#also yeah guess whos watching 3L again

[kiwinatorwaffles]

"ᵉᵗʰᵒ"

[moves over] "yeah?"

"ᶦ ʳᵉᵃˡˡʸ ʳᵉᵃˡˡʸ ⁿᵉᵉᵈ ᶠᵒᵒᵈ"

#tango on his track record of begging people for food ehajsehgajshdlgashghasdg #also yeah guess whos watching 3L again #but etho pov #<- ethogirl #3lsmp #3rd life smp #ethoslab #tangotek #meme tag #life series

[ladyevol]

Dusk for two

Characters: 3L!Grian and SL! Scar

Relationships: 3L!Grian X 3L!Scar (mentioned), 3L! Grian X 3L!Scar

Tags: Hurt/comfort, angst

____________________________________

A man sat in front of the shore, hugging his knees with both sets of wings spread over the sand, watching as the waves moved closer and away. The pair of wings near his shoulders were mostly red with blue and yellow feathers mixed in, similar to the wings of a parrot. As an avian, they had always been far too small for him to actually fly, leading to the man only being able to soften his fall when he fell. His hair was dirty blond and his body was covered by a red poncho long enough to hide his legs from the rest of the world in that position. His black eyes were also made bigger by the glasses that sat over his nose. The avian was short, standing at 5'6ft and his skin tone was a light warm ivory. Even under the harsh sun of the desert, he had never been able to tan. The larger, wider wings growing from the lower part of his torso were purple with a blue eye-like pattern on them. When he was younger, having those wings was everything that he had ever wanted. Now, he would trade them in a heartbeat for the chance of seeing him again.

“Hey, G.” Grian heard the painfully familiar voice coming from behind him and hugged his legs more tightly. “Mind if I sit here?”

“You are free to do whatever you want.” Grian mumbled without turning to look at the man on the wheelchair.

Scar was a much taller and more muscular man than he was at a full height of 6’0. He had spiky dark brown hair with a few gray strands growing to the side, likely due to stress during his own games. Instead of a poncho, the man wore a black cloak over his body covered in lilacs and red poppies, they seemed to almost grow from his clothes, leaving a trail of petals wherever he went. His pants were far baggier than those of Grian and his white shirt was always open for everyone to see his scars covered sienna muscles. Much like Grian, he had wings, albeit mismatched ones as one of his wings was blue and leathery, closer to that of a vex and the other was purple, having the same patterns as Grian's larger ones. While most people in there had scars on their body, Scar had a much more apparent and predominant lightning scar that covered most of his upper body, even his face, hence why he had received the nickname.

Grian sighed deeply. “What are you even doing here, Scar?”

“Oh, you know me. Just enjoying the beach and the breeze and the ocean. You know, I am quite an excellent swimmer. In fact, people would go so far as to wonder if I was part merman for how good at it I am.”

“That's not what I mean and you know it.”

Scar's smile faded a little as he rubbed the back of his neck, “yeah. I know. I guess I am just worried about you. It has been a couple of months now since I arrived and whenever we aren't training, you will just stay here. All alone, watching the sea. I know what it is like to be alone, Grian. Believe me, I know too well and I don't want that for you.”

Grian shook his head, “I deserve to be alone.”

“See, you keep saying that, but I just don't think that's true.”

Grian scoffed, “and what the hell do you know, huh?! You aren't even a player anymore! None of us are! We are just empty husks abandoned by our creators and then taken in by the Watchers to be their own personal little killing machines! We aren't supposed to think! We aren't supposed to feel! We are just supposed to do! And I can't even do that right because all that I want to do is sit on this goddamn beach, because at least the sand reminds me of the few truly good moments of existence that I have that are truly mine and not someone else's memory!”

Silence fell between them for just a moment, but for both of them it felt far longer. The air was heavy.

“Well,” Scar said, “first things first, I believe that the correct term is vessel, not a husk.” Grian glared over at the man who was smiling slightly, his green eyes on him, “second, just because we received these memories from our players instead of making them ourselves, it doesn't mean they aren't true. We are still them, but that doesn't mean we can't also be us. I don't see why those two things can't happen at the same time.”

“But you are not him.” Grian squeezed his legs more tightly.

Scar looked to the side, “no. I'm afraid I'm not your version of Scar.” He began pulling himself from his wheelchair to sit on the sand next to Grian, “I'm just not that lucky, I suppose.”

“Lucky? He is dead. How the hell can you call that lucky?”

“It is better to die knowing there is someone there that will always remember you than to live as just a ghost in the lives of everyone else. Believe me, Grian, if there was a way to give him my soul and bring him here, I would do it in a heartbeat. I'm still not even sure how I won. I certainly didn't deserve it. Gem, Pearl, hell, even my version of you deserved this more, at least you had people who cared about you and were rooting for you. But me? I burned every bridge I had ever built to appease the secret keeper. I destroyed every alliance and drank the blood of the people who committed the crime of just letting me live for too long. I murdered my own mother, my own father, I betrayed the people that dared to think of me as a possible ally, and do you know for what?” Grian finally turned to look at him, “a book. All of that, and for just a book, a book demanding more and more from me." Scar reached inside his cloak and pulled out the book containing his last task. He opened it to read ‘win secret life.’

“Well, you also earned a soul of your own, outside of the players.”

“See, that's the thing though, I'm unsure if that's even a reward! Because it feels more like a punishment most of the time.” He laid on the sand, “at least when I was being controlled, I had the excuse that things were out of my control, that his actions were not my actions, even if it is my body, but now? Now I realize how wrong I was. There was no line where he finished and I began. He was me. His desires, his anguishes and his fears are mine too. And so are our crimes. Except I have an even longer list of crimes now. Like you said, we are killers. We are neither watcher, nor player and we are above your regular vessel. We are Winners. Plain and simple.”

