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animeniacss · 4 years

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A Palette of Emotions - Artist!Taehyung x Teacher!Reader - Chapter 3 - Opportunities

Synopsis: Taehyung dreams of being a professional and famous artist one day, but finds that the sea of creativity can be lurking with blood hungry sharks, as well as bland, motionless starfish. Swimming through the sea of opportunities somehow washed him up onto the shore of Bright Star Preschool, as an art teacher. This wasn’t where he expected to be 4 years into his career, but anything to get his big break though, right?

Feat. BTS, TXT, ITZY, Jisoo (BlackPink), Taeyong (NCT)

Genre: Romance, Slow Burn, Love Triangle, Drama, School Setting, Working!AU,

Length: approx. 5k words

Chapter 3 - Opportunities

“…A preschool job?” Taehyung asked, looking up at his friend. Jimin had come straight over to his apartment from work, hurrying in and prying Taehyung away from a sketch that he was very invested in. Before Taehyung could even ask what Jimin was doing, he was given the piece of paper with all the information on it regarding the position.

“Yeah. My boss just gave me the information before I left. I think you should totally look into applying.” Jimin said, sitting beside his friend. “The pay is pretty good, and it’s not hard. You’re just doing art projects with a bunch of little kids.” Taehyung sighed, passing the paper back to his friend and running a hand through his hair.

“I don’t know, Jimin.” He said. “I’m not really good with kids.”

“What do you mean? You always get along great with your cousins.”

“Okay, then let me rephrase,” Taehyung said. “I’m not really good with kids who I can’t play wrestle and backflip onto the couch.” Jimin nodded, leaning back in the seat. “Besides, I’m trying to be a famous artist, not a school teacher.”

“But it’s a job until you become a famous artist,” Jimin assured. “Besides, it could be fun. You need a change in scenery.” Taehyung sighed, getting up and walking back to his desk, plopping himself in his seat. “I need a day or two to make some samples for the guy. Will you at least tell me you’ll think about it?” Taehyung, running a hand down his face, focused his eyes on Jimin. Jimin smiled at him, his eyes sparkling with the same whimsical aura that they always had, an aura that always assured Taehyung that things would smooth over in the long run. Taehyung had put a lot of his trust in Jimin since he decided to pursue art when they were in high school, waiting for the bus stop one early Monday morning as they dreaded the idea of being up so early for school. Taehyung groaned, knowing it was only a matter of time before he gave in to his best friend.

“Okay, okay, okay. I’ll think about it.” Taehyung finally said. Jimin grinned, getting up off the couch.

“Okay, awesome. I’ll let you know when the flyers are done and I’ll give you one so you can call them.” Taehyung nodded, swiveling around in his chair as he looked back at his sketches that were stopped halfway through. Jimin yawned a bit. “Do you mind if I stay here tonight? I’m too tired to drive all the way home.”

“I guess so,” Taehyung said. He heard footsteps heading towards his bedroom, and he looked over. “Why are you heading towards my room? There’s a perfectly good couch.” Jimin turned back around as he shrugged off his suit jacket, folding it over his shoulder as he loosened his tie.

“You’re going to be up all night with that light on and I’m not losing sleep because of your pencil scratching and constant grumblings-.”

“Artistic grumblings,” Taehyung said, grinning playfully. Jimin chuckled.

“…Artistic grumblings…either way, I’m not letting it keep me awake. When you’re done, come to kick me out on the couch. Unless you want to join me~.” He teased, and both of them laughed.

“I’ll probably crash right here,” Taehyung said, patting his desk. “Just like always.” Jimin smiled a bit. “Goodnight.” He said, before swiveling once again to face his desk. Jimin watched as he picked up a pencil and began to draw again. He stood for a moment, just staring, before finally heading into the bedroom. When Taehyung was alone in his living room, he leaned back in his seat, pulling out his phone and quickly being bombarded with tons of Instagram notifications. He had uploaded a picture about an hour ago, before he really got into his work, of the sketching that he planned to do all night. He opened the app up, wondering what his followers were saying about his brainstorming stage. The comments were not what he expected.

Oppa, post a picture of your face~! ^.^ I’m sure you’re looking extra handsome today.

Don’t work too hard, you don’t want to get rings under those beautiful eyes, Oppa~ <3

I’m not really a big art fan, but I just think you’re so handsome, Oppa, I’ll follow you always! uwu

There were almost 100 similar comments, only a handful of them curious about what he was creating in the picture. He continued to scroll, hoping that he would find just one of those handfuls so that he could work tonight with a smile on his face. Through the seas of appearance-based comments, he finally found one. One that had nothing to do with his appearance, but his work. @MissSunshine43 wrote:

How do you always find ways to get inspired? I’m jealous. >.<

Taehyung chuckled a bit, tapping the heart beside the message and allowing it to pop up in bright red. He had to admit, curiosity got the better of him, and he tapped onto the profile of MissSunshine43. The profile itself was not what he was expecting. The page was bright and colorful, and it looked like a school classroom. Pictures that contained children had their faces covered by cute emojis, and as he scrolled, he saw all the different things that this school did. Different themed days for holidays, different events involving parents, and different types of work students had completed. A small smile formed on his lips as he continued to scroll, more and more curious with every picture that he saw. He didn’t need to see the kid’s faces to know that he was having fun with whatever they were doing. When a new set of pictures loaded, he clicked on the one picture of a female face. She was sitting around 4 kids, on top of a big, white tarp. Her hair was in a messy ponytail, hints of colored paint showing in her locks. Her hands as well as the hands of the emoji-faced students around her were holding up hands that were coated in different colored finger paints. The teacher had spots of red paint on her cheeks, with a small smile stretched between them. Sliding to the next picture, Taehyung saw a completed picture that was decorated with colored swirls, hearts, handprints, and crudely scribbled names most likely written by the students. In the middle, it read: Thank you for another fun year! 2018-2019. The picture was nothing stunning, but it seemed to suit the class it was for. Taehyung read the caption underneath:

Finally got to crack open the paints this year! Our teacher did a good job again, yeah? OwO

Taehyung’s finger ran along his phone screen as he examined the photo for a few more minutes. He thought back to what Jimin told him about the preschool job that would soon be up for grabs. Sighing, he leaned back in his seat. He closed his eyes, his hand lazily tapping on his phone a few times, then blinked, lifting his phone back up to his view. The photo he had just been looking at, one that was around a year old, had a big red heart on the side of it. His eyes widened, and he quickly turned his phone off and slammed his phone down, leaning forward and running a hand through his hair.

“Aaaah, fuck, now I look like a stalker.” He grumbled to himself. Taehyung sat like that for a moment, running his hands through his hair multiple times. Despite the constant reminder that he was an actual idiot running through his mind, he looked back at his phone, which lit up again with the notification of an Instagram interaction covering the background he had of him and Jimin posing dramatically in suits for one of Jimin’s important business events. Simply flipping over the phone so the case was exposed, he sighed. “A preschool, hm?” he mumbled to himself.

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Two days later, you were sitting at your desk, eating some lunch with Hoseok. He was helping you prepare for when the students returned from lunch, as this week’s focus was on different people in a community. So far, they had learned about the jobs of police officers, firefighters, and medical staff such as doctors and nurses. Today would be focused on teachers, and next week, after introducing a few more community workers, the students would be able to dress up as their favorite, and they would have a big celebration day. You were most excited about that and had lined up a few people that you knew in each profession who were willing to come and talk to the students about their job and what it was like. Videos and stories could only do so much, which is what you had been doing, so having real people come in would be a treat that kids were looking forward to.

“I wonder what all the kids are going to choose to dress up as.” Hoseok hummed, looking at you. You glanced up, popping a piece of leftover chicken into your mouth that you had packed from yesterday’s dinner.

“I have a feeling I know what a few of them are going to be.” You said, smiling. “Which reminds me, I need to go put up that flyer on the bulletin board by the front door for the parents to see.” You got up, setting your boxed lunch down onto the table, and picking up the colorful flyer with clipart pictures of different community helpers that the students were learning about. Hoseok continued getting today’s teaching activity ready while you headed out to the bulletin board. It was already covered in work made by the kids, as well as notifications for parents on school events, local community events, and anything else that they may need to know. It was a pretty crowded board of stuff. “I should get rid of all of the old news, huh?” you hummed, pursing your lips. You scanned the cluttered board, picking off a few events that had since come to pass. You began reorganizing the board, making sure that it was visually pleasing to the average eye despite all that was being displayed was various pieces of colored paper with lots of sentences written in Black Comic Sans.

“Yoooohooo~.” You heard a voice calling and turned to see Seokjin approaching you. He was grinning as he waved a thin piece of paper in his hands. “Just the pretty lady that I wanted to see.”

“Hello, Mr. Kim.” You said, a bundle of old and crumpled papers now in your hands. “What’s that?”

“The job application for the new art teacher~.” Seokjin grinned. You felt yourself grimace slightly, but you tried to remain subtle about it. Unsure if it worked on your boss �� it probably didn’t – you watched as he stepped close and showed you the colorful paper. The name Bright Star Preschool centered the page in bright pink letters and an eloquently simple font. All the information necessary was written on the flyer as well, placed so creatively inside a giant-sized palette as replacements for the colors that would normally be seen on one. A paintbrush sat beside the over-sized palette, and on the bottom of the flyer held a contact phone number. It didn’t seem like such a massively elaborate project, and yet, somehow, you could tell it was done by professionals. “Doesn’t it look great? Namjoon’s workers know what they’re doing.” Seokjin walked to the board, lifting up the stapler that was waiting for use on the floor. As he stapled the paper onto the board, a content grin remained on his handsome face. “I’m excited to start interviewing.”

“Yessir…” you said softly. Seokjin looked at you, patting your head gently.

“I’m going to upload the flyer to our social media accounts, and I’m sure we’ll start getting calls soon, so get your interview face ready because you’re going to be incredibly busy.”

“Yessir.” You said, nodding your head.

“And grow your vocabulary, okay?” he teased, patting your shoulder. You watched as he headed back to his office, his hands behind his back as he strolled down the colorful halls in absolute bliss. Suddenly, the man stopped in his tracks and turned to you. You could see the excitement radiating off of his entire body, and towards you. It was like he was trying to push that aura in your direction and have it absorbed into you, but unfortunately for him, it wouldn’t work. “Oh, this Friday night I want to get that dinner I keep promising you. Okay? You’re not allowed to say no.”

“Yes-.” Seokjin’s eyes widened a bit, and you smiled a bit. “I’ll be there.”

“That’s my girl.” Seokjin slapped his hands together. “Get back to work.” He waved you off before once again turning on his heel and heading down the hallway. You watched him for a moment before Hoseok stuck his head out of the classroom door.

“You almost done? We need to go get the kids soon.” He saw your hands were still full of crumpled up papers and he walked over to you, gently taking them from you. “Head inside and finish eating your lunch, okay? I’ll go throw these out.” He offered you a grin that you just had to return, it was so genuine.

“Alright.” You said. Hoseok turned to face the bulletin board, finishing what you started as you headed into the classroom. You plopped your body down on the chair, every muscle you didn’t even know you had tensed up finally relaxing into the comfort of the seat. Your eyes scanned the classroom, currently empty, though you could hear the scattered conversations of students as they went through their daily routines, talking to Hoseok, talking to each other, and even talking to themselves. You had no idea what they were saying or what they meant, but it was music to your ears just hearing the scattered little voices. As you leaned forward, you continued to eat the leftovers, though they had unfortunately gotten even colder than they were when you opened them up only 30 minutes before.

The idea that five days a week, right after the students returned from lunch, 30 minutes would be taken away from your time with the kids. You already gave up 45 minutes to Yoongi three days a week when he came down from his full-time job at the high school to provide the students with needed physical activity, but Yoongi was here way before you were, so it wasn’t a big adjustment. Hoseok had gotten his job as your teacher’s assistant right after you were hired, per your request. But this new art teacher was just something you didn’t want to deal with. What if they were stuck up? Didn’t flow well with the kids? They might not share the same work ethic as you did, how would you keep the peace between your time and theirs? These ideas ran through your mind, and you felt a headache coming on that was even bigger than the daily ones you found yourself getting simply by being in this profession. Your eyes wandered to the clock, and you stuffed one more bite into your mouth before closing your lunch and sticking it back into your work.

