#likely contribute some of their clothes. so maybe consider why not a single fat person was involved with the event

[lesbianboyfriend]

going to any sort of local clothing swap event is always like wow. do the organizers of this event know any fat people. was there a single fat person involved with this event

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #270

“please remain calm; the end has arrived. we cannot save you; enjoy the ride.”

Do you own pastel-colored pants? No. What type of lotion do you use? I don't really use it. Nothing seems to help how dry my skin is. What were your favorite clothing stores in high school? Hot Topic. If you could have a car in any color you wanted, which color? Pastel pink, but realistically (given a pink car would probably have a paint job I'd have to pay for, I assume?), I like burnt orange cars. Not too brown-ish, though. What is your favorite color, do you look good in it, & do you wear it a lot? Pink, probably not, and no. Name someone you know who hates pink. Idk. What is your favorite Avril Lavigne song? "Nobody's Home." Do you kill bugs? Sometimes. Depends. If they're in my house, most likely. Have you ever had a bedroom that had wallpaper on the walls? No. Do you own any rompers? No. What’s one thing you’ve done to celebrate Earth Day? I made a birdhouse out of a milk carton once. Animal Planet taught me lol. Do you use window clings (aka window stickers)? No. What color is your stapler? Black. Do you have a desk that you sit at in your room? Ugh, no, but that's one reason I want to move to somewhere I have a bigger room for a desk so I don't do everything in my damn bed. What do you miss about college? Feeling like I was worth something and on a "proper" path. Was your middle school crush the same as your high school crush? No. What is/was your dream school? I never had a "dream" school. Do you wish you could talk to someone about your past? If so, who? Idk, probably someone. What motivates you? Music and/or videos on whatever subject I could use motivation in, like self-care on my bad days. Have you ever completed a weight loss program? No. Tried, though. When was the last time you did something for the first time? I went through a doctor appointment entirely without Mom just a few days ago; she had to stay in the car due to chemo, so I filled stuff out, checked in/out alone, answered questions on my own, that business. I'm entirely aware it's sad as hell that a 24 y/o did that for the first time, but if you knew just how dependent I am on my mom, you'd get it. Which do you prefer: Valentine’s Day or Easter? Valentine's when I actually have someone to celebrate with, but I love Easter as an aunt with how excited the kids are about candy and all. Easter sorta rubs me the wrong way though since, y'know, Christianity essentially stole and rebuilt it. Do you wait until the last minute to decorate, or do you decorate early? I myself don't even decorate. Mom only does for Christmas, and it's very last minute. What’s your favorite Starbucks drink? I don't drink Starbucks. What were you wearing in the last good selfie you took? *checks phone* uh the one where I'm wearing a red tank top is okay. That's all you can see cuz FUCK taking full-body pics of me. What’s on your wish list right now? Ha, I actually have a list in my phone of things I really want/need to buy when I can. A few include a bigger terrarium to Venus, a treadmill, an Unus Annus shirt before the channel and thus merch expire, glasses for driving... What do you use to sweeten your tea? I don't drink tea. Have you ever owned an expensive eyeshadow palette? No, I don't wear enough colors or makeup in general to warrant buying one. When was the last time you stepped outside of your comfort zone? The aforementioned doctor visit. How would you rate your self-esteem? Low, healthy, or high? Low as like, the deepest oceanic trench probs. Do you own a tripod for your camera? Yeah. Were you a bigger fan of Lindsay Lohan or Hilary Duff? Hilary. Do you make Halloween costumes out of clothes from your closet? Only ever to just be a goth to live out my inner fantasy of regularly flaunting that aesthetic. Do you enjoy putting outfits together? Not particularly. Would you rather it rain or snow? Snow! What does your umbrella look like? Don't have one. What’s one thing you’ve had a toxic reaction to? Do you mean like, emotionally/mentally toxic? I'm guessing probably yes. Even though parts of it were entirely realistic, understandable reactions/behaviors, I most definitely had some toxicity in me regarding the breakup, too. Which do you prefer: cropped tops or tunic tops? Uggghhhh, both are so cute. On me, I'd only ever wear tunic tops, but on others, I tend to find cropped tops cuter. What’s a style or trend that you think is ridiculous? I don't pay enough attention to this to really know... hm. Yeah, idk. Which YouTuber do you want to be more like? I could only dream of being as motivated and smart and determined and "I can do this shit" as Markiplier jfc I Love One Man Only. Do you like stuffed animals? EEEEEEEEK yes!!!! What was your favorite class in high school? Art. Have you ever gotten straight A’s in a class? If so, which classes? Yes; not to brag whatsoever, but too many for me to remember. I remember I got my very first B in 5th grade in I think math, and I was so bummed out. Were there any subjects that you got a perfect SAT score in? If so, what? I don't think so. Are you happy today? If so, what made you happy today? I'm content-ish, not happy, but also not unhappy. Is your bed right by a window? There's one to my upper right and middle left, but my bed's not exactly against either. Do you spend more time in your bedroom or your living room? I barely leave my bedroom. Which holiday is your favorite to decorate for? Halloween, if I actually did decorate. Do you name stuffed animals still? Very rarely. Depends on what it is, the importance, etc. What titles did you win in the senior class polls? I FUCKIN READ THIS AS "TITTIES" AND WAS JUST LIKE... Anyway, none. Were you popular in school? No. If you’re from the US, what states have you lived in? Only NC. Who was your best roommate? Well, Jason, if he even counted as a "roommate." Was your first roommate your best roommate? See above, considering idk if he fits the term; if he does, then yes. What’s the best family vacation you’ve ever been on? Disney World. Have you ever wanted to be a model? No. What years did you attend prom? Sophomore (bf was a senior and he took me) and senior. What do you want to be for Halloween? I was recently listening to a metal version of Oogie Boogie's song from TNBC and it hit me: MISS Oogie Boogie. A fat bitch could pull that shit off, watch me ho. Which member of your family are you closest to? My mom. If you have any regrets, what is the biggest one? If not, why do you have no regrets? Letting a boy become absolutely all that mattered and more to me. Would you ever apply to be on reality TV? Why? Ew, no. I don't need any more people judging me and my life. What is the best thing that has ever happened to you? The partial hospitalization program that saved my life, literally. Do you have a hard time letting things go? It depends on what it is, but generally, yes. I recently realized one of my greatest flaws: I respond very, very poorly to loss, in any way. Looking back on people (especially people), events, other things... a negative, chronic reaction to loss is present throughout. What have you accomplished in life that has made you the most happy? Emotionally healed, a lot. I don't think some things will ever fully scar over, but nevertheless, I don't mentally have fuckin gashes in me. Have you ever struggled with your weight? Ever since the breakup, yes. I thought I was slightly fat before then, but looking at pictures now, I just think "damn hunny u look gud" and realize I was perfectly healthy. But anyway, I was put on a medication called Abilify (full-on name droppin', fuck this med), and it MURDERED my metabolism. I could eat a fuckin carrot and gain five pounds, probably. Emotional eating probably contributed too, but here's the thing: my current doctor took me off of it, knowing the moment I mentioned it that it was not only bad for me and my conditions but also responsible for the extreme weight gain? Pounds dropped like a ton of bricks, and this started before my emotional eating began to die off and regulate. I lost around 80 pounds just from dropping a goddamn pill. Cue college essay-long rant here about how my body image was slaughtered, how much I loathe the fucking doc that kept me on the med and blamed everything on me, and now how I've been stuck weight-wise for two years despite a vast plethora of methods to continue shedding a;sdlkfajkwlelawe GUYS I could rant til my hypothetical great-grandchildren die. When you are out with your friends are you loud and outgoing or shy and reserved? It depends on who the friend is, where we are, etc., but generally, I'm just awkward, trying to be outgoing when in fact I'm questioning every single thing I say and do al;wekjrkawde this survey has taken a TURN. Do you like to stay in your pajamas all day long? I don't leave my pj's unless I have to leave the house and go inside somewhere besides like, a gas station or something that's just "whatever." In high school did you have a lot of friends? Do you still keep in touch? I wouldn't say a *lot*, no, but not a tiny amount, either. The only one I ever still see is Girt, but I keep up with many on Facebook via the like button and shit, ha. Do you really care about such issues as abortion, religion, and global warming? Fuck yes I do. Who is the biggest womanizer you know? Juan sure was, but I haven't been in contact with him for years. Would you ever have a threesome? No. Who is the most attractive person you know? Of those I personally know-know, my answer will probably always be Alon like jc she's beautiful. When did you last feel the most free? ZOINKS we can't ask that question in America rn. Is there anyone who likes (or liked) you and had a really hard time getting over you? I don't know. Did you ever love someone and feel like it was wrong? Love? No. Well, before I realized I was bi, maybe Mini counts, as then I was anti-LGBT and couldn't even imagine myself as anything but straight. What’s your favorite bug? Butterflies. What’s the longest amount of time you liked/loved somebody for? Yeesh... I still can't say with absolute confidence I no longer love Jason at all, whom I started dating in 2012 and went head over heels for. What song makes you cry? There's a few that are capable of it sometimes, but do fucking not play "Stairway To Heaven" if I'm within 10 miles of you. "Another Life" by MiW usually makes me tear up towards the end, but it normally doesn't get that far anymore. Do you like rock or rap music better? Rock, as I'm not a rap fan. If you could watch someone change, would you? Yes let me live my life a;lsdkfjaws Ever known someone with an eating disorder? I don't know. I think maybe? Have you ever had a white Christmas? I think? The best snow we ever got was late Christmas night though, and the next morning was a total whiteout. What’s something you want to do but aren’t sure of yet? Hm. Idk. I'm pretty sure of most things I want to do. Biggest lie you ever told? I'm not entirely sure and I'd rather not search for one. Do you have a religion? I don't fit perfectly into any. I relate most with Neo-Paganism, but even that I deviate from some. Believe that there is a point to churches? I mean sure, people have the right to believe in/worship what they want to, and some people get a lot of joy and reassurance out of going. How do eat Oreos? "I split them in half and lick the cream before eating the cookie." <<<< Converse or Vans? Idc. Eh, maybe Converse, but idk. Dancing or watching others dance? I love watching others dance, it's why I enjoyed dance recitals and competitions. Favorite thing to touch/feel? My cat! <3 Rather be in a tornado or a large earthquake? Both would be horrifying, but I guess earthquake. I've had an outrageous fear of tornadoes since I was very little. Would you rather Santa or the Easter Bunny actually exist? Santa, duh. Would you rather spread gossip or start a fight? Start a fight, I guess. Trying to sully someone's name with false information would haunt me way more than starting an understandable fight. What has been the best New Year's for you so far & why? I don't know. What is the weirdest fear you’ve ever heard of someone having? Do you have any weird fears, and if so, what are they? Uhhh I think maybe butterflies? Idk, even that's not too weird considering it's an insect, and that's common. I'm personally absolutely terrified of pregnancy and also whale sharks scare me quite a bit. ig that's weird. How did you find Tumblr? lol how could you not know at some point as a teen on the Internet. What of the 8 wonders of the world do you find the most fascinating, if any? I had to look them up lmao. I guess the Great Pyramid of Giza. I in general find Egyptian culture and art to be very cool. Do you have a webcam? If you do, do you ever use it and what for? I mean, it's built into the laptop. I never use it. What is something that you think is really underrated? The band Otep, for one. I mean they're not small, but I don't think most people interested in the metal genre know them. OH and then there are A LOT of YouTube artists that MADLY deserve to be signed. I have a large chunk of metal musicians I listen to, and those especially like Jonathan Young blow my fucking mind they haven't technically "made it," even if they have a large subscriber base. Have you ever had a dream where you died? Did anything weird happen to your body after it? Yes, a few. Now hang with me, okay? One of my worst nightmares as a kid involved the wicked witch from TWoO turning me into one of those fucking party things that you blow into it and the paper unfurls and her using it killed me. Yo idk. I was really scared of that witch as a kid. What’s the scariest dream you’ve ever had? How about the most realistic? It involved my dad and that's all that needs to be said. Realistic? Hm. This was SO long ago that I barely remember *just* how real it felt, but I remember it felt real as fuck. I was very little when this happened. I dreamed that I went outside to our porch because there was a weird light and when I stepped outside, a swan and a goose flew down from the light onto the porch to become my late grandpa and my deeply beloved cat Midnight, who died from sickness. I'm sure it was just a dream now, but back then, I was VERY convinced it was like a vision from God or something, telling me they were okay and with us. Do you have a favorite fashion trend? What is it? Is there a fashion trend right now that you think is completely ridiculous, and if so, what? What do you think was the worst fashion trend of all time? I don't care about fashion enough to go in depth about all this. I'll tell you right now though that mullets were the worst mistake known to mankind. Do you tend to like original horror movies or re-makes better? What’s your favorite horror movie? Is it an original or a remake? If you're remaking an old one, I'll probably like it more since they're generally not nearly as cheesy. Modern horror movies, I don't have much of a preference. My fave is The Blair Witch Project, and it's an original. What is one characteristic in a person that you cannot stand? What characteristics do you like best in a person? Do you possess any of these characteristics? Those that act violent when they're angry, for one. Those scare me. Some traits that I really like are compassion, patience, genuineness, empathy, kindness just for the sake of being so, stuff like that. I'd like to think I've got some of those. It's notable that in my nightmares, I'm way more violent than I actually am, though. What kind of jeans do you like best? When I actually wore jeans, they were like solely skinny jeans. What has been the most traumatic experience of your life? Does it still bother you? A very abrupt and poorly-executed breakup after a long-term relationship and falling way, way too hard to be healthy. Does it still bother me? PTSD is stapled on my fucking forehead if you know the slightest about it. I've healed a whole lot, but I'm pretty sure it's a scar that's never going to even fully seal.

