#Freud is my favorite dead white man

[ka-zook]

I just called cocoa powder coca powder and if that is not the ultimate freudian slip idk what is

[friendlyunclej]

A King’s Depravity

Prologue

     My citizen’s have never respected me. I worked as a carpenter, sharing my desire to compete for the crown with those who hired me to fix their homes or refurbish their shops. They all scoffed at the possibility of a “mediocre handyman” being intelligent enough to become king. As I climbed the ranks in the competition, they then accused me of cheating, saying that a man who could “barely replace floorboards” shouldn’t have made it out of the preliminary rounds. When my competition began to drop out of the proceedings, my fellow citizens then accused me of bribery, claiming that a man who they barely paid would have the funds to pay off people. Soon after, some of my toughest competitors would mysteriously disappear after facing me and, just as before, the other citizens accused me of foul play. They weren’t wrong, but I made certain that any proof of such accusations would never be found. When I did become king, I made sure that those who accused me of such devious activities had their suspicions confirmed as I left them in the sewers to rot like the others.      The previous king died the night after I won the crown. I, at least, gave King Sigfried a proper burial. He was, after all, the only person who never questioned my intentions. On the other hand, the queen he left behind would prove herself to be more curious than useful. She joined him in the ground not too long after. Officially, it was due to espionage from visiting officials from another city on the continent. That truth was better for the citizens, anyway.

In Need of Warmth

     As king of the City of Tyriok, I’ve spent the past few decades caring for people who would rather see me dead. I believed that they would finally respect me once I had become their ruler, but it didn’t matter. I expanded the city’s control to half of the Verdant Green, including the nearby town of C’Moira, yet the citizens didn’t understand the importance of expansion. I kept Draturi City and its Elven leaders from encroaching on our beliefs, keeping their control out of our walls. They claimed to offer good tidings, such as silk and gems, for our cooperation. I saw through their deceit, though, and made the correct decision for this city, much to the ire of my constituents. Not a single High Elven heel will ever set foot in my city while I’m still alive, even if my new queen works against me.      I had gone nearly a decade before I had a proper queen by my side after the previous one found her way to an early grave. There was one interim queen after King Sigfried’s queen perished, but she proved herself unfit for the job and soon vacated the crown. For the years that followed, a number of women piqued my interest, but none proved themselves a proper ruler. To obtain the crown in Tyriok, one must compete against others vying for the position in many competitions of intelligence. For years after my coming to power, no one attempted to replace the previous queen, undoubtedly discouraged due to the fear caused by rumors about what happened to the previous ones. Out of desperation, I sought future rulers at the local orphanage. It was their that I met my future queen.       The queen I have now, a woman by the name of Beatrice, is the only thing in this entire city that I’ve been able to stomach. She’s intelligent and easy on the eyes. When I first met her years ago, she was the most cunning in the building.  She was far too young to actually obtain the crown at that point, but she showed enough promise and prose that I knew she must be my queen when she came of age. I opened my library to her, leaving her with proper teachers far superior to the ones in care of the orphanage. As the years continued, her promise grew but so did my hesitation. She had grown wise beyond her years and, I must admit, swiftly surpassed me in intellect. It worried me even further once I considered the company she kept.      There were two boys she always spent her time with, Sebastian and Freud. They weren’t “born” orphans, like Beatrice was. They had the great misfortune of actually having a relatively happy number of years with loving parents before being left as orphans. Their parents were emissaries for Tyriok City, whom I would often send out to parley with C’Moira and other nearby towns. They were loyal citizens when I first came to power. Well, they were loyal to the city more than they were to me. Many times I would send them to C’Moira to demand tax and recompense for being allowed to operate as a separate entity from my city in our territory. Every time, they would return with compromises and counsel meetings to speak in the town’s favor. They were proper emissaries whom I trusted, but their good hearts clouded their judgement. They served the city well so I saved their children from sharing their fate, but I had to prevent them from poisoning the city any further once I found out that they were trying to find favor with Draturi. It broke their hearts to leave their children at the orphanage. I didn’t pay the children of traitors any mind until it was obvious that the older son, Sebastian, was far too familiar with Beatrice.      They grew up together, so I should have known that they would take a shine to each other. However, what’s an orphan to a king? After all, I could have Sebastian and his slow brother, Freud, fed to a Gelatinous Cube at a moment’s notice if I so desired. The only reason why I never did was because I knew that it would dishearten Beatrice. But once Sebastian showed interest in becoming a knight for the city, I made sure to encourage him towards a life self-sacrifice in the hopes of him dying a “hero’s death”. Unfortunately, he proved more competent in battle than I had anticipated as he joined the ranks. He even showed himself to be a man of the people, reminiscent of his parents. If he wasn’t my queen’s best friend, I would have had him sent on a mission to never return years ago. Sadly, I was lovesick when Beatrice became my queen. It had been nearly a decade and a half until she became my better half but she proved far worth the wait.      Even in my ailing years, she more than proved herself capable without me. My age swiftly deteriorated only a few years after she became my queen, but she took care of the entire city as both ruler and expecting mother. Those first few years were nearly a dream for me, but the child’s birth soon proved it to be a nightmare instead.      I should have known that making the man she grew up with, Sebastian, our most trusted bodyguard was too kind. I, King Garland, the ruler of Tyriok who brought the city to its shining stature that it is today, was proven to be nothing more than a cuckold when their daughter was born. I should have known that the man she truly held affection for, the man who truly had her heart long before she stole mine, was working behind my back since the very beginning. From the moment that child was born, I had a constant reminder of how asinine and foolish I truly was. In retaliation, I sought ways to ensure that Sebastian’s life would be a worse Hell than he was already damned for. It took a number of years until I could send him off. However, as much as I wanted to give him a similar fate to his parents, I knew that Queen Beatrice wouldn’t leave the disappearance of her lover alone.       When his contract was up for renewal, I found the strength to attend the signing myself. My queen pleaded for me to return him to her side, and I looked him in the eyes as I stripped him of his status and pension. I knew that his parents were a deep scar in his heart, having been old enough to remember the pain of them leaving unlike his younger brother. So when my whore queen begged me to leave him something to live off of, I chuckled at the only property I offered him. I told her that I would take him there myself the next day.      Allowing him to keep his armor and possessions, I brought Sebastian on to my favorite cart on the way to his new home. He tried to ask me why he had been fired, but we stayed in silence as we made our way to the bar.

     As we approached the lower end of the city, I asked, “Do you remember anything about your parents, Sebastian?”

     Caught off guard, the fool took a deep sigh before replying, “No, I was too young when they left me and my brother at the orphanage. The only parent I know is Miss Frau.”

     “Come now, Sebastian,” I insisted, knowing he was lying, “We both know that you were plenty old enough to remember the sting of them leaving.”

     I hear the wood of his chest carrying his belongings creak as his grip tightens in annoyance before saying, “My king, I can assure you-”

     “You can assure me of what? My new status of ‘Cuckold’,” I say, angrily gripping my walking cane, “I believe your daughter is assurance enough, thank you.”

     I watch as he fills with rage, like a geyser nearly bursting through the earth, before he calms leans forward to say, “My liege, she is your daughter. You must believe me.”

     Laughing aloud, Sebastian slumps back into his seat as I retort, “Really? My daughter? That is what you and my queen would have me believe but we both know the truth. To be frank, the entire city knows the truth. You’re lucky I don’t have her tossed out into the ocean.”

     Upon hearing that, I see the geyser burst from stone as he drops his crate and nearly lunges at me. One of my guards pulls his sword and places it against Sebastian’s throat, forcing him to retake his seat.

     “Thank you, Roland,” I remark with a grin, as Sebastian forces himself to calm down, “Now, we should be at your new home soon.”

     “If you harm Olivia or Bea, I will hang you from the guard towers,” Sebastian spits, trying to intimidate me.

     Wiping a drop of spittle from my eye, I reply, “Don’t worry. They’ll be safe in their homes, just as you will be in yours.”

     The cart comes to a halt as we arrive outside of the only bar in the entire city, the same one his parents ran before they disappeared. I handed him the deed and watched his face go white as he read the names of his deceased parents. I soaked in the sight like warm rays of sunlight after a night of rain.

     “If you’re ever seen on castle grounds again, I’ve given the guards orders to kill you on sight,” I tell him, as I step out of the cart with my cane.

     As Roland tosses his possessions out of the cart, Sebastian just stares daggers at me as he replies, “You know that none of the guards will listen to that.”

     “Oh, I know and I’m betting on it. That means that they’ll capture you, instead,” I spout, a weak smile forming on my face, “Which means further use of the tools under the western guard tower. You remember those, don’t you?”

     Sebastian didn’t respond. He simply placed the deed in his cracked chest of belongings and snatched the keys from my hand. I bid him one last farewell before my cart left to return me to my home. Proud with myself, I feel the last bit of warmth from the sun hit my face just before the clouds steal it from me.

Epilogue

     In the weeks that followed, I did my best to ensure that my rule would continue in my absence. For the initial years of my queen’s daughter’s life, I was constantly there to take care of her. I tried to teach her as much as possible, but it’s difficult to implant anything useful in a toddler’s mind. I left the child to be dealt with for a different time. Aside from that, I left my control of the city to my Tribunal instead, just before I locked myself away. My health had deteriorated so swiftly that I was no longer fit to be seen by the public so I instead set a plan in motion to ensure that however my health would turn, I wouldn’t be leaving so indefinitely.      As I was helped up the many tower steps to my room, I looked to the new hire who was helping me. He was a dragonborn of black scales, no older than the age of twenty-two. He attempted to tell me his name, but I simply shooed him away as I told him to fetch me my council. I had to specify that I meant my Tribunal so that the idiot wouldn’t bring me the queen. After a few moments, Roland, Yaromir, and Valentia arrived in my room.

     “So, do you remember what I need?” I ask, resting on my bed.

     Cutting and eating an apple, Roland replies, “Honestly, all I remember is being told to kill Sebastian if we find him close enough to the castle. Everything else fell on deaf ears.”

     Valentia pulled out a small piece of parchment as she recited, “The heart of a newt, the eyes of a recently deceased child, poison oak leaves, a large cast iron urn, incense infused with nightshade, and poison derived from the blood of an Elf. Anything else, Garland?”

     Smiling as I turn to Valentia, I say, “Well, at least one of you have proven that Doppelgangers are worth keeping around.”

     Returning my smile with a wink, Valentia is nudged by Yaromir before he says, “Flirting aside, we need to better know who we’re contacting in Draturi. A name would better help us know who is the actual target.”

     “My contact in the city is not a target. They are a contact. Repeat it back to me,” I demand as I turn to stare at them.

     Giving a disgruntled sigh, Yaromir corrects himself by saying, “Your ‘contact’ in Draturi would be easier to locate if we had a name to go with the portrait you provided us.”

     “The portrait is enough, I assure you.”

     “Really? Because they all look the same to me,” Roland mocks, his body transforming into the person from the portrait I provided them, “I mean, honestly, can you at least tell us if it’s a man or a woman?”

     Valentia snorts, “He’s clearly a man. Look at the jawline.”

     “No, she’s a woman,” Yaromir bickers, motioning with his fingers, “Can you not see the more feminine cheekbones?”

     As they continue to bicker amongst each other, I angrily close my eyes before shouting, “It doesn’t fucking matter what gender my contact is. What matters is what I need them for. You do remember what I need them for, correct?”

     “Yeah, we do,” they reply in unison.

     “And you understand that if you don’t find them soon enough, I won’t be able to pay you what I promised you, correct?”

     “Yeah, we understand,” they echo again.

     “Good, now, before you all leave, show me the disguises you’ve chosen so that I make sure nothing is too jarring.”

     As I say so, the three of them transform before me. There clothes skin and hair all writhing into themselves. Their flesh turning a soft blue and their eyes becoming a pale yellow with no pupils before morphing into proper disguises. Valentia chose a more buxom female form with sharper features and long, dagger-like ear. Yaromir transformed into a shorter male Elven form with a stronger jaw than he usually preferred. Roland, much to my surprise, presented a more Wood Elven form with a gentle smile. I nodded in approval of their disguises as they returned to their normal visage.

     “Good,” I sigh, “Very good. Now, as for the last bit of business before you leave, I simply need you to tell some guards to bring my old personal throne into the room.”

     With a dumbfounded glare, Roland says, “ ‘Throne’ as in your toilet or...”

     Valentia rolls her eyes as she says, “No, you fool. His actual throne.”

     They continued to trade insults until I grew too tired to listen, shouting, “Yes, my actual throne! The stone one that I’ve always sat in. Take your bickering out of my tower and get it all done posthaste!”

     Stopping their childish bickering for a moment, they all salute and bow to me before leaving my room. As they do, I struggle to my feet and shuffle over to a window. I pry it open as I stare out over my city from the top of a 300 foot tall tower. The rain is heavily falling, washing the streets. Unfortunately, there’s not enough rain to wash the stench of betrayal that covers my home. I look out to the fields and see Queen Beatrice sneaking out with her daughter in tow. They’re dressed in clothes reminiscent of the orphanage. I slam the window shut as I return to my room.

     “All I’ve ever been surround by is snakes,” I say to myself, “From the ones I’ve put in the ground to the ones still in the sky, all they’ve ever proven to be are conniving traitors. All they’ve ever done is use me like a rag then tossed me aside like a pitiful copper piece. Soon, however. Soon, they’ll be begging me for mercy again. They’ll all fear me again. As they all should. As everyone should.”

     I stare at my hand and feel a familiar warmth coalesce around my hand. I hold my eyes closed and breathe hot air into my hand. As I open them, I see a ghastly blue flame escape my mouth and form in my hand. I let the embers turn red and dance in my fingers before clutching my fist to extinguish it. I toss the window open with a new vigor as I stare out over the city bathed in flame and devils. I smile as the hallucination shows my whore queen and her affair hanging on pikes, burning on pyres as the rest of the citizens are running for their lives.

     A soft voice whispers, “And you will find yourself as the ruler of a new kingdom as long as your end of the bargain is kept.”

     Twisting around as fast as I can, I nearly twist my ankle only to find no one behind me. I feel a spark of fire in my heart fill me with determination, just before I fall unconscious to the floor.

[sitonmyhot-seatoflove]

A Sós - Brian May x Brazilian!Reader

(aka my insanely belated A Night at the Fandom gift for the lovely Ana @bismillahnah. there's an author's note for you at the end, darling! thank you so much @dtfrogertaylor for pulling this together for all of us! you rock! this was amazing! once again, I'm so sorry for being this terribly late)

word count: 3988 words

warnings: some making out, some implied sexual content, lots of cheesiness, a little bit of untranslated Portuguese (it’s set in Brazil!), and some playing fast and loose with the timeline.

Só nós dois e uma madrugada inteira pra conversar / Só nós dois e uma infinidade de Amor pra cantar / Com você o manual da vida fica fácil de ler / Com você a hipótese de uma vida pra ser / Vivida juntos / Nesse e naquele que é só nosso mundo / Um mundo de nós / Eu, você e a existência a sós.

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You were never really one to talk to strangers.

Not this incessantly, at the very least, and certainly not this intimately.

Something about this one made him a little extra special, though.

Maybe it was just that you'd had a couple of drinks, and had gotten free entry to what was supposed to be the best Carnival party of the year - only to be ditched by your best friend when she found someone to make out with in some random corner. You were all alone in the Baile Vermelho e Preto, and hell, it was Carnival - you weren't supposed to be alone.

Maybe it was something about him - maybe the way his curls framed his face and bounced around him as he walked, a little messy and a little frizzy, giving him a frazzled sort of look you couldn't help but find endearing. (It was all the humidity, he'd explained, from being so near the ocean - his hair was usually much tidier.)

Maybe it was how cute he looked when his pointier teeth showed whenever you said something clever. It was nearly addictive, that smile, and from the moment you saw it for the first time, your sole purpose for the rest of the evening was to make sure you could produce it as many times as possible.

Maybe it was the way he'd never lost his temper while trying to communicate with that bartender - even after seven whole minutes of failed attempts to order a different drink, even as there was a line forming behind him, even as he was sweating through his white button-up so much it was sticking to his skinny back. His voice was soft even as he half shouted out his order over the music in a heavily accented Spanish/Portuguese/English blend of a language - and even though everyone behind him seemed annoyed, they all seemed too reluctant to do anything about it. You'd noticed some of them looked almost intimidated - maybe by his height? Maybe by the fact you didn't usually get that many tourists in this part of town? You weren't sure. But, while they all stared and whispered, no one seemed about to step in, and you were a translator, damn it, even if you only did it as a side gig.

He was nine minutes into his attempts to communicate with the bartender when you'd decided to intervene.

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"Ele tá pedindo uma cerveja escura. Tipo Guinness. Se não tiver, ele quer só uma água tônica mesmo." The bartender looked exasperated at your attempt to help. You couldn't blame him - that crowd wasn't exactly the nicest to be around, and the last few minutes probably hadn't helped improve his mood.

"Eu entendi, moça. Tô tentando explicar pra ele que a gente só tem Brahma e água mesmo. É open bar, olha essa fila, pelo amor de Deus..."

"Desculpa, moço. Vê duas Brahmas mesmo." You turned to the tall stranger, who looked dumbfounded by your meddling. "Sorry, buddy, you'll have to make do with light beer and regular water. It's not too bad, though, I promise." You pulled him away by his upper arm - surprisingly toned for such a skinny lad - while holding the two beers in your other hand. He was wide eyed, and you assumed he'd been a bit stunned by your unabashedness.

"I'm-" He paused as he saw the line that had formed behind him. "Jesus. Sorry. Didn't mean to be a prick."

"I know. Figured I'd rescue you both." You offered him his beer and a soft smile, and he looked down at it, looking less than excited to give it a try. "C'mon, now. It won't kill you."

"No, no, I know, I just - not my favorite drink, really, but it'll do," he said, tilting his bottle to clink with your own before taking a tentative sip. "Thank you."

The smile he gave you right then completely changed your entire evening. The only word that your fogged brain could come up with to describe it was magical - you cursed yourself for the cheesiness of it. It really was how it felt, though - from the moment you saw the way his eyes crinkled just a tiny bit, and glowed just a little more than everyone else's, you were done for. And after he took a moment to look at you up and down, apparently taking notice of you for the first time that evening, and his eyes seemed to brighten up at the sight - that was it, this was the best Carnival ever. Never mind your friend, never mind the fact that you'd have to wake up at an ungodly hour. Who could possibly give a shit that your feet were hurting from the pretty shoes you'd chosen when this man was looking at you like that?

His raised eyebrows seemed questioning all of a sudden, and you realized his lips were moving. They had been moving. Cacete, Y/N, acorda, ele tá falando com você, responde- 

"Sorry, what?" You ask in response, finally waking from whatever weird type of trance this stranger's very handsome face and unearthly pretty eyes had put you under. "Hard to hear over all the music."

"I said, do you wanna step outside for a smoke?"

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“I swear to God I can speak Spanish.”

The smoking section kinda stunk, you couldn't lie. It was pretty rough - while the front of the building had been spruced up recently, probably for the party, the side, where most smokers had gathered, was all just rough cement with exposed orange brick in some spots. He - Brian, you'd learned, Brian from the UK, an Astrophysicist who was in town for work - leant on that wall while trying to justify his faux pas from earlier. You tried to stay serious, but a little scoff of a laugh escaped your lips at his proclamation. “I’m dead serious! I even spoke Spanish very well to some native speakers last week," he bragged, taking a long drag of his cigarette before speaking. “For work.”

