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female-buckets · 2 years

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LAS VEGAS (AP) — I’m so grateful to have the opportunity to put on the USA jersey every day.

It’s been a long road back after thinking my career was over after having spinal surgery in January of 2020.

I thought my life was going to change drastically and I wouldn’t ever be able to play again. Yet here I am 2 years later, hoping to earn a spot on the U.S. World Cup roster.

Thinking back to my time in the hospital bed to be now being back at the peak of competition, I’m just so grateful to be playing basketball at this level again. I can’t really discredit God at this point, I’m just really humbled to be here.

It’s a dream as a basketball player to play for the USA. It’s the one team that everyone wants to play for at some point and everyone knows is one of the hardest to make. To have the opportunity right now is a dream come true.

This isn’t my first time playing for USA, having won a gold medal at the World University Games when I was in college. That probably was the longest flight I ever took, well until now when we head off to Sydney.

One thing you can always count with USA Basketball is that they take you all over the world. Up next might be outer space.

This is my first time going to the Outback. I think I’m looking forward to learning more about the place. Experiencing the continent and just trying to get myself back on track. Ever since the Phoenix Mercury season ended I’ve been running and ripping across multiple states.

We had a good training week in Las Vegas. It’s a really good group and everybody carries the same energy and intensity as far as winning goes. Practices are really competitive and there are a lot of new faces which is nice. There’s also a lot of youth.

I’ve gotten to spend some time with Rhyne Howard. She and I are very similar in a lot of ways. It’s been great to pick her brain a little bit and take in this whole experience with her. At some point soon, we’ll have to have a conversation about SEC basketball.

As a group we’re still looking to build our team chemistry, but everyone’s bought in on the process and what the team will look like. We eat all our meals together and lift together. We’ve had some good recovery pool workouts too.

And now we’ll get a chance to bond for 15 hours on the flight to Australia. Catch you all soon.

#Yay! Everybody loves Rhyne!#diamond deshields #wnba #usabwnt #usa basketball #usab #fiba wwc #fiba world cup #phoenix mercury #rhyne howard #atlanta dream

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mychemicalficrecs · 4 years

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hi, do you know any good vampire frerard fics? :)

Hi Nonny!

I do know a few of those: check out this list that's all about Gerard as a vampire (and mostly Frank/Gerard). If that can't quench your thirst, try this list!I've read the first four of these (no. 2 & 3 are the same universe) but there are A LOT of fics about Vampire Frank/Gerard on AO3 and all of these looked really interesting, so there should be something for every taste!Some fics on this list have multiple pairings, I've added those to the descriptions when they seemed more than a background or past relationship.

Vampire Frank/Gerard

Gerard Way's (Vampire) Detective Agency by jjtaylor, Pennyplainknits, more ships in later fics, 164k, Mature, Teen And Up Audiences, General Audiences. Pete, in Decaydance Mansion, with a yarrow stake. Frank and Gerard, in the greenhouse, with a plant of questionable origin. Bob, everywhere you look, with a gang of assassins for justice. Vampires, valets, pamphlets, haunted furniture, dub-thrall, disembodied voices, zombie couriers, and sinister rituals.

They Came From Outer Jersey! by thatsfinewithus, Gen, Frank/Gerard, 25k, Rated R. New London Fire is an elite fringe government force assigned the task of protecting the earth from some of its more interesting threats: those from beyond the atmosphere or even the universe. They've handled dangerous cases before, but they've never seen anything like...ZOMBIES FROM SPACE. Vampires, long hunted in lore and legend, are now the earth's only saviors. There is little information as to who sent the creatures until Mikey Way, head of the NLF, finds out more by being abducted. Is it too late for him? Is it too late for the earth? Find out how six vampires, one government general, and one frustrated comic book artist save the earth in...THEY CAME FROM OUTER JERSEY!!

I Think I Thought (I Saw You Try) by thatsfinewithus, 3k, NC-17. Vampires, and MCR, and porn. Welcome to some weird AU world in which Gee only does awesome comics and Frank is a vampire.

A State Of Orange by gala_apples, Frank/Mikey, Frank/Gerard, 20k, Explicit. Being a halfling in a red state can sometimes cause issues for Frank Iero. He’s the weakest at Jett Clement High School, and probably the entire state (not counting the meal plans). His moods are oddly stable, as much as he tries to be mercurial. And being able to withstand the sun for up to twenty minutes only allows him more time to be forced into chores. Still, his parents are insane if they think he’s going to be happy about their decision. Frank doesn’t want to move to a Mixed state. How is he supposed to get great friends? How is he supposed to find great food? How is he supposed to have great sex? But Frank doesn’t have a choice. He’s New Jersey bound for the next year, if not longer. He’ll be surrounded by tame vampires who have been nagged out of a sex drive, and humans he’s not allowed to eat. Mixed states suck. Lucky for him, not every person in Jersey sucks.

All's Night by MizErie, 16k, Explicit. The war between humans and vampires has been raging for centuries. Too long according to Frank Iero. But if all humans aren't considered equal, what chance do vampires have in the fight for equality? That's why when Frank bought and began running his small bar, The Jukebox, he also implemented All’s Night. All’s Night began as an all-inclusive Tuesday night for tolerant humans and vampires to come together and socialize. Its popularity in the community has grown, and Frank has since started hosting All’s Night on Thursdays as well. Those are his two favorite nights of the week.

