#they can do so much with my id in 48 entire hours

[idsb]

holy fuck just when I thought things stopped being awful I just had my fucking IDENTITY & PASSPORT STOLEN because I fell for a phishing text

[theweirdestroller]

Crime Time!! Now With Actual Crime!

I have been on a roll when it comes to writing!! More criminal AU, more Bite-Sized, I'm feeling unstoppable!!

Anyyyyway, here's more of my AU of @cubbihue's AU! Hope y'all enjoy!!

Mugsy knew he couldn’t afford to house an entire other person. But Peri had nowhere to go. Mugsy wasn’t even sure the guy had any living family. He asked about it once and Peri got so miserable Mugsy was afraid to ask again.

Yeah, he’d love to keep Peri around until he could reasonably move out, but it wasn’t possible. Not unless he started making more money and fast.

The majority of his funds on any given week were typically from thievery, and Peri didn’t seem like the kind of guy who would be okay with that. If Mugsy asked, if he phrased it right, maybe he could get Peri on board.

There were a couple issues that came with employing Peri as a literal partner in crime. For one, Peri wasn’t the best at walking. Mugsy had snagged a cane, not from anyone using it, no, from a store, and handed it to the guy. It took some trial and error, but Peri was getting the hang of it. He still wasn’t the most mobile person out there, but he was getting better. For two, Peri could not navigate. Dimmadelphia was a huge city, not the biggest out there, but still a bustling metropolis. One that Peri had gotten lost in twice already and they’d known each other for only a couple of days. And three, Peri really didn’t seem like the kind of person who would want to commit crimes.

Welp, Mugsy would never know if he never asked.

Peri was setting up a space on the couch so he could sleep there tonight. He had gotten the apartment tour the day prior, when the two of them arrived home from the cafe. Apparently, Peri really didn’t have a single thing on him. Not a phone or wallet, not an id. It was mildly concerning, but Mugsy let it slide, if not for anything else, than for nearly mugging the guy.

“Hey, Peri?” The purple haired man looked up, setting down the pillow he was fluffing. “Uh, you think you could help me out with stuff, moneywise? Since you’re going to be staying here,” Peri tilted his head like a confused kitten.

“Sure. But what did you have in mind?” Mugsy took a deep breath. “Oh. Please don’t make me mug people!” Peri’s voice took on a bit of a whine as he said that.

“No! No. Uh, not mugging. But, stealing in general. Expensive stuff left... Unattended. And food and stuff. Pickpocketing maybe?” Peri looked thoughtful for a moment before he smiled and nodded.

“Sure! I can do that! I think... I haven’t stolen too much before, and it was a while ago, so I might be rusty,” And what? Peri’s stolen stuff before? It was probably when he was a teenager and in a rebellious phase. But hey, at least he’s still open to it.

“Great. We can get started on that as soon as you're settled.” Peri shot Mugsy a thumbs up before returning to his work on the couch.

–

A couple hours later, Peri and Mugsy wound up inside a walmart. Peri isn’t as nervous as Mugsy thought he’d be, but he was fidgeting with his hands quite a bit. Though whether that was nerves or something else was up for debate. They needed clothes for Peri, and that was simple enough. As well as perhaps another cane, definitely a phone, and maybe one of those water flavoring drop-things. In the last 48 hours or so, Peri had only drank a coffee, and a single sip of water. He had a concerning sweet tooth, it seemed.

Mugsy had his backpack, which had plenty of space for anything Peri might want, and was leaving it with his new companion. It was very much divide and conquer, and Mugsy could only hope that Peri wouldn’t immediately screw this up.

–

As it turned out, Peri was not the one to mess things up. It was Mugsy. Apparently he looked too sketchy and acquired a stalker watching him from in between the aisles.

This is exactly how Mugsy ended up booking it out of the store with Peri draped over his shoulder. The purple haired man was struggling with the zipper of the backpack as they made their getaway.

Despite the extra weight of a whole human, Mugsy managed to escape whatever security might have been chasing them. The duo ended up in a nearby park, showing off their spoils at one of the many picnic tables in the area.

Just about every article of clothing that Peri had snatched was purple. With the exception of some pink and green accessories. The guy certainly seemed to have a theme. He had somehow found a pair of dark purple pants that he insisted were ‘aubergine.’ Mugsy did not recognize the word, so Peri must have made it up.

Mugsy’s haul was much smaller, given that he had been caught, but he did manage to get the water flavoring, which meant Peri could properly hydrate. He did not, however, get a phone. But that could wait for another day. At the moment, Mugsy was likely the only person Peri could call. He had also scored another cane, this one a purple-y color, which Peri was calling periwinkle and claiming that he loved it already. So, mission success!

The two started their way home at a leisurely pace, Peri testing out his new cane and sporting a pair of bracelets pink and green, both with crown and star charms.

[fizzing-imagines]

Playtime Pt. 1 | Daycare Teacher! Billy Hargrove x Reader

Notes: This, too, has been living in my head rent-free

Warnings: Alcohol consumtion, pregnancy

Words: 2k

Your best friend and roommate Jenny called in a panic, asking you if you could pick up her 1-year old daughter, your godchild, from her daycare as she started running a fever unexpectedly. She put you down as an emergency contact at her daycare, and she was so caught-up at work that her boss wouldn't let her leave. Of course you agreed, you loved your godchild and treated her as your own. So you got into your car and drove down to said daycare. Once you arrived, you saw the photowall with the employees pictures at the entrance as a new face struck out to you. A handsome, young guy named William Hargrove. You greeted the known faces of the other attendants as you quickly made your way into her toddler room.

"Hi, I'm here to pick up Ari.", you said to the new employee, William, as you entered. "Are you her godmother?", he asked you. "I'll have to ID you because I've never been here for you to pick her up." You gave him an understanding nodd before fishing your wallet out of your bag. Once found, you showed him your ID to which he turned around and got Ari from the book corner. Her face was flushed red and her eyes were watery. "(Y/N).", she mumbled as she reached out her arms to get to you. Happily, you carried her on your arms to make her feel better. "Can I ask you a question?", you asked William in a worried tone. "Sure, any time.", he said with a smile. "I've never took care of a sick toddler, and her mum works for three more hours. What do I do now?" You were at a loss, Jenny always knew what to do. This was a first, for both you and Ari. "Well, I don't have any kids of my own so I can't really recommend anything. Other parents here use Calpol though." You nodded your head while mumbling "Calpol, okay." to help yourself remember. "And cold compresses on the legs and neck if her fever gets higher." You nodded once again. "But it's best if you try and go to the doctor with her, they can tell you much more than I can." He smiled at you as you nodded for the third time. "Thank you so much, and thank you for looking after her.", you said while smiling back at him. "It's not a big deal. Just remember that we have a 48-hour rule of being free of symptoms until she can return to daycare." You were happy that he told you, because you wouldn't have known any of that. "Thank you very much, William.", you said with a smile. "Just call me Billy."

Ari stayed home with you for the entire week as you were on a two-week holiday for your mental health. It helped you a lot, actually, as you had a hard time getting up and doing anything for yourself. So taking care of a tiny human, feeding her, putting her to bed, bathing her, it helped you with doing something good for yourself. So good that, when Jenny was home for the weekend, you decided to go out partying with two friends from high school on a Sunday night. You picked out a beautiful dress, did your makeup, styled your hair and you haven't felt this good about yourself in weeks. After months of low confidence, it shot through the roof just like that.

The club was loud and smelly. People were chatting, dancing, making out in some corner and most of all, drinking alcohol like it was water. Your friends made it their goal for the night as well and made a bee-line to the bar with you. They ordered three shots of tequila, followed by a mojito and a vodka-soda. As you felt the alcohol kicking in, you felt like dancing and made them go on the dance floor with you. You gave it your all, dancing with anyone who was willing to get close to you. And you had such a fun time, being carefree and wild for just one night until you bumped into someone you knew while looking for your next dance partner. "Billy?", you yelled over the loud music. He looked at you, trying to match your face with someone you knew, and he remembered eventually. "(Y/N)!", he said with a grin. "Nice seeing you here!" Billy was clearly intoxicated, and completely different than from who you saw at the daycare. Well, teachers have a private life so you shouldn't be too surprised. But you did end up being surprised when he put an arm around your shoulder and led you to the bar. "Let me buy you a drink, pretty thing.", he said with a flirtatious smirk. You blushed at his words, wondering how one 10-minute impression could get him to talk like that. "S-sure.", you replied, a bit flustered. Billy bought you a Rum-Cola with another shot of Tequila. Your already-buzzed brain did the math and concluded that you'd be piss-drunk in about an hour. "You know, you have to look each other in the eyes when you toast.", he said to you while taking the shot in his hands. "Why?", you asked him. "Because if you don't, you'll have bad sex for the next 7 years." His statement surprised you so much that you couldn't even look away from his eyes, so he took his opportunity to toast with a wink. Oh, so that's the road he chose?

Did you end up back at his apartment? Absolutely. Both of you got drunk as shit and slept together. But you did leave his place when you woke up at 2am and realized what you've done. One check on your Nokia 3110 showed you that you've abandoned your friends at the club with no warning; you had 7 missed calls from them and 3 missed calls from Jenny. "Shit.", you mumbled under your breath as you wriggled out of Billy's arms that were wrapped around your waist. Quickly, you got dressed, called a Taxi and drove back to your apartment. Once you entered, you saw dim light in the living room and stumbled inside, still slightly intoxicated, to find Jenny on the couch. She was trying to keep herself occupied, but you could see her nervousness because she chewed on the nail of her index finger. "Jenny.", you whispered while clumsily taking your shoes off. "Jesus Christ (Y/N)", she whispered back while getting up from the couch. "You've had me worried sick, where were you?". Oh shit. Now you'll have to tell her. "I was...uhm...at a guys house.", you stuttered, still whispering. "Seriously? What, isn't that good? When have you last done that?" She had a wide smile on her face, the initial anxiety and anger washed away in an instant. "Not really.", you whispered in an anxious tone. "It was...it was William, Ari's teacher." Jennys eyes went wide in shock. "He was at the club, and we got drunk so..." She didn't say anything for a while. "Well, you sleep it off and we'll talk about it tomorrow, yeah?" That wasn't really what you were looking fir as an answer. "I'm not angry. I'm just surprised." Now that actually calmed you, but you understood that she needed to cope with what you told her just now.The two of you went to bed, and you didn't wake up until 1pm. The apartment was empty by then, and as soon as you woke up you had to make a bee-line to the bathroom to throw up. Your guts hurt like a bitch, your throat burnined and your head was pounding. Jenny, being the sweet soul that she is, already put out ibuprofen and a glass of water on the small table you had in the bathroom. You were so lucky to have her. In hopes of relief, you took the ibuprofen and went back to bed. Your phone woke you up two hours later with Jenny calling. "What's up?", you grumbled into the speaker. "Good morning.", she said in a cheerful voice. "I have to work overtime today, can you pick up Ari?" A cold shiver ran down your spine. "With Billy there? I doubt it.", you replied in a hoarse voice. Why did your throat hurt so bad? There must have been more than just throwing up...oh. "He went partying yesterday, I doubt he'll wanna work while hungover. He wasn't in this morning, so he most likely has a day off." Jenny was right, and you knew it. "Fine, I'll be the lesbian adoptive mom.", you replied while getting out of bed. "Thank you honey, love you.", Jenny said before handing up. Slowly, you got dressed, put on sunglasses and started driving to Aris daycare. Your brain fully convinced you that Billy wouldn't be there, because who in the world would be such a jackass, so you took it easy as you walked in. Well, both you and Jenny were horribly wrong. Ari was standing behind Billy, who sat on a tiny chair, while putting bows and clips in his mullet. Both were all alone in the room, all kids being picked uo already and the other two teachers outside cleaning up. Did Billy look pleased? Not really, but he didn't look hungover either. Your goddaughter saw you as soon as you closed the door behind. "(Y/N)!", she cheered as she took you by the hand to lead you to Billy. "Pwetty.", she added with a proud smile. "Oh yes, Ari, you made Billy really pretty.", you agreed and undermined your statement with a nod. She then pointed at you with a questioning look. "You can do my hair at home, yeah?" She smiled and nodded in agreement before you picked her up and carried her back to the door. "Can you say bye bye?", you asked Ari. She waved her tiny hand at Billy with a grin on her face. "See you tomorrow, Ari.", Billy said with a wave back.

