#when i leave in 12ish hours

[apuzzledprince]

why wait until last minute to tell me "oh actually, im not gonna be any help and im not gonna get any sleep if i go so actually id rather not /:" instead of when i asked. TWO WEEKS AGO. or any time ive checked in and asked since then.

#im very upset #ive been so excited #and constantly checking in like 'hey are you still okay with driving six hours with me to pick up Sunny' #and it was always 'oh yeah no problem' #and now #NOW #when i leave in 12ish hours #you tell me #'no i dont think i can go' #ignore me im rambling #james i love you thank you for saying you'll go with me but please dont stress yourself about it or reschedule your day around it #(james isnt who this post is about but he deserves to be mentioned for the huge favor he's doing) #(he is mentioned in gratitude not anger)

[pilferingapples]

Les Miserables 1948 pt 2 (a) : In Which Absolutely Nothing Will Be Explained

My previous review posts here: 1a and 1b

Warning that those posts, like this post, contain spoilers. Yes even if you've read Les Miserables. Especially if you've read Les Miserables. I really strongly advise not reading this post if you think you're gonna see this version soon because going in unspoilered was a treat.

That said, let's roll!!

The second half starts with the Amis!! They're all printing Illegal Materials and discussing the latest censorship laws!

[ID: a group of photos of the Amis, young-ish men in surprisingly good 1830s outfits, reading a paper that offers "1,000 francs to anyone that will provide information likely to lead to the identification or arrest of the makers, holders, or disseminators of revolutionary newspapers, posters, pamphlets." /end ID]

Credit where credit's more than due: this is a fantastic way of introducing a large group of new characters and a new setting (wider Paris)! As they discuss their work, we learn more about them, their goals, and Parisian politics. Elegant and efficient! genuinely , I love this approach and wish more adaptations would do something like it

Unfortunately, while they do showcase several people doing various tasks, they don't name all of them--a shame, when it would have been so easy! But we do get to meet

Enjolras and Marius, the older leaders of the group! Here, Marius (left) is trying to get Enjolras (on the right) to leave Paris for his own safety (it does not work):

[ID: Marius tells Enjolras "And we must think, Enjolras, how you can get away from Paris for some time." /end ID] Courfeyrac, a younger, clothes-focused revolutionary, and of course Gavroche:

[ID: Enjolras brings Courfeyrac, a younger revolutionary, "Courfeyrac, distribute them in the foyer of the opera and at the Jackie club." Courfeyrac responds: "But I can't go like this, I must change my clothes. " Enjolras: "Mm...Do as you will." Gavroche, a kid about 10-12ish, watches this conversation./end ID] and of course, everyone's favorite

tumblr's star of this show

GRANTAIRE!!!

[ID: Closeup on Grantaire! a short, loudly dressed... 65 year old man?? saying " I know by heart the whole Constitution of the Year 2 ! "/ end ID ]] I bet you do, 48! Grantaire! I bet you were there!

[ID: Grantaire brags that "I can talk about it for six consecutive hours. I've been timed. " while Gavroche prepares to burst a paper bag behind him. /end ID]

(Gavroche's relationship with this Grantaire so far delights me, in that it's mostly based on pranking him)

Were you ready?? I was not ready!!!

Anyway then the police break in and there's a SHOOTOUT and Marius escapes and runs through the streets of Paris and Cosette lets him into her and Valjean's house!! Marius flirts with Cosette by guessing that her favorite author is ANDRE CHENIER!! Valjean sends Marius some mixed messages by hiding him from the cops and then telling Marius to go away and then going to Marius' apartment to tell him to never try to see Cosette again and frankly,dude, a guy could think you were following him!

Oh yeah Marius' apartment is an inn run by the Thenardiers. Eponine is the general serving-girl there and he's just as conscious and careful of her feelings as he is in the book:

fckin OUCH

We also find out that Marius is living in the Thenardier's new inn on CREDIT?? Thenardier is just...bankrolling him?? WHY (this will not be explained so just forget it)

Marius goes to meet Cosette (whose dresses, in keeping with this show, are Pretty Darn Good!)

--and I have to say I think this show does a good job (so far!) with Valjean and Cosette's relationship! Yes, he's overprotective and keeps them too isolated-- but he does it out of concern rather than control, and she's not afraid of him, she trusts him and worries about hurting him, not being hurt by him, and he's always concerned for her safety and happiness above all. As she tells Marius in this scene, she never even noticed how isolated she was before-- she's been happy! I think they really get some of that Gothic haunted element around this house and Cosette's life , and it's great!

Marius leaves for the Revolution, telling Cosette to not worry for him (!) and Cosette goes inside and gets told there's a man waiting for her ??

[ID: Toussaint tells Cosette "He's in the hall, he was very insistent. He says his name is Baron Thenard." /end ID]

Thenardier tries to scam Cosette by pretending to be an old friend of her mom's

And it's actually a fantastic scene? Cosette reveals that she knows nothing of her past, and we can see how that's made her vulnerable; and we learn how desperate she is to learn more about the mother she can't remember.

I really like this move to make Thenardier Cosette's villain/nemesis, the haunt from her past! it makes so much sense , given...everything else up to this point...and gives her a chance for some excellent character moments!

Fortunately Valjean interrupts Thenardier's attempt to Scam Cosette! and then Valjean and Thenardier agree to meet at the Old Mill Thenardier Inn?!?

And then ..

ok what happens next should obviously be the Gorbeau Raid, except:

Marius has nothing to do with it. At all. Marius is not anywhere close to this, he's gone to join the Revolution, remember?

Eponine is not? there?

There is A LIGHTNING STORM for no reason?

VALJEAN HAS A GUN

the cops show up despite having absolutely no reason to??

I cannot usefully screencap this scene, its genius lies in its pacing, but also I am not sure how it's relevant anymore to the entire rest of the show! Kicking out Marius' Thenardier/ Napoleon issues kinda destroys half the relevance of the scene and Valjean and Thenardier already having acknowledged each other (and Thenardier knowing where he lives!) removes most of the rest. All we have left is FIGHT SCENE but then that's what this movie is about baby!!!

[ID: Valjean being embraced by the Patron Minette as they all try to avoid the police. No really, that's what's happening. /end ID]

I have no idea what's going to happen at the barricades! I am so excited!

#LM 1948 #Les Miserables #Les Mis #other adaptations #I DIDN'T EVEN COVER GOVT. MINISTER GILLENORMAND #so many choices.

[mebiselfandi]

🕯️ for the fic ask! and the arrow through heat. im on desktop and lazy

Hi Mars🫶

I thought you meant an arrow in heat and I got horrible flash back to Leo’s slick. Anyways

🕯️was there a fic that was really hard on you to write, or took you to a place you didn't think it would take you?

Well, yes but I don’t want people to think I’m psychotic but it’s probably the following fic in the next answer which I answered before this one. Basically I wrote it through writers block and then when nobody said anything after about 12ish hours, I panicked and had a whole ‘woe is me’ moment. Anyways apparently this block is gone now but still there for neymessi so all my fic plans for them have come to a skidding halt

💘Is there any posted fic you want to rework/re-edit/re-write?

Yeah 2 fics actually. A lichantony fic which I want to rewrite to kunessi for obvious reasons. And also this one tiny fic I fought against the grain of writers block to write. It’s 4k long and still posted but it’s so cringe and the sadness is so ‘my grandma died and my cat got hit by a bus and then I broke my leg, be sad for me’ instead of smoothness persistent sadness that leaves you contemplating things about yourself. Anyways, once I get there, I will make it as angsty as possible. Also chap 1 of my Neymessi cowboy fic was done but then I decided to rewrite some of it and add stuff yesterday and now I’ve felt anxious for the last 8 hours :)!

Ask me fic questions

#mars🌪️ #girl from mars #mars bar #marsipan #the martian

[moonlitarmor]

She hates me. It's kind of insane how she can switch off her vitrol towards me, like a switch. She'll curse at me/about me/tell me about how horrible i am/how i make her sound horrible and then go silent when we are front of people and just. Im not explaining it well. She can hate me so efficiently and silently in public and so loudly and clearly in less public moments. Im just stumbling after her. Im getting better. Its easier not to care about people hearing me say, are we still fighting? Are we done fighting now that we're in front of other people? Are you done cursing at me? Are you no longer mad at me bc we're in front of other people.

I would never let her hold or take care of my grandkids. She's so comfortable switching faces and making you feel its normal for her to hate you-act normal at you. I wouldnt want my child to have to act normal for their grandmother to hate them bc theyre too much like me. She hates me. She gets mad when i say she doesnt like kids but man she didnt seem to enjoy raising us. She would constantly talk about how we were killing her, treating her like a servant, a slave, she would die one day, etc. this was 6 in the morning, from my memory, ages 7-12ish? I got better at blocking it out. In high school, I would leave home before 6 am and before anyone else would be awake to be at school an hour early sometimes just to not be in the house... make my own breakfast, homework done, clothes taken care of by me, just to not interact with my family. I would see them for the first time at night just to have that peace. She made every morning of my childhood horrible. I don't think she likes kids. I don't think she liked me as a child. I remember thinking that, that I was either useful or nothing to her. I thought that and i think thats still true. She didnt like spending time with me or listening to me talk. I dressed wrong, did my hair wrong. My grades were okay but she didnt want to hear about school. She didnt ask about friends. I wasnt allowed after school activities, so i would leave really early to maximize out of house hours. She gets mad at me for thinking this but i dont think she likes kids. I didnt feel well like as her child, at all. I thought that as a child many times, i was either useful or annoying, in the moment, to her. Now im more annoying than anything and im just really tired.

[mkg-modelmyopia]

Deadline Extension!

Hello, hello! I hope your week’s been off to a good start so far~! We come with an important (and hopefully welcome) announcement! Having due dates in December is always a bit awkward, with finals crunch and holidays and what not. Looking over the calendar, the last day for extensions was going to be Friday, December 23rd. Mostly because most of us will be busy with holiday stuff that weekend and might not be available for last minute questions. But that did leave you a weekend less.

So… with that being said, we’ve decided that we will be extending the overall application period until December 31st. Yahoo! That means everyone will have up until this time to get those apps tweaked, and hopefully get a little stress off you guys during the busiest seasons! That being said, because we are extending it by about over week and we would like to keep this game decently on track, the 31st will be a hard deadline— basically meaning that there will be no extra extension period this date to turn in apps. There will definitely be a grace period of some kind (a 12ish hour window after the 21st while the mods are in bed), but otherwise this will be it! I’ll be changing the deadline on the blog theme when I get back to my desktop as well to avoid any confusion.

We hope this comes this comes as positive news! For those of you who are nearly done with your apps, keep up the pace~! It does help us enormously not to get tons at the last minute, though this would never count against your application by any means.

Thanks, everyone!

