest not to raise his voice but getting through her right now is just impossible.

Sora usually keeps her resolve. But when she gets drunk or tipsy, this foreign version of her, the one who loves fights, just comes out not to play but to yell at Rafael.

Actually, even without the influence of alcohol, he has been well-acquainted with her lately. Things between them have been less than perfect, obviously so, because this relationship, them, should be easy and comfortable, but for a few weeks now it has been anything but. They should really talk about it because their relationship turned out to be the opposite of both their expectations, Rafael notes in his head.

He will definitely not be putting it off anymore. He knows he already said that the last time they had a misunderstanding, but it will happen. Totally. He is not sure when, but surely, someday. Hopefully-- no, certainly, before she ends up deciding to break up with him.

“Look, I really don’t want to fight. All I want right now is to go home, so please get in the car and I’ll drive you to your apartment.” Rafael says in a calm voice.

“Let me guess, now you’re gonna tell me that you never wanted to go here in the first place? That you’re right about not wanting to go? And it’s all my fault that you’re flirting with your ex--”

“Sora, please, I swear to you I wasn’t flirting with--”

“Maybe I basically forced you to go with me tonight, Raf. That’s on me. But you were, and anyone with eyes would see all the sparks flying between the two of you. This is the reason why you didn’t even tell me you dated, right? This is why I had to ask specifically if you two had history.” She is finally calmed down, but somehow there is more bite to her words.

Dropping the hammer, Sora continues. “You still have feelings for her.”

Rafael inhales sharply, feeling the rising panic in his chest. “What- I- No…”

“I’d say you’re convincing me and not yourself, but I know better.” Sora chuckles humorlessly. “God.” she sighs deeply, rubbing her forehead with both hands in frustration. “I should’ve known better. Your heart is big, Raf, I’ve always known that. But not too big for me to be sharing your love with someone else, no matter how much you try to deny it.”

“Sora, please, let me just--” he tries to grab her hand, and she lets him, but he notices she looks past his shoulder.

“Talk to her, really talk to her. It’s about time you do.” Sora says, taking his keys. “I’m still buzzed so I’ll wait for you in the car. Take as long as you need.”

Rafael was confused for a moment, but he soon feels the eyes boring on the back of her head. He turns around, freezing upon seeing her.

“Casey…”

[liam-93-productions]

When One Direction parted ways back in 2015, and in the process shattering the hearts of fangirls across the globe, something remarkable happened. Each of the five members would go on to tackle mainstream chart success from completely different angles. For Wolverhampton’s poster boy Liam Payne, it was following in the footsteps of his personal heroes – the likes of Justin Timberlake and Usher – morphing into an all-singing, all-dancing, pop sensation. Debut single ‘Strip That Down’ featuring Quavo stacked up a rather impressive 318 million views on YouTube, followed by a slew of hits which featured the likes of reggaeton sensation J Balvin and producer mastermind Zedd. On last year’s LP1, Payne dipped his toe into a plethora of different sounds and influences, moving between tropical house and sensual R&B, to slow-burner ballads and trap-laden instrumentals throughout.

As a pop star on the course for global domination, Payne needed his signature uniform. That’s where Hugo comes in. As a brand ambassador, Payne partnered with Hugo back in December for a collection of signature casualwear that included graphic tees, classic shirting and one saucy campaign flaunting the collection’s underwear selection. The collab was a hit, so much so that the dream team had to come together once more for a second instalment. This time around, the collection celebrates Payne’s rapid journey from boyband sensation to established solo artist.

“For the second collection, I had an idea of how the Hugo creative process works and more of an understanding towards materials, colours and the reality of making a collection,” explains Payne. “We could also see what worked in the first collection which all helped to make me feel more comfortable this time around.” Working in a signature palette that rotates between black, white, navy and red, all 14 pieces are inspired by Payne’s own wardrobe – each as sporty as they are sleek. The Hugo logo is redubbed ‘Hugo93.LP’, paying homage to the year Payne was born, emblazing cracking twin sets, full tracksuits and a brand new trainer silhouette. Another motif appears throughout; the chevron – inspired by the arrow tattoo situated on Payne’s arm, photographed in the collection’s campaign by 10 Magazine contributor Tom Craig.

“I love the tracksuits, I normally do so much travelling and it’s so nice having something that’s comfortable but still looks good,” says Payne. (...) As for heading back on stage after life returns to normality, Payne is most excited to sport the jeans: “I think the jeans are going to be my go-to for on stage, I have never had any that fit so well!  And they can be worn with so much of the wider Hugo collection too.” To mark the collection’s release, we asked Liam Payne 10-tastic questions:

1. This season celebrates your journey from teen pop sensation to an established solo artist. If you had to pick only one single One Direction song to listen to for the rest of your life, which would you pick?

Only one song for the rest of your life?! I’d miss out on so much! If I have to pick, I would probably have to say ‘Little Things’ as this will always be one of my favourite songs. It was a crazy time in my life so it brings back a lot of memories and means a lot to me. It was also my first time working with Ed Sheeran which was amazing and I’ve been lucky enough to continue working with him through my solo career.

2. Out of all the collaborators on your debut solo album LP1, who do you think would rock this collection the best?

I’m hoping they’ll all like it, but I think it’s really more Jonas [Blue] or Zedd’s style. Maybe Zedd as he’s in LA and can rock the swimming shorts more regularly than we can over here!

3. The chevron motif that appears throughout the collection is inspired by a tattoo you have on your right arm. If you had to make another motif from one of your other tattoos, which would you pick?

I guess the roman numerals would be the obvious choice as they are my X Factor number and that was obviously when my life changed completely.

4. You say this collection is “full of easy styles that are perfect for the weekend,” what’s your ideal Saturday night?

Because it’s more casual, (...) After that, I’ll either chill or write some music.

5. What makes Hugo the ideal fit to be a global brand ambassador for?

I’ve always really liked the brand it’s really the sort of style that I like. They’ve been amazing to work with and I love that I’m not just the face of but that I can actually get involved in the whole process. It’s ace!

6. What’s your favourite song to perform live?

My favourite song recently has been ‘Polaroid’ but I’ve just released a new song with Alesso called ‘Midnight’ and I cannot wait to get back on stage to perform it!

7. What’s the craziest rumour you’ve heard about yourself?

There was a rumour that I was dead once…my mum called me and asked if I was alive!

8. What’s the fashion moment from your former years that you regret wearing the most?

Some of my travelling gear was questionable back in the day.  I feel like I was still working out my style then, but it was fun getting there.

9. Before you go on stage, what artists are usually on your pre-show playlist?

This changes from show to show depending on how I feel. Usher, John Mayer, Justin Timberlake and Post Malone are normally in there.

10. If you could team up with any other artist for your next Hugo collection, who would you pick?

I’d love to go for someone really random that no one would expect…like Billie Ellish! So many girls are making the collection work for them so it would be cool to actually team up with a female. Imagine if we worked with Billie, it would be so fun to see where that would go.

The second release of Hugo x Liam Payne is available to purchase online now.

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

Welcome to FiveThirtyEight’s politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.

sarahf (Sarah Frostenson, politics editor): Last Wednesday, the U.S. Capitol was attacked by a mob of President Trump’s supporters, many of whom had very explicit and not so explicit ties to right-wing extremism in the U.S. There are reports now, too, that there could be subsequent attacks in state capitals this weekend. President Trump’s time in office has undoubtedly had a mainstreaming effect on right-wing extremism, too, with as many as 20 percent of Americans saying they supported the rioters. But as we also know, much of this predates Trump, too. Right-wing extremism has a long, sordid history in the U.S.

The big question I want to ask all of you today is twofold: First, how did we get here, and second, where do we go from here?

Let’s start by unpacking how right-wing extremism has changed in the Trump presidency. How has it?

ameliatd (Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, senior writer): Well, the first and most obvious thing is that Trump has spoken directly to right-wing extremists. That is to say, using their language, condoning previous armed protests at government buildings and explicitly calling on them to support and protect him. And that, probably unsurprisingly, has emboldened right-wing extremists and made their extremism seem — well, less extreme.

That goes for a wide array of extremists in the U.S., too. I’m thinking, of course, about Trump’s comment after the white supremacist violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, when he said there were “very fine people on both sides.” But Trump has also encouraged white Christian nationalists, anti-government extremists and other groups and individuals that I certainly never thought I’d hear a president expressing sympathy or support for.

jennifer.chudy (Jennifer Chudy, political science professor at Wellesley College): Absolutely, Amelia. And while the actual extremists may represent a small group of the public, the share of Republicans who support their behavior, whether explicitly or implicitly, is not as small. This is, in part, due to mainstream political institutions — like the Republican Party, with Trump at its helm — helping make their mission and behavior seem legitimate.

maggie.koerth (Maggie Koerth, senior science writer): I’ve been talking to experts about this all week, and I think it’s really interesting how even the academics who study this stuff are kind of arguing over the role class plays in it. People like Christian Davenport at the University of Michigan have argued that we should understand that all of this is happening in the context of decades of growing income inequality and political stagnation. In other words, he contends that there are legitimate reasons to be angry at and mistrust the government. But it also seems like this crowd was not even close to being uniformly working class and probably contained people from a range of different backgrounds. And that’s why I liked one of the points Joseph Uscinski at the University of Miami made: We might be seeing a coalescing of two groups: the people who have been actually hurt by that inequality and are angry about it AND the people who are doing pretty well but who feel like somebody might come and take that away. And, of course, both those positions can dovetail very easily into racial animus and white supremacy.

ameliatd: That’s interesting, Maggie. As you alluded to, though, it’s important to be clear that economic anxiety — which was used in the aftermath of Trump’s election to explain why so many Americans voted for a candidate who framed much of his candidacy around animus toward nonwhite people — doesn’t mean that racism or white supremacy isn’t a driving force here, too.

Part of what’s so complex about the mob that attacked the Capitol is that it was a bunch of different people, with somewhat disparate ideologies and goals, united under the “stop the steal” mantra. But underlying a lot of that, even people’s anger over economic inequality or mistrust in institutions, is the fundamental idea that white status and power are being threatened.

jennifer.chudy: There is also just a lot of evidence in political science that racial attitudes are associated with emotions like anger. Two great books, one by Antoine Banks of the University of Maryland and the other by Davin Phoenix of the University of California, Irvine, consider this point in depth. Insofar as right-wing extremists express anger at the system (in contrast to fear or disgust), their anger appears more likely to be motivated by racial grievances than by economic ones.

Additionally, the Republican Party’s base has, for years now, become more racially homogeneous, in part because of the party providing a welcome home to white grievances. But some have argued that this has also been exacerbated by the Democratic Party speaking more explicitly about racial inequality in the U.S., something that wasn’t the case in the 1990s. Regardless, a more racially homogeneous base can make a party’s members more receptive to this type of extremist behavior.

We also can’t underestimate the role that COVID-19 plays here. As Maggie and Amelia suggested in their article from this summer on militias and the coronavirus, many folks are at home and glued to their computers in ways that facilitate this type of organizing. They can burrow themselves into online communities of like-minded folks which may intensify their attitudes and lead to extreme behavior.

Kaleigh: (Kaleigh Rogers, tech and politics reporter): Polling has shown that ideas that previously had been considered extreme, like using violence if your party loses an election, or supporting authoritarian ideas, have definitely become more mainstream.

This is partly due to Trump’s own rhetoric, but also due to the effects of online communities where far-right extremists and white nationalists mingle with more moderate Trump supporters, effectively radicalizing some of them over time.

What’s interesting to me about all of these different factions, though, is there is actually a lot of division among these groups: Many members of the Proud Boys aren’t fans of the QAnon conspiracy, for instance. And a lot of white nationalists don’t like Trump, but they still end up uniting against a perceived common enemy. That’s why you saw people in the mob at the Capitol waving MAGA flags alongside people with clear Nazi symbolism. They are not all white nationalists, but they’re willing to march beside them because they think they’re on the same side.

But in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 attack, those divisions are becoming more stark in these online communities. I’m seeing a lot of infighting over whether planned marches are a good idea, whether they are “false flag” events or traps or whether they should be armed. There just seems to be this heightened anxiety as they draw closer to an inevitable line that they can’t come back from: Biden’s inauguration.

sarahf: That’s a super important point, Kaleigh, on how different extremist groups have rallied behind this. But given how much Trump has directly spoken to right-wing extremists, as Amelia mentioned up top, can we drill in on the violence, as well? It’s not just that different factions have united or that these views have mainstreamed under Trump, but also that there’s been an actual uptick in violence, too, right?

ameliatd: One thing Maggie and I heard from experts on the modern militia movement is that these groups’ activity levels depend on the political context. The uptick in violence under Trump is real, but it’s not something that’s only happened under Trump. There was a surge in militia activity early in Obama’s presidency, too, for example.

maggie.koerth: Very much so, Amelia. The reality is that the right-wing extremism we’re seeing now is a symptom of long-running trends in American society, including white resentment and racial animus. And on top of that, you have these trends interacting with partisan polarization, which means the political left and right (which used to have fairly similar levels of white racial resentment) began to diverge on measures of racial resentment in the late 1980s and now differ greatly.

