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#Narrator is absolutely a starbucks guy
imnotmufi · 4 months
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bookgeekgrrl · 1 year
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My media this week (29 Jan-4 Feb 2023)
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📚 STUFF I READ 📚
😊👂‍A Quiet Life in the Country (Lady Hardcastle Mysteries #1) (T.E. Kinsey, author; Elizabeth Knowelden, narrator) - very entertaining historical cozy mystery with charming characters and not heavy historical accuracy (which doesn't detract in any way from the entertainment value (at least for me)). Plus the fact that they are free in both ebook & audio via KU. Definitely going to read more.
🥰 Exquisite (copperbadge aka Sam Starbuck) - 172K, White Collar, Peter/El/Neal - complete AU rewrite of s1-2, very well plotted & integrated; light D/s dynamic with P/N. I regret endlessly that there is not more good OT3 stuff like this for this show!
🙂 Push The Button (Kalee60) - 100K, shrunkyclunks - absolute tropefest: fake dating, team-as-family, only one bed, an entire pine forest
😊👂‍Mystery Mile (Albert Campion Mystery #2) (Margery Allingham, author; Francis Matthews, narrator) - this one was full on 'mysterious criminal gang adventure' than 'domestic murder' - I really do enjoy Campion's whole THING: his complete willingness to be the absolute fool so that people vastly underestimate him. alas, CWs for all the usual period typical/contemporary racism/antisemitism/xenophobia (+ a mouse death)
💖💖 +80K of shorter fic so shout out to these I really loved 💖💖
the night breeze carries something sweet (asbealthgn) - Stranger Things: Steddie, 4.8K - short but delightful rockstar!Eddie/some guy!Steve meet cute
His Greatest Adversary Yet (architeuthis) - original work: 15K - absolutely wonderful story about a retired superhero and the supervillian who keeps seeking him out because he misses him (and has a very late-in-life gay awakening when he finds him)
And I Knew (in the Crystalline Knowledge of You) (PippinPips) - Stranger Things: Steddie, 27K - fantastic Practical Magic AU
Cassiopeia, Orion, Bootes (AidaRonan) - Stranger Things: Steddie, 10K - another incredible monsterfucking fic. what a fucking gift!
📺 STUFF I WATCHED 📺
Shotgun Wedding
Scooby Doo, Where Are You! - s2, e1-4
Poker Face - s1, e1-4
🎧 PODCASTS 🎧
Off Menu - Ep 104: Martin Freeman
Welcome to Night Vale #210 - Ten Years Later
Welcome to Night Vale #211 - Howl
The Sporkful - The Boom And Bust Of Meat Alternatives
Renegades: Born in the USA - Relationships with Our Fathers & Masculinity
Welcome to Night Vale #212 - The Campus
You Must Remember This - 1980: Richard Gere and American Gigolo (Erotic 80s Part 3)
Welcome to Night Vale #213 - Murals
Welcome to Night Vale #214 - The Comet's Tail
The Atlas Obscura Podcast - Galileo’s Middle Finger
Strange Customs with Sasha Sagan - Nicole Richie—The Conspiracy
Renegades: Born in the USA - Fatherhood
Off Menu - Ainsley Harriott
Vibe Check - Hope Is A Light-skinned Ideal
99% Invisible #523 - Six-on-Six Basketball
Ologies with Alie Ward - Laryngology (VOICE BOXES) Part 2 with Ronda Alexander
The Atlas Obscura Podcast - Freud Museum London
Welcome to Night Vale - Bonus Episode: Crime Line
Welcome to Night Vale #221 - The Glow Cloud, Explained
You Must Remember This - 1981: Neonoir, Body Heat and Postman Always Rings Twice (Erotic 80s Part 4)
Into It - A History of Whammies at the Grammys (Plus: What's Lil Rel Howery Into?)
The Atlas Obscura Podcast - The Westgate with Rico Gagliano
Renegades: Born in the USA - Looking Towards American Renewal
Off Menu - Ep 137: Michael Schur
Endless Thread - Him: An AI Love Story
You Must Remember This - 1982: Teen Sexploitation, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Porky's and The Blue Lagoon (Erotic 80s Part 5)
🎶 MUSIC 🎶
Presenting Miley Cyrus
Presenting Britney Spears
Presenting Dua Lipa
Future Friends [Superfruit]
Presenting Lady Gaga
My Mix #3 {mostly '80s pop with a New Wave concentration}
my 'Thumbs Up' playlist
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bamfdaddio · 3 years
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X-Men Abridged: 1979
The X-Men, those globe-trotting mutants that have sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them, are a cultural juggernaut with a long, tangled history. Want to unravel this tapestry? Then read the Abridged X-Men!
(X-Men 117 - 128, X-Man Annual 3) - by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, Terry Austin, George Perez
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See Jean? Dark Phoenix is nothing: this is how you turn evil properly. (X-Men 123)
So, these things have been getting longer. Whoops.
Last year, plotlines tended to bleed over in one another, but this year is a lot more arc-based, jumping from location to location. This is basically X-Men: World Tour. After hitting Antarctica and the Savage Land, our team of merry mutants visits Japan, Canada, Egypt, Scotland and even a theme park! (And really, both Murder World and Disney Land are run by capitalist scumbags who pretend to be in it for the art, the only difference being that Arcade purposefully murders his guests.)
But, before we check in with the X-Men, we return to the Institute. See, there’s a mutual misunderstanding that wouldn’t be out of place in a Shakespearian tragedy: Jean and Charles think Beast and Jean were the only survivors of their fight with Magneto in Antarctica, while the rest of the X-Men believe they were the only survivors and Jean and Beast perished. Since the X-Men have been trapped in the Savage Land, nobody has been able to clear up the confusion.
With their grief driving a wedge between her and Charles, Jean leaves the mansion to deal with her feelings on her own. (She’ll end up on Muir Isle.)
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This is adorable! And, if the whole "Empress of the known Universe "-thing blows up in her face, she can always become a barista at Starbucks. (X-Men 117)
Lilandra successfully persuades Xavier to leave Earth as her consort, now that there is nothing left for him. Xavier agrees, but not before having a flashback to the time he met another telepath named Amahl Farouk in Egypt. (The Shadow King isn’t relevant just yet, but he’ll become an important villain later on.)
The X-Men, meanwhile, cross a treacherous ocean on a raft and are picked up by a Japanese vessel. The Japanese do not allow them to call anyone, for some reason. Sure. When they finally dock in Japan - six weeks later - some arms dealer named Magnum Moses has put Agarishima is on fire. Like, literally an inferno of such big proportions that even Storm can’t do much.
What follows is an uninspired, slipshod adventure. For some reason, Misty Knight and Colleen Wing are there too, because the president needed American detectives to investigate Magnum Moses (?) and for some reason, Misty doesn’t know Jean thinks Scott is dead, nor does she mention she just saw Jean to Scott. AUGH. It will take almost a year for Scott to figure out Jean isn’t dead and it becomes increasingly more contrived. I get that Claremont needed to isolate Jean to make her susceptible to, er, a certain someone’s machinations, but holy fuck do I have to suspend my disbelief for all of this bullshit.
The only good things about this little arc are:
Sunfire is still a dick.
Wolverine meets Mariko Yashida, a Japanese girl who actually reciprocates his feelings, as opposed to Jean. I’ve mostly been ignoring his budding feelings for Jean, because I stopped finding love triangles interesting since I was 16 and watched The OC, so I can only applaud this development. Mariko brings out Wolverine’s soft side and it’s very adorable. Later on, she moves to NYC for some reason and they start dating.
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There is something sweetly disarming about calling Wolverine ‘beautiful’. (X-Men 120)
Anyway, Magnum is holding Japan hostage: either they give him what he wants - I think that might be money, sorry, wasn't paying attention - or he sinks Japan by activating the fault lines and you guys, I am sooo bored. Unsurprisingly, the X-Men stop him and for once, it’s Banshee who gets to play the most important part.
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It’s a good thing I was terrible at science, otherwise I might have to point out that earthquakes and sonic waves don’t work that way! I simply get to be entertained by little rascal Colossus, plugging his ears like a toddler, and Sunfire’s gritty determination to not be impressed by some silly screaming Irishman. (X-Men 119)
Banshee pays a steep price for the victory, however: his vocal chords end up damaged, leaving him effectively powerless for the remainder of the year.
Oh, and here’s interesting fact about the above spread: you may or may not know that Chris Claremont and John Byrne were notoriously terrible at working together; this issue became a particular sore point between the creators. See, Byrne wanted to run the above panel without the sound of ‘Kra-Koom’, believing the art was strong enough to convey the destruction. He was livid when the finished product ended up containing a sound effect after all. I get your frustration, man, but if you want a writer who knows how to say less with more, you should maybe not work with Claremont?
(One of the reasons Claremont liked being so verbose and descriptive in his scripts was because otherwise, the artist would fill in the blanks using his own imagination. It’s no wonder these two found it hard to work together.)
On the flight to the US of A, Colleen Wing hits on Cyclops. It has to be the jawline, right? It can’t be the personality. All of a sudden, a snow storm causes their plane to be diverted to Calgary. The cause of this delay is Alpha Flight, who want their Wolverine back!
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When even the narration is all “and they think they’re equal to any team of superheroes”, you know you’re a bunch of C-listers. Ugh. (X-Men 121)
Vindicator, previously known as Captain Alpha. He changed his name after accidentally shooting Moira that one time, which is exactly the kind of hollow gesture this dude would make. Ugh. If you think his new-found remorse won’t let him threaten an airplane chock full of innocent passengers, you would be wrong.
Shaman, doctor by day, magic user by night. Him and his magical little pouch are to blame for the snow storm.
Sasquatch, Canada’s answer to the Hulk. (Hilariously, the theory on why he turns furry instead of green is because he’s closer to the Aurora Borealis and this somehow messes with the radiation?)
Snowbird, a young Arctic goddess. Precious. To be cherished. Barely there for this adventure, sadly.
Northstar, an arrogant, hot-headed speedster, the twin brother of
Aurora, a lover, not a fighter. Together, they have light powers.
Vindicator and Shaman hog most of the spotlight, so Alpha Flight continues to be the ever-loving worst. They’re really wasting Northstar’s first appearance here. Here's why they suck:
Alpha Flight accidentally smashes a plane and keeps threatening to drag Wolverine back to the military against his will.
They push the cover price of the comic to a whoppin’ 40 cents.
Johnny fuckin’ Hudson even provokes Storm into an attack in the middle of a mall.
Shaman lets his blizzard get out of control.
After Storm fixes this mistake for him, Northstar has the gall to knock her out, “because she’s obviously the strongest”. Like, you’re not wrong, but damn, y’all a bunch of unpleasant superheroes.
To stop the fight, Wolverine decides to turn himself in. The X-Men leave, but while flying back, they already make plans to save their teammate. Wolverine saves them the trouble, casually sauntering into the cockpit while claiming that pulling a fast one on them was the easiest thing ever.
To be fair, I understand why you’d want to put a country between yourself and those bozos.
And finally, the X-Men are home! Xavier left them the equivalent of a Post-It saying “off to space”, so they try to pick up their life as best they can. None of them contact Jean’s parents, make an attempt to visit her grave or happen to see Beast on TV and by now, my suspension of disbelief is stretched so far that it could replace Reed Richards on the Fantastic Four.
Ororo, meanwhile, makes a little pilgrimage to Harlem, to the building she grew up in before she moved to Cairo.
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I have failed you as a recapper, because I have absolutely no idea how to parse this scene. (X-Men 122)
I think I’d have to write a full-on thesis before I could properly analyse this, because so many things intersect here: poverty and racism, the boundaries of a superhero comic, confronting a (shared) past. I can’t even fully gauge if this is a clumsy, privileged attempt at tackling a serious topic or rather, a valuable moment in a comic that continually tries to expand on its themes of racism, exclusion and prejudice. One thing I will note is:
Luke Cage delivers the sort of trite conclusion that they’re superheroes: they’re better at fighting Galactus than at fixing the human condition. Point is, he kind of has to believe that, doesn’t he? It’s the sort of blind spot we all permit ourselves: you can’t fix everything. None of us have the power to fix the earth, or humanity, or the economy, or whatever: if you’re lucky, you can maybe tend to your own garden and leave it better than you found it, ensuring some happiness for yourself and a few loved ones.
Chasing bank robbers is easy. Superhero stuff. But here? Who do you attack here? These kids, or the system that failed them? You can’t really punch a needle exchange into being. Maybe that’s the appeal of superhero comics: there’s a clear villain, which is so sorely lacking in our day to day lifes. There, we are ruled by systems that are rooted in inequality, patriarchy, gender...
But Storm isn’t like Luke Cage, not in this regard. Before she became an X-Man, she used her powers to help people that came to her. And the whole point of the X-Men - other than beating up villains in colorful spandex - is that they want to change the system. They want to fix things, they want to fix a dark part of human nature, the part that hates which we fear.
Storm doesn’t really respond to Luke Cage here, but we know she’ll keep fighting the good fight, despite insurmountable odds. You can’t fix mankind, I don’t think, but you can sure as hell try.
*coughs*
Anyway!
Black Tom and Juggernaut hire Arcade… to kill the X-Men! I’m not sure why? I thought these two usually attempted to solve things on their own and Arcade’s fee is, like, a million bucks, so…? Maybe Black Tom asked his boyfriend what he wanted for his birthday and Juggernaut clenched his fists and said “I WANT THE X-MEN DEAD” and things escalated from there.
So, Arcade is a subtle villain. While Scott and Colleen Wing are on a date, this happens:
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I can’t decide which is funnier: kidnapping people by sneaking up on them with A GARBAGE TRUCK or the fact that Spider-Man deduces this is Arcade’s doing by the noise alone. (X-Men 123)
Spider-Man doesn’t really figure into the rest of the plot, by the way.
Arcade successfully kidnaps all of the X-Men (and their dates: Colleen, Amanda and Betsy). Who is this Arcade? Well, he is an assassin who lets his victims run through a gauntlet of some sort, testing them with potentially deadly results in his Murderworld. He’s like a discount-combo of Saw and the Joker, except a lot less competent and a lot more spoiled rich kid. He barely kills anyone, ever, until maaaybe Avengers Arena, some forty years later.
