#alter ego magazine

[evilhorse]

If you follow this blog, you know I absolutely love everything Earth Two written by Roy Thomas at DC in the 1980s, from All-Star Squadron to Infinity Inc to Young All-Stars and beyond. So when this issue of Alter Ego magazine arrived in the mail yesterday, I was pumped and read it from cover-to-cover in one afternoon. Such fantastic stories about an amazing series that didn't survive very long. I particularly have always been taken with Thomas's theory about the Crisis erasing the big Golden Age heroes but not their energies. I thought replacing the DC trinity with brand new heroes and adding in a few other young guns was an ingenious solution. That's something I miss in today's comics; a commitment to continuity and the clever retcon to solve a continuity problem.

#alter ego #alter ego magazine #young all-stars #all-star squadron #fury #helena kosmatos #iron munro #arn munro #the flying fox #neptune perkins #tsunami #dan the dyna mite #daniel dunbar #Earth two #roy thomas #brian murray #howard simpson #lou manna #magazine #comics history #80s comics #dat rack #continuity #crisis on infinite earths #energy #dc trinity #world war two #awesome #twomorrows publishing #twomorrows

[jhl1031973]

Published Works

Here's a list of my published work so far. My Superman Homepage work will be put in another list when I have me time, as that goes back all the way to 2006.

“Video-Grams: A Look at Captain Video and His Video Rangers” by James Heath Lantz and Roy Thomas, (Unabridged Version) Roy Thomas Presents Captain Video, PS Artbooks, April 2013

“Video-Grams: A Look at Captain Video and His Video Rangers” by James Heath Lantz and Roy Thomas, (Abridged Version) Alter Ego #117, TwoMorrows Publishing, June 2013

“Dare You Read This Introduction,” Pre-Code Classics: Weird Mysteries Volume One, PS Artbooks, August 2013

"Revenge of the Living Introduction,” Pre-Code Classics: Weird Mysteries Volume Two, PS Artbooks, February 2014

"Inner-Space Opera: A Look at Marvel's Micronauts Comics," Back Issue #76, TwoMorrows Publishing, September 2014

“Queen of the TV Jungle: Irish McCalla as the Reincarnation of the Fiction House Heroine,” Roy Thomas Presents Sheena - Queen of the Jungle Volume Three, PS Artbooks, October 2014

Trilogy of Tales, Self-Published, distributed through Smashwords, September 2015

"The Many Lives of Supergirl: A Look at the Post-Crisis Maid of Might," Back Issue #84, TwoMorrows Publishing, September 2015

"X-Men Revisited: A Look at the Reprint Years of Marvel’s Mighty Mutants," Back Issue #86, TwoMorrows Publishing, January 2016

"A Monolith in Comics: A Look at Jack Kirby’s Adaptation of 2001: A Space Odyssey," Back Issue #89, TwoMorrows Publishing, June 2016

"Prince Namor the Sub-Mariner Scion of the Deep or Royal Pain?," Back Issue #91, TwoMorrows Publishing, August 2016

"Fanfare For Bill Mantlo," Back Issue #96, TwoMorrows Publishing, May 2017

"Expanding the Timmverse: A Look at the DC Animated Universe in Comics," Back Issue #99, TwoMorrows Publishing, August 2017

"Cable Guide: A Look at the History of Marvel's Time Traveling Mutant," Back Issue #102, TwoMorrows Publishing, January 2018

"Come into the Dark Side: A Look Inside the Mind of Darkseid, the Tyrant of Apokolips," Back Issue #104, TwoMorrows Publishing, May 2018

"Radioactive Panels: A Look At Marvel's Radioactive Man," Back Issue #112, TwoMorrows Publishing, May 2019

"Captain Video: Forgotten Father of the Sci-Fi Franchise," Sequart Organization (Online at sequart.org), June 2019

"Irreverent Panels: The Comics Career of Billy Graham," Back Issue #114, TwoMorrows Publishing, July 2019

"Capes, Cowls and Purple: How Prince Merged the Worlds of Music and Comics With Batman and Beyond," Sequart Organization (Online at sequart.org), July 2019

"Adventure Star: A Look At The Life of Starman Prince Gavyn," Back Issue #115, TwoMorrows Publishing, August 2019

"Dark Knights, Kryptonians, Predators And Aliens... Oh My!," Back Issue #116, TwoMorrows Publishing, September 2019

"With Great Power Comes Great Career Opportunities: A Character Study of Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell’s Zenith," Sequart Organization (Online at sequart.org), May 2020

"Pages Of Thunder: A Look At The Adventures Of Arak," Back Issue #121, TwoMorrows Publishing, August 2020

"Starfire In The Sky: A Look At The New Teen Titans Warrior Princess," Back Issue #122, TwoMorrows Publishing, September 2020

"Ages Of Romance: May-December Love In The Bronze Age," Back Issue #123, TwoMorrows Publishing, October 2020

"Where Strikes The Thunderbolt: Hulk's General Ross In The Bronze Age And Beyond," Back Issue #127, TwoMorrows Publishing, June 2021

"Mister Sandman, Was It A Dream?," Sequart Organization, (Online at sequart.org), July 2021

"The King's Odds And Ends: Jack Kirby's Freelance Work At DC Comics," Back Issue #131, TwoMorrows Publishing, October 2021

"Starjammers: Jamming With The Stars," Back Issue #133, TwoMorrows Publishing, February 2022

"Scream Queen: The Life Of Silver Banshee," Back Issue #135, TwoMorrows Publishing, June 2022

"Roy And Remembrance: How America Took On The Justice Society," Back Issue #137, TwoMorrows Publishing, August 2022

#Alter Ego Magazine #Back Issue Magazine #TwoMorrows Publishing #PS Artbooks #Roy Thomas Presents #Pre-Code Classics #Sequart #Published Work #List

[downthetubes]

Alter Ego spotlights the career of MAD magazine's Angelo Torres

The latest issue of Alter Ego (#186), from TwoMorrows Publishing spotlights the career of the award-winning comic artist Angelo Torres, the youngest and last of the fabled EC Comics artists

The latest issue of Alter Ego (#186), from TwoMorrows Publishing spotlights the career of the award-winning comic artist Angelo Torres, the youngest and last of the fabled EC Comics artists, who went on to a fabulous career as a horror, science-fiction, and humour artist for Timely/Marvel, Warren Publishing, and MAD magazine. Angelo was born in 1932, on the island of Puerto Rico, where he spent…

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#Adventure Comics #Al Williamson #Alter Ego #Angelo Torres #downthetubes News #EC Comics #Frank Frazetta #Mad Magazine #Roy Thomas #The Fleagle Gang #TwoMorrows Publishing

[giffingthingsss]

#brannon braga #til he was originally jackson archer #magazine things #Enterprise things #cool name #but sounds like some rocking 24 year old #jackson archer is jonathan archer's transporter accident too-cool-for-school alter ego #he doesn't go around chasing chicks #he wears sunglasses and carries around a skateboard #and waits for the chicks to chase him #also i must admit to finding the ransom name super cool #also just loved that actor #but i was sitting here trying to figure out where i've heard the ransom name before #lewis' space trilogy #that i tried to read when i was like nine #funnily i didn't like the name then

[hilite-head]

Denver Life Magazine feature

Denver Life Magazine feature

Thank you Stephanie Wilson for a great interview. Original article here.

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#alter ego #artist interview #bbq #Denver Life Magazine #meow wolf #Meow Wolf Mongovoo #mongolia #mongovoo

[astroboots]

Every You Every Me Issue #3

Pairing: Miguel O'Hara x female reader

Summary: You are determined to meet your Spider-benefactor face to face and you go to ever increasing extreme lengths to do so. Problem is, Miguel O'hara is very uncooperative to your plans.

Word count: 5,500 words.

Content: Slowest of the burn, so slow you wonder if it's even burning. Near death experiences, the state of the economy and how expensive it is to live in a big city, the emotional whiplash of Miguel O'Hara.

Astroboot’s Masterlist | Series Masterlist | Spiderverse Masterlist

[Previous issue] [Next Issue]

You saw them in the window display of a bakery in Greenwich Village. Round sugar cookies with red frosting and white eyes, decorated as a tribute to everyone's favorite neighborhood Spiderman.

Before you had time to properly think things over (would he even like the cookies? Is he on a strict superhero diet and workout plan? What if he's gluten intolerant?) you were already standing in front of the cash register having a dozen of them wrapped up in fancy crinkly paper and were $72 dollars poorer. 