Kaleigh: Exactly, Maggie. That’s also why the FBI and other experts are particularly concerned about planned militia marches ahead of the inauguration. These groups tend to be much more organized and deliberate in their actions than the mob we saw last week. And because of that, they’re even more dangerous.

ameliatd: Right, so this violence isn’t new. But I do think it’s fair to say that Trump has raised the stakes so dramatically for right-wing extremists that we’d see a throng of them storming the Capitol. A lot of them see him as their guy in the White House!

So when he says, look, this election is being stolen from me, and you’ve got to do something about it, they listen.

jennifer.chudy: That’s true, Amelia, but work in political science shows just how much of this change was afoot prior to Trump’s election. Some tie it to Hillary Clinton talking too much about race during the 2016 election — they argue that this drove away some white voters who had previously voted Democratic (and could do so in 2008 and ‘12 because Obama, despite being Black, did not mention race much during his candidacy). But Clare Malone’s article for FiveThirtyEight on how Republicans have spent decades prioritizing white people’s interests does a great job of tracing these roots even further back.

maggie.koerth: Yeah, I’m really leery of the tendency I’ve seen in the media to act like this is something that started with Trump, or even that started post-Obama. Most of the experts I’ve spoken with have framed this more like … Trump’s escalation of these dangerous trends is a symptom of the trends. We’re talking about a lot of indicators that have been going in this direction since at least the 1980s.

jennifer.chudy: True, Maggie, from the beginning of the Republic, I might argue! But one reason the tie to Trump and Obama is so interesting is that Trump’s baseless claims around Obama’s birth certificate correspond with his debut on the national political stage. So even as there is a long thread of white supremacy throughout American history that has facilitated Trump’s ascension, there may also be a more proximate connection to recent elections, too.

ameliatd: Ashley Jardina, a political scientist at Duke University, has done some really compelling research on white identity politics — specifically how the country’s diversification has created a kind of “white awareness” among white Americans who are essentially afraid of losing their cultural status and power.

This is a complicated force — she’s clear that it’s not exactly the same thing as racial prejudice — but the result is that many white people have a sense that the hierarchy in which they’ve been privileged is being upset, and they want things to return to the old status quo, which of course was racist. And the Republican Party has been tapping into that sense of fear for a while. Trump’s departure was that he started doing it much more explicitly than previous Republican politicians had mostly done.

So yes, Maggie, you’re absolutely right that it’s not like Trump came on the scene and suddenly right-wing extremism or white supremacist violence became a part of our mjui78 political landscape. Or partisan hatred, for that matter! FiveThirtyEight contributor Lee Drutman has written about the effect of political polarization and how it’s created intense loathing of the other party, and he’s clear that it’s been a long time coming. It didn’t just emerge out of nowhere in 2016, as you can see in the chart below.

On the other hand, though, it’s hard to imagine the events of last week without four years of Trump fanning the flames.

maggie.koerth: Right, Amelia. Trump is a symptom AND he’s making it worse. At the same time.

Kaleigh: What you said, Amelia, also speaks to just how many Trump supporters don’t consider themselves racist and find it insulting to be called so. A lot of Trump supporters think Democrats are obsessed with race and identity politics, and think racism isn’t as systemic of a problem as it is. There are also, of course, nonwhite Trump supporters, which complicates the image that only white working-class Americans feel threatened by efforts to create racial equality.

ameliatd: That’s right, Kaleigh. We haven’t talked about the protests against police brutality and misconduct this summer, but I think that’s a big factor here as well — politicians like Biden saying that we have to deal with systemic racism is itself threatening to a lot of people.

sarahf: It does seem as if we’re in this gray zone, where so much of this predates Trump, and yet Trump has activated underlying sentiments that were perhaps dormant for at least a little while. Any child of the 1990s remembers, for instance, the Oklahoma City bombing and Timothy McVeigh, who held a number of extreme, anti-government views, or the deadly standoff between federal law enforcement officials and right-wing fundamentalists at Ruby Ridge.

And as Jennifer pointed out with Malone’s piece, the thread runs even further back. It’s almost as if it’s always been part of the U.S. but maybe not as omnipresent. That’s also possibly naive, but I’m curious to hear where you all think we go from here — in how does President Biden start to move the U.S. forward?

maggie.koerth: Honestly, that’s the scary part for me, Sarah. Because I don’t really think he can. Everything we know about how you change deeply held beliefs that have to do with identity suggests that the appeals of outsiders doesn’t work.

jennifer.chudy: Yes — one would think that a common formidable challenge, like COVID-19, would help unite different political factions. But if you look at the last few months, that’s not what we see.

maggie.koerth: Even Republican elites who they push back on this stuff get branded as apostates.

ameliatd: And there’s evidence that when Republican elites are perceived as apostates, they may also become targets for violence.

Kaleigh: But we also know that deplatforming agitators helps reduce the spread of their ideas and how much people are exposed to/talk about them. Losing the presidency is kind of the ultimate deplatforming, no?

jennifer.chudy: Is it deplatforming, though? Or is it just moving the platform to a different setting? I don’t know the ins and outs of the technology, but it seems like the message has become dispersed but maybe not extinguished.

sarahf: That’s a good point, Jennifer, and something I think Kaleigh hits on in her article — that is, this question of … was it too little, too late?

maggie.koerth: I think it has been a deplatforming, Jennifer. If for no other reason than it’s removed Trump’s ability to viscerally respond to millions of people immediately. And you see some really big differences between the things he said on Twitter about these extremists last week and the statements he’s made this week, which have had to go through other people.

It’s not so much taken away from his ability to speak, but it does seem to have affected his ability to speak without somebody thinking about the consequences first.

ameliatd: There is an argument that Trump’s presidency and the violence he’s spurred is making the underlying problems impossible to ignore. I’m not sure whether that makes it easier for Biden to deal with them, but it does make it harder for him to just say, ‘Okay, let’s move past this.’

Lilliana Mason, a professor at the University of Maryland who’s written extensively about partisan discord and political violence, told me in a recent interview that while someone like Biden shouldn’t be afraid to push back against Trump or his followers because it will lead to more violence (an argument against impeachment that’s circulated in the past week), she does think pushing back against Trump and his followers probably will result in more violence.

So that leaves us, and Biden, in a pretty scary place.

Republicans are in a bind, too. Electorally, many of them depend on a system where certain voters — white voters, rural voters, etc. — do have more power. So yeah, Sarah, that doesn’t make me especially optimistic about a big Republican elite turnaround on Trumpism, separate from the question of whether that would actually diffuse some of these tensions.

sarahf: One silver lining in all this is we don’t yet know the full extent to which Trump and Trumpism has taken a hit. That is, plenty of Republicans still support him, but his approval rating has taken a pretty big hit, the biggest since his first few months in office in 2017 — that’s atypical for a president on his way out the door. More Republicans also support impeachment of Trump this time around.

There is a radicalized element here in American politics — and as you’ve all said — it isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, but I do wonder if we still don’t fully understand where this goes next.

Kaleigh: What gives me some peace in this time is looking back at history. America has dealt with far-right extremists before. It has dealt with violent insurrectionists before. We have continued, however slowly, to make progress. Sometimes the only way out is through.

[lovemesomesurveys]

Is your nose stuffed up at the moment? Nope.

Do you like apples? Not especially. I couldn’t even tell you the last time I had one.

Do you ever read the newspaper? No. I read my news online for the most part and catch some on TV.

Is anyone in your house sick? No.

Someday do you ever want to go and see the Egyptian pyramids? Damn, it’s almost a 16 hour flight to Egypt from California.

Have you ever seen the Statue of Liberty? No. I’ve never even been to New York.

When’s the last time you got your hair cut? Back in February.

When’s the last time you rode a bike? Never.

Spring or summer? Spring out of the two, but meh. It means summer is next and that I don’t like.

Do you like to go sledding in the winter? I’ve never done it.

Do any of your friends’ boyfriend/girlfriends annoy you? I don’t have friends.

What time is it? 5:24AM.

Will you be calling someone tomorrow? No.

Have you smiled today? Yeah.

Do you wish you could start over with anyone? Sometimes.

Do you like Kid Cudi? I liked Day ‘n’ Nite. Whatever happened to him?

Or, who is your favorite rapper? Some that I listen to are Megan Thee Stallion, Cardi B, Nicki Minaj,  Drake, Post Malone, Travis Scott, DaBaby, Roddy Ricch, Bryson Tiller, Tory Lanez...

Have you ever created a survey? Once, a longggg time ago. Like, during the Xanga days sometime. 

Where were you today? I’m at home and that’s where I’ll stay. 

When was the last time you had to give bad news? I’m usually the one receiving the bad news.

Were you sad today? Sad is one of my personality traits.

Do you take any foreign language classes? I’m not in school anymore, but I did in high school and one semester in college.

When’s the last time you received bad news? My doctor wanting me to do ridiculous xrays that aren’t necessary and then throwing in the possibility of doing a spinal cord stimulator and I’m like yeah, absolutely not.

Are your parents together or divorced? They’re still together.

Is there one person you look at and automatically smile? My doggo.

Who are you texting? No one.

What are you doing later on? My Bible study.

Do you wish anyone in particular was still in your life? Yeah, a few people.

Who was the last person you were on the phone with? My mom.

What makes you happy? My doggo, trips to the beach, Disneyland, binging a show with my mom, that first sip of coffee, when it rains, fall, the holidays.

Ever liked someone older than you? Only by a couple years.

Which did you discover first, myspace or Facebook? Myspace. I’m old.

Have you kissed a: A, B, C, D, E, G, K, U, Q, V, T ? D and G. 

What was the last thing you ate and why? Ramen. I like having my nightly bowl of ramen, it’s my thing.

What was the last thing you drank and why? Starbucks Doubleshot energy drink cause I like ‘em.

How many tabs do you have open and what are they? 10: 2 are Tumblr related (1 is my dash and the other is my likes), YouTube, Pinterest, 2 LiveJournal survey blogs, Facebook, a Christian radio website page relating to something my church is doing, a website with different prayers and scriptures related to them, and Spotify. 

What browser do you prefer to use? I only use Chrome.

What’re five random things on your desk besides any computer-related items? I don’t have a desk.

What room are you in right now? Mine.

What color are the walls and floor in that room? White walls, tan carpet.

What’re the items closest to you that’re red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, white, gray, brown, black, silver and gold? Red: Red and black plaid throw pillow. Orange: Orange highlighter.  Yellow: Yellow highlighter. Green: Baby Yoda plushie. Blue: Mist fan. Purple: There’s some purple on one of my pillows. Pink: Bottle of Pepto Bismol. White: There’s white on my Starbucks Doubleshot energy drink can. Grey: My remote.  Brown: My Baby Yoda plushie is wearing brown. Black: Laptop keyboard. Silver: My laptop. Gold: A gold garland strand across my dresser from last Christmas. :X

Out of all the things you listed above, which is your favorite? Baby Yoda plushie! 

What kind of chair are you sitting in? I’m sitting on my bed.

Where would you prefer to be right now? I want to be right here.

Do you have any plans this weekend? No.

Are you excited for anything this month? This month is just about over, so I’m hoping it starts to cool down soon.

What’s the date today? It’s September 28th.

Is there anything special about today? No.

How’re you physically feeling right now? Tired and my stomach is messing with me.

How’re you emotionally feeling right now? Blah.

Have you ever traveled outside of your home country? I’ve been to Mexico once.

Can you speak, read and/or write in another language besides English? Some Spanish.

What language course did you take in school, if any? Four years of Spanish in high school and one semester in college.

What language would you most like to learn? I’d like to be fluent in Spanish.

What grade are you in right now? I’m done with school.

What would you like to get a degree in? I have my BA in psych.

What was you dream job when you were a little kid? I wanted to be a teacher.

What happened to that dream? I decided it wasn’t what I wanted to do anymore when I got older. I didn’t feel cut out to teach.

Speaking of dreams, when was the last time you had a sleeping dream and what was it about? I always have the most random, weirdest dreams.

Do you have more nightmares or good dreams? Mostly just random and weird.

Do you wake up a lot in the middle of the night? I’m always up all night, so no.

Can you sleep comfortably in another bed besides your own? I can sleep fine in hotel beds. Those are the only other beds I sleep in.

What book are you reading, what genre is it and do you like it so far? “Say You Love Me” by Willow Rose. It’s a murder-mystery and thriller. It’s the 4th book in a series and I’ve really enjoyed them all so far. They’ve all had a really crazy twist I didn’t see coming.

Are you a shorts wearing kind of person? Nope. I never wear shorts.

Is your grandparents’ house obsessively tidy? Yeah.

About how much can you bench press? I can’t at all.

