#I just checked I didn’t realize Austria was sprint

[chaosinstigator]

so it’s a triple header with a sprint weekend in the middle… are yall trying to kill these people or😭

[joshslater]

Christmas Dream

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Andrew knew right away it was a dream. That in itself was weird. He had read about lucid dreaming, but never experienced it himself. Normally when he dreamt everything made sense, no matter how impossible or out of place the elements of the dream were, until he woke up. While the memory of the dream rapidly disintegrated from his short term memory without bogging down his long term memory, he could recognize the ridiculousness of the fragments of the dream he could grasp before they too slipped through his conscious inspection. But standing in the snow outside an impossible castle, wearing only his pajamas it was clear he was in a dream.

He hadn't attempted any of the tricks given in any of the lucid dreams texts he'd read, but perhaps just knowing about them made them work, eventually. Like learning about the FedEx arrow, if you hadn't noticed it before. Once you see it you can never not see it. He tried to remember any of the practical tips. One was to push a finger through the opposite palm to prove you are in a dream. He held out his arms in front of him and slowly moved his right hand's pointing finger towards his left-hand palm. They connected as you would expect if you were not dreaming. Well, absence of proof isn't proof of absence. Parts of the castle were levitating after all.

He walked closer to the castle, walked through a big archway, and into a large courtyard. Everything looked serious but cute at the same time. Like the castle in Austria or Switzerland or wherever that the Disney Land castle was modeled after. At one point there must have been a hanging or beheading there, but still it had a feeling of being friendly. No angry French gargoyles or winged stone grotesques looking down at you. No drawbridge to keep you out, or in.

But no people. There were fires lit everywhere in those metal basket fire things placed on the cobbled courtyard floor. Everything was dusted with snow, but there were steps and trodden paths all over the place. He stood still to take it all in. There were quite a few large doors leading out from the courtyard, most of them open and with welcoming light flickering from inside. He raised his gaze up the walls and saw row after row of windows, each one with a lit candle inside. Above that were the towers, reaching high above where he stood. Some of them were clearly floating in the air, with bridges leading to them from other towers. It felt like the first level of a game. Was this where got his first weapon and gear?

There was something else also. A noise like a constant sea, or a wind sweeping through the castle. He couldn't feel any breeze, but then he was standing barefoot on snow on cobblestones and didn't feel a thing. There was also.... like a faint pink mist around him, around the entire courtyard. It was thicker closer to the doors, like it was flowing out of the castle, or into it. And smack in the middle of the square was a small hearth with a black cauldron hanging over a lit fire on a tripod, looking suspiciously like Halloween props. He moved closer.

It looked out of place in the large courtyard. Next to the fire stood a little tray with small metal steins. There was a smell of autumn spices and fruit wine as he moved close to the small cauldron and its dark contents. The setup was obvious, mulled wine and mugs, but would he dare Alice in Wonderland the situation? It was his dream, he decided, and picked up one of the steins. It was warm from the nearby fire, but not hot. He dunked it into the cauldron to scoop up some of the liquid. He hesitated again. You are not supposed to smell anything in dreams, are you? Perhaps if you lucid dream you get to do whatever. It was already clear he was dreaming in color.

The hot liquid was sweet, boozy, and well-spiced, but as soon as he'd swallowed his first sip the world began to slow down. To his horror he could see the licks of the flames in the fire move slower and slower, like one of the drugged-up addicts in the Judge Dredd movie. The good one. He put down the mug on the ground, afraid he would spill the hot liquid on himself if he collapsed. He moved as fast as before, but the flames were just getting slower. As he looked up he realized that the pink mist wasn't mist anymore. It was people dressed up in white hemmed red Santa clothes moving around him like flash. DC, not Gordon. But they were all also getting slower and slower. They all looked like they moved with a purpose, and none of them gave him even a glance as far as he could see, though at the speed they were moving he could absolutely miss it.

Although they were of all different ethnicities they all looked remarkably similar. All boys similar in age to him, all of them of similar height, slim, athletic build, cute faces with an overall clean look. This part of the dream he recognized from before. He had struggled with his sexuality, desperately trying to like girls, but somehow he always dreamt about boys before waking up sticky. Always cute, slender boys that were totally out of his league. That's another big reason why he hadn't come out yet. He felt coming out as a pudgy teenager would just bring forth the full brunt of bullying with no upside.

