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hermannsthumb · 3 years

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Could you please write #43 grandparents/neighbors one?

43. we’re having our family meal at my grandparents’ house this year so fingers crossed your parents still live next door and you grew up to be even hotter

from winter writing prompts here

oh god this one got so long. sorry everyone! thank you to @k-sci-janitor for the alien bit because it was so fucking funny

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Holidays have gotten a little weird to manage since Newt transformed into a fully-fledged adult with an apartment and a job and stuff, so while he hasn’t made it to the big Geiszler celebration in Germany every December since starting college out of elementary school, he still tries to make a point of dropping by his dad’s for dinner and a movie or something to fill his holiday quota. It’s fine by him; he loves his family, but they’re definitely overwhelming, and trying to submit final grades and work on syllabuses for the next semester all while distant relatives ruffle his hair and ask him when he’s going to hit his growth spurt is not his idea of a relaxing time. It’s a constant point of contention between him and his dad. This year more than most, apparently.

“Your grandmother misses you!” he tells Newt sadly over their Chinese takeout. “She calls me every week to ask how you are, and why you never visit with them. Every week.” He waves a fork at Newt. “You’re breaking her heart.”

“I’m in the lab, like, twenty-four-seven, dad,” Newt sighs. It’s a well-rehearsed conversation at this point, but it doesn’t get any less tiresome. Especially because he knows his dad is lying about the phone call thing—Newt is a great grandson and texts his grandmother plenty, thank you very much, he would know if he was breaking her heart. “I’m working straight through winter break this year. Seriously.”

“That’s what you did last year,” Newt’s dad says. “And the year before that…” Newt turns the volume up on the TV to cut his dad off before he can segue into the next part of his argument, which is (usually) that Newt needs to work on his personal life, maybe settle down, produce some grandkids of his own. Or at least adopt a cat. Also well-rehearsed.

He’s not sure why he says what he does next—maybe in a desperate attempt to distract his dad further. Maybe because of the sudden onslaught of childhood memories the mention of his grandparents’ house brought on. “Hey, do you remember that boy who used to live next door to grandma?” he says. “He had the weird haircut and always dressed kind of funny?” Old-fashioned, and a little too formal for the sort of things that little kids tend to do, climbing trees or playing in the mud—sweatervests and polished loafers and starched-white knee-highs.

Newt’s dad blinks at him. Newt half expects him to declare that Newt is nuts, and that he has no idea what he’s talking about, like this is one of those horror stories where the childhood friend turns out to be some ghost who died fifty years prior. The clothing would match up, he guesses. But he smiles in recognition a moment later. “You mean the Gottlieb boy?” he says.

“Gottlieb,” Newt echoes. It sounds familiar enough. “Hermann, I think. When I’d stay with grandma for the summer we would play together every day. I wonder what he’s doing now.” Hermann was a smart guy, a real geek like Newt; he used to carry a graphing calculator around in his pocket and build the most goddamn pristine model spacecrafts Newt had ever seen. Hermann’s dad shipped him off to a prestigious boarding school the last summer Newt spent there, when they were around twelve or so. Newt started at MIT not long after. “Dude’s probably designing rocket ships by now or something.”

“You could ask him yourself if you came with me,” Newt’s dad laughs. “The Gottliebs never moved away, and their children actually visit. I’m sure your Hermann visits, too.”

“Ha,” Newt says. “Yeah.”

It’s snowing by the time Newt and his dad finish their movie, and Newt (fearing his dad’s driving even in ideal conditions) declines the offer of a lift home to trudge his way through it to his T stop instead. It’s nice to have the chance to be alone with his thoughts, anyway, because he can’t seem to get funny little Hermann Gottlieb out of his head. What is he doing now?

A quick Facebook search on the train produces a few Hermann Gottliebs, but none of them promising—none of them have the brown eyes or strangely angular face (devoid of any baby fat even that young) Newt remembers, none of them are from the right German countryside, none of them went to a preppy English boarding school. Google (utilizing the information Newt does have) is a little more rewarding, and by the time Newt presses the button to request his stop, he’s scrounged up a decent amount of info: Hermann Gottlieb has a doctorate in astrophysics, Hermann Gottlieb publishes papers at a slightly terrifying rate, and Hermann Gottlieb turned out kinda hot.

As Newt stares down at a slightly grainy current photograph of his old friend—haircut and clothing unchanged, a cane in hand, some round librarian glasses perched on the end of his nose, wide mouth twisted into a scowl—he suddenly recalls another thing about Hermann Gottlieb: the summer Hermann was sent away to boarding school was the summer that Hermann kissed Newt goodbye, shyly and tearfully, under the shade of the tall maple tree in his yard. It was the last time Newt ever saw Hermann. It was Newt’s first kiss.

“Oh, boy,” Newt says.

He texts his dad when he gets back to his apartment. When do we leave?

Newt feels like the belle of the fucking ball when he steps into his grandparents’ house a week later, snow dusting his shoulders, small suitcase clenched in his hand. His cheeks are kissed; his scarf and hat and leather jacket are brushed off and tossed onto a coat rack; his hair is in parts smoothed down (too messy!) and ruffled (too flat!); he’s hugged more times than he has been in the entire last year, probably. “Still playing around with bugs in the dirt, eh, Newt?” his grandfather booms, tucking Newt into the crook of his arm with enough force to knock Newt’s glasses off.

“Actually,” Newt squeaks, scrambling for both what he remembers of his very rusty German, and his glasses before they can hit the ground, “entomology isn’t really my main focus at—”

“Newt’s studying jellyfish now,” Newt’s dad declares proudly. “He went on a diving expedition this July.”

“Diving? How exciting,” Newt’s grandmother says.

“Yeah,” Newt says. He pushes his glasses back on. “Yeah, it was fascinating, I was lucky to get the funding for it. You wouldn’t believe the sorts of—”

“Isn’t that dangerous?” Newt’s cousin says.

“My little Newt’s a daredevil!” Newt’s dad says.

“It’s not that dangerous,” Newt says. “As long as you’re—”

“What happened to that nice man your father said you were dating?” Newt’s grandfather says. “With the, the what was it, the poetry? The poet? We thought you’d bring him!”

Newt flushes. Trust his dad to talk up some random guy Newt dated in March like it was a long-term affair and not an elongated one-night stand that fizzled out after three weeks. Though maybe that one’s on Newt—it’s not like he mentioned the one-night stand part to his dad, after all. He definitely didn’t mention that the guy ended it with a poem, too. “We broke up,” he says, weakly. He wriggles out from the throng of the crowd. “Look, it’s so great seeing you all, but I’m actually, like, really tired, soooooo…?”

“Oh, of course you are,” Newt’s grandmother says. She pats his head. “What a long flight you must have had! We’ll send someone up for you for dinner—you can have your old guest room.”

“Cool,” Newt says.

He scurries up the stairs.

The guest room he slept in during those summers is almost exactly the way he remembers it, but a little dustier—the floral quilt on the bed, his grandma’s sewing table crammed into the corner, the bookcase stocked with a weird combination of kid’s books and illustrated encyclopedias that Newt used to pore over for hours as a kid, often with Hermann. Newt draws back the embroidered curtains and peers out the window at the Gottliebs’ snow-capped house next door. Hermann’s window was directly across from his. It still is, technically, though the curtains (these navy blue and embroidered with little constellations) are pulled tight, and Newt has a feeling that Hermann hasn’t set foot in his old room in well over a decade. Two decades, probably.

He remembers the one summer he showed Hermann how to make a soup can telephone, and they managed to string it all the way across between their windows before discovering it kinda didn’t work as well as Newt said it would. He remembers when Hermann’s dad banned him from the Gottlieb house for tracking water all over their front hallway after he and Hermann went wading in the creek, but it was really Hermann who did it, because he forgot to take his shoes off and they got soaked, and Newt just took the fall for it so Hermann wouldn’t get in trouble. And when Hermann asked Newt to play astronaut with him, and Newt insisted on being an alien and mimed the chestburster scene from Alien, and Hermann freaked out so bad he fell in a mud puddle and got grounded for ruining his clothing, and Newt got grounded for that and for watching Alien when he wasn’t supposed to, and they spent the following few days staring sadly out across at each other before Newt’s grandma finally got tired of his moping and sent him to work weeding the garden. He remembers knotting a little friendship bracelet for Hermann out of embroidery thread he found in his grandmother’s sewing basket and Hermann vowing to keep it until he died.

Newt’s half of the soup can phone is still on the windowsill, though the string snapped and crumbled apart years ago. He picks at the peeling Chicken Noodle label, so distracted that he almost doesn’t notice the light suddenly seeping through at the edges of Hermann’s curtains, or the way they’re pushed open—almost.

Hermann—real, live, adult Hermann, botched haircut and round glasses and all—stares out at Newt with a shocked expression on his face. Newt drops the can with a clatter.

Then he waves.

“Hey, Grandma?” Newt says, poking his head into the kitchen. Tonight’s dinner is a massive pot of soup boiling away on the stovetop, dessert a mountain of cookies and tiny pastries on serving platters on the counters. Newt hasn’t had food that looked this good since he moved out, to be honest. The intersection of Newt’s sad lack of cooking skills and his attempts at vegetarianism means he eats a lot of boxed mac-and-cheese and frozen Vegetable Lovers’ pizzas. “Are you—?"

“Oh, Newt!” Newt’s grandmother says. She sets down her wooden spoon. “Are you feeling rested, then?”

“Yeah,” Newt says. “Grandma, I was wondering, could I—uh—maybe run some food over to the Gottliebs? To be…neighborly? We just have so much, and—”

“That’s a wonderful idea,” Newt’s grandmother says. “They keep to themselves, mostly, but I can’t imagine they’d turn it down. You might even see your little friend again! What was his name? You were so fond of him.”

“Hermann,” Newt says, quickly shoving cookies into a red-lid plastic container. “Thanks, Grandma.”

He tucks the tupperware under his arm and nearly wipes out on the icy front path he runs to the Gottliebs’ so fast. Before he can so much as catch his breath and knock, their door swings open; Hermann, dressed in a tacky Hannukah sweater, arches an eyebrow at him. “I saw you sprint over here like a bloody madman,” he says, in blessed English. He must’ve remembered how shitty Newt’s German was when they were kids. “Hello, Newton. What’s so terribly important?”

His voice got deeper—expected—and he swapped out his German accent for an English one somewhere along the way. Probably at his stuffy boarding school. He also got taller—he’s got a few inches on Newt now, but Newt admits that’s not exactly hard. God, he’s even hotter in person. “Uh,” Newt says. Why is he here? Oh, right. He thrusts out the tupperware. “I brought some cookies over for you?”

Hermann peers down at the offering over his glasses. His forehead wrinkles. “How considerate,” he says. He pulls an olive-green parka on and steps out onto the porch, tugging the door shut behind him. He taps at a peeling porch swing with the end of his cane. “Just leave them there. Would you like to take a walk?”

It’s freezing, and snowing, but for some reason, a walk sounds like the best idea in the world right now. “Yes, please,” Newt says, and chucks the cookies onto the swing.

“I must say,” Hermann says, after their meandering walk around the Gottliebs’ yard takes them to the old maple tree. The branches are bare, but thick, and shield them from most of the falling snow. Hermann’s breath puffs out white in front of his angular face. The last time I stood here, Newt thinks, he kissed me. “I really did not expect to see you.”

“I didn’t expect to see you, either,” Newt admits. “From what I remember, you and your family weren’t—uh—well, very close. I didn’t think you’d be coming back to share in the holiday cheer with them, is what I mean.”

The corner of Hermann’s mouth twitches up. “That’s certainly one way of describing it. Yes, I suppose you’re right—my father is a bit of a bastard, isn’t he?” Newt laughs awkwardly, unsure whether to agree or attempt to weakly the defend a guy who openly hated him for being a bad influence on Hermann most of his childhood; he’s grateful when Hermann continues and saves him the choice. “This is the first year I’ve come home in a long while. My brother’s just had a daughter, you see, and I thought I should start getting used to playing uncle.”

“Oh, congrats,” Newt says. Hermann shrugs, and Newt has the distinct feeling that this is Hermann’s older brother, who used to dissemble Hermann’s telescope and hide the pieces around the house when Hermann annoyed him, and tattled on Newt and Hermann to Hermann’s parents the one time Newt snuck in to see Hermann after he got banned. He always made Newt thankful that he was an only child. “Same here, actually. Not the uncle thing—I mean I haven’t visited since I was in college. Too busy.”

“I know,” Hermann says, and then adds teasingly (in a way that makes color flood Newt’s cheeks and his heart beat just a little faster), “I’ve looked you up online. Er—quite a bit recently, in fact. I was curious. You’ve made quite the name for yourself, haven’t you, Dr. Geiszler?”

“I,” Newt squeaks, and then coughs. “I mean, I guess? I like…science.”

“I oughtn’t be surprised,” Hermann says. “You were always giving me bugs, and salamanders, and funny little frogs—”

Newt liked bugs, and salamanders, and frogs, but he liked Hermann more, and the gifts had a lot more to do with the latter than the former, because what kid wouldn’t want bugs or salamanders or frogs, right? Not that Hermann ever appreciated them—especially not the worms Newt would pluck from the sidewalks after rainstorms. He thinks he got grounded for that one, too, because his grandma wouldn’t believe that he really wasn’t trying to terrorize the poor Gottlieb boy. “And what about you?” Newt says. He pokes his elbow into Hermann’s side. “Dr. Gottlieb? Guess those model rockets paid off.”

(“No, Newton,” Hermann would snap at him on the rare occasions he would allow Newt to watch him piece one together, “the glue hasn’t dried yet. You have to be patient, or else it’ll fall apart.”)

“Not yet,” Hermann says, “but I hope soon.”

Hermann smiles at him. A snowflake catches in his eyelashes—his long, pretty, dark eyelashes. “Do you remember when you kissed me here?” Newt blurts out.

“It’s hardly the sort of thing I’d forget,” Hermann says. He reaches out and tucks a piece of Newt’s hair up into his hat. “I like your tattoos—I saw the photographs on your social media accounts. They suit you.” Newt wonders if this means Hermann saw the shirtless selfie he posted on Instagram. “I’m also pleased to see you’ve gotten your braces removed. It wasn’t a very pleasant experience last time.”

Then he leans in and kisses Newt. Again, technically. It’s so light and brief Newt hardly believes it even happened. Their glasses clack together, and when Hermann pulls away, he straightens out Newt’s.

“I confess,” Hermann says, “that I’m wholly pleased to see how you’ve turned out. I hope that wasn’t too forward of me. I’ve been thinking about doing it all night.”

“Jeez, dude,” Newt says, blinking at him, his head swimming just a little. Hermann looks smug. “Not, uh, not too forward. So. Uh. You wanna get dinner or something this week and catch up?”

Hermann snorts, and nods.

#newmann #maria's fanfiction tag #Anonymous

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curlytemple · 4 years

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niche interests list

okay sure yes this is fun! i havent posted a thing like this in such a long time. thank you new gal pal @scottspack for tagging me!

pigs????

alright first lets throw it back to preschool! my fav childhood toys were my baby doll (snookums) and a plush pig that my grandma got me that i just called ‘pig’ ...i watched the babe movies countless times, and piglet? that anxious little guy GETS ME bro. when my preschool did a nativity play and my class got to choose an animal to be in baby jesus’ manger, my mother recalls me saying that i would be a pig because jewish people (jesus christ) wouldnt eat me. she has no idea how or when i learned about kosher foods. ironically despite my namesake i was too afraid of the movie charlotte’s web to watch it more than once because the scary farmer tries to kill wilbur for being small and the pretty spider dies.

sugar creek gang

OKAY this is a book series from the 40s-70s about a group of christian little boys in indiana who went on adventures in the woods and helped people. my dad read a LOT of chapter books to me as bedtime stories when i was little (see also the mandie series, nancy drew and the hardy boys, little house on the prairie) but sugar creek gang is one that really hit. i read all 36 books with dad and at least once again on my own. there was a series of 4 or 5 movies in the early 2000s when i was the Perfect age to have a crush on most if not all of them. this might be too much detail but i have to tell you about these boys. we WILL not be revisiting the heavy religious themes.

the narrator is bill who is Good and Kind and wants to be a doctor when he grows up. his best friend is a chubby boy nicknamed poetry because he memorizes and quotes poems, he is the Detective of the group. BIG JIM is the leader of the group who is supposed to be like, 14, which was very cool and hot, to me. and yes there is a little jim, who is the baby of the group. then there is CIRCUS who is known for his climbing and acrobatics, and his FIVE SISTERS AND BEAUTIFUL SINGING VOICE. dreamboy. i’m almost done listing boys, i promise. a boy called dragonfly who is allergic to everything and hella superstitious. later in the series a new boy named tom moves to town and tom has an older brother bob who is NOT A CHRISTIAN (bully)

tangentially, the buttercream gang, a movie from 1992 that was almost definitely made by some christians who grew up reading the sugar creek gang series which i’m guessing on vibes alone. will spare you Good Boy details but scott is in love with his best friend pete who moves to chicago and falls in with a bad crowd and scott just refuses to stop LOVING HIM. very gay christian film in retrospect.

peter pan

so i know liking disney’s peter pan isnt niche, but it was the way i liked it. tinker bell stan from day one, i watched all of those disney fairies movies, even the ones that came out after i was definitely not intended audience. there was an online pixie hollow game where you could design your own fairies and play mini games where you gathered dew drops or something. had a HUGE CRUSH on jeremy sumpter in peter pan (2003) then i got really darkly obsessed with the idea of growing up when i was 12 or 13, and everything peter pan was deeply My Shit for my entire adolescence. i read the original book and every other twisted version of the story i could find and seriously freaked myself out about wasting my youth.