Do you get embarrassed easily? Yes.

Is dinner done yet? It’s 7 in the morning.

Have you ever had your phone die on you in the middle of a conversation? I’m sure it’s happened before.

Is anybody in your family a carpenter? No.

Are you avoiding someone? You could say that.

How social are you? I don’t have a social life at all anymore. 

What’s your favorite primary color? Yellow. 

What were you for Halloween? I stopped dressing up a few years ago.

Do you like hot chocolate? Yeah.

What do you have pierced? Just my earlobes.

What’s your favorite type of tea? Mint or chamomile. 

Do you have any clothes from Walmart? I have a couple shirts.

Are you hungry? Kind of, but my stomach is feeling a little meh.

When did you get a Facebook? Back in 2008.

What color are your eyes? Brown.

How’re you feeling? Tired and blah.

What motivates you? I haven’t felt motivated in a long time...

Can you walk in heels? No.

When was the last time someone asked you your age? I get asked often in surveys.

Why are you taking this survey? I want to.

Do you ever sing in the shower? Yeah.

Do you keep a journal? This is my journal. I share a lot in these surveys.

When is your favorite time of day? When I have my first cup of coffee and the late and early hours when I do my usual routine of surveys and ASMR videos.

How often do you get headaches? Often. 

Have you ever tried a weird flavor of vodka? I had caramel vodka before. I don’t think that’s weird, though.

Do you wear a ring on your finger? Nope.

What are you doing? Besides the obvious, I’m listening to an ASMR video.

What’s the last kind of soup you ate? Ramen.

Do you currently have a sunburn? No. I wasn’t able to have my beach trips this year, which is the only time I spend a significant amount of time outdoors. I’ve hardly been out of the house at all since March.

Could you eat nothing but grilled cheese for a week straight? No.

Have you ever thought about getting your nose pierced? Nah.

Who did you last text? My mom.

Who’d you last call? About what? My mom to ask her something.

Are you currently frustrated with someone? No one but myself.

Have you graduated from high school? Yeah, back in 2008...

Did you receive a good morning text today? I don’t receive those.

Will you be having sex tonight? No.

Do you drink hard liquor? No, I don’t drink anymore.

Have you met anyone new yet today? No. I highly doubt I will.

Do you drink water or soda more often? Water.

Do you straighten your hair? No.

When did you last talk to your brother or sister? Last night.

If you have younger siblings, how old were you when your siblings were born? I was 9 when my brother was born.

Do you watch the Big Bang Theory? No, I never could get into it.

Would you ever pick up gum from the ground and eat it? What in the actual.... NO. Ew, who the hell would do that???

Have you ever gotten stitches? Yeah, several times.

Do you pluck your eyebrows? Yeah.

Think back to the last thing you drank. Did you drink it using a straw? Yeah, I always use a straw.

Do you ever listen to country music? Sometimes.

This time last year were you happier then or now? Neither then or now.

Does your bathroom have a theme to it? No.

From inside of your house, how many doors lead outside? Two.

Do you sometimes use your music player to help you fall asleep? No.

What’s your favorite music video at the moment? I don’t watch music videos anymore. I miss the TRL days, I always looked forward to the top countdown and new video releases.

Can you play the violin? No. I took violin in 4th grade, but I just didn’t enjoy it. Me and the violin didn’t vibe like the piano and I did. I stuck it out for the year and then I was done.

Is the sun shining? Yeah.

Where did you go today? Nowhere.

Have you ever taken a survey while under the influence of drugs or alcohol? Yeah.

Where will you be in an hour? Right here in bed.

Is anyone irritating you? No.

Did you wake up in the middle of the night last night? I haven’t gone to bed, yet. 

The last time you burned your tongue or mouth, what were you eating? Probably ramen.

Have your parents ever threatened to throw your things away because your room was messy? No.

Is there any one food you constantly find yourself craving? Boneless wings from Wingstop.

What’s the longest time you’ve ever spent in front of the computer doing surveys? Well, my nightly routine consists of doing surveys. It’s usually between the hours of like 3AM to 7AM. Some of that time is also spent scrolling through my dash, but for the most part it’s doing surveys.

Name someone with big eyes. *shrug*

Do you like the humidity? Nooo.

Who will you hang out with next? My family.

Is your shirt pink? No.

What’s something fuzzy near you? Giraffe stuffed animal.

Are you going to do more surveys? Maybe. I should be going to bed, though...

Who is the most complicated person in your life right now? Me.

Are there a lot of trees in your yard? No, just one.

Did the last type of shoes you wore have laces? Yeah. 

How much money do you have on you right now? Some.

Are you CPR certified? No.

What genre is your favorite movie? I have several favorite movies that fall under the horror, psychological thriller, drama, romantic comedy, comedy, fantasy, and sci-fi genres. 

Are you texting anybody right now? No.

Who was the last person you were in a car with? My mom.

Do you like the picture on your license/I.D. card? No.

What’s your favorite thing to snack on while watching a movie? If I go to the theater then I gotta have popcorn.

When was the last time somebody hit on you? It’s been years.

Was the last person you met a male or female? Female.

Which one of your friends do you feel most comfortable around?

Do you own a map of the world? No.

What brand is your underwear? They’re from JCP.

What’s your favorite Thanksgiving food? Mashed potatoes and gravy and the stuffing.

Is the light on in the room you’re in? Nope.

Who did you last spoon with? I haven’t spooned with anyone.

Are you currently watching TV? It’s on, but I’m not watching it at the moment cause I’m watching/listening to an ASMR video.

Have you ever had surgery ? I’ve had several.

Do you own any clothing that has animal print? No.

Does your family eat dinner together? Sometimes.

Where do you work? I don’t.

Are you in high school? No. I’ve been out of high school for well over a decade now.

Do you have a TV in your room? Yep.

Are any of your electronics charging right now? My phone, laptop, and Nintendo Switch.

What was the last video game you played? Animal Crossings: New Horizons.

[alexanicholsauthor]

The world according to Anne, my writing playlists, and calling James Patterson out for a fight

Back when I was doing daily Diary entries (I still don’t see how I pulled that off considering everything else I was juggling), I used to let Anne occasionally slip in and write an entry for me. I would label these little creative outbursts of hers as “Anne’s entry” and just let her go to town – no grammar checking, no filtering, and no direction as to what she should write about. She loved it.

So, I figured it was time to give her another stab at it. What’s the worst that could happen, right? 😳

I got new video games and been watching Jersey shore I really like it. Alexa girl be you was right about the show. Do you want to hang out this weekend? How is your writing going I want to tell you about this new movie Call Deep sleep you should watch trailer for it. We been having fun Mario kart 8 I am all most done with one of Batman telltale game. The game are awesome. I like watching lore it’s very different.

So, there you are. The world, according to Anne. 🥰

My life has been a combination of three things lately: Jersey Shore binge-watching with Anne, overdosing on wax cubes (I love those damn things!), and writing like a fevered madwoman to get Erotic Urban Legends: Pulse finished for my Patreon peeps. As I write this, a dear friend of mine is beta reading it for me, so as soon as I get it back and throw it at the rest of my Beta Reader Hit Squad, it will be shelved! I really wanted to make a short horror story, but this motherfucker ended up 22,844 words – far from what I intended.

Initially, I gave myself a cap of 2,500 words, and the first version was somewhat close to that. After three different revisions and some severe brainstorming… things got a little out of hand. 😅 While my stories always inflate during the revision process, this was a bit ridiculous. I swear I spoil the shit out of my Patreons…

Because of my release schedule, I won’t be able to release it to the general public until April 2022, but I’ll give you a sneak peek of the cover now:

Because I was writing this, I had to temporarily pause the last book in my Exitium Mundi series, which is in the rough draft stage itself. Which means I’m also paused in the middle of Voyeur’s Season 2 (no, I swear it isn’t abandoned) and the next book in the Killer Lolis series: Hunt for the Lolistone. The cover for that book (which is also in the rough draft stage!) is below:

So many things I want to write, so little time! 😭 And then there are other stories that are almost finished that I really need to polish up like Mya, Lilith, Invictus, Balls Deep – A Love Story, and others. I need more hands. Or maybe I can pull a James Patterson and hire other motherfuckers to write my books for me and just sit back and rake in the money. I will never do this, of course, because, you know, I’m actually a writer…

#Shade #ShotsFired #ComeAtMeBro

Maybe I just need to double down my writing efforts. I dunno.

Which reminds me. I decided to add yet another feature to my paperbacks: playlists! See, before I write a book, I compile a 100-song playlist, and I listen to nothing but that playlist while I write. It was an idea sparked by a request from a reader (thank you, John!), and I decided to run with it. I’ve already started including short stories, previews of upcoming books, and interviews in the paperback editions of my books, so this will fit in nicely I think. Just for kicks, here’s the playlist I wrote to for Erotic Urban Legends: Pulse.

Ängie: Spun + Smoke Weed Eat Pussy + Housewife Spliffin Avicii: Wake Me Up Awolnation: Sail AZ Yet: Last Night Backstreet Boys: Inconsolable Bebe Rexha: I’m Gonna Show You Crazy + No Broken Hearts ft. Nicki Minaj Bhad Bhabie: Bestie (Feat. Kodak Black) Billie Eilish: Bad Guy + You Should See Me in a Crown Boyz II Men: Oh Well Brad Paisley: Whiskey Lullaby (feat. Allison Krauss) Britney Spears: Criminal Ed Sheeran: Shape of You Fall Out Boy: My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark (Light Em Up) (Part 1) Fat Joe: Make It Rain Finger Eleven: Paralyzer + One Thing Frankie J: Daddy’s Little Girl Full Exposure (feat. Mario & Serayah) Geto Boys: Mind Playing Tricks On Me (Uncut) Ginuwine: When Doves Cry Go West: King Of Wishful Thinking Hailee Steinfeld: Most Girls Halsey: Nightmare Hayley Kiyoko: Girls Like Girls Insane Clown Posse: In My Room Jessica Simpson: I Belong To Me Justin Timberlake: Cry Me A River Ke$ha: TiK ToK Keri Hilson: Pretty Girl Rock kirstin: Break A Little + Naked + Bad Weather Linkin Park: The Hybrid Theory + Living Things + and Recharged albums. Mario Winans: I Don’t Wanna Know Maroon 5: Girls Like You ft. Cardi B MAX: Lights Down Low Offset: Clout ft. Cardi B Phil Collins: In The Air Tonight Porcelain Black: Naughty Naughty + I’m Your Favorite Drug Post Malone: Rockstar + Goodbyes ft. Young Thug R. Kelly featuring Keri Hilson: Number One Rita-Ora: Girls Santana: Maria + Maria Seckond Chaynce: Undeniable Silk: Freak Me Baby Somo: Ride Star Cast: I Bring Me + There For You Tamar Braxton: All the Way Home + Love and War + Let Me Know ft. Future + Prettiest Girl + The One Taylor Swift: Gorgeous The Fugees: Killing Me Softly The Weeknd: Often + Party Monster Tinashe: No Drama Young Jeezy: Tear It Up

Thanks for reading my latest rant, beloveds. I really appreciate it. 🥰

[gifsbysimplysonia]

End of Day Sh!t Post - September 20, 2019

This is literally so insane to me. I’m super grateful to anyone who has read and hit the like button, and to the others who also reblogged and to the handful of you who have left reaction GIFs and/or comments!!! It’s, like, surreal and exciting to see something I created resonate with anyone else. I convince myself I’m the only one who likes the things I like, and this story has a very specific vibe that I thought would freak people out (and it probably did lol) but that anyone else vibes with it is pretty cool. Makes me feel way less alone. 

I actually moved quite a bit on the next part which I’ve been working on for weeks. The thing is, it’s going its own way and I don’t think it’s developing into something anyone else would like. People seemed to like Ransom being a dickhead and having a hard edge in the first story, right? Well, my dumb ass has no idea how to write cold people or keep it to no-strings-attached sex. So my  muse, she’s trying to develop a REASON for how he is, and as always ... trying to give him the tiniest bit of heart.

I don’t think that’s what people want to see from that character? Me and my bestie, we happen to adore secret sweeties, but like ... Ransom is different. We don’t know him yet, so it was easy for me to build him “from scratch” essentially. My brain didn’t HAVE any reason to STOP me and go, “NOPE, you can’t do that cuz that’s not how he is!” But like, if that’s how I established him, isn’t it then disappointing to explain the edge away? And actually put emotion into the exchange? LoL it’s not even that I’m subtracting the edge. I like that, it was fun as hell to write, it’s that whole vibe that suddenly got me writing again! But, because I don’t like mean people or I can’t imagine how they actually WORK ... my muse has to put reasons to everything and it’s ... sigh. 

It’s frustrating cuz I figure people would prefer smut. That seems to be the trend with fic. Even terribly written smut seems to get so much more attention over thoughtfully developed characters and plot; it’s actually upsetting sometimes. But, in this instance, isn’t that what Ransom lends himself to? Nobody wants to know WHY he is the way he is, they just want the sass and the vibe and sex and to Hell with anything else. Right? 