Now he was surrounded by a flurry of handsome boys, all dressed up as small Santas in tight, red pants, loose-fitting white hemmed red jacket, and a red hat with a white, fluffy ball at the tip. Peaking out below the pants were black shoes or boots that looked far more rugged than the rest of the outfit. Amazed he was looking around him at the slowly slowing traffic that he almost jumped of surprise when he found someone pacing right next to him that appeared to be observing him. So he wasn't invisible to them after all. "You can see me?"

"Of course I can," he said in a high pitched voice. "Drink more so we can have this over with." The observer looked like all the other boys rushing past him, lean, pretty, and clad in Santa clothes. In addition he looked bored bordering on annoyed. That did nothing to make him less attractive to Andrew. Fair skin, chiseled features, and tufts of blonde hair was peaking out from under his Santa hat. This was clearly some sort of Christmas fantasy so Andrew decided to call these boys elves. "Ok," he answered, grabbed his half-filled stein from the ground, and drank the rest. Everything around him rapidly came down to normal speed, or something close to it. It still looked like everyone was in a hurry, but their movements didn't look unnatural anymore.

"Come with me, he is ready to receive you," the elf next to him said. "Who is?" "Santa. It's my job to bring you up to speed. Follow me," and he dashed towards one of the open doors without checking Andrew was following him. Andrew was caught off guard and took a moment to start following him, so he had to sprint to catch up. "What about?" "Be quiet unless spoken to. This is a place of efficiency." "What about getting me up to speed?" "I did. You are."

They reached a set of grand stairs. Five people could easily walk next to each other up or down the stairs, and indeed they met several other elves rushing down the stairs and a few passing them running up. The stairs were a consistent marble staircase but the flights looked very different from each other. He could only see doors or hallways around the stairs, but the floors were made of different materials and architecture. Even the ceiling height differed. The first few floors looked like what you would expect from a castle, but then they passed floors looking like modern offices, like concrete factory or warehouses, even one floor appeared to be wood, like a barn or a stable. He wished he had counted properly from the ground floor, because he soon lost track of how many flights they ascended. He was astonished he'd manage without running out of breath.

Finally his guide turned in a different direction, not following the impossibly long stairs up another flight, but instead turned left down a hallway, and then left again into the belly of the building. This floor looked a bit like a castle again. Everything was tall and wide and big, and hefty lit torches lined the walls, sitting in ornate brass holders. Suddenly they came to a stop in front of two massive, white, ornate doors. Andrew's guide turned to him and looked him over. Andrew suddenly felt self-conscious again, having forgotten about himself while taking in the strangeness of the sprint. His hair was damp with sweat, his checkered pajama shirt was stretched around his body, and his jammie pants clearly showed his erection. Andrew thought he could detect a flash of a sneer or smirk in the face of the elf. "Good enough," he said and opened the door for Andrew.

Inside was a grand waiting room with marble floor, high white walls, and several sets of comfortable looking armchairs, and a large desk next to another set of doors. Behind the desk sat another handsome elf who looked up at them as they entered. He had a more tanned skin than the first elf, and black hair. "He'll soon be ready for you," he told them unprompted. "Have a seat." Andrew tentatively moved to one of the armchairs, while his guide just stood there motionless and looked bored. The other elf had returned his focus to a book that he appeared to study carefully. As soon as Andrew sat down in the armchair the elf behind the desk looked up and announced "He will see you now." Andrew's guide elf motioned impatiently towards the inner set of doors. Andrew jumped up, and quickly joined him as he opened the doors.

The room revealed as the doors opened was nothing like what Andrew had imagined. Instead of an impressive office in the style of the waiting room preceding it, the room was styled like the inside of a forest cabin. In fact, looking out the windows it looked like a snowy forest landscape dimly lit by stars. In a corner of the room a fire was crackling, and right next to it was a small desk with a man sitting behind it. Compared to the man the simple wooden desk was hilariously undersized. Although sitting down he could tell the man would rise to a sizeable height standing up. He had black boots on that, unlike what the elves wore, were polished into a reflective pitch surface, reflecting the fire. His red woolen trousers were tucked into the shin high boots. Around his waist Andrew could hint a black belt in the same shiny black leather as the boots, but only because the desk was so small and the belt was massive, 4-6 inches wide. But above that his body was naked.

