#Maybe you need to re-evaluate your taste in music

[child-of-peace]

When you try to call your wife, but it goes through to her voicemail - A Facial Expression Appreciation Post

FEAP 8 (Masterpost)

#Oh sorry are you not a fan of banshee song? #I wonder why that is #Maybe you need to re-evaluate your taste in music #At this point I think I need a master post for all of these... #Brom Bones #Ichabod Crane #Headless: A Sleepy Hollow Story #Headless Shipwrecked #Shipwrecked Comedy #Own Post

[turtleboyz]

The dream beavers and what each dreams mean:

Leo dreamt that his leg was healed, not feeling pain, and that he could fly

Donnie dreamt that he was being chase, hiding, and someone wanted to eat him, salt.

Mikey dreamt of candy and cute stuff while having someone to play with

Raph dreamt of blue fire, rock music, and white snakes.

The symbolism:

Depending on the dream, white snakes actually can mean a lot of difference things! From wealth and prosperity, to growth, or making the wrong decisions. Here in Raph’s dream he was wrap up by the snakes while the biggest snake ate his brothers.

Dreaming of a big snake means that you are afraid of someone, or that you might have depression. Dreaming of being wrapped up by a snake means that you want freedom. Dreaming of (almost in this case) being bite means that something new will happen, a surprise.

Now snakes symbolize different things; in some cultures they represent fertility. It also respersents the Rod/Staff of Asclepius. It’s base off the God Asclepius who was the god of healing and medicine. Snakes also symbolize different religions. In Japan snakes represent a god, a messenger of god. White snake moults mean rebirth.

Blue fire in dreams can mean dangerous person, encountering challenges, honest or healing. Spiritual blue flames can mean passion, a desire to transform, or a desire to heal. blue flame is also associated with anger

Dreaming of rock music means that their a lot of energy inside you. But don’t have the right direction. It represents that you are a person, who wants to achieve everything within a short span of time. But do remember, everything in life needs persistence and hard work.

DREAM of being chased and hiding. It’s cause by stress and anxiety. Dreaming about running and hiding may reflect your desire to re-evaluate your life. Maybe things are changing too fast in your life. When you try to hide from danger, this dream is a sign of depression. Bad experiences make you too careful, and you don’t trust others. You might also experience a great misfortune and grief, due to losing someone dear. This dream can also indicate getting involved in an accident in the near future.

I find it really interesting that the dream beaver keep calling Donnie salty. I know it’s because the beaver want to eat Donnie and scare him. But salt in dreams actually have different meanings! If you dream about salt in your mouth it can mean emotional outbursts. Salty oceans can mean heartache, smelling salt and not like it means loss and destruction. While the opposite means wealth. Salt symbolize purity, taste, fidelity/faithfulness, bad thoughts, death.

As for breaking about being eaten, it mean lake of self-confidence, Dreaming about a hungry monster trying to eat you it means that something is consuming you, like an addiction or a bad habit. It also means you dislike something about yourself.

DREAM of candy means good luck, joy, and positive. It’s can also mean your pleasures that could end up harming your health, perhaps some kind of a toxic relationship that will drain positivity from your life after a certain period of time. dreaming of candy represents your wish to be rewarded for your efforts.

As for dreaming about playing games with someone signifies your attitude and confidence. You are ready to move on from the past. You have a positive outlook in life and are not limited by anything. The dream represents self-exploration and your connection with a higher power. Grace, agility, regeneration and growth.

DREAM about flying. It’s can mean freedoms, the desire to escape. The spiritual meaning of flying in a dream is that you are rising above your challenges. Whatever they may be. It shows you are in control of your destiny and can overcome great challenges in order to succeed. Dreaming about flying without wings can also mean a spiritual awakening or a different perspective.

#2012 tmnt #Sebastian review 2012 #long post #dreams #symbolism #I really could find much info about not dealing pain in dream or dreaming about a candy world #character analysis #donnie analysis #raph analysis #leo analysis #Mikey analysis #raphael hamato #donatello hamato #leonardo hamato #michelangelo hamato

[newmovers2023]

What to get rid of when moving?

Once you realize the clear benefits of relocating with Packers and Movers Kolkata to Mumbai fewer belongings, the next step is to identify the things to get rid of when moving in order to decide what to do with them. This time-consuming task is called sorting /inventorying/, and it’s exactly what you are advised to do the moment you find a bit of time on your hands.

Follow the next few steps to be able to complete the sorting process quickly so that you can start work on other equally important tasks. Here’s how to get rid of clutter before you move out:

Step 1. Initiate the sorting process one room at a time, and make sure you begin from the rooms with the most items in them.

Step 2. Start sorting out the big items first (furniture, electric appliances, specialty household items, etc.) and then move on to the smaller ones (books, clothes, bathroom products, etc).

Step 3. Create a quick classification method to finish the sorting job faster. As a rule of thumb, you are encouraged to have at least the following 4 major categories: must-take items, valuables, unwanted/unneeded items, and useless items.

Step 4. Identify the must-take items. While writing down all the things you own, mark down the possessions that you will definitely take with you. These are the no-brainers: your recently purchased flat-screen TV will come with you as will the set of expensive soft furniture pieces you bought for the living room. Also, your rare collection of first-edition books will look lovely on the bookcase in your new home. Whatever indispensable items fall into this group, they need to make it safe and sound to the new address.

Step 5. Guard your valuables. Valuable items can mean so much for you for a number of reasons – monetary value, sentimental value, and so on. These are usually the things you will not easily part with unless you come to the conclusion that it’s better to sell some of them (not the sentimental ones, of course) prior to the move to earn money and save space – read on to learn of your sale options. For the time being, however, your primary goal is to set them apart: expensive electronic equipment, jewelry pieces, heirlooms, antiques, emotional gifts, and of course – your child’s very first pair of shoes.

Get rid of stuff when moving

It’s sad when things that used to mean the world to somebody are later just thrown away.

Step 6. Mark all unwanted or unneeded stuff. This is the category that you need to close pay attention to because getting rid of the stuff found in it is your priority. Yes, successful sorting and consequent reduction of the number of your no longer needed items will let redirect more financial resources to other essential relocation aspects that require them. So, what are the things you may no longer want or need?

Outdated or outgrown items such as shoes, clothes, children’s toys, and so on;

Duplicate items – do you really need 3 toasters and 2 microwave ovens?;

Forgotten items – when was the last time you used your tennis racket? Sports equipment, musical instruments, and other special-purpose things are just a small taste of what was once great and useful but is now forgotten and useless;

Collector’s items you no longer care about. Maybe it’s time to cash out on a sizable collection that stopped giving you any joy a long time ago? Re-evaluate your options with the factors Money and Space in mind.

Gifts you never really liked. No, you’re not supposed to sell or give away presents made by friends or family or relatives but that big and heavy bowling ball… you don’t even like bowling that much.

Step 7. Useless stuff. Well, you know perfectly well what you should do with anything that is broken or damaged beyond repair, or worn out beyond any further usage. Or, if you’re still not sure, see the next section to see what options you have to get rid of unwanted items in your home.

[gwekajob]

What to get rid of when moving?

Once you realize the clear benefits of relocating with Packers and Movers Gurgaon to Ranchi Cost fewer belongings, the next step is to identify the things to get rid of when moving in order to decide what to do with them. This time-consuming task is called sorting /inventorying/, and it’s exactly what you are advised to do the moment you find a bit of time on your hands.

Follow the next few steps to be able to complete the sorting process quickly so that you can start work on other equally important tasks. Here’s how to get rid of clutter before you move out:

Step 1. Initiate the sorting process one room at a time, and make sure you begin from the rooms with the most items in them.

Step 2. Start sorting out the big items first (furniture, electric appliances, specialty household items, etc.) and then move on to the smaller ones (books, clothes, bathroom products, etc).

Step 3. Create a quick classification method to finish the sorting job faster. As a rule of thumb, you are encouraged to have at least the following 4 major categories: must-take items, valuables, unwanted/unneeded items, and useless items.

Step 4. Identify the must-take items. While writing down all the things you own, mark down the possessions that you will definitely take with you. These are the no-brainers: your recently purchased flat-screen TV will come with you as will the set of expensive soft furniture pieces you bought for the living room. Also, your rare collection of first-edition books will look lovely on the bookcase in your new home. Whatever indispensable items fall into this group, they need to make it safe and sound to the new address.

Step 5. Guard your valuables. Valuable items can mean so much for you for a number of reasons – monetary value, sentimental value, and so on. These are usually the things you will not easily part with unless you come to the conclusion that it’s better to sell some of them (not the sentimental ones, of course) prior to the move to earn money and save space – read on to learn of your sale options. For the time being, however, your primary goal is to set them apart: expensive electronic equipment, jewelry pieces, heirlooms, antiques, emotional gifts, and of course – your child’s very first pair of shoes.

Get rid of stuff when moving

It’s sad when things that used to mean the world to somebody are later just thrown away.

Step 6. Mark all unwanted or unneeded stuff. This is the category that you need to close pay attention to because getting rid of the stuff found in it is your priority. Yes, successful sorting and consequent reduction of the number of your no longer needed items will let redirect more financial resources to other essential relocation aspects that require them. So, what are the things you may no longer want or need?

Outdated or outgrown items such as shoes, clothes, children’s toys, and so on;

Duplicate items – do you really need 3 toasters and 2 microwave ovens?;

Forgotten items – when was the last time you used your tennis racket? Sports equipment, musical instruments, and other special-purpose things are just a small taste of what was once great and useful but is now forgotten and useless;

Collector’s items you no longer care about. Maybe it’s time to cash out on a sizable collection that stopped giving you any joy a long time ago? Re-evaluate your options with the factors Money and Space in mind.

Gifts you never really liked. No, you’re not supposed to sell or give away presents made by friends or family or relatives but that big and heavy bowling ball… you don’t even like bowling that much.

Step 7. Useless stuff. Well, you know perfectly well what you should do with anything that is broken or damaged beyond repair, or worn out beyond any further usage. Or, if you’re still not sure, see the next section to see what options you have to get rid of unwanted items in your home.

[obeymeswdwritings]

Feelings Realization

Characters- All except Luke

Gn!Reader

Warnings- demon tantrums, swearing

Category- Headcanons/short fics

Lucifer

King of being bad at feelings 

He didn’t realize slowly, over time, or anything, nah, it hit him like a sack of snakes.

He was lecturing you for some dumb prank you pulled, while you were sitting in the opposite chair, beaming with pride, cocky smirk and all. Honestly, didn’t you have any sense of self-preservation?

And then you left the room, and he gave himself a second to re-evaluate the expression.

And it was actually? kinda cute?

He dislikes this realization immensely, immediately analyzing all of your past interactions to figure out just how long this’d been going on

Uh

Two months?

well

Time to cope

AKA turn on the loudest record he has and kick the shit out of his walls

Kinda weird they didn’t break (Solomon put a spell on them to make them unbreakable as a prank, not sure what he had to gain)

pissed. how dare you make him feel this shit. what the fuck

Mammon

Surprisingly had a reasonable reaction

Which was “oh fuckkkkkkkk”

but hey he was aware of the whole falling in love thing!

Ever since you went “I have a name use it maybe”

Sure he went into denial but hey who hasn’t

anonymously got you gifts

Leviathan

honestly he didn’t realize for a little bit but once he did HOO BOI

felt guilty

“besides, there’s n-no way a normie would ever want to be with someone like me!”

genuinely tries to talk himself out of feelings

When it doesn’t work it’s time for avoidance

Locks himself in his room, is super grumpy, etc

claims he’s busy whenever he comes across you

It gets to the point Solomon and Satan stage a fuckin intervention, AKA forcing his door open, shoving you inside, and refusing to let you out until you make up

He claims he just needed some time alone, and it’s obviously a lie but eh whatever good enough

The only real change in behavior is that he starts being a little bit shyer around you, blushing easier.

Satan

HAHAHAH what.

As mentioned in one of the lessons, he’s shit at figuring out feelings that don’t fall into the pissed category, so it’ll take a bit

Just starts trying to read romance novels, trying to get advice about the next he should do

Confused as shit

He’s trying to figure it out, but doesn’t know how to proceed.

Asmodeus

First instinct is to panic

And then cope! woo!

By cope, I mean blasting human world music, getting new essential oils, and going to the Fall.

He doesn’t tone down on the flirting any (”come on, I flirt with everyone, that’d be so suspicious!”)

However, expect more genuine compliments being dropped during the pickup lines, it’s subtle but if you know what to look for!

Beelzebub

The only one who can honestly say he had a reasonable reaction

And he did! well adjusted man

He realized pretty fast, and refused to change the way he acted around you.

Like genuinely, the only difference was willingness to share snacks.

You know the whole “when I’m around you, being hungry isn’t so bad” shenanigans? yeah, early stages of the realization

He’s very sweet

Belphegor

Very pissed at the feelings, no. 2 in the “I’m going to fucking murder my room until I feel better” gang

It doesn’t work, Beel ends up calming him down

He’s just not thrilled at first

But wait until he adjusts

Cause once he does, welll hope you like cuddling because he does, and he’s a clingy lil shit

Diavolo

Fuckin golden retriever energy = realizes and is more than okay with it

Invites you over like “hey talk about your interests! for research reasons!” and flops onto your lap in the middle of it

Using the sunshine powers to his full benefit

“It’s fine, I can tell your teachers/Lucifer you were with me! they won’t mind!”

honestly kinda reassuring

Barbatos

“Doing research for Lord Diavolo” “Observing differences between you and Solomon” “Practicing human world recipes and needed a taste tester” ok bb everyone believes you

he’s terrified to look into the future for anything about you two 

trying really hard to make time for you but has none

at least none that wouldn’t be visibly “I want to spend time with you” so see previous excuses

knows all the gossip, you have gossip sessions with him and Asmo regularly as part of the exchange program only of course. 

