#i want to put up a bunch of religious stuff so that every crap you take is a holy crap

[scyaxe]

i want an aesthetic bedroom when i move out, and i've already started vaguely planning, but i don't think anything i currently own would match my vision. and i can't get rid of most of it bc i really like it and/or use it

[popculturebuffet]

Rumble Review: Time For Some Kaiju Bollocks Lads! (Comissioned by WeirdKev27)

Hellooooooo bloggers. I’m Jake I review stuff and today I have a special treat today courtsey of my boy @weirdkev27 who requested this likely because I like animation, I like wrestling, and felt i’d be a good fit to cover an animated wrestling movie about giant monsters. He was right.

I won’t pretend to be the most dedicated wrestling fan: I haven’t watched any of the shows weekly in a long time due to not having a way to (Though I would with AEW and probably will with NXT 2.0 if it’s any good now I have Peacockcockcock), and when it comes to knowing basic moves that arne’t finishers.. I very much don’t. 

But I also won’t pretend i’m NOT one either: I have sting and new day funkos proudly displayed next to my ken from street fighter and captain underpants funkos respectively, I watch OSW Review religiously, and I  bring up restling bollocks of years past whenever I can. I also find the sport facinating from how much skill and effort it takes to how much true love people have of the sport.. to how much potetial’s been wasted by ego and stupidity. It’s a truly awesome and facenating sport and I don’t like the crap it gets sometime. Sure they know the finishes ahead of time, the fueds themselve are built entirely on scripts.. but it’s one of the greatest shows around because of this. They craft powerful stories in and out of the ring. .and when they don’t it can be REALLY, REALLY hilarious so unless something’s truly terrible, you’ll usually have some fun watching wrestling. 

So while I wasn’t going to see this one back when it was set for theaters.. I probably was eventually. Not a major priority but I would’ve gotten to it even if Kev hadn’t thrown money at me. Probably not any time this year but still. It’s a wrestling film with Kaiju starring Will Arnett and Terry Crews. You.. you don’t need a lot to get me in the door unless it ended up being really bad. And at worst critcally rumble was met with a resounding

Not really loved by critics but not really loathed either. So will I find myself in the middle or suprised? That’s for you fine folks to find out under the cut. 

Rumble is VERY  loosely based on the Graphic Novel “Monster on the Hill”, something I DO want to check out sometime as it has it’s own unique premise: in it it’s set at the turn of the century and in this world monster attacks aren’t revilved but praised. People are proud to be scared by their local monsters but in the small locale of stoker on Avon, the people have a depressed monster named Rayburn, so it’s up to the local scientest and his boy sidekick to make this monster shine.  It’s brilliant and I will read it at some point. 

Rumble takes the bare basics: every town having a monster, their proud of, int their station. A monster named Rayburn. And the town being named Stoker after of course Bram Stoker writer of Dracula. But it updates it in it’s own unique brilliant way that still feels creative as hell, to the point I feel monster on the hill could be reapdated with the original premise and a monster name change and no one would notice. 

In the world of Rumble, instead of each town having a monster to scare people, each town has a monster due to the world wide monster wrestling league. See in this setting since ancient times monsters have naturally duked it out as much like with big sweaty men, you get a bunch of giant monsters together eventualy two are going to want to punch each other or need to have a ladder match for child custody. Eventually Human and Monster worked together to convert this into monster wrestling and the rest is history. 

As for how any of this works. .that’s one of the films high points. They put a LOT Of thought into this so as a result Monster Wrestling for the most part has clear rules, setup and pulls from not just wrestling but other sports to make it FEEL like an actual sports system while still simplified enough to work. 

As such the basic setup is the same as a standard pro wrestling match just with Kaiju: two monsters enter, beat each other up with cool acrobatic moves and powerful holds, and the winner usually wins by pinfall. But there are nice tweaks that add bits from boxing and other sports. For boxing, since it gets the most, the count is at 10 and monster wrestler have coaches who help them plan stratagey. Granted Wrestlers have managers, but coaches here work more like boxing coaches than wrestling managers so.. there you go. 

The fights are also unscripted, or to put it in wrestling terms  a shoot. Most wrestling based films do this to highten the tension and what not as “this is for realllll”, since honestly i’ts the same principal real matches use: like in a film wrestling is scripted.. but your still invested in who wins or looses anyway if the story’s told right. There’s also rounds, which again makes sense with both the coatches and not being pre-planned. 

WMW also throws in some bits and pieces of other sports: each town having a monster is much like towns having sports teams, complete with home stadiums, and the ring is in octagon instead of a square much like MMA, which makes perfect sense: the combatants are bigger and thus need more room to manuver even when you make the rings kaiju sized. 

We don’t get any special conditoin matches like regular wrestling.. but that’s fair as it keeps it simple for the story. If they end up making a sequel, which I hope for, THEN they can bring in stuff like weapons and cages to help amp it up. But keeping it just to one on one pinfall matches for this keeps the focus on the fights and the story instead of wondering how this new gimmick works.  Again common thing in wrestling movies, with both no holds barred and ready to rumble saving special stipulations for the final matches and having regular matches first. And yes I may cover both films here some day. One is so bad it’s good the other is ready to rumble. Not even David Arquette could save it and that is a hard bar to clear. Speaking of which if there’s a sequel PLEASE cast David Arquette as an evil manager or a monster himself. Dude needs more work and deserves more work because he’s fucking awesome. He’s also a former wcw champion, fought AGAINST them making him champion because itw as ab ad idea, then donated that money to people in wrestling who needed it. Guy is a legend and loves this buisness and I love him for it.. and for Scream. God bless Dewey. 

So naturally this sport has it’s own legends, and the peak of them all was Rayburn, backed by his coach the equally legendary Jimbo Coyle.  Rayburn was Monster Wrestling’s biggest draw, like Stone Cold Steve Austin or Goldberg, until one day he and Jimbo vanished at sea never to be seen again.  I geninely thought the film was setting it up for them to return at the end but no, they don’t. As far as the film’s concerned they dead. Maybe they wanted to keep something up their sleeves for a sequel, maybe it was in an original draft, maybe they just wanted to kill them without it being too graphic, I don’t know. I’m just the jackass who finds it darkly hilarious a godzilla-sized kaiju... went out drowning to death. I don’t have all the answers. 

Rayburns home city was Stoker which naturally suffered a bit after loosing i’ts biggest draw but has started to recover and now has it’s big chance to make it back as they have a new beefy boy to promote: Tentacular, a giant handsome shark man with tranlucent tatoo like skin things played by Terry fucking Crews.  I can’t belivie it’s taken almost two years to get to Terry on this blog but he’s FINALLY here. Terry Crews is a terrific man, a hell of an actor and utterly killed it with Brooklyn 99 as Terry Jeffords, cumilating in Terry breaking through the wall like the Kool-Aid Man. 

God I miss this show. So the town’s all happy for it with signs, merch and buzzing to the jimbo coyle memorial stadium. Chief among them is Winnie Coyle, Jimbo’s daughter played by  Geraldine Viswanathan of Blockers.. where she played John Cena’s daughter. Yes really. The irony is not lost on me. 

Winnie is a huge fan of her dad, monster wrestling and is essentially our surrogate as she prepares to enjoy the match. So we get our first proper match complete with entrance music! Which isn’t very good! Yeah let’s talk about that: Tentacular gets a very generic r and b song that feels like a studio mandate. It’s mostly galling because one of this films MANY production companies, seriously there’s like a full minute even for a modern movie it’s rediculous, is WWE Stuidios. And it’s not a passing sponsorship: while they didn’t take creative control far as I can tell we see a sign promoting a kaiju version of smackdown in one scene and one of the later matches has the NXT 1.0 logo in the background. Which is awkward given they’d switched, very infamously given they fired tons of stars and changed who ran it, to 2.0 the same year this ende dup coming out but still. Point is they coudl’ve leant them some good entrance music.

It’s not a budget thing either. That i’d be fine with except his oponent uses Fancy for his entrance after using Rue Britania to start. So they CAN afford lisecned tracks, they just either couldn’t, as I could see paramount picking some of the songs, or failed to use better ones. Like fancy is not a terrible song... but it’s just not a great ring entrance for the wrestler in question. When you have access to masterpieces like “Glorious”, “The Game” and “My Time is Now”, among SO many others at yoru fingers why the hell do you go with Fancy? 

As for the opponent he’s one of my faviorite monsters of the film: King Gorge, a giant bulldog with bullhorns and whose also british... a LITERAL british bulldog. Though weirdly despite this refrence there’s only two kaiju here who refrence wwe history specifically, this being a refrence to Davey Boy Smith “The British Bulldog” and the other we’ll again get to. 

And our beefy heroes bring up another of the films strengths: monster design. Each monster is unique, beauituflly animated and fun to look at. It makes it so each match no matter the length is never boring and always keeps your attention and it makes it so some have logical weaknesses to exploit. I REALLY wish this had gotten a video game tie in and hope it does some day as this would be REALLY fun to play if done properly. But to watch.. still fucking cool. 

And the weakness thing is a major plot point as Winnie, having grown up around wrestling, can spot weaknesses. Thus when it seems Tentacular might loose, she runs down to point out  a tell she noticed he has. She’s almost rebuffed by her dad’s old sidekick and sexist asshat Siggy, played by of all people Tony Danza. But Tentcular ignores him trying to play whose the boss and listens: Gorge has a tell when he’s about to ramp up: he licks his nose. So Tentacular uses that, suckers him and succesfully beats him

But as you probably guessed by the fact that the guy on the poster is NOT a bara terry crews shark... Tentacular isn’t a great guy. Not wanting to be overshadowed by rayburn. Tentacular announces despite having just won the championship and the town needing it he WON’T be repping Stoker and is moving to slitherpool. It’s a heck of a heel turn,  nice work movie. I also didn’t peg Terry Crews as someone who’d be a great heel, he mostly plays nice guys, boisterious guys or boisoterous nice guys but he’s a fucking natural at it, and only gets better as tentacular gets more heelish. And what’s a good wrestling heel without a slimy manager. Thus we enter my boy Ben Fucking Schwartz as Jimothy-Bret Chadley III. But since that name is so dumb it warps the fabirc of time, space and my patience i’m just going to call him Jean Ralphio since he’s basically playing the character again just less horny. He’s an obnoxious rich kid with a lot of money whose parents barely tolerate him whose...

I mean Jimothy isn’t up to faking his own death or getting run over by a lexus levels of greatness but he could get there someday. 

Anyways Jean-Ralphio’s family bought him a stadium in Slitherpool, fucking over Stoker and leaving everyone, Winnie in paticular devistated. Well maybe not more than fred who remodeld his diner sign to honor the guy who just peaced out with a rich kid to go work somewhere else. Fred is great by the way, he’s voiced by Monk and Wings alumnus Tony Shaloub. 

Things are worse than that though as it turns out without a monster, the funding for the stadium goes away too and puts the towns jobs in jeapordy. So the mayor and city council.. are planning to sell it to put up a parking lot. Winnie is upset about this.. but while in theory they could get another monster in practice the town needs the money the sale would give to live so it seems stuck. 

Okay two things about this. The first is simple:

THIS IS CONTRIVED AS ALL HELL

The monster wrestling world has to have even dumber laws than the kayfabe world of wrestling for this to BEGIN to make sense. And keep in mind THIS once happened in the world of wrestling

Yes i’m calling this dumber than a ladder match with a prize.. and for those of you not familiar with wrestling or this match.. yes this DID in fact happen. And THAT is still smarter than the time , RECENTLY Rey Rey lost an EYEBALL during a match in kayfabe. Yes again, really. 

My point is an athlete being able to walk out, with no consequences, potetntail lawsuits or pentalites from Stoker or the various stadium backers makes no sense for anything OTHER than plot purposes. Sure sports teams leave.. but sports teams aren’t one person. Tentacular would get sued into oblivion.  And yes I know he’s a giant sexy shark man who could just eat a human lawyer.. but this is a world where humans and monsters live side by side. That means that not only are there probably monster lawyers, not every monster wants to chokeslam i’m sure, but monsters are held to the same laws as humans. Within reason I mean there are probably allowances for accidently stepping on a car or something, it happens, but my point is there had to be a contract. This isn’t like in wrestling when a wrestler turns heel. And again look up, wrestling kayfabe law is fucking insane and nonsensical. You can bet anything on a wrestling match. Dominick Mysterio isn’t the only person to be bet on a wrestling match.  Buff Bagwell’s MOTHER was the prize in one match, on a forklift rather than a poll but still. 

But my problem with all this is all that shit has been wrestling being kinda nuts or neceisated on the dramatic payoff in situation being guys hitting each other with chairs. As such a LITTLE wiggle room is okay...again wrestling’s taken in in insane directions like “winner has to make his opponent loose his eye”, but still.  This film is a wrestling film yes, so some bollocks betting is expected and is used for the climax.. but having this entire exit dosen’t

On top of that while most towns seem to have a monster, the fact is an open slot for a monster, especially from a town that has now produced TWO champions, would send tons of monsters flocking to fill the stadium. The film seems to forget , which is VERY werid given how much it understands wrestling, that a LOT of wrestlers.. grew up watching other wrestlers on tv. Looking up to them. Wanting to be them. So while Tentacular turns up his ... nose? Do sharks have noses? does it matter for a shark tentacle man? I don’t know. Point is while Tentacular scoffs at being in rayburn’s footsteps, tons of monsters would KILL to not only have a town to represent but for it to be RAYBURN’S town. Sure the coach they have now is an inexperinced 20 something.. but for a film that’s in part about the love of the game it forgets wrestlers are fine with working up the card. So the 90 day “get another monster” thing makes no sense to me when it shoudln’t be that hard to get a workable monster. It’d take time to get another champ sure.. but loosing the champ isn’t their fault and investors would rather get merch than a quick payout from something as stupid as a giant parking lot for a town in the middle of nowhere. 

The second isn’t as frustrating but it is very noticiable

THIS FILM IS PACKED WITH SPORTS AND ANIMATION CLICHES TO A LUDICROUS DEGREE

Look while I feel animation is more of a medium than a genre the fact is, having seen 80 dozen animated family films in my life time they have certain narrative tropes writers like to use a lot, and some of those become cliches very quickly because they use them all the damn time. It’s simple storytelling. 

So it’s impressive this film uses MOST of them, while also using one or two sports movie cliches for good measure because this is a wrestling movie after all and they love those as much as any sports movie. 

And cliches can be used well and sometime their often used for good damn reason to the point you can’t do a film without them. This film has montages for instances but the fact is a sports film.. just isn’t the same without one and we all know it.  And i’m not even a sports guy but it’s just something that’s baked into the genre. But here it comes off as a lazy way to avoid having to build a plot or deeper characters so they can focus on what they clearly care about: the world. And the world for this movie, as iv’e said, is fucking amazing. Without it this movie wouldn’t be as good as it is. Outside of that... headache above, it’s incredibly well thought out. But you can have a well thought out world AND a good story. Inside Out, Toy Story, Incredibles, films that aren’t pixar probably, they put in effort for the world AND tell a great story with it. This film is enjoyable, I don’t question that. But it COULD’VE been better if they put some effort in on the story and characters. 

Instead that leaves me to use my faviorite tool the counting gag to show just HOW many, good and “oh god not this again” are baked into the film

So already from the setup of the film we have: young scrappy hero who no one belivies in, young scrappy hero who idolizes a dead parent and wants to be them, supportive mother for said hero, opening where a heroes dream falls apart after building up their expectations of finally making them, main villian who seems nice but is actually a dick (earlier than most but still counting it), comedic sidekick for said villian, crotchety old bastard who dosen’t like hero because they different, having to save the town, having to save the local sports team, having to save a thing from being demolished, no one but our hero and one or two other people beliving in saving said thing, the hero only having one parent left, a place that was once great but has now fallen on hard times or changed from what the hero remembers, bumbling rich idiot and the hero having to learn to not be the person they idolize but themselves or as spider-verse brilliantly put it “don’t do it like me, do it like you”.

So that’s

CLICHE COUNT: 13

You can see why I didn’t start the count till now as there’s SO many in just TWENTY MINUTES OF SCREEN TIME, yes 20 we haven’t even gotten into the meat of the film yet, that if I did it’d wreck the pacing. And you’d think “Well okay it’s just a bit frontloaded iwth them” but no it has more in the pocket. Yes somehow. I do like this flim but my god did they not put a lot of effort into making the story or characters feel fresh or new and given the budget, beautiful animation and wourld they damn well should’ve. 

Anyway Winnie heads to go fetch them a monster, so we actually get to see the underground scene. Fitting WWE’s view of any promotion that isn’t them it’s a dingy fight club where anything goes. This is also where the Kayfabe comes in as these matches are predetermined... granted here it’s so the owner, Lady Mayhem, can fix the bets, but like real worked matches they still take a lot of altheticisim and it’s unclear if EVERY match is worked or not, but probably. 

Winnie is taken with a female monster named Razorback, played by WWE and NXT Women’s champ winner and the boss Becky Lynch, who have I have the utmost repsect for.. and did not recognize in this film as she dosen’t use her regular voice so it’s a bit of a confusing cameo but hey, it’s still nice to have her. Razorback laughs winnie off, though unlike the other thing I get this: she’s making decent money, has fans, and would have to give all that up to play by regular rules and possibly loose. As we learn league matches are winner take all, so there’s a chance of not getting paid, something that just isn’t a problem here as long as you play by Lady Mayhem’s rules. 

So Winnie is depressed and goes to a bar to get drunk... so she’s at least 21? Anyway the guy at the bar is a friendly fella who points out the monster he bet on in the current match, a big horned red guy played by Will Arnett... who Winnie recognizes. Turns out this guy is Rayburn Junior, now going by Stupendous Steve, and she played with him. Which itself is confusing.. not the size things, monsters start out pocket sized here and grow into being kaijus. He was like a toddler sized whent hey played. No what’s confusing is the characters are close to the same age in flashback or only a few years apart at most yet steve is played like a decade older than her. Again for a film with such tight world building the slips just make me pound my head into a desk that much more that they didn’t catch this or think this through. 

Anyways naturally Winnie goes to talk to him, he tries to ignore her and the resulting mess causes steve to accidently win his match.. that he was supposed to and was trying to throw.  Steve tries to run but gets stopped by a giant furry ball thing man, a great little onster deisgn and is forfced to confront lady mayhem whose mad the match got borked and wants her money back in 90s day or it’s his ass. And i’d say a wrestling promoter getting this thretaning over a mistake would be a bit much but A) this is an underground fighting ring, she can make her own rules and getting the money back is more important than whose fault it was. and B) This is how the actual owner of the actual biggest company acts. 

Vince McMahon Frightens Me Count : 1

And yes this is a promo.. but Vince ACTUALLY ACTS LIKE THIS BACKSTAGE. The only seperation between real vince and kayfabe vince is that each one commited diffrent crimes. 

So Steve is understandably pissed at Winnie and not really into going home, given the whole changing his name and running away thing. But given he has a pissed off monster after him for money and 90 days to get it he has no other options so he reluctantly agrees. 

Steve is played by Will Arnett himself.. who while having a penchant for manchildren in general.. is basically playing a younger bojack before he REALLY fucked up his life: he has issues with his dad, who in this case put way too much pressure on following his legacy (Something they needed to do more with honestly), is sarcastic, lazy and has a paunch belly. I’m not complaining mind: watching a giant kaiju bojack horseman is a good afternoon. Just an observation is all.  So now once again it’s time for some more cliche counting! We have protaganist whose dad never understood them, main character is saddled with the best they can get, sarcastic jaded snarking male paired with peppy female who gets him to be a better person, villian with minon who is goofy yet suprisingly intimidating, secondary villian who is only in the plot to move it along and the one i’m suprised is a cliche, chacter character owing a lot of money or money substitute to a shady mob boss. 

Cliche Count: 19

So this unlikely duo head back to Stoker. To get training. Also we get Winnie’s mom, and I almost forgot to include this, saying “use the monster you have not the monster you want”. Which one, phrasing, and two... you probably could’ve got this across without just yelling your point at the audience. 

 As you’d expect things don’t go great as the idea of getting up at 6 is foriegn to steve who flat out refuses. So Winnie decides to shove his words of “get me a match and i’ll do the rest” down his throat.. not literally, he’d probably swallow her by accident. 