[valentines-in-london]

I Need Fire (Part 15)

Authors Note:  Hello everyone!  Thanks so much for being patient while I was away!  I saw a lot of new readers were binge liking the chapters while I was away also, so hello to all the new readers!  Please let me know what you think, what you think might be coming next, things you like, things you don’t.  I’d really appreciate any feedback! Word Count: 5,700 Warnings: light smut, fluff Taglist:   @freddiessmallnipples @triplehaitches@samanthadegaro @lauravic @oh-well1  If you’d like to be added please let me know!

Previous Chapter  // Master List  // Next Chapter

Chapter 15

“Tommy sound check is at 3:15.  You have to be back by then okay?”  Doc said firmly from outside the hotel’s automatic doors.

“I know Doc, I promise I’ll be on time.”  Tommy smiled shaking his head while handing Rayne’s bag to the driver. “I’ll be back.”

Tommy got into the backseat of the car to join Rayne, immediately taking her hand in his. She looked up at him with glassy green eyes.  Her week on the road with Tommy had come to an end all too soon.  Road days were like dog years, it was as if she had been out with him for six months when you considered the miles they traveled, the hotels they stayed in, and all the people they met.  “Being without you is going to be like not being able to breathe.”

Rayne gently placed her forehead against Tommy’s, closing her eyes, breathing in his scent. A scent she would be without for another four months.  “Well if it’s any consolation I’m going to be empty without you.”

Tommy wrapped his arms around Rayne holding her as close to him as possible.  The car made its way to the airport far too quickly for either of their liking and soon enough Rayne found herself sitting with Tommy outside her gate.  Rayne’s legs were casually thrown over Tommy’s lap while Tommy caressed her calves.  She didn’t want to leave, she didn’t care if that made her seem weak.  “Final boarding call for Flight 761 with service to Los Angeles.  Final boarding call.” The flight attendant announced over the loud speaker.  Rayne sighed and reluctantly slid her legs off of Tommy’s lap to stand up.

They hugged as if it was the last time they would ever embrace and Tommy pulled her in for a kiss that could make the North Pole warm.  “I love you.”

“I love you too Tommy. With my whole heart.”

“I’ll call you every day.”  Tommy said as Rayne led him to the gate.

“I’ll wait for the phone call.”  She smiled up at him before she stepped over the threshold and released his hand.  As soon as she did Tommy reached back out and pulled her in for one final kiss.  One single tear fell down Rayne’s cheek as she returned his kiss.  Pulling away Rayne said one final time.  “I love you.”

She turned to walk down the ramp, wiping away the tears streaking down her face.  The flight attendant walked to the gate and closed the door, she looked to Tommy sadly and said, “Wow, that is one lucky girl.”

Tommy thought to himself, No I’m the lucky one. Vacantly he turned and walked to the large glass window watching as the plane pushed off and made its way to the runway.  He looked at each window on the plane until his eyes locked on where Rayne sat.  From the plane through glassy eyes Rayne saw Tommy and put her hand against the glass window.  She couldn’t help smiling as she watched Tommy run through the airport waving at her until he reached the end of the building and the plane turned rendering him out of sight.  Rayne pulled the curtain on her window down, put her head in her hands and cried.

Two Weeks Later

The hit-and-run plead sanctuary, 'neath a holy stone they hide They're breakin' beams and crosses with a spastic's reelin' perfection Nuns run bald through Vatican halls, pregnant, pleadin' immaculate conception And everybody's wrecked on Main Street from drinking unholy blood

Sticker smiles sweet as Gunner breathes deep, his ankles caked in mud And I said, "Hey, gunner man, that's qucksand, that's quicksand, that ain't mud Have you thrown your senses to the war, or did you lose them in the flood?"

Rayne sat in Stanley’s design studio with a big salad in front of her, absentmindedly picking at the greens.  She had put a record on the turn table tapping her feet to the music while she was lost in her thoughts.  She had been spending lots of time with Stanley lately to fill time without her best friend and boyfriend.  Rayne glanced at various sketches, seeing everything from gowns, to pant suits, to leather outfits.   “Hey Stanley?”

“Yes my love?”

“You know how you’re always asking me to work for you?”

He poked his head out from behind his sewing kit almost immediately.  He smiled wide, removing his glasses, “Yes!”

“What exactly would working for you entail?”  Rayne questioned casually taking a bite of her salad.

“Well, it would start with dealing with the stack of mail on my desk from promoters for shows. I need a “take no shit” type of person who will make the right decisions for me and our design house.  Of course knowing you I would want you to contribute creatively to designs because that mind of yours is stunning when it comes to fashion, and obviously you would be compensated and credited for those ideas.  And maybe just maybe help me by walking in my shows if we decide to do that.”  Stanley charmingly said.  “I could have my lawyer draft up a contract for you to sign with more specific things, and any of your input if you’d like.”

“Full time?”  Rayne questioned.

“Oh it would have to be.”  His smile got wider with every question.

“Would I be able to go out and see my boyfriend if I wanted to?”  Rayne asked fluttering her eye lashes.

“As long as it wasn’t during a show and your work here didn’t suffer, I think we could work that out.”

“Salary?”

“What are you making at the hell hole you work at now?”

“It’s not a hell hole Stanley.”  Rayne laughed. She’d been thinking a lot about what Tommy had asked her when they were in the tub in their hotel room. She really was not inspired by her work, it was important work and she did love it at one time but she had consistently felt distant and coldness from the people working in the office with her.  When she came back from her vacation no one asked her how it was, in fact she got more grief about taking a vacation for the first time than anything else.  That’s what did it for Rayne.  It didn’t feel like home.  And even though she had not known Stanley for that long the time she spent with him, she always felt at home.

“Whatever it is you’re making I’ll pay more.  That’s how much I believe in you.”  Stanley said placing his hand on Rayne’s shoulder.  “I think we can do very big things bella.”

“Let me put my two weeks in at my job.”  Rayne nodded her head, her statement made Stanley cry out in happiness and throw his arms around her.  “I can’t believe I just said that out loud.”

“I have some champagne here somewhere, this calls for a celebration!”  The older man said happily disappearing from view.

One Month Later

Rayne threw herself into her new job with Stanley, which she was happy to do, it made the time separated from Tommy move faster.  She didn’t know shit about the ins and outs of the fashion world but she did know a little bit about business and suggested some quick changes to what Stanley was doing to help him be more profitable.  They had gotten a few fashion magazines to feature the clothing and there started to be some rumblings that had gotten back to Stanley about his unique designs and people’s interest in him showing his clothes at a few shows.  

“You’re going to walk for me.”  Stanley said coming out of his office with a calendar in his hand, pointing to a date. “February 13th!”

That was a few months from now.  Rayne looked up from her desk and sighed.  “Stanley why me?  I can find you some curvy girls who are far more beautiful than I am, who’d be happy to do it.”

“Oh no bella. You are my vision.  I said it when I first met you.  You are every man’s fantasy and you don’t even know it.”  Stanley said passionately while Rayne rolled her eyes.  “Don’t give me that look.  You’ve got a body for sin, an extreme hour glass figure.  I’m not even attracted to women and I can say your body is a dream.  Ask your drummer boyfriend, what he thinks of your body.  I’m sure he’ll agree with me.  And besides it was in the contract you signed. You my dear, are going to have to do it.”

“I hate you so much.” Rayne laughed putting her pen down in the desk, leaning back in her chair.  “I can’t be the only one showing off the clothing, you’re going to need more girls.”

“That’s fine, but they will all follow after you.  You are my ace in the hole.”  Stanley lowered his glasses on the brim of his nose.

“Uh huh.”  Rayne shook her head, picking up her phone. “Give me the calendar and I’ll call some agencies and have them send over some girls.”

“Perfect, then I want to see you in my design room.  I have some fabric for the sketches we came up with and want to see what you think will work best.”

“Yes sir.”

“Oh, don’t call me sir.  That reminds me of one of my ex boyfriends, real kinky type.”  Stanley turned smiling wide.

“Stanley!  No way you’re doing kinky shit.”

“You’ve never met men that have spent most of their life closeted my dear.  A little kink is a good thing, but I think you already know that.”  He winked before disappearing into his workspace.  Rayne let out a chuckle before dialing the number of the first agency on her list.  You would think she was asking for a million dollars from these people with the responses that she got.

“Plus size?  What’s that?”

“We don’t have any models over the weight of 110 pounds, why would you want anyone heavier?”

“Oh yeah we can send you some of the ones that got fat.”

One even hung up and laughed at her for her request.  Sighing and putting her head in her hands Rayne took a deep breath. The responses had lit a fire under her.  Girls with curves and bigger girls were just as beautiful as traditional models and the fact that some of these agencies were so small minded to think that anything outside a certain box was not wanted or desirable made her sick.  Rayne picked up the phone and called another agency.

“Hello Valley Modeling Agency how can I help you?”

“Yes, this is Rayne Sykes from Poison Ivy Designers I was hoping to have some models sent to us for some features we have coming up.”

“What are you looking for?”  The woman asked on the other end of the line.

“Well we’re looking for women specifically with curves and meat on their bones.”

“Really?”  The woman asked on the other end. Rayne braced herself for the inevitable snarky comment that would surely follow.  “I think that’s amazing!  I could have a handful of girls over in two hours.”

Rayne couldn’t help the smile that spread across her face at the positive response.  “That sounds great.  What was your name?”

“Ally.”

“Well Ally, thank you very much.  I look forward to seeing your girls.  Have a good day.”