Life as a Process by ViciousVenin, 57k, Explicit. Frank's college experience isn't exactly what he was hoping for. He has no idea what he wants to do with his life, his RA scares him, and his roommate Gerard seems pretty weird. Really weird, actually, but not in a bad way. As the two of them get closer, Frank finds that Gerard is one of the most interesting people he's ever met, and cute as fuck to boot. Frank just wishes he could figure out what Gerard is hiding...

The Life You Always Dreamed Of by caffienedcold, 180k, Mature. You’d think having grown up in New Jersey, Frank would’ve outgrown his horror movie fixation. But no, he’s thirty, teaching Italian in fucking Rhode Island and he actually believes the student gossip that the art teacher is a vampire. So what if Frank has had an awful crush on him since the school year started? He’d helped Mr. Way move into his classroom and carried a box containing issue one of Doom Patrol, a Batman figure, and splattered tubes of screen printing ink. You really couldn’t blame him for the crush. And the vampire rumors? Icing on the cake. At least until it’s Frank’s blood on the line.

'Til the Sun Goes Down by BasementVampire, 2k, Explicit. Frank wants to fuck his best friend. Gerard wants to drink Frank's blood.

I Think I'd Go Insane Without You by hellborn, 3k, Mature. Gerard just smiles, his lips closed, eyes dark red and eager. Mikey covers his face with his hands and squeezes the empty bag between his calloused fingers, "I must be out of my goddamned mind for even considering this." A dangerous, thin-lipped smirk spreads across Gerard's face and Mikey can see row after row of long, sharp, teeth gleaming from between his bloodstained lips, "Come along, Mikes, it's time to dig up my boyfriend's dead body!"

Mortui Non Mordant by Tezy, 32k, General Audiences. “Does that matter right now? I’m – fucking dead, man. I wanted to do so much shit with my life before I died!” “You still can,” the guy said. “Like, nothing’s stopping you.” Gerard leapt to his feet, aghast at how casually he was treating his death. That wasn’t very good manners. “Except being dead.” “What did you want? Fucking ballet dancing at your funeral? Get over it, we all did.”

Those Cemetery Eyes by corruptedkid, 11k, Explicit. Every second Gerard was absent, Frank felt like there was a hole in his chest. The day Mikey showed up at his doorstep blotchy and tearstained, the hole collapsed into a supernova, turning him inside out and swallowing him whole.

at midnight all the agents by orphan_account, 18k, Mature. "I'm so, so sorry, I didn't meant to kill you," the black-haired man said in a distressed voice.

we only come out at night by cemetery_driven, 2k, Teen And Up Audiences. Gerard and Frank are just stupid vampire boyfriends.

Vampire AU by Andromedas_Void, 26k, Explicit and Teen And Up Audiences. Mister Francis Anthony Iero, Junior, Your presence is requested this evening at 221 Upper Birch Lane, North London. A carriage will be awaiting you at 3:00 pm sharp. Cordially yours, Gerard Arthur Way, Esq.

burning up in the sun by akamine_chan, 12k, Explicit. Life hasn't been the same since the Rift. Frank hadn't been planning on getting stuck in this stupid town, kept captive in the sketchiest bar in the universe, chained to the counter like an animal. And just when he'd been sure that nothing could surprise him anymore, he was rescued by a rock 'n' roll band of vampires. He hadn't seen that one coming.

There's A Lot Of Vampires Out There by iamdali, 27k, Explicit. In the year 2025 over 90% of the word's population are vampires. These days, vampires don't have to prowl alleys for human victims, massive medical co-operations mass produce blood and inject it in to every day food. Gerard Way is an office boy for one of the biggest companies in the US, and when he's not paper pushing for Vladimir Co he's plotting to find his still human brother with his companion, Frank.

Like a Secret In Your Throat by frankie_ann, 10k, Explicit. Frank sells himself as a live-in housekeeper/boyfriend. Gerard is a vampire (and independently wealthy artist) with a deeply unhealthy blood addiction who could use a hand around the house now that Mikey is off at school. …Mostly there’s a lot of porn. And blood. And I do believe in happy endings.

(To Die Will Be) An Awfully Big Adventure by FayJay, Frank/Gerard, Lindsey/Gerard, 73k, Mature. Gerard has always vaguely liked the idea of being a vampire, in much the same way he's always vaguely liked the idea of time travel, or of being a pirate - but it's only when he wakes up dead that he realises that not all his fans (or friends) are actually human. This is rather a shock to the system, but Gerard does his best to deal with the fact that he's now an undead American, and he's lucky enough to get a little help from an unexpected corner. Just as he thinks he's starting to get the hang of being a vampire, however, everything suddenly goes to hell in a handbasket, and before he knows it there are angry vampires slayers chasing him around LA, and an urgent appointment with the Fairy Queen looming before him... A story about love, family, metamorphosis, art, trust and geekery.

Cycle of Souls by Green, Gerard/Mikey, Frank/Gerard, Brian/Gerard, 49k, Explicit. Gerard loses his brother in the 17th century, and is turned shortly after. He grieves for his lost brother for centuries, but becomes content when he meets a man named Frank. Now, in the 21st century, he sees someone who looks exactly like his lost brother. In fact, he's positive the young Mikey is his dead brother come back to life. Will Mikey accept a vampire into his life, or is Gerard destined to lose him yet again?

