#no gins were harmed during this drawing

[dailyrioranger]

Day 6: NOT MY GIN!

[wisehoagiekidwobbler]

100 Prompts for Working with Your Grimoire on a Daily Basis.

Your grimoire is a living document. Recording your spiritual practice in a sacred manner is a great way to stay connected to your spirituality. Plus, by recording things like your new moon intentions, rituals and your moods or dreams during certain astrological events, you are creating a way to observe and bear witness to your spiritual path as it evolves. I recommend making your grimoire a part of your daily spiritual practice so that it becomes an innate part of your witchy path. Sometimes it can be a challenge to find new ways to work with your grimoire though, and then the document becomes stagnant, no longer keeping up with your daily spiritual experience. Once you have recorded the magickal correspondences of your favorite herbs and crystals, astrological signs and a few spells or recipes, you may find yourself stuck as to how to continue working with your grimoire. To help you out with that block, here are 100 prompts to kickstart your creativity and get your witchy observations underway:

1. Record information about plants that are native to your area. 

2. Get to know your sun sign. How does it manifest in your real life? What house do you have the sun in and what other planets are also in that house? All of these elements affect your astrological relationship with the sun.

3. Look up your own moon sign, as well as any planets or asteroids in your natal chart that are in the sign of Cancer, (the sign of the moon), and record what you find in your grimoire.

4. Create a page in your grimoire to record the intentions you set at each new moon for the entire year so that you can keep track of your progress.

5. Write out tutorials for particular projects you make often or are interested in making, such as tinctures, infused oils, homemade gin or flower essences.

6. Make natural ink from plants to use when writing in your grimoire. (There is a great tutorial for this in The Modern Witch’s Guide to Lammas online course!)

7. In addition to individual profile pages for each plant, create indexes of particular traits, correspondences or astrological rulers for easy reference.

8. Record recipes for diffuser blends, tinctures, tea blends, spells and other herbal concoctions and leave space at the bottom to note in a few days, weeks or months, how the recipe’s effect turned out.

9. Keep track in your grimoire of where you acquire your favorite versions of each plant. As you practice herbalism regularly, you will discover that you prefer some plants from certain shops over others or from your own garden or not. 

10. Rather than simply drawing a picture of the plant on its profile page in its most commonly recognized form, include more detailed drawings as well of the plant as it appears in various seasons and periods of its life cycle. 

11. Keep a record of the types of pollinators that visit your garden and research their likes, dislikes and functions.

12. Work with the spring astrological signs of Aries, Taurus and Gemini and record information you find about the energies of these signs in your grimoire.

13. Work with the summer astrological signs of Cancer, Leo and Virgo and record information you find about the energies of these signs in your grimoire.

14. Work with the fall astrological signs of Libra, Scorpio and Sagittarius and record information you find about the energies of these signs in your grimoire.

15. Work with the winter astrological signs of Capricorn, Aquarius and Pisces and record information you find about the energies of these signs in your grimoire.

16. Profile crystals and herbs related to Ostara and Beltane, such as tulips and clover, or rose quartz and aquamarine.

17. Profile crystals and herbs related to the Summer Solstice and Lammas, such as wheat, sunflowers and citrine.

18. Profile herbs associated with Samhain, such as Rosemary, Mugwort and Yarrow.

19. Profile crystals associated with Samhain, such as Bloodstone, Obsidian and Black Tourmaline.

20. Profile crystals and herbs associated with Yule such as garnet and moss agate, or holly and peppermint.

21. Profile crystals and herbs associated with the moon, such as selenite and jasmine. 

22. Journaling Prompt: Where do you feel like you shine? In what situation do you feel your best, most brilliant self?

23. Summer is when the sun is at its strongest. Record scientific, metaphysical and astrological information about the sun.

24. Record the steps you take for your Ostara and Beltane rituals and your springtime full moon ritual, so you can refer back to them in future spring seasons.

25. Record the steps you take in your Summer Solstice and Strawberry Moon rituals. It can be very helpful and enlightening in the future to be able to refer back and see what you did and how you felt at the time.

26. Record the steps you take in your Samhain and Blood Moon rituals. It can be very helpful and enlightening in the future to be able to refer back and see what you did and how you felt at the time.

27. Record the steps you take for your Yule and December full moon rituals, so that you can refer back to them in the future.

28. Journaling Prompt: Summer is the season of abundance. What is in full bloom and abundant growth in your life right now? What needs a little extra care to achieve abundance?

29. Meditate or do a card reading outside in the sunshine. Feel the warmth shine down on your skin and record the results of your solar-powered meditation or reading.

30. Now that your garden is in abundant production, record the recipes (culinary, medicinal and otherwise) that you are using your herbs and veggies in.

31. Record information about the energy of the new moon.

32. Start a Lunar Grimoire to keep track of your new moon rituals.

33. Record information about the astrological sign that the moon is currently in.

34. Journaling Prompt: What intentions are you setting at this new moon? What goals are you setting? How do your physical goals and spiritual intentions differ from each other?

35. Record your favorite oils, crystals and herbs to aid in manifestation work for realizing the intentions you set at the new moon.

36. Look up which phase the moon was in when you were born and record information about it.

37. Journaling Prompt: What have you manifested since the last new moon? Did you realize your intentions or goals that you set then?

38. Pull one tarot card every new moon and record it in the same section of your grimoire each month so you can refer back to where you were at for the beginning of each lunar cycle in the year.

39. Record information about the energy of the full moon.

40. Start a Lunar Grimoire to keep track of your full moon rituals.

41. Keep a daily record of particular habits you want to start, such as drinking water, exercising or practicing a morning or evening ritual.

42. If you have pets or a familiar, research any plants that may be harmful for them and record them in your grimoire for safety reference.

43. Record information about the astrological sign that the moon is currently in.

44. Research moon goddesses such as Selene, Diana and Hecate and write in your grimoire information about how they are worshiped.

45. If you commonly suffer from a particular ailment, research which plants and homeopathic remedies exist to treat it and record them in your grimoire. (Please note: Always consult a doctor for serious or chronic conditions. Do not mix homeopathic remedies with Western medicine and medication without speaking to your doctor first.)

46. Journaling Prompt: What do you want to celebrate at this full moon? How have you grown and what have you achieved in the last lunar cycle?

47. The new moon is associated with the maiden aspect of the Triple Goddess. Research the maiden and goddesses associated with her and record what resonates with you in your grimoire.

48. Spring is associated with the maiden aspect of the Triple Goddess. Research the maiden and goddesses associated with her and record what resonates with you in your grimoire.

49. Summer is associated with the mother aspect of the Triple Goddess. Research the mother and goddesses associated with her and record what resonates with you in your grimoire.

50. The full moon is associated with the mother aspect of the Triple Goddess. Research the mother and goddesses associated with her and record what resonates with you in your grimoire.

51. Autumn is associated with the crone aspect of the Triple Goddess. Research the crone and goddesses associated with her and record what resonates with you in your grimoire.

52. Write down all of the tools you like to use in moon rituals, including your favorite candles, tarot decks, teas and oil blends.

53. Journaling Prompt: What do you want to release from the past lunar cycle?

54. Sketch out the layout of your garden or planters.

55. Research plants that are native to your area or that you want to grow yourself and record information you find about them, as well as their magickal properties.

56. If you plant to grow plants that you can cook with, write down a few magickal recipes you will be able to use them in.

57. Journaling Prompt: What does rebirth mean to you? Is it the natural cycle of the seasons or something more literal or magickal?

58. Design a tarot spread for spring and record it in your grimoire. Themes for your spread could include rebirth and new growth.

59. Journaling Prompt: What aspect of your spiritual or magickal life do you need to do a little spring cleaning in? What can you clear out to make room for new ideas?

60. Speaking of spring cleaning, record the ways in which you are adding a magickal touch to your cleaning routine, such as saging your home or infusing your cleaning products with your intentions for the spring season. This can become a ritual in and of itself.

61. You may also want to “spring clean” your grimoire: smudge it with smoke to release any negativity or energy it has collected over the winter and start the season fresh.

62. Record in your grimoire family recipes you make each year during the holidays, such as the family gingerbread cookie recipe. This is perfect for kitchen witches who use their grimoires as recipe books as well.

63. Journaling Prompt: Reflect on the past year and how you have grown in your spiritual journey during that time.

64. Record a favorite holiday story or Yule legend, such as A Christmas Carol or the story of the yule log. Then, each year, you will be able to read this story out loud from your grimoire to create a new holiday tradition.

65. Make plans for the new year in terms of your spiritual journey. What new ideas and techniques do you want to study?

66. Sketch or trace mandalas into your grimoire and color them in. Coloring may be trendy but it really is deeply meditative and relaxing, and mandalas can be very powerful for centering your energy. The perfect activity for a rainy, winter day!

67. Press sprigs of holly leaves, pine or cedar in your grimoire to scent the book with the feeling of the season.

68. Research and record information about gods and goddesses associated with Yule and other winter holidays, such as Saturnalia. You might find a new tradition you feel drawn to.

69. Journaling prompt: What in your life is coming to an end? How do you feel about that?

70. Design a tarot spread for fall or Samhain and record it in your grimoire for future use. Themes for your spread could include letting go of something or connecting with your ancestors/ancestral knowledge.

71. Research traditional witchcraft in your ancestral culture. Are there any particular spells or practices that you can incorporate into your own magick? Record them in your grimoire.

72. Journaling prompt: How does the crone goddess present herself in your own life? Is there someone that you think represents her? How do you relate to her wise and often misunderstood energy personally?

73. Have a favorite fall recipe? Look up the magickal associations of the main ingredients and record the recipe in your grimoire.

74. Sketch a plan for your fall garden, along with how you are physically and spiritually clearing out the garden from summer. Note what the magickal associations of your new fall plants are.

75. Journaling prompt: Fall and Samhain are sometimes associated with inner darkness and understanding that side of ourselves. How do you deal with dark thoughts when they occur? How can you better harness that darkness and turn it into something productive and useful?

76. Carved pumpkins or jack-o-lanterns are a traditional form of protective magick. Sketch out your ideas and final plans for your jack-o-lantern this year in your grimoire! Incorporate protective sigils or pentagrams into the design for an extra magickal boost.

77. Press fall leaves in your grimoire and try to identify them on the page. What is their significance? What do they represent together and individually for you?

78. Record magickal traditions and superstitions of the cultures that your ancestors came from. Write down spells and rituals you come across, even if they aren’t something you would every practice yourself – having this understanding of where you come from can help you more deeply connect with your own unique magick.

79. Record all of the plants you are starting from seed or planning to put in your garden. You could even sketch out your garden layout, as well as record the magickal correspondences of each plant.

80. Create a dream journal section in your grimoire to record your dreams each morning and the astrological and outside factors that may have influenced them.

81. Have a reading done by a professional tarot, tea leaf or palm reader, and record in your grimoire what they said or predicted about you. Leave space to record in a few weeks or months how their predictions manifested.

82. Develop a daily skincare routine for hot weather and sun exposure and record the routine, as well as recipes for any homemade cosmetics used in the routine.

83. Draw constellations that you see in the sky and record when and where you see them and information about the mythology behind them.

84. Draw your own natal chart and record information about the placement of your planets, signs and houses.

85. Keep a running list of witchy books you are interested in reading and currently reading. Give a brief review of each to refer back to after you have finished them.

86. Record a list of songs and musical artists that put you in a magickal or spiritual mindset.

87. Collage a mini vision board of your intentions on a page spread in your grimoire.

88. Write or sketch out yoga sequences such as custom sun and moon salutations.

89. Draw different crystal formations and record information about their meanings and functions.

90. Explore the ways that the element of air manifests in your life.

91. Explore the ways that the element of earth manifests in your life.

92. Explore the ways that the element of fire manifests in your life.

93. Explore the ways that the element of water manifests in your life.

94. Research other witchcraft traditions than your own to discover what you can learn from them. Explore the labels you have used, those you have shied away from and what that all might mean for the future of your practice.

95. Journaling Prompt: How do you relate to technology in your spiritual life? Do you utilize it or turn away from it? Why or why not?

96. Record a spiritual history of your family, beginning as far back as you are aware. What were the spiritual beliefs of your immediate family and of your ancestors? How did those family traditions evolve over time and how do the beliefs of others affect your practice today?

97. Lay outside on a partly cloudy day and look for shapes in the clouds. Draw what you see and record what you think it means.

98. Create an index of herbs and crystals so that you can cross-reference them by their many variations of folk names.

99. Create a tarot journal section in your grimoire and write down the meaning of each card and your personal associations and reactions to it. You could also do this for individual oracle decks!

100. Journaling Prompt: What kind of witchcraft do you identify most with and why?

[ugly-crying-over-bucky-barnes]

Blue Eyes Part 2

Summary: After the Garrison is shot up, the youngest Shelby daughter finds a new home in London. She strips herself of her last name and tries to live a peaceful life far away from her brothers’ chaos in Birmingham. But fate leads her right back into it after she runs into Alfie Solomons.

Part 2: A chance encounter between a Shelby and a Solomons. But neither knows who the other really is. 

           Ella Thorne spent her twenty-third birthday with close friends. They went out dancing at a popular club that January night. It was well liked by the young adults of London who liked frivolous fun mixed with intrigue. There, the ordinary rubbed elbows with the wealthy and the criminal. It was great fun and perfect for a birthday celebration.

           Amelia, Ella’s best friend who she met at work, was a carefree spirit who loved the era. She wore her hair short and her dresses even shorter. She mastered the smoky eye and used her alluring appearance to lure men like a siren’s song. Often times she had multiple men trying to win over her affection at the same time. There were rumors that she’d had affairs with American mafia and European royalty. But behind all the showmanship, the young woman was a kind soul and a loyal friend.

~~~~~~~~~~~

           “Don’t you want to dance with that boy again?” Amelia pointed out a dapper man who had asked Ella for a dance earlier in the night. He stood by a group of well-dressed colleagues. His green eyes kept returning to Ella and he gave her a smile whenever she returned the glance.

           “Oh, I think my shoes have given me a blister.” She replied and nursed her gin. “He’s sweet but not very interesting.”

           “His mate said he’s a banker. Might be well off?” Amelia shrugged.

           Ella smiled but shook her head. She knew money wasn’t everything. “What about you? I’ve seen you dancing with four different men tonight.”

           “Five.” Amelia corrected with a smug smile. “They’re nice and all, but none of them could keep up with me on the dancefloor.” She sighed dramatically and leaned against the bar. "So I assume they couldn't keep up with me in life."

           “I don’t think anyone could keep up with you, Amelia.”

           “I know but…oh shit, look!” She gasped and pointed towards the entrance of the lavish club.

           “What?” Ella tried to see over the crowd of dancers and drinkers but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.

           “That’s Alfie Solomons. Bloody hell, what’d you think he’s doing here?” She asked.

           Her friend saw the crowd start to part slowly like the Red Sea. She saw a small group of men making their way through. “I don’t know who that is. But he’s at a bar, I’m assuming he came here to drink.”

           “No, El.” Amelia shook her head firmly. “He’s a gangster but don't let him hear you call him that. Controls Camden Town, s’fucking terrifying. He doesn’t come to clubs unless he has a reason.”

           Ella furrowed her eyebrows. The men drew closer and she finally got a good look at the man leading the pack. Barflies quickly moved aside to let him through. They seemed afraid to be caught in his line of vision. He appeared very intimidating. A black hat cast a shadow over his face; he wore a big coat and multiple rings on his fingers.

           “Just keep your head down,” Amelia whispered to her friend over the loud jazz music. "Ignore him and he'll ignore you."

           Ella had never seen her friend shy away from anything. But she apparently had a good reason just like the rest of the club. She turned and faced the bartender who had gone a little pale.

           The gangster arrived at the bar; he was given a wide berth despite the packed nature of the club. “Evening, Louis.” He greeted the man behind the bar.

           “Mr. Solomons, can I help you with anything?” The bartender swallowed hard and approached him slowly. "A drink maybe?"

           “Nah mate, just out having some fucking fun, ain’t I?”

           “O-okay…”

           Alfie chuckled and gestured for the man to come closer. Warily, the bartender leaned in. With frightening speed, the gangster grabbed the man by the collar and slammed his face against the bar top.

           Ella jolted and watched the bartender pick himself up and stagger back a few steps. His nose was clearly broken and blood streaming down his face. She’d never seen anyone react so violently when they were unprovoked. But no one else seemed surprised. In fact, even the bartender looked like he had been expecting it the moment Alfie walked in. He simply grabbed a towel from under the bar and pressed it to his bloodied nose, wincing from the pain.

           “Your boss is fucking late again, mate. You know I don't give people a third chance. Fuck, you're lucky I gave you lot a second chance.” Alfie continued talking like he hadn’t just bashed the man’s face in.

           “I-I’ll get him on the telephone…” Louis stammered behind the towel.

           “’Course he ain’t here again.” Alfie sighed heavily and adjusted a gold ring on his index finger. “Fucking hiding out and making you face the consequences, s’a disgrace, innit? He's a coward, yeah, and people like that in my fucking neck of the woods don't survive very long.”

           “Yes, sir…”

           Alfie pointed at him with two fingers. “You get him on the phone, yeah, you tell him if he innit down here in two minutes with the proper money he owes me, I’ll fucking kill you both. Right? Good lad.”

           The bartender nodded shakily and hurried off.

           Ella was frozen in place. Her blood had run cold as she listened to the threats the man was dealing out. She wasn’t sure if he would really kill the poor boy but she wouldn’t put it past him.

           “Did’ya hear me?”

           Ella was in such a state of shock that she didn’t even notice the gangster had turned his attention to her. She met his eyes and was partially surprised to see how handsome he was, albeit rough around the edges. He certainly wasn’t the clean-cut gentleman that Amelia fawned after. But had had lovely teal green eyes and a spine-chilling scar that marked his right cheek, not completely hidden by his beard. He was interesting even on face value and Ella couldn't look away even if it meant her safety.

           “Sorry?” She wasn’t sure how she found her voice again. It was nearly impossible to think straight in his presence. It was such a strange contradiction that she felt. She’d watched him harm an innocent young man, continue to threaten his life, and now she was caught up in his appearance.

           “Said your drink’s empty, love.” He repeated himself. A small smile graced his face.

           “Oh uh…” Ella glanced down and saw that she had finished her gin. “Yes, well I…”

           But he didn't let her finish. “Fucking hell, you’ve got blue eyes, don’t ya?” He bent down slightly to come eye to eye with her. “What’s your last name, love?” There was only one other person on this planet that had eyes like her.

           “Thorne,” Ella answered. She’d successfully gotten the name Shelby out of her mouth during those four years away from Birmingham. “Ella Thorne.”

           Alfie nodded slowly. Tommy never mentioned having a relative named Ella. “Alfie Solomons.” He introduced himself in turn. “Sorry, ‘bout the little show.” He gestured to the blood on the counter. "But it's all business, innit?"

           “N-no it’s okay,” Ella replied. She felt someone tugging her arm and saw Amelia give her a look of alarm.

           Alfie raised an eyebrow. “Am I interrupting something?” He asked.

           Amelia shook her head firmly. She looked immensely uncomfortable when his attention turned to her. “No, Mr. Solomons. I uh…”

           “Go and dance, I’ll be right here,” Ella assured her friend. It took some convincing but Amelia did eventually retreat to the dance floor, looking over her shoulder every so often.

           “Ah, your friend’s told you who I am.” Alfie surmised by Amelia's reaction to him.

           “She knew your name,” Ella admitted. But she remembered not to say anything about his profession to his face.

           “And you didn’t.”

           “I can’t say I know everyone in London.” She smiled shakily. "It's such a large city."

           He nodded with an amused look and ran a hand over his beard. “Just an innocent bit then, aren’t you? Small life in a big city, aye?”

           Her lips parted and she thought about her family. She certainly didn't have a small life when she was in Birmingham. The Shelby name gave her a larger appearance. London did make her feel smaller but that was good. Fewer people paid attention to you when they didn't care what your last name was. “Do you judge people based on how they look?”

           Alfie leaned back to take in her appearance. “You a Soviet spy or something?” He cocked an eyebrow.

           Ella couldn’t help but giggle at the outrageous idea. She'd never been accused of being a spy before, let alone one from Russia. “No.”

           He actually let a small smile make his beard twitch. She had a charming smile. “Well, they usually send beautiful women that’ll catch you off guard, don’t they? And when they've got you naked and tied up, they stick a gun to your fucking head.”

           Her cheeks flushed red when he called her beautiful. She was strangely used to crass language. She grew up swearing like a sailor because of her brothers. She tried to be a little more refined now that she was a professional woman, working in an office. But habit was hard to break and Amelia always laughed whenever the girl got too drunk to speak English and reverted to Shelta. The young woman ducked her head and shrugged. “You spoke to me first, Mr. Solomons.” She replied.

           He chuckled and tapped his fingers against the bar top. “Cheeky.”

           “Do you always think you have spies on your tail?” She wondered and tilted her head to the side. “Most people aren’t worried about spies."

           “I’m just a baker, love.” He smirked. “What would spies want with me?”

           The bartender returned with a nervous looking man following him. His eyes were shifty and he looked like he was going to be sick when he saw Alfie standing there. “Mr. Solomons.” The man cleared his throat and tried to look him in the eye.

           Alfie looked displeased that he would have to conclude the business he’d come there to carry out. He was a little more interested in the woman to his right. The one with the bluest eyes he’d ever seen. There was something about her that was drawing him.

           But business was business.

           “Is that money I see in your hand?” Alfie looked surprised. “Really? To think I was going to have to fucking beat it out of you.”

           “I-it’s…” The man’s sentence stopped abruptly and he shook his head. “Erm…here.” The owner of the bar handed Alfie the envelope of cash.

           Ella had seen massive wads of money before and hats full of coins. She often wandered around the betting shop, helping Finn read the betting slips, following Polly around, and seeing if Tommy would let her drive the family car. Sometimes she glanced over her aunt’s shoulder as she opened the safe. It was unreal to see that much money in one place. But her brothers made it happen.

           But Alfie seemed displeased when he took a peek into the envelope. “Seems short. Ollie, count it.” He handed the envelope to the curly-haired man standing to his left. As his assistant swiftly counted the bills, Alfie kept a hard look at the owner of the bar.

           “It’s only half,” Ollie informed his boss and returned the envelope to him.

           Ella saw the owner of the bar go even paler than before. She clutched her purse close to her side and looked for Amelia in the crowd.

           “Half. Fucking half? Louis, mate, did I ask for half or did I ask for the full amount?” Alfie narrowed his eyes at the bartender.

           “F-full, sir.” He answered.

           “So why do I only have fucking half of the payment in me fucking hand?” He demanded.

           Ella wondered briefly if this was how her brothers handled business. She could for sure see John and Arthur carrying out in such a way. She’d seen Arthur threaten men for far less, like accidentally bumping into her on the sidewalk. But she wasn’t sure about Tommy. She often wondered if Tommy was capable of hurting anyone. He was intimidating, sure but that didn’t mean he would be as brutal as her brothers or the man beside her at the bar. She usually considered him the brains of the operation and not the force.

           Alfie pocketed the money in his coat. “I’ve got to take care of some business, love.” He turned to Ella.

           She nodded and realized she wasn’t afraid of him like she probably should’ve been. Like Amelia and the rest of the club was. She knew how gangsters were. They were only scary to the people who had reason to be scared of them. She wasn’t afraid of her brothers because she was under their protection. Alfie didn’t seem like the kind of man who would harm her unless he had good reason to.

           “Have a good night then, yeah?”

           “Yeah…you too,” Ella replied even though she had a good feeling he was going to seriously injure the men behind the bar. But what was that compared to all the men her brothers had harmed? Maybe she'd grown too accustomed to the idea of violence even while she was away. There was always a reminder in the back of her mind that her brothers were dangerous and she didn't even know the half of their deeds.

           He smiled and tipped his hat to her before turning and walking towards the back door of the bar. His entourage followed him as well as the owner of the bar who would be found in the Thames the next morning.