- Mod Evie

#mod post #announcement

[lixiepeach]

Yes that was the fic I meant, and in any case I’m sorry to have mentioned it because it seems to be something that’s struck a nerve with you, I hope things improve for you soon and if it’s any consolation I really enjoy your writing and didn’t mean to offend or upset you in any way

No, no, it wasn't anything you did. I'm really reactive right now and I should have known better and saved answering that ask for tomorrow. I apologize, I shouldn't have said that.

I've been dealing with a lot irl this year and it's just not getting better and it's really taking its toll on me now.

Yeah, writing in general kinda strikes a nerve right now. It's just been an absolute doldrums of comments/reblogs/feedback and it's just really starting to take it's toll. It's not just me, my feed is practically just authors begging readers to understand why fic writers are leaving and not writing anymore. I always told myself I was going to be a fic writer that didn't give up writing no matter how few interactions I got. I've never been a popular author, not across the five sites now that I've posted on in 12ish years of fic writing. I've just never been the author that gets 1k+ comments, or constant asks, and I've always just kind of had to be okay with that. I get it, not everyone is going to like my writing, and I tend to favor a lot of heavy/niche topics and that's okay. It's not everyone's cup of tea. But it's really hard when you follow those big blogs that get tons of interactions and have literal fandoms based off their fandom works and it just...it gets to you after a while. There's just been this extreme lack of interaction recently and it's really made me question if I want to continue posting. Cause like, yeah, I write for myself, but I share it so others can enjoy it and I can get feedback and ya know, if one person tells me I made their day better then it makes it worth it. But if no one is interacting outside of just liking something...that tells me absolutely nothing. And if no one's giving feedback, I can't know if anyone liked it and it's just really disheartening when you spend literal hours, days, weeks on something just to get a handful of likes, maybe a reblog or two.

So I've really been struggling questioning if I want to keep writing. Why go through the stress of putting something into words when I can just keep it in my head? I don't have inspiration to write right now because everything I've written across all three of my active blogs recently has just flopped.

It's nothing you did. I'm just tired and frustrated and stressed and my normal outlet for that isn't working anymore.

#i really am sorry for coming across that way #i shouldn't have been snappy #but it really is a sensitive topic right now

[laora-ryn]

why lichtendahl tsery is the coolest character in gundam 00

Or, in which Laura thinks a lot about Lichty's prosthetics. Probably even more than the production team did

look i just love lichty a lot okay

---

me, last night: i can't write this post, i have a horrific headache and laundry to fold

me, four hours and almost 4k words later: oops

laundry did not get folded

---

so i'm gonna preface this with, while i have two degrees in bioengineering, it's been about 3 years since I was in school, and nowadays I do more assistive tech and hardly any prosthetics. so, pls don't take my word as god or anything, I'm just here with feelings and science that is (hopefully) at least 75% correct

uhh slight content warnings for show screencaps with blood/dying in them?? and discussions of things that would probably be considered body horror

it is under the cut because holy GOD it got long

first of all, i would like to put out that i am so upset that we literally only find out about his prostheses when he's dying. it makes sense for the story and for his character, it just makes me really sad that it isn't explored any further. like, even prosthetic limbs or systems in general are barely touched on after this

Louise has a prosthetic arm in s2, and we see the surgical scars briefly during the party scene, where she's talking with Setsuna, but she turns the subject quickly. So like, all we know canonically about in-universe prosthetics is that they exist, and that they work well enough, and look close enough to real limbs, that they pass to people who aren't looking closely.

But at this point in 2308, Louise having a prosthetic arm is considered the last-ditch effort. The way Saji talks, the idea of regrowing her arm in a regen pod isn't out of the question, if it weren't for her particle poisoning. (I have another soapbox here about the pods, lol) So I feel like most likely, by this point prosthetic systems have kind of fallen out of favor, and the favored med tech is regrowth (so long as you have the $$$$$$$$).

Which begs the question of: how long ago was Lichty injured?

"My parents cashed in their chips in the solar wars," and he was injured in the same explosion. Setsuna's scene at the start of ep1, which we're led to believe is the twilight of the wars - at least in Krugis - is in 2301. So, as a guess, he was injured in the late 90's. He's 21 in 2307, born in 2286, so - 11-13. Prepubescent, or barely starting puberty, when he's caught up in an explosion that blows away half his body.

His parents were elevator engineers, but I have to assume that they were working within the atmosphere, possibly at the base, because catastrophic injuries like this + the vacuum = no chance of survival, definitely not long enough for someone to find him and get him medical help. So, he must've been on the surface. Still, it's a miracle he survived at all

The wiki makes it sound like his entire body is mechanical, and "only his mind" remained (???). Personally, that, uh, makes no sense to me, so here's my personal headcanon on how much of his body survived:

Obviously his right side was blown away, we see that in ep 24. But I imagine for him to have any sort of chance of survival, his heart must've been spared?? Which guided my thought process there. So, he's got a little more than half his chest, a little residual abdomen that probably got swapped out for prosthetics anyway, + his left arm.

Which...leaves us with a 12ish year old kid on extensive life support, who needs a new lung, a new arm, two new legs, a new diaphragm with which to use that new lung, and all new viscera, as well as a body cavity that will support all of those shiny new organs, both in gravity and without.

I headcanon that Lichty's got one of - if not the - most extensive prosthetic systems in the world. That his parents knew they were going into the job with risks, knew they were bringing Lichty (and the siblings I headcanon he had, who didn't survive the attack) into the potential crossfire of the war. So, his parents probably had it written into their contract that if anything happens to their kids while they're on the job, they get all their medical care paid for by the company, and they get the best care available.

I headcanon he's Ukrainian, ie HRL, which doesn't seem like the bloc to pull out all the stops to save a single nobody-kid. But assuming he has extended family who assumed guardianship, they would've been able to call in the contract and get Lichty put back together. (Sounds like a long shot to me, tbh, but obviously he survived somehow.)

So this kid's on life support in a trauma center somewhere, probably in Indonesia or maybe China, considering the HRL's elevator is in the middle of the Pacific. He's got an artificial digestive system feeding the parts of him that are left, he's on a ventilator, he's on dialysis, he's got so many tubes and wires coming out of him that he's half-hidden behind them in the hospital bed.

He's in an induced coma for months before he's anywhere close to stable and the doctors feel comfortable waking him up. And even once he's awake, he's kept in a sterile room because half his surface area is still open wounds and they can't risk infection. Everyone he sees, for months and months and months, is either on the other end of a video or in a hazmat suit.

And of course, even once he's mostly stable with machines substituting for the organs he's missing, there's the matter of rebuilding them.

We've got just a couple shots of his prosthetics - honestly, not a lot to go on, but here's the three I'm looking at:

(last image from this post by pwryyynce)

So, what I'm seeing here is that his musculature and bone structure are all made of metal, and probably whatever other structural parts were needed beyond his ribs/synthetic spine. They're covered by what looks like real skin, considering all the blood. I think it's reasonable to assume that they took skin samples and grew duplicate swathes in the lab in the early stages of his treatment, so they wouldn't need to worry about rejection when they grafted it onto him. They probably made or simulated subcutaneous tissue also, so that his arm doesn't look (and feel!!) like skin stretched over a bunch of metal. I feel like probably, people would say something if Lasse threw an arm around his shoulders and ended up with a bruised forearm lmao

What I'm really wondering about is his organs. It's been way too long since I took a biomaterials class, and there would be enough innovation 300 years down the line that all the stuff we use now would be moot anyway, but I wonder how many of his organs were grown or transplanted, and how many were just substituted with mechanical systems that do the same thing.

This is a part I'm really no expert in, but I feel like just putting in filtering systems to replace his kidneys would probably be a lot easier than growing him new ones. They'd make him a functioning urinary system to connect the filters to, but tbh that whole system would probably be easier/simpler to just re-engineer.

I feel like his lung would need to be organic to deal with expansion and just. All that oxygen exchange? But it's entirely possible that a synthetic lung exists 300 years in the future that they could install. Pulmonology isn't my strong suit Px

Digestive system would need to be completely rebuilt, and I've always imagined it as synthetic, just his intestines replaced by a mess of tubing, possibly engineered to increase their overall surface area, reducing the length of intestine needed and leaving room for other systems around them. His esophagus would still be there, at least part of it, so they'd just integrate that into an artificial stomach

What's REALLY tripping me up is his circulatory system. Like, okay, he has a heart, and re-creating the major veins and arteries would be doable, but - interfacing them with the lung so the blood can pick up oxygen?? Interfacing them with the stomach and kidneys and liver properly?? Like, I do not know how you would functionally recreate a capillary bed and that sounds like a job for Future Bioengineers lmao. But I just.

You'd think at first that he wouldn't have as much blood because of all the mechanical systems, and I think he'd probably have less than average, but most of your viscera is involved with processing energy to keep your brain going, right? So your blood still needs to go down to your intestines to get those nutrients in order to bring back up. And, on top of that, his skin - which presumably covers the majority of his body, and definitely covers his limbs and upper chest - is vascularized and needs blood, too.

So, he still needs a decent chunk of blood for his body to run properly, which is great and A+, except for the fact that blood is made in your bone marrow, and guess what he doesn't have a whole lot of, anymore?

I don't know if they'd be able to like, create some kind of system that approximates bone marrow, or somehow supplement the stuff he has left in his left arm and remaining ribcage/breastbone/spine, but this would also significantly impact his immune system since bone marrow is also where your white blood cells come from. So like...that would be a serious issue they would need to address, maybe they'd somehow put bone marrow in his prosthetic long bones, with enough of the hormones/stuff that tells it to keep production of BM up, since it's constantly reproducing itself? Or else just have a whole extra box in his abdomen that's like "no, you make blood now" idk like I said, this is not My Thing

Again his immune system would be fucked, so the Bone Marrow Box would also need to replenish white blood cells, which would not at all help with replacing his lymphatic system. His thymus would probably have survived since it's over the heart, but his spleen is gone and - yeah, I'm not qualified to talk about this lmao

tbh I don't understand the liver or pancreas or gallbladder at all, and at this point I'm too afraid to ask

But! His nervous system! is something i am qualified to talk about, buckle up kids we're going for a ride

because his brain/brainstem/spine to T9 ish, probably, would have survived. Which means his use of his left arm would be 100% intact. Tbh after all this he's almost definitely left hand dominant, even once he gets a functioning right arm again, for reasons I will get into in probably a few paragraphs

For the mechanics of a prosthetic arm, tbh in the 24th century they've probably perfected it. We've come a long way now (well, as of 2018, when I wrote my thesis) in making a hand that can physically move in the ways a real one can. the real problem with fancy stuff like this is controlling it.

Lichty would functionally be a shoulder disarticulation amputee (where your ball and socket joint is disconnected), which is. about as high as you get. Your major nerves to the arm are the radial (back of your arm/hand), median (thumb half of your arm/hand), and ulnar (pinky half of your arm/hand). Those three kind of thread around your collarbone before dipping down into your arm, splitting up gradually into smaller nerves that innervate different parts of your arm and hand.

