#its just a really weird experience going from having 400$ a month to live on and stealing and getting things from friends

[seraphim-soulmate]

it's strange beyond belief going from thinking "oh I need a new bag" -> finding one on the street that's in pretty good condition and going "yes fuck yes thank GOD I really needed a bag"

TO

thinking "oh I need a new bag"" -> "well I guess I'll add it to my dad's wishlist and we can talk about whether or not he wants to buy it" -> "oh shit he bought the bag for me without me having to convince him of the pros of having this bag. I have a bag that I like and that suits all my needs now and I didn't have to mentally agonize over it"

[celestialarchon]

400+ Followers Celebration!

various genshin impact x f!reader

warnings: fluff/crack/NSFW implications, jokes and innuendos. reverse Isekai storyline and a LOT of attention on reader. SPOILERS FOR IN GAME. Archon spoilers!

As much as you tried, connecting and staying in reality was too hard. It was always the same outcome, finding yourself whisked away to another fantasy land through media. Normally your obsessions didn’t last long, but one game had completely sucked you in. Maybe it was the stress of the nightmare year 2020 or maybe it was the fact that Genshin Impact was everything you loved and more, but you couldn’t get enough. It was getting out of hand as even your roommates had began to play because of the way you romanticized the game. Acquiring most of the five star characters, building several strong teams, and finishing almost all the quests in roughly 5 months.

As an insomniac, it was easy to grind through the game until the sun came up. Sometimes you wondered if it was strange that an adult would be so enamored with a game but shrugged it off. It’d been a hellish year, you deserved to treat yourself.

Yet another night spent entirely on the dreamy land of Teyvat. You yawned and stretched as the sun peaked through the blinds and cursed yourself for not noticing the passing time. Removing your head set, you yawned again, feeling a wave of drowsiness wash over you. It was strange, you’d only been up one night and you were already so tired. Your home was quiet, all the roommates sound asleep as you crept into your bed under the covers. The stuffie you adored so much was soon in your arms as you drifted off, wishing to dream of traveling the world of Teyvat.

An extremely loud crashing sound woke you from your deep sleep. Instinctively you shot up, your arm moved on its own aiming for the space around you and swinging quickly and forcefully. Your fist made contact with something and you shrieked as the strange shadow crumpled. You flew out of your bed and away from the safety of your covers, grasping for the light switch.

Your panicked screeches only grew louder as the figure on the floor groaned and stood upright, still fumbling for the lights. Fingertips finally brushed the switch on the wall and you flipped the lights on. The sudden brightness blinded you for a minute and the mystery person as well. It hit you how stupid it was to turn on the lights in your room as soon as your eyes adjusted. Adrenaline was pumping through your veins as you rushed to the door. You could hear heavy footsteps from the other room. Other people were home you needed to get to them.

“Shiiiiit,” The strange person groaned again, “I drank too much.”

The voice was familiar and made you freeze for a moment. Mentally slapping yourself you darted out of your room but ran straight into a wall. Well, that’s what it felt like, but there wasn’t a wall outside your door. The force of the collision knocked you on your ass and you yelped as you hit the floor.

“Oh? What’s this?” The supposed wall turned to look at you, eyebrows arched as he stared down at you.

Your jaw nearly hit the floor as you looked up at the familiar man. That smooth voice, the long hair, the eyepatch. This had to be some sort of weird dream. No matter how hard you tried to move, your body wouldn’t obey. You heard steps from behind you and glanced back to see another Mondstadt troublemaker. A disgruntled anemo archon was slowly approaching you.

“Ehe, fuck, she hit me hard.” Venti giggled nervously.

“Poor thing,” Kaeya held his hand out to you, “Did the mean little twink scare you?”

The room was spinning, so you took the cryo pirate’s hand. Your jaw was probably still on the floor. His grip was strong and cool, it was bringing you back down to the reality of the situation you were in. Oh, the irony. You were not dreaming. Awestruck, you peered behind Kaeya into your living room to see even more Genshin characters just vibing. The esteemed geo archon was drinking from your favorite mug, two troublesome harbingers bickered in the corner of the room, a certain librarian was flipping through your books, both travelers were attempting to learn how to play uno. It was unreal. A pirate was flirting with a silver haired beauty.There was an astrologist examining your fish tank, an alchemist and a child terrorist asleep on your floor, and a fucking adeptus perched on your couch like a gargoyle.

Your roommates were nowhere in sight and your home was crowded by your fictional lovers. The absolute chaos of it all sent you over the edge. High pitched, clearly unstable laughter erupted from you. What else could you do? Cry? That wouldn’t change anything. All eyes shifted to you as you leaned on the wall, clutching your abdomen and giggling like a madwoman. Kaeya shifted away from you, allowing the others to get a good look at you.

Finally composing yourself, you stood up straight and introduced yourself, “Hello, why are you invading my home?”

“Hey girlie! I’m Childe,” The cheery harbinger nearly skipped up to you shaking your hand, “but you can call me daddy.”

Your face reddened at his bold introduction but you clicked your tongue avoiding his eyes.

“Hello, cutie. I’m Lisa.”

“Albedo, and this is Klee.”

“I tend to go by Zhongli.”

“Beidou! The lovely lady by my side is Ningguang.”

“Adeptus Xiao.”

They all introduced themselves so politely, you almost felt bad for acting a bit crazy. However, that feeling was quickly swept away by Kaeya and his sharp tongue.

“Kaeya, but I believe you already know that,” he smirked at you, “May I ask why you aren’t wearing any pants?”

“Oi, what?” You looked down and gasped.

Venti’s drunk ass had sent you into fight and flight mode so you had forgotten all about your night time attire. You were in an oversized Genshin Impact shirt without any pants on. Shoving Venti out of your way, you rushed to your room to dig for pants. Oh, how you wished you hadn’t forgotten about laundry. You hastily grabbed a pair of shorts that really didn’t do much except cover your underwear.

“I have shorts on now. You just can’t tell because of my shirt.” You declared entering the living room.

Some of the more promiscuous characters giggled at your embarrassment while Zhongli facepalmed and the most serious of them all, Scaramouche and Xiao, simply scowled. You sat on the end of your couch furthest from everybody else, nervous. Nobody had answered your earlier question. Apparently your discomfort was lost on the Adeptus Xiao, or he just didn’t care. He was in front of you in a flash, pinching your face and glaring at you.

“Why did you call us here you foolish mortal?” His tone was more annoyed than murderous.

Zhongli slapped Xiao’s hands away from your face and sat down next to you, “Be nice. She doesn’t know either.”

You nodded at this, and the room erupted in murmurs. Zhongli slipped his arm around you, patting your shoulder sympathetically. Lumine tossed the Uno cards down and glided to you, taking strands of your hair into her hands and beginning to play with it. Perhaps it’s because you played as both the travelers but the three of you seemed to silently click. Scaramouche and Childe began to argue again about something silly. Out of the corner of your eye you saw a certain bard and the charming Sir Kaeya raiding your liquor cabinet.

It was too overwhelming to argue. Lumine took her time playing with your hair while the others attempted to figure out how to go back to their own world. Xiao crept closer to you, truly like a cat. Beidou and Ningguang fawned over you and invited you into their relationship several times. You politely declined, knowing they’d have to go back to their world. It was disappointing and a bit frustrating.

Your wish came true but it was too good to be true. Albedo seemed to notice your silence. He gently maneuvered his adorable little sister off of him and approached you. His eyes were filled with curiosity, your silence only made his thoughts wander further.

“Can I experiment on you?” Albedo was blunt.

“Huh?” You blinked, unsure if you heard him correctly.

“I’m not sure if that was brave or stupid,” Childe snickered, “Has he always been this bold?”

“Tch,” Scaramouche rolled his eyes, “Thats a terrible pick up line, mad scientist.”

“Leave my cutie alone!” Lisa yanked Albedo away from you defensively.

The room was filled with protest at Lisa’s words. Zhongli merely sighed and pulled you closer. Venti’s dumb ass was floating around your living room hiccuping. Xiao was wedging himself between you and the arm of the couch. It was insane. Beidou and Ningguang noticed the two Liyue men snuggling up to you and marched over to the three of you.

Ningguang tried to pull you away from them while Beidou aggressively smacked at Xiao. Xiao was hissing at the beautiful captain and Zhongli was attempting to intervene. You shoved them out of your way and stood up, panicked by the attention. Lisa caught you as you tripped over your own feet but landed face first into her chest. She stroked your hair but was interrupted by Albedo grabbing your wrist and mumbling about experiments. The single moment Childe and Scaramouche got along was to pull you from Albedo but it became a quick tug of war over you.

Somehow, Klee was still asleep and Kaeya was just watching all of it go down.

“Cheeeeeeeeers, bitch bitches,” The Knight slurred.

“Enough.” Lumine and Aether both intervened.

Aether held his hand out to you, “You don’t have to pick now, but please say you’ll come with us?”

“You belong in Teyvat,” Lumine smiled at you warmly.

“So,” Aether continued “What do you say, outlander?”

All eyes were on you as the words left Aether’s lips. What would you do?

[danwhobrowses]

A Personal Rant before Sword and Shield comes out

I’ve sat idly by for months, tried to weather a few negative responses but given that it’s now 6 days from release and I’m hearing that devs are getting literal death threats I’m going to put my foot down

If you’re already shitting on a game that hasn’t been released yet, you are all juvenile bitches, and I’m about to tell you why.

Before we begin, I’m not saying that you’re not allowed to dislike a game, that happens, but usually it happens after you play a game, not before.

You are viewing this game through a keyhole and judging the room and what you’re seeing is not worthy of this much hate. Let’s start with the big one Dexit: Not as Big as You Think Having No National Dex is of course not ideal, but it doesn’t ruin the game. Let’s Go has no National Dex, all it had was Alola forms and nobody whinged about it. Ruby and Sapphire didn’t have a National Dex until FRLG, and nobody whinged about it. Sun and Moon and Ultra Sun and Moon do not have a National Dex And Nobody Whinged About It Do you know why? Because it’s not actually a big deal. People who complain about it are bandwagoning because ‘Dexit’ is a meme, its name literally parodies an event in current Britain that many people don’t actually want to happen.  Now currently, the anger of Dexit is that Bulbasaur and Squirtle are not in it, which frankly is hilarious because the last wave of bitching was ‘Kanto mons are getting all the new stuff’. You wanna know how many main series versions Bulbasaur and Squirtle have not been in? Seven, only way to get them is trade and event. The other complaint is that there’s ‘only 400′ Pokémon. Remember those days where people were fine with 150? 400 is huge, in fact it’s 3 less than USUM and it’s not accounting for the Gigantamax forms Don’t let headlines fool you either, Sun and Moon had 302 Pokémon, it’s far from the ‘lowest dex number since 2003′. Do your own research with these things. Kalos’ regional dex was 151, BW2 was 300, BW 153, Sinnoh 210, RSE has 386 and GSC had 252 Don’t get me wrong, it smarts that some Pokémon isn’t there, but it’s not a dealbreaker, like let’s be honest here. For a good year and a half all your pokémon are gonna do is sit in an unused cartridge or a PC box, you’re literally whining about the fact that you can’t move your perfect IV Pokémon from one box to another. You could simply just let them stay in Let’s Go or USUM, you don’t have to use Bank or Home on continued subscription for that, so your complaints are only set on the foundation that you feel like you have to continually pay to not transfer your Pokémon, Finally, people act like these Pokémon are deleted forever, they’re not, this is for spacing to make sure this game doesn’t break down from the sheer mass of models and textures it has to maintain in a massive open world space, the local and online camping and battles. Just use the Pokémon that are there! There’s new Pokémon don’t you wanna try those? You can also look at FRLG or Emerald and consider that maybe more Pokémon will get patched in once the game proves to be stable. I don’t think you’ve noticed, but the Nintendo Switch isn’t as powerful as the other consoles out there, sometimes it runs like shit. Believe me on that one, Switch is still in a very buggy development phase. Let’s Go was kept small to test it’s capability and Sword and Shield can’t just fly in and give you all 1000 Pokémon just so one of the ones you want can be in there

You have to be much less obtuse with this, I mean this was a long time coming. You’re gonna have to live with the fact that not every Pokémon ever can be supported on one game alone. Disk, Download, Cartridge and Patch Sizes have limits in Compliance, you can’t just throw everything at it. Waah, the New Pokémon Don’t Look Good They do, you’re being petty. It happens every version, the people dislike the starter evolutions or just one in particular. Remember all the Oshawott hate? This all comes and goes because people have simply gone on the first instinct that ‘new and different is scary and should be shunned’ You’re that Simpsons meme when young Homer accuses Grandpa of not being ‘with it’ I won’t spoil to those who haven’t seen it, but I like the new starters, and some of the new Pokémon will need some growing but not every Pokémon looks good at first glance. If Mr Mime, Hypno or Gastly came out nowadays they’d be crapped on so much for lacking creativity or for looking weird. Look at Drampa as well, thing looks like Falkar from The Neverending Story, when I first saw it I thought it look weird but now I like it. You should offer these things time And actually fall back on past experience, you’re reacting like this isn’t the same thing that happens every version; the dex gets leaked, people whine about the evolutions, people get over it and accept that they overreacted. hIgH QuAlItY aNiMaTiOnS I’ve seen that video, 2 clips and you judge a whole game how classy of you? If you don’t see improvement you’re blind. You can’t shit on a game for keeping the battle animations, you can’t expect every Pokémon to move their own unique way to the exact position of the body part the opponent needs to get hit by, that’s just unrealistic. You’re also failing to equate to the new moves and all the new movesets. You have to ensure that each Pokémon is capable of calling this animation as well. The second clip in that video was Hop and Hau having the same rigging, and once again, that’s not abnormal. Rigging is not easy either, do it wrong and it sticks and deforms texture. There’s nothing wrong with Hop having one animation that matches Hau’s, you’ll probably find that many models actually have similar rigging as previous games. Because it’s not that big of a deal and it saves money, as an example look at Disney they copied hand-drawn motion and stuck a different character on them, Robin Hood’s Little John dances just like (animated, for those too young to know otherwise) Jungle Book’s Baloo The thing you’re also ignoring from that clip is the graphical improvement of Hop compared to Hau, Hau looks like a balloon with a smiley face but Hop’s face has depth and his mouth actually moves like a normal person, his clothes have far more contrast and complexity, but no just zero in on one fighting animation and one rigging that’ll surely be worth abusing a game that’s not even out... B-But Charizard I’ve already explained this before but Charizard is Leon’s main, it’s obviously going to have a Gigantamax, ergo it’s also going to be in the Dex. Does Charizard get a lot? Yes, but the reason is because Charizard is popular. One of the rarest cards is a Charizard Hologram Card, Charizard is one of the first version mascots, it is one of the most recognized Pokémon Ash has in the anime Reality of the matter is that like Pikachu, Charizard is a recognized Pokémon for all ages, it appeals to a demographic that’s not playing In Layman’s Terms: that part is not for you A reality you really need to face. Pokémon is a game for all ages, so elements of the game are not always going to be tailored to your age range. The gimmick of Dynamax and Gigantamax is for merch sales and young children because it’s got an audience there, you can’t expect the Biggest Entertainment Brand in the World to simply shut out a large fraction of its demographic just to appeal 100% to you And again, it’s not a big deal, so there’s a Charizard there, just save a Stone Edge and be done with it, if you hate Charizard so much this’ll be catharsis, but in actuality you’re complaining because it’s something to complain about Kanto are getting Everything That went down like a lead balloon didn’t it? Reminder that the first Gigantamax forms were Galar Pokémon, so you can’t really say that anymore. There are Galar forms from non-Gen I Pokémon too I assure you, but the reason Kanto gets a lot of them is because Kanto is the oldest. Let’s not pretend that other gens don’t get love either Or should I remind you of Mega Ampharos, Scizor, Heracross, Houndoom, Tyranitar, Blaziken, Gardevoir, Gallade, Mawile, Aggron, Medicham, Manectric, Banette, Absol, Garchomp, Lucario, Abomasnow, Steelix, Sceptile, Marshtomp, Sableye, Sharpedo, Camerupt, Altaria, Glalie, Salamence, Metagross, Latias, Latios, Rayquaza, Lopunny, Audino and Diancie? It’s true that the Johto starters could use something, but I don’t think they’re being purposefully ignored, perhaps the right design hasn’t come along. Rather it be done right than poorly wouldn’t you agree? The Devs Should’ve Done <Insert Thing Here> People who say this kinda stuff have no idea how a game is made. I have a First Class Bachelor’s degree in Computer Gaming and Animation Technology and I can tell you that none of the stuff you want them to do is easy. Even getting grass right is a complete hassle. You want small insights you should watch Corridor Crew react to Good and Bad VFX, they tell you about the mechanics of CGI a few times on those vids. This is what annoys me with the prior swipe at the Battle animations and rigging, even with 2 years this is a heavily massive workload and Game Freak have only recently expanded the team that work on Pokémon which makes communication much more widespread and difficult to manage, likewise they are working on other games too they are not just Pokémon, currently their next IP is why Toby Fox was able to do a bit of music for Pokémon, because he’s collaborating with them on another game. The work doesn’t stop, most of these people are overworked and still doing overtime, they bring out a good product and all it gets is ‘but it should have this’, and unless it’s a huge part of the game that’s needed to function then that’s really disrespectful Before you start critiquing on what the people making this game ‘should’ve done’ perhaps you should try to make a game yourself, because it is not easy even for pros, I call back to Toby Fox because creating Undertale took 32 Months to create, that’s 2 years and 8 months for those slow with math, it also took 3 years before it could be ported to Switch because the Engine couldn’t support the platform, Pokémon has less time to do that, greater graphical and animation quality to achieve and more characters to battle, attacks to animate and more songs to compose. Conclusion: You’re All Just Bitter I’ve already seen it happen recently but this group of people senselessly bashing something because of ridiculous demands, expectations or arguments based on a lack of understanding all combine into something I’m simply calling the ‘Bitterness Fandom’. It’s people hating for the sake of hating and trying to bring something down just because it’s been a popular force for so long, and it’s not just Pokémon that’s getting it It’s already been happening to Star Wars. The Last Jedi and Solo were great films but the Bitterness sank its fangs in and act like neither are as good as the original trilogy (like killing Snoke without knowing anything about him and Phasma before she could do anything is any different to killing Sidious and Boba Fett in Jedi or Maul in Phantom Menace and Grievous in Revenge of the Sith), a lack of awareness to reality and the desire to complain for the sake of complaining continues to infect Star Wars. We even have a thing called ‘Star Wars Fatigue’ Star Wars can’t release a film every year because of ‘Fatigue’ but Marvel can release 5 MCU films a year and nobody bats an eye. Those frustrations aside, I refuse to let the Bitterness sink in without me calling them out, because you are not Pokémon Fans. If you were you’d know that having no National Dex isn’t new, you’d know that the graphics have improved and leaks of the game happen every time, you’d know why Charizard is popular and that some features are not intended to be targeted at you Shock and Horror to the heavens above but games can’t do everything And if you’re that naive to think so then you’re clearly not doing your homework So let’s throw out an absolutely WILD suggestion shall we? Let’s decide our opinion on a game After playing it? Because shitting on something you don’t even have hands-on experience with it is a fragile pedestal to put yourself on. If we all think it’s bad then, so be it, but I sincerely doubt that is the case When my copy of Pokémon Sword gets delivered to my house I am going to enjoy it because I will not let petty and incorrect statements sway my feelings and I swear to Arceus if you think the Bitterness will bring down Pokémon that easily then you did not see the queue to the London Poké Center that had been amassing since midnight and was forced to stop taking more people when the doors opened What should matter is how you enjoy the game, play it before you judge it And honestly, don’t send death threats, why we need to tell you that is beyond me, the ones who made these games are people who have worked their asses off day in and day out to provide something you aren’t even going to play because one Pokémon isn’t in it, the irony is not lost on me when I say this but deep into the very bottom of my heart: Grow Up. If you don’t like the game, don’t play it, don’t bother people about it, we don’t need your shit here Enjoy the Game People

[buildarocketboys]

Books read 2020: Reviews (1-20)

Decided to write a little review/overview for all the books I’ve read this year. Mostly just for personal record but please feel free to message me about any of these books!

1. Amberlough by Lara Elena Donnelly (Jan 6th – Jan 13th) 8 days 400 pages

I loved this whole trilogy, but this might have been my favourite of all three. I loved the setting (the main reason, apart from the queer characters, why I wanted to read this book) which is a fantasy setting based on the dying days of Berlin during the Weimar Republic. Loved this setting (especially the cabaret/music hall part) and it’s the only book that really features it. I also enjoy (or…find compelling, enjoy might not quite be right since there’s some very ‘yowch’ descriptions regarding torture/being beaten up) the story/plot most in this one, I was on the edge of my seat wanting to know what happened next…

2. Maurice by E.M. Forster (Nov 17th – Jan 21st) 256 pages

This is the only kind of cheat I have in here, because yes I did start reading it in November 2019, but I read the vast majority of it in 2020. I’d wanted to read it for ages because it’s such a gay classic and there were many sections (sentences, paragraphs) that I related to heavily, not even always as a queer person, but in that way that the best books get at the heart of something about the human experience in a way that’s intensely relatable to the reader. I think I found the romance elements kind of anticlimactic overall but maybe that’s kind of the point? It’s a happy ending, but in a very quiet way. (I think, it has been nearly a year since I read it!)

