#like i've seen them in june and then 2 months later and you could feel the difference idk

[fivewholeminutes]

I've never really thought vessel is faking the crying, i mean. Imagine, for example, reliving what atlantic is about every time you sing it, impossible not to cry. But at the same time i was always happy for him when he managed to go through the set without his voice breaking in any of the songs. Idk, it just gave me a sort of relief that he might've been doing a bit better on that particular day.

#sleep token #been a few hours already since i've seen the messages and i am still not okay #like i've seen them in june and then 2 months later and you could feel the difference idk #maybe he was just less tired bc in june they were already touring for quite some time #and then they've had some rest before prague #but idk. #god i hope i don't sound creepy when i talk about it #i'm just feeling a bit better knowing that someone who has helped me a lot looks like he's feeling a bit better too

[stoopid-turtle]

BTS in Order Addendum 2

Second and final addendum for rn! This covers the translated bts clips for June that I found. Sadly, the playlist did not have July or Aug, so I can't go over those. If I ever do find July and Aug, I'll try to add it on.

As before, the timeline posts are already updated. I'm just highlighting some things here for those who don't want to hunt for the updates. Also, I tried to clean up some of the formatting but y'all, the formatting on Tumblr is just weird. I can't figure it out and I'm not gonna invest the time to do so, so I've done my best!

I can see where the WZC/GG pairing came from. GG and WZC seem quite close, often playful, and similarly physically affectionate to ggdd. Their dynamic is different, but I can def see how people could pull together a compilation of their bts clips for CPFs. (Not saying they were a real couple, like ggdd.)

Madam Jin did not seem to realize she was cast in a bl adaption.

There's much mentioned of dd's afterglow on 6.19 after the Dragon Boat Festival date, but I've never seen anyone mention that GG is also in a really great mood the next day. His first scene is in the forest with JC and JL, and he's all smiles and says, "I'm so happy this early morning. I really love my team."

JC says "Happy? What nonsense!" For some reason, this sets gg off on the giggles.

Needless to say, GG had his own afterglow.

Also on 6.19, there's this cute exchange between gg and the older lady producer (?), who is also from Chongqing:

Crewmember: So many beauties come from Chongqing. GG: I'm beautiful. Producer lady: More beautiful than me? GG: How can that be? Can't compare!

And then, a couple days later on 6.23, when dd is still gone, gg is in a hellishly rotten mood. He's visibly moody and unresponsive to xl and JC, both of whom try to cheer him up. At one point, he asks someone (his assistant?) if he has any crying scenes that day. And later he says, "Remember this feeling. After a month, when filming, definitely will..." I think he says something more to XL here, but I guess it was too quiet for the translator to hear. The implication to me is that he's gonna try to bring up the experience of his feelings in later scenes when WWX is having similar feelings.

Not everything with regards to the boys has to be about ggdd, so it's possible that gg's bad mood is bc of something else going on in his life. Family, friends, something with his company, politics, a stranger being a jerk, whatever. DD's one possibility among many. I did check out what dd was doing on 6.23 and 6.22, and he's on Produce 101, where he looks as DD (with a mullet) as ever. But there aren't any bts or unscripted clips of him where he might reveal a similar mood, so it's hard to say anything.

So basically, make of gg's bad mood what you will. It could be literally anything.

I need to talk about JC's fake butt

So the clip on 6.25, with JZX, Mianmian, dd, XL, and gg all chatting starts with them talking about JC wearing a "fake butt". I'm guessing butt padding? Some highlights:

DD is confused because he's "not even wearing jeans", to which gg asks if it makes sense to wear a fake butt in jeans.

The "reason" why JC wears this is apparently only known to XL and GG. XL refuses to explain.

GG says if she doesn't explain, dd will just walk up to JC and ask him, "JC, you wear a fake butt?"

Poor WZC did seem a bit put-upon on the set.

Also, unrelated, dd thinks sweat is sexy.

Also, the nasal spray that got passed around: looked sus, but not actually that sus. It's a Thai herbal nasal inhaler, which apparently looks a lot like people doing some uppers. (So much so that gg chastises the cameraman for filming it and XL turns her back to do it)

Also also, gg's rotten mood is gone. The clip on 6.23 of him being in a bad mood is only about 5 min long, and there's only a 45sec clip for 6.24. So basically, we have no idea what might have cheered him up and there are almost a full 2 days of stuff we know nothing about.

#bjyx #yizhan #the timeline of ggdd love yue #poor jc #but why the fake butt tho?

[skelleste]

2023 Art Summary

Some of the many things I worked on over the past 365 days. More details below.

Happy New Year!

Just like last year, 2023 was full of even more character art, including a brand spanking new OC. You haven't seen much of the comic yet, because it's not done, but there's been progress on that in the background as well. I also started commissions last March. None are featured in this post so I could focus more on original art, but I wanted to give a special thank-you to all my past commissioners. Not a single one of you were a customer service nightmare, in fact it was quite the opposite. I appreciate everyone who's been kind enough to give me work and treat me well.

The rest of this post is going to be some of my favorite pieces by month, and a little about them. I usually spare my followers from most details in my posts, because there's often not much of interest to the public to say, so this is mostly self indulgent.

January

I decided to revisit Tom and Maudlin, as I hadn't drawn them much since creating them. Whenever I make a new character of importance, I try to go out of my way to put them in varied poses and expressions so that I am able to understand how their bodies work by the time I need them for a real project. It's also a great way to explore their personalities, although I feel that I'll have to push Tom's emotional side more in the future.

February

Props for the comic! It sucks to have to design things on the fly, so it helps to have notable objects designed beforehand. Especially if it's important to the plot. Some of these appear in more panels than others, but it smooths out the comic process nevertheless to have ample references on hand.

March

More character designs to spare me from designing mid-comic production. If they don't have lines in the comic, then I ask random people to assign names to them to make it fun, and because it's easier to keep straight who's who when they're not named Man 1 and Man 2. Left to right, they are Johnifer (you can already see why I name the ones with dialogue myself), Wanda, Jean Vincent, Booker, Charles, Maribelle, and Gertrude.

April

It'd be silly of me to pretend as if 90% of my output isn't shitposts. When you dedicate most of your art time to a project, then you're not going to end up making any other art unless you satisfy primitive monkey brain somehow. In my case, that's usually addressed by drawing funny shit. Early this year is when I discovered how easy it is to crack jokes with Scatterbrain. This goofiness is now embedded into her personality permanently. Expect more of this.

May

April-June is when I do my Art Fight preppin', which usually consists of me making a list of my most neglected OCs and giving them some attention. I also try to get around to eventually making all of them a reference sheet in this style, just so they have something standardized between them. This year, Walla Walla had her turn. She's a shitpost character, so I won't be drawing her much again, but she's a good excuse to draw some J-fashion doodles. My interests outside of cartoon stupidity don't really make it into my art often, so she's a minor outlet for some of it.

June

I've made even more character designs this year than last year, but they were all background characters, making Raoul the only new important one. He's been officially-unofficially written into the story since 2022, but it's very hard for me to make OCs that are written before they are designed. Everyone else was designed first and assigned a role in the plot later, so he got put off for a good while. I finally got around to it though, after I killed some darlings. He is now an all-new species, and I modified the chain design to something less clunky compared to what would be historically accurate.

July

July is, of course, Art Fight month. All other art is put on pause. This year, my favorite attack was a drawing of Enchanted Bones for my friend Bugles. I drew the character independently from the background, which is why the lighting situation is as unfortunate as it is, but we don't talk about that. Thank you to everyone who attacked me and made awesome art, I'll revenge you maybe in a few years. Sorry for the wait, but the backlog is mighty long.

August

Stanson got a slight redesign in the last year, so he can fit with the style of the comic better. He's actually the oldest character out of the bunch. I had no purpose for Scott when I made him and threw them together in the same folder. I had a few one-off designs that I figured I'd keep around in case I ever did an OCT, but these two got yoinked out of it when I started getting story ideas for the them. Stanson is a cowboy (not really), so it became a western setting to make sense of it. I plan on giving him the same sketchpage treatment the other characters have gotten, but I've been putting it off purposely for a while. You'll just have to wait.

September

And there it is, the inevitable page of Raoul getting into various mischief (and subsequently getting his ass beat half of the time). He has a very abrasive personality that gets him into trouble. I don't want the comic to be heavily action-based, but he naturally lands himself in these positions and it lets me draw characters in new situations. His introduction to the story is still a long way off at this point, but I can't wait to pit him against Scott in some slapstick shenanigans.

October

Spooky month is incredibly busy for me in real life, so there isn't as much time for art as I'd like there to be. That's why I dedicated all my time that month to trying to get Halloween art done in time. I've been a fan of Homestar Runner since childhood, and as soon as I thought that Raoul would pull off a Jigen Daisuke look, I knew I wanted to do a full Homestar-esque set of costumes. The other ideas quickly fell into place. My version came out way more detailed than theirs usually are though. The spirit of Halloween possessed me.

November

I started going full gear on the comic around this time (I think 28 hours in one week when I stayed home), so there's an absence of polished personal art here. Scatterbrain eating some spaghetti is my placeholder art for "I worked on a website a bunch instead". It's far from done, but I've made major strides since then.

December

A secret santa gift for my friend, Toby! I continued doing mostly comic work, but I also made room for a secret santa and scheduled a bunch of art trades to complete between December and March. The rest still have to be completed, so you'll see that throughout 2024. Anyway, Toby's OC, Thomas, is based on the state of Michigan. I plastered him on a postcard in front of a highway sign with some Robins because they're the state bird.

There were many more drawings of course, and you can find them scrolling through my Tumblr, or on my DeviantART (I switched to Tumblr as my main site in late August). I hope the new year brings many improvements and happiness for everyone. Last year my goal was simply to start on the comic, which I did, but it was also to get it uploadable, which I didn't. I'm gonna have to aim for the same goal again. Life things were largely fine but still tumultuous enough to throw me off-course, but now my most dangerous family member has moved out and it should be somewhat safer to live here. Not 100% safe though. It never will be. I generally avoid talking about the comic extensively as I won't have a solid release date for some time, so this is the last you'll hear of it for now outside of the rare WIP screenshot. Wish me luck and have a wonderful new year!

#art #artists on Tumblr #Happy New Year #long post #art summary #2023 summary #summary of art #summary of art 2023

[mercurialmilk]

Grief is an emotion I wouldnt wish on my worst enemy.

I gotta get this out for the sake of my soul. It's a really long read.

back in June of 2020, my sister and I found a cat while out for a walk. She was really friendly but looked in really bad shape. She had horrible matted fur all down her back, she was so thin you could feel her entire spine, scratches and old injuries. But she was so curious and bright eyed!

We thought she might be a lost cat so we took her in, sent info to shelters and our block watch captain (oh, the suburbs) and took her to the vet.

They shaved her from the neck down because they couldnt do an exam the mats were so bad.

She was suffering from malnutrition, had several broken bones that healed wrong, beginnings of kidney problems, was partially deaf and had several superficial scratches and bad teeth.

A few days later we found her owners. They said their kids gave them 2 kittens years ago and they just live outdoors mostly. I was really shocked, at that time we lived in the suburbs next to a ravine filled with wildlife. Coyotes were seen almost every night.

They said that her brother died a little while ago from a coyote.

I was completely furious but tried to keep cool. I asked if they would be open to us keeping her? They asked why on earth we wanted a 19 year old cat (19 years old!!)

They warned me she had behavioural problems and peed all over their house and the woman (it was a couple) said that she "hated petting her because she was so boney"

Yikes.

We agreed that I could keep her as long as they didnt have to pay the vet bills.

(turns out the man of the couple was a bit more attached to the cats or maybe he felt guilty because a few weeks later he showed up with an envelope with half the cost of vet bills for me)

This cat was supposed to be my sisters. I've never been much of a cat person because growing up our mother would foster cats and the minute you got attached to one it was gone to a new home.

