#which is way faster to get done.. that is.. if your drafted patterns still fit Sunny..

[somedaytakethetime]

And back on another note, let's get to part 2 (of lord knows how many) of my quest to re-write myself into a new person. Still on inspiration images...

I went through all my crap stuff today! Sorted out all of my accessories, sorted my fix pile and donated all the clothes that I'll never wear so there's no point in taking them in to fit me. I'm pretty sure that I'm still going to get rid of more clothes in the upcoming months as I go through the things I have and what I'll realistically wear but I feel much better having cleaned up even more things now!

But that's not the point, the point is that today I'm going to sort through the rest of the knit items. So... let's get the move on 😩

Starting with colourwork sweaters! I didn't save a ton of those, because realistically... I love knitting colourwork. Small colourwork projects that is, sweaters? Meh.. not a huge fan. BUT.. I like the look of them and I would like a few little things that say 'themed holiday' 🥺

Let's start with things that can look normal:

(links: image 1, image 2, image 3, image 4, image 5, image 6, image 7)

All of these can look perfectly fine for daily wear if they're knit in very subdued shades, I think. Granted that umber 7 is definitely very much 'gingerbread biscuit' but if winter isn't the time to dress like a cookie then when is the right time?? 😤

Now... let's look at something else...

(links: image 8, image 9, image 10)

I'm honestly convinced it's the blonde lady's fault that I have so many things saved.. I'm not sure if I actually want the sweaters or if I want to smooch her 😶 BUT ANYWAY LET'S FOCUS! Do I want a Valentine's sweater? Yes. Do I need one? Probably not. And tulips? SHEEP?? DO I NEED A SHEEP SWEATER?? MY BRAIN WOULD SCREAM IMMEDIATELY 'YES' BUT THE ANSWER IS PROBABLY NO! These are adorable in my eyes, but would I actually wear them? Only the hearts one and probably not in red..

Now let's look at something totally different. Skirts and dresses! Never made them in knit, but they sure look cute

(links: image 11, image 12, image 13, image 14, image 15, image 16, image 17)

So here's the dilemma: I think these are really cute (I'd make things in neutrals again, nothing bright or super colourful. Except skirt 14, it reminds me of folk skirts from several places in Europe and I love it so much) but a) would I wear them? Also.. would I like the way I look in a knit dress or mini skirt? Spoiler alert and sort of trigger warning I guess: I don't really love the way I look all that much, if anything, I sort of hate how I look and I feel stumpy, ugly and pudgy.. my legs, being as short and stubby as they are, are likely my least favourite thing along with the massive size of my hips and derriere (Hi, I'm pear shaped! I have a set of child-bearing hips that's... atrocious to me..). So, I do love the look of these but.. I'm not the level of slender and tall most of these women seem to be, so I would look rather different in these clothes... it's on the table, but also very much up for pondering. Unless I can stop hating myself? Probably not going to happen..

Now let's move on to happier pastures. Scarves!

(links: image 18, image 19, image 20, image 21, image 22)

I'm a huge fan of a silly little scarf. And a neck warmer. And just a big ole scarf in an interesting patter. I have a choking kink, I guess, I like something choking me out during the winter.. plus, neck warmers? Perfect for the scoop neck and lower necklines that I have! These are just a sample of what I have saved up, I have a small big obsession with neckwear and I don't know why.. probably the choking kink

And finally last category for the knits? Mittens, beanies and socks!

(links: image 23, image 24)

I'd change that condomhead look of number 24, not a huge fan of that vibe, but all in all I don't need a ton of these. I also have a balaclava and a few kerchiefs saved but I'm not sure if I'll make those. Maybe just one balaclava? For the construction of it. Also because I do get that cold even if my country isn't super cold at all..

(links: image 25, image 26)

Simple and all I need: one or two pairs of convertible mittens/gloves and some fingerless mittens. Don't need more than this. I have many fancy designs ones, but those, if I were to make them, it would be because I REALLY love the design and I'm in a world of LOTS of patience..

(links: image 27, image 28, image 29, image 30)

Now socks? Socks I'll need to make some decent amount of them. I wear socks year-round, so I would need a few pairs of them to go through. I've rounded up a few different heel constructions, toes I think they're all the same for the exception of number 28 where you can pick a choose (I can't remember the rest honestly, I don't remember the descriptions). I want to learn a few different methods for sock making, I'm really interested in a toe up sock. I've made socks before but they were cuff down, I don't have beef with sock making, I just enjoy learning new techniques.

I think with that I've rounded all the knitwear. Well, for the most part. There's still things that I didn't mention like my interest in making knit bras just because. I think they would probably be really comfortable for me, I'm an A cup so I don't need any support at all and I have a fierce hatred of The Brassiere™.. I still need to plan out really well what I want to make and which colours I want to use. I want to create sort of a minimal wardrobe type of thing, I'm just old and tired of owning a lot of stuff and feeling suffocated in piles and hoards..

Up next, I'll actually round up outfit inspiration images. Just for a visual of which style I actually gravitate towards, plus what would actually look good on my stumpy, lumpy, wee self. If I learn how to hate myself and how I look less, that would be major help too for all of this 😂 I need to make a proper narrowed list of basic things I truly need, everything else will be add-ons just because.. but that requires severe planning first so... yeah.. 😩

[ticktickblog]

Time Blocking: How It Helps You Take Control of Your Time

You might instantly recall the Lego blocks that we used to build a house when we were kids. Similarly, if we split 24 hours/1440 minutes of a day into blocks, how we spend the time is how we pile up these blocks in order the house to be built.

What is Time Blocking 

Time Blocking is a time management method that helps us get more done in the finite time by cutting a day into many chunks and each chunk is dedicated to a certain task. Some of the world’s most productive people, from Elon Musk to Bill Gates to Cal Newport (Author of Deep Work) have combined their to-do lists with this important method: Time Blocking.

A Russian entomologist Alexander Aleksandrovich Lyubishchev, kept recording the expenditure of his time, for 56 years in a row, in order to stay in control of his time. This comes with higher necessity in today’s society since 24-hour-a-day remains unchanged, while daily information explodes in the modern workplace.

How Time Blocking works

From the face value, this technique seems just a walk in the park. In what way can it really benefit us?

* It reduces context switching and mental energy loss

Time blocking is closely linked with task batching, which means similar tasks can be grouped together and distributed to time chunks. There are mainly two types of tasks at work: Deep and shallow. Deep tasks such as coding, designing, and drafting a marketing plan, usually require intensive attention and deep thinking, while shallow tasks are comparatively low-value tasks like emails, team chats and phone calls.

Setting a time frame for shallow work can prevent you from spending too much time on it and save mental spaces for other more high-value tasks. Combining time blocking and task batching also avoids frequent text-switching and helps minimize your cognitive burden caused by goal-changing.

* It helps lock your focus and reduce anxiety

Doing one task at a time can lock your focus and keep it intact, compared with splitting your attention across multiple tasks. With all mental resources invested in a single task, it can avoid getting distracted by miscellanies. With all tasks planned out alongside the day, the anxiety level is also lower because you can easily gain the control power over your workload.

* It helps keep track of your time expenditure 

When you get used to scheduling your day into set and controlled units, your own productivity pattern will form. For one thing, competitive daily/weekly tasks can be quickly arranged. For another, you’ll know the average time spent on certain tasks, which then helps you make realistic plans on time allocation. Therefore, time blocking lets you track your time-spending and further reflect on it for higher efficiency.

Is Time Blocking effective for everyone?

Well, the fact is there is never a one-fits-all solution. Time Blocking might be infeasible for reactive workers, e.g. customer support specialists, whose work  is basically based on in-time situations and thus cannot be estimated. 

However, blocking time off has an instant effect on those who have a short-term goal, no matter if it's an important exam or a job application, because they need to use their time wisely in a short period to maximize output. In another case, if you’re a fresh graduate who just joined a new company, then maybe the awareness and skills of time management are what you need, to avoid being trapped into the “keeping-busy fallacy” where workload keeps piling up but productivity keeps running low. Time Blocking also works for someone who can get a sense of accomplishment and stability from a well-scheduled daily life and who’d wish to continuously look back on his/her performance. 

Some misuses of Time Blocking

Like what’s being said, even though time blocking is a simple concept from the surface, it can still be misused and taken to extremes. There are mainly five cases that cannot be considered as an appropriate adoption of time blocking.

* Keep every minute on the regiment, and make 24 hours fully stuffed. * Too strict to the schedule and any changes or flexibility are not allowed. * Too optimistic about the estimated time arranged for a task. * No any loosening-up activities scheduled between blocks. * Sequent time chunks filled with all deep work, or vice versa.

Step-by-step guide to use Time Blocking at TickTick 

* Creating a to-do list

Creating different lists for projects or different parts of your work, and writing down what you need to do is all for the start. Don’t forget to set Tag or Priority for these tasks, because this is important for quick sorting and grouping in later arrangement.

Tip: Make sure to distinguish different Lists and Tags with color coding, because tasks will then show in the calendar in the form of color blocks, based on three options: the color of Tag, List, or Priority.

* Arranging Tasks in the Calendar 

After going to Calendar in TickTick, you can switch the view to Today (also for tomorrow/three-day/week/month). Tap “Arrange Tasks” and all tasks you’ve created before can be filtered by Lists, Tags or Priority. Here you can add any tasks into any time blocks simply via drag n’ drop. The space of each time block is adjustable and the minimum size is 15 minutes. The sequence of blocks is also changeable if you’d like to fill one time slot with multiple tasks for example, or keep a good balance between shallow and deep tasks.

After this step, you’ll be able to see a completed time-boxed schedule with tasks planned out for Today. 

Tip: If you’re using other calendar tools, you can import your data into the TickTick calendar too. 

* Starting to focus with a Pomo Timer/Stopwatch

Now, it’s time to start working! Opening a task from your Time Block 1 and starting to focus with the Pomo timer on in TickTick. Pomo helps enhance your focus and also keep a work-rest balance. But if it’s a new task and you wish to test out how much time it’ll cost, then Stopwatch instead of Pomo should come in use to count up the time. Therefore, next time when scheduling, you’ll be able to make a fair evaluation on time allowance for this task.

* Tip1: Saving competitive tasks as Templates

An easier and faster way to arrange a repetitive task is from the Template. Instead of repeating the process of creating the same task each time, a daily task such as team meeting, can be saved as a Template. With this, the task can be added to your “Today” List in just seconds.

* Tip2: Have you tried “Plan Your Day”?

Another helpful feature for a quick schedule is “Plan Your Day”. On the right top corner of your “Today” List, you can find a double circle shaped button, and from there all your today’s tasks and overdue tasks can be arranged with just a few steps away.

[aurorajay]

I love making costumes but I always feel bad about my skill level being far below everyone else’s. Even though I love making costumes they never look good quality. Any advice?