3. East, West by Salman Rushdie (Jan 17th – Jan 24th) 8 days 224 pages

I started reading this to compare it with its Spanish translation for my Postcolonialism in Translation essay lol. Some pretty interesting stories in here, also pretty sure this is the only collection of short stories I read this year, so it has that distinction. Not super my thing but acted as an enjoyable reading break in the local park while I was slogging my way through essays (and God do I miss that life now).

4. Affinity by Sarah Waters (Jan 24th – Jan 31st) 8 days 352 pages

This was the first of three Sarah Waters books I read this year. I have now read all of her work, and I enjoyed this one a lot – very much a ghost story. It wasn’t my favourite, but definitely sits nicely in the middle.

5. The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger (Jan 31st – Feb 5th) REREAD 6 days 500 pages

Reread this while on a trip to York, when stuff like that was still possible. As good as ever. I love Time Traveler’s Wife not for the romance (which is…interesting, but personally I don’t find it exactly enjoyable and the characters aren’t particularly likable or relatable for me) but for the prose and the structure. The back-and-forth structure of the book (travelling through time, Henry – and Clare – at different points in their life) makes for a breathtakingly constructed plot and I love it more every time. Some of the prose and stuff the characters talk about are kind of pretentious but I’m kind of pretentious myself (I discovered  Rilke through TTW) and a lot of it has stuck in my brain, to the point that 10 months later I keep thinking about it and kind of want to read it yet again.

6. Armistice by Lara Elena Donnelly (Feb 5th – Feb 9th) 5 days 400 pages

I really enjoyed this sequel, I loved exploring the rest of the world, I loved the interaction between characters who either hadn’t met before, hadn’t seen each other in years (there’s a time jump between Amberlough and Armistice) and brand new characters (who were mostly equally as compelling/lovable). A worthy sequel.

7. Consider the Fork: A History of How We Cook and Eat by Bee Wilson (Feb 13th – Feb 24th) 12 days 327 pages

My thing (at least non-fiction-wise) this year has been books about food and food history, and this is the first of those on this list. It was pretty good, very interesting. I have trouble retaining information from non-fiction books so I only remember it in the broadest strokes (and remember reading it in the Hygge café in Sheffield which was really cool and I hope it’s survived the pandemic) but it was a really eye-opening look into different appliances/tools/processes/spaces used throughout history and in different parts of the world when it comes to food and cooking.

8. Bi: Notes for a Bisexual Revolution by Shiri Eisner (Feb 25th – Mar 11th) 16 days 352 pages

I read this in the period just before everything started shutting down and the day I finished it (incidentally my girlfriend’s birthday) was more or less the start of the lockdown for us, so that’s my prevailing memory of this book. It was a very good, enlightening look into bi politics and what we (I, as a white gentile especially) could do better. But again, I don’t remember it in great detail because I was more preoccupied with what was happening around it.

9. Solitaire by Alice Oseman (Mar 14th – Mar 16th) 3 days 392 pages

This was pretty good but I definitely read most YA (well, reality-based YA) as an easy, quick read that doesn’t challenge me too much, so I don’t have too much to say about it. It was nice to read about the Heartstopper characters

10. What If It’s Us by Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera (Mar 17th – Mar 20th) 4 days 437 pages

Again, early lockdown YA so basically brain popcorn for me. That’s not a bad thing though.

11. The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters (Mar 20th – Mar 30th) 11 days 512 pages

This was my least favourite of the Sarah Waters books I read this year, and probably not coincidentally, the only book of hers without explicit queer characters. But still a pretty good scary story.

12. Amnesty by Lara Elena Donnelly (Apr 1st – April 6th) 6 days 384 pages

The last in the trilogy. I still liked it very much, but not as much as the first two books. I think endings to a trilogy are hard to get right. I feel like there was too much focus on one character and his predicament (and while I enjoyed his ending and happily ever after with probably m favourite character of the series), I wasn’t as compelled by this one as I was by the other two.

13. Lisey’s Story by Stephen King (Apr 6th – Apr 15th)  10 days 513 pages

My first Stephen King! I actually really enjoyed this, especially the scary fantasy dream world thing. It wasn’t too scary for me (I am a big scaredy cat who’s just dipping my toe into horror novels since I figure reading horror is moderately less scary than watching it) and just overall pretty good.

14. This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone (Apr 16th – Apr 20th) 5 days 209 pages

Loved this! The meandering almost poetry of it, the epic enemies to lovers, the weird admixture of sci fi and larger than life fantasy concepts (and beings!). Will definitely return to this one again.

15. Five Hundred Mile Walkies by Mark Wallington (Apr 21st – Apr 25th) REREAD 5 days 224 pages

I read this as a young teenager and found it hilarious. It was one of my dad’s books (he might even have recommended it to me, although I did have a habit of reading anything and everything that was in the bookcase – Memoirs of a Geisha at about 13, anyone?) and I laughed out loud practically every page. The gist of it is that Mark takes his sister’s (or sister’s ex??) dog, Boogie and goes to walk the entire 500 miles of the South West coast path. I loved this anyway because I loved the South West (especially Cornwall) and love seeing it through someone else’s eyes. So I reread it and I still enjoyed it, but didn’t find it as rip roaringly hilarious as I used to. Guess your sense of humour changes as you grow up, who knew?

16. Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café by Fannie Flagg (Apr 27th – May 10th) 14 days 416 pages

I’ll be honest, I struggled with this one. I’m not sure if it was the setting (historically, geographically, linguistically) that put me off or the way it was written or what. I enjoyed the story but it just wasn’t really my thing.

17. The Night Watch by Sarah Waters (May 11th – May 17th) 7 days 528 pages

My final Sarah Waters book (until she writes more! *fingers crossed*) and definitely my favourite of the ones I read this year. Set during the Blitz in London, it’s pretty much straight up historical fiction, and I enjoyed it very much. I think part of it was I related heavily to the characters going through this dramatic time in history, because, you know, pandemic! There were certain passages that really connected with me/felt like an echo of today in a way that was sort of comforting, I guess.

18. Doctor Who: The Maze of Doom by David Solomons (May 18th – May 19th) 2 days 272 pages

A fun, quick and easy Doctor Who romp. Not much to say about this one.

19. Room by Emma Donoghue (May 19th – May 20th) 2 days 321 pages

Possibly the opposite of the previous. If you know anything about Room (the book or the film, which I actually watched years ago) then you know the subject matter is pretty dark and harrowing. Because it’s told through the eyes of a child however, I found it pretty easy (in terms of speed rather than subject matter) to get through and read it in about 24 hours. It’s super compelling too.

20. The Psychology of Time Travel by Kate Mascarenhas (June 6th – June 11th) 6 days 372 pages

This, as far as I remember, was just a random one that I managed to pick up (metaphorically since I read this as an ebook) but it was pretty good. Possibly my favourite random discovery of the year, an interesting look on time travel and its consequences, based around the discovery/invention of time travel by four women scientists in the 1960s (I think) and how it affects the rest of their lives.

[whetstonefires]

Okay, it’s been about a year but here is the second-to-last of the fics I signed up to write for the go-fund-cee drive! For @jes-cher, who has been lovely and understanding about my choice paralysis bullshit.

I’ll be posting a shorter, darker Jason-focused one later, as apology for slow. Ten months of beating my head against my first idea for this prompt before it occurred to me I could just. Write something else. It doesn’t matter if it’s a great idea if it’s clearly not getting written! 😌 Rip.

(Anon who’s the only one left, please feel free to contact me with a new prompt if you’re no longer interested in your original request after this amount of time, or have justifiably lost faith in my ability to execute it, as I chronicled my battle with Lobdell’s writing style, and would prefer I give you 10,000 words of something else. I’ll still post what I have written for that prompt already!)

-&-

Gotham wasn’t actually that bad a city. Steph had actually lived in a few different ones now, and visited lots, and for all the crap her hometown got, it stood up pretty well. The architecture was nice; good balance of eras, a unified aesthetic with a lot of variety to keep it interesting.

The street system wasn’t ideal, especially in the old parts of town, but they didn’t have any of the traffic nightmares of New York or, really, most of the rest of the metro belt. Only Metropolis did a better job at avoiding gridlock.

Public transit was robust and reached most of the city, and while the buses weren’t wonderful they weren’t bad. Sometimes they were even on time. The libraries and schools were all pretty well funded, because the Wayne Foundation made up the tax shortfall in districts with below average income. The street lights usually worked, and the cops were a lot more chill than most places unless they thought you were a supervillain, in which case they still probably wouldn’t shoot you, even if maybe they probably should.

The supervillain problem was worse than average, she could admit that, but crime as a whole actually wasn’t. Air pollution had been really bad forty years ago, and the river still wasn’t anywhere you’d like to swim, but that was true of a lot of places, and their reputations didn’t linger like this. She’d been to Paris! Gotham sanitation workers were about 400% more successful, and they kept working through frankly ludicrous conditions! Possibly they were paid really well, she didn’t know.

The weather, though. She’d give the world that one. Gotham’s weather was consistently terrible, awful, no-good, and deserved everything anyone had ever said about it.

Which made it actually really weird that their supervillain problem featured someone with a plant theme.

“Move somewhere tropical, Eisley!” she groused, as she swung to the next roof, careful of her footing. “Cultivate jungles! Save the planet! Stop making us come out in the freezing rain to deal with your unseasonable bullshit.”

She paused for a second on her last rooftop perch, both to gather herself and in case Ivy took the cue. She often did. Supervillains in general seemed to have a hard time resisting a straight line—which Steph could relate to, honestly. And she’d caught Batman holding back his entrance for the most ironic dramatic moment before, so it wasn’t just a villain thing.

No villain attack, which was good, because Steph was on her own out here. This was hopefully just a scouting mission. Probably Poison Ivy wasn’t even here.

This afternoon, just after lunch, as Steph was getting off work, every park in the city had suddenly erupted with enormous…growths. They were tree-shaped, thirty feet high with little crinkled green leaf things at the top, but from what inspection had been done so far seemed more like fungus than anything. The spreading limbs had a weird rubbery texture.

Steph was calling them Doom Broccolis.

Whatever they were, they were suspicious as heck, and in response to their appearance Batman had immediately rallied the troops. Which had quickly led to the discovery that Red Robin was missing, and had been for at least eleven hours. He’d never checked in last night.

The troops had promptly been rallied even more urgently, and dispersed across the city to its various infested green spaces.

So Steph’s mission, like everyone’s, was twofold—see if she could learn anything about Ivy’s scheme in time to foil it, and search for any sign of Tim. If they were lucky, he’d just dropped out of contact voluntarily for unrelated reasons and could be yelled at later. If not… Well. If not, he needed them.

She’d been telling herself all the way here that she appreciated that Duke and Damian were the ones who’d been sent out with each other as backup, that she was respected and trusted to operate solo and that was a good thing. The practical side of her would really prefer backup please, and the insecure one kept murmuring that maybe what it really proved was Batman cared less if she died.

Batgirl gave herself a little shake. Shut up, little voice, she told it, and mentally squashed the slug of it under her heel. She adjusted her gas mask to make sure the seal was tight. Time to get her reconnoiter on.

And hopefully not have to fight the most powerful metahuman in Gotham by herself on unfavorable terrain, in the freezing rain. That would be really great.

There was almost no sound as she crept through the nasty rubbery grove that had erupted in the long narrow triangle that was Hyde Park.

The broccolis themselves were silent, not even creaking or rustling in the occasional gusts that drove the freezing rain at an angle, and city traffic and all the sounds of people were hushed on a day like today, between the weather and the large-scale supervillain incident. Everyone who could be was either out of town or at home, stuffing newspaper into any cracks in case of spores.

After an unenlightening loop around about half the perimeter, Steph was forced to drop to ground level and forge her way into enemy territory. The doom broccolis had avoided uprooting any existing trees or large shrubs, which meant the spacing was slightly uneven and in some places there was no easy way through on foot, but for the most part they were far enough apart to leave plenty of corridors of sky for Steph to stay out under—cover from line of sight wasn’t worth putting herself directly below the things, if she could help it.

Fairly quickly, she noticed something that had not been in the photos from the main infestation in Robinson Park, forty minutes ago.

She clicked her comm on. “Hey,” she murmured just above the subvocal range, for the throat mic. She’d mostly gotten the knack of subvocalizing rather than whispering, which didn’t engage the vocal cords and which the microphone pasted to her neck therefore didn’t pick up well. “Is anybody else seeing…fruit? On the broccolis?”

There was a second of dead air, and then Red Hood said, with a grimace you could hear, “yeah. Like…huge brown cherries, on a couple of ‘em.”

“The ones here are more or less mushroom colored,” reported Signal from Finger Park. “But kind of like cherries, yeah.”

“Don’t touch them,” warned Batman, with the condescending Dad-instinct need to tell everyone things they already knew. Steph was in the middle of rolling her eyes when she rounded another broccoli and froze dead.

“Holy crap.” The broccoli mushroom tree at the middle of Hyde Park was bearing fruit that wasn’t shaped like cherries at all. Batgirl’s first thought had been holy shit it’s people, but then she’d taken her second look, and now it was worse. “Team,” she said, trying to keep her voice professional, “I… think I found Red Robin.”

Because dangling from the central broccoli, by dark hair that turned into green stems just before joining the bough, were seven still vaguely formless figures, torsos partially sheathed in giant green leaves like Ivy wore sometimes for modesty, and with arms and legs looking just barely stuck together. Like a partly melted wax figure, or dragon fruit that wasn’t quite ripe. The fingers and toes were mostly fused, and greenish at the tips. The faces were kind of melty too, hopefully enough so that they wouldn’t be a sure match against a photo to a stranger, but not so much that Steph couldn’t instantly recognize the lines of one of the faces she knew best in the world.

There were seven under-ripe Tim Drakes growing from a broccoli tree.

A clamor of demands for clarification was starting in her comm, and she crept forward as she waited for Batman and Oracle to quiet them all down. There was a bulge halfway up the meaty-looking trunk. “I said ‘think,’” she murmured, studying the nearest Tim-fruit for signs it was actually the real one, “because this broccoli—”

Something slammed into her from the side before she could say any more, heavy and cold and leaving her head ringing and her stupid gas mask flying away, and the combination of experience and instinct only barely let her leap and handspring with the blow, just fast enough to avoid the grasp of the thing that had struck her.

Her boots and glove almost skidded in the freezing-rain-on-grass and left her wiping out, but the jagged rubber treads she’d selected specifically for moments like this saved the day.

Steph made a three-point landing and stared up at Poison Ivy, standing looking thunderous on the top of a huge coil of some sort of vine, several more of them lashing around her like octopus arms. Steph couldn’t even tell which one had hit her.

Oh shit oh shit oh shit, Steph thought, and grinned.

“Gotta try harder than that, Pam!”

No one was talking in her ear. The ear she’d been smacked in. She reached up to check. Yeah, the comm had had it.

She couldn’t be sure about the throat mic—the stick-on patch it was under was still in place but she was pretty sure it got most if not all of its broadcast strength from the earbud unit, so it probably wasn’t transmitting to the others anymore but it might be. She’d keep that in mind to a) pass info just in case and b) try not to embarrass herself, in case there was a silent audience.

Ivy didn’t go straight for the kill, so Steph took the time to readjust her stance into a slightly more upright, flexible posture that kept both her hands free, though she didn’t bother to straighten her cape, which had gotten flipped forward over her right shoulder while she was flipping around.

“You’re planting dude-trees now, Pam?” She and Ivy absolutely weren’t on close enough terms to use first names, even if the meta lady had currently been on the upswing and working with the Birds of Prey again, instead of on a sharp down and terrorizing the city. “What, real guys not listening to you anymore?”

“Human beings are disgusting resource sinks,” Ivy said, in a tone of abstracted disgust that didn’t omen well for her losing her head and making a mistake. “Especially men. I’ve always been working on alternatives. Sadly,” she gave a shallow sigh, inspecting her nails, “the ones I’ve developed have always been…limited.”

Steph nodded sagely. “The veggieburger problem,” she agreed. “Hard to get a plant to do the job of meat.”

Ivy glared. Hah. That one got her. “My new varietal,” she snapped, “will overcome that problem. Each specimen engulfs and consumes one large mammal, and produces fruits that mimic the full intelligence and abilities of the prey sample, in a vegetable form completely loyal to me.”

Steph gaped, because one, that was the most terrifying thing Ivy had done in years, and two, consumes was a very very alarming word in this context. “The Doom Broccolis are carnivorous?” she did not actually squeak. She really hoped her throat mic was still working. Even if it wasn’t, though, backup should be incoming.

Ivy rolled her eyes. “They are not even distantly related to broccoli. And yes, although the digestion process doesn’t really set in until the fruits ripen; the early experiments failed to reproduce cognitive function accurately, due to the breakdown of key tissues.”

Whew. So Tim had…at least a little time left, probably. Steph looked uneasily around the grove of horrible flesh fungus. “I don’t see any loyal broccoli people,” she said. Maybe they were off guarding the other parks?

Ivy scowled. “Of course not. The early cultivars weren’t large enough for human trials, obviously.”

…so there were loyal vegetable guinea pigs or something. Sometimes it was easy to forget Ivy had once been an actual lab scientist.

“So wait, you haven’t actually done a person before and you start with—him?” Steph caught herself at the last second; she didn’t know which identity Tim had been caught in.

“Why not? Red Robin is an excellent specimen. Good balance of strength, strategy, and unlike Batman actually takes direction.” Ivy made a sour face, like her inability to control any version of Batman for long was a thorn in her side.

“Is that what you think,” said Steph, who had had the experience of trying to control Tim Drake. He did try to be accommodating, about most things, usually, and he did take direction better than Batman, for what that was worth, but in the end he’d always go off and do whatever he thought best, no matter what, and possibly let you yell at him about it later.

If anyone could take stock of his preconceived values and identity issues and think his way into a twisty workaround for inbuilt loyalty programming in order to fuck over his creator, she’d bet it would be a perfect copy of Tim.

“Also I caught him skulking around my newest greenhouses,” Ivy shrugged. “Waste not, want not. Recycling is good for the Earth.”

Haha, Ivy had just called Tim garbage. Harsh. But as interesting as it would be to see if the veggie-Tims actually did go rogue, them waking up would mean Tim was now actively dying if not already dead. So no. Not that funny.

Steph caught the enemy’s eyes shuttling subtly toward the central broccoli with its heavy burden of fruit. Aha. Just as she had suspected. (As of like…six seconds ago.)

Poison Ivy had been keeping Batgirl talking, buying time for her Tims to ripen.

Steph appreciated the compliment of putting off the fight rather than counting on being able to end it quickly, but she’d been buying time, too. And unlike Ivy, she was done shopping.

Her Batgirl cape wasn’t nearly as wide cut as her Spoiler cloak had been, not as good for hiding things in, but she’d contrived to use its cover to take out and arm nine individual exploding batarangs while they talked. That was more than she carried normally, or even would be allowed to carry normally, but when you were fighting evil trees more ordinance tended to be called-for, and Batman had issued a supply.

Without wasting time, she started throwing. Her aim had never been especially exact, something Damian liked to give her a hard time about, but here all she had to hit was ‘an entire tree.’ No fiddly precision targets today. She had to aim for the ones not showing fruit or trunk bulges, which she was going to have to trust didn’t have people inside, rather than having just recently acquired very tiny people—this seemed like a safe bet since Ivy tended to be soft on kids.

Not enough to stop periodically trying to destroy humanity for their sake, but enough that it was hard to imagine her hurting one face to face.

“No!” Ivy shouted. She got points for not leaping toward the blinking explosives to try to stop them, sending vines striking like snakes instead, but she was too busy doing that to get away from the bomb that had landed only about five feet away from her.

The blast blew her off her feet, and clear off her pedestal of green. She’d managed to remotely yank two of the batarangs out before they went off, saving those doom fungi, but Steph wasn’t worried about that; she’d successfully set the supervillain up for the kind of fatal misjudgment in defense of plants Batman always said was the surest way to beat her, and now she charged in to make the most of it.

She got there in plenty of time to really put her weight behind a punch hammering down into Ivy’s face, then kicked her in the chest, heel driving in just below the collarbone. Ivy gave a very human uph and pained expression, though she didn’t fall, and Steph went for another kick, this one more carefully aimed.

This was a mistake. One green-tinted hand came up and closed around her ankle like a Venus flytrap made of carbon steel, and in one sharp uncoiling move Eisley rose to her feet and with a twist of her whole torso flung Steph head over heels across the grove.

She realized somewhere between getting thrown and suppressing the urge to vomit as she gyroed upside-down that she’d been thrown straight for one of the remaining undamaged, unfruiting tree-things. Could see the surface getting sort of…gelatinous in preparation for her impact, which was so many flavors of no.

Her hands didn’t fumble at her belt, courtesy of many hours of drills and live practice, even as instinct screamed for rush and now now now.

Her grapple caught in one of the spreading ‘boughs’ at the top of another broccoli, and she tugged the line to send herself swinging out on a long arc just short of making contact with the fungus that wanted to eat her.

She peppered the air in front of her with ordinary, nonexplosive Batarangs as she came back around on the end of the wire—Ivy smacked these casually aside, but it made enough of a distraction that Pam didn’t notice in time the moment when Steph got her backup grapple into a different tree, and accelerated.