A massive upper body, while not as defined as a bodybuilder sure had at least as much muscle on it. He was strongman competition ready. Even though he probably looked more muscled hunching forward over the desk, making his shoulder and traps pop into big hunks of ham, there was no denying this man could deck most people. His skin complexion was slightly darker, like Mediterranean, and his body hair most certainly was. He was covered in black hair. Arms, chest, shoulders, all of it. And looking at his face he sported a thick but neatly trimmed, black beard, black eye brows, and black hair, topped with a red and white Santa hat. In this case Andrew was pretty sure it was THE Santa hat.

He looked a bit lost and pushed some papers around until he found a book on his disk. He scratched his chin through the beard while opening it. "Let me see... Let me see... Andrew was it?" his voice boomed in the room. "Yes, Sir!" Andrew responded, quick as he could. While the man acted gentle enough, he didn't look like he would respond well to fools.

"So, what do you wish for?" he said, looking up from the book, haven’t barely looked at the first page. "Eh... The new PlayStation." "That's just something you want, not a wish," the man said, almost with disdain before going back to the book. Andrew felt stupid. Was there a difference between wanting something and wishing something? Should he have wished for an end to all wars and global warming?

The man silently flipped through the book, sometimes going back and reference something from an earlier page. "So you stole a wallet at Walmart in second grade?" Andrew felt a chill and a panic as he was racking his brain for any time he had been at Walmart in second grade. He knew he hadn't stolen any wallet, but was there another wallet incident he could think of? "The wallet I found at the parking lot? I handed that in to a cashier," he answered, still not sure if that was it. The man flicked forward a few pages. "Ah! And then the cashier kept it. I see... I see..."

He then continued to skim forward in the book, occasionally looking up at Andrew. Minutes felt like hours. Andrew didn't even know what this was all about. Was this some sort of sentencing? Was this the actual afterlife? Had he died? Somehow his heart kept racing. "Tell me about miss Sullivan, your neighbor up the street. Why did you mow her lawn?"

"I've done it many times. She talked to mum about it and offered me a job, so I went there sometimes during the summer and mowed her lawn and got $10 for doing it." Words just poured out of Andrew without him even breathing. He was sweating and not sure what the man was after.

"What about last summer?" he asked. "She got ill, not sure what. She didn't want anyone to see her in case it was contagious. But I thought I should just continue as before." "And you got paid to do that?" "No, I'm not even sure she knew I did it." "Did that make you disappointed. Not getting paid?" "No" Andrew knew immediately that that was a lie. "I mean, yeah, I would have liked to be paid. But at least I got a workout." "You work out a lot?" "No. No, I don't." "And yet you'd like to look like you did?"

Damn, he kept making everything look bad. Andrew wanted to shout "Yeah, I wish I looked like the guys on the football team or the basket team or the swim team or any other fucking sports team, but I don't because I'm a loser that isn't good at any of that or good enough in school to not spend all my free time to catch up with everyone else so it's not going to fucking happen!"

"I just don't have time." "Time for miss Sullivan's lawn apparently."

With a loud thud he closed the book, making Andrew jump. He looked straight at Andrew. "I think you need some time as a proper helper." Then he shifted his gaze towards the elf Andrew was surprised to realize was still behind him. "Make it so"

"Yes," the elf responded and ushered Andrew out of the room.

Back in the waiting room the elf behind the desk looked up at them exiting the cabin room. "What's the verdict? Naughty or nice?" he asked. "Helper duty," Andrews guide responded. Andrew felt that things were happening outside of his control that he needed to be more aware of. "Wait. What's happening? Helper duty?" "Don't worry. It'll be fine," the guide elf responded. "Don't say don't worry. Tell me what's going on." "Ok, then. Do worry. You are going to become a helper. Just follow me." and he started to walk out of the waiting room back out into the corridor outside. The receptionist elf had stood up, walked around the desk, and patted Andrew in the back to motion him to start walking. Reluctantly Andrew started to walk, following the first elf. To his surprise the other elf followed him.

All three of them turned down the corridor in the opposite direction of the stairs and walked further into the building. Andrew was thinking about the encounter he just had. Somehow he wasn't sure if it had been a good or a bad one. He clearly wasn't getting any useful answers from his guide. The way they were walking, one in front and one behind, was kind of telling. Like he had just been sentenced and was on his way to receive his punishment. As if there was anywhere he could run. And he was still hard. Big fucking oblivious dick just happy to see everyone. Like a stupid puppy not understanding the situation. But did he?