It's easier to answer specific questions about a project vs. a general "how to be good”, but I'm gonna give it my best shot.

First off, go easy on yourself, you're learning! I know I'm still learning. Hell, the seasoned pro of 3 decades is still learning! Every fuck up and mediocrity is a step of improvement. I won't tell you that practice makes perfect, because it doesn't. It will make you better, great even. But it won't make you perfect. No one ever achieves perfection. And that's okay! Literally every single piece I've ever made has multiples elements I would change if i could. Even the ones that look good, like the now-popular moth cape. I will do lots of things differently when i make my next one.

Also, I know from experience how hard it is to avoid comparing yourself to others, especially online. So when we (inevitably) do, I think it's important to remember that there can be a BIG difference between in person and photos. That cool looking cosplay armour? Upon closer inspection it might be held together by hot glue. That pretty formal gown? It might have a real shitty fraying seam down the back. All we see is a carefully curated version of reality.

It's hard offering practical tips without more info to go on, but hopefully some of this will help. I think what makes a good looking costume can be broken down into 4 basic elements, so here’s what I think are the most important things to consider

Design: This is the part that people seem to have the easiest time with, and I can help the least with. Coming up with the idea. And when you’re costuming just for the pure enjoyment of it, there are no bad ideas! Now everyone approaches this differently, whether it's sketches, moodboards, or diagrams. Unless someone else is executing the concept, it doesn't even need to look remotely good! As long as you understand what the design is supposed to be, it works.

I will say to design with practical considerations in mind though. Think about where, how, and why it will be worn. Plan for things like zippers and buttons to get in and out, the weather where it will be worn, how much movement will be required, etc. You don’t want to end up sweaty and stuck in a polyester bodysuit that can only be opened with the help of two assistants in say, an outdoor summer event in LA.

Materials: This can be tricky, because it’s dependant on your resources. Materials are expensive, and quality ones even more so. But researching options and picking the best fit for your project is important. Making a historical piece? Stick to natural fibers. Cosplaying a superhero? You're gonna need spandex.

If you're short on funds, going through second hand stores can be real handy. Bigger ones will sometimes have actual yardage, but you can find sheets, curtains, saris, and all sorts of things to take apart and use. Get familiar with the properties and names of different textiles. You'll eventually develop a skill for spotting the nice stuff.

More specialized tools/materials like say fosshape or sewing machine attachments are harder to stumble across, but there will be online sales. If i find something good for cheap I buy it and hang onto it for later projects. If possible, take advantage of sales and rare finds while you can. You're a dragon and materials are your hoard!

Construction: Obviously you want your costume to be well-made, but this means knowing and mastering different techniques. It's a slow process, but one everyone is capable of undetaking! Firstly, you need to familiarize yourself with technical terms to make finding the actual tutorials easier. One of my go-to resources for this is The Sewing Book, by Reader's Digest. (There’s also a newer version available, I’ll include it below). It covers a wide variety of techniques, materials, etc. and has fantastic diagrams. Can’t recommend it enough

Companies that sell specialized stuff like thermoplastics or casting resin often have tutorials on their websites which can be indispensable to learning to use them properly. As well as very important safety precautions. They will also sometimes list external how-to sources or sell instructional books.

Take a close look at clothes and costumes you own to understand how they are put together. Figure out what techniques are appropriate to use where. A flat fell seam is great for jeans and french seam is perfect for chiffon, but try the reverse and it will be a pain. Take pictures and make sketches of interesting details that catch your eye. You can come back to them for ideas later.

I try and incorporate at least 1 new technique into every project I make, that way I'm always learning. But don't jump straight to trying it out on the final piece! Always make a sample (or several) beforehand. And keep the samples for later reference! I'm trying to amass a big scrapbook-style binder of samples, which is sooo so handy to come back to when it's been a while since you've done something.

Fit: This is the final, and possibly most difficult element of costuming. No matter how cool the design, how fancy the materials, and how good the construction, if something doesn’t fit right it’s going to look and feel wrong. Most of us here are making costumes for ourselves, which means you're going to need help. Measuring and fitting clothes on yourself is a nightmare, so enlist a friend or family member to give you a hand.

The other thing you can do it is to get a dress form/mannequin. These are pricey, and will probably need to be customized with padding and such anyways, so I recommend you DIY it. Again, you will need a helper, because the easiest way to get a custom dress form it to just straight up duct tape yourself into a crappy old shirt, cut it off, then stuff it. There’s tons of tutorials online for this, it’s a tried and true cheap method.

I highly recommend learning some basic pattern drafting, and that’s honestly the hardest part. You can rely on store bought patterns, but they are extremely variable in quality, and unless you’re in the rare minority who are a sample size, it will need some altering to fit you right. They can be a good starting point, but ultimately I think pattern drafting from scratch is much faster and more adaptable, if you're able to learn it. This is where you will need some good books or video instructions. I don’t have one single resource to recommend for this, but I will list some books at the end. If you personally know ANYONE with this skill, try and get them to teach you everything they know, because they are worth their weight on gold.

It’s important to note that some pattern drafting is easier than others, Stretch fabrics are MUCH more forgiving in this area, and that’s how i got started. Because the fabric will accommodate your form, the pattern requires fewer parts and darts, and there’s more leeway for mistakes. The one downside is that stretches can be more difficult to sew. Personally, I feel like they more than make up for it by being simplicity of drafting. The resources I’ve linked are geared toward drafting for non-stretch, but if you’re not following a similar tutorial i recommend stretch.

One last thing in regards to fit. ALWAYS MAKE A MOCKUP. You can work out so many fit issues just by making your costume in crappy material first, taking note of the fit issues, and adjusting them with pins, marking them with a sharpie, etc. Then you can change your pattern accordingly. Whether it’s a breastplate made of cardstock or a dress done in old sheets, you should always make a mockup. Sometimes several! The material doesn’t matter as long as it behaves roughly like the good stuff you plan on using. Don’t use a heavy blanket for if your costume is going to be a gauzy nymph robe, for example. But it doesn’t have to look nice. It just has to be wearable.

Resources:

*These are mostly tailored towards women’s garments. A lot of the same principles apply, but making men’s costumes will have some separate considerations not covered here. Just something to keep in mind if you want to draft for guys. These are all just starting points anyhow. There’s tons more out there

https://www.amazon.ca/Sewing-Book-Alison-Smith-2014-02-03/dp/B01JXQQ9Y2

https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Guide-Sewing-Step-Step/dp/1606522086

https://www.handimania.com/diy/your-own-shape-sewing-mannequin.html

https://www.fearlessmakers.com/measurements-for-pattern-making/

https://opensourcestitches.wordpress.com/2010/07/14/pattern-drafting-101-drafting-the-basic-bodice-block/

https://opensourcestitches.wordpress.com/2011/02/17/pattern-drafting-101-the-mens-shirt-block/

http://isntthatsew.org/pattern-making-101/

https://sewing.wonderhowto.com/how-to/draft-basic-pant-pattern-0126850/

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/063206501X/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_image_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[yourarmynoona]

The Warrior & The Warlock || Chapter 2

Description:  [Fantasy!AU] You have lost your home, your family, your tribe, and are wanted by a rival tribe for the murder of their general. On the run and seeking vengeance for the destruction of your people in the form of a Sacred Rune, you make an unlikely ally in the form of a wandering Warlock with his own secrets to hide. Your fates intertwine as you journey across to mysterious lands in search of the rune but when destiny has other plans, your journey becomes much bigger than you could have imagined.

Rating: M

Reader x Namjoon

Themes: Fantasy, Smut (eventual), Adventure, Murder, Mystery

Notes: If you haven’t already figured it out, this Fantasy!AU is a D&D!AU following a campaign I’m actually currently on. Yeah, yeah my nerd is showing but I’m hoping to update regularly as we go through our own journey! 

Notes 2: This chapter goes out to @kpopluvwriter because well, she deserves to have a good week and it’s the best I can do! (And she does amazing reactions fyi)

Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4

The last 24 hours had been a hell of a lucid nightmare for you. You were drugged, nearly abducted and sold into slavery, and now you were bruised and imprisoned for the unintentional destruction of a bar after a handsy bar patron thought it was a bright idea to touch you. Your head was aching, your face was bruise, your ankles were growing irritated with the dirty iron shackles you were currently walking in, and you were hungry and hungover. A winning combination you remarked to yourself sarcastically. Namjoon and yourself had been fetched from the cell you shared and walked to a large room with a single dark wooded table before a hearth and several bookshelves lined with an assortment of tomes, scrolls, and books. Your eyes scanned the room and Namjoon seemed to mumble something about the vast number tomes he has yet to see in the room. You were standing before the large table, your hands bound behind your back and the sound of your chains dragging across the floor as you settled into a comfortable stance while the jail guard stood behind the both of you.

“What do you think they want with us?” you whispered, leaning over to Namjoon at your left who was wearing a serious look. He leaned over slightly stating “No idea” before returning to his standing position.

“Ah, dey look positively fit for de job!” a voice behind the both of you announced. Namjoon and you turned your heads to a man in a brightly patterned caftan and covered in golden chain necklaces, rings, and bracelets. You raised an eyebrow. He was tall and somewhat plump, his round cheeks high into a searingly white smile that was a stark contrast to his dark skin and hair. You could tell he was a Turami like many other of the natives of Port Nyanzaru.

“Please, let dem out of deir cuffs. Dat is no way to treat guests!” he commanded the guard behind you, his hands expressively waving in the air as if batting something invisible away. With a clang, the iron cuffs were removed from your wrists and ankles, and you rotated a sore foot bare on the stone flooring of the room while Namjoon shook his hands out and squatted down to rub his own sore ankles. You scoffed and glared in the direction of the guard who was gathering the chains into his arms. If only you had your axe you would have massacred him by now.

“I am Wakonga, de purveyor of dis place and masta merchant for all of de port. I am sure you are aware by now dat you have done much damage to one of my many establishments. Not only did you destroy property, you started a war in dat tavern and it took a dozen of my men to get it under control.”

You were staring at him as he paced back and forth across the floor in front of you, his hands and face expressively detailing the incident to which you had barely any recollection. “De damage was so great, I had to shut down de place for repairs. Do you know how much dat costs me?” he did a quarter turn to Namjoon and yourself, waving his finger aggressively. You were about to speak when Namjoon cleared his throat, telling you to remain silent. Wakonga again spoke, his voice rising “It costs me more dan you would make in a yeah! So as you can see, de events of last night have affected my bottom line and as a man of business, I cannot just let that slide.” Wakonga walked slowly over to you, his footsteps echoing in the room against the adobe and mud dap walls. He looked straight at you, one of his hands to your face, the cold of his gold rings hard under your chin. You stared into his eyes as he evaluated you, your expression unperturbed.

“I have use for you, barbarian. And you, half-elf.” You could see Namjoon cringe out of the corner of your eye as he let your chin go during that statement and walked over to him. Wakonga stood before Namjoon assessing his clothing and his features before Namjoon spoke.

