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lovemesomesurveys · 3 years

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“The rest of your life” Are you independent or dependent? Both, but definitely more dependent. Even more so these past few years.

If you could put your life into a category, where would it go? I feel like this would be easier to answer if you gave a list of categories. I don’t know what kind of insight you’re looking for. <<< Yeah, I have no idea how to answer this.

How many animals do you have? I have one doggo. <3

Are you popular? Nope. Never was and that’s perfectly fine.

What time were you born? Around 430PM.

Have you had any candy this week? Nope.

Are you more afraid of tornadoes or hurricanes? I’ve never experienced either one, but they both sound terrifying.

Do you like those nerd glasses? I don’t know what “nerd glasses” you’re referring to.

Have you ever been in a fist fight? Nope. Or any kind of physical fight.

What color is your house? Beige.

When was the last time you saw a rainbow? Hmm. I don’t remember.

Have you ever ate a crayon? Nope.

Ever rode in a helicopter? Yes, after my accident I had to be flown to another hospital.

Do you like rabbits? Sure.

Do you like mushrooms? Nope.

“It’s like you step into the room and just press play” What was the last movie you cried at? On Halloween I rewatched It Chapter 2 and the ending always gets me in the feels with what happens to Eddie, when it shows the loser’s club as kids and then adults, and the letter from Stanley.

What ice cream flavor best describes your personality? Vanilla cause I’m plain and simple and “innocent”, ha.

Would you rather work for a small or large company? I don’t know.

Where's your favorite place to buy clothes? Boxlunch and Hot Topic.

How many languages do you speak? Just one fluently. I can speak some Spanish, though.

What was the worst movie you've ever seen? Hm. There’s been several wtf movies, but I don’t know what I’d say was the worst. I don’t feel like thinking much about it.

What video game have you played the most? Mario bro games and most recently Animal Crossing: New Horizons. I’ve been playing that just about everyday for a lot of this year.

What was your favorite TV show as a child? Nick Jr shows, Playhouse Disney shows, Arthur, The Big Comfy Couch, Tiny Toon Adventures, Animaniacs, Bobby’s World, some Cartoon Network cartoons, and Saturday morning cartoons like Recess and Pepperann.

What's your favorite sport? None.

If you were given a brand new yacht, what would you name it? I have no idea.

Do you believe there’s life on other planets? Not in the form of ugly green creatures with odd shaped heads.

What was the worst place you ever traveled to? Hm. I haven’t been anywhere I didn’t really like.

What is one thing you’re really bad at? Life.

Do you believe in angels? Yes.

Would you rather be a famous actor or musician? Neither.

“where have you been all my life?” If you could have invented one thing, what would it have been? I don’t know.

What's your favorite exercise workout? I don’t have one. I don’t exercise :X

What's your favorite thing to do? Some things I like to do include surveys, reading, watching YouTube, scrolling through Tumblr, and checking my social medias.

What did you do for your 17th birthday? I’m sure dinner with family. Probably invited my aunts and cousins over.

Does your local Wal Mart have benches in them to rest? Yeah.

Was your favorite stuffed animal really a teddy bear growing up? I got more into stuffed animals as I got older to be honest when I started collecting giraffe stuffed animals.

If your house was haunted, what would you do? Uhh I don’t know.

Are you crazy in love currently? No.

Are you good at swimming? No, I can’t swim.

What's worse: Slow internet or slow walkers? Slow internet is suuuuper frustrating.

What is the rudest thing a guy has ever done to you? Use me and play me.

Do you sleep with the sheets tucked in or out? Out.

What do you do to fall asleep faster? I don’t have much say when I fall asleep, but to try and help with that I listen to ASMR.

Do you carry a bottle of water wherever you go? No.

Ae you afraid that one day you might get cancer? It is something I’m afraid of. I’m someone who tends to think it’s always a possibility whenever something is wrong or I’m really sick.

“Letters to Juliet” Are you a fast or slow walker? I’m a fast wheeler.

Do you usually have to wear a belt with your pants? I never wear a belt.

Does it bother you when people's underwear hangs out? Kinda cause as someone in a wheelchair I’m at the level of a lot of people’s behinds lol and yeah, I don’t particularly want to see their underwear. Even worse if their ass is hanging out.

Are you usually the person to try new things with your hair? No.

When's your birthday? July 28th.

Do you own a bobble-head toy? Yes.

What color was the towel you used to dry off with today after a shower? I haven’t showered yet today.

Has anyone ever walked you home? Yeah.

Have you ever liked someone and they were taken? Yes.

When was the last time you went fishing? I’ve only tried it once, briefly. It wasn’t my thing.

True or false: You've read the book Lord of the Flies? True.

Have you heard of the band Yellowcard? Yep.

Have you ever seen the show Teen Wolf? I never got into it.

Do you have any quotes, lyrics etc on your walls? No. Are you a fan of Star Wars? Yes. I finally caught up on season 2 of The Mandalorian so far last night.

“Our parents never let us cross the street, but we did it anyway” Has anyone ever told you that you have nice hair? Yes.

What brand of camera do you own? I use my iPhone XR.

Is there something you're not looking forward to? My next doctor appointment.

Have you ever read the book Thirteen Reasons Why? Yep, back when I was in high school.

Do you wear white pants? No. I avoid wearing white cause I’m a slob haha.

When was the last time you were really angry? My doctor pisses me off. I don’t know why it’s so hard to get a call back regarding some lab results. I call and they say they’re waiting for the doctor to look over them and they’ll call me back to let me know but ugh it’s been taking days.

Have you ever made a 3 pointer in a basketball game? I’ve never participated in a basketball game.

Do you think you look better with your hair up or down? Down, but I always throw it up because it’s easier to deal with. I don’t have the energy or motivation to style or do anything with it.

Do you warm up before you hardcore exercise? I don’t hardcore exercise. Or exercise at all.

Do you want a pair of Converse shoes? Not currently.

Are you more of a studs or hoops type of person when it comes to earrings? Studs.

How many shirts do you have of your favorite band? Two.

Turn on the TV. What channel are you on? It’s already on, it’s currently on The Hallmark Channel.

Have you ever wore a tie before? No.

What did you have for breakfast this morning? I haven’t ate anything yet today, it’s only 5:28AM.

“For the Krusty Krab” Are you good at art? Nope, not at all.

How many times have you read your favorite book? I don’t reread books, actually.

Name one thing that you really hate. My health.

Have you ever tried walking on stilts? No. That would be impossible for me.

Is there a war that you find interesting? I’ve read the most about the Civil War and Abraham Lincoln. Especially for one of my community college history classes because the professor was a big Lincoln buff and I did a paper on Lincoln and the war.

Would you rather live in the city or country? City.

Do you think $7 is too much for a movie ticket? $7 is okay, but our movie tickets are more than that.

Would you like to be a newscast person? No. Fun fact: I was one of the newscasters on my elementary school’s news program when I was in the 7th grade, though. I enjoyed it, it was fun. It was nerve wracking, too, cause I went to a k-8th grade school and the news program played in every single grade/classroom.

Do you like word searches, coloring or crosswords better? I enjoy word searches and coloring.

Close your eyes and press a random key on the keyboard. j

How many William’s do you know? I don’t know any.

What time did you wake up this morning? It’s 5:34AM, I haven’t gone to bed yet.

Do you enjoy crutches? I’ve never used them, but does anyone actually enjoy them? They’re beneficial and necessary for some, so it’s great that they exist, but I don’t know if anyone actually enjoys them.

What's better: Snapple or Arizona tea? I used to love Arizona teas when I was a teenager. The green tea and the watermelon flavors were my favorite.

Make a word out of the word: Dinosaur. Sound.

“she said I love this song, I’ve heard it before” When you were younger, did you play with legos? Yeah.

Do you like Trix cereal? Yes. I haven’t had it in several years, though.

Do you get nervous easily? Yesss.

How long is your Facebook password? Uh, I’m not sharing that.

Do you like the movie Mean Girls? Yes.

How do you want your wedding to be? I don’t plan on getting married.

Have you seen the movie or show Catfish? Both. I love the tv show.

Do you hate it when you arrive to something early? No, I hate when I arrive to something late.

Have you ever been on Omegle? Yes.

Are you still in love with one of your exes? Nope. I moved on years ago.

Do you think it's attractive when guys wear beanies? It can be, sure.

What's something that makes you feel shy in public? Being in crowded places is one.

Do you like the shows on MTV? I like Catfish and the Teen Mom shows.

If you could go back and relive one day, what day? Hm. I’d have to really think about that if it was just one day.

What's one word you hate to be called? Sensitive. I know I am, but I hate being told “I’m too sensitive.” Plus sometimes it’s like, “no, maybe you’re just mean?”

#personal #text #survey #surveys

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purplesurveys · 4 years

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659

Mosquitoes find you particularly delicious. The rainy season where I live is essentially equivalent to mosquito season, so there is definitely a certain period in a year where they are more than usual; and because I like having just my windows open when I sleep (I find the aircon too cold most of the time), the mosquitoes find their way to my room and so there’d be days I’d wake up filled with new bites. I’m lucky enough to have never had dengue. You cheated on Heads Up 7 Up in elementary school. We don’t play that here. We do have a game called 7 Up and it *may* be a variation of that, but 7 Up involves running and chasing haha. You had a favorite Spice Girl. I’m definitely not old enough to have reached Spice Girls’ peak, and out of all of them I only know Victoria Beckham. You remember watching the first episode of SpongeBob when it came out. I was only a year old when Spongebob first came out, so I didn’t watch it by then. I do know what episode you’re talking about, though – Spongebob was pretty much all I ever watched as a kid. You like to draw. I was never any good at drawing, so I hate every bit of it.

You wish you had a car. Sort of? I have my own car bought by my parents, but I am aiming to get my own car when I could afford it. My dream car is the Mini Cooper Clubman. You used to want to be a model. I’m embarrassed by it now, but it was a legitimate dream of mine before, so much so that I let my dad know of my intention (then) of becoming a runway model. Idk, I had a past friend who was into VS models and reblogged them all the time, so her interest rubbed off on me and I wanted to be like them as well. I cringe every time I remember, lmao. You wanted to be on the show All That. I wanted to be on all the Nickelodeon shows that had the same theme as All That. You enjoy public speaking. I’m good at it and can enjoy it on a good day, but sometimes I’ll get anxious. You have witnessed something supernatural. Nope. I’ve had friends tell me their stories and I believe them, but I can’t say the same for myself. You believe in the supernatural. Just ghosts. I don’t believe in folk creatures, like the ones we have in our native culture. You aren't heterosexual. My survey answers in the last six or so years have made this very blatant. You think the whole transgender thing is stupid. That’s twisted and sad and pitiful. You own a dreamcatcher. Two – one mini dreamcatcher and another giant one. I’ve had an attachment to them since seeing New Moon of the Twilight Saga – there’s a part where Jacob gives Bella her own dreamcatcher at a time when she got depressed and was having nightmares every night, and I know there had been many times when I was like Bella, so I wanted one for myself as well. You'd want a boho wedding. So not my style. My wedding’s going to be minimalist and at most, pastel-themed. You think pink is the best color for cars. Not for me, no. Simple is better; I like my cars white. You've been called a free spirit. Nope, and rightfully so. I wouldn’t call myself a free spirit either. I like trying out new things, but I also like having security blankets and safety nets around. You're the same height as your mom. Yeah pretty much. She’s just a tiny bit taller. You grew up watching Nickelodean. I grew up watching Nickelodeon*, but this works too. My cousins and I just flipped among three channels – Nickelodeon, Disney Channel, and Cartoon Network.

You have a sibling who looks like you. Nah we all have our own distinct looks. There are angles and expressions wherein we look more similar, but generally it’s easy to tell us apart. You like to write in a journal. This account is pretty much like my journal, and I love using this blog for my thoughts and ramblings. You're tired. It’s Friday, it’s the end of the week, and I’m so, so, SO tired. And of course I’m celebrating by drinking two cups of coffee and staying up as late as I want, lol. You felt sick today. The last time this happened was late last year. I felt feverish while I was out for dinner with Gab, but the weird thing about it was that I felt better and as if nothing happened literally a half hour later. You're very creative. That is the LAST word I would use to describe myself. You can be disorganized. I’m organized about a lot of things, but I’m also disorganized about a lot of things. I could never maintain my closet no matter how much I put an effort to fold everything neatly and start from square one. You have a fever right now. Nope.

You've enjoyed babysitting. We never explicitly used this term but I was always the go-to elder kid to look out for my baby cousins, especially when we still lived under the same roof as an extended family, and I loved every bit of it. I was okay with being the motherly figure while everyone else played games or with toys. You want to go to New York City to visit. Yeah. I like bustling cities, so I feel like NYC would be right up my alley. I don’t care much for Times Square though and I would probably spend most of my time going to their museums. You love tea. I’m not obsessed with it; I can take it or leave it. And I don’t like the teas that come with a teabag; I drink either the traditional Chinese tea or just sweet, unhealthy iced tea altogether. You don't play an instrument. Yeah and I get sad about this like two times a day lmao. I wish I could play just a tiny bit of piano and/or violin. You used to want Taylor Swift's hair. I never actively wanted to be anything like her. You enjoyed High School Musical. Of course. I was THERE when it came out, and I stayed for every bit of the first film, High School Musical 2, and High School Musical 3. I was right smack in the middle of the HSM frenzy and it’s one of the more cherishable moments of my childhood haha. Everybody knew the songs, the steps to We’re All In This Together, and had HSM shirts, bags, pencil cases, and notebooks. You watched The Rugrats Movie in the theater. I barely remember that it had a movie, and I don’t think I ever saw it. Definitely not in the cinemas. You've performed on stage in a musical. I’ve performed on stage (as part of a big group) for annual school productions, but I think they were all plays. Hated every second of it. You've had the lead role in a musical. Certainly not. You've had cramps so bad you threw up. No, but close. A few weeks ago I had a headache SO bad I actually had to run to the toilet only to dry heave. It’s never happened to me before so I got scared and I just slept it off to see what happened the next day. You've never had Nutella. 2010 Tumblr pressured everybody to get Nutella because it was all the rage at the time and all the cool kids were having it, so I also did at some point. You have a favorite blanket. The one Gabie gave me two Christmases ago is my favorite. You own family heirlooms. I’m sure we have some but they haven’t been passed on to me yet.

You have carved and painted pumpkins before. No, pumpkins aren’t really a thing here. As far as I know, coloring/painting on Easter eggs is a more common activity. You have colored Easter eggs. Yes, I used to do this with my (second) cousins when they were younger.

You've walked through a haunted house. I always say I’m into horror stuff, but tbh I think horror movies are the furthest I can go HAHAHA. I’ve never been in a haunted house whether day or night, and I think the only time you’d get me to do it is if I got paid for it. You've dressed up on Halloween. Plenty times. I was Dora the Explorer last year :D :D You've tried to kill yourself. You've had a false rumor spread about you. In Grade 6 I had a rumor come back to me saying I was bi and was seeing my friend Andi (who, to be fair, I had a crush on at the time but I didn’t realize it yet). I just found it cool at all that I had a rumor about me considering I wasn’t a popular kid and had literally 2 friends, so I didn’t let it bother me haaaaah. You've been kicked out of a store (whether for a good or bad reason.) It was at a McDonald’s lmao. My friends were playing a card game and were yelling every five seconds; I knew people were going to get pissed so I distanced myself as much as possible even though I was at the same table jkfghdgh. Eventually an old man had had enough and asked us to leave, which I was GLAD to do. You have a favorite stove burner that you always use. I don’t have a favorite...the one I use often just happens to be my regular one. You enjoy eating at fast food restaurants. I find them dirty and nasty so I only eat there if I absolutely have to, but I do like getting takeout and enjoy fast food in general. You like arrows and feathers and peace signs. Ugh cringe, this SCREAMS 2010 Tumblr hahahahaha. I mean I liked all of these at some point, but not now. You want to wear a flower crown for your wedding. Hell no. It was cute for a while, but not anymore. You have signed someone else's yearbook. We don’t do that here. We pay tons of money for our yearbooks that it’s practically destroying them if we ever wrote on them lmao. You were shy in high school. For the first half, I was shy and pretty unpopular. By the latter part of high school I managed to gain friends and end up in the ~popular~ circle, but I was still shy compared to my peers. I didn’t take up a lot of extracurriculars (which is what the popu kids tended to do) but I managed to stay within the circle until the end of it. You're shy when first getting to know someone. Of course, as most would be I would imagine. I can warm up fast, though. You've gotten all A's in a class before. In high school, this was me with English and history. In college, this would be me with my history electives.