“Winners.” Grian took a deep breath. “Winners of sorrow and despair. We are never going to stop being controlled, are we? At least we knew what the players were thinking and feeling. This is so messed up.” He buried his face in his knees before feeling a hand on his shoulder. He turned to look at Scar who was smiling at him.

“You are right. This is awful. It is so much that sometimes I feel like the pressure of it all will be enough to make me die. But even if it is like that and we are trapped in a hopeless, wretched existence where there is no possibility of a good ending, at least we are not alone.”

“Yeah, right. Because that is SO encouraging.”

“Maybe it isn't, but if there was one thing that Secret Life taught me was that life is worse when you have to live it on your own.” He placed an arm around Grian and pulled him against his chest in a sideway hug, “so smile my friend! Even if tomorrow is not the most beautiful and graceful day ever, at least you can have a shitty day with me.”

Grian looked at Scar with a faint blush on his lips before snorting, “yeah, right. I guess there were worse people to be trapped in here with.” He rested his head on Scar's shoulder as they watched the sun go down. Maybe, just maybe the night could be a little bit warmer with someone else by his side.

#mcyt #gtws #grian #desert duo #secret life #third life #hermitshipping #goodtimeswithscar #winning vessels au

[poppyseed799]

You said you were taking oneshot requests so uh

Can I get just a little thing with Skizz and Etho during 3rd Life? Like before Skizz died but after the war started if that makes sense-

(Sure! But I’m a bit rusty on red army stuff (currently in the process of rewatching Martyn’s 3L series) and I’ve honestly never been SUPER familiar with 3L!Etho so sorry if this seems ooc or wrong! I’m gonna try to keep it short and simple due to those factors but hope you like it! (Also I’m gonna completely make up stuff that happens dw bout it))

Etho had turned red recently, meaning he was free to kill whoever he wanted. The problem? He didn’t know who burnt his castle this time.

He just returned home to see it up in flames. There was no one sailing away in a boat, no one fleeing on the nearby land. The culprit must’ve set the wool ablaze a while ago, and didn’t stick around to watch. Why even do it then? Isn’t it fun to watch things burn? What sort of monster sets a castle on fire and doesn’t even bother to watch it?!

Ren came to visit with the rest of the Dogwarts Alliance following behind him after hearing the news of the burning castle. “Etho! What happened, my dude? Are ye alright?”

“I’m fine, but my castle needs to be rebuilt… again.” Etho sighed. “Pretty sure I have enough wool, but this will take a while…”

“You are protected by the banner, Etho. That means we shall assist you!” Ren held his shield high, showing his own banner. Then his ears went down, and he looked around at his crew. “Unfortunately, we are uh… a little busy. But fret not, dear Etho! For we shall lend you… ONE SOLDIER TO HELP!”

“Ok” Etho said. “Thanks.”

Ren studied the army behind him for a moment, then pointed to Skizz. “SKIZZLEMAN! Are ye willing to assist our friend, our brother?”

“Of course I am!” Skizz declared proudly.

“Thank you! Now for the rest of us…” Ren turned to Martyn and BigB. “LET US RETURN TO OUR KINGDOM!”

They left Skizz with Etho. Once they were gone, Etho gave Skizz some wool. “I know there’s not much framework left to copy off of, but… just get some sort of structure going.”

Skizz took the wool in one hand and saluted with the other. “You’ve got it, boss!” He then laughed softly to himself and began working.

They had finished rebuilding a lot of the castle before Skizz had decided to ask, “Who did this, anyway? We’ve gotta kill them!”

Etho sighed. “No idea! Must’ve been a quick drive by. Interrogations aren’t working out, either.”

“WHAT?!” Skizz yelled too loud. “There’s no WAY they’re just getting away with this!!!”

Etho shrugged. “Unfortunately, looks like they will. I could just launch a missile at Bdubs and say it’s revenge for my castle, even if it turns out it wasn’t him.”

“Or, we could kill EVERYONE on the server! Then we’re GUARANTEED to kill the culprit!” Skizz smiled.

Etho blinked. “Everyone…? That seems like a lot. Some of them are allies.”

Skizz shook his head. “Yeah- you’re right- not EVERYONE… just people who aren’t our friends! Cuz a friend would NEVER do this!”

“That’s still a lot of people. I’d prefer to blow up the Crastle. Less risky, more fun.”

“You… don’t think it would be FUN?” Skizz frowned. “Ever since I turned red, all I’ve wanted to do was kill! Don’t you feel the same way?”

Etho thought for a moment. “Um… well, I guess I’d like to, for revenge. Am I supposed to want to kill… more? I’m still pretty new to being red.”

“I dunno! This is just the way I’ve felt ever since I turned red, I guess it could be different for everyone.” Skizz said. “Honestly, the bloodlust gets a little hard to control sometimes! I just get overwhelmed with the urge to STAB SOMEONE!!!”

“Well you’ll have to be careful. We’re in a war, you know. And I just lost one of my lives to our enemy.” Etho said. “You can’t just charge into battle, we’ve only got one life left.”

Skizz sighed. “Yeah, I know… but together, we can win this war! If you weren’t alone, Scar would’ve been the one to die in that fight!” He smiled at Etho. “He’d be so busy trying to kill you that I’d be able to charge at him and get the job done!”

Etho hummed, amused. “Yeah, that would be a more ideal timeline. Instead, we’re stuck like this, preparing for the big war.”