So to kick the guys ass into shape she books him a match. And the setting is really cool: it’s at a shiping yard with plenty of spectators at night, so it’s surrounded by boxes, having a sort of underground feel but without being underground like the last match. Feels like they slammed Ken and Zangiefs stages from Street Fighter II together honestly, shit’s awesome. 

His opponent is Ramarilla Jackson

A... well gorilla. NOt a lot of ram in him though weirdly. You’d think with the name. But he’s got hammer like hands so he has SOMETHING going for him.  Winnie tries coaching steve who rebuffs her... till he tries to play it like he does and play dead. After going back to his corner Winnie announces the catch: as I mentioned earlier Monster Wrestling Matches are winner take all. So while the cash payout is enormous you get nothing from jobbing. And this structure does make sense: it gives every match stakes as the winner gets paid and gurantees a decent sized match. Squash matches, i.e. one wrestler steamrolling another, have their place and are a staple of the industry.. but they just don’t work in a version of it with such a small roster: ther’es likely only so many registered towns (Jimothy-Ralphio had to get his parents to buy him a staidum and stadiums irl are expensive so imagine them for kaiju) so having them get clocked in 12 seconds dosen’t work.  So Steve has to actually put in effort, which terrifies him. With ya man. But Winnie has a plan

No really, she pegs Ramarilla has having great offense but no stamina. Hence if steve can just keep away from him long enough he’ll tire out and Steve will net the W. It’s not PRETTY.. but they also don’t have any other options. So steve runs around the ring, sadly not to yakkity sax, and even though he ends up on top of the containers running from ramarilla at one point.. he still wins. Technically. This also brings us to our next cliche, a character winning their first match or whatever in a sports movie entrely by luck or circumstance despite doing really bad. 

Cliche Count: 20

The match dosen’t go over well though as we get one of the films handful of talking heads segment. Though sadly instead of getting actually wrestling color commentary people for this.. they got two guys I haven’t heard of as a giant angler fish type kaiju and his black human cohost. The Angler guy is a likeable enough guy, rooting for our heroes while his human pal.. lis an angry dick who constnatly raves about how “this isn’t really wrestling”. And he’s one of the more annoying parts of the film as if I wanted to hear some guy say “this isn’t wrestling” without it being funny intresting or anyhting i’d go refollow Jim Cornette. And yes the irony that a character whose a strawman for guys like Cornette is black does not escape me. 

So while running worked once they have to up their game but once again, as you’d expect things don’t go well which means it’s time to up the count as it’s time for the two to have a blow up followed by an emotional moment that helps them connect better. 

Cliche Count: 21

Again I don’t hate these tropes, this one’s fine, but i’ve seen it in so many animated movies. IN this case Winnie keeps trying to make Steve follow his dads old plays and train like him till he snaps.. and accidnetly blows away the book. To his credit though, he apologizes and the film does give us a valid reason this dosen’t work for him: during the training earlier he gets a flashback where his dad tried to railroad him into doing his moves, being kind of a dick about it. 

And this has given steve a complex as he explains: He ran away from stoker for the same reasons Tentacular strutted away: he was tired of being compared to his dad. It creates a nice contrast between the two: Both have a valid wish in NOT wanting to be compared to Rayburn constantly. The diffrence is how they went about it. Steve left sure, but he left when Stoker had another monster, was disappointing nobody and simply wanted to find his own path away from his dad. He did it unhealthily, fight clubbing and hiding , but you can’t blame him after having what had to be a pretty shitty childhood being constantly told “you have to live up to my legacy son!” and never allowed to be himself. 

Tentacular by contrast IS allowed to be himself.. but is so insecure and resentful of his town having a history before him, of not being THE center of attnetoin but the succesor to an all time great, of being just SLIGHTLY in someone’s shadow, something he’d likely of crawled out of with time.. .he abandons a bunch of people who NEED him just to satisfy his own ego. Just to be the best and spite a guy he likely never knew simply because he HAS to be center of attention nor nobody is. 

And it’s why Winnie eases up on Steve: he still needs to train and shape up sure, but she now sees she was trying way too hard to be her own dad. Sure JImbo didn’t abuse her.. but she’s not him and Steve’s not rayburn and if she wants to save her town.. she has to start thinking like herself and let Steve be himself. 

So she starts over, asking what steve enjoys. And after relatable answers like napping and sitting, he gives one that’s also relatable, even if he’s far better at it than me: dancing. While naturally as you’d expect he denys it , which gives us another one as “character has goofy passion they deny that gives them the 

Cliche Count: 22

Still it works. As Winnie notes wrestling is mostly footwork. And other things but she’s not wrong, so she simply translates that into dancing, which not only gets steve actually motivated, but bonds the two as we finally get a proper training montage

Cliche Count: 23

There’s another montage later, but i’m only counting for the one. Just because it happens twice dosen’t mean i’m going to double it’s spot on the count.  So steves next match against a lucha style lizard man goes much better as his salsa means steve can easily dodge, and dances his way to a victory and the pin. It’s geninely charming and fun to watch.

My issue with it is more the commentary guy I mentioned: he just wont’ stop raving about how “dancing isn’t wrestling”. One Fandango, Tyler Breeze, Disco Inferno, Brodius Clay and Too Cool would like to have words with you and two... it comes off as whining over a gimmick that’s not tha tbad and is unique and intresting, with Steve showing real dancing tequnique while being badass.  Besides i’ve seen and heard of SO many gimmicks that are worse. And since I got you here

Let’s do this.

We have Akeem the African Dream, a white man pretending to be a black man in a dashiki, Kerwin White, a latino man forced to pretend to be a white man, Beaver Clevage, you don’t want to know and if you do.. i’m so sorry, Paul Vergil, first a pirate then incest, Issac Yankem DDS, the Repo Man, both self explaintory, Sparky Plug, the nascaar driver/wrestler, Bastion Booger, he nasty, Atom Bomb, he from the future, Arachniman, guess, Hornswoggle, he’s a leprechaun, Lumberjack WIlliam Regal, HE’S A MAN, SUCH A MAN, Mike Awesome as both the fat chick thriller and that 70′s guy, again both self explantiory, Hugh G. Rection, yes really, The Booty Man, again YES REALLY, Zodiac, who befor eyou say “that sounds kind of cool” he went yes no yes, THE YETAAAYYYy, who was actually a mummy, and the king of all thorughly stupid , throughlly laughed at , throughly questionable gimmicks, THE SHOCKMASTER!

I have no words, such poetry. And so many questions. Even if he HADN’T fell over the wall.. he’s still a paunchy man in a glittery stormtrooper helmet and black vest who sounds like dr.claw. Just one of these thigns woudln’t hurt his drawing power but why all at once? 

So yeah we get a montage as steve gets in shape and fights more opponents the major one being Jokerzuna, basically gamera combined with yokozuna, a sumo wrestler wwe legend. Since he’s a big boy, Steve has to practice with Razorback to be able to life him dirty dancing style, allowing steve to eventaully win. 

So our heroes are on the up and even get a match with Gorge... it’s because Gorge is still traumatized form his last loss but still. 

Then thigns take a turn as the mayor and councilwoman decided to sell anyway because fuck this plot making any sense. Like.. you guys HAVE the monster now, even if he’s a comedy babyface, he’s still a mo nster. They can’t legally pull the money. That was the problem. 

Also “shockingly” given he hasn’t been in the film for an hour despite being the obvious final boss, Tentacular is behind it, wanting to tkae his petty wrestling dickery from regular heel to “ric flair buying hulk hogan’s orphanage on baywatch” levels of heel by ruining the town. The mayor agrees and even lets jimothy sign it on his back and Winnie is left crushed by everyone being stupid. Like.. you get more money from having a monster you can slwoly make a champ than a fucking parking lot. and your selling to someone obviously and transparently shady! Just find another billionare who WANTS a monster fighting franchise and let him buy it! 

So both me and Winnie get some and while Steve TRIES to help her, she’s down which leads to him going back to pay his debts and her moping, so we hit another as we get “the heroes have a falling out and things are really bad”.. only really stupidly handeled because them going bad makes no sense and Steve has no reason to go back to throwing fights or any motivation too anymore.  Paying his old boss back? Sure, but why does he go back there? Why any of this?

God my head hurts, so point is Steve comes back and after getting jabbed in the eye, makes his own inspirisng speech to winnie, pointing out he dosen’t want to go back to who he was, and even if they loose the stadium.. they have each other. He wants to be a better person and knows she has it in her.. and he actually has a plan to save things. 

So as Jimothy Ralphio gets booed and Tentacular prepares to blow it up real good.. nothing happens

Naturally our heroes stopped it, with Steve making an entrance and offering a match: he wins, Tentacular dosen’t tear it down. Tentacular, who choked steve earlier, laughs it off at first.. till steve reveals himself as Rayburn Jr, taking back his dad’s name. Not for a legacy or because of the pressure.. but because it’s the only way to help his friend. 

And thus he offers Tentacular the one thing he can’t turn down: a chance to completely and utterly destroy rayburns legacy and once and for all remove him form his predecessors shadow.  It’s also a brilliant play: even if Tentacular wasn’t such an egotistical manchild that he coudln’t resisit the chance to beat up the closest thing he has to rayburn and prove himself once and for all, and he does not, given there’s news coverage of this event, hence every character we’ve met finds out the reveal about steve, Tentacular will look weak if he dosen’t honor the bet, and it means Winnie can book it in stoker, so the town likewise gets a GIANT match with all the buisness that comes with it: the prodigal son of rayburn himself versus the man who wants to bury his legacy. It’s a perfectly built build for this match and awesome as hell. And since the bet is ONLY for Steve to go three rounds (Winnie got excited), the town gets it’s money either way: if they win and keep the stadium, they now have a monster who just surivived three rounds with the champ and lived and whose the son of their biggest hero. He’s both guarnatteed a future title shot and bigger matches from this. If he looses.. well the contract isn’t void then and they still get the money needed to keep going. But it still works because the stakes are personal: our heroes are fighting for their dad’s legacies and for themselves against someone we want to see go down. And often.. that’s what makes a good wrestling match. The belts nice but it’s the beef between the two fighting over it, the struggle to get there tha makes it FEEL gigantic. Also big bet based entirely on a sports match

Cliche Count: 24

That said while this was a big swing Winnie isn’t dumb: She knows Tentacular is a massive step up from the mid carders and low carders they’ve been facing. Thankfully the town bands together and makes a neat obstacle choice. So we get a training montage.. sadly not set to I get knocked down as is teased as the song peters out after Steve gets knocked down but it still works. 

The town thing is eh for me though: While I like them coming together they never feel like a character, something you need for this film. 

So steve trains, cleverly using some shipping boxes to simulate the tentacles and runs a gauntlet before running up a hill while winnie tries to kill him with a forklift, ole. He wins and IT’S TIME FOR YOUR MAIN EVENT. RABOGRRGLE

The atmosphere is tense, thigns are set, let’s do it to it: So Steve gets the only proper entrance music of th emovie, a salsa version of eye of the tiger. A bit of an easy choice for the song being covered sure.. but it’s so damn cool I can’t help but love it. Tentacular gets another nothing song and we  GET READY TO RUMBLLLLE complete with Micheal buffer, the guy who made up that catchphrase.  Before the match Steve has a bout of nerves both due to seeing his dad on the banners in the stadium and his opponent. So Winnie gives him a rousing speech (Steve told her not to earlier then wonders why she didn’t before now because it helps), pointing out how far he’s come and how he’s his own monster and can win this by being himself and you know the rest. Oh almost forgot, be yourself moral

Cliche Count: 25

This pumps him up and round one goes their way, with steve dancing through the danger and dodging everything. But then things get clever as instead of just having tentacular counter it normally, finally taking the match seriously etc. But no smartly the narrative dosen’t have his own arrogance be his downfall like you’d expect. I mean that trope works, just ask Vlad Masters, but here they went with something that works better: tentacular and old man whose name i’m not bothering to look up more than once thought ahead. Thus when Steve tries salsaing away next round.... Tentacular TANGOES with him. Besides giving us furries what we asked for it’s a damn clever twist, showing that as much as they dont’ LIKE the whole dancing gimmick, Tentacular isn’t above learning it. It also shows that while Winnie netted him the championship.. this guy DID earn it himself. He’s a dick sure, but he’s not an incomptient dick. 

He also chokes steve, again because that was clearly someone on the team’s thing, and is forced to let go with old man whose name I dont’ care about urging Winnie to give up. SHe almost does... but Steve dosen’t want her to. Even if he’s at risk of getting hurt worse.. he wants to try. It’s not about the stadium, or about jimbo, it’s about the two of them proving they can do this. 

So he lets Winnie actually coach him, using a combo of his agility and dancing ablility with actual wrestling moves. THis leads to a REALLY awesome and tense third act: while, let’s face it, we know their going to win, this movie isn’t rocky after all, the film does what a good wrestling match does: has you buy into the narrative: you dn’t FEEL that steve’s win is guarnateed so you buy totally into it hoping for him to. 

The finish is equally spectacular.. and kind of hilaroius. Steve tries to do an elbow drop, tentacular throws a chair.. except it’s people sized so it instead goes flying past him and only hits him in teh eye scausing him to tumble over. But even with that our two combatants are too exausted and it’s down to if they can even stand. Tents can, but it seems like Steve is out.. until the crowd starts clapping in time thanks to winnie’s mom, the beat slowly rasing him as the croud chants “RAYBURN JUINOR (CLAP CLAP) RAYBURN JUNIOR”

Steve gets up and does his dad’s finishing move on a dazed and shocked tentacular, winning the match, saving the stadium.. and to his shock WINNING the championship. Tentacular is left beaten and in disbelief, Jim-Ralphio gets hit with a chair in one of the best gags of the film and we end with a dance party. 

Cliche Count: 26

Still for once this one works as.. what else were they gonna do? Honestly. 

Final Thoughts:

Rumble is FAR from a perfect film. As the count up there suggests ther’es a lot of well trod ground and some very annoyingly baffling plot points. But despite this.. it’s still really fun. It truly loves wrestling and celebrates it, the animation is gorgeous and the cast is great. IT’s a truly fun movie if not a great one and I genuinely want it to get a paramount+ spinoff series. Wrestling is perfecctly built for a show a week format and there’s tons more to do from here: where does Steve go from here? whose he fight next? what next level opponents does he fight now? Who from his past will come out of the woodworks now he’ scome out as Rayburn jr? How do he and Winnie handle the pressure of being #1 in the world. What’s tentacular do now? Lots of good questions, please answer them.  So yeah not the best film.. but I had fun anyway and if you love wrestling or will arnett, then you’ll enjoy taking three rounds with this film. 

If you enjoyed this review and want to see me step into the ring for some more, follow this blog, consider joining my patreon to help keep it going, and follow me on twitter. Thanks for reading, see ya real soon and until next time.. a winner is you. 

[venusiangguk]

BUDGETING

dont know if everyone will still want to know on budgeting lol

I don't want to sound like a bitch yk

BUT

I think the most important thing for me was learning to give yourself the freedom to enjoy things like little by little

I used to do this thing where I was uptight for a super long time and then I wpukd splurge huge amounts and for nothing.

I'm not religious either but I truly believe that setting out a little each month/week for charity is great bc it's always comes back in a form that's greater you know.

Pay rise, new job opportunities, idk good things.

Ik it sounds cringe and gross but I think it's worth it !

THE STEPS LMAO

Okay so I always but in 40%-45% like in the bag already savings I mean (this can obvs be adjusted to fit your own needs but if say keeping over 30% is key!)

And work around everything else in the steps below !!!

If I was brave enough I would send pictures of my last year budgeting plan and how I managed to save !! But I'm not 😭😭😭

the first step for me would be to list your monthly income !

Monthly is way easier to work with and easier to adjust in the long run !

Second would be list out things that have to be paid always. So fixed expenses.

I.e rent, MOT, bills, food ( for this I would highly recommend just having a monthly shopping of like say £20-25 - seems un do able but isnt !!! Frozen veggies are your best friend:)) gym membership, spotify, prime all of that.

Third which is super important for me at least would be to set out a like reward bonus for yourself.

( in cash preferably- like so once it's gone it's gone you know- like monthly rewards for yourself - sometimes you use it and sometimes you dont!! )

Fourth - ALWAYS SET AN EXTRA LIL FUND FOR THE UNEXPECTED THINGS!!! ( car crashes, dentist, medicine if your toaster breaks if your fridge breaks !! all of that lovely stuffs 😃)

So when you look at all that infront you- really just scrutinise it.

Like -

How much of that do you really need to spend?

Is there anything you can cut out on ?

This is super important at least to me bc then I see that yh shit - that is crazy I'm spending useless money )

I think that also keeping student loans separate is SUUUUPER SUUUUPER bc it just. Idk if anyone else is like this but seeing how much they expected from me to be able to learn always depressed me so I made a separate folder for that- made it pretty so it didnt look sooo bad lmao ) but I think the biggest part was getting to grips that I had all that to pay back!!!

Then like random things :

Concerts, events, holidays.

Like make sure you have them planned in advance and make separate funds for all of them.

To cater to what they need! Like for a concert- hotel and food money and merch buying and army bomb and a NEW OUTFITTTT lmao)

And yh - I think setting up a teeny amount for charity or to help ppl is always great aswell bc well idk you feel good and it does always come to find you- doesnt have to be a large amount. Maybe even a food box every month or smn cute and sweet like that !!

This is how I did it : ( kind of irrelevant and just abt silly me lmao but maybe itll help(?))

So i used to work night shifts at this horrible packing place ( it was freezing too but the pay was so good! It was £15-18 an hr ( sometimes even more )and I used to work from 11pm-4am 7 days a week like I didnt take a day off until I quit and i did it for 2 years ! That was like 50k but I had a lot of things to pay off and my parents wanted nearly all of it back off of me 😃)

This is also the NOT the job I wanted yk? Like I used to work with a bunch of stinky ass men and it sucked but I had to do it bc well my parents kicked me out bc I was non religious looool.

I was never enough and I just got kicked out yk? ( oh no not my sob story but just to put it into perspective sort of like I was fucking depressed my money was going like wildfire )

So I had to kind of take everything/every opportunity. They expected a lot back from me too in that way like alot of my learning was going to them :/)

From 5-7

I worked at a bakery ! Cooking and baking and having fun! That was the best job I had the pay wasnt all that but it was something and I needed everything I could get ! It wasnt everyday either but so and so.

I also am bilingual so that way I was able to get a job as a teacher in a daytime school teaching which I did voluntarily! For the first year !

( I had this routine for 2 years!!)

So like I was getting an okay amount from these jobs but god heavens I was spending so unnecessary.

Like a high price for a shit apartment where I would have to pay for things to get fixed to and that was really expensive.

My parents also took alot first year earnings and that's when I was like well shit I have nothing I really need to like get my shit together yk?

There was student loan (- I dont want to like envoke sympathy bc of all this I just wanna like say that my money was kind of slipping away yk I feel like I'm being annoying 😭😭😭 ) - and just a whole lot of wasting on food ( my biggest expenditure- at the time I was struggling with binge eating and bulimia so 🙃🙃 yh )

Dumb shit off amazon, and like just crap you know

Also car petrol and mot and car stuff. and bus and train fares just money can go so easily.

It was just super super tiring to have juggle all these balls at once but when I got the hang of it like doing all those steps I felt more free and more aware of myself and I was able to enjoy while still getting yk the most out of what I do.

I work as a translater/teacher now so the pay is good and like using these steps is how I got the most out of myself

Uh idk If this even makes sense anymore and I'm sorry if come off as bitch too

I don't mean to or come with a sob story

I just think its important to like realise that no matter what and who in your life demands things from you - you always have to choose to look after yourself first- how you choose too look after yourself is ultimately how you choose to look after others too ! Take good care of yourself - give yourself a clearer mind and you'll be able to see a bigger picture- outside of the one built for you !!

If your struggling with other issues - mental health too it can help bring clarity to that too ! Bc it's some sort of semblance.

Gosh I feel gross what if you have to read all of this 😭😭😭

I hope it helps you ♡♡

Budgeting is really important bc we need to buy houses!!

Need property!!!

Start our own businesses !!

Become our own bosses !

It's just super important to know your expenses you can know yourself better too !

