#the capital letters just make it funnier to me

[mochinek0]

Chat Noir vs Adrien Agreste

"Adrien, Adrien, Adrien." Chat Noir whined, "All the girls are fighting over him. No one's fighting over me. Yet, I'm so much more sophistiCATed, funnier, and definetly better dressed than him." in front of the school.

Marinette giggled, "I'll fight for you, Chat Noir!"

Many students were shocked by her decleration. They knew that she liked Adrien Agreste, but here she was saying that she preffered Chat Noir over him! Chat Noir smiled and walked over to her. They all witnessed as hero hugged her and the blush that crossed her cheeks. The students couldn't help but wonder: 'Maybe Marinette has a thing for blondes?'

"This is why you are my Princess." Chat Noir whispered, low enough for only Marinette to hear.

Chat Noir pulled away and smiled. He gracefully swept himself into a bow and kissed her hand. With a wink, he quickly left. Marinette just stood here waving 'bye' to the empty air.

"Hey." Alya spoke, snapping Mari out of her stupor, "What did he say to you? I saw his lips move."

Marinette smiled, "He told me 'thank you'. I-I guess he really needed to hear it."

"So?" Alya goaded, her confused friend, "New feelings?"

"Ch-Chat?" Mari stuttered out, "You-You think I like Chat Noir?"

"You chose him over Adrien." her best friend pointed out.

"I like him over Ladybug." Marinette declared.

"Why him?" the blogger asked.

Mari smiled, "He makes akumas not seem so scary."

Adrien couldn't wait to see Marinette the next day at school. He had been so happy that she had chosen Chat Noir over his model self.

"Hey, Marinette!" Adrien shouted, waving happily.

Marinette walked right passed him and towards the classroom.

'What?'

Adrien tried all day to talk to her. He'd wave to her. He would wait by her locker. He even saved her a seat at lunch, but she pretended like he wasn't there. Try as he might, he couldn't think of what he had done or said for her to ignore him. It was just like when they met and he hated it! Adrien quickly ran after her when the bell had rung to go home. He spotted her in the courtyard and stopped in front of her.

"Marinette!" Adrien shouted.

"Yes?" she jumped back, almost colliding with his chest.

"You're ignoring me!" he stated.

"FUR a good reason." she smiled.

'Wait! Did she just pun?'

Adrien quickly cleared his mind and pleaded, "What? What did I do? Why? Please, just tell me!"

"You didn't read the shirt?" Marinette questioned.

'Shirt?'

Adrien took a step back to get a look at her shirt. It was black and read: 'Team sophistiCATed' in green. He could feel his cheeks turning pink.

"Sorry, Adrien." Mari spoke, before walking around him, "It's nothing PURR-sonal."

Adrien quickly rushed to his car and smiled happily in his seat.

'Marinette puns! How did I not know this? It makes her ten times cuter!'

"Princess." Chat whispered, knocking on her skylight.

"Chat Noir." Marinette smiled, inviting him in, "I know it's not perfect, but-

"What's not PURRfect?" he questioned.

Mari rolled her eyes, "I made this shirt last night. I was sort of inspired by what you said."

Chat looked over the shirt a bit more. He could see it was a solid black shirt. The green lettering was a bit sparkly and the pun was in capital letters to get the point across.

"I love it." Chat smiled, "Is it alright if I take a picture with you?"

"Sure." Marinette answered.

"Say 'cupcake'." he smiled.

"Cupcake!" Marinette repeated.

Chat was quick to place a light kiss on her cheek, just as he took the picture. Marinette turned to him and blushed.

"Thank you." he spoke, "That shirt really made my day."

"You're welcome, Chat." she replied, "I might have ignored my friend, Adrien, today because of the shirt."

"Adrien Agreste; the model?" he asked.

Marinette nodded and blushed. Chat Noir began to laugh.

"Did you explain why you ignored him?" Chat questioned.

"Afterschool." she winced, "I thought he had seen my shirt, but he hadn't. He actually confronted me because I was ignoring him."

Chat just listened to her ramble.

"I feel really bad, but I wanted to make a point." she continued.

He pulled her into his arms and held her.

"I think he understands." he whispered, "You can always apologize tomorrow, if you feel like it. I know I'd be a little sad if you ignored me, Princess."

"Okay." Marinette answered, "I'll just warn him that if I wear the shirt, I'm not talking to him."

Chat Noir chuckled and squeezed another hug out of her.

"Now, let's see if I can get you some real cupcakes."

"Yes!" he cried out.

Marinette laughed and went downstairs for sweets. Chat Noir looked down at the picture he had taken. He had timed it perfectly. Her eyes were closed and she was smiling and his lips were barely pressed against her cheek. They looked happy.

'You really are special to me, Marinette. I'm glad someone sees beyond all the perfectness.'

"I found some cupcakes!" Marinette cried, announcing her arrival.

Chat Noir closed his baton and placed it in it's holder.

"Yay!" he cried out, happily.

"Adrien, I wanted to apologize about yesterday." Marinette began to ramble, "I wanted Chat Noir to know he was important, too. Not that I'm saying you're not important! You're my friend and I support you, but sometimes it seems like people only like Ladybug; not Chat Noir. Not that there's anything wrong with being a model!"

Adrien just stood there as Mari continued to compliment both sides of himself.

'She's so cute when she's trying to figure out what to say and not hurt anyone.'

Adrien quickly hugged her. He felt Marinette freeze in his arms.

"I understand, Marinette." Adrien reassured her, "It's okay."

He immediatley felt her relax into the hug. He smiled as he felt her small arms wrap around him.

"I was confused, but you explained it." he continued.

Adrien froze when he felt Marinette mumble something into his chest.

"What?" the model asked, pulling back a bit.

Marinette mumbled again.

"Sorry, Marinette. I still couldn't hear u." Adrien spoke.

Mari took a deep breath and shouted, "If I wear the shirt again, I'm ignoring you!"

Everyone froze.

'Was Marinette that big of a fan of Chat Noir?'

"I can live with that. Maybe we should start a Chat Noir fan club." Adrien laughed, "You think he would let me wear one of your shirts, if it's to promote him?"

Marinette giggled as Adrien led her to the class, talking about Chat Noir.

"I can't tell if Marinete has Chat Noir and Adrien fighting over her." declared Rose.

"I don't know, either." answered Alya.

Soon, there was a secret poll going around the school on who they thought Marinette should end up with. To no one's surprise, it was a tie. It looked like Marinette, Adrien, and Chat Noir were the deciding factor. Now, if only one of them would make a move!

TAG LIST: @animeweebgirl @a-star-with-a-human-name @meme991001 @vixen-uchiha @abrx2002 @alysrose-starchild @fandom-trapped-03 @dood-space @moonlightstar64 @saltymiraculer @marveldcedits20 @09shell-sea09 @icerosecrystal @animegirlweeb @insane-fangirl-of-everything @blueblossombliss @nickristus-dreamer @megawhitleycalderonpaganus @missmadwoman @meira-3919  @princessdaisysolosyourfaves @blep-23 @fangirlingfanatic @darkhinauniverse @ravenr22 @im-a-satanic-ritual @ravennm84  @bianca-hooks123 @a-slytherinish-gryffindor @starling218

#chat noir #marinette dupain cheng #marichat #marinette likes blondes #teasing #adrien agreste #ignoring adrien #marinette puns #sophistiCATed #love square #it's complicated #chat noir vs adrien agreste #adrienette #place your bets #mochinek0

[carlyraejepsans]

> "Is the King... y'know..."

"How... big is this kingdom exactly?"

Sans considers the question for a moment.

"...eh. it's hard to tell at this point. hundreds? maybe a thousand subjects, but i wouldn't count on it. whoops, sorry. fans."

"That's all?"

"yup," he said, his distinctive lack of lips not preventing him from popping the letter, "used to be more, of course. this place was pretty crammed just a few years ago..."

He looked away for a moment, then back at you, face carefully blank, "but now we're not. lucky us, huh?"

You can feel something bigger than you bubbling under the surface of the conversation. You decide not to press your luck.

"Is everything like this around here?"

"like what?"

"You know..." You wriggle your hands, vaguely pointing at the discarded suit.

Sans gets your meaning, "sugar and spice and everything awful? heh, nah. not that mettaton isn't trying."

He scratches at the side of his skull.

"but it's just easier to focus on the capital. and the stuff immediately around it. new home, the core. hotland. anything past waterfall though, THAT'S where it gets tricky. it's, uh, not easy if you wanna build anything big over there. you better count on having help from the local folk. and those folks REALLY don't like change. specially the, uh, glittery, brainwashy brand."

"There's opposers to the king?" you ask, growing hopeful.

"sure thing. the further west you go, the less they like the guy. as a rule."

The thought doesn't half form in your mind before he snorts, again.

"yeah, uh, i wouldn't do that if i were you."

"What d—"

"you wanna leg it, don't you?" he interrupts you, "you're thinking "if the king wants me here, well, i should hide where they don't like the king". it's sound enough as far as plans go. but..."

He swirls the contents of his cup around once again.

"human SOULs are powerful stuff down here. it's just the sort of thing you'd want your hands on if you planned to, say, overthrow a king or something. heard they're plotting something big around snowdin, so i'd definitely avoid the area. although, you didn't hear it from me."

"...I don't get it," you say, "They're threatening the King. Shouldn't you do something? I thought you were his guard dog, or something."

"honorary. does it look like i have a tail? not that i'd let you check. but uh, yeah, pretty much. you're forgetting something, though..."

He takes a swig from the mug and winks.

"i'm REALLY bad at my job."

You don't respond. It would be funnier, you think, if you didn't know how false that was.

"I don't see the problem. If they want a human SOUL, I could help them—"

"yeah, no. SOULs are the kinda thing that's only useful when you're dead," Sans interrupts again. Seeing you deflate, he adds, "sorry."

You breathe in. Out again.

"You said the cave expands West, but it can't go on forever. What's at the other end?"

"nothing," he says plainly.

"Nothing?"

"nothing you're looking for, anyway. the..."

To your surprise, he falters. His eyes close for a second as his finger taps against ceramic.

"snowdin forest. that's as far as you can go. anything beyond that is off limits. magical seal: everything can come out, nothing can go back in. whatever's on the other side of the door is dead land, anyway."

"So you're saying you don't know?"

Sans looks up at you. For the first time, his mask of amiability cracks with annoyance.

"i'm saying you'll freeze to death before you can move that door a single inch. but you're free to get yourself dead if it makes ya happy."

You feel giddy, "Is there another entrance to the cave?"

"dunno."

"You don't know?"

"i don't care," he snaps. He takes a breath and leans back, forcing his pose to relax, "it wouldn't change anything for me. or anyone, for that matter, so. why bother?"

But you bother. The human in the photograph still smiles in your mind's eye.

"How do I get out of here?"

"the door," Sans says flatly, "i thought that was obvious, but considering how you came in—"

"How do you leave the Underground," you cut him off. You have no time for this.

Sans inspects your face for a moment, his momentary frustration from before scrubbed clean, in a perfect poker face.

He tips the mug to check that nothing is left in it, then drops it on the floor with a clunk.

-->

#undertale #sans #mywriting #this was a fun one.

