#stressed out and pissed off despite us all working in a spa like this is a place for relaxation but I guess that never applied to the

[divine-mistake]

The Cracks in Our Reality (2)

Summary: Loki hates the Executive Manager of the Avengers Tower because she’s too loud and too sarcastic and too kind and too soft, especially to him, who really doesn’t deserve it.

Characters: Loki/Plus-sized (f)Reader

Warnings: 18+ (no smut), language, mentions of sex

A/N: Thanks for reading! You guys have been so incredible with your support on JUST the first chapter! I won't leave you hanging. Updates weekly on Saturday.

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“You’re incredible. A life saver. A genuine Mother Teresa. God is a woman.”

You wave him off, draining the last of the tea from your to-go cup.

“You know, if you keep talking like that, you’re just going to fuel my god complex.”

Mike from Accounting grins at this, shuffling the paperwork you handed off to him only moments before. It was sloppily done, the forms filled out in a hurry as soon as the accounting department called you. They were always having problems with the books—half of that was Tony’s outrageous spending, the other half was the neverending damages the Avengers kept ringing up on the metaphorical receipt.

You didn’t even work in finance, but someone had to get the job done, and who better to do it than the Executive Manager of the Tower?

“Well, I don’t know about this god complex, but can I buy you another coffee for your trouble?”

Mike’s cute. He’s slim, brunet, has glasses that sit a little crooked on his nose. You bet he’s just a little kinky in the bedroom. Like, doggy style is his flavor, and maybe a slap or two on the ass in the throes of passion. He’s cute, but he’s not that cute, and it’s not like he’s asking you on a date or anything.

You flash him your Signature Smile. “I really shouldn’t have any more caffeine, but thanks for the offer. You don’t owe me anything.”

Then, you slide off his desk, heels clacking on the ugly tiling that covers the accounting department’s floor. With a shimmy, you adjust your pencil skirt from where it’s ridden up your thighs, hands fluttering down your silk dress shirt to smooth out the nonexistent wrinkles. Then, you twirl around to look back at him.

He leans his elbow on his desk, chin in his palm, as he looks over you. “Next time then.”

You give him a mock salute. “Have a good rest of your day!” Then you’re strutting off toward the elevator, content to head back up to your office and get the rest of your work down.

From behind you, Mike from Accounting shouts, “Thanks again!”

The elevator shuts, already on its way back up.

It’s nothing new, really. The bouncing around, the extra work, the pulling overtime to get someone else’s work done for them when they’re overwhelmed. The hurried finance forms aren’t anything new—and in a month or two, Mike from Accounting will be calling you again, asking for you to redo the forms that someone else fucked up.

It’s what you’re paid to do. Kinda.

By the time the elevator doors are opening to the main floor, you’re already swiping through the schedules for the week on your tablet. A thread of annoyance is tugging at the back of your neck, a twinge of pain in your muscles from being too tense, too stressed. Your feet are already killing you, toes squished in the stylish heels you decided to wear last minute because you swore you’d be cooped up in your office all day reorganizing the schedules and making room for the press conference.

The press conference for stupid Loki Odinson, whose doing his community service as a probationary Avenger. Stupid fucking Tony Stark, who didn’t tell you that Loki Odinson, the God who tried to take over New York, was coming to stay at the Tower. Stupid fucking Steve Rogers, who tried to tell a little white lie about “forgetting” to mention it. Hah! You’d whipped his ass for that last night, giving him The Look until he finally broke and told you the truth—that Tony made him agree to not tell you.

Oh, and you’d put Tony on blast for that, too. The conversation ended with him promising you a day trip to the spa and a shopping spree for all his bullshit, not that you’d be accepting it. You really just liked to watch him sweat.

And stupid fucking Bucky Barnes for still being away on his solo mission.

Okay, but really you’re pissed at Loki because you’d tried to be nice to him and bring him dinner after you noticed he hadn’t eaten, and you brought him some extra blankets because Thor told you about his whole heritage deal and you don’t really know anything about frost giants, but maybe Loki doesn’t like being cold like a frost giant. And the motherfucker had the audacity to pull a knife on you. You’re sure he hates you because you most certainly hate him.

You stop in the middle of the hallway, finger pressed against the screen of your tablet. Everything around you is quiet. The common room is empty and the sanctuary that is your office is only a few more steps away. The light of day spreads through the Tower, spilling out from the floor-to-ceiling windows and making everything warm. You shiver despite it.

You don’t hate Loki Odinson.

He’s an asshole, sure, but from what you’ve heard from Thor, the dude hasn’t had it easy. And you know, somewhere deep down, you should be a little more gentle with him. He’s not the first person to pull a knife on you when you’ve sneaked up on them. You’re used to that.

You should know better than to bark back at a caged animal.

As soon as you enter your office, you kick your heels off underneath your desk and slouch into the comfort of your leather chair. Despite the temperature, your fingers are cold and stiff—they ache slightly when you pick up a pen to sketch out the new schedules. You lean your head back and groan.

Every time you cross-check someone’s schedule with another, you curse Tony’s name. By the time you have three sticky notes on your free hand reminding you of appointments that need to be moved around, you’re calling him unsavory names that don’t make any sense when spoken aloud, but they sure make you feel better.

Natasha comes knocking just as you’re mumbling about Tony’s lifelike resemblance to the stale ends of sliced bread, and when you look up to greet her, your desk is covered in a sea of brightly-colored notes with varying degrees of importance, noted by the multiple—or lack thereof—exclamation points on each.

“Hey,” you greet with a sigh.

She leans over your desk and reaches for your face. You flinch until she rips something off your cheek, the barest hint of a burn as the sticky note you’d somehow lost a few minutes ago pulls your peach fuzz.

“Hey,” she mimics, reading the note. “Looks like I’m not having that photoshoot on the 8th.”

“Don’t get me started!” you whine, snatching the reminder back. Thanks to the sticky notes still attached to your fingers, you don’t get enough traction to yank it back, but Natasha takes pity on you and smacks it onto a free surface.

But it’s enough to make her laugh, and that fact puts a smile back on your face.

“You scheduled the press conference already?” she asks, grabbing one of the plastic chairs Steve made you keep in your office after he came to have lunch with you once and had to stand while chowing down on his salad.

“Of course.” You huff, peeling your fingers free. “Now I’m just dealing with the damages. Mr. I’m-So-Great-I-Can-Do-No-Wrong-Stark needed it scheduled pronto, something about Fury and a compromise and ‘the trust of the citizens.’”

Natasha nods, eyes scanning over some of the reminders. “I didn’t realize schedules were so damn complicated.”

“It’s why they pay me the big bucks,” you joke, hands threading through your hair to pull it away from your face. The gentle tug on your scalp feels soothing. “It’s overly complicated because there’s so many of you, and I have to cross-reference everything to make sure nothing clashes, plus mission scheduling, and all of you have routines that I take into account.”

She whistles, and it flips a switch in your brain.

“I’m not complaining,” you say quickly. “It’s not that big of a deal. It’s not even hard. I just have to spend the rest of today making some calls to move everything around and then the schedules will be right again. It’s easy.”

“ Zaika,” she calls gently. Natasha is only ever gentle when the two of you are behind closed doors. “It’s not an easy job. That’s why Tony hired you—you’re the best there is at this stuff.”

You shrug at the red-head. “I’m decent at it.”

Natasha rolls her eyes. “You’re the only one who ever goes above and beyond to take care of us, y’know.”

“Well you should be taken care of. You’re always taking care of humanity or doing whatever else you Russian spies do.”

She cracks a grin at that and you can’t help but do the same.

“Damn straight.” As you pull up a list of press contacts to start calling, Natasha looks down at her watch. “It’s past lunchtime and I bet you haven’t eaten yet,” she says with a knowing glance. You have enough decency to pretend like you don’t know what she’s talking about.

“Are you asking me on a date, Nattie?” You bat your eyes at her.

“No way, we’re going dutch.”

“Dutch is a date.”

“No, it’s not, and if you’re going dutch on your dates you need to tell me who the hell is taking you out because I want to speak to them.”

With a flick of your wrist, you toss a couple of takeout menus across the desk to her. “Chill out. It’s not like I’ve been on a real date in the past—”

The shrill bell tones of your phone interrupt you and your knees clatter painfully into your desk as you jump from the sound. You lunge for where it’s hidden under a thick binder full of finance notes you used earlier, pressing it to your ear immediately.

And once again, you’re lost in the whirlwind of your job.

As the man on the other side rants about some minuscule problem he’s having with an upcoming interview scheduled for Sam Wilson—something about a security issue, and now you’re dreading broaching the topic of changing the date—you vaguely gesture at Natasha to leave. It’s unlikely you’ll be taking a lunch break today.

She gives you the Evil Eye, the look where she purses her lips like an irritated mother and draws her eyebrows together in a way that screams about you being irresponsible. In the end, she stands and starts to head out the door, but not before turning to give you one last disappointed glare.

Natasha points two fingers to her eyes and flicks them in your direction:  I’m watching you.

Then she’s gone, closing your office door behind you, leaving you to put your phone on speaker so you can massage your aching temples where a headache is beginning to bloom.

It’s one in the morning and you’re shoveling the boiling hot ramen you just microwaved down your gullet like a starved man, standing in the darkness of the kitchen to hide your shameful dinner when the lights flicker on overhead and suddenly, you’re frozen. Your eyes must be bugging out of your head when you look at whoever just caught you slurping up the remnants of the first meal you’ve had in hours.

And of course, it’s the blond-haired blue-eyed babe of a God who strides in, looking nothing but chipper until he sees you leaned against the counter, dressed only in a frumpy t-shirt and threadbare pajama shorts, feet bare and cold. To top it off, you know there is soup on your chin. You just know it.

“My lady!” he booms and you wince, hoping he doesn’t wake the whole ass tower up with his projection. “Why did you not join us all for dinner earlier? Stark provided pizza!”

You shrug, hiding your face in your bowl of noodles. “I was busy, and even if I wasn’t, you know I’m not a fan of pizza.”

He frowns and it looks so funny on his normally cheery face, almost like it pains him to say what he’s about to say. He takes a step toward you.

“My lady,” he says lowly, “I do not know anything of the sort. Anyone who claims to not love the grand Midgardian pizza is either lying, or they are my enemy.”

You snort. “I don’t like Pop-Tarts either and you know that, too.”

Thor shakes his head, slaps his big hand upon his big chest, and buckles his knees like a dramatic fool. His other hand reaches out for your forearm as if he’s begging for you to save him from whatever untimely death he’s experiencing at your pickiness.

“Treason!” he shouts. “Lying to your king!”

You pull your arm away from him to shove another forkful of ramen into your awaiting mouth.

“Not my king,” you mumble, snickering under your breath. Thor wouldn’t understand that reference even if you tried to explain American politics to him.

When Thor finally decides enough is enough and whatever brought him into the kitchen is more important than annoying you, he passes by you and heads to the pantry. You can hear the crinkling of a foil package before he turns back to face you, and low and behold, there are three packages of Pop-Tarts in his grip.

Like the true king he is, he offers you a pack, giving you the most exaggerated eye roll in history when you shake your head at him.

It’s a comfortable silence that occupies the kitchen while you both chow down. You don’t speak to each other, don’t look at one another, just enjoy the company and the orchestra of chewing and slurping and the gentle sounds of the tower at night. By the time you’ve finished off your bowl, placing it into the sink quietly, Thor’s demolished his snack and is brushing crumbs from his comfy red sweatshirt.

You waggle your fingers at him in a half-hearted wave, but Thor grabs your hand in his own. His palm engulfs yours. You swallow back whatever words seemed to think they could slither out from between your lips as you look at how gently he cradles you.

When you look up at him, his eyes are soft.

“I am sorry,” he says as if you should know what he means.

“For what?”

His gaze turns to the floor, almost ashamed. “For Loki.”

“Oh, Thor.” You don’t hesitate to pull your hand away from his in order to wrap your arms around his neck, stretching up on your tiptoes. “You don’t have to be sorry for your brother. He has to apologize for himself. It’s not your fault.”

He had felt terrible when you told him what happened the other night, although you definitely left key parts out of the story you recounted to him. Thor had apologized then, too, even with the absence of the dagger in the story, but you told him you understood what Loki must be feeling right now, that you understood he needed time to warm up. Unwillingly, Thor accepted that you were letting the incident slide, but really, what were you going to do? Get Loki chained up again? Cut off his magic?

Yeah, ‘cause that would totally help him mesh with the cool kids.

After a long moment, you feel Thor’s arms tighten around your waist, hands pressing into the small of your back as he bends to accommodate your height. Or maybe it’s to get closer to you, to press further into you. Like the soft puppy he is, you stroke the back of his head, nails scratching over his scalp lightly.

“He’s better than this,” Thor whispers. “I want him to be better than this.”

You think about all the things you could say, but none of them sound right. The soft-hearted side of you says to tell him that everyone deserves second and third and fourth chances, that he and Loki both have their issues they need to work on if they ever want to work on their relationship. The jaded side of you says that no one gets second chances in this world. Second chances only open the door to a second betrayal—a second chance to be hurt. Chances never bring change.

“He needs time,” you finally say, but you don’t know if you believe your own words. “You both need time to heal.”

It’s not the first time someone’s pulled a knife on you before, and you know better, but you aren’t sure if you know for better or for worse.

Next Chapter

Taglist: @poetic-fiasco @suffocatinglypositive @melancholic-metanoia @lucywrites02 @delightfulheartdream @its-bucky-barnes-bitch @mochminnie @httpjazel @sciamachy-after-dusk @girl-obsessed-with-things

#loki x reader #loki x you #loki love #avengers loki #plus size reader #redemption loki #loki fanfic #the cracks in our reality #loki pov #loki series #thanks for supporting me!

