#realign my fucking like. order of events

[aberrantmind]

my god

[lupismaris]

Holiday prep for the week reset of sorts to do list because every attempt this weekend to take care of myself and feel better failed miserably and I'm feeling worse than before

Meds (pre/probiotic and calc/mag/zinc add in)

Veggie supp + matcha + honey + oatmilk + spinach + apple w/herbs smoothie thing (i want to like smoothies but texture man it's like we have to chug it like a keg stand)

Eat half (or as much as we can stand) of the harvest bowl thing we ordered

Check in with Paul re Friday hearing and Uncle Pat re visit in February

Touch base with BF

Prep planners for week ahead (practical planner done time for the pocket astrology tarot drag your ass daily planner that i bought to keep my demons in check)

Smoke to keep the existential dread and bone deep fatigue at bay for another four hours please gods give four more hours

Recolour hair in prep for various events this week well it's done but the brows are definitely more natural ginger than I've had before and a smidge patchy :/

Deep moisture treatment and touch up undercut (tomorrow)

Eat second half of harvest bowl thing (fuck it wine time)

Heavy handed skin care routine since I've not moisturized 3 out of the last five days and my face feels sad (half way done w/ mask and nuface routine (don't look at me it was a post surgery gift and i like the way it soothes my need to be hyper in control) I'll finish the rest post salt bath)

Salt bath with added vapor salts for pain and wheezies

Take all your bedtime meds by 9 if we can manage it so they have time to marinate

Stretches (unlock your back and realign your hips i think one slipped yesterday)

Bed before 12am (audiobook only)

[my-whumpy-little-heart]

Kneecap Day - Floyd

(better title TBD) This piece is in celebration of two different events! First of all: happy kneecap day to @brutal-nemesis! Thank you for the inspiration this event has given so many of us. Second of all: this is my happy anniversary piece to the Persistence series, which I posted the first part of last year on this date! I seriously can’t believe this story has been in progress for so long already, and thank you to all of you who have supported me through it. Alright. Without further ado, here’s the masterlist for everything else, and this happens further in the future than anything I’ve already written, the closest being the branding. 

Content warnings: creepy/intimate whumper, suggestions and implications of dehumanization (not quite the purpose, but just to be safe), dislocated joints and realigning them, starvation mentions, and general cruelty and unfairness. ————————————

Mud splattered all across Floyd’s backside when he collapsed from the sheer dizzying force of the slap.

“You get on your knees when you’re told,” Percival snarled, leaning over him and pulling on the leash as he scrambled to sit up. “There is no hesitation. There is no unspoken question. There is no disobedience. A direct order is to be followed immediately, you understand?”

“Aah, I understand- I understand I just- sir, please, the ground is muddy here-”

“Do you think I’d tell you to kneel if I didn’t know what the consequences would be?” A tilt of the head, a rhetorical question.

“I was- I was acting in your best interest, I promise,” Floyd shuddered at his words, but he couldn’t risk anything else. This was his decision to obey, get off easy for the time being, make it through this as quickly as possible, and minimize the consequences when it was finally over.

“You think you know better than I do now, Benedict?” Percival smiled, humor dancing in his eyes. “Oh, dear, I know you’re not that stupid.”

“No! I… these clothes are- they’re so nice, I wanted to show you- I- I’m-” He couldn’t spit out the ‘grateful’ fast enough, but his tormentor understood well enough.

“And yet you’ve gone and ruined them.” Percival sounded disappointed and Floyd flushed in embarrassment, but there was something else in there too. Frustration stirred at the unfairness of it all.

“I’m sorry!” He really was.

“If you loved them so much then maybe you should’ve steadied yourself after a single slap.” 

“You- you ha-aven’t let me eat in three days! What did you expect?!” Anger seeped into Floyd’s voice, but he couldn’t be bothered to stop it. Percival bristled at the change in tone.

“I expected a little more respect toward the hand that chooses to feed,” he snapped, “especially since allowing you to kneel would have been a generous mercy, had you taken the opportunity. I’m sure neither of us wanted you to collapse today, and yet here we are.” 

“Maybe I wouldn’t have fallen if you actually gave a single damn about me!” Floyd yelled, voice cracking around the curse he knew he shouldn’t have said.

“Oh? You don’t think I care for you, is that it?” Venom pooled in Percival’s words. He sank down, straddling Floyd’s chest and letting his own knees sink into the mud. A rough hand cupped his cheek. 

“I… I-”

“I’ve taught you more about yourself than you ever could have figured out on your own. I found the potential within you that you never could. I am making you, Benedict Floyd.” He paused as the man in question shuddered against his grip. “Don’t you think that’s caring enough?”

Before he could even register the tension, Floyd snapped. He smacked Percival’s hand off his face, shoving frantic elbows into his chest and kicking wildly until he slid free, scrambling back as far as the leash would allow. Even then he pulled back against it, settling into an unsteady crouch and meeting Percival’s eyes again. 

He saw the mounting fury there held back by careful patience, but Floyd wouldn’t have been able to hold himself back even without that hesitancy. Words bubbled up and spilled forth faster than he could find the strength to control them. 

“Right, right, because that’s all you see me as, isn’t it? I’m s-something for you to control, to teach, to- to parade around like-” he sobbed, unable to breathe or speak for several seconds, “-parade like a fucking- fucking animal, and you’re so goddamn proud of yourself-”

“Hey now, I-” Percival warned, and Floyd cut him off.

“You do not get to make me. You don’t- don’t deserve to make me. You don’t know me, you never even tried to- to- to talk to me... you saw the potential I had and... decided that’s all that I am.

“I have tried- so hard to find myself. Have you- have you ever lost yourself before? Have you been told that your body is not your own, you are worth only as much as you can work, you are not worth the investment of basic necessities, and- and- you don’t understand. It took years to understand I could be something. Something more than what I was made to be. I took the time, I-I found my truth, I had only just begun living it, and I spent far too long lost in my own mind to just let you pull me under again.

“You hurt and hurt and hurt and you say I’m learning, that I’m- I’m better off, that I’m good for you! The only thing I’ve fucking learned here is how much hurt I can bear before I black out, how hard you can push me before I break! 

“...you... you broke me, Percival, sir. Is that what you want to hear? Is that what you want from me? Do you- do you want to know that you’re the one person who has hurt me the most, finally pushed past my limits? 

“F-fine, then. Look at the mark you burned into my chest and know that everything you’ve done has broken me beyond belief, and- and you’ll probably do it all over again and I can’t stop you. But when all is said and d-done, don’t you fucking dare believe for a second that you built me.”

.

..

...the world held still for a few, blissful moments where Floyd felt good. Percival’s eyes narrowed and he did not turn away, did not flinch, did not fall to his knees. 

Percival approached and Floyd rose shakily to his full height, swaying with the dizziness that took him, but standing his ground. When he came face to face with his captor, craning his neck up to see him fully, Floyd didn’t step back up against the wall waiting for him. He didn’t have to. 

Percival shoved him up against it himself, a hand on his forehead to keep his head grinding painfully against the bricks while the other held him in a choking embrace, pulling the leash down between his shoulder blades. 

“Hmm, such a pity. You could have looked so much prettier for your backslide. If only...”

“What-hgk!” A jerk on the leash silenced him as Percival kept on, anger darkening his tone.

“Did you really think all that just now was how you’d been this entire time? Just a free spirit locking himself up of his own will until he could run free again? I didn’t see you slipping shackles over your wrists or heating the brand of your own free will, did you?

“None of this has been a choice for you, Benedict. You fail to see that just because you didn’t recognize something doesn’t mean I didn’t do it. And you have to understand that, no matter what you think, if you aren’t controlling my actions, then you aren’t in control. I broke you, yes, but I’ve also built you up in ways you will only realize when they come to fruition. And when they finally do, you will thank me for what I’ve done.”

“Fff-fuck you,” Floyd sputtered, a last, hateful resort.

“...in any case, I’m not sure you’re even worthy of kneeling at my feet right now.”

Percival’s foot connected with his knee and it buckled immediately. Floyd gasped and fell, but the leash held his limp body up as Percival kicked again, repeatedly smashing metal toes into his battered knees. Pain tore up his leg, flaring with each subsequent kick and suddenly something was wrong. A sickening pop ricocheted through his body, and his vision went white when the next kick did the same to his other leg. He couldn’t scream, he couldn’t breathe, but he was finally allowed to crumple to the ground. 

A hand in his hair righted him, briefly him leaning forward on bent knees that he could hardly feel through the blinding agony. Percival was saying something that he couldn’t hear over his own screams, throwing him on his back and holding him down by his shoulders as he writhed.

“Stop, stop stop- hAAAHH! Off, get off get off it HURTS!”

He felt hands on his legs, pulling them flat against his struggles until he went limp and darkness nearly claimed him. Floyd faded in and out of consciousness, gasping for breath around whimpers and cries, somehow finding the energy to shake his head when Percival ordered him to submit. 

A foot smashed down on his knee and he lost himself in the pain, coming to when a cold touch smacked across his cheek. Percival’s muddy hand smoothed back over it--that was certainly going to bruise at this rate--forcing a shiver through him.

“Nnh, nnhhh-“ he groaned, still weakly trying to throw off the people holding him down. 

“Really?” Percival sounded so far away now. “Are you really going to throw away all our progress just like that? Just for some sad, prideful ideal?”

“Wh- hhhhnn… what progress?”

“Oh come now, you can’t deny all the work we’ve done with you. You said it yourself already. I broke you, and I’ll do it again.”

“Yehh- yes, I- but- hhhhh-“

“My darling Benedict,” Percival said, voice in his ear now, a low murmur that made his blood run cold, “I don’t think you understand the predicament you’re in right now. I could leave you like this, you know: leave you to starve with your legs twisted completely out of place, and make sure nobody will ever find you. I could ruin your legs permanently, drag you everywhere else for the rest of your miserable life. I could make this so, so much worse. Is that what you want?”

Floyd almost forced himself to nod, but he was trembling in fear, breath hitching at the mere thought of anything like that…

“Y-you wouldn’t.” He made himself to swallow down cries, slur out weak defenses. “Would nhh- would never. Like me too much f’r that.”

“Oh, I bet I could stop liking you long enough to get the job done. Don’t doubt that, sweetheart.” A warning in a teasing, lilting tone. Floyd was too out of it to even question if that was the truth. “I’ll ask again. Will you submit to me and take back those words, or will you accept one of my many alternatives?”

Tears slipped from the corners of his eyes as he squeezed them shut, lips pressed together to hold back the refusal on the tip of his tongue. 

“I… I’ll s-submit, sir.”

Percival didn’t give a response, humming affirmingly and running a wet hand through Floyd’s hair, the other still resting firmly on his shoulder.

“Emil,” he called out to one of his crew members, probably nearby, probably one of the ones holding Floyd down, “how are you feeling?”

He slipped out of coherence again before he could catch the other man’s response, only vaguely aware of the people moving and shifting around him to make room, the person crouching over his legs, placing careful hands on his knees, feeling the dislocation in each one. 

Floyd snapped back to consciousness when he felt a strong presence grip his knee, a horrible sensation that became a grinding, moving pain until something clicked. The pain died down immediately, now only a throbbing soreness. The invasion left for a minute and he basked in the slight relief. Then it was back in his other knee, moving, pushing against his will, and snapping into place again. Floyd let out a shaking sigh, the effects radiating through him so much more bearable than what they had been just previously.

“Thh- thank-” Floyd snapped his mouth shut, finally registering what he was about to say on instinct. He was too slow, though, as he heard Percival’s delighted laugh above him.

“Only proving my point for me, Benedict. Come on, we’ve still got plenty to get done today. We’ll continue this conversation later. In private.” The twinkling smile as Percival pulled Floyd to his shaking feet was as comforting as a threat, and it really might as well have been one at that point.

Floyd tilted his head into the hand settled over the back of his neck, rubbing right under the collar where the feeling was near heavenly, and tried to pretend it was a choice. 

He wasn’t sure he’d be able to live with himself otherwise.

————————————

Tag list, ask to be added or removed!

@whump-tr0pes, @burtlederp, @castielamigos-whump-side-blog, @doitforthewhump, @shameless-whumper, @endless-whump, @theycomeinthrees, @faewhump, @lonesome--hunter, @insanitywishes, @ohmywhump, @deluxewhump​, @galaxywhump, @liliability, @whump-only

[pigtownchronicles]

Chapter 1.6 - The VIP

For Samuel, the coke had kicked in, the floor, the air, the bodies around him were all thrumming with energy and rhythm, and he was swept elsewhere for a time. It didn’t bother him that he’d lost track of Barry--his ex was such a square. It was clear that Barry missed him and the scene and he wondered what he could have had if the two of them had stuck it out, but as Samuel had told him when they broke up, there was no real future between them. They existed in totally different realms, on different layers of reality. There would never be a place for either of them in the other’s world--not without a substantial change for one of them, something neither was really willing to do. Dennis was a bore, but if Barry liked that, and he’d liked it enough to marry it, good for him. Samuel didn’t understand it at all, but knowing how much Dennis made, and how Barry had always thirsted for a climb up the corporate ladder, maybe for the right price, you could like anything, really.