His work was interesting. You were a little confused as to why an Astrophysicist had come to spend so much time in South America - he'd told you he'd been in Venezuela just last week, and Argentina was coming up next - but, really, you weren't complaining, not when it had landed him here, right in front of you.

“What do you do, then?”

“I’m still finishing my degree too," you said. He'd talked a little bit about his unfinished PhD - something about 'various pressures', but he'd been weirdly coy about those. Busy with work, he'd said. “Still on my bachelor’s, though. Wanna be a psychologist.”

“Been analyzing me this whole time, then?”

“Obviously.”

That one got you a smile. Score.

You both were comfortable with each other - weirdly comfortable, as far as your experience with handsome strangers went. Because he wasn't just asking you questions for the sake of asking - when he inquired further about your interest in psychology, he asked about the specifics and couldn't stop asking follow up questions. What you wanted to do with your degree, what type of approach you preferred, whether you actually bought all the stuff Freud had come up with, what was your take on the more recent developments in Cognitive therapy stuff… He also seemed to be knowledgeable in nearly every subject. An hour had passed, you'd noticed, and all you'd done was talk - about your interests, nonetheless. He shifted the subject slightly, only once, interrupting you mid-sentence while you mused at him about the more philosophical aspects of Freudian theories.

“I would like to see you tomorrow.” You were a bit taken aback at the interruption - and his interest - and he noticed. "Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt, I just - you're brilliant. And beautiful. And I would like to see you again."

"That's not how Carnival works, Brian." He frowned at that, and you realized that maybe he'd forgotten what this was - where you were, what you were supposed to be doing. You weren't supposed to be discussing philosophy and he wasn't supposed to be taking an interest in your intellect; you were supposed to be making out in some corner, just like your friend had been, both of your names having slipped from one another's mind by the time morning came. "It's usually a one night thing… And I'm busy tomorrow." You were completely busy for the next few weeks, as a matter of fact; a fantastic job opportunity had turned up, but you couldn't help but want, just for a second, to say 'screw it' and give Brian all the time in the world. You could, at the very least, give him the rest of your night, though, so you tried to find a way to stretch your time together a little longer.

"You seen the beach yet?"

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Copacabana was just as beautiful at night, he'd decided. Turns out he had seen the beach, but only in passing - his hotel was a few of blocks from where you two were now, walking aimlessly, slowly, shoes in your hands so you could feel the sand. Just trying to pass the time with one another.

The sky was clear enough for you two to stargaze, too, which gave you a nice little way into his mind, for a change. He marveled at the constellations he'd never get to see back home, and cursed himself for not bringing a telescope along for the trip. You teased him for that - how does an Astrophysicist travel halfway across the globe and doesn't bring a single telescope? But he only shrugged at that, blushing a little and turning your attention to the Southern Crux, bright and beautiful and right above you both.

"Do you think we're ever gonna have a real answer?" He didn't seem to get your question, so you expanded. "I mean, do you think your lot - the hard scientists, I mean - do you think you guys will ever be able to tell us why we're here after all? What it all means?"

"Science's really good at the 'what's and the 'how's, but it doesn't have much to say about the 'whys'," he replied, thoughtful as ever, sounding a little more confident now that you'd switched lanes and were talking about his specialty, rather than yours. The way his voice had shifted was more attractive to you than anything else about him so far. "Neither should it, I reckon." He shrugged. "And I don't think we can ever come up with those types of answers. We know so little, as much as we like to pretend otherwise. I mean, think about it, we only know the size of the observable universe," he said as his eyes shifted upwards, "we can hypothesize all we want about what's on the outside of that, but, truth is, we have no bloody clue." 

"Great, that's not nerve wracking at all."

"It's kinda nice, if you think about it. We're tiny specks in a tiny world, which is a tiny speck in our Solar System, which is a tiny speck in our galaxy, which is a tiny speck in the part of the universe we know." He shrugged once again. "Puts things in perspective, you know? I mean, how special are we, really? But, then again, maybe we are. Maybe the Christians are right. I don't know."

"You think there's life out there?"

"Well, you ever heard of the Drake equation?"

God, you could hear him talk for hours. Even if it was about numbers. You did hear him talk for hours - and he heard you, too. About psychology again, sure - why you'd chosen it, and why you'd become passionate, and all the professors you hated and all the ones you loved. But things got a little more personal, too. You talked about how you'd moved up to Rio from the South because they had the best Psych school in the country, and while you really missed your family, you'd fallen in love with what you believed was the most beautiful city on Earth. How you liked the beach, but Copacabana was overrated - "it's touristy and there's prettier places" - and, really, you preferred the short stretches of woods you could find in the local parks. He kept up with everything you said, and your conversation moved so quickly you couldn't really tell how you'd skipped from one subject to another. He could discuss the complexities of Nabokov and the psychological analysis you'd done of his characters, laugh at a stupid pun you'd made about the ocean, and show real interest in your passion of history all in a matter of minutes.

"And there's this really swanky café," you said, while doing your best to give him a mental tour of Rio's historic downtown, "it's called Cafeteria Colombo. Bit touristy, but I'm into it. They're really traditional - the Emperor of Brazil supposedly used to eat there, which is kinda ludicrous but super fun at the same time."

"Take me there." You looked confused - it was the middle of the night, and you opened your mouth to explain that it wasn't exactly a 24-hour joint, but he beat you to it. "Tomorrow - let's go there tomorrow. My treat."

"I... don't think so, Brian."

"It's the least I can do after you saved me at the bar." You chuckled a little at that. "And introduced me to the best damn light beer I've ever had." You actually let out a full-bellied laugh, and he seemed satisfied to see it. "Let me see you again, Y/N. Buy you a cuppa."

And you wanted to, but that's not what this was. You had to keep it in mind, and he had to get it into his - it was not what this was. He beat you to your argument before you could even protest, though.

"I don't care how Carnival works." He stopped walking. "You can't possibly believe this is a one night thing, Y/N."

"You should really be more respectful of the holiday traditions, Brian."

He didn't have an answer for that, which made you a little disappointed. Still, you'd meant what you'd said - he was leaving in a couple of weeks, and you knew that if you got to see him again - if you got to hang out with him for any longer than a single night - you'd serve him your heart in a silver platter to take across the ocean without hesitating. Hell, you'd been with him for a few hours and already felt tempted enough to do it.

You kept walking in silence, the air feeling a little heavier from the higher rise and from the way you'd shut him down again. Before you could come up with something else to say - anything, puta merda, Y/N, inventa qualquer coisa pra falar - he moved his hand and placed it over yours, and you swore your heart started wanting to jump out of your body and physically reach over to him.

"Can you ever feel your heart in your ears?" You blurted out and immediately cursed yourself; he laughed a little, though, and had a surprised expression on his face when you dared to look over. "Sorry, that was stupid."

"It wasn't." You stared at him in mock seriousness, pointedly. "I swear." He was smiling at you, and at this point, you couldn't help but smile back. His eyes lingered on your lips for a half second too long. "Why'd you ask?" You stopped walking again, a little too stunned at his bluntness to keep going. Wasn't it obvious why you'd asked? "Can you feel yours now?" He asked, his voice softer than ever.

"Yeah."

He placed both hands - God, he had really large hands - on either side of your head, fingertips playing a little with your earlobes. "Well, your ears are hot."

"Well, you're not exactly helping with that right now, are you?" You wrapped your hands around his wrists, hoping to feel a quickened pulse, hoping to God his heartbeat was as strong and erratic as yours was right now. Did his heart want to come find you, too?

"How do I ask 'May I kiss you?' in Portuguese?"

"Eu posso te beijar?"

He tries to repeat it, and something comes out - it sounds more like Spanish than Portuguese, but you forgive him the second you look into his eyes. You thought you could get lost in them - Jesus Christ, where the hell were these romcom thoughts coming from? You could, though, you swore you could, and that looking straight at them felt like plunging deep into the ocean, and ugh, that particular thought was made so much cheesier by the fact that you were right by the ocean - and wait, puta merda, he was looking at you - at your lips, then back at your eyes, then back at your lips - very expectantly. Right, he had asked you something, you were supposed to say something, even though you were honestly about to go blind from how warm his hands felt on your face. "Close enough," you managed to whisper out, your swirly mind getting swirlier by the second as this beautiful stranger pulled you in.

His kiss felt huge - bigger than the both of you, bigger than tonight, certainly bigger than Carnival. That's the only way you could describe it. His lips were soft on yours, and as you opened your mouth with a gasp, you could taste a tiny bit of Brahma on his tongue. It was mostly mint and ocean salt and cigarettes and him, all around you, his tall body enveloping you and somehow putting your brain in a haze where time seemed to move outside of reality. There was nothing other than you and Brian and, for all you knew, Copacabana was the whole world.

You were trembling by the time you'd stopped kissing, and, as he moved his hands to encircle your waist, he was trembling too. You were giddy to notice it. He seemed giddy just from kissing you.

“Let me see you tomorrow.”

“Can’t live in the moment, can you?” You teased, pulling him back into you and playfully biting at his lip to get your point across.

You quietly inquired, in between warm kisses, where he was staying, again - wasn't it close by? And, wouldn't you know it, his hotel was just a block away from where you were standing right now.

And, well, that had to be kismet, right?

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

His suite was fancy - too fancy for an Astrophysicist, and you might have realized that, maybe, if you weren't so otherwise distracted by his lips, seemingly all over you at once, setting your skin alight one peck at a time. By the time he started using his tongue on your neck, you were done for - nothing would come out of your mouth that night other than kisses and loving and strangled moans of his name, which happened by the minute. He seemed to love it - every time you said his name, he was a little spurred on, grabbed at you with a little more force, and, in turn, you loved that. Every time he said yours, your stomach did somersaults. You hoped you sounded as sweet to him as he did to you.

He fell asleep before the sun rose, and your heart sank a little at the thought of leaving his embrace and making your way back into reality. You tried to commit everything to memory - the smell of the crook of his neck, the curve of his tiny bottom, the pattern of the freckles on his upper back, the way he sighed in his sleep when you scratched his scalp, the freaking hotel logo on the face towel in the bathroom - absolutely anything you could get your senses to grasp at. You had to make sure you had a full picture to come back to, otherwise you feared you might think it was all an alcohol induced illusion of some sort. Besides, he looked so pretty while he slept, so that's how you chose to remember him - the crease between his eyebrows gone completely, lips slightly parted, drool starting to come out, hair more frazzled than ever.

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

It was always great working with musicians - you liked talking to artists, you'd always get to see their shows for free and, as part of the 'entourage', you'd always get some damn good amenities - and this was an especially sweet gig. Queen was the biggest client you'd ever gotten - their original translator got sick and, when a producer friend of yours had referred you, you were more than happy to step in for them. The four members would need a translator to work closely with them for the next couple of weeks, and you couldn't have been more excited to run around town with rockstars for a longer stretch of time, especially while on break from school. It was perfect, really - good pay, good gig, and, hopefully, some good company.

You tried to keep this in mind - to conjure up how excited you'd been when you'd gotten the job; how, because of it, you had been able to buy tickets to go home for Holy Week; how excited your family had sounded on the phone. This was worth it, you thought, it was worth not seeing Brian again. He would go back to the UK so soon anyway - it was just a fling, just a sweet memory you had to lock up in a little box and keep in the back of your brain for now. 

And you did. You did such a good job at compartmentalizing you only thought of him once during your morning shower. Once again while making your coffee - you wondered how he took his, or if maybe he was a tea drinker. He was British. But maybe that was just a stereotype? Maybe he loved coffee, maybe he took it with three spoons of sugar just like you did. You wished you'd stayed long enough to find out.

You did a great job of keeping him out of your mind while commuting to the convention center all the way across town where you'd be meeting the band. You were running late on your first day, which was less than ideal, and the anxiety of it kept your thoughts stuck on the traffic and on your watch. They couldn't fire you on the first day, could they? You'd assumed most journalists at the press conference would be ready to ask in English, but you never really knew - Brazilian journalism could be unpredictable. They still needed you. You were fine, you were not going to get fired, and you were certainly not going to be distracted by the memory of the tall, handsome, unattainable man you'd left in bed that morning.

You were so consumed by your thoughts - your non-Brian thoughts - and the desperate need not to be late that you ran inside the venue, not bothering to take a second glance at the journalists setting up in the main area or at the Queen poster someone had put up near the entrance to the meeting room a staff member directed you to.

In retrospect, paying a little more attention might have saved you a lot of grief, or, at the very least, a hell of a scare. It would have been shocking to see Brian looking down at you from the huge poster right outside the room your new client was supposed to be in - but it was a much bigger shock to walk in and find the man himself, staring at you, eyes wider than ever, dropping his half-drunk tea on the carpet.

Well, you thought, guess he's a tea drinker.

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

A/N: oi, Ana! espero que você goste do seu presente. não sei se você já sacou, mas eu sou brasileira kkkk e, como boa brasileira, tô chegando bemmmm atrasada por aqui com sua fic. desculpa o atraso, de verdade. não sou uma escritora necessariamente boa, mas juro que a fic foi feita com muito carinho - eu quase pirei quando recebi você no sorteio e vi que você era brasileira!! fiquei mandando mensagem em inglês pra manter o sigilo e não estragar a surpresa.

o título da fic e a inspiração vieram de uma música do Rizzih, como você deve ter percebido (aliás, não conhecia ele! fiquei super feliz de conhecer um artista novo). na real, eu tava querendo fazer uma fic com uma Reader brasileira e tradutora faziam décadas, e achei seu presente a oportunidade perfeita pra explorar esse relacionamento e essa personagem. ainda tenho algumas aventuras planejadas pra ela e pro Bri (um dos motivos da demora foi justamente o fato de que eu queria que essa fic fosse três ou quatro vezes mais longa, mas resolvi dividir em partes e ir postando conforme for conseguindo escrever). como as sequências não vão tecnicamente fazer parte do seu presente, apesar de serem da mesma história, me avisa se você quiser ser marcada quando eu postar! eu amei conhecer um pouquinho mais sobre você durante esse mês e espero poder conhecer mais ainda daqui pra frente. mil abraços e, novamente, espero que você goste! com muito amor, sua amiga oculta, finalmente podendo falar com você em português - S (🕺🏻)

[cartoonhangover]

Meet Brett Jubinville

Brett Jubinville is the Creative Director at Tinman Creative Studios and creator of Super Science Friends, an animated series about a team of superpowered scientists (Freud, Einstein, Tesla, Darwin & Tapputi) who travel through time fighting nazis, renegade soviet cosmonauts and their own scientific rivals. The latest episode, “Freudian Sleep” is available now on Cartoon Hangover Select on VRV.

We got to talk with the creator himself about the ins and outs, and all abouts of the series!

What's the story behind the creation of Super Science Friends?

Since I’m less of a writer and more of a drawer, the way I typically come up with ideas is by drawing. In the case of Super Science Friends I was home by myself for a weekend, my girlfriend was out of town, and I stayed up really late playing Fallout New Vegas and drawing. At some point I drew a sketch of a soviet zombie astronaut.

Later that night I couldn’t sleep because I kept thinking about that drawing, so I got up and spent the rest of the night coming up with a show idea where that character could exist. I still have those drawings, and they’re more-or-less what the designs for the show ended up looking like.

What other historic geniuses might be part of the Super Science Friends? Who didn’t make the cut?

Because we went for the lowest hanging fruit possible, there weren’t many characters who didn’t make the cut. Everyone we chose needed to be more-or-less a household name, have a power that was easily identifiable as a superpower (for example, Tesla = Electricity Powers) and also they had to have been dead for a certain amount of time to get us out of any sticky likeness rights trouble. Aside from Tapputi, they all hit each of those marks.

I’ve got a lot of characters I’d like to get onto the show. One of them who played a major role in the comic book was Ada Lovelace, and I’d like to find a reason to have her join the cast for an episode.

Other than that we’ve got ideas for James Prescott Joule, Lord Kelvin, Robert Oppenheimer and Pythagoras.

What made you think, “Man, we need a young Einstein, let’s do a clone!”?

I really made him a clone in order to justify the design choice I had made during that all-nighter where I came up with all the characters. I happened to draw him as a teenager, but gave him white hair so he would be recognizable (since I couldn’t give him the moustache). So in order for that to all make sense he couldn’t be the original Einstein, and so I wrote that the original Einstein was dead and Churchill had ordered himself up a clone. Then we decided that he was a clone created by the US Government in order to justify casting Fred Kennedy who has a North American accent.

What modern day evil-doers would the Super Science Friends have beef with?

Assuming they arrived in 2017 coming from 1941 I’m pretty sure they would think that the entire human race has been brainwashed by our phones, computers and televisions. My guess is they would dedicating themselves to “freeing” us and in the process set the science and technology back decades. Oh man, we just wrote a sweet episode of Super Science Friends!

Is it okay to punch a Nazi?

Well … I was ready to punch the person in front of me at Starbucks this morning for returning her drink because she asked for half-sweet and not full-sweet and felt that it was still just too sweet, so I’m probably not the most moderate person to decide on who’s punchable. But I figure, hey if you can’t punch a Nazi then who CAN you punch?

Will you ever do another segment like you did for Episode 1 with the nerds fact-checking the show?

Those nerds (as you so callously put it) were actually our biggest Kickstarter backers for the first episode. They donated enough that they were able to get killed in the show. The main nerd actually went on to play the voice of Edison in episode 2.

But while they don’t get apple’d, we do have people who donate to our Patreon as extras in the show all the time. So if anyone wants to be in the show they can become a patron and then email us some photos and we’ll put them in.

Can we expect more episodes of Super Science Friends?

You sure as heck can! Episode 4: “Freudian Sleep” is out now on Cartoon Hangover and our Patreon, and on YouTube December 14th. After that we’ve got three more episodes planned to round out season 1. So there’s still lots more on the horizon.

What artists and animators inspire you?

That’s such a big question! I’m just going to spout off some Instagrams that I think people should follow if they want to look at the same cool stuff I look at on a regular basis.

ashleywoodart

crom_cristianortiz

heikala

jbnda

loiclocatelli

merghimself

nuriatamarit

shaneglines

taryndraws

thasenkamm

Also, follow an artist named Xulm wherever you can. He does background designs for Super Science Friends and they’re literally the least cool thing he does, which is saying something because the backgrounds he does for us are amazing.

What are your favorite cartoons?

As a kid I was all about Looney Tunes, Batman the Animated Series and X-Men. Lately I’ve actually been on a bit of self-enforced cartoon embargo until I finish Super Science Friends. There are a lot of cartoons I know I’d love but haven’t seen yet because I don’t want them to subconsciously affect how we write our show. Those include Adventure Time, Rick & Morty, Steven Universe and Gravity Falls to name a few.

“Ermagerd you haven’t seen Rick & Morty!!!!!!!1” Yep. Haven’t seen it. I really want to, but I gotta wait until our show is done so it doesn’t inadvertently become Super Rick & Morty Friends.

What's the last thing you took a picture of on your phone?

This checklist of scenes that were completed for the next episode of Super Science Friends. We’ve gotten a few more done since then.

What else are you working on?

We’re in development on a couple other series that we’re really getting excited about. You should be hearing about those sometime in 2018.

Anything else you'd like to share with the world?

Yeah, actually one of Super Science Friends’ background designers has a book coming out soon. If you’re into cats and large, naked men, you should check out Manfried the Man.