“You too Miss Sykes.”

Rayne pushed her chair away from her desk walked into Stanley’s office smiling at him. “You know Stanley, I can’t believe the shit I just heard on the phone calling agencies for models.”

“Oh I’m sure a lot of them laughed and hung up.”

“One did.” Rayne shook her head, pushing herself off the door frame.  “We have about ten girls coming in a few hours.”

“Good, good.”

“I’m serious Stanley that really pissed me off.  I get what you mean now about making a difference with all of this.  I think I’m beautiful but I’ve never seen anyone that looked like me in a movie, or in a magazine, or in a music video for that matter be portrayed as sexy.  The big girl is always the less desirable friend, or the funny friend.  It’s time we get to be the leading lady.”  Rayne said passionately.

“Now you’re speaking my language gorgeous!  I knew you’d get galvanized eventually.”  Stanley just knew in his heart a fired up Rayne was going to be an unstoppable Rayne.  

Later that day Rayne and Stanley finished picking out fabrics for some of their new ideas when Ronnie, Stanley’s assistant, came back to the room.  “I’ve got our first model here to see you guys.”

“Thanks Ronnie.” Stanley nodded.  Both Stanley and Rayne stood up, Stanley grabbing a rack of clothing he had designed recently to show.  He wanted to put the models in some pieces to see how the clothing fit their bodies, and if he needed to make any alterations if he did indeed book the models.  Over the next hour or so various women came in with their portfolios in hand to see Rayne and Stanley.  All of them looked absolutely incredible and more than a few said it was so nice to be a first choice girl for a designer.  One girl even expressed that she was once booked for a show and the piece of clothing she was chosen to wear basically made her look like she was in a garbage bag because it was the only piece that fit her.

Stanley had told each of the girls if they knew of any women who had been cast aside by the modeling world because of their weight to reach out.  The rest of the day was spent fielding calls and booking appointments to bring those women in the over the following days.  It was as if they sent up the bat signal and everyone ran towards it, it was absolutely incredible.

Rayne looked at the clock and saw the time, “Shit is it seven already?”  The phone rang and Rayne contemplated answering it because they were technically closed.  “Poison Ivy how can I help you?”

“Hey baby.”  She immediately smiled hearing Tommy’s voice on the other end.  “I called the house and you didn’t pick up.”

“Sorry we were working late tonight.”  Rayne smiled sitting down on her desk.

“It’s okay baby! We just got off stage.”  Tommy said enthusiastically, at first it didn’t make sense but then she remembered he was a few time zones ahead of California. “Is everything still going well with the new job?”

“I love it. Today was a really good day. I think this can be something big Tommy.”  Rayne smiled. Seeing how happy the women who came in today were to be treated as beautiful and in stunning clothes, it filled Rayne with pride.  And she couldn’t wait to make agencies and other designers green with envy over what they were going to do.  She was ready to turn the fashion world upside down with Stanley.

“I know it can be, you’re involved.”  She smiled at his eternal optimism.  “I’m so proud of you baby.  I can hear it in your voice, you sound happier.”

“I am happy.  As happy as I can be with you on the road.” She said sadly as she saw Stanley come out of his office, turning the light out.  Rayne mouthed that it was Tommy on the phone.

“I’ll be home soon, and then we’ll be on a break then we’ll make the new record.  Actually, I wanted to talk to you about something.”

“Yeah?”  Rayne asked concerned.

“Well, this tour is going extremely well, the album is selling like wild fire.  What would you say to when I get home, moving out of the condo and into a house?”  Tommy asked and Rayne’s jaw dropped.

“What?”  Rayne asked shocked.  “Are you serious?”

“Yeah, why not?” Tommy smiled.  “We can pick it out together, I know I surprised you with the condo.”

“Okay, yeah, sure. We’ll look at houses.” Rayne nodded her head.  “I’m just totally shocked right now.”

“It’s a good shocked though right?”

“Of course.” Rayne nodded her head.  “Hey I should probably go, Stanley and Ronnie are looking at me like they’re gonna kill me if they don’t get out of here. Call me when you get back to the hotel?”

“Of course. Maybe you and I could play a little tonight.”  She could practically hear Tommy’s grin on the other end of the phone.

Flipping her red curls to the other side of her face, hiding herself from the two sets of prying eyes she smiled and said into the phone.  “I’d like that.”

“I’ll call you later babe.”

“Bye.”

Rayne turned toward Stanley once she hung up the phone with a smile on her face.  “You two are so cute.  Oh to be young and in love.”

“Oh shut up.” Rayne laughed, “Are you two ready to go?”

“Yep lets go.” They both said in unison.

Three Weeks Later

It was Rayne’s birthday and she treated herself to a delicious fettuccini dinner that she cooked herself.  She sat on the couch in the condo watching MTV do another story about Motley Crue and the show their shows getting picketed.  

“Our fans are smart kids.  When we wrote Shout At The Devil, we’re talking about the oppressor’s parents, teachers, and bosses. We’re not saying shout with the devil.”  Nikki spoke to an interviewer.

“Yeah we want the kids that come to our show to be able to blow off steam from anything they’re dealing with in their lives.  You come to a Motley Crue show and you can give us your anger.  And if that helps people deal with their issues, we did out job.”  Vince built off Nikki’s answer.

“Motley Crue continues their tour with the prince of darkness himself Ozzy Osbourne for the next month, we’ll put the dates on screen now.”  The VJ spoke before the last run of dates flashed on the screen.  Fifteen more shows, just fifteen, at least the last five were in California and Rayne was able to go to them.  Rayne put her plate of food down on the coffee table and rushed to the phone that had just started ringing.

“Hello?”  

“Happy birthday to you.  Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday my love. Happy birthday to you.” Tommy sang out.

“Happy birthday Rayne!”  She heard a chorus of voices surrounding Tommy.

Rayne laughed, “Tell the boys I said thank you.”

“She said thanks. Now fuck off so I can talk to her.”  Tommy playfully shouted at his band mates.  “How was your day babe?”

“It was good.  I met with a realtor, and told them I’m waiting for you to get back before we look at anything or make any decisions. But she was nice.  And I just sat down with a plate of pasta that I made.”  Rayne smiled.

“I can’t believe we’re going to buy a house together.”  Tommy said enthusiastically.

“I mean we’re living together in the condo, it’s not that different.”  Rayne reasoned.  If she was being honest she couldn’t believe they were going to buy a house either.  Never in her wildest dreams did she think her life would be going the way it was, she wouldn’t change it for the world.

“Something just feels more adult about buying a house.  Have you thought about what you want it to look like?”  Tommy asked.

“I think I’ll know it when I see it.”  Rayne smiled.  “I mean we want to live by the beach, so I’m sure everything will be beautiful.”

Tommy and Rayne through various late night conversations had decided they wanted to move to Malibu. Tommy had always wanted to live near the water and Rayne liked the idea of that herself.  Growing up in New Jersey she was always close to the coast and missed being able to take a short ride to dip her feet in the water. The water had always been a solace for her, a place to go when she was stressed or feeling down.

“I got you something for your birthday.”  Tommy whispered.

“Tommy, you know you didn-“

“Yeah yeah I know, I didn’t have to get you anything.  I think we both know at this point I enjoy giving gifts to you.  You’re just going to have to deal with it.” He said happily through the line.

“Well it better not be a house.  You promised me that we were going to decide together.”  

“It’s not a house baby.”  Tommy said while there was a knock at Rayne’s door.  “Speak of the devil.  Go open the door.”

Rayne walked to the door and looked through the peep hole to see a delivery man.  She opened the door to see a sea of sterling roses. “Sign here for me.”  Rayne signed the form.  “I’ll be back there’s more for you on the truck.”

“More flowers?”

“No just packages.” He called back to her as Rayne reached down to grab one of the enormous bouquet of uniquely colored roses to set on the kitchen counter.  When she walked back to the door to get the second the delivery driver was back with a cart of packages.

“These aren’t all for me are they?”  Rayne asked in disbelief.

“Afraid so.”  He said wheeling the cart into the condo before shimming it out from underneath.  “Have a good day.”

Rayne walked over to the phone and picked it back up, staring at all the boxes and flowers in disbelief.  “Tommy?  What did you do?”

“I felt bad that I was missing your birthday baby.  So I wanted to make sure you felt like the Queen that you are on your birthday even though I’m not there.  Go on, open them.”  Tommy urged while Rayne walked over to the boxes, bringing them over to the couch one by one to open them while on the phone with Tommy.

Two Weeks Later

Rayne got caught in traffic and was running later than she wanted to on the way to the venue in San Francisco.  When she arrived she immediately went to the backstage entrance and showed her pass that had been given to her when she went on vacation to join up with Tommy months ago.  The security guard allowed her back and she quickly heard Motley sound checking and made her way towards the music.  As she approached side stage she quickly greeted Danny who worked their on stage monitors.

Rayne watched as Tommy was lost in the song, drumming his little heart out to Shout At The Devil. Eventually he looked over at Danny to get an adjustment in what he was hearing behind him, he did a double take when he locked eyes with Rayne.  Smiling wide he jumped off the drum stool and ran over to Rayne wrapping his arms around her, lifting her off the ground.

“Doc said you were running late.”

“I know I was hoping to be here before sound check started.”  She smiled kissing Tommy.  “Now go and get back on that kit, Mick is giving me the death stare.”

“Do you have something for me?”  Tommy raised an eyebrow.

Rayne smiled and handed a tiny remote over to Tommy.  He immediately rushed back to the stage taking his spot behind the drum kit. He looked back at Rayne with a cocky grin and with a push of a button she almost jumped out of her skin. See, Tommy had given her very specific instructions when she came to San Francisco.  One important instruction was directly related to one of the gifts he had gotten her for her birthday.  He wanted her to be wearing it.  So when she felt the new underwear he had given her start to vibrate against her unexpectedly it was a shock needless to say.  “Hey you!”  Jo cried out from behind her, the mixture of surprise from her friend catching her off guard and Tommy being a little shit caused her to jump. “Woah, you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Rayne nodded her head trying to focus on her friend in front of her.  “You just startled me that’s all.”

“I’m so glad you’re here.”  Jo said with a tinge of sadness in her voice.  “I’m not talking to Vince right now.”

“What? Why?  What happened?”

“The band did an in store signing yesterday in Seattle, and some bitch grabbed Vince and started kissing him.  He didn’t push her away in fact he pulled her into his lap and kept going.”  Jo said sadly.  “That’s not part of the agreement.”

“Oh!”  Rayne cried out feeling the vibration against her clit pick up.  Rayne quickly tried to gain her composure.  “Oh Jo, I’m so sorry.”

“He did it to get back at me.  He thought I was flirting with Ozzy’s guitarist the other night because he found us alone in a room backstage.  We weren’t doing anything, we were just talking about the tour.  Honestly!”

“You two fight like fire and gasoline.”  Rayne shook her head.

“Speaking of fire, are you ever going to spill what exactly was going on that night we all heard you and Tommy screaming at the hotel?  It sounded pretty great.”  Just thinking about that night with Tommy did nothing to help the fact that she currently had a vibrator moving between her legs.  She could feel herself start to peak and looked over to Tommy who quickly lowered the vibration.  He smiled like he knew exactly what he had just done and she could’ve killed him for it.

“You’re still wondering about that?  It was so long ago.  But regardless nope my lips are sealed.”  Rayne tried to play it cool.  “It’s not like you and Vince are talking right now so he couldn’t use Tommy’s moves even if I told you.”

“You fuckin tease.” Jo narrowed her eyes at her best friend.  No that’s the tease out there, Rayne thought to herself.