~~~~~~~~~~~

           Ella woke up with a bit of a hangover. Amelia had kept her out into the early morning hours. She’d only managed to get a bit of sleep before the sounds of London woke her up. After getting dressed, she went downstairs and picked up the mail. She sorted through the pile and stopped at a cream-colored envelope.

           Miss Ella Shelby

           She rolled her eyes and knew who it was from. Only Tommy insisted on calling her by her given name. She often missed her family but she felt she had a good reason to stay in London. She had Ada who seemed happy to keep her distance from the family business too. Although these days she found herself more involved.

           Tommy called Ada frequently to make sure Ella was safe and doing okay. He snuck small amounts of money into her bank account, just enough that she wouldn’t get suspicious. He just wanted to feel a little less guilty. Tommy missed his youngest sister but he had to carry on. He just thought she’d be back in Birmingham by then but four years later and she didn’t show any signs of giving in.

           Ella opened the envelope and furrowed her eyebrows when she read the invitation.

           Cordially invited…Wedding…Thomas Shelby…Grace Burgess.

           “What?” Ella whispered under her breath. She shook her head in disbelief and left her apartment to walk to Ada’s.

~~~~~~~~~

           “Married? I thought Grace was just the barmaid at the Garrison, what on Earth?” Ella shook the invitation at her sister. “What is he trying to pull?”

           “El, it’s not some master plan,” Ada assured her. “Sit, I’ll make you tea.”

           Instead, Ella threw the invitation on the table and followed her older sister into the kitchen. “Ada, he wrote Shelby on the envelope!” She exclaimed. “I told him…”

           “He misses you. They all miss you.” Ada interrupted her. “You know how much they care about you.” She started the kettle and pulled out two teacups.

           Ella huffed. “Why is he marrying her?” She asked suspiciously.

           “They have a child together now. He only thought it was right and I think he really does still love her.”

           Her mouth fell open. “A…what? A child?”

           Ada sighed softly. “You’ve been away from Birmingham for longer than you think.”

           “I…” She scoffed in disbelief. But the shock of the news hit her in the heart. She hadn’t known her brother was a father now. She didn’t know her new nephew even existed. “When’s the wedding?” She asked quietly.

           “Next month,” Ada answered and poured her sister a cup of tea, adding in the milk and two sugars she always requested. “I think it would mean the world to him if you were there.”

           Ella looked at her feet and sighed. “I know.”

           “He’s got a lot on his plate right now. The Oddfellows, the Soviets, the London outfit.” Ada listed off and went to sit down in the parlor.

           She sat on a sofa and slowly stirred the milk into her tea. She wrestled with the idea of attending her brother’s wedding. Could she really be heartless and refuse to go? Or would she be protecting herself? She had hardly any clue what Ada was talking about anymore. Used to be her brother only dealt with the other gypsy families, the police, and the people in Birmingham. “The London outfit?”

           Ada waved her hand with a shrug. “Other gangsters who work from London. The Italians, the Jews.”

           Ella had a sinking feeling in her gut. If Tommy was getting involved with firms in London, then she was more open to being victimized by his enemies. “Are we safe?” She asked.

           Her sister nodded. “Of course. Tommy knows what he’s doing.” Both of the Shelby girls weren’t completely sure about that but he always seemed like he had a plan for any possible scenario. “I would just stick to the areas you know. Stay out of Camden and don’t trust anyone who says they’re a fucking baker.”

           Ella stared at her. “A what?”

           “A baker. Usually means they work for a distillery in Camden Town.”

           “Oh…” Ella felt her chest tighten. Had she come into contact with one of her brothers' enemies? Was that why he asked her last name? He thought she was a Shelby because of her blue eyes. She had just lied to a very dangerous man and now she could only pray she never came into contact with him again. Even though she had thought about his playful eyes all night and how her heart had skipped a beat when he called her beautiful. A fucking baker. Tommy would have a fit if he found out.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Permanent Tag: @papa-geralt-of-cirilla​ @giftofdreams​

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[bungouimagines]

Can you write a scenario where akutagawa thinks his crush is in love with dazai but it's all a huge misunderstanding and he finds out she actually likes him?

Sure thing! I have to admit, the amount of detail in this scenario is impressive, I love detailed asks like these. Hopefully I can do it justice! ~(^u^)~ Answer’s below the cut!

“The One Where Akutagawa Loses It Over a Simple Misinterpretation”

Ryūnosuke wasn’t sure what exactly his crush was meant to do during this mission, but as of this point, they had to be crossing some line. Their role in this mission was simple: meet with the members of the Agency, posing as a client (much like Higuchi had previously), then find a way to throw them on a wild goose chase of some sort so the Port Mafia could run some drills later that evening without interruption from the fuzz.

He didn’t have to be here, but at the same time, he was begrudgingly glad that he disobeyed orders and spied on their little act of subterfuge. 

This however, was not according to plan. The tensing in his jaw was apparent at this point, just looking at them with him of all people…it left the Port Mafia’s Rabid Dog teething with rage. His frustration only grew as he continued watching his item of adoration cover their face and anxiously laugh–something they would only do in front of him–alongside his former mentor, a mere fool who reduced himself to a seemingly “pious” existence with the Agency: the enemy. 

Akutagawa persevered however, he understood that his s/o would need to play the part to lure the senior officers out. But things took a turn as soon as the bandaged man reached over, his action made in a hasty blur, and grasped their hands in his. 

Why didn’t they recoil? Why aren’t they breaking the contact? 

Akutagawa recalled a conversation he had had with this particular junior member a few days previous. They seemed to be experiencing some level of unease regarding their upcoming mission.

Normally, Ryūnosuke couldn’t care less about his underling’s pre-mission anxiousness, so long as they didn’t get in the way of the Mafia’s goals.

But this was different, this was someone who had caught his eye, after all. A feat even Akutagawa couldn’t fathom. So he decided to talk with them; gradually coaxing the item of his affections to explain their general nerves regarding the mission, but also drawing some questions from them:

“Senior officer Akutagawa, sir?”

He brashly corrected them, perhaps too quickly, to refer to him just by his surname. 

“R-Right. Well, Akutagawa, might I ask you something?”

He nodded his head, advising them to keep it brief…should he not have added that last part?

“What is your connection to Dazai? D-Dazai Osamu of the Agency?”

The mere mention of that man set his blood afire, in a hellish sort of way. How did this underling know about him? He answered in a brusque manner, telling this person, this damned, quizzical creature, that his connection to Dazai was that of a former Mafia relation. Nothing more, nothing less; and to leave it at that. Turning away and briskly walking towards the exit, he could hear the lower Mafia member mumbling bemusedly to themselves. 

“Dazai…Osamu. Hmm.”

What was with that tone?

He was storming away, again. At this rate, the mission would be a critical failure if he hadn’t have removed himself from the situation. It didn’t take long for the junior member to finally exit the building, as Gin relayed their progress via text to her brother. Not that he cared at this point. 

Another *blip* of the screen got his attention however, the message was curt, yet sent a jolt through his very being:

Crush leaving now–company = Dazai…your jurisdiction?

Rushing to their last pinged location, Akutagawa began gritting his teeth once more, particularly when he was able to visually confirm Dazai as his infatuation’s sole companion in an alleyway just a few clicks from the Agency’s headquarters.

He waited, watching their movements carefully from atop one of the adjacent buildings. They were awfully close…it made his akin crawl. 

How dare they?

It didn’t take long for another interaction between the two, the junior member was practically embracing his former mentor–the bastard. The Rabid Dog decided he had had enough, jumping down with his gift’s signature black beasts accompanying him. He didn’t realize he was yelling until he heard the click of a gun.

His clever subordinate was holding Dazai at gunpoint, point-blank range in fact. That embrace was nothing more than a cheap tactic to get him close…

Akutagawa felt his mouth falling agape at their wit. 

Though their mission proved to be a failure once the Agency’s cavalry showed up, Ryūnosuke was able to retrieve some vital information, as well as pull the crafty underling out of harm’s way rather swiftly.

They were alone now, sitting by a safehouse at the docks, the evening sun coating the sky in rich orange and red tones.

He asked them what they thought they were doing back there.

“I w-wanted to help you, Akutagawa, sir.”

Help him?

“Ridding you of that man’s expectations once and for all, surely that would benefit you, right?”

He wasn’t sure what to say.

“I did it because…”

Akutagawa felt himself demanding them to answer, grasping to their shoulders and forcing them to face him.

“I love you sir.”

They didn’t care for Dazai.

They did everything for him; even jeopardized their own mission.

He embraced them tightly, thanking them for their service, and stayed there for a long while.

[wedoyouressays195]

writing help

About me

Impact of Illegal Drug Use Among Teens

For more than one hundred years, the United States has been managing the utilization and maltreatment of illicit medications. The central government has burned through billions of dollars since 1906 attempting to stop the creation, circulation, ownership and utilization of medications. The war on drugs has been long and exorbitant with negligible advancement made. In spite of the fact that the utilization of unlawful medications among adolescents has decreased, their maltreatment of physician recommended drugs has risen generously. Medication use is an intense issue among young and school age people and is available on each grounds over this country.Even however the war on drugs is continuous, the government’s endeavors to decrease tranquilize dealing has had little impact on the utilization or maltreatment of illicit medications among adolescents. Medication misuse proceeds to plaque our country, causing obliteration along its way, there is by all accounts no way out from this disturbing pattern. The most significant test for medicate strategy is to invert these risky patterns. Unlawful medications are effectively available; they are in our homes, schools, organizations and even in the correctional facilities and penitentiaries. They influence the vast majority in this country in some structure or another, in the case of manhandling them themselves or knowing somebody who does or has mishandled them.The utilization of medications right on time among youngsters is particularly hazardous, and regularly lead to useless, undesirable conduct. Inclusion in criminal equity framework, adolescent misconduct, untimely sexual action (which opens them to explicitly transmitted maladies and increment the danger of undesirable pregnancies), are totally connected with the utilization of illicit medications. The stunning expense for pointless social insurance, car collisions, wrongdoings coming about because of medication use and additional law implementation has caused considerably more harm to a previously fizzling economy.If the administration is to push ahead in its endeavor to battle the war on drugs, it needs to make viable medication arrangements and grow better projects to stop the beginning of starting medication use. Educating today’s youth about the risks of illicit medications will demonstrate definitely more gainful than basically utilizing alarm strategies with harsher punishments. A key segment in the battle to spare the youngsters from drugs is viable medication training. The Narconon medicate educational program will show them why they should state “NO”, by helping them comprehend the enduring harm of drugs.In handling the high school tranquilize issue, first, we need to figure out what a portion of the hazard factors are that may have driven them down that way from the earliest starting point. How a kid connects in different settings like at school, with instructors, their companions, kin, guardians and in their neighborhood can assume a urgent job in their enthusiastic, social and psychological turn of events. On the off chance that they start to carry on in the class, bomb classes, have poor social adapting abilities, start to connect with an inappropriate group and change in generally speaking discernment about things they know aren't right similar to lying, drugs, violations, etc.These are for the most part warnings and ought to be examined and tended to right away. You need to take a stab at chatting with them or taking them to see an expert to discover what's up, if conceivable, change their condition, place them around positive companions, get them engaged with sports, church, social clubs. Take the necessary steps to keep things from spiraling crazy, use every one of your assets. Attempt to tell the youngster you are there and that you care about what they are experiencing, this could have a significant effect, in whether you reach them.If guardians read, instruct themselves of the risks in utilizing medications, at that point and at exactly that point will they have the option to show their kids how to engaging in tranquilize use. To arrange enough exploration for a balanced paper destinations like; the Office on National Drug Control Policy, National Institute on Drug Abuse, the Internet, ProQuest, and the Ashford Online Library were utilized. These locales alongside others sources contained a plenitude of data, enough information to make an instructive paper.This research called attention to the social and wellbeing cost of illegal medication use, and further distinguished that sedate related disease, demise and wrongdoing, cost the country more than one hundred billion dollars per year. The Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) reports, of the 263,871 crisis office visits by youths age 12-17, about one tenth (8. 8 percent) included self destruction endeavors, just about three of each four (72. 3 percent) were females. Of the 95. 4 percent sedate related suicides pharmaceuticals were included and more than three-fourths (77. 0 percent) finished with follow-up care (SAMHSA, 2008).The most noteworthy expense of all medication misuse is paid in the lost of human lives, either legitimately through overdose, or medication misuse related maladies, for example, tuberculosis, (AIDS) and hepatitis. (NIDA and NIAA, 1992). It was imperative to lead this exploration to make perusers mindful of exactly how awful society is bombing the young people of this country. The United States government can't do it without anyone else. This is a national issue and it will take a country to settle it, everybody needs to help or this battle will be always lost.After a right around ten-year decrease, maryjane is on the ascent again among youngsters. Secondary school seniors announced that they smoked pot more than cigarettes as per the National Institute on Drug Abuse ongoing “Monitoring the Future” overview. While 21. 4% confessed to utilizing maryjane over the most recent 30 days, just 19. 2% smoked cigarettes during a similar time span. This was the first run through since 1981 that pot was utilized more than cigarettes in that age gathering. In spite of the fact that the general wellbeing efforts to decrease cigarette smoking among teenagers think about this as a triumph, its decay can fundamentally be added to the ascent of cannabis use.Many kids appear to feel that smoking pot is just “not that large of a deal”, all things considered, it is just pot; even eighth graders don't accept the hazard is that extraordinary. This sort of demeanor clarifies why there is a 1% expansion of every day use for eighth graders and a 3% expansion for tenth graders and means that weed use will probably keep on moving as these children draw nearer to graduation. Around one out of four seniors and one of every four tenth-graders said they smoked maryjane in the last year.Obama administration’s tranquilize despot, Gil Kerlikowske, accuses state clinical weed estimates like California’s Proposition 19 for causing pot to appear to be less perilous to youthful Americans. “Calling maryjane ‘smoked medicine’ is totally mistaken, youngsters have taken an inappropriate message” (Healy, 2010, p. A-10). As indicated by the executive of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, Dr. Nora Volkow, in light of the fact that teenager’s cerebrums are as yet building up the expanded day by day utilization of cannabis is especially upsetting, since it has been known to cause learning and memory damage.The truth that they use pot all the more oftentimes puts them at a more serious danger of getting reliant on it and different medications. The utilization of the club medicate Ecstasy has expanded among eighth-and tenth graders yet not all medications indicated an expansion. The maltreatment of the solution torment prescription Vicodin was down to 8% contrasted with 9. 7% in 2009 and the illegal utilization of narcotic painkiller OxyContin rose among tenth-graders however stayed consistent with twelfth-graders. The utilization of medications recommended for a lack of ability to concentrate consistently scatter, (ADHD) for non-clinical reasons in the most recent year among secondary school seniors is 6. % and is about the equivalent for amphetamines use (Healy, 2010). One of the most recent developing adolescent patterns, which focuses on the inspecting of an assortment of physician endorsed medications and afterward drinking liquor is causing a lot of concern. Children feel that physician recommended drugs are more secure than road drugs, since they are endorsed by a specialist and are typically bought in a medication store.This is basically false; they really are all the more remarkable which makes them much increasingly perilous particularly while adding liquor to the blend. Nora Volkow, says, “Kids are not pharmacologists, they may state, Fentanyl OxyContin-what’s the distinction? So they take a lot of things and may consolidate them with liquor, that is a dangerous miscalculation” (Jetters, A, 2010-2011, p. 146). To accomplish sentiments of happiness, the measure of narcotic painkillers required is so near the sums that can kill you. In the event that you include liquor or sedatives like Klonopin, Valium, Xanax, which likewise discourages the minds respiratory focus. Only one gin and tonic joined with a 40 mg methadone pill can be lethal. They are playing a risky round of Russian roulette, one that they obviously don't understand.When you consider medications and how they got into the United States, the majority of us consider them originating from another nation, as perhaps Mexico or some place in South America. In any case, more now than any time in recent memory we need look no farther than our own medication cupboards. The times of taking an anti-inflamatory medicine or Tylenol for a cerebral pain, spinal pain or toothache are a distant memory. We would now be able to glance in our medication cupboards and look over an assortment of incredible extra painkillers recently endorsed to us for different a throbbing painfulness. For in the course of recent years, multiple times the quantity of narcotic medicines was written.Doctors recommended them at a pace of in excess of 180 million every year. By giving patients enough medicine to facilitate their torment, specialists trust it helps in the mending procedure and permits the patient to concentrate on recovering and not on the torment. This kind of basis may have made specialists over cure, consequently recommending painkillers for even the smallest torment. Painkillers like Vicodin, OxyContin, and Percocet are even recommended to youngsters that have scarcely arrived at puberty. This may clarify why they are the most mishandled pills among 12 and 13-year-olds (Jetters, A, 2010-2011, p. 148).Dentist and oral specialists are endorsing narcotic for straightforward systems like molar extractions. Moreover, the children are being sent home with much a greater number of pills than they need. Indeed, kids feel

[sunlitfirewhisky]

come with me //

1,189 words // in honor of harry’s birthday, of course. there is a (TW) slight mention of self-harm. I also mention this because it’s an idea I stole straight out of another fic I once read, but for the life of me can’t remember which (let me know if you can!) but it always stuck with me and kind of inspired this. other than that, i promise this is nothing more than a fluffy one-shot

She almost doesn’t want to wake him. Merlin knows he needs the sleep, and it’s rare to see him looking so peaceful––without the terrible expression of anguish and sorrow that still darkens his face during most of his waking hours…

She leans over and shakes him gently. He gives a little yelp and rolls over abruptly, hand fumbling for his wand. She’d expected this, of course (that’s why she’s already cast a Muffliato around them), but her heart still aches to see him like this.