And you can be more mature and more self aware

💜💜💜💜💜💜💜

Gosh I really ate your ear off with this one

for everyone wondering about our bestie w 50k savings: this is her story !!

[jamaisvuandyou]

Please Dry My Eyes: Part 6

Description: Jin, Hoseok, and Yoongi have had a running streak of bad luck, but Jin isn’t sure what to make of this one: His old friend’s trickery that leads to him being the new father of a little toddler, Jeon Jungkook.

Posted: 02/6/2021

WARNING: Mentions of death

Angst/Fluff: 2,846 words

A/N: Welp.

Previous Part.  Next Part.

The one thing they dared not do at this exact moment was take Jimin away from Jungkook. He was distracted. He was happy. He wasn’t sobbing pitifully into Jin’s shoulder.

Jin had finally been able to take a shower, and put on a dry shirt. Not because he wasn’t expecting more tears, but because it made him feel better to get a dry shirt.

Hoseok was distracting both of them with some sort of silly song time, and the babies were laughing more than singing, but that was good. That was progress.

Yoongi was working on paperwork with Namjoon, so once Jin was finished with his shower, he went to make lunch for all of them. Something that would be easy to feed the boys while some trivial kids show played on the TV because today, of all days, was a cheat day.

“Yoongi,” He whispered, leaning on the table so that the two men seated there could hear him better. “We need kids DVDs. ASAP.”

Yoongi glanced down at the paperwork, then at Namjoon, before looking confusedly up at Jin. “Now? Why?”

“Because, we don’t have cable and we don’t have any other TV watching things, I barely remembered to get the internet installed here, and I am not trying to wrangle two emotionally unstable children for lunch when the rest of us are feeling emotionally unstable without some sort of distraction for said children,” Jin said, putting money on the table. “Take Namjoon if you need to. I’m assuming you’re staying for lunch.”

Namjoon sort of bobbed his head, a little shy. “Yeah, sorry, there’s a lot of paperwork and I thought it might be better for me to stick around and help a bit with Jimin the way he is.”

“That’s fine. Great even. Hope you like kids food. Shoo, off to the nearest store or resale shop or something.” Jin pulled both of them up by the arm. “You’ve been doing paperwork for three hours. Think of it as a coffee break, but without the coffee.”

Both of them headed for the front door, putting on their shoes to go on the trivial errand.

Jin got everything ready for when he was actually going to make lunch, then checked on Hobi and the boys again, trying to buy some time for Yoongi and Namjoon to get the required materials, and cleaned up the house a little bit since it was just short of a disaster thanks to the mess of a morning.

Lunch was almost ready when Namjoon and Yoongi returned, a few bags in tow.

Jin eyed them as he portioned out more sliced grapes. “Um….”

Yoongi held up his hands. “We went to the resale shop. It was the closest store, and we did get movies, though the quality of them is…questionable, but they had some of their toys on sale and I know that Jungkook likes the puzzles and Jimin looked like he liked books so….”

Jin nodded. “That’s fine. It’s a good idea for us to check out what they have for kids clothing-wise too. What DVDs did you get?”

“Well, we found some VHS tapes, and I remembered that ours still worked so I grabbed Cinderella, Rugrats—whatever that is, and The Lion King.”

“Let’s save Lion King for when they’re much, much older,” Jin said, thinking it would be a bad idea to show toddlers who recently lost their parents a movie where the father dies. Heck, who was he kidding, he didn’t think he could watch it.

“Right…um, well, DVD’s were even more scarce, but we found a couple DVDs of Veggietales—which I’ve never heard of, but they look pretty harmless and it is marked as having won a parent’s choice award so it’s got to be decent—Lyle the Kindly Viking, and The End of Silliness. Then there was Curious George and a Barbie movie. And the lady said we were lucky to find most of these.” Yoongi showed him the DVDs.

Jin grabbed one of the ones he hadn’t heard of, scanning over the back and then shrugging. “Let’s try one of these new ones, I guess. If it’s too bad we’ll switch to Curious George. Meantime, I’m going to look it up.”

“Already doing that,” Namjoon said. “Oh. I mean, they are Christian influenced…but definitely kids and…” He trailed off as he saw the look on Jin’s face. “Vegetables singing and acting out stories, sounds like a great distraction for the kids.”

Jin nodded. “I will take anything at this point. I’m not about to get picky on a day like today. There’s a lot of christian crap that’s secular enough to pass as not christian and at least we don’t have to worry about someone dying. And this one says it’s mostly songs from the show. Songs are good. Do you hear them singing?”

“Jin didn’t get as much sleep as you’d have thought,” Yoongi muttered to Namjoon, gently tugging him away.

Namjoon nodded, retreating with Yoongi with the DVDs to get it set it up.

Jin rubbed his forehead and finished plating it up. He didn’t have to patience to contemplate religions or whatever. He needed distractions for toddlers and they wouldn’t even really remember this. It would not be a formative memory. As long as it distracted his kids and didn’t trigger them, it could be any religion, any language, any content. He wouldn’t care until he’d slept a full night, and he had to care about their formative memories. He would figure it out then.

Just one of many meals that would blend into nothing in the minds of the infants.

And he wouldn’t have to contemplate what sort of language would be acceptable in his house for another day.

He would have to look into shows for the kids though, and get either a streaming service or a lot of DVDs.

But the four men got the two infants settled in front of the TV with their lunch.

Yoongi and Namjoon went back to their paperwork about halfway through.

But Hoseok, bless him, kept the kids invested in the show while also getting food in them. He had them dancing to a few of the songs.

And Jungkook kept watching even though he did give up on dancing to sit on Jin’s lap.

It wasn’t until it ended that Jimin seemed to calm down and remember.

He stood in the middle of the living room, hands at his sides, staring at the credits as they rolled. “Eomma,” he whispered.

Jin gently deposited Jungkook onto Hoseok’s arms, then crouched beside Jimin.

Jimin looked at him, then sighed and wrapped his arms around Jin’s neck, burying his face.

Jin held him carefully, lifting him and just holding him against his shoulder. There was a certain amount of fear inside of him: fear of Jimin becoming too attached to them, fear of letting Jimin go….

Jimin sniffled lightly.

“Well, baby,” Jin whispered. “It’s going to be long ride, but I’ve got strong shoulders. I can hold you as long as you need me too.”

As Jin sat down, Hoseok snuggled closer and rest his head on Jin’s shoulder so that Jungkook could rest on his shoulder but seemed to be satisfactorily close to Jin.

“Nice wide shoulders,” Hoseok murmured.

Jimin studied them a little bit, then reached out a hand.

Jungkook innocently took it, then closed his eyes.

Jimin smiling a bit through his quiet little tears and soft sniffles, and closing his eyes as well.

Jin watched both of the little ones until they seemed to be asleep. “Let’s put them to bed for their nap.”

Hoseok sighed. “Two more minutes.”

“No, two more minutes and we’ll both be asleep. Come on. Give me Jungkook. They’re sharing a bed. Yoongi, you took a picture, right?”

“I’m not stupid.”

Jin and Hoseok maneuvered Jungkook onto Jin’s other shoulder, then Hoseok helped Jin get up.

The toddlers barely stirred when Jin lay them down.

“For someone who supposedly hasn’t worked with kids that much, you’re doing really well,” Namjoon said quietly. “And I’m sorry about questioning you earlier on the dvds. You have every right to decide what is and isn’t okay in your house. And you were right. It was harmless.”

Jin waved them all out, closing the door for now. “Religions…are complicated, but I know a lot of religions have higher censorship, which means they’ll be more…friendly for kids who have been traumatized like mine have. Supposedly, anyway. I’m still going to screen a bunch of stuff before I let them watch it, but tonight it was desperate measures. They’ll be able to choose what they want to believe.”

Yoongi nodded. “I went to catholic school. It wasn’t all bad.”

Namjoon shrugged a bit. “Sorry. I’m an atheist, so…I didn’t think about your perspective on it.”

“Now you know my perspective on it. I’m not really religious or anything, I don’t have a set of beliefs, but if they decide they want to pursue any sort of religion, I’m not going to stop them…unless I think it’s a cult, then I’m probably going to lock them in the basement and try to talk sense to them.”

“I’m gonna pretend you didn’t say lock them in the basement and just roll with the talk sense to them, but yeah. I get it. Like I said, you were right. I’m sorry. But…did you really just call both of them your kids?” Namjoon was smiling.

Jin stared at the social worker, trying to remember what he had said.

Yoongi and Hoseok were smiling as well.

“I’m a duck,” Jin muttered. “A damn duck. I’ve imprinted. What the hell.”

Yoongi sputtered behind him.

Hoseok was make a lot of choked laughing noises as he followed Jin into the bedroom.

Jin changed into sweats, and stared at himself for far too long in the mirror, zoned out while trying to figure out when he’d subconsciously decided that Jimin was his now and that was such a dangerous thing to think.

Yoongi was sitting on the edge of the bed when he came out of the bathroom, but Hoseok was under the covers. “Namjoon left.”

“Right. Okay.”

“He said he’d see about trying to keep Jimin with us.”

“Right,” Jin repeated intelligently. He climbed under the covers, just waiting for Hoseok to get comfortable cuddling with him.

“Jungkook’s doing really well with him, and Jimin seems to really love Jungkook,” Hoseok whispered, holding his hand out for Yoongi to cuddle with them. “Actually, I’ve never seen Jungkook so…so….”

“Pacified? Independent? Detached from Jin?” Yoongi offered as he moved to spoon Hoseok, sandwiching the youngest in the middle. “Yeah, I think having another kid might be good for Jungkook, but we’ll still have to watch carefully over the next few days.”

Jin nodded, closing his eyes.

“But hey, we discovered that music is a good distraction for them. That’s good, you know?”

“True. And we found out that a desperate Jin doesn’t give a—”

“Language,” Jin grumbled, reaching out blindly and gently hitting at whatever his hand reached.

Soft chuckles were the response, then they all fell quiet, falling into a well-earned nap.

–

Previous.  Next.

Masterlist.

[the-velveteen-victorian]

Elle can you explain what goth is? Google is really inconsistent and I’m having such a difficult time understanding it. When did you find out you were goth?

Definitely! This is a long response just so you are prepared. =) Goth is a music-based subculture. You are correct… Google is not a good resource for discovering what goth is. Unfortunately, a lot of “goth” guide books aren’t either (I know one of them features a lot of emo bands?). First off, let’s just get out of the way what goth is not. Goth is not emo or metal. Avenged Sevenfold, My Chemical Romance, and Pantera are not goth. Goth is not white supremacy. Yes, those of us with naturally pale skin sometimes strive to keep our skin tones light, but goth is a home to people of all skin/hair/eye colors. Anyone who says you can only be a pale, white person is disgusting. Goth is not associated with any religion, philosophy, political inclination, or specific belief system. There are Christian, Hindu, Atheist, New Age, Shinto, Muslim, Republican, Democrat, Green Party, pineapple on pizza, no pineapple on pizza goths. You get my point. =)

Wearing goth fashion does not make someone goth, no matter how great the outfit may be. I (and most goths, elder and younger) define goth as someone who has an intense interest and passion for goth music. That’s it. Sure, most of us will gravitate toward darker aesthetics and like to wear the fashion when we can, but it is absolutely NOT a requirement. That is what google gets so wrong. One of the goth ladies I know spends 80% of her time in scrubs. She loves her job as a nurse practitioner and she has to have a more conservative look while she is working. She can’t wear the fashion more often than a couple times a month. She listens to goth music every day and is super knowledgeable about it. Is she goth? Yes. Conversely, I know a lot of teenagers who are trying to figure out who they are (which is TOTALLY FINE). They actually do a really great job of diy-ing goth looks, but they do not listen to goth music at all. Most of them listen to metal, emo, or country music. Do I consider them goth? No. But I do not judge them for it. Music is about what speaks to you and goth is in no way superior to any other musical taste.

With the rise of “pastel goth” and fashion trends on tumblr/social media, I think a lot of people get misled. This is why it is so important to have some level of contact with the actual goth community. Covid showed us that it is possible to do this online! We can attend online goth nights, get the set lists and analyze goth club music trends from our homes, and have zoom dance sessions! I really love the flexibility and versatility that the pandemic revealed to the goth community… because a lot of goths don’t live in cities with a big goth scene.

How did I discover I was goth? By beautiful accident. =) I was 15, and I struggled to have any level of autonomy or self-expression at all. I grew up in a conservative family (Christian/religious) cult. That rabbit hole runs deep and is a separate story for another time. The point is that I had very limited contact with the outside world apart from my private school, church, and Christian-group violin lessons. However! I received a nano ipod from an extended family member for Christmas one year. I copied a bunch of CD’s from Christian acquaintances at my church and filled the ipod up with the generic contemporary Christian and overstimulating broadway musicals endemic to the culture around me… it was all I had. Then, one day I discovered a goth band. I had no idea they were a goth band. I was obsessed with their sound. I can’t remember which platform I found them on, but I remember I did not have a video with it… so I’m thinking I was on the itunes store. I had chills and for the first time every something felt “right” in the music world for me.

Goth music begets more goth music… Itunes recommended other bands like the one I had found. I only had the money to buy a few albums over the course of a year, but I would retitle the songs and albums as Christian or Disney compilations so that my parents would never suspect what I was listening to (they regularly went through my ipod to make sure I wasn’t listening to anything worldly). One day, I was listening to some of my goth music with another confirmed atheist at my private Christian school and he was like, “OMG I had no idea you were a goth!” I was super confused and was all like, “No, I’m not. I don’t even know what that is…” This guy was a metalhead, but he had a ton of goth friends and he gave me my first thorough education on everything goth. I was 15 at the time, and it was not until nearly 4 years later that I would escape my family and truly come to integrate in the goth community.

Long story short, I started out with the music with no clue about the fashion. I think I was very fortunate in that because it gave me time to develop my musical preferences and tastes without feeling pressured to fit into a tiny little box. Later, when I was free, I did develop a goth wardrobe and (of course) decorated my house in a dark romantic/Victorian style…. But I never felt like those things were vital to who I was as a goth. I’m really thankful for that.

Please understand, that I do not want to erase the incredible goth fashion magicians out there or diminish the hard work someone may put into their personal look or aesthetic. The goth aesthetic is the heartbeat behind the unparalleled, transcendent feeling I have in a goth club or just in my own bedroom. It definitely adds to the experience. All I am saying is that those things alone do not a goth make. I also grew up obsessed with (gothic) Victorian literature... it took me awhile to put 2 and 2 together for that one too lol.

My controversial opinion here is that I do believe that some level of gatekeeping is necessary to keeping goth alive today. Unfortunately, it is an endangered species as subcultures go… this is not because there are not any goths. It is because the mainstream has appropriated it and defined it as fashion ONLY, which then confuses people who go to the surface level of the internet to get answers… which then creates a whole following that erases what goth truly is.

However, I need to explain that when most people refer to gatekeeping, they are talking about bullying. I am defining gatekeeping as providing a definition for the heart of the goth movement and sticking to it. Bullying is never acceptable. Ever. The example I employ a lot utilizes musical genre as an example. Let’s say you put on a Carnifex t-shirt and wear it a lot. But…. You don’t listen to metal because it just is not your sound. You don’t talk to other people about metal music, seek out the aesthetic, have more than 2 songs on your phone with metal music, or (want) to attend metal events. Are you a metalhead? No, of course not. But are you inferior to metalheads because you choose to listen to classical and hip-hop music? No, of course not. Another example: Let’s say you don’t like coffee. You don’t regularly drink it, read about it, or have an interest in it. Are you a coffee enthusiast? No, of course not. Are you inferior to those who do drink coffee? No, of course not. But it would be ridiculous to feel pressured to fit the mold of a coffee enthusiast, right?

It is never wrong to define what something is and to stick to your guns on it as long as you do not cross over into elitist territory, thinking you are better than everyone else. That is the point I want to get across here. Goth fashion does own my heart, but I also sometimes dress in dark academia, cottagecore, dark mori, and even in 80’s retrofuturistic styles when the mood strikes me. It does not change my involvement in the goth community or erase my love for goth music.

Lastly, a question I get a lot (and I have addressed this in previous posts) is, “I am obsessed with goth music… I have a wide knowledge base that I have spent great amounts of time developing and it is my life… but I also like Lil Peep, Lady Gaga, ‘gothic’ metal, and Lana Del Rey. Am I still goth?” The answer is YES. Of course you are! Loving goth music and being obsessed doesn’t mean you can’t like other things. Anyone in the goth community who tells you have to ONLY listen to goth music is full of crap. Eighty percent of my ipod is goth music… I am lucky to have thousands of songs. (And by the way, if you cannot afford a lot of goth music, you are not less goth than the rest of us. Listening for free is just as valid.) The other twenty percent is classical and synthwave/cybersynth/retrowave/darkly inclined/spacewave/video game sountrack/cyberpunk-inspired stuff. Am I any less of a goth for also being obsessed with the retrowave community or for listening to bands that are darkly inclined but not quite goth? No, of course not. Also, you can be darkly inclined without being goth, and that is just as beautiful. =) My husband is darkly inclined and likes some goth music, but he is more involved in the horror community. He is no less valid and freaking awesome than I am.

I hope this makes sense! This is a subject I feel passionate about. Just to recap, the pillars of fashion, gothic literature, and general aesthetics are valid in the goth scene and contribute greatly to the structural integrity of the whole. However, the soul of goth is in the music. I have hearing loss myself and have a couple of friends who are completely deaf who also agree that the music is the soul of goth. The way they engage is by reading the lyrics and even going to goth clubs when they can to dance and feel the beat. =) I think that is beautiful and so amazing. Hearing disabilities do not disqualify you from the goth scene- anyone who says they do is garbage.  

Here are a couple of videos explaining a bit about what goth music actually is. Let me know if you would like more resources! Angela Benedict did a video where she answered the question, “Can you be goth and not like the music?” Her answer is also no. She is a great youtuber to watch because she was there for the 90’s goth scene! It is so fun to hear her stories and learn about the elder goth generations. <3

Goth music is not just goth rock… there are SOOOOO many subgenres under the massive umbrella that is goth. It is a big universe to explore. =) If you would like a list of some of my favorite goth bands AND goth adjacent bands, then I can do a separate post for that- just ask! Thank you for tolerating my info-dumping. =) <3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKDo_j0O-hA&t=116s – Accumortis on goth music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGj3CuAeW1w – Angela Benedict on goth music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zg3HwuFlGeU&t=587s – Angela Benedict on defining goth

[kissjane]

Last one for today, but this one is defs not a drabble, but rather a full one shot, so once again, continue reading under the break! This one was requested by one of the anonymous Davenzi shippers, so anon, hope you enjoy!

And with this one I think I have done 15 out of the 50, that’s 30% done! Yay! The next one will probably be Elu again (#5? #12? #49? I can tell you it won’t be #30, though.). 

#23 from this prompt list.

“Just tell me why you did it!” “Because I’m in love with you, okay!”

David knew it was his worst idea ever. He knew he shouldn’t do it, but it was stronger than himself. He knew it would ruin everything, but he just couldn’t lose Matteo.

Matteo. His best friend since as long as they both could remember.

The had never kept a secret for each other. David had known Matteo was gay before anybody else, years ago, and he had kept Matteo’s secret faithfully. Matteo had shown him the same courtesy when David had told Matteo he wanted to transition. And when David had started the long process, Matteo had helped him choose a new name, and had used it without ever slipping up once.

It was straightforward between the two of them. They understood each other without many words, and acceptance was as simple as a nod, an easy ‘okay’, and nothing more was needed.

They knew everything there was to know about one another.

Except for that one thing, the one secret he had kept close to his heart for years now, patiently waiting until Matteo would be ready to come out officially.

He just had never counted upon the fact that Matteo would come out by introducing his boyfriend to the whole squad.

But that was exactly what had happened. Matteo had just shown up with a tall, blue-eyed, blonde guy, and when the boys had fallen silent upon spotting their linked hands, he had bluntly announced the facts.

“Michael, these are my friends, David, Jonas, Carlos, and Abdi. Guys, this is Michael, my boyfriend.”

David had spat out his drink. The others had needed a few seconds to digest the news, but then they had exploded into their usual chaos.

“Bro, when did you get a boyfriend?”

“More importantly, how did you get a boyfriend? You have absolutely no game!”