You had a favorite class and a favorite teacher in high school. Sure! Our biology teacher in sophomore year was evvvvverybody’s crush. She was so pretty and kind and smart; when we went to a beach for our field trip, I tried getting stung by a jellyfish just so she’d treat the bite on my leg cos she was one out of two faculty members who knew how to treat stings HAHAHAH. I didn’t get the highest marks in her class, but I enjoyed nonetheless. You were a teacher's favorite. BY NO MEANS. Gabie was, though. We were total polar opposites when it came to how we acted in class. You've won a costume contest. I...don’t think I ever did, but my mom did go all out when it came to coming up with our costumes as kids. You have a favorite Disney princess. It used to be Ariel, then I found her annoying. My present favorite is Rapunzel. You get carsick. Only if I excessively do something while in a moving vehicle, like text or read. You've flown first class. Never have. You hate inequality and wish life were more fair. Don’t we all? You've had a bad neighbor. They weren’t bad per se. Just a bit chaotic and the kids (a little older than I was at the time) clearly had behavioral issues. I was so relieved when they moved out. You've done a cannonball. I don’t think so. You have fallen and hit your head. Nope, and that sounds like the literal worst thing. You like sunflowers. Sure! It’s a popular UP symbol – every year, a few weeks before the university-wide graduation, they’d plant huuundreds of sunflowers to line up the entire road leading to my school :) We usually refer to sunflowers as a sign of encouragement to keep on keeping on, so that one day the sunflowers will bloom for us as well. You like the name Skylar. It’s alright. I like it because it’s the name of the badass mom in Breaking Bad, but otherwise it’s nothing too special for me. You've had a friend named Sarah. I have acquaintances with the name Sarah but they’re not my friends. You have an Aunt Robin. Nope. I would end up being the Aunt Robyn in a few years, hahahaha. You have an Uncle Rick. I’ve never heard of an Uncle/Tito Rick, but with how big Filipino families are I wouldn’t be surprised if I turned out to have one. You have a cousin Annabelle. No, but close. I have an Auntie Bel whose whole name is Amabel. You think flying a kite is boring. I never had fun doing it, or whenever we had to do it as a school activity. You were born in the year of the Dragon. Tiger, yo. You like your Chinese zodiac sign better than your American one. I don’t care for either. Your laptop has shut off because it got too hot. It’s never done this before, thank goodness. I try not to overwork it either. You've accidentally caught something on fire. Nope, I don’t think this has happened to me before. You make your bed every day. Aside from my mom requires me to, a neat bed makes the entire room feel much cleaner so I do it anyway. You wear a digital watch. I have a bad record of losing watches, so I never like wearing them. You have a favorite park. We don’t have a lot of parks here to even pick favorites from to begin with, which is a shame. You've hiked a mountain. I want to sooooo bad. It’s just never happened before/yet. You want to hike a mountain again. ^ You've been a slave. What the fuck. You feel like you've had your free will stolen from you. My parents were quite strict before but it never felt this bad. You speak in tongues. If you mean I can speak more than one language, then sure. You enjoy medieval festivals. Never been interested in anything medieval. Your favorite fair ride is the pirate ship. I don’t ride rides. Cotton candy isn't that good. It’s a cute concept but I wouldn’t always pay for it. Men look good in pink. Men – and anybody – would look good in any color so long as they’re comfortable with it lol. You went to youth group. Hell no. I’m glad my mom never forced me either. You were baptized in a lake. No. Just in a church. You were on Color Guard. I have no idea what this means. You went to your senior prom. We had a junior prom that I went to, and that was it for my school; but I was also asked to go to a senior ball of another school. Your first kiss was just an experiment. No, it was a legit kiss. You dated a guy you didn't like. Almost did, though. You have fallen asleep in class. Never. I never want this to happen, either. You have won an award. A few times. You type fast. Yeah, you get used to it through the years. You have a lot of dreams for your future. I still want to do a lot, yes. You've gone camping in the woods. Never, but it’d be a cool experience. I wouldn’t want to be alone though. You love to sleep under the stars. I don’t get to do this but it sounds like a lovely time. You've gone camping in the fall. I haven’t gone camping at allllllll. You own a pair of slipper socks. That sounds way too hot for where I live lmao.

#survey #surveys

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joyofcrime-elinorhigh · 5 years

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Scary Godmother: Halloween Spooktacular REVIEW:

Hello there, everybody. My name is JoyofCrimeArt and Halloween is right around the corner. Enjoy it while you can because the minute Halloween is over you know that big business and mass media are going to start bombarding us with Christmas music and advertisements twenty four seven, (assuming they even wait that long.) But regardless of that THIS time of year is celebrated with candy, pumpkin spiced everything, and of course Halloween specials. You got your Charlie Brown's and your Over the Garden Wall's and such, but if you ever watched Cartoon Network during the month of October during the early to mid two thousands their is one special you must of at least glimpsed at least once. That special is Scary Godmother: Halloween Spooktacular!.......Ah, I see what you did there, it's a pun on... yeah, well played special.

In case you don't know Scary Godmother is an animated CGI Halloween TV special created by Rainmaker Entertainment in 2004. It is based on the children's book and comic series of the same name created by Jill Thompson. This special was a staple of Halloween on Cartoon network for many years and even got a sequel entitled "Scary Godmother: Jimmy's Revenge" the following year. Now is this special any good. Ehhh-Ye-No....Sorta? Let's talk about it. The first thing you'll notice about this film is it's animation. It's...not the best looking by today's standards for sure. CGI from this era is definitely dated by this point, but it's hard to blame the special for it's animation given that it was only 2004. Plus the special does offer up it's own sort of style in many respects. The character designs on the humans aren't very good, as a lot of the time they do just looked like pallet swapped versions of the same model, but the designs of the actual monsters later in the special are really creative looking, just like in the books. Plus they do this neat thing where a lot of the backgrounds will be hand drawn illustrations and certain props will have a cool "pop-up book" element to them. So yeah, the animation is pretty dated, but I'm glad that they did something to make it have it's own unique look. So I can forgive it for the most part. The special opens up on Halloween night as we see three kids, Daryl, Bert, and Katie dressed in Halloween garb outside of the haunted "Spookhouse." Katie is dressed up as a cat, which is sensible enough, but Daryl is dressed up as a piece of candy, Bert is a baseball driver in his SUV. It's dumb and cheesy but in a charming and kinda amusing kind of way. Anyway, then we Jimmy appear on top on a tombstone dressed in his devil pajamas, but he is quickly knocked off of the stone be the light from a flashlight held by his younger cousin, Hannah, our main protagonist for the story. Now here is where things start to get a bit odd. Jimmy asks why Hannah is flashing the flashlight around, and then the three other kids jump in calling for a "flashback." Now some fourth wall humor isn't the weird thing, but what's weird is the fact that we don't actually get any real "flashback." instead we get a scene of the characters reenacting a scene where Hannah's parents give Hannah the flashlight with Daryl and Katie playing the part of Hannah's parents. But the thing is, 1.) Jimmy and Hannah clearly came to the Spookhouse separately from the other three kids because they show up afterwards, so there's no way that Katie and Daryl could of known the specifics of how Hannah got the flashlight. 2.) Jimmy was in the flashback, picking Hannah up before going trick-or-treating! So how was he confused by Hannah's flashlight? He saw Hannah's parents give the flashlight to Hannah! I mean I suppose he might not have been paying much attention to what Hannah was doing since Jimmy wasn't in the exact shot where Hannah's Dad (played by Daryl.) gave Hannah the flashlight, but still! Also then there's like this wipe, where Hannah comments that that was close to how it all went down. With, Bert even being annoyed he didn't have a role in the flashback, so I'm not even sure if that scene even happened at all! It's hard to explain but it's a really bizarre scene. Point is, Hannah's dad gave Hannah the flashlight, saying that light from a flashlight could scare away monsters. Anyway, while Hannah is off flashing her flashlight around Jimmy talks to his friends. Jimmy comes with the idea to trick Hannah into enetering the old Spookhouse. That way Hannah would run home scared and they could trick-or-treat without her, since there "big kids" and she isn't. The other three are against it at first but end up being tempted into evil by the silly devil hoodie clad little boy. So they tell Hannah that there is a monster in the Spookhouse, and every Halloween the new kid must go inside and give the monster a piece of candy or else the monster will come out and eat every kid in the world. So Hannah goes into the house, and is tricked into thinking the house is full of monster due to Jimmy's amazing work at creating hand shadows.

I DON'T CARE WHO YOU ARE OR HOW GOOD YOU ARE, HANDS DO NOT WORK THAT WAY! Anyway the big kids run outside the house leaving Hannah in, holding down the door knob so she can't run away. Even though the whole plan was to make her run away. They just want to traumatized the kid a little more. Y'know, for the lol's and such. Anyway Hannah starts crying until suddenly her Scary Godmother appears! Hannah is at first to sad to even notice this, but eventually Scary Godmother is able to get her attention. Now you may be wondering what is a Scary Godmother, and the answer to that is obvious! It's..um...I guess there like Fairy Godparent's but...spoopier? Or something? I dunno, it's not really touched upon much. All that matter's is that Scary Godmother is going to kidnap-I mean-invites Hannah to her home on the "Fright Side" for her Halloween party, so she can introduce Hannah to all of her monster friends in order to help her get over her fear of monsters. We get this weird scene where Scary Godmother has Hannah get on her broom and they fly up the chimney and into the sky to get to the Fright Side. They fly through this weird cloud monsters mouth and then end up there, but what I don't get is if Hannah flew up the chimney how come none of the big kids saw her? Also later in the film they don't seem to need to fly back in order to get back into the Spookhouse. I figured that the Fright Side was tied to the Spookhouse but they seem to be flying away from the house in order to get there. WHAT ARE THE RULES HERE! NO, YOU'RE OVER THINKING THIS! Anywho they end up in Scary Godmother's house located on in the Fright Side. I like the design of the house, it oozes Halloween and the pop up book aesthetic really shines here. Scary Godmother begins introducing Hannah to all of her friends. Starting with her "Broommate." (Yeah, I hope you like puns, cause you're going to be getting a lot before this 44 minute film is over.) Mr. Pettibones, a Skeleton who lives in peoples closets. Much like Pearl from Steven Universe his main personality trait...is being really gay. *OH MY GOD, IT WAS A JOKE, PLEASE DON'T KILL ME STEVEN UNIVERSE FANS* I swear as a kid I never got the joke that he was suppose to be a skeleton "in the closet." but it's actually kinda clever looking back on it now. And all joking aside he's not a bad character. He does act as the sassy gay best friend to Scary Godmother but he is a funny character who has a role in the story. He's the one setting up most of the party. Mr. Pettibones also explains more to Hannah that not all monsters are bad. We then cut back to Deryl, Bert, Katie and Jimmy waiting outside of the house waiting for Hannah to come out screaming, annoyed that it's taking so long and-OMG WHAT THE HECK!

We get a Black Hannah and what I think is just a literal clone of Katie, except she's in a bee costume. Who cares about this story, I want to know about the secret underground cloning lab that exists in this town! Anyway as I said the big kids are waiting for Hannah and Daryl and Katie are trading candy, because they decided to trick-or-treat a little before meeting up with the rest of the gang. Katie offers Deryl a piece of candy for "three kisses." And they go in to kiss before Bert interrupts them. I wonder where this romantic subplot will lead........ (It leads nowhere.) Back on the Fright Side it's time for Hannah to meet another one of Scary Godmother's monster friends. This time a werewolf (or is it wolf man?) named Harry. Harry is...pretty much the worse. He's dumb, arrogant, rude, and overall self absorbed, with food being the main thing on his mind as he mooches off all of his friends. And I'm not saying this as an insult to the film, because the film acknowledges it! Nobody in the film likes this guy! And to be fair he's not too annoying to the audience, as he seems far more annoying to the characters in the film, but still. It's weird why they even bother inviting this guy. Even when Harry isn't doing something wrong everyone at the party seems to have disdain for him, which in some ways makes me actually feel bad for him. But then he does something else selfish or annoying to make me feel less sympathy towards him, which I guess is good since the film isn't trying to make him sympathetic I guess? You'll see more as I go forward with the review, but yeah. Harry is THAT guy. The guy we all know, the friend that we don't like but we just got to put up with. Harry goes up to Hannah thinking that she is an actress in his favorite "Skelevision" show. (Ha Ha! The puns have returned!) I wonder where this subplot of Harry thinking Hannah is an actress will lead........ (It leads nowhere.) Though I do appreciate the film diverting from the cliche "Vampires vs Werewolves" rivalry, instead opting for a "Skeletons vs Werewolves" rivalry, which makes a lot more sense when you think about it. Though this rivalry probably has less with race and more with everyone hating Harry. So after that it's time for the next guest to arrive. We get the vampiric couple of Count Max, Ruby, and their son Orson. Wait a minute....Max....Ruby....

MY GOD! Scary Godmother invites the vampires in. (Because vampires can't enter a house uninvited.) and Hannah starts befriending Orson. It's a really cute scene and makes some great use of a rotating camera angles. Orson is also really fun with his awkward childishness contrasting the fact that he is a vampire. Hannah and Orson's friendship just feels like a genuine friendship in the way kids there age becomes friend. (Also it's a better love story then Twilight, am I right? Yuk Yuk Yuk?) Oh and there's also a pointless chase scene...moving on. Also throughout the film Harry keeps becoming incapacitated. First he get's peanut butter stuck to the roof of his mouth making him unable to talk earlier in the special, and then he get's hypnotized into a trance by Count Max. We then get our next guest, the monster named Bug-A-Boo. A giant multi-eyed fanged monster. I love his design due to it's uniqueness and while he's not actually scary looking to the audience, if you where to imagine this thing being in the real world it would be terrifying. And Hannah agrees with me as Bug-A-Boo is the monster that causes her to finally freak out. And can you blame her. One of his teeth is the SIZE OF HANNAH!

Also there's a genuinely funny bit with Hannah screaming, then Scary Godmother telling her to breath. She breaths and then starts screaming again. Good stuff. Anyway another chase scene begins and Hannah tries to shine the flashlight on Bug-A-Boo. Only to find out it doesn't have any effect. Scary Godmother lies to Hannah telling her that flashlights only work on monsters who live in the closet, not under the bed. Hannah says she wants Bug-A-Boo to leave and he begins to comply. This is when she see's that looks don't matter, and that Bug-A-Boo is actually nice. Though is he that nice? We learn that his job is to scare children by hiding under there beds, which is pretty much the same thing that the big kids do to Hannah, and their treated as the villains. Also do you think whatever company Bug-A-Boo works for is a rival company with Monsters Inc? With all of the guest arrived the monsters and Hannah begin their Halloween party. We cut back to the big kids and theirs a bizarrely funny bit with a Bert saying that his "Door is ajar." there's no logical reason I find it funny, but I do. Also that cut to the big kids lasted exactly 19 and a half seconds and only exists to do the "Door is ajar" bit. WORTH IT! Then we get a very brief dance sequence with the monsters and then cut BACK to the big kids. Because...why not? The night is ending and the big kids have, for all intensive purposes ended. Katie wants to go an rescue Hannah but Jimmy is insistent on waiting for her to come out of the house on her own. Jimmy you're plan isn't very good! You have your little cousin run into an old abandoned house that has a frickin' GRAVE YARD it it's front yard, and then spend like, hours, waiting for her to run out. Why not just go in there and see if she's scared? If she is she'll probably agree to have you take her home. I means she's must of been there for a while since all of the houses are turning there lights off, so if she wasn't scared before what would make you think that she's be scared now. What do you think she's been doing this whole time?! You wasted your whole Halloween on faulty logic! If you wanted to get more Trick-or-Treating done you should of just cut your loses and given up long before now! But no, you still hold on to this plan. What is she was attacked by a murderous clown or something!? Who knows what kind of non supernatural threats could be inside this creepy old house. Jimmy you are so stupid!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgxYUxqcg1Q