Thanks to Brett for taking the time to talk with us!

Super Science Friends Episode 4 : “Freudian Sleep” is out now on Cartoon Hangover Select on VRV. Watch here.

[thisisnotdrbattista-blog]

Essay III: Get Out

For my third critical analysis essay on horror, I chose the contemporary movie, Get Out, directed by Jordan Peele. Horror is a broad spectrum, and the most effective pieces of horror find their success in playing off the insecurities of their audience.  This movie was considered a huge hit in its genre, and has such a unique and captivating story.  Get Out uses race and cultural differences to uncover the social failings of a society and to entertain at the same time. Using references from literary studies on the uncanny, zombies, and much more, this essay is going to take a deeper look into the power of genre and the cultural significance of this movie.

The first connection I was able to make to the coursework when watching this film was the similarity between the Haitian Zombie, and the way that the Armitage’s were able to create their own zombie slaves, if you will, through hypnosis. David Inglis provides a great definition of the zombie in his chapter Putting the Undead to Work: “The fear that is embodied in the Haitian figure of the zombie is not the Euro American one of the dead returning to visit a cannibalistic holocaust on the living, but rather involves dread of the body snatcher –the zombie master- who takes the living body and destroys the soul within it, creating a living dead being who endlessly obeys his will” (p. 42).  I think the term “body snatcher” can be easily applied to the work that the Armitage family was doing.  A perfect example would be the opening scene where the son throws a black man in the trunk of his car, who shows back up later at the garden party, but this time he does not seem to have his soul.  Following the same type of mentality as the witch doctor from White Zombie, the Armitage family is making slaves out of people, through hypnosis and surgery instead of magic, and selling them off as their own labor force.  

Another connection I made after watching the movie was the sunken place (Chris’ hypnotized state) and the subconscious, to Freud’s ideas on the uncanny.  Freud gives an insightful explanation on the relationship between human consciousness and the uncanny: “If this really is the secret nature of the uncanny, we can understand why German usage allows the familiar to switch to its opposite, the uncanny, for this uncanny element is actually nothing new or strange, but something that was long familiar to the psyche and was estranged from it only through being repressed” (pg. 148). Exploiting Chris’ subconscious by bringing up the topic of his mother’s death, she is able to repress the part of his brain that makes him Chris.  After the initial hypnosis, she almost has complete control over him with her teacup. We see throughout the film that these people with someone else in their mind controlling their body and consciousness are brought to the surface when exposed to a camera flash.  Meaning there is some hope for these people that have been turned, but we also see that the man taken over by the grandfather kills himself as soon as he is freed from the distressing situation of living his life as a spectator.

The term used to describe these people once they’ve been hypnotized is the “sunken place.”  Once put in this trance, Chris finds his existence to be as the passenger of his own life, he screams and struggles and gets no result or reaction from the people around him.  The sunken place is meant to represent the oppression of the system, and how minorities find themselves trapped, screaming as hard as they can without being able to get any sort of communication across.  Peele was trying to make a statement about the underrepresentation of black people in the horror genre, and how he was upset with the stereotype of them always being the first ones to die off.  Thinking about the film in that light, Peele really turns the tables around, by not only having the black protagonist survive, but having to murder his way out of the house to freedom.  

To bring this all back to the discussion of cultural significance, Get Out, tells a story of racism to a group of people that think racism is no longer a problem.  So what is it that makes this movie so powerful and such a good medium for a message that a nation desperately needs to hear?  Author Colin Dickey sheds some light on what separates good hauntings and horror from the sheep: “A paranormal event without a story is tenuous, fragile.  What makes it “real,” at least in a sense, is the story, the tale that grounds the event. The sense of the uncanny, of something not-quite-right, of things ever-so-slightly off, cries out for an explanation” (pg. 5).  Dickey explains to us that to deliver a message, especially to todays disconnected population, you have to ground the idea your trying to communicate with something that seems more interesting or entertaining to the masses.  Once you have captured their attention you are able to point out the reality and truth to them, the truth that they refuse to see by looking around.  Even genres of horror like the ghost hunters start off by establishing the history of the buildings they go through, as well as the tragic pasts of the ghosts they are trying to provoke.

Peele does an excellent job in Get Out of building suspense.  By creating those not-quite-right situations, as Dickey put it, he was able to use a realistic character.  Most horror films feature protagonists who are incredibly oblivious and don’t have the sense to pick up the phone and call the cops, or to get in the car and drive away. What is so brilliant about the suspense build up in Get Out, is that nothing too out of the ordinary happens that would make a rational person leave a girl he’s been dating for months, until its too late.

So what dose this movie say about our current situation as a nation? Looking at the bonus features on the film there was a Q&A panel with Jordan Peele and someone asked him about his favorite scene in the movie.  Peele responded, saying that he enjoyed the insecurities revealed in the garden party: “When you have older white people trying to connect with a younger black man the insecurities come out in a weird way.”  Watching the movie, you find out that the whole purpose of the garden party was for these people to evaluate the possibility of buying Chris at the auction, which only adds another theatrical layer to the racist situation on display. Every time Chris meets with a potential buyer they let out some awkward piece of conversation as their way of trying to connect with someone with racial and cultural differences.  All the other black people on the question panel agreed that this scene had a lot of truth behind it, and said that they do have to suffer through situations like this regularly

One of the biggest eye openers for me when I watched this movie is the character Rose.  She is a powerful persuader and a master of lies, and to me, she reveals the most about our culture’s divide when she tries to talk down Chris as a way to prove to him she and her family are not racist.  Rose will go on little tangents with Chris as her audience about her family having black servants, the way he was treated by a cop, or how her family and friends are just “so white.”  Hearing her overcompensate as a way to try and come off as sincere reminded me of the same thing I see on social media every day.  White people will see a video of police brutality on twitter and quote it with some witty caption and think that they have just made peace with the whole black community.  The way they go into great lengths online about civil rights and social responsibility reminded me of the same empty way that Rose would overcompensate so that her cover wouldn’t be blown.  I know that these people’s words are hallow because I spend time with them in real life and know for a fact that they are not actually doing anything to change the current situation, or to give up the privilege they’ve been born with.  

Overall, this movie is a great tribute to its genre and does a great job reflecting national anxieties and problematic attitudes.  Watching this movie again after in class discussions about zombies and Haitian culture, I was able to notice a lot of parallels between Get Out and movies like White Zombie.  A lot of the ideas and theories presented in Freud’s The Uncanny, are revealed in this film.  Peele does a great job of building suspense in this movie while delivering a powerful message at the same time, and I would recommend this movie to any fan of Horror.

Work Cited

“Putting the Undead to Work” David Inglis

“The Uncanny” Sigmund Freud

“Ghostland” Collin Dickey

[stargleeksil-blog]

Criminal Minds s04e06 The Instincts review - or more aptly named, the episode where I fall in love with both Matthew and Shemar and I love their bromance

Episode 06 – The Instincts

He guys! So I’m ready for another day of reviewing CM episodes … and as much as I want to feel welcoming towards Jordan, I can’t, because she poses a threat to my favorite ship on this show and it’s not fair that it’s not cannon yet. Sigh.

All right, let’s see what happens.

Talk about a dramatic entrance.

Wait. Where’s Derek? I don’t like this.

Pretty poodle.

They’ve gone into a basement, and found a body.

I hope it’s not dead.

Wait. What? A six-year-old kid is dead? Oh god.

A BABY?????

What the fuck?

That’s JJ’s baby?

Oh thank fuck, it was just a dream. Fuck.

“Ha, no kidding.”

Oh my god, you little shit, Emily!

“You know, Reid, simple dream analysis, if there’s a baby in your dreams, that baby’s actually you.”

Since when is Derek into psychological analysis crap? I just wet myself.

“I don’t believe in dream analysis.” WHAT?

“Maybe your subconscious is telling you, you want to sit this one out.”

“I don’t.”

Don’t tell my poodle what his subconscious is telling him! Everyone’s trying to help poodle and he just wants to bury himself in the sand, but he can’t , because he’s 30,000 feet up in the air in a metal box with six other people who can read him like the palm of their hands lol.

“Why aren’t we reviewing the case?”

“I don’t know. Maybe because someone fell asleep on the jet.”

EMILY! Stop making fun of my poodle!

Shit. We’re dealing with child abduction and murder. I’m not gonna be able to handle this. JJ is a future mother, poodle is an emotional bunny, and Derek is a compassionate puppy, and I can’t handle this.

Amos Bronson Alcott: “Who speaks to the instincts speaks to the deepest in mankind and finds the readiest response.” Okay, I need to finish my coffee before this one can make sense.

Oh god. They actually have to look at a body of a little boy, oh my god, my heart is ripping in seven.

“He was being starved?”

Oh dear lord.

Wait. So he was being starved, but getting nutrients? That makes no sense. Especially since there are no signs that he was given them via IV.

“Call it intuition.”

Lovely JJ.

Also, lady, not nice.

I don’t like her.

Awesome. Garcia is trapping and tracing the call.

Wait. He called to tell her she’s a bad mom? Oh my god, that guy is one sick asshole.

And how did he get a voice-distorter on a cellphone? Can you even do that?

Damn it. I don’t like where this is heading at all.

SLEEPING POODLE

Awww, is he having the dream again? Wait, he looks disheveled enough to have just woken up. Is he literally going into the basement? Wait.

Oh thank god. It’s the dream.

Ha. But in this dream instead of Prentiss and Hotch, it’s Rossi and Morgan. But Morgan looks dangerous and angry. I don’t like it.

Oh dear lord. They had leeches on him.

Bah.

Aw, Morgan waking my poodle from a dream.

Hey, dick! You can see that poodle agent is only a kid, let him be!

“These cases get to all of us.”

Damn straight. I can’t even watch this in one sitting for fear I’m going to throw up or throw a hissy fit.

But Morgan comforting someone is the best thing of all.

And my poodle is so adorable, I just want to gather him up in my arms (though that’d be something, because I’m probably half his height) and snuggle him.

Okay. That is enough for me. How can any color he chooses look good on my chocolate Adonis? It’s simply unfair. He looks good in white, beige, red, black. FUCK YOU, YOU GORGEOUS SPECIMEN!

Okay, Derek dressing in a jacket shouldn’t be hot. But it is.

I’m sorry, but if it weren’t so serious, I’d be thinking that Morgan was telling him it’s time for them to get married or something. I can’t. I’m awful.

“When I was a kid, every boy I knew had piles of dinosaur toys.”

“Not you?”

“I had books and notebooks.”

Of course you did. XD

Reid trying to analyze his dreams and then,

“I thought you didn’t believe in dream analysis.”

“Freud’s been discredited but Jung still has his merits.”

Wait. Freud has been discredited? Really? Good to know.

Wait. My poodle had been dreaming this awful dream since he was a kid? Oh my god.

“I just want to find this boy.”

Okay, so turns out I’m into polyamory. I’m in love with both Matthew Gray Gubler and with Shemar Moore.

Hey, Jane! I love your eighties hairdo. XD

“I’ve been here before.” Wait what?

Bam. Emily has eyes on the weirdo.

“Where were you on the days Ethan Hayes and Michael Bridges were abducted?”

“I was home.”

Wait …

“Don’t you need to ask what days those were?”

OH! You’re busted, freak.

Okay, listen up, dude, you can’t get away with it. You’re a freak, and you need to be put away.

And you need to tell us where Michael is.

Now.

“The name Riley Jenkins mean anything to you?”

“No.”

“Think. Back to when you were a little boy.”

“I had an imaginary friend named Riley when I was little.”

“Riley Jenkins. He was murdered right here in Las Vegas when he was six years old. My math says that you would have been around four at the time.”

“He was found in the basement of his own house, behind the dryer.”

Oh shit.

“He’d been sexually abused and stabbed.”

Oh my god. So the dreams were actually the trauma he went through when he was four? Oh my poodle!

“He doesn’t know the details of the murder.”

Frack. It’s not him.

Poor kid.

Wait. So it might be a lady now? Oh god.

I love you, my perfect genius.

“A male wouldn’t reference specific details like that.”

And that’s why they pay him the big bucks.

Derek said the word ‘love’. Shit. I’m hooked.

Wait. So she might have been institutionalized? Oh boy.

So Garcia can’t find the lady, but because Reid’s mom is in one of those places, he can help.

YAY.

Well, not yay per se, but still. YAY.

JANE! She actually gets to interact with Matt in this episode! I’m so freaking happy!

“Did I know a boy named Riley Jenkins?”

“Riley Jenkins … he was a story you made up.”

“No. No. he was a real kid who was murdered when I was four years old.”

“Oh, I think you’re mistaken.”

“I’ve been seeing things.”

“Don’t say that.”

“I’ve been having dreams about his death since I was little, mom.”

“You were always a reader. It affected your dreams.”

“I remember, when I was four, we went to a funeral.”

“Your Uncle Daniel’s, maybe?”

“I also remembered we moved houses. And you and dad argued about it. And you told dad that I was in danger.”

“Because you were.”

Wait, what?

“Why … why would you think that?”

“I don’t know. I just knew. I told you, a mother knows. We’re animals, Spencer, we feel things.”

I don’t get it.

Wait. What did my poodle just realize? Oh god.

Wait what? So they get nutrients through breastfeeding at the age of five? Oh god.

“What is it, Garcia?”

Oh god. The lady lost her child to social services when her baby was seven days old, so she’s basically going bananas and nuts and taking kids for seven days. Oh god.

Why did she pour gasoline? I don’t like where this is going.

Oh god, someone stop her before she throws that kid in the fire. Please.

I’m sorry. But seeing him with a gun is nothing short of ridiculous to me.

Oh thank god, it wasn’t the actual kid, Reid’s got him. Thank fuck.

Oh god. This is the cutest picture ever. I want it framed.

Oh thank god. She dropped toys into the fire and not an actual kid. Phew.

“I believe you could have done anything in the world with your life and you chose this job. Your man Carl Jung says our unconscious is the key to our life’s pursuits.”

Wait. So now Derek is quoting people? I LOVE YOU!

“So, for whatever reason, that case was stuck in your brain all these years and it not only led you to this career choice but to the same city where your mother lives. And for us to have the opportunity to save chis child.”

You perfect puppy, you!

Reid wants to stay another night.

And then Hotch turns to Morgan, “Do you think you can find something to do in Las Vegas for the night?” SERIOUSLY?????

Oh my god I love this show.

Bob Dylan: “I think the truly natural things are dreams, which nature can’t touch with decay.” Yo, that man was deep. And for some reason, I just read that in a Jamaican accent because I always confuse Bob Dylan with Bob Marley, and I KNOW I’m gonna get skewered in the replies to this one. Sorry guys!

So Spencer wants to spend the night in his mom’s room, and she’s like: “If anyone tries to keep him here any longer, I’ll scratch your eyes out.”

Who said she wasn’t a good mother? Diana Reid is amazing.

By the way, I just had a little glimpse of Sue Sylvester there. I LOVE IT!

Also, it’s unfair how gorgeous this man is.

SLEEPING POODLE

Wait. So he dreamt that his dad had killed that kid? Why?

 Okay, so this episode was gorgeous on every possible level. It was equally tragic, emotional, and had a bit of humor in the beginning and the end which evened it out. But it was a very serious episode and I actually so appreciated how focused they were on Reid in this episode, because it gave us a glimpse into his past, and how despite him being a boy genius and everything, there are some things he’s repressing, and at the end of the day, he’s just this little boy with a dark past like Derek, and they aren’t so different after all. I love this show so freaking much.

I’ll catch you all next time, I have to go do some groceries shopping if I don’t want to eat crap for the next week ;)

I love you all, and appreciate you taking the time to read this shit <3 love you!

And as always, here are some photos that didn’t make it in the cut above.

[beardcore-blog]

A Princess Diary

"What’s Wrong With Cinderella?"

I finally came unhinged in the dentist’s office — one of those ritzy pediatric practices tricked out with comic books, DVDs and arcade games — where I’d taken my 3-year-old daughter for her first exam. Until then, I’d held my tongue. I’d smiled politely every time the supermarket-checkout clerk greeted her with ”Hi, Princess”; ignored the waitress at our local breakfast joint who called the funny-face pancakes she ordered her ”princess meal”; made no comment when the lady at Longs Drugs said, ”I bet I know your favorite color” and handed her a pink balloon rather than letting her choose for herself. Maybe it was the dentist’s Betty Boop inflection that got to me, but when she pointed to the exam chair and said, ”Would you like to sit in my special princess throne so I can sparkle your teeth?” I lost it.

”Oh, for God’s sake,” I snapped. ”Do you have a princess drill, too?”

She stared at me as if I were an evil stepmother.

”Come on!” I continued, my voice rising. ”It’s 2006, not 1950. This is Berkeley, Calif. Does every little girl really have to be a princess?”

My daughter, who was reaching for a Cinderella sticker, looked back and forth between us. ”Why are you so mad, Mama?” she asked. ”What’s wrong with princesses?”

Diana may be dead and Masako disgraced, but here in America, we are in the midst of a royal moment. To call princesses a ”trend” among girls is like calling Harry Potter a book. Sales at Disney Consumer Products, which started the craze six years ago by packaging nine of its female characters under one royal rubric, have shot up to $3 billion, globally, this year, from $300 million in 2001. There are now more than 25,000 Disney Princess items. ”Princess,” as some Disney execs call it, is not only the fastest-growing brand the company has ever created; they say it is on its way to becoming the largest girls’ franchise on the planet.

Meanwhile in 2001, Mattel brought out its own ”world of girl” line of princess Barbie dolls, DVDs, toys, clothing, home décor and myriad other products. At a time when Barbie sales were declining domestically, they became instant best sellers. Shortly before that, Mary Drolet, a Chicago-area mother and former Claire’s and Montgomery Ward executive, opened Club Libby Lu, now a chain of mall stores based largely in the suburbs in which girls ages 4 to 12 can shop for ”Princess Phones” covered in faux fur and attend ”Princess-Makeover Birthday Parties.” Saks bought Club Libby Lu in 2003 for $12 million and has since expanded it to 87 outlets; by 2005, with only scant local advertising, revenues hovered around the $46 million mark, a 53 percent jump from the previous year. Pink, it seems, is the new gold.

Even Dora the Explorer, the intrepid, dirty-kneed adventurer, has ascended to the throne: in 2004, after a two-part episode in which she turns into a ”true princess,” the Nickelodeon and Viacom consumer-products division released a satin-gowned ”Magic Hair Fairytale Dora,” with hair that grows or shortens when her crown is touched. Among other phrases the bilingual doll utters: ”Vámonos! Let’s go to fairy-tale land!” and ”Will you brush my hair?”

As a feminist mother — not to mention a nostalgic product of the Grranimals era — I have been taken by surprise by the princess craze and the girlie-girl culture that has risen around it. What happened to William wanting a doll and not dressing your cat in an apron? Whither Marlo Thomas? I watch my fellow mothers, women who once swore they’d never be dependent on a man, smile indulgently at daughters who warble ”So This Is Love” or insist on being called Snow White. I wonder if they’d concede so readily to sons who begged for combat fatigues and mock AK-47s.

More to the point, when my own girl makes her daily beeline for the dress-up corner of her preschool classroom — something I’m convinced she does largely to torture me — I worry about what playing Little Mermaid is teaching her. I’ve spent much of my career writing about experiences that undermine girls’ well-being, warning parents that a preoccupation with body and beauty (encouraged by films, TV, magazines and, yes, toys) is perilous to their daughters’ mental and physical health. Am I now supposed to shrug and forget all that? If trafficking in stereotypes doesn’t matter at 3, when does it matter? At 6? Eight? Thirteen?

