#“oh we need to put anti-depressants to this countries waters” no we need to kill all fucking men

[mold-girl]

This is the latest, and the most enraging, femicide case in turkey

A male who has been obsessed with a girl has killed her and her best friend before killing himself.

He forcefully took her to a historical castle, she was screaming for her life the whole way there yet noone intertwined. He decapitated her and sent the location to her mom saying "your daughter is resting peacefully" when her mom arrived there he threw her daughters head at her.

He has been obsessively stalking her for over 5 years, they had a restraining order agaist him and she even stopped going to school and started homeschooling because of him. Yet one day he decided that he wanted to kill her and kill himself and that was it.

She fought for her life the whole time but just a male deciding that her life was over was enough for her to die.

[shy-magpie]

RQG 152

Poor Alex, there was no way to know and changing the story would be more of a breach of the implied contract than going forward. Plus side this warning implies we'll get more info on how the biology of the infection works before RSB actually explodes. To be clear I am all for warnings, I just imagine this was one heck of an awkward position for Alex & co to find themselves in. Well one would think they wanted to get through the intros as fast as physically possible! Seriously bless em for sticking with the structure instead of saying screw it and diving right in. Must be frustrating but it really helps me get in the right space to listen. Yeah it was a bit of an altruism run. That Ben physically ill at the prospect of characters talking? Yuck it up, I was specifically promised three (3) distinct topics would be addressed including both coping mechanisms and back stories. Poor Azu. If someone doesn't hold her while she has a proper cry I will be an unhappy Magpie. Are the new kids going to be invited to the conversations that are totally for sure not going to be put off for a month? Retcon: Barnes and Carter actually fought well it. I guess they were just down to the tricky ones. Theatrical much? Cel is great, have I said that enough? Well obviously not it should be declared at least hourly: "2 o' clock and Cel is great". But right after last episode instead of backing down (and IDK implying Wilde told the new kids their pronouns), Cel is immediately introducing themself with them and emphasizing their importance. Hamid right in there with the leadership, telling the duo that the party needs to go into isolation. I know having Zolf around must have took some weight off his shoulders but the man has grown since season one or even since Prague. He didn't lose that just because he cheers up when not solely responsible for leading the party. Note there is a messy negotiation with Zolf about who is in charge coming up and it is a mark of my trust in this show that I'm not dreading it. Am curious if it will be explicit enough for the white picket fence kids to pick up on, I know I have a thing about rank but some people seem to miss that aspect entirely. OK point Zolf but even with his charisma score there has to be a better way to put it than "do that and you are responsible for infecting Jasper and the village". Wow I guess that is the case isn't it. Thank you leader!Hamid coming in again. Getting Cel the kind of updates on home Hamid was denied in quarantine is fairly low risk for great gains in Cel's comfort with the whole thing. Point of clarity: as much as I hate to admit it, once the quarantine began they couldn't really keep Hamid in the loop since Ishaq was in the care of the Harlequins. Its been implied even without simply escaping an infected person could have means of communication that work in am anti magic cell. The village however is public info. Zolf, I want that again in small words! Are we talking black death or infrastructure problems? Because a few targeted infections could take out the government but not directly kill the citizens. Cel is doing the forced cheer again. What the hell have they been through that they default to words of affirmation for gory violence? Like most characters acknowledge the gore or that it was helpful, not both. Barnes is more reserved outside of the fight. Issues? Trauma? Oh Helen spelling it out, he's my type, crap. "Emotionally unavailable pirate" is a lot of people's type TBF. No wonder I made a warding gesture on hearing Zolf's description and didn't warm up till Dover. These characters wear the red flag as a cape and I'm surprised when my heart gets broken every time. Eh Zolf came back and is doing well enough, maybe Barnes will turn out to just not be chatty vs heart rending. And Hamid in there with the initiative casting Detect Magic so they don't have to face all the risks implied with not checking over the bodies. Barnes and Carter are glowing "like a fireworks factory where things have gone wrong". Only Water Breathing on the mooks. Speaking of emotionally unavailable pirates, Zolf sounds resigned as hell. I know he's working on it but the situation would depress anyone and he's been having a time of it, what with the puzzles and all. Shutting down isn't actually coping better than being shouty just more convenient. Have I already mentioned I want someone to comfort Azu on screen so she can put herself first for once? Remember how bright she shone in Cairo? If she doesn't process soon she's going to echo Zolf's arc. Carter is trying to looking at the bright side. Thank you Ben and Alex, not only a mood lightener but one that reminds us that Zolf asks direct questions now. And Zolf just moved as clearly as possible to protect Azu after Carter lashed out in response to her. I know they have a ways to get to where Grizzop & Azu were but I think they are at least proper team mates. Maybe having Zolf on this side of the bars this time will ease anything Azu is carrying from their introduction. Cel is a delight. Did they just suggest hamster balls? I love how Alex jokes about his own set design. Ah there is Ben's Minecraft joke. I think that's what you call environmental story telling. I love the mental image of them making their entrance crashing the mine cart into the ambush, like half way between a roller-coaster and sledding. Ah its been so long Zolf can't apply his memories of mining. They are officially out! Azu and Zolf are finally breathing right. Hey Zolf broke the weather machine! Cel takes a look see. Plumes of smoke from Shoin's? Wreckage from all the storms. Zolf joins Cel and USES HIS WORDS! I am so proud of him. Like not kidding learning to proactively offer praise & comfort instead of only offering concrete assistance in reaction is a huge step. Oh Cel! Getting yourself killed fighting alone would not have been better than defending your patch. And Zolf is right there, god remember Paris? Remember Prague? Now look at him. And there is the reality check. Not as jarring as it could have been. Azu is face down on the ground near Hamid! No more putting on her game face and slogging through it! Yes, process all you need darlin, no reason to rush. Hamid checks in! Azu takes his hand and explicitly talks about how scary it was when he was missing. Hamid talks about putting on a brave face for Skraak! RQG really just said "we're giving the fandom everything they want" in an episode recorded before we had a chance to ask. Azu checks in with Hamid! Oh Hamid its ok not to be ok. Oh hat Azu! Hamid call your family 18mumble is a go! Alex I will scream if he gets another delaying tactic. Cross your fingers we might get Ishaq and Saira! Azu assures him it would OK. Timing Zolf Horses! Topaz! Barnes: right Well that's a fair reaction to a celestial camel, he doesn't even know what the T stands for. Azu hugs Topaz Thank you Alex for making judgmental celestial camel canon.  How GMs don't all go insane with power from the moment it hits they can rewrite their world on a whim is beyond me. A Shetland for Hamid, a standard sounding horse for Cel, a cart horse for Azu, and another Shetland for Zolf. Carter can't get the question out before Zolf shuts him down. He is sticking to his word to Skraak, the island belongs to the Kobolds. Hamid calls en route! Bryn remembers to roll for it! Ishaq is a great kid, such a good sign he sounds like a kid too. Yes the kids are all together in the country house! Dad is at a redacted location, thank you Alex! Mom is alright! Saira is busy and the biggest problem with Ismail is that he is now taller than Ishaq! Ismail is good at magic too. Family bonding time. Einstein is working. Emeka & Veseek are helping things. Ed is with the family. Zolf is not happy about the call. Fair Zolf but none of us are regretting that call. Eh it being a one time thing is fair. Have I mentioned I like how Hamid & Zolf bicker? Its not like with Grizzop. They assume good faith and argue about the issue not score points. Part of why I shipped them in the beginning honestly: charismatic as Hamid is he probably impressioned like a duck on the first person to care more about what he was saying than how he said it. They joke about how hard nonverbal shots are in a podcast. Yes Alex we really do respect your craft. Might have been reassuring Ben. Helen is on the audience's side as always and tells him to pay up on the promised coping mechanisms talk. And Alex makes them roll a perception check. Do not talk block. Carter has been trying to eavesdrop. Azu tells him he isn't invited and Zolf tosses something at his head. Carter slinks back off. Zolf is still not good with words but he is resisting the urge to take it back. That counts damn it! Azu: your not good at talking for someone who says we need to talk. Yes Azu, and thats what makes it special. He is willing to put himself out there and do things he is bad at for the sake of the team. I like how Helen plays Azu getting over her issues with Zolf rather than just leaping to "Hamid vouched for you so we're besties". I need a clip of this, Zolf is offering to listen and be there while respecting boundaries and citing his own experience. Helen is great, Azu jumps right into the 18 months by asking about his relationship with Poseidon. Which again makes sense, as Azu is still working on "we met after you drugged, trapped, and imprisoned me". Which I get but seriously couldn't it have been in the stew or something? Drugging a woman's drink has connotations. Azu backstory(ish) oh thank Alex her cult is still doing the good work. Zolf tells Azu this, and offers her an out? Hamid & Zolf offer reassurance. Yes Hamid specifically tells her it isn't her fault. Zolf assures her that she isn't responsible for Sasha's decisions. Cel and Carter are chatting about what they've seen on the island.  Barnes tells them to keep the volume down and does Zolf's thing of bouncing something off Carter's head when he's loud again. Hamid moves to check in with Cel. Cel calls him on it.  Hamid asks what Cel plans to do after quarantine! Thank you Bryn! Cel doesn't know, ow. Cel feels obligated to be more proactive. Hamid reassures and points out that they were able to do it as a team so its not on Cel for not acting alone. Cel what is your backstory, afraid of being the monster. Thank you, I could wrap myself in this episode like a blanket. Cel how do you know that about being friends with mercs? Hamid would do it again but wants them to have a choice. Cel: When I call you little buddy I m not referring to the size of your heart. And that was veering saccharine so Ben swoops in with the Harrison Campbell joke. Do not make me get into why Hamid might be using snobbery as a cover for continuing to care more about what people might think than what he wants. Its a cheap shot for what could equally be he's that age and still has some flaws to work through. Thank you Alex for being realistic about horse pace without turning it into a word problem. Wilde! Cel points out the inn keeper could be infected, the boys explain the system of watching one another. Zolf is not letting Wilde get cute with his team again. Wilde wants them "fully supervised" in the bath. I feared that Alex, Wilde turned himself off again. Zolf calls him on it, kinda. They skim past the bath, thank you that could have been problematic. Thank goodness they are leaving the cell door open but locking the trap door. The new kids are in quarantine with them. Fair, going to be fun, but fair.  