Ugh! So anyway Jimmy says that they should continue with his idiotic plan because he's the leader, and all of the big kids get into an argument on who the leader is. There's a bit decide to do a vote on who should be leader and they each get one vote each. Bert and Jimmy vote for themselves and Katie and Daryl vote for each other. (Which is a cute moment and the one of the only bits of continuation for their "romantic subplot.") Then if that wasn't pointless enough we get a scene of Bert demanding recounts and Daryl recounting the votes. Granted the scene is kinda funny, but I would be lying if I said it wasn't pointless. Back in the Fright Side we get more interactions between our colorful cast of characters, and we get to see a bit more of Hannah and Orson and also some interactions with Max and Ruby. We get to see Max is sort of introverted and behind the times. He wants to be, in his own words, "groovy." I like Count Max a lot because of this and most lines from him get a pretty good laugh out of me. He's kinda like a less silly version Count Dracula from the Hotel Transylvania series. Again, it's good stuff. So then it turned out that Harry, the Scumbag Steve of the monster world, has eaten all of the buffet. (Though in Harry's defense, before this scene none of the other monsters where letting him eat any of the buffet, which does seem a bit unfair. It further goes to show how odd it is that they even invited him if he wasn't even allowed to partake.) So now that there's no food left And thus Bug-A-Boo suggests that they should order pizza. And thus we begin the pizza sub plot! I call it the sub plot because the whole pizza scene takes up a total of four minutes (not counting the cut back to the big kids that occurs in the middle of said subplot.) and contributes almost nothing to the story! I know that four minutes does not sound like much, and it really isn't, but consider the fact that the special is only 44 minutes long. So that's an eleventh of your whole story! Keep that in mind. So we then get a scene where we learn that Bug-A-Boo and Hannah both like pizza with extra cheese and olives on it. Further cementing that fact that Bug-A-Boo is nice and doesn't eat little girls. Proving that no matter how different people look or act we can all bond over are love for pizza. World peace is truly a possibility here folks. So they have Harry order the pizza's because they clearly haven't learned there lesson by this point and he ordered twelve pizza's, and Scary Godmother doesn't have enough money to pay for it. There's a funny bit where the pizza delivery boy offers to give them the pizza's on the house is Scary Godmother gives him her soul, but she declines. Scary Godmother, Mr. Pettibones, and Hannah try to get some money by taking all the money that got stuck to Bug-A-Boo from being under the beds all day. Hooray for stealing money from your friends! (Which he accidentally stole from children!) Also the pizza's are said to cost about 200 dollars, and Hannah even mentions finding a 50 dollar bill. I know Bug-A-Boo goes under a lot of kids beds but how many kids who are young enough to be scared of monsters under the bed really have that much money under there beds. Even I've never seen a fifty dollar bill before, and I'm way older then those kids would be! So then Scary Godmother chastises Harry for buying to many pizza's, telling him that he's going to make it up to her by working for her until he makes up the money. This is actually a major plot point in the second special, if you can believe that. Also Harry doesn't get any of the pizza. Poor Harry. If only he wasn't so darn awful I wouldn't feel so conflicted in feeling bad for him! There's also a funny joke where Count Max recalls an old conversation he had. "-But other then that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the show!" It's funny because her husband was shot right in front of her...oh, now I've bummed myself out. Then Hannah tells the monsters why she's here, and gives Bug-A-Boo a piece of candy in exchange for not eating everyone in the world and that's when the monsters tell Hannah that she had been lied to by Jimmy. We also learn that Jimmy is one of the kids on Bug-A-Boo's route and that even big kids get scared. Then Scary Godmother comes up with a plan to get back at Jimmy. It's time to go Toy Story on those fools. Outside the Spookhouse the big kids finally decide to enter the house, even though by now they seem scared to enter it themselves, which would make a logical reason why they didn't go in to get Hannah by now, except they where in the Spookhouse earlier in the film when Jimmy was making his magical shadow puppets. They walk inside and see Orson, thinking he's just a kid in a costume. Orson get's mad that they don't think that he's a vampire and called out his parents form the closet, as Count Max and Ruby say that there going to eat the big kids. They run in fear from the actual vampires and end up coming across all the other monsters all threatening to eat the kids. Harry ends up actually trying to eat Daryl thinking that he's a actual piece of candy. So that's one potential human casualty that could of occurred as part of this plan. They then find Hannah and Hannah uses her flashlight to "defeat" the monsters, as every time she points the flashlight at one of the monsters they pretend to die. Scary Godmother even frickin' melts. The big kids end up running out of the house scared and Scary Godmother gives Hannah a magic key, telling her that if she ever wants to return to the Fright Side she can, and all that she would have to do is use that key on any door. Jimmy asks if Hannah wants to hold his hand for "her protection" and she agrees. The special ends on the valuable moral that "Revenge is great!" So in conclusion, is Scary Godmother: Halloween Spooktacular any good, and is it worth watching? Ehhhhhh, I think it depends on who you are. This special, from a technical standpoint, isn't that great. There are a ton of flaws with it. The animation is dated, the special is overall pretty plotless, there is a ton of filler, and some of the choices made by the characters don't make to much sense. So if you want a special that is better on a more technical level, one with better story, animation, ect. then this special probably won't be your cup of cider. But if you have nostalgia for the special, or if you don't mind some cheesiness and just want a fun but kinda dumb special that will put you in the Halloween mood, you might end up enjoying it. I had more fun watching this special for this review then I expecting to be honest with you. So maybe consider checking it out sometime. What do you think of Scary Godmother? What do you think of the sequel (which I hope to review next Halloween, from what I remember it's one of the few sequels that is better than the first one, though that not that difficult considering this special.) Leave your thoughts in the comments down bellow, I love to hear what you guys think. Any suggestions for things I should review. Suggest them down bellow and maybe I'll do em' if I find them interesting enough. Please fav, follow, and comment if you like my review and have a great day and Happy Halloween! ...Oh, and did you know that Scary Godmother is played by Rarity from MLP:FIM? And Hannah is Princess Cadance? It's weird. (I do not own any of the images or videos in this review all credit goes to there original owners.)

#Scary Godmother #Cartoon Reviews #Halloween #2000's #Review

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simplylove101 · 5 years

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Influential TV Shows

Okay this is kinda random and why I prob won’t tag the shows I list cuz this is more just something I wanted to get out of my head after watching J&J’s latest podcast where they were talking about this topic. They kept it to 7 shows each and while that would certainly be interesting to try, that’s kinda hard. lol I went about grouping some of them - shows that shaped me growing up, shows that impacted me/stuck with me, comfort shows/watch with the family, taught me about fandoms, etc. And saying something about each of them. Anyway, this is stupid but here we go lol:

The Shows Growing Up:

Sailor Moon: Okay, nobody make fun of me. lol This is the first show I remember really watching as a kid that wasn't Barney or whatever, something I decided to watch by myself and it actually had an ongoing story. And ofc it took time for me to realize that this was just an English dubbed version that they would play on Cartoon Network. Looking back on it, it’s a little cringey (the voice readings, Serena being a bit of a crybaby) but seeing girls, even if it was animated, kicking ass over evil as a group made an impression on me so it’s no wonder I would watch it religiously after school and was sad when they stopped airing it. And ofc I watched all the movies too. I was a shameless fan. lmao I also eventually read the manga and appreciated it.

Hey Arnold: As a kid, I would watch Cartoon Network & Nickelodeon (& eventually Disney when I got a little bit older), and I think one of the Nickelodeon shows that really stuck with me as a kid, like Rugrats, was this one. It had a wide range of really distinct characters. It was genuinely funny. And I did love the dynamic between Arnold & Helga (who was interesting & sometimes they would let her be the protagonist of an ep instead of him, like the therapist one which is a def fave) even if her crush was kinda as stalkerish as you can get why maintaining innocence. lol And you know what? I did totally watch the recent movie they did where it tied up loose ends like getting these two together and allowing her to grow as a character. Gotta say it was rewarding after all this time. lol

All That: I feel like I gotta put this here because I watched this show all the time as a kid. And I think it’s something that really taught me about comedy. I had seen things from Saturday Night Live growing up cuz of my parents but this was my Nickelodeon version with people that weren’t much older than me at the time so I could really get what was going on/enjoy it. It’s also the first place where we saw people like Amanda Bynes & Kenan Thompson & Kel Mitchell (which is partly why I later watched things like The Amanda Show and Kenan & Kel) What can I say? As a young person, it was just really cool seeing kids being funny. Yeah, there was some cheese but I didn’t care. It stayed with me.

Boy Meets World/Sister, Sister/Lizzie McGuire/Even Stevens: I kinda cheated here and bundled these shows because these are four of the shows I watched on Disney growing up (Disney showed reruns of Boy Meets World & Sister, Sister for the record) There were others like That’s So Raven, Suite Life, Wizards of Waverly sort of, Proud Family to name a few but these shows I picked have such iconic episodes that I still remember well and love. Like Even Stevens - musical episode hands down Idc. Boy Meets World - Scream-inspired Halloween ep for sure. Yes, there was cheesiness with all these shows. Sometimes very after-school special, but they shaped me I think. Also gotta mention, I remember thinking of Hilary Duff as my idol. lol

The Ones I Watched With the Fam:

That 70′s Show: Now the thing with my family is that we were one where for a time we would watch tv while eating dinner and my dad would have control of what channel we watched. It was always this way, which meant it would either be Law & Order or Seinfeld (the second one I was cool with and I almost included it on here cuz it’s such a staple comedy but eh,,, I appreciated it more later on. It felt more forced on me at the time) This is probably one of the only shows I can say my whole family truly agreed on watching all together tho, including my sister who generally watches trashy reality shows. This show will always remain one of my faves, because it was hilarious. It got a little weaker towards the end (We do NOT speak about Season 8) but I loved how it was a true ensemble sitcom where everyone brought something to the table and enjoyed the different dynamics between the group. The funny running gags, Jackie & Hyde still remain one of my all-time otps, and Kelso is probably the funniest & lovable dumb character I can think of (If nothing else, Ashton Kutcher was meant to play this part ok) It was nice to have something my whole family could enjoy together. It was a rarity so this show has a special place in my heart for that alone.

Joan of Arcadia: Another show that has a place in my heart, despite it only lasting 2 seasons and it ending on a bad note (major cliffhanger, still never fully making things right w/ Adam after destroying his character, ultimately S2 was problematic but still) because this is a show that I watched religiously (pun not actually intended here lol) with my mom every Friday it was on. What I loved about it was that the concept is centered around Joan talking to God yet it generally wasn’t being preachy. Joan wasn’t always willing to do what God wanted her to do, and things didn’t always turn out how she wanted. It was a kinda perfect blend for me and my mom to watch together. After this we were more willing to watch stuff as a pair cuz we were close but this started all that. I remember always being curious how God would appear to Joan cuz it was always changing, but there were some fave recurring ones like Cute Guy God, Goth God & Old Lady God to name a few. heh Joan was played wonderfully by the awesome Amber Tamblyn who could always make me cry (naturally she played my fave Tibby in the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants movies too lol) and she had awesome friends in Adam & Grace (who were my faves) and family. I rewatched this show and you know, I’d say S1 holds up and even the first half of S2. Heck, the episode where Joan & Adam break up towards the end of it, while totally heartbreaking and PISSES me off cuz bad writing for Adam, was solid simply for the acting so there’s that. lol

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Putting this show under this category because this was a show that I mostly got into because my sister loved it growing up. I was really young when it came out so I mostly remembered bits & pieces when I later watched it when I got a little older. It stuck with me tho cuz ofc the awesome Sarah Michelle Gellar playing badass Buffy (she was my sister’s idol) and it was a genuinely funny and smart show. It also got dark too. It wasn’t always solid towards the end, but I think it mostly nailed the actual ending (why Anya had to die tho... Spike I got but ugh) Anyway, this was kinda a big deal cuz it was the only thing my sister and I really watched together that wasn’t bad reality television or me barely paying attention to Dawson’s Creek at the time lol This showed that my sister could have taste when she wanted to (lmao sorry)

The Carol Burnett Show: I had to mention this show because this is one that got me, really my family, through dealing with my mom’s dementia. We chose to care for her at home instead of putting her in a nursing home. We did this for 2 years until her death. And the one thing we (excluding my sister cuz her & old stuff don’t mix) could always count on cheering us up was this show. My dad told me that my mom loved this show growing up and that’s why we turned on for her. So luckily memory or no memory, she still had a sense of humor and she knew when to laugh. And with good reason. This show is hilarious. So iconic. Carol Burnett was/is rightfully loved dearly for this show. I wish I had more I could say, but this was truly a comfort show when I desperately needed it so I am forever grateful that it existed.

Honorable Mention: Young & Hungry - another show that got us through that dark period, my dad actually really enjoyed this, despite seeming skeptical, and eventually started calling it the “Josh & Gaby Show” lmao Only thing is we never finished it together so oops. Not so much influential maybe but worth mentioning it felt like since it was underrated, got me thru a tough time, was hilarious and I loved that cast a lot. Emily Osment deserved to be the lead of her own show. Comedy queen.

The Ones That Brought Out the Fangirl In Me AKA The Teen Years:

The O.C/One Tree Hill/Gossip Girl/The Vampire Diaries: Another category where I’m just grouping them up together cuz ultimately it wasn’t about high art with these shows. They were the staple teen shows that everyone was watching and well, I was one of those people. lol It all started with The O.C. It was one of those ‘at the right time’ kinda things cuz I just went into the 6th grade when S1 started and it was such a big hit that everyone was always talking about it and there were even shirts involved (I never went that far lol) but this is where my need to explore YouTube came and then I was making fanvids. Gossip Girl is the one where I actually inserted myself into a fandom for the first time. My goodness the cringe that came with it but it gave me two of the longest online friendships I’ve ever had so I don’t regret it. (Shoutout to @backtothestart02 here as one of them) And well, three of these shows taught me the toxicity that can come from fandom. So I’ve been less vocal/more aware with other shows because of it. There’s problematic stuff in all of these but they were entertaining most of the time despite frustration (lol)

Honorable Mention: Teen Wolf - Had to mention this one cuz this was a show where I had a group of friends who all watched this together and we talked about it til the end (even when we weren’t happy with it lol) I was never really vocal in the fandom cuz by this point I was wary of them (fandoms I mean), but it was nice to share a show with people who felt similarly about it. As a show, I truly loved it up to 3B. Some of my favorite episodes were the ones that almost felt standalone-ish (3x06 AKA Motel California still remains my fave to this day) Lastly, it’s because of this show I was introduced to Dylan O’Brien who I always refer to as my ‘always & forever’ guy so yeah lol

Maybe Superhero Shows Are Worth Watching lol:

The Flash/Daredevil/Cloak & Dagger/Runaways: So I’m someone who growing up, beyond Spider-Man and Batman, never really jumped at superhero movies. I still don’t to an extent but I’m more willing to watch stuff now. I think because when it comes to TV, I’m willing to check out at least an ep. I got into The Flash because my friend Lauren was really into it (and still very much is now) and wanted me to check it out so I did. I sorta watched Arrow before it until a point so I’d seen Barry’s appearances on it and remembered thinking he was precious so I wasn’t surprised that I liked him as a main character. I do think these later seasons have lost some quality but I think the earlier ones were very solid and Grant is perfect in the role. Daredevil... R.I.P. That show was so high quality so the fact that Netflix cancelled it is just rude. Now... Cloak & Dagger has been one of those surprises for me cuz it was such a slow burn that when it really got going it left me wanting more. That S1 finale was so solid. Cannot wait for S2. Love the dynamic between Ty & Tandy. Now Runaways isn’t perfect but it’s my biggest fandom right now and I’m proud of that fact. It’s a show that highlights diversity with 4 PoC leads & 4 kickass ladies (Nico & Gert are my bb girls), healthy ships including an LGBTQ couple currently as the main one (tho it is Gertchase that owns my heart), and overall a pretty great cast that meshes well like the thrown together family they portray. It even got me back into writing fanfic again. A miracle tbh. lol

Overall Just Amazing:

This Is Us: I just think that this show pulled me in the second they revealed that first plot twist in the pilot. It surprised me and then they kept doing that a bit after. Now it’s more about how it has the ability to make me cry every ep and feel things. It doesn’t always touch me the same it did in that first season (it was an emotional year for me tbh) but it does have a class act cast who can always pull at my heart strings.

Boardwalk Empire: This technically could have went under something I sort of watched with my dad, but it is kinda a weird show to share I guess. We didn’t usually watch it together (saved some awkward convos sometimes lol) but always talked about each episode weekly and it was kinda fun cuz it was usually in-depth. My dad still quotes things from it to this day. He also once said that he considers S1 the best TV season he’s ever watched. I agree that it was great. For me, the first 3 seasons are solid while the last 2 felt different but still pretty good. There was such quality to it. Great acting headed by Steve Buscemi. What can I say? I have a thing for gangster stories. I could say more but I’ll stop. lol

Stranger Things: The show that really turned me into a binge-watcher. I had just gotten Netflix and what show did I decide to watch on my birthday? This show. I had seen things in the media about the kids from it and I was like, they’re adorable!! And ofc I got hooked when I actually watched the show. It just has everything in it that I like: mystery, thrills, humor, hint of romance, awesome acting, music moments, nostalgia. This was my obsession for a while until I got into some other things but if you don’t think I’m totally pumped for S3, then you best believe I’m watching it all in a day if I can. lol

Community: This is a show that reminded me how a show can think totally outside of the box and still have a lot of heart with its comedy. I love situations where a group of misfits come together and become a family. I love that this show celebrates being different. Troy Barnes remains one of my favorite TV characters ever (& omg his friendship with Abed is pure goals!!) and Donald Glover played him perfectly. And Alison Brie is just adorable as Annie. Love this group of weirdos. The quality was different after S3 but I still adore it.