On the other hand, maybe I’m still surfing a washed-out second wave of feminism in a third-wave world. Maybe princesses are in fact a sign of progress, an indication that girls can embrace their predilection for pink without compromising strength or ambition; that, at long last, they can ”have it all.” Or maybe it is even less complex than that: to mangle Freud, maybe a princess is sometimes just a princess. And, as my daughter wants to know, what’s wrong with that?

The rise of the Disney princesses reads like a fairy tale itself, with Andy Mooney, a former Nike executive, playing the part of prince, riding into the company on a metaphoric white horse in January 2000 to save a consumer-products division whose sales were dropping by as much as 30 percent a year. Both overstretched and underfocused, the division had triggered price wars by granting multiple licenses for core products (say, Winnie-the-Pooh undies) while ignoring the potential of new media. What’s more, Disney films like ”A Bug’s Life” in 1998 had yielded few merchandising opportunities — what child wants to snuggle up with an ant?

It was about a month after Mooney’s arrival that the magic struck. That’s when he flew to Phoenix to check out his first ”Disney on Ice” show. ”Standing in line in the arena, I was surrounded by little girls dressed head to toe as princesses,” he told me last summer in his palatial office, then located in Burbank, and speaking in a rolling Scottish burr. ”They weren’t even Disney products. They were generic princess products they’d appended to a Halloween costume. And the light bulb went off. Clearly there was latent demand here. So the next morning I said to my team, ‘O.K., let’s establish standards and a color palette and talk to licensees and get as much product out there as we possibly can that allows these girls to do what they’re doing anyway: projecting themselves into the characters from the classic movies.’ ”

Mooney picked a mix of old and new heroines to wear the Pantone pink No. 241 corona: Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Mulan and Pocahontas. It was the first time Disney marketed characters separately from a film’s release, let alone lumped together those from different stories. To ensure the sanctity of what Mooney called their individual ”mythologies,” the princesses never make eye contact when they’re grouped: each stares off in a slightly different direction as if unaware of the others’ presence.

It is also worth noting that not all of the ladies are of royal extraction. Part of the genius of ”Princess” is that its meaning is so broadly constructed that it actually has no meaning. Even Tinker Bell was originally a Princess, though her reign didn’t last. ”We’d always debate over whether she was really a part of the Princess mythology,” Mooney recalled. ”She really wasn’t.” Likewise, Mulan and Pocahontas, arguably the most resourceful of the bunch, are rarely depicted on Princess merchandise, though for a different reason. Their rustic garb has less bling potential than that of old-school heroines like Sleeping Beauty. (When Mulan does appear, she is typically in the kimonolike hanfu, which makes her miserable in the movie, rather than her liberated warrior’s gear.)

The first Princess items, released with no marketing plan, no focus groups, no advertising, sold as if blessed by a fairy godmother. To this day, Disney conducts little market research on the Princess line, relying instead on the power of its legacy among mothers as well as the instant-read sales barometer of the theme parks and Disney Stores. ”We simply gave girls what they wanted,” Mooney said of the line’s success, ”although I don’t think any of us grasped how much they wanted this. I wish I could sit here and take credit for having some grand scheme to develop this, but all we did was envision a little girl’s room and think about how she could live out the princess fantasy. The counsel we gave to licensees was: What type of bedding would a princess want to sleep in? What kind of alarm clock would a princess want to wake up to? What type of television would a princess like to see? It’s a rare case where you find a girl who has every aspect of her room bedecked in Princess, but if she ends up with three or four of these items, well, then you have a very healthy business.”

Every reporter Mooney talks to asks some version of my next question: Aren’t the Princesses, who are interested only in clothes, jewelry and cadging the handsome prince, somewhat retrograde role models?

”Look,” he said, ”I have friends whose son went through the Power Rangers phase who castigated themselves over what they must’ve done wrong. Then they talked to other parents whose kids had gone through it. The boy passes through. The girl passes through. I see girls expanding their imagination through visualizing themselves as princesses, and then they pass through that phase and end up becoming lawyers, doctors, mothers or princesses, whatever the case may be.”

Mooney has a point: There are no studies proving that playing princess directly damages girls’ self-esteem or dampens other aspirations. On the other hand, there is evidence that young women who hold the most conventionally feminine beliefs — who avoid conflict and think they should be perpetually nice and pretty — are more likely to be depressed than others and less likely to use contraception. What’s more, the 23 percent decline in girls’ participation in sports and other vigorous activity between middle and high school has been linked to their sense that athletics is unfeminine. And in a survey released last October by Girls Inc., school-age girls overwhelmingly reported a paralyzing pressure to be ”perfect”: not only to get straight A’s and be the student-body president, editor of the newspaper and captain of the swim team but also to be ”kind and caring,” ”please everyone, be very thin and dress right.” Give those girls a pumpkin and a glass slipper and they’d be in business.

At the grocery store one day, my daughter noticed a little girl sporting a Cinderella backpack. ”There’s that princess you don’t like, Mama!” she shouted.

”Um, yeah,” I said, trying not to meet the other mother’s hostile gaze.

”Don’t you like her blue dress, Mama?”

I had to admit, I did.

She thought about this. ”Then don’t you like her face?”

”Her face is all right,” I said, noncommittally, though I’m not thrilled to have my Japanese-Jewish child in thrall to those Aryan features. (And what the heck are those blue things covering her ears?) ”It’s just, honey, Cinderella doesn’t really do anything.”

Over the next 45 minutes, we ran through that conversation, verbatim, approximately 37 million times, as my daughter pointed out Disney Princess Band-Aids, Disney Princess paper cups, Disney Princess lip balm, Disney Princess pens, Disney Princess crayons and Disney Princess notebooks — all cleverly displayed at the eye level of a 3-year-old trapped in a shopping cart — as well as a bouquet of Disney Princess balloons bobbing over the checkout line. The repetition was excessive, even for a preschooler. What was it about my answers that confounded her? What if, instead of realizing: Aha! Cinderella is a symbol of the patriarchal oppression of all women, another example of corporate mind control and power-to-the-people! my 3-year-old was thinking, Mommy doesn’t want me to be a girl?

According to theories of gender constancy, until they’re about 6 or 7, children don’t realize that the sex they were born with is immutable. They believe that they have a choice: they can grow up to be either a mommy or a daddy. Some psychologists say that until permanency sets in kids embrace whatever stereotypes our culture presents, whether it’s piling on the most spangles or attacking one another with light sabers. What better way to assure that they’ll always remain themselves? If that’s the case, score one for Mooney. By not buying the Princess Pull-Ups, I may be inadvertently communicating that being female (to the extent that my daughter is able to understand it) is a bad thing.

Anyway, you have to give girls some credit. It’s true that, according to Mattel, one of the most popular games young girls play is ”bride,” but Disney found that a groom or prince is incidental to that fantasy, a regrettable necessity at best. Although they keep him around for the climactic kiss, he is otherwise relegated to the bottom of the toy box, which is why you don’t see him prominently displayed in stores.

What’s more, just because they wear the tulle doesn’t mean they’ve drunk the Kool-Aid. Plenty of girls stray from the script, say, by playing basketball in their finery, or casting themselves as the powerful evil stepsister bossing around the sniveling Cinderella. I recall a headline-grabbing 2005 British study that revealed that girls enjoy torturing, decapitating and microwaving their Barbies nearly as much as they like to dress them up for dates. There is spice along with that sugar after all, though why this was news is beyond me: anyone who ever played with the doll knows there’s nothing more satisfying than hacking off all her hair and holding her underwater in the bathtub. Princesses can even be a boon to exasperated parents: in our house, for instance, royalty never whines and uses the potty every single time.

”Playing princess is not the issue,” argues Lyn Mikel Brown, an author, with Sharon Lamb, of ”Packaging Girlhood: Rescuing Our Daughters From Marketers’ Schemes.” ”The issue is 25,000 Princess products,” says Brown, a professor of education and human development at Colby College. ”When one thing is so dominant, then it’s no longer a choice: it’s a mandate, cannibalizing all other forms of play. There’s the illusion of more choices out there for girls, but if you look around, you’ll see their choices are steadily narrowing.”

It’s hard to imagine that girls’ options could truly be shrinking when they dominate the honor roll and outnumber boys in college. Then again, have you taken a stroll through a children’s store lately? A year ago, when we shopped for ”big girl” bedding at Pottery Barn Kids, we found the ”girls” side awash in flowers, hearts and hula dancers; not a soccer player or sailboat in sight. Across the no-fly zone, the ”boys” territory was all about sports, trains, planes and automobiles. Meanwhile, Baby GAP’s boys’ onesies were emblazoned with ”Big Man on Campus” and the girls’ with ”Social Butterfly”; guess whose matching shoes were decorated on the soles with hearts and whose sported a ”No. 1” logo? And at Toys ”R” Us, aisles of pink baby dolls, kitchens, shopping carts and princesses unfurl a safe distance from the ”Star Wars” figures, GeoTrax and tool chests. The relentless resegregation of childhood appears to have sneaked up without any further discussion about sex roles, about what it now means to be a boy or to be a girl. Or maybe it has happened in lieu of such discussion because it’s easier this way.

Easier, that is, unless you want to buy your daughter something that isn’t pink. Girls’ obsession with that color may seem like something they’re born with, like the ability to breathe or talk on the phone for hours on end. But according to Jo Paoletti, an associate professor of American studies at the University of Maryland, it ain’t so. When colors were first introduced to the nursery in the early part of the 20th century, pink was considered the more masculine hue, a pastel version of red. Blue, with its intimations of the Virgin Mary, constancy and faithfulness, was thought to be dainty. Why or when that switched is not clear, but as late as the 1930s a significant percentage of adults in one national survey held to that split. Perhaps that’s why so many early Disney heroines — Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Wendy, Alice-in-Wonderland — are swathed in varying shades of azure. (Purple, incidentally, may be the next color to swap teams: once the realm of kings and N.F.L. players, it is fast becoming the bolder girl’s version of pink.)

It wasn’t until the mid-1980s, when amplifying age and sex differences became a key strategy of children’s marketing (recall the emergence of ” ‘tween”), that pink became seemingly innate to girls, part of what defined them as female, at least for the first few years. That was also the time that the first of the generation raised during the unisex phase of feminism — ah, hither Marlo! — became parents. ”The kids who grew up in the 1970s wanted sharp definitions for their own kids,” Paoletti told me. ”I can understand that, because the unisex thing denied everything — you couldn’t be this, you couldn’t be that, you had to be a neutral nothing.”

The infatuation with the girlie girl certainly could, at least in part, be a reaction against the so-called second wave of the women’s movement of the 1960s and ’70s (the first wave was the fight for suffrage), which fought for reproductive rights and economic, social and legal equality. If nothing else, pink and Princess have resuscitated the fantasy of romance that that era of feminism threatened, the privileges that traditional femininity conferred on women despite its costs — doors magically opened, dinner checks picked up, Manolo Blahniks. Frippery. Fun. Why should we give up the perks of our sex until we’re sure of what we’ll get in exchange? Why should we give them up at all? Or maybe it’s deeper than that: the freedoms feminism bestowed came with an undercurrent of fear among women themselves — flowing through ”Ally McBeal,” ”Bridget Jones’s Diary,” ”Sex and the City” — of losing male love, of never marrying, of not having children, of being deprived of something that felt essentially and exclusively female.

I mulled that over while flipping through ”The Paper Bag Princess,” a 1980 picture book hailed as an antidote to Disney. The heroine outwits a dragon who has kidnapped her prince, but not before the beast’s fiery breath frizzles her hair and destroys her dress, forcing her to don a paper bag. The ungrateful prince rejects her, telling her to come back when she is ”dressed like a real princess.” She dumps him and skips off into the sunset, happily ever after, alone.

There you have it, ”Thelma and Louise” all over again. Step out of line, and you end up solo or, worse, sailing crazily over a cliff to your doom. Alternatives like those might send you skittering right back to the castle. And I get that: the fact is, though I want my daughter to do and be whatever she wants as an adult, I still hope she’ll find her Prince Charming and have babies, just as I have. I don’t want her to be a fish without a bicycle; I want her to be a fish with another fish. Preferably, one who loves and respects her and also does the dishes and half the child care.

There had to be a middle ground between compliant and defiant, between petticoats and paper bags. I remembered a video on YouTube, an ad for a Nintendo game called Super Princess Peach. It showed a pack of girls in tiaras, gowns and elbow-length white gloves sliding down a zip line on parasols, navigating an obstacle course of tires in their stilettos, slithering on their bellies under barbed wire, then using their telekinetic powers to make a climbing wall burst into flames. ”If you can stand up to really mean people,” an announcer intoned, ”maybe you have what it takes to be a princess.”

Now here were some girls who had grit as well as grace. I loved Princess Peach even as I recognized that there was no way she could run in those heels, that her peachiness did nothing to upset the apple cart of expectation: she may have been athletic, smart and strong, but she was also adorable. Maybe she’s what those once-unisex, postfeminist parents are shooting for: the melding of old and new standards. And perhaps that’s a good thing, the ideal solution. But what to make, then, of the young women in the Girls Inc. survey? It doesn’t seem to be ”having it all” that’s getting to them; it’s the pressure to be it all. In telling our girls they can be anything, we have inadvertently demanded that they be everything. To everyone. All the time. No wonder the report was titled ”The Supergirl Dilemma.”

The princess as superhero is not irrelevant. Some scholars I spoke with say that given its post-9/11 timing, princess mania is a response to a newly dangerous world. ”Historically, princess worship has emerged during periods of uncertainty and profound social change,” observes Miriam Forman-Brunell, a historian at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Francis Hodgson Burnett’s original”Little Princess” was published at a time of rapid urbanization, immigration and poverty; Shirley Temple’s film version was a hit during the Great Depression. ”The original folk tales themselves,” Forman-Brunell says, ”spring from medieval and early modern European culture that faced all kinds of economic and demographic and social upheaval — famine, war, disease, terror of wolves. Girls play savior during times of economic crisis and instability.” That’s a heavy burden for little shoulders. Perhaps that’s why the magic wand has become an essential part of the princess get-up. In the original stories — even the Disney versions of them — it’s not the girl herself who’s magic; it’s the fairy godmother. Now if Forman-Brunell is right, we adults have become the cursed creatures whom girls have the thaumaturgic power to transform.

In the 1990s, third-wave feminists rebelled against their dour big sisters, ”reclaiming” sexual objectification as a woman’s right — provided, of course, that it was on her own terms, that she was the one choosing to strip or wear a shirt that said ”Porn Star” or make out with her best friend at a frat-house bash. They embraced words like ”bitch” and ”slut” as terms of affection and empowerment. That is, when used by the right people, with the right dash of playful irony. But how can you assure that? As Madonna gave way to Britney, whatever self-determination that message contained was watered down and commodified until all that was left was a gaggle of 6-year-old girls in belly-baring T-shirts (which I’m guessing they don’t wear as cultural critique). It is no wonder that parents, faced with thongs for 8-year-olds and Bratz dolls’ ”passion for fashion,” fill their daughters’ closets with pink sateen; the innocence of Princess feels like a reprieve.

”But what does that mean?” asks Sharon Lamb, a psychology professor at Saint Michael’s College. ”There are other ways to express ‘innocence’ — girls could play ladybug or caterpillar. What you’re really talking about is sexual purity. And there’s a trap at the end of that rainbow, because the natural progression from pale, innocent pink is not to other colors. It’s to hot, sexy pink — exactly the kind of sexualization parents are trying to avoid.”

Lamb suggested that to see for myself how ”Someday My Prince Will Come” morphs into ”Oops! I Did It Again,” I visit Club Libby Lu, the mall shop dedicated to the ”Very Important Princess.”

Walking into one of the newest links in the store’s chain, in Natick, Mass., last summer, I had to tip my tiara to the founder, Mary Drolet: Libby Lu’s design was flawless. Unlike Disney, Drolet depended on focus groups to choose the logo (a crown-topped heart) and the colors (pink, pink, purple and more pink). The displays were scaled to the size of a 10-year-old, though most of the shoppers I saw were several years younger than that. The decals on the walls and dressing rooms — ”I Love Your Hair,” ”Hip Chick,” ”Spoiled” — were written in ”girlfriend language.” The young sales clerks at this ”special secret club for superfabulous girls” are called ”club counselors” and come off like your coolest baby sitter, the one who used to let you brush her hair. The malls themselves are chosen based on a company formula called the G.P.I., or ”Girl Power Index,” which predicts potential sales revenues. Talk about newspeak: ”Girl Power” has gone from a riot grrrrl anthem to ”I Am Woman, Watch Me Shop.”

Inside, the store was divided into several glittery ”shopping zones” called ”experiences”: Libby’s Laboratory, now called Sparkle Spa, where girls concoct their own cosmetics and bath products; Libby’s Room; Ear Piercing; Pooch Parlor (where divas in training can pamper stuffed poodles, pugs and Chihuahuas); and the Style Studio, offering ”Libby Du” makeover choices, including ‘Tween Idol, Rock Star, Pop Star and, of course, Priceless Princess. Each look includes hairstyle, makeup, nail polish and sparkly tattoos.

As I browsed, I noticed a mother standing in the center of the store holding a price list for makeover birthday parties — $22.50 to $35 per child. Her name was Anne McAuliffe; her daughters — Stephanie, 4, and 7-year-old twins Rory and Sarah — were dashing giddily up and down the aisles.

”They’ve been begging to come to this store for three weeks,” McAuliffe said. ”I’d never heard of it. So I said they could, but they’d have to spend their own money if they bought anything.” She looked around. ”Some of this stuff is innocuous,” she observed, then leaned toward me, eyes wide and stage-whispered: ”But … a lot of it is horrible. It makes them look like little prostitutes. It’s crazy. They’re babies!”

As we debated the line between frivolous fun and JonBenét, McAuliffe’s daughter Rory came dashing up, pigtails haphazard, glasses askew. ”They have the best pocketbooks here,” she said breathlessly, brandishing a clutch with the words ”Girlie Girl” stamped on it. ”Please, can I have one? It has sequins!”

”You see that?” McAuliffe asked, gesturing at the bag. ”What am I supposed to say?”

On my way out of the mall, I popped into the ” ‘tween” mecca Hot Topic, where a display of Tinker Bell items caught my eye. Tinker Bell, whose image racks up an annual $400 million in retail sales with no particular effort on Disney’s part, is poised to wreak vengeance on the Princess line that once expelled her. Last winter, the first chapter book designed to introduce girls to Tink and her Pixie Hollow pals spent 18 weeks on The New York Times children’s best-seller list. In a direct-to-DVD now under production, she will speak for the first time, voiced by the actress Brittany Murphy. Next year, Disney Fairies will be rolled out in earnest. Aimed at 6- to 9-year-old girls, the line will catch them just as they outgrow Princess. Their colors will be lavender, green, turquoise — anything but the Princess’s soon-to-be-babyish pink.