It was fun, getting back together on occasion though. Samuel got bored easily--of his art, of his patrons, of his boyfriends. He thought about going to find Parker, but that was beginning to bore him as well. Sure, he was hot. Sure, he could fuck. But he couldn’t hold a conversation for more than a minute without losing track of it, and as hot as his body was, his steroid habit was taking the fun out of sex for them both, since his dick couldn’t get hard. Probably time to cut that off soon, he supposed, but there was still a little fun to squeeze out before parting ways, and moving on to someone else.

He was coming down a bit, the music was slowing, the smell of the dance floor was becoming a little more ripe than he usually liked, and he allowed himself to be washed up on the edge, damp and breathing hard, but exhilarated for the moment. He made his way towards the patio for another drink, and maybe another bump from Hugh, but before he got there, a bouncer came over and stepped in front of him.

“Pardon me, Mr. Boone? Samuel Boone?”

He stopped short and looked around. “Me? How do you know my name?”

“I have a member in the VIP lounge who would like you to join him for a moment,” the bouncer said, avoiding the question.

Samuel hadn’t even been aware that Depot had a VIP lounge. “I mean...sure. Did he say why?”

“Follow me,” the bouncer said, and they headed for a corner of the room, off to one side from the stage, which Samuel had always assumed was a blank wall. In fact, there was a hallway that wound deeper into the building, until it came to a red lit junction. There was the break room for the staff ahead, and to the left a velvet rope. Not a very attractive VIP area. The bouncer unhooked the rope, and they ended up climbing a flight of stairs to the upper level, where the old overseer’s area of the building had been converted into a rather cozy bar above the stage. There were a dozen or so men there, most of them sprawled out on something between a bed and a pile of pillows, engaged in rather slow, methodical sex. To Samuel, it looked like acid sex. The bouncer didn’t give the orgy much of a look, but took Samuel over to the short bar, where an older fellow in a well tailored suit was sitting, sipping a cocktail. He turned on the stool and his dark grey eyes lit up. “Ah! I had heard we had an emerging artist in the building. Welcome, my name’s Rod,” he said, getting up and extending his hand, “Have a seat, won’t you?”

Samuel did, and the bartender set the drink he’d been mixing in front of him--the same he’d ordered earlier when he’d walked in, but with top shelf liquor this time. “Alright, this is a bit strange. How did you know I was here? And how did you know to make this?”

Ron motioned to an alcove behind the bar, where there were a number of television screens, all of them broadcasting the activities of the folks below. Most of them were focused on the...seedier corners and corridors where the sex was happening, but there were also a few at the entrance, and the patio. Enough to collect intel, if necessary. “Perhaps it seems invasive, but I want my guests to have a good time. A little supervision goes a long way towards letting my team deal with bad actors.”

“I see,” Samuel said.

“Now, I must apologize, I wanted to attend your event earlier this evening, but my work here takes precedence. I saw your art when I passed the gallery earlier this week, and was rather mesmerized. You have a spectacular eye, you know. A little more development, and I believe you would be a singular talent. When I recognized you on the screen, I knew I needed to see you this evening, and had my bouncers keep an eye out.”

It sounded like flattery, and it probably was, but Samuel didn’t mind it. That didn’t mean he didn’t want something from him, probably a discount. “Anything piece that particularly struck you?”

“Untitled number 13. I purchased it on sight.”

Samuel had been alerted to the sale, to an anonymous buyer. He was impressed, that piece was sizable, and quite expensive. “Well, if you’d wanted to meet me, why the anonymous purchase? For someone with eyes everywhere, you seem to keep a double standard for yourself.”

“Ah, well, perhaps you’re right. But wealth does afford you a measure of hypocrisy, I’ve found,” Rod said, reached over, grabbed hold of Samuel’s jaw, and turned his face towards his own. Their eyes met, and The grey shade of them struck Samuel again, like clouds rolling on a day before a storm, threatening rain or snow, and then he snapped away, something like a zap passing between them, making Samuel blink and his eyes water.

“Fuck, what the hell?” Samuel said, rubbing his eyes.

“My apologies, again,” Rod said. “I mostly wanted to meet you so that I might extend an offer. Patronage, you could say. A monthly stipend and a studio. No strings really, I merely ask that your next project be focused here, on Pigtown.”

That was a lot of money for someone to hand over, with so few conditions. He was suspicious, but also tempted. What starving artist wouldn’t be? 

“Look, give it some thought--the offer is open, no deadline,” Rod said, and passed him a business card with his contact information on it.

“Thanks, I’ll give it some thought.”

“Now, maybe you’d be so kind as to step in with your boyfriend in the bathroom? That is right, isn’t it? He seems to be...escalating, and I would prefer you manage it, rather than one of my bouncers.”

“What?” Samuel said. Rod pointed to one of the monitors, currently showing the bathroom, where Parker had a young man bent over the sink, fucking him rather...roughly. “God damn it...” Samuel muttered.

“Thank you, and do consider my offer, won’t you?”

“Sure thing,” Samuel said, and followed the bouncer back downstairs to the bar proper. He’d seen Hugh and Parker go off talking, before hitting the dance floor with Barry. Those two, probably some fucking experimental shit he’d have to talk him down from--again. Where the fuck did Hugh keep getting that shit from? Why did he even care? He paused for a moment, considering just letting things sort themselves out instead...but already, he could feel his priorities realigning, after that offer of patronage. Rod had asked him to do it--and that made it feel like a test. A silly test, certainly, but Samuel also knew full well he was being watched this moment. It made him feel dirty. With a scowl, he set off for the bathrooms. The sooner he got Parker out of here, the sooner he could get out too, and think about all of this with a clear head.

***

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[epicstuckyficrecs]

Post Endgame Fic Rec!

So at the time I’m making this post, I haven’t seen Endgame yet (but it’s out in certain parts of the world), but I imagine that what everybody will want after watching it is either 1) to pretend it never happened, or 2) some fluff (I tried to keep it to fics posted in the last year since I already did a fluff fic rec after IW). So here goes! Enjoy!

(* besides the ones I’ve read)

Infinity War fix-it

*still here by wearing_tearing (1,8K): Steve wipes the dust off his face.

*To Never Have Loved At All by hitlikehammers (3K): Steve will say they had work to do, and a universe to put to rights. They had people to find and hearts to unbreak. They had a mission. There was no time for any of them to mourn. Steve, as it turns out, says a lot of things that are mostly bullshit.

Beyond the Burn by eyres (7K): Steve saves the universe - but it takes him awhile to be okay again.

This is the Perfect Time to Panic by Brokenpitchpipe, emij1s (8K): Finding the infinity stones and restoring half the universe is the boring part. The fun part comes next.

*watch them rolling back by napricot (17K): Bucky was just here, he was right here. This can’t be all that’s left. Well, it’s not all that’s left, not quite. There, in the pile of ash that used to be Bucky Barnes, already drifting to scatter across the soil of Wakanda, to dissipate in the air, to be nothing but dust on Steve’s hands and in his gasping mouth and in his lungs—left there, in that ash and dirt, are his gun, and his left arm, gleaming dully in the sunshine.

Realignment by amethystkrystal (24K): After assembling their own Infinity Gauntlet, the Avengers defeated Thanos and brought back everyone who disappeared. But their victory came at a great cost: in order to take the Soul Stone, Steve had to sacrifice the Captain America mantle and all the super-soldier strength that came with it. Small and sickly again, Steve’s poor health soon reaches a breaking point and his last option is a difficult surgery only Shuri and her team can perform. But not all hurts can be fixed with medicine, and the real healing begins after the operation -- when Bucky asks Steve to stay in Wakanda with him.

*Endless War by Nonymos (27K): There is always something more to lose. (Which means all is not lost.)

At Times I Almost Dream by LadyC (29K): When Thanos snapped his fingers, he split the universe into two – one where half the population had been erased from existence, another where the other half had. As both sets of Avengers will learn, the divide between the worlds is thinner for those who share a particular type of connection…

*might never be normal again (but who cares) bynapricot (WIP, 3/4, 36K): All things considered, Steve thought he’d handled the whole Thanos killing half the universe thing and the ensuing bitter, desperate quest to defeat him pretty well. Sacrificing his super soldier serum to use one of the Infinity Stones wasn't a problem either, not when it meant getting back the half of the universe they'd lost, and especially not when it meant getting Bucky back. But retirement and finally confessing his feelings for Bucky? Those were proving to be more challenging.

Dismantle The Sun by hitlikehammers (WIP, 19/20, 56K): This is the way the world ends: with a bang, and a whimper, plus a snap. And yet—between realities and quantum vagaries and heartbreak and that foolish not-just-human penchant toward hope—even that wasn't the end of their stories. Not even close.

Fluff

*I [Heart] You by writeonclara (1,1K): “Steve’s been hit with a curse,” Natasha said. She said it calmly, so Bucky didn’t immediately go flying out of the apartment to tear apart the Tower in search of Steve. “Of course he has,” he said. He felt, abruptly, exhausted. “What is it?” “It might be easier just to show you.”

*Boeuf Mystère by galwednesday (1,2K): “Quick question,” Bucky said. Steve looked up, but didn’t stop moving passports and stacks of cash into a nondescript blue duffel, his mind busily ticking through logistics. He’d grab the glock taped behind the hidden drawer in the desk on their way out, and they could buy new clothes once they got across the border into neutral territory, so they didn’t need much else, apart from whatever Bucky wanted to bring. One duffle should be enough. “Yeah, honey?” “What the fuck.”

*Blank and Silent by Kellyscams (1,6K): Without any words on his wrist, Steve Rogers is sure he'll never find his soulmate. But fate might have some different plans for him.

*Check, Mate? by talkplaylove-art (talkplaylove), wearing_tearing (2K): A notification from Check, Mate? blinks back at him. Steve’s heart speeds up when he opens the app and then his face breaks into a blinding grin when sees what’s waiting for him. James likes him back.

*Just About Half-Past Ten by rohkeutta (2K): But as he reaches Madison Avenue, Stark Tower a mere block away, the skies open with a whoosh, and he barely manages to duck under the construction scaffolding perched over the sidewalk. Thunder rumbles overhead, and Bucky frantically checks every compartment of his bag for an umbrella he knows is there. It’s not. He does find some loose glitter, though, and a lipstick he wore for Pride and had thought he’d lost, plus a spare Metro Card he can’t remember buying. He also gets a crystal clear flashback of leaving the umbrella under his desk to dry yesterday morning, and never picking it up again.

*One for Fiction by thepinupchemist (6K): In the heart of a modern library, children's librarian Bucky Barnes meets his match in the form of the new barista: Steve Rogers. He doesn't think there's any way his crush could be requited -- but sometimes librarians don't know everything.

*A Little Sparkle by roe87 (7K): "What about that guy in accounting?" Natasha mused. "Billy, Buddy, or...?" "Bucky," Steve said, knowing who she meant. "Lip piercing, right?" "Yeah! He's cute." "Yeah," Steve agreed hesitantly, then added, "but I'm not ready for that."

*A World That Makes Such Wonderful Things by stevergrsno (noxlunate) (8K): In which Steve is a mermaid, Bucky's a werewolf, and as always, they fall for each other.

*Found: One Bicycle by gracie137 (8,7K): Bucky Barnes posted in Overheard at Middlebury College: Hello fellow students! Basically in my drunken stupor last night I came across a bicycle. Being rather intoxicated and far from home I decided the logical thing to do was ride it back. I can assure you all that both me and the bike survived this adventure and are in perfect condition!! I now however have no use for for said vehicle and have realised that someone is probably pretty upset about having lost it. Anyway, if you can correctly identify the bike’s make and colour, slide into my DMs and I promise to return it to you!! Thanks for the ride xoxo

*Kiss me and take off your clothes by steveandbucky (10K): Steve Rogers is dared to send a dick pic to a blog which critiques dick pics (run by none other than Bucky Barnes). Hilarity ensues.

*before we can breathe easy by belovedmuerto (22K): No one touches Steve. Bucky sets out to do something about that.

*Roll Out the Red Carpet by Lorien, Quarra, talkplaylove-art (talkplaylove) (29K): The premiere for Steve Rogers' newest Captain America movie was just around the corner, and Steve knew it was going to be a hit. The big downside was that he had to have a date. The last several times he'd brought someone to an event like this, things had ranged from unpleasant to disastrous. In a last ditch effort to get out of taking someone that might make his night hell, Steve went on Twitter and invited the Winter Soldier to be his plus one. The Soldier was an international fugitive, and currently wanted for a series of high profile attacks on corrupt businessmen. Since every person the Soldier attacked was involved in some truly vile criminal activity, the public loved him, despite his crimes. Inviting him to the premiere was the perfect cop out. There was no way he was ever going to show. Right?

*The Twilight Bark (And Other Things Bucky Has To Deal With On A Daily Basis) by spacebuck (36K): Steve Rogers: I couldn’t say no to this little guy, so I guess he’s coming home with me! The picture below it is an overexcited looking dog, barely older than six months, shoving its nose through the bars of a shelter gate. The tweet already has twenty thousand retweets, a few thousand more likes, and nearly three thousand comments. Bucky can’t help himself, leads in hand, and he leans a shoulder against the doorjamb and taps the comment field. bbarnes: if you’re ever in need of a walker I’d be happy to take the lil guy on, nyc based and rescues are my thing!

