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insanityclause · 3 years

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Penzey Spices -- loves Loki!

Bill Penzey, owner of Penzey Spices in Wisconsin, sent this to his online customers today. I thought it might be of interest to those of us who gather here:

Like everybody, Jeri and I look for shows to watch. Sometimes things are recommended, other times something just pops up and you give it a try. In that "just give it a try" category was the English version of Wallander. It’s well acted and you care about the characters but its four seasons really are a long, dark spiral. Ultimately, in the very last moment it ends in a way as a cook I think you would appreciate, but the road there is hard. If you were to watch it you should give serious thought to watching the episodes in backward order, that way the show’s arc would be ever more hopeful, ever brighter.

Somewhere watching the show, towards the end of the first season or beginning of the second, I actually paused the show and said to Jeri, “That guy.” As I pointed to one of the junior detectives in the back of the scene. “Why won’t someone give that guy a show? I could watch him read the phone book.” With the way he almost never got any lines this would mean him reading the phone book silently to himself, but I was okay with that. In the bleakest of shows he somehow managed to deliver humanity with just the look upon his face. Most every scene he was in became something better, something more decent just because he was there.

Flash forward 10-12 years and that actor, Tom Hiddleston, now does have his own show, Loki, on Disney+ and since the universe responded to my request, I feel obliged to put in a plug for it. Plus, it’s starting to cook. New episodes air every Wednesday. Last week’s episode was a breakthrough and in many ways was a retelling of the Grinch story where Loki’s heart grows not one, not two, but three times larger simply by coming to understand firsthand he is someone worth loving. In some ways it reminded me of the also very worthwhile Elton John biopic Rocketman. Good stuff all around.

And of course this is one of those shows with a mystery behind about who really is in charge and what they really are up to and those shows never end with viewers happy with the big reveal. As I was explaining to the kids just last week, as much as it may well seem like naming a street after a living person is a really good idea, in the moment it rarely is. But even if, as hinted at, Loki only gets this “one brief shining moment” to be good and find happiness within the Marvel Universe, it’s still a good moment to be a part of. Obviously Loki has some work ahead of him and obstacles to overcome if he is to prove he is indeed a good friend to Möbius, but I’m rooting for him.

Earlier in the season in a restaurant scene that wasn’t really a restaurant scene, there was a discussion over what to order and one of the options was potato skins. This started a discussion in the Penzey house. Jeri and I will be married 19 years next month and to the best of our recollections in all those years I’ve never made her potato skins. The kids have never even had them. So, start with larger baked potatoes the way you like to bake them. If you are new to baking potatoes, wash them, poke them with a fork 8-9 times all around and then place them in a 400-degree oven for about an hour turning once while baking. They are done when they “give” when squeezed, or if you prefer to use a thermometer when the center reaches 205 degrees.

You can bake these a day in advance, but they are even better the same day. Let them cool for a bit and then cut potatoes into thirds lengthwise (this is the fun bit :) ) then scoop out the center part of the potato leaving about 3/8ths of an inch of potato still attached to the skin. In the old days I would butter the inner part of the potato, now it’s a drizzle of olive oil. There are trade-offs in life. Then a good sprinkling of Sandwich Sprinkle followed by the shredded cheese of your choice. Inspired by Loki visiting 1985 Oshkosh, Wisconsin in the second episode, I went with three cheeses: mozzarella, 2-year Cheddar, and pepper Jack. Wisconsin is fun.

Next comes bacon or no bacon. Usually I’m not a crispy bacon kind of person, but for this if you want to use it, precooking it to crispy and then crumbling is the way to go. And if you picked up the Potato of Love as part of our June Rainbow Pride giveaway, this is a really good spot to use those. Then it’s just a matter of placing them in the oven until they reach your desired level of melty. I like them just a little bit browned, but the kids had not had them before and we wanted these to be liked.

While they cooked I mixed 1 tsp. Justice Seasoning with 1/4 cup Sour Cream and Jeri cut up and lightly mashed a medium avocado to which we added 1 and 1/2 tsp. Salsa & Pico Seasoning and served these on the side. We had a hit! Jeri said we should do these more often. And Grandma Ruth, who loves nothing more than sacrificing for her grandkids, quickly grabbed seconds before the kids even noticed the supply wasn’t endless. This made me so happy!

If you have access to Disney+ please consider giving Loki a try. To get people to cook they have to see the value in caring for one another. There’s not a lot of shows out there that radiate this. Ultimately as the show itself says: “Most things in history are kind of dumb and everything gets ruined eventually.” But for now we have Camelot quotes and DB Cooper and people caring about each other.

And if a segment of this year’s Emmys is to be Tom Hiddleston, Owen Wilson and Sophia Di Martino quietly reading the phone book to themselves I would be good with that. But Wilson has a whisper like no other. They probably should consider using that. And maybe if Wunmi Mosaku was up there with them as the one who isn’t getting many lines now but should have her own show ten years from now, that would be good as well. Progress matters.

Thanks for reading, thanks for being our customer,

Bill [email protected]

P.S. If this email did not come from us directly but was forwarded by a friend, would you please consider signing up for our email list? A business is only as good as its customers and you would make us even better. Thanks!

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What a fantastic read! Thank you, @honeyfromtheweed.

#submission

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thesaltofcarthage · 3 years

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Penzey’s Spices on Loki

Thanks for reading, thanks for being our customer,

Bill [email protected]

(Penzey’s Spices is an online spice merchant with a liberal bent. The company spent $92,000 on ads calling for Trump’s impeachment. Penzey’s actively donates to the Trevor Project and local charities, and promotes vaccination, voting, funding teachers, and helping in your community. They speak out often and ferociously against racism, including giving away BLM stickers with their orders. And their spices are THE. BEST.)

#loki #loki series #penzeys spices

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soocouldbemyonlystar · 5 years

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Chaebols: The Arrangement Pt10

Genre: Chaebols AU/romance/angst/fluff

Pairing: Kyungsoo x OC

Rating: M

Length: 5.1k

I highly suggest listening to It’s You by Ali Gatie and Without You by Mad Clown ft. Hyolyn

First Previous Pt10 Next

edit by @lalahs85

Her art studio was turned upside down. At least it was form Jae-Eun’s perspective where she lay, sweaty and satiated on Kyungsoo’s desk. Inspiration had struck her in a dream, (a normal dream, the nightmares were few and far between) as she had gotten up to paint.

On the way out she grabbed one of Kyungsoo’s work shirts to cover herself and in the passion of painting, gotten medium on it. Oil paint is a pain to get out, if it will even come out.

Turns out the shirt was part of Kyungsoo’s forty-three thousand-dollar Brioni suit. One Jongin bought for his last birthday.

Later, Kyungsoo found her oblivious to the world and covered in paint.

A very serious scolding followed because though he knew she got caught up in her art, she needed to mind the things around her. In the middle of his rant, Jae couldn’t stop herself from dipping her paint brush in the cadmium yellow and dotting the color under his left eye.

His lips parted in surprise and he jolted forward. Jae-Eun squealed, dodging his advances, bolting across the room. She evaded him for a bit before he caught up to her behind his desk. His smile covered his face as he turned her in his arms and placed a kiss against her cheek.

Jae responded by pressing her thumb to the still wet paint and smearing it across his cheek before planting her lips against his. Jae-Eun never knew it was so hard to kiss someone when your smile was so big it wouldn’t let your lips pucker.

That smile has almost been a constant for the last couple of months. Kyungsoo and Jae-Eun were inseparable if they could help it. They still argued because they were both stubborn and opinionated, but that anger didn’t make it past bedtime. Talking it out before falling asleep was something they both believed was important.

They made it passed their wedding anniversary. As a surprise, Kyungsoo took her back to the island where they had honey-mooned, but this time there was only one bungalow, and they only ever left it twice. The first time was for dinner, the second was to walk the hiking trail, stopping in the same places to get pictures.

Kyungsoo wanted to replace the first set they had faked on their honeymoon, with real ones, for her. Accept the picture when she had surprised him. This time he reversed it, pressing a kiss firmly to her cheek. The resulting picture was Jae with eyes closed and an enormous smile across her face.

Where the first picture was the first thing she had sat on her desk at work, the second joined their wedding picture on Kyunsoo’s desk.

Baekhyun claimed they were the most annoying cute couple in the group, beating out him and Yeri, Yixing and Yan, Sehun and his new fiancé, Park Hye Jin, and Jongin’s girlfriend (who she had yet to meet).

Jae didn’t hate the title.

“I change my mind. You can wear any damn thing you want.” Kyungsoo’s labored voice brought her back out of her thoughts.

Their happy kisses took a turn when Kyungsoo discovered his shirt was all she was wearing. He’d lifted her off the floor and sat her on his desk. His hands found the shirt, only unbuttoning it made for slow work.

“Damn, Kyungsoo, the shirt is ruined.” She told him.

He understood, gabbing the panels in his fists, ready to rip the remaining buttons open.

“Shit, I can’t do it,” he released the shirt and resumed the buttons. With a laugh Jae joined him, hastening the time in which it would take to get his hands on her skin. He didn’t bother removing the shirt entirely, just filled those hands with tender, hot flesh.

When he joined them together it was a symphony of hands, lips, sighs, moans, heat and sweet. With their bodies held close, breathing the same air, they pitched over the edge one after the other.

Jae-Eun fell back, head dangling oer the edge of Kyungsoo’s desk, looking at her studio upside down.

Kyungsoo slipped his fingers into hers and pulled her back up to him.

“Mmm, next time it will be the Brioni jacket.” She teased.

Kyungsoo wrapped his arms aboutn her keeping her weakened body close to him.

“But you wouldn’t really though, right?”

Jae-Eun laughed, “No.”

“You want breakfast?”

Jae shook her head, “I’m going to get a shower and finish my painting.”

“It’s not ruined?”

“Oil paint takes longer to dry. I can get my shower come back and still blend that shit out.”

Kyungsoo chucked against her ear, a sound she was completely in love with, “I love it when you speak art to me.”

Jae slung her arm around Kyungsoo’s neck pulling him to her, brushing her lips against his. “I just love you.”

Kyungsoo moved her hand to press it against his chest. He did it every time she said the words. I never said it himself, but Jae-Eun knew it was his way of telling her how he felt. His heart pounded wilder than any drum could produce.

“Come watch a movie with me when you are done?”

Jae nodded. She felt warm and content in his arms. I reminded her of a little web comic she followed. Any time the main character came close to her love interest the artist circled them in a halo of pink, the darkest saturation of color just between the characters hearts. It was how Jae felt, saturated in pink.

She showered in a daze. The doubt was still there, that feeling of dread sat underneath the surface. But every day that passed lessened its intensity.

Kyungsoo had even stopped talking to Mi-Sun in any capacity other than work. Jae-Eun knew this cause Mi-Sun worked on a schedule coming to visit or bring her son at the same time every week. Time in which Kyungsoo now spent with Jae, in her office or at lunch. Any free moment they could find was spent together.

Accept for the times when he was with Chanyeol and Baekhyun. Jae was kept in the dark about their “business” but Kyungsoo promised he would tell her when the time was right. She didn’t like it, but after what Chanyeol gave up for her, Jae-Eun wouldn’t interfere or ask question.

Kyungsoo frequently sent the house staff home one day of the weekend, with full pay of course, so they could have a day entirely to themselves. It was usually spent in silence. They didn’t need to talk to understand each other, sitting together in the silence was enough. Then there were times when they stayed up talking about everything from her art, to their school days. He eagerly listened to every word, she said, watching in fascination of the passion in which she spoke with.

True to his word, her old room had been turned into a play room for when Yeri brought the kids. If she wanted to be serious, there were plenty of other rooms in the house for her to take if she wanted, but she had no plans to do so.

Their circle was expanding and so far, Jae-Eun really like the women, becoming quick friends with Yeri and Yan.

With work, new friends and being with Kyungsoo, Jae-Eun’s life was full. No matter what happened now, that wouldn’t change. She was happy in and out of her marriage.

When she returned to her painting, Jae-Eun again thought she agreed with her progress. Most of the dream she didn’t remember, just walking through the woods, the morning sun ahead of her, past the break in the trees. It felt symbolic.

It took a few hours to get to a point where she was satisfied. Jae would let it dry for a couple of days, then come bac and put in the last few details.

She found Kyungsoo laying on the couch.

He was sprawled out across the couch, an arm behind his head his ankles crossed. Kyungsoo comfortable and content was one of her favorite sights. He was effortlessly beautiful. She was tempted the break out her sketchbook, this side of her husband was good sketch fodder.

"Leave the sketchbook where it is and come watch the rest of the movie with me." Kyungsoo's eyes never left the screen.

Jae-Eun couldn't stop the smile from forming. "And you say I know you too well."

He angled his head toward her, "Artist Jae has a tell. You raise your left eyebrow, squint your right eye and tilt your head to the side. I can always see when you are sizing me up for a sketch."

He watched as she moved to him, crawling in between him and the back of the couch, cuddling up against his chest.

"I can't help that you inspire sketches." She teased.

Kyungsoo's arm came down from behind his head, his fingers playing in the hem of her shirt.

"What are we watching?"

"The original Count of Monte Cristo." His voice vibrated through his chest.

Kyungsoo threaded the fingers of his free hand into hers, and they watched in silence as the falsely accused Edmund Dantēs finds his fortune and brings justice upon those whose betrayed him.

It was the moments like this, quiet and alone together, that made Jae-Eun feel optimistic about the future. There was no talk of messing things up, or failing, they just worked it out together. Kyungsoo wasn’t pushing himself to try, he didn’t have to anymore, he was just present. He wanted to be present, and that was what made the difference.

The movie ended, but other than to turn off the television neither of them moved. Kyungsoo inhaled deeply, his chest rising and falling slowly. Their fingers intertwined, played with each other. This was it. The Kyungsoo and Jae-Eun together, in the silence, just being.