shug

you’ve probably heard of jenny han now, or at least the netflix adaptations for to all the boys i’ve loved before and the sequel ps i still love you (always and forever, lara jean, coming soon?) but before she wrote THOSE, she wrote my first ever Favorite Book, about annemarie “shug” wilcox, a girl in the summer before starting middle school. it is SO engraved on my heart i cannot explain. i felt so incredibly understood and cant even tell you how many times i read it. thinking about all of the ways it made me feel SEEN is actually making me very tender so i’m gonna go on.

the summer series

on the subject of jenny han, since she was now my Favorite author, when she came out with the summer i turned pretty in 2009, i was ALL IN. it’s not summer without you, and we’ll always have summer were published the next two years. a coming of age series about a girl isabel “belly” conklin who stays at her mother’s best friend's house at the beach in the summers. i really could talk about it forever yall. i actually dont know how to be succinct about it. i will try. her mom’s friend has TWO BOYS. one brother, jeremiah, is the golden boy and her best friend who is in love with her! the older one CONRAD is her childhood crush who's just sort of around while belly is firmly getting over her childish feelings and going out and experiencing teen beach life with jeremiah for the first time and figuring out who she is and wants to be! by the end of the summer he admits he feels differently about her (hence belly internalizing this as The Summer I Turned Pretty) and they get together. this is already too much so i will just say that the next two books deal with a PROFOUND LOSS and the selfishness of grief and the SELFLESSNESS OF CONRAD and i will absolutely lose my shit if netflix picks it up for a second jenny han series adaptation.

pappyland

this was a kids show in the 90′s that features a character named Pappy Drew-It, an artist dressed like a 49er who lives in a magic cabin in pappyland. there’s tons of characters and music and life lessons but the meat of every episode is a detailed drawing how-to (pappy is actually a cartoonist, michael cariglio) and i have a hard back cover sketch book from my grandpa that i FILLED with drawings that pappy and DOODLEBUG taught me to do. there is a running gag that pappy always breaks his crayons.

boy meets world

i KNOW this is beloved by many but i’m counting it because i’m simply too young to have such an obsession with it! the show ran from 1992-2000. i was born in 1996, but reruns on the disney channel and abc family cemented it as one of my favorite shows. cory and shawn, closer than brothers, shameless homoromantics, shawn is cory’s first wife!!!!! truly showed me what a best friend can and should be!!!!!! the great love of your life!!!!! TOPANGA, the og weird feminist girl who said stop shaving your legs and start speaking your mind, ladies! the characters are so richly developed that they are real people to my heart. YES every character on this show is in their late 30s-early 40s and YES i feel like we grew up together. in season one they’re in the 6th grade and we follow them all the way to COLLEGE. countless poignant life lessons, often literally dictated by the wise and hilarious MR. FEENY, cory’s next door neighbor and somehow one of his teachers for YEARS. my love was only solidified by the 2014 girl meets world reboot, centered on cory and topanga’s daughter and her best friend. (which was literally cancelled because disney didn’t want to transition from a kids show to a teen show, something essential to the original. also because that teen show would have had CANON LESBIANS. extremely shameful move in 2017!) boy meets world lives rent free in my heart and i will never evict it!!!!!!!

i consulted my mother when i got stumped for more and she reminded me that i had obsessions with the impressionist art period and babies and ANYTHING fairies or pixies, and i was way too young when my love of the canadian teen after school special degrassi began. she also said bob ross, which i was hesitant to include because he’s been super ~trendy in recent years, but to be fair (To Be Faaairrr) she’s right! i don’t think people really watched the joy of painting as much as i have throughout my life. best sick day show of all time.

lastly i could honestly list anna herself as a niche interest, my mom actually metioned that ive always hyperfixated on my girl friends (gay) but i’ll just note that YES friday night lights, YES barry lyga novels. love to share so many things with you, niche or not, they’re niche in Our Mind.

#with the baby obsession came an obsession with adoption #my aunt and uncle adopted and when i learned that there were ORPHANS whew #i was in preschool judging people for getting pregnant when there were SO many babies without mommies #she had a good point!#also does being a niall girl in 2012 count

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agentaace · 4 years

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artemis fowl liveblog, if anyones interested (disclaimers: i was a HUGE fan of the books when i was younger but i barely remember anything, and i am pretty high right now)

its gonna be long folks! like..... really long

okay. news reporters. is that.... the digging guy??

YEAH ITS MULCH!! is he.... the narrator??? why is he the narrator???

who is this surfing child. the artemis i know has never stepped foot outside. i dont think he ever went to school either "an unusual kid" NOT UNUSUAL ENOUGH.... this kid looks to much like a cinnamon roll..... WHY IS HIS MOM DEAD

a hoverboard? a fucking hoverboard???

humans shouldnt know about the faeries

this bitch wearing jeans? also the dad looks like david from schitts creek but older

i should mention that the first time i heard this movie was approaching i looked up who was cast for Holly Short, bc i DISTINCTLY remember her explicetly canonically having brown skin bc i used to draw her!!! also butler's name wasnt revealed until like the third book and it was a BIG DEAL, youre just gonna drop it just like that?

whys artemis dressed like edmund pevensie...... fucking knock off version. edmund had more evil in his body than this wannabe supervillain and edmund was a GOOD BOY

hate this version of butler. hes too nice. hes helpful and kind. why has disney spat in my face

OH SHIT FAIRYWORLD LOOKS DOPE AF, somehow almost exactly like inused to picture it!! one good detail!! and if holly wasnt whitewashed she'd be kinda cute,,,,

this is not a compliment to the movie at all but i still absolutely love the faeries being super sci fi and tech oriented, thats incredible.... scifi fantasy DREAM HYBRID

oh god last time i saw judy dench was in the cats movie,,, she stared into my soul,,,, i cannot forget. though yeah she is a good commander root actually from what little i remember, the vibes are right

pleasebejuliapleasebejulia.... oh its juliet but SHE IS HERE!!!!!!!!!! h his twelve year old neice??? no??? she is his like 17 year old sister

oh my god foaly..... ok he looks cool as hell actually.... too bad his legs are animated weird!!! i would die for him

the l.e.p.recon suit and the wings actually look pretty close to whay i pictured too.... and the troll scene!!! holy shit i remember this!!! and thats how artemis finds her..... yess.... god those books were good.... time-freeze bubble foreshadowing omg i REMEMBER THAT and artemis figures out a way to avoid it..... holy shit im having so many flashbacks

OPAL KOBOI OH MY GOD wasnt she not until the third book??? and the dad and the aculos stuff too???? why are they mixing them up like this

okay kidnapping scene and where holly and artemis meet is sorta exactly what i remember, like i feel like its almost line for line tbh

pacing is wack, i feel like the time freeze was much later in the book and holly was captive for like, a majority.... also, now that artemis is playing villain to holly it feels a lot more natural, he is SUPPOSED to be snarky and rude and mean

"top o' the morning" very funny judy dench line, but i dont think its funny for the reasons disney intended

ARTEMIS IN A SUIT, FINALLY!!! also, Take The Shot! lmao. and see... this little good artemis doesnt make sense to have this extremely thorough and detailed and villainous plan, why couldnt disney just make him evil

HEY I REMEMBER THE GOBLIN FIRE THING IN PRISON W MULCH ACTUALLY..... NICE

"youre enjoying all this, you think it's a game!" YES! wht couldnt disney just lean into this and commit!!! i just wish this child looked like more of a bastard!!

hehehe david bowie is a faerie (though i'm.... not really liking josh gad's comedic relief role here.... thats nothing new) FUCK ME I FORGOT ABOUT THE JAW THING I AM TOO HIGH FOR THAT SHIT THIS IS HORRIFYING

iris cam!!! vividly remember that!!! and the finger gun thing, did they use that too?? loved that, will be disapointed if its not here

eeeughfjhf i forgot about the dwarf beard hair thing too oh GOD

the aculos looks good according to my awful memory!!! nice

the cudgeon storyline was NOT in the first book, not that i can remember, amd its not even interesting?? it just clutters up this movie with some nonsense. i dont like it.

that troll fucking YEETED butler eeeeeigufjkd the jaw thing again noooooo

like okay i like that artemis looks Baby, i like that he looks 12, i just wanted a shittier twelve year old. this ones too nice!! toss him out!!!

this butler is also too cute. i needed him to be way intimidating. but this one is wholesome. fuck this

and the relationship between holly and artemis. its too good, too pure. they are so cute. in the books they were friends completely against their will.

yeah i am totally mad that they are combining the first book and the third (?) book. not everything has to be some End Of The World shit. sometimes a kid just ransoms a fairy because he wants gold and he's evil. this disney version is much more boring. like if this movie had leaned into the wholesome stuff while keeping a lower stakes plot, thatd be okay. if artemis was super evil and cool as fuck and they made the stakes a little higher.... that might have been okay? but Good People Fighting The End Of The World is every movie and it is very boring!!!!! oh my god!!!!

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!? THE DAD'S NOT EVEN EVIL???? NOOOOO

holly and commander root were not close. seriously cut the wholesome shit. these were the LEAST wholesome books i read as a child. the faeries have swear words and they arent afraid to use them.

ugh the weird "we're probably not going to get a sequel but we're going to imply one anyways" thing that bad book adaptations do.... like miss peregrine's, remember that?

"i'm artemis fowl. i'm a criminal mastermind." FUCK YEAH YOU ARE GO OFF KING actually a little hyped over that line. maybe twelve is too young to be fully evil. he still has time to become Bastard.

fuck the mulch narrator bullshit. hate that. "i hope you don't get squeamish" I DO PLEASE DO NOT DO WHAT YOU ARE DOING shut the fuck up. all of you shut the fuck up you are so ANNOYING

okay its over and i am free

#artemis fowl #artemis fowl 2020 #liveblog #artemis fowl movie #funny #mine #ummmm ive only ever done liveblogs of magnus archives before #and thats on my sideblog #but i like it! might do it more especially if people like it

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a-story-teller · 4 years

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tagged by the sweet @kecharitomene! Thanks so much!!

are you staying home from work/school? I work in childcare, so almost first thing my job got shut down, and even my independent clients said they’d be putting off my usual babysitting. I miss work so much right now!

if you’re staying home, who’s with you? I’m cooped up a studio apartment with my sister @bell-flower - we’re making it work, but since the quarantine got extended we’ve been going a little nuts.

an event you were looking forward to that got cancelled? hopefully they’ll be delayed and not canceled, but I was supposed to go to an NCT concert and a Monsta X concert back-to-back in June, and if I don’t get to go I WILL cry. And sue Ticketmaster.

what movies have you watched recently? what shows? I’ve been watching SO MUCH. Notably, I finished Arthdal Chronicles and Carnival Row. I’ve been catching up on campaign 2 of Critical Role. Other shows I’ve watched/am watching include Into the Badlands, Kingdom, The Good Place, Schitt’s Creek, and The Mandalorian. I’m also making sure to get my recommended daily dose of The Return of Superman, which gives me at least as much serotonin as my antidepressants do. Movies I’ve watched/plan to watch include Lu Over the Wall, Kiki’s Delivery Service, The Company of Wolves, The Autopsy of Jane Doe, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, A Room With a View, Vita & Virginia, Picnic at Hanging Rock, a timely rewatch of the original Wicker Man, and A Good Year. I also watched a documentary of a 60′s Drag competition.

what music are you listening to? Doja Cat, Bollywood soundtracks, NCT’s newest album Neo Zone, Vietnamese house/lo-fi pop?, Imogen Heap, Heartfelt Motown, Kate Bush, music that makes me feel like I could be lying on a chaise lounge and eating fruit on the sunlit balcony of an Italian or French villa, Mariee Sioux, and SIAMES. I’m not stressing that, their name is just capitalized!

what are you reading? I haven’t read in a really long time, but I got an audible free trial so I listened to Little Weirds by Jenny Slate (and will probably listen again, because it’s not that long and she really scalped me hard) and am in the process of listening to Fingersmith by Sarah Waters, the book that The Handmaiden is based on. I think I’ll read Sabriel by Garth Nix once I’ve finished that. And maybe I’ll reread Notes from Underground? I’m feeling wistful.

what are you doing for self-care? I’ve been drawing a ton; I also bake, do face masks and other skincare, online window-shop, look at pictures of babies on instagram, work on my one-person DnD campaign/graphic novel/novella, play guitar, nap, listen to ASMR, go on bike rides along the river, and attempt to clean.

I tag @satellitesapphic and @dictatorish

#meet the blogger #yes I know I haven't posted since 2018

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leupagus · 5 years

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you will miss the green and the woods and streams

A Schitt’s Creek AU thing I wrote for @broadlybrazen, which boils down to “lol what if Schitt’s Creek had been Schitt Records can you imagine.”

You’re welcome/I’m sorry.

***

“Okay, but why are you making me do this.” David doesn’t ask, because it’s not a question; it’s a declaration, something he’s learned in the long years since he and Stevie were coworkers, then friends, then — something, almost, not quite — and now they’re people who drag each other to shitty bars in shitty basements in shitty Toronto, except only Stevie is that.

“I’m not making you do anything,” Stevie lies right to his actual face as they collect her beer and his wine from the bartender. “You offered to comfort me.”

“I don’t think I said ‘comfort’ so much as I said ‘support you in your time of—‘“ he waves at her generally, carefully not to spill. “Loss, or whatever.”

Not that Jake qualifies as a loss, per se; he hadn’t even tried to get out of the contract, which Stevie keeps saying is the important thing. And David of all people knows that above-average sex can only take you so far when the other guy is an emotionally illiterate carpenter/rockstar who responded to a breakup text with “bummer :P”

“Well, this is you supporting me.” Stevie takes a swig and leans back against the bar; David admires the clean line of her neck and chest the way he’s done a thousand times before, absentminded appreciation the way he looks at a beautiful coat or listens to a new record; letting it slip through his fingers, like everything else.

“You’re not…performing, are you,” David doesn’t-ask.

Stevie gives him a long look. “You’ve known me for over two years,” she says, even. “Do you think I’m likely to break out into song?”

“You’re a talent scout for a major record label,” he feels obliged to point out.

“Uh, first of all, it’s not major, and second of all, so are you,” she says.

This is, sadly, irrefutable.

When Ira disappeared to God knew where with the keys to the Rose family fortune, their lawyer had pulled them all into the living room with a chipper expression and a folder. David hadn’t listened, the sounds of furniture, paintings, his life being carted out the door overwhelming everything else. But Dad’s voice cut through.

“Schitt Records? That was a joke—“ and it still is a joke, almost two and a half years later. The biggest joke in the music industry, and David hears the laughter everywhere he goes.

Roland Schitt had been managing his wife and an extremely chipper singer-songwriter who went by “Twyla” and did tarot card readings after every set. Schitt Records was worth approximately nothing; probably why the government had let them keep it. When Dad finally exercised his ownership clause and made Roland an ex-officio (read: non-voting) board member, Roland had actually cackled with delight and wished them all the best, taking his “President of” title and a small stipend with him. Jocelyn and Twyla stuck around, although David still isn’t sure that Twyla’s all that aware of the change in management.

And anyway, as far as David’s concerned, the only thing of value at Schitt Records, at least at first, was Stevie.

They’d put Alexis back in the studio for want of any better ideas; David had found a semi-decent, semi-sober songwriter to give her some of the songs Meghan and Ariana had rejected. “Pullin’ Up Alexis” didn’t so much as crack the top 200 but it had put Schitt Records in the black, at least, even if Alexis did go white-faced and brittle at the awful venues David coaxed her into for the better part of a year — county fairs and no-name festivals where the audience wanted to jeer and heckle, where her dancing would get her laughed offstage if her singing didn’t. But every time he’d tell her she could quit (she couldn’t) and that they’d find another way to get the company on its feet (they wouldn’t), she’d lift her chin and smile and ask her where they were going next, and David loved her more than he’d ever, ever tell her.

And when the tour ended, David gritted his teeth and went out with Stevie to find something else. They found Ronnie, who hates them all but has hands like an angel on the piano; Jake who’s prettier onstage than off but who can draw a reliable crowd; even Ray, whose one-man band act is surprisingly lucrative, though David suspects that’s because anyone who listens can’t actually believe what’s happening.

Schitt Records still isn’t worth buying, but it’s worth something, now; worth spending late nights in small towns, worth sleepless weekends working festivals, worth more than David had ever expected to find.

But he’s still looking, he knows, for something else.

Even more insultingly, the open mic has a theme; “90’s Nostalgia!” which means too many bad covers of Alanis and one truly offensive attempt at “I Will Always Love You” that has David ordering his next glass of wine in a pint glass.

Stevie is laughing, though — she’s happy, in tune with the crowd who are clearly here for their respective friends onstage, leading the shaky ones through their choruses and cheering with far more enthusiasm than is merited when each of them wraps up.

“This is horrifying,” David tells her as some guy in his 60s gets gently ushered offstage and there’s a blessed lull.

“I know,” Stevie replies, eyes shining. “It’s great.”

And it is, in a weird way that David would never have enjoyed in his other life; he would never have set foot in here, would never have been friends with someone as grounded and solid and plaid as Stevie in the first place. So he takes a drink and doesn’t suggest they leave, but does pick a fight about sending Ray to ACL.

Stevie obligingly takes the bait and they’re halfway through the comfortable old argument about riders when David realizes the strummy-strummy lala in the background is a) recognizable, b) good, and c) infuriating.

The guy onstage is best described as “unprepossessing accountant,” wearing an ugly shirt and ugly slacks and uglier shoes and an astonishingly ugly fringed vest that’s probably (hopefully) a joke, judging by the wolf whistles from a table near the stage. But he’s got a smile like a searchlight as he rounds the corner of the first verse:

“I’m caught up in the midst of you And I cannot resist…”

David flails around until he makes contact with Stevie’s — okay, her face, which she’ll probably complain about later, but he’s too incensed. “He’s singing Mariah?”

Stevie swats his hand away. “He’s not bad.”