[moonlitlex]

i have so much to say abt chalice of the gods so im just gonna copy paste my review from goodreads here. you can also read it on goodreads

ok. i promised i would hate this book. and i do. i hate this book. i also hate rick riordan. in addition, i hate capitalism. i promise that’s relevant.

let’s talk about the book now. i’ll cover the things i love first. i love percy jackson. i love grover. i love annabeth. i love sally. i love paul. i love percy annabeth and grover together. all of these things are very obvious and self-explanatory. percy is hands down THE main character of all time. i have nothing bad to say about him. his literal fatal flaw is loyalty. he’s actually perfect and has no flaws. this is expected from the son of sally jackson, the perfect person. paul is sweet and kind to sally and that’s really all that matters. annabeth is awesome and supportive and so is grover and they’re all besties forever. you get it. you’ve read percy jackson.

the jokes are better than before. there are definitely some legitimately funny jokes in this book, which i was really missing from the last few rick riordan installments. and i don’t think this is because rick suddenly got funnier. i think it’s because this style of joke works for percy. of all of rick’s protagonists, percy seems the most natural fit for these jokes.

sally is great. grover and annabeth are generally on form. so is percy, as much as can be expected from rick riordan at this point. i will elaborate on this later.

now to complain. this is the stupidest premise i’ve ever heard of. percy is a high school senior. he is going to go to new rome university. he needs 3 divine recommendations. this is already a stupid premise but don’t worry, it gets worse. poseidon reveals that the reason percy needs these recommendations is that it’s a special requirement for him specifically made by zeus. and the reason he gets to have this stupid requirement is that he’s a child of the big three and shouldn’t exist.

hello. zeus. yes, lord zeus, it’s me. alexis.

what the absolute FUCK are you saying.

this doesn’t MAKE SENSE. the only reason percy shouldn’t have existed was that the gods had a stupid pact to not have any kids because of a stupid prophecy. two things here. one - that prophecy is OVER. everything turned out fine. thanks to percy jackson. you’re welcome, gods of olympus. two - percy has literally saved olympus TWICE now. two times. this is genuinely such a dumb and made up reason to send percy on a quest that i can’t even turn my brain off and enjoy it. it’s not fun. leave percy alone. LEAVE HIM ALONE.

it’s literally insane how stupid this setup is. rick keeps writing books about how the gods are horrible and take advantage of the demigods and the demigods live terrible lives. in this book, percy has LITERALLY saved olympus TWICE and motherfucking zeus (literally) had to be talked down from making him get 25 letters of recommendation to 3. this is AFTER percy spent 3 years in pjo almost being killed and got his memory wiped for 6-8 months depending on which book you read in hoo and then got sent on a quest to save the entire world AGAIN. this CHILD got like a 2-4 month break (depending on which book you’re reading) and he woke up with no fucking memory and had to spend like 2 more months fighting monsters and the literal primordial earth goddess. and now he has to go on literally pointless quests that someone who didn’t just get back home from saving the actual world could ALSO just do. because he needs to get some fucking letters of recommendation.

look. genuinely. percy jackson should snap at this point in the story. this boy should’ve snapped like at least 5 books ago. at minimum. rick wrote the perfect setup to show us percy’s instant descent into madness. he should LOSE it. all the gods have done for the ENTIRE time he’s known he’s a demigod is treat demigods like disposable tools. this is the point in the story where percy goes. wow. luke was right. you guys are all assholes who don’t care about us even a little bit. i am NOT saying what needs to follow is a fanfic-esque dark!percy story where he successfully destroys olympus or something. what i AM saying. is at bare minimum this is where percy goes you know what fuck you i hate you guys and washes his hands of being a demigod at least temporarily. at the very least he should sit back and think yeah, i don’t really want to go to new rome university. it’s not worth it. i will just go to a different university. look. it’s percy jackson. he can literally one shot all but the most fearsome monsters (typhon, the giants, a drakon, etc). he is literally going to be 100% completely fine going to mortal university AND he wont have to deal with zeus’s annoying ass.

listen. MY percy jackson wanted to kill smelly gabe as a 12 year old because he abused his mother. MY percy jackson doesn’t like bullies. MY percy jackson challenged ares to a fight just on the basis that ares was a fucking asshole.

MY percy jackson is not going on useless fucking quests to go to new rome university of all places.

which reminds me. why DOES he want to go to new rome university. this is percy jackson. he LOVES new york. why is percy “what did they do to my city” jackson going to university ACROSS THE COUNTRY from the city he loves. why is he doing that. and hey look. sally and paul (and soon estelle) are ALSO going to be in new york. so like WHY is he leaving for real. percy my fatal flaw is loyalty jackson. IT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE OK! it’s percy he is seriously not going to have issues with common monsters attacking him. we literally saw him fight off titans and giants a fucking hellhound isn’t gonna get his ass. WHY is he leaving. it does NOT make sense.

there’s this scene ok. where sally tells them she’s pregnant. and percy’s like oh my god…. i’m going to be in california…. and my sister is going to be here…. and i was just sitting there going. yeah bro. why are you going to california. i literally do not understand. you literally are from nyc. you live here. your family is here. your friends from chb are like a short pegasus ride away. there are like 50 universities in new york. just go here. why are you leaving. you are percy jackson. being a new yorker is literally one of your defining traits. stay here. WHY AR EYOU LEAVING I DO NOT UNDERSTAND PERSEUS

and listen. if your argument is that annabeth is going to be in nru. why the FUCK is ANNABETH going to nru!!!!! WHY WOULD SHE DO THAT!!!! EXPLAIN IT!!!! percy LITERALLY says annabeth is such an overachiever she’s already run out of ap classes to take. he literally says that. why the fuck is this girl going to nru where let’s be real her admission is guaranteed. annabeth is 100% someone who would want to go to an ivy. and would you fucking believe it there’s an ivy right here in nyc. like let’s be fucking realistic here. annabeth started her architecture career at SIXTEEN designing the city the fucking GODS live in. so like. don’t you think she’d want to be a bit more challenged. don’t you think she’d want to go to a university that is actually recognizable to mortals. annabeth did NOT love new rome that much like did richard forget what he wrote. this girl was freaking out about new rome until percy said he only likes it because they could live together there. she literally does not care about new rome and she is WAY too ambitious and academically inclined to be happy with going to some small as uni 99% of employers have never heard of.

this isn’t even the worst character assassination in the book. that award goes to the way rick wrote percy. percy. my darling percy. my beloved percy. perseus jackson. light of my life. as i said before, he is MOSTLY on form. the him really wanting to cali thing is definitely ooc for him but it is NOTHING compared to the sheer amount of times rick portrays percy as stupid in this accursed novel. his internal monologue is constantly shit like i’m always so behind annabeth and omg i’m being so dumb right now and annabeth calls me seaweed brain because i’m an idiot and blah blah fucking blah.

dick riordan has forgotten that perseus jackson is, in fact, not stupid at all. he is INCREDIBLY clever. he is just not particularly academically inclined/not very book smart and it would also be perfectly understandable given the fucking books that riordan wrote to interpret that as percy being very discouraged from engaging with his studies. he genuinely enjoys chiron’s class at yancy because chiron is an engaging teacher and encourages him. he spends 90% of his time in pjo deducing what’s going on with extremely limited information because rick decided none of the characters can tell him anything because of plot and exposition reasons. in son of neptune he literally just coasts on having sherlockian (not bbc that’s a whole other angry review) powers of deduction. to the point where the characters around him are amazed at how he’s figuring stuff out. literally in house of hades annabeth’s pov’s are constantly her commenting on how she gives percy shit for being a dumbass but he’s actually really clever.

it genuinely feels like at some point during the writing of mark of athena rick decided to just slowly start making various fanon ideas canon. percy being stupid is very commonly accepted fanon because he doesn’t realize how smart he is (and fans don’t realize he’s an unreliable narrator) and the fans also love to infantilize characters with more in your face adhd (leo is another victim of this phenomenon). we’ve spent 5 books in percy’s head and he doesn’t think he’s particularly clever so it makes sense to ignore the mountains of evidence pointing towards his quick and creative thought process in favour of haha percy is dumb jokes.

the wild thing is, percy isn’t even that hard on himself in pjo. he obviously doesn’t see himself in the same way we later come to find out other people see him (mainly thinking about hazel and frank in son of neptune, which is the only time in hoo he genuinely feels like the same character as pjo percy) but he’s not really dealing with crazy self doubt and self esteem issues. he does have his down on himself moments but they’re all extremely understandable given the context because he literally faces impossible odds in every single pjo book. at one point he’s disappointed he couldn’t tell that ares and luke manipulated him… like yes bestie that’s a very valid thing to feel upset and betrayed about. it doesn’t mean that he’s actually stupid though and genuinely he comes across more as humble and not realizing just how awesome and cool and interesting he is than anything else. percy consistently shows that he is really clever. half of pjo is percy figuring out a new and interesting way of defeating his enemies and the other half is percy figuring out how to bait his enemies into a duel to improve his odds. it’s horrible what rick does to percy in his internal monologue.

it’s to an insane degree. yes i realize i have already written 500 words about percy not being stupid alone but i must stress how egregious this is. it’s literally characters who have previously acknowledged percy’s intelligence who start remarking about how he’s stupid. in house of hades percy and annabeth get out of fucking TARTARUS and reyna makes a jab about how percy wouldn’t be able to find his way out of a paper bag without annabeth. that is an INSANE thing to say for reyna and for rick. rick has not written a stupid character so it’s weird to make that something a character does without really trying to show them being wrong. from reyna’s perspective, this is a guy she was complimenting a few short weeks ago. this is a guy she immediately wanted to make a leader at the camp that she loves and is her home. this is guy she barely knows and she pretty much immediately proposes to him. WHY would she suddenly start making jokes about how dumb he is? it’s not like she actually knows him better now. he came to the battle with reinforcements and basically immediately dipped after the feast. how are we to accept reyna treating our beloved perseus in this horrific manner? we simply cannot. it is unnacceptable. this is inaccurate.

it’s so WRONG to do this to percy. yES I UNDERSTAND I HAVE BEEN TALKING ABOUT THIS FOR TOO LONG. I DON’T CARE. PERCY JACKSON IS MY BEST FRIEND IN THE WHOLE UNIVERSE AND I NEED TO DEFEND HIM FROM THIS SLANDER. I AM ONLY PARTIALLY JOKING. listen. liSTEN. this is the guy whose signature move is manipulate your enemy into dueling with you when you’re outnumbered or outmatched. he very coolly manipulated bob into killing his own brother (btw this was very hot and sexy and clever and attractive perseus is king of gaslight gatekeep girlboss). he is NOT stupid. he is impulsive. he is extremely oblivious about some things. he is NOT stupid. i watched perseus jackson grow up for 5 books and he is not stupid. i always say this. i always say that percy is not stupid and richard riordan refuses to listen to me.

there are such horrendous lines as “i am a guy of limited talents. if i can’t kill it with water, a sword, or sarcasm, i’m basically defenseless.” richard how DARE you say this about my beloved perseus. he is NEVER like this. he literally would never say that. even at absolute worst percy’s internal monologue was “this plan is stupid and will get us killed. but it’s the plan i have.” he’s NOT a being defenseless guy. what hte fuck are you saying. richard did you read your own books. RICHARD. DID YOU. at one point he says that he is constantly several steps behind annabeth’s thought process. he has literally never thought this before and it is also untrue. richard. i hate you. read your own fucking books oh my god.

ok. i think i have sufficiently harped on the fact that percy is not stupid. now i will complain about another thing. and this was just in one part but it bothered me and this is my review so i get to talk about whatever i want. if you don’t like it read someone else’s review. don’t hate read my review. i didn't charge you money to read it

at one point, percy has to wrestle a god who hercules once wrestled. and annabeth says something about hercules brute forcing it. and look. i GET that hercules was freakishly strong. i get that. i understand it. but when annabeth says hercules just brute forced it they’re both like ah shit i can’t do that. perseus. beloved. you ripped the minotaurs horn off its head with your bare hands as a 12 year old with no training. you are literally insanely strong as is. that is an insane thing for a 12 year old to be able to do. hell, that would be an insane thing for a grown adult to do. i don’t think rick realizes how op percy is. he was so caught up in making percy cool (which is, you know, extremely understandable and right and correct percy jackson is the coolest man in fiction for a reason i get it) that he forgot that he made percy extremely unbelievably powerful too. with the curse of achilles he was potentially matching minor gods in power level. he fights while sustaining mini-hurricanes and explodes glaciers and shit.

some more things. the prose is… acceptable. the plot reads like a fever dream. there is a smoothie shop called himbo juice that annabeth percy and grover are evidently regulars at. and there are. himbos. that serve. juice. so you can imagine what this fever dream looks like. like the last couple rick riordan releases, this one reads like published fanfiction too, just with better quality of writing than the sun and the star.

there are some WEIRD continuity errors in here. one of them is fairly minor but i still noticed it - percy says his father compared his mother to a princess. this is not true. poseidon compared sally to a queen. specifically, he called her “a queen among women”. i know this because i am sally jackson’s number 1 fan.

more egregiously, however, is annabeth’s yankees cap heebie jeebies. percy puts on annabeths’s cap and gets the heebie jeebies while using it. and then he goes wow annabeth. you never told me that using the cap is like this. and annabeth is like yeah well. power is like that. richard. riordan. did you fucking FORGET that percy has, in fact, worn annabeth’s cap before. and it was literally completely. once again, richard, did you read your own books.

one more good thing - when percy fights geras/gary, who is the god/personification of old age, the way he does it is by imagining him and his friends getting older and embracing it. this was a genuinely good and sweet moment and it was very touching. the trio’s talks about this after the fact are also absolutely a return to form from riordan. for like, a few paragraphs. but still.

the biggest problem is just how obvious it is that this book is a cash grab. we had pjo. then we had a sequel series. then we had ANOTHER sequel series. and now we’re getting random standalone novels that are extremely unnecessary and don’t add anything. rick riordan has dollar signs in his eyes. these are not stories that make sense. these are not stories rick genuinely wanted to tell. these are stories that are being told because the purpose of publishing books now is to maximize profit. (sidebar - i told you the capitalism thing would be relevant. you should believe me more often. smh) the only reason rick is still writing these books is that they make money. they feel extremely empty and hollow.