#fic rec list #frank/gerard #frerard #vampires #alternate universe

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vestedbeauty · 3 years

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Go Outside and Play! (Yes, YOU)

New Post has been published on https://vestedbeauty.com/go-outside-and-play-yes-you/

Go Outside and Play! (Yes, YOU)

How many times did we hear it as kids? “Go outside and play!” (possibly followed by, “and don’t come home until the streetlights are on!”)

As a kid growing up in the seventies, getting to go outside and play - especially during the summer - was a huge part of life. We lived in a neighborhood with lots of kids. Many of the moms stayed home or were just easing they way back into the workforce. It was a different time.

Looking back, it’s no surprise that the moms wanted us out, out, out! In prior generations, parents didn’t really play with their kids. Kids played with kids.

It may not have been perfectly safe. (OK, it was definitely not perfectly safe.) We did a lot of stuff that seems dangerous now:

Playing unsupervised in other kids’ homes

Tromping through the woods until we got lost

Skating on the little pond at the end of the street… even if the ice wasn’t thick enough

Riding our bikes (helmets? ha!) all over creation, usually without even telling anyone where we were going

We got sunburnt, ate junk food whenever the opportunity presented, and drank Kool-Aid made with a whole cup of sugar. I literally dreamt of bubble gum, packs of watermelon Bubbalicious and grape Bubble Yum so real I could taste it.

"Dangerous" But Fun

And at the end of a long, hot summer day, we slept like babies.

I don’t know how we learned so many games to play. There was no internet, of course, and I can’t imagine finding a book full of games at the library. Still, we played all the usual games (hide and seek, kill the guy with the ball, and kickball). But somehow we also found out about Red Rover, TV tag, freeze tag, SPUD, and four square. And we made a bunch up, too, like bicycle shop (turn it upside-down, crank the pedal as fast as you can, pretend to fix stuff using blades of grass and sticks).

It’s like there was some invisible network between children, where vital information traveled without the assistance of media or adults. There was always some kid who knew stuff. That’s the one who gave everyone else the scoop on current events, like when “Mikey” ate pop-rocks and drank a Coke at the same time and died.

youtube

Friendships started because of proximity. Not everyone got along. There was the girl who cried way too much, the boy with the hair-trigger temper who was always fighting, the kids whose parents wouldn’t let them play with anyone in the neighborhood. Of course, there were the kids who were too little, who were dying to be invited to play.

And there were the “big kids” who never seemed to come outside. Well, unless they were hanging out on the porch or by their pool (so jealous!) with their high schooler friends. We held those big kids in reverence. It seemed impossible to even imagine the same girl I saw kissing her boyfriend (ON THE LIPS!) ever sitting in the grass, trying to find the perfect blade to use for a whistle.

Playing Outside Isn't Just for Kids

And then, one day, we were the big kids. Outside wasn’t for playing - it was for transportation or chores, if anything.

Actually, it didn’t happen all at once. We had a few years’ span in our ages. But somewhere around the seventh-grade mark, our friend groups shifted from the neighborhood to the classroom. I remember discovering that I could have school friends come over to hang out. We might walk home from school together, but we’d spend our time indoors - or maybe walk to the 7-Eleven store up the road to buy a Diet Coke. Then back to the house to listen to records, make prank calls, watch General Hospital, and gossip. We got part-time jobs working indoors, at least all mine were.

Then it was off to college. I went to Rutgers University, which is spread across five campuses (there are satellite campuses, but I never saw them). That meant lots of bus rides and tons of walking. At the time, I didn’t mind walking miles and miles each day - unless I was running late for class. It was just part of life.

The yellow, orange, and red leaves on the trees in the fall semester were a stunning welcome to the first semester. I remember feeling especially alive and connected to… something… as I’d kick my way through piles of fallen leaves. The winters felt harsh, though. Duck boots were great for navigating ice, and they probably did wonders for thigh muscles because they were so heavy. But snow in New Jersey is really only nice for a few hours before it gets dirty and slushy. Not that fun to be outside then.

In graduate school, I only remember being outside to walk to class - or walk to work if I didn’t have a ride. At some point, I took up early morning walks to clear my head. It was South Hamilton, Massachusetts, and there may be no more beautiful spot than New England - especially in autumn.

Yes - that's NJ! The Delaware Water Gap is gorgeous, especially in autumn.

Adulting Is Better with Outside Time

After my ex graduated, we moved to Jackson, New Jersey, and I took a job at an accounting firm about an hour away (unless traffic was really bad). With two hours of commuting and eight hours in the office, plus weekends taken up by my role in his job (another post, another time), outside time became a memory.

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Well, unless you count sleeping outdoors in our backyard on blankets because without air conditioning, our house was unbearable! (I always wondered if the neighbors knew - they had air!)

But I remember one day feeling like this entirely indoors existence felt like a rip-off. I bought some plants, seeds, and seedling trees, and started a tiny garden. I set an alarm to get up thirty minutes earlier and spent the extra time kneeling in the grass, hands in the dirt.

The results shocked me. It felt like I had a life again. My mind wandered - even frolicked! - as I played in the soil. Something therapeutic happened as I pulled weeds. That outdoors time was mine alone.