“I—“ David clutches at his pint glass. Fringed Vest, still grinning into the crowd and unaware of David’s newborn vendetta against him, continues.

Boy, if I do The things you want me to The way I used to do Would you love me, baby Hold me, feeling now Go and break my heart

The entire bar joins in on the chorus, Fringed Vest leading them like some hick accountant Pied Piper:

Heartbreaker, you got the best of me But I just keep on coming back incessantly Oh, why did you have to run your game on me I should have known right from the start You'd go and break my heart

Fringed Vest does not, thank God, try his hand at rapping the break but the crowd seems reluctant to let him actually finish the song, the choruses getting progressively louder and more boisterous until Fringed Vest puts a line underneath and steps back from the mic and they finally take the goddamn hint.

“That was—“ awful, he’s about to say, but the problem is that it wasn’t. There’s not a whole lot a Canadian accountant can add to Mariah Carey, especially with the advent of Lip Synch Battle. But it hadn’t felt patronizing or mocking; Fringed Vest knew every word, sang with a voice that couldn’t hold a match to Mariah but still expressed some sort of longing. He’d been joyful, earnest where most people tonight had clung to trite. It… worked.

He’s even more enraged.

“C’mon,” Stevie says, slipping through the crowd with the weary ease of someone who’s been doing this half her life. David tromps behind in her wake, bumping up against the same people Stevie glides past and almost losing her twice before she gets to the dinky curtain that is the backstage and ducking inside.

Which smells like vomit; David immediately flips through the various acts tonight and makes a bet with himself that it was the very sweet otter with the beard and the accordion even while Stevie is making her way over to the side of the stage where Fringed Vest is talking to somebody else and drinking — god, Red Mountain, David is vetoing any contract Stevie tries to push on this guy for that alone.

But Stevie’s introducing them and Fringed Vest extends a hand. “Patrick,” he says, grip firm. Up close he’s — not attractive, exactly, no eyebrows to speak of and a haircut that screams middle management, that smile still the most interesting thing about him. But it’s very interesting.

“David,” he admits, aware of Stevie’s narrowed eyes.

“David Rose,” Patrick says, worryingly. “You own Schitt Records.”

He blinks; this is possibly the first time anyone’s said the name of the company without smirking. “Co-own,” he corrects.

“You manage a friend of mine,” Patrick continues, “Ray? Butani?”

“We only manage one Ray, don’t worry,” Stevie tells him.

“How are you friends with Ray?” David demands. “He plays a vibraphone.”

“We both went to Rotman,” and that explains so much about both Ray and Patrick. “He was pretty excited when he signed.”

“Yes, the glamour of the pub circuit,” David says. “Who can resist the allure of all this,” and he almost hits a girl with beads in her hair and a banjo in her hand climbing onstage.

“It’s got its charms,” Patrick says, still smiling.

#schitt's creek #david/patrick #schitt records #schittalking #ficcage of interest #this story happened mainly because I finally bit the bullet and listened to Noah Reid's album #which hit all my 'very impressed‚ was not embarrassed at all‚ and I thought I would be' buttons #and was like 'oh no what if Patrick had written this instead'

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isaackuo · 5 years

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Starco Week5 Wrap-up!

This week was really fun! It was nice for someone to actually see the silly comics I draw! Normally, hardly anyone even notices so I rarely put in the effort of a multi-panel comic.

Here are links and explanations to my Starco Week 5 comics:

https://isaackuo.tumblr.com/post/185176588866/awkward

The one that started it all for me! I actually didn’t even notice there was a Wedding prompt later in the week. I just saw a post about “Awkward Dating Moments” and the Kellco shipper in me thought of a cute little comic that MAXIMIZED STARCO AWKWARDNESS.

So I thought, why not? It was only 3 little panels, and it mostly involved me drawing Kelly - who I find easy to draw. And I thought it was freaking hilarious.

EXPLANATION:

This comic refers to Booth Buddies, a “memorable” episode among us Starco shippers. In it, Kelly and Marco are on a wedding date, until Star Butterfly yoinks Marco away to the infamous photo booth. Then things get a little weird. In this comic, Kelly gets back by yoinking Marco to be her breakup buddy “booth buddy”, when Marco and Star are on a “wedding date” ...

https://isaackuo.tumblr.com/post/185223809716/yeah-im-a-bad-boy-princess

This one was the toughest for me, and also the weakest. I don’t follow AUs and I’m not used to thinking in terms of AUs. I tried to study the Bad Boy AU a bit, but I couldn’t think of any funny jokes for it. Honestly, I just went with the first idea I finally thought of which was vaguely funny.

EXPLANATION:

This comic references a few of the “bad” things canon Star actually did:

1) Trash a cop car in Star vs Echo Creek

2) Shoot a cop chopper out of the sky in Sad Teen Hotline

3) Murder the MHC in Cleaved

But “nice” AU Star wouldn’t do that stuff, right? So Bad Boy Marco picks up the slack for her. So ... it’s funny? I dunno, I think my sense of humor is too obtuse a lot of the time. You really need to be in deep with the show to even remember the stuff I’m referencing and make the connections?

I guess either you “get it” or ... oh well.

https://isaackuo.tumblr.com/post/185220760531/starco-snugs

Haha, this one was “controversial”. I mean ... if you read my stuff then you know I think Star was addicted to the thrill of having both Marco and Tom, the same way Marco was addicted to the thrill of two timing with Star and Hekapoo (in Night Life). I think this was cute and tragi-comic, and it’s one of my favorite parts of Star Butterfly’s character. Let her have her distinctive flaws, okay?

But apparently this also cuts a bit too close to home, since it’s one of the things hardcore Tom stans criticize Star for (both the character and the show).

Anyways ... while everyone else was going sweet lovey-dovey, I went a bit freaky. I mean ... I think of this as romantic, but maybe I’m just weird that way. Like ... just imagine. Marco Diaz consoling Star every night for breaking up with Tom, and then he gets hit by “Mind Eraser” so he gets to do it again tomorrow. Isn’t that romantic?

EXPLANATION:

This comic is based on the “Mind Eraser” spell Eclipsa teaches Moon in Total Eclipsa the Moon. It’s one of my favorite spells to make jokes around, because it’s basically the flashy thing from Men in Black.

So I ponder ... what if Star really went all out using “Mind Eraser” and she went completely nuts taking advantage of it on Marco Diaz? Okay, in Here to Help, Star rushed to skip the awkward talky talky stuff and went straight for a kiss first. Maybe she’s used to it because she’s had the confession talk with Marco dozens of times already?

Oh, I also snuck in a joke referring to how Tom didn’t let Star kiss him on the lips after they broke up. As such, the only actual Tomstar kiss shown was the Lava Lake Beach kiss Marco saw from a distance. A bit mean to the Tomstar shippers, don’t you think?

https://isaackuo.tumblr.com/post/185256268271/when-is-this-state-going-to-end-starco-road

Road Trip was a challenge for me. I wanted to minimize drawing effort since my arm was sore, but I also wanted to depict a long amount of time. So I was thinking of them taking turns driving, but I switched to a bicycle based on Honey and Clover. Using a bicycle also allowed posing them in cute ways not available with a car, so it all worked out!

I was also thinking to try and cram in a joke about Star not being able to just use magic - using the Thor reaction gif to Steve Rogers not having the internet to look up the weather meme ... but ultimately it just didn’t fit. Also, I wanted to minimize drawing effort.

EXPLANATION:

Not much going on here - there’s really only one joke. But the cuteness of Star slumping on Marco really sells this one. Apparently, everyone else also thought so, since this ended up being pretty popular.

Oh, I suppose the sheer absurdity of doing an interstate bicycle trip eastward from the California coast is also a bit funny.

https://isaackuo.tumblr.com/post/185303660951/isaackuo-sword-fight-club-xover-double-fight

I initially struggled with this prompt. I mean ... crossover double date? It’s just weird to me. How do they even know each other? How did they meet? It makes no sense?

Well, a classic Douglas Adams writing trick is to take what you’re stuck on and turn it around. And so I did. How do they even know each other? THEY DON’T. It’s just some random “Fight Club App” meetup. Once I had that epiphany, it was a matter of figuring out what couple would be the funniest to fight ...

EXPLANATION:

I’m proud of all the jokes I packed in here. Of course, we start off with the fact that this “date” is a random “Fight Club App” thing. Not only that, but it’s a Sword Fight Club. Like that’s a thing. You’re just going to randomly fight some strangers with swords. Like you’re in freaking Highlander except there’s no Prize or whatever.

But it’s funny because getting into some random fights is indeed the sort of thing Star and Marco would do for a fun date! Same with Steven and Connie, really (although this is more along the lines of Steven and Amethyst wrt Tiger Millionaire).

Then there’s the fact that Marco Diaz wore baby Mariposa to a sword fight. Who even does that? Oh right ... Queen Solaria and Queen Eclipsa. Which fandom didn’t question at all ... we just thought it was cute.

Star’s “We’re fighting kids?” is a reference to Alone Together, when Kevin freaks out that Stevonnie is actually two kids.

Marco is okay with fighting a kid, since his Season 1 karate nemesis was 8 year old Jeremy Birnbaum (remember him?).

The slit eyes Mariposa give Steven are based on the way baby Meteora looks at Marco.

Connie’s right - Star and Marco are 15 ... not all that much older than she is. But Star has been through a lot of serious stuff making her grow up young. She has lost touch with what teenagers even do (as she noted in Cornonation).

Star’s shocked at Steven’s age the same way Connie was shocked when she learned Steven’s age.

Even though Steven’s age disconnect is caused by wibbly wobbly gem hybrid growth rates, Marco assumes it’s because he “Did time in the Neverzone”. I had fun rewording that phrase until it implied something like doing a prison sentence.

The final kicker is baby Mariposa revealing she’s almost as old as Connie. This calls up fandom mixed feelings about Neverzone age ambiguity and what the heck this implies after Gone Baby Gone. And I mean ... you all saw it coming, right? You knew baby Mariposa had to be there for a reason, right? It’s funny because you see it coming a mile away.

Needless to say, this one is the one I’m most proud of. I had so much fun writing and rewriting it in my head until it was perfect! The only bad thing is that you need to be pretty familiar with both Star vs the Forces of Evil and Steven Universe to get all the jokes. But hey ... my sense of humor is obtuse like that.

https://isaackuo.tumblr.com/post/185295564211/the-honey-moon-ball-starco-wedding-prompt

This was another tough one. I already blew my best wedding joke on Day 1, and I didn’t even notice there was a Wedding Day prompt at the time!

I struggled and struggled to come up with anything. So I just latched onto the first joke I came up with. In lieu of good jokes, I tried to sell this one with sweet cute character art showing Tom being dashing and Starco being lovey dovey. Still ... this is one of my weaker ones.

EXPLANATION:

Obviously this is based on the Blood Moon Ball/Curse, but this time Tom’s hitting them with a different curse - the Honey Moon Curse.

As we find out in Curse of the Blood Moon, Star didn’t pay attention to the MC and she thought the Blood Moon light was just a fun party light. So in this comic, she’s just obliviously caressing Marco while he questions what Tom means.

I initially thought of Tom explaining that he was confused about what Marco had previously meant when he said he wanted a “honeymoon”. But then, I thought it would be funnier if it’s simply ambiguous whether or not Tom is being spiteful or a silly practical joker or what. Sometimes it’s funnier when there’s a psychological tension - you don’t know what Tom’s thinking/feeling.

https://isaackuo.tumblr.com/post/185313724836/toy-star-starco-week-5-prompt-au-of-choice

Another one which was initially tough for me. I’m just not familiar with AUs, so I knew I’d have to make up my own. But what? Nothing clicked until ... TOY STORY! After that stroke of brilliance, there were too many ideas. The hard part was paring things down into a manageable short comic.

I’m most proud of the INSANE look of Princess Star tapping her Wand at Diaz. And also the Pony Head box for Princess Star.

Anyway, the great thing about Toy Star is that I didn’t need to fill in much detail in order for the reader to imagine a whole world around it. I mean ... we all know and love Toy Story. It’s part of our cultural consciousness. So it’s really easy to imagine some fun enemies-to-buddies story just from a few suggestions.

EXPLANATION:

The boxed Princess Star bonking Diaz off the bed is actually not quite how it happened in Toy Story. But close enough! (We don’t actually get to see the majesty of a boxed Buzz Lightyear until Toy Story 2.)

Princess Star has ball jointed arms similar to Buzz Lightyear while Diaz is a flexible stuffed doll like Woody. I left off “Butterfly” because “Princess Star” feels more self centered and self important.

Diaz is named “Diaz” just to make Jackie’s line sound more intimate and personal.

Mermaid Jackie is, of course, a reference to the popular fan theory that Jackie was a mermaid. This “Sunny Atlantis” mermaid is a reference to the Pixar short Knick Knack. She’s an aquarium decoration, rather than a toy. This is a reference to how Woody’s girlfriend Bo Peep was also not a toy (she was a lamp).

The mermaid in Knick Knack has shades rather than eyes. So that’s why mermaid Jackie is lifting up shades to look down toward Diaz.

The panel where Diaz is getting out from under Adam’s bed is directly based on a Toy Story screenshot. The original does have a cactus pictured on the bedspread. I thought it would be kinda funny if it’s ambiguous what sort of “cactuses” broke Diaz’s fall.

The “must be some mistake” panel is also directly based on a Toy Story screenshot.

Princess Star immediately trying to Narwhal Blast Diaz indicates she’s even crazier than Buzz Lightyear. Buzz merely shifted around pointing his laser arm at Woody. Oh - the “psycho” look in her face really sells this, I think.

The fact that Princess Star is somehow aware she has to tap the button on her wand to activate it is ... well I think it’s funny. (The button placement, of course, is plainly designed for human use.)

Princess Star requesting a nearby Quest Buy is a reference to Quest Buy, the episode where they go to Quest Buy to buy a wand charger. “Or do you still use Plutonium” is a reference to Buzz’s technobabble “distolic fusion” ... but I thought the use of real world “Plutonium” would give the joke a bit more kick (sort of a Back to the Future reference also).

Diaz answering “we’ve got double-A’s” is a reference to Toy Story where Woody says the same thing.

“Look, new friend,” is something Star Butterfly would say, but with a flat attitude more like Buzz Lightyear. This indicates Princess Star has a bit different personality than canon Star Butterfly. It fits in more with Toy Story, helping the reader imagine how this Starco relationship will play out.

“Multiverse High Command” is a mashup of “Magical High Commission” and “Star Command”. The threat of the multiverse being destroyed is something Queen Moon warns Star in Star Comes to Earth. The spiel where Princess Star explains her mission is similar to Buzz Lightyear explaining his mission. Presumably, it’s written on her Ponyhead box. Again, all this stuff helps the reader imagine how this Starco relationship will play out.

Diaz’s “You’re a toy” is, of course, a reference to Woody trying to explain to Buzz Lightyear that he’s just a toy.

“I believe the term you’re looking for is ‘Magical Princess from Another Dimension’“ refers to a similar Buzz Lightyear line, as well as how canon Star introduces herself to Marco Diaz in Star Comes to Earth.

But really ... there are SO many memorable Toy Story lines that cramming in references is like shooting fish in a barrel. Too easy! But still fun!

Of all the silly ideas I put out there for Starco Week 5, Toy Star is perhaps the one which has gotten some interest. It’s begging to be fleshed out. I welcome anyone to do whatever they want with it!

And again, a big thanks to everyone who read my stuff, followed, reblogged, and such! Especially, of course, @starco-week

#starcoweek5 #starco #svtfoe #star vs the forces of evil #Thoughts #myart

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candace-engl-306-blog · 5 years

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Pages 1-4 ish

Description of art and panel layout of the first few comic pages:

Page 1-2 ish:

A date at the top of the page indicates that it is December and the drawings and panels of this graphic story are functioning as a diary of sorts. To open the narrative, a series of panels showing a post office box (mail boxes in an apartment building), in progressing levels of morning sunlight. These panels and the ones following will be mostly black and white and drawing with pen, with loose crosshatching to show value and detail. A hand reaches out and opens the box. A hallmark letter sized envelope waits inside. The rand removes it, and there is a pause as the protagonist (Audrey) holds the envelope and examines the return address. It’s from an old coworker of her mother’s and Audrey’s old 2nd grade teacher, which is confusing because Audrey hasn’t really heard from any of her teachers in the past, and although this woman was close with her mom, she hasn’t ever gotten mail from her in the past. This won’t necessarily be obvious on the page just yet. The panel will show Audrey’s face examining the envelope, giving the reader the first real glimpse at the “narrator” so the drawing will be somewhat more precise than the previous panels to make it stand out and indicate her role as the protagonist. This will also be an important portrait of Audrey because it will be the only time the reader views her before she discovers the death of her mother.

A series of panels shows Audrey opening the envelope while still downstairs because of her curiosity. The corner of a card peeking out of the simple drawing of the envelope shows detailed and vibrantly rendered colored flowers on the front of the card. Audrey’s hand pulls it from the envelope. A cliché note about loss and grief is written in three different cursive fonts. By all accounts the design on the card is intricate and ugly. Audrey, confused, her hands shaking a little, (shown by drawing two panels that show the briefest lapse in time of just her hand working up the courage to open the card), opens the card and reads the message from her mother’s coworker. “Very sorry to hear of your loss. Please give a call if you need anything (anything underlines and written in swooping cursive). God bless, Ms. Molly”

A panel shows Audrey looking up. A man sits at the lobby desk but there’s no indication he is meant to work there or is just lounging. His expression is bored, and he stares at Audrey as if she is paint drying and he is trying not to fall asleep. Audrey checks the time on her phone. Every moment is now being rendered in its own panel to slow the pacing of the narrative and distort the flow of time. These eventually grow darker in value and the reader then suddenly see a message typed hastily on a phone cancelling what the reader can assume was a date.