percy is trapped as a teenager forever because rick refuses to let him age up. percy accepting old age would make FAR more sense for a percy who’s in his 20’s and just now realizing that he lived past all the shit he thought was going to kill him and he has a real life that he likes and he could actually grow old now. but percy must be a child for marketing purposes, so he stays a child. the world itself is trapped in a cycle of the gods promising they’ll be better and the gods literally not changing at all. and for the sake of the book series, it can’t change. if we had real change in the world, that would actually mean something, silly. we can’t have consequences. we have to reset every 5 years like a fucking comic book so that we can make infinite money. this is the infinite money glitch irl. just make trash that doesn’t need to be made. the end point of capitalism is making trash no one asked for that has no artistic merit just because you can make money off of it.

by the way, dr emily wilson’s iliad translation, which was also out on the same day, is LESS expensive than this book. this cashgrab nonsense novel is MORE expensive than a book a professor in classics who has a phd spent 4 years on. this is just wrong. the fun and stupid cashgrab book should NOT be more expensive than a book that someone spent 4 years meticulously translating from ancient greek. it’s just so clear and in your face. trials of apollo absolutely felt like a cashgrab but at least there was SOME semblance of effort there. this is literally just the most plain and simple cashgrab novel you can make.

hey. you know the infinite monkey theorem? the infinite monkey theorem is that a monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type any given text including shakespeare. richard riordan is a monkey with a typewriter. you get it. you’ve read percy jackson.

rick riordan struck gold with pjo. it’s genuinely to this day one of my favourite things i’ve ever read, flaws and all. it’s FUN. it’s COOL. it’s THEMATICALLY COHESIVE. the characters grow and change. they feel like real people with personalities. it literally doesn’t even matter how op percy is because THAT’S how good of a character he is. he is so compelling that you want to read about him anyway even though you can tell right from the minotaur fight that this kid can decimate whatever opponent he has. the books are funny and moving because you can genuinely connect to these characters. the more i read rick riordan’s work, the more certain i am that pjo was a fluke. i don’t think he knows what he’s doing. i think he should retire from writing.

unfortunately for me, richard riordan seems to have no intention of retiring. he has announced another percy jackson book that will be released next year. i assume there will be at least 2 more books based on the setup in this one.

rick. listen. i know you’re listening because what else will you do with your time. rick, why are you doing this. hasn’t percy been through enough. when will it end. give it a rest. stop it. get some help. at the very least, read your own books before writing percy. i am right about him and you are wrong about him. you are the author and i’m killing you right now. i am strangling you and i am hitting you with weapons. all at once. i am very proficient at causing deaths. (this is a metaphor referring to roland barthes’ death of the author. i wish no bodily harm to richard riordan).

this book is… alright. percy is my smart king. sally jackson is queen of my heart. it’s a fun read but you do have to turn your brain off completely and read through some serious percy defamation.

[edit: i am downgrading this book to one star (was at 2). the more i think about it, the more angry i am. there is literally a paragraph tailor made to rub jason's death in our faces. it's about how he looks forward to getting old being married to piper and having grandchildren. it's a very low blow. jason is literally rick riordan's biggest missed opportunity and he's rubbing in how poorly he treated jason even after killing him off for apollo's character development.

annabeth still keeps putting percy down because rick doesn't realize how mean she is i guess. she's still scared of him. canonically. which is a really weird and fucked up thing to write imo. this relationship doesn't seem healthy in canon (they are healthy in my head, however, because i know what women are like) but rick refuses to address it or let them break up. i LOVE annabeth. i love her. but she is an extremely flawed character and rick never treats her as such. and it just makes it exhausting to read about her.

percy IS on form but it genuinely feels like he's tlt percy, not post hoo percy. his inner voice sounds way more immature than it has for most of pjo and in son. riordan also repurposes the "look, i didn't want to be a half-blood" line from tlt to make a dumb little joke about how high school is hard. it was a GOOD opening line. it immediately set the tone and told us so much about percy in literally just a handful of words. now it's a joke about how being a senior in high school sucks. it's this mcu-esque allergy to being sincere that pjo never had.

there is BARELY any grover in this book. i love grover so much that i was cheering any time he was there, but there is very little of him. he's in like 2 or 3 scenes and has his own side plot going on with juniper and being bad at understanding what his girlfriend wants or whatever. extremely unnecessary and not what i want for grover. this book kind of ends up feeling like it's about annabeth but from percy's perspective. she gets good moments at percy's expense. percy spends the book monologuing about how annabeth is way smarter than him and all he has is his sick ass water powers and the best swordfighting skill in 300 years, both of which are very downplayed. percy explodes a river and it's treated like this crazy freaky scary thing but two years ago in universe he made a volcano erupt and everyone was like yeah this makes sense percy is that powerful. in son he explodes a glacier and it's just a normal tuesday for him. he literally doesn't even react to it. and now we're supposed to believe his exploding and purifying a river feat is some unbelievable feat.]

in conclusion, i want a refund. no i did not purchase this book. however, i would like to be reimbursed about $5000 in emotional damages. i will also be suing richard riordan for defamation on percy’s behalf. good night new york city. and my beloved perseus jackson who lives in new york city.

#alexis.exe #pjo #cotg crit #rr crit #cotg spoilers #cotg #i hope yall who dont want negative stuff have the crit tag blacklisted lol dont come at me

[nikathesiren]

Not-Jojo content for a hot minute! Let's talk about the Borderlands movie...

First things first, I don't know if you know this, but my nickname comes from Borderlands. Although now I only talk and draw about Jojo's, I'm still a big fan of the Borderlands games.

When I played the first game, I loved the concept about sirens, and it was back then when I started using my actual nickname (circa 2010). Then, when Borderlands 2 came out, I was obsessed with Handsome Jack. And when I say obsessed, I mean OBSESSED with huge and bold capital letters. I consider Borderlands 2 the best Borderlands game of them all, and The Pre-Sequel is a close one just because of my full Jack obsession, lol.

Keep reading for my opinion about the trailer...

I don't remember when they announced that they were making a Borderlands movie, maybe 2017-ish??? I was extremely excited, thinking that they would adapt the story of the games (back then, I think Borderlands 3 wasn't even announced, but they could have started as a trilogy...). I even fantasized about the idea of Dameon Clarke, Handsome Jack's VA in English, being Jack in the movie as well. But that dream was long gone when I read that the film would not exactly follow up the story we all know. And the wait to see something about this movie was LONG.

I finally watched the trailer when they released it, and even it's not the story I was hoping to see... I kinda like it. I didn't feel the hype I expected being a huge Borderlands fan, but I think I can still enjoy it. Some stuff from the movie feels off (like Roland's personality... he doesn't feel like Roland at all... and where are Lilith siren tattoos!?!?!?), but other stuff feels total in the style of Borderlands (people bullying Claptrap in some way is a must). The movie has its flaws, but people on Reddit keep bitching about Lilith and Tannis being too old, Roland being too short... ugh, I don't fucking care about the cast not being aesthetically perfect (but I admit that I would have liked them to). If the actors and actresses do a good job interpreting their characters and the story fits the Borderlands' universe with good humor and action, I'll consider myself lucky.

That was my impression of the trailer in English, but I'm from Spain, so the next day I watched the trailer again, but dubbed in Spanish, and... it felt way funnier! At least Tina's phrases sounded funnier for me (instead of saying "it's in my mouth!" she says "I swallowed it" lmao), and some voices suit the characters better than the original ones. Usually, it's the other way around, lol!

I think the localization will improve the movie for me, and that gives me some hope to enjoy the movie besides all the bitching on Reddit. Seriously, guys, stop complaining about people's bodies... there are other things to be criticized...

To try to introduce myself into the mood, maybe I'll do a redraw of an old Borderlands fanart... it'll be coming soon!

#personal #borderlands #borderlands movie #opinion #i tried to be respectful #at least I'm more respectful than some people out there

[endlessthedestiny]

for a long time now ive been thinking about the HS typing quirks and what would the quirks be for sandman characters, so im making this long ass post just to eliminate this from my system

disclaimer: english is not my first language (classic) and if you disagree or have a different headcanon pls share i want to hear (if some may seem ooc my deepest apologies)

Morpheus

Writes in italic.

Bold for emphasis. can also *rarely* use asterisks.

No emoticons, but probably used "*-*" in some conversation with Death.

Normal capitalization and punctuation. If mistype, corrects expressively (ex. "I meant afternoon, sorry.)

If comfortable, uses keyboard smash (ex. "Ahshsnsbj") to laugh.

Death

Doesn't capitalize the beginning of the phrase or utilizes final dot unless she wants to be taken seriously.

Sometimes use the emoticons ":)", ":(", "^_^" only with those she is intimate/trusts. Uses frequently with Delirium.

Emphasis is CAPITALIZED.

When mistypes corrects with *asterisk.

Avoids sending a wall of texts, preferring send small texts to form a big text.

Desire

Italic.

Not severe with capitalization or punctuation. only cares and uses it perfect if wants to be taken seriously.

If sending a big message (+3 lines) ends with a "~ <3", otherwise, only uses "~".

Syllables repetition only to annooooy, with ellipsis at the end. . .

Only emoticon used is ";)"

For emphasis, utilizes *asterisk*.

Also corrects mistypes with *asterisk, and sometimes adds a "oops" or similar at the end.

Despair

Capitalization In Every Word, but the punctuation is perfect.

Bold for the emphasis.

Uses ellipsis in the end of most phrases. . .

Also only send ellipsis if doesn't want to answer.

Rarely mistypes, but if do, doesn't correct.

Destiny

Again, italic.

Capitalization and punctuation perfect.

Doesn't mistype, and corrects the others faster than the person themselves.

Bold for emphasis.

But when angry and wants to be taken more seriously, uses exclamation marks at the end!

Sends empty messages if doesn't want to answer.

Answers in a unbelievable speed. Sometimes send multiple responses almost at once.

If wants to laugh (which RARELY occurs) sends "Ha, ha, haha."

Destruction

ALL CAPS. Inconsistent punctuation.

Double square brackets to [[EMPHASIS]].

Laughs with "OHOHOHO" and similar.

Sometimes uses ":DDD" by influence of Delirium.

When mistypes, very rarely corrects, and corrects expressively (ex. "I MEANT TOMORROW").

Delirium

wRiTES cApITaLiZiNg RAndOmly. punctuation.. it's complicated. she knows how to use question marks that's much I guess

She starts every phrase (when she remembers) with "@ - - >"

For emphasis, she alternates between ****ASTERISKS****, (((TRIPLE PARENTHESIS))), bold and FULL CAPS.

When more controlled, she capitalizes less (ex. "iTs Me."). But the more she is angry or ansious, the harder becomes to understand what she's saying (she replaces some letters with random symbols, keyboard smashes mid phrase etc).

She uses every type of emoticon possible. But her favorites apparently are ":D" and "@__@". Kaomojis are rarely used.

Sometimes Barnabas translates what she's saying. (Ex. Del: "@ - - > iM sOOOoOooy hApPPY!!!! ajahshshhshd". Barbanas: "She said I'm so happy.")

Laughs with keyboard smash, the longer the funnier.

When she mistypes, she doesn't correct. Also dislikes when someone excessively corrects her.

okay now some extras, I didn't think much about them so yea

Lucifer

When he mistypes, he corrects himself as fast as he can. But Destiny always corrects his mistypes first and faster which pisses him off. But Lucifer also corrects the people when they mistype to annoy or simply to correct.

Sometimes simply answers "A" or "K".

Also laughs with "Hah". Already laughed with ))) at some point.

Corinthian

He uses ";)" and "B)".

Begins the phrases with < less than and finishes with greater than >

Hob

When sending a long text, finishes with "~ H."

The one who said that Morpheus is the "*-*" emoticon, and insists in using it with him.

okay im tired, if anything I will edit this post or simply reblog with additions. also now im feeling guilty of tagging cori and hob but whatever

thank you if you read allat

#the sandman #ok let me tag them all #dream of the endless #death of the endless #desire of the endless #despair of the endless #destiny of the endless #destruction of the endless #delirium of the endless #lucifer morningstar #the corinthian #hob gadling

[synthapostate]

WIP List Strikes Again

Because making lists helps my brain.

Resist Psychic Death - Possessed Newt. (Undergoing structural changes.)

The Tropes Nobody Asked For - A bodyswap AU. This would be complete if I could come up with a concluding paragraph to wrap things up.