“Shh––shhhh,” she hisses softly, pressing a finger to his lips. “It’s just me.”

She can almost see the nervous energy evaporate from his body as his eyes recognize her features through the darkness. He falls back against his pillows, still breathing coarsely.

“Come with me,” she whispers, taking his hand and tugging on it gently. She sees his eyes flit to the clock on his bedside table: 4:03 A.M. “Sorry for waking you up,” she adds hastily. “I’ll meet you downstairs. Grab a jumper, okay? And try not to wake Ron.” Ginny tiptoes out of the room––Ron’s room. It’s where Harry’s been sleeping all summer, or, well––since two weeks after the war ended, when they’d found Harry in the morning with his arms crusted with blood from how hard he’d dug his fingernails into them during the night, and her mum had decided that Harry was not sleeping alone in Charlie’s old room anymore…

She’s just scribbled a quick note for her mum in case she wakes up––this was not the time to risk giving her mum a heart attack over missing children––when Harry appears in the kitchen doorframe, still looking groggy and dazed, his hair sticking up in all sorts of novel ways.

“Let’s go,” she says, going over to him and taking his hand. “Follow me.”

“To where?”

“You’ll see,” is her reply. She leads him out the Burrow’s front door into the chilly pre-dawn air.

It’s still dark out, and the only thing that distinguishes the shadowy hills from the night sky is the coat of twinkling stars on the sky. The air is cool, but she can already feel her skin starting to sweat beneath her jumper. The only sounds are the chirping of birds, buzzing of crickets, and the squelching of their trainers in the dewy grass––she figures that Harry’s feet are probably getting wet, too.

They continue on for a while in silence, until she finally turns her head to look at him and gives his hand a little squeeze. “So––you’re eighteen. Happy birthday.”

He blinks at her in response––he’s only just remembered. “Oh––oh yeah. It’s my birthday.”

“It’s okay. I know you didn’t exactly anticipating me waking you up at four a.m. today.”

“No, I didn’t.” He lets out something between a laugh and a cough. “So––what is this all about, then? My birthday?”

“Yeah. I––I couldn’t really think what to get you.”

“Again?” he asks. “Seems to be a pattern.” She glances over at him, and there’s a twinkle in his eye that she hasn’t seen there for ages. Her heart gives a leap.

“Shut up,” she growls, but now she’s grinning. “So I was trying to think what––er, could be useful.” She bites her lip. “When I was a kid––Mum used to let us come up here”––she gestures in front of them, as it’s evident now that they’re ascending a hill––“at least one night every summer, usually. Dad would charm up an old Muggle tent that he had for us, and we’d camp out up here on the hill. Me and my brothers. Except Ron, he was too afraid of spiders to sleep outside.” She smirks and grins at him, and he’s definitely grinning back now. 

“Percy would try to make us all go to sleep at nine o’clock, right after the sun went down. Fred”––she draws a deep breath––“and George were obviously having none of that, until they had the brilliant idea to just go along with it and let Percy think we were all going to sleep. We’d let him fall asleep and then we’d play pranks on him––stuff toads in his sleeping bag, draw on his face, that kind of stuff. And then I’d stay up ‘til two or three in the morning with Fred and George, just messing around.

“But then Percy’d try and get us all to wake up at five a.m. to watch the sunrise. Actually, the whole thing, from daybreak. Obviously, Fred and George weren’t too thrilled about that, either––they’d usually just end up fighting with Percy and going back to sleep. But I’d stay up, and to be honest, I was always secretly glad about it. I loved watching the sunrise.” She pauses in her storytelling, as they’re both breathing quite heavily now, almost at the crest of the hill. “I thought it was the most beautiful thing ever. I just––I used to think that everyone should get to watch the sun rise over Ottery St. Catchpole at least once in their lives. I used to think that––if I ever got really sad about something, if I ever––ever thought that life wasn’t worth living anymore, all I’d need to do would be to come up here"––she motions around––“and watch the sunrise again.”

She fixes her eyes at the distance. The stars are beginning to melt into a smudge of a faint purple in the east. The cool air is searing her lungs, and she glances back at Harry for just long enough to see that his hair is sticking to his sweaty forehead, before glancing down at the grass.

“Shit, sorry, I should’ve brought a blanket to sit on. Anyway, I didn’t think you’d be interested in the camping bit after this year, but––”

“Gin,” he cuts her off suddenly, grabbing her hand and spinning her to face him directly so that her eyes have no choice but to meet his, wide and anxious behind his glasses. He stares at her for a few seconds––minutes––several pre-sunlit days?––before pulling her down onto the grass and scooping her into his lap. He wraps his arms around her waist, burying his face into her neck. “Don’t worry about the stupid blanket,” he mumbles.

“Okay,” she breathes.

They sit there in silence, his chin propped up on her shoulder, and watch the sky go from deep blue to inky purple to dusky gray. They watch the constellations fade, one by one, into the rosy pink rolling over the hills until they can finally make out the morning mist floating toward the horizon and the signature steeple and rooftops of Ottery St. Catchpole nestled below. She swears that he holds on to her a little tighter as the first rays of sunlight begin to peek over the hills, bathing the valley in a warm, orange glow.

“For someone who can never figure out what to get me for my birthday, I think you manage to come up with some pretty good ideas,” he finally whispers.

[mauridianhallow]

A L L O F T H E Q U E S T I O N S

Good shit good shit this took me ages holy hell enjoy you meme loving fucks Q's for you to A Do you have a favourite sweater? I actually do, it's that kinda folded over stretchy grey one I always wear, y'know? I wore it to The 1975 and, from what I hear, it was awesome. (Although I can't remember bc I was Gin Drunk) What’s your middle name? Lawrence...no judgement...Do you still talk to the first person you kissed? I don't, I wonder how's she's doing. Heard she was studying History from her friend I met in a bar one time. Glad to hear, she was nice. Do you get on with your grandparents? I did! Sadly it's been a few years since they passed but I very much did. What was your favourite cartoon as a kid? Hmm, it's a tough one, between the 90's X-Men TV show they played on repeat on Fox Kids or Ben 10 when it wasn't absolute shit like the remake. Yeah I'm bitter. What’s your favourite cartoon now? Archer lol Do you read the news paper? Yeah pretty much every day...I swear I'm not an old man. Who was the last text you sent to? My friend Laura, asking if they'll still be at the park when I finish work. What does the last text you sent say? "Y'all still gonna be there when I get away?" If you could have any hair colour what would it be? Idk I like the one I have. Do you like nature documentaries? Not really my cup of tea to be perfectly honest. What is your aesthetic? Climbing a mountain at a 90° angle in Skyrim on a horse. When did you last pet a dog? ''Twas yesterday. Whose friend’s parents do you like the most? The twins'! They employ me! I literally get paid to hang out with friends some days that's the good shit! Have you ever been on a road trip? I've been on a couple, longest was a drive to Southern Spain from Scotland! Was awesome! Tell me about someone you know called Emma? Went to school with her, cool gal, she saw HP in London and I'm jealous, shoutout to @weewildelassAre you reading a book in english class, what is it? Oh god I'm old. I haven't had or attended an English class in over 2 years. Do you have a favourite Aunt? Well considering she also employs me...hell yeah, shoutout to my Aunt K you legend! Baths or showers? Baths for comfort and treating yo self, or sharing...😏...Showers for quickness and weird snapchats at 3am...😂 Skiing or sun bathing? Sun bathing my dude. Do you kill spiders? Sometimes, sometimes not. Have you ever made an ice pop? I have not. Are you wearing shoes right now? I'm not wearing anything rn. Tell me about you favourite primary school/elementary school teacher? Let me tell you about Mrs. Mary "The Bonecrusher" Highland, and how she was such an iconic, legendary, influential and inspiring woman that she was the person you sent into the bad fucked up schools in movies and have them all pass with straight A's, she ran a tough ship and was slow to praise but when she did, she went all out, and made you feel like what you had achieved was truly a feat. Oh and she encouraged children to learn and think for themselves, genuinely encouraged you when you said you were interested in something even when it went above and beyond the curriculum. She was charitable, friendly, and spoke to you like you were an equal, and a worthy one at that. Mrs. Highland was literally so influential in so many people in my class being successful, free minded, hard working adults that she deserves a goddamn award. And let me tell you another thing, at the end of my First Year in College, I went back to my old Primary School for a teaching assistant internship because I knew the school was becoming a bit run-down and out of control and I wanted to help the way that Mrs. Highland had, and who had they just asked to come out of retirement, come back for TWO WEEKS, sort shit out and then walk away into the sunset like some goddamn Old Lady Teaching Avenger who appears when needs were greatest? MARY FUCKING HIGHLAND, I GOT TO HELP ONE OF MY CHILDHOOD HEROES BE AN ABSOLUTE TEACHING LEGEND AND REALLY INFLUENCE SOME GOOD IN A KIDS LIFE, THAT IS THE SHIT! Seriously though, she truly is one of the good ones, they don't make em like Her anymore. Who was the last person you hugged? I think that would be my mother actually hahah. Do you wear glasses? Occasionally. Do you have a cat? I sadly do not. Do you have a favourite pair of underwear? Not a favourite pair exactly more like a favourite kind?? Next All-Black, that's the good shit, makes my ass look great among other things. What was your last tweet? "How the fuck do you work twitter" about 5 years ago and I haven't used it since. Do you still use Facebook? I do, rarely. Do you like birds? Aye pal birds, blokes, the lot. Who was the last person you called cute? That genuinely would be my niece, or you lol Who was the last person that called you cute? This is a strange answer but a regular in my work. Long story. How did you meet your best friend? I literally turned a corner and ran into a group of emo's in like Fourth Year at High School and I haven't looked back since. Escalators or elevators? Nah m8, trick question, I'd rather take the stairs. Does wonders for the thighs. Are you named after anyone, who? Ahaha yeah my dad, both my granddads, and Saint. Christoper (Catholic mum yo) What was your first url? I have no idea. Autumn or Winter? Winter I can't lie. Do you win at scrabble? I do not lol Put your ipod on shuffle , who is the first song that comes up by? "American Idiot", Green Day. Classic. Have you ever drunk from a mason jar? I have not. Can you draw? Barely even write m8 let alone draw. What was your first profile picture? I think it was Kenny from South Park. Favourite t-shirt? God I have no idea. Best tumblr friend? Shoutout to @bepizzazzed and @double-dorks-beanie and @hesitant-butthole When did you last run? Tonight when as a joke my friends took my jacket and tried to get it on top of a climbing frame? lol I had it back in seconds and decided to get some payback ahah Do you like to paint your nails? Not particularly fussed, not a look I could pull off. Did you ever do something as a kid that got you into loads of trouble? I did more things to get me into trouble as a kid that anyone should ever do. And I still did it. Who is your favourite dog that isn’t yours? Trick question, all of them. Have you ever been drunk? Literally so many times. So many. Have you ever done something you regret while drunk? Some-thing? Some-one? Getting into a slutty dance off with a professional dancer? Stealing a mannequin? The exact words "I can easily make this jump..."? The exact words "Watch this lads"? The exact words "Shots won't do me any harm"? The exact words "Another Venom? Aye no bother!" The exact words "You can crash at mine if you like...?" You get the picture...I do messed up shit I'm drunk, and yet, I continue to do so. Do you want to kiss anyone right now? Ronald McDonald ngl for the sweet sweet invention of double cheeseburgers. Do/did you like you math teacher? I had a crush on both of my maths teachers, Mr. Kelly and Mrs. Hendry, both of which contributed to me turning up to class, but also contributed to me failing said classes bc I was too busy looking at them and being a hormone ridden, horny 16 year old boy, than I was doing maths. Do you often ride the bus? I do, everyday I'm in College. Do you have a fireplace in your house? We do actually it's getting renovated right now. Are you violent when you’re angry? God no! Do you cry when you’re angry? No, I rarely get angry and when I do it can only be described as dry anger. Favourite Harry Potter book? It has to be OotP, fight me. Can you remember your last dream? I can, and let me just say, Chris Pratt, thank you. Do you go to bed early or late? "Do I go to bed?" would be a better question. Do you speak a second language? I speak various levels of different languages. Some if you dropped me in their respective countries I could find my way about, albeit difficultly, and others I can ask for the bar and the bill and that's about it. Who was your first ever best friend? A boy called Dean. Have you ever had an operation? I've had a couple yeah. Tell me about your favourite cousin? His name is Reece and he's a meme loving shit and I love him the whacky bastard. Do you have a piece of clothing that doesn’t even fit you anymore but you can’t bare to throw away? During what can only be described as the Greatest Summer of My Teenage Years; the Legendary Summer of 2014, I wore on my feet almost EVERY DAY a pair of Classic Chuck's, they cost my poor wee mum like £60 the Christmas before but they were too big and when it finally hit summer they fit perfectly. I wore them every time. If you've ever read the book Me Before You or watched the film you'll know what I mean when I say they were my bumblebee tights. Have you ever been in a musical? I played the Cowardly Lion in my school play as a kid. Do you have a porch? I do not. How many times have you watched your favourite movie? At least 100 no joke it has to be. Empire Strikes Back. What do you order at McDonalds? Plain double cheese , small fries, Oasis Summer Fruits and maybe a coffee. Do you get on with old people? Worryingly well. Science Fiction or Romance? Sci-Fi m8. Do you take naps? Anytime I can. How many classes do you/did you take in High School? In my final year I took 3 classes. At its height I think I was doing 9 classes. When did it last snow where you live? A few months back. Does it ever snow where you live? It's Scotland...hahah it very much does. How many months until your birthday? 12 m8. How much charge does your computer have right now? 42%What is your favourite Disney Channel Original Movie? I don't actually think I had one. Sorry. the City or the Sea Side? Jokes on you fool, you can have both. What is your least favourite colour? Beige. Who tf likes being beige. Do you have homework to do? Nah. Are you still friends with your first best friend? I am not. Do you have/are you the gay cousin? I have an asexual cousin, bug more often than not I'm the gay cousin. Do you own dungarees? They can look cute on peeps. Do you like to play sport? I do, not to the extent I used to but yeah. What was your favourite ever Christmas present? My baby nephew. How old are you? Ugh I'm 20. Do you ever use Internet Explorer? Not for s long time. Have you ever had blonde hair? I haven't no. I wanted to but sadly I was a kid. When did you last see the person you have a crush on? Well considering I fall deeply in love with strangers who are nice to me on the train, that question is crazy. Who did you last talk to on the phone? Laura. Pants or Dresses? This question is a lot funnier in the UK and even funnier in Scotland where a man can wear one, but to do so, he's not supposed to wear the other 😉 Do you read fan fiction? Not anymore y'know. What is you’re favourite blog? @mauridianhallow is a pretty cool blog you should check that shit out Do you write poetry? I HAVE written poetry before. Drama or Comedy? How dare you insult The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt by suggesting you can't be both. Have you ever had a hickey? Perhaps...perhaps I have. Perhaps I cannot remember how I got some of them. Perhaps I should stop buying the ENTIRE bar a round of shots knowing all too well that almost every one of these people will offer to buy me drinks all night and then I won't pay shit for another drink until the night is over. Perhaps I should...I won't but I fucking should. And perhaps this has on certain occasions resulted in hickeys I don't know.

[ethelbertpaul444-blog]

25 Health “Facts” That Are Totally Wrong

There are some health “facts” that many people have heard so many times that they just assume they are true, theories like “juice is healthy” or “gum will stay in your belly for years . strong>

But many of these “facts” are actually myths about health . strong>

Here’s what the social sciences genuinely adds about these health illusions . strong>

There’s something about state and nutrition folk wisdom that’s resistant to truth.

Common health “facts” include the ideas that MSG will determine you sick, that a juice detox is just what you need after a week of gratification, and that sports alcohols like Gatorade are absolutely penalize since you need the electrolytes.

None of these things are true. They, like many other kinfolk sayings and tips-off, fall into the category of health illusions that are totally — or at least chiefly — inaccurate.

Here’s the truth behind some of those health claims you’ve discovered all your life, but might not hold water at all.

MSG in Chinese food will impel you sick . strong>

Will Wei, Business Insider

The myth that MSG is bad for you comes from a character a doctor wrote to the New England Journal of Medicine in 1968, where he coined the call “Chinese restaurant syndrome” to describe a variety of manifestations including numbness and general weakness.

But though medical doctors accused these tenderness on monosodium glutamate, MSG, studies and research doesn’t back it up. The technical consensus according the American Chemical Society is that “MSG can temporarily alter a hand-picked few when downed in huge quantities on an empty stomach, but it’s perfectly safe for the great majority of beings . strong> “

And this procreates appreciation — MSG is nothing more than a common amino battery-acid with a sodium atom included. The placebo impact is more than strong enough to account for the negative effects sometimes associated with MSG.

Coffee stunts your swelling . strong>

There isn’t a whole lot of prove on this, but most research determines no equivalence between caffeine consumption and bone increment in minors.

In adults, researchers have seen that increased caffeine consumption can very slightly limit calcium absorption, but potential impacts is so small that a tablespoon of milk will more than adequately offset the consequences of a goblet of chocolate.

Interestingly, advertising seems to be chiefly responsible for this myth. A breakfast cereal manufacturer referred C.W. Post was trying to market a morning liquid called “Postum” as an alternative to chocolate, so he ran ads on the “evils” of Americans’ favorite hot liquid, announcing it a “nerve poison” that should never be served to children.

Bundle up or you’ll catch a freezing . strong>

Being physically cold isn’t what comes you sick; revelation to a cold virus does. There’s no proof that going outside with wet hair when it’s freezing will oblige you sick by itself — stipulated you bypass hypothermia.

But there are some scientifically sound explanations for why people catch more freezings in winter. Because we deplete more time in close quarters indoors, it is more likely that we’ll cross routes with a cold-causing virus spread from another person during the winter. And for various rationalizations, we may have a harder duration pushing off freezing and flu virus specks in winter.

But being freezing itself isn’t what induces sick, and some argue that cold exposure can actually improve your health.

The compound tryptophan in goose obligates you sleepy . strong>

Another Pint Please …/ Flickr

Who doesn’t adoration the post-Thanksgiving nap? We regularly consider those naps inescapable, since goose contains tryptophan, an amino acid that is a component of some of the intelligence compounds that help you relax.

But plenty of foods contain tryptophan. Cheddar cheese has even more than turkey — and cheddar is never pointed out as a sleep inducing meat. Experts say that instead, the carbs, alcohol, and general size of the Turkey-day feast is the reason for those delicious anniversary siestas.

Taking your vitamins will maintain you healthy . strong>

Vitamins definitely sounds like a great impression. One lozenge that can provide you everything “youve got to be” health!

If exclusively they toiled. After decades of research on vitamins, most reviews don’t find any reasons for our multivitamin wont, and in some cases, vitamins are really been associated with an increased risk of various types of cancers. Malnourished beings might benefit from some complements, but most of us should just get our vitamins naturally from food.