Out with the Kids - But It’s Not Quite the Same

Soon, we started a family. I went part-time with my job, which meant two ten hour days in the office each week, plus several hours at home. On the days I was home, I loved nothing more than bundling my first baby up and going for a long walk in the neighborhood. We had an incident with some dogs that might have ended that practice (I love dogs, but this was scary). But I just switched routes. Then, a few months later, there was a truly horrific crime in our neighborhood. Never again would I feel safe letting my son (and my daughter who was born just a couple years later) play outside without my eyes on them.

I’d made some girlfriends who also had kids at the same time (there was a pregnancy pact - maybe a post for another day!). We loved taking the kids to parks, petting zoos, and a nearby lake. They’d play, we’d talk. These were some of my favorite days.

But the world had changed. We moved a bunch, and there never seemed to be many kids in the neighborhood - certainly not playing outside. There were playdates, but they weren’t spontaneous. Kids never seemed to come calling, ringing the doorbell and asking if my kids could come out and play. I saw them becoming indoor-dwellers, and while it felt sad, it also seemed like the logical course.

Along the way, we’d moved to Florida. It’s hot. It’s humid. Most people seem to stay indoors unless they’re at the beach or poolside. I learned to take early morning walks with my dog. If we didn’t get home by about 6:30, it felt like walking in a steam bath.

Freelancers Don’t Go Outside and Play

We needed money. I needed something creative to do - especially while the kids were at school. So, I started a freelance writing business. It took off quickly. Soon, I was working every minute the kids were at school. Then, the workload expanded and I worked when they got home, too. Then weekends. “Outside” was nothing more than the few feet between the front door and minivan door. “Playing” felt like frivolity. Working “all the time” was both a burden and a point of pride for me. I’d set my prices too low, and was too timid to raise them. For several years, I was the primary breadwinner. I felt so tightly-wound that I could barely remember feeling lighthearted, playful, or relaxed.

Let’s just fast-forward about a decade. Kids are grown. (I am astonished to learn my love, respect, and enjoyment of them has somehow gotten 100x deeper with time - didn’t think it was possible.) I’m in a new marriage, living in a little town outside Huntsville, Alabama. The freelance writing business is now an agency, and while I help steer it, I have a team who takes care of my clients. I also work full-time as the editorial director at Capitalism.com - a “job” I love with people I adore.

Life gets busy. But having reached 53, I have gathered at least this piece of wisdom, which I practice daily: Go outside and play.

Playing no longer looks like choosing teams, running around, and flopping onto the grass.

It looks more like sliding into my funky little rubber boots tending my flock of backyard hens. It’s moving piles of mulch and preparing garden beds. It might be mowing. Or it could be an after-lunch walk with my hubby and the dogs. Sometimes, it’s just sitting outside on the porch, admiring the sunrise and sunset. When I miss a day, something is off. My best ideas come from time spent outdoors. I call it puttering. It’s good for the soul.

Go play outside. See what happens. I'd love to hear what you like to do outside, what joys you've discovered out there, and how often you make outside play part of your day.

Also...

I’ve been reading this book by Trevor Blake, called Three Simple Steps. (Trevor built and sold multiple businesses for hundreds of millions - starting in midlife! He also only works a few hours a day, and is a huge proponent of spending time outdoors.) It’s one of the best things I’ve read in a long while.

#Go Outside and Play

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mangokiwitropicalswirl · 7 years

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Paging Dr. Scully, chp 3

Paging Dr. Scully, chp 1: Squeeze

Paging Dr Scully, chp 2: Jersey Devil

Paging Dr. Scully, chp 3: Shadows

Why had she let Gina convince her to wear the lace bodysuit?

“I look like a preteen in a Love’s Baby Soft ad,” she mutters to herself in the bathroom mirror at the restaurant as she touches up her lipstick and pushes carefully-curled tendrils behind her ear.

Normally, she’d have called up Melissa to come help her get ready. Melissa keeps up with fashion trends – she wears chokers and Doc Martens with bohemian dresses, not a predictable rotation of petite-sized scrubs underneath bleachy-white doctor coats. Scully rarely has a reason to put on anything other than jeans and a sweatshirt in the all-too-short hours between shifts.

But Melissa is away “on walkabout,” as she had put it. Scully had teased her repeatedly for calling an aimless American road trip by the Australian term for an adolescent spiritual rite of passage. “But it IS meaningful, Dana,” Melissa had insisted, her voice deep with conviction. “I want to see what the world holds for me, to open myself up to possibilities.”

Scully had nodded, only the slightest raise of her eyebrow betraying her scepticism that the trip is anything other than an excuse to hook up with random strangers and experiment with mind altering substances of one kind or another. She could have been jealous of Melissa’s unencumbered ways, but that had never been what she wanted from life.

She had thrived on the challenges of school and the thrill of the ER’s energy. She likes knowing she has control, giving commands to nurses and technicians, swooping in to bring order out of the chaos. That’s what she does. And it’s what she wants – to make sense of things, to categorize and pin things down. Life should be conquerable, ordered, stable. She needs a partner who wants the same things, right?

Which is why she finds herself sitting across from Rob, the tax accountant, easily eight or ten years her senior. A divorcee. Talking about taking kids to the park, or the museum, or is it the circus? Her mind is wandering.

He is nice enough, pleasant, average-looking, but clean. Uncomplicated. The first date she’s had in far too long. Unless you counted that hospital-basement coffee that the cute FBI agent bought her the night before.