I could be writing sweaty nerd sex like a normal person but no - Mostly a story about self-image. Angst. Fluff. There is no plot. Some kind of stream of consciousness BS. (Complete in the sense that anything can be complete given continuity of identity within linear flow of time.) It wasn't complete. Turns out I'm writing sweaty nerd sex but not like a normal person. Scrapped. Wtf I don't know. Maybe not everything needs to have a plot.

Heating Pad - A cat adopts Hermann.

Miserable, Lonely and Depressed (Pathetic) - The return of Cool Uncle Newt. (He's not cool, he's possessed.)

Vampire AU - I mean obviously I had to write a vampire AU at some point. (Comedy.)

Whump - Was supposed to be about a car accident, but it turned into emotional hurt/comfort. With pie.

Some Days You Just Can't Get Rid of a Bomb - Newt tries to solve capitalism. I don't think this is even going anywhere, but I like the title too much to let it go.

Retail Horror Stories - Newt and Hermann commiserate over the shitty jobs they worked when they were younger. (Maybe scrapped because honestly no one needs my nonfiction about MegaKaren.) Scrapped because people are gross.

The Graves Stood Tenantless - Comedy, it was SUPPOSED TO BE A COMEDY Death of a major character. 30k word novella about grief APPARENTLY. Still lacking final chapter and epilogue.

Nightmares - Ghost drift bleeds into their dreams. This would also be complete if I could come up with a concluding paragraph to wrap things up.

Cold as Ice - Hurt/Comfort? Something. Contains no hurt/comfort and has nothing to do with cold or ice, but...it's...something. A convergence of "whoever will take him" and (numbers) "will never betray me". Hurt people hurt people, but survivors can be kind.

Newt's Passion - A sex pollen fic. (No, it isn't.) (Zom com.)

Other, Funnier Ghost Story - Will it be a comedy this time? Let's find out. It is a comedy but it's about vampires now. OH GOD. Not a ghost story, not remotely funny. Vampires, full horror. I'm tempted to resurrect my old pen name for this one. (Y.A. Gorefest, Jr.)

Consent is Sexy - A team-building exercise leads to certain confessions that would not be made while sober.

Cold as Ice 2: Alaskan Boogaloo - Does have something to do with cold and ice.

The Worst Thing I Can Possibly Imagine - My genuine attempt to work through something, but then I thought of a punchline so now it's a funny little shitpost.

Splash - A...feelings thing. The first tentative steps toward getting along.

Caffeine Blues - I swore I would never write a coffee shop au, but...(One chapter to go. They were supposed to have a big fight in the final chapter, but they went ahead and did it early, so now I don't exactly know what happens. Also, it's no longer set in a coffee shop.)

Fields of Azure - Newt and Hermann are sent on an outdoorsy team-building retreat with some rangers (possibly by mistake) and both turn out to be full of surprises. Pure fluff.

Stop You Have Enough WIPs - Some silly fluff for these stressful times.

Shoes - Newt's past catches up with him. Hermann is intrigued.

Groundhog Day - Hey man, these sci fi tropes exist for a reason.

Turning Cursive Letters Into Knives - I swore I would never write a soulmate au, but...

Newt and Hermann Go On Six Dates - I write fluff now 😊💖

Hermann Gets Shot - It is so dangerous to start a fight in an elevator when one of the people you're fighting has a gun.

Return to Sender - Newt leaves Hong Kong to work for Shao. Angst. Uhhhhh I used that title for something else. What's another song about letters

Find Me in the Drift - Some very disorganized ramblings that might be a sequel to Dinner With a Friend.

The Curse of Gottlieb Manor - In which I actually try to write horror on purpose, and give myself the most intense nightmares I've had in years. I'm toning it down for the actual story.

Painting the Kitchen - About finding a future after the apocalypse is averted.

Total Eclipse of the Heart - Jake Pentecost doesn't trust Newt, decides to keep a close eye on him to guard Hermann's back, and accidentally ends up with two new dads.

Black and White Cookies - Birthday fluff.

A Kidnapping - Um...it's a kidnapping.

Wake Up, Dr. Jones! - More trauma. Possibly too much trauma actually. Scrap this why can't I type a question mark

Have a Cup of Cheer - So the truth is I hate Christmas, but this has been a year defined by my new willingness to embrace the things I was sure I would hate, starting in January with Pacific Rim. I haven't regretted it yet. So, to holly jolly hell with it, I'm writing Christmas fic.

Space Opera - When the first kaiju comes through the breach, Newt fires off a plea for help into deep space. There can't be just one alien race out there, right? Maybe some of them will be on our side.

Cherry Bomb - Apropos of nothing, Newt decides to bite the bullet and seduce Hermann.

Third Act Breakup - I also hate romcoms. Let's do this thing.

Sweet Siren Song - Newt is doing his biology thing in the Atlantic, Hermann is an inexperienced sailor who shouldn't be out alone on a day like this, they both get caught in a storm, turns out mermaids are real. (Romance.)

What's Your Angle - Turns out mermaids are real. (Horror.)

Etiquette and Protocol - Loosely based on a dream, the boys are forced to take an etiquette class because anger management isn't working. (Protip: if you encourage me to add something to my list, I probably will.)

Am I Blue - In which Newt learns how far Hermann is willing to go to save him.

Mr. Cellophane - Post-war, they go their separate ways, but when Newt is involved in an unlikely lab accident, obviously his first thought is to go to Hermann for help. Oh no, I just realized it would be funnier if they switched roles, DO I HAVE TO START THIS OVER FROM SCRATCH

Hanahaki - I never thought I would write a hanahaki fic, not because I hate the premise but simply because I had never heard of it until this year and it seemed too specific to intrude on. But when do I ever pass up the opportunity to gorge myself at the angst buffet

In Time - I could almost reuse the tag "Hermann Gottlieb bends all of time and space to his will for the man he loves," but this time it isn't on purpose and it's up to Newt to take charge of the situation.

Chuck Punches Hermann in the Face - He was aiming for Newt.

I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm - In which Newt owns a space heater, and Hermann does not.

Marriage of Convenience - Lars Gottlieb has a scheme, Hermann will do anything to get out of it, Newt is an agent of chaos, fake dating ensues.

Dream of Flying - I'm doing Secret Santa :]

#fic

[owlsbride]

Situation: 

I've just posted a new chapter on Icha Icha and Prejudice.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28777821/chapters/70570248

I'm about to post a new one for Rear Window and have already thought about the next one.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/37587790/chapters/93822145

I posted my first Kakashi x Reader fic here, which was really good. 

And so, I thought my mind would be at peace for a while. Still, I realise I have this bunch of new ideas that don't let me sleep at night. Because while I'm writing and pretending to arrive at an end with my main two fics, I don't know when it will be because the stories keep flowing by themselves like a lovely calm river; I NEED, yes, with capital letters, to give life to this many others one-shots or stories. 

So, like in a diary, a list of possible plots is left here. Maybe this way, they can shut up a bit and let me be. 

1- Inspired by a conversation with @silverninja88: Your life sucks, and you know it even more when you come back from a terrible mission that didn't go as expected, and the only person you want there is your old Anbu partner that now decided to left it all to be a teacher. How could he change you for a bunch of kids? 

2- I'm Lady Tsunade; What Do You Care?: We all know Tsunade, her strength and determination. We know everything she had been through the years, but what else do we pretend to be from her? Aren't women too empowered to choose how to live and make our own choices? Why is it that she is that question at times? 

A conversation with herself that challenges her decisions, what is expected of her, her role of power as a women and her chosen loneliness

3- The Monkey and the Anbu: An elusive thieve dressed as the legendary Iron Monkey is making some mischief in Konoha. Under the orders of an unknown landlord, he is stilling important secret scrolls from under the nose of the Hokage, and there is no Anbu who seems would stop him until the last resource comes back from another mission. Could be the young Anbu Captain Hatake Kakashi able to stop this elusive and charismatic thieve without turning deathly hurt or falling into his charms?

4-Sakura finally got the date of her life! And she is thrilled about it, but she doesn't have many ideas about what an actual date is, so she decided to search for ideas. Interviewing her friends is easy, but things got complicated when she got to his former sensei's house. Will she get to the date?

5- (Finally, and indulging myself) A sequel to This too Shall Pass, Undertaker (Kuroshitsuji), after the pandemic, and his first encounter with the doctor, decided that having her around is much funnier than don't have her at all, so now it's the moment to get close to her. The only problem is that this time he will have to play the doctor and, for once, not the death or the mortician. 

So now you are alerted. This is all to come. If you have ideas, questions, suggestions, or would like something special, you know where to find me. Cheers 

Yours, Owl's

#naruto #kuroshitsuji #fanfiction #fanfic #naruto fanfiction #kakashi fanfiction #undertaker #kuroshitsuji fanfiction #writting #reblog #reblogg #ask #follow 👑 Share ❤️ Enjoy 🍑 #literature #supportwriters #sakura centric #kakashi x you #kakashi x reader #kakashi x sakura #tsunade #Read on AO3 #AO3 fanfic #ao3 writer #artists on tumblr #narutoverse #fluff #kakashi fluff #kakashi smut #Sakura Haruno #ideas

[first-empire-fancy-boys]

Reading Larrey was making me stop to google too much and I just did not have enough brain energy for it tonight (I don't know that many medical terms, much less medical terms in outdated spelling), so I switched over to Fighting for Napoleon French Soldiers' Letters 1799-1815.

4 different guys put their letter on one sheet (most likely only one of them knew how to write) and the last two copying each other lol

Hubert-Joseph Dantinne, already encountered in Chapter 2, was the cousin of Jean-Joseph Jeunehomme. He sent a very banal message to his family:

My very dear father

[…] I received your money. I have nothing else say except that I am well. I kiss my father, my mother, my brother and my sister and all the members of the family and my friends.

Jean-Joseph Englebert's was equally brief:

Madrid Capital of Spain M 1808

My very dear father

[…] I have nothing else to say except that I am well. I kiss you with all my heart. I kiss my father, my sister and all the members of the family and my friends. Give my regards to those who ask about me.

One of the other letters is translated such that the soldier identified Eugene de Beauharnais as "vice king" instead of viceroy and I'm just sitting here wondering why vice king sounds so much funnier to me than viceroy even though that is basically what viceroy means.

#napoleonic #napoleonic era #napoleonic wars #fighting for napoleon french soldiers letters

[walhalla]

do you guys know the typical really long and specific light novel titles??? i'm gonna write one watch this

I Wanted To Get My Friend A Present For His Birthday But Ended Up Killing His Brother And Now I Have To Kill Him Too!

#i'm so sorry #the capital letters just make it funnier to me #and now I'm going to bed #tokyo revengers #kazutora hanemiya

[mysticalmusicwhispers]

Filling me with rage is a 100% guaranteed way to make me post more. Guaranteed. Foolproof solution to hiatuses.

#I have just. Looked at. A blog. that Has. some stuff I don.t like. a lot. So it's time to post more POC centric stuff. As a solution. #As you can see. I am Spiteful and Frustrated that there are blogs. With No mention of Non European/American content. Besides in Reblogs. #As an aside. I should really just start blocking people. That I don't like to see posting. But. Alas. I cannot. I have no idea why I dont. #And. it's like. Do you Know. the Rest of the World. Exists??? Anyways. I will be back. I'm making some Cameroon content real quick. #He is Underrated. And a big softie. And I already love him because he plays soccer and has a pet lion. And loves wildlife as much/more than #me #In conclusion I Love. All the POC. And am indifferent to/love/like most/some of the Europeans. Besides Britain. But. They have enough conten #already. And if the Tags. Read like some 1600s Letters to the Governor of Colonial Fairyland. I didn't Intend that. #At first. But it got Funnier as I wrote on. And so now all the Capitalizations are in the Wrong places because it is Intentional. #ramblings #Perhaps I will Delete this Later. Who Knows.

[gatheringbones]

[“WHEN I FIRST started really writing, like for real writing, like not a story for English class or in a journal but for really real writing, Stone Butch Blues by Leslie Feinberg was the only book I could hold up and say, “I want to do this. I love this book because this is a story about someone like me, and before there was this book, there were no stories about people like me written by people like me. I want to write a book just like this one, except less sad. I want to be like the person in this book, except funnier. I want to write a book about this hard life, except I need this hard life to one day be easier.”

Last year I got a letter (well, a Facebook message, actually) from a young trans guy who said he had read all my books, ever since he was in grade eight and a counsellor had given him one, and that my writing had given him hope, had helped him come out and transition and feel less alone, but now he was contacting me for the very first time ever to complain about something I had recently read at a live show I had done with some other writers. Their stuff was really heavy, he said, about sexual abuse and misogyny, and then I got up and told a funny story about how when I had top surgery, I was worried Did they switch my nipples around and stitch the wrong one back on the right side? or whatever, and how dare I make light of body dysmorphia issues like that? and he was so disappointed and so forth, and P.S.: Why didn’t I also talk about capitalism and the environment and other important issues?