“And you never felt the need to tell us you were gay before, huh?”

“You shouldn’t just assume he’s gay, bro. He could be bi, too.”

“Way to go, though, Luigi. Way to go.”

“Are you gay, then, Luigi, or what?”

“Doesn’t matter, he’s taken. More girls for us, either way.”

“Man, Michael, we can tell you stories about Luigi…”

And amidst all the noise, Matteo had turned to David.

“Hey,” he’d whispered, “Thanks for keeping the secret all these years. But I guess I’m out now. I couldn’t have done it without you though,” hugging David briefly before turning to the boys again, and putting a firm stop to any potential embarrassing stories.

David knew he should have been happy for Matteo, out and proud, and with a boyfriend, too. But instead, he felt numb.

And that is why something inside him snapped when Michael turned to him, smiling politely, saying he had heard so much about David. And he decided to follow through on his worst idea ever.

“Nice to meet you, Michael. Although I am sure we won’t see each other often.”

The polite smile on the boy’s face faltered slightly.

“I am sorry? What? I wouldn’t keep my boyfriend from his best friend, if that is what you mean.”

David laughed, high and phony.

“Oh, no. I just mean you won’t be his boyfriend for very long.”

He took a sadistic pleasure in seeing the confusion grow in Michael’s eyes.

“Huh? What are you talking about?”

“Oh, honey,” David said, insincere concern lacing his voice. “You thought Matteo was out now? Oh, no, sorry to disappoint you. His dad is a homophobic dick, but Matteo needs his money. And his mom is very religious, and she’s also in a fragile state right now, so Matteo will not risk her health by telling her he’s gay. I’m afraid he’s just using you for a bit of fun. But he can be a lot of fun, take it from me.”

He winked suggestively. He felt the bile rise in his stomach as soon as the words tumbled out of his mouth, and he wanted to take it all back, claim it was just his way to mess a bit with his best friend’s boyfriend, but he thought he might vomit if he opened his mouth again, so watched helplessly as Michael talked to Matteo, and Matteo just sat there, turning silent and small and sad, his shoulders hunched and his blue eyes dull.

And he still watched as Michael left, and Matteo came back to the table where the boys were still being their rambunctious selves. They didn’t even notice Matteo’s struggle to keep the tears at bay, so Matteo slid silently into the booth next to David, and David, feeling every bit the snake he was, put an arm around Matteo in consolation.

“What’s wrong?”, he asked.

“He – he broke up with me. Just like that. Couldn’t he have done it before we came here and I came out to everybody, then?”

“I’m – I’m so sorry, Matteo…”

“And what did I do wrong? He just said it wouldn’t ever work out. Why, David? I didn’t do anything, wrong, did I? Or am I just not good enough?”

The tears shone in Matteo’s blue eyes, and they were like pools in which David would drown willingly. He couldn’t stand it. He hurt his best friend, out of spite and selfishness. He needed to come clean, confess to his actions of tonight – and the reasons behind them.

He took a deep breath.

“I think I may have said some things to him that were not true, and which scared him away.”

Matteo looked at him as if he just had grown an extra head.

“What? Oh, I see. You are just trying to cheer me up, David, but that’s not necessary, I mean, I guess I’ll just have to get over the fact that nobody will ever love me and –”

“Teo. I’m not trying to cheer you up. I chased Michael off. I – I told him you were not interested in a relationship and were just using him for some fun.”

“You – what?”

The incredulity in Matteo’s voice made David feel even more guilty. He tried to grab Matteo’s hand, but the latter wasn’t having any of it, and shook off David’s arm, too, planting his hands on his knees and looking David straight in the eyes.

“I’m so sorry, Matteo, I didn’t mean to –”

“You didn’t mean to lie to my boyfriend? Or you didn’t mean to break up the two of us? Cut the crap, David. Just tell me why you did it!”

Matteo was full-on angry now, and he actually yelled the last sentence. This finally got the attention of the other boys, who looked up anxiously. David wondered if any of them had ever heard Matteo yell before. Even David had only heard Matteo shout once before, at his father the day the latter had come back to pick up his stuff, three weeks after leaving his teenage son and unstable wife alone.

Three pairs of eyes turned towards Matteo and David now, and David swallowed.

“Why, David? Just tell me why,” Matteo repeated, at a much lower volume, tiredness speaking from his words, his posture, his entire being.

“Because I’m in love with you. Because I’ve loved you for years, okay?”

David almost choked out the words, but his eyes didn’t leave Matteo. All colour drained from Matteo’s face, and he opened his mouth, only to close it again without speaking a word.

It is, in fact, Jonas who broke the silence.

“Hey, uh, boys, let’s go. Call me later, Luigi.”

Carlos and Abdi got the hint, and they stood up, hastily collecting their phones and jackets and scarves and hats. David thought Abdi was wearing Jonas’ gloves, and Carlos had just grabbed a bunch of clothes without actually putting them on, and in a matter of seconds, the boys had disappeared.

Matteo was still staring at him, not moving, not speaking, so David tried again.

“I love you, Teo… I know I shouldn’t have done it, I know I should have been happy for you, but I just –”

“You’ve been in love with me for years?”, Matteo interrupted, forming the words carefully, as if this is the only bit of information he had retained.

“Yes. Yes, Matteo. I know it’s not an excuse, and I swear I’ll make it right again, I’ll call Michael and explain it was a lie, just give me his number and –”

“Why did you never tell me then?”

“What? Oh – uh, I – I didn’t want to put pressure on you. I didn’t know how you felt about me, and I didn’t want to lose you, and even if you could ever see yourself giving me a chance, you weren’t ready to come out yet and I didn’t want you to feel like you had to for my sake… I know I fucked everything up now, and I understand if I lost you anyway because of this. But I swear I will call him, Matteo, and I won’t stand in your way ever again, just… just don’t cut me out of your life completely, please?”

Matteo didn’t answer, and David felt his stomach sink as dread slithered clammily down his spine. Of course, Matteo would not forgive him. He was just about to start begging again, when Matteo spoke, softly.

“I love you too.”

David felt sucker-punched straight into the gut.

“Matteo?”

“I just didn’t think I could have you…”

David wasn’t sure if this was reality, or whether he had somehow entered a parallel universe.

“But you can! God, you can, Teo!”

Matteo nodded, seemingly lost in thoughts. David decided to push his luck. If he was indeed in a dream, he might as well make the most out of it. He took Matteo’s hands in his. Matteo didn’t pull back this time, and David considered it a good sign.

“So… uhm… Can you forgive me, then?”

Matteo looked up, then, and his beautiful eyes had found their sparkle again.

“I don’t know… It all depends…”

“On?”, David asked, his heart beating rapidly as he awaited Matteo’s answer.

“How good you kiss,” Matteo smirked, and David laughed, carefree and bright.

“No pressure,” he murmured, teasingly, as he leaned in, and finally – finally – captured Matteo’s lips.

This was by far the best idea he ever had, he thought, before all rational thought left him completely.

[rametarin]

The complicated issue of the ‘war on science’ in the United States.

We are all painfully aware that there are individuals and communities in the United States of America that believe garbage like, “The earth is between 2021 and 6000 years old.” That’s not where the story begins or ends.

Yes, individuals like this exist. Small communities of people like this exist. I’m not denying that. They’re well documented and will out themselves in the right section of the country. They do tend to be right wing voters, but not exactly for the reasons you’d think. And it is an anti-science position to say the earth is only that old. This is not in dispute.

Typically the conversation then goes to a smug look at the 4th wall, some smug assed, “LOL LOOK AT THE AMERICAN MILITARY BUDGET VS. ITS PUBLIC EDUCATION BUDGET. :^)” And the implication for this thinking is that North America is so full of religious zealots, systematic conservative theocratic control and by extension nativist white supremacism based on bellowing blowhards that it does not value science, “as a society or a culture.”

This is pure and simply masturbatory fantasy on behalf of people that tend to see all religious culture under this light. Or at least, Christianity. Since they often don’t have the balls to apply these “harshly judging medieval superstitious culture” standards to immigrants from Islamic countries or cultures or communities.

The actual numbers of flat earthers, young earth creationists, etc. are extreme outliers with very little actual power. However, those people are good caricatures to shame and embarrass and stigmatize and stratify religious people. They don’t have to DIRECTLY mock the religious, they just have to mock those extremes, get the actual religious to also join in and be part of the cool kids for mocking the more extreme and nonsensical beliefs. That creates a mental, psychological and social division. It’s a Mean Girl tactic and technique to make a person socially divorce themselves and shun and ostracize someone else in order to be spared being made fun or, or similarly be shown that derision or hostility.

The people doing it the loudest and most subvserively tend to do it because they aren’t JUST atheist or agnostics, like normal scientifically minded individuals, but zealous atheists and secularists that have a big mind about what “society” is and means and what they want it to mean. And they abhor that religious culture that is so contrary to science and reality exists. Especially when they’d much rather those people stop existing in their own bubbles, (”Atomization”) and get on board with THEIR brand of culture, society and, dare I say, revolution.

So they publicize and shame the religious by showing every potentially inbred, belligerent, anti-science yokel from a small community where a religious culture is the norm of the territory by embarrassing them, they put it in the news to create this image of a basis and normalty. “Look at how stupid and anti-intellectual the seedy underbelly of the US of A’s culture is!”

When in reality, that’s the sign of multiculturalism. Multiculturalism does not mean, “a bunch of different cultures that also fit your neat ideas of reality.” Some cultures, despite what your cultural relativism says to you, really are that stupid. And guess what? Many of them would make their new home a lot like the failed or inadequate idea of home, if they could.

Multiculturalism is not, “we’re all different but we all believe the same things!” Multiculturalism doesn’t even necessarily mean all cultures will cease being based on imaginary shit and only pull from objective, measurable reality. When you shame an outlying religious community for their asinine beliefs and then try to use the broad strokes to negatively portray the land they live in as dangerously unhinged psychopaths purely based on what the outliers believe, you lose any and all credibility when you defend corrupt religious nations like Pakistan or Taliban era Afghanistan.

The, “War on Science” is a lot like the War on Christmas. In that, neither are quite happening in quite the same way the people crying about them are saying.

If you asked a person that voted more left-wing or liberal, they might say the US was full of religious kooks that vote contrary to reason or science. That they think with their egos, not their rational brains, and that the only thing that has stopped them from destroying everything is exploitative greed and/or sadism.  They imagine people that disagree with them as effectively screaming, shit throwing chimpanees wearing papal gowns and beating people with scaramental candle holders.

If you asked a person that voted more right-wing or conservative that also happened to believe the hooey about the US being a “blessed Christian nation,” they might say that “liberals’ (an umbrella term used by these types) are waging a war on North America’s religious Christian traditions and culture. Firstly by trying to disentangle Christian participation in public schools, such as getting rid of Christmas decorations, holiday songs, even cutting snowflakes and stuff. Not in any display of multiculturalism, but simply to eliminate “respecting establishment of religion” in a secular public school environment.

By trying to stigmatize “Merry Christmas” as unwanted and uncalled for, the product of assuming if you’re wished one, they assume the recipient is inherently Christian, and that’s either annoying or offensive depending on the religion of the recipient. Borderline hate speech, if the recipient is a member of a religious faith or culture that sees such well wishing to be heretical.

Both of these examples are of people with a vested interest in painting your perceptions of the issue from a position of bias. Both of these examples have elements where they are correct in all the wrong ways and incorrect in all the right ones.

The truth is that the US also has a problem with smarmy assed people that rue the power of the religious communities and would give anything if only they could find some legal avenue to make them go away, short of going out and firebombing churches in high profile. Some way to disincentivize going to church, to get observation of religious culture and beliefs to have the communal aspect removed from them in order to be acceptable, since they view the entire concept of culture and society to be the sole domain of secularism, and religious community is seen as a stumbling block, opponent or even a danger to their preferred majority society.

We seldom get to hear about these ones outside the context of an angry religious idiot harping on about, “them godless li-bur-awls.” That doesn’t mean these people that are just jealous they bow at the altar of a different god aren’t the secular, dogmatic yuppies and shit. It just means the reason they’d specify as to why they have a problem with them gets stuck in their own personal bias and perspective. From their view, erroneous as it is, the United States was a country created by the will of God and ordained for a purpose (it wasn’t) and to divorce God and Christianity from dominance in the United States is to deliberately be spitting in the face of god and trying to destroy the world.

Outwardly, that sounds crazy and stupid. And it is. But just because that guy is crazy, egotistical and stupid does not make the objectives, reasons and goals of the person doing it noble, reasonable or even beneficent. Not even by comparison.

Socialists and communists style themselves as The Scientists, The Thinkers, The Creatives. Which is why so many of them wind up burnt out, addicted to drugs and miserable, while going nowhere. They share many of the same ideological trappings as creationist Americans. They do not share much of the same peace of mind as the simple minded religious folk that everything happens in some grand plan or because some beneficient deity willed it.

American socialists/communists desire a more unified and singular society and culture that does not bow its thought processes to religion. Which isn’t to say that it bows to science, just that it doesn’t bow to other religions and disagree. For you see, the major failing of socialist/communist culture is that it sees itself as THE way fashioned and formed by objective science. At the same time and in the same breath they fashion their own proposed solutions to problems based on the ideals and “theories” (opinions, editorials) of social science. Which ultimately are just arbitrary crap from people produced with degree granted institutionally provided papers of authority they believe gives them more credibility and justification to run their mouths, because they’re “valid to society.”

They do not see the inherent contradiction of hating religious and theocratic institutions for doing the same bogus shit, just under the pretense of a creationist shared myth. In fact, they view the shared myth and everybody believing the same shit with veneration and ideals. They just don’t want people believing rival or opposing things to their Grand Society.

God and the different religious communities, to them, aren’t a bunch of different cultures we all need to make room for and tolerate and appreciate and let live. They’re rival oppositional sources of competition for society’s attention. The only use this particular brand of secular dogmatist has for religious multiculturalism is to break up the homogenuity of a small community without dirtying their reputations or even having to lie about their intentions when they try to derail the inertia of celebrating things like religious holidays in those small, homogenuous communities defined by their populations and people.

They’d rather drive to get a number of similarly devout religious people, toss them into the same population, and not only make the established population fight for dominance, but deal with the incoming sects trying to use secular, neutral civic government as a bat to disentangle things like Town Christmas Parties from being acceptable, community gathering things.

The people conspiring and trying their hardest to inflate and magnify the expanse and reach and power of the religious right, the supposed anti-intellectualism they see as so base and prevalent in the United States, are simply covetous of the useful idiots in the Christian pews, when they could be useful idiots in yoga class, or gazing into crystals and inhaling incense fumes and doing irresponsible amounts of shrooms. Anything but being part of a coherent and established mainstream religion or religious culture and anything but a cloistered off community that differentiates itself with space and partitions itself with ideas.

And given the predatory, condescending, often “ends justify the means, by any means necessary”, culturally predatory way these types conduct themselves, using psychology, social psychology, institutions of state and interpersonal relationships to peel away the onions of misc. groups identities, try to force them down specific lines of social thought using the bridge of modernity as the means to reach them, I simply cannot mention the US’s supposed “War on Science” without also explaining that these people have been deliberate agitators in the debate between the place of religion, faith and society and secularism in the US since at LEAST the rise of communism across the US, if not the rise of anarchism in Europe.

The argument of the war on science is not, “polite and civilized society desperately trying to calm down a schizophrenic and make them take their anti-psychotics.” The war on science is more like a corrupt psychiatrist that detests the local church and would rather not just own the property the church is built on, but disestablish the entire religious community, chemically treat and psycho-condition the flock to feel (not think) the same way the psych does, and have them operate in the way he (or she) sees as “normal and good.” Whatever that is at any given moment, based on whatever doctrine they feel serves them.

It’s not about science. It’s about control. The fact they make the environment contested about secularism in the state and creationism in the mind and civilized society in the heart and soul of a given population or community is just good human resources and public relations nonsense. They honestly don’t give a fuck about anything but being right. The minute they don’t have competition for thoughts, out comes the Lysenkoism. The minute they don’t have to worry about shit like armed insurrection or forceful resistance, out comes the jackboots and the open shirking of legitimate channels of government. Out comes more blatant and blazen corruption.

So if you are not a fan of either extreme, you realize the status quo is simply a rapidly diminishing peaceful, middle ground. A middle ground that has been the inertia and the status quo of secular mainstream society, put in place literal centuries before you were born, maintained with temperance and discipline not by innocent cavemen that could not possibly understand the things you’ve seen and understood because they lack a modern perspective, but reasoned and civilized individuals that had more intimate schooling and treasured it all the more when they had it to spare. That they didn’t “finish off” their competition, be it religious docmatic or “li-bur-awl” anarchist/socialist, because they staunchly fought for the ability to respectfully disagree and would shut down, by force if necessary, any extreme that tried to assert itself over these values of tolerant religious secularism in government and society.

You realize that the religious people seldom can make more than even minor headwinds in even the most bumpkin and backwater of places without the next generations moving away and leaving them decaying husks, unable to properly establish themselves for long. And that while the disgusting megachurch evangelical pews of the 80s were monolithic and ridiculous, they also all but curled up and died by the turn of the century as secularism and reason and simple CHOICE allowed young parents the luxury of not forcing religion on their kids. And so, attendance dropped.

And you realize a lot of the supposed “war on science” is in fact a smear campaign levlied against a weakened religious institiution and its credibility and justification for existing in a modern society. Designed like putting the poor, simple fool in stocks in the middle of town while some falsely compassionate jackass of a jester disingenuously asks it, “harmless questions,” only to get back vitriolic declarations of fire and brimstone and just generally behave like an irrational, angry poked bear. So the faux-intentioned performer can shrug helplessly and go, “Eh, religious nuts, what can ya do?” before mourning how anti-intellectual and misplaced our values are, pumping so much money into national defense and so little into secular, federated, public education.

And as much as you may despise the preacher being socially and mentally flogged and made to look like an idiot, a loose and unhinged cannon, a danger to themselves, others and every impressionable child they are allowed to bark mythical nonsense at, the people behind the camera, the people directing where the camera looks, the people arranging this “interview” to show and bring out the worst in the targeted, vetted mark, are just as insidious and disgusting as the Holy Rollers extorting millions from dying old people that want to buy their way into heaven.

And you realize the enemy that they want you to shake your head at in sadness and pity is just one enemy on that stage. One easily spotted wolf in sheep’s clothing that lures the gullible, the mentally troubled, the simple, the emotionally unwell and looking for purpose, structure and community belonging to function.

And the other is so slick and sneaky, you don’t even notice they exist. Their campaign to embarrass the predatory they see as their competition so organic and well orchastrated and asymmetrical, they don’t even get their name dropped. The nature of the relationship is not mentioned. Their presence, obfuscated unless you know what to look for or suspect conflict of interest behind it.

And this predator vying for the pews and the flocks from the religious authority? Here’s the biggest kicker of all.

They wage their own war on science, too. By labeling their religion as ‘social science,’ and demanding when hard, empirical, objective, physical or biological science butt heads, it is social science that gets to dominate, get priority and interpret other science based around the social science. Based on what? Abstracts and constructs in law and philosophy that say to not do so would be a violation of civil rights and protections. To NOT give them ideological right of way is oppression of other people.

The American war on science is not limited to fire and brimstone spewing megachurch preachers. It’s in the heart and on the face of every horn rimmed glasses wearing, “quirky hair dyed and dyke short cut”, “nonbinary and politically ‘kweer’“, hammer and sickle flag waving asshole, as well.

Both want to destroy culture and philosophy which are not their own. Both want to dominate how government works and why it functions and how. Both want to dictate what is right and wrong based on ideology. Only one observes an organized creationist myth, though the other may harbor some arbitrary individual “spiritualism” if they’re particularly narcissistic or crazy.

But explaining this takes a lot of time, space and breath, and, well... saying it is one thing, proving it is another.

Thems my thoughts. I hope they help in some small way.

[secretgamergirl]

Hate Mobs Gotta Go

Last night, I did something I have never expected to do, and just full on gave up on a fun RPG writing assignment. Which I had to do because I hit a point where it was so overdue and unfinished that I was falling asleep sitting up and stress vomiting and other such things. There’s a whole lot of factors behind that. Other health issues, the toll of being on total pandemic lockdown for months, with neighbors just straight up open mouth coughing at my door, emergencies with friends and family, multiple fires and hardware failures, but the main thing was, and still is, the constant harassment from a militant hate mob, completely out of touch with reality.