Charging six dollars per cookie is practically highway robbery, but that's par for the course with New York bakeries. You wouldn’t be surprised if every bakery in New York was already a part of Wilson Fisk’s criminal empire. 

As you push open the door, box in hand, you wonder wryly to yourself why Spiderman’s ruder alter ego isn't there to save you from that.

You wonder, for Superheroes, what classifies as an event worth intervening in and what everyday citizens need to be saved from?

Financial ailment doesn't quite seem to qualify from what you've been able to glean so far.

Tony Stark, for all the wealth he’s amassed (a large enough treasure hoard that he would be capable of buying the whole planet of Mars according to Forbes) isn't massively involved with charities. He only donates to the one: his own. And the Stark Foundation is really just Tony Stark paying reparations for the damage he and his buddies caused in the first place.

Thor is an actual deity, and you still remember that write-up in Esquire magazine, where local waiters in New Mexico had called him a terrible tipper and a habitual smasher of glassware.

Assault and battery is up in the air. There are accounts of Superheroes intervening; that Tiktok videos of She-Hulk breaking up a bar fight that went viral a few weeks back. But then equally, there are memes of Doctor Strange peeking out the window of Sanctum Sanctorum watching a street fight unfold,, utterly uninterested in getting involved. The internet labeled it as "mood". 

As for murder and mayhem, there's a longstanding public debate as to whether Superheroes cause more than they prevent. Case in point: that Moon Knight guy that paints the streets of London red.

There is no rule book written to explain how Superheroes decides who is worth saving and who is not.

Does one have to be important and have a material effect on the state of the world?

If so, you fall pitifully short. The most world-changing decision you made as of late was deciding to opt out of utensils on your last GrubHub order to help save the environment.

So it makes you wonder: Why on earth has this non-costume accurate Spiderman saved you, not once, not twice, but 13 times to date?

That’s just the first of many questions you’d like to ask him. What does he know that you don’t? Does he know why the universe seems to be out to get you lately? Or why death itself is following you everywhere you go, nipping at your heels?

You haven’t had the chance to ask him anything, because despite all of your encounters, you haven't met him face to face since that very first time. 

Inconveniently, you don't exactly have a way of contacting him. Superheroes aren't listed in the phone book. 

With no other way to reach out, you go at it the old fashioned way. You write him a note from a page you've ripped out of your notebook:

‘Thank you for saving me. Can we meet? I have questions.’

You place the note on the window sill. Setting the plate with $72 dollars worth of Spiderman cookies on top of the left corner of the paper to make sure it doesn't get blown away in the wind. Then you leave the window open for the first time since you've moved into this apartment before heading to bed.

There's nothing else to do but to wait. 

You wake to the spit and splatter of rain against your window. It's gray outside, and the cookies you set out the night before remain untouched. You frown at the sight, but you can't say you're surprised.

There was never any real indication that he was lurking around you. Superheroes are bound to have more interesting things on their schedule than stalking a random insurance employee.

You don't know why you thought this would work in the first place.

Getting out of bed, you walk up to your window to inspect the scene. The note is where you have left it, ink a little smeared from the rain, where the plate has kept it in place on the right corner.

That seems odd, now that you think about it. You stare at the note, eye drawn to the watermarks. Why are there water stains bleeding into the paper if your window was closed? As crappy as your rundown apartment can be, water damage is the one thing you haven't had issues with.

You draw your eyes to the closed window being smattered with the rain outside. Didn't you leave the window open last night? You're pretty sure you did, hoping that the open window would be seen as a gesture of invitation. You had left it open… right?

You did.

You're sure you did.

He must’ve been here.

Rude, not-costume-accurate Spiderman was here.

Right?

Your eyes flicker back to the window.

Or maybe you did close the window?

You close your eyes trying to recall your evening, packing the length of your apartment as you replay the memory. Suddenly, you're not so sure anymore. You always close your window, and even though you had every intention of keeping it open last night, who is to say you didn't close it out of sheer habit?

It's strange. Because if he was here, he would've spotted the note. But it's in the same spot you left it yesterday right under the plate on the left side of it...

You eye the undisturbed note tucked under the right corner of the plate.

Wait, wait. Didn't you put the note under the left side of the plate?

You did.

Yes, you definitely did.

Which means, he was here... Right?

You feel like you are going insane.

Are you seeing things that are not there? Was he actually here and if so why did he go to such lengths to pretend otherwise. Why would he passive-aggressively gaslight you into thinking he was never here?

You decide on a redo.

Because if you can't trust yourself and your questionable memory, you can trust a recording.

A teddy bear nanny cam sets you back $50. Not cheap, but not as outrageous as your stale-cardboard-tasting Spiderman cookies. 

You set it up on your dresser opposite your window and link it to your phone as per the instructions.

As for the bait. After having tasted those brick cookies for yourself, putting it out for a second night for a man who has saved your life repeatedly didn't seem right. You decide to bake them yourself this time.

The added bonus is that you get to mix blue food coloring into the frosting for the decoration that goes on top. In retrospect, the red Spiderman cookies from last time might’ve implied that you’re calling him a knock-off Spiderman. 

Besides, even with the cost of living crisis: a bag of flour, baking powder, unsalted butter, sugar and eggs cost a lot less than $72 dollars.

This time, you don't write him a sloppily put together note. You decide to write him a proper letter. 

If he did visit your apartment, (and you're not just going insane) the fact that he moved the note meant that he must've read it. 

This note didn’t work. 

It must not have been compelling enough, you were kind of in a hurry… 

You’ll have to write something better this time. Longer. More emotionally compelling. Surely if you take the time to really explain your plight, you can make him understand why it’s so important he talks to you! 

The problem is that it’s hard to sound serious when it’s written on lined paper from your ruled notebook. 

That won’t do. You go to the nearest stationery store in your neighborhood, a chain outlet of Paper Source to get yourself some decent looking stationary paper with a matching colored envelope to boot. 

You immediately regret this part of your plan, because it ends up setting you back another $26 dollars. Why is 6 pieces of paper so damn expensive anyhow? Surely there’s a few trees left in the world to chop down?!

$102 dollars down in your bank balance, you sit down at your dining table that night, pen in hand and begin writing. You pour your heart onto the pages, setting out in as precise words as you can manage the effect your near death incidents have had on you. 

How scared you are, how confused you are, but also how grateful you are that he's saved you, again and again and again. That you believe if you and him can just meet in person and talk, if you could ask questions and figure out why this is happening, then maybe you can find a way to stop it from happening again.

Then you fold the letter and tuck it neatly into the matching envelope and slide it under the left side of the cookie plate and go to sleep.

When you wake the next morning, nothing seems out of the ordinary.

The cookies are still neatly arranged on your plate. The letter snugly tucked underneath it.

On the left side this time, you note. 

It doesn’t look like he came. 

The only thing is that you swear that the envelope is now several inches further to the left than where you left it last night.

Again, maybe that’s just wishful thinking.

You pull up your phone, opening the app linked to the nanny cam and press play.

There is nothing but the still frame of your studio apartment, your bed to the right and your window square in the camera-view. You speed up the video, but the only thing that takes you by surprise is that you apparently toss a lot more in your sleep than you thought.

The camera footage goes well into 3am, and you’re resigning yourself to the fact that this was all down to your imagination.

He didn't come last night. Probably didn't come the night before. Most likely you woke up from the rain, closed the window and were too sleepy to remember.

You sigh, setting down your phone on the table, prepared to let this whole endeavor go.

On your screen, a smudged shadow appears in the corner of the window. You jump to your feet from your seat, knocking your chair over in the process with a raucous thud. The dark figure grows larger on your screen, dark navy blue and lines of stark red that perches itself onto your window sill.

YES! yes-yes-yes! You knew it. You fucking goddamn knew it!

You were right.

Adrenaline buzzes victoriously in your veins, and you grip your phone harder. Your heart is pounding so fast and hard in your chest you can hear the drumming beat of it in your ears.

He was here!

(You're not cuckoo for cocoa puffs).

You watch as his large figure sits on your window sill. He's still wearing his mask, and while you can't make out the expressions underneath, the outline where his eyes would have been, painted in dark blue, now narrow into a slit on your screen. 

There's a hostility emanating from that glare that you are able to sense all the way from the opposite side of the screen. He stares down at the plate of cookies suspiciously. Then he just stays there, unmoving, having a staring competition with the cookies you baked in his image.