To appeal to that older child, Disney executives said, the Fairies will have more ”attitude” and ”sass” than the Princesses. What, I wondered, did that entail? I’d seen some of the Tinker Bell merchandise that Disney sells at its theme parks: T-shirts reading, ”Spoiled to Perfection,” ”Mood Subject to Change Without Notice” and ”Tinker Bell: Prettier Than a Princess.” At Hot Topic, that edge was even sharper: magnets, clocks, light-switch plates and panties featured ”Dark Tink,” described as ”the bad girl side of Miss Bell that Walt never saw.”

Girl power, indeed.

A few days later, I picked my daughter up from preschool. She came tearing over in a full-skirted frock with a gold bodice, a beaded crown perched sideways on her head. ”Look, Mommy, I’m Ariel!” she crowed. referring to Disney’s Little Mermaid. Then she stopped and furrowed her brow. ”Mommy, do you like Ariel?”

I considered her for a moment. Maybe Princess is the first salvo in what will become a lifelong struggle over her body image, a Hundred Years’ War of dieting, plucking, painting and perpetual dissatisfaction with the results. Or maybe it isn’t. I’ll never really know. In the end, it’s not the Princesses that really bother me anyway. They’re just a trigger for the bigger question of how, over the years, I can help my daughter with the contradictions she will inevitably face as a girl, the dissonance that is as endemic as ever to growing up female. Maybe the best I can hope for is that her generation will get a little further with the solutions than we did.

For now, I kneeled down on the floor and gave my daughter a hug.

She smiled happily. ”But, Mommy?” she added. ”When I grow up, I’m still going to be a fireman.”

– by Peggy Orenstein, for the New York Times Magazine (December 2006)

Posted by lukewho on 2007-01-01 19:50:52

Tagged: , fremont , christmas , 2006 , jacinto , princess , disney

The post A Princess Diary appeared first on Good Info.

[lykanthropa]

Support Class

Chapter 10: Who is the coward here?

When Medic wakes up in the morning, the cold had penetrated his bones. Presumably, he had been woken up by that, even though he was embedded in thick hay. But the barn has cracks and holes in its wooden walls that let in the cold air. At night it’s unbearable. He looks around for his dove. Archimedes sits on a crossbeam above him and watches over his owner. He had fluffed up and looks like a big plush ball. “Guten Morgen, Archimedes.” Hans' voice draws the attention of his dove and it flutters down to him and settles on his shoulder to rub against his cheek. “I know it's cold. You're not used to that anymore, are you?” “Coo~” “Maybe we should move to a state where it's always warm. Or are we too soft? Years of desert sun probably spoiled us too much. Or what do you mean?” “Coo~” “Hahaha.” “Are you talking with your dove again?” Hans' homeless roommate is just climbing the ladder up to their sleeping place. He hadn't noticed that he was not there at all. “Ah, Ben. Good Morning. Are you always awake so early?” “Of course. I never sleep long during the winter. The risk of freezing is far too great.” “Well, I don't want to take your hay from you.” “You are my guest. So you get the most hay. Besides, you are driving again today. Then I have everything for myself again.” A smile flash over Hans' face. “Tell me, does your dove understand you? Or is that just a matter of habituation? When you live alone, you start to talk to all kinds of things.” “Alone I was only in my childhood. And yes... I think Archimedes understands me. More or less. I definitely understand him.” “Is that so?” “Oh yes.” “How does this work?” “Well, there is no particular trick behind it. I have him for so long. The more time you spend with someone, the better ... the better you understand him...” Hans has to swallow a big lump when he realizes how homesickness spreads in him. Homesick for his family, deep in the desert. In the other world… “Then you are something like a pigeon breeder? So hobby-wise? Heard that these people should have a very intimate relationship with their animals. I wish I had a pet. Then I wouldn't feel so alone.” “Are here no stray animals here?” “In this town? Not at all. As you already know, this city is not very animal-loving. Here live smaller animals, such as birds and squirrels. Maybe cats or goldfish are kept in some houses.” “…... would you like to have a house here?” “As I said, this is my home town. No matter how cold people are here. Not for all the money in the world I would want to live somewhere else.” “I see. Where have you been by the way?” “Just outside to do a few warm up exercises. I do that every morning. Warm me up in the fresh air after a cold night. This is life. You cannot understand that, eh? I didn't mean to mention that, but you've appear very affluent on me since the first moment. But now I know that you are a doctor.” “Well, now that I'm away from my old job, I don't earn any more money and so I'm more or less destitute.” “Such a comedown can happen very quickly.” “It wasn't a comedown. It's just... My past caught up with me. I made only one mistake, and that cost me my old life.” The only mistake I made was that I ignored Friedrich's thoroughness. I should have known he made a copy of Mann Co.'s letter. I would have had to turn his whole office upside down. I maneuvered myself into this situation. It's all my fault. “You seem depressed right now. I'm sorry if I said something wrong.” “It's not your fault. Only mine. I have to rearrange my life. But that's not easy when people treat me that way.” “Don't forget that you have many fellow sufferers. Like me, for example.” “Yes, thanks… Ach, I should go now.” “Do you really want to go now? Wait for the afternoon train.” “No, I want to go now. The sooner the better. You have helped me a lot. Thank you for this.” “The nearest town is one and a half days away. So you don't have to worry about a night place. But if you want to take the morning train, we should go now.” Hans rubs the grit out of his eyes. Without water, it's a bit difficult. “If you want to wash up, use the snow outside.” “………” “Don’t worry, it’s white.” “I'm not afraid of foreign body fluids. It's just ... That just reminded me of someone.” “Coo~” “What did he say?” “Oh, Archimedes just wants to comfort me.” Hans strokes his dove's head. “I don't know what I would do without him, now that I have no one left." “Times can change.” “The same goes for you.” “My life doesn’t have to change. I’m really happy as it is now.” Hans nods. “Let's go. In ten minutes the train arrives.” “Alright. Come on, get into your cage, Archimedes.” He opens the birdcage and the dove flies in. He notices the grin on Ben's face. “I still can't believe it” he says, shaking his head and climb down the ladder. “Throw down your suitcase. I will catch it.” Ben skilful catches it, so Hans has a free hand to hold the cage and climb down the ladder. “Hmm... For having to start a new life, you really have little luggage. The suitcase is not even half as heavy as it looks.” “Heavy… Well, I'm just not a big friend of weighing tons luggage.” “I can understand that.” Hans pulls his jacket closer around the body before he divest Ben the suitcase and they step out of the barn. It's snowing again. The whole sky is gray. Just like yesterday too. It's really time for Hans to move on before Archimedes is getting sick. Hans himself already feels a little sickly. His thoughts want to digress back to his old life. He can only prevent this with great difficulty. The time heals wounds. At some point he will not think about this Team anymore. Maybe every now and then. But then these memories will be nothing more than faded, meaningless images without any meaning. Hans can hardly wait for this time. But he is afraid of dreams. The last two nights were dreamless. But eventually they will come. Them, Hans fears the most.

The streets are dead. Silence lies over the city. The only thing that can be heard are the crunching sounds that Hans and his companion make when they walk across the snow. “Beautiful, isn't it? This silence, this white and the almost invisible fog. Almost like a dream. I love the winter.” “That's why you always get up so early?” “Yes. Then it is as if the city belongs to me alone. But that's only in winter. In spring and summer people are more active. Also in the early morning. I don't feel well in these seasons.” “What about autumn?” “Hmm... autumn is a mix between winter and summer. Warm and cold. This season, I use to adjust myself. What do you like?” “Rain. I like the rain. Therefore, autumn is my favorite season.” Especially with lightning and thunder to expedite certain experiments. But that's all past now... “And then you choose a life in the desert? As far as I know, it rarely rains there.” “There are several reasons for this. Anyway, it was not a wrong decision.” “Well, in life, something changes again and again. And now it's time again to start a new section. Be glad that you get the autumn back. Unless you want to live in a desert again. There are more than enough of them in this country.” “No... no, I think a desert as a place of residence is out of the question for me no more. Well, I guess, I'm already too old for my former job anyway.” “Do you think so? Doctors can still practice their profession in old age. That is, as long as they feel fit. And you still seem to be very fit.” “Haha... Thank you. And um... would you like to be treated by a doctor who doesn't have a license to practice?” “You mean a license to heal? I'm not picky.” “Nice to hear.” “Besides, I think that these people have a certain amount of knowledge about medicine, otherwise they wouldn't decide for that kind of job. License aside.” That's how Hans met Ben. Completely optimistic. And that for a homeless man. It's almost a shame he has to leave this good man behind in this stuffy little town.

When they pass the main square, some townspeople bustle in front of a large building. “What is that?” “This is the house of the mayor.” “Standing every day so many people in front of his house?” “No, not really. Only if there is something to complain about. And I have the unfair feeling that you are the reason.” “My presence got about quickly.” “In a town like this, everything spreads faster than wildfire, which scares people here.” “Do no harm…” “What?” “This is written on the bust of Hippocrates.” “I'm sorry. But I don't understand that much.” “No problem. What I'm trying to say is that I've become a doctor to help people. Of course, you have to make a few sacrifices now and then, but that happens after all for the good of humanity and in the name of science.” Hans sighs sadly. “I miss the good old days of lobotomy. Unfortunately, I never got the chance to do it once. Which of course doesn't mean that I cannot do it anyway, hehe.” “There he is!” “Hmm?!” The cluster of people is suddenly moving toward Hans and Ben. Led by a small, fat man with a walrus moustache and a small cylinder on his bald head. Two meters from Hans, he and his followers come to a halt. Apparently they don't dare get any closer. “Hello, Mr… German?” “…my name is Hans Ludwig Freud.” Hans knows that he has to be patient with these people, but that greeting is already giving him a bad mood. “Okay, Hantz Lutwik Fruit.” “………” “My name is Benjamin Loire. I am the mayor of this small town.” “And what can I do for you?” “I really do not want to be rude, but...” The man in his mid-forties tugs nervously at his sash. “I have to ask you to leave this town.” When the mayor said that, he takes half a step backwards, while trying to look Hans in the eye self-confidently. Hans stays silent. Of course he should tell them that he is on his way to the train station, but he has just come up with a devilish idea. The people here really seem to be afraid of him. Why not take advantage of it? Hans puts down his suitcase and cage on the floor and takes a step towards the townspeople, on his face forms a malicious smile. “Why should I oblige?” It's clear to see how the mayor has to swallow a big lump. “B-because, because err…” “Because what?” Loire winces. The people behind him, too. They seem to say and do everything the mayor says and does. And if he's afraid of someone, then they are also afraid. “Heh! Why should I go? I like it here. I want to settle here.” “But you can not stay here! You are a… German.” “Hmpf! I didn't know you need qualifications for an American town to live in. And I've never seen a sign that says I'm not welcome here.” “Our town is small and is hardly noticed. We never thought that just a German would get lost here. And that you would make common cause with a German I would have thought like never!” The words of the mayor addressed to Ben are sharp. But old Ben remains unimpressed. “You don't care what I do. But as soon as I welcome a stranger, you notice me again?” “He is not just any stranger! He is a-“ “Enough! Bad enough that there doesn't seem to be any hospitality in this town. But treating someone like that from your own ranks is disgusting! I come from a place where everyone treated the other with decency and respect. Well, at least that's how it was most of the time... You don't care that someone born in this city has no home. Did you ever offer shelter to him? Do you donate food to him every now and then? Do you share your clothes with him so that he doesn't have to freeze in the winter?” The people stay silent. “I anticipated as much. I always thought that people, especially in small towns, take care of each other. After all, these are the places where everyone knows everyone. This man…” Hans puts a hand on Ben's shoulder. “He was the only one who welcomed me. He shared his food with me, although it was not much. Despite his position, he always had a smile on his face. And although he keeps telling me that he is as happy with his life as it is, I still know that he, too, has certain desires that he, as a homeless person, cannot afford.” Oh mein Gott… What am I talking about? Is that me? Or am I losing my mind? I want back home! “Be that as it may. Anyway, I'll stay here. And I'm sure we'll all get along very well, hehe.” Hans' devilish grin returns and the people move together closer intimidated. The former mercenary doesn't feel well with it. He would have liked to leave finally. But after this fuss, I cannot just go now. But whatever. Then this is just my new home. It's not that bad either. The repellent behavior of the people is very annoying, but after a few weeks they have become used to me. Maybe I should run for a post as mayor, no, as a god! Then I can shape this town and the people to my will. Muhahahahaha!! But first I need a job and a roof over my head. Hans claps his hands. “So, which house is still empty?” People stare at him with wide eyes. Wondering, Hans turns to Ben. He, too, looks at him with almost as big eyes. “What’s wrong?” “A-OK! But... If you really want to live here and win the trust of people to be voted as mayor, you should keep your diabolical laugh for yourself. Well, nevertheless, you already have my vote.” Ben knocks him friendly on the back. “Wherefrom...? Oh... I probably spoke my thoughts aloud.” “Loud and clear.” How uncomfortable. “Pah! As if a German could carry the office of a mayor! And that in America.” The little mayor suddenly becomes very courageous. “This is my town! And I will not let a megalomaniac madman take control! And you will not get a house here either!” “I have money.” “We do not want your Nazi Gold!” “My… my what?!?” Hans takes another step towards the mayor and his community. Immediately they make two steps backwards. “I said money, not gold. So much is this city not worth it anyway. Apart from that, you are the only Nazis here!” A startled murmur goes through the crowds. The people are genuinely shocked. “You are trying my patience. You should beg me on knee to stay here with you. I have medical knowledge that you can only dream of. You could learn a lot from me. I could turn this dozily town into a medical metropolis. You need to deal it. You are too cut off from the outside world. I know exactly how it is...” Hans looks deeply into the mayor's eyes. Fear and insecurity are reflected in them. And Hans realizes one thing - no matter how great the fear of him is, the hatred for Germans is even greater. Only over his dead body he would let Hans live in this city, much less give up his office. The reencounter with Friedrich was probably inevitable. But couldn't that have lasted a few more years? At least until World War II is no longer so present in the world. 23 years doesn't seem to be long enough.

An engine howls and suddenly a vehicle is driven into the main square. A van. Hans recognizes it immediately. “Sniper…?!” The van drives through the crowd. The people are running and screaming, disperse. Hans' heart beats like a steam-hammer. But not because people were almost caught by the car, but because he hopes that Mundy came here to pick him up and bring him back home. But something is wrong... Mundy drives like a beginner. Suddenly, Archimedes is cooing loudly in his cage. “What the…?” The Van comes slithering in front of Hans to a halt. It's only a few centimeters between him and the vehicle. He stares in disbelief through the windshield, where a yellow eagle-eye pair is facing him. The driver's door flies open and a black dog jumps out, runs up to Hans and grabs his coat with its teeth to pull him into the van. It's one of Friedrich's Dobermann dogs. He doesn't have a good feeling “L-let me go!” The eagle and a macaw also leave the car and grab his suitcase and Archimedes' cage. “Hey!” Hans can't oppose against the forces of the Doberman and he already stands with one leg in the Van. He hardly finds words when he sees all the animals in the driver's cab. The predator bird, the robin, a... squirrel? How did these animals drive the van? Is that even real? Can he trust his eyes? Maybe he is still sleeping? Or is he in a coma? Did the train have an accident? Is he half frozen in the snow? Anyway. Sniper will blame him in all three cases. “You have already mentioned this sniper several times.” Hans grits his teeth. Did he always thought aloud? Anyway, the others in Base never mentioned it. “Um…” Hans turns to Ben. “Sniper… is just a nickname. For the eagle.” “Is this a traveling circus?” “No… They are here to bring me back home.” “Home? Back to the desert?” “Yes.” Hans can only suppress a jubilation with difficulty. He is so happy to see these animals. From today, he will look at them with completely different eyes. The mercenaries must miss him so much that they sent their animals to bring him home! But that's what makes him suspicious. Had not Mundy said that he would come in person and pick him up? Apart from that, he would never allow animals to drive his beloved Van. So maybe they are not here because they want him back, but because something happened! It was clear that there would be trouble with Friedrich… Hans looks at Ben startled. But this time, his thoughts don't seem to have left his mouth. “You lived with animals all these years?” “May I introduce? My family.” “………”Suddenly Ben starts to laugh. “No wonder you behave like a madman. If a person lives among with animals for years, you just has to lose your common sense.” “You think I'm a madman?” Ben puts a hand on Hans' shoulder. “I do. But that's what makes you so likeable. We are not so different. I'm not at my best anymore, too. I'll miss you. But tell me... was that really serious that you wanted to stay here?” “Yes, but I have to say that I was a bit worried that they would hunt me with torches and pitchforks. You know, in Germany I was born in a little old town. They are comparable to small towns like this one. I didn't live on the street, but I was a misfit anyway. And everywhere hung torches and pitchforks on the exterior walls. You have to know, my hometown has an interesting past.” “But it was never used, right?” “It was. Once. Because I had... Oh, never mind. Anyway, people were happy to rid of me. At least I suspect that.” “But this shouldn't be an advice to leave here?” “No no. But on the contrary. If people abhor you so much, you should stay more than ever. But you don't have to do that on the street.” “Hmm?” “Where is my suitcase?” The eagle had dropped the suitcase in the footwell of the passenger seat. Hans gets it out there and opens it. “That's for you, my friend. For your generosity and hospitality.” Hans fetches several thick bundles of money out and presses them into the hand of the speechless Ben. “That's $ 500,000. I know people like you think nothing of that, but I'd like you to accept it. Because that's my way to say thank you.” “………” Ben stares spellbound at the money in his hands. With a big smile, Hans slaps on his shoulder. “Buy a nice house and a pet. Decent clothes and shaving kit. And then run for mayor.” “W-what…?” “Yes, I relinquish this office to you. Me as mayor? Ha! I am glad that this is spared me. But you're a good guy. You could make something out of this town. You know, hospitable. Maybe you'll get tourists or something like that. I'll come visit you in a few years. Then I want to see something, alright? If not, I will demand my money back, understood?” “Err… wow. I… I just don’t know what to say.” “You don’t have to say anything. Just let action speak.” The Dobermann pulls on Hans’ jacket. “I have to leave now.” He climbs in the van to the animals, closes the door and leans slightly out of the open window. “Take care, my friend.” “So you return to the place where skin color and origin don't matter? How are these things play a role when it’s about animals?” “Haha! Well, animals are easier to handle than humans. Anyway. That's where I belong. For me as a German the outerworld is no place. Not yet.” “Good luck out there.” “I have to wish you good luck.” Suddenly the Van jumps forward when the Dobermann throws itself on the gas pedal and the small town rushes past Hans. He presses deep into the driver's seat. His eyes move from one animal to another. The dog operates the gas and the eagle the steering wheel. “What is going on here?” Hans feels like a kidnap victim... He looks to the side. The robin sits on Archimedes' cage and cheeps loudly. Archimedes looks at Hans with his black button eyes, asks him to open the cage door. He does it. The dove immediately jumps out and cuddles up to the robin. The macaw jumps towards them and greets Archimedes with a light touch of his beak to his dove's and they begin to chatter. Almost as if they were talking. “…………”

“There they are! There they are!” Robin shouts excitedly and points with his small wing to a small crowd on a large square. “Archimedes and Medic!” Dante accelerates the Van and Compatriot steers it directly into the crowd. “Do you want to run someone over, you crazy bird?” “They'll get out of the way if they want to live on” the bald eagle answers relaxed. The people jump screaming out of the way and run away in panic. Dante jumps on the brakes to prevent worse. Only a few inches, they come to a stand in front of Medic. “See? All went well.” “Stupid poultry…” “Let’s get them!” Compatriot and Dante leave the Van. Aberdeen notes that the snake has disappeared. “Hey, where are you, snake?” “I’m here.” The snake looks out from under the driver's seat. “What are you doing down there?” “I'm hiding.” “Why?” “I had already told you once that people, at the sssight of mine, ssstarting to kick, to beat or jussst run away ssscreaming.” “Yes, but not Medic. You've been hiding in vain all these years for nothing, lad. Our Mercs don't even fear death. So how should they be afraid of you?” “Maybe you are right. But for now I will ssstay down here.” “Whatever you say.” Compatriot carries the cage of Archimedes in the Van, after he had already stowed the suitcase in the footwell of the passenger seat. He drops the cage on the passenger seat. “Archimedes!” Robin squeezes his little head between the thin cage bars. “Robin, you’re here, too!” “Da! I thought I will never see you again. Sorry that I did not say goodbye to you. I was so desperate... You are my best friend.” “It’s okay, little friend.” “Are you going to stay with me forever now?” “I don’t know… Why are you here at all? Did something happen or did you just miss us?” “Yes! Something terrible has happened!” “I will tell her!” “…her?” Robin lays his head on the side. At the same moment, Dante tugs Medic into the Van. He closes the door and the animals hope he starts right now. But they wait in vain. Hans talks to an older, dirty man. “Who are those old geezers?” asks the squirrel. Only then does Archimedes notice the new member. “The handsome man is my owner and the other was our host. And you are?” “I'm your new teammate. I'm faster than the wind, smarter than any creature in the world and more beautiful than a snow-white wedding dove on a bouquet of red roses.” “...which one of you left the window open?” “I didn't sneak in! The feathered knuckleheads here have to make amend something! After all, they almost ran me over and even wanted to eat me!” “Who wanted to eat you? Compatriot or the dog?” “The snake!” “Snake?” At the same moment, the reptile stretches its head out of its hiding place. “Nice to sssee you, Archimedesss.” “You are here, too?” “Isss that a problem?” “Not at all. I’m glad to see you.” “Thank you very much. Sss….” “What amazes me is that this dog is with you.” “Dante is very nice. She came with us to help us.” “What happened?” “We don't have time for that now, Maggot! Stubby tail, step on the gas! The two don't even stop talking!” The Dobermann operates the gas and Compatriot swings back onto the steering wheel and with a loud squeak the Van races off. The Medic is pushed into the seat. He looks quite confused and skeptical as he watches Compatriot and the Dobermann driving. Archimedes feels sorry for him. She would like to tell him what's going on. But even she has no information yet. He looks in her direction as Robin begins to cheep. He had sat down on the cage to ask Hans to open the cage door. Archimedes helps with her gaze and he understands. He opens the door and Archimedes settles next to Robin, whereupon he immediately cuddles up to her. She raises her wing and puts it gently on the robin. Aberdeen sits down next to the cage and he and Archimedes greet each other with a touch of their beaks. “Good to have you back, lad.” “You look as good as always, Aberdeen.” “I like to return the compliment.”