A rather thick black line cuts the above panels off from a panel that is the width of the page. From the reader’s POV, Audrey has transported to the train station. This transitional panel depicts a lowering (or raising, since the panel that would reveal which way it moves is not present) guard rail and commuter legs crossing in front of the “camera.” This is an above ground train, with only two tracks, indicating Audrey’s location somewhat outside of the denser parts of the city. Audrey stands on the platform with her arms crossed and one hand raised to her ear, holding her phone.

Page 3-ish

A detailed drawing of Audrey in profile is lit by the phone screen pressed to her ear, indicating that she just checked the screen to ensure the call was going through before returning the phone to her ear. This light does the work of an onomatopoeia for the reader, the Samsung dialing tone is evident. For a few panels Audrey waits for an answer, the wind blowing her hair to indicate the movement of time. Audrey’s sister answers. Audrey closes her eyes, and the page becomes black and a dialogue in white lettering transcribes the conversation.

Audrey: Hannah? Hello?

Hannah: Audrey? A baby cries in the background. Yeah hi! What do you need, what’s up?

Audrey: I got a weird card. Wait, what do you mean what’s up? You know what’s up.

Hannah: Oh Audrey. Oh…

Audrey: I got a card from one of Mom’s old friends. Hannah, when did she die? What… I?

Hannah: I really did mean to call you. It was only a few days ago. Just hold on. She whispers harshly to a child to drop something. Audrey, you there? Try not to worry, I was going to call once the arrangements had all been made; Dad didn’t want to worry you with all this.

Audrey: You’re talking to Dad? No. Wait. How did she die? Hannah this is a huge shock, I don’t understand what’s going on. A kid shouts on the line. Are you listening to me?

The black background begins to lighten, and a silhouette of Audrey is visible under the still-white and fading words.

Hannah: Oh crap, what, yes, I’m here. Look, I have to go. The baby just threw up and Peggy’s screaming at her sister. I’ll call you later OK?

The black fades completely and the reader sees Audrey in profile again, but from her other side. She hangs up the phone and static starts to overtake the page. She looks down into the train tracks, but the reader doesn’t see what she’s seeing, just her face, blank, which is unsettling or unexpected considering how she’d discovered her mother’s death. The camera pans out and the static surrounds her more. Then Audrey’s figure is replaced by a detailed and colorful drawing of a cup of green tea.

Page 4 ish

The same cup of green tea is held by a familiar hand. It’s the first panel on the new page. The lighting is colorful and golden, and no black values exist in most of this page. The exception is a drawing of Audrey sitting on the floor of her apartment and looking out a window. She holds a mug in her hand, but it isn’t the same mug as the cup in the top of this page. The tea from the cup bubbles up and then spills over the page, swirling into a waterfall, going from warm yellows and greens to cooler but still calm waters.

At the bottom of the page, kid feet dash past. A rope guardrail merges from one panel into the next. Two young girls appear hooking their arms over the rope and swinging on it. Behind them walk the torsos of a young couple, not a new couple, but not yet in their 40s. Their faces are hidden by the panel gutter. Remarks on time and memory can be made here, on how kids don’t remember their parents’ faces and just their smells, voices, and hugs. The woman kneels between the girls. They look out at the small waterfalls, large in a child’s memory, but really just a creek pouring over a small cliff, just barely eight feet high.

And for some context, here is the written scene that became the opening scene of the graphic story (so you can see how this has developed):

I awoke early that morning by some accident, maybe knowing what the day held, if you believe in that sort of thing. I slipped on a sweater and went downstairs to check my mail. The man behind the front desk greeted me with a smile as I unlocked my box.

The pale blue envelope tucked inside was stamped with the army seal, and as I withdrew it, I thought it felt too small and too light in my hands. I knew what it was, and I suddenly realized I needed to choose a place to open it. My apartment? No, I needed to live there. And I couldn’t do it here, in the lobby.

I hid the letter away and took the stairs back up to my place. I sat in front of the window and lifted back the curtain just enough to see outside. Nothing had changed. The city glistened with cold, but the sun warmed me through the glass. I could taste sleep in my mouth.

I knew that breaking the seal wouldn’t be what killed my mother, but I put it off. I sat for a while, maybe an hour. I took note of the room, of the way the sunlight fell behind me onto the floor, of what I was wearing, of the movement of the cars below, the pattern of the trains coming into the station. I counted the seconds between the guardrails dropping and the trains bisecting the road. Trying to commit to memory the last moments I had before my mother was dead.

Finally, I pushed myself up and forced my boots on, grabbed my jacket and keys and went out into the street. The sun’s rays made it feel deceptively warm at first but then I ducked my face into my scarf against the breeze. The guardrail bells began to ring, and I headed for the station. I bought a platform ticket and the gate ate it and spit it out as the limited rushed through the station. As it passed, I reached the edge and could look down into the tracks. The cold had set in permanently over the rails, untouched by the sun. I slipped my hand into my pocket and touched the envelope there. I didn’t know what compelled me to need to open it at the station. The trains had become a vein connecting me to the city, my commute familiar, so that I couldn’t feel like an outsider while I rode to and from the hospital.

But whatever the reason, I figured it was time. I opened the notice, and my mother was dead. As express train after express train shot past, the tracks disappeared and reappeared in a blur. I imagined watching myself getting caught underneath the platform, in the hidey-holes carved into the concrete in case you fell in. Or just lying down and waiting. If I fell in, could I make myself flat enough to avoid having my body smeared away? The letter didn’t say how she died. I didn’t know if it mattered to me; people only want to know how others died so that they can get a hint about their own end. Would my death creep up on me like a dream, allowing me enough time to realize what was happening?

As the bells began to ring again, I stepped closer and peered down into the tracks. I thought maybe I’d start crying.

“Hey you, stand back behind the line!”

I jumped and backed away as the local train slowed into the station, whistling. The conductor in the front car turned his head to look at the weirdo (me) as he passed. I hadn’t been leaning over the edge, so decapitation wouldn’t have been possible, but I stopped zoning at the idea of suddenly becoming just a head. I folded up the letter and tucked it back inside the envelope.

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readbythestarlight · 6 years

Text

c2e28

“This flask is Taliesin’s new character” shut up Sam don’t mock us

They’re FINALLY going to go check out the Taskers and i swear if Taliesin’s character isn’t with them I’m gonna die

(unless this is all a trick and Taliesin is just hanging out until Molly can reasonably be brought back…)

Caleb stepping in and doing some strategizing both makes me proud and makes me sad because I guarantee he was great at that before Everything happened

Beau and Caleb disagreeing over a spider

“Shady Debaters Debate Team” I would wear that shirt

Nila wants to use her lighting let her fuck people up with her lightning draw people outside for her to fry please

Yes please get yourself some goddamn healing potions

YAAAAS NILA HAS HEALING WORDS

and good berries xD

GUYS I STILL LOVE HER SO MUCH I WOULD STILL DIE FOR HER

The Bone Orchard…ooooooo

Necromancers maybe?

Please go to the Taskers first I feel like Taliesin has to be with them

If people have been torturning Jester I’m gonna cry she’s too sweet for this

Nila’s smell bag is so cute y’all stop teasing her

“You are relying on me, I’m very happy” sHE’S SO PURE

Oh shiiiiit she just saved them from freaky forest ground monsters that’s my girl!

GRAVE SITE I’M TELLING YA ITS NECROMANCERS

Caleb getting tired of the debate and just heading over the gate

Not just carelessly flinging herself after him smh

Spooooooky place I don’t know how I feel about this

YAAAAAAAAS THEY FOUND HIM HOLY SHIT AHHHHHHHHHHHH OF COURSE HE LIVES IN A GODDAMN GRAVEYARD I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN HE IS THE ULTIMATE GOTH

HE’S A FIRBOLG???

“Caduceus Clay” AND HES A CLERIC GOD BLESS Jester will be delighted that she doesn’t have to do all the healing anymore

Caduceus seems delightful I’m delighted I MISSED YOU TALIESIN

fuck i love him already

he’s like the goddamn grave keeper TALIESIN COULD YOU HAVE GONE ANY MORE GOTH

B: “You’re drinking dead-people tea?”

Cad: “Aren’t we all?”

THE. ULTIMATE. GOTH.

…can’t bring Molly back. I’m not surprised at all given that it would be weird to bring his own character back, but still. That’s okay. It’s fine.

He just figured he’d sit there with his tea until someone came to help him leave lol

C: “Welcome to the Mighty Nein”

Cad: “There’s only, uh—“

B: “DON’T overthink it”

Nott shooting Beau to test Cad’s healing xD

FRUMPKIN NO DONT KILL HIM

fuuuuuuuck he dead

they needed him god dammit

HE’S ALIVE

ALIVE BY 1

I can’t decide if this is going to be a disaster, them going after them again right now, or???

LETS NOT SPLIT UP AT ALL EVEN JUST TO KILL TWO GUARDS

Taking off her armor is a horrible idea guys

Guest!Ashley has the cutest face and the purest laugh??? I love her

While we’re on break I’m trying to decide, is it weird that Taliesin chose to play a cleric when they already have a cleric? Part of me is like “what if he did that because he knew they were gonna need the temporary heals and he’s just gonna stick around as Cad until Jester is back and then he’s gonna rez Molly” and part of me is just like bfs girl Molly is gone let him go??

I don’t think I’ll be able to move on from Molly for sure though until the M9 move on from Shady Creek, with Cad tagging along.

Frumpkin the 3-HP spider

Not asking Cad questions nervously is adorable

Beau just sticking her face in the bag for the luck orb xD

Caleb: talks about breaking a guy’s skull

Nila: “excellent”

Poor Taliesin having to figure out a whole new character. He’d barely really figured out Molly yet.

20 for a perception check nice job Keg!

Sumalee accidentally meta gaming is honestly just cute enough that i don’t even care she could metagame all day and i’d be fine with it

HERE THEY GOOOOO

Matt looks so lost xD

FUCK ‘EM UUUUUUP TEAM BEAU/CALEB/NILA

FUCK ‘EM UUUUUUP TEAM KEG/NOTT/CAD

good rolls, good rolls…

YAAAAS GO KEG!

YAAAAAS NILA BASH HIM DO IT GIRL she’s been waiting to kill someone for so long

goddamn they handled that SO WELL LOOK AT THEM IM SO PROUD

“one was just enjoying the wind, and then darkness forever” Matt xD

Goddamn I can’t believe they pulled that off so well. Lorenzo better watch the fuck out.

Are we calling him Clay then because I liked Cad

Frumkpin the flying spider?? Methinks they all forgot Caleb made him a spider

Nila’s so excited to have like 32 gold she’s so cute you guys

Keg get another nat20 for stealth

okay… are they really unnoticed I’m nervous

B: “Look at the—look at the windows, too.”

Cad: “They’re nice.”

I love hiiiiiim

We can’t go get friends tho because they’re not HERE YET

Boy I can’t wait to see this map

Liam missing his rogue days hardcore right now lol

YAAAAS Taliesin with the nat20 deception I was so scared

“I’m gonna have an ulcer after this game” fucking SAME

Ashley and Sam holding hands like SAME god the stress

Also heck yeah we’re uncovering the maaaaap!

Liam is just very thoroughly uncovering the map

fuck don’t squish Frumpkin

“Hey Phil come help me kill this spider!”

Oh thank god good job poofing him out Caleb

I’m serous guys I love Caleb coming up with plans and leading the group in Fjord’s absence I love it

WAIT

YOU CANT SEND NOTT IN BY HERSELF

DONT DO THAT

FUCK

WE CANT AFFORD TO LOSE ANOTHER MEMBER OF THE GANG GUYS

NOT NOTT

Hey Caleb can you teach Nott the door unlocking spell?

Keg: “Nott. Be careful.”

Nott: “…Do you care about me?”

K: “…Yeah.”

N: *happy wiggle*

Fuck I don’t like this they were doing so well but this is going to be a disaster

A NAT1

FUUUUUUUUUCK

KILL THEM

fuck it was going so well god DAMMIT Caleb this was a BAD PLAN

God they’re not even all together I am literally so afraid right now

Yessss hasted Keg

fuckfuckfuck im literally so fucking scared right now

okay good they missed Not

FUCK ‘EM UP NILA

NO SAVE THE TOTEM FOR LORENZO

SAVE IT NILA

SAVE IT

poison spray yesss that sounds nice and 12pts damage good girl

poor Sam has such a hard time with his rogue skills

NOTT STOP RUNNING AHEAD

GOD Y’ALL DID MOLLY TEACH YOU NOTHING

fuck them up Keg

Yessssss kill him Keg my hero

Hasted Keg is the best man 4 attacks? She’s helping make up for a lack of Yasha

Keg getting between Nott and danger is so sweet I’m crying is she trying to make sure Molly does’t happen all over again

I would also die for Keg you guys

Sorry Phil you dead

BITCH HAS YASHA’S SWORD

FUCK HER UP

Wait until you get in the room above the trap door at least Nila

I adore her

PHIL DON’T YOU TOUCH NILA

yesssss he misses

NOTT

DONT FUCKING GO NEAR THE BARBARIAN

“IM THINKING OF REMOVING MY SPINE… CAUSE IT’S ONLY HOLDING ME BACK! :D”

holy shit Nott put her prone I’m crying I’m sorry I doubted you Nott

Fuck up the barbarian Keg yessss

Action surge means what what is that it’s cool

NAT20 YAAAAAS Keg is the BEST you guys

What I’m taking from this is that women name Ashley make the best lady characters and get the job done

why are you spending key points in non-combat when Lorenzo is still out there somewhere

Oh jeez are Cad or Nila close enough to heal Keg if she needs it??

DON’T TAKE AWAY HASTE

fuck

Liam and Matt gonna fight lol

Let Nila beat the door in

MOMMA POWERS ACTIVATE and she beats in the door HELL YEAH

Maybe she should have saved the totem for IN the trap door?

Sumalee is so concerned that she’s gonna make a mistake it’s cute

UH I KNOW IT’S A JOKE BUT YOU CAN TAKE TALIESIN’S NEW CHARACTER FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS SOMEONE ELSE CAN DIE

Cad coming in with the heals heck yes

“A cleric who likes to heal! It’s amazing” LOL Sam. My thoughts exactly though

This isn’t going terrible but it isn’t going great and I’m worried about what they will have left when it comes time to face Lorenzo

YEAAAAAH HDYWTDT CALEB HECK YES somebody grab Yasha’s sword

also damn Caleb you get vicious with that fire

oh baby

please don’t freak again Molly isn’t here to forehead kiss you out of it

Aw first time he managed not to have issues

Maybe Lorenzo isn’t home… that would be great…

Or he’s downstairs…

Damn, Taliesin, that’s so amazingly morbid and fantastic. Just melting them away into fertilizer.

Nott apologizing for not being able to unlock the door and Caleb reassuring her that it’s not her fault. My heart.

Trapped door.

They are all getting silly xD

Oh god okay here we go

“I like pink better than purple” Liam how dare you

Manacles again ffs Matt

God a whole underground place

“He’s looking for green or blue or goth”

Fuuuuck they gotta get through at least 3 more??

And still no Lorenzo

fuck i don’t like thiiiiiiis

Lorenzo is absolutely in there. If he was upstairs he would have come down.

You’re assuming that there isn’t another way out that they could escape through and flank you

Matt’s like “I just got the downstairs map out guys”

Cad/Clay/Whatever like “let’s just?? ask??”

Oh no

stop him

“fucking Phil, ammiright?”

fuck this son of a bitch up

16 damage fuck him uppppp Nila!

fuck him uuuuup Keg!

fuck him up Clay!

fuck him up Nott!

Clay just… turning him into mulch I’m crying

Damn I’m so impressed they took care of that so well

fuck traps

PLEASE LET NILA’S BABY BE OKAY

Nila being such a mom is my favorite like I’m so here for the peaceful person who has never hurt anyone, but will fuck you UP for touching their loved ones

SOMEONE HEAL ASSAR

IM CRYING

MATT STOP IT

it’s fine I’m only crying a little

“be well. be well my son.”

I’m very much crying

Let her rip it open Matt let her do it

Okay Nila it’s okay let Nott try or Caleb then if Nott can’t

SAM stop with the 1s!!

SHES GOT HER FAMILY BACK AGAIN I CRYYYYYYY

the power of love is stronger than metal bars hell yes

“I love it when it works for the narrative!” lol Matt at his most DM-i-est

FAMILY HUG ITS FINE IM NOT CRYING

oh god I’m gonna miss Nila so much

WE LOVE YOU NILA I HOPE WE SEE YOU AGAIN SOME DAY

FIRBOLG HUG

I’ve cried way too much these past like idk 7 episodes

Nila is forever a member of the M9 y’all save that feather

it’s fine

it’s totally fine

How many members of the M9 are there now

Fjord Jester Caleb Nott Beau Molly Yasha, then Shakaste, Cali, Kiri, Keg, Nila, and now Clay.

God this was such a good episode.

Caduceus is great guys. He’s different enough from Molly not to make me heartsore, and I think he’ll bring a nice new dynamic? I’m not at all disappointed by him (not that I expected to be, I knew Taliesin wouldn’t let us down).

I’m gonna miss Nila so much. Like Marisha said, she was the softness the group needed.

I can’t believe Sumalee has never properly played before! That’s amazing! She was amazing! I hope I can be half that great at my first proper game!

And I’m so excited to see how it goes next week, live from GenCon! Excited to see how this section wraps up. It’s gonna be amazing.

#emi watches critical role #Critical Role #critical role spoilers

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brooklynislandgirl · 5 years

Note

what creature visits your dreams most often?

Perchance || Accepting

The house is silent.

It doesn’t settle on its foundation. The timbers don’t creek, you can’t hear the muffled infomercials from someone’s decades old television, or the gurgle of rusty pipes protesting the different uses put to them at three in the morning. This place, this community, is vastly different from the pre-war walk ups back in Brooklyn.