I called another writer friend of mine and read her the message. I was nearly in tears, and she was trying not to laugh at me but not succeeding. She has three books out and is working on her fourth, but she was breastfeeding her second son right then as she was talking on the phone to me, and the dog, or maybe the cat, just puked on the stairs and it was still all over her sock, not to mention the carpet, and she hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep since the first son was born and he just started grade one, so don’t hold your breath waiting for this novel, she told her agent last week.

“Wait,” she said. “Back the fuck up. Do you mean to tell me you can’t feel your nipples, like at all? God, what I wouldn’t give to not feel his little teeth coming in, day by day by day. I believe this is why babies are born toothless. No one would breastfeed at all if the little fuckers were born with a mouth full of teeth. You have to ease yourself in to excruciating pain like that,” she informed me.

I could hear water running in the background and the dog barking.

“Besides, switching nipples is serious fucking business, and anyone who can’t see that hasn’t had their nipples removed and stitched back on again. Yet. He’s young. It’s his job to turn on the ones who made him, who fed him, who taught him. It’s a rite-of-passage thing. It’s in all those fucking parenting books Jin is always bringing home. I tripped over How to Raise a Feminist the other day and fully felt like killing him for two days. It’s the lack of sleep, I tell him, but some days I suspect I actually do want to kill him.

“Anyways, don’t take any of this personal. It’s not even really about you, or what you wrote or said, or didn’t write or say. It about him flexing his brand-new biceps or spreading his newly feathered wings, or whatever it is the kids do these days to make sure we know that we are officially irrelevant now, and that they invented everything radical. You probably did it to someone too, pal, think back. Next.”

She has a way of putting things into perspective. That’s why I called her.”]

Ivan Coyote, Rebent Sinner

#ivan coyote #trans literature #stone butch blues #gender stuff #wasteland radio #He’s young. It’s his job to turn on the ones who made him who fed him who taught him. It’s a rite-of-passage

[thera-daydreams]

INDAY

± A Trese Fic ±

[Crispin/Basilio/Maliksi/Dominic x Skymaiden!Reader]

01: Noon at Ngayon (✓)

02: Ang Kambal na Anak ni Datu Talagbusao, Diyos ng Digmaan (Link)

03: Ang Prinsipe ng Mga Tikbalang (Link)

04: Ang Pinuno ng Mga Aswang (Link)

05: (Link) 06: (Link) 07: (Link)

01: Noon at Ngayon

Back then, long before you were born, your mother used to work as a katulong of the Trese Family and was very close to its matriarch, Miranda Trese. Coming from the province, she was no stranger to superstitions—even more so after knowing the work of Miranda's husband Anton Trese, who was actually the Babaylan-Mandirigma of Manila.

Years later, after giving birth to you around the same time Miranda gave birth to her twins (one a stillborn, unfortunately), it was you and Alexandra who became best buddies instead, as different your personalities were. You two had practically grown up together and you yourself heard countless stories of the supernatural from your Tito Anton. It wasn't that hard to believe when he and his sigbin companions would sometimes come home tracking blood prints on the floors (which you'd helped your mother clean up). Heck, you'd even met Señor Armanaz, the Great Stallion himself and the ruling tikbalang of the Armanaz herd. That pretty, white-haired diwata seemed extremely fond of you, too, which was evident when you'd sneak in with Alexandra to Tito Anton's meetings and she would smile (even wave) at you happily.

You had absolutely no idea why the fae-like lady was so nice to you, but you weren't complaining at all!

However, in spite of your experiences with the supernatural, you and your mother always believed that you were normal humans. In actuality, that was who you were for the majority of your childhood. It was only until Miranda herself saw a vision of you—a much older you—fighting the monsters of the Underworld alongside her own daughter. During dinnertime, Miranda told your mother that she saw you blessed by the heavens with powers that would aid in the battle against evil.

It sounded absolutely ridiculous, right? Yeah, your mom thought so, too.

Your mother only laughed it off as she placed a steaming bowl of tinola in front of Alexandra's brothers, who instantly dug in like they haven't been fed in years.

"Boys! Dahan-dahan lang," Anton reprimanded his sons. "Or else you'll choke and the soup will come out of your noses!"

"Okay, Papa."

"Grabe ka naman, Miranda. I doubt that anything like that's going to happen to my daughter," your mom chuckled, watching your little hands try to feed Alexandra with a piece of chicken. "Unlike you guys, our lineage isn't anything special. Ordinaryo lang ang lahi namin."

Miranda sighed, looking at you and her only living daughter enjoying your time being kids, "I guess you're right. Baka panaginip lang talaga 'yun."

Anton glanced at her knowingly. Although he was aware that you and your mom didn't dabble in magic or anything like they did, he knew that whenever Miranda—one of the Seven Seers—had such vivid dreams, it was something of great importance. But he decided to say nothing, understanding how much your mother wanted to let you live as normal of a life possible in this household.

That was when you were seven years old. One year later, Miranda died fighting against a group of aswang who decided to betray Anton. Said man found the eight-year-old Alexandra hiding in a corner behind the waterfalls, scared and holding Sinag close to her heaving chest as she tried to hold her tearful sobs in.

Of course, a few days later, you and your mother attended the funeral with the mourning Trese family. All the brothers had done their best to stay strong, especially for their little sister who didn't fully understand yet what just happened. Little you ran towards Alexandra, holding her hand tightly as her mother's casket was lowered. Around you were various comrades, both human and non-human, paying their respects to their bereaved allies.

That day, as you turned your back to return to your mother's arms, you knew you would never forget the feeling of numerous unearthly eyes following your every movement.

Even they could sense that there was something about you, a so-called regular human child. You smelled human and had the aura of one, but there was something they couldn't place. It was like a tiny rock getting into your shoe, not coming out at all.

Much changed after that, but you and Alexandra remained close together. To your dismay, just after you graduated elementary, you and your mother had to move back to the province to stay with your sick grandparents. The last thing you could remember was kneeling in the back of the car, looking sadly through the rear windscreen as Alexandra and her brothers waved goodbye to you.

More than a decade had passed since then. You used to write letters to Alexandra, but after Hank told you she had to undergo the trials of the Puno ng Balete, you haven't heard from her (although Hank did disclose that she'd managed to come home safely, which was a great relief to you). You didn't blame her; you knew Tito Anton had passed away in the five years she was gone and that she had to take over the title of Lakan, as well as the Babaylan-Mandirigma of Manila. It was a demanding job! You remembered Tito Anton sometimes staying up all night—breakfast would be served and he would still be in his study, going over paperwork. On other days, he would be gone for consecutive nights handling cases all around Manila. You could only pray Alexandra was fine.

Your life had continued on, as well—you took care of your ill grandparents until they died, helped your mother in the province, went to a good highschool, then earned your degree in another prominent city that wasn't Manila.

Your mom actually recommended that you go to school somewhere else, given the constantly rising number of attacks in the capital of the country. And so you did. Life was hard, but normal until then.

The funny thing was that, when you reached the age of twenty-one, you finally understood why those supernatural creatures kept looking at you weirdly as a kid (and why Lady Diwata liked you so much).

What was even funnier was that the dramatic revelation came to you when you weren't in the Philippines. It was after you freshly graduated college, when you were traveling all over Asia to volunteer in charity projects. It was always your dream to one day expand your horizons not only beyond your province, but the Philippines itself, while also doing good in the world.

And here you were, walking that path you dreamt of.

The organization you luckily managed to become a member of provided everything you needed, and every few months, you would move from country to country. Because of that, you'd already been able to travel to so many places. First it was Thailand, then Indonesia, China, South Korea, India, Japan, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Malaysia, and currently, you were in Vietnam. Visiting those places was fun and gave you a whole new perspective of the world you lived in; it was a... learning experience, too.

Still, that incident happened when you were in Thailand, when you were the last one in the rented apartment balcony taping up the boxes for the donation drive tomorrow. Yawning, you cut more duct tape and stuck them to the open boxes tightly.

"Inday," someone said from behind you. You didn't bother turning around, thinking it was one of your fellow volunteers looking for you this late at night. Probably your roommate. She was the only one who usually called you by your nickname instead of your real name.

"Hmm?" you hummed, taping up more boxes. "Papasok na ako sa kwarto, Lyn. I just have a few more boxes to close. Alam mong mapapagalitan ako kung may hindi madidistribute bukas."

"Hindi ako si Lyn."

You paused, then slowly turned around, flinching at the sudden bright light that shone right against your eyes. For a moment, akala mo namatay ka na at hinaharap mo si San Pedro.

It was a glowing figure in white whose face you couldn't clearly see, which frightened you even more.

"Ay, mama!" you exclaimed, shielding your eyes and falling to your knees. Then, you gasped loudly, patting your body and panicking with closed lids. "Oh my God, am I dead? Nasa heaven na po ba ako?" Your lips wobbled. "Ngayon pa nga lang ako nakaalis ng Pilipinas... I haven't even done all the things I've wanted to do! Hindi pa ako nakapagpaalam sa nanay ko—aray!"

You'd felt something hit the back of your head. Hard. It was the glowing figure in white, but now you could see their unimpressed face scowling at you.

"Kalma lang, Inday. Hindi ka pa patay, pero makinig ka nang mabuti," they shushed you urgently (you weren't sure if they were male or female). "Do not be afraid. I am a messenger from the heavens, and I bear great news!"

"Great news...?" you trailed off, then your eyes widened excitedly. "Like, nanalo ba ako ng lotto? Isang milyon? Bilyon? Hala! Wait, is this a Mama Mary moment? I'm not ready to be the next immaculate conception!"

They glared at you, making you shut up instantly. "Sorry, I'll shut up now," you apologized with a mumble. This person (thing?) was kind of... strict. Whatever did you do wrong? You were just sleep-deprived and running on energy drinks (as well as kape).

"I have come to tell you that you are the vessel of the last skymaiden," they revealed, arms wide open. The light around them seemed to grow even brighter, making you squint. You felt like you were about the go blind! "Ikaw ang huling biraddali, Y/N L/N."

At ayun, zero brain cells remaining. Tunay na nagloading screen ang brain mo. Nag-error at nagcrash pa nga siguro, eh.

"... Ha? Ano?"

You blinked, completely speechless—as seen by how wide your jaw had dropped open. It wasn't that you were unfamiliar with the biraddali, it was just that you'd only heard of them once when you were just a young child. Your Tita Miranda had mentioned they were long gone from the world of the supernatural.

"Oh no, me? A biraddali? You're joking," you stuttered out, pointing at yourself. "Aren't they extinct or something? And, uh... not human?"

They nodded, "Yes. It is correct that everyone in the mystical world thought that the biraddali were long gone, even before the colonizers came to conquer the native lands. However, before the skymaidens all disappeared, the youngest and most powerful one among the seven sisters sealed her soul away to the rivers of time until the strength of a heavenly being was needed to help purify the evils of the world." The figure floated closer to you. "That last biraddali's soul, along with its corresponding power, traits, and knowledge, had chosen to reside deep within you the moment you were conceived."

Honestly, how were you even supposed to react? Your life was nowhere near ready for something like this. Was this a prank by your friends? Your colleagues? The light around this person seemed too authentic to be fake, though.

You stayed in shock for an entire minute, silent. The being in front of you only waited for a response.

"Ano 'to, Sailor Moon? Winx Club?" you whispered to yourself, before slapping your own cheek and scolding yourself. A stinging red mark was left on your face. "Inday, kakamanhwa mo 'yan! Nasosobraan ka na ata, matulog ka na!"

Sighing heavily, you rubbed your face tiredly, still in disbelief that you—according to this stranger—were apparently some old soul from a species of ethereal beings that were long gone. It sounded like something out of those reincarnation webnovels you got addicted to. What now, you were the MC? Wattpad ka, girl?

"Look, this is a mistake. I still have to wake up early tomorrow to give out the donations," you spoke to the glowing being (or whatever it was), laughing nervously. "I'm sorry, but I think you have the wrong person. Either that or I must be hallucinating from sleep deprivation, because I'm definitely not a divine creature. You're probably just a product of my imagination. Sorry, I'm going to bed."

Bang!

At that moment, the power in the building went out. The only thing you could see was the thing who assumed you were a biraddali (they were so bright they were like a flashlight in the dark for you).

"Brownout?" you blinked. It felt wrong, though. It was eerily silent. "Did a fuse blow up?"