It was time to get the kids from lunch, and you were never one to be late.

As Seokjin heard the sound of chattering children returning from the cafeteria, he was just finishing with getting the flyers out onto social media. With the final click of a button, he leaned back in his seat. Ever since he had made the decision, he felt bad for the way it made you feel. However, he could sugar coat it all he wanted, if you were to distracted by the mundane arts and crafts, everyone suffers. Especially the children. He knew you would get over it in time, and he knew including you in the process would take a little, if any, tension off your shoulders. He saw you pass by through the square window in his door, your head turned as you kept a finger to your lips in hopes to encourage silence from the children as you passed by his office. A smile stayed on his face as his eyes fell back down to the flyer still plastered on his social media.

“That Jimin kid really did a good job.” He mumbled to himself. “Let’s see how long it takes for us to start getting some calls.” He hummed, leaned back in his seat and putting his hands behind his head.

-------------------------------

“You want me to call now!?” Taehyung shouted. His phone was resting in between his cheek and his shoulder since one of his hands was tightly gripping a piece of sketch paper while the other was lodged firmly in his pants pocket.

“Yeah!” Jimin said. “I’ve been following the school’s social media, and they just posted the flyers about an hour or so ago!”

“Shouldn’t I wait a few days or something before I call? I’ll look desperate, won’t I?”

“Taehyung, this is a job inquiry, not a first date.” Jimin groaned. Taehyung could hear his friend’s annoyance through the phone. “Just call and say you know me and that you heard about the job. Namjoon-Hyung said the guy is really nice and the school is great.”

“How would he know?”

“His son goes there,” Jimin responded simply.

“That’ll explain it.” Taehyung sighed. “Okay, okay. I’ll call now.” He said.

“Awesome! Call me back right after; I want to know how it goes! I’ll text you the number.” Jimin was quick to hang up the phone before Taehyung could even open his mouth to say goodbye. Glancing down at the phone, it wasn’t long before he saw a notification pop up, Jiminie as well as a phone number written in the little blurb. He stared at the phone for a moment, lips strung together in an extremely tight straight line. He knew the minute he did this; there was absolutely no going back. He would have to go in for an interview, at the very least. At the very most, he had to work as a preschool teacher for god knows how long. As he paced the back of his couch, he stared at the phone number, occasionally having to tap the phone with his thumb to ensure the screen would not go dark. As he paced, he thought back to the Instagram account he had come across recently. He thought about the smiling woman with the colorful paint all over her, and the students that he knew were smiling behind the emojis that covered their identities.

Was it going to be like that when he went? If so, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Taehyung sighed, pressing the phone number link as the screen went black. When a faint ringing tone was heard, Taehyung placed the phone to his ear. He chewed on his bottom lip, reluctantly halting his pacing and instead resorting to just slightly bouncing in one place. Finally, after what felt like forever, a voice spoke on the other side.

“Bright Star Preschool, this is President Kim Seokjin speaking.” The voice hummed. Taehyung froze for a moment. He couldn’t remember the last time he did this, having to act professionally. Well, he did, but the resulted in a shattered champagne glass and hundreds of eyes staring at him in shock and fear. “…Hello?” The voice hummed, and Taehyung blinked, realizing that he must have just barely been breathing.

“Y-yes, hi. Uhm, well. I heard from my friend that your school was looking for an…art teacher?” Taehyung bit his lip, scratching his mess of black hair. “He was the one who made the flyers for you.”

“Aaaaaaah, Park Jimin! Yes, he’s so talented!” Seokjin said. “I’m so glad you’re interested, you’re the first call we’ve gotten since I just put the flyers up a few hours ago.” Seokjin was silent for a moment. “Listen, Mr. Kim. Our school day is just about finishing up for today. I don’t want to inconvenience you with asking you to come to the school right away, so will you be able to come in for an interview sometime next week? You’ll be meeting the main teacher in the classroom as well.”

“Next week? Taehyung asked. “Sure. I can do that.”

“Great!” Seokjin cheered. “Do me a favor, please. Give me your email and I’ll send over a form for you to fill out and send back to me. Just put what days work best for you and I’ll get back to you.”

“O-okay…” This was all happening so fast, but next thing Taehyung knew, he was reading out his business email to the man across the phone. Seokjin laughed a bit.

“Awesome, I’ll send it over right now. Thanks for calling, I’m so excited to meet you.”

“Me too, Sir. Have a good day.” He said. Seokjin was first to hang up, allowing for a dead dial tone to ring through Taehyung’s ears. He sat down on his couch, laying his head back on the couch. “What days work best for me? I’m unemployed, all days work best for me.” He mumbled to himself. Before he had to sit and think of his busy schedule, he called Jimin back. It only rang for a second before Jimin picked up.

“What happened?” Jimin asked.

“I have an interview next week,” Taehyung said.

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“Bye, Mr. Hobi! Bye, Teacher!” Yuna cheered, waving to you as she walked hand-in-hand with her mother. You and Hoseok waved to the little girl as she clung to her mother, eyes wide as she talked about the fun day she had. A smile formed on your face, watching the eyes of the mother. She looked happy knowing that her daughter had completed yet another good day at school. Kids were being picked up left and right, a sea of loud goodbyes coming from all different angles. You smiled, waving them off as the children exited the preschool. It had been a long day of teaching about teachers, which is a lot harder than it sounds when you’re surrounded by kids who kept giggling at the fact that the same word was said twice in one sentence over and over again.

As the final handful of kids began to left, you were left with just one. Kai, also known as Hyuka by his friends. The youngest boy in the class with a big personality. He sat on one of the steps, his hands clutching his backpack as he kicked his legs. H didn’t seem to be bothered by the fact that he was the last student in school, as Hoseok almost immediately crouched down with him and began talking to him about his excitement for next week’s party. Kai grinned as she shared the fireman costume that his father was planning to buy for him just for the occasion.

“Dad said I have to use it for Halloween too, but that’s okay. Dad has lots of parties.”

“That sounds so fun.” Hoseok grinned. “What do you do at those parties?” As the boys talked, your eyes wandered to the bulletin that Hoseok had finished reorganizing. The colored papers were placed in a way that was much more visually appealing to the eye than the cluttered mess that was there before. Looking closer, you saw BRIGHT STAR PRESCHOOL along with a painter’s set of supplies sitting right in the middle of the board, being the first to take the attention of anyone that looked there. You walked over while Hoseok was occupied, hoping to take it down and place it somewhere on the board. Suddenly, you heard Kai shriek.

“Daddy!” When you turned over, you saw Hoseok stand up and wave to the man that squatted down to lift Kai into his arms. As he stood up, you saw Kai fix his father’s glasses, which had gotten slightly crooked from the impact. Kim Namjoon. “Daddy I want to tell you about my day!”

“During dinner, okay?” he smiled. “I want to hear all about it.” Namjoon’s dragon-shaped eyes fell in your direction, and you felt your cheeks heat up just slightly. Those eyes, especially when behind those thick-rimmed glasses, always knew how to make you just slightly flustered. Namjoon set his son down. “Talk with Mr. Hobi for a minute while I talk to your teacher.” He said, patting his son on the head. Next thing you know, this six-foot-tall man was walking in your direction, hands stuffed in his suit pockets. A small smile formed on his face. “Sorry, I’m late. Jungkook called, said he couldn’t’ babysit tonight.”

“No worries.” You assured. “He was only here alone for less than ten minutes.” You offered him a kind smile. “I’m sure he’s excited to tell you about the past few days. He’s been talking to me about you every chance he gets.” Namjoon chuckled a bit, scratching his head sheepishly.

“I know, I know. But my workload is definitely lighter, so I’ll be picking him up myself again.” Namjoon shifted a bit, letting out a shaky sigh. “So, you’ll be seeing a lot more of me.” You noticed Namjoon’s piercing dragon eyes turn round and soft, as a small, yet genuine smile formed on his face. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all.” You said gently. “I’m sure Kai would love that.” Namjoon chuckled a bit. A moment of awkward silence washed over you, and out of the corner of your eye, you could see Hoseok giving you a glance. When your eyes met, he offered you a playful thumbs up, before quickly turning back to Kai, who was still chatting on as if Hoseok never turned away from him. When you looked back to Namjoon, he was also staring right at you. You had to admit, it made you even more flustered to have all these men staring at you.

“I…had a lot of fun at that art show last weekend.” He said gently. “Did you?”

“Hm? Oh, yeah, I did. Thank you for inviting me.” He smiled down at you, and you had to reach up and play with the tips of your hair, needing for your hands to do something other than just lay dormant at your sides.

“Of course. I hope you’ll let me invite you to more places in the future.” He said happily. You sighed softly, looking at him.

“Namjoon, I don’t want my boss to make you feel like you have to-.”

“He’s not,” Namjoon assured. “I genuinely mean that I want to take you out again.” You couldn’t help but smile a bit at that. “Only if you want to, of course.”

“I’ll…think about it. These next few weeks are going to be hectic planning for the rest of the community week and the party and everything.” Namjoon simply nodded in understanding. You felt the beginnings of another awkward silence falling over the both of you again, and your eyes wandered to the bulletin board behind you. Namjoon’s gaze followed yours, most likely hoping that whatever he would lay his eyes on would lead to even more conversational topics with you. He motioned to the flyer sitting dead center of the board.

“Seokjin-Hyung hasn’t stopped talking about the art teacher job he’s opened up.” He said, looking down at you. While he expected to see yet another smile form on your face at the idea of a new coworker, instead he was met with a slight frown on your face. “You don’t look too happy.”

“It’s not that. It’s…just a long story.” You admitted, your hand continuing to comb through your locks. Namjoon nodded.

“Maybe you can tell me over dinner?” he asked, tilting his head curiously. You looked up at him, chuckling a bit in amusement, and Namjoon followed suit.

“That was smooth. But like I said, I’ll keep you updated. Now, take your son home.” You motioned to the little boy, who was now looking in his father’s direction much like how Hoseok was still staring in yours. “I think he’s getting impatient.”

“Right…” Namjoon hummed, not wanting to end the conversation though he knew he eventually had to. “I’ll call you.” He looked at you. You offered a forced smile, nodding.

“Get home safe.” You said simply, nodding your head. You watched as Namjoon returned to his son’s side, scooping him up into his arms as the boy squealed in delight. Kai waved to you and Hoseok, saying a giddy goodbye as Namjoon headed out of the preschool gates and to the car that was parked outside on the street. You rested against the wall, crossing your arms as you watched Namjoon get his child situated into the backseat. As he opened the driver’s side of the door, he turned to offer you one last kind glance, before slipping into his car and driving off.

“Did he ask you out again?” Hoseok asked, standing beside you. When he saw you nod, he simply sighed. “Aaaah, what did you say?”

“Don’t be jealous, Hobi.” You teased, turning on your heel and heading back into the classroom to gather your things.

“I’m not jealous!” Hoseok pouted, following quick behind you. “I’m just curious.”

“Don’t be. I don’t intend to do anything with him. His son is my student, I don’t want him to be overwhelmed if his dad and his teacher started dating out of nowhere, it’s not appropriate.”

“He won’t be your student forever.” Hoseok pointed out, grabbing his bag. You glared at him, and Hoseok could only smile. “I’m just saying.”

“Well, don’t just say it, then.” You said simply. Collecting your things, you headed out of the room and to Seokjin’s office to confirm with him that you were ready to leave for the day. Hoseok hurried behind you, calling out multiple apologies to you as you pretended you couldn’t hear them, despite only being a few steps ahead of him. As you walked down the hallway, your eyes fell towards a window that exposed the street outside the school, where Namjoon’s car had just been moments ago. You sighed, quickening your pace to the office.