Going for a kick would have been the smart, safe option, but Steph was rarely smart and almost never safe, so instead of slamming her full body weight heel-first into the supervillain and hoping it stuck this time, she grabbed with the full strength of endless thigh workouts and dragged Ivy clear off her feet.

Ivy’s plants were protective, but they tended to rely heavily on her for targeting anything that wasn’t right in front of them, so keeping her disoriented was a good idea if you could manage it. It said so in her file. So this part, the grabbing, had been an actual plan, even if one it had taken about two seconds to make, and even if ‘hit the supervillain essentially with your crotch’ was probably a combat recommendation no one would make ever.

The next part was sheer impulse, based on how much easier Ivy was to move than expected—maybe her punch resistance wasn’t so much physical density as some sort of supernatural rootedness, and if you could get her off the ground it stopped working?

Steph released the retraction mechanism on her secondary grapple and let it start paying out again, an instant before she hit the max-strength retract button on her original grapple, the one that was still in her other hand, and gripping a bough halfway across the grove.

Her right shoulder screamed, but Ivy let out a startled choking sound as their trajectory wrenched around out of the arc Steph had been carrying her into headfirst, and shot the other way. Which meant she was still discombobulated, which meant Steph still had the upper hand, shoulder or no.

Steph picked the right moment as they went rocketing back, and let go. Momentum kept Ivy flying, and none of her plants reacted to catch her in midair before she landed. Right on target.

Ivy sank headfirst into her own carnivorous fungus tree, in the gelatinous patch where she’d tried to throw Steph. Her legs kicked once, and then fell still. “See how you like it!” Steph shouted, which was perhaps not the wittiest repartee ever, but she didn’t care.

She landed, staggering a little because her shoulder might be dislocated a little bit and was definitely killing her. And normally she wouldn’t turn her back on a villain just because she’d gotten one good hit and they hadn’t immediately gotten up again, but what she’d been fighting for this whole time was time, because the window of opportunity to stop Tim Drake-Wayne from being reduced to protein goo and the pattern for a bunch of veggie-copies was closing fast. This wasn’t a defeat-top-rank-supervillain-solo mission, this was a rescue mission.

She pelted back toward the relevant tree, holding up the elbow of her bad arm with the opposite hand against the jolt. How to get him out? With two good arms she could have climbed or grappled up to the level of the bulge that represented the broccoli’s prey and started cutting, but it would be hard to get good leverage. Was there a better option?

One of the Tim-fruits twitched on its stem. Fuck it.

Steph recalled the grapple-end of her holdout gun from where it had been since she use it to get the drop on Ivy, fired it into the gummy-looking limbs of the Tim tree, and hauled herself up. She needed to start carrying a better cutting implement than a Batarang, how did Midnight Boy Scout not mandate that already, but for now she gripped one swoopy sharp black wing awkwardly in her gauntleted left hand, braced toes and knees against the nasty cool-flesh stem, and put all the strength her bad arm had into cutting through the tough husk.

It wouldn’t cut.

More of the Tims were starting to move. Their copy nervous systems booting up or whatever.

The whole tree seemed like it was twitching, and then she realized it was, or rather just the lump under her feet was, and she pulled back her Batarang just in time for something thin and yellow to burst out through the surface of the Doom Broccoli, and disappear, leaving an almost invisibly thin slash that dribbled a transparent greenish fluid that reminded Steph of aloe vera gel but smelled more like old mango and artichoke.

The rubbery husk was being sliced up from the soft, inner side with the hawks-head emblem that belonged in the middle of Red Robin’s chest, which wouldn’t you know was a holdout throwing star thing after all, just like his R used to be. She should’ve known.

Talk about impractical shapes for a knife.

“Keep going, you’ve almost got this.”

Whether he heard her or not, he went on thrashing and slashing, and Steph with her Batarang tore as best she could with her bad arm at the shreds between cuts, trying to get them to snap and let all the thin slashes add up to one hole large enough to escape through.

The Tim-fruits were still twitching. Would they fall to the ground and then peel their limbs free like they were breaking out of husks, and get up and start walking around? Or would they need to get all the way to looking like functioning humans before detaching from the stems?

A whole arm burst out in a rush of goo. They were going to make it.

The fingers of the nearest fruit came unstuck, one by one, curling around air the way Tim curled his around a staff.

And then he was out, headfirst and gooey.

“Man, Ex-Boyfriend Wonder,” Steph sighed, as she let him grab onto her and lowered them on a slowly paying-out jumpline, helping him reach the ground with slightly more dignity than clawing his way down the slime-encrusted ruptured stem of his prison would have allowed, assuming he hadn’t just landed face-first and died. “Why’d you have to go breaking yourself loose at the last second like that? I was supposed to be the hero!”

“Believe me, you—pbbbft—were,” Tim answered, pausing partway to spit out a mouthful of sap-gel that he must somehow have been breathing in there. “I’d never have even managed to wake up if you hadn’t turned up to distract Ivy and make such a racket. I could feel her speeding it up, toughening up the…things, pushing.” The shiver was understated enough Steph might not have noticed it if he hadn’t been clinging to her waist. She eyed the Tim fruits. They’d stopped moving. Good?

Feet on the ground, Tim brushed fruitlessly at the slime all over his costume, then obviously gave it up as a bad job. “Where is she?” he asked, looking around.

“Over there.” Steph landed too, and pointed to where Ivy was still embedded head-first in a broccoli.

She’d disappeared up to the waist, and didn’t seem to be making any effort to get out. In fact, as they watched she seemed to sink in another centimeter.

“Okay, that’s a bit better than a distraction,” Tim acknowledged. “But also I don’t think we should let her finish. I don’t want to fight a dozen vegetable Poison Ivys.”

“Don’t like to eat your vegetables?” Steph teased, even as she sized up the situation—should they pull Ivy out, probably the faster option but then they’d probably have to fight her some more right away, or try cutting down the Doom Broccoli with her still in it, more thorough?

“Yeah actually I’m not going to be able to look any cabbage varietals in the face for the next six months,” said Tim, apparently agreeing they were broccoli regardless of their creator’s opinion and the mango smell, “but come on. It’s never good when villains start to spawn. Chiraxes was bad enough.”

“Blegh,” Steph admitted. The duplicate Drury Walkers had at least had a super short lifespan and been self-disposing. “Okay, I’m all out of bombs. You?” Probably a dumb question, given all his storage space had been confiscated.

“Ivy took my belt and everything in my bandoliers,” Red Robin admitted, touching the cape closure thing at the top of them, where he’d shoved his little sigil-thing back into place in spite of all the goo. His stupid little gimmicks would be easier to make fun of if they worked out less often, lucky stiff.

“But she left that.” Because Tim had all the luck when it came to details like that. “And your mask?” Not that Ivy had ever cared much about things like the Bats’ secret identities.

He shrugged. “I guess she didn’t expect it to be relevant long.” Anything she wanted to know from or about him, the copies could have told her, soon enough. And he wouldn’t have mattered, once he was dead.

This had been another close one; Steph got those feelings out with a little shiver of her own. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s do something about Ivy. Everybody else should be here soon.”

“Backup,” Tim sighed, pushing his hair back from his face and having it stick that way, messily moussed with doom fungus glop. “I love having backup.”

“Sure didn’t act like it back in the day.”

“I am an older and wiser man now. Who values being alive and made of the original meat products.”

Steph stole a glance over her shoulder at the Tim tree. “…I’m really glad those things aren’t waking up.”

“Me too. Think of the ethical implications.”

Steph side-eyed him, not sure whether that was intentional humor or not, then decided it didn’t matter and elbowed him in the ribs anyway. She immediately broke into a run to avoid any counter-attacks, bad arm carefully supported once again. “Race you to the supervillain!”

[miguel-manbemel]

Aspects & Fanfics Ep. 39: Alone in the Dark

As it has been the norm lately, 14 days have passed and I present you with a new episode of the main narrative of the blog. In this episode, although I had made mentions of it in previous episodes, I fully start mentioning the quarantine and the effect it’s having on Thomas and the Sides, which is gonna be the base for this episode. Some of it is inspired on my own experience of being under quarantine in Spain, which is one of the countries that had the strictest confinements in all the world (we couldn’t leave the house at all except to buy first necessity goods, like basic food and medicines, and the penalty for breaking the lockdown was of 400 euros, with the possibility of even going to jail) I know in America the confinement wasn’t that strict (at least I read they let people get out to do some exercise, always keeping social distancing) but a confinement is a confinement anyway and when its as long as this one, it can take a toll on anyone, including character Thomas. That’s what I’m exploring in this episode. I hope you enjoy it and I’m leaving you with it now. Until next time.

SYNOPSIS: It’s been four months of confinement. Thomas is feeling very lonely, even hopeless, so he calls Joan. They give him the idea of visiting him in the Mind Palace since now they can enter from any physical location at their own free will, and so they both meet there. Roman visits them and soon they realize he’s not feeling well at all, and it doesn’t help matters that Thomas once again gets possessed by his Dark Master self, threatening to wreak havoc all over the Mind Palace.

WARNINGS: Mentions to lack of hope, sickness and the possibility of death. Romantic prinxiety, dukeceit and logicality. Remus and Janus make some innuendo references.

In memory of the great acting lady, Dame Olivia de Havilland (1916-2020), one of the best actresses of the last century. May she rest in peace and her work never be forgotten.

EPISODE INDEX

[Thomas is playing video games in his living room. He seems to be struggling on a difficult level. When he was almost on the verge of finally completing it, he’s beaten out]

THOMAS: [yelling] MOTHERF… [bleep] [bleep] you fu… [bleep] [bleep] [bleep] son of a fu… [bleep] b… [bleep] [bleep] [bleep]

[the screen pauses. Patton’s voice is heard off-screen]

PATTON: Don’t adjust your TV sets, kiddos. Your speakers are totally safe and… sound.

LOGAN: [voice in the distance] Holy sh… [bleep]

PATTON: Logan, please, get your bleeping act together! As I was saying, Thomas is just going through a fit of inappropriate language to vent out his frustration over having to restart that level he’d worked so hard on. Remember, kiddos, it’s not nice to use this kind of language at home. Use instead clean alternatives like “Dadgummit”, “Son of a bee-sting”, or my favorite, “What the fwah?”

REMUS: [voice abruptly interrupting Patton’s voice] Naaah, to the f… [bleep] with that! These words are in the English dictionary so why the f… [bleep] shouldn’t we use them? Let people express themselves however they f… [bleep] …ng want, Patton! Okay, I just wanted to leave that there, go on with whatever boring voice-over you were doing. See ya!

PATTON: [loud sigh] As I was saying, signal will be resumed ten minutes after Thomas calms down so your ears don’t suffer any longer. Roman, if you don’t mind, could you serve us a flash-forward, please?

ROMAN: [off voice] At your service, Patton! Rolling title screen, before the green goblin decides to come back!

[intro sequence]

THOMAS: [still angry but more calm] What is up, everybody? [sighs] Sorry about earlier. I shouldn’t have reacted as verbally angry as I did, and I apologize. It’s just that this quarantine thing is driving me crazy. I know it’s the right thing to do and that it’s hard for everyone and that it is our duty to comply, because everybody’s health, even lives, are at risk, so I’ve complied without fail. I only got out when strictly necessary to buy food, hygiene products, or medicines if I needed them, always wearing my mask and keeping social distancing, and I stayed home otherwise. But it’s been four months already and… every day is harder than the previous and… I also miss hugging my friends and family. I must endure, I know, that’s what I keep telling myself all the time. I thought, as an introvert, this would have been much easier, but one thing is avoiding social contact because you want to and another thing is being deprived of social contact by someone else. I never thought I would say this, but… I miss social contact, every day more. [sighs] Sorry about this rant. I have no one to talk face to face like that, so… yes I have my Sides, but they are me, so it’s not the same… I think I need to talk to Joan. Maybe I should call them. They always have that word of wisdom that helps me see the light in any situation, like all best friends do. I’ll call them. I hope they’re not too busy… Oh, what am I saying? We’re all confined at home, they’re as busy as I am right now.

[Thomas picks up his phone and calls Joan. After a couple of seconds, Joan picks it up]

JOAN: Hi dude.

THOMAS: Hi Joan.

JOAN: What’s up?

THOMAS: Nothing, really. I just needed to hear your voice… Wow this sounded way different in my head, I…

JOAN: It’s okay, I got it. Are you okay, Thomas?

THOMAS: To be honest, I’m kinda feeling like a mess right now. I’m getting a fit of longing for speaking to someone face to face. You’re lucky you’re spending quarantine with Talyn, at least you got each other to hold each other’s back. But I’m feeling so alone in my house right now… I’m sorry I’m venting on you. I don’t want to make you feel as down as I am right now…

JOAN: It’s okay, Thomas, that’s what friends are for and I’m happy to listen to you when you’re feeling bad, just like you listen to me when I’m in your place.

THOMAS: Thank you, Joan.

JOAN: Say, I suddenly got an interesting idea.

THOMAS: What is it?

JOAN: You know, I cannot go there in person to cheer you up, no matter how much I’d wish to do so…

THOMAS: I’d truly wish you to come here in person too. [sighs] but I guess that can only happen in my imagination right now…

JOAN: You read my mind, Thomas.

THOMAS: What?

JOAN: Have you forgotten? Thanks to us synchronizing our brainwaves I can enter inside your Mind Palace any moment, from any physical location. Why don’t we hang out in your Mind Palace so we can see each other face to face?

THOMAS: Oh, my goodness… that’s the best idea you’ve ever had, and you’ve got a lot of great ideas! But wouldn’t it be dangerous because of the virus?

JOAN: I don’t think so. I never heard of a virus spreading inside imagination. Have you? Besides, you said that Sides don’t get human diseases. I presume that also goes for people in the Mind Palace. It’s worth a try, at least. Don’t you think?

THOMAS: I think you’re right. Let’s try. Are you ready?

JOAN: I’m already concentrating. Hang up the phone and I’ll see you there.

THOMAS: Got it!

[Thomas hangs up the phone. Then he concentrates and sinks down. He rises up in a random room in the Mind Palace. After a couple of seconds, Joan rises up next to him]

JOAN: Hi, Thomas.

THOMAS: [happy] Joan! I’m so happy to see you in the flesh, you don’t have an idea!

[Thomas gives Joan a hug. Then he summons a couch and they both sit down]

JOAN: So, how are you doing, Darude Sanderstorm?

THOMAS: Well, as I told you… I’m feeling a little lonely at the moment. And this quarantine thing seems like it’s never gonna end. It’s driving me mad. Literally.

JOAN: Thomas, don’t lose hope. This has to end some day. You’ll see how, when we least expect it, they’ll find an effective vaccine and we’ll finally wake up from this nightmare.

THOMAS: I’m trying to, Joan, but lately, my hope has become so frail.

[Roman rises up in front of them]

ROMAN: [princely pose and smile] Did someone say prince?

THOMAS: What? No… But hi, anyway, Roman.

ROMAN: [confused] That’s weird, I would have sworn that this time you wished to summon me for certain, so I came… Are you sure you don’t need me?

JOAN: Well, maybe you could be of help, Roman, now that I think about it. Sit down here, please.

ROMAN: Okay…

[Roman walks to the couch. When he’s almost there, he stumbles. Joan grabs him before he falls down]

JOAN: Whoa! Be careful, Roman!

ROMAN: [giggling nervously] Haha… I tripped… Thanks for grabbing me, Joan, you’re my hero.

JOAN: You’re welcome. [mumbles in confusion, looking at the ground] What did you trip on, anyway? There’s nothing on the ground… [normal voice] Are you okay?

ROMAN: [sits down next to Joan] Yes, I’m… I’m totally okay, don’t worry. Well, how can I assist you?

JOAN: Well, you thought we were calling you and in a way you were right. The truth is we weren’t calling you by your name, or by the name Princey or anything… But we were discussing about Thomas’ frail hope… And you are Thomas’ hope, aren’t you?

ROMAN: [sighs] I think I know where you’re going, Joan… Thomas, I’m so sorry.

THOMAS: Sorry? For what? I don’t understand.

ROMAN: I’ve been feeling a lack of strength lately that I cannot ignore any longer.

THOMAS: What? But you’ve been working as usual. I may have stopped proper filming, but I never stopped writing, much less imagining stories. I’d say you’re working as good as usual.

ROMAN: Not in the creativity department, but in the hope department. I’m doing my best, but I’m running out of strength to keep your spirits up and you’re feeling the effects of it.

THOMAS: Oh…

JOAN: Do you have any idea of why is it getting so difficult for you to maintain Thomas’ hope strong enough?

ROMAN: Well… Having to face the current reality of the outer world one day after another… it weakens me. I’m fantasy. I feed off from fantasy. But fantasy in turn is grown from reality. If good things happen in reality, good and bright fantasy is created and I become strong as I can be. But lately… reality is so harsh, so crude, so full of illness, injustice and… death… that the fantasy that grows from it is equally spoiled and rotten. So, to put it in a single word, in a way… I’m starving. I’m acting strong but I’m feeling so weak lately…

THOMAS: Roman, please, you don’t need to act strong.

ROMAN: Yes I do, Thomas, because you count on me. I’m your main tool for your work. You need me, and, as I told you once already, so long ago… I can’t let you down.

THOMAS: And I also told you that you could never let me down.

ROMAN: You keep saying that, but you and I know that’s not really true. I… I’m capable of failure. In fact… I’m prone to failure lately. And it scares me that one day you may need me and I just… won’t be able to deliver. If that isn’t happening already, that is…

[Virgil rises up]

VIRGIL: Why didn’t you tell me any of this, Roman?

ROMAN: Oh, Virgil, you were listening?

VIRGIL: I came here looking for you… I just happened to arrive mid conversation and I heard everything. So, again, why didn’t you tell me any of this, Roman? How am I supposed to support my husband if he doesn’t open up to me?

ROMAN: I’m sorry, Virge… I didn’t want to worry you… We already have too many things to worry about, with our child injured. As I said, I need to be strong to support you all, and…

VIRGIL: Do you think you are the only one who has to support our whole family? That’s too much weight over your shoulders! We’re in this together, remember? I’m here to support you as much as you are here to support me. It’s not like the first time we’ve had this conversation.

ROMAN: I know, but…

[Virgil sits down next to Roman and hugs him. At that point, Roman drops the act he had been performing up until that very moment, and Thomas shows a face of horror when he sees Roman’s real face of exhaustion, even emaciation]

THOMAS: Roman! You look horrible! You mean that’s your real face and you’ve been hiding it from us all this time!?

ROMAN: [weak voice] I’m the best actor in this Mind Palace… [ironic weak voice] You must recognize that I delivered the performance of my life… I was even able to disguise my legs failing me as if I had simply tripped. Also, makeup was really helpful too…

[Roman moves his hands around his face and the makeup he was wearing disappears. Now everybody can see the deep dark bags under his eyes and his white paleness]

VIRGIL: [horrified] Wow… You look more emo than I’ve ever looked in my whole life. That shadow under your eyes, I never had it so dark… and it’s not even eyeshadow, right? Are you crazy? You’ve put your life in danger! You should have told us this earlier, at least you should have told me!

ROMAN: What use would it have been anyway? This isn’t something that Thomas or any of us can fix by waving some magic wand. It’s the state of the world what has caused it and there’s nothing we can do about it. Do you mind if I lie on your shoulder, Virge? I’m feeling so tired right now…

VIRGIL: Of course you can. You need to rest. I don’t know how you’ve been able to act as if nothing was happening to you and no one would notice. Heck, I don’t even know how you’ve been able to walk at all.

ROMAN: I’m a great actor, as I told you… and the show must go on, right?

[Roman grabs Virgil’s hand]

VIRGIL: Goodness… Your hand is so cold. Heck, you’re literally freezing! [Virgil takes off his hodie and puts it over Roman’s royal suit, placing the hood over his head. Then he summons a purple blanket] Here, maybe this will warm you up. [Virgil hugs Roman closer to him and they both cover with the blanket up to the neck] I don’t know if my body warmth will be enough, but I’ll do my best to keep you warm.

ROMAN: [now shivering] Thank you, my love. Snuggling with you always makes me feel so nice.

THOMAS: Roman, I’m scared to see you like this. If only I could do something to help you.

JOAN: You can do something, indeed. Thomas, you must try to cheer up and focus on the positive things of life.

THOMAS: You do realize that’s not exactly the easiest thing to do in the current times, right?

JOAN: Yes, I know. But you must try to stop focusing on the negative, or else Roman will suffer the consequences. Not to mention that if you go on this route, you may end up falling in a depression.

THOMAS: [suddenly angry] That’s not something that I can exactly control, Joan! Don’t blame me! It’s not my fault!

JOAN: [weirded out] Nobody is blaming you for anything, Thomas.

THOMAS: [standing up, even angrier] Yes you are! You are all blaming me on what is happening to Roman, as if it was me who drained him of all his energy on purpose!

ROMAN: Thomas, calm down, nobody is…

THOMAS: [demonic voice, his eyes turn green] STOP PUTTING THE BLAME ON ME OVER EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENS IN THIS MOTHERF… [bleep] …NG MIND PALACE!

VIRGIL: Oh, no, something’s wrong again! This is the third time this happens!

JOAN: The third time? You mean this happened to him another time after the first one I saw it happen?