Years ago, I remember there was this thing the internet at large was fond of doing with foaming at the mouth far right religious extremists- Mercilessly ridiculing them in public to expose how disconnected everything they said or did was from reality. Remember seeing this one float around and laughing your head off?

And if I mention the Westboro Baptist Church, you immediately picture a single family of raving bigots picketing funerals and such with their big homophobic signs, with a bigger crowd mocking them, right?

For some reason, the modern version of that particular flavor of fringe weirdo doesn’t get that sort of ridicule. Presumably because they’re focusing almost exclusively on trans people, and most people have this weird thing where like if you stick up for trans people you get cooties or something and never dig into the real juicy ridicule fodder. But for real, this stuff is OUT THERE. Just look at a few examples here.

Come for the weird ravings about harvesting baby organs. Stay for the... adult woman who apparently believes breasts get their shape from actually being sacks filled with milk under women’s skin? Now, how about this colorful comparison?

For anyone who wasn’t aware, pronouns are words like “I” “you” “he” “she” “it” and “this,” while rohypnol is colloquially known as “the date rape drug,” so this is utter gibberish. The full context of course is that this person is trying to make the argument that forcing this bigot to refer to women she’s prejudiced against as “she” instead of arbitrarily tossing around “he” or “it” is... raping her brain, I guess?

So... this is pretty clearly some creep’s weird little fantasy. The obvious giveaway is pretending that trans women “aren’t in the correct bathroom” when going to... the correct bathroom, and that the non-existent law about this is somehow enforced by... random bigots opting to deputize themselves. What DOES happen for real though is bigots like this being arrested for barging into public restroom stalls with camcorders aimed at the crotches of women on toilets and trying to defend themselves by insisting they have some duty to check what their genitals look like. On which note...

That’s just disgusting. It’s also as close as I feel comfortable to posting all the graphic fantasies I see from these people about the barbaric genital mutilation they imagine trans women subject ourselves to which really has no basis at all in reality. Well maybe I can post this one.

I’m not going to go through and itemize all the baldfaced lies in that, because I really kinda hope I don’t have to, and also because the person who slapped this together was kind enough to break it up in such a way that I legitimately can say “every single line of this is a completely baseless lie.” Also the art in the corner is stolen from a child-friendly comic whose author is trans, so, that’s extra slimy. Also wow that “bone scans” bit is actually one I’ve never seen. Where the hell do they even get these ideas?

Also this one needs some setup. If you have time, this right here is a freaking journey, if not, I’ll try to summarize.

So a while ago, this one particular unhinged bigot decided the most productive way to spend all her time was to get in touch with a bulk sticker printing business and order thousands if not millions of these weird gross poorly framed slabs with a really crude drawing of a penis and bunch of gibberish she really wishes were the names of popular twitter hashtags that nobody else but her ever uses. And then after receiving these, just... wandering around the city she lives in all day every day plastering them on phone booths and power poles and the mirrors of bathrooms in like.. elementary schools and park benches, just everywhere. And then makes multiple passes a day apparently to make sure nobody has tried to remove any of them, as detailed in this amazing thread I’ll link again.

So the latest break in that particular saga is that same zealot going around plastering stickers like this around too, to make it seem like “both sides do it.”

It should be obvious that that’s a “blacks rule!” sort of fake between the baffling text and using the extra inclusive, particular emphasis on supporting people of color, general purpose LGBT+ flag, but also, like their fellows on 4chan, they plan this sort of “false flag” crap in broad daylight:

I should really properly credit the whistle-blowing on that particular oddity, and I should also note that aside from the breast milk sacks, this is all just stuff I saw TODAY catching up on my twitter feed, but my main point with all this is to illustrate that we really are dealing with Jack Chick/Westboro Baptist-level unhinged zealotry... but again, nobody’s out there pointing and laughing. And it turns out, when you don’t have people pointing and laughing at this sort of thing, you get people taking it seriously. So... when I went to quickly search for a news story to link with the bit about creeps barging in on women with cameras, the results I got were... this.

That... sure is a lot of stories about totally innocent people in a demographic I belong to being murdered by total strangers goaded into blind murderous hatred by the sort of people I’m pointing and laughing at! Ha ha! There’s a very real chance of that happening to me every time I step outside, for any reason! Tee hee! I live in a state of constant fear! Whoopsie!

And it’s not just stuff like that. The people posting these rambling tirades about “breast milk sack implants” and putting crude penis stickers everywhere, never being called out as the unhinged weirdos they are, either have the world turning a blind eye to all this crap, or have everything they do downplayed in the media to the point where outright sexual harassment, doxing, and slurs I don’t want to repeat get headlines like “so-and-so made comments that some fringe trans activists on the internet deem ‘possibly transphobic’” and that’s AT BEST. More often you get stuff like the one incident I managed to bring a lot of public attention to way back when, where some bigot just literally walked up to someone on the street, grabbed them, savagely beat the hell out of them until pulled apart, had friends film the whole thing, and bragged after the fact about it, and every story that appeared as a result claimed the assailant was the victim, because they were all written by her friends.

Face obscuring provided by me here, by the way.

And that isn’t a one-off incident. Because, see, most of these unhinged weirdos spewing out all this transphobic gibberish are not, as you would think, a bunch of barely educated Trump hat wearing members of some fringe religious congregation. They’re editors and producers in major British news outlets. This isn’t me shouting conspiracy nonsense either, this is well-documented. Like, The Guardian gets public internal protests over this crap. So does the BBC. Yes, other respected news sites cover this. Media watchdog groups do their best to reign this in with hearings and such, but, don’t actually have any power to enforce anything really. So when there’s “reporting” on this crap, it’s coming directly from the “breast milk sack implant” people. Oh and here’s some screenshots of the headlines of those stories you’re too lazy to click through and actually read:

And of course, sometimes when they want to really come across as respectful, they try to find “scientists” and “doctors” who back up their ravings but all they have to fall back on are disgraced quacks who spend most of their time on activism work to normalize pedophilia.

I’m not bringing that point about Cantor up to discredit his writings about trans people by the way. He doesn’t really HAVE any writings about trans people. He just pasted the names of a bunch of random studies from the 70s about whether playing with barbies makes you gay into his blog a few years back and this crowd was so desperate for validation they declared him an “expert in the field” and started passing out links to his.... pro-pedophila blog. Which is part of this whole pattern, but I’ve written about that before. Oh and the governments of multiple countries manage to treat all these people as “experts” and make policy decisions based on their ravings. That’s fun.

Anyway, aside from encouraging random people to, you know, just randomly murder anyone they see who looks like maybe a trans woman, every so often this weird little cult pulls in an actual celebrity who then has a public meltdown as they post all this gibberish to a wider audience. Currently this is going on with Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling (who’s actively promoting the pedophile guy up there on Twitter), and I think also William Shatner, but I haven’t really looked into it. The last big one though was Graham Linehan. Who you might remember from co-writing some sitcoms that were popular decades ago in Britain, or from being the weird cartoon villain who tried to kill the funding of a children’s charity, prompting this strange pledge drive marathon of Donkey Kong Country.

You might also know him as one of... I think honestly just two people who have ever managed to be such out of control stalking hate mongers that they were actually given a permanent no possible appeal ban from Twitter. Personally though I know him more as, you know, that one absolute creep who’s been obsessively stalking me for like 5 years and never shutting up about his weird personal obsession with me.

I WOULD link the recent freaking filmed interview he did where he spent forever rambling about me, but I’d have to actually watch it to confirm I had the right link, and also the only place I could quickly find a link to it would be on his twitter feed, which as stated, no longer exists. Oh and random side note there, despite being personally, by name, the person he was explicitly targeting all his hateful ramblings at, he wasn’t banned from that site for any of the disgusting stuff he said to me. He just slipped up and mentioned a cis woman with a professorship while shouting about this crap recently and that caused people to actually take action. I do so love being invisible.

Anyway, point is, prior to Rowling grabbing the baton from him as his social media presence went up in flames, this guy was name-dropping me a LOT. Presumably he still is, just in places fewer people see it. And when you have as big an audience as he did, and that audience is as full of hatemongers as his was, that has a pretty noticeable effect. I’ve been deluged with so much hateful garbage for so long it’s impossible for me to put any numbers on it. The closest I can do to quantify it is note that hate dump was big enough that I was also flooded with more weird messages intended as support from total strangers than I could deal with, totally losing access to social media feeds and my e-mail from the volume for a good bit, and THAT flood was big enough that I got this whole second wave of creepy stalkers who’d built up this whole weird fanon where this stalker here is like, someone I used to date or be business partners with and not just some creepy dude like twice my age stalking me over the internet, from a completely different hemisphere.

And I mean... in the broadest of strokes, I can kinda laugh all this off. Because... these people are completely ridiculous, out of touch with reality, and mostly live in other countries. But... all the threats and shouting are very real and very constant and like.. picture someone outside on the street shouting at your windows about how they’re going to break in and kill you. You really can’t ignore that. Even if they’re unarmed, and all they’re really capable of doing is shouting and pounding on your door, you can’t really just ignore that shouting and pounding and just watch a movie or play a game or write this article you promised would be done 3 months ago. You can certainly try, but a pretty big part of your brain is going to be occupied with thoughts about how maybe you should call someone to see if they’ll escort this violent person away, or maybe you should barricade your door in case all that pounding does something.

And I mean this isn’t a bad metaphor for how all the constant threats and stalking I’m dealing with thanks to celebrity bigots personally obsessed with me impacts my life, but it also does a pretty good job of describing how my night went pretty recently when I ACTUALLY DID HAVE SOMEONE POUNDING ON MY ACTUAL REAL PHYSICAL DOOR SHOUTING ABOUT STABBING ME TO DEATH, and no, there was no resolution to that beyond the sound of sirens causing that person to back off.

I also had an experience not too long ago where I was supposed to take a cab to a routine appointment, a car showed up with the cab company’s name on it, somewhat early, and proceeded to drive me... out to the middle of the freaking woods like an hour from where I live, and when my phone rang with my actual cab asking where I was the driver freaked out, had me get out of the car, and took off leaving me just... stuck in the middle of nowhere freezing to death and trying to find a landmark an actual cab could pick me up from. Still don’t know what the hell that whole thing was about and whether a cab driver just REALLY didn’t know what he was doing and panicked or what, but I do know that talking about it publicly in the vaguest of terms lead to a bunch of unhinged shouting from... apparently some unconnected ride share driver with a habit of dumping trans women between stops when they try to get medications or something, convinced I was calling him out for that.

So.... yeah. Things aren’t exactly going great in my neck of the woods. I’d really appreciate it if people would properly treat these unhinged violent weirdos like unhinged violent weirdos and not respectable members of society so they quit getting so bold and public with the violent stuff, and people who listen to them get properly shouted down for doing so.

[scifinal]

DW s12e10: It's Quite Unfortunate That This Child Keeps On Regenerating

It's only fitting that the first post on a blog called "SciFinal" should be about a season finale.

Not that fitting is the fact that in said post I'm going to begin where it all started for me.

Part One: How I Even Got into This Mess of a Show in the First Place

While I call myself a huge Doctor Who fan, even a – *gasp* – Whovian, I must admit I am not as familiar with the franchise as I would like to be; I've seen the new show, I've seen Torchwood (though, admittedly, I had to force myself to finish the fourth season – but that's a story for another day), I've listened to a handful of audio dramas (including Kaldor City, which I consider to be canon for both DW and Blake's 7) – mostly Torchwood audio dramas, but who cares, – I've read a couple of comics, I've got a novel or two somewhere on my bookshelf, I've seen the first couple of seasons of the classic show, but that's about it. I can't say I grew up with it – it wasn't on TV when I was a kid, there isn't an official Ukrainian dub, et cetera, et cetera. I first heard about it when I was about thirteen, when my classmate did a project about something they liked – and was pretty dismissive of my peers' hobbies at the time, believing myself to be somewhat above them, so I didn't pay much attention.

Then somebody finally pressured me into watching it (I believe I was fifteen or something back then) and I loved it. The first two episodes of the first season, I mean. I watched those, texted my friend something like "consider me a Whovian now!" and abandoned the show completely only to return to it maybe several years later.

I loved it. This time, for real.

Doctor Who has been with me ever since that time, it has a big soft spot reserved for each and every Doctor ever in my heart, and for each and every companion. I know full well it's cheesy, and it's stupid, and it's technobabble-y, and it's glorious in all of its cheesy technobabble-y stupidity.

And I hate this finale.

Part Two: Doctor, Why

I hate this finale – because I hate Chris Chibnall. Mind you, not the gentleman himself (I don't even know what he looks like, and I can't be bothered to Google), I hate what he did to Doctor Who.

Now, when it was revealed that the would replace Steven Moffat I felt... nothing. What did you expect? I had no idea who the man was. I know now he's made Broadchurch, and I know he wrote a bunch of stuff for Torchwood back in the day, including Cyberwoman. I had to drop Broadchurch because of how well-handled the depressing atmosphere was, and I love the flawed, dumb, sexy-cyber-bikinied, almost-fifteen-minutes-of-Ianto's-whining-including (I know because some time ago I literally cut almost every single moment of Gareth David-Lloyd whimpering, moaning, groaning, screaming, and mugging at the camera out of the episode and made those bits and pieces into a beautiful clip show called "I HATE THIS" to explain exactly why his face was and still is so punchable) mindless fun that is Cyberwoman (this is also one of the two episodes in which they actually do something fun with the pterodactyl living inside Torchwood's underground base). The latter also led to the creation of one amazing in how it develops Ianto's character audio drama entitled "Broken". I love Broken. I am now forcing you to look at its cover because of how much I love it.

Here we go. Now, back to the point of me rambling pointlessly

In his video "Sherlock Is Garbage, and Here's Why", a well-known YouTuber hbomberguy pointed out how Steven Moffat's problem is that he is more than capable of writing a good one-off episodes, but ultimately fails at managing multiple complex, overarching stories, as visible when you look at the difference between Moffat's individual episodes and his run on the show.

Now, I believe that Chris Chibnall suffers from the same affliction: he's a good screenwriter but a terrible, terrible showrunner. Sure, he's made Broadchurch, but Broadchurch, in its essence, was a complete singular story with a beginning, a middle, and an end. There were no bigger, incomplete arcs expanding at the expense of other episodes, and the show did exactly what it was originally designed to do: it told an uninterrupted story.

Here comes Chris Chibnall's run on Doctor Who.

Now, while Steven Moffat was ultimately not very good at managing overarching stories, he tried to do so nonetheless, and the fans seemed to like his attempts. And while I can't be sure as to whether it was Chris' original vision for the show or he and his co-writers were merely trying to emulate Moffat, he attempted the same. A friend of mine has even pointed out how, to her, it was painfully obvious how the writers of the finale were desperately trying to copy Moffat's style (to give you some context, she grasped it from a 30-second clip of the CyberMasters' reveal, and that clip basically consisted of me filming my laptop's screen and laughing at their design, making the video wobbly and the audio distorted). At the time of writing this post this friend hasn't seen a single episode of Chibnall's era and, as far as I know, has no wish to do so – mainly because of two reasons that both have something to do with the finale:

Somebody's already spoiled it for her, so who cares;

I ranted to her about how shit this finale is and now she hates everything about Chibnall era.

I am very sorry for the latter, since I genuinely believe there are some nice episodes in these seasons, and I especially like the "historical" ones, they really are quite a lot of fun, I like Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison fighting badly CG-ed alien scorpions, I love Lord Byron and Mary Shelley running around a haunted house trying to escape from a Cyberman (even though it's all too similar to the Agatha Christie episode from Russel T Davies' run), I adore that episode about Rosa P–– oh, wait, no, that one was crap and ripped off Blake's 7... Anyway, I love Jodie Whittaker's Doctor, I am a big fan of Graham, I like Ryan just fine, and I can put up with Yaz, even though it's been two seasons and I've still got no idea what's her personality supposed to be, and I absolutely love the new Master (he reminds me of a cute little pug with a big Tommy gun). There is plenty of good stuff in these two seasons, they are lots of fun to watch, but this finale... Oh god, this finale.

Part Three: We Had All of Time and Space at Our Fingertips and We Ended Up with This

We are getting to the point of this whole thing. I would love to begin with the obvious, the twist, but there's so much wrong with this who-cares-how-many-parter than this one big thing.

It is inept. It is impotent. It is incompetent. It is bad at almost everything except its okay camera work, somewhat good (for a British TV show, I mean) effects, and its really solid performances.

Its editing is tone-deaf to the extreme. There is a moment in the final episode where Ko Sharmas asks who will be the first to cross the Boundary and step into the unknown, and immediately it cuts to Yaz walking towards it, all fast and silent. I would love to show you a clip of it, but I don't have one and I can't force myself to download the episode and sit through this shitshow again just to present you with a ten-second clip. Nonetheless, that part is not edited like a dramatic moment. You edit comedies this way. Bad comedies. Bad editors edit bad comedies this way.

Its plot is incoherent. There are several plot threads in this finale, and they're managed in a way that doesn't make the viewer care about all of them at the same time, rather the viewer goes "oh, I've completely forgotten this was happening" and then, before they can even begin to care, the show cuts to something else. It's all over the place and oh so annoying.

The plot armour is painfully obvious despite every attempt to disguise it. There wasn't a single, solitary second when I believed the Doctor was really going to sacrifice herself and, lo and behold, here comes the old guy ex machina to do it for her. The only questions I was asking at that moment were "How are the writers going to prevent the Doctor's death now that they've seemingly created themselves a way to go on forever?" and "How can Whittaker care so much about her performance in this scene she's literally almost crying?". I wholeheartedly related to the Master asking "So why are we still here?" and shout–– hiss–– mumbl–– whatever-ing "Come on, come on, come on!" – at that point I've suffered through at least forty-five minutes of utter nonsense, people going preachy, religious Cybermen with Dalek motivations, that absolutely ludicrous scene in the previous episode when the show was trying its worst to make me perceive autonomous flying Cyber-heads with laser eyes as a serious threat, a shit twist and... Oh.

I've got to finally touch on the shit twist, haven't I?

It doesn't make sense. No, I mean it. I guess it makes sense from the show's writers' standpoint to retcon everything in a way that would allow them to go on forever without having to come up with a way to circumvent limited regenerations, yes. And I won't be touching upon all the lore people say this twist has ruined. No. It doesn't make sense as it is.

The twist is revealed to us by a madman that claims to have hacked into a database, claims to possess control over the Doctor's mind, and gives the Doctor and the audience no actual solid proof that the Timeless Child is, indeed, the Doctor. We have Ruth, sure, and she's nice enough (damn, I want that vest), and she's a Timelord that happens to own a TARDIS that looks like a blue police telephone box, and she calls herself the Doctor. Here's Ruth:

I really like Ruth. She also makes no sense from the show's timeline standpoint, since the Doctor's Type 40 TARDIS only got stuck looking like a police box in 1963, so there's no reason for the Doctor to not remember being her.

We also know that the Judoon have identified Ruth as "the Fugitive"... except in one of their previous appearances in the show they weren't able to identify their targets exactly and thus were seeking out non-humans. There is a possibility that they were only looking for a Time Lord on Earth.

You know what? It's possible that Ruth is actually the Master messing with the Doctor. I have just as much proof of this as I have of the fact that the Doctor is some kind of an endlessly regenerating superbeing.

But this is not the most maddening thing here. I loathe it, but I don't loathe the twist itself: I loathe its lifelessness, I loathe how empty, how unemotional, almost robotic it feels. When somebody'd spoiled the finale for me, I got angry, and I started asking questions, and when later I saw the actual thing...

This gif. I can't even explain how accurate it is. I stood there, in the middle of my kitchen, episode paused, holding a cup of cold tea and desperately looking around as if in my surroundings I could somehow find that emotional reaction that this show failed to evoke. I was ready to burst into tears of how empty it felt, and how empty I felt, and how the same show that has Christopher Eccleston go from literally foaming at the mouth with pure hatred to shocked silence in a matter of second because of one sentence that you, a viewer, can't help but be astonished by failed to make me feel the tiniest speck of literally any emotion. And slowly, I felt that vast void in my chest fill with sheer, pure, flaming hatred for the person who made me feel nothing, for the story that left me not bored – but empty.