You had no time for love, even if you wanted to. You needed to worry about this new art teacher that was going to ruin everything you had worked so hard to perfect all these years.

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miairviin · 4 years

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Kunst

If I only had one word to describe Vienna it would be polished. As soon as we stepped off of the plane and sought out the train that would take us to the hostel this was evident. The train smelled like a new house and the chairs were cushioned. The metro station was spotless, except for a few pieces of graffiti that covered the wall. At night, Vienna was very quiet. Our very first night, by the time Madeline and I made it to the hostel it was 11 pm. In Greece and every other country I have visited so far, the streets would be alive with movement. The restaurants would be full of people still eating. In Vienna, however, this was not the case. All the restaurants were empty, the employees sweeping the front steps and stacking chairs on tables. Luckily, we were able to find a pizza place that was just about to close. We capitalized on this, and because they were closing, high tailed it back to the hostel where we feasted like Queens on the last slices of pizza in all of Vienna.

We had an 8 am wake up call, but not necessarily because of a tour or train to catch. Simply to guarantee we would make it to the free breakfast provided by the hostel. We ate as much as we could and put together a couple sandwiches together to go. We were going to milk this breakfast for every penny. Our first day in Vienna was truly one of wandering. It was so liberating to have absolutely nowhere to be and everywhere to go. Vienna continued its pattern from the previous night, absolutely everything in perfect order. I was amazed with the clean streets and the perfectly constructed buildings. We hit the Volksgarden which was a garden complete with statues, a pond where a duck was taking in the morning sun, and unfortunately lines of small trees with brown bags tied over them. The next place we found was the Hoffburg Palace complete with a historical figure who’s name I do not know riding his majestic steed.

Next, we went to the Museumquartier, jokingly following a little girl on a scooter. Our philosophy there being that you should always trust a local on a scooter. And good thing we did, because it brought us to Museum Leopold which we had seen a brochure for in our hostel. Both Madeline and I were familiar and curious about the work of Gustav Klimt, and some of his pieces would be there. We decided to head in. Art museums are always interesting to me. I love looking at the work and reading about the different colors used and the themes the artist is trying to address. But the Museum Leopold offered so much more. They presented an in-depth biography about the artists work at the beginning of their kunst, (art) and once you were in their exhibit, some of the pieces came with a short blurb about the social ramifications the piece might have stirred up, the artists inspiration, and the story the painting was telling. It felt so much different than other museums I had visited. It felt like I was staring back in time. It was easier to picture a distraught Richard Gerstl brushing madly against a canvas when you found out his muse was the wife of his best friend, and the two carried on an affair for some time. When you knew Gustav Klimt's last words were “send for Emilie” it made his work even more beautiful, more complicated. The museum also presented art like interior design, and discussed why one architect faced public outrage when he made cafes a more open concept, appealing to the lower and middle class. Or how posters revolutionized the streets, turning them into an art gallery for the poor man. Museum Leopold left me with so much to think about. Art is truly a revolution.

After the museum, we snacked on our lunch as we walked to the next stop, Belvedere Palace. The next stop was decorated with so many spots along the way. This included one of many parks we meandered through, Beethovenplatz, a butterfly house, and many beautiful buildings. That was the thing, it never felt like I was on the way to something. Everything was a view. Everything was kunst.

Vienna came alive during the day. The part of the city we were in definitely determined the age group that dominated the sidewalks. The older, more European looking Vienna with tall buildings decorated with statues and columns separated by open streets seemed to have an older population. Conversely, the younger people seemed to occupy the contemporary looking office spaces and more city-esque streets.

The Belvedere Palace was nothing short of extravagant. The gardens were kept symmetrical and spotless, the gravel walk looked freshly swept despite the many tourists walking along it. Uniformly groomed trees lined the gravel leading up to the palace. A few empty fountains stood in between us and the palace, their porcelain statues looking only a tad out of place without water showering down upon them. The palace was so wide, so magnificent. It was hard not to think of the grandeur of days past. When people would walk through the grounds just to take the air in. I wondered if they thought one day people would travel far and wide to marvel at their home.

We turned back and headed for the St. Stephen’s Cathedral. The wind and cold chased us into a small cafe so we could stop for a moment to warm up, and from there it was right back outside and towards the cathedral. Much like Florence and the Duomo, you turned down a normal street with a souvenir shop on one side and a bar on the other and there it stood. It was tall, it was ornate, it was holy. We walked around it, trying to take it all in. It was impossible. Because the city had truly grown up around it, there wasn’t much room to wander so our next stop was simply to head in. The inside was just as awe-inspiring. The architecture was exceptionally detailed, portraits of people like Mother Theresa on the walls. There was a quiet reverence amongst all of the tourists as we walked in the specifically designated areas. I’m sure the cathedral would look beautiful in the daytime with sunlight pouring in. But seeing it at dusk gave it a gothic charm I was grateful to witness.

We left the St. Stephens Cathedral and sought out a bathroom. An employee of a souvenir shop informed us the closest bathroom was just a minute away in the metro. When we made it down the escalator, my bladder definitely dancing the delicate line of being too full for comfort, we were faced with a coin machine. Paying for the bathroom was not something new. We had run into this problem in Italy a few times. In part protest of this capitalistic concept and in part because I’m cheap, Madeline and I had taken a stand and decided to refuse these set ups. We would hold it. But not only was this classist, we noticed it was .50 for a women and .20 for a man! It was sexism! We couldn’t believe it. Since we are both angsty feminists, this was a topic of discussion (mainly jokes) that carried on for a little while.

After the bathroom fiasco, we made our way through the maze of a mall that surrounded the cathedral. Stores like Louis Vuitton were the general theme, and we joked about trying to head in and getting stopped by the door man. “You girls work on commission right? Big mistake. Huge.” We would use these lines if we ever came back. We saw the parliament building where stoic statues sat pondering the great issues of our time as they looked out over Vienna. The air was perfumed with the scent of cigarettes and horse, as a few horse drawn carriages were carrying some tourists who probably shopped at Louis Vuitton.

We decided it was time for dinner and set out to find the cheapest schnitzel we could. Ultimately it was a quiet spot down an alley near our hostel. We ate our schnitzel the German way: with ketchup mixed with mayonnaise and beer. It was fantastic. Unfortunately, nothing has touched the jaegerschnitzel I had that first night in Berlin, but it was a formidable competitor.

However our night was not finished yet. We wanted to hit Sigmund Freud park, just to say we did. It was a short walk, marked by only a few signs. There was a small piece of art, benches, grass, and it seemed to be the place to be if you were an Austrian teen on a Friday night. One thing we picked up on is how proud Austria is of their alumni. Beethoven, Motzart, Klimt, and Freud all have squares, streets, parks, and cafes all named after them.

We picked up a few small dessert pastries and headed back for the hostel. I meant to write this post as well as pen a journal entry but the 13 miles we had ended up walking day snuck up on me, and exhaustion creeped in. Plus, we had an early wake up for the bus ride to Budapest, where I am writing this from. Vienna, as Billy Joel promises, will be waiting for me when we return on Monday.

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mregalaphotos-blog · 5 years

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Assignment 2: Journal

I have decided to just keep a continuous log with thoughts and ideas and if I explore an artist or concept deeper, I will mention it and make a write up separately. I will post them all at the end. I have had issues with Tumblr deleting posts while I type that out or submit this so keeping them in a document makes sense to me. Apologies for what I assume will be an incredibly long post.

DART 1130 Journal

Monday, March 18: After presentation of our works, we got into discussion of Assignment 2, Make What Will Happen. We discussed multiple different aspects of making the photos unique. I was especially interested in double exposures as an approach. It would be a very difficult thing to do but could lead to interesting juxtapositions of images and ideas. I may explore that further in a deeper dive of the concept. An example of this using an outline to mix concepts is seen below in Andreas Lie’s work.

Friday, March 22: For me, I think nature photography is once of the more interesting and beautiful parts of photography. When you get out into nature, you are no longer shaping the world but experiencing it. The only purely human element in the image and the experience is yourself and the camera you are taking the picture with. The only things you control are how you frame the picture and what parts you choose to capture. I will do a few deep dives into nature photographers and what they draw inspiration from and see if any of what they mention resonates with me and my past and present experiences.

Saturday, March 23: The first nature photographer I will explore is Ansel Adams. A deeper dive will be posted when I post this all, but Ansel Adams is a photographer well known for his images of National Parks in the United States that led to a greater conservation movement because of their profoundness. As someone who has spent much of their lives traveling and hiking the parks, I owe a lot to him.

Monday, March 25: This week is study week for the Paddington campus. I need to expose some images for next week’s class to get a start for the project and be better prepared to develop film. I am going on surf camp this weekend, which I think would be a great time to get some cool and unique pictures. I can capture the human elements with one of my favorite places in the world, the beach. As someone who has grown up on the Gulf Coast of Florida, it has played a major role life and why I decided to study abroad in Sydney. Another interesting thing that I am exciting to take pictures of is sunrise. For most of my life, I have been getting sunsets on beaches as I have lived on the west coast of Florida. On my first morning in Sydney I woke up early (mainly due to jetlag) and figured out the bus system in order to go to the beach and catch sunrise. In many ways it was symbolic of a dawn of a new experience that would be very different yet share some similarities with my past. This could be an interesting thing to explore as it explores my new environment and how it relates to me.

Wednesday, March 27: Discussion of sunrise and sunset made me think I should look at some photographers who take pictures of sunrise and sunset themselves. I will do a deep dive into a photographer and his work and post more on him. Tacita Dean, whose video on chasing the green flash was an interesting introduction to the topic but I want to look into another photographer… After looking around on the internet I have settled on award winning photographer Paul Reiffer. He tells of a similar story to me where he was up early due to jet lag and so took an amazing picture of the Sydney Harbor, as seen below.

Additionally, I went into the campus gallery and checked out what they had. There was an interesting exhibit that played with various shapes and was supposed to tell a story. I had difficulty following along but it seemed like a very interesting storytelling feature in a 3D environment. Another collection showed these black and white pictures that would be most similar to what we are working on class. However, it appears that the artist also used/recreated images from video games or other similar works to make their pictures. In the end they looked pretty demented, but their ability to invoke that kind of response in me was an interesting feature of the art.

Friday, March 29: A short update but I checked out a camera for the weekend. They gave me the Nikon rather than the Pentax K1000. I will see how it goes because it is different from the short introduction we had to the camera. I will take 36 pictures and see how they turn out on Monday. While at Paddington I did a little research for the library activity and looked at Zoe Leonard.

Monday, April 1 (pre-class): A little update on how the weekend went. I got a few candid photographs of some friends I made during surf camp. There are a bunch of good day time images of things like people, signs, birds, and the scenery. I was too exhausted from surfing to be up early enough for sunrise during camp. So, this morning I woke up early and bused down to Coogee and took some sunrise pictures at the beach and finish off the roll. I ran into some issues where it was very difficult to get the camera to wind a little over 20 images in. I rewound the roll a little and it seemed to fix whatever jam there was. Here is a picture from my digital camera from the morning.

There was a beautiful mixture of colors/lighting levels that I am interested to see how it turns out. I think I got some more of the sun in those photos compared to this one.

Monday, April 1 (post-class): In class we developed our pictures, and were supposed to create our proof sheet before the next week. I figured out why the camera lever was not working right when I was working on developing the pictures. I foolishly assumed that the roll of film was 36 frames, but it was actually 24. Therefore, the second half of the roll was double exposed at full exposure and was completely unusable. The reason I was not able to create the proof sheet was that I ran out of time. It took Maria and I a very long time with a lot of struggles to load our film in the complete darkness. By the time we were done we were quite behind the class. After all was said and done, I only had a few workable frames, all from surf camp. I think some got fogged while developing as well or there was some error or another.