[retroknightx]

hypmic headcanons

since nobody on my instagram appreciates me, i’m going to put them here, and it’ll be like a master post i can add onto that way anyway (which is convenient for me, because i keep adding on… yeah, it’s bad lmao. my notes document can only take so much) all of it will be under the line so you guys don’t just have a big ass post clogging your feed! to whoever my 4 followers are

starting with fling posse…

---

Ramuda Amemura

He’s trans.

He has a superiority complex to hide his inferiority complex.

He also likely has a little bot of a god complex… Just a tiny bit… Not to the point it’d endanger his life, but to the point he can never admit he’s wrong (I suppose this can also count as the superiority complex).

He also has a little bit of a schoolboy crush on Dice… that has lasted far longer than he’d ever like to admit – not that he’d ever admit it in the first place – and he gets jealous over Dice.

He started his whole thing with girls, whatever it is, as a power trip, which also explains why he likes to cause so much chaos.

Since he used to smoke, he started candy as a way to stop smoking and it slowly replaced his smoking habit (as I have yet to see him smoke otherwise, but keep in mind I’m not far into the manga and mostly I’m going off the ARB story).

---

Gentaro Yumeno

All writers are perfectionists (I’d know as one).

He’s probably very particular about the details and doesn’t like doing things without a plan.

He’s the lyric write for Fling Posse’s raps and does not enjoy making up lyrics on the spot; however he can if he must – This is also why he carries the book everywhere.

I honest to god don’t feel like he’s of this world and whatever his actual form is (irony in his rap name?), it scared Ramuda enough to create Fling Posse, so here they are.

---

now for the dice ones… it’s gonna be long!

---

Dice Arisugawa

He is, unfortunately, very oblivious to romantic approaches – especially from close friends such as his division members, for he’s been with them for so long that he can never imagine them falling in love with him.

He has abandonment issues/a fear of abandonment because his mother left him.

Speaking of his mother, Dice likely knows how to do “noble” things because he was raised by a politician; i.e. how to play piano and stuff like that.

Adding on top of that, I feel like Dice has an accumulation of many different skills from being all over the place – He learned how to do card tricks by watching others, and he probably learned bird calls from spending time with Rio.

He undoubtedly has ADHD (as a person with ADHD myself, you cannot tell me I am wrong)!

He’s well aware that’s he a leech, but he can’t stop himself because the addiction is stronger and he feels terrible about it; it’s why he often begs instead of anything else that would fit his character more.

He’s a very talkative person and often rambles to get his thoughts organized.

He doesn’t like being put into awkward situations or forced into silence because he is used the buzz of a casino and a busy city.

Relating to the ADHD canon, Dice puts his life on line not only for the thrill of it, but to keep his mind off of thoughts, and it’s also why he gambles; so he can focus on one thing.

He is numb to change because he’s a gambler.

He is very good at adapting to a new environment.

He doesn’t like being looked down up and that’s why he started gambling; to prove that he’s worth something.

He uses humor to cope if he can’t get his mind off of things with the thrill of gambling.

---

Extras (Fling Posse all together)

Dice has weird limbs, so clothing fits him weird, and Ramuda started making clothes for them because of that.

Ramuda chased after Dice after he stole his signature parka and the Fling Posse star was embroidered on later by Ramuda after the formation of Fling Posse.

Ramuda likely pulls whatever strings he has access to to make life easier for his division members (not that it stops them from getting into trouble, that is).

Gentaro spends a lot of time away when writing and likely forgets he’s even alive during those periods, so his division members make sure he’s still taking care of himself when he gets like that.

They all piss each other off, but in a platonic love kind of way.

---

moving onto matenrou! my favorite division <3

---

Jakurai Jingui

Oh, my poor man’s so tired. He just needs a long break and a spa day; speaking of this, he likely doesn’t ask for help often – it’s the messiah complex he undoubtedly has.

His hair is too long for him to be taking care of it himself, and it definitely looks in fantastic condition, so he definitely takes good care of it – I just don’t think he takes care of it himself; I think he enlists the help of his division members (as I headcanon that Matenrou is in a poly relationship).

Jakurai’s matureness can sometimes get in the way of other things, such as emotional moments, and he can come off as cold or distant when he doesn’t mean to come off that way.

Unlike the other divisions, Jakurai wanted to really separate from his past, and that’s why he named his division Matenrou instead of reusing something from the past. He also probably doesn’t like talking about the past.

His hair is naturally silver, but the lighter shades that are nearly white underneath was caused by stress.

He gets cold quickly, which is why he always keeps the lab coat on, and it’s also why he wears a turtleneck.

Jakurai does live in the same apartment as Doppo and Hifumi, but he’s always so busy that he often can’t get there, so he ends up sleeping at the hospital; he also has a separate apartment of his own that’s closer to the hospital if he has free time, but he’s not off work/off work but still on call.

---

Doppo Kannonzaka

Man, the first thing I thought when I saw him was that he has a choking kink. Enough said. He also likely has a praise kink.

If he didn’t have social anxiety and wasn’t so busy, he’d also probably be going over to Rio’s camp a lot. I think it’s because he’s so overworked that he doesn’t care about what’s in the food; as long as he gets it.

He’s probably passed out from exhaustion more than once and just got used to it.

Despite all his problems, he definitely wants to be known and he wants his name out there; he wants to be just like the other two and he definitely looks up to them already, but he aspires to be them.

He is so thankful for his divison members and he’s glad that they accepted him.

---

Hifumi Izanami

Hifumi is a classic case of “fake it till you make it”; I really don’t know how he became one of the most popular hosts in Shinjuku, but it’s definitely about the fake confidence and the jacket is a comfort object for him that allows him to have that confidence.

He cooks all the time for his division members and he uses the catches from fish all the time, too. He even brings the lunches to their works for them.

---

Extras

Since Hifumi’s always out so late, the others make sure he has everything he needs for whenever he wakes up and sometimes they wait for him.

They’re all in a poly relationship and I refuse to believe anything else; I mean, have you seen those “my room” dialouge in ARB? Fruity.

They probably all love to cuddle whenever they get the chance because they can’t do it often.

They definitely set up one day of the month for all of them to just be together.

---

buster bros time!

---

Ichiro Yamada

This may just be the Ichiro simp in me, but I think he has a very nice tummy that’d be nice to lay on; like a soft one if that makes any sense to anybody other than me.

He’s a very friendly person and if you’re close friends with him, he’s definitely loyal; he’d be willing to drop anything to help you kind of loyal, like he is to his brothers – all that, except the willing to die part.

I think he gets flustered easily and doesn’t know how to respond to compliments. That’s also probably the Ichiro simp in me.

Although he has to stop his brothers from ripping out each other’s throats all the time, he’s very proud of them and of their achievements, no matter what they are. He’s willing to praise them even for the tiniest things to make up for his absence in their lives.

He probably has a terrible sleeping schedule, but he could probably operate on pretty much anything. Two hours of sleep? That’s not an issue for him; he’s used to it.

He’s likely a cheapskate when it comes to himself, but when it comes to his brothers, he spares no expense if he can.

---

Saburo Yamada

He has a superiority complex. I mean, just look at how he acts with Jiro – that’s enough proof right there.

He got into hacking and all of that computer stuff because it was interesting to him; he’s probably pursuing a career in it, considering just how good he is at it. I feel like he’d make a good white hat hacker that tests your website security, like Alma in Va-11 Hall-A.

Call him a library, because he holds grudges for years.

I think he just likes picking arguments because he think it’s funny and there’s nothing better to do when you’re stuck with your brothers (as somebody with a sibling myself, I can attest to that).

---

Jiro Yamada

Anger issues. Yep, that’s it. That’s the headcanon.

Man probably goes dumpster diving to see what kind of treasures he can find; his room is probably full of that kind of junk.

He probably has greasy hair. It doesn’t matter how much he cleans it, it’s just greasy (as somebody with the same issue, go clean your pillows Jiro).

---

Extras

Ichiro has to hold Jiro back from just punching Saburo all the time.

God, somebody save Ichiro from his siblings; with how much they bicker, he probably has taken so much ibuprofen to stop headaches in his life that he should be considered dead from an overdose.

Despite being assholes to each other, they all help each other out – Saburo helps Jiro with his work, Jiro helps Saburo with whatever he can’t do, and Ichiro takes care of the rest. It’s the only thing keeping their bond together.

---

mad trigger crew, my beloved.

---

Rio Mason Busujima

Rio’s very stoic and that often doesn’t break, so it’s very rare to see a smile on his face. He has different smiles for different things too – there’s the business one; one so he doesn’t look as intimidating, and the actual genuine smile that’s very rare to see, but it happens when somebody appreciates his food.

Rio’s not good at understanding emotions and it takes him awhile to process emotions; he goes quiet in these moments and it can be confusing for those who don’t know him, but once he’s thought everything out, he’s very smart about responding.

He’ll never fully adjust to a life outside of the navy and military.

Opposite to Dice, he finds the buzz of a city to be too distracting for his thoughts and he enjoys his solitude, but he doesn’t mind company at all.

Due to how his unit was broken up, he refuses to abide by H law and keeps his gun on him. Even Rio can be spiteful. However, he mostly uses it for hunting, which is why he’s so far out in the forest.

He definitely has a lot of scars and that’s why he often wears his fatigues; he doesn’t wana come off as off-putting. His cards without the jacket did him so dirty. Of course he’d have scars from fighting in World War 3.

He can come up with strategies on the spot and is a very quick-thinker when it comes to combat.

Despite how ruthless he is when it comes to rap battles and being an ex-navy, he’s actually a very gentle soul.

I feel like he’s asexual, but homoromantic.

---

Samatoki Aohitsugi

He only uses the bad guy persona as a way to be left alone, but he’s actually a very kind person.

Despite being a yakuza, he actually abides to the H law and it’s probably only because of Nemu (however, this is only based off of the anime, so I can’t say for certain, but I haven’t seen anything in the manga disproving otherwise yet).

I just feel like he eats a lot throughout the day. I can’t explain this one, but he has the vibes.

He also knows how to cook quite well himself, and he does it for his division members sometimes.

---

Jyuto Iruma

He’s very cocky because he knows he can get away with things; I mean, he’s the authorties, why wouldn’t he get cocky about what he can do? However, it’s somewhat annoying to Samatoki.

If he wasn’t a gay bastard, Samtoki and Rio probably would’ve been arrested long ago. Thankfully for them, he is a gay bastard.

He likes looking good no matter what; it helps his confidence, so he dresses up to go out anywhere.

His glasses are probably just reading glasses.

He likes spending money on expensive things.

---

Extras

Samatoki and Jyuto are in a relationship. They’re so fruity that I’m sure I don’t have to explain this one.

Samatoki doesn’t approve of Rio dating Dice at all and it’s only because of Jyuto that Dice is still alive.

Rio is pretty much their marriage counselor; he has to constantly deal with them bickering, so of course he is. He’s pretty much the adopted child to save their marriage.

---

Ships

Riodice

Samajyu

Poly Matenrou

---

i will likely make a separate post for the ship headcanons because this will be much longer, but i think this covers all of them anyway, so here you go. enjoy.

#headcanons #hyperfixation #hypmic #hypnosis mic #samajyu #riodice #matenrou #mad trigger crew #fling posse #buster bros #ichiro #saburo #jiro #ramuda #dice #gentaro #samatoki #jyuto #rio #doppo #jakurai #hifumi #master post #poly matenrou

[sickkillerzach]

Ex Gon' Give It To Ya

Everytime Gloria invited Javier over to see Manny, I knew it was bad news.

But she insisted every time he came over that "it's good for Manny to see his dad".

That all changed the most recent time he came to visit.

You see, he didn't just come to visit Manny.

He wanted to take Manny with him.

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

There was a knock on the door. ugh I thought, Gloria's ex husband. I hate him.

She came rushing towards the door. I could tell she didn't enjoy his company, but obviously, she thought it was good for him.

But there was something rather odd about the way she looked. She always looked like she was dreading his very appearance at her house, but she looked, rather, nervous to open the door.

I stopped her dead in her tracks. "Gloria, sweetheart, you seem to be anxious about Javier's presence."

"I don't know. I just have this very strange feeling about inviting him over. I've had this feeling for a week, when I got the call from him. He sounded like he was up to no good." She replied.

He pounded on the door again, rude and impatiently.

"We'll be there in a second!" I yelled loudly, my Australian accent kicking in, as usual.

He stopped knocking.

"Well, he's already here, nothing we can do, let's just have him over to visit Manny, and he can leave, and that's it." I assured her.

I didn't want to say anything to her, as I saw the stress she was under, but I was very frustrated at her, and almost wanted to say "Well, had you listened to me, you wouldn't be here".

It was bad enough my friends never listen to me, but my soon to be fiance not listening to me is even worse.

I felt very hurt, but didn't say anything.

She went to the door and took a deep breath, and opened it.

"About damn time," he said "where the hell were you?" He asked, being very rude, again.

She ignored the question, and I came over and shook his hand. I did this every time he came over, but he was always rough with me. My hand was always red and sore afterwards, and sometimes he even squeezed so tightly, I could feel my pulse in my hand.

Manny walked over and hugged his father.

He even looked concerned, almost as if he was sharing the same feeling his mother was.

Javier gave him a very weird looking grin, like he was up to something.

Was Gloria's strange feelings, that may have been shared with Manny, meaning something more than we thought?

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

Everything seemed to be normal. He gave Manny a gift, as always (which bothered me, because it was like he was trying to compete with me, but I'm always going to be the better father), he ate dinner, chatted with us, the usual things he would do.

However, when he left, that bad feeling started to settle on me.

was he up to something? I thought, and what was with that grin he kept giving Manny? He kept staring him down.

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

That night when we settled on the bed, I had nothing on but a pair of boxer shorts, and Gloria had on one of her nightgowns. Everything seemed to be usual. Usual day, usual night, the only thing different was that Javier was over.

So I thought.

In the middle of the night, I had to take a piss. This was normal, as I frequently had to urinate in the middle of the night.

