#780 words now this is the most I’ve written in a while

[valeovalairs]

Hehe, Shilo in the bathroom

here’s a sneak peek. And actually, now that you’ve seen a bit, do you think it’d be better to rate this T or M. I do go into a bit of slightly gore-y detail about the whole ripping a guys throat out, but im not sure, cause it’s not like over the top descs.

400 words already, yeah i can knock out a 1k worded fic tonight. That’s doable. See you guys in a few hours.

[userkhael]

adore

Summary: You cried over a book and Henry consoles you.

Pairing: Henry Cavill x Reader

Word Count: 780+

Warning: RPF, FLUFF FLUFFY FLUFFIER

A/N: No taglist because I am inconsistent AF. This is probably the first time I've posted in a long time so... I've written this last night and feel asleep lmao but mostly this is about me listening to a song and being inspired to write. Everything I've written is in drafts. Anyway, this is not beta'd so there will be errors. Enjoy and every comment, like and reblog is very much appreciated!

Orange bathed skies greeted you when you walked out the door. It's becoming a daily routine to see how your plants are thriving after being cared for by your not-so-green thumb. And honestly, the smell of nature is always a welcoming invite into your senses.

This is just one of those lazy days where you wake up, eat breakfast, work and then suddenly it's night time.

Stack of papers are neatly placed in the table just at the corner. Your little nook when you wanted to change scenery and has been your husband's constant little man cave when he's home. He looks too out of place but it would take him hours and hours in there.

He looks up from what he's reading and smiles at you. That kind of smile that makes you go week in the knees. You must admit you hit the jackpot on this one.

Spotting the book in your hand, he pulls you in for a squeeze and kisses you on the lips. He still smells like his aftershave and your heart grows warmer by the minute.

"You've been busy..." You notice he was reading The Witcher Season 3 script with very bold "confidential" printed in the front page. Even though you've been a huge fan of the series, you knew Henry would never, ever tell you anything. And you respect that. Not that you can't tell anyone but you definitely will, so you better not now any information at all.

It's exactly a week after he's done with the promotion and other side interviews. And him being him, he immediately immersed himself with the next season's script. He was the same when he's reading all the Witcher books. Dedicated can't even cover what he's doing. He's doing his very best, everytime, for any role he has to play.

You eased right in and started reading. You've been sitting for you don't know how long, so it feels good to finally lean back and relax. You lift your feet and place it on his lap. He smiles at you and gently massages your foot while he reads his script.

You might've moaned a bit because his hands feel to good. Well, his hands had done so much more erotic than this but this feels so nice, it feels like a dream.

You continued reading and he continued massaging your feet and of course, reading.

The book you're reading is a tearjerker and you've reached the most sentimental part, and being a sensitive dumbass, you fucking cried. Of course. This is what you get after working hours and hours straight, tired and exhausted, crying over a goddamn book. You throw your head back and let the tears just flow.

"Hey, hey." Henry dropped whatever he's holding and consoled you. You felt stupid because it was just a goddamn book and you can't stop crying.

"Come here..." He whispers and you hesitated but he pats his lap and his arms are open and that's all you ever want.

So you obliged and finally felt safe in his strong arms. Clinging to his body like you've felt the worst heartbreak ever.

"I hate being this vulnerable."

You sat there, in his lap, like a baby, your arms hugging his body and your face nestled safely in the crook of his neck. His Adam's apple bobbed up and down and hugged even tighter.

"I love you like this. And don't ever, ever be afraid of showing how you feel. That's what I'm here for. To crush you with these arms."

You smile and you hear his chuckle vibrate across his chest and you playfully put your hand inside his shirt. He's quiet for a moment, just holding you, kissing your head over and over again.

"What was that book all about?" He asked and you closed your eyes.

You sighed and cleared your throat. "The Song of Achilles."

"I feel like you aren't ready to talk about it?"

You shake your head and look up at him, smiling, tears still at bay.

"It's okay, darling. When you're ready."

Both of you just sat there for a long time. Feeling each other's heartbeat, holding each other like there's no tomorrow.

"What did I do to deserve you?" You whisper and looked up at him, his eyes a bit bluer than usual.

"For being you. I wouldn't want you any other way."

He kissed the tip of your nose, your temple and finally pulled you in for another hug.

"Don't change, my love."

His voice boomed in your ear as it's placed against his chest. You smiled and threw the book across the yard. You both chuckle and everything feels okay again.

[secretgiftsforshaman]

I wrote 2826 entire words before I collapsed last night

I have been seriously struggling this academic quarter. And I seriously struggled last academic quarter. As I did in undergrad, and in high school, junior high, and elementary. But I do not have any learning disabilities. And you have some idea of how smart I am in general, but I’ll share one specific example about just how very academically intelligent I am. On the SAT, I scored 700 in reading, 730 in writing, and 780 in math and I did not study for it. I spent most of the test bored and waiting for the allotted time to run out because I finished nearly every section way early. Early enough that at one point I had enough time to leisurely leave and use the restroom and came back before everyone else had finished. The only reason I did not score a perfect 800 in math because I missed *exactly* one question. I can still remember and visualize exactly which one it was – and only I missed it because it was the second to last one of the last math section and my brain read the word ‘diameter’ and was tired enough that my brain went ‘oh cool, radius’ even though I could have easily solved that problem when I was 11 or 12 (if you haven’t already gone “wow, she’s got some serious perfectionism issues” then now would be a good time for you to do so).

All of this to say: it has never been a question of not being able to understand the content. Very, very rarely in my entire scholastic lifetime have I ever not understood what was being taught to me. It is – and always has been – a matter of not being able to sit down and do the work.

One of the rubs of being so smart (especially when also socially inept – I don’t think I’ve ever had a formal diagnosis, but I would be astonished to learn if I wasn’t somewhere on the autism spectrum) is that your sense of self-worth is all too easily conflated with your intelligence and academic performance, placing massive pressure on yourself to be good at school, ‘cause that’s one of the few things I was reliably good at. 

Most of my school-age bullies, particularly the loudest ones, were just as smart as I was: all enrolled in the same accelerated classes, but they didn’t struggle the way I did, and they definitely saw it, and made sure I knew they did. They could all do their homework and turn things in on time, but I just couldn’t sit down and do even the simplest assignments sometimes – let alone the big projects and reports, not without crippling deadline pressure. My parents and teachers also tended to view the situation as if there was some kind of issue with me, too: that I was lazy/disorganized/not ‘applying myself’/needed discipline and punishment and then I’d be fine – alllll of that unhelpful bullshit.

Nobody thought that I wasn’t smart enough, though. Clearly, I was always great on tests: sit me down and ask me what I know and if there’s a definitive correct answer then odds are good that I knew what it was, so I excelled in math and science, and I took great comfort from knowing what I was doing and working familiar problems over and over. But having to go find sources for research and report on something or answer essay style questions – anything subjective or humanities-ish – was my kryptonite. I couldn’t ever say “this is enough information, this is complete and I’m done now” – once I started searching I’d drown in all of the information available and not be able to pull myself out with just enough to get the job done. I would become paralyzed simply by the thought of needing to sit down and do schoolwork, so I’d avoid it and distract myself with reading or anything else BUT schoolwork. And if I ever fell behind (which ALWAYS happened because that’s what happens when your avoidant coping is your default), then it was like pouring anti-napalm on everything: I’d be even more frozen and unable to function, like cold terrified acid licking through my veins. I have been a student most of my life – 21 and a half years to date – and the entire fucking time I’ve been limping along like this, always hoping at the start of each new term that This Time, somehow, I could Just Do It Already The Way I Should Be Able To, but over and over that optimism has crumbled to ashes in that undying flame of fear, paralysis, self-disgust, and despair.

I am able, now, to identify and name what I have suffered from my entire life, the condition that I was made to carry so much crippling SHAME for, that I learned to hide almost completely from all of my loved ones for over a decade so nobody would see that shame and decide to think less of me.

I have anxiety and complex PTSD. 

Where one ends and the other begins isn’t worth the effort of trying to tease them apart. The DSM-5 is an imperfect tool and no diagnosis is a uniform monolith – anxiety, PTSD, depression, and every other name of every other illness is merely a professional shorthand for “all/most of these symptoms are present.” It makes much more sense to treat my anxiety and PTSD as a single condition. Moreover, I have a strong suspicion that my endocrine disorder, PCOS, was triggered by the chronic stress/elevated cortisol and insulin (because one of the most socially acceptable ways for our nervous systems to regulate and soothe themselves when under stress is with food), and if it isn’t completely just part of the same thing, then it’s LARGELY overlapping with the anxiety/PTSD (I know that my mother and grandmother suffered in a very similar way in school, and I know that the PCOS is tied to inherited/ancestral trauma, so it makes every kind of sense if the anxiety/PTSD that we all have is related as well). 

I have had a generalized anxiety disorder diagnosis on my chart for years, and I’ve known, in my rational brain, that I’ve needed to get it under control to feel better and function in school (and to be honest, with almost all other professional/adulting things too). But thinking about what I need and actually DOING something about it are such utterly different things. It has only been in the past few weeks that I have been able to admit to myself that I need real, professional help to overcome this condition – and to ask for and start receiving that help. There is a big culture in my family, especially us women, about ignoring our own issues and focusing on helping other people first (I know I must have written to you about this before), so this has been a massive step for me. 

For a while I’ve been struggling to stay on top of my classes, and have fallen behind in all four of them, and the feeling of being overwhelmed has only increased exponentially. I’ve wanted, desperately, to go to an emotional ER so many times the past month, so much so that I found myself wanting (and knowing on a deep level that my body needs) some kind of pharmaceutical support to get me through the fucking day and allow me to do some of the massive, teetering pile of backlogged work. Upon hearing about my experiences of paralysis and dysfunction, and scoring very high on the anxiety diagnosis questionnaire she used, my doc, who rarely reaches for her Rx pad off the bat, suggested putting me on Clonidine (non-addictive, originally developed for hypertension) especially after my double-checked at-home blood pressure reading was 154/80 (which is consistent with STAGE 2 HYPERTENSION in an otherwise healthy and young TWENTY-NINE YEAR OLD for fucks sake)(insert emojis denoting ABJECT PANIC here).