“I deeply apologize for our actions in your tavern,” he bowed deeply as he continued to speak, “It was not our intent to cause chaos or harm to anyone, much less damage your establishment. In what way can we repay you?”

Wakonga scoffed.

“You cannot repay me in coin, but I have use for your talents. You see, I have a friend from fa away that is sick…very sick. She has asked me to lend my services to her aid but my men are ill-equipped for such a venture. Dere is a plague, a death plague, where anyone who is touched by it will meet a true death. After dey are raised, deir body will slowly rot, waste, and dey will die. You cannot resurrect dem anymore. My friend, she is near de end and she wants to put and end to dis cursed wasting plague. With her magic she has sent two heroes from Baldur’s Gate on de Sword Coast. If you accompany dem an tour dem around de city, I will forgive your debt.”

Namjoon and you looked at one another. He must have been thinking the same thing as you; there was a catch.

“Say we did do this and act as their guides, would you really forgive the debt we have caused?” Namjoon spoke, an eyebrow arched in suspicion. Wakonga placed his hands up in mock surrender and stated with a playful smile “Yes, all will be forgiven and you may go on your way.”

You grimaced. Your brow furrowed before you inquired further “And if we do not comply?”

Wakonga frowned and shrugged nonchalantly before stating matter-of-factly “You will stay in here and rot or be sentenced to hard labor.”

Your frown deepened and you let your shoulders slump with a defeated sigh. It looked like you were going to have to comply with what he was saying. So much for getting the rune you needed and getting out of there.

“We’ll do it.” Namjoon spoke up before you had a chance to answer, his posture firm and his expression serious. Wakonga clapped his hands together excitedly, his chains and bracelets rattling. “Wonderful!” he exclaimed, his cheeks bunching up to his eyes, “I will see to it dat your contract is drafted by dis afternoon. Until den, gather your tings and meet back here at high noon. We will discuss de matter further.”

Wakonga walked around you and Namjoon and as he entered the doorway he stopped suddenly and turned around.

“Oh and barbarian, don’t break anymore of my tings.”

 The jail guards had gathered up your materials left in the jail cell as well as handed back your shoes, coin purse, and axe.  You made sure to check that they had not robbed you of coin and you let out a relieved sigh as all of your money was still accounted for. Namjoon sat beside you on a wooden bench in what would appear to be a moderately sized lobby area with two desks, a receptionist, and guardsman walking about on duty.

“So I guess we’re stuck together for a while.” He stated playfully as he slipped on his jacket and secured the buttons on his shirt sleeve beneath.

“I suppose so,” you said wistfully as you glided a hand across the face of your axe, inspecting it for undue damage from the previous night.

You both agreed to go about your business and meet back in an hour, gathering what material possessions would be needed for the day and so that Namjoon could gather some research from the library on exactly what you were facing off against. As you walked through the streets back to the inn to which you were staying, your mind began to wander. Though you had just met him, you knew you could trust him. He had saved you from being sold into slavery or worse and had upheld a warriors honor. In your culture, such an act of selflessness is to be repaid with servitude. As you imagined in what way you could best serve Namjoon to repay the debt for him saving your life not once, but what could be considered twice, you blushed.

You had begun to imagine his handsome face and warm smile which had somehow morphed into you imagining how his plush lips would feel on yours and if he would accept your body as payment for a life saved. This idea shook you to your core, forcing you to suddenly stop in the streets of the Red Bazaar as you quelled your racing heart and heated face. “What the heck am I thinking?! Of course someone like him wouldn’t do that!” you fought an inner monologue after your sudden stop, continuing to walk straight down the avenue filled with merchants and tourists.

It was not unusual that barbarians would offer a life of servitude to a master if they had been saved by someone of higher blood but it was also not unusual that barbarian women tended to offer themselves in payment for a debt to another warrior. You started to imagine how his caring hands would feel on the exposed part of your thigh, how he would look at you as you removed your breastplate and left yourself bare for him to see. Your mind was out of control and you hastened your pace, picking up speed through the bazaar and attempting to avoid people caught in the crosspath. Faster and faster you walked until your walk became a sprint through the crowd, dodging carts and shoppers. You thought you were in the clear until, BAM! You collided with a solid piece of metal, knocking you, and the metal to the ground with a giant timbre.

“PELANA!!” you yelled in your native tongue, your butt sore from hitting the ground and your bruised cheek throbbing from the impact. You glanced upwards to see what you had collided with and it was a young man with doe-like eyes and an elegant silver suit of armor graced with spirals of gold. His helmet was in hand and he seemed amused as to what had just happened. Just as you began to apologize he smiled and laughed heartily before reaching down to help you up.

“Are you okay? You ran into me pretty hard” he said, his eyes scrunching into crescent shapes. He was very handsome indeed with a moderate build that you could see, brown messy locks upon his forehead, a prominent nose, and large eyes that you could see were full of mirth.

“Yes, I apologize! I should have been watching where I was going!” you nodded apologetically.

“Don’t worry about it, you looked like you were in a rush. Besides, I’m pretty well protected!” he exclaimed, knocking a metal fist into his breastplate where it rang out loudly. “Just be safe and get where you need to, okay? See you around.” And with that, he continued on his way with a wave leaving you to contemplate how it was you were in the port for 3 weeks and all of a sudden, you’re just now meeting people.

After gathering your materials and paying your inn fee, you were feeling quite famished and had grabbed two kebabs and some fruit from a food cart near the inn. As you continued to meet back near the jail with Namjoon, you were giving one of your last looks to the city. Your time in this place was coming to an end and after this, you had decided you were going to travel up river into the jungle to Madukka, the Rainy City and see if they had any information on the Lost Runes.

Walking through the bustling streets you saw children playing with a rubber ball and small Thunder Lizards pulling merchant carts filled with goods through the streets and towards the docks. It was something you always found fascinating. The people of Chult relied on Thunder Lizards, reptiles of all sizes, for transportation and hunting. You had only ever seen them in Chult and you remember the first time you entered Port Nyanzaru from the ship, you almost attacked a small stray Thunder Lizard that was eating fish from a nearby fishing ship on the docks. When you had asked locals about it, it apparently was commonplace but you still could not wrap your mind around the fact they had tamed such incredible beasts.

When you had finally arrived and finished up your meal, Namjoon was waiting with a side pouch and what appeared to be a scroll in hand. His quarter staff was strapped to his side opposite his daggers and his frilled jacket laid out on top of his pouch, leaving him in a loose white shirt and patterned vest. He looked almost regal looking about the crowds. You waved out to him and he smiled, walking over to meet you halfway.

“___! Did you get everything you needed?”

“Yeah, I travel pretty light these days. What’s that scroll your holding?”

Namjoon looked to what you were pointing at and nodded for you to follow him to the outside of a nearby cafe that was near the jail. It was a large establishment that had an enclosed patio area filled with lounging cushions, smoking towers, and covered by fabric awnings and fairy lacrima hanging above the iron fence. He ushered you into a corner of the outdoor portion of the café and you both sat down on some large plush pillows before settling in. A waitress came over and offered a special tea, to which you and Namjoon accepted to quench your thirst in the thick midday heat. Taking a large sip of his tea, he released the scroll from his grasp and rolled it out on the floor before you. It was old and tattered and in a language you couldn’t quite understand but had symbols and drawings you recognized instantly.

They were Runes.

“___, I did some quick digging through our archives at the Academy and found something really interesting. This wasting disease….it isn’t the first time something like this has happened. There have been isolated incidents throughout history and most contributed to failed attempts at Necromancy or weak magic. But no, the things Wakonga was saying and the things this scroll said match up. I think the Wasting disease is related to these Runes right here,” Namjoon pointed at the familiar symbols “The scroll is damaged in some parts so I’m not exactly sure, but there is a tomb in the jungle here that may hold Runes that can stop the curse.”

You looked up at him in surprise. Namjoon wasn’t only good looking, he was highly intelligent, and apparently spoke and read multiple languages.

But he was out of his mind.

“You’re thinking of accompanying our visitors and going into the jungle instead of just being tour guides because….?”

“Because the Runes in this temple have great power. They can right wrongs, grant incredible powers, heal people, cure sickness, make them whole again, and….they can bring back the dead.” His last words were somber and sullen.

You gazed at him sorrowfully but with the realization that he too knows loss.

“Can I ask who you’ve lost?” you settled into the cushion, leaning a slight bit closer to him as if seeking to comfort him. His shoulders were down in defeat and his hands loose in his lap. You were sincere in your words, knowing that maybe you could help him here as part of your servitude. Slowly he looked up, his eyes were somewhat glossy.

“My mother and sister. They…there was war. I was away in the capital studying to become a great scholar and wizard. I wanted to make them proud.”

You frowned in concern.

“What about your father?”

“He...he left many years ago. It isn’t safe for Moon Elves to be near humans for too long. Humans can be vile and selfish, not to say elves cannot, but things are different for them. Elves live for many years longer than humans and live cloistered lives in cities hidden by magic. Their laws are different and life is spent in scholarly ventures and bettering society. Since elves live such long lives, most may take many lovers in their lifetime and have many children until they meet someone whom they wish to bond with until death. This is like human marriage but so much more sacred because of how long it lasts. Elves are prefer to choose mates of nobility or of high blood purity close to royalty. They call this Sacred Bone. Hence, it is frowned upon to marry a human and even more frowned upon to breed with humans because they value this blood purity.”

Your brow furrowed and you could feel the sadness in his voice. From what you knew, half-elves resembled their elven cousins but their lifespans were considerably shorter and they were not accepted by humans nor their elven blood because their existence is a taboo. You recall visiting the Western Highlands and seeing many half-elves be shunned by humans in their villages and by their elven brethren, hearing things like “mutt” and “half-breed” yelled openly. Slowly, you reached your hand over to his that was lying on the map in an empathetic gesture.

“When was the last time you saw him?” you asked softly.

He hesitated in response.

“I…I think it would have been about 23 or 24 years ago?”

You looked up quizzically. Namjoon couldn’t have been more than 24 or 25 so how did he remember his father at such a young age? Taking a sip of tea, you were trying to do the math on just how old he was. As if sensing your confusion Namjoon interjected “I was still young but I think it was when I was about 22 or 23.”

You choked on your drink, a small dribble of tea falling from your lips and onto your chin.

“H-how old are you?!” you stuttered out in shock, wiping the tea from your chin, only for Namjoon to look at you in surprise.

“____ I’m 46?”

You were in shock. When you did the math that means Namjoon’s father disappeared from his life when he was about 21 and you were barely a toddler. Trying to put your shock behind you and act like he wasn’t a 46 year-old man that looked like he was 20-something was difficulty for you to comprehend as you stared at his physical appearance. “If I can ask…when did you lose your mother and sister?” you asked carefully.