Into the Badlands: Have to mention this show because what it has been doing action-wise is just incredible. The fighting sequences are out of this world. I’m always excited to see how they top it. Also, an Asian male lead? Go dude! The whole cast is wonderful and everything is just high quality, ok? Also, that cinematography!! Can’t believe it’s ending when it comes back. Sadness.

One Day at a Time: This is more of a recent discovery for me (had friends who watched it and knew it was good but only decided to check it out not too long ago) but it’s already made its impact on me. This show has so much heart to it. The writers put so much care into their work when they bring up these controversial issues in the episodes. All while being totally hilarious (but also trust me, I manage to cry at least 1 or twice an ep lol) A show centered on a Cuban family, plenty of good rep for LGBTQ/non-binary people while also handling things like depression/anxiety, addiction, immigration, etc. It’s definitely making its mark on TV. Also, Rita Moreno is a living legend who I adore. I love this cast so much.

12 Monkeys: I. loved. this. show! I still think it had the best series finale that I have seen in a while. It wrapped up things so well that I was smiling for a while after watching it. I couldn’t believe that of all shows this one gave me a happy ending. lol Casserole remains one of my all-time ships because they were truly epic and pulled at my heart strings so many times. Jennifer Goines was my queen. But seriously, a show about time travel that managed to make sense? So impressed. And the visuals? gahhh

Friday Night Lights: Last, but most definitely not least, this show is just up there as one of the all-time bests IDC. The fact that at first glance the show seems centered only about football and it got me to keep watching definitely says something. lol This show had so much heart, the cast was excellent, an ending that was pretty much perfect. Coach & Tami Taylor were relationship goals. Honestly one of the best portrayals of a married couple I’ve ever seen because they were very much a team (while yes there was the occasional bickering that you gotta love) and it just felt real, you know? Also, it’s a show that proved that you can come back from a sophomore slump (yeah S2 was the worst season) and continue to be great.I can’t decide if it’s my favorite show of all-time but it’s certainly one of the first ones to come to mind. So glad I decided to give it a chance.

There’s probably a couple other shows I could list here but some I haven’t finished yet and don’t feel ready to put them on here yet. This is just what I could come up with.

#about me #influential tv shows

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surveys-at-your-service · 5 years

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Survey #189

“why are the children all marching into the desert to die?”

What does your trick-or-treat bag or pail look like? Pretty sure mine was usually just a plastic orange pumpkin. How old will you turn on your next birthday? 23, wow-ie. What are your plans to celebrate? Dinner with the fam, and I don't think I could possibly pass a birthday without getting a tattoo. :') Which X Factor audition(s) was/were your favorite? Don't watch it. Were you a straight A student in spelling and grammar? Yes. Were you a straight A student in math? No, I got Bs sometimes. Were you abused or do you know anyone who was abused? I know people who were. What is the name of your favorite coffee shop in your town? N/A What is fall weather usually like where you live? Usually warmish and breezy, but sometimes super cold. Do you think you have an accent? Very slightly. Do you use plastic, wooden, or wire hangers? Plastic. What is your favorite shade of yellow? Pastel. Are there any shades of blue that you don’t like? If so, which ones? No. Are you afraid of getting yelled at? YES YES YES YES I WILL CRY PLEASE DON'T Who has the best-decorated house in your town? *shrugs* What is your favorite part of Halloween? Dressing up. Is there a cemetery in your backyard? No. Did you decorate a pumpkin this year? No. ;_; What are some fall activities you would do with your kids? If I actually wanted them, take them on a hay ride (spooky one if they're older and want to), decorate pumpkins together, obviously go trick-or-treating, let 'em play in leaf piles. Have you ever seen a fox? Yes. What color are the squirrels where you live? Brown. Is there anything about Halloween you find offensive? Um no. What do the trees look like where you live? There's basically a shitload of pine trees, some dogwoods in spring (which fucking stink, btw), and then there's other trees idk the name of. Did you like field trips when you were a kid? YESSSSSSSSSSSS Do you find museums boring or interesting? Interesting! What was your school’s rival team’s mascot? Uhhhhh idr. What are three issues you are passionate about? Gay rights, gun control, and immigration. Would you ever wear a shirt with your country’s flag on it? I mean if I had to? What’s a medicine that makes you sleepy? Klonopin, back when I had to take two a day. I was just barely able to function at all on three. Do you like bath bombs? Never used one, but sure. What was your favorite girl group when you were growing up? Pussycat Dolls lmaoooooooo Do you like Disney movies? Only heathens don't. In what type of area was your first sexual encounter? A house. What do you occupy your time with on flights? Listen to my iPod. Do you ever realize how ridiculous you’re being yet continue on anyway? Sometimes in anxiety-type situations. Have you ever seriously vandalized someone else’s property? No. Have you ever been punched? No. What do you usually order from Olive Garden?  Spicy shrimp fritas oh my gaaaaaaaaaaaah How do you like your steak cooked?  Medium well. How do you feel about bats? I'm love them. Is anyone in your family artistic? Me. Have you ever suspected anyone of cheating on you? No. Are you emo/gothic/punk? I AM the Thicc Goth GF in my head. I'm just too poor and lazy for the wardrobe. :^) Would you date someone 20 years older than you? Nooooooooooo that's way too big a difference for me. What is your father’s middle name? John. What was the last food you got a random craving for? Sour gummy worms lmao. What is something you enjoy doing, but aren’t good at? Singing, sometimes. Name some healthy foods that you enjoy eating. Strawberries, apples, peaches, corn, cucumbers, green beans, bananas... What is your favorite Studio Ghibli film? Don't think I've watched any. If your best friend was a fictional character, who would he/she be? Why? This requires too much thinking. What was the last song you listened to? Does it mean anything to you? Ninja Sex Party's cover of "Africa" is on now. No. What flavor was the last cupcake you ate? Chocolate. When was the last time you complimented a stranger? Idk. Do you know how to text without looking? Not well. What about typing without looking? Yup. Have you ever thrown rocks at a girl/guy’s window? No. When was the last time you bought a bathing suit? Like, a year back? Do you like eggnog? NOOOOOOOOOOO. How often do you see your mother? Every day. When was the last time your living room furniture was rearranged? Long time ago. When you were little, did you like watching Cartoon Network, Disney or Nickelodeon more? Disney. When is the last time that you experienced rejection–literal or imagined? By no means /serious/ rejection, but I suppose it fits the definition. Asked the tat/piercing parlor I go to about working there at the desk (the place isn't busy and I'm v comfortable there, so I think I easily could), but they let me know they currently didn't need anyone. When you are feeling down are you more likely to cheer yourself up by shopping, eating, or drinking? I've gotten loads better about it, but eating. Do you think there will be a time when our current age of rapid innovation comes to a standstill? What do you think is the limit of human technological advancement? No, honestly. It may stall, but I don't see it stopping any time soon. In hindsight, what was the most misguided/unhelpful assignment you had to do in school or college? Uhhhh idk. On any blogs or social media you may have, do you try to maintain a certain aesthetic or persona? Is this consistent across platforms or just specific to one? Not really. My less-appropriate sense of humor comes out more on Tumblr, and in some areas I type in all lowercase because I find it more aesthetically pleasing. Is there an artist or celebrity whom you admire for their craft but take issue with their personality or politics? Marilyn Manson, very easily. He's talented and unapologetically unique as all hell, but I do noooot like him as a person from what I know. What is the last party or event you were invited to but declined? Why? Are there certain events that you might be invited to which you are likely to decline? An old friend's Thanksgiving-ish friends party. I was tempted, but it was explicitly stated to BYOB and weed and I just didn't want to be in an environment where there was lots of drinking and smoking something that's still illegal in the state. I was already uncomfortable enough last time I went to a party at her house and there was so much smoking. You were also supposed to bring a piece of Thanksgiving food to contribute, but I can't cook and I didn't wanna bother Mom about it. For the last question, it's just about a "never" situation where I'm invited to a real event besides family birthday parties or meet-ups with Dad and his wife. Off the top of my head, I'd never go to a club if I was invited. Imagine your life three years from now as if things have gone perfectly, better than you would typically predict. What do you see? Living with a happy Sara in the mountains, very successful in photography and thus financially stable (or hopefully a bit beyond that), excelling in school, back to my healthy weight, my mental health is great and I'm on way fewer meds, Sara's able to breed snakes and write as a real career, COVER ME IN TATS BITCH, more piercings, a treatment/medication for hypotonia has been discovered, my niece and nephew have met Sara and been taught our relationship is not wrong (I doubt it though :x), I'm happy, it'd be nice to write with more people, I have at least one poem published, Teddy, Venus, Kaiju, Roman, Mitsu (now totally comfortable being held), and Sara's babies are still alive and kickin', Venus and Crowley have had a clutch, Sara's PMDD is under control, Dad's stopped smoking, Mom is in a healthy, fulfilling relationship, both Mom and Sara are at the weights they aim for, Nicole is with a guy she truly loves and he reciprocates properly, Mom has been treated for depression and has forgiven Dad... Man, lots of things. This question really made me look forward to creating this future. What about your personality makes you good at your job? Alternatively, why do you find yourself uniquely suited for or drawn to your ideal career path? No job, so I'll just respond to the second. Photography is pretty surprising as it requires serious communication, which y'all know isn't my forte in the least. However, I'm so passionate about it and feel knowledgeable enough on it to be confident. Plus I just love showing how beautiful the world is capable of being. Do you find it valuable or important to respect those in positions of authority simply because of their position? Does this vary based on what that position is? Nope. I'm not gonna respect an absolute asshole just because you're of a high position. It doesn't vary to me, either. Do you find that you often desire and/or enjoy sex? If not, why not and how do you negotiate those feelings with your partner? If so, what is it that you enjoy about it in particular? I'd say I desire it to a normal degree, and yeah, I enjoy it. Why, #1, it's such a passionate and intimate way to communicate how much you love and trust your partner. Then I mean it feels good so. How many times have you seriously injured yourself? Idk. Seriously... three? When was the last time you were a passenger in a car and sat in the back? In the back, idk. Did you attend Sunday School as a child? Yes. Are/were you in the school band, and if so, what instrument did you play? Yes, flute. What is the best thing you’ve ever bought at a thrift shop? This cool crashed ship lamp! It's beside my bed. Have you ever ordered an unusual drink at a bar? No. What is your favorite thing about summer? Swimming. That's it. When was the last time you went to your local library? Whew, years. Can you do a proper cartwheel? No. Have you ever been pulled aside by security at the airport? No. Are you a fast-thinker or a slow-thinker? Slow. If you were to donate to charity today, what would you donate to? The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention or The Trevor Project. What is your favorite card game and when was the last time you played it? Magic: The Gathering and not since my PS3 broke (I had the Duel of the Planeswalkers store game on there and I WANT IT BACK). Who was the last person you cuddled with? Sara. Did you ever go to summer camp when you were younger? No. What is your favorite seasonal candy? (only available at certain times) Gingerbread men!! Are there any television shows you own in entirety on DVD or VHS? Meerkat Manor. How far away from your house is the nearest gas station? Like, two minutes. Do you know anyone who is fluent in a second-tongue? Yeah. What is the scariest movie you’ve ever seen and who did you watch it with? The Rite, but only because the whole "raped and impregnated by a demon" shtick is a fuck to the no from me. Watched it with my younger sis years ago. When was the last time you had a bubble bath? A looooooooong time ago, I don't like baths. What was the last strong scent you smelled? Poop. Good job, Bentley. What did you buy the last time you went shopping for new clothes? A bra, I think? How did you discover your favorite band? Mom's CDs. When I was getting into my rock and metal love, I went through them and listened to albums with cool covers or bands I knew she loved, and the first happened to be Ozzy. :') Does the weather affect your mood? If so, in what ways? Yes. I have a greater tendency to feel down when it's real cloudy and sometimes rainy. If it's really hot, I'm in a worse/cranky mood. When are you most likely to be bored? Late afternoon/evening. What was the last big decision you made? Hmmm. Going back to school, maybe? Where was the last place you traveled to, and what did you do while there? Illinois. Hang out with my bby. :') What is your favorite thing to go shopping for? Clothes at Hot Topic ahhhhh. What was the last thing you received in the mail? Something for VR. What is one of your wildest dreams or ambitions? Become a well-known photographer. When was the last time you performed in front of a group of people? Years ago for dance. Who was the last person to upset you? How about the last person to cheer you up? Mom; Sara. Is there anything or anyone you’re trying to get over or let go of? No. What was the subject of your last phone conversation? Uhhh something short with Ma that I don't remember. How close do you have to be with someone before you’ll consider them a friend? I have to feel decently comfortable around them. How do you feel when a mostly unheard of band (or tv show, movie, etc.) that you love suddenly starts to gain popularity? I'm happy for them! I just hope they don't change. When was the last time you listened to new music? Uhhh recently. Do you think it is strange when a couple says “we are pregnant” rather than “I am pregnant” or “my girlfriend is pregnant”? No, I actually prefer it. You're in that shit together. Do you ever feel like you were born in the wrong era? What decade would you most like to have grown up in? No. I'm good with the '90s. What was your most memorable concert experience? Only been to one. :| But Alice was great. If you have any, are you close with your sibling(s)? Has it always been that way? Not very, and no, at least with my younger sister. We were pretty close. Do you require “closure” after things like break-ups or do you move on easily? I. Need. Closure. How long does it take for someone to earn your trust? Good luck. Do you like peanut butter? Yesssss. Have you ever had to wear a uniform to school? Do/did you prefer wearing it than regular clothes? In middle school. Hell no. What’s the last thing you got really excited over? Going to Sara's. Is there a genre of movie that you just can’t watch? Action-y. What was the last song to give you nostalgia? "Holiday" by Green Day. Do you have a certain color grape you like the most? Purple. What’s your signature thing you do when drinking that will make your friends say, “Alright, they’re drunk”? N/A Have you ever been on a hot air balloon? No. What’s your definition of weird? I try to keep the mindset that "weird" doesn't exist as I'm not one to talk about things being so, yet I'm hypocritical about it and do find some things, ex. fetishes, extremely weird. Do you use shaving cream? For my legs. When was the last time you cleaned your room? Is your room clean? I dusted my whole room a while back. I need to vacuum baaadly, but ours is broken. ;-; Have you ever personally known any girl who shaved their head? Yes. Have you ever known anyone who committed suicide? Sadly. Have you ever tried to commit suicide? Yes. Have you ever coughed up blood? No. How do you wish you could die? Surrounded by family and painless. Do you have any apps on your Facebook? If so, what? No. What kind of mouse pad do you have? Don't have one. What color is your mouse? Pink. Do you know any who might be anorexic? Do you know anyone who has bulimia? Maybe? Did you ever want a pony when you were little? Idr. What’s your favorite dessert food? Ice cream. What is the closest thing to you right now that is alive? My dog. Do you exercise? I'm starting to again. Do you dislike writing school essays? Not if it's a subject I like. Are you a very open-minded person? Yes. Are you modest? I believe I am. Do you skate? No. Are you in a band? No. If you were to make it big with your own band, what would its name be? *shrugs* It depends on the members. Would you rather a friend come over to your house or you go over there? I go over there. Have you ever had rabies? No. Do you know anyone who ever had to get a rabies shot? Idk. Have you ever gone hunting? No, never would. Ever eaten deer? Duck? Squirrel? How about lamb? No. Have you ever received a note in your locker? I think once from Aaron?

#survey #quiz #questions #random

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astral-space-dragon · 6 years

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My favorite Halloween films

I talked about my favorite Christmas films and thought I’d share my favorite Halloween films. Now keep in mind that these are in no particular order, just a list of Halloween films that I like. NOTE: I am excluding “Hocus Pocus”, “The Nightmare Before Christmas”, slasher films, and Stephen King films. That’d be too easy.

With that being said, here’s my favorite Halloween films.

1. Trick ‘r Treat

This 2009 film, takes place over the course of Halloween in the fictional town of Warren Valley, Ohio. Its story is told in a nonlinear narrative, with characters crossing paths with each other throughout the film. At the centre of the story is Sam, a peculiar trick-or-treater dressed in pajamas and a burlap sack, who appears to enforce the “rules” of Halloween.

This film was a hit in the box office, but for the few years, no one really talked about it. In recent years, it has gained a cult following and there have been talks of a possible sequel.

This films is perfect for Halloween. It’s riddled with the holiday: fallen leaves, trick-or-treating, jack o’ lanterns, all that good stuff. See it for yourself and join the following.

2. Mad Monster Party

Hey, remember those Christmas specials? Frosty the Snowman? Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer? Santa Claus is Coming to Town? Of course you do. Well, the same company (Rankin/Bass Productions) tried their hand at making a special for a different holiday: Halloween and “Mad Monster Party” was that final product.