Her feelings were thick in her throat. She needed a distraction.

Jae separated her fingers from his, and in one swift move jabbed her pointer in between his ribs.

He jerked, “Quit.”

She poked him again.

“Jae!”

A final stab sends Kyungsoo over the edge.

“That’s it!” he declares, both hands attacking her side. Jae-Eun screamed, launching herself across the couch from him. But he followed pinning Jae-Eun beneath him, his relentless assault had her laughing until her face was apple red.

“Stop!!” she shrieked.

“Say it first.”

“No!”

Her giggles and screams filled the room, echoed through the halls.

Finally, she relented, “Soo’s the best! Please, I can’t breathe.”

Kyungsoo hands moved to hold himself up. He watched with a smile as she struggled to catch her breath. Jae-Eun’s face was contorted into a half-happy-half-painful grin as she dragged lungs full of air in and huffed them back out.

Kyungsoo’s smile faded.

“Jae-Eun-ah.”

She opened her eyes. Kyungsoo hovered over her, but his smile had disappeared. He watched her with solemn almost sad eyes. But today was a good day, Jae-Eun didn’t want sad.

Her hand came to his face, tracing the lines she found so beautiful. Kyungsoo leaned into the touch.

“God, I love it when you do that. I just…Jae… I…”

Jae-Eun shook her head, “You don’t have to say anything. Don’t say it if it doesn’t come naturally. You show me how you feel every day.”

He pressed his lips to her palm.

“How did I get so lucky?”

Jae-Eun giggled, “Cause our parents are smarter than we are.”

The smile returned to his face. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Don’t do that, don’t put me on a pedestal. I make mistakes, I’m human just like you.” She hated that Kyungsoo tended to deify her. Like he was a lowly person and she was something to aspire to. The fact that he didn’t believe he deserve happiness hit her hard.

“You are my favorite human. I mean, after Jongin of course.”

Jae-Eun smacked his shoulder as they laughed. Her hand came around his neck, pulling him down to her, his lips to her lips.

She loved all of him. His gruffness, his anger, his gentle heart, his loyalty, his wry sense of humor. Their life together wasn’t perfect, but she loved their struggles as well as their successes. Jae felt they could overcome anything together, and it was more than she had ever dreamed for them. She felt the tears well up.

Ugg, why was she being so emotional.

Kyungsoo’s kisses, washed it all away. She didn’t know what the future had for the two of them, but Jae-Eun was happy with the right now.

And that was all she needed.

In utter exhaustion, Jae-Eun leaned back in her chair, throwing her arms over her head in a relaxing stretch. The rush of Monday was wearing on her, especially after a peaceful Sunday at home. She didn’t mind the grind, but today it was hitting her harder than usual.

Adjusting her watch to check the time, Jae-Eun decided she was going to call it a day. Most of her employees had retired for the day. She knew Kyungsoo had a schedule full of meetings, her plan had been to hold out and go home with him, but her body ached, and home was sounding more attractive every minute she sat at her desk looking over ad pitches.

If she was quick, she could pop in to Kyungsoo’s office before the next meeting and see him before she left. The probability of his getting home before she fell asleep was low, and she craved a few minutes alone with him.

Jae-Eun shut everything down and gathered her things from her desk. Stopping at the door, she patted the wrinkles out of her navy, high-waisted slacks and silk, maroon blouse then locked the door and made her way to the elevator.

She promptly cussed her self for wearing the shoes she chose today, a wine colored half- D’Orsay pump with a pointed toe and stiletto heel. They were beautiful and matched her ensemble well, but the height had her standing taller than Kyungsoo, which she typically tried to avoid. But they had been sitting in her closet for some time and needed to be worn.

Regret had her sighing as she exited the elevator, her legs were paying the price for her vanity.

Secretary Yoon smiled as Jae-Eun approached the desk. “The CEO has about ten minutes before his next meeting, I’ll let him know you’re here.”

“Thank You,” Jae-Eun sang as she walked ahead to his door.

Waiting only long enough to the secretary to announce her, she made her way into Kyungsoo’s office.

Her husband looked up from his desk, his doe-eyes peered up at her from behind his horn-rimmed glasses. His face seemed to light up. It made her stomach flip.

“You’re still here?”

She dropped her things off in a chair and hobbled to his desk as he came to his feet and walked around to meet her. Kyungsoo’s eyes angled up to hers. In her heals she stood just taller than him. Kyungsoo laughed at the difference.

Jae-Eun stepped out of her heels, thankful for the relief… for getting out of her heels and for stepping into his arms. His warmth, his scent rolled over her like liquid energy. She sighed.

“I missed you too.” he beamed.

She lay her head against his chest. “I wanted to wait for you, but I think I’m give out.”

Kyungsoo held on tight, pressing his lips to her forehead. “You should head home, I have a budget meeting, I may be here for a while yet. We need to get it done and this was the only time we could all get together. Everyone is busy with the new resort and some other endeavors.”

“I know, I’m going, I just wanted to see you before I left.”

Kyungsoo took her head in his hands and leveled her face to his. “Now you have seen me.”

He pressed his lips to hers, molding them together. Jae-Eun’s heart pounded as his lips gently played against hers. She leaned further into him, absorbing every ounce of him she could get. That part hadn’t changed, no matter how much their relationship had. Jae-Eun still took everything he was willing to give her.

Kyungsoo pressed one more tender kiss against her lips then leaned back.

“I’m sorry I won’t be going home with you today.” He tucked a rogue strand of hair behind her ear. “You do look tired. I’ll come in a little later tomorrow and we can have breakfast together. Even lunch, huh? To make up for today.”

Jae-Eun pouted, “Promise?”

Kyungsoo gave a little nervous chuckle, “I promise. Now stop being cute and clingy before I blow this whole good CEO thing and just go home with you.”

He leaned into her again, but just before his lips reached hers the buzzer on his work phone rang out.

Kyungsoo sighed, “Just five damn minutes. That’s all I wanted.”

He mumbled as he pressed the button. “Yes, Secretary Yoon.”

“Director Yoo is here for the meeting.” The secretary informed him.

“Send her in.”

He turned back, “I’m sorry baby, but the quicker I get this done the quicker I can get home.”

Jae-Eun painted a smile on her face. She didn’t really feel it, but it was for Kyungsoo’s sake. “Wake me when you get in.”

There was a tap at the door before Mi-Sun stepped in, a black binder pressed against her chest.

She bowed, “CEO, Director Lee.”

“Director Yoo,” Jae-Eun acknowledged, it was the best she could give the woman.

“Early as always Director.” Kyungsoo fumed.

“Yes sir,”

Jae-Eun turned back to Kyungsoo. “I’ll see you at home.”

Placing a kiss to his cheek she whispered, “I love you.”

Jae-Eun stepped back into her heels and turned to the door but Kyungsoo’s fingers closed around her wrist. She looked back as he brought her hand up, pressing her palm to his chest, holding it there as his lips drew thin in a satisfied smile. Like always, his heart pounded rapidly. Jae was void of any words. Kyungsoo didn’t do public displays. He rarely held her hand in public, so this was unprecedented.

Mi-Sun watched with wide eyes.

“Be safe.” He said as he released her.

Jae turned in a daze. Barely recognizing Mi-Sun as she left his office, too bewildered to even pull his door all the way to.

“Good night Director Lee,” Secretary Yoon called from her desk.

“Huh, yes,” Jae-Eun mumbled as she passed her to the elevator. But as the door closed Jae-Eun came back to reality.

“Shit.” She forgot her purse and phone in Kyungsoo’s office. “Stupid.”

Maybe she still had time to grab it before the other members showed up for the meeting. The elevator opened on her floor and she popped out between a couple of the marketing employees and hit the button to get an elevator going up.

Secretary Yoon gave her a double take.

“I forgot my purse, they haven’t started yet right?”

She shook her head.

Jae-Eun walked on hoping to grab her bag without interrupting him. But her hand froze on the knob at the sound of Mi-Sun’s voice.

“But you don’t love her like you love me.” Mi-Sun inserted.

Kyungsoo’s deep, taut voice replied, “You’re right, I don’t.”

Any other words were drowned in the white noise that turned up like an empty channel on an old television. She snatched her hand back as if the door knob had burned her. What had she just heard? What did it mean? The world seemed to crack under her feet.

Jae-Eun backed away, turning and heading back to the elevators.

“Director?” Secretary Yoon called, but the sound was muffled by the static that flooded her mind.

Slamming on the down button Jae-Eun, slipped into the elevator. But again, as the door closed, the noise died and Jae-Eun was left with anger. This bitch was messing Kyungsoo again, her husband, the love of her life. How in the hell was she supposed to just walk away from that?

Even if he did still love her, the woman was toxic. Kyungsoo would never be free as long as Mi-Sun was left uncheck to wreak havoc on his heart. Jae-Eun didn’t care if he didn’t love her the same. Someone needed to be a buffer between them. He may get angry with her, may hater her later, but she would no longer allow him to be held prisoner by a malicious, manipulative woman.

She hit the button for Sehun’s floor, exited and hopped the next elevator back up. Secretary Yoon watched silently as she stomped past, the carpeted floor buffering the sound of the heals.

Jae-Eun swung the door open and halted in the door frame. Her rage was fueled even further as she watched Mi-Sun, arms locked around Kyungsoo’s neck, lips assaulting his.

Lips that Jae-Eun had just kissed.

Kyungsoo’s hands held firmly to Mi-Sun’s hips. Jae-Eun slammed the door shut.

Mi-Sun jumped back at the sound.

“Well look what we have here.” Jae-Eun taunted. “And I’m barely out the door for five seconds.”

Terror spread across Kyungsoo face. “Jae, please, it’s not what you think.”

Jae-Eun stepped out of her shoes and ambled over to them, “Nah, you don’t know what I think, but I can tell you. I think… I’ve been a little too nice, for far too long.”

With anger boiling in her chest, she set her fist free. It was the second time in less than a year. Jae was not a physical person, but she was past a breaking point.

Having already been subject to her fist before, Kyungsoo anticipated the move, ducking back out of its trajectory, only the punch wasn’t intended for him. It landed center, in Mi-Sun’s face. Long, dark hair flew around as Mi-Sun fell back, landing hard on her ass.

Man, it felt good.

“Did you think I was just going to sit here and let you continue to manipulate him? I don’t care if he still loves you. This ends now!”

Mi-Sun pulled her hand away from her face. Blood covered it, along with the lower half of her face.

“You broke my nose, you stupid bitch.”

Jae-Eun lunged forward, but strong hands lifted her off her feet and spun around away from the bloodied woman. She jerked out of Kyungsoo’s grasp, arms flailing, ready to give him what-for as well.

“Calm down Jae-Eun-ah.” Kyungsoo urged. “You have to stop.”

Jae-Eun huffed, straightening her blouse again.

When he was sure she was under control, Kyungsoo turned away, pulling some squares of tissue from the box on his desk, then knelt down beside Mi-Sun to hand her the tissue.”

“Are you alright Director.” He asked her.

Jae-Eun froze. An image crept into her head. One where she was in a white dress, on her wedding day, and her new husband was knelt next to a pregnant Mi-Sun, looking her over for injury. His worry had been palpable. The entire room of wedding guest watched the spectacle.

There were no guests here to witness this. Only Jae-Eun. No one to see her heart finally shattering into the tiny splinters that would sit in her chest, festering into hatred, resentment, and regret. She was hollowed out. Jae-Eun could handle his feelings for Mi-Sun, she had up to this point. But for him to run to Mi-Sun’s side a second time… Suddenly she felt weak.

“Jae, I think you should go home. I’ll be there as soon as this is over, and we can talk.” Kyungsoo stood to lean a hand on Jae-Euns shoulder, but she evaded the contact.

“Don’t touch me.” She warned calmly. It was too hard to look at him right now. “You… are no better than she is.”

Jae-Eun pointed at the bloodied woman on the floor, “You two deserve each other.”

“Lee Jae-Eun, go home.” Kyungsoo’s voice was low and dangerous.

She backed away, with a crooked smile she said, “Of course, Yeobo.”

With the last of her energy spent, Jae grabbed her shoes and purse and walked out of his office for good.

She wasn’t answering his calls. He wasn’t surprised, if he knew her well enough, she would need some space. But he couldn’t help hanging it up and dialing again.

Mi-Sun had been sent to the hospital to assess her wound. It took him twenty minutes to convince her not to press charges against Jae-Eun. And he wasn’t entirely sure she didn’t still plan on doing it. The meeting had been conducted without his accounting director and was finished, he should be going home. He wanted to be at home, but he knew the scene that would be there when he arrived.

He stared at the picture they had taken just a few weeks before, his lips pressed to her cheek, the smile that shown brightly on her face. She was so happy in that picture. That was all he wanted, for her to be happy, and he’d known for a while that he wanted to be the one to do that for her. Looking at her now, knowing she risked herself to stop Mi-Sun��s devious plans, his chest ached. But he had been so proud, his fierce, little wife coming to protect him.

He was so stupid.

Why had it been so easy for him to admit his feelings for Jae-Eun in front of Mi-Sun, when he had been fighting so hard to hid them from Jae, from himself. She, more than anybody, deserved the truth.

Scared as he was, he needed to see her, he had to explain the situation, tell her the truth. To tell her everything, from the very beginning. So he gathered his things and headed down to the parking garage.

Driver Hwang waited for him.

“Did you get the Madam home alright?”

“Yes sir. Right up to the front door.”

That was a relief. Kyungsoo was positive he would lose it if there was another L.A. incident. He hated that he had only discovered how deep his feelings for his wife were, when he was faced with losing her.

Things wouldn’t be how they were now if he hadn’t been stubborn and decided to deal with his discovery on his own. The truth of his relationship with Mi-Sun.

For so long he had felt responsible for the change she had gone through. From the sweet girl he fell in love with, to this hardened woman who lied to him, and used him. If he hadn’t left her alone in the states, she wouldn’t be this way. Whatever happened while he was gone is what had changed her, and it was his fault for leaving her alone.