Unfortunately, due to some circumstances, my sister had to go to the hospital for a long time and I became the caretaker for this little girl.

First, I didnt want to let her into my bedroom. Then she wasnt allowed in my actual bed. Then she wasnt allowed to spend the night. All of these rules didnt last long at all.

We found the perfect equilibrium. She loved to sleep on my lap (she's incredibly small and perpetually cold) during the day (I work from home) and at night she would snuggle into the crook of my left arm (always the left) and snore peacefully into my ear.

I moved a few months after getting her. In the summer, she goes out to the patio and sleeps on the warm stones. She has a little harness and a really long leash so that she doesnt wander far. My desk is right by the door so I can sit and watch her. And untangle her when she gets wrapped around the patio furniture.

She never had a single "behavioural problem" like the couple said. She always went to the litterbox perfectly, even on long car trips when visiting my parents.

She doesnt like other cats (I think she is anxious about being bullied) but she likes dogs.

She is now completely deaf, which is great because I dont disturb her sleep with vacuuming or my work.

I completely fell in love. And honestly, she saved my life. She became my perfect companion. I put her on a raw meat diet, her fur grew back beautifully and she feels and looks a lot better!

Thing is, being 19 when I got her, I knew what that meant. I knew the end would come a lot sooner than I'd like so I truly treasure every single moment with her.

Yesterday I got the results of her blood and urine tests. Her kidneys are officially in stage 3 out of 4, meaning that the end is coming.

It could be a few weeks or months but there's no stopping this.

I've never lost a person before but my dog passed away after a prolonged illness in 2018 and it was easily the hardest thing that I've ever been through.

My only regret with my dog was that I was so desperate to keep her alive that I held on too tightly. It's never an easy decision because you dont know if it's the right time.

This time my only goal will be to give her the best possible end. Once she shows me that she's ready to go, I will listen. I already know I'm going to do it at home. I have researched the company that does it.

It probably wont happen for a while. She's still happy, eating ok, sleeping a lot but that's because she's a lil grandma. Right now, her diet is well in line with kidney heath.

I'm still waiting on test results to give me a better picture of how far into stage 3 she is. But the writing is on the wall and I'm full into grief.

Is it better or worse to know it's going to happen soon? Does it matter?

I passed all the stages of grief a long time ago (if you believe in that). I've been at 'acceptance' for a while now. But it really doesnt make it any easier.

I feel so weak and so powerless. I know this will pass and I will survive. I've survived before. I just needed to get this out.

Here's Kida. Although I never call her by her name. She's either Little Girl, Baby or Beloved.

When we first found her:

Vs today:

#tl:dr my elderly cat's kidneys are slowly shutting down and Im spiralling a little #tw animal death #tw animal harm #im grateful more than anything else #our lives intersected at the right time

[thatwheelchairchick]

I posted 10,584 times in 2022

That's 8,758 more posts than 2021!

155 posts created (1%)

10,429 posts reblogged (99%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@aislinnstanaka

@nerdferatum

@suggestionsofkindness

@thechangeling

@bookpillows

I tagged 1,508 of my posts in 2022

#litg - 817 posts

#euphoria - 289 posts

#saving for later - 158 posts

#litg instincts - 51 posts

#litg bobby - 50 posts

#litg gary - 50 posts

#litg s2 - 48 posts

#litg ff - 43 posts

#bobby x mc - 41 posts

#gary rennell x mc - 38 posts

Longest Tag: 136 characters

#mostly because those are the most damaged part but also because i cannot be bothered to lotion my whole body after washing my whole body

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

After The Villa - Chapter 3

16 notes - Posted December 1, 2022

#4

After The Villa - Chapter 2

17 notes - Posted November 24, 2022

#3

Date Ideas for the S2 LIs

I mostly started this list of ideas for me so I had a better idea of what dates to write for the characters I'm writing for, and I thought I'd share what I've got. I've got 5 date ideas for each of the LIs I included, but I wasn't comfortable writing for the Casa boys, Elisa and Priya.

Let me know if you disagree, I really struggled with Ibrahim, Lucas and Noah's, but I think they mostly make sense. These aren't necessarily their perfect dates, after all, but dates they would hopefully enjoy.

Bobby

Baking together at home

Building a fort and then having a movie marathon

Go to the arcade

One of them sets up a scavenger hunt

See a comedy show

Gary

Go bowling

Go out for dessert

Go to a theme park

Go to the arcade

Take a cooking class

Hannah

Go to the theatre

Horseback riding

Picnic in the park

Spa date

Window shopping

Henrik

Go-karting

Hiking

Picnic in the park

Rock climbing

Volunteer together

Ibrahim

Go to the comic book store

Learn a sport neither of them know

See the full post

21 notes - Posted May 23, 2022

#2

New headcanon: Lucas knows some basic British Sign Language, and although he couldn’t have a full conversation, he can understand more than he can speak and would like to take more lessons. 

30 notes - Posted June 15, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

What the S2 LIs Did after the Show If They Didn’t End with MC

I saw @noahsthottie's post and wanted to do my own one, so here it is. It's not all of them, but it's who I'm comfortable writing these headcanons for.

Noah

While Noah did go back to working in the library, he also did a lot of charity work while also dating Hope for a bit.

They last between 3 and 6 months before breaking up and going their own ways.

He meets a girl at a charity event and starts dating her. He goes on to marry her a few years later and he almost fully comes out of the spotlight unless it’s charity related.

He does regret not going after MC, but he appreciates the lessons he learns from his experiences.

Gary

He and Lottie have a casual thing for a few months, but she ends things after she figures out that he was pining for MC the whole time they were in the Villa.

She had seen some of the headlines, but hadn’t paid much attention until she watched some clips, which then spurred on a full on marathon to see what actually happened.

He didn’t deny his feelings and that was that for them, not that he minded.

Outside of that, he went back to working, but cut his hours for the first six months so he could do his interviews.

His nan was actually more popular that he was, having made a twitter account and learnt how to use it while he was away, going viral several times, and she actually was involved in most of his interviews and partnerships. He hated the fame, but loved doing those things with her.

He also loved the female attention for a few months, but got bored quickly since he wanted a wife, not a one night stand.

He found his (future) wife working in the soup kitchen, and she was already friendly with his nan.

Bobby

Bobby ended in a friendship couple, so he was single.

He was the most popular boy, and had the opportunity to run his own bakery and have a baking show if he moved to London.

He agreed, and although he was sad to leave Glasgow, he was greatful he moved to where the opportunities were. He visited them as often as he could, and he paid for his family and friends to visit whenever they wanted.

He did a touch of modelling and hated it, but then started a successful YouTube and TikTok channel.

He stayed friends with almost everyone else, and reconnected with Emily from Casa Amor at an event. They dated a while, and he let MC go and became a true friend of hers, without hope for something more. If he didn't think it would cause problems, he'd apologise for being friends with her for all the wrong reasons.

He and Emily eventually got married, and she still teases him about the fact it took a second go around for him to pay attention to her and stop pining for MC.

Ibrahim

He ended with Jo and was actually really happy with her.

He did patch things up with Shannon after getting out, and she ended up genuinely happy for him after seeing him with Jo through interviews and the paps.

He focused on Jo, building a life with her, and on his career. They became each others biggest cheerleaders, and supported each other no matter what.

She did get a bit salty when she realised he did like MC at one point, even after they met, but he pointed out that he wouldn’t be with her still if he wasn’t happy.

Lucas

Whether he was Villa!Lucas or R!Lucas, he didn't stay with his end partner. With Hannah, he knew she was playing the game, and with Chelsea, he went with her because he didn't have another option.

After the Villa, he went back to work for a few weeks, but his patients were starstruck and it wasn't working, so he took a year off.

See the full post

41 notes - Posted January 7, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#tumblr2022 #year in review #my 2022 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

[lonelier-version-of-you]

I stopped watching holby post John Gaskell. Please can you give an overview of all the major storylines henrik had after that. I want to finish holby but only really care about henrik tbh

Sure! Or, well, I can try to. Henrik didn't have a lot of major stories after the Gaskell one anyway, so they should be fairly easy to recap. And I definitely understand what you mean about only caring about him, that was how I felt after like 2020 myself. It didn't feel worthwhile caring about any other character after that. Well, not that caring about Henrik did. But I'm getting off topic now.

I will say: I haven't seen a lot of these stories in a long while or even since they aired. I've rewatched some of the Russ story, but not all, and that's about it. So I may have forgotten or misremembered some things, or not know the exact eps some things happened in (especially for story 2, as Holby felt more like a chore to me than anything at that point and I was basically just sitting there hoping it'd get better - which it did in summer 2020, but then after the second hiatus of the year it went further downhill than it had ever been IMHO). I'll do my best though. I may leave some things out because they're too complicated to get into or weren't particularly major stories, I hope that's not bothersome or anything.

Also, if I sound bitter or grumpy at any point, I promise it's not towards you! It'll all be bitterness/grumpiness at what Holby became in its later years. (Sometimes I wish I had stopped after the Gaskell story myself.) I'm also sorry it took me so many hours to answer this, I had to think of how to explain the stories.

Story One: As of May 2019, Henrik has just been sort of lingering in the background for months, ever since he was basically pressured into being CEO again at the end of 2018. I have no idea why he didn't get a breakdown story after Gaskell when everything seemed so narratively set up for that to happen, but he didn't.

Anyway, in June 2019, Henrik finally gets a story. Sara Johansson - Fredrik's wife, who had left him back in October 2017 - comes to Holby and brings Henrik's grandson Oskar with her. Sara is struggling to cope (I'd go so far as to say she was implicitly suffering from depression or PTSD): she's upset that she didn't realise how evil Fredrik was, and scared that Oskar could grow up to be similar. She and Henrik have several conversations along these lines, and for some reason Henrik's relationship with Gaskell is never acknowledged or properly alluded to in any of this even though there's so much thematic resonance there - Henrik having been, like Sara, in love with a man who did awful things.

Sara ends up running away. This leaves Henrik taking care of Oskar for several months, although Sara does write a letter at one point IIRC. There's some very cute scenes with them - some of which seem to imply that Oskar is autistic like Henrik, or at least that's how they came across to me - and some interesting stuff about Henrik not being sure if he's doing things right because he wasn't there to raise Fredrik. There's also a sweet scene where Henrik goes to Jac to ask what to do, when he unintentionally upsets Oskar by telling him the Tooth Fairy doesn't exist. Henrik also befriends Dom's mum Carole around this time, and they start going to dance classes together. It's all very cute.

In August 2019, Sara returns. She's got a new job (I don't think it's ever said what her job is, so just imagine her doing whatever sort of job you think she'd do, I suppose), and she's coping better and she's ready to go back to Sweden with Oskar. Henrik ended up stepping down from the CEO position again, and went to stay with his family in Sweden for a while. (Guy Henry needed time off to go and do some theatre acting, so that's why this happened.)

Of all the stories Henrik had after Gaskell, I think this is probably the best one. It's not perfect - as I say, the lack of acknowledgement of Gaskell agitated me a lot, and it still glossed over parts of the Hanssen family history. E.g. there's a patient Henrik talks to who's scared of people thinking he's like his dad, and this reads as a parallel to Oskar, but it's not brought up that Henrik of all people also has an established fear of being associated with his dad. But still, at least this story has its strengths, and it doesn't actively insult Henrik's character or insult other characters or extensively retcon his history. That's about the most one could ask for from later Holby.

Story Two: I don't know that I'd say this is a major storyline, but I'll talk about it anyway. I hate this story, but not as much as I hated some others in the last years of the show. That hatred will probably be obvious in how I talk about it.