THOMAS: I’M TIRED OF HAVING TO TAKE CARE OF EVERYTHING IN THIS PLACE AND NOT RECEIVING ANYTHING OTHER THAN COMPLAINTS! F… [bleep] ALL OF YOU!

VIRGIL: But it had never lasted so long! Thomas, control yourself, please!

[Thomas starts screeching a demonic yell while his eyes start glowing in green and a whirlwind forms around him that pushes the others away from him. Virgil holds Roman tight, preventing him to fall from the couch, while he himself grabs to the couch with all his strength. Suddenly, Patton and Logan rise up, then Janus and Remus rise up too]

LOGAN: [yelling over the storm noise] What is happening!?

PATTON: My ears!

VIRGIL: Thomas suddenly went out of control! He’s being controlled by his Dark Master self again!

REMUS: Wow, I could never screech like that. It hurts even me! Somebody make him stop!

JOAN: [fighting the wind] I know I called him Sanderstorm, but this is ridiculous!

PATTON: I got an idea! I hope it works! If I can get past the wind, that is!

[Patton struggles, trying to reach Thomas’ hand. The wind unties his cat hoodie and it flies away, but Joan manages to grab it before it gets lost. Patton can’t go any further and is pushed back, falling down. However he immediately stands up and tries to reach Thomas again. After some heavy struggle, he manages to grab Thomas’ hand. At that moment, the wind stops, Thomas stops screeching and he shows a neutral, emotionless face. The glow in his eyes disappears, then his eyes start flickering in the colors green and blue. Finally, they go completely blue and he shows a peaceful face, while his eyes start glowing in blue]

PATTON: Is that you, Light Master?

LIGHT MASTER: [speaking through Thomas’ body] Yes, it’s me, thank you for giving me the strength to rein the Dark Master in for the time being.

PATTON: What is happening with Thomas?

LIGHT MASTER: I’m ashamed to admit it, but I underestimated the Dark Master’s power and maybe forcing him to join me in the Mind Palace Core was a bad idea after all. He’s trying to take control of Thomas as he always intended to do. He can’t take control completely while I’m here, but he’s trying to overcome me and we’re in a constant fight.

PATTON: Is there anything we can do to help you?

LIGHT MASTER: Not much, unfortunately, you can’t get into the Core, as that would destroy you. This is a fight I must do on my own, and I promise you I’ll never stop fighting him.

PATTON: But why is this happening to Thomas right now?

LIGHT MASTER: It’s everything that is happening in the outer world lately. The quarantine, the injustices in America and the rest of the world, the people that is suffering and dying for so many different things, the racism, the virus, the denial of healthcare… Thomas is losing hope and that is threatening the equilibrium in the Mind Palace. To put it in words easier to understand, it’s like he’s starting to believe that evil in this world is stronger than good, at least at the present moment, and as a result he’s starting to surrender to his evil self, making the Dark Master stronger than ever since he was “defeated”.

VIRGIL: There has to be something we can do!

LIGHT MASTER: Thomas is gonna need all the help in the world. Both from his Sides and from his friends in the outer world. He needs to be reminded of how much good there still is in his life and how much there is still in this world worthy to fight for. It’s not gonna be a quick process, so you must work on it on the long term, and the Dark Master will never lose his influence completely, as you already know, but the more you can lift his spirits up, the stronger his good self will be. Also, Roman is endangered.

VIRGIL: [scared] Endangered?

REMUS: [also scared] Wait, what is happening to my brother? [noticing Roman’s face of emaciation] Roman, what’s wrong?

LIGHT MASTER: You’ve seen how he is right now. Roman mentioned that he was starving. He intended to say figuratively, but unfortunately, he’s literally starving and no ordinary food can help him, he needs to feed on clean bright fantasy to save himself. If Thomas doesn’t regain the spirit he used to have, Roman will slowly get weaker and weaker until he’s no more.

REMUS: But I’m not feeling weak or starving at all? We are connected, anything that happens to him will happen to me. Why am I not as emaciated as he is right now?

LIGHT MASTER: As a matter of fact, Remus, you are endangered too. You’re not feeling the same as Roman because you don’t take care of Thomas’ hope, that’s all entirely Roman, and you’ve got plenty of dark fantasy to feed on, but if Roman perishes, as you know, you will perish too.

ROMAN: [weak voice] I’m sorry I’m dragging you into this, brother. I wish I could be stronger.

REMUS: [grabbing Roman’s hand with a face of determination] Never mind… we’ll figure something out.

LIGHT MASTER: And I’m sorry I keep on bringing bad news, but there’s more. If Roman and Remus perished, a new Creative Side would be created in the Core as Thomas needs Creativity in his life, but it wouldn’t be Roman or Remus, and of course, if Roman dies, Sandersia, and all its inhabitants, would disappear too, including Roland, your newly found Sandersian friends and the Sandersian body of Ira, who would be condemned to turn back into a Green Sprite again. So there are lots of lives at risk. You mustn’t fail, guys.

JOAN: We’ll do our best, at least our share of the task. Thomas is our best friend and we love him, we won’t let him down on this one.

JANUS: And we’ll also fight for him, like we’ve always done. You can count on us, Thomas. You too, Roman.

LIGHT MASTER: Thank you, Joan, thank you Janus. Thomas is very lucky of having such good and unconditional friends. Now I must go, my fight is never ending and I must continue the struggle. Don’t worry, after the boost of energy Patton has given me, Thomas will be okay after I’m gone, the Dark Master won’t take control of him at least for some time. Farewell, Joan. Farewell, Sides.

PATTON: Farewell, Light Master. Thanks for your advice.

[Patton drops Thomas’ hand. Then Thomas’ eyes turn back to brown]

THOMAS: Thank you, Patton. I was… so full of irrational anger and hatred. It was horrible. Thank you for rescuing me.

PATTON: [suddenly weak voice] You’re welcome, kidd… [Patton suddenly loses balance. Thomas and Logan grab him before he falls down] …oh…

LOGAN: [concerned] Patton, what’s wrong with you?

PATTON: It’s okay, my love. I’ll be all right. I just gave a lot of energy to the Light Master so that he could fight the Dark Master more efficiently. That was the plan, after all, and it worked. Now I’m feeling exhausted, but I’ll be okay in a couple of minutes if I rest. Let me sit down on the couch and I’ll be good as gravy in no time.

THOMAS: I hope so, I don’t want two Sides sick at the same time.

[Logan and Patton sit down next to Roman and Virgil. As the couch is now full, Janus summons two more couches on the sides of the existing couch and everyone sits down]

ROMAN: I’m sorry you guys had to interrupt your honeymoons…

REMUS: Don’t sweat it. Your health is more important, Ro. Many lives depend on it, including mine.

JANUS: And Thomas’ health is important too. If you need us, we’ll stay around. We’ll need to form a plan of action to lift Thomas’ spirits up. It’s time for me to get back to work as your self-preservation, Thomas, and I’m coming in full strength.

JOAN: I’ll also get in contact with Dahlia, Dominic and the others. You better get ready for a good long Zoom call session. You’re gonna have a big bunch of Dahlia’s corny jokes until you can’t handle them anymore. And you know Dahlia has a lot of those jokes… and if they run out, she’ll find more.

THOMAS: [smirks] Yes, I know… Thank you guys, all of you. I don’t know what I would do without you. By the way, Roman, Virgil, where is Chris?

VIRGIL: Don’t worry, Chris has already got out of hospital, and he’s back to his bedroom in our room. Ian is taking care of him right now. He’ll be fine.

THOMAS: Still, he should know what’s going on with you, Roman.

JANUS: It’s okay, Thomas. Ian knows everything through our shared memory. At this point he’s informing Chris.

THOMAS: Okay, glad to know. Thanks, Jan.

REMUS: I hope you switched him off from your memories while we were out on our honeymoon. I mean, I personally don’t mind that he saw everything we did, outdoors and… [mischievous smile] indoors, but I wouldn’t want to disturb your brother… more than on average.

JANUS: [nervous] Remus, please, leave that topic for when we’re alone. And yes, I switched him off at those moments…

REMUS: [wiggling his eyebrows, with a naughty smile] Do I see blushing on your cheeks? Don’t tell me you’re embarrassed of talking about it. Come on, we’re all experienced adults in this room and I’m not so bad at that, am I?

JANUS: [a little angry voice, his human cheek now blushes heavily] Remus, the problem is that you’re… excessively good at that, so much so that I can’t keep up to your rhythm. And this conversation ends right here. We may be adults here, but there may be younger viewers watching, and maybe we can’t stop you from saying what you want whenever you want, but not even you could escape the power of outer censorship of this work of fiction, so zip it!

THOMAS: [face of shock, stuttering] Yes… please… I… I beg you… too much inappropriate innuendo… and too much meta too… [clears his throat] Okay, back on track. What are we going to do to help Roman in the short term? We can’t leave him like this, in this condition.

VIRGIL: Don’t worry, Thomas. I’ll take care of him. We’ll be heading to our room and I’ll make sure he takes some time to rest.

ROMAN: I don’t want to be a burden to you…

VIRGIL: “In health and disease”. I vowed to be there with you, and I’m fulfilling my vow, just like you would if it was me standing there sick, right?

ROMAN: I love you, Virgil. Did ever tell you that?

VIRGIL: Yeah, you did, but it never stops lifting my spirits up, so keep saying it, please.

[Roman holds Virgil’s hand and looks at him with the most loving glance in the world. Virgil kisses his forehead and then Roman kisses Virgil’s hand, with a tear rolling down his now dark purplish cheek]

THOMAS: Guys, when you give each other so much love… I feel so good and complete…

ROMAN: Thank you, Thomas, for rejoicing in our happiness.

THOMAS: It’s more than that. Before you all started dating, there were times in my life were I felt… I don’t know… alone in the dark, like there were times were I despised myself, and I know I have no reason to do that, but self-love is so hard to achieve and… [gasp of realization] …wait a minute, I think I get it. [smiles] Your love for each other, guys… feeds my self-love. You guys are me, so you guys loving each other is me loving myself. I…

[Thomas gets emotional and he starts crying]

ROMAN: I had never thought of that before… but you’re right. If we are you, our love for each other is your love for yourself. Wow, it’s beautiful if you put it this way.

PATTON: It also helps that we all love you, Thomas and we’d to anything for your well-being.

THOMAS: [cleaning his eyes] Sorry, guys, I got overwhelmed by emotion. I love you too, guys.

JOAN: We, the ones that are not part of you, love you too, Thomas, if I’m allowed to say it. I hope that helps you too in your quest for self-love.

THOMAS: Thank you, Joan, it really does. I’m happy to count on your friendship as always. And you know what? I’m feeling more hope than before already. Still not feeling perfect by any means, [singing the song from Tangled] “but at last I see a light”. Wow, it may be true that thing the Beatles said, that “all you need is love”.

ROMAN: It may be true, Thomas. I’m already feeling a little stronger, [singing the same song from Tangled] “and it’s like the sky is new”. Still have a long way ahead until I feel recovered, [theatrical princely voice] but we’ve started walking it. And nothing will stop us. Our adventure has only begun, and we’re gonna be victorious, both of us!

THOMAS: That’s the spirit, Roman. Now, to get some rest and gain strength to keep on walking. [to the camera] And to all of you out there, I hope you all find ways to work on your self love too. You don’t need to have Sides like I do, just remember that you are loved, that you are capable of loving, and that you are worthy of love too, and then you’ll be ready to start loving yourself, I know it’s not easy, but just one step in front of the other, and we’ll get there. Until next time, take it easy, guys, gals and non binary pals. Peace out!

[ending card]

[Thomas is in his living room, in front of his computer. He’s having a Zoom call with Joan, Talyn, Dominic, Dahlia and Kenny]

THOMAS: Wow, guys, I really missed this.

DAHLIA: Well, it’s not like you don’t already know we’re here for you. You can call us by videochat any time you need.

KENNY: Yes, you can count on us for any cyber-reunions like this one. I also miss all of my friends.

DOMINIC: Yes. We should try to make another video together like this. Thomas, Joan, you’ve got to think of something.

JOAN: I have already something in mind… but I need time to make it work. I’ll call you when it’s ready.

DAHLIA: Yeah, and in the meantime you can always count on your other friends, right, Tho…? [notices she’s messed up and covers her mouth]

KENNY: [confused] Other friends? What other friends? What did I miss?

[Dahlia looks at Thomas with a face of guilt, like apologizing without words. The other friends and Thomas show an awkward face]

KENNY: Guys… I suddenly feel like you all know something that I don’t. It’s fine if you want to keep it to yourselves, but this is making me feel a little weird.

[Logan appears next to Thomas, off-screen so no one in the chat can see him. Thomas looks at him with a face of angsty questioning, like telling him “What do I do now?” without words]

LOGAN: Well, it’s my opinion that the circle of people knowing your secret was already wide enough. But you know Kenny well. It’s your choice if you think you can trust him enough to tell him the secret. What does your heart say?

[Patton rises up too]

PATTON: I say let’s give it a try! If Kenny keeps the secret, there’s nothing wrong on him knowing, right? In fact, I would tell all of your close friends. I’d really love to be able to interact with them all, they’re all so nice people, it’s a pity we can only interact with them from within you.

LOGAN: Okay, Patton, one step at a time, let’s focus on Kenny first and we’ll make any future choices when we get there.

[Thomas nods, agreeing with Logan]

KENNY: Thomas, what are you looking at? Who are you nodding at? Is anybody there?

THOMAS: Sorry… I was having a discussion with my… friends.

KENNY: What friends? What discussion? What is going on here?

JOAN: So you’re gonna tell him? Okay, but Kenny, you must promise that you will keep the secret, for Thomas’ safety.

DAHLIA: I’m sorry you’re being forced to do so because of me, Thomas.

THOMAS: It’s okay, Dahlia. If Kenny promises to keep the secret, there’s nothing to fear, and I know I can trust he will keep this promise, right Kenny?

KENNY: And now it’s when I’m getting really confused… Okay, I promise to keep your secret, whatever that is.

THOMAS: Okay… [sighs and keeps going] Remember my videos where I portrayed different characters representing the different aspects of my one personality?

KENNY: The Sanders Sides? Yes, I do, remember that I lent you a hand to film some of the episodes. [smiles] You’re not gonna tell me now that these people are real and are living with you in your apartment right? [chuckles] That would be fun if you think about it…

THOMAS: [nervous giggle] Yes… it would be fun… [smile drops] and it is fun actually… or at least it usually is… Guys? Come here, please and show yourselves.

[Thomas makes a gesture to Logan and Patton to get closer to Thomas, and they do, getting in front of the camera and appearing on-screen. Kenny’s smile drops immediately, while the other’s friends smile nervously, timidly waving hello at the Sides]

LOGAN: Nice to meet you Kenny.

PATTON: [with a huge smile and voice of joy] Look at that Kenny Guy over there! I’m so happy to meet you at last, kiddo!

[Kenny is so in shock that he’s gone completely speechless]

THOMAS: Okay, firsts things first, don’t freak out, Kenny. I know this is gonna take some time to digest so let me tell you my… our story, but remember your promise.

[Kenny barely nods with the same face of shock, still unable to speak. Thomas sighs and starts putting Kenny up to date about the Sanders Sides]

[kbrown78]

Monthly Wrap Up: August

Not a lot to say with this month. Mostly I just wasn't in the mood for reading or writing (which is why this is late). I tried to do 2 readthons and didn't fully complete either of them. I only read 6 books and while overall they were good (only having one 2 star), they were almost all disappointing to a certain degree. I did still manage to have a good variety of books (including a non fiction), read my classic of the month, and continue with my yearly reading challenge. Also midway through the month I started impleneting a new star rating system on a scale of 10 stars that I would then translate into a scale out of 5 stars. For clarification numbers on the left is out of 10 stars and the numbers on the right is out of 5 stars: 1-2 stars=1 star, 3-4 stars=2 stars, 5-6 stars=3 stars, 6.5-7 stars= 4 stars, 8-9= 5 stars (if a book manages to get 10/10 it's obviously going to be 5 stars). Not a bad month, just wasn't what I hoped it would be.  

More Than This by Patrick Ness: In the past I've read two very different books by Ness. A Monster Calls and The Knife of Never Letting Go. Also had very different opinions about the books. I've stayed away from Ness' other books because they've gotten mixed reviews, at best. The one exception seemed to be More Than This, which everyone seems to like but also tip toed around what it's about. Now having read it, it makes sense why very little is given away about this book, but I really didn't like it. The only reason I kept reading it was in the hope that I would get answers by the end of the story, which I didn't. I will say that the first quarter of this book, when Seth is waking up and just experiencing the environment around him, was actually good. Lyrical and introspective, the pacing was just right and really pulled me into the story despite little action or dialogue. It was definitely my favorite part of the book. After the mysterious Driver shows up, however, the entire novel goes downhill. Instead of being a slow, tender story that would focus on people, and life, and mortality, it just degrades into this weird action packed dystopian. Characters were just bland, absolutely devoid of personality and minimal back story to establish how tragic they are. As for Seth himself, I liked that he was gay and in the big scheme of things it wasn't a big deal, but I don't get why their had to be such extreme hatred for him being gay when that was only a very small part of the story. What's most frustrating about this book is that nothing makes sense and it provides no answers. Even the ending makes no sense! I can't go into any details because of spoilers but this is definitely one of the worst post apocalyptic/ dystopian stories I have ever read, and there are a ton of generic ones out there. This novel was just a cheap Matrix rip off with sloppy execution. Based off my opinion of this book, and what I've heard of other works by Ness, I don't think I'll be reading any more material that produces. More Than This received 2 out 5 stars (3/10) and was my pick for the Treasure Hunting Readathon: Door.

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett: I was initially going to read this one next month, as my classic for September, but I picked it up for this month as part of a reading challenge (which I did not complete). I know it's classic that a lot of people read as a child, but I wasn't one of those people, and I was curious how I would feel about it as an adult. There were definitely some problematic aspects of this book that are honestly staples of Victorian literature, child abuse (neglect) and racism. That being said, I rather enjoyed this book. It's a simple story, a sour girl discovering a secret garden, with a lot of depth due to the themes of love, friendship, and growth, making it both easy to read but something that lingers with me. It's a pretty book, with both the writing and the setting, that works as a timeless classic. The Secret Garden received 4 out 5 stars (7/10).  

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak: When I read this book in junior high, I liked it but I honestly didn't get the hype. Now rereading, I realize that I missed so much as kid and this is the type of book I would recommend everyone read. Taking place during WWII, this book follows a young girl named Liesel as she grows up in a small town in Germany with her foster family. This is a book that nails everything that a historical fiction should be. The war serves as a backdrop while the spotlight is put on the struggles of daily life and the effects of the war. Characters are all well written, to the point where they come off as life like. Each one stands out as an individual with their own story to tell: from the book thief, to accordion player, to the Jesse Owen's fan, to the Jewish fist fighter, even Death himself. Even the plot, which is simple war time slice of life, really pulls me in with it's humanity and stellar characters. It's honestly hard to restrain myself in this quick wrap up because this book evokes so many thoughts and emotions in me. The best thing about this book is that it shows the humanity, it shows the light even in dark times. There's very little fault to this book, if any, and is the kind of book the comes along every once in while that you know will withstand the test of time and evolve into a modern classic. Needless to say The Book Thief received 5 out 5 stars (9/10).  

The Social Sex: A History of Female Friendship by Marilyn Yalom and Theresa Donovan Brown: While the topic of this piece of nonfiction did appeal to me, since I'll read just about any history book that focuses on women, but I think because it was a topic I had such high hopes for, I was ultimately disappointed by it. There were only a few chapters that I thought were actually informative, which is actually the problem I have with most shorter history books. When it's a history book there's generally a lot of ground to cover, that can't be properly condensed into a book under 400 pages. The result is usually a text that glosses over the more intimate and intricate details, which is what I'm really looking for. I really wanted to get a sense of the real world history of friendships among women because it's something I feel like doesn't get the spotlight it deserves and even in fiction I'm always looking for good examples of friendship between female characters. The first few chapters focused on the philosophy of friendship, while emphasizing how male dominated it was at the expense of women. That theme remained to almost the halfway point, which I really didn't want because that lesson has been driven in my head and I don't want to see it everywhere I go. Those chapters really only focused on a few notable female friendships at various periods of history, and only in 3 countries (sort of 4) in the entire world. There were a few solid chapters in the middle, and the book did end better than it started, but the last few chapters kept repeating the same thing. I felt stiffed because most the book just wasn't informative or memorable. An interesting subject that just fell short in it's delivery (and possibly research). The Social Sex received 3 out 5 stars (6/10) and was my pick for the PopSugar prompt “book by 2 female authors” (which was really hard to find).  