[karmanticmoved]

1-85 uwu

j esus okay

1. describe yourself.

uh,, emotional ig, dumbass, quiet, exhausted all of the time, v queer, healthy mix of feminine and masculine, insecure, and not tha t great tbh. kinda a pussy ass b itch

2. if you could go anywhere for a week all expenses paid where would it be?

idrk. maybe somewhere like a hella nice beach in another country, maybe somewhere in europe. i like travelling but i hate the travel to get there and have no money so i havent put thought into it. maybe hawaii or somewhere like that.

3. do you have siblings?

the one thats still alive is my half brother

4. what is your favorite constellation, why?

orion maybe bc i don't know a lot but i can see that one from my bedroom window even in the city n idk. its comforting. or scorpius cause i'm a scorpio

5. favorite color.

yellow, pink, or blue.

6. what kind of music do you listen to?

almost anything. whatever catches my interest.

7. favorite flower. (you can name as many as you want cause flowers are awesome)

forgot what i said last time but those

yellow carnations i think?

8. if you could do magic, what is the first spell you would learn?

maybe smth to put myself to sleep immediately bc f uCk

9. favorite childhood memory.

my summer camp memories are pretty great. also memories of my dad and i going fishing are good.

10. have you ever been cheated on?

i mean in theory i couldve been bc online relationships but no. n im polyam and have identified as such for a majority of my relationships so no.

11. if you could describe your perfect room, what would it be?

big but not too big, yknow? like big enough that it can be filled and have room to walk around and lay on the ground or whatever but not Empty. and a pretty big bed to stretch out on, n a closet in the room. multiple windows w blackout curtains so theres light but it can be blocked out. n fluffy rugs or carpeting but preferably rugs in case smth spills so we can get it out of at least Remove the rug. and probably a cat tree thing in corner for dipper. n a computer desk and actual lights that light up the whole room. but probably,, fairy lights too bc full lights too bright. and i kinda want a pink room but blue or yellow work also. a nd pride flags on the walls + posters and various other stuff bc plain walls are boring. and tons n tons of b ooks too.

12. favorite animal.

river otter

13. what was the last photo you took of?

cat

14. do you believe in soul mates?

i'm not sure. i do kinda think there are people who you will like. really really click with and who become so important in your life that they're like. apart of u yknow? but i don't think that anyone as an individual needs to keep those people in their life forever. they arent destined to stay with them, and they shouldnt force that relationship (platonic, familial, romantic, or whatever) even if they were close for years and years. screw destiny. youll have people you care about, and sometimes you have to break that bond to save yourself, and thats okay. there will be other people who can and will be just as important. that got kinda off topic skbsks. i don't think theres really like Destiny soulmates. but there could be like. soulmates in the sense of for however long we're together, we're soul bonded. even if its not forever. does that even make se nse skbsns

15. do you hang toilet paper over or under?

over is the one thats socially acceptable right

16. your go to place to eat & your favorite thing to get there.

idk theres a place near a movie theater closeish to my house and its a nice little cafe and i dont eat there bc i dont eat much in general but i get their bubble tea and i love. raspberry bubble tea w rose popping bubbles. its comfort drink.

17. do you believe everything happens for a reason?

no. sometimes shit happens for no reason, and its bullshit, but you can't reverse it, so you gotta figure out how to move on from it.

18. guilty pressures?

im assuming thats meant to be pleasures

umm,, idrk. i don't know what exactly i like that would count as a guilty pleasure so,,

19. favorite mythical creature, why?

merpeople are s o cool i fuckin. love funky aquatic pals hell yeah. maybe im just Water babey but. they're rad. dragons are also hella cool bc like dragons???? theyre scaly and prett y and can breathe fire or have wings and kill u?? also like selkies bc again. water. but i used to hear a lot of stories abt them and theyre so nea t

20. something most people don’t know about you.

i have the potential to be a huge asshole and also kinda Wish to fuckin murder someone sometimes but. i act nice most of the time anyway.

not murder murder but i can get angr y enough that i just wanna Stab smth

21. where did you grow up, what was it like?

grew up kinda near the edge of the city, still in it but not like the main city area. in western washington. it was kinda rly boring, i used to spend a lot more time outside or just by myself playing with leaves or toys or whatever. when i had friends i played make believe w them even when outside of school. so yeah. boring id say.

22. do you believe aliens exist?

sure.

23. what was your last google search?

other than names for some actors n stuff, i was looking up various star wars things

24. what did your last relationship teach you?

the one that like. ended? i guess thatd be. be careful with your own feelings and try to figure them out before jumping into anything, and also don't try to force smth that in reality isnt really working.

25. would you relocate for love?

honestly yeah

26. do you hold grudges or forgive easy?

both. it just depends on how badly i or someone i care about was hurt by it. more likely to hold a grudge if a friend was hurt by someone d eep enough to leave a lasting impact or if they don't get a genuine apology i will be 🔫🔫. or if the person keeps hurting them. even if that person is also my friend.

27. favorite book.

favorite graphic novel is bloom by kevin panetta

favorite books in general are autoboyography, more happy than not, and what if its us. all gay. i know. its okay. im a kinnie.

28. do you consider yourself an extrovert or introvert?

introvert by far

29. have you ever kept a journal, do you now?

i tried once. i probably will have to once i go see a therapist, or at least one for my Bad Thoughts

30. top 5 favorite movies.

in no particular order

little shop of horrors, love simon, coco, it (2017 and 1990), and shazam! ig? maybe others but i definitely Forgot all the shit ive watched

31. do you believe that everything happens for a reason?

no

32. what is your greatest fear?

definitely gotta be all of the people i love hating me and abandoning me or secretly hating me and then leaving me without saying anything. and the worst part is im always afraid its gonna happen babeyy

33. favorite alcoholic beverage.

im baby

34. most embarrassing thing you’ve done.

im embarrassed by my own existence. i don't remember the Most embarrassing thing

35. do you believe in ghosts?

not until i have proof that i can actually trust and believe in

36. what is the best and worst part of your personality?

idk ig im nice. but im also. very easily set off on certain emotions especially the bad ones which sucks like especially jealousy bc i dont wanna!! feel jealous!! tho i think that ties into my greatest fear bc my brain immediately tells me im useless to everyone and they hate me. but. sometimes i get jealous and then feel bad for that and then hate myself for all of it. bc my friends deserve to hang out w other people and care about other people im just fucking stupid babey !!

37. should you split the dinner bill?

i rly don't get why you wouldnt tbh like if u both wanna be there u should both pay. but if one person gonna pay it should be the person that asked.

38. are you a good liar?

most of the time. when it comes to my mental health i can either lie great or im literally breaking down in front of the person so

39. what keeps you up at night?

depressing thoughts. anxiety about everything. wishing i could cuddle and fall asleep w jay. sometimes i just cant sleep bc im too restless.

40. would you rather go without your phone or music?

music. i need my phone to text my friends and i Need my friends

41. do you believe in god?

what god would let the world get to the point its at. what god would allow people to do such fucked up shit.

no. i don't.

42. how do you relax when frustrated?

cry, take a nap, take a shower, listen to music, cuddle dipper

43. what’s something that offends you?

when people go "oh yeah i support gay rights but im still gonna eat at chick fil a bc its good" like i get so fucking. pissed off by that. youre not gonna fucking s ta rv e without their goddamn chicken. i know a bi person who goes there and says its okay bc they dont Directly Give Their money to Specifically anti gay organisations but im just. ugh. fucking pissed bc there are other places to get food just avoid the one place for fucks sake. their food is good it doesnt matter. its like saying yeah pewdiepie is a bad person and nazi and a racist asshole but his videos r funni haha so im gonna watch him anyway

44. favorite food

i hate myself whenever i eat food

45. if you were on a 10 hour flight and could sit and talk to any person the entire time, who would it be?

@destinedformuchmore or @pinaplelee

46. when do you feel the most confident?

never? but ig i feel confident when working on tech construction during theater tech. as long as i know what im doing.

47. what do you do in your free time?

sleep. draw. cry. play video games. talk to my friends.

48. is there anyone who has completely lost your respect

matpat did for being a dick abt neopronouns and making a transphobic joke and only apologizing when a cis person told him to. not when hundreds of trans people did. and also other jokes that are inherently offensive to various groups. a n d for making extremely not Child friendly jokes in his videos which are very much targeted towards kids. say what you will about the target audience, there are a lot of children who watch them. please stop making creepy nsfw jokes if you won't even swear, sir.

49. have you ever broken someone’s heart?

i guess so yeah. but she also broke mine first.

50. did/do you play sports in school?

i did. i don't anymore bc highschool sports are bullshit but. basketball, ultimate, and soccer.