In February 2020, Henrik returns to Holby after his time offscreen in Sweden. He has some more scenes with Carole, and it's implied that he's fallen in love with her. It's all very sweet. Disappointingly, that story is never continued - there are conversations later about Henrik's feelings for Carole, but the romance never goes anywhere.

The story that happens instead is Henrik, along with Ric and Fletch (especially Fletch, which baffles me because just a couple of years before he was yelling at Henrik for not being a good CEO!), planning to overtake Max McGerry as CEO. Now, Max isn't a perfect CEO or a perfect person, but she's definitely more competent than Henrik. And Henrik doesn't even like being CEO. So this storyline makes no sense. It felt like a leftover recycled Serena storyline (Serena had left by this point) or something - trying to overtake other people as CEO was always more of a Serena thing than a Henrik thing.

Eventually, Max starts lying about what she has planned for the hospital - I think she says she wants to get rid of AAU or something - to see if it gets back to Henrik. Or something like that. This wasn't a story I wanted to remember at the time. Anyway, it does get back to Henrik, and he confronts her. Max tells him she lied, and points out that she was brought in to sort out the mess he had made of the hospital. I cheered at this point, because I love Henrik but in this case he deserved that. Henrik stops trying to be CEO again after that.

Interlude - April 2020 to September 2021: Henrik doesn't get a lot to do for much of this time. He does play side roles in some other characters' stories, and mentors three new doctors at one point. On the occasions he does get any meaningful screentime around this era, most of it is trying to inexplicably retcon his history, contradicting both things that are established as canon - e.g. Sahira Shah is suddenly said to be his childhood friend, when she's at least about a decade younger than him and has only known him since the 1990s according to previous eps, and things that are onscreen canon - e.g. Henrik suddenly starts saying he was involved in raising Fredrik, which can't have happened, because "Hanssen/Hemingway" has a scene of Henrik learning Fredrik's name for the first time in 2013. So if Henrik didn't even know his son's name, how could he have been involved in bringing him up? And, as said above, Henrik had been talking about how he had nothing to do with Fredrik when Fredrik was growing up as recently as 2019!

I just ignore these retcons and try to forget about them, myself, because it's easier than trying to get them to make sense with Henrik's decade worth of established history lol. Not that things didn't get retconned before - e.g. Roxanna being his friend from medschool instead of a colleague he didn't know well - but they usually either got explanations, or it was easy to make up explanations for yourself. That wasn't the case with these.

One interesting thing does happen during this interlude time though: Lucky Simpson, a psychiatric nurse, implies Henrik has CPTSD. I hadn't thought of that before, but I think it makes sense for him as a character.

Another, less interesting thing that you still have to know because it's relevant in Story Three: Henrik becomes CEO again in spring 2021. Max had to leave the job because she said she'd been taking things from the hospital - she hadn't, but her son Louis had, it's a long story - and while she did get to return to Holby, she couldn't be CEO again. I don't remember if any in-universe reason for that was ever given. Fletch was CEO for a while until Henrik agreed to go back to the job. None of it made any sense to me. Holby had long since stopped making any sense to me by this point.

Story Three: Finally, stories for Henrik that aren't just generic "CEO man who talks about his son all the time" things!

In October 2021, a doctor turns up, who turns out to be Henrik's old friend Russell Faber (but he often goes by Russ). Henrik has known Russ for a long time - though exactly how long isn't specified - ever since he once got Russ away from a shark. That seems like a joke, but I'm not making it up, a shark did bring them together. I wonder if John ever knew about that. He must've been so jealous if he did.

Russ and Henrik don't seem to have talked in a while - Russ knows about the Gaskell stuff, but he could have heard that somewhere else, and Henrik doesn't seem to know much about the past few years of Russ's life. Russ had a husband, Ami, who passed away from COVID in 2020. They also have a daughter, Billie - she's 16 at this time, though IIRC she was played by an actress a bit older, as tends to be the way on Holby. Russ, it turns out, has come to Holby to ask Henrik to mentor someone.

The "someone" Russ wants Henrik to mentor is Oliver Valentine. Basically he's been subjected to the "This character is permanently disabled now! Oh wait no we got tired of them being disabled so they're abled again now!" trope. Thank goodness Malick stayed away so it didn't happen to him too. A character can become disabled and still be fulfilled in life, Holby. Ollie not being able to be a doctor anymore wouldn't inherently be a less happy life for him than him being able to go back to it is. Anyway, Oliver has gone back to being a doctor, and Russ thinks Henrik mentoring him would be good for Ollie. Oliver has PTSD that's causing serious problems in his life, which Russ doesn't know the extent of and doesn't tell Henrik about.

After Oliver has a flashback in theatre, Henrik learns that Russ knew of Ollie's PTSD. He's upset that Russ didn't tell him and seems distrustful of Russ, though they make up the next week - which is also the first onscreen useage of Russ's nickname for Henrik: "Henny." It's adorable. Meanwhile, Oliver gets therapy and eventually leaves again to be with Zosia, while Henrik gives Russ a longterm job at Holby.

After a bit of to and fro where Henrik thinks Russ is asking him out and gets disappointed when he realises he's not, the story goes for a different turn. In January, it turns out Billie has a kid on the way... in a few weeks, to be precise! Russ hasn't noticed, for storyline convenience. When Henrik realises, he wants to tell Russ, but Billie wants to tell him herself when she feels ready.

In February, Serena and Bernie - lol, Bernie deserves a separate recap - come back. They're engaged now. Serena realises Russ and Henrik are in love. She has a conversation with Henrik about it where she tells him no one uses labels anymore. I think that's reasonably in character for Serena, but the narrative seems to portray her as Objectively Right, which frustrated me. Using labels and not using labels are both okay, neither one is better than the other, and IMO Henrik would be the sort of person to want to use a label. Other than that, the conversation is quite sweet: Henrik asks her how she knew her decisions were right with Bernie, and she basically says that if Russ makes Henrik happy then being brave enough to get together with him is more than worthwhile.

The next week, Henrik asks Russ out. It's all so cute. Later in February, Billie has a son: Denver. I seem to remember him being mostly or entirely portrayed by a doll, which amused me. I get why Holby do that, but there's still something funny about it when you can tell a character is just holding a doll. Russ learns that Henrik knew about all of this, gets upset that Henrik didn't tell him, and Henruss have their second breakup in four months. They weren't even together for the first one or arguably this one, but they still, somehow, have two breakups. Typical Henrik relationship, I suppose.

In March, Russ learns that Billie wants to move to Leeds - he and Ami both have relatives who live there, and there's an art college Billie wants to go to. Russ is starting to forgive Henrik now, but then they have an argument where Henrik tells Russ their relationship is all "a fantasy". It's Henrik's way of trying to get Russ to go with Billie, but it's still not exactly nice. Oh, Henrik.

In the finale, Henrik goes to Leeds to see Russ. He says he's there for Russ, they smile at each other, and - that's it. Yes, this is Henrik Hanssen's ending. Has he left Holby to get back together with Russ and move in with him? Has he come to reconcile with Russ and they'll return to Holby together? I hope it's the former, but nothing is explained. Almost two years later, we still don't know.

I'm so sorry for how long all of that was. I tried not to make it too long, but it's still so long. I hope it's a good enough overview.

#Holby City #Henrik Hanssen #asks #anons

[jinxxedmisery]

I just wanted to come here and say, I'm sorry I haven't been active lately.

I haven't gotten around to requests in like months.. thankfully only one is in my inbox right now.

I also haven't been doing a lot of art.. things have happened which I will vent about... because my therapy appointment is over a month away and where else can I vent if not tumblr..

Tw mental health stuff, general health stuff, transphobia, relationship drama.

So happy Pride Month... it's nearly over, I know.. but oh well. Like a lot of people are saying, this pride month feels different.. less safe.. I came out as nonbinary to my family last year and started socially transitioning and I have known I was pansexual since 14.... so this stuff kinda hits hard.,

Even being in Canada it's scary seeing all this hate.. it's not as bad here.. but haha.. I happen to live in Alberta.. half the population here is homophobic, godfearing, truckers, cowboys, and farmers.... so I feel a sense of danger every time I'm open about it..

I went to a parade in my town.. we have a yearly event in June.. it's not pride.. but I kinda treat it as a form of pride.. I wore my pronoun pin badge I bought shortly after I came out. One of the town four churches has a Vacation Bible School program and a woman who is a pastor's wife always every year comes up to me and tells me she wants me to volunteer to help them out and kinda forces me to take an info packet....

Yeah.. this year she looked directly at my pin badge and talked to my parents instead basically pretending I didn't exist which was kinda funny and a huge relief.. hope this stops her from bothering me In the future... I did notice a few people look at it as well and like body block their child... which was so stupid.. istg conservatives think we're the boogeyman or some shit. Also kept getting misgendered... some lady who knew me from my childhood says "oh you've grown into such a beautiful young lady" and I straight up felt ill..

Anyway.. during that event my mother had a medical emergency.. she had a mini stroke.. my mom was very confused wasn't aware of her surroundings.. she's normally super resistant to going to the hospital and will fight you.. but she was so confused she got up, got her shoes on and got into the car and walked into the hospital without a fight...later she nearly punched me in the face while we were trying to hold her down so the nurses could get an IV in.. (they don't have daytime security at the local hospital and they don't have restraints) she said she doesn't remember any of it..,

As for my relationship.. I still have a boyfriend.. he's been pretty busy with work though.. his boss moved him to a super inconvenient schedule 3pm to 9pm.. every single day, no days off..

He's also had so much trouble with his car that it's not even funny. It's all been the coolant.. he thinks he's fixed it though so.. I'm hoping that won't be an issue as much.

So it's been hard for us (especially me.., because.. like my last relationship ended shortly after my ex couldn't make it out to see me.., he did finally admit it was excuses so.. I'd be lying if I didn't say I was afraid of that happening again) but we're enduring it.. he's a sweetheart and has been making time to talk to me after work almost every night until he gets too tired to continue..

It helps a lot.. he makes me feel wanted and he is trying his best to make it work so we can see eachother in person 😊he'll be coming out tomorrow morning and staying until 1pm.. we only get 2 hrs together but it's fine.. any amount of time with him that I get is worth it.

I promised him one day if he's able to visit for longer we'll watch Heathers: The Musical and get slushies... mountain dew, cherry or lime flavored ofc (iykyk) he's into that idea thankfully lol..

it's a requirement that everyone in my life watches Heathers at least once... I've seen it so many times I could almost recite the entire thing... 🤭

But that's all for now, when I get the motivation I will write requests!

[purple-hel]

I am extremely angry with my ex (I might be redirecting sadness). I had to take one of his cats, Leo, to the vet for the last time last night. Leo wasn't mine but he also wasn't NOT mine.

Cut for having to let a pet go on.

Backstory-When ex and I first moved in together, we had a roommate. She had cats. We had cats. Leo was her cat at the time. We lived together for several years, and I loved her cats just like mine, cos that's who I am as a person. Eventually she moved out.

Fast forward about a decade. Ex and I have just just separated. Former roomie is moving overseas and can't take her cats, and asks Ex if he'd like Leo, as Leo and one of our cats, Miranda, were very close when we all lived together. Ex said yes. Only Leo and Miranda no longer got along well, and Leo wouldn't leave ex's bedroom for like 2 years because Miranda would pick on him.

Then I ended up without a place to live in early fall 2019 and staying in ex's guest room for a year, and in pretty short order had Leo and Miranda better socialized. They never got back to their youthful friendship, but they tolerated each other enough that Leo didn't just hide. /Backstory

So, Leo was diagnosed diabetic earlier this year, needed twice daily insulin. I've always been ex's go to cat sitting, since we split, but with Leo needing so much care catsitting had to happen at my place.

