#I WANT SILLY DUMB SOUVENIR SHIRTS

[cactuupng]

If Mumbo ever decides to do merch again, I am BEGGING him to make merch related to the shops he's built/gonna build

[nyacht]

Seashell for Kakashi, Canon for Jaehee and Compas for Raihan?? :3 - love-and-starshine

BLESS YOU!!! Thank you SO much!! 😭😭💕💕 @love-and-starshine (you are definitely full of love and you are a heckin STAR!! 🌟)

Seashell; What are three or four of you and your F/O(s) favorite souvenirs and what is the story behind them?

1. So one of my prized possessions is Kakashi’s headband. Ok, yes, dumb and silly. When we first started getting more comfortable around each other- comfortable enough for us to poke fun and tease- I snatched his headband while he was deep into his Icha Icha Paradise book and put it around my own head! He lazily looked over at me and raised an eyebrow, not too bothered by my silly antics.

“What? You aren’t going to fight me for it?” I goaded, playfully sticking my tongue out at him. I could see the corners of his mouth turn upwards through the dark fabric he had covering his face. He chuckled and quipped, “If I wanted it back, I would’ve pinned you to the floor by now and have taken it no problem.” I would’ve challenged him again, but I was afraid of how I would’ve reacted if he actually followed through with his statement. But his retort shut me up quick.

Turns out, he had an extra one at home, and he let me keep his headband because he thought it was cute how flustered I got after that. It smells like him. >///>

2. Do you remember those silly bells he had when he was first testing out Team 7’s skills and teamwork? I have one of them that I carry around as a prized possession. For how I got it? That’s a story for another day!

3. And lastly, I did gift Kakashi something but I’m not sure if he considers it a souvenir. 🥺 As much as he reads, I’m surprised he didn’t have a book mark! And I’m 100% sure he doesn’t fold and crease the pages either! I figured that to make it easier for him to find his place, I got him a book mark!! I actually made it myself and drew a wolf on it (because, hello, yes, I’m a wolf-lover!). It was special to me because I put time and effort into this artistic creation. I practically threw the bookmark at him out of nervousness. But does he use it? Not sure lol

Canon; Who shot their first move? Was it smooth and clean or was it sloppy and awkward? Did it work?

OH!!! Jaehee definitely made the first move because sometimes I’m OBLIVIOUS and dumb! She practically asked me out on a dinner date, and I was just like, “Oh!! As friends!? :D” The realization didn’t hit me until I arrived at a 5-star restaurant, and she met me at the door, dressed to the nines. I showed up in a shirt and jeans. :’D

Compas; What lind of love languages do you and your F/O(s) speak?

DRAGON MAN 😤💕 My primary love language is Acts of Service, and my secondary is Quality Time! Raihan’s primary love language is Words of Affirmation, and his second is Physical Touch!! ovo

[immovable-force-archive]

@motherfucking-username

After everything that happened, it hadn’t felt right to wear his old, red hoodie. Sure, there were times he missed it, but at the end of the day, it was an old thing from a second-hand store. He’d find another hoodie to wear on his incognito missions, one that didn’t remind him of being drugged and attacked in a nightclub bathroom. Or waking up in the hospital to Connor screaming at him for his negligence.

... He didn’t like thinking about that night, even if it had opened more doors than it closed in the end.

Kisama blinked when Connor approached, holding his present. A... new hoodie? He stood from his chair, looking at the perfectly-folded garment in the other’s hands. The text and logo for the Detroit Police Department caught his eye... Hah! It’s almost like a souvenir, huh? He took it from Connor like it was precious, unfurling it to see the full thing. Looks like his size! Connor thought of everything, huh? (’It’s a gift. That I got for you.’ Hehehe! Why is that so cute?)

“I love it,” he says outright, a dumb smile on his face the longer he looked at it. Kisama’s wearing a blazer and dress-shirt, but that’s not about to stop him-- he wants to try it on right now! He slipped it over his head, fumbling around a little to get his arms through the sleeves, and winding up looking pretty silly with his messed-up hair and goofy grin.

“Thanks, Connor! Can’t wait to wear this at work, heh.” He chuckles, doing a spin like he was a model. “Well? How do I look?”