51. when are you happiest?

talkin 2 jay prolly

52. coffee or tea?

tea

53. what is one possession you own you wouldn’t want to live without?

my binder. or my stuffed cat puppet thing ive had since i was 7

54. what is the first thing you notice about a person?

their general emotions, mostly. like if theyre in a good mood or if theyre bored or distracted or whatever. or if they seem interested in actually talking to me

55. what is your favorite season, why?

fall. my birthday, the atmosphere is nice, it's pretty, its hoodie weather.

56. what makes you laugh?

stupid little comments or jokes my friends make tend to make me laugh a lot harder than i should but jabdn

57. are you a clean or messy person?

a mix. i Cannot have some things messy or i will ksjqkd. Die but i don't make my bed too often bc its ha rd when its against 3 walls.

58. what is important for a successful relationship?

communication communication communicati

talk about ur goddamn problems n keep talking to each other.

59. what was your upcoming like?

if thats supposed to be upbringing

idk, very relaxed. pretty easygoing and kinda boring.

60. favorite holiday?

any holiday in december rly. i don't celebrate a Lot but the atmosphere and others celebrating is nice to see. i kinda wish my parents did more to embrace the jewish part in our family blike. whatever. christmas is fun.

61. what is the first thing you’d do if you won the lottery?

give half of it to my parents. and then probably use it for plane ticket

62. what’s the best pizza topping combination?

hawaiian pizza. pinapple n canadian bacon ty

63. favorite outdoor activity.

frisbee

64. how are you? honestly.

not great. i want highschool to end.

65. would you rather go camping in the woods or stay at a beach resort?

idk. camping is fun but if i get to stay at the resort for free i would rly love 2 stay at a resort tbh ive never done that

66. what is the most beautiful thing in nature?

waterfalls. or rivers or just. water in nature. and very green forests. aNd snow.

67. favorite type of candy?

none

68. if your life was a book, what would be the title?

i can and will do arson, an autobiography

69. what movie quotes do you use of a regular bases?

i quote john mulaney and whatever my obsessions are pretty regularly

70. what was cool when you were young but not cool now?

silly bandz. pokemon cards. these weird unicorn figures i collected

71. what’s the craziest conversation you have ever eves dropped on?

im mostly the one having the weird conversations

72. what’s the most interesting documentary you’ve ever watched?

i watched one about dogs and cats and their evolution which was lit

73. what’s the worst hairstyle you’ve had?

when i let the lady just go fuckin ham on my hair bc i was watching spirit that horse movie and didnt wanna stop so it was. rly bad bangs and hella short in back but not the sides

74. what do you like to cook?

whatever im hungry for. i don't have the energy to cook a lot

75. what’s the coolest animal you’ve seen in the wild?

really pretty tropical fish

76. what’s the funniest tv show you’ve ever seen?

idk. i rly like schitts creek its pretty amusing

77. do you usually follow your heart or your head?

heart at first but my head if things get bad

78. what is your favorite quote?

"i have a splitting headache and i think i'm dying. how are you?"

or a character just saying "try harder" when another failed to do smth.

this is supposed to be deep or whatever but im in a Mood

79. what’s the weirdest crush you have ever had?

once had a crush on a character in a minecraft parody lmao

80. what’s your love language?

sending shit that makes me think of them. n just. making tons of stuff for them both online and irl like bracelets.

81. do you ever feel alone?

oh yeah. all the time. im not but it feels like i am which sucks

82. ever been bullied?

yeah

83. are you usually early or late?

late bc of my parents rip

84. what kind of art do you enjoy most?

drawing, or writing. also theater.

85. what do you wish you knew more about?

i just wish i could remember everything ive learned more about. i know a lot i just forget all.

id like to know more about forensics tho

[whitelippedviper]

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin. Fuck war, love comics.

So I’m making my way through Yoshikazu Yasuhiko’s Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin and like I’ve seen Yaz’s work before.  I have the first volume of Venus Wars--but it just didn’t click for me. MSG: The Origin tho is goddamn sorcery on the page. You need to know this first off, you don’t need to know anything about Gundam to read this.  The whole thing is this is the book retelling the story that started it all but like Yaz’s from the heart version.  And two volumes in, which is like...1000 pages of comics, and this is a masterpiece.  

I’m mostly going to talk about the art, but story wise, military stuff is generally not my bag.  Unfortunately, it’s a genre that is grossly popular in American comics, not just in straightforward military stories, but superhero comics as well.  Too often these heroes have design updates that are all too happily to enlist heroes whose past models leaned more heavily into daredevil circus performers or wrestlers.  You know the look.  When your favorite hero goes from tights and a cape look to body armor looking shit everywhere.  War on crime right? And then these companies on their film side have all kinds of connections to the military industrial complex--hell these companies often employ ex-military, or in some notable cases ex-CIA to write the damn books.  And when you couple that with how interested the military has always been with warping people’s brains to keep the war machine humming(they once put acid in a whole town’s water supply just to see what would happen!) it’s quite unnerving!  So besides being extremely anti-war in practice, I’m also pretty tin foil hat when it comes to seeing the edges of the military in pop culture, particularly when the message is like “look how cool this is!”

Which as a sidebar is one of the things that makes the Aubrey Sitterson GI Joe thing complicated to me, because like...I don’t think GI Joe is a good thing, and I don’t believe leftists should be getting their pay pushing paper for something that could not BE more military industrial.  Like let's make kids think how cool being a soldier and going to war is--and then those kids grow up, and what a surprise we are in like ten wars that we know about, and will be for forever--and you get this kind of brainwashing that turns Kapernick trying to say “hey, maybe cops should stop shooting black men” into a debate about “respecting the flag” because the NFL is in bed with the military….agh.  I hate it.  I hate it all.  From Operation Condor, the firebombings of dresden, hiroshima and nagasaki, the genocide of the american indian, fallujah, Abu Ghraib, our complicity in Saudi atrocities in Yemen and Qatar...we are not the good guys of history!  We kill for empire, but our empire isn’t colonies, it’s more war. Our chief export is war.  And I would love to expatriate to a country that doesn’t have these values, but I don’t know if even then I could shake that shit from my stomach.  And even more insidious than our war is our financial arm, our banks and investors who have killed as many people with pens as any soldiers with guns.  We are an empire of atrocity!

So when I see military comics, or cop comics, it just reminds me that I live in the most warlike country of the last 100 years, and all of those innocent people that are caught up in our bombs, and the way we turn whole regions into chaos to serve our ends and make more money--my relative prosperity as an American is built on the bodies and bloodshed of innocents the world over.  I mean why is America what America is?  It’s because WW2 basically moved europe's wealth to the US, and then we spent it on more bombs and we stepped in not because of any real moral thing--we stepped in because england owed us too much for us to let them go down.  We as a country became a world superpower, the world superpower, through war profiteering and slavery.  That’s a huge aside, but I’m saying, I fucking hate war.  And maybe find ways to not contribute to more of those sort of comics?  But more than that in an aesthetic sense, the codes for military in American comics are so bland and it seems half the time to justify not having to do interesting character designs. So surely there is a better fit for someone like Sitterson who has the politics I do, I think, than writing war comics to a patriotic pro-military audience, so I wish him the best, but fuck GI Joe. (And as an aside aside, if it were Frank Miller and not Aubrey Sitterson with the controversial opinion that book isn’t getting dropped--these companies only do these things as financial calculations, and if you are a big enough cash cow you can say or do whatever you want in comics for the most part but if you aren’t--you better protect your neck because these companies don’t have your interests in mind. And we live in stupid times) So I can fuck with Gundam because 1) it hates war as much as I do. And 2) they’re not trying to make everything look like utilitarian military shit.  They’re about looking goood while they are hating war.   The story is really rich, background characters positively radiate and each have their own character which comes to the fore at different parts.  In some respects, Amuro Ray haunts this comic like death, because he’s the end of so many terrific characters that you really grow to love, and the Federation cause is somewhat murky at best, as is their exploitation of kids like Amuro. I kind of think Yaz does my favorite faces in all of comics, unseating Jose Munoz:

This kind of caricaturing is really lovely for a story this rich and dense, because you get so much just from how a character looks and the faces they make, and it’s quite appealing to look at I think.  There are characters you fall in love with just because you want to see Yaz draw their face again.  The range of expressions he has in the toolkit is amazing to me. Yaz’s style in general to me is like magic.  Lines don’t connect, and it’s like he can just shift around these minimal set of lines and accomplish anything on the page.  It’s like he has a set number of lines that he’s working with on every page, and he just dips his brush into the page and waves it around and those lines bend and contort into perfection.  He’s one like Kirby where he kind of just sits down at a page and the images come out of his brain.

 It’s not overly rendered, but it still is textural and inky.  I think this also has my favorite lettering in comics.  I don’t know who was responsible for it in english, but I love the obvious care that went into varying the lettering, and just how gentle and elegant it is.  It probably was just a font in a computer--but it doesn’t FEEL like that, which is cool. Oh also Yaz watercolors various pages in the book, and they are almost all stunning.  I’m planning to read his Joan of Arc book which is all watercolored, so that should be interesting. But I think what comes across more than anything reading these books, because of not only the comic, but the production value of the books themselves--the hard cover, the essays at the back, the slick pages, the thoughtful lettering--what comes across from stem to stern is that these books are a labor of love and passion in a way that you would not expect from the retelling of a decades old giant anime franchise!