The first time I saw the cats after Leo was diagnosed, I was shocked how thin they had *both* gotten. I pointed this out to Ex *repeatedly*, over months, and he kept telling me I was wrong, the vet had said in June they needed to lose weight. But you could feel their ribs! There was NOT an appropriate amount of muscle and fat. But he kept insisting the vet had said in June they needed to lose weight. /Backstory

I hadn't seen the cats in about 2 months. They went to the vet last week and were both diagnosed as having early stage renal issues, probably from the diabetic food. They were supposed to transition to renal food, but the vet only had the wet, not dry, so said keep giving them the dry diabetic, as much as they wanted, and wet renal twice a day. Ex was going home for the holidays, so I was going to have his cats for a week.

I picked them up Wednesday evening. Leo was SO THIN. LITERALLY just skin and bones. Forget *feeling* his ribs, there was *nothing* under his skin except bones. Ex had already left town, so I just brought them to my place. Leo seemed OK at first, but I started to suspect he wasn't eating.

After I gave him his insulin Friday morning, I sat and watched, and he barely ate his wet food. I came back later and it was gone, but no way to know if he ate it or Miranda. So Friday night I sat and *watched*. He didn't eat any of it, and was very lethargic. I didn't give him his insulin (low blood sugar is a lot faster of a danger than high), and gave him some water from canned chicken. He kept sipping it, at least. I called my ex and told him what was going on, and that I thought Leo should go to the vet.

But Ex said 'but they'll just say put him to sleep, right?' I told ex no, vets will try and do whatever you can afford if it could help, but ex spent a lot of money on the trip home, and wanted to wait and see.

I'm pissed at myself I didn't push harder. Maybe it would have made a difference.

I didn't give Leo his insulin at all on Saturday, and kept trying to get him to eat and drink, but he wasn't really. Before I went to bed Saturday night, I checked on him again, and found he'd thrown up and was lying in it. I called ex and said it was time for the vet NOW.

Ex was asleep and tried to argue, couldn't it wait till he got back in a week, until I finally had to SAY I was pretty sure it was either a gentle falling asleep at the vet or me spending hours or days watching Leo die, and I was *not* willing to do that.

So at 3am on Christmas in 7 degrees (my car doors were frozen shut even *with* remote start), I had to go to the emergency vet.

Leo's blood volume was so low they couldn't get his BP. His temp was 95 when it should have been like 102. He had aspirated the throw up. (his glucose was normal tho, so I was right about skipping the insulin at least.) He was *severely* malnourished, and they were side eyeing me until I gave them his history and said I haven't had any say in his care and had been telling Ex he was too thin for months.

So the vet gave me the 'we can try things but it will be extremely expensive and unlikely to have to outcome you want, or we can help him go gently' speech. I had to call and wake my ex *again*, and listen to him complain that this was happening while he was out of town, and had to explain to Ex repeatedly that any other choice was choosing to let Leo suffer. The vet specifically said, several times, that Leo was suffering.

And then I had to be the one to cuddle Leo while they gave him the shots, because my fucking Ex ignored me telling him for 6 months that the cat was too thin, because 'the vet said he needs to lose weight'. And because I didn't insist on taking Leo to get fluids on Friday. Maybe it wouldn't have made a difference, I don't know, and I never will know and that's killing me.

[scamrico]

📞

dealing w customer service DNA

if they see the package did arrive (because they tracked the package) or that the carrier took a picture of it, say one of these:

❀   "I have a feeling it could've been stolen."

* because you don't have cameras so never seen your packages arrive or get stolen

* because you live in an apartment complex (if you really live in an apartment) and get your packages delivered to your door so it's possible it could have been stolen

if you ask if there's picture proof it arrived and they say NO, then say:

❀   "It could've gone to the wrong house."

*because it's common for your packages to be delivered the next block over or to a neighbor

if they say the DATE the package arrived, say:

❀   "I was out of town that week."

*because you were outta town the day it arrived, it could've been stolen

OTHER THINGS TO LET THEM KNOW, IF YOU FEEL THE NEED TO:

1. you've texted you next door neighbors already, asking if they received a package with your name and neither of them did

2. let them know theft is common at in your neighborhood, so it's possible that your package could've been stolen

3. let them know that you don't have cameras because you've never felt the need to install cameras before

TIPS ♡

● Don't mention too many details all at once. You will sound like your trying hard to act clueless and they'll know your making it up.

EX. "Hello I was calling because I never received my package and I have a feeling it could've been stolen, but I don't know for sure because I dont have camera proof because I don't have cameras installed because I never felt the need to."

● Stick to one story. Don't say "I think it was stolen", then later say "but I think my neighbors could've got the package." This type of inconsistency could encourage them to investigate.

● If a company does investigate with the carrier, then you'll want to wait at least three-four months to DNA again. It'll look suspicious to the carrier when your address is being investigated to often. This could lead to a felony on your record if you'renot careful!

🥷🏻

This is my first "advice" post because I've been getting into DNA, so I thought I would make a hopefully helpful post for someone who needs it. Haven't seen a post with advice on what to say when you talk to customer service which is why I chose to do one. In this post I included some specific things to say so you can stay calm and collected. The reason I made this post is because imo doing these things help you avoid investigation, even if it's part of the company's policy.

Good Luck 🍸

ABOUT ME:

• TX USA

• LATINA, ARAB & JAPANESE

• BABY L*FTER SINCE JUNE 2021

[thegyusorcerer]

I've been inspired by @asexualone to do a post like this one so shoutout to them for the idea 💡

Signs I should've known I was an aroace lesbian long ago: ⚘

What's an aroace lesbian you ask? Well, every aspec lesbian has a different experience. I, personally, define it as experiencing little to no romantic & sexual attraction (aspec) but still feeling some kind of attraction to women & desiring a relationship with one 🌸

Disclaimer: these have no particular order, I'll just write down all that come to mind first.

Growing up, when watching movies & TV shows I always focused more on the girls and always said I wanted to be their friends and be in awe of how pretty they were.

After watching Avengers in 2012 I was SO obsessed with Scarleth Johansson that I went and watched every single movie I could where she starred. Hence my divergent obsession months later 😂

I can recall at least 3 girls I was obsessed with, during elemtary school. I wanted to be their friend and play with them and have them pay attention to me only etc etc... this never happened with a boy ☠

In middle school, when all my classmates where obsessed with Nick Jonas and Channing Tatum, I remember wanting to "fit in" and went on Pinterest, created a board for "celebrity crushes" and added every single guy I could think of.... not an hour later I was deleting said board because I just didn't get the appeal 😭

I went to an all girls elementary/middle school. Nothing else to add 🤭

I never get crushes, like I have literally never seen someone and thought I'd date them or they'd make a good partner. Nope. Not even girls, like I would KNOW if it was romantic or not. BUT I've always had squishes and mistook them for crushes, and only on girls... 😬 I have met girls and instantly felt a very strong attraction and feeling like I'd do anything for them and wanting to spent all the time I can around them; someone should've told me about aromanticism honestly 😂 Like I can't remember this happening with boys, like an intense interest in them. Never 💀

Fast-foward to high school, I met this girl at church (2 years older than me) who I just connected with instantly and we became super close, we would spent all the services and youth activities together, we talked about literally anything and everything. we were very affectionate physically (which is something I never do with anyone bc I'm touch averse) and I was totally okay with it. One of the best friendships I've ever had 💖 and also the one I miss the most bc were no longer that close due to college and her moving out of town :((

Teenage years: I was never interested in dating boys (I would find any random excuse to not have to go out with the ones that asked me out) and I was always seen as the "weird" one bc of it. I remember telling a friend one day that I would much rather spent the day with her than go out with X guy 🤡

I never understood kisses like it seemed weird to me how you smash your mouth with someone else's. But when watching a kiss play in a movie or show I NEVER, never payed attention to the guy and only focus on the girl 💀 and I didn't question this like ??? June you're a bit 💅

Had this conversation with a guy friend once: "girls are obviously prettier than men" and he was like "I know, right" like, bro didn't even question my outwardly gay comment lol 👀

I've never seen someone and thought "I'd fck that." I have never felt sexual attraction. I'm ✨ ace ✨ but I remember once when I saw this girl in a coffee shop and having a full on gay panic bc WHY is she so pretty (note that during this moment I was very religious so it made me develop some internalized homophobia 😐).

Had a family member once ask me "so where's the boyfriend?" To which I answered "there's isn't one." & then "and a girlfriend?" And I was so lost like: there isn't one either 😅? Now that I think about it, my family probably suspects I'm a lesbian lol.

In high school, I had this mini-obsession with a girl & I thought she was the prettiest girl in the classroom, I always felt nervous around her. Once I got assigned a seat next to her for a whole semester and we became good friends 🤭 I was always excited to go to the class where I would be next to her.

When I read Loveless by Alice Oseman I full on thought "WHY DID SHE LITERALLY WRITE MY STORY THO" bc I could relate TOO MUCH to the mc, Georgia 🥰 but it also confused me a lot bc I related to some comments Pip (Georgia's lesbian bff) said about being too close with girl friends and stuff...

I remember deciding I will never get married when I was like 17 and much rather spent my adult years traveling around the world with my girl best friend ☺

When I found out I was asexual I remember telling my sister "I still want a partner though... and I wouldn't mind if they were a girl." UM EXCUSE ME 😳 yeah and I still didn't consider my attraction to women for like 5 months later 😂😂😂

In conclusion, I should've realized a bit earlier that I'm aspec (belong in ace and aro spectrums) & a lesbian. I hope this was at least fun to read 💕

#aro #ace #lesbian #signs I should've known #aspec lesbian edition #storytime #aspec #aromantic #asexual #sapphic #aroace wlw #aroace

[bryan360]

My reactions through my Nintendo E3 2021’s highlight picks

Hey guys! You know me from what been checking on E3 announcement last week. I even did my other posts to mention it of 🐰Mario + Rabbits sequel game and 🏁🏎Forza Horizon 5 as my interests picks.

June. 13th, 2021 - Link Here

June. 14th, 2021 - Link Here #2

Now it's finally time that I can talk through Nintendo E3 2021's announcement of games and content; after reveals back in June 15th that I should've bring this sooner, but due to working on my other tasks that I'm gonna save it til today. Hoping that I had time for free time to explain of what I feel for Nintendo E3 2021 Direct reveal for this month of June; especially which one that I finding most interested so I could added through my wishlist on eShop app. So today, here's my interesting picks for Nintendo E3 reveal this year; whether you agreed or disagree of how it goes when you suggest other was. I know if everyone so close to look forward the Switch Pro reveal, but it seems that it didn't happen anytime soon. Anyways, now get into my picks that I screenshot and edited through last week's Nintendo Direct I've managed.

First top left - ✊😈Kazuya Mishima joining Super Smash Bros Ultimate

First off, I knew that there will be at least one Super Smash Bros DLC Fighter reveal; before saving the last one for coming months this year soon. What's really unexpected to see though is a second Bandai Namco fighter after 👻PAC-MAN, but sadly its not Lloyd that if everyone hoping he would've upgraded from a Mii Costume to a true fighter yet. (Like we ever getting another sword fighter once again. 😒) No, it was actually ✊😈Kazuya Mishima from the Tekken series. My reaction was caught my attention since it started when he carrying Ganondorf to the lava pit and so does other fighters that is really dark. Except for Kirby that thankfully knows how to get away, but still. If I remember his origin through reading wiki site though, at time he used to be good until his father Heihachi sees him as his weakness. Later when Heihachi kills one of the family members that Kazuya been fond of and being thrown by his father in the cliff until he eventually climbs back up when his devil gene activates. Ever since then, Kazuya is now antagonist for the recent Tekken games so far and seeing him to match fight against Smash was an unexpected sight. I remember the time after hearing Masahiro Sakurai's interview where he consider Heihachi to be playable for Smash 4, but pass over due to implement his moveset to be difficult. But here we are seeing for Kazuya instead that it really sure takes time to deliver. After his moveset through his reveal could be challenging to work it out on command. Let's just wait to figure out once Sakurai will finally bring us his next presentation next week, but for now knowing this Tekken fighter joining Smash was a unique idea that Sakurai managed to work it out.