"Nagsimula na ang iyong unang pagsubok, Y/N," they announced seriously. "Creatures of the dark have already begun to take over this building. You may not have noticed, but all throughout your life, you have always been helping and giving. It is your nature as a being descended from the heavens themselves, and now, it is time for you to accept your destiny."

"Hoy, sandali lang! Sandali, sandali!" You were absolutely wide awake now as you heard the sounds of strange whispers around you. It was terrifyingly creepy, much creepier than whatever you'd seen back in the Trese Residence (and you'd seen a lot in that house). You did not want to be a part of a horror movie-like lifestyle. "Don't I have a choice in this?! I—I don't have any training or fighting skills! Hindi ako Alexandra Trese o Babaylan-Mandirigma! I'm not ready for this, holy sh—"

The candescent creature raised a brow at you, "Inday, I just told you that you have the power of a lost mystical being. And tell me, if you had the power to save your companions in this building from the forces of evil, would you save them?"

You were silent, knowing the answer.

"Well?" they prodded.

You bit your lip, "Oo naman. I'm not heartless!" But you were a little impulsive. And apparently, insane.

"That's what I thought. I just need you to believe in yourself," the being encouraged, gentler this time. It transformed into something smaller and rounder—like a ball of light. "Ikaw ang huling biraddali, Y/N, at marami kang kapangyarihan. Isa dito ay ang pagtulong sa mga nangangailangan, lalo na laban sa masasamang nilalang."

Bestie, what had you just gotten into?

You swallowed apprehensively, then nodded in determination, "Sige. So, how do I save the people in the building? Biraddali were said to be able to shapeshift, right? If I remember the tale correctly. Oh my God, I can't believe this is happening to me right now."

"That's just one of your abilities, but I'll teach you. I'm actually your guide," they replied confidently. "With me, you'll be able to master your powers and exceed your capabilities in no time!"

"Wait! Anong pangalan mo?" you asked breathlessly, following them as they speedily flew out of the room. "Grabe, slow down! I'm not athletic! I haven't even exercised this week, goodness."

"... Gabay. Ako si Gabay."

Despite the adrenaline and fear running in your veins, you still grinned up at the ball of light, "Okay. Nice to meet you, Gabay."

This was just the beginning of your supernatural combat training abroad. When you returned to the Philippines three years later, you were stronger, faster, and more powerful than you'd ever felt before. It was crazy.

Oh, that guy who tried to rob you when you came back to Manila was crazy, too. The two identical-looking men in dark suits and white ties—you wondered how they were surviving the heat in that attire—could only watch in awe as you chased down that man who stole your bag while doing acrobatics and parkour.

"Uy, Kuya Crispin, sino kaya 'yun?"

"Ewan ko, Basilio."

"... She's kind of pretty. Type ko. Type mo rin ata."

"The more important question is, paano niya na nahuli ang magnanakaw?"

"Oo nga, no? One in a million chance 'yan dito sa Maynila, haha! Ang astig ni ate!"

(Next Chapter.)

± Author's Notes ±

Ayieee, type daw tayo ng kambal! 😌

How the hell did I write this entirely random thing in one day? 2k+ words? Ano daw? 😃⁉️

You know, this was supposed to just be a Trese one-shot or a bunch of drabbles for the characters I'm currently simping for... but it turned into a full-blown, shameless self-insert slash crackfic. Kakacellphone ko 'yan. 🤦‍♀️

Nagresearch pa ako ng articles about Filipino skymaidens because I wanted something similiar to the Japanese celestial maidens (tennyo). Very random idea but why not? Gusto ko ng badass Y/N na hindi takot lumaban sa mga mumu! 👻

Also, pagbigyan niyo nalang ang matandang 'to kasi ilang taon na akong hindi nagpopost ng mga writings ko. May track record pa naman ako bilang author na hindi nagtatapos ng mga fanfic, hehe. I also haven't read the comics so please forgive me for any inaccuracies and of course, misspellings/errors. Gusto ko lang matapos 'to para makakabalik na ako sa Jujutsu Kaisen. 🥲😗

Anyways, comments and constructive criticism are welcome! Hit those heart, reblog, and follow buttons for updates! Just comment if you want to be tagged in the next chapters. ❤

#trese #trese netflix #trese 2021 #crispin #basilio #maliksi #dominic #x reader #kambal x reader #crispin x reader #basilio x reader #maliksi x reader #dominic x reader #trese x reader #thera.writes

[simonalkenmayer]

plz be quiet on funny posts PLEASE I AM LIT BEGGING U U ARE RUINING EVERYONES GOOD TIME

My thousands of followers beg to differ, and believe it or not, I also have a sense of humor. It makes this effort you’ve gone to so much funnier, rather than the piteous attempt at bullying that merely demonstrates your fragile psychology, that it is! So…you see? I chuckle at capital letters. Very funny.

If you don’t want to see my remarks on posts, do you know how to fix that? You block me. It’s like magic! Instantly all my additions disappear!

You know that, but you don’t do it. Why?

I have my thoughts.

Another tip, if you click the previous segment of a post, you see the earlier version, which allows you to eliminate later comments when you want to reblog a specific post in a specific way. Also I don’t see you chastising anyone else for adding to funny posts. It’s just me to whom you object. So….I don’t actually care.

[iamthenightcolormeblack]

Pride and Prejudice 1940: "When Pretty Girls T-E-A-S-E-D Men Into Marriage"

Made during the Great Depression, this classic black and white film is loosely based on Austen's novel and is set in what is likely the 1830s rather than the Regency Era (late 18th century to early 19th century). It is an escapist piece which capitalizes on nostalgia for a simpler time by transporting its viewers to a chocolate-box vision of the past, while paying homage to Austen's social satire by delivering plenty of laughs along the way.

Overall Thoughts on the Film:

The first time I watched this movie, I was confused because the plot as well as the setting was revised significantly (the events after Darcy's first proposal are changed to hasten the happy ending; Darcy's letter and Elizabeth's visit to Pemberley are not included in this movie). This changing of plot points makes the 2005 movie a much more faithful adaptation in comparison with this version, in spite of the creative liberties both take with the novel.

Production Design:

The movie is a typical example of Golden Age Hollywood productions, with beautiful actresses and melodramatic flourishes added to increase the drama. Some of the lines are delivered very quickly, in keeping with the comedic style of the time.

The music: definitely not historically accurate. A lot of sentimental, "ye olde timey" string arrangements that emphasize emotions or fast-paced waltz music for balls/parties.

The 1830s costumes are beautiful; it seems as if no expense (or quantity of fabric) was spared in making them. The bonnets are way taller and have more decorations than typical 1830s bonnets. Some of the patterns/fabric choices are very 1930s, and the costumes are exaggerated in such as way as to make the wearers look like fancy turkeys.

Hair and Makeup: very 1930s, with finger/sausage curls, plucked eyebrows, lipstick/lip makeup, and long lashes.

The sets: the dollhouse-like interiors are lavishly gilded and made to look as opulent as possible. Outdoors scenes are lush, with lots of flowers and bushes; the garden in which the second proposal takes place is gorgeous. The set design transports the viewer into an idyllic vision of the bucolic English countryside.

The Lead Actors:

With the exception of Laurence Olivier, the majority of the actors are American, since this is a Hollywood production. Many of the characters in the film's imaginary vision of pastoral Britain speak American or make clumsy attempts to imitate British English.

Greer Garson: while she is definitely too old for the part, she perfectly conveys Elizabeth's intelligence, outspokenness, and sarcasm. Her facial expressions are killer as well; with the arch of an eyebrow along with a snarky side eye, she captivates us all. All in all, Garson effectively shows off Elizabeth's impertinence through her nonverbal acting (this reminds me strongly of Jennifer Ehle's Elizabeth Bennet).

Laurence Olivier: he effectively conveys Darcy's pride while hinting at his deeper feelings beneath the surface (I can see why Colin Firth spoke so highly of Olivier's portrayal of Darcy). Most importantly, the film emphasizes Darcy's intelligence; he is certainly Elizabeth's intellectual equal. While this portrayal of Darcy is very accurate to the book, Darcy's pride does go away pretty quickly (he and Elizabeth form a tentative friendship early on) and his social awkwardness isn't immediately obvious thanks to his charm. Also the unflattering hairstyle with the greasy hair and painted on sideburns makes me sad.

Key Scenes:

Opening scene: The title card appeals directly to the audience's nostalgia for a sentimental, romanticized past: “It happened in OLD ENGLAND (this was actually capitalized), in the village of Meryton…” The Bennet women are at a fabric shop, where they gossip with aunt Phillips about the rich people moving into Netherfield Park.

The carriage race: this scene, which isn’t in the original novel, represents the rivalry between the Bennets and Lucases. The mothers both want their daughters to be the first to snag the rich bachelors.

The first ball: There is a historical anachronism as the music is a waltz by Strauss, who became popular in late 19th century, specifically the Gilded Age; far too early for the Regency Era or 1830s England. Other changes from the original novel include Elizabeth meeting Wickham before Darcy; other events from Aunt Phillips’ ball (which isn’t included in this movie) and Wickham and Darcy’s confrontation are included in this scene.

Elizabeth’s impression of Darcy at the ball: she puts on airs and mocks his casual dismissal of her as tolerable (definitely a parallel with the 1995 version, where Jennifer Ehle does the same, but privately with Jane).

Great comedic change: Darcy introduces himself to Elizabeth after calling her tolerable and asks if she will dance with him (this originally takes place at Mr. Lucas' ball). Right after rejecting Darcy, she instantly agrees to dance with Wickham; in a humorous moment, Darcy evacuates to a corner of the room to sulk while seeing Wickham dance with Elizabeth.

The “Accomplished woman” scene: the dialogue lifted directly from the book for the most part. Darcy, in a departure from his trademark seriousness, shows off his playful side when reacting to Caroline Bingley's "turn about the room." I particularly like this added repartee from Elizabeth Bennet to Darcy, which is clever but also foreshadows her prejudice: “If my departure is any punishment, you are quite right. My character reading is not too brilliant.”

Elizabeth can't stand Mr. Collins: After twirling about his monocle, he pronounces that: “It might interest you to know my taste was formed by lady Catherine de Bourgh.” The best part of this scene is when Elizabeth plucks a wrong note on her harp when Collins gets really annoying.

The Netherfield ball (which is now a garden party):

Elizabeth running away from Mr. Collins: She looks rather ridiculous, almost like an overdressed turkey, in a white dress with puffy sleeves as she runs away from an overeager Collins. Then she hides in the bushes while Darcy helps her to hide, telling Collins he doesn't know where she is. It's fun but most likely not something a proper lady and gentleman would do (two people of the opposite gender out alone, shock!).

The archery scene: Darcy attempts to teach Elizabeth how to shoot a bow and arrow, even though he doesn’t hit the bullseye. She goes on to impress him by perfectly hitting the bullseye every time; Darcy learns his lesson: "Next time I talk to a young lady about archery I won't be so patronizing." Caroline Bingley, very passive aggressive as usual, shows up for her archery lesson right after and it's absolutely perfect.

Mr. Collins attempts to introduce himself to Mr. Darcy: Laurence Olivier captures Darcy so perfectly in this scene (really set the precedent for Colin Firth). When Mr. Collins starts talking (inviting Elizabeth to dance with him) Darcy tries to keep himself well-composed but has a pained expression on his face as if he’s about to pass out. Olivier masters the way Darcy can look so miserable but also disgusted and proud at the same time.

Mr. Collin's proposal to Elizabeth: I like the added touch of Mrs. Bennet pulling Elizabeth back by her skirt when she tries to run out of the room. The dialogue is taken directly from the book, and the scene is made even funnier when Collins holds on to Elizabeth's hand desperately and doesn’t let her get away. My only quibble is that Elizabeth isn’t indignant enough when Mr. Collins doesn't take no for an answer.

Elizabeth and Darcy at Rosings: I like that Olivier subtly indicates that Darcy is clearly affected upon seeing Elizabeth at Rosing, hinting at deeper feelings beneath the surface. I also like how the scriptwriter emphasizes that Darcy indirectly praises Elizabeth and enjoys their conversations, while she remains convinced that he hates her. Sadly, the original dialogue of the piano scene is not included, which is unfortunate as it allows Darcy to reveal his introvert tendencies, calling into question Elizabeth's assertion that he is unpardonably proud.

First proposal: The famous opening lines are mutilated with awkward punctuation: “It’s no use. I’ve struggled in vain. I must tell you how much I admire and love you." While the rest of the dialogue matches up closely with what happens in Austen's novel, both of the actors aren’t emotional enough; instead Elizabeth cries very daintily, and Darcy remains serene, which conflicts with the book's description of both of them being very angry and defensive at each other.