Hideaki Anno said in his essay in the first book: “And I sense a certain good grace.  He decides to draw Gundam--well known to the masses as a premier franchise of the plastic model and anime industries--not from weariness, not as expiation, nor to return to his roots, but in earnest as a work of his own” and I think he’s absolutely correct.  There’s a love and attention to every inch of these books that is really inspiring to behold whether as an artist or in whatever you do to fill out your days--seeing something, anything, done by a master, with care and concern is a special thing to behold.  I mean I don’t know for sure that Yaz actually gives a shit about this book--but that’s what comes across on the page.  It comes across that he cares about these lines, about these stories, vividly, and even more surprising, the people whose charge is getting the work out to others, they seem to care just as much, so what you get is a very very special book.

In some ways, these dueling masters, Char and Amuro Ray, also express this concern and care.  At one point Char loudly criticizes Amuro Ray for his lack of style.  And while Char’s vanity, his secrecy, his romantic rogue ideal is extremely alluring, and any scene he’s in, I’m pretty glued to the page--he’s like Harlock or Queen Emeraldas.  We don’t have these kind of artist villains in American comics for some reason.  The closest I’ve seen was Ron Wimberly’s Prince of Cats which has characters who besides their bloody monstrous ideas, consider style to be important.

But even with all of that going on with Char, I’m surprisingly drawn to Amuro Ray--who is a character even without watching the original Gundam series(something I’m planning to rectify this winter--trying to finally knock out all the Gundam I’ve put off for years) that you just kind of know even without ever knowing why.  He’s a legend.  Like Luke Skywalker.  Even his name when you say it, you feel like you are speaking the name of a god.  But he’s a punk kid who has been dragged into this war against his will, and is desperately trying to balance doing the right thing, and keeping his identity.  I love that sometime he just refuses to go out in the Gundam which puts Ltg Bright in these particular binds(Bright might lo key be my favorite character in the series weirdly, for how he kind of morphs through being a snotty prick, to being in over his head, to being someone capable of real genius creativity. I’ve been watching Iron Blooded Orphans which is a Gundam series about child soldiers and is really brutal and depressing, and Orga is kind of like Bright mixed with Char.) His mercurial nature speaks to the nature of his art versus Char.  Amuro Ray belongs to the fickleness of inspiration, so because of that he’s not really reliable, but when he shows up he’s capable of things Char isn’t, moments of improvisation and grouchy genius that are the linchpins of the romantic appeal of the series.  

Versions of this character archetype I feel usually are supposed to be incompetent or dumb to those around them, but their conviction carries them, they have the most will--but in Amuro Ray’s case, he’s just an asshole.  The despair of it all, which is never lost on Amuro is that whether he does something, or doesn’t do something, people are going to die and it’s going to hurt.  And knowing that, that in the end horror is inescapable, and that death is undefeated--like what do you do?  How do you function?  What do you choose when there are no good choices?  Char is a little different, because his aim is revenge.  Which that side of Char that he hides behind his rogue’s grin, and devilish acts is really stunning when it first comes out in these early books.  He’s so careful to let that out, and when it does, you’re like “oh man, Char isn’t playing the same game the rest of you are”.  Agh.  It’s soo good. Comics like these keep the fires going.  There’s an infinity of them out there to be sure, but nothing makes me happier than a truly great comic.  Those comics that years after you remember the experience of reading them, where you were, what music was playing.  A great comic is a great lover.  It won’t last forever, though there’s a LOT of this book still for me to read--and I get in this mode where I both want to just inhale the whole comic as fast possible, and I don’t want this experience to end.  This is that sort of thing.  Which should be evident, since I bothered to write about it, haha.  I could never just review comics.  I’m like Amuro Ray with comics criticism, I need the right situation to be compelled to climb in and do it.  I don’t fundamentally love writing comics criticism--but when I experience something great, I have to talk about it and write about it.  Comics like these affirm everything about being involved with comics for me.  Check it out, see if you feel the same way.

If you liked this essay, and want to see more like it, subscribe to Sarah Horrocks’s Patreon.  For as little as a dollar a month you can help a comic topic in need get the coverage it deserves.

[daniwile24500]

So I, as an American citizen in poverty, live among a group of adults that parental figures basically half raised and there is a lot of very fucking important knowledge missing here because of it. Some of these things I’ve mentioned before but here are some things from the street, from life, all adults need to know

Your regular tire pressure should be at 32 psi

Donuts, temp tires, are usually higher pressure of 60 psi, it is crucial that you do not mix these numbers and underpressurize a donut

Before you add any kind of oil to your vehicle, please google the make and model so that you put the correct oil/synthetics fluid to run that model

It is absolutely pointless to do an oil change without changing the filter

When your turn signal blinks rapidly in your vehicle it means a light has went out

I absolutely implore everyone reading this to NOT EVER take your tires to a quick shop like Walmart or something similar that usually employs 18 year old happy to use a pneumatic torque drill and they almost ALWAYS strip your lug nuts -

AT ANY POINT IN YOUR LIFE WHEN YOU ARE OPERATING A DRILL YOU MUST START THE SCREW/NUT BY HAND otherwise the device will absolutely strip and destroy your equipment

If you need metal to stay in place for a long period of time and need to perhaps more secure, you can seek out Loctite. Blue loctite is temporary, red loctite is designed to be put on screw/bolt and never be removed again

If you are working on any kind of hydronic or pneumatic equipment, you must NEVER do metal on metal, you must seek teflon tape or pipe dope

Do NOT mix any kind of cleaning chemicals in your home, it is crucial that you watch what chemicals are being used while you clean, mixing things like Amonia (windex) and Bleach will cause Mustard Gas, we on the same page?

If at any point in your life you choose to “speedball” there is absolutely nothing safe about this, but I advice that you never mix a Benzo (Valium, klon, Zanny) with a Pain Killer - this is a combination of death. I implore if you ever choose this route to mix something like Hydros or Percs as they are not really depressants with a Upper, this is absolutely not a suggestion at all, nothing about this is safe, but the safest route is mixing those drugs

Please, if you ever choose to do Coke or Blow, do NOT drink alcohol with it - you will continue to drink unaffected until your in the hospital because of the effects of the speed

Ecstasy is Molly or Coke based, if you ever choose this route in your life, I would advice you ask who you’re receiving it from what is inside

In the legal system of the United States the only thing that matters is what’s on paper. If you ever need to take legal actions I advice everyone to remember this, when apply for fssa or HUD - legal addresses and a paper trail are the only thing that matters to these people. To get something certified so that someone cannot Deny reviving something is a process you can request from any United States postal service, they will stamp it and make the person sign that they received this paper and if this is ever needed for a fee of about five dollars

Cigarettes are literally the most tainted form of tobacco - if you ever switch from smoke two pack a day to rolling real bagged tobacco from a shop please keep in mind the tobacco in a bag is at least five percent more pure than anything in a cigarette and you will absolutely give yourself nicotine poisoning if you attempt to smoke at the same rate

If you want to consume tobacco “safely” I strongly suggest cigars or rolling tobacco of choice, these items have so many less chemicals to cause the cell malfunction that we call cancer

If you have smoked for the last fifty years, I strongly suggest not attempting to move on to VAPING materials, this will literally just add water to the mountain of chemicals already built in your lungs and weigh them down

Tornados can literally only be formed with Walll Clouds, if you just see some clouds hanging down during a storm, it is not a twister, it has to have a certain chemical combination to create this natural monster, my step dad lead and created the ball state storm chase team

Anti-inflamatories and Acetaminophen are completely different chemicals and cause completely different things. Any kind of Motrin, Ibrophen, Melixicam - all of that is a Anti-Infalmatory and is made to bring swelling and fevers down, these chemicals strongly effect the stomach, it is absolutely crucial that you eat before taking them, and if you ever attempt to take too many, they will destroy the lining of your stomach (if you attempt suicide on an anti-inflammatory or Asprin, you will generally fail, they will rush you to the ER when you can no longer vomit and then pump your stomach and you will never be able to eat certain groups of food again- bad choice ) Acetaminophen which is Tylonel, and in Hydrocodone and Percocet, is simply just a pain killer, and this drug will effect your liver if taken continuously or in large amounts, it is absolutely crucial that you drink minimally on these as they will cause you to vomit uncontrollably and as i said they will destroy your liver, it is absolutely shameful that currently in the United States healthcare system that because adults choose to abuse mediations they deny people in need of serious pain killers and force them to pop 18 tylonel a day and therefore cause them to destroy their livers in an attempt to get out of pain —- you can absolutely take Motrin and tylonel together

FBI stands for Federal Beurocrat of Investigation- that means that this branch of government exist to investigate issues inside the boarders of the United States, such as missing persons cases and police brutality

CIA stands for Centeral Intelligence Agency and therefore is the agency that brings in intelligence from outside of the nation, threats from our enemies

The fall of the USSR happened because after decades of threatening the Western World with Nuclar Fallout the United States and 23 European countries came together to forum something called NATO that combines the intelligence a military power of the United States and most of Europe - this group decided the best way to destroy the Soviet Hold was to convince the Ukraine to separate from Communist reign, we promised Ukraine absolutely anything they could possibly need to maintain independence from Soviet Russia if we could sit outside the wall and watch the Russians. I am goin to take this moment to say that the fucking piece of shit in office right now has almost undone decades of work right now by withholding funds from the Ukraine as Putins BITCH and therefore aiding the new rise of the USSR

Genetically Modified Food is literally everywhere, in fact in most cases its less safe to seek food without these, these modifications often keep the rather unfriendly parts of our food from actually effecting us

In the Midwest if someone ask you for a Square, they are asking for a Menthol Cigarette

90% of women addicted to alcohol were sexually assaulted as children, almost all male heroin addicts were also molested as children, and our justice system happily punish the addicts and not the assailants

These are all the things off the top of my head i have explained to adults my age that simply were never given the time of day

Oh

And Jeffery Epstein didnt kill himself



[taekwonduh]

Don’t Forget, Pt. 2

Summary: “It is okay if you do not remember me, I can do the remembering. But in a world where I hold absolutely no place in your life, not even as the girl who knew your name before your face, I think it would be a place too cruel to live in.”