But something was off.

I never noticed how creepy Gloria's house looked in the dark. It was a beautiful house, but right now, it looked creepy.

I wanted a light source, but didn't want to awake Gloria, so, I grabbed my Rick and Morty Portal Gun, put it on silent, and made it so that the light stayed on until I shut it off, rather than turning off automatically.

And as an extra comfort source, I grabbed my Raichu plushie from the bed.

Gloria turned over a little bit, but didn't wake up from me getting my Raichu, and Portal Gun.

I walked across the hall, and went to the bathroom, which was right next to Manny's room, which was right next to Joe's room.

I went in, and set my gun and plushie on the counter right next to the toilet, and lifted the seat up, and did my business. I couldn't help but feel this strange feeling overwhelming me, the same feeling I was getting while Javier was over, but worse.

Way worse.

Once I got done in the bathroom, I grabbed my Portal Gun, and Raichu, and continued walking towards our bedroom.

But the feeling was getting worse as I walked away from the hallway.

For whatever reason, I checked in Manny's room.

good, he's just in his bed, snoring away I thought to myself.

what the hell was I thinking? He was gonna be missing or something?

I went back up to the bedroom, set down the portal gun on to the the dresser, turned it off, set Raichu back on the bed, covered back up, and went back to bed.

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

At around 4AM, there was a loud noise throughout the house. It woke both me and Gloria up.

"What was that?" I asked her, rhetorically.

"I don't know, we should go downstairs and see." She replied.

As I walked through the bedroom door, I sensed the same feeling I had while in the bathroom.

We walked down the stairs, where the noise sounded like it came from, and there was nobody there.

I could hear Joe crying upstairs about something.

"I'll get him, you keep looking." She said as she ran back up the stairs.

I kept looking around until I heard the words come out of Joe's mouth.

"Manny's dad came and got him."

"What?" I said back.

"Yeah, he came and took him. I couldn't say anything because he had a gum at my head." He replied, obviously mistaking "gun" for "gum". I always thought it was so cute when Joe talked like a child.

"What kind of wanker points a lethal weapon at a child?" I said.

"Oliver, we've got to go save Manny." Gloria told me, which was the obvious thing to do.

I put on my tan leather jacket, black sweatpants, while Gloria put on her red sweater, and brown skinny jeans.

We made sure to have pockets to hold our guns.

"Let's see here," I started listing off all the guns we had in our gun safe. "Thompson? Nah, that'd jam too much. BAR? Too heavy. We're only killing one guy after all. SPAS-12? That's-" Gloria interrupted.

"Will you just hurry up already? We don't know what Javier could be doing at this moment, I'll just be taking the Glock." She told me.

"Fine, I'll just take the PPSH-41, and the 1911."

We put Joe in the backseat of the car, and were on our way to that dickhead Javier's house.

I wanted to tell Gloria that I knew that inviting him over was a bad idea, but chose not to, as I didn't want to put more stress on her, or even worse, cause an argument. After all, there was a lot of tension.

I started to notice how much of a bad idea it was to put the PPSH on my back, as it started to hurt with the carseat right up against it.

Too late to take care of it now.

The closer we got to the house, the faster I started driving.

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

When we finally arrived at the house, we started loading up our guns.

"Papi, just stay here while me and daddy take care of something-" I interrupted her.

"Look, the kid understands what we're doing, no need to sugarcoat it, let's get moving, and take down this cunt, and save our son." Gloria wasn't fond of me swearing in front of Joe, however, I made it up to her by calling Manny "our son", despite me just being his step-father.

We began to walk towards the front door, and I knocked on it, very hard.

I could hear him screaming something in Spanish that I couldn't quite understand.

"Who the fuck is it? And what the fuck do you want?" He yelled in English, this time I understood him.

I tried my best to hide my Australian accent, and said "mail service!"

Gloria stared at me deeply as if she was saying "what the hell is wrong with you?"

"Mail at 5AM?" He replied.

"Told you so." She said, despite not saying anything beforehand.

I gave her the same look she gave me.

I scratched my beard and mustache as I thought of what to say next.

"We're working the nightshift." I finally said, but became concerned as my accent was a teeny bit audible, and because that's obviously not convincing.

"No mail guy comes at-" I interrupted him.

"Goddamnit Javier just open the fucking door!" Gloria gave me an even darker look, as if she was saying "now what's your plan genius?".

"Oliver? What are you doing here?" He asked, trying to sound surprised.

"You know why, give us Manny, and nobody gets hurt." Gloria finally spoke.

"I don't have Manny? What are you talking about?"

I whispered to Gloria, "let's start shooting at the door, then he'll have to open."

She nodded, as in confirmation.

I pulled out the 1911, and she pulled out her Glock, and we started firing shots.

He started yelling in Spanish again. The only thing I could understand was "ay dios mio".

"You brought guns? What the fuck? Okay, I'll open the door, just stop firing!" He said, as he walked over.

I pulled out the PPSH from my back, and put the 1911 back in my jacket pocket.

When he opened the door, I hit him with the butt of the gun.

"You fucking son of a bitch, give us the kid right now!" I yelled as I pointed the sub machine gun at his forehead.

"I dont have him! I told you." He replied.

Just then we heard a scream, coming from, what sounded like a teenage boy.

Gloria and I turned to each other.

"That confirms it." She said.

"Guess it's time to waste this wanker." Just then he pulled out his P-99 from his jeans pocket and stared firing shots. Gloria and I immediately took cover behind his walls at the side of his house. Unfortunately, we were on the opposite sides, making us separated.

He quickly reloaded, and continued shooting.

I nodded at Gloria silently, and then moved my head in the direction of the back of the house. She seemed to get the idea.

We met up at the back, and just before we started discussing the plan, we looked in the window.

Manny was in the chair, tied up, his back turned to us.

"There's Manny. Alright, here's the plan. You run in and get Manny from the chair, I'll shoot this cunt in the leg, and then we'll have some fun with him afterwards." I told her, she didn't say anything, but rather smiled, and nodded.

"That sounds good to you?" I asked, just to confirm with her, despite she clearly agreed.

"Ye-" She began, but then was interrupted by something she saw. Her eyes widened, and looked as if she was about to piss her pants.

I heard a click.

"He's right behind me, isn't he?" I asked rhetorically, knowing the answer.

"Well, it seems you shouldn't have came here, doesn't it?" He said, as he started to hold me by my neck, making me drop my PPSH.

I thought quickly of what to do, and the kicked him right in his balls.

I picked up the gun from the ground, and shot him right in his kneecap.

"Get Manny from the house, I'll take this wanker in with you." She nodded and ran to the door. She didn't go in though, and waited for me to go to the door, and opened it for me.

"Thanks." I said. I gave her a slight kiss on the cheek, just to piss off Javier.

He started yelling in Spanish, for the third time.

I noticed he was bleeding a lot, and it seemed he was hanging on to conciousness. I set him down on the ground, and put pressure on his wound.

"Oh, buddy, you can't die now, we're just getting started." I told him.

I took a look over at Manny, and he looked horrible. He had blood all over his legs and face, and it even looked like he pulled out a few teeth.

This angered me more than I thought it would.

"I see you did a lot worse damage than I thought you did." I said to Javier, as he started making grunting sounds.

Gloria kissed Manny on his forehead, and hugged him tightly, and said something in Spanish to him.

That's what I loved about Gloria, she was such a soft mom.

She took him to the car, and walked back in.

We grabbed Javier, and put him in the chair.

"You are now about to witness the strength of street knowledge." I told him as we tied him up.

Gloria looked at me, as she got the reference.

"What are you talking about? You don't have any "street knowledge", the both of you don't". He said.

"Really? You don't get the reference? Straight Outta Compton, by N.W.A.? Niggaz With Attidues?" I asked.

"I don't listen to that garbage you call "rap music"." He said back.

I gasped. "How dare you disrespect the legacy of Dre, Ice Cube, Eazy-E, and everyone else in N.W.A." "That's it." And I grabbed my phone, and played the song.

He screamed, clearly hating it.

"If this is bothering you, holy shit, you're not ready for anything that's about to happen next." I said.

Gloria seemed annoyed. She wasn't very fond of rap herself, but she tolerated it when I was around.

I grabbed my wrench from the trunk of the car, and sang along with the lyrics.

"Straight Outta Compton, crazy motherfucker named Ice Cube."

I started banging the wrench on his legs to the beat of the song.

Gloria, while not being fond of the song, was clearly amused at me beating him to the song.

She then came around and started shooting at his feet.

"Oh God, please stop!" He cried out in pain.

I then grabbed a pair of pliers and pulled out his fingernails.

He continued to cry out in pain.

He was clearly close to death, and so I quickly stopped the song, and put my phone back in my pocket.

I then grabbed the lighter from his cigarette packet, lit up a cigarette, while Gloria grabbed the jerry can from the trunk, and poured gasoline on him. I didn't smoke the cigarette, as I'm not a smoker, but I threw the cigarette on top of him, burning him. We quickly ran out of the house, and got in the car. I started driving back to our house.

"Well, now that that's done, Manny, are you okay?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'm in a lot of pain, but nothing too serious." He replied.

"That's good. But just know, he won't hurt you anymore, now that we took care of him. We'll get you cleaned up at home, and everything is gonna be okay. Can you walk okay? He hit you pretty hard on the legs."

"I can walk fine, it hurts a bit, but I'm fine, you guys came just before he can do anything worse."

"I'm sorry about that kiddo, but he's been taken care of by us." I said.

"Thanks dad." He said.

My face lit up when he said that.

"Did-did you just call me dad?" I asked happily.

"Well, my real dad is nothing to me now, so you're really the real dad I have."

For over two years, he had only called me Oliver, and for the first time, he called me dad.

"I love you son." I told him.

"I love you too." He replied.

"Dad."

Gloria was smiling really hard when she heard this.

I then pulled out my phone.

"Hey Google, play Real Muthaphuckin' G'z by Eazy-E." I told the phone.

"Okay, starting song." The phone said back.

"Oh God." Gloria said as she sighed deeply.

We drove home safely, cleaned off Manny's wounds, and went back to bed after a long exhausting night.

The police came the next day, asking questions about the situation, and Manny showed the officer his injuries.

We were let off scott free, and everyone was happier after that.

#modern family #fandom #fanfiction #fanfic #gloria delgado pritchett #gloria pritchett #manny delgado #joe pritchett #modern family fanfic #what's this? #i drew a fanart and wrote a new fanfic all in the time span of two weeks? #that's insane

[staytinytrash]

Could I request the Ateez members reacting to someone flirting with their s/o infront of them?

ATEEZ reacting to someone flirting with their s/o

(Sorry this took a little longer than expected! I hope you like it! It’s my very first reaction post and I’m excited （╹◡╹）. Also I tried making this gender inclusive to the best of my abilities.)

Hongjoong:

Y/N didn’t mean for this to happen. There they were, caught in between a bar table and some guy leaning over their shoulder. The flashing lights and strobes made it hard for anyone to see what was happening but Hongjoong saw all too well. “Aw, what’s the matter love? I told you I can show you a great time.” The man leaned further onto Y/N’s shoulder as they slightly winced softly.

“I-I’m really sorry, but like I said I’m here with someone else. Please if you’d just-“ The man chuckled and slowly slide his hand down their arm but it was caught by another hand. “They’re here with me. Please be so kind enough and remove your hands from them.” Hongjoong’s voice was sharp and his eyes pierced into the mans as he dropped his hand. The man looked shocked at Honjoong and scurried off leaving you in confusion. “I’m sorry Joong, I told him that I was here someone and he-“ Before you could finish he placed his arm around your waist and dragged you in for a light peck. “It’s fine love. As long as he knows that you belong to me.”

Seonghwa:

Seonghwa hardly got any time to spend around you due to his hectic work schedule as an idol and there you were speaking up to some guy at the concession stand. He thought bringing you out for a movie and dinner would make up for some lost time but maybe you weren’t content. He didn’t expect to see you beside some other guy so bubbly after he came from the bathroom.

“Don’t tell me such a beautiful gem is watching a movie by herself? How about I join you?” The guy chimed as he placed his arm on her shoulder. Visibly uncomfortable, Y/N shrugged their shoulders with a small laugh. They didn’t know what the guys intention was but all they knew was that their hand on their shoulder made them feel off. “Ah well you see, I’m here with my boyfriend. He should be back soon.” And with that Hwa appeared beside you placing an arm around your shoulder, brushing the other males arm off in the process. “And here he is. They aren’t interested clearly..” His tone was spiteful in a way as he watched the man stagger away mumbling a few curses under his breath. “Are you okay baby? I didn’t mean to raise my voice okay? I don’t like seeing people mess with what’s mine.”

Yunho:

It had been an eventful day with Yunho as he took you to a carnival since you hardly seen him for the last two weeks. He wanted to make it up to you and showered you with affection the entire day out. You were getting a bit hungry and Yunho happily jumped up from the seating area to grab you a bite. What he didn’t realize were the two guys checking you out even before he left.

As soon as Yunho went off to grab you something to eat, the two guys approached you and sat on both sides of you. You being polite honestly thought they needed help as they were going on and on about how they weren’t from the area. You being coy didn’t see through what they were saying and simply kept the conversation going. What you didn’t realize was Yunho coming back with a tray of food along side a very unpleasant look on his face. The boys looked up to see the tall giant who was now frowning and glared at them.

“Excuse me, but why are you talking to Y/N?” The boys took this as a hint to leave and scurried off as Yunho dropped the tray onto the table. He sighed lightly and sat down grabbing your hand. “You know I don’t like it when you talk to strangers. Am I going to have to show you how that makes me feel angel?”

San:

You and San were out, as usual, at one of your favorite nightclubs. You were sat at a booth while San went to grab a few drinks for you both. However, you didn’t notice when a man, who was clearly intoxicated plopped down beside you.

“You look really pretty tonight.” The man chirped to you as you nodded and smiled looking out the booth for San to come back.