Set far back from the street that the sodium glow of the few lamps doesn’t manage to make it past the manicured lawn and it’s only the grace of nature that allows the full moon to trek its way in through the half parted curtains. All of it makes her anxious. Gnaws at the back of her mind as she lays there in the dark with little sharp mouse-teeth. And maybe the worst of it is just how still Martin is. Even if she holds her breath and strains to listen, she can’t hear his. He’s a gentleman too. Despite their cover ~and Captain Avery made no bones that he specifically asked for her to be assigned to this~ and the fact that in their real life they are what she would consider good...great...friends, Martin Riggs is a gentleman. He still insists on letting her have the bed while he sleeps on the floor. A thin mat and a sleeping bag. Military issue.So when that deep, slow drawl rises up with the question, she nearly jumps out of her skin. Tries to cover it up by shifting. Draws herself up into a ball almost, arms and knees close to her chest. It’s a fair question, if a little weird. That could describe everything about them though. And she takes a while to answer. She can almost feel him gathering the wherewithal to call her name a little more quietly.“Before I can even remembah,” she says and there’s guilt laced through her tone, “I had...dreams. Night terrors, dey call ‘em. Andy told me I was quiet for a baby when I was awake but when time for sleep came, I would close my eyes and soon enough, would start shrieking. Inconsolable, he say. My maddah try every kine an’ nothing worked. Da Admiral decided I was defective, an’ I t’ink at some point, he demanded Andy ~all of six year old, mebbe? Mebbe five~ do somet’ing about it. An’....an’ dat’s how I start sleepin’ in his room. He could always get me t’ quiet down. Would sit dere f’ hours, holding my hand, stroking my hair. But da dreams didn’t go away. Jus’ got worse an’ worse....an’ dat’s when sleep paralysis started. Whole body petrified. Even when I woke up...no could move. No could scream. No....no nothing.”

She grows quiet a minute, the sound of her swallowing barely loud enough to register.

“Shadows. Black, amorphous. Shiftin’ an’ writhin’ an’ twistin’ into each oddah. Jus’ dis palpable feelin’ of malice, of hatred so deep...a hunger. T’consume da whole world an’ drown out all da light in it. An’ one would peel off. Slink it’s way toward da foot of da bed...trailin’ hard fingers up my legs, dipped down over my waist. Up my chest. An’ I knew...I know...if I don’ wake up before it gets t’ my t’roat...I won’ wake up at all.”That’s what Beth dreams about. That’s why Beth doesn’t really sleep any more.“Can we....talk ‘bout somet’ing else, Mar’in? Please?”

#mahalo!Martin <3 #She's Talking to Angels {Bethisms}#Making Wishes on Passing Cars|Answered Asks #Thin Blue Lines|Lethal Weapon verse #riggsanity

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blesspastacraig · 6 years

Text

Sixteen (SP Drabble Bomb Day 1 - Decade)

Here’s my offering for the @spdrabblebomb prompt decade!

Predominantly Craig focused but there’s some light Creek.

Just a story about Craig and all his Stripes throughout the years.

On ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14765684/chapters/34146584

Drabble Track - Sixteen - Lucy Camp

I Don't Wanna Be Sixteen Again I’m Just Nostalgic

Craig has been a keen owner of Guinea pigs since age eight. He used to hang around the pet store while his mother ran errands a couple of stores down. He’d place his chubby little hands on the glass and peer in at them as they waddled around the cage going about their day. He wanted one more than he wanted the new season of Red Racer on DVD or maybe, even more than he wanted a telescope, to look up at the stars.

But his Parents said no, both to the Guinea pig and the telescope. They said that he was too young to be responsible for either of them. That didn’t stop him from asking, though. He begged almost every day for a year, and on his eighth birthday, his tired parents finally gave in.

He woke up to find a small cage in the middle of their living room with a tiny, squeaking fluffball inside. An all-black baby with only a singular white stripe across its nose. Craig was almost too scared to pick the baby up: what if he broke it? He remembered the instructions from one of the books on Guinea pig care he read religiously, in an effort to try and convince his parents that he was responsible enough to take care of one. He gently picked up the baby, making sure all four legs and its bottom were supported before he nestled it to his chest.

“Is it a boy or a girl?” He asked.

It is, in fact, a girl. Craig and his family find that out for sure when Craig peers into her cage one day to see Stripe (Craig wasn’t very creative with names), and two smaller Stripes wheeking up at him for breakfast.

Craig has to cover his mouth to stop himself from shrieking with excitement. (Loud noises scare Guinea pigs, one of the many things he recently learnt about them.)

He goes bounding down the stairs from his bedroom into the kitchen to where his mother’s packing their school lunches for the day.

“Stripe had babies, Mom!” It’s the most animated Craig’s sounded in a good while. Well, probably since he got Stripe, at the very least.

“She what?”

“She had two babies! Look!” Craig excitedly grabs her hand with his own little one and tugs. Laura Tucker obliges, bewildered that her son’s Guinea pig has somehow managed to multiply.

(When they call the pet shop they got Stripe from, they get a bored teenager who tells them that it’s hard to tell when a Guinea pig is pregnant. Thomas and Laura know there’s no way they can take Stripe back for a refund now. Craig is attached.)

That afternoon, Craig borrows a book about caring for Guinea Pig babies at the library. He decides to name the babies “Stripe #2” and “Stripe #3”, and his parents give up on any idea of giving them away.

All three (all girls, by some kind of freak of nature) die suddenly and together not long after Craig has turned ten. Craig strongly suspects foul play, but he can’t prove it. His parents blame it on the temperature, but Craig doesn’t buy it.

All he can do is try not to cry about it in front of his friends, lest they label him a crybaby like Clyde. According to all the books he immersed himself in after becoming a Guinea pig owner, two years isn’t a particularly long life for a Guinea pig, and that makes him very sad. For all he could see, they were just happy, furry goofballs who had never done anything wrong in their short lives.

Why did his pets have to die? Why couldn’t it have been someone else’s, someone who didn’t care as much? Or why couldn’t they at least have been older? It doesn’t feel right or fair.

Despite the fact that Craig called him a crybaby countless times, Clyde still comes over and helps him make drawings to mark their graves. Clyde later takes those drawings and gets them laminated for Craig, so they’ll still be there after the rain.

Craig doesn’t call Clyde a crybaby again after that.

Craig starts dating Tweek before deciding to get a new Guinea pig. He hadn’t meant to; they’re only ten and have no idea what they’re doing, but it seems to make everyone around them happy. Tweek’s not so bad himself, not really, it’s nice to be spending so much time with someone he genuinely likes and doesn’t feel like he needs to impress all the time. Craig discovers that’s one upside to dating Tweek instead of girls. Girls seem to have these expectations of him that he could never hope to meet. He’s supposed to not play in the dirt? No way! At least Tweek is there, playing in the muck with him, which is much more fun in his opinion.

Tweek knows Craig is sad about Stripe and her babies. So sad that he hasn’t even thrown away their cage or any of their toys. Craig is pretty sure that his parents aren’t going to let him have another one anyway. Tweek is nice to him about it, though. He takes Craig to the movies, and offers him his leftover fries when they go to McDonalds afterwards. He holds his hand a lot, which is more helpful than Craig expected.

When they head past the pet store, Tweek stops, and they both end up hovering out front for a few crucial seconds. “Can we look?” Tweek asks, and Craig shrugs.

Tweek wants to look at Guinea pigs. Craig tries not to fall in love with a particular tricolour—one with a white stripe across their nose.

“Do you like that one?” Tweek asks him. “I want to get you -nnn- one you like.”

“You want to get me what?” Craig frowns. There’s no way his Mom will just let him bring home another Guinea pig.

“I’ve been saving up… you seemed so -ah- sad. Your Mom and Dad said I could. As long as I got a boy.”

“Oh,” Craig says, dumbly. “I like that one, yeah.”

He doesn’t say thank you in words—but in the way he holds Tweek’s hand the whole way home.

Craig comes home with his first boy Guinea pig in a cardboard box. There won’t be any surprise babies this time, but Craig is sure both he and Tweek can be enough to entertain Stripe #4.

Stripe #4 passes when Craig and Tweek are teenagers. Just on the cusp of making their relationship more real, more genuine. Not just two little kids play-dating because that’s what they saw their parents do. At least Craig has had the label ‘gay’ slapped on him since he was ten, so he doesn’t feel so weird about wanting to kiss Tweek for real.

Craig has braces, and Tweek is a little chubby around the middle, but Craig figures at least they can go through their awkward stage together.

The vet suspects cancer, which is very common in rodents, and Craig is inclined to agree. Tweek promises over and over that it was nothing Craig did and that even the best care can’t prevent something like cancer. Craig still feels guilty anyway. Tweek bought Stripe #4 for him, and Craig hasn’t kept him alive very long at all. Five years is a good run, but this Stripe had only gotten to have four.

Craig makes Stripe #4 a marker for his grave in woodwork, and Tweek lovingly bedazzles it. They add it to the Guinea pig cemetery in Laura’s flower beds and sit in silence as a tribute. Craig rests his head on Tweek’s shoulder, and Tweek holds him close so that any nosy neighbors won’t see him cry.

When they decide to get Stripe #5 (there’s no discussion on what he will be named), they go together. They also pay together, half and half - it feels weirdly adult. Craig feels like it’s a commitment even if they’re only fifteen and clueless. Their only condition is that they have to get a boy again: Craig’s parents are still scarred from the surprise baby debacle and will not chance a girl ever again.

“That one looks like he has hat hair!” Tweek exclaims, pointing to a small boy with black and white fur, a white stripe along his nose, and an impressive-looking crest. Craig doesn’t correct him regarding the crest, and instead laughs along with him.

“He looks small,” Craig says. “Do you think he’s okay?”

“I think he’ll be just fine if someone who really -hnn- cares takes him home with them,” Tweek replies, knowingly. After nearly five years together, Tweek can read him like a damn book, and Craig has a love-hate relationship with that fact.

“Okay then,” Craig says. “I want him then, if you do?”

Tweek does, although he argues on the way home that they should have named him Pepe Le Pew.

At eighteen, ten years after he set his eyes on Stripe #1 in all her glory, Craig and Tweek have a huge decision to make. Sure, applying for colleges and choosing your future is super hard, but for Craig the most agonising part is deciding what to do with Stripe #5. He’s three years old, and as far as Craig can tell, he’s perfectly healthy and thriving. He’s doubled in size since they first brought him home as a tiny runt who could fit nicely in Craig’s palm. They could take him along, but that would mean they’d have to find a pet-friendly apartment. Living on campus would also be completely ruled out. It narrows their accommodation options by a lot.

Craig thinks maybe it might be better if they leave him behind. Craig and Tweek could always come back to visit him during their holidays - Craig’s bedroom in South Park is all he really knows, and Craig isn’t sure that it would be kind to move him somewhere else potentially hours away.

When Tricia offers to take him, Craig breathes a secret sigh of relief.

He feels, in an odd way, he’s passing the baton to her. Maybe she’ll become as avid a Guinea pig lover as him. Maybe in the future, Craig and Tweek will get another Guinea pig once they’ve finished college and have a place all their own.

That doesn’t mean Craig still doesn’t shed a tear as he and Tweek bundle their things into Tweek’s hand-me-down car. Tweek holds his hand over the console as they drive away, without their beloved Stripe #5.

#south park drabble bomb #sp creek #craig tucker/tweek tweak #craig tucker #tweek tweak #south park #spdrabblebomb

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thotyssey · 6 years

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On Point With: Megami

If ComicCon and DragCon had a baby, she’d grow up to be this new queen! And in a modern queer pop culture where drag and genre cosplay are increasingly melding together, it will be goddesses like Brooklyn native Megami D.Vil (better known simply as Megami) who will be leading the freaky masses to a new horizon of performance entertainment.

Thotyssey: Hello Megami, seasons greetings! The heat just came on in my apartment today. This is great drag weather, isn't it?

Megami: It really is! Gür! I’m a Thicc Woman. I sweat walking to the train!

Oh me too, it's tragic! So, what were you more excited about these past few months: DragCon or ComicCon?

Ugh! That’s so hard! It’s like choosing between my children! Do I choose the pretty one, or the fun one!? I was really looking forward to both for different reasons. At DragCon, I got to see all my fav NY girls (from on Drag Race and off), buy their merch, feel beautiful! And this has been my 10th year going to NY ComicCon, so it’s been my yearly geek pilgrimage since I was 19.

I mean, for both Cons it’s so great to just be in a place where my weird hobbies and interests are celebrated; as both a Queen and a Geeky Cosplayer. Although, I did get to dress as Sailor Moon Darth Vader for NY ComicCon... so I suppose that edges out DragCon by a hair. Haha!

Understood! It actually feels like the worlds of drag and sci-fi fangeekery blend a little more each year, don't they?

They do! Crazy characters, stunning looks... they’re highly compatible. And I certainly try my best to make them blend as much as I can.

I started doing drag about two years ago when I won the Gay Geeks of New York cosplay lip sync show GeekSync (which I’m hosting at the West End Lounge for the second time this October), but I’ve always loved to do cosplay drag looks, even before I performed.

It’s always been my goal to merge gay culture with geek culture as much as I can--to let all the queer geeks out there know, like, “Hey! It’s not weird at all to geek out about Star Wars and Game of Thrones as much as Drag Race, or...” ugh...I don’t know what gays like...”the gym!” Like the things you like with your full heart. Your geeky passions are what make you unique!

Werk! I was in the judge’s panel for Miss Nerd at Rockbar in June... your Bowie / Labyrinth look and number was a crowd pleaser!

Yeah. And I mean, I won Miss Fan favorite, so the crowd definitely responded to my geekery! I’m not much of a pageant girl, but I definitely already have some highly ambitious gags planned for next June. I’m coming for that crown! Haha!

You’ll be the queen to beat! “Megami,” by the way, is a video game reference, right?

Yes! Megami actually means “Goddess” in Japanese. I took [Japanese] for two years in college ‘cause I’m a super anime loving Otaku Weeaboo and thought I could learn enough to not need subtitles! (Spoiler: I did NOT. Japanese has three alphabets, and is one of the hardest languages in the world to learn).

But yeah, Megami D.Vil was inspired by the video game Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga ‘cause I’m a Goddess and a Devil. I know. Incredibly convoluted. Nobody understands my name. I have to spell it out all the time. But like I say at all my shows: I’m a Puerto Rican man pretending to be a Japanese woman who acts like a white girl who thinks she’s a black girl... so eat your heart out Rachel Dolezal! Step your pussy up!

And Megami is actually my old cat’s name. So every time I go visit my parents and someone calls “Megami!” It’s very confusing for the both of us.

Are you, like, a JPop and KPop fan, also?

Oh I love KPop and Jpop! Koda Kumi, Twice!, Girls Generation, of course Utada Hikaru... there’s not a single self-respecting weeb out there who doesn’t know every single word to Utada’s “Simple and Clean.” It’s the weeb anthem! And I’ve performed songs in Japanese and Korean before. And in Spanish too, while I’m at it.

I draw my inspirations from all aspects of my life. If it’s my own Latin culture or gay culture or geekery or music... I will never be shy about saying “Hey everyone! This is an awesome thing I love and that inspires me! Love it, too!”

Side Geek Question: lots of fans seem unhappy with the casting of Ruby Rose as a lesbian Batwoman... even LGBT fans. What are your thoughts?

Okay, real talk. I wasn’t gonna watch even if, I don’t know, Ellen was Batwoman. Haha ...Maybe if it was like... Meryl... or Gaga... or Cher... Cher Batwoman would be AMAZING! I have two X-Men / Dark Phoenix tattoos on my arm, so I’m staunchly on the Marvel side of the fence in these kinda fights. I’m more upset that the godawful-looking Dark Phoenix movie is getting released than about Ruby being Batwoman. Like, Sophie Turner apparently graduated from the Kristen Stewart school of Non-Acting, with all 2.5 facial expressions she’s capable of emoting. I really, really wanted Disney to give X-Men the MCU overhaul.

But at the end of the day, fans (LGBT or not) will always get their panties in a twist about EVERYTHING! EVERY SINGLE THING! (Hey, myself included, proven by my previous statements). Across all fandoms, these stories and characters are sooo precious to us Geeks. They were our friends, and reasons to keep going on and be brave when the world told us we were too weird, or too weak, or too queer. We all have deep connections with our fandoms. So it’s hard sometimes when a story or character that’s precious and personal fells like they’re being mishandled by greedy corporations. Art is personal.

You’ve been hosting Thirsty Thursdays at Mom’s Kitchen & Bar in Hell’s Kitchen for a few months now. There are certainly no shortage of queens in that neighborhood, but your show seems to be a hit! What’s Thirsty’s winning formula, and how did you land that gig in the first place?

Well, landing the gig was partially luck, partially just impressing the right people. Mom’s was looking for a newer queen to spearhead a Thursday show. They’ve never done anything like this, so they wanted someone they could grow with and establish something fun in a relatively new establishment. So I stepped in with a game plan and a few good recommendations, and we’ve just gone from there.

I think the formula that works for me has been choosing a different theme every week to build each night around. It forces me to come up with fresh material and numbers consistently. I’ve done themes like “Geeks & Gaga” (for the week of NY ComicCon and the A Star is Born premiere), “Ladies of the 80s,” “Extra Divas,” “Ladies Who Rock,” and many others. “Latina Night” and “Halloqween Spooktacular” are coming up very soon.

I think above all, I just like people. Aside from drag, I volunteer with the LGBT organization GGNY (Gay Geeks of NY) as their VP and Art Director. So I’m very used to talking to people, running events, and just letting my terrible personality shine!

Well, it seems like you’re doing great work! And speaking of new gigs, tell us about The Creek & The Cave in Long Island City, where you will be premiering a new monthly drag revue, Gender Blender, on Sunday the 28th!