Characters: Jungkook, (she/her) Reader, Taehyung

Tags: Angst, romance, food for thought

Memo (Prologue), Pt. 1, Pt. 3

You have been awake for six hours. 

But it is now, only now, that you believe you are truly awake, because for a dream to hurt this much, it could only be reality. 

You have closed the book, now it sits sullenly at the edge of your desk, whereas your spine grates painfully against the wall you lean on while hunched on your bed, curled to your knees, trying to find some sort of explanation for the blow dealt to you from a single mysterious book alone. The sky gets dark. You find none. There is nothing in your mind but the echo of the first words you had brought yourself to read from that book. 

good morning! so glad you found your way to this. (you don’t always pick it up and days are bad when you don’t.) anyways, please do read to the end, you need every memory you can get out of this.  - 12.03.14

There are many questionable things about the message, but none are quite as chilling as the numbers written at the bottom. You don’t want to think that they signify the date, but the arrangement could hardly mean anything else. You don’t want it to be the date, because-  

Because it is three years into the future. 

At this point, when you have barely skimmed the surface of what you hope is an elaborate prank pulled by Taehyung to celebrate your recovery, it is easy to write it off as bullshit and be done with it. Yet you have to admit that you are so very curious, so very eager to learn why it had elicited such a response from you, to understand what it meant by needing every memory you could get out of it.  

For a joke, it is quite a stretch for Taehyung’s usual capabilities, and he is known to pull some seriously ridiculous pranks. But if it’s not a joke, what else could it be? A time slip? A warning from your future self? That sort of thing only happened in movies. Perhaps if you confronted him about it, it would all just end in playful mock and laughter. 

But what if it isn’t his prank? What then? Knowing him, it would escalate into a suspected stalking because which person from outside of town could know your address so accurately? Taehyung would murder anyone that stood in his way of getting to the bottom of it, and losing the book to the authorities when you have barely learned about it does not seem like a good plan for you. You want to know why this book had raised such emotions in you, and even deeper down, you foolishly hope that it might provide some sort of answer to your dreams.

For now, you decide, grasping the thick leather in your palm, reading on and finding out more would be the logical option. 

you turn twenty-one this christmas. remember to give family and friends a phone call! - 21.01.16 

Your nails dig anxiously into the cover of the book. Christmas is in fact the day you turn a year older. You might be friendly with quite a fair bit of people in the town, but only a handful are aware of your birthdate, much less your actual age. The elderly view all young people as the same after all. And when you calculate it, the year 2016 is the year you turn twenty-one, but that is five years from now. Why does anyone need to be reminded of how old they’d be five years later?

“Y/N!”

Your door swings open with vigour. You flinch violently on your bed, book falling out of your lap. When you realise who it is, you take the chance to bury it under your covers. 

“Taehyung, knock.”

The boy laughs it off, slightly breathless from probably running up the stairs to your room. His hair is damp, and your room is suddenly filled with the smell of his usual shampoo, it gets stronger, mixing slightly with body lotion, when he saunters in and plunks himself on your beanbag. Freshly showered Taehyung is your favourite kind of Taehyung, mostly because it reminds you of your earlier years with him, when you were both no taller than the light brown fences that marked the perimeters between your home and his. 

“Knew I’d scare you. Did you take your medicine?”

“Not yet… I still don’t understand why I need medicine. I was only sleeping for a long time.”

Taehyung clucks his tongue, pulling himself up when he hasn’t even sat that long to bring you the white plastic bag that contained your prescribed pills. 

“They’re for before you slept for two weeks. Anti-depressants. The doc said they’ll work better with therapy, but let’s cross that bridge when we get to it.”

When Taehyung punches a pill out from the foil, you obediently open your palm for him. 

“I’m not depressed.” 

He hands you a mug of water. "You tried to kill yourself.”

“I didn’t.”

“Oh yeah you didn’t, you were just taking a swim, right? Except you weren’t moving? Maybe you thought the lake was a hot tub or something. Just wanted a nice, good soak?”

Your eyebrows pinch. ”What is your problem?“

Taehyung squeezes himself onto the bed, looking just as pissed off and ready to rebuke you. His lips part, but he stops short, and within seconds his eyes have softened, jaw losing tension. "I just- I can’t imagine losing you to something like… like that.”

“I know how it feels.”

Now he breaks into a short half-laugh, half-scoff. “And how would you know? I wasn’t the one who threw myself off the pier.”

“I just… I just do.”

“Alright.” You don’t quite like it when Taehyung’s voice goes tender. It only ever comes out in contexts like this one, when both of you have crossed a line and he is the one that lets you win. “Since you know how horrible that feeling is, be good and take your medicine. We’ll work something out if we have to.”

“Well, what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Are you keeping things from me? Things that bother you?”

With the released tension between you two, Taehyung allows himself to hitch up from the edge to a position closer to you. He mimics your posture, leaning against the wall beside you, your shoulders, arms and legs pressed flush together. For a moment, he gives you a look that is both playful and brotherly, it reassures you, and gives you comfort that he is here, that he is with you. 

But he ruins everything when he knocks your foreheads together, cackling like a boy at your pained expression.

“I’ll let you know when I think of something!”

“Don’t!” You retort, rubbing the side of your head as you glare at him from under your hand, “I’m not interested in knowing anymore.”

“You petty little thing.” He joins you in relieving the ache, thumb rubbing circles where your fingers previously were, but he ends up ruffling your hair into a tangled mess. Probably on purpose. You bat his hand away, and he laughs even more, putting the matter aside when he pulls out his cellphone and puts it between you, “Come on, I have something to show you. Jaegeun got drunk for the first time the other day. It was a mess.”

“You went drinking while your best friend was in a coma?”

“Semi coma. And no, I didn’t drink. Just popped by to watch because it was so damn hilarious. Look!”

When Taehyung is bent on getting your attention, there is little you can do to wiggle out of it. And so although the book is not deeply hidden, you manage to forget about it for the night as Taehyung shows you video after video of all the things you’ve missed out about your friends during the two weeks you were held captive by unconsciousness. 

The two of you are almost always together, the longest you have gone apart being a week when Taehyung and his family travels up the country to visit his university student brother in the capital. Now you suppose the new record is the two weeks you ‘slept’ away; the period was long, and you were right there with him, as he was with you, but those two weeks that slipped through your fingers like sand felt like the furthest you have ever been away from him. As if the dream you spent two weeks dreaming had been years living in another world. 

You suppose that is why you find yourself missing him even now as you are together, like your reunion had been five years overdue, the moment you returned to the world and once more met with the chocolate brown eyes filled with adoration for you. You say you know what it feels like to lose him, because perhaps in one of the dreams that you cannot remember, you already have. 

At this point you can’t quite be sure how often you and Taehyung meet up, but right now it feels like a lot. It has been three weeks since your discharge, and more than half of the time is spent with Taehyung and a few other friends. You have always been around each other, that you know, but somehow spending time with him now feels a little different. 

He does not stick himself to you, no, Taehyung is much too prideful for that, but no matter what you do, or where you find yourself, be it within the center of the group or at the outskirts, you feel his guard, his protection. At any one moment when you look up, you will find his eye on you. They are not glaring nor heavy, but rather, soft and tender, like a father that watches over his daughter. It is obvious that this has to do with your 'incident’, and maybe, it is his way of 'keeping a closer eye on you’ as he mentioned before. You appreciate him, of course, but it also makes you feel terribly rotten on the inside/

You find yourself smiling more, smiling wider and laughing louder, and when you peek at the relieved purse of his lips that grows more evident over time, you can feel his anxiousness over you drop. But while that dilutes the debt you think you owe him, the rotten feeling does not go away. Your cheeks cramp, your lips twitch and your feet scrape heavily against the pavement- you are so very exhausted, but at least you are able to make him worry a little less. 

This is what Taehyung meant by sharing a love that is self-destructive, you suppose. There is no middle way with you two, you are two lighted matches in a race to see which one burns out first. You hope it is you. Taehyung would be the one to bear the weight of living without you, but at least you are not around to watch. It would kill you otherwise.

“High school starts in one week." 

You are curled in the hammock on Taehyung’s front porch, a mug of ice cold rice punch in your hand and a battery-powered fan in the other. Summer beats down on your neighbourhood, there is hardly anyone on the streets, all gone to take shelter in the cool comfort of their homes. Taehyung’s room has gotten too stuffy from just the fan alone (his aircon has broken down), so the two of you have escaped to the shades outside. 

Taehyung is on the steps a few feet away, wearing sunglasses, his own rice punch beside him on the floor. You watch dazedly as the condensation droplets slide tantalizingly down the surface of the glass mug, accumulating a wet stain on the wood it rests upon. 

"Don’t remind me,” the boy grumbles, thumbs flying across the keyboard of the latest iPhone 4s. “Just thinking about it is giving me major vacation withdrawals.”