Weeks passed, you haven't picked up Ari in since the first incident. Once you told Jenny, she started asking Aris godfather to do pickups. Her baby daddy was a no-good leech, and her parents didn't support her so it was just you, Jenny and the godfather. And you thought that it was ideal, but that ideal was broken by a tiny plastic stick with two blue lines on it. "Fuck...", you mumbled. It was all you could say. Jenny was at home, taking a quick shower before wanting to pick up Ari from daycare. "What does it say?", she asked you while peaking out of the shower. "I'm pregnant...", you mumbled. It felt so real now that you've said it. "And you're sure it's Billy's?", she continued. "I haven't had sex with anyone else in the past six months.", you told her while pulling your legs into a criss-cross position. The two of you were having a deja-vu, as this was the exact same way Jenny found out she was gonna have Ari. Just with a different father. "So, I'll give him your number when I pick up Ari and we'll go from there. At least he has a stable job.", Jenny said while washing out her conditioner. "You're way too calm, Jen.", you said. "I just told you I'm pregnant, you're taking this easy." You could hear her chuckle. "Well, if he's a dick as well we'll just be a four-people household."

But Billy did call you and asked to talk with you face-to-face. While Jenny didn't tell him what exactly happened, she did tell him that it was important. Billy already had his suspicions at those words, but he didn't know how to feel about them. His mind was reeling as he drove over to your place to pick you up, and you were waiting on the sidewalk with the test in hand. He parked at the nearest parking spot and waited for you to enter. Once you sat down next to him, you silently handed him the test. "Well, fuck.", he mumbled as he looked at the two blue lines.

"Yeah, that's kinda how that happened."

[decaffeinatedgalaxyprince]

Hiii in response to the 48 hour bladder slave post, honestly I'm probably lighter on ideas than most would be, but I would have so much fun controlling your intake.

Id give you good drinks that were also diuretics and then take you out somewhere for a while, like a restaurant so we could eat. And you'd be desperate but not TOO horrible so that we could head back home while you're squirmy. And then when we'd get back home, we'd watch a movie and of course I'd make you hold it through the whole thing.

Id only let you pee when you TRULY can't hold it, and only then, would have to have accidents.

Another idea would be sharing a shower while you're desperate. So easy to pee right then and there but you'd have to endure the entire time with all that nice hot water tormenting you. And i take loooonggg showers :3

And of course, if at any point, you have to pee, you have to ask me for permission first. If I don't feel like letting you go yet, then you'll just have to drink a bit more and ask again sometime. I think I'd get a kick out of putting you in difficult clothing, like overalls and belts and complex pants :3

yessssss yes i love these ideas. i love having my intake controlled so much honestly like it's underrated, having someone dictate and know exactly how much liquid has to go into my system and thus my bladder eventually. so good.

a restaurant could be nice too, maybe some place casual so i could just snack but not have to worry about trying to stay sitting down. or like a mall or arcade or something like that... playing pool at a pub or something, like i'd have an excuse to fill up on drinks have some salty snacks and pace around fidgeting

trying to hold it through a movie might actually be easier on me lol because i can distract myself from my bladder pretty effectively right up to when i'm totally bursting. but maybe a nature documentary about river ecosystems... and i do like to snuggle up, so i'm sure you'd 'help'

i also love love the idea of having to hold during a shared shower, showing together is so nice honestly and holding in the shower is so hard so i'm sure i'd love that. i also take nice long showers hehe

and yes yes yes to having to being put in complicated clothing, belts and overalls and playsuits and stuff. yes please. i love when i get told how to dress up, also very underrated, especially with some shibari over top... and i have to ask permission every time because i'll need your permission to undo some of the clothing and belts and knots... heheheee 💖

these all sound like great ideas, 10/10 weekend of being controlled

[someone-always-cares]

chapter 5, page 48

first - previous - next

[image description: an sac webcomic page. "seems like a normal kitchen. coast's clear, but it's locked." jade says, off panel. theres a view of the kitchen from the outside. no acual kitchen appliances are shown, but there is a island counter, and a few shelves in the back with various items, notably camera equipment, cleaning supplies, and assorted boxes. "we'll have to break in here, everything else is boarded. you remember what i taught you about breaking glass?" she continues. "yeah. it'll be loud though" lewis replies. "we'll just have to take whoever hears us." jade states, the panel now showing jade hiding to the side of the window, looking at it out of the corner of her eye, while lewis has wandered off and is kneeled down to pick up something off the ground. "this glass seems sturdier than the wine glasses lewis practiced with... can he do it? i've never been able to get the frequency right, but surely any glass will break with a loud enough noise?" jade thinks to herself, looking through the window, still to the side of it, while frowning contemplatingly. she seems to be unaware of lewis behind her, raising the brick he just picked up like one would when preparing to pitch a baseball, and sticking his tongue out in concentration. end id]

yall are getting a treat with me drawing actual backgrounds the past few pages! my computer fucking hates it and has tried to crash my art program many times but im not losing to a fucking machine so the page is ready to go! and yeah i didnt think to google what a broken wire fence looks like until typing this

anyway some life updates. next page may be a little late, i have a convention this weekend (if anyone is headed to animeleague london anime and gaming festival this weekend feel free to say hi! its the one with the star fairy lights and like. my art in it? yeah. also for the same con in birmingham in a couple weeks)

also ended up getting those wooden pride cat pins! or the charms, i need to glue the actual pin bits in and that tomorrow's task!! and even more importantly, i've started the process of trying to make sac into an actual printed comic!! so far it seems like im just going to start with chapter 1, because with the printer im thinking of using, anything over 76?ish pages is automatically more expensive so currently only have the funds for chapter one (50ish pages inc bonus and prologue).

also because turns out theres more work than i thought. theres some things like getting the colours cmyk ready and fixing typos and other errors, there is some size problems (the first 6 pages in particular need to be redone entirely but not much of a loss. they look.... Not Great. maybe prologue too). also some "accidentally lost some files and the backups of said files in an external drive related incident a couple years ago" but i've got my best experts on the case (asking my dad for help). i also need to change the font since the old pages are using the old version of the font. also a front cover because i never made a cover for chapter 1. anyway. its a start

anyway this was long i really needed to sleep a few hours ago lol. its only 1am but its been a day

[nochi-quinn]

legend of vox machina season 2 episode 12: The Hope Devourer OR LAIR ACTIONS

my partner went "he's dreaming" literally immediately

I can't figure out what that is on the mantle. brain says probably a dildo of some kind, given that that's anal beads and a flogger hanging over the wood hopper

the painting from brimscythe's lair, lute, more sex toys, dragon tooth?

the painting of them that makes me cry despite vax looking Like That

the troll dick is also on the mantle

not sure whose helmet that is in the case tho

a painting of the keep :(

I can't figure out if that purple book on the shelf is supposed to be anything

me: why tf is there a cameo of a cha - CHAIR

three guesses whose children these are

both the characters and the actors

is that the damn reward poster that led them to fighting umbrasyl in the first place

not fucking kraghammer

okay given that they said the runes they've used other places translated into real language, what are the odds this book actually says something

also is that keyleth's ring she got from kerrek or

it's me, I am the person that one animaniacs skit was talking about

that morph from kaylie to vax was actually really smooth tho, props

"we need a skyship to catch them" percy just really wants a skyship

not the tail slap

stop shittalking the dragon in midair

okay but How tho

heheh, ass-id

grog whaling on umbrasyl like a piñata, if he hits it enough his friends fall out

grog crater 3.0

and now he REALLY doesn't have any bones

studiously looks at notepad so I don't have to look at broken bone

this episode just hits all my major squicks, it's Great :)

that sound effect was 100% unnecessary

I don't know why I love vax's "oh no" so much but here we are

it's the raven from the intro!

WINGS

and now vax can fly 400 miles an hour and throw 67 daggers at once

keyleth: you're so beautiful vex: you get fucking WINGS what the FUCK

I love the little scuff marks on Bad News' scope

"there's no such thing as luck" oh? oh mr. vax "almost got the Lucky feat banned from matt mercer's table forever" ildan?? is that so???

mr. "gave sam reigel shit for not using the halfling feat to reroll natural 1s for two entire campaigns"??? no such thing???

"yup, we're dead"

"we're hurt but so is umbrasyl" smash cut to umbrasyl healing himself

did you just hang up on thordak

"another ominous mountain lair" that's okay it's your favored terrain

[keyleth] flirting: I don't want you to die

as everything from the past 48 hours clicks into place for pike

the Kamaljiori head was a low fucking blow

(little sad we didn't get more about Scanlan and Kam. mb next season)

if I had a nickel for every time Vax went ahead and got caught by an enemy he didn't expect to be in the room and couldn't get past them to escape despite having a perceived physical advantage, I'd only have two nickels but it's weird that it happened twice

HEY you're only supposed to be able to use those once a day

I! Love! the colors! in this lair!

I already love greens and teals so that kind of gradient on the acid effects is targeted at me specifically

"YEP still broken"

the way I broke in half when someone pointed out RQ broke the connection between the twins

"we're splitting the party?" again?