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Arcade veers heavily to the silly side of the silly-to-sinister scale, but he at least commits to a theme. Bonus is that trapping your heroes in a bunch of ricocheting balls fubars them ever-so beautifully. (X-Men 123)
This whole adventure is very silly and has very little bearing on the overarching plot, but it’s a fun enough romp: Cyclops nearly gets squashed by a hydraulic press, Nightcrawler gets attacked by bumper cars with chain saws attached to them, stuff like that. The absolute best part is when Colossus is hypnotized by an illusion of the KGB and becomes THE PROLETARIAN.
His insignia is Vladimir Lenin, y’all.
After various shenanigans, everybody is freed from their respective booby traps, everyone except Colossus. See, Piotr has been feeling down, torn between the exciting new loyalty to the X-Men and the more dutiful loyalty to his family and his motherland. (Also, he’s been feeling like a failure because he came up short a couple a times, aw.) Those feelings are exactly what Arcade has been abusing, but when Colossus comes in for the kill, Storm gives the most heartfelt plea:
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I’m not crying, you’re crying. (X-Men 124)
Arcade’s all: “Eh, can’t win ‘em all” and yeets the X-Men out of Murderworld. The story has barely any other repercussions, except we stop seeing Colleen Wing and Betsy (Piotr’s date) after this. To be fair, being kidnapped by a super villain is a good reason to stop seeing someone.
Even more inconsequential is the adventure in the Annual. The only important thing to glean from there is that, when Thor is unavailable, Storm is a suitable substitution. Couldn’t agree more.
The quality of the comic has been steadily ascending throughout the year and ends on a supremely high note: Proteus. Because I think it might be Claremont’s best work so far, I’ll be dedicating a full post to that. (Man, that 10-picture-limit is a real bummer, huh?)
Ugliest Costume: I don’t care, I just want someone to cosplay the Proletarian.
Best new character: There’s actually a few options - Snowbird, Northstar, Proteus - but both Jean-Paul and Narya don’t really show their best sides this year, so I’m going in a different direction. My pick is the Shadow King. He is a very effective foil to Xavier, perhaps even moreso than Magneto. I know I rag on Xavier and his cavalier attitude to bending others to his will a lot, but imagine if you had his powers: wouldn’t you just make people do whatever you want? Just, like, all the time? The Shadow King is an effective reminder of what Charles would have been like, had he been immoral. (Well, more immoral.)
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No matter how cool your psychic battle may be, this is what it looks like to the rest of the world. (X-Men 117)
Turns evil: Colossus, for the first time!
What to read: 117, 125 - 129.
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woozapooza · 3 years
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Moby Dick 1998 reactions
Literally just the notes I took watching the 1998 Moby Dick miniseries. I enjoyed it a lot but I like the 2011 one better.
Elijah is pretty goofy here
Note to self--find video of Henry Thomas talking in his normal voice. Is he doing a weird accent for this role, or is that just how he talks? He sounds almost Irish. [BTW after I finished watching, I looked up a video of him talking in his normal voice and he does not sound weirdly Irish-tinged in real life, so I have no idea why he was talking like that in this adaptation.]
They shoehorn some narration from the book into Ishmael’s dialogue
Not sure if the problem is with the actor or the dialogue, but Henry Thomas’s performance is...rather stilted
Here, Ishmael has no nautical experience. 
“I fear I must make a confession. I used to be a schoolteacher.” HE SAYS THAT LIKE IT’S SO EMBARRASSING 
When Peleg says that Queequeg “doesn’t look like much of a Christian,” Ishmael fires back with “HE’S KILLED MORE WHALES THAN YOU CAN COUNT” and seriously looks like he’s about to punch Peleg until Queequeg puts his hand on his shoulder.
Queequeg is less worldly here than in the book. Ishmael takes him to church to teach him about the concepts of God and souls.
STARBUCK IS PLAYED BY BUFFALO BILL FROM THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS?!
Ishmael is so serious here
Stubb is perfect
Interesting that Ishmael is a brand-new sailor, but he already knows the song (shanty?) the other sailors are singing
The guy playing Flask could stand to rein it in a bit
Pip is younger than I imagined him. But then, I don’t think his age is specified in the book.
Ishmael’s hands are burned by the rope. Later, below decks, Queequeg patches them up :) 
One guy literally refers to Ishmael and Queequeg as “lovebirds” and another guy makes kissing noises at them
Those guys try (pathetically) to bully Queequeg. Ishmael says to Queequeg, sounding kind of ashamed, “You pagans should teach us Christians the art of kindness.” Queequeg reassures him that they (Q & I) are friends *emotional emoji*
This is so weird! There’s a scene where basically the whole crew converges on Ishmael and tells him scary whale facts while he looks terrified!
I feel like Ahab needs to have a beard. I forget if he has one in the book but he SHOULD.
Ted Levine has the absolute BEST judgmental face.
They keep the scene of Ahab throwing his pipe overboard!
Pip sounds like he’s from the Caribbean? Interesting. I looked up the actor and he’s from Wisconsin. 
Fedallah is east Asian instead of Parsi for some reason 
“There’s no savagery of beast that’s not infinitely outdone by that of man.” I love that they retain Ishmael’s bursts of human-phobia!
The little swing Captain Boomer uses to get to the Pequod looks like so much fun
After the encounter with the Samuel Enderby, Starbuck openly stands up to Ahab, but Ahab shuts him down. Then there’s a shot of Pip angrily throwing down his tambourine. I like that. It adds some depth to Pip.
Wait, Bulkington’s name is in the credits??? He’s here??? I looked up the guy who plays him and I don’t recognize him but apparently the character is here somewhere. 
The whale looks so silly
Pip is in Starbuck’s boat here, and the emphasis is on Starbuck, not Stubb, choosing not to bother helping him. That’s an odd choice. I like that Ishmael is trying to get Starbuck to go back for Pip. When the hunt is over, Starbuck proposes going back for him and Stubb argues against it. Now that I think about it, I kind of see what they were going for. Starbuck’s first priority is to get the job done and his second priority is morality. 
A SHARK ALMOST GETS PIP?! WHAT’S GOING ON
When the rescue boat approaches the Pequod, there’s a shot of Ishmael holding Pip in his arms <3
When Pip is lifted aboard, Stubb celebrates. Sir, kindly shut up. You were in favor of leaving him to die. Okay, to be fair, I guess the novel is coloring my view of the miniseries’ take on the character. Here, Stubb wasn’t the one who left him behind, that was Starbuck. Stubb just thought he was probably dead, which I guess is reasonable.
Out of nowhere (unless I’ve forgotten something), Bulkington is an actual character in Part 2.
I love the choice to literally film from Pip’s point of view to depict his terror and disorientation. 
I don’t love this portrayal of Queequeg, to be honest. He lacks subtlety.
Pip starts dressing up as Ahab. I’m trying very hard not to find this funny. I KNOW it’s serious. It just reminds me of when I was a kid and I would entertain my mom by putting on her hat and shoes.
Unlike in the book, here Pip doesn’t become...I don’t know the word for it. Disidentified with himself? He doesn’t talk about “Pip” in the third person or say that Pip is dead or missing.
I like that, unlike the 1956 and 2011 versions, this one is really making an effort to depict the bond that forms between Pip and Ahab. However, the fact that it only forms once Ahab sees Pip dressed up as him cheapens it a bit, I feel. 
Ooh, they have Queequeg stand up to Ahab! That’s a fun choice. 
Ishmael is very angry that everyone on the ship is going mad. 
Why do some of the actors pronounce Queequeg’s name “kee-quay”???
THEY HAVE QUEEQUEG DECLARE THAT THERE IS NO GOD ON THE PEQUOD AND THROW YOJO IN THE FIRE??? 
Starbuck catches Bulkington trying to jump ship and go home to his wife. Instead of trying to stop him, he gives him a letter to deliver to Mary. Bulkington suggests that Starbuck just come along with him, but Starbuck can’t bring himself to do that. That’s really interesting. I like that.
Starbuck comes into Ahab’s cabin, where Ahab and Pip are both asleep, and stands menacingly over Ahab. Maybe thinking murderous thoughts? I’m not sure, but DEFINITELY thinking malicious thoughts. But then he sees Ahab put his hand on top of Pip’s, and he softens. I love that.
Ahab takes the wheel in a storm. Major Flint vibes!
Patrick Stewart seems to be having a great time
I THINK QUEEQUEG JUST DECLARED AHAB HIS GOD? WTF 
Ishmael and Starbuck commiserate about how everyone else on this crew has lost their minds. In the book, Ishmael is clear about the fact that he was under Ahab’s spell just like the rest of the crew (minus Starbuck), but I guess they wanted to give him stuff to do in this adaptation aside from just being one of the crowd.
Whoa there is something weird going on between Starbuck and Ishmael. I’m starting to ship it, frankly. 
I don’t like what they did with the “let me gaze into a human eye” scene. In the book, it’s really moving. Here, Starbuck literally has a knife in his hand. Ahab puts his hand on Starbuck’s face and Starbuck looks extremely uncomfortable. However, as the interaction continues, you see Starbuck start to feel less murderous and try to reason with Ahab, so I guess that’s good. 
Oh snap! Starbuck holds the knife to Ahab’s chest...and then starts crying. And then voluntarily lowers the knife. This is wild. Ahab says “what have I done” and you get the sense that he’s on the verge of being persuaded...when the guy on the masthead spots the whale. 
I like that this version includes Fedallah at all but Kee Chan is simply not given a whole lot to work with. 
OH GOD QUEEQUEG GETS BADLY INJURED—I THINK HE SOMEHOW GETS HARPOONED?—AND HIS LAST WORD IS “ISHMAEL” AND THEN HE SINKS UNDER AND ISHMAEL SCREAMS AND DIVES AFTER HIM AND TRIES TO PULL HIM UP BUT QUEEQUEG SHAKES HIM OFF I’M GONNA DIE
AND THEN WHEN ISHMAEL RESURFACES HE SCREAMS AGAIN I AM DEVASTATED 
The cook and the carpenter are both trying to get the doubloon. Guys...priorities.
Starbuck is just hanging out inside the boat this whole time and then the whale rams into the boat and Starbuck and Pip both get overwhelmed by the water :(
As the carpenter dies, there’s a shot of the doubloon in his hand. I like that. 
As with the 2011 version, the “epilogue” feels a little rushed. I guess maybe it just doesn’t translate all that well to the screen. Oh well.
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kataa-floko · 3 years
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so i have scoured in one of our enemies’ bases (aka spn fanpages on instagram) and i have come back knowlegdable:
- the amount of people who thought Järed’s tweets were “a prank like they usually do”, even though his second reply (the famous “I’m gutted”) was included in the post is astounding. In addition, there were some people that said it was all “just a PR thing to generate excitement”
- a lot of memes, generally by destiel-positive pages, mostly the comparisons to november 2020
- a truly horrific caption saying “it’s all good, they talked it out”, and the comments were clearly people that don’t know how PR works
- the same caption later claimed “even dean isn’t in the show, so don’t be bothered they didn’t tell Järed anything”, but ONE post earlier the caption read ‘yeah it’s narrated by dean’
- some people saying Jensen was a dick for not telling Järed, end Järed’s response was absolutely justified
- two or three people being like “guys they talked about this in the last convention” (which, btw, was in march), “just watch minutes x0 to x2 they talk about it there”. I think this refers to the clip of the CreationCon that was going around yesterday, where a lot of destihellers (honorific) said that Jensen looked kind of done with Järed
- i found some pages that post memes from ages ago (anyone remember the leviathan mug by starbucks), and I really wanted to ask them if they were going to post anything about it
- and my favorite comment: “spn fans are always so crazy, homophobic abuser [in referal to J*hn Winchester], y’all always pull stuff out of your ass” to which I really really badly wanted to reply “have you actually watched an episode outside of s14e13 lebanon???”
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artificialqueens · 4 years
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drawing new lines, chapter two (branjie) - holtzmanns
(read on ao3) | (tumblr: plastiquetiaras) | (word count: 3514)
AN: Thank you SO so much for the lovely response to the first chapter. I’m so glad you guys are enjoying it so far as much as I am. This story is so, so fun to write and such a lovely refresher from the angst trains I usually end up on while writing. Hope you enjoy this chapter as well! Writ, as usual, is the most wonderful beta.
Vanessa is already bouncing in the Starbucks line before even getting her sweet, sweet hit of caffeine. But she’s two days into this fake dating business, and the real finesse is about to start.
“Hi, welcome to Starbucks, what would you like?”
“Can I have a grande blonde roast, two creams, two sugars…and a grande dark roast, black with room for milk?”
Vanessa’s own coffee needs to be chock-full of sugar in order for her to be able to drink it, but Brooke? Vanessa’s not quite sure what she likes, but a dark roast with cream and sugar brought on the side seems like a safe option.
Silky and A’keria look at her with questions on their faces as they wait for their drinks to finish, A’keria already munching on her breakfast sandwich.
“Why you ordering two?” Silky’s looking at her with narrowed eyes, and it’s all Vanessa can do to not yell in excitement as she tries to keep herself blasé.
“Oh, no reason. Thought I’d drop by Brooke’s office, that’s all. We going on a date tonight.” She holds her fingers out in front of her, inspects her cuticles, as if it’s an everyday statement, a normal occurrence to go out with the office building’s most eligible bachelorette.
Which it completely isn’t, by the way that A’keria slams her breakfast sandwich down on the counter.
“You’re what?” Silky’s yell makes other customers around them turn around, stare, and Vanessa doesn’t even care, because the looks on Silky and A’keria’s faces are enough to keep her laughing for days.
“Goddamn, Vanj. You really got that blonde skyscraper to agree to go on a date with you?” A’keria looks mildly impressed. “To be honest, I didn’t think you had it in you.”
“I told y’all, I’m a catch.” Sure, Vanessa’s voice is a bit haughty for someone who is absolutely not going on a proper date with Brooke, rather a fake one, but regardless. She’s gonna milk it.
“I’m surprised someone sees it.” A’keria shares a look with Silky, who is shaking her head in disbelief. “Even more surprised that it’s her.”
“No one can resist the Vanjie charm.” With that, Vanessa picks up both drinks, winking at her friends before heading to the elevators. “Deuces!”
Brooke is mildly amused when Vanessa swings by her office, placing the coffee in her empty hand. “How’d you know I like my coffee black?”
Vanessa raises an eyebrow at her. “You look like the kind of person who thinks that putting sugar and cream in coffee ruins the taste or something.”
“It does actually, it-” Brooke pauses when she sees Vanessa snickering. “Hmph, never mind.”