I know I’m supposed to write what I wanna write, but like, I dunno. Sadly, that’s all I CAN do. I don’t know how to do anything else lol but my brain is forever getting in my way and I’m forever worrying about things 70 years in advance so ... this is how it’s going for me right now lol. I wish I could smoke weed cuz I like to BELIEVE that it would turn my brain OFF and allow me to maybe just GO with whatever flow hits. But the way my luck works, it’d probs have the total opposite effect it’s supposed to have on me and then my brain would be going overtime arguing with me lol. 

It was an ok week on my end so I hope everyone else had one too. Quiet, no news is good news type of week. It’s supposed to rain this weekend which I hop does NOT happen cuz we still have a bunch of areas where I live that are flooded from the last severe thunderstorms that came through here. 

I have burst into tears twice today thinking of my former Alaskan bestie. I have an emotional trauma I have been refusing to deal with and it loves to just bubble up when I’m not expecting it or out of nowhere. This morning, I was listening to a song I just discovered called “Goodbyes” by Post Malone and I just ... burst into tears thinking about her. I keep pushing it down and repressing cuz I don’t know how to deal with the loss. I’m not sure I even have the right to the pain because she had decided to pull out of our friendship years before I learned of how her story ended. So ... I dunno, y’all. 

If you have people you love, I ask that you do me a favor and TELL THEM SO. Send a text. Send a letter. Pick up the phone and call them. Go over to them and hug them. Life is fleeting and finding people who we connect with and can have close to us is so incredibly precious. And then one day it’s too late or it’s over and it’s devastating. So take advantage of the time you have with the ones you love because who the hell knows, right? 

:) 

Love and light to all who happen upon this and/or need it. 

[beardyallen]

Bad news, guys...

Alright, so I’ve decided that, seeing as I’ll be visiting W-Town and the Great Wall again in May (when it will be waaaaay prettier), I’ll just do a post about it then.

Suffice it to say, it was a dope trip.

HOWEVER!!!!! I’ll tell y’all about my time since. The major highlight since the W-Town trip was obviously St. Patrick’s Day. I was somewhat nervous, given that most of the people I’ve met here probably wouldn’t want to celebrate the way that my family (which is way better at St. Patrick’s Day than your family, thank-you-very-much) celebrate.

There were no green alligators or long-necked geese, and that bleeding pub didn’t catch fire. Certainly not 12 times!! I suppose I still saw the same number of unicorns as usual, but I think I would have had bigger problems if there more.

My plan for that day was to make it to Paddy O’Shea’s Pub, the Irish pub of Beijing, by 12pm on the 17th. As it turns out, the Pub had started their St. Patrick’s Day celebration on the 16th because they knew some people wouldn’t want to be completely hungover for work the next day.

For me, though, 12pm on the 17th seemed a perfect time to start as it would be 12am on the morning of my grandmother’s would-be 91st birthday. I could go on and on about how wonderful that woman was, and how big of an impact she had on me, but I’ll just say this: she was a good Bud. I’m obviously incredibly thankful for this teaching opportunity, but I’m struggling with being okay about missing out on St. Patrick’s Day in Northern Michigan this year. At least I was there last year and for Christmas and the New Year. That will have to be enough.

Anyway, I went with ML, S and another neighbor L, none of whom have ever truly celebrated St. Patrick’s Day like an American, let alone a Sylvain, but they were open to trying. And I was the one leading the group, which I still think is strange as I thought I was the least capable of the 4 of us at guiding a group through this very Chinese city. Fortunately, that compass in my brain works just as well on this side of the world as it does state-side.

Oh, and I looked damn fine, if I do say so myself!

We were a tad late to Paddy O’Shea’s, but the beer came quickly enough, and it tasted almost as good as it would have at the Side Door Saloon.

I didn’t take a picture of the bangers and mash that I ordered, but I couldn’t have been more pleased.

One major difference between celebrating here versus back in the States: there were people born and raised in Ireland celebrating with us! And there was a really cute bartender from just outside Dublin that came to serve beer just for that evening...

OH! On the Wednesday before, one of my students asked if I was going to wear a green hat when I celebrated, and the rest of the room laughed. I didn’t get the joke, commented that I’d for sure wear my green tie but that I didn’t own a green hat. After inquiring about the hat, they shared that, in China, wearing a green hat sort of sends the message that you’re a cuckold. 

I would later find out the “historical basis” for this strange cultural faux pas: during the Warring States Era in China, there was a famous political icon who I was known to wear a green hat. Apparently he was a big deal, and he always wore a green hat. And then his wife cheated on him, so now a green hat means what it means. That’s it. That’s the whole story. It happened to one dude who happened to wear a green hat, and now it’s this huge thing that college students laugh about. *shrug*

Anyway, back to Paddy O’Shea’s. The bar itself was more “authentic” than I have grown to expect. I’ll probably pass the time in that pub a few more times before my time here is up. One of the key advantages is that it has a fully functioning website, which is something I’ve learned not to take for granted anymore. When I was searching in the days prior for a place to celebrate, I had stumbled across another bar: Molly Malone’s. Do not (I REPEAT: DO NOT) visit the website for Molly Malone’s. Especially at work. With the door open. When anybody and their mother could walk by.

The website, the one that the location on Google Maps and every other map app links you to, looks like a mid ‘90′s website with a few notable images. I’ll describe it for you to the best of my memory: the background is all black, all of the text is placed in little white rectangles, all of which span the middle 40% of the site and fit jigsaw-like to form one large rectangle of questionable links. The font itself is in a variety of cheap styles and bright, neon colors. Flashing text, coloring-changing text. The works. Again: it looked like a mid ‘90′s website. But not just any mid ‘90′s website.

A mid ‘90′s website with vulgar images that would make a 12 year old blush and fidget uncomfortably in their seat. I repeat again: do not visit this site! WHY IS THIS THE OFFICIAL SITE FOR THE WEBSITE?

And when I found out that, not only is this bar a real place that happens to be near a few foreign embassies and it is reportedly not-too-difficult to find a “lady of the night” in its vicinity, I wasn’t surprised? Why is it that those two pieces of information just “fit together?”

*sigh*

Paddy O’Shea’s, in contrast, is an upstanding establishment. And though they had started their party the day before and kept it going all night, the place was still in remarkably good shape, all things considered. Most of the seating was filled when we arrived, but by the time I left around 8pm (I’m completely guessing here; I have no idea what time it was), all of the standing room was occupied.

ML and S seemed quite gungho about having an Irish Car Bomb, while L was shocked that anyone would use such a phrase to describe a beverage. Unfortunately, ML had some grading to get back to, so they left before we ordered one, but not before some rando came by and spray-dyed my beard and S’s hair green.

The dude in the middle isn’t the guy that did the coloring; just another “victim.”

Not too long after, my officemate showed up; it was comforting to have someone there who had a decent grasp on the holiday!

The non-Americans left soon thereafter, but AL and I kept ourselves sufficiently “entertained.” His friend P was also meeting us! She don’t think she’s ever really celebrated St. Patrick’s Day either, but she joined AL and myself in our one and only Irish Car Bomb of the day. Kudos to her!

AL and I chatted the next day and confided that we were both a bit more pissed than we thought...

NR also came out to join us, but she didn’t arrive until after P was getting hungry. Although why she didn’t seem interested in bangers and mash, I have no idea. When AL and P left, P made sure to leave me with some chaperones, a group of ex-pats from several other countries who P had joined for a shot of Fireball. For some reason. P was terrified at the idea of leaving me alone at a bar in Beijing. As if anything could go wrong?! I was with my people!

Anyway, I chatted up a nice girl from Texas, mostly about teaching because what else do I talk about nowadays, and NR finally showed. The good sport that she is, she joined me for another beer, and then we left to find food elsewhere. The place was getting to be a bit to much; she had just arrived, my voice was on it’s way out, and her’s would have joined it not too long after.

As it turns out, there was a place just around the corner that specialized in Peking Duck, something that AL and I were both quite curious to try thanks to KFC’s interesting spin on it...

But again: my beard was green. And I wouldn’t say that I was loaded, but there were at least four rounds in my six-shooter, if you catch my meaning. And this restaurant was niiiiiiiiceeee!!! There were 4 different people who helped us before we got to our table: one took our reservation, another led us to the stairs, a third took us up the stairs, and a fourth led us the last 10 feet to our table.

In hindsight, I was worried that it was just the way-too-many-beers-prior-to-entering-this-establishment that made watching this guy slice the duck so fascinating, but NR mentioned the followed day that she found the experience just as captivating.

Also, I’ve never been one for bathroom selfies...but when (drunk) in Rome (and by Rome, I mean a restaurant that I have no business being in), you do as Romans do. (Fun fact: Roman’s invented selfies. #themoreyouknow #notfakenews #youhearditherefirst)

#romansdidntinventselfies #dontberidiculous #leavetheridiculousnesstomeandmygreenbeard

Seriously. This dude was awesome. I wish we had more footage...Guess you’ll just have to go there for yourself!

We also ordered several other dishes, all of which were amazing. Some shrimp, some part of a lamb, I think. All of it was good. Like everything else I’ve had in China!

All in all, the weekend was dope, the week after was less-so, and the coming weekends will be amazing. My students had their first exam this week, and on Tuesday I ordered an American cheeseburger and a Budweiser from a western-style restaurant just to see if it holds up out here. It was...so-so. Last night, I joined a couple friends for a drink at a bar called “Lush;” apparently it was open-mic night. One of the guys I was with was hoping for an environment more conducive to idle chit-chat amongst the group, so we ended up leaving after only one. I was displeased as I was having a great time. Guess I’ll just have to wander back out that way on my own sometime.

The plan for Sunday was to visit the Forbidden City, but I guess they ran out of tickets, so we’ll find something else to do. Will post after that. The weekend after is a Craft Beer festival that several of the faculty here will be visiting. I’m pumped.

OH! And I think I’ll be visiting Shanghai at the end of April! I didn’t know this, but apparently Shanghai was all grassland like 50 years ago! (This, according to one of the guys last night. Feel free to fact-check this.)

It’s going to be an interesting couple of weeks...

If only I could get my sleep schedule back on track. This whole “falling asleep at 4am and waking up at Noon” business is getting ridiculous. I blame my teaching schedule. #ishouldntcomplainbecauseimteachinginchina

Sláinte,

BeardyAllen

P.S. I’m super pumped for Shazam! And the End Game trailers are driving me up a wall...

[claremal-one]

What Are The X-Factors That Could Change The Results In Iowa?

Welcome to a special edition of FiveThirtyEight’s weekly politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.

sarahf (Sarah Frostenson, politics editor): Our last politics chat before the 2020 Democratic primary kicks off!! And we’re talking Election X factors! Or what things we should be looking at, besides the polls (and our forecast), that could affect who wins on Monday?

geoffrey.skelley (Geoffrey Skelley, elections analyst): To me, in a race that is so close, the number of precincts in which a candidate is either ahead or falling short of the viability threshold – 15 percent at most caucus sites — seems like it could be really important for what happens on Monday. Because say, someone like Bernie Sanders, if his support is concentrated in more urban areas or college towns, does that mean someone like Joe Biden could get more delegate support because he has backing across more rural areas? I don’t know.

nrakich (Nathaniel Rakich, elections analyst): Yeah, and related to that point: The polls only measure voters’ initial preferences. But caucusgoers are allowed to realign if their candidate doesn’t meet the viability threshold, and then, of course, the delegates awarded are based on that post-realignment total.

In other words, the polls can’t really tell us exactly how votes will translate into delegates. So it will matter whose support is distributed the most efficiently.

sarahf: (Quick side note: For the first time, raw vote tallies from the first and second alignments will be released publicly, as well as the state delegate equivalents that a candidate earns. In the past, the party only reported the delegate tallies.)

ameliatd (Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, senior writer): Well, and an interesting question along those lines, Geoffrey, is how much will turnout shape the final narrative? In the past, when raw vote totals weren’t released, candidates like Sanders didn’t have as much of an incentive to run up their numbers in places like college towns where they have lots of densely concentrated support. This year, that will be different, and it could make for some confusion when the delegate counts and the raw votes are in.