"drop him" drop it, drooooop iiiiit

THE EAR TWITCH such a weird thing to be my favorite trope but here we are

if I had a nickel for every time a powerful enemy used one of vex's siblings as a shield -

I just love the delivery on percy's "get us the FUCK out of here"

vax about 45 minutes late with that "chenga"

"she doesn't control my destiny!" "no, you do" no fate only wyrd

I'M THE JUGGERNAUT BITCH

LAIR ACTIONS

grog has just been Through It these past couple-few days huh

me having to defend scanlan's character arc to my roommate bc she was actively getting bored with Canonically A Coward Scanlan

umbrasyl that is CHEATING

I think if vax says "fate" one more time I'm gonna just leave the room

the way umbrasyl froze at scanlan's voice, chef's kiss

I fucking love the harmonizing with the sword

(another reason umbrasyl probably wouldn't have been able to wield it properly) (besides not having thumbs)

I was almost convinced we were moving up Bard's Lament

"your daughter would have been proud" rest of party: his what now

(I know she was whispering, it's just hilarious to think that's how they found out, like the fucking destiel meme)

"you're ALIVE, motherfucker?!"

mansion time, MANSION TIME

we all precipitated!

if you're not part of the solution etc etc science joke

"and I believe in you" mala: that's just sam and liam

wilhand's new lockeeeeeet

someone pointed out the ptsd percy must have had during this whole scene

an enemy infiltrating his home, his friends and family collapsing in front of him…leave this boy alone

vax I don't know why you thought that'd work

"mind your manners" hehehehehe

see, it WAS sleeping gas

so yennen's been dead at LEAST since they came through from the keep, right

I still cannot hear liam in vorugal and it's driving me nuts. I know it's got all the reverb and shit on it, and he's also fucking gollum so it's not like he's always 100% recognizable, but also I have a reputation to uphold

thordak: I got kids I need this job

LOVE ending on the cracking noise, so fucking good

[shakes internet until season 3 falls out]

[perseusjackson-jasongrace]

I posted 439 times in 2022

61 posts created (14%)

378 posts reblogged (86%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@perseusjackson-jasongrace

@ashilrak

@cold-r-ain-in-june

@elaborateruses

@sodamnbored

I tagged 434 of my posts in 2022

Only 1% of my posts had no tags

#i bloody love fan artists - 156 posts

#percy jackson - 93 posts

#ciara’s convos - 49 posts

#jercy - 48 posts

#jason grace - 47 posts

#hoo - 40 posts

#pjo - 40 posts

#pjjg fanfic - 39 posts

#pjo tv show - 39 posts

#self reblog - 25 posts

Longest Tag: 136 characters

#then we can kind of deduce that percy is not even using his full power while he’s ‘making little storms um uh making fucking hurricanes’

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

percy jackson is music.

and what I mean is, he’s like biting into fresh watermelon on a hot summer’s day. he’s burning your fingers trying to roast marshmallows. and the breath in the moment before disaster.

what I’m trying to say is, he’s walking in the city at night and hearing it come alive. he’s listening to cats purr. watching someone hold the door for a person a little too far away. he’s changing the channel and finding your favourite movie just starting. he’s slushies at the movies. and the joy of learning something new.

you know? like I think, he’s hugs from a friend you haven’t seen in too long. and lying in your bed in the dead of the night trying to hear if the world breathes when it’s this quiet. he’s driving past a forest in the rain. and almost burning your toast. he’s five minutes away from forever. the first thing you remember really understanding.

do you get it? he’s like the weather changing too quickly. and taking the first sip of your favourite drink. he’s laughing untamed. and curling in front of a fire on the coldest day of the year. he’s the coldest day of the year. and the fluffiest socks you own. he’s the road trip snack you can never live without. and the early hours of the morning. he’s your favourite hoodie. and the day you said goodbye to someone you love.

what I really mean is, he’s the chaos. but also the calm. percy jackson is art. the boy himself.

65 notes - Posted August 18, 2022

#4

this ended me. it’s so in character

[id under cut]

[image id: a tweet by @/Daniel Howell that reads “just beat hades for the first time I’m shaking with adrenaline and feeling incredibly bisexual”

@/eqmess retweeted with an additional comment that reads “percy jackson at 12:”

end id]

67 notes - Posted January 10, 2022

#3

the real reason hoo should have been in percy’s pov only was so that we could read him being his true bisexual self by calling every new person he meets beautiful and handsome the way he did in pjo

90 notes - Posted April 26, 2022

#2

if I ever call Jason a “son of a bitch” please make no mistake the bitch is not beryl grace it is Zeus.

118 notes - Posted January 14, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

happy birthday to the boy that single-handedly developed my entire sense of humour and impertinence <3 sending medusa’s head back to the very forces that created her will forever be the most iconic act of defiance and direct action ever.

435 notes - Posted August 18, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

it’s always a pleasure <3 and I find it hilarious that jercy is still one of my top tags and posts despite the fact that I haven’t produced content of any kind for them pretty much the whole year WILD

[tomorrowillbeyou]

10 14 37 48 52 55 for math ask game

HII OMG THANK YOU FOR SENDING THIS!!!

10. do you have any least favourite theorems?

ok for some reason i can't STAND the triangle inequality. every time i see it im like NOT THIS GUY AGAIN and i literally have no reason to feel that way its so irrational but i hate her so much 💔 im sorry triangle inequality

14. do you think you're good at math? do you expect more from yourself?

hmm that's a . tricky one to answer. i think ive always been a little hard on myself because one of my best friends growing up was literally the smartest like as in international olympiad competitor style LOL so i felt inadequate in comparison but at the same time i never felt like i would never be able to do something, i feel like i know deep down very strongly that if i work hard enough i can eventually understand something i don't yet. in terms of creativity and problem solving and stuff like that i do kind of expect a lot more from myself though but like.. i think that will grow over time fingers crossed . also im mega autistic so the whole being rigorous thing is like literally what i already had to do in my regular life or i would get scared of being misunderstood haha. king of overexplaining. anyway this became too long.

37. have you ever used math in a novel and entertaining way?

ough i am a little confused what this is asking. but in many different ways yeah . at school we used to do stupid shit like calculating the number of dots on my blazer or making up ridiculous maths pick up lines or trying to come up with the weirdest proofs or create the fastest growing function stuff like that. ive also helped run kids maths challenges where you kind of have to do that kind of thing . i think i just have a very silly and nonserjous approach to the whole idea of maths like the whole point for me is to have fun with it and mess around so Yea. idk if that's what the question means though

48. has math changed you?

that's another difficult one to answer bc i feel like it's always been really ingrained in my life so it's definitely shaped me as a person for my whole life and i can't imagine the person id be without it but like .. there wasn't really a time before i liked it and then i started liking it and became a different person iykwim. i guess when i became burnt out at the beginning of this year that changed me by making me feel incredibly depressed and lose my sense of identity entirely ahamfhkjrd but were good now!!

52. do you have favourite math textbooks? if so, what are they?

I CANT LIE A TEXTBOOK IS JUST A TEXTBOOK TO ME.. if it gets the job done and isn't super obscure and confusing im chilling 👍👍👍there are probably some really good ones out there but all the ones ive encountered have just kinda been textbooks tbh

55. where is your most favourite place to do math?

welll i guess my favourite place to do most things is in my bedroom at my desk bc that's where i feel most comfortable and private anskdjdk but sometimes if i take a bus while im really struggling with something it helps me get my ideas in order i guess it's the change of scenery or something... on the other hand least favourite i could go on for hours literally anywhere where i have to be around people without headphones in ..my misophonia swag... OH ALSO i like under the stairs in one of the lecture theatres here bc nobody ever goes there and i can blast thursday through my headphones and dance while working on problems sjdksjf but i only go there if i don't have time to go home in between things

[charlotteiscrying]

222 days sober today. 222 days since you left, 222 days since every single aspect of my entire life changed. im kinda happy i lost everything at once. it could not physically have hurt more, but now that ive lived through, actually prospered through, the hardest 222 days of my 22 years of life, i feel like i can do anything. there is literally nothing, outside of death, that can hurt me more than ive already been hurt. not meaning that i haven’t been hurt by death, more meaning that death is the only thing that could hurt me more than fentanyl, hurt me more than you.

i try to remember the girl i was 222 days ago, the girl who was withdrawing n just so sick, with so much anxiety about giving up the only thing that ever made me happy in this world. i genuinely couldn’t keep using that stuff, i was at the point that i couldn’t physically get enough fentanyl up my nose to even feel just baseline 33% okay. even after i started smoking it, i couldn’t chase the dragon fast enough, or well enough, to ever feel okay.

that shit sucks. i think about that all the time when i see homeless people around the city. they are so sick all day every day, chasing some powder, that smells like actual ballsack, that will, only maybe, make them feel just barley okay for 15 mins. i was right there with them, n that’s the scary part. all it took was 2 years to get to the lowest rock bottom possible. going through an endless cycle of withdraw, hustle, buy, snort, repeat. every 30 mins.

im just so happy i can say ive changed in these past 222 days. i don’t even recognize myself when i look in the mirror. i look healthy, i have color in my skin again, ive actually gained almost 20 lbs. im on the tiny dose of methadone the rehab left me on, n thats actually made me accidentally quit alcohol and any and all benzodiazepines. same w mdma, acid, all hard drugs in general. all i do is smoke weed now.

im actually taking care of my body and my skin, its been borderline impossible trying to heal all this acne i have left from the fentanyl n all the toxins i was putting into my body. and the scars from all the times id scratch my skin open… im trying to heal them, but mainly im just proud of me for taking care of myself. and i’m so beyond proud that i actually enjoy doing my skincare now, i’ve made it a little routine thats such a nice break i can take for myself each day.

mentally, the hardest part of these 222 days has been you cheating on me. you know you didn’t break up with me first. you cannot gaslight me into believing that- you just didn’t break up with me. you also know i didn’t hallucinate 6 months of long distance. i didn’t hallucinate your facetimes every night, your promises that you love me, that there’s no other girls, that i have nothing to worry about. you obviously couldn’t admit to me just how much you had been using me. just how unfaithful you had been. you had been cheating long before i found out. long before. n i knew. im not dumb, i just get blinded by lust. by what could be. by what we could have been.

that’s another huge thing i’ve accomplished recently. realizing the difference between love and lust. i care about you, n i have a lot of lust for you, but i do not love someone who treats me how you have. i thought i loved you. i really did. i thought you loved me. that’s the crazier part. we made it through two years of addiction, fentanyl addiction at that, you went to prison, proposed to me, several of my cars got crashed, i od’d, you saved my life, we both got clean, made it through rehab, we were doing long distance for 6 months. we mf beat fentanyl. or- i did. you pussied out on day 2, then beat 5 doctors up until they shot you up with fentanyl to sedate you. you then proceeded to continue tweaking, so they’d give you more. you od’d. so you never detoxed, they detoxed you while you were asleep. you were awake for 48 hours of detox. i was awake, and conscious, through every second of it. i was in the emergency room for 22 days. in the telemetry unit actually, i had an arrhythmia, and tachycardia, from detoxing. i beat fentanyl. and i didn’t immediately turn to alcohol to satiate my cravings, either. i learned to look beyond them, to see what i already have right in front of me. that’s why, in 222 days, i’ve made all this progress, n you’re right back exactly where you left off. oh, and i know you’re back on fentanyl, too. i’d know that behavior anywhere.

im glad that i ruined juice wrld for you. same w my city, bmws, that gun you love so much that i was with you when you bought. all your favorite things reek of me- i love it. every day you get further and further from me, i realize just how much you used me. how much you didn’t care. how much you tricked me, how much you lied. how much I didn’t need you. 

you’ll never get to touch me again. you got to be with me at my lowest. congratulations. you never even met the real me. the sober me. you know i kinda am happy you left how you did. you ripped the bandaid off. it hurt so bad it made me realize i recognized that hurt from somewhere. i had gone through the emotions of being broke up with by you probably 22 times over.

im so excited to see what i do in the next 222 days. how much more progress i will have made. where i will go, the things i will do, the people i will meet. i hope im almost completely off the methadone, n i hope i have found many more things that make me happy. healthy things i mean. im just proud of myself. n so beyond excited for the future. i know its gonna be wayyy better than these last 2 years, and even better than these last 222 days.