In the privacy of your living room, you have the luxury of taking the time to get a proper look at him without interruption. It's hard to ignore the fact of just how tightly fitted to his skin that suit is. The dark blue fabric clings to every line of muscles on his body and it makes your cheek prickle with heat when you look. It feels voyeuristic somehow, but you can't help but think that the more modest alternative would be if he had worn nothing at all.

He's absurdly ripped. Muscular doesn't even begin to describe it. Broad shoulders and a narrow tapered waist segueing into obscenely thick and defined thighs that have your eyes linger for far too long. You shake your head to snap yourself out of it, Jesus you are acting like a creep. This isn’t OnlyFans, though lord knows you paid for this privilege! $102 for a cam video! 

On the footage, there is finally movement. He reaches for a cookie, bringing it to his mouth. The blue fabric dematerializes on his lower face until it reveals his tanned skin and that ridiculously cut jaw of his.

His mouth parts. Fangs protrude where his canine teeth are supposed to be and the sight makes you nearly drop your phone in shock.

Is this Spiderman a vampire? Or is he like a tarantula Spiderman with fangs to match?

You watch in suspended horror as he bites into the cookie, those sharp fangs of his are in plain view as he chews. 

He leans over to reach for a second cookie and all your trepidation is forgotten for a second, because if he’s reaching for a second one, it must mean he likes them. You grin at your screen, culinary pride beating out any caution or fear you may have had. 

Then he lifts up the plate, picking up the letter. The anticipation is too much. You press your face closer to the screen to try to get closer, because your screen is too small to pick up any possible nuances in his expression. 

He's carefully opening the envelope as he starts to read. It's impossible to tell what he's thinking. There's no visible change of facial expressions in the outline of his masked eyes. His mouth, which is bared to you, doesn't so much as twitch.

It doesn’t take long for him to read it. When he's done, he tucks the letter back under the plate. Then he bends down over the plate of cookies, and for a moment you think he’s going in for a third. Instead his hand lingers on the plate, before he starts to slide the remaining cookies around the plate to your confusion. You watch in confusion as he picks up the cookies one by one to space them out more evenly. You don't quite understand what he's trying to do, wait… is Vampire spider man re-arranging the cookies to make it less obvious he’s eaten them?!  

The bastard really was trying to gaslight you into thinking he was never here.

Once he’s seemingly satisfied with his work, he straightens up, turning until his back is against the camera preparing to leave.

To your surprise his face turns around to take one last look inside. The direction of his gaze settles on your bed where you're sleeping. His eyes lingers there for a handful of moments, inscrutable over the mask.

Is he sad? Angry? You can't tell.

He finally looks away and then he leaps off the window.

Politely asking him in writing is clearly not working out for you.

You decide the only recourse you have left is to try and physically catch him.

Such a simple sentiment that had sounded so easy in your head, but you quickly run into logistical issues when you try to put it into practice.

The man is built like a tank. Can leap off of skyscrapers (and the window of your sixth floor) without breaking a sweat. Potentially also a vampire.

You're not exactly sure how you're supposed to catch someone like that.

Your google research is off to a shaky start. Somehow you end up down a rabbit hole of tutorials for non-lethal mouse traps. It's not very useful inspiration. Because you can't exactly build a 7 foot large cage trap to catch him the next time he comes around to help himself to cookies.

But the concept of having a lure trap set with bait seemed transferable and so you decide to go for a classic spring trap that you’ll modify. No cage, instead you set up a DIY contraption with a sturdy string attached to a bell meant to quickly alert you to his presence next time he comes around. 

The game plan is to wake up and corner him before he has a chance to abscond.

As for bait, you google things that vampires might like in a half-thought of plan it might be applicable. Unfortunately, there are no young virgin maidens you know of as far as the eye can see in New York (yourself included) so that was a no go. 

So you default back to cookies (because hey, at least it worked last time).

Amazon has your whole set up shipped and delivered by the next day and you implement phase 3 of your rapidly escalating attempts to reach out to him.

Unfortunately, it doesn't work. For one he doesn’t show up that night. Or the night after. It takes him four whole days to show up again and when he does, he spots your trap a mile away. When you review the footage on the cam the next day, he avoids the rope and the whole mechanism effortlessly. 

There's no sound on the nanny cam so you can't be sure of it. But you think from the way the line of his shoulders shake as he steps over the rope that he might be laughing at you. He’s definitely seen through few supervillain traps in his days so in hindsight the probability of success here was low.

He does however eat three of your cookies this time.

You get a little bit more desperate after that.

You decide that if a trigger trap to wake you won't work, then obviously, the next best thing is for you to simply stay awake.

The problem is that he doesn't show up every night. His visits are entirely random without an obvious pattern. Sometimes he shows up two nights in a row, sometimes he goes several days without making a guest appearance on your nanny cam footage.

It means you end up downing a whole carafe of coffee, and several energy drinks, every night for a week straight. Entirely unable to predict what night he's going to appear, you keep dooming your already tiny bladder to a dozen visits to the bathroom before the clock has even struck nine.

The saddest part of it is that despite being wired on enough coffee to power a nuclear power station by yourself, you never end up staying awake the whole night through. 

More often than not you end up falling asleep sitting upright by the dining table waiting up for him. Then the next morning you wake with a wry neck, a sore back and your face pressing up uncomfortably against the wooden surface.

But you're nothing if not tenacious. Tonight makes it the sixth night in a row that you’re doing this. You stare down the can of red bull on your dining table as you pick it up and lift it to your mouth. You’re going to keep going, hardness of the wooden table be damned.

You're surprised to find yourself waking up feeling well rested without any aches. Surrounded by the softness of your quilt and your even softer memory foam pillow. 

The luxurious comfort of it all is such a relief that you don't even question it at first. Don't question why you're in bed when the last thing you remember was nodding off against the palm of your hand and the hard discomfort of your dining chair.

In the sanctuary of your bed, you just dig your face deeper into your pillow and snooze for as long as you can. Ignoring the bright sun pouring in from your windows until it sears unforgivingly against your skin and you decide that it’s finally time to start your day.

By habit, the first thing you do as you get up from bed is to pull up the nanny cam app on your phone and press play on last night's recording.

There's nothing of interest. Seeing yourself read a book by the dining table and chugging down a series of Red Bull is hardly riveting television.

Yesterday you barely even make it until midnight because you can see yourself nod off at the table, head sliding off your palm and plonking down on the dining table. You flinch at the impact, vaguely impressed that the collision didn't wake you.

Your (maybe vampire) Spiderman turns up at 3 am.

Much like the times before, he perches himself on your window sill, peering inside (presumably to check for any new traps you might have laid out for him).

His broad frame stiffens, and then, with a smooth leap, he's inside your apartment.

Excitement rushes to your head, because this is the furthest he’s gone and the first time he's come all the way inside instead of just lurking on the window sill. 

He goes over to your bed, flinging the quilt to the side. He seems stressed, the dark shape of his eyes wide as he stands over the empty bed when it dawns on you what’s happening on screen right now. 

Oh, he's worried.

He looks over at you, hunched over the dining table, sound asleep and oh god, is that drool on your cheek? 

The line of his shoulder relaxes. The broadness of his chest rises then dips with a heavy exhale. Something warm trickles in your stomach at his obvious concern for you.

The mystery is confounding. You don't know him. You've never met him, but for some unfathomable reason he cares enough about you to genuinely care about your safety and you want to know why. 

He makes his way over to the table where you are. The mask slowly ebbs away, uncovering his familiar chin, cheeks and then finally his eyes. An other-worldly shade of crimson that has you spellbound and transfixed on the screen. 

You find yourself raising your phone closer to your face, trying to get a better look at him. Cursing the crappy quality of the video. You don't know what to make of the way he's looking at you. It's intensely focused, almost sad, and… and… And you don't know what, but it makes your heart leap up into your throat, chest clenching tight.

He bends over, wrapping his broad arms under your knees. He’s careful in his movements, cupping your head as it lolls to the side until you’re comfortably resting against his shoulders. It’s a practiced movement, as if he’s done this a hundred times before as he picks you up and carries you bridal style to your bed. Gingerly tucking you under the quilt with something that looks a lot like tenderness. 

It leaves you with more questions than ever.

Ever since you started your caffeine chugging marathon, work has become a new kind of hell.

You're already half-asleep and nodding off at your desk by 10.30. Eyes sore and strained as you stare at the bright screen and try to make sense of the endless columns that are all different and also all the same until your brain refuses to try to make sense of any of it anymore.

You need to go for a walk. Clear your head.

Maybe pop out for a coffee... smoothie. Definitely smoothie.