[letstalksymphogear]

Symphogear, EP. 5 (Cont.)

Tsubasa ruminates about her current situation in her Symphogear Brand Safety Capsule of Absolute Dunces.

“aight ive done seen the light lemme at that sweet, sweet taco bell”

Meanwhile, some old ass politicians rumble about Relics.

“im old.”

But they immediately get fucked up in a nasty car accident.

As it turns out, the Americans were waiting to intercept these old crones to steal The Goods.

And holy fuck are they are American. Personally, I feel the writers of Symphogear watched Die Hard and immediately went “these people are fucking animals”. That’s just me, though.

“ooh ouch oh mmm ouchie ouch oooo ouch”

They tear into these people with an almost machine like efficiency.

These people don’t fuck around. There’s a strange surreality around it given that this is honestly pretty accurate to how brutal special operatives can be, but the Japanese accent they have in their English voices is... a bit jarring.

“IM BACK FROM THE MALL, YA’LL”

“oh god she’s back”

“ah, ryoko. as per your lingo, quote, ‘i like your new gucci boots... bitch’ was that good? im not fond at cursing at women unless its a mutual training session”

Genjuro alerts that the Minister of Defense for Japan has just been assassinated.

“shits bad”

Conveniently... Ryoko’s phone was broken. In her defense, it’s 2012. Battery life didn’t have the bragging rights it had now for phone.

“i personally use a razer flip phone. those will never go out of style!”

Ryoko manages to show them the box the Americans were trying to get. Suspiciously...

There’s a bloodstain on it.

So the main struggle right now is that the Bad Guys(tm) want to get their hands on Durandal, which is a completed relic that is hidden away miles underneath the school in the 2nd Division Labs.

This musty, old, shitty sword has immense power. Almost Godlike.

“hey why dont we just use the sword to beat up the bad guys”

The sword was handed from the EU to Japan for Japan to safekeep, and in exchange to forgive some of the loans the EU owed Japan should the EU economy collapse.

How topical.

“i read a lot of beserk and honestly im pretty sure someone beats up the bad guys with that dumb sword”

“listen nerd, we’re not doing that dumb weeb anime shit. we’re taking this sword to a vault to the bottom of parliament.”

“thats right. who needs anime when you’ve got nicholas cage.”

And so, they plotted to deliver this dumb sword tomorrow.

Ryoko logs into Runescape.

Fun fact: Fulcanelli is a reference to this dude, who was a French alchemist whose identity nobody really knows. Alchemy is a concept that will come up during GX that has no relevance whatsoever during these first 2 seasons except in some passerby jargon. This as just a cute thing I wanted to point out.

You know, that’s a pretty sexy sword upon closer examination.

“thats the dark souls of swords”

“ah! a fellow gamer! im glad that you too partake of the souls of darkening. would you like to play a two player match somtime, fellow Gamer?”

“I would genuinely rather eat shit for the rest of my life!”

The scene ends. Alright, where are n-

Oh God we’re back to this bullshit. Okay then.

Miku, reasonably, is upset that her wife is gone for several hours for increasingly sketchy reasons. Much like an estranged wife going to see her “tennis instructor” for “private tennis lessons” in the “safety of their house, which has a tennis court”, Miku is worried that Hibiki is a liar liar, pants on fire.

Nose the size of a wire.

Hibiki, feeling the fear of God, quickly bails this increasingly tense situation.

Miku is suffering, and so am I with this hamfisted writing.

“you didnt even try the cookies i made out of frustration for you. i designed them all after me with increasingly angrier faces”

“im too young for a divorce. fuck, those cookies smelled good”

Hibiki decides to not sweat it anymore, opening a magazine and WHOA WHAT THE FUCK

WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS I DONT REMEMBER THIS WHEN DID HIBIKI GET HER HANDS ON THIS OH MY GOD

“HELL NO IM MARRIED THE DEVIL CANNOT TEMPT ME”

Hibiki closes it up to reveal the relevant part of this magazine.

This is subtle, but it’s basically a vehicle to explain how things are covered up for Symphogears. Ogawa walks in, talking about how this headline was his doing.

“i wasn’t joking when i said we were literally the NSA”

Hibiki is happy that Tsubasa has been freed from Metaphor Limbo, having escaped the Water Metaphor Dimension back into real life.

“she literally wont stop talking about taco bell and honestly its killing me inside”

“shit ill get her some”

Ogawa does some schpiel about teamwork and asks Hibiki for an idea on what to do with Tsubasas image even though he’s supposed to be the manager and it’s just general prattle.

Everyone gets briefed about the delivery. Ryoko’s soccer mom van sticks out like a sore thumb. Nobody on the Lydian campus asks why there are 5 cars outside the building with men in suits and fucking Hibiki standing there with them why are these children so fucking incurious.

“this feels like the world’s most important weed delivery, but im going to deliver the SHIT out of that weed”

“hibiki please its not weed”

“ALRIGHT FAM LETS DELIVER THE SHIT OUT OF THIS WEED”

Big thick black cars surround Ryoko’s tiny vehicle as they all drive in unison to the drop point.

No fucking around here. The weed must be delivered.

The weed? Secured as shit.

“its not fucking weed it’s a goddamned french sword okay god”

“ROAD’S LOOKIN’ A-OKAY FOR OUR WEEEED DRIIIIIIVE”

PSYCHE, NO IT AINT. ROAD’S CRACKING UP HARD. COMES APART, CAR FUCKING EXPLODES!

“oh my god we seriously arent fucking around here those guys are fucking dead”

“bruh you never delivered weed before? that shit happens all the time”

“anyway grab on to something ‘cause we’re gonna initial d this shit”

“i thought we were delivering WEED not SUSHI”

“WEED... SUSHI... IT’S ALL FUCKING METAPHORS, HIBIKI. AND WE’RE GONNA DELIVER EM!”

“now ORDER UP, MOTHERFUCKER”

Every car is destroyed.

Ryoko flips the car like nobody’s business.

“ryoko! the kansai drift was too strong!”

“your delivery’s late, pal. that’s gonna have to come out of your tip.”

“jokes on you! you already paid the tip beforehand online!”

“oh, we’re going with pizza jokes now? is that what we’re doing? yeah, sure, whatever”

Unfortunately, Chris ordered her pizza with meat, extra crispy.

“FUCK, i cant see anything. now i don’t know if they have the weed- i mean, the sushi- er, the pizza- god i hate all these JOKES”

RYOKO SUMMONS A FUCKING SHIELD OUTTA NOWHERE WHILE HIBIKI’S KNOCKED OUT COLD

“yo hol’ up a moment did this pervert manage to summon a shield”

“are- are you able to fight the noise? are you fucking kidding me? this entire time when literal children were fighting these battles, you literally could have fought back effectively? are we but mere playthings to you? is this really the bullshit im seeing?”

“uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh i can only make shields. piss shields, out of piss”

“that is absolute fucking bullshit”

“but i believe it.”

Hibiki has primed her fists and is about to show how much she’s improved combat wise, which is actually a lot.

Nevermind, she tripped again. Turns out, Symphogears fight in heels constantly, which is absolutely fucking horrifying. Hibiki realizes this, and then

FUCKING BREAKS THE HEELS LIKE NOBODY’S BUSINESS.

AND THEN SHE WRECKS SHOP WITHOUT BREAKING A GODDAMN SWEAT

“oh shit how the fuck did she improve this quickly”

The suitcase where the sword is stored opens up. That means it’s activating.

Immediate fear.

“alright bruce lee you mightve mastered a thousand kicks but you better change your gameplan because im about to realign that pretty little face of yours”

“thank god you kicked me. needed you to get closer so i could kick your ass, after all”

The fucking suitcase, I shit you not, pops open immediately with the sword flipping to the sky like a bad Gmod toy as it suddenly stays floating, perfectly still.

“ive officially lost track on what the hell is happening”

The sword just floats there, as a sword does.

“you know how many fried turkeys i can cut open with that bad boy? that shits mine now.”

Chris goes to get it.

“fuck you! im going to slice HONEYBAKED HAMS with that sword!”

Hibiki intercepts it and takes the sword.

Now Hibiki becomes a proud Stand owner, having acquired the power of The World and stopping time at will.

“oooooh holy shit”

Hibiki, now channeling the power of Durandal, feels the raw strength of a completed relic all through her body.

Real spicy stuff running through her veins.

The power unleashing itself into a raw stream of piss skyrocketing into the stratosphere.

“the pizza has been delivered... all according to plan...”

“...she was right. honeybaked ham was the superior meat to slice...”

Hibiki is channeling a power source so ancient, so powerful, that through using her as a conduit, the sword actually finishes itself into its full, completed form.

Holy shit, Hibiki.

Goddamn. That’s a really sexy sword, actually! Pretty nice...

...oh.

You’re not looking so hot, pal...

“why is it that every opponent of mine can literally asspull all this garbage and im stuck here looking like a bad kamen rider villian getting my ass kicked every time. its not fair.”

Ryoko looks extremely hyped for this event. Maybe a little too much so.

“MAN FUCK THIS NONSENSE IM PUTTING AN END TO THE SUPER SENTAI POWERUP”

“O-OH FUCK- uh, i didnt say that. totally swear. you uh, keep doing that. yeah. aha.”

“SLICED...”

“...HONEYBAKED...”

“oh god. oh god. im sorry. im sorry. im so sorry. oh fuck im so sorry. honeybaked ham is better. fuck turkeys. fuck drumlegs. fuck any sort of fried meat. honeybaked ham is better please im begging you dont vore me or slice me in half IM BEGGING YOU OH GOD”

“...HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM!”

“ham..... mmmmm... honeybaked ham....”

“WHO YELLED ABOUT HAM? god, im hungry now.”

Hibiki wakes up from it all after passing out, expressing a power of magnitudes unheard of, as if it were all a bad dream.

“YEAH THATS RIGHT WE HAD TO DELIVER THE WEED PIZZA AND I WANTED HAM AND- THE SWORD, YEAH! THE SWORD!”

To her disappointment, amongst this wanton destruction, no ham was found. Ryoko clues her in that Hibiki just single handedly completed a relic, and though the entire place is a mess, the mission wasn’t a complete failure. They’ll just have to return the relic back to base, now the entire location is, conveniently, destroyed.

“yeah yeah. the weed made it. the sushi made it. the pizza made it. what didnt we deliver today?”

“...”

“singing really does make you hungry, huh?”

[howlsmovinglibrary]

If you wouldn’t mind, I’d love to hear your Jaime Lannister rant! I’m more of a book fan myself but I did watch this last season and it was just so profoundly disappointing to watch them ruin a great redemption arc because “well bad people are just bad forever that’s how it goes”. (I have heard he does some worse stuff in the show than in the books, and that he never really broke from Cersei in the same way, but still).

Invite me to unload my broken JaimexBrienne shipper heart, anon? I don’t mind if I do!

Answer under the cut, because again, LONG POST. (with spoilers)

So, my personal theory behind how awfully and profoundly circular Jaime Lannister’s character development in the show turned out to be is just an extension of what’s already been confirmed before. From the very beginning of the TV show, Jaime Lannister was a much more liked character than he was in the books, from a much earlier point in the narrative. I think this is partly because, you know, fandom and hot antivillain men, but also because from what I gather the books deny you Jaime’s POV and his version of the events he’s been involved in for much longer, whereas the show’s omniscient viewpoint means you see much more sympathetic aspects of his character from the very beginning.

Whenever show!Jaime got too likeable, the writers would have him do something awful, often without source material as justification, to try and realign the audience’s sympathies and put him back on the villain side. Rather than doing the logical thing and leaning into it and therefore guaranteeing the support of your fanbase (I say this is ‘logical’ not from my shipper bias, but from the perspective of examining the way shows typically manipulate fandom - for instance Spike was such a fan favourite in Buffy that he basically got written into the show, and his entire redemption arc was just a very refined and appreciated form of fan pandering.)

When Jaime hurt and abandoned Brienne in the same episode that the ship was confirmed, I had an awful feeling this was exactly what the writers were trying to do: “oh shit, Jaime is going to die, because they made him a dickish, out-of-character thing to try at the immediate moment he became too likeable, and turn the audience against him so that they won’t riot at his tragic ending.”

Turns out I was right, but his tragic ending was way worse than I could ever imagine, because it was thoroughly pointless.

I’m sure there’s a lot of other people on this website that have much more textual backing for this, but Jaime should’ve killed Cersei. Or hell, Jaime should’ve been killed by Arya (the heartless murder assassin version of last season), and then Arya uses his face to kill Cersei, manipulating the queen’s greatest weakness against her. Anything that confirms Maggie the Frog’s prophecy about how Cersei will be killed by her younger brother, but subverting Cersei’s profound belief that it was always going to be Tyrion.

My personal theory was that Jaime was going to push Cersei out of a window - continuing the poetic justice streak within GoT where characters are killed in the ways they murdered others.  He would push her, she would grab for him, and he’d try and catch himself. But oh no! he’s got a metal hand! he can’t find purchase! and he also falls, tragically, to his death. Prophecy subverted but fulfilled, my favourite ship sunk (although Brienne, my queen, lives), BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY IN TERMS OF JAIME’S CHARACTER, redemption achieved.