- it was just 2:22AM :)

[discord-thoughts]

My phone was stolen this weekend, and I have so many feelings about them and there’s nothing I can do, so you have the pleasure of listening.

I was working the bar, and when it was slow, I would read. The author likes the thesaurus’s so I kept my phone handy to make notes of the words I didn’t know. When I would help a customer, I would leave my phone beside the book. That was a mistake.

We have her in camera. At 3:23, she slipped my phone into her coat pocket and left. She had been gambling, and didn’t get anything to eat or drink except for three cups of ice, the entire time she was there. She said it was an Irish thing, that they ate toilet paper, and something else too. It had a name; I think it began with a K.

I realized at 3:45 that I shouldn’t have left it on the counter, but it wasn’t there when I went to grab it, so I checked my pockets. Empty.

If I had worn my apron that day, maybe I wouldn’t have left it in the counter, carelessly. I told myself I wouldn’t need my apron, anyways.

I checked my Apple Watch. It was disconnected from my phone. So I called my phone from the lounge. Voice mail. I called again. And again. And again.

Voicemail.

Voicemail.

Voicemail.

I called my husband, and asked to check the location.

“It says you’re at work, as of 20 minutes ago”

I asked him to call.

Voicemail.

Voicemail.

Voicemail.

The panic set, and I had to leave the bar before my customers saw the tears in my eyes. I don’t handle panic well.

I begged my coworker to tell me it was a prank. A cruel joke. I was crying by this point, but she had no idea what I was talking about.

I signed into find my iPhone. It’s in lost mode now. Maybe they’ll try and sell it, and the buyer will call me. I called my data provider. The IMEI is blacklisted. I filed a report with the police. I cried.

I had run out of cloud storage, and ignored the notification warning me for months, maybe even years now. Everything on that phone was not coming off unless I did it manually, with the phone present. Now I pay for iCloud storage.

Photos of my niece, my siblings, my dogs. Photos of the country, and memories I’ll never get to see or send again.

16 half written songs, and a note of bits and pieces. Prompts. Lyrics. Ideas. A TBR book list. Sims 3 achievements checklists. How much I need to transfer each month for bills. Thoughts that I had been hoarding, waiting until there was enough to reread. Random, ridiculous things that I can’t even remember now. Words from the book, that I never got to define.

I had an assignment due that night. I tried to distract myself with it, but I couldn’t access my account without verification via text message. It’s been three days. I still haven’t messaged my instructor. I really should.

I had stickers on the back. Some meaningless. Some from friends a whole continent away. Some from old teachers, on assignments i did well on. Some were inside jokes, or just the context of when I put them on were sentimental.

Text messages. Christmas gift ideas. Birthdays. Heartfelt conversations. Reminders.

Gone.

The address on my phone location updated on Monday, the day after it was stolen. I called the non emergency line, and they sent someone to check. They denied. I sat outside their house in my car the whole time. I waited two hours for the officer, and I watched as he drove away. I cried.

He gave me his work number. I sent him the video of her walking out with my phone. The photo of her face. He said they’ll try to ID her, that he’d call me back in 24 hours. It’s been 36. I haven’t heard from him.

I sent him a screenshot of the find my iPhone. The address updated to 48 streetname Cresent, from its original 44. I haven’t heard from him. I think I’m going to call again tomorrow. It’s 2am. So, today.

I had to buy a new phone yesterday. I called about insurance. I thought I was protected for theft; “Insurance for lost or stolen phones is expensive and tedious, so we don’t outright offer it to customers”. On upgrade fees, financing payouts, activation fees and down payment, I spent $1200. I now spend $13 a month on damage, theft and loss insurance. My phone bill is now $2 less than with my old provider, and they gave me a $10 discount and $5 insurance.

I get tips from the bar, so I had cash on hand, but I don’t know how I’m going to pay for my next semester of school.

It’s a newer model.

It feels wrong.

It’s empty.

All flash, no substance.

I woke up this morning, feeling like a stranger, all because of a strange phone.

I want my phone back. I want my memories back. I want someone to care. I want to stop crying. It’s a stupid thing to cry about, really. I want to curl up in a hole and not exist. I haven’t felt this way in a long time.

It’s just a phone.

I shouldn’t be so upset.

Maybe it’s the mistake.

I hate making mistakes.

I feel dumb.

Useless.

Worthless.

Incompetent.

Careless.

Tired.

Angry.

Sad.

Stupid.

It’s my own fault.

I wish they would do something.

It’s a stupid phone. I shouldn’t be so upset.

[fangirlings-things]

Goodbye [1/2]

➤ PART. 2

Fandom: Criminal Minds

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x reader

Word count: 1.5K

Warnings: heavy angst, mentions of death

Summary: after being taken by an unsub, you are given a goodbye call and you use it to call the chief of your unit and lover, Aaron Hotchner

A/N: just a lot of angst with this man because I love him!!! let me know your thoughts and if you want me to write the second part this is supposed to have lots of love 💖

GIF IS NOT MINE || TAG LIST: @imaginesofyourfandom ; @locke-writes ; @regalbanshee

Hotch could not believe his own ears when the phone rang in the room in Oklahoma City the police had given the BAU team to use during the current investigation. Everyone had been expecting that call for 48 hours now. They knew that call would be made, because that was the signature. The signature of the killer they had been hunting.

Hotch exchanged a brief look with all the team as he walked forward towards the table were the phone was. All the others had something in their expressions that he knew probably resembled his own. Fear. He actually had to take a deep breath before pressing the button to pick up the call.

As the phone was programmed to sound on speaker, the whole team was able to hear a shallow breathing on the line. No one dared to say anything, too tense to do such a thing. But then they didn’t have to, because the person with the shallow breathing then spoke. “H-Hotch?”

It broken him. Right then and there. He did not want to believe it, he refused to. For 48 hours he had given all he had to try to solve that case in time, but hadn’t been able to. As the M.O said, the killer gave his victims one last call before finishing them. And that was happening. That was your last call and it did not surprise anyone, that you were looking for him. For you, it had always been him.

“Hotch?” your voice sounded again, weak, and that finally set him into action.

“(Y/N)?” your name seemed heavy on his tongue, like it had never before. He leaned down and pressed his hands into the surface of the table as id to hold himself up. “(Y/N), I’m here. Where are you?”

“You know I don’t know that. And if you’re asking me, I suppose you and the team don’t either” you tried to give out a little laugh, but it quickly turned into a cough. From their side of the line, Garcia pressed one of her hands to her mouth, tears already steaming down her face.

“(Y/N), anything. Anything at all that…” the leader of the unit said, the words leaving his mouth in a terrified rush.

“Aaron” the intensity of your tone and the fact that you used his first name made him go quiet on the very same instant. Around the room, no one else dared to speak. They knew you wanted Hotch, and him only. “Stop. It’s over, babe”

“No, it’s not. We can…” he began again, trying hard to keep his voice steady.

“Aaron” you spoke again, much more softly this time and it seemed as if Hotch had been slapped. He pressed his palms so hard against the table that his knuckles turned white. “This is my goodbye call. You know what this means”

“You have to remember something. Anything. Did you see…” your silence was unbearable and his voice died in his throat, tears blurring his vision and falling on the table. “I shouldn’t have sent you alone”

“You know I would have gone anyway. I lost, it’s part of the job. But you and the team will still be able to catch him” he realized you thought the others weren’t hearing your words and silently decided to leave it that way. He knew you never liked to be so exposed and fragile in front of everyone. And still, he could not ask them to leave the room. Honestly, he thought he wouldn’t be able to go through that alone. “You have to catch him, Aaron”

“I will. I promise you, I will” from the corner of his eye, he saw David pull a chair and sit down to then support his face on his hands, the sadness clear in his features. “(Y/N)…”

“I know” you said, and it made him go silent again. “I know” you repeated and the team was able to hear the change in your voice when you started to cry. “I’m really going to miss you, Aaron. God, I already do” in that moment Derek took his hands to his head and started to walk around the room, in agony. “I’m going to miss having to make you leave the office and go home. Spending the weekends with you and Jack. Falling asleep by your side on the jet” you sobbed loudly then, giving into emotion. Emily cleared her throat to stop herself from sobbing too. Hotch had to pull away from the table to take a deep breath and control his own now unregular breathing. “But above all, I’m sorry”

“What?” he asked, too confused and overwhelmed by the whole situation.

“I’m sorry for making you go through this again. I know how much your suffered because of Hailey. I never wanted you to have to…” you sobbed again. The hot tears streaming down his face seemed like a waterfall, never ending. Never stopping. “I’m so sorry”

“This is not your fault” he forced his voice to go out. He came back closer to the table and sat down on a chair merely because he felt like falling down at any moment. “You know this is not your fault”

“Still, I wanted you to know” you went silent for long moments and just when he was about to call out, your voice came back. “Can’t believe I’m not going to see everyone again. This team…” you laughed a bit and all of them could picture your smile. “I’m going to miss them all so much”

“(Y/N), anything…” Hotch grabbed into hope, wishing, craving something, anything, that would change the outcome of what was to happen.

“Tell David to don’t get married again” you interrupted, sniffing as you tried to stop crying. Talk about your co-workers made your tone sound sweeter and you felt a certain warmth in your chest. “Between the job and the idea of another divorce, he will loose it” you laughed and David laughed too silently, nodding in agreement. “Emily belongs in the BAU. She’s an amazing profiler, and an amazing friend” Prentiss closed her eyes at the compliments, feeling too deeply. “Don’t let J.J work too much. Make her go home by seven and please, if she’s overwhelmed, make her take a few days to herself” J.J by hearing you talk about her, turned around and stormed out of the room, unable to hear more. “Penelope, oh, I adore her. Thank her for all the advices, the playlists she made to cheer me up and listen on the jet. Thank her for everything” Garcia reprimanded a sob and left just like J.J had done. “Derek…” Morgan instantly stopped walking and fixed his blurry eyes on the phone, like he could see you somehow. “he is my best friend. My best friend in the entire world. Tell him I remember every laugh, moment, drink, every pizza night we had together. I wish we had more of those” Morgan really cried now, punching the closest wall with all the force he had. If you heard the sound, you did not mention it. “Spencer is the brother I never had” Reid, who sat on a chair close to Rossi, squeezed his lips on a thin line. “I love that he always have… had a new historical fact to tell me about. Seeing him trying to eat in hashis always made me laugh so hard. Tell him to visit his mother more. I know he misses her” another pause. Another sob. “I love them all. Tell them that I do. Hotch?”

“Yes?” he took the tears away from his face with the back of his right hand, feeling his chest aching. It was like he could literally feel his heart breaking.

“I love you. It took me a long time to say so, maybe too long. I wish we had more time” you sobbed again, harder, and that sound was horrifying, like it came straight out of a nightmare. “I found the ring, Aaron. On your drawer. I was only looking for a shirt and there it was… the ring” Hotch closed his eyes hardly, telling himself he wanted to wake up. He had to wake up and see that it was not real. It couldn’t be. “I would’ve said yes, Aaron. It would have definitely been a yes” and then the line went silent.