Sounds great and neat and simple, right? You just follow the nerves and make new wires and attach them to the prosthetic, right?

(((((((:

nerves are a FUCK, and yeah, none of that is how it works, and tbh I feel like evolution just made it overly complicated on purpose, just to frustrate people because oh my god

To slightly oversimplify, you have two different kinds of neurons making up your nerves: sensory and motor. Sensory takes inputs from the endpoints (your skin, typically) and sends them back up the spinal cord to your brain. Motor takes inputs from your brain and sends them down to the peripheral nerves to create a result (typically, muscle contractions). These are not sorted into neat sections within the larger nerves, and aren't especially easy to differentiate, especially if you're just trying to zap a whole nerve with electricity to make the muscle go. you're gonna hit all sorts of muscles, and all sorts of sensory inputs, and it's a mess.

Here's a basic diagram of a nerve for reference:

Basically, what you need to know is that every axon (neuron) is going to innervate a particular muscle fiber, or send a particular type of sensory input for a particular patch of skin. These axons are not sorted neatly by type of neuron or area of the arm/hand. They regularly jump between fascicles throughout the length of the nerve, and fascicles aren't neatly sorted, either. So, trying to target a particular fascicle, for example, is usually a lost cause. (without putting an electrode INTO the nerve, which is a Whole Other Thing that's being studied, but urgh)

Currently, myoelectric prostheses are the 'state of the art,' where there are sensors on the inside of the socket that read muscle activity in the residual limb and use it to power the prosthetic. This...wouldn't work for Lichty for a variety of reasons, and is generally not super well received by patients today, anyway. Typically, if you're lucky, you get 4 electrode sites, so for example, you would be able to flex/extend your elbow, and open/close your hand. Not exactly 27 degrees of freedom, yeah?

A process that tbh could work well in conjunction with future!prosthetic arms is something called targeted muscle reinnervation (TMR), where they basically say 'hey Lichty, try and flex your right elbow,' they record which nerve endings in his residual shoulder light up, and then they attach those to the mechanism that flexes his elbow. (Typically they deal with fascicles, if I remember right, but tbh in 300 years I wouldn't be surprised if they could go more specific.) It wasn't the focus of my research - our lab did hands primarily, and TMR is usually reserved for high level amputees, and it's a SUPER invasive surgery, so not a lot of people go for it. But lichty's just about as invasive as you can get lmao, so

TMR can also do some limited sensory feedback! basically, they stimulate different nerve endings and ask him what he feels and where. That's where a phantom limb map comes into play big time. Depending on how complete it is, he could say "yeah it's upper arm, vaguely pressure?" or "yeah it's the back of my upper arm but sort of to the side, and about halfway down, and it's sharp poking." Both the motor and sensory stuff are kind of hunt and peck searching but they kind of have all the time in the world to work with him on this, so I think it'd be a really good option for him!

So, google targeted muscle reinnervation if you wanna learn more! It's cool as fuck, and it's the thing that I think is probably most viable for Lichty to get use of his right arm back! I don't know that it'd give him full movement and full sensation, but it'd be enough to go on - especially since they'd definitely prioritize getting the most common sensations and motions working. A couple people in my lab were looking at combining different movements to reduce the number of movements you'd need for prosthetics in general - moving your wrist at a certain angle to approximate both radial deviation and wrist extension, for example.

Now legs, I am less qualified to talk about. TMR also works for them as far as I know, though balance and gait would be a Whole Thing, he'd have to relearn how to walk, not just because he's been bedbound for so long, but because he has to learn how his new legs operate, and where his new center of gravity is, and just...yeah.

I imagine probably, legs are the last thing they get him working on - they get his torso finished and operational and closed up, and at this point he wouldn't need to be quarantined/sterile anymore. If he really wanted to be up and about at this point, they could get him a power wheelchair, or a one-arm-propel manual chair would work too. Then they'd get him an arm and start him with therapy for that, and skin grafts. Once he's recovered from the arm surgeries and doing well enough they'd probably start talking about prosthetic legs.

Depending on how well TMR works 300 years from now, he'd have to re-learn grip strength, pressure, heat, like he'd have all new baselines for his new limbs which would in particular impact his hand. That'd be a looooot of PT and OT to make sure he doesn't drop or crush stuff on accident. He also may need to learn to operate without proprioception, depending on whether his phantom map included that. Proprioception is knowing where your limb is in space without looking at it - so like, if he didn't have it, he couldn't just like reach over and grab something, or type on a keyboard, without watching his hand as he did it - at least without a lot of practice and trial and error.

also your nervous system does sympathetic and parasympathetic stuff which is like, the automatic 'tells your organs to do their job' except i know next to nothing about that. so uhhhhh I think it'd be reasonable to assume that all the mechanical replacements for organs have their own like, 'battery' and 'brain' in them that keep them going properly and that's all i'm gonna say about that

holy jesus god this nervous system section is like as long as the rest of it combined i'm so sorry

His ribcage would need to be rebuilt in metal, which we can see in the pics. His spine would also need to be, if only to connect his ribs to his new pelvis lmao, but I guess it looks like they built in more metal around his abdomen too, so the spine would be slightly less structural than in the normal body. but - yeah, there would definitely be a lot of work going into into 'printing parts that will keep all these obscenely expensive organs in place and connected to the right things'

(oh that's another thing!! I headcanon that all these custom parts are 3d printed to his specs, in whatever material is best for that particular job. Presumably the material options are a lot more than we have now, and esp the metal structural parts, I think would make a lot of sense to print)

In terms of skin coverage!! Pictures are inconclusive whether he has skin covering his abdomen, or just his upper chest and limbs!! We can see skin on his hip and shoulder, but none in between, but I can't tell whether that's because his side was damaged worse, or if there's no skin there to begin with. Personally I think grafting skin to metal would create all sorts of New Issues that would be more effort than it's worth, but shrug, and also, leaving it open, with just a brace to go around his abdomen as extra support, would give him/his doctors easier access if anything were to go wrong. In my fics I go with the brace solution, because angst, but YMMV

skin coverage brings up all sorts of angst that his silly swimsuit just cracks the surface of. he's def wearing that suit for at the VERY least the skin graft scars, and also probably because he doesn't have skin on his abdomen sdlfkjsodfjsl

The other fun thing that would need to be taken into account for lichty! Is that! He's twelve (ish) when this happens! And twelve year olds! Aren't done growing! Lichty's pretty tall, 5'11" ish if I remember right, so it's not like they just stunted his growth permanently.

If he's 12 when he's injured, I'd guess he's probably 14 ish once he starts looking at getting prosthetic limbs. 14 yo boys aren't done growing either, so they'd either have to make him Weirdly Long for a teenager before he grows into his prosthetics, or make his limbs and torso designs growable to match what they think his height and weight would've been.

Growable limbs would be Really Difficult but probably doable? he'd just have to come in every several months after he's discharged to get Stretched (lol). On the other hand, he's probably actually pushing 17 by the time he's discharged, by which point most teenaged boys are done growing. So, it would make sense for them to make him Long while he's an inpatient, since that last year of therapy would be the most intense/functional, and also when he'd be roughly his adult size. So, he'd be a little disproportionate for a few years, but theyre years that he spends largely in a hospital bed anyway, so it wouldn't be that big of a Thing?

Then, they'd be able to discharge him when he's ready, without any plans to bring him back unless something goes wrong

They would've just estimated what his limb lengths would've been, with some growth room in the size of his chest and his right shoulder. His remaining chest would still be scrawny as a 14 year old, when his torso's closed up, but on the off chance he turned barrel chested by the time he hits 17 lol they'd need a plan for that. Luckily, adult!lichty is scrawny af, so there was probably minimal adjusting that needed to happen there.

The other other thing is, he hasn't gone through puberty yet! And while some of the puberty hormones would still kick in on time, ie the ones that come from his brain, he's also now missing all his reproductive organs. so, he'd need to get injections for the hormones he's missing, probably, because he looks and sounds like he did, indeed, go through puberty

(it's my headcanon that he's infertile even though he desperately loves kids. He and Chris adopt a small horde once they retire peacefully from the job they definitely didn't die doing)

This kid definitely has chronic pain - phantom pain and otherwise - especially when he's in gravity. he definitely has sensory and motor deficits that he gets really good at hiding. he definitely prefers to stay in space because it lessens the pain, and also because it means he doesn't have to walk around, which reduces pain even more. He's probably got a backup cane and/or wheelchair stashed in the back of his closet for bad days on the surface. he probably goes to see dr moreno more than anyone else, which causes lasse and feldt and chris to constantly ask if he's okay, as well as they can around the secrecy rules. he's definitely left handed, and sometimes his right hand is next to useless depending on the day, so he's gotten really good at typing one handed, and maybe even prefers the one handed keyboard he learned to QWERTY or standard DVORAK or whatever they use on the ptolemy lol

uhhh he weighs more than a normal person his size, most probably, because of the metal parts. the blood flow means his arm and legs would be warm, and the skin has nails and hair and wrinkles that make it a convincing enough arm, but if you hold it too tightly or look at it too closely it looks a little off in a way you can't place

he's definitely got a Thing about people touching his abdomen or chest, not even like because he's touch-sensitive like setsuna, just because his stomach isn't gonna squish like everyone else's and that'd lead to way more questions than he's willing or able to answer

an artistic rendition:

lasse: when the FUCK did you get abs like this oh my god???

lichty: nervous sweating

but yea tldr is 'this kid definitely shouldn't be alive, but he is, so laura got to geek out about biotech and uh also his rehab would have taken literal years after the literal years of surgery to put him back together.' in other words he was probably recruited to CB like. Barely a few months after he left the hospital for good

((also, as an aside, i would like to make you all very sad and remind you that lichty's backstory is actually really similar to lockon's, he lost his family in a terrorist bombing as a kid, and was horrifically injured by it to boot. but so far as we can tell, he basically took the exact opposite approach to neil. like yeah, his cheeriness is probably a front at least part of the time, but like, he didn't go off the deep end, and join CB for revenge. he joined to make the world a better place, and never once talked to anyone at all about the stuff he went through as a kid, and never - so far as we can tell - blamed anyone for it))

((like idk guys just. lichty going through the same thing, only worse as lockon, and coming out the other end as an objectively happier and arguably better person, gives me a lot of emotions that i'm struggling to articulate sldkfjaosdjflad))

((also I definitely headcanon that the kpsa did the bombing that killed lichty's family too just because it hurts a lot, especially since lichty's bomb would've been roughly a year after Neil's))

I uh don't really have a conclusion here so. Have 4k words of science dump, thank u all for encouraging me yesterday to write it!!!