THE SCRIPT:

The first half of the film up to Darcy's first proposal follows the events of the original book closely, though certain blocks of dialogue are moved elsewhere and other events such as Mrs. Phillips' party are skipped over. The most significant changes, besides updating the setting to the 1830s, are made to the second half of the book to squeeze the key events of the story into the movie before delivering the inevitable happy ending.

Brilliant Quotes:

Mr. Bennet's reaction to Mrs. Bennet's despair over the situation of their 5 unmarried daughters: “Perhaps we should have drowned some of them at birth.”

Darcy insists Elizabeth cannot tempt him: “Ugh. Provincial young lady with a lively wit. And there’s that mother of hers.”

Darcy is an arrogant snob: “I’m in no humor tonight to give consequence to the middle classes at play.” (Technically the Bennets are part of the gentry; they just are less wealthy than Darcy).

Elizabeth's reaction to Darcy pronouncing her to be tolerable at best: “What a charming man!”

Elizabeth rebuffs Darcy's offer to dance after overhearing his insult: “I am afraid that the honor of standing up with you is more than I can bear, Mr Darcy.”

Elizabeth favors Wickham after witnessing the bad blood between him and Darcy: “Without knowing anything about it I am on your side.”

Mrs. Bennet's comment after she sends Jane to Netherfield under stormy skies: “There isn’t anything like wet weather for engagements. Your dear father and I became engaged in a thunderstorm.”

Mr. Bennet's reaction to Jane's fever: “Jane must have all the credit for having caught the cold…we’re hoping Elizabeth will catch a cold and stay long enough to get engaged to Mr. Darcy. And if a good snowstorm could be arranged we’d send Kitty over!”

The sisters' description of Mr. Collins: “Oh heavens! what a pudding face.”

Caroline Bingley at the Netherfield garden party: “Entertaining the rustics is not as difficult as I feared. Any simple childish game seems to amuse them excessively.”

Darcy reassuring Elizabeth after helping her escape Mr. Collins: “If the dragon returns St. George will know how to deal with it.”

Darcy learns his lesson after Elizabeth beats him at archery: “The next time I talk to a young lady about archery I won’t be so patronizing.”

Elizabeth comments about a curtain: “Oh that’s pretty. It’s a pity you didn’t make it bigger. You could have put it around Mr. Collins when he becomes a bore.”

Elizabeth on Kitty and Lydia: “2 daughters out of 5, that represents 40% of the noise.”

Elizabeth sees Lady Catherine for the first time: “So that’s the great lady Catherine. Now I see where he learned his manners.”

Lady Catherine's attitude towards philanthropy: “You must learn to draw a firm line between the deserving poor and the undeserving poor.”

Darcy takes Elizabeth's advice: “I’ve thought a great deal about what you said at Netherfield, about laughing more...but it only makes me feel worse."

Elizabeth and Darcy have a conversation with Colonel Fitzwilliam: “He likes the landscape well enough, but the natives, the natives, what boors, what savages … Isn’t that what you think, Mr. Darcy?” With a smile: “It evidently amuses you to think so, Miss Bennet."

CHANGES FROM THE BOOK:

The first half of the film up to Darcy's first proposal follow the events of the original book closely, though certain blocks of dialogue are moved elsewhere and other events such as Mrs. Phillips' party are skipped over. The most significant changes, besides updating the setting to the 1830s, are made to the second half of the book to squeeze the key events of the story into the movie before delivering the inevitable happy ending.

With the exception of Lady Catherine de Bourgh, the portrayals of the characters are (generally) true to the book.

As I said earlier, the film neglects any sort of historical accuracy when setting the story in romanticized "Old England," where genteel people pass simple lives that revolve around dresses, tea parties, social gossip, and marriages. A lot of Austen adaptations present an idealized vision of Regency life, where people are dressed immaculately, flawlessly adhere to "chivalry," and find love in the ballroom. This contributes to the misconception that Austen's novels are shallow chick-lit books with flat characters who live for lavish parties and hot men, instead of stories of unique, complicated women who happen to be well-off but aspire towards love, respect, or independence instead of being content to make economically advantageous marriages. Austen's novels are character novels and she doesn't waste time writing about dresses or tea parties; balls, while exciting, are just another part of daily life for her characters rather than some Extremely Big Special Once In a Blue Moon Event.

Austen's multifaceted view on marriage turns into a game of matchmaking. She recognizes it as necessary for women to survive in the patriarchy, since they cannot provide for themselves unless they marry well, but at the same time, presents marriage as a means for freedom if it is a loving partnership between two people that respect each other. In contrast, marriage is a game of manipulating the partners into wanting to marry (ex. Lady Catherine and Darcy's trickery). Also, it seems to be a given that Elizabeth will marry for love, unlike in the book where it is uncertain whether she will achieve this.

Kitty and Lydia's antics are viewed much more sympathetically as those of young people having fun; in the book, their behavior harms the family's social reputation, reducing the chances the Bennet daughters have of making good marriages.

Louisa Hurst, Georgiana Darcy, and Aunt and Uncle Gardiner are not in the movie.

Wickham is introduced much earlier than in the book; he is friends with Lydia from the very beginning. Interestingly, he doesn't begin to trash-talk Darcy until Bingley leaves; in the book he does so much earlier, before the Netherfield ball.

Darcy is more considerate towards Elizabeth at the Netherfield party (ex. rescuing her from Collins), until he overhears Mrs. Bennet scheming to get the daughters married. Elizabeth forms a tentative friendship with him until finding out that he separated Jane from Bingley.

Jane is more obviously heartbroken over Bingley's departure than in the book, where she keeps her pain to herself. In the movie, she runs away to cry, which is uncharacteristic of her.

Collins is a librarian instead of a clergyman. I dislike this change because some Austen scholars/fans think that Collins being a clergyman is a deliberate choice as part of Austen's social criticism. Collins is representative of how hypocritical the Church is, since he worships Lady Catherine's wealth instead of God, and preaches moral lessons instead of actually using religion to help people. My theory is that the change was made because of the Hays Code, which led to the censorship of movies for "unwholesome" or "indecent" things; the religious criticism could have been offensive.

Elizabeth reacts rather too kindly to Charlotte marrying Collins by showing concern for the loveless marriage. While she does worry about the lack of love in the marriage, initially she is extremely surprised, outright shocked, and confused.

The scene where Darcy tries and fails to talk to Elizabeth (the "charming house" scene in the 2005 movie) just before the proposal is removed.

Darcy's letter is skipped over and Elizabeth overcomes her prejudice of Darcy very quickly, as shown when she tells Jane she regrets rejecting his proposal. This is contrary to the book, where overcoming her prejudice is an emotionally exhausting and slow process that continues all the way up until the second proposal.

The Pemberley visit is removed; instead, Elizabeth returns home to the news that Lydia has eloped. Visiting Pemberley is very important as part of Elizabeth's re-evaluation of Darcy's character and provides an opportunity for Darcy to show Elizabeth that he has changed for her. The visit is key in increasing Elizabeth's love for Darcy, and removing it means that the characters have less personal growth (also wouldn't it have been great for the audience to be treated to another gorgeous estate of "Old England?"). Instead, Darcy visits Longbourn on his own and offers his help in finding Lydia. When the news comes that Wickham accepts very little money in exchange for marrying Lydia, it isn't as shocking as it is in the book because Darcy had already expressed his intentions of helping Elizabeth earlier.

Here's the change that bugs me the most: Lady Catherine becomes good; though she is a busybody, her main priority is Darcy's happiness. Her confrontation of Elizabeth is a scheme hatched between her and Darcy as a test to be certain of Elizabeth's love. This does not make sense on so many levels: first, Darcy insists that "disguise of every sort is my abhorrence," so why would he resort to trickery, however well-intentioned, to find out if Elizabeth still loves him? Second, Lady Catherine is a social snob and objects to Elizabeth's low connections; also she has an arranged marriage planned for Darcy. Third, in the book, because Elizabeth likes Pemberley and gets along really well with his sister Georgiana, Darcy would have had some evidence that Elizabeth, in the very least, cared for him. And the added claim that Lady Catherine approves of Elizabeth because she likes rudeness and thinks Darcy needs a humorous wife irritates me further because the marriage of Elizabeth and Darcy is revolutionary since it was made in defiance of societal rules!!! Why, why, why in the name of comedy did they have to do this?!

Darcy kisses Elizabeth (in a stagey and melodramatic way) after she accepts his second proposal. Seems a bit uncharacteristic of him.

All the sisters get married at the end. Happily ever after.

CONCLUSION

This movie certainly was not aiming for faithfulness to Austen's novel; it ignores her detailed portrait of Regency era society and its attitudes and focuses on the "light, bright, and sparkling" aspect of Pride and Prejudice that gives the story its timeless appeal.

All in all, this comedy of manners is definitely a classic thanks to the clever dialogue and jokes within the script, along with some great acting.

@appleinducedsleep @dahlia-coccinea @princesssarisa @colonelfitzwilliams @austengivesmeserotonin

#pride and prejudice 1940 #pride and prejudice #pride and predjudice #jane austen #movies #movie review #laurence olivier #classic movies #we stan p&p 1940

[characcoon]

The Way of Business

Words: 2143

Summary: How Donnie first met Charles. 

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

"I'm trying my best to not question, but… "Cat claws, be sure they fell naturally" and he wrote the last word with capital bold letters." Donnie pokes the shopping list with his finger "And my favorite, "Coffee beans (digested)", which, by other terms, means coffee that has been shat."

"Keep not questioning." April says, hands on her pockets "It's witchy, magic stuff. We already went through this, Dee. Sometimes it doesn't make sense and that's fine."

"I'm aware. But it's not everyday you have poop coffee on your grocery list. What's he even going to do with these?"

"I don't think that anything Barry does should be our business."

April and Donnie walk around a busy street in the shopping district of the Hidden City, trying to identify the things on Draxum's list only by looking at the shops and vending stands, since the old sheep Yokai didn't think of writing where exactly to find the stuff.

"Maybe it's a cake." Donnie mumbles, stopping by a counter and quickly examining some items "Mikey's been teaching him some more recipies, he might be returning the favor by making Yokai food."

"Pooped coffee cat claws cake! Yummy." April gags, then points at a jar filled with sparkly deep blue glitter labelled mermaid bone powder "I think we need that one."

They continue shopping for another 20 minutes until they reach a part of the district that is definitely more shady and quiet. Sales are made among whispers and the shops have much less products on display, everything of importance stocked in the back. 

As April intimidates a merchant to lower the price of the cat claws, Donnie spots something familiar in a corner and curiously turns around to look. It's one of Big Mama's guards, but not just any guard; it's that specific one that seems to be on a higher rank, that was at the scene when the spider Yokai first took the Shredder to make him her champion. Donnie hums, watching as the guard dives between two stores and vanishes into another street.

"Got it for half the price." April comes to him, smiling proudly and shaking a tiny bottle filled with cat claws, then notices Donnie isn't paying attention "Earth to Donnie?"

"Wanna put some noses where they don't belong?" He sends her a trickster smile, bumping his fingers together.

"That depends, are you going to explode the whole street again?"

"Scoff!" the turtle scoffs "I saw one of Big Mama's guards going that way."

"And we need to go after them because…"

"Because it's her personal guard. The personal, stealthy, silent guard. The guard she sends to kill people without leaving a trace. The guard that probably has a cool name that makes people shiver in fear upon hearing it. The guard I just saw going that way."

April puffs her cheeks and blows out air in sections, a thoughtful expression on her face. Then she sighs, puts the bottle on Donnie's hand and starts walking.

"Alright, let's seek trouble, why not."

Donnie silently celebrates and dashes across the street, April right on his tail, following the same path of the guard. They go between the stores and find themselves in a smaller street with much less stores that are much more shady, to the point of being just holes between the brick walls. They reach the end of the street, turn to the only side available into another short road that hits a dead end. The guard is on that far end, with their back to the two curious teens who are slowly and quietly getting closer by using the little things around that can be used as barricades.

“We could make business faster if you tell me what you want straight up, I don’t do well with riddles.”

Donnie peaks behind a depression in the wall he and April are hiding in and notices a big trashcan shoved inside the wall with some christmas lights dangling from the sides and some mechanisms bending the lid and forming a roof. The guard is in front of whoever’s speaking, neither Donnie or April can see who.

“Or you could send the Great Milf here personally! Would love to catch up with her, if you know what I mean.”

Donnie gags in silence.

“She wants the Barnacle.” the guard speaks, voice muffled and distorted.

“The Barnacle! Wow! And why would I have that, exactly?”

“You were seen with it, at the docks. Took the package from Captain Piel.”