“Less than a year ago. My sister was only a couple of years younger than me. I miss them every day.”

Namjoon was looking downwards with a sad smile playing on his lips as he looked on at the map. “What do you say we pack up and go see about a contract?” he said with a heavy breath. With that, you both got up and paid your server and adjusted what equipment you were currently carrying. Straightening out your pelt skirt and ensuring your axe was secured, you wondered how he had been so open with you when he had endured so much loss. You wish you could have told him you know how he felt because you too had lost your family, but you yourself had yet to come to terms with it as well. Perhaps one day you could tell Namjoon that he wasn’t alone. For now, you were content offering whatever servitude you could.

As you entered the jail once more, the pair of you were escorted to the back room where you had first met Wakonga. The air was cooler inside but had a dank and musty smell inside, your nose scrunching in displeasure as you took a whiff of what smelled like day-old dirty, wet fabric and moldy wood. A guard ushered you towards the table to which you and Namjoon were formerly shackled before and on it you saw the contract that had been drafted up. Namjoon went over to take a look and was reading the detailed portion at an alarmingly fast rate when Wakonga made his appearance.

“Ah, my friends! So glad you are back. I see you have read de terms of de contract. Do you have any questions?” he walked around the table, his golden chains clanking as he walked. You looked towards Namjoon for some sense of confirmation. Unfortunately, you couldn’t read Common as much as you could speak it making the words of the contract beyond your comprehension. His brow was stern and focused as his eyes rapidly skimmed through the papers before looking towards you.

“It looks okay to me however, we are at the mercy of our patrons. Are you okay with that ____?”

You nodded in agreement.

“Okay Wakonga, we’ll sign it.” Namjoon stated firmly, being handed a quill and signing Kim Namjoon on the line. You thought it was odd in the manner he signed but realized that Shou and Mulan often put their surnames first. After he signed, he handed you the quill pen and gave you a confident nod. You signed your name in Common before setting the quill back in the ink pot. Wakonga clapped his hands happily before stating “Ah wonderful! Now let me introduce you to de heroes sent here by my colleague, Syndra.”

Just then, you heard a pair of rather footsteps walking across the stone floor and into the room. When you turned around you saw first, a very tall young man of about your age, fluffy blonde locks and light grey eyes wearing a rather unusual silk garment that was colored cream and a dark purple. The top hung loosely from his tall frame and was tucked into loose pants that were held up by a leather belt that had various pouches, small loops with viles attached to it, and what looked like a schmitar. He smiled a boxy smile as he turned to wave at the pair of you, a long silver earring swinging too and fro from his left ear and a charm hanging from the staff in his hand jingling lightly. You simply nodded in return before someone walking in behind him caught your eye. It was the guy in the suit of armor you ran head first in to earlier in the market! The stranger stood tall with his helmet in his hand before clearing his throat.

“Pleased to make your acquaintance. I’m Jungkook and this is my partner Taehyung. We’re looking forwards to  seeing the city with you.”

[chibisquirt]

Celestial Navigation remix teaser

This isn’t even its final form.

No, seriously, this isn’t anywhere close to even a first chapter first draft.  It will change!  And I’m not writing it right now.  (I would say “I’m not writing The Thing,” except that that would be true, and this would be The Other Thing.)  I’ll probably seriously start work on this sometime in...  April?  May?  Right around then.  Definitely not during Remix Madness, not unless I can somehow work three work shifts and write *eyeballs it* 60-100k in two days.  

Don’t hold your breath.

But @sabrecmc​ said she loved my idea, and I wanted to get it down before I forgot it.  So this is... the start of an idea.

I had fun with it, anyway.

Tony stormed into the lab in a bitch of a mood, but he really didn't think he could be blamed.  Fury's words were still ringing in his ears like a boxing blow.  

“We have no problem with Iron Man; Iron man does damn good work.  And we have no problem with Tony Stark; Tony Stark is revolutionizing every lab we got in this damn place.  But Tony Stark and Iron Man being one and the same?  Yeah, that we kinda have a problem with.”

In the wake of Afghanistan, Tony had been adamant that Stark Industries would no longer make weapons that could fall into the wrong hands.  He couldn’t shut down every operation— SI was under contract for up to three more years, in some cases, and they couldn’t afford the fallout of breaking those deals— but all the contracts they were bidding on were dropped, and Tony had flat-out refused to consider any future deals making weapons.  

But he wasn’t willing to just shut down the company wholesale, so alternatives had to be found.  SI already made body armor and flight prototypes; Tony had ramped those categories up, adding green energy and communications to their list of milieus.  He had SI producing with his usual high standards within months, and SHIELD was his biggest contractor.  

Of course, once he had SHIELD clearance for those contracts— which weren’t being offered to the military yet— it made sense to bring Tony in as a contract engineer, too.  For the last three months, he had been romping around as many SHIELD research departments as he could find, and been playing merry hell with all of them.  (Except for linguistics; the linguists were a little weird, even for him.)   He already had a helicarrier under development, as well as some prototype hard-light armors that no one other than SHIELD would ever be willing to pay for.  He even had his hands in SHIELD’s perennially doomed efforts to create a super-soldier, not that he expected it to make a difference.  SHIELD had been failing at that one since back when they were the S.S.R., Tony didn’t exactly expect it to succeed now.  

The science division was about fifteen floors of the Triskellion (twenty-seventh to forty-second, in fact), but the central area of the twenty-seventh floor was its own little access way:  if you wanted to get anywhere in the science division, you had to go through there.  

Tony swanned into that science lobby like Alan Rickman entering a potions dungeon.  

“Alright, kids, show daddy the good stuff," he said, and a dozen Beta scientists leaped to obey.  Ten points to Ravenclaw, he thought, and sneered at the first project that came under his nose.  

Well, okay, come on— that wasn’t being in character, it was just a really bad design!  “Why did you put your damn rotors on the bottom, Evans?”  As if Tony didn’t already have a migraine...

“I thought— it’ll make for less wear on the bolts to heave up the body than to pull, right?  So—”

“First of all, no it won’t.  And second of all, it’ll increase the wear on the rotors themselves—”

“No, but— it lands in water, right?  I mean we’re not doing this from land, or anything—”

“ — and at those speeds, the water may as well be concrete!  This isn’t grade school—”

Evans got the message.

Tony worked his way through them, the UAV’s and the phasers and the—

“Please don’t call it that.”

“Well, if you come up with a better name than the ‘night-night gun’ I’m sure we’ll be happy to change it,” the little Beta huffed.

— and slowly worked his way through to the back of the lounge where the scruffy-looking Dr. Banner was waiting.  

“Done with the scrum?” Bruce asked.  He sipped his tea.  

“Mostly.  Saving the best for last.”  Tony pasted on an encouraging grin, just for him.  

It wasn’t Bruce’s fault, it really wasn’t.  Bruce was a good damned scientist, careful and thorough and painstaking, but with an effortless grasp of higher concepts of physics and chemistry that still seemed to elude some of his more decorated colleagues out there.  It was Bruce’s bad luck, though, to be assigned to the shittiest project in the whole place.  Seriously:  if the projects were potions students, Bruce’s was Neville Longbottom.  And it wasn’t fucking fair— but then, very few things were.

Plus, at this point, Bruce was contributing to his own relegation.  It wasn’t like his good work had gone unnoticed— if no one else had tried to scoop Bruce, then Tony would have.  But as Tony had been informed— repeatedly, and at a variety of volumes, some of which had not been necessary, thank you, Fury— Bruce had stubbornly insisted that he could crack his stupid Super-Soldier project, and had remained, slowly chipping away at it, for over a year after he could have been reassigned.

That was honestly the only reason Tony was even interested in the project.  It was a bad idea; far too much potential for abuse, for one thing— what if you super-soldiered the wrong guy, and got a madman?  So Tony jumped on board to help Bruce get done faster, and then he started screening the candidates, too— just to make sure they were all people he would trust with super-powers.  It took up more of his time than anything else he did here, but it was also a bigger challenge:  psych evaluation wasn’t exactly Tony’s strong suit.  See exhibit one:  Stane, Obediah, betrayals thereof.

“Got a new batch of subjects in,” Bruce said mildly.  “I know you like to meet them.”

“Fabulous; something else to fail at.”

Bruce stopped and pivoted halfway through the door of his department, raising his eyebrows in surprise.

Tony sighed.  “Nothing.  Meeting with Fury went... poorly.”  

Bruce tipped his head to the side, but didn’t push.  Very restful guy, Bruce.  Tony really did like him.  “First one’s through there,” was all he said, pushing through and back to the exam rooms.  Bruce’s department was set up so much like a doctor’s office that Tony suspected it had originally been intended to be one, and the decor didn’t help:  muted tones and uncomfortably-padded furniture.  He even had magazines in the waiting room, although, being for SHIELD agents, they were more Guns&Ammo than out-of-date US Weekly.  

Tony snagged the file out of the holder on the back of the first exam room door.  “Barnes, J. B., Level 3 SHIELD Agent,” he read off.  “Fabulous, more spies; just what we need.”

Bruce nodded unironically and headed to the lab— ostensibly to run tests, but Tony knew that was where he kept his teapot, and his mug was suspiciously empty.  Mark down another on the list of people who drink around me, Tony thought, although the thought was a lot fonder than it usually was.  “Be nice to that one,” Bruce instructed.  “I like him.”

“Good lord, why?”  Tony opened the door.  

“I’m serious, Tony; he’s on the short list.”

Tony blinked, and then without another word, stepped through, closing the door behind him.

J. B. Barnes was tall and fit, a Beta wearing a SHIELD uniform.  So, they hadn’t pulled him off of an assignment for this, then.  Closer examination revealed the cast on his left arm:  a-ha.  Benched, for now.  His hair was brown, eyes pale— blue or gray, hard to tell at this distance— and his ears, apparently, were sharp, because he was grinning.  

There was something familiar about that grin...  Tony shrugged it off.

“Name and birthday?”  

The grin barely faltered— no more than a sixteenth of an inch.

Okay, and right off the bat, that one was probably on Tony; they were required— stupid Bruce and his stupid scrupulousness about protocols— to confirm the identity of the people they were talking to before discussing any medical records.  But Tony didn’t have to say it quite so sharply.  He didn’t usually spit the words “name and birthday” like they were going to take out Gilderoy Lockhart, after all.  So once Barnes had confirmed that, yes, he had been born March 10th, twenty-one years ago, Tony settled into the little doctor’s stool, did a full rotation because wheelie stools never got old, and apologized.  “Been a long day,” he explained it, “people being difficult.”

“And by people you mean pirates?”

Tony almost didn’t get it for a second, because it was said so blandly it might as well have been asking his oatmeal preferences, and because it was so unexpected coming from a Level 3 agent.  “You usually that irreverent about Fury?  He might keel-haul you.”