But that was a lie she let him believe because it suited her plans. He didn’t know if anything she told him was true.

What he was told: Her parents were dead, she was living with a horrible uncle who wouldn’t let her come back to Korea, she had met someone else, but they broke up and she needs help getting home.

The truth: Her parents were farmers in the south, her uncle had graciously offered for her to stay with him in the states for an education, which he mostly paid for, and didn’t know of her desire to come back home. She had never broken up with that other man and had used the promise that they could be together to get Kyungsoo to bring her home and give her a position in his company. Then she brought the boyfriend over and married him.

One-week Kyungsoo thought they were going to be together, the next she was married to someone else.

Mi-Sun had played him from the very beginning. Telling the naïve rich boy exactly what he needed to hear to get what she wanted from him. And he hadn’t questioned any of that until Jae.

She made him realize he deserved better than that. Because while he took his pain and anger out on her, she remained understanding and supportive. He didn’t deserve her. He had gotten lucky because his mother and hers were best friends.

Lee Jae-Eun had set him free, and he hadn’t even bothered to tell her.

Driver Hwang opened the door for him.

“Rest well tonight, Ahjussi,” he told his old friend.

“Thank you, sir.”

Kyungsoo entered his quiet home to find Nari waiting for him.

“She’s isn’t here is she?” He asked, but he already knew the answer. His chest hurt, his lungs burned. It was like he was drowning. Damn annoying.

“No sir, the Madam came home a while ago, packed a bag and left. I believe there is a note for you in your room.” She informed him. Worry marred her eyes, as she helped him out of his jacket and straightened it out.

“I don’t know if I can bring her hack this time Nari. I should have sent that woman away a long time ago, but I didn’t, and it may have cost me the best thing in my life.”

Nari lay his jacket on the table and swathed him in a tight hug. “Oh, my sweet boy.”

Kyungsoo wrapped his arms around the woman who was like a mother to him and let the tears build up in his eyes.

“I don’t know what to do.” He barely managed to get the words out.

Nari held him at arm’s length. “Do you love her?”

He nodded.

“Then you do whatever you have to.”

Kyungsoo swallowed back the lump in his throat. The muscles ached from holding the emotions back.

“I don’t think there is anything I can do but give her space and time.” He told her. “Right now, I’m going to try to get some rest. It’s going to take a while since she’s not here.”

Nari released him, bowing as he made his way down the hall to his room. Just as she said, a note sat on his bedside table.

I’m at Dae’s. Don’t call, I need time. -J

Kyungsoo let the tears fall.

“But I love you.” He said to the note. He’d admitted it to Mi-Sun, to Nari, and now to a damn note, just not to the woman who needed to hear it.

He would give her what she wanted. Kyungsoo had to have faith that Jae-Eun would come back to him. He could tell her the truth of what happened, give her the proof, the USB he held like his own life in his hand. And then tell her what he should have months ago. He loved her, and he was more sure of that than anything else in this world.

But before that, he had another matter to take care of. It was late, but he knew his friend would answer the phone.

So, he made the most important call of his life.

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grimes-claireboucher · 5 years

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GRIMES | WHO KNEW WORLD-BUILDING WOULD BE SO DIFFICULT?

BY SID FEDDEMA

APRIL 23, 2019

You can hear it, can’t you? The pulsing, panning synth bass, ingenious and instantly memorable. A gossamer coo, almost a sigh. And then a voice in an unusually high register singing  lyrics full of menace, at odds with a calculated syrupy-sweet, faux-naive intonation: I never walk about after dark / It’s my point of view / If someone could break your neck / Coming up behind you always coming and you’d never have a clue.

Seven years later, its power remains unmitigated. “Oblivion” turned horror into art, and, while drawn from a personal, particular experience, it spoke to a universal pain, a sense of predation and vulnerability all too familiar for women. Most importantly, it is a defiant act of resistance, a steadfast insistence on Grimes’ ownership of her own experience, and a refusal to be silenced. Pitchfork named it the best song of the decade so far. NPR named it one of the “greatest songs by 21st Century women.” Grimes was suddenly a cultural touchstone, a feminist symbol, a cherished member of the resistance. Everyone was watching.

They still are. Look at the Twitter fusillades, the talmudic readings of even the most flippant utterance, the team-joining. Feuds! With contemporaries, the media, her label. Gossip! A storm of it, following her spacetime-warping appearance with Elon Musk on the Met Gala red-carpet. And to hear Grimes tell it, being caught up in all this has been excruciating. She’s said that 2018 was one of the hardest years she’s endured.

When we speak, Grimes is in flux—emotionally, artistically, career-wise. But that’s nothing new. If I was to describe her with one word, I think it would be '“mercurial.” Or “protean.” She never stands still, never settles. She feels less like one person than like a collection of occasionally-combative creative spirits inhabiting one body. Hence the wide cast of characters in her albums, the fashion experiments, the accretion disk of material spanning mediums and genres. As I was writing this article we got word that she has changed her name—to c [lowercase italic], rather than Claire Boucher, and that the Grimes identity she’s built up over the course of her career could be next to go. For a journalist, she’s a tough subject: not only is she encyclopedic in conversation, but by the time you finish your draft, half of what you’ve written may no longer be true. While this capriciousness is a powerful creative resource, it can also make things difficult. She is a hell of a lot of fun to talk to, though—a whirlwind of ideas, opinions, wisecracks, and puckish self-deprecation.

I was given four tracks from the new album to prepare. But when I bring up the first, the disarmingly raw, strange, and lovely “Shall I Compare Thee,” she laughs. “I hate all these songs now. I might even replace them all. I’m supposed to be finishing the album this month or whatever, but I’ve been making a shit ton of new music instead. Which is a really bad idea.” She sighs, thinks for a moment. “But I’ll probably put out the songs that I said I’ll put out.” I tell her that her fans would surely appreciate seeing what she’s been working on. “Maybe, maybe not,” she replies, grinning. “I think the fans want me to stop making metal, nu-metal. Which I will! I have, I have stopped making metal!” Meanwhile, she’s dropping demos for an augmented reality side project under the moniker “Dark,” scribbling away on a novel, and thinking about a suite of “hymns, like glossolalia vocal music,” but which she “probably won’t release as ‘Grimes,’” as she explains it. She has changed her artistic approach, and is intent on unshackling her creative impulses. “I read a book on speed painting, about how you just lay it down and become satisfied with it. So I’m trying to do a bunch of stuff like that right now. It does feel better, because it just contains more life,” she explains. “Shall I Compare Thee” embodies this speed-painting creative methodology: DIY production, recorded in “like, two hours.” But the other single from the album, “We Appreciate Power,” is the opposite. It’s polished to a shine, conceptual, accompanied by a well-produced video. “‘Power’ is sort of the end of the old music I was making,” she says. “This era of super-produced and perfected sound—it’s sort of a thesis on that, a bookend.”

She’s eager to explain the concept of the new album. However she feels about the songs at any given moment, she’s clearly excited about the story that they’re telling. “Miss Anthropocene” is a character, essentially an anthropomorphization of the concept of climate change. The name is a witty pun on “misanthropy” and “anthropocene”—the geological era defined by humanity’s irrevocable impacts on the planet. “All the media about climate change is like one big guilt trip. It’s super depressing, like, here are some facts that make you wanna go home and kill yourself. It sucks and it sucks to look at, so people just kind of look away from it,” she says. “I want to change that. In ancient Greek culture you have these gods that represent abstract, terrifying concepts. Like a God of Death. So I wanted to make Miss Anthropocene this idea of, like, the God of Climate Change. She wants the world to end and she wants to bring about the end of humanity, but she’s fun. She’s fucking fun and evil!” Grimes laughs. “Also, climate change is beautiful, even if it’s terrifying. It’s so nice to look at. The sunsets are brighter and more beautiful. Volcanoes, oil rainbows, hurricanes... destruction is gorgeous—people are drawn to it.”

Miss Anthropocene marks the end of an era for Grimes. When it’s released she’ll be finished with her obligations to her label, and she’s excited about the prospect of working without contractual restrictions. “I’ll never sign with another label. I’ll never have to put out another album... If I didn’t have this whole requirement to release an ‘album,’ I would have just dropped a bunch of music ages ago.” The album format, she says, feels increasingly ill-suited for her shape-shifting, experimental style. “Albums are trash unless you sit down and make a really good album. I’m not really that consistent. I feel like I would work better in like EP-ish formats.”

It’s not the only departure from musical tradition that she’s considering. Touring, she tells me, has increasingly become a stressful obligation. “I wanna retire from touring. I wanna do a hologram tour. Why do we keep doing them for dead artists instead of living ones who have stage fright?” Does she still get stage fright, this far into her career? “Oh my god, yes. It’s nightmarish. Apocalyptic. Terrifying, horrible. I can’t hear clapping or cheers—I just hear an echo chamber of death. I black out. Dissociation—I can’t tell what’s happening. After a show I’m always thinking, What happened? And people are like ‘It’s ok!’ I know people like the authenticity of live performance, and I do too. But I’m not a good performer. I’m a director who accidentally fell into this position, and now it’s too late to change. So I need to Gorillaz it—I need to find a way to not have to do the Beyoncé thing as much.”

The sense is that Grimes is finished with facades, done pretending, done jumping through hoops to meet our expectations for what a ‘pop-star’ should be. Coming to terms with all this has been a messy and difficult process, but she’s finally feeling like herself again. She’s optimistic, if wary. And she’s ready to let it all out. Her forthcoming album, to hear her tell it, is Grimes unleashed. “I feel like at times there is an extreme rage that I haven’t been able to lay down,” she says. “A rawness that I have withheld from the public, because people always told me to make it more accessible. I’ve given that up for this, and it’s been freeing.”

She’s confronting her past as well. Miss Anthropocene was written during a period of intense self-reflection, and in the midst of personal tragedy. After losing others to addiction and overdoses, yet another close friend had passed. She hints obliquely at her own struggles with substances. It’s hard for her to talk about, but she has confronted it head-on while making this album, and is ready to be honest with the public. “I had early disturbing experiences with kids coming up to me and admiring things that were self-destructive. I was like, fuck, people think it’s cool to cut yourself or vomit or do crack. That’s not good! But then it became this stifling thing,” she says. “I don’t know. I’ve lived this hard, fucked-up life. I can’t pretend I didn’t. It started feeling like I couldn’t express myself properly, because I was so worried about being a good role model. It scares me to be hyper-honest, but we never see women getting to be that way. There should be someone out there that’s messy and fucked up—for some people this is how it is. It scares me because I don’t want little kids to romanticize certain things that are not cool. But I also don’t want to lie about the reality of my existence. I can’t make super honest or super emotional art if I’m always pretending to be cool and chill all the time.”

Grimes’ fans, who love her rabidly, have expressed worry at times in the last few years. If it seems she’s been self-sabotaging, whether online or in her relationships with collaborators and partners, it’s because she really has struggled. But unlike most of us, every step of her journey has been seized upon by a fascinated public and a cynical press hungry for headlines and clicks. And her reticence to tell us what she was really going through left all the more room for speculation. “Two of my best friends died before I was 18, and I lost like five friends to opiate-related deaths. Really close friends. I had one die when I was on a shoot, and found out while filming the second day. All this stuff, fucked up stuff, is happening. Before I would just not mention any of it. I feel like I’ve been through war when I think that all these people around me are dead. In 2016, my good friend died. They were a friend of 15 years, and I felt nothing. Just nothing. And it was so weird. But, you know, there you go. So you start removing yourself from everybody because you don’t want to face it. Life becomes too shockingly fragile, you know?”

It hasn’t been easy for Grimes to engage with her past, but talking about it—in her art, in interviews like this one—is helping. “I’ve gotten better. I was really fucked up in 2016 when I wrote this album, but now I’m doing much better. When I was going through the Art Angels cycle, I was having severe PTSD, and everyone was like, ‘Don’t let the public know!’ I know there are people who think I’ve fucked up the last year, and I do need to be more organized and reasonable and thoughtful at times, for sure. But I feel my art is better.”

Grimes’ favorite part of her job comes before she records a single note. “Dreaming it up feels so easy. The making and releasing can be horrible, but the dreaming is always fun,” she sighs. And that’s why she’s such an interesting figure, right? She’s a prodigious dreamer. We may love the music—I still blast “Oblivion” on an almost monthly basis, revisit the strange and compelling world of Art Angels—but it does sometimes feel almost beside the point. Grimes is building a universe, and she’s shedding the strictures that get in the way of that grand vision—the album format, her label, even her own carefully-crafted identity. “Part of what I’m doing is setting up the world-building. Reverse Harry Potter it. Soundtrack comes first, then the fashion, then everything, everything, everything. Then the book, right before I die,” she says, not really joking. Reaching this point of liberation hasn’t been a smooth process. Grimes is unfailingly honest with herself, her own worst critic. But she feels free, she’s happy with what she’s creating, and her ambitions have only grown. We just need to get out of the way and let her dream.

#grimes #claire boucher #actuallygrimes #interview 2019 #flaunt magazine #sid feddema #2019 #zoey grossman

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luxmagnafest · 4 years

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INTERVIEW: "Reflectif" Artists Reflect on Black Representation from their Upbringing

In one week, Lux Magna will have the pleasure of opening a month long art exhibit at Casa del Popolo, curated by local visual artists Kai Samuels and Joyce Joseph (a.k.a. JUICE); Reflectif is an exposition of art spanning various mediums, by 6 young Black artists coming from across the country.

Team member Mags (who is also a visual artist) spoke with Nafleri, Tyrin Kelly, Joseph Moore, Hasina Kamanzi (OTT), BlazenBlack (OTT) and Simone Heath (TO), about their respective experiences growing up with (or without) Black folk represented in the media and art that they consumed.

When was the first time you remember seeing Black folk represented in media or the arts?