“(Y/N)?” Hotch called, but there was no answer. His breath hissed. “(Y/N), keep talking to me, babe” nothing still. “(Y/N), please, talk to me”

“Aaron” David got up from his chair and walked around the table to put a hand on his shoulder.

“Please…” he was the one who then started sobbing.

━━━━━━━━━━ × ━━━━━━━━━━

“Aaron, we need to talk” David entered the room of the station where Hotch had been alone in for hours now. As he got no response, he insisted. “Aaron?”

“Leave me alone” he said only, eyes still fixed on the phone from which he had heard your last words. Last words.

“Aaron” David said again, more seriously this time.

“What?” Hotch raised his voice, eyes dry and hurting. The tears seemed to have ended long before.

David fixed his eyes on his. “Garcia found something”

[bookwyrminspiration]

PLS TELL ME ABOUT THE HISTORY OF CADAVERIC DISSECTION I WANNA HEAR ALL OF IT PLS PLS PLS

Yes yes yes!! I would love to!!! I love this subject!! /g

disclaimer: I’m not an expert, I just think the topic is interesting and research it in my spare time

so I think one of the more fascinating aspects of human dissection, is that originally it all started with the goal of finding the soul. These people wanted to figure out where in the body the soul was kept, as the soul was the part of you that would outlast your body and persevere forever. This is a fairly religious outlook, but it’s what motivated them. It’s an outlook that can be seen with the ancient Egyptians, although they were taking apart the body for purposes of preservation, not to study the anatomy. A lot of earlier people actually thought the heart was the most important organ and not the brain, which was why it wasn’t preserved in the mummification process.

But now for actually dissection! We go back to Ancient Greece, 3 BCE, where Herophilus of Chalcedon and Erisistratus of Ceos practiced. We actually don’t have any record of them or their practice, as their studies were burned in Alexandria (I believe the second burning, the one by Theophilus). We just know they existed because they were mentioned by later people. These two are generally considered the first two people to practice human dissection, which is why they’re important. I bet you’ll probably never hear there names in discussion of anything else.

But after Alexandria burned, human dissection vanished for 1,700 years, later coming back in 14th century Italy. As of the 12th century it wasn’t expressly prohibited, but there was a phrase that translated to “the church abhors blood” that was misinterpreted as a ban. But later on the Holy Roman Emperor, Fredrick II, said a body needed to be dissected every five years in order to study anatomy. So the first publicly sanctioned dissection since Ancient Greece took place in 1315. However, the style of dissections during these time periods are absolutely atrocious in terms of effectiveness.

There were three people involved. The Lector, who read aloud from a text (an out of date, inaccurate text); the Ostensor, who pointed at the part of the body to be dissected; and the Sector, who did the actually cutting people open part. However, the Lector never actually saw the body being opened, they just read from the text. So the person teaching the students couldn’t actually see the body, which isn’t great. Also, most of these dissections were taking place to just reinforce what students had already learned, not the actually explore the body.

Around the middle of the 14th century, it became mandatory in some universities to attend a dissection before you could graduate, which led to a sudden high demand for cadavers that just couldn’t be met. So how are these bodies acquired? Students were required to pay for and attend the funerals of the people they dissected, which was meant to encourage families to offer the body for dissection in exchange for a free funeral. Wasn’t quite enough to satisfy the demand, but it was enough that murder and grave robbing weren’t really a problem yet.

Anatomists and medical students weren’t the only people dissection bodies though. Dissection came back originally in Italy, and later on during the Renaissance many artists and sculptors would perform dissections to get a more accurate knowledge of the human form. Although many did choose to just stick to observation of the human form opposed to cutting it apart.

Now if you’ll remember, the dissections done with three people didn’t explore the body or have the Lector involved with the actual cadaver. This changed when Vesalius entered the picture, as he thought if you wanted to learn anatomy, you had to do the dissection yourself. However he was a student at this time and didn’t have many opportunities to dissect, so he would take bodies from the mound of Monfaucon, where executed criminals bodies would be hanged until they disintegrated. While unethical, it did give him a more thorough understanding of anatomy that he displayed when he took over from his Sector and started cutting open the body himself.

Now let’s take a little jump over to England. England was a little behind everyone else, starting dissection in the 16th century (this delay is likely due to the church). So the demand for cadavers rises because texts from Italy and France are making their way to England and now medical students are interested. So now the government needs to come up with a way to legally supply bodies, hence the Murder Act of 1752, which said executed murders could be dissected. This was both to legally provide bodies and to discourage murder.

However, while it wasn’t really a problem in 14th century Italy, grave robbing has now become a serious problem because the government just can’t meet the demand of the dissectors. There was even a specific name for the people who dug up bodies and sold them to medical schools: they were called body-snatchers by the general public and resurrectionists by medical schools. But there was another way bodies could be attained: murder. William Burke and William Hare killed at least 16 people and sod them to medical schools. They would kill these people by getting them intoxicated and then suffocating them, as this method would go undetected by the doctors they sold them too (as opposed to like, a slit throat). This specific style of murder was actually named after William Burke and called “burking.” Ironically when he was caught he was executed, and because executed criminals were fair game, he was dissected.

So because murder had become a problem, the anatomy act of 1832 was passed, which allowed unclaimed bodies of the poor from workhouses to be used for dissection purposes. If the body was still in the workhouse 48 hours after death, it was considered unclaimed. (Bodies we’re dissection 3-4 days after death because otherwise the stench would become unbearable). This made these corpses cheap and legal, so it was no longer worth the price of buying them from illegally procured sources. So yay, Murder has successfully been avoided. At the cost of the poor. This reasonably led to a rift between classes, as the poor didn’t want to be dissected and the rich wanted dissections for the purposes of science. Dissection had been used on executed criminals for long that it had become synonymous with capital punishment, and now all the sudden it’s like they’re saying these people are being punished for being poor.

The way people rationalized it was saying the bodies they were taking (and continued to take into the 20th century) were just repaying their debt to the society that had looked after them when alive. This is why soldiers were never dissected, as their service was considered repayment. However around this same time to workhouses began to close, so the number of corpses available decreased. So where do they get more bodies? From people who died in psychiatric asylums. They also explored other marginalized people, like immigrants and people of color. Enslaved people were considered property of their owner and could be sold, and what the family wanted didn’t matter. In Germany a large supply of bodies also came from concentration camps, with a legislation passed in 1942 that actually denied relatives of executed Poles and Jews the right to claim the body.

Now let’s hop over to the US. The US was very similar to Europe, however one thing that does stand out is the Uniform Anatomical Gift Act in 1968, stating that the deceased persons wish for their body now superseded that of their next of kin. This was important in terms of body donation, as now when someone wanted to donate their body that was respected above the families wishes. The act being successful also helped enact similar legislation around the world, like the Anatomy Act in 1984 in the UK. now medical students rely entirely on body donation to have cadavers to dissect in almost every part of the world. And it’s been proven time and time again and backed by medical students that their knowledge of anatomy and the human form is greatly improved when they have the chance to attend a dissection. Another aspect of this is keeping students sensitized, reminded that this was a real living person deserving of respect. That’s partially why earlier students would pay for and attend the funerals, to sensitize them. Now the students may meet the families of the person they’re dissecting prior to doing so.

Medicine has definitely come a long au since the idea of the four humors (which id also be happy to talk about /g), and there’s some very thorough resources out there if you want to look! I could give you the links to a few of my favorite if you’d like /g, but this is just a general summary of human dissection as a whole. Thanks so much for asking about it because I adore the subject and would love to talk about it anytime!!

[chaos-burst]

i saw u were still taking requests so 43 or 48 for fjorclay :00 can u tell I love their height difference

43. A kiss pressed to the top of the head. 48. One person has to bend down in order to kiss their partner, who is standing on their tip-toes to reach their partner’s.

[ID: a gif of the two male protagonists from the animated movie El Dorado nodding each other and saying “Both? Both? Both. Both is good”. End ID]

Fjord isn’t exactly sure how it happened. 

And at this point he’s definitely too afraid to ask. 

The first time it happened was directly after Fjord almost died and Caduceus pulled the yellow stone out of his body. Fjord remembers the pain and the rain dripping into his armor and then a soft press of lips onto the top of his head. 

He was so distracted he almost missed it. Later, when he lay in bed he was sure that he imagined it. But it keeps happening. 

A soft kiss on the cheek. Another one on the top of his head. A kiss on his goddamn hand that makes him do an embarrassing kind of wheezing noise about which Beau laughs for over an hour every time she looks at him. 

Fjord could swear that Caduceus sits closer to him, too. And touches him more. Like a brush of fingers to get a strand of hair out of Fjord’s face. Or a gentle touch on his arm, asking if he needs healing. 

Fjord is at the same time very good and very bad with people. 

Talking to people is no problem at all. 

Reading and understanding people? Definitely his least favorite thing. 

He’s not sure what prompted all this, but the kisses and the touching and the closeness keep happening. 

It’s not like Fjord minds, per se. In fact, he very much enjoys all of this, but it does make having a crush on your fellow follower of the Wildmother a little difficult. 

Every kiss feels like a very pleasant punch in the stomach. He can’t even make fun of Beau anymore when she turns into a stammering mess whenever Yasha looks at her sideways. But at least Beau doesn’t have to deal with Yasha pressing soft kisses on top of her head. 

It feels nice, though. Protective and soft at the same time. 

At some point Fjord can’t take it anymore. 

“Hey, Beau”, he says one night while they’re taking first watch. 

“What’s up?”

“So, um. About Caduceus”, he starts and Beau snorts and grins and punches his arm. 

“Yeah, good job, man.”

Fjord stares at her. He doesn’t know what exactly he did a good job at, but somehow he feels like everyone knows something that he doesn’t, so he doesn’t ask what he originally wanted to ask. 

“Thanks”, he says, without knowing what he’s thanking Beau for. 

It all comes crashing down in Eiselcross as the big Goliath lady in the meat shop starts hitting on Caduceus and Fjord feels like taking one of the meat hooks from the ceiling and making some shashlik out of this woman. 

Caduceus smiles as pleasantly oblivious as always and then. 

“Oh, thanks, this is so nice, but I--uh. I already have a boyfriend.”

And he turns around and gestures at Fjord. 

The meat lady looks at him as if she considers whether or not half-orc meat is tasty enough to sell. Yasha looks at Fjord with a confused look on her face that tells him that at the very least he isn’t the only person who doesn’t understand what’s going on. 

Maybe Caduceus is doing this to get out of the whole situation. Then he remembers how Beau said ‘Good job, man.’.

Um. 

“What?”

Now everyone is staring at him. Including Caduceus. Which. 

Fjord thinks that something very terrible is happening right now and he doesn’t understand what exactly it is. 

“Wait. What? You’re boyfriends?”, Yasha asks. 

“No”, Fjord says at the same time Caduceus says “Yes”. 

There is a very awkward silence until the meat lady says “You could’ve just said no, you know.” and Fjord decides that he should better leave this whole situation and maybe go bury himself in the snow. 