#gundam 00 #lichty tsery #lichtendahl tsery #fuck i love this kid so much i would die for him tbh #g00 #reference #mine #image ids in alt text #I am so sorry for the excessive run on sentences I tried #When I get like this I get very stream of consciousness #And editing can only do so much without having to rewrite the whole thing 😭

[spiral-ingoutofcontrol]

PLEASE TELL ME ALL ABOUT THE AU YOU'VE BUILT AROUND THE ANGSTY ARMADA UNIT FIC Ive come up with some ideas of my own in the 12ish hours that this fic has existed in my life and im curious to see how they differ from what you made

Leah I am in LOVE with you for sending this ask 😍🥰😩

For anyone that hasn’t read Glitchflower’s Piratin’ with Gears here’s the link. It’s 300 words of pure angst and I haven’t stopped thinking about that shit since a I read it two and a half years ago😭😭😭

Little bit of a self plug for my corresponding moodboard for this AU. The moodboard is for my captain, Caroline Blake but I’m going to leave out the name and leave it gender neutral here 👀 insane ranting under the cut

OKAY SO we don’t diverge from canon until the end of Cool Ranch and then we go absolutely off the rails. Instead of making it out with the ship and their second piece of the map, Deacon manages to pull himself together, sneak up on the crew in their moment of celebration, and put the barrel of his gun against their Captain’s head. He gives them an ultimatum. Leave with their Captain or with their piece of the map. They aren’t leaving the skyway with both.

It’s an easy decision for the crew- they wouldn’t have gotten this far without their Captain. With them at the helm, they would be able to recover the map pieces and beat the Armada back into submission. Their Captain made a different call. They couldn’t let the Armada have half of the Map to El Dorado. So they gave the map piece to Bonnie Anne and let Deacon lead them back to the Erebus at gun point. The dramatic bastard even locks them up in the (now repaired) part of the brig that they were being held in at the beginning of the game.

This becomes the first time that the pirate meets Kane- they also spit on him which isn’t important to the plot but is important to me. He tells Deacon to take the pirate to Bishop. If they aren’t willing to offer up any information relevant to the Armada’s cause, he could use the pirate for his special project. If you’ve read the ficlet and you know where this is going, I am SO sorry.

Things get fuzzy for the pirate after being delivered to Bishop. Between the torture, long stretches of time between meals, and Bishop drugging them every time he takes them out of their prison cell, everything blends together. The line between dreams and reality blur. Are they really trying to escape over and over only to be captured again or just wishing it to be true? Is Bishop really making them test out his latest machine when he let them leave their room or were they making it all up? By the end of it, the pirate is following Deacon around like a loyal guard dog. They know that there’s no point in trying to run anymore. Kane is pleased with the results of Bishop’s mysterious project. 

Their crew finds them after two months, at half strength and still searching for their lost Captain. They’re heard about the Armada testing a new weapon and went to see what it was. They weren’t expecting it to be their captain.

But their captain wasn’t the same. They didn’t respond to their own name- only to orders given to them by Deacon when he called them Galatea. Their entire right arm had been replaced with the most intricate piece of clockwork they had ever seen. And boy could the thing do damage. It hit harder than a brick and came equipped with a canon and a concealed blade. They almost took out Ratbeard’s good eye in the ensuing fight. By some miracle- or maybe some cruel twist of fate- the crew is able to knock them out and drag them back to the ship before they’re able to kill anybody.

When the Captain wakes up, they’re back to their normal selves, but it’s very obvious that things are never going to be the same. The Armada had been controlling them like a puppet. A good knock to the head wasn’t going to fix them forever. They couldn’t even remove the clockwork arm- Nurse Quinn wouldn't even know where to start on it. It was the most advanced prosthetic she had ever seen. Ratbeard didn’t hobble around on that peg leg because he thought it matched his outfit.

The Captain disbands the crew out of fear. They don’t want to hurt their friends- their family- because they were being forced to live at the Armada’s beck and call. They go into hiding on a farm in Cool Ranch with Old Scratch as their only companion- the old skeleton to loyal to leave them all alone in the desert. They find peace out there. They find time to heal. And then they find Bonnie Anne and Subodai in their living room one day. They’ve found a new lead on the map, a duck in Mooshu that was in the picture of Pollo’s crew. They want to get the band back together. Finish what they started. 

The pirate doesn’t want to go. They only agree after Subodai promises them something unthinkable. If the Armada turns them against the crew again, they want Subodai to kill them. They’ve known each other the longest and saved each other’s necks more times than the pirate can even count. He’s the only one that they trust to really go through with it in the end.

And in the end, he has to.

#lol sorry for the abrupt ending I don't have the whole outline done yet #pirate101 #pitty101 #pitty #pitty fandom #i might actually write some stuff for this if y'all're inch rested #but i should should probably actually finish where the ocean is the sky first lol #thanks for the ask leah im crying

[somewhere-in-santa-feeee]

Yall are gonna get my Headcanons of Race’s childhood because I said so. Enjoy (or don’t I can’t really tell youse what to do)

⚠️-WARNING MENTIONS IF ABSE AND DRIKING-⚠️

So he was born a twin in Italy, 1884 to the name Antonio Higgins, his father was high in the crime business and his mother a housewife. (His twin was called Bella) He had 4 older brothers and 2 older sisters. They lived in Italy until he was about 10 then they moved to Queens, New York because his father fucked up some sorta heist or some shit. (It starts to go down hill from here) so because their father is in crime they have quite a lot of money so they buy a HUGE fuckin mansion. Then his mother fell pregnant again and had another set of twins but the pregnancy knocked her for 7 and her health started deteriorating fast, then she died around when Race was about 12ish he was freakin heartbroken because he was closer with his mother than anyone else in the family (apart from Bella). So after that Race’s father started gambling and drinking more due to grief and loss and he started taking his anger out on Race and the two younger twins. Then when they were about 13ish and their father was out of town, Bella gave Race a shot tone of money and just said run, and Race, being the stubborn bitch they were, was like it not leaving without you. So Bella said I’m not going, I need to look after the twins cuz I don’t see dad doing it any time soon. And Race was like fine, I’ll miss you, and She was like I’ll miss you too and she gave him a little note that she had written and said read it whenever you miss me and I’ll be there with you. So Race just nodded and legged it for about 3 hours away and ended up beaten up in a side ally being found by Jack Kelly and then he became a Newsie. Then the first time he went to the refuge, he found that his father was in prison as-well and Snyder knew that his father used to hit him and used it to his advantage and shit. And also they got the smoking habit from his brothers and the gambling from his father. That’s it basically sorry it was so long and deep but yeah.

#newsies #racetrack higgins #newsies headcanons

[stasammenarchive]

miguel spent around... 12ish hours in the land of the dead - give or take.. because i was doing some research on the subject.. and miguel entered the land of the dead shortly after sunset.. and in the REAL town of santa cecelia sunset around that time was just about 6pm.. with sunrise being about 6am 

that’s a long ass time to spend in the land of the dead, especially with how close he was to becoming a skeleton at the end.. and that sort of thing would likely leave a mark. you don’t get that close to the dead without it impacting you SOMEHOW. 

with that said it’s sort of my personal headcanon that miguel is sort of a bridge between the living and the dead, but really only on the day of the dead. he can’t cross the cempasuchil bridge, but he CAN see and interact with his dead relatives when they arrive to the land of the living. one he realises that he’s not going to die from being able to see them again it’s actually.. a huge relief. he gets to see his family.. and he doesn’t have to wait to be dead to see them all again! he feels pretty lucky that he has that ability. 

#003 : ( miguel headcanons )

[beitingz]

Requested: Donnie x Reader

Request: “Playing computer games and cuddles with Donnie, please <3”

I hope this is okay! I sort of changed it up just a little. It’s not much, but it’s honest work. Excuse the spacing, too, it turns out a little weird when I paste it here from my notes.

————

You entered the lair around 9 o’clock, just a few hours before your boyfriend and his brothers went out for patrol. You didn’t really bother calling before you arrived, and besides, Donnie stopped replying a while ago. You knew he was getting caught up with the work he busied himself with, so you decided to stop by and get your compete daily dose of attention.

Leonardo was the first to greet you tonight. “Oh, hey, Y/N,” he waved two of three fingers in your general direction while he continued on his journey to the kitchen, “what’s up?”

You smiled and greeted him in return. “Nothing much. I just came to hang out with Donnie.”

“Well, he’s exactly where you left him,” the eldest brother said with a slight chuckle, opening the fridge. “Hungry?”

You shook your head when he casted you a glance and held up a black plastic bag. “Nah, I grabbed some snacks on the way,” you said, pointing a finger at the bag with your free hand, “do you want anything?”

He closed the fridge and took you upon your offer. After that little exchange, you almost ended up getting trampled by Mikey who seemed to be on the run from a maskless Raph. You yelled your hellos and goodbyes as the two dashed away before finally entering your boyfriend’s lab.

It was a mess but if you methodically analyzed his workspace long enough, you’d see that there was a method to Donnie’s madness. You had bought him bins and little baskets to help him keep his things organized, but as far as you knew, he most likely used them for one of his projects. You saw the back of his head being partially illuminated by the monitors that surrounded him and rolled your eyes half-heartedly. He really was in his own little world when he was focused.

“Hi, cutie,” you called out, shoving the door shut with a jut of your hip. “Hey,” he replied, giving you some form of acknowledgement at least. You frowned at this as you approached his hunched over form. “I brought some things for us to munch on, buuuut I gave Leo my chips, so if you want, we could just...” you trailed off when his digits refused to stop dancing across the keyboard. He wasn’t listening.

“Don?” you mumbled warily.

“Oh, hey, when did you get here?”

You would have whirled his chair around so fast if this had been the first time, but you knew what he was doing was probably very important. It better be...

With a defeated sigh, you set your things down on the most spacious spot you could find on the surface of his makeshift desk. He hardly faltered when you took a few moments to slip underneath his arms and sit across his lap, curled up against his plastron.

It felt like an eternity had went by when you finally felt a pair of lips gently press against the crown of your head. You tilted your head back to look at the face of your lover and see that he was smiling down at you. You didn’t smile back. You pouted and buried your face in the crook of his neck.

“Princess...”

“Don’t ‘princess’ me,” you muttered, ignoring the butterflies in the pit of your stomach at his name for you. He said nothing for a while, then draped his arms around your form. “I’m sorry,” he apologized, rolling the chair away from his computers to give him room to stretch his legs and adjust you more comfortably on his lap.

You contemplated dragging on this little act for a moment, however decided against it. You had missed him too much. “Will you make it up to me then?” you asked, pressing feathery kisses against his neck.