The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson: Every century, someone is chosen to be the bearer of the Godstone. Princess Elisa is the current bearer, and while she is prophecised to perform a great act of service, the path to that destiny is filled with danger. When she is married off to a king from a neighboring kingdom she must finally face what it means to be the bearer and begin her long journey with an uncertain ending. I am excited to talk about this one but I'm finding it hard to. When I first read it back in high school, it instantly became one of my favorite series and remained one of my favorite series all these years. Because of how much I loved it, I put this reread off for awhile because I was super nervous that it wouldn't live up to my previous experience. It didn't, but to be fair it would be almost impossible since my reading tastes have changed, I have a better understanding of what I think makes a good book, and I've been hyping up this book for years.  What made this first book so beloved to me (an intelligent female protagonist who experiences amazing growth and the role of religion) were still all there with the depth that I remember them having. There even some surprising elements: like I still thought the romance was well handled and I loved the world. Everything about it from the religion to the geography to the language and even the fact that all the characters have darker skin (seriously if you're looking for more diverse YA I would totally recommend this one), clearly has influence from a certain culture in our world but is still its own thing. There were however, a few things that did disappoint me, one of them being a big deal (at least for me personally). The pacing of the narrative itself was fine, especially since there was a lot of journeying in this book, but it almost felt like the narrative was moving too fast and I just wish there were at least a few moments where the plot settles and we get more intimate character moments. The major issue I had with this book the lack of girl power, something I thought this series had but upon reread I was confronted with the fact that it really doesn't. Again I would like to emphasize that Elisa is a fantastic character, not only because she proves her intelligence and puts it to good use but she's someone who grows past her insecurities and becomes a better individual for it, but she's the only female character that gets this treatment. Most of the other females, like her sister Alodia, her nurse Ximena, and her new handmaid Mara, get little screen time and are hardly relevant to the story, while the only female side character, Cosme, is a total bitch to Elisa for basically the entire novel. It was the exact opposite of what I wanted in terms of girl power, and I was really disappointed by that, but that's my only major complaint. This book has its strong points that elevate it beyond the typical YA fantasy but it isn't all that I thought it would be. The Girl of Fire and Thorns received 5 out 5 stars  (8/10) and was my pick for the PopSugar prompt “reread of a past favorite.”

The Crown of Embers by Rae Carson: Immediately after I finished The Girl of Fire and Thorns I started reading this one, since I want to marathon read all the books in the Fire and Thorns series, like I did last time. Where the first book focuses on Elisa's personal growth (the whole series does but its most prominent in the first book), introducing the world, and the battle of good vs evil (Joyans vs Invierne), the second book focuses more on Elisa being a ruler while still having a looming destiny and the political machinations of the world, and starts to blur the line between good and evil. Based on that summary it sounds more like the kind of book that I would love, but I struggled more with this book than I did the previous. I think it's due to the fact that this book tried to tackle more mature subject matter, but kept the narrative pacing the same as its predecessor, and also didn't really remedy the issues I had in the previous book, which were only more prominent. I didn't like the political intrigue because almost everything about it was just kind of dumped in the book with no prior development, which it really needed in order to create a believable scenario. I discussed in The Girl of Fire and Thorns wrap up that I was pretty disappointed by the lack of girl power which only got worse in this book. Mara as a character frustrated me because she only existed to talk about boys with Elisa, but there's also a lack of females being major characters or even important figures in politics. Even Elisa being a ruler is undermined by all the males in her court (except Hector), which is something I've seen done with YA fantasies with female monarchs, and I really don't like it because it reduces the queen down to little more than a figure head. Carson clearly shows that she can write amazing characters that are also female, but I don't know why she reserves it to only 1. Speaking of Elisa though, she is the best thing about this whole series. Like I love everything about Elisa. I love that she retains her core characteristics (strong moral code, her faith and intelligence) but she continues to progress as a character, constantly evolving to reach her full potential. She's honestly what drives the narrative, her decisions as a queen, her destiny as the bearer of the Godstone, and her internal growth. As YA fantasy, especially one from the time period it was published, this is a good book, but it's frustrating seeing the obvious potential this book has to be a rather sophisticated fantasy series, but then just not having it reach that potential. The Crown of Embers received 4 out 5 stars (7/10).

Thank You Everyone

Keep Calm and Keep Reading

[kimberlycollins]

NIPPON GA DAI SUKI (JAPAN WE LOVE YOU)

Traveling to an exotic country sounds, well, exotic. And it is. It’s a true adventure in life. It’s also exhausting. And enlightening.

I’ve traveled afar throughout my entire adulthood. All over Europe, The Middle East, Egypt, Central America, Mexico, Eastern Europe, Canada, the Caribbean, Australia… Florida. ;)

I give travel (and my parents, *ehem*) credit for keeping me grounded, humbled and modest, in the sense of “I AM BUT A SPECK ON THIS EARTH” or “MY BELIEF SYSTEM IS NOT EVERYTHING” or “I DON’T KNOW AS MUCH AS I THOUGHT I KNEW” or “I REALLY DON’T KNOW HOW I GOT BEST DRESSED IN HIGH SCHOOL” (read: France ;)).

Travel helps us all to get out of our comfort zone and to see what a tiny place we occupy on this planet. It’s a liberating realization, embracing one’s insignificance in this world. It’s not about being small, because none of us are. It’s more about the world being BIG.

Travel puts your life into perspective; your problems and celebrations do not hold as much weight as they seem. It also shows you how much you have or what you don’t have. It’s a healthy reality check.

That’s why travel is good for you.

I am reminded this after a crazy year. My husband and I have been on tour with our music (The Smoking Flowers) for a lot of 2018, in and out of the country. It’s been a healthy year of these reality checks for sure.

That’s why I am writing this post on my health blog, as this type of health is just as important as the physical.

And so I write.

I write to journal.

I write to inspire (myself, if no one else).

I write to remember.

I write because I am bored today, it’s cold outside and my matcha is steaming, infusing me with memories.

I’m also writing because I miss Japan.

Of all my travels, I think Japan smacked me across the head when I needed it most. It made me feel like I was five years old again. Everything, down to using the toilet, I had to relearn/rethink. Yep, it took 43 years off my life. Now that’s a natural youth serum I can live with.

It also made my brain function differently. Trying to learn a foreign language audibly and visually that has no history in the Latin world is truly a foreign language. I now know how to order water, draft beer, sake and vegetarian ramen in Japanese. Basics. (Although a friendly laugh is usually the response to the veggie ramen inquiry). I now know how to tell a Japanese punk band they did a great job after seeing them open up for us at our show. I learned to say just plain “awesome”, and used it a lot. Japanese is pretty “saikou”, after all.

Japan can feel very futuristic, and Tokyo is like being on a movie set at times. They are the future for most of the civilized world seemingly 10 years ahead of us all, yet still remaining ancient and historic at the same time. Eating sushi or having tea can be presented like it was 400 years ago or like something out of The Jetsons (ala conveyor belt computer sushi restaurants).

But beyond the exotic veil, it was the culture and etiquette that really impressed me and made my head spin.

Below are but a few observations of the plentiful Japanese culture I experienced over my month long visit. And of course, they are my own, so they are neither right nor wrong. Just observations from a somewhat worldly gal who grew up Southern in America:

1. The Japanese have manners like I’ve never seen.

They are unwavering in their politeness. Selfless hospitality is a cornerstone of Japanese culture, and you can feel it in everything down to their quiet nature to their cleanliness to the way they package your purchased goods like a present. And that bow! That Japanese bow. It makes you feel special.

2. They are startling quiet and calm.

Given that Tokyo houses more than 13 million people, the sense of order and calm as everyone goes about their responsibilities with concern for others is remarkable. The Tokyo city streets are shockingly silent. You can hear the air, the machinery hums that run a city and the cars passing, but they don’t honk like NYC. I think I heard two honks the entire time in Tokyo, and that’s not an exaggeration. We drove the interstates a ton on our tour, all over the country... aggressive driving doesn’t seem to exist. Could this be from their Zen culture?

Also, they don’t bump into you trying to get on the subway in a hurry. It’s an orderly line and gentle squeeze to fit everyone on the trains, like a can of sardines without the stink.

I want to throw in another aspect of “calm” here; safety.

Feeling safe, stable, and secure is central to our health and wellbeing. How safe we feel at home and in our neighborhood can influence our social habits and feeling of freedom. When we feel safe, we find it easier to relax, do all the things that comfort us, and focus on the work or study we need to do to help ensure our stability.

I’ve never felt safer anywhere in my life than when in Japan. I never worried about my purse or goods being stolen. Never worried about locking our apartment or car doors. Never got ogled at or hit upon. Wowza.

3. There’s no trash on the streets. And I mean zero. Not even cigarette butts. And it’s not like there are janitors sweeping the streets and alleys. To make this fact more amazing, it’s hard pressed to find trash bins anywhere. So where does a city of millions dispose of their goods while walking/biking about? Their pockets… until they reach home to throw in appropriate bins.

RETRACTION: One time we were walking under an over pass in Tokyo and we saw, gasp, trash. The remarkable thing was that this trash was piled neatly in a small pile, waiting anxiously to be picked up properly.

For an interesting article on Japan and the waste culture check out this article: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/07/why-japanese-dont-litter/

4. They seem to really care about the planet.

And don’t just post about it on social media.

You won’t find paper towels anywhere, sans a few nice restaurants. Water waste is thoughtfully considered in everything they do it seems. Yes, even the toilet fill water after a flush is used as a sink to wash your hands before entering the tank. They line dry their clothes (like most of the world except America). They ride bicycles like it’s Amsterdam on steroids. There are even parking lots just for bikes. This eliminates the need for excess taxis on the streets (i.e. “fossil fuels”). I know this goes on all over the world, but I again, I’m sticking to Japan here.

5. Buddhism and Shintoism.

I have practiced Buddhism since my 20’s and see it as more of a mind set and lifestyle than a religion. So for me, I felt right at home in a country that houses over 77,000 temples (No typo there). Incense permeates the air, especially in Kyoto. Smelled like my house and I couldn’t have been happier about that aspect.

But it’s more than Buddhism. The main Japanese religion is Shintoism. Many Japanese people practice both. The beliefs are very compatible and not contradictory.

6. ROBOTIC TOILETS!

Japan has a magic thing called Toto Toilets. And the toilet culture there is really something to behold. I fell in love with their toilets and never once worried to sit on the public toilet seat. I can simply not go back to our classic Kohler again. Trust me, once you experience a heated seat, self-cleaning, massaging, butt-cleaning, “privacy sound”, hand-washing toilet all in one small package, you’ll never go back. Don’t know how to expand on this in a blog… just “go” try it for your self.

7. 7- Eleven heaven!

Yep, you heard this health advocate correctly. When you are looking for a healthy bite on the road or on the quick, there’s a 7-Eleven on every corner. And it’s not the 7-Eleven we know in this country at all! Made fresh daily veggie sushi, veggie rice “sandwiches”, miso soup, raw veggies, healthy drinks, tea, fairly healthy snacks if you are into the packaged food thing. All for super cheap. I cannot tell you what a lifesaver it was on the road for us when there were practically no healthy options. Also, we decided to add fish into our diet while in Japan, and certainly glad we did. I’ve never had better fish in my life. It really felt healthy. My nails are still shiny like they’ve been shellacked. Win win.

8. VENDING MACHINES!

Super convenient and anonymous, there are vending machines all over Japan (even in remote villages) that can get you most anything you need instantly: from fermented bean drinks to green tea to hot or cold coffee to fully cooked meals to used panties. Yep, the Japanese can get weird.

Ok, so maybe the last three points are less about culture, but I had to throw them in for the “wow” factor.

I could go on and on about Japan… it’s as wide and deep and old and beautiful as it’s countryside beacon Mt. Fuji. But it has its pitfalls too. No culture is perfect. I just prefer to focus on the ideals I look up to, rather than focusing on the negatives. Their negatives are no different than America’s: too much sugar and meat in the diet, it’s a highly misogynistic society, cigarettes, stressful six day work weeks with long hours, those darn plastic bags… But we all know those are WORLD WIDE ISSUES.

Japan, you definitely stole my heart. Thank you to all who came to our shows and to those that showed us your rare style of hospitality. And a huge special thanks to my tour manager, Gus Bennett, who introduced my husband and me to this beautiful country, showed us the ropes and helped us navigate into this great unknown that will certainly be with me forever.

Mata, chikai uchini, aeruto iine.

Photo credit: Marley Parker at ML Parker Media

[choco-milktea]

10.23.21

i wonder if he thinks im bipolar or something lol. ive been very up and down with him, hot and cold with the way i act around him

ive been very distant and ive been worried about how to remediate that so that we could go back to being friends. but i didnt know how to do it in a natural way lol

today i offered to open the door for him as he wheeled a patient to a room. and i could tell he was surprised to see me but he answered sarcastically, “well if you’re already here” he was smiling and i know he found my question and the situation funny

so i rushed to the door and excitedly said, “ok wait, stop stop stop” as i opened the door for him and the patient

i told him “youre welcome” playfully passive aggressive and i think he said thank you? idk

but he definitely asked where ive been, and i think he said something like i havent been around

i said i quit . idk it just came out lol

and hes all like, “you quit... but youre here” implying i said something stupid, which i admit it was lol

and i paused and said “yes” to his statement lol. i could tell he found it amusing

then after doing some work i went to find him, to take initiative to maintain some kind of friendship.

i tried to be casual and said, “oh here you are. i was wondering where you were since i didnt see you in the back. i was like did he leave already?”

i mentioned without him asking me that i moved to morning shift to which he called me a traitor. i told him i didnt like doing so much work with all new hires and i guess that made him realize that they were all new

i told him i miss seeing graveyard shift and talking with them. 

he said something weird: “well we miss you”

and i scoffed and was like “speak for yourself”. i was trying to imply that graveyard does not know me but i panicked after those words left my mouth and don’t remember what was said right after lol

then he asked whats new with me and i said not much to which he somehow did not believe and scoffed at

i said ive been busy with school and rambled about how i hate it

then he actually asked something about me which he usually doesnt. he asked where i go to school? to which i replied with the school and he said its a really good school. then something about the pants being blue lol. i was literally thinking what, why is he saying this stuff lol

i think he also asked me when i graduate somewhere in there but i dont remember clearly. i was trying so hard to seem casual and nonchalant

i asked about the status of his applications for PD and fire

he was very detailed compared to when i last asked him about it, which was only a month ago. but there was also someone else present at that time too, so maybe its something he wanted to keep low-key? idk

anyway this really got him talking. which i know always does so the fact he wasnt so willing to share last time confused me

he explained almost everything about the application process from the 400 question long personality test to how he needs to do the polygraph a third time. how it took hours going to different rooms. hes waiting for a followup to the results of his “test” and he doesnt have an estimate time. i learned his father is also in the police department. he might get grandfathered in. he seemed very proud of his father... i thought it was weird that officers usually get paid decently but he implied that his family doesnt live in a house

anyway he seems to have a lot of friends trying to get in or are in the police department, he shared snippets of their experiences with PD constantly throughout our 20 min talk

another question he asked me which is sooo rare is when he asked, “ive been meaning to ask you, did you like the comedy show?”

i told him i liked it and it was funny and fun. i keep forgetting to thank him for the night. 

anyway he asked me (again, so rare) if ive ever been to one before. i told him i did once when i was younger.

he said he was going to a comedy show special next month. i wanted to ask who he was going with. i hate that i was kinda hopeful that he would ask me to go too cuz the timing... the transition into it was ... not there lol... it almost seemed implied that he was about to ask me. but i know im reading too much into it

but i asked what it meant by special and he said it was an hour long of one person, then i asked who it was and he said a name ive never heard before lol. apparently hes really funny and i looked him up in the computer in front of me. then i sensed him get closer to me to help look this guy up. im glad i kept my cool lol. anyway c.g. recommended i watch the guy’s stuff on netflix in a certain order. i probably readily agreed like an idiot cuz im not thinking straight lol

ngl i kinda liked that i made him neglect his work LOL. someone else had to go to him to take over a task he was putting off. its a sign that he either enjoys talking to me to the point he willingly puts off his work or that he simply lost track of time (while talking to me)

then morning shift came in and settled into their assignments. i made an escape and c.g passed as i talked to a coworker. i heard him ask about the location of his glasses as he took my conversation partner away. i forget he still wears them sometimes

at my mobile computer they were on their way out and he passed by while tapping my computer desk. he wanted my attention and wanted to make sure i knew he was leaving. i didnt, or rather couldnt, make eye contact as i got into my work. i kinda wish i spared him a glance so i could see his expression or something. maybe a sign of affection lol. but i said bye, and he said “see you next month” and i said “uhhh maybe” lol

i really hope a month doesnt pass before i see and talk to him again. thats been the pattern lately. it was a very productive day in terms of reestablishing and salvaging our friendship

[femmesfollesnebraska]

Judy Chicago at 40, a blog post at 40

On the occasion of my recent entry into the 40s and my blog’s forthcoming 10th anniversary (April 2021), I present an irregular, informal, brief series of posts around some of my favorite artists -- what did they do / create their 40th year? Why do I like them so much? What’s my favorite work of theirs? 

LFF is always open for submissions. This is just a playful random series to add to the text about women/art/feminism.  I do this research almost daily anyway, to attempt to recognize and remember all of the amazing women artists out there. This isn’t academic, this isn’t official, it’s just a few words from me complemented by images, as I figure out what I’m doing at 40...At end of this post are a couple of my drawings in tribute to the artist.

To begin, of course: Judy Chicago (I’m not giving a bio/visit her link). Definitely a controversial artist, and also (finally) one of the women/feminist artists who have “made it” into internationally recognized collections/institutions - ironically, this feat among her controversies.  I’m not going to go off on her feminism/controversies (if you wanna read one of my articles around her controversies check out my article in Artslant), rather mention a few things of note about her/work from my point of view.

In grad school (for art history), I was pondering what work(s) I should research for my thesis - of course it had to be around women/feminism, I had a million ideas...I was going to New York for a conference/fun and, at one of my grad advisor’s advisement (!), I decided to visit the Brooklyn Museum and Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party. (I am also not going to review this piece - go to my Artslant article and/or  the link on the title.) 

Me, visiting The Dinner Party, for the first time in 2015.

My personal irony is that I was “one of those art history feminists” who was annoyed with Judy Chicago for having so much “success” - as if most people can name her as an artist at all. I didn’t think much of visiting the piece, but moreso like, if I’m studying feminist art, I guess I have to see this. But what’s the big deal about a table? We know these women now...

OK, so I was wrong. Even thinking about visiting it the first time I get a little verklempt. So, if you read my Artslant article you’ll get the idea about all of the aspects that make up The Dinner Party--amazing tremendous, multilayered, contextualized, educational piece made between 1976-79 with 400+ volunteers. What got me in this moment was seeing these names, these stories, these women - many I had never heard of - 1,048 altogether and in such a respected, reverent manner. It’s weird, growing up and most of your history is about men, when you’re a girl, you don’t really know your history. It’s a difficult thing to explain when faced with so much (missing) history (much of which Chicago and her volunteers discovered themselves).

So this was debuted Chicago’s 40th year - 1979. Pretty fuckin amazing. Chicago didn’t start out a feminist--at least, not consciously. But when she came to it- she went all out. I’ll mention 3 of my favorite works of hers.

1971 exhibition announcement when she changed her name and came out as a feminist. As someone who is also recently divorced and changing her name, and you know, just being a woman at all, can feel like you’re constantly in a boxing ring. (Read more about this ad here.)

Red Flag, 1971

Gosh I love this piece - how shameful it is to have a string showing, or even worse, blood on your pants? Even today, though thanks to social media periods have gained a little acceptance, this thing - this occurance that happens to many women most every month of their lives - is generally forbidden from conversations. Even carrying a pad/tampon in the hallway is “embarassing.” So yeah - this piece, in all its glory - appropriating a phallic shape (?) - focused on the red, beautiful, direct, real. Love. Read more about Red Flag here.

Faith Wilding and Janice Lester, The Cock and Cunt Play, performance. “Womanhouse” Project, 1972, Judy Chicago and Miriam Schapiro

Womanhouse. If I were to say “all women need to know...” these artists/exhibits, I would say Womanhouse - on same level of The Dinner Party. I was not around sadly, to experience this full house installation created by Judy Chicago and Miriam Schapiro and their students in their Feminist Art Program in 1972 - each room themed around a different female experience - but this taking over, making the art the full experience - a woman’s experience - I can just imagine the thrill, and for men as well. The above image is from one of the performances that came in conjunction with the exhibit, The Cock and Cunt Play, which cracks me up - snippets can be seen on youtube.  Read more about Womanhouse here.

There’s so much more to Judy Chicago - all of her work - though my faves happen to be older - is stellar. Get on her site - https://www.judychicago.com/ - and explore.

So she debuted The Dinner Party at 40 - lines around the block at San Francisco Museum - I won’t be tackling anything similar - but this piece and artist undoubtedly impacts my work, perspective, artistically and otherwise. Many of my artworks are tributes to other artists, as Chicago too believes, in the importance of remembering who came before us - not an easy thing, when our history isn’t always written.

~Sally Brown (Deskins)

https://sallydeskins.wixsite.com/feministart

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Sally Brown Deskins: Tribute to Judy Chicago I (small)

Sally Brown Deskins: Tribute to Judy Chicago II

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Les Femmes Folles is a volunteer organization founded in 2011 with the mission to support and promote women in all forms, styles and levels of art from around the world with the online journal, print annuals, exhibitions and events; originally inspired by artist Wanda Ewing and her curated exhibit by the name Les Femmes Folles (Wild Women). LFF was created and is curated by Sally Brown Deskins.  LFF Books is a micro-feminist press that publishes 1-2 books per year by the creators of Les Femmes Folles including the award-winning Intimates & Fools (Laura Madeline Wiseman, 2014) , The Hunger of the Cheeky Sisters: Ten Tales (Laura Madeline Wiseman/Lauren Rinaldi, 2015 and Mes Predices (catalog of art/writing by Marie Peter Toltz, 2017). Other titles include Les Femmes Folles: The Women 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 available on blurb.com, including art, poetry and interview excerpts from women artists. A portion of the proceeds from LFF books and products benefit the University of Nebraska-Omaha’s Wanda Ewing Scholarship Fund.