Fox. Why is she thinking about Fox right now? Rob is explaining some intricate new estate tax law that Congress is considering, which will wreck havoc on his clients’ attempts to exploit the gift tax loophole.

She keeps the polite smile plastered on her face, ignoring the back part of her brain that begins comparing this conversation to the bizarre repartee she’d had with Mulder – she remembers he had said to call him Mulder – his skulking around the morgue, the story about Jersey Devils. She wonders if he’d called up Dr. Diamond, and if he had, what they’d found out.

Rob is still rambling and she hopes her face isn’t betraying anything but eager, engaged first-date interest.

Would he call her? She’d basically asked him to. She never does that. Why had she done that?

“Dana,” Rob says her name suddenly. “Do you need to get that?”

“Hmm?” She gives her head a startled shake. “What?”

“Your pager went off, do you need to call in?” Rob looks dutiful and concerned.

“Oh, sorry!” She looks sheepishly down at her pager. It’s the hospital. “I’ll just be a minute.”

Walking toward the restaurant desk phone, she can’t put her finger on why she feels disappointed. It’s not like she’d given Mulder her pager number. And for goodness sake, she’s on a date with another guy! Get it together, Dana. Her internal monologue is confusing but mercifully cut short when the call in to the hospital switchboard jolts her back into a role she’s more comfortable with.

“Multiple victims from a ten car pile-up headed in, we need you here tonight, Dr. Scully.”

“I’m on my way.” She doesn’t pause to measure the sense of relief that floods her, which is not a typical reaction to news of a long night of triage and trauma. She’ll make her apologies to Rob, but she won’t say anything about rainchecks or next times.

She dodges Rob’s phone calls for the next week, although work is genuinely busy enough that she doesn’t have to actually lie about why she’s not calling him back. Her mom is not so easily dissuaded. Maggie can’t seem to understand why her highly eligible daughter has made it to the ripe old age of 29 without at least a steady boyfriend.

“We just didn’t click, Mom,” she explains as Maggie questions why she’s not going out with Rob again.

“Well honey, sometimes you have to give a guy a second chance to make an impression,” Maggie sighs.

Scully sighs as well. Sometimes she placates her with promises to be more open, but other times, the best approach is to deflect attention to Melissa, who is several years older and also equally unattached.

“Mom, how’s Melissa? Have you heard from her?”

Maggie knows this is a diversionary tactic, but lets her off the hook anyway. Their conversation wanders away from the topic of Dana’s love life and onto speculations about Melissa’s.

It’s not until a week later Scully remembers that Mulder neglected to call her. And then it’s a quiet Friday another week after that when her phone rings.

“I don’t suppose you’re in Philadelphia right now?” He doesn’t even bother with hello, so it takes her a minute to place the confident, teasing voice on the other end of the line.

“Alas, no,” she smiles, settling down into the soft corner of her couch, propping her feet up on the coffee table. “Why? Should I be?”

“It’s just that I have the strangest hankering to go and see the Liberty Bell. I’ve been here a hundred times and I’ve never seen it.”

“You’re not missing much. It’s a big bell with a big crack, and you have to wait in a long line.”

“Still,” Mulder pauses, “I’d really like to go. You want to come meet me?”

“At the Liberty Bell?” She incredulous, sitting forward on her elbows now.

“Yeah, it’s only, what, three hours drive?”

“Three hours and a dozen tolls,” she laughs. “Plus, I think they’d be closed by the time I get there.”

“Hmmm,” he hums looking at his watch, “true. They probably close after 11.”

“So you’re assuming I’m just going to hop in my car at 8 p.m on a Friday night and meet you in a city three hours away?” Scully is almost impressed by his audacity. “If I remember correctly, we’ve only met twice, and the second time you never called me back.”

“I’m calling you now, aren’t I?” She can hear the smile in his voice.

“Okay, fine. Let’s imagine I hop in my car and meet you in Philadephia. What are you doing up there anyway?”

“On a case. I think I’ve got real proof of psychokinetic activity this time.” He’s breathless, eager.

“Psychokinesis?” Scully laughs. This is an entirely different galaxy – nay, universe – from conversations about tax accounting. “You mean how Carrie got even at the prom?”

“Basically, yes.” He laughs too, and then there’s an awkward pause between them, a low hum over the telephone line that’s neither physical nor entirely imagined.

Scully takes a deep breath before she can change her mind.

“Okay.”

“Okay, what?”

“Okay, let’s go to the Liberty Bell.”

“Really?” His voice raises half an octave.

“Don’t make me second-guess myself, G-man,” she retorts, getting up from the couch and hurrying to change into something resembling an outfit. “And you better be buying the cheesesteaks because a girl gets hungry after a long drive.”

“You got it, doc.”

Three hours is a lot of time to second guess oneself, so she finds herself pushing the speed limit more than her usual nine-and-a-half miles over. If she drives faster, she won’t have a chance to analyze the logic of driving three hours to meet a man she’s only met twice – both times in a hospital, and both times he has talked about monsters. Well, monsters or aliens.

What the heck is she doing? She doesn’t know, but she can’t suppress the giggle that bubbles in her belly when she imagines his face when she told him she’d come. Somehow she can picture his wide-eyed surprise, and the way his lower lip must have turned up in a smile.

Why is she thinking about his lip? She barely knows him. Shut up brain. She drives faster.