“Are you here alone? I could keep you company, I wouldn’t mind giving you the attention you need-“

“They don’t need any attention. I give it to them everyday now get lost, thank you.” San had reappeared at the edge of the booth as he placed the drinks down. His gaze was deadly on the male as he wobbled out the booth with his hands up in defense. San clicked hid tongue in annoyance and sat back down grabbing your waist to pull you closer to his side.

“Keep up the nice act up and I won’t be very nice to you tonight.”

Mingi:

Mingi wasn’t the type to get jealous but his skin seemed to have caught fire when he saw some guy trying to flirt with you. You guys were at the mall and Mingi decided to get some pretzels for you two to munch on. He knew the guy saw him sitting there previously with you yet he still had the nerve to approach you.

“I’m just here by myself. Shopping and pampering myself, how about I spoil you instead?” Before you could even decline his offer, Mingi was looming over the other male confused. He rarely got mad, but to think someone would dare approach you in that manner really peeved him off.

“I spoil them very very often. It would be great if you moved along now.” Mingi held a smile on his face and even waved as the man quickly made his way up. He shook his head before turning his attention back to you. His naturally high voice dropped a bit along with his facial expression as he leaned down to you. “Seriously, what makes you think you can get away with that kitten?”

Yeosang:

You didn’t really notice when Yeosang had left you in the middle of the park alone. The last thing you heard him say was ‘I’ll get ice cream for us’ and before you could say anything he was already gone. You found this pretty cute and simply went over to a bench and sat there waiting for him to return.

Yeosang wasn’t that far out where he couldn’t see you, like how he noticed when a man sat beside you on the park bench.

“Hey, I think I’m lost and I’d really like if a beautiful pearl like yourself could help me.” You being oblivious as always decided to stand up and started leading the man in the direction of the parks exit. “Yeah of course I can help! So you just need to- Oh, Yeosang!”

Yeosang reappeared with two ice cream cones in hand and a flat expression. His usual giddy appearance was no longer visible and this seemed to be a trigger for the other male to exit. Yeosang handed you your ice cream and began walking off hinting for you to follow. “You better enjoy your treat now, you have a severe punishment later.”

Wooyoung:

If you both weren’t back home in each other’s embrace, you’d both be at a party. Tonight, San was throwing a house party for no real reason and Wooyoung made sure to drag you there despite your pleas not to go. And there you sat boredly on the couch as a bunch of people moved around with solo cups filled to the brim with beer. It was nice still to be out the house again but it would’ve been better if Wooyoung was actually paying attention to you.

You decided you might as well walk around and talk to some people and so you did. But it was a couple of guys who in your perspective seemed really nice. That was until Wooyoung popped around with a cup full of beer for you only to see you weren’t on the couch anymore.

He heard your laughter from the other side of the room and instantly went over to find you ‘cozying’ up to some other boys. He didn’t even need to think about his next actions when he threw the beer from the cup onto the boys and gave them a glare before yanking you away from them before they could utter a word to him. “Is this what we do now princess? You really love getting me pissed off don’t you?”

Jongho:

You and Jongho had went away for the weekend for some relaxing time alone. You knew how stressed he had been with work and decided to surprise him with a weekend at his favorite spa. It was in a more rural part of town which you hardly had any knowledge or idea of how to get around. So, when you promised Jongho you’d be back in half hour after picking up some snacks, it turned out to be longer and you’d decided to call him up to come find you. You stood close by to the convenient store awaiting for his arrival when you noticed a guy trying to get your attention. He had a pretty chill demeanor and you thought nothing out of the ordinary since it was such a nice neighborhood.

“I mean yeah I can always show you around if you’d like. I know some good bars and grub spots and let’s not forget nightclubs right?” Before you could respond, Jongho loomed above you and you felt his arm snake around your shoulders. “Yeah I think she’s fine. I can show her around, I mean after all she is my girlfriend.”

#ateez imagines #ateez x reader #ateez san #ateez icons #ateez yeosang #ateez seonghwa #ateez hongjoong #ateez yunho #ateez wooyoung #ateez jongho #ateez mingi #ateez reactions #ateez #kpop au #kpop angst #kpop imagines #kpop bands #ateez texts

[throughthewwods]

100 Days of Productivity . Day 83

I… Spent most of yesterday casting my net hoping that one of the many people I contacted will result in my next lead, a clue to my next moves, something constructive.

😃

💚 OH! And I jogged for a half mile without needing to slow down,

not some remarkable athletic feet, but before Covid I couldn’t do that, so… despite grappling with my leg injury off and on ever since last summer it looks like I made progress after all.

I never thought I would miss running errands, but I do. I i miss the gratification of visible results that you just don’t get when everything is done over the phone or through an app. I wrote several paragraphs of unfettered stress that I’ve since deleted because.. things are what they are and bitching won’t change that. What will change circumstances is putting myself in the pathway of more opportunities, which is what I did yesterday.

🧡 I left a voicemail with the rehabilitations counseling Director for more information about the program

🧡 I signed up for a ‘cultivating hope after trauma’ training seminar

🧡 I reached out to my acquaintance at the National Federation for the blind to see if they could help connect me with some helpful people

🧡 I reached out to an acquaintance who may be able to help me connect with key people in my local nonprofits that work with families

📚 I networked with the head of my disability resources & explained more of my issues with a PA but hopefully she will be able to help with

📚 my research supervisor gave another grad school meeting about weaving our narrative

🧡 I popped into the career fair and talked to one of the agencies about upcoming volunteer/internship opportunities

🐾 The dog training continues:

this time I walked him outside the apartment complex.. start working on getting him used to traffic. Also took him on a jog afterwards. He did a surprisingly good job.. That was definitely encouraging. he’s also doing better with socializing and other animals. The other day an obnoxious, off-leash Chihuahua came at GSD, all piss and vinegar, and GSD didn’t react thank god. That definitely could’ve gone badly. GSD has not responded well to bumping into other dogs off leash ever since that one asshole dog in the complex. he’s also been quieter and, though far from calm, calmer with RB’s arrivals. this morning when RB stepped out of the room I noticed GSD was less noisy and mellows out much faster than the past. 👍

⭐️ I left my apartment complex a voicemail about renewal paperwork

⭐️ I scheduled a doctors appointment for my tailbone

💙 I donated to a friend’s surgery recovery fund

💙 I did home-spa stuff to help me relax

📚 I reviewed a chapter on humanist psychology

💜 I got Kiddo into a cool Girl Scout thing where Michelle Obama gave the girls a talk on empowerment

⭐️ I found the energy to cook dinner and run a load of dishes before bed.





#journal #writing #my writing #motherhood #100 days of productivity #studystudystudy #parenting #adulting

[the--blackdahlia]

It’s So Easy (And Other Lies) Chapter 25

Title: It’s So Easy (And Other Lies) Chapter 25

Summary: Stevie Adler likes Duff McKagan. She has for a while now, but she is convinced Duff doesn’t like her that way. Duff likes Stevie, but so does their new bandmate Axl Rose.

Chapter Warnings: Language mainly, also I am not a doctor, so everything I got is from Google.

AN: Thank you all for the feedback!!

The boys slowly started to leave the next day. Duff could  tell that they didn’t want to leave, but he insisted they all get a little break before going back to the tour. Slash was the last one to leave, per Stevie’s request. She waited until everyone was gone before her and Duff sat down with him.

“So, we wanted to talk to you when everyone was gone,” Stevie told him. “We wanted to ask you to be Hope’s godfather.”

“Me?” Slash asked. “Are you sure you don’t want Izzy or Mick or someone?”

“You’re our family,” Duff told him. “Our closest family that isn’t blood, you know? So, we wanted to ask you.” Slash wiped at his eyes.

“I, yes. I would love to be her godfather,” He had a big smile on his face.

“Do you want to hold her?” Duff asked. Slash just nodded. Stevie gently placed her daughter in Slash’s arms. She looked up at him with her big, blue eyes.

“Hey there sweetie,” Slash told her. “I’m going to spoil the everloving crap out of you.”

“I think a lot of people are doing that,” Duff laughed. Slash noticed Stevie hadn’t talked much and looked up at her.

“Are you okay?” He asked her. Duff looked over, worry evident on his face.

“I’m great,” She told them. “I’m perfectly fine.” The two shared a look. They had lived with her long enough to know when something wasn’t right, but they didn’t want to push it too much.

Instead, they just turned their attention to Hope.

****

It was days after everyone left and Stevie was starting to feel a little overwhelmed. She had done good the first couple days of being able to catch what Hope was upset about, but now she wasn’t sure if it was a dirty diaper, hungry, tired, Princess Peach looking at her weird, or all of the above.

“Just breathe,” Marie told her when she came over to visit. Duff was with Hope, and the two women were in the kitchen.

“I’m failing as a mom,” Stevie told her, holding her head in her hands. “How am I supposed to do this for the next how many years? How am I supposed to be a good mom?”

“No one is born a good mom, and even those bitches that say they are, they had help,” Marie told her, rubbing her back. “It’s okay for her to cry. It gives you a minute to take a breath and figure out what is going on. And take advantage of your husband wanting to help you.”

“But what do I do when he’s on tour?” Stevie asked. “How am I supposed to know what she wants, when she wants it?”

“You have me,” Marie told her. “And you have all of Duff’s siblings that are still around Seattle. I’m sure that your mom would come up here if you need her to. And you have a large family that will help whenever you need it.”

“But half of them will be out on tour with Duff,” she told her. “And I can’t keep asking Tommy, Nikki, Mick, and Vince to drop everything and come to Seattle every time I feel a little overwhelmed.” Marie wrapped her arms around her daughter-in-law.

“Just breathe,” She told her again. “In through your nose, out through your mouth. Let your muscles relax.” She knew exactly how Stevie was feeling. The tears were all too familiar.

“What am I supposed to do?” Stevie asked.

“Go take a nap,” Marie told her. “Then when you wake up, take a hot bath. Duff and I can take care of Hope. You need to take care of yourself.”

“But…”

“No buts. Go.” She put her hands on her hips and Stevie sighed and headed up to her and Duff’s room. A few minutes later, Duff came from Hope’s nursery.

“Dirty diaper done, baby happy,” Duff laughed. “Where’s Stevie?”

“Honey, I need you to watch her,” Marie told him. “I’m afraid the baby blues are going to turn into something worse.”

“What do you mean? What’s going on?” Duff asked.

“Postpartum depression is a very common thing that women go through,” Marie explained. “And if it’s left untreated, it can get really bad. And I’d hate for you to go out on tour and come back to no wife.” She saw Duff pale.

“I, oh god. Mom, what do I do?”

“You’re already doing really good, being a good dad to Hope,” Marie told him. “Stevie’s going to take a nap right now. Maybe run to the store and get her the things for a spa? Or I can go.” Duff ran a hand down his face. He had read about this in those books they had gotten, but he hadn’t thought any about it. Stevie was always so happy.

Marie seemed to sense what was going through her son's head.

“I’ll be right back,” Marie told him. “Just let her sleep. When Hope goes for her first doctor’s appointment, maybe suggest that Stevie talks to hers too about some meds to help balance her out.”

“What do I say? Hey babe, Hope has her doctor’s appointment and you should make one too because your mood is a drag?”

“Well, maybe not that harsh,” Marie shook her head. “I’ll be back.” She left to head to the store. Duff sighed and headed up to his and Stevie’s room. He heard soft crying, and he knew that it wasn’t Hope’s. Vince was right, she had a set of lungs on her, and these were muted cries. Duff carefully pushed the door open and headed inside.

“Stevie?” Duff asked gently.

“S-sorry,” She whispered. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“Hey, there’s nothing wrong with you,” Duff crawled into bed by her and pulled her to him. “Why do you think there’s something wrong with you?”

“Because I keep crying all the time, and I don’t even want to hold Hope right now. And I am just failing as a mother…” She started to cry again. Duff rubbed her back gently.

“You’re not failing,” Duff told her. “Neither of us have ever been through this before. We’re not supposed to know what we’re doing. It’ll take some time.”

“But I don’t even know what she needs when she’s crying!” Stevie told him.

“It’s okay. We won’t always know what she needs when she’s crying. We won’t always be able to give her everything. But we’re trying, and that’s all that matters.”

“That’s not really making me feel any better,” Stevie admitted. Duff kissed the top of her head.

“I read something about this,” Duff told her. “There’s a thing called the baby blues, and it can last up to a week or so after having a baby. But sometimes that can become postpartum depression.”

“Depression?” Stevie asked. “But...really?”

“Yeah. And it’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Duff told her. “We’ll just set you up a doctors appointment to get you something to help, if that proves to be the case. I just don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“I’m sorry,” She whispered. Duff pulled her closer to his chest. “Your mom said that it won’t hurt Hope to cry.”

“It won’t,” Duff told her. “Sometimes, it could just be her releasing some stress. You know how like we’d be on tour and you’d get so pissed off at Axl you’d just scream?” Stevie laughed a little. “Ah, there we go.”

“You still love me, right?” Stevie asked after a couple moments.

“More than anything in this world,” Duff told her. “You’ve always been my girl, even when you weren’t.” Stevie started to laugh. “What?”

“I know you were trying to be romantic, but that honestly sounded a little scary,” Stevie teased. Duff smiled.

“Just get some sleep,” He told her. “I’ll listen for Hope.”

“Okay,” Stevie yawned and let her eyes close. Duff stayed alert, getting up to check on Hope the couple times she cried. Marie had come back with things to help cheer Stevie up and saw Duff warming Hope’s bottle.

“I talked to Stevie,” He told his mom. “I just told her what I had read and what you told me. She agreed to talk to the doctor.”

“That’s good,” She handed Duff the bag of things she had picked up for Stevie. “I’m so glad you two found each other.”

“You have no idea how glad I am,” Duff smiled at his mom. “I’m gonna go give Hope her bottle. I told Stevie to just rest.”