Submissions always open!

https://femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/callforart-writing

[torontotravelblog]

27 Toronto Tourist Attractions That You Shouldn’t Miss

These Are A few of the Toronto Vacationer Attractions!

Getting Around Toronto

Because there is a lot to see as well as carry out in Toronto, doing it all will certainly take some preparation. While the city is generally all level and walkable-- the distances between tourist attractions can be a little overwhelming. You can get on the TTC (Toronto Transportation) by utilizing the trams, buses, and train lines to get around.

You can think about getting Voila card (the rechargeable card you just touch) as well as just packing it with money at a device. The TTC is actually moving to Presto-only in the near future (very early 2019?) so the facilities will with any luck be caught up for site visitors to conveniently obtain their Presto as well as go. It wasn't easy in years prior ... trust us.

Toronto Taking In The Sights City Tours

That being claimed, there are great deals of scenic tours that are arranged for you to check out one of the most without preparing anything at all. You can take place the timeless bus tour of Toronto and acquire a hop-on-hop-off bus tour ticket. These benefit various lengths of time to match your trip.

One more preferred way to navigate Toronto in by bike-- as well as there are lots of wonderful Toronto bike excursions that will certainly reveal you the means! Biking is in fact a wonderful method to navigate due to the fact that Toronto downtown core web traffic can be an outright headache.

Undoubtedly, bike tours just run in the warmer months but most definitely something to consider. You can't beat a local guide, exercise, and also a quicker setting of transport!

Finally, if you just intend to state screw it and do it all-- you can do an utmost day scenic tour that consists of a boat cruise ship on Lake Ontario. Being able to see the sky line from the waterfront is something that Eric hasn't also done!

Toronto Visitor Attractions

However that's enough scenic tour talk now-- let's study the top tourist attractions around Toronto! You'll notice that they are in no certain geographical order. That claimed, we did our ideal to offer you the general locations/directions.

CN Tower

The Canadian National Tower (additionally frequently referred to as the CN Tower) resembles the crown jewel of the Toronto skyline. Constructed back in the 1970s, the CN Tower was the highest man-made structure! Standing at 533 metres high, the views from the top are absolutely incredible. You can see for numerous miles and even into the USA!

As soon as you ride one of the fast elevators to the major deck, there is lots to do up there! There is a famous glass floor for those endure enough to walk on. The view to the ground is pretty dizzying. There is a restaurant up there-- 360 Dining establishment-- that is recognized for offering superior dishes with local components. The coolest part? The restaurant makes a full rotation every hour so you absolutely obtain sights of throughout the city!

The CN Tower is known for the Edge Walk-- a thrill-seeker experience of hanging off the edge of the beyond the building. Lastly, you can take the lift to the Sky Case-- one level higher for sights of the city. Comes at an entry cost, though so strategy as necessary! Right here is the official site for the CN Tower.

Ripley's Fish tank of Canada

As a relatively more recent attraction to the city's line-up of amazing points to do, Ripley's Fish tank has actually absolutely made a splash in a short quantity of time. See what we did there? Got ta love our aquarium puns!

The Fish tank is house to the lengthiest undersea glass tunnel in The United States and Canada-- it prolongs via "Unsafe Lagoon". This is where you come face-to-face with some terrifying predators like sharks and eels.

In all, there are 9 various galleries as well as over 400 varieties to have a look at. You make certain to find something you delight in! The area is so popular-- they suggest going to prior to 10 am for after 3 pm to defeat the crowds.

If you are preparing a visit to Ripley's Fish tank of Canada and also recognize which day, consider a Ripley's Fish tank "After Hrs" ticket that stands for an evening visit after 7:00 pm. Crowds can be smaller as well as admission is really lowered from the daily fare.

The Distillery Area

Do you like beer, background, excellent food, and also excellent photo places? Great-- it seems like a visit to the Distillery District is for you! Located to the east of midtown, this old enterprise zone was as soon as the home of several distilleries in the city-- hence the name!

Nowadays, the weird distillery still exists and is mixed in among the many stores, restaurants, coffee areas, as well as breweries that have actually moved in! You can do a Distillery Area strolling tour modification to find out about the rich history of the red-bricked factories.

The Distillery District has plenty of fascinating art setups that attract crowds and also make great photographs. In the winter, the District is residence to incredible light screens as well as a wintertime paradise of Xmas Market delays.

The Area is likewise residence to one of our favourite classic breweries-- Mill Street. Recognized for their Signature Mill Street Organic Beer, you can even sit outside as well as have a trip of beer for a great cost!

Pro Pointer: If beer is what you enjoy, Toronto has a crazy vibrant beer scene. You can check it out on a Beer and also History Scenic tour of the city. The good news? You'll finish in the Distillery Area!

Kensington Market

You might have become aware of this hip and different location that you have to walk through? It's likely Kensington Market-- and you should definitely check it out. Kensington lies to the west of Spadina Avenue, north of midtown, between University as well as Dundas Streets. It's close to Chinatown if you wish to see that too-- we state it below!

This urban forest of graffiti, amazing clothing shops, fantastic restaurants, markets, probably has something for everyone. You do not also have to be trying to find anything-- just a stray with to experience the neighbourhood suffices. You can not miss things like the Yard Automobile-- you'll know it when you see it. Depend on us.

Pro Idea: Kensington is an uniquely old as well as modern area with a fascinating immigrant background about it. So, it's fitting to learn more about the history of Kensington Market through a food excursion!

Bata Shoe Museum

Do you like footwear? Like, do you ACTUALLY like shoes? Would a gallery filled with footwear make you delighted? If so, the BATA Shoe Museum could be for you to look into! Located on Bloor Street simply north of downtown, the gallery has done an incredible job of gathering and showcasing footwear from around the world.

We have actually never been yet strolled by lots of often times as well as constantly thought it looked super fascinating. If you want to visit, obtain your BATA Footwear Museum entryway ticket.

Woodbine Coastline

Ah, Woodbine Coastline-- what can we claim? It's "residence". The coastline is located in the neighbourhood called "The Beaches". The Coastlines remain in the city's eastern end-- and also it's really precisely where we lived right part of 2017 when we lived in Toronto!

Woodbine Beach is a massive (and greatly preferred) sandy as well as rocky coastline with access to swim in Lake Ontario. There is a boardwalk that runs for kilometres with Ashbridge's Bay, other strolling routes, parks, canine coastlines, and also woody areas.

When it comes to points to do, the summertime is busy with paddleboard occupants, swimming, sunbathing, a couple of patios, and also beach volleyball. The fall is excellent for autumn strolls along Lake Ontario.

The neighbourhood area along Queen Street East has lots of restaurants, bars, and also shops that you ought to take a look at. It's funny-- the Beaches is where we worked with as well as expanded our other traveling site-- Penguin as well as Pia-- in its early days. Exactly how times have actually altered!

" The Toronto Indication" at Nathan Phillips Square

Travelling to Toronto and wanting to snap an image for Instagram? Certainly you do! Head north from Lake Ontario to Nathan Phillips Square. Situated at Queen Road West just west of Yonge, it's right here that you'll discover Toronto Municipal government and also the well-known "Toronto Indication".

Throughout the day, the indication of commonly themed for numerous festivals or events. At night-- it's all brightened! Nathan Phillips Square is quite the gathering spot in the city. At New Year's, the Square is filled with performance stages as well as party-goers-- Eric has also been a few times.

In the winter months, the fountain you see before the indication becomes an ice skating rink which is complimentary to make use of (or sets you back a couple of dollars for a skate service). There are street food trucks and also lots of tourist buses park below considering that it's a great location to start any type of Toronto sightseeing and tour adventure.

Fort York

Are you into discovering Toronto's function in army background? Wish to learn about exactly how we beat the United States in the War of 1812? That's a real story-- as well as you can discover everything about it at Ft York. The grounds are located to the west of downtown-- squeezed between the Lake and Freedom Town under the Gardiner Expressway.

The historic site is in fact among the biggest collection of 1812 Wartime structures. They even have cannon shootings and daily trips that run regularly. Some of the park ground are cost-free to wander with yet the displays and museums are entered for a charge. To find out more regarding seeing Fort York and also the exhibitions, go to the official Fort York site.

St. Lawrence Market

The St. Lawrence Market is most definitely a must-see if you are going to the city. We saw the marketplace "playing traveler" when Lisa was visiting before she moved to Canada as well as it was an outstanding experience.

The present building where it lies was opened in 1902! Inside, there are two floorings-- the main floor extends the size of the major hall as well as the lower floor is just a section of the length. You'll find a choice of fresh fruit and vegetables, fresh meats and seafoods, cheeses, ready food, red wine, trinkets, you name it!

There are examples at numerous counters and also locations to order lunch so you certainly should not leave hungry. If you are trying to find really traveler Canadian mementos, there is additionally a location to buy them here. You can learn more concerning the Market and also the location of Old Toronto on a historic food as well as market scenic tour of the location!

Pro Tip: -The marketplace lies simply to the eastern of midtown on Front Street-- and also you can look into The Gooderham Structure for a great image. The Gooderham is that historic red-brick flatiron building at the junction of Wellington Street and Front Street!

Distillery Brewery

All aboard the Vapor train ... to Steamwhistle Brewery! Situated extremely close to Ripley's Fish tank, the CN Tower, and also the Rogers Centre, Steamwhistle has actually been a vacationer magnet and prominent brand in Toronto and Canada for two decades.

Established back in 1998, Steamwhistle discovers its home in the Roundhouse-- an old red-brick train repair work depot utilized back in the day.

Nowadays, you can visit the brewery or simply belly up to bench for a pint of the timeless pilsner that has actually made them one of the most well-known beers in Canada. To check out the Brewery or to schedule an excursion, take a look at the official internet site of Steamwhistle.

The Toronto Islands

Aiming to get away from the pressure of midtown Toronto? Have a look at the Toronto Islands-- that could aid! Found in Lake Ontario just off the shore across from downtown, "the Islands" as they are known are popular for their beaches, walking routes, as well as the historical Centreville Amusement Park.

The Islands themselves in fact have citizens-- and to get to them there is a ferryboat that leaves from the Ferry Incurable located on Queens Quay between Yonge and Bay Streets. You can look into the Toronto Island ferry routine here.

Alternatively, if you want a smaller sized trip of the harbour and also surrounding islands, have a look at this Toronto Harbour watercraft cruise. You need to get off on the islands so the excursion functions as a water taxi-- and fantastic images of the sky line are generally guaranteed!

Casa Loma

It's a home? It's a castle? No, it's Casa Loma! Built in the very early 1900s and also located in Toronto's midtown, Casa Loma is a leading tourist attraction for so many factors.

This Gothic desire home was developed by an affluent Toronto business person-- Sir Henry Pellatt. After years of background, the estate is now possessed by the city as well as revered for its numerous art items as well as abundant history.

Due to the grand size of the estate and also gardens, Casa Loma is likewise the place for several events, celebrations, and also wedding events throughout the year. If you are going to, you can purchase a ticket to enter and also get on a guided tour to discover all about one of Toronto's most popular attractions! Here is the main Casa Loma site!

Hockey Hall of Fame

You can't most likely to Canada as well as not uncover the abundant background of hockey! So, you must take a trip to the Hockey Hall of Fame! Located midtown on Front Road, the Hockey Hall of Fame is a wonderful museum/exhibit with tons to do and also great deals to learn about.

The coolest part is that you will have the ability to see the Stanley Cup (the largest trophy in hockey and also among the oldest sports prizes in organized leagues worldwide).

Eric went as a kid lots of often times since it was constantly a great area for an institution to intend a field trip to. That claimed, there is lots to do for adults as well. Hockey is a huge part of Canadian society and so a visit is most definitely worth your time! You can discover more at the main Hockey Hall of Popularity site.

Dundas Square

If you are seeking the "Times Square" but also for Toronto-- Dundas Square is it. From the street performers to the lights at night, the edge near Yonge and Dundas is an excellent area to experience Toronto industrious at night.

Besides shopping centers and also dining establishment, there isn't much to do there, however you would absolutely go through to snap a couple of photos in the evening!

It's possibly good to state that the southwest edge is where you go into the Eaton Centre-- a top destination yet not good enough for its very own place on the list. It's simply a really great shopping mall that is rather large as well as features some popular stores. There are fountains as well as at Christmas, they have a tree and also huge reindeer!

Royal Ontario Gallery

The Royal Ontario Gallery (the ROM, for short) is located at Bloor Street and also Avenue Road as well as has a background of showing simply a bit of everything! Nevertheless, this makes good sense-- the ROM is the largest (and also most gone to) museum in Canada and among the biggest in The United States and Canada.

With around 6 million items, the countless galleries and also exhibits feature points from spiders to art, culture to dinosaurs, as well as Rome!

Eric went as a kid years ago and remembers having an impressive time at the ROM! If you are arriving by subway, you can get off at-- you guessed it-- Gallery Station!

Pro Tip: You can get a ROM General Admission ticket ahead of time here if you select!

Scotiabank Field-- previously Air Canada Centre

If you are into sports, Toronto is an incredible sporting activities city with very enthusiastic followers throughout the professional organizations. At the Scotiabank Sector (previously called the Air Canada Centre) the Toronto Maple Leafs play ice hockey as well as the Toronto Raptors play basketball. The Sector is located closer to the water, simply southern of Union Station.

Leafs tickets can be very pricey yet are certainly worth the experience of enjoying specialist degree hockey in Canada. Raptors tickets can be more economical if you do not mind sitting farther up in the stands!

Even viewing the game in any of the sporting activities bars close-by is an experience worthwhile of a site visitor to Toronto! Below is the Scotiabank Field web site if you wish to have a look at ticket availability as well as rates.

Art Gallery of Ontario

The Art Gallery of Ontario (or AGO, for short) is located on Dundas Street West in between Spadina and University Avenue and also is most definitely an art fan's paradise. Featuring 95,000 works over 45,000 sq metres of room, this makes the AGO one of the largest galleries in all of The United States and Canada.

The AGO was initially established in the year 1900. Throughout the years, it has actually seen expansions to the present size and also number of galleries.

The AGO hosts exhibits and has several long-term galleries including every little thing from Canadian artwork to African sculptures to Baroque-era paints. You can learn more right here at the official AGO internet site-- keep in mind the AGO is closed on Mondays!

Chinatown

There are lots of amazing Chinatowns around the world (San Francisco, for example)-- and Chinatown in Toronto is no exemption! If you want to experience Chinatown in Toronto, head over to Spadina in between University Road and also Queen Road West.

You'll locate outdoor shops with all type of items, amazing dining establishments (with truly excellent dim sum), and also various other areas to grab sweet treats.

Chinatown itself is a cool experience as well as easily put along Spadina. This makes it very easy to wander through on the way to an additional destination. Toronto is a city that prides itself on its multiculturalism and also ethnic diversity so check it out!

Rogers Centre

Still considering sports? Just how around catching a baseball video game? Heaven Jays dip into the Rogers Centre-- located literally at the base of the CN Tower.

The Jays are the only Canadian team playing in Major League Baseball so if you remain in Toronto anytime from April to September, Toronto is your only opportunity to capture baseball north of the boundary!

The wonderful thing about Jays games is that the summer weather condition indicates a great time out in the sunshine. The other excellent aspect of tickets at the Rogers Centre is that they are still relatively inexpensive. You can go to a ready low-cost as well as appreciate the video game from suitable seats!

Unlike at Scotiabank Arena, you can show up on video game day, wait in line, and also obtain tickets! It's a franchise that isn't also costly yet (coughing, the Leafs). Below's the Jays website for tickets.

Queen Road West

Queen Road West is definitely where you can obtain some shopping done! Found-- you thought it-- along Queen Street West west of Yonge Road as well as expanding well past Bathurst Street, Queen Street is likewise house to many amazing restaurants, hip bars and pubs, and cafe.

One of our preferred ramen areas in on Queen Road West as well as Lisa misses it a lot from when we used to go for ramen lunch! Mmmm, noodles.

Harbourfront Centre

If you are looking for things to do down near the waterfront, head to the Harbourfront Centre! The Centre itself is actually a location of the pier referred to as a "cultural hub". This implies that there are strolling courses, efficiency phases, displays, dining establishments, coffee shops, as well as far more.

There is always something taking place down at the Harbourfront Centre. You can get excellent images down by the lake, and the proximity to Amsterdam Brewhouse is also good! Discover more concerning what's on at the Harbourfront Centre at the main site.

University of Toronto

As one of the earliest colleges in all of Canada as well as the earliest in Ontario, the College of Toronto has a terrific credibility on the world stage for academics. Founded in 1827, the main campus (St. George Campus) is commonly like entering a time capsule.

This college has an enormous primary university that stretches for blocks as well as obstructs between University Road and Bloor Street. You can go through, get on a campus scenic tour, and you could also discover football taking place at their University Stadium!

Tourist Attractions Located Just Outside of Toronto

While this write-up has to do with Toronto tourist attractions that are primarily located midtown or very nearby, the reality exists are a handful of outstanding destinations that you may be interested in looking into! So, here are five.

We intend to make it clear: these are NOT in midtown Toronto. It would be in your benefit to have actually a rented out vehicle to get to these destinations given their distance. That stated, you 'd most definitely think about these on a weekend journey in Ontario if you're up for it!

Toronto Zoo

Found out in the north end of Scarborough, the Toronto Zoo is renowned for its number of varieties-- over 5,000! The zoo itself is separated right into 7 "areas" what display all various climates/regions where animal groups exist in the wild.

The Toronto Zoo was originally opened in the 1970 and also today takes pleasure in very high visitor numbers as a result of their commitment to study as well as environmental sustainability. You can learn more about instructions and admission costs at the main internet site of the Toronto Zoo.

Scarborough Bluffs

If Woodbine Coastline as well as the parks in that area weren't sufficient, you can drive out to Scarborough (much east of the city). Along the water's edge, you'll find large white high cliffs-- these are the Scarborough Bluffs. The cliffs reel in a number of site visitors to the neighboring parks and also coastlines in the summer season. Significantly, you can prepare a see by going to Scarborough Bluffs Park Beach or Bluffer's Park Beach.

Canada's Paradise

Wonderland is the greatest as well as ideal amusement park in the nation. Found regarding 40 mins north of downtown Toronto, Heaven features roller rollercoasters that break numerous top 10 checklists in the world for tallness or speed, to name a few things. Simply Google "Leviathan"-- it's the tallest in Canada and the 9th highest on the planet!

Eric matured about 20 mins north of Heaven therefore as a child (and as a teen, as well) he would go to Wonderland on summertime evenings when the crowds had died down.

You can additionally enter the spring or autumn at minimized hrs. These days, the area is busy and also pricey-- but certainly worth it if you like delights as well as decent attractions. Take a look at the official internet site for Canada's Wonderland!

Ontario Scientific Research Centre

Intend to be entertained and also discover a little, too? The Ontario Science Centre is where you need to go! Located to the northeast of the city along the Don Valley Parkway in North York, the Scientific research Centre is recognized for the included exhibits, interactive science screens, and IMAX theatre.

They also have a jungle location which is environment controlled to assist grow various plants to review ecology.

Overall, the Science Centre is a wonderful way to eliminate a couple of hrs or captivate the youngsters if you desire much more suggestions! Look into the main site for the Ontario Science Centre for instructions and prices!

Niagara Falls

Allow's be clear-- Niagara Falls shouldn't be on this checklist because it's not "only a 45 minutes drive" from Toronto like the others. Niagara Falls has to do with 2.5 hrs from midtown Toronto, traffic depending.

So, if you wish to check out Niagara Falls, you can take place a Niagara Falls day trip from Toronto to make things simple if you really did not intend on heading down on your own.

The article “ 27 Toronto Tourist Attractions That You Shouldn’t Miss “ was published first on Toronto Away

Vitamin Therapy Toronto - The IV Lounge

[azariaspace]

My RA Application Essays

Nobody wants to read these?  Good.  Here they are anyway.  It’s been at least two months since I first thought about this and I can’t let the idea go.  It’s been two weeks since word of my continued-resident status, and I’m still thinking about it.  I’ve accepted my fate but my life now is geared towards being one as a junior.  So I’m flinging these into the void for...  I dunno why.

Why do you want to be a Resident Assistant? (200-400 words) Calvin has grown to become home for me, and I want to give that to others.

I love authentic community.  It's something I've cherished my whole life, and I want to instill that love in others.  I define authenticity as honesty coupled with vulnerability, and genuinely believe it's the greatest gift we can give to each other as people.  Authenticity allows us to see who we truly are as people by being honest with ourselves and others, and allows us to form true, genuine relationships with each other.  In addition, people are complex.  They're funny, weird, and ridiculous, especially young adults who are learning to be independent, and nobody gets to see that transformation and that funny, weird, ridiculous reality more than an R.A.

In addition, my R.A. in particular has helped me a lot.  She's walked with me through some difficult situations and supported me through some really cool things that I've been fortunate enough to experience.  [She] is such a strong support for individual members of our floor and the community at large, and I'd love to be able to offer that support for a floor myself one day.