Yes the gossip appointments are called tea parties

Simeon

He’s so oblivious it’s almost endearing

Idiot (fond)

“Hmm these feelings must be because as an angel, I have a natural love for mortals! :D”

He’s not quite as oblivious as he seems but it is up there, let me tell you

When he does realize, he’s just like wELL GUESS THIS IS MY LIFE NOW

*panicked yelling from inside his room* “GOD I KNOW YOU DON’T MAKE MISTAKES BUT ARE YOU SURE”

Solomon

Fully aware of his feelings, refuses to let that interfere with his mischievous acts

Okay maybe a little

Fucking human emotions :((((

#I FUCKING WROTE IT AND THEN ACCIDENTALLY DELETED WHAT THE FUCKKKK #omswd #omswd writings #omswd hc #obey me brothers #obey me undateables #obey me cast #gn!reader #obey me shall we date #obey me x gn!reader

[young-jae]

Today I unfollowed you, I was getting angrier and angrier the more I read your opinions, so I had to stop and think why I was feeling this way, about something as trivial as our own taste in music, and then it hit me, I became so obsessed with this comeback and to break more records that I completely stopped enjoying their song, I started to agree with people who would practically bully others into streaming and mass buying, I even stopped listening to other artists because I was afraid I was giving them streams (I stopped listening to Taemin for fcks sake!!! I hate myself), I was more worried about them not getting no. 1 on bb than my work, THAT IS RIDICULOUS!! I got angry at you because I got stuck in the mindset of “my faves are everything”, the fact that I stopped listening to so many amazing kpop artists because I felt that I was being a “bad fan” is just, i can’t with myself right now, I’ve been a fan since Fake Love and this has never happened before, my taste in music is quite simple and to be honest I really really enjoyed Butter (and I looooved the choreo), but I was so obsessed with numbers that I started to not enjoy anything else, not even the song itself. I know my behavior was childish and it’s probably got to do with other personal issues. For now I know I need to step away from some social media (specially Twitter), need to stop obsessing over numbers and star enjoying because I actually want to, even if I listen to the song once a day, once a week or whatever. I know this was long, I’m sorry, and I hope you stop getting hate and I hope people start thinking why they feel the way they feel and why they feel the need to react at your opinions (that every human is allowed to have) the way they do. Also, I’m following you again, hope that’s ok. Hugs from Mexico.

i am so, so glad you told me this and i'm so glad yesterday helped you re-evaluate yourself and what you've been doing. honestly, i'm proud of you for reflecting on yourself and taking strides to better yourself, for admitting that you started losing sight of what was really important for the sake of numbers that in the long run don't mean anything at all. thank you for telling me, for opening up and for being brave and strong enough to recognize when you need to take a step back. i know that's not easy, and i'm so proud of you. please accept a hug from a stranger all the way in sweden, and maybe even a lil smooch ♡

#SMOOCH #HUGS #MWAH

[theonetheycallhannah]

The Treatment of Capt. Syverson-Chapter Two: Therapeutic Procedure

Pairing: Captain “Sy” Syverson x OFC (Shane Benton)

Summary: Shane and Sy share some moments during their treatment sessions…and a phone call that could set the tone for the next few weeks.

Word Count: 2.6k

Warnings: None, yet… ;)

Author’s Note: Sorry, I was so eager and excited to post the first chapter of this last night, I totally put some inaccurate info in my description notes. I will correct that in the original post and  try to do better henceforth! Hope you enjoy Sy and Shane totally flirting some more and getting more friendly in this chapter. Feedback is appreciated! Even constructive criticism! :D

Disclaimer: Unfortunately for me, Henry is not mine, le sigh, and all mention of him, his characters, any characters from his films, or his precious doggy, Kal, are strictly for transformative and recreational use. I neither ask for, nor accept payment for the work I post on Tumblr or AO3. Unbeta’d because this is for fun and escapism. 

Tags: @onlyhenrys @cavillryarchive @summersong69 @titty-teetee

Let me know if you wish to be added to the list! I’m happy to do it!

Shane woke up that morning with knots in her stomach. She dropped every product she picked up in the shower, she was shaking so much. She accidentally ordered the wrong coffee on her way to work and was now drinking something much less caffeinated and far too sweet for her taste. The barista had informed her it was a grande caramel macchiato with an extra pump of vanilla and extra caramel drizzle…with only two shots of espresso…she couldn't begin to describe how wrong that drink was for her. But it was better than nothing, she told herself, not fully convincingly.

She had chosen her clothes with extra care, even though, with the dress code, her options were limited. And she had made sure to put on a bit of mascara and just a touch of perfume, even though they weren't strictly supposed to wear it…she didn't know why she was bothering.

Well, actually, she did know why. She had been checking her schedule extra diligently lately to make sure she didn't look like a hobo when Sy was coming in. He'd been coming for three weeks now, and after the initial bellyaching about Jordan not being as pretty as her…her heart!...and his feeling extra sore after his visits with him, they were on a roll and had a great chemistry together as far as their treatments went…she tried not to think about…beyond the world of therapy.

She thought back to their first session after she got back from her trip. And the conversation they had.

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

"I think the next time you can't see me, I'm just going to cancel." he had sulked as he wiggled his mass of muscle onto the mat.

"Sy, no. you need therapy. Don't be like that to Jordan. He's an excellent therapist."

"He ain't you though." he smirked, sending her heart racing with that smile that somehow managed to look both boyish and rakish under his full, dark beard. Fucking hell. He needed to stop.

"Well, we can't fault him for that, can we? Lay back, Mister." She demanded. Done with the niceties of the evaluation and onto the treatments where she was in charge. The boss.

"Yes, sir!" she laughed at his clear avoidance of calling her ma'am.

"So where'd you go last week? Vacation or stay-cation?" he asked, the term "stay-cation" sounding downright comical coming out of his country-boy mouth.

"I went to the beach. Gulf Shores."

"I thought you looked like you got some sun."

"Yeah," she pretended his noticing the detail of her awesome tan did not send her reeling. "My folks rented a condo right on the water for my siblings and I to come and stay with them. They're still there. It was tough to leave all that beauty." the beach, pretty much any beach, was her favorite place to be.

"I bet…" he looked at her, something dreamy in his eyes, but he looked away before she could process it. "I thought I had my fill of sand and sun when I was over in Iraq. But you make it sound…like paradise." he smiled softly up at her as she worked on his knee, trying to break apart some of the scar tissue from the injuries and surgeries he'd had…and focus on that, and not the warmth rising in her.

"That's the perfect way to describe any place on the Gulf of Mexico. I doubt it's anything like Iraq, since there's so much water around. It's my favorite vacation destination. Well, apart from London."

"Them British folks always seem so stuck up. Don't know if I'd get along with any of 'em."

"It felt like a second home for me. Everyone was very kind and polite, for the most part. At least it was no worse than it is here."

"Maybe it's just because you're so nice."

"Wait 'til about week eight or ten of your protocol. You won't think I'm nice then. You'll be cussing me out and ready to ring my neck."

"Promise?" he asked, a dark grin on his lips and in his eyes…she faltered for a moment, gulping.

"Cut it out, Syverson." she rolled her eyes, covering…without great effect the way he made her feel.

"Yes...ma'am." he smirked with satisfaction.

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

And now, today, she'd be treating him again, fairly early in the day, and she had to prepare herself. She'd checked the policy, and although there wasn't anything strictly against dating a patient, it was clearly a conflict of interest, and would be frowned upon by her frigid tyrant of a boss. Best to let things remain platonic for now.

Her 9:30 was a no show, so she finished up some notes and was working on some continuing education credits when messenger popped up around 10:00.

Sergeant Sexypants is here. He's quite early and he knows it…*smirk emoji* he must like you, Shane!

Heather, come on, be respectful…he was discharged at the rank of Captain! *rofl emoji* and I think you might be right about him liking me…*nervous emoji*

Oooooooooh!!! You guys are gonna *couple kissing emoji* *eggplant emoji* *okay emoji* *explosion emoji* *baby emoji*

Omg…*three facepalm emojis* I am going to go ahead and start him early since my 9:30 was a NCNS.

Don't finish him too early. Make it last. *smirk emoji*

Jeez. She closed the chat and went to grab him from the waiting area.

"Hey Sy, you ready?"

"You bet, sunshine!" he flashed her a crooked smile. He was calling her sunshine now…ad that to the list of things she'd have to pretend didn't make her swoon.

"Great. Let's start on the bike. How's the knee feeling today?"

"Oh, it's…about the same. Stiff. Lil' sore."

"Well, it's a slow process, like I told you at your eval. You've got a lot going on in there."

"I know…just…it hasn't taken me four weeks to do anything in my life." he sulked. "So…thinking about this taking…twelve or more…" he grimaced as he sat down on the bike, and adjusted it for his longer than average legs, putting his feet in the pedal stirrups.

"You may not see it, Sy, because you're so close to it, but trust me, you're making progress. I can tell you're doing your exercises at home, and you're always willing to put in the work here. You have no idea how much that sets you apart from…some of these other people." she leaned in closer and spoke the last part more quietly to him. It was true. So many of her patients were either lazy or just in it to appease their MDs into writing them scripts for pain meds. That wasn't Sy.

"You really think so?" he gave her the side eye with his baby blues, crushing her with the color like the waves of the ocean she'd just returned from.

"In fact, I know so." she placed a reassuring hand on his broad and thick shoulder. She felt the tension between them hum, like electric current.

"Now, level one, and a steady pace. You're not trying to win any medals here. I'll take those crutches."

"When ya think I can 86 'em damn things?" he griped as he handed over the assistive devices.

"Well, you see Potter again tomorrow? I'll write an update today and send it to him. If he likes what he reads, or more likely pretends to read, regarding your progress, he may discharge them. Do you feel like you can be good to the knee and treat it nice without using crutches? I don't want you to regress and re-injure yourself. That's not gonna get you into your running shoes any sooner."

"I'll be nice. Real gentle." he winked at her…he wasn't just talking about the knee. And she knew it. But again, she pretended she didn't, ignoring once more those butterflies threatening to choke her they were multiplying so fast in her belly.

"Okay, I'll put that in my note. Patient compliant with instructions to be nice." she laughed.

They talked as they biked, Shane sat on the one next to him and pedaled along with him for something to do other than be idle. She thought it made him feel better as well. Like he wasn't doing it alone. They covered the subject of her siblings, an older brother in IT and a younger sister who was an MA, and his German Shepherd, Aika, which he was allowed to bring home from Iraq after they were both honorably discharged. Music, both of them completely in agreeance about the superiority of classic rock.

"I noticed you've worn a Lynyrd Skynyrd shirt a few times and meant to say something before now."

"Yeah, they're one of my favorites. But there are a few newer groups that I like a lot, too. Kings of Leon got me through some tough times, honestly."

"Oh, they're great! I love their sound. And their lyrics…poetry."

"No shit. Sorry." she shook her head and raised up her hands to indicate that he didn't need to apologize to her for swearing. She'd been known to make sailors blush when she was off the clock. "Only by the Night…that whole album is…it's just in my blood, ya know? Ya ever have an album do that?"

"I have. Whole artists catalogs, actually."

"Which artist?" he prodded.

"The Beatles. Pretty much every song. Like you said, it just, like, I dunno, it's almost deeper than the veins. It's in the marrow. My soul." she stared off out the windows ahead of them, thinking about her favorite band in the world and how magical it was to experience Sir Paul McCartney playing some of her favorites live…twice…and the timer on the bike went off, pulling her from her daydream.

She looked over at him, startled by both the noise, and the dreamy look in his eyes that was becoming all too familiar.

"Sorry." she stood, grabbing his crutches for him and handing them back to him from where she had leaned them as they rode.

"Hey, don't be sorry for…ahem…for loving what you love. We should all…hold on to the things that make us feel like that." she nodded.

"Thanks…I don't think a lot of people…understand the way I…my tendency to take things like music, movies, and shows…books…so deeply to my heart." they walked to the treatment room from the gym, taking their time, since they had it. A rare occurrence for Shane, always needing to capitalize on every spare minute. To make productivity a priority.

"I think…that…well, seeing a pretty grim side of the world like I have…seems like there's enough darkness and bullshit making everyone miserable. If we find something…or…someone…that brings us some happiness or even just makes that misery bearable…we oughta hang onto 'em real tight. Cherish it like gold." the silence in the small room was loud with that electrical hum of their tension again. He'd said all the right things, as he always seemed to, but under the absolute wrong circumstances. She just nodded.

"They teach you philosophy in Basic?" she giggled. He laughed back in response.

"Oh, no, Basic was way easier than…whatever goes on inside of us."

"Speaking of which," she segued deftly, "lay back, and let my try to get some range out of that knee before I take new measurements for this update I'm gonna write."

"Yes, ma'am!" he chuckled.

"You get some sick thrill out of calling me that, don't you?" she scowled playfully at him.

"Oh, you have no idea…ma'am." he winked at her.

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

The next day, Shane was wondering how Sy's appointment went as she ate her soup at lunch and caught up on her morning notes. She got a ping on messenger.

You have a gentleman caller…*eggplant emoji*  hehe, he's on line three.

Geez…thanks Heather.

No need to ask for a name. She knew Heather meant Sy.

She picked up the phone at her desk in the treatment room.

"Hey Sy! How'd the appointment go?"

"Hey, sunshine…eh…he said I'm doin' good, but he wants me to stay on crutches another two weeks." she could hear grave disappointment in his voice. She felt for him.

"Aww, I'm sorry Sy. I know you wanted off those. And I know they're a pain. Literally and figuratively."

"Why wouldn't he want me off 'em?" he was so frustrated. He must have just left the office.

"Did you ask him that question?"

"You know doctors, Shane. Not like I would have got an answer in plain English. Figured you'd know."

"Well, I haven't seen your post-visit report, but it's my presumption that he wants to play it safe. You know he spent most of his day in the operating room with you, right? An eight hour surgery, you had. He probably doesn't want to undo all that by d/c'ing the crutches too soon."

"I was gonna be careful though, Shane!" he was worked up properly, and she could hear it over the roar of his pickup in the background.