Skizz groaned in annoyance. “I just wanna kill someone, you know? Like, whoever burned your wool castle? Let’s find them and kill them!”

“We don’t know who it was,” Etho reminded the grey man. “Do you want to help me fire a missile at Bdubs’ castle instead? It’ll be worth it.”

“Hmm… alright, I’m in! You seem to have fun doing it, so I’ll help!” Skizz smiled at Etho.

Etho smiled back. Was it because Skizz did, or because Etho thought the idea of firing another missile at Bdubs was super funny? Didn’t matter, it’s not like anyone could see the smile through his mask… right?

“Alright, let’s take a break from this and do that real quick then.” Etho decided, putting his wool away and grabbing materials to build another one of his signature missiles. Skizz cheered and put his wool away too.

“Just remember to be careful, okay?” Etho said to Skizz. “I don’t wanna lose you because you decided to try to charge into a tough battle and kill everyone in sight.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll try not to.” Skizz said. “I could never abandon my people like that. I wanna be with you guys until the very end! Us against the world!”

At the moment, it was more like them against the Crastle. But it was fine, it was safe, it was fun. An exciting little moment for the two red soldiers. The war could continue at any moment, but they’ll be ready. They’ll be with each other. They’ll survive.

#3rd life smp #3lsmp #trafficblr #life series #3lsmp etho #3lsmp skizz #third life smp #it wasn’t specified what kind of relationship so I just went for buddies lol #requests still open if y’all see this #skeetho

[truthofherdreams]

please don’t stop the music (3)

also on ao3

There is something almost comforting about classes starting, even though Lara Jean has to get acquainted with a whole new set of professors and fellow students. But there is something to be said about waking up every morning with a purpose, and keeping her mind busy with lectures, readings and homework. Chris thinks her crazy for how organised she is – from her pastel highlighters to her neat notes to her pretty schedule above her desk –, not that Lara Jean pays her mind. They might get along, but it soon becomes clear Chris and she have opposite views on their academic performances. Which is fine with Lara Jean, really. Nobody can be at the top, that’s why it’s the top.

At least she gets one week free of acapella before auditions are held, and so one week away from Gen’s deadly stares. The girl doesn’t scare her, not really, still Lara Jean is careful. Even more so since Chris dropped the Peter bomb on her.

She hasn’t seen him around since the activities fair, which obviously means that he’s right there in the food hall on Wednesday when she gets her breakfast before her 9am econ class. She toys with the idea of running away for a second, but then he’s raising his head from his plate, his eyes meeting hers, all surprised glee and boyish smiles, and she knows she’s done for.

She piles more pancakes that is probably healthy on a plate, pours herself a cup of tea, and goes to pay. All in slow motions. All to push down the inevitability of having to sit next to Peter Kavinsky.

“Hey, Covey,” he greets her when she finally plops down in the chair opposite his. “Bright and early?”

She steals some time by sipping on her burning hot cup of tea, and it only makes him grin more. Idiot. “You’re one to talk,” she manages to reply after a while, nodding to his still damp hair and flushed skin.

He obviously already took a shower, while she’s still in her pyjamas. They’re on two very different levels of early-birdness right now.

Peter only shrugs. “Morning training has me up at 6 every morning.”

She lowers her cup, eyes a little wild. “What.”

Everyone and their mother told her it was madness to take a 9am class and that she soon would regret it. Lara Jean always replies that she likes waking up at the same time every morning, as part of her routine, so it really is not a problem. She would be awake anyway, so might as well be productive about it.

But six am? Every morning? That is madness, indeed.

Peter simply shrugs with one shoulder, before he shoves another spoonful of cereals in his mouth. “The gym is always empty this early in the morning.”

“I wonder why,” she replies.

He only grins for a moment, head tilted to the side like a curious puppy. There is something too soft about his features, and his eyes, and his smile. Lara Jean has to look away.

“Well yeah, that’s the point. Nobody to steal the treadmill from me or to judge me when I’m lifting weights.”

“But why?” she wonders out loud. Why would he put himself through such a drastic regimen every morning, when he could just sleep in and probably still looks just as good. She doesn’t say that out loud, though.

“I’m part of the Lacrosse team,” he explains. “Scholarship.”

Her mouth opens in a small ‘oh’ of surprise as understanding dawns on her. She has vague souvenirs of Peter playing Youth Lacrosse when they were in primary, jokingly calling it 3L – Little League Lacrosse. It makes sense that he would keep with it in high school; Peter has always been an outdoor kind of boy, when she was just fine reading inside. The neighbours’ tree house had been a happy in-between for the two of them.

“So you’re a masochist,” she comments.

Peter presses a hand to his hand, faux offended expression on his face. “Damn, Covey. Since when are you so savage?”

She’s the one to grin this time, hiding her giggle in a sip of her tea. It reminds her of primary school all over again, of the recess time spent playing games together and the play-dates watching Harry Potter and Disney movies and running around her garden, yelling like animals. It was a simpler time then, without having to worry about her father and Kitty, or helping Margot with chores, or writing down meal plans for the week. A time when all three Covey girls were just that – girls, who knew nothing of heartbreak or maturing too soon.

It’s always been easy, with Peter. He was her first friend, from the very first day of school, sitting next to her and telling her how he liked her little combat boots. She wasn’t used to be friends with boys then – it was Margot and her, for the most part, and she was fine with it – but Peter made it easy. Comfortable. Fun.