“You’re a good man. I raised you right,” Marie hugged her son before he took the bottle to feed Hope. Princess Peach sat at her feet. She scratched his ears. “You’ve got some good parents sir.”

****

Hope’s first doctor’s appointment came up a day or so later. The uncles all made Duff and Stevie promise to tell them how it went, since they weren’t there for it. Stevie just laughed a little.

“Oh my god, they’re worse than a grandparent,” Stevie told Duff. “You’d think they were the ones who were in labor with her for hours.”

“They’re just protective. Just like they were with you,” Duff told her. “I feel confident in knowing that Hope is safe as long as her uncles are watching out for her.”

Hope’s pediatrician looked her over with a smile. She was growing just right, eating just right. All and all, she was the perfect little baby.

That afternoon, Stevie had a doctor’s appointment. Duff stayed home with Hope, despite wanting to be there for his wife. While she was at the doctor, he took the role of calling all of Hope’s uncles to tell them how her appointment had gone.

He had just gotten off the phone with Tommy and Nikki when Stevie came home with a couple bags of groceries and a pharmacy bag. Duff checked on Hope before meeting Stevie in the kitchen as she put the groceries away.

“How’d it go?” Duff asked, taking some of the dry goods to put in the pantry for her.

“Dr. Bradford went ahead and put me on an antidepressant, to hopefully combat whatever is going on,” Stevie explained. “She wants me to just keep an eye on myself, and if I feel worse, to let her know.” Duff wrapped his arms around Stevie and kissed her temple.

“Well, everyone was super excited for Hope’s update,” Duff told her. “I can’t believe she’s already a week old.” Stevie smiled at him and kissed his cheek before she got to work making dinner.

****

Over the course of the next few weeks, Hope was starting to grow like a weed. Stevie was normally the one that would be up with her early in the morning, but Duff tried to help as much as he could. Stevie had already been up with Hope for hours trying to sooth her. She gave her her bottle, changed her diaper, and had finally gotten her calm before she went to sleep.

That lasted about twenty minutes.

“I’ll get her,” Duff told Stevie when she started to get up. “I’m up anyway.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. Just rest honey,” He kissed her cheek before going to Hope’s nursery. He picked her up and cradled her in his arms. “Okay princess, what’s wrong?” The large tears were falling down her face. Duff decided to try something. He wasn’t sure if it would work or not. So he turned down the lullaby music that was playing and he started to sing.

Talk to me softly, there's something in your eyes

Don't hang your head in sorrow and please don't cry

I know how you feel inside, I've, I've been there before

Something is changing inside you and don't you know?

Don't you cry tonight, I still love you, baby

And don't you cry tonight

Don't you cry tonight, there's a heaven above you, baby

And don't you cry tonight

Hope calmed some at the sound of Duff’s voice. He smiled and settled in the rocking chair, holding her close as he rocked and sang. Duff had no idea that she would even like his singing, and this specific song just seemed to fit the mood.

Give me a whisper and give me a sigh

Give me a kiss before you tell me goodbye

Don't you take it so hard now and please don't take it so bad

I'll still be thinking of you and the times we had, baby

Don't you cry tonight, I still love you, baby

And don't you cry tonight

Don't you cry tonight, there's a heaven above you, baby

And don't you cry tonight

Stevie hadn’t been able to go back to sleep. So she made her way to the nursery where she heard Duff singing. With a smile, she stood in the doorway, listening. She loved when Duff would sing, and he had been doing it more and more, but still didn’t feel confident to do a whole song for an album yet.

And please remember that I never lied, oh

And please remember how I felt inside now, honey

You got to make it your own way but you'll be alright now, sugar

You'll feel better tomorrow, come the morning light now, baby

And don't you cry tonight

Don't you cry tonight

Don't you cry tonight, there's a heaven above you, baby

And don't you cry

Don't you ever cry

Don't you cry tonight, baby, maybe someday

Don't you cry, don't you ever cry

Don't you cry tonight

Duff looked down to see that Hope was fast asleep. He quietly laid her back in her bed and tiptoed out of her room without waking her up. He almost ran into Stevie, who was standing out in the hallway, listening to everything. She had a smile on her face as she looked up at her husband.

“What are you doing up?” Duff whispered as they headed back to their room.

“I couldn’t get back to sleep after you left,” She admitted. “That was so pretty.”

“You’re just saying that because you’re my wife,” He chuckled. Stevie shook her head.

“You really should sing more,” Stevie told him. “And I know you’ve been working on songs. Why don’t you make a solo album sometime?”

“I’ve thought about it,” Duff shrugged. “But I might see about making something specifically for the little green sprout.” Stevie smiled and cuddled into him.

“You should make one for me too,” She told him. “So I can hear your voice whenever you’re away.”

“I won’t be gone forever babe,” Duff told her. “But damn, I’m going to miss you both.” Stevie felt tears in her eyes as she rested her head on Duff’s chest and let herself drift back off to sleep.

Forever Tags: @dekahg @marvel-af-imagines @feelmyroarrrr @nanie5 @imboredsueme @gemini0410 @aiaranradnay @babypink224221 @mogarukes @xxwarhawk @sandlee44 @shatteredabby @caswinchester2000 @lauravic @mrsambroserollinsacklesmgk​ @teller258316 @horrorpxnk @tommyleeownsme @marvelismylifffe​ @mrslogansixxpixx​

Guns n Roses Tags: @duffshairdye​ @slashscowboyboots​ @hauntedapricoteggsclam​ @bitter-13-suite​ @arianareirg​ @lucyboytom​ @ozzy-dumbass-of-darkness @julessworldd​ @solopadawan​ @stradlin-cold-heartbeaker @catsandacoffee​

It’s So Easy Tags: @str4nge-haze​ @viralwolf02​ @overlyobsessedfangirl​

#it's so easy and other lies #guns n roses #duff mckagan #steven adler #duff mckagan x steven adler #fanfiction

[charlion-em]

Voltron Pokémon AU

...that I’ll never actually write so here is a summary/bullet point/outline thing

Summary:

Wild Pokemon in the Altea region begin to turn up without any power, unable to fight, and completely helpless. Professor Sam Holt and his children are the first to discover them, and together they search for a cure.

Meanwhile, Team Galra finds wild pokemon will no longer fill their needs and begin to steal the quintessence from trained pokemon. Once word spreads, five unsuspecting trainers are summoned by the elite four to help defeat the threat. Not only must team Galra be stopped, but they need to discover a way to return the stolen quintessence to the pokemon.

There is a rumor of an ancient pokemon named Voltron, a pokemon strong enough to defeat Team Galra and restore stolen quintessence. Too bad it is only a rumor. Or is it?

With the guidance of the mysterious Allura and Coran of the elite four, the five trainers set out to save the Altea Region.

Pairings: Implied past Keith/Shiro. Probably Heith and either Pance or Shance as endgame, but the romance is such a minor background thing I never put much into it. Could just stay platonic.

Katie/Pidge:  grass/bug types

Everything was peaceful in the Altrea region, so much so no one would believe young Katie Holt when she discovered pokemon unable to fight.

Her father, Professor Holt, thinks it is a simple anomaly and keeps it in his lab, “It can't survive in the wild. It's a miracle it has managed this long.”

Professor Holt and his colleagues in town, including their gym leader, Sendak, come to the conclusion it is a new disease.

But Katie isn't having it, something is wrong.

Seriously wrong.

But when Katie discovers a 2nd, then 3rd… she declares there is something amiss. But what?

What could cause pokemon to lose their power?

Even if no one will want to believe her, her father supports her decision to go in search of more data. 

Determined to find the source of the weakened wild pokemon, Katie set out with just her trusted pokemon and her wits.

She heads further East, back into the wooded mountains where she discovered the first helpless Pokemon

Sam Holt, her father is unable to reach her after the first three days

Her brother sends word to his best friend, Shiro, in hopes of keeping her safe- but Shiro is on the West side of the region. Matt is already on a research mission, and alters his course to try and find and help Katie.

Shiro: Steel/Fighting types

Across the region, Shiro discovers a weakened wild pokemon.

Despite once being one of the top authorities on Pokemon, he is retired from training and doesn't have the supplies to care for it.

Yes, he was a legend by the time he was 19

He tries to call Matt, but the phone system has been on the fritz for the last couple weeks.

He takes the injured pokemon to the poke center in his town, but they can not help.

“Everything is fine, maybe it is just weak and needs trained,” the nurse means well, but Shiro can sense her inexperience.

He may have let people believe he was dead...

After a bad breakup, he moved and never responded to media requests

Same media ran a story saying he was dead

He didn’t care, so he didn’t correct them

Only the Holts knew he was alive

Matt likes to call him “The youngest hermit I know”

Keith: Fire/poison types

Lives in the town on the outskirts of natural hot springs.

They are dangerous and highly acidic, but he enjoys the pokemon found in the area. And it is quiet. Quiet enough he can relax and enjoy his solitary life.

A few weeks after moving here he began to feel a pull towards the cave system behind the springs.

He spends his days exploring and mapping, but can't pinpoint why he is drawn to the area.

The last thing he needs is Shiro showing up with a pokemon with a mysterious injury. But also- Shiro is ALIVE?

Oh man, is he pissed and happy and completely overwhelmed

Hunk: Rock/Fairy types

Was on track to be a top poke engineer, but he decided a quiet life would be better for him.

He still occasionally tinkers, but doesn't want the attention which would come from his inventions.

He currently runs a battle restaurant and pokemon spa in the largest city in the region.

Everything was going swell- his best bro worked across the street, business was booming, and he was able to try new recipes each week.

Then, the powerful trainer, and current leader of the elite four, Zarkon shows up, demanding a dish he doesn't have the ingredients for.

Denying Zarkon would spell disaster for his business, he would surely be shunned.

So, he does the sensible thing and heads west to gather the rare ingredients from the acidic hot springs. Anything to save his restaurant from certain doom.

Lance: Water/Flying

Just won (okay it was passed down to him from his grandpa) the title of Gym leader.

His gym is right across from Hunk’s restaurant.

Battling has been hard

He lost one and gave up a gym badge

Hunk tries to get him to understand he can lose now and then. Thats why there are badges

He has a lot to prove, to himself and his family.

And hey, running off with Hunk is just the right sort of distraction.

Team Galra

Team Galra, in their matching purple uniforms, harvest quintessence from stolen Pokemon.

Their leader, Zarkon is a power hungry asshole who is using the quintessence to power his pokemon.

With Haggar’s magic, he is able to transfer the quintessence from wild pokemon.

But that isn't enough, and eventually he becomes determined to be the only person with pokemon able to battle.

Allura: Fairy type

Unable to use the phone system, and on the run from Zarkon, she sends letters to the trainers she has been watching.

They are, she believes, the only chance they have to stop Zarkon and save the pokemon.

The Elite four has been comprised by Zarkon

She uses random trainers to deliver letters as they travel looking for the lions

giving them tips ext

eventually will meet up with them

Coran:  ?

Protects Allura (she doesn't really need it though).

He is on the run with her, but is sent to find the trainers while she tries to locate the Galra base.

And the only way to restore the quintessence is to find the legendary pokemon, Voltron.

Which is actually the temporary formation of 5 separate lion pokemon. (Which the 5 paladins find on their journey)

It has a special move which restores stolen quintessence

But they need to locate Team Galra’s stores first

Starts with their intro chapters- basically the above minus Allura and Coran. Then:

Hunk and Lance show up as Keith and Shiro are examining the injured pokemon

The first lion is in the cave system near Keith’s home

Hunk is directed by someone at the pokecenter to see Keith about the ingredients he is looking for

Keith is more than happy to escort Hunk into the hot spings areas as a distraction from Shiro

And he charges for tours- gotta make a living somehow

Lance tags along- banter with Kieth

Hunk encourages Lance to not antagonize Keith since they need his help

Shiro comes with so Keith doesn’t run off before they solve/help the pokemon

Lance is nosy and asks whats up- is amazed when he finds out this is SHIRO

his hero

and he wants tips/ext on how to be a good gym leader but doesn't know how to ask and also HOW is Shiro alive? Where did he go? Did he fake his death?

Or was it all a rumor that got out of control??

While searching for the ingredients, they run into Team Galra Grunts

Ignore each other- Keith mutters about weirdo tourists

May have also been a jab at Lance

Find a cave with the right ingredients

follow/ext

Find Lion #1-- Blue

It won’t fight any of their pokemon, just stares at the group

Grunts show up

they fight and win- duh

Lance approaches the lion and it lets him touch it.

Hunk suggests using a ball

Lance catches it

He is silent on the way back to town, how could a pokemon like that choose him?

He can barely handle his gym

They (mostly Shiro and Hunk) discus what pokemon it is

Keith reminds them of the legend about the lions and mentions some writings he’s seen in the caves

Back East, Coran finds Katie.

She just took down a bunch of Galra Grunts and is working on analyzing the few files they had on them

Coran tells her what he knows (about Zarkon)

They meet up with Allura on the way down the mountain

Allura stresses the dangers of what is happening

Coran and Katie head West

Allura goes south to try to locate the other lions

Hunk wants to go home now that he has his ingredients- gotta save his restaurant

Lance agrees- wonders how Blue will handle at the gym

Keith and Shiro ask about heading there too

They hope to find answers at the research facility there

As they travel, Coran and Katie join them

They took a boat down the river to save time

Yes, it weirds them out that Coran knows who they are

“How is this good in the Elite Four”- Lance, Probably

Katie gives the info she gathered to Shiro

Okay, Keith is pissed because it is CLEAR she knew he was alive

They locate Lion 2 (Green/Katie) and 3 (Yellow/Hunk) on the way back to the main city

Mostly thanks to Allura’s secretive guidance and odd insistence of which trainer approach which lion

And okay- why are they trusting them?