Barnes grinned again.  “I have a well-established pattern of snark,” he admitted.  “There’s a reason I’m only a level three.”

Tony looked back at the chart again. “You’re a baby,” he said absently, “don’t take it personally—”

It was a pretty impressive chart, though.  “You can shoot.”  

“Yeah, a little.”

Barnes could probably win gold at the olympics and be set for life, given the numbers from his last round on range.  Sure. “A little,” Tony repeated dryly.  “Interrogation specialist, really?  ‘Exceptional problem solver,’ what does that even mean?  And you speak...”

“Five languages— well, okay, the Irish is mostly profanity.”

Tony hefted the file.  “This says four.  Counting the Irish.”

Barnes shrugged.  “The Klingon’s more recent,” he admitted, “and it really shouldn’t count anyway, there’s only, like, three thousand words—”

“Closer to thirty-five hundred.”

“It’s not Chinese, though, right?  I mean...”

Tony’s mouth twitched.  “It’s not Chinese, no.  Or... Russian, apparently.  Huh; eclectic.”  

“Thanks.”

“It wasn’t a compliment.”

“There a reason you’re busting my balls?”

Tony paused.  More of the snark?  Or was he really being too harsh?

“I mean, given that Doc Banner just told you he likes me.  Either you’re trying to break me— which, good luck, chill out though because it’s not going to happen— or you’re in a legitimate shitty mood.  In which case, I’d rather not be your punching bag.”

There was something about how he said it...  The young man wasn’t saying it to push, like another Alpha would have.  He wasn’t saying it defiantly, either; it wasn’t like he was daring Tony.  That one was a standard technique in Alphas and Betas alike:  the Alphas used it to start a fight, the Beta’s used it to make the Alphas look irrational and over-emotional.  It usually worked pretty well in either case, too, although Tony had seen it often enough in boardrooms that he could handle it.

But that wasn’t what was going on here, and the difference was so obvious it set Tony blinking.  The guy— Barnes— was just stating a fact, that was all.  “Here’s what I see, and that’s how it is.”  No bravado, no push— just truth.

Which neatly left only one possible response.  “Sorry,” Tony said again, and meant it this time.  “Pirates.  You know.”

“Perils of the high seas,” Barnes agreed.  “But it’s just us up here in the crow’s nest; you wanna talk about it?”

Tony laughed, impressed by the balls on the guy if nothing else.  “No.”

“Could help.”

“No,” Tony repeated, struggling to keep down the simmering heat that had been resting behind the arc reactor since his meeting with Fury delivered his ultimatum.

“Look, we like what you do, Tony— there’s no doubt about that— but Iron Man is too reckless, too borderline suicidal, to also be the guy essentially running every research operation we have!  Add to that, every analysis we’ve got—”

Tony had sent Natasha Romanov, sitting at the table with them, a dirty look, but she had just blinked slowly at him and Fury hadn’t checked his tide of words.  

“ — has indicated that Iron Man is a dysfunctional personality— and that was even before we knew he was also you.”  

Tony caught his breath.  Iron Man was the best of him; hearing that even his best wasn’t good enough... that hurt more than he wanted to admit.  And certainly not to Fury.  

“He is headstrong, disregards the standard protocols of operation, twice he’s put our other agents in danger—”

“Point of order:  he can’t put your ‘other’ agents in danger because he isn’t one—”

“I don’t care, Stark.  Make a show.  Be stable.  Invest in the future—”

“What do you think the whole ‘green energy’ thing is about?!”

“ — personally invest.  Hell, get yourself an Omega!  Pop out a couple kids!  We’ll all pray the brains are heritable and the personality isn’t.  Just... don’t break things, for once in your goddamn life.  Show me you can be a team player, and I’ll think about it.  Show me you’re not an adrenaline-junkie mess, and I’ll welcome you back with open arms!  But until that happens, Iron Man— and you— are barred from all aspects of the Avengers Initiative.”

Fury had almost made it to the door when Tony’s head snapped up.  “You know,” he called, “if you don’t break things, you can’t put them back together with improvements!”

The only answer was the whisper-soft slide of the Black Widow’s boots as she followed Fury out the door.

“Unless you’ve got an Omega in your pocket,” Tony said now, his voice approximately as dry as a dead cactus, “I’m shit out of luck.”

Barnes froze.  He blinked, and then blinked again.  He looked around the room as if scanning for cameras before bringing his head back around to meet Tony’s eyes.  “I mean...”  He rubbed his palms along his navy blue trousers as if he were trying to rid them of sweat.  “...You can’t tell Fury.”

Tony froze, thinking about it.  It had been an offhand joke, a throwaway line designed to get the conversation back on course.  But then again...

Tony was about to make a very, very, very large mistake. He tossed Barnes’ file on the counter.  

“Tell me more.”

[jessicakmatt]

What is a Topliner? How to Get Started With Topline Songwriting

What is a Topliner? How to Get Started With Topline Songwriting: via LANDR Blog

Toplining is a popular songwriting technique. It’s common practice especially in the world of pop, hip hop and electronic dance music.

But a topliner is slightly different from a traditional songwriter.

In topline songwriting, the creation of the melody and lyrics is based on beats. In fact, sometimes it’s based on fully fleshed out productions.

In this article I’ll explain everything you need to know about toplining, how it works and why you should consider it as a songwriter.

What is a topliner?

A topliner, or topline songwriter is an artist that provides a melody and lyrics for a producer’s beat or instrumental track. Toplining has become more common as the influence of electronic and sample-based genres has expanded in pop.

Here’s how it works.

Imagine an EDM producer reaches out to you with a demo track and asks you if you’d be interested in toplining it.

If you accept, you’ll write the vocal melody and lyrics on top of the music the producer has already composed.

In most cases, topliners record demo vocals for the projects they embark on. If you’re an artist, you might be asked to lend your vocals as a featured artist on the collaboration as well.

In most cases, topliners record demo vocals for the projects they embark on.

Why you should try toplining

For one thing, it’s a really productive way to combat writer’s block.

When you create a song out of thin air, the process often varies. Sometimes the stars line up and you end up writing a brilliant song in under an hour.

But more often than not, you’ll write a few decent lines and struggle for hours to piece them together.

Before I got into toplining, my songwriting strategies were limited. I would play with a few chord progressions. Maybe revisit some of the melodies I randomly thought of and recorded as voice memos. Look through some lines I scribbled down in my notebook.

 Once I gave toplining a try, I realized that there are more ways to flex my songwriting muscles.

If you’re a songwriter who generally writes alone, you’ll notice moments where your ideas start to become repetitive or redundant.

Collaborating with others via toplining eliminates this issue.

Why?

Because as a topliner, you’ll make an effort to create melodies and phrases that fit on top of the beat.

You’ll work with constraints like a predetermined tempo, key, time signature, groove and set of chords. These constraints will help you write faster, since you won’t have to try to figure out multiple concepts at one go.

In other words, toplining helps you discover new realms as a songwriter.

Collaborate better

Here’s another advantage to consider. When you topline a demo, you can still write in private. You can record your draft when you’re done and hit send.

I’ve done several collaborations in this manner, and in most cases, even a single phone call wasn’t required.

Perhaps this will seem impersonal to some songwriters. But it’s a good alternative for musicians who are shy about collaborating with others in real time.

You might also enjoy toplining because it’s time efficient. Once you get used to it, you’ll be able to jot down your ideas quickly. It’s a great way to stay productive and active in your music community even when you’re extremely busy.

If you’re still not convinced, here’s another angle to consider. As a songwriter, in most co-write situations, you’ll be expected to topline in real time.

The music producer in the room will build the demo, as the songwriters discuss the lyrical theme and exchange melodic ideas.

In short, it’s a good idea to practice toplining on your own regardless of your artistic interests.

In short, it’s a good idea to practice toplining on your own regardless of your artistic interests.

Practicing toplining

With so many loop libraries and beat making tools, it’s easy to create simple arrangements to practice toplining.

Keep it simple. Try putting together an 8-bar-long beat with a few chords that can be looped indefinitely.

In a lot of cases, you’ll topline demos with repetitive chord progressions. Building a song structure out of repeating patterns is a skill you’ll get better and better at over time.

 You can also search for toplining-ready instrumental beats online. The key is to pick simple arrangements with enough space to carry a lead melody.

It’s also not a bad idea to reach out to your music producer friends when you feel ready. They probably have discarded beats which you can transform into full songs.

Choosing the right projects

Some topliners choose to work with specific genres, others don’t. It really depends on what you want your catalogue to look like.

As a songwriter, it’s easier to keep your identity hidden from the public eye. As an artist, if you release a collaborative single, you’ll be expected to endorse and promote it publicly.

Of course, you can still topline as a songwriter only, even if you have an artist project. It’s all about determining your own rules and conditions from the get-go.

As a songwriter, it’s easier to keep your identity hidden from the public eye. As an artist, if you release a collaborative single, you’ll be expected to endorse and promote it publicly.

Expanding your skillset

If you’re excited to give this a shot, here’s something else you should keep in mind.

Most topliners who manage to make a name for themselves are those who can record and produce their vocals.

But here’s the good news: if you are willing to go the extra mile, you can turn your brand of toplining into a lucrative business.

Setting up a profile on an online marketplace like LANDR Network can open you up to new toplining opportunities.

On the other hand, if you’re a producer looking to hire a singer to topline your track LANDR Network is one of the best places to go to find the right talent.



Keeping an open mind

Urge yourself to remain open-minded as a topliner. The best part of toplining is that it’s full of surprises.

You never know what you’re going to get! You might receive demos that grab your attention and never let go when you least expect it.

The post What is a Topliner? How to Get Started With Topline Songwriting appeared first on LANDR Blog.

from LANDR Blog https://blog.landr.com/what-is-a-topliner/ via https://www.youtube.com/user/corporatethief/playlists from Steve Hart https://stevehartcom.tumblr.com/post/622457492475150336

[maritzaerwin]

16 SEO Best Practices 2020 : The Do’s and Don’ts of SEO Writing

When it comes to SEO writing in 2020, things will change in a great manner and in case you are not preparing now, you won’t be able to keep up with the times.

The good news is that the SEO trends next year display the clear search engine priority for the content that fulfills every particular need of the lead generation company. The major change to SEO in the upcoming year will be the development of voice search as 50% of all online searches will be voice-based by 2020.

With the help of voice search on the desktop or Smartphone, it is still good enough to have the links appear on the very first page of Google search results. 

Let’s dig deeper and find out the 16 DO’s and DONT’s for SEO writing in 2020 :

1) DO NOT Ignore the Relevance of Keyword Research

Keyword research is one of the most beneficial parts of the content strategy which can help you in targeting the right audience and optimizing your website. This further builds links and helps in developing content for your audience or any online marketing campaigns.

For the campaign pieces, blogs, white papers, and service pages, etc., all the keyword research is done by following the SEO guidelines to identify what keyword phrase will likely to bring in relevant traffic for your website blog.