And the next moment, in its own unique way of being absolutely tone-deaf, the show introduces the CyberMasters, looking ridiculous, being asinine in concept, making me burst into laughter with their dumb design. Wow.

So.

Chris Chibnall's Doctor Who is no longer a show. Chris Chibnall's Doctor Who isn't even, as somebody on Stardust said, a fan fiction. It's a rollercoaster. A lackluster rollercoaster that lifts you from the vast caverns of frozen hell, devoid of any life whatsoever, soulless and abandoned, to the heavenly torture of being so bad, so utterly awful and ridiculous, that you can't help but laugh as you watch something you used to love be distorted and deformed to the point where you can't recognise it anymore nor really care. This is what Chris Chibnall's Doctor Who has become. And I'm going to continue my ride on that grotesque rollercoaster. I'm going to pirate that ride and get on it again. Because I'm a masochist. Because I want to feel something, even if it's hatred towards those that make me feel nothing.

Because some time ago my fifteen-year-old self watched the first season and learned a lesson that I hold dear after all these years – that I can't abandon hope, and that someday, somehow, things are going to get better. That the future is being written right now. That the future can change.

[kierarutherford]

Anxiety the update

Putting this under a break for length and because I do discuss some personal things. Please feel free to message me about any of it. I hope this helps someone with anxiety or other issues. We’re all in this together. So, let’s be good humans and help when we can. Thank you for attending Kiera’s TEDTalk. 

So I’ve said it before I suffer with anxiety and it was effecting my sleep. As in: I was getting next to none. My brain was constantly cycling through how terrible I was. Why? Because you didn’t do: A or B and you totally promised C. You are a failure! A terrible mother and horrible human being. Now I know that’s anxiety. 

I’m overweight. About 40lbs (18kgs) and I know I need to do something about it. I’m pre-menopausal (comes early in my family. I’m only 31) and everything is starting to ache in places. Well, flash forward to a horrible week from the eternal hell known as SOCIAL ANXIETY! 

I have a membership to the YMCA (kinda like a gym) and tried out a A zumba class. I nearly squicked out when I saw the room full. But I did it. And... I hated it. Realistically it isn’t something I’m going to stick with. So, I tried the gym... By try I mean, I walked up, saw a BUNCH (ok, again ANXIETY maybe 8 people) who all looked like HALF (anxiety) my size and I froze. My chest hurt, my stomach turned and I squicked. 

Now that really came to eat me in the sleep department, because, one more thing to pick myself apart about, right? Well, I found a cure/fix. This might not work for everyone and I understand if you don’t like/can’t do it. BUT it worked for me so I want to share.

I’m in Canada. Where pot was legalized about a month ago here shortly. I did my research, and I purchased a glass pipe, and some weed. I am on my second full week of peaceful, restful sleep. Sleep that has me out by 11:30pm and up by 7:45am EVERY DAY!!!! 

I feel calmer and more in control with sleep now restored. It’s helped with my depression and has quieted my anxiety. It’s all still there but it’s lessened. A rested brain makes a world of a difference. If you can get it where you are, medical or recreational, here’s my little lesson.

There are 3 strains of weed. These are IMPORTANT, so pay attention. 

Indica: also commonly known as the sleepy/calming stuff. A couple puffs and you feel relaxed, your mind emptied and your body light. Slipping under the sheets after a few puffs and personally I fall asleep within a few minutes and wake restfully and easily in the morning. No foggy haze. No drug coma crap. Just, awake and ready.

Sativa: known mainly for calming but keeping you ALERT! Some of the strains this one derives can cause the dreaded ‘munchies’ but there are many that have breed that issue out. Research your stuff, but this is the alert and calm. “Good high” stuff.

Hybrid: Literal as it’s name entitles it is a combination of both Indica and Sativa. Alert, calm, with a cool full body relaxation effect. Also can be drowsy depending on the blend and predominate strain. Again, always read. But once you know which strain type you need, it makes the search a lot easier. 

I’m in the trial and enjoy stage. I buy when I need and try whatever ‘flavor’ they have. Not much to pick from in Ontario. We’re having issues with our government. But it too will pass. In the meantime, I enjoy a good puff or half dozen before bed around 11:30 to midnight and get restful sleep. Sleep is HUGE with the brain and not enough can damage your body. 

Feeling better, with rest and now proper diet I feel some of the weight coming down. And, to be frank, my mind feels more my own. Less fog and strange things. Sleep deprivation is scary. I was only getting a couple hours a night. 

Anyway, long story/ short, I want to let you know that I don’t judge. That I think you need all the cards on the table. Medication is useful and it can help, but you need to be aware of ALL the options. Marijuana for me is safer than a sleeping pill. Is safer than the low dose muscle relaxer every night for my restless legs (which don’t happen when I smoke up!) I have tried melatonin and it has left me groggy come morning and it gives me a horrid headache which persists all day. 

There you have it. Pot; it’s a good thing. I’m not going to get moral here because quite frankly at 31, pre-menopausal, restless legs, anxiety and depression, I don’t think my health is a religious thing or a ‘moral’ area. It’s my health, and in the end whatever makes me feel better, without harming me, is good in my books. 

Uh, so there. If you are suffering from those things and have run out of ideas, perhaps this will give you something to speak to your doctor about, or if it’s legal where you are, to purchase. Buy a pre-rolled, light up, take only three maybe four puffs (hold it in your lungs as long as you can. That makes it more effective.) Then ash it out. A single joint could last a week, maybe more if you don’t need much. If you need/want support, I’m here. You aren’t a terrible person, mother, sister, brother, father, whatever! You are doing what is right for you and that makes you the best person! Cheers to good sleep, and a calmer mind. I’ll be lighting up again tonight before bed, and getting up refreshed and alert in the morning with my kids. Now that feels good. ;)  

[mrs-yamada]

Coping Mechanisms

I realized I’ve posted a lot of stories about abuse, but none of the things I’ve learned over my 40+ years to cope with or lessen the everyday pain one goes through. It’s so hard to struggle through each day all by yourself by sheer will - as it certainly feels like, somedays.

You need to find some ways to deal with your pain! No matter how silly something may sound, if it works it’s not silly at all.

Obviously these won’t all work on everyone and some might irritate the heck out of you, because we’re all different. But if you put your own spin on them and think of what you enjoy to do, they could be helpful. 

I’ll add to these if I remember more, since I’m in sort of a downward spiral (parents visiting soon) myself...

Onward, under the break...

Sleep when you need it

If you can, that is. I have too many issues to work and luckily we’ve managed so far with one income, although it sucks. This does mean that I can cater to my individual sleep schedule, however, and I use that to my advantage. 

Don’t listen to neural typicals when they say “go to bed at the same time every night”. They’re normies! We’re not! Our bodies differ. You may actually benefit from doing as everyone will tell you, but a lot of us with mental differences benefit much greater from setting our own, very different (and rapid cycling) sleep cycles. I am currently sleeping from 6 am until 1 or 2 in the afternoon. I simply cannot sleep until then no matter what I do - and in a few weeks, I know this will change and I’ll be back to 10 pm or maybe 12. The difference is I get the sleep my body so desperately needs, and it helps greatly. I know not all of us can do this, but if you can - go for it. Try it out. You’d be amazed how good you feel after actually sleeping.

On the flip side, though:

Don’t oversleep

No, seriously. We all have the urge to “never get out of bed”, but you’re just gonna feel like crap and get a headache. Sometimes it’s cool to do this but, you know. Don’t abuse the treat.

Clean up (yourself & the home)!

Yeah. This is another one of those “you see it everywhere” tips, but that’s because it does work. Even if you can only manage to brush your teeth, change your undies, whatever, you’ll feel a bit better. Same goes for your house/apartment/room. Clean a tiny space if it’s all you can do - you’ll feel like you’ve got more breathing room.

Don’t EVER want to shower/bathe?

We’ve been there. It stinks, no pun intended. Personally, I had to think of a great way to encourage myself to get the heck out of bed and bathe - bath bombs.

And not just the regular kind! Glitter, rainbows, especially the ones with little toys inside, those are the best for days I don’t want to wake up and shower. You can even use them (as I just said) in the shower. They act like shower steamers and smell the rooms up nice, too.

Make a “Power Outfit”

It could be a comfy sweatshirt, or animal pajamas (kigurumi). Maybe it’s a really wacky pair of socks or a shirt that features your favorite TV star or character from a series. This could include accessories, like a fun hat, headband, furry tail, superhero cape - whatever will make you feel great. Don’t overthink it. It’s not “weird” to wear what makes you feel better, no matter what.

Hide/buy surprises for yourself!

Again, this is one I absolutely love to do. I scroll around through etsy and eBay a lot as another numbing yet engaging brain exercise, and I look for the cheapest “blind boxes” and/or “surprises”. Blind boxes are packages where you don’t know what’s inside until you open it, just like the name suggests. If this doesn’t bother you, it’s great for buying yourself a surprise. I use this as stocking stuffers for myself, too. Ha.

Of course this works for things like a book you want to read or a puzzle you’d like to do. Maybe even wrap it and leave it in the “gift pile”. Gift yourself when you need a pick me up!

Another of my favorite things are called “surprise balls”. They’re balls of crepe paper strips you unravel, and each layer has a surprise in it. You unroll the rainbow-colored strips, dropping toys, novelty items, etc, as you go. You can unroll one layer at a time or all of them! Find them at etsy, you can even get them customised. 

Eat better. Exercise.

Trust me, I used to hate exercising (and when I say “hate”, I mean it). But it makes such a complete difference that I actually miss it when I skip on the weekends! Eating right (whatever is right for you, allergy-wise, dietary preferences, etc) also makes a huge difference. My mood lifted so high without the use of mind-altering drugs at all (societal approved medicine or otherwise).

Aromatherapy 

I’ve seen so many people FREAK OUT about this.

Relax. It’s not meant as a “cure-all” no matter what the MLM pushers say, it simply helps a little. And for those of us with a lot of problems, “a little off the top” is really a big help. There are different types of scents for different mood enhancers, but my favorites (bubblegum, lemon, orange) are citrus based because that lifts depression. (Google this if you’re want - there have been tests done researching depression & aromatherapy).

Use wax melts, incense, whatever - and remember that candles can be bought on etsy & elsewhere that have surprises in them, too! You take out the charms and gems and such as the candle burns. Win-win for a little pick me up!

Rainbows

Yeah, I know. I have little crystal rainbow catchers in my windows so that my rooms fill with rainbows throughout the day. You’d be amazed at how many times a surprise rainbow from one of them lifted my heart and made me smile. 

They’re not expensive, either. You can pop down to your local craft store and buy them in the beading section. Thread the bead with string or fishing line and hang it up on a suction cup or - really, wherever you can where light will catch!

Wait, did I mention craft stores..?

Arts & Crafts

I may be biased here, but there have been a lot of people that benefit from coloring books and crafts. They’re soothing, but be warned - they’re sometimes not good for mind-wanderers. If you’re “dump-trucking” bad thoughts, a mindless task will NOT be a good thing to do. I sometimes pair crafts and such with watching TV so that my mind and hands are busy at the same time.

Distractions!

Writing

*looks at self in reflection of monitor*

...yep.

This can help not only you, but others. It’s a relief to feel that you’re not alone, and when you come across something that helps you in a moment of need it’s awesome. It feels just as good to let it all out.

Write about your day, your past experiences, your hopes - anything. Heck, write fanfiction where the guys or gals or beings of your dreams help you get through things. Work it out. You don’t have to publish them. It will still feel good. And if you want to record your own in one area, or read specific fics, especially fanfics, I recommend the Archive (and not simply because I write there, ha)! 

Television/Movies/Games

Same thing for movies, games & TV. They may distract you, but that means you may get the odd, sneaky thought that creeps in. We all hate those. Oh, and watch out for triggers! Good flipping butt, so many triggers!

There’s a site that helps for tons of triggers (including books, games, etc) called “Does the Dog Die”. I use it constantly when watching new programs or movies. 

I personally do toon-fests where I watch so many cartoons, especially kiddie ones like “Molang” (so cute)! And I love using Minecraft for chilling out, game wise. Just, again... watch out for games. Man, they can be a pain sometimes if you’re getting frustrated. Stick with ones that you know are relaxing or you can play on “safe mode”. Don’t try to do a complicated campaign or grab that rare trophy/achievement when you’re stressed.

Music!

Yep. Music lifts spirits. And did you know if you search Google Play they’ve got free stuff? Like, a lot of it you might not want and there are a ton of religious readings, etc (if that’s your thing, then hooray)! But often I’ve found some really nice relaxing music with wave sounds, thunderstorms, etc. Of course you can buy albums too.

Voices

The same goes for voices. They can be very soothing and help you relax. There’s a whole bunch of Play apps where anime dudes and/or chicks talk you to sleep, or say comforting things. Well, technically, they’re real people speaking but there’s images of anime guys and gals. There are all types, so look around.

You could even ask your loved one to make a recording of them speaking to you or reading poetry, etc. It’s very helpful to hear a beloved voice - no matter who it is for you -- in times of need. 

Cuddles

Pets, stuffed animals, blankets, fellow humans... hugs help sometimes. Sometimes you really don’t want to be touched, but that stuffed animal or pillow can give you just the right snuggle to lift your mood.

Free stuff!

Every once in awhile I use a throwaway email and go freebie hunting on the internet. A lot of places will give you stickers, samples, and all sorts of stuff for free. If you have a PO Box or don’t mind giving out your address, this works so well. Mail surprises are the awesomest.

[wildflower8281]

Books! How Reading Has Elevated My Mind & Heart Post-Convent

In the convent we were only provided with catholic books. There were libraries in every convent and we were reading all the time actually, but it was all catholic culture, doctrine, spirituality, thought. I have undoubtedly read the life of every single religious nun in church history. When I came home, it took me awhile to not feel scandalous reading other material or books. Even flipping through a regular magazine felt borderline sinful because of what I was exposing myself to - articles about sex, humans in underwear or bathing suites, products enhancing vanity, etc. As I state everywhere, the Program is real and it took me probably about a year before I ‘strayed’ into reading non-catholic books.

Eventually I headed over to the library, got myself a card and wandered through the great halls and explored. It was one of the most liberating moments post-convent, for me. To be able to freely wander these fantastic long rows of all the books I could ever want! It was an introvert and writer’s dream! Fictional stories about different places, books on nature, animals, travel, art! Books on psychology, the brain, nutrition, health! And of course, books on all the religions and spiritualities in the world. It was definitely a moment of mental liberation and thrill for me when I realized how much of the world had been kept from me and how much I was now totally free to explore! Yes, in religious life we were exposed to music, art, history, philosophy - it was actually a very rigorous academic formation - but it was all within the context of the church, it was all always catholic in some form or fashion.

Reading took me into the world at large and let my mind breathe outside of the church confines. I reveled in reading a book about the brain! I relaxed and enjoyed the comfort of a good fiction book on a snowy day. Reading definitely played a huge part in deprogramming my mind from not only all the convent culture, but the catholic programming as well. As someone who is naturally docile and a pleaser, I had accepted mostly everything without question (which is why I was fantastic as a religious superior by the way.) There were always a minority of sisters who were intellectually curious and rebellious, who would question the things or care enough to ask. I didn’t really. It was easier to just assent and move along. However, reading helped me not only open my mind, but begin to use it again, to learn the questions, to integrate new information regarding the church, the world, and myself. No wonder they don’t let religious read more non-catholic stuff - it creates free thinking humans!

Ok, so here is my list of some truly life-changing books, in my geek-opinion. I would recommend these books to any person, whether they were a nun in a past life or not, male or female or any gender identity honestly. I think they are good for the human spirit and mind to learn about, to traverse and integrate!

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho: This is an international forever best seller, life-changing type of book. It is published in 56 languages and has won the Guinness World Record as the most translated book by a living author. Need I say more? It is in essence a fable about a young man who traverses the desert and has different experiences, searching for his purpose. Underneath the story, the mythical characters, the magical desert landscapes are truths about life, love, and self that will resonate if you have a beating heart. There is really nothing more to say here.

The Gifts of Imperfection by Brene Brown: This amazing woman is generally more known for her Ted Talk and for her book, “Daring Greatly,” however for me, it was ‘The Gifts of Imperfection’ that really spoke to many things I was struggling with on my road back into the world. She is famous for her TedTalk on Vulnerability, which probably every human should watch. She teaches on courage, authenticity and showing up as yourself, not faking for anyone. The things she speaks and writes have always resonated with me, because she speaks the language of being human. This book however is a short and sweet version of her overarching philosophy. It’s divided into bite size chapters, packed with real stories and good fodder for thinking, as well as practical ways to implement the practices into your life. Since a lot of convent programming focused on: self-denial, sin, staying busy, keep working, rules, control, falling in line - this book focuses on things like playfulness, creativity, letting go of what people think, self-compassion, heeding intuition, and rest! It’s kind of like an antidote to much of the rigorous mental & physical sides of religious life. For me personally, it kickstarted my curiosity regarding art and creativity specifically. It led me to try new things, to grab some art supplies and begin to just play. Finding art and play was a very deep part of my re-integration and self-confidence that is still with me today. In art and play, I learned to be fully myself without filters. Due to the happiness I found in art & being creative, it opened an entire universe of creativity, movement and freedom for me, mentally, spiritually and physically. Do yourself a favor and grab this short & sweet life manual!

Women’s Body, Women’s Wisdom by Dr. Christianne Northrup, MD: This is basically an anatomy textbook that is fascinating and is helpful if you have a body. True confession: I’m a total geek about the body and enjoy learning about how we work, so dipping into this book was fun for me, however -  if you have a body that you live and move and breathe in daily, I highly recommend getting to know how it works for you in exquisite detail at each moment! It’s a big book and that can be off-putting. I get it. The bible is also a big book, but how do you read it? You don’t read it in one sitting, nor do you read it from front to back. You pick it up and read wherever you are led. This is how I read books like Women’s Body, Women’s Wisdom. I read the contents, then skip to any chapter or parts that I’m curious about.

What does this book have to do with life post-convent?

Basic Health: Well, in religious life there was a lot of programming around ignoring the needs of the body, which leads to ignorance in general about how our bodies work and how to take care of them. Also, in religious life, we kind of eat whatever we are given or served. Learning about our bodies and nutrition empower us to choose how we want to nourish our bodies for maximum efficiency and replenishment. This helps us to feel amazing mentally and physically, aiding in our journeys onward. Eating crap and not taking care of our bodies will make the transition into the world - an already rocky one at best - that much more difficult, as our brains will be sluggish, anxious or depressed and our bodies will feel tired and weary. Knowing our bodies and caring for them is perhaps the single most important foundational piece to transitioning back to the world serenely.

Coming Home: Lastly, and personally most important for me was just reconnecting with my body, on the energetic and spiritual level. In the convent (and often in the church,) we live so much in our heads, such an academic and spiritual atmosphere. For a decade, I barely thought about the needs or feelings in my own body. It’s like the priests and nuns are a bunch of heads running here and there. The simple act of sitting and listening to my breathing, or just stopping to notice my heart beat were transformational moments for me. I felt like, ‘Wow, this living, breathing body has been here all along, working for me, taking care of me, doing what she needs to survive, assimilate foods, move for me. And I have utterly ignored every need and feeling from her.’ It was a coming home and a reconciliation for me.

This book will help any human understand their bodily systems much better. It is not heavily scientific, even though she is a renowned doctor. It’s written for the regular person, living a modern-day life. It connects the body with stress effects, the basics of nutrition and shows the energetic connection between the body, mind and illness. It is not new-agey or woo-woo. It’s grounded in legit science and medicine (I say this for the skeptics, because I do believe also in energetic medicines - my Mom is a massage therapist and Reiki practitioner!) It is approachable and easy to read. It’s more like a manual or reference book, but indeed should be read or at least present in any human household!