Outside, the heat is oppressive, far too hot for only being May. Definitely too hot when there are this many tourists around. The street is so crowded you can barely make an inch of headway, trapped behind a family with a stroller in front, trapped in front of a pushy businessman who keeps stepping on your heels every two steps, and trapped next to a guy who is really into his airpods.

With the excess of caffeine still trying to make its way out of your system and the unforgiving heat of the sun beating against your back, it all has the effect of making you feel like you’re hung over. Your breakfast is roiling in your stomach. Sweat plastered against every inch of clothing. You don't know why you do this to yourself.

Every morning you tell yourself never again, and yet every night, there you were, spending half of your disposable income on energy drinks.

Starting from today, you're going cold turkey on the stuff. You've finally given up on trying to stay awake long enough to catch your super-stalker in his cookie burglar routine. Endlessly chugging down caffeine every night is not working out for you. Neither are the DIY mouse traps.

You're running low on ideas of how to trap him. You have nothing else to go on anymore. No idea on how to summon the man. The only time you know he'll be there is the moment before each near-death when he's there to save you.

What are you supposed to do with that? Purposely throw yourself off another building to lure him out?

That's crazy!

…Right?

But maybe... No! Definitely crazy.

Someone screams, and you snap out of your thoughts. There's yelling and terrified shrieks all around you. You're caught in the throng of people, panicked bodies pushing and pressing up against you, all of them trying to run the other way.

You dig in your heels, bracing yourself against the stampede of people. They’re pushing in from every direction until it’s impossible to move an inch. It’s hard to turn your body, when second after second, someone is pummeling into your side, knocking into your bruising shoulder. You barely manage to crane your neck back far enough when you finally spot it. 

A red-green truck with a gigantic taco on its roof is careening towards you across the pavement, no driver behind the wheel. The sea of bodies parts around the out-of-control vehicle, people running left, right and forward to escape being crushed under the wheels.

There’s no time to react. It’s too close. Too fast. 

A hand clutches at your wrist and pulls you backwards, your vision obscured as your face is pressed up against a familiar solid warmth. 

"Hold onto me," he tells you, and you do. 

You're held firm against him as the ground underneath your feet disappears, and everything feels weightless. Then all you hear is a loud thunderous crash.

Your feet touch back down on the ground, and the strong protective hold on you unravels.

When you open your eyes he's already gone. You're left on the corner of Lexington Avenue, still trying to catch your breath. The mob of people is still there all around you, but the panic has passed now, everyone is standing still. Everyone is observing the wreckage of the run amok truck that is now flipped onto its side, rendered harmless.

Miraculously, somehow, nobody around you seems visibly injured.

From a distance, you can hear sirens approaching with a deafening wail. 

But your mind is elsewhere, on the shade of the familiar dark blue and red as you were being saved seconds ago. On his gentle voice in your ear that still thrums pleasantly in your chest. 

You want to see him again. 

It's Friday, and you break half an hour early for your designated 40 minutes of lunch, taking the elevator directly to the 72nd floor, which is under construction to renovate it into an open observation deck for the public next year.

The thing with commercial skyscrapers is that nowadays most of them have safety glass panels on all outside spaces of the upper floors to ensure that it is impossible to climb up the buildings and jump.

It's a safety feature that became standard after the financial crisis of 2008.

Turns out that imposing an 80 hour work week on your employees, where they don't get to see their family or friends or have a life outside of work, and then stripping them of their financial security makes a lot of people miserable and suicidal (who knew?)

The elevator pings open, and you exit into the construction zone, carefully avoiding the various tools scattered across the half-finished deck. On Fridays, the construction workers on the site leave by lunchtime, and the space is empty of people. 

Step by step, you walk up towards the edge of the terrasse, until you stand before the temporary safety rail, looking out over the sprawling city below you. Cars look like tiny moving pebbles and the people, a hive of ants scurrying from street to street.

It’s a dizzying view. Both beautiful and grotesque in its grandeur. The 72nd floor will be 28 more floors to fall from than the 44th was.

The air around you seems to thin, and your stomach wants to crawl down to your feet and hold on to steady ground.

Taking a deep breath, you lift the hem of your shirt, running your hand over the safety harness strapped around your waist, reassuring yourself it's still there. Then you feel along the attached cord, using the carabiner at the end to clip it around the rod of the safety rail. 

Being impulsive and daring in your quest is one thing. Reckless and stupid is another.

It’s not a real climbing rope and harness. Turns out professional safety gear is shockingly expensive, but you found a knock-off resistance training set, complete with harness and stretchy bungee cord rope, on Amazon for a very reasonable $15. You’ve already spent $72 on cookies, $50 dollars for a nanny cam set, and an extortionate $26 for stationary paper in your never-ending quest to lure out Fake Spiderman. You figure a rope is a rope, and you're not paying $100 more to get ripped off by the big climbing corporations. But you’re also not willing to go without.

After all, you've already fallen from the Chrysler building once, and you're not angling for a repeat.

As intent as you are on seeing your Spider-benefactor eye to eye, you're not quite prepared to die for the privilege. Your plan is just to make it look like you are going to jump.

Any superhero worth his dime wouldn't actually let you fall before they would be willing to save you.

That would be a real dick move.

You give your impromptu safety rig one last tug to make sure it's secure, then straighten your posture. Grabbing a hold of the metal rail, you hoist yourself up. You clamber onto it, gripping tight with shaking hands as you swing a leg over, straddling the bar.

Left leg then the right, until all of you are on the other side of the railing.

Then you stay there.

One second. Then two. You close your eyes and try not to look down at the many, many floors below, and how one gust of strong wind could probably knock you over and have you falling down the building again. You count the seconds that pass you by. 

Five. Six. Seven.

A strong gust of wind blows through your side, and your legs buckle at the strong resistance, hand gripping down on the metal railing to hold yourself steady so you don't fall off.

Eightnineten! Ok. Fuck. No. You're good. Fuck this! He's not going to come.

If he didn’t come when you climbed over, he's not going to turn up now.

You briefly let go of the railing with one hand, adjusting your grip so you can climb back to safety. The sun beating down on your back disappears and is eaten up by a large and looming shadow. Every hair on the back of your neck prickles in warning.

Your reaction is too slow, you don't even have time to turn around to see what caused it. Then all you hear is an angry booming voice right next to your ear.

"Have you lost your goddamned mind?!"

You panic, flinging out your hand to catch the bar, but the hard metal of the railings isn't there anymore.

There is a sharp metallic snap. The safety rope around your waist splits from the hasp.

He’s calling your name.

The world tilts and everything goes upside down along with it. Your stomach sinks with a sickening plummet, legs dropping through into zero gravity as you find yourself staring up at the blue and endless New York sky.

Then you're falling from the Chrysler building.

Again.

Fuck!

~ Next Issue

Dedication & Credits: To my dearest @thirstworldproblemss who has to constantly listen to me jabber on about this day and night endlessly and forever. She is in every sense of the word a collaborator on this project. She brainstorms, she pitches in, she edits and she beta-reads. This and so many of my works would not exist without her, please send her all the love if you enjoyed this story.

I don’t have a tag list but please follow me on astroboots-writes and turn on notifications to be notified when I post something new!

#miguel o'hara fic #miguel o'hara x you #miguel o'hara x reader #miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara fanfic #spiderverse #across the spiderverse #oscar isaac #spider man: across the spider verse #marvel #miguel ohara x reader #spiderverse fanfiction #across the spiderverse fanfiction #miguel ohara #miguel ohara x you

[sonichedgeblog]

Artwork from Shogaku Gonensei, a Japanese study magazine. Here Sonic is Nicky's alter-ego, alongisde his sister Anita and mother and father. Notably Ray and Mighty are also part of the group.

#Shogakukan #5th Grade #SEGA #Sonic #Sonic The Hedgehog #Artwork

[witchygirlgray333]

Some journal prompts I like (writing and creative) :

I’m going to do a separate list for some chronic illness journal ideas bc I’ve found it’s so helpful!