Wednesday, April 3: I do not have much time to work on photography this week because I have major projects/presentation and an essay all due on Friday. However, I came into the photography lab to print the proof sheet so I was not completely behind for the coming week. A picture of it can be seen below. There are not many frames to work with and I am not sure I want to incorporate it into the final project but I will at least be able to use the pictures to learn the techniques involved in printing from negatives.

Saturday, April 6: With a little respite from projects I continued to think about interesting ideas and concepts to explore for the final project. While browsing on the internet I came across this photo of a long exposure of a departing train.

It was a very cool picture to me because it expressed this movement of light with a dark background. You can see each point of lights distinct path as it travels. This made me further interested in long exposures and how it can allow you to see interesting things. In having a think about that it led me to think about the many images of the night sky I have seen where the Milky Ways and other stars are incredibly visible and beautiful. These are captured with long exposures and so I thought it would be an interesting concept to explore. Because of that, I looked into Milky Way and long exposure photographers such as Dave Morrow. These kinds of pictures could be a potential thing to explore as I am currently planning a road trip in New Zealand where at night I would be camping in places with very little light pollution. The addition of a thinner ozone layer means I would get pictures I would be unable to get back home in the US.

Monday, April 8: In class I was able to print two negatives from the roll. These were both done using a filter of 2, the largest aperture, and an exposure time of 4 seconds.

Image 1: My thoughts on this are that it turned out much better than I imagined. The lettering on the sign is backwards which I think was interesting and added a little flair to it. The contrast and coloration of it turned out pretty well in my opinion. I really like how the border looks. It gives it an almost 3-dimensional look as if the picture is solid and its own thing.

Image 2: This image was a little bit rushed. It is not as in focus as it should be. The actual image itself was of a bird, which at the time I was exploring using different shutter speeds similar to what we had seen in the first lesson on using the cameras. In the end I don’t think this is really what I wanted to explore in the project.

In class Izabela talked about the piece of paper you use to determine the lighting conditions and camera setup for night time photography with me and Nicole. It is good to know that there is a tool like that to use.

Tuesday, April 9: I needed to go pick up more film so that I could get a better roll of negatives to work with and develop next week. I made sure to verify that this roll had 36 frames to work with. It was the same Ilford brand and ISO 400 that we had used previously so things should be relatively similar.

Friday, April 12: I had some spare time so I thought I would check out a camera and explore Paddington and take some pictures. Unlike the previous roll I had no issues with the camera, both with cocking the lever or rewinding the film. I took pictures of various subjects, ranging from trees and shrubbery to cool things I saw along wall surfaces especially related to lighting. I also got some pictures of streets and street signs similar to the sign I had printed earlier. There was a cute cat that walked up to me so I got some frames of her as well. I will hold on to the frames and see how they turn out on Monday.

Monday, April 15: We discussed an interesting concept in class, the dodging and burning. Using those to block out subjects or only focus on one is really interesting. It explains how some images I have seen such as the bear one from a few weeks back get their distinct outline. This technique could be a very useful tool when it comes to double exposures, where you could use something like the outline of a building and capture nature in the second exposure.

We also took a trip the Art Gallery of New South Wales to see Izabela’s works. I really loved the prints she had on the metal surface. It added an extra element to the work where each leaf in the work had this little shine on it like it was capturing the sunlight and reflecting it even though it was just a picture. Another very interesting takeaway from the work that I enjoyed was being able to see the grains in the picture. It was blown up to an incredible size and so the details didn’t come incredibly sharp but instead you can see the texture to which the medium applied to the work. I also really enjoyed the way the images were presented in a 3D space, with the folds distorting our view as I imagine the view was distorted due to diving and having limited light. A lot of thought was put into the presentation of the work and added to it greatly.

On a separate note I did not know that we would have class off next week and class the following weeks when I was planning on traveling. Due to this I will not be able to attend class in week 11 so all future interaction with this course will be outside the classroom.

Thursday, April 18: I am leaving for Cairns until Sunday. Due to the lending policy I cannot check out a camera for this trip as I would have to return it on Friday. So, instead I will take what photos I can with my digital camera and just reflect on them. I will be seeing some wildlife there and then scuba diving. Another limitation of the camera is I cannot take it underwater so there is really no reason to bring it.

I believe I know what I want to photograph for the final project. Izabela and I had discussed on Monday more about the self-reflection and relating the pictures to myself. I had previously talked about the sunrise and sunset and how they played a major role in my life and my trip to Sydney. So, I will try to capture sunrise in various places on various days with different subjects to illustrate my journeys and experiences with the first light of the day. I will get a long-term rental of a camera for New Zealand and try to photograph sunrises next week. I will bring two rolls of film and hopefully some of those 72 images will turn out well and I can help build a cohesive story around them.

Sunday, April 21: Just a few photos from the Cairns trip.

Monday, April 22: On Tuesday I will be leaving for New Zealand so I have just been preparing. I got an extended loan form singed from Izabela so I can check out a K1000 for a week. I went to Ted’s Photography and picked up two rolls of film to use, same brand.

Before I leave, I wanted to focus on a specific topic for once, which is how to take photos in a way that is aesthetically pleasing and have good compositions. A couple of rules, suggestions, and ideas will be shared in an accompanying post.

Hopefully I can use those rules to make more aesthetically pleasing photos.

Monday, April 29: Disaster has struck… For the past week I have been off the grid due to not having a phone plan while traveling and only being in a camper van during it so no Wifi. I ended up only taking one roll of photos while there due to a combination of sleeping in after exhausting days of travel as well as very poor weather preventing any picturesque sunrises. That would have been all good and fine and possible to work with but there was an issue unloading the film where it got fogged. I had pressed the release button and wound the film back up until it was loose like I had before. However, when I opened it up the film had not rolled up at all and the whole roll was a waste. There go all of those pictures from Wellington to Napier to Taupo to Waitomo to Tongariro to Wairarapa. I will attach some photos from my digital camera from the trip but obviously I cannot use those in the project. I had a lot riding on those so I am going to have to improvise and work fast to make up for the loss. I checked out a camera again to take more pictures. Here are some pictures from the trip that I took on my digital camera.

Tuesday, April 30: I woke up early to take the bus to Coogee beach to get some photos of sunrise. It was a beautiful morning to take pictures, with the lighting elements working out great and providing great layering and levels. I was really excited to use these photos. Sunrise had been a great decision to use for the project and I was excited to develop the photos and begin printing…

The same thing happened as before. I rolled it up, it got completely loose and so I was sure the film was ready to be taken out and of course no, it did not wind up and another roll was fogged. This was very frustrating.

So, I had to go to Ted’s again to buy more film. At this point I am running low on money and film is not cheap. I am also starting to run low on time as I was hoping to have had much more time for prints by then. I checked out a camera again because I am anything if not determined to get quality pictures of sunrise.

Wednesday, May 1: Taking pictures this morning was no issue at all. I had great pictures of sunrise, the cliffs and the waves and once again I was excited to develop pictures. Sunrise and its colors were even more beautiful than the day before and these pictures would turn out really well…

Everything changed when the light nation attacked. I had gotten back to the Paddington campus and everything was going well. Like always I was having difficulties loading the film into the reels. But I got it done and began the rest f the developing process. After the long time of doing so, the moment of truth came and I finally pulled them out of the container. They were all black. I don’t know when or how it happened but some light must have gotten on the film and ruined it. This was another day lost, but at least I had become even more cautious and I knew the routine. I could reasonably give myself Thursday to develop and get the first round of prints done and then Friday to reprint any with flaws.

As I was out of film, I was saved by Melvin who gave me a roll of his Kodak ISO 400. Tomorrow’s roll is realistically my last good chance.

Below is a picture of today’s sunrise.

Thursday, May 2: Things finally turned out much more positive. The bus I took ran late so I missed the best parts of sunrise but I still got some quality pictures. When I got to Paddington there were no issues developing the film. It was the best feeling I had in a while. So, I became very efficient in the dark room for the next couple of hours. I selected promising pictures from the proof sheet I made and started making prints. For the early sunrise photos I used a 2 filter for most of them as I already had some great contrast. When I got to later photos I found that that was not enough. I bumped it up to 3 and got much better variation in the blacks and whites. I was efficient and got many prints in.

At the end I checked the photos again and found little imperfections on the paper. They were minor marks that I wanted to rerun. It seemed like the paper was scratched at some point or perhaps the negatives had specks of dust on the. Either way I am going to rerun the prints tomorrow.

Another note and a point of concern was that as I ran my prints it was towards the end of the day. Those who had been printing earlier started saying that they noticed that the fixer was not quite working right and perhaps it had been used up or contaminated. It was changed by the resource center but not after I had run my prints. I will have to look at them tomorrow and see what I can do. Although not the greatest thing to happen, I am not extremely concerned as the slight pinkness may actually add to the images as they are of sunrise and those are the colors you typically see at the beginning of sunrise.

Friday, May 3: This is the last day I could print. I isolated 10 of the most promising photos from the day before and set out on reprinting those with the flaws I had noticed yesterday. I did see some slight pinkening from poor fixer so I will look at them later. Due to missing filters and interest in bumping up contrast even slightly more I went up by half for this days prints. Overall I was happy with they turned out. For those with better lighting there is great gradation and others with capture the essence of the first light show less of that and show more of the gray’s representative of their nature at that time.

Stylistically I like the slight pinks in the colors. They fit the theme well. Embracing the flaws is a good thing and letting them say something of the work helps add to it. Overall, I am happy with the reprints. I got a good effect of the sunlight on the water for parts of them

Now, with all of the prints done I need to focus on the presentation and putting them in a way where they relate great. I have quality images of sunrise and I have quality images of its effect on cliffs but the lighting looks very different because half is of the source and half is of the subject. Perhaps I will present them so as they are facing each other as they do in real life. The observers of the mare much like what I was in photographing them, as something in between them to see and interpret their interactions.

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tevotbegotnaught · 4 years

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Dubov's Last Jump-off pt 3

Saturday afternoon, we found out the club couldn’t (or wouldn’t) accommodate our third night. Dubov had to pay us, of course. Mo was looking at other venues, possibly for tonite, realistically for the coming week. He asked our availability. Once we all responded, possibilities quickly evaporated. That weekend passed and more days after.

After waiting a week, I texted Mo about money. Hours later, he replied:

“High paint he otter eyes or sue didn’t cut anything”

At the gigs, I watched Mo use his phone; its screen at his nose, glasses mid way between forehead and hairline. He looked down precipitously, grumbled, grumbled again, then pressed send. What usually came through was a ransom note clipped from Beckett. He never corrected these puzzles until one of us asked. Here, a fully translated version of our exchange:

“I paid the other guys, you sure you didn’t get anything.”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

“Did you send your invoice to Julie.”

“Yes”

“I’ll call them”

“is there anything I can do to expedite this?”

“Chris, I’m not your employer”

“Right”(!)

“There’s a rehearsal tonite, will you be there”

“I didn’t know about a rehearsal. Where and when?”

“Still working on a place. Maybe 7?” (3 hours from now)

“Tough for me”

“No worries. If you go, you’ll be paid of course”

“Ok”

“No worries. I’ll get back to you”

Now, I was enrolled in the Godot payment plan. Dubov was looking at spending four lifetimes in more chains than Issac Hayes ever wore. I just wanted to get my money.

Weeks later, Mo Bedbug went live.

“Bears ash oh Friday”

Mo called in a favor with some Long Islanders. We had a show Friday. I lobbied for travel money.

Any evening rush hour on the LIE (a highway, not an enormous falsehood) was a parking lot. Friday rush was tailgating minus libations. I pressed him for my other money in the bargain.

“I paid Pianist with Venmo. Do you have Venmo.”

(I send my Venmo)

“This is will be easy, I didn’t know you had Venmo.”