Baron Boris von Frankenstein (voiced by Boris Karloff [yes, I mean that]) achieves his ultimate ambition, the secret of total destruction. Having perfected and tested the formula, he sends out messenger bats to summon all monsters to the Isle of Evil in the Caribbean Sea. The Baron intends to inform them of his discovery and also to reveal his imminent retirement as head of the "Worldwide Organization of Monsters". Besides Frankenstein's Monster and the Monster's more intelligent mate who live in the island castle with Boris, the invites also include Count Dracula, the Mummy, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the Werewolf, The Invisible Man, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

The special did decently at the time of its release but since Rankin/Bass Productions was (and still is) known for their Christmas specials, the film flew under the radar and was pretty much forgotten.

Like “Trick ‘r Treat”, “Mad Monster Party” has gained a cult following in the recent years, but it’s still not talked about as much. Find the film for yourself and see why it should never be forgotten.

3. The Halloween Tree

“The Halloween Tree” is a 1993 Hanna-Barbera film based on the Ray Bradbury novel of the same name. The film tells the story of a group of trick-or-treating children who learn about the origins and influences of Halloween when one of their friends is spirited away by mysterious forces. The film stars Ray Bradbury as the narrator and the late Leonard Nimoy as the children's guide, Mr. Moundshroud.

I remember watching this film every year on Cartoon Network when it aired on the Halloween season (I don’t think they do anymore since it doesn’t fit their TTG agenda....), so it hold a special place in my heart. In the film, the children travel though time and witness ancient traditions that modern day Halloween takes inspiration from. From rituals carried out my Celtic Druids to Dia de los Muertos in Mexico; there’s something for everyone in this film.

4. Frankenweeinie (1984)

When I say “Frankenweenie”, I’m not talking about the 2012 stop-motion remake, I’m talking about the original 1984 film that got Tim Burton fired from Disney (yes, you read that right).

If you’ve seen the 2012 remake, then you already know the story. For those who don’t, allow me to give you a synopsis: The film is both a parody and homage to the 1931 film Frankenstein based on Mary Shelley's novel of the same name. The story goes as is: A young boy sets out to revive his dead pet using the power of science. It’s such a simple concept, a boy and his dog. But that concept, really never gets old. While I love the 2012 remake, I grew up watching this version and, call it a bias, I prefer this version.

5. Creature from the Black Lagoon

This 1954 monster flick is considered a landmark. It’s the film that inspired Guillermo Del Toro to make “The Shape of Water” (it’s true, I shit you not). It’s “The Creature from the Black Lagoon”. While this is not a film I grew up watching, I have fond memories of watching it in my honors biology class in high school. Yes, the film is cheesy as fuck and it at times leaves much to be desired. But, past all of that is a relic of the past and a film that helped paved the way for monster movies (and made monster fuckers dream come true).

So what’s the film about? A geology expedition in the Amazon uncovers fossilized evidence from the Devonian period that provides a direct link between land and sea animals. What follows is a return expedition to the Amazon to look for the remainder of the skeleton.

6. Freaks

Easily one of my favorite films. I could watch this anytime of the year. It’s an incredible film. The best part, the freaks in the films: all real. No make-up or special effects. You had Johnny Eck, Schlitzie, dwarf siblings Harry and Daisy Earles, and conjoined sisters Daisy and Violet Hilton are just a few of the freaks that starred in this movie.

The film is about trapeze artist Cleopatra who learns that circus dwarf Hans has an inheritance, she marries the lovesick, diminutive performer, all the while planning to steal his fortune and run off with her lover, strong man Hercules. When Hans' friends and fellow performers discover what is going on, they band together and carry out a brutal revenge that leaves Hercules and Cleopatra knowing what it truly means to be a "freak."

“Freaks” is easily one of my favorite films of all time. I’ve always had a fascination with sideshow, freakshows and such; and to have this relic of the past is really something special.

7. The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad

While this film has two short stories, the one I want to focus on is “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”. This segment scared the piss out of me as a kid and I LOVED IT. The second segment is based on "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" by Washington Irving and it follows Ichabod Crane, a lanky, gluttonous, superstitious yet charming dandy arrives in Sleepy Hollow, New York to be the town's new schoolmaster.

I don’t want to give too much away but I assure you this segment is so much fun to watch. Both Ichabod’s and Mr. Toad’s segments are a lot of fun to watch. If you want to check it out for yourself, I highly recommend you do (research the production history as well, really interesting stuff).

8. Beetlejuice

You all know this film. Tim Burton. Michael Keaton. Young Winona Ryder. Danny Elfman. Geena Davis. The Banana Boat Song. What else is there to say?

9. Onibaba

I’ve only discovered this film this past year is it’s easily on my top 3 list. You may not know this, but I’m a huge sucker for Japanese folklore (thank my Japanese roots for that) and when I discover Onibaba, I already knew this film was up my alley.

I don’t want to give anything away about this because I want you to go into this film blind like I did. Let me just say this: the two women in this film are badass.

10. Kakurenbo

This.... this is film that made every second count. “Kakurenbo” is only 25 minutes long and they made every second and every frame count. You may be thinking “That’s way to short to tell a full-fledged story!” The thing with Japanese storytelling is that they make 25 minutes as good as a two hour film and Kakurenbo is no exception.

The film entails a game of "Otokoyo", a version of hide and seek played by children, wearing fox masks, near the ruins of an abandoned old Kowloon-inspired city but there is a twist: children who play disappear, never to be seen again.

I first saw this film back in 2005 when it played on Cartoon’s Network’s adult-oriented nighttime programming, Adult Swim. 10 year old me was completely engrossed by this film. The story, the designs of the demons, everything about the film stuck to me. I recently got the my hands on the DVD (thanks mom) and I’m elated that I can enjoy “Kakurenbo” on any given day and not have to scour Youtube for a “decent” version.

I know I’ve said this throughout this list, but I STRONGLY urge all of you to check out “Kakurenbo” when you get the chance. You will not be disappointed.

#long post #shut up chrome

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mandygreenfieldromanceandar-blog · 5 years

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For those moms entering teen-dom... I got you.

I have turned into one of those parents, that when I see any baby related post on social media, I feel the need to comment. “Try Mylicone drops!” Or, “A little dirt never hurt!” And my favorite, “You will miss this one day!”

Now, I never wanted to be one of them, haven been through the phase of unwanted and outdated advice myself. I always thought, that when someone asked for advice, only then would I give it, not blurt it out like it’s girl’s night with too much homemade Sangria. (He said WHAT to you? Oh girl, you don’t need no MAN!)

Now, I don’t want to age myself or anything, but social media wasn’t a huge thing in 2005 when I started my journey fresh with a set of twins. The advice from moms then, wasn’t as in your face as it is now. It was a tad subtler, and you could avoid it generally by skipping Uncle Phil’s 60th birthday celebration. But these poor moms now. Oy. The doors are wide open, and here come the crazies.

Oh, and I’m totally guilty for being one. The ones who have been there before so heartily that they can’t NOT give the un-asked for, often cringe worthy advice (I had TWINS. HAYO!). I get it now. We are just trying to save the young Jedi’s from all our past mistakes. You know, forgetting the Mylicone drops, so they were up with gas all night, and picking them up when they fall and immediately putting them in the bath (they’re just going to get dirty again, right?) We did those things, too, despite that unwanted and outdated advice we got as well.

As much advice as you get as a young mom, and some days it seems your dodging it with Captain America’s shield (if only), that advice undeniably becomes something else as they blossom into teen-dom. What’s the word I’m looking for? Oh.

Non-existent.

Maybe it’s the smell, the disgusting pile of food wrappers under the bed, or the consistent eye rolling, but that advice is generally limited to, “Oh, good luck with that!” Yeah. That doesn’t help me and if we are getting technical here, that’s not advice.

You have no idea how much you miss the crappy advice when it stops coming, and even worse, the wholly vacant guidance for how to deal with the fact that this journey?

This, crying tears over failed pregnancy tests, waking up all hours with a crying baby, holding hands out in the middle of the night to stop the vomit, night terrors, play dates, kiddie rides, first days of school, Batman lunchboxes and homemade Halloween costumes, is well. It’s almost over.

No more Santa, or Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy. Carving pumpkins is kind of boring, and watching holiday movies with me? Forget it. Its like torture.

ONE piece of advice they did share;

“It goes so fast”.

Not advice, per se, but more of a warning. And they were thoroughly and unfortunately, all too correct. It happened one day when I wasn’t looking. I had my back turned, I was making coffee, I was cleaning the house, paying the bills. I was food shopping, back to school shopping and making doctor appointments. And when I came home one day from keeping with this life, they were huge; no more Nickelodeon, Power Rangers, Hot Wheels. No more juice boxes, footy pajamas and sweet smelling babies. They were replaced by Cartoon Network, sometime R rated movie watching almost adults, who cursed in front of me by accident and burped the alphabet.

Yes. My two almost fourteen-year old’s are entering eight grade this year, and I am a total, unequivocal, pile of mom-of-teen-mess.

It really did happen that fast.

The tired up-all-nights night,s and constant physical exhaustion of running after toddlers is replaced with a new mental exhaustion; a brand of your very own kind of worry that only comes with having a teenager. Worry is now of being bullied, failed important tests, girl/boy friends, proper hygiene practices, homework anxiety, and not to mention peer pressure. Your mind wanders to when you were that age, and you remember the heartbreak, the feelings of defeat, the loneliness, and the sheer and utter feeling that you were completely alone.

Yes. They feel alone, and consequently, so do you, and no one is offering advice on what to do about that.

I looked at my one son the other day while we were at the pool, who is now almost as tall as me. His shoulders are broader, his cheeks thinner, his laugh deeper. He’s filling out, becoming a man now and by next year, I lamented, he will be completely different. Not just another year older, but another year closer at being a grown up, on his own, and away from me.

It’s staggering, the thought; I have a few short years to fit in more trips, hugs (when he lets me), one on one conversations, pool days, and Christmas mornings. A very few, fast short years.

And when that realization happens, it hits a mom in the face. Hard. So hard, your vision is blurring, your head hurts, and you need to lie down.

No one tells you how to handle them actually becoming grown-ups. They only tell you how to handle the things it takes to get through childhood. Things like, croup, tonsillitis and potty training. They don’t open their guts and tell you that this is golden. All of it. All of the years.

Whatever you’re doing?

It’s fine. You are fine. Stop worrying about those little teeny things, and enjoy the big things. You are much smarter than you realize, and much more capable than you think.

Don’t be afraid to ask for the advice the day they leave grammar school, or how to tell your son that it’s not your fault she doesn’t like you; that your real friends don’t care what you wear and that your time in middle school is short, and even though it’s awkward, it’s supposed to be. It inevitably becomes a learning experience you carry with you to adult hood.

Tell the mom with kids on the edge of reason, that reason will come soon enough; that you will survive their awkward years with them, and you may have more sleepless nights, even if they pale in comparison to the baby years. Buy her a spa gift card now that she has time to use it. Take her to the movies and convince her that she may question her sanity right now, but it will all be okay in the end.

And lastly, while it feels like it’s ending, it’s not. You still have time.

Time to:

Hug them when they don’t want you to.

Talk to them, even though they would rather to talk to anyone else.

Help them with Algebra, even if you must do it with them step, by painful step.

Swim with them.

Get interested in their music, even if it makes you want to poke your ears out with sharp pencils (Do we need to bring up Vanilla Ice?)

Listen to what they are saying to others.

Keep them respectful.

Get them in nature.

Play board games.

Eat dinner with them.

Be their mom. Not their friend. They may hate you for that now, but you will hate yourself later for giving in when you should have said no.

And finally, don’t beat yourself up. Every stage is hard. There is no magical age. Kids are kids. It’s all hard and you, mama, are doing a great friggin’ job.

I may not be getting advice in this stage, but I have decided to make my own. I will NOT be the mom that just says, “Good luck with that!”

Okay, I may, but directly after that, I will tell them they are not alone, that I am here, and hey, I have some advice….

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surveystodestressme · 2 years

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300.

Who do you know who makes the best French toast? probably my boyfriend or my mom

What was the last thing you ate that had cheese on it? i had cheesecake lol i don’t know if that counts though

What is your favorite pizza parlor? i don’t have one.

Name three things you like about winter. it’s not super hot outside, snow looks really pretty when it covers everything, sometimes work/school gets cancelled

Is winter your favorite season? nope

Do you know anyone whose favorite season is winter, and if yes, who? I don’t think so

What is the most frustrating thing that's happened to you recently? us being short staffed and a lot of my coworkers quitting to go to better jobs

Are you happy today? yeah sure

Who is someone you've been enjoying watching on YouTube recently? jacksepticeye

What's your favorite song at the moment? became by atmosphere

Are your hands dry right now? Yep.

Do you own pajamas with llamas on them? i do not

Would you ever wear hot pink cat-eye glasses? sure why not

What is something you've been undecided about recently, if anything? going to college again. i know i want to get a bachelors but do i want to go all the way and get a doctorate? idk yet

How often do you use the toaster? not super often

Have you ever made a dreamcatcher? i did when i was a lot younger

If applicable, what color boombox did you have as a kid? I don’t think i ever had a boombox

Would you rather dress up as a zombie or a unicorn for Halloween? Zombie.

Who was the last of your friends to have a baby? i have a coworker that is due in a couple of weeks

What's the most ridiculous thing you've heard lately? just some stupid shit that clients say

Can you see snow out your window right now? nope.

What are three of your favorite things to do when it snows? making a snowman, taking my parents dogs out in the snow to play, sitting inside away from the snow by a fire or heater

Have you ever contemplated shaving your head, and if so, why? my head is currently shaved. i contemplated it for years and finally went on and did it

What types of cancer are in your family? none, i think. my grandpa had skin cancer and i think that’s it

What color socks are you wearing? one is gray and the other is black

Which cartoon character looks the most like you? sid from toy story lol

Which family member did you get your height from? my grandma

Do you believe in the supernatural? sure

What color looks the worst on you? yellow

What year were you born? 1996

Do you own a pair of plaid pants? several lol

Which TV channel did you watch the most as a kid? Nickelodeon and Disney Channel. the occasional cartoon network but my mom didn’t really like that channel and didn’t want me to watch it

Who is your favorite cousin? i don’t think i have one anymore lol i am not in touch with any of them

Do you prefer black tea, herbal tea, or green tea? any of them honestly.

What do you think of hypnosis? Do you believe in it? i don’t really believe in it, no. i think it is interesting though

What's your favorite fast food restaurant? i don’t think i have one atm, i go to taco bell the most but that’s because it’s by my apartment complex

What would a Lisa Frank version of you look like? really fucking cool lol

If you had to choose a country to live in besides your own, which country would you choose? i don’t know

What's the most dangerous thing that's happened to you recently? getting bit by a cat at work. it wasn’t that bad of a bite though

What color ink did the last pen you wrote with have? black

Have you ever had a friend with the same name as you? i had a classmate with the same name as me and i have a coworker now who has the same name as me too

Do you think you look better with long hair or short hair? both honestly.

What are three things you are thankful for? my family, the fact that i have a home, the fact that i am able to have food on the table every day

What did the last mask you wore look like? it was a blue surgical mask

Did you wear a mask today? yes

Have you ever ridden in an ambulance? i have been in the back of one but i have never ridden in one

Do you ever find youtube's video recommendations annoying? nah they’re usually spot on

Which did you have first: Myspace or Facebook? Myspace

What color was your nursery when you were a baby? I have no idea.

Do you prefer canoeing or kayaking? i’ve only ever been kayaking so i don’t know how different canoeing is

When was the last time you went kayaking? it’s been a couple of years

Do you have anyone you can trust? of course

What color is/was the last carpet you sat on? brown, black, beige

Do you have a rug in your room? Not the room i’m currently in, no

What was the name of the first college dorm you lived in? I have never lived in a dorm

#bored #quiz #questions #survey

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sprinklig-kindness-podcast · 4 years

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Corpse Bride

whats up guys, hello how are you welcome to your favorite podcast so

today i want to talk a little bit about the movie "Corpse bide" produced by warner bros, yesterday i watched the movie again because it's october and watching this kind of movies makes me feel that it's october because honestly where i live these months is horrible, everything is dirty and the weather is very dry, i just don't feel like i would like to feel since october is my favorite month of the year for halloween.

I remember the first time I watched the movie, I remember that when I was a kid there were movies on Saturday afternoons on Cartoon Network and at that time there was no netflix so if you wanted to see a movie you had to go to Blockbuster and when there were movies for kids on TV it was great and I remember that the same movie would be on in the afternoon and at night again.

I feel so old saying this

I remember that the movies that came out the most were Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Harry Potter, most of the movies were warner bros, maybe that's why I'm so obsessed with warner bros and I love most of his movies plus in my programming we didn't have channels like Disney so I didn't grow up watching Disney shows like Hannah Montana, Raven, Zack and Cody, the only kids channels we had were Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network.