Hunk: Because they are less scary than Zarkon

Shiro works with Coran to decipher Allura’s 3rd letter

Lance and Katie go find the Green Lion near the next town while the others train

Hunk and Keith go to the abandoned mines to their south to find Yellow

Hunk frets about his restaurant

Keith offers support

Galra Grunts and a boss at each Lion

4th Lion is found to the North of the main city

Red is temperamental and refuses Keith

As they argue about what to do, Zarkon shows up

Huge battle

Zarkon’s Pokemon are way stronger than normal

think robeasts

Red comes to defend them

Whoops butt

Zarkon escapes

Go to town

Here about trainers who’s pokemon suddenly can’t battle

Hunk invites them to his restaurant

Frets about Zarkon

Lance has a bunch of trainers waiting to fight him

oooooops

Shiro gives him encouragement 

Lance decides to battle one trainer then call it a day

Lots of chat while eating

Keith opts to help Hunk in the kitchen to avoid Shiro

Lance picks Shiro’s brain on various topics

Lets it slip Hunk has some cool poke’gadgets

And yes, Shiro is very interested in the incubator thank you very much

Katie and Lance argue over the best pokemon training spots

She also has some ideas to improve the incubator

Hunk gives up trying to keep them away from his workshop downstairs

Distracts them temporarily with food

Allura shows up as they finish eating

And omg Hunk is an amazing cook

She tells them the last lion is in the city

It’s why Zarkon was hanging around

Black Lion is under the city

Maze of tunnels ext

Lots of Grunts

Allura and Coran stayed up top to fight Zarkon should he show up

Get Black Lion

Haggar and Grunts block their way out

Her pokemon are way stronger too

Hard fight, they win

Allura and Coran are missing when they return

A letter at the restaurant for them to train and figure out how to form Voltron

Train

Battle Restaurant, so plenty of opponents without needing to go out looking

Struggle over forming Voltron

Is the legend even true?

Lots of arguments between the five

Shiro and Katie team up to get them to work together

Shiro convinces Lance to try again

Katie real talks with Keith

She tells him to grow up and get over Shiro

And he has no reason to be upset over anything because he broke up with Shiro

Lance may have overheard and is a little jealous

Hunk is the one who finally calms Keith down enough to try Voltron again

He basically tells Keith to live in the now and not the past

They go outside and find a field

Get Voltron YAY

Damn that is one large pokemon

How do we control it?

Separates

Train some more

Take a break

Interlude chapter

Lance works on his gym

feels much more confident now

Hunk and Katie tinker a bit

Shiro disapears

Katie goes to watch/help Lance

Ends up being the gym helper who fights trainers before getting to the leader

Not many make it to Lance

Hunk shows Keith how to cook some basic dishes

Katie shows up just in time to eat those dishes

Lance and Shiro talk about his time “dead”

Shiro asks about his family and what his plans are for the gym

They figure out how to get their lion pokemon to merge and form Voltron

It gets easier

and lasts longer

They learn to control it

Test out returning quintessence to pokemon

It works!

They travel, trying to restore as many wild pokemon as they can

Allura finds them

Urges to go on the offensive against Zarkon

Otherwise, they will never win

They find Zarkon’s secret base

except it isn’t secret

its the elite four

he’s taken over the whole thing

Allura and Coran were the only ones to escape/oppose him

They fight their way through

Zarkon is at the end

fight through very strong Galra Grunts and Officers

All with altered pokemon which are very strong

They fight Haggar and Zarkon together

Form Voltron to defeat them

Almost lose

But they win

They set up a restorative center in the building next to Hunk’s restaurant

Trainers and researchers bring their pokemon for healing 

Katie’s dad comes, apologizes for not believing her

Turns out their town’s gym leader, Sendak, was on team Galra and mislead them

Lance no longer feels like a fraud for being a gym leader

Katie offers to stay and help run it

Shiro is, well, in the news again. He debates running, but needs to face it

After this, he knows he needs to stay and help research

Plus, he made some great friends

Hunk’s battle restaurant is busier than ever

People want to battle the legendary pokemon

Keith says he will return to his shack by the hot springs

Hunk asks if he’d rather stay with him

To help with the restaurant. Totally just that.

Keith smiles and agrees, though it wouldn’t be just to help

Allura and Coran set to fixing the elite four

Ha, It got less detailed and more loopy towards the end. oh well. IDK what happened to Matt. I forget what he was going to do... oh well. Just another plot whole to go with this. I remember I had something planned for one of Hunk’s inventions, but I can’t remember WHAT.

I was going to write this for the voltron big bang, but it was more than I could handle at the time so I dropped out. I even had the outline mostly done, but I know my limitations... and well, after writing it all out I realized I wasn’t going to stay interested in it long enough to write it fully. It needs a lot of work with the details and names of things.

Feel free to use this in part or whole for your own fic, just please credit back.

#not a fic #Voltron legendary defender #Pokemon au #Past Sheith #implied heith #summary outline thing #i lost interest in writing this out #i have like 3 paragraphs of it written out #but I know some peeps were interested in this au #so #i don't want to just scrap it without sharing i guess

[inspirationallyinsane]

January 7, 2017

I just got off the phone with my mother and I am very upset. I left Chapman University to go to the cheapest school I could just to appease my parents and it's still a fucking issue. I can only take three classes this semester because those are the only classes open that would give me proper credits and that don't have a prereq that I needed to take in the fall. I literally can't take any other classes. But my mother is still mad at me because I'm only taking three classes and "we don't pay per unit, we just pay for the semester" so I should be taking 18 credits which I actually can't do until my third semester at this disgusting school which I told my mother but she doesn't seem to be able to process information properly and continues to insist I take more classes despite the fact that I CAN'T TAKE MORE EVEN IF I WANTED TO. NOTHING IS OPEN. I CAN'T. She is mad at me for not FIXING the school. A school that I hate. A school that I don't want to go to. In a location that I have despised my entire goddamn life. I am doing this for them. I could have transferred to another school in LA if I didn't love Chapman. I could have gone to a school that was just as expensive. I could have chosen LMU or fucking Pepperdine but I didn't. I didn't do it because my parents couldn't pay for those schools (even though apparently they can pay for 850 dollar dinners and spa trips and shopping sprees. Even though they can afford to buy all new glasses for parties and new blenders. I'm shopping at the goddamn dollar store for food, buying cranberry juice which has a warning saying it can make me infertile to try to save money and they aren't doing fucking shit to save money). Cutting organic foods out of your life, not spending 300 dollars two times a week at the grocery store, that is not saving money. That is living like a normal fucking person. They must think I'm fucking stupid that I wouldn't notice that they're spending all this money on all this unnecessary shit. They put me in this 750 dollar a month apartment in Ashland, like if we were actually trying to save money, if my life was a burden to them financially, I could have gotten an apartment in phoenix or talent for 300 dollars a month or less. It is insanity. My mother is pissed off that I am going to spend more time and money in school than what is absolutely necessary but guess what??? She spent 5 and a half years in college?? She switched her major after she finished a different one!!!! How is that any better or different??? She's talking to me like "Oh I went to college I did 18 credits" Yea well guess the fuck what??? We are different people in different situations?? You had your classes handed to you because you were on the basketball team going to a goddamn community college. I don't have priority classes. I don't get to sign up first and since I had to transfer schools so you wouldn't have to stress out about paying for my school, I was the very last person to register. There is nothing available for me. Nothing. I COULDN'T TAKE THE CLASSES IF I WANTED TO. WHICH I DID. I emailed my academic advisor four times to try to get into the advanced German class I tested into but I can't get into the class. The system is 'broken'. And now according to my mom that is somehow my fault. It is my fault I had to transfer schools. How is this my fault?? After that whole debacle in May that whole conversation we had this is my fucking fault. I desperately wish I just didn’t give a shit but I do. I want my parents to be proud of me. I came back home, even though I can’t live in my home, just so they’d be better off. This is all for them and they can’t give me one ounce of sympathy or understanding. I am trying my best. I don’t even have a bed to sleep on. I can’t even afford a mattress at this point. I have nowhere to put my clothes, I got my furniture from habitat for humanity. My lifestyle has changed so dramatically over the last few months and theirs has hardly changed at all. I go grocery shopping with my father and it isn’t about the prices for him. He doesn’t even look at the prices. But I have to go to the dollar store. The pasta at the dollar store doesn’t get soft. You can boil the shit out of it, put butter in it, put sauces on it, it never gets soft. It’s all chemicals. It makes me feel sick but that’s what I am eating because I am trying to save money to buy a mattress. And my mom is pissed off because I don’t play basketball and I don’t have a job and I’m only taking three classes (which no matter how much I explain that I can’t take more, she does not listen to me). I’ve been here for two weeks. Two fucking weeks. I am working on getting school settled, trying to find loopholes to sign up for more classes just to make her happy. I tested into the most advanced German class because I actually made an effort to study beforehand because I knew I couldn’t take a fourth class unless I tested into it. Apparently I can’t take the class anyway. I am planning on getting a job. I have to. I have to buy a mattress and that money has to come from me. I can’t keep buying my food from the dollar store and that money has to come from me. And I wouldn’t be mad if my family actually couldn’t afford to support me. I would do anything for them. I would switch schools and move back to a place I hate for them. To help them afford me. But when they’re out spending money on clothes and spas and vacations and 850 dollar dinners for four people, I get upset. Do you know how long 850 dollars would last me?? 850 dollars in extra funds. It would mean the goddamn world and to throw that away on one dinner which included my brother’s girlfriend of three months?? Fucking ridiculous. My parents can say they can’t afford to give me anything else all they want and maybe they can’t when they’re spending so much on themselves but I see that money and I see them spending it on themselves and I can’t imagine what else they are buying, the things I can’t see. The new clothes I don’t see, the grocery trips I’m not there for. It hurts my heart. I feel like they don’t care. They care more about getting themselves nice things and fun experiences than their daughter eating properly and having a fucking bed to sleep in. But I’m somehow the financial problem. I’m the burden because I am not taking 18 credits. 18 credits I would take if I were allowed to because I would let myself get walked over and force myself into classes I hate just so they would say that I am doing something right. It’s shit. I’m tired of it. I’m tired. I listen to all their shit about each other constantly, since I was fucking 12 years old, both of them shitting on each other to me, I took that for six years. I still do. It’s fucked up. And they can’t even support me financially when they have the funds to do so. I’m not asking for anything excessive. I just don’t want to be shit all over for taking the classes the school signed me up for, the only classes available to me, the classes that were given to me by my academic advisor which I made the effort to go and see and email multiple times just to make sure I was doing all I could. And I would like enough money to shop at Albertsons and buy things that are on sale. I don’t even want the nice things. I buy soy and almond milk because it is almost always on sale and usually two dollars cheaper than regular milk. Do you know that soy milk is a bit chunky? It is not smooth like normal milk, it has the consistency of milk that has gone bad for a few days. I try to make the best of it saying that it tastes better or whatever but last week the love of my life gave me 20 dollars to treat myself to a nice dinner and so I bought regular milk for the first time in months and it is amazing. I am so happy. I bought real pasta that gets soft when you boil it and I bought a bag of salad and I bought cheese that melts (dollar store cheese doesn’t melt. It tastes like plastic. I think it might actually be plastic). It was a like a dream. I am drowning worrying about my financial situation and trying to spend as little as I can so my parents don’t have to give me more money but the longer I do this for the more they seem to be spending and the less I seem to be getting. I’m exhausted. I’m tired of worrying about them and myself when they clearly don’t need to be worried about. I know that eating ramen noodles every night is part of the college experience but guess what?? I can’t even afford to do that!!!!! Those are one dollar per cup. I can’t afford that shit. I have to buy bulk noodles for a dollar. Everyone knows what cup noodles taste like. Now imagine a cheaper version of that. It is hard to believe it even exists. I cut myself the other day because I have to open bags with a knife that I stole. I can’t afford scissors and I don’t steal things anymore so I have to use the old shit I used to take. I really can’t even buy bandaids and neosporin for it. I’ve been wrapping my cut in tissues and using wet wipes to clean it. Although I’m sure I’ll run out of those soon too and I’ll have to start using clorox to clean it which I know is terrible for me. Did you guys know that dollar store soap doesn’t get soapy? Like it doesn’t make the bubbles that normal soap makes. It just kind of slides around and then disappears. I’m banking on the fact that it actually does wash my hands but honestly I don’t really know. I don’t mean to complain so much but everything feels like shit right now. I need help and I need support. I just want someone to take care of me. I know this is what it is to be an adult but I feel like I was thrust into it too fast. It is such a dramatic lifestyle change for me and I am not handling it well at all. I am trying my best for everyone else and everyone is still mad at me. I want to try my best for me. I want to take creative writing classes or film classes and not have to worry about my parents going into crippling debt because I’m an artsy type of person. I’m willing to go into something I lowkey hate for them. I’m taking these math and science classes for them. None of it’s for me and they still want me to do more for them. None of this is for me. I could be living in a two bedroom apartment in medford or talent with my boyfriend but I am stuck here in this shithole because my mother insisted this is what I wanted. Is this for me? Is this what it means to be living my life the way I want to? I am making these decisions, they are my decisions, but they are not for me. They are for people who would rather spend thousands of dollars on their own parties and dinners and experiences than give their daughter money for proper food. I don’t know how I feel anymore. I want to be ok. I don’t even need to be happy. That would be asking too much. Everything is so different now. I’m tired. I’m so tired. I just want a little help.

[drtanstravels]

We had a big year planned with a ton of traveling, the bulk of it for Anna’s work, but many of the trips over the coming months have been scrapped due to Singapore, and the world in general for that matter, being overly cautious of the Novel coronavirus. During March and April there have been ophthalmology conferences either cancelled or postponed in China, Taiwan, and Korea, and also a wedding we were supposed to attend in Thailand in April has been scrubbed due to many people being unable to make it because of travel restrictions. There was also some doubts about us being able to attend the 43rd Annual Macula Society Meeting in San Diego, California, but Anna had booked her leave early and it was a good thing, too; not only would she be making a presentation at the meeting, but she had also been inducted into the Macula Society late last year and there would be a welcome dinner at the meeting for all new members.