[davionstar]

Something of a post-PAX report, but a bit more personal. I won’t bore anyone with it if you don’t want to read so I’ll put it under a read-more thing.

So my original plan for this weekend, was to come out to all my friends in this particular crew on Thursday after we’d all met up. But things went fast and I never really got a good opportunity, and well, I just flat out chickened out on it and focused on having fun with my friends.

Next day...I barely got any sleep. At all. I woke up stressed and only half alive, so to speak. It was made worse by the fact that we got up super early to stand in the queue line for....no reason, as it turned out. (We were all confused about it, so it was no one’s fault but it still sucked) I hadn’t even gotten to putting on my pride pins yet. My mood started tanking. I was feeling horrible and I was getting worried I wouldn’t be able to enjoy any of the con because these days I just have those days where I just feel awful and can’t do anything.

I tried pushing through as best as I could, but it was really hard. But then something happened. Saki had wandered over to the PAX Merch booth. We usually get at least one thing there every year as a souvenir. She sent me a photo of a really nice looking purple hoodie (PAX Unplugged’s color theme is purple). I’d been looking for a new hoodie for a while now so I wandered over. She also found a t-shirt that had a lighthearted jab at gender identity and D&D alignments that said “Gender Lawful / Gender Neutral / Gender Chaotic” and was in this gorgeous shade of purple. Saki checked the sizes and bought me both the hoodie and the shirt. And I just felt so much better afterwards.

I enjoyed my time wandering the con with my friends. Dragged my buddy Bryan over to check out this newish card game I saw advertised. We demoed it and we and Saki got a bunch of cards.

Next day, after much better sleep, I threw on my shirt and hoodie, attached my pins, and was ready to go out and proud. I still didn’t fully come out but I did point out the shirt and pins and got approval from the folk who already knew at least. One thing that meant a lot was Saki spotting them and asking me if I wanted her to refer to me as “they” in public for the rest of the con and I told her yes and have I mentioned Saki is the best? Because she is. That day was fun as well.

Dawn of the final day I’d had another good night sleep. Was REALLY tempted to wear that shirt for another day, but I didn’t want to wear the same thing twice in a row at a con. Even if it didn’t get sweaty or anything I didn’t want to risk it. Still kept my pins up though. I was feeling pretty good through the day but as it was winding down, I started getting tired and a touch grumpy for some reason. We played a board game and I was kinda confused and all of my decisions ended up being bad. My mood started to fall again and folk still referring to me as “he” was making it worse. I finally asked if folk could call me “they” and they agreed. But it wasn’t enough, sadly. It got to the point where I couldn’t even stand to be there any more between the noise and feeling dumb and I left the con early to go back to the hotel. Curled up on the bed feeling awful and eventually fell asleep. I woke up, Saki and Dack showed up in the room and I was eventually able to slowly pull myself up. We went out for our end-of-PAX dinner and we were all talking and I finally was starting to feel good again. We got in some gaming before the end of the night and went to sleep.

The last morning we got up early, tried out one last game with Bryan that I wanted to see, then we finished packing and headed to our train. Took my pins off partway through so my mom wouldn’t see them. The trip home was uneventful other than the drive to our house where my mother first almost got us into a car accident and then told us how she barged into our house without permission while we were away. =_=

And now here I am. Back home with my responsibilities and worries. Got a phone interview this afternoon. At least I don’t have to dress up for it. But...it is pretty lonely here. Time to cuddle up in my new hoodie, wash my shirt so I can wear it at least when I’m not going out anywhere, and make it through the day.

I really wish I could put my pins somewhere nice or something. I really liked having them on my bag on display. It seems silly but it made me really happy. Even if probably no one really noticed them.