He knows that he can only hide for so long, but Fjord isn’t exactly the best at dealing with feelings so he takes a long walk through the snow to clear his head. But of course Caduceus finds him. 

“So, uh. I wanted to apologize for that whole thing back there. I talked to Jester and maybe, uh. Maybe I misunderstood some things and that usually doesn’t happen to me. But I want to apologize for making you uncomfortable. That was not my intention.”

Fjord looks at him. It doesn’t take a talent to read people to see that Caduceus looks sad and very apologetic. His heart feels like it’s going to burst out of his ribcage at any second. 

“No, I--uh. I guess I didn’t realize...”--that you felt the same way about me. 

“I read you wrong, and that is entirely on me, so don’t worry about it happening again”, Caduceus says, raises his hands in a gesture of surrender and does a sort of half bow. 

Wow. Fjord really fucked this up spectacularly. 

“You didn’t”, he finally manages to get out and his own voice sounds foreign to his ears. 

“Didn’t what?”, Caduceus asks and stands up straight again. He still looks sad. Fjord hates it when Caduceus is sad. 

“Didn’t read me wrong”, he answers and takes three steps through the snow, grabs Caduceus by the front of his coat and pulls him down to kiss him straight on the mouth. If he stands on tiptoes because Caduceus is just so damn huge then no one has to know about it.  

When he pulls away to search Caduceus’ face for discomfort or lingering sadness, Caduceus raises his hand and touches the corner of his mouth. 

“Oh”, he says and a soft smile spreads across his face that has Fjord’s insides do a whole dance routine. “Wow, that was nice.”

“Yeah”, Fjord rasps. 

“Can we do that again?”

“Yeah, definitely.”

“And does that mean that we are, in fact, boyfriends now?”, Caduceus asks, seemingly concerned that he misunderstood the situation. Fjord feels his cheeks heat up. 

“Yeah, I--uh. Yeah. It does.”

[munmunwerewoof]

I posted 7,913 times in 2021

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For every post I created, I reblogged 328.7 posts.

I added 118 tags in 2021

#me - 52 posts

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Longest Tag: 109 characters

#but if you wanna play arenas fuck off i am never touching that mode except doc would play areanas w you maybe

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

Your opinion on dead by daylight

ok tbh i think i exaggerate a lot when i say i hate it and stuff. its fun but i can only handle it i think in small doses. sometimes smaller if im getting bad matches. but boy oh boy i sure do love watching shit on it on yt!!!!!!!!! tbh if i had the amount of hours i had watching the game and playing it switched around id be a pro w everyone prestige 3 level 50. oh yea its highly flawed but i still think its fun and enjoyable theres the opinion

4 notes • Posted 2021-10-09 05:02:08 GMT

#4

this is what i get for reverting daylight savings

4 notes • Posted 2021-03-18 06:59:41 GMT

#3

POV: you are gordon @crowbarcollector and i am outside your house at 2 in the morning

5 notes • Posted 2021-01-09 21:02:07 GMT

#2

Would you like an egg?

POG POG POG THANK YOU SO MUCH (puts the entire egg in my mouth and chews on it)

10 notes • Posted 2021-03-30 03:45:51 GMT

#1

13430 notes • Posted 2021-04-24 02:18:48 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[sinceileftyoublog]

Riot Fest 2021: 9/16-9/19, Douglass Park

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Much like Pitchfork Music Festival earlier this month, this past weekend’s Riot Fest felt relatively normal. Arriving at Douglas Park every day, you were greeted by the usual deluge of attendees in Misfits t-shirts and dyed hair, the sound of faint screams and breakneck guitars and drums emanating from nearby stages. The abnormal aspects of the fest, at least as compared to previous incarnations, we’re already used to by now from 2021 shows: To get in, you had to show proof of vaccination and/or a negative test no older than 48 hours, which means that unvaxxed 4-day attendees had to get multiple tests. Props to the always awesome staff at Riot Fest for actually checking the cards against the names on government-issued IDs.

For a festival that dealt with a plethora of last-minute changes due to bands dropping out because of COVID-19 caution (Nine Inch Nails, Pixies, Dinosaur Jr.) or other reasons (Faith No More/Mr. Bungle because of concerns around Mike Patton’s well-being), there were very few bumps in the road. Whether Riot Fest had bands like Slipknot, Anthrax, or Rise Against in their back pocket as replacements or not, it very much felt like who we saw Thursday-Sunday was always supposed to be the lineup, even when laying your eyes on countless “Death to the Pixies” shirts. Sure, one of the fest’s main gimmicks--peeling back the label on Goose Island’s Riot Fest Sucks Pale Ale to reveal the schedule--was out of date with inaccurate set times and bands, and it still would have been so had Faith No More and Mr. Bungle stayed, since Fucked Up had to drop out last minute due to border issues. But the festival, as always, rolled with the punches.

The sets themselves offered the circle pit and crowdsurfing-inducing punk and metal you’re used to, with a few genre outliers. For so many bands of all styles, Riot Fest represented their first live show in years, and a few acts knew the exact number of days since their last show. For every single set, the catharsis in the crowd and on stage was palpable, not exactly anger, or elation, but pure release.

Here were our favorite sets of the festival, in chronological order.

WDRL

Last October, WDRL (which, amazingly, stands for We Don’t Ride Llamas) announced themselves with a Tweet: “y’all been looking for an alt black band,, well here you go”. A band of Gen Z siblings, Chase (lead guitar), Max (lead vocals), Blake (drums), and Kit Mitchell (bass guitar), WDRL is aware, much like Meet Me @ The Altar (who, despite my hyping, I couldn’t make it in time to see) that they’re one of too few bands of POCs in the Riot Fest-adjacent scene. Their set, one of the very first of the weekend during Thursday’s pre-party, showed them leading by example, the type of band to inspire potentially discouraged Black and brown folks to start punk bands. Max is a terrific vocalist, able to scream over post-punk, scat over funk, and coo over slow, soulful R&B swayers with the same ease. The rest of the band was equally versatile, able to pivot on a dime from scuzzy rock to hip hop to twinkling dream pop. Bonus points for covering Splendora’s “You’re Standing On My Neck”, aka the Daria theme song.

Joyce Manor

Joyce Manor’s self-titled debut is classic. The best part of it as an album play-through at a festival? It’s so short that you can hear it and you’ll still have half a set for other favorites. So while the bouncy “Orange Julius”", “Ashtray Petting Zoo”, and ultimate singalong “Constant Headache” were set highlights, the Torrance, CA band was able to burn through lots from Never Hungover Again, Cody, Million Dollars to Kill Me, and their rarities collection Songs From Northern Torrance. Apart from not playing anything from Of All Things I Will Soon Grow Tired (seriously, am I the only one who loves that record?), Joyce Manor were stellar, from the undeniable hooks of “Heart Tattoo” to the churning power chords of “Catalina Fight Song”. After playing “Christmas Card”, Johnson and company gave one final nod to the original fest cancellation, My Chemical Romance, who were slated to headline 2020, then 2021, and now 2022. If you ever wondered what it would sound like hearing a concise punk band like Joyce Manor take on the bombast of “Helena”, you found out. Hey, it was actually pretty good!

Patti Smith

Behold: a full Patti Smith set! After being shafted by the weather last time around, a sunglasses-laden Smith decided not to fuck around, leading with the inspiring “People Have The Power”, her voice as powerful as I’ve ever heard it. Maybe it was the influence of Riot Fest, but she dropped as many f-bombs as Corey Taylor did during Slipknot’s Sunday night headlining set. After reluctantly signing an adoring crowd member’s copy of Horses, she quipped, “I feel bad for you have to cart that fucking thing around.” It wasn’t just the filthy banter: This was Smith at her most enraptured and incendiary, belting during “Because The Night” and spitting during a “Land/Gloria” medley, reciting stream-of-consciousness hallucinogenic lyrics about the power of escape in the greatest display of stamina the festival had to offer.

Circa Survive

“It feels good to dance,” declared Circa Survive lead singer Anthony Green. The heart and soul of the Philadelphia rock band, who cover ground from prog rock to post-hardcore and emo, Green was in full form during the band’s early Friday set, his falsetto carrying the rolling “The Difference Between Medicine and Poising Is in the Dose” and the chugging “Rites of Investiture”. While the band, too, can throw down, they’re equally interesting when softer and more melodic, Brendan Ekstrom‘s twinkling guitars lifting “Child of the Desert” and “Suitcase”. Ending with the one-two punch of debut Juturna’s introspective “Act Appalled” and Blue Sky Noise’s skyward “Get Out”, Green announced the band would have a new record coming soon, one you hope will cover the sonic and thematic ground of even just those two tracks.

Thrice

Thrice played their first show since February 2020 the same day they’d release their 11th studio album, Horizons/East (Epitaph). To a crowd of fans that came to hear their favorite songs, though, the Irvine, California band knew better than to play a lot of the new record, instead favoring tracks like The Artist in the Ambulance’s spritely title cut and Vheissu standout “The Earth Will Shake”. Yeah, they led with a Horizons/East song making its live debut, the dreamy, almost Deftones-esque “Scavengers”, and later in the set they’d reveal the impassioned “Summer Set Fire to the Rain”. But the set more prominently served to emphasize lead vocalist Dustin Kensrue’s gruff delivery, on “All the World Is Mad” and “in Exile”, the rhythm section’s propulsive playing buoying his fervency. And how about Teppei Teranishi’s finger tapping on “Black Honey”?!? Thrice often favor the slow build-up, but they offered plenty of individually awesome moments.

Smashing Pumpkins

William Patrick Corgan entered the stage to dramatic strings, dressed in a robe, with white face paint except for red hearts under his eyes. He looked like a ghost. That’s pretty much where the semi-serious theatricality ended. The Smashing Pumpkins’ first Chicago festival headlining set in recent memory was the rawest they’ve sounded in a while, counting when they played an original lineup-only set at the United Center a few years back. It was also the most fun I’ve ever seen Corgan have on stage. Though they certainly selected and debuted from their latest electropop turn Cyr, Corgan, guitarist James Iha, drummer Jimmy Chamberlin, guitarist Jeff Schroeder, and company more notably dug deep into the vault, playing Gish’s “Crush” for the first time since 2008, Adore’s “Shame” for the first time since 2010, and Siamese Dream barnburner “Quiet” for the first time since 1994 (!). Best, every leftfield disco jam like set opener “The Colour Of Love”, “Cyr”, and “Ramona” was quickly followed by something heavy and/or recognizable, Chamberlin’s limber drum solos elevating even latter-day material like “Solara”. At one point, Corgan, a self-described “arty fuck,” admitted that years ago he would have opted for more experimental material, but he knew the crowd wanted to hear classics, the band then delving into a gorgeous acoustic version of “Tonight, Tonight”. And while Kate Bush coverer Meg Myers came out to sing Lost Highway soundtrack industrial ditty “Eye”, it was none other than legendary local shredder Michael Angelo Batio who stole the show, joining for the set closer, a pummeling version of Zeitgeist highlight “United States”. Leaning into the cheese looks good on you, Billy.