But instead, Euron fucking Greyjoy (a hated, reviled character who is the embodiment of all the misogynistic gross crass violence certain writers use GoT as a means of getting away with) gets a triumphant kill, and Jaime goes back to Cersei, undoing seasons of him battling with a toxic relationship and learning that some things are more important than family, or in fact just learning that his sister in an abuser who he needs to escape. He doesn’t kill Cersei, but even worse, NO ONE kills Cersei. Cersei doesn’t even have agency in her own death! Instead she starts weeping, because we need to humanise our main villain in order to demonise Danaerys and in some way justify her crazy bananas arc (rather than, you know, through good writing), and she gets crushed by a building.

So yeah, I’m mad. I’m also mad that when JaimexBrienne becomes canon, it entails this weird feminising of Brienne, where she is ashamed of being a virgin in a faux medieval society where such things are to be prized above all in the nobility, after a career of confidently defying the attempts of others to make fun of how undesirable she is. I’m fine with the last shot of her character being her writing about Jaime, because yeah, my shipper heart twinged a little. But she didn’t write an entry about herself afterwards? About how she’s now not only the first female kingsguard, but the head of the kingsguard? Fucking wild. Terrible writing. Seven seasons wasted. Well done D&D.

[bluemoonpunch]

⭐ The External Alignment of Kim Namjoon - Oracle Reading

[The External Alignment of Kim Namjoon, born September 12, 1994 — Virgo. The External Alignment reading is designed to showcase an individual’s alignment with external energies such as Gods/Goddesses, Guides, or Guardians. For this reading, in particular, I use the Wisdom of the Oracle deck. This spread is an original design by me. This reading is being featured as part of the December BTS Overload event.]

This reading was performed on November 26, 2018.

Pre-Reading:

I was really hoping for more to come out with Namjoon’s reading, but things were actually pretty quiet compared to everyone else. There’s a good reason for that though. He’s integrating just like everyone else, but his conscious state is still being brought back up to speed in terms of connection and alignment. On my end, it seemed really complicated because there seemed to be a million things going on at once, but apparently, it’s being handled without him having to actually do much other than pay attention to how he himself is feeling. That’s it.

Right now there is a lot of open space around his energy and it’s almost like they’re literally prepping him to go through a rapid integration like Hoseok. They’re giving him room to work his shit out on a conscious level, but on an energetic and soul level things are being moved around and seeded for him to continuously nudge him in the right direction with his awareness and inner connection.

-full reading with photos under the cut-

Because there wasn’t really that much to look at or do while in his energy, I just focused on the physical sensation and even that was pretty clear. 

The breathing was very, very even and smooth. Body movements are very fluid and loose, almost like moving in slow motion. I was seeing this as thought being put into action, or very careful movements being made with a steady mind. I was a little confused by that and where exactly that sensation was coming from, but later on, I realized that that is what his Guides are currently trying to push towards him. Slowing down the mind and focusing on what he’s been doing will allow him to really zero in on where he had given up his control and will then allow him to take it back and move on with purpose.

I made a note as well that there could even be an awareness of the conscious disconnect from the Higher Self on some level.

While focusing on his energy I was seeing that he had this purple pulsing light coming from his head, it almost looked like a halo, but it was sitting around his head at ear level, so it was covering his eyes. That visual of him made it look like he was unconscious, which is a good representation of what his Higher Self is at right now. Not really unconscious, just integrating while there’s also conscious level shifts being handled by his Guides. This is what Yoongi’s Guides wanted him to do.

There was a lot of tension in the throat which is something I’ve gotten for him before. It was around the time that the Soul Body Healing started to manifest on a conscious level and he was starting to reconnect. His conscious mind gets very stimulated because if he’s connected he’s channeling almost constantly, and therefore really wants to talk to people, especially his audience. He wants to get things out into the open, express himself, and that’s mainly because what’s going through his head is stuff that’s going to help shift awareness and consciousness in tiny increments. So, he’s at that stage right now because of the integration as well as the conscious seeding.

Because I wasn’t really able to see or do anything in his energy I was going to tap out at this point, but before I could I got a visual of Namjoon standing in the middle of a river and there were these stepping stones at the surface. He was just standing on one and staring down at the water and he looked scared to be there, but like he was trying to build up the courage to take another step.

I had no fucking idea what that was but at the last second, I thought back to his and Jin’s relationship reading and how I saw Jin trying to deliver Water and Fire to Namjoon’s tree in preparation for an internal shift. 

So… I guess that’s what that was. It’s emotional purging, literally having all that past nonsense that got built up from literally handing his soul over to other people is being washed away. Like, he has to actually process it though, it’s not just going to disappear. That might be why he’s freaking out. He’s going to have to go back into a slightly self-loathing state in order to be critical of himself clear down to his very soul, and then from there rebuild very quickly.

I was shown with that that he will, in fact, immerse himself at some point though.

The last bit I saw for this as I was getting ready to close this out was that he’s building up a balance like his Higher Self is building up balance energetically and the whole build up thing is literally coming from the fact that they have to start from scratch. "They” being him, his Higher Self, and his Guides. 

Then I saw that Yoongi and Namjoon are actually working together, or they’re meant to be working in sync with each other to help the others, or to “pull them” along, but Namjoon is behind because of that disconnect and pretty much needing to remake his own conscious perception as a whole. Very interesting.

I guess Yoongi is meant to be anchoring in energy for all seven of them to shift internally while Namjoon is supposed to be triggering the conscious shifts, but obviously, he can’t do that until he himself has shifted on that level.

That also may be what Yoongi is waiting for as well. Just waiting for Namjoon to get his shit together before the world comes to an end, I guess.

I specifically asked to be shown what his core state is at the moment seeing as how it, to me, looked like he was unconscious, and this is what I got. 

Quite a lot going on there but that’s exactly what I was getting in terms of how he has like a million things going on around him. In a sense, if you could imagine Namjoon to be anywhere in this layout, he’d be smack dab in the middle between Death, Judgment, The Emperor, and the 8 of Pentacles. He’s there, but he’s not there. That part of him is having a nap right now because this shit is exhausting.

Around him, all this stuff is happening in order to bring that conscious shift, and when that happens, the floodgates will open and he’ll get that rapid integration like Hoseok, only faster.

I’ll try to just summarize this nonsense real quick.

His Guides are connecting to his subconscious mind, which is the bridge between the conscious and the unconscious — unconscious being the seat of the Higher Self who is currently having a nap — and therefore are the primary driving force in this shift or clearing of the conscious mind. 

They are doing this, as I said, by pretty much just dropping bits and pieces of understanding towards his own relinquishing of control and his own disconnect from his inner knowing. They’re just presenting him with these ideas to get him thinking. They can’t just force him into knowing it, he has to figure it out on his own because, you know, free will and all that.

While that’s happening, there’s also this attempt to reconnect his inner knowing to his conscious awareness, so not only are they trying to get a reformed consciousness towards himself, they need him to also start establishing connection to the soul on a conscious level as well because that is where his understanding is towards his soul purpose. The loss of the soul connection was what made it possible for him to disconnect completely as that is what keeps his heart or passion in the forefront of his mind. 

Basically, he forgot why he started all this because he got freaked out about how big things were getting and just stopped trusting himself to be the one to create what he started viewing as their product rather than their message.

It was a whole thing.

So, all of that is kind of getting mushed together in the 8 of Pentacles where his Guides are literally working on him, like finetuning him just like the man in the image is perfecting his pentacle. The actual goal here is to get him back to the 3 of Wands where all that passion of the soul and understanding of his purpose is and bring Death, or transformation, to The Emperor.

...it’s a bit literal there. They’re killing off the idea that he can’t be his own authority when it comes to his work and his artistry.

Once that happens he’ll be at The Empress where integration will occur and he will sync up with Yoongi — mixing of the core energy after HS integration, so Water and Earth creating the fertile soil of The Empress — and then from there they will be emitting those frequencies just as I’ve mentioned in the past few readings in relations to the Sun.

Pretty intense shit, very confusing, but clearly they’re getting shit down, which is good.

The Reading:

Most Prominent External Influence:

Regeneration

The Fates

Lol, literally.

Just to repeat myself, his Guides are working on bringing him back to where he was and to realign with his soul purpose so they can get shit done again. 

The Regeneration card was a big thing for them before in the OT7 2018/2019 Outlook reading (the original one) and it was this whole thing about how they were supposed to start integrating the Higher Self, but they didn’t because of the whole Soul Body manipulation and Namjoon disconnecting the whole body from their source energy.

Here, this card is literally like they’re going backward, they’re backtracking in order to get him back in line with The Fates or his soul purpose. That’s why he has to actually process everything in a very emotional and not intellectual way, which is very hard for him to do when it’s his own shit he’s dealing with. He’s always got to turn everything into a learning experience, he can never just feel shit and move on.

So, yeah, pretty simple, they’re just working on getting him up to speed again.

Conscious Alignment: Blessed

I like how this is put because, obviously, when you think of someone being blessed you think of things being handed to them without really having to do anything, and that’s literally where he is on a conscious level. All he really has to do is think and align with what he himself, internally and in his heart, wants to do, and that’s it. Everything else is being handled for him.

His alignment is literally perfect, much better than Yoongi’s since Mr. Pisces Man Min Yoongi feels the need to hold up the sails in spite of the fact that they’ve got a whole crew manning their ship now, lol. Just by simply being aware and open to considering his own mistakes and where he may have dropped the ball on a few things is exactly what he needs to do and he’s doing it.

How The Alignment Manifests: Truth Be Told

This is just that shift in consciousness and awareness, and it could still point to him becoming consciously aware of his soul disconnect as well. I’m leaning more towards him not only seeing where he messed up but also seeing where other people, such as the company, also messed up.

The eyes of the owl were what I was really focused on in this card, so it’s really giving that vibe of him being able to see this shit, but probably not talking about it. Like, he’ll get it and he’ll act on it, but it’s not going to be this huge earth-shattering revelation. He’ll simply start seeing things from a slightly elevated perspective, just seeing the bigger picture.

How To Maintain The Alignment:

Milk and Honey

Peace

Both of these cards were in Yoongi’s reading and they’re both literally carrying the same energy. All he needs to do is take care of himself, be kind to himself, and not act in resistance to any of the shifts and reformations taking place on a conscious level. He just has to be the egg and sit there and let it happen. Simple as that.

Where Will This Alignment Lead:

Loyal Heart

Time To Go

These two cards came out together and as soon as they hit the table I wrote down, “act through the heart” which was what I got for Jin as well. 

All that jazz about Jin pretty much being handed the world as long as he acted from his heart, from his soul. It’s the same thing here with Namjoon. That reconnect will bring back that passion, that need to really run with what he feels the world needs to hear rather than what the masses want to hear.

Even with the owls in the image of Loyal Heart, it’s like the owl from the Truth Be Told card was able to see so clearly that it started to see itself. It’s staring at its own soul, working in tandem with the soul or Higher Self, and that is where his drive is. That is how he fulfills his purpose. 

Just like all of them, as long as they are acting from the heart, they are acting from the soul, and that is as simple and easy as it gets when it comes to fulfilling the soul purpose.

That’s all I have for this one, thanks for reading!

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[alifeiwishwasreal]

Dawn - G.W Oneshot

Character: George Weasley

Fandom: Harry Potter

Era: Golden Trio Era

Gender: Female

Info: Reader is of no particular house and a muggle-born. One year younger than the boys as requested.

Warnings: Swearing, fighting, injury.

Summary: You and George have the worst fight in the history of your friendship, leaving Fred to create a dodgy plan in order to get you back together again.

Requested by: Anon

You can remember the day your friendship with the twins was forever solidified in the history of Hogwarts. You were walking through the halls in second year, minding your own business as your friends had gone to lunch. You say friends lightly, more acquittances as you were a muggle-born, and in a particularly prejudice year, you found it hard to slot yourself into the wizarding community.

Then due to the stupidity of two third years, you found yourself covered in whipped cream from the kitchen. Peeves being the messenger that you'd be the culprit of the prank they'd left for Flitch.

Both came running up to you in the halls as an apology which you brushed off – but George convinced his brother that it was obvious she was upset about it. There began their personal mission to cheer you up – sitting with you at lunch, learning about your life, making sure you were out of the way of future pranks – which lead to the friendship you had today. They joke they're only with you out of obligation, but you three were the Musketeers.

Fred knew George was in love with you since you were in fourth year and he was in fifth. A year and a half later he was slowly losing his mind at the cycle his brother went through of wanting to be with you and then wanting to keep it a secret.

But all hell broke loose when the holy trinity was announced to be apart for a day.

"Jake asked me to go to Hogsmeade and I said yes."

"Jake? Tall Jake? Good-looking Jake?" Fred asked as George glared at him.

"Yes, don't sound so surprised." You joked going back to your book as George began to speak his mind.

"And why didn't you say no? Stop him flirting with you?" He asked as you looked up at him confused.

"Because he's nice and cute and I wanted to say yes."

"But we planned stuff this weekend." He insisted as you gave him an annoyed and pointed look.

"Then we'll do it next weekend."

"You don't need a boyfriend Y/N."

"You don't need to control my life, George."

"Can't help that you're a little girl with no one else to run to."