“You enjoy your boring coffee, and imma enjoy this sugary goodness.” Vanessa’s own drink smells like caffeinated heaven, and so what if she takes a big sniff of the cup? No one’s judging her.
Okay, maybe Brooke is, from the way a single eyebrow of hers is raised, but Vanessa also doesn’t care.
“You are absolutely going to have a sugar crash in an hour or two from that.” Brooke points at her cup as she takes another swig.
“Bold of you to assume my body hasn’t built up an immunity to sugar because of how much of it I have on the daily.”
“You’re ridiculous.” But Brooke laughs as she’s saying it, a real laugh, by the way her eyes are crinkling at the edges.
“Count on it.” Vanessa plops into Brooke’s fancy desk chair, her office a stark contrast from Vanessa’s cubicle. “Damn, this is comfy. D’you have to buy this shit? Or did they just give it to you?”
“Amazon, actually. I have a bad back.” Brooke leans against her own desk, facing Vanessa. Her legs look like they go on forever in her heeled boots, though Vanessa is absolutely not focusing on them, no ma’am.
“Send me the link, would you? I wanna pimp out my boring cubicle.”
Brooke snorts. “Now that’s a trashy reality show I would watch.”
“Speaking of which, we got our first fake date tonight.” Vanessa crosses one leg over the other in the office chair, leans back against it. “I’m thinking shitty TV show marathon.”
Brooke raises an eyebrow. “You wanna Netflix and chill on the first date?”
“What? We’re not actually-” Vanessa sputters on her words, because Brooke’s looking at her with a note of amusement in her eyes. “Damn, you making me sound like I got a one track mind, mama.”
“I mean, it’s our first date, isn’t it? You gotta take me somewhere classy first, treat me real nice.” Brooke is fully enjoying the conversation at Vanessa’s expense, leaning forward as she winks at her. “If you wanna keep a lady around you have to make her feel like a queen, y’know.”
“Goddamn, not even real dating and we got demands here.” But it doesn’t deter Vanessa in the least - in fact, if Brooke wants to enjoy this scam that they’re pulling off, Vanessa’s gonna make sure she does by planning the best damn date ever.
Vanessa discovers that she has incredible difficulty planning the ‘best damn date ever,’ even when it’s fake.
“Y’all, where do I take her? I ain’t planned shit! Just told her to dress up real nice, now she expecting something special and my dumbass was so excited for the date that I forgot to plan. Shit!”
To an outsider, it looks like Vanessa’s officially lost her marbles, talking to herself. While she certainly does feel that way, she’s got her good Judys on the open FaceTime screen, ready to help her in times of crisis such as these.
Vanessa’s rifling through her closet, pulling out dress after dress because none of them will work, not in the least. They’re too short or too nun-like or too thotty - she needs the perfect amount of classy, and it’s nowhere to be found.
“Vanj. Vanj. That fancy restaurant uptown?”
Silky’s suggestion is nice, sure, but absolutely no help. “That place has been booked up for months, Silk. Ain’t no way we gonna get a reservation for tonight.”
“Take her to a movie or some shit, then balance it with a mediocre restaurant. They’ll cancel each other out.” A’keria’s suggestion is smart, sensible, but-
“But that’s so boring, that’s what everyone does on every first date to ever exist. I wanna wow her.”
Vanessa’s not even sure why it matters so much to her - the date is not even a real date, for crying out loud. But part of her still wants to impress Brooke, make her enjoy herself, because she’s still taking time out of her own evening to spend with Vanessa after all, real or not.
“I ain’t got nothing left for you.” Silky shrugs, grabbing another handful of popcorn that she’s popped specifically to watch Vanessa’s dramatics. “You on your own. It’s now or never.”
Vanessa looks out the window of her apartment, sees the glittering lights and sky scrapers that feel so far away and-
“Shit y’all, I’ve got it!”
“Planetarium, huh?”
Brooke’s impressed - Vanessa can tell these types of things. It makes her more excited than she wants to admit.
“Ah y’know, nice chill first date material.” As if Vanessa hasn’t already tried to pat herself on the back for coming up with it. “Anyone tell you that you look killer, by the way?”
Brooke does, in a black knee length dress that makes Vanessa’s eyes constantly trail to her-
She can control herself. She’s not a teenage boy. Or is trying not to be.
Brooke gives her an appreciative once over in response, one that makes Vanessa squirm under her gaze even though she knows that there’s nothing behind it, that it’s platonic. Because there’s something about having Brooke’s full attention that still feels like a bit too much, like it’s taking her breath away.
“Where do you want to sit?” Brooke’s looking at her with an eyebrow raised, as if she’s already asked the question more than once, as if the first time had flown over Vanessa’s head. If it has, Vanessa’s unaware of it.
But she’s not going to make it a habit. Brooke’s just a person - a smoking hot one, sure, but still just a person. Someone who’s helping her win a bet against A’keria and Silky, and so Vanessa owes it to both of them to make sure they have fun in the process.
So, she’s gonna make sure Brooke has the best fake first date in her damn life.
“Let’s go to the back. My neck’s gonna cramp up if we take the front.” Vanessa takes a step up the stairs, but not before interlocking fingers with Brooke - after all, if she’s gonna play the part, she’s gonna fully go for it.
Brooke shrugs, but doesn’t pull her hand back. Instead, she tightens their grip. “Works for me. Lead the way.”
The theatre darkens as they take their seats, and the announcer’s voice is hard to focus on, it is, when the ceiling above them is lit up with stars and galaxies not unlike those that would sparkle in Vanessa’s dreams when she was six and had wanted to be an astronaut. The twinkles that seem so in reach, so close by, not like the huge bundles of fire that they actually are, the ones that burn should anyone get too close.
It’s mesmerizing.
Vanessa feels the resurfacing of the niche outer space facts from her childhood, from the secondhand kid’s encyclopedias that her mom had gotten for her at garage sales. The ones that Vanessa would pour over, trying to absorb everything she could, back when her biggest problems in life could be solved by thumbing through the pages.
“Did you know that any these stars coulda burned out ages ago and we wouldn’t know, ‘cause of how fucking far away they are? They’re hundreds of light years away so when we see them burn out, it’s actually happened centuries back. But we only find out now.” Vanessa whispers the words because the narrator is still droning on and she doesn’t want to disrupt anyone else.
But it’s cool.
Brooke looks over for a second, unspoken questions on her face that Vanessa can’t quite decipher. “How’d you know so much about space?”
Brooke’s voice is a whisper too, not wanting to disturb the presentation either, and it strikes Vanessa how much the reflection of the stars in Brooke’s eyes is really making them shine.
“Astronaut was my backup career after HR.” The statement has the intended outcome of making Brooke laugh, and it feels better than Vanessa wants to admit. “You ain’t had obsessions as a kid?”
Brooke pauses, really thinks. “Mine was the Titanic, when I was eight. Not the movie, but the actual sinking of the ship itself. I was fascinated by it.”
Vanessa wrinkles her nose. “The ship? Why?”
“I dunno,” Brooke shrugs, “think it was the way it contradicted itself. Supposed to be the unsinkable ship, branded as such. Treated as such. Yet it went down on the first voyage.”
“That’s what happens when you get overcocky. Can’t mouth off too much.” Vanessa tries to hold back a laugh when Brooke looks over at her, the scandalized furrow of her brow fitting perfectly from the way her mouth has slightly fallen open. “Am I wrong, though?”
Brooke lets out a huff. “No. But still.”
But Brooke’s face can’t hold its serious expression for long, though, something Vanessa is delighted to see. Vanessa grins when Brooke leans back in her seat, tugs on the bracelet on her wrist. “Tell me more outer space facts, space girl.”
“What kinda nickname is that?”
Brooke grins. “One that somehow fits you.”
Instagram story posted by @bhytes. Location: @griffithobservatory. Tagged: @vanessavanjie. Description: A boomerang of Vanessa spinning in a circle, her skirt twirling around her, under a backdrop of stars.
“So, there we were in Target, my abuela completely having lost control of the motorized scooter, about to crash into the display of paper towels, my mom running after her and screaming, a buncha other customers watching with their mouths open, and me and my aunt laughing so hard that we’re about to fall over.” Vanessa’s eyes are lit up as she sets the scene, and Brooke doesn’t think she’s ever laughed so much in her life.
“Stop, stop. I’m gonna pee.” Brooke has to wipe a tear from her eye, trying desperately to hold back the giggles that are threatening to bubble up again whenever she so much as makes eye contact with Vanessa.
“So then she crashes, right? But then one of the wheels is still going so she starts spinning. Spinning. Meanwhile my mom’s tryna turn off the dang thing, and you know what starts playing in the background?” Vanessa takes a bite of her pasta, and Brooke wants to take a sip of her own drink, she really does, but she’s afraid of doing a spit take at this point.
“Oh, god. What?”
Vanessa giggles before she can get the words out. “‘You Spin Me Round’ by Dead or Alive. You know, ‘you spin me right round baby, right round like a record player…’”
“Shut up.” Brooke has to clap a hand over her mouth because the other diners at the restaurant are looking over at the two of them, but she can’t help it, can’t help the laughter because Vanessa is hysterical.
“I ain’t playing, it really did! Me and my aunt were absolutely hollering and no help whatsoever to my abuela. Some random pimply sixteen year old that worked there had to come and turn her scooter off.”
“She wasn’t hurt, was she?” Brooke pauses, realizing that the story could have more serious consequences on the way. She doesn’t want to be disrespectful towards Vanessa’s grandma, she really doesn’t-
But Vanessa waves her hand. “Nah, she was fine. In fact, when they got her up again, she started grumbling on about how the fastest setting on the scooter was still too slow. Adrenaline junkie.”
Brooke tries to picture what Vanessa’s grandma would look like, speeding a little too fast on her scooter. “Somehow, she sounds like you when you’ll be older.”
Vanessa snorts. “I can’t even argue that. We basically the same.”
“You’re ridiculous, and I love it.” Brooke rests her chin on her hands as she glances across the table over towards Vanessa, still shoveling down her pasta. “God, why haven’t we ever talked before?”
“Maybe ‘cause we’re in completely different departments?” Vanessa raises an eyebrow, her lips curling up. “And tell me you’d still give me the time of day if I hadn’t barged into your office one day and roped you into this little scheme of mine.”
“Hey, I would have!” Brooke’s indignant, because she so would. She’s not that closed off. “I think.”
She thinks.
“So me striking up conversation in the Starbucks line about my wheelie-loving abuela would have gone over well?” Vanessa lets out a laugh, and Brooke can’t help it either, at the mental image of Vanessa tapping her shoulder to do so.
“To be fair, that’s not a scenario that’s ever really crossed my mind before. Do you often bother people about your grandma?”
Vanessa doesn’t miss a beat. “Only the ones who get as delighted about it as you do.” She leans back in her seat, putting her fork down. “That being said? I’m glad we talking now, ‘cause you’re more fun than you seem.”
Brooke scoffs. “I’m plenty fun, thank you very much.”
“Oh yeah? What’s your last Venmo transaction?”
Brooke wrinkles her nose. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Venmo transactions tell a shit ton about a person. Now c’mon, open up that shiny phone.” Vanessa’s fingertips tap on the table, and Brooke lets out a huff, but does so.
Hopefully it’s something cool. Fun. Exciting. Not something boring like-
“A cat tree? Your last transaction was for a cat tree?” Vanessa’s trying not to laugh, Brooke can tell, and she has to hold back a groan.
”It was a really cool cat tree! It had multiple levels and all these little hiding spots that Henry and Apollo will love and-” Brooke cuts herself off, dropping her head in her hands. “Ugh. Cat trees can be fun.”
Vanessa reaches out to pat Brooke’s shoulder, her eyes still sparkling. “I believe you, mama.”
“No you don’t.” Brooke’s voice comes out muffled, and sure, she’s acting like a ten year old, but she can’t help it.
“I sure don’t. So guess for our next fake date you gonna introduce me to those pussycats of yours, hmm? We gonna be spending some time together.” Vanessa pauses, her lips pursed together as to keep herself from cracking up. “Not your actual pussy, remember, we fake dating, not real dating, jesus-”
“Oh, shut up.” Brooke reaches out to shove Vanessa’s shoulder, her hand nearly landing on the table when Vanessa dodges it. “Just for that, no meeting the cats for you.”
“Mean.” Vanessa sticks her tongue out at her and Brooke snorts.
But now that Vanessa’s said it, she’s coming around to the idea. It would be kinda nice to hang out more with Vanessa, even if the purpose is to post things on social media to fool her friends into thinking that they’re dating. Because it would be fun - her and Vanessa clearly get along great, and, well-
Having another friend wouldn’t be so bad.
“Tell you what. You can come over and meet the cats, but I pick the show we watch.”
Vanessa grins at her suggestion. “Tryna Netflix and chill me already?”
Brooke rolls her eyes. “You’re relentless.”
“And yet, you enjoy it.” Vanessa wiggles her eyebrows as she takes a sip of her drink. “Fancy that.”
It’s true. Vanessa is hysterical, fun to talk to. Sure, a little ridiculous at times, but it’s what Brooke needs - someone to balance her out a little.
“Honestly? Somehow, I kinda do.”
“You went on a date.”
“Yep.”
“You, Brooke Lynn Hytes, went on a date.”
“You bet.”
“You went on a date?”
“Is that really so hard to believe, Nina?”
Nina takes a big sip of her wine, as if she needs it to get through the conversation. Brooke can’t blame her for it.
“I’ve known you for seven years and not once have you been on a date.” Nina’s pointing a finger at her, and she shrugs.
“What’s wrong with being picky?”
“It’s not being picky if you absolutely refuse everyone. Except, it seems, for this new girl.” Nina’s already leaning forward, resting her head on her hands with a grin on her face. “So, you need to tell me absolutely everything about her because this is the best day of my entire life.”
Brooke raises an eyebrow. “More than the day when Ben proposed to you?”
Nina pauses. “Well, maybe. Actually, I think those two would be on the same level.” She shrugs when she sees Brooke’s skeptical expression. “C’mon, this literally never happens. It’s exciting. Now tell me about her.”
“She’s in HR, we struck up a conversation and she asked me out on a date and I said yes?” So what if Brooke’s explanation ends in a question?
“You said yes.”
“Yeah? How else would we have gone on a date?”
“But you never say yes.” Nina’s brow is furrowed as if she’s trying to solve the world’s biggest math problem, and it almost makes Brooke laugh.