Second top right - 🌟Mario Party Super Stars

How about that when where seeing the next Mario Party game brings us? Despite the recent 2018 Super Mario Party, this will be the twelfth installment to be heading Nintendo Switch this year's 🎃October 2021; this time having 100 remastered minigames like I've seen them before on previous Mario Party games. My reaction was good to see how it continues on, but sure miss that time I remember from my childhood for the original first Mario Party game on the N64 console. So what's get me attention is the recognized boards such as 👑🎂Peach's Birthday Cake makes a comeback! It looks the way that I remember from playing the N64 game when the layouts off frosting goodness and the song to match as well. It was really something when it comes from Nintendo and their past N64 games I have memories fond of. 🙂👍🏼

I give this Nintendo a good move when trying to bring back Mario Party again as a E3 reveal, but maybe just maybe if it will be this good from previous Mario Party games in terms of selling copies. Who knows? *Shrug*

Third middle left - Metroid Dread

However, if you really looking forward a new Nintendo game coming to October 2021 early is a most recognized franchise making a return....meanwhile Metroid Prime 4 is still in development. At least knowing this game can take us time before the fourth prime game can be finished, but man that everyone went crazy after the reveal of Metroid Dread! It the return of 2D Metroid game in action after the success of Samus Return for 3DS back in September 2017. My reaction was surprised and impressive for the looks and feels about this game's tone; especially the haunting part where the robot named "EMMI" (but don't be confused with the word Emmy as an Emmy Award like if would funny. 😅) trying to catch up with Samus and it's game over....😵 I think I could add this into my wishlist and it would be the first time I'll be owning this Metroid game for my Switch system. Fact: Metroid Dread was originally plan as a Nintendo DS title way back in mid 2000s, but sadly being cancelled due to technical limitations.

Fourth middle right - 💣WarioWare Get It Together

I was hoping if Warioware could come back for the lastest Switch system and they finally called. However, this game will take a different approach than doing minigames of yourself, but with your characters do it for you. For this latest Warioware game of picking noses, it'll be having one of the characters such as Wario, Mona, Jimmy T, 9-Volt, and others to do on all minigames with their strengths and skills they can managed. My reaction was pretty good knowing that Nintendo is making this a unique idea than doing a same microgame gameplay style from previous ones, but in a fun way. Cross my fingers if I'll be saving this as a digital download version. Like that time I actually got "Warioware Touched!" for my 2DS/3DS handheld system back in April 2016, but sadly lost it of deletion unfortunately....😧 Link Here #3

Fifth middle bottom - Game & Watch The Legend of Zelda

And finally is something that we're hoping to expect during almost halftime of their E3 direct reveal. Knowing this year is The Legend of Zelda 35th Anniversary, you probably hoping they can bring something to celebrate one of the most recognized series run. While it was shocking to know they won't be having plans to do; even for me that I finding baffling for Nintendo would do this. At least they wanted to make up for it by having to released the HD remastered version of Skyward Sword coming next month and giving us a second look for the upcoming Breath of the Wild sequel until it'll be released next year....eventually. What's my pick though is the Game & Watch version for The Legend of Zelda; the same thing of what it made for Super Mario and during its 35th Anniversary run last year. For this next one will have 3 related Zelda games: 1987 original, Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, and a special Game and Watch version of Vermin, but playing as Link as he trying to clobbered the octoroks instead of moles. Looks like it'll be a different take from what the Super Mario version have, but hoping it won't be the limited edition once maybe I could get one of those a try. So for my reaction was pretty alright. 🙂👍🏼

Overall:

Man that is the list for my interests picks I gotten, but after watching Nintendo E3 Direct for this year sure worth it at the end. It was very impressive direct despite of absent games not being showed like Bayonette 3 or Metroid Prime 4, but with other announcements such as Metroid Dread and Mario Party Super Stars does give us something for the win.

What did you think about this list of my interesting picks for Nintendo E3, though? Give yourself some likes and reblogs for this post I bring. Anyways, I'm just gonna check on my P-Pal's secret art trade part for me that I should've done it early. Sorry about making this post that I took hours to finished, @murumokirby360

#screenshots #edited #youtube #video #e3 2021 #nintendo #nintendo e3 2021 #kazuya #kazuya mishima #tekken #super smash bros ultimate #mario party superstars #metroid dread #warioware get it together #the legend of zelda #game and watch #june 2021 #june 24th 2021

[gunnerpalace]

hey there! so i used to be a huge fan of bleach, and loved ichiruki, and i was reminded of them today but i haven't been involved with the fandom since the series ended. however, i've heard of different variations of why the series ended/ships happened the way they did, and was wondering if you knew or could direct to me a post that explains that? i apologize if i'm bringing up bitter feelings, but i've always been curious if bleach's ending was a big FU from kubo or if he always intended rr/ih

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a post that really goes over it structurally in that kind of way (from a shipping perspective). I’ll get back to what you actually asked me after some asides, because it’s not so simple to just analyze the ships in a vacuum.

I’ve had my own post about why the ending was a fuck you moment, thematically, because it failed to resolve any of the themes and momentum of the series in a way that would be appropriate (either internally or in the context of the supposed genre of shounen.)

I would also say that the ending was a fuck you moment in terms of lore, backstory, and mystery, because all of the historical and political dimensions (i.e., things involving the Soul King and Great Houses) were unceremoniously shuffled off to Can’t Fear Your Own World. Not that any of those things were ever brought up properly in the manga to begin with; the proper and natural time for that would’ve been at the conclusion of the Soul Society arc, when Ichigo and co. spent a week there, which we saw none of. So I would say that everything in CFYOW is basically retconned bullshit hung off prior convenient plot hooks, and that the same was true of TYBW and LSS/TLA/Xcution as well. There may have been some notes and forethought, but it’s about as “valid” as Kevin J. Anderson and Brian Herbert’s Dune works are compared to the original Frank Herbert ones; it’s second-hand, at best.

(This is setting aside that Bleach was clearly made up as it went along. For example: Noriaki literally admitted that he didn’t know who had killed Aizen in Soul Society until he realized that Aizen not being dead was the most shocking answer; the clear baiting and abandonment of Kisuke as the villain hinted at through various means such as his unclear and later retconned reasons for being exiled, and so on. Bleach was very much a J. J. Abrams-style mystery box work that was made as it went with, at best, rough notes, which is why its themes and focus change, for the worse. I also have a post about why it stopped being special, which is part of a running series I intend to write on how to rewrite it to fix and preserve that)

The best recent thing to compare it to is, really, HBO’s adaptation of Game of Thrones, wherein D. B. Weiss and David Benioff openly admitted to removing or deemphasizing story elements, and ignoring themes in adapting the work. The difference is that Bleach was not being adapted from anything; it degraded due to its own creator not understanding what he had created.

(To put it very simply, because this would be the point of Hyperchlorate Part II and would take a whole post to explain: the ending of the Soul Society arc did not properly establish and flesh out Soul Society as a place with a history, space, and purpose. Instead, the Arrancar and Hueco Mundo arcs decided to be a thematic inversion and deconstruction of the Karakura and Soul Society arcs. This again had an ending that did not establish or flesh anything out after Aizen’s defeat, with an even greater diffusion of focus onto ancillary characters. The Xcution arc tripled down on this by addressing something entirely new and retconned in, only to abandon it midway through in favor of going back to invoking Soul Society. And Thousand-Year Blood War took all of these problems to 11. tl;dr: Noriaki tried themes, people hated it, and so he just shoved in more and more dumb sword fights between people nobody cared about, half of whom hadn’t previously existed.)

So, let’s get back to your question. Let’s talk about ships. I’ve clicked a lot of keys and spilled a lot of ink on this subject over the years, but I no longer particularly feel like searching my own archives (really ought to go back through and organize them better) beyond this post and my own follow-up to it about the chronology of IR interactions, so I’m just going to repeat myself.

First, let’s say that Bleach was not ever a manga about ships.

I’m not disavowing that what Rukia and Ichigo had was special. That was called out multiple times through the focus of the art, the dialogue, and by the characters themselves. (Directly by, for example, Orihime’s outright statement to the effect in Soul Society, and her later jealousy regarding it. Indirectly by, say, Uryuu’s acknowledgement that him saving Rukia first would piss Ichigo off. In fact, the biggest indirect indicator doesn’t even involve Ichigo and Rukia; Shunsui asks Chad why he’s there and Chad says he wants to save Rukia, Shunsui calls bullshit that two months isn’t enough time to risk your life for that, and Chad agrees and says he’s there because Ichigo wants to do it. Shunsui moves on, but his argument is left hanging: why was two months enough for Ichigo? Because, as Orihime will later say out loud, Rukia is special.)

What I’m saying is that that was never the focus. It was explicitly constructed that way.

How do I know? The Grand Fisher fight. The Grand Fisher fight is emotionally charged, bringing up both Ichigo and Rukia’s greatest traumas, and is their one real moment of not understanding each other for a time. It was a triumphant moment that made them truly glad to know one another, and you can see it in their reactions afterward (Rukia thanking Ichigo for not dying, Ichigo asking Rukia if he can keep being a Shinigami). There was a lot to unpack there, and you can see it in the way they look at each other.

What happened immediately after the Grand Fisher fight? Noriaki skipped a whole month. We go from June 18th of 2001 to July 17th of 2001. He deliberately skipped all of the emotional impact of that event, and Rukia being around for Ichigo’s 16th birthday. Just never happened. We never hear about it. Wasn’t his focus as a writer.

Now, I’m convinced that was because he was scared of what he had on his hands. He wasn’t willing to commit to either a couple’s battle shoujo or a shounen with male and female seemingly-heterosexual co-equal deuteragonists who clearly had a strong emotional bond. More specifically, he wasn’t willing to make Rukia a centerpiece of the manga despite having designed her first, having made her the moral and philosophical core of his manga, and having based Ichigo entirely around completing and complementing her. But hey, that’s just my opinion, right? Except it kept happening.

From the Grand Fisher fight onward, the name of the game in the manga, structurally, became keeping Ichigo and Rukia apart.

The moment she was taken back to Soul Society, her prominence dropped. We got emotionally charged scenes of them regardless. Right at the conclusion, after yet another emotionally heavy set of Ichigo and Rukia interactions, we again skip almost a month, from the end of the first week in August of 2001 to September 1, 2001. (Due to some completely unnecessary timey-wimey bullshit with the Precipice World.)

In the Arrancar and Hueco Mundo arcs, they have roughly a day together over the course of three months. What happens after every meeting? They’re shuffled apart and split up, and we cut away. This time, for over a year!

Ichigo and Rukia again have a very emotionally charged meeting in the Xcution arc. And what happens at the end of that arc? We skip ahead another month to TYBW. (Xcution ended sometime in May of 2003, TYBW starts June 11, 2003.)

And in TYBW, Rukia and Ichigo barely meet up at all. Indeed, the focus is scarcely upon them.

In CFYOW, neither of them even appear, let alone have any relevance to the plot.

The implication, in my opinion, is pretty obvious: Noriaki was deathly afraid of dealing with the outcomes of their interactions, and that ultimately became him being deathly afraid of allowing them to interact at all to begin with. Why? Well, as I said in one of the last linked posts:

As an author, sometimes you will find your characters will do things you didn’t anticipate or plan for, and you’ve got two choices: you can go with the flow and do what’s natural and deal, or you can fight it and try and impose your vision anyway.