To his credit, Mulder is waiting at the entrance to the deserted Liberty Bell pavilion parking lot with two oblong foil-wrapped cheesesteaks.

“I had to guess how you’d like yours.” He raises hers up in the air as a greeting as she steps out of the car. “Sorry.”

“I’m sure you did fine,” she smiles, reaching for the sandwich. Now it’s awkward. Should she hug him? Give him a kiss on the cheek? Shake hands?

He’s not helping, staring at her with a quizzical look, his eyes darting between the sandwich in his hands and still-lit pavilion behind her. Scully raises her eyebrows in a question, and shrugs.

“Well?” She says.

“C’mon,” he gestures with his head toward the lighted building. “I bribed the guards to keep it open.”

“You bribed the guards?”

“Bribed, threatened, cajoled, whatever.” He smiles. “The badge comes in handy sometimes.”

“So you’re saying you misused your credentials to convince some poor, beleaguered Liberty Bell attendants to stay open three hours past closing just so we can see this big cracked hunk of tin?” Her words are sarcastic, but her tone rings with delight.

“You make it sound so nefarious,” he says innocently. “Like I said, I just wanted to see it this time.”

“What about the sandwiches?”

“We can eat them inside.”

Scully shakes her head, smiling. This is, hands down, the strangest date she has ever been a part of. And now she’s not even sure it’s a date. He hasn’t attempted to touch her. Not a hug, not a hand on her shoulder. She’s suddenly worried she has misread this entirely, that this is just some strange overture of nerdy friendship. An uncomfortable sinking feeling lodges in her stomach as she searches for a way to ward off her embarrassment if it turns out she made too many assumptions.

But as they walk up to the building, he reaches ahead of her and opens the door, making an arch with his arm for her to walk under. She looks up at him with a smirk as he follows behind her, his hand pressing the lightest touch in the hollow curve of her back.

#paging dr scully #xf fic #x files fanfic #msr fanfic #xf alternate universe #xf au #mywriting

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thrashermaxey · 5 years

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Ramblings: Koivu Injured; Boyle Traded; Updates on Byfuglien and Larkin; Cap Leagues – February 7

The Minnesota Wild announced that captain Mikko Koivu will miss the remainder of the season after tearing his ACL and meniscus in his right knee. He is set to have surgery on Friday and then we can probably expect some sort of time line.

Koivu has one year left on his current deal and will be heading into his age-36 season.

Until we know more about Koivu’s recovery, I won’t speculate there. Let’s just hope he can come back and be close to the player he’s been for the last several years.

As far as the rest of the team is concerned, I suspect this means Minnesota packs it in. They are currently in a wild card spot but there are seven teams within six points and they’re already without Mathew Dumba. This probably means Eric Staal is to be traded by the deadline, which is just a few weeks away. He is a pending UFA and can always re-sign him. I guess we’ll know more in the next couple weeks. If they go on a big win streak, it’ll make the decision tougher. If they start to lose ground, it makes it easier.

It should also mean a lot more minutes for Victor Rask. He’s averaging under 15 minutes a game so far with the Wild but with Koivu out and Staal potentially gone in the next couple weeks, we could be about 20 days away from Rask being on the top line and playing 19-20 minutes a night. Not that I’m a big Rask guy, but anyone earning those types of minutes playing with Jason Zucker and Mikael Granlund (or whomever), is worth the look. Just keep him in mind once the Staal trade chatter picks up.

Dylan Larkin was back in practice for the Red Wings just a few days after suffering that strain that took him out of the lineup for last Saturday’s game. He had been expected to miss up to two weeks, but it looks like he’ll be good to go for Thursday night’s contest against Vegas.

It took one game, but Jeff Skinner was back on Jack Eichel’s wing in practice on Wednesday. Quelle surprise.

Fantasy owners can expect Dustin Byfuglien back in the lineup Thursday night. I assume he’ll be back on the top PP unit as well, especially with the uncertainty around Josh Morrissey’s availability.

It also looks like the Flames should get Travis Hamonic back Thursday night. Whether that’s fantasy-relevant for you would depend on the size of your league, I suppose.

Nick Bjugstad was lined up on the top line for Pittsburgh in practice, alongside Sidney Crosby and Jake Guentzel. Did I mention that their game Thursday night is in Florida? Oh baby.

Nashville acquired New Jersey forward Brian Boyle on Wednesday in exchange for a second round pick in this year’s draft. The top-6 seems locked up (especially with Kyle Turris returning) and Boyle seems destined for the second power-play unit. A guy playing in the bottom-6 of almost any team isn’t usually worth much in fantasy, though Boyle will still be relevant in leagues that count hits. Overall, I don’t expect much change in his fantasy value.

The Predators also traded for Cody McLeod. Sure? To replace McLeod, the Rangers called up Vinny Lettieri.

An interesting tweet came across my timeline on Wednesday:

Past 10 NHL seasons: Tuukka Rask is first in save percentage, fourth in shutouts, seventh in wins.

Yet there is a crowd out there that still hates on this guy. I'll never understand it

— Matt Larkin (@THNMattLarkin) February 6, 2019

This is, in fact, true. There are 41 goalies with at least 200 starts since the start of the 2009-2010 season. Of those 41 goalies, Rask is first in save percentage at .922. John Gibson is the only other goalie with at least a .920. Rask has a career .924 save percentage in the playoffs, including a Cup Final run in 2013 when he posted a .940. So I ask: is Tuukka Rask a Hall of Famer?