Some DONTs you should not forget : 

Don’t forget to use the keyword in the title tag.

Don’t forget to use the keyword in the meta tag.

Don’t forget to use the keyword with significant variations in the text.

Don’t forget to promote your blog.

2) DO Make Your Content In-depth

Rather than publishing the half-baked blog posts twice in a week, produce a thoroughly-researched article that could leave a great impact on a great number of the audiences. As lack of right information will slower down customer engagement and further result in low ROI.

People love stories and that is why you should share the experiences as it will build authority and trust.

Never forget that Google wishes to display the most effective content for a search query. This is the major reason why you should invest an ample amount of resources and time in generating the content that can cover your target audience’s pain points.

In case the content can offer answers to the queries of users, it will bring the best results. 

3) DO Write Quality Content

In case you look closely at the major writing trends in SEO, one thing is common for all i.e., maintaining content quality. Irrespective of how instant your site loading time is, how well the keywords match the user intent or how cool the videos look, there is no way that you will have a good rank if the content is not good.

It is suggested to publish less in case you do not have the budget or time to generate sufficient content.

In today’s intensely competitive market, the quality of your content matters more than ever. 

Please note that quality has nothing to do with the flashiest user-interface or the most impressive graphic design. It refers to replying to the right queries as well as offering useful, top-quality information to the reader.

4) DO NOT Imitate Your Competitors

Mostly in this situation, people take the help of live chat to interact with the customer and to solve their queries. You can only provide value for your business if your voice for the writing words is unique and creatively different and original. There are a lot of writers out there in the market who copy as well as rewrite blog posts throughout the industry, from the digital marketing world to finance to motorcycles to biohacking to real estate. 

In terms of writing, the only time you must pay heed to the customer’s competitors is for the keyword rankings as well as top linking sites. You should provide your writers with the guidelines required to produce something which will rise above proverbial noise. 

5) DO Rewrite

Write. Read. Edit. And then rewrite. Repeat.

During the rewrites, eliminate anything unimportant, as well as simplify things. While guiding the writers, instruct them to outline and then blow out the very first draft without having to worry about sloppiness, spelling, or grammar issues.

Never forget that magic happens at the rewriting stage. However, do not forget that the aim is not to edit the written piece to “perfection” as it will lead you to be extra cautious about everything as well as you won’t be able to deliver the content on time.

  6) DO NOT Forget to Be Exceptional

Always keep it in mind that the only method of dominating the digital world is by creating an exceptional service or product, as well as remarkable marketing. Now, this also refers to the creation of exceptional content writing. 

You should leave no stone unturned in making each word count for producing a remarkable piece of content.

In case something doesn’t add value or make sense (also called “fluff”), do not show reluctance in killing it and creating something new, or rewriting the existing piece. Put an equal amount of energy into your every written piece, be it the 160-character Meta description, 250-word product copy or 2000-word blog. 

7) DO Master the Art of Patience

Needless to say, patience is the basic driver for achieving success in any sector, from building the business to relationships and, specifically, for writing. It takes time to write good content and for that most of your time includes editing.

This is the major reason why you should learn patience for editing, rewriting, and editing as much as needed, to become a much better writer. Moreover, perfectionism is procrastination. 

8) DO NOT Ignore the Significance of Headline

The headline of your content comes under the category of the most relevant elements of writing. Put a lot of time into producing the headline just like you do while creating every piece of your content.

Always use the target keyword and do not forget to appeal to the emotions.

Ensure the fact that while doing content writing, you do not make your headline an afterthought but offer it the much-deserved creative energy. 

9) DO Learn the Science Behind On-Page SEO

It will help you in easing up things for your company, whether you have the SEO team or not. It is suggested to learn about the internal linking structures for passing the link equity to those pages which you wish to highlight for both search engines and readers. 

Format the on-page SEO for including the same in snippets, like: 

Utilizing bullet points.

Breaking-up the written piece into various headings.

Focusing upon sentences or words with italics or bold. 

In addition to this, in case you are working on blog or page content, you must learn how to write exceptional meta descriptions.

They can assist you in backing up that equally amazing headline you wrote and as a result of which, the agency or business you are associated with will start loving you more. 

10. DO NOT Become Irregular

Your Company should keep uploading the schedules for the blogging campaigns in a consistent manner. In case you are doing 3 blogs weekly, they must be scheduled at the same time on the same day as per the analytics of when that site usually gets the most traffic.

The same rule applies to all the writers out there. You must train yourself for writing every day at the same time, and your creativity/mind will adapt to it instantly and ultimately, the flow of words will turn out to be seamless. 

There is no denying the fact that average writing cannot build loyalty and without loyalty, you won’t be able to make your mark and will remain just another online writer.

As the SEO trends get continuously updated in 2020 as well as beyond, you will also be required to empower the writing skills as much as possible. 

 11) Do Use A Tool to Avoid Content Embarrassment

You should always keep track of what you are writing. Right from the keyword research to sending blogs, you should use tools to avoid silly mistakes.

Always use keyword analytics to identify the right keyword and to improve the efficiency of the content.

Use Grammarly or any tool to check the grammar and spelling of the content and help you in writing content faster and better.

As it is always tricky to identify plagiarism in the content, choosing an online tool to check the plagiarism of the content can help you without any error.

Alexa, Moz, and Hubspot are also a few other tools that will help you in making the right decision to write content that could fit best in the category you are writing.

12) Do Not Hesitate to Write Without Any Delay

Don’t ever feel afraid, stressed and uninspired while writing a blog, this may reduce your productivity. There is no waiting for the right time for writing content with perfection and creativity. This is the only time, time to research, time to explore and time to start writing content without procrastinating.  

Points to help you gain self-confidence while writing:

Just Start Writing now, the words will flow itself.

Do not repeat the patterns of writing, stand and move to refresh your mind and once you are ready, sit down and start writing again

Set a deadline for yourself to increase your writing speed.

Don’t just be perfect; write content with full imperfection to train yourself to write better content next time.

Choose a goal to avoid any difficulty while researching the content you are interested in writing.

Find a location where you can best use your mind and write content with full interest and dedication.

13) Do Not Get Affected With the Criticism

A good writer should always understand the difference between good writing and bad writing. Good writing is not always about appreciation and perfection, you should always take the criticism with full positivity and learn from those mistakes to go the extra mile which many people will not take.

Do not back step to rewrite the content if demanded by the clients and choose to be different. To become a good writer and to become a professional, one should be humble and one should have the willingness to listen and accept change.

14) Do Not Forget the Interest of the Audience

Writers these days just focus on SEO and forget to gain the attention of the audience. This is not right to ignore the reader’s interest and write only to please the search engine and run behind Google ranking.

One should always make a strategy that focuses on both SEO as well as caters to the interest of the audience. An SEO strategy will help you in identifying the required content which helps you in Google ranking and with the help of that content one must write content that should be a great read for the audience.

15) Do Not Forget to Add Images While Writing Your Blog

Adding relevant images on your blog post not only makes your writing look attractive but also makes it easier for the readers to understand what exactly you are trying to deliver. Attractive images drive the reader’s attention and help you in engaging more audience which further helps you have huge traffic and more social engagement.

 Things you should take care while posting an image:

Find a photo that fits best with the content.

Share live, experienced pictures.

Edit downloaded photos and give credit.

16) Do Write Using ART (Authority, Reputation, and Trust):

It is very easy for readers to recognize fake and trash writing. It is very important for the writer to gain complete and true knowledge about the topic he is writing. If you want to write content with ART, you have to read daily and follow their lessons.

You have to write with full authority to build a reputation in the industry and gain trust from the audience.

The post 16 SEO Best Practices 2020 : The Do’s and Don’ts of SEO Writing appeared first on CareerMetis.com.

16 SEO Best Practices 2020 : The Do’s and Don’ts of SEO Writing published first on https://skillsireweb.tumblr.com/

[jaigeddes]

Man versus Machine – Architectural Sketch Series

I’m currently in Chicago celebrating the 50th birthday of a good friend of mine. In fact, there are four of us here and we all know each other from our time together from the University of Texas School of Architecture. Evidence presented this weekend would suggest that we are all still about 24 years old despite the realities that we are all considerably older. This has been a fairly architecturally intensive themed weekend and sprinkled throughout our reminiscing has been some interesting conversations about how things are done now compared to how things were done “back in the good old days.” I am many things but a Luddite wouldn’t probably be one of them, but I do like doing some things a certain way even though there is technology out there that could possibly do a task more efficiently.  Primarily among these activities is that I like to sketch out my ideas rather than relegating it to a computer program.

For grins, I thought I would use the following example … laying out tile patterns. I posted the following picture to Instagram a few weeks ago and a fairly interesting conversation occurred in the comment section.

View this post on Instagram

Spent some time yesterday working through tile layouts and the percentage mix between the tiles selected (this was a 20/80 mix) . . . . . . . #whatthisarchitectdoes #architect #design #tiledesign #tombow #heathceramics #easymath #lifeofanarchitect

A post shared by Bob Borson (@bobborson) on Apr 12, 2019 at 5:42am PDT

For the most part, this is a pretty straightforward photo, but I received the following comment:

“Looks like a perfect use of computation to look at the variations. A quick script in Dynamo could generate what you hand is doing a whole lot faster and effectively”

For those of you that don’t know, Dynamo is a program that runs within the drafting software my company uses (Revit) to create scripts that automate repetitive tasks, explore complex design problems, and streamline BIM workflows in a Revit model. The person who left me this comment was pointing out that instead of trying to determine the tile layout by hand, I could simply write a quick script and Dynamo could do it for me.

While he is absolutely correct, from my standpoint there are a few considerations to his argument, at least where I am concerned,  that doesn’t favor using this piece of software – the main one being that I don’t really draft in my office anymore and don’t know Revit or Dynamo. Beyond those, I don’t want the computer doing my tile layout for me.

Saving time is one of the main arguments for allowing the computer to generate a mix of tiles in your layout – you can easily change the percentages of the mix to quickly determine if an 80/20 mix is right or if an 83/17 mix delivers the results you want. For me, I definitely went old school on this process … I did it by hand.

[GASP]

This is the elevation in question – quickly printed out from our drawing set.

Step 1: Count the number of tiles For this, I actually counted the horizontal rows across the top (there are 24) and multiplied that times 3 columns * 4 tiles per column + 4 tiles for that little sliver on the far left-hand side. This gave me a grand total of = 292 tiles

Step 2: Do some really easy math I was interested in an 85/15 split so I multiplied 292 * .85 which equals 248.2 tiles … I rounded down to 248

Step 3: Do some more easy math I subtracted 248 from 292 which gave me my 15% balance of 44

Pretty easy so far as I have 248 tiles of one color and 44 tiles of an accent color. Here’s where being a designer kicks in … I  wanted to lay out the tiles myself so that  I could make sure that I liked their distribution. So far I have invested about 23 seconds of my time, which is about 12x less time then it took for me to actually type these steps up.