I am comforted by the fact that my doctor, who I’ve seen since I was a tweenager, has shifted in the past few years to specialize in treating addiction and substance dependency, so if there’s anybody who I can trust to medicate me without causing a chemical dependence it’s her (thank GODDESS). Dr. M agrees with my perspective that the meds are just a temporary measure to alleviate my symptoms enough to function, and that the true treatment is the therapy work that I’ve been trying to do for myself, but there’s only so much you can do all by your lonesome, no matter how many self-help books you read (and goodness knows I’ve read a TON).

So I also finally started seeing a therapist (!), and just admitting some of this out loud to another person has been so profoundly healing. Our second session was this past Wednesday, and I was able to start opening up and telling her that I think my anxiety traces back to ancestral trauma and how I feel called to use a bottom-up, somatic approach (hence my recent interest in shamanism, ritual, soul retrieval, transpersonal psychology, etc., which she’s totally accepting of; again, THANK GODDESS).

One of the many many many self-help books that I’ve had my nose in is “The Instinct to Heal: Curing Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Without Drugs and Without Talk Therapy” by David Servan-Schreiber, MD, PhD (which I started reading like a day before I finally admitted that I needed to take drugs and do talk therapy *laughing at myself emoji here*). Servan-Schreiber beautifully articulated the relationship between our neocortex: the newly, highly developed, outer portions of the brain where our logic, reason, cognition, and consciousness arise from, and our limbic system: the older, more primitive inner section of our brains that controls our unconscious, autonomic physiological processes (like breathing, digestion, heart rate, etc.), trauma, instinct, intuition, and emotion, and is therefore far more deeply and intensely connected to the body (and bodily held memories) than the neocortex. 

I’ve been running around in my rational, conscious, neocortex mind *thinking* about all of my issues and traumas and everything for ages, and I understand so much about these things on that rational level – but that is miles away from the irrational, unconscious, limbic bodymind where all of those traumas actually ARE and continue to play out over and over as if they’re still happening. This is something that my therapist helped me understand – our neocortex understands that this is a different time and the thing that happened in the past is over and done and we’re safe now, but the limbic system has no sense of time. In our irrational reptile brains, everything still exists the same as it did all those years ago as if it never stopped happening. THIS is where our inner wounded child lives, where a soul fragment likely fled from for safety in the midst of the unendurable whatever-it-was that precipitated the trauma response, and where the empty spot is where it needs to be called back to still resides, open and waiting and longing. 

THIS is why I’ve felt called towards the irrational, mystical, shamanic modes of healing: I’ve done as much as I can with my rational mind, which cannot be used to solve an irrational problem or heal an irrational wound, which is what all trauma is. A couple of weeks ago, when I asked you for your help as a shaman with conducting a soul retrieval, this is the kind of work that I was starting to realize that I need to do. The crazy Thing That I Did that I told you about (and meant to describe for you more at the time but I was exhausted and desperately needed the rest instead) was a small and beautiful spontaneous retrieval of a part of me when I was seven, a part that was thirteen, and a part of me as a young infant that I brought to my own breast in recognition that I was both deserving of my own love, nourishment, and care, and capable of being a loving, heart-centered parent to myself. I felt all of the past, younger versions of me that I’ve already been gathered in concentric circles within me, and all of the older versions of me that I’ve not yet been spiraling around me, and my ancestors and guides and spirits and all of the love and kindness that anyone has ever directed towards me gathered around all of me like a compassionate embrace, and I think that it was that experience that gave me just enough of my soul back, just enough juice and magic that I could start digging my teeth in and taking the steps I needed to take to seek treatment and get my legs back underneath me.

As amazing and beautiful as that experience was, it wasn’t everything that I need in order to heal. I want to do a soul retrieval/healing ritual to unfreeze the part of me (and the part of my mother, grandmother, and other ancestors) that is stuck in that root trauma – where the anxiety, complex PTSD, PCOS - where all of that junk stems from. I don’t yet have much sense at all what that’s gonna look like, but I know that it’s gonna be the biggest damn spell I’ve ever cast, and that I don’t think I can cast it alone. Watch this space.

I do think, though, that preparing for that is the thing to do for now, by accumulating small things on multiple fronts – growing my strength, calling back small parts of me, telling more and more loved ones about my truth, chipping away at the stack of things to do, continuing with meds and therapy, contacting my professors and possibly the department/program admin (with a letter from Dr. M in hand documenting my diagnosis and treatment) to let them know that I need help I’m figuring out how to make up for assignments that I haven’t turned in and make sure that I can continue next quarter and not get kicked out of the program. I’m still carrying a lot of fear of failure/expulsion around this (and anxiety = paralysis = inaction for me, even though I desperately want to fix it) – especially after handling myself so badly in a similar situation at the end of last quarter. When you’ve got a minute, I’d appreciate a pep talk about broaching the subject with them.

All in all, I’m doing well and things are looking up in a way I’ve NEEDED them to start looking up for literal decades. I’ve even been able to start telling my mother about how badly I’ve been doing (she knows I’ve seen my doctor and started therapy and meds) and allowing her to see that pain and struggle after years of hiding it from her out of shame has been scary but such a relief. But Goddess Knows I’ve got A LOT to do still. Just cause I’ve finally struck a match and can navigate a little better doesn’t mean I’m out of the dungeon yet.

I began the meds just yesterday, and I’ve spent the day decompressing (never been a better time for me to have a few days all to myself kitten-sitting for some friends while they go to a tiny, COVID-regulation compliant thanksgiving visit with their family in Portland). Drowsiness is a listed side effect of Clonidine, and I was really worried that my prescribed dose was too high after being soooooo tired yesterday and today after I took the pills, but my increasing suspicion is that I’ve just been so high-strung and hypervigilant (hello super premature hypertension!) that the anti-anxiety/BP-lowering drug just uncovered the chronic e x h a u s t I o n that was already (always) there, rather than them making me drowsy when I wasn’t. So I’ve spent the day eating my friend’s leftovers (she’s an AMAZING cook) and cat napping with the two sweetest little troublemakers you ever did see (I’ll send pics!). 

I think that FINALLY being able to relax like this was what helped me to begin to be receptive and start opening up (and connecting with you!) again. Anxiety = I clam up, my libido nosedives, and my pelvic tightness/vaginal armoring gets painful and rigid – all bad prospects for wild, sexy, blooming Love-Lust-and-Light fun. I was so glad to reconnect with you – and that you reminded me that I need to get this out and I can process it and heal it by sharing it with you – that our Sacred Space is still there for me to use and pour my pain and magic and consciousness out into.

I think that’s all the most important developments. I’m excited to hear all about all of your new developments, processing, perspectives too. 

And now I’m gonna go to bed. One nap today was NOT enough to recover from  goddess-knows-how-long-I’ve-had-this chronic fatigue. I’ll talk to you soon

I love you, Άδης

Your Εκάτε <3

[manicalicorn-art]

2017 Writing Round-Up

source: https://trey.dreamwidth.org/584.html

Total year-long word count: 16,200

Word count by fandom: 

BnHA: 12858

Assassin’s Creed: 2562

Original: 780

Fics completed: 3 oneshots

Works-in-progress: 2

This year I wrote and posted:

He Woke to Fire chapter 2

Rocket

What Goes Around chapters 1 thru 4

Wind

Slut Shaming

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted?

Way, way more. I only started on He Woke To Fire last year, expecting it to be a short two-shot. Now not only has it evolved into a 4+ chapter fic, I also got into BnHA and have been inundated with new fic ideas and have actually, for the first time in my life, started organising and planning my fics in earnest. I only expected to write one (1) short little chapter for HWtF this year, and like. Look at that.

What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January?

Fandom: BnHA!! I actually got into it because I saw an artist that I followed from another fandom drawing tododeku fanart and I was like ???? I’ve seen the split-hair guy around what show is this? and that was the first actual post that I saw having the title of the anime on it. I didn’t expect to fall as in love with it as I did, because I’ve been getting tired of shounen tropes, but BnHA has some really fresh takes on ideas and is quite self-aware/genre-savvy/trope-subverting on many fronts so I enjoyed it immensely.

Pairing: TodoBaku. I haven’t actually posted any todobakus, but I have been writing quite a few snippets here and there.    As mentioned above I got into BnHA fully prepared to ship tododeku.    Bakugou was introduced and I was like “Hah rival character I’m sure there’s BakuDekus out there” and I was right, and I did like it, because I like rivalships, so that was expected.    Then while browsing BakuDekus I found KiriBakus and read a few and I was like “cute but why” so I went on watching the anime and reading the manga expecting to start shipping the KiriBakus any day now but I was,,,, still not shipping both tododeku and kiribaku.    On the other hand, the Sports Fest happened and I had a sudden ‘oh hey imagine todobaku lol’ and then immediately after went ‘!!!oh hEY IMAGINE TODOBAKU!!!’ and here we are lmao.

I wrote fluff. I’m not kidding, this was the weirdest direction I’ve ever taken my writing. I’ve been a consummate angst slut ever since I fuckin knew how to read, and while I do read the Simple Fluff stories every now and again, they’ve never been things that truly made me happy as a reader. So the fact that I’m writing what’s basically a pure-hearted friendship fic is... mind-boggling to me, both as a reader and a writer.

What's your own favorite story of the year? Not the most popular, but the one that makes you happiest?

   Oh... this one’s hard, but I guess He Woke to Fire wins that spot. For one, it’s angst, and I’m an angst whore.    For another, it’s a canon-divergence centred around the death of the main character before the story even began, which has seriously been fascinating (and it also gave me a long existential crisis at one point) to contemplate.    Further, the substitute main character is a canon character who got like, two speaking lines and half a minute of screentime before dying unceremoniously, so it’s really given me a real mental workout trying to flesh out his character.    Lastly, there’s a lot of psychological, ideological, and philosophical themes in original canon that by necessity needed to be addressed and recontextualised in order to suit this new AU, and I think I handled it fairly well so I’m really proud of that!

Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them?

Writing fluff. As mentioned, I have literally never touched fluff ever in my (admittedly sparse) writing history. It has posed an interesting challenge in the form of needing to really think about ways to throw complications in the plot and resolving them without emotionally or physically traumatising the characters in any significant measure.