After driving a short distance, Dante stops the Van and turns to Hans. He sits on the seat with legs apart, so that the dog has space in the footwell. You can see that he fears the Dobermann could bite him at any moment in the crotch. “Why have we stopped?” “Sir Hootsalot is injured! Medic has to help him!” “He is here, too? Where?” “Down here!” the snake hisses in alarm. Aberdeen, Archimedes, Robin and Compatriot fly into the footwell of the passenger seat and look under it. The owl lies motionless in the shadow of the seat. The healthy wing is firmly pressed against the body, while the injured wing hangs limp on the ground. “How did he come down there?” “He hasss to feel ssso badly that he hasss hid himssself away.” “But… animals with such injuries only hide themself away to… die...” the robin gasps. “What happened?” “His wing is broken. Do you think Medic can manage that?” “For sure! There's nothing my dad cannot do. Dante, right?” Archimedes turns to the Dobermann. The dog gives a good account of herself to prove the dove that she is peaceful. The last meeting of the two was not so peaceful. Dante is a little ashamed of that. “Yes.” “Do you think you could bring him out without hurting him?” “You want me to do that? Do you trust me?” “Well, everyone else seems to trust you, so you have my trust too.” “Thank you.” The big dog squash herself past Medic's leg, whereupon he squeezes his legs tight, glad, to have the Dobermann no longer between them. Dante puts her head under the seat and takes the tail feathers carefully between the teeth. Slowly she pulls out the big bird under the seat. Sir Hootsalot still doesn't move. Robin is scared. “Is…is he dead?” Now Dante takes the owl by the neck and lifts him up. Carefully, she puts him down on Medic’s lap. Petrified, he stares down at the bird. “What the…? This is Sniper's owl...” Carefully he takes the seemingly injured animal in the hands. Archimedes flutters on the knee of her owner. “Coo~ Coooo~” “What? The wing is broken? And it also has a fever? Oh no…” In the eyes of her dad blazes the hot-blooded fire of the Medic he has always been. He pushes the cage aside, takes off his coat, carefully wraps up the owl in it and places it on the passenger seat. Then he puts his hands on the steering wheel, depresses the gas pedal fully with his foot and they are racing through the city. “Where does he want to go now?” “Trust him” begs Archimedes. After a few meters they stop in front of a larger building. “Where are we?” “That’s the hospital.” Medic opens the car door, picks up the owl and gets out. “Dante, accompany him!” “Why?” “They will try to stop my Papa. You have to help him.” “Understood!” The Dobermann jumps out of the Van and follows Medic. “Why should they try to stop him?” “It's obvious! The patient is an animal, and they are not an animal hospital, Maggot!” “You always know everything better, or, lad?” “That's not it” Archimedes answers sadly. “These people here don't like my Papa. They think he is something, but what he isn't. I'm so glad we're leaving. But now explain to me what happened.” “I would like to know that too.” “Ssshut up, rodent. Thisss isss none of your businesss. When all thisss isss over, we'll cassst you adrift anyway.” The snake peeks out from under the seat and gazes with her yellow eyes at the squirrel, which has made himself comfortable on the headrest of the driver's seat. “Well, I want to see that. You will not get rid of me anymore.” “Listen, Archimedes. Sniper, Spy and the new Medic were kidnapped!”

Hans hurries towards the hospital. Out of the corner of his eye, he notices something black. He stops and looks down in wonderment. It's the Dobermann who follows him. The animal looks up to him, expecting. Hans feels uncomfortable with Friedrich's dog, but at the same time he feels as if it wants to help him. What is going on with these animals...? Despite all confusion, Hans bethinks of the essentials again. Namely, to treat this owl as soon as possible. And nothing and no one will stop him! Determined, he enters the building through the double door. The woman at the desk (Mrs. Kelly?) makes a startled face as she recognizes him. It was exactly the same scared face when she learned that Hans was actually a German. A face as if she must be terrified of him. At the beginning she was so nice...

Hans rushes past her. Somewhere in this building there must be a lab or a storeroom where he finds everything necessary to help the animal. Something to splint the broken wing and a homeopathic remedy for the fever. Maybe he even has to operate the owl. “S-stop! You just can’t…!” Kelly calls after him but Hans has already disappeared through the next double door. She doesn’t run after him but she will left no stone unturned for sure to stop him. With a quick step Hans hurries through the wide corridor, right and left doors with labels. Mundy's owl doesn't move. Hans is not sure if it's still alive... Is there a defibrillator in this wannabe hospital? What you use for a human cannot be bad for an animal. At the very end of the corridor, a sign points out to the lab. It has to be right around the next corner. “Freeze!” A doctor obstructs him. Hans recognizes him immediately. It's Mr. Burnsfield. The man who claimed that there is no place for Hans in this hospital. But he is not alone. Another man, presumably also a doctor, goes to his rescue. But that's no reason for the thoroughbred Medic to stop. And if he has to break through the two! He already holds a protective hand over the injured animal, but fortunately it doesn't have to come this far. The Dobermann sprints forward and growls and barks. Startled, Burnsfield and his colleague retreat. The dog pushes the two out of Hans' way and holds them in place. Watch out with bared teeth that they are not getting too close to Hans. It gives the impression of a wild beast. “A wrong move and my Dobermann will rip you apart. You know that a Dobermann is a German dog breed, right? And since you're such smart men, you know, of course, that everything that comes from Germany is dangerous. Therefore, you should take my warning seriously.” With a schadenfroh laugh Hans continues his way to the lab. Finally he can do his job.

The lab is behind a normal, white door. Usually such areas are strictly secured by titanium doors and a numeric code. But this door is not even locked. Once again Hans realizes how lucky he is not to have to work here. All this is below his level. Far, far below his level... I should stay fair. After all, this is a small town, cut off from civilization. These people probably knows Metropolitan crime only from books. The doors here don't have to be locked. Almost like in Rottenburg... The lab is small and lucid, but it contains everything Hans needs to handle the owl, and he sees it with just one glance. An operation on the bird would have been nice, but there isn't enough time for that, so a conservative method must be used. Hans places the owl on the counter and carefully palpates the injured wing. “Ah ja… Don’t worry, my winged friend. Soon you are as good as new.” Luckily Hans doesn't have to dig through the cupboards. Everything he needs is already at hand. The damaged bone must be returned to its proper anatomical position. Of course, since he cannot use human splints, Medic quickly grabs a wooden clipboard nearby and breaks it in half. The two halves are just the right size for the big wings of the owl. After that is done, he grabs a small bandage role and carries everything to the animal. He rolls off one meter of the bandages, puts the two wooden halves on the broken wing and fastens them with the white bandage. “So, that should hold. And now…” On the wall in the back of the laboratory hangs a small cupboard with a sliding glass window. The content - small, brown vials of various pharmaceuticals for injecting. Not even that is locked… Already through the glass window Hans discovers the vial with the inscription Metamizole. He takes it enthusiastically in the hand. “Metamizole. You can even use that with animals. Perfect! Hmm?” Shouting is heard in the corridor outside, but the Dobermann makes for loud barking and threatening growl for instant silence. I should hurry up. Hans hurries back to the bird, grabs a syringe lying loose around, fills it with the metamizole and injects it into the bird's neck. “Now we can only wait…” He picks up the owl wrapped in his jacket and leaves the lab. In the corridor are now three people who are guarded by the dog. Mrs. Kelly had arrived. Probably to check what happens here and was promptly taken hostage by the Dobermann. Just like her male colleagues. Presumably the screaming came from her, startled by the big and threatening-looking dog. All three are pressed close to each other against the wall and hardly dare to breathe. A picture that would normally make Hans burst out laughing, but the patient in his arms needs urgent rest. “Thank you for letting me use your laboratory. I found what I needed. Then I don't want to harass you any longer with my presence and that of my animals. Auf Wiedersehen~ Bei Fuß!” And indeed, the Dobermann reacts to his command and together they leave the hospital and return to the Van. Hans places the owl carefully on the passenger seat. The Dobermann finds its place in the footwell of the passenger seat. When Hans finally sits back in the car, a weight is lifted from his mind. But suddenly Archimedes lunges at him, clawing at his shirt as he beats his wings wildly. “Was ist los, Archimedes?” “Coo~! Cooo~!” “Hmm…!? What?!? Spy, Sniper and Friedrich were kidnapped? By Gray Mann? At least that's a guess?” “Coo~!” “My goodness. How could that happen? Well, that would explain this situation.” Hans looks at the animals. “Okay then! Off to Gray Mann's headquarter! Hehe! I cannot wait to see Friedrich's stupid face when I come to free him. Then he will owe me something.” He owes me my job as a mercenary of the class of the Medic and that he quickly goes back to Germany or anywhere else. But Hans knows better. Neither he, nor Friedrich can decide about it. Only the Administrator. And her words were more than clear. Whether mercenary or not. He feels responsible for his former colleagues. And he would always come to rescue them. Even if he have to travel to the end of the world for that. “Haha… Nun, that was very cheesy.” Hans notices the eyes of the animals on him. “Well. Here we go!”

Team Fortress 2

When Spy comes to himself, he feels absolutely whacked. Even before he opens his eyes, he feels that strong pain in his back, as if he had remained in one and the same position for hours. He automatically tries to push his back, but notices that he can barely move. His eyes open and a gray wall stares at him. “What the…?” slips out of his mouth and then he already feels the ropes, which are tightly wrapped around his wrists and upper body. Even at the ankles he was tied up. They are furthermore tied to the legs of the chair he was placed on. Double hedging. Somebody wanted to play it safe. And then, the memories come back. “Merde… I’m too old for this nonsense.” “Finally awake, Spook?” “What?” The voice behind him makes Spy turn his head. Like a lightning strike, the pain runs up from his back into his neck. “Damn it! Ahh…” “Rusty?” “Just shut up, Bushman! And after all, you were the first one to be overwhelmed. I kept up at least for so long that I could find out who we owe our kidnapping to.” “I would like to finally have an explanation, too!” “Our dear docteur is also awake.” Spy turns his head (carefully) in the other direction. As far as he can tell, their chairs are standing back to back. Then he starts to take a closer look at his surroundings. A small, colorless, empty room that probably has never been used. Till this day. “Hmph! Such a big headquarter, and our lounge is a shithole.” “Honhon! You are a Bushman. You should be used to that. Wait a moment. So you know where we are? Did they mention Gray Mann to you, too?” “Nah. But who else should be interested in kidnapping us?” “Pah! You seem to be awake in quite a spell. You ‘ad plenty of time to think about it. Because you're not quick-witted.” “Oh, make yourself invisible, Spook.” “Unfortunately, I lost my watch.” “Could someone finally explain to me what's going on here? We are tied up here, not knowing what is going to happen to us, and you have nothing better to do than to dis each other! What is wrong with you?” “Oh, right. You didn't ‘ad the pleasure with Gray Mann yet.” “Who is that?” “A phenomenon that does itself the ‘onor every now and then.” “So that has happened often?” “Well, he attacked us once or twice. But that he kidnaps one of us is new. That means the wanker is planning something new. Maybe he even kidnapped the whole team.” “I don't think so. There were three of them and one of them was a ‘ulk, but they would ‘ave a tough time with Heavy. No, no. I think, only we came into the firing line of Gray Mann. The support team.” “Why us?” “Just as I know Gray Mann, ‘e's already paying us a visit and telling us ‘is plan. We just ‘ave to wait.” “Wait? How about we try to free ourselves?” “Docteur, sometimes it's just better to stay calm and to let the opponent make their move.” “Apart from this, you're really the last person who should complain, Doc. After all, you absolutely wanted to take over Hans' job.” “It was planned from the beginning that I work as a Medic! I am your Medic! Still, it would have been helpful for me to have taught that we have more enemies than the BLU team! There was nothing in the contract about that!” “Why should it? As Spook had so well formulated, Gray Mann is a phenomenon. Also, the Mann Co. contract is from the time before Gray Mann showed up with his robots.” “Robots? What robots?” “Yess~ Robots built after our image.” “Our dead ringer.” “…what?!” “The robots look like us. They are designed to resemble us in everything, but are ten times stronger than we are.” “Maybe you're lucky and he's rebuilding the Medic robot in your own image. That's a certain honor.” “I ‘ardly believe that. I don't think Gray Mann knows we ‘ave a new medic right now. And even if, I don't think ‘e'll make that effort. ‘e's already old and building robots is a tough job now.” “I think I am losing my mind. Whenever I come in contact with Hans, something happens. This guy is a walking jinx. How much trouble have I had with him in the past? And now that!” “Sounds almost like you want to quit this job.” “I have to defeat your hope. I will stay.” “Don't blame Hans for all your failures, Docteur. If you are 'onest, you 'ave contributed a certain amount to it.” “What do you mean?” “’e told us everything before ‘e left. ‘e told us ‘ow you caught ‘im by doing one of his experiments. You threatened to report ‘im to the university administration. You both knew that would ‘ave meant the end for ‘im. If you ‘ad left it at that, Hans wouldn’t ‘ave ‘ad to take revenge on you.” “Leave it at that? He had removed the skeleton from a living person! It was my duty to report this! Hans is crazy and a danger to humanity! I would have never forgive me for letting this man set onto patients!” “You are very responsible. But Hans, too. Okay, his methods may be a bit stubborn. But he has always kept us alive. He even got me back from the dead once.” “And now you just sit in this mess because you thought you must taking what you deserved. If you stayed at ‘ome, it wouldn’t ‘appen to you now.” “There is even a word for it. Karma.” Friedrich sighs resignedly. “Apparently I am the only normal person in this damned desert. Nobody sees what a maniac Hans is. But on the contrary. He is even being protected. That is not normal here.” “You seem to forget that you are now a mercenary. We ‘ave different rules.” “Yes…” Aimeric had heard a certain tone in Friedrich's voice. This man is easily overwhelmed. But he tries not to show it. He is still cold and distant.

Suddenly, a deafening squeak echoes through the small room. Aimeric bites his teeth tightly, his eyes tight as he tries not to let the aching sound penetrate too deep into his pinna. Now even headaches are spreading. “I already imagined that you are already awake. Damned mercenaries…” Aimeric has the door in his back, but he doesn't have to see their visitor. He immediately recognizes the old, scratchy voice. Gray Mann comes with his wheelchair driven into the room. “Now comes the part in which the villain reveals his plans?” Mundy sneers. “Pfah... As disrespectful and loudmouthed as ever. I do not think I have to explain my plans to you.” “It's always the same. You're trying to kill us to get Mann Co. We know this. What we don't understand is why you let kidnaped us.” “I have changed my plans slightly.” While Gray Mann is talking to them, he drives slowly counterclockwise around his prisoners and stops by Friedrich. With a scrutinizing look at the new Medic, he answers monotonously: “And you too, apparently. What did you do with your old medic? Do you have two now? It would be annoying to have missed one of the support team.” “That sounds like you see us as the greatest danger.” “I do. Support... What would we humans be without it? Without support, our goals were unequaled. I need my robots to support me to destroy your brood. Helena needs the support of the mercenaries to defend Mann Co. And both the offensive and the defensive needs support. In other words - you.” “So you really think that we were the reason for your previous defeats?” “Not the only reason, but the main reason. You are hard to grasp during the fighting. But that's no wonder. Because you are cowards.” Again Gray Mann circles them, slowly, with a smug smile on his wrinkled face. “Snipers. You can safely attack from a distance while crouching safely and hidden in your hiding place, far away from the battlefield.” Mundy makes a puffing sound. “Spies. With your small, sophisticated toys, you could either make yourself invisible or imitate the enemy. You're sneaking from behind to stab your opponent in the back. You do everything to win. But woe, you have to face your enemy eye to eye. Then you also like to make yourself invisible. Hehe...” “…………” “Medics…” Again, Gray Mann comes to a stop in front of Friedrich. “You heal, you revive. You stand at the front, but you don't fight. You are doing everything to keep your allies alive. But also to stay alive yourself. And for that you hide behind your healing subjects. Use them as human shields. And should your healing target die, you're just looking for a new one to use it as a shield as well. Everyone should be hit by bullets and missiles, the main thing, you will be spared. You are like parasites. So, the question is... who of you is the biggest coward?” “I hide behind someone?” Friedrich replies suddenly. “Preferably behind this Russian, right? Pah! I am not hiding. Never.” “I don't care who you are or why you now the medic in this team. But you chose a bad time to ally with Helena. Because soon you will die. You all will die.” “Do you suffer from amnesia? We can't die just like that” Mundy growls. “Ahahaha! Of course, I haven't forgotten your respawn machine. How should I? It's after all an invention of my stupid brothers. They are long dead, but still I curse them for it. With the mercenaries now having to fight without their precious support team, it will be a lot easier to get to the core of the respawn and destroy it. And with it you too.” “I think you underestimate the offensive and defensive. Just because we are no longer, doesn't mean that they will lose.” “We will see about that. We'll see... My robots are already on the way to your base with the transport tank. When it's over, I'll personally give you a bullet in the head. I hope Helena will enjoy the show as much as I will. Farewell, mercenaries. Oh, and ... don't try to escape. Outside this door a nasty surprise would await. And you are unarmed. Please don't take the fun from me of killing you personally.” And so the old man leaves the room, the door behind him closes automatically (again with a deafening squeak). “How dare he call me a coward? The job as a sniper is noble and connected with concentration and responsibility!” “I understand you. I also didn't like ‘ow he vilified my profession.” “He was right about you, Spook. Your spies are really cowardly and devious. Bloody Spoies.” “…I will remember that.” “Could we focus on getting us out of here?” Friedrich spits. “You sound irritated, Docteur.” “I am! I am reluctant let me kill idly.” “We will get out of ‘ere.” “And how can you be so sure about that?” “Because we are the mercenaries of Mann Co.”