You roll over on your hammock to stare up at the roof. It is a shade of brown coated in dust that you are quite familiar with. “You’re being dramatic,” you say, feeling a cloud of drowsiness loom over you. It must be the heat. 

“Don’t tell me you’re excited for school to start?”

“I’m not, but… this vacation feels kind of long too, doesn’t it?”

“You’re weird.” You can sense his commitment to the pointless conversation slowly dwindling, but you are much too sleepy to rebuke him for paying more attention to his phone than you. Your eyelids have just fallen shut when he suddenly yelps an alarming oh my God, and you are falling over the hammock and scrambling over to see what’s up. 

“Rohwan just texted.” The moment you come to his side, his hand has gripped your forearm, fingers easily going full circle around it as he pulls you closer to his phone screen. “There’s a new guy in town. He moved in to West End yesterday, he’s our age, and Rohwan saw him in a Juhan uniform!”

You raise a judging brow, subtly wondering if the boy has always been this dramatic, or he has just become more inclined to such reactions after nearly losing you in the recent incident. Losing interest immediately, you drone, “and sooooo…?”

“We haven’t had a new face in six years, and he’s from Juhan, Y/N, that’s a school in Busan.”

Oh. Your eyes go full circle in their sockets, and you shake off Taehyung’s grip. Daegu-Busan rivalry is a concept that should only exist in dramas, it was such a shallow rivalry that you doubted anyone in real life would actually believe it. You’ve obviously doubted wrong. Taehyung is absolutely gobbling this news up. 

“Tae, are you serious? Daegu and Busan have nothing against each other. That’s old people belief.”

“Okay, forget the cities, I was looking our school up the other day, Haesan and Juhan High have been baseball rivals since the eighties. That’s twenty years of tension! So here’s the thing, Juhan is comprised of both a middle and high school, so what is the new guy doing not sliding into the high school that he’s already affiliated to and enrolling into Haesan?”

Somewhere along Taehyung’s gossip-girl rant, you find yourself already plopped down beside him to listen. “How do you know he’s going to attend Haesan?”

“Rohwan saw him in the uniform shop. Dressed in Juhan but shopping for Haesan? Scandalous.”

“There are plenty reasons for someone to move cities. Maybe his dad got a job transfer? Or rent was cheaper here? Maybe he got sick of the smell of sea salt?”

“But Juhan…” This is when you realise Taehyung is no longer listening, and your warning goes unheeded even when you glare at him, jaw-slackened in girlish offense as he types an eager response to Rohwan’s texts. Frustrated by the lack of attention, Taehyung’s ignored mug of rice punch is taken into your hands, palm rubbing back and forth on the wet surface to smother his cheeks in gross lukewarm water. Taehyung screeches. 

Then you’re racing around the porch in a game of cat and mice; you scramble across the lawn squealing out defeat, but Taehyung just warns for you to run while you can, covering the same distance with two long-legged strides, he leaps over his own fence and gains leverage over you because you’re not tall enough to jump and have to use the gate.

You’ve run down three houses when your lungs encounter a hiccup, suddenly strained for breath, you’re forced to come to a stop, bending over as you heave and cough. Taehyung catches up to you in seconds, laughing and pulling you upright.

“Jesus, I nearly forgot you were asthmatic!” He taunts, grabbing you carefully but firmly around the arm and helping to straighten your back, forgetting all about revenge. “Easy now, deep breaths.”

You level out your breathing following Taehyung’s instructions, the boy is concerned, but still manages to laugh at you about karma. The knot in your lungs untangles eventually, and though he seems to have put the matter of his wet cheeks aside, you certainly haven’t. When his guard his fully down and he’s ready to head back to the house, you burst up and jump onto his back, howling with laughter and rubbing your knuckles into his skull. “Pick one! Your phone or your best friend, huh?”

Taehyung’s whining and groaning throughout your noogie, floundering and staggering with your weight on him and your merciless devilish ministrations. 

“Ow! Ow- okay! Shit, alright I pick you! I’ll always pick you!”

“Be careful kids! You’re on the road!”

Your heads lift to the first floor window of the house across the street, behind which the twins’ mother stands, armed with a spatula. Her eyes are scolding but her fond grin gives her away. Taehyung apologizes for the both of you and returns to the sidewalk with you on his back. It is only when you arrive at your white fences that he pops you down. 

The run has gotten you both perspiring, sticky skin warmed by the mid-afternoon sun. Your shirt clings to your back, sweat drips down the side of your face, you’re breathless and tired, but you’re smiling and Taehyung’s smiling back- years from now, this moment is one you want to always remember.

Don’t forget, Y/N, don’t forget. 

High school begins tomorrow.  

“We have twelve hours until we’re back to the routine of waking up at five and having our asses stuck in a plastic chair for eight hours straight.”

It is five o’ clock. You’ve just returned from a very early dinner with your mother at the diner on the edge of town when you chance upon Taehyung in the hammock. He’s dressed exceptionally special when you see him, too special to just be lazing around on his front porch. 

“Did you forget the hour-long commute during morning rush hours?” You respond lightly, grinning ear to ear when the boy emits a comical high pitched whine. Gesturing for your mother to head inside without you, you stop to converse with the boy from the sidewalk. “Are you heading somewhere?”

“Yeah. Dinner with the boys. Where are you coming back from?”

“Dinner too. Mum and I ate early because I wanted to go to the pier. I was thinking of asking you along.”

Though you are quite a distance away, leaning on the outside of his fence, it does nothing to mask Taehyung’s snap to attention. He bolts upright from his lying position, staring right back at you with unusually wider eyes. His jaw is set, his lips pressed to a neutral line. 

“Are you sure about it?”

“Yeah.” You know what he’s referring to, but in all honesty the pier does not bode anything negative to you like Taehyung thinks it does. You want to reassure him of that. “I mean, it’s just the pier, right?”

“Yeah.” He holds your gaze, unwavering and full of depth. You try to smile. “Just the pier." 

"Is eight okay? Is it too early?”

The boy shakes his head. “Eight is fine. I’ll meet you there.”

“Right.” You push off from the fences, angling your body towards your own home.

“See you there.”

 When you return to your bedroom, the silence is more static than you are used to. Something weighs in your chest, something is always weighing down in there, but this one feels oddly tangible. It’s something you can’t shake off even after changing into your comfiest pair of t-shirt and shorts and curling up amidst freshly laundered sheets, but you refuse to brood on your last day of vacation. 

The right drawer of your desk is more eye catching than ever in the rare moments that you are left alone. It is where that book has been sitting, out of sight and therefore out of mind, for the past three weeks after you had read the first page of it. Ever since Taehyung’s interruption that evening, you have willed yourself to put the book and all the complicated thoughts it brought to your head away, having convinced yourself to deem it a prank or delivery gone wrong despite the odds.

But your curiosity about it’s’ background had not yet died out. You think that if you allow this loose end to carry forward into your beginning at a new school, you would be left feeling like you had left one shoe stuck in the mud. And before long you find your fingers curled around the knob of your drawer, the book in your lap and the hours going by. 

i think you should move out. mum is working herself to the bones trying to take care of you and paying for therapy. you can take care of yourself as long as you have this book. mum won’t be around forever. - 07.06.13 

don’t worry, i will take care of you. love, mum - 18.07.11 

three years ago you were diagnosed with anterograde amnesia. a car accident, they said. although you can’t remember how it happened. the therapist suggested you make this scrapbook to help you keep track of things. - 12.03.14 

it’s your first day in your new apartment. someone has left post-it notes next to your pillow saying that you should check out this scrapbook. you know everything now. and you know you should read this book again tomorrow. aunt lives fifteen minutes away, she’ll look out for you. call her if you need anything. - 22.03.14 

The weight in your chest grows to a point where it physically aches. You are a third’s way in to the book when a chime from your phone thankfully interrupts you. It’s Taehyung. He says he’ll be fifteen minutes late at least, and it’s a quarter to eight o’ clock when you decide its best to set things aside and head to the pier. 

The book is hurting you and you know that, you only cannot figure out why. The accounts it holds is too detailed, too personal, to possibly be a prank. It feels so real, but also so unbelievable. And it reminds you a lot of your dreams- always altered, but always surreal.

It feels ridiculous to contemplate the possibilities, but the theory on it being from the future is eating away at you as the car engines die out to crickets singing in the trees, neon lights on shops giving way for muted silver moonlight. The hustle and bustle of the town’s busier district is replaced, after a near twenty minute walk, by the crystal clear sloshing of water against the shore. Soon, you have arrived at the pier, a canvas of black and a crackly reflection of the crescent moon against it.

Perhaps you’ve been watching too many movies, but the oddities are beyond reasonable explanations. How and why are the two crucial factors to this book being delivered to your address specifically. Nothing but a crack in reality, a slip in time, could explain why this book details the daily accounts of an amnesiac from the future. And it chills you to the bone that this book could very well be yours. 

A crunching leaf snaps you to attention. The pier is a place of solace that is more than familiar to you and the youths of your town, but being that far out from commotion where street lamps are not always functional keeps you on your guard. 

Scraping of soles against asphalt then turns to resounding footsteps on the wooden floorboards that make up the pier. You try to seek a face on the other end, one that you hope is Taehyung’s or someone just as friendly, but the lighting is scarce and your poor eyesight renders you no aid. The footsteps get louder, and soon a silhouette that is tall and fairly built becomes clear in your limited field of vision. 