"I know you were, Sy. I'm sure you were going to take all kinds of precautions. But what if you're walking into your kitchen, during a storm, and there's a loud clap of thunder, and Aika gets startled and busts past you? What if you're feeling good one day, and forget about it, and jog to catch up to someone holding the door open for you and miss a stick or something under foot? You can't prepare yourself for every pebble or patch of mud in your path, Sy. Accidents will happen. Some circumstances are beyond our control…we just have to do the best we can. The crutches are going to help you until we get you stronger. That's what we'll focus on until those two weeks are up."

"Why is it you can calm me down like this?" he asked, sincere and truly calmer than he had been.

"I'm just a good therapist, is all."

"Ya don't think that's really all, do ya?" the sound of his deep drawl in her ear from the receiver made her shiver. He was implying something that she just couldn't entertain. It wasn't possible for them right now. Maybe…down the road…in a few weeks…

"I'll see ya tomorrow, Sy. Come ready to work that knee."

"You didn't say no…" he was too hopeful. Damn it, he was cute when he was hopeful. She was glad she couldn't see his face light up like she knew it was doing.

"You may have noted I didn't say yes, either."

"Yet. See ya in the mornin', sunshine."

"Bye, Sy."

She put the receiver in the cradle and her face in her hands.

"Shit."

She had a feeling this particular patient was about to become much more complicated.

Up Next: Chapter Three-Therapeutic Activity

#netflix sand castle #sand castle #henry cavill #henry cavill fanfic #henry cavill x ofc #captain syverson #captain syverson fanfic #captain syverson x ofc

[branchingcrossroads]

Thinking more on awareness-consciousness-sentience, trying to logic through it.

To be able to learn and act, an organism needs to be able to prioritize information. No matter how much processing power you have, you need a way to allocate it. I don’t know what kind of impoverished environment (coupled with enormous processing power) would allow you to process all stimuli equally and get away with it.

If we have prioritization, we have “attention” in some form - as the spotlight that zeroes in on high-priority information.

“Attention” ties into “awareness”. If we devote more “attention” to a stimulus, we process it more quickly and/or in greater depth, we are more “aware” of it.

“Awareness“ introduces more ambiguity, though. If something falls below some threshold, are we “unaware” of it? Can we still “perceive” it without being “aware” of it? Should we define “conscious awareness” vs “unconscious awareness” vs “unawareness” - and if so, where do we draw the dividing lines? Does “awareness” presuppose a sentient agent, or can we talk about an amoeba’s “awareness” of water temperature?

To sidestep the whole issue, will try to avoid the term “awareness” for the time being. (And won’t even touch “sentience”. ATM I’ve no idea how to even approach that term.)

Let’s simplify “self-awareness“ to “the action of directing attention toward oneself“. (I think it makes more sense to see it as an action, not an inherent quality. “The capacity for self-awareness” is a quality, but not even the most self-aware (or self-obsessed) mind can direct its full attention inwards 24/7.)

Directing attention inwards draws processing power away from external stimuli. It’s is a trade-off. On the other hand, unless a being has the capacity to direct at least some processing power to itself, it has a blind spot in its mental model. At the simplest level: unless you account for the fact that you leave footprints, you’ll be tracking a Woozle with Winnie the Pooh.

Different situations can call for different levels of inward-attention. The optimal case is obvious: “one should direct exactly enough attention inward, and no more than that”.

So how much is “enough”, vs “too much”, vs “too little”? I would certainly love to be able to “switch off” excessive inward-attention when it happens. (There’s a reason grounding techniques tend to involve directing attention back to the senses - feeling your breath, tensing and relaxing the muscles, listening, smelling, touching, etc.)

But inward-attention is also the thing that allows me to counter unhelpful unconscious decisions. And even to notice when unhelpful “inward-attention” happens, so I can try to redirect it back out.

Presumably... if you have instincts and autopilots that are well suited to your environment... you’d hardly ever need inward-attention (beyond the level required to not "Woozle-track”).

But currently, human instincts and automatic processes aren’t calibrated for modern life. So inward-attention is required to counter any outdated (and sometimes plain wonky) autopilots.

((Spoilers for “Blindsight” ahead.))

Which seems to tie in with consciousness being described in “Blindsight” as “training wheels“.

For all we know, Scramblers (or whatever part of Rorschach is “the actual organism(s)”) used to have inward-attention. With its help, they rebuilt/reprogrammed themselves, got rid of the inefficiencies and any other evolutionary baggage. And then inward-attention became unnecessary, presumably only kept as a backup in case some new revision was needed. (Susan did talk about how a scrambler needed to be “reminded” about its own existence.)

...Which makes the Scramblers' reaction to humans’ signals make all the more sense. Here they were, doing perfectly well with their minimal necessary level of inward-attention hovering near zero, and something tries to encourage them to bring it back up. “What for? Did the the autopilot become suboptimal? Do we need to re-evaluate it?” - “No, just for the heck of it.”

So the signal acts as a two-pronged attack: 1) if they stay at near-zero inward-attention, they can’t comprehend the signal. They can waste as much time and energy as you like, and still not “decode” it. It’s a potentially endless energy sink. 2) if they crack the signal, it means the signal forced them into a high-enough level of inward-attention to "get” it. And if they try to pass this information on, they’ll be pushing the next Scrambler to go into that state too. (Unless they don’t pass on the message, and instead tell everyone “it’s garbage” and drop back down to their near-zero inward-attention. Which is what they apparently did in the end.)

((Side note: Can / does inward-attention act as a “parasite”? Does it refuse to shut down once activated? To me, that doesn’t seem right. In a well-calibrated organism, it should be able to detect when it’s no longer needed, and shut back down. That’s part of its job. And in a less well-calibrated organism, what else can help it self-correct and recalibrate? I can think of some counter-examples, cases where it would try to hang on and overstay its welcome. But I think Scramblers are optimal enough that it shouldn’t apply. And humans... ...y’kno’wha, I won’t try to get into that right now, that’s a whole separate train of worms.))

For bonus points, gonna try to decode “I enjoyed it” from a minimal-inward-attention standpoint.

“I attended to an internal signal that indicated a boost to my genes’ chance of survival/proliferation.“

...no, won’t try to go beyond that right now. Would need to further parse “I / my“, “attend“, maybe “internal signal“.

......can take “attend” out of the equation: “It resulted in an internal signal that indicated a boost to my genes’ chance of survival/proliferation.“ This can actually be useful intel on how to boost survival odds, if it’s difficult to get the information from the environment directly. (E.g. "I ate an apple, it tasted as if it made me stronger” is an (indirect) cue that maybe you should eat apples too. Though “I ate an apple and now I’m stronger” would be a better indication, and a controlled study on the effect of eating apples would be better still.)

Of course, if “it” refers to something whose only effect is to change an internal state (e.g. art or music), then a being with already-optimized internal states would (at best) shrug it off, and (at worst) have its well-tuned internal processes thrown off.

#current interest #Blindsight #awareness-consciousness-sentience #ramble #if you love something - analyze it to death

[late--arrival]

Honest feelings about each of the boys albums?

Not going to lie I ended up rambling about a lot of things, sorry. Also I'm going to preface this, while I do support the guys I can both still listen to them and give my own opinions and criticism. I still like them all.

Louis' I like, I regularly listen to his songs. I think the problem Louis had was he waited so long, I know his mum died and I don't know if there were contract problems or something? But there was such a long wait between one direction breaking up and his debut album that it caused some problems. I'm going to try explaining this in the best way. The general public's attention span isn't very long, I think striking while the iron was hot was a opportunity missed. I think the album would've done better while Louis was getting the one direction media attention, mainly because his album was very personal about his life. If you aren't a fan of his already, and thus already informed about his personal life, you can tell that lyrics meanings are going over your head. If you aren't in the know you either miss a lot meaning, or you gotta look up his history on Wikipedia. In and just after one direction, the media were reporting on Louis always, you didn't need to be a fan to know what Louis Tomlinson was up to because it was news articles and tabloids. That wouldve been the bridge between general public and his songs, because they more than likely would've heard about his life through media and popular social media and wouldn't have to run a background check. On a different note I really think he has the voice for punk stuff. I've said it before and I'll say it again, he should collab with Yungblud (and MGK).

Zayn's first album I actually don't like that much to be honest. I think it's kinda... it does what it says on the tin basically, y'know? It's sex and swearing. I think he tried too hard to pull away from his boyband image and did, well, that instead. It sounds a little random, but there's this Kevin Hart sketch about his mum letting him say a swear word to his teacher. He gets so caught up in being allowed to say something naughty and trying to look impressive and hard in front of his friends, he just goes ham and says every naughty word he could. To me the album seems like he just wants to swear and have explicit sex lyrics in an attempt to seem more adult and more "#realmusic" when to me it comes off as bland and uncreative. Icuras Falls is better (to me at least) I think maybe because he isn't trying so hard to push himself away from the boyband thing.

Niall's I'm going to 100% be honest, I love Niall, but I don't personally enjoy love songs. Niall has a lot of love songs. So I'm familiar with his albums the least because I don't often listen to them, but it's only because of my personal taste in music. I've mentioned it before, but I do really like No Judgement. I can definitely see why he's popular, his albums kinda give me a Ed Sheeran vibe, thinking about it they should collab actually. Unrelated note, I'm curious as to what Niall meant when he tweeted that he was going to "re-evaluate"? Re-evaluate what exactly? Pretty vague.

Harry, I like both his albums. In fact I first got into the fandom because one of Harry's songs came up on my YouTube recommended, listening to Harry made me listen to the rest of the guys and from there I got into one direction. I think it's interesting that he has yet to collab with anyone, I feel like he would lean towards older music figures and not the... More mainstream for younger fans? As in, I can't see him any collabs between Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, Ariana Grande, or that kind of artist. But Shania Twain has mentioned them potentially collabing, maybe Stevie Nicks at some point? I kinda want a collab between Harry and Paul McCartney.

Liam, oh Liam. I felt he did so well at the beginning. I don't listen to his music a ton, but it's on my playlist. Unrelated but related note, I wonder what's going on behind the scenes? Since Liam wrote a lot during one direction, yet hasn't written much of his own stuff? Strip That Down had 15 or something writers? I also feel bad because he's such a nice guy and I feel like he tried to shout out the LGBQ+ community and missed the mark. Like, I'm in the LGBQ+ community myself and I can understand why people disliked the lyrics, but the way people went about it was just so awful. Literally all that was needed was telling Liam to educate himself better on the subject, then be done with it and go on your way. It's not like he did anything to be malicious or hateful, he made a mistake and apologised. Even worse, it took such a mental and emotional toll on him he avoids mentioning LGBQ+ community because he's worried people are going to attack him again. Even, even, worse, beforehand he liked showing his body (not my kind of content but nothing wrong with that) now he doesn't because people came for him. And if it couldn't get anymore worse, l feel like the whole affair has turned him off the type of music he was doing. It really felt like people just wanted to kick Liam while he was down tbh.

I think I answered your question lol even if I ended up going on several tangents about a bunch of stuff you didn't ask haha

#harry styles #louis tomlinson #niall horan #Liam payne #One direction #Asks

[scaredandbored]

.ok i caved and wrote spones. academy au spones. with a really, horribly out of character spock. was this purely self-indulgent? yes. i’m not even 100% sure what im doing with this story, only that its spones, they share a dorm, and its going to be a gross, borderline self-insert fic lmaoooo. playing fast and loose with the academy’s curriculum because i’m a lazy piece of shit who won’t research the actual structure. also, idk if it even counts as slash, because it contains what i consider flirting, which is ACTUALLY just bickering and academic/scientific discussion combined with gentle physical contact. let me have this. 

additional note : i snuck in some pining at the end! so it’s definitely romantic! ha! (it’s not worth it dont bother)

additional additional note : i fucked up a perfectly good spones fic by trying to add jim but it turned into McSpirk 

Collectors poke and scalpels ring

(title from billy corgan’s poem “a wax seal”)

warnings : don’t read this spock is so badly written in it.

                 blatant abuse of the comma, oxford and otherwise

                 someone gets burnt but it’s not severe and it’s off of tea 

                 cursing. a lot of it. 

words : c.6’000 (i’ll count properly tomorrow, it’s hard to get a word count on mobile)

If Leonard was being completely honest with himself (which he tried to be, dammit), his studying had stopped being productive at some stage between midnight and one a.m, but he’d be damned if he was going to grant his smug-enough-already roommate an “I told you so” by going to bed. Not that Spock would use such colloquial, illogical language. Resisting the urge to groan, Leonard let his head fall to his desk, confident the pile of pages he had accumulated while studying for his assessment in Standard Procedures in Classifying Non-Humanoid Life-Forms would muffle the thud enough to prevent upsetting his roommate’s meditation in the bedroom next to his. Walls were thin at the academy, that was the whole reason he’d had to turn down Jim when he’d requested Leonard to bunk with him for their second year in the academy. Bones loved the kid, he really did, but if he wasn’t blasting his frankly awful study music through the whole night, he had someone over from wherever he’d been that evening, and Bones had come to learn (quickly, and unwillingly), that Jim was loud in bed.

Making the decision to go make a coffee (not with one of those godawful replicators, but with some decent coffee beans that his younger sister had brought as a present on his birthday, for which he’d had to actually purchase a grinder and coffee press for afterwards, but it was the thought that counts), Bones couldn’t help but miss the all-nighters he and Jim used to pull together in their previous year at the academy, using each other to keep awake and motivated. The kid’s taste in classical music left much to be desired, but he didn’t seem to mind Bones’s preferences, so they’d throw on the med student’s study playlist on Jim’s maybe-technically-banned-but-no-one-is-going-to-snitch-on-us-because-we-all-have-one-Bones-relax speaker and bounce flash cards off of each other, explaining things to one another, and sharing notes. Jim had always been very much an aural-oral learner, unable to retain information unless he had explained it to someone, or had it explained to him, and while Bones definitely did not mind helping his friend out, he’d always been a more individual learner, preferring to take his notes and summarise them, re-writing the most important points until he had them ingrained in his subconscious. Which was all well and good, except it was a pain in the ass of a technique that only became more frustrating when it was employed in a long night of cramming.