He refused to let his art take the direction it needed to go in.

Now, some people might say he got bored of them, or of having them together. I say that’s bullshit. And the reason I say is down to three things:

He didn’t ignore them, he did his best to keep them apart. I outlined this above.

He did not emphasize anything or anyone else instead. His focus was all over the place. While, admittedly, Ichigo’s prominence also declined, so did everyone else’s.

It would have served him well to focus on their interactions to expand his universe and explore its lore. The things that were detailed in the databooks and CFYOW could’ve been presented naturally and easily if they were together. But that came with a cost of shifting the focus. A cost he refused to pay.

Let’s talk more about (2) and (3) now.

Regarding (2), Chad and Orihime are inextricably linked in Bleach, because they essentially have the same relationship to Ichigo. “But Orihime loves Ichigo, and Chad is his no-homo bro!” someone proclaims. So what? They’re presented as equal and parallel at every step.

They both gain their powers at approximately the same time.

We are told they gained their powers due to the Hogyouku (in Rukia at the time) interpreting their wishes (and no one else’s, such as Tatsuki, Keigo, or Mizuiro), meaning they probably had the same strength of desire.

They both go to Soul Society “for Ichigo.”

They both utterly fail against Yammy and Ulquiorra.

They both spend most of the Hueco Mundo arc doing nothing.

They are both featured prominently in the Xcution arc, and both fail to see through Tsukishima’s powers despite their love for Ichigo. (Meanwhile, Byakuya coolly tries to murder someone who he thinks is his mentor, in Ichigo’s name.)

They both get sidelined in Hueco Mundo with Kisuke in TYBW, doing little to nothing.

They both are utterly ineffectual in the final fight in TYBW.

They are often portrayed together, they are often as effective as one another, and they are equally as developed in their relationship to Ichigo going forward, which is to say: not at all. The loss of focus on IR did not come with an attendant rise of focus on IH, any more than it did with the sudden rise of IchiChad. Nothing was built in IR’s place. There was no emotional or human content which filled its gap.

This is where the IH ending coming “out of nowhere” stems from: it indeed came out of nowhere, because Ichigo was never shown to have any interest in Orihime in all this time, nor an especially close relationship with her. He never hangs out with Chad or shows a bond with him either. He never hangs out with anyone, in fact. (Indeed, “friends” in Bleach do not do any of the things that friends actually do in real life. Nor do parents. You might say that interpersonal relationships and communication largely don’t exist in Bleach. But that’s its whole own topic.)

I would honestly say that more time and emphasis was given on Ichigo’s pseudo-surrogate mother relationship with Ikumi than was spent on him interacting with Orihime. (I would say Noriaki has serious hangups about relationships of any kind, be they romantic, familial, or friendly, and also has some severe hangups regarding mothers and fathers, but that is also its whole own topic.)

Regarding (3), Noriaki apparently wanted this big, Game of Thrones-style world with a long history and political machinations and so on. This is the whole point of TYBW and CFYOW. Trouble is, early Bleach was successful because of its small-scale intimacy. So how do you go from one to the other? You have to lay the foundations at every step. And Noriaki steadfastly refused to do so at every step. Having Ichigo and Rukia interact, and focusing on Rukia while Ichigo was sidelined without powers, would’ve permitted that organically. Indeed, if RR was the endgame, it would have given time to establish that, were it his desire. (Because Rukia never showed any interest in Renji, and frankly Renji always seemed way more preoccupied with Byakuya.) It didn’t serve his goals, but he did it anyway.

It’s much simpler to say he lost focus, and that he started to hate the manga as a whole. Why else would you have Mayuri fighting a giant hand when that achieved nothing, and Kenpachi fighting Thor when that achieved nothing? It became empty. Hollow, you might say.

But that takes us back to the question you posed: where did the ships come from? Nowhere. IH, RR, and fucking TatsuKeigo weren’t established anywhere. They just appeared. Why?

Well, why did every single character wind up doing the exact opposite of their intended and stated goals in the end?

Why did Soul Society revert to its previous attitude and rebuild the Sokyouku?

Why did nothing get resolved?

Why did nothing change?

Why was it all revealed to have been completely and utterly pointless?

In my view, it’s because that ending was a giant fuck you to the readership and Shueisha. There is no other way to interpret an author pulling a 180° and completely nullifying their characters’ arcs, and their work’s themes. Aizen’s little speech at the end is the cherry on top. I read it as Noriaki saying that he’s showing “courage” in telling us all to fuck off.

As to why? That’s an open question. His relationship with Shueisha was contentious, so maybe he was mad at them. (They gave him a deadline once he was dragging his feet, and reclassified Bleach as a joke manga.) His readership was on the decline after the Soul Society arc ended, so maybe he was mad at the audience. I don’t know. I also don’t really care. What I am convinced of is he decided to blow up his franchise and to not leave a single stone unturned when he did so.

That’s where that “ending” comes from, which is why despite it featuring IH and RR, both are thoroughly unsatisfying and without setup: it was the only way to piss absolutely everyone off, including people who wanted that outcome.

In a way, it was his greatest success since the early days of the manga.

Anyway, this was messy, but it’s not a simple topic to address. The tl;dr is that Bleach was a trainwreck from the very beginning that only succeeded on the merits of its characters, and that Noriaki deliberately avoided the promise it had to be something unique and grand. The ships are just a part of that, and cannot be understood in isolation from it.

#Asks #Bleach

[bisluthq]

I think it's interesting that you've got this fairly hard stance of "shawn m*ndes is a homophobe" when it seems a lot more likely that he's literally just... gay. (or maybe bisexual) 😬

I mean the dude literally had a panic attack while he was watching love simon in the movie theatre. he had to leave the movie theatre early, and then he went back to his hotel room and stayed up until 3am, reading fan tweets about his new song to calm himself down and ended up crying his eyes out. I can't tell you how many times I've done things like that

he accidentally included himself in the lgbt community in an interview once and then realized and sort of had a deer in caught in headlights look on his face.

he has a pink triangle mug that he drinks from at Q&A sessions

he's been rumored to have had a thing with nick jonas, john mayer, and niall from 1D. the niall rumor has the most evidence though out of the three, and a lot of people think something might have actually gone on there

also, I don't think he's as homophobic as he sounded back then bc there have been incidents like the time when he was in a club with niall and a couple of other guys, and a guy walked past and shouted, "best gay club ever!" at them, and shawn just smiled and laughed. he didn't look bothered at all. I feel like that rolling stone article was mainly him being an idiot and also his team's attempt at guilting people into not calling him gay anymore

some of his song lyrics are pretty sus and can be read as pretty gay, whether that was the intention or not. like "I wonder if I'm being real, do I speak my truth or do I filter how I feel? I wonder, wouldn't it be nice, to live inside a world that isn't black and white?"

he said he felt like he needed to be seen with a woman publicly so that people wouldn't think he was gay, and then 💥 BOOM 💥 next thing you know, he's getting papped with camila everywhere

and there are a lot of things about that relationship that are extremely sus. I don't really have the energy to mention them all bc I don't really care about them enough, but I've seen a ton of stuff pointed out by other people, and they've slipped up countless times too

also about why they would be doing it: even on the chance that he's straight, shawn and his team have been trying to get rid of his gay rumors for a long time. and most of the general public still thought he was gay and just bearding during almost all of 2020. it's only in the last few months that people have finally started saying "okay, maybe it's real and shawn is straight if it's gone on this long"

there was also this blind that was posted on laine gossip back in august 2019 (so 2 or 3 months after it first began)

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.laineygossip.com/what-they-know-in-advance-blind-riddle/57429/amp

which basically said that one of the two members of sh*wmila was secretly working on a huge project behind the scenes and that the producers had been told that the other one had agreed to make appearances in it, and they had promised the producers 100%, without any doubt whatsoever, that they could guarantee them that would be no change in their relationship status until the project was released 12 to 18 months later. that led to a lot of skepticism on the relationship's authenticity from people working on the project

sure enough, about a year later, shawn eventually announced that he'd been secretly working on a netflix documentary. it was released in the time frame that laine gossip gave (the next 12 to 18 months), and camila was in a few scenes, and sh*wmila was used as promotion for the documentary a lot (like in the trailers and stuff). it was only released a few months ago in late november 2020

I've seen fans of theirs saying they think they might wait until the 2 year anniversary to "break up" which is like... may/june/july 2021. somewhere around that time, I can't remember exactly. and camila has a movie coming out around that time too, so it'd make sense to do it around then

like they've got a lot of publicity from this, the laine gossip blind was proven right a year and a half later when shawn surprise announced his documentary, and it's only bc they've stretched it out this long that a lot of people have finally stopped saying it's just PR. if they'd stopped it back in late 2020, a lot of people were still saying it was fake back then

I don't actually like shawn btw. I think he seems like a nice guy based on the stories about him from deuxmoi (if they're true), but he kinda annoys me and I think he's a very bare minimum guy that is only as famous as he is bc he's white and male and somewhat conventionally good looking. I don't think he's that talented, and some of his dumbass comments bother me sometimes

that being said, I do feel empathy for him bc he really does seem closeted, and he hasn't made any stupid comments on being gay since late 2018, so I think he might have realized he sounded like a harmful idiot. I do think he's closeted, and there's a lot more evidence to point towards that than towards him being a straight homophobe

Okay but in December 2020 she said being called gay caused him damage and was frustrating:

(Source).

In 2019 he said being called gay is hurtful:

(Source).

And here’s a great take from a gay man on why this shit’s fucked up:

I’m sorry but I’m not gonna be like “Awww maybe he’s gay”. He says he’s not. He does damage by denying it in the way he does.

Sure he could be in Narnia. I’m not Shawn.

If that’s the case, he should get some therapy and/or stfu.

#nat talks shawn mendes

[florbelles]

❄️🔪🍂 for Lyra! Had to go ahead and get the sad one out of the way first, because I've come to accept that it is simply part of the Lyra experience whenever I ask these things. (The date is June 17, 2020 and I still have not recovered from "yes, darling, I know he's dead, do you think that makes me love him less?")

thank you lovely 💕 when i said i’d answer this in five to six business days i was fully joking but i’m pretty sure it has now in fact been five to six business days. embarrassing

❄️ What makes your OC sad, so sad that they can’t help but cry all day? How do they cheer themself up? Does their sadness upset any of their loved ones too?

we’re gonna subvert expectations, no dead husbands shall appear in this answer! 💕 

lyra would tell you it's cheap whiskey and gas station sushi and hope county street style, but honestly, she just desperately wants to be liked and loved and accepted, so rejection in any form -- from anyone, even those sinners and nonbelievers, even her sworn enemies -- wounds her. (she’s really out here at 3am like john? john are you up? because i don't think hurk sr likes me, he was extremely rude today while i was threatening him in his home)

(the rest is going under a cut because tolstoy has nothing on me. tw for references to lyra typical self-destructive behavior, drug, sex, alcohol, serial murder mentions)

having said that, it doesn't normally affect her -- she doesn't care or think enough of most people for it to have a lasting impact, and it just increases animosity and disdain where it already existed. when it is someone she cares about, though, or comes from someone who’s meant to care about her, it's emotionally devastating.

the most extreme instance came in the form of her parents disinheriting her when she was 16 years old. it was a formality more than anything else -- she was nearly 17, she’d run off the year before and cut off all contact -- and in many ways she’d expected or even attempted to deliberately provoke it, since it would force them to acknowledge what she’d always known, that they didn't see, know, or care about her. it was impossible for them to love her; her father was a narcissist who prized her insofar as he could project onto her as a version of himself, and her mother was so far gone on designer drugs she was apathetic to nearly everything else, her unwanted trophy daughter most of all.

still, receiving confirmation in the form of a notice that caught up to her while she was crashing at one of her favored ex girlfriends' family home -- that they went to that effort just to ensure she knew they no longer recognized her as their daughter -- gutted her. later she’d say that it was what she’d wanted, that they were already dead to her, and thank fucking christ she wasn't a member of that sick miserable family any longer. in actuality, she locked herself in the guest bedroom, curled into herself on the floor, and cried for three days straight.

and then she stopped.

she doesn't get cheered up, honestly, she just has to go through straight through it. if there's an action she can take or vengeance she can exact somehow, she’s eventually able to drag herself out of the comatose state she goes into when she’s grieving; lyra feels everything very deeply, so she’s physically crippled by emotional pain in a way that she never is by external injuries. (break her leg and she’ll drag it behind her, but if her heart’s broken, she won't walk for a week.) because of that, she absolutely tries to fight emotional pain with physical pain -- she doesn't self-harm in a direct way, but she does seek out risky or destructive behaviors (trysts in back alleys with strangers, binge drinking, drug use, getting in fights, reckless driving) until she finds somewhere else to channel that energy. god help anyone who's in her way when she does.