I remember one Saturday after my mom cleaned the house and it was just the two of us in the house like I always put on Cartoon Network and I was really excited about the movie and they put on Corpse bride and I would take it off, I really didn't like it I don't know why I had never seen it, but they played it so often that one day I said let's watch it I was bored, there was nothing on TV, not a single kid invited me to play, I was bored, alone so I gave it a try and I loved it.

I've seen that movie about 20 times, I remember I cried a lot watching that movie, but the story is so sad.

The story about how a girl in love was stolen, cheated on and killed by the man she loved, I don't know is so sad and horrible and then how Victor sets her free is beautiful.

It felt so horrible when she was frustrated because she was dead, because it is not the same to die for you, for some pain, for being sick or for being old to be killed, because it was not her fault.

In the end when Victor was going to sacrifice his life to be with her and said that she was engaged but her dreams were stolen from her and that she was now stealing them from someone else it really hurt but when she said I love you Victor but you are not mine I started crying like a child in preschool on the first day of school.

Also when she finally left and some beautiful blue butterflies flew into the moonlight it was beautiful and I still cried because I don't know, it was unfair, I said she deserved more, to be happy, that none of this would have happened, I was crying horribly my eyes were super puffy, my nose was red, I was suffering.

I think it's one of the most beautiful and saddest stories, also the soundtrack, the background music is great, sometimes I listen to it on spotify because I really like it, and I also look great all the work they put in that movie because the animation in Stop Motion seems to me fantastic because I think the fact of making the characters and scenarios molded with the hands seems to me super complex, every movement everything to be looked at with sequence is impressive.

I really value the production of the films because it is something I like very much and I really find it difficult.

But now after seeing these movies I am afraid that they will kill me, I want to clarify that I am not afraid to die but the fact that someone wants to hurt me, that they will kill me, I don't really know, I am afraid and I imagine what I would do in a situation like this, where they are chasing me or like this, I don't know how to fight, I was never good at hiding, I am not agile or strong, I don't know, it is very dangerous in my city and many people always disappear but generally women and it scares me.

I'm afraid to go out in the streets, I used to go out a lot, but now I'm afraid to live here. But no place is safe so I think I'll have to learn to take care of myself, I think it's very sad that I'm afraid when it gets dark, and here not even the Uber's are safe, I hope someday I can move to a safer city.

But guys we have reached the end of the episode, I hope to see you in the next episode, take care, do not trust strangers, kisses and hugs goodbye.

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https://open.spotify.com/show/6sRbt534HdK7ApK26fOneJ

And more for FREE

We have one Official page from our podcast where you can find all the information that you need to know about our podcast

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mogdaze-blog · 7 years

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Midnight Rendezvous - Short Story for Halloween

It’s hard to make a good living as an actor. Unless you’re an A-lister, chances are you’ve probably got a second job on the side to make ends meet while you try to live out your dreams. That used to be me, too: a plucky little kid eager to take on any role he could get. I was more than willing to bust my ass in the meantime if it meant getting to do what I love, knowing that all the long hours and back-breaking work would be worth it in the end. When I got my big break.

Life has done a great job of beating that enthusiasm out of me since then.

Now, I’m a graphic designer. The work is interesting, don’t get me wrong, and it puts bread on the table, but it was never my real passion. Ever since I was a little kid, all I ever wanted to do was play pretend, and it’d been my greatest goal since then to do it professionally - even though I hadn’t scored a real acting job since the Nineties.

That’s why, when in mid-October I was contacted by my old agent, Sean Harrell, for the first time in a decade, I didn’t hesitate to pick up the phone.

“Travis! You son of a bitch, you!” He said in the cheerful, endearing way only a talent agent could get away with calling someone a son of a bitch, “shit, what’s it been, eight years? God, it’s crazy how time flies.”

“What do you want, Sean? I didn’t even know I still had you on retainer.”

“Once your agent, always your agent, baby,” he said with a laugh, “if you’re wondering why I’m so chipper, it’s because I just got handed a big, juicy opportunity for you, my man.”

The last alleged “big, juicy opportunity” Sean had gotten me was a commercial for breath spray running on a few major networks back in the day. I couldn’t get a date for a few weeks afterwards, thanks to my newfound reputation as “Man With Halitosis Number 3.” Sean was one gift horse who was occasionally filled with bloodthirsty Trojan soldiers, so I’d learned to look at his offers with a healthy sense of scepticism.

“What’s this big opportunity?”

“You’ve been offered a guest spot on a major talk show,” he said, giddy as a kid on Christmas morning, “I’ve been speaking to the reps all morning, they’re practically begging to have you on.”

I scoffed and shook my head, though I knew Sean couldn’t see it. Even when I was acting, it was cult stuff - B-movies and little indie films where the work was varied but the pay was crap; none of them ever broke out of the indie circuit and made it big. In short, it was all nothing that Conan O'Brien or Jimmy Fallon would give two shits about.

“What talk show is this?” I asked.

“Midnight Rendezvous, with Julie Forrester. It goes out live to a few million people every week.”

“Never heard of it.”

“That’s funny,” he said, “because the reps told me that if I mentioned the name, you’d know it immediately.”

“Well,” I said, feeling irritated, “I guess they’ve got the wrong guy. Why would they want me, anyway? I don’t even act anymore, it’s not like I’ve got anything to promote.”

“Apparently,” Sean said, speaking uncharacteristically slowly, as though trying to choose his words extra carefully, “don’t get mad, but they want to talk about The Red Weekend.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah, I kinda figured you’d say that. They’re recording on the 31st.”

“Halloween? Oh, for fuck’s sakes, Sean. Could it get any tackier? Look, if they call again, tell them I don’t wanna talk about that stupid movie, and if that doesn’t get them to shut up, tell them they can take their offer, and shove it up their–”

“The pay, Travis. Let me tell you about the pay before you get all…heated.”

“What are they offering?” I grumbled.

“Fifteen thousand, for just a couple of hours on set. Still feeling crabby, Trav?”

Yes, I was, but I didn’t feel I could show it. Fifteen thousand for a few hours sitting on a couch in a studio, being asked questions about some stupid B-movie I starred in when I was in my twenties, seemed like a deal only a proud idiot would turn down. I may have been proud, perhaps unreasonably so, but I was no idiot.

“You sure these guys are legit?” I asked, not wanting to say yes right after hearing the number, “they’re not just gonna lure me out to some vacant lot, beat me over the head, and harvest my organs?”

Sean groaned into the phone. It was like we’d never stopped speaking. Truth be told, I’d missed the slimy bastard. At least he gave it all to you straight. When you spoke to Sean Harrell, you knew what you were in for.

“Look, Travis, there’s no way to ever really be sure they’re not organ traffickers - hell, I’m sure Kimmel fenced a kidney or two when he was starting out - but I can give you at least a strong 80% certainty that these guys are the real deal,” he said, “I spoke to the host for a little while, uh, Julie! She seems nice, you know, a personality. I’m sure you two will get along just fine.”

“You said the exact same thing about that Fairweather woman, but that fell through, too. How do I know this is gonna be any different to that?”

“Oh, come on, Trav, that’s not fair. You know the Fairweather thing couldn’t be helped. Besides, it was ten years ago. This? This is now, and now I’ve got this offer on the table for you and you only. Do you think I would have called if I thought this was just gonna be bullshit? Hell no. So, what’ll it be, buddy, you in or you out?”

I gave a reluctant sigh, before finally saying, “fuck it, why not. Sign me up.”

“Great! I’m so glad you said that, Travis, because truth be told I’d already said yes on your behalf.”

“Jesus Christ, Sean.”

“What? It’s my job to make decisions in the best interests of your career, even if you don’t. I’ll keep in touch and feed you the details in the next couple days. It’s shaping up to be a real happy Halloween, Mr. Norton.”

“Don’t push it. Speak to you later, Sean.”

“Later.”

He hung up after that, and I was left with nothing but silence and my thoughts.

The Red Weekend. It’d been a while since I’d heard that name, and that was no accident. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that it was the movie that destroyed my credibility, and my acting career, so just thinking about it made my blood boil. Plot-wise, it was nothing special. Just a derivative 1985 monster movie cashing in on the slasher formula that was so popular at the time, with a few stolen shades of “Creature from The Black Lagoon.” A bunch of hapless teenagers decided to spend a weekend in a cabin on the edge of a lake, only to have their fun spoiled by a creature rising up and slaughtering all of them except one - who then goes on to turn the tables and slay the monster, avenging the fallen. Simple, cheap, and cheesy.

I played the creature from the lake, affectionately dubbed by the cast, crew, and all five-or-so fans of the movie as “The Bog Man.” If I took the role today (which, by the way, I wouldn’t) I’d have gone uncredited and collected my pay check, before moving on with my life. But I was star-struck, by the one person on the production team with what you might call genuine prestige.

Richard Upton Pavlović, the most iconic special effects artist you’ve never heard of. All the greats - Savini, Baker, Rambaldi, and a laundry list of others - all studied under Pavlović at one time or another, since he immigrated from Croatia in the forties. But he was a famously private man: nobody outside the business had ever heard of him; he was one of B-cinema’s best kept secrets. While the number of special effects artists who’d studied under him was vast, he only chose to work on a handful of different films personally: one of which, for reasons I doubt I’ll ever understand, was The Red Weekend.

The reason I took the role, and the reason I chose to be credited, was that in playing The Bog Man I’d be working one-on-one with Pavlović in the makeup room. It was my only chance to really interact with a living legend, before his death from a sudden heart attack back in 2007. Pavlović was a man with extraordinary vision. His one condition for working on a project was full creative control over creature designs, because he needed to be unstifled to truly work his magic. And it was magic: he could string together blood and gore with the best of them, sure, but when it came to monster design, Pavlović was the master.

When I met him in person for the first time, in a makeup trailer during a bitterly cold day in September, I was surprised by how small he was. Pavlović was a squat, wiry man with a silver horseshoe of hair and thick half-moon spectacles, looking like a cartoon shrew from a mid-30s Disney short. His design for The Bog Man was assembled in a thick stack of papers he carried in the crook of his arm, and started pinning around the makeup chair I was sitting on.

“Have you been under heavy prosthetics before?” He asked, with a soft, frail voice that still carried the echoes of a Croatian accent.

“No,” I said, “but I’m open to new experiences.”

Pavlović gave a quiet, good-hearted chuckle at my naïveté and continued pinning up his pictures. They were all hand-drawn pencil illustrations, some of parts of the creature, others of the entire thing. It was a huge amphibian, a little bigger than a human, with features somewhere between an axolotl and a triceratops, with the addition of a long, whipping tail. It was a hunched, slimy, pot-bellied creature with green skin and long arms ending in six thick claws. There was a strangely childlike nature to its head: wide and flat, largely smooth and featureless, with beady black eyes and three horns sprouting from either side of its head. In the illustrations with its mouth closed, it seemed more like a frog, with its lipless gob stretching from one set of horns to the other. When the mouth was open, it reminded me more of a shark, with multiple rows of switchblade fangs.

“What is this thing? I’ve never seen anything quite like it.”

“It is Rugoba,” Pavlović replied, gravely, “haunter of shadows, devourer of man.”

“Did you draw all these yourself?” I asked, “the detail is incredible.”

“Some I drew, yes,” he said, unpacking his equipment now, “others I inherited, from family members back in the old country. Creatures in the movies these days, they’re too tacky, too homogenised. I like to draw inspiration from older sources. It looks better, don’t you agree?”

I nodded in agreement, not knowing what else to do.

What followed was nothing short of gruelling. Seven hours in the makeup chair every morning and every night, and layer after layer of paint, putty, latex, slime, and false skin was packed onto me, until I felt like I’d been shrink-wrapped. Pavlović was a perfectionist, and I can’t imagine anyone ever felt that better than me. The head was a mixture of latex and animatronics that I wore like a helmet, with extremely limited visibility. My hands and feet were bound and fitted with claws, and a multi-jointed wire wrapped in latex became my whipping tail, that moved of its own accord.

For all the layers they’d packed onto me, it didn’t do anything to insulate. During the shoot - a lot of which I spent emerging from water and chasing down drunk, horny morons - it was a miracle I never came down with hypothermia. Day after day after day in Pavlović’s makeup chamber of horrors, all for a film I knew nobody was going to see. It was only when I got the chance to see the first proper cut of the film that I started to truly understand all the mythos behind Pavlović’s supposed mad genius: when I watched the film, waiting to see myself in a hokey monster costume, prancing through the woods, I never got what I wanted. When I was on screen, there was no recognising me, because I was not there. It was only the Rugoba, as if it’d been ripped straight from Pavlović’s nightmares and spat onto the screen, hunting its prey.

I remembered performing all the actions I’d see on screen, but I couldn’t - no matter how hard I tried - see myself doing it. Pavlović had turned me into his monster, and he’d done it flawlessly. The movie, as anticipated, was hot garbage, with plotting and characters as thin as wet toilet paper, unbearable dialogue, and thoroughly incompetent cinematography. But the Rugoba? That, I think I can say without a doubt, was the greatest, most realistic monster to ever grace the silver screen.

However, there was another element of the Pavlović legend which made him a little less desirable to work with. Actors, in one regard, are a lot like football players: they’re a superstitious bunch. The little superstition that Richard Pavlović carried around his neck was that he was cursed: any film he chose to work on was doomed to fail, and if you were unlucky, that failure would spread its tendrils out to the cast and crew as well.

Ian Barker, one of my co-stars, once told me in confidence that he felt the whole production just reeked of doom to him, like some invisible axe was hanging over all of our heads, just waiting for the right moment to drop. Thanks to being in full Rugoba makeup for almost my entire time on set, not many of the cast interacted with me - I was the amphibian social leper - but Ian was different. He was at least someone I felt like I could talk to, even if most of what we discussed was Pavlović’s curse.

To me, it was all stupid, baseless hokum, but towards the end of the shoot, I started getting worried. Maybe it was the fear that rattled me, but after The Red Weekend, I never nailed another audition: not for movies, not for TV, not for Broadway. Sean netted me a few commercials after that, but for all intents and purposes, my serious acting career was kaput. Looking back, I probably never had the nerve for stardom anyway, but just thinking about that movie had the power to leave a sour taste in my mouth.

And this Julie Forrester wanted me to talk about it on live TV. Part of me, honestly, was afraid of what I’d say, under pressure, and under the intensity of all those studio lights. My best guess for what they were trying to do was a Halloween retrospective on the life and work of Richard Pavlović, monster movie maestro, and seeing as I was the last actor to officially work with him, my experiences held some weight.

In the end, if I could take home fifteen grand for a talk show appearance a couple decades after my fifteen minutes of mild fame were up, who was I to complain?

Sean got back to me a few days later, saying a chauffeur paid by the studio would be taking me from my bungalow on the edge of L.A. to the studio. It all felt a little much, considering my credentials, but Sean just encouraged me to put my feet up and enjoy it. After all, I didn’t know when I’d get another experience like this, if I ever did. Might as well soak it in while I still could.

It was about eight at night, and trick-or-treaters were already prowling the streets, when a black BMW parked in front of my home and dimmed the lights. It felt less like a talk show valet and more like a mafia hitman, but I walked up to the car nonetheless, and the driver rolled down the window. It was a woman who looked to be in her mid-forties, wearing a classic chauffeur hat and a wide, inviting grin.

“You Travis Norton?” She asked.

I nodded.

“Hop on in, Sir. I’m Mary, I’m gonna drive you down to the studio.”

The car was comfortable, and there was a small bottle of champagne in a little icebox on the seat next to me, with a smiling jack-o-lantern painted onto it. The temptation was there, but I didn’t touch it - probably wasn’t wise to get loaded before a TV interview. Once I was belted up, Mary fired up the ignition and drove.

“Everything okay back there, Mr. Norton?” Mary said.

“Oh yeah,” I replied, “it’s wonderful. I feel bad for making you come out, I could have driven down myself.”

Mary laughed to herself in the front seat.

“Nonsense, Mr. Norton,” she said, “I’m honoured to have you in my car. I never thought that I’d be in the company of the star of The Red Weekend. If it’s not too unprofessional of me to ask, would I be able to have your autograph when we arrive? I’d just like to show my kids.”

“You let your kids watch The Red Weekend?” I asked, remembering its plethora of gory death scenes.

“Are you kidding?” Mary said with another hearty laugh, “it’s their favourite movie. They’re crazy for it.”

For the rest of the journey, I remained largely silent. Mary seemed nice at face value, but the more you spoke to her, the more you realised something was off about her. But it wasn’t just Mary that was a little odd: the car, upon closer, more sustained inspection, was strange too. The back windows were so tinted you could barely see out of them, and before I knew it, I was hopelessly lost. I’d lived in L.A. for most of my adult life, but the neighbourhoods Mary was driving us through felt totally alien to me.