Thankfully sound check wasn’t that much longer because Tommy was getting trigger happy with his new toy and kept bringing Rayne right to the edge before backing off.  As he walked off stage Rayne hit him in the shoulder.  “You are such an asshole!”

“What did I do?”

“Oh you know exactly what you did.”  Rayne laughed.  “What you’re doing is basically cruel and unusual punishment.”

“Oh I think you like it.”  Tommy teased wrapping his arms around her.

“Payback will be a bitch.”  Rayne threatened pointing her finger into Tommy’s chest.  As soon as she did she jumped into him as she felt the vibrations pick up again.

“Oh will it?” He winked.  “You threaten that a lot, so far nothing’s been done.”

Oh she was so going to kill him.  She narrowed her eyes at Tommy only to be pulled away as Vince and Mick greeted Rayne while they walked back to their dressing room.  Nikki approached her and Tommy and wrapped her up in a bear hug, lifting her feet off the ground in the process.  “Hey you.”

“Hey Sixx. How’s everything going?”

“Same as it was when you left.”  Nikki said before lowering his voice.  “I told Doc to fuck off with all the mom stuff.”

“I’m glad.”  Rayne smiled patting his back.  Tommy who was in a playful mode chose to turn on the vibrations once more causing Rayne to shoot board straight and sharply intake a breath.  

“You okay Cherry?” Nikki gave her a quizzical look.

“Yeah, fine.  I just had a pain in my back, girl stuff and all.”  Rayne brushed it off.

“Ugh say no more.” Nikki held his hands up before looking at his best friend.  “Sucks for you dude, you haven’t seen your girl for months and she’s on the rag.”

“Fuck off Nikki.” Tommy spit the words out causing Nikki to chuckle before making his way back to the dressing room and eventually the bus.

“God, what is wrong with you?  You almost made me fucking cum in front of your best friend.”  Rayne gasped before grabbing onto Tommy, who just turned the toy to what had to be his highest setting.  Burying her head in his chest Rayne grabbed and twisted his tank top as she felt her orgasm wash over her.  Tommy wrapped his arms around her as she began to shake, her sounds of muffled whimpers were a total turn on.  

“That was so fucking hot.”  Tommy smiled kissing the top of her head.  “That’s not going to be your last of the night either.  Consider them birthday orgasms since I couldn’t give you any for your birthday.”

“Mmmhmm.”  Rayne moaned, still resting her forehead against Tommy’s chest.  She could’ve protested that he had given her birthday orgasms over some great phone sex on her birthday but she couldn’t form the words just yet.  Her boyfriend was into her getting off in public.  Just another daily revelation about being Tommy Lee’s girlfriend, Rayne thought to herself.

Two Weeks Later

Once the tour ended Tommy insisted that the two of them meet with the realtor right away, he said if he took a moment to relax he’d just sleep and sleep.  Rayne could see he was tired, he was still stunningly handsome but little things like his unshaven stubble, and dark circles under his eyes were telltale signs of his exhaustion when she had met up with him for the first time in months.

Rayne and Tommy had gone to three houses already, one Tommy liked but Rayne wasn’t crazy about and the other two neither of them liked.  Diane, their realtor, turned to the couple as they walked hand in hand up the driveway to the next place, “Now this house isn’t even listed yet, but the owner told me he wanted to sell as soon as possible.  I think this might be what you’re looking for, and you could get in the place by the end of the week if you make an offer.”

From the outside the house was beautiful, it was painted a light grey, with white shutters and front door, there was beautiful lush landscaping leading all the way up to the garage.  “Well the outside looks promising.”

“Come on, follow me. Now you’ll have to use a bit of imagination, it’s not furnished.”  Diane said leading them towards the front door.  As soon as they walked in Rayne’s jaw dropped.  The large bay window on the second floor brightened the entire foyer.  They followed Diane a bit further into the house to the living room which was spacious and open with a fireplace and built in book shelves.  Sliding glass doors opened up to the outdoor patio, flooding the living room with more sun.  Rayne looked up to see that the upstairs hallway could see down into the living room.  Everything about the house was open and spacious.  The kitchen was attached to the living room, it had a six top stove with a center island and marble counter tops.

Tommy smiled down at Rayne who was standing at his side wide eyed.  “This might be the one baby.”

She simply nodded and kept following Diane through the house.  When they reached the master bedroom, that sold it for Rayne. It was a huge space, with large walk in closets and a balcony that looked right out over the ocean. The master bathroom had a giant claw foot tub with a sky light above it and large shower enough for two. Diane left the room and before Rayne could follow her Tommy quickly tugged on Rayne’s hand, standing in the center of the room.  “I can picture a bed here, a nice big bed for us, a small love seat on the back patio,” Tommy paused before pointing upward to the ceiling, “And a mirror up there.”

“Tommy what are you talking about, why would we put a mirror on the ceil- oh.”  Rayne stopped herself once she had realized exactly why one would want a mirror above their bed.  She gave him a smack on the shoulder before turning to walk out of the room.  “Don’t even start.”

“What?”  Tommy laughed rushing after her to catch up with Diane who was waiting for them downstairs.

“I have one more thing to show you before you decide.”  She smiled before walking out the door to the back deck.  The deck was huge, it was covered in smooth stone, had columns where the upstairs patios were which provided nice shaded areas, and a beautiful outdoor fireplace.  Where the stone ended there was sand and beach grass with a trail leading out. “You can walk right out onto the beach.”

“Oh my god.” Rayne gasped grabbing Tommy’s hand walking down the trail and onto the quiet private beach.  This place was heaven, absolutely an oasis. Rayne turned to Tommy looked up at him, “What do you think?”

“I think this is our house.”  Tommy smiled.

“It’s our house.” Rayne returned the smile before jumping up into Tommy’s arms, wrapping her legs around his waist.

“So is that a yes?” Diane smiled at the couple.

“Yes!”  They both said in unison.

“I’ll draw up the papers and get them to you this week.”  Diane smiled.

“Holy shit. Tommy it’s perfect.”  Rayne said elatedly.  

“Vince is gonna flip when he sees this place.  His new beach house doesn’t hold a candle to this.  Speaking of which, don’t forget the party at his place next week.”  Tommy reminded her.

“How could I forget?” Rayne replied giving him one last kiss before he let her back on the ground.  “We have a lot of packing to do.”

“I’ve got nothing but time.  If all goes well we’ll be in this place right after we sign the papers.”  Tommy held out his hand for Rayne to take.  Everything was absolutely perfect, he had his girl, a new beautiful beach house, the band was taking off, only one thing could make it all better.  The wheels started turning and he made a mental note to call Vince ASAP for some help.

Take me to the next chapter...

--

There you have it!  Was it worth the wait?  I hope so!  These “in between” chapters are always hardest for me!  What’s Tommy up to?  Any thoughts?

[shawnsorangeglasses]

Better Conversations - Part 3

2.3k words

Get you some tea, it’s BC Part 3

Hello yellow, you gotta read part 2 if you haven’t already. Better yet, here’s the masterlist.

It feels like the whole world has gotten wrapped up in Shawn’s appearance with (Y/N) in the streets of New York. She faces some consequences.

warnings: a little dramatic, sweeter ending

......................

News of Shawn’s mystery “girlfriend” caught fire and spread rapidly across all social media platforms. Fans were either happy, suspicious, or appalled. No matter what they felt about it, young girls from all over the world began to analyze and pick apart pictures of them together in the streets of New York. The group of fans they met at the diner took a video of their meeting with Shawn and that only stirred up some more talk online as well. There were screenshots and red circles and literal YouTube videos on this. It’s not like (Y/N) and Shawn were caught holding hands or making out, but all the gossips sites wasted no words and no time getting their articles out for clicks.

The video of them only caught her from the chest down, a snippet of her voice, and Shawn’s full body sat at the lunch counter. Some people were kind enough to comment that whoever this mystery girl was had really nice legs. That seemed to be the only positive aspect in all the chaos.

Bea, (Y/N)’s sister, only recognized her because of her clothes, specifically the boots she always wore. She was just as confused and shocked as the rest of the world when she called. It took about ten minutes to calm her down and explain the whole mess.

Shawn still had to leave for Toronto that night. Goodbyes weren’t even an option. His people wanted him and him alone at the airport, which (Y/N) understood. In her mind, she had already caused enough trouble.

Miraculously enough, not one person had been able to place (Y/N)’s face or social identity. She never really posted pictures of herself online and rarely allowed anyone to take a picture of her and post it without permission. Her Instagram page only had three posts, all city photography, and her profile picture only displayed a solitary bumblebee doodle. For a while, it seemed like the damage would repair itself. (Y/N) thought she may have been in the clear.

Then she woke up. More photos were published. Her phone had ten missed calls. Eight from Jason and two from Lawrence Derringer, the head executive of his branch. (Y/N) prepared for the worst.

It was Sunday by now. The Jason and Mr. Derringer opened up their offices just to talk to her in the conference room. She wore the most conservative outfit she could find in her closet.

“Ms. (Y/L/N), are you aware of the story that has surfaced about you and Mr. Shawn Mendes in the news?”

“Yes Mr. Derringer, but I can explain. Nothing happened at all between Shawn and me. I would never get involved with a client in that fashion, and as far as I know, they never even got a picture of my face.”

“I’m afraid you’re mistaken, Ms. (Y/L/N).” They present a laptop screen to her, opened to a TMZ article with her and Shawn stood at the gemstone pop-up shop. Her face is clear and visible. “This was published eight hours ago,” Jason mumbles.

“I know your intentions must have been pure, Ms. (Y/L/N). What I’m struggling to understand is why you never questioned any of the endeavors you had with Mr. Mendes. Harmless as they may have been, this could have a negative effect on our firm’s relationship with him as well as our image in the industry. Did this not occur to you when you realized you were being photographed? Surely it must have.”

(Y/N) doesn’t answer, right away. Saying no, would have been a lie. She did consider the possibility of them getting a little publicity, but she didn’t think so far ahead about how that might affect the company.

“I suppose you’re going to have to fire me then?”

Mr. Derringer glances at Jason, then back at (Y/N). “Fortunately, no. You will not be fired for this. Apparently, Shawn called our offices several times last night trying to get a hold of one of us. He managed to reach me and said the day out was his all idea and that you should not be fired for the events that followed.”

“So, I’m not in trouble?”

“Well yes and no. I told him you would keep your job but that does not mean you can get off without some repercussions. Since Whitman was the one who hired you, I figured he should be the one to enforce that.”

Jason steps forward, looking like he was trying so hard to be authoritative in front of his superior. “I made the decision to prohibit you from attending any future corporate events where Shawn or any other Island Records artist may also attend. It’s probably for the best that you don’t see Mr. Mendes anymore in public for any reason. Your recent promotion has also been revoked as well and your salary will revert back to the earnings you made prior to said promotion.”

(Y/N)’s jaw set, keeping her tongue from saying everything she wanted to spit in his stupid Ivy League face. Everything she’s wanted to say to him for the past eight months feels like holding acid in the back of her throat. She swallowed her thoughts.

“I understand. My sincerest apologies, Mr. Derringer. It won’t happen again.”

“I certainly hope not, Ms. (Y/L/N). You’re a valued member of our staff and you contribute so much to the floor and the board. It’d be a shame to lose you over something like this. Jason will see you out. Have a good evening.”

(Y/N) is already at the elevator smashing the down button before Jason can even make it down the hall. Tears of humiliation sting her eyes as the elevator slowly takes her and Jason down from the top floor. He tries to lay a hand on her shoulder, apologetically, but she shrugs it off and steps further from him. If he was sorry, it only because he felt like he had to be, not because he actually was.