And he still does, telling her about his Lacrosse career and his daily training sessions every evening with the team, and how all the other dudes are so much more buffier than him. Hence the extra training in the morning, to keep up with them. In return, she tells him about Margot in Scotland, and Kitty being such a little feminist warrior, and how she loves to bake whenever she can. Which isn’t all that easy when she’s sharing nothing more than a kettle and a microwave with an entire floor of college students.

“I remember you mom used to make those little Korean pastries,” he says, using both his hands to mimic a round shape. “With like, red bean stuff or something.”

“Hwangnam bread,” she replies, and hopes he doesn’t notice how her whole body went tense for a second there, a little startle of surprise at how casual he brought her into the conversation.

But of course, it’s Peter, and he notices. Eyes a little sad, shoulders slouching ever so slightly, “I’m sorry, I didn’t…”

“It’s fine,” she cuts him off with a wave of her hand. And, truly, it is, in some weird, probably inexplicable way. The hurt will always been there, at the back of her mind, but. It’s less painful now, dulled with time. “I’m just not used to people talking about her so casually.”

Usually, people are very good at toying around the subject. They’re not very good at being casual about it, though. Too many teachers being so awkward around them when it was time to make a Mother’s Day present, so many people apologizing too many times about it like it was somehow their fault. And dad, who’s so good at just keeping it all in to the point where Kitty once asked her if he didn’t love mom anymore. It’d broken Lara Jean’s heart so much she’d cried herself to sleep that night, unable to explain that dad does that because he still loves mom so damn much it hurts.

“Well, her pastries were great. And she was, too.” A pause. Then, “dad left us like, a year after you guys moved out. Got himself a new wife and a new house and a new family. They even got a dog and shit.”

Lara Jean’s mouth opens but, for a few moments, no word come out. She has no idea what to answer that isn’t the damn hollow apologies she hates so much. So instead she says, “Oh Peter…” and her voice goes lower, softer.

“It’s fine, really,” he replies, even though his tone makes it everything but. “It’s just, I know what it feels like. People being weird at you trying to act like the situation is normal even if it isn’t.”

Lara Jean remains silent for a while, her pancakes abandoned in favour of staring down at her hands in her lap. She doesn’t have many memories of Peter’s parents or family life, only that his mom runned the local antiques store that Lara Jean loved so much as a child. There was this one necklace she always admired, and Mrs Kavinsky even let her try it on for a little while once. But, beside that, Lara Jean can’t remember anything. Can’t remember if the Kavinskys looked happy or not.

When she still doesn’t speak up, Peter simply adds, “Well, that was deep,” and it makes her laugh out loud, a little nervous and breathless. He’s grinning again when she looks up at him, eyes crinkling and dimples in his cheeks, and she finds herself blushing for no reason. She coughs, then shoves some more pancakes in her mouth.

Chewing and swallowing, she decides it’s time to move on to things that are a little lighter and less awful. “Owen must be so grown up now.”

Peter groans, head tilting back. “He’s driving mom fucking crazy, doing nothing of his days beside playing Fortnite and watching videos of like, David Dobrik.” He shakes his head, like he him can’t believe it. “She keeps wishing he took after me and was outside all the time.”

“We can’t all be kind of the lunch hall,” she comments as an educated guess. Something funny twists in her stomach when Peter is the one to blush. Maybe not such a guess after all. “Too bad they live far away from each other, Kitty could force him to go outside once in a while.”

“Oh I remember the little monster,” Peter grins.

Kitty was barely more than a baby when he last saw her, running around the house and screams like a banshee. Nothing much has changed on that subject, comes to think about it. Lara Jean wonders how long it took her this time, to hack the TV’s parental control and gain access to HBO all over again. Two days? Three at most? Damn, but Lara Jean misses her already.

She thinks of sending her baby sister a quick good morning text, and so grabs her phone from her pocket, only to notice what time it is. Her class starts in half an hour, and she still needs to shower and get ready.

“Shoot,” she softly curse, which of course makes Peter laugh. “I have to get ready for classes.”

“Yeah, sure. Let me go back up with you.”

Which is how Lara Jean learns that he lives on the fourth floor, while she and Chris are on the third one. Not so far from each other, especially since they can hang out in whichever floor’s common room if they feel like it. Which, Lara Jean doesn’t want to sound presumptuous, but maybe they do.

(She refuses to think of Gen right now.)

Peter holds the elevator’s door open as she gets off and turns toward him, fishing for her door card in the pocket of her cardigan but not moving down the corridor. Like she wants to enjoy any spare second with him she can get.

“That was nice,” she comments.

“It was,” he agrees. “Guess I’ll see you on Saturday, then?”

“What?”

“The party after the audition?” When Lara Jean doesn’t react, only offers him a blank face, he explains, “I’m part of the Ransom Notes. So I’ll see you at the acapella party.”

The elevator’s doors close on his wink.

Chris has a lot of explaining to do.

#covinsky #covinsky ff #covinsky fanfic #to all the boys I've loved before #fanfic #ff: tatbilb #ff: please don’t stop the music

[canaryatlaw]