Write out the lyrics to your favourite song and/or do a drawing / painting / collage of your interpretation of the song

Books you want to read

Films you want to watch

Diary entry about your day

Bujo style - plan out your week or month

Pressed flowers

Scripting (manifestation)

Vision board (manifestation)

Notes on a topic you’re learning about (for example I like to watch lots of nature or history documentaries and sometimes I make notes on them in my journal or if it’s witchy stuff I write it in my grimoire)

Letter to past you / future you / someone in your life (remember they don’t have to read it, this has helped me so much in certain situations so I can get out whatever I want to say without upsetting people) / someone you love who has passed on / the god or deity you worship if you worship one / to your future children / future partner

Wishlist

Ideas for things (like stories you want to write, photo shoots, fashion, films, art etc)

Poetry (either that you’ve written or that someone else has written that you like)

Get to know me page so if you want to look back on your journal in the future you can see what you were like then

Films you’ve watched / books you’ve read / favourite songs from the past month

Positive affirmations

Shadow work

Sticker / photo dump

Recipes

Go sit in nature and draw or write about what you see or feel when you’re there

Draw out your alter ego

Stick in scraps from throughout your day (such as receipts, labels from things, stickers, pictures etc)

Book reviews

To do lists

Design your dream room

Your childhood (draw or write about childhood memories, hobbies, things you used to collect, stick in childhood photos, the toys you used to play with etc)

Travel bucket list

Life bucket list

Family tree

Write a list of things that make you happy

Stream of consciousness

Write about your dreams and what you think they might mean

Brain dump (I sometimes do this before I go to sleep if somethings going on)

Doodle page

Stick in notes your loved ones have written to you

List of favourite quotes

Self care ideas

List of songs / playlist

Goals in life / 5 year plan

Plan a day out or a holiday

Plan content you want to make for social media

Tattoos you want to get

Things that make you happy

Outfit ideas

Hobbies you currently have

Hobbies you want to try

List of things you collect

Yoga / exercise routine

Seasonal bucket lists

Things you want to learn or research

Mood tracker

Stick in any colouring pages you’ve done

Daily skincare routine

List of Studio Ghibli films and tick off the ones you’ve watched

List of your favourite things

List of things to do when you’re bored

If you normally write about your day, draw pictures of all the things you did instead of writing (a bit like in a comic book)

Advice people have given you that has been really helpful

Ideal morning / night routine

Notes from therapy / hospital appointments

Page of all your cinema tickets

List of people that inspire you

Angel numbers

Crystals and their meanings

Your favourite artists

Worry tree

Favourite memories

Write your dream wardrobe

Reasons to stay alive

Stick in photos and write a bit about them

Names you like

Favourite words

Write about an event (a description of what happened, how it left you feeling, who was there and what they said and did, what you wish had happened instead, the reasons why you find it hard to let go, steps you could take to start to move on)

Notes on a language you’re learning

Collage about a film you’ve recently watched

Glow up check list

Write about a tarot reading you did

What does heaven and hell mean to you

Flip through a magazine and do a collage of pictures from it

#journalling #journal #book of shadows #creativity #alt #art #art journal #bookofshadowsprompts #journal prompts #writing #doodles #journal ideas

[proxyflans]

The first volume of The Magical Girl in PROXY is now available on itch, and will soon be available in print!

The Magical Girl in PROXY: Volume One: I Woke Up One Morning and Discovered I’m a Magical Girl Mascot

What if the Mascot that turned you into a magical girl—was also a magical girl?

On her first day at a new school, an amnesiac girl with recurring dreams of a magical girl who loves flan finds a magazine with information on all the girls in her class—along with instructions on how to turn them into magical girls.

With monsters showing up, Kurosawa Takako has to keep her alter-ego as a magical girl mascot secret—along with the secret identities of the fourteen magical girls in her class!

#magical girl #anime #mahou shoujo #light novel #oc stuff #the magical girl in proxy #Youtube

[poirott]

Ariadne Oliver and Hercule Poirot, detective duo

Mrs Oliver is detective novelist and Poirot's friend. She accompanies Poirot on several of his most famous cases, providing her own unique perspective on each of the crimes they encounter. She is feisty, quick to jump to conclusions (sometimes right, sometimes wrong), and strongly believes that Scotland Yard would be better run by a woman. Ariadne Oliver is, in many ways, a vehicle for Agatha Christie's own voice, particularly in relation to writing and the public. In a 1956 interview with John Bull magazine, Agatha Christie dismissed the idea that any of her characters are truly derived from real life, although she did admit that Mrs Oliver has "a strong dash" of herself. Christie always took a somewhat tongue in cheek approach to her supposed fictional alter ego, who she credited with writing a novel called The Body in the Library, a title she would use herself in 1942.

A HAUNTING IN VENICE (2023), dir. Kenneth Branagh

#a haunting in venice #poirot #hercule poirot #agatha christie #kenneth branagh #tina fey #perioddramaedit #filmedit #ahauntinginveniceedit #*edit #tina's portrayal looks amazing <3 #she's going to be an awesome madame oliver #her connection with poirot is already felt #in various clips and promos we've got #it would be quite the twist if they had #romantic undertones in this version! #canonically they're dear friends #and i'm fine with either choice <3 #i don't think it'll be outright stated #but i do feel there are certain shots in the clips #where she's always looking at him #and like she's looking out FOR him #that make it an interesting romantic AU :) #where she's a widow maybe?

[dreamgrlarchive]

Nicki Minaj’s The Pinkprint Era (+No Frauds)

#PrettyHeiressDiaries: Eras Edition 🎀

this is my first #PrettyHeiressDiaries post. as i’ve previously stated, this series is going to be me diving into my fav muses and celebs and dissecting what i can take from these lovely ladies. this blog will focus on Nicki Minaj’s branding from 2014-2017 roughly. + a few Queen era looks.

The Pinkprint Era Style Elements:

the pinkprint was alter ego free, and a return to hiphop and r&b for nicki. meaning she was highly stripped of the campy pop rap star we had come to know. it was chic DOWN. think collector barbie vs the harajuku barbie. don’t mistake me though, onika was still very in touch with her cutesy girly side. there was a balance of sexy and chic with a few drops of cute. and this is why the pinkprint era is my absolute favorite, with her looks being a standard i follow for a lot of my looks.

nicki’s cute mirrors 🎀

nicki’s iconic black barbie insta selfies, wearing real hair or natural extensions(often textured ponytails and blowouts), minimal makeup and natural beats 🎀

lots of black and neutrals, statement purses (often times chanel) 🎀

nicki makes a return to the harajuku barbie aesthetic during the pinkprint tour 🎀 +

prissy pink looks i loved from this era 🎀

No Frauds Era Style Elements:

after the pinkprint era was dying down and nicki had become the victim of “the nicki hate train,” her style was still reminiscent of pinkprint. but i would say her branding shifted from the demure somewhat sweetheart to more of an unapologetically bad bitch. this is marked as the “no frauds era” (the time between pinkprint and queen)

glamorous gowns, grandiose blingy bodysuits and adornments, continuing from the pinkprint aesthetic, she’s still wearing natural glams and hairstyles 🎀 +

latex catsuits, lacey looks, pink as seen in the paper magazine cover and the motorsport video 🎀

literally queen couture (tiaras, headpieces, and maximalist furs), the subtle return of the barbie chain, 40 inch “you b*tches can’t even spell prague” naomi/cher hair 🎀

My Fav Queen Era Looks:

ex. tusa videoshoot, harpers bazaar vietnam cover, 2018 vma look, chun li cover art look, 2018 harpers bazaar look 🎀

So What Can We Learn?

Nicki’s style has never been anything short of ultra femme and makes it clear she’s not afraid to take up space and your attention.

As her branding and look shifts through these eras, it’s as if she’s becoming more aggressive with the her fashion to speak to the public.

During The Pinkprint Era, she said “Look, I can put the pink wigs and rainbow paint away and still capture attention while making quality work. Respect me.”

The No Frauds Era saw her evolve into a more flashy Nicki while taking hints of her past looks to say “I AM the greatest, you will NEVER top me, and I can remind you who I am.” Note the Barbie chain while also dressing like modern day royalty.

Nicki Minaj is a highly polarizing figure in pop culture but that should not stop us from acknowledging the cultural resets she’s delivered us in the fashion and beauty industry. When she said “I got all these girls wantin’ to be Barbie Dollz,” it wasn’t just a line, ITS TRUE. So many influential girls on instagram look like either Nicki, Kim K, or Madison Beer, just to name a few. The girls have taken a heavy note from the colored hair, bussdown middle part inches, bulky chains, all while trying to maintain an untouchable level of HYPERFEMININITY. An actual BLACK BARBIE.

-PrettyHeiressDiaries 🎀

credits: nathyyy and blessing mukosha via youtube, @thevirgodoll and @babyphat05’s breakdowns on femmes in the culture on the respective personal blogs.