“Ok”(I offered twice before)

“I’ll see you Friday my place"

Mo balked at travel money, though. Arranging an Uber from his place and promising we'd miss rush hour. To get to Mo's, I took the bus, two of them. It cost me way more than the fare. Flushing Avenue, Shabbat imminent, was a sightseeing tour: high school kids, restaurant workers, construction crews. So many people boarding, I couldn’t see nor hear my stop and had to walk an extra half-mile.

Turning onto Mo’s street, a familiar Bushwick tableau appeared. A massive pit, surrounded on three sides by green plywood. Graffiti tags and band decals fading under the shrouds of old posters. At the curb, a ziggurat of garbage-strewn ten-foot pipes and a marooned RV, black spray paint scrawled over its siding and vents, windows cracked and stuffed with wads of insulation, front seats piled to the ceiling with bundled magazines and crumpled newsprint.

On the next block, I found Mo's address stenciled on the brick wall of a old factory. Drummer stood away from its entrance smoking and scrolling his phone. He looked up.

"Man, I texted him like 10 minutes ago."

"No answer?"

"He said he’s coming right down"

"I’ve been giving him progress reports. F***ing bus was crawling."

The building’s entrance, a glass and brushed steel module, sat cheek by jowl with a battered freight elevator. After a text reminder and more waiting, the freight elevator doors parted vertically. Mo let the canvas strap swing overhead.

"This way" he said, glancing over his shoulder at the gleaming foyer before pulling the strap down. The elevator enclosure, a hypoxic chamber of fuel vapors and sawdust, led darkly to a huge steel door. Mo punched a code and pulled the handle. Inside, a newly carpeted hallway, filled with tarps, drywall, paint cans and the potent smell of sandalwood.

"They’re still doing work....as you can see. My place is cool, though.”

"Where’s Keys (the new pianist)?"

"He’s here. Been here a while. Working on the music."

"You have a piano?"

"Uh, I have kind of a studio. Not for recording, but you know, instruments and stuff."

Mo had room for those instruments and plenty more. His walls sprouted art in every medium and material: paintings on wood, metal, plastic jugs, shards of glass; sculptures of bottle caps, cardboard, styrofoam; violent, erotic black and white photos fetishizing punk style and concert posters from Downtown’s acme.

I stooped to gawk at an undulating video in a KFC bucket.

“That’s from my gallery. I used to have a gallery. When it closed I moved everything here. Well, not everything, but…you know.”

Keys sat on a leather couch. He was a kid, maybe twenty-five. I was his grandfather. That messed me up. Before excusing himself, Mo pulled me an espresso from a fancy Italian machine. I packed sandwiches and coffee, but the extra shot was welcome. From a closed door, medicinal-grade weed wafted. We were a full hour behind schedule.

Out on the street, waiting for the Uber, Mo nodded at the construction site and listing RV, saying in his mumblecore voice,

"That’s my girlfriend’s art project.... I mean, ex-girlfriend. "

"The RV? She did THAT?"

"Yeah....Well, her friends... they did it together. I don’t know who did which part"

(There were ‘parts’?)

"How long has it been there?"

"Uh....nine months. Wait...yeah. We broke up six months ago. She was living in it for a while."

"Living in it? You’re kidding. Was that part of the project?"

He chuckled. "Yeah...I don’t know."

"We’re still friends" he said, mostly to tumbling litter in the street.

Inside the Uber, Mo continued: “the realtor told me this was east Williamsburg, but it’s not, it's Bushwick. I don’t care what they call it, of course. I don’t mind living in Bushwick. It’s easier to have a car here.”

“You have a car?”

“Not now. Had to get rid of it. Wasn’t right for this neighborhood”

“Wasn’t right?”

“it was an Audi R8. Midlife crisis car. These streets are so bad, I kept having to get it fixed.”

Driving due east, the winter sun behind us pooled on the shiny road. We careened through four lane traffic. Ahead, break lights fanned out, ruby droplets cascading off a humpback’s tail.

Drummer and Keys talked through the set, then volleyed gossip about mutual friends.

When the radio spun an artist he knew personally, Mo turned around and apropos-ed a story, interrupting the other guys. In the 80s, he produced videos for many fledgling stars. It was a new medium for him and Pop music. A few of his clients soared from Downtown digs to world domination. Mo didn’t stay on for their ascent, though. He also worked on an early Dubov-produced movie until the boss’s relentless cost-cutting and hostility wore him down. While he rambled, a vape pen did plenty of its own talking.

Tonight’s venue, a redux of a famous Long Island rock room, now tucked in the basement of a new boutique North Shore Inn. That building, a block-size Cape Cod, dropped like Dorothy’s whirling farmhouse at an angle to the tony commercial strip.

We had a seriously low pressure slot, opening for a veteran blues band. Ten white guys from three generations; a solid outfit with a long history playing sincere, tasty covers. Always simpatico, Karolina added "Stormy Monday" to our set list. Due to the short notice, we lost Pianist, our stellar MD, and Trumpet wasn’t available. Pruned to prototypical stripper band: saxophone, piano and drums. Not without some irony..

When the ladies hit “Uptown Funk", shimmying and signifying, the audience, almost all sixty year-old white dudes with the occasional spouse, started hooting and whistling. T and A wasn’t on the bill, but it still satisfied. Margherita did her canned steps for ”Too Darn Hot". Karolina was confident and sold her songs. Keys somehow kept the basslines and harmonies together. I completely missed the famous trumpet intro to “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy". The ladies jumped in undaunted. The Male Gaze kept the show alight until we exited, dodging the headliner's B3, Leslie and vintage amps.

The ladies were pros now and we repaired to the underground parking lot to celebrate. The girls in jeans and hoodies, band in our "gangster suits". While she waited for Keys to blaze up. Margherita asked me,

“Did you have fun?”

"Sure, I always have fun" I told her. What counts as honesty when the entire premise of an act is fakery?

"Great" she said, tracking down the joint.

A couple hits and we went back inside, sitting down near the jacked-open exit door. The blues band’s horn section looked on wearily as the front man sang verses fashioned by tougher men for harsher times. From our seats, we saw Mo sweep through the green room doorway, his long canvas coat and scarf swinging. He pivoted at the closest table and exchanged with the owner, a grizzled man with a barely legal date. Their conversation rearranged chairs and sent the men striding out of the club, proving there actually were blues to be had everyday.

When Mo and dance partner failed to return, we headed upstairs and onto the porch, where patio furniture gleamed under blinding lights. At the foot of the wooden steps, livery cars glided in and out of the glare. After a flurry of texts, the ladies gathered their garment bags and kissed us goodbye. A black SUV, indistinguishable from the others, stopped and a rear window opened. Inside, Dubov’s face, like crumpled paper, if paper were milled from lipids and dusted with ash. "Good job guys" he said, voice level and hoarse. We thanked him. The ladies got in on the far side, Dubov’s window closed and the car drove off.

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

After dropping him at the factory, Mo left the meter running on our Uber so the band could get home. On the way, we speculated about Dubov’s eventual prison sentence, Mo’s fee and when "the New Yorkers" might book their first Bar Mitzvah.

The driver, a Bengali, navigated without commenting on our post-mortems, confirming and re-confirming each address for his app. I was last on the circuit. Once we were alone, I asked the driver about his night. His answers were brief and courteous. As we waited at a light, he turned his head toward me. "Excuse me, one question. Have you ever been to Las Vegas?"

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arianasgrnds · 7 years

Text

Manchester Arena Attack - My Experience

On Monday 22nd May 2017, a bomb was detonated inside the foyer of Manchester Arena following an Ariana Grande concert that I had attended. This is my story.

For around 3/4 years I have been desperate to see Ariana in concert, but I never had gotten the chance to, until she announced her Dangerous Woman Tour which included a date in Manchester, approximately 44 miles away from my hometown Leeds. I ordered my tickets on the bkstg pre sale on 26th November 2016 and the countdown started until the day my dream was going to come true, none of my friends were fans of her so I begged my boyfriend to come with me, he knew how much it meant to me to see her and agreed to come with me.

We decided to go there for the day and explore Manchester a bit and get food before we went to the concert, we had previously visited Manchester in September to see McFly on their Anthology Tour and only got to explore a little of Manchester, but we fell in love with the city. We booked tickets to go to a Cat Cafe in the afternoon, but other than that our plan was just to walk around and go into a few shops.

The night before the concert I was up until around 1am panicking because I had a gut feeling that something was going to go wrong, however I suffer from anxiety and panic attacks so I just put it down to that and I was already anxious about taking the train there. As we were waiting for the bus into the city centre to get our train I told my boyfriend about how I was feeling through the night and that I was panicking something was going to go wrong such as losing our tickets, missing our train, getting stranded etc and I was scared I was going to have a panic attack as I had had one at McFly in September and when we went to see You Me At Six in October 2016, but he assured me everything would be fine and we went to get our train.

When we arrived in Manchester we were both excited to explore and go to the Cat Cafe, we went into a few shops and walked around the city centre then went to the Cat Cafe. After the Cat Cafe we went to Pizza Hut for tea, there was a group of girls on a table next to us wearing Ariana merchandise and I began to get suuuuper excited that I was finally going to see her in a few hours.

We went from Pizza Hut straight to the arena and queued to get into the venue, doors were supposed to open at 6:30pm but they were running late so we got in around 7:30pm, got some soft drinks, went to the toilet and sat in our seats. At this point I started feeling really anxious, my way of dealing with this was to get up and walk to and from the toilets just outside of the entrance near our block, I did this several times until Victoria Monet and BIA came on, still feeling quite anxious whilst waiting for Ariana’s countdown to start.

Ariana’s 10 minute countdown video started playing and I felt a lot better due to the excitement of finally seeing an artist I had looked up to for so long, I had been counting down for months to this moment that I was going to be in the same room as her. She came onstage and I was ecstatic, she was amazing, my favourite part was Knew Better part 2/Forever Boy, I sung so loud and was so so so happy and in awe of her, she hit every note effortlessly whilst dancing perfectly in high heels, how? I don’t know.

Her last song was Dangerous Woman, she said goodbye etc then over the speakers they started playing Dangerous Woman as people started to exit the arena. I had bought a DWT hoodie and shirt that they had put into a JD bag, before the show my boyfriend thought to push it under his seat so it was safe, when he stood up as she came on stage, he accidentally pushed the bag further under his seat so we were trying to get it out. We were due to be getting the 11:30pm train from Manchester Victoria back to Leeds so we had around an hour before we had to get our train, we had planned to wait in the foyer where McDonalds etc was, the foyer where the bomb was detonated.

We finally got my merch out and started walking up the stairs of our block (block 105) to exit when the terrorist detonated the bomb. Under my feet I felt this vibration so powerful that I had never felt anything like, the arena which was previously filled with excited chatter, happiness and laughter from a room full of fans who had just seen their favourite artist went silent, but only for a second, then it went loud again, but this time it wasn’t excited chatter anymore, it was panic. Everyone started screaming and when I looked above us there were people jumping off of the balconies to try and get out of the arena, my reaction was to grab my boyfriends hand and run after saying to him “we need to run or we’re going to die”

Security didn’t know what to do, but they were asking us not to run down the stairs, there were children screaming and crying, their parents trying to console them whilst hiding their own fear. We ran to the fire exit and through some corridors (this part is a blur to me) when we came to a stand still. I asked a member of staff what had happened and got told it was “just a tactical throw”, I also overheard someone saying a speaker had blown, but I thought it was either a shooting or a bomb. There was a strange smell of burning which I can’t describe, I had never smelt a burning smell like that before.

A girl in front of us was covered in other people’s blood whilst a crowd of people surrounded her asking if she was okay, my boyfriend asked her if she was okay and what had happened but she was too in shock to reply. We then started running again before coming to a stop once again, I looked to the right of us and there was a middle aged man holding a white Ariana shirt to his head, the shirt was red with blood and there was a puddle of blood at his feet as well as blood on the floor around him. I looked back in front of me and still holding my boyfriends hand began running again until we finally managed to get out of the arena.