Michael Dal Colle was on a line with Mathew Barzal in Islanders practice. As for how long that remains a thing, we’ll call it TBD.

An interesting wrinkle in for the Bruins in their 4-3 shootout loss against the Rangers on Wednesday: they broke up the top line, moving David Pastrnak to the second line with David Krejci and Peter Cehlarik, lining Danton Heinen with Brad Marchand and Patrice Bergeron. Jake DeBrusk was bumped to the fourth line. Each of Pastrnak, Bergeron, and Heinen scored in defeat.

The overtime in this game was particularly nuts. It was odd-man rush after odd-man rush, featuring a spectacular sprawling glove save from Jaroslav Halak to briefly preserve the chance at a second point.

Mika Zibanejad scored in the win, keeping his point-per-game pace this year with 53 in 53. That makes 11 goals and 23 points in 18 games since the holiday break.

In Bob Cole’s final home call on a Maple Leafs broadcast, we had a good ol’ fashioned Battle of Ontario shootout. The Leafs ended up with the 5-4 win thanks to a lot of wizardry from Mitch Marner (two assists), John Tavares (one goal, one assist) and Zach Hyman (one goal, one assist). Auston Matthews also tallied, giving him four goals in his last five games.

Magnus Paajarvi tallied a pair of goals, boosting his season total by 40 percent. Thomas Chabot also scored, his 20th career goal, and his 40th point of the season. He officially becomes the ninth defenceman in the NHL to hit 40 points this season, and Chabot has played just 45 games. I’ve repeated it often but he’ll be in the Norris conversation sooner rather than later.

The biggest news this week is probably going to be the signing of Auston Matthews, who signed a five-year deal with an AAV over $11.6-million. That might seem like a weird deal given that the Leafs would likely have wanted to keep him around for eight more years rather than five, unless he signs another extension down the road. But as Cam pointed out in his Ramblings yesterday, the team only bought one year of unrestricted free agency, which kept the cap hit down. If they buy more UFA years, that number of $11.6-million goes even higher, and this is a team that needs every bit of cap space they can manage for 2019-20. I wouldn’t expect guys like Matthew Tkachuk or Sebastian Aho to sign five-year deals.

Does this change the landscape for RFAs, and what is the impact for cap league owners? This started with William Nylander in the summer (and fall) and has continued with Matthews and will finish with Marner.

The thing is, Nylander wasn’t really out of line with his ask or with what he ended with. Though the AAV this year is wonky, Nylander effectively signed to carry an AAV of $6.96-million under a salary cap of $79.5-million. Back in the summer of 2016, Filip Forsberg signed for six years with an AAV of $6-million, Nathan MacKinnon signed for seven years with an AAV of $6.3-million, and Mark Scheifele signed for eight years with an AAV of $6.1-million. At time of signing, Forsberg had a career points/game mark of 0.73, with MacKinnon at 0.70, and Scheifele was at 0.64. Nylander, when he signed his, was at 0.73. Those guys signed deals when the cap was $73-million, which means those three guys signed for anywhere between 8.2 percent and 8.6 percent of the cap. Nylander’s deal was 8.8 percent of the $79.5M cap (though it’s a higher AAV this year because of signing bonuses, and it’ll be lower next year when the cap goes up). Now, it’s obvious he doesn’t have the same upside as MacKinnon, but at the time the contracts were signed, they had produced at a very similar rate. Nylander’s contract, then, isn’t an outlier. He asked to be paid like those in recent history with similar performance had. It may be a bit higher than we’d expect (this year doesn’t matter too much because the cap crunch doesn’t come until the season is over), but certainly not extreme.

As far as Matthews is concerned, we can debate length of the contract, the dollars, whatever, but if we just isolate the AAV, as Cam pointed out, he’s being paid a similar percentage to other top centres. The difference between Matthews and others is AM34 is coming out of his ELC. The only real comparable contracts we can point to recently are Leon Draisaitl, Connor McDavid, and Jack Eichel. When Draisaitl signed his deal, he was 11.3 percent of the cap. Eichel’s this year is 12.6 percent, while McDavid’s is at 15.7 percent. Matthews’s will be 14 percent next season, and as Cam pointed out, the team only bought one UFA year whereas Edmonton and Buffalo bought multiple UFA years. The difference being Eichel was a 0.85 points/game guy in his first three years, but Matthews is at 0.98 and looks to be one of the top-3 goal scorers in the league. In that sense, Matthews’s landing between Eichel and McDavid isn’t much of a stretch.

Finally, we have Marner on the horizon. If he maintains close to his current point pace, he’ll have over 220 career points through his first three seasons. Since the 2005 lockout, there are just eight players with at least 220 points through their first three seasons: Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin, Evgeni Malkin, Nicklas Backstrom, Patrick Kane, Steven Stamkos, Connor McDavid, and Artemi Panarin. If you exclude Panarin because he came over to the NHL at such a late point in his career, you have seven players. Of those seven, six are future Hall of Famers with Nicklas Backstrom being the only question mark, and he’s largely been Ovechkin’s centre for all these years. We can talk about more goals and a different game all we want, but if Marner’s agent can point to Patrick Kane and say “my client’s first three seasons are similar to his first three seasons,” the guy is going to get paid, and paid handsomely.