“Are you seriously pissed at me? You brought this on yourself.”

“You have no right to try and keep me from seeing him or anyone.”

“That’s what you think this is about? Maybe you ought to think twice before sleeping your way through our list of clients.”

Of course, it’s all my fault that I didn’t feel like eating alone one afternoon.

“I’m sorry. I wasn’t aware going to lunch with one man is the equivalent to shoving my tongue down his throat.”

“You might as well have been, the way you were smiling at each other in those pictures.”

“I knew it. I knew you had a problem with me seeing other people. You can go and fuck every girl in Times Square if you want, but I have to sit idly by like your personal dumping ground?”

“You can see whoever you want. Just not him. You should know better. This firm—”

“Like you give a damn about the firm. This is about you and your fat ego. You can’t handle the fact that somebody might even be a little interested in me because you know that as soon as I find someone who actually gives a damn about me, I won’t have a reason to come back to you for a goddamned quickie in the janitor’s closet.”

“It’s that kind of thinking that keeps you behind that desk.”

(Y/N) falls silent. No more words are spoken. There was no use in trying to argue or be right. Jason was jealous again. He’d done this once before when another coworker, someone on (Y/N)’s pay grade, showed interest in her. The elevator doors finally open and she treads heavily out the front doors, never looking back.

…………………..

(Y/N) spent the rest of the evening wrapped in her bed sheets, at first crying with her makeup still on, then eating leftovers and watching Criminal Minds reruns. Hearing Dr. Reid talk about m.o.’s calmed her down. She’d turned her phone off hours ago just to get some peace. Family and friends were calling and texting her non-stop yesterday evening about her appearance with Shawn. At the time it was too much to handle with possibility of getting fired still looming over her head. But now with the worst over, (Y/N) figured she should probably check her notifications for anything important.

Through all the messages from cousins and people who barely knew her, one single text from Shawn floated to the very top.

[please call me]

He sent it about an hour after (Y/N)’s meeting with Mr. Derringer. It’s 1 AM now but Shawn was in LA. She checks the time zones first then finds his contact and presses the call button. He picks up on the first ring.

“Hey, are you okay?”

(Y/N) grins for the first time today, more than happy to hear that soft voice again. “I should be asking you that. Every news outlet has a story on you. And me, I guess.”

“Yeah but are you okay?”

It sounds like he’d been waiting to ask her this question all day. Technically, (Y/N) was okay, but she could be better, given the circumstances. She chooses her next words carefully.

“I…I will be. I didn’t get fired if that’s what you mean. Thank you for that by the way.”

“I’m so sorry. I said everything would be fine and I should have known this would happen.”

“It’s not your fault. People aren’t that crazy about it. Your fans are being relatively nice to me, now that they know my face.”

“They know your face?”

“Yeah. More photos came out this morning.”

Shawn goes quiet for a moment. It sounds like he’s moving into another room away from the chatter in the background. “Could we video chat?” The new echo of his voice sounds like he’s moved into the bathroom.

(Y/N) looked at her reflection in the mirror on the wall across the room. Dramatic streaks of mascara still trailed down her cheeks and her eyes were still very red. She should say no, but she desperately wants to see his face. And this technically didn’t go against Jason’s stupid new rules for her.

“Give me a minute.”

She washes her face in the bathroom the best she can. Her eyes are still red when she’s done. Fuck it, she thinks. Maybe he won’t notice.

(Y/N) flops back down on her bed and opens the app. Shawn’s face pops up on her screen, riddled with concern. He’s sat in the bathtub, one in a hotel probably, wearing a white t-shirt, hair fluffy and wild without its gel. One “s” curl fell on his forehead.

Unfortunately, he does notice. “You’ve been crying?”

(Y/N) bites her lip. “Maybe.”

Shawn doesn’t speak. He just wants to look at the girl on his screen. The truth is he didn’t really have a good reason to facetime her other than just wanting to see her again. He was so sure that she would never want to talk to him again after all of this.

“I want to know why, but you don’t have to tell me,” he says.

“No, it’s alright. I’m not fired but I am never allowed to be seen in public with you again as long as I work there.” (Y/N) sniffles. “Which is fucking stupid.”

“So quit,” he mutters. The words leave his mouth before he can think twice about saying them.

“Quit?”

“I mean—I’m kidding, that’s not what I meant. God, that sounded really bad.”

“It did,” she says through a smile. “But I have thought about it. About a year ago actually.”

“What changed your mind?”

“I met someone. At work. We’re not a real couple but...” (Y/N) realizes she doesn’t have an appropriate label for whatever she and Jason are, but Shawn seems to understand. “I wasn’t trying to get ahead. I did actually like him once upon a time. But he never wanted to be anything more with me. Then he became my boss and things just moved under the table.”

Shawn thinks this time before speaking. “Was it that guy you were with at the party?”

“Damn, you’re good. How much of that did you see?”

“I saw when he tried to get you to dance. And when he was at the bar.”

“Well if this music thing ever bombs—it won’t—you should be a detective.”

Shawn gives her a weak smile. A piece of his heart broke a little when she admitted to being in a relationship, albeit a noncommittal and toxic one. Someone already had her heart and her eyes.

“Do you still love him?”

(Y/N) thinks about it for second. Love? It seemed so unattainable for her at this point. At the start, Jason was romantic but never with the usual gestures. Just clever lines and secret lunch dates on the rooftop. Then one day he just stopped. Looking back, it doesn’t seem like love anymore. Just regular sneaking around. “I don’t think we ever made it to the love stage of it all.”

Shawn slouches down into the tub more, forcing his long legs out and his feet up on the tiled wall in front of him.

“I take it back. Maybe you should quit.”

(Y/N) blinks at him. “Very funny. I may be unhappy, but I still have bills to pay. That bastard docked my salary too, so I’ll be working double shifts again.”

“No, I’m serious, (Y/N). If you go in tomorrow and put it your two weeks’ notice, you can have a job as my assistant.”

She sits up in her bed, not believing a word of what those bright pink lips were telling her. “I thought we we’re joking when we talked about that.”

He shrugs. “I wasn’t.”

“Doesn’t there have to be a few more conversations with a few more people before you just bring a new person on board?”

“I’ll talk to Andrew tonight,” he promises. “He knows who you are, and I’ve told him how hard you work.”

“I’d have to think about it Shawn. That’s a big leap.”

“I know, but I do mean it. You have a job waiting for you whenever you want it.”

(Y/N) tried feel good about this, but everything about working for Shawn scared her. She knew his intentions were good but there was more risk than that. What if she fell into the same hole she did with Jason? What would fans say? What would people think?

“I call you when I have an answer.”

......................

taglist:

@spider-mendes @sebsdreamboat @innositer

[alarajrogers]

literally google what pedophilia culture is, and read about rape culture too to help you understand. no one is calling you a pedophile or whatever or even criticizing you personally. your choice is irrelevant. it is about how society encourages men to see youthful = sexy, and how this contributes to our view of pedophilia. there's an article on theodysseyonline about it if again you google it, it's in simple words and even has a meme to help someone like you (who's somehow 40??) understand.

Yeah, no. I do in fact know what rape culture is. Society encouraging men to see youthful = sexy isn’t actually about pedophilia at all, which is a mental disorder; it’s about power. Men who are attracted to women who are much younger than them have power over those women, and if men in general are encouraged to have power over women, then patriarchy maintains its power.

However, none of that has anything to do with shaving or not shaving. That’s by itself an inherently harmless choice that becomes harmful when it’s enforced. Every change to our bodies that is enforced on us for the sake of gaining male approval, whether it makes us look “younger” or “older”, is harmful. Getting breast implants, which I think even you guys would recognize is approximately the opposite of “pedophilia culture”, is harmful. Enforcing that women wear makeup is harmful. Enforcing that women be too skinny or too fat is harmful. Societies have in the past done things like demand that women damage their own necks, earlobes, or put poison in their eyes, to say nothing of foot binding and clitoral mutilation. Some of these are inherently harmless, like makeup, but become harmful when enforced. Others, like foot binding, have as their fundamental purpose harming women and making it harder for them to escape male control.

You guys and your hyperfocus on pedophilia is dangerous because you are literally giving air cover to pedophiles by declaring any number of things to be “pedophilia” that are not. The things might be inherently harmful, or harmless, or are harmful if enforced by society (and yes, demands that women, or anyone, shave are harmful if enforced by society, but not because of pedophilia – it’s because nearly any body modification that society demands of you in order to appeal to men is wrong, particularly if the same modification is not demanded of men. Shaving has negative side effects, which those who choose to shave can choose to endure, but those who are pressured to shave should not have to because they didn’t freely choose it.) But as long as you declare them to be “pedophilia” or related in any way to pedophilia, you do two things: you broaden the definition of “pedophilia” to the point where most normal people no longer agree with you, thus creating a “boy who cried wolf” effect where people just stop thinking that anything a person on tumblr defined as pedophilia could possibly actually be. This harms actual victims of CSA and makes them more vulnerable. Also, if you are right, and women who shave are more attractive to pedophiles… as long as the women in question are adults, maybe that gets some actual pedophiles to have sex with consenting adults and not harm children. Things that attract pedophiles to adults are good things because they reduce the harm done to children.

The problem you’ve identified – that society promotes simultaneously the infantilization of adult women, and the sexualization of young girls – is a real one, and it exists not because of the powerful pedophile lobby that doesn’t exist (yes, there are powerful pedophiles, but in general people have such horror at the concept of pedophilia that no, there is no powerful organization lobbying to normalize sex with children because there are pedophiles who want it that way), but because men being sexually interested in teenagers – which is not pedophilia, and is not a mental illness, and unlike pedophilia, men can be trained into it – promotes patriarchy. Also, because anything that prevents a man from being attracted to an adult woman until she undergoes various expensive modifications or buys products, allows capitalists to sell her shit. This is also what’s behind the sexualization of actual children. If you can convince a 12 year old that she’s not pretty without a ton of makeup on, and you can convince a 30 year old that she needs plastic surgery to look 18, you’ve captured money from two demographics.

But when you specifically attack anything women (or men!) do as “this is being forced on you by pedophiles!”… first, you destroy nuance. Second, “pedophile” is a radioactive word on tumblr right now because people are using it to attack people who drew art of fully clothed teenagers of the same age kissing and holding hands; the word is losing credibility, and considering how valuable the concept is and how terrible what it represents is, this should be something we fight back against, the way we fight back against “rape” being cheapened to mean “defeated in a video game” or “forced to pay a lot of taxes.” You have a problem with people being pressured into shaving? Me too! I also have a problem with people being pressured into wearing makeup, getting breast implants, or changing their names when they get married, and your hyperfocus on “it’s all the fault of pedophiles!” is going to completely miss that two of these problems even exist. 

The problem is never the specific thing that women are being pressured into doing. The problem is that they were pressured into doing it. I took up shaving when my only exposure to porn ever was to images from the 1970′s, where women were very hairy, because I hate body hair of all kinds except what’s on the tops of our heads. No one pressured me. But in today’s environment where porn is full of images of women who are fully shaven, and men feel they have the right to expect that, and treat women as gross if they’re not? Yes, that’s absolutely horrible… and in no way is calling it “pedophilia culture” a valid means of attacking it, both because it’s wrong and because it’s going to be ineffective. If the pressure was on women not to shave if they want to because “shaven women look like children”, it would be equally as bad. (BTW: shaven women do not look one single goddamn bit like children. And children with pubic hair do not look one single goddamn bit like adult women. Which is part of why I feel so strongly about this. I have personal reasons to be horrified by the conflation of “adult woman” with “has pubic hair.”)