Beer before liquid, never sicker; liquor before brew, you’re in the clear . strong>

We’re all heard it: “beer before liquid, never sicker; liquor before brew, you’re in the clear.”

But while it’s very true that overdoing it with booze might leave you praying to the porcelain gods, there’s no need to lieu the accuse under the orders you deplete the refreshments in — booze is alcohol, and too much of it will make anyone feel sick.

However, there are some strange highways this section of suggestion can make sense. Beings who swap from beer to mixed drinks( with abilities and judgment once gloomy) may be less likely likely to monitor their booze uptake and thus suck more.

And some research registers that your mas metabolizes mixed drinks faster than higher-concentration alcohol( a shot of whiskey, reply ). So computing liquid to a stomach-full of beer could, in theory, create a kind of mixed drink that they are able to metabolize faster than one or the other on its own.

We’ll call this one partly true, but chalk up the “never sicker” segment mostly to bad decision making.

You lose 90% of your body heat through your brain . strong>

Flickr/ hounombrellonelculo

Not consequently. You lose body heat through anything uncovered, according to Dr. Aaron E. Carroll and Dr. Rachel C. Vreeman, writers of “Don’t Swallow Your Gum !: Myths, Half-Truths, and Outright Lies About Your Mas and Health.”

Your head is not special in that behavior — it’s merely more likely to be exposed.

“Most of the time when we’re outside in the coldnes, we’re robed, ” Richard Ingebretsen, MD, PhD, told WebMD Magazine. “If you don’t have a hat on, you lose heat through your head, just as you would lose heat through your legs if you were wearing shorts.”

Wait an hour after snacking to dive or you’ll drown . strong>

Some parents say no swimming for 30 hours after eating, some speak an hour, but many of u.s. may remember waiting out the clock before returning to the consortium or sea. The belief behind this seems to be that accepting food will draw blood to your tummy, meaning that less blood is available for your muscles, constituting them most likely to cramp.

But there’s no attest to support this claim. In actuality, many sources say there are no documented cases of anyone ever drowning because they’ve had a cramp related to swimming with a full stomach.

Cramps do happen often when swimming, but they aren’t can be attributed to what’s in your tummy. If you do get one, best available policy is to hover for a minute and give it pass.

It makes 7 years for gum to grasp if you swallow it . strong>

When it came out that Trump press secretary Sean Spicer chewings and withdraws two and a half packs of chewing gum by midday every day, many people had the same interrogate: Couldn’t that maybe do some distres?

Probably not. Gum is mostly indigestible, meaning that it frequently surpasses through your bowels and outlets the other side, like the majority of what your mas doesn’t necessary and can’t digest.

“On uncommon moments, large quantities of swallowed gum combined with constipation have blocked intestines in brats, ” Dr. Michael Picco of the Mayo Clinic writes. Still, he announces swallowing gums generally isn’t harmful.

When you’re liquor on gin, you get aim . strong>

There are plenty of alcohol-related superstitions out there, and the idea that different alcohols have differing impacts on you is a big one. Some people claim wine procreates them sleepy while whiskey attains them want to argue.

In short, experts say this is bunk. “Alcohol is alcohol whichever way you slice it, ” pharmacologist Paul Clayton, a colleague of Oxford’s Institute of Food, Brain& Behaviour, told The Guardian.

So why do parties insist that tequila constructs them crazy?

One very strong possibility is that we experience the effects we expect when we booze( or deplete most substances ). Scientific experiment going back to the 1960 s demonstrate that we “learn” how to behave while drunkard, and that our actual drunken action is a direct reflection of our hopes.

Although many beings may become violent while intoxicated, people who have never associated drunkenness with conflict don’t support the same demeanor. So by that same sign, if we expect that vodka will impel us want to sing karaoke, we can perhaps curve that into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A juice cleanse will ‘detox’ you after an unhealthy eating orgy . strong>

The myth of the juice cleanse is a stubborn one — and one frequently promoted by fames — but it’s both bad and harmful.

First of all, your body naturally removes injurious chemicals through the liver, kidneys, and gastrointestinal parcel — there’s anything about juice that will hasten that process along.

Secondly, juicing is mainly a route of removing supportive fiber from fruits and vegetables — countless sugary fruit juices are as bad for you as sodas. You’re preparing the outcome little health by “juicing” it.

Everyone should booze eight glasses of water per day . strong>

Hydration are key, but the idea that eight glasses of spray is crucial is a strange one.

In healthful people, researchers haven’t felt a connection between flowing intake and kidney canker, cardiac infarction, sodium levels, or skin quality.

People get a lot of their sea from menus and other beverages in the first place, but there is a good reason to booze more sea. It’s a calorie free alternative to other beverages( especially sugary ones ), and people who drink water instead of those beverages consume fewer calories overall.

But in general, booze when “you think youre” thirsty — you don’t is a requirement to count the glasses.

It’s fine to eat something if it’s been on the flooring for less than five seconds . strong>

Flickr

It’s the worst when something you really wanted to eat falls on the flooring. But if you grab it in five seconds, is it okay?

Sorry, but the five-second-rule isn’t a real thing. Bacteria can infect a nutrient within milliseconds. Moist nutrients attract more bacteria than cool meat, but there’s no “safe duration.” Instead, refuge depends on how clean the surface you plummeted the menu on is.

Whether you eat it or not after that is up to you, but if the people that amble on that storey are also walking around New York City, for example, we wouldn’t recommend it.

Vaccines can be risky . strong>

This idea comes from a now thoroughly-debunked( and retracted) learn of 12 brats that appeared in 1998 in The Lancet and claimed there was a link between the MMR vaccine and autism.

It turned out that investigate wasn’t exclusively flawed, the committee is also contained false information that was necessary to make its point.

Since then, several subjects that have analyzed data regarding more than a million children have shown that there’s no connection between inoculations and autism.

But panics about that connection have persisted, partially stimulated on by public figure inducing spurious pretensions about inoculations. This contribute to shocking infections like measles coming back here.

Yogurt will help put your digestive plan back in order . strong>

This is one of our modern health beliefs. Yogurt is frequently marketed as having benefits for digestion and as something that’ll keep parties skinny because of probiotics, or the “good bacteria” that’s living inside it.

Researchers have found that the bacteria in our figures are exceedingly connected to our metabolism and obesity frequencies, among other things, so it seems like there’s a logical tie here.

But we don’t more understand how the trillions of bacteria in our figures work well enough to influence them in this way. Despite the facts of the case that the probiotic business was value $23.1 billion in 2012, we can’t clear yogurt that will amend our internal bacterial balance.

That’s not to say that yogurt is harmful, just that its benefits are oversold. Plus, a lot of yogurt is parcelled with sugar, which we do know contributing to obesity and other questions — so if you experience yogurt, find a version that isn’t full of added wasteful calories or it might have the opposite of the intended effect.

An apple a date keeps the doctor apart . strong>

Apples are good for you, bundled with vitamin C and fiber, both of which are important to long-term health, but they aren’t all you need.

And if specific viruses or bacteria get into your plan, an apple will regrettably do nothing to protect you. So plow ahead and get that influenza shot, even if you dine apples.

Eating ice cream will build your cold worse . strong>

roboppy/ Flickr

If you’re home sick with a cold, you can totally go ahead and solace yourself with some ice cream.

The idea that dairy increases mucus yield is very fortunately absolutely no truth to the rumors, according to investigates and a medical doctor at the Mayo Clinic, who tells “in fact, frozen dairy commodities can allay a absces throat and require calories when you otherwise may not eat.”

Praise be.

Cracking your knuckles will give you arthritis . strong>

Fortunately, this isn’t genuine either.

Cracking your knuckles may irk the people around you, but even people who have done it often for many years aren’t any more likely to develop arthritis than those who don’t.

Starve a delirium, feed a cold . strong>

There’s a good reason you may have heard this said various paths, either “starve a cold, feed a fever” or “starve a delirium, feed a cold.”

Despite a slew of headlines claiming that starving a delirium wasn’t a story in response to a tiny and chiefly misjudged consider in 2002, there’s no real prove to back this up. Restraint your caloric intake may actually hurt your immune organization more than facilitating it, and it would certainly be a bad theory to not feed during the course of its 6-8 daytime duration of a cold.

Instead, physicians say to go ahead and devour if you are able. The more precise idiom, as Scientific American notes, would be “feed a cold, feed a fever.” And make sure to get batch of fluids.

It’s penalize to imbibe athletics sips to rehydrate . strong>

We all know that soda and similarly sugary sips like lemonade are poor for us( right ?), but what about athletics sucks like Gatorade or Powerade? Sports-focused promote has successfully convinced a whole lot of beings that downing a bottle of this trash is fine, extremely if you’ve started for a trot recently — it’s replacing electrolytes, after all.

But actually, for most people the amount of sugar in these imbibes is far more than is needed — even if you’ve been activity. Lower calorie options, which many of the same firms have created in recent years, are much better options. Or just drink water.

Drinking liquid can assist you avoid a sunburn . strong>

New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady desires hydration and has said that clean drinking water facilitates him shun getting a sunburn.

There’s nothing wrong with hydration. But there’s no ground whatsoever that being hydrated can prevent you from getting burned by ultraviolet radiation in any way. Only sunscreen or attire will do that. Vanish onward and drink enough irrigate to quench your yearning. But if you’re going to get out in the sunbathe for a while, don’t forget to cover up.

Coffee and beer dehydrate you, since caffeine and alcohol are diuretics . strong>

In ample quantities, caffeine and booze can have a diuretic gist. But the quantity of caffeine in a normal goblet of chocolate or booze in a brew isn’t enough to really have this gist, according to one recent study. A moderate extent of either coffee or brew hydrates beings just about as well as spray does.

Milk does a figure good( and safeguards your bones )! strong>

Guy Montag/ Flickr

This is an improbably successful fleck of publicizing that has wormed its nature into our mentalities and policies — the US Department of Agriculture tells us that adults should suck three beakers of milk a day, primarily for calcium and vitamin D.

However, multiple analyses show that there isn’t an association between imbibing more milk( or taking calcium and vitamin D complements) and having fewer faultings.

Milk is fine, but it’s not a mystical health suck. Amazingly, however, milk is specially hydrating — similar to pedialyte, both even more hydrating than water.

You shouldn’t eat too many eggs , since it’ll collect your cholesterol . strong>

Eggs have lots of cholesterol in them. For the majority of members of us, that’s not an issue, since a growing figure of research pictures that dietary cholesterol( from meat you gobble) doesn’t certainly have much of an effect on blood cholesterol in the vast majority of people.

Thank goodness.

Eating fat will make you fatty . strong>

The tide has started to swaying back the other lane on this one, but recommendations regarding low-fat meat remain common.

The decision to demonize fatty for its caloric concentration and heart-clogging consequences was mainly the result of crooked discipline influenced by a carbohydrate transaction group. It turns out that the society-wide decision to cut saturated fatty from nutritions led to increased intake of sugar and handled trans obesities, all of which were most likely little healthy overall.

We necessary a moderate amount of overweight — specially health solid — in our nutritions.

Read the original clause on Busines Insiderer. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Copyright 2018.

Read next on Business Insider: 10 delicious and healthy dairy-free milk alternatives to try — whether or not you’re lactose intolerant

Read more: http :// www.iflscience.com/ health-and-medicine/ 25 -health-facts-that-are-totally-wrong /

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25 Health “Facts” That Are Totally Wrong

There are some health “facts” that many people have heard so many times that they just assume they are true, ideas like “juice is healthy” or “gum will stay in your stomach for years.

But many of these “facts” are really myths about health.

Here’s what the science really says about these health myths.

There’s something about health and nutrition folk wisdom that’s resistant to truth.

Common health “facts” include the ideas that MSG will make you sick, that a juice detox is just what you need after a week of indulgence, and that sports drinks like Gatorade are totally fine since you need the electrolytes.

None of these things are true. They, like many other folk sayings and tips, fall into the category of health myths that are totally — or at least mostly — wrong. 

Here’s the truth behind some of those health claims you’ve heard all your life, but might not hold water at all.

MSG in Chinese food will make you sick.

Will Wei, Business Insider

The myth that MSG is bad for you comes from a letter a doctor wrote to the New England Journal of Medicine in 1968, where he coined the term “Chinese restaurant syndrome” to describe a variety of symptoms including numbness and general weakness.

But though the doctor blamed these feelings on monosodium glutamate, MSG, the research doesn’t back it up. The scientific consensus according the American Chemical Society is that “MSG can temporarily affect a select few when consumed in huge quantities on an empty stomach, but it’s perfectly safe for the vast majority of people.“

And this makes sense — MSG is nothing more than a common amino acid with a sodium atom added. The placebo effect is more than strong enough to account for the negative effects sometimes associated with MSG.

Coffee stunts your growth.

There isn’t a whole lot of evidence on this, but most research finds no correlation between caffeine consumption and bone growth in kids. 

In adults, researchers have seen that increased caffeine consumption can very slightly limit calcium absorption, but the impact is so small that a tablespoon of milk will more than adequately offset the effects of a cup of coffee. 

Interestingly, advertising seems to be largely responsible for this myth. A breakfast cereal manufacturer named C.W. Post was trying to market a morning beverage called “Postum” as an alternative to coffee, so he ran ads on the “evils” of Americans’ favorite hot beverage, calling it a “nerve poison” that should never be served to children.

Bundle up or you’ll catch a cold.

Being physically cold isn’t what gets you sick; exposure to a cold virus does. There’s no evidence that going outside with wet hair when it’s freezing will make you sick by itself — provided you avoid hypothermia.

But there are some scientifically sound explanations for why people catch more colds in winter. Because we spend more time in close quarters indoors, it is more likely that we’ll cross paths with a cold-causing virus spread from another person during the winter. And for several reasons, we may have a harder time fighting off cold and flu virus particles in winter.

But being cold itself isn’t what makes sick, and some argue that cold exposure can actually improve your health.

The chemical tryptophan in turkey makes you sleepy.

Another Pint Please…/Flickr

Who doesn’t love the post-Thanksgiving nap? We frequently consider those naps inevitable, since turkey contains tryptophan, an amino acid that is a component of some of the brain chemicals that help you relax.

But plenty of foods contain tryptophan. Cheddar cheese has even more than turkey — and cheddar is never pointed out as a sleep inducing food. Experts say that instead, the carbs, alcohol, and general size of the Turkey-day feast are the cause of those delicious holiday siestas. 

Taking your vitamins will keep you healthy.

Vitamins sound like a great idea. One pill that can provide you everything you need to be healthy!

If only they worked. After decades of research on vitamins, most reviews don’t find any justification for our multivitamin habit, and in some cases, vitamins have actually been associated with an increased risk of various cancers. Malnourished people might benefit from some supplements, but most of us should just get our vitamins naturally from food.

Beer before liquor, never sicker; liquor before beer, you’re in the clear.

We’re all heard it: “beer before liquor, never sicker; liquor before beer, you’re in the clear.”

But while it’s very true that overdoing it with booze might leave you praying to the porcelain gods, there’s no need to place the blame on the order you consume the beverages in — alcohol is alcohol, and too much of it will make anyone feel sick.

However, there are some strange ways this piece of advice can make sense. People who switch from beer to mixed drinks (with senses and judgment already dulled) may be less likely likely to monitor their alcohol consumption and thus drink more.

And some research shows that your body metabolizes mixed drinks faster than higher-concentration alcohol (a shot of whiskey, say). So adding liquor to a stomach-full of beer could, in theory, create a sort of mixed drink that would metabolize faster than one or the other on its own.

We’ll call this one partly true, but chalk up the “never sicker” part mostly to bad decision making.

You lose 90% of your body heat through your head.

Flickr/hounombrellonelculo

Not necessarily. You lose body heat through anything uncovered, according to Dr. Aaron E. Carroll and Dr. Rachel C. Vreeman, authors of “Don’t Swallow Your Gum!: Myths, Half-Truths, and Outright Lies About Your Body and Health.”

Your head is not special in that way — it’s just more likely to be exposed.

“Most of the time when we’re outside in the cold, we’re clothed,” Richard Ingebretsen, MD, PhD, told WebMD Magazine. “If you don’t have a hat on, you lose heat through your head, just as you would lose heat through your legs if you were wearing shorts.”

Wait an hour after eating to swim or you’ll drown.

Some parents say no swimming for 30 minutes after eating, some say an hour, but many of us may remember waiting out the clock before returning to the pool or beach. The theory behind this seems to be that digesting food will draw blood to your stomach, meaning that less blood is available for your muscles, making them more likely to cramp.

But there’s no evidence to support this claim. In fact, many sources say there are no documented cases of anyone ever drowning because they’ve had a cramp related to swimming with a full stomach.

Cramps do happen frequently when swimming, but they aren’t caused by what’s in your stomach. If you do get one, the best policy is to float for a minute and let it pass.

It takes 7 years for gum to digest if you swallow it.

When it got out that Trump press secretary Sean Spicer chews and swallows two and a half packs of chewing gum by noon every day, many people had the same question: Couldn’t that maybe do some harm?

Probably not. Gum is mostly indigestible, meaning that it usually passes through your intestines and exits the other side, like most of what your body doesn’t need and can’t digest.

“On rare occasions, large amounts of swallowed gum combined with constipation have blocked intestines in children,” Dr. Michael Picco of the Mayo Clinic writes. Still, he says swallowing gum generally isn’t harmful.

When you’re drunk on gin, you get mean.

There are plenty of alcohol-related myths out there, and the idea that different alcohols have different effects on you is a big one. Some people claim wine makes them sleepy while whiskey makes them want to argue.

In short, experts say this is bunk. “Alcohol is alcohol whichever way you slice it,” pharmacologist Paul Clayton, a fellow of Oxford’s Institute of Food, Brain & Behaviour, told The Guardian.

So why do people insist that tequila makes them crazy?

One very strong possibility is that we experience the effects we expect when we drink (or consume most substances). Scientific research going back to the 1960s shows that we “learn” how to behave while drunk, and that our actual drunken behavior is a direct reflection of our expectations.

Although many people may become violent while intoxicated, people who have never associated drunkenness with conflict don’t show the same behavior. So by that same token, if we expect that vodka will make us want to sing karaoke, we can perhaps turn that into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A juice cleanse will ‘detox’ you after an unhealthy eating binge.