You could only assume the man had noticed your presence, for the footsteps then stop short, and the silhouette is no longer in motion. 

“Sorry,” he says, in a tone the hints nervousness and genuine apology, like he’d wandered into territory that he knew was not his, “didn’t think there’d be anybody here.”

From the first word alone, his voice had sent a devastating jolt to your heart, one that leaves you breathless, incapacitated, absolutely stumped. You lose the instinct to breathe, and all you know is that this is a voice you have heard before, this is a voice that-

“Jungkook…?”

The floorboards creak, the silhouette advances and a face is illuminated by moonlight. Your knees nearly buckle.

“How do you know my name?”

[desertshake9-blog]

Immigration: For Those Who Move To Philadelphia, The Mental Health Journey Is Often Far From Over

 Added on November 18, 2018  Laura Smythe  Colombian , Community Partnership Initiative , Council for Relationships , hispanic community counseling services , mental health , Nationalities Service Center , Refugee Health Screener-15 , Thomas Jefferson University , World Education Services

UPROOTING

Born and raised in Barranquilla, Colombia, Carolina Coronado never thought she’d leave her native country.

But one day in the mid-2000s she received a phone call from a Colombian guerrilla group — part of a rebellious anti-government movement — threatening her family.

“We moved immediately from Barranquilla,” Coronado said. “I left everything behind. Dog, car, house.”

Her son Nicola Villegas, who was 13 years old at the time, described the day the family immigrated to the United States as “chaos.”

Villegas, his sister Natalia Munive, who was then 6 years old, and Coronado made the trip. The family couldn’t afford to check bags on the plane, so they carried all the luggage they were allowed and ran through the airport to catch their flight.

“I didn’t have anything when I came here,” said Villegas, now 26, who studies education for fourth through eighth graders at the Community College of Philadelphia. “I didn’t even have a book on the plane from Colombia. All my childhood [was] practically gone.”

With help from a Colombian government agency, Coronado and her children relocated to Bogotá. She started the refugee application process to relocate her family to the U.S., but said it was complicated and lengthy. Midway-through, a friend in Philadelphia offered to help move the three to the U.S.

From Colombia, Coronado sent her savings to her helper, who used it to rent Coronado a house in Northeast Philadelphia and buy her a cheap car.

After boarding their plane in Bogotá, Colombia’s capital, Coronado’s family flew to Panama and then Houston before arriving in Philadelphia. The trio almost missed their Panama connection and then did miss their flight in Houston due to a lengthy immigration process.

Coronado and her children didn’t speak English at the time, and they met with an immigration officer at the Houston airport for an interview — without a translator present. The immigration officer asked what the three were doing in Houston and why they wanted to enter the U.S.

“I don’t know how I understood what they said, but I remember there was a lot of people … that had been with us and they had [helped],” Coronado said. “I think maybe the situation forced me to read the body language.”

ADJUSTING TO NEW SURROUNDINGS

Coronado, Villegas and Munive navigated many difficulties during their first years in the U.S. Villegas started at Grover Washington Middle School while Munive entered first grade at Laura H. Carnell School.

Villegas (pictured below) said the first school year was “ridiculous,” and he felt the impact of cultural differences when other kids picked on him because he didn’t speak English.

One day at school, Villegas broke down when a boy punched him in the face during lunchtime. Unfamiliar with the language and cultural customs, Villegas didn’t know how to react or ask the kid why he did it.

“I had never talked to him, I didn’t know English, I didn’t know anything,” Villegas said. “I was so frustrated with not being able to know how to express myself that I just left and walked to the bathroom and splashed water on my face.”

For Munive, the problems she experienced were mainly identity issues stemming from looking Caucasian, but only speaking Spanish, she said. As she grew up, Munive’s experiences made her aware of the different races living in Philadelphia.

“What is a Hispanic?” said Munive, 19, who studies social work at La Salle University. “What is a white? How does that carry itself in Philadelphia? How do you approach someone else who is maybe white and Hispanic?”

The immigration and cultural assimilation processes impacted both Munive’s and Villegas’ mental health. Munive said she began developing anxiety at a young age, while Villegas experienced depression.

“The first two years was the biggest shock,” Villegas said. “I had no friends. You’re vulnerable. You’re not used to anything that’s happening.”

The first time Munive experienced anxiety was in first grade. A group of friends at her school went around pulling each other’s pants down as a joke.

“That was normal for them, and they did it for me and … they just killed me,” Munive said. “It was that difference of social constructs.”

After the incident, Munive (pictured below) began crying everyday. She said the newness of the culture and her surroundings made everything feel much worse.

“The smallest thing would happen and I felt it a lot deeper,” Munive said. “Every single time that I wasn’t around someone that I knew, I would immediately be deeply freaking out.”

She started a habit of making a best friend and keeping that person around at all times for support as a coping mechanism.

Munive still experiences anxiety, especially in unfamiliar environments. She tries to avoid going to new places alone.

“I get anxiety when I’m not babied,” Munive said. “But that’s the experience of putting a little girl who came from … higher-middle-class Colombia to basically poverty in Philadelphia.”

Like her children, Coronado said the immigration experience impacted her mental health. When she left the airport after first arriving in Philadelphia, she broke down in tears.

“[I was] crying because the part of the world that I come from is completely different,” Coronado said. “You start to feel anxious because you are not ready for what you’re seeing, facing … but it happens.”

In Colombia, Coronado had been practicing psychology for 11 years. But when she arrived in Philadelphia, she was still waiting for the World Education Services to assess her credentials. WES is a nonprofit organization that evaluates how international students’ and professionals’ credentials transfer to the U.S.

Coronado said the process was long and complicated, and she had to start working at a factory to support her kids.

A professional all her life, it was the first time Coronado had done factory work. She would try to make herself feel better about the work by telling herself she was being paid to not use her brain, or she’d view it as a workout.

“You try to comfort the situation that you are living to something more positive,” Coronado said. “Trying to put a costume to the reality that you’re living, so you don’t feel like the reality is so hard.”

STARTING FROM ZERO

Coronado drew on her psychology background to remind herself the situation was only temporary. Still, Villegas remembers Coronado often coming home from work in tears.

Eventually, WES processed Coronado’s transcript and let her work as a psychotherapist in the U.S.

Despite her work experience and six-year psychology degree, Coronado (pictured below) said she was demoted in the transfer process. She couldn’t resume practicing as a psychologist, which involves making diagnoses, administering mental health tests and prescribing medicine, so she started working as a counselor at Hispanic Community Counseling Services in Kensington.

Coronado said the demotion is frustrating. With 27 years of experience, she often knows a client’s diagnosis, but co-workers won’t listen to her because she isn’t a licensed U.S. psychologist.

“When you’re an immigrant, you have to know that you have to start from zero,” Coronado said. “You have to admit it that no matter who you were in your country, now you’re here and no one. You start to rebuild your life again.”

She added the immigration process is especially mentally challenging when coming from a professional background.

“When you are living in higher status and you’re a professional and you came here and you don’t speak the language, you don’t know the system, ” Coronado said. “You don’t know no one. You say, ‘Oh my god, what was the mistake that I made? Why am I here? Why, why God?’”

Coronado, who has worked at HCCS for 10 years, is pursuing a master’s degree in family therapy. She works with many immigrant and refugee clients with similar immigration experiences to her family’s.

The feeling of having to start over when immigrating to the U.S. often results in depression or anxiety as part of a mental condition called adjustment disorder, Coronado said.

Adjustment disorder is a temporary mental condition causing bouts of depression and anxiety that results from a dramatic life change and usually subsides after a few years.

“You start to create a new life in a space that you don’t know anything at all,” Coronado said. “You don’t know the language, making the situation worse. You feel afraid that you don’t have the legal status, and that makes the condition worse because you are scared that maybe the police or someone will put you out or people will reject you because you look different.”

AFFORDABLE COUNSELING SERVICES

For immigrants to Philadelphia, resources within the city exist to address their mental health concerns arising from the transition.

“If you haven’t dealt with the incredible stress that you experienced before you came here and the incredible stress of relocating in a completely different culture without all your [support] systems, it’s like there’s this missing component,” said Gwen Soffer (pictured below), the wellness specialist at the Nationalities Service Center. “It’s like skipping over this huge thing that could impact someone throughout their life.”

The Nationalities Service Center addresses immigrant and refugee mental health needs. NSC is a nonprofit organization providing a range of services to immigrants and refugees to aid assimilation.

“Imagine you have your life and then you essentially lose all of your support systems,” said Soffer. “You are in a brand-new culture with a language [that] in many cases [immigrants] don’t speak yet, different customs, everything different.

Council for Relationships, a nonprofit therapy organization that provides affordable counseling services, collaborates with the NSC to provide therapy to immigrants and refugees. Thomas Jefferson University graduate students working at CFR conduct counseling sessions at NSC, in an environment already familiar to the clients.

The students receive counseling hours required for graduation, while immigrants and refugees receive free counseling services. Each counseling session includes free language translation services in languages like French, Spanish, Portuguese, Burmese and Arabic.

The CFR-NSC partnership began in spring 2017 as part of CFR’s Community Partnership Initiative, a program that strives to increase vulnerable populations’ access to counseling by bringing therapy to locations convenient for them.

The collaboration addresses common barriers to immigrants and refugees receiving clinical mental health care, like high cost, finding child-care or accessing transportation. The program aims to come into the environment where someone already is instead of asking clients to come to a new, unfamiliar place.