So if you want to fight the social pressure, promoted by porn, that women *need* to shave, I am right there with you. But if you want to make up bullshit about how the societal forces training men to have a sexual interest in young women have anything to do with pedophilia, a mental disorder characterized by sexual interest in pre-pubescent children, instead of focusing on how pressure on women to meet any kind of standard enables capitalists to make money off female insecurity and how training men to be sexually interested in young women protects patriarchy by promoting relationships where men have more power than women just because they’re older, then you’re barking up the wrong tree and I cannot support you. A secret cabal of pedophiles does not rule the world. But societal forces that reward men for doing things that oppress women really do exist. And your focus on pedophilia leaves you completely incapable of addressing the issue of adult women being pressured to hyper-extend their features of sexual maturity, such as wearing high heels or getting breast implants.

[archonreviews]

The Archon’s Review of SOULCALIBUR VI

SOULCALIBUR VI is the seventh installment of a venerable series of fighting games that started with Soul Edge. The series is created by BANDAI NAMCO Studios, more specifically by Project Soul. In the 16th century, rumors of a powerful sword, Soul Edge, have emerged. Many seek it, some to wield it in service to a greater cause, others in service to themselves. However, only a few know of the truth, that Soul Edge is an evil, soul-devouring blade that slays every wielder to comes into its possession. Fewer still know that Soul Edge has a twin, the spirit sword, Soul Calibur. In the midst of this turmoil, many warriors fight for good or evil, order or chaos, and future of the world and all its souls hangs in the balance...

While I was never very good at fighting games in general, I consider myself passing skilled in the specific arena of 3d fighters. I’ve played the shit out of Soulcalibur II, Soulcalibur III, and even Soulcalibur IV. When I heard that another one of these was coming out, I was rather quite pleased, especially since it’s out on Steam.

So, in case you haven’t heard, the Soul Calibur series is a tale of souls and swords, eternally retold. In this case, it really is a tale retold, as it is a soft reboot of Soul Calibur, which came after Soul Edge. What this really means is that we get the tragic backstories of certain characters as they were told in SC, plus the tragic backstories of other characters as they were told in SCII and SCIII, and some stories were changed entirely, just for funsies, as far as I can discern.

“But Archon,” I hear you ask, “this is a fighting game. Story would have been shunted faaar down the priorities list; why are you talking at length about it?” And to that I would ask you how you got into my house. But also, I would say that the Soul Calibur series has always put a whole heaping helping of plot and story in its titles, and that story is often... interesting, but not skillfully executed, leading to some... peculiarities.

I’ll start with the main story. They call it “Libra of the Soul”, and it’s called such because it uses a set of scales (or “Libra”) as a metaphor for their moral choice system. So you’d think that if they’re naming the main campaign after the moral choice system, then that system would be executed well. You would be wrong, sadly. Basically, what happens is that every so often, usually after a fight, you’ll be presented with a binary moral choice. Some of them make sense, such as “Steal this defeated bandit’s weapon, or tussle his hair and tell him not to do bad things anymore”. But the decision that sets the tone, the very first one, in fact, is completely bonkers. See, you’re in a dream sequence, and you’re presented with two swords, one golden and one azure. You’re told that the golden one represents freedom and the desire to forge your own fate, while the azure one represents a desire to impose order and harmony on an inherently chaotic world; you’re then asked to choose one. Naturally, because I am a red-blooded, eagle-fucking, burrito bowl-eating American patriot, I picked the golden sword, after which the game literally told me that I was “Aligned with the darkness.” Oh I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that wanting to forge my own destiny made me a bastard! And there are plenty of other choices that the game boils down to either “good” or “evil”, despite being more complicated than that. Worse yet, the post-game content, as far as the morality goes, is literally just picking from those fucking swords over and over again. So why is it even here if it’s so poorly presented? Well, the only things of substance that seem to change if you’re good or evil is which of the two plot-important swords your character wields in certain cutscenes, and a particular line your character spouts after a post-plot optional fight. The game will tell you that certain optional fights are only available to characters who are either good or evil, but I don’t buy that, frankly. And certain weapons have an increased rate of scoring critical hits depending on your alignment, but realistically, you can just wield the one with the biggest average damage and you’ll be fine.

(This question about fate is the only moral choice in the game with a neutral option, and frankly, it isn’t even really a moral choice, in my humble opinion.)

While Libra is the story of your OC (more on that in a bit), the game also infuses the main cast with individual stories of their own. And it even does something quite revolutionary for fighting games: it creates a central canon and has the cast all tie their plots around it, so that you don’t have a case where theoretically one character’s ending is just as canon as another’s, unlike most fighting games I’ve played and seen. However, this creates a couple of glaring issues. First, it means that the main cast can’t be fighting each other all the time, because they’re all in different places and times. To solve this issue, a not-insignificant number of plot relevant fights are against total randos who contribute nothing to the story. This contributes to the second issue, that is to say that any character’s plot outside of the main canon feels tacked-on and unnecessary. Most of the characters don’t even interact with the main macguffins at all. In addition, many chapters are extended dialogues instead of fights, which seems extremely misguided seeing as how we are here for the fighting. One particular instance that really got my goat was the character Zasalamel, who’s entire plot is given via monologue, without a single fight. It honestly made me wonder what I was even there for.

(Now, when the game decides to go full cutscene, it’s pretty stunning)

So a fighting game has a poor plot; and in other news, bears remain Catholic. I bring attention to it, however, because SCVI just has a shitton of plot, more plot than is socially acceptable for a fighting game to have. This makes me wonder something. A thought, you see, crept into my brain pan as I traveled across the world map of Libra, stopping intermittently for plot-relevant fights and sidequests which I had little personal investment in. That thought being, “Would Project Soul be more comfortable just making RPG’s?” I mean, the Libra mode has all the trappings of an RPG: an expansive world map, random battles, tons of sidequests, weapon and item drops, a levelling system, and expansive scope, a binary moral choice system. And yet it was bound, or maybe cursed, to be a fighting game. So, Project Soul, if you guys happen to read this ever: Would you guys be more comfortable making RPG’s? Because I can’t speak for other people, but I would play the shit out of a Soul Calibur RPG. Just something to think about during the next company meeting when some bigwig from BANDAI NAMCO is droning on about how you’ve gotta make Sophitia twenty percent more “milfy” or how you’ve gotta make Siegfried sixty percent more emo.

So, lets veer away from plot and get more mechanical. I’ll start with the character creation; and let me just say that I’m actually more mixed on it now that I’ve had time to reflect. When you first create a character, the game gives you a list of fantasy races to choose from (my idea from when I was like, 13 years old, but go off I guess), and you can be as fat or as skinny as you want to be, and you can modulate your character’s voice to be however you want it to be. All in all, first impressions were good. However, I was disappointed to learn that you couldn’t be a female lizardperson. In fact, several races lack female options, which really irritated me, because I had an awesome idea for a lizardwoman character, but I couldn’t use the female clothing options to make that idea a reality, so I just had to use male clothing options and headcanon my own OC as a female, even though it said “Male” on her sheet. What chuffed me even more was the fact that you could have a female skeleton, skeletons being the one entity I could imagine skipping out on gender designations for. In addition, they still havn’t brought back the custom character styles from SCIII yet, nor have they allowed you to make your own, forcing you to use a pre-existing style, which, as has been stated before by better critics than I (notice me Yahtzee), is basically just crafting a custom model for an already existing character. This wouldn’t be a problem if they just brought back the custom styles from SCIII or let us create our own style in the vein of Mortal Kombat: Armageddon. However, the creator may be more robust than I give it credit for here; I did manage to make some characters that I thought were pretty awesome, and plenty of people have bent it toward the ever-noble goal of transplanting Pokemon into the Soul Calibur universe. Basically, if you want to create a fun and interesting-looking character, great. If you want to have a custom moveset, or if you wanna make a big-tittied lizard play a female lizardperson, so sorry.

(Seeing this screen actually brought me no small amount of joy.)

Now, what about the mechanics of play? Well, this is the reason I, despite all my earlier criticism, really like this game. The fighting is solid, each move having appropriate weight and impact. The controls are responsive and smooth, even at high graphical settings (online play notwithstanding). Guard impacting makes a triumphant return after its apparent disappearance in SCV, although, it seems like the timing on it is a little more lenient than in previous installments. Soul Charging is its own little cutscene and knock-back effect, instead of SCII, where I remember Soul Charging being a liability that no one used. There’s also this new thing called a Reversal Edge, where you and your opponent both press a button and the person who pressed the best button wins. Okay, it’s a little bit more complex than that, as when the two players tie, they do it again, except verticals win, except if both players did a vertical, in which case the instigator wins, so the whole process ends up being like speed Rock-Paper-Scissors with extra rules. People seem mixed on whether this is a welcome edition to the formula or if it’s pointless and dumb, but I personally like it. If nothing else, it’s flashy as fuck. The move list also seems slightly more simplistic, although that could just be down to me finding all my favorite moves early.

Now for small potatoes and nitpicks! They changed many of the voice actors since SCIV, although, since I didn’t play SCV, I wouldn’t know if these are recent changes. While I really didn’t dig most of the choices, I will admit that Siegfried’s VA was spot on, capturing a sort of perfect middle ground between tortured hero and lovable wangsty-man. I remember liking the old announcer more too, although I fully admit to having nostalgia goggles on for that.

The amount of objectification of women in this game is frankly intense, although, if you’ve ever seen the models for the characters of Ivy the dominatrix or Taki the ninja, that shouldn’t surprise you. What may surprise you is that clothing damage is back, which is weird, because while in SCIV, clothing damage had a purpose, as certain pieces of clothing informed certain stats, it doesn’t seem to serve any mechanical purpose here. However, it does mean that the men can get in on the sexualization action too. In fact, I’ll tell you all a little secret: Raphael, the fencer, has a move that can tear off all the clothes of any other character, leaving them in their skivvies. Step one: Soul charge. Step two: Use the Triple Botta In Tempo (forward+vertical, then vertical vertical vertical vertical...). If you’ve completed step one, and the enemy hasn’t blocked, Raphael will do this kind of Zorroesque maneuver and wham bam thank you mam, all your opponents’ clothes fall off. Do it on Mitsurugi the samurai and...

(Both of these characters are only based on the mentioned characters, but I hope it demonstrates my point. On the left, my Raphael-style character.)

One last point, and one that’s been made to death: the guest characters. While Geralt from The Witcher series made sense, being at least aesthetically consistent with the other characters, BANDAI NAMCO are apparently going to put in 2B from Nier: Automata, and frankly, that doesn’t make much sense to me, but I may very well be in the majority on this, so I won’t say too much more about it, since this gripe is even more subjective than usual.

To sum, would I recommend Soul Calibur VI? I would say so, if for no other reason than that the game mechanics are solid, and frankly, if I take the nostalgia goggles off, I have to admit that this one is the best Soul Calibur so far. In addition, this character creator is pretty robust, if you don’t mind not being able to do very specific things, such as making a big tittied lizard. While the unnecessary sexualization and weirdly grandiose story can bog things down for some, I’d still recommend it for the gameplay alone.

(No big tittied lizards, but Pokemon/Human hybrids are okay. Sure.)

[carterrollins96]

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[sarahburness]

5 Reasons Why You Need to Stop Taking Life Seriously

Pretentious title, but far from a call to adopt a stance of apathy within this wondrous and dynamic reality we exist together in.

Well, no. It’s quite the opposite.