I’m also curious to see what kind of horse-trading will go on in the caucuses themselves!

geoffrey.skelley: Definitely true, Amelia. I’m looking forward to the possibility of a scenario where Sanders wins the post-realignment raw vote total, but Biden wins the delegate count.

ameliatd: That’s one of the things that makes caucuses so fascinating and unpredictable — people are literally trying to convince each other to join their side as it’s happening.

sarahf: And you’ll be there to see it in action, Amelia! That ought to be wild.

ameliatd: Yes! I will be on the ground at a precinct in Iowa City, which I think will be one of the hubs for a potential Warren/Sanders showdown. My Monday night is going to be full of drama.

sarahf: But play out that scenario you just mentioned, a little bit more, Geoff. How could it work that Sanders wins more votes, but Biden wins more delegates (and therefore Iowa)?

geoffrey.skelley: Basically, every precinct is worth a certain number of state delegate equivalents, which is used to determine delegate allocation for national delegates. So if you get particularly high turnout at a precinct near, say, the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Johnson County, that precinct’s value for delegate purposes is already set based on a calculation determined by the 2016 presidential and 2018 gubernatorial Democratic vote share in that precinct. So if Sanders gets like 500 of 600 voters there, it might have the same delegate value as Biden dominating in a different precinct with 150 voters if they are worth the same number of state delegate equivalents. In the 2016 caucuses, for instance, Hillary Clinton swept all 1.6 SDEs in a Waterloo, Iowa, precinct that had 141 people show up, while Sanders got 1.6 of 1.8 SDEs in an Iowa City precinct that had 646 participants. We can’t know what the “popular vote” was in those precincts in 2016 — that’s available for the first time this year — but the delegate value for the two candidates was pretty much the same, even though one precinct had far higher turnout.

nrakich: I’m curious — which of those measures will you guys be paying the most attention to?

sarahf: I mean … I find the whole “both sides could claim victory on caucus night” a bit disingenuous, or at the very least, there should be a heavy burden on the media to report it responsibly. Because you can’t claim victory from the pre-alignment vote total!! That’s not how caucuses work. (Now you can have quibbles with why Iowa caucuses in the first place sure, but this whole sowing confusion narrative bothers me. Let’s not sow confusion!)

nrakich: Why not, Sarah?

That’s the popular vote!

That’s how almost every other state does it, i.e., primary states.

It is the most small-d democratic.

sarahf: That’s true, but Iowa isn’t a primary state! And maybe caucuses should be banned for the reasons you outline (it is really time consuming to caucus), but it’s not like how the winner in Iowa is determined has changed. It’s still based on the number of state delegate equivalents a candidate wins, we’ll just get to see more inside the process, which as a journalist, I’m 100 percent in favor of. More data always, please.

But that means as journalists we have a responsibility to talk about the three different vote totals in the context of how they work within a caucus, e.g. don’t read too much into the pre-alignment vote, because this will change (not every candidate will have enough support to make it to the next round of voting). That vote is the most small-d democratic, as you say, but it’s also not how caucuses work, so we shouldn’t feed into that narrative! Although, I’m sure some candidates will. But whatever. Report the process; don’t sow confusion.

nrakich: My short argument for why the initial preference numbers are the most important is that they’re the best representation of how voters feel — kind of like a massive poll. The state delegate equivalents might matter more for delegate selection, but Iowa is a small state — the number of delegates a candidate gets there is less important than the momentum/vote of confidence he/she receives.

geoffrey.skelley: Right, Nathaniel — in fact, AAPOR (the American Association for Public Opinion Research) recommends that journalists compare poll results from this cycle to those pre-realignment numbers when considering the accuracy of polls.

clare.malone (Clare Malone, senior political writer): Here’s a pulled-out question, not related to thresholds: Is there anything that could happen in this last weekend to sway things one way or the other for voters still on the bubble? Is it good for the Democrats that all these senators aren’t going to be in the Senate for a drawn-out impeachment trial after all?

ameliatd: I have to imagine, Clare, that the senators are pretty excited about the prospect of getting back to Iowa. They’ve had surrogates campaigning on their behalf, but having the actual candidate there seems like a much better recipe for firing up their supporters — and that enthusiasm can really matter in the caucuses.

clare.malone: Another x-factor to mention: Could some big-name establishment Democrat speak out against Sanders? That sort of stuff has been floating around the past couple of weeks in news stories. It’s the kind of thing you could see happening on a Sunday show or a cable interview over the weekend.

sarahf: I mean, that’s a great question. In theory, Iowa always has at least a few polling surprises, but it’s also kind of hard for me to see Buttigieg, Warren or Amy Klobuchar making a big comeback at this point.

I know, never say never. But it’s hard for me to see this path — don’t @ me!!

Someone from the Democratic establishment speaking out against Sanders, on the other hand … that could be

.

Except Democrats would be smart to not have the spokesperson be Hillary Clinton. I feel like that Hollywood Reporter story about that new documentary where she dished on Sanders, and what it was like working with him in Congress, just fired up his base more than it actually hurt him.

nrakich: I don’t know if any figure in the party is big enough to matter, unless their last name is Obama.

And I don’t think either of the Obamas is going to weigh in at this point.

Mayyyybe if Sanders wins the first few states and he becomes the favorite to win the nomination …

geoffrey.skelley: Which could definitely happen — if he wins Iowa, he’ll be favored in New Hampshire and probably Nevada, too.

ameliatd: It would make sense to me if it were that the big establishment figures were biding their time to see how Sanders does in Iowa, and holding their fire until then.

clare.malone: I think the polling surprise is a great point, Sarah.

And considering the big Des Moines Register poll didn’t drop this weekend, we’re kind of in the dark as to where things could be headed. Hazard any guesses on potential surprises?

sarahf: I mean, we expect a few polls later today, but I was surprised in this last week that Buttigieg and Warren didn’t see more of an uptick. If anything, Warren actually ticked down more in our forecast this week despite the endorsement from the Des Moines Register, which should have helped her at least somewhat in the polls.

If anything, Klobuchar has started to do better. Granted she only has a 3 percent chance of winning the most votes in Iowa, but that’s been an interesting development to me anyways.

I mean … if anyone other than Sanders and Biden are in the top two at the end of the night on Monday, that’s an x-factor, right?

ameliatd: It’s all because of Klobuchar’s hot dish, Sarah. Never doubt the power of tater tots!

sarahf: Lol, that article.

nrakich: Klobuchar doing well would be an x-factor because I’m not sure there is room for FIVE front-runners. If Klobuchar surges, in my mind, someone like Buttigieg would have to crater.

As a reminder, we have never seen more than three candidates get more than 15 percent (the threshold required to get delegates) in any state before.

geoffrey.skelley: Definitely agree that it would be surprising if Biden or Sanders were not in the top two, but that’s certainly a possibility. With voters’ second-choice picks being really important in Iowa, I don’t want to totally discount anyone in the top four from winning, or anyone in the top five — so Klobuchar, too — from ending up in second or third.

And right now, we have three polling above 15 percent in Iowa and Warren just under that at 14 percent. Plus, Klobuchar is now right at 10 percent in our polling average.

perry (Perry Bacon Jr., senior writer): In some ways, I wonder if the buzz about Sanders’s potential to win Iowa and that victory catapulting him to the nomination happened a week or so too early for him. And it allowed his opponents within the party to hit him fairly hard, with an argument (electability) that Democratic voters really care about.

clare.malone: Ooooh, I like this take.

Interesting fodder!

And the idea that a person can have a “week too early” surge seems like a very Iowa phenom.

nrakich: It’s amazing how the timing of an election can matter. Random choices like whether the Iowa caucuses were this week or last week can make a big difference in who potentially gets elected leader of the free world.

ameliatd: Well, and a scenario like that could be especially helpful for Biden is that his supporters are generally older and perhaps more likely to caucus, too — although some of those folks aren’t necessarily regular caucusgoers.

perry: Buttigieg is even trying to get former Republicans to go to the caucuses. Those people are not going to support Sanders or Warren as a second choice.

geoffrey.skelley: Actually, age is one of the big questions about the caucus electorate — some polls have people under 50 making up as much as 47 percent of the electorate, which would be good news for Sanders, while others have it much lower than that. This has ramifications for each candidate’s poll numbers, but especially Sanders and Biden because their support at the age poles (oldest and youngest) are opposite of one another.

sarahf: So OK, say Sanders doesn’t win — because as Perry says, he peaked too early — does that put him a few points behind Biden … and Warren? Is there still room for her to be thought of as a moderate alternative to Sanders?

Perry: If the turnout is screwed young, I think Bernie will win. He really needs the electorate to be younger.

geoffrey.skelley: If Warren remains viable in most places, that actually could be quite bad for Sanders. And that’s because she’s the one whose backers are most likely to pick Sanders as their second choice. As the most recent Iowa State/Civiqs poll showed, 33 percent of Warren backers picked Sanders as their second choice, whereas no more than 11 percent of the other leading candidates’ backers chose Sanders as their top second choice.

nrakich: I mean, not to be that guy, Sarah, but in 80 percent of simulations in our model, Sanders could do anything from surge to 43 percent of the vote to drop to 11 percent in Iowa. And yeah, if he falls that far, he could finish below several other candidates (for the record, Warren’s range of outcomes in the 80-percent confidence interval is 3 percent to 31 percent).

ameliatd: I’m also really curious as to what will happen in places like Iowa City, which Bernie won handily in 2016. Obviously, a lot of 2016 Sanders’s voters are already supporting other candidates. But is it possible that all of the sudden focus on Bernie actually energizes his young lefty supporters and juices turnout even more?

Or, to answer your question, Sarah, maybe the attacks on Bernie prompt some progressive folks — the people who actually live and work in college towns, not the students — to give Warren a second look.

geoffrey.skelley: Thing is, because each precinct has a pre-assigned value based on the 2016-2018 Democratic vote, how much you can gain from juiced turnout near college campuses could be limited if it’s in select precincts.

nrakich: Right, which is why the actual preferences of Iowa voters is all that matters

sarahf: Lol, what about the possibility for technical glitches and the fact that Iowa is kind of sort of going to be making it easier to caucus this time around?

Do you think that’s an x-factor at all?

ameliatd: I’m a little skeptical of whether the satellite caucuses are actually going to make things easier. There are not that many of them, and they’re mostly in the middle of the day or the evening.

Of course, there will be a caucus in Tblisi, Georgia, which could really be what gives one of the candidates their edge.

geoffrey.skelley: Yeah, you still have to gather for a couple hours in the evening. Not like having ~12 hours to show up for 20 minutes and cast a ballot.

ameliatd: Or drop your ballot in the mail!

geoffrey.skelley: So I’m not expecting turnout to be crazy high.

nrakich: I think the overarching thing to remember here is that caucuses are always going to be harder to vote in than primaries. This article, about how difficult it can be for people with physical disabilities to caucus, really stuck with me.

#BanTheCaucus

sarahf: OK, rapid fire, final X-factors going into Monday. What do you think is super important to keep an eye on? I still think there’s got to be some kind of polling surprise that we just don’t know about yet, or wasn’t caught because there were a lot less polls this time around. …

nrakich: I think it will be whether the media makes a big deal out of “so-and-so winning Iowa,” even if he or she wins by just a fraction of a percentage point. To me, that is better thought of as a tie, but the way cable news tends to frame things as winners and losers could have a real impact on the narrative of which campaign is surging and which is struggling going into New Hampshire.

For instance, if Warren and Biden effectively tie, I think it will be spun as a win for Warren but a loss for Biden, and I don’t think it should be.

geoffrey.skelley: Relatedly, I’m interested in the possibility of having super ambiguous results because we will have three different outcomes to look at — first preference, final preference and state delegate equivalents, the last of which actually determines delegate counts.

ameliatd: I’m going to be a broken record but — turnout! Who shows up, and where? Whose supporters are most jazzed up and enthusiastic? That’s something that’s harder to predict/see until the caucuses are actually happening.

perry: What I’m looking for, before Monday night, are any clear urgings from really prominent Democrats to not back Sanders. (House Speaker Nancy Pelosi gave clearly anti-Sanders remarks on Friday, but they didn’t get much attention and she didn’t use his name.) Also, I’m watching for some of the lower-tier candidates to point their supporters to all get behind a second-choice person. (This would not be done by the candidate or their top staffers directly, but more under the radar.) So would most Yang/Gabbard supporters get behind Sanders? Klobuchar backers to Biden? The most interesting questions to me are whether Warren supporters, in places where she is not viable, mostly go to Sanders and in places where Buttigieg is not viable, if his supporters mostly go to Biden.

from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/2UfQbSp

via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR

[kuciradio]

DAY N NIGHT 2017 (part I)

The 2nd annual Hip-Hop festival Day-N-Night hosted by THE OBSERVATORY and presented by REVOLTtv happened this weekend September 8-10 at the Angel Stadium of Anaheim. As a first time attendee to this festival I must say I was very impressed. All three days offered an eclectic array of up and coming hip-hop artists. From precocious 12 year-old fidget spinner rapper sensation Matt Ox, to already more establish acts like Majid Jordan, there was something for everyone. And with big name headliners such as; Travis Scott, Grammy winning artists Kendrick Lamar, and Chance The Rapper, I already knew I was in for a good time.