Finally, I want to bring a new look at inclusion to the way a lot of floors operate.  Inclusion is often pictured as simply physically bringing members together and making sure everyone shows up to a certain number of events.  But I think inclusion relates back to authentic community.  It's not enough to personally invite people to floor events instead of just sending mass emails, though the personal connection is definitely a part of it.  I think inclusion involves really knowing who each resident is and what makes them unique, embracing their similarities and differences, and celebrating them as individuals and as a community.  Inclusion is often a joyous time, and can look like having international students teach the floor how to cook dinners from their home countries or celebrating residents’ first snows, but it also can involve difficult conversations about race, gender and sexuality, and disability, among other things.  Inclusion can be hard, but it's worth it, because it's part of truly knowing and being known.  It's part of community.  It's part of living wholeheartedly, and it excites me.

Please describe 2-3 personal traits do you possess that will help you be successful as a Resident Assistant. (200-400 words) The first trait I possess that would help me be a successful R.A. is my flexibility.  I’ve always been able to adapt to changing circumstances fairly easily, but working on the set construction crew in Calvin Theatre Company this past semester really helped me hone this skill.  In the scene shop, you have to do different things each day, from cutting wood with power saws to rigging lights to designing a lighter version of a certain prop, and everything in between.  While I imagine being an R.A. would involve a lot less sawdust, no two days in Residence Life are the same.  An R.A. has to be ready for any circumstance, from an impromptu floor event to a crisis, and a good R.A. would be able to navigate the dynamic landscape of a floor, and the dorm at large, with a cool head and grace.

The second and third traits I possess that would help me be a successful R.A. are intertwined.  They're the traits of being passionate and being committed.  I believe passion and commitment are two sides of the same coin.  If I'm passionate about something, then I'm committed to seeing it through, from its conception to its fruition.  If I'm committed to something, then the passion — if it didn't exist at the beginning — will develop as I work on it.  Basically, if I want to see something happen, then I will make sure it happens or it gets to the people who will make it happen.  If I've been tasked with making something happen, then I will grow to love it as if it was my own idea while still recognizing the unique qualities that whoever thought of it brought to the table.  This passion and commitment extends to coursework, to ideas for floor events, and to finding ways to make Calvin a more welcoming place for all of its students.

What practical strategies do you implement to keep your life organized and follow through on tasks? (100-250 words) I use three tools to keep myself organized and ensure I follow through on tasks.  The first is a Google calendar, my primary method to track time commitments — like classes.  Whenever I find out about an event, I'll place here.  If it just happens once, I'll indicate that, but I can also plug in recurring events.  I also indicate time for studying and free time, so I have a full understanding of what my day looks like.  Finally, it’s color-coded, so I can easily see what I have going on at a glance.

Secondly, I use a physical calendar.  While I use the Google calendar to only see one week at a time, this calendar shows me a whole month.  On this calendar, I write down all my big assignments, such as papers, as well as things like sporting events.  This calendar helps me get an overview of what my month looks like and helps me budget my studying and free time wisely.

Finally, I have a to-do list on my phone.  There’s a section to keep track of things I need to do throughout the week, like working on a paper, and a breakdown of everything — both tasks and events — that I need to do on each day.  It’s a very specific combination of the two calendars that takes the items from both and combines them in one space.

Taken as a whole, this system helps me stay organized and on top of all my commitments.

In addition to dorm or KE [apartment] worship times and Bible studies, please explain how your personal Christian faith would be demonstrated in your work as an RA. (200-400 words) I hope that my faith is demonstrated in everything I do, even now.  I imagine many of the ways my faith would be demonstrated as an R.A. would be the same as now.  I attend chapel and LOFT [the weekly not-church service put on by Campus ministries], and invite people from my floor to come with me, go to church on Sundays and talk with my floor-mates about our different church experiences each week, pray for people when they ask and sometimes volunteer that service, and maintain my own personal relationship with God through prayer and devotions.

In addition, there are some things that I would do for my floor as an R.A.  Not all of these ideas are mine, so I’ll try to credit their authors.  The first comes from [my brother] R.A.  He noticed that, Biblically, people made great sacrifices for and highly prioritized prayer.  As such, he gets up at three in the morning and wanders up and down his hall, praying for his residents.  He sacrifices some of his sleep for his residents, and even if none of them are aware, it’s still strengthening his floor.  I want to do that.

The second idea is a collaboration between my R.A. and myself.  [My R.A.] started a Community Development Team.  After our first meeting, she told me her ideas for praying for the floor.  She mentioned [our brother R.A.’s] prayer walks, and her attempts to do the same every week but doesn’t always succeed.  I mentioned that we as a team could take turns doing it each week, and she threw out the idea that we could have one night of praying for the dorm, where we each have an hour-long shift with a partner.  If I take the idea of the Community Development Team with me (which I plan on), I’d want them to do something similar.  If I don’t, I’d still want to bring the night of prayer in some capacity.

The final idea comes from a previous [dorm] Barnabas [the spiritual leader of a floor].  It’s the idea of having a time to de-stress and plug into the Word in the basement.  The way they did it last year was by, on Saturdays, having coloring pages with Scripture passages on them and worship music, and anyone from the dorm could come and color.  I think that’s a really cool way to build community throughout the whole dorm and strengthen people’s faith in subtle ways.

In both challenging ways and fun ways, what do you believe is the role of an RA in bringing about Calvin's vision for community in the residence halls? Calvin’s mission is to equip students to think deeply, act justly, and live wholeheartedly as Christ’s agents of renewal in the world.  All staff are charged with facilitating this goal, and R.A.s are in the unique position of being both students — the people being equipped — and staff — the people equipping others.

Calvin wants its students to thrive, and it wants its students to thrive together.  An R.A.’s job is to create an environment on their floor where community can happen.

On the one hand, that involves challenges.  An R.A. has to enforce policy, because a community needs rules and boundaries in order to function.  From gently reminding residents to keep it quiet to calling out and dealing with far more serious breaches of the Calvin Student Conduct Code, an R.A. has to be capable of and willing to deal with every violation.  In addition, an R.A. must abide by all the standards — they must hold themselves to an even higher standard than their residents.

On the other hand, bringing about community is a fun task.  It involves eating with people, planning and executing events with people, having planned and spontaneous conversations about everything from music to life stories.  Community can involve going to your residents’ events, showing up when one of your residents has desk duty, and singing “Happy Birthday” to your residents as loudly and as obnoxiously as possible in the dining hall.

Community involves living life together, and life is often messy, but it’s also so much fun.  Life is like a painting — the palette sometimes looks like a wreck, but the final product is beautiful.

Do you have any reservations or concerns about being placed in a particular hall or with another particular RA candidate?   Also, list any RA candidates you are dating or have dated. I’m nonbinary.  That means that I’m not a guy or a girl.  I’m a little hesitant about being placed in a traditional residence hall, or really anywhere that is divided by the gender binary, because I have no place in that system.  I’m outside of it completely.  But I know I’ll only be a sophomore next year, so if I am chosen to be an R.A., it’s extraordinarily unlikely that I’d be chosen to be an R.A. for [upperclass housing] (and, in fact, I wouldn’t want to be an R.A. for [the apartments] if I had other options, and I would be the first to admit that it would be weird for me to be an R.A. in [upperclass-only dorms]).  I spoke to my R.D. about what it would look like to be a nonbinary R.A., and she said that it would probably be the best fit for me to be somewhere in [the living-learning communities where the wings are connected by a shared lobby space on each floor, unlike other halls], as gender is de-emphasized.  But honestly, I just really need a staff that is not only supportive in general, but actively supportive of the LGBTQ+ community and affirming of my legitimacy as a leader and a resident wherever I live.  It’s going to be a little weird no matter where I wind up, assuming I wind up an R.A.  But weird isn’t necessarily bad.  I’m excited for the opportunity to grow with my (as of now theoretical, but hopefully real) staff and my residents, just as I’ve grown with my floor this semester and will continue to do so throughout this year.  In addition, I have some health complications that might make being on [a specific living-learning floor] challenging, with the emphasis on outdoor activities.  (These would in no way impact my work as an R.A. on any floor; rather, they would impact my ability to be a participant of [that floor] under any circumstances, R.A. or resident.) I have not dated any potential R.A. candidates in the past and am not doing so now.

That’s that. That’s what they saw on the essay front.  I only edited this to take away names and locations, and to clarify what some terms meant for people who don’t go to Calvin.  The grammar is as-is, meaning that there’s something I picked up on that I should’ve changed.  But we’ll see.  We’ll see if anybody else wants to edit and has any thoughts.  Because I’ll be damned if it slips away from me again.

[engineerbabuinc]

Remote Jobs for Web Developers to Work Remotely

Are you looking to hire dedicated web developers for remote jobs? Whoa! You are on the right page.

Ask any start-up or any new-gen- entrepreneur the toughest part of his job is “Hiring a right remote candidate”!

Though, any organization whether doing online or offline business hire a remote worker. It is a cultural shift and every business is embracing this change. According to a study, the US spends $80,000 USD and Australia spends $70,000 AUD, and still unable to find accurate people who can complete the work with quality and perfection.

Companies that are making remote workforce

A report by Gallup stated that employees in the USA who regularly work remotely increased from 39% to 43% of the workforce between 2012 and 2016. If we dive deep into the study, it claimed that in 2016, 57 percent of employees working in computer/information systems spent some of their time working remotely.

Many successful businesses including GitHub, Buffer, Zapier, etc are running by fully-remote teams that launch chart-topper products and services which are built-in and marketed from home offices, coffee shops and co-working spaces around the world.

In addition to this, a cyber-security company Crowdstrick which is also named as “great place to work” by Fortune, its 400 employees out of 800 work remotely. This a prime example of how modern age and well-established companies are welcoming the remote working practices.

How remote jobs are beneficial for employers?

Many (many) people seem to think that ‘working from home’ or the remote working amounts to flutter down on the sofa, watching television or playing video games all day, with maybe an hour or two of ‘work’ thrown in the mix. Good luck finding that gig (lol).

But the truth is that most remote workers tend to put in long and extended hours and take fewer breaks than conventional office employees. With zero commute and fewer distractions — which eventually lead to more focus and productivity, it’s easy to see why. Some of the key benefits of hiring developers for remote jobs are listed below:

Talent Pool: Hiring remotely always allows employers to choose ‘the best out of the best’. Some businesses or entrepreneurs are able to hire people from anywhere in the world, while others require someone to be in a particular location or time zone. Talent from a different location is always better than local staff. He/she will give new a twist to the workflow.

Cost-saving: A talented employee who works from home doesn’t require any office space, computing equipment, coffee, and covering of commute. This money can be utilized to boost up the salary which will obviously increase the productivity of every developer.

Innovative ideas: Remote developers have working experience with various companies around the planet and deal with multiple clients at any one time. This provides them with multitasking exposure, which gives a clear path to new and innovative ideas. Remote developers are more inspired, enthusiastic and motivated about their work and give more input as compared to in-office employees.

Higher retention: It has been observed that remote workers have a higher job satisfaction ratio and they enjoy a perfect social –work-life balance. They have lower down the stress levels and live a healthier lifestyle. This is the reason why work from home (WFM) employees takes leaves less often. It will be really surprising to see after hiring your first remote employee that working with such an employee is quite easy. Moreover, you will certainly feel a sense of efficiency and reliability while getting your work done.

Increased productivity: It actually sounds weird but yes remote workers are much more productive than in-house developers who regularly work at 9-5. After continuously observing these groups for a period of 9 months, a study generated the following statistics which were released by the researchers. - Remote employees worked for more days (less number of sick days and leaves) - 5% more calls completed by the remote workers - Fewer breaks during the whole work.

Time zone coverage: Having a developer who works in rotational hours or of different time zone can improve the development process and support team because of instant work.

Various ways where you can hire developers for remote jobs

To begin with, we should discuss a choice between freelance remote developers or a dedicated team of developers. This is a very complex question but it streamlines the process of hiring. Depending upon the size of the project, the budget and a certain skill set is decided. Let us dive deeper into that. A project can classify into two parameters:

Small

Medium / Large

A small sized project required limited freelancers (one or two) to accomplish a small project or a particular task, which also indulges a Project Manager who will look after the code quality, time and proper communication with the team. In the case with larger projects with a need for ongoing support engaging a dedicated remote team is the best solution. Those normally are managed by their own (Project Manager) PM team, so they share additional your time on management tasks and communication efforts. To get more clarification refer to this chart:

Freelance Developers:

Project Size - Small

Budget - Limited

Project Manager Availability -  Yes

Skill Requirement - Short Term

Dedicated Team:

Project Size - Medium/Large

Budget - Modified

Project Manager Availability - No

Skill Requirement -  Ongoing

Recommended Reading: How to Hire a Dedicated PHP Developer

Now I think you have decided which hiring model suits you well, so the next question arises where to find a developer for remote jobs? There is a huge list of sources where you can hire a developer or team to carry out your project.

1. Freelancing Platforms: The freelancing platforms provide a wide range of remote developers. Millions of businesses and job seekers registered themselves on various freelancing portals in order to undertake remote jobs.

Upwork: This is the well-known remote job offering platform. It provides job opportunities for both – an independent freelancer and small startups (Agencies). But it has its own pros and cons. Basically; Upwork works as a mediator between both parties and charges some money. Some of the clients experienced that chasing an independent freelancer is a challenging task. They usually go for an agency in order to check these hurdles.

Freelancer: Another very famous podium where a job seeker can bid on various projects posted by the job provider or “the client”. It is worth mentioning here though its database is low as compared to Upwork. But recent times its user suggested that it doesn’t provide quality of the job and secure payments.

People Per Hour: People Per Hour is another marketplace connecting businesses and freelancers. People Per Hour is a freelance job board where clients post work requirements and freelancers find the jobs. This only for the clients who are interested in hiring developers only on an hourly basis. It doesn’t allow the client to hire developers for remote jobs monthly, yearly or per task. These limitations of People Per Hour drive the client towards other options present in the market.

2. Industrial- specific Forums: In the fasten society and the era of information technology, the majority of the software development solution providers offer quite informative software development blogs either on their websites or on public resources like Medium, Hackernoon, etc. Additionally, you can search the best software service provider on industry define platforms which gives more information about the company and help you get in touch with it.

Clutch: Clutch.co is a B2B marketing platform empowering premier brands to identify, understand and motivate their customers. It gives unbiased reviews and ratings to the businesses. More than 7000 IT-field companies registered themselves. The benefit of Clutch is that it only index verified companies and publishes verified clients’ reviews and feedback which helps to make a proper decision.

GoodFirms: One more in the list of remote hiring platforms. It provides a direct communication of job seekers with thousands of expert professionals within the software development industry all over the world. GoodFirms, just as the name suggests itself, is a dedicated community and contains the list of well-performing IT companies as well as a software solutions provider in the world.

3. Direct Hiring: Direct hiring means a situation where a company that intends to hire a candidate offers them the job directly. The direct hiring process doesn’t require any third – party elevation. There are many promotional blogs available in the public domain which gives a simple idea about the benefit of remote hiring. Here are some sources which will help you to find out the best developers for remote jobs.

Social Media: A very popular and prominent source to find out the remote developers who can work from home or any co-office space. You can easily find them on various social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. You can visit their websites and can see their previous work experience and discuss them about the same.

LinkedIn: It is specially designed for corporate. This is a type of social media that promotes talent and company in a very easy and professional manner. The LinkedIn profile shows the employee’s authenticity and works history with the skill and work experience in relevant technology.

Some myths about hiring Developers for Remote Jobs

As remote working and hiring are becoming more and more popular it simultaneously gives birth to the misconception about remote jobs and their working style. Here are some very common myths we heard off:

They work 24/7: It is a very common myth that the remote worker is always on “ON MODE”. Employees like working remotely because it gives them the freedom and flexibility to make their own work schedule but it doesn’t mean that they are available 24/7 to give services and support.

Difficult to communicate: Well partially it is true! Because are not available for group meetings and discussion every time but connecting them via video conferencing might be a good option. This will also help both parties to build a virtual relation. Another concern is that they aren’t communicators. But the fact is English is a universal language. Every professional is trained in speaking, writing and understands it very well.

Less productive: This is a very common misconception that the remote developers are lazy and they do not put much effort into the job. But this is wrong. The remote employees make their own work schedule. A recent study finds that remote employees are much more productive than in-office employees because they use less time to commutate and take shorter breaks. The remaining time is saved for the additional work.

Besides all the challenges here for the company are developing a consistent hiring the framework to get the best talent across the world, regardless of location; working on fostering the right culture; making meetings better and focusing on accountability.

Recommended Reading: Best Way to Hire a Node JS Developer

There is not a single reason left for you to limit the talent pool to a particular area. There is a wide range of tools available that assist you in collaborating with your remote workers for better communication. You can take advantage of these kinds of technology and enjoy these advantages of hiring developers for remote jobs.

Why hire offshore developers only from India?

According to Wikipedia, India is the 2nd largest country to provide freelancers. Over15 million people work remotely in IT and programming. India is the biggest market for hiring a developer for remote jobs. The proven record of performing well in the IT industry, Indian companies also open the doors for the world to work with their developers. There is no doubt that Indian developers are highly skilled and par excellent communicators, but they are also available at reasonable rates as compared to others.

India is a land of diversity. Its culture changes from place to place so the workforce too. When it comes to comparison of two IT hubs in India (Bangalore and Indore) Indore seems very reliable. Like if we talk about the work- employee culture Bangloreian IT engineer’s tendency to switch the job in every 7 months (on average) but IT engineers from Indore stick to the company for long.

EngineerBabu, a 10 years old startup from Indore achieving new heights. All developers of EngineerBabu are pre-scanned and hand-picked. We believe that every company should get benefit from extending the product team remotely and we provide a great opportunity to try scaling remotely with our trial! Let’s discuss the remote hiring process now!

Visit our blog for more information and feel free to request a demonstration of our hiring process.

I am very open for any suggestion, questions or feedback write to mayak@engineerbabu.com

Enjoyed the blog? Feel free to share it everywhere.

[therealak47-blog]

Closing Time

“every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.”

I’m really feeling that today.

Today is September 1, a day where my city’s population increases by ~40 000 people, as we’re a mid-sized (~400 000 people) city with two acclaimed post secondary institutions. I’ve lived here my whole life, save for my stint of living in Toronto, and this effect seems to have increased in the last decade. 

I’ve already done a bachelor’s degree at the university (in Canada, we use a slightly different vernacular, “college” is similar to a community college and offers mostly two year programs and “university” offers 4 year bachelor degrees and Masters/PhD programs).

And now I’m going to the college for some post grad work. I never thought I’d be going back to college the month before I turn 30, but here we are. 

I’m having a lot of feelings right now. It’s weird, I won’t be studying with 18 year olds (the program requires a degree with a minimum GPA for admission) but my classmates are still going to likely be 5-6 years younger than me for the most part. I’m not too worried about the social part. I didn’t really have a great experience in university- I was with my ex-boyfriend (who was 12 years older than me) and a local, so I didn’t have a lot of “college” experiences. Kind of just went through the motions, didn’t bother attending the graduation ceremony. The degree is in my closet. 

I live alone and have a much better idea of “my five year plan”, so I think studying will come much more naturally. There’s also a lot of perks of going back to school with the changes the government made recently in regards to student loans.

Canada, while not as progressive as Europe, has had much lower tuition fees and more access to loans and bursaries than the United States, at least going back to 2005, my first year of university. My parents are working poor, so I had to take my share of government loans- definitely would have made different decisions, but that’s fine.

Last year, the government changed its rules regarding student loans so that if you earned under a certain income, you would be given grants, not loans. So I have been struggling financially these past twelve months and one night (real talk: I don’t remember doing this. I think I was high.) I applied.

A couple weeks later, I got papers in the mail, saying I was approved and showing what I was entitled to. The grants cover tuition, books, and even most of my living expenses.

Included in tuition fees is a 12 month unlimited bus pass which has a ton of value for me, as I have epilepsy and can’t drive. A monthly bus pass is ~$80 here, so just that is a ~$1000 annual expense I don’t have to worry about.

There is a health plan with dental. I have a root canal tooth that broke a few weeks ago. Now I have an appointment to have it looked at (extracted) next week, because I don’t have to worry about how I’m going to come up with the money for a dental bill. 

There is a student rec center at the school that does not charge a membership rate for students. I also have arthritis and can’t run or do high-impact exercise. It will be awesome to have access to bikes and low-impact classes, like yoga. 

Another thing that I want to talk about- the Justin Verlander trade.

I woke up this morning to see that Verlander had been traded to the Astros. I keep very active in the baseball world and NO ONE saw this coming. Even the usual guys like Ken Rosenthal and Jon Heyman didn’t tweet until after midnight last night (I had fallen asleep before that)

You see, I didn’t always love baseball. My first live game was in 2006, in Detroit with my ex, watching the rookie Justin Verlander start against the Yankees (I’ve always hated the Yankees, though, even before my love of baseball). The guy just seems so cool. I’ve grown into loving baseball as he grew into a MVP, Cy Young winner who is now engaged to Kate Upton and drives a sweet Lamborghini while touring Italy with said supermodel financee. The guy has the coolest life.

It’s going to be so weird to not see him in a Tigers uniform. And I’m not even a Tigers fan- I’m a Jays fan. Or a Giants fan, if we’re in the National League.