“Given what you’ve been through, either as a refugee who’s fleeing or as someone who’s trying to acculturate to a new country, there’s a lot of emotional and psychological challenges,” said Tracey Tanenbaum, a Council for Relationships staff therapist and the Community Partnership Initiative clinical specialist. “There are therapists who are right there who can help you with that.”

Many NSC clients also experienced trauma in their home countries from social and political events that caused them to immigrate. In the process, many were separated from their families.

“Either their [family] unit was too large or … they were in different parts of the country and spread out,” said Christine Wamble (pictured below), who provides therapy in the collaboration. “Just knowing about their family’s safety, knowing about their conditions is really worrisome.”

There are many reasons why someone new to the country would need assistance.

“Our clients come for case management, they come for English classes, they come for all different things and this is just one more component, so they’re familiar with being here,” Soffer said.

NSC clients have case managers, which helps the therapists provide continued care. Case managers might forewarn therapists of potential missed appointments for clients without phones or computers, and therapists can sometimes work with a case manager to connect a client with services discussed in a counseling session.

“[It’s] that health care system having all of the components where people are able to work together physically, mentally, emotionally,” Wamble said. “I think that benefits everybody.”

ACCOMMODATING DIFFERENT CULTURES

For clients receiving therapy in lesser-known languages, the CFR-NSC program relies on over-the-phone translators from across the country.

“A couple of my clients don’t get to speak their native language because it’s a very unique language to this part of the world,” said Wamble, who has provided therapy at NSC to clients from Mexico, South Korea, Jordan and several African nations. “Sometimes having someone on the phone who can speak their language is therapeutic in itself.”

The collaboration uses the Refugee Health Screener-15, a 15-question tool that evaluates refugees’ emotional and psychological wellness by asking clients questions about how they are feeling and handling changes in their lives.

RHS-15 includes a “distress thermometer” that lets clients fill in the thermometer to indicate their stress level in the previous two weeks. The visual component gives therapists an immediate indicator of how a person is feeling, which is important for clients from cultural backgrounds who might deal with stress and emotional wellness differently.

From June 2017 to June 2018, NSC referred 45 clients from 19 different countries to on-site CFR therapists. The clients, from countries like Haiti, Brazil, Iraq, Guinea, Syria, Nigeria and Pakistan, received a total of 152 hours of free therapy.

One of the challenges of the partnership is figuring out how to provide clinical care for clients from diverse backgrounds. Some cultures carry more stigma around mental health and therapy than others, which often depends on if a culture is individualistic or collectivistic, Soffer said.

In an individualistic culture, emphasis is placed on an individual, while emphasis is placed on a family or community unit in a collectivistic culture. Soffer said while seeing a therapist is somewhat normalized in the U.S., it’s not something everyone is used to.

“[An immigrant] might deal with those things not with a therapist, but with a community member or a religious figure,” she added. “[They] would maybe handle it a different way than in the U.S.”

To address cultural differences, CFR therapists tailor their therapeutic approaches to match a client’s needs. Therapists will familiarize themselves with a client’s home country however they can, Wamble said. This includes researching a client’s country before a therapy session — learning where it’s located, what the agriculture is like and the political climate.

“[It’s] putting anything in the tank that is helpful and building that idea where this person may or may not have come from and using that as a place to ask questions or [ask them] to give anecdotes about their experience,” Wamble said.

Developing this cultural competence allows the therapists in the collaboration to develop their skills, too.

“It’s such a great lesson for [the therapists] as they move out into their careers to understand that you’re a therapist to an individual, not the theory that you learned,” Soffer said.

She added the program is important because even though many social services exist for immigrants and refugees, their mental health is often overlooked.

“Any time you can tell your story in a way where it stops controlling you, you’re in a better position to deal with your life and your relationships,” Tanenbaum (pictured above) said.

For Wamble, the most satisfying part of working with her NSC clients is their inspiring sense of positive resiliency, hopefulness and gratitude — something she said is unique to this demographic.

“There’s this ability to balance such challenging experiences with this undying level of hope, not just in their life, but in humanity,” Wamble added. “[They have] this idea that people really are good. … It’s inspiring.”

-Text and images by Laura Smythe.

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Source: https://philadelphianeighborhoods.com/2018/11/18/immigration-for-those-who-move-to-philadelphia-the-mental-health-journey-is-often-far-from-over/

[clippedwingsmusic]

Interview With Yungblud

(Photo by Mika Earley)

We got the opportunity to sit down with Yungblud, one of the biggest names to march onto the music scene in the past year at his sold out show in Boston! This energetic and compassionate 21 year-old, also known as Dominic Harrison, gave us a little more insight into his album and it’s topics through our ‘21st Century Liability’-inspired questions!

Eulogy - How did it feel writing your own eulogy for the record? Do you have any edits now that the album has been out?

It was weird, man. In the studio we had a piano from the 1400s or something stupidly crazy like that, and I had started messing around on it and playing these sad chords and just thought “What if I open up the album with my own eulogy and go into ‘Die For The Hype’?” (It is) A sort of representation that you suffocated me so much that you put me in a box. As everything I do, I wanted it to represent my psychotic nut side of my personality, so I wanted it to be funny. I did it in one take and it just came out in the realest form of what I wanted to say, and I wouldn’t change it. It was what I was thinking in that particular moment so I put it on the record.

Die For The Hype - Why do you think that it's sometimes necessary for artists to “die” to gain attention in the music industry? Do you agree that that should happen?

I think in this industry you get so scared of failure and you have to kill a part of your soul to conform to a box and fit with what’s current and trending, and it’s exactly the same with your personality. For me, I’m totally anti that. I’ve always had it in my personality where if everyone is wearing a white hat, I’m going to put a fucking black hat on. At the end of the day, in this industry, if you lie I feel so sorry for you. If you’re not being yourself and telling the truth in this profession, then I am very scared for you.

Doctor Doctor - If you were a licensed musical professional, what would you prescribe for the music industry?

A bit of fire in everyone’s bellies right now. Less water and more cordial, do you know what I mean? Everything is so diluted and I just think a prescription for more bollocks is needed.

Medication - Do you agree with the older generation that mental illnesses are overly diagnosed, or do you agree with the younger generation that mental illnesses are sometimes over prescribed?

Over prescribed. 100%. Everyone suffers with bouts of anxiety and depression- that’s just fact and human behavior. And the problem is that if someone says they’re depressed, people are like “Alright, let’s put you on drugs.” but that’s not right. They’re putting depression in a box now when there is a spectrum of things that can usually be healed with a conversation and actually addressing that something is wrong instead of saying “Oh, you’re depressed, which is box #2, so we’ll give you the pills for box #2.”. That’s exactly wrong and exactly why a long of young people are pissed off right now and the older generation have no idea why.

Machine Gun - Majorly populated countries also tend to be major powers in terms of military. Do you feel that this money is being well-spent?

It’s absolutely disgusting to me that people can put so much money into weaponry and advancing that all over the world but in the States, healthcare isn’t free, and in England, university isn’t free. I think that that’s fucking nuts.

Psychotic Kids - Do you think the voices of the youth will come forward as strongly as hoped in the upcoming elections?

Oh hell yeah! I genuinely have so much faith in our generation. We’re pissed off and that’s the only way to change shit. Even if this election doesn’t happen, there’s a bunch of kids between 12 and 17 that will be coming up and are going to be ready to take a stand and make a call to action.

Anarchist - If you could get away with one illegal activity, what would you want it to be and why?

Probably just make cannabis legal everywhere. Just spread the love, you know? Most people want me to say ‘Assasinate Donald Trump’ or something like that but to be honest that’s a bit naive. I don’t want to kill anyone, I don’t want to hurt anyone, I just want to take him off the pedestal that he’s clawed his way up to. I;m not interested in hurting anyone, I just want to spread the love.

I Love You, Will You Marry Me? - Have you ever done anything wild to woo your crush?

Yeah, I used to do crazy shit for my ex-girlfriend like send her flowers every single Sunday. I remember spending like £2000 on flowers once to just cover her flat in them. But, I’m a really romantic man, I love the 50s and shit, and I love just putting on a suit and going out to dinner.

Polygraph Eyes - People say eyes are the windows to the soul. What do you think your eyes are telling your fans?

Just the truth. That’s all I ever want to do. In doing this I never want to have lied or covered up who I am.

Kill Somebody - Is there a part of your life that you feel like you've "killed off" to become a musician that you miss?

Not seeing my family is hard. But I don’t know, I feel like I’m infected almost. All the people I meet that are thinking the same things as me and we have helped make things worth it.

California - Los Angeles is known as a hub for upcoming talent in theater/film/music. How did your background in musical theater help you begin to create music?

I think you can definitely tell that I love theater. With the videos, the outfits, the acting, the logos- everything. It really taught me how to put on a show. No one puts on a show anymore, really. I don’t want my show to be all smoke and mirrors, I want to be like Freddie Mercury, or Mick Jagger, or Gaga, or Marilyn Manson: To be one person standing on stage but to put on a show that’s so theatrical that 10,000 people can’t take their eyes off of you.

21st Century Liability - Of time periods in recent memory, this one could be the most pivotal in terms of human rights. What are your ultimate hopes for our generation in the coming years?

I just hope that everyone can be accepted no matter what. That’s the world I want to live in. I want to live in a world with love and equality, where the cataracts of these old ideologies just gets fucking cured. I just want us to talk about shit that no one talks about in music because that’s how conversation is created and things change.

https://www.yungbludofficial.com/

Written by Ashton Carr