So here is the layout using my 23 seconds of math. It’s a little sloppy but easily got the point across. I won’t presume to know what you’re thinking [yes I will] but I’m going to guess what you’re thinking:

You: Bob, look at all the tile, it must have taken you quite a lot of time to draw up that pattern, at least as long as it took you to write up that paragraph explaining the math. I know that you’re trying to say that it’s sloppy but c’mon … it’s amazing!!  

Me: Thanks, but it really didn’t take me very long. If you must know, I would say this took me at maybe 30 or 45 seconds.

You: LIAR!!! There’s no way …

I am not a liar and here’s how I did it … I simply overlaid a piece of trace paper on top of the printed out elevation. Whomp!

There was one step that I did prior to this one, but it made more sense to move the images around. I actually made a few versions of these tile layout studies and during the photoshop assembly of getting them ready for today’s post, I cleaned up the perimeter’s edge (that’s the black line defining the outline of the elevation). You can see it more clearly in the next image …

Okay  – I tried to make things a bit more obvious in this image and if you look at the very bottom, you can see that there are three little tick marks. Instead of writing out all the step-by-step instructions, I’ll just blurt it out. I basically divided the entire wall of tile up into quarters with some more quick and easy math and I put a tick mark at the bottom so that I would know the boundary area. From there, I just needed to put 11 accent tiles into each quarter (44 tiles divided by 4 = 11). When I was drawing it up, I put the brownish accent tile mark down first and then came back afterward and just filled in the field tile.

And for your eagle-eyes out there who will do the math, you’ll notice that there are actually 12 tiles in the quadrant to the far left.  For my own special amusement, I added 1 additional tile just because I can.

So how did all this take me? Maybe 90 seconds total. I probably did all four of my studies in a 5-minute window and I was happy with the results and settled on the 85/15 split.

These are the mix of tiles we will be using from Heath Ceramics

There is a lot more to this bathroom than just the single wall of tile that I showed above. This is a commercial project I’ve been working on and there are 2 pairs of Men’s and Women’s toilet rooms (4 total). We didn’t want to match the tile used in each space so we have selected 4 complete sets of tile to personalize each space.

Nice, right?

There are times when I am acutely aware that there is technology out there that could potentially make my job go a bit faster. I would also imagine that the scale of the tasks I am working on would be impacted by my decision to do this by hand or write a short algorithm that would allow my drafting software to make these sorts of decisions for me. If this was a professional football arena and I was working through the layout of 60 bathrooms and 145,612 tiles (instead of 292) I would be the first in line to take advantage of some technology. But it’s not, so I’m not, and therefore I didn’t … it’s that straightforward for me. I also tend to think that the end result is impacted when we put “technology” into the actual design process in an automated manner.

When challenged with: If I design the tool to create the pattern have I not also created and designed the pattern? No, I don’t think so. My counter for such arguments is If I build a piano, it does not make me a musician. I am aware that this is a simplified response to what is actually a much longer and (at least to architects) possibly more interesting conversation. This is a fairly mundane task and if I could take that algorithm and simply run it over and over again until I get a pattern I like, I could then have a seamless transition to my construction documents. In my hand-drawn version, I would have to hand this sketch to the installer … which I could actually do and it still wouldn’t take that much time, but it is a matter of scale. If the space I was working on was much larger than this, I would assuredly be wasting some time on a process that could be expedited. It could be relegated to the computer and I could then turn my attention to problems that the computer can’t solve for me.

But where’s the fun in that?

Cheers,

ps –

I mentioned at the start of this post that I was in Chicago celebrating the 50th birthday of a friend of mine. The picture above was taken by placing my phone on the ledge of a window at the Robie House by Frank Lloyd Wright. The four of us all graduated from architecture school together but have since scattered to all corners of the US (this was the first time we have all been all together in the same place since 1992).

[andrewysanders]

Man versus Machine – Architectural Sketch Series

I’m currently in Chicago celebrating the 50th birthday of a good friend of mine. In fact, there are four of us here and we all know each other from our time together from the University of Texas School of Architecture. Evidence presented this weekend would suggest that we are all still about 24 years old despite the realities that we are all considerably older. This has been a fairly architecturally intensive themed weekend and sprinkled throughout our reminiscing has been some interesting conversations about how things are done now compared to how things were done “back in the good old days.” I am many things but a Luddite wouldn’t probably be one of them, but I do like doing some things a certain way even though there is technology out there that could possibly do a task more efficiently.  Primarily among these activities is that I like to sketch out my ideas rather than relegating it to a computer program.

For grins, I thought I would use the following example … laying out tile patterns. I posted the following picture to Instagram a few weeks ago and a fairly interesting conversation occurred in the comment section.

View this post on Instagram

Spent some time yesterday working through tile layouts and the percentage mix between the tiles selected (this was a 20/80 mix) . . . . . . . #whatthisarchitectdoes #architect #design #tiledesign #tombow #heathceramics #easymath #lifeofanarchitect

A post shared by Bob Borson (@bobborson) on Apr 12, 2019 at 5:42am PDT

For the most part, this is a pretty straightforward photo, but I received the following comment:

“Looks like a perfect use of computation to look at the variations. A quick script in Dynamo could generate what you hand is doing a whole lot faster and effectively”

For those of you that don’t know, Dynamo is a program that runs within the drafting software my company uses (Revit) to create scripts that automate repetitive tasks, explore complex design problems, and streamline BIM workflows in a Revit model. The person who left me this comment was pointing out that instead of trying to determine the tile layout by hand, I could simply write a quick script and Dynamo could do it for me.

While he is absolutely correct, from my standpoint there are a few considerations to his argument, at least where I am concerned,  that doesn’t favor using this piece of software – the main one being that I don’t really draft in my office anymore and don’t know Revit or Dynamo. Beyond those, I don’t want the computer doing my tile layout for me.

Saving time is one of the main arguments for allowing the computer to generate a mix of tiles in your layout – you can easily change the percentages of the mix to quickly determine if an 80/20 mix is right or if an 83/17 mix delivers the results you want. For me, I definitely went old school on this process … I did it by hand.

[GASP]

This is the elevation in question – quickly printed out from our drawing set.

Step 1: Count the number of tiles For this, I actually counted the horizontal rows across the top (there are 24) and multiplied that times 3 columns * 4 tiles per column + 4 tiles for that little sliver on the far left-hand side. This gave me a grand total of = 292 tiles

Step 2: Do some really easy math I was interested in an 85/15 split so I multiplied 292 * .85 which equals 248.2 tiles … I rounded down to 248

Step 3: Do some more easy math I subtracted 248 from 292 which gave me my 15% balance of 44

Pretty easy so far as I have 248 tiles of one color and 44 tiles of an accent color. Here’s where being a designer kicks in … I  wanted to lay out the tiles myself so that  I could make sure that I liked their distribution. So far I have invested about 23 seconds of my time, which is about 12x less time then it took for me to actually type these steps up.

So here is the layout using my 23 seconds of math. It’s a little sloppy but easily got the point across. I won’t presume to know what you’re thinking [yes I will] but I’m going to guess what you’re thinking:

You: Bob, look at all the tile, it must have taken you quite a lot of time to draw up that pattern, at least as long as it took you to write up that paragraph explaining the math. I know that you’re trying to say that it’s sloppy but c’mon … it’s amazing!!  

Me: Thanks, but it really didn’t take me very long. If you must know, I would say this took me at maybe 30 or 45 seconds.

You: LIAR!!! There’s no way …

I am not a liar and here’s how I did it ��� I simply overlaid a piece of trace paper on top of the printed out elevation. Whomp!

There was one step that I did prior to this one, but it made more sense to move the images around. I actually made a few versions of these tile layout studies and during the photoshop assembly of getting them ready for today’s post, I cleaned up the perimeter’s edge (that’s the black line defining the outline of the elevation). You can see it more clearly in the next image …

Okay  – I tried to make things a bit more obvious in this image and if you look at the very bottom, you can see that there are three little tick marks. Instead of writing out all the step-by-step instructions, I’ll just blurt it out. I basically divided the entire wall of tile up into quarters with some more quick and easy math and I put a tick mark at the bottom so that I would know the boundary area. From there, I just needed to put 11 accent tiles into each quarter (44 tiles divided by 4 = 11). When I was drawing it up, I put the brownish accent tile mark down first and then came back afterward and just filled in the field tile.

And for your eagle-eyes out there who will do the math, you’ll notice that there are actually 12 tiles in the quadrant to the far left.  For my own special amusement, I added 1 additional tile just because I can.

So how did all this take me? Maybe 90 seconds total. I probably did all four of my studies in a 5-minute window and I was happy with the results and settled on the 85/15 split.

These are the mix of tiles we will be using from Heath Ceramics

There is a lot more to this bathroom than just the single wall of tile that I showed above. This is a commercial project I’ve been working on and there are 2 pairs of Men’s and Women’s toilet rooms (4 total). We didn’t want to match the tile used in each space so we have selected 4 complete sets of tile to personalize each space.

Nice, right?

There are times when I am acutely aware that there is technology out there that could potentially make my job go a bit faster. I would also imagine that the scale of the tasks I am working on would be impacted by my decision to do this by hand or write a short algorithm that would allow my drafting software to make these sorts of decisions for me. If this was a professional football arena and I was working through the layout of 60 bathrooms and 145,612 tiles (instead of 292) I would be the first in line to take advantage of some technology. But it’s not, so I’m not, and therefore I didn’t … it’s that straightforward for me. I also tend to think that the end result is impacted when we put “technology” into the actual design process in an automated manner.

When challenged with: If I design the tool to create the pattern have I not also created and designed the pattern? No, I don’t think so. My counter for such arguments is If I build a piano, it does not make me a musician. I am aware that this is a simplified response to what is actually a much longer and (at least to architects) possibly more interesting conversation. This is a fairly mundane task and if I could take that algorithm and simply run it over and over again until I get a pattern I like, I could then have a seamless transition to my construction documents. In my hand-drawn version, I would have to hand this sketch to the installer … which I could actually do and it still wouldn’t take that much time, but it is a matter of scale. If the space I was working on was much larger than this, I would assuredly be wasting some time on a process that could be expedited. It could be relegated to the computer and I could then turn my attention to problems that the computer can’t solve for me.

But where’s the fun in that?

Cheers,

ps –

I mentioned at the start of this post that I was in Chicago celebrating the 50th birthday of a friend of mine. The picture above was taken by placing my phone on the ledge of a window at the Robie House by Frank Lloyd Wright. The four of us all graduated from architecture school together but have since scattered to all corners of the US (this was the first time we have all been all together in the same place since 1992).

  from Home https://www.lifeofanarchitect.com/man-versus-machine-architectural-sketch-series/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[thejerkstorecalled]

Race Report: Ironman 70.3 St George 2018

Every time I start a race report, I think that it’s going to be short. I think this one really might be 😊 after I get through the prologue!