Hasina: The first time I remember seeing Black people highlighted in media was when I went back to Burundi for the first time in 2014. I saw an oil painting exposition that was illustrating what life was like in Burundi pre-colonisation. I didn't realize at the time how influential it would be for me so, unfortunately, I can't recall what was the name of the artist or the name of the exposition.

Nafleri: Having grown up in Haiti, I was surrounded by Black people, so Carnival season was Black people and their joy put on a show. I knew whiteness existed but it was in light-skin Black [people] or missionaries; I wasn't fully aware how much opportunities catered to it. BUT, after arriving in Canada and being taught to be Black, around my second year, I remember TVA played films every Saturday, and during the week they would play the trailer for said movies; I remember once they played Fat Albert and all through out the week I was hype ‘cause it was movies with characters I felt I could relate to. I ended up being disappointed but, I still remember that child's hype. But in Haiti, I remember music, cinema, literature, paintings, sculptures, I wasn’t fully aware of it but I was lucky enough to experience Blackness in art.

Joseph: The first time that I remember seeing Black people represented within the media was The Proud Family. The show had a significant impact on my childhood, as it allowed for me to see various Black characters in a normalized and lighthearted setting on a regular basis.

BlazenBlack: Had to be the detective [Bulletproof] in the cartoon COPS, followed by X-Men’s Storm.

Simone: The earliest Black character I could remember is Susie Carmichael from Rugrats. Pinpointing a first time is hard to say for sure. I grew up in the late 90’s-early 2000’s with a lot of Black shows, a few having more Black-centric protagonists. I can remember watching The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Family Matters and The Cosby Show with my family.

Tyrin: I’m not sure… growing up I became really obsessed with the early jazz scene in America. It was drummers like Philly Joe Jones and Art Blakey that really inspired me to learn an instrument. K-OS is one of the first modern Black musicians that showed me you can make hip-hop and be a rock-star. I fell in love with Atlantis Hymns for Disco and really idolized that whole “B-Boy who makes indie music” persona. In terms of visual art I wasn’t really aware of Black artists that stuck to my memory until high school art class I think. I was really invested in the poetry scene in Ottawa during that time and Saul Williams is another Black artist that really influenced me.

2. Who was your favorite fictional Black character growing up?

Nafleri: Can I answer Jesus? (laughs) I remember reading (I know nada of Christian theology) that Jesus never wrote anything, his partners did, so in the writing of others, I'd see the fiction of Jesus, not that it's a bad thing, fictional characters can be inspirational but… uncles, aunties and ‘em might roast for that one. (laughs). Jokes aside though, growing up I remember Bouki and Malice, which were folk stories of Haiti and in the literary work of Odette Roy Fombrun. I was able to see Black characters that weren't asked to be super, they existed in the complexities of their life. Looking back, I'm grateful to have experienced that.

BlazenBlack: My favorite fictional Black character must have been Piccolo [DragonBall Z] if he counts. If not, War Machine [Iron Man franchise].

Hasina: Growing up, my favorite Black fictional character was Pamela (from the Tea Sisters book series) [Thea Stilton series in North America]. Technically, she's a mouse but she was also very anthropomorphic & born in Tanzania (like me!) so baby Hasina read her as Black.

Joseph: This is a hard question to answer as I can think of many favourites, but if I had to choose, it would be between Alyx Vance from the Half Life video game series or Michonne from The Walking Dead.

Tyrin: My favourite fictional Black character growing up was Radio Raheem from Do The Right Thing. Also Q from Juice. Foxy Brown was also so badass. Those three will forever be cool.

Simone: Probably Raven Baxter from That’s So Raven for a bit. I liked a lot of the outfits she would wear. She was multi-talented and funny.

3. What is your opinion on the current state of Black representation in Canadian media?

BlazenBlack: I don’t watch much Canadian TV, so I can’t speak on shows or movies, but in terms of animations, I can’t even name one off the top of my head. I'm hoping to change that.

Joseph: While I admit that I haven't been consuming as much Canadian media as I would like to as of late, I have found it harder to name many prominent or relatable Black characters within Canadian media off of the top of my head as opposed to American characters. While I appreciate Canada's willingness to represent many different cultures and viewpoints, it would be interesting to see something centered around the regular lives of Black people living in Canada on a larger platform.

Simone: Black representation in Canadian media could be a lot better. It feels as though it isn’t really there or pushed into the background as apart of Canadian diversity. Most of the Black media I consume is from the States. I don’t watch a lot of Canadian television, but from what I’ve seen I don’t recall any Black protagonists, usually side characters with little to no background. I feel like Black Canadian artists/athletes aren’t recognized until they have made something of themselves outside of the country. I’m grateful for people that reach out and organize events like this to have ourselves shown. I also have a lot to learn myself when it comes to being more active in these conversations and connecting with other Black Canadians.

Nafleri: I feel like I can't speak of Canadian media, though this stretch ocean to ocean I've only visited— I can't even say Toronto— Niagara Falls… once on a family trip. Quebec media however, having consumed a lot, hoping to fit in, I know for a fact, there is a big lack of representation. Though I stopped consuming QC media, late high school, my best friend studying in a theater institutions is closer to Quebec's media and we often discuss the lack of representation in his future field of work.

Tyrin: Um, I’m not sure it’s so black and white… if you’re looking at “credible” sources of media, yeah definitely a little convoluted. But in terms of independent media— media environments run by artists for artists— then I think it’s thriving and it’s all so cool! Like, looking at people I follow on social media or friends and peers that are making cool shit the list is giant. Definitely media representation is positive and important to an extent, and I think in Canadian media the effort is made, but that’s not what matters. What matters is honesty and published honesty is recognized in every format. I mean, shouts out to: Tau Lewis, Marvin Luvualu António, Moneyphone, Schwey, Elle Barbara, Tati au Miel, Neo Edo, Cole Craib, James Goddard, and all other Black artists who are doing their thing.

Hasina: There is a lot of work to be done but I'm hopeful because I see a lot of creatives doing great things both in Ottawa/Gatineau (where I live) and in Montreal.

Closing thoughts from co-curator JUICE

It's really cool how living Black is very different to other people. I always had this ideology that, because I was navigating spaces where there were a few Black children (or I was the only Black child) while growing up, meeting Black folks outside my environment meant that I could relate to them, just because they were Black. I wouldn't realize that our experiences could be different. Seeing how representation is so different but so important to each individual life, reminds me that, what ever they're doing creatively, you can do too, and you're not alone on the journey.

The first time I remember seeing Black folks was when my mother gave me a Spice Girl doll. Mel B (Melanie Brown) was the first Black doll I ever had and she had an Afro. She was the one doll I spent so much time on; I loved her so much. When I found out she was an actual person, I was shocked, and was interested in what she does, but I didn't have access to seeing what she did creatively (except on those celebrity TV talk shows when my mother would take me out to hair salons) . Later on growing up, I was into 1990's-2000's TV shows. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, My Wife and Kids, and Sister, Sister to name a few. Cartoons and anime were some other things I would watch when I would spend time with my siblings. Codename: Kids Next Door, Teen Titans and Bleach were a few of the earliest shows I would see Black characters. I would be extremely happy whenever they appeared on my screen. This only lasted during the years I moved and lived in Philadelphia. I moved back to Canada in 2008 and my spaces drastically changed. TV wasn't really the same after that.

The shows that depicted the Black characters I loved and enjoyed, weren't available in the country. Sometimes if they were, they would be 3-4 episodes behind from the American releases. At this point, I relied on the internet, or my brother’s video collections to air the shows I missed so much. Black representation was never really viewed as much as I was exposed to in the States. It became non-existent to me. The only time I would see a Black person in media or TV, is when a creative artist becomes popular, and outlets find out they're from Montreal. It was difficult to find representation growing up in this city, I always felt like we were side characters in our own adventures. People don't realize it but it does have an affect on people. It's nice to know that organizations are creating platforms for BIPOC representation, because we exist and we are not alone.

➡ RSVP ⬅

#2020 #kai samuels #juice #nafleri #hasina kamanzi #blazenblack #joseph moore #simone heath

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sikereviewdotcom · 4 years

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wilfred (2011) - season 1 ep1 “happiness” review

ok so today were reviewing fucking "wilfred" basically its a story about a depressed guy who tried to kill himself but he failed because hes a pushover in life and even suicide is mocking him yea jk actually his sis prescribed him placebo so the meds he used in his suicide attempt were useless yada yada

then he sees his neighbours (on who he tots have the hots for) dog as a man and hes like lol wtf why is there a furry standing in my yard? im not into dogplay dudette, please dont do this to me ah-

unfortunately for him the chick, on the next day asks to take care of her dog meanwhile because idk shit happens in her house? and she has to work? yea something like that so anyway he accepts because hes into her and out of it aswell more out of it than anything tho

our man, ryan is pretty disturbed but it happens anyway he has NO control over his life so why would he have control on a dog fursuit wearing 40 yo man? yea exactly wouldnt make sense

wilfred enters his house and smoke a damn bong thats right, a very efficient way to introduce what kind of character were up against see, jason gann has the perfect face for such character looking all dirty in that suit with a big ass black painted dog nose you gotta think "that dawgs up to no good" and youd be damn right keep reading to discover why so basically nm happens in this episode if it isnt the setting of all the shit because well ryan has a lot of issues and its gonna get worse you cant believe this dog is gonna make things better for ryan not really hes just scamming the loser with cheap tricks and drugs

btw after (trying) to vape or w/e with wilfred, the man falls asleep, wakes up because his sis whos a bitch, remember her

its important to spot whos a bitch in each show ill be reviewing its pretty easy to balance whos the antagonist and who isnt although it often is much more complexe than that which is why im here making it all very easy and very interesting, aside from lost cases like the magic school bus i cant make that shit any worse nor TOO better like i have limited power my reviews are sike but some shows are just nah back to our whipped cream: ryans depression: he is jobless ok? so his sis is mad that he doesnt make the effort to come work and do what he has to also he used to be a lawyer btw because his father wanted him to be and then his father died and he lost his job and he hated being a lawyer so w/e but he also seemingly lost all reasons to live and redacted more than one suicide letter so im not sure what to think about it he was really eager to die yknow his sis couldnt care less tho its like "yo stop ruining my image im trynna get you a job in my hospital fuckface" yea see that why shes an inconsiderate bitch

so instead of going to work because of wilfred, ryan takes him for a while btw that vermin also tries to get elijah (the actor playing ryan is elijah wood obvs btw so this series already gets 5 points to begin with i dont make the rules) to throw a tennis ball and dont forget this ball ok? its gonna come back and start a whole drama its the beginning of our adventure a ball

next theyre in a restauration thing eating chips and drinking a beer together dog and his friend then the waitress comes and

happens the tiddies eating, it almost one fucking minute im sure we could all feel the embarassement of having your animal rubbing its balls and penis against your friend whos over for the nights leg in the middle of spring and youre just trying to get it back but wow the hormones are hitting it hard its like a cleaning robot vibrating on a grandma whos cardiacs chest and you trynna take that little asshole away but for some reason its rubbed in olive oil so not only does it reeks of olive, its also slippery as heck and you can see your grandma spasmming on her soon-to-be deathbed, she has spasms for god sake no the robot no someone stop it from stimulating the old ladys torso ah shit marguerite died after drowning in her drooling

not even died of an heart attack nah, it was such a messy death she suffered so much no one could do anything its like the robot was sentient yknow and well same goes for wilfred hes making it on purpose but uses the excuse : he likes the boobs it nothing personal, ryan

w/e they leave after paying (not for the side tits tho, it was a freebie for dogs) after that shit happens (i wont spoil you EVERYTHING, im just painting a pic here ok?) at this point you could wonder "is wilfred being a dick on purpose or its just about said instincts? how much percentage of his behavior is actually dog and how much is ryans mind (the guy is deranged there is no denying that but how much? )) whats sure is that his owner likes her dog vm and hes maining that chick

good for him? but it also happens that before that, elijah just threw the ball above the gate and into his much less friendly neighbour because he was sick of the dog asking to throw it and so yea, there is a tension between ryan and wilfred not any kind of tension, exactly the kind of elija x reader fanfic i wanted to read except pov: im a canine furry and i smoke weed on a daily basis and im a jackass

theyre almost breaking up someone does something about it i was seriously getting into it wow oh no fuck look at me tearing one or two here

rip their new born bromance? or... is it all there is to it? well see no obviously its the problem we were waiting for because when our fella enters back home and idk whatever else happens its night and his sister comes home and she goes all "lol actually i gave you placebo itd be dangerous otherwise you numbfuck" but shes quickly muted once our man notices his dog friend in his yard... its time for a reunion a heart to heart conversation to proceed so he has to ditch his sis which he casually does bros before hoes

its again about the ball which HE WILL go and fetch by passing over the fence to get in neighbours yard but damn it cant be just that? wouldnt it make a lame crappy story? we need some actions, we got the tits, the beer, no job, delinquency has no limit so fuck it says the dog as he smashes the window and enters the bikers house because he SMELLS (like he smells the shit streaks you have on your pants) the weed, ryan is like "no fuck bro no shit fuck ah-" then sees the damn weed which they steal ok? hes really a pushover he has not got the right idea of stopping being one because thats what his new friends supposed to be here for yknow trynna get his loser into a winner, that lil camper gotta level up his game, go get into the business of life barging in kicking the door to enter, no shame nor hesitation were trying to make him STEP UP for HIMSELF but guess what? ill tell you later or itd be a spoil in a spoil surely a bad paradoxal medium w/e business going on blablabla theyre up to no good thats for sure as sure as how much ryans actually enjoy this the mans into this pee slash poop affair:

spoiler alert: he does it and

im just quoting him here : he never felt more alive nor glad to be so i guess thats whats life about shitting in peoples affair, stealing weed plants and quitting your job on your first day (you havent showed up tho so w/e you never really worked in that place no one knows you its all good you can get back in that place looking innocent and smiling with your broken ribs "yea nah i never had a job here and ditched yall huh" thats foxy of him kinda but not really since he had no intention back then to do anything for himself it was all strings pulled by a fucking dog hilarious really im having a kick haha no

so what next? theyre best friends? man and dog, a wonderful friendship happens he has no more family to support him but HE HAS A DOG guys he was so into it im feeling sorry for this hobot-to-be schizophrenic man

i wont spoil you but trust me when i say not to trust a furry who eats tits on your first date

in conclusion: it was a pretty decent first episode ill update my final thoughts on the first season once im done watching it but so far its recommandable the camera work is pretty cool like its not just thoughtless filming we actually have a nice feel to it, the setting of the series is esthetically pleasing you get nice colors and it aint boring, its not like a FRIENDS episode yknow? dawg i dislike how boring it looks filming wise for start but damn i aint reviewing FRIENDS rn so next, the comedy? after all its a comedy genre series not a drama, idk if id review an actual depressive show on here thatd bum the vibe out ok? i know im making all my revs awesome w/e it is that i choose to rate and comment but still im serving you a plate of my finest sheez not any fizzle in the mizzle ok?