We had a few days to kill between our arrival in Los Angeles and the meeting so the initial plan was to hire a car and drive up to San Francisco for a few days. It was a cool idea, but I was a bit hesitant as well, because it is a journey that takes between six and eight hours from LA depending on traffic and I wasn’t all that keen on Anna driving that far while jet-lagged. She had also been to San Francisco several times before, however, San Diego is only 24 km (15 miles) from the border of Mexico, a place neither of us had been. We did a little homework and decided instead that we would spend three nights in Ensenada, a city in the Mexican state of Baja California, before attending the meeting in San Diego.

Friday, February 14, 2020 We had celebrated our ninth wedding anniversary at an awesome Kazakh restaurant the previous night and now Valentine’s Day was going to be spent on a hellish 15-hour flight from Singapore to Los Angeles, California. The flight didn’t suck because of the time, length, or our seats, it was an 8:00pm flight and we were in Business Class. What made it so bad was that there was a woman in the seat next to me who had an extremely young child with her that she insisted on taunting and playing with for almost the entire duration of the flight. When this baby wasn’t screaming and laughing with its mother, it was crying loudly, particularly as it got more and more tired, sounds that even my noise-canceling headphones couldn’t block out. Add to this how hot it was on the plane and it wasn’t a particularly pleasant flight. After several hours of the woman shrugging off the death-stares I was giving her and her child, a flight attendant could see how pissed off Anna and myself were getting so she moved us to a vacant set of seats at the back of the section. The noise was reduced a little and did eventually cease for a bit when the baby collapsed from sheer exhaustion, but it was still difficult to get comfortable because of the heat, resulting in me getting only about three hours of really restless sleep.

Tim, Tim, and Anna

Because of the time difference, we arrived, were off the plane again, through immigration at LAX reasonably hassle-free, and at the Renaissance Los Angeles Airport Hotel at around 8:00pm the same day, the exact time we had departed. Once up in our room we showered, got changed, and then went down to have some dinner before hitting up the hotel bar in an effort to try and stay awake longer and fend off the jet-lag. After we had settled into the bar we got talking to a guy from South Carolina who was also called Tim. Tim was celebrating his birthday alone while he was away for work and was also stressed about planning his upcoming wedding. On the other side of us was another woman from around the same part of the country so she joined in the conversation, explaining the finer points of low country boil to us among other topics. After they left, Anna and I played some pool before heading back up to the room to get some sleep. We had a big day ahead of us.

Saturday, February 15, 2020 Our alarm went off at 10:00am, but things weren’t normal when we woke up. I was butt-naked in bed, my pyjama-shorts in a soaking wet pile on the floor, and despite not having drunk all that much at the bar, neither of us had a particularly clear memory of the latter parts of the previous night, particularly after Tim had left. I remember buying him a glass of whiskey for his birthday, but it gets quite foggy after that. In fact, the only reason I remember playing pool is because Anna told me she could kind of recall playing, triggering a brief recollection of the two of us laughing loudly as we struggled to even hit the balls. I know I hadn’t had a seizure in my sleep, Anna generally has a decent memory, and we both felt completely fine so it was all very strange. Had somebody put something in our drinks? Nothing of ours was missing, Anna checked with the credit card company and she had paid the bill at the end of the night, but we weren’t carrying any cash so perhaps if someone had slipped us a roofie, they didn’t bother taking anything when they realised we didn’t have any money and nothing sexual had happened to us. Neither of us could recall getting back to the room, but the bathroom floor was extremely wet so we had definitely showered before going to bed, the one thing Anna insists on, regardless of the situation. If I had got up in the middle of the night and sat on the toilet, that could explain the wet pyjamas. We could’ve spent the whole morning trying to piece together Friday night and figure out what had happened between bouts of dumbfounded laughter, but we had to be downstairs at 11:00am, because we had a driver picking us up to drive us to San Diego. We ended up chatting with our Mexican-American driver about things to do and see in Mexico, what to expect at the border, that kind of thing, as well as reconstruct the events of the night before, but after about an hour both Anna and I were sound asleep.

The drive to the Mexican border is supposed to take a bit over two hours from Los Angeles, but apparently we were delayed by almost an hour due to a car crash in the horrendous LA traffic, but we didn’t mind, it just meant extra sleep for us. We weren’t going to drive across the border, because that is supposed to take an extremely long time and the searches can be a bit of trouble so we were going to get dropped off and walk across the border to Tijuana with our luggage, as that is supposed to be a quite fast option. One of the first things I noticed when we arrived was that there was a Taco Bell on the U.S. side. Who the hell in their right mind would go to Taco Bell for notoriously diarrhoea-inducing Mexican-inspired American food, when you could just grab your passport and take a short walk for some legit tacos? The process of getting across to buy those tacos is really simple too and that’s not just because a portion of Donald Trump’s impenetrable wall blew over in the wind recently. We put our bags through an x-ray, had our passports stamped, and we walked across into Mexico. Obviously I couldn’t take any photos inside the immigration area, but here’s where we went through to Tijuana:

Approaching the wall

That’s where we’re going

About to cross over to Tijuana

Now in Mexico near General Abelrado L. Rodriguez International Airport

The next step was to take a 20-minute taxi ride to General Abelardo L. Rodriguez International Airport to pick up our rental car for the next few days and then we just had to drive for about an hour and a half along the beautiful Baja California coastline, avoiding some enormous potholes along the way, and we’d be in Ensenada:

Ensenada is a coastal city in Mexico, the third-largest in Baja California. Lying 125 kilometres (78 mi) south of San Diego on the Baja California Peninsula, it is locally referred to as La Cenicienta del Pacífico, “The Cinderella of the Pacific”.

One of the first settlements founded in the Californias, Ensenada has emerged as a cruise ship destination, aerospace center, and a jumping-off point for Valle de Guadalupe, a local wine region. It is said that the first Vitis vinifera made it to the region’s San Ignacio Mission in 1703, when Jesuit Padre Juan de Ugarte planted the first vineyards there.

Situated on the coastline of Bahía de Todos Santos—an inlet of the Pacific Ocean on the peninsula’s Gold Coast—the Port of Ensenada is an important commercial, fishing, and tourist port. The city is home to a navy base, army base, and Ensenada Airport, a military airfield.

Besides being mentioned in the Ween song Bananas and Blow, why did we choose Ensenada? Well, if you read the above information, it says that there are plenty of wineries which Anna would love, but when we were reading up about the place we discovered there were also a lot of microbreweries for me. Add to this the fact that the city is known for its local seafood, particularly fish tacos and ceviche, as well as having some decent cheesemakers, and it ticks a lot of boxes for us.

We eventually arrived in Ensenada, navigated our way through endless junctions that inexplicably have ‘Stop’ signs on all four corners which make it difficult to figure out who has right of way, but before too long we were at our home for the next three nights, the Posada el Ray Sol. The scenery on the drive was beautiful, as was our hotel, so we were definitely off to a great start:

On the outskirts of Tijuana

Looking over a valley

We passed some gritty neighbourhoods of Tijuana, but this wasn’t even one of them

Now going into the hills

Our view was like this for the best part of an hour

Almost there

The living room of our suite at Posada el Rey Sol

Now our bedroom

walking toward the front door

Looking over the pool and spa in our hotel

A bad photo of us having our complimentary arrival mimosas

Because we had slept on the drive from Los Angeles to San Diego, we were feeling refreshed so it was time to hit the town. The sun sets at about 5:30pm here so it was already dark when we arrived and it wasn’t particularly warm during our entire visit, usually no more than 20°C (68°F) during the day and below 10°C (50°F) at night. It was time for dinner and Anna was on top of it, finding an enormous restaurant, Mariscos Bahia de Ensenada, where just the seafood dishes took up five pages of the menu! We were hungry and we wanted our first proper meal in Mexico to be an epic one, but definitely over-ordered because everything looked so good. Among the dishes we had were seafood tortillas, a mixed seafood soup, the daily special ceviche, ranch style sea snails, and some breaded oysters. It was fantastic, but we struggled to finish it all and if we continued to eat like this every night, we would both undo several years of weight loss. Once done we took our bloated selves back onto the street to find a place to settle in for the night. One thing we noticed immediately as we strolled around was that there was a hell of a lot of pharmacies around, some streets consisting of almost 50% pharmacies and it turns out that the whole Baja California region is a hotspot for medical tourism due to the high cost of medication and procedures in the US. Just take a look at what some health insurers from Utah are doing:

A health insurer in Utah is seeking to reduce prescription drug costs by flying state employees to Mexico, where they can collect medications at a fraction of the US cost.

The year-old programme involves about 10 state employees. The cost savings are so large that the insurance program can pay for each patient’s flight, give them a $500-per-trip bonus and still save tens of thousands of dollars.

One participant, Ann Lovell, a 62-year-old teacher, said she had saved as much as $2,400 by travelling from Salt Lake City to San Diego and then crossing the border, in order to refill a prescription for arthritis medication.

Now it all makes sense. Anyway, we made our way down Ave. Adolfo Lopez Mateos, the main entertainment street in Ensenada, stopping off for a few beers at a small bar, but to fend off the jet-lag we wanted something more happening, which led us to El Pato, where we’d spend the rest of the night, Anna drinking mojitos and me on the local beers. There was a really good band playing, sports were showing on huge TVs around the room, and we got to entertain ourselves by watching two women pushing 70 years old just dancing and downing tequila shots. Seriously, it’s completely normal for women my mother’s age to go out on the town and buy a bottle of tequila here!

Once we were done for the night we started to walk home, but accidentally went the wrong way and found ourselves in a seedier part of town. This was pretty evident when as we were walking past a hotel advertising rooms for 240 pesos (US$12.40) per night we saw police handcuffing a man against a wall while a scantily clad woman who all signs pointed toward being a prostitute went and planted herself on the street corner on this chilly night. Anna was a bit worried and decided to call an Uber, but I also needed to pee quite badly so I walked past the hooker and went around the corner to relieve myself in a nearby bush and when I returned our car was there. It turns out that we really weren’t that far from our hotel, the Uber only took about two minutes and cost us the equivalent of US$0.50. It would’ve been cooler if we had known about the local app, GrinGo. Yes, that is it’s real name Looking back at the scenes on the street, dinner, and our first night out in Mexico:

One of dozens of pharmacies in town

Viagraman is pretty big here

Our spot for dinner

One of the chefs doing his thing

Anna with just a portion of our dinner

That’s a juicy taco

A cool octopus sculpture

Knowing my luck this will be me by the end of this leg of the trip

In the first bar

Walking along the boardwalk

Now in El Pato

A portion of the crowd

Kicking back at our table in El Pato

Grandma’s starting to feel it now

Someone’s burning birthday cocktail

“Five minutes!! Please, Roxxy, I’m in the bathroom.” Classy.

Will use this next time

Sunday, February 16, 2020 There were plenty of cool cafes near where we were staying so we grabbed a latte each and once we had finished those we were going to get some tostadas for lunch at La Guerrerense. Pretty much every food guide in the area tells you that this is the first place you should go; Forbes magazine hinted that La Guerrerense might have the best food in Ensenada and Anthony Bourdain described it after visiting the stall for the Baja episode of No Reservations like this:

“La Guerrerense, a humble street cart, is as simple as it gets; the most mind-blowing fresh, sophisticated, and colourful tostadas imaginable. Absolutely phenomenal.”

That’s good enough for me, but initially I couldn’t understand why we were going to a place that was supposed to be so good for lunch, not dinner. Anna is terrible at describing things so she neglected to mention that La Guerrerense is just a small family-owned food stall on a quiet street where it has stood since 1960 that opens at 10:00am and closes at 5:00pm or whenever they run out of seafood, whichever happens first.

When we arrived there was a decent sized crowd around the stall, some waiting to order and others waiting for their food. Anna loves sea urchin and that is their most famous tostada so naturally we got one of those, as well as a mixed ceviche with avocado and the “Campechana,” which consisted of tuna ceviche with prawns, octopus, sea snail, scallops, mussels, and clams. We waited for our tostadas to arrive and there is no way to explain how good these things were! We thought we had eaten incredibly well the previous night, but that had nothing on La Guerrerense. They may look simple, but these things are incredible and some people consider them expensive, but I’m more than happy to pay 110 pesos (around US$5.70) each for these:

The scene when we first arrived

Taking orders

Making the tostadas

Anna with our phenomenal lunch

I may as well get a picture of me holding them too

We finished our tostadas and the stall operates on an honesty system so we paid and then decided to explore some new parts of the city. Anna had read about a large flea market that was away from the tourist district of Ensenada, but one piece of advice we had received from our driver that took us to San Diego was not to venture too far away from the main tourist areas. The market was going to be a reasonably long walk, but it was a nice day and we figured if things got a bit sketchy, we’d just head back to the main area.