The insight I’d like to share with you today is the equivalent of an open-handed, movie-cliche slap to the face, regretfully but lovingly administered to pull a panicked comrade back from the brink of a full-blown meltdown catalyzed by a collapse of rational, critical thinking.

This short read is nothing special. Basically, it’s a reminder of the same thing you’ve always known, but for some reason decided to stuff far too deep into your travel pack. And of course, the bug sprays and painkillers at the top of the pile provide less incentive to dump the bag to re-evaluate priorities of survival.

My motivation this day is to encourage within you a willingness to consider the game you’re immersed in from a different hilltop. It’s one with a joy-horizon not obscured by the clouds of stress or grief.

Brevity is always the best way to get a message across, so let’s sink our teeth into the meat of this feast. Let’s skip the greens for a time when protocol dictates we munch on a smaller fare to prolong social interaction.

Enough ramble, let’s dive in.

Here are practical considerations to stop taking our lives so seriously:

Reason #1: You’re Gonna Die

This is definitely the most obvious and important point I need to share.

If your attention wanders to YouTube videos of dogs wearing hats before you read this essay’s completion, at least commit yourself to finishing this first segment’s diatribe. That way, you’ll still walk away with a much-needed reminder to stop giving such a serious fuck to whatever drama encompasses your life.

I can’t speak for Jesus. I can’t speak for yogis, mystics or other tight-lipped people about prolonging a physical body eternally. However, I can suggest to you that there’s a high degree of probability the animal vessel you occupy will slowly break down. It’ll become enfeebled, endure a six-foot covering of dirt or an unceremonious barbecue behind closed doors, severing your tangible connection to this physical world.

So, let’s look at death from both sides of the coin.

If you believe in a mechanistic, uncaring, fluke of a Universe that big-banged you from dumb luck and random chance, every second of your existence here should be valued as the only shot you’ll ever have to experience happiness or contentment.

So, why would you spend one second engaged in something you don’t want to do? Why would you fill your days ingesting toxic food? Why would you consume tainted water? And why would you believe the ridiculous ideas corporate entities endlessly serve to keep you in perpetual fear of living out your most heartfelt desires?

If you believe in the continuity of spirit, eternal life or any form of reality after the Earth-plane, the same basic questions apply — why would you spend a single second in fear of tackling head on each and every beckoning to revel in the experience of a unique, fleeting world? What could an eternal spirit possible have to worry about?

Don’t think about your fear. The time to jump into the deep end is now.

Whatever your beliefs, the most important thing you need to realize is the only time you’ll ever have at your disposal is this very moment.

If your job is boring, quit it. If your woman sucks the life out of you, ditch her. Or if you tap the snooze alarm ritually, it’s probably the time to consider making fundamental changes to the way you navigate your reality.

You can start climbing any moment you choose.

See Also: 7 Easy Ways to Remove Negative Energy and Unnecessary Stress

Reason #2: Your Telepathic Skills are Most Likely Not Great

I’ve met some bonafide empaths and psychics over the years. For the most part, humans are unable to step into the minds of their fellow creatures and accurately read the thoughts/emotions/intentions of the entity standing 2-feet from their face.

When we inject our personal spin on the motives of another, our egoic speculations are almost always a cause for grief. Judgment and faulty perception lead to obsessive and tormenting conjecture, such as…

“That person must hate me. Why else would she have said that? Look at her hair. What was she thinking? I wonder if my ass looks fat in these jeans. Oh, I forgot to check my Facebook updates, I’m sure someone liked my recent post by now. I’m gonna order nachos, I think they’re gluten-free. Oh yeah, forgot about that nasty person.”

And on and on…

The point here is simple and quick:

Stop judging other people’s journeys when you’ve never sampled their footwear. Stop caring about what people might think of you.

You wanna impress someone? Impress yourself and forget the tortuous speculations of how fellow explorers might perceive you.

Adopt an empathetic approach to life, applying it both to yourself and others. Keep in mind that your travel comrades have been just as duped as you to believe iPhones and designer clothing have any bearing on self-worth. The contributions necessary to healing this broken world will never come with a “Made in China” stamp.

Reason #3: You’ve Been Lied To

I’m doing my best to keep these points as concise and simplified as possible. However, there would be nothing more fulfilling to me right now than to break into a 97-part series about all the things we’ve accepted over the years as “truth.”

From politics to health to relationships to government to history to the very nature of the cosmos, everything our “protectors” have weaned us upon is manipulated, twisted, and skewed. They are so far from authenticity that “facts” are more accurately perceived by assuming the exact opposite of whatever vomit the media spews out.

Ironically, I can probably sum up this segment faster than any of the others with a simple statement. It comes not from a paranoid, untrusting person who rebels for the sake of rebelling, but from one who has experienced the buffet of media and culture first hand.

“Do not accept the sustenance proffered without sampling the fare. It makes no sense to fill your belly with fodder that causes indigestion, bloating or queasiness just because it’s familiar, convenient or steadily dined upon by the rest of the tribe. If the menu is unpalatable, learn to cook for yourself.”

Reason #4: Other Realities Exist

It’s tough to broach this topic in the mainstream without coming across as a foil-hatted nut job. I have a sneaking suspicion that within a decade or two, this next topic might just become the motivation for humans to rediscover the adventurous, limitless nature that lies at the core of our essence.

The subject here is lucid dreaming.

I will forego elaboration for the sake of a concise post. However, I would urge you to do a bit of research into this fascinating practice. Let me share with you the key insight I’ve learned from conscious awareness while in the “dream” world.

Earth is not the only game in town. No matter how much the gods of science and media love to dismiss the things they can’t measure, there’s far more happening under our very noses than the Facebook updates and Netflix subscriptions we’ve come to accept as the comforting norm.

There are other realities beyond the JunkieSphere we inhabit. I’ve visited, I’ve played ball. If a man of science wants to tell me there’s nothing more to my astral experiences than a delusion of synapses firing in my brain, I could easily make the argument Earthland conforms to the exact same parameters.

They’re equally both real or both fake — no further elaboration needed.

If you want to explore beyond your job at the office and renew your zest for life, I’ll give you a dozen links to start your journey of lucid dream exploration. Or just call me, I love shooting the shit with weirdos. Track me down through the bio.

Reason #5: Egos Are Fictional

Perhaps another obvious one, but worthy of a last loving slap to the face.

You can shift your ideals and views of the world you live in with a single thought. Your ego is a fiction you’ve created to provide a frame of reference to experience the world. It doesn’t have to control you any more than Instagram does.

An ego is capricious. It’s fickle, fluctuating, and endlessly malleable. The wider you open your doors of perception, the less controlled you’ll be by it. The less you define it, the grander your nature will become. The less often you feed it the spiritual Cheetos it joneses for, the wider the panorama of clarity will stretch, facilitating an ever-deepening understanding of cause and effect.

Maybe the person you hate at work isn’t a vindictive monster because she never gives you the days off you request. Maybe she’s just feeling impotent to change her own world, unconsciously projecting her shortcomings on the people around her. Or maybe life here on Earth isn’t the stress-filled, grab-as-many-prizes-before-the-circus-ends kind of carnival we’ve been led to believe it was. Perhaps, it’s just a unique opportunity to discover the very nature of who we are, what we are, and why we’ve chosen to pay the extra five bucks to enter the freak-show tent.

I’m not an expert on evolution, creationism or pretty much anything else for that matter. I can’t say for certain why humans wander this planet, but I’ve committed my days to digging as deeply as possible into the existential questions that haunt us all.

It’s up to us to choose when and where we ride

Perhaps, candy-floss isn’t the healthiest thing to walk away with as the carnies shut down the midway for the night, but I’m in no position to judge what might satisfy the longings of a wayward soul. We’re all doing our best to understand the endless stream of data thrown at us. The only way to do so is to experience the roller-coaster with arms up in the air as it peaks each crest. Sometimes, the attraction sucks and other times, we feel compelled to buy another ticket. Either way, it’s up to us.

Life is an amusement park that should be enjoyed, not wandered through in fear of every megaphone-announced call to action. The snake-oil tonics and rigged bottle-toss games will always be part of the show, but we can pass them by just as easily as convincing ourselves happiness couldn’t possibly exist without partaking in whatever the rest of the crowd is doing.

When you pass a long line of humans standing patiently, waiting to give the flavor-of-the-month a lick, don’t feel compelled to take a position among them. There’s a good chance the raspberry/crack cocaine swirl wasn’t engineered with your best interests at heart. Sample if you must, but also consider walking past the bright and colorful kiosk.

In Conclusion

Eventually, we’ll get to where we want to go, but only after donning our hiking shoes and accepting the eventuality our feet will get muddied.

And that’s why so few people stand on Mt. Happiness. If the path leading to it was already well-worn, equipped with safety lines and neon signs, we’d all be up there.

You’ll likely need a machete to find the hill you seek. Snakes and spiders will definitely await the trek. But once you’ve filled your soul with the stunning view after an exhausting journey, the pitiful knolls you’ve been continually encouraged to frequent will never satisfy again.

See Also: 9 Baby Steps To Happiness For The Naturally Gloomy

The really fun things are still out there. The adventure only awaits your willingness to embrace it with fascination and wonder, knowing limitation is merely a concept defined by Fox News and the fiction writers of science who profess their wisdom as absolute.

Grab your hat and walking stick, and find out for yourself.

The post 5 Reasons Why You Need to Stop Taking Life Seriously appeared first on Dumb Little Man.

from Dumb Little Man https://www.dumblittleman.com/dont-take-life-seriously/

[sugarfreeplz]

Epic Progress Update

Hi, blog thing, it’s been a minute.

I don’t feel bad for my (uh, has it been a year already?) inconsistent posting, I’m pretty sure I write this blog just for me, but I want to start using it in a slightly different way so it’s imperative that I create a new baseline post.

Since the last few posts, I’ve made some massive progress resulting from massive shifts in my life. I’m 135.6lbs (which kind of blows my mind just writing that), I’ve lost 32.4lbs since i started this journey in August 2015.  Despite the immensely slow progress, I’m thrilled. I can’t wait to see what I look like in another 10lbs... which may not be something I get to see until November, at this rate, but whatever. ;)

I want to start posting my recipes and ideas and stuff that I’ve been doing so that I don’t forget how much work it took to get here... so I never let myself lose control again. After the jump is a summary of my journey over the last year. tldr: I full on embraced keto (seems inevitable when I think on it, considering the title of this blog) and I’m doing Olympic weight lifting 3-4x weekly plus 30 min cardio every morning. I’m not a morning person but now I’m in love with morning workouts. Seriously, I don’t think I could have predicted this. WTF, fam. 