After some twists and turns they stopped in front of a much more mundane door. One of many they had passed, and there were many more ahead of them in the corridor. The first elf opened the door and they all stepped inside.

This room was reminiscent of a locker room. Well lit, white walls, green plastic floor, a shelf system along one wall with rows after rows with labeled boxes, and in the middle of the room, a knee-high, sturdy bench with something akin to a gym mattress as a top.

No sooner had the door shut behind Andrew before the guide elf jumped him and started kissing him. Andrew's brain just went completely blank at first, not knowing what to do. He'd never kissed a handsome dude before, or any dude, and the kiss with Sophie didn't really count as a kiss really. They were just practicing. A few seconds in he realized he should perhaps do something too and grabbed hold of the elf. He started to actively kiss him back, or tried at least. He wasn't quite sure all the parts of his body were doing what he wanted them to, but holy fuck what was going on? Then he felt the other elf behind him, breathing at his neck. He could feel him kissing his neck while his hands went up inside his T-shirt. He was almost out of air and begun to feel light-headed when the first elf pulled away from their kiss. His vision came into focus again and he looked straight into the steel blue eyes of the boy. He was smiling for the first time Andrew had seen. Crisp white teeth, pinkish lips, and smooth skin. This was as up close as you could get and he was still gorgeous. They were both panting. "I need you... to take off... your clothes," the elf managed.

Andrew was happy to oblige, and the other elf behind him helped him out of his T-shirt. Andrew untied the drawstring on his pajama pants and stepped out of them while the first elf came back from the wall of boxes with some items, the first of which was a pair of grey socks. "Here, put these on." Andrew sat down on the bench and put on the socks, where we was joined by the receptionist elf. He kept rubbing Andrew's shoulders and back, and gave another kiss on his neck as he reached down to put a sock on his second foot. "You've never slept with anyone before, have you?"

Andrew turned to look at him directly. He hadn't really given him a proper look, as the elf had walked behind him all the way. He looked like a Brazilian photo model with tanned skin, hazel eyes, and pitch-black hair. His flimsy Santa jacket was opened and revealed a magazine cover perfect view of pecs and abs, and below that a bulge in his pants straining to be released. Andrew, naked except for the socks, was already showing his willingness with an almost painfully erect penis. "No..." It was like Andrew's brain was shortcircuiting next to this beautiful boy and couldn't come up with proper sentences.

The elf guided him to a bridge position. "Here, roll over." He kissed his way down Andrew's spine down to his butt. Then he dabbed his finger in Andrew's precum and started to slowly massage Andrew's butt hole. Then gently going in and out, then using two fingers, then three. Andrew thought he would explode with cum right then and there, but somehow that didn't happen. He kept his eyes closed and thought of the handsome boy behind him that was loosening his asshole.

When he opened his eyes he saw something sliding in below him. The other elf, the blonde guide elf was on his back in front of him on the bench, completely naked. Andrew was staring down at the elf’s balls and erect dick just below his face. He looked up over the body, the same perfect abs and pecs as the other elf, and all the way up to his handsome, chiseled face. He saw that the Santa hat was still on, so not completely naked after all. He looked down at the dick on offer in front of him again. He realized he was salivating. Tentatively he lowered himself and began to lick the tip of the penis a few times. Then he did a quick attempt at putting it in his mouth. Then he started to suck it in earnest. At the same time he could feel the reception elf entering his butt.

Andrew tried to keep the same pace with his sucking as with the penis going in and out of his butt. That way he felt like he could just zone out into bliss and not think of anything but pleasure. When he eventually did orgasm all three came at the same time. Andrew wasn’t prepared for any cum, and more as a panic reflex swallowed everything that got pumped into his mouth, just as he came on the bench and the second elf in his ass.

"Now these." Andrew realized he had been standing there on all four, frozen just trying to process what had just happened. "What?"

"Put these on," the but for his hat naked elf repeated, holding out a pair of red trousers of the same kind as they wore. As he put his feet down from the bench Andrew realized his legs looked different. Then he realized that his upper body looked different too. It was the same lean abs and pecs as all the other elves. Almost dazed he took the trousers, stepped into them, and slid them up his legs. Were his dick and balls any different than before? Perhaps. Hard to tell.