Yeah! The Creek and the Cave is a well-known comedy club that’s hosted a TON of the world’s best comedians. But they’ve been looking to expand and have different kinds of acts. So I’m bringing the Queer to Long Island City! I have a lineup of cosplayers and queens to kick of this monthly show with a geeky bang!

Wonderful! anything else to report as far as gigs or projects?

Well, on top of hosting Thirsty Thursday every Thursday at Mom’s Kitchen in Hell’s Kitchen from 9-11, I will be hosting GGNY’s Third Annual Geek Sync (the cosplay lip sync competition) Saturday, October 20th at the West End Lounge, from 6-8pm...

... premiering Gender Blender: A Monthly Drag Show, Sunday October 28th at Creek & the Cave, and in the near future doing a Miss Nerd 2018 Miss Fan Favorite show at Rockbar. And of course, whatever other little gigs I can wiggle my size 10 rainbows pumps into.

Excellent, have fun with everything! Last question: best video game ever?

This is a hard question!!! Again, cruelty to animals. I’m calling PETA!

Final Fantasy X. I have it on PS2/ PS3/ PS4 and soon the Switch. I’ve played through it a million times, and I still cry at the end every time. And the sequel X-2 is the SINGLE gayest piece of media that has ever existed. The Sailor Moon costume transformations, High Summoner Yuna becoming the Pop Star sensation, Leblanc the Drag Queen. Gay gay gay!

Though I do plan on getting married to my imaginary boyfriend on November 7th because of Mass Effect... so it’s Sophie’s Choice... or Shepard’s Choice, actually.

Play on, Megami! Thank you!

Megami hosts “Thirsty Thursdays” every week at Mom’s (8pm), and “Gender Blender” monthly last Sundays at The Creek & The Cave (7pm). Check Thotyssey’s calendar for all her scheduled gigs, and follow Megami on Facebook and Instagram.

On Point Archives

#onpointwith #megami #shin megami tensei

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ask-bohemian-ilse · 6 years

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answer all of them!

11. what’s an inside joke you have with your friends?* there’s far too many to pick just one, honestly.

12. what’s your favorite planet?* saturn!

13. what’s something that made you smile today?* first, stanley anderson let me copy his math homework. then, @ask-melchior-gabor gave me some of his favorite pirate literature that i haven’t read yet during study hall. and then i got burgers with @ask-max-von-trenk and @ask-the-reformatory! (having normal food was SO great.)

14. if you were to live with your best friend in an old flat in a big city, what would it look like?* a huge mess. seriously! at least my section would. it’d probably be decorated pretty clashingly, because we all have different interests. it’d definitely be covered in flowers. and it would have lots of books! (for melchior)

15. go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is!* mercury is shrinking!!!

16. what’s your favorite pasta dish?* fettuccine alfredo…yum!

17. what color do you really want to dye your hair?* i don’t have any desire to dye my hair at the moment, honestly.

18. tell us about something dumb/funny you did that has since gone down in history between between you and your friends and is always brought up.* @ask-moritz-stiefel exposed that i stabbed him with scissors once because i thought he was possessed. nobody wants to let it go!

19. do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw in it?* i do! when i feel really out of my head, i either ramble just to get everything off my mind, or draw some pretty strange stuff. it’s very useful.

20. what’s your favorite eye color?* green!

21. talk about your favorite bag, the one that’s been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces.* my trusty “in case of sudden escape” bag has seen me through everything. it’s always full of necessities, and it is immune to being torn apart! it’s very sturdy, small enough that i can wear it without feeling weighed down, easy to travel with, and still covered in paint. it’s been there for me through so much. love you, bag.

22. are you a morning person?* most of the time!

23. what’s your favorite thing to do on lazy days where you have 0 obligations?* go down to the creek, lay out in the sun, listen to some music, and just relax.

24. is there someone out there you would trust with every single one of your secrets?* i’m too ashamed to tell anybody ALL of my secrets — but in the matter of trust, i’d have no qualms placing my faith in max, melchior, and @ask-hanschen-rilow these guys are locked boxes.

25. what’s the weirdest place you’ve ever broken into?* one night, a group of us (the phallustics and some other models) were so drunk that we managed to get ourselves into a yacht that DEFINITELY didn’t belong to us. most of the passengers were pretty drunk too. i’ve also broken into a lighthouse…that was fun.

26. what are the shoes you’ve had forever and wear with every single outfit?* i have these killer sandles that are very ancient greece-like. they’re my favorites!

27. what’s your favorite bubblegum flavor?* motitas banana gum!

28. sunrise or sunset?* sunrise

29. what’s something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing?* moritz does this adorable thing where his nose wrinkles when he thinks you’ve said something especially funny/outrageous. it’s so cute! i love it!

30. think of it: have you ever been truly scared?* yes.

31. what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks.* i have a love-hate relationship with socks. as most of you know, i’m happiest barefoot. however, i love crazy/weird socks! especially knee-high ones! they’re so fun to play around with! i do not sleep in socks, though.

32. tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3 AM when you were with friends.* this one time, melchi and i were ridiculously high and we tried to order food. it went REALLY badly. he kept trying to not have to pay for food by psychoanalyzing the poor worker, and then i stood on a table, and we couldn’t stop laughing, and it was overall very chaotic and he’ll kill me for bringing it up again at some point. (love you, melchi!)

33. what’s your fave pastry?* OH! THERE’S SO MANY GREAT ONES TO CHOOSE FROM! i love sfogliatelle so much. i’ll go with that!

34. tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what did it look like? do you still keep it?* i wasn’t allowed to have one.

35. do you like stationary and pretty pens and so on? do you use them often?* yes and yes!

36. which band’s sound would fit your mood right now?* misterwives.

37. do you like keeping your room messy or clean?* M E S S Y

38. tell us about your pet peeves!* people invading my personal space, being talked over, the sound of a fork scraping someone’s teeth, people who grab me without warning.

39. what color do you wear the most?* hmm…probably green!

40. think of a piece of jewelry you own: what’s its story? does it mean anything to you?* the piercing in my collarbone? the one that keeps getting infected? i did it because i was really angry at the time — the night before i left. i was so, so tired of the way i had to live to keep modeling and to keep being pretty and all of that. it’s my freedom, baby!

41. what’s the last book you remember really, really loving? * it was a collection of h.p lovecraft’s works.

42. do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it!* it’s small, but it’s always warm and it smells like vanilla. the people who work there are insanely friendly. it’s a bit dark, but in the cozy way. they always remember my name there.

43. who was the last person you gazed at the stars with?* moritz.

44. when was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything?* there was this one night where @ask-georg-zirschnitz and i were chilling on the roof. it was so quiet, and so warm, and i felt so safe. that was the end of last summer.

45. do you trust your instincts a lot?* incredibly so, yes.

46. tell us the worst pun you can think of.

47. what food do you think should be banned from the universe?* at the moment, fish.

48. do you like buying CDs and records? what was the last one you bought?* yes! i just bought a duran-duran cd…no shame!

49. what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today?* my father. no.

50. what’s an odd thing you collect?* georg says my collection of old letters written during the wars is weird.

51. think of a person. what song do you associate with them?* “baby’s on fire” by die antwoord.

52. what are your favorite memes of this year so far?* keanu reactions.

53. have you ever watched the rocky horror picture show? heathers? beetlejuice? pulp fiction? what do you think of them?* I HAVE THE RHPS MEMORIZED IN ITS ENTIRETY. MY DREAM IS TO DO ONE OF THE REENACTMENTS AS COLOMBIA. heathers is good, but hits a bit too close for me to watch comfortably. beetlejuice is a halloween classic! pulp fiction is also a classic i love.

54. who’s the last person you saw with a true look of sadness on their face?* i looked in a mirror. KIDDING! KIDDING! actually, stan the man did seem kinda sad today.

55. what’s the most dramatic thing you’ve ever done to prove a point?* chugged nearly a whole bottle of benadryl. DON’T DO THAT.

56. what are some things you find endearing in people?* when they talk about things they love and their faces get all glowy. when they laugh.

57. go listen to bohemian rhapsody. how did it make you feel? did you dramatically reenact the lyrics?* shocked at how high freddie mercury’s voice can go. no, but i did start dancing.

58. who’s the wine mom and who’s the vodka aunt in your group of friends? why?* i’m the wine mom, max is the vodka aunt. it just fits.

59. what’s your favorite myth?* the myth of arachne!

60. do you like poetry? what are some of your faves?* i adore poetry! the book “new american best friend” by olivia gatwood is full of all my favorites.

61. what’s the stupidest gift you’ve ever been given? the stupidest one you’ve ever received?* i don’t believe in stupid gifts!

62. do you drink juice in the morning? which kind?* orange juice!

63. are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organized or leave them be?* no! i leave them be, makes it easier for my siblings/friends to grab them when they want to.

64. what color is the sky where you are right now?* black.

65. is there anyone you haven’t seen in a long time who you’d like to hang out with?* @ask-bobby-maler

66. what would your ideal flower crown look like?* full of baby’s breath and orchids! very big.

67. how do gloomy days where the sky is dark and the world is misty make you feel?* miserable. terrible. sad and alone.

68. what’s winter like where you live?* cold and bitter and awful.

69. what are your favorite board games?* clue!

70. have you ever used a ouija board?* yes

71. what’s your favorite kind of tea?* chai tea and bubble tea!

72. are you a person who needs to note everything down or else you’ll forget it?* depends on my state of mind

73. what are some of your worst habits?* addiction and clinginess

74. describe a good friend of yours without using their name or gendered pronouns.* very easygoing. lots of piercings. naggy about my personal health but throws caution to the wind with theirs. very handsome. a fantastic listener. an even better friend.

75. tell us about your pets!* hellbeasts.

76. is there anything you should be doing right now but aren’t?* homework.

77. pink or yellow lemonade?* pink!

78. are you in the minion hateclub or fanclub?* the what?

79. what’s one of the cutest things someone has ever done for you?* one time, reinhold picked me up from school and he had this playlist full of music he thought i’d like and it was one of the sweetest things in the world.

80: what color are your bedroom walls? did you choose that color? if so, why? • i have white walls! i didn’t, but georg’s mom lets me draw on them :) 81: describe one of your friend’s eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of. • luminous!  82: are/were you good in school? • i…don’t think my grades indicate my understanding of what we’re being taught. 83: what’s some of your favorite album art? • david bowie has cool covers! 84: are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones? • i have one! i don’t want another at this moment, but maybe later… 85: do you read comics? what are your faves? • teen titans is a fun read 86: do you like concept albums? which ones? • THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST!!! 87: what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives? • black swan. the rocky horror picture show. moulin rouge.  88: are there any artistic movements you particularly enjoy? • tons! i go too in-depth, though.  89: are you close to your parents?* no. 90: talk about one of your favorite cities. • novosibirsk. so cool.  91: where do you plan on traveling this year? • i don’t know yet! 92: are you a person who drowns their pasta in cheese or a person who barely sprinkles a pinch? • DROWN IT 93: what’s the hairstyle you wear the most? • i like putting flowers in my hair. i leave it down!  94: who was the last person you know to have a birthday? • wiebke from lit class! 95: what are your plans for this weekend? • i don’t know yet. get really fucking high? maybe leave town. 96: do you install your computer updates really quickly or do you procrastinate on them a lot? • depends 97: myer briggs type, zodiac sign, and hogwarts house? • i don’t know. taurus. i don’t know. 98: when’s the last time you went hiking? did you enjoy it? • last weekend! it was lovely! 99: list some songs that resonate to your soul whenever you hear them. • vagabond by misterwives, homeless by marina kaye, rootless by marina and the diamonds 100: if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why?* neither. i don’t want to risk that.

#ilse neumann #ask

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taz-writes · 6 years

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25 Writing Questions

@whycanthisnotbeeasier tagged me in this pretty massive tag game, which is pretty cool! Thanks for the attention! Here goes nothing...

1. Is there a story you’re holding off on writing for some reason?

A few of them, for a few reasons! The most obvious is Book 3 in my Feilan series, under the working title Storm and Shadow (it’s edgy I know). Reason being, it just got too damn messy. The end of book 3 is the low point of the whole series in every available subplot--so many things go wrong, a few MASSIVE things happen that are game-changers for book 4, and it’s hands down the most difficult scene I’m going to have to write for this series. When it came down to it, I couldn’t do that. The real end of the story at book 4 wasn’t that clear to me either, which is a major problem. So what I’m doing now is working backwards, a little bit. I’ll return to the Purple Sands once and for all after I’ve tackled book 4 and I know where I’m actually going with this.

Also, I’ve been delaying work on a few other baby WIPs because they’re just not developed enough to see the light of day yet. But that’s pretty minor.

2. What work of yours, if any, are you embarrassed about existing?

Uhhhhhh... literally the entirety of the original drafts of books 1 and 2. They’re beautifully-written bullshit. Also there’s some really bad Homestuck fanfiction from six years ago still floating around the Internet somewhere under an old pseudonym of mine. I like to pretend it doesn’t exist.

3. What order do you write in? Front of book to back? Chronological? Favorite scenes first? Something else?

I like to write front-to-back, which in my case is the same as chronological. I’m a bit of a pants-er, and my outlines often don’t make any sense once I’m actually a few chapters in and I realize that the planned plot point coming next is painfully out of character (or just impossible in general). I tend to use the exciting parts as motivators to get me through when I get writer’s block.

4. Favorite character you’ve written?

Violet. Hands down, indubitably, Violet Ravenhart. She’s probably the best fictional character I’ve ever created--she has so many layers to her, and she’s so nuanced, and genuine and close to my heart in ways I never expected. I think I’ve done a really great job creating her, and I only hope I can write her as well as she deserves.

5. Character you were most surprised to end up writing?

Kyrina, I think... she was originally supposed to be something COMPLETELY different than what she’s become. All of my villains used to be really two-dimensional and flat, but Ky’s come the furthest away from there. She used to be an Azula expy? Now she’s just a dumbass.

6. Something you would go back and change in your writing that it’s too late / complicated to change now

Part of me wants to say that I’m proud of everything I’ve made, and I do plan to stick to my guns, but there are a lot of aspects of Feilan’s worldbuilding that are incredibly messy. The magic system is the most obvious... if I could go back and change that, and make it significantly less complicated and hard to understand, then I probably would. But the whole thing is built into the structure of the world, and I’m emotionally attached, and besides, it’s unique! It’s definitely got plus sides.

When it comes to things like that, I’m more likely to retcon or explain the weird thing than erase it altogether. Any dumb trope can work if you write it the right way.

7. When asked, are you embarrassed or enthusiastic to tell people that you write?

Oh god, I love telling people about my stories. I talk about Being A Writer all the time! I don’t share my work very often, though.

8. Favorite genre to write

Fantasy!

9. What, if anything, do you do for inspiration?

I like to take walks, or just go sit alone in places. I draw my spirit and energy in writing from the natural world... when I feel drained and creatively empty, I go to the creek behind my house, or I take a walk around Schenley if I’m at school. It even helps to just sit outside for a while. Nature inspires me.

10. Write in silence or with background music? Alone or with others?

Depends on the scene! Always alone, though. Other people tend to distract me. I write with background music most of the time, but if I’m working on poetry or the scene is particularly intense then I turn it off. My writing style, especially in emotional moments, is very reliant on the rhythm of the words. Having music in the background interrupts the natural flow.

11. What aspect of your writing do you think has most improved since you started writing?

DIALOGUE. Dear lord, I used to be so bad at dialogue. I’ve also improved at plotting, but that improvement is... nebulous.

12. Your weaknesses as an author?

I like tropes, and I also like doing weird stuff. I often like both of these too much, resulting in plots that jump from point to point with little clarity. I’m also a consistent retconner, so my characters’ motivations and goals can change with little to no warning. I’m working on that.

13. Your strengths as an author?

I’ve been told that my prose has a very strong flow to it, especially in descriptive passages. So for all my faults with the construction of my stories, my actual mechanical writing is consistently excellent. And I’m also a fan of my character concepts, even when I don’t write them out as well as they maybe deserve.

14. Do you make playlists for your work?

Absolutely! I have spotify playlists for most of my stories and all my main characters. I don’t actually listen to those while I’m writing, I prefer listening to video game music, but making playlists for my writing is a lot of fun.

15. Why did you start writing?

Because I couldn’t find any books that told stories I wanted to read, so I decided I’d make them myself. I wanted to read stories with characters who dressed like me and thought like me and did amazing things without people questioning it all the time. Also, I wanted stories with fairies who weren’t vapid useless girly-girls.

16. Are there any characters who haunt you?

Most of them, at some point or another. All of my main characters in Feilan are manifestations of some part of me. I wrote Violet to cope with depression in high school, Dusk came directly from how trapped I felt when my parents wouldn’t listen to anything I said, Sayara is the physical manifestation of righteous fury against the world. So their muses lean pretty hard into me when I start running into those problems again.

17. If you could give your fledgling author self any advice, what would it be?

Please use an outline. I know they “cramp your style,” but please, for the love of God, use a freaking outline. And figure out the ending FIRST.

18. Were there any works you read that affected you so much that it influenced your writing style? What were they?

Yes!! Some of those were things I watched more than things I read, but it still counts. I was really into the Redwall books as a kid, and they’re a direct cause of the weird tropiness inherent in my early writing. I think I still favor a lot of cheesy tropes that I learned there--I like to think I write them with more nuance, though. The TV show Avatar was also a MASSIVE influence in how I create stories and characters. I mentioned earlier that Kyrina used to be an Azula expy, but on a larger scale ATLA introduced me to grey morality that works. Zuko’s redemption arc is on a level I strive for to this day. Rick Riordan’s books inspired my character voices, I’ve always liked his humor and his writing showed me that you don’t have to cling so closely to traditional grammar rules to write well. Fullmetal Alchemist was another big influence on my stories’ morality,

There are probably more, but I don’t remember any right now.