Alright, well today was overall pretty good. I woke up around 11:24 I think, I had my late alarm set for 1pm but figured I’d wake up before then. I had a weird craving for chocolate chip pancakes, which is kinda odd because I’ve literally never made them before in my life, but I had a hershey bar and some m&ms I could use, so I was like hey, let’s do this. So I chopped up the hershey bar and started making them, then moved to the m&ms when I ran out of the chopped chocolate. my pancakes haven’t always been cooperating with me lately, but I was trying to do smaller ones today and I think that worked a lot better, so that’s good to know. And they were really freaking good. So after I finished eating I knew I should get to work, so I pulled up the two things I had for the legal drafting assignment and started doing my final edits before turning it in tonight. I knew it wasn’t perfect, but honestly at this point I just don’t give a fuck anymore, I don’t care if I get one fucking C in my last damn semester, it can’t affect my GPA that much, and who the fuck cares anyway??? I just don’t anymore. but I made some edits and changed a few things around. The thing is I know my arguments are really solid, really damn good arguments, but I know that’s not gonna be what matters because with this prof it’s all about procedure and format and bullshit that doesn’t even matter in the real world. Like legit when I was talking with her last week looking over my past assignment she was like “oh you’re doing this like they taught you at the courthouse, but we’re doing it like this” and I was like ???? these hypothetical projects are *literally* supposed to be from the damn courthouse I worked at, like literally working for the cook county public guardian’s office, and you’re telling me what I learned actually being there was wrong??? I’m just so fucking done, this class should’ve been a breeze for me but it became a massive pain in the ass instead. And I really don't give a fuck if she doesn’t like my writing, the people I’ve actually worked under in the real world have always loved it, my one supervisor still gushes about the motion I wrote from the child death case as one of the best he’s ever seen, and I really, really don’t give a fuck about this goddamn class anymore. I’m ranting, I know. But anyway. I made my edits and printed it out, ended up having to print two copies of each because something didn’t turn out right in the first version of each, stupid staples (they’ll literally dock you points if your stapling doesn’t look good) and temporarily forget to use page numbers. But I got all that done and headed out to school a little early, there was supposed to be a PAD transition team meeting at 5:30 so I thought I’d come for a bit before class, except nobody actually doing the meeting showed up on time, and I had class at 5:50, so I left at 5:40, and I apparently didn’t miss much. We turned in our assignment, and then had class for about half an hour, talking mostly about factors regarding appeals and what you should take into consideration when deciding if you’re going to appeal or not. Good stuff I guess. But we ended around 6:20, and the PAD event we had for tonight didn’t start till 7 and it was right across the street so I chilled in the PAD office for a bit before going over. The event is supposed to be an official introduction to the new executive board, with alumni coming and networking and all that good shit, it’s called “Story Time” because we’re “Story Chapter” (all of the chapters are named after Supreme Court justices, since our chapter was founded in the 1890s it was after a very old justice, Joseph Story). So I headed over there and mingled for a bit, pretty good food, they had chicken tenders that were like, really damn good chicken tenders lol and they had grilled cheese, which is like, perfect, so I was pleased with that. I spent a while chatting with one of the older alums about work and life and all that good stuff. He’s looking for a law clerk, but since I’m a 3L he said I need to focus on studying for the bar, and worry about jobs later, which is valid, lol. After that I just went to where my friends are and hung out with them for a bit more, just having fun. The event ended around 9, and since we were the ones throwing it we ended up being the last people there, and they had a buffet style food set up and the staff put out to go boxes and were like “hey if you want to take any of this home go for it because it’s just gonna get thrown out” so I may have gone to town on the chicken tenders and shoved 20 of them into a to go box (I counted) which I expect will go to good use over the next couple of weeks (weeks because I’ll probably freeze some of them at some point, chicken tenders aren’t really a food that’s like, cooked one time, because most of them come pre-cooked, and they were warmed up today, but I can just warm them up again and they’ll be the same lol so that’s useful. I’m sure Jess will be having some this weekend because she hasn't eaten shit all week (sigh). But yeah, I went home, dropped my stuff and decided to watch Arrow. It was......odd. Not really an episode they’ve ever done before, mostly just because there was almost no Oliver in it. And I felt like the whole time they were trying to get us to like Diaz and like, I just don’t??? I don’t find him to be a very