Our journey inland began by crossing a bridge that obviously separated the commercial and more upper-class areas of the city from the grittier part where most of the population can afford to live. First, we passed what appeared to be an old  convent that was now a cheap hotel, then we ventured into Fausto Polanco Hacienda, what was once a hotel established in 1948, now a boutique furniture store with some interesting art displayed around the place, the original facade of the building still pretty much intact and each individual hotel room set up as its own display. We weren’t supposed to be taking photos, but I managed to snap a couple of sneaky ones to show how beautiful the building was inside. Soon we were back on the street, still trekking toward the flea market. We walked past a motorcycle gang gathered together on the sidewalk, surrounded by their Harley Davidson’s and not long after we had past, one of them got on his bike and flew by the only two tourists around as loudly as possible for his own amusement, almost causing Anna to shit her pants. We soon approached a church that was having a jumble sale out the front which consisted predominantly of dirty old track pants and sweaters, as well as some headless dolls. We were still a 20-minute walk from the flea market we wanted to see, but based on the church sale we probably wouldn’t find much and what was there would more than likely have actual fleas so we decided to head back into town, passing a place that was rebuilding classic cars and guarded by a dog that looked like it wanted to kill you:

Now on the wrong side of the tracks

About to enter Fausto Polanco

Now inside looking to the back of the room

And looking from the rear

We encountered a lot of skeletal artwork, but this was one of the cooler ones

Definitely a different vibe in this part of town

The church that was having the jumble sale out the front

This was our view when we decided to head back to main part of town

One of the cars being restored

The scary guy patrolling the yard

A cool, but extremely long mural heading back into town

We returned to the Ventana al Mar (“Window to the Sea”), the boardwalk area we had walked around when we first arrived, this time to see it and the gigantic Mexican flag there during the day. We wandered around, looking at all of the stalls that were set up, mainly selling jewellery, food, and tourist souvenirs while live mariachi bands played. As we walked along the water we saw seals playing in the bay and before long we were at Mercado Negro, a fish market with rows of small stalls and restaurants selling dishes made from fresh goods purchased at the market. It was too early for dinner so we went back to the main streets, snapping a photo of me with a statue of Viagraman in the process. One convenient thing when walking around here is that pedestrians have the right of way when crossing the road, all the cars just stop and wave you across, no matter when or where you decide you want to be on the other side of the street.

As I mentioned earlier, one of Ensenada’s most famous dishes are fish tacos so when we began to get a bit peckish we went back to Mercado Negro to get some. The stall that was the busiest had just stopped serving so we went to the one next door and even if it was the second option, it was still an excellent choice. We got some tacos and a seafood stew, then went back into town to find a place to hang out for the night. As we were looking at different bars it occurred to me that the NBA All-Star game was being played so we found a small bar with some more great local beers that I hadn’t tried. We arrived at half-time and this year the game had been reformatted in honour of Kobe Bryant and the new changes made it really competitive compared to the snore-fest that it has been in recent memory, but there was one problem for us; the bar only had a few people in it, two smoking and watching from outside and a really fat guy at the end of the bar who silently let off these incredibly bar-filling farts periodically. It was like he was cropdusting, these things were an assault on the senses and they were beginning to make Anna feel sick. At first she would discretely put her scarf over her nose, but before long it got to the point that she wanted to send a message in the hope that he’d stop, so she started commenting loudly and coughing, but to no avail. When the game was over we knew we had to find a new place to go and it was Sunday night so we thought we’d go to a place that we had wanted to try the previous night, but had been far too busy: Hussong’s, the oldest bar in Ensenada, established in 1892, and the alleged birthplace of the margarita. When we first entered it was still extremely crowded with a band playing inside, but the guy on the door said there was another bar out the back in a courtyard with heat-lamps that only had a few people in it so that’s where we went. Naturally, Anna wanted a margarita and I wanted a beer so I went over to the bar, meanwhile a local guy was working up the courage to try to chat to her, eventually approaching Anna as I returned with our drinks. He turned around and only came up to my chest and I guess he assumed that the gringo had just cut his lunch, but was too big to bother with so he spent a large portion of the night staring at me and grinding the complimentary peanuts into the ground with his feet before we eventually were able to pull up a seat inside. A hilarious ending to a great day:

A child scares pigeons while his parents get churros

Anna among the stalls

Token panoramic shot

Walking down the boardwalk

A mariachi band performing

This picture doesn’t capture how enormous that flag is

A seal playing in the bay

Hanging out

Entering Mercado Negro

I don’t think that’s been driven in a while…

A really happy market worker

There are endless stalls like this, the seafood looks so good!

A tad racist for a Japanese restaurant

It looks like I stole Viagraman’s shoes

Our fish tacos before we added salsa, chilis, and guacamole

Anna with one of hers

Me with one of mine

Every different seafood soup we get is delicious

A sticker in Hussong’s

We finally made it inside once the place had emptied out a bit toward the end of the night

Monday, February 17, 2020 The region in which we were staying is famous for its wineries so Anna wanted to make the most of our last full day in town by doing a winery tour that afternoon. We decided to take advantage of the free hotel breakfast so we ordered some dishes, one of which resembled nachos floating in an oily sauce, however, I can’t remember what they were called. I recall mentioning to Anna that they were really unhealthy and she replied, “What, these chinchilla things?” She wasn’t parodying Super Troopers and I might not have know what they were either, but I knew for a fact that we weren’t feasting on small, South American rodents. After our traditional, greasy breakfast we were off on a tour of the Guadalupe Valley wine region:

The Valle de Guadalupe (Guadalupe Valley) is an area of Ensenada Municipality, Baja California, Mexico that is an increasingly popular tourist destination for wine and Baja Med cuisine. It is located 20 kilometres (12 mi) north of the City of Ensenada and 113 kilometres (70 mi) southeast of the border crossing from San Diego to Tijuana. It includes communities such as Ejido El Porvenir, Francisco Zarco and San Antonio De las Minas, and had 2,664 inhabitants (2010 census).

Since the 1990s the association of winemakers of Baja California holds the Grape Harvest Fiestas in the Valley of Guadalupe and the town of Ensenada every year in August. The celebration includes wine tasting sessions, concerts and soirées, and samplings of regional cuisine and Mexican wines.

Wine tasting is available year-round, and several of the wineries have built up-market restaurant/tasting establishments aimed specifically at tourists from the United States. A winery tour is usually included on cruise ships that stop at Ensenada.

There are over 100 wineries in the Valle de Guadalupe.

Our private tour was through a company called Ensenada Sky Tours, with a private guide picking us up at 11:00am. Our private tour would include:

Exclusive private tour just for your group of up to 4 people (This is truly the best way to experience the Best of Baja!)

An extraordinary & personalized all-day & worry-free experience in the largest wine country in Mexico

Wine Museum visit

Well-equipped vehicle with a personal driver

History of the beginnings of wine making in the region, the process, and a tasting of unique wines & food at an an unforgettable scenery!

Bilingual tour guide & wine connoisseur

Lunch stop at one of the gourmet cuisine choices

Water & light snacks for the road

Photo stops

Our guide, Alejandro, was really cool and the first stop was a place that made cheese and cured their own salami. The cheese was unbelievably good, but obviously it would be difficult to bring any back to Singapore without it liquifying so we settled for some salami and then it was time to hit the road again. Over the course of the afternoon we would tour four different wineries and get to sample from each, as well as having a bite to eat, particularly oysters and more ceviche. The countryside was stunning, the tours of the wineries and wine-related museums were interesting enough, but just like when we were in the Alsace region of France recently, there was more information than I could possibly take in, but that’s probably also because I’m not really into wine. I did love the food and the cheese though, and Anna definitely embraced the wine, because she bought four bottles to bring back to Singapore and was also quite hammered by the time we returned to the hotel at 5:00pm so she required a two-hour powernap before dinner.

When she awoke we went back into town to celebrate a great couple of days in Mexico. Being a Monday night there wasn’t a whole lot of options, but we ended up at Papas&Beer, a place that is a bit of an institution. On this particular night they had karaoke, but it was all a little pedestrian, one person even stooping to singing Tequila, a song that only has one word in the lyrics! I love doing karaoke after a few drinks, but it was still early in the night, however, Anna kept nagging me to get up and do my thing. Everyone else was really only singing songs in Spanish so I made a deal that I would only sing Paloma Blanca by Georgie Dann, mainly due to how terrible it is. The video is even worse, I’ve probably used it in another post before, but I just love it. How did he actually get that pantsuit on?:

Unfortunately they didn’t have my song so I didn’t get up and make a fool of myself singing anything else while dead sober. Instead, we just kicked back and enjoyed our last night in town, comfortable in the knowledge that coming to Ensenada was a good choice. Looking back on a boozy Monday:

Our non-chinchilla-based brakfast

So many choices at the cheesemaker’s

Olives, too

Cheese makes me happy

Panoramic view from the first winery

Looking over a vineyard

I love me some oysters, too

Anna approaching another winery

The scenery here is really beautiful

Some tanks

Going down some slippery steps into the basement

A small portion of the barrels

Not a bad use for old bottles

An old cart

A wall full of bottles

More barrels in a different winery

This winery had a really cool bar

Sitting back on the balcony and staring at the hills

Ceviche!

Later that night in Papas&Beer

What the table next to us was eating

Oh, and if you’re wondering how that karaoke rendition of Tequila went, here it is:

Tuesday, February 18, 2020 Today was the day that we had to drive back to Tijuana and cross the border back into the US, but we still had business to take care of on the way back. One of our Mexican friends in Singapore, Enrique Caballero, suggested that we stop off in Puerto Neuvo, a small town with a population of 135 people in the Rosarito Beach municipality. The reason for this was that the best way to cap off a weekend eating nothing but fresh seafood would be to pay a visit to a village famously referred to as the “Lobster Village” of Baja California. The village mainly only consists of restaurants, all of which serve lobster, so we pulled up a seat in a place called Sandra’s for lunch. Our last meal in Mexico consisted of a final serve of fish tacos, seafood soup, and two lobsters, the best possible way to finish this leg of our North American adventure.

We were back in the car after lunch and our time in Mexico had gone a little too smoothly, but that wasn’t going to be the case for long. We had paid for lunch by credit card, but when we were leaving Ensenada we still had 100 pesos (US$5.13) left and we hadn’t really bought any souvenirs so Anna got a small sombrero for Kermit, our dog back in Singapore. In what could’ve resulted in yet another instalment in the seemingly never-ending ‘T’ Factor series, we completely forgot that there would be several toll booths along the freeway and had blown our remaining local currency on a novelty hat for our dog! I searched in between the seat cushions as Anna drove, but fortunately when we arrived at the booths they accepted US currency, of which we had enough.

When we arrived in Tijuana and dropped off our rental car it was time to cross the border again on foot, as the waiting times when trying to drive back into the US can be insane! Unlike going the opposite direction, we had a tough time going back into the US for several reasons, all of which came down to the general incompetence and stupidity of the border security officer serving us. When we first arrived in LAX four days previously we had used the electronic immigration lanes and we still had valid ESTA (Electronic System for Travel Authorization) passes so everything we had done to enter the country was completely valid and legal. Anna went first and the woman working our immigration line was instantly suspicious, thinking that she was trying to enter with me illegally. She asked to see Anna’s ESTA pass so Anna showed her a .pdf file of it that she had saved on her phone. This wasn’t deemed sufficient and the woman replied sarcastically, “You need to print your ESTA out, but you would’ve known that.” Anna wanted to remind her that the letter ‘E’ in ESTA stands for ‘Electronic’, but instead said she hadn’t needed to in the past. This made the woman more suspicious of Anna’s intentions, claiming that it still needed to be printed out, a requirement we had never faced on any other occasion entering the US. She then kept asking why there was no passport stamp from when we had first entered the country so Anna told her we went through the electronic immigration queue. Still not good enough, the immigration woman said that she required a stamp, scrutinising every page of her passport individually to find it. Anna tried to humour her by asking back to me if I had a stamp, only to be met with, “Your stamp is not going to be in his passport!” Anna stayed calm and told  her that she was aware of that, but just trying to save her some time by seeing if I had one, knowing full well that I wouldn’t. The woman mentioned that I don’t need one because I’m a citizen, assuming the blue passport in my hand was a US one. Anna pointed out that it was in fact Australian and was then taken to a waiting area to be questioned and processed. Now it was my time. I received the exact same questions as Anna about the ESTA and passport stamps and I gave the exact same replies at first, but there were a few other enquiries she had, the first being why I hadn’t spent a significant amount of time in Australia. I told her I was there in January, but I hadn’t lived in Australia in almost 13 years and showed her my Singaporean ID. She kept repeating that I needed to spend a significant amount of time in Australia before traveling to Mexico. She also got curious as to why there were so many stamps in my passport, asking me what I do for a living. I replied that I used to be a teacher, but now I work as a writer. She got even more annoyed and asked why I spend so much time traveling so I pointed to Anna and said, “My wife over there is an eye surgeon, she has to travel a lot for work so I go with her. In fact, she’s a guest here this time.” This confused her so I got sent over to wait in the dock next to Anna, us both chuckling and shaking our heads, but before too long, a different immigration staff member came over, smiled, and tore up some forms that the woman had handed him, apologising for the confusion as he did. We were now back in the US and were told several times by a number of people afterward that American immigration don’t tend to put their best and brightest staff on the US-Mexican border Here’s our lunch in Puerto Nievo, some scenes along the way back, and approaching the border again from the other side:

Maybe it’s the quality of the avacados, but Mexican guacamole is so good

More condiments

Our seafood soup

Don’t mind if I do

A passible spread for our last meal in Mexico

That’s a look of pure anticipation on our faces right there

A Mexican knock off of Rio de Janeiro’s ‘Christ the Redeemer’

Approaching the border again

Nirvana had a song called Mexican Seafood and I always thought it was an analogy for not feeling all that great, because when I was growing up I thought Mexicans really only ate beef and chicken, not seafood, and I had heard it wasn’t that clean there. I couldn’t have been more wrong, if for nothing else, go to Baja California in Mexico just for the amazing seafood! I know I would do it again in heartbeat, even if it is a little difficult to leave.

Stay tuned for the second part of this post where we spend time at a resort outside of San Diego attending dinners, having drinks, getting awards, and driving around in a rental car that perpetually smelled of weed before returning to LA and flying back to Singapore. Also, if you’re skeptical as to whether it was worth risking being stranded in Mexico in order to buy a canine sombrero, decide for yourself:

Kermit doesn’t seem to mind it

Three days of beer, wine, and seafood in Ensenada, Mexico We had a big year planned with a ton of traveling, the bulk of it for Anna's work, but many of the trips over the coming months have been scrapped due to Singapore, and the world in general for that matter, being overly cautious of the…

#bars and pubs #border #Ensenada #food #Seafood #wineries