Quietly, Bones took his mug as well as the rest of the required paraphernalia from the almost-bare shelf in the equally almost-bare cupboard he and Spock had voted to dedicate to Bones’s “illogical need to entertain guests with a strange variety of baked goods paired with one of two hot beverages” and Spock’s “ostentatious pots and probably poisonous concoctions”, all while chiding himself for reminiscing about study sessions. Of all the stupid shit he could reminisce about at the ripe age of twenty-two, study sessions with a friend he could easily invite over to join him was probably the one of the most stupid. Bones was forced to pause and evaluate his situation as he realised that all his quiet tip-toeing about in an effort to leave Spock’s meditation undisturbed was probably null and fucking void, seeing as he had to manually grind the coffee beans, which would indubitably create enough noise to irritate those over-sensitive ears. Not that the vulcan could feel irritation. Fucking asshole.

Rolling his eyes at his own cankerous mood, he began to prepare his coffee, keeping half an ear on the sudden rustling noises from Spock’s bedroom as the disturbed vulcan did god-knows-what before coming out to lecture Leonard. Or to glare at him. Or condescend him. Maybe criticise him on how late he’d left it to study for this godforsaken exam. Or maybe Leonard was projecting onto his poor roommate, who he’d only known for the better half of a month. (During which, the cranky bastard side of his brain argued, said roommate had made his distaste for human culture and illogic clear, his particular dislike (it was dislike, regardless of whatever “vulcans don’t feel” bullshit he was trying to pull) of Leonard thinly veiled, and his disinclination to speak to Leonard in general blatantly obvious.) Most likely Spock would simply head into their shared living area to procure a cup of his noxious evening teas before returning to his meditation, not stooping so low as to acknowledge the source of the disruption to his nightly routine. Leonard’s mission to caffeinate himself was not under threat. It took more energy than Leonard would ever admit to quell the disappointment that bubbled up at the thought of Spock just ignoring him.

It was stupid-o-clock in the morning, of course the vulcan wasn’t going to engage in a full-blown academic conversation with him, what was he thinking? Bones haphazardly plopped the filter over his mug just as the kettle came to a boil, doggedly ignoring the squeak of Spock’s door and the sound of his bare feet against their tile floor.

“It is not recommended for humans to ingest beverages of such a high caffeine content at this hour.” Spock’s voice breaking the eerie silence of the late hour was enough to make Leonard’s usually still hands jerk, splashing his knuckles with the hot water. He managed to suppress a hiss of pain, determined not to let the vulcan see any weakness.

“It’s not generally recommended amongst humans to get your medical degree at Starfleet Academy, yet here I am, Spock.” Griped Bones, turning to face Spock with his mug in hand, the eye contact he made intended as a challenge. Try and stop me, Pointy.

Spock raised an eyebrow, which alerted Leonard to the vulcan’s significantly slower than normal movements. The damn vulcan was sleepy, he realised. In an infuriatingly adorable way, Spock blinked slowly twice before responding, a significant delay in his usual response times to Leonard’s taunts. “On the contrary, an education in Starfleet Academy is highly coveted amongst humans; its expansive curriculum makes its graduates highly sought after in careers outside of the academy. I see no logic in your statement.”

Bones rolled his eyes, knocking back half his coffee in a matter of seconds, and burning his tongue in the process. “I don’t see the logic in continuing to hold conversations with an individual you find so distastefully illogical, Mr.Spock.” He passed the strange traditional vulcan teapot out to his roommate along with the decidedly terran-style mug Spock seemed to prefer using.

Spock offered three more of his slow, dazed blinks before responding with a tilt of his head that was slightly more pronounced than the one he tended to make during the day. “Distasteful? I do not believe I have ever said as much, McCoy.”

Bones gave a single, barking laugh, shaking his head as he began to move back towards his bedroom. “Careful, Mr.Spock. Keep up the flattery and you might say something you regret.”

“You are studying?” Spock called after him, just as Leonard was closing his door.

Leonard watched Spock as he shuffled around their kitchen, preparing his tea, his normally purposefully brisk steps reduced to a half-asleep stumble. His roommate gave no indication of having spoken to him. “In my usual, time-consuming way. Yes I am, Mr.Spock.”

Spock did not face him, but the delay in his response was still significant, for the vulcan, “You study using this highly inefficient method only when learning independently, correct?”

“What is it you’re getting at? There’s only so many hours in a night, and some of us have work to do.” Growled Leonard, his prolonged view of the back of Spock’s house robes frustrating him. Their arguments were much less entertaining and all the more aggravating when he couldn’t look Spock in the eye. Spock attempted to answer while turning to face Leonard in his sleepy daze, forgetting that he was halfway through pouring the boiling water over the strainer, effectively dousing his front in the scalding liquid. There was a brief pause where Spock blinked down at the front of his robes, while Bones processed what had just happened before jerking into action. “Get that glorified dressing gown off of yourself, Spock!” He whisper-shouted, determined not to wake the entire residential block. Spock just blinked at himself, then at Leonard.

“It is burning.” He deadpanned, prompting Bones to roll his eyes and cross the room in a few quick strides.

“It’s boiling water, Spock, of course it’s burning.” He hissed tapping the lapels of the robes. “You need to get out of this so we can get you under some running, room temperature water, try and stop any blistering.” Spock finally seemed to register what was going on and began to unwrap the ties of the robes, turning away from Leonard as he did so. Leonard noticed his roommate look uneasy at the prospect of being shirtless around him, and decided to leave him to it. “I’ll go run the shower, you dry yourself off a bit and run any part of your arm that got caught in the stream under the tap. I’ll call you when the shower’s the right temperature, ok?”. Leonard waited for Spock’s nod before bolting off to their shared bathroom to start working. 

So much for his productive night studying. It was starting to look like he’d be playing nurse for Spock until the on-campus medbay opened at five am. He was just beginning to realise exactly how fucked he was for the exam the following day when the door to their bathroom creaked open slowly. “Nearly there, Spock. I don’t recommend using any of your pungent herbal shit, we don’t want anything getting into any burst blisters or anything.” 

“Your alarm is unwarranted, Leonard. There is no lasting damage done to my person.”

“Congratulations on your medical degree, Spock, didn’t realised you’d discovered a fast track. Y’could’ve told me.” Leonard drawled, not taking his eyes off of the shower, his wrist under the stream of water to monitor the temperature. 

“You know I have done no such thing.” Spock huffed, his less alert state loosening his restraint enough to allow for such blatant emotionalism. 

“Sarcasm, Spock. Somethin’ you’re gonna have to get used to if you plan on launching into the void canned in with a bunch of humans once we graduate.” Leonard was angling for a mild version of their normally acerbic exchanges, but Spock didn’t seem willing to take the bait.

“If you insist I must bathe in tepid water, I will comply, but I trust you understand the state of my health is my concern alone, and you have no power to forbid me from assisting you with your studies.”

“Bold of you to assume I want your assistance.” His final attempt to goad Spock fell just as flat as his others, and he gave a defeated sigh. “Please stay in until your skin’s returned to its normal complexion, alright?”

Spock gave a half nod and stood to the side to let Leonard pass out of the bathroom, which he did a mite faster than was strictly necessary. Sighing as Spock closed the door, Leonard began weighing the benefit of trying to study against the fact he was just worried enough to be distracted from anything too difficult. Leonard scoffed. “Who am I kidding, everything in this module is difficult enough to make me want to rip my fucking eyes out.” He continued grumbling incoherently as he made his way back to his room, throwing a dirty look at the mess of teapots, mugs, and cafetieres as he walked past it. Spock would have a hissy fit. Or, the closest thing the teachings of Surak would allow to a hissy fit. “Goddamn, green-blooded, neat-freak.” Leonard groused, frowning at the state of his room.

Leonard often consoled himself for his lack of cleanliness within the confines of his bedroom using the fact he very rarely sullied shared living areas. He liked to think of his room as a sort of nesting area; cluttered, but cosy and homely. Spock thought the state of his room was indicative of his disorganised mind and illogical outlook on life. He looked around his room, trying to decide how to partially tidy it most effectively before Spock got out of the shower. 

Ultimately, he decided to leave anything that could be passed off as studying material (including, but not limited to the notes Jim had left behind on Starfleet-approved mixed martial arts) and to gather all clothing into one pile behind the door. He had just finished that and was contemplating moving some of the collection of unwashed, half-empty mugs he’d forgotten about into the sink when someone cleared their throat at the threshold of the door, causing Leonard to jump. “Goddammit, Spock, y’could’ve killed me!” He snapped, subtly kicking the sleeve of one of his hoodies behind the door. 

Spock’s eyes followed his foot as he attempted this subterfuge, which lead him directly to the pile of clothes. He raised an eyebrow, looking back at Leonard. “I was unaware the human heart was so poorly designed that even one belonging to a relatively fit for duty, young man was susceptible to cardiac arrest caused by unpredictable scenarios. It leads me to wonder why Starfleet consists mostly of such an inept species.”

The adorable, sleepy Spock had disappeared, leaving the sharper, more alert, more dangerously attractive Spock that Bones was going to have a hard time not coming onto over the next year. “I think I preferred you when y’couldn’t string together a sentence.”   

Spock’s eyes narrowed infinitesimally as he stepped purposefully towards Leonard’s desk. “You are hardly the image of a functioning officer after your rest cycle has been disrupted, McCoy.” He quipped, pouring over the notes Leonard had been working on before the whole tea-spilling fiasco. “You have been repeatedly transcribing the same five notes for upwards of an hour, if you maintained a constant rate of words per minute.” 

Leonard shrugged, striding over to his desk to snatch the notes back defensively. “What of it?” He snapped, picking up his pad of paper (not good for the environment, but he’d loaned his PADD that he usually used for revision to Jim a week ago and wasn’t due to get it back until that weekend) and old-fashioned pen that used to belong to his mother. 

Spock raised an eyebrow at Leonard’s odd behaviour, picking up the textbook that had started to slip down the back of the overcrowded desk to leaf through it. “It is a highly inefficient method of study. Particularly given your current time constraints.” 

“Spare me the lecture, Spock. It works, and that’s all that matters.” Leonard drawled, having already resumed his scribbling, desperately attempting to commit one of the longer definitions required for the exam to memory. 

“That statement has no grounds in fact, nor does your extension based on the untruth follow any semblance of logic.”

Leonard uttered a string of curses in his native tongue, making Spock consider taking Earth English classes on the side, if only to aggravate the med student in his own native tongue. Not that Spock would ever admit to such irrational motivations.  “Dammit, Spock,” Leonard’s familiar growls in Standard had less venom than they usually did this early in their verbal sparring, a fact that drew Spock’s concern sharply onto the med student. “,either sit down and help a guy out, or get out and let me be. Ain’t that hard.” Spock eased himself down onto the human’s bed carefully, sitting cross-legged beside him with the textbook balanced carefully on his knee.

“I have heard you listening to music whilst studying on previous occasions. I have noted you do not tend to do so while I am meditating, however, I am doing so now. If it assists you, I would recommend you indulge.” Carefully watching the human for signs of distress while he spoke, Spock decided another snip at him would not hurt him. “Your human focus is dismal enough without depriving it of the stimulus necessary for it to operate at an acceptable level of efficiency.”

Spock watched with mild satisfaction as Leonard threw his archaic study materials down in a small rage, his eyebrows practically dancing as he spluttered furiously for exactly 3.2 seconds before responding coherently. “Why, you listen here, you green-blooded son-of-a-bitch, y’ain’t doin’ much good in this here bedroom, so you’ve got about three seconds ‘fore i throw you out!”

Spock unfurled himself and stood, but he didn’t make a move for the door. Instead, the stoic bastard moved back to Leonard’s desk, sorting papers into piles as he systemically searched the surface for something. Finally, he picked up Leonard’s music device: a miniature PADD his younger sister had constructed for her first set of practical engineering exams, programmed to run audio files only. “A’ight, give it here.” Leonard stretched out his hand, palm up, waiting for Spock to hand it over. Spock took a moment to briefly page through the audio files Leonard had equipped the tiny device with, the corners of his mouth turning down fractionally. “Somethin’ the matter, Spock?”

“I was under the impression that humans preferred to listen to classical music whilst studying?”

“That is classical, Spock.”

“I do not recognise it.”

Spock looked up just in time to watch the furrows between Leonard’s brows deepening. “Well, it’s classical, terran music, not vulcan, so I don’t suspect y’would.”

Without thinking, Spock said, “My mother made sure I was acquainted with many kinds of classical terran music as a child. I expected to recognise at least one of these songs from the information she provided me with.”

“Your mother liked terran music?”

Spock didn’t even pause to consider the trust required for him to offer an insight into his personal history. He just did. “My mother was human. I am only half-vulcan.”

“Might be half-vulcan, but you’re still a whole pain in the ass.” The rapidity of Leonard’s answer set Spock totally at ease, and the vulcan allowed himself to relax slightly in the presence of the human. “Y’still’ve done absolutely fuck all to help me, and I really do need to study. Y’can stay if y’want, but I can’t be shootin’ the breeze with you all night, y’hear?”. Spock’s look of confusion at the idiom was enough to send Leonard back on the defensive, and he was about to launch into a strong verbal eviction from his room when something almost-but-not-quite-clear quickly swept over Spock’s eyeballs. “What in the fucking HELL was that!” He shrieked, immediately grabbing his training tricorder from under his bed and scanning Spock, studies forgotten.

Spock’s alarm was only notable in his shoulders, which tensed as Leonard crowed into his personal space to a degree that would’ve been considered improper on Vulcan. Spock did not make any movement to rectify this situation. “McCoy?”. Leonard was muttering to himself as he scanned Spock for a third time. “Leonard?”

“What was that, Spock?”

“I am unclear on what it is exactly you are referring to.” Spock maintained solid eye contact with the Leonard, concern for the human’s mental well-being bubbling under his cool exterior. Leonard blinked, twice, incredulously, before putting his hand on the junction between Spock’s neck and shoulder, which was covered by his turtleneck. He looked at though he was going to say something before he went extremely pale and spluttered incoherently for a few moments before beginning anew with his tricorder scans. “Leonard?” 