I doubt Verlander thought his life would be as it is today, now a Houston Astro, but still with the hot girl, the cool car and the sweet life. 

My life is not as glamorous, but I think Justin and I are both having a day where one life ends and another begins.

I’m having a bit of trouble of how to start today. School starts Wednesday so I have the long weekend ahead to get things in order. My loan will be deposited either tonight or Tuesday so that will influence how and what I get done. 

I have about $50 of disposable cash until the loan is in my bank, so my options are somewhat limited, but also my state of mind is shuffling me in confusion. I haven’t had a period in almost two months (and am 100% not pregnant) so I’m experiencing like the advanced version of PMS- I was on the pill most of the nine years I dated my ex, so I’ve learned a lot about my hormonal imbalances while single. My body and mind feel like shit (the weather is getting fall-like which is also not helping) so I don’t feel like putting on a pretty dress and makeup and getting a drink somewhere. I’ve eaten way too much the past two days and am bloated and feel so fat, I have the two little patches of eczema/acne on my chin that I get right before my period now and awww-type clips make me cry. I don’t have a lot of female friends so I feel pretty alone in talking about my concerns.

After writing this out, I’ve decided to have a low-key day- a hoodie and yoga pants will be totally fine today. It’s cool out anyway- about 20C (68F for the Americans, roughly) and I can save looking nice for next week when I meet a bunch of new people. Today I’ll take for me.

And tonight, since I’ve read pretty much all the Rick/Reader fanfiction that exists, I’m winding down with some Kilgrave/Reader fanfic. It exists, I have the tab open for later reading. I haven’t had much of a sex drive lately but today I woke up feeling differently. I’m the weirdo that prefers written porn to videos (I actually prefer almost written ANYTHING to video ANYTHING) and what turns me on is reading about fictional, sociopathic men and imagining myself being manipulated (dub-con/non-con stuff). We’ve got our things and that’s mine, all right? It’s not like I do anything sexual with my plush Rick Sanchez. I just like imagining Rick Sanchez (or Kilgrave) fucking me into submission.

Kind of a weird way to end a long stream of consciousness, but I want to start my new life. And read some weird Kilgrave fanfic later.

[doctor-paprika]

Heroin sucks.

I have no followers, so I guess I am using this as a diary entry that no one will see but can help me vent a bit.

I am learning how to tumblr so have been randomly searching any interests that come to mind. Of course, one of the first I could think of was heroin/addiction recovery, but very few results came up. After that, I stupidly just searched the word “heroin” and the results really brought me down (lower than I already was, which was surprising.)

A few accounts were splattered with pictures of Kurt Cobain, which didn’t surprise me. Soon I saw several accounts with videos of people shooting up, people talking about how much they love heroin and other drugs, and of course, people talking of how they may be addicts, but they aren’t dirty junkies!

When I was 14 I began eating pills. Benzos were fun, but opiates were my favourite. I took them from medicine cabinets and kept myself in steady supply that way. Years passed, I graduated high school, fell in and out of a few relationships, and eventually began seeing someone who had been using heroin for a while. They would leave the room to shoot up, but one night I told them to stay, and I asked them to share.

I was 19, had a good job, a reliable car, over $4k in the bank I had earned every penny of on my own, a good relationship with my parents, and a few people I called friends.

I don’t want to sit here and put down my partner at the time because it is counterproductive. All I will say is that they were 26, had never had a job, a driver’s license, a high school diploma, but got lots of money given to them without question by their mother.

I say this just to give you (the person who is not reading this) an idea of my situation at the time.

I loved my first shot. There was no mark left on my arm, which shocked me. Before this, I had needed four nurses to hold me down to get a tetanus shot, but suddenly the fear was gone. I didn’t want to bring up doing it again, so was very excited when my partner asked a few days later if I would like to join them in shooting up again. The second time was even better than the first.

The lies came quickly. Calls to my job, claiming my car was broken down. Calls to my parents coming up with various reasons as to why I wouldn’t be home that night. The few friends I had became unimportant, I had new “friends” that I met through my partner, and they either sold, used, or both.

A few months after I turned 20 I quit my job, officially moved in with my partner, and had begun to spend almost every moment of every day coming up with ways to get heroin. I felt like a cool adult, able to make my own decisions and get high whenever I wanted! What fun!

Without having to pay for food, rent, or anything but heroin, I ran out of my $4k in less than a year. I had been saving all of my money from age 15-19 and it was gone in just a few months. I also got my car taken from me by my parents. My partners mom knew that we used, she sobbed about it, yelled about it, and acted like it was the worst thing that could have ever happened to her… but would still give us $100-300 a day so we wouldn’t get sick, and provided a nice, new car for us.

I was lucky to live in the Bay Area, because all it took was a fifteen minute drive to Oakland and I had access to dozens of dealers. There were also many needle exchanges around the city in which each person could get 400 free, new clean needles and all the ties, cooks, cottons, and anything else a heroin addict could need, including a limited supply of Narcan - which I always kept on me after having OD’d myself once and watching another friend OD, and having us both be saved by the opioid antagonist.

Oh, and I began smoking crack. Lots of crack. Crack was great! And heroin was a perfect comedown! I was awake most hours of every day, and spent almost every second of those hours worrying about how the next hour would go.

By the time my parents found out about my use, I was 22. They had been my best friends and now we were completely out of contact. My mom would occasionally stop by the apartment my partner and I shared with their mom, but by then I had begun living in the car we had, because being in Oakland all the time was easier than having to drive there every day.

My partners mom would occasionally go through periods where she decided to cut us off. She was married to an alcoholic whose health was declining so had to tend to his addiction more than ours at that point. I had never imagined myself having to fly a sign for money, but now I was doing it all day, every day, and most of the time was stuck standing out there sick. Lots of homeless people live on the streets of Oakland, so to get a good spot to stand you needed to get out early, and find some confidence to fight others who wanted your spot. I had shit thrown at me, usually open drink containers, I got yelled at to get a job, to get the fuck off the median, to kill myself. I didn’t understand what I was doing to offend these people so bad. My least favorite part was the men who would hold out a dollar, just to pull it in once I got close and show me their dick before laughing and driving off - and the worst of that was one who actually came on my hand, he could have at least gave me the dollar after!

Once my partners mom was at the hospital daily with her rapidly declining husband, waiting for him to get a liver transplant that eventually came too late, we began staying at the apartment more. Every wall became covered in blood spatter, shot from rigs that had become blocked with coagulated blood. You could not see one inch of the floor, as it was covered in used rigs and bloody rags. Surprisingly, we didn’t get the security deposit back! I will always feel terrible that I let my cat live in that fucked up place.

I joined a methadone clinic a few times to try to avoid going through withdrawal, but I would always stop going because the drive there took away time I could have spent flying my sign, smoking crack, or shooting dope.

I was 23, my job was flying a sign, my car was in three accidents that left it barely functioning, had no money for longer than a few minutes (more usually a few hours because dealers were generally slow movers), was out of contact with my parents for thirteen months, and I didn’t have one friend. I had also gotten below 90lbs, which didn’t go well with my 5'8" body - inside or out. You know you’re at rock bottom when you have old crack dealers with no teeth telling you how unhealthy you look.

You know what my most commonly used phrases during those years were? • “I’m not a junkie, I’m a functioning addict!” • “I’m not a dirty crackhead, I take showers, brush my teeth, and wash my face (in the bathroom at Safeway.)” • “My parents/friends are so stupid, they don’t get that I’m totally fine. I’m better than fine, this stuff makes me feel great! If they tried it, they’d know!” • “I know *drug dealers name* takes a long time to meet up, but we’re friends! Not like how it is for them with all the junkies out here!” • “I’ve never had to whore myself out, I’ve never been to jail, I’m not like these nasty junkies out here..”

You know what kind of things I did that I thought were totally normal and definitely didn’t make me a mentally ill drug abuser? • searched the floor of my car for lost crack rocks for hours, tearing apart any parts of it I could - one time even thinking I had found a big chunk of crack and immediately smoked it, but it was a popcorn kernel! Worst thing I’ve ever smelled or tasted. • gone through every inch of my partners mom’s room to find any loose change or gold jewelery I could sell. • sold every book, videogame, DVD, CD, and any item I owned that I could get even a dollar for, including things I had had since my childhood that had incredible sentimental value. • sold every Safeway giftcard my partners mother would give us for 75% of its value, knowing it meant my partner and I would have no food for the foreseeable future. ¹ • then spent the money we got for the giftcard on crack, knowing that without food in our system we would throw up bile after each hit. • had to shit so badly after taking a hit of crack that I went on a curb where others could see, in the middle of the day, and then taken another hit right when I was done. • taken suboxone sooner than I knew I should have, and proceeded to vomit non-stop while driving, followed my shitting my pants three times, selling a PS4 that belonged to my partners friend, and driving to meet a dealer while still vomiting and wearing my shit filled pants.

Too much information? Gross? It’s weird for me to talk about it, because I have incredibly bad anxiety and don’t like to be open about more than I have to be, but drug addiction is gross and people need to realize that. There are people out there buying clothes and accessories with “Xanax��� and “Percoset” labeled on them! Alcohol is glamourized in the media all the time! And the worst part is, I get it. I get that feeling that of independence, that feeling of being cooler than others, that feeling of finally having found something to calm down my brain even a little bit and falling head over heels for it, that feeling of doing something illegal and scary and the adrenaline rush from it.

When I was in middle school there was an assembly where a man talked about his drug use. It ended with him saying quitting cigarettes was harder than quitting heroin. Once I got addicted to heroin, I knew that was complete bullshit. I wish there was a way to tell kids, adults, anyone who might be considering using that they should do anything else, that their lives can so easily be ruined for who knows how long, but unfortunately most will only learn from experience.

Addicts are demonized, we are looked at as scum, as monsters, as those you should stay far from. Addicts are people. Many addicts are brilliant minds that suffer from mental illnesses, some known and some not. I knew I was mentally ill, but the therapy groups gave me anxiety and the meds didn’t work quick enough so I took the route I felt would be easier, which proved to be the opposite. Addiction is a disease, whether people choose to believe it or not. The biggest argument I have heard against this is that addicts choose what has happened to them. Do you put down a diabetic, even if they are only dealing with that disease because they ate tons of pies and cakes every day? Do you put down a person with cancer, even if they are only dealing with that disease because they tanned themselves in the sun or under tanning booths every day? I chose to use heroin, I chose to use crack, I chose to eat pills, I chose to drink, but I did not choose to be an addict. Long before I did any of those drugs I was addicted to picking at my skin, addicted to cleaning, addicted to exercising and watching my diet very closely, but no on has ever put me down for having dermatillomania, for having OCD, or for having anorexia.

Those with mental illness are looked at as lesser beings, as being incompetent, as needing to be pushed aside and stepped on. But we are strong, we are bright, and we deserve love and acceptance.

I have been off of heroin since early 2014, but I will be celebrating my one year date of being completely clean and sober in eleven days. I never think about drugs anymore, until I see videos of others shooting up, text or images promoting the addict lifestyle, and unfortunately for me those are all too common and too easily found.

If you are an addict, ask for help. If you suffer from, or even think you may suffer from, any mental illness, ask for help. Even if it is hard to find at first, it is out there. Therapy, medications, rehabilitation and the like are out there.

But, you’re not reading this are you? Like I said, this is just a way for a rambling, ex-junkie to vent.

[swimmylionni]

Let me tell you about my favorite band, bloodthirsty butchers.

bloodthirsty butchers were a Japanese band active from 1988-2013. (Yes, it is stylized as “bloodthirsty butchers,” without caps. Don’t let Wikipedia lie to you, it’s written that way in all their music videos and almost all their album covers.) Most websites have trouble categorizing them, so they go with “punk” or “indie.” Indie doesn’t mean anything, of course. Early on they probably fit the Punk label pretty well, akin to a slightly heavier Blue Hearts. At their peak, they were more like a punk/neo-psych fusion band. Most of the songs were high-energy, fast-paced, with unmusical yelling vocals and awesome, unique, lengthy guitar solos. Hideshi Yokimura couldn’t sing, but his guitar playing was entertaining as hell. I won’t vouch for the skill involved--I don’t play guitar and can’t tell technical ability. But I can tell whether someone builds tension well, and as far as I’m concerned he was the best ever.

The best bloodthirsty butchers songs end with several minutes of guitar noodling, sometimes longer than the lyrical portion of the song. Y’know Sleater-Kinney’s Let’s Call It Love? Y’know how it’s their best song? bloodthirsty butchers were basically ~20 years of that.

Here’s a rough guide to bloodthirsty butchers. If we go chronologically we’ll start and end kinda weak, so let’s jump around and find ourselves in the middle. ‘Kay? And if you don’t care, there’ll be a nice tl;dr at the end you can look at.

Bloodthirsty Butchers [1990]

I’m Standing Nowhere [1993]

Lukewarm Wind [1994]

Their first albums were 2 cassettes released in 1988 and 1989. They are basically impossible to find, unless you want to shell out the $400 for the complete box set. I can’t comment on how they sound.

I can comment on the 3 albums released in the first half of the 90s. This is the period when the butchers were a kinda by-the-books Japanese punk band. The songs are mostly short, fairly catchy, very poorly produced, and loud. They’re all worth a listen, if you like that kind of music. (I do.) Of the 3, Lukewarm Wind is by far the best. The songs are ordered to make a more coherent sonic narrative. Occasionally it takes a break from LOUD FAST.

I don’t have a whole lot to say here. “ALLIGATOR” is a popular song but I’m not crazy about it. I’m more a fan of stuff like “Pressure,” which is a great way to end a record. If you like that song, look at Lukewarm Wind and work backwards from there.

No Album Mudai [2010]

Youth [2013]

Let’s jump way forward, to the end of the butchers. Yokimura, the band lead, died in 2013, so Youth is most likely their last album, unless for some reason they decide to plod on with a different lead or there’s enough new material already recorded to put out one more album.

These albums aren’t great! No Album Mudai has 2 songs worth listening to, at the very end. They are good to hear in order: Ocean, Curve. They work well together. Almost nothing else on this album works. It all sounds tired and by-the-books.

Youth is a bit better on average, but doesn’t have any songs as good as Ocean or Curve. This isn’t super surprising. A lot of bands get boring after 25 years. Cheers to the butchers for at least putting out something listenable. Compare to, say, most of Nick Cave’s recent albums, which leap between “kinda good” and “OH MY GOD TURN IT OFF.” Putting out good albums for more than a decade is hard!

Ok, now that leaves 7 non-compilation albums, plus some good EPs and live stuff, between 1994 and 2010. Also stuff I probably don’t have because English websites aren’t as reliable in regard to Japanese bands. Let’s break them down.

1999 - 2001: The slow, plodding stuff

Mikansei [1999]

Yamane [2001]

2 of the top 5 albums for sure.

Mikansei (which means “Incomplete”) is one of the first albums with serious neo-psych elements. (I skipped the first. We’ll get to it later.) It opens with “Faust,” which is not slow or plodding at all. I gave that description more because of “Boku,” which is good but not interesting enough to be as long as it is, “Mikansei,” which is about as good as title tracks can get, and “Sankaku,” which is fairly energetic but ends with about 10 minutes of kickass guitaring that isn’t energetic for much of the time. I feel like these songs give Mikansei a much more downbeat feel than previous albums. If you want to know why I say they’re punk/neo-psych fusion, give any of these a listen, especially Sankaku. (You might find it under “「△」.” “Sankaku” means triangle and sometimes the title is stylized that way.) This one has its rough spots and is clearly a transition album, but it’s one of my favorites. Someone must really like this album, because there’s easily-available romanization and English translation of most of the songs online--not so for the other albums, except Kocorono.

Yamane was the first butchers album I ever heard in full, and it was love at first listen. Almost every butchers record has at least 1 instrumental song, and Wagamama No Hotori is my favorite. It fits so beautifully in its place before “-100%.” I’m sorry I can’t find a link. Yamane is a lot slower than other butchers albums. It begins with a rather skippable trumpet opening, then opens proper strong with “Happy End.” It is not a happy-sounding song but sonically, the proper reverb use and repetitive structure and beautiful guitars make it a personal favorite. The last 3 songs on the album are “-100%,” “Moeru, Omoi,” and “-100% No.2.” Both of the 100%s have the same bass line and mellow melody. They’re relatively peaceful and lovely, if you like noise the same way I do. “Moeru, Omoi” is a long, intense divider between them, where every word is screamed as loudly as Yokimura can. The buildup around the 4-minute mark is the reason I love this band so much. “-100% No.2″ is the best song on the album. The production is immaculate, “-100% No.2″ has this fuzzy distortion that makes me feel so relaxed and happy. I’m sorry I can’t find links to any of these online. It is some of the best butchers material there is.

2003 - 2004: The weird stuff

Kōya ni Okeru bloodthirsty butcher [2003]

Birdy [2004]

Neither of these these rank among my favorites, but they undeniably have some super good songs.

Kōya ni Okeru has “Lucky Man,” which feels a bit like a return-to-roots attempt. This is what those first 3 albums would have sounded like if they had more experience back then. “Dorama” is... an “Obladi Oblada” cover? More or less? There’s no way it’s an exact translation, but it is almost the exact melody. “ 悲しみをぶっとばせ！“ is an instrumental song that’s mostly good except it has this really annoying synth around the 2:50 mark. There are a few segments where they experiment with atonal sounds, but it doesn’t work well for them.

Birdy opens with two of their best songs: “JACK NICOLSON” is one of their most popular, I believe. It also has a neat video, check it out (though cw for suicide attempt). The last line of the chorus translates to “I want to be a bad role model.” “Birdy” is simple but fun. For a song released in 2004, it really sounds like something someone would have put out in the 90s in the US. It’s kinda downhill from there. “Love Supreme” is one of their better instrumental songs. Again, there’s atonal stuff that doesn’t work--the album’s real pitfall.

2005 - 2007: The FUCK YEAH stuff

Banging the Drum [2005]

Guitarist Wo Korosanaide [2007]

I’ll come back to Banging the Drum. There’s too much to say. But I want it to be clear it belongs in the FUCK YEAH category.

Guitarist Wo Korosanaide translates to “Don’t Kill the Guitarist.” It begins with “yeah#1″ and OH MY GOD, YES, THIS IS HOW YOU BEGIN AN ALBUM, FUCK YEAH FUCK YEAH FUCK YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! This song RULES. It’s energetic as hell, dynamic enough to be more than a simple fast punk song, and is so very butchers in sound. It is, unfortunately, the highlight of the album. But there’s other really interesting stuff here, and nothing grating, so FUCK YEAH! I really like the female guest vocals on “Mushizu to taikutsu.” “Story” is like a better version of the type of songs that would be on No Album Mudai, their next album. This is solid work in general, even if it’s not their best.

1996, 2005: The stuff I skipped

Kocorono [1996]

Banging the Drum [2005]

I skipped them because, y’know, best for last.

Kocorono is probably their most popular album. There is a reason for this. It’s almost perfect 90s punk, with a narrative, evolving sound, musical callbacks, fantastic guitarwork, and my favorite guitar solo of all time ever. It’s another downbeat album, for the most part, but is the real start of the punk/psych fusion sound I love so much. Each song is a month, starting February and ending December. (A bit like Album of the Year.) The original album didn’t have “January,” but it’s on the 2010 re-release. It’s a better closer to the album than “December” and I recommend getting it. Every single song is great. If this post weren’t already so long, I’d want to go into my favorite parts down to the second of each. (Maybe later.) The awkward sax opening of “November” is the only thing I think doesn’t work. “July” is my favorite song ever. It is half guitar solo, wonderful, wonderful guitar solo. I could watch live performances of it all day. It is a true shame I’ll never get to see the butchers perform, because hearing this live would be a nigh-spiritual experience for me. I get goosebumps when I hear the opening.

Banging the Drum is my favorite album. I mean of any band, ever, not just bloodthirsty butchers. I don’t know that others feel the same--looking around at internet reviews, it seems other people like Guitarist wo Korosanaide more. But this is my blog, so I’m rambling about this one.

It begins with a kickass drum solo. (”Joshou”) That song leads into a high-energy punk song (”B2″) and from there it gets even better. Every song flows effortlessly into the next. Every song is interesting. Everything they try works, nothing sounds bad or grating or annoying for even a second. I find it hard to listen to any song in isolation--I need the whole album every time. At most, I can listen to the final two tracks--”No. 6″ and “Banging the Drum”--in tandem. They fit together far too well.

There are a some female vocals on this album (uncommon for the butchers), and they all sound great. “YAMAHA-1″ is the winner, in that regard. In “PLUS/MINUS” they act as lovely backup.

Track order is an art in itself--it’s why I almost always listen to whole albums rather than individual songs. I love the artistry involved in constructing a long sonic narrative. I think Banging the Drum has one of the most impressive album structures I’ve ever heard. It’s not quite Raining Blood (the best I know of), but everything fits together so, so well. (It helps that all the songs are great.) “Banging the Drum” is one of the best album outros ever.

Much like Yamane, the production works very well with the songs, and they have just the right amount of lovely fuzzy distortion. Again, I could go into every song by second and mention my favorite parts, but this is too long already. With that in consideration...

tl;dr

Listen to Kocorono and Banging the Drum. If you like either, listen to Yamane. If you like that, go for Mikansei, Guitarist wo Korosanaide, and maybe Birdy. Let bloodthirsty butchers into your heart. Amen.