The myth of the juice cleanse is a stubborn one — and one frequently promoted by celebrities — but it’s both wrong and unhealthy.

First of all, your body naturally removes harmful chemicals through the liver, kidneys, and gastrointestinal tract — there’s nothing about juice that will hurry that process along.

Secondly, juicing is mostly a way of removing helpful fiber from fruits and vegetables — many sugary fruit juices are as bad for you as sodas. You’re making the fruit less healthy by “juicing” it.

Everyone should drink eight glasses of water a day.

Hydration is very important, but the idea that eight glasses of water is essential is a strange one. 

In healthy people, researchers haven’t found a connection between fluid intake and kidney disease, heart disease, sodium levels, or skin quality.

People get a lot of their water from foods and other beverages in the first place, but there is a good reason to drink more water. It’s a calorie free alternative to other beverages (especially sugary ones), and people who drink water instead of those beverages consume fewer calories overall.

But in general, drink when you are thirsty — you don’t need to count the glasses.

It’s fine to eat something if it’s been on the floor for less than 5 seconds.

Flickr

It’s the worst when something you really wanted to eat falls on the floor. But if you grab it in five seconds, is it okay?

Sorry, but the five-second-rule isn’t a real thing. Bacteria can contaminate a food within milliseconds. Moist foods attract more bacteria than dry foods, but there’s no “safe duration.” Instead, safety depends on how clean the surface you dropped the food on is.

Whether you eat it or not after that is up to you, but if the people that walk on that floor are also walking around New York City, for example, we wouldn’t recommend it.

Vaccines can be risky.

This idea comes from a now thoroughly-debunked (and retracted) study of 12 children that appeared in 1998 in The Lancet and claimed there was a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. 

It turned out that study wasn’t only flawed, it also contained false information that was necessary to make its point.

Since then, numerous studies that have analyzed data from more than a million children have shown that there’s no connection between vaccines and autism.

But fears about that connection have persisted, partially spurred on by public figures making false claims about vaccines. This has led to scary diseases like measles coming back.

Yogurt will help put your digestive system back in order.

This is one of our modern health myths. Yogurt is frequently marketed as having benefits for digestion and as something that’ll keep people slim because of probiotics, or the “good bacteria” that’s living inside it.

Researchers have found that the bacteria in our bodies are very connected to our metabolism and obesity rates, among other things, so it seems like there’s a logical connection here.

But we don’t yet understand how the trillions of bacteria in our bodies work well enough to manipulate them in this way. Despite the fact that the probiotic business was worth $23.1 billion in 2012, we can’t make yogurt that will repair our inner bacterial balance.

That’s not to say that yogurt is unhealthy, just that its benefits are oversold. Plus, a lot of yogurt is packed with sugar, which we do know contributes to obesity and other problems — so if you enjoy yogurt, find a version that isn’t full of additional unnecessary calories or it might have the opposite of the intended effect.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away.

Apples are good for you, packed with vitamin C and fiber, both of which are important to long-term health, but they aren’t all you need.

And if certain viruses or bacteria get into your system, an apple will unfortunately do nothing to protect you. So go ahead and get that flu shot, even if you eat apples.

Eating ice cream will make your cold worse.

roboppy/Flickr

If you’re home sick with a cold, you can totally go ahead and comfort yourself with some ice cream.

The idea that dairy increases mucus production is very fortunately not true, according to researchers and a doctor at the Mayo Clinic, who says “in fact, frozen dairy products can soothe a sore throat and provide calories when you otherwise may not eat.”

Praise be.

Cracking your knuckles will give you arthritis.

Fortunately, this isn’t true either.

Cracking your knuckles may annoy the people around you, but even people who have done it frequently for many years aren’t any more likely to develop arthritis than those who don’t.

Starve a fever, feed a cold.

There’s a good reason you may have heard this said multiple ways, either “starve a cold, feed a fever” or “starve a fever, feed a cold.”

Despite a slew of headlines claiming that starving a fever wasn’t a myth in response to a tiny and largely misinterpreted study in 2002, there’s no real evidence to back this up. Limiting your caloric consumption may actually hurt your immune system more than helping it, and it would certainly be a bad idea to not eat during the 6-8 day duration of a cold.

Instead, doctors say to go ahead and eat if you can. The more accurate expression, as Scientific American notes, would be “feed a cold, feed a fever.” And make sure to get plenty of fluids.

It’s fine to drink sports drinks to rehydrate.

We all know that soda and similarly sugary drinks like lemonade are bad for us (right?), but what about sports drinks like Gatorade or Powerade? Sports-focused advertising has successfully convinced a whole lot of people that downing a bottle of this stuff is fine, especially if you’ve gone for a jog recently — it’s replacing electrolytes, after all.

But really, for most people the amount of sugar in these drinks is far more than is needed — even if you’ve been exercising. Lower calorie options, which many of the same companies have created in recent years, are much better options. Or just drink water. 

Drinking water can help you avoid a sunburn.

New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady loves hydration and has said that drinking water helps him avoid getting a sunburn.

There’s nothing wrong with hydration. But there’s no evidence whatsoever that being hydrated can prevent you from getting burned by ultraviolet radiation in any way. Only sunscreen or clothing will do that. Go ahead and drink enough water to quench your thirst. But if you’re going to be out in the sun for a while, don’t forget to cover up.

Coffee and beer dehydrate you, since caffeine and alcohol are diuretics.

In sufficient quantities, caffeine and alcohol can have a diuretic effect. But the amount of caffeine in a typical cup of coffee or alcohol in a beer isn’t enough to really have this effect, according to one recent study. A moderate amount of either coffee or beer hydrates people just about as well as water does. 

Milk does a body good (and protects your bones)!

Guy Montag/Flickr

This is an incredibly successful bit of advertising that has wormed its way into our brains and policies — the US Department of Agriculture tells us that adults should drink three cups of milk a day, mostly for calcium and vitamin D.

However, multiple studies show that there isn’t an association between drinking more milk (or taking calcium and vitamin D supplements) and having fewer fractures. 

Milk is fine, but it’s not a magical health drink. Surprisingly, however, milk is particularly hydrating — similar to pedialyte, both even more hydrating than water.

You shouldn’t eat too many eggs, since it’ll raise your cholesterol.

Eggs have lots of cholesterol in them. For most of us, that’s not an issue, since a growing body of research shows that dietary cholesterol (from foods you eat) doesn’t really have much of an effect on blood cholesterol in the vast majority of people.

Thank goodness.

Eating fat will make you fat.

The tide has started to swing back the other way on this one, but recommendations for low-fat foods remain common. 

The decision to demonize fat for its caloric density and heart-clogging effects was largely the result of shady science influenced by a sugar trade group. It turns out that the society-wide decision to cut saturated fat from diets led to increased consumption of sugar and processed trans fats, all of which were most likely less healthy overall.

We need a moderate amount of fat — especially healthy fat — in our diets. 

Read the original article on Busines Insiderer. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Copyright 2018.

Read next on Business Insider: 10 delicious and healthy dairy-free milk alternatives to try — whether or not you’re lactose intolerant

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/25-health-facts-that-are-totally-wrong/ from All of Beer https://allofbeercom.tumblr.com/post/173437695877

[allofbeercom]

25 Health “Facts” That Are Totally Wrong

There are some health “facts” that many people have heard so many times that they just assume they are true, ideas like “juice is healthy” or “gum will stay in your stomach for years.

But many of these “facts” are really myths about health.

Here’s what the science really says about these health myths.

There’s something about health and nutrition folk wisdom that’s resistant to truth.

Common health “facts” include the ideas that MSG will make you sick, that a juice detox is just what you need after a week of indulgence, and that sports drinks like Gatorade are totally fine since you need the electrolytes.

None of these things are true. They, like many other folk sayings and tips, fall into the category of health myths that are totally — or at least mostly — wrong. 

Here’s the truth behind some of those health claims you’ve heard all your life, but might not hold water at all.

MSG in Chinese food will make you sick.

Will Wei, Business Insider

The myth that MSG is bad for you comes from a letter a doctor wrote to the New England Journal of Medicine in 1968, where he coined the term “Chinese restaurant syndrome” to describe a variety of symptoms including numbness and general weakness.

But though the doctor blamed these feelings on monosodium glutamate, MSG, the research doesn’t back it up. The scientific consensus according the American Chemical Society is that “MSG can temporarily affect a select few when consumed in huge quantities on an empty stomach, but it’s perfectly safe for the vast majority of people.“

And this makes sense — MSG is nothing more than a common amino acid with a sodium atom added. The placebo effect is more than strong enough to account for the negative effects sometimes associated with MSG.

Coffee stunts your growth.

There isn’t a whole lot of evidence on this, but most research finds no correlation between caffeine consumption and bone growth in kids. 

In adults, researchers have seen that increased caffeine consumption can very slightly limit calcium absorption, but the impact is so small that a tablespoon of milk will more than adequately offset the effects of a cup of coffee. 

Interestingly, advertising seems to be largely responsible for this myth. A breakfast cereal manufacturer named C.W. Post was trying to market a morning beverage called “Postum” as an alternative to coffee, so he ran ads on the “evils” of Americans’ favorite hot beverage, calling it a “nerve poison” that should never be served to children.

Bundle up or you’ll catch a cold.

Being physically cold isn’t what gets you sick; exposure to a cold virus does. There’s no evidence that going outside with wet hair when it’s freezing will make you sick by itself — provided you avoid hypothermia.

But there are some scientifically sound explanations for why people catch more colds in winter. Because we spend more time in close quarters indoors, it is more likely that we’ll cross paths with a cold-causing virus spread from another person during the winter. And for several reasons, we may have a harder time fighting off cold and flu virus particles in winter.

But being cold itself isn’t what makes sick, and some argue that cold exposure can actually improve your health.

The chemical tryptophan in turkey makes you sleepy.

Another Pint Please…/Flickr

Who doesn’t love the post-Thanksgiving nap? We frequently consider those naps inevitable, since turkey contains tryptophan, an amino acid that is a component of some of the brain chemicals that help you relax.

But plenty of foods contain tryptophan. Cheddar cheese has even more than turkey — and cheddar is never pointed out as a sleep inducing food. Experts say that instead, the carbs, alcohol, and general size of the Turkey-day feast are the cause of those delicious holiday siestas. 

Taking your vitamins will keep you healthy.

Vitamins sound like a great idea. One pill that can provide you everything you need to be healthy!

If only they worked. After decades of research on vitamins, most reviews don’t find any justification for our multivitamin habit, and in some cases, vitamins have actually been associated with an increased risk of various cancers. Malnourished people might benefit from some supplements, but most of us should just get our vitamins naturally from food.

Beer before liquor, never sicker; liquor before beer, you’re in the clear.

We’re all heard it: “beer before liquor, never sicker; liquor before beer, you’re in the clear.”

But while it’s very true that overdoing it with booze might leave you praying to the porcelain gods, there’s no need to place the blame on the order you consume the beverages in — alcohol is alcohol, and too much of it will make anyone feel sick.

However, there are some strange ways this piece of advice can make sense. People who switch from beer to mixed drinks (with senses and judgment already dulled) may be less likely likely to monitor their alcohol consumption and thus drink more.

And some research shows that your body metabolizes mixed drinks faster than higher-concentration alcohol (a shot of whiskey, say). So adding liquor to a stomach-full of beer could, in theory, create a sort of mixed drink that would metabolize faster than one or the other on its own.

We’ll call this one partly true, but chalk up the “never sicker” part mostly to bad decision making.

You lose 90% of your body heat through your head.

Flickr/hounombrellonelculo

Not necessarily. You lose body heat through anything uncovered, according to Dr. Aaron E. Carroll and Dr. Rachel C. Vreeman, authors of “Don’t Swallow Your Gum!: Myths, Half-Truths, and Outright Lies About Your Body and Health.”

Your head is not special in that way — it’s just more likely to be exposed.

“Most of the time when we’re outside in the cold, we’re clothed,” Richard Ingebretsen, MD, PhD, told WebMD Magazine. “If you don’t have a hat on, you lose heat through your head, just as you would lose heat through your legs if you were wearing shorts.”

Wait an hour after eating to swim or you’ll drown.

Some parents say no swimming for 30 minutes after eating, some say an hour, but many of us may remember waiting out the clock before returning to the pool or beach. The theory behind this seems to be that digesting food will draw blood to your stomach, meaning that less blood is available for your muscles, making them more likely to cramp.

But there’s no evidence to support this claim. In fact, many sources say there are no documented cases of anyone ever drowning because they’ve had a cramp related to swimming with a full stomach.

Cramps do happen frequently when swimming, but they aren’t caused by what’s in your stomach. If you do get one, the best policy is to float for a minute and let it pass.

It takes 7 years for gum to digest if you swallow it.

When it got out that Trump press secretary Sean Spicer chews and swallows two and a half packs of chewing gum by noon every day, many people had the same question: Couldn’t that maybe do some harm?

Probably not. Gum is mostly indigestible, meaning that it usually passes through your intestines and exits the other side, like most of what your body doesn’t need and can’t digest.

“On rare occasions, large amounts of swallowed gum combined with constipation have blocked intestines in children,” Dr. Michael Picco of the Mayo Clinic writes. Still, he says swallowing gum generally isn’t harmful.

When you’re drunk on gin, you get mean.

There are plenty of alcohol-related myths out there, and the idea that different alcohols have different effects on you is a big one. Some people claim wine makes them sleepy while whiskey makes them want to argue.

In short, experts say this is bunk. “Alcohol is alcohol whichever way you slice it,” pharmacologist Paul Clayton, a fellow of Oxford’s Institute of Food, Brain & Behaviour, told The Guardian.

So why do people insist that tequila makes them crazy?

One very strong possibility is that we experience the effects we expect when we drink (or consume most substances). Scientific research going back to the 1960s shows that we “learn” how to behave while drunk, and that our actual drunken behavior is a direct reflection of our expectations.

Although many people may become violent while intoxicated, people who have never associated drunkenness with conflict don’t show the same behavior. So by that same token, if we expect that vodka will make us want to sing karaoke, we can perhaps turn that into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A juice cleanse will ‘detox’ you after an unhealthy eating binge.

The myth of the juice cleanse is a stubborn one — and one frequently promoted by celebrities — but it’s both wrong and unhealthy.

First of all, your body naturally removes harmful chemicals through the liver, kidneys, and gastrointestinal tract — there’s nothing about juice that will hurry that process along.

Secondly, juicing is mostly a way of removing helpful fiber from fruits and vegetables — many sugary fruit juices are as bad for you as sodas. You’re making the fruit less healthy by “juicing” it.

Everyone should drink eight glasses of water a day.

Hydration is very important, but the idea that eight glasses of water is essential is a strange one. 

In healthy people, researchers haven’t found a connection between fluid intake and kidney disease, heart disease, sodium levels, or skin quality.

People get a lot of their water from foods and other beverages in the first place, but there is a good reason to drink more water. It’s a calorie free alternative to other beverages (especially sugary ones), and people who drink water instead of those beverages consume fewer calories overall.

But in general, drink when you are thirsty — you don’t need to count the glasses.

It’s fine to eat something if it’s been on the floor for less than 5 seconds.

Flickr

It’s the worst when something you really wanted to eat falls on the floor. But if you grab it in five seconds, is it okay?

Sorry, but the five-second-rule isn’t a real thing. Bacteria can contaminate a food within milliseconds. Moist foods attract more bacteria than dry foods, but there’s no “safe duration.” Instead, safety depends on how clean the surface you dropped the food on is.

Whether you eat it or not after that is up to you, but if the people that walk on that floor are also walking around New York City, for example, we wouldn’t recommend it.

Vaccines can be risky.

This idea comes from a now thoroughly-debunked (and retracted) study of 12 children that appeared in 1998 in The Lancet and claimed there was a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. 

It turned out that study wasn’t only flawed, it also contained false information that was necessary to make its point.

Since then, numerous studies that have analyzed data from more than a million children have shown that there’s no connection between vaccines and autism.

But fears about that connection have persisted, partially spurred on by public figures making false claims about vaccines. This has led to scary diseases like measles coming back.

Yogurt will help put your digestive system back in order.

This is one of our modern health myths. Yogurt is frequently marketed as having benefits for digestion and as something that’ll keep people slim because of probiotics, or the “good bacteria” that’s living inside it.

Researchers have found that the bacteria in our bodies are very connected to our metabolism and obesity rates, among other things, so it seems like there’s a logical connection here.

But we don’t yet understand how the trillions of bacteria in our bodies work well enough to manipulate them in this way. Despite the fact that the probiotic business was worth $23.1 billion in 2012, we can’t make yogurt that will repair our inner bacterial balance.

That’s not to say that yogurt is unhealthy, just that its benefits are oversold. Plus, a lot of yogurt is packed with sugar, which we do know contributes to obesity and other problems — so if you enjoy yogurt, find a version that isn’t full of additional unnecessary calories or it might have the opposite of the intended effect.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away.

Apples are good for you, packed with vitamin C and fiber, both of which are important to long-term health, but they aren’t all you need.

And if certain viruses or bacteria get into your system, an apple will unfortunately do nothing to protect you. So go ahead and get that flu shot, even if you eat apples.

Eating ice cream will make your cold worse.

roboppy/Flickr

If you’re home sick with a cold, you can totally go ahead and comfort yourself with some ice cream.

The idea that dairy increases mucus production is very fortunately not true, according to researchers and a doctor at the Mayo Clinic, who says “in fact, frozen dairy products can soothe a sore throat and provide calories when you otherwise may not eat.”

Praise be.

Cracking your knuckles will give you arthritis.

Fortunately, this isn’t true either.

Cracking your knuckles may annoy the people around you, but even people who have done it frequently for many years aren’t any more likely to develop arthritis than those who don’t.