Character voice switching and a large cast. Really getting into multiple characters’ heads, understanding their personalities, strengths and weaknesses, asking myself ‘why is this character taking up this narrative role and not this other one?’ and trying to overcome biases for my faves. It’s not really an epic, and the background characters remain in the background even if they do do things, but I think I’ve gotten a little better at a more holistic approach to writing multiple characters.

Your best story of this year: hhHHHH He Woke to Fire. Makes me so happy.

Your most popular story of this year: (Based on AO3 stat numbers) that would be What Goes Around with 271 Kudos, 33 comment threads, 54 bookmarks, 112 subscriptions, and 2053 hits. I am... speechless. Thank you all so much.

Story of yours most under-appreciated by the universe, in your opinion:

Rocket. C’mon guys. Why have the parallels between Uraraka’s anti-gravity powers and Bakugou’s blasting powers and outer space travel never been talked about? Bakugou’s a literal human rocketship; why would he ever be afraid of Uraraka’s Quirk????

Most fun story to write:

... I had to resist the urge to simply answer this with ‘writing is not fun’ because I get writer’s block really really quickly. I second-guess every plot point as soon as I put it down and I struggle through every line. I write because I want need these stories to exist, not because I enjoy the process of writing. BUT I won’t be a cop-out so I’ll make an actual selection here: Rocket, because fight scenes are fun to imagine. Even if the point of this fight scene was that it wasn’t much of a fight.

Story with the single sexiest moment: The legend of Altaïr’s soul and the djinn beneath the waves in He Woke to Fire. I don’t care if ‘sexiest’ here was meant to refer to literal sexual themes I’m just taking it as ‘moment that made me the happiest’. The invention of this single legend allowed me to talk about a lot of aspects of Altaïr (his immense combat prowess, his cold personality, his fear of water, his death by suffocation) in metaphorical and mythical ways throughout the story and I’m very happy I came up with it by myself.

Most "Holy crap, that's wrong, even for you" story: Thing is, I am well aware of how fucking messed up my imagination can get, so there’s literally nothing I can come up with that would surprise me or anyone who knows me. He Woke to Fire is the most thematically heavy and graphic one I have published I guess.

Story that shifted your own perceptions of the characters: HWtF again.    Like I said, it actually gave me an existential crisis that lasted practically a whole year because I realised halfway through that I was writing the story as though Kadar was just a cuter Altaïr, which he is obviously not.    So I had to go back and replan the entire fic again which then made me introduce Maria as a major character, then I had another crisis because I actually hate the way Maria has been portrayed and treated in canon (and a lot of fanon too for that matter). So I had to really sit down and think about a way to reinvent her in a satisfactory manner for this fic.    I’m still not entirely sure that I’ve got it, for either of them, but goddamn have I had to try.

Hardest story to write: HWtF, see above.

Biggest disappointment: The third chapter of What Goes Around. The writing there feels so stilted and forced, and a lot of the rhythm/word flows/pacing is very repetitive. Despite knowing exactly what I wanted to have happen, I struggled through the entire chapter and it shows.

Biggest surprise: Second chapter of WGA, that I wrote in the same sitting as the first chapter, that I wrote in the same sitting as the second chapter of HWtF. It was the easiest time of writing that I have ever had in my life ever and I didn’t even have to think - except for like, once, when I forgot to mention a detail I thought I had already written but I hadn’t actually so I had to backtrack a couple lines. And usually when I write that fast and fluidly, I’ll come back and read it later and find holes and logic errors and sections of senselessness but nope. It’s completely coherent. I have never written like that before or since.

Most unintentionally telling story: Probably What Goes Around.    I generally try to mention every single student of 1A at least once, and Todoroki’s part in the story was supposed to be limited to that single incident with Tsuyu and then he was done. But he’s kept popping back in in subsequent chapters like a creepy stalker because my ridiculous TodoBaku-shipping heart just wants them to interact more goddamnit.    Now I’ve just accepted that in the WGA canon, Todoroki has a crush on Bakugou and is actually following him around like a lovesick puppy and Bakugou just hasn’t really noticed.

Favorite opening line(s): From Wind: A wind. There’s a wind that blows across the land, a soft sigh on the bright sand.

Favorite closing line(s): From He Woke to Fire: “You’re not real,” Malik says with heartbreak in his voice. “I’m not,” the vision of Altaïr says with Altaïr’s voice, sounding surprised Malik could tell. Then with eyes glowing gold, reaches out a hand to caress Malik’s face, “but you could be happy here with me.” Tears slip down Malik’s cheek as he leans forward to catch ‘Altaïr’s lips in a kiss. “I couldn’t,” he says, voice breaking, arms wrapped bone-crushingly tight around ‘Altaïr’, “but by Allah I wish I could.”

Favorite 5 line(s) from anywhere: From What Goes Around: Katsuki took his food seriously. His old man had what his mum called the ‘art student diet’ where he, if left to his own devices, would just eat four boxes of chicken nuggets at three AM in the morning and completely forgo lunch and dinner, and it pissed her off to no end. So she had Katsuki trained to cook as well as she could (if not better) so that he could force his dumbass dad to eat a decent meal every once in a while whenever she had to go out for a shoot. Sixteen years of life and nearly ten whole years of (violent) culinary training later, Katsuki figured he knew his way around food. Whatever this… stuff was? Not food. He had to close the fridge door and spend a few minutes just breathing because no. Just. Holy shit, no.

This one’s my favourite because it’s me calling myself (and several other people I know *cough*) out for our garbage ‘art student diet’ while also talking about the BakuParents.

Top 5 scenes from anywhere you would choose to have illustrated:

He Woke to Fire:  Altaïr gasping and dying in the sealed cavern, desperately trying to claw his way out till his fingernails are bloody, then scratched off, the dying firelight and the scattered corpses around him.

He Woke to Fire: Kadar clinging gracelessly like a worm to a rafter, looking over at Altaïr in the high narrow room, and seeing birds in cages.

He Woke to Fire: A badass Kadar with hardened eyes, wielding the eagle-pommel sword - Altaïr’s sword.

What Goes Around: Bakugou, so sleepy he can barely keep himself upright, exhausted and rumpled from hard work, giving a jittery Kaminari a one-armed hug until he calms down and feels comfortable in his own skin again.

Rocket: I would love to see this entire ‘fight’ animated but in particular, the part where Bakugou is just grumpily drifting along in the air waiting to be declared the winner.

Fic-writing goals for next year:

Finish HWtF and WGA. They’re my first proper multi-chapters and I do actually kind of know how they’re supposed to end as well as sort of how to get there, so I really want to see them through (as well as not being a dick and leaving my readers hanging)

bktd week. I actually have all the lore and outlines ready, and the outlines have (almost) all the dialogue already written. So hopefully I can actually see it through, and on time for the week.

Start working through my Endless Prompt List which is mostly self-prompts. I’ve taken screenshots of my yelling in great detail about many many ideas and filed them neatly away in the hopes that I actually get around to writing them. My final year in university starts in the second half of 2018, and I’ll be busy with my graduation projection and other important school work, and preparing my animation portfolios and showreels for future employment, and I’ll hopefully be able to get an internship which will be really taxing... So I don’t have very high hopes in terms of my writing for the next two years. Writing’s only a hobby that’s just simply neither important nor urgent in the grand scheme of my life so it’ll have to take a backseat.

[surveysonfleek]

373.

5000 Question Survey Pt. 8

701. What is your favorite mixed drink? mojito or espresso martini. 702. When answering these questions are you often pulled in different directions, as if committing to one answer eliminates the possibility for all others? errrr i don’t really think that hard. i just type whatever comes to my head first. 703. Chicken Mesala, Pasta Primavera, Veal Cutlet Parmesan or Linguini with Clam Sauce? veal cutlet parmesan. 704. If you were alone in your friend's house/room/apartment would you look in their drawers and notebooks? no. i’d be annoyed if a friend did that in my place