The heat did not deter fans from going all out this weekend. Upon arrival on Day 1 of Day-N-Night, the temperatures were already in the high 80s, but the crowd was nevertheless beaming with excitement. Lines moved quickly thru security, and getting your wristband for the event was a breeze. My only complaint would be not being able to get your wristband upon receiving your tickets at will call, but perhaps that’s how they kept lines moving rather quickly, jumping from one line to another, allowed for constant fluidity.  As for VIP holders, one of many cool perks, was that they had a separate entrance in which allowed them to bypass the lines, which is a big deal when the event was rumored to host more than 20,000 thousand attendees.  Another perk as a VIP holder was that unlike other festivals where the VIP section is actually far off to the side of the stages, this time around VIP holders had the same opportunity as GA ticket holders to be in the front at centers stage, but with the benefit of not having thousands of attendees fighting for the same spot. But whether you were VIP or not the perk of having a festival being held at a baseball stadium were the restrooms! Yes, I said restrooms. Finally! Actual toilets and sinks to wash your hands off.  Portable Potties were still on site, no festival is a festival without them, but let’s be real no one was really using them.

The weekend was definitely a blissful hip-hop blur.  The first act I caught was THEY, a LA based hip-pop, R&B grunge duo. They were a great band to start the festival with, as their set was full of energy and heavy rock and roll vibes. On the main stage MadeinTYO kept the energy going by yelling to the crowd to mosh pits or get out. Later on, followed by 19 year old teen idol Khalid,  he brought back down the crowd a few notches with his slow jams and hits like “Location”. While on the other end of the festival grounds we had Majid Jordan performing their electronic ballads to an excited dancing crowd. I must say, Majid Jordan blew me away. The combination of intergalactic visuals juxtaposed to Majid’s crooning voice and Jordan’s electronic beats will forever be one of my favorite sets at Day-N-Night.  

Travis Scott closed Day 1 with a killer performance, flying on a hawk over the crowd and all. I had never seen Travis Scott perform live, and that night I walked out a fan. His energy on stage is electric. He definitely brought the house down.  

Day 2, I spent it mostly hanging out in the artists compound. I don’t even know how that happened, but it was definitely a change of scene. From rubbing elbows with Post Malone and seeing meme sensation ‘Cash me Ousside’ girl  Bhad Bhabie IRL, I got a glimpse of the shenanigans that happen backstage. And while that was fun and all, I mean I got a swagbag  full of goodies by sponsors RIP&DIP, (thanks for my cool new alien socks!) I still found myself bummed for missing out on some acts.  

Hearing the crowd sing out loud to Post Malone’s ‘Congratulations’ in the backstage area was bittersweet.  I still did manage to catch new sensation SZA perform on the main stage.  Her song ‘Drew Barrymore’ had the crowd going wild. Before SZA, British rapper Little Simz  held her own as she rapped songs ‘Dead Body’ and ‘Back Seat’. Don’t let her looks fool you. Little Simz knows how to deliver cut-throat lyrics and rhymes.  

By the end of the night of Day 2, Grammy winner Chance the Rapper had everybody dancing and singing along to gospel music. Day 3, had me glued all day to the front of the main stage awaiting Kendrick Lamar, and I wasn’t alone.  By 1 pm there was already a big crowd forming for Kendrick.  On the flipside, many of the acts I wanted to catch (aside from Massego and Daniel Ceasar) were performing on the main stage that day. Princess Nokia, showed festival goers that hip-hop is not an all man’s world. She flaunt her body with feminist pride and confidence, warning men that he who dared to harass or take advantage of any women in the festival would get their butts kicked out. Her song ‘Tomboy’ had the crowd dancing and singing along, while her freestyle rap proved that she is not one to be messed around with. 

Another act that I truly enjoyed was Russ. He made his fame via Soundcloud and killed it on stage.  He has a strong presence and as Princess Nokia, let the freestyle rap flow with tenacity and grace. My favorite song was ‘Goodbye’ as it reflected about toxic relationships and the catharsis of finally letting go. Before Kendrick hit the stage, we got a memorable performance by YG. Another Compton native, he had the crowd bumping and grinding to his hits like ‘Who do you Love’ and then taking a more political stand point when he brought out a Trump impersonator, for his song FDT towards the end of the set. Quite the memorable moment for the festival as Orange County is home of Sanctuary City Santa Ana. YG’s closing song paved way for Kendrick’s politically charged performance at the end of Day 3 of Day-N-Night. 

Kendrick Lamar made a dramatic entrance with his song DNA from his latest album DAMN. With storytelling visuals and pyrotechnics, Kung Fu Kenny had all of Orange County going mad with excitement. Kendrick delivered hits from his latest album such as ‘Loyalty and ‘Element’ but he also sang some of his classics like ‘Bitch don’t kill my Vibe’ and ‘Swimming Pools’. In all Kendrick Lamar was the cherry on top to what was already an amazing weekend full of music and memorable moments.

As the crowds dwindled down and I made my way back to the car, I realized how this weekend was make or break for The Observatory and for the festival’s future in Orange County.  Last year while the event as a whole was well curated and praised by many, fans did complained about the location as it was far in the canyons of Orange County and the 5 plus hour long traffic jammed caused by a “rumored’ shirtless gunman on the last day of the festival did not help at all to the cause. This year though, it seems that hosting the festival at The Angels Stadium parking lot was a stroke of genius by event staffers. While unconventional, it honestly felt like the perfect place to host a Hip-Hop festival. A concrete jungle if you will in the middle of Orange County suburbia.  Day n Night is here to stay, and if The Angels Stadium knows what is good for them, they’ll be smart to keep the festival in their grounds.

-Priscilla Perez (Celestial Transmission, Friday 6-8 pm)

Photos by Celeste De Los Santos

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

Welcome to FiveThirtyEight’s weekly politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.

sarahf (Sarah Frostenson, politics editor): In recent months, Sen. Elizabeth Warren has come a long way in the polls. When she first announced she was considering running for president on Dec. 31, her numbers hovered in the low single digits, but now she’s comfortably in the double digits and poised to steal the number one spot from former Vice President Joe Biden, according to the RealClearPolitics polling average of the 2020 Democratic primary.

And for the most part, this rise has been accompanied by positive media attention for Warren, with glowing profiles and the like. But is there actually a problem in the way the media covers Warren, i.e., are we too cozy with her candidacy?

clare.malone (Clare Malone, senior political writer): I should state off the bat that this is such an interesting question in part because Warren is SO MANY things: She’s a left-leaning (too left-leaning for most of America?) candidate, the emerging co-front-runner and an older woman running four years after another older woman lost for the Democrats.

That said, I do think we’re seeing the embryonic stages of Warren coverage. She’s currently getting nicer coverage, and I think we haven’t seen as many storylines that delve into questions like: a) Are some of her political stances going to play in swing states, and b) Will her wealth tax work/is it constitutional?

And yeah, I do think that’s going to come later because the media and its dominant demographic group (college-educated white people) are Warren’s base.

natesilver (Nate Silver, editor in chief): For the past several months, I think Warren’s gotten the most friendly stretch of media coverage of any presidential candidate since Barack Obama in 2008. It can change, though. Obama also had phases in 2008 where he got very skeptical coverage. And Warren’s media coverage upon her announcement wasn’t very friendly, for instance. In fact, much of it centered on her decision to take a DNA test to prove her Native American ancestry.

clare.malone: What do you think the first wave of skeptical Warren coverage will be, Nate? Will it be health care stuff, a la “is it too left for the white non-college-educated voter in the Upper Midwest the Democrats need to win back?”

natesilver: I mean the first wave was POCAHONTAS and LIKABILITY.

So we’re talking about the second wave.

clare.malone: OK, I STAND CORRECTED.

What’s the second wave?

natesilver: THANKS CLARE.

I mean, we might see POCAHONTAS and LIKABILITY/ELECTABILITY and the TOO FAR TO THE LEFT arguments again.

clare.malone: I think “too far to the left” will become the next big thing for her. I wonder if that won’t become a more explicit line from Biden in the next debate.

natesilver: And in some sense, that’s a fairer critique. There’s a decent amount of evidence that candidates who are too far to the left or right are a bit less electable than candidates who are moderate. Meanwhile, there’s not as much evidence that women are less electable or less likable, and those critiques are often fairly gendered.

perry (Perry Bacon Jr., senior writer): I tend to think that a candidate with this kind of surge in the polls is going to get good media coverage no matter what, because the political press is obsessed with the horse race.

I also think part of what we are seeing is that the press, and I would argue to some extent college-educated people in general — especially white, college-educated liberals — have gotten more liberal on issues like racial and gender inequality. In terms of media coverage, that has meant that coverage around Warren’s DNA test was harsh, but so has been the coverage of Biden allegedly touching women without their consent or that of his comments highlighting his positive relationships with segregationist senators. I think some of the coverage around “electability” has been maybe not as been as anti-Warren as it could have been for this same reason. Electability often gets cast as the idea that a woman or a minority can’t win — so my guess is some in the press have downplayed the issue a bit for that reason.

sarahf: So David Byler of the Washington Post wrote a piece last Thursday arguing: 1) There have been some press-worthy developments in Warren’s campaign as of late, i.e., she’s on the tails of Biden (and maybe overtaking him). So that’s huge and one reason she’s getting so much coverage; but 2) Warren is also the kind of candidate journalists love to cover — because she’s running on policy ideas, “rather than issues such as electability and style that they see as lesser or maybe even distasteful.”

How do we reconcile Nos. 1 & 2? And what do we make of that claim in No. 2?

clare.malone: Yeah, I mean, I do think her steady rise in the polls is grounds for worthwhile coverage.

And I do think the fact that Democrats might elect another older white woman is interesting! You could read it as a middle finger to Trump just as much as a problem of electability.

natesilver: I’m not sure it’s that complicated? Journalists are disproportionately college educated, so campaigns that are attuned to a college-educated audience are probably going to resonate more with journalists in all sorts of tangible and intangible ways.

Pete Buttigieg has gotten pretty good coverage too, maybe the most favorable after Warren’s. And his supporters are super college educated.

Kamala Harris (also lots of college-educated support) hasn’t gotten great coverage lately, but she’s still probably gotten better coverage than Biden or Bernie Sanders, who are doing MUCH better than she is in the polls!

sarahf: That’s fair. But remember that piece from the New York Times earlier this year that argued that the Democratic electorate on Twitter had an outsized voice in the primary compared to the actual Democratic electorate? Do we think there’s evidence of that happening here?

natesilver: I think that’s also a factor. Journalists spend a lot time on Twitter. And Twitter ********loves*******

Elizabeth Warren.

clare.malone: I mean, Biden’s team loves to talk about this: how their strategy is to give voice to the people not on Twitter — largely older voters, voters of color or voters without a college education.

natesilver: I think those critiques from Biden’s team are mostly valid. And you see it in the polling coverage. I’d argue that polls that show Warren tied or ahead of Biden generate tons of coverage. The ones that still show Biden ahead don’t.

clare.malone: I agree.

natesilver: In some sense, that’s why I focus the most on the way that polls are covered.

It’s complicated to determine, objectively, whether Warren has more thorough policy ideas than her competition. And in some sense, I’d have no problem with her getting “better” coverage if she does.

perry: Yeah, I’m not sure a content analysis of a full year of media coverage would reveal that it’s been more favorable to Warren than, say, Buttigieg or Harris or even Biden. In fact, I’d argue the electability and “eliminating private insurance coverage” has not been great for Warren, and that latter story has been covered pretty extensively.

But I do think that a poll of Twitter users would be way more pro-Warren and anti-Biden than the polls are. And I think that makes me constantly remember to use Twitter for news updates, not to gauge where the electorate is.

clare.malone: Agree with that, Perry. The interesting thing is, Biden isn’t all that conservative of a Democrat.

He’s decently liberal!

natesilver: But polls are fairly simple, objective facts. So when you see certain types of polls hyped up and others ignored, that’s a relatively clean indication of the biases of the moment.

sarahf: Which polls do you think are being ignored Nate?

Biden just got one good poll in South Carolina, and it got some coverage, no?

natesilver: Really? Biden got a pretty good (Fox News) poll in Wisconsin this weekend, and it got almost no coverage.

The Morning Consult poll that still shows Biden well ahead of Warren nationally gets very little coverage. The HarrisX polls that show the same thing don’t, either.

clare.malone: Biden’s polling news cycles have tended to focus more on general election head-to-heads, I think.

natesilver: Yeah, Biden’s general election polls do get some coverage, and they probably shouldn’t! Because those polls don’t mean all that much at this stage! But early primary polls are reasonably predictive, and if you were just reading Twitter, you’d get the sense that Biden had crashed. He hasn’t really though — he’s fallen by just a couple of points in the averages, while Warren has risen a lot.

clare.malone: We like to cover a moving car rather than an idling one.