We didn’t know which way it was to Manchester Victoria as we had come through a fire exit, everyone was panicking and screaming in fear as an announcement played over speakers telling us to evacuate the building. My boyfriend asked a security guard which way Manchester Victoria was and we ran that direction until we were outside Manchester Victoria, which had gone into lockdown. We stood outside Manchester Victoria trying to calm down and figure out what to do as we tried calling my Dad, because even if our train wasn’t cancelled, we didn’t want to get it and I was desperate to see my Dad. My phone wasn’t ringing at first so my boyfriend tried to call him on his phone, after a few calls to the house phone and his mobile he answered and he said to my Dad “something has happened in Manchester and we need you to come and get us” it was at this point it sank in what had actually happened and I broke down.

I spoke to my Dad and he said he was on his way and to send him the postcode for Manchester Victoria, I googled it and sent it over to him, then a group of armed police ran past us shouting at everyone to move so I suggested we ran to the nearest hotel. I asked a policeman if there was any safe place we could go and he replied “no, you need to get out of the city, now!” So we started running again, we didn’t even know where we were going because the times I had been to Manchester Arena in the past my parents had taken me there and picked me up, we just ran.

We ended up at the Travelodge hotel we had stayed at when we came to see McFly for 3 days in September, the lobby was packed with people trying to get last minute rooms because they were stranded and people just wanting a safe place like we were. We sent my Dad the address, sat in the bar area and got drinks as everyone crowded around the tv to watch the news because at this point, you couldn’t escape what had happened because it was on every news channel. Breaking news. I was in the middle of something that tv and radio channels all over the world had stopped everything to cover. On the news it said 19 was dead and 50 something were injured, everyone in the lobby started crying again and holding those close to them, when a little girl ran into the lobby who had gotten separated from her Mum and sister. This girl looked around 10 years old and it broke my heart because she was one of thousands of other children her age and younger who were at the concert that night.

I checked my phone and had messages from hundreds of people asking if I was okay, people offering to come and get me and my boyfriend too, the support that we were offered was so overwhelming. People were opening up their homes for those stranded, taxi drivers offering free lifts home to as far as Liverpool and Sheffield, hotels opening up their lobbies for victims and survivors and looking after children that had gotten separated from the adults they were with.

After what felt like hours and hours, my Dad called us letting us know he was in Manchester but couldn’t get to us because all of the roads had been blocked off into the city centre, thanks to police we managed to finally find him around half an hour later of walking around, as soon as I saw him I ran up to him and hugged him tighter than I ever have done before. He was still in his pyjamas because he couldn’t get dressed properly he was rushing so much to get to us. We got in the car and I cried the whole way home, then sat up until 5am watching the death toll go up. For about a week after it happened I became obsessed with checking the news for updates to a point where I was waking up several times during the night to check.

Since it happened I have nightmares and flashbacks every night, even after over a month, so I’m hoping that this post will help me because this is the first time I’ve fully shared my story. I’m scared to click post, but it’s something I need to do. I think about the victims and their familes every day and probably will do for the rest of my life.

We were given free tickets to One Love Manchester, my Dad took us so we could leave at any point, but we ended up staying until the end. Once we got inside I was fine, but leaving I started to have flashbacks of that night and panicked. People passing by, complete strangers, even stopped to ask if I was okay, everyone was so united and looking after each other.

One Love Manchester was so important because it helped me, my boyfriend and thousands of others that experienced that night heal. I’m so proud of every person that returned to go to One Love Manchester and of course, of Ariana, who is such a brave and strong woman, her strength inspires me. I loved her so much before this experience, but she means so much more to me now than she did. Her concert was one of the best/worst nights of my life, but I won’t let it stop me going to concerts, concerts have been my happy place for as long as I can remember and the next time she tours I won’t hesitate to buy tickets, I’m going to get meet and greet and squeeze her to tightly. We can’t let hate win.

#ariana grande #manchester arena #my story #one love manchester #dangerous woman tour #dwt #dwt: manchester

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lattetudes · 7 years

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hey!!! i was wondering, how come you study in france? i'm fairly new to your blog and i love your posts, i would like to hear more about your experience regarding studying in france in your situation!! and if you have any anecdotes about that that you would like to share!!

hi! firstly, thank you so much! it really means a lot to me. (seriously, i have the biggest smile on my face). i’m so sorry for the late response, i was moving (:

send me another ask if you’d like to know more! this is a little long -

the how

french has been in my life for a long time. i think i was first enrolled in an international program (where they taught it) when i was twelve - not even a couple months later, i left to visit france for the first time to visit my mom.

she went to france (in 2011) to get her master’s degree in linguistics.

my brother (2013) and sister (2011) went with her. (i, however, didn’t join her until the the summer before what would have been my freshman year. was that something i regret? yes.)

so for three years, i visited them (and when i wasn’t, i lived alone with my dad, who worked a lot to support an apartment in france and in the united states).

when i fourteen, i visited paris for two weeks with my class as part of an exchange program.

it was chic, it was this entirely new universe i’d never seen before. i’d never felt more different, and i think that was a good thing. the cafés, the music, the pathways where hemingway walked - it’s this sort of unconquerable way of living that makes up Paris’s charm – something that cannot be calculated into a ranking.

it’s truly beautiful. and when i was asked if i wanted to go to poitiers, three hours away from paris (my last chance) for freshman year, i took it. i made the mistake of staying for friends - i couldn’t go through life wondering what if. i didn’t want to regret anything, you know? i knew i wasn’t going to be at the top of the class, not at first.

only, it didn’t end up being one year. i would end up staying there for my entire career as a lycéenne.

the apartments the apartments my family stays in are very small, with exception to our last one

our first one was the size of a shoebox. i’m not kidding when the kitchen and the bedroom were in the same space. (the bed was a fold out couch).

i don’t remember our second apartment very well. i think it was next to an indian restaurant - it did have two bedrooms, making it easier to stay in when i visited my family.

the third was located in a small complex with a small parking space.

the fourth, i don’t remember at all (:

the fifth apartment is located above a sephora, about two minutes from the central square. we spent about three-four years here (renting), and it even had a loft space on the third floor. an artist, an attorney, and many other people with different stories lived there with us. i remember when the police showed up, twice. another story for another time (: i’ve got so many memories here, which makes it even harder to leave. it means a lot to me. i love it here: it’s empty now, save for a computer (the one i’m writing on right now), a desk, wifi, and a printer. our lease is up by the end of the month (:

the sixth, next to a park and a café, where the neighbors play their music just a little too loud (: it’s different for sure. we just moved here, the rooms are fill with boxes and nothing is unpacked yet - hopefully, it will feel like home soon.

i spend christmas and the summers in the united states, in the house where i grew up until i was fourteen.

since i live in a small city, i walk by almost all the apartments i’ve visited / lived in everyday. it’s surreal for sure - i get to see where i’ve started and where i’m going to be.

france!

i live in a city where you know everyone, and everyone knows you.

there’s music almost always playing in the street.

some people will judge you because of your nationality: it’s okay and you learn to deal with it.

a lot of people like to do manifestations (they like to protest) here.

shops are everywhere - all of them are small town french stores and they’re super chic and very inexpensive.

the cafés are great, very lovely and the food is above average

breakfast isn’t a big deal. croissants, orange juice, little bread and cheese, coffee..

i don’t like croissants (: or i didn’t, i’ve started to like them after four years.

bacon isn’t bacon.

in central square, they’ll have parties / an event in correspondance with the season

at christmas, central square is transformed into santa’s village: skating, hot cocoa, waffles, churros, cute scarves and hats, hazelnut coffee, that type of thing (:

most restaurants close at 2pm and re-open around seven.

the bagel shop knows me and my order because i go there everyday.

the quiches are amazing, if you like quiches.

cobblestone streets.

sundays are quiet, almost everything is closed.

where i live, it’s true: the french dress to impress.

smoking is a thing - it’s not unusual, and everyone does it (not me), teachers included.

i once saw one of the social economics teachers smoking with his students and taking instagram photos.

he was one of the newer professors. he left to get some life experience

the language: studying in french

freshman year, it was hard. i didn’t have many friends, i was just learning the language, and most of all: i was lonely.

everyone spoke so fast. i was completely out of my depth. to make matters more difficult, i suffer from social anxiety: which made talking a struggle i have to live with.

by the end of my first year, my comprehension of french was excellent.

when studying in another language, it may get a little bit overwhelming, but you have to really acknowledge what you don’t understand: is it the concept, the idea, or vocabulary?

there is a trick to learning languages that can shorten the journey to fluency from decades to mere months. there’s also something most teachers won’t even tell students for fear they would never start, but in fact, is vital that you know. hint: complete linguistic immersion is everything (:

4% of students embarking on language courses in schools achieve a basic level of fluency after three years. this is what happened to me, and i realized this as soon as i got here: basic was a generous way of describing my level back then.

one of the biggest reasons cited for abandoning is that students don’t feel any sense of progression. a student with an A* will visit france and find they can’t even have a basic conversation. (me, my first year)

i felt like giving up becuase i had the wrong expectations set.

it takes 600+ hours of study & practice to reach fluency in french

from february (which is way too late to start studying for the bac), i studied for a minimum of three - four hours every single day.

be realistic about what you can achieve so you won’t get demotivated.

immersing yourself as deeply as possible in the subject allows you to rack up the hours as quickly as possible.

memory fades unless it’s the language is used.

low-intensity studies (high school french) are ineffective because their intensity is so low that you end up forgetting a large percentage of what you learn.

it’s not until B1/B2 that the light comes out and it starts to feel really good speaking French.

i took the B1 in tenth grade, my second year. i passed with like an 85 percent. it does get better.

It’s really worth while registering to take DELF exams - tests that mesure your linguistic ‘level’.

i hadn’t heard of the DELF until i got to lycée. don’t be me!

i felt lost for the better part of a year.

repetition is vital to learning.

sleep is vital to memory. i still have problems with this, given the fact it still takes me a while to complete all my work.

my lycée, or high school

is amazing. it’s made out of glass, shaped like a pyramid, and is relatively new compared to most of my city.

we have french, spanish, russian, and chinese students (i’m the only american) who study here!

it’s right next to this mall, auchan, where everyone goes when they don’t have class.

a mini-café is managed by the MDL (student council) on the first floor.

you can get coffee, tea, cookies, chocolate, or crèpes there (on some days). it seriously helps with the long hours in the library

we have soundproof music rooms: pianos, music, drums..

on sunny days, groups of us will sit outside on the grass and just talk. we form circles and listen to people play music and sing.

a lot of people smoke / hang out near the observatory (which is shaped like a flower). hasn’t been used in years.

for the most part, the teachers are very good.

for our last history class, we cried because the professor was leaving.

he baked us brownies and brought some drinks and it was one of the saddest moments of première (eleventh grade).

last year, we visited paris for two days. one night, the whole class united in a hotel room - we told ghost stories until 2am.

in spring, we host a festival: dancing, handball, singing contests, etc.

one day, my class dressed up as the x - men.

french literature class is one of the hardest classes i’ve ever had to take.

international week (where every student comes from around the globe to visit): i went to a party with some romanian students and drank beer for the very first time.

i can drink legally, now that i’m eighteen.

drinking isn’t a big deal here, not where i live.

on tuesdays and wednesdays, my classes end at 12pm.

three days out of a school week, i go to school at nine thirty in the morning.

mondays and fridays, i end at five thirty.

i have to take the bus for forty five minutes everyday.

ACFs on thursdays: classes created by students which are validated by a jury at the end of the year. i did fashion couture class this year and dance class last year.

if you guys have any more asks about my lycée, i’d love to answer them!