705. What would you really like to do but you don't because you are afraid of getting caught? hmm nothing.

706. Of the following, which word best describes you: responsible: this. spontaneous: tactful: uninhbited: 707. Which band would you most likely check out? The Smiths (indi-pop 80's-90's) The Lords of Acid (acid/house/dance 90's) <--- this Front 242 (80's-90's industrial/dance) 708. How can one put an end to procrastination, as a bad habit? make a list everyday and committing to finishing those tasks everyday. 709. What feature would you want on your car that is not currently offered? inbuilt gps. or subwoofers. 710. What kind of poetry speaks to you? song. 711. What is your favorite store that is open 24 hours? there is nothing open here 24/7 but mcdonalds and gas stations. 712. Do you find that sleep is just so much sleepier when you are supposed to be doing something else? sure. 713. Do you also find that the books you chose are so much more luscious when you have a stack of actual assignments that you Should be reading? of course. 714. If you have had the chance to compare the original 5000 Question Survey to this edited version, what is your opinion? i don’t know the original version. 715. What's the most creative answer you can think of for 'what is black and white and red all over'? a newspaper. 716. Why do people slow down on the highway when they pass a cop car pulling someone else over? either to watch or make sure to follow the speed limit in case the cop goes after them instead? 717. Are they afraid that the cop will STOP pulling over whoever he is pulling over and pull them over instead? yeah, just said that lol. 718. It's daddy's birthday. What do you get him? i’ll ask him what he wants a week beforehand. 719. What's your 5,000 question survey nickname? Look at the word next to the 2nd letter of your first name A anything but B bubalicious C captivating D deadly E erotic F funky G greasy H heaps of I indie J jelly K kinetic L lasher M Mr. (or Mrs.) N neglected O ogre-like P parading Q quacking R Rico S stinky T the one and only U uber V Velcro W wishing for X x-tra Y yearning for Z zoobalee Now take the first letter of your last name. A aardvarks B baboo C creme pie D drag queen E eggbert F flex G god H hell I Isabelle J juice K kisses L lightning M mannish boys N nice O octopi P porcupines Q q-bert R rainbows S suave T tushy U underwear V valor W weenie X xtc Y yohimbe Z zipper Put the two words together for your nickname. erotic drag queen. 720. You know that shaky feeling that you get when it's all coming to a climax, and everyone involved is breaking into the good kind of cold sweat, working as individuals and at the same time as a single force of energy, and it all meshes together, and for a brief moment, you're holding your breath and tingling all over, and after it's done you're on an explosive and dizzying high for the rest of the night? What does that feeling come from? drugs or adrenaline surely. 721. How many of your teachers can you imagine drinking or doing drugs on the weekends? i don’t go to school anymore. 722. Do you like Alice in Wonderland or Through the Looking Glass? i haven’t seen it. 723. Write a question and answer it here. no. 724. Who is your favorite playwright? none. 725. What movie has come out recently that you couldn’t have less interest in? the emoji movie lmao. 726. What would the worst movie ever be about? emojis. 727. Do you like truffles? Do you like Turkish delight? i like both. 728. Can you tell the difference between a transvestite and a real woman? i mean would it matter if i could/couldn’t? 729. What's funnier, plants or fire extinguishers? neither. 730. For question 720 did you write down sex? You pervert, I was thinking of musical theater. nope. 731. Which is better, leopard print or plaid? haha plaid if i had to. 732. What would you consider ordinary? ugg boots lmao. 733. What is out of the ordinary? idk. 734. Do you ever watch COPS? bahaha yeah when it was on tv at like 2 in the morning. 735. Is there always room for j - e - l - l - o? no. 736. If you had your own TV show, what kind of show would you make it? reality probably. 737. Do you know how heavy things like airplanes stay in the air? i have a faint idea. 738. When do you act the most dramatic? most of the time. 739. Are you one of those people who have, "see photo id,” written on the back of their credit cards? nope. 740. It's mom’s birthday. What do you get her? i’ll ask her what she wants a week beforehand. 741. What celebrity has pretty much disappeared leaving you wondering 'where are they now'? that video vixen, angel lola luv. 742. Would you get angry if you and your girl/boyfriend saw the preview for a movie and talked about seeing it together and then they saw it with one of their friends while you were busy? hahahahaha this has happened before. i was sorta annoyed but got over it quickly. 743. How many people do you think will finish this whooooooole survey? i’m sure there’s people that have. i’ll try my best. 744. Have you ever written a message, sealed it in a bottle and thrown it into a river/lake ocean? nope. 745. If you haven't would you want to? too much effort. 746. If you ever did what would you write? - 747. What do you wish you could always be protected from? danger. 748. What small thing annoys you so much it should be a crime? arrogance. 749. Would you rather watch a video of fish in a tank, or the Yule log on TV? fish in a tank. 750. Is it better to be loved or feared? loved. 751. What causes you to panic? things not going to plan. 752. Do you believe that you have a strong personality? kinda. but lately i’ve gotten a bit more laidback. 753. When Jesus saves souls...does he trade them in for valuable prizes? i don’t think so. 754. What resolutions would you make if it were new years? lose weight, save money. 755. Why wait? i’m not waiting right now. 756. Do you feel like time is on your side or working against you? working against me. 757. What do you do for yourself when you are down to put a little joy back into your life? distract myself with netflix. 758. How much Tolkien have you read? none. 759. These are the songs on the radio. Which are you most likely to listen to: Time Bomb by Rancid Dead Man's party by Oingo Boingo The Sun Always Shines on TV by A-ha 50 Ways to leave Your Lover by Paul Simon Run by collective Soul none 760. Do you believe that Jesus existed as a real person? well yeah, hasn’t it been proven he was real? 761. Do you believe he was the son of god? haha idk. 762. How do you feel about organized religion? it is what it is. i’m all for different religions, i’m just against brainwashing cults. 763. What sentence have you heard lately, that would sound pretty odd out of context? idk. 763. If you had to choose one image to be a symbol of our times, what would you pick? a damn smartphone. 764. Name a group of people: millennials. 765. How many of them does it take to screw in a light bulb? google it. 766. Do you like the movie The Labyrinth with David Bowie and some muppets? i haven’t seen it. 767. Do you like the movie The Dark Crystal? never seen it. 768. Metallica or Guns N' Roses? neither. 769. Do you follow the Chinese zodiac? no, but i know i’m born in the year of the horse. 770. Do you like reggae music? i don’t hate it. 771. What makes your life worth it every day? just all the opportunities i’ve been given. 772. Do you seize each day and sink your teeth into it? unfortunately not. 773. I’ve heard people say that Jim Morrison never yawned because he was just so full of life. How often do you yawn? everyday probably. 774. Who decides what behavior is 'crazy' or 'sane'? idk... 775. Who are the most inspiring artists, musicians, poets, and writers? honestly anyone who’s striving to be successful in those crafts. 776. Did anything historically significant happen in the year you were born? all i know is that pretty woman was released lol. 777. Besides blowing out birthday candles when do you make wishes? 11:11 sometimes. haven’t caught that time in forever. 778. Are you self-sufficient? yes. 779. Is it better to be wanted or needed? wanted. being needed can be pretty hard. 780. What do you feel is an appropriate age to lose one’s virginity at? whenever the person is ready. 781. Do you feel that the appropriate age for girls and for boys is different? probably.  782. Are you a hard person to get to know? not really. if i get along with someone and conversation flows well then it’s fine. 783. What is the craziest thing you have ever done out of anger? thrown my phone into the other side of the room. 784. What's the MOST annoying sound you can think of? nails on a chalkboard. 785. What's the silliest vegetable you can think of? bittermelon. 786. Do you believe in love at first sight? no. 787. Name one thing you have referred to in the past as “better than sex”: i haven’t. 788. What do you see when you turn out the light? nothing. 789. Do you like jazz, blues and/or swing music? i don’t typically listen to it but it’s nice. 790. Do you prefer gold or silver jewelry? white gold. 791. In what ways do you want your children to be like you? everything except my laziness. 792. In what ways would you want your children to be different from you? my laziness lol. 793. What was the scariest movie you've ever seen? idk. the conjuring. 794. What was the funniest movie you've ever seen? 40yo virgin. 795. What was the worst movie you've ever seen? umm idk, like mean girls 2 haha. 796. Are you a good massage-giver? i think so. 797. What is one question that no one can ever truthfully answer 'yes' to? idk. 798. Is there more to this world than human beings can perceive? i’m sure there is. 799. If matter is neither created nor destroyed then is it possible that you are made up of molecules that once made up Ghandi or Jesus or Einstein? well possibly but i doubt it. 800. Are you often sarcastic? pretty often.

[raina16]

LXXXV At length with jostling, elbowing, and the aid   Of Cherubim appointed to that post, The devil Asmodeus to the circle made [675]   His way, and looked as if his journey cost Some trouble. When his burden down he laid,   "What's this?" cried Michael; "why, 'tis not a ghost?" "I know it," quoth the Incubus; "but he Shall be one, if you leave the affair to me. [680] LXXXVI "Confound the renegado! I have sprained   My left wing, he's so heavy; one would think Some of his works about his neck were chained.   But to the point; while hovering o'er the brink Of Skiddaw (where as usual it still rained), [685]   I saw a taper, far below me, wink, And stooping, caught this fellow at a libel— No less on History — than the Holy Bible. LXXXVII "The former is the Devil's scripture, and   The latter yours, good Michael: so the affair [690] Belongs to all of us, you understand.   I snatched him up just as you see him there, And brought him off for sentence out of hand:   I've scarcely been ten minutes in the air— At least a quarter it can hardly be: [695] I dare say that his wife is still at tea." LXXXVIII Here Satan said, "I know this man of old,   And have expected him for some time here; A sillier fellow you will scarce behold,   Or more conceited in his petty sphere: [700] But surely it was not worth while to fold   Such trash below your wing, Asmodeus dear: We had the poor wretch safe (without being bored With carriage) coming of his own accord. LXXXIX "But since he's here, let's see what he has done." [705]   "Done!" cried Asmodeus, "he anticipates The very business you are now upon,   And scribbles as if head clerk to the Fates. Who knows to what his ribaldry may run,   When such an ass as this, like Balaam's, prates?" 36  [710] "Let's hear," quoth Michael, "what he has to say: You know we're bound to that in every way." XC Now the bard, glad to get an audience, which   By no means often was his case below, Began to cough, and hawk, and hem, and pitch [715]   His voice into that awful note of woe To all unhappy hearers within reach   Of poets when the tide of rhyme's in flow; But stuck fast with his first hexameter, Not one of all whose gouty feet would stir. [720] XCI But ere the spavined dactyls could be spurred   Into recitative, in great dismay Both Cherubim and Seraphim were heard   To murmur loudly through their long array; And Michael rose ere he could get a word [725]   Of all his foundered verses under way, And cried, "For God's sake stop, my friend! 'twere best— 'Non Di, non homines'  — you know the rest." XCII A general bustle spread throughout the throng,   Which seemed to hold all verse in detestation; [730] The Angels had of course enough of song   When upon service; and the generation Of ghosts had heard too much in life, not long   Before, to profit by a new occasion: The Monarch, mute till then, exclaimed, "What! what!  [735] Pye?  come again? No more — no more of that!" XCIII The tumult grew; an universal cough   Convulsed the skies, as during a debate, When Castlereagh has been up long enough   (Before he was first minister of state, [740] I mean — the slaves hear now); some cried "Off, off!"   As at a farce; till, grown quite desperate, The Bard Saint Peter prayed to interpose (Himself an author) only for his prose. XCIV The varlet was not an ill-favoured knave; [745]   A good deal like a vulture in the face, With a hook nose and a hawk's eye, which gave   A smart and sharper-looking sort of grace To his whole aspect, which, though rather grave,   Was by no means so ugly as his case; [750] But that, indeed, was hopeless as can be, Quite a poetic felony "de se." 40 XCV Then Michael blew his trump, and stilled the noise   With one still greater, as is yet the mode On earth besides; except some grumbling voice, [755]   Which now and then will make a slight inroad Upon decorous silence, few will twice   Lift up their lungs when fairly overcrowed; And now the Bard could plead his own bad cause, With all the attitudes of self-applause. [760] XCVI He said — (I only give the heads) — he said,   He meant no harm in scribbling; 'twas his way Upon all topics; 'twas, besides, his bread,   Of which he buttered both sides; 'twould delay Too long the assembly (he was pleased to dread), [765]   And take up rather more time than a day, To name his works — he would but cite a few— "Wat Tyler" — "Rhymes on Blenheim" — "Waterloo." XCVII He had written praises of a Regicide;   He had written praises of all kings whatever; [770] He had written for republics far and wide,   And then against them bitterer than ever; For pantisocracy he once had cried   Aloud, a scheme less moral than 'twas clever; Then grew a hearty anti-jacobin— [775] Had turned his coat — and would have turned his skin. XCVIII He had sung against all battles, and again   In their high praise and glory; he had called Reviewing "the ungentle craft," and then   Became as base a critic as e'er crawled— [780] Fed, paid, and pampered by the very men   By whom his muse and morals had been mauled: He had written much blank verse, and blanker prose, And more of both than any body knows. XCIX He had written Wesley's life: — here turning round [785]   To Satan, "Sir, I'm ready to write yours, In two octavo volumes, nicely bound,   With notes and preface, all that most allures The pious purchaser; and there's no ground   For fear, for I can choose my own reviewers: [790] So let me have the proper documents, That I may add you to my other saints." C Satan bowed, and was silent. "Well, if you,   With amiable modesty, decline My offer, what says Michael? There are few [795]   Whose memoirs could be rendered more divine. Mine is a pen of all work; not so new   As it was once, but I would make you shine Like your own trumpet. By the way, my own Has more of brass in it, and is as well blown. [800] CI "But talking about trumpets, here's my 'Vision!'   Now you shall judge, all people — yes — you shall Judge with my judgment! and by my decision   Be guided who shall enter heaven or fall. I settle all these things by intuition, [805]   Times present, past, to come — Heaven — Hell — and all, Like King Alfonso.  When I thus see double, I save the Deity some worlds of trouble." CII He ceased, and drew forth an MS.; and no   Persuasion on the part of Devils, Saints, [810] Or Angels, now could stop the torrent; so   He read the first three lines of the contents; But at the fourth, the whole spiritual show   Had vanished, with variety of scents, Ambrosial and sulphureous, as they sprang, [815] Like lightning, off from his "melodious twang." CIII Those grand heroics acted as a spell;   The Angels stopped their ears and plied their pinions; The Devils ran howling, deafened, down to Hell;   The ghosts fled, gibbering, for their own dominions— [820] (For 'tis not yet decided where they dwell,   And I leave every man to his opinions); Michael took refuge in his trump — but, lo! His teeth were set on edge, he could not blow! CIV Saint Peter, who has hitherto been known [825]   For an impetuous saint, upraised his keys, And at the fifth line knocked the poet down;   Who fell like Phaeton, but more at ease, Into his lake, for there he did not drown;   A different web being by the Destinies [830] Woven for the Laureate's final wreath, whene'er Reform shall happen either here or there. CV He first sank to the bottom — like his works,   But soon rose to the surface — like himself; For all corrupted things are buoyed like corks, [835]   By their own rottenness, light as an elf, Or wisp that flits o'er a morass: he lurks,   It may be, still, like dull books on a shelf, In his own den, to scrawl some "Life" or "Vision," As Welborn says — "the Devil turned precision." [840] CVI As for the rest, to come to the conclusion   Of this true dream, the telescope is gone Which kept my optics free from all delusion,   And showed me what I in my turn have shown; All I saw farther, in the last confusion, [845]   Was, that King George slipped into Heaven for one; And when the tumult dwindled to a calm, I left him practicing the hundredth psalm. 42