The royal media “we,” I mean.

perry: The main issue for me in analyzing the race is that many of the people I follow on Twitter for non-political reasons — say, for their expertise on economics, gender or race — tend to like Warren and not Biden. I don’t even think Obama in ‘08 was thought of as the “candidate of the experts” like Warren is because Clinton was also fairly well-liked by wonky people. So we have this weird dichotomy, and I have to constantly check the polls and be like, “Is Biden still doing well? Yes, he is.”

natesilver: Another element here is that both Biden and Sanders are old news, whereas Warren is a newer and fresher story. Also, some of Sanders’s staffers and some of his supporters are not exactly the nicest people to the press.

clare.malone: Some of this comes back to the emerging progressive movement in the party, though, and much of the base isn’t really aware of this. Lots of Democratic voters liked, and now want a return to an Obama-style, establishment Democratic Party. They want to reset the clock. But the politically tuned-in people and policy experts of the Democratic Party have already moved like five ticks over on the progressivism odometer in the last four years.

There’s a dissonance that’s powerful, and you see it in news coverage.

sarahf: But to Clare’s point, what really surprised me in Perry’s piece on why Harris isn’t doing better is that the candidates who have made claims to Obama’s legacy (think Harris, Cory Booker, Buttigieg and Beto O’Rourke) aren’t doing better. Combined, they’re polling at 14 percent in national polls. As Perry wrote, this is pretty strong evidence “suggesting that Democratic voters aren’t looking for an Obama re-run.”

perry: It is worth considering that Warren is actually running a better campaign than Biden? Like, the idea of releasing a fairly-aggressive leftward policy plan each week or so was pretty savvy. I do think Warren has more aggressive plans than Biden — and that creates news coverage, too. Warren also was among the first Democratic presidential candidates to call for Trump’s impeachment. So the fact that Warren is gaining on Biden is not entirely shocking.

clare.malone: That’s a very interesting question … I think you can’t say Biden is running a terrible campaign given the way they were able to ride out the summer’s pretty bad bumps. But Warren’s campaign has had a very solid communications ethos and effort since the very beginning — I’d argue since they ran that “angry woman” last September.

Brett Kavanaugh was allowed to be angry. Dr. Ford wasn’t. Women grow up hearing that being angry makes us unattractive. Well, today, I’m angry – and I own it. I plan to use that anger to take back the House, take back the Senate, & put Democrats in charge. Are you with me? pic.twitter.com/c9DebKTQEV

— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) September 30, 2018

The Warren campaign has a knack for knowing the sort of blend of righteous anger and wonkery that suits them best.

natesilver: But I think Warren sometimes gets credit for being apolitical when that’s sort of bullshit, and she’s just as much of a politician as anyone else. Almost all of her plans are pretty well-calibrated to appeal to the Democratic base.

Maybe it just so happens that’s what she believes, but there’s not a lot of heterodoxy in what she’s offering.

But there’s also stuff like Warren being against the expansion of nuclear power. I hesitate to characterize the views of entire groups of scientists, but my understanding is that most scientists who are concerned about climate change would support expanding nuclear power. Warren doesn’t support it though, probably because it isn’t very popular among Democrats.

clare.malone: She’s a first mover on a lot of issues.

She’s not afraid to be out there, and I think that’s unique, given how conservative a lot of national politicians are.

perry: I agree that Warren is not taking stands that are going to piss off a lot of Democrats. She is quite political, I agree. I just think she might have arrived at a strategy that has worked well: being extra to the left and framing herself as “having a plan.”

natesilver: It’s smart politics! Part of smart politics is doing things that the press will like!

One of the most depressing parts of covering primary elections is that kissing the media’s ass and providing lots of access to the candidate is probably very “worth it” in terms of the coverage that candidates receive.

clare.malone: Ah. I think that we’ve landed in interesting territory re: access.

Biden’s campaign has gotten media people irritated by not letting him talk more. He just doesn’t do a lot of TV or a lot of on the record, regular media sitdowns.

He even got called out this summer by the hosts of The Breakfast Club (a New York City radio show ) for offering a surrogate when other candidates were appearing directly.

natesilver: And Biden had a pretty friendly relationship with the press as VP.

perry: Buttigieg did the media access thing hard early on in his campaign, and I thought that would really take off for him. It helped him get that initial burst but that was it. I’m kind of surprised by it — I thought Buttigieg was rising the media wave just right.

natesilver: Maybe he’s still overperforming right now, Perry?

I mean, he’s probably in fourth place in the polls now.

A distant fourth, granted, but it’s not bad for the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, to be beating all these senators.

clare.malone: I think he’s gotten slammed by the fact that we only really talk about it as a three-person race of late.

Fair or not, he could still get an Iowa storyline, and that could buoy him.

natesilver: It’s a two-person race, Clare.

(TROLL BAIT!!!)

clare.malone: I will let the trolls take that.

But … here’s a question: Are we maybe more aware and, therefore, more OK with talking about these media coverage biases than we were in 2016?

Or was it the same then, too?

I ask because I’ve noticed a bit more meta-awareness by the media in the way we’re covering things. But unfortunately, people who get their news from Twitter and people who get their news from, say, TV are so disconnected by medium — and probably lifestyle — that they get a fragmented sense of the race. (And, obviously, this problem can be exacerbated if reporters tend to get more of their news from Twitter than TV.)

All of this is to say: I think we’ll probably continue to see tougher coverage of Biden in part because of some of the biases we’ve talked about in the media, but also because he’s just running a campaign that, at times, seems more tentative and conservative in its approach. And that gives room for doubt and perhaps induces more reporting on an imminent polling slump or whatever.

natesilver: Maybe there’s more meta-awareness, as Clare puts it. But I think it’s hard for journalists to recognize just how wrapped up everything is in the horse-race narrative. When a candidate is rising in the polls, everything is deemed to be good news for them.

[talhaghafoor2019-blog]

Drake, Ariana Grande, Cardi B and the other songs to create the best Summer music playlist

On Spotify last weekend, it seemed as if the streaming service had given itself over entirely to presenting the music of a single artist.

That would be Drake, whose double album Scorpion was released on June 30.

Everywhere you looked, there was his handsome mug, the cover image of every single playlist on the world’s most popular streaming service.

That went for even the ones his songs weren’t featured on, such as “Best of British,” or \”Happy Pop Hits.” The promotion was a silly goof that online rageaholics are comparing to U2’s Songs of Innocence being inserted into all the world’s iTunes music folders in 2014 because, well, because people love to complain.

But the all-Drake all-the-time stunt underscores a truism: Scorpion is the unavoidable event release of the summer. The Toronto rapper’s album is uneven but still packed with hits. Scorpion has smashed streaming records left and right, garnering more that 435 million plays on Spotify, Apple Music, and other streaming services in its first three days of release. That is more than the previous record holder, Post-Malone’s Beerbongs & Bentleys, accumulated in a week.

Drake is included on the 24-song summer playlist assembled here, which you can play on Spotify by scrolling down to the bottom of the page.

But there’s more than Drizzy happening this summer: The tunes assembled include big pop hits in contention in that winner-take-all Song of the Summer competition that media outlets obsess over, but also breezy and brooding songs with a multiplicity of moods, because while hot and sticky seasonal pop songs are often joyful, they’re not always enough to chase away the summertime blues.

“I Like It,” Cardi B feat. Bad Bunny and J Balvin. If a single song of the summer had to be named, I’d go with this one, the second Billboard chart topper for the Bronx born rapper who dominated 2017 with “Bodak Yellow.” This collaboration with two reggaeton emcees effortlessly blends trap music beats with salsa. It’s further evidence of the indomitable spirit of the rapper born Belcalis Almanzar.

“Make Me Feel,” Janelle Monáe. The current single from the Atlanta R&B-pop-funk synthesist’s terrific new Dirty Computer is “I Like That.” “Make Me Feel,” however, is the superior summertime jam, a celebration of sexuality that takes pointers from Prince’s “Kiss.” She will play the Made in America festival on the Ben Franklin Parkway on Labor Day Weekend.

>> READ MORE: ‘I’m not America’s nightmare, I’m the American dream’: Janelle Monáe’s new kind of protest song

“Apes-,” The Carters. Beyoncé says the bad word on multiple occasions in this hard-banging celebration of high-powered entertainment couple bliss on Everything Is Love, which features art history lessons aplenty in its video filmed at Paris’ Louvre museum. Jay and Bey will be at Lincoln Financial Field on July 30.

>> READ MORE: Beyoncé and Jay-Z are a happy couple on ‘Everything Is Love.’ Is that good for their music?

“Short Court Style,” Natalie Prass. A delectable slice of bubble gum flavored throwback 1970s pop-funk  is Richmond, Va., indie singer Prass’ impressive second album, The Future and the Past. Prass plays the Xponential festival in Camden on July 28.

“Boo’d Up,” Ella Mai. Summertime is the love song time. British singer Ella Mai first put out this celebration of going steady early last year, but it’s a success story that gathered stream and pop radio exposure into 2018.

“Slow Burn,” Kacey Musgraves. While still IDing herself as country singer, Kacey Musgraves has redirected her music in a ‘70s soft-rock direction, a smart strategy since country radio is too conservative to play her anyway. This superbly crafted tune stays on permanent simmer.

“Babe,” Sugarland feat. Taylor Swift. Wyomissing, Pa.’s own megastar Swift now rules a pure pop universe. She plays back-to-back nights at Lincoln Financial Field starting Friday. but she’s smartly kept her finger in the country pie by continuing to write hit songs for country pop acts such as reunited duo Sugarland.

“Let’s Take a Vacation,” Joshua Hedley. The Nashville crooner  puts a warm-weather spin on Merle Haggard’s “If We Make It Though December,” on this cut from Mr. Jukebox, as he tries to convince his significant other that a summer time getaway will put some zip back in their failing relationship.

“Pretty Horses,” Dwight Yoakam. This is the best of two new lonesome and blue songs that the uncommonly dependable veteran songwriter recently debuted on his excellent new Sirius XM channel Dwight Yoakam & the Bakersfield Beat.

“Pet Cemetery,” Tierra Whack. A love song to her lost dog, this is one of the standout cuts on the North Philly rapper’s wondrous 15-songs-in-15-minutes album Whack World.

>> READ MORE: Welcome to Tierra Whack’s ‘Whack World’: The North Philly rapper only needs 15 minutes of your time

“Summer Games,” Drake. “Summer just started and we’re already done,” the Canadian rhymer, in sad and sensitive mode, raps on the 1980s synth driven summer bummer, sounding disappointed. It’s one of many Scorpion cuts, along with “After Dark” and “Nice For What” that would have made worthy addition to this list.

“No Tears Left to Cry,” Ariana Grande. The octave leaping singer has a new album called Sweetener due next month, and a frisky new single called “Bed” with Nicki Minaj. This, though, is the sad song with a sweet melody whose mournful tone feels like a response to the terror attack that killed 22 at a Grande show in England last year.

“Lucid Dreams,” Juice Wrld. Drake isn’t the only rapper who’s pouring his feelings out this summer. Juice  Wrld is the suburban Chicago teen born Jared Higgins who specializes in feeling sorry for himself in song, thankfully with a modicum of self-awareness. “I take prescriptions to make me feel a-OK,” he rap-sings. “I know it’s all in my head.”

“Heat Wave,” Snail Mail. Baltimore teenager Lindsey Jordan explores her feelings with scalpel-sharp acuity and songwriting smarts on her debut, Lush, and this will mentally cool you down if you watch its ice hockey video. Jordan plays Union Transfer on Saturday.

“Nameless, Faceless,” Courtney Barnett. The Australian rock songwriter who is so good at precisely — and drolly — detailing thoughts of alienation and detachment on her new Tell Me How You Really Feel. Put down of the summer: “I could eat a bowl of alphabet soup and spit out better words than you.”

“If You Know You Know,” Pusha-T. There’s no self-pity on this hard-hitting highlight from Daytona, the Kanye West-produced return to form by the rapper who made his name with the street-wise Virginia hip-hop duo Clipse.

“Stay Woke,” Meek Mill feat Miguel. The appropriately serious-in-tone first song by the Philadelphia rapper since his release from prison in April. He spits with authority, and takes Grandmaster Flash’s classic “The Message” as a starting point. Look for Miguel to join him when they both play Made in America on Labor Day weekend.

“This Is America,” Childish Gambino. The song of the summer that speaks the most intensely to a bitterly divided nation in 2018 from Renaissance man Donald Glover.

“The Middle,” Zedd, Maren Morris, Grey. A collaboration between Russian-German deejay-producer, a Nashville country pop singer, and an L.A. EDM act is just the sort of Frankensteinian creation that contemporary pop mega-hits are made of. And this one is hard to resist.

“One Kiss,” Calvin Harris feat. Dua Lipa. This summer’s soaring firework celebration-ready dance track from Scottish deejay and Taylor Swift-ex Harris. This time with English songwriter and vocalist handling the vocal duties in a testimony about how a single peck on the lips can spell transcendence.

“A Song for Those You Miss All the Time,” Thin Lips. Speaking of Lips, this song by the Philly band fronted by Chrissy Tashjianis is by no means a happy one, but its gnarly guitar riff and catchy hook does deliver plenty of catharsis. Chosen Family is out July 27.