“I did this time.” Brooke shrugs, taking a sip of her wine to avoid eye contact with Nina.
“But why? Why this time?”
Brooke pauses, because she can’t give Nina the real answer. That they’re doing this for shits and giggles and so that Brooke won’t have to deal with people trying to set her up.
So, she goes another route.
“I dunno. She’s funny, I like her. She made me laugh more in that first conversation with her than I’ve laughed with anyone else. So, maybe I just want a bit more laughter in my life.”
It’s true, when Brooke thinks about it. Fake dating or not, Vanessa is fun. Someone who is genuinely delightful, genuinely fun to spend time with. Their date hadn’t even been a real one but it’s probably the best one Brooke’s had, maybe ever, solely because of how much she’d enjoyed herself. How much fun Vanessa is to be around.
Brooke’s going to try and stay her friend, once they’re done this nonsense. To still hang out with Vanessa and be her friend ( are they friends?) because she’s someone that doesn’t drain or tire Brooke out, despite her exuberance.
Nina’s eating it up, from the way that her eyes are wide, how her lips are forming a soft pout. “That’s so fucking cute, you absolute sap.”
“That wasn’t sappy in the least and you know it.”
Nina waves a hand. “Whatever. From you, it’s practically a declaration of love. Anyway, can’t wait to be your maid of honour at the wedding.”
“Don’t you start.”
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this has been the most wild fuckin year so let’s do a Year in Review shall we
in terms of internet and fandom life, that is. my real life has been atrociously boring but who cares about real life amirite folx
january probably the only calm month of the year.  i spent the first day of the month watching the brazilian inauguration in burgos, spain with one headphone in, while ordering for my family in a restaurant where nobody spoke english (my sister speaks decent spanish, but my whole family has like 8194814 food restrictions so it kind of went past her level of ability). translating between spanish and english with portuguese in one year was kind of awesome. i watched bodyguard and it was amazing!  what else...in january i briefly owned the issue of spanish GQ with Luka on the cover which i then forgot about until november. other than that...? nada.  the calm before the storm. (fav music)
february was so long ago that i keep forgetting how insane its 28 days were.  probably the wildest month of the year really. i got involved in an absolutely batshit and exclusive group chat with a famous person’s family member (which must remain confidential). it was all sunshine and rainbows for a week and a half and it then devolved into the most absolutely insane Lord of the Flies situation ever--it turned into 1 main chat and then 1 chat that was less puritanical than the main chat, and that chat spawned another chat that didn’t trust the previous chat, and then that chat had a massive argument and a like 6-person bitchy chat modded by a gay guy who does voodoo (shoutout to ALCIDES) spawned from that one.  i made it into every level of group chat and was asked by the tiny bitchy chat to spy on the other bitchy chat (i did not lol). i was a member of the tiny bitchy chat until i got a new phone and was logged out of whatsapp for like a month.  these words can’t even convey what this chat was like--oh and did i mention it was all conducted in only my 3rd-best language? it’s no wonder my weird ass survived middle school almost entirely unscathed.  as this was winding down, on the very last day of the month, I found out about Justin’s involvement in the SNC-Lavalin scandal and decided to go public about my years-long boner for him; Lavscam definitely changed the course of the rest year ~ Oh, also i began helping to repair a friendship that had had some Drama go down so that was p cool ~ (fav music)
march was a Time. The insanity of lavscam helped me finally finish the macdeau I started writing the previous December when a bunch of tungelr people called me disgusting for writing it.  i wrote my first straight-up serious explicit porn in years which has wound up being the third-longest thing i’ve ever published on ao3. Also, Hozier released Wasteland, Baby! which made a huge impact on me as well.  i spent like half of march staying up till 3:30 am writing said Long Fic, and i was firmly in the closet about stanning manu. also justin almost got a vote of no confidence or something and he got busted for eating a chocolate bar during a parliamentary all-nighter.  (fav music)
in april i wrote a ton of fanfic thanks to declining mental health(tm).  i think this is when i started my emmanuyell insta account and became really into making weird edits (which i still love doing just...don’t anymore.)  i started meeting some cool people thanks to macdeau.  what else happened in april? i feel like it wasn’t actually too eventful other than writing a lot of fanfic and being Annoyed about manu.  feel free to jog my memory lol.  oh i think i wrote “Okay so who from the French national team are we gonna ship Manu with” on twitter after seeing photos of manu + antoine griezmann at the World Cup but nothing came of that...at that time... (fav music)
may saw me having to deal with my shit mental health and up my meds but that seems to have had a good effect because i seem to not be too depressed to write in the winter/fall anymore! it was the 2nd anniversary of manu’s election and at the Christchurch Call in paris, macdeau took that amazing fairytale princess photo together that was completely unrivalled in Gay Shippy Feels moments until ivan went out of his way to kiss luka during the el clásico gameplay last wednesday. someone wrote ao3′s first griezmanu drabble and at the end manu gets down on his knees in front of antoine, takes off his shoes for him, and sucks his dick, and i achieved another state of being entirely.  my sister graduated from grad school and when we went down to DC for the weekend i went to eat at this restaurant manu famously ate at while there and ordered the same stuff he did and i have no idea how he consumed all that grease.  i learned about the song O Come, O Come, Emmanuel *snort*. i feel like other things happened in may too?  OH YES--i got the idea for my magnum opus, Trophy Boyfriend, and started to write it. the first scene i wrote was justin blowing manu in the hallway. then the same day i wrote the scene at the airport (which was the ending for a solid month and half till i realized it shouldn’t be), and the saddest scene in the fic--but we’ll stop to open presents.  oh! and i stumbled across the macronists discord chat which is such a delightful little community *weepy sniffles* (fav music)
june was Eventful.  a french neonazi on tumblr told me to go let manu fuck me in the ass because i was a fucking degenerate.  what a start!  then came the ceremony in which manu awarded everyone on the french national team the legion of honor medal and the way he and antoine looked at each other was truly...Wait it was the 3rd Gay Shippy Feels moment of the year.  as soon as the ceremony was over i wrote a fic about it and haven’t looked back.  between this + watching almost every 2018 World Cup game and the women’s world cup (during which I cried during argentina’s last game because of that miraculous penalty) i finally achieved my years-long goal of getting into Futbol(TM).  Antoine dropped his spotify playlist and my crush on him turned into Intense Love (TM) and also he introduced me to some legit awesome artists.  which led to (fav music)
july, in which i wrote “ça c’est ma dope” which is definitely the best thing i’ve written since i wrote “modernity towering in front of the sky” almost exactly 10 years before. got embroiled in Soccer Transfer Drama and learned its pain for the first time (unfortunately, since i wound up attaching my heart-wagon to barça’s Suddenly Least Favorite Player, the transfer drama pain has...never ended) became a full-fledged culé, O the joy O the honor.  i wanted to ship antoine with someone on the team, which in their current chemistry-less season is a real challenge, but after seeing a few photos i decided it would be fun to casually ship antoine + ivan rakitic (partially because, ever since i went from Enemies to Lovers with the croatia NT during the World Cup, he was one of the only players i knew anything about other than messi, suárez, and piqué lmao). while looking on ao3 to see what kind of headcanons people had about him--and the fic is definitely in general better than what’s out there about antoine, which is perplexing because antoine is much easier to write than ivan--i found That Amazing Rakidric Fic and thought “oh wait that ship makes a lot of sense” and started also shipping ivan and luka with the fire of a thousand suns.  oh and my air conditioner was broken for like 3 weeks. i worked on more fics, seriously outlining the path of Trophy Boyfriend, and my music taste was killer. (fav music)
in august i finished Trophy Boyfriend in my neighborhood Starbucks after writing the scene that was giving me the most trouble (the scene at the beginning where they’re organizing their book collection). the fic has made multiple people cry and people disagree on whether justin’s choice at the end was the right one and god i’m so proud of it.  Instantly went on to write ‘i might not mind,’ a lively lighthearted Friends to Lovers ivantoine~ romp which was definitely going to be a one-off and i was definitely not going to get an extra celeb crush out of it,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, (fav music)
in september ivantoine became A Thing in my mind and it’s a whole ongoing slow-burn character-arcy series that has taken a very different turn than i had expected. i’m not saying it’s like, the most deep writing of all time, but it’s gone to some interesting places emotionally. honestly, ships and boners aside, the concept of a person who made some really stupid homophobia 101 comments many years ago slowly realizing over and over again that they have gay feelings for a man who seems rather comfortable with gayness is a fascinating one and one that’s really cool to explore in writing.  Or at least, i think so.  in many ways ivan is my most unreliable narrator because of the many layers of Discomfort, Emotion and Repression at play in the fic while he’s interacting with this pretty cheery and uncomplicated seeming-dude who’s still perceptive enough to sort of know what’s going on (and that’s not even adding in the star player/falling from grace former rockstar dynamic!!!)  i know in the current climate it’s Not Allowed to write about someone who said a bad, but luckily i’m too old to give a Fuck. ivantoine is hard to write but it’s my bff’s favorite ship of mine and has a few other excited fans on ao3 which tbh is kind of an accomplishment considering i made it up out of thin air and it’s not something you’d ever think would be a thing. instantly also developed ‘getting called out about ivan by a child on the internet’ as a goal.  and...i achieved my dream of leading high holiday services!!! (fav music)
october had more high holiday services and i worked a lot on certain fics (including d*janfic which would be fun to finish). i came up with the idea of a Very Long Rakidric Fic based on the translation of a gorgeous croatian folk song i sang in college (Janko fell asleep under the poplar/My dear and beloved/My beautiful dark eyes/Look at me/Under the poplar's golden branch/My dear and beloved/My beautiful dark eyes/Look at me/I tore off the golden branch/My dear and beloved/My beautiful dark eyes/Look at me--in which the golden branch is a reference to a way to get into the underworld). decided to start quarter-assedly learning croatian for fun.  Fun...ha.  other than fangirling a lot and watching the croatian NT play, october was pretty uneventful? i think? Justin got reelected and mauricio didn’t ;( (fav music)
in november i finally achieved my dream of having a literal child on the internet call me out about being attracted to a homophobe.  (they were a madridista even!) accidentally started writing some more rakidric and now i’m seriously hooked.  also accidentally came out of the closet about the secret crush i’d been harboring on luka modric and then one fateful day in the ihop on 14th st i realized i’d had this crush already and repressed it from my memory. Don’t do that kids! now it’s Hurting Really Bad. Ivan dropped the most pathetic and candid interview like...ever and i hope “¿Cómo puede disfrutar uno? Jugando al fútbol. ¿Cómo se siente mi hija pequeña cuando le quitan un juguete? Triste. Yo me siento igual. Me han quitado la pelota, me siento triste” goes down in the history of most epic futbol quotes of all time.  (still haven’t actually been able to watch this because no one has uploaded it anywhere)  What else...............Am i forgetting anything? i celebrated my birthday with @tender-vittles in epic fashion after two years of Not doing that, and turned 32 going on 15.  enjoyed my first-ever “x reader” fic (zlatko dalic x reader LOL) and finished “drive your plow over the bones of the dead” which was real fucking good. i saw hozier live and it was a religious experience and i unexpectedly cried during nina cried power and then called myself “Luka B” when ordering at the classy taco bell across the street after getting a glimpse of alexxx ryan in the flesh. (fav music)
now it’s december and my seasonal depression is a little worse than it’s been the past few years but i’m managing.  still shipping and writing and i just got called out about ivan again last week.  i’m 2 for 2 here!  el clásico was boring but also it was gay and my heart my heart my heart ! Anything could happen in the last 10 days of this year and honestly...I’m pretty sure I’m ready.
Most importantly this year, despite it being not that great in a lot of ways, I developed a lot more self confidence, made many important realizations, and became a lot more peaceful (despite how this post makes me sound) and wiser and less bitter and pessimistic.  And i became outspoken enough about antisemitism on the left to lose friends over it...3 for 3.  i can’t say i’m displeased with these developments.
Hasta 2020! <3
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648-649: "Making a Sortie! The Legendary Hero Usoland!" and "The Fierce Battle Coming to the End! Lucy vs Chinjao!"
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*looks into the camera like in The Office*
The fight between Luffy and Don Chinjao is finally over! I think after what happened, Luffy might have found a new friend. Law also made a stressful phone call to The Krusty Krab Sunny and ordered delivery of one ship to Green Bit.
Zoro and Franky have teamed up with Sol at Resistance HQ in Flower Field, and if Usopp keeps perpetuating his fantastic bullshit, the entire Strawhat crew will be elevated to God status in the Tontatta tribe.
Slightly worried about Law and the Strawhats stuck on Sunny but I’m seventy percent certain they will pull through and won’t be captured by any Donquixote family affiliates. (The thirty percent left over remains a huge, nagging doubt.)
Luffy’s Tough Love Fight Therapy
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The Colosseum showdown between Luffy and Don Chinjao picked up at the start of episode 649.
The action was fast and furious. Luffy pulled out all his quick moves: jet pistol, jet gatling, jet stamp gatling. All defended against by Chinjao. The crowd went wild. It was one of the greatest matches the Colosseum had ever seen! Some cheered for Lucy. Others cheered for Chinjao. The atmosphere was electric.
“You’re quite a fighter,” Don Chinjao said.
“Yeah, you’re strong too, as I thought,” Luffy answered. You know. Being honest as he is.
Don Chinjao totally overreacted. “WHAT U SAY? STRONG? U TRYIN TO INSULT MEH??”
Luffy was, quite rightly, bewildered. “Wtf, all I said was that you’re strong?”
Apparently, this was a grave insult to Don Chinjao. A huge kick in the ego. Chinjao had been much stronger before.
“I’m no better than a wolf without its fangs now. A skin-headed man without his drill. A brat like you can’t understand how miserable I feel living my life like this. I’m frustrated, disappointed and sad. But you can never understand.”
I laughed when Luffy yelled, “How can I understand? You keep messing with me without explaining anything!” (He’s just saying what we were all thinking, right?)
“You really want to know why I’ve become like this?”
“No, I’m not that interested.” (Lmao! We meet again, harsh Luffy.)
“Well, I’ll tell you before you die, since you insist.” 
Don Chinjao is one of those old dudes that is TELLING you that long and rambling story even though you have showed zero interest and have been glancing at your watch for the past half hour.
Suddenly, Luffy the Fight Therapist was unwilling and open for business.