The Female Brain by Louanne Brizendine, MD: This is along similar lines to Women’s Body, Women’s Wisdom except that it is focused soley on the brain functions and hormones. This book blew up my mind space about my cycle, my hormones and explained so much about how being a menstruating woman feels. I formerly thought that all the hype around pms and cyclical hormones was just that - cultural hype, making fun and being dramatic. This MD explains, again using scientific research in an approachable manner, how exactly our brains work, how our cycles work and how they are connected with the waves of the three main hormones that pulse through us. It’s not a joke, it’s not a drama, it’s basic science and anatomy and how the female brain and reproductive system works. Every human should read it - if they are a menstruating person, or if they know one. Men need to read this book if they are dating women, married to women or are dad’s to women!

This book also empowered me (I rarely use that word because it feels so overused these days, so know that the fact that I’m using it for these two books is noteworthy!) to know myself and my body even more. It helps explain why, as women, we sometimes feel fantastic, strong, outgoing and sexy while other weeks, we may simply want to cozy up in a blanket with a book for 3 days, and not talk to anyone. It helped me understand why sometimes I feel emotionally and mentally resilient, like I can take shit and move on with my day, whereas other days every small comment causes an emotional upset. Understanding my cyclic nature has helped me plan my social life, my errands, my work life, my exercise routines and greatly assisted in relationships. It has given me ownership over my body and being that I am no longer confused or embarrassed by, but rather proud of and make no excuses for. I always know where I am in my cycle and I don’t get freaked out if I am feeling a little low energy or gloomy some days. Additionally, when I am feeling the extra bounce of energy provided by my hormones on the rise, I take full advantage to make social plans, be adventurous and get things done!

Spiritually, I’ve been able to connect the cyclic nature of my body to the cyclic natures of creation and this most definitely has helped me to find peace in each season of a cycle. We cannot be going all the time, just like the flowers are not constantly blooming, and it’s not always Spring. There are seasons of hibernation and stillness, just as much as there are seasons of bursting forth and vibrancy. The ocean waves ebb and flow, the moon waxes and wanes. We go forth and retreat. I’ve written an entire blog on this you can find here (insert link.) Our society and culture, including the culture within the convent, is constantly pushing us to work, keep going, moving always forward (adelante) - however, if we take some wisdom from Nature, we will see that nothing in Nature is always pushing outward. Literally nothing. Things grow and bloom in seasons, in cycles of going forth and pulling inward. This is what our menstrual cycle reminds us to do. Our magic and power as women dwells within us and the only way to tap into that is to have time to go inward. This is why we bleed, why our hormones drop, why we yearn for solitude, quiet and stillness. It’s nature giving us the time we need, just like other living beings, to listen, nourish, incubate the light, love and creative works that we are called to bring forth into the world.

Dance of the Dissident Daughter by Sue Monk Kidd: This provocative title drew me and I also love a good autobiographical account. This is the real story of Sue’s personal spiritual journey, her Story of a Soul, one that began in the christian church world and led her across the world in search of the divine. I was never one to buy into or pay much attention to the charged lingo like ‘patriarchy’ and ‘misogynistic’ things that people said about the church, but when this book found me, I had processed enough of my time in the convent, to read and be open minded about this woman’s journey and search for not only the divine, but truth in the church and rituals. It helped me see with a lot of clarity how things in the convent, especially how we revered the priest ad nauseum, how we served and drove them everywhere, how Mass and many rituals are focused on them - is perhaps a little skewed and off. And I am someone who still holds love for many a priest in my life. I think it’s ok to not be in agreement with the male power in the church, and at the same time truly enjoy the persons that are specific priests in our lives. The book is not all about this, but it was one of the first pieces of literature where - since I was drawn into her personal journey - I read about how patriarchy and men in power can affect one woman’s experience of the Divine and of Church. She takes a beautiful journey that is full of connections to her heart, body, the earth, rituals and a sincere seeking of the Divine.

A few others that come to mind, a short list:

Falling Upwards by Fr. Richard Rohr: This Franciscan priest elaborates on how the second act in someone’s life is often accompanied by great spiritual growth and what we sometimes label as failures or falls actually catapult us forward and upward in wisdom and light. What he connects here regarding veterans who return to civilian life was very helpful & affirming with how many of us feel returning to life in the world, after a unique and extreme situation. Great, helpful read!

The Highly Sensitive Person by Elaine Aron: If you experience sensory overwhelm, have introvert tendencies, don’t like loud places, people, violent movies, etc - this book is for you. It helped me feel normal and be more confident asking for what I need in life, relationships, work and saying no to what I do not enjoy. About 15-20% of humans are HSP, and of that number, 70% are introverts. There is a website dedicated to this book with a quiz you can take to see if you fall into this category.

Quiet by Susan Cain: For all my introverts, do yourself a favor! For all my extroverts, learn about your friends, family and lovers here! This book upped my confidence and self-awareness even more, enabling me to find strength and confidence in my innate, interior, introverted gifts.

The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman: If you plan on loving humans, read this book or at least go to the website, take the quiz and know your own languages. Do you know how you recieve love? Are you a gift person, or acts of service? Do you love physical touch or would you rather have someone compliment you? Also - are you giving love to your loved ones in the language they speak? If you give compliments to someone who prefers acts of service, your compliments will mean nothing. Again, just great to know if you are human and plan on loving and being loved on any level.

Ok, that’s all for now. I could add dozens to this list! Happy Reading!

[lewnatic]

For the D&D asks, 1-20

Oh gosh, okay. This is gonna be long so I’m gonna do it under a cut.

What was your favorite Nat 1 Experience?

I don’t think a lot of my characters have had really funny Nat1 moments, sadly. I will always remember the one when @zhixx​ made a goblin named Spook’em specifically designed to have the least survivability possible. The first time he was downed he rolled a Nat1 on his first death save. The feeling of comedic timing was just beautiful.

Favorite D&D Inside Joke?

“You are a privateer! BUT ON LAHND.”

Favorite Item Your Character received in D&D?

Phailyn was supposed to get a tome to increase his strength, but when his crush said she wanted it, he immediately fucking dropped it so she could have it. So the DM let me sneak off and get a scrying orb we’d passed up earlier. He hasn’t used it yet, but I just like the story behind it.

Ves probably considers Sikrikta to be the best item she’s received has a lot of really expensive shit she’s keeping just because she has bourgie taste. She got a bottle of wine as a gift that would have been 400g if she’d left it unopened. She’s drinking it gradually through the adventure. It’s good, but not quite as good as what she’s used to.

Teeki has a gaudy diamond crown that Bing bought for 300 gold. It does nothing. It is purely cosmetic. She loves it.

Basically I love frivolous shit.

Preferred Animal Companion (if you had any)?

Vesxlit has a familiar, if that counts. He’s a parrot named Brilliant. He talks like a normal human (in a setting where that is definitely not commonplace) and is a member of the Bardic College in the capital city of the nation we’re traveling in.

He’s a posh gentleman who helps Ves sew dresses. They spend 90% of their time arguing because, being a bird, his fashion sense is incredibly bright and garish.

Favorite D&D Battle Encounter?

Every boss fight Skaaren has done is goddamn awesome, tbh. My favorite is the first just because of how scary it was.

Keep in mind, we’re level 1 in Pathfinder, an Oracle (Ves) and a Barbarian (Cato.) We’ve just watched a big hole open up in the ground, and our characters don’t know why, but we’re looking for missing people (including the barbarian’s boyfriend Fabius, he’s important) so we figure hell, this is probably where they’re missing.

We find some of the missing people at the bottom of the hole, but we haven’t found Fabius, so we go deeper in. We find this creepy old woman doing some kinda ritual or something by a pool of water? Barbarian charges in to kill her and save his man, and… kills her very quickly.

Silence. We go to check on Fabius, and we’re not sure if we can safely move him. I’m running out of heals from earlier stuff and I pop my last one on him, and after a while of debating what to do a ton of undead start coming out of the water. Just a goddamn mob. Whatever the hell creepy-lady was doing, we were suddenly way in over our heads. Even if we picked up Fabius and ran, we don’t have a fast way out of this hole. And we start taking damage fast. Including Fabius.

I don’t remember the specifics of the fight. I think that’s a testament to how much we were panicking. I remember feeling the helplessness of being a mage completely out of spell slots frantically trying to hit things with my stupid mace.

And I remember when the fight was over, I stayed down there panicking for several more minutes, trying to determine if Fabius was even alive while the barbarian ran to get the local doctor in a town of which he didn’t even speak the language.

In the end, Fabius was okay, and we both got out of it alive. It was just that sense of dread and fear, that we didn’t know how the DM’s rolls were going or if anything we were trying had any impact. Skaaren has always done a stellar job since of bringing that sense of genuine fear into the game when he wants to, but that first unexpected taste of it was so damn cool.

Favorite D&D NPC Interaction?

Varis Vrynn was my favorite villain. Not because of his fight, or how he fit into the greater lore, but because of how @extravagantshoes​ played him. He was a slimy uppity elf in the city of Galthiel, a city with heavy class divides based on magic ability. Varis was a powerful diviner, and a lot of our party interactions involved everyone in the party trying to piss him off and Varis looking down his nose in disgust at all of us.

Then Cedlanna, our young sorcerer, got a conversation with him alone in his manor, where he wanted to make a deal with her. And she just ripped into him. Cut to the core of his insecurities and how with all of his riches on display, his manor still was incredibly empty–that for all the parties he hosted he was completely alone.

He was doing some really irredeemable things and later tried to kill us all but I still managed to feel kind of sad that we ended up gruesomely killing him.

Dumbest thing You & Your Party Did

Charging through multiple spinning saws comes to mind. Every time I try to sneak around in heavy plate armor also comes to mind.

I feel like I need to make a separate post to discuss just all the impulsive things Cato does. Turning an entire city upside down just for the chance to punch a specific guy in the face was one.

Most Epic thing You & Your Party Did

I might also make a separate post about this, but Cato and Ves convinced a bunch of lizard people that they were their gods.

Basically in this setting, the level 1 baddies generally fought are called Rapia. They’re kobold-esque in design, but they have a faith-based culture and… well, kind of a faith-based biology. Rapia need something to worship, they undergo gradual physiological changes based on the thing they follow. (Say it’s a sea creature, they might get gills.) And if they don’t have something to worship, they literally become sick and presumably die.

We’d fought a few before and looted crap from their caves, including a tiny hammer that we never could have used but the barbarian held onto cuz idk??

We later ran into some others by falling through the roof of their cave, but they didn’t attack us. They started to assume that we were the gods depicted on one of their cave walls. For the sake of brevity, a fight broke out later when we were trying to leave, and Cato gave the hammer to one of the rapia who was helping us escape. It turned out in the DM’s notes, this hammer had significance to the rapia, and was supposed to be given to the religious leader of a tribe. And so the entire tribe turned to our side and protected us. And… they started following us.

It was about this time that the DM broke character to tell us he had no plan of this happening, and I guess we just have a tribe of rapia now. And we’ve had the goddamn campaign balanced around having a tribe of rapia ever since.

What did you like about your Campaign’s World?

I’m gonna try to sum these up quickly cuz these stories have already gotten long.

The Ascension world has elements of what I affectionately like to call Pop Fantasy, there’s some genre-awareness while not being parody, and all the work on the pantheon Spi did has been goddamn amazing. I also cannot figure out the overarching mysteries and that is awesome.

Nejj puts a ton into immersing us into the world. I can always very clearly get a feel for the sort of setting he’s putting us in, and I’ve been having a lot of fun with the political intrigue he’s been setting up.

Skaaren’s got the weirdest goddamn races in his setting and I love every single one of them. He’s also packed the setting full of little cultural details, I swear to god he’s done extensive research into what we’re having for breakfast in the morning based on where we’re staying.

What was the most Interesting Lore you Found?

I seriously can’t pick a favorite here so I’m going to give a silly answer, and that’s that acolytes of Ves’s goddess commune with her by getting super high. 

Summarize Your Campaign(s) in a Single Sentence

One for each campaign:A group of weird rebels and one very ordinary guy dismantle the ruling government.Goblins discover crazy politics and necromancy, what happens next will warm your heart.Tourists getting intimate with the horrifying hidden truths of nature

Describe your whole Party Dynamic in a Sentence

The best bunch of weirdos and one stupid shady paladin.Loner rogue becomes Team Mom by sheer force of how much the other two hate each other.Bug Jesus and The Angriest Boy discover family in the form of lizards.

What Alignment do your characters lean towards?

I have a weird time choosing an alignment for characters cuz motivations change a lot for my nerds. Teeki was True Neutral but has become more Chaotic Good. Ves is Lawful Good I guess?? And Phai is a goddamn mess whose alignment has shifted at least thrice since his conception.

How do you tend to Take Notes (if you do)?

Badly! Next question.

Prefer Story/Plot Driven or No Plot/Character-Driven Campaigns?

I tend to prefer plot-driven, but I honestly think elements of both should be implemented in your narrative–occasionally giving breaks from the overarching plot to give the cast some time to dick around can give a breath of fresh air to roleplay.

Combat or Role Play?

Roleplay, of course. I actually used to think I hated D&D combat. It took a lot of great sessions to make me realize that the RP doesn’t stop for combat, and that’s when I started really getting into learning and enjoying mechanics elements.

Favorite D&D Monster/Creature?

Illithid. I would love to actually play as one someday.

Magic User or Fighter?

Magic is more engaging to me, personally, but I like both.

Preferred Weapon/Spell in D&D?

Tasha’s Hideous Laughter. In large part because of how it’s roleplayed in Critical Role tbh. I also have felt the high of Sneak Attack enough times to really love it now.

What was your Favorite Nat 20 Experience?

One time I rolled a Nat20 perception while we were on the road and it was literally just to find a coin on the ground. That might always be my favorite. 

[the-firebird69]

Elton John is a Deadman for putting a hit on him and it's going to stay on there until he's dead every time someone hits them they're going to get paid and it's big money for our people it's big money and we want people to step forward if you're a skilled train sniper in a certain class and level and we're putting out what's required we want you to take pot shots at them all day show him what furious because the a****** keeps doing it to our son no matter what said to him this is a freaking prick you have to bring a lot of ammo too sasso's show up and challenge just pick them all off stick move pick them all off stick move keep doing it until they're all gone I'm going to do this now I'm sending in troops I'm sending in troops and piles of snipers each one will have a chance at it

I want them all gone of course so I want everybody to organize now things that you can do here that does that he's exhausted he's done it for months he wants people to help him we need to help this is terrible here these people are sick they're decrepit they're pieces of crap and they're wandering around begging for stuff by bothering him I want all their tires flat now I want all their bikes stolen I went to the locked himself to death it only take like one mile a'll will be gone.

Thor Freya

Those numbers above for each location about tripled and we're missing a few items and going after some of them are going after the ships the numbers are not so high because they don't know if they're there or not lots of them are going after billion will and Bill that's right people think they have the Intel this s*** heads would not stop talking about stuff today you're so dumb about it and have a lot of Intel for real they just kept on saying it and saying it and saying it look we have a lot of Intel they're trying to tie people up they keep making larger and larger groups come around so much so we had to tell them to shut up they said we know what we're doing so this is huge groups are going after him in Port Charlotte no other way up to Norway and then it went to Europe and they're coming downwards and this giant groups after them

Big Joe says that's ridiculous and Preston says oh cool they found out what we're saying why don't you shut up Big Joe and Big Joe says you're the one blabbing Preston and our son says hey why don't I get into this this is religious hand signal they're saying no no stay there I like Europe....Ken?

Each group is about 500 billion millions okay okay 5M+800,000N's and they're about 10 groups because they're from all different areas up there different countries they're flying out of these bunkers a bunch of maniacs he's going I need to go back to the UK and pick something up that grandpa has been laughing well we move they catch up to us and it's wicked heinous so we move again and they catch up to us they had no idea they were so huge he says you're going to have to run him into something like go near a wall maybe the Sahara and take a cruise over to Egypt run up Israel then shoot back over to Europe do it again something like that you guys know what's going on better than me and dump them off at the wall you know have them swim there. Can check them into the Ukraine. So there's two ideas the wall is kind of a benign thing they may not mind that Preston says Big Joe's starting to argue Big Joe you should have stayed home but..... Joes laughing hahaha very funny you little kid.

The crowd is following him is mixed that's mostly more like and Max and everybody is telling them to get the hell out of there and they're bringing like armament with them and stuff and it's all terrible stuff so I'm willing to I'm looking to the East and saying well so I think they're starting to go that way cause I'm not getting this whistle no thanks from the crowd with them and it's saying no things what so I can figure out something huge

No we've got some missing words above it's kind of like we have to get in there and the crowns are very huge following them. And Corky you have s*** your pants in front of everybody so many times you have to correct words that's what it's called and your language you sit there s******* your pants all day long in front of everyone you got diaper rash that would make the red in China look like nothing.

So killing off tons of these idiots mostly Max and neck guards and they're getting dragged into the Europeans now and there's tons of sadness come out and beat the s*** out of them shooting him taking him down it's a huge fight this Max deserve it and they're falling after these two well that was a good decision to break up the band there huh tell me if he knows experiencing it too Tommy favino is experiencing it as well he can't stand it he says this kids are going through it everyday that is lunatics that follow you around trying to knock you down bother you harass you we don't know what they want how to speak to them or what to say it's like this get the f*** out of the way and it looks like they're not even there so people can't tell what they are who they are and here it happened here at cyclically it's like if it wasn't stupid enough somebody is adding stuff to it and I'm funny here thinks it's the robot people and Olympus says they have proof it happened here a lot.

Hal is laughing cuz supposedly our son is laughing at Alice not sure if that's right else is pissed. This this computer sound like little kids that are very smart very sharp they don't Satanist stuff inside and out.

Those giant groups got bigger but twice as big and they're contemplated going into Russia for just a few nips of and they're worried about what's going on so he's trying to help him he says think of a place you could go where they calm down on stuff and it wouldn't be where you make stuff Joe no. Like Disneyland or something they hv it in China. Preston says leave him happy and dizzy well you know it is Chinese beer and her son says Joe m is cracking up that's a possible solution we have a ton of money we can travel all over it's not a ton of money but it's pretty much we can travel for thousands of years and not notice it oh s*** thank God for polycarbonate it's only by osmosis today you better not drag me out to Russia it's a bug China was great enough that was a fun time here was my 100 grand I was starting to think about something this is not worth it no no we had to do this absolutely had to there's something stupid fish here I don't know what to say our friend here my boy he's telling us off and he said you have no idea he was right the whole time and I can't believe it there's so many people that know about us he was telling Brian shut up Brian shut up you're a f****** idiot you're you're so stupid we are going to kill you now nobody gets it and you're moron now bja is starting to say this is way too many people at me there's too many people doing stuff I can't see anything I can't go anywhere and he was right this time it looks like the real thing but our friend says Brian is the ultimate c********* and he says it and then he goes like damn this is my angle I win and there's really not much of an angle but it does reflect what they believe in. It's really stupid but we believe that he's being accurate and we question him quite a bit and he says I have plenty of people this guy is a turd this guy Brian he doesn't believe I have any people so he knows the problem but this is ridiculous Joe M says and Preston says it's more than a problem it's a solution to all Chris' problems that bja is happy to provide we told him that one day and he said what do you mean and he asked us a bunch of questions and then he started using it against him, and in our book that doesn't make any sense but in his it does because he's not about facts and verifying things he's about getting away with lies and deceit and and acts in his lies and deceit and act don't match anything cuz it's all basically fraud and cheesy so he's getting killed by the max shut up it's like this four year old child who went nuts with Ebonics we have comparisons and they sound the same it's like some moron running around just yelling and screaming the answers saying I win afterwards Preston says there's got to be an end to it when the Max and then finish each other off he adds

When I say is there's so many of them more like dying than Max they're going to be gone pretty soon but we're in a lot of trouble if there's more than that cuz that's a lot that's a hefty number and our son says just you wait it's going to increase with edge of Tomorrow and the cage you get involved and they see the cage you up there ripping the s*** out of them they're going to flood in there nose ark was just completed.