“Hey! Little Child,” Low Cut Connie. A ribald stomp from the raucous throwback Philly rocker’s Dirty Pictures (part 2), covering Big Star star Alex Chilton, who included it on his 1979 solo album Like Flies On Sherbert.

“I’m Your Man,” Spritualized. One man band Jason Pierce — a.k.a. J. Spaceman — is returning with And Nothing Hurt, his first album of new music since 2012 on Sept. 7. This and a second song, “A Perfect Miracle,” are marked by swelling orchestration and divine summertime sadness sentiment.

“Summer’s End,” John Prine. Before you know it, it’ll be gone. This highlight from the 71-year-old Prine’s superb better-than-it-has-any-right-to-be The Tree of Forgiveness is as beautiful and bittersweet as a late August sunset.

July 5, 2018 — 6:54 PM EDT

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[datingadviceonreddit]

This will be long, but I go through the mess I went through this year. It is a crazy story, so read if you’d like, but please do take some stuff from it all, so you don’t do what I did.So first of all, not every Redditor is going to be right, but everybody puts their non-biased opinions in, which helps a lot. Unfortunately, I did not take these tips and opinions, and put myself through a lot to get to where I am today.Last year around this time, I made this post: https://ift.tt/2Q6vnMn highly suggest taking a look at that and some of the comments.I never updated everybody on this, but that girl broke up with me at that time because she had cheated on me, and she felt horrible about it, so she felt like leaving was the easiest option, however, I found out what she did not too long after.It has been nearly a year since that post was made. Let me tell you all what has happened in that year. This will be a long post but hopefully it will all give you insight to what I’ve gone through.After I found out that she had cheated on me, a few days after I made that post, I texted her that I knew what she did, and she wanted to talk over phone, not text. I didn’t want to talk that night, I was so frustrated, so I told her very politely that we would talk in the morning but I know what she has done and goodnight. So, we had about an hour and a half conversation about what all happened. She cried and said she’s so sorry, and I said it’s okay and I’m here if she needs anything. I had a snapchat streak with her, and now that I think about it, the night she broke up, she sent me a streak picture of the guy that she cheated on me with. Very disheartening stuff, that hurt my feelings.Anyways, all of December passes and we don’t talk any. I invite her brother and some friends of mine that lived 2 houses down from them out to my house to hang. So anyways, we all hang and then the next day, I drop off her brother and he tells me to come in. I said I didn’t really feel comfortable to, but he said to do it anyways. So I walk in their house and everyone is sitting in the living room. They all say hey and all, and tell me to take a seat. The only empty seat in the room was right beside, well you know it, my ex girlfriend. So I sit down and I notice her staring kind of at me out of the corner of my eye, and I’m thinking,”Oh lord.” We do eventually talk some and I told the family I had to go to my other friends house because they wanted me to spend the night (the friends were the ones 2 houses down). So I say my goodbyes and go to my friends house. When I get there, my friends start getting defensive and were asking me why I was at her house and I said to drop off her brother and all. They were very skeptical. All of the people in that house didn’t want me getting back with her or even talking to her, they knew she’d hurt me. After everybody questions me, I get a text from her telling me that if I want cookies, she is cooking them and she’d like for me to get some. I told her no thanks but thanks for the offer and she’s all cool with it.Well, blah blah blah, let me skip a few things, we eventually start talking and being with each other more, so of course, we start dating. It was pretty good at first, however, I still stressed about her cheating and stuff and the past repeating itself. She reassured me that it would be okay but I still sometimes got worried. Skip another month, she gets to go to another dance, but not with me. She had to book this dance before we even got back together, so she booked it with another guy. No biggie. So, I ask her not to grind on the guy or kiss him or do anything else bad and I tell her to have fun and all. I get a text from a close friend an hour into their dance (I was 7 hours away in another city) that she was grinding all over on and twerking on her date for the night. Reddit, I was so disappointed and sad. I had the literal worst feeling in my stomach that night, I felt like puking. It wasn’t because of the grinding so much as the lying. I thought she had changed and I was beginning to trust again. It felt so disrespectful. So I text her and tell her that I found out some stuff and I was very calm and told her I wanted to break up. She got pretty agitated because she said she was pressured into it, and it slowly turned into an argument. Anyways, we stay together, but she goes and tells her family about our argument, and she makes a big scene, and I felt absolutely belittled and embarrassed. I texted her parents about how I was sorry, but I didn’t even start anything. I made myself look worst. Anyways, the parents were chill but they didn’t believe me. They said she couldn’t hardly move in her dress, much less dance or twerk. Yeah right. I never argued though.Skip forward some, things seem to be taking a turn for the worst, and so I figured to fix it, I’d get her a diamond promise ring. So she could always wear it on her finger and keep her promises. I guess that was a pretty naive thing for me to think. Nothing really changed. That night was the first time I had made out and I felt great, but nothing really changed.After almost one more month, we discussed it and we broke up. However, we still stayed in contact. Anyways, I make a slight mistake. This was my first relationship so I was so naive in so many things. So, this girl messages me and begs me for some pics or some crap, so I send them. And they are not the best pics, if you all catch my drift. My then ex and I were most definitely broken up, I’d never EVER cheat at all. But I still felt like I had to apologize to her (Naive, I know). So, I told her to promise to keep a secret and I told her right after it happened. I felt like trash, I blocked the girl that asked and left it be. Anyways, I figured she wouldn’t tell anyone, I’ve kept her secrets that she has told me. I was WRONG!!!We are sitting in an awards thing on stage, and we are towards the back. It’s mostly for seniors so there was nothing for us to do at the time, so we were looking at instagram and stuff. Now this girl like to talk to her exes often, and so much so, she showed me one of their text’s she thought was funny. It was not to me. She thought it was funny because he was getting mad because she “didn’t text him often”. Okay, whatever. What got me; he said,”Why would you want to talk to someone who would send pictures to another girl.”Yeah, she told one of her exes, that was using it against me in an argument. I felt so betrayed, I basically shut down. She tried to make up to me on stage but I was so irritated. She knew she did wrong. I mean, I did too, but we weren’t even dating and she promised not to tell. I haven’t mentioned him the whole time either, but she also has this other ex, who was her first (first person she had sex with). She had the yellow heart on snapchat with him (I know, cringe, but let me explain. The Yellow heart is a token beside another persons name, which means that you were snapping that other person the most for a week straight at least. So basically, she was “talking to” her ex more than me, which is a red flag). I check her phone once ever and see that she has it with this ex of hers, and I get noticeably irritated (I told her at least 10 times I don’t like her talking to him, but I’m not going to make her do anything. I figured she’d stop on her own out of respect). She started trying to kiss me and tell me everything is alright. Yeah right. Why am I bringing this up though? The only to times she showed true compassion to our relationship was those two times (the snapchat thing and the situation where she told her other ex my secret).So that night, I was so perturbed, I went out to my car, went home after everything, and the next day, I told her I wanted to end all communication.It didn’t work.We start talking more this time. We are basically dating when this other dance happens at our school. She’s not in it though, she is helping set up for it and monitor it, however, she tells me they usually twerk in a circle and crap. I asked her not too and she basically said,” I don’t care what you say, I’m doing what I want.” So I said”okay” and just asked her not to grind on anyone and she did agree and promise to that. I’m working that night on our farm. All night long, I worry, then I just release all the stress and I just feel like I should just trust her. Everything seems to go great all night, nobody calls or texts me, and it is all nice. The next day however, that’s when I get a call.A guy at the party tells me that he didn’t see anything, but apparently my cousin and her friends saw her grinding on a guy and apparently got a video of it. My heart drops once more. I call my cousin, and she confirmed it. She was even in the car with the friends that saw it and they confirmed it. They said that she was on her hands and knees grinding all over another guy, who I find out later was one of our waiters that served us at a fancy restaurant one day, but oh well I guess. My cousin sends me the video, and you can’t see her doing anything in it, but you can see her with the guy. Apparently, she even went and told my cousin to please not tell me about it because she saw that they saw her.That was the last straw. I was supposed to go see Post Malone with her that weekend too, but I did not go. I told her that the ticket was hers, to take somebody else, but not me. She got mad, and we did not talk anymore until the middle of summer.I went on a cruise, and when I got off I had 4 voicemails from her making sure I wasn’t dead because she couldn’t get in contact with me (I turned off my phone for no extra out of the country charges). We talk a little but go the rest of summer without talking.Anyways, at the very end of summer, she texts me and we start texting again. She seems different though. She seems like she’s changed. So, after a little while, we get back together.Everything is so much better, she is communicating with me more (I never mentioned this but this is really important. She always used to get mad when I worried about her cheating, she would never discuss it with me), and communication is super important. She seems nicer too and better, However, things go down the drain some. We end up having sex and it was okay, not really the best experience, but I appreciate her opening up to me like that, and that is forever in my gratitude. She said I was the best though which is good. I do wish I would have waited though to lose my virginity. However, that all happens and everything is happy. I start worrying some though because I take a step back and I remember how badly I had been treated in the past and even then (she did not always treat me very nicely, which is okay, but just, a lot of stuff was extremely rude, like saying she hoped I got sick after coughing in my face. She said it was a joke and that’s fine, but it just was rude though. I don’t mind playing around some but the way she said it seemed sincere), I also worry about the past repeating itself. Eventually, she starts saying how she sometimes feels like she can’t take it (because I wanted to ask her stuff and sometimes I did repeat myself, but she always got so mad and never communicated it with me. I would’ve been better off with the slightest compassion), and it really kills me because I went through hell and back for this girl and she can’t take it anymore because I love her so much that I worry? Yeah, okay...She was mean to me, stressed me out, I put my all in and she didn’t seem like she really cared all that much, and I was losing myself in the process.Before all of this, back to the snapchat thing, she had a red heart now with her first once again (That means you’ve been snapping each other the most for basically a month straight). Big red flag. I told her I believe probably about 20 plus time about how I thought it was disrespectful, and nothing really changed. One day, their heart went away, and then we got one.Anyways, this is basically the climax. All of this stress with me realizing how she is not the best for me was building up.Before I went to bed one night, I went to bed and checked my phone, and we lost our heart. I was hoping that everything was okay, but I did worry. I still went to sleep though.I woke up at 5 because of stress and a dream I had. The dream was, she had the yellow heart with this ex of hers again, and that was a sign for me that it wasn’t for me, and in the dream, I left and was stress free (I kid you not, this really happened). Anyways, she woke up eventually, and we texted our good mornings and all. Anyways, I texted her and asked her something I’ve never asked for, I asked her for a screenshot of her top 10 people she talks to on snapchat the most, and she said ‘sure’. 5 minutes later, I got it, and sure enough, it was just like in my dream. I knew how much disrespect I’ve taken, and this was nothing but the tipping point for me. I knew what I had to do.I told her I wanted to break up and we talked some but that was it (Again, I did not break up because of snapchat, I broke up because of so many other reasons but it was only a tipping point for me).Anyways, I was going to get her one closer to time, but unfortunately unexpected things happened. She got me one though and she wanted to give it to me if it was the last thing she did.I told her thanks, but I can’t accept, but she told me I WILL take the present. So because I didn’t even want to fight, I agreed. I received it today.It was very nice and now I feel bad for even taking it. I spent a lot on her but I really don’t care how much I spent or how much hell I went through, I felt and feel awful about it.So Reddit, here we are now. After everything; me feeling like trash at times and believing all of this was my fault and after all of the emotions I’ve felt and heart breaks and times I, a pretty serious guy, have cried myself to sleep, and after all of the emotions; it could have been avoided if it was for me listening to those Redditor’s.After everything though, I never put her down in any way, or made her feel bad about herself. Taking the highroad is the ultimate gift.After all of that, and by the way, thank you to anyone that read it, it should offer a different viewpoint to anyone that can use it, but it could have all have been so much better if I would have listened to Reddit.I listened to my heart though and in the end it ended up being shattered multiple times and dropped on the floor and crushed.Reddit offers different views that usually are non biased to your life or your feelings, and the most logical approach to every situation.People who post anywhere, but especially on this forum, please take heed to the warning Redditor’s give you and please do not make the mistakes I have which was go back to somebody who doesn’t cherish you as much.The girl I dated is high status in school (I am also) and you would never think she was capable of this or we were not compatible. There is so much though to learn. Looks are not all.AND IF YOU ARE IN A SMALL TOWN OR WHERE EVER AND STAY IN A BAD RELATIONSHIP BECAUSE YOU FEEL LIKE YOU CAN’T GET ANYONE ELSE AS PRETTY OR WHATEVER THE CASELeave the relationship for your own health. There are so many people out there that will want you and cherish you always. Do not ever settle for less and know your self worth. Trust me, it will get better.And the sun will always rise the next daySo listen to Redditor’s and live everyday to the fullest with the person you love and who loves you back and respects you always like you do themI wish I had that, but we all live and learn. Best of luck Reddit, and thank you all for opening my eyes more. via /r/dating_advice