"Can't help that you're an immature twat!"

"Guys!" Fred shouted over both of you.

"What has gotten into you?"

"Me? I'm not the one running off to be with some other person."

"You act like I've told you I'm leaving Hogwarts, I'm going on a bloody date with someone."

"Well, you shouldn't be. He isn't right for you."

"Isn't right for me? Have you got a personal mission to piss me off tonight?!"

"Georgie, calm down."

"Maybe I'm tired of you two flirting."

"US?" Fred responded.

"Maybe I'm tired of you trying to change us, of convincing us to change the way we are and behave. JUST MAYBE I'm tired of babying you and being there to pick up the pieces when this inevitably ends horrifically. MAYBE you need to stop being such an uptight bitch and see I'm doing this for your own GOOD!" He shouted and you stood up raging, anger coursing through your veins as words you never thought you'd say began to come out of the depths of your throat.

"WELL MAYBE I wanna hang out with someone who is intelligent and gives a shit about academics and something OTHER THAN useless pranks as I'd actually like to have serious conversations with a boy who ISN'T possessive and criticising my every move, A HYPOCRITE, and Fred is dating Angelina, you DICKHEAD! MAYBE if you thought about anyone other than yourself, you'd see that you're WRONG and ACTING like a total and complete prideful PRICK!" You screamed as you got up and stormed off, leaving both Fred and George breathless; you never shouted.

One twin turned to the other, and they mirrored the same expression.

"Fucking hell Georgie – what have you done?"

-

Fred had never seen anything like it. It had been a month at this point and you'd done no more but mutter several insults at each other. You'd spoken to him, of course, shared cuddles, rants and homework answers but he'd soon learned there were 2 He-Who-Should-Not-Be-Named when it came to you.

Just setting eyes on him could put you in a bad mood.

But Fred knew the façade his brother wore – back in his room he was miserable, and under the influence of firewhiskey he admitted how he wanted nothing more than to forget everything but like you said – he was too prideful.

Fred just thanked the Lord that his brother wasn't completely destroyed, but that was only by the fact that you did not go on that date at all – too enraged by the events and too afraid that a scene would be caused in public.

Fred decided to take matters into his own hands. He'd had enough of the days switching potions partners, running through the Great Hall mid-lunch to see you both, trying to stop the comments he knew neither of you meant.

He knew he had to do the unspeakable. He had to scare his brother.

-

Creating a plan with the beater of your team, he knew as he sat beside his brother that the narrow miss of that ball to your head would fill Fred's thoughts with what could've happen at the thought of that heavy object meeting an element of your person.

You flew towards the snitch, dipping and diving until the way James hit the back of your broom made you spiral around and almost lose your control. Fred felt George shift, and mumble about it being a close one under his breath. James shrugged at you and you looked around as you'd now lost sight of the snitch and began to search low down the ground where it had been beforehand, until you'd actually began to flow up and then it hit you. But James missed his target.

Everyone took a gasp as the ball hit you right in your side and caused you to fall with a thud from 20 feet upwards. All George could hear were screams and comments of shock around him before he shoved everyone to the side so he could scramble down as the game came to a halt.

-

The first thing you noticed when you regained consciousness was that it hurt to breathe. Before opening your eyes you skimmed your hand around, feeling the thin blanket and clothes that felt like your bed wear rather than your Quidditch uniform.

You heard the creaks from another bed that came from the endless patching of muscles and bones after practises and games.

You'd came to the conclusion you were in the infirmary.

You opened your eyes to a faint pink rising from the window across - sunrise. You turned your head and saw the ginger hair laying in a bed next to you. If you didn't know them so well, you might've swore it was Fred but you knew it was George and your heart ached. He'd looked like he'd been crying, and honestly, it was exhausting fighting with him. You were distraught your friendship was so easily thrown away and the amount of times you'd caught yourself going to apologise to him and then seeing him storm away from you.

You went to sit up but the unexpected pain caused you to shout in response, ringing throughout the quiet room as you laid yourself back down and took some deep breaths to try and stop the pain which caused tears to leak.

"Y/N?" George rose from his sleep and wiped his eyes as you looked over and smiled at him.

"Morning sunshine." You joked as he got out of bed and quickly waddle over to sit at your side.

"How you feeling?"

"Like shit." You whimpered through your breaths as your eyes closed again and you took more breaths to try and stop the pain.

"You tried to get up, didn't you?" You nodded quickly and he gave you his hand to squeeze as the pain subdued.

"Its the last of the fixing stage - Pompfrey says you'll be alright by morning."

"It's never been this bad before." You breathed, his hand still encased in yours.

"I'm not surprised - you broke three ribs."

"Three?"

"One from the bludger and two from your fall. Your shoulder got dislocated as well."

"No wonder I feel like shit." You said finally opening your eyes to find him smiling down at you.

"I'm sorry. For everything."

"Me too." You whispered as he lifted your hand up to kiss it.

"I shouldn't of came for you the way I did."

"I shouldn't of shouted."

"Did you know you're really fucking scary when you shout?" He said and you began to laugh but you managed to ignore the hurting it caused. Probably because you were so relieved you were friends again.

"If you're scared I'm gonna forget about you don't. The three of us. It will always be us three."

"It wasn't that." He responded quickly and smoother over your furrowed brows as he squeezed your hand.

"I got jealous because I've been in love with you for a while now-" he took a deep breath and your heart swelled.

"And I don't know but I just couldn't control it and I got angry because I'd had so many opportunities like this and I missed it, ya know?" He admitted, looking down at your hands and seeing how your dainty ones felt in his.

"I knew." You admitted and his eyes met yours with a large amount of panic, as he was urging you to explain.

"The lack of want for a boyfriend? Looking at me throughout lessons? Trying to make me laugh all the time? Fred? You think he can keep a secret?" You asked with a smile as George groaned and put his head on your stomach and you reached down to pet his hair.

"I had my suspicions but I got to the point that I thought you were never gonna do anything or maybe you'd just fallen out of love and so I said yes to Jake after saying no to people for years and then-"

"All hell broke loose." He responded as you nodded.

"You know this is Fred's fault?"

"What did he do?" You sighed.

"Meddled with James so we'd make up."

"And he'd realign the stars and we'd never realise it was him playing Cupid all along."

"Maybe he should've remembered Owen was a better aim than James."

"When this ribcage is better, he's gonna have to run." You threatened and George laughed as he finally rose to sit in front of you again.

"I'd pay to see that." He stated, licking his lips and looking back down to you again in your eyes.

"Are you gonna kiss me or do I have to wait even longer for that?" You asked with a smirk, and George smiled back down at you.

"When did you get so bold?"

"Apparently getting knocked off your broom will do that to you." You smiled as he put his hand to your cheek and leaned down, putting his hand on either cheek and finally putting his lips to yours. His body hovered over you, cradling you like you were breakable, as one of your hands moulded around his wrist, his lips moving slowly against yours as you felt your head sinking deeper against the pillow.

You didn't know how long you were there. Seconds, minutes, hours, but it felt like neither of you could bare to stop. Too long spent debating the cause and effect of what might happen to actually explore what could happen.

When George finally brought himself to pull away, you could see his swollen lips but smiling as if he'd just seen Umbridge catapulted by the Whomping Willow.

"Worth the wait?" You quipped with a whisper, your breathing being the only two things heard - only you, and him and the sunlight in that moment.

"Bloody hell - yes."

[spacemilkies]

Still rolling through this. Almost done with the game!! It’s so good guys. Also side note: I’m planning on traveling out the of the country soon so internet will be spotty. I’ve written some parts but just letting you know if I disappear I’m not dead.  

[ Artificially Genuine ] ft. Connor

[ 01  Markus | Kara ] [ 02  Markus | Kara ]

It’s fixed but the organization decides to use the downtime to move forward with the testing of other candidates. The lapse in time aggravates your progression timeline but you use the opportunity to proactively prepare for future challenges to avoid this upset. With each week, it seemed, the selection pool drew more narrow and somehow your admission remained viable. Apparently there was too much going right to completely disregard all your work. If it was to select one sole core alibi, advancement would be the marching theme for Cyberlife. 

Naturally this results in less hours at home and more frequencies in your lab just to remain afloat. Overtime was a commodity in your line of work but groundbreaking results certainly paid better than any hourly wage.

Leaned at an uncomfortable angle, you lazed over the wide screen, eyes blinking in tandem with the patient cursor awaiting your next command. The preceding numbers and letters were the extent of your presumptive calculations as you took into account every possible altercation, fine tuning the decision map to know when to act and when to investigate for stimulus. In terms of pages, you were making amicable progress but without a clear end point there was really no scope of ground covered. As if the prospect of another prototype exceeding where Connor had failed wasn’t frustrating enough.

As if drawn to the specimen at the thought, your eyes flittered briefly over the impassive android. It wasn’t currently in stasis as you often had questions but still hadn’t you noticed any movement in the last hour.

Was it bored?

Your nose turned at the consideration, immediately disregarding the notion of it feeling such a sense of emptiness. It was simply waiting It’s next order, as it should be. In order to be at a maximum capacity for receptiveness it had to be attentive to the slightest order. Programming minimal loading abilities just seemed silly, like some kind of archaic screen saver to diverge from black screens. 

Yet.

“Do you require my assistance?” 

Well it was certainly performing at full magnitude.

Rather than be startled given your current assessment, instead you sank deeper into the spiral of consideration. What if this was another layer of complexity to tackle? The organization certainly didn’t care much for the image of humanity in their projects but there was an advantage to them being able connect in the real world. The less they seemed like robots the more their work would be accepted. Though forebarence was trivial to results, you’d argue as you took in the quietness of the empty lab.

“Ridiculous,” you scoffed and resumed your attention on the screen, the android knowing well enough to take it as an offhand comment than to inquire. As long as it did its job, who cared how it functions outside of command lists. Alternatively to wrecking havoc, it would be a welcomed assistance.

Biting your lip, you tried not to think about the memory of leering glances and collective whispers of your colleagues as they huddled in their circles. To you it was simply a distraction to them and yourself. Clocking in meant you were there to improve progress not gossip and slow it. This was why you were a step above them, if not consequently another step or several away from them.

You functioned better this way though. No one thought like you making the prospect of collaborating not only invasive but detrimental. You’d spend more time explaining than experimenting. Besides, look how far you’d come on your own.

As your thoughts drowned in the limitless abyss of alternate realities and vague reminiscing you found yourself peering considerably back at the static android.

“For fucks sake.”

Kicking away from the desk, you wheeled near one of your tool containers, rummaging recklessly through the inventory. You could practically hear it’s processors whirling with the turn of events, attempting to evaluate the sudden shift in the environment for possible outcomes. Rolling your eyes as you can’t up short, you cruised to another. It was difficult to not come up short when you weren’t quite sure what you were looking for. Outside of sequenced codes, there wasn’t much stimulus to add. Connor was programmed to take in its surroundings and recalculate probability and projected scenarios. In lieu of murder, it wasn’t meant to do much else. That was what the ‘wait for instruction’ coding that was ingrained in every android despite its purpose was for.

And still, again.

Connor’s hand shot into the air, catching the rashly thrown item with little difficulty. As you returned, he stared at you inquisitively, hand still hiding it. You had no doubt in that short moment of reflex he’d already analyzed it. Which of course works lead to the endless run of calculations streaming across its face.

“What am I meant to do with this ?”

God this was so stupid, why did you even bother?

 Groaning, you found yourself struggling to justify such a pointless interaction. A simple whim had grown into an action so unnecessary yet plaguing you with such curiosity. You waved him away with feigned disinterest as you realigned your erratic mess.  

“I don’t know. Play with it or something.”

“Play?” It sounded so utterly perplexed, if that was even the right word to describe that sequence of processing. One of the struggles of programming for new android designs was the speculation of overloading servers. There was still no official shortcomings to what all they could handle and confer. The shift from store clerk to house attendant was a marginally invasive turn of events that took time and consideration to introduce to the public. Now technology was doing more than scratch surface, and integrating more firmly as a permanent fixture.

“Just manipulate it with your hands, Connor … it’s not that difficult,” you muttered under your breath but of course it wasn’t lost to it.

The expression on its face never changed but it was hard to miss the heavy implication of consideration as he turned the silver coin over in its hands. Your head remained trained forward, but every now and again your gaze strays to its progress.

It had progressed to testing mass and gravity, tossing the quarter back and forth between hands to analyze more data. And when all possibilities were exhausted, it returned it to one hand and close its fist around it. Just when you thought the idea was a waste of time, the coin seemed to appear out of nowhere, wedged between two fingers before flipping effortless along its knuckles from one side to the next. The action is as so simple yet motorly complex in a way you hadn’t considered.

The motion abruptly ended with a closed hand and Connor turned its head to you.

“Is this what you instructed ?”

“I-“ Your tongue felt cool to the touch of air, and you quickly snapped it shut to get rid of the awed expression on your face. It wasn’t even that impressive. He’d likely recalled a cinematic event from some source. Even in experimenting with the item, there was no way he’d flawlessly execute such movement without a prompt. You were a damn good engineer but even that was leaps and bounds above your potential. Not to mention hinting at autonomous proficiency. Not even a daring mind could managed such a feat.