🔪 Has your OC ever killed someone? Ever had to defend themselves against violence? How did this make them feel? Or, alternatively, has your OC ever attacked someone? Seen someone die?

no,  lyra has never killed anyone in her life, why???

she killed seven men before she came to hope county. the first was a known predator at the strip club where she worked when she was 18 -- she propositioned him and then stuck a knife in his throat.

she fully believed that she was acting in defense in all seven instances, albeit not necessarily her own. each of the men she killed were especially dangerous or vile predators/abusers/otherwise corrupt and exploitative who were considered untouchable -- to the law, maybe, but not to her. (she never killed the relatively harmless philanderers who made up most of her targets; she just seduced, robbed and humiliated them).

her last kill before she flees to montana -- the reason she flees to montana, in fact -- is the man in idaho, and it’s a huge fucking mistake, one that almost gets her caught. it’s messy and impulsive and she does it because she’s shaken up and triggered af from her recent vegas trip. she’s fully spiraling. like this can't be it, this can't be all there is, this can't be all i am, this can't be all that's left for me, and part of her Wants to get caught on a subliminal level; some part of her Wants to die just to have an end. she’s tired. she’s jaded. she was at that gas station where she found him in the first place buying two bottles of tequila, but then she could just Feel the way he watched her and kind of hovered over her and she just. left the bottles on the counter and followed him out the door and stalked him for deadass fifty miles until he finally pulled off at a truck stop.

that and her first kill mirror each other in that they weren't calculated and she did it in a Rage.  she was purely driven by anger and hatred and adrenaline, she was shaking, her body just completely Flooded itself and so honestly? she’s a little hysterical about it -- both times she started to sob at first and then she just. laughed, she couldn't stop laughing, and that’s the only time she’s truly afraid of herself. usually she doesn't feel anything but relief and vindication when she kills; she’s doing it for a reason and she believes she’s justified so she doesn't feel any haunting guilt. she’s like this is what i am, this is what i can do, this is how i can be good even though everyone has always told me i was born bad -- maybe i was but maybe i can use that, maybe i can do what others can't

obviously in the holy war of 2018 she kills Hundreds of people, both heretics and defecting (or potentially defecting) peggies. she doesn't feel remorse about any of that tbh, she never will. she was protecting her family, it's not a question to her, it's not something she has to think about

🍂 What are their opinions on the different seasons? Which one do they hate and which one do they love and why?

lyra loves the summer best. she always has. as a girl,  summers were when she was home and could at least pretend her family wanted her, and if nothing else, she could go run free and become a menace on the island. she first ran away in the summer, she found her home in hope county in the summer, she fell in love in the summer.

(also homegirl's wardrobe is like. entirely sheer dresses with high slits and bare arms and plunging necklines she floats through life in silk and tulle and lace and strappy stilettos and she’s happiest in the sun out lying in a meadow or wading through the river or leaning out the side of her car with the windows and/or top down do you really think this bitch thrives in the colder months)

she’s a daughter of spring, she was born mid-march, and she does love it -- she’s a flower hoe, she likes watching the world come back to life and the smell of blossoms in the breeze and the crisp air in the mornings

same with fall, she loves her bonfires and hot coffee and her furs and her cider. she got married in the fall, the best months of her life were in the fall. she lost her heart in the fall. she dies in the fall.

winter can go fuck itself

i jest she thinks the snow is pretty aesthetically and she likes holiday events & attire & traditions and mulled wine and chestnut praline lattes and her furs are lovely and expensive and she might as well break them out, but the cold is Not her friend and neither is the snow. like. does a bitch look like she shovels. do you think she owns snow boots, do you think she owns thermal clothing,  no she does Not so overall winter gets like a 2/10

#answered #risenlucifer #oc: lyra fairbanks

[timeaftertime-chriscornellfanfic]

Chapter 4 - Disappearing One

Toronto Ontario Canada, January 31 1972

Andi

"But John this is crazy... there's got to be some way to explain this,"

"Cathy, just relax. Andrea's  fine see? She's in her playpen, no harm done,"

"But I swear she wasn't there a second ago,"

The sound of my mother's voice filled with worry, echo throughout the living room as my father desperately tries to explain just where I've been for the last 8 minutes. If there was a way that I could explain with actual words, since I can't quite make out full sentences yet, I would just tell my mother that I was only just upstairs but 1 year before this current time.

Yes, I know it probably sounds crazy, and completely confusing so allow me to explain.

Ever since I can remember, which is pretty far back mind you, I've somehow been able to slip through time. I still can't quite put my finger on what actually causes me to do so but it's usually only for just a few minutes. As I got older, the length of time that I would slip increased from just a few minutes, hours to eventually days and weeks, even years.

Now I know what you're thinking... "How does one slip through time?"

It should be easy to explain the process but really, unless you've experienced it yourself it's hard to explain just exactly what happens. At first it feels like the most euphoric sensation you can think of. Like you're purely at peace with yourself, like nothing else in the world means anything anymore. Then it changes to nausea and dizziness like you just drank a 40 of Jack Daniels so fast it could make your head spin. Then, just like that, everything goes black and suddenly I'm somewhere else, naked and alone, trying to find clothes, shelter anything to protect myself.

When I was younger and I would time slip, most of the time I would just end up somewhere else in the house only it could be either 30 minutes before, or as far back as actually seeing my mother pregnant with me.

Yes I have gone back in time and met myself before. It's not a regular occurrence mind you, but It's pretty much how I taught myself to pick locks when I needed to and find the right places to hide if I so happened to end up in the middle of a sticky situation. Most of the time I was alright though. Most people, when they see a naked girl on the street, they try to help as much as they can rather than the opposite so for that I'm thankful.

Now I know most people would think "Well how the hell does that happen? What about the grandfather effect, the butterfly effect and all the other effects of nature that rule against the fact that you can go back in time?"

Well to tell you the truth, I don't know. It's not something I can explain. I can only say that I've only ever been able to travel as far back within my own life time. I can't go back and see the amazing symphonies that Beethoven wrote nor, go back as far to stop World War 2.

Meeting a your future self is something that's amazing and strange at the same time. Every time it would happen, my younger self always knew it was my older self. My older self knew not to tell my younger self about the future, but gave me useful tools like lock picking so that I could protect myself. I was very careful at not disrupting anything that could alter my future for the worse. And... like I said, it was very few and far between that I met up with myself anyways.

"Cathy, I think you're just imagining it,"

"John, I know what I saw. I set Andrea in her playpen turned around to grab her bottle and when I turned back she was gone,"

My father then walks over to me, his boots thudding against the hardwood floor. He picks me up, brushing a few curls out of my face while I smile at him and he places a kiss on my little forehead. Leaning into him, I giggle, resting my head on his shoulder, my little fingers playing with the shaggy curls of his dark golden hair that rest just at his shoulders, and that familiar smell of Aqua Velva after shave filling my nostrils with delight.

"What were you up to baby girl?"

His deep voice vibrates through my little frame and all I could manage was a giggle.

"Daaaady," I manage with my little voice and he chuckles placing another kiss on my forehead.

I think for the most part, my father was in denial of the whole thing. I know it frightened him to no end at the fact that his only daughter disappears for moments at a time, with no explanation and no reasoning and then re-appears as if nothing had ever taken place.

He sets me back down in my playpen and I continue on with playing with my little stuffies without a care in the world.

"John, I think we should take her to see Dr. Fresno... maybe he can figure out what going on,"

"Cathy, she's still so young, she's only 2 years old, I don't even know if a neurologist is going to even see anything wrong,"

"Are you kidding? John, it's been happening more frequent than you realize... but wait, you're hardly ever here with us so it makes sense why you're in such denial over it,"

Oh the inevitable arguing. They argue over everything and it always seems that my father is the one to blame. My mother always bringing up the fact that he was never home, that he was always on the road travelling with his band Steel Gates - a sort of Black Sabbath/MC5 hybrid- playing bars and clubs never bringing in any real money. I for one love my father's music. It's so real and the way he can play, I swear he was like the next Tony Iommi.

"Ok well, I gotta head out here and meet the guys at The Edge... are you meeting me later on?" My father says walking away from me and towards my mother, who just stands there with her arms crossed.

"No, I have Andrea to look after,"

"I told you, you can bring her... you know she loves it when she's around the band,"

She just stands there and glances back at me with her arms still crossed, reluctant to even say goodbye to him, even if it's just for a few hours. 

With that, he hesitates for a moment, as I laugh and giggle playing with my little furry friends, then leans in to place a kiss on my mother's temple though she still doesn't look at him. He then turns and grabs his leather jacket, slipping it on as his boots thud against the hardwood floor.

"Ok, well I'll be home later on tonight," His voice deep as he heads out the door, leaving my mother watching me as I play.

******

Toronto Ontario Canada, June 13 1976

"Ok sweetie, now place your fingers here, here and... here,"

"Like this daddy?" I ask looking at the fret board of my amber burst VOS guitar with a white pick guard, my dark little curls falling in my face.

"Uh huh, now strum,"

I scrunch up my face as I try to hold the strings down with my fingers, my father sitting across from me with his own Cherry Burst Gibson SG across his lap, reaching over and helping me place my fingers where they should be. I start to strum and the oddest sound emits from the amp but once I'm able to adjust my fingers perfectly, the beautiful distortion bellows through the amp.

"Yea... alright now put them all together... like this," My father smiles as he starts to play the three chords in succession like he showed me and I follow along with him as we play together.

I had been learning to play guitar from my father for the last few months since we discovered that music seems to calm the time slip episodes down. My mother insisted that we see Dr. Fresno to see just what exactly is causing the time slips and though my father reluctantly agreed to, he did eventually see that it was a good thing that I was seen by a neurologist.

I've been diagnosed with a neurological disorder - time displacency -not an actually medical term I know but there's never been a case quite like mine before. After some testing, Dr. Fresno discovered that it's a relation to epilepsy but is also triggered by a multitude of emotions, especially if I feel stressed or anxious. It can happen either consciously or subconsciously and when it does, a seizure will take place inside my brain at the exact moment, somehow causing a time slip. At first, the doctor did prescribe medication - the type that helps with epileptic seizures - but that was no use. I was still time slipping. Possibly even worse than before.

Nothing seemed to really work until one day I was in my father's studio  - I was 5 years old at the time -and I walked up to Cherry Burst Gibson SG, and started to play with the strings while it sat on the stand. I've always loved his Cherry Burst Gibson and when he noticed just how attached I became to that guitar, he got me one of my own for my 6th birthday - well not a Gibson but it looked exactly like one - so that I could practice with him. He was amazed at how quickly I was learning Chords and strumming for only being 6 years old.