Now there's a couple people have to get shot Dan and a douche she's probably how he got to do the movie cuz he's stupid we can't stand you people we need to get rid of you we need you to go places

Living lying the max they're living a lie with you your lives are not truthful it's not your friend he's taking things from you he's taking lives from you and money and gold and diamonds took all that stuff from Saudi Arabia get rid of Jason's people and keeps blaming me for it you put the diamonds up in the death Star and Jason is relentlessly bothering me shows up all over the place and does a stupid freaking routine that anybody would shoot him for if someone's near me I can pay for their gun I'm going to shoot that stupid idiot I don't care if it's made to do it holy s*** is it annoying and that just keeps pushing his buttons having him do it just like this bja guy holy s*** you guys are like b****** you're so sensitive and sit here all day and I don't do anything they also was in the Attic abacab or whatever cab which is like a song from Genesis and it's in genosis the Star wars movie and it's near there and it's also in the Bible and Mac has a lot to do with that so come on you Jew to Jamie chomo to be such a homo he's laughing now but later he's going to turn into an a******. Speaking of which the max are all over the place at diamond locations now seem more like me as well go there and they'll at the white gold location here and you know where that is and also in their Shadow domes beating the f*** out of small groups he was going in there

Thor Freya

[maneaterwithtail]

I will give attack of the Clones this, they tried really they did. They recast the much criticize young child. They reduced the presence of the Annoying character. They figured out how to retcon in a mysterious character that was a fan favorite. They included a masterful character actor.

However, there were some problems they ran into just from taking too long. the idea of clones being the stand-in for manufacturer and slavery abuse made perfect sense until dolly was an actual real thing. and by that point clones have been tied into reproductive technology so being anti clone was much closer to being anti in vitro fertilization which was more of the women's rights issue as opposed to tampering in God's domain

Just felt finessed okay in some ways. especially as it meant that they're treating cloning less as this Grande crossover past the threshold but instead unlocking something that they always could do but was forbidden and now they're doing it even though they know it's wrong. gives that sense of creeping corruption that you realize is sort of happening with everyone

Again they needed better direction for actors but in terms of what the dialogue was trying to convey I like the fact that Obi-Wan kind of disliked Palpatine. the only problem was it felt like they couldn't really get into this or that issue. the setting and narrative felt incomplete and just an excuse plot to get people moving around from one adventure to the other. To be fair this is something of a plot point the fact that nobody's taking time in order to really analyze why and where everything's going is how Palpatine leads them through his maze

I just like the fact there's so much Casual Lying to the point where you actually have to re watch and re consider. Lucas is taking real advantage of the fact that the audience knows more than the characters so that that way they can follow a really convoluted plot but have It ultimately makes sense with the occasional scene of us peeking behind the curtain see what the villains are up to

even this is a very deliberate attempt to reduce the boring parts of the phantom menace with the Senate

This is why while better executed the sequel Trilogy always felt more frustrating to me. it very deliberately decided to try to go back to the original trilogy rather than at the very least bring things from it. More than a few have pointed to the expanse

you could have a new threat an old threat or even the same threat just told differently and better

Hell actually have our ST heroes be entirely from the unknown region dealing with the encroaching Colonial ization of the new Republic. And in this case it's a matter of finding synthesis between restoring what's lost and allowing those that have grown up in the shade of the dark ages of the empire with their own autonomy. Something that even the Jedi struggled with

Keep Ben solo. do not redeem him but make it so that Ray is the person who brings Luke over to their side and makes him realize hey we've gone wrong and let ourselves be blinded by dogmatic got to do this one way ism

yes I'm agreeing to vilify Our Heroes as opposed to make them pathetic. Particularly as its of the everyone's sure they are hero of Their Own Story. it's more of an actual Civil War situation. something that Turned out to be the thing that was inside the prequel trilogy that got hijacked by it's all a conspiracy by Palpatine. End in the synthesis with the new and the old allowing for a proper passing of the torch new settings that don't necessarily conform to what we think of as Star Wars so you get your metacommentary but include more than just meta commentary. And with ultimately Luke deciding that he's going to allow everyone to be Jedi or at least Force users sharing their wisdom and only watching for actual Darkness as opposed to adhere to his definition of the light creating a more Universal approach everyone can be United on Common Ground more than under a common Dome of the government avoiding the corruption into the Empire that exists with or without Palpatine

you still keep Smoke and ben to show how just because someone is giving the downtrodden or the objectors power doesn't necessarily mean that they're not doing so with the same authoritarian bent or out of broken cruelty

so why don't I trust taika waititi? because they had their shot in order to deconstruct reconstruct Star Wars and they kind of got mean-spirited and annoying about it. And he, in the specific, sort of took all the gravitas that was building out of Thor in order to make it zany. finally whether it was his fault or not shot on the interesting new status quo afterwards with the two Infinity movies

it seems constant catastrophe in order to Grant profundity to you because we put emotional investment in the status quo especially with long-term property is the only trick that they've got. And they don't care to follow through the implications of that catastrophe so much is bring in meta commentary primarily to win Twitter arguments or to preach their weird progress gospel. Instead of, just say, giving us a female Jedi agent

number one reason I hated Admiral holdo? I knew what they were doing in terms of character comparison with hot shot Cowboy pilot who is male Poe Dameron vs Admiral holdo just seriously look at her

you could practically hear Look Out Boys a lady is in charge in Star Wars -ignoring Mon Montha there was literally the previous movie and the earlier run of this one with General Organo oh you know Princess Leia. Only when she came on screen they very deliberately made sure to reframe her as Field Marshal first with no mention I think of her being a princess on screen and only only slight visual allusions to such

we already have plenty of bad ass females and Star Wars. we didn't need this whole weird gender War to play out just have us have bad ass females in Star Wars

rey having issues because she knows her parents were a bunch of drunken junk herders and she desperately wants them back to give her some validation is a perfectly fine story. don't tease the audience with a special revelation and to be fair parents of nobody was literally the only twist that Star Wars had for the " who the person's parents are" thing.

We did the parents are hero, parents are divine, child is the Antichrist, parents are villains thing already.

they could have easily given us a Star Wars filled with gay characters female characters. And characters who were anti-global ism Without having to destroy what came before. maybe challenge what came before by making the faction of our old heroes or our heroes be part of the problem as part of the solution. But that would actually be taking elements of the complexity that the prequels -however much It fumbled- managed to somehow open the door for in Star Wars and then let it expand to the characters that- let's face it- were much more simpler but very likable.

We can even explain Ray and her goodness with machines as well as her amazing force abilities as being the result of yahoo and the ur being wherr separates of the separatist movement having run to.

unknown regions and done their thing instead of the wreckage there just being Imperial stuff it's Imperial and separatists stuff. Sure we got the desert planet and we got the planet that was turned into a cyborg

but now we are going to have the planet That is the result of a bunch of Gene Engineers getting the f*** with it for decades on end and produce this or that the point where ya much like many prequel detractors or people who hate midichlorians talk about " why don't they just inject the fetuses"

well guess what Rey is the results of those kind of experiments by random we need crap here is a kid give us drugs to try stuff. but it's not as easy as inject midichlorians get super Jedi. They have to like you and more than likely you're going to go crazy or develop -I don't know -mitochondrial cancer something.

this still makes the climax helping Ray reach Luke and comprehend the universe and Luke having to accept change even in light of his own personal failure with his Orthodoxy by ultimately changing things and learning from the failures of the Jedi to adapt

this instantly explains Snoke. he's not Darth Plagueis but he is someone working on the same tech line but at the same time he's got the raw power but f****** look at him! he's made himself a giant who's half deformed and can't live outside of the specifically prepared environment.

this is the twist with Ben. he's inherited a very high-quality of midi-chlorians in addition to the fact that he has refined training from Jedi who have been trying to figure things out. He is after smokes dark way. It would also probably reflects our current social religious prospects where we now know a lot of our beliefs are made up. Or to be generous not given directly from on high but go through development politicization and what have you. but that doesn't necessarily make the practice of them worthless. Or every heretic or challenger Richard dawkins

you even tie in the idea of Ray coming from something dark because the manipulation directly admitted chlorians was always something associated with self with Sith Alchemy and deliberately in this case with Gene engineering and many people look on the Clone Wars as a dark time for the galaxy

Projecting their prior failures on to a lesser group who they're going to "lift up" so that that way they don't have to deal with them.

All this and you don't turn our previous heroes into failures. you turn them into guys who got the chance to be on the upper seat and fell to some of the Temptations of power but the new Heroes either defeat or redeem them. And we also get to see some of the good that they could do. Luke having to distribute the Jedi teachings in a new form to a new sort of people. Leia ultimately having to weaponize the locals and other people so that that way they can make sure that they don't fall under the sway of their own Palpatine. And Han ...actually keep him sacrificing himself to try to save his son.

Just you know make it so that he hasn't returned back to smuggling he's actually been turning back to running the underways in order to track ben down

we hit a lot of the same beats of the previous generation struggling with failure the corruption of the prince of the new generation but also the rise of a new generation Independent of them while drawing from them and becoming their own people.

all of this while progressing from the original well not necessarily trying to reach Reddit all and certainly not spending a lot of time deconstructing it or Star Wars and their fandom

[6stronghands]

please read. it’s long. but i need to say this:

Broken in the past year:

Dishwasher, refrigerator, microwave, furnace, water heater, toilet, gas fireplace, TV, 2 laptops, 2 cellphones, my eyeglasses, the locking system, door handle, driver window (stuck DOWN not up, of course) and catalytic converter on my 15 year old minivan and the other car, a 22 year old beloved 4 Runner had to be junked because it was so decrepit and unfixable (it’s a credit to those amazing early generation Runners though, because it made 260,000 miles and basically ran on Marvel Mystery Oil, Seafoam, and pep talks at the end), then I found out that my home has serious foundation issues, and now, NOW, the dryer. 

My new (used) Mustang got hit ONE WEEK after I bought it, by a drunk guy in a big ol F150, as I was my way home to kansas after caring for three (3!!!) family members in the hospital in Utah for four months. The whole time I was in Utah, I was like, holy god these guys are shockingly bad drivers (and I’ve driven extensively around a ton of states). There’s this move I call The Utah Special, a lane changing move where they don’t signal, they don’t check their blind spots, they don’t move vertically….they just horizontally zoom into a space they want in the next lane. I saw so many near misses and actual accidents during my time there. And lo and behold, LITERALLY AS I’M ON MY WAY OUT OF THAT HELL STATE, at the motherfreakin base of the canyon, four hours from Colorado and freedom from the religious insanity and repression that manifests as the angriest, most aggressive, flat out incompetent drivers I’ve ever seen, a jackalope did the Utah Special on me and my new car.  

It screwed up the alignment and tire pressure monitor and left a big dent on the drivers door. Luckily i didn’t run into the giant concrete wall that he spun me into, because I’m an experienced driver, esp in correcting a bad, fast turn, but it was close. The guy is now trying to avoid payment so I’ve been driving around with a beatup looking car. 

One month after i got back to Lawrence, a guy backed into me at the store, and I ended up using the 100 bucks he gave me for groceries, and trying to buff out the back myself, which didn’t work. This is my childhood dream car btw, the only nice thing I’ve ever owned (and it looks a lot nicer than it is, it’s very bare bones inside and out, it just looks slick. It took almost two years and three states of looking to find a good Mustang for such a low price). 

And now. 

Now I’ve got a gutted dryer, parts spread out to hell and gone, because Samsung dryers have the worst design and the cheapest parts (seriously, don’t ever buy Samsung appliances. Three different parts stores and repair people told me they refuse to work on Samsungs or carry parts for them any more because the design is so bad and the parts are so cheap). I thought I fixed it by replacing the circuit board, but now I think it’s the thermal fuse switch which is located UNDER and BEHIND the drum, not in the more accessible places other brands put it. But that’s not irritating enough, no no, now it turns out I have to learn how to solder because they didn’t use screws or plugs for the fuse mount, no no, they soldered it on, so I had to drill the fucker out and and buy a solder iron and now I’m watching how-to-solder videos on youtube. 

And (of course there’s an AND) the charging port on my 3rd used cell phone broke, and I don’t have time to order a replacement port and do it myself, so I took it into one of those overpriced walk in places (for $130 dollars!!! for fifteen minutes work). Picked it up five minutes before they closed last night, and now the screen is unresponsive. According to the good people of the internet, since I can’t get it to reboot, it’s probably a badly seated digitizer that got bumped when they did the replacement. I have to take a break from my how-to-solder videos and go in and convince a bunch of 20 year old guys to fix my phone and not charge me for it. 

So. This is a lot. 

And because we are in the aptly named bad timeline, my personal life has pretty much echoed all the broken down stuff. I have had some weird, hard to diagnose, health crap that cost me one job and has prevented me from finding another. So I just do a bunch of volunteer stuff now, and keep applying to worse and worse jobs, hoping someone, somewhere will take me. My new dog (who I adopted because I’ve been so overwhelmed and stressed, I was freaking out one day and my sister was like, I KNOW WHAT YOU SHOULD DO, YOU NEED A DOG, and she was one hundred percent right, everything is better with a good dog) got attacked at the park, by a Husky owned by a RedditGuy, who then RAN when I was trying to revive my dog, and drove away in a Mercedes with a license obscurer. The only reason I know who he is, is because a quick thinking teenager ran after him and tried to get his name (which the guy wouldn’t give) and the teen took pics of him with his cellphone (don’t shit on Millenials around me, just don’t. All I see are good kids doing good stuff under bad circumstances). (Also, just fwiw, there are all kinds of Huskies being surrendered at shelters and involved in attacks because, and this is so dumb it just kills me, people are watching Game of Thrones and deciding they want their very own Direwolf, without having the experience or willingness to take on a breed that needs a lot of training and reinforcement and care. Huskies are great dogs if they have great owners, like a lot of other great but high-care breeds). 

The medical bills were over $4000, which I had to take a loan out for. There was a court hearing, and the judge ruled in my favor, and ordered the guy to pay, by March 1st. You won’t be surprised at all, because FML, that the guy hasn’t paid, and is contesting it, which means more court stuff. This has all been stressful as hell, but this dog is genuinely the most amazing dog I’ve ever had; he is worth any trouble and expense. I would sell my Mustang, if I had to, to keep this tiny, adorable fuzzball (some kind of poodle-terrier mix, I think, I dunno. He was a rescue dog who was fostered with an inmate in a local prison, Safe Harbor Prison Dogs, check it out, they’re great) I’ve never had a companion dog before. I’ve had family dogs who have all been great, but I’ve never had one where they are bred to be a companion, that’s their work, like a work-dog needs work to be happy and sane. He is carrying my kid and me in his soft little paws; he does good work, this guy. He is always happy, very energetic when you want, calm and cuddly when you want, incredibly sensitive and attuned, unnervingly intelligent and a joy to train, and as soft as a bunny. I have to brush him every single day because of his crazy Fizzgig hair, but that’s fine. He rides on my shoulder in the car and fits inside a tote bag so I can sneak him lots of places. I’ve socialized him from the beginning (which is why I was at that damn park) so he’s totally silent in public places like stores. He loves people, especially kids, and if I ever get off the job-hunting, broken-thing-fixing treadmill, I’d like to volunteer him as a therapy dog in hospitals or wherever. He’s like my very own Daemon, my own Pantalaimon. A gift and a blessing at any time, but especially now, when things are Challenging. 

Then. Then the worst thing. Something really bad happened to my one of my kids. Something so bad that I can’t talk about it in a public place like this. I can barely talk about it in my Al-Anon support group. I spend a lot of energy not thinking about it. I have learned a lot of things in the past few years, like A LOT. I know so much more now, about so many, many things. But this bad thing is something I wish I never knew, and it’s not fixable, only recoverable. 

I have never, ever been so continually sad and angry. It’s been bad timing for my mental health, the Me Too movement. I had a friend visit and he was talking about it, and was telling me that it’s turned into a witch hunt, that things aren’t really this bad for women, that maybe women and men just speak different languages and have different needs and wants, that if things have been this bad, why didn’t women say something sooner, and I just….I couldn’t talk. He wanted me to give him specific examples of male violations in my life, and I literally didn’t know where to start. I can list so many, like every woman alive. I could list hundreds of small things, things where you just accept it because what else can you do, and other things, things that were not small, but you ignore, because you actually know the guy and you know he’s genuinely a mostly good guy, or trying to be, or will be some day, or has a family who loves and depends on him, or maybe I didn’t have the vocabulary or confidence or experience to safely call him out then, or maybe I didn’t know if calling him out would ruin his life, and for real, I could see that he would some day evolve into A Good Man, An Ally, and I didn’t want to jeopardize that. Because that’s real, that dynamic. It doesn’t fit into any black and white social media woke doctrine, but it’s real. I have hurt people through ignorance, and I have learned and evolved, and there have been a few specific times where I can look back in gratitude that someone educated me in a gracious, patient way, because it changed me for the better. Do men know this? That people like me aren’t calling them on stuff? That the problem is much, much worse than the revelations of the Me Too movement? That we let pretty much all the small and medium stuff go? Do they know? Are they so uneducated, so culturally indoctrinated, so blind, to other men’s bad behavior, to their own, that they really think that this is all an over-reaction or mixed signals or just women looking to be angry about something??? 

 I know it’s a lot more complicated than that, because goddamn life usually is. There have been hundreds of not-terrible and semi-bad violations in my 40 years, that I’ve just lived with, and then there’s been a handful of genuinely, life-altering-ly bad ones. The ones that teach you to to beware, that there are predators who prey, and you are just meat. But I couldn’t articulate any of this to this friend, this guy who feels so defensive and attacked by the movement. No one has accused him of anything, he’s just feeling defensive. He thinks people are unfair to men, that men are trying their best, that women need to explain more nicely. 

I have been so angry, about so much, for months now. I usually blow up fast and I’m done. I’m usually the poster girl for Onward And Upward, Life Is Beautiful, Everything’s Awesome. This constant anger is exhausting. And I wish I was only angry, but I’m also broken-hearted. Broken. Everything’s broken, everything keeps breaking. Bad people, careless people, indifferent people, they keep ruining things and getting away with things. The news isn’t good, not politically, not economically, not environmentally, not anything. All signs point to things getting much, much worse. 

I will say this, I am smarter than I was a year ago. 

I seem to only learn by doing, to learn the hard way. I know a lot more now. Like A LOT, in a pretty short span of time. I am not the same person I was a year ago. I am not as sweet, and not as optimistic, but I am seasoned. I’m better at problem solving. I know there's always going to be another damn thing, whatever it is. I know the importance of good tools and resources and support, whether it’s fixing broken cars or broken hearts. That came out trite, but it’s true. I’ve learned that sometimes the only good thing to come out of a bad thing is knowledge, if you use it to recover or evolve, or to help someone else. Sometimes the only silver lining is that you’ve got newfound empathy. We need more empathy in the world, so that’s not nothing. I am so, so worried about the future, about what my kids are going to have to learn in order to navigate their own personal and cultural despair. They’re gonna have to get tougher, faster, while protecting their gentle hearts and giving natures. That’s tricky. I hope they’ll remember that we’re in this together, that the only way to survive is by leaning on and helping each other. Another thing that sounds trite, but is the truest thing I know. I’ve learned to talk about things, to ask questions, to ask again if I don’t understand (and again, and again), and to say to people, I need you, I’m stuck, I’m headfucked, I’m heartfucked, help. Help me. Using your resources, whether they’re youtube how-to videos, therapy, doctors, friends, Al-Anon groups, dogs, whatever, is the only way I know how to get over and through. 

It’s kind of strange to FEEL how much stronger I am right now, than a year ago. Because things are much worse; something that would have broken me for good, if Then-Me had known. But Now-Me has soldiered through some shit by leaning hard on my resources, and because of those resources, not through inner grit or stoicism, but the resources, I’m tougher, smarter, better equipped. I am not exactly happier, but I do have happy moments. That’s a big deal. I am afraid for the future, but I know that, at least as long as I’m able to fight, I CAN fight. 

I have leaned on some of you here. Some of you are my safe places, are resources, tools, friends. Genuine, real ones. I am stronger because of you. I can write and write, but never truly articulate what that has meant, what it means to me. You know how vets are with other vets? The way they’ll meet up after they leave the military, and fall into each other’s arms, the way they trust each other for the rest of their lives? I feel that way about you guys. I’ve been in the motherfucking foxhole, and some of you guys climbed in and covered my head and held my shaking hands. I just have no words. The ‘no atheists in a foxhole’ thing isn’t true. I still don’t believe in God, but I believe in friends, in good people, in the righteous fighters who get no acclaim, no awards, but quietly, bravely, change the world around them a little at a time, to great cumulative effect. I can say I love you, I’m so grateful, you’re wonderful, but really, I have no words other than, thank you. Thank you. THANK YOU.