“Of course, darling,” he cooed, tilting his head opposite of yours in order to give you more room. He felt your smile against his scaly skin before you pulled away and began to sit up. His arms tightened around you, indicating that he didn’t want you to leave, but he eventually let you slip away to grab the bag of goodies you brought for the both of you. He watched as you reached inside and began pulling out some of your favorite treats as well as his, drinks and all, and placed them to the side of his computer. Normally, he would’ve went off lecturing you about the hazards of having food and drinks about electronic devices, though he knew he’d be somewhat of a hypocrite with him and his slight caffeine addiction; he decided against it.

“What are we playing tonight?” you asked, cracking open a soda can and handing it to him. He glanced at one of the monitors and saw that is was a little past 10:10. He would have to go on patrol around 12ish. “How about,” he took a quick swig of his drink, “a game that won’t cause us to lose track of time?”

You agreed as you reclaimed your spot on his lap, your back was towards his plastron this time and took over his computer. His free arm loosely wrapped around your frame, soon to be joined by the other when he finished his soda and awaited his turn (or whenever you appeared to need help).

#tmnt x reader #donnie x reader #donatello x reader #video games #fanfiction #request

[goatmeatstew]

so, when I was young maybe 7-12ish, though I dont remember my exact age, my mom and I moved to Chicago to live with her then boyfriend, now ex, Michael Voss. He was an alcoholic, dont know about now but he probably still is, and he was not a nice drunk. He and his parents were always tormenting me and I never knew why. The three of them treated his daughter like she was a perfect little angel, but me? oh I was a wicked, horrid child who only ever caused problems in their eyes.

Only today have I realized they were treating me like that because I'm autistic. Its taken me an embarrassingly long time to connect the dots and realize this, and I only realized it because I was talking to my mom about all the trauma that Michael caused and she mentioned that he probably treated me the way he did cause I'm autistic.

I hope he feels good about himself, tormenting an autistic child for no reason. if I never come into contact with him again, it'll still be too soon.

I'm so glad my mom sent me back to texas to live with my grandparents while she saved up enough to get away from his abuse, but I feel so terrible that she couldn't afford to leave with me and had to stay with him longer than I did.

The only good memory I have associated with Michael is one time my mom convinced him to go to Alcoholics Anonymous and I was left alone in a room full of toys and I just built stuff with k'nex for hours.

#tw alchoholism #tw abelism #tw abuse #tw child abuse #tw vent

[atleast400relativelysmallworms]

i have math work i should really be doing but fuck that polynomial devision aint shit and something has just occured to me

how much sleep does five actually get in season one???

first day- he gets to vanya's house when its quite late at night after having just drunk a rather large cup of coffee and being in a fight which isnt a good combination for a wonderful night's rest and also leaves quite early in the morning so not much not much sleep then.

day two- another fight, he comes home with delores. again, i'm assuming quite late by how dark it was outside. he's quite upset so once again i'm thinking neither a restful nights sleep nor a very long one

day three- five spends pretty much the whole day in the car but i don't he wouldve had a nap and we know he was up for atleasr some protion of that night watching the lab dude doing his sketchy deals and if he did sleeo after that a utility van doesnt make for a great bed, though you could say he's gotten used to sleeping in uncomfortable places, still i'd wager he didnt wake up well rested.

day four- ok to be fair in this episode we do see him sleep passed out for quite a while and apparently sleeing peacufully (though he does wakeup looking pretty rough the next morning so the quality of that sleep is questionable also he probably would've had a killer hangover) not much to say here but atleast a little bit of propper sleeo

day five- at the end of the day he goes back to the commision with the handler so i'm going to say he was up for 12 hours at least (i'll inculde his time at the commision in day five) and then spends probably the best part of a day at the commision so lets add on another 12ish hours to that, i'm going to take a wild guess and say he didnt sleep between talking to the handler for the first time and leaving the commision so he's now been up for 24ish hours

day six- definitly no sleepy times between getting back from the commision and going to leonad's house while he's there he passes out from pain but he's awake when they get back to the academy so he wasn't unconsious for that long and collapsing isn't not sleep. that siad, though drug induced, he gets his first propper night's sleep, after being awake after being awake for maybe 36 hours.

day seven- the boys go rescue alison with five driving the car so no car naps, they reach leornord's murder shack when it dark and i'm guessing it took them a little while to get back and when they did not only did they have to make sure alison was going to be ok but also seeing your sister nearly die isnt the best way to prepare for a good night sleep so another short night of ad quality sleep

day eight- i cant really say much about this on accound of it being the last one of the seaon but they were up quite late at night fighting vanya and then he jumps into the middle of the day in dallas so not much sleepy time

#this ended up taking way longer than i thought it would #and oh god i promised my cenco that i would be productive and feel better about myseld this week #oops #i might look at season two because out poor baby man doesn't get much sleep then either #ughhhhhhhhh #now to ruin my own sleep staying up all night relearning mathematical proof #ahhhh i hate algebra #the umbrella academy #number five #give the boye a rest #let him sleep #please #tua

[shwazzberryswriting]

Sweet Treats

Pairing: Jeno x Original Female Character|Reader

Genre: Meet-Cute (sort of), Fluff, AU - Non-Famous Jeno

Word count: 2.4k

Rating/Warnings: Teen (12ish+)/Kissing

Prompt: Random Word Generator

*Must be about Jeno

*Must be 2k words (overshot it ROFL)

*Use these words (random word generator):

-main

-mutual

-organ

Author’s Note: Thank you to my friend for their patience with me taking forever to get this prompt fufilled! It wasn't from a lack of inspiration. Hot Sauce era gave me a lot of fuel for Jeno!

--------

If Suyuan could make a dessert to represent her cousin’s bake sale, she’d bake a Keylime Pie. The middle school’s front entrance was lined with thick green grass that glistened in the sunlight. The late spring breeze carried the scent of the lime trees nearby, tingling her nose.

The PTA was throwing a Mountain Retreat Bake Sale to raise funds for a weeklong mountain retreat for the 6th grade class. Fen, Suyuan’s cousin, should have been setting up the baked goods under the tent, but the 12-year-old was having too much fun playing with her friends. They were currently bullying a man who seemed to be related to Fen’s best friend, HaeWon.

He wore black skinny jeans and a loose white and black striped knit sweater. His black hair fell over his eyes as he grimaced a smile. He was trying to dance along to an Itzy song, but the kids were booing him as he refused to do “aeygo”. Suyuan grinned as she recalled how she and her classmates would tease their older cousins to do cute dances to entertain them. It was a circle of life to be forced to do cute dances at various points in one’s life.

“Fen, I think we have to set up the lemonade, too,” Suyuan called out, setting a sign down on the table as she stood up. “Give that guy a break, too! We’re helping you for free, you know. I should have told you to buy me Starbucks.”

“Jeno Lee! Jeno Lee! You can’t dance!” Fen and HaeWon chanted. The main bullies had even started a dance where they sashayed their hips. They stopped once their friends began to retreat back to pick up their tasks.

“Thanks,” Jeno Lee said with a shy smile as he walked away from his red motorbike to join her under the tent. “I’m Jeno.”

“Suyuan,” she replied, waving her hand. “I’m Fen’s cousin. How’d you get roped into this?”

“My aunt and uncle helped me with my bake sale when I was 13,” he replied. He began helping Fen and HaeWon line up trays of cookies on one of the white topped plastic tables. “HaeWon should buy me some Starbucks, too, I think.”

“I don’t even have a credit card,” HaeWon replied, looking over her shoulder to glare at him.

“Suyuan helped me bake these strawberry macarons!” Fen exclaimed, setting the cookies down beside the blueberry jam thumbprint cookies. “My mom and I made the shortbread cookies.”

“Did you have to do this?” Jeno asked as he sat down to help make the signs to indicate the prices of the baked goods.

“No, for our school trip we pitched our trip to family members, Shark Tank-style,” she replied.

“What?” he sounded incredulous as he stopped writing on the white board to stare at her. “Your school turned it into a Economy project?”

“It was fun. I mostly used cute pictures of me in my slides and I kept saying, ‘You’re investing in my future and well being,’ enough to make my parents emotional. It annoyed my siblings and other relatives enough that they handed me at least a couple dollars before I could finish my pitch.”

“Smart,” he said, looking impressed. “Do you know how to write DanPatBbang?”

“My mom made a huge batch!” HaeWon spoke up as she pointed to the golden buns wrapped in clear plastic bags.

“Um, no,” Suyuan replied. “We can write Sweet Red Bean Paste Buns. We’ll find someone to write it the correct way. They look amazing, HaeWon! Your mom told me you made the paste.”

“I also brushed the egg wash on,” she said.

Fen and HaeWon took over all the tasks Suyuan and Jeno started. Soon enough, Jeno and Suyuan were seated behind the pastries and water cooler filled with lemonade, chitchatting. They exchanged war stories about their 6th Grade Mountain Retreat. Jeno’s class were locked in their dorms for a few hours as a family of bears foraged around their camp for food the first day they arrived. It sounded more exciting than what really happened, he claimed.

Jeno seemed captivated as Suyuan told an elaborate story about her group’s river raft ride. Their raft capsized partway through the ride, and her group had to walk their way back to camp with nothing but an old compass as help, all of them soaked to the bone. Suyuan had sprained her ankle, and cried her entire walk back to camp, which had been roughly a half mile walk.

“It’s funny now,” Suyuan said as Jeno chuckled into his fist, “but I was miserable for the rest of the trip.”

“How many days did you have your ankle sprained?” he asked, picking up a sugar cookie and taking a bite.

“That’s a dollar fifty,” she said, holding out her hand. His eyes widened as he stopped midchew.

“All I have is my debit card,” he replied, spitting out crumbs into his fist.

“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” she scolded gently, leaning over to grab a napkin that sat behind him. Her chin bumped into his shoulder and she jumped back immediately.

“Sorry!” they exclaimed in unison. She threw the napkin over his mouth as he spat out more crumbs.

“Let me get you some water,” she said, standing up to walk over to the cooler near a table where HaeWon and Fen were standing. They were talking to some of their classmates, Fen staring at the blue haired kid holding a skateboard. “Can I buy a bottle of water?”

When she returned to Jeno, he was biting into strawberry danish. He thanked her for the water, and gave half of the danish to her.

“I’m going to spend $10, and I’ve eaten $3’s worth of pastries so far,” he reasoned, picking up a scallion pancake Suyuan’s mom made for the bake sale. “These are good. I’d love some kimchi with this.”

“Do you think someone’s auntie brought her own jars of kimchi to sell here?” she asked, sitting up straight to crane her neck around.

“I’d smell it before either of us see it,” he said, pointing to his nose. “Maybe in an hour? It’s good to have people filter in late. My uncle says it keeps the flow going and the food fresh.”

“Your uncle gave you economics lessons anyway,” she said, impressed.

As the day wore on, Fen and HaeWon began whistling Red Velvet’s “Red Flavor” whenever they came around Jeno and Suyuan, to the point that Suyuan had to bribe Fen with $20 in cold hard cash to leave them alone. Jeno was very kind and gentle, but his absentmindedness led to a chaotic energy. Jeno’s card was declined when his aunt showed them how to use electronic transactions on her iPad.