anyway yea the humor aint bad, i havent laughed my ass of but i did find it amusing to watch the jokes may actually kick in in the second episode ill have to update this rev alright? just hang on to your balls peeps this fam will serve in due time

rating: 7,5/10 scenery/camera work 7/10 comedy 8/10 interest/entertaining points total: 7,5/10 for a first episode is fine enough to be recommanded, like a "give it a chance" sorta case yknow isnt the most hilarious show youll watch but its fine especially if youre into homoromantic tension between a furry and elijah wood

tg, out

#wilfred #review #series review #wilfred review #wilfred 2011 #furry #sike reviews

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houseofvans · 5 years

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SKETCHY BEHAVIORS | INTERVIEW W/ CRYSTAL HABITATS

Combining stain glass, metal smithing and mineralogy, founder of Crystal Habitats, Rachel Pitler transformed her drawing and painting skills into a magical world of 3D stained glass and molten metal sculptures – from jewel adorned cardholders, wands, daggers (athames), to ring holders, just to mention a few. Not only one thing, Rachel is also a co-founder of Bitchcraft, an unique holiday event featuring over 60 vendors, selling everything dark & magical. We’re excited to talk to Rachel and find out more about how she started her creations, what inspires them, and what she has planned for 2019!

Take the leap below!

Photographs courtesy of the artist.

Introduce yourself. My name is Rachel Pitler Hsiung. I am a mixed-media artist (stained glass, molten metal, oil painting, and clay). Originally I am from Detroit; however, I have been living in Los Angeles now for many years. My professional background is in the rock & mineral industry. Working in this field allows me to travel to all the big gem shows where I am able to work with interesting specimens on a daily basis... as well as being surrounded by these beauties is a huge creative plus for me and where I draw much of my inspiration.

Tell us a little about your background in art? I never had any formal training in drawing & painting. My mom is a fantasy illustrator, so growing up I often sat with my mom and watched her paint/draw, and I took to it myself pretty quickly. I got a job in my 20s teaching art to kids & teens on the basics of drawing, watercolor & oil painting. I taught art for 8 years. It was a really important time in my life for me to grow as an artist. Through teaching others I discovered a lot about myself, I learned to enjoy my process of making art, to never stop learning, and to push myself out of my comfort zone into new mediums.

How did you go from working with traditional material like oil paints and pastels to a medium like stain glass and solder? When did you start creating pieces out of glass, metal, and so forth? A little over 5 years ago one of my best friends Erin Coovert (Moontan Stain Glass) started taking a glass class. She encouraged me to try out her class, I did and have been forever changed by this incredible medium. I am so grateful to her for sharing this path with me as it opened up so much more for me in terms of my creative abilities. It's really hard when you have a lot of creative ideas, but little tools to make them into reality. I was such a two dimensional art person trying to be a 3D artist and for whatever reason stained glass opened that part of my brain up to problem solve and tackle art projects that I would have otherwise given up on.

Tell us a little about Crystal Habitats and the unique pieces that you create for it? In mineralogy, the word crystal habit is a characteristic of crystal groups & individual crystals. I wanted to make artwork that reflected my own take on crystals and create pieces that are like little worlds within themselves, little habitats that harness magick and cast their energy onto whoever uses them. Art for me has always been a refuge and a place of healing.

I love making tools that do just that. I make wands & daggers (athames) that are adorned with crystals & molten metal. I make three sided pyramids (often with crystals adhered to them), jewelry, ring holders, and a lot of other items. In my drawings & paintings, I have a fantasy world I came up with called The Ice Crags. Many of my paintings & drawings take place in this realm. My characters are often High Priestess (and wizards). Recently I have started to making these characters in stained glass.

Of the many things you create–from wands to daggers–which is your favorite to make and why? What is the process like for one of these, from start to finish? Right now I am really enjoying the process of making my snake athames (a type of dagger). Snakes represent healing & transformation, when paired with a stone setting and blade, these pieces really become a source of internal empowerment.

My friend John (@jabforge) makes my blades, I make the hilt with molten metal...I cut out a copper/metal sheet with my metal cutter to create a handle. I hand solder the entire base...there are different ways to solder...I have adapted a painting style of soldering, you can create patterns within the metal to give it a unique look. When I add the crystals I make bezels out of metal, and solder it to the hilt, and I hand make the the snakes out of epoxy clay. I give my pieces a dark patina and I often use my dremel to smooth out parts and I sand it down to give it an interesting aged look. I enjoy making these in particular as it is a collaboration which I always love and each piece has such a unique character to them. When working with molten metal, I never know what pattern I am going to make till I start soldering, it's always fun to see how they turn out.

In your studio, what type of art materials and tools would we find on your desk? Too many tools and never enough tools! Lead free solder, soldering iron, flux, glass cutting materials, dremel, jewelry wax, metal cutter, thin wires, metal sheets, copper sheets, all sorts of dental tools (I use them for carving) epoxy clay, lots of glues, torch, hammers, paint, glass, wood, my lapidary wheel, patina, cabochons and crystals parts, there's a lot of stuff! Im super obsessed with working with new materials. Since I work in a handful of mediums, it becomes a real science project in my studio mashing them together to see what works and what doesn’t.

What are some of the cool collaborations you’ve done? How do collaborators incorporate your works into what they’re doing? A recent collaboration I did was with my good friend Alex from Acid Queen Jewelry. She makes incredible jewelry and we often talk shop on a weekly basis. She made a gorgeous ring and I made a matching glass ring holder (glass base with a quartz point as the holder for the ring). She and I will have more collabs in 2019! Very excited to work with her again! And as mentioned earlier John from Jab Forge. He is a blacksmith, his blade work is my favorite...his blades look like moon craters, they have a real old world look to them and I enjoy matching my style of metal work with his work.

What medium haven’t you tried that you’d definitely like to get your hands on? Metalsmithing. Well this is a medium I have dabbled in but really haven’t gone deep and it’s my goal for 2019 to get into it more. Specifically so that I can incorporate a different type of metal work into my stained glass & my solder work. Medium cross over is my favorite thing to mess around with, good for the brain ;)

Not only are you behind Crystal Habitats and its creations, but you had an active role in creating an event/community called Bitchcraft. Can you tell us more about Bitchcraft, how it started and the idea behind it? When was the last one and when’s the next one? Yes! 10 years ago I co-founded it with 4 of my friends. We all made things and wanted an all female handmade collective where we could barter/sell goods. I believe we had like 10 vendors at the first one in our friend’s backyard...now there are over 60 vendors, it's a pretty large holiday event. It's a collective that celebrates everything dark & magickal, a curated group of like-minded makers filled with everything from metal goods, apothecary, altar items, capes, wands, jewelry, and really a lot of items related to other worldly and the occult. We just had our annual holiday show in December! There's always a chance for a mid year show but for now not till Dec 2019 :)

Who are some of your favorite vendors or artists from that Bitchcraft community? What’s your favorite thing about that community? Oh that is really hard for me to say!! Most of these people have been my friends for a long time and have been a creative support system and I cherish all of them and appreciate & admire all of their works. My favorite thing about the Bcraft community is the friendships! There is so much love and support with this crew...outside of this event a lot of the vendors work with each other on projects, do shows together, help promote and support one another. Having a strong group of makers is super important to me and has helped me grow so much as an artist, and I am so thankful for all of them!

Who are some other artists you’re inspired by? What kind of things inspire you? I have the longest list of artist who have inspired me!! But I have to say my very top inspirational artist would be my mom, Sheri-Pitler McClure. Her work is everything to me...she has a way of drawing people that is so out of this time, totally belongs in Middle Earth. Growing up my mom surrounded our household with fantasy - wizard & unicorn statues spread throughout our my childhood home...she is a big fan of science fiction, so as a kid I was exposed to all movies and books on the subject. She is also a rock collector (she did opal lapidary work back in the day) so I guess all of these things had a big impact on me. When I was really young she painted a series of these goddesses that represented the different seasonal full moons. These women were painted as strong ethereal beings, who’s magick reached out from the canvas and wided my eyes to endless worlds one could create. That was my first memory of how art can really change your perspective and it has stuck with me ever since.

Other things that inspire me spans from crystal formations, old medieval paintings, everything Tolkien, old lore & fantasy books/movies. I am also really into the color pallet of the Dark Crystal, I often watch and think about that movie when I am making.

What’s been the most challenging part of maintaining Crystal Habitats? What’s been the most rewarding? What do you do to keep the balance? I would say compartmenting my time has been a big challenge….often people tell me to do my art full time but working in the mineral business is my dream job and it is also is a place where I come up with my concepts...its like one can’t exist without the other, so figuring out the balance of them has been something that I am always working on. The most rewarding part is when I have a really fresh new idea and I am able to execute it….there are some designs that I will do over and over, but when a new design pops into my head it becomes extremely exciting to work on.

Recently I have been bringing balance into my work space by not taking on too many custom orders or too many shows...allowing myself to have breaks...through these breaks I have been able to come back fresh and renewed, which is very important to my process.

What’s your advice to folks who see what you do and want to pursue it as a career? Don’t compare yourself to others. Keep learning, discover new mediums, always be a student of something it really opens your mind to concepts that otherwise could be dormant.

What’s your best advice for creative folks on social media platforms, like Instagram? Have fun! I know that sounds lame, be seriously don’t get caught up in it too much. The more stress you surround yourself with social media & the more it takes away from your art. I love using social media, I love using it to showcase my art and be connected to other artists/communities, but don’t allow it to become overwhelming. I think being true to your art is the most important part:)

What are your FAVORITE Vans? Slip-Ons!

Finally can you share with us what exciting things you may have lined up for 2019? I’ll be working on a new line of handmade jewelry boxes. A lot more snake themed items for sure!! I have been working on some Shield Maiden jewelry through metalsmithing/lost wax mediums, it is something I have been really taking my time with and I am hoping to have some completed soon. I will also being vending at the Culver City Gem & Mineral Show in June 2019.

FOLLOW RACHEL | INSTAGRAM | WEBSITE

#Art #Vans #Vans Art #Vans Girls #Crystal Habitats #Rachel Pitler #Metal smithing #stain glass #crystal #hand craft #DIY

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a-shakespearean-in-paris · 5 years

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Writer’s Questionnaire

tagged by @galadrieljones! Thanks! :)

Short stories, novels, or poems? I write a lot of short scenes, but I prefer reading novels as well as writing them. It’s so fun to see how your character grows and changes, how they develop, and how things you thought would happen don’t, or happen in a way different from what you imagined. It’s wonderful, though difficult. (Constantly I have to ask myself have I used this turn of phrase in the story before?)

What genre do you prefer reading? Looking at the books that caught my interest of late, (and in general) the stuff I read has some sort of family dynamic present. More often than not, there’s also a love story. Typically my favorite books are sagas that take place over different generations. (thorn birds one of them, and when I was younger and read a lot of Sidney Sheldon, one of my favorites of his was Master of the game, which took place over fifty years of family. my older self though now really likes Rage of Angels...I would love to like modernize that story...) My dream is to write a long family saga one day.

What genre do you prefer writing? there’s no contest: Romance. I was once very adamant about not using that word due to the stigma behind the romance genre, very keen on...a story about two people who happen to be in love! But you know..it’s romance. I’m just endlessly fascinated by the different ways people can fall in love, and how their love manifests and effects others.

Are you a planner or a write-as-I-go kind of person? Hmmmm.....a little of both. With Our Immortal longings I made an outline of events, but things changed, shifted around, or flat out didn’t happen. Back in the day I was very strict on following the outline I wrote, but now I’ve finally found the happy medium of following it but understanding the story is going in a different direction. I think one of the reasons my modern AU is stagnant right now is because I didn’t make an outline.

What music do you listen to while writing? Usually I don’t. However, there are a few scenes I have written throughout my resume where there was a song I replayed over and over again, because it just fit the mood. So now when I listen to one of those songs, all I can think about is the scene. :)

Fave books/movies? Hmmm I have books that have meant a lot to me over the years. East by Edith Pattou (which now has a sequel. Like..wha?) The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCoullogh, Phantom by Susan Kay. I also love so many plays. Of course Shakespeare, but also Anton Chekhov.

Movies: Howl’s Moving Castle is arguably my biggest inspiration. And when I watched gone with the wind when I was 12 I swear it changed me. I wasn’t used to seeing female characters being so unapologetic, and while I certainly don’t idolize Scarlett O’hara, I find her endlessly interesting as a character. Some other favorites are The Sound of Music, That Hamilton Woman, Wuthering Heights(1939), Bridesmaids. And I saw the new A Star is Born and it’s on my eternal favorites list.