#prettyheiressdiaries #nicki #my posts #some looks are places in a different time period purely for aesthetic reasons

[aconflagrationofmyown]

|| Memphis to Fort Hood

Timeline alterations: Spring of 1958

Theme: THAT ASKED FOR BABY ANNOUNCEMENT, sorta

So, so many thanks to all my darlings who I throw my ideas at and they in turn bolster my resolve and refine my daydreams.

Warnings: good ole fashioned 50’s misogyny, Elvis being rather poorly represented? -for the reasons of this being written as critique?…nothing explicit but themes of free use, subspace, paranoia and eating disorders (which ends up being morning sickness so no really big deal there, just wanted to be careful.

A note on the style of this particular interlude: One of my obsessions with this universe has been using multiple points of view and narrative styles, ultimately adding to my own expansive delusion that this AU really was the verified version of his life. 🤓 And see, if it had been we would have magazines and newspapers, speciations and interviews galore, all of which I’ve enjoyed fabricating in the past and intend to continue. Now I’ve cooked up something else, a faux cultural study on what would have been the massively studied and criticized impact of a couple this peculiar and idolized -Mrs. Presley and Other Martyrs:

Strangely, if one looks for the first cracks in a marriage that outlasted five decades, nine children, assasination attempts, adultery, rock n’ roll and the most publicized divorce of its time, one might find that the first fissure had begun to open by the Presley’s third week anniversary. Outlasted, that’s the key. But that doesn’t mean there weren’t things to outlast. The old curse of stepping outside Graceland and finding trouble found them early on, as did their tenacity to simply ignore and surmount the witch’s brew of criticism, ego and exhaustion.

It took 38 hours by train to reach Fort Hood from Memphis Tennessee in the year 1958. Time enough for legends to be made. Dynamics to be established. A couple dozen demons to resurface.

And impressions to be formed. Lasting impressions of herself by the scrutinizing public that Elaine Presley reportedly never forgave Elvis for -a remarkable instance of a grudge in a woman so notoriously absolvent.

At the start of the journey she boarded the train at Memphis a sheltered girl tucked under the arm of the most famous man on earth, her own face captured without obstruction for the first time by the press, wedding band flashing and virginal blush staining her features at the attention and the queries hurled at her. The most envied woman in the country hadn’t known she was wanted a month before and by the time she stepped off in Texas, Mrs Presley was the doe eyed subject and demure recipient of a hundred varied opinions, editorials, fan tokens and bouquets.

What her rushed wedding may have slighted Elaine Presley of in terms of a bridal fuss, this dutiful journey made up for in sheer abundance of notoriety. What her sequestered honeymoon had sheltered her from in terms of being tabloid fodder was more than made up for on the trip as Elaine Presley got paraded on the train balcony at each stop along the route by her beaming groom:

A sauve cad in a uniform who beamed at the crowd with a cocky leer that suggested much in regards to his reserved bride and was in stark contrast to the sober and tear streaked boy he’d been when he came up this way to say goodbye to his mama weeks before. This little couple and their little rebellion of a marriage was manic in appearance and in gaiety, and even the most charitable of well-wishers found the occasion they were celebrating a bit forced, a bit dire, a bit off kilter for something as sanctified and sober as matrimony.

This was compounded by the new groom’s attitude which seemed as eager to display the varied trousseau he decked this almost catatonically pliant girl in -with a change nearly on the hour- as he was to introduce his new wife to his nation’s worth of fans that crowded the rails as they hustled south.

As Hedda Hopper unapologetically noted in her column that week “…it makes a person wonder if this sensational canary of an entertainer is too proud of having conquered a sensible girl child into being his wife to realize he just married himself off the market. America’s daydream is now a taken man and no one in the nation seems ready for that, least of all him.”

Married, to Elvis Presley, was perhaps more of a reality than Miss Hopper and her column gave him credit for, although the old spinster might’ve been aghast if she knew what marital duties the young star prioritized over others. The folks who caught sight of the flushed couple at each stop might’ve had a suspicion. Certainly Elvis’ ever present entourage of childhood friends and relations couldnt hope to be left in the dark.

Even if the close quarters on the route, the thin traincar doors and shared meals were not enlightening enough, Elvis Presley gloated too much in being a new husband to possibly retain any mystery. Love drunk and determined to stay so lest panic or grief overtake him, his friends recall his unreasonable amounts of excitement and generosity in detail regarding his “lil wife.”

-And his skills as a lover, of course.

Nothing had changed for Elvis from his time on the road with these naughty friends of his except that now all his famous drive and obsession was channeled towards one rather overwhelmed teenage girl. One who had, in typical 1950’s fashion, promised to obey his every whim. Turns out, trapped in a train car for over a day with an insomniatic sex addict uncovers an astounding amount of whims that their more placid honeymoon at Graceland had kept at a low simmer.

Whether tamed by the supposed influence of his mother’s ghostly presence at Graceland or whether in a fit of gentlemanly restraint for an untried bride, Elvis Presley had, by all accounts, played the gentleman while at home in those first weeks of marriage. While happy and smug -so much so that the story went that when the colonel appeared at Graceland to assure himself that the secret wedding hadn’t happened, one look at Elvis and the girl on his lap assured him it had both occurred and been consummated- he had nevertheless been considerate, gentle and almost tutoring in aiding Elaine to adjust to her new life.

Trapped in the claustrophobic buzz of the train car speeding south to a life of regimented discipline and obedience in the army, the antsy rebel in him found his boredom and dread peaked beyond endurance and distracted himself with the new and ever captivating charms of his new wife.

Elvis Presley with a goal could be a dedicated and diligent man but without one he was a chaotic force of nature that could catch all those around him in a whirlpool of fun or an avalanche of insanity. Pursuing Elaine Presley had brought out the best in him and so intently did he peruse her with every traditional method of wooing a typical southern girl, that she had quite forgotten the more frightening aspects of his temperament that she and her father had been witness to before. She could be forgiven for thinking he had matured past such outbursts and compulsions he had been thrall to in his early fame. Subdued by grief and spurred by ambition to have her, he had been impressively restrained upon his return to Memphis and driven by a rededication of his life to the old values of his mama’s ambitions for him, he had managed to continue it into the first days of marriage.

The upcoming reality of life within the rigorous confines of Fort Hood was too strong for such flimsy good intentions. As was the oppressive reality of his mother’s permanent absence in his life. His love, which had always been a somewhat smothering thing that required as much as it gave, was needy yet inexpressive in those early days and according to his daughter Ella, who divulged some of her mother’s confidences in her own book, Elaine was yet to learn how terrified her young husband was of a future that most would have envied.

Scared of being alone, yet suspicious that his presence was merely being tolerated, young husband Elvis Presley had every hope he could train a young girl by conjugal powers alone to be loyal to him where others failed. In a fit of hubris and optimism, he chose for this amorous experiment the one woman in town who admitted to not being in love with him. This fear and frustration expressed itself in an appalling physical demand on her bodily attentions. One that their fellow train car occupants could not ignore yet found themselves incapable of preventing, bound by the antiquated respect of a husband's rights.

“I swear he’d not leave her alone for a full hour,” Red West recalled in his book, reflecting on the times he spent in the Presley’s entourage, “and he’d be back there with her for hours at a time, then pop out and then right back again. If he couldn't sleep then he didn’t see why she should.”

Billy Smith, his cousin and a man adamant about staying on Mrs. Presley’s good side over the years, would only admit discreetly, “He was utterly in love with her, had been for years and couldn’t quite pace himself once he got the green light, so to speak. He adored her and was in a bit of a state of shock that she was even better than he’d hoped, she was like the first thing to exceed his high expectations. She was very genuinely kind to him and he ate it up. On the train ride he was bored and it was like taking a bored kid to their favorite sweet shop. And Elvis Presley had a big ole bank account to cash in.”

Big enough, apparently, that by lunch of that day the ever proper young Mrs Presley, in her perfectly starched new outfits and watery lined eyes, was having trouble sitting still at table, much to the comment of guests and friends. After excusing herself early she went back to their suite. Elvis was seen following within minutes. Thirty minutes later the train stopped and Elaine Presley, in a fresh outfit and an uncharacteristic wobble to her stride was paraded by her husband on the balcony to the roar of envious onlookers.

The train moved on, she excused herself again, as did he moments later.

“We could hear them, it became like road noise.” Red West, long used to Elvis’ various rendezvous while on the road in the past took this marital overindulgence in stride, “Initially it was kinda a laugh and a grin about it with all the folks in the dining car, but then we could hear her tiring out, and he’d keep at it and it got a bit annoying, all her pleading and him going on about bein’ able to do anything he pleased with her. He’d come out and brag to us when we told him they were being loud.”