“The Vision of Judgment”(1820) Lord Byron,  Cantos 85 to 106

[jakehglover]

The US Opioid Epidemic — A War of a Different Kind

By Dr. Mercola

The opioid epidemic — which between 2002 and 2015 alone claimed an estimated 202,600 Americans’ lives1 — shows absolutely no signs of leveling off or declining. On the contrary, recent statistics suggest the death toll is still trending upward, with more and more people abusing these powerful narcotics. The most common drugs involved in prescription opioid overdose deaths include2 methadone, oxycodone (such as OxyContin®) and hydrocodone (such as Vicodin®). This dangerous class of drugs promises relief from pain and is filling a hole in human hearts and souls everywhere. According to the most recent data3 from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), overdose cases admitted into emergency rooms increased by more than 30 percent across the U.S. between July 2016 and September 2017. Overdose cases rose by:4

30 percent among men

31 percent among 24- to 35-year-olds

36 percent among 35- to 54-year-olds

32 percent among those 55 and older

In the Midwest region — Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin — overdose cases rose by 70 percent and opioid-related mortality by 14 percent. Large cities also saw a 54 percent increase in overdose cases in that same timeframe. According to CDC officials, the results are “a wake-up call to the fast-moving opioid overdose epidemic.’’

‘The Opioid Diaries’

Curiously, opioid abuse appears to be a uniquely American problem. As noted in a recent write-up in New York Magazine,5 the U.S. “pioneered modern life. Now epic numbers of Americans are killing themselves with opioids to escape it.” I’ve written about opioid misuse and addiction on many occasions in recent years, and it seems one cannot discuss this issue enough. Many are still unaware of the dangers involved with filling that first prescription.

As an indication of the need for awareness, the March 5 issue of Time magazine, “The Opioid Diaries,”6 is aimed at exposing the national crisis. For the first time in the magazine’s history, an entire issue is devoted to a single photo essay — the work of photojournalist James Nachtwey, who has documented stories for Time for over three decades. In “The Opioid Diaries,” Nachtwey’s photos detail the stark reality of this all-American crisis.

He and editor Paul Moakley spent months traversing the U.S., interviewing over 200 people along the way. As noted by a deputy sheriff who has seen more than his fair share of the fallout of this epidemic, opioid addiction doesn’t discriminate. “It’s not just the guy who’s never worked a day in his life,” he says. “It’s airline pilots. It’s teachers. I’m sure there’s law enforcement, firemen out there hooked on it. It’s Joe Citizen that’s dying.”

A Country in Crisis  

Here are some statistics about the U.S. opioid epidemic that really ought to get everyone’s attention:

Leading cause of death for younger Americans

Drug overdoses are now the leading cause of death among Americans under the age of 50.7

Annual death toll greater than entire Vietnam War

Preliminary data for 2016 reveals the death toll from drug overdoses may be as high as 65,000,8 a 19 percent increase from 2015; the largest annual increase of drug overdose deaths in U.S. history, and a number that exceeds both the AIDS epidemic at its peak and the death toll of the Vietnam War in its entirety.9

That much-opposed war claimed the lives of 58,000 American troops. Now, we’re suffering a death toll exceeding that of the Vietnam War each and every year, courtesy of a drug addiction epidemic created by the pharmaceutical industry.  

Deadlier than breast cancer

Opioids, specifically, killed 33,000 in 2015,10,11,12 and 42,249 in 2016, which is over 1,000 more deaths than were caused by breast cancer that same year.13

Synthetic opioid abuse skyrocketing

Deadly overdoses involving fentanyl, an incredibly potent synthetic opioid, rose by 50 percent between 2013 and 2014 and another 72 percent between 2014 and 2015. Over 20,000 of the drug overdose deaths in 2016 were attributed to fentanyl and other synthetic opioids.14 In Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, fentanyl was responsible for at least 70 percent of all opioid-related deaths between July and December 2016.15

While some users will buy fentanyl on purpose, others buy tainted wares and end up taking it without knowing the risks. This is a critical problem, as fentanyl is so potent just a few grains can be deadly.

An inexpensive fentanyl test strip can check for the presence of the drug, and trials where test strips have been given to users show they’re more likely to cut back on the amount they’re taking when they know it’s tainted with fentanyl. As such, fentanyl testing can be employed as “a point-of-care test within harm-reduction programs” aimed at lowering the death toll.16

Significant factor in unemployment rates

Opioid abuse has been identified as a significant factor in rising unemployment among men, accounting for 20 percent of the increase in male unemployment between 1999 and 2015.17 Nearly half of all unemployed men between the ages of 25 and 54 are using opioids on a daily basis.18

Americans use vast majority of global opioid supplies

Americans consume 99 percent of the hydrocodone sold worldwide, and 81 percent of all oxycodone — approximately 30 times more than medically necessary for the population size of the U.S.19 A number of different statistics convey this massive overuse.

For example, in a five-year span, between 2007 and 2012, 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills were shipped to West Virginia, which has just 1.8 million residents.20 More than 1 in 5 Americans insured by BlueCross BlueShield were prescribed an opioid in 2015, and insurance claims involving opioid dependence rose by nearly 500 percent between 2010 and 2016.21

Declining life expectancy

Life expectancy for both men and women in the U.S. has declined two years in a row,22,23 and this decline is largely attributable to the opioid crisis. Just as the opioid epidemic, declining life expectancy is a uniquely American phenomenon. No other developed countries has experienced this decline in life expectancy.

A Story of Misery

There are compelling reasons to suspect the opioid epidemic was purposely engineered by the drug companies that make them, and that these same companies have, and continue to, shy away from doing what’s necessary to curb the use of opioid pain killers for financially-driven reasons.

Moreover, while this was not likely planned, the industry’s misleading promotion of narcotic pain relievers appears to have coincided with a growing trend of emotional pain and spiritual disconnect, and opioids satisfy people’s need not only for physical pain relief but also psychological and existential pain relief. As noted by New York Magazine:24

“The scale and darkness of this phenomenon is a sign of a civilization in a more acute crisis than we knew, a nation overwhelmed by a warp-speed, postindustrial world, a culture yearning to give up, indifferent to life and death, enraptured by withdrawal and nothingness …

[U]nless you understand what users get out of an illicit substance, it’s impossible to understand its appeal, or why an epidemic takes off, or what purpose it is serving in so many people’s lives. And it is significant, it seems to me, that the drugs now conquering America are downers: They are not the means to engage in life more vividly but to seek a respite from its ordeals … And some part of being free from all pain makes you indifferent to death itself.”

The article cites a number of firsthand accounts of the experience opioids provides — the blissful serenity of being able to stand apart from one’s psychological pain in addition to physical pain; the sensation of being connected to some deeper wellspring of peace. These are experiences typically derived from spiritual practices, and hint at a widespread lack of connectedness to the divine in general.