Any current WIPs? My DBH fic has become my main focus, Our Immortal Longings. (Which I would really love to shorten to Immortal Longings but hey what can you do.) I also have a post blight fic with cullen, that details the relationship he develops with one of the chantry sisters. I also have a modern AU with Cullen and Lydia. I like the fic in theory, and I was experimenting away from the romantic feel of my previous work to something blunter and more realistic (for lack of a better word.) But I just feel for Connor’s character when I played DBH, and I really wanted to tackle how he would deal with falling in love. In the process I seriously became enamored with my own OC and the dynamic she has with him. Odd because I was never interested in robots or stories about robots before...but now...well....look at all the possibilities!

also I had a MGIT story about a Shakespearean actress. I’m sorry to those who liked the story, but I’m not going to continue with it.

If someone were to make a cartoon out of you, what would your standard outfit be? A pink colored sundress decorated with flowers, and ballet flats. My hair is big and curly.

Create a character description for yourself: She was alive. That was always good, though perhaps not in the best of her appearances with her glasses on, face unmade and hair in a messy bun. She was also wearing one of her dumpy nightshirts. But again, she was alive, and she was writing. Every single word she wrote was a victory.

Do you like incorporating people you actually know into your writing? Bits of them sure, not blatant insertions to where people I know would know. Maybe just a wink.

Are you kill-happy with characters? Well, people do die IRL and in my writing. But I wouldn’t say I’m kill happy. IWD had two causalities. Will OIL have any? Well....I can’t answer that. Some of my favorite movies/books have poignant deaths, and I will admit the one major death scene that happened on screen in IWD was very cathartic and powerful for me.

Am I George RR Martin kill happy though? no.

Coffee or tea while writing? Morning: coffee. Night: Tea.

Slow or fast writer? I’m reasonably fast, though it certainly depends. sometimes it takes me a while to start.

Where/who/what do you find inspiration from? Everything and anything. I always have my eyes peeled. When I was in Disney I came up with so many scenarios for Connor and Sophie, and yesterday doing sparklers and fireworks with my family I imagined a Cophie new year, lol.

mainly though? Music. Definitely music.

If you were put into a fantasy world, what would you be? In my best life I’m a bard that follows along an adventurer and becomes their companion as they travel the the world.

Most fave book cliche? Least fave book cliche? I’m a sucker for a lot of romantic tropes. The dance of romance, forehead touches, died in your arms, (Is that morbid? lol I’m sorry I just find it so dramatically satisfying.) I love broody guy, gentle girl and variations of that trope. Friends to lovers. in fact I view my two OtPS a variation of the above. I probably have more too. Bedsharing too. I did bedsharing back before I knew everyone else loved it too :)

I’m of the opinion that most things can work if done properly but least favorite is by far the whole liar revealed story arc. at best I tolerate it, but...no. Just no. I’m getting a little tired of “we can’t be together” story lines and love triangles too. I also have tropes that I think are okay but everyone else loves: fake dating. (I know, I know. I even have my own fake dating story too. mostly I wrote it because I wanted to see if I could grow to like it.) and dramatic height differences. but this is mostly because I’m tall, and when I read young adult fiction as a youth, the LI was always so much taller than the herione...and I’m salty ok? lol.

OH on young adult books: I’m tired of the heroine that “isn’t like other girls because I’m tough and reclusive and I don’t like makeup or whatever” (BELLA SWAN) I would like 2019 to be the year that I say you can be a powerful female and still like things that are traditionally feminine, and there should be no shame in it. I love writing characters that draw their strength through their femininity, because guess what...it’s not inherently weak!

Fave scenes to write? I love scenes where the characters just talk. I love grand romantic gestures. I love moments of reflection. And of course, I love a love scene. :p

Most productive time of day for writing? When the muse strikes.

It’s also strange to me that I most want to write when I’m in a crowd of people. maybe sometimes I feel like people are talking without listening and I feel a bit lonely so I imagine my characters, because they make me feel less lonely.

Reason for writing? I always have in some way. The simple reason? I like to. It’s my therapy and my art. I just do :)

this took a long time for some reason! tagging @bitchesofostwick @negotiator-on-site @inquisitorsmabari @fourletterepithet @whatsherfacewrites @laraslandlockedblues @out-of-the-embers @ladymdc

#writing meme

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930club · 6 years

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9:30 INTERVIEW: Chris Thile of Punch Brothers

Punch Brothers’ new album, All Ashore, has been described by mandolinist Chris Thile as "a meditation on committed relationships in the present day, particularly in the present climate." He continues, "we were hoping to create something that would be convincing as a complete thought, in this case as a nine-movement, or nine-piece, thought. Though it's rangy in what it's talking about, and in the characters who are doing the talking." We asked Thile some questions about the album and more ahead of their upcoming show at The Anthem.

Jon Chen [9:30 Club]: So, I was a pretty big fan of your newest album— I saw how it kind of kept in step with The Phosphorescent Blues. I felt like they were both sort of meditative takes on some nuanced aspect of society. The Phosphorescent Blues was about connection in an increasingly digital age, and All Ashore being about more committed relationships. I was wondering, who do you try to reach with these albums, and is there a common link in what you try to communicate?

Chris Thile [Punch Brothers]: I think both records share a yearning for a deep connection, or a feeling that there’s some sort of salvation in forging a lasting connection with another human being, or that there’s a salvation or an antidote to the malaise of our times. In a way, looking back at The Phosphorescent Blues, I almost wish those were our problems still: just railing against a life of distraction or never being fully present in any one moment. If there’s a silver lining to everything going on right now, it’s that I think people seem a little more engaged than before all this stuff that’s happening, between Brexit, and Trump, and this sort of creeping— although I guess it’s not really even creeping anymore— this advancing nationalism, which seems to be something of a global phenomenon. It definitely has gotten our attention, so I do think those records are thematically related, although not directly or intentionally. I think in All Ashore, stakes have been raised, on a macro level as human beings, and also on a micro level for us as bandmates, in that we’re having children now: two out of five of us have kids, myself included; three out of five of us are married, and everyone’s in a committed relationship. The record is very much a product of the times, as is Phosphorescent Blues, and I guess that’s the main connection, that they’re both records of their respective times. I think especially now, you’re seeing a whole lot of that; I think artists can’t really ignore what’s going on right now, our work is fairly consumed by it.

Absolutely. I think all of you have kind of been in different projects, living in different cities, being in committed relationships. And somehow in spite of this, I felt like All Ashore really showed signs of growth as a band: I thought you guys seemed tighter, and I felt closer to the message you guys conveyed through the writing. Maybe it was a result of hearing your music that was a product of the times. I was wondering, how have you managed to keep growing as a band while being so far apart?

I think everyone’s growing as musicians individually, and Punch Brothers takes up less of the year since its inception. You know, these days people becoming family men, myself becoming the host of this radio show [Live From Here], the band sorta just has less “acreage.” I actually think that may have brought us closer together creatively because when we’re together, there’s this sense of urgency, and this necessity of focusing on getting the job done in maybe less time than we’ve had before. There’s also this real joy and refreshment and affirming aspect of being in a band— it’s a treat now to work together, which is a pretty crazy thing to say twelve years into a collaboration. Every time we get together to put together new music, or deliver to the people who are interested in it, it’s just taken on a new identity. To maybe put it more simply, I think we know what we have now, since we’ve taken more time away from it, and every time we get to do it, we are fully engaged.

Wow. I’ve often been fascinated by how as a band, your actual instrumentation is, you know, officially “bluegrass-y,” but you often borrow from pop, rock, classical, and other repertoire. What makes you want to pursue this genre-bending, and how does it inform your songwriting and composition?

The main thing for me is that the string band is kind of what my bandmates and I understand the best, just texturally. So that’s what we’re going to use, it’s what we understand. I almost feel like the genre discussion is a discussion of medium, like an artist might use pencils, or watercolors, or oils, or whatever. That’s how I feel about the bluegrass ensemble; me saying, “I play in a bluegrass ensemble,” is like saying, “I work primarily with oil.” But that doesn’t give you any more information than that. If I say, “Yeah, we play bluegrass instruments,” I have given you no more information than if an artist says, “I paint with oil.” You can think of that, but as far as what we’re gonna paint, you have absolutely no clue yet. For me, when a musician says “I play ____,” that’s how I take it. “So, what do you paint?” would be my next question. A lot of times I think people maybe assume something, like how we play bluegrass instruments, and all of a sudden what you’ve heard before on bluegrass instruments is popping up in your ears. So, we’re not interested in that, not because we don’t love it, but because it’s already been done. And so, I think most musicians or artists, that’s kind of where they’re coming from: you love what has been made well. You don’t wanna do it because it’s already been done well; you wouldn’t be doing your job if you just did something the way someone else did it.

youtube

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Genres are just labels to a lot of us, and as an artist I guess you wouldn’t want to constrain yourself to that.

Yeah. It’s not that it’s not important— it is, the choice to paint with a specific kind of medium is a choice worth talking about and thinking about. But I would just always encourage people to think of it like that: there’s still a lot of questions to be asked after the question of genre.

Totally makes sense. Kind of along the same lines, your last tour was the American Acoustic tour where you kind of represented a lot of American folk music. I’m wondering, what do you think the future of American folk music is?

I guess I think that all music is folk music— any music made by humans. That tour was a celebration of this medium of acoustic instruments, but it was also something to give people a vague idea of the aesthetic that they were in for. To talk about where acoustic music is headed… I do think people kind of think acoustic music is synonymous with folk music and that they’re one and the same. That’s fine with me, just a question of semantics, all of which is interesting, but again, doesn’t tell the whole story. I think that acoustic music is headed in precisely the direction we’re aiming this conversation, which is forward, forward, forward. What are we going to do now that we’ve made this textural decision? How do we justify our existence as artists, I think, is the question. The way that you justify is by doing something that is both new and useful. Doing something new is pretty easy. I could just play an old fiddle tune on stage, and, I don’t know, rip the stuffing out of a plush giraffe, and that would be new, nobody would’ve ever done that before. But is it useful? No. Well, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I would argue that’s not terribly useful. The fiddle tune might be useful, but again, a lot of people have already done that. Again, that’s not to decry purely doing something new— doing something useful by definition is of use— but I think we all have to concern ourselves with doing something useful and new. I think that’s what most of my peers, I hear them striving to do, that’s what I’m trying to do, and certainly what Punch Brothers is trying to do — make something new and useful.

And it sounds like you’re doing it well! Going back to American Acoustic, which ended almost exactly a year ago, you were on stage then with a lot of your most frequent collaborators, and it had kind of a “Punch Brothers and Friends” kind of feel. Your All Ashore tour seems like, though Madison Cunningham will be joining for a large part of it, the tour will be a much more intimate gathering of the band members. Would you say this tour will carry a different tone than the last tour?

Yeah, for sure. Madison, first of all, is incredible. She’ll be opening for us, there hasn’t been a “collaboration” as of yet, it’s more of a traditional concert experience. I absolutely feel like it’s a pretty intimate experience, like the boys and I are inviting you to a small gathering at our favorite bar. It’s like we’re there to escape, and then to discuss what we’re escaping from, and I think that’s kind of how a lot of small intimate social gatherings are functioning right now. You’re looking to escape the cares of the day, which are many, and many of them are shared. You have a lot of mutual cares right now with human beings, like climate change, how divided we are as a country and world, and a lot of stuff that’s really happening to us as a people right now, not in the abstract. They’re serious, life-affecting issues, and we’re all experiencing them. The record is also about how these kinds of issues are affecting our daily lives. For example, the record starts at the micro level with this small, new-ish family, and kind of ends with humanity, in “Like It’s Going Out Of Style” as something of a mantra. It takes a pretty major political detour as well, which basically all conversations are doing right now. That’s kind of where this record is, as the second round is hitting the table at a good cocktail bar, amongst close friends, and the conversations that arise at that moment.

I think that sounds really great, and I think The Anthem is going to be a really special place for that to happen. I’m excited to see what you think of it.

Yes, my first time there!

My last question is: what’s next for Punch Brothers?

The boys and I are more committed than ever to forging ahead as a creative entity. I think the experience making and now disseminating All Ashore has just underlined this project’s importance in our respective lives, and I think we’re presenting a pretty unified front, and want to continue to. We’re already starting to talk about what the next project will be, and have some ideas. I think whatever it is, it’s going to be ambitious, is the best I could give. It’ll be fun.

-Jonathan Chen

Tickets for Punch Brothers at The Anthem are available here.

#930 Interview #Artist Interview #Chris Thile #Punch Brothers #All Ashore #The Phosphorescent Blues #Live From Here #Bluegrass #Americana #Folk #Like It's Going Out of Style #The Anthem #Upcoming Shows #Jonathan Chen

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owlaholic68 · 6 years

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OC as companion: Fallout 2 - Carla

Find the FNV template here (not mine). Find blank FO2 template here (mine).

Basic info:

Name: Carla

Race: Human, mixed Mexican/Japanese

Gender: Female

Affiliation: the Wright family in New Reno

Role: Assistant at the Jungle Gym, prizefighter

Location: New Reno, Jungle Gym

Base SPECIAL: 9S 6P 3E 7C 5I 8A 3L

Tagged/Notable skills: Unarmed, Lockpick, Small Guns

Perks: Slayer, Bonus Move

Talking Head Y/N: Yes

Default Inventory: Leather armor, powerfist (requires ammo)

Carla is Stuart Little’s assistant at the Jungle Gym, and a renowned prizefighter. She is the final fight before the Masticator, and poses a significant threat because of her Unarmed damage. Beating her is necessary to gain the Prizefighter title. She has a good reaction to PC with Karma +100 and Wright Made Men, and has a bad reaction to Childkillers, Slavers, and Karma -100 (and will not join these characters).

In order to recruit her, one must defeat her in the ring or pass a relatively medium-level Speech check. She will join low-intelligence PC. If recruited but not defeated, a generic fighter will replace her slot in the “Become a Prizefighter” quest. She will join a PC despite any negative New Reno Reputation.