compelling character and the whole time I was just like Dinah honey why are you hanging out with this asshole?? I don’t get it. I will say though I did like the plot between Oliver and Felicity and the moment they had at the end of the episode, so that was good. After that the only other show I had left to watch was Riverdale, which I put on because we decided we’re going to “Riverdale Con” (god that sounds so absurd) next weekend because it’s in Chicago and we can, and plus we’re already going two weekends without a con, we definitely couldn’t go three. Riverdale was the musical episode of course, and I had fairly mixed feelings about it. I wasn’t familiar with the music of Carrie, I knew the plot obviously but hadn’t heard any of the songs before. Most of my feelings were that the majority of the cast really cannot sing and were very, very autotuned, and like the only one who could actually sing was the actor who plays Kevin, and they only let him sing like two fucking lines??? I mean wtf was that about, bad choice there. But yeah, I guess the episode itself was fine, and I did walk away with Veronica’s song stuck in my head. I also ended up looking up the plot on wiki because I wanted to see how the songs fit in, which was an interested read at least....lot of death. It was funny though because I know Christy Altomare and Derek Klena had played Sue and Tommy opposite each other in the 2012 production, and then of course they’re currently playing Anastasia and Dimitri in Anastasia right now. And yeah, I finished watching that then basically started getting ready for bed. Other things that have been on my mind though, I read an article talking about how Christians are becoming disillusioned with the term Evangelical because it’s come to be associated with the Trump idiots and everything that comes with that. And like, it’s so interesting for me to see this because I was thinking through all of this back in 2014 when I decided that I was no longer identifying with that term. Because what does it even mean?? Nothing, really. There’s no set definition that would make one an “evangelical.” I broke with the movement way before everyone else did though, over the “World Vision Incident” that left me so incredibly incensed at everyone who caused that horrific event to happen- basically, World Vision announced that as a non-denominational Christian organization they would be hiring Christian employees in same sex relationships since some denominations are now affirming. One of World Vision’s main programs is about sponsoring a child, send like $30 a month to go to the life of this specific child you’re matched up with. And when this happened, a lot of evangelical leaders protested which led to a huge number of people cancelling their child sponsorships, to the point where World Vision was forced to capitulate or they would suffer such a horrific loss in the work they are doing. Overall, the entire event resulted in 10,000 people dropping their sponsorships, and many did not renew them when they changed positions (incidentally, I immediately called up and started a sponsorship right after this happened). And like, for me that was such a clear line in the sand that was drawn. When you’re fighting your culture wars using the lives of children living in poverty as bargaining chips to force a company not to hire people you disapprove of, that keeping these people out of your organizations is more important to you than the literal lives of children, when that is what you believe in, I’m sorry but you and I do not believe in the same God. I believe in the God who said let the little children come on to me, and admonished the adults to be more like the children. The Jesus who never uttered a word about the culture issues evangelicals are obsessed with pressing. The God who said it was better that you throw a millstone around your neck and jump into the water than to lead a child astray, to hurt a child like that. That’s my God, I don’t know what bastardized version of a god (small g) that you believe in, but he’s certainly not the one I know. The one who gave me such a drive to change the world for children, to help the most vulnerable of the most vulnerable, those shoved into horrible situations and desperately need love and assurance from those around them. The God that created me to have steel in my veins when it comes to dealing with the child abuse I willingly engage with, the God that made me for this purpose, so much that I can feel it in my bones, this is what I was meant to do with my life, nothing else could ever feel right. The God who won’t let me stop until I make a difference, until I’m saving the lives of children in the system every day, no matter how difficult and traumatic that might be. The God who never turned his back on me when I doubted he was there, when I couldn't see him then, but looking back I can see he never left me, he was there the whole time, carrying me through the hard times while I was kicking and screaming and was furious with him for putting me through all I had to deal with. The God who used all of that to create a deep passion in me to save children, so they never have to go through that. This is my purpose in life, and that’s the God I believe in, I don’t know the one you’re praising who cares more about making gay people outcasts than the literal lives of children.