An Epic Failure of Government

While the drug industry deserves a large portion of the blame for creating the opioid epidemic, the U.S. government also mismanaged the situation right from the start by supporting drug companies’ efforts to make narcotic pain killers more readily available for people with nonlethal pain conditions, and its slow reaction to the problem has only allowed matters to worsen. In a recent Washington Post article, columnist David Von Drehle writes:25

“With the possible exception of alcohol, no substance on Earth has a longer track record of disastrous addiction than opium and its derivatives … Yet despite centuries of hard-won knowledge, pharmaceutical companies and prescribing physicians were allowed to make such opioids as Percocet and OxyContin widely available as treatments not just for acute pain, but for chronic discomfort.

Their fantasy of benign long-term opioid use is the root of the epidemic. Nearly 80 percent of heroin users report that prescription pain relievers were their gateway drugs … Such a failure of epic proportions by a generation of public-health officials merits a major congressional investigation to reduce the chance that anything like it ever happens again.”

The U.S. government is further exacerbating drug use by tightening restrictions on less harmful and far safer non-narcotic alternatives such as medical marijuana, CBD oil and kratom. As noted by New York Magazine, “The iron law of prohibition, as first stipulated by activist Richard Cowan in 1986, is that the more intense the crackdown, ‘the more potent the drugs will become.’ In other words, the harder the enforcement, the harder the drugs.”

History Tells Us Prohibition Doesn’t Work

During the prohibition of alcohol, people didn’t turn to beer making. They started making hard liquor — moonshine. The same thing is happening now, as heroin — the street version of opioids — is being replaced with fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that is up to 100 times stronger than heroin. Users buy what they can get, and so the spiral of drug abuse and death continues spinning out of control.

“The critical Office of National Drug Control Policy has spent a year without a permanent director,” New York Magazine writes. “Its budget is slated to be slashed by 95 percent, and … Kellyanne Conway — Trump’s ‘opioid czar’ — has no expertise in government, let alone in drug control.

Although Trump plans to increase spending on treating addiction, the overall emphasis is on an even more intense form of prohibition, plus an advertising campaign. Attorney General Jeff Sessions even recently opined that he believes marijuana is really the key gateway to heroin — a view so detached from reality it beggars belief …

One of the few proven ways to reduce overdose deaths is to establish supervised injection sites that eventually wean users off the hard stuff while steering them into counseling, safe housing, and job training …

[W]e would have to contemplate actually providing heroin to addicts in some cases, and we’d have to shift much of the current spending on prohibition, criminalization, and incarceration into a huge program of opioid rehabilitation … We would, in short, have to end the war on drugs.”

Making Drug Use Safer Doesn’t Work Either

On the other hand, the safer you make drug use, the more drugs will be misused. That’s exactly what a recent study looking the variations in timing of expanded access to naloxone found. Naloxone is a drug that can reverse an overdose if administered quickly enough.

In 2013, states began expanding access to the drug beyond trained medical professionals, and more than 40 states now have expanded access, making it available to police officers, nonmedical emergency responders, teachers and even family and friends of the addicts themselves.

While the idea behind expanded access was to prevent deaths, by lowering the risk opioid-related overdoses shot up even more. As mentioned earlier, overdoses increased by more than 30 percent in the 14 months leading up to September 2017.

Worse, mortality increased by 14 percent in the Midwest after naloxone access was expanded, in large part due to increased use of fentanyl, which typically requires multiple doses of naloxone. Even with multiple doses, it doesn’t always work. Expanded access to naloxone has also led to more opioid-related crime, including the illegal possession and sale of opioids.  

Common Pain Meds Are Just as Effective as Opioids, Study Finds

Evidence suggests opioid makers such as Purdue Pharma, owned by the Sackler family, knew exactly what they were doing when they claimed opioids — which are chemically very similar to heroin — have an exceptionally low addiction rate when taken by people with pain.

In fact, the massive increase in opioid sales has been traced back to an orchestrated marketing plan aimed at misinforming doctors about the drug’s addictive potential. The drug’s general effectiveness against pain has also been vastly exaggerated by drug manufacturers. In April 2016, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published a paper in which it noted that:26

“Most placebo-controlled, randomized trials of opioids have lasted six weeks or less, and we are aware of no study that has compared opioid therapy with other treatments in terms of long-term (more than 1 year) outcomes related to pain, function, or quality of life.

The few randomized trials to evaluate opioid efficacy for longer than six weeks had consistently poor results. In fact, several studies have showed that use of opioids for chronic pain may actually worsen pain and functioning, possibly by potentiating pain perception …”

More recently, government-funded research27,28,29 published in the journal JAMA earlier this month confirmed that patients taking opioids did not experience better pain-related function than those taking far safer, non-narcotic pain relievers. The study is the first to compare opioids against non-opioid pain medication for people with chronic back pain or osteoarthritic pain in the hip or knee.

Contrary to popular belief, patients who took Tylenol, ibuprofen or lidocaine actually reported less pain intensity than those taking an opioid drug such as morphine, Vicodin or oxycodone. Not surprisingly, however, opioid users were far more likely to experience adverse side effects. According to the authors:

“Treatment with opioids was not superior to treatment with non-opioid medications for improving pain-related function over 12 months. Results do not support initiation of opioid therapy for moderate to severe chronic back pain or hip or knee osteoarthritis pain ... Overall, opioids did not demonstrate any advantage over non-opioid medications that could potentially outweigh their greater risk of harms.”

Treating Your Pain Without Drugs

It seems we’re not going to get anywhere with this epidemic until or unless we begin to address deeper societal issues. Most areas have lost a sense of community, and social media has only deepened the gulf between us. In many ways, the opioid epidemic appears to mirror a deeper, psychological and spiritual disconnect.

It’s important to recognize and address our human need for life purpose, a sense of community and shared values. There are no quick fixes to existential despair. It will require a shift in mindset across society as a whole. With an eye on the big picture, it appears we really need to find ways to reinfuse meaning into our lives.

With regard to physical pain, we clearly need to have compassion. But the most compassionate treatment isn’t necessarily a narcotic pain reliever. A number of studies have already confirmed that opioids do not work well at all for chronic pain. Most recently, they were found to be no more effective than Tylenol and ibuprofen over the long term. Opioids really must be a drug of last resort, and should almost never be considered for chronic long-term use. It’s important for both doctors and patients to recognize this.

That said, considering the health risks associated with opioid painkillers, I strongly urge you to exhaust other options before resorting to these drugs. The good news is there are many natural alternatives to treating pain, including the following:

Medical cannabis

Medical marijuana has a long history as a natural analgesic and is now legal in 28 states. You can learn more about the laws in your state on medicalmarijuana.procon.org.30

Kratom

Kratom (Mitragyna speciose) is a plant remedy that has become a popular opioid substitute.31 In August 2016, the DEA issued a notice saying it was planning to ban kratom, listing it as Schedule 1 controlled substance.

However, following massive outrage from kratom users who say opioids are their only alternative, the agency reversed its decision.32 Still, its scheduling remains uncertain, as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently declared kratom an opioid.33

Kratom is safer than an opioid for someone in serious and chronic pain. However, it’s important to recognize that it is a psychoactive substance and should be used with great care. There’s very little research showing how to use it safely and effectively, and it may have a very different effect from one person to the next. The other issue to address is that there are a number of different strains available with different effects.

Also, while it may be useful for weaning people off opioids, kratom is in itself addictive. So, while it appears to be a far safer alternative to opioids, it’s still a powerful and potentially addictive substance. So please, do your own research before trying it.

Low-Dose Naltrexone (LDN)

Naltrexone is an opiate antagonist, originally developed in the early 1960s for the treatment of opioid addiction. When taken at very low doses (LDN, available only by prescription), it triggers endorphin production, which can boost your immune function and ease pain.

Curcumin: A primary therapeutic compound identified in the spice turmeric, curcumin has been shown in more than 50 clinical studies to have potent anti-inflammatory activity. Curcumin is hard to absorb, so best results are achieved with preparations designed to improve absorption. It is very safe and you can take two to three every hour if you need to. Astaxanthin: One of the most effective oil-soluble antioxidants known, astaxanthin has very potent anti-inflammatory properties. Higher doses are typically required for pain relief, and you may need 8 milligrams or more per day to achieve results. Boswellia: Also known as boswellin or "Indian frankincense," this herb contains powerful anti-inflammatory properties, which have been prized for thousands of years. This is one of my personal favorites, as it worked well for many of my former rheumatoid arthritis patients. Bromelain: This protein-digesting enzyme, found in pineapples, is a natural anti-inflammatory. It can be taken in supplement form, but eating fresh pineapple may also be helpful. Keep in mind most of the bromelain is found within the core of the pineapple, so consider eating some of the pulpy core when you consume the fruit. Cayenne cream: Also called capsaicin cream, this spice comes from dried hot peppers. It alleviates pain by depleting your body's supply of substance P, a chemical component of nerve cells that transmit pain signals to your brain. Cetyl myristoleate (CMO): This oil, found in dairy butter and fish, acts as a joint lubricant and anti-inflammatory. I have used a topical preparation of CMO to relieve ganglion cysts and a mild case of carpal tunnel syndrome. Evening primrose, black currant and borage oils: These oils contain the fatty acid gamma-linolenic acid, which is useful for treating arthritic pain. Ginger: This herb is anti-inflammatory and offers pain relief and stomach-settling properties. Fresh ginger works well steeped in boiling water as a tea, or incorporated into fresh vegetable juice.

from HealthyLife via Jake Glover on Inoreader https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2018/03/20/opioid-epidemic-a-war-of-a-different-kind.aspx

[dlbusinessnow]

Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015

Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015

Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015 Free,Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015 Free Download

Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015

For 3 Days Only: The World’s Top Business Performance Enhancement Experts Are Coming Together To Roll Up Their Sleeves And Teach You The 3 Most Powerful Levers That Almost No-One Else In The Business World – Including Your Competitors – Understands, Let Alone Uses.

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This is a content-heavy (& strictly no theory) event where you’re going to learn how to make everything you do produce double, triple or quadruple its yield for almost no extra cost, time or investment. GUARANTEED.