The Bronx

Credit to L.A. punk rock band The Bronx, playing early on a decidedly cooler Saturday early afternoon, for making me put in my earplugs outside of the photo pit. Dedicating “Shitty Future” to Fucked Up (who, as we mentioned, had to drop out), the entire band channeled Damian Abraham’s energy on piercing versions of “Heart Attack American” as well as “Superbloom” and “Curb Feelers” from their latest album Bronx VI (Cooking Vinyl). Joby J. Ford and Ken Horne’s guitars stood out, providing choppy rhythms on “Knifeman” and swirling solos on “Six Days A Week”.

Big Freedia

The New Orleans bounce artist has Big Diva Energy, for the most part. After her DJ pumped up the crowd to contemporary Southern rap staple “Ayy Ladies” by Travis Porter, Big Freedia walked out and showed that “BDE”, firing through singles like “Platinum” and “N.O. Bounce” as her on-stage dancers’ moves ranged from delicate to earth-shaking. At this point, Freedia can pretty much do whatever she wants, effortlessly segueing between a cover of Drake’s “Nice For What” to “Strut”, her single with electropop DJ Elohim, to a cover of Beyone’s “Formation”. Of course, the set highlight was when she had volunteers from the crowd come up and shake and twerk--two at a time to keep it COVID-safe--all while egging them on to go harder. Towards the end of the set, after performing the milquetoast “Goin’ Looney” from the even-worse-than-expected Space Jam: A New Legacy soundtrack, she pulled out the beloved “Gin in my System”. “I got that gin in my system,” she sang, the crowd singing back, “Somebody gonna be my victim,” a refrain that compositionally not only leaves plenty of room for the thundering bass but is thematically a statement of total power--over sexism, racism, the patriarchy--even in the face of control-altering substances.

Les Savy Fav

During Les Savy Fav’s set, lead singer Tim Harrington at various points--*big breath*--went into the crowd, deepthroated an audience member’s mohawk spike, found a discarded manikin head with a wig on it, revealed the words “deep” and “dish” painted on his thighs and a drawing of a Red Hot on his back, rode a crowd member like a horse, made a headband out of pink tape, donned ski goggles, surfed on top of a door carried by the crowd, squeezed his belly while the camera was on it to make it look like his belly button was singing, and referred to himself as a “slippery eel.” Indeed, the legend of Les Savy Fav’s live show starts and ends with Harrington’s ridiculous antics, as he’s all but out of breath when actually singing dance-punk classics like “Hold On To Your Genre”, “The Sweat Descends”, and “Rome (Written Upside Down)”. We haven’t heard much in terms of new music from Les Savy Fav in over 10 years--their most recent album was 2010′s Root For Ruin--but I could see them and the extremely Aughts genre in general become staples of Riot Fest as albums like Inches, The Rapture’s Echoes, and !!!’s Louden Up Now reach the 20-year mark. Dynamic vocalists, tight bands, and killer grooves: What’s not to love?

State Champs

This set likely wins the award for “most immediate crowd surfers,” which I guess is to be expected when you begin your set with a classic track 1--album 1 combination. “Elevated” is the State Champs number that will cause passers-by to stop and watch a couple songs, the type of song that can pretty much only open or close a set. And because they opened with it, the crowd immediately ramped up the energy. It’s been three years since the last State Champs full-length, Living Proof, so they were in prime position to play some new songs. As such, they performed their bubblegummy “Outta My Head” and “Just Sound” and faithfully covered Fall Out Boy’s “Chicago Is So Two Years Ago” (releasing a studio version earlier this week). But the tracks from The Finer Things and Around the World and Back were, as usual, the highlights, like “All You Are Is History”, “Remedy”, “Slow Burn”, and set closer “Secrets”. At the end of the day, it didn’t entirely matter: The crowd knew every word of every song.

Bayside

Putting State Champs and Bayside back-to-back on the same stage made an easy decision for the many pop-punk bands at Riot Fest. Bayside’s been at it for twice as long, so the breadth of their setlist across their discography is more variable. Moreover, they’ve thrice revisited their discography with acoustic albums of old songs, so even their staples are subject to change. They provided solid versions of Killing Time standouts “Already Gone” and “Sick, Sick, Sick”, Cult’s “Pigsty”, and older songs like their self-titled’s “Montauk” and Sirens and Condolences’ “Masterpiece”. For “Don’t Call Me Peanut”, though, they brought out--*gasp*--an acoustic guitar! It was a rare moment not just for one of the most popular pop punk sets but the festival in general, a breather before Vacancy shout-along “Mary”.

Rancid

“Rancid has always been anti-fascist and anti-racist,” said Tim Armstrong before the band played “Hooligans”. It was nice to hear an explicit declaration of solidarity from the street punks, reminding the crowd what really matters and why we come together to scream and mosh. The band expectedly favored ...And Out Come The Wolves, playing almost half of it, and they perfectly balanced their harder edges with more celebratory ska songs like “Where I’m Going” from their most recent album Trouble Maker (Hellcat/Epitaph). My two favorite moments? The breezy, keyboard-laden “Fall Back Down” from their supremely underrated 2001 album Indestructable, and when they asked the crowd whether they wanted the set to end with “Time Bomb” or “Ruby Soho”. “We have 4 minutes left, and it’s disrespectful to play over your set time,” said Armstrong. It’s easy to see why Rancid continues to make an impression--instrumental and moral--on touring bands new and old.

Run the Jewels

The brilliant hip hop duo are masters of balancing social consciousness with the desire to fuck shit up for fun. Live, the former tends to come in between-song banter, the latter with their actual charismatic, tit-for-tat performances of the songs. However, Run the Jewels also are probably the clearest live performers in hip hop today, Killer Mike and El-P’s words, hypersexual and woke alike, ringing in the ears of audience members who don’t even know the songs. (Looking around, I could see people smiling and laughing at every dick joke, nodding at each righteous proclamation.) Some of the best songs on their most recent album RTJ4 (Jewel Runners/BMG) are perfect for these multitudes. Hearing both RTJ MCs and the backing track of Pharrell Williams and Zack de la Rocha chanting “Look at all these slave masters posin’ on yo’ dollar” on “JU$T” as the rowdy crowd bounced up and down was the ultimate festival moment. For those who had never seen RTJ, it was clear from the get-go, as Killer Mike and EL-P traded bars on “yankee and the brave (ep. 4)” that they’re a unique hip hop act. For the rest of us, it was clear that Run the Jewels keep getting better.

The Gories

It felt a little weird that legendary Detroit trio The Gories were given the first set of the final day--I’d have thought they’d have more draw than that. No matter what, they provided one of the more satisfying and stylistically varied sets of the festival, showcasing their trademark balance of garage punk and blues. Mick Collins and Dan Kroha’s guitar and vocal harmonies were the perfect jangly balance to Peggy O’Neill’s meat and potatoes drumming on “Sister Ann” and “Charm Bag”, while folks less familiar with The Gories were treated to their fantastic covers of Suicide’s “Ghost Rider” and The Keggs’ “To Find Out”. Smells like time for the first Gories album in 20 years!

FACS

I thought it would be ill-fitting to watch a band like FACS in the hot sun, early in the day. Their monochrome brand of post-punk seems better suited for a dimly lit club. But the hypnotic nature of Brian Case’s swirling guitar and Alianna Kalaba’s slinky bass was oddly perfect in a sweltering, faint-inducing heat. Just when you thought you might fade, squalls of feedback and Noah Leger’s odd time signatures picked you back up. Songs from their new album Present Tense (Trouble In Mind) such as “Strawberry Cough” and “XOUT” were emblematic of this push-pull. And everything from the band’s red, white, and black color palate to their lack of stage banter suggested a cool minimalism that was rare at a festival that tends to book more outwardly emotional bands.

Alex G

On one hand, Alex G’s unique combination of twangy alt country and earnest indie rock makes him an outlier at Riot Fest, or at the very least a mostly Pitchfork/occasional Riot Fest type of booking. On the other hand, like a lot of bands at the festival, he has a rabid fanbase, one that knows his back catalog hits, like “Kute”, “Kicker”, and “Bug”, as much as if not more than hyped Rocket and House of Sugar singles, like “Bobby” and “Gretel”. Backed by a band that knows when to be loose and when to tighten up--and the instrumental chops to do so--Alex G was better than he was a Pitchfork three years ago. He still sings through his teeth, making it especially hard to hear him on louder tunes such as “Brick”. But when the honesty of his vocals combines with the dreamy guitars of “Southern Sky” and circular melodies of “Near”, it’s pure bliss. 

HEALTH

The formula for the LA industrial noise band has pretty much always been Jake Duzsik’s soft vocals contrasting John Famiglietti’s screeching bass and pedals and BJ Miller’s mammoth drums. Both in 2018 and Sunday at Riot Fest, the heat affected Famiglietti’s pedals, which were nonetheless obscured by tarp. Or so HEALTH claimed: You wouldn’t know the difference given how much their sound envelops your whole body during one of their live sets. Since their previous appearance at the festival, the prolific band has released two new records on Loma Vista, Vol. 4: Slaves of Fear and collaboration record Disco4: Part 1. Songs from those records occupied half of their excellent set, including battering opener “GOD BOTHERER”, “BODY/PRISON”, and “THE MESSAGE”. It was so wonderfully loud it drowned out K.Flay’s sound check drummer, thank the lord.

Thursday

Last time Thursday played Riot Fest, Geoff Rickly was battling heroin addiction, something he talked about during the band’s triumphant late afternoon set on Sunday. He mentioned the kindness of the late, great Riley Gale of Power Trip in extending a helping hand when he was down and extended his love to anybody in the crowd or even the world at large going through something similar. To say that this set was life-affirming would be an understatement; after 636 days of no shows, Rickly was at his most passionate. He introduced “Signals Over The Air” as a song the band “wrote about men beating up on women in the pit,” that a record exec at the time told them that it wouldn’t age well because he thought--no kidding--sexism would eventually end. Rickly’s voice, suffering from sound issues last time around, simply soared during Full Collapse’s “Cross Out The Eyes”, No Devolucion’s “Fast to the End”, and two inspired covers: Bruce Springsteen’s “Dancing in the Dark” and Texas Is The Reason’s “If It's Here When We Get Back It's Ours”. The latter the band played because TITR guitarist Norman Brannon’s actually on tour with them, though Rickly emphasized the influence the NYC post-hardcore greats had on Thursday when they first started. Never forgetting where they’ve come from, with self-deprecating humor and radical empathy, Thursday are once again a force.

Devo

Much like the B-52′s in 2019, Devo was the set this year of a 70′s/80′s absurd punk band with some radio hits that everybody knows but with a swath of die-hard fans, too. It’s safe to say both groups were satisfied. You walked around the fest all day wondering whether the folks wearing Devo hats were actual fans or doing it for the novelty. By the time the band actually took the stage after a career-spanning video of their many phases, it didn’t really matter, because it was clear the band still had it, Mark and Bob Mothersbaugh and Gerald Casale’s vocals booming throughout a massive crowd. They ripped through “Peek-a-Boo”, “Going Under”, “That’s Good”, “Girl U Want”, and “Whip It”, which caused the fans waiting for Slipknot (and presumably some Devo heads) to form a circle pit. And that was all before the first costume change. Mark passed out hats to the crowd, fully embracing converts who might have only known “Whip It”. The feverish chants of “Uncontrollable Urge” and synth freakouts of “Jocko Homo” whipped everyone into a frenzy. And the band performed the “Freedom Of Choice” theme song for the first time since the early 80′s! I had seen Devo before, opening for Arcade Fire and Dan Deacon at the United Center, but the atmosphere at Riot Fest was more appropriately ludicrous.