Initial Description: You see a tall muscular woman with two long braids. She looks tough.

Description after becoming a companion: You see Carla, prizefighter representing the Wright family. She bounces from foot to foot, anxiously looking at her surroundings and flexing her hands.

Comments and Floats:

Floats:

Fear/Defeat: Let’s not try that again.

Victory: Nothing we couldn’t handle!

Use Lockpick skill (Success)(optional): And there! Got it!

Use Lockpick skill (Failure)(optional): This nut’s too tough to crack.

Injured: Could use some help here

Relating to another companion:

(Marcus) You look like you know how to throw a punch, big guy!

(Lenny) You doing okay, Len?

(Myron) Just stay out of my way and you won’t get hurt. Battle’s no place for someone like you.

(Goris) So a deathclaw, huh? Interesting.

(Cassidy) You watch where you’re pointing that thing!

Relating to scenery/location:

(Vault City) A bunch of stuck-up assholes, if you ask me.

(Gecko) We’d better not cause trouble here, these folks seem friendly.

(New Reno)

Ah, the sweet smell of vice and drugs. Now I remembered why I only tolerated this place.

Can we stop by the Wright’s place? Keith and I need to catch up.

Maybe I should check in on Stuart, see if he wants me back in the ring.

(Chinatown) Wow, the Golden Gate Bridge looks even cooler in person. Wait, what’s parked on it?

(Hubologist bunker) *shivers* These freako cultists give me the creeps.

I don’t like this place: We’d better watch our backs here. This place gives me the creeps. Maybe we should make this visit quick.

Level up: I feel like my skills have really grown. Travelling with you is doing wonders for me!

Waiting: (humming a tune) You done yet?

Misc floats:

Nice decor.

My feet hurt. Sorry, I don’t like complaining. But seriously, I think my callouses are becoming new toes.

(PC passes a Barter check) Good. Always save money when you can.

(PC murders an innocent or steals) Whoa, what are you doing? Let’s keep this cool!

Hey, a dog! Here, boy!

Comments/Dialogue:

Standard Greeting: What’s up? What’s our next plan?

Reaction to Low Intelligence PC: I’d better watch your back, make sure no one tries to take advantage of you. You seem nice.

Crippled: *pained gasp* This is going to take more than a stimpack. We’d better find help, and quick.

After healing: Thanks. I’m ready to get back in the ring!

Put your weapon away: Good idea. Don’t want people to get the wrong idea about us.

Open inventory: Good idea. We should always know what we’re working with.

Stay close to me (CLOSE): I’ll watch your corners and you watch mine, got it?

Don’t get too far away (MEDIUM): Whatever you want. Sounds good.

We should spread out a bit (LONG): Gives me more room to maneuver.

I need you to wait here until I come back: Okay, but don’t take too long. You never know what could happen when you’re alone.

Rejoin: Just let me grab my stuff and I’ll be ready to hit the road!

Rejoin, PC doesn’t have necessary requirements (optional): Listen, you’ve changed, and I don’t think I want to be seen with you, okay?

Rejoin (over party limit): Too many people, and enemies will see us coming from miles away. How about you free up some space in your team and then come see me?

I had some other questions: Ask away. You’re full of curiosity.

Leaving/Disbanding: I can’t stand by you anymore. I’m leaving. This isn’t what I intended when I decided to come with you.

Trivia and Additional Info:

Because of her extra move points, Carla can sometimes accidentally move into other NPC (or the PC)’s line of fire, therefore risking damage. She dislikes chems, and will not use any if in her inventory. She can be asked to use her Lockpick skill, often to great success. She can also offer +5 to the Unarmed and Small Guns skill while at the Jungle Gym. This will take two hours of in-game time.

New Reno NPCs have positive reactions to her, recognizing her as a local celebrity. Wright family-associated NPCs will also have positive reactions, as she is an honorary member of their family.

She also has a unique sprite with long black hair.

Best weapons/armor:

Carla performs best with Unarmed weapons and Small Guns (pistols, etc). To optimize her efficiency in combat, she should be given the .223 pistol or the Gauss pistol. One can also get a Mega Powerfist, which she will do devastating amounts of damage with. Be aware that because of her low Luck, she will rarely land critical hits with guns. But because of her Slayer perk, she will always land critical hits with Unarmed attacks.

She does not have animation for big guns (Minigun, pulse rifle, etc) and therefore cannot use them. However, because of her high strength, she is proficient with a great array of weapons. It is not recommended that she be given grenades, as she has an awful Throwing skill and will likely end up killing everyone in your party.

She can be equipped with Power Armor, though because of her high Strength stat, this would be wasted on her. However, because of her low Endurance, some armor is STRONGLY recommended.

Ending:

After the destruction of the Oil Rig, Carla returned to Arroyo with the Chosen One, helping rebuilding efforts. However, about five years later, she decided to leave Arroyo and travel east in search of adventure. The Chosen One would occasionally receive letters from her, telling of exploits and challenges, and would always consider her to be a close friend.

#fallout #fallout 2 #fo2 #oc as companions #oc development #chosen one carla

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trinhhungthin · 4 years

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Law Class Research Assist and Website Teaching StudyDaddy.com

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Recently a newspaper flashed a headline, “Mush most hated man in Pak”. This may surprise the western countries as he had been fighting the “war on terror” since many years and doing everything that is right for Pakistan and the world. Only in 2005, General Pervez Musharraf was rated amongst the top 10 worst dictator of the world by Parade Magazine. He also won the recent presidential election by unprecedented margin. Why his own people hate him so much? After all he did everything for the country Your second reflection paper topic is about terrorism, mass protests, and mass shootings. This is essentially the second half of the semester. The directions for this are the same as the first and risked his life for Pakistan.

The Closer (TNT, 9pm) – NEW! Pope implements a plan to improve the department’s public image in the wake of the brutal slaying of a parole-board member who was killed during a phone call with Gabriel. But before any image is boosted, Brenda must first solve the murder.

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Russia has once again used its courts for a political purpose. It demonstrates an utter disregard for human rights and th contmpt for the rule of law. In convicting Mr. Khordokovsky and Mr. Lebedev, Mr. Putn has proven that his country is once again a heartless dictatorship.

What happened to our government? Why won’t the Congress listen to the people, or uphold its oath of office to defend the Constitution anymore? It almost sounds like our elected officials are conducting a concerted effort to push us into another form of government, foreign to traditional American values and our Constitutional heritage of freedom.

Reading the local trade press, both in print and online, could be very helpful to your job hunt. Not only will it help to keep you informed about what’s happening in the sector, but in many cases, they will carry details on vacancies at law college firms.

“That’s both interesting and worrying.” I say. I am not too amazed by this. I mean, I have heard we are at War, you know? Besides, there may be a very good reason for not using machinery. Perhaps a unique ant or lizard is living in that area? Perhaps there is no oil or gas to get at?

Bundy grew up thinking that his grandparents were his parents and when he found out that they were not he felt betrayed by his mother, Eleanor Louise Cowell. He only found out that he was illegitimate because his first love, Stephanie Brooks, had broken off their relationship, telling him that he was going nowhere and that he couldn’t plan anything, so he went home where he found his birth certificate. He returned to college having re-invented himself as a charming and sophisticated out going individual. He got involved in politics and started to learn Chinese.

If you are a student law then you have a lot of entry level law jobs waiting for you. But you must always remember that it is very much important to perform well in all your law school examinations.

The last Supreme Court judge to be impeached was “Old Bacon Face,” Samual Chase. In 1805, he was brought up on charges that he treated defendants unfairly based on his political bias. He was eventually acquitted. Of particular note is that Chase’s impeachment set the benchmark for several judicial boundaries. Most notably, it set the “gold standard” that Supreme Court justices are required to abstain from partisan politics. And let’s be perfectly clear: Religious intrusion into the law of the land is a partisan political matter. Just ask Rick Perry.

The same is true in the world of grownup men. Every person wish to do what he likes i.e. what his nature desires. Yet society only considers some of his desires as right and other as wrong. So the people in power use their power to punish such person for any act that are not considered right by the society. What else they can do to a person who does not confirm to the laws of the society? How do you deal with people in your office who does not work, or work against the interest of the organization? Only punishment can improve them. How do you deal with citizens who break the law and commit criminal acts against the fellow citizen? Only force can set them right. What do you do with a government that does not given justice to its people? You can only change it by force.

Know that applications committees and potential employers can view your social networking profiles. Keep information about yourself unobjectionable to make a good impression and prevent any question of your character.

The Stimulus Package And Obama Provide Mothers With College Grants

For a high school chemistry teacher, teaching kids can sometimes be a nightmare! High schools students can be a bit difficult to handle and when you are talking about chemistry, which is one of the most dreaded subjects, the problems gets even worse! The teacher has to make sure that the subject is interesting and students can easily understand it.

Children are particularly vulnerable to the harmful effects of these toxic cleaning products because proportionally, due to their size and activity levels, children consume more air, water and Unit II Research Paper OpenInstructionsPesticides are a common environmental concern due to the potential long-term effects of the chemicals and their metabolites on the immediate environment food, pound for pound, than adults. In the long run, children are the ones who suffer the heaviest exposure to toxins in the home. You wouldn’t let your child play in a bucket filled with a poisonous substance. Why, then, would you let a baby crawl on a floor that has just been wiped with a toxic chemical? Or worse yet, why let a baby put a toy that was just wiped with a toxic disinfecting wipe into its mouth?

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No time to eat? Grab a liquid breakfast and run. Why tie a knot in the umbilical chord connecting your bed to your desk? If you can find a long enough straw, just start slurping as you rise from bed, and smack your lips to the last drop as you whiz out the front door. Bye.

You know life is always going to deliver some heavy blows and you’re not always going to be prepared to handle it as you would like. As much as suffering is apparently a negative feeling and gives you the sense of loss, a feeling I know most of us would like to avoid there are however, certain cultures that embrace it, and furthermore find it necessary to their growth.

On no account should you agree with your best friend that her ex was a boring ugly tosser and then add that you’re glad they’ve split as you could never stand him. Next week they will have got back together and your best friend will be your ex.

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To turn this around and make better use of the medium of video, students need to be given control. Students should be allowed to use their imagination and create, not teachers.

On one occasion the secretary phoned me and said there were two enormous boxes that had been left by a parent for the college of chemistry. It turned out to be a spectrophotometer. Now don’t get me wrong. A spectrophotometer is an extremely useful piece of equipment, when it works. This one did not work at all.

Consider this: In one study, beginning tennis players who were told that they could improve their game by trying hard and practicing scored consistently better than those who were told that poor performance meant they lacked the innate ability. “If you believe you have bad genes, you’re less likely to succeed than if you believe you have the power to control your actions, your attitude, and, consequently your weight,” says study leader Robert Singer, PhD, chairman of the exercise and sport school of chemistry at the University of Florida in Gainesville. It’s all about developing what psychologists call “self efficacy” a big word for believing in yourself and your power to do what needs to be done. Here’s how to boost yours.

Exercise MYTH #3: Running a mile burns more calories than walking a mile. The TRUTH: Both running and walking a mile burn the same amount of calories.

I can now personally vouch for the whole Alkalinity argument. I now have vibrant energy, I have lost excess fat, I don’t feel like I need a nap every after noon like I used to, and at the age of 40 I am competing with the young guys in my Triathlons and basketball games. And I was able to do it without giving up my social life!

The post Law Class Research Assist and Website Teaching StudyDaddy.com appeared first on LUẬT NHÀ ĐẤT.

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katefathers · 6 years

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Kate Watches: Doctor Who 9x02 & 9x03

In preparation for the Christmas Special, the Canadian Space Channel has been going through all their episodes of New Who, and I thought this was the perfect time to get caught up on Series 9 and 10.

Of course cable listed the wrong episodes, so I missed “The Magician’s Apprentice”. Figures.

Before I start, there are going to be a few guidelines to these reviews. As its a marathon, I’ll be looking closely at how two-part episodes work together, at each series as a whole (including story and character arcs), and at how both series work as major parts of the Twelfth Doctor’s story. As this is the age of binge-watching, overall cohesion is important in television storytelling and it’s something I definitely want to focus on.

First on the docket is “The Witch’s Familiar”. I might have missed the setup to this episode, but it’s not difficult to figure out what’s going on. The Doctor and Clara have been separated. The Master is causing trouble. Davros is dying. A little boy, possibly from the past, is somehow significant. The story’s primary focus is on character, particularly the Doctor’s character: his history with the Daleks, as well as any similarities that exist between him and Davros. The concept of the Doctor, on his second-to-last life, and Davros, who is in the final hours of his, having a final meeting is a brilliant concept. It could have been incredibly powerful, hearkening back to “Genesis of the Daleks” but with the added weight of everything that has come after: the destruction of Skaro by the Seventh Doctor. The Time War. The events of “Journey’s End”. Unfortunately, as with most Steven Moffat episodes, while the idea is there and the special effects are slick and the acting is superb, the story itself is not well executed. Any power this concept could have had is (pun totally intended) exterminated by bad writing. Characters talk and talk, but never say anything. Characters do things that look cool, but are lacking in logic and realism. There’s slapstick and lengthy speeches, but partway through I wondered what the story was. Did any of these characters have a story? The Master and Clara wander around and introduce the sewer system, but what other function did they serve? The Doctor bounces from room to room, and has conversations with Davros that are supposed to read as illuminating, but what was the story? What was the point? What impact did this actually have?