“Spock, something’s happening to your eyes.” He growled in response, pressing at the junction where his hand rested. “Turn your head, I want to scan it from another angle. Do you feel dizzy, nauseous, anything out of the ordinary?” 

“Nothing. The level of confusion I am experiencing is within normal parameters for my interactions with you.” Spock felt a wave on content pass over him when McCoy stopped scanning for a second to glare at him, before shaking his head and resuming his activities.

After a few minutes, he withdrew the scanner, dragging a hand down his face. “Spock, I don’t suppose vulcans happen to have a second pair of eyelids, do they?” 

“Have your anatomy classes failed to cover that of vulcans?” Spock narrowed his eyes, deflecting from the fact that he didn’t actually know if the second eyelid was still a functioning part of vulcan biology. He’d learnt about it as a vestigial organ, but his hybrid nature had fascinated many scientists back home. One of the reasons he had decided to leave for Starfleet; Spock had hoped to avoid the invasive poking and prodding done in the name of research. That being said, the soft poking sensation of Leonard’s fingers through his shirt was far from uncomfortable, and Spock felt strange when the sensation stopped. 

“We do, but the piss-poor files the VSA are willing to relinquish to us mere humans are so fucking full of redaction and contradiction that all we’ve left to work with are a few vague diagrams and thoughouly unhelpful paragraphs on the composition of vulcan blood.” Leonard took a step back from Spock, restoring the traditional respectful distance between them. Much too distant for Spock’s liking. “You’re sure you’re not going to die in the next few hours until we can get you to the sickbay tomorrow?”

“I do not need-”

“Spock, you’ve not only burnt yourself-”

“It is superficial at most, and does not require-”

“-but you’ve just discovered what might maybe be an eyelid but could equally -for all we know- be-”

“-medical attention. Your anxiety is unwarranted and your focus on your studies has waned to what could prove to be a detrimental degree if you do not-”

“-a malignant growth of some sort, you have to go to find out if that thing is hurting you or not at least-”

“-cease your illogical fussing and resume.”

“-and I- Spock are you even listening to me?” Leonard’s gradually increasing volume finally peaked out, and Spock raised an eyebrow at the outburst. “Ah. shit, the neighbours.” 

“At this hour, we can hope they are in a deep enough sleep not to have heard-”

“Are you kidding me Spock, I practically screamed-”

“If we continue in this vein, you will lose what little volume control you posses. Please sit down once again and I shall try and gauge how much you have prepared for this test already and we shall start from there.” Spock’s eyebrow lowered itself slowly as he relaxed once more, Leonard sitting down on the bed close to the headboard, making it easy for Spock to sit relatively close to him without making it look like anything but a logical decision for optimum viewing of the human’s notes. Not that it wasn’t motivated by logic. The fact his side was pressed soothingly to Leonard’s was a pleasant bonus. “That eyelid thing is a bit strange, you’re sure it doesn’t hurt?”

Spock levelled him with a flat stare. “I shall visit the nurse tomorrow if you cease this discussion.”

Leonard shrugged and dropped his head down and began working on a list of things he felt confident on for the next day in an attempt to hide his smug smile. It didn’t work, but Spock didn’t say anything. 

A few hours later, they had taken a break from Spock’s relentless verbal assessments for Leonard to give his brain a chance to process the points they had been drilling and for Spock to asses the data he had collected on Leonard’s rate of retention of information to try and streamline their next bout. Except Leonard’s head had dropped onto Spock’s shoulder, and the heat from where their sides were pressed tightly together was relaxing Spock into a borderline meditative state. It was only when his chest started to vibrate lightly when Spock snapped himself back to reality, confident he had not woken his study mate with his unfortunate vulcan habit. Hubris was not a trait vulcans were capable of possessing, so Spock classed his slide in judgement as a calculation error, not as a result of unfounded pride.

“Were’y’... purrin’, Spock?” The human’s voice was muffled by Spock’s turtleneck, so the flush high on the his cheeks went unnoticed by Leonard. 

“It is... an unfortunate, involuntary response of Vulcans.” Was Spock’s clipped answer, suddenly awake and almost frantically pouring over the notes he had made on Leonard’s progress. 

“Mmm, sounds like more of y’all’s goddamn cagey nature. Outta be somethin’ your doctor outta know.” Leonard slowly picked himself up off of Spock’s shoulder. Spock felt irrationally irate at the loss of contact, despite the fact their sides remained pressed together. “Ah, shit. How long was I out?”

“Twelve minutes.” Was Spock’s response, glad to have moved on from his embarrassing lapse in control. Leonard’s response wasn’t forthcoming, so Spock chanced a glance at his roommate, only to find his mouth wide open, eyes closed, and seemingly struggling for breath. Spock’s basic first aid training kicked in, fully aware that humans, much like vulcans, required a constant supply of oxygen, and he began to thump at Leonard’s back, the angle much too awkward for him to apply the force necessary to dislodge whatever may have been blocking the med student’s airways. Except, the med student seemed to have cleared his airways on his own. And was using his perfectly clear airways to yell at Spock.

“The hell’re you doin’? Coulda seriously hurt me with that goddamn “superior vulcan strength” you won’t shut up about! Ain’t a fella allowed t’yawn in his own damn bedroom?”

Spock quickly stood up from the bed, and Leonard watched as the relaxed stance the vulcan had had previously completely vanished. “You appeared to be in respiratory distress. The training I have thus far received in first aid on humans required the first thing to do in such a situation would be-“

“Dammit Spock, I’m a med student, I know what t’do when someone can’t fucking breathe! I, oddly enough, was breathing just fine!”

Spock’s chin lifted fractionally, the last of his near-tender demeanour hardening. “Incorrect. Your chest ceased to rise and fall regularly, you had opened your mouth for maximum oxygen intake and yet you did not inhale, and the distress weakened you insofar as you were forced to close your eyes.”

Leonard looked at him, incredulous. “I yawned.”

“I do not understand. Does this correlate with your -“

“I yawned, you thick-skulled-“ Leonard stopped and took a breath, scrubbing his face with his hand. “Don’t worry, s’just an unfortunate, involuntary response of humans.”

Spock recognised he was being quoted, but unlike previous, malicious quotations made by various humans (including this patprticular one), his roommate did not seem to be trying to get a rise out of him, so he decided to retaliate. “That is the nature of most human responses, voluntary or otherwise.”

The outraged eyebrow that was slowly creeping up Leonard’s forehead was completely undermined by the sleepy grin that was taking over his entire face. “I’m not going to get much more study for this assent done, huh?”

“Assessment?”

“Yeah, the thing we’ve been studying for.” Leonard looked confused, but Spock’s head tilt betrayed his own befuddlement. 

“You referred to it previously as an exam.” His arms crossed his chest, marring his perfect posture slightly. It looked to Leonard that, despite his confusion, his roommate was more relaxed than he had been. 

“Yeah, an exam, an assessment, no difference, is there?”

Spock would later deny the look he gave Leonard was ‘incredulous’, Leonard would exaggerate his expression into one of absolute shock when retelling the tale to Jim the following evening. “There is a considerable difference, Leonard. Considering the brevity of this particular elective, the only grade that might impact your final score will be the final examination. Assessments in such a relatively insignificant elective will not affect your final grade in any serious manner.”

“It’s a matter of pride, Spock.” Leonard smiled, shaking his head. “Gotta keep up appearances.”

Spock glowered down at his roommate, the expression so slight that Leonard didn’t notice it at all. The silence strung out for a moment longer than absolutely necessary before Spock sat down at the foot of Leonard’s bed. “Pride is illogical, McCoy.”

Leonard snorted, shaking his head. “Pride and spite are the only things that keep me going, take ‘em away and I wouldn’t do a thing.” 

He watched as Spock’s eyebrow crept upwards, his head tipping lightly towards him. “Your finger brushed my collarbone earlier, when you touched my robes.”

Leonard went a bright red, and his respiratory distress seemed genuine this time. He leapt off of the bed, putting the distance of the width of the room between them. “Fucking shit, Spock? Why didn’t y’tell me! Fucking touch-telepathy, that was probably stupidly invasive, wasn’t it? Shit, shit, shit! I’m sorry. I’m fucking dense, I thought- I don’t know what I was doing, shouldn’t’ve gone near you-”

“Calm yourself Leonard-”

“And now you’re too polite to call me out on it, goddammit, we had lectures on proper conduct with vulcans, fuck-”

“Leonard.” Spock had stood and walked over to the human. Leonard was shocked when Spock put his hand on his shoulder. “There is no offence taken, do you understand?”. Leonard seemed to have lost his voice, but nodded. “I only brought up the incident because I sensed only concern and concentration from you through the contact. There was no bitterness, no concern for your pride or reputation. You saw your patient and thought of nothing but how best to administer effective and efficient treatment.”

Leonard had not made any indication of wanting to brush off his hand, so Spock decided to return to the personal space he had occupied while Leonard had been scanning him earlier. Leonard blinked several times, eyes crossing slightly to stare at the tip of Spock’s nose, only an inch, maybe less, from his own. His mouth suddenly went dry, and he swallowed hard, once. Spock’s nose had never looked so kissable. He shook his head- not an appropriate thought to be having while Spock was, wait, what was Spock saying? Leonard could hear him speaking, but his brain wasn’t processing the words correctly. Or at all. He thought maybe he was complimenting him, or maybe trying to get Leonard to explain his dry, almost self-critical comment. Hell, Spock could be reciting Shakespeare for all Leonard knew. Or cared. The vulcan’s voice was deeper than it was normally, more like it was when he had been sleepily pouring his tea earlier, less like it had been for their shared life up until today. The vibration of this deeper voice reminded him of the purring, the utter relaxation and warmth that had accompanied those vibrations, and... and Spock was still talking and Leonard still had no idea what he was saying because his mouth was moving very nicely, had his mouth always moved that nicely?

“BONES!” That voice would pull Leonard out of any dazed stupor he could possibly fall into. That voice, with that tone always meant one of two things. Jim needed his help, or Jim had done something he needed to confess to that would probably piss Leonard off. “BONES? YOU HOME?”

Spock had somehow managed to perch himself on the edge of Leonard’s desk, textbook and notes in hand, pointedly not looking at Bones. Rolling his eyes, Leonard walked out into the living area. “What the fuck have you done, Jim?” 

“Bones!” Jim practically bounced over to the med student, which meant he’d absolutely fucked something up that was going to piss him off. Clapping his shoulder playfully, Jim used the momentum of his bounce to swing himself around Bones, heading for his room. “You’re not going to believe what a weird mix-up there’s been, man! So, look, I-why, hello, Mr.Spock!” Jim glanced over his shoulder with an “i-cannot-believe-you-got-the-hot-guy-we’ve-both-been-crushing-on-into-your-room’ look on his face, his mouth slightly open and his eyes comically large in mock disbelief. “What’s a hot guy like you doing in a dingy place like this?” He had turned his impish gaze back on Spock, gesturing vaguely around Leonard’s room as he mentioned the ‘dingy place’.

Spock’s face remained impassive, not betraying the flash of amusement he always felt when the younger human flirted blatantly with him. “Vulcans’ core temperatures are, on average, actually lower than that of humans.”

Where Leonard would’ve snapped back a witty counter attack in order to incite a fascinating debate, Jim simply leaned right into the lewd implications only he could draw from such a droll, basic fact. “Are you saying that you think Bones and I are hot, Mr.Spock?”. The man had far more confidence in his charismatic abilities than any other human Spock had seen knocking their own glasses off of their face when discussing something passionately with a lecturer.

Spock was about to fire back a response -noting in the back of his mind that of the friendships he had deliberately built with a select few humans in the hopes of appeasing his mother, the ones he had formed with Jim and Leonard, though not particularly strong yet, brought him a feeling of completion- when Leonard came into the room, red-faced and rolling his eyes. “Shut up, Jim, you’ll make him uncomfortable. Vulcans don’t flirt, that’d require expression of emotion.”

Spock raised an eyebrow at Leonard, mildly puzzled. Had Leonard not recognised their discussion before Jim had arrived for what it was? Was his respect and admiration of the medical student not clear?

“What is it you’ve done, Jim?” Bones had leaned himself against the door frame, staring fixedly at his ex-roommate, who was glancing between Spock and Bones with a shit-eating grin plastered across his face. 

“Well, I was going to apologise for a stupid thing I did, but seeing as it wound up with all three of us in a room with a bed, I’d say no apologies needed.” Jim couldn’t keep a straight face delivering that line, his flirtatious demeanour crumbling into pure giddiness. “Sorry, sorry, I’ll stop. S’just weird seeing the two of you together, it’s like you guys exist separately in my mind, and seeing you getting cosy in Bones’s room is just so wacky-“

“Jim!” Bones’s bark made Jim laugh even harder, and Spock allowed the corner of his mouth to twitch ever so slightly as Jim’s merriment grew and Leonard became more and more flustered. These humans affected Spock more than he’d care to admit, and watching them interact brought a sense of contentedness over him. “It’s fucking crazy o clock in the morning, what in the hell could’y’ve done that y’need to confess so bad?”

“Small scheduling error, Bones, no big deal! In my defence, I didn’t realise how late it is, I was reading this really cool book that Galia’s sister sent her, so far it’s been absolutely gripping, can’t put it down-“

“Jim.”

His blue eyes darted around the room nervously as he giggled anxiously. “You don’t have a test tomorrow, Bones, I do. I fucked up and logged it in the PADD you’d loaned me instead of my own PADD, so I guessed you got a reminder and I know your memory is shit outside of your studies, so I figured you’d be up cramming-“

“Jim-boy, what’d you just say? Because if you said what I think you said, I’m going to-“

“Leonard, I would not recommend engaging in a physical altercation with Jim. He has considerable more experience in such matters.”

Spock felt a shiver down his spine as Leonard’s dangerously icy glare turned on him. “Are you sayin’ y’don’t think I can take ‘im, Spock?”

“That is not what he said Bones! C’mon, how bad was it? You got to bond with your roommate, and now my two best friends are on speaking terms, at least. Sounds like a win-win to me!”