Starve a fever, feed a cold.

There’s a good reason you may have heard this said multiple ways, either “starve a cold, feed a fever” or “starve a fever, feed a cold.”

Despite a slew of headlines claiming that starving a fever wasn’t a myth in response to a tiny and largely misinterpreted study in 2002, there’s no real evidence to back this up. Limiting your caloric consumption may actually hurt your immune system more than helping it, and it would certainly be a bad idea to not eat during the 6-8 day duration of a cold.

Instead, doctors say to go ahead and eat if you can. The more accurate expression, as Scientific American notes, would be “feed a cold, feed a fever.” And make sure to get plenty of fluids.

It’s fine to drink sports drinks to rehydrate.

We all know that soda and similarly sugary drinks like lemonade are bad for us (right?), but what about sports drinks like Gatorade or Powerade? Sports-focused advertising has successfully convinced a whole lot of people that downing a bottle of this stuff is fine, especially if you’ve gone for a jog recently — it’s replacing electrolytes, after all.

But really, for most people the amount of sugar in these drinks is far more than is needed — even if you’ve been exercising. Lower calorie options, which many of the same companies have created in recent years, are much better options. Or just drink water. 

Drinking water can help you avoid a sunburn.

New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady loves hydration and has said that drinking water helps him avoid getting a sunburn.

There’s nothing wrong with hydration. But there’s no evidence whatsoever that being hydrated can prevent you from getting burned by ultraviolet radiation in any way. Only sunscreen or clothing will do that. Go ahead and drink enough water to quench your thirst. But if you’re going to be out in the sun for a while, don’t forget to cover up.

Coffee and beer dehydrate you, since caffeine and alcohol are diuretics.

In sufficient quantities, caffeine and alcohol can have a diuretic effect. But the amount of caffeine in a typical cup of coffee or alcohol in a beer isn’t enough to really have this effect, according to one recent study. A moderate amount of either coffee or beer hydrates people just about as well as water does. 

Milk does a body good (and protects your bones)!

Guy Montag/Flickr

This is an incredibly successful bit of advertising that has wormed its way into our brains and policies — the US Department of Agriculture tells us that adults should drink three cups of milk a day, mostly for calcium and vitamin D.

However, multiple studies show that there isn’t an association between drinking more milk (or taking calcium and vitamin D supplements) and having fewer fractures. 

Milk is fine, but it’s not a magical health drink. Surprisingly, however, milk is particularly hydrating — similar to pedialyte, both even more hydrating than water.

You shouldn’t eat too many eggs, since it’ll raise your cholesterol.

Eggs have lots of cholesterol in them. For most of us, that’s not an issue, since a growing body of research shows that dietary cholesterol (from foods you eat) doesn’t really have much of an effect on blood cholesterol in the vast majority of people.

Thank goodness.

Eating fat will make you fat.

The tide has started to swing back the other way on this one, but recommendations for low-fat foods remain common. 

The decision to demonize fat for its caloric density and heart-clogging effects was largely the result of shady science influenced by a sugar trade group. It turns out that the society-wide decision to cut saturated fat from diets led to increased consumption of sugar and processed trans fats, all of which were most likely less healthy overall.

We need a moderate amount of fat — especially healthy fat — in our diets. 

Read the original article on Busines Insiderer. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Copyright 2018.

Read next on Business Insider: 10 delicious and healthy dairy-free milk alternatives to try — whether or not you’re lactose intolerant

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/25-health-facts-that-are-totally-wrong/

[covenwrites-blog]

Solomon and Sheba - Party VI by gray glube and ohyellowbird

Title: Solomon and Sheba

Authors: grayglube & ohyellowbird

Rating: M

Warnings: Language, sexual situations, dub-con themes, violence

A/N: Smut delivery. Also, the plot thickens?

-

Madison comes in and finds her sitting at the kitchen table after dinner. She’s lonely, thinking about fall back home, thinking about how Charlie and her used to rake lawns together, first dates and pumpkin picking. Polar bear dares during winter break.

“What are you drinking?”

“Gin.”

Madison sits down next to her, puts her feet in her lap and pushes the bottle around, “What’s wrong?”

Zoe shrugs, “I don’t know.” She doesn’t want to talk about it. Madison waves a hand for her drink, it slides across the wood, eventually Zoe wants more of it, “Okay, gimme.”

They drink. Madison needs to redo the polish on her toes.

“Madison?”

“What?”

“You ever lose someone you really cared about?”

There’s a snort and a long drawn out breath before Madison smiles wry and mean, “Yeah, my entire fucking childhood.”

“I meant a person.”

“Oh,” Madison thinks, Zoe expects her to say something like ‘my mom’ even though Zoe knows Madison’s mom is alive, but might as well be dead for all she does for her daughter, but Madison just say, “no.”

“Okay.”

“…”

Zoe knows she’s more than buzzed, more than half-way to drunk, “I miss Charlie.”

“Charlie is dead.”

The glass falls off the table when Madison reaches for it, the feet in Zoe’s lap pull off.

“Just leave me alone now, Madison.”

The rest of the night she spends in the kitchen, drunk is how Queenie finds her. She’s considerate enough to bring her upstairs and into the bathroom.

Madison is brushing her hair, ignoring them. Zoe figures she deserves it. No one holds her hair back for her, but in the morning there’s bottled water and tylenol on her bed stand when she wakes up. Dry toast and orange juice. Zoe’s head spins.

-

“You asked why it was different. With Madison.”

Kyle can feel the wide berth between them. Zoe stands at the window, half-turned to survey the grounds without opening the curtains to see. Her hair is sleek, face rosy from the heat without being gross. He stays sat on Archie’s empty bed, replies, “yeah.”

Weighted by the guilt of their bad date and by what he’d done outside after with Peter, it’s hard to look her in the eye.

She slips her fingers down the frayed edge of one curtain, sweeps up windowsill dust, feigns disinterest. Her skin is sallow and she looks too thin inside a big sweater and calf-length boots, “It’s because of specificity, your powers work best on girls and mine work best on boys. It’s why we have a separation of schools in the first place, Madison’s Influence is similar to what we can do, yours is meant to engender someone into…being with you, and mine is meant to kill someone. Influence is a neutral power, compulsion is something that is only seen in warlocks, and constraint is only seen in witches.”

Cyril had never served it up in such plain terms. Kyle blinks, “How come?”

“Because warlocks fathered more children than witches gave birth to, because when witches with the power of constraint came around they needed to have a power that made it easier to propagate the race, on females in general, just like witches have needed to protect themselves against men, in general.” During her explanation, Zoe drifts closer, touching on the edges of his desk and chair, only giving him her eyes in little glimpses.

He wants to apologize for the date, mouth soggy with I’m sorrys. “Where did you learn all of this?”

Something passes between them, a look, and then her body language loosens up, arms unfold. Forgiveness. “Books. Not nice ones. Apocrypha, mostly.”

“I don’t know what that means.”

She’s opening her bag and starts pulling things out, chapstick, a hairbrush, a book and then another, shoving her mishmash of miscellaneous girl stuff back inside, she hands him one, “It’s like a record book, enrollment, like a family tree but instead of dates and marriages and birth,s it records witches and warlocks and their powers.”

It’s old and bound in black leather, it reads like a ledger inside. The other one is in her hands still, she gives it a look he can’t read.

“And how many have ours?” He looks at the handful of bright page markers, he counts them, there’s four neon pinks, six dark blues, more green than those combined and there are two purple ones.

“Not many, there’s a lot of stories, legends and stuff. Biblical, Mesopotamian, Arthurian, evil archangels, weird stuff, angels of prostitution, succubus, incubus. I marked them, blue for boy, pink for girl, green for influence.”

She hands him the one she’s held onto. Its cracked green cover has two words on it, concilium nocuus, in black bold letters. He doesn’t know what it means, either.

He asks.

“It’s latin. Concilium is influence, Noccus means dark or harmful, the way you’re not supposed to use influence.” Sitting on his bed, made only because she was coming over, Zoe collects her hair with her hands, spins it into a bun on the top of her head, lets it fall.

“But that’s out power.” Kyle drags over his desk chair to sit opposite her. Their knees don’t touch.

“There’s a log of council ruling in the black one, one of them was that you can’t actively practice constraint or compulsion or try to develop it in a way that is dangerous. It’s different if it’s your first manifestation of a…talent. The purples are a witch and warlock who got burned for using their powers for murder and rape.”

Kyle plucks over the little plasticy tips with his fingers. “Only two.”

“They only burn you if you use them on another witch or warlock, they don’t really count normal people,” she says, looking down to knock her toes into the sides of his shoes.

“So what are these for?”

Her eyes draw up, on his face and then the book in his hands. “I snuck them out, I’ve finished reading them and I thought maybe it was time we  were on the same page.”

Kyle drops the book, heavy on the tops of his thighs, and reaches for one of her hands, turns it over to trace the tiny lines in admiration. She lets him, watching quietly, tap tap tapping against his fingertips with hers when they still.

He thumbs over one of her unpainted nails, voice soft. “I’m sorry about being a shithead, I don’t know why I was like that.”

“Okay.”

She wraps her fingers around his thumb fast and smirks up at him, he startles, she laughs. It feels good, a little bridge between them. He doesn’t want to let her leave, he wants to kiss her but he doesn’t, he knows it would ruin their quiet moment of camaraderie. She might push him away and he knows no matter what he’ll want to keep kissing her.

-

It’s raining out and Zoe left to go do something, Madison lies on the sofa, Queenie reads, Nan cuts a long line of paper dolls, “I thought science fiction was supposed to be robots and alien sex.” Queenie announces from the floor.

“It isn’t?” Madison asks, moving on the couch to make room for Nan. She lights a cigarette and helps Nan paint nails on the paper silhouettes, she lights a cigarette after Nan tells her nail polish is flammable just to be a bitch. Queenie flips through pages in Left Hand of Darkness.

“Nah, there’s sex in this one, not weird alien sex, though. I haven’t gotten to the robots.”

“Le Guin?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Fucking feminist,” Madison grumbles, comical in her response mostly because she’s ambivalent to the literature, partly because she likes dick too much to really get man-hate. She tells Queenie as much.

“Girl you’ve got problems. Not about hate, it’s about equality.”

“You know a lot about that, Aunt Jemima? You’re still black, Nan’s got her bag of issues and we’re all still girls.There is no such thing as equality, just fucking each other over.”

Queenie’s mouth drops open and Madison smokes, Queenie makes a sound in her throat to get Madison’s attention, she’s had it for awhile but Madison isn’t invested enough in the conversation to fight about modern female politics.

“You are a twat.” Nan tells her, stealing the words out of Queenie’s mouth. Madison smiles. “Thanks.”

“Do you ever listen to what you say?”

“She doesn’t.” Nan tells Queenie, Madison nods, picks away a ragged paper edge on Nan’s string of little women.

“But she’s right, no one’s equal. And we’re all better. We’re witches.”

Madison looks up, ponderous. She hadn’t even thought of that. Neither had Queenie. They brush it off and return to menial tasks, outside it’s still raining.

-

He cracks open the books and promptly shuts them again, eyes searching the den, Squirrel is on his stomach staring at his lizard lying placidly in front of him. Peter had said something scathing, ‘They have a deep spiritual connection’ not too long ago, and has long since wandered off.

Anything with pictures of naked breasts gets a rise out of him, even if it’s centuries old book engravings. He peeks again at the bookmarked page and reads a caption that has the word ‘copulation’ in it, he shuts the book again and rubs a hand over the cover.

He takes them upstairs and looks at his bed before deciding the desk is the best place to read things he needs to concentrate on fully, beyond just looking at the pictures.

There are little notes on post-its, slips of paper tucked among the old pages.

Someone knocks on his door, “Yeah.”

He nudges the books closer to the wall. Dalton comes in and shuts the door. “Hey, what’s up?”

“I just came to get some stuff, for Archie. Cyril told me that witch is going to stop by tonight, we’ll clean him up and stuff.”

Thinking of it now Kyle hasn’t seen Misty Day in awhile, not at Robichaux or led up to the attic to see Archie by Cyril, “Has she been coming lately?”

Dalton doesn’t look up from Archie’s side of the room, opening a drawer and pulling out clothes, they land on the bed haphazard and wrinkled the same way Archie put them away to begin with, “No.”

“That’s weird.”

“Cyril said she’s been off the mortal coil.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Some swamp accident, alligator rescue effort.”

Kyle remembers that Misty doesn’t live at Robichaux’s, “Oh. So she, like, died?” Dalton shrugs, “Guess so.”

“Her name is Misty, you know?” Kyle opens and closes a book cover to have something to do with his hands, the motion makes Dalton look, Kyle stops and pushes the book over on the desk.

Too late, “What are you reading?”

“Uh…” He doesn’t have anything at the ready to lie with. Dalton’s eyes narrow, a flare of bitterness and resentment, “She was here today, but she didn’t stay. Your girlfriend.”

“Not my girlfriend.”

“Whatever she is, I don’t give a shit.” Dalton forgets about Archie’s clothes and  stands behind his chair, “So, what’d she bring?”

Kyle tries to hunch over them but Dalton is persistent, “Just books. Apocrophix, aprocrophata, apoc-something.”

“Apocrypha?”

“Yeah.”

Dalton leans a skinny hip into the edge of the desk and reaches for it, “How far does it go back?”

“Eighteen Hundred.”

There’s an eyebrow raise, Dalton’s chosen expression of either disdain or wary appreciation. This time it looks like the latter. “What’s the other one?”

Kyle slides it over the desk top, watches Dalton flip back pages, read off something written in a long line across the top of a blank page with flourish, “Qui nequissimus est opus noxia. Rake’s, Knave’s, something like that, Council, work of, harmful.” Dalton gives him a look over the page, “Yeah, don’t let Cyril see this.”

“Why not?

“Well…,” Dalton’s stare doesn’t give him anything to work with, “Cyril wouldn’t give a shit if you have it. Peter on the other hand, maybe. Don’t let Peter borrow it.” There’s something like a warning in his tone.

“You know Latin?”

Dalton looks down at the books, touching them lightly, like he’s remembering something, “I grew up having to read shit like this.” He flicks open the bigger book, “Simple stuff. This is,” He pauses reading the words and mouthing them again, slowly, word by word, “The Rake or Knave’s, harmful council,” there’s another pause, and Dalton’s brow creases, his eyes coming up to look at the wall as he mentally works at the words, “work of the harmful knave. Something like that. Depends on how it reads.” Dalton flips through a few pages more, then goes by with larger sections of the old paper over and between his long fingers. Decides it translates to The Rake’s Harmful Council while Kyle sits silent and dumb, “You’ve read stuff like this?”

“Gran’s a witch, read some stuff. Not this kind of stuff. The basics.”

“I didn’t know that.”

Dalton never really talks about his family, none of them do. Still, Kyle is surprised Dalton knows that someone is his family is a witch, has learned from someone before he came around to the school. It could explain the physicality of his power.

He pulls off the desk, “Whatever.” His expression goes a little haughty around the mouth, “You’d need like a decade of latin to cast a spell in this right, so don’t go messing around with it.”

Kyle looks down at pictures of medieval nudity and badly drawn and enunciated penises on what looks like an evil wizard. He smirks a little at the page, rolling his eyes, “What is it? Sex magic?” He grins. trying to be funny.

“Yes.” Dalton deadpans.

Kyle feels his expression fall off his face and into the metaphorical mud puddle, “Oh.”

He thinks Dalton is going to leave, it looks like Dalton thought so too, but he still stays standing next to the desk, there’s a small moment of silence that Kyle takes as Dalton deciding whether or not to engage in further human to human conversation for once, “Why’d she give this to you?”

“She thought it might help.”

“Well how’d she get it?”

“I think she borrowed it.”

“Uh-huh.” There’s a smirk that Kyle returns, they both know that’s bullshit.  “You gonna tattle on us, Dalton?”

He shakes his head, goes to pick up Archie’s clothes from the bed, “It’s just weird that they have something like this. Since it’s not written for witches.”

“Oh.”

“I gotta get the rest of his stuff together.” Dalton disappears into the connecting bathroom.

“Dalton?”

“What?”

Kyle pauses, chews on the end of a pen before getting the question out right, “Since you can read Latin could you help me read this fucking thing?”

There’s a long moment. A head pops out from around the door frame,“Fine. But we have to give Archie a bath. He’s always a pain in the ass about it.”

“Yeah, sure. Thanks.” Kyle thinks maybe Dalton was waiting to be asked for help.

“Whatever.” He mumbles around a cigarette, his lighter doesn’t catch, he looks at it, “Fuck, I need a flint.”

“Hey.”

“Yeah, what?”

Kyle lights his cigarette with a thought from across the room. Dalton inhales in surprise, coughs and looks at the cigarette, “When did that happen?”

“Couple days ago.”

“You should go tell Cyril. He’d want to know.”

Dalton’s leaving and Kyle feels weird about where their friendship stands, if it’s really friendship at all or merely benign tolerance without attachment. Ever since Archie died their entire team dynamic has been off.

“Hey, you okay?”

Dalton stops walking, gives him a withering look that asks without words if Kyle is full of shit.

Kyle winces and smiles at the expression, “sorry, dumb question.”

“I’m fine. Come upstairs and help in like an hour.”

-

The tiny half of Valium running its way through her circulatory system has her feeling too good for words, she thinks she can sympathize with Madison’s issues with addiction if this is how it feels. Madison called it Breakfast at Tiffany’s after breaking the scored tablet in two and leaving one piece in her hand after a smirk and dry swallow of her own.

She guesses by the Lincoln town car in the car port that Cyril is back from whatever secret warlock and witch mixer he and Fiona disappeared to. She smelt cigarettes in the upstairs hallway before they left and she took it to mean the Supreme was back in house.

Madison’s suggestion of pre-lesson relaxation made her uneasy but Zoe caved, reminded that Madison’s around to have her back. A shaggy haired boy she’s seen before but whose name she can’t remember answers the door and tells her Kyle’s is in the backyard. He drifts away, floats, maybe. Zoe’s envious until she corrects her thoughts that swimming everywhere. Paulie offers Madison a spot next to him on the sofa in the living room set behind french doors. There’s a closed door to the study, Cyril behind it probably. Paulie tells her, over the back of the couch and an easy, lazy smile, that he saw Kyle head up stairs right before they came.

Zoe manages the stairs, slowly, transfixed by how well vacuumed the carpeting is, how drastically the bannisters shine.

On the bed inside his room he’s sprawled out on his back, nude in the sweaty sticky final dying gasp of summer heat before autumn blows in for real. The room smells like boy, like solitary sex and fresh air and she watches closely, considers telling him he’s pulling too hard.  

The slick wet wash in her underwear comes with heat, she wants to touch it too, but that’s not so surprising in the moment, she wants to kiss him. All of him, maybe.

“Don’t act like you’re not impressed,” he huffs a laugh, pumping himself, angry and red and swollen. She feels swollen too, he laughs again, sits up and swings his legs to her side of the room, “gonna leave the door open all day.”

He looks like a lazy minor pantheon godling. Her mouth can’t articulate the poetry her brain lets drift off on the baby blue haze of druggy euphoria so she shakes her head in the negative and knocks the door shut clumsily with the toe of her sneaker.

When he stands up she decides it’s not the pharmaceutical mix of feel-good and girlhood giddiness feeding her high that’s made him suddenly taller and boy parts more appealing looking than high-school sexual education prepared her for. There’s old butterfly bandages on his chest she doesn’t remember feeling.