“The Witch’s Familiar” had a script editor, but this feels very much like a first draft. It needed more drafts and more focus; it needed the dialogue cut down by half. Take Davros’ revelation that he “allowed a defect” in to the Daleks so they wouldn’t destroy their creator. It should have been followed by silence, the focus only on the Doctor’s reaction. Television is a visual medium, and that was a perfect time to utilize it. Peter Capaldi is an amazing actor, and he should have been allowed to act--to show what his character is thinking and feeling. Instead Moffat has Davros narrating the Doctor’s reaction--telling the audience--which diminishes the weight of that moment. We aren’t allowed to sit with that revelation. We aren’t allowed to formulate our own feelings, because we’re too busy listening to the story tell us what those feelings should be. One of the big indicators of a first draft is that it’s not confident that the audience will understand the message it’s trying to send, so it over-explains. In editing, that confidence is restored. Those explanations are scooped out. The writer trusts both the audience and the strength of their own story. “The Witch’s Familiar” doesn’t have that trust, and as a result we have a very passive viewing experience. Moffat forgets that being an active participant is part of the joy of consuming a story. Audiences get a thrill out of drawing conclusions and finding hidden meanings; mysteries are popular for a reason. Stories that don’t ask anything of you--that spoon-feed--aren’t any fun to consume. They’re boring. And at the end of the day that’s what “The Witch’s Familiar” is: boring.

“The Witch’s Familiar” is a story that could have been more. It could have done more with its concept and it could have done more with its characters. The Master could have served a larger function than simply lazily attempting to kill Clara. Clara could have tried to figure out a way around the Dalek’s manipulation of her vocabulary, instead of waiting for the Doctor to save her. The episode’s focus was clearly on the Doctor, but Moffat squandered even that by focusing on questions no one wants the answer to (”Why did [the Doctor] leave Gallifrey?”) and the lazy retcon of the Time War and the Doctor’s relationship with his people (the Time Lords are “[the Doctor’s] own”? The same Time Lords he has always been so different from? The same Time Lords he has been in lifelong conflict with? The ones who forcibly regenerated him and put him on trial and tried to live forever no matter the cost? Those Time Lords?). It’s dull, and in some ways a retread of “Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks”, and while it’s clearly trying to be a Twelfth Doctor take on “Genesis of the Daleks” it doesn’t even come close. In someone else’s hands this could have been an incredible episode. In Moffat’s, I was happy when it was over.

Which then brought me to episode three: Toby Whithouse’s “Under the Lake”. This episode stands in stark contrast to the one that came before. While sharing many similarities with “The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit”, it’s still funny and fast-paced and fresh. There’s air in the script, which allows the actors to actually use their abilities, reacting to dialogue and communicating non-verbally. The cheeky grins the Doctor has the time to shoot Clara make him charming. Unhampered by speeches, Clara has the time to roam and appear curious. When dialogue does appear, it’s informative but snappy, and the personal interlude between the Doctor and Clara actually has weight and sweetness. The story itself has an intriguing mystery and genuine tension. When Lunn was almost killed by Pritchard’s ghost, I was holding my breath. I was genuinely worried. The cliffhanger also displays a classic use of time travel: as Clara has seen the Doctor’s ghost, we know he has to die, otherwise he would create a paradox. Is there a way around it? Are these characters really dead? If not, is what happened to them reversible? I’m actually curious about the answer!

“Under the Lake” also gives us what Doctor Who does best: a diverse vision of the future. Cass, a deaf woman, is the acting commander, and she is respected and listened to and the skills she has as a deaf person (lip reading) are valuable. Characters are important, and characters are clever, and the only one the Doctor shows any disrespect to is Pritchard who is representing an oil company, an industry we should have an aversion to. If I was to give one criticism, it’s that it was a little difficult to remember everyone’s names. As this is an establishing episode, it could have done more to make the identities of these characters clear.

Overall, “Under the Lake” is a strong start. It’s fun and engaging, and unlike it’s predecessor it’s asking something of its audience. It wants us to ask questions. It wants us to solve the mystery right alongside the characters. The episode ended with the Doctor and Clara separated, and I do hope that this leads to more action for Clara. After the previous episode, she deserves the opportunity to be a hero, to save herself and Lunn and Cass, and maybe everyone else. Given the treatment of the characters so far, I’m hopeful that it won’t disappoint.

#Kate watches #Doctor Who #Doctor Who Series 9 #criticism #analysis #review #spoilers

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pwylldavydd · 7 years

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All the Realms

The Gods

I was fortunate to be present for the reunion. Or reconciliation, as it was intended. While a recent arrival in Toronto – and only twenty-three years old – I’d ingratiated myself in its society of booksellers, writers, and scholars; although the events I experienced, or persons I met, often found me out of my depth. Not unlike my first exposure to Buddy Ebsen, as Jed Clampett in The Beverly Hillbillies. I was only twelve years old then and didn’t know he’d been a song-and-dance man in the movies and vaudeville. (He was going to be Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz no less, but he couldn’t tolerate the makeup.) Barker Fairley, one of the two desired to be reconciled, was himself less famous than his depth might recommend. A poet and painter, he’d written a landmark study of Goethe, and was friends with members of the Group of Seven and other distinguished persons in the Arts and Letters Club circle. He’d painted A.Y. Jackson in 1939, and Fred Varley had painted him in 1922, when he was thirty-five. By the time the launch for his book of poems was being refashioned for rectification in 1977 he was ninety. Everyone thought the two had better patch things up, because they weren’t going to live forever and people ought not go to the grave with things unresolved. In fact, he didn’t die until 1986, at the advanced age of ninety-nine. Thoreau MacDonald, the one from whom Barker was estranged, also had many years still to live, passing away in 1989 at the age of eighty-eight. He was and is among Canada’s most distinguished artists. His preferred medium was woodcut illustration, and he’d decorated and lettered poems of Barker Fairley’s in the 1920s. But they’d had a falling out and hadn’t spoken for forty years. It was Thoreau who got up from his chair that evening at the party. He walked over to where Barker was sitting and leaned forward slightly on his walking stick. “Hello, Barker,” he said. “Hello, Thoreau,” Barker replied. Then Thoreau turned and walked back to his seat.

Demigods

You could spot the men and women who travelled with the company, as opposed to the local hires. They were deeply tanned. Seasoned. Vaguely dangerous. They had their own train! Which you could see parked on a railway siding beside the fairground while the show was on. At its peak Royal American Shows was the largest carnival company in North America, which after the War included a number of city fairs in western Canada where I lived. You’d often read in the newspaper back then how people wanted the midway cleaned up, or modernized. Little was changed or updated over the years, and by the late 60s the Royal American train was a rolling anachronism, loaded with the artefacts of an already-bygone era. Today, exhibition midways are mostly amusement rides and games of chance offering plush toys for their hapless winners. In that earlier era, carnival operators had those things, but they also had sideshows, announced by hand-painted banners, hung in rows like huge lettered sails. There was Leon Miller’s Club Lido, a burlesque tent that travelled with Royal American. Blaze Fury! The Human Heat Wave the banner announced, famous for twirling flaming tassels. The company was also renown for its girl-to-gorilla illusion, a must-see, portrayed on one of these colourful flags. Next to that, a banner for Serpentina, the Reptile Queen! in the Museum of Mystery. At bottom, it was this everyone wanted “cleaned up.” The freak show. The circus tradition of parading shocking medical anomalies and persons of peculiar talents (such as contortionists and sword swallowers) in a sideshow tent came to trouble public conscience. Not so for the Wall of Death, though, where daring motorcyclists rode stunts on the inside wall of a carnival motordrome, like a giant wooden barrel 16 feet high and 30 feet across. We watched from the spectator platform around the top edge above as they entered the arena floor below, waving up at us as they started their stripped-down Indians and Harley-Davidsons, the roar of the engines engulfing our applause.

Humankind

1930 was not a good year to be born in Tibet. In your late twenties, as you reached your prime, your home and culture and country would be smashed by foreign military forces. You would likely be imprisoned and tortured, and your mother and father would be brutally murdered in front of your eyes. On the other hand, 1930 was the best year ever to be born in the west, especially in Canada or the United States. Too young to serve in World War II, you enjoyed the buoyancy of its patriotic mood in safety as a child; then had many veterans’ benefits available to you when it was over. A time of terrific waste and excess, you suddenly and relentlessly mowed down vast forests, raped the great oceans, and burned huge quantities of petroleum. With these assets, you enjoyed stunning economic and technological prosperity, never before imaginable. And jazz. You had jazz music. Especially swing. Swing was a big band sound for dancing, full of primal rhythms. The best of swing were the bands of Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Count Basie, and Duke Ellington. For me, their finest moment was Sing Sing Sing, written by Louis Prima and made famous by Benny Goodman. Born in 1954, I was too late for the original passage of all this, although enjoyed the tidewater of its prosperity later. But as a teenager I scorned the jazz singers, like Frank Sinatra, Mel Tormé, and Ella. And scorned my dad for loving them. Which, when I got to my forties, suddenly flipped to a powerful lesson of just how wrong you can be. My dad was gone so I couldn’t tell him I’d come to this realization. Although opera was my first love then, not jazz, and I woke up to CJRT radio at 6 am for the classical program. One day in a mood of mischief, the announcer played Sing Sing Sing at 6 am for his still-sleepy classical listeners. While I lay there in bed listening to the huge chorus of brass, and Gene Krupa pounding his drums, this seemed to me the very essence of the entire possibility of living.

Animal Kingdom

My supervisor explained that people noticed I was always staring at the shapely young women who came in the shop. I replied I wasn’t looking at all of them; and besides, I wasn’t staring, I was just trying to comprehend them. Besides that, he wasn’t really my supervisor. I was supposed to be working in the back, doing cutting and collating and other bindery jobs for the document printing and copying the others did out front. But I always seemed to drift out to the retail counter, where the supervisor was, where the men and women were, and where I thought I could be more useful. Although, there was the guy who came in one day and grabbed my shirt, saying he’d have killed me if I’d been there in the meeting when he handed out the misfed photocopies I’d done for him the day before. I explained it was really up to him to inspect the work, that the machines weren’t completely reliable. What machine could be! The accounting girl wasn’t my supervisor either, but she caused some trouble when she shooed me out to breakfast one day. There was a restaurant next door where I often had an omelette in the morning, but I was kinda late that day and my boss said “no,” that working hours had started; but a little later the accounting girl said “go ahead,” and I did. But my boss came into the restaurant for his coffee and saw me there and took me back to the shop by the throat, which I thought was excessive. When the new shop expansion opened there was no counter to stand behind, but my boss was still never happy with me, although I was there working even when he wasn’t. It was not unlike how one day a customer came in with a short story to copy. Behind the counter we stood about nine inches higher than the customers down in front, which gave me a sense of superiority to them, but not to this man. I was reading his story and it was moving to me. Like my boss, the character in the story was not happy. He’d become traumatized after he’d seen a bumper sticker that said Jesus loves you, but everyone else thinks you’re an asshole.

Hungry Ghosts

The soles of my shoes were squeaky on the mat my office chair rode over at work, which kept its wheels from grinding the carpet. She said they must be sticky with muck from the raisins I’d mashed. Well, I ate lots of raisins, but I hadn’t mashed any on the plastic mat. But then, only about ten minutes later, what do you think? I mashed a raisin on the mat! Under my shoe. I hadn’t said anything, but I think she knew I couldn’t imagine myself mashing a raisin under my shoe, but then I’d just gone and done it! As though some part of my subconscious brain just had to go and prove I might indeed do the raisin squashing. I remembered how once when I was working at University of Toronto Library I noticed I’d never goofed up my lunch break, going at 12.00 instead of 1.00, say, if I’d been scheduled at 1.00 that day. (When later I first started at the record company my boss said he wanted me to start at 1.30, but he meant $130 dollars a week, not 1.30 in the afternoon, which confusion was awkwardly resolved.) Anyway, the very next day I went for the wrong lunch! Nobody was mad at me because I was usually so reliable and they knew it was just a mistake. But it was as though my mind sought the experience I believed I’d never have, even though when I missed the lunch I’d already forgotten the thought I had the day before. But when I realized my mind would do this, I started thinking, Oh, I’d never see that girl naked! when I went by a beautiful woman on the street, or Wow! An Austin Healey 3000! I could never, ever own a car like that! Everywhere I went I was thinking about the things I’d be so unlikely to have happen. There was no lottery then, or I’d surely have considered that the most unlikely thing of all. But, hey, if I rescued the son of an oil sheik in front of the Ritz Hotel in London, he’d certainly reward me, although it was so improbable I’d be on the spot right at the crucial moment, and would be modest even though I’d have been injured.

The Hells

The air changes when it falls below -40 degrees. Too cold to hold moisture, it becomes dry and still. The air was cold and dry and still every winter in Alberta before the 1970s, when the warming began. A young child then, I didn’t realize there were places elsewhere in the world where winters were mild. I’d seen photographs of tropical islands in Life magazine, abundant with hibiscus flowers and pretty young girls, but I didn’t know they had mild winters, or no winters at all. That they’d never seen sun dogs, or knew the air could be as cold as that. That they didn’t know the sun only shone six or seven hours in a midwinter day, and had never once seen the northern lights. I took our winters in graceful stride, knowing no other life. I knew how to protect myself outside, and how to warm up coming in. How to avoid swollen hands and ears and cracked lips. I don’t know how we could possibly have had jackets and gloves and hats and boots warm enough, but I do remember being upset with my dad for bringing home a new jacket for me, a faux-furry jacket, which I thought was effeminate and I was embarrassed to wear. My friend Grant Hagen didn’t have to wear a girls’ jacket. Grant and I were school patrols on December 15 1964, in Grade 6 at Crestwood Elementary School, the day it was colder than it’d ever been before. The radio announcer didn’t say ‘Crestwood’ reading his list of school closures, so we went on our way, fulfilling our charge at the 96th Avenue crosswalk along the way, unaware that thousands of beef cattle were that moment freezing solid in their shelters. The blizzard raged with heavy snow, high winds, and bitter cold. I saw on the front page of the Edmonton Journal that evening, delivered by another boy indifferent to the crisis, a chart showing the windchill temperature of -92 degrees F. Back then the transit bench by the crosswalk on 96th Avenue was painted with the slogan Rest and Read the Journal, but there was no one relaxing there with the newspaper that day.

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