He realized he’d been using his Student credit card’s PIN when the card was declined for a third time. Suyuan poured Jeno a cup of lemonade as he had to call his bank to explain why his card had been declined three times. His face was flushed as he took a sip from the purple straw in the cup she handed him.

“Thank you, yes, I’ve got it,” Jeno said after 15 minutes of transferring to 2 different departments of customer service. “Auntie, I think I’ve solved it. I’m going to buy $10 extra for these pastries.”

“It was that bad?” Suyuan asked as Jeno picked up one of the bao buns Suyuan had made with her aunt and mom. “Those buns are $2.”

“OK,” he said through a mouthful of food.

“You never learn,” she said with a grin, handing him a napkin. “Chew, then speak.”

“These buns are so good, I love the barbecue pork,” he said, staring at the red filling. “This bake sale is probably more legit than the China Town in the city.”

“I haven’t been there in years,” she said. “I heard they opened a Korean patisserie near that tacky karaoke bar.”

“Jeno,” HaeWon called out, waving from the playground behind the tents they’d set up, “how do you shoot from the three-point line?”

Some of the kids had arrived with a basketball, and they watched as Jeno made shot after shot on the basketball court. After making a basket from every angle the kids requested, Jeno handed the basketball back to HaeWon. Despite teasing Jeno earlier, it was obvious that HaeWon looked up to him a lot. She showed it in her own special ways.

“Did you want to go get some boba?” Jeno asked, holding his hand out to Suyuan. “My mom and aunt are relieving me of my duties soon.”

“My mom’s on her way, too,” she replied, taking his hand. “Perfect timing.”

When Suyuan’s mom arrived, she eyed Jeno on his red cruiser motorbike.

“Be safe,” her mom said pointedly before hugging her. “I heard Jeno’s quite polite, but...be safe.”

“Oh, mom, calm down,” Suyuan sighed, giving her mom a grin. “You know Jeno’s parents well enough.”

“A motorbike,” her mom mouthed silently as Fen and HaeWon walked by. She rolled her eyes.

“I’ll text you, mom. Bye, Fen! See you, HaeWon!”

“Don’t kiss him too much,” Fen uttered out and HaeWon laughed as the pair ran off at the sight of Suyuan glaring at them.

Her annoyance disappeared as she saw Jeno sitting against his bike, holding out a helmet to her. His grin made her chest feel like it was growing, and she thanked him in a soft voice as she took the helmet. True to the rumors her mom heard, Jeno politely helped Suyuan secure her helmet on, and checked with her that she felt secure before starting the engine to his motorbike.

She pressed her body close to him as his body warmed her. She smelled the blueberry on his shirt, perhaps due to the slice of blueberry pie he’d accidentally spilled onto the left sleeve of his sweater. It took everything in her not to sit up and kiss his cheek as they stopped at a red light.

Once they reached the boba shop near the church one of her aunts volunteered at, Suyuan slowly slipped her hands away from Jeno’s body. She was afraid to admit to herself that she enjoyed her time on the ride with him. It was better than her time with any significant other she’d ever been with, even her boyfriend of 8 months during her freshman year in college.

The church organ music playing in the distance reminded her to stop her imaginations from going too wild as she watched Jeno brush his hair out of his eyes. As they sat on the picnic table near the boba shop, Suyuan asked Jeno questions about his bike, and how he got into riding motorbikes.

“My Engineering final had me do a group project,” he explained between sips of his watermelon slush. “We refurbished an old Honda Fury. We were docked a grade for turning our Shop project into our Engineering project, too.”

“That’s bullshit,” she said with a grin. He laughed in agreement. “Is it easy to ride a motorbike?”

“Easy enough,” he said with a shrug. “You have to go in without so much doubt and fear, and then you’ll be confident in your riding.”

“You’ll have to teach me,” she said, sidling up close to him. “How were we able to miss each other when we were teens?”

“You traveled in the bookish crowd, and I was with the jocks and gamers,” he replied.

“What does that mean?” she asked, feeling her cheeks turn warm.

“We had Algebra 101 together but you were home sick for the first 3 weeks,” he said. “I had a small crush on you, but I never worked up the courage to talk to you. I wanted to ask you to help me with my homework. I’m not good at math.”

“We went to school together?” she asked, shocked that she had assumed that they were mutual strangers when they met that morning. “I’m sorry. My teen years were my confused queer years. I spent all of high school crushing on girls and boys, and I didn’t know if it meant I was a lesbian or bi...or something else along the queer spectrum.”

“So do you have it figured out?”

“Um,” she grinned at him as he threw his arm over her shoulders, “I’m OK saying I’m bi, but I know that things are never set in stone.”

“I’m glad we spent today together,” he said, resting his hand on her chin, pulling her close to him. He kissed her. “I had to wait for my cousin to tease me for you to notice me.”

She laughed against his lips, kissing him as she rested a hand on his shoulder.

“You wouldn’t have liked angsty me anyways,” she admitted, pulling away from his kiss. She wiped her lipstick stains off his lips with her thumbs. “I wasn’t prepared for a relationship as a high schooler. Did your crush return today?”

“It was when you stood up to my bullies,” he said, his cheeks flushing pink.

“Our cousins?”

She laughed before planting a wet kiss onto his lips. He wrapped his arms around her waist, and requested he take her home.

“For the record,” she said, taking his hand and kissing it quickly, “I think I crushed on you at the same moment. You were putting up with the kids’ bullying so well.”

She held on tight to him, relishing the feel of his back as she pressed her cheek against it, hearing his heartbeat against her ear. His body felt firm, and his sweater was soft, although a bit itchy. Once they reached her apartment complex, she got off the bike and handed his spare helmet back to him.

“Thank you for bringing me home safely,” she said. Before he could respond, she kissed him, pressing her tongue against his lips. He pushed back immediately, his lips capturing hers.

“Can I take you out to dinner tomorrow?” he asked when he broke their kiss. She licked her lips, tasting a hint of sweet red bean paste. “No pressure.”

“Pick me up at 6:00 PM?” she asked. She kissed him, and his hand reached up to touch her cheek.

“It’s a date,” he breathed out as they rested their foreheads together. “I should let you go home. I want to be a gentleman today.”

“I can’t wait to see you tomorrow,” she said before caressing his earlobe. She kissed him. “Text me when you get home?”

He kissed her one last time before they broke apart. As she walked up the stairs to her apartment her mind clouded with thoughts of Jeno’s lips on hers. He was warm, like the bright spring sun. The scent that radiated from him was grassy and refreshing, energizing her in the same way the scent of limes did. Jeno Lee was her perfect Keylime Pie.

------

Thank you always for reading!

#nct scenarios #jeno fluff #nct jeno #jeno x reader #jeno x oc #kisses

[hangryandlazy]

africa jul 19

wow lol it’s taken me 2 years to actually put this post together. a LOT has changed since then and it makes me immensely happy to recognize how lucky we were that we’d had 2 insane years of travelling right before the pandemic hit. but this post is not to dwell on that, so let’s get on with it!!

this was our amazing 2019 africa trip~

jun 30, 19 ••• we make our way from hong kong to the netherlands on klm airlines. i distinctly remember how impressed i was with the quality of service and the comfort of the 12ish hour flight. after around 16 hours of commute, we just want to stay in and chill, so we order room service and call it a night early. i recall wearing a fun t-shirt that read, “not to be rude, but shut the fuck up” which i personally find hilarious and endearing, but which made the guy at the front desk quite uncomfortable. lollll oops!

jul 1, 19 ••• yay! we had a full day alone in amsterdam. we (i) decided to walk from the hotel to the town center, because it’s fun experience new cities by exploring them on foot!! why not? you come across many things that you just couldn’t have planned to find.

look how beautiful the canals in amsterdam are! anywhere you turn, it’s picturesque.

we had lunch at wagamama because i saw that the avant garde vegan, gaz oakley, had done a collaboration with them at some point, so there are some guaranteed vegan options. we then walk around the bloemenmarkt and find our way to the cannabis college, which had 2 verdampers for rent! yesssss! i was so happy. 

we explored and walked around more, then stopped by a coffee shop to smoke a bit more. there was a lovely vegan cafe right next door, which i’d been eyeing when we went in to smoke, so we had a top up on coffee and matcha there. we saw a cute frenchie across the road and missed the dogs so...

we had dinner at this place called cafe frijdag (which means Friday!) which was delicious! so happy that amsterdam had vegan options for me

jul 2, 19 ••• we got up bright and early to meet my parents for breakfast and we go to the airport to catch our flight to kigali. about 10 hours later, we were buying sim cards at the kigali airport. we then checked in to the radisson for the night, and it was feeling very surreal to be in africa. i remember feeling anxious.

jul 3, 19 ••• today started on a somber note. we went to the kigali genocide memorial. i cried a lot, especially at the exhibit with the photographs of only a fraction of the victims during that time.

then we drove at turtle speed to our next hotel, which was a loooong long way away. we arrived at the lake kivu serena hotel in time for a very late lunch. the cuisine here consists of rice, tortilla-like wraps and papadum-esque crispy rolls.

this fruit tastes disgusting... it looks like a tomato but isn’t sweet at all. i only remember spitting it out, trying another piece from another plate, and still hating it.

thankfully everyone wanted to relax and take it easy, so we ordered in for dinner and spent the rest of the night chilling.

jul 4, 19 ••• we drove out to see the border between rwanda and the democratic republic of congo. we were told to be very careful about taking photos of the police officers there, so we were. it felt strange to take photos of the border, i’m clearly very ignorant of the relations and history. it was a very busy juncture, with a sea of people crossing this way and that, lots of cars bumbling about and a lot of fruit, as i recall. hahah.

we then drove out to see a makeshift hot spring. we were asked if we wanted to take a dip, but none of us wanted to..... felt bad saying no, but really not worth it, sorry.

https://vimeo.com/568059672  (okay, i’m unable to embed more videos so links will have to do until i figure out something better...)

we took a boat ride along the lake, but there wasn’t that much to see around there, it was pretty dirty and murky... reminded me of the hong kong harbor, with trash floating around. it was also freezing, so i wasn’t having any fun at all.

we went to the gym and worked out a little bit because there was a lot of time to kill in between returning to hotel and our private pre-planned bbq dinner on the beach. we were lucky enough to enjoy traditional rwandan dancing which was absolutely gorgeous.