“Oh,” she starts and blinks, looks down once and back up at his face when he steps closer, erection bobbing like a separate entity, not coming too close but close enough to know it isn’t Kyle.

Kyle smells like classic heavy scented deodorant and store bought aftershave, something with an awful commercial but distinctly male nonetheless, not-Kyle smells like sixty dollar a bottle spice that she doesn’t like at all, he smells like deception and magic.

“You must be…”

Not-Kyle smiles.

“Peter,” he supplies, inclines and shakes his head with a laugh, nonplussed by being found out.

“Where’s Kyle?”

“Backyard.”

“Oh.”

“How’d I do?” He stands straighter for her inspection, suddenly very serious.

“Not bad, I guess.”

She finds herself momentarily transfixed by his dick, wonders if it’s an exact replica or just an over exaggerated mimicry of the one she’s felt pressed thick and firm on the inside of her thigh.

“Not impressed?”

“Seen boys naked before.”

“Oh. Give me a second.”

It’s stunning, like a sunrise, the slow eating away of form into a new one, reformed suddenly and slowly in a way she can’t really comprehend, she’s looking at her own naked self, an approximation but pretty close, she wonders how he got it so close, she giggles, rolling through a light stupor, thinking that boys are gross. She wonders if they sit around and try to make themselves look like the girls who beat them at strip poker by wearing extra accessories while they end up naked with losing high-cards.

“Is that what you do for fun?” She takes a step and presses fingertips to a too big and slightly differently shaped breast on a body that looks like hers, Peter presses up and she pulls her hand away. “The boobs are wrong. The nipples ar…-”

The door bangs open and Kyle stands in the frame staring at them, and then looking at the wall. “What the fu-…”

Peter deadpans that it is exactly what it looks like.

Kyle makes room for Peter-as-Peter to pass once he’s put on pants. The door shuts slowly and Kyle knocks his head against the door, ‘I’m going to kill him.”

“That was weird.” Her voice must be off because when he looks at her it’s probing, he takes the three steps towards her it takes for their toes to be an inch apart. He smells like store bought aftershave and heavy scented deodorant, her sex clenches, empty and wet and suddenly hot.

“Are you high?” He sniffs once at her face and then again trying harder, she tiptoes up an inch and sways, hands coming up to steady herself, they touch his chest and he sways back, “Maybe.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” But he says it with a laugh, amused as he flops back onto the bed with a step around her.

“I wouldn’t lay on that. Another person was masturbating there like a second ago.”

“What!”

“Hey, it’s fine,” she smiles, sitting on the bed he isn’t, “There’s another one.” He gets up and looks at her sitting down, he’s just barely settled when she kisses him. Because it’s Kyle, because she likes kissing Kyle. He’s Kyle.

“Why are you high?”

“It’s rude not to partake, Madison says. Thought it might help. It is. It’s my turn anyway so I’m allowed to do what I want. You’re not.” She snickers, his face goes dumb before he says, “Zoe.” She frowns at it and shakes it off by pulling her shirt over her head, pulling the straps of her bralette off her shoulders, struggling to remember how exactly she normally takes it off, down her legs or over her head, it ends up on the floor too.

She sits back down and slips off her shoes, talking while she unlaces. “He got my boobswrong.” She looks down at her chest, considers each breast and soft pink nipple, it’s warm in the room, she touches them, distracted for a moment by the color. She leans back and puffs out her chest, looking at them like someone looks at shoes they’ve just put on,  “I like mine better, anyway.”

Kyle makes a sound in his throat, clears it, “Yeah, they’re nice.” She beams, glad she’s isn’t the only one who thinks so, “Thanks. Take off your shirt.” He takes a moment to comply.

Her nails are a vivid dark shade of blue to match the canvas on her oxfords, they look strange on his skin, she drags a nail over his nipple and  explains that on boys they’re ornamental only, that they serve no real purpose, just for show like plastic fruit or silk flowers.

Kyle nods studiously.

“Okay, sorry. I’ll stop talking, we can start practicing now.”

“Yeah, sure. Whatever you want. Can I kiss you?”

“Nope. Not yet.” She swings astride and kneads his shoulders with her fingers, “This was a good idea, more skin, in contact.”

“Yeah.”

She puts her head under his chin and wraps arms around him, touching her mouth to patches of skin between shoulder and fifth ribs, his chest expands with deep breathes and his hand squeezes the mattress edge on the outside of her knee, “And it’s a good idea since we’ll have to be naked,” she adds with a mumble to his bicep.

He jerks a little, a car accidentally shifted into neutral before a full stop, “What? When?”

“When we have sex.”

“What?” His head keeps moving and knocking into her cheek while she works on kissing his neck, “Why do you keep saying what?” He cranes his neck back, it feels like he’s getting away, she’s up by his ear, tongue tipping the lobe and he sags back, her weight on him suddenly welcome, “I don’t know. I just forgot, I guess. That’s a while away though.”

“Not if we practice more. I wish it was your turn. My turns are always bad.”

“Not all of them.”

She pulls back to look at his mouth, “Is this one okay?” Her eyes find his looking at her face, “Yeah. So far so good.”

She smiles and goes back to his skin.

His hand is hot and big over the expanse of nylon covering her from waist to toe under her modest skirt, he tips back on the bed and keeps her chest pressed tight to his, fingers poking  under the elastic band on her tiny waist, eventually it lies tight across his wrist like a girl’s hair elastic, then his forearm as he fits his hand over the back of her underwear, his fingertips and thumb grazing skin but he keeps control in mind and his powers in check.

She kisses him syrup slow and druggy, drops plush pecks over his throat and pulse, he turns his head to the side and she latches on under his ear to suck a hickey into existence. He watches her hands fist in the sheets, her fingers open and close and roll her chest against his. “You’re chest is scratchy,” she tells him with a little laugh in his ear.

“I’ll shave it.”

“Don’t, I like it. It be like making out with a girl if you shaved it.”

She works her breasts against him gently, deciding it feels like wearing a soft wool sweater without a bra.

Her mouth is lax and swollen, a lazy smile sweeps over it and he surges up to feel it with his mouth. His fingers clench and unclench on the soft swell of her ass, she wriggles and sighs on his clavicle, “I wish it was your turn. You make me feel good.”

His dick twitches inside his jeans and between her thighs at what she says and how her hips move, forward as her bottom tilts up. His fingertips dip under her thighs and find the soft swell of her sex, prod wet cotton up between her folds and slide against the slick growing patch of proved arousal.

He finds her mouth sloppily with his tongue and opens her lips, she kisses his all open mouth and tongue and teeth on his lip, his fingers slide aimlessly against her slit, hot under the spongy cotton.

“You’re wet.”

“Uh-huh,” she mewls back, mouth pouty and eyes closed, distracted and unfocused and his chest tingles, his lips disappearing under numb tingles, he sniffs and tastes blood.

“Zoe.”

“Hmmmm?”

“Get off.”

“Oh!”

She rolls off and bounces a little next to him, he makes a sound, fighting through the migraine that feels like shrapnel behind his eyes, metallic and cold and excruciating. Not worse than when she spit in a glass and made him drink it but quick and surprising. The persistent throb of his erection halving in intensity under the icy stabs of sudden discomfort at his temples.

Zoe isn’t on the bed, she’s at the door talking to someone, wearing his shirt. Peter comes in from the hall and looks down at him, makes a disinterested face and turns back to Zoe.

“Nice tent, eagle scout.”

“Go fuck yourself.”

Peter smiles and makes to leave the room, “He’s fine, just a nosebleed. He’s being a baby. “

“Okay,” she answers to an already closing door.

“Have fun.”

There’s another knock a moment later and a tentative, ‘Zoe,’ spoken through the door.

“Yeah?”

Madison’s head pops in, “You okay?”

“Yeah. I can fix it.”

“Okay, I’ll be out in the hall.”

The mattress slowly dips, cautious hands smooth his hair over and over, “Kyle?” He let’s his eyes slip open, “yeah?”

“Did you read the books I gave you yet?”

“Some parts.” He admits, though mostly he just dogeared promising passages and went on to pages with pictures.

“Did you get to the part where they talked about how to, how to…” she struggles with finding the right words to describe what she means to ask, “keep things…uh…negate things?”

“Yeah.”

She nods, her eyes concerned, hands still petting at his head and fingers soothing on his scalp, his dick returns to it’s former state of readiness.

“You should try to do it.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

He lets a little bit seep out of him, away from where he can control it, and slips it into her mouth with his tongue, she makes to move for more but he presses a hand under her jaw and pushes her mouth off of his.

“That’s good enough. It feels a little bit better now.” There’s a smear of orange red over her mouth and cheek, from him, he rubs it away with his thumb.

She lets her head fall next to his on the bed and sighs, shaky and heavy, her legs rub together and her knees nudge his thigh, on her side next to him she rubs her face against the bedding, eyes watching him. It reminds him of cats looking for attention, insistent and intense.

“Kyle?”

Her voice is low, warm breath and want.

“Yeah?” He’s shut his eyes in hopes he won’t look at her and sound the same without knowing it, for posterity, for the sake of being able to control saying ‘fuck it.’

“…Kyle.”

Her knee comes up higher, heel nudging the side of his knee and foot sliding down his calf, toes finding the hem of his jeans and creeping up to nudge at his sock, push it down infinitesimally and touch his knobby ankle, “Don’t do that.”

“You make me feel good.” And he feels her arm maneuver down along his side, feel the back of her hand against his hip briefly as she tucks it between her legs under her skirt and down her tights, he can feel her little fingers moving. His eyes open and watch hers lid heavily half-way, the gradual flush of pink arousal over her neck and heavy breathing chest, “It feels good when you touch me.”

His breath catches when she sighs, pressing tighter and warmer against his bare side, “Do you want me to get Madison?”

She keens, fingers stopping for a moment to press, “I don’t want Madison.”

“I’m going to get her.”

When he sits up she doesn’t and it makes him pause, look down at her, hips tilted into the mattress because of his absence and extrication from her soft prison limbs, he stares at the sheerness of her stockings where her hand stretches them, the suggestion of her ass curving under black nylon, the pale shadow of her skin underneath, strangely seductive, his dick throbs and weeps sticky inside his briefs.

She mumbles,“please don’t ruin this.”

“Ruin what?”

Her hand is still working outside of her white underwear when she sits up with knees folded open flat against the bed and curves against the line of his side, “I like when it’s just us, that’s what. Just you…and me. I’m getting better with it,” her hand snaps out of her stockings to grab his, he can see the slickness on her fingertips when she brings his to her mouth and lets her tongue nudge them, kiss them before sighing, cheeks flushed and eyes bright, “I’m getting stronger, see?”

“Zoe…,”

Her mouth slowly spreads into a smile while her  knees widen and she rocks up against his hip, the crotch of her stockings is messy wet and two of his fingers are in her mouth up to the knuckle, her lips drag over them, tongue moving with a dirty insinuating tease as he pulls them free, he can’t breathe.

“See? You can still feel your fingers right?”

“Yeah.”

She drops her chest to the bed, both hands working their way back inside her stockings, she breathes hard, one leg straight and the other shifted, bent haphazardly in his lap, knee nudging his groin, “You don’t have to touch me, I can do it myself, but I still like touching you anyway. I like you, Kyle.”

Her pelvis rocks and her eyes close, half-smile turning toothy as a canine digs into the fuller  bottom lip of her pouty mouth.

“I like you too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

He smoothes a hand over where her slim calf is hard with a curve of muscle, she mewls, rocks harder, ass clenching, white panties against black stockings, knee kneading and nudging, he’s going to cum inside of his jeans.

Her mouth is open and her teeth drag over the bedding, a damp circle from her tongue forming, he realizes he’s working his hips in the same rhythm against her leg as her are against the bed and her fingers. She watches him orgasm, he misses hers and wishes he kept his eyes open to see it.

She breathes, face against the bed, pulls her limbs to her and rolls back onto her side, head on her forearms, eyes slipping closed, “I’m tired.” He nods, he is too. He lies down next to her. She offers him the curve of her spine and makes sure to hold his hand in hers over the swell of her breast, her bottom mercifully still after a moment of lazy rolling back and forth as she falls asleep.

He’s awake for a little longer, daydreaming against her skin about dipping fingers inside of her, how she’d feel on his fingers, wetter than the inside of her mouth, the twinge in his dick a brief aftershock. He holds her tight, too tight he worries but her mouth breathes open and warm on the inside of his wrist. It feels like she’s his.

-

There are board games set out all across the long dining table. Some boxes have sharpied discounted prices written on the sides, missing pieces inside, picked up from this yard sale or that. The girls have Scattergories set out, each of them with their own placard and notepad, miniature golf pencils with blunt points. The buzzer goes off and Queenie reads through her list, the letter was P.

“Superheroes. I put Professor X”

“Same, dammit.”

“Kitty Pryde.”

Queenie coos. “Good one.”

“I got Princess Peach.”

Madison reaches over and runs a line through the word, “Doesn’t count.” Zoe slaps at her hand.

Nan picks up the twenty-one sided die, but doesn’t roll. “You know, we could be superheros,” she says. “We could protect people.”

Madison makes gagging noises, peels open her fingers and takes the die. “Have you seen their wardrobe? Polyester doesn’t breathe.” She rolls a D, “talk about crotch rot.”

They flip cards and Zoe turns the timer.

Cordelia put together this nostalgia fest, said partaking in a normal night in might do them some good, like they’re seven years old or just socially inept. Shocking no one, she and Fiona are missing from the table.

Zoe considers the superhero idea further, keeps them in silence except for Queenie who’s already reading through her List 6.

The forced camaraderie is making Madison sweat. “Hun, your superpower is having killer drool. I don’t think you should be expecting a call from the Avengers anytime soon, start the timer.”

Zoe rolls out her tongue and wags it, frisbees Madison the game timer and pushes back from the table. “I’m tired.”

Madison knocks it to the floor without lifting her hands, uses them to reach for Zoe instead. “Stay awhile. I’ve got a better idea.”

Queenie throws her pencil into the open game box. “Fuck your shitty idea.”

“Oh, so I guess you don’t want a hit then?” Madison maneuvers Zoe back over to perch in her lap. A deadly manicure withdraws two rolled joints from one bra cup.  Nan? You game?”

Zoe pushes at the offer, but readies a Zippo. “I think I hit my limit.”

Madison cranes her neck to light up and takes two hits before passing. Queenie takes the blunt and puffs silently.

Nan doesn’t cough, she makes a face, “weak.” She passes it back and clears their half of the table, lids all of the boxes they’d gone through and stacks them in front of Fiona’s designated spot at the head.

Zoe rolls her eyes, her neck. “Shut up, Nan. Now what?”

Madison insists on high twister. Queenie flatly refuses, Nan is transfixed by the spinner-Zoe is forced into one on one limb tangling. At some point, Misty shows up eating an uncooked poptart in the doorway. The three of them play for forty-five minutes.

Later, velvet skater dresses and cigarette pants are traded for tank tops and Soffe shorts. Madison is draped horizontally across the foot of Zoe’s bed, her hair a waterfall over the edge, her eyes on the ceiling. “So did you have fun today?”

Zoe is curled by her pillows scrolling through facebook. She finishes flipping through an album and clicks her phone dark. “It was alright.”

“You are a liar.”

She sighs and rolls, stops shoulder to shoulder with Madison, her on her belly and the other girl belly up. “I shouldn’t have taken anything before. It was like a drunken one night stand, but worse because I can remember it.”

“Poor baby.” Madison pouts and plants a sticky kiss to her left eye, it’s wet and makes her cringe but she laughs pushing Madison away.

-

“Jesus Christ, wash your face. What was she, on her period? Cyril won’t let you wear your red-wings to the dinner table.”

Dalton and Peter are skyscrapers at the end of Kyle’s bed. Kyle has to open his eyes a few more times and even then isn’t sure who’d been talking. For getting into bitch fits so often, on some fronts they are eerily similar.

“What?”

Peter mimes. “You’ve got blood all over your face.” His nose is snarled up on one side, repulsed.

Kyle wipes at it with a heavy hand, stares at the dark red smear over his knuckle. Swallowing, he still tastes copper. “Ugh.” Rolling to the edge of his mattress, he sweeps the floor for an old shirt, plugs up his face with it until he can get to the bathroom and slumps upright.

Peter’s eyes are above where Kyle is swabbing at his upper lip. “The only people who use ‘redwings’ in casual conversation are ones who have them, Dalty.”

Dalton shrugs, “Blood doesn’t bother me, neither does pussy. Unlike either of you.”

Green eyes cut over and down. Peter is casual with his cruelty. “What a bitch.”

“Whose fault is that?”

Kyle’s spine is a comma facing away from the two boys between himself and the door.

“Puh-lease if it’d keep him quiet and nice I’d suck his dick right now in the middle of the hallway, but I’m afraid no amount of orgasm can help him,” Peter sighs, looking mildly stoic about it.

Dalton knocks him into the dresser, “is that your professional opinion, doc?” and leaves. “Don’t stay in here with him too long, Kyle. I think his mouth is a magnet for cocks.”

“Is that your professional opinion?”

Peter leaves too. He and Kyle haven’t spent any time together alone since that night on the porch. Neither of them bring it up, but there’s something less routine about the way Peter teases. His jabs are barbed, and even though his power is physically harmless, the idea that there might be malice there unsettles Kyle.

His earlier appearance in his room with Zoe has Kyle uneasy. Something like actual fear for a moment was there, Zoe a little high, smiling, with a naked dude.

Looking at himself in the mirror it occurs to him how fucked up Peter could make things, could have, like the night at the party. Zoe in his room with Peter. And his mind makes up all the awful scenarios. There’s something sinister in Peter. Sometimes.

Kyle scrubs his face, thinks about Zoe. He puts on a shirt and goes down to dinner.

-

The creepy butler side-eyes shade at him as he walks in, there is no gallery of black clad hungry girls at the top of the stairs, waiting like crows for dead bodies, today, Paulie looks around for Madison while he goes up to find Zoe. He knocks and gets no answer for a long minute, he knocks again, and it opens. Zoe in a cotton t-shirt and long black skirt, there’s steam from the bathroom and her hair is wet. Behind him someone clacks down the stairs in heels, Madison, he looks back at Zoe, “She’s not coming in?”

“I think we’re past that,” she answers motioning him inside her room. He casts one last look at where Paulie and Madison are snarking off at the bottom of the stairs before shutting the door.

She starts with, “I don’t want anything to happen like it did that night at the party. But, you can touch me.” Neither does he. The attic isn’t big enough for two helpings of potato-brained boy.

“How far is too far?”

“Third base.”

“Okay.”

She dressed for this, everything loose-fitting and without fastenings. Knowing that it was a conscious decision, that she stood in front of the armoire thinking of right now helps Kyle put away any of his usual reservations.

He watches her hands slip up under her skirt and then her underwear are hanging off her fingers, she tosses them carefully to a chair full of clothes and his tongue gets heavier in his mouth.

Her steps forward have him backing up to sit on the bed, hands fisted tight so he doesn’t drag her closer. She straddles him when he’s settled against the headboard, pillows propped behind his back. She looks at him, waiting. He allows his hands to ruck up skirt, upper thigh, exposing soft skin but nothing of what’s between her legs.

Her throat works on a swallow he can see, and she isn’t wearing a bra, nipples poking hard at the cotton, he wants to lift her shirt and leave hickeys on her chest. He found three from her mouth after dinner the other night.

“Did you shave during your shower?” he asks, an awkward kid under the scrutiny of expectations, he rubs her thighs, it’s nice. She nods and rolls her weight down, locks both hands around his shoulders, fingers leaving little dents in his skin, grabbing too hard. Spreading her knees a little with guiding movements, he wonders if maybe she’s become addicted to how his powers make her feel. Will it ever be the same if she decides to touch another boy like this?