The preamble is that I first raced Ironman 70.3 St George in 2015 and got completely Tyson’d (“everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face”). It’s the race performance I’m least proud of, definitely for the distance and maybe ever. I debated whether or not I would ever race there again. After completing fourteen different half-distance triathlons without repeating the same race, options were fewer, especially if you’re looking to fill a certain hole in your scheduled via a North American race. Mid-season in 2017, I repeated a super-tough Olympic in the mountains that I originally raced in 2015 and was able to bike seven minutes faster and even run the super-hilly run course slightly faster. I realized it was time to return to St George for redemption.

I took a look back at finish times – my own at various races, and others at this race – and put together a plan to take at least 20 minutes off my 2015 time. This is what that looked like.

It helps for me to write down my goals, to maintain focus and stay honest with myself. I also like to do weird things, like when it’s time to update all my many work account passwords and I’m out of options, I use race goals. For instance: CIM310 (check) or STG525 (check, check). Of course these aren’t the exact or complete passwords, it would be silly to give way my syntax publicly on the interwebs. With this sneaky and ever-present tactic, you remember your goal every damn day and think about how badly it would suck not to hit the time that you can’t get out of your head.

Okay, onto the race!

Michael and I flew into Vegas two days pre-race, and drove to St George just in time to check in and pick up our bikes before Ironman village closed on Thursday. He noticed a new issue with his head unit, so had planned to hit up bike tech early Friday before driving some loops of the course as a refresher and doing our shake-outs. No big surprises in driving the course, mostly just subbed in a new out-and-back on the bike course.

We arrived right on schedule to Sand Hollow Reservoir where the swim and T1 (swim -> transition area) were set up to do a shakeout ride on the first five miles of the bike course and splash around a bit to remember what 60* water temps feel like. At 1.27 miles, my chain got mangled. Usually I can sort it, but this was pretty bad. Michael couldn’t get it either, so he had to ride back to get our rental van so that we could take my bike to bike tech all the way back in the town of St George where Ironman Village was.

The bike mechanics had to take apart my chain rings to get my chain sorted and let me know that I needed to replace the chain rings (after the race, this was beyond their race venue scope). This was frustrating since I’d had quite a bit of bike work done a month prior, with a full tune-up and new cabling among other things. Bike te also advised me to ride conservatively the next day. Not at all what I wanted to hear!

By this time, it was approaching 4 PM. Our bikes were due for check-in by 5 PM, all the way back at the reservoir. I did a super-short ride near bike tech in case of further issues, and tested the gearing. I was able to shift into my small chain ring, a requisite for riding a course as hilly as this one! I was still super-nervous. By this time, my goal was to ride conservatively enough to finish the bike course.

We made the bike check deadline with a bit of time to spare, and I was able to squeeze in a short run on reservoir trails and a swim to the first buoy and back. A really epic four-minute shake-out swim!

It was time to get cleaned up and eat something before bed time. For simplicity, we just decided to eat at our hotel bar knowing that it likely wouldn’t be crowded and we wouldn’t need to get very fancy or drive anywhere. We ended up having tasty bites and drinks with two guys from Normatec – one of which was the guy who raced all the Ironman events wearing fireman gear on the run and the other was a former pro who still dabbles heavily in extensions of the sport.  A fun way to shake off a stressful day.

BTW would highly recommend out hotel: Hyatt Place. It was nice and new and smelled of fancy lotions like the hotels in Vegas usually do. The staff was super-friendly and helpful. The breakfast was legit. The snack options were delicious. The gym was on point. No complaints. I’ll also share the hotel tip that I imparted upon Michael from my semi-frequent travel experience: always carry a water bottle and refill it with the cold, filtered water in the hotel gym/fitness center to be eco-friendly and cost-efficient.

Race Day!

Up at 3:30 to get to the hotel-provided race breakfast at 4 (the bananas usually go fast). Since that leaves four hours until getting in the water given where I’d seed for the swim, here’s what I ate:

Ezekiel toast with almond butter

Banana

Zest Tea’s High Octane Green Tea

Chocolate Clif Gel and water (~30-45 min before swim start)

We parked near Ironman Village so that we could access T2 and take the Ironman shuttles to the swim start. We had to turn in our run bags the day prior but pro tip (from a total amateur): get in on race morning and remove your run gear from your bag, set it up to support a faster transition from bike to run.

Bike set up went quickly and was great to hang out with Sherpa Courtney and Competitor Mike before we filed into the start chute.

The Swim

I optimistically started right around the 36/37-minute swimmers. To be fair, I’ve had swims in this range and my pool times have been solid the last few months.

I jumped in the water without hesitation and was feeling pretty good. I thought I might be passing people but then I also realized I was too far to the left…again…so this might be me and not my sleeved wetsuit 😊. There were a lot of waves splashing me in the face and I was taking in a ton of water, woof. The second half of the swim, I definitely felt like I was getting passed, and for the final 3 – 4 buoys I knew I’d been in the water a long time and was expecting to see 38-40 on my swim clock.

This is wildly frustrating. I keep putting increasing effort into my swim training year over year, and I’m see gains in my pool times and enjoy swimming so much more than in the past. What used to be my all-out-and-Im-probably-drafting 100s are now my steady-race-paced-just-slower-than-Z3 100s; I was stoked when I – two or three years ago – was able to hold this pace for 200-300 yards at a time and now I’m holding it for 1000 continuous. But it’s not translating to open water swimming; my OWS times are not moving, and may even be digressing. I’ve been obsessing over if this has to do with a certain wetsuit or whether I breathe bilaterally or if I’m not swimming straight whereby adding on lots of distance and thus time. I have no idea; the results are far too mixed with no clear patterns:

The Bike

The bike went by fast. This course has a lot of different-feeling sections that are easy to mentally parse up and digest. It was fun and scenic, and the roads were good. I wish every bike course was like this!

I had to change gears pretty gingerly and less often than I wanted to in order to avoid a race-ending malfunction. This meant that I was often not in the gear I wanted to be in or in the gear that would help me ride faster for that section of the course, but I was in a safe/lower risk gear that meant I was more likely to get to T2 and the run portion.

I was proud of myself for smiling a lot, encouraging fellow competitors and riding bravely (I’ve been riding like a real pansy in training, on my tri bike, and wasn’t sure if/how I’d be able to “race” on it). And for remembering how to use my behind-the-saddle bottle holder and take bottles at the exchanges, things I haven’t practiced in about eight months! I think I put my helmet on weirdly because I had much less front-facing visibility that I usually do, and had to pick up my head more than was comfortable or optimal for aerodynamics, to ensure I wasn’t about to roll into anyone or anything. Otherwise, a smooth ride! I was elated to dismount without incident.

Bike Nutrition:

Two bottles each containing two scoops of custom Infinit and ~5 oz of Red Bull (mixed w water obvi)

Two lightly salted Yukon Gold potatoes

I took a water bottle at each of the three aid stations, chugging some and diluting/filling my bottles with some

The Run!

I took off out of T2 trying to just get relaxed and into an easy rhythm. Most of my training runs recently have been directly off the bike or weights where I needed a couple miles or a couple minutes to feel “normal” which was good precedent for this race where you come off a hilly bike course into a run that starts with 3 miles of real climbing. During this easy start, I mentally collected myself and devised a game plan: the more miles of “up” at the outset meant the less miles of effort and pain at the end. So in my mind, it was a ten mile run since the last 2.5 – 3 miles are downhill. I like to lie to myself and I always fall for it, ha!

I also planned to manage the climbs with a strong but controlled effort and then hammer the descents, pushing the cadence and high foot turnover as hard as I could. If you’ve ever run alongside me, you know what this must have sounded like because my feet literally pound the pavement. I hammered down loud and proud! I passed a lot of guys on the descents who were putting on the brakes and being timid about pounding and rolling down the hills – I know they’re carrying more lbs than I am, but guys, your quads will forgive you in a few days!

I was actually feeling good and happy and all those weird things. I was even called out by other racers for smiling stupidly on a dead-ish area of the course, just to myself! Also: science, smiling relaxes you and makes you go faster, so sometimes I force it in the name of science. Maybe it’s because I’ve done so many tough training runs/intervals on the treadmill getting serious mental training and zero air circulation. The breeze I felt from running outdoors, even in the exposed desert sun, was quite a treat.

I wasn’t watching my splits because on a run course like this, it’s just demoralizing. I mostly record for post-analysis. My watch band actually spontaneously broke in half and my watch fell off while I was running, and I almost didn’t go back for it. What a great excuse for a new watch for a girl who still uses a 6 YO Gamin 910 that’s on it’s third(?) band!

I told myself that once I was done climbing and everything left was downhill (about mile 10.5), I could check my watch to see average page and get some motivation to cut that down with some high cadence descending. The math was much better than I expected! The last 1.5 miles were tough, I was nervous that I might collapse or pass out and not make it to the finish line. I could see my pace petering a bit and kept trying to force the turnover because I knew I was staring down a run faster than I thought possible and wanted to see how low I could get it.

Run nutrition

One 25 mg caffeine Strawberry Clif gel

Water from aid stations; usually I like Coke on the run but I could tell that my body probably couldn’t handle any more caffeine without some kind of intestinal implosion or explosion

BTW – because it was hot, a lot of spectators were out with super soakers, spray bottles, etc and there was a mister on course. I know some people avoid these because they’re scared of blisters. Guys, just get better socks. The cold water is a lifesaver! I got a free pair of SmartWool socks in the swag bag for a trail race I did a few years ago and wore them in a 50k that included multiple stream crossings. Nary a blister. I’ve bought more of these socks and wear them when I know I might want to get wet 😊

Epilogue

I was happy to come well-below my goal time for the race overall and hit a time that I really didn’t think was possible even though my swim goal was off. I noticed that it was offset by faster transitions, so while I didn’t swim a lot faster, my increased swim fitness allowed me to feel super-fresh coming out of the water and “race” the transition to kick off the bike with gusto. Secretly, I did want to break 2:50 on the bike, so rode just where I wanted to despite not doing it exactly how I would have liked due to gearing issues. I would have been happy with anything <1:50 on the run, thinking that a perfect day would yield 1:45 on this course, so am pretty stoked with the run.

For my first 70.3 of the season each of the last three years, I’ve had some specific goals I developed in the preceding off season, and always hope to race near the top of my age group. I did that at Oceanside in 2016 (dern I miss the 30-34 AG ha ha!), and had designs on doing that at Coeur d’ Alene in 2017 and now this race. In both instances, I achieved a finish time that seemed like a real stretch and one that would’ve put me on the podium the previous year. Not sure if I raced in better conditions or against stronger fields each time, but dang, can a girl get a break? Maybe next time…