jul 5, 19 ••• we spent most of our morning in the car, having crossed the border to the republic of uganda. we stopped by a cute cafe along the way for lunch, but it was a grueling 4-5 hour car ride to mahogany springs, which was our hotel for the gorilla trekking. we managed to arrive around 715pm, by which time it was pretty dark and scary outside. the other car had broken down twice, once in the dark as well, so spirits were low and there was a lot of muttering and grumbling done under people’s breath. everyone was ravenous by the time dinner was served, but despite how late it was, it was absolutely delicious and i was happy! (also grateful for our car not having broken down)

jul 6, 19 ••• we woke up VERY early in anticipation of gorilla trekking. we waited around the hotel lobby after some coffee and biscuits for breakfast. it was an awful lot of waiting, but i didn’t sense anything wrong until i saw how pissed off our tour guide looked. it turns out our permits had gotten stolen! probably bribes.

here we were mucking around, still anticipating gorilla trekking.

we didn’t let it slow us down though. i actually am grateful for how things turned out because we wouldn’t have gotten to experience uganda like that without this turn of events. we joined a community tour that showed us how tea is harvested, how coffee is grown, harvested and round, as well as how bananas may be used to make juice, beer and gin! very cool

african tea leaves

jackfruit??

these are flowers from the coffee tree

the different stages of the coffee plant

this is henry, he owns this coffee plantation. here, henry shows us how to the use this contraption, the purpose of which is to grind coffee beans into powder

here henry is, sifting the coffee powder

here are my parents, having the time of their life (lol at my dad)

fresh bananas

these are the different stages of a banana’s life: from raw to ripe to fermenting. it can be made into juice and liquor.

we then visited a local school, where we were entertained by kids from kindergarten to 6th grade. we learned about their mission and goals to educate the younger generations by providing classrooms and a dining hall and even dorms for boarding. the singing and dancing was BRILLIANT. loved every single second of it. wish i’d joined in and not cared about what anyone thought.

we stopped by a women’s community center and saw a lot of cool crafts and art. that was on the way to the batwa pgymy tribe. we learned how they integrated with the batwa community. they showed us some dances they have dedicated to the gorillas, for which they are very grateful because it brings tourists in and therefore gives them an income. they showed us how to use a bow and arrow to hunt, and how they weave baskets and make handicrafts.

alan with the leader of the pgymy tribe

one of our guides spotted 2 chameleons, which was super impressive. he even brought the chameleon down close to us so that we could see it. i won’t ever understand how he was able to spot it in the wild, and from so far away as well.

we returned to the lodge and had lunch. the veggie stir fry was pretty dang good. it was served with posho, which is a maize bread, beans, and also matate (???) which reminded me a lot of plantain. back at the hotel, we chilled (without tv or wifi) until dinner. alan fell asleep, and i kept myself busy sorting out photos. dinner was early, and our night was early because we were promised gorilla trekking in the morning!

delicious!

jul 7, 19 ••• we were up and ready to leave by 7am. we were in the clear! we drove a little bit to the bwindi impenetrable national park for some entertainment (dancing and singing) from local students and a hilarious briefing on what to expect and do’s and don’ts of the trek. 

we then had separate meetings within our trekking groups. ours was quite big, with 10 tourists, because michael and our guides had spent HOURS the day before handling our stolen permits. an exception was made to accommodate us all, so our group consisted of the starke’s, alan, kerstin, a couple from oregon, and an english family. we had to get in another car and drive a bit to the mountain, where we met our porters and then began our trek!

the hike up was difficult, and at times i legit feared for my life because the mud/rocks were loose and one wrong step would have had us tumbling down the edge of the mountain... and that was me at age 28!! cannot imagine how my parents were feeling...

alan with meddie

as we made our way to the gorilla family, we encountered a solo young male who was soooo friendly, he cut across our group, like right down the middle, and he even reached out and touched my mom on her jacket! it was wild that a gorilla was that close to us, and then he left as quickly as he had joined.

this is the photo my mom managed to take when the young gorilla male was right next to her

we kept on hiking and found a large. our guide, meddie, told us that we were lucky to have found such a large family doing a whole bunch of different activities: we saw mothers nursing their babies, babies swinging from the trees and playing with one another, sub adult males beating their chests and other members of the family eating and feeding. we even got to watch as a silverback gorilla pulled a very healthy poop out of its butt, and we ran into him snacking again later on.

on the way down, it started raining a little bit. we all slipped at one point or another, but it was especially dangerous for my dad so we all had to slow down our pace a little bit to match his speed. thank god he had a porter there to help him out and save him. 

we returned to the same place as where we had started our morning for a debriefing, and we each received a certificate to show that we had been on this trek. we waited around a little bit for the other group to arrive, and were once again very grateful that our experience was much more pleasant. one lady in the other group had to leave the trek on a stretcher, and the others were caught in the rain on their way to the gorillas, so it must have been a cold and awful experience on their end. 

us after the successful completion of our gorilla trek!!

we headed to a local inn nearby where we had a late lunch and could change into dry clothes. we then drove a bumpy 4 hours to mweya safari lodge, located inside queen elizabeth national park. we made a couple of stops along the way (one of which was in the middle of nowhere so that people could go pee out in the open where animals are potentially roaming around?!?!?) and when we finally arrived, it was already 830/9ish pm.... we insisted to order room service because we were pooped, and we got showered and hit the hay.

this cute sign was outside the lodge!

this super old school cash register was at the lodge too

jul 8, 19 ••• today started off with a game drive, early in the morning! 

we drove around the gorgeous park and saw elephants, warthogs, antelope, eagles, all sorts of bird and butterflies, buffalo and weird-looking lemur or ferret creatures. we thought it was great, but some other members of the group were underwhelmed. 

this is the view from the car we sat in for the safari

this gorgeous tree houses sooo many bird’s nests! do you see them?

cute antelope we saw on the tour

after lunch at the hotel, we went on a boat tour around the kazinga channel. i think it was called lake edward? we saw many animals again, including crocodile, elephants, buffalo, all sorts of birds, and hippos.

favorite photo of my parents ¨̮

we followed a few elephant cuties along the bank. it drizzled for a little bit in between.

dinner was delicious. it was a great buffet, although i was severely grossed out by the ants that joined us on the dining table.

there were so many animals on the grounds of the lodge. don’t be fooled by how cute these guys look, we saw them fight over raw meat at some point! we also saw a warthog stroll around.

jul 9, 19 ••• we were up bright and early today for a quick breakfast before heading right on out. on the way to entebbe, we stopped by a local motel for lunch. the service was SUPER slow (maybe because we had such a huge group together!) but it was delicious and worth the wait! i ordered a coleslaw and avocado vinaigrette (this was THE HUGEST AVOCADO i’ve ever seen in my life?!?!?), a veggie biryani and some of paul’s aloo matar. we then filed back into our cars for several more hours of “african massage” to the next destination. had an early night, i think we ordered room service to the hotel room and tried to get our butts to bed as early as possible because it was another EARLY day the morning after.

we stopped at the equator in uganda to take some photos, of course!

i was sooo happy to be able to order room service! we felt like we were finally back to civilization... 🥺 we had wifi and tv and hot water... ugh it was amazing

jul 10, 19 ••• my alarm was set for 4am this morning.... 🥲😅 we left the hotel at 5am for the airport and obviously i was tired and grumpy and just in a crappy mood overall hahahah. our first flight was barely 45 minutes.... to mbarara i’m guessing?? i was assigned a middle seat on my own originally but no one was in the aisle seat so i moved over woohoo! our first layover was 2-3 hours, not too bad. we hung around at the lounge area. 

our second flight was to harare. alan and i managed to snag 2 joined seats towards the back end of the plane so that we could watch conan’s traevel shows on his ipad. there was a pretty scary drop when we were descending imto harare. i think we just stayed on the plane for about half an hour so some people could get on the plane and join.

we flew about 3 hours more to cape town, and we were EXCITED to arrive. it was a hell of a time checking in, and it was a nicer hotel in a nice area so we decided to just stay in and order room service again. we had a slow night and it was SOOOO needed. cape town felt a lot closer to the first world and we were enjoying and appreciating it to the max. we even started playing pokemon go and its harry potter-themed equivalent (oops forgot the name), but to be fair, we didn’t get cell phone service everywhere we went, so it would cut on and off.

jul 11, 19 ••• eek, cape town was COOOOLD! luckily i brought a jacket along, we really really needed to cover up and stay warm! got to sleep in a bit, we left by 830am to drive to the pebble beach by the water to take some gorgeous photos. we stopped by chapman’s peak for another photo op, then drove to boulders beach in simon’s town to see the penguins!! it was such a dream, loved every second of it.

i believe this was chapman’s peak??

what a model

this was at the pebble beach at the cape of good hope. 

saw a cute ostrich on the way somewhere

next we went to cape point. we took the funicular to the top, then hiked up to the lighthouse. we took pots of great pics but omg it was EVEN MORE freezing there. we had lunch at the two oceans restaurant. fancy and delicious! the calamari was bomb, the arancini was alright, but the main of chickpea and mushrooms was delish. after lunch we headed right on back to the hotel.

when i said it was cold, i wasn’t joking... it was FREEZING at the top. i had a horrible time because i don’t do that well in the cold

alan and i walked over to woolworths to get water and makeup remover and snacks. on the way back we stopped by PLANT for dinner. i was sooo excited to try out their vegan fast food, so i ordered a lot of the menu. we got the quinoa salad, mac and cheez, seitan lasagna, schawarma, pot stickers, siu mai, spag bolognese, tiramisu, milk tart and a bunch of other random vegan snacks. i was in HEAVEN. even though some of the stuff was cold by the time we got back to the hotel and ate, it still tasted DELICIOUS. i was soooo impressed.

this was the lasagna. omfg i need an encore of this restaurant one day!!! wish i knew how to cook like this

jul 12, 19 ••• today we went to a wine blending workshop at grande provence winery. the first step was to blend 3 different mixtures. after tasting them all, we decided the last blend was the winner, with 40% zinfandel, 10% shiraz and 50% cabernet. so then we blended up a big bottle of it, corked it, thew on a hand-signed label, and then walked around the beautiful indoor and outdoor art galleries.

this was our group!

wine blending is literally mixing different wines together in different proportions and figuring out which you like the taste of the best

there was a lot of cute art at the winery! i loved all the dogs and greyhounds around the property. these 3 dancing pigs came a close second

we drove a little way for lunch at another beautiful vineyard. i had a charcoal ciabatta, tomato quinoa salad, root veggie risotto and steamed veggies on the side. we skipped the wine tasting because our lunch overran a bit and our bus driver buford said that the traffic would be pretty heavy on a friday afternoon and it wouldn’t be worth it to be stuck on the bus. so we just walked around the cute little town we were at, franschhoek (??)

there was a lot of cute art and small local shops around this town! we strolled around and got some souvenirs ¨̮

love this

we had a dinner booked way ahead at fyn restaurant. it was stunningly delicious. i loved every single course and was thoroughly impressed.