(for what it’s worth, the first two seasons of Kane’s career saw a similar goal rate league-wide as Marner’s first two seasons)

I know there’s a lot of freaking out about how much players are making coming off their ELCs. This would change the landscape for cap league owners. The thing is, I’m not sure a lot has really changed. As I explained, Nylander’s AAV was in line with production from guys before him, Matthews is probably a bit high considering it’s only one UFA bought but he’s an exceptional talent, and Marner is producing at a level few players in his position have over the last 15 years. The circus (Nylander not signing before the seasons, Marner’s agent, etc) aside, there isn’t anything extreme here. It’s an exceptional circumstance where you have three players of this calibre all coming off ELCs within a year of each other. The Jets have something similar coming up with Kyle Connor, Patrik Laine, and Jacob Trouba, but even those names aren’t at the same impact level as the Matthews-Nylander-Marner triumvirate, and Trouba is not coming off an ELC.

All this is to say, I don’t think anything is considerably different but this is rather just a unique situation. Players are being paid more in raw dollars but as a percentage of the cap, it’s not all that different than what we’ve seen in recent history. All eyes are on Marner now, though. If he were to sign a five-year deal with a similar cap percentage to what Kane signed with back in 2010 (which was a five-year deal), he’d be expected to earn about $8.8-million per season. Depending on the length of the contract, it could change the landscape. On the other hand, it might not. We’ll see when he actually signs the deal.

What I will say is that one change to keep an eye on is the length of contracts coming out of ELCs. Nylander signed for six years and Marner for five. Maybe Matthews does the same. I wonder if we see the upper-tier of players coming out of ELCs signing short deals (five, maybe six at most) as opposed to eight. Teams are more hesitant to sign 29- or 30-year olds to long-term deals than they had been in the past, which is the age players coming off eight-year RFA deals typically land. Teams will be a lot less hesitant to sign 26- or 27-year olds to long-term deals, which is the age players would be coming off five-year RFA contracts. This allows the player some level of guarantee to sign two big contracts in their careers, as opposed to risking getting short-term deals as they approach 30 years old.

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-koivu-injured-boyle-traded-updates-on-byfuglien-and-larkin-cap-leagues-february-7/

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worlds-okayest-farmer · 7 years

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Day 30: Tell the tale of how exactly you found yourself getting into the HM series. Make it long and detailed! :D

So how did I become a total Farm Game Hellion who is currently counting down the hours until I can get my copy of 3oT? (24 until the place I pre-ordered from opens on release day!) Sorta like this:

“What are you playing, bro?” “It’s Harvest Moon!”

When I was eight years old, my older brother started playing a bunch of old SNES games on an emulator. Stuff like Secret of Mana, etc. (He actually bought a proper SNES to play Earthbound on a few months after all this.) I was kind of an odd kid who never had a ton of really good friends in the neighborhood (they were mostly my younger brother’s friends; I went to school a half hour from Pennsauken so I didn’t see my friends after school very often), so on days when I didn’t go outside after school and my younger brother was doing other stuff, I’d watch my older brother play all these games. (This was after his Diablo II and Final Fantasy phase but before his GTA phase, so it was much more interesting to me, if less funny for me to watch.) While I liked playing video games on my own a lot of the time, we only had one N64 and I was only allowed on it a certain amount of time, and we were between Pokémon generations at the time. Besides, my older brother had cooler games.

Anyway, I don’t remember the exact day this happened, but one day I came down to my brother’s room in the basement and watched him play this game where he’d run a farm. As I’ve said a number of times on here, I live in New Jersey, a state that’s pretty farm-heavy (at the moment, I live in a suburban area near two small farms). A lot of my school field trips even in high school were to farms. I wouldn’t say I’ve grown up on ‘em, but multiple years of hayrides and apple cider donuts and fresh-picked sweet corn and petting animals made me pretty into the whole farm thing. I was pretty into this game, more so when I saw him cooking things and he started talking about picking a girl to marry in the game and having kids and raising chickens and all that...

This isn’t when I got to play the games, however. He didn’t want me playing his emulator games, I didn’t have a computer in 2001 or the knowhow as an eight-year-old child to get them on my own, Blockbuster didn’t have HM64. After a while, other games came out and I started playing them or watching my brothers play them. But I didn’t forget the name Harvest Moon, and in late November of 2003 I was reading a Toys ‘R Us catalog because my parents demanded a Christmas list from me. Then I saw Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town in the video games section, and I remembered watching my brother play.

I got the game for Christmas that year and played it enthusiastically for a month and started a new file every so often over a few years. After that, I didn’t keep up with the series until 2012, a little while after I met my now-boyfriend. He was playing Tale of Two Towns one day when I came to his house, and it reminded me of how much I liked Friends of Mineral Town, and I felt like getting invested in a new video game series (and, to be honest, to play a game with cute dateable male characters after my love of the “bachelors” in Avalon Code sparked an interest in similar things), so I went to GameStop one day and bought the DS version.

I bought the rest of the games where you could marry male characters in the six months after (except Magical Melody, which I got recently but haven’t played yet). I’ve been hooked on the series as a whole ever since, and I’m pretty sure I’ve spent many more hours on it than my brother has.

#30 day challenge #what a long strange trip it's been #i owe whatever coolness i have to my older brother #he made me into the person i am today

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