okay, that turned into a massive rant that went a little off the wheels, but I hope I got my point across. My faith is so, so important to me, and it hurts me so much to see the name of Christ being dragged through the mud by those claiming his name and acting as if they’ve never opened a bible. But anyway. That’s about it for my day. No official plans for tomorrow, I might do a short grocery run to stock up on a few things, and maybe small group at night, we’ll see. I mean, I should probably start studying at some point, but my first final isn’t until May 2nd, which is still a week and a half away, and it’s the easiest one, so I’ll have time. Alright, I’m done now. That was a massive rant about my many frustrations that I will hopefully feel better about now. It’s past 1:30 am so I’m going to get to bed now. Goodnight my dearies. If you made it all the way through this post, bless you for caring about my life enough to do that. ❤️

#daily journal #April 2018 #Rachel watches Arrow

[canaryatlaw]

Alright, so today was good, not exhausting probably because I got to sleep in which was like 🙌🏻 even though I was extra lazy and took a Lyft to Ulta to get my hair cut so I could get another 45 minutes of sleep 😂 at least I didn't blow off anything actually important, and I was SOOOO overdue for a haircut, like omg. So I got to catch up with my stylist who I love and we always trade crazy stories, so I was telling her about all the mayhem that is juvenile court and all the fun we've been having there (that's a pretty loose definitely of fun, of course). But I finished up there around 3 and walked a few blocks down to the blue line and took it back to school. I dumped my stuff in the PAD office because I always have way too much stuff with me, then went searching for where I was supposed to turn in my appellate briefs because I didn't want to be responsible for holding them anymore like here just take them haha I literally was keeping them in a plastic ziploc bag in an attempt to keep them undamaged. So I was happy when I accomplished that. Back to the PAD office, and had barely a few minutes to copy case briefs for this week's crim pro reading into my notes (because lol who does the reading anymore what am I a 1L? And that was the only class I was actually reading for to start with 😂) and then had to meet my spring break friend because they were doing the pro bono service awards for the students that hit the most hours. As of now I'm at 148 and I still have some more to log from this year, but the highest award is just for 3L's who've broken 200 so I'll definitely get that next year haha but I got the 100 hour one for this year. I hung out with my friend and the two guys from the public interest law board that we're friends with. The ceremony was nice enough, the lady like forgot to call my name which I thought was more amusing than anything else haha because I really did not care but she was like "omg I'm so sorry!!!" and freaking out and I was like haha it's fine really. So we hung out there for a little bit longer before heading back to school (it was in the building next door that's still owned by our university but isn't the "college of law" building), and I copied the rest of the case briefs before heading to class. It was fairly interesting, all 6th amendment right to confront your accuser stuff and there was one case that was substantially similar to a case we cited in the motion I wrote at work about a child abuse victim testifying via closed circuit TV and everyone was talking about protecting the defendants rights to a face to face confrontation of their accuser and I was just like ".....so you guys know in juvenile court we do this stuff literally all the time right?" Lol like I know juvenile court is technically civil court but it quasi-criminal enough that you get a public defender. So that at least was somewhat interesting. Our prof just like, gave us a random 20 minute break and said it was so we could do our professor evaluation but it looked like she really just needed a minute haha it seemed her thoughts were getting a bit jumbled there. But then we finished up pretty quickly and she let us out like 45 minutes early (I just think she doesn't like classes being that long) so I got home a bit earlier than I would've. Nothing new recorded, so I watched crazy ex-girlfriend which is of course reaching whole knew levels of craziness and I do love the show, but I also want to be done with it because there's so much I want to watch right now, lol. I want to catch up on APB which I haven't started at all but have a bunch of recorded episodes of, and I need to see 24: Legacy at least as long to when my bby Tony shows up, and then there's the pressing Netflix shows I really want to drop everything and watch because everyone is talking about them. I know Iron Fist was getting pretty mixed reviews, at least in the comic-media world I frequent, but I'd very much like to see it. And then of course everyone's been going nuts over 13 Reasons Why, which I find interesting because what's gotta be like 8 or 9 years ago now (I was 16 I think) my friend lent me that book to read (I was highly suicidal at the time and I guess she thought maybe it would help? Idk) and I remember reading it, and then starting the lovely bones right after that. It's interesting to see the different feedback to it, and I know there's been some pushback from the mental health advocacy community based on some aspects of the story so I just really want to watch it for myself so I can share my thoughts on it (post-finals, probably). I think I always may have more thoughts on the bullying angle now because of my experiences on tour with that subject. So I'd like to do that. But yeah, that ended my day but I think I had a few more things I wanted to talk about. One would be classes for next semester. The school, for whatever reason, significantly cut down on how many classes they were offering which is a major wtf for all of us, but I'm basically just worried I'm not taking enough bar-tested courses (only certain areas of the law are tested on the bar exam) and more like the ones I'm interesting in, which are great, but may not help on the bar. Tbh though it's not like I'm very worried about not passing the bar. I've always been an excellent test taker, and I know if I prep correctly and give myself enough time to grasp the concepts of the tested classes I didn't take (like how I taught myself all of property in two weeks) I'll be just fine. But as it stands right now, I have adoption law, poverty law (both of which would be very good additions for my line of work), business organizations (which is obviously bleh but it's a must for the bar) and then a legal drafting class we have to take. They have different topic ones you can take, and I didn't really want to do the family law one because I knew it really just meant divorce and I don't really want to do that, so I picked civil litigation on the hopes that maybe I will end up in the outside the govt civil sector fighting for child rights, like I'd really really like to be doing....but we'll see. I'm also seeing the timing work out pretty well, right now I have adoption law and poverty law on Monday and Wednesday nights (one on each night, I just can't remember which night is which), then bus orgs on Tuesday and Thursday from 1-2:40 (my only meets twice a week class, bleh), and then legal drafting on Thursday right after from 3-4:30, that way I figure I can still get home to enjoy a Thursday night. I'm trying to make it so I do have bit more breathing room and I'm not coming home late every single night of the week. This plan would presumably have me at work then class on Monday, one afternoon class on Tuesday, one night class on Wednesday, two afternoon classes on Thursday (and somewhere between those last 3 days slip in my DVLC shift) and work on Friday, which sounds pretty good to me, so hopefully that will work out well. The other thing I wanted to talk about is once again my fucking back, because it was killing me again today and now I'm wondering if I shouldn't go to the grappling class I'm signed up for at the kickboxing gym tomorrow night, but like at the same time it's super easy to talk myself out of these things if I'm not like super strict about it so I don't want it to just be like an excuse, but I also don't want to aggravate it.....idk, I haven't made up my mind yet. We'll see how I'm feeling in the morning and how the day goes. Okay, that's about all I got. Goodnight darlings. Sleep well.

#daily journal #April 2017

[canaryatlaw]