Flaming Lips

“The Flaming Lips are the most COVID-safe band in the world,” went the ongoing joke, as throughout the pandemic they’d give audience members bubbles for their bubbles to be able to play shows. The normally goofy and interactive band scaled back for Riot Fest. Before launching into their traditional opener “Race For The Prize”, Wayne Coyne explained that while the band is normally proud of where they come from--Oklahoma City--they’re saddened by the local government’s ignorant pandemic response and wouldn’t risk launching balloons or walking into the crowd because they might be virus spreaders coming from such an under-vaccinated area. To his and the band’s credit, they wore masks during the performance, even when singing; Coyne removed his only when outside of his bubble that had to be deflated and inflated many times and that sometimes muffled his singing voice even more than a mask. Ever the innovative band, they still put on a stellar show. Coyne autotuned his voice on “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1″, making it another instrument filling the song’s glorious pop melodies. Less heavy on props, the band favored a glitchy, psychedelic setlist that alternated between beauty (”Flowers Of Neptune 6″, “Feeling Yourself Disintegrate”, “All We Have Is Now”) and two-drummed cacophony (“Silver Trembling Hands”, “The W.A.N.D.”). They’ll give a proper Lips show soon enough, but in the meantime, it was nice to see them not run through the motions.

Slipknot

Apart from maybe moments of Slayer, I’ve never witnessed a headliner at Riot Fest as heavy as Slipknot was. Even the minor ethereal elements present on their most recent and very good album We Are Not Your Kind, like the chorus of voices during “Unsainted”, were all but abandoned live in favor of straight up brutality. Sure, there were moments of theatricality--Corey Taylor’s menacing laugh on “Disasterpiece” and pyrotechnics in sequence with the instrumentation on “Before I Forget” and “All Out Life”--but for the most part, Slipknot was the ultimate exorcism. Taylor’s new mask, with unnaturally circular eyes, seemed like it came from a particularly uncomfortable skit from I Think You Should Leave. They bashed a baseball bat to a barrel during the pre-encore performance of “Duality”. And the songs played from tape, like the gasping-for-breath “(515)”, were designed to contrast Slipknot’s alien appearance with qualities that were uncannily human. For a band whose performances and instrumental dexterity are otherworldly--who else can pull off tempo changes over a hissing, Aphex Twin-like shuffling electronic beat on “Eyeless”--the pure seething emotion on songs like “Psychosocial” and “Wait and Bleed” shone through. Like Smashing Pumpkins, and like so many other successful Riot Fest headliners, Slipknot abandoned drama for pure, unadulterated dirt.

[renegadepisces]

Bright Imagine: Kandomere accidentally meeting your family Pt. 2

You weren’t sure if Kandomere was flirting. You also weren’t sure if he’d meant what he said about coffee on Monday. 

Thankfully, an all points bulletin for a centaur brandishing swords in both hands as he galloped through the Natural History Museum prevented you from finding out. Of course, you were less thrilled at the prospect of missing lunch and lingering at the office well after dark. 

A notification from your phone tore your attention away from the mound of paperwork in front of you. You’d disarmed the centaur, but not without injury. The stitches you received at the hospital were not enough to get you sent home though. You’d put the cuffs on the centaur, so you had to deal with the paperwork. 

That meant forms for booking his swords into evidence, forms for cataloging damage to the museum, forms for turning him over to the hospital for drug screening - and you were certain he was on something - and more forms for processing him in jail. And then there were injury reports and the statements from your colleagues. The centaur would likely face an additional charge of assaulting an officer, which meant you could look forward to wasting an entire day testifying against him in court sometime in the future. 

You expected a text from Kandomere asking where your report was. He was usually the only other soul at the office this late. But it wasn’t Kandomere or anyone else in your unit. The notification was from your in-law, and your jaw clenched as you read it.

Heads up, the kids said they saw you on the nightly news while we were washing dishes. Are you ok?

Being on the news and the unwelcome attention that would bring wasn’t the purpose of their warning. You knew what they were really preparing you for. Any second now -

Your phone buzzed sharply against the wooden surface of your desk, only somewhat muffled by the piles of paper surrounding it. The caller ID image showed your sibling smiling broadly and grasping all three of their children tightly in a hug. It was one of your favorite pictures, but you were sure its subjects weren’t smiling now. 

Sighing, you accepted the call. Your sibling wouldn’t stop calling until they heard your voice. Maybe not even then. You did the same thing whenever they experienced a close call at work.

“Before you start, I am 100% totally fine. There’s nothing to worry about.” You told them, enunciating each syllable slowly and calmly in the hopes it would rub off on them.

It didn’t. 

“You went full Xena Warrior Princess on the 7 o’clock news, and that’s what you tell me?” Your sibling screeched, causing you to grimace and pull your phone away from your ear. 

“That’s a bit of an overreaction, don’t you think?”

That was clearly the wrong answer because you couldn’t manage to get a word in for 10 minutes while your older sibling ran through a laundry list of questions. 

No, you didn’t need to make a doctor appointment. No, you didn’t need to stay the night with them either. Yes, you were sure that you were perfectly well enough to drive yourself home from work. No, you didn’t have a concussion. You suspected that last one wasn’t quite true, but that was a problem for later. 

Finally, your sibling seemed pacified.You’d put him on speakerphone about 5 minutes into the conversation so that you could keep doing paperwork.

“Okay, fine. But turn on your camera. I want to see your face. The kids want to see you.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” you warned. “I caught a hoof in the face at some point. I’m sure it looks worse than it feels but it might not reassure them.”

You heard the anxious intake of breath from the other end of the line and cut your sibling off before they could wind themselves up again. 

“What if I show you my face and you tell them I’ll come over for dinner on Friday? The bruises will have faded by then. In the meantime, I can read them a bedtime story to distract them and you all can get to sleep.”

Your sibling paused, considering your plan. It was late and getting close to the boys’ bedtime. Your niece was hopefully already sleeping soundly in her crib at this point. But seeing news footage of your scuffle with the centaur had no doubt whipped them into a frenzy. You doubted they would sleep well tonight, and a pang of guilt echoed through you at the thought of them worrying about you. 

Your sibling agreed and did their best to stifle a wince when you flipped your camera on. You didn’t blame him. You gotten up from your desk since Ward and Jakoby brought you back to the station, which had allowed you to actively avoid all reflective surfaces. You didn’t need to see it to know it was bad. It felt awful. But you couldn’t let your nephews know that. 

The boys hadn’t quite learned to compromise yet, so you had to read two stories - one picked by each of them. Your sibling steered them toward mercifully short tales, and you channeled every ounce of effort you could muster into bringing them to life. At the conclusion of the second story, your sibling switched their camera away from the book and panned over the boys. 

Their tiny bodies were nearly still except for the steady rise and fall of their chests. Deftly and soundlessly, your sibling put the books away. You heard the soft click of them flicking the lights off as they crept out of your nephews’ shared bedroom. 

“Good job y/n,” they yawned. “Are you sure you don’t need anything?”

“Yes! You’re such an older sibling!” You hissed exasperatedly. “I have one more page to fill out, and then I’m going home.”

“No, don’t go home. You’ll go straight to bed and wake up starving at 3 am. Grab some food first,” urged your sibling’s spouse in a voice made husky from drowsiness. Your sibling must have taken the phone with them into their bedroom.

“Don’t worry, I’ll make sure y/n gets home alright,” Kandomere said from a few feet to your left. You hadn’t heard him approach, or even seen him since you left the scene of the incident. You wondered when he’d gotten back. Had you really been so out of that you didn’t notice?

“We’d appreciate that Agent Kandomere,” your sibling paused, and you could hear the smile in their voice before they continued. What they said next nearly made you fall out of your chair. 

“And you’re welcome to come with y/n on Friday if you’re available. They’ll give you the details.”

A stream of expletives flitted through your mind as you processed what your sibling had just done. You’d only narrowly avoided embarrassing yourself on a (maybe?) coffee date at the expense of your ability to move any part of your face and upper body without being in pain. How the hell were you supposed to get out of a family dinner? Your sibling had already told the kids, so you couldn’t cancel without gravely disappointing them. You couldn’t stand the thought of upsetting them like that when they were so worried about you. 

But you didn’t find the thought of Kandomere sitting down to dinner with your family much more tolerable. What if your sibling tried to talk cop shop with Kandomere over dinner? What if your nephews asked you to sleepover, which they usually did if you came over for dinner on a Friday night? What if they pulled up those silly selfies you’d taken with them? Or that ridiculous video of you slow dancing with them at your cousin’s wedding last spring?

Kandomere thanked them for the invitation and your sibling hung up, leaving you sitting in the suffocating silence of the MTF’s bullpen with nothing but your feverish embarrassment and Kandomere for company. You’d been avoiding eye contact with him since he made his presence known, so you were surprised when he pushed a steaming hot cup of coffee into your hand. You hadn’t noticed he’d been holding a cup in each hand. 

The comforting, sharp aroma of espresso wafted up from the cup. Your mouth started watering as the smell reminded you just how little you’d eaten or drank that day. 

“You remembered,” you whispered, and felt very stupid as soon as the words left your mouth. 

Of course he had. You always ordered espresso when buying coffee. He could probably smell it all over you. And it had been less than 48 hours since he ran into you with a cup of espresso gelato in your hand. The fact that he remembered you liked espresso was less impressive to you than the fact that he’d actually bought you coffee. 

He’d been serious. 

“Thank you,” you added hastily, eager to recover some sense of control over the situation, “You didn’t need to.”

“I keep my word.” He said, and you caught the faintest twitch at the corner of his mouth as he continued, “And you’ve earned it, going ‘full Xena Warrior Princess’ this afternoon.”

You groaned. You should have guessed he’d heard that with his superior sense of hearing.

“Xena would have looked cooler and not gotten kicked in the face doing it.” you laughed. 

“You looked good enough to me,” he insisted. 

You realized at that moment that both of you still had your hands on your coffee cup. The heat of the liquid inside seeped through the styrofoam cup and its cardboard sleeve, but you also felt the warmth of his fingertips brushing yours. 

“When I first tried Aikido, I made a smart-mouthed comment about the rarity of being attacked by a sword-wielding lunatic. It seems that I owe my teacher an apology, given what happened today,” you deflected, trying to smother the mounting unease his comment sparked with humor. 

He chuckled and withdrew his hand from your coffee cup. His fingertips ghosted over yours as he did. In the dim after-hours lighting of the MTF bullpen, he looked much less severe than in the bright light of day. There was more than enough light even for your human eyes to catch the faint trace of a smile in his features though.

“Clearly there’s no need for me to ask your sibling if your impertinence is a lifelong trait over dinner on Friday.”