UGHHHHH just soooo good.

jul 13, 19 ••• FINALLY we had a day to sleep in!!!! we let our group know the night before that we didn’t want to join the walking tour around the city. we woke up and made our way to the company’s garden, which was directly next to our hotel. we played harry potter wizards unite and ran into the tour group. my mom told me later on it was a good decision of ours not to join haha.

we walked to addis in cape for an authentic ethiopian meal experience. we washed our hands at the table, ate the whole meal with our hands, and finally i was able to taste injera. it was 100% teff injera and it did not disappoint. i ordered a vegan platter while alan got a combo. the amount of food was PERFECT for us, we finished every single thing. 

we ordered dessert but the hot berries never showed up and the ice cream was interestingly very gummy and very very sweet. the coffee was strong and served with a beautiful platter.

after that, we needed to walk our full tummies off. we headed to the waterfront, where there were many shops and stalls in indoor and outdoor malls. it was just a really good time walking around there and we saw soooo many things. there was bubble tea in south africa, a yogurt bar that made me sooo happy, dogs were up for adoption, and a bootleg jabbawockeez performance at the city square. we walked back to the hotel after that and got ready for bed.

jul 14, 19 ••• we woke up at 430am to head to the airport by 530am. we caught our first flight from cape town to johannesburg, then transferred to a direct flight back to hong kong. it was a TIRING trip but wow, the memories!! really want to go to back soon

#tanjastravels #tansworld #travel #wanderlust #tanja travels #tanjalan #cape town #uganda #gorilla #gorilla trekking #africa #south africa #safari #memories #travel memories #do you even travel

[geekeryandsentiment]

I remember you telling us, you know quite a bit about all the kiddo’s rooms. Can you describe them for us? And why did Liz wanna rearrange her room? (as mentioned in the silent treatment) Also, You had mentioned chalkboard paint once, and I found that idea so cool😍

Hey there! You send this in about four years ago and I just didn’t have the time to answer when you sent it in and then idk, I just got lazy and let it sit in my inbox for a while...however, here’s your answer, sorry about that. This one is below the cut and I’m warning you it’s loooooong. Sorry lol, I got a lot carried away. I hope it was worth the wait lol. Sorry again.

Before I forget...Lizzie just wanted to rearrange things. Sometimes moving the direction the furniture is facing can help spice things up a bit. If i remember correctly she was 11/12ish during the silent treatment and around that age Arthur pulled out his old desk from storage and put it in her room, so possibly she thought of a better way to rearrange her furniture to put that desk in the place she wanted it? 

Liam’s room is like his happy space. There is no theme or reason to anything. It’s all completely random. He’s still got posters and trinkets from his first year attending school and even before that. Alby’s art is plastered on his walls and he has old birthday cards and little notes that he and Alex used to pass back and forth in lessons tacked up on his walls as well. He has repainted it 4ish times since he was eleven and his parents repainted one of the other rooms (the one that would eventually become Alby’s room) and he decided it looked fun and wanted to try it. One time, when he was sixteen, he endured his room being pink for almost three months over the summer because Elizabeth dared him to do it when he was discussing possible color changes and he didn’t have anything else to do that next day (and has absolutely nothing against the color pink) so decided to take everything off his walls and paint them pink just to show her that he would. His room is currently green and the wall that had chalkboard paint on it is accented a darker brown (the green did NOT properly cover up the chalkboard with only two coats and he didn’t have any more green so he had to improvise). For several years he had a whole wall of chalkboard paint (the around his door) and he and Alex were entertained by that for many many hours in their preteen years. He is the only one of the kiddos to have a TV in his room. He didn’t get it until he was thirteen and he had to practically trade away his soul to convince Waverly to allow it, but he and Alex also had a lot of fun playing video games on that throughout the years. He has Theo’s old room, and Theo is very crafty with his hands. When he was younger he installed bookcases into the same wall his two windows are on, so William has bookcases surrounding his two windows that go from his ceiling to his floor. They are covered in books, some of which he will never read but owns anyway simply because he likes the cover and think they look cool. The other furniture in his room doesn’t match all all. Like at all. For the most part that is because he has broken a lot of the pieces that used to match and instead of doing what Waverly wanted to do and reordering the pieces or even picking something that matches the remaining stuff, Liam just picked out things he liked as replacements, even if they clashed with the other things in his room already.

Alex’s room is a bit more themed and put together, but it’s also always messy. It’s not dirty. It’s regularly cleaned and he makes his bed every morning (and if he dared leave food wrappers or any food in his room Waverly would have his head) but it’s cluttered most of the time. He doesn’t really mind if things are on the floor or if his desk is stacked three feet high with different files and textbooks and Lord knows what else. He knows where everything is. He manages to stay ahead with his schoolwork and keep everything straight, so Arthur and Waverly don’t hound him too often to make sure his room is as neat as they would like. His room is pretty typical. It’s painted a dark, navy blue and he has a whole lot of red (his curtains and bed sheets) and grey (his comforter and bean bag) accents. He does have a giant beanbag in the back corner behind his bed that Alby loves to fall asleep in sometimes, though. His bedroom used to belong to Beatrice when she lived in the palace when Arthur was younger, but her pink walls were painted over when he was about one years old and Arthur and Waverly decided to stick him in the room beside William’s. It’s nothing too fancy. William’s room is definitely far more interesting with the built in bookshelves (and wait until you hear about Lizzie’s room...🤭) but it’s his home. That’s his safe space. When he feels like the whole world is against him, the only place he wants to be besides maybe on his piano bench, is his own bedroom. 

Elizabeth’s room has changed colors a few times throughout the years too, but it’s stayed purple, just different shades. Her room is across the hall from Liam and Alex’s and on the same side of the quarters as the sitting room, meaning her windows overlook the palace gardens. She has a large, three window set up with a small cushioned seating area that extends out from the wall a little bit. When she was younger she had a few cushions and a mattress pad there and her and Alex would have sleepovers in her room all the time. They would look up at the stars and she would try to point out constellations. Now, that mattress pad is used every once in a while for Alby if he wants to spend the night in her room, but more often it’s tucked away and she just uses the area to sit on her laptop or read. In the corner she has a large corner desk with a desktop computer with two monitors. She doesn’t have a TV, and she doesn’t really need one because she has a pretty sweet set up there. Her desk belonged to Arthur when he was younger (no, none of the children are in his old bedroom. Too many unhappy memories. That’s used as a guest bedroom now, and only if there are too many guest to fill up the other two rooms) and still has his initials carved into the corner from when he got bored and engraved them one day when he was about twelve with an old key he found. Her room is more themed than Liam’s, her furniture matches, even Arthur’s desk fits in really well with the other black pieces, but there isn’t really a color scheme or anything. Lizzie doesn’t really care about that. She just fills it with things she likes. Oh, she also has a blacklight in her room and an epic solar system hanging from her ceiling as well as markers that she can draw all over that massive window with. When she was home full time it used to be schedules and count downs until special dates and to do lists. Now it’s not quite as busy as it used to be and more often than not the windows can actually be seen out of because they aren’t covered in marker...but every once in a while she’ll feel a sudden urge to draw on them again and fill them with chemistry or math or biology...or even music. 

Alby’s room is stand alone and surprisingly the farthest away from Arthur and Waverly’s because he was born last. He is on the same side of the hall as Lizzie, but he does not have the room connected to hers. He’s actually one more down. ((Oh, this is actually relevant so let me talk about it for a moment...The room that is connected to Lizzie’s is currently used as a lab or sorts for her. She has all kinds of old technology in it that she tinkers with a lot, it’s pretty empty and none of the others are jealous that she has the extra room or anything. They do call it Lizzie’s “lab” though sometimes, and there is a proper key to it that she has and she regularly locks it when she doesn’t want Alby to go in and touch anything she’s working on.)) His room is still really kid-ish. He has toys and a little chair that hangs from his ceiling that he can sit in when he reads. His room doesn’t have the same bay window that Lizzie’s does. He doesn’t spend a lot of time in his room. He’s almost always in one of his siblings’ rooms or he’s lugged a handful of toys down to the sitting room/Arthur’s study/wherever someone else is to sit and quietly play near them. He doesn’t really like to be alone, and his room reflects that. There isn’t a lot of personalized things in his room, instead he likes to leave an impression on the other rooms of the house (leaving drawings on the walls in Liam’s room, pictures on Lizzie’s windows when she lets him use her markers, and leaving stuffed animals and small toys on the shelf where Alex’s stuffed crocodile spends his lonely days now that he’s a teenager and he doesn’t play with him anymore). No one seems to mind, in fact, William regularly tells him when he’s away at school that he wants a whole new set of pictures hanging in his room for him when he gets home to help keep the baby busy. Alby has his own shelf full of books that has slowly started to overflow as his siblings slowly hand the boy more and more books to read. His favorite toy when he was younger, and to this day, is trains. He looooooves trains. So if his room has any theme in the chaos it’s definitely trains. He has those stickers on his walls of little cartoon trains and he almost always has some giant town built with the little wooden train sets across the back half of his room on the floor. His parents gave up trying to make him clean those up every night a long time ago. Some battles just aren’t worth fighting, especially when one little town of his creation could keep him occupied for days. 

I don’t know if you meant Elaina too but you’re going to get her because I’m on a roll at this point, lol. Elaina’s room is...well kind of boring. And she hasn’t had too much freedom to change anything either which kind of stinks. She has Brielle’s old room and it is exactly how you would expect a princess’s room to look. Light baby pink walls. Her furniture is white. It’s adorable. She HATES it. I mean, I shouldn’t say it like that, it’s her room and she likes it because it’s her space. But she doesn’t like how it looks. She doesn’t really like how it looks like a nursery (because it kind of does) but her parents aren’t really feeling the whole re-painting thing and her furniture belonged to her grandmother and so it’s staying in the family and she can’t get rid of that either. She really loves all three of the English kids’ rooms. They all are a little darker and the paint and the colors are cooler and not as bright and blinding as her pink and white. She is just a touch jealous that despite Arthur and Waverly’s dictaror-ish tendencies, they let their kids decorate their rooms how they want. She’s an artist, as you all know and she loves to sketch and paint and draw. At one point when she was about 11 or 12, I forget exactly but it’s written so perhaps I could share it one day, she used a sketching pencil to draw this really pretty floral design down the side of her nightstand and her parents saw it and lost their shit (old family antiques are not for drawing on, Elaina. You know better!). She hasn’t dared try to do that again, but she’s also always wanted to get all new white furniture and paint over it and cover it in her own drawings. One day she promises herself that she will. In the meantime, she has one single poorly shaded drawing on her nightstand that she managed to convince her parents to let her keep and not erase. 

That was a LOT. However...sprinkled in there is a few really relevant pieces of information. The story arch I am currently working on directly involves some of this information and you know how my brain is...I can’t think of anything without figuring it out for everyone...so you’ll see some of this brought up in the actual story again too, eventually. 

#my writing #alex #Liam #alby #lizzie #elaina #aaaaaand now I'm going to bed #Feel free to send in more questions any time #I apologize if it takes me literal weeks to get to it #bedrooms