#answered

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replicarters · 7 years

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hellraiser 3 funtime carnival, pt 1

it has been an age since i've done an old school picspam like this. back in the livejournal days, i lived for this shit. i took my f-list through a horde of awful, awful films starring very attractive women, but everybody had a good time along the way and i miss that rush of communal drunken laughter. so when i texted kristen and i said "will you watch hellraiser 3 with me" and her response was "ughhhhh do i have to", she suggested maybe i just livetweet it. i said to her no buddy, i'll do you one better, i'll do this. i think this is the kind of experience that's going to be much better with visual aids, because i gather it's disgustingly violent.

i don't know anything about hellraiser. i'm not into horror movies; i'm actually several levels of baffled by the legions of horror movie aficionados in the world who are passionately drawn to the aesthetic quality of blood and guts and buy these movies on vhs, ld, dvd, bluray, and watch hacking and slashing over and over and over again and take screenshots of the artsiest parts of people having their brains splattered on walls by hideous monsters. i don't get it, but there's a part of me that wants to understand it? wish i could be an art house horror movie critic like the cool hipsters. PERHAPS i can get a little closer to the delightful rainbow horror vortex through hellraiser 3, which horror movie people apparently don't like that much. is it because there's not enough killing in it? are there not enough visible intestines? well, i won't hate it, i don't THINK, because i'm here for one reason and one reason only and that reason is terry farrell, exactly one year before ds9 and cute! Cute!!

maybe be wary because i'm not going to shy away from nasty screeshots, but otherwise, pull out your genuine hasbro ouijas and get ready to commune with zozo because we're goin in babyyyyyyyy

the year is 1992, dan quayle has just harangued murphy brown for having a baby out of wedlock, and that's the only timeline gauge i have for 1992. i was a child. i was in kindergarten or some shit. i barely had a handle on my right hand vs. my left hand and was not old enough to watch a horror movie; i wasn't old enough to watch sister act. some of you reading this were not even born in 1992 and that's perhaps more nauseating than any severed body part i will see in this movie.

lmao the music is so orchestrally spooky and i'm like, "ohhhh no this was a bad idea" asldfhlahsld. i'm NOT a weenie, i can watch a shitty horror movie... it's a pretty sweet song actually, it's like, "satan is coming, and we're all going to suffer, but beautifully!" well, i hope that's true.

this kid with roaring red cowboy boots walks into an art gallery in the middle of the night and gives me the finger with his cigarette. IS THE HELLRAISER IN HERE? IS HE GOING TO RAISE HELL INTO THIS BOY? ARE THERE ANY SECURITY GUARDS ON DUTY PAST THIS GALLERY'S REGULAR BUSINESS HOURS?

a statue of tits and asses and whatever else slowly spins. art!

rebel boy approaches, ignoring the really fascinating painting behind him of a scabby spooky ghost man realizing he's just run out of scrubbing bubbles and will have to disrupt the whole rest of his saturday cleaning day to head to fred meyer to pick up some more. damn it, gerald, if you'd gone to costco like everybody else, then you'd have 99 scrubbing bubbles AND you'd have gotten free trail mix samples.

AAHHH THAT'S IT THAT'S THE ZOZO CUBE. that's the THING that the THING is in DO NOT TOUCH THAT. it's gonna get touched. a lot, i'm sure.

uh, okay, where's that museum security because this guy just got in here. "you want it?" he asks. do i want... a 99 pack of scrubbing bubbles? yeah, i mean, i can always use more... you can never have too many scubbing bubbles.

that's not what he's asking, he's asking whether rebel kid wants to have the naked zozo obelisk. rebel kid asks how much he wants for it. hobo man says "whatever you think it's worth".

and they make a drug deal out of it while an Evil Beast Sound plays in the background. if there's anyone i don't trust with a cube of vacuum-sealed evil, it's this wannabe edgelord danny from grease. hell is that much closer to getting raised!!

oh my god, yes. this is joey and she's my daughter and i love her. I WILL PROTECT HER FROM THE CUBE MAN WITH MY BARE HANDS. actually i think she's going to protect me, you, and all of creation from the cube man, so that's good i'm really looking forward to it.

oh no she's extremely cute. and struggling with journalism things, but that is something i can only marginally pay attention to because...

...off to the side here nurse nancy is laying out all sorts of tools while ill-boding sounds happen. it has only been 6 minutes.

DUDE! you guys fucking remember GTE??? holy fug that's a blast from the past... damn. so's this giant phone, which the cameraman picks up while just saying, "speak." love it.

wh-what is the significance... ahhhh......

cameraman is getting called away to some BREAKING NEWS, and he's a good old man so he tries to bring joey along but they're like nah. he says things'll be okay, the story of her life may be just around the corner! yeah, and it's gonna be something not even klonopin could take the edge off of.

oh god. nurse nancy takes out a saw and strokes it.

WHY IS IT DARK IN HERE I THOUGHT THIS WAS A REGULAR HOSPITAL. i mean, obviously not with nurse nancy's jagged metal fetish.

suddenly there are sirens, and paramedics burst through the door carting a guy with...

BLOODY CHAINS???? FROM WHERE????? WHAT???????

i can't begin to understand this. there's a guy, just here all of a sudden, with bloody fucking chains hanging all over him. but most hilariously, one of the paramedics says, "you ever seen anything like this before?" and the other one goes, "yeah, yeah, sure!" YEAH, YEAH, SURE? you've seen a guy before with chains protruding from his epidermis? fucking WHEN? don't say the last time you got the marijuana munchies because that doesn't count.

ohhhh shit, that's NEWS! how did the cameraman miss this cavalcade rolling into the er on his way out the door? from where in time did this all COME FROM? oh my god i'm so confused.

this girl from hot topic keeps saying this had nothing to do with her, she was just there, can she go now? dude. the guy. has chains. coming out of his skin. i know that's more of a party city at halloween kind of thing but you have to be at least a little more concerned, i would think.

hot topic girl says this happened at "the boiler room", so, i'm definitely crossing that right off my list of places to visit in my lifetime. all places named boiler room, in every corner of the 48 continental united states. don't care, not going to them.

all of a sudden there's a huge pop from the or along with flashing lights. aaaahhh!!! joey runs toward it, eager for news that not one sane person will believe, while hot topic girl is like "fuuuck that" and leaves.

well, this is what's going on in the or. somebody touched the side while trying to get the charley horse...!

mmmyeah everything is disgusting. this guy's seizing, the chains are yanking on him, electricity is crackling, all the doctors are like ahhhh what the fuck!

VERY SAME

oh, and then?

the guy's head explodes.

it has now been... 8 minutes and 44 seconds. i have at least 82 more minutes. of this. this was a baaaaaaaaaaad idea. maybe the worst i've ever had. i'm scared, you're scared, heads have exploded, and there's 82 minutes left for it to get so much worse.

this nurse is sobbing, i don't know how that bloody hand print got there, there is blood all. over. the floor. blood is dripping from chain guy's corpse, which incidentally now has no head. closed casket for sure!

joey literally falls her way out of the or and tries not to vomit. pretty normal reaction to watching the very real consequences of too much margarita monday at the boiler room.

prepare for it? uh, i don't know if you were paying attention but it just fucking happened, at the darkest hospital in the city which apparently hasn't paid its electricity bill in three years.

we all gotta decompress from that shit. let's all breathe, do some light meditation...

NO, NO TIME FOR DECOMPRESSING, ONLY JUMP SCARES NOW. this HAND comes out of GODDAMN NOWHERE to slam on the window of this MOVING BUS WHAT'S HAPPENING I DON'T KNOW ARE YOU SCREAMING BECAUSE I'M ALSO DOING THAT! MY EARS ARE FULL OF SCREAMS AND THEY'RE ALL MINE!! WE CAN'T BOTH SCREAM TOGETHER THE DECIBELS ARE TOO HIGH!!!

oh, just kidding, it was only some hobo banging on the bus for no reason. haha! gotcha! oh, post traumatic stress disorder from watching a guy's head go off like your uncle's 4th of july fireworks show, it's hilarious.

back at the studio, joey and cameraman and other guy whose role i don't know at this point in time are all watching tapes, and other guy is like "listen you gotta show em some thigh and then you'll be an anchorwoman." i mean, just show me some thigh, just a little. i don't need a whole lot. well, joey wants to do this the right way, because she's an upstanding heroine who's not gonna sell herself out.

also she told them about the hospital horror show and surprisingly, they're not jumping all over that to believe it instantly. well, joey knows what she saw gosh dang it, and you do, too, unfortunately, thanks to my screenshots.

other guy's name is brad, which is very much an other guy name. brad.

ohhhh nononono, i don't want to be here, i'm not going in there.

the boiler room is a shitty club you have to pay $10 to get into, then once inside you have to look at, like, artists' renditions of death metal baby cirque du soleil performers. i don't know about you, but i feel right at home.

hey can anyone make sense of this outfit? asking for a friend.

joey tells a bartender she's looking for a pretty girl, and he's like, "oh yeah go that way." shocked that he wasn't like, "mmm, have you looked in a mirror? asking for a friend."

okay, and then we're in this place, with class and violins? is this part of the boiler room? is this an off-shoot of the boiler room? is this a restaurant next door whose owners lament "those fucking punk kids" next door with their rabble-rousing and their bloody chains?

oh hey, it's mr. late-night art connoisseur. he owns... either the boiler room or the restaurant, or both if i could figure out the relationship between the two. he tries to give joey a rose and she's like no thanks pal.

meanwhile hot topic is right over here. just... just look a little... a little farther to your left... just a little more...

and now we're doing saving private ryan! if i had an explanation for this aside from "somebody slipped me acid at work and i didn't notice until now", i would tell you.

joey didn't realize she had tickets to saving private ryan but here she is, watching the carnage. anyway spoiler alert it's all just a dream of her dad dying in vietnam or something.

the phone wakes her up and it's hot topic, calling to say she'll come over for a chat. her boyfriend threw her out so she'll trade her, they'll have a chat in exchange for hot topic having a place to sleep. joey's on board so let's see what's up with this girl.

this is how i sit everywhere i go, real fact.

hot topic's first question is what joey was dreaming about, and joey's like girl why do u care? it was just scenes from apocalypse now, don't you ever dream about that?

that fucking music starts again, the orchestral devil summoning one. they talk about dreams, and hot topic says it sure is cool, being able to have a dream, because she never has. girl... have you ever reached REM? are you all right? how are you alive?

"hey, this is great, isn't it? i mean, just, uh... two girls talking. having a conversation." yep, just in here having a conversation, delicately dodging the fact that beelzebub is out there waiting to knock down everybody's doors.

hot topic peer pressures joey into a cigarette and says, "what, do you think you're gonna live forever?" um, YEAH, she's gonna live like nine hundred years thanks to the worm inside her, thank you very much.

"OH," hot topic says, "you wanna talk about THAT?" yeah, that, the six flags halloween fright fest show that happened in the hospital. she says she doesn't know the kid, that he must have taken "it" from "the statue". ohhh dear. there that cube goes, getting touched all over by wandering hands.

OH GOD NO IT'S WORSE THAN I THOUGHT SHE HAS THE CUBE, I REPEAT, SHE IS IN POSSESSION OF THE CUBE. get that out of here it's dirty and you definitely have no idea where it's been. you have no idea whose guts have been splattered on it.

back at the weird boiler room ranch, danny zuko overlooks his bizarro domain, thinking about all the good times he's had here, all the sweet nights, all the instances of kids picking up devil cubes on his property and being speared with the metal that flies out of them.

pitiful crying noises there's the hole where the cube used to be and i'm peeing myself. god don't let anything come out of that hole i am BEGGING YOU MERCIFUL LORD

don't TOUCH IT OH MY GOD DO NOT STICK YOUR HAND IN THAT HOLE! OH MY GODDDD

I'M GONNA LOSE ITHFKDGHKAFKLG don't go digging around in this portal to the 9th circle oh my god please i'm holding my face bracing myself for this guy to lose his arm and spray blood like a hose

YEP SOMETHING CHOMPED DOWN ON HIM OHHHHHH SWEET JESUS i regret this i regret every choice that brought me to this moment in my life

here's the thing, all it was was a giant rat? but now...

something's happening...

theeee statue's sucking his blood in nnnoooohohohoho

ohhhhhh no HANG UP ZOZO. GET OUTTA HERE.

but this idiot's having the time of his life while the rabies from that rat sets in.

i can't take any more of this tonight i'm TOO PEEPEE SCARED and also it's after midnight and i need sleep. which i CAN'T GET NOW having gazed into the vortex of my demise.

scale of one to ten, this was a thirteen on horrible ideas, my computer is haunted now, i'm haunted, the hellraiser is coming FOR ME PERSONALLY, just as soon as he's done siccing his rats on unsuspecting frat bros slash business owners. ugh. UGH.

anyway, check out the hellraiser theme, it's tight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kswWeezE7hA

i'll see you again soon for more abject terror!