"These should be your size now," the other elf said, and placed a pair of black boots in front of him. Sturdy, no-nonsense, military style black leather boots. "I..." Andrew began, but couldn't really verbalize what he felt. There were a faint trail of hair from his pubs to his belly button, flanked by the most pronounced V he had ever seen in real life. It was one thing to see the bodies of all the elves, but on himself was another thing all together. He pushed one then two feet into the boots, tied them, and let the trousers hide them.

"Almost done. Just these two left," the guide elf said, handing him a jacket and a hat. Andrew grabbed both and quickly put them on. "Now what?"

"Now you look like a helper. Always were one."

The room is black save for the faint blue light from the alarm clock on the nightstand. Andrew stared into the black ceiling wide awake. He glances over at the clock. 05:16. A bit too early to run downstairs and check the Christmas stocking. He's supposed to be almost grown up after all. What a weird dream. Hot, but weird. He sticks his hand down the pajama pants. Sticky, but not bad enough to not sleep a few hours more. As he turns to the side he feels the boots on his feet.

[slasherholic]

Answer 21, Tag 21

My dear friend @irageneveart has tagged me in an ask game, so here we gooooo

1. Nicknames: Maddie, Chaddie and Daddy, in that order. My friends aren’t a very creative bunch when it comes to nicknames.

2. Zodiac Sign: Cancer! But my moon is in Capricorn, and I believe that I’m more of a Capricorn at heart. My MBTI type is INTP.

3. Height: 5’3”, which I’m proud of because it puts me at exactly one foot shorter than 2018 Michael and I really like the sound of that.

4. Hogwarts House: Slytherin baby!

5. Last Thing I googled: “Bruce Campbell” but I don’t really remember why I was googling him. He’s gonna be at the horror convention I’m going to this weekend though!

6. Favourite Musicians: In no particular order: Elvis, Blur, Dropkick Murphys, Two Steps From Hell, AC/DC, The White Stripes, The Dreadnoughts and some good ol’ Dead South when I’m in the mood for banjo that slaps.

7. Song Stuck in My Head: Icky Thump by the White Stripes, the guitar in that song shreds harder than it has any right to

Following Now: Ahhh 41 people. I’m really bad about checking my feed, so I usually just check tags and forget to follow. Baaad Maddie.

9. Followers: Damn, 750 as of the time I’m writing this! Thank you all for bothering to stick around to read my dumb stories, I legit have no idea what I’m doing but I’m glad that you guys find meaning in my work.

10. Do I Get Asks?: I get few here and there. It’s really my fault for not being more interactive!

11. Amount of Sleep?: Ooof, 5-6 hours of unbroken rest if I’m lucky. I’m an insomniac. The fact that I prefer to do most of my writing between the hours of 10 pm and 3 am doesn’t help my situation gshshshssh

12. Lucky Number: 8! It reminds me of Ouroboros and I love snakes heheh (I have two!)

13. What I’m Wearing: My pajamas still, and that’s not just because it’s Sunday… many of my classes are online and so I get to sit around in overly large fuzzy pants all day.

14. Dream Job: Right now my passions lie in the film industry! I’m going to be studying film production starting next semester. For a long time I wanted to be a paleontologist, but I now realize that any field of science is off the table for me because numbers fry my brain like an egg.

15. Dream Trip: Germany, Switzerland or Austria. That region of Europe looks totally different from what I’m used to here in bone-dry SoCal. I’d love to see the Alps!

16. Favourite Food: Too hard for me to answer. I can do my favorite drink though, it’s called a “Mango Lassi” and it’s Indian in origin and it’s the best fucking thing I’ve ever tasted. I’ll down ten of those things if I’m not stopped.

17. Instruments: Piano! I took lessons as a kid and can sort of still play? Honestly though, all that matters to me is that I can play the Halloween opening theme with my eyes closed heheh

18. Languages: Just English. I tried to learn French, Italian and Japanese but didn’t commit, whoops

19. Favourite Song: Can’t choose ahhhhh

20. Random Fact: I uhhhh sleep naked 90% of the time. I have a plethora of skin issues and so clothes just bug me. This is the real reason I choose to wear loose-fitting pajama pants all day.