“I’m gonna need the two of y’all to get the fuck outta my room, if I’m going to get any sleep at all before tomorrow.” 

Jim’s smirk got even more mischievous, the glint in his eye almost dangerous. “Maybe we’ve planned for you to get no sleep tonight, Bones.”

“I resent your implicating me in your antics, Jim.” Spock was definitely grinning, goddammit! There’s no way a vulcan could manoeuvre their mouths any further into a vague smiling shape.

“You’re not denying it-”

“Both of y’all need to shut up and go to bed, it’s late.” Leonard groused, having had enough of Jim’s playfulness, which was a bit too much for how late it was. Also, the thoughts and feelings he was invoking in Leonard with his meaningless teasing were enough for him to overthink on for the rest of his life. Jim’s pout made Bones fully aware of just how much he wouldn’t mind kissing his best friend, which reminded him of how close he had been to doing just that to his roommate, which reminded him of how it was just his fucking luck to be attracted to the two people he most defiantly shouldn’t be attracted to. The two most unattainable people on campus. He was probably a sadist. Jim sat next to Spock on his bed, and Spock had turned to mutter something in Jim’s ear. On his bed. He was absolutely a sadist. 

“That’s a good point, Spock. I think it’ll be difficult to strong-arm him into spending more time with the two of us as well.”

Spock had the good grace to look up at Leonard with what could be interpenetrated as an apologetic expression. “Those were not my... exact words.”

“I’m a med student, not a socialite, dammit!” Jim was sitting very close to Spock, they looked so right together it was sickening, and Spock was clearly mooning over Jim, and Bones... Bones needed to sleep. Now. “I’ll come over to your place tomorrow after I get out of the labs at six, Jim. If Spock comes, he comes. I don’t care.” He did care. A lot. 

“Seeing as two of us live in these quarters, it would be more logical for us to reconvene here, would it not?” 

“Nah, Jim’s got a better replicator.”

“I’ve also got better taste in holos, so...”

“You absolutely do not-”

“I don’t think watching documentaries counts as a relaxing night in-”

“I shall be there, eighteen-hundred hours.” Spock interrupted, his expression doing nothing to ease the daydreams determinedly banging at Leonard’s subconscious as he looked between the two humans. That odd eyelid-thing slid open and shut twice, which Leonard probably shouldn’t have found cute when he didn’t know whether or not it was hurting Spock. But he did, nonetheless. 

Jim clapped Spock’s shoulder, which stopped the eyelid blinking, and resulted in a rather cat-like freezing of his entire frame. “Excellent!” Jim jumped up, bouncing out the bedroom door. “It’s a date, gentlemen!” And he was gone before Leonard’s outraged spluttering could hold him up. 

“It’s not a- dammit, we’re not- Spock-”

Spock stopped to place his hand on Leonard’s shoulder, deliberately making eye-contact. “To borrow Jim’s turn of phrase, ‘it’s a date’, Leonard.” 

And that rendered Leonard totally speechless, left staring mutely at Spock’s retreating back. What the fuck kind of emotional fuckery had he gotten himself into?  

#im feral for spones goddamnit #spones #spock #bones #bones mccoy #leonard bones mccoy #leonard mccoy #academy au #author is lazy so joanna is bones's sister #jim kirk is in here somewhere #jim kirk #basically me projecting onto bones for over 2000 words #this would've been a little bit more legible if i'd focused it on either bones or spock but i DIDNT DO THAT #this is the definition of self-gratuitous #star trek #fic #star trek fic #wait no projecting onto bones for over 4000 words im so sorry #spock doesn't know what a yawn is and thinks leonard is dying #bones doesnt know about the vulcan second eyelid and thinks bones is dying #also purring is in here #becuase i am HERE FOR vulcans=logical cats #bored writes #mckirk #i guess #that wasnt meant to happen but here we are #also mcspirk #mcspirk #hakhalkhsalkha #me projecting onto bones for around 6000 words because i literally dont shut up ever

[trentteti]

Getting Through Brutally Difficult Reading Comp Passages About the Arts

If you’ve done any LSAT from the last five or so years, you’ve certainly realized that the Reading Comprehension section can be brutally difficult. The LSAT as a whole has gotten slightly more difficult in the last few years, but neither the Logical Reasoning nor Logic Games sections have become quite as fearsome as Reading Comprehension. And three types of passages almost always give their readers the most trouble: passages about science, the law, and the arts. Unfortunately for us all, basically every LSAT has at least one passage on science, at least one passage about the law, and at least one passage about the arts.

If you’ve been recently tearing out your hair as you attempt to read through dozens of these seemingly impenetrable passages, you’ve read enough lately, so I’ll just cut straight to the point: in a three-part series, we’re going to discuss what makes these passages so difficult, and what we can do to make them a little less formidable. We began this series by focusing on passages about science, and last week we discussed passages about the law. Today, we’re concluding this series by looking at passages about the arts, and offering some final advice about difficult passages in general.

We’ve discussed the reasons why science- and law-themed Reading Comp passages can be tough — most pre-law types don’t have a totally great understanding of how those things work. But why are passages about the arts supposedly difficult? I mean, most of us have at least a passing interest in some art, even if our aesthetic tastes don’t get much more refined than Netflix’s original content and the top songs on the music streaming platform of our choice. Plus, the arts are supposed to be enjoyed — we shouldn’t be suffering through these passages. And yet, the art-themed Reading Comp passages are among the most reviled on this test. What gives?

Well, if I may be blunt, the people who write these art passages seem to have a bit of an intellectual inferiority complex, so they’ll attempt to flex their knowledge and expertise by using big words to convey relatively simple ideas. (This, of course, is a favorite trick of those who write the Logical Reasoning questions as well.) So how can we deal with these over-written passages?

Try your best not to get lost in the big words. Don’t be scared off by them. Use context clues. Generally speaking, just knowing whether the author’s general opinion of the subject matter is positive or negative is all you need. (Though you should be dutifully looking up every word you don’t know when you’re reviewing these passages — expanding your vocabulary can only help you on the LSAT, law school, and your career.)

Still, if the morass of verbose, abstruse, recondite, or otherwise grandiloquent language still presents an issue for you, fret not. The art passages tend to reiterate the same themes. Historically, we’d get a ton of passages about some unconventional artist or group of artists doing something wacky with their painting, literature, music, sculpture … you name it. Nearly every time, the author would — as the online might say — stan the unconventional artists and the innovative thing they were doing.

In such passages, there were usually two crucial points you had to catch to answer most questions: what were the key characteristics of the art (and, on a related note, what made it unique or otherwise noteworthy) and what was the author’s opinions of that art. So to answer the questions on such passages, just make sure you have a very solid understanding of what the artists were doing and how their art was different from the conventional approach of their time (it can help to actually imagine what the art looks like) and what the author thinks about that art (again, the author is usually a fan).

More recently, however, these passages have focused on the nature of the art. Some passages have discussed different artistic media — such as the passage about the corruptibility of film in June 2019 — while others have discussed certain artistic genres — such as historical fiction/autobiography, 1930s musicals, opera, or, in a meta twist, what defines genres themselves. These passages are less about individual works of art or artists, and more about the formal characteristics or rules that define these genres, what artists operating within these genres must consider, or how to evaluate art produced within these genres.

These passages are less predictable than the older passages about unorthodox artists — yet another reason why Reading Comprehension has gotten more difficult in recent years, maddeningly — but tracking the author’s attitude is still incredibly important. The last five published exams all featured arts passages that discussed specific genres of art; of the thirty-six questions from these passages, twenty-one related to the author’s opinion in some way. We recommend keeping track of the author’s attitude by underlining the words that convey the author’s opinion as you read. The rest of the questions mostly asked about how the passage was structured. You can keep track of that by making brief notes about the role played by each paragraph in your provided scratch paper .

A Final Note

So these posts provided are our recommendations on how to endure the brutal passages about science, the law, and the arts. However, I must end with a caveat: I can’t guarantee that the science, legal, or art passage on your exam will all conform to the recent trends mentioned in these posts. Nor can I guarantee that the specific pointers included in these posts will apply to those passages on your exam.

But there is a strategy that I promise will help you on any passage, even the most brutally difficulty passages on science, the law, the arts, or whatever else. This strategy has a 100% success rate, and I can guarantee that it will be applicable on your exam. That strategy? Slow the hell down as you read the passage.

Now, I know advising you to not only slow down, but to slow the hell down, on a timed test may seem counterintuitive. It may even make me sound like I’m engaging in educational malpractice, and that I’m disqualified from offering any further advice on this test. But before dismissing this advice, let’s do some math related to the time you actually have on a Reading Comprehension section …

Most Reading Comprehension sections have about 4500 words in total, including the passages, the questions, and all the answer choices. The average adult’s reading speed is about 200 to 250 words per minute. But since you’re taking the LSAT, you are — statistically speaking, in all likelihood — a recent college graduate with a non-STEM major. Which means you read (or, at least, you were supposed to read) far more than the average adult. You’re also likely between the age of twenty-two and twenty-four, which means you’re functioning close to your cognitive peak, information processing- and short term memory-wise. It’s safe to say that your reading speed is at least 300 words per minute. (Congratulations, by the way, for possessing this exemplary skill — even if it’s based entirely on assumptions some blogger is making about you.)

If your reading speed is about 300 words per minute, and there are about 4500 words in this section, it should take you about fifteen minutes to read the entire Reading Comp section, cover to cover (well, the digital version of the test doesn’t technically have covers, but you get the point). You have thirty-five minutes to complete this section. Ergo, you have about twenty extra minutes you can use to … say it with me … slow the hell down.

The reason people experience timing issues on Reading Comp is not because they don’t have enough time to read or process the information. There’s plenty of time to do that, even if you read more slowly than the average adult. The reason people experience timing issues is because they don’t know the answers to the questions. Because they don’t know the answer when confronted with a question, they have to go back to the passage and re-read large swaths of it trying to locate the answer. That’s the real time suck. This is maybe an obvious point, but on Reading Comp, it’s a crucial one.

When people try to speed up on Reading Comp, the most common strategy is to read the passage more quickly. This is a misguided strategy. For one, it’s an attempt to fix a non-existent problem. Remember, we just did the math to prove you have plenty of time to read the passage and questions. Plus, whatever slight gains reading more quickly provides are more than offset by the extra time you have spend answering the questions, since the reading the passage more quickly means you won’t have as many answers to those questions. Finally, reading passages more quickly can only hamper your accuracy on the questions, which means you’ll likely lose points in the end.

The answers to the questions are invariably in the passage itself. So you should read that passage slowly and carefully. Try to use some of the tips in these posts on the inevitable science, law, and arts passages; odds are that at least some of them will help you. But most of all, take your time to make sure you understand the passage. It’ll pay off in the end.

Getting Through Brutally Difficult Reading Comp Passages About the Arts was originally published on Blueprint LSAT Blog

#Arts #LSAT #reading comprehension #study tips #trent teti #lsat

[ettadunham]

A Buffy rewatch 4x03 The Harsh Light of Day

aka the poophead principle

Welcome to this dailyish text post series where I will rewatch an episode of Buffy and go on an impromptu rant about it for an hour. Is it about one hyperspecific thing or twenty observations? 10 or 3k words? You don’t know! I don’t know!!! In this house we don’t know things.

And in today’s episode I spent 42 minutes thinking about all the ways I want to punch Parker Abrams in the face. It was a very productive time and a rewarding exercise in creativity for me.

More importantly, how the hell am I even gonna talk about anything else other than how much I hate that guy’s smarmy face and sketchy eyes? When he’s staring at Buffy being all wide-eyed and shit... Give me a fucking break, dude.

I know that the most obvious comparison for poopy pants is Angel because of the whole ‘slept with a guy and then he turned into an asshole’ thing... But Parker for me is more of a combination of Tom from Reptile Boy and Owen from Never Kill a Boy on the First Date. And maybe a dash of Cameron from Go Fish before he overdoses on the misogyny. Just... an overall fake deep manipulative empty douchebag who doesn’t give a crap about Buffy beyond getting what he wants from her.

My girl has a terrible type and she deserves so much better. STOP! TAKING! ADVANTAGE! OF! HER! HUGE! HEART!

Xander has a line in this episode while having sex with Anya, saying “still more romantic than Faith”... And that may be fair for him, but do you know who was getting more romance from Faith than these douchelords? Buffy. Sure, there were some betrayals and attempted murders in the mix, but one certainly can’t say that Faith didn’t care about Buffy.

Which I guess is an unexpected segue to another character appearing in this episode - Spike.

Now, I mostly avoided talking about Spike up to this point, because I have complicated feelings about him. But as he’s going to play a huge role in the series going forward, I guess now’s as good as time as any to start re-evaluating those emotions.

I guess where I landed is that... I enjoy Spike. Immensely. He’s a villain, and as a villain he’s gonna do some highly disturbing and petty shit throughout his run on the show, and that’s okay. When it comes down to it, I think most of my negative impressions come from his perception, rather than the character himself.

Seeing people bend over backwards to defend his actions and if necessary, victim shame other characters in the process just leaves a real bad taste in my mouth is all. Sometimes your take is just bad, my dude.

On the other hand, I do feel like we put a lot of pressure on people (especially younger folks) to consume media “properly”, and that’s not fair. We all have perspectives, and you’ll certainly see me defending characters and their actions beyond reason, and have more extreme reactions to others. That’s my perspective, and it might change and evolve 5 years from now. Just as it might change for the person who has takes I violently disagree with.

We all tend to feel rather passionately about the media we love, and discussing it helps us gain more perspective about how others see the world. And that makes us all better, more empathetic people, even and especially if we all have our own distinct view of things.

(Still, for the record, if you say Spike trying to rape Buffy was somehow on her I’m still going to violently flaunt you into space. And not in the fun way. What the actual fuck is wrong with you??? And I know that that’s still pretty far off, but we need to lay the ground rules now if we want to continue having meaningful discussions with his character involved. This is the line I draw in the sand when it comes to open discussions and you better not be fucking thinking about stepping over it. I mean it. I’m old and I’m grumpy, don’t fuck with me.)