Discover How I Convinced 2 Of The Most Celebrated Marketing Brains On This Planet To Join Me On Stage For 3 Days In London, Each Of Us Committed To Sharing The 3 Keys to “Leverage Marketing” That 95% Of Business Owners Simply Don’t EVER Discover. Read this letter to find out exactly what marketing legend Jay Abraham, digital marketing superstar Ryan Deiss and I will be sharing with just 780 business owners and entrepreneurs just a few weeks from now…

If you’re a business owner, then you’ll know that there are some defining moments in your journey, some things that happen that change your life forever.

We All Have Them. It might be a keynote presentation, a TED talk you watch on your phone, curled up on the sofa.

It could be your first cashflow scare (when you promise yourself that you’ll never let this happen again), or it might be someone’s throwaway line that really resonates with you.

The birth of a child is when it happens for many. I’ve seen plenty of business owners who’d previously been flirting with success properly knuckle down and chase their goals with steely fast commitment as soon as they walked out of the maternity ward, their perfect defining moment wrapped up in new blankets.

I’ve been in business for a decade, and in that time I’ve had my fair share of defining moments, including a life-threatening brain injury a few years ago and the births of my three beautiful children.

I’ve launched businesses, I’ve sold them, I’ve merged them and unmerged them. I’ve taken plenty of money out of my businesses and reinvested some when I’ve needed to.

I bought a Ferrari a couple of years ago too. That had been on my ‘to do’ list for a while, and I’m pleased I ticked it off. I barely kept it for 12 months though; it burnt through cash that I’d prefer to invest in my businesses or enjoy with my family in a way that’s hard to do when you’ve only got two seats!

Two Defining Moments… Ten Years Apart Almost a decade ago, someone told me about a book I should read. If you’re anything like me, you’ll just order the book and add it to the pile, and that’s exactly what I did with this one.

It was called “Getting Everything You Can out of All You’ve Got” and it was written by a guy called Jay Abraham. I’d heard of him, but I didn’t know much about him.

The book must have sat on my shelf for a couple of months, but then someone else recommended it to me, so I pulled it out, blew off the dust, and started reading…

…Discovering Jay Abraham Became One Of MY Defining Moments. Since then, I’ve digested, studied and absorbed every word of Jay I can lay my hands on.

He’d been the business and marketing consultant that big businesses had turned to for decades, and now he was the guy that I turned to.

Over the years I’ve implemented everything I learned from Jay in my own businesses, and taught his core principles to hundreds of my own clients.

Perhaps more than anybody else in this world, Jay Abraham has proven time and again that he knows how to create and use maximum leverage in your business to produce more buyers, lower customer acquisition costs, higher customer values, more repeat sales, more referrals and more profit.

Earlier this summer, a friend of mine called Steve who’s also a Jay disciple (he runs a very successful business that’s worth over £20M) called me to say he’d caught wind that Jay was in the UK for a few days later that month, and that we should try and set up a meeting.

We Contacted Jay’s Office. They Said No.

Jay’s schedule was too busy, he was flying into London for a couple of days with clients and then straight out to the far east where he would be – through a translator – delivering a series of talks to audiences of over 4000. Steve and I didn’t take no for an answer. We hustled, we charmed, we flirted, and we finally got a call directly with Jay.

He agreed to move his travel dates to free up one day in London. Steve and I invited a select group of professional marketers and 7 and 8-figure business owners to join us. The ticket price was £8,000 a head.

13th June 2015 That day was a defining moment for me. Watching Jay at close quarters opened my eyes to the huge value that lies hidden in every business, usually never to see the light of day, but easily findable by someone who knows what to look for.

I watched Jay work his way through intense hotseat after hotseat, expertly navigating his way to the untapped potential in every one of the businesses in the room.

I was blown away.

Everyone there that day had profitable businesses, with strong revenues and good models. None of us were ‘wet-behind-the- ears’ newbies or startups. All were time-served business owners, running decent-sized businesses.

Jay Was On Another Level. In the week that followed that day with Jay, I decided that I needed to expose more businesses to Jay Abraham. I work with hundreds of business owners who could have benefitted from watching Jay and understanding how he thinks about business, so that they too could discover the hidden revenues and profits in their own businesses.

I needed to make this happen.

“No chance.”

I called Jay’s office.They said no.

I called Jay.I pleaded. I begged.

I explained that I knew THOUSANDS of business owners in the UK who would benefit hugely from understanding his strategies.

I told him that he NEEDED to come and share what he knew with more people.

He Agreed.

Imagine discovering a way that you can easily, quickly and profitably increase your revenues by 50%, 100%, 200% or even more.

The answer lies within your business. It’s there. I promise you.

Like a rough diamond sitting on the desert floor surrounded by worthless rocks and stones, the value is right there, easily accessible, but difficult to spot.

An untrained eye might never spot the diamond.

An Expert Can Identify It At Twenty Paces.

The truth is that every business has got a seam of value buried within it that’s waiting to be mined. Few businesses ever find it; fewer still understand the huge value and how they can profit from it.

Over 3 days in London, I’ll share with you exactly how you can identify and monetize the tremendous value that’s locked away within your current business.

I’ll be joined on stage by Jay Abraham, the world’s #1 marketing and business consultant, a man who Tony Robbins called “amazing”.

Success magazine says Jay might be the brightest marketing mind alive on the planet today. Forbes called him “the real thing”.

Jay and I will be presenting alongside the smartest digital marketer in the world, Ryan Deiss, who’s flying in from his home in Texas just to be at this event.

There are plenty of so-called “gurus” and “business growth experts” offering to help grow businesses, but few of them have the credibility and experience that Ryan has.

Ryan is the co-founder and CEO of DigitalMarketer, over the last few years his team has invested over £10 million in marketing tests (in all sorts of markets), they’ve sent well over a BILLION permission- based emails, generated tens of millions of unique visitors and run approximately 3,000 split and multi-variant tests…

It won’t surprise you to learn that Ryan is a hugely in demand business consultant whose work has impacted over 200,000 companies in 68 different countries.

Ryan is the real deal. He spoke in front of almost 1000 business owners at an event I put on last November, and the feedback was nothing short of astonishing.

He’s also a lovely, honest, straightforward guy. I’m really looking forward to welcoming him to the stage again.

Your Pathway To Profits If you’ll let us, over three days, Jay Abraham, Ryan Deiss and I will help you to find the fastest, shortest and most powerful “Pathway to Profit” in your business.

This Is For You IF… Your customers love what you do, but there aren’t enough of them. You’re busy working hard, but you’re not making enough profit. Your business never seems to grow, and your revenues don’t seem to increase. You know that there’s huge potential in your business, but you don’t know where to find it. Global Masterminds 2015 Will Be An Event Like No Other… This will be a content and information event, completely unlike anything I’ve been involved in before, and likely anything you might have experienced, even if you’ve been to hundreds of conferences or conventions.

Over 3 days, Jay, Ryan and I will explore and examine real world examples of how you can create more leverage in your business to produce more buyers, bigger units of sale, more repeat sales, and more referrals.

We’ll walk you through every single element that you’ll need to optimize as you maximize and multiply your business performance and profits.

We’ll look at the optimal approach to marketing (and marketing spend) for your business. We’ll give you the key way to understand your market… …and how people in your market want to be sold to. We’ll teach you ways to access and engage with prospects that your competitors will never discover. We’ll hand you practical ways to optimize the interactions between your prospects and your sales team. We’ll explore the customer service and aftersales process that can transform businesses and explode repeat buying. We’ll open up the usually undervalued area of ‘business maths’. Lots of people talk about the importance of “knowing your numbers”, but the cold hard reality is that most haven’t got a clue. The Other Area Jay, Ryan And I Will Be Bringing Sharply Into Focus Is Your Data. Data is drastically, hugely, massively overlooked by 90% of businesses, and few business owners know – let alone use – their data to multiply sales and increase profits.

Yet data inarguably represents the single most valuable piece of sales and profit accelerating information a business could use.

Data lets you assess the value of your lead sources and product categories and tells you where to put your time and money to maximize your profit.

Data lets you almost instantly accelerate the sales cycle, meaning people buy faster, so they come back and buy again and again, more quickly and more often.

You can command your data to identify your hottest prospects for lucrative new or specialized offerings, you can identify ready buyers in a prospect list, you can identify current customers who are about to stop buying from you unless you intervene, you can dramatically increase sales conversions by customising meaningful conversations.

Whatever type of business you’re in, whatever you sell, the fundamentals of business data are identical across any business in every market. Once you understand what data you should be looking at, where to get it from, and how to read it properly, you’ll easily be able to identify dozens of ‘impact points’ in your current revenue model, where slight shifts will create major increases in sales and profits fast.

Does That Sound Unimaginable? Think Again. Over 3 days in September, Jay Abraham, Ryan Deiss and I will share with you the keys to what’s been named “leverage marketing” and show you how to make your business produce more sales for less effort, with no added costs or expenses.

We’ll hand you the tools to own your entire industry in a dominant way, by mastering data driven performance through leverage marketing.

Never before has this high powered integrated business growth “system” been shared where every piece makes brilliant sense and where you execute simple changes in your strategy, marketing, business model, processes and procedures and start using your people, relationships, opportunity cost and capital more astutely.

This method has got the power to blow the roof off almost any business that’s stuck.

Whether you’re stuck with eroding profits, stuck being marginalized by competitors, stuck with erratic sales, stuck with expenses eating up your profits, you’ll be unstuck and possess clear cut easy action certain steps and solutions that work by the time you leave at the end of day three.

No One Has Ever Offered As Bold A Proposition As This. Join me, Ryan Deiss and Jay Abraham in a few weeks time and spend three of the most stimulating and clarifying days shifting your thinking from linear to geometric, from tactical to strategic and from reactive to proactive.

Spend face time with proven masters on the subject of business growth . Understand the exact process that Jay Abraham would follow to find the hidden profit goldmine in your own business. Discover for yourself the impact points you and your team can leverage immediately. Learn how to implement the simple changes that can dramatically and instantly fire up your profits.

A Higher Altitude This whole event will be conducted at a very different, much higher attitude and altitude than anything you’ll have seen before. We’ve got Jay Abraham, the world’s highest paid strategic marketing and business growth mastermind, on stage every day for two and half hours.