21. Aesthetic(s): heavy rain against a window, dancing in a thunderstorm, tired eyes, things that go bump in the night, rattlesnakes, cold sweat, insatiable curiosity, a nervous smile, stars twinkling against an inky black sky, morning mist, fog too thick to see through, getting hopelessly lost in a daydream, sprinting as fast as your legs can carry you

Tag 21 people: Hah, I know like 3 people so I’m just gonna tag randomly here: @renlvbon​ @someone-who-is-there​ @masks-n-steel​ @queenslasher​ @medicated-for-public-safety​ @psychocyde @insearchofnewdreams @nasti-imagines @tinalbion @lilliryth @slasherbabes @bubbaskitchen @lookwhatbeewrote @45lampkinln @i-find-slashers-agoreable @slasher-fanatic @nathalyryder

[travelinglight10-blog]

Thai Adventures With Bubba

Bubba had been telling me for months that he was coming to visit me in Thailand, even before I left last year we talked about it. He had to work to make it happen, starting with getting a passport. After that he just needed to save up enough money for a plane ticket and a little extra to spend while here. After a while it seemed like he wasn’t going to make it, but I kept my hopes up and prepared for him to visit by saving up my allotted vacation days. Bubba does things in his own way and in his own time and I was trusting that he would figure out a way to come visit me. At the end of June, he sent me a picture of a receipt for an expedited passport and finally, in July he bought a ticket to Bangkok. I was so excited.

The trip started off with his flight being delayed, which meant he would be landing in Bangkok sometime in the wee hours of the morning. I live about an hour from Bangkok International Airport, so originally, I was going to pick him up and take a cab home that night. Which meant, I would be able to make it to work the next morning. However, as Thailand has graciously taught me, plans often go awry. Instead, I booked a last-minute hotel near the airport and called in sick to work the next day. Because his flight was delayed, he missed his connecting flight, so I had no idea when he would be arriving. I fell asleep, not knowing when he would be landing, but figured he would be able to call me when he arrived. Turns out, the international plan he signed up for was for texting and calling only, and the plan I have here, is for data only, so our phones both worked, but they didn’t speak the same language. Around 5 am I received a call on Whatsapp, from my mom, telling me that Bubba had landed, so I told her to convey to him the instructions to get a cab to the hotel I was staying at. Shortly thereafter, there was a knock on my door and my brother was there! It was so good to see a familiar face. After such a long journey, he was eager to shower off the grime of travel. Showers are a bit different in Thailand, but I assumed he would figure it out. I was wrong. To my amusement, he told me how he has used the little hose that hung near the toilet to shower. What he thought was the shower, was actually the bidet or what some refer to it as, the bum gun. I wonder if anyone else has ever made that mistake before…

We started our adventure together in Krabi Province, in the South of Thailand, where we stayed on an island, spending most of our time lounging on the beach and meeting fellow travelers and Thai’s, alike. Because August is considered low season, especially for the islands, I scored a cheap room in a nice hotel on the island. Normally, I stay in hostels or share cheap bungalows with friends, so it was quite the treat. Our first night on the island we decided to grab dinner at an Indian restaurant. In order to get to the restaurant, we had to go to the other side of the island. There are three ways to do this: 1) a 45-minute trek through the jungle, 2) a 15-minute hike through the mountains/jungle that is sometimes blocked off when the tide is high, 3) walking along the shore when the tide is low, around the mountains/jungle. To go to dinner, we took the second route. We ate dinner and ended up going to a bar on that side of the island, where we played a few games of Jenga and filled each other in on what we’ve been doing over the last 10 months. Soon after, were both ready to crawl into those cozy hotel beds and pass out for the night, but mother nature had a different idea. When we went back to the shore, we realized the tide had risen so high that we couldn’t get to the entrance of the path to get back to the other side of the island. We were essentially stranded, at least until the tide went back out. We asked a local when the tide would be low enough for us to get to the path and he said around 1 or 2 a.m. So, we headed back to the bars. On our way back, we passed a couple playing music together on the beach. Bubba said we should join them, but I told him I didn’t want to intrude. We ended up at a reggae bar and 5 minutes later, the couple from the beach came and sat down right next to us. We ended up talking and we all decided we should go back to the beach to jam, but after 5 minutes, it began to pour. We sprinted to the nearest shelter, which was a little restaurant that was closing up for the night. We stayed there for about an hour, adding our voices to the sound of the rain pounding on the roof above us, until we were kicked out. At that point, the rain was still coming down in buckets and the tide was still too high to cross over to our side of the island. The lovely German couple we were with, took pity on our predicament and offered to let us sleep on the balcony of their hotel room. They even pulled the cushions off the couch in their room, so we could sleep on them. If it wasn’t for their kindness, we would’ve been stranded on the beach in the rain all night. After a few hours of sleep and 50 bug bites later, we quietly left their room to attempt to get back to our beds. It was around 4 am by the time we left and the tide was finally low enough for us to cross over. We grudgingly trekked our way along the shore, up into the jungle and back to our hotel. We slept in late that day and when we woke up we went to a cute little teahouse, where a kind elderly woman made us fresh ginger tea with lime. We spent the majority of our time in a bar on the island, where we chatted with the owner and other backpackers, played ping-pong, and listened to music. The rest of the time we spent on the beach, taking in the scenic views. We were fortunate to be on the islands during the full moon and lunar eclipse. That night, I stood staring up at the sky, basking in the glory of the moon and the beauty of nature.