There’s too much downtime, Kyle quiet and wondering if she might get sick of this. She can just as easily hone her gifts on other people, the only advantage of working with Kyle that there might be fewer bodies.

It’s midday, the sun bleeding in through gauzy white curtains. Zoe likes his face without shadow. She plucks at a chapped lip and then ducks down to taste it, leaves the anchor of his shoulders to bring one hand up underneath the puddled folds of her skirt.

“When Peter looked like you before, was that your real dick? Has he seen you naked?”

Kyle freezes up. Her voice is soft and warm and pleasantly curious, but he has to shut his eyes against the insinuation.

“Can we not talk about Peter?”

Her shoulders shrug, wet hair spider-webbing down her front. “Sure, I guess I just want to find out someday.”

There’s a beat of silence where he doesn’t know how to respond, still perturbed that she would be thinking about Peter right now, but then the want for a response dwindles. Zoe opens up his hand, palm up, and rubs herself along the lines in a bobbing motion. There and gone.

He lets his fingers curve into a more ergonomic shape, grazing her on every downstroke.

“Take off your shirt.” It passes from her mouth and over the rasp of his cheek, but they both comply.

Shirtless, Kyle has an idea. “Turn over,” he says like a question, helping her pivot and sit again, her back against his chest and her hips cradled by his thighs. Her pointed toes would only brush his ankle.

Sealed up with so much skin touching like this, he has to exude more energy reeling his powers in.

His hand gravitates between her legs again and she tilts her pelvis for easy entry, head lolled to one side, eyes half-open.

She looks complacent, but the way her fingers grab and pull at the knee of his jeans speak of something real. He watches her chest fill up and empty out, feels the air leaving her against the left side of his chest and gives where she wants him.

Fingers gentle on his wrist guiding, he lets fingertips linger on the safety of her mound, she’s smooth there too and he knows while he’s touching her that she hadn’t just meant her legs by the affirmation of his question of shaving during her shower.

The line of her groin is hot and she sucks in a heaving sigh, “Touch me.”

He tucks a kiss to her neck that makes her jump a little, “I am,” one finger slipping along her slit, back and forth, long simple strokes, he doesn’t want to admit that he’s never done this before, at least not like this, not with so much intention and attention paid to how he’s touching her. He lifts his other hand to her breast, thumbs her nipple and gently cups her with two fingers on either side of where she is leaking heat steadily.

“Do you want them inside? Is that what you mean?”

She tips her head up, tongue poking out the corner of her mouth, “Whatever you want, it’s your turn.”

Kyle pinches her nipple and nudges a finger inside, a second after two slow drags in and out, fingers rolling her nipple while he works between her thighs. He lets them rest inside, squeezed by her clenching body, her thighs tighten before opening wide like a book, a hand scratching at the sheets and the other pulling his hand from her breast to lattice their fingers together.

“Are you okay?” His eyes are on their folded hands. She feeds the handshake little pumps of pressure each time his other hand reaches, wriggles inside of her. Her toes curl and uncurl on the sheets.

“Yes.”

“Does it feel good?” Inside she clenches, hugging his fingers wetly for a brief fluttering moment.

Her lungs fill all the way up while he watches, chest falling in slow motion with a huff of irritation, both eyes are closed. “Don’t ask me stuff like that, Kyle.”

“Why not? I want to know.”

“I can’t focus.”

The languid rhythm of his fingers stops, halfway inside with the pad of his thumb resting over the soft skin under her navel. “It’s my turn, remember? I’m the one that has to focus.”

She warps in his arms, twists more to one side without dislodging his hand. “Is that why you talk so much?”

“I’m just nervous.”

She smiles. Her fingers unhook from the sheets and reach back, sift blindly through the hair covering his ears, trace out the shape of his jaw and chin. It isn’t anything close to how rounding the bases is supposed to go, from bat boy to third within the span of two shots and three songs at a friend’s birthday party. Everything is planned here, but it doesn’t have to feel mechanical. The way Kyle turns into her palm and pecks a kiss over the veins on her wrist is something maybe lovers do.

“I keep wondering how the fuck I’m supposed to fit.” He smirks almost against her mouth, she lets out a held breath, it’s shaky.

One day he’s going to see her from a new angle, her legs triangled out around his waist, his cock holding her open for him to look and he can picture it now, but at the same time it feels like one of those things you shouldn’t wait for.

The warm hand holding his face, drops, back on his knee, and then moving up along his leg and behind her back, he chokes when she finds him. “You don’t have to,” he tells her. Even though he wants her tiny hand touching him.

“Can’t unzip you anyway, next time.”

In his head there’s an unprompted scenario playing out, one where they forget about turns and move on to things like his tongue on her clit while she sucks him, one big turn where everyone is satisfied. He starts imaginary conversations with her in his head that lead to less clothes and more cumming.

But the heel of her hand stays pressed against the thick line of his dick, trapped inside his jeans, throbbing. He presses on her clit, prodding it with two removed slick fingers, her head tilts against his collar, chin raised and eyes closed, “In.”

He circles her clit instead until she asks again, insistent, her hand leaving his lap to push his where she wants it, taking it’s place at the pebble hard nub.

He can’t feel his fingers,“You’re pushing back. Just relax.”

“Sorry,” her hips jumping up, feet planted on the bed for leverage, “I just…, try to cancel it out,” she sounds desperate. He wonders if she wants him to use his powers to make her cum, if that’s the suggestion she’s really making. He thinks about what it’d be like to, thinks about her asking one day.

“It’s on or it’s off, mostly. I don’t want to give you too much.” He doesn’t. He’s going to get himself killed, one day. There will be a lesson where clothes come off, all of them and he’s inside of her, and if he can’t take it then he’s dead. He doesn’t want to give her something she doesn’t ask for. He realizes that he wants her to ask, this time she doesn’t.

“Okay, it’s okay. That’s enough then.” She shifts, legs coming together and her hand pushing his away, turning in his lap and tucking her skirt between her thighs. “My powers are just more sensitive now.” She sounds self-conscious suddenly, but her smiles is proud. Progress being made. It makes him decide to evaluate his own, he knows there’s Madison a shout away, Nan to hear if he starts to die, Paulie to get him back home. His hands massage her knees, “Wait.”

She does and he leans forward to speak against her throat, “I want to.”

Her head tilts back, pulse throbbing on his bottom lip, huffing out, “What?”

“I just want to finish you off. If you want.”

He looks up at her eyes, pupils eating up the color, glassy, so turned on that he knows it hurts, his fingers have feeling again when he sucks on them, tastes her on his skin. He’d made sure to read the books she gave him.

She watches his mouth, nods mute and lifts her skirt. He tilts his head and looks down, she’s bare but he wants to see everything, he shifts and pushes her back, kisses her navel and looks between her thighs while her arms spread akimbo above her head.

She’s pink and swollen, her thighs part open further, coquette and waiting, “use three,” she says and he pushes them inside, watches how her cunt takes them in, he kisses her knee and feels high on the way she smells. Needy, wet. The back of her hand is over her mouth, her eyes everywhere, skirting around the room like she’s lost. A knuckle between her teeth while her hips lift and fall under his hand.

The sound, sloppy hot. He sucks hard on her skin, wants her to see something he’s left on her later in the mirror, when he’s left and she’s alone at night. Separate beds, lonely and bored and guilty about so many things.  

Her expression is brittle like a wishbone, he wants to feel her snap, fill up with the satisfaction of the sound.

This time he sees her cum. She tilts her head to the side and twists, thighs tight, her hand pressing his fingers deeper while he keeps moving her clit in tight circles with the fingers of his free hand.

“Was that okay?” Her eyes are closed and her bare chest works, “Yeah, yeah.” Her hips stutter up, undulate against his hand and the bed, her insides still squeezing lazily. She lets go of his hand and stretches under him, she looks pliant and soft and lovely.

He wipes at his face, another bloody nose, his throat feels tight but otherwise he’s alright enough to grin, “Your powers are getting stronger, is that good or bad?”

She shrugs, hair moving over the sheets, “Both, I guess. It feels different.” Her thighs are still rubbing together under her skirt. He feels a little more like a man watching her in the aftermath of an orgasm he’s given her.

“What does it feel like?”

Her eyes open, head rolling on the bed and she shrugs again, eyes off him and looking at empty space, “Less intense, but it still feels go…” She stops suddenly and with a hand coming up to her mouth, eyes wide and horrified, three quick drops of blood from his nose on her forehead and cheek and covered mouth.

He puts palms on her cheeks, twisting his head to try and hold her gaze, “What’s wrong? Hey.” She’s not flushed anymore, gone pale. There’s a knock on the door.

It gets her back, “I’m sorry.” And she’s out from under him him, knees on the bed and off it on the other side, she’s secluded behind the bathroom door in second, there’s the sound of something being knocked over, he can hear her throw up.

He sits on the bed and fills in the word she couldn’t finish. ‘Good’, how it felt when she killed Archie, when she killed her boyfriend whose name he can’t remember, mostly because he doesn’t want to.

Madison bangs on the door and then knocks it open, “Zoe?”

“She’s in there.”

“You should go now.”

In the bathroom she sobs, her chest is on fire and the wet stick of arousal between her thighs is cold and lonely and awful.

This time she doesn’t tell Madison to go away, she just lets someone hold onto her while she falls apart.

-

“Hey Paulie, have you seen The Napoleonic Wars?”

Paulie looks up from his laptop alone in the sitting room, shakes his head. “Sorry, buddy. He isn’t in his cage?”

Squirrel’s eyebrows pull in the middle. He isn’t touching anything in the room, an island on the hardwood. “No. I always read to him before bed, he likes Whitman, but I can’t find him anywhere.”

In a grey tank top and sweatpants, Paulie looks comfortable, two fingers on the touchpad, scrolling through Reddit. He shuts the computer and sets it on the coffee table, belly red because it had been getting too hot. He pats the spare cushion, motions Squirrel over. “Don’t worry. He’s gotten out before. We always find him.”

Reluctant at first, tensed to leave and continue his hunt, Squirrel’s shoulders sag and he comes closer, he sits.

Paulie flattens a palm between his shoulder blades, rubs in soothing circles like his mom used to when he was a kid and woke up from bad dreams. God, he misses his mom, fucking pasta with real red sauce instead of ketchup.

Squirrel’s eyes are puppydog sad and beseeching. “He’s my best friend, Paulie.” And suddenly Paulie realizes that maybe he’s been neglecting Squirrel lately, that they all have. Because Squirrel doesn’t demand. Peter needs an audience, Dalton needs an inferior, Kyle needs a buddy, and even Paulie knows he does things to get people to notice.

A house full of lost boys, Squirrel’s a lot like the tinkerbell, maybe-Paulie scraps the thought, Squirrel is the lost boy in rabbit pajamas..

He’s different and he’s quiet, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t get lonely, and Paulie feels selfish, drooling over Madison and halving his time with Kyle and Peter while Squirrel takes longs walks in the park to touch the leaves and cobblestones alone.

His arm hooks around Squirrel’s shoulders, tipping the other boy into his side. “Hey, wanna go watch something on Netflix? Your pick, and if The Napoleonic Wars doesn’t turn up by morning we will get the whole house together for a manhunt.”

“Yes,” Squirrel says with a wobbly smile, leaving his little book of poems with the laptop on the table when they get up to microwave popcorn and reset the router upstairs.

“Can we watch Deadliest Catch?”

“Really?”

“Crabs that live in cold water are not very nice you know. They will eat your eyeballs if they can get to them.”

“Fuck those eyeball eaters.”

Sagely, Squirrel nods.

-

Much later that night, when all of the boys in bed are asleep, the one in the attic looks over and reaches out a hand, a lost reptile crawls onto his palm, rests a moment in strange, unnatural stillness, and scurries away. The boy’s eyes close and he slumps back, he still breathes and his heart still beats but his eyes dilate, incoherently seeing things he thought he never would again. The Napoleonic Wars skitters across the wood floor and disappears amongst boxes, waiting for the ladder to come down.

[celticnoise]

TODAY CQN brings you the twenty-first EXCLUSIVE extract from Alex Gordon’s book, ‘CELTIC: The Awakening’, which was published by Mainstream in 2013.

The book covers the most amazing decade in the club’s history, the Sixties, an extraordinary period when the team were transformed from east end misfits to European masters. This instalment takes you into the equally-thrilling seventies.

GOING into his second full season, Danny McGrain, an ever-reliable performer, had made the right-back berth his own. His admiration for Jock Stein was obvious.

‘I could never call our manager anything else other than Mr.Stein,’ recalled the player who would earn genuine world class status. ‘Let’s face it, he deserved the utmost respect for his achievements in the game. Managing the club to success in Lisbon was simply awesome. He deserved to be held in the highest esteem, as far as I was concerned. I was seventeen-years-old when I joined and could never think of calling him Jock. That may have been acceptable for the older players, but not for me.

‘I remember Sean Fallon turning up at our home in Drumchapel to sign me. I immediately called him Mr.Fallon. However, he told me to call him Sean, as everyone else did. Later on in my career, I would be an experienced player in my thirties and in the Scottish international set-up when Mr.Stein was the manager and I still gave him his full title. Not once did he tell me to call him Jock.

‘I was extremely fortunate to start my career with a manager such as Mr.Stein around. Simply put, he was a winner and he wanted all his players to be winners, too. In fact, I was fairly lucky with all three of my Celtic bosses because Billy McNeill and Davie Hay had the same outlook as Mr.Stein.

‘Of course, I had played alongside them and I thought they were both excellent managers. I was also fortunate to be involved in so many memorable games. I don’t have too many regrets, but one would be the lack of success in Europe during my time. I had arrived at a club that had conquered Europe, would reach another European Cup Final three years later and always seemed to be there or thereabouts in these competitions.

DANNY McGRAIN…regrets in Europe.

‘We reached the European Cup semi-final in 1974 before being kicked off the park by Atletico Madrid. In the main, though, we struggled to get past the quarter-final stages. I recall we were 2-0 up on Real Madrid in 1980 before we went down 3-0 at the Bernabeu. We got a good goalless draw with Brian Clough’s Nottingham Forest four years later, but lost 2-1 in Glasgow. I don’t think we did enough, though, in Europe back then. Not by Celtic’s standards, anyway.’

As McGrain settled into the right-hand side of the defence, Roddie MacDonald, unfussy on the deck and excellent in the air, was given a few outings at centre-half. Pat McCluskey, a solidly-built character, was being moved around the back four, apart from the main central defensive position where his lack of inches would have undoubtedly created a problem to a team used to the aerial command of McNeill.

‘Dixie Deans wasn’t particularly tall, but he had a wonderful leap and uncanny anticipation when he attacked the ball in the air. Former Scotland keeper Alan Rough would surely testify to his overall ability; Deans stuck six past him in a 7-0 rout over Partick Thistle at Parkhead on the team’s unstoppable march towards title No.9. He also collected four in a 6-0 drubbing of Falkirk.

Deans, like Jimmy Johnstone, was a free spirit Stein sometimes failed to understand. This colourful personality possibly didn’t do anything to aid his cause in manager/player relations when he turned up one morning for training wearing a tuxedo, after just returning from a pal’s wedding the night before.

‘He also enjoyed a cigarette or two and, while other players refrained from smoking in front of their manager, Deans would merrily puff away with the boss in attendance. ‘Maybe I was the only one man enough to do it,’ said Deans, adding ‘Or mad enough.’

Tommy Gemmell looked back, ‘I’m sure Big Jock thought alcohol was the elixir of the devil. He was tee-total and couldn’t work out why anyone would take a drink. If we were on an away trip in Europe, down at Seamill or on tour, he would keep a wary eye on all the players. Some, of course, might have a vodka and Coke or a Bacardi and Coke. Jock knew full well what some of us were up to. He would come over, look at your glass and say, “I’m thirsty, let’s have a sip of your drink.”

TOMMY GEMMELL…’young guys took mikey out of Big Jock.’

‘Then he would put it to his lips. Sometimes you got caught, sometimes you were fly enough to just have a Coke when you knew he was in the vicinity. Don’t get me wrong, we were no angels and there were a few at Celtic who liked a drink, including me. We could have a bevvy on a Saturday night knowing we had the following day off.

‘If there was a game on Wednesday that would be it. I never drank after Wednesday when we were playing on a Saturday. We all trained hard on Thursday and Friday and by the time the game came around, we were well up for it.

‘The guys who really took the mickey out of Jock were the young blokes. He would bring a few of them down to Seamill when we were preparing for big games. Reasonably, he thought the experience would do them no harm. He would say to the first team squad, “Look, I want you to set an example to these young lads. Watch what your doing with alcohol.”

‘So, we would all be on our best behaviour and we would look over at the some of the Quality Street Gang. Davie Hay and George Connelly were among them. We would spot George fumbling for something under the table and then coming up with a full glass. It certainly wasn’t lemonade. Big Jock was too busy patrolling around and watching us to clock what the youngsters were getting up to.’

‘Guilty as charged, m’lud,’ laughs Hay. ‘We would bring a couple of half bottles of gin or vodka and then top them up with Coke or something when we sat around later in the evening. It wasn’t a bevvy session or anything like that, but there was a wee bit of devilment in the youngsters back then.

‘Of course, we realised Big Jock absolutely abhorred alcohol and we knew what we were doing. We did it for a laugh. God only knows what would have happened if we had been rumbled. It doesn’t bear thinking about.

DAVIE HAY…high jinks with Jinky.

‘Later on, I realised the lengths Jock would go to keep tabs on his players after their day’s stint at the park was over. Of course, stories of Jinky and bevvy are legendary. You could say he liked to unwind after training. He used to go to a pub called Noggins – no longer there now – in Uddingston and have a couple of drinks with some old mates.

‘Then the telephone in the bar would ring. The barman would answer and then shout, “Jimmy, that’s your taxi.” Jinky would pick up the receiver. “I never ordered a taxi,” he would say. Then on would come the unmistakeable tones of Big Jock, “Get out of there and get up the road!” he would growl.

‘Jinky looked around the bar and wondered who was a spy for The Boss. He never quite worked it out, but, unluckily for him, Celtic had a part-time scout who lived in a flat directly opposite Noggins. He had been instructed by Jock to keep an  eye on the pub and if he saw Jinky he was to phone him immediately.’

Bertie Auld said, ‘You might have thought with his mining background Big Jock would have fancied a foaming pint of ale after a day’s hard graft down the pit. But I never once saw him take a drop of alcohol. The champagne corks could fly all over our dressing room after an important victory, but Big Jock refused to indulge. I remember talking to him one day when we were travelling to an away game. “If we win with a couple of goals to spare, will you have a drink with us afterwards?” I queried, rather mischievously.

‘Jock thought about it and surprised me when he answered, “Okay, you’re on – if you win by three.” We duly went out and achieved the target set by our manager. On the way home, I asked Jock if he was coming for a drink. Again, he remained silent for a moment before replying, “Would you think any more of me if I went for a drink?” I answered, “I couldn’t think any more of you than I do just now, Boss.”

‘He never went for that drink.’

* TOMORROW: Don’t miss the fourth and final part of ‘FAREWELL TO THE LIONS’, another dramatic instalment from Alex Gordon’s book. ‘CELTIC: The Awakening’ – only in your champion CQN.

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