According to Chinjao, Garp punched his head in thirty years ago. Literally. As in Don Chinjao once looked like Dan Akroyd from 90s sci-fi comedy, Coneheads. 
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That was until his resplendent, pointy napper met Garp’s fist.
The whole flashback was hilariously weird. Turns out Chinjao’s drill-like bonce was the only means to access his remote family treasure vault under an ice sheet. Once Garp took away the key, Chinjao fell into a deep depression. Heartbroken, he retired from piracy, a lifeless shell, just idling away time.
That was kind of sad. I felt for Chinjao then. He’s like the model of the old, proud working man who suffers a physical injury, can no longer work and slips into anger and depression. Since Chinjao knows and values nothing but strength, wealth and power, he cannot and will not see another way forward. Unlike Luffy, Don Chinjao got his ass beat and never found the strength to crawl out of the gutter and retrain.
Instead, he decided to lay the blame for his misfortune squarely at Luffy’s feet.
Luffy, naturally, was outraged. “Wtf are you talking about? Grandpa and I are different people. Look, mate. I’m busy. I’m gonna win Ace’s fruit at any cost and become the Pirate King. I have no time to be your therapist.”
Then Chinjao made two Big Mistakes.
Wow, Chinjao has Really Specific Taste
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Mistake #1?
Chinjao laughed off Luffy’s chances at becoming Pirate King. The reason was typical crotchety old man talk: “the media lionised you worst generation squirts and it emboldened you. But none of you are strong enough to sail across the sea *we* fought on. After Whitebeard’s death, I ain’t expecting much. The only guy who looks good is Blackbeard Teach.”
At the mere mention of Teach, Luffy’s eyes became two circles.
“If I had to pick one, it’s him. But anyway, if you’re only good enough to compete against me, just give up!”
Oh, Chinjao, I thought. Ohhhhhhhh, you just goofed. You goofed big time. You do not mention Teach in a positive light within Luffy’s earshot. You just do not. Teach was the asshole who captured Ace and handed him to the Marines. He shares Public Enemy Number One status with Akainu. Tell Luffy you believe Teach will become Pirate King and your fate is sealed.
Mistake #2?
Chinjao’s fighting style is kinda lame. People who spin during fights in shounen anime are always fodder (the one that sticks out is that spinning top guy in the HxH Heaven’s Arena arc.) This was not his mistake. It’s just a side thought.
The Teach comment pushed Luffy’s buttons. But what Chinjao said next was even worse.
“You’re not too bad but if a guy like Rayleigh chose a brat at this level as the flag bearer for this generation, he’s not as smart as he used to be. The Marines were smart when they squelched the most evil one of the lot: Ace. That man had demon’s blood in his veins. Do you think you can beat the Marine admirals, the Yonkou and surpass Roger? That’s impossible!”
Demon’s blood? Most evil one of the lot?
*cue Kill Bill red-mist music*
“Stop whining over one punch!” Luffy yelled, as he wound up a Thor Elephant Gun attack. “I can’t count how many times I got punched by Grandpa!”
When the attack connected and that spike popped back out of Chinjao’s head, I laughed like a drain. Luffy hit Chinjao so hard, he turned the clock back thirty years.
I’m sure Chinjao will be ecstatic. Take the L with good grace, mate. Your conehead is back! Go and wreak havoc on the high seas again. Recoup that treasure. The world is your oyster!
Up on the balcony, Bartolomeo still has not revealed his connection with Luffy. Cavendish is still throwing a strop. Bellamy is lurking in the shadows, clearly in two minds about his new assassination mission. And Burgess, thanks to Cavendish and his big mouth, knows that Luffy is Lucy.
Thanks, Cavendish.
(And Burgess really does walk around chortling and flexing all the time. He’s like an evil All Might.)
Thus the Legendary Heroes of Green Bit were Born
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This cast reunion based on Usopp’s total bullshit was so much fun.
I loved Usopp and Robin’s expressions when the Tontatta took them to their airport. They were starry-eyed. And so they should’ve been. It was a miniature version of a proper, fully-equipped modern airport. I wouldn’t be surprised if the place had Duty Free, passport control and Starbucks concessions.
But it was not a holiday destination Usopp and Robin were flying out to. The entire airport had been overtaken by a military operation. Cub, the yellow bee squad leader, and Bian, the pink bee squad leader, reported for duty. Usopp picked up the bee planes and kept saying, “I wanna show this to Luffy.” (They are such good pals, it warms my heart.)
Unfortunately, Usopp and Robin were too big to travel by bee plane, so they had to take the local number 20 bus to Dressrosa. The buses were cute, vulpix-like foxes with huge, fluffy tails you can sink right into for a comfortable ride.
While they made their way through the tunnel, Master Roshi - the pervy little Tontatta chief - emerged from Robin’s cleavage. He bore dire warnings. “I should tell you because you will risk your lives for our cause.”
Usopp was thinking, “I ain’t gonna die for you but go on...”
“Doflamingo has been causing our tribe a lot of pain recently, but our connection with him goes way back before the last decade. Nine hundred years ago!”
Then the narrator interrupted and I was like, “So you’re just going to leave it there when I was about to get Doflamingo family history? I am not at all mad about this. No, sir. Not one bit.”
The action cut to Flower Field, where Franky and Sol descended a secret stairwell. Said stairwell led to the Resistance Army HQ! Some soldiers ran up to Sol and addressed him as “Captain”, so Sol is a Big Deal in the Resistance.
Franky was like, “Why are all these small people swarming me?”
Sol explained. The Tontatta people were called fairies in town, how they moved faster than the human eye could detect and how they were immensely strong. Franky put two and two together and realised one of them stole Zoro’s sword!
And guess who reached Flower Field before Franky? Before any of the other Strawhats!
That’s right. It’s our boy Zoro. (So proud he learned to follow directions.)
Zoro, hilariously, had made himself at home and was watching Luffy vs Chinjao on the big screen TV. He was absolutely fuming. Why hadn’t Luffy told him there was a fighting competition? THE BETRAYAL. Will he get over it? Probably.
He must’ve been distracted by the fight, as he completely forgot 
Then some intelligence scouts ran up. They had a report for Sol. “We already know what our enemies and Sugar are doing!” (Sugar? Who dat?) “And with the battle close at hand, some legendary heroes have appeared at Tontatta: Usoland and Robiland. They have brought with them Luffyland, Zoroland, Namiland, Sanland, Chopperland, Fraland and Boneland.”
Franky and Zoro exchanged a Look. They knew instantly Usopp was on the bullshit wagon again.
“Um, I think I’m Zoroland,” Zoro said. (Lmao, better get into character quick.)
“And I’m Fraland. Nice to meet you!” Franky added.
It was round about then that Zoro remembered that Nami, Chopper and Brook were in serious trouble back on Sunny. He now wants to skip the battle (he doesn’t yet know about) and rescue the other Strawhats.
I wonder how this will go? Wicka did say she would let Zoro go back to Sunny once he’d taken her back to Resistance HQ. But Leo and the others back on Green Bit were suspicious of Robin and Usopp escaping. Will they let Zoro go or will he have to fight the battle first? Hmmm... I’m fifty/fifty about this.
God damn it, Caesar
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*curb your enthusiasm music kicks in*
Meanwhile, back on Green Bit, Law was under heavy bombardment. Fujitora took a step back in this episode and Doflamingo stole the limelight. The cool music from Enies Lobby (as I call it in my head. I have no idea what the real title is) played as Doflamingo pursued Law. 
As Doflamingo was about to land a finishing blow, Caesar shrieked, “OI, JOKER! Before you kill Law, I need you to take something back for me. Law took my heart and I don’t know what he’s gonna do with it!”
Doflamingo looked round like, “Wtf... are you talking about?” And while he was distracted, Law shambled his way out of trouble.
Doflamingo was furious. FFS, CAESAR. I bet he wanted to say that but couldn’t. Gotta keep your cash cow scientist happy..
Please send help. Our art teacher has locked us in class.
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Unfortunately, Law didn’t have time for a breather. He had an urgent phone call to make.
While Nami, Chopper and Brook were brought up to speed on the Humans Turning Into Toys situation by Giolla, the ship’s DDM rang. Chopper hilariously ignored Giolla and answered the call (she was maaaaad).
It was Law. He said, “Is that Nami-san?”
To my disappointment, Chopper did not answer, “No, this is Patrick.”
“I don’t care what’s going on over there,” Law said. “Listen carefully. I need you to sail Sunny to Green Bit right now. I wanna leave Caesar with you guys. No time to explain. Bye!”
Okay, so I added in the “bye” part. Law abruptly hung up.
I like how he has faith that Nami, Chopper and Brook will be able to handle the situation, but their weapons have been rendered usless by Giolla’s Art Art Fruit power. I have no idea how they’re going to get out of this one (and I’m keen to see Oda’s creative solution).
The shitshow that is Law’s current existence continued once he hung up. Doflamingo is Doflamingo. He caught up with Law again near the end of episode 648. With that slasher smile, he shot Law with a string bullet and demanded to know who Law had called for help.
Doflamingo must be confident he has Law where he wants him because he spilled the beans on his diabolical plan to snare Luffy. “Give me back Caesar’s heart already. It’s so meaningless for you to keep hanging on here. Strawhat has already walked into the trap I set. He’s fighting in the gladiatorial contest at the Colosseum. Tough contenders from all over the world come to fight in it. Outlaws only. It’s a deadly competition. When someone loses, it’s a one way ticket to hell! He will never come out of the Colosseum alive! It’s the end of your alliance, Law. Just give up!”
I wonder if Law will use the heart as leverage. Maybe he’ll give up Caesar’s heart to escape, regroup and stop Doflamingo the old-fashioned way: with Tontatta military might. (Doflamingo better not kill him off...)
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Don’t worry, Chinjao. Luffy will beat you until you feel better! :D
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palukoo · 4 years
Text
so a couple months ago i relistened to w359 and made a 18000 word document while doing so containing iconic quotes, my reactions, feelings, et cetera. heres some highlights with varying amounts of context. (theres lowkey spoilers for the whole series btw)
""""i empathize too much""""
crazy how i still vividly remember walking outside [my old job] and to starbucks while listening to the spider ep... trauma
i mean i dont love it but it makes me feel things
GABRIEL THATS TOO ON THE NOSE
"let me have my badass space chick victory cocktail"
god like i AM team what wrong with handcuffs but I WOULD NOT HESITATE to kill hilbert for hera
the girlssss are fightinggg
THE SAD W359 MUSIC IS KILLING ME
like memoria who maxwell who jk jk
i love you renee minkowski marry me
local idiot's heart is in the right place
HARPOOOOOOONSSSS
lovelace lovelace lovelace loveLACE LOVELACE
"maybe she's some kind of clone thing" EIFFEL... this is day 1!!!
i hate these self sacrificial idiots
no no no not this music again ill cry
yall are so emotionally stunted it fucking hurts but damn if you dont care
literally how are they still alive
i want to hug her so much omg
alan rody shut the FUCK up im crying
rip zach valenti's throat
face the death reality via math
jacobi being a piece of shit
maxwell said lets kill hilbert rights
this is a kepler hate blog
minkowski thinking her emotions dont matter to the mission oh ho ho
"youre gonna straighten up" cutter they cant theyre not straight
maxwell and jacobi show up and blow up lads
"and you should really be more careful with your queen" KEPLER WHAT DOES THAT MEAN
wolf 359 stop making me stan these literally terrible people
FUNZO FUNZO FUNZO
i am caring about men tonight lads
theyre both awful sure go ahead have history
hilbert you interrupted their emotional moment they wouldve had a MOMENT
hera said im gay
ohhhh nooo interpersonal conflict makes me sad
hug minkowski rn
FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC jacobi and maxwell are iconic
minkowski how did you not kill him
how much do yall use the words "good enough" and "cant"
"are you an alien" GOD the Hints
"one of our... sexier jobs" vs "this is gonna said less sexy after that"
eiffel stop cockblocking them
y'all's choice of pronouns IS illuminating
PROTECT HERA AT ALL COSTS
aw eiffel... minkowski... communication is KEY
oh yeah THATS what the psi wave regulator is for.... SURE
hilbert read the room
JACOBI you can't just describe minkowski like that without giving me a heart attack
how many times have all these bitches almost died
SORRY ANYTHING THEY SAY I LOSE IT
oh minkowski finally flipped (VALID)
oh wait that fact isnt fun at all and im literally crying
LIKE sometimes you save someone's life at great personal risk only to kill her a little while later
minkowski cries to “back to before” from ragtime
i feel to many things about the gals here idk what to tell you i love them thats the problem
its gay and it hurts!
lovelace laughing at people who can and will kill her... hot
OH WERE STARTING LOVELACES SELF SACRIFICE ALREADY
they let lovelace say FUCK
OH WAIT NO I FORGOT ITS WORSE
THANKS FOR MURDERING ME WITH YOUR TEARY ANGRY VOICE
ouchie anyways gay or no but also gay
hilarious and sad at the same time?