Weight chart, July to December 2016 - feat. slowest moving weight-loss on planet earth

July 2016: Went to Paris for 10 days, ate whatever I wanted and walked everywhere. Felt no guilt around food, didn’t binge eat, just paid attention to my body and got tons of exercise. All the chocolate croissants were mine and I loved every second. Weight at end of July: 153.4lbs / 69.6kg

August 2016: Went home to Utah for two weeks, chaotic road trip and visiting of family. Drove back to LA and my grandmother died the same week. Flew back to Utah. Grief eating, that’s a thing. Kept it in check and resolved I was going to take care of myself so that complications from back surgery never had to be something I’d worry about dying from. Motivation that had been slacking for a few months got restored. Weight at end of August: 151.4lbs / 68.7kg

September 2016: Things were OK, weight loss was still in this slow downward trend. Desperate to mix it up, I start researching different ways of eating. Two-thirds of the way through the month I decided to try keto. (Check out r/keto if you want more info.) Easing into it was a good idea, starting with Low Carb High Fat and then slowly radically changing my eating. I loved keto because I was already about the sugar-free life, but I had some habits and food I had trouble transitioning away from. I probably could have lost weight faster initially had I fully embraced keto but I am just too stubborn. I started tracking on these spreadsheets: TDEE Calculator (found on Reddit), Weight Loss Tracker (made this one myself). Weight at end of September: 150lbs / 68kg

October 2016: Started going harder towards a lower-carb lifestyle. Weight loss stalled out again. Frustration, despite having broken into the upper 140s for the first time in 3 years. At this point I had pretty much stopped lifting 3x weekly. I just went to the gym for cardio and an occasional dumbbell workout. This is probably what contributed to the plateau. Weight at end of October: 149.4 lbs / 67.8kg

November 2016: Went to Utah again. Broke through another plateau to a new low weight of 148lbs, tried Crossfit mostly for Olympic lifts and got addicted. Found the top box in Los Angeles and joined after I returned to LA / after an epic Thanksgiving where I baked the most delicious keto-ish cheesecake on earth. The scale still wasn’t moving like I wanted it to... I’d say a rate of the slowest molasses in the universe. Got another dexascan: 34% Bodyfat is a win, but lost bone density. Resolved to lift more. Weight at end of November: 148lbs / 67.1kg

December 2016: Decided Crossfit is second fiddle to weightlifting. Resigned myself to the fact that I really should only expect to lose 1-1.5lb per month according to the scale. At this point I was starting to believe that I was some freak of nature who can’t abide by the laws of thermodynamics. Maybe I was really probably just holding onto a lot of water weight, but I still kind of think I might be a freak. I was weighing and tracking all my food obsessively. I was back in the gym 3-4x week. Scale still in the parallel molasses universe. Just can’t win with it.

Then the holidays happened, I traveled to Utah again, and I just kind of let myself live. I stayed pretty keto, all things considered. I know that if I am overly restrictive when it looks like other people are enjoying themselves I will only fail in the long run, so I went over my calories, drank the champagne, and didn’t feel bad at all. Despite the dgaf attitude in the last two weeks of the month, I saw the same amount of loss relative to other months and still hitting new lows (in the middle of many fluctuations). Weight at end of December: 146.2lbs / 66.3kg

End of 2016 Progress: 21.8lbs lost since August 2015

Weight chart, January to Present 2017 - finally picking up speed

January 2017: I started the year with a new, clear goal in mind: workout 5x week, no matter what. This was an awesome way to start the year after returning to LA and has really set me up for the success I’m seeing now. It was nice to have a goal not centered around weightloss. I wanted to hit 145lbs by my birthday but it just didn’t happen. I got really close, though. I also decided to move away from the beach and into a more positive environment. Did a lot of skiing, visited Mammoth, almost met Alfie Allen (Theon Greyjoy), got snowed in. Weight at end of January: 145.6lbs / 66kg

February 2017: Month of moving and shaking and shifting of things. More skiing. Fell off the workout bandwagon because of all the moving; pretty sure I only averaged 4 workouts per week, but was moving my body a lot almost every day. Went to a black tie industry awards for World of Dance. Felt super gorgeous and sexy. Indulged mindfully and dropped 2lbs, biggest amount lost in one month since May 2016. Weight at end of February: 143.6lbs / 65.1kg

March 2017: Fully moved into my new place and really happy about it. Dexascan is showing progress at 32% Bodyfat and improved bone density. Boyfriend’s cat died, which was incredibly sad. Some grief eating, but under control. Two ski trips: one to Utah, another to Mammoth. Definitely starting to look different and clothes aren’t fitting the same anymore, Boyfriend is even noticing (and enjoying ;) ) the changes. End of March I decide to go for broke and start doing Cardio in the mornings (every day, no excuses) and Weightlifting at night (min 3-4x weekly), to be carried into April. Weight at end of March: 142lbs / 64.2kg

April 2017: I order new clothes to the tune of low low prices from my best friend, Amazon. These are huge hit with the boyfriend. It’s a rush. I’m feeling more comfortable in my skin for the first time in 10 years. I ate at maintenance for the whole month because I was mentally exhausted caring about staying around 1200-1300 calories. Despite knowing I was eating maintenance, I was still frustrated with the slow weightloss. Roommate declares I’ve lost “like 20lbs” since I moved in whenever I complain about the weight coming off slowly.  Before the end of the month, I begin taking on intermittent fasting. I can’t make it through a month without traveling so, Boyfriend and I go north to his family’s hometown for Easter. I work out every single day in April (morning cardio, at least) and then drive to Utah (again) at the end of the month.  Weight at end of April: 141.2lbs / 64kg

May 2017: The month starts me off with a really wonderful surprise whoosh down to my new low, 137lbs. I haven’t broke through the 130s since high school (10 years ago). Such a rush and I literally feel on top of the world, even though it’s really just weightloss and I should calm the fuck down, I feel like I’m finally conquering my demons of binge eating by embracing intermittent fasting and paying closer attention to self-care on a daily basis. I’m getting noticed, flirted with, and complimented on the street. I love (but also don’t know what to do with) the attention. I get some inappropriate attention, too, which definitely boggles my mind. Boyfriend and I drive back to LA after the first week of May. I broke my workout streak of 49 days when my best friend came into town the next week and was kind of OK about it. Back on track by the end of the month but no more lovely whoosh... more riding the frustration train to weight fluctuation land. At least I look pretty good. Weight at end of May: 137lbs / 62.1kg

June 2017 (so far): I decided to take weightlifting to the next level and get into the gym 4x week minimum alongside cardio 5-7x week. Time to add some weight to the key weightlifting movements and stop relying on Squats and Deadlifts to get me heavy PRs. I’m still perfecting technique because my upper body is atrociously inferior in strength to my lower body, but there’s slow (as usual) progress. I tried the egg fast plateau killer last week and it did break through my plateau to a new low of 135.6 (!!!). Huge win for me. I haven’t weighed this since I was 17. Going to do a 3 day egg fast at least 2x monthly to keep the water weight down, since that seems to be the evil behind all the weight-fluctuation. Starting second round tomorrow and have another Dexascan on Wednesday. Excited to see the results!

2017 Progress: 32.4 lbs since August 2015

The next post I want to make is going to be about what the round trip journey back to feeling like myself has been about, why it happened, and what I might have done differently (thought the journey I took was perfect for me, there’s always ways to improve). I’m going to post some recipes and pictures and bullshit like that in the mean time, but might as well put all this stuff banging around in my head somewhere.

[type2diabetestreatments-blog]

Punitive Fees for "Unhealthy Behaviors" (Like Diabetes)

New Post has been published on http://type2diabetestreatment.net/diabetes-mellitus/punitive-fees-for-unhealthy-behaviors-like-diabetes/

Punitive Fees for "Unhealthy Behaviors" (Like Diabetes)

Punishing people for being unhealthy is certainly not a new concept. Everything from societal peer pressure and restrictions on things like where you can smoke, to calorie counts at fast food restaurants and financial hits through insurance have tried to convince people to just be healthier. And for some people, it may have worked.

But now the state of Arizona wants to take a similar "health initiative" and turn it into a money maker. Arizona's Medicaid program is cash-strapped, so now they want to tack on a fee to all those unhealthy people who are apparently sucking the system dry. Arizona is going so far as to single out groups of people whom they think are the biggest drain: folks who smoke or are obese. PWDs and others with chronic illnesses are also being included in this "fat fee," where they will be required to pay the fee if they don't follow their doctor's directions to lose weight (there's no indication that A1c or other measures of health would be included).

Some private insurance and state governments have already implemented a simple fine for people who are overweight or smoke, but Arizona's fee would be the first state-federal fine for low-income people.

There are so many problems with this initiative that it's hard to know where to start, but consider... why is it OK for the rich Arizonians to remain fat?! If it were so important for the state to use punishment to motivate behavior change, why wouldn't they charge the wealthy-unhealthy proportionately?

Since this is focused solely on low-income households on Medicaid, let's consider how much money goes into weight loss efforts: purchasing healthy, fresh, or possibly organic food (if you can get it where you live); exercise equipment and/or gym membership; clothing and appropriate shoes for exercise; and co-pays for medications and services (which are small compared with private insurance co-pays, but they still exist). Not to mention time: time off work, time meeting with doctors and nutritionists, time driving, time waiting in line at the pharmacy, and the complete lack of time with the physician that you're required by the law (if this AZ fee passes) to see.

Not to mention all the other factors you might not have control over, such as disability, race and genetic factors that contribute to prevalence in obesity (and diabetes). Talk about adding insult to injury!

A spokesperson for Arizona's Medicaid, Monica Coury, says "We want to stretch our dollars as far as we can. Part of that is engaging people to take better care of themselves."

Wha? Since when has punishment in the absence of rewards been proven an effective health engagement strategy? Since when does charging a $50 penalty do anything other than annoy people? Unless of course you are a 2-person family earning less than $15,000 per year, and possibly struggling to pay for your diabetes meds — in which case the fee becomes a large financial hardship.

We certainly agree that this country needs to address obesity and unhealthy lifestyle and eating behaviors. We're not shrugging our shoulders at that. But there are better and more productive ways to encourage healthy living that don't involve a fine! My suggestion: instead of charging people a nominal fee for not following directions, why not actually help prevent the reasons why 25% of Arizona's population is obese and 46% of them smoke? Perhaps gym memberships should be reimbursed? Perhaps there should be vouchers for healthy food?

Implementing programs that make it easier for people to be healthy is what would engage and encourage people, rather than sending them a "You're still too fat" bill every year. For diabetes in particular, some health insurers are trying incentive programs, like the one from UnitedHealthCare that provides discounted rates and no-cost office visits, lab tests, generic drugs, insulin, pen needles, syringes and lancets, as well as insulin pumps and supplies as long as members take certain proactive steps. They must "comply with diabetes and preventive care evidence-based guidelines" provided by the ADA. A tracking site collects information about the services members use, and has an automated reminder system to prompt them to get their checkups and lab tests regularly. Not a bad idea, it seems.

Meanwhile, we PWDs who are pretty engaged have been arguing with private insurance for years to pay up-front for the costs of staying healthy now, rather than waiting until serious complications set in that are vastly more expensive. Maybe instead of cutting gym class at schools or making fast food so appealing to children (Happy Meal toys anyone?), Arizona should cough up money for Weight Watchers programs and diabetes education, to name a few.

A "sin tax" does not count as helping!

I really liked the MSNBC op-ed in which contributor Dr. Art Caplan, professor of bioethics at University of Pennsylvania, writes: "And just to be fair, the governor can add the same tax to water-skiing, jet skiing, horseback riding, mountain biking, owning a swimming pool, paragliding, rock climbing, failing to wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle (Arizona has a very weak law) or choosing to work in roofing, mining or construction — or any other activity that carries a risk. Actually, if the governor really wants to make money, how about a tanning tax for those who bask in the Arizona sun and hike their risk of skin cancer?"

In addition to passing the Republican state legislature, this new bill would also need federal approval, because Medicaid is a federal program, so there's a good chance it won't pass. Still, if you live in Arizona, this is a great time to put on your Diabetes Advocate hat.

Finally, if this more about a state budget crisis than a health initiative (as seems to be the case), I'm sure we can all figure out ways to get the biggest bang for the buck that will actually ease the budget and help people be healthier. Right?

Disclaimer: Content created by the Diabetes Mine team. For more details click here.

Disclaimer

This content is created for Diabetes Mine, a consumer health blog focused on the diabetes community. The content is not medically reviewed and doesn't adhere to Healthline's editorial guidelines. For more information about Healthline's partnership with Diabetes Mine, please click here.

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