[sallsmum]

Season 1 magnus quotes

Just a collection of my favorite quotes from Magnus. He had some great lines.

Will do season 2 next. Hope you enjoy them too

Season 1  Ep.2 descent into hell isn’t easy.

“Are you really going to risk your life for a Shadowhunter?

” Ep 4 Raising hell

“You may be immortal, Elias, but you’re not immune to crow’s feet

”“I was alive when the Dead Sea was just a lake that was feeling a little poorly”

“who are you?”

Alec: “well done

”Magnus: “more like medium rare”“

Normally I love a dirty lair, but this one’s just sloppy”

“About Alec, is more a flower or cologne man?”

“pretty boy, get your team ready. (stops Jace) I’m not talking to you. (points at Alec) I’m talking to……..you”“

Oh the only other person who I’ve known who could draw as well was Michaelangelo, who excellent in bed I might add

”Clary; ‘is he going to be alright?

”Magnus: I dunno. Does he normally lay like that without moving?

”Magnus: ”there’s nothing to be ashamed of Alec

”Alec; “I don’t know what you’re talking about”

Magnus; “you will”

 Ep 5 Moo shu to go

“Playing hard to get, I love a challenge”

 Ep6 of men and angels

Magnus; “one more thing I need Alexander”

Jace: ”why do you need Alec?

”Magnus:” virgin Shadowhunter energy.Magnus:”

 stir, we need to have it ready before your boy toys get back

”Clary: ”what if they don’t get back in time?

”Magnus: ”you can’t think like that, Biscuit

”Magnus: “’help me I need your strength”

Alec:  ”take what you need”

Alec: ”are warlocks always this cryptic?

”Magnus: ”I’m not being cryptic, I’m being coy. Let me spell it out for you, I wanted to see you again”

“for almost a century, I’ve closed myself off to feeling anything for anyone, man or woman. You’ve unlocked something in me”

 Ep 7 Major Arcana

“if Valentine started creating Shadowhunters or regain control of demons it would be like Beyonce riding on a dinosaur through Time Square. People would notice

”Clary: ”this should be easy”

Magnus: ”that’s what General Custer said

” Ep. 8 Bad blood

Izzy: ”I want to get my hands on that thing”

Magnus: ”speaking of which, how is Alexander? I was hoping I might hear from him”

“It’s just so hard to tell if Alexander is even interested. I can’t fathom why he wouldn’t be”

(looking at Alec training) “ok, I’m back”

“Oh you don’t have to get dressed up for me. Fine. But I like what I saw”

 Ep. 9 Rise up

“your both going to owe me. I’m talking 14th century, gold, rubies, definitely diamonds”“

what can I say, I have a deep understanding of the human psyche, at least that’s what Freud always said.”

Alec:” I’m getting married

”Magnus:  ”whoa, that’s a tad sudden isn’t it? I mean we should at least go to dinner first”

“solid partnership. That’s hot”

“well ok then. Marriage is a wonderful institution. Not that I would know”

“goodbye, Alexander” (insert me crying in puddle on the floor)

 Ep. 10 This world inverted

“this is the longest I’ve abstained, from a lot of things”“

Now that’s what I’m talking about. We have lift off.”

 Ep. 11 Blood calls to blood

“As you all say the law is the law there’s no stopping me from slipping through this gaping loophole”

Alec: ”name it

Magnus: ”you. In fact, I’ll do you pro bono

Alec: ”so you get it

”Magnus: ”No Alec. I get her. I like her. But you don’t have to marry her”

“you’ll be lonely all your life and so will she Neither of you deserve it .And I don’t either

” Ep.12 Malec

“where’s the honour of living a lie?

”“what about love? Even Shadowhunter fall in love Alec. Just tell me you’re in love with Lydia and I’ll stop.

”“confusion is part of it. That’s how find out if something’s there. Emotions are never black and white. There more like, symptoms. You lose your breath every time they enter a room. Your heart beats faster when they walk by. Your skin tingles when you stand close enough to feel their breath.”

“I know you feel what I feel, Alec”

“you have a choice to make. I will not ask again”“

it’s happy hour somewhere, my dear”“

I’ve played my last hand here, even I know when to fold them”

“I’m sorry I asked. I came here with you to escape my relationship drama not  get front set to yours.

”“Maryse, this is between me and your son. I’ll leave if he asks me to

”‘You never cease to amaze me Alec

”“I have to hand it to you Alexander, you certainly know how to make a statement”

 Ep. 13 Morning star

“and yet true love cannot die”

“well, this is awkward”

“if I know Camille she’ll have a trick or three up her sleeve”

“Alexander, I may be the high warlock of Brooklyn, but even I can’t see the future”   

[mebeingserious]

(c.) End 2012 - Early 2013

- - #1

#Based On A You Story. Blinking cursor.

Peep my Doogie Howser blue screen. Peep my blue light. No bloc festivities, streamers, or tails to pin anything on. Pin that shit on yourself, B. Take responsibility.

“Pin The Tail” had a Max B verse on the original. Do with that knowledge what you will if what you will do is reimburse me for my strong miscellany-fact-brain game. I refined it through the arthritis of those on my personal Mt. Rushmore.

I’m unknowable, really. You should get to un-know me.

And it was an inside job, btw. Egged on by the peanut gallery, flipped the switch, gave you a parachute and some mumble-mumble about how the chlorophyll’s gonna be stunning.

I’m just another human cat, word to Grass Green. Don’t treat me like the grassy knoll. Leave them stones turnt all the way down.

But that “you” isn’t you, that’s you’s on you’s on you’s. UUU, if you will. Gotta not have it.

New swatch alert. Here. Peep the texture and the hues. That’s the interior.

Cam’ron in a Utah Jazz throwback staring back at me through a phone’s reflection. [||]. You right, you right.

Captain Quirk but the Captain Crunch Dog at the same damn time. Pretend it’s two months ago, though.

Your last.fm recent plays leave you vulnerable, if you think about it. I thought about it.

I need to remind myself I don’t do this for the little or the big dunns. Everyone needs to get their Lex Luger on from time to time. B.Y. Before Yokozuna.

So I say that to say this: “Can’t call it, might spoil it”

Performing tune-ups with some VBRs and possibly, 192s. You can only crash so many planes before you start frisking yourself in the airport.

Further and farther are in full effect. But then I remember “that’s when the money starts running” and Stoicism, and put it in hands I once knocked down.

- - #2

Spot ‘em, got ‘em. I got dirt on you, doggie.

But God made dirt and dirt bust your ass.

Or my ass. I know too much. Internal Spy vs. Spy.

I saw those stars. Had my radars up. Tangible air.

One minute it’s in the constellations, the next sixty-seconds it’s a “Superthug” if.

Hella.

No, not you. The other. But you? You’re putting together a 150-piece in the dark.

Me? S.O.L. S.O.S. But I’m like Private Ryan. So you can save that.

Oh wait, I forgot that motherfucker survived.

Anyways, haardships.

My window’s been closed but at least I have a window. But it’s lowkey amazing that a window is even a thing.

I just did what Game did with the coaching of the fat producer on ironing Dickies. But you don’t hear me, doe.

Do you hear me, doe? This is the Gawd.

He doesn’t take requests but he’ll play me, though.

But really, I did that. Sorta like what Kane said on “The Symphony.”

Anyways, indecision.

He who hesitates in peace is even worse.

The pyramids didn’t get built by throwing stones or sitting on them. But I fucked up when I entertained the E.T. theory.

I’m the man now, dog. But really, without the seven you’re not Sean Connery. You’re just…

Anyways, alternate universes. That exist in shared thought bubbles.

But that’s the only place they ever existed, nah?

But let’s thought experiment. Does that outcome satisfy?

Or is it just better than hearing a single echo against drywall?

I can give you advice on farther but my track record is a stumble out the blocks paired with a horizontal starting gun, finished off with a somersault. 1.0 - 1.0 - 1.0

Got gotted and spotted.

Need is whatever you think it is.

But try to take my arm and leg and I might be that shoe with the band between the big toe.

You can have a symphony composed of c-notes in that porcelain but if you don’t embrace that internal Hammer … well. Basslines don’t come across well in sign.

You can go on and be Big L’s Rocafella debut, but you don’t know voodoo.

But tangible is good. I mean, Tough Luv holds up pretty well eight years later.

I guess I misunderstood that originally. Or I tried to understand too soon. He was right when he said “…or rather me.”

- - #3

The last verse on “Pyramids” without the sonic context.

Strikes Back. In the Empire. They say it’s their favorite flick.

Swore my hand waved to me as it fell, in that “Hi, Hater” motion.

Took off that mask and it was a mirror. No disrespect but there’s truth to it.

Anton Chigurh in the guidance counselor’s office basically saying “heads or tails.”

Saw it with the old man. In the alt. section of the universe it was Batman Returns.

Trying to lucid dream about the Northwest in 1996, but I’m better off sleeping. And peeping those trees with the date emblazoned in a reddish orange beneath their stumps.

Subsidized Napoleon complex had me fighting on the wrong side. Got did like Waterloo.

Manila envelopes addressed to that British newspaper. Don’t you know this is the Empire?

Telepathy returned to sender.

Heard “boo” from that pocket-sized frame.

But ghosts only come for your wig when you turn your back.

“Whoa” ain’t me, that’s Black Rob.

Speaking of that song…

Come to terms with endearment.

You chose the ball and you joined me in breadth.

Another one chewing dead skin, dirt particles and textile fibers.

Carly Simon. Bet.

What came first, the wound or the egg that provided the shells that were stuck in the soles?

South West here like Northern OH. Something something “talent.”

Indecisive travel agent that forgot to build a plane.

I saw the white plates, the blue plates, and now they’re yellow. i.e. I’ve seen the Empire crumble.

Let an ocean talk for me.

What the fuck is portamento? Not worth it.

Waking up to a foreign vocabulary test. Appealing. No comprende.

Opted-in because I was loyal to the wrong things. Minus the fuckboy-isms.

He was the Pookie of venlafaxine.

Caesar: Judas.

Conversational anesthesia. Was on that Freud shit.

Liked the yellow yoshi that stomped and the one with wings.

And you can tell a lot about a man by how he uses a warp whistle. Button on the VCR.

Meant to hear Tiến Quân Ca in person but couldn’t. If he saw the inland, I wouldn’t.

Lucas Arts revisionist tip. Script = flipped. And now…

Telling the emperor “We don’t need to see all that.” I’ll say it.

And maybe worth it. But no capitulation. The sign fixed.

- Carly.

“You, Me, Him and Her” gets played twice.

The first one’s near Luxor, prolly.

Gut snitched.

Us couldn’t stop dreaming, then I couldn’t get to sleep. Both.

“I fuck around and have you sleeping underneath something”

But that last verse, though.

- - #4

Pop culture hustling and cocaine references are the way to my heart. My heart is sullen and abandoned; full of un-shatterable Pyrex-brand measuring cups.

Or is it. Racially ambiguous inquisition. Internal. In-terminal, I keep ticking. So, maybe occupied.

Don’t knock it. I’m taking out this time. To compose choppy sentences that stop before they start because I’m so non-fiction I might call myself Tumblr Game Tom Wolfe.

Looking back, YN really inspired me with his Letters From The Editor. But nah to that “Ha!”

Flirting with disaster because she sent me a flick. Y’all are too literal. Down to the ‘I’m so crazy.’

Meanings on top of meanings. Princess and the Pea. That now archaic Jay-Z and Kanye interplay. References need a new hard drive. They’re making that grindin’, too busy to stay up-to-date sound.

I’m not looking at your dues, I’m looking past you. Why are ghosts see-through but you can’t see through what you can see.

Peter Piper was too fucking picky. End of story. Citing Antwan Patton in MLA style. If you want the references, you gotta pay for this. I accept Juelz. Pay the pause forward.

Subtle is my subtitle. You can read or watch. An internet quiz will tell you what that means for you and your personality.

John on the run eating. But wasn’t gaining.

Acting like shenanigans in loosie, but there was no explaining.

No, no, no. I’m not you, rapper.

Jesus H. Pylori. The church of disrupted insulin function and latter day faints.

Glue where the flex be. Vampires that never heard about the smallpox blankets. Paul’s Boutique sample count. Dust, brother. Trying not to bite down.

That admittance, and the small BIC. Alluhdat.

Three letters. Now I feel alluhdat.

Maybe knowing in retrospect is the win. Like when they extend those legs and and hold their hands in a state-enforced half-hearted semi-prayer position saying “I hope this provides closure for your family.”

A & B convos. Split-tests. More like a two and eight.

Good things surface for those that hold elevators. Or something.

Lost the top about fitty-leven times. No lojack. Find it, then repeat. Dementia. Kojack.

No lolli. Point the finger, no Rollie. No handle, no bars. Just folly.

Was on that “If I die, I die.” Life Game Ivan Drago.

Try to be a fatalist. Unexciting Mortal Kombat finishers.

Marcus Aurelius darts onto the screen to kill the opponent with mercy.

No hip hop genius to help you. Y’all Nah Right sidebar. Newsy. Your quotient can’t save thee. Or thou. Or you. Let’s say you.

Because I’m like Jason Bourne asking himself about that one birthday party when he was an age that gets spelled out by the Associated Press. Hope unseen sequels don’t kill my simile.

We’re all trying to live facsimile’s meaning if you said it quick. Gender neutral, though.

Don’t, doe.

Because reflection requires dedication. Three’s ain’t always charming. There’s precedent. See the millionaire trying to kickflip.

I’m not a walking version of the back of the teacher’s edition history/sociology/psychology combo cost-saving textbook.

Slight of hand. Converse with it.

Phonte’s monologues on the last two from Get Back.

That’s the point. Nipsey Russell.

[criticalotterstudies]

Mr. Lévy is France’s favorite punching bag. Legendary for wearing a black Christian Dior suit over an unbuttoned white shirt, the man who has had the ear of presidents since Francois Mitterand, no matter their political affiliations, was born into wealth and attended the best schools in Paris, getting his agrégation in philosophy. His counter-intuitive lightning rod 1977 book Barbarism With A Human Face was published at a time when the communist party was not only France’s main political opposition to the Gaullist right, that had been in power since World War II, but the main referent among intellectuals. In the eighties there was not one TV talk show producer who didn’t want to book the former Maoist and a few other of his friends, called the New Philosophers, such as Andre Glucksman and Pascal Bruckner. The new prime-time stars were eager to explain their sudden disdain of Marxism and full embrace of the crypto-fascist anti-USSR Tsarist Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Mr. Lévy’s father, who had made his fortune with Becop, a corporation importing rare wood treated in exploitative plants from the Ivory Coast and Gabon, where subpar wages and mass deforestation were the norm, financed his short-lived daily L’Imprévu while he was dating models. As with many neocons in America who had a leftist past, this newfound anti-Marxist discourse, which occurred while the USSR was invading Afghanistan, resonated throughout Europe like a Tickle Me Elmo fire sale in a Columbus, Ohio suburb.

Pretty soon Mr. Lévy was in Sarajevo dodging snipers’ bullets and having tea with Ahmad Shah Massoud in the Panjshir Valley. When he got stuck in Bosnia under Serbian shells, unable to fly to Saint-Paul-de-Vence to marry Eric Rohmer’s égérie Arielle Dombasle, he had President Mitterand send an air force jet to bring him to Provence on time.

“Don’t you think that’s why people hate you?” I asked him. “What was I supposed to do? Not get married?” he answered. “Mitterand owed me, I helped him save face in Bosnia. I did so much for the French government, in the name of the French government, that it was really the least they could do to help me fly there.”

Indeed, it was his idea to have the French president land unannounced at the Sarajevo airport in a show of force meant to calm the carnage taking place in the former Yugoslavia. Alas nothing came out of it, so grateful Mitterand was to the Serbs for their stance against Hitler during World War II and so helpless Europe thankfully is without an army. The slaughter kept on going in Europe’s backyard until President Clinton belatedly intervened and bombed Serbia.

Part prime-time buffoonery, part tourism diplomacy, Mr. Lévy was at least trying to end Sarajevo’s siege and help Massoud get international recognition and weapons. Never mind that people close to Massoud never heard of a meeting with Lévy and that a Bosniac TV crew staged an interview with the philosopher, replete with sniper soundtracks and faux dodgings.

“Democracies are not run by the truth,” Mr. Lévy told me.

...

No wonder that Mr. Lévy, a son of the Enlightenment, sees Voltaire as the light at the end of the tunnel. “My relationship to powers has always been the same,” he said, “I act as a real citizen, a citizen is somebody who considers that the power is at his service. They are here to serve us. We are users of the powers, they belong to us. We elect them we have the right to use them and when they act bad we have the right and the duty to disdain them.”

“That’s naïve what you just said,” I told him. Naïve but remarkably efficient. In 2011 Mr. Lévy went to Benghazi, camera in tow, when Gaddafi was about to squash a growing rebellion with mass killing at a time when Libya was already parceled out to tribes and warlords out of Tripoli’s grip. He sat down the first loudmouth he crossed paths with at the newly established Transitional Counsel, a guy named Mansour Saif al-Nasr, stood close to him to be on frame on camera and dialed president Nicolas Sarkozy, famous for wearing compensated shoes. A week later this traveling circus was at the Elysée Palace on Mr. Lévy’s own dime and in a month, after Sarkozy had convinced David Cameron and Barack Obama to join forces, French jets were pounding Gaddafi’s troops. Three months later Gaddafi was dead.

Today Libya is the most dangerous place on earth, a failed state, with ISIS free to set up shop in the north. The chaos is such that women and children from all over Africa jump by the hundreds on derelict boats and go drown in the Mediterranean Sea on their way to Eldorado Europe. “You knew that there were people in the Transitional Counsel that were former Gaddafi henchmen like Mustapha Abdeljalil who was his butcher in chief as minister of justice.” I told him, “It didn’t make you pause? Wasn’t the writing on the wall?”