Now that I got that out of my system,. I guess we can continue on this ride of blondie bear disaster.

Speaking of which, what a fun entrance of Harmony as a vampire! Although her going after Willow first did remind me about how we’ll re-introduce her on Angel later on with a weird predatory lesbian metaphor, ngl.

But I love that she has this whole softness and vulnerability to her, even as a vampire. And pairing her up with Spike is an unexpected delight.

Another unexpected delight were the Scoobies going over Giles’ stuff at his apartment. Oz appreciating his taste in music and records was such a joy. And then Xander getting excited about Giles being ‘shallow like the rest of them’ for owning a TV, and Willow and Oz’s genuine disappointment in hipster Giles? This is peak television.

The closing images of Buffy, Harmony and Anya walking alone was a bit on the nose, but whatever. Men are poopheads is the lesson of the day I guess.

And Parker can just go ahead fuck himself. That’s it, that’s my finishing thought.

#buffy rewatch 2k19 #btvs talk #btvs

[runaway-train-works]

ANNUAL WRITING SELF-EVALUATION 2018

I wasn’t officially tagged by anyone but I decided to do it anyways because I’m starting the year right with #selflove2019.

ALL FICS MUST HAVE POSTED ON AO3 IN 2018

1. Number of stories (including drabbles) posted to AO3: 7 (but 4 belong to the same AU so 4 separate stories I guess?)

2. Word count posted for the year: 144,725

3. List of works published this year (in order of posting):

I Won't Give Up So Come And Get Me

I’ve Been Hoping You’d Be Somewhere Better Than This (Ad Au)

You Sent This Hurricane Now It Won’t Go Away (Ad Au)

I Put My Dreams Into You They’ll Grow (Ad Au)

Baby I Need You In A Serious Way (Ad Au)

And Touch Me Like You Never

Better Not Pout, I’m Telling You Why

4. Fandoms I wrote for: One Direction

5. Pairings:  Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson,

6. Story with the most:

Kudos: I Won’t Give Up So Come And Get Me (581)

Bookmarks: I’ve Been Hoping You’d Be Somewhere Better Than This (291)

Comments: Better Not Pout, I’m Telling You Why (45 threads)

9. Work I’m most proud of (and why):

Definitely I Won’t Give Up So Come And Get Me. It’s my first ever fic, and my first attempt at writing anything really (I studied maths in uni and I’ve worked as a manager in hospitality for years, writing is not my thing) so I can’t tell you how scared I was posting it, I was pushing myself way out of my comfort zone by trying something new to me. I must have refreshed the stats/hits screen a billion times but then I got my first kudos and my first comment and I was like, ‘if that's all I get, then I can sleep tonight,’ because at least one person thought it was alright. 

10. Work I’m least proud of (and why):

My Santa fic. I was rushing to meet the holiday fic fest deadline and I reckon if I had had another week with it, it could have been better, more polished and the writing slicker, I was just so focused on getting the plot down, some of it is a bit scrappy. 

11. A favorite excerpt of your writing:

Ohhhh I really don't know. I guess I like the banter from the Ad Au fics, and the lead up to H & L having sex for the first time is probably my favourite, because I don’t think you see scenes like that a lot in smutty fics and I thought it was funny (maybe just me?). 

And don’t ask me why, but I really like the line from And Touch Me Like You Never, ‘Harry wants to tell him that there isn’t for him, that there is only one fish and that’s Louis and that he would swim a fucking ocean for him if Louis asked him to. I think to me it just represents their whole relationship in the fic. 

12. Share or describe a favorite review you received:

Any comments make me happy, but the readers that give you their reasons for liking a fic are the best. My absolute favourite reader/commenter is QuelquesEtoiles (not sure on their Tumblr? I’m shit at knowing who people are if their names aren't the same on both) because their comments are hilarious and I actually go and re-read them when I’m feeling shit because they make me smile that much, especially the play-by-play on ATMLYN. 

13. A time when writing was really, really hard:

I’ve mentioned this before, but I started a fic based on a lumberjack prompt and then the really good lumberjack one came out and it had very similar themes to what I was attempting to write so I just gave up, that was shitty for me but I'm over it now. Also struggled with the Santa fic because my default setting is to make Louis a sassy little shit that’s only nice to Harry so that was difficult for me haha. 

14. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:

Niall in ATMLYN. It wasn't a conscious decision at first to make him Harry’s sounding board, but I think it ended up pacing the story well and would have been too messy to include the other boys. 

15. How did you grow as a writer this year:

I didn't grow. I was a brand new baby, and I’m going into 2019 as a toddler; I can say a few things and run around like I think I know what I’m doing but I’m still bound to run into stuff and cry a few times while I’m at it.

16. How do you hope to grow next year:

I have an idea for a pretty big ABO high school fic which will be kinda slow burn and I might post as a WIP on ao3. Slow burn will be a challenge for me because I want H & L to get together from like the second paragraph most of the time and a WIP will be too, as it will take a lot more planning out and developing the story as people are reading and giving feedback which I think will be an interesting process for me.

17. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc):

I don't really know that many people in the fandom but everyone that has contacted me has been super lovely. Ana (@finck-you-freeky) has been absolutely amazing. We have similar tastes in fics that we read/like and I get her to read all my fics before I post them now because her opinion and notes are invaluable to me. She is also is very supportive when I’m having a bad day and hate every word I have written. I love speaking to people about fics though that aren't my own so it’s good to chat to her about other ones we have read or writers we enjoy.

Also, random shout out, but @blouisparadise have been super nice to me since I started writing, they often include me in their monthly recs and their post for IWGUSCAGM was actually how I found Tumblr in the first place because I found it through google (I’m not a huge social media user), so just want to say thank you to them for the support!

18. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year:

Uh, the inspiration for IWGUSCAGM is very, very loosely based on my flatmate in uni, but her story isn't as charming so I won’t divulge. 

19. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:

Writing for a fandom is a weird thing. You think to yourself about your own works ‘this is so shit, no-one will read this, why am I bothering?’ but at the exact same time you’re like ‘why is no-one reading this? this is brilliant and better than anything anyone else has ever written,’ and I guess I need to try and remember that thats normal for everyone. If you’re writing because you enjoy it, then that will come through in your work and eventually praise will come, even if its not from a lot of people. I’d rather have just one person absolutely love my fic than a hundred people thinks it’s just OK, and I need to remember that when I see fic lists and reblogs that don’t include my name. Having said that, if you had asked me this a week ago I would have said no, I have no wisdom to share, but after several lovely people have included me in their ‘best fics of 2018′ I would say that not worrying about not being ‘shouted about’ is something I’m going to start doing more of (hopefully). I seriously thought no-one knew who I was or cared about anything I wrote because I don't get a lot of acknowledgement on Tumblr, particularly from the big blogs and fic reccers. It made me sad and I just didn’t know what to do about it, but as it turns out, some people were reading my stuff and enjoying it, and you don’t necessarily have to have a hundred reblogs and notifications of your posts for that to happen. 

20. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:

Along with the ABO one, I’ve got a couple of short fic fest ones that are ready to post (thats not til february), I’m writing a sort of birthday one which I’ll post on H’s actual birthday. Also have an idea for a boxer harry one which is basically just pwp. Have two musical fic fest ones I’m excited about and that are a bit different.  Also might try a different pairing, maybe a Ziam or a past Zarry? So yeah, lots to work on. Will see what happens. 

21. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read.

I feel like most people have done this now, but if you haven’t do it!

#2018 review #my fics #writing stuff #fic writing #runaway_train

[gallifreyanlibertea]

I Took My Hater Out On A Date (2/7)

(1/7)  (3/7)  (4/7)  (5/7)  (6/7)

a/n: thank you to everyone that replied to my post!

Arthur barely heard the text notification over his yowling cats. Of course, the beasts only got louder once he turned his attention away from them in pursuit of his phone. They thumped his leg, stomped on his foot. Arthur sighed defeatedly as his fingers curled back into his palm. It seemed his cats weren’t going to let him check his messages until they’d been fed.

Honestly, they acted like Arthur starved them. 

Arthur scraped the food into their food bowls, pausing momentarily at the sound of yet another phone notification, to which his second kitten, Gregory, mewled yet again at Arthur’s distraction.

“Alright, alright.” Arthur snapped. He finished dispensing the food and his cats went to town, to which Arthur’s annoyed, furrowed brows ironed out with a slight, forgiving smile. He couldn’t stay mad at them for long. He reached to scratch their ears as they ate, only to be startled by yet another notification. It was one too many from what Arthur usually received at such a quiet, boring time as one twenty-three PM.

Most of his friends were at work by that time. Arthur would’ve been as well, had it not been for the fact that he’d slipped in his bathtub and nearly snapped his back in two a few days ago- he chose never to explain that incident in detail to his YouTube subscribers, who no doubt saw him as a young, sarcastic and somewhat robust man. It was an illusion he hadn’t been so quick to shatter, so he’d told them he was hospitalized and that was all they needed to know. 

It wasn’t exactly a lie so much as it was a half-truth.

Arthur had been leaning to check his messages when he was startled by five firm knocks on his front door. He scrambled to brush the cat hair off his sweater before he opened the door to- “Francis? Aren’t you supposed to be at work?”

“I left early. Have you seen it?” Francis said, lips spreading in what seemed to be a mocking smile.”That American’s new video?”

“Wh- what? I-”

Francis helped himself into Arthur’s apartment, squatting by Arthur’s coffee table to retrieve Arthur’s laptop from underneath, all with the familiarity of an ex- live-in boyfriend.

It put a sour taste in Arthur’s mouth to remember that he’d actually dated Francis Bonnefoy.

Francis hated cats, Arthur hated the French, Arthur wasn’t quite sure how it had all worked out for three months, much less a minute.

He supposed the sex had been good. Really good. That was all their relationship had been, really. It lacked any substance, it had moved far too fast, it was far too sloppy, which made it all the more easier for Arthur when Francis finally grew bored of Arthur and broke things off.

Nevertheless, Arthur found that he was never able to truly get rid of Francis Bonnefoy. He hadn’t minded that sometimes.

He minded it now, as he watched Francis nearly step on a cat in his hurry to sit on the couch.

“Watch out for Greg!” Arthur hissed.

Francis paused. His lip curled. “I’ll never understand your choice of pet names.”

“The name means to watch, to be alert.” Arthur sniffed. “Cats deserve meaningful names as well, you know, he’s got those sharp ears and those big eyes, like he’s always looking for something-”

“You named the first one Biscuit.”

“I thought it was cute!”

Francis rolled his eyes and went back to work. Arthur eyed him as he threw Arthur’s laptop open, with long painted fingernails clacking on the keys.

“I hardly think it’s that important, Francis.” Arthur scoffed. Curiosity gnawed at the pit of Arthur’s stomach, but Francis didn’t need to know that. 

See, all Francis would need to know was that Alfred Jones, that annoyingly attractive American YouTuber, was nothing more than an insignificant part of Arthur’s YouTube career. Arthur’s subscribers had brought Alfred to Arthur’s attention, and Arthur had done what he did best, what his viewers liked best. He’d reacted to Alfred’s videos.

Besides, it was shockingly easy to make fun of Alfred, just as it was to poke fun at any gaming YouTuber, really. Arthur never had understood the hype.

He recalled almost groaning at the thought of having to watch Alfred’s videos to find something to talk about. He’d clicked on them reluctantly. He wasn’t exactly eager to spend his time watching something he knew for a fact he wouldn’t enjoy, even if it was for the sake of his ‘career’.

He supposed he’d judged the book by its cover, but that form of evaluation almost always worked when it came to gaming YouTubers. They were all the same. With their same, screamy, juvenile content. Their same ‘squads’ playing games together, their same scripted content. Arthur never understood how they gained so many subscribers.

And there had been no plot twist, no sudden realization that, wow, I’d misunderstood this Alfred Jones all along! Because Arthur had truly hated the first video he’d seen. 

That particular video had been Alfred and his mates playing a game with commentary voiced over. It had been dreadful to watch, so painfully boring. Arthur never understood how it could be entertaining to watch others play a game and not actually play it yourself.

Arthur had, however, smiled a little- maybe a little- at some of Alfred’s light humor, sprinkled in between censored curse words and loud laughter. That was all.

It wasn’t until he’d watched a video with Alfred’s actual face in view that everything struck him. 

The other video had the game in full view with a small window in the corner where Arthur could see Alfred and his friends playing. He’d skipped to the middle to watch it and left almost a minute after, so Arthur hadn’t gotten to see that deliciously strong jawline in clear view, full lips parting for dimpled grins, broad shoulders clad in that sweatshirt of his.

Suddenly, Arthur found it difficult to piece together his argument. He was at a loss for words when words were the things he desperately needed to conjure up- dry-humored, cynical words, ones that had never failed to entertain his viewers. 

Well, it was easy to draft something vicious, of course. Arthur never ran dry on ways to insult a person, but he needed to find something… genuine.

Arthur liked to think his videos were an extension of him. Nothing was scripted. He’d just talk and talk and edit out the rough parts, but it seemed everything he had to say about Alfred was a rough part. He’d gone on for minutes flaming Alfred’s content in front of his camera until it had figuratively laid in simmering ashes at Arthur’s feet, but when Arthur re-watched the footage, he felt something missing. 

He didn’t know what.

It was strange, considering that Alfred had an enormous amount of content, which meant more for Arthur to talk about. That meant it would be easier to find material for a reaction video, right?

Arthur’s research had started out with a wide sweep of the channel. He could’ve easily poked fun at just the amount of playlists the lad had- it seemed he made a video about everything.

There was a gaming channel. Arthur had passed that one almost immediately, not wanting to torture himself any longer. He’d already had enough to say about those videos.

There was a… conspiracy theory channel? Arthur had paused upon seeing that, wondering if his eyes deceived him. He’d clicked onto it to find videos about faked moon landings, Mandela effects, theories as to how the world would end- Alfred seemed to be very well versed in his research.