MAXWELL dont be a bitch... i expect this from jacobi and honestly i actually expect this from maxwell too but i dont like it
NO NOT THIS MUSIC
BROTP BROTP BROTP
i cant say anything else im too busy crying
UGH I COULD WRITE ESSAYS ON MY THOUGHTS ABOUT THIS THE MESSAGE THE TAKEAWAY BROADLY THE PERSONAL EMOTIONAL ANGUISH THE DESIRE TO HUG HERA ITS
im mad but thank you... all of you... explain... 
stop stop stop im literally so tense gone straight from sobbing to freeze instinct
GOD I HATE ALL THESE SURVIVALS GUILT IDIOTS
OH theyre all about uncertainty... the what ifs... okay... ouch ouch ouch
give everyone awards for bolero
eris are you gay
she said gay rights and AI rights
like i know i know we been knew but goddard really is so awful
Hera stop narrating Lovelace’s ongoing existential crisis
HOW IS THIS NOT GAY (I know how it’s not gay but. Let me have this)
KEPLER stop giving Lovelace insecurities and existential crises
Team back off lovelace for the win
like not to be dramatic but her arc is beautiful
oh boy thats my girlsssss
THATS FLIRTING MINKOWSKI
god i love that concern for your gf keep it up minkowski
COMMUNICATION? WITH THIS CREW? BOLD
GOD angrey hera is great
you know hera is having the time of her life witnessing it
eiffel you just ruined their romantic moment
minkowski is gonna kill them
a much better gayer more altruistic light
WE’RE ALWAYS TALKING ABOUT COMMUNICATION
WAIT I WAS BEING CANON DAMN I THOUGHT I WAS BEING CREATIVE AND PERHAPS OOC BUT IM IN THE CLEAR I GUESS
god hera has needed to snap at eiffel for so long
i can already feel myself about to get hit with the tears... the emotions
that shit hits different renee
The implications that Goddard like destroyed global warming omfg
it’s the moral grayness babeyyy
when it hits you with minkowski's shaky sigh first thing you know its gonna hit different
MINKOWSKI i need you to. love yourself as much as i love you
GOD the mutual concern they always have for each other is touching whether or not you think its gay. i think its gay
HERA WOULD YOU ASK A COW TO NOT BE A COW
oh of COURSE they cut coms first
lovelace is man, butterfly is quote, it says "is this flirting"
jacobi i need you to chill
but jacobiiiii thats lovelaces schtick
oh eiffel... you fucking idiot who gets really lucky sometimes
this game of chicken where theyre both chickens and kepler doesnt know any of that and each of them only know half
minkowski said im an ethics teacher now
who taught minkowski empathy in high stress situations?
yeah so i stay hitting the nail on the head
“kepler SHUT UP” is what brings everyone together
this is, como se dice.... kinda gay
this statement does not bode well for that
“Maybe less talking to yourself” he says to himself
ugh, to be Pop Culture Man™️
RACHEL i love you even tho I also hate you
Rachel if you make one more hand joke I’ll lose my mind
HER NAME!!!! IS HERA!!!! And I love her!!
i have a vivid mental image of post-series eiffel doing stand up like chris fleming style 
"my crew has made it very clear through a series of looks and gestures that one more slip up and i am out, thats it, so im taking this job very seriously"
"minkowski is very overprotective in a weird, erratic way, like when your seat belt randomly locks and its like i appreciate what youre trying to do but im going 4mph in a drive way."
"so when something like this happens you have to at least consider going away for a long time and living on a cursed space station"
"you know how when maxwell and hera are talking ive never felt less needed, you know, like ‘cause you guys would be totally happy alone on a rock in the middle of a lake"
"this is the kind of body you look at and go he'd probably be ok in space without a space suit"
the whole "theater kids" video is actually him going off about minkowski
minkowski is too swole for her own good
jacobi im gonna need you to take the redemption arc more seriously
i love my crazy crazy bitches
this FUCKING music
GOD HOW DOES PRYCE JUST ALWAYS GET WORSE
she just like mutilated that man he is doa absolutely destroyed one hit ko
can you tone down the gay, sweetie
you did it you broke rachel and Goddard down to their bare essentials
GOSH shes so AWKWARD 
so damn jacobi was just IMMEDIATELY ride or die for maxwell
this is too much for my poor baby heart
pryce & carter literally are just like lets do eugenics, lets do genocide
when hera says ill pull a yall and sacrifice myself for minkowski and lovelace 
god like cant believe KEPLER got a redemption arc (well not arc but you know)
ah yes the most tragic scenes all take place at once :)
I HAD TO STOP LISTENING TO BRAVE NEW WORLD CAUSE IT MADE ME TOO CRAZYYYY
THE SCRIPT SAID IT NOT ME
i love space moms!
this fucking music ALAN RODY IM SUING FOR DAMAGES
like the document also does have a lot of like deep thoughts and meta and parallels and discussion of motivations but this is just fun random things i said
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purplesurveys · 5 years
Text
533
Is there someone in your life you know you'd be better without? I think so. I wouldn’t for sure, though – I don’t know what it’s like without them just yet. For now, I just *think* it would better. Have you ever witnessed abuse in your friend's family? Yes. She narrated everything to me herself. She seems to be in a better place nowadays, which I’m happy about. Do you ditch school a lot? I used to in my early years in college. I’ve since felt guilty about that and never cut classes now as a result, unless I absolutely need a sanity break. What do you like about your display picture? I had just had my hair trimmed and was feeling pretty cute that day, so naturally I thought a bunch of selfies in the car was the right thing to do haha. Do you get criticized because of your body? Not much; admittedly, people don’t really criticize you much when you’re on the skinny side. My mom does tell me from time to time that I’ve been gaining weight, but I don’t mind it since it really is kind of my goal to put on a few pounds.
How much did you weigh when you were born? I was like five-ish pounds maybe? Not sure; I’d have to check my baby album to be certain. Did you kiss the last person you called? I have. When was the last time you danced? Not sure, I hate dancing and don’t really do it a lot. Maybe during my Paramore show last year? When was the last time you jumped on a trampoline? 1st or 2nd grade. My old friend, Katreen used to have a trampoline at their house and when I would use to visit them every Friday, I liked jumping on it. Do you keep in mind of other people's feelings? Yeah, always. Are any of your friends pregnant? Man, I never know. I have several batchmates from high school who’ve already got kids and no one had any idea they were even pregnant. Another one may have a baby on the way and I wouldn’t even be surprised anymore. If you have a hang nail do you pull it or clip it? I wait for it to just fall off by itself. Who do you want to forget? No whos. I want to forget the last two weeks. I want our Nach back so bad. Who was the last person to send you a letter? Probs some org in my email that sent a partnership proposal for their event. How much money is in your wallet? A little above P2,000 or around $40. When's the last time you did laundry? How far have you gotten with the book you are reading? Haven’t been reading anything. I’ve since returned the last book I borrowed, History of the Filipino People, back to our library. Who did you last tell to shut up? I don’t like speaking to anybody like that. What's the last thing that you smelt that smelt bad? A few days ago I faintly smelled cat pee when I entered my college’s building. Who were you with last night? I was by myself doing my readings the same way I did tonight. What's your favorite book at the moment? No favorites. Haven’t got the time to read. What's your favorite cereal? Cookie Crisps, alwayssssss. How do you feel when people lead you on, but they don't even like you? Idk, I’ve never experienced this. Could you live without sunlight? I think I could. I really hate the sun and bright weather and feeling hot lmao. What's something you know is bad but you want to do it anyway? Abandon all my readings and just watch YouTube videos all day. Oh and spend all my money on nice food hahahaha What was the last thing you lied about? That I was doing okay. Who is your number 2 speedial? Do you regret anything you've done in the past week? Driving over a huuuuuge pothole last Friday morning. I was going too fast so I couldn’t swerve at the last second. Car was shook up pretty bad, but she’s a fighter and didn’t die on me. What was the last movie you bought? Not too sure about ‘bought,’ but the last movie I watched in full was Hello, Love, Goodbye. What is a sport you would like to do? Table tennis. I never did get to play a game with N, who was the only other person I knew that actually played the sport. That’s another big regret. When was the last time you felt like crying? Right now. Have you ever wanted to kill someone? I’ve felt hatred to that level, but I was never serious enough to obsess over it or actually make plans or anything like that. What was the last song you listened to that wasn't sung in English? Buwan by juan karlos. What did you last draw? I don’t draw a lot. What tv show would you like to be on? Those that have hosts trying out street food everywhere would be nice. If you could choose a pokemon, who would you pick? idk I don’t feel like picking one at the moment. Is Chuck Norris really as great as he seems? I guess he is from what I saw in 2010 9GAG posts lmao but I’ve never actually seen any of his works. What was the last video game you played? Does Mario Kart Tour count? I’m not a big video gamer. Have you ever been in a musical? I’ve been in school productions, but always just as a part of a big singing group. Do you follow your own style or everyone else's? I’ve developed my own over the last few years. What's the last store you bought from? Does Starbucks count? Who is your true best friend? Gabie. Do people use you a lot? No, because I don’t let them. What are you doing two days from now? I’ll just be in school that day. I’d probably be practicing for my report scheduled for Wednesday. Are there any teachers at your school that dislike you? In high school? Definitely. I didn’t like the rigidity of the place and tbh barely adhered to the rules, so I won’t be surprised if I caught the ire of several teachers.  What turns you on? Typically I’d answer this, but depression is kicking in and I am missing Nacho and this isn’t a good time to answer the question. Did you ever believe there were monsters in your closet? No. Do you let random people sign your yearbook? Noooo. Yearbooks are so expensive; I wouldn’t let anybody scribble on mine. Would you adopt a child that had a mental illness? I wouldn’t mind having a kid that ended up being mentally ill; but I don’t plan on adopting in general. Does thinking about death scare you? No. If you died, would you go to heaven or hell? Ugh. Do you lick envelopes or tape them shut? I staple them shut. Do you care what people say or think about you? Only if it comes from people I care about, or consider as friends. Have you ever had surgery? No, and I hope I never have one.   Have you ever been threatened? In various ways, sure. Which side of your family do you get most of your qualities from? MOM’s. Definitely. What was the last thing you drank? Caramel macchiato that’s since grown stale. Have you ever kept a relationship a secret? For a few weeks. Gab and I rekindled our relationship in the last few weeks of high school, and seeing as we were in a conservative, Catholic, all-girls school, we had to be extremely careful because being found out could cost us our diplomas. The night we graduated we shared our relationship on Twitter. How much do you weigh? Idk, somewhere in the 90s. How much do you want to weigh? I’d like to weigh 10 pounds heavier, at most. Who's the last person you called a creeper? This Singaporean guy who hit on Gabie through Messenger after her trip to the country hahaha What street do you live on? What is a quote that you love? “When is a good time to be marupok?”
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imaghostwriter · 5 years
Text
11/11/11 (or more like 44/11/11)
Rules: Answer 11 Questions, Ask Eleven Questions, Tag Eleven People!
alright, so i had a lot of people tagging me in this one and i was really happy about every single one! but to sum things up a little (and also so that i wouldn’t have to come up with 44 questions myself) i decided to put it all in one post. i will tag 11 people with 11 questions of my own and answer all 44 questions i received under the cut.
thanks to the wonderful @thewritingsofart, @i-rove-rock-n-roll, @writingsonesdreams and @waywordwriter for being awesome and for tagging me! xx
now, here are my 11 questions:
1. if you had to rewrite the earliest work you remember writing, what would you change?
2. have you ever written fanfiction? if so, what was your first fic about?
3. do you have any foolproof methods against writer’s block?
4. have you ever thought about quitting writing?
5. is there an author who you feel influences you as a writer?
6. would you like to have fanfiction written about your works?
7. what is the nicest compliment you’ve ever received on one of your works?
8. have you ever cried over one of your own stories?
9. do you draw about your own stories?
10. have you ever written an au about one of your own stories?
11. have you ever written something creative in another language than english? if so, which one was it? and which language do you prefer?
sooo, those were my 11 questions. now my 11 victims are: @storyteller-kaelo, @metaphors-and-melodrama, @wasted-hymn, @authorified, @writingnosefreak, @quilloftheclouds, @bookenders, @vhum, @madammuffins, @catgirlwarrior, @blueinkblot
and for those who are interested, here are my answers:
@thewritingsofart 
1. In what other format do you enjoy reading a novel? Script, Poem, Diary, Illustrated, etc.
i love stories of all kinds, the format doesn't really matter
2. What POV do you prefer reading from? Writing from?
third person, both reading and writing. it doesn't matter if the narrator is omniscent or stays up close and personal with the protagonist
3. Do you remember what your first creative writing piece was?
i remember the first one i created outside of school lmao it was awful but i've also grown a lot since then and i still remember my first work fondly. and tbh i still like the idea so i gottagive little me probs for that. it was about a girl who wakes up with no memories, in a world where everyone believes to have a certain destiny and thus doesn't question what happens to them bc they accept everything to be part of a greater scheme and she starts rebelling against that bc she doesn't want to accept that she was supposed to forget everything about her life and then tons of stuff happens
4. What are you working on now?
a fantasy novel which is a collab with a writer friend that i still know from school and a drama novel, set in the 1960's
5. How do you get in the mood to write?
usually i just reread what i've already written and that does the trick for me but if not then go back to my outline and work a little on that which reminds me of all the cool stuff that i wanna write that's yet to come
6. What in your daily life inspires you to write?
everything and anything. inspiration doesn't come from a certain place from me, it's compeltely random. i just hear or see or read something and it sparks an idea and then i'm stuck with it
7. Do you have a favorite writing snack(s)?
i don't snack much whilst writing tbh bc then i need my hands to write. but i snack a lot to procrastinate and then any snack will do
8. Who do you go to first when you want someone to read/look over your writing?
the friend i do my fantasy collab with is the only friend whom i'm entrusted with almost everything i've written in the last three years and i've even shared some of my older stories with her
9. What got you started in writing for pleasure?
i can't remember if there was a specific reason that got me started. i always liked the creative writing tasks that we got in class so one day i wanted to try writing a book. that was pretty much it
10. How do you create your characters? Do you use a character sheet or another method?
my characters are usually the first thing that come to me so i don't actually use any specific method to create them. they all serve the plot and are built for necessity around my protagonist to create the most believable and most fun dynamic that ultimately leads my main oc to where they need to be
11. If you could have one famous person, from today or history, to read your best piece of writing, who would it be? This includes authors
jane austen probably bc i think she could give me good advice on character dynamics and would smack me on the head for making a man the pov character in my drama novel. but i also think she would be super nice and encouraging in her advice. also she's one of my favourite authors so there's that
@waywordwriter
Heels or flats? flats! i can't walk in heels properly
What’s your favorite Starbucks drink? i don't go to starbucks. if i go to any café i usually get tea if i stay in or coffee if it's to go
Winter or summer both are very uncomfortable, temperature-wise. but i'll go with summer bc it's nice to be too hot for once when you're usually always too cold
Do you write short stories? heck yeah i do!
Favorite author? jane austen bc i always feel good when reading her books
3 words to describe your protagonist(s) going only with daniel from my drama novel: repressed, oblivious, gay
3 words to describe your antagonist(s) well, in my drama novel there is no clear antagonist as in it's not a person and in my fantasy novel the protagonists are kind of the bad guys so i don't really know how to answer this. capitalism? prejudice? believing you know what's best for the people you love and acting on it until your behaviour is downright abusive? none of these are three words but i'm rolling with it
Favorite school subject? constantly changed. when i graduated it was english, german, spanish, art and philosophy
Favorite book(s)? also ever-changing but since i picked jane austen as my favourite author i'm going with pride and prejudice
Favorite music genre? don't have one, it all depends on the song but atm i listen to a lot of old rock
How was your day today? veryyy stressful and emotionally exhausting but i also got to see a good friend of mine that i hadn't seen in some time now and that was nice!