“He was very proud of how sensitive she was,” Joe Esposito does not bother to sound impressed himself when relating this confidence, “he’d tell us how she was a squirter and she got all sensitive real fast before he was even close to done and he’d just have to hold her and make her let him finish, sometimes make her keep going when she swore she couldn’t. He said he was training her to respond the way he wanted. It didn’t occur to him maybe she was made different than the ones he’d been with before, he just thought he was a damn good husband. Figure she just wanted a nap and maybe some Vaseline. Nobody dared to tell him to give her a break.”

Ultimately Vernon Presley ventured to do just that at breakfast the next morning, after his daughter in law had skipped dinner the night before and breakfast that day from a ubiquitous headache that was likely not an ache in the head at all.

“He was so timid about it as Elvis was in a mood, worn out and hadn’t slept, stabbin’ his eggs like they’d done him wrong.” Lamar Fike remembers the incident, “Vernon just spoke up real gentle like and says ‘son, why don’t you go easy on the little lady, she’s real fresh and delicate,’ Elvis just glared at him so he tried jokin by sayin’ something like ‘you got the rest of your lives for this, don’t gotta cram it all in today.’ Elvis didn’t even try to act dumb, he just got mad and stood up from the table and said ‘daddy, you mind your own business, reckon I don’t need lessons for how to take care of a wife, not from you leastwise.’ And that was a low blow, you could see it on Vernon’s face and like I said, Elvis stood up, with his napkin still tucked in his shirt neck, and went back there to her again like he was makin’ love to spite his old man. Ya just don’t tell Elvis what to do with what’s his.”

Charlie Hodge wasn’t there and in an admirable display of keeping in his lane only commented that, “Elvis told me they danced a lotta the way, had the old records on, trying to keep the cramp away. He’d get antsy on trips.”

Marty Lacker had the decency to at least be sheepish and a little apologetic about the times when relating his version of events, “Just a different time back then, ya know? Didn’t occur to us to step in. We’d say a thing or two but ultimately that’s between a husband and wife to sort out and back then wives just didn’t fuss. It all worked out, they sorted it. Elaine never breathed a word of anything and we wouldn’t think of saying anything to her. Not even after the little emergency, you just don’t talk about that stuff. It’s not fitting. Even Elvis knew that, he didn’t appreciate the advice or adminitions from his daddy. Braggin’ between boys us one thing but talkin’ about what goes on between a man and his wife beyond that it’s, it’s just, it’s not fittin. It’s just not a thing to be discussed, you know? Different times, man.”

The little emergency in question was a case of Elvis bursting out of the train car an hour or so after lunch on the second day in search of his paternal grandmother, old Dodger as the family called her, full of consternation that his young bride was unresponsive.

“I really think he rode her silly, that’s all there was to it.” Joe shrugs at this bold diagnosis, “He’d brag about how out of it she’d get when he would start again after she thought he was done. Said she’d space right out and start shakin’ and shivering and get plain stupid. I think he liked that, makin’ a smart girl feel dumb. He’d dress her up and redo her makeup and take her out like that in front of fans, and they all got the impression she was a little bozo. Then I guess he just kept at it one time too long.”

Elvis told Dodger that his wife was not fully concious, although his heightened concern was less regarding her insensibility than the fact that neither a light smack to the cheek nor a resumption of activities on his part could rouse Elaine like it had on previous occasions. Vernon dunked her head in a bowl of ice water with no success, Billy tried to give her aspirins but she wasn’t awake to swallow them down.

Dodger prescribed a drink of water for the young girl, a cold compress to the nether regions and a nap -sans husband. Disgruntled but terrified of losing yet another woman in his life, and with his own cheek stinging from his grandmother's wrath, Elvis Presley secluded himself to playing cards with the boys in the smoking lounge for the remaining three hours of the train ride while his grandmother watched over his bride and her precariously suggestible headspace.

“ ‘I done told her again and again to hold it if she gets so excitable after she comes that she can’t stand to take me longer. But she’s a hair trigger, couple stokes and she’s off, keeps comin’ all the same then acts like I’m skinnin’ her when I keep goin. I gotta finish man, what else am I supposed to do?” Red recalls Elvis bemoaning his bride’s hyper responsiveness like a martyr recounting his sentence -while wearing his signature sulky expression that did nothing to hide the smug pride beneath.

By the time Elaine Presley wobbled off the train onto the platform at Killeen Texas and stiff smilingly took her seat beside Elvis in a taxi to their little crackerbox house on base, the world at large had a firm opinion that the new Mrs Presley was a pretty little thing with dark features and a rosebud mouth, a nice figure and sweet charm but possessing a vacant sorta look to her. It suggested a gullibility so utterly untrue to her real nature that three decades worth of wit and shrewdness could hardly undue their initial impression of her.

Elaine Presley would ultimately have her revenge for such a first impression but it would cost her much in the process and Elvis Presley even more.

The buzz of press did not decline upon her arrival. With Private Presley busy soldiering all day, it fell to his young wife to sort the intricate social circle of his entourage and fellow soldiers, to manage the fanmail and contracts as well as set up house as best she could in such impermanent lodgings. All these precarious duties were stalked and documented beyond all sense, photographs of her and her choice of groceries dutifully printed for readers across the country to guess at what she planned to feed their idol for dinner. If the sharp glint in her eyes, captured on occasion when the intrusion became absurd, hinted at something beyond the vacant and ravished doll of the train ride, no one was eager to investigate. A sharp set to the mouth or a dangerous glitter in the eye got one called a bitch and it was better to be vacuous as a woman than to be venomous. So Elaine was caught smiling with her vegetables and spending her afternoons baking beneath a Texas sun while chatting with snide fellow housewives.

It was the first bootcamp for a lifelong grueling ordeal that Elaine Presley submitted to with grace and tenacity.

If her wit and her marital irregularities were glossed over by the papers in their eagerness to find the noble idyll amongst the immoral muck of rock and roll, what did not go unnoticed was the increasingly wane aspect of what should have been a rosy and glowing young wife. Shortly after arriving in Texas, Elaine’s already strained nerves seemed to have frazzled beyond small fits of fainting and what was once a private display of weariness kept between her and the implacable Dodger. Soon it became bouts of vomiting and exhaustion beyond any reasonable excuse.

The public noticed her figure grow slight and frail, as did Elvis. No longer was she slight but sickly instead, and a milky complexion was now waxy and unbecoming in contrast to her dark hair. The public were concerned for her, not for her health so much as for the future of the readership should her picturesque ordeals unravel further.

Battling his own preoccupation and exhaustion in the hard crucible of army bootcamp, Elvis’ one solace was the charming little haven he had created for himself with a wife and domesticity shipped in like so many plates and doilies. When this fairytale grew pale and bony and even the most cheerful of liars couldn’t convince him his “Tinkerbell” was fine, Elvis Presley grew increasingly paranoid of something fatal having cursed the women in his life. Frustrated at Elaine for allowing herself to grow so weak, his friends recall his behavior towards her vasciaiting from aching tenderness to angry remonstrances at her to eat and to rest and take care of herself. He even paced his own indulgences and begged her not to bring him the usual treats she’d sneak into barracks during the heat of afternoon. He pampered and berated, prayed and cursed.

None of these precautions were sufficient to build her up and alarmed beyond any reassurance, Elvis Presley packed his young bride into a car in the early summer of their first marriage and, having a five hour furlough from the army, drove her himself into the nearby hospital. The statement tossed to the press waiting outside was mild sinus congestion.

Twenty minutes later these two world wide famous young adults stumbled out in a daze of knowledge that they were about to be parents for the first time.

A severe case of twins -and the rigorous discipline of making them- having caused all the raucous.

No longer scared of abandonment, imminent loss or rebellion on his wife’s part, Elvis Presley softened considerably in the next months, the looming likelihood of a separation with his deployment softening him even further. It was the first case of children saving -and complicating- one of the most volatile and devoted couples of the 20th century.

By the first few weeks of the second trimester, Elaine Presley was both filled out enough and sufficiently cheery to regain the accolades lost to her by the press during her first. Finding few friends to be had amongst jealous soldiers' girlfriends and snooty Sargeant’s wives, as well as having been abandoned by most childhood companions after becoming mistress of Graceland, Elaine, never to be out maneuvered by bad luck, turned those publicized grocery store runs into social occasions, her growing belly eliciting advice and solicitations from wise old Texan grandma’s and rancher’s wives.