Jay charges $50k a day to visit him in California. It’s a cool million bucks if you want him to work with your business on long term.

Jay’s clients are worldwide, everything from the largest candy company in China, the largest diving school in Japan, a cloud based solution in the largest tech based institute in the world. He’s a business legend, creator of world famous business strategies and philosophies, like the Power Parthenon, the 34 X Factors of exponential growth, the 12 pillars of geometric growth and the Sticking Point Solution.

Nobody before has tried to bring this level of entrepreneurial power together, focused squarely on solving the specific issues your business most needs help on.

Jay Abraham is the top expert in the world on ‘Leverage Marketing’. More than anyone else, Jay knows how to make your message perform more, your media perform more, your responses convert more, and your position compel more. Ryan Deiss is the world’s foremost authority in online and digital marketing. He’s run over 50,000 tests and experiments, and he knows how to take whatever you’re doing online and make it outperform by an order of magnitude. Dan Bradbury understands more ways to use technology, process and systems to maximise prospect conversions, to turn customers into repeat buyers, to increase lifetime customer values, and to eliminate inefficiency.

Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015

Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015 Free,Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015 Free Download

Abraham, Bradbury, Deiss – Global Masterminds 2015

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[surveystodestressme]

47.

5000 Question Survey Pt. 8

701. What is your favorite mixed drink? i like sex on the beach a lot but i honestly like a lot of mixed drinks 702. When answering these questions are you often pulled in different directions, as if committing to one answer eliminates the possibility for all others? nahh, i try not to put too much thought into my decisions lol 703. Chicken Mesala, Pasta Primavera, Veal Cutlet Parmesan or Linguini with Clam Sauce? i don’t know what any of these are.  i guess pasta primavetra 704. If you were alone in your friend’s house/room/apartment would you look in their drawers and notebooks? i’d probably just watch tv

705. What would you really like to do but you don’t because you are afraid of getting caught? gamble??? lol idk

706. Of the following, which word best describes you: responsible: this one i guess spontaneous: tactful: uninhbited: 707. Which band would you most likely check out? The Smiths (indi-pop 80’s-90’s) probably this one The Lords of Acid (acid/house/dance 90’s) Front 242 (80’s-90’s industrial/dance) 708. How can one put an end to procrastination, as a bad habit? commit to everything that you ever need to get done 709. What feature would you want on your car that is not currently offered? well, i don’t have a car but if i did i would want bluetooth so i can always listen to my own music 710. What kind of poetry speaks to you? i don’t like poetry 711. What is your favorite store that is open 24 hours? uh... walmart? i guess 712. Do you find that sleep is just so much sleepier when you are supposed to be doing something else? absolutely 713. Do you also find that the books you chose are so much more luscious when you have a stack of actual assignments that you Should be reading? lol i mean kind of? 714. If you have had the chance to compare the original 5000 Question Survey to this edited version, what is your opinion? i haven’t done the originial so i have no idea honestly 715. What’s the most creative answer you can think of for ‘what is black and white and red all over’? a sunburnt penguin 716. Why do people slow down on the highway when they pass a cop car pulling someone else over? just to be cautious, i guess 717. Are they afraid that the cop will STOP pulling over whoever he is pulling over and pull them over instead? possible, i guess 718. It’s daddy’s birthday. What do you get him? something sports related 719. What’s your 5,000 question survey nickname? Look at the word next to the 2nd letter of your first name A anything but B bubalicious C captivating D deadly E erotic F funky G greasy H heaps of I indie J jelly K kinetic L lasher M Mr. (or Mrs.) N neglected O ogre-like P parading Q quacking R Rico S stinky T the one and only U uber V Velcro W wishing for X x-tra Y yearning for Z zoobalee Now take the first letter of your last name. A aardvarks B baboo C creme pie D drag queen E eggbert F flex G god H hell I Isabelle J juice K kisses L lightning M mannish boys N nice O octopi P porcupines Q q-bert R rainbows S suave T tushy U underwear V valor W weenie X xtc Y yohimbe Z zipper Put the two words together for your nickname. indie creme pie 720. You know that shaky feeling that you get when it’s all coming to a climax, and everyone involved is breaking into the good kind of cold sweat, working as individuals and at the same time as a single force of energy, and it all meshes together, and for a brief moment, you’re holding your breath and tingling all over, and after it’s done you’re on an explosive and dizzying high for the rest of the night? What does that feeling come from? drugs prolly 721. How many of your teachers can you imagine drinking or doing drugs on the weekends? definitely some of my high school teachers 722. Do you like Alice in Wonderland or Through the Looking Glass? i like alice in wonderland 723. Write a question and answer it here. what do you want to be doing right now? eating 724. Who is your favorite playwright? i don’t have one 725. What movie has come out recently that you couldn’t have less interest in? there are so many lol 726. What would the worst movie ever be about? poop 727. Do you like truffles? Do you like Turkish delight? not a huge chocolate person 728. Can you tell the difference between a transvestite and a real woman? it doesn’t really matter if i can or not 729. What’s funnier, plants or fire extinguishers? lol neither? 730. For question 720 did you write down sex? You pervert, I was thinking of musical theater. i didn’t actually 731. Which is better, leopard print or plaid? plaid for sure 732. What would you consider ordinary? blondes 733. What is out of the ordinary? dogs with sweaters 734. Do you ever watch COPS? I FUCKING LOVE COPS 735. Is there always room for j - e - l - l - o? i hate jello 736. If you had your own TV show, what kind of show would you make it? a horror drama 737. Do you know how heavy things like airplanes stay in the air? buoyancy??? idk if that even makes sense 738. When do you act the most dramatic? every single day of my entire life 739. Are you one of those people who have, “see photo id,” written on the back of their credit cards? i don’t think so 740. It’s mom’s birthday. What do you get her? she’s hard to shop for so idk, i’d probably ask 741. What celebrity has pretty much disappeared leaving you wondering 'where are they now’? amanda bynes 742. Would you get angry if you and your girl/boyfriend saw the preview for a movie and talked about seeing it together and then they saw it with one of their friends while you were busy? jack has done that before lol.  except with his mother and i was a lil mad because we talked about seeing it and he went without me but it ended up being a good movie and he took me later that week or something 743. How many people do you think will finish this whooooooole survey? not many, i’d say 744. Have you ever written a message, sealed it in a bottle and thrown it into a river/lake ocean? nah. 745. If you haven’t would you want to? sure 746. If you ever did what would you write? something significant 747. What do you wish you could always be protected from? death 748. What small thing annoys you so much it should be a crime? when people chew with their mouth open 749. Would you rather watch a video of fish in a tank, or the Yule log on TV? fish in a tank 750. Is it better to be loved or feared? loved 100% 751. What causes you to panic? lots of things man 752. Do you believe that you have a strong personality? i think so? unless that’s a bad thing lol 753. When Jesus saves souls…does he trade them in for valuable prizes? idfk man, do i look like jesus? 754. What resolutions would you make if it were new years? lose weight or at least get in better shape 755. Why wait? bc i’m lazy 756. Do you feel like time is on your side or working against you? working against me most of the time 757. What do you do for yourself when you are down to put a little joy back into your life? watch something or read something 758. How much Tolkien have you read? i don’t even know what that is 759. These are the songs on the radio. Which are you most likely to listen to: Time Bomb by Rancid Dead Man’s party by Oingo Boingo The Sun Always Shines on TV by A-ha this one 50 Ways to leave Your Lover by Paul Simon Run by collective Soul 760. Do you believe that Jesus existed as a real person? no 761. Do you believe he was the son of god? idfk dude 762. How do you feel about organized religion? i don’t care 763. What sentence have you heard lately, that would sound pretty odd out of context? idk 763. If you had to choose one image to be a symbol of our times, what would you pick? a cat 764. Name a group of people: crowd 765. How many of them does it take to screw in a light bulb? one, hopefully 766. Do you like the movie The Labyrinth with David Bowie and some muppets? never seen it 767. Do you like the movie The Dark Crystal? never seen it. 768. Metallica or Guns N’ Roses? metallica 769. Do you follow the Chinese zodiac? i used to 770. Do you like reggae music? not really. 771. What makes your life worth it every day? getting to see the ones i love 772. Do you seize each day and sink your teeth into it? sure 773. I’ve heard people say that Jim Morrison never yawned because he was just so full of life. How often do you yawn? every single day 774. Who decides what behavior is 'crazy’ or 'sane’? anyone who wants to i suppose 775. Who are the most inspiring artists, musicians, poets, and writers? oh there’s tons.  robin williams was always an inspiration to me and so was van gogh. 776. Did anything historically significant happen in the year you were born? not that i know of 777. Besides blowing out birthday candles when do you make wishes? on shooting stars whenever i see them 778. Are you self-sufficient? i try to be 779. Is it better to be wanted or needed? wanted 780. What do you feel is an appropriate age to lose one’s virginity at? whenever they are ready 781. Do you feel that the appropriate age for girls and for boys is different? no 782. Are you a hard person to get to know? i don’t think so.  i’m an open book 783. What is the craziest thing you have ever done out of anger? hurt myself 784. What’s the MOST annoying sound you can think of? nails on a chalkboard 785. What’s the silliest vegetable you can think of? idk 786. Do you believe in love at first sight? not really 787. Name one thing you have referred to in the past as “better than sex”: food lol 788. What do you see when you turn out the light? it’s dark so probably not a lot 789. Do you like jazz, blues and/or swing music? nope 790. Do you prefer gold or silver jewelry? silver 791. In what ways do you want your children to be like you? i don’t want children 792. In what ways would you want your children to be different from you? ^ 793. What was the scariest movie you’ve ever seen? back when i was little freddy kreuger scared the actual shit out of me 794. What was the funniest movie you’ve ever seen? grown ups or horrible bosses 795. What was the worst movie you’ve ever seen? the haunting of molly hartley 796. Are you a good massage-giver? i think so. 797. What is one question that no one can ever truthfully answer 'yes’ to? if they know everything 798. Is there more to this world than human beings can perceive? of course there is 799. If matter is neither created nor destroyed then is it possible that you are made up of molecules that once made up Ghandi or Jesus or Einstein? sure why not? 800. Are you often sarcastic? pretty often.