@i-rove-rock-n-roll
1. What part of worldbuilding do you like the least? i'm a sucker for worldbuilding to the point where i procrastinate writing bc i worldbuild too much. there is no part that i don't like
2. Do you write in your own language? If not, why? i do! but i also write in english. at first bc it forced me to simplify my sentences due to a lack of vocabulary but now bc i like it and it gives me the possibiliy to share my work with a wider audience!
3. How many of your characters are orphans or have absent parents? not too many, actually. i think it's mostly a thing in my drama novel where it's 2.5/5 (one being an orphan, the other having abusive parents and one case where i'm not even sure if it's just a very complicated relationship or if it counts as downright abusive but the story doesn't dive too deply into it either). in my fantasy novel it's just 2/6!
4. Do you have any happily married couples in your story? uhhh... now that i think about it.. i don't. wow. never realized that, you really got me there!
5. What kind of visual arts (cinema, sculpture, painting…) inspires you and your stories? all.
6. Did you ever go somewhere and think “this is exactly my story’s setting”? not really. but certain places do sometimes inspire me to set my story somewhere similar. my trip to cambodia led to an outline for a pirate story that has yet to be written
7. If you take public transports, do you ever look at the people around you and imagine their story? yesss, i am 100% that creep that is constantly observing and analysing other people
8. What is the last book you read (or are currently reading)? Would you recommend it? it was "the death of mrs. westaway" and i definetely recommend it! it was a good read. even though i guessed the ending it was still thrilling and it didn't chip away any of the suspense bc the author always kept me questioning myself and always had me asking "but what if i'm wrong?"
9. When was the last time you read fanfiction and what was it about? maybe about two weeks ago? i can't remember what it was about bc it was just small bits of fluff but i do remember that it was a merthur fanfic
10. What is the first thing that came to you for your WIP? Was it a scene, a character, or something else? going with my drama novel: it started out with the idea to write something where the story couldn't stand the way it does if a single sentence where to be taken out. to have something written so minimalistically that only what is absolutely necessary remains but still have it be interesting, engaging and compelling. so i started writing something from the pov of someone who is just the most oblivious rhabbarb the world has ever seen. the rest evolved around it
11. Is there a genre or writing format you’d like to try in the future? not currently. these things tend to come to me with time and as soon as they do i try them out at once bc i can't wait haha
@writingonesdreams
1. How much of your writing is influenced by your daily life? Like does what happened during the day affect what and how you write? not intentionally but when it happens (and i notice it happening, usually) then it influences mostly my characters. their aspirations, their internal conflicts. the reason why daniel is struggling with the expectations of others is bc it's something i experience myself, although maybe not as strongly as he does. but then again, that's kind of a universal experience so it's not that noticable
2. How much of you is inside your characters? every single one of them has something from me but i always make sure to never make them too similar to me and whenever i see myself too much in them i start changing them around until i can distance myself enough from them to be able to write about someone else's experiences instead of my own
3. Do you start writing from the beginning or somewhere else? yes, i usually do
4. What is the most difficult for you about writing? connecting scenes. i never know when to write something out or to sum it up in one sentence and just dive into the next scene. it confuses me to no end
5. What is the hardest part about creating characters for you? my characters tend to come very naturally to me. they're born out of necessity for the plot and thus are fitted to it. i guess what is most difficult for me is reminding myself of the fact that all my charas have a live outside of the plot, except for my protagonist and usually have more than just that one (1) friend
6. What are the themes of your wip and what do they mean to you? both my wips deal with questions of morality, loyalty and autonomy and those are all themes that i spend a lot of my free time thinking about and/or that are very important personally. especially autonomy was always something that i was taught to value as a child and that my parents value a lot as well, even more than most germans which is saying something.
7. What books/movies/series whatever inspired or influenced your current wip the most? i honestly don't know. they're both not consciously inspired by specific media although i don't doubt that i was influenced by a lot of different works
8. What would be the biggest appreciation of your work for you? if someone loved it. if someone would read it not just once but then again just bc they felt like it and wanted to insert themselves into the world again. if someone would love the characters and bond with them. if my work meant something personal to someone.
9. Why did you choose to write this wip and not something else? What’s so special about it? my fantasy novel: i wanted to do a collab with a friend of mine whom i've known for a while now and she only writes fantasy so i thought it would be a good excuse to try myself out in the genre my drama novel: i honestly don't know. i can't even remember how the idea came to me but suddenly i was heads deep in a 1960's period drama about a gay dude and social pressure. i guess it was the way i write it, as minimal as possible, that appealed most to me
10. What kind of scenes do you not want to write/don’t enjoys writing but can’t get around them? scenes where i don't know what's going to happen plotwise but only the feeling that i want to get across
11. What part of the writing process is your favourite? (Coming up with the idea, thinking, outlining, researching, writing itself, editing, reading what you have written, etc) worldbuilding and creating characters bc i get to enjoy the creative process without worrying too much about perfection and editing bc it's meditative and bc i feel proud for completing my draft and don't have to worry about still having to write anything out. but i also love reading what i’ve already written! i guess in the end i have fun with all the parts lmao
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shark-myths · 5 years
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Writing Reflection: 2018
I was tagged by @horsegirlharry, who i will smooch in person in ONE WEEK! 
1. Number of stories (including drabbles) posted to AO3: 15. I'm trying not to feel critical about my output this year: I was distracted by ~boy problems and emotional turmoil for a lot of 2018, so I absolutely slayed some journals but neglected my fic. but I also tackled some difficult projects, some of which I'm really proud of, and translated a lot of those big emotions back into writing, so there's a lot to give myself credit for.
2. Word count posted for the year: 224,001
3. List of works published this year (in order of posting)
Roman Candle Hearts
I'm A Wing, I'm A Prayer
The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique
your hips, your lips, are mine
in space, no one can hear you misgender me
Girl Firsts
halfway to your heart (starting from your knees)
Boys Next Door/Assholes
Vices & Vices
Early Morning Company
Jaws of Death
Baby You're A Haunted House
The Fixed Stars of Heaven
Sell Out Girl
Think of All The Fellas I Haven't Kissed
4. Fandoms I wrote for: Fall Out Boy, Battlestar Galactica, Panic! at the Disco, My Chemical Romance
5. Pairings: Pete/Patrick, Starbuck/Apollo, Pete/Brendon, Brendon/Ryan, Patrick/Michael Day, Frank Iero/Gerard Way, Joe/Andy
6. Story with the most:
Boys Next Door/Assholes, aka the peterick SUMMER BOYFRIENDS au, aka the fic I wrote about falling in love with my ex that captures the sweetness and suffering of new summer love in a very specific and tactile way. It has the most hits, kudos, and comments of anything I wrote in 2018. I'm so glad you guys loved it so much!
9. Work I’m most proud of (and why):
Sell Out Girl, the sequel to girl out boy, is incredibly important to me and I'm so fucking proud of how it turned out. emotionally, i am prouder of the girl out boy stories  than anything else i've ever done. girlfic is how I am cleaning my wounds and healing my heart, and it is an honor to be doing that with you walking alongside me, and being touched and changed too. this fic was incredibly emotionally demanding but also, on a technical level, easy: there was lots of rambly internal monologues and angst, glitter-sharp language and poetical pain, which is my comfort zone as a writer for sure.
on a technical and writerly level, the one I'm most proud of is Baby You're A Haunted House, because i wrote it *fast*, in a fandom I'm not comfortable or familiar in, in a style I don't usually use, and to achieve a very specific artistic effect with the unreliable narrator and shifting sands of reality, while heartbroken. so I'm pleased as fuck with how it came out. it's one of my favorite things I've written in the past several years, and the perfect kind of challenge for me.
10. Work I’m least proud of (and why):
ugh, The Fixed Stars of Heaven . I usually love everything I write, but my experience of writing this fic was terrible. I was never inspired (except when researching the ISS and zero-g botany!) and the epistolary format meant I didn’t know how to develop the kind of tension I *live* for. the whole time I was writing, I didn’t go back and reread (a typical part of my process for matching tone) because I loathed it so much! I kept saying “well, something has to be my worst story” about it... and I still feel that way.
11. A favorite excerpt of your writing:
It's impossible to choose--I like my writing a lot, that's why I write the way i do. all of Baby You're A Haunted House and I'm A Wing, I'm A Prayer are beautiful to me; the love letter Pete writes in Boys Next Door/Assholes; and the whole bathtub scene from chapter 5 of Sell Out Girl, of which this is the very best part:
“Pete is safe and warm and submerged, an egg in a mermaid’s purse, waiting to swim out as a shark whenever she’s ready. She holds her breath and feels her baby beat within her. She looks up at Pat and fears nothing, nothing but love.”
12. Share or describe a favorite review you received:
every review I get makes impact on my heart. I take screenshots and save my favorites; you guys bolster me and keep me going. The best and most important reactions are the ones I get on Girl Out Boy stuff, and the outpouring of fanworks and support means the world to me. especially the way you guys showed up for and stood with me during my difficult breakup this year—wow. I love you so much.
my favorite reviews I’ve gotten this year have been a few different people who told me I was skilled at capturing the feeling of falling in love. as a feelings-and-process oriented romance writer, that means the world to me! I never know what plots my stories are going to have (my characters always surprise me), but I always know how I want a fic to feel. I’m never more honored than when you feel it too.
13. A time when writing was really, really hard:
during the slow-motion process of one of my romantic relationships coming apart in September and October! I was so anxious and keyed up and self-obsessed and miserable during that time, I literally couldn’t bear to write, and when I tried I just kept wrecking the Girl Out Boys’ lives. you guys carried me through.
14. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:
I don’t want to spoil Sell Out Girl, but a ship I don’t typically ship popped up and I went with it, and I was exactly as surprised as everyone reading that it happened and that it felt so right and good!
15. How did you grow as a writer this year:
i tried new types of projects, like the fucking epistolary scifi fic, a flash fiction exercise, the unreliable narrator trope, and sequels. i wrote in a couple fandoms I'm less comfortable in, fairly often off of other people's prompts. I am trying to hone a cleaner writing style: I spend so much time lost and rambly in describing how characters feel, my stories lose a lot of chances for action and motion. i like my writing best when it is spare and vivid, able to actually evoke emotions rather than just tell you what they feel like. i think some of my fic this year really showcases that (like Vices & Vices ). i still grow so much as a writer, and learn so much about the craft, with each work.
i used an editing and revision process for Fixed Stars of Heaven, thanks to my dear friend JM, that i don't usually subject my work to. i also wrote through a project i was not enjoying, rather than dropping it as soon as my interest waned. my discipline as a wild, reckless writer is, slowly but surely, improving.
i wrote through my own shitty emotionally abusive relationship with a parent through the character of Andy in sell out girl, and got better at naming trauma and abuse and setting my own boundaries as a result of that.
i started reading (and a little bit writing) poetry again.
16. How do you hope to grow next year:
oh, i can't see that road! i hope i grow in ways i never expected cuz i'm faced with challenges in my work i could never have anticipated. generically, i hope i keep tightening my style and improving my discipline, and getting better at defending regular writing time.
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 read only works by women for the entire year of 2018, and the nourishing impact of that on my entire inner life cannot be overstated. i didn't even read a comic book or a work book if it was written by a man. i kept myself entirely pure of the labor of perspective-taking for men, or subjecting myself to men's conception of anybody else's experiential reality.
- @leyley09 my official Fic Enabler, who is SINGULARLY AND SOLEY to blame for at least two fics this year, and has encouraged my very worst ideas about a hundred more
- my unofficial cheerleading squad family on tumblr, who lifted me up and made sure i was healthy, supported, and well through my whole shitty relationship ending debacle. @glitterandrocketfuel, @secretstudentdragonblog, @allkindsofplatinumandpercocet, and @laudanumcafe -- not to mention every other beauty who commented on my sad-ass selfies or my fic. thank you, my loves.
18. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year:
EVERYTHING IS REAL
most notable and egregious examples:
- the letter pete writes for patrick in boys next door/assholes is a real love letter i gave someone
- the fight brendon and ryan have in vices & vices is a real fight i had with a partner
- the climactic kiss on the streets of new york at the end of sell out girl is my real first kiss with my new boo
the worst thing is that i don't generally farm my *past* life for my fic--everything that shows up is really recent and fresh, because i'm most interested in writing things i'm currently dealing with and experiencing. and yes, i especially steal the sex scenes.
19. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:
be curious about yourself and your characters. if you've never written / published in a serial format, where you're only writing a week or so ahead of posting, you must try it at least once! listen to what your readers are noticing about your themes and characters! i learn so much about my the emotional resonance and direction of my stories from the people who read them and comment. my writing is so much stronger as a result of writing the majority of my work this way, and i have much more fun with it than when i write a long piece in an echo chamber with no input from you guys!
20. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:
- i'm working on a Rent-A-Family trope + law firm AU + kidfic thing i started messing with last year
- Pete Wentz's Bisexual Realizations, a fic dreamed up and playlist-empowered by @nikadd
- a Venom AU for my beloved @immoral-crow
- Girl Out Boy hiatus fic
- and a MANIA anniversary surprise <3
21. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read.
all of my Peterick creator pals! @leyley09 @shatteredmirrors-and-lace23 @allkindsofplatinumandpercocet @laudanumcafe @glitterandrocketfuel and everyone/anyone else!