[verbballetstaipei-blog]

Day 14- last day in Taipei☹️

Oh my goshhhhh!!! Today was my last day in Taipei😩 I'm sad guys! This has been an amazing trip and it's hard to see it come to a close. But I guess they say all good things come to an end. Fine. Still feel like that's a dumb saying but ok ok I get it I can't stay on tour in Taiwan forever. So here's how the day went down: I got a good night of sleep (always a blessing before a performance day) and had my last hotel breakfast of fruit, veggies, a hard boiled egg, one cappuccino and one cup of coffee with steamed soy milk. I shall miss their fancy coffee machine😌 Then I attempted to start packing, got overwhelmed by the amount of dirty laundry and souvenirs (man I can really accumulate some stuff!), and gave up in exchange for heading to the theatre. On our way in, Kelly and I saw a ceremony of sorts for a big summer athletic event that Taipei is hosting, complete with many of the marching bands that we had seen practicing the day before. There was so much pomp to be had. Woo! Amped up for the last performance, the Verbers took our last company class with the BodyEDT dancers. They're beautiful movers, and I can't wait to see more of them when they come work with us in Cleveland! One of the dancers named Hsin (pronounced "She") gave us little cakes with egg and pineapple in the middle that were sooooo tasty. I have tried a lot of pineapple cake since being in Taiwan and those were by far the best. Thanks again for the tasty treat, Hsin! 😋 Then it was showtime for Program B. I thought my performance Saturday night was better for me personally, but the show still went well overall. I find that my best performances happen when I can completely lose myself onstage and immerse myself in whatever piece I'm dancing. If I let conscious thoughts drift into my mind, like "Oh I have to do this step that I can usually do fine, but what if I mess it up today?" or weird second guessing thoughts like that then it's hard for me to get back into that performance zen mode. But the audience still seemed to enjoy the performance, and that's ultimately the most important. Lots of people wanted autographs and pictures after the show, which to makes me feel a silly to be honest (it's just little ol' me🤓) but I was happy that I could do something to brighten their day. One young woman took a picture with me and posted it on Instagram with the caption "I'm in Love." They sure showered us with their affection! After the audience meet and greet, we did a quick photo shoot on the stage. Then we said goodbye to BodyEDT and the stellar stage crew and we were on our way! Richard, our associate director, had kindly arranged reservations and transportation so we could all have a final Verb dinner together. Mexican food best fits the dietary constraints of the group so it was Eddy's for nachos and margaritas for us. Thanks Senor Richard! Taiwanese Mexican food is surprisingly tasty! Since it was our last night, we wanted to make sure that we spent every Taiwanese dollar that we had exchanged when coming into the country, so our last stop of the trip was Shillin night market. Although we had already been once, the night market is so huge that when we went back I saw entirely new stall and stores. We had a total blast🤠 Because we didn't have to work the next day (actually we were purposely trying to stay up for most of the night in attempt to initiate the 12 hour time zone switch), we enjoyed ourselves and stayed out late. I bought a really obnoxious Taiwan hat that I plan to wear all around Cleveland this summer, some earrings in the shape of Taiwan, and a fo-jade necklace with Christina. We figured we could call it "genuine night market jade." I also tried a grass jelly tea (the tea part was great, I think I'll pass on future grass jelly😝) and Michael and I split this divine little cheese tart. Michael got a cute shirt to add to his crop top Friday collection and Christina got a pretty ballerina style tulle skirt. There were so many great options! It is very rare for ballerinas to have a little money to spend and time to do it so we enjoyed the luxury💁🏼 Thank goodness Kelly decided to buy some snail earrings because the jeweler who made them alerted us that the MRT was about to close. We ran to the MRT station (Lieneke buying chopsticks and Kelly purchasing a postcard rapidly along the way) and hopped on the red line. It was a really good thing the jeweler told us because we were out of Taiwanese money and wouldn't have been able to pay for a cab! That could've been a very long late night walk! When I got back to my hotel room, I had a package waiting for me from Connie, the hotel desk worker that came to our performance. She had hand stitched a "Verb Ballets in Taipei" embroidery and left it for me with a very sweet note. The whole trip, I found myself consistently overwhelmed by everyone's generosity and adoration. Taiwanese people are just so stinking kind! The tapestry is my favorite thing I'm bringing back from the trip. Thanks again Connie💌 Then Kelly and I turned on Taiwanese TV (we think it was a show similar to ninja warrior only with super crazy sound effects) and got to packing. Yaowowza I had a lot of dirty laundry😝 Like ehw! If TSA decides to do a random search of my suitcases, they'll be in for a rude awakening. I somehow managed to smash everything in (both of my suitcases had to be expanded to their maximum size), wrote a couple thank you notes, and I set my alarm to get me up in 2 hours. It was a great last day in Taipei!