Simmering on satisfaction, you were able at allocate more attention to your work with the distraction well taken care of. “Yes, keep that on you and resume that activity in pending commands.”

It nods in confirmation, the cognitive circle whirling to life.

Eventually your fingers gain pace, sudden the action becoming more smooth as the mind block seemed to finally lift.

Not even a minute later the coin resumes its dance.

[ladyeternal178]

There is no Song In My Heart

Dear Adam & Eddie:

If you’re going to try and rip off Joss Whedon this blatantly, you need to not be so phenomenally bad at it.

Seriously:  the infant son of a hero and a villain is kidnapped away from someone that was taking him to be hidden from one of his parents for his own safety.  He is taken to a demon dimension by his kidnapper, where they raise him like their own child and train him to serve their agenda. When he gets back to his parents’ dimension, barely any time has passed for them but he’s a fully-grown adult because time flows differently where he was raised, and he starts going after the good guys and his family because of the machinations of the bad guy that raised them.

Am I talking about Gideon from Once, or Connor from Angel?  The only way to tell them apart is the fact that Connor actually managed to beat Angel a couple of times, whereas Gideon has never gotten the better of Rumple.  Even when Gideon was using the Dark One dagger, Rumple outmaneuvered Gideon at every turn.  Somehow, A&E managed to make the son of the Dark One, a character that could’ve been a huge wild card that completely realigned the balance of power in Storybrooke, totally fucking useless and only slightly less relevant to the story than the dwarves are.

But now they’ve also completely wasted the potential of a musical episode at the same time they were trying desperately to pull it off by using a similar set-up to BtVS’ Once More With Feeling.

See:  Once More With Feeling used magic to make everyone burst into song, too.  And it played with the idea that music, when combined with magic, can be used as a weapon.  But where The Song In Your Heart utterly and completely failed to live up to its spiritual predecessor is that, rather than having the musical curse woven into the modern setting and illuminating something about the characters’ current emotional states, or revealing something critical that had been kept hidden from the others before now, they decided to cram yet another flashback confrontation between Snowing and the Evil Queen into an already overfull backstory.

All in the name of giving Emma’s massive inferiority and martyr complexes an opportunity to rear their ugly heads again and then allowing for a deus ex machina, a/k/a Henry, to come in and rescue her from them.

It makes no sense that Fiona and/or Rumple didn’t go after Henry when they were rounding up everyone in Emma’s immediate family to use as hostages.  Henry might not be able to use his author powers to affect the Final Battle, but he’s still the Truest Believer.  He above anyone would be the person most likely to keep Emma from being mired in self-doubt, since he has absolute faith.  And maybe Fiona doesn’t know about that part, but Rumple does, having been privy to the events in Neverland and therefore knowing the reason why his father wanted Henry’s heart.

Not to mention that Henry is Emma’s son.  You’re trying to tell me that the woman who turned herself into a fairy and very nearly used the Dark Curse’s precursor to banish all children in the Enchanted Forest to another realm in order to protect her own son didn’t think that holding the Savior’s son as a hostage wouldn’t get Emma to do anything she wanted?  I doubt it, considering she didn’t even have compunctions about harming children to achieve her own ends before she became a fairy.  And it’s not like his adoptive mother/step-great-grandmother, step-great-great-aunt, grandparents or step-father-to-be were in any position to stop her from hurting Henry, considering they were all her hostages, too.  So why have she and Rumple leave Henry out there free to act instead of using him to leverage Emma?

Answer:  A&E decided that the plot device they wanted to use was cool enough that the audience would ignore the plot hole and forgive the deus ex machina needed to pull it off.  And they were wrong on all three counts.

The hard-won admission by Buffy to most of her loved ones that she’d been in Heaven when the Scoobies had resurrected her at the climax of Once More With Feeling was a cathartic paradigm shift for the characters and a gut-wrenching emotional pay-off for the viewer at the same time.  We’d been hanging on the edges of our seats waiting for that reveal to happen, and the way we got it was pitched perfectly.  Emma’s emotional epiphany in The Song In Your Heart didn’t have the same impact because we’ve been here before.  We’ve been watching Emma re-learning this lesson in various ways since the Neverland arc in Season 3, and A&E are clearly running out of ways to keep convincingly putting her through this particular emotional journey.

But I think perhaps the biggest sin this episode commits is the aforementioned shoe-horning in of the musical confrontation between the Charmings and Regina.  The Song In Your Heart isn’t even the first episode this season to be guilty of throwing something into the characters’ pre-Curse lives to set up a Chekov’s gun that will be used in the very same episode.  But even with the pre-first-Curse timeline being a bit murky, A&E are running the raggedy edge of feasible when it comes to how much they’re trying to claim happened between the Charmings’ wedding and Regina’s first casting of the Dark Curse.

Magical settings don’t give you carte blanche when it comes to how much can reasonably fit into your backstory or timeline, and the advent of online fandoms with on demand access to re-watch, scrutinize, analyze and categorize every event in every episode has largely eliminated showrunners’ ability to rely on Bellisario’s Maxim when it comes to them prioritizing the cool factor of a plot device, twist or arc over the cohesiveness of their world-building.  Flashbacks to the time before the first Curse are this show’s stock-in-trade, but even in the context of a musical episode, this vehicle could’ve been used in far better ways than it was here.

For example:  in the modern Storybrooke era, the Black Fairy has cast a spell compelling the characters to sing what’s in their hearts because there’s something she needs to know from one of them that will give her an advantage in the final battle.  They’re singing because truth potions/spells don’t necessarily get people to speak the truth of their hearts, but music always gets at the emotions we think we’re keeping hidden even from ourselves.

You could’ve had Snow & Charming waxing rhapsodic about their own wedding which dovetailed into a flashback about the ramp-up to the ceremony we saw in the pilot.  You could’ve had Regina singing about how her mother’s pursuit of revenge, and her own, have robbed her of getting to have a wedding day like Emma’s, paired with a flashback of the Evil Queen observing the preparations for the royal wedding and finally snapping over Snow getting to have the happy wedding that she and Daniel nwere permanently denied.  You could’ve had Zelena singing about how everyone’s making such a huge deal out of the wedding and it’s not as important as they’re all building it up to be before slowly revealing that, unlike Emma, she has no one that cares enough about her to want to give her a special wedding day and she is still mourning the one person that would’ve possibly ever wanted to marry her to begin with.

And then at long last, you have Emma singing about how she’s happier than she’s ever been and looking forward to marrying Hook, but the part she's not letting anyone see is that she’s frightened of losing the family that it’s taken so long for her to find and build and accept:  if not to the Final Battle then to some other evil because there will always be darkness for the Savior to fight.  That she knows they’ll carry on if she dies because that’s what they do, but she doesn’t know how she’ll go back to being alone again if something happens to them because she needs them to remind her that she’s no longer a lonely, unwanted orphan girl.

Cue the Black Fairy now knowing what she needs to know and cursing the town so that when Emma wakes up the morning after her wedding, she’s alone, isolated from everyone she loves, and she has to face the Final Battle without the support system she’s come to rely on to remind her of her own self-worth.

Was this episode fun for the OUaT cast & crew to make?  Probably.  The actors certainly seemed to be having a ball with the musical numbers, and some of the vocal performances were unexpectedly good.  But it didn’t really serve the overall narrative, it didn’t give us any insight into the characters that we didn’t have already, and the emotional pay-off didn’t have anything to do with the musical device.  The emotional pay-off was the wedding, and while I’m glad they didn’t fuck around with the actual ceremony (ruined weddings are one of my top five most-hated plot devices ever), there was no dramatic tension at all in the 50 minutes leading up to that moment and no interesting character development to make the time feel like it was spent wisely.

A&E should’ve called Papa Joss to consult.  We would’ve gotten an episode with some heart for the songs to be in.

[sheilacwall]

So You Want To Keep This Website Going

The moment both of you have been dreading is here. It’s high time I address just exactly what the hell this blog is, what it was supposed to be, what it could be in the future, and how we can get there together. I know that what you mostly care about is what’s going to change over here at HHID, but I have to tell you a story first.

Once upon a time, back in 2007, I started Hip Hop Isn’t Dead as a way to keep my writing skills sharp in between projects. Although album reviews, especially those centered around hip hop, were in plentiful supply, I figured I could jump into the fray with my own style (read: honesty, sarcasm, and honest sarcasm) leading the way. A fanbase generated around me, which I’m forever grateful for, as it meant that there was clearly an audience for music critique that wasn’t afraid to point out just how goddamn silly all of this was in the first place.

The basic concept I started with was to review artists by looking at their entire body of work, charting their growth, their regression, their influences, and how they ended up influencing the younger class. I did so through track-by-track reviews to not just provide running commentary in the event that you may have been listening to the album in that moment, but in the hopes of discovering unsung gems, both for my playlist and yours. This may have been too good of an idea, or perhaps it’s just in my nature to bite off more than I could chew, but instead of finishing up with an artist’s back catalog, I’d jump to an altogether unrelated rapper, group, or tangent and start the process all over again. This has led to a lengthy list of topics in the sidebar, but only a handful of rappers and groups whose discographies I’ve actually completed. I’ve lost the plot, as they say.

So. What I’m doing with Hip Hop Isn’t Dead is reconfiguring just whatever the hell this has morphed into over the years. First things first: I have to get back to the project, I have to finish what I started, even if it’s only for my own well-being at this point. What this means is that there won’t be any more flights of fancy on HHID, no more random artists thrown into the mix just because. And, of course, by “no more” I mean “I reserve the right to do whatever the fuck I want”, but ultimately I need to focus on the project in order to see it through. You may read that as “oooh, Max is trying to end the blog,” and you wouldn’t be wrong: this thing isn’t sustainable, and everything ends eventually. Keep in mind, though, that this project will take me quite a while to get through, since the artists on my permanent list keep continuing to release albums for some fucking reason. Who’s on this permanent list? Stay tuned, as I plan on posting that very soon, because if you’re anything like me, you like knowing what you’re getting in to.

Does this mean Max is done with the RandoMax Radio mix posts, the random articles about Billboard charts and the XXL Freshman Class of 2012? Nah. But it does mean that the output on HHID may slow down a bit (he says, having just come back from a month-long hiatus that lasted for almost two months). How can you combat this? Leaving comments helps: HHID was always designed to function as a way for like-minded hip hop heads to discuss music. Sharing blog posts with your followers on social media (I really have to get that Facebook page back in order) is another good way to help out. You can always engage directly with me over on Twitter @hhid_Max. Submitting a Reader Review is another idea: sometimes the best way to have a conversation about your favorite album is to start it yourself. The email address remains the same: max.hiphopisntdead@gmail.com is how you go about pitching me your ideas. No blind submissions, please. I don’t want to waste your time or my own.

So what now? Well, the format of the “project” has been getting on my nerves for several years now. There are artists and albums I wanted to discuss with you two that I couldn’t fit into the schedule for whatever reason, and I’m fucking tired of it.

So there’s a new site. With a catch, because of course there is.

Hip Hop Is Done is my new hub for album reviews (and, eventually, other shit) that didn’t really fit into what I was trying to do with Hip Hop Isn’t Dead. (Hey, look at that, they have the same initials!) It doesn’t imply that I think rap music is over, nor does it mean I’m done with our chosen genre: instead, I’m continuing my search for unsung gems, except without any arbitrary restrictions created by 2007 Max hindering my progress. What this means is that I can write about whatever and whoever the hell I want, and I can follow whatever whims I wish.

And there is a fee to read these articles. It is a Patreon page, after all. I’d been looking for a way for you to support the site directly, as these Amazon links pay jack shit, and hope and believe three dollars a month is sufficient for those of you who want to continue helping me out. That’s like buying me a cheap cup of coffee every month, and in return you get exclusive access to write-ups for reviews that won’t end up published at home base.

(As of right this very second, there are two reviews waiting for your eyes – a look at Dan the Automator’s soundtrack for the video game NBA 2K7, and my thoughts on Freddie Gibbs and Madlib’s Bandana, with more planned to follow very soon.) (EDIT: Since this post’s publication, a write-up for the DJ Muggs and Roc Marciano collaboration KAOS has also appeared on the Patreon. I’m just saying.)

I have some interesting ideas for running series on Hip Hop Is Done, including some topics that have fascinated me for a while, but never really fit in here, such as:

– producer/artist collaborative efforts (see: the aforementioned Bandana) – producer-based projects featuring as many of their friends as possible – soundtracks – label samplers crew projects – a series looking at the albums in DJ Khaled’s catalog, but a single track at a time, as those projects constitute one long, incoherent playlist anyway – something I’m cleverly calling “Drink Coasters Revisited” (details remain a mystery) – a series running complimentary to the DJ Khaled thing that focuses on a similar gambit, but from a different perspective – other stuff

Also, the very title Hip Hop Is Done allows me to flex on over to different musical genres as needed, which will greatly help me if/when I get some of my other ideas off of the ground.