"...ok now change... good... now D...." He smiles as he watches me keep up with him though I keep my eyes glued to my fingers making sure I was changing to the right chord properly. Then he starts to improvise on his own, playing a little solo part while I continue to strum and I look up at him and laugh.

"Wait daddy wait... I wanna do that," I giggle and he smiles at me.

"Alright sweetie go ahead..." He chuckles and I attempt to try to improvise but everything sounds completely out of tune. I scrunch my face up again and stop but my father continues to urge me on.

"I'm not really good at that," I say and he chuckles a little.

"Andrea it's alright... just keep going, you'll get it," He smiles at me. We continue to play, with him teaching me some more and after a little while I hear my mother come down the stairs.

"Andrea, your lunch is ready," She calls and I set my guitar down back on it's stand beside me.

"You coming with me daddy?" I ask.

"No sweetie, you go on ahead, I've got to work on some stuff down here," He says sweetly as he sets his guitar back down on it's stand.

"Ok... um... can I come back down when I'm done?" I ask.

"Of course you can sweetie, you know that," He chuckles and pulls me into him and starts tickling me. I begin to laugh and squeal as he laughs as well, then eventually letting me go but not before placing a kiss on the top of my head.

"I love you daddy,"

"I love you too baby," 

*****

Toronto Ontario Canada,  May 15 1985

"Damn it John, I can't do this with you anymore! I told you this is it! You need to leave!"

"Babe - "

"Don't 'Babe' me. It's done! It's over now just get the hell outta here!"

It was the middle of the night and I wake from my sleep hearing voices coming from downstairs. I push the covers off me and quietly get out of bed, rubbing my eyes to rid the sleep as my dark curls fall down around me. Once I reach the hallway, I can hear my mother screaming at my father from the front door.  As much as you think you get used to hearing your parents fight, you never really do. This time though, it was different.

"Cathy just hear me out ok? It was nothing, it meant nothing - "

"No! Don't fucking touch me! I want you outta here! Just get the fuck outta here!"

I quietly sit myself down on the top of the staircase as I listen to their fight. Even though I was still half asleep, I could feel this strange feeling deep inside my chest. I could hear my father pleading with my mother but she was not giving in. There were so many times before when they fought, that I just brushed it off, not letting it affect me. They were never terribly mean to each other, such as calling each other names or anything from what I  remember, but this time like I said, was different. My mom was just letting it all out calling him everything that you could think of and it makes me wonder just what he did to make her so angry. If he did anything at all.

The strange feeling in my chest grew as he continued to plead with her but she still wouldn't give in. Moments later I hear the front door slam and my mother quietly crying. She then appears at the bottom of the stairs and as she takes a few steps she sees me sitting at the top.

"Andrea, what... what are you doing?" She asks looking away wiping away a tear. I say nothing as she looks back up at me.

"I'm sorry you... heard all that... I didn't mean to - "

"Don't mom, just don't," I say trying to hold my tears back, though I'm not sure why I'm feeling like I need to cry in the first place.

"Andrea - "

She starts but I rise from the stairs and turn to make my way back to my room.

"Andrea honey..." She says as I hear her voice breaking while she attempts to hold back her tears.

"Don't! Just leave me alone," I say, still not recognizing my own voice, hearing myself begin to cry as I hear my mother following behind me. I've never felt like this after they've argued. I've always been able to push the feeling away. Shoving it down into the pit of my stomach and only release it when I play my guitar that my father gave me. This time it's different. I can feel my chest tighten and it feels like I can't breathe.

"Andrea - "

"Go away!" I exclaim and slam my bedroom door leaving her outside in the hallway. As much as I try to will this feeling away, I can feel it growing.

Why? What is this? Why does this hurt so much?

As I feel my heart begin to pick up pace, I close my eyes, standing in the middle of my dark bedroom surrounded with posters of Black Sabbath, Aerosmith, Ramones, and Motorhead, I start to feel euphoric, almost like an adrenaline rush, then completely at peace, then suddenly I feel dizzy and nauseous, like I'm about to vomit.

"Oh god," I exhale and suddenly there's a quick flash of light and everything goes completely black.

**************************************************************************************************

#chriscornellfanfiction #chris cornell #fanfiction #grungefanfiction #grunge #grungefanfics #soundgarden fanfiction #soundgarden #temple of the dog #time after time #time travel #also on ao3 #also on wattpad #sciencefiction #fantasy #alternate universe #my story

[hillbillyhippiemusicreview]

Post #46—Them Dirty Roses: Locked Down & Unplugged LIVE

“Cause I found the wind that blows, It’s blowin’ me back home 🎶”

Nashville-based southern rockers Them Dirty Roses recently let the wind blow them back to the Bama clay they were raised on for two consecutive nights of sold out shows at Sidetracks Music Hall in Huntsville, AL. General manager/talent buyer Shane Bickel was eager to re-open and provide both musicians and fans alike a safe, socially-distanced outlet for music, so Hillbilly Hippie Music Review made the trek there via Indiana and L.A. (that’s lower Alabama) to enjoy a couple nights of tunes post-lockdown.

Deemed “Locked Down & Unplugged LIVE,” the set of acoustic shows was the perfect, albeit different, way to kick off the return of live music—especially since HHMR’s last show before the nation-wide pandemic lockdown was in March with TDR at Sidetracks. Total full circle kind of moment, and one we wish we could have frozen in time. But, I’ve got to be frank—despite being a total glutton for acoustic music, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, being that everything had changed so quickly. Would people hesitate to interact? Would we dance and sing or sit there like statues? Would the energy in the room be relaxed or tightly-wound? At first, there was a bit of an unsure current in the air, but before long, everyone was loosened up and moving to the groove in their seats and all the ladies made their way to the stage to end each night with “Shake It,” a TDR ritual.

Before we dive into the specifics of the weekend, here’s a little background for readers unfamiliar with TDR: Brothers James Ford (vocals and guitar) and Frank Ford (drums) formed Them Dirty Roses with their friends Andrew Davis (guitar) and Ben Crain (bass) in Gadsden, AL circa 2012 prior to moving to Tennessee to travel the country playing their brand of rock and roll and finding success both stateside and across Europe. Their sound is a bit southern rock heavy laden with outlaw vibes, and a bit party band mixed with a penchant for slower, sentimental jams—in other words, it’s eclectic and every bit as unique as the four men who form the band. However you describe it, a TDR show is always a good time—and it only takes one to get hooked on the electric energy these guys bring to the stage. On June 5th and 6th in a little venue off by the railroad tracks in Rocket City, the vibe was killer and the feeling was out of this world. Not only were the fans ready to rock, but the band was ecstatic and thankful to be back in action.

HHMR contributor Linda Owen’s first-ever TDR show was March 13–the night the country shut down due to the pandemic. She has the unique perspective of experiencing the “typical” wide-open TDR show and the stripped, intimate version back to back. Here’s what she had to say:

“Three months without live music—I know I slowly watched myself go from the happiest most optimistic person I knew, to a complete mess. It may have seemed like I was okay, but I assure you I was not.

I’ve always known how much music has impacted my life. It has always brought me the greatest memories and blessed me with many friendships and there were so many times in my life where the only thing I had to hold on to was a song. Three months without my music family was torture. With that being said I'll never forget my first shows post-COVID-19. Ironically, the first post -COVID-19 show was at the same venue with the same band I saw pre-COVID-19, and it was perfect.

Let me set the scene. Sidetracks Music Hall is the kind of local music hall we all want in our hometowns: you feel at home as soon as you walk in, you are treated like family, and it has by far the friendliest staff and patrons of any place I've been to date. The venue possesses a large open floor plan with the bar area in the back, so there is not a bad spot to see the show. For this show in particular, tables are spread about what is normally the "pit" area. To be honest, I was a little nervous that this social distancing acoustic show wouldn’t quite fill that void that COVID-19 has left me feeling...I was so wrong. After getting settled in with a drink, my sidekick Lyssa and I did some mingling getting to talk to new-to-me friends that I'd made three months previously at the last show I had attended. The excitement in the room was palatable—and it only got better from there.

TDR hit the stage and you could feel the spirits of every single person in the room glowing around you. All the doubts that an acoustic show wasn't going to feel right with social distancing rules melted away! We danced and sang along like those tables weren't in the way the first night. "Whiskey in My Cup" "Grew Up In The Country" and "Molly" had us all on our feet grooving. We were treated to covers by The Black Crowes, Jason Isbell, and The Allman Brothers, in addition to fan favorites and new songs from their upcoming album expected to release in September—and we are stoked for it.

My heart and soul were happier those two nights than they'd been for the past three months. I sang my way back to Indiana..caught myself sing at work on Monday too!”

The magic wasn’t solely felt by the HHMR team—the air was saturated with it and everyone in the room had a taste that left them yearning for more. Below are a few comments from TDR fans:

“The first show post lock-down came with more enjoyment than just the music. We were super excited for the chance to get back out and hear live music! Them Dirty Roses were the last band we got to see prior to the lock-down. Now, it turns out that Them Dirty Roses would be the first post lock-down. The music was great! What we didn't anticipate was the joy it also brought by seeing so many friends with smiling faces! It was amazing to be seen again and to hear two nights of wonderful tunes!”

—Bud Gambrell

“Went to the Friday show and it was a group of guys that were ready for a show. They were the last band we saw before the Coronavirus shut things down in Huntsville. Looking forward to seeing them again.”

—Kevin Boyd

“The first show post quarantine was like something wonderful that I had been deprived of for a long time. I think sometimes we don't see how many things that surround us in life we take for granted. I see at least two live music shows a month. During the summer, I probably go to 2-3 shows a week. Honestly, it seemed like such a wonderful release and something that people needed. Everybody has something that feeds their spirit—mine is music. Being deprived of other people and the things we love are just some of the things that add to that depression that comes with the whole quarantine/covid situation. So, being around friends and music felt really great and normal. It seemed like life may be getting back to normal finally. I smiled all night!”

—Jerolyn Davis

“Needless to say, Them Dirty Roses put on one hell of a show two nights in a row, which was just what I needed after the almost three month drought of no live music! The fact that they were the last live show for me before everything shut down is kinda ironic and cool at the same time. I'm also very thankful to Sidetracks for putting on the shows, they rock!”

—Robin Huff

Guitarist Andrew Davis was on the same wavelength as many in attendance. When asked his thoughts on performing again post-pandemic, he said: “In March, the future of the entire industry was uncertain. We all knew that April was going to be postponed, but we couldn't even imagine postponing or cancelling the entire festival season. Then, weeks later, exactly that happened. With all of the uncertainty surrounding the future of our industry, it was very reassuring to get back out and play again. It definitely answered a lot of lingering questions about whether or not people would rush back to live venues.”

After last weekend, it seems life will slowly, but surely, get back on track and all will be right in our world again. Until that day comes, be sure to support live music and independent venues—such as Sidetracks who has hosted many fabulous performers like Anderson East, The Steel Woods, Black Stone Cherry, Adam Hood, Kingfish, Ritch Henderson, Muscadine Bloodline, Whitey Morgan and the 78s, and many, many more in addition to TDR—in whatever manner you can so that we have them to return to when COVID-19 restrictions are lifted nation-wide. And don’t forget to keep your eyes peeled for that new Them Dirty Roses record to release this fall—it’s without a doubt some of their best work. In the meantime, keep up with the band and their tour schedule at www.themdirtyroses.com and @themdirtyroses on both Facebook and Instagram.

As always, stay safe, spread love, and be kind to one another. See y’all down the road!

✌🏻💙🎶—Lyssa

*This is an independent review. The Hillbilly Hippie Music Review was not compensated for this review.

*The opinions expressed are solely that of the author(s).

*Fan quotes have been edited for conciseness and clarity.

*These images are not ours, not do we claim them in any way. They are copyrighted by Todd Dean with Butterdean Photography, Linda Owens, & Lyssa Culbertson.