19. When it comes to more complicated narratives, how do you keep track of outlines, characters, development, timeline, etc.?

See: Taz’s greatest flaws as a writer.

Jokes aside, I like to keep one single print paper outline for each story that I’m working on. I’ll write out notes to myself there, create a chapter-by-chapter outline, and edit things in the outline as I go. They’re a great time capsule of all the things I’ve retconned over the course of my series. Recently I’ve also started using Evernote to track things digitally, but I’m still figuring out how it works.

20. Do you write in long sit-down sessions or in little spurts?

Both! Depends on the day. I write when I have the spark and the attention span, and I write for however long it lasts.

21. What do you think when you read over your older work?

Some of my old work is actually quite good! So I’ll appreciate that for what it is. The parts that are less good I laugh at, and I’ll send excerpts to my friends going “hey look at this ridiculous bullshit I created three years ago isn’t it funny??”

22. Are there subjects that make you uncomfortable to write?

Yeah. There are a lot of uncomfortable things lurking on the periphery of Feilan that I’m super awkward with. Violet’s trans-ness is the main one that comes to mind, because I want to confirm it in canon but there’s really no way she would ever bring it up of her own volition. Sayara’s too stupid to notice anything and definitely wouldn’t be rude enough to ask about it if she did. There’s also, well, the fa Viandre situation. I’ve avoided going into too much detail about the abuse there, but every situation with Dusk and fa Viandre gives me the willies. I write it because I think it’s important, and it’s a powerful arc, but it’s fucked up.

More generally? Sex scenes are uncomfortable to write in general for me, I don’t mind reading them but writing them is super awkward. Romance in general can be that way sometimes. I just don’t know how to handle it.

23. Any obscure life experiences that you feel have helped your writing?

I don’t know if there’s anything obscure, necessarily. I think being a musician helped my writing improve, because I’m very sensitive to what Sounds Good, and with poetry especially it’s become more of an instinct than conscious knowledge.

24. Have you ever become an expert on something you previously knew nothing about, in order to better a scene or a story?

I wouldn’t say I’ve ever become an expert on anything in the interest of research, but I’ve become moderately proficient with a few things. I’m in the process of learning everything I can about conlangs so that I can finally give all my made-up words some internal consistency, so that’s cool. I took a couple group fencing lessons. I’m pretty lazy about my research, honestly, and when I don’t already know something I lean towards just making it up from wholecloth.

25. Copy / paste a few sentences or a short paragraph that you’re particularly proud of.

I knelt by the crack, peering into it, hoping, even as the desperate stillness grew stronger and the silence did not change and time almost seemed to stop.

Cool starlight slid like molten silver through the shimmering gaps in the trees, sinking into the world around me. This cool starlight illuminated everything: the pocks and picks in ancient stone, and the knife-point edges of blades of growing grass, and the dust that had settled upon the little hiding place and the child’s bones it hid.

This is an old excerpt, from my newer draft of book 2. I think I wrote this almost exactly two years ago. I’m rather fond of it, though. This is Feilan’s aesthetic in a nutshell.

This was an essay at the end, but also a tag game, so... @jade-island-lives @firewritten @thewingwriter @lady-redshield-writes, if yall wanna do this, go for it! No obligation of course. :) Anyone else who sees this and thinks it’s cool, feel free to do it and say I tagged you, too!

#taz shut up #tag game #this was fun! thanks!

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aspiestvmusings · 4 years

Text

TMS S3: GROUP B

THE MASKED SINGER SEASON 3

GROUP B/ GROUP 2: (contestants 7 - 12)

EP 3x04: CLUES & MORE: RECAP for remaining 5:

SPOILERS BELOW!!!

FROG

CLUES:

Location: Hollywood (CBS?) Lot: 1920s street/building

VISUAL CLUES:

His clues video is done in black & white (like a 1920s silent film)

B&W image: MIB sitting on a bench, on a street, as newpapers are being thrown at them (by a paperboy)

Newspaper: The Daily Ribbit (price: 5 cents)

Newspaper headline: Frogs are jumping! Frogs are jumping!

Newspaper headline: Tadpole plucked from large creek!

Newspaper article subtitle: Toad’s crazy ride begins!

Newspaper photo credit: Frog joins The Masked Singer

Newspaper article [this is a nod to the detectives among us, viewers]: TEXT HERE LATER “So there was this tadpole just swimming along, doing its tadpole thing, thinking “Hey, life is pretty good!” Who needs legs anyway?” Then one day it was swimming near a horseshoe and mustve felt lucky. It waived it’s little fishy tail and swam faster than ever and the metamorphosis began in the blink of a frog’s eye. Good bye tail, hello legs! “What arethese weird spongy things in my body? Oh, lungs! Cool!” The tadpole became a frog, but seriously are you actually reading all this? Did you pause on me? Are you hoping for more clues? Or should I say hopping for more clues? Well here’s a frog joke: Why are frogs so happy? Because they eat whatever bugs them! Hahaha. Sorry, that wasnt a clue, but hopefully there’s a kid in the roomto enjoy it. I’m impressed you’re still reading this small print. Back to the frog: it really did have a wild, wild ride. Though it did have some interesting eating habits and I'm not just talking about dining on flies. By the way, have you seen slo-mo videos of frogs using their tongues? Pretty fascinating. Okay, you’ve made it this far. I’ll just tell you the tadpole who became a frog is the celebrity we all know and love who goes by the name” [ARTICLE ENDS HERE]

Sign on the wall of the building “arrow pointing to the left”

Papar bags on the ground next to the bench with “Leftovers” written on it & “leftovers” from one nag have fallen out...to the ground.

The frog’s shadow behind the window/glass is seen using his tongue to catch/eat a fly on the glass

Poster on the (office) floor: 1996 Games: 1000-Meter Leap Frog

The frog & MIB doing dance moves on the street (as he comes out of the building)

Old school michrophone with the “LIKE” sign on it.

Dollar bills on the “counter”: 100 dollar bill + 5 dollar bill + 1 dollar bill (100 + 5 + 1 = 106 dollars)

AUDIO CLUES/VOICE OVER:

“News Flash: My metamorphosis has been anything but typical.”

“I leapt to stardom as fast as the lightning bolt.”

“Never had a chance to evolve my image, and do things my way.”

“I was slitherin with the big frogs from Jump-Jump. Just had to fit in and survive.”

“But now I can write my own masterpiece”

“Showing this new side (of me) gives me butterflies in my stomach.”

“But I'm ready to drop the hammer, and sing my face off.”

ON STAGE CLUES:

Song choice: “U Can’t Touch This” by MC Hammer

Look/Costume: Frog is wearing a purple suit & a yellow/purple checkered tie. He has a matching hat with a feather (1920s “gangster” style) & “Gatsby” style shoes.

Stage: Moves around & dances a lot, while rapping. Very energetic. Touches the brim of the hat during “questining”

Height: Short. Seems around 170 -173cm = 5 feet 6 inches

Build: He’s small, but athletic.

Mic hand: Right.

Talking: “I feel free, baby! I came here to win it all, baby, that’s what I came to do - win it all!” (when answering "How does it feel to dress up as The Frog?”)

GUESSES:

Shad Moss aka (Lil) Bow Wow (rapper/singer/musician) - for me the dance moves confirmed it’s him, cause I am not super familair with his voice alone. But last year when many suggested he could be "The Rottweiler”, I looked him up, and the dance routines he and his kid do in several of his posts leave me with no doubt that it’s him. I would not have gotten this one from the voice alone. 99% chance

POSSIBLE MEANING OF CLUES.

TBA LATER [SEE: LISTED CLUES & YOU’LL KNOW ANYWAY]

Paper bag “Leftovers” = Doggy Bag -- his artist nme was/is Bow Wow + it’s the title of one of his albums (Doggy bag)

Mic + Like sign = Like Mike

106 dollars = he hosted the”106 & Park” music vid show

KITTY

CLUES:

Location: many clips used from Georges Méliès silent film(s) - “Astronomers Dream” watch on YT

Silent film era style clips from a (movie) theatre

VISUAL CLUES:

Most of her clue package is in black & white, in “silent cinema” style. Lot of footage from the time films were first made & lots of references to the film of that time.

(Stage) Curtains opening

B&W: People watching the performance though binoculars.

B&W: Audience clapping (during the performance)

Kitty Mask appearing on each lens of the binoculars.

B&W image: a group of men coming to the stage, in one line...as we see it from the audiences POV. And Kitty Mask appearing in front on them...as the only in COLOUR image that has been added to it.

B&W: (Astronomical) Observatory with a telescope pointed at the Moon. There is a globe in the room. A stand with drawings and shapes (geometry) on one side & a blackboard with AB + CD = [more math...which I can’t type in here...for reasons] An old man/astronomer in a wizard hat is sitting on a chair, reading a book. Then gets up to write something on the blacboard. There is a coat of arms on the back of the chair. - a clip from Georges Méliès "The Astronomer's Dream" (old film from 1898)

In colour: Kitty walking to center stage - alone on the stage, in an ampty theatre

B&W: The Moon with a face being blown up - a clip from Georges Méliès "The Astronomer's Dream" (old film from 1898)

Blinking dressing room lights (a wall full of them) in the background of Kitty Mask

A glass jar/bottle of milk + a glass of milk...with Kitty mask sitting on top of he glass...as milk is poured into it.

B&W: Pirates sword-fighting on an old ship deck.

Kitty doing the CATwalk... with greenish-blueish lights in the background...

A (big) glass rose shattering to pieces as it falls to the ground... with rose petals fling everywhere...

AUDIO CLUES/VOICE OVER:

“In all my wildest dreams I’d never imagined I’d be here where I feel at home among the weird and the wonderful.”

“It’s almost like this show was made for me. -- A little bit of heaven where I can wipe the slate clean as the purest snow.”

“Sometimes it feels lonely, because people don’t think of me as the person I’ve become, but the person I once was.”

“But now under these light - among the cream of the crop - I get to start from scratch.”

“And just like a Kitty will always find a way to nuzzle into your heart, Tonight, for my big debut, I'm going for high drama...as I show you why I'm the pick of the litter”

ON STAGE CLUES:

Song choice: “Dangerous Woman” by Ariana Grande

Look/Costume: Burlesque/(Vegas) showgirl costume - sparkly dress with straps, and feathery skirt + feathers on top of the head (inside a small crown”, and added to that are sparly silver boots. Wearing a leotard under the dress (it seems to be a Red Silver Tabby cat). Kitty mask with different-coloured eyes (heterochromia) - one blue & one brown. The costume has a kind of Satine from “Moulin Rouge” feel/look to it.

Stage presence: Dancing sensual “Cabaret” chair dance while singing. Her backup dancers are dressed as “Chesire cats”

Height: Short, looks around 155-163cm = 5 feet 1 to 5 feet 4

Build: Petite. Very small & slender.

Mic hand: Alternates between left & right

Talking: “I am being somebody that noboby has ever seen before, and its always been inside of me, so... it’s great!” (when answering “Whats it like being The Kitty?”)

GUESSES:

Sarah Hyland (actress) -- the voice & the stage presence remind me of her...the most, though alost none of the clues fit her (rose for BF & drama for being on a popular mock series with lots of “drama”...are the main ones fitting her) 50% chance

Emma Watson (actress) - several clues fit her, but I am uncertain about the voice being a good match

Chloë Grace Moretz (actress) ...so many clues seem to reference to the movie “Hugo” she was in...that was a “tribute” to Georges Méliès...

Kate Bosworth (actress/model) - she has heterochromia + several clues fit

Mila Kunis (actress) - she has heterochromia

Lily Rose Depp - I am not that familiar with her voice to make a definite yes/no decision, but several clues match - pirates connection through her dad & French connection though her mom. She starred in a film titled “Planetarium”... and in the Vanity Fair’s “Secret Showcase/Talent” she did has a very similar oldie feel to it...like the clue package has

some/any “former” Disney actress, who is now in their late teens to late 20s

With this Mask I am more confused than I have ever been with any other mask...any season. Some fit the voice, some the stage prsence, some the clues. But none seem to fit (to me/to my knowledge) them all. And I still cannot decide on the voice..even after re-listening/watching. I really need that 2nd & 3rd song to make up my mind.

POSSIBLE MEANING OF CLUES.

TBA LATER [SEE: LISTED CLUES & YOU’LL KNOW ANYWAY]

TACO

CLUES

Location: (Restaurant) Kitchen

Location: Hollywood (CBS) Lot: streets/parking lot

VISUAL CLUES:

MIB dressed as chefs (in buffed up/sumo suits) preparing food - tacos

The taco lying on the plate as MIB chef adds some seasoning to it

VHS tapes...on the counter

Anchor (nautical.. ships anchor) on a plate

A (solved) Rubik’s Cube on top of a bowl filled with lemons/limes.

Fresh food in the fridge as the door is opened (salad, peppers) - a red trolley (tramcar/streetcar) is on top of the food

The MIC chefs adding more seasonings, and then ketchup to the taco. Writing TACO as a decoration on the plate, next to the taco, with ketchup.

The taco jumps off the plate, and onto the kitchen floor, adn starts running away..as the MIB chefs run after him (with ladles in hands)...He runs out of therestaurant...and onto the street

The MIB looking out between large TMS door and waving for Taco to come their way...and the Taco running into the studio...as the doors close just in front of the chasers

Sign next to the TMS mask logo doors: Studios 36 & 46 Main Entrance [arrow pointing to the left]

Sign on the wall inside the TMS studio doors: Stage 46 [arrow to the right]

AUDIO CLUES/VOICE OVER:

“Like the comfort food I am, I’ve been a confirting part of your lives for decades”

“I’ve got plenty of seasoning & I'm in a good place, but my routine can get a bit mild, so I'm here to bust out of the buffet...and spice things up.”

“To enchiladas and beyond!“

“Here I go...as fast as I can.”

“I want to be the last mask standing.”

“I just hope I don’t fall apart out there.”

“Time for Taco Wednesday.”

ON STAGE CLUES:

Song choice: “Fly Me to the Moon” by Frank Sinatra

Look/Costume: Dark green suit under a taco suit/costume. Cherry tomato for a head. Ketchup bottle for a mic. suits in the background.

Stage presence: Moon & stars theme: Big Band with starry suits. Swing music style..very 1960s Sinatra vibes.

Height: He’s around 170cm = 6 feet (about the same height as the host, Nick)

Build: Tall-ish & lean-ish.

Mic hand: Right

Talking: "This is how dress normally! No(w), the weirdest thing about this experience is being ignored by everyone, cause they don’t know who I am. For the first time (in my life) I feel invisible!” (when answering “How is his normal life different from being on TMS?”)

GUESSES

Tom Bergeron (TV show host & comedian) 99% chance

Tim Allen (actor/comedian) 0.5% chance

Tom Hanks (actor) 0,5% chance

Though the voice at times makes it seem as this could be the actor (and comedian, and writer, and artist) John Lithgow and/or the clues at times make it seem as this could be the actor Ted Danson...it cannot be either of them. They’re just too tall to be the person in that costume.

POSSIBLE MEANING OF CLUES

TBA LATER [SEE: LISTED CLUES & YOU’LL KNOW ANYWAY]

VHS tapes = America’s Funniest (Home) Video’s - he hosted the show..for years

The trolley = the exact trolley/model like in “Mr. Roger’s Neighbourhood” +the 2019 film about him - hesang a song on the 2019 films “soundtrack”

“...as fast as I can” = the title of his (autobiographical) book is “I'm hosting as dast as I can”

MOUSE

CLUES:

Location: Football field

VISUAL CLUES:

The Mouse holding a megaphone & gicing orders through it to others (shes the boss of them all)

MIB dressed in dark slacks & yellow jerseys + wearing helmets...ready to play some “american football”

One MIB is dressed as a cheerleader - with pink tutu skirt & golden pom-poms...cheering them on...

There is a dark football helmet with the US flag on the bench next to the Mouse Mask

The Mouse standing on top of a car/trcuk tire...that’s on the foorball field

Whiteboard with game strategy on it. Title: Bang Bang Formation. Football field drawin under it...with each players moves indicated.

The four cardinal directions: N for north, S for souts, W for West & E for east (in a different colour!) on each side of the table.

The MIB athletes doing push-ups..with The MOuse standing on top of one of their helmets

The MIB yellow jerseys say “Wariors” & their numbers are “19″ & “79"

The MIB athletes tackle the trainign equpment the mouse is standing on, making her fly, and (crach) land of the grass

AUDIO CLUES/VOICEOVER:

“Just like a mouse I’m small and cute. But don’t let my size fool you, because my presence is larger than life. ”

“I’ve always been a leader in my field, really.”

“I wrote the Playbook.”

“But as much as I love calling the shots, and showing everyone who’s the boss, I also love having a walk-on role to play.”

“They say: “Don’t sweat the small stuff.” But now that I'm putting myself in, you should. Because I never accept anything less than gold.”

“So, to all my copetitors, you “cheddar” watch out”

ON STAGE CLUES:

Song choice: “Get here” by Oleta Adams

Look/Costume: Pink-ish mouse costume, wearing a long fairy skirt/dress (with flowers in front) & fairy wings on the back.

Stage presence: Static. Sitting during both the performance/singing AND the “panel guessing” part [indicating she’s older and/or has a health issue and/or it’s done just to fool the viewers about her height...and hence the line “don’t let my size fool you” in the clue package]

Height: Shorter than the host, Nick. Seems about 170- 175 cm = 5 feet 5 iches to 5 feet 7 inches tall.

Build: “Normal” ...to smallish

Mic hand: Right

Talking: “Not being able to talk. Yeah, you know, I’m a chatterbox. And I love talking and they always tell me...that I can’t say anything to anybody.”

(when answering the question “what makes this experience different from her day-to-day life?”