The studio was like an anthill, pulsing with life, and dotted with more rictus pumpkins. Assistants and stagehands shuffled to and fro in steady streams, the pumping lifeblood of the whole big, complicated affair, as Mary pulled us into the parking lot. I got out of the car, gave a small, reluctant autograph in her pocket book - dedicated to her kids, of course - before being ushered away by another little detachment of stagehands. The place seemed to run with almost military efficiency, with everyone around me constantly checking their watches before moving at a quickened pace.

It was this aspect of a life in show-business that I never missed.

“Mr. Norton,” said a shrewd-looking studio rep who’d materialised from a crowd of scurrying assistants - he’d never be on camera, but his suit looked far nicer than mine, “I’m Michael. Splendid to see you accepted our offer. Please, follow me, I’ll see to it that you get to Miss Forrester.”

Ten years out of the media, and here, I was a babe in the woods. I blindly followed Michael further into the bowels of the studio, away from packed crowds of excited guests being corralled into queues. Most had won contests to be here, and the rest had probably paid their way in. They’d be the ones watching me, reminding me that I was being watched, not just by them, but by millions of others who’d all tune in to a show I’d never even heard of. It’d been a strange and eventful Halloween.

Before I knew it, in the haze of yelling directors and baking studio lights, I was backstage. They ushered me into a makeup room, where I was given the most minimal makeup job I’d ever seen, even more so considering my work on The Red Weekend for comparison. I was about half way through deciding whether it was a compliment when the door opened behind me, and a strange, kinetic energy seemed to fill the room, as though someone had just turned on a generator.

“Travis Norton,” said a shrill, excited voice coming from a shape I could only just catch in the corner of my mirror, “you have no idea how long I’ve waited for this. I feel like I need someone to pinch me.”

Julie Forrester, like most television hosts, was a font of untapped energy, constantly bubbling beneath the surface. She was a little shorter than me at about 5"8, decked out in a tasteful grey suit, with a broad smile that seemed to flash the majority of her paper-white, perfectly-aligned teeth. She’d been prepped and polished by countless stylists and makeup artists, because I couldn’t for the life of me tell you how old she was - you could peg me as a middle-aged bum at a glance, but Julie seemed to stand outside age, just looking in and smiling at the rest of us. Her hair - black, silky - was cut fashionably short.

“Hey Julie,” I said, with the awkward, feigned familiarity of meeting TV personalities, “thanks so much for having me on. I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunity.”

She gave an excited little squeak, like a teenager at a boyband concert. This was all feeling more and more like a big, sinister practical joke. Trick or god damn treat.

“Hearing you say my name is so surreal,” she said with a laugh - no, a giggle, “young me would have exploded at just the thought of it. You should know, I don’t normally do this, but with you I just couldn’t resist. You’ve been a hard man to track down, you know? Extraordinarily private, for a celebrity of your stature.”

I laughed back, acting like I was in on the gag.

“Yeah, well,” I said, “I have always been pretty low-key.”

“Are you a fan of the show?” She asked, clearly hoping the answer was yes. Julie reminded me of the kid in class who was always trying to impress the teacher - searching for some kind of validation from someone she perceived as an authority figure. You don’t get into this line of work unless validation is part of what drives you.

I’m ashamed to admit it, but I thought about lying, about humouring her. It was only when I realised there might be a follow-up question that I decided to give her my slightly-sanitised version of the truth.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “but I don’t really watch much TV. But Sean, my agent, he told me this show was excellent, so I jumped at the chance to be a guest.”

Julie’s face fell slightly, as though my words had wounded her, but she stayed positive. Outwardly, at least.

“In that case, Travis, you are in for a real treat tonight,” she said, “I’ve got some great questions lined up, there’ll be a brief Q&A with some audience members - don’t worry, it’s all screened, so there won’t be any curveballs - and we’ll have a few fun little segments mixed in to break stuff up. Is this your first time doing a live TV interview? My researchers couldn’t find much footage of you online.”

“No, uh, this is my first time. I’m a little nervous, actually.”

She gave a friendly, comforting chuckle and patted me on the shoulder.

“Don’t worry, you’ll be just fine. You can pretend it’s only you and me, if that helps, but everyone out there loves you, Travis. They’ll be hanging off your every word.”

“I never knew The Red Weekend had such an ardent fanbase.” I said, trying to play off all the uncomfortable praise that seemed to be bombarding me from every angle.

Julie laughed again, as though I’d said something funny and missed it.

“Don’t be so modest, Travis, everyone remembers their first time watching The Red Weekend, it’s a rite of passage,” she said, walking towards the door, “if you need to do any last-minute psyching yourself up, now’s the time. You’ll be on in ten.”

The sudden, strange realness of it all hit me like a haymaker as Julie closed the door behind her. What the hell was I doing? I wasn’t an actor, not anymore, I designed logos for small businesses and occasionally made a poster or two. The freakish contrast between the world I’d known for the last two decades and the world I was being pulled back into was jarring. It barely felt like I had time to blink, when Michael, the rep, was knocking on the dressing room door.

“We’re ready for you now, Mr. Norton, do come out and join me. Recording will begin soon.”

I gulped down my final misgivings like cheap scotch, and gave a long sigh. It was now or never, but truth be told, even for fifteen grand, “never” was looking more attractive.

The set was, in a word, generic. A large red couch sat across from a wide desk, bearing the title “MIDNIGHT RENDEZVOUS” in large but tasteful lettering. The background was the standard plywood fare covered in a large facsimile of the L.A. Skyline up in lights. Julie sat at her desk, beaming, while a skinny warmup comedian stood centre stage, making anodyne jokes about West Hollywood traffic to the softly-laughing studio audience. They sat in near-darkness, compared to the bleached whiteness of the set, but the longer you looked at them, the more you could make out all their shapes.

I took a seat across from Julie, not wanting to upstage the comedian, but the second I entered the view of the audience I felt a hundred pairs of eyes pierce me. For whatever reason, I was the centre of attention.

“This will be over soon, and we’ll get started,” Julie said with a wink, “this might be my most anticipated episode. No pressure, though, you’re gonna nail it.”

The warmup comedian was finishing his set, his brow now dotted with glistening beads of sweat, like the damp patches glaring through his cheap suit. None of his stuff was particularly funny - all broad observations and reheated takes, the TV dinner of comedy. Most of all, he just seemed surprised and giddy to be there.

“Thank you!” He said, “you’ve been a wonderful audience, but now I’m gonna hand you over to Julie and Travis, who I hear have got an excellent show for you tonight! Have a happy and safe Halloween, guys!”

He laughed as the crowd cheered, and then started to head for the exit, when Julie called to him.

“Josh!” She called, “you did a great job, really awesome stuff. Would you mind sticking around a few minutes longer? There’s a few last little things we need to do.”

Josh nodded politely and returned to centre stage, delivering a few more inoffensive little quips to the crowd, and receiving small bouts of friendly laughter in return. I didn’t notice at first, but Michael the rep had appeared at Julie’s side, and I caught the tail end of their conversation.

“Is the perimeter secure?” She asked him.

“Yes, ma'am,” he replied, “we should be all good to go, when you’re ready.”

She nodded, and Michael disappeared backstage. Seeming to just arbitrarily come and go was Michael’s whole thing, I gathered, but before I could think about it any longer, Julie stood up and joined Josh, centre stage.

“It’s looking like we have a beautiful audience tonight!” She said, with the practiced, theatrical flair of someone who’d said this a million times, “and how appropriate, because I think tonight we may have my favourite guest of all time. Do I even have to say his name, folks?”

There was a cheer from the crowd. I gave an awkward smile, and Josh just stood there dumbly, next to Julie.

“I have been informed by the producers that all the perimeters are secure now,” she said, “so, with that in mind, it’s time to change.”

It happened so quickly, but it felt like it took a million years. The hue of Julie’s skin began to change from a pale pink to a deep, murky green, as her shape began to shift, bloat, and elongate. But, it wasn’t just Julie: the camera men, the stagehands, and the audience began changing too, all slowly warping themselves out of humanity and into something else entirely. Six claws, those big amphibian faces, those long, whipping tails and terrible jaws full of thousands of teeth.

If I wasn’t almost entirely sure it was all fake to begin with, I would have screamed until my lungs burned up into prunes in my chest cavity, but as it was I couldn’t summon a single sound. The host, the crew, the studio audience: they weren’t human, not even close. They were Pavlović’s monster. They were the Rugoba.

All of them except Josh, who stood next to the seven-foot-tall monster that Julie had become - still somehow wearing that sleek grey suit over her freakish new body. He was quaking in terror, only letting out occasional whimpers of fear. Both were standing in front of me, so I couldn’t get a good look at their faces, but beyond them I saw a legion of grinning Rugoba filling the stands. All here to see me.

“But, before we get this show on the road,” Julie said, her voice startlingly similar to when she still seemed human, “some free concessions for the first few rows. Remember to share!”

With a huge, clawed hand, Julie gave the quaking Josh a push. He pitched forwards, screaming, into the midst of the studio audience, and they set upon him in an instant with claws and teeth. Ripping, tearing, devouring. Those panicked yells soon just become bloody gurgles, and then nothing but the sounds of feasting, and of Julie’s laughter. When Josh’s head came away from what was left of his body, several Rugoba seemed to fight over its contents.

Had I not have been desensitised by spending my young adult years working in crappy, exploitative horror movies, I’d have thrown up. Instead, I just sat and watched, feeling like someone was taking a weed whacker to my soul. Human beings weren’t meant to witness things like this, and now, I was the only one here.

“Settle down, folks,” Julie said with a good-natured chuckle, “we’ll have more snacks distributed throughout the show. Everyone ready to begin? If you are, give me a big cheer!”

And she got one. The creatures that’d eaten a man alive a few seconds before just took their places, all looking as excited as their inhuman faces seemed to allow. The better part of me knew that I should have tried to run - I wasn’t paralysed by fear or anything like that, no, I just knew that if they were eating Josh but sparing me, there had to be a reason.

A Rugoba director, wearing an abnormally large headset to fit around his horns, called lights, camera, action.

What I assumed must have been the theme tune began to play, as Julie turned to me, a look of confusion spread against her wide, froglike face.

“Why haven’t you changed, Travis?” She asked.

That’s when it all hit me: why I was here, what all this was about. Pavlović - that mad, genius son of a bitch - his makeup job wasn’t just good, it was utterly flawless, a perfect representation of a creature his family always knew truly existed. The costume was so good, it even fooled Julie and the others. For all these years, they genuinely thought I was one of them.

“I can’t.” I said, without thinking.

“Why?” She asked in a harsh whisper.

I could tell the theme song was drawing to a close, and I needed to spin good enough bullshit to not get eaten by a talk show host. It wasn’t my best work, in hindsight, but what I said was:

“I’m a method actor, and I’m playing a human in my next role. I don’t want to compromise the integrity of the character.”

What I expected was getting a face full of gnashing monster teeth, but no, Julie just laughed and smiled at me. As the theme song played its last few notes, I breathed a sigh of relief, knowing she’d bought it. And with the audience’s undivided attention, Julie began her little monologue.

“Welcome, welcome, welcome to the good people at home! You know me, I’m Julie Forrester, and this is Midnight Rendezvous - the most popular talk show on Rugoba TV!” She said, before presenting her middle claw to the camera, “so pogo on that, Morning Chitchat. And boy, do we have a special guest for you tonight, folks, a guest quite unlike any other. You know him, you love him, it’s the one and only Mr. Travis Norton!”

The studio audience exploded into deafening cheers and applause, like none I’d ever heard in my lifetime. The response was so overwhelming, I nearly forgot I’d just seen them all eat an innocent man alive.

Julie walked back and squeezed herself behind the desk, making it look comically child-sized now.

“Now, Travis, I’m thrilled to have you on.” She said, leaving a pause for me.

“I’m thrilled to be on,” I said, my voice quivering, “sorry, I’m not used to all this attention. It’s a little overwhelming.”

She laughed again, and said, “now, in many ways, you’re a guest that needs no introduction - but I’m gonna introduce you anyway, because that’s how I make my living.”

The crowd laughed, and I decided to join in. Slime was dripping in liberal dollops from Julie’s massive jaws, coating the top of the desk. It’s a miracle I didn’t relieve my bowels just looking at her.

“I know I’ve been a fan of you for a long, long time, Travis. Having a Rugoba celebrity on the show is nothing new, of course, we’ve had plenty here: Björk, Kanye West, Ryan Reynolds…but Travis, you, to this day, are the only Rugoba in living memory who’s had the guts to show their true form on film,” she said, a genuine note of pride in her voice, “and I think that deserves another round of applause, don’t you, folks?”

More applause, and I forced a smile. It was becoming clear to me that this whole thing was just a tightrope act: I was a folk hero to them for now, but the second they realised I wasn’t one of them, I’d be devoured, just like Josh. In that moment, I wished that Richard Upton Pavlović was alive again, so I could have a go at beating him to death myself.

“If you’re wondering why Travis is looking so tasty tonight, folks, it’s because - and this is a Midnight Rendezvous exclusive - he’s going to be starring in a new movie soon. How exciting?” Julie said, playing up every word for the eager crowd of monsters just beyond the edge of the set, “he’s a method actor, so he’s trying to stay in character. Can you tell us a little about the film, Travis?”

Great. I was on the spot again, one lie leading to another. A good piece of advice to take to heart is that when you’re already in a hole, it’s best to stop digging, but I was already half way to China.

“It’s called Mirrors: Reflecting,” I said, completely pulling it out of my ass, “it’s a comedy-drama about a has-been actor who ends up getting way in over his head in a situation he doesn’t understand. It’s in pre-production.”

“Oooooh,” Julie said, “sounds exciting. Now, I’ll start with the question I think we’ve all been thinking since we first saw The Red Weekend: how did you find the willpower to never eat any of your co-stars?”

The general rule seemed to be that anything I found morally repugnant would get a big laugh out of the crowd. The Rugoba sense of humour seemed to be mainly based around terrible things happening to humans, so I chose my words as carefully as I could, given the circumstances.

“It’s, uh, it’s all about self-control,” I said, “you’ve just gotta tell yourself to stay in the professional zone, and that you can’t eat any of them, because it’ll, uh, compromise the production.”

“God,” Julie said, “check out this guy here, making me feel like a slob. You’ve gotta give me the number of your dietician after this, Trav. I ate mine last week.”

I laughed out of politeness, but I genuinely wasn’t sure whether it was a joke or not. For my own sanity, I chose to believe the former. The crowd found it hilarious, either way.

“Did any of your co-stars know the truth? You know, about who you really are?” She asked.

“No,” I cut in, worrying that revealing the truth would be a secret death sentence, “those dumb humans believed it was all just makeup. You know what people are like, easy to trick.”

Julie slammed a claw down on the slimy desktop and gave an over-the-top laugh.

“So true, Travis, so true!” She cackled, “in fact, half of the folks at home are probably enjoying a trick or treater as we speak. Halloween, what a holiday, it’s like getting free home delivery - and they bring your dessert in a bag with them! So considerate - who says humans aren’t good for anything?”

How many of these things were there? How many facets of society had they invaded, if they had their own TV shows? Sean said this show went out live to millions of viewers, and surely not all of them would be watching. There must have been Rugoba everywhere.

“Now, a couple more serious questions, before we get to the fun stuff,” she said, licking the slobber off her fangs with a long, purple tongue, “your filmography has some strange gaps. You get plenty of work in the eighties, and a little going into the nineties, but then a huge episode of silence until now. Why the return to film?”

It probably shouldn’t have rattled me, given what was going on, but it did. Somehow, the fear of failure ran even deeper than the fear of monsters, and Julie had opened the floodgates.

“It’s not been for lack of trying,” I said with a laugh that undermined my sadness, “it’s hard to make a good living as an actor. Unless you’re an A-lister, chances are you’ve probably got a second job on the side to make ends meet while you try to live out your dreams. I’m a graphic designer in my spare time. Just lately, I got lucky, and was offered another big break. It wasn’t what I expected, but I’m trying to play it out as best I can.”

The crowd gave a sympathetic “awwww” that felt good in spite of them being a horde of carnivorous beasts. Julie seemed similarly sympathetic, looking at me with those big, black shark-eyes that somehow communicated a warm depth of compassion you couldn’t imagine coming from a creature like her.

“Well,” she said, trying to reclaim the room, “I’m sure I speak for everyone in this room when I say that we’re glad you’re getting work again, Travis, you’re a talent like no other. That’s why I thought I’d get you a fun little Halloween treat.”

All the lights around us began to dim, as several excited “oooooohs” issues forth from the crowd. I could hear sudden movement backstage, and the scraping of metal against metal.

“But,” Julie said with glee, standing up from her desk and trotting to centre stage, “one person’s treat is another person’s trick, quid pro quo, that’s the way the world goes. Travis isn’t the only special guest we’ve got tonight, courtesy of some fine work from our producers.”