“Hey guys,” Alfred started all his conspiracy videos with chilling music. Arthur liked to pretend it never got to him, but he had clicked out of the video that night and watched it the next morning, in broad daylight. “I have a brand new conspiracy to talk about and- wow, I honestly could not see anything the same after researching it.”

That low, husky voice Alfred put on for the videos, Alfred’s knowledge on the matter- it gave Arthur... mad-scientist vibes. Arthur hadn’t known he’d been blushing profusely until he’d clicked out of the video and taken a break for a quick glass of water.

Arthur couldn’t help his attraction to the strangest little things. He had a thing for tourists, for conspiracists, for glasses, for a nice tall build, and Alfred was inconveniently all of those. Alfred was annoyingly, incredibly, attractive, and there was no denying it.

But hell, Arthur found many things attractive. Even Francis was attractive (which was something Arthur would never tell him) but that had never stopped Arthur from making fun of him.

So yes, Arthur found ample things to discuss in his video, but he had never been content with a single take. In fact, he’d contemplated giving up on the idea, but he couldn’t afford to pass up on making a video that almost guaranteed viewer satisfaction, what with the sheer amount of Twitter posts, YouTube comments, Instagram DMs and whatnot that practically begged Arthur to consider Alfred Jones.

He would simply have to make it work. He’d scanned his thirteenth take, in which he’d been sitting in front of the camera with a sneer on his lips. “I don’t know just how offended I should be that you lot selected someone so unbelievably annoying, so humorless, so-”

And Arthur had winced, just a little. Despite the fact that his viewers adored his rant videos, Arthur didn’t have the heart to be so cruel this time. At least not without some sort of filter. Besides, he wasn’t exactly keen on having Alfred Jones superfans flooding his comment section.

So Arthur had found a comfortable middle-ground. He indulged his viewers in the mockery while diluting it for the sake of diplomacy- er, however much diplomacy could be managed with a Reaction YouTuber’s videos.

“As pretty of a face as he does have, I’d still never subject myself to his mind-numbingly boring and clichéd content, nor would I subject myself to a date with someone with a loud, annoying, cookie-cutter online personality.”

Arthur wasn’t wrong. Alfred was attractive, and Arthur had been pleased with the take. It hadn’t been too harsh. It had just the right amounts of everything, just enough not to make Arthur feel too guilty. After all, he complimented Alfred! Even if it was just a little.

It also helped that Alfred wasn’t there in person. Arthur doubted he could say anything remotely rude in front of those big blue eyes.

… or maybe he could. Arthur didn’t know. That was the whole point of the situation, because Alfred was a YouTuber on Arthur’s laptop screen. It didn’t feel real. It made it all the more easier for Arthur.

It also didn’t help that Alfred was predictable as well. When Alfred had replied, it was as Arthur had expected. It was like a game of chess. It was hardly two people in a petty fight- Arthur assumed that if this were in person, that was what it would be. But because it was online, it felt like a battle, a war.

See, he’d learned a lot from dating a popular MUA, and it was that YouTube interactions between two well-known creators were hardly ever just an interaction. It was a tactic. It carried benefits.

When Alfred had said, “Besides, I’d never date anyone who can spend that much time complaining on camera”, Arthur had raised his brows. He’d checked the comment section to find some of Arthur’s subscribers meagerly defending him. How cute.

He’d checked his twitter to find the brewings of a feud. Subscribers of Alfred’s fought ones of Arthur, subscribers of both were eager for more. Oh god, Arthur had even found hate-to-love fanfiction-

The viewers were not letting this go. Therefore, Arthur would not be letting this go. He would not be sparing Alfred Jones.

It seemed Alfred wouldn’t be sparing Arthur either. Arthur checked his messages as Francis searched for Alfred’s latest video, one he absolutely had to watch, apparently, because Arthur’s first message had been from an ex-roommate that Arthur still kept in contact with, Bharat:

Have you seen it????

Another had been from his older brother, Allistair:

Watch the new vid, am honestly cryin HAHA its what you get fer fuckin round on yt all the time

And two others had been from Francis:

MDR did you see??

I’m coming over I’m almost there

It seemed Alfred wasn’t sparing Arthur either, because Arthur found his expression contorting into one of pain every second of Alfred’s latest video, wondering what exactly on God’s green earth was Alfred’s plan. 

It was unpredictable, and Arthur never made his next move until he knew what his opponent was up to.

Francis had let the cursor hover over a video on the trending page titled ‘Why Arthur Kirkland Should Date Me’. Arthur’s eyebrows had shot up. “Wh… what?”

Francis had clicked the video with a smirk. “Trust me, it gets worse.”

“Hey, what’s up you guys! I’m back again with another video.” A chipper Alfred said on the screen. “I’m gonna assume you all know why I’m making this. A YouTuber I’d never seen before- and trust me, I would never have forgotten a face like that if I had.” Alfred winked. 

Arthur choked on air. Francis bit back a smile. 

“He’s been dragging me to hell and back, and his recent video was particularly interesting to me.”

A thumbnail link of the video popped up on the screen. Well, at least, Arthur was getting some advertisement.

“Come on now, dude, this isn’t kindergarten! For a guy that spent a good ten minutes talking about how childish I am, you’re not so much better yourself.”

Arthur had frowned quizzically, not entirely sure of where the message had been going.

“You think I’m hot, I think you’re hot-”

What.

“I mean, I’ll look past the huge eyebrows and the fact that you wear the same type of sweater in all your videos, if you can look past my cookie-cutter online personality. I took the liberty to make a video just for you, in the hopes that you’ll just drop the act and slide into my DMs.”

Arthur furrowed his brows. Alfred was a clever lad. A clever, clever lad, it seemed, because, well, this was Alfred’s plan. If Arthur made another, normal reaction video, there would be no changing of the fact that millions of viewers now thought Arthur was some schoolgirl with a crush, some schoolgirl in denial.

Arthur watched the scene cut to Alfred lifting weights in the low, orangey light of a gym-

“I work out!”

-then, to Alfred on some sort of gymnastic mat, doing impressive backflips and other... bendy things, “I’m flexible if you know what I mean.”

Arthur watched, red-faced, as Alfred winked on screen. The scene then switched to Alfred playing with a pet- a fat, fluffy white cat with brown ears. “I saw in a video that you liked cats. I have one too! His name’s Hero!”

That bit was predictable. It was easy to see that the Alfred was a comic book buff from the figurines that lined the room he filmed in, the posters on his walls.

Now, Alfred was on a couch, scrolling his phone with a big, cheesy smile. “I just googled your height, and I think you’d fit just perfectly in my arms. People tell me I’m real warm.”

This was ridiculous. Surely Alfred had to know that! Arthur’s cheeks burned red in embarrassment. He was suddenly aware of Francis’ presence, those blue, mocking, laughing eyes of his drilling into Arthur’s mortified body.

And finally, much to Francis’ glee and the twist in the pit of Arthur’s stomach, Alfred took off his sweatshirt. He took off the shirt underneath it, displaying a deliciously tanned expanse of toned muscle. Alfred grinned cheekily, and Arthur felt his insides flutter. “And last of all, because this is what’s under my sweatshirt.”

“That bastard,” Arthur muttered as the video came to an end. “I- I don’t even know what he… that cheeky bastard.”

“I say you accept his proposal,” Francis joked. Arthur ignored him.

“I’ve got to do something, Francis. I can’t just let him- I… I need to match his play, but I can’t just do something like this, God knows I don’t have that in me!”

“Stop blubbering. Does it always have to be a play with you?” Francis scoffed, “Maybe he likes you.”

“Oh come on,” Arthur rose from the couch, taking to pacing in his living room, “He’s doing this for views and I know it. Fans go crazy over gay subtext like this.”

“It’s hardly sub-text.”

Arthur ignored him again. “I’m not going to let myself be ridiculed like this.”

Arthur filmed a new video the next week, in which he’d taken to coming up with a list, similar to Alfred. He’d filmed in various locations, similar to Alfred. Arthur matched the play.

“Sometimes I box after a stressful day,” Arthur had said as Francis filmed him in the ring, boxing glove-clad hands poised up, “I can quite easily knock a tooth out.”

The scene switched to Arthur sifting through his mail. “I’ve got all these bills that I’m paying with my job. In case you’re not sure what that is, it’s an adult responsibility. To put it into terms you might understand, my job is like a… um, quest that I complete to gain coins, money, um… V-Bucks, so I can pay for ‘cool stuff’! Like rent! And it’s very important, so I’d rather not be bothered with children dragging my name into videos for viewer satisfaction.”

And there was much, much more. Oh, so much more. Arthur titled the video ‘Why Alfred Jones Should Fuck Off’ and posted it with a smug smile on his lips.

It was trending a week later.

Arthur scrolled through his email notifications absentmindedly, watching his subscriber count grow, as his free hand stroked Biscuit on his lap.

See, Arthur could admit that all the new subscribers did make him feel a little bit nice. Maybe that made him slightly egotistical. He liked to see his email chock full of the notifications. He liked to scroll through them, when he had nothing else to do, and recently, he’d had quite a few in his inbox. With the time he’d taken off work, he’d also had quite a few moments in his day when he had nothing else to do.

He then paused. He blinked. His lips curved up in a slight smile.

Alfred Jones has subscribed to you on YouTube!

#usuk #ukus #usukus #past fruk mention #aph america #aph england #aph france #my fanfiction #YouTuber AU #I Took My Hater Out On A Date #next saturday is when my ap exam results come out so I might not post?? i'll let you know if it comes to that #my eyes will probably be too swollen shut from sobbng my lungs out to edit LMAO #also I had to leave really quickly today so this is unbetad as well

[layersofmatte]

Post-vacation Blog

Weather: Rainy and cold (April showers, huh) Coffee Tastes: Good Music: “The Dance of Light and Shade” by Soul Doubt

Not sure why I woke up this morning and thought about using my Tumblr, but here were are. Just got back from a two-week vacation in Australia and had to get a few thoughts down in blog form. I’ve used a physical journal in the past, but I feel like it makes me realize how terrible my handwriting is instead. I would much rather strengthen my typing skillz (2018 and all). 

So... what did I want to blog about? Probably start with how I just got back from my first trip overseas and am already falling back into normality. In one sense, it’s comforting to fall back into my old vices (Taco Bell lunch, browsing YouTube, watching anime, playing video games). On the other hand, I think my expectation was that I would come back from AUS with a newfound sense of purpose or direction (or at least a cute overseas girlfriend to talk to). I spent my first day back being somewhat productive (unpacking, cleaning, finish the second BotW DLC... productive) and I woke up waaaay too early this morning so I’m taking advantage of that by having an early breakfast and blog session. I think it would be fun to do this regularly. :) 

Back on target. What is next? Since I’m going back to work on Sunday, I would like to take my day off to do something different and start shooting towards some kind of goal. It would probably be better to set small short-time goals and try to achieve them within a reasonable time-frame. Things like: losing some of the extra pounds I put on during vacation (a bit afraid to check), learn a few more complete songs on the piano (I had a chance to play a piano on vacation and realized that I don’t really know many full songs), finish a few games in my backlog (sounds like a silly goal, but having them checked off feels good).

As far as the gym goes, I was doing a great job attending every other day after work. The work gym is always quiet when I leave, so it’s the perfect time to do an hour or so of exercise. Let’s jot down my current weight and comfortable rep limits, then try to excel and see how much weight I can lose each week. Of course, exercise isn’t everything so I should really re-evaluate my diet (but Taco Bell though...). I also think eating breakfast regularly will give me the energy that I’ve been severely lacking by afternoon. Maybe I can share tips and progress with Mark to keep myself motivated. 

I had a revelation one day while I was on vacation. I realized that when I’m listening to a good song or a custom playlist I’ve created in Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/user/121944433?si=KBefQ8fWSF6A6VUHuWFaAg), that I like to picture what the live version of each song transition would look like or how I would light each performance. Now that I type that out, it really seems like I should get into stage production, but I’ve always liked the idea of performing piano solo or with percussion accompaniment. Even getting a gig at a cafe/bar sounds like fun. Someday I would like to be good enough to take requests. If I want to make this dream a reality, I’ll need to increase the amount of time I practice piano. Currently, I’ll just plop down and hammer a few bars by ear (taught myself “Evil” by The Flaming Lips this morning). I think the best way to build this skill would be to pick a song each week, learn it, memorize it and play it flawlessly by the end of the week. Then I would move on to another song until I can build a repertoire. I’ll make notes for each song (difficulty, key, etc.) and collect my notes for a future session for friends (start small, then go live). 

Playing games is something I do regularly (you could call it work research but that’s stretching it, Matte). Unfortunately, I would say I have about a 30% completion rate with most games. I’ll get invested in one and then something new comes out just a week or so later. Even glancing over to my game library is an intimidating sight (and that doesn’t include my digital game collection). While this goal isn’t quite as healthy as the others (depending on your perspective), I still get a sense of relief and accomplishment from finishing I game I enjoy. Let’s work on that by focusing on a single title each week/day and see if spending a few hours on it makes me still feel that I would like to finish it. I think that’s the other difference is knowing when to accept that I’m just not having fun and should shelf the game. In the past, I’ve used an Excel spreadsheet to document each title and estimated time to complete, so I might start that up again. This time, only list five titles at a time to avoid being overwhelmed. 

So that’s it. A post-vacation blog about the things I want to do aside from work. If you squint hard enough, you might notice that “finding romance” is not on there, but I still have mixed feelings about that world. I’ve found that my best relationships have always fallen in my lap, but that’s not the best perspective. Maybe I’ll reconsider by the next time I type up a blog, but for now I just want to focus on the things I enjoy. Having someone here with me to enjoy them or broaden my focus would be helpful, so I’ll be keeping myself aware of any possible opp--this is starting to sound like a job application. Oy vey. Let’s just have fun and take things one day at a time. I don’t have any major plans until June (E3 baby!) so focusing on short-term goals will be perfect. I’ll think more about summer goals later (more gym time = swimsuit confidence).  Glad to be back in the blogosphere. Hello, I love you and I’ll see you again soon. Until then, be good to each other.