POSSIBLE MEANING OF CLUES:

TBA LATER [SEE: LISTED CLUES & YOU’LL KNOW ANYWAY]

Warriors 19 & 79 = 1979 [the year, the number] = This is the year, when her album “Dionne” was released.

Gold (pom-pons) in her clue package = many of her (her bands) albums/songs have gone Gold.

GUESSES:

Dionne Warwick (singer) 90% chance

I dont really have other guesses. I was conflicted for a bit during the original airing, cause it looked like she was wayshorter than the host, but thats cause I did not pay attention to the fact that she was sitting the whole time. So my confusion “that’s D.W.s voice, but the height excludes her... cause she is a bit taller than that” was over as soon as someone pointed it out to me, and I was able to re-watch & see that she sat not only during the Q&A, but also her performance.

BANANA

CLUES:

Location: Football field

Location: Party/Tour bus

VISUAL CLUES:

Four small fruit-shaped “hobbit houses” - one pear, one stwarberry & 2 watermelons...behind a white picket fence + theres a bicycle nxt to the fence

Banana sleeping & “yawning” outside, on a grass (football field)... on a blanket

A cowboy hat next to the sleeping banana

A tomato & a blowfish next to the sleeping banana

MIB texting “Banana! Where R U?” to him..on an orange-coloured phone

All kinds of veggies and salads + a banana peel..on the grass. The MIB “walking and texting”, and hence not seeing the banana peel & slipping on it & falling down next to the blanket

The Banana sleeping under the blanket...with two dressed in green “cowgirls” sleeping on either side of him. The Bananas clothes/costume is on the floor/grass next to them...so he’s “naked” under the blanket

All kinds of veggies lying around the blanket, on the grass õA

A blue (dog) collar on the grass next to the blanket

Banana partying on a tour bus with the two green creatures

Banana dancing on the table...

AUDIO CLUES/VOICE OVER:

[Banana sleeping on a football field & getting a text “Where R U” from MIB] “What? Where am I? Oh, no, I’m late for the stage! Aaahh”

[12 hrs earlier] “Ugh, I cant believe I overdid it last night. You’d think this was my first rodeo.”

“I’m the banana because I'm tough on the outside, but a total smoothie on the inside. And a hoot to have at parties. Am I right, ladies?”

[getting up from under the blanket] “Help me get dressed, dadgumit.”

"I cant wait to peel back my layers, and show I can use my voice in any environment.”

"I just wanna see you smile.”

ON STAGE CLUES:

Song choice: “A Little Less Conversation” by Elvis Presley

Look/Costume: Yellow costume suit & a banana head with banana peel for a collar

Stage presence: Very energetic, moving around & dancing a lot. Ends the song with an “Iron Man landing pose”

Height: He’s around 180cm = 6 fee (around the same height as the host, Nick)

Build: He’s tall & lean

Mic hand: Right

Talking: “[chuckles] Technically... No. My kid. -- I’m getting ready to work out -- she hands me a banana, and it’s a sign. So here I am - The Banana. And I’m peeling it. I’m peeling the music.” (when aswering the question “Did you always want to be the Banana?”

GUESSES:

Bret Michaels of “Poison” (singer/musician) - those denace moves! and stage presence just give him away.

POSSIBLE MEANING OF CLUES.

TBA LATER [SEE: LISTED CLUES & YOU’LL KNOW ANYWAY]

Cowbvoy hat = he wars one quite often (its kind of one of his trademarks)

Blowfish = they are poisonous & “POison” is the name of his band

The MIB slipping on a banana peel & falling = Bret famously fell once during Tony Awards in 2009

Blue Collar = he has a pet clothing line + his daughetrs name is Bleu

ELEPHANT

First mask to be voted out in ep 4!

I am sad, cause I really liked his performance. But I get it...they’re all really equal, so it just depends which voie/mask has most “fans” in the audience that day/moment.

The clue package video hinted at a sportsman (athlete: skateboard, acrobatics, parkour, snowboarding...or similar..based on the MIB choreography). An individual sport, not team sport. The blue birds hinted at his company name + kinda his last name, too.

What people shoul’dve picked up, too were: his “limping” as he entered the stage. His “sliding to his knees” on stage (a move in his sports...to protect from falls). And... even though it was most likely just about “he's moving to the beat of his own drum” with the drums/drumming, but Id like to think that is was a nod to his role in that “Guitar Hero” add, where he & 3 other famous athletes played band members...and he was the drummer.

<<<<< THIS IS WHAT GOES ON IN MY HEAD AFTER EVERY TMS SHOW/EPISODE. THIS IS HOW I CATEGORIZE THE INFO I HAVE INTO FOLDERS IN MY MIND. THIS IS HOW SPECIFIC I AM, AND HOW INTO DETAILS I GO. THIS IS HOW MUCH I PAY ATTENTION (while, most likely, missing a ton of more hints that I’ll only notice during re-watch) I JUST DECIDED TO WRITE IT DOWN…FOR ONCE.

As promised, I’ll be doing this for the first episode of each group (3x01 for group A, 3x04 for group B, and in a few weeks 3x07 for group C). But that’s all I’ll be doing. Those three. Cause I have no time or energy to write it all down each week.

#THE MASKED SINGER #TMS #SPOILER #TMS SPOILER #TMS US #the masked singer usa #THE MASKED SINGER SEASON 3 #TMS S3 #TMS SEASON 3 #THE MASKED SINGER S3 #MASKED SINGER

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artificialqueens · 7 years

Text

Summer of '89 Chap. 1 (Trixya) - Tyler

a/n: Heyooo. This is a crossover with Firewatch, with eventual Trixya. You shouldn’t have to be familiar with the video game to understand this fic, but feel free to look it up. (it’s worth it)

This is pretty much just a rewrite of the game as of right now, but I promise once we get things going it’ll branch out into it’s own thing. Hope you guys enjoy this as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it so far.

Hit me up on @aaagays if you wanna talk about it.

Flashbacks are in italics. (there’s a lot of them, it was weird to write it like this but i hope it’s still understandable. if it isn’t, let me know!)

1975. Brian sees Violet from across the bar. She’s around his age, late twenties. She’s laughing with well-dressed professors and grad students from nearby CU Boulder. Brian was out drinking with his friends, but decides to ditch the three men to approach the stranger. The man was drunk, to say the least, a goofy grin set on his lips. “You… You’re pretty.” Violet looks up at him, a small smile toying at the corners of her lips.

“You’re pretty,” Violet responds, coolly. To be honest, Brian wasn’t pretty. No, he was the picture of a future hangover. It didn’t matter what the truth was.

“What,” Brian says, brow furrowed in confusion. Violet chuckles at the man, smiling.

“Someone should buy you a cheeseburger,” she says. She flags down a waiter, orders Brian a cheeseburger and Brian doesn’t even bother to tell Violet he doesn’t like onions. He eats it happily, only wincing once at the harsh taste of the onions piled on top of the melted cheese.

Talking to Violet seems to come natural to the man who’s used to isolating himself, it feels different but it feels good.

A week later, Brian becomes Violet’s boyfriend.

Brian taps his foot as the elevator dings. He grabs his backpack, swinging it over his shoulders for the brief walk to his truck. After tossing the bag inside the back, he climbs inside the old pickup. Settling into the driver’s seat, the man smiles to himself as he starts the engine. A country song fills the truck, static over the words but Brian feels it somehow.

They date for over a year. Violet drives Brian absolutely nuts, but Brian loves it. They move in together, an apartment near the school with a view of the mountains. They drink beer together out on their deck, hands clasped between foldout chairs and content smiles on their faces.

Brian drinks beer just about anywhere and life is good.

After a while, Violet wants to get a dog. Brian is hesitant but agrees, he knows it’ll make her happy. They adopt a German Shepherd and name him Mayhem. He’s an excellent dog. Mayhem loves wrestling with Brian in the park and goes with Violet on her runs.

He’s a friend, child, and pet all rolled into one.

1979. Violet and Brian are sitting on the deck, hands still tightly clasped between two foldout chairs as they sip on cold beers. It’s summer and they feel like the heat is never ending. They sit in pleasant silence, until Violet speaks up.

“What do you think about kids?” She asks.

Brian looks up at her. “Kids…? They’re not very smart. Or good at much.”

“I’m saying if you and I have some. A couple little idiots.”

“One day. Why rush?” Violet looks away, out towards the mountains. “We have plenty of time, Vi.” He grazes his thumb over the back of her hand, an attempt to reassure her.

Violet pulls her hand away. “Speak for yourself.”

“Don’t worry,” he says softly. Brian looks up at the moonlit sky, sighing. “Vi, I-I really don’t know why you’re worried. You have the body of an undergrad, sweetie."

"My ovaries didn’t get the memo,” she says, laughing it off. Brian suddenly feels guilty.

“One day, Vi.”

Six months later, they get engaged lying in bed on a warm Sunday morning.

He climbs out of his truck, slamming his door shut and grabbing his backpack. Brian takes a deep breath, a content smile curling the corners of his lips as he walks toward the open gate. Brian makes his way down the path, smiling at the sounds of nature. It feels like home. There’s something comforting about the sound of a creek, along with the chirping of the birds high in the trees.

1980. One Thursday night, Violet is for hours late. She doesn’t call to let Brian know she’d be home late. Brian is getting worried and getting angrier by the minute, but heads to bed anyway.

Violet walks in after he’s settled in bed and Brian can tell she’s been drinking. He huffs as she climbs into bed, placing a sloppy kiss to his cheek and then turning to face the wall. Brian’s had it, he calls her an inconsiderate asshole. She tells him to fuck himself and to not be such a baby.

Brian calls her selfish. Violet knows he means it and it hurts, more than the other comments did.

They fight it out and eventually go to bed happy. At 4am.

1981. Violet likes to draw. She draws plants from research, all the places they go. She draws Brian. He giggles like a girl and frolics like a Victoria’s Secret model, which gets a laugh here and there from his fiancée.

Turns out, Violet was right: Brian is very pretty.

Brian hums to himself as he walks through the woods, sweat trickling down his forehead as the harsh rays of the sun make contact with his skin. He climbs over a log in his path, panting as he takes a moment to collect himself. Brian looks at the mountains, squinting through the sunshine to make out the trees. It’s a gorgeous view.

1982. During the summers, Brian and Violet enjoy taking Mayhem for walks at night. One week, there’s a festival in town. It brings folks from far away places, including a few who weren’t all that pleasant.

One of them tries to mug them with a knife. Mayhem runs away, leaving Brian and Violet alone. Unprotected.

“May-mi-moo-fuck-d…d…dog!” Violet calls. She gets flustered and has trouble speaking when she’s stressed. Brian takes a deep breath, jaw clenching as he approaches the attacker. He could beat the guy’s face in if he wanted, but he knows it would upset Violet.

Instead of physically attacking him, Brian simply reaches into his pocket as if he has a gun and threatens to kill him. Fear flashes in the stranger’s eyes, along with Violet’s. He takes off in the other direction, but Brian doesn’t move until he’s out of sight.

After finding Mayhem, the couple goes home to relax.

They take a different path from that day on, by the river.

1984. Plans to have kids get waylaid by work. Violet gets offered a job at Yale, which is two thousand miles away. It’s a great job: associate department chair. She wants to move. Brian does not.

Brian can tell she wants the job more than anything, so he agrees to let her move if she visits. Violet agrees, even though it’ll be hard. She flies back to Boulder three times each semester.

1985. Violet is sent home from Yale on paid leave after having “an episode.” She lost it at a colleague for borrowing books that were important to her research. She didn’t remember she had happily loaned them to him just two days prior. Violet was found crying in a stairwell.

Brian suggests that maybe they should talk to someone about it. Violet is hesitant, but agrees. After seeing multiple doctors and having many tests, they’re worried Violet might be suffering from early onset dementia.

She’s only forty-one.

They decide to keep it a secret for now.

Brian leans forward on the foldout chair, gaze trained on the leather journal on the tree stump in front of him. He grabs it, flipping the snap lock off of it and flipping through it. Violet’s sketches adorned the white pages. A small, fond smile is painted on his pink lips as he comes across the nude drawing of him in a ‘sexy’ pose. The page is littered with hearts, and the word pretty above it. Brian grazes his thumb over his wife’s handwriting.

Mayhem is getting older. He’s got silver hair running down his back and slows down at night. Brian and Violet bring him to the bar to see their friends and it feels like nothing has changed, even if it has. Mayhem is gentler than he was before, nuzzling up against hands and legs the whole time.

Violet goes back to the university.

1987. Violet’s affliction gets worse. She can’t remember things in class. Her research is in shambles. She drives her car to the next town over, for no particular reason, and has to be brought home by the police. Violet is devastated, to say the least. She’s sent home on permanent medical leave. Brian welcomes her with a hug and a cold beer.

Some days Brian gets the Violet who calls him a dope and his unborn children little idiots, the Violet he loves. Other days, he gets a stranger.

One night, she pulls him into the bed to make love and within five minutes, she’s in a panic thinking her dad is at the door. Brian decides to tell her family. They’re crushed and begin to make trips to and from their home in Atlanta to visit her.

For a while, their friends come by with little things to brighten the day. There’s nothing that can distract Brian from the fact his wife is getting worse though, so the visits decline and soon the only people Violet consistently interact with are Brian and her family.

1988. Brian spends his days following Violet around the house and counting the seconds between the two weekly visits from Kurtis, the nurse. He suggests that Violet could live somewhere else with 24-hour care. A home. Brian thinks about it for a few months, but eventually decides that it’d be best to take care of Violet himself.

Kurtis doesn’t exactly approve of his decision.

Brian is tired. He’s been hiking for an entire day, he isn’t even close to the lookout tower. Brian is about to reach up to readjust his cap when his gaze falls on an Elk. The creature is eating and as much as Brian wishes to not disturb it, he’s way too tired to wait for it to finish. He steps toward it, watching as it’s head jerks up before he bounds away. Brian can’t help but chuckle as the animal leaps off of the hill.

It is impossibly hard. The worst is when he gets mad at Violet for trying to cook her own food. Brian is constantly worried that she’s going to get hurt, he really wishes he would’ve taken her to a facility.

When she goes to sleep Brian stays up for a few hours, drinking on the deck. Watching baseball in the summer, college football in the winter. Drinking then too. Eventually, he starts going out after she goes to sleep. The first time Brian does it he worries about Violet getting up and walking around while he’s gone, so he puts a chair in front of their bedroom door.

Not exactly the best solution, but it’s what puts his mind at ease.

Brian goes to the same bar at the end of Pearl St. It’s nice there. Over time, he tells Derrick, the bartender, everything. It feels good to talk about it to someone. He’s home and in bed by 1am a couple nights a week. Brian looks forward to those nights.

1989. One night, Brian is stopped at a DUI checkpoint. He blows a .10 and is taken to jail for the night. Brian considers trying to hide it, but he tells his sister-in-law. Violet’s parents take the next plane from Atlanta, they can’t believe the state their house is in. They tell Brian that Violet is coming to live with them. He doesn’t argue, says he’ll visit soon. He doesn’t.

A few weeks go by. Summer is coming and Brian sees an ad in the paper for a job as fire lookout. He takes it.

Brian pushes past a tree, smiling in victory as the lookout tower comes into view. “Finally,” He mumbles to himself. Approaching the stairs, he makes his way up them and takes a few minutes to observe his surroundings. Brian can make out another lookout tower in the distance, he assumes it belongs to his supervisor.

He enters the building and looks around for a moment. It’s dark, save for the blinking red light of the generator switch. He figures he should probably turn it on, save his eyes from straining to see. Brian pushes the button, watching as the ceiling light comes to life. He begins looking around, examining the books tucked neatly into a shelf.

The silence is broken by his walkie-talkie.

“Hello, Two Forks Tower!"

Brian jumps, startled. He reaches for the radio, pulling it up and pressing the talk button. "Um, hello? Whoever this is?”

“It’s Brian, right?"

"Yeah.”

“I’m Trixie.”

“Yeah, that’s what the guy said on the phone.” Brian looks around the room before starting to unpack his things.

A few seconds pass before Trixie speaks again. “So, what’s wrong with you?” Brian raises an eyebrow, slightly offended.

“Excuse me?”

“Well, cowboy, people take this job to get away from somethin’. So what’s wrong?” Trixie asks, sounding a bit playful but Brian doesn’t exactly want to respond with one of his borderline offensive jokes if she was being serious.

So, instead he replies with the only other thing he can think of. “What’s wrong with you?”

Trixie laughs. “That’s a great idea! Go ahead,”

“Look, I just hiked for two days so I don’t really follow whatever it is you’re doing right now.” Brian can almost hear Trixie roll her eyes.

“You take a stab at what’s wrong with me,” she says.

“Fine, then can I sleep…? Forever?” Trixie laughs, but it’s closer to a scream than anything this time. Brian smiles. He gets up, walking outside to look around now that he had everything settled.

“Sure, cowboy. Now, go ahead.” Brian doesn’t respond, too tired to come up with something. “You’re just going to wait me out on this?! Fine. But I’m gonna take a second here and have a guess about you,” she pauses. “I don’t know anything about you, other than you’re white and you have a hat on.”

“What? How do you know that?"

"I can see you from my tower, dummy.” Trixie giggles. “Anyways, I say you got fired from your job and have finally decided to write your novel. Yeah. That’s the sort of bullshit reason you’ll find a man out in the woods."

"What if I just enjoy the wilderness?”

“Who the fuck enjoys the wilderness?” Trixie responds, making Brian chuckle.

“You have a point."

"I know I do.”

“Goodnight, Trixie.”

“Welcome to the job.”

#trixie mattel #katya zamolodchikova #violet chachki #derrick barry #miss fame #vatya #eventual trixya #angst #fluff #au #slow burn #tw dementia #tyler #rpdr fanfiction #m/f au #firewatch au #summer of 89

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