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bookgeekgrrl · 2 years
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My media this week (19-25 Jun 2022)
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ᶦⁿ ᵗʰᵉ ᶦᵐᵐᵒʳᵗᵃˡ ʷᵒʳᵈˢ ᵒᶠ ᵈᵒᵒʳ 'ᵇᵃᵇʸᵍᶦʳˡ ʸᵒᵘ ᵃʳᵉ ˢᵒ ʰᵒᵗ ᵃⁿᵈ ʸᵒᵘʳ ᶦⁿˢᵗᶦⁿᶜᵗˢ ᵃʳᵉ ˢᵒ ᵇᵃᵈ'
📚 STUFF I READ 📚
😍 Fete For A King (Shivadhverse #1) (Sam Starbuck) - cannot express how much I love this entire universe!!!! This book started as a 'what if there was a hallmark movie where a guy-fieri-like celebrity chef fell for the crown-prince-soon-to-be-king?' - it's sweet and fucking hilarious and very low angst and all the characters are amazing
😍 Infinite Jes (Shivadhverse #2) (Sam Starbuck) - 2nd book in the same universe; a recently retired ex-king at loose ends decides to start a podcast and ends up acquiring more loved ones in the form of a nonbinary producer and their 15-yr-old apprentice/son/disaster magnet
😍 👂‍ The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes (The Queer Principles of Kit Webb #2) (Cat Sebastian, author; Joel Leslie, narrator) - fuck, I knew I was going to fucking love Marian Hayes and I wasn't disappointed; give me a prickly, angry romance heroine every day and someone who loves her because their jagged edges fit together
😍 Ain't No Grave (Can Keep My Body Down) (spitandvinegar) - reread, absolute five-star forever fave; always enamoured of the idea that a broken, junkie recovering-from-hydra former asset would find enough of bucky barnes left to adopt two queer homeless kids; all the characterizations in this are incredible
😊 👂‍ Death in the Clouds (Hercule Poirot #13) (Agatha Christie, author; Hugh Fraser, narrator)
😊 Sweet Berries (Cambric Creek #2) (C.M. Nascosta) - mothman monsterfucking romance, very enjoyable
😊 👂‍ Enter the Saint (Simon Templar 'The Saint' #3) (Leslie Charteris, author; John Telfer, narrator) - surprisingly fun action adventure story; what little I knew of The Saint was from the solo hero he would later develop into - I enjoyed this early stuff where he's the leader of a vigilante gang of Bright Young Things
🙂 Dear Mona Lisa… (Claire Davis & Al Stewart) - short novella about a middle-aged synesthete trying to find the right way to come out to his daughter before his impending wedding
💖💖 +311K of shorter fic so shout out to these I really loved 💖💖
Me and the Lavender Moon (emchant3d) - MCU: shrunkyclunks, 10K - another fantastic part of this series about nonbinary kitchen witch bucky & cap!Steve - really love this entire series so much
📺 STUFF I WATCHED 📺
Fire Island - just as amazing and wonderful on the rewatch; nothing but pure serotonin
Legends of Tomorrow - s6, e8-13
🎧 PODCASTS 🎧
99% Invisible #496 - The Rights of Rice and Future of Nature
Twenty Thousand Hertz+ - Breathe
Shedunnit - Bonus: Ask Me Anything Part Two
Strong Songs Bonus Episodes - "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)" by Kate Bush
Hit Parade - These Are the Good Times
🎶 MUSIC 🎶
Fire Island Movie Soundtrack playlist
Presenting Janet Jackson
Women Who Owned '99
Gotta Get Away!
Pride Anthems
Summer Ska Celebration
Lazy Summer
Presenting Reba McEntire
Up All Night with Nile Rodgers
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tomochocopod · 6 years
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Kase-san Notes!
This week on TomoChoco, Kit and Sarah talked about the Kase-san Series, which is one of Kit’s favorite yuri manga. Here’s her notes!
Flowers: Morning glories, sunflowers, hydrangeas, tulips, cherry blossoms
The anthology that this manga was originally published in was called “Pure Yuri” and I think that’s a really good term to describe this series
I think the thing that I really love about these two is that they’re so open with each other. There’s a lot of new relationship anxiety that crops up from time to time, but at the end of the day they’re always honest with each other and feel like they can talk to each other about their feelings.
I like the way the series deals with different aspects of jealousy that happen in relationships and how they’re overcome with honest communication between the two girls
THESE TWO GIRLS ARE SUCH ABSOLUTE GOOBERS I ADORE THEM (re: waving at each other during Kase’s track meet)
Another thing I really love about the relationship is that it feels so balanced. It really feels to me like these two girls love each other to hell and back and that its MUTUAL.
The art is SO expressive. While it might not be as elegant as sometime with Aoi Hana, the slight cartoonishness of the panels does an excellent job of creating a vibrant, expressive story
Yamada is SO expressive, specifically. I could go through my books and screenshot like 100 panels or more of facial expressions she makes that just delight me
I love how these girls are just… allowed to love things and have other interests in their lives outside of each other. Kase LOVE track. Yamada LOVES horticulture. And they love listening to each other talk about their passions even if its an interest they don’t share. Girls being allowed to be passionate about things is SO FULFILLING.
Thing I didn’t like: “We’re both girls but we’ve been going out” at the beginning of like every chapter. Like, we get it. But I DO like how the story eventually moves away from that. The narration in and of itself is a form of character development. Because eventually it doesn’t matter that they’re both girls. All that matters is that they love each other. I’m trying not to cry in starbucks writing these notes like THEY’RE JUST SO BEAUTIFUL AND I LOVE THEM SO MUCH OKAY I HAVE SO MANY FEELINGS
Talking point: What makes a good relationship? I know there’s that relationship goals meme but like… its interesting to me to think about what defines a good relationship
Yamada is the most useless lesbian but so is Kase and I just… I love them??? I love how much they love each other??? I can’t. I just can’t, you guys.
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ratemysheppard · 6 years
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33) Battlestar Galactica
Title-  Battlestar Galactica 
- Daybreak: Part 2 & 3 (2009) 4x20
- Blood on the Scales (2009) 4x16
- Sine Qua Non (2008) 4x10
- Crossroads: Part 2 (2007) 3x20
- Crossroads: Part 1 (2007) 3x19
- The Son also Rises (2007) 3x18
Year- 2007-2009
Character- Romo Lampkin
Synopsis- Humans created cylon robots to serve them, but the cylons gained independence and war ensued. Humanity thought the cylons had disappeared for good, until a nuclear attack by the cylons, who have now evolved to look identical to the humans who created them, wipes out the twelve colonies and most of the human race. The remainder of humanity must band together and escape the cylon threat, led by Admiral Adama and the crew of the Battlestar Galactica. (But seriously, this is not a synopsis, JUST WATCH IT OMG).
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Entirety or episode?- Entirety
Overall verdict- I don’t actually know how to review this because it is literally the best fckn thing I have ever seen on TV and I still cannot stop thinking about it like guys I am foaming at the mouth over how amazing this show is. Like, personally – thank you Mark Sheppard for causing me to watch this masterpiece. It’s just… stunning. Professional, expensive, gorgeous graphics, sets, costumes. Incredible tight, tense, terrifying, uplifting, emotional, heartrending, CONSISTENT writing. The most memorable, relatable, loveable and hateable characters who are constantly surprising and portrayed by outstanding actors in some of the most incredible performances I’ve ever seen. It is compelling and you will CARE about it. Like, literally, this is the first thing in years I’ve watched that gave me regular nightmares – it just got under my skin so much.
I know lots of people said the quality dipped in series four and they hated the ending, but tbh for me any inconsistencies or loose threads in this case made it kind of more interesting, because it’s all thought provoking and even the (admittedly, many) flaws are fascinating rather than annoying. I’m still not even sure if /I/ hated the ending (there’s certainly stuff I don’t like about it) but it doesn’t actually matter because the whole thing’s so good. The only thing that really got to me were the rape elements (and my good ol’ Most Hated Trope, The Baby Farm) and I’d have preferred the music to be an unrecognisable song until the very last ‘modern day’ scene (like, it’s something that’s been passed down as an innate thing that’s eventually become a rock song?) Also the fact that the corners are cut off every paper item in space really irrationally does my head in..! But basically – this is only four seasons, and they are GOOD SOLID seasons. It ends when it needs to end, and there IS a clear end, and personally I found that closure to be necessarily satisfying, with none of the ‘dragging on past its prime’ that can affect some shows.
I have so many theories about this show but for once I don’t want to spoiler TOO heavily because everyone should watch this, seriously (yes, I realise I am decades late to the party and everyone’s probably already watched it but whatever). I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that whilst Crowley might be my (so far) favourite Mark character, BSG is my favourite show he’s been in and Romo is definitely a very close second fav character.
Screen time- He’s only in a few episodes, but he gets good screen time in most of those.
Accent- Irish
Mark’s character- Romo is bloody awesome. He’s competent, manipulative, self-serving, surprisingly badass (all my favourite things in a character) but underneath it all really soft and kind of broken – obviously, like the majority of the rest of the human race at that point. He’s also the most unreliable narrator ever and you can never be totally sure whether he’s telling the truth, and when, and if he’s acting at any given time, which makes him utterly fascinating. Mark S is absolutely CAPTIVATING portraying this guy, which speaks volumes about what he can do with a brilliant script. He’s just a joy to watch. And without spoilering too heavily again – that damn cat, and the whole of Sine Qua Non (the most depressing episode ever btw) like, everything that’s happened and that’s what tips him. That performance before we know what’s gone down, when Romo is talking to the cat, is just perfection. Also honourable mention to Jake the dog because /heart melts/ what is it with Sheppard characters and dogs? In short: the exact character trope that kills me every time; the noble bastard. And he actually gets a relatively happy ending, too.
Highlight- TOO MANY.
Starbuck’s escape with the cylon vessel.
Starbuck in general (I came to kind of hate her, but she’s undeniably an incredible character and I maintain Daniel was her father, and for real Katee Sackhoff has the most gorgeous smile I have ever seen on any human.)
Tyrell and Cally’s jump into space – effing TERRIFYING.
Baltar, in general. I love a self-server.
Helo being pretty much the only consistently decent and sympathetic character in the whole thing.
Tighe’s overarcing storyline and what he has to come to accept about himself.
Crossroads Part 1 & 2 – when the penny drops about the music, then that finale – I actually applauded, it’s rare a TV show gets me so immersed.
Lampkin putting on his shades and discarding his walking stick like a boss.
That captivating manipulation of Six with the monologue about his wife.
Lance was so gorgeous whyyyy.
Lampkin and Jake.
That pre-breakdown portrayal of a man torn by guilt.
Killing his captor WITH A PEN and presumably thus escaping execution himself.
(Paraphrased) “Help us” “Sorry” “Please” “Oh… frak”
Rewatch?- I will watch this so many times. I already want to start rewatching.
(I’ve only done a few caps from The Son Also Rises, as there’s tons of Romo caps/gifs already that I’ll reblog).
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I mean lookit his lil studded collar 
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I am painfully invested in that damn cat
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wanderingnork · 7 years
Text
@luminis-infinite asked me today in IM: How shy is Percival in the “Queenie is a Youtuber” AU?
896 words later...
I think...he wasn't in his professional life? Like, he trained himself VERY HARD to be a guy who maybe isn't outgoing, but can do like camaraderie and so on. And then he retires and he's like... "I'm done now" and now he IS shy.
AND HE IS PARTICULARLY SHY ON CAMERA.
Queenie thinks it's adorable because he gets all kinds of nervous and it turns out he has like this nervous laugh that is so sweet.
The fans think it's cute too.
He doesn't blush or anything, but he...fidgets.
By fan request they do a few couple challenges and during the "how well do we know each other" one, Percival is just sitting there spinning a pen absentmindedly. Every time he talks, it speeds up; when he's silent, it slows down.
Halfway through the video he accidentally hits himself in the face.
AND THEN
they do the "my boyfriend does my makeup" challenge!
Queenie announces it on Twitter in advance and people are like "dude he is the Most Masculine Man no way in hell"
He *kills it*
Comes out later that Graves watches Queenie do her makeup every morning, and he's been watching makeup tutorials on his own so he can understand what's going on.
This is the fangirl apology: They get the chance to do a collab video with Dan and Phil, and they collectively do the Try Not To Laugh challenge.
A. Envision this: Queenie is the shortest one in the room, D&P are *giants* and Percival is no small man himself. B. Queenie kicks all of their collective asses because she has a poker face par excellence. C. In the video that Dan and Phil post later on their gaming channel (they bring back the Dance Dance Revolution thing where they taped their legs together) Queenie and Graves get WRECKED because the height difference is so bad. (Dan and Phil STILL almost break their damn legs because they have the collective coordination of a concussed giraffe.)
It doesn't take long before Percival is kind of the darling of Queenie's fanbase.
He doesn't appear in many videos, really, like most of her vlogs are still just her, and it comes out that he CANNOT STAND doing bullet journals (which she loves) and he really doesn't do that whole ~psychic~ thing well. So those videos are hers and hers alone.
But eventually, after Queenie does a whole "A Day In the Life Of GildedLily" (which is her username), she convinces him to do "A Day In the Life of Percival Graves"
He does it mostly on his phone, not on any special camera, because he's kind of lazy that way.
The entire opening of the video is just him making coffee and periodically muttering about "this is ridiculous" and "does she want this to turn into a comedy channel"
Three cups of coffee later, he starts perking up
She wanders into the kitchen and everyone gets to hear the absolutely unadulterated adoration when he says good morning...
Cut to her going off to the studio to record while he gets ready for work.
There's a brief cut of him pulling into a Starbucks because...more coffee.
(A counter appears in the bottom corner, tallying the number of cups.)
He doesn't do much filming at work, though the coffee cup counter ticks up alarmingly as he stops by the break room three times for more coffee
Viewers are treated to a rant about the Dewey Decimal System and the superiority of the BISAC system while he reshelves books after the library closes for the day
He's this soft-spoken guy in a sweater and glasses who just CARES ABOUT BOOKS, OKAY?
He does narrate a story about some jackass who tried to avoid paying a fifty-dollar fine they'd somehow racked up while he's driving home though
How the hell do you rack up $50?!
Percival doesn't know either.
Was he like, eating them? This is the question Percival asks. "We say 'devouring books', I'm pretty sure this jackass went Hannibal Lecter on them!"
THE FANS GO NUTS
Did the softspoken man with glasses and sweaters just swear?!
Someone does a Songify remix of it
Queenie plays it as her outro for a week
She does a fanart episode, half of them are Percival in that Hannibal Lecter mask
so that night
Queenie films him making dinner (broccoli-cheese soup), there's an interruption when she steals too much cheese and he chases her out of the kitchen
The phone gets dropped but it's still recording, viewers hear laughter and shrieking, and then dead silence for a second before someone, muffled, says, "I love you."
There's a big jump cut to bedtime, with Percival standing and filming himself in the bathroom.
"Queenie's already in bed, so I thought I'd say goodnight."
He's shirtless.
The fandom kind of goes ballistic.
"Thanks for, um, going along with me today? I didn't think anyone would care about my boring life, still kind of don't. I just hope that none of you get driven away from Queenie's channel over this one."
He laughs.
"Anyway...I guess I should do some kind of outro? So. Um. Subscribe to Queenie, if you liked this video, hers are so much better than mine. Take care of yourselves, everybody. And I guess...I'll see all of you in the next video."
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