“Stupid lump of rotten flesh ratted me out, huh.” the other mumbles and sighs “Alright, I’ll get it, gimme a minute.”

April and Donnie glance at each as they hear ruffling and some crashing, the immovable form of the guard giving no indication of noticing the eavesdropping happening behind them.

“Is she gonna pay me at least?” the guard doesn’t answer “Y’know, in my land we have this saying. Quem cala consente. It means “silence means yes”, so I’m expecting some good cash unless you say words. No? Nothing? Talking to a door is funnier than talking to you.”

“The Barnacle, Charles.”

With a flicker of their wrist, a kunai appears between the fingers of the guard. Donnie instinctively moves his arm to his back, near his staff, and April gets into a better position to either fight or run.

“Is that handle made of Calligraphy Stone?” the merchant, possibly named Charles, speaks with excitement “Oh, damn, how much do you want for that?”

“Not for sale.”

“Oh, c’mon, it’s Calligraphy Stone!”

“Not for sale.”

“You’re boring. Y’know that? Boring. Wanna know what’s for sale? The Barnacle inside this box, this pretty doormat I made this morning and this GUN!”

A loud bang can be heard and the guard violently flies backwards, a blast of light illuminating the whole street. The guard smacks hard on the floor, smoke coming out of their chest, unmoving. Charles can now be seen; it’s a raccoon, very short, doesn’t go past Donnie’s knees. His tail is pink and orange, he wears duffle bags strapped to both sides of his hips, metal bracelets taking both his entire forearms and a gray sleeveless hoodie. On his face, big steampunk goggles and a wide, manic grin. On his hands, a gun definitely made out of garbage and nonsense, reminiscent of a grenade launcher, bigger than his whole body.

“I lied! The gun is not for sale!” he laughs and points the gun to the guard again “Now scram before I blast you into pieces!”

April notices the guard starting to move first, but doesn’t have time to warn everyone; they’re up and running in a second, blade slicing where Charles’ standing. The raccoon hops above the slash, smacks the guard in the head with the gun and drops it, then dashes towards the exit, but takes a sharp turn and bumps into the two teens. Before any of them can make any noise, he removes a disk from one of his bags, puts it on the floor and clicks. A translucent green wall blinks for a second before going orange. Donnie opens his mouth to speak, but the raccoon turns and shushes him so hard he even forgets what he was going to say. April goes equally quiet.

The guard finds his footing again after the blow and walks a few quick steps to the exit of the road, stopping right in front of the hideout of the other three. Charles silently clicks on his bracelets and long, sharp claws form as gauntlets on his hands and he gets into position, fur standing up, body tense and ready. Donnie’s breath gets caught on his throat when the guard swiftly turns their head and locks eyes with him, even knowing that the disk on the ground is some sort of cloaking tech making them all invisible.

The guard stands down, turns to the end of the road and walks back to the trashcan. They’re after the Barnacle, after all. Before they can reach it, however, the raccoon takes a small switch from his pocket and clicks on a button. The lid of the trashcan slaps close with a car alarm noise and the entire thing, wall included, poofs out of existence.

The road, not a dead end anymore, extends back to the one Donnie and April were previously on. Passersby and merchants turn to look at the wall that vanished and the guard just standing there, hand stretched to grasp nothing. Their stance slowly becomes neutral and it takes another minute for them to go away as a blur of movement.

Only then Charles snorts, so sudden and loud that Donnie jumps away from him.

“Idiot.” he continues laughing, disengaging his gauntlets and the cloaking device.

“That was so cool!” April speaks up “You played them so hard!”

“Yeah, I-” his ears go up and he flinches, remembering there were other people there too. “GUN!”

He turns around with two properly sized guns on each hand, pointing one to each of them. Donnie shows his hands and April smiles.

“You’re a human.” he shakes a gun at April “The hell you doing down here?”

“Shopping.”

“And the mecha-frog?”

“Frog?!” Donnie makes an offended expression and scoffs “Frog!”

“Are you a pokemon, only speaks your own name?”

“Wh- no! I’m a turtle!”

“Be nice, Dee. This dude’s super cool. And has a gun pointed at your face.”

“You should listen to the lady, Dee.”

“My name is Donnie.”

“Okay, Donnie Dee.” Charles opens his hands and his guns turn into liquid metal that surround his arms and turn back into being bracelets “I gotta go now. See ya around.”

He pulls the same switch he used to make the wall disappear and opens a side panel.

“Wait, you sell stuff, don’t you?” April takes Draxum’s list from Donnie “Do you have crystallized coral?”

“I do, yeah. But the shop’s all the way up to the surface now, so you should finish everything you have to do down here first. Y’know, time efficiency.”

“We are done here, right?” Donnie asks and analyzes the list “If you have the coral, digested coffee beans and petrified wood. Did we get the owl feathers?”

“We did.” April answers.

“Then.” he turns to the raccoon “Do you have those other three items?”

“100%.” Charles smiles “Hold onto me and we can warp there, pronto.”

Charles extends one hand to them and they grab one finger each, April making a squeaky noise. He clicks on his switch and they all teleport away.

Donnie recognizes the street they appear on, it’s not too far from the Lair. The trashcan store shoved into the wall is there, creating another dead end that he’s sure didn’t exist before. Charles rushes to it, opens the lid and jumps inside, sighing in relief.

“Alright, let’s get to business. Coral, wood, coffee. Talking about coffee, would you like some to drink? I always have one jar ready.”

“It’s not digested, right?” Donnie makes a face.

“No, it’s black coffee. From the store. Completely normal, I assure you.”

Donnie asks for a cup and the raccoon serves him, then asks which street they’re on. The turtle answers, gets a thanks and watches as the small merchant goes around opening drawers and boxes.

“What’s the Barnacle?” Donnie asks “And why would Big Mama want it?”

“It’s an invisible creature.” Charles answers, putting one big box with crystal coral by the counter “A plague. Sticks to the boats and sucks out life force to grow bigger. When a ghost ship is found and they can’t find out why everyone’s dead, they blame the Barnacle. 80% of the time they’re right.” another box, with petrified wood balls “And I think you can guess why Big Mama wants it. The damn thing might have a preference for boats, but it can stick to any wood structure.”

And finally, a bag of digested coffee beans.

“Pick as many of these as you need.” he points to the coral and wood “Only have this bag of coffee for sale. Stupid spider shut down more of my contacts.”

“You two seem to have some history” April starts to collect some wood balls.

“Oh, dear, if only you knew.” the raccoon laughs “You gotta keep a hold of the competition. It’s how business go.”

After taking the necessary quantity and paying, they say their farewells. Charles slides two business cards to them before they leave.

Quinquilharias, the card says, with a resume of the services and products in the back of it. Donnie hums as he reads it, considering returning more times soon, since it’s so close to the Lair and he’s the most charismatic merchant he’s ever met. And his coffee is decent enough.

And of course, he would be lying if he says he’s not curious about what’s his deal with Big Mama.

#The Tiny Trash Uncle #rottmnt #rottmnt fanfic #rottmnt self insert #rottmnt oc #rottmnt april #april o'neil #rottmnt donnie #rise of tmnt #2k words #fanfic #writing #char writes

[josefavomjaaga]

Caroline Murat and her daughter Letizia, who accompanied her mother on the trip to Munich in 1805.

***

@joachimnapoleon, because she's cool like that, has dug up the letters that Caroline Murat sent to her (at the time) BFF Hortense de Beauharnais in Paris. As the letters were published in a French paper, and as I'm very unsure about French copyright, I do not want to translate them in full. But I hope it will be okay to quote one passage from it, as I think this might illustrate quite nicely all the misunderstandings and misconceptions existing between the »startup« Imperial court of the Bonaparte family and the small German "ancient" courts.

Caroline describes a visit to Electress Karoline, in presence of Caroline’s two ladies-in-waiting Madame La Grange and Madame Lambert. She had arrived in Munich on December 20th after a rather desastrous 3-days-journey that included a road accident. She wished to be lodged not in the electoral residence but in her own palace, and as she had not brought many servants (apparently, she and Murat had some financial problems at the time), she was waited upon by servants of the electoral family.

I have already written a little about Electress Karoline's first impressions of Empress Josephine here. So, now for Caroline’s impressions of the electress:

Munich, December 24, 1805 [if this isn’t a mistake in the publication, then apparently she already uses the old calendar that Napoleon will only officially reintroduce on January 1st]

[…] The Court is extremely boring. The Elector is a very good man, in the style of the Elector Archchancellor [Dalberg, who had been in Paris for the Sacre], except that he is not so witty.

I received yesterday from noon till six o'clock the foreign ministers, their wives, Prince Hohenzollern, one hundred and fifty ladies of the town, the whole household of the Elector and all the gentlemen of the town, and at the end the Electress, who saw Letitia, whom she found charming. I have done so many reverences that I am in bed with a dreadful ache.

The day before yesterday I went to the theatre, where it was colder than at the coronation; I was afraid it would hurt me.

When we go to the Elector's, a table is brought in, and Princess Augusta sits down and makes tea for everyone. Don't fancy the Court too high; they are all like good bourgeois. Nothing is funnier than to see the Elector making conversation with the Empress's maitre d`hotel. […]

Madame Beauharnois makes little of an effect. Madame Lambert makes no effect at all; as she only knows how to be silly and as I do not allow her to be silly, she is nothing. Madame La Grange makes an extraordinary effect; the elector always talks about her, because he knew her father and her whole family very well. Monsieur Daligre, though a fool, also makes an impression, because of his name and his fortune; the elector has often dined at his father's house and knows all his family well. If you come to this country, bring people who have a name, because they do not see the others, I will give you an example.

Yesterday, everyone was wondering what Mrs Lambert was, who her father was, who her husband was... So the electress approached her and said that she was very happy to return to her what her parents had done for the elector in Paris and that her name was not unknown to her, because she had heard a lot about the La Grange family; I then saw Mme Lambert blush, very embarrassed; I stepped forward and told her that she had been mistaken and that this woman was called Lambert. Then she wanted to know what she was; the questions embarrassed me, and I answered that she was the wife of one of our principal inspectors of reviews and that she had a very considerable fortune. Then her glances fell more slowly on her, and she told her that she was well pleased to make her acquaintance. While chatting with another lady, I observed Mme Lambert, who was in conversation with the electress, and I was annoyed to see that she always had an air of embarrassment and of a little girl. I am telling you all this nonsense to make you aware of what is liked here.

Except that I don’t think she really understood »what was liked« at the Bavarian court at all. Maybe I’m reading too much into this, but I think her own expectations really got in the way. What she writes seems to me like an amazing mixture of condescension - "Don't imagine too much, they live like good citizens here, the princess personally makes tea for everyone!", disappointment at not making enough of an impression (why would she even try to achieve that?), and the tacit assumption of not being taken seriously by her hosts. She immediately assumes that the electoral family occupies themselves with some of her companions more than with others because those have »a name«. Whereas Max Joseph - remember, this is the guy who walked around his capital on foot and who, in his palace, strangers liked to mistake for one of his servants - just immediately pounced on anyone whose name reminded him of his youth in Paris.

As for the scene with Madame Lambert, it's actually the Bavarian Karoline who makes a mistake and confuses the two ladies-in-waiting. Which Caroline Murat seems to think is some kind of ruse so she has an excuse to inquire about Madame Lambert's family background? I think Karoline really did address the wrong lady by mistake; she is twenty years younger than her husband, to my knowledge has never been to Paris, and probably only knows the names from Max Josef's nostalgic descriptions. She is presumably at least as embarrassed as poor Madame Lambert. Especially as she apparently continues to talk to the lady she has mistakenly addressed for quite a while, observed by Caroline Murat, despite the fact that Caroline knew nothing more to tell about her lady-in-waiting than that her husband has a pile of money.

So, plenty of misunderstandings. Caroline Murat has come to Munich to see a »real« court - and what she gets is tea served by the elector’s daughter. At the same time, she expected to meet with rejection and secret contempt, and now saw these in incidents that in themselves may have been quite harmless.

The author of the article, Paul Le Brethon, juxtaposes these letters from 1805 with a few lines from another letter written from Munich by Caroline, on her way to pick up Napoleon's new Empress Marie Louise, in March 1810 to her husband Joachim Murat:

My friend, I always feel very comfortable with the King and Queen of Bavaria; they enjoy a calm and perfect happiness in their home; their young family is very interesting [they had five daughters at the time, among them twice twins]; these children remind me of my own, and my eyes are filled with tears every time they look at them.

I think by then, Caroline had understood the difference.

#caroline murat #joachim murat #max joseph #karoline von bayern #auguste von bayern #eugene's marriage #munich 1805 #munich residence #napoleon