Alrighty, well today was pretty good. Had an easier time falling asleep but realized I double dosed myself again (accidentally this time) because I'd already put the old melatonin in my pill box so I took both....whoops. Lol. So I had my alarm set for 11 and like the weak bum that I am when it rang I reset it for 12 and went back to bed lolol. So weak and such a bum. Got up then and jumped into my reading for trial advocacy, because I knew I had 71 pages to do and like 4 hours to do so, not impossible but rushed. It was interesting, the first bit was like the basics of a trial which I pretty much knew all of already, and I dumped highlighting after the first chapter because it was taking too long (there were 3 chapters). Then we got into the actual lesson which was on voir dire (vwah deer) which is when the lawyers select a jury by asking them questions and striking the ones they don't want. Do they was fairly interesting, and the reading sped up towards the end because a lot of it was hypothetical conversations between lawyers and potential jurors, all pretty basic stuff, so I finished the reading by 3:15. After that though I had to do the two "problems" that were assigned, two hypothetical cases that they wanted us to set up a good and bad juror profile for as well as a list of questions to ask for both sides. It was interesting, not terribly hard, because a lot of it was just like opposites, like if one side wants this the other side obviously wants the opposite of it, so it wasn't very hard to come up with stuff. It had been raining and super windy all day, so when it became time to go to class I decided to implement one of my alternate routes to school and see how it goes. This one involved taking the same train from the same station that I normally do, but walking down a few blocks and then taking a bus east about 6 stops to the station, and it wasn't terrible. It was like super windy out, so I don't think I would've wanted to walk through it. The bus was pretty crowded though, and it was still like a 7 minute walk to it so I may not always use it, but it's a good option for now. We were meeting at the major downtown courthouse instead of at school because they let us do that, so I got off two stops earlier and was able to take the "pedway" system over from where I was on the red line to the blue line stop that's right in front of the courthouse. It's like, through a little mall/shopping center, so that's interesting haha. Better than walking in the cold, even if it's not for very long. Got to the courthouse and got through security, which was a fun little exchange about me always setting off metal detectors haha they were in good humor about it. Up to the 13th floor for the courtroom we're meeting in, it's like 5:35 at this point and class starts at 5:50, and already it was pretty crowded but no instructors in sight. So we sat as more students came in, and I struck up a conversation with the guy next to me that was in my crim pro class last semester at first about the class and our grades but then more general stuff and it was nice. The instructors finally came in at like, 6:05, which was pretty typical lol. So there's the one lady who's in charge of everything, then like 7 other people because we would be splitting up into 8 groups, each of which will rotate between 2 instructors, for most of the semester. It's a smart idea because otherwise it would take forever to get through things and people would get a lot more intimidated about speaking in front of like 65 people versus 8 people. Most of them were judges with a few defense attorneys thrown in there, one of which is the school's mock trial coach. So they talked about the class and such for a while, then we split into groups and went off. We were with the only private attorney of the group, and he does criminal defense, nice guy. There were 8 of us, two are girls I knew from my section, two 3L's, and then another two girls I've only seen in passing. So we got to our own room and started the exercise using the jury questions we came up with with fake jurors given a little profile to be used with that problem. It was interesting, because they were obviously given stuff that would be relevant and probative to the problem, and they pretty standardly fell into being good for one side or the other. We did the criminal problem first, armed robbery based on an ID question, so that was fairly interesting and I asked questions for that. It was funny at the end because the instructor asked the prosecution which of the 4 jurors they would strike and they said 2, and then he asked the defense and I was like "oh we'd strike the other 2" and everyone laughed haha but it was true. So then we did the civil one, medical malpractice, and I was a fake juror for that. One of the issues for potential bias in the case was that the victim was a legal immigrant from Mexico, so my juror profile was mostly framed around that, so I was like born in Cuba and came to America with my parents under Castro and such haha so it was interesting. When we finished with that we all went back to the first courtroom where they did a little "demonstration" which was just a mock direct and cross examination of a cop in a case. Our instructor was doing the cross and he was pretty good. While we were waiting to get back into the courtroom I chatted with my instructor a little and got introduced to two others, one of whom is a judge for the juvenile delinquency side, and the other is our other instructor who is a judge now but used to be an ASA and went through juvenile court, so we talked a little about that, and it was good. They let us out around 8:15, so 15 minutes early. I spoke to the mock trial coach after about practice this week because I was gonna send them an email to find out details but I could obviously just ask him here, so they'll be back in the courthouse at 5:30 on Thursday so I'll be there for that. After that headed home, I was looking up routes to take because it's later and the buses don't run as often or at all, but I ended up taking the same train and just walking back and it wasn't too too bad, cold but not unbearably so. Got home and chilled out, watched this week's episode of Conviction which was pretty good I'd say. Apparently they only have like 2 episodes left which I'm kind of sad about. I really liked the character Tess in this episode and I think they're finally getting a handle on the characters where they're not super annoying so that's definitely progress! The case was about a new murder that fit the MO of a serial killer who was supposedly locked up at the time it happened, so they had to figure out if they have the right guy and this was a copycat, or if they got the wrong guy and the real one was out here all this time. So it was a bit different than their normal style being that it was intertwined with an active investigation into the crime as well, and I think they did a good job with it. Interesting solution, the guy in prison was innocent but the reason for the 10 year absence of the killings was that the real guy was also in prison on other charges but then just got out and went back to it, and they found him after he broke into the house of the one victim that survived to supposedly finish the job but she was like bitch no and shot his ass and killed him haha so that finished up the case pretty nicely for them and their guy got out, and he had a little subplot about not knowing if he wanted to be released because he has OCD and was so used to the routine he had in prison that he didn't know if he could handle being out, but they helped him get into a program that would help him readjust so I was glad to see that. And yeah, I hung out for a little while longer and then got ready for bed. Few other things throughout the day, my period randomly showed up tonight after being MIA for like....10 months? Lol. So I'm on birth control because I get fucking awful cramps that land me in bed for 2 days and I can't do that every month when I have class to go to dammit. I usually just go from one set of pills to the next without takin the placebo pills though because I'm not worried about being pregnant because I'm not having sex with anyone, and there's really not a medically necessary reason to have a period every month if that's the case. I have done the placebo in the past though and given it a number of days and it just never showed up, and I didn't think too much of it, but it just showed up now which is kind of strange because I've been taking the real pills this whole time and not having a break in those, but now that it's here I guess I'll do the placebo ones for a few days to let it through or something like that, lol fun times. The other thing which I mentioned earlier was my juvenile justice grade was finally posted, and as expected it was an A. I was obviously happy to see that, but more so just relieved I didn't have to sit in suspense anymore (and I was pretty certain I was gonna get an A anyway). I checked my final GPA's, cumulative and semester, and my late night calculations were mostly correct, my semester GPA being a 3.925 and my cumulative being 3.703. I'm a little ticked off by my cumulative one, though I won't know for sure until rankings come out, but I remember last semester 3.7 was at like top 12%, not top 10% like I was hoping (because then my semester GPA was a 3.7). And the ranking are cumulative, though based on just the semester I'm sure I'm pretty close to the top. If only that was what mattered....lol, I know I'm being ridiculous complaining about being in like, the top 12% instead of the top 10%, but I just want to feel smart and the best at what I do, okay? I'm a hopeless perfectionist, I know. But hopefully rankings will come out soon and be favorable. And CALI's should come out soon too (reminder: a CALI is the highest grade in the class and it's especially recognized and you can put it on resumes and shit) and being that I got 3 A's I'd be in the running for 3 potential CALI's, and that would be really cool....I don't know how likely it is that I'd actually get any of them, at least for evidence and crim pro I really wouldn't know, but I think I have a pretty good shot for juvenile justice, so that's good. And yeah, my eyes want to close now which I'm taking as the new melatonin kicking in and doing its job so I'm not gonna fight it and just go to bed now. Goodnight my dudes. Be well.

#daily journal #January 2017