“That’s not how power works. You don’t go around telling people the truth. People don’t vote for just the truth. If only it were that simple…You would tell them the truth and everything would get figured out. That’s not how people vote. They usually vote for the lies. They vote for economical reasons as Marx said, for very personal reasons as Freud said or because it suits their view of the world as Nietzsche said. I see these leaders I deal with and ask to intervene in some situations, all of them, as cards in my hand. With power things happen surgically, by piecemeal, one-time deals as Michel Foucault said. I was against the war in Iraq because no Iraqi asked Bush for help, to come in and topple Saddam. In Libya a vast part of the population was begging for our help. The chaos is a necessary step unfortunately in the birth of democracy. In the great scheme of things, 40 years is nothing for people to build a democratic constitution. We are not slaves to power, we can vote, we can take it.”

...

Many French people think Mr. Sarkozy used Mr. Lévy as a smoke screen and the decision to destroy Mr. Gaddafi’s power as a preemptive strike because the Guide was about to make public the tens of millions of dollars he had given to Mr. Sarkozy’s campaign for the presidency in 2007. Others point to the fact that his foreign minister at the time, and probable next French president, Alain Juppe, had already sent emissaries to Benghazi to reach out to the Transitional Counsel. Meanwhile as a result of the West’s intervention in Libya, mercenaries and weapons looted from Gaddafi’s military bases poured into the Islamist tribes’ hands in neighboring northern Mali and they all started marching on the capital Bamako in the south. President Hollande, who defeated Mr. Sarkozy in the meantime, sent troops to Mali to protect the Christian south and while he was at it to CAR, all of it according to The New York Times to get access to primary resources.

“The New York Times was wrong,” Mr. Lévy said. “There is nothing to grab in these countries and if this were the goal we would do what the Chinese are doing… come in slow and steady with a lot of cash and no weapons.” But the Chinese are sitting on half of the world’s currency debt and France is broke as Job. All of a sudden, while there is growing talk of a European military force, France is back all over northern and Sub-Saharan Africa with boots on the ground battling the same foe it tamed during its colonial past: Islam. Simultaneously, fascist parties are on the rise in every country across Europe and in some places like France and England they arrived first in the recent European elections. Colonial powers never run on liberal fuel. But what is the exact meaning of an expansionistic Europe in the age of verticality and globalization? England, one of the rare European countries growing out of recession, pulled back its troops from Afghanistan and refused to help France pay for its African folly. “Hollande was right to intervene in Mali and CAR,” Mr. Lévy said, “he had to fight terrorism there.” Wasn’t this one of Bush’s rationales to enter Baghdad? Wasn’t another one democracy export?

https://observer.com/2015/05/why-does-everyone-hate-bernard-henri-levy/amp/

[bastardtravel]

November 25, 2017. Vienna, Austria.

There’s really no missing the Pestsäule. The 60-foot baroque monstrosity juts up out of the center of the Graben like an ornate middle finger to God. It’s actually emperor Leopold I delivering on his side of one of those pleading prayer bargains we’ve all done. Leo’s was “Please, let the plague stop. I swear I’ll build you a really dope art phallus right in the middle of the city, just stop killing everyone.”

The Plague Column is also called the Trinity Column due to its three sides, each one presumably representing some aspect of the tripartite God.

About a block away is the Stock im Eisen, or staff in iron. That’s misleading, it’s not a staff, it’s a tree trunk full of nails, kept in a tube that makes it totally immune to photography.

I did what I could. Now, you might be asking, “Why is there a protected chunk of tree, full of nails, on a street corner in Vienna?” Good question. I’d love to answer it, but it doesn’t seem like anyone can. Every website has a different interpretation of the Stock im Eisen‘s history, and the locals who were attempting to explain its significance to their visiting friends were telling conflicting stories.

Here’s what I’ve pieced together. In the Middle Ages, nail trees (Nagelbäume) were used by craftsmen, or anyone else with nails, for good luck. This particular nail tree had something to do with the Devil. There’s a ballet about it by Pasquale Borri, so if anyone more sophisticated than me can check that out and report back, I’d appreciate it.

There was a locksmith who wanted to marry his master’s daughter, or maybe he just wanted to be the greatest locksmith who ever lived. Dude shot for the stars. So he calls Mephistopheles out of Prague, who shows up on a FlixBus a few hours later. The locksmith sells his soul in exchange for just a really, fuckin’, top-notch padlock. It’s amazing. He puts that on the tree and issues challenges to either his master in exchange for his daughter’s hand in marriage, or to all the locksmiths of the world in exchange for World Locksmithing Supremacy. Since the Devil made the lock, nobody could crack it, and he lived happily ever after until he burnt in Hell. The tree remains with a lock on it to this day, and also full of nails, for some reason.

This is confirmed bullshit. They looked into the padlock and it’s empty, there’s no tumblers or anything in there. It would pop right open. Maybe that’s why the whole thing’s behind the bulletproof glass.

Well, that was most of center city, barring museums and palaces. I sidled all the way across town to the Freud Museum.

  I thought it was interesting, but Freud was what got me through college. I’d read the bulk of his debunked wackadoo theories long before I got “higher educated”, and since every class in undergrad wanted to beat both Freudian and Pavlovian dead horses as much as possible, I got to recycle the same paper, with subtle stylistic changes, something like ten times.

My favorite, bar none, was a History and Systems project where we were required to adopt the persona of our chosen theorist and have an open debate with the rest of the class. We got extra credit for accents, props, and convincing portrayal. I shaved my scruff into an approximation of his beard and showed up to class with a grape White Owl in my mouth and a baggie full of flour smeared around my nose. The only Austrian accent I’d ever heard at that point was the Terminator’s, so that was how Freud talked. I sat next to B.F. Skinner, as portrayed by a gorgeous little ghoul with dichromatic eyes, and we became a vitriolic tempest of condescending reductionism, laying waste to anyone fool enough to have chosen a humanistic or positive psychologist. The Carl Rogers surrogate got the worst flaying. I think he might still be institutionalized.

speaking of my college

hoo i heard that

Siggy’s personal necromancy cabinet. easily puts mine to shame, but the museum did keep repeating that his three great passions were “traveling, smoking, and collecting”

I laughed so hard and so inappropriately at that adorable picture of Carl Jung. Look at him go! With his little hat, and his little disapproving frown!

I love Jung, I think his work is interesting, if convoluted, arcanist rambling, but I wasn’t prepared for this. From here on out, I’m never gonna be able to think of Freud and Jung as anything but Germanic Rick and Morty.

On my way back to the hostel, I located the only grocery store in Vienna (I’d been looking) and picked up a box of juice brand named “Munter und Aktiv”. Well, I got half of that. I asked Google Translate and it said Munter means “blithely”. I recognized this as impossible. I activated my German field agent and she told me it’s a mixture between happy and awake and active. Well, we already have active. I asked the lady at the hostel desk, planning on averaging all these translations into one definitive Munter.

“It is like waking up with coffee in the morning,” she said. “Like chipper.”

“All right, thank you.”

She asked me if I still had my key card. I said I did.

“Good work,” she told me. She seemed serious, but she may have just been possessed of the Wiener Grant.

“Do people lose them a lot? Is that a big problem here?” I asked, blithely. Munterly.

“No, no problem. We don’t have problems here,” she said, then she honest to God slapped the table and shouted in the thickest, most Germanic accent I’ve ever heard, “VE HAVE ZOLUTIONS!”

She laughed after and clarified that she was just kidding, but I was deer-in-the-headlights frozen. One of those disbelieving grins, you know? When what’s going on… can’t be what’s actually going on.

I know we have a sad little Nazi party movement in America, but realistically that’s like 40 lonely dudes with bad haircuts who get way too much media coverage. In much of Europe, they seem mighty sorry for World War II. The Mahnmal in the heart of Vienna is a good indicator, but there’s more going on than monuments, culturally. The aforementioned German girl is currently crossing eastern Europe and self-inflicting a sort of guilt tour (or Schuldtour). Warsaw and Auschwitz, that I’m aware of. Die Madchen ist haunted.

(As a quick aside, I looked up the German word for ‘haunted’, and, unbelievably, it is spukt. Go ahead. Say it out loud. Spukt. This fuckin’ language, man.)

In the Athens flea market, after divulging her nationality to an antique dealer for reasons I will never understand, he rolled out a bunch of old Nazi medals.

“You want?”

She literally backpedaled, shielding her face like a tall, rigid vampire from an iron cross. But she went on to tell me that there are people back in Germany — in America, we’d call them hicks — that love that kind of thing.

The modern nationalism necessary to breed either sentiment is lost on me, but I don’t think that’s because I’m an American. I’m just not much of a joiner.

A final, weird note, and the last Hitler point I plan on making: the Indian guy told me that Hitler is sort of fondly remembered in India and China. In the course of the war, Germany did a lot of damage to Great Britain, and India is still carrying a pretty understandable grudge against their former imperial taskmasters.

I sat down and collected myself until my chronic and intractable antsiness returned, then I figured I’d go check out the craft beer bar half a mile away. I hadn’t eaten in six or seven hours, so that seemed like the ideal time. They had a Bier dem Wochen flight for the cost of a regular half-pint, so I got that. They brought me 4 beers, all from Anchor Brewing, which I learned from a hipster’s t-shirt is in San Francisco.

welp

The Steam beer must be called that because that’s what it tasted like. The stout was palatable, in a cream soda kind of way. I downed it and ordered a local imperial stout called Der Schnittenfahrt from a company called Brauwork. Hilarious though that may sound, it means “cut drive”, and washing down a flight with it on an empty stomach was perhaps ill advised.

“schnittenfahrt” tho

The bar was very excited about rugby. Ireland vs Argentina. I didn’t know who they were rooting for, but they were rooting for them with all their heart. I went to the bathroom and laughed so hard I scared a dude.

now that’s opulence

That was enough for one night. I had a bus to catch the next morning. I stumbled back to my hostel and passed out. I slept like a rock, except for at around 3 AM when I was awake just long enough to see the dude in the opposing bunk sit up like a mummy, slam his face into the wood support of the bunk over him, and release a long, low-pitched, closed-mouthed moan. It was sort of like a cow mooing, but in slow motion. Absolutely fantastic.

The next morning I threw all my stuff into my bag and wrote in the kitchen until my Brazilian DJ friend rejoined me, looking much worse for wear.

“Bunch of bastards,” he told me out of nowhere.

“Huh?”

“The club I played at,” he spat. “Didn’t pay me a DIME. Bastards. Didn’t even give me free drinks. I had four beers, and they charged me.”

I shook my head. “Animals. Well, chalk it up to experience, I guess.”

He made a vague allusion to being all about peace and love. I shook his hand, wished him well, and headed for the door.

Oh, right. The bus was to Bratislava, and hoo boy, do I got some stories for tomorrow.

    heard yo mama in the movies

Love,

The Bastard

Vienna: Phallic Fixations November 25, 2017. Vienna, Austria. There's really no missing the Pestsäule. The 60-foot baroque monstrosity juts up out of the center of the Graben like an ornate middle finger to God.

[nostalgiaispeace]

389.

5,000 Question Survey–Part twenty-seven

2501. what image, scent, memory, etc. would you take with you into the dark/light, the land of dead, heaven, infinity…..? the smell of a forest.

2502. Who is the most annoying musical artist EVER? Taylor Swift...Justin Beiber....Demi Lovato...Miley Cyrus 2503. If you HAD to go to one of the following concerts, which would it be: Snow Vanilla Ice NKOTB Milli Vanilli BSB NSYNC

2504. Do you believe in manifest destiny? no... 2505. Have you ever fallen for an email forwarding hoax (send this to 13 people and old navy will send you a $200.00(100 pound) gift card)? Do you ever think ‘well, maybe…’ and actually forward those damn things? no; no

2506. Let’s say there are 2 schools. one for boys and one for girls. They are both supposed to offer the same facilities so that the girls and boys get equal education. Would you take this to mean that the same courses should be offered to both girls and boys or that the same amount of money should be spent on each school? both?

Imagine that in the boys school fifteen boys sign up for calculus. In the girls school only five girls sign up for calculus. Should the girls calculus class be dissolved and replaced with an easier one? no.. 2507. Would it bother you if you found out that the fruits, vegetables, and meat that you eat is genetically altered (in lots of cases it is!)? they are tho... 2508. What does this world need? peace. 2509. Is there anything you do just because you want to even though it has no redeeming social value? yes...tumblr lol

2510. If you drink what kind of drunk are you? i don’t really drink. 2511, Do you ever 'conveniently’ forget something you don’t want to remember? yeah... 2512. If you have any cousins are you close? no 2513. Are you in love with yourself (your beautiful self)? not at all. 2514. What was the first movie you got on dvd? i think Lilo and Stitch tbh 2515. If you’re sexy and you know it clap your hands. Did you clap? no 2516. have you ever called a: psychic hotline? no suicide crisis line? i’ve dont an online chat one. sex line? no dating line? no 2517. have you ever placed a personal ad anywhere? yeah 2518. Do guys look good in make up? sometimes. 2519. What are 5 things you don’t care about? - 2520. What are you going to do until you die? read books; watch movies; sing. 2521. What 'issue’ do you think your opinion is so right about that you end up trying to sway others to your point of view? mental health stigma 2522. What age do you hope to live until? don’t care. 2523. Do you like to tie others down during sex? no

Have you ever been tied down? no 2524. Do you own any “toys”? yes

Do you ever use them? yes

2525. Have you ever been spanked in that sexy way? no

Have you ever spanked anyone else? No.

2526. Do these questions make you uncomfortable? kinda

Do you like that feeling? no?

Does it turn you on? no..... 2527. You know those ___ for dummies books (COMPTERS FOR DUMMIES, SURFING FOR DUMMIES, GOLDF FOR DUMMIES, WICCA FOR DUMMIES)? yes Which one do you need to read? none. 2528. What do your socks look like? white 2529. Which of these really famous music artists started their career as a mime: no clue...

Alice Cooper David Bowie Bruce Springsteen Moby Jewel Frank Zappa

2530. Does love float away if you let go? probably? 2531. Do you think that most people in today’s society are: kind? no calm? no humble? no peaceful? no helpful? no happy? no spiritual? yes creative? yes friendly? no independent? yes intelligent? some? having fun? no clue coming up with new ideas? yes able to think for themselves? no able to really connect with others? maybe?

If you answered no to any of the above, why do you think that is? experience.

2532. Do you believe that every action has a sexual motive (think Freud)? no 2533. Speaking of Freud, did you know he was on drugs (think cocaine)? don’t care. 2534. Do you trust psychology as a valid science? yes 2535. ID: In Freudian theory, the division of the psyche that is totally unconscious and serves as the source of instinctual impulses and demands for immediate satisfaction of primitive needs(sex, food, aggressive behavior, drugs, alcohol, yelling, anger, fighting). SUPEREGO: In Freudian theory, the division of the unconscious that is formed through the internalization of moral standards of parents and society, and that censors and restrains the ego. So, which one do you express more, your ID or your SUPEREGO? superego 2536. Do you think that people who are alone and depressed are depressed because they are alone or alone because they are depressed? neither. they have a mental illness. 2537. Can you complete any of the following lyrics: I stop and I stare too much, afraid that I care too much… - You’re a new and better man, he helps you to understand,He does everything he can, he’s…. - Took the needles from my arms and put them to the sky… - Top Gun shut down your Firm like Tom Cruise…. - Don’t you take it so hard now, And please don’t take it so bad…. - 2538. How about these? From around the way, born in '73, Harcore B-boy named… - And this feeling shivers down your spine, Love comes in colors I can’t deny…. - Before he hung up the phone he took a deep breath, stopped, and replied…. - When I want you in my arms, when I want you and all your charms, whenever I want you all I have to do is… - Silly games that you were playing, empty words we both were saying… -

2539. Have you ever been to see a ballet? maybe 2540. What is the difference between Satan and Pan? - 2541. What should a poem be or do if it is a successful poem? ? 2542. When you interpret a poem can each line mean anything you want it to? i’m sure? 2543. Are you an orgasm addict? i like them but naw 2544. Are you a sugar junkie? yes 2545. What are you doing? this and watching The Purge Anarchy

Why aren’t you marching in line with the rest of them? ? 2546. Do you only hear what you want to? sure 2547. Are you anal-retentive? ? 2548. In and Out Over and Under Around and ???

WHAT 2549. What was the last thing you returned to the store? - 2550. Why ask why? to learn

2551. What is your favorite song or artist that is: jazz: Ill Wind - Billie Holuda metal: suicide season - BMTH rock: Since I’ve been loving you - Zeppelin new wave: - psychadelic: - 2552. What are your feelings about: Picasso? - Van Gogh? - Michaelangelo? i like his work D'Vincci? interesting Einstein? he’s cool Tesla? -

2553. Who else can you think of that made a MAJOR contribution to art or science? - 2554. Who can you think of that made a major contribution to modern thought? - 2555. Why is it called 'coca cola’? no idea. 2556. Would you ever buy a Ford car? i have 2557. Donald or Daffy duck? none 2558. What is the most memorable thing about Pee-Wee Herman? - 2559. Lease or buy a car? which i could buy 2560. Have you met Real Talkin’ Bubba? no

Do you love him to death? - 2561. Have you ever been in a situation where you weren’t sure if you were seducing or being seduced? no 2562. Can you 'pinch an inch’ on your belly? - 2563. Have you ever been to: a temple? no a bar? yes a massage parlor? no 2564. Would you ever want to visit Thailand? Sure. 2565. What culture are you fascinated by? European 2566. Have you ever worn a cape? naw 2567. What is the difference between 'nude’ and 'naked’? I don’t care

2568. What can you get for a dollar (.59 brittish pounds)? a soda from the vending machine 2569. What makes you who you are? everything 2570. How do you search for meaning in life? i don’t 2571. If your partner collected internet porn pics of celebs s/he thought was hot would that bother you? no. 2572. You are alone with your lover’s diary. What do you do? ? 2573. You read some and find out that a whhhiiillle back your lover had a crush on someone else, but you two were together. You both still hang out with this person. What do you do? nope. fuck that bitch. 2574. Are you an old fart? basically. 2575. What were your favorite things to do in the yard as a kid? play 2576. Why don’t people have more fun? no idea? 2577. Have you ever wanted to have a pet skinned and turned into an article of clothing? um no wtf

What pet? -

What article of clothing? -

2578. Do I come off sounding normal, mildly irrational, blatantly insane or completely certifiable? i don’t like this question. 2579. Did you ever feel that you were unable to function in society? yes 2580. Is it nap time yet? feels like it. 2581. Do you have to have the space next to the door or can you walk from the other end of the parking lot and still be okay with the world? sure? 2582. Do you like trains? sure 2583. What’s in Hungary? people 2584. have you ever felt like you were holding someone else back? probably.

Has someone ever held you back? dunno 2585. What do you think of the term, 'organized religion’? not a fan 2586. What do you think of the name 'Orson’? idc. 2587. What frustrates you? ignorance. 2588. Winkin, Blinkin and Nod, one night, sailed off in a sea of dew.. ? 2589. Is ten dollars (5 pounds) a good price to pay for one lipstick? no

Does anyone else remember when lipstick was, like, 2 or 3 bucks? no 2590. Are you ill? no 2591. Where were you the night of…..oh hell, last night? home 2592. Do you pronounce the 'er’ sound at the end of words(lookER or lookA)? yes 2593. Do you drink only 100% juice? probably? 2594. Do you remember the bills you have to pay…or even yesterday? yes? 2595. What duck? - 2596. Do you collect coins? no

How about stamps? no 2597. What’s the best way to learn a new language? no idea. 2598. Is god in you? nope 2599. Are you in god? nope. 2600. Do you know which fork to use at a formal table setting?

no