To sum up: Hip Hop Isn’t Dead isn’t dead, but will refocus its efforts and realign its vision, with the slack being picked up by Hip Hop Is Done, my Patreon site that will provide longtime loyal supporters with bonus content that will hopefully continue the conversation. RandoMax Radio is still very much a thing that exists (is there another Producers Guild entry coming soon? Probably), so you should also subscribe to that, as well. (You can follow @RandoMax_Radio on Twitter if you want to keep up with those posts.) So this isn’t bad news: ultimately I want to provide much more content. I just have some annoying habits, such as the need to eat and have a roof over my head, that must be met in order for that to happen, so I hope you find it within yourselves to help a guy out who has made you chuckle at your phone screen since 2007. The Amazon links will remain, too, in case you two think of me when doing your holiday shopping online.

Read/review/subscribe and share with anyone you know that may appreciate my ramblings, and who knows, we might be able to turn this fucker into something interesting.

Thank you for your consideration, and thanks for reading!

-Max (@hhid_Max)

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[flauntpage]

50 Hot Takes for the Philadelphia Sports Fan

It’s come to my attention that I’ve been incredibly neutral lately, just trying to do quality analysis and post-game breakdowns without the knee-jerk overreaction or outrageous hot takes.

In other words, I’m trying to be fair.

But fair doesn’t necessarily move the needle in 2018, when the most well-known media personalities are people who just say ridiculous and off-base shit, contradict themselves, and continue to make things up until someone finally pulls the plug or they retire.

I can hold my own alongside Jason Whitlock and Colin Cowherd, and to prove that I’m not Mr. Milquetoast, I pulled 50 hot takes out of my rear end, which you can dive into after the jump:

Philadelphia sports writers are some of the worst-dressed people on the planet.

Both radio stations should cut down on listener phone calls by 50-60% and book more guests.

I love hockey, but it will soon be the 5th major sport in the U.S. I’m not just saying this because I’m a soccer guy, but just take a drive around the city and see for yourself the changing demographics in this country.

Baseball didn’t necessarily slow down [editor’s note: it did, as game have risen to an average of over three hours] society just sped up. We have smartphones and Grubhub and instant access to everything, which killed attention spans and our general ability to sit still and relax. The game isn’t broken, but MLB is doing a poor job of adapting to this societal change.

Television personalities who only show up to 8-10 games per year generally ask the most useless questions in press conferences. We use the derogatory term “playoff people” to describe them.

When people tell you to “stick to sports,” they aren’t trying to silence you or suppress your First Amendment rights. They’re simply saying that they would prefer to get their politics from political experts and their sports from sports experts.

Rocky is played out and cliche.

Gritty is becoming dangerously close to played out, like Philadelphia’s love for Bruce Springsteen and Pearl Jam.

More young and able-bodied writers should be actively participating in the sports they cover because it adds credibility to their stories and opinions.

We don’t care who wins the game. It’s a job. We’re going to write about it whether they win or lose. When sports becomes business, the emotion and fandom is fully drained from you (which is kind of a shame, but necessary).

Very few Philadelphia media bosses have any clue what they’re doing.

Talen Energy Stadium features the best atmosphere of any regional sporting venue.

Building Talen in Chester was a huge mistake.

The Sixers should build their own arena.

College football is better than the NFL.

I hate the fact that Philadelphia does not care about college football.

Penn State and Pitt and West Virginia and Syracuse and Rutgers should be playing each other every year. I know PSU fans don’t want this, but I’m a believer in eastern football and conference realignment really killed a lot of great rivalries and traditions.

Lincoln Financial Field is the third-best football atmosphere in Pennsylvania.

The vibe and excitement at any SEC or Big 10 football stadium is better than anything at the Wells Fargo Center, Linc, or Citizens Bank Park.

Philadelphia DOES have a large section of sports fans who are total assholes. However, bad fan behavior takes place all around the world, which is why we share those stories whenever they happen.

The best local beat writer is Sheil Kapadia. He asks smart questions, doesn’t do hot takes, puts together detailed video breakdowns, and consistently produces interesting content.

A lot of people got totally screwed during the Josh Innes RADIO WARS shuffle. Rob Ellis and Jon Marks are two of them. Jon got shoved on the morning show where he was barely allowed to talk and Rob was pulled off nights, moved to PM drive, then again moved off that shift to accommodate Josh.

I appreciated the fact that Josh challenged the typical corny radio routine that we’ve been subjected to for years. He was an outsider, which was a breath of fresh air. However, he really rubbed A LOT of people the wrong way behind the scenes and wore out his welcome rather quickly.

Butt-hurt Flyers fans need to relax. We don’t hate your sport, it’s just down in the pecking order right now because the Eagles and Sixers are good. I covered soccer for eight years, so I understand the struggle for media coverage and respect in a football town.

I hate music in the middle of a sporting event, especially during Sixers games. It feels corny and inauthentic. The fan atmosphere was great at The Wells Fargo Center last season and you don’t need shitty mumble rap to be played in the middle of a possession to generate an interesting ambience.

The best sports video game was Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater.

Robert Covington is overrated by Process supporters and underrated by Process opponents.

Saying that John DeFilippo and Frank Reich were a “big loss” is a bad take because no fan or media member can realistically quantify or qualify their behind-the-scenes contributions to the 2017 Eagles’ offense.

I’m intrigued by the Philadelphia Fusion, but the fact of the matter is that the squad features zero Americans and they do not live in Philadelphia.

The Fusion choked in the Overwatch League final.

Fortnite sucks.

The mental health of athletes is important and I appreciate the NBA’s forward-thinking here. We also have to draw lines between those who have legitimate and diagnosed issues and those who do not. It’s unfair for an athlete who is taking medication for a diagnosed bi-polar disorder to be lumped in with someone who got booed after a bad shooting night. One is a true mental health problem and the other is not.

Dreams and Nightmares is overrated, as is Meek Mill’s music.

Joe Buck and Troy Aikman do not hate the Eagles.

Say what you will about Angelo Cataldi, but the guy is a master of his craft, expertly plays to his listener base, and knows exactly what he’s doing from a business standpoint. Wing Bowl is a cash cow for WIP and the morning show has enjoyed more stability and continuity than any other program in Philly sports radio.

Villanova is a Philadelphia school. I mean, for fuck’s sake, we worship at the altar of Mike Trout, who grew up 46 miles away in Millville. Nova’s campus is 17 miles from Center City.

Every Eagles fan should be pulling for Andy Reid to do well in Kansas City.

There’s too much media availability in the NBA. There’s no reason a coach should have to speak before or during a game. Ben Simmons does not need to speak five times a week.

I don’t like being in the locker room and I don’t think reporters should be allowed in the locker room. I’ve always felt like it’s a “sacred” kind of place reserved for players and their game preparation.

I also HATE advertisements on the Sixers and Union jerseys. Jerseys should have a name, number, logo, and nothing else [editor’s note: rich take coming from a soccer Emirates fan]. I wouldn’t want to be a walking advertisement, no matter how much Bimbo or Stubhub is willing to pay.

Not every show on sports radio needs to feature a former football player.

If you’re a reporter on the team payroll (like Dave Spadaro), please let independent media ask their questions first before tossing up a couple of softballs. This goes for TV and radio broadcasters as well, or anyone affiliated with the team (they generally do a good job of this).

There are too many credentialed reporters at various sporting events who are not working or doing much of anything at all.

When a coach or athlete goes out of their way to tell you that they don’t read your stories or pay attention to Twitter, it means that they definitely read your stories and pay attention to Twitter.

All Philadelphia teams should be owned by Philadelphia-based groups. No more New York City carpetbaggers down here, please.

Big 5 basketball features a lot of interesting matchups and storylines that unfortunately become buried in a pro sports town.

The Flyers’ black uniforms are the best uniforms in town.

I wish people would appreciate mixed martial arts for the interesting clash of styles and incredible physical gifts each fighter possesses. Combat sports are much more than Conor McGregor shit-talking and a violent punch-fest.

“No one likes us, we don’t care,” is a very entry-level way of motivating yourself, though it is effective to a certain point. The best athletes in the world don’t play the rudimentary disrespect card, but have essentially risen above that to a sort of self-motivating nirvana where they know they’re the best and don’t give a shit what anyone has to say (Tom Brady, prime Tiger Woods, Serena Williams).

If you’re young or have the ability to move, go live somewhere else before resettling in Philadelphia. You’ll have a better of understanding of sport and how people around the country (and around the world) support their teams and consume content.

That’s 50. I’m not sure all of them were hot takes. Maybe a couple of aphorisms made it in there, like a Friedrich Nietzsche publication. Twilight of the Idols was my favorite.

Anyway, hope that was hot enough for you. I’ll be back tomorrow with fair and balanced lukewarm takes.

The post 50 Hot Takes for the Philadelphia Sports Fan appeared first on Crossing Broad.

50 Hot Takes for the Philadelphia Sports Fan published first on https://footballhighlightseurope.tumblr.com/

[bluemoonpunch]

BTS Soul/Energy Map Healing - Please Participate.

The Moon and Venus align at 7 degrees in Libra on August 14th at 12:49PM EST

Surprise! The BTS Soul/Energy Map does, in fact, have a purpose and was, in fact, not shoved into my brain just to torture me. Groundbreaking, I know. If you've been on the blog recently, you know of the fuckery that's been happening and you know of the recent events involving a "transfer" of the low-vibe energy into the lower part of the BTS Soul Body. I will do something in the near future to explain all of it, I swear to you, but for now, there's, like, actual fucking work to do, lol. The purpose of the Soul Map really is to use it as a map, and yesterday it was explained to me how we are meant to use it and why, and what will (hopefully) come of it. I wanted this to be way more of a group effort and I had tried to film a video to explain things, show the map, give all the details start to finish, but my phone was acting up and my laptop is not the best for such things apparently. Bit of a bummer, but I have looked into what else you guys can do to help us out with this. ANYONE CAN PARTICIPATE — You don't have to specifically belong to the BTS Soul Group (most of you are, anyway), even if you just happen upon this post, you are more than welcome to join in with this. Below the cut, I have provided a bunch of different ways for different people with different skill sets and different comfort levels to join in in any way that they see fit. This will be taking place August 14th, 2018 at 12:49PM EST (check your timezones) when Venus and the Waxing Moon align in Libra at 7 degrees. I was shown that this is a "point" or a "portal" and HAS TO BE used for this. The time of day for me (12:49) adds up to 7, the moon and venus line up at 7 degrees, 7 members, 7 positions on the soul map, and this work is meant to be done through all 7 chakras aligning and channeling through the Heart Chakra. I will have energy lines extended to continue funneling high vibrational frequencies into the Soul Body Structure until August 16th at 5:30AM when the Moon leaves Libra and enters Scorpio. More info and ways to participate are listed below. The most important thing you can do is literally allow yourself to feel love for BTS as a whole, all seven of them equally, and send out positive vibes to them with the intention of helping to heal, realign, and balance the Soul Body structure. Thank you for helping.

++ So, I've been given very specific directions of how to go about doing this and I've shared them with @lunar-lepus who has been about 80% of the brains in all of this. We're both good with energy and trance work, so I feel very confident with our ability to channel the energy that is accumulated from this alignment. I will provide info here on what exactly is happening, what we will be doing, and what you guys can do. The main issues within the Soul Body: The low-vibrational beings that had broken through the net and threw off the balance by loading the lines between the energy centers with Fire energy and over-stimulating their Divine Masculine influence have found the other opening in the Soul Body. This opening is the midway point between the accumulation of vibration of the Soul Body and physical manifestation. This means that they are infecting Taehyung and Kook's position in the Soul Body. They have specifically targeted Taehyung because of planetary shifts (Retrograde Mars going into Capricorn — Taehyung is a Capricorn, and is also an incarnate of the "product of Mars", AKA Mars’ child, just as Kook is an incarnate of the "product of Venus") This is the same tactic they used to latch onto Hoseok when the Eclipse energy was in Aquarius and all of those planets were in retrograde (they still are), except his was much worse as he is EXTREMELY sensitive to cosmic shifts. It’s his place in the Soul Map to be a filter for those energies. They found this opening towards the "feet" of the Soul Body because I posted a preview of the Soul Map and the transmission of this map was solidified in the 3D wavelength where these low-vibe beings exist. Basically, I fucked up and showed them right where they needed to go. That's why I wasn't supposed to show the map.     Kook is being affected in the sense that he is being blocked off from me and they are trying to block him off from Jimin. As an incarnate of the "product of Venus" he clings to Jimin's energy (Jimin = Libra = ruled by Venus), that is where that Parent/Child vibe comes from. Because Venus is in Libra and because Jimin is currently in a clear mental space, he and Kook are both balancing each other, so Kook is not as vulnerable as his Soul Brother, Taehyung is. Taehyung's manipulated energy is being "thrown" in Kook's direction though.     The space where Taehyung and Kook rule is where the projected energy is, it is where the "vibe" of BTS comes from. Objectively speaking, I think we're all aware of the fact that out of everyone Kook and Taehyung tend to be people's favorites, usually because of their looks and specific characteristics. This is why. They are the conduits through which the energy, vibration, frequency, transmission of BTS meets the physical world. This is why they are looked at more than other members, they carry more vibration in the 3D and therefore attract your subconscious attention. Becuase this space is now infected, this projected energy can be manipulated very easily. Again, the low-vibes’ terf is the 3D, this is where they rule. They have a much easier time fucking with shit at this level. What they are trying to do is literally mess with the projected energy so that the perception of those who pick up that projected energy will be altered. This is why I warned against playing into any rumors that come up, especially about Taehyung, and why I said to keep an open mind with the album. If they succeed with what they are trying to do, they can cut off a huge number of the soul group and drop the vibration of the soul group, the BTS Soul Body will deplete, and there will be a steady decline with them IRL, thus making it difficult or even impossible for them to fulfil their group purpose and implement and maintain a shift in consciousness and awareness for their MASSIVE soul group. This tactic that the low-vibes are using is literal psychological manipulation on members of the soul group as well as the general public. This is what they are best at.     Hoseok is not in his proper position in the Soul Body. He is meant to be on the left side under Namjoon and across from Yoongi. He is now in the center of the Soul Body. I was seeing it like they were using it as an infirmary like he's being healed there. Energetically speaking, he was in bad shape because of how much energy splitting took place due to the planetary/cosmic influences as well as the energy manipulation. Yoongi and Jimin are the ones healing him. Again, Jimin is a Libra, he carries that energy entirely in his core. Libra is ruled by Venus, and Venus is now in Libra. This gave him a lot of energy and this is why I was going to wait until the end of August to check back in with them all with the Outlook reading. I wanted all of this energy to settle and see where it took them. I was right in assuming that Venus going into Libra would help as Jimin is one of the balancing pillars in the Soul Body, the other being Jin. Jimin and Yoongi (Air and Water) literally cooled Hoseok down and pulled him towards them, which is why he's now in the center, and are putting their energy into healing him.     I was shown that Jimin and Yoongi are going to build something. They can't do it while they are healing and balancing Hoseok, and even then they don't have enough energy to do it with just the two of them —  they are the only ones in the Soul Body who are both engaged, balanced, and aligned properly. The energy work I am going to do while restructuring the Soul Body is going to funnel in energy that these two are going to use to build whatever it is that they want to build. I have no confirmation, but I'm assuming they are going to build some kind of wall around the Soul Body to keep this from happening again, but they will need all 7 members to be fully engaged, aligned, and balanced in order to keep it enforced. Again, this is something I'm going to help with through the energy work with the soul group.     Namjoon and Jin are both absent at the moment, as in they are not engaged in the Soul Body. I was shown it as them being in "sleep mode". I don't really know why, but there was nothing there that made it seem like this is a bad thing.     What I am doing: I was given instructions on how this needs to go:

Direct the energy. 

Figure the path. 

Realign independent structures.

Those are the main things. The realigning of independent structures is what will take me the longest to do. This means balancing each and every line combination between all 7 energy centers. We are also going to "flood" the lines with Water. It's a cleansing process, but I think it is also going to "cool down" or lower the Fire energy that is being poured into them. (They are not supposed to carry Fire energy, the whole point of Jimin and Jin's position is to stabilize and weaken the high vibrational, white-hot energy that the Rap Line triad creates through their weird little system of transmitting, translating, and transmuting thing they do.)       

I will then go through the same Chakra alignment process that will be listed below and raise my personal vibration, except I will follow that up by anchoring in the energy that you have sent out to the Moon. I always use the Moon as a sort of focal point for group work. It's literally a satellite, so once you send something up, we'll be able to tap into it and use it. I'll pull that down and go through the process of pushing that energy through the lowest access point, which is where the low-vibe energy is right now between Kook and Taehyung and basically flood it out. Then every single line will be washed out. I will take as much time as possible with this to be sure that everything is out.

Once the lines are clear and I'm at the "head" of the body (Namjoon) I will pull down the EXTREMELY high-frequency vibrations from the line that extends past Namjoon's placement to... you know... where they come from, I guess? I will pull that down through each of the energy centers and charge the lines. This is the energy that the low-vibes literally cannot touch, this is what is supposed to be in the lines, to begin with.

I will then spend as much time as I need to in order to make sure that that energy is in every line and every energy center. After that, I will continue to pull it down into the Soul Body until it extends past the outer layer of the Soul Body. Their Guide's will use this excess energy to repair the net that they had cast around them to keep shit like this from happening in the first place. 

From there I will finish off with making sure Hoseok's energy center is put back in its rightful place and that Taehyung and Kook's energy fields match up the way they are meant to so that neither is overpowering the other in any way. I'll make sure Jin and Namjoon are out of sleep mode too, I guess, lol.    

I'll be closing out of this by putting curtains or a blockade around the opening at the feet of the Soul Body so that nothing can get in, but what needs to come out can still come out.

@lunar-lepus will be doing this as well. I kindly ask that you guys don't direct your energy into the Soul Map. We have visuals and are using the map as it is meant to be used and would appreciate no interference in that. All we need from you is any of the contributions from this list below.

These are what you guys can do to help —  I've listed them in order of time constraint and capability. Please do not feel the need to do more than what you are capable of or more than you know you are able to. Again, these can be done any time before August 16th, 2018 5:30AM EST —  this is when I will take down my energy lines and will no longer be acting as a channel to the BTS Soul Body.     All of these engage your Heart Chakra, be mindful of that.     Love BTS —  everyone should do this.

Engage your Heart Chakra and literally just watch crack videos or listen to their music. Do something that lets them bring you happiness, and with that joy (high vibration), send some of it out to them specifically with the intention of returning the favor in a way. Just send them some of the good vibes they give you.

Lend your energy

Simply declare out loud or by writing it down on a piece of paper that you would like to lend some of your energy to this energy work. Declare it with the intention of contributing to the healing, realigning, and balancing of the Soul Body. Visualize it in your head as a little ball of pink, white, or gold energy coming from the middle of your chest. Say again that you want to lend your energy and see it shoot up into the sky or something like that. Your Guides will take care of the actual delivery.

Engage in personal alignment and energy work

This is the chakra alignment process that I will be doing and you can do this as well if you have the experience, capability, and the time. Take your time with all of these if you choose to do it.

1) Draw in energy from the Earth's Core into the lower 3 Chakras (root, sacral plexus, and solar plexus). Stabilize.

2) Pull down energy from Source into the upper 3 Chakras (crown, third eye, and throat). Charge.

3) Merge these two energies in the Heart Chakra in your chest. Let them spin together in a clockwise motion. Focus on the joy that BTS has brought you and the joy you would like for them to experience. If you are not a BTS fan and you are joining in with this, just focus on what makes you happy and the kind of happiness you would like to spread to other people. Let this fill your chest. Breathe into it. Let it heal you. If you start to cry, or laugh, or even feel sexually stimulated in some way, don't freak out, that's extremely normal when you activate and align the Heart Chakra.

4) When you feel like your vibrations are high and you feel good about extending it out. Send out a line of energy from your chest, your Heart Chakra, and direct it towards the Moon. Again, it will be anchored there for me to use, trust in that. You can let it merge with the other high vibrational energies that you may meet there.

5) Allow yourself to relax when you are finished. Lay down and breathe. You might need to ground after this, so take your time with that. If it helps, go outside and look at the sky, and if you are able to, walk on the grass/dirt with bare feet, this will pull any excess energy that is lingering outside the body to be pulled back in.

Here is an image to help you visualize a little better:

I will do an update around the end of August for sure when this is all said and done, but this will need time to settle in.

[sheilacwall]

So You Want To Keep This Website Going

The moment both of you have been dreading is here. It’s high time I address just exactly what the hell this blog is, what it was supposed to be, what it could be in the future, and how we can get there together. I know that what you mostly care about is what’s going to change over here at HHID, but I have to tell you a story first.

Once upon a time, back in 2007, I started Hip Hop Isn’t Dead as a way to keep my writing skills sharp in between projects. Although album reviews, especially those centered around hip hop, were in plentiful supply, I figured I could jump into the fray with my own style (read: honesty, sarcasm, and honest sarcasm) leading the way. A fanbase generated around me, which I’m forever grateful for, as it meant that there was clearly an audience for music critique that wasn’t afraid to point out just how goddamn silly all of this was in the first place.

The basic concept I started with was to review artists by looking at their entire body of work, charting their growth, their regression, their influences, and how they ended up influencing the younger class. I did so through track-by-track reviews to not just provide running commentary in the event that you may have been listening to the album in that moment, but in the hopes of discovering unsung gems, both for my playlist and yours. This may have been too good of an idea, or perhaps it’s just in my nature to bite off more than I could chew, but instead of finishing up with an artist’s back catalog, I’d jump to an altogether unrelated rapper, group, or tangent and start the process all over again. This has led to a lengthy list of topics in the sidebar, but only a handful of rappers and groups whose discographies I’ve actually completed. I’ve lost the plot, as they say.

So. What I’m doing with Hip Hop Isn’t Dead is reconfiguring just whatever the hell this has morphed into over the years. First things first: I have to get back to the project, I have to finish what I started, even if it’s only for my own well-being at this point. What this means is that there won’t be any more flights of fancy on HHID, no more random artists thrown into the mix just because. And, of course, by “no more” I mean “I reserve the right to do whatever the fuck I want”, but ultimately I need to focus on the project in order to see it through. You may read that as “oooh, Max is trying to end the blog,” and you wouldn’t be wrong: this thing isn’t sustainable, and everything ends eventually. Keep in mind, though, that this project will take me quite a while to get through, since the artists on my permanent list keep continuing to release albums for some fucking reason. Who’s on this permanent list? Stay tuned, as I plan on posting that very soon, because if you’re anything like me, you like knowing what you’re getting in to.

Does this mean Max is done with the RandoMax Radio mix posts, the random articles about Billboard charts and the XXL Freshman Class of 2012? Nah. But it does mean that the output on HHID may slow down a bit (he says, having just come back from a month-long hiatus that lasted for almost two months). How can you combat this? Leaving comments helps: HHID was always designed to function as a way for like-minded hip hop heads to discuss music. Sharing blog posts with your followers on social media (I really have to get that Facebook page back in order) is another good way to help out. You can always engage directly with me over on Twitter @hhid_Max. Submitting a Reader Review is another idea: sometimes the best way to have a conversation about your favorite album is to start it yourself. The email address remains the same: max.hiphopisntdead@gmail.com is how you go about pitching me your ideas. No blind submissions, please. I don’t want to waste your time or my own.

So what now? Well, the format of the “project” has been getting on my nerves for several years now. There are artists and albums I wanted to discuss with you two that I couldn’t fit into the schedule for whatever reason, and I’m fucking tired of it.

So there’s a new site. With a catch, because of course there is.

Hip Hop Is Done is my new hub for album reviews (and, eventually, other shit) that didn’t really fit into what I was trying to do with Hip Hop Isn’t Dead. (Hey, look at that, they have the same initials!) It doesn’t imply that I think rap music is over, nor does it mean I’m done with our chosen genre: instead, I’m continuing my search for unsung gems, except without any arbitrary restrictions created by 2007 Max hindering my progress. What this means is that I can write about whatever and whoever the hell I want, and I can follow whatever whims I wish.

And there is a fee to read these articles. It is a Patreon page, after all. I’d been looking for a way for you to support the site directly, as these Amazon links pay jack shit, and hope and believe three dollars a month is sufficient for those of you who want to continue helping me out. That’s like buying me a cheap cup of coffee every month, and in return you get exclusive access to write-ups for reviews that won’t end up published at home base.

(As of right this very second, there are two reviews waiting for your eyes – a look at Dan the Automator’s soundtrack for the video game NBA 2K7, and my thoughts on Freddie Gibbs and Madlib’s Bandana, with more planned to follow very soon.) (EDIT: Since this post’s publication, a write-up for the DJ Muggs and Roc Marciano collaboration KAOS has also appeared on the Patreon. I’m just saying.)

I have some interesting ideas for running series on Hip Hop Is Done, including some topics that have fascinated me for a while, but never really fit in here, such as:

– producer/artist collaborative efforts (see: the aforementioned Bandana) – producer-based projects featuring as many of their friends as possible – soundtracks – label samplers crew projects – a series looking at the albums in DJ Khaled’s catalog, but a single track at a time, as those projects constitute one long, incoherent playlist anyway – something I’m cleverly calling “Drink Coasters Revisited” (details remain a mystery) – a series running complimentary to the DJ Khaled thing that focuses on a similar gambit, but from a different perspective – other stuff

Also, the very title Hip Hop Is Done allows me to flex on over to different musical genres as needed, which will greatly help me if/when I get some of my other ideas off of the ground.

To sum up: Hip Hop Isn’t Dead isn’t dead, but will refocus its efforts and realign its vision, with the slack being picked up by Hip Hop Is Done, my Patreon site that will provide longtime loyal supporters with bonus content that will hopefully continue the conversation. RandoMax Radio is still very much a thing that exists (is there another Producers Guild entry coming soon? Probably), so you should also subscribe to that, as well. (You can follow @RandoMax_Radio on Twitter if you want to keep up with those posts.) So this isn’t bad news: ultimately I want to provide much more content. I just have some annoying habits, such as the need to eat and have a roof over my head, that must be met in order for that to happen, so I hope you find it within yourselves to help a guy out who has made you chuckle at your phone screen since 2007. The Amazon links will remain, too, in case you two think of me when doing your holiday shopping online.

Read/review/subscribe and share with anyone you know that may appreciate my ramblings, and who knows, we might be able to turn this fucker into something interesting.

Thank you for your consideration, and thanks for reading!

-Max (@hhid_Max)

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