A group of Rugoba in dark uniforms dragged a huddled, chained figure onto the stage. He’d been either beaten or drugged, but whatever the case, the guy was totally out of it. Half-naked, covered in scratches where his handlers had been too rough. It’d been so long, but after a moment or two, I recognised who it was.

Ian Barker, my old Red Weekend co-star.

“As you all know,” Julie said, addressing the crowd, “the one blemish marring the perfection of The Red Weekend is the downer ending. The rest of it is such an uplifting story of Rugoba conquering and devouring humankind, as nature intended, until the character played by our new guest Ian Barker here slays our champion!”

The crowd entered a state of vicious booing, all directed at Ian, who was too dazed to even respond. He remained on his knees, with a heavy metal collar bound around his neck.

“But, today, as a Midnight Rendezvous Halloween special, we’re going to right that wrong, folks!” She said with a laugh of shrill, sadistic excitement, “our dear friend of the show, Travis Norton, will devour Ian Barker live for you and the folks at home, and all the wrongs will be right again. Is everyone excited?”

As the volume of the cheering went up, my heart sank. Before I could even think to stop myself, or formulate a plan, I was up on my feet and charging towards Julie with an excuse.

“Julie, you don’t understand,” I pleaded, “I have to stay in character, I need to seem human.”

Julie scoffed and shook her head - more for the audience than me.

“What? Humans eat other humans all the time! Jeffrey Dahmer, Andrei Chikatilo, and a whole bunch of others,” she said, “you don’t even need to change back. The producers got you this handy little tool.”

A fourteen-pound framing hammer was forced into my hands, crushing my last attempt at an excuse. Everyone but Ian was looking at me, as I stood there with the hammer, all grinning and egging me on with their eyes.

“You only have to eat some of the brains, it’s the best part anyway,” Julie said, “I’d hate to break you too far from character.”

Then the chanting began: kill, kill, kill. I don’t know who started it, but now there was no stopping it, not until I’d made up my mind. I gripped the hammer, hard, and looked at the back of Ian’s head. If I fessed up, and told the truth, would they kill him and me anyway? Did it make more sense to just kill him and get it over with, then try to live with the guilt afterwards?

Maybe it did make more sense. But that’s not what I did.

“Stop! I yelled, the hammer clattering to the ground, "and please listen!”

The room fell silent, and Julie started looking at me like she knew something terrible was about to happen.

“I have a confession,” I said, “you’re not gonna like it, but you have to listen to me, and hear me out. I’m not one of you, okay? I’m not a Rugoba. I’m a human being, it was all a big god damn lie.”

Julie stared at me, devastated, and said “wait, Travis, what do you mean? The Red Weekend…”

“The Red Weekend is a shitty movie that ruined my life!” I blurted out without thinking, “it was all special effects makeup, none of it was real. The guy just knew about you, somehow, and you’re what he based his design on. I was never a Rugoba. I’m sorry for misleading you all like this, it’s just a huge misunderstanding.”

In an instant, the crowd devolved from low, worried murmurs to riotous shouting. Julie tried in vain to comfort the yelling crowd, to stop them baying for my blood, but it was too late. I’d taken one of their greatest living legends, and torn it apart in front of them. I’d gone from being a hero to the devil himself.

Running was the first thing on my mind, but before the thought even properly formed, something had struck the back of my head - and everything went black.

***

When I finally came to, I was staring out of thick, iron bars into the furious amphibian face of Julie Forrester. The room was dark, so I could barely see beyond her, staring into the cage and mugging at me. She’d lost her grey suit, and was wearing a white outfit with a skirt instead, her whipping tail protruding from the back, lashing at the air.

“I bet you feel really clever right now, Travis, well done,” she said, her voice devoid of the lightness and humour I’d known it for, “you made me look like an absolute clown on my own show. I trusted you, I invited you on, and you just humiliated me.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, my thoughts still returning in brief snatches, “I really am, Julie, I didn’t mean for it to happen like that. Aside from the whole ‘eating humans’ thing, I like you as a person. I wouldn’t want your credibility to take a hit.”

She ran her claws across the bars of the cage, and shook her head.

“Too little, too late, I’m afraid,” she said, “but you can still make it up to me, in other ways.”

“I want to, Julie, I really do.”

Julie pulled back from the bars a little and seemed to pace around the cage, her footsteps heavy and wet, but as regular as the ticking of a clock’s pendulum. It’d drive you mad if you listened for long enough.

“What you said earlier about the entertainment industry is true, Travis, even if the rest was all lies,” she said, her tone gravely seriously, “if you want to make a good living, one job won’t cut it. You need to be a real polymath to put bread on the table. Thankfully, I’m a Rugoba of all trades: Midnight Rendezvous is just one of the shows I host.”

“What’s the other one?” I asked, out of morbid curiosity.

She stopped, pressed her terrible amphibian face against the bars, and grinned.

“You’ll see,” she said, “you’ll see real soon, Travis. I’m gonna make you into something so much better…”

As Julie started to walk away from the cage, one by one the studio lights began to turn back on, cracking into life. The couch and L.A. backdrop was replaced by a homely-looking kitchen, fitted with a gorgeous array of utensils and hardware. Julie produced from the front pocket of the white apron she was wearing a long and magnificent chef’s hat, and placed it onto her huge, slimy head.

The words “COOKING WITH JULIE!” were emblazoned across the front of her kitchen unit.

My fear had already passed, all that remained now was that kind of dissonant, slaughterhouse calm that sets in when you already know you’re finished. All that’s left to do is wait. But, I took a strange comfort in knowing that this Halloween night The Red Weekend would finally be coming to an end.

I closed my eyes and exhaled, as the director called “lights, camera, action.”

#stories #horror #halloween #funny #monster girl

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littledonkeyburrito · 7 years

Text

Some lint

1. Have you ever punched someone and broke their nose? Haven’t broken their nose but I’ve certainly hit a few in the face bc karate

2. What is the longest time you have gone without sleep? Forty-something hours without even a nap

3. Have you ever been someplace tropical? Several places

4. You see an ant on the ground, do you squish it? If it’s in my house, yes.

5. Have you ever baked a pie? I don’t think so.

6. What is your favorite social networking site? Instagram probably

7. Has anyone in your family fought in any of the wars? Dad’s dad was in WW2. Dad fought in Belfast in the 70s I think

8. Would you make any changes to your current bedroom? Yeah, I would like $100,000 to magically appear under my mattress.

9. Has a stray dog ever tried to bite you? Playfully. I stop playing with strays when they get boisterous bc rabies

10. When riding a bus, do you prefer to sit up front, down back or the middle? Middle-back generally

11. Have you ever been on a cross-country train ride? Yes, in a few places. I freaking love sleeper trains, I think they’re so fun with a group. On one of the sleeper trains I went on in China we accidentally taught the guy with the food/drink trolley the english word for beer because we bought more every time he went past.

12. Is there currently any caffeine in your system? No

13. Look around, are things organized? Yes, I keep my apartment very tidy.

14. Is there any TV show that ended that you wish hadn’t? Don’t Trust the Bitch in Apartment 23

15. Know what you’re planning to do after this? Attempt to kill time for a couple of hours until I can go to bed

16. How often do you update your Facebook status? I don’t really do statuses, just post photos from my instagram.

17. Do you even wear any jeans other than skinny anymore? All my jeans are of varying levels of skininess. From slim-fit to practically painted on.

18. Are you sensitive to caffeine? Yes. I would have a rum and coke right now but 1) I don’t have any coke, and 2) if I drank any it would take me a long time to get to sleep.

19. How do you usually get around? Walking or metro

20. Which languages do you wish you could speak fluently in? It would be nice to be fluent in spanish but if it happened magically overnight it wouldn’t be fun because I like the challenge. It would be cool to magically become fluent in arabic and/or mandarin.

21. Have you ever been accused of being too clingy? No

22. Can you speak any French? No.

23. Have you ever stayed in a hotel? Dozens. I travel a lot.

24. What is in your pocket? Some lint.

25. Is there a secret you’ve never told your parents? There are certainly some details of my life that I have omitted. Such as some experiences with sex, drugs and alcohol.

26. Who was the last person to smoke a cigarette in your presence? People from that office I briefly worked at. Or probably more recently just random people on the street.

27. Have you ever lived with a friend? Yeah, a few.

28. What are a few of your favorite tv shows? iZombie, Brooklyn 99, Jane The Virgin, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Club De Cuervos, Parks and Rec 29. What kind of socks do you like to wear? Brightly coloured ones with wild patterns 30. Do you have your own house key, and how often do you actually use it? Whenever I need to get into my apartment. (This question must have been written by a teenager)

31. How often do you eat chocolate? Not actually that often. I don’t have as much of a sweet tooth as I did when I was younger. 32. How often do you wash dishes at your house? Every 1-3 days depending on how lazy I am.

33. How much sleep did you get last night? ~7 hours 34. When was the last time you went to a cemetery and why were you there? Last year on halloween myself and a few other drunk people from the party I was at decided to go wander around the nearby cemetery. 35. What were you doing when you heard about the attack on the twin towers? I don’t remember specifically hearing about it. I was only 7 so I wouldn’t really have cared anyway. Mostly what I remember is that they took cartoons off tv to play non-stop news for at least a week. 36. Doesn’t John Mayer suck? I have no opinions on him. 37. When was the last time you saw the sun rise? When I was in Colombia. One night in Cartagena I stayed up with a swedish and a colombian guy chatting in spanish while we watched the sun rise over the river. Then the cops came over and told us to leave.

38. What was the last picture you took? It was of my DS because I started playing pokemon in spanish and I was sending the picture to a couple of friends to say that the pokemon names are still the same in this language.

39. Are there many traffic incidents in your area? I don’t drive anymore so I don’t pay attention. 40. Have you ever been for a ride in the back of a truck? Probably at some point during travels. I’ve done a lot of weird shit 41. Are you currently downloading anything? No. 42. Does your father have any facial hair? No

43. Have you ever played golf? My mum attempted to get me into golf when I was a kid (maybe young teen?) and I absolutely hated it. It was the most infuriating game I’ve ever played.

44. What was the last tv show you watched an episode of? The Defenders 45. Do you like beer? If so, what’s your favorite brand? Beer is fine. I’m pretty used to Moritz and Estrella Damm because they are common local brands. The fucking worst beer is Balboa in Panama. God it was so awful. Also not a fan of San Miguel which is common across all of spain. 46. Do you feel bad when you throw food out? Yes 47. When was the last time you waxed anything on your body, if ever? I’ve never waxed. I just shave. 48. What’s your favorite fast food place? I don’t have one. I don’t really eat takeout here. 49. When was the last time you went out for a meal? A few weeks ago. 50. Have you ever been in a car accident? A few minor ones but not while I’ve been driving. 51. What colour shirt are you wearing right now? Navy blue

52. Have you ever had a bonfire on the beach? Y’know I actually don’t think I have... I should get on that.

53. Are you skilled when it comes to working in the kitchen? I don’t burn anything. That’s a skill, right?

54. When was the last time you went to a campground? That would have been back in April, camping in the Sahara Desert.

55. Do you listen to music while driving? Yes, and I sing along Very Loudly.

56. When was the last time you hung out with people younger than you? I have absolutely no idea.

57. What is the closest blue object to you? Box of tissues on the coffee table.

58. How much did you spend on your last shopping trip? Probably about 25 euros at the grocery store

59. Have you ever gone over your cell phone plan by accident? I used to go over my data limit pretty regularly at my old job.

60. Can you honestly say you’ve been drunk before? Very, and many times. (this question must have been written by a teen)

61. Where did you get your last bruise from? Probably that mystery bruise I got in my armpit in central america. I’m pretty sure I got roofied that night so I don’t remember anything at all but I am still sooooo curious how I got that bruise. Nobody I was with knew how it happened either but then again they were all pretty trashed anyway so even if they saw they might not remember.

62. Are you a person that likes to take chances? Depends. Sometimes I take calculated risks.

63. Would you consider your life to be great right now? Right now it’s pretty mediocre but a month ago it was freaking awesome.

64. Do you remember the dream you had last night? Not exactly but I think it involved me getting tattoos on my arm

65. Do you get emotional easily? I don’t really have emotions tbh

66. Do you get obnoxious when you’re drunk? Nah, I get fun when I’m drunk

67. Who was the first person to ever give you flowers? I’m not sure anybody has ever given me flowers.

68. What was the last thing you heated up in your microwave? Chicken and veggies to go with my baked potato the other day

69. Were you born somewhere other than a hospital? No.

70. What was the last flavor of ice cream you had? Mango. It was homemade by a woman in Comuna 13 in Colombia 71. When you go out drinking, what do you prefer to drink? Beer or rum and coke 72. Is there a trash can near you? Yeah

73. When and where was the last time you took a picture of yourself? I think I took a selfie in my kitchen a few days ago 74. When was the last time you stayed up throughout the entire night? Cartagena, Colombia. ~8 weeks ago. But I stayed up until 2 or 3am a few times after that.

75. Have you ever considered a foreign-exchange program? No, I just fucked off overseas on my own accord.

76. Are sex and sexual activities something you enjoy? Yep 77. What’s an interesting fact about the state in which you were born? I know literally nothing about the region I was born in.

78. What’s one aspect of your life that did not turn out as you expected? Well I definitely didn’t expect to learn spanish 79. Is there a subject about which you know a great deal? Probably, but nothing immediately comes to mind 80. What was the last thing that you put off doing? I should probably vacuum and mop my apartment 81. What did you do instead of that activity? Anything else.

Before and after: 3 years ago, today

82. What size is the last bed you kissed on? - Double. - A single bed in a twin room in a hotel. Tbh I probably could have swapped to a double room but at that point I didn’t realise he’d be staying with me

83. When was the last time you were sick? - I got the flu pretty bad in 2013. Probably should have gone to hospital but instead I only took 2 days off work. - I had a mild cold when I got home from my last trip. 84. Do you have any summer plans yet? - I ditched summer in favour of going skiing in Japan - Summer just ended. I don’t know whether my next summer will be here next June/July, or back in Aus in January. Will depend on whether I find a job 85. When was the last time you shaved your legs? - Probably within 2 weeks - Earlier today 86. Is there someone you wish you were closer with? - I think I had just started developing a crush on a guy that I later dated briefly and then he cheated on me, lied about it and broke up with me by facebook message while I was on holiday overseas. So, not the best idea really. - I’m all g. 87. Do you tend to waste a lot of money? - I made 1 or 2 poor decisions with money but I was earning enough to cover my ass. - It’s not a waste when it’s something I actively want to spend the money on. 88. What did you last drink? - Probably pepsi - Orange juice 89. Have you ever received an injury from a hook up? - Uhhh no? - Not unless that’s how I got that mystery bruise in my armpit. 90. Do you have any good friends of the opposite sex? - Yes - Yes, the same ones 91. When was the last time you had a crowd at your house? - Probably around this time 3 years ago was my housewarming - I have never had more than 2 people visit this apartment at a time. Last time I had a crowd would have been my moving out party (from the place I just moved into 3 years ago) which was a bit over a year ago.

92. How many cell phones have you had? - 5 - 7, if you include the work phone I had 93. Where do you get all your clothes? - JayJays - H&M, C&A, Mango etc 94. Have you ever regretted kissing someone? - Nah - Nah 95. Have you ever gotten a speeding ticket? - No. - I got one just under 3 years ago 96. Would you rather sleep with someone else or alone? - Alone - Depends. Sometimes I wouldn’t mind having someone here 97. Do you think age matters in relationships? - To an extent - Not really 98. Have you ever lived with a girlfriend/boyfriend? - No. - No 99. When will your next kiss be? - Probably the next party I went to. I made out with a lot of people that year - No idea 100. Add up all the digits of your cell phone number. What do you get? - 40 - 50 101. When you lost your virginity, do you honestly feel like you were ready? - I didn’t regret it but I probably wasn’t emotionally ready for it. - Same as above I guess. You only lose it once.

102. Was the person you lost your virginity to younger or older than you? - Older. - ^^

103. Were you sexually experienced whatsoever when you lost your virginity? - Not at all - ^^

104. Have you had sex with more than one person? - Yes - Yes by a larger amount

105. Have you ever had sex with the lights on? - Yes. - Yes

106. Have you ever had sex on a floor? - No - Yes

107. When is the last time you had sex? - Probably like at least 6 months before - About a month ago (can’t believe my trip ended so long ago)

108. Do you care for that person? - Eh - I guess

109. Is this your boyfriend or girlfriend? - No - No

110. The first time you got drunk, how old were you? - 16 - ^^

111. Where were you located the first time you got drunk? - The afterparty of my highschool formal. It was in the backyard of a girl in my grade - ^^

#other potential titles:#From slim-fit to practically painted on #Very and many times #I just fucked off overseas on my own accord

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