#picspam #terry farrell #ds9

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dandelliongirl · 7 years

Text

Poetry

with grandmum.

Last week was a bit busier with work. I had three meetings and one briefing to a group of students. I spent a few hours at the office on Tuesday as well. Other than that I worked on reading stuff for my thesis and studying video games for our game studies group. I also had ballet, taught my dance classes and went skiing.

I finally got my N7 jacket in the mail. It was quite the adventure and the post office staff had to call the delivery people on several occasions. I got the announcement of a package waiting for me on Monday, and going to get it on Tuesday I found out they didn’t have it. Also, the barcode that was supposed to be on the package was stuck on the paper with the corresponding half of the barcode so my package wasn’t logged in any of their systems. I went back on Wednesday and still no sign of it. They promised to call the delivery people and managed to call me back on Thursday. They said the delivery guy had “accidentally” put the piece of paper into my mailbox, and tried to fix their mistake by putting the other side of the barcode sticker on the paper as well. Obviously this couldn’t have been true because a) if they didn’t have a package for me, how could they have known my first name or randomly decided to write down my address out of everyone else in this city, and b) if they had made a mistake there is no way they would’ve been able to fish out the paper from my mailbox and put the other side of the sticker on it. Also c) if they did fish out the paper why did they put it back if it was a mistake in the first place? I called the lady at the post office on this delivery person’s bullshit and she promised to call them back. She was very sceptical at first and kept asking me if I was sure that I hadn’t already gone to retrieve the package. You’d think I’d known if I’d gone to the post office..? Anyway after like 15 minutes she called me back saying they found the package and it was on their shelf all along - just without a code like I knew it would be. I went and got it after my meetings on Thursday and I’ve basically been wearing the jacket ever since. It’s really nice. ♥

Me and dad went skiing on Thursday and it was a lot of fun. We did a 4-ish kilometer ski trip and I spent the rest of the day watching TV and napping at home. It was awesome ♥ I had ballet in the evening though and all this skiing and pointe shoes have my feet aching real bad.

Friday was packed with a meeting from 8 to 9 am, our game studies group meeting from 9 to 10:45, my briefing from 11 to 11:30, thesis seminar from 12 to 2pm, and finally a quick lunch and packing stuff for work from 4pm to 6pm. I went to stay the night with mum and dad, and spent the first night in my renovated room. It still doesn’t have lights but other than that. It felt super weird to think that nothing (apart from my bed) that made it my room is there anymore. I’m kind of sad I didn’t take pictures before - in a way - my childhood was demolished. It does look really pretty though but I feel weird, almost as if it hasn’t hit me yet. I can’t believe last Christmas was the last I saw of my room as I’ve known it for more than ten years...

Another thing that I felt really weird about was obviously Trump’s inauguration speech. All that talk of “America first” and “patriotism” and strong metaphors of “we all bleed the same red” or whatever just made it seem really really scary. It was genuinely upsetting to watch so I focused on making fun of his weird hand gestures. We’ll see... Our historical research methods class is going to practice discourse analysis on his speech on Wednesday so that should be interesting. He is such a populist. Imagine if everyone in the world only cared about themselves the way he wants countries to?

So we went grocery shopping and skiing on Saturday morning. It was a nice and sunny little ski trip despite my feet being so achey and tired. Dad made spaghetti bolognese and granny came over. We talked for a while and in the afternoon mum took me and granny to my apartment to record the final versions of our poetry project. Now it’s up to me to find background sound effects and to edit and burn the CDs. I already told granny we’d have a big party for when the CD comes out. It has been so special working with her. She’s an artist and there’s so much meaning behind her words when she recites a poem. You can tell it’s what she loves to do, and what she wants to leave us with when she’s gone. I was trying to persuade her to write some kind of an introduction to the project with a few words about her life with poetry. She seemed a bit apprehensive but I hope I can get her to do it since it’d be so valuable for future generations to know the thought behind the project and to know something about her as well. Even I don’t know a whole lot about granny because to her talking about herself is selfish and rude. She’s always been a listener and I’ve inherited that from her. Anyway I love her to bits and I can’t wait to hand her the finished product. ♥ We’ve spent my childhood performing at kindergartens, organizing events and her telling me endless amounts of stories. She helped me with the poetry part of my IB finals and she recited a lovely poem at my confirmation party. Now this could very well be our last art project together. I have to make it count.

Next weekend will be my big training for my job of doing social media at the world championships. I don’t know yet if I’m going to be taking the bus or driving over there. I’ve planned to spend Tuesday at the office again and I’ve got my methods lecture on Thursday. Oh and a group meeting on Friday.

My guy’s about to return from his parents’ and I promised to go meet him at the bus station in about 30 minutes. I should also go over a DVD of Coppélia since our spring show theme for my dance school is a toy factory and I’d love for us to do something related to that. Coppélia is one of my favourite ballets alongside Giselle and the Nutcracker.

I’m starting to feel the Dragon Age Inquisition hype again. I’d really want to play but I need to go to Halamshiral next and I hate the place with a passion. My guy just did Priority: Thessia in ME3 and has been really into the multiplayer, which doesn’t leave me much time with my PC, heh. In ACNL I just got my golden fishing rod and I’m trying desperately to finish my mermaid set by visting the island daily. So far they’ve had 90% cabana seres since Christmas with like the mermaid chair or the mermaid bed on there a few times. I’ve also got over 300 medals because I take at least one tour every time I visit so... I’m scared of the eventual launch of a new Animal Crossing on the Nintendo Switch since I can’t just leave Sonetia behind and start a new life in a new town but I can’t possibly manage two at the same time! I will also have to buy the console because since it’s portable I won’t be able to use my guy’s Switch for it.. Yikes.

Now I really have to hurry off to the bus station. I can’t believe January is coming to an end already! Wow..

#personal #diary #January2017

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andrewmawby · 5 years

Text

September 29, 2019 AsktheBuilder Newsletter

You may be a new subscriber this week. I was on vacation and hope you settled in okay. This is NOT a normal newsletter. You'll see why in a moment. Hang in there until next week for a home-improvement injection.

If you're a hardened subscriber who's a road warrior like me, then you know what it's like to travel and try to avoid barker spiders!

Little-Man Self-Discovery Trip

Kathy, my wife, is not a big fan of traveling. I'm the opposite. I could be ready to leave in about 45 minutes if an opportunity arises.

We have a great relationship and she encourages me to travel because then she gets a vacation from me! It's important for you to realize I've worked out of the house for the past twenty-five years.

Need I say more?

About 15 years ago, I started traveling to very neat places here in the USA and Canada. Many trips were wrapped around going to secret Internet mastermind conferences.

I majored in geology in college, so I'm attracted to the Southwest where bedrock and structural geology is delicious eye candy.

I'm sitting here right now creating this newsletter for you at Gate C 31 in the Denver airport on my way back to New Hampshire. I've got about an hour to get this into your inbox.

I spent the past week in northern New Mexico. What a delight!

Here are some photos that tell just a part of story of the trip: I shot the above photo at Boston Logan airport last Monday morning. I had to wake up at 1:30 AM to catch a 3:15 AM bus to the airport. UGH!

But I was rewarded with this sunrise just before boarding the direct flight to Denver, CO. After a grueling 21-hour travel day on Monday, I woke up in Taos, NM. My buddy Dan and I went to Bandelier National Monument.

Here I'm standing in front of a giant pot at the shuttle bus stop. I wear the spandex hoo rag as a sunscreen and it makes me look mysterious as well.

Bandelier has some remarkable cave dwellings that were carved out of volcanic tuff deposits up to 1,000 feet thick. Massive super volcanoes in this part of NM blew their stacks over a period of 1,000,000 years plus creating all the rock.

I highly recommend you going to Bandelier. These are just a few of the cave dwellings at Bandelier. The loop trail is easy to do and there are not too many elevation changes. You can do this trail. My buddy Dan thinks I take the strangest photos. Here's a great sewer lid in Santa Fe. Personalized sewer lids are the sign of pride and creativity.

Think about it. The foundry just charges a one-time fee to make the mold and BOOM you have super-unique sewer lids that tourists photograph! The above fresco was in a very old town meeting building in Taos, NM. The artist back nearly 100 years ago understood how too many laws are not a great thing. Too many regulations and laws crush us and hold back our ability to create things.

Think about it for a moment. When was the last time you saw a news story of any type where your local town or state government repealed laws? I know I can't remember. Each law that's passed takes away some of your, and mine, freedom and liberty. It's really something to ponder in my opinion. I love love love watermelon. Kathy thinks the aroma of it is disgusting, much less the actual melon. I've often thought, "Why don't they sell watermelon juice at the grocery?"

BOOM! I was walking through the plaza in Santa Fe this past Thursday mid morning and look at what I saw! Blamb was the food vendor selling the juice along with his multitude of fresh and wholesome burritos. I ordered a lamb one with tasty fried onions sans wretched green peppers and cilantro.

I'm one of the ten percent that thinks cilantro tastes like soap. I promised Blamb that he'd be featured in my newsletter. The burrito and juice was simply fantastic. Here's William the poet. He sets up at one corner of the Santa Fe plaza. This was our first night here. I had him compose a special poem for Kathy. He's holding it in his hand. He uses a real typewriter with a black and red ribbon to type your poem on card stock. It's very unique.

He asked me a few questions about what I wanted, I gave him some ideas about what message I wanted to convey and William said, "Come back in 10 minutes and I'll have it ready."

I came back and it was unbelievable. You can hire William long distance to send a special poem to that special person in your life.

What's cool is YOU decide what to pay. Very clever, William!

CLICK or TAP HERE to order your personalized poem from William.

I get NOTHING from William and am just happy to tell you about this very one-of-a-kind service. Let him know you heard about him from me. Thursday afternoon found us at a non-planned stop. It turns out this may have been the most scenic of all the places we saw!

Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument

WOW!

That's a slot canyon cut into more volcanic tuff. I can't say enough great things about this amazing national treasure. It's not too far off the beaten path and if you can get here, DO IT!

This was me yesterday on top of Sandia Peak above Albuquerque, NM. I was doing a Summits on the Air amateur radio activation. We rode the ginormous Sandia Tram up the mountain. It whisks you up 3,600+ feet of elevation in just 15 minutes.

Moments before this photo was taken, I threw a water bottle up into a pine tree about 55 feet.

Everyone that walked by me while I was contacting other radio operators marveled at just one thing:

"How in the heck did you get that string up so far in the tree?!"

I'm glad you asked. I had Dan record a video showing exactly how I do it when we were at the Randall Davey Audubon Center in Santa Fe on Wednesday.

CLICK or TAP HERE to see exactly how you can get a string 50+ feet up into a tree by just using a water bottle.

I took hundreds of other photos, but didn't want to overload you.

I'll have a regular newsletter for you next week, so hang in there!

Tim Carter Founder - www.AsktheBuilder.com Certified Organic CLEAN MAN - www.StainSolver.com Outdoor Radio Mountain Man - www.W3ATB.com

Do It Right, Not Over!

P.S. Late September is absolutely a magical time to be in northern New Mexico. The daytime average high temp is in the upper 70s F or so. I hope you get to travel here.

The post September 29, 2019 AsktheBuilder Newsletter appeared first on Ask the Builder.

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thegregorybruce · 5 years