Accompanied by the stoically indomitable Dodger, Elaine could be found at geriatric swim classes at the local pool in a bid to stay cool during the heat of summer, at smoky poker games at Billy Bob’s honky tonk where she was the lone abstainer from the free flowing bourbon and became winner of a mechanical bull riding competition against a Navy Pilot.

It was a win for the infantry that night and even Elvis drank a cold one in celebration of her winnings that she spent on quenching the Hell on Wheels squadron at the adjacent saloon. Those Sargeant’s wives got somehow even more acrid after that.

Whether there was a correlation between this heated ride-off and said Navy Pilot’s face ending up black and blue the next day from some jealous young husband’s fist, was anyone's conjecture. Either way, Elvis Presley was likely too busy for such petty displays of insecurity, he was hiding in the lavatory most times to get away from his recently energized and insatiable young wife whose visits to Fort Hood soon became a byword and euphemism for something else besides visitation.

Altogether the Presley’s in Texas was an eclectic and occasionally damaging PR debut, but not without its merits.

The nation decided the new Mrs. Presley may have been a little short in the smarts department but she made pregnancy look fun again and that was rather charming and not a little rebellious, as was unapologetically marrying Elvis Presley right from under their noses. And Elvis? Well, it would be two long years before the world got any candid, civilian, unrepentant opinion out of Private Presley.

Hope you enjoyed! 💋

Tags: (let me know if you’d like to be added or retracted)

@paradsol000

@eliseinmemphis

@prompted-wordsmith

@ab4eva

@foreverdolly

@powerofelvis

@butlersxbirdy

@crash-and-cure

@elvisabutler

@heartbrake-hotel

@stylespresleyhearted

@thatbanditqueen

@crazymadpassionatelove

@myradiaz

@ash-omalley

@whatstruthgottadowithit

@arianatheangelgirl

@steph-speaks

@burningloverdoll

@angelface-555

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@coolgirl462

@kingdomforapony

@18lkpeters

@richardslady121

@from-memphis-with-love

@lillypink

@artlover8992

@pennyroyalcreep

@notstefaniepresley

@ellie-24

@renaissingle

@waiting4brucewayne2adoptme

@presleyenterprise

@marriedtopresley

@ashtag2887

@dkayfixates

@vampireindistress

@ashtag6887

@i-r-i-n-a-a

@obsessedvibee

@peskybedtime

#elvis fanfiction #elvis presley #sarge and lil mama #elvis fanfic #elvis imagine #elvis x reader #austin butler elvis #austin elvis x reader #elvis smut #austin elvis smut #Elvis #elvis 2022 #50’s elvis

[danandphilplay]

i think phils psychic grandma is sooo funny and just so phil. also i looove the bit of hometown showdown where phil gets dan to try local stuff from the bakery. its so cute and relatable makes me think of cakes my grandma made

#dan howell #amazingphil #dan and phil #dan and phil poll #hometown showdown

[klonoa-at-blog]

From: Klonoa 2: Lunatea’s Veil Official Guide Book (Published by Famitsu/Enterbrain - 2001) (Pg. 207)  

~Messages from the Klonoa 2 Staff~ Lastly, we would like to show you messages from those who were involved in the development of Klonoa 2 to the public. You'll find hard work, inside stories, and a few positive ones(?!) here and there! ......So, thank you all for your hard work!

Tomomitsu Kaneko Profile: ● Age: 24 years old ● Blood Type: O ● Responsibilities: Sound Effects ● Comments: Sound effects...... sound effects? Ugh, too much light. ● Favorite character: Likuri

Minako Matsuda Profile: ● Age: 33 years old ● Blood Type: A ● Responsibilities: Package Design ● Comments: Every time we make a package, we go to the chief to see what the next one will be like, but this time, we don’t have to do that anymore, Mr. Kobayashi just comes in and talks like a madman and leaves. I could go on and on about this and that, so to sum it up, this is a package that says, “Let’s go on an exciting adventure!” What I really like is the part where the ears are moving. I think that’s what makes Klonoa so great. ● Favorite character: Moo

Shinichi Tsuruya Profile: ● Age: 25 forever ● Blood Type: Typical B ● Responsibilities: Quality control and programmer snoozing ● Comments: I am Tsuruya, in charge of quality control. I have always heard users say, “Klonoa makes me cry!” I agree with you completely. It really made me cry, yes. Both 1 and 2. I can’t stop crying. The first ocean is our incapacitation. It was only those who played Klonoa that stopped the tears. Thank you for playing! ● Favorite character: Large Dream Stone with wings x5

Ryo Sakamoto Profile: ● Age: 28 years old ● Blood Type: O ● Responsibilities: Quality control (Debugging) ● Comments: Hello, my name is Sakamoto of Quality Control. I hope you all are enjoying the scaled-up Klonoa 2 in all aspects. My favorite song is from Mts. of Mira-Mira. When I was tired, that BGM cheered me up. You may also feel more energetic if you listen to it when you are tired. Last but not least, the entire staff will continue to do our best based on your support, so please continue to support Klonoa for a long time to come. See you soon! ● Favorite character: Moo (I like the way he walks)

Noriko Kobayashi Profile: ● Age: Unknown! ● Blood Type: A ● Responsibilities: Sales Promotion (Public Relations - mainly magazine publicity) ● Comments: We held game tournaments (Jungle Slider Relay Race!) with users at event sites across the country. We also danced the “Klonoa-kun Dance” to the background music of the Mts. of Mira-Mira stage. We were blessed with the opportunity to actually talk with many Klonoa fans, making this year’s sales promotion activity a very memorable one. I hope that everyone who played the game will become a word-of-mouth promotion captain and spread the fun of Klonoa to the people around them.  ● Favorite character: Erbil is so nice~

Hideo Yoshizawa Profile: ● Age: Age? I forgot. ● Blood Type: Once a B, now an A ● Responsibilities: Scenario (Screenplay, Supervisor) ● Comments: I had a lot of trouble with this story. I even had to reject one entire story. In the end, I rewrote the story up to about the seventh draft. I wanted to make a fresh and a little sad ending this time, since I made a very sad ending last time. But I wanted it to be directly connected to the hearts of the players, who are the alter egos of Klonoa, and that’s how I set up this world. Think about what sorrow means to you. ● Favorite character: Leorina

#klonoa #translation #lunatea's veil #enemies #moo #leorina #hideo yoshizawa

[picspammer]

Mr. Veidt, to date, you're one of only two Watchmen ever to reveal their true identity to the world, the first being Hollis Mason. And you've certainly profited greatly by it turning your superhero alter ego, Ozymandias, into a billion-dollar industry: toys, lunchboxes, genetic engineering. I understand there's a movie in the works.

I'm not hearing a question, Mr. Roth.

I'm sorry. Do you think…

The other Watchmen resent me for prostituting their struggle? It's a fair question. Yes, it's crossed my mind some of my old colleagues might see it that way, just as you're clearly aware that biased journalism sells more... magazines.

#and in that moment he got me #adrian veidt #ozymandias #watchmen #watchmen 2009 #zack snyder #matthew goode

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

“When E. Jean Carroll talks about the loss of her reputation, it's hard for Millennial, Gen Z, and frankly, even Gen Xers like me, to fully appreciate what she lost. Yes, she was an advice columnist for ELLE magazine. But she was also the stuff of journalistic legend. She made her bones in the often macho "gonzo journalist" movement, inserting herself into -- and often doing crazy things -- in the name of a story. Her big break came from taking Fran Lebowitz *camping*; her byline appeared in Rolling Stone and Playboy. She was sophisticated, witty, beautiful, and as one reviewer wrote, like the late Nora Ephron, but "wilder." She was Carrie Bradshaw if Sex and the City began in the mid-80s, not the late 90s, and everyone gathered at Elaine's, not Balthazar. In fact, Bradshaw's creator/alter ego, Candace Bushnell, wrote in 2019 that Carroll "was the coolest woman journalist around – daring, had a ton of guts, and was as funny as the guys. . . . There really wasn’t and isn’t anyone else like her.” If you were a trailblazing Emmy winner once known as the "coolest woman in journalism" by a woman who herself redefined the zeitgeist for a generation of New York women, ask yourself whether you'd risk that legacy all for a lie. Yeah, I didn't think so. Trust women.” ~Lisa Rubin

#believe women #trust women #E.Jean Carroll #Lisa Rubin #articles #women