After a few lazy days on Tonsai, we flew up north, to Chiang Mai. After checking into our hostel that night, we went to the night Bazaar, a huge night market. Bubba got some dinner, we did some window shopping, and then found a bar with live music, where we ordered some hot tea.

At our hostel, we met a guy from Turkey and ended up spending a lot of time with him. We rented a motorbike for a few days and drove into the mountains to explore with our new friend. The first day with the bikes, the three of us went to Doi Suthep, a temple with a beautiful view of the city. Then we drove further into the mountains and found a little coffee shop, where we for stopped a pot of tea (Bubba and I both have an affinity for tea) and watched storm clouds roll through the mountains in the distance.

 We continued our journey and found a village higher up in the mountains. There we found a beautiful flower garden and a waterfall. 

The next morning, we woke up early for a cooking class on a little organic farm. We were picked up and brought to a local market, where we sampled a few different Thai fruits and bought a few ingredients we would need for our dishes. When we got to the farm, we picked the rest of the ingredients ourselves and then made 5 traditional Thai dishes. Needless to say, we were very full by the end of the class! 

That night, we went to North Gate Jazz Club with a few other people we met at our hostel. The following day, we drove into the mountains again with another friend, a girl from Austria. As we were driving, it started to rain, so we decided to pull our bikes over. Luckily, we happen to stop at a waterfall, where there was a gazebo and benches to stay dry. While we waited for the rain to stop, we ended up doing some spontaneous yoga poses, meditation, and even “omed” together. As always, Chiang Mai treated me well. I’m so happy I was able to share the charm of such a wonderful city with my brother.

A few days in Chiang Mai and then we were off the Pai, a hippy, mountain town, about 3 hours from Chiang Mai. This time, I was prepared and took motion sickness pills before getting into the van. In Pai, we shared a cute little bungalow surrounded by rice fields.

We went on a hike and found a few temples and a huge white Buddha. 

There was an amazing vegan restaurant down the street from where we were staying. They had buy 2 get 1 free kombucha, vegan waffles and ice cream, an array of vegan desserts, and some of the most delicious food ever. We were happy campers (:

I don’t know what it is about Pai, but it has a powerful energy. There’s magic in the air there. Those few days there were transformative.

After a truly wonderful two weeks, it was time to fly back to Bangkok to send Bubba back to the states. I was sad to see him go, but knew I would see him again soon, along with the rest of my beautiful family!

If you’re reading this familia, I LOVE YOU! 

[jodyedgarus]

What A Badass Olympic Skier Can Teach Us About Work-Life Balance

Team USA has sent 20 fathers to Pyeongchang, but only one mother: Kikkan Randall. A three-time winner of cross-country skiing’s World Cup sprint title, Randall was part of a baby boom that happened after the 2014 Sochi Olympics, when four of the sport’s top athletes took time off from racing to give birth.1

These women didn’t just return to work — they came back to the highest level of a demanding sport, and all four are expected to compete in Pyeongchang. But Randall is doing so without the same safety net that her European colleagues have. And that’s left her facing the same challenge that many other American women experience: how to balance a grueling career with the demands of new motherhood. A job as arduous as being a professional athlete (or, say, director of policy planning at the State Department) has little room for compromise or scaling back, and that means that much of the parenting must fall to a spouse or outside help.

The 2018 Games will be the fifth Olympic appearance for Randall, a 35-year-old cross-country skier from Alaska.2 In 2008, Randall, nicknamed Kikkanimal, made history by becoming the first American woman to win a World Cup in cross-country skiing. And in Pyeongchang, she has a legitimate shot at a medal.

Mothers-to-be in most professions take time off after childbirth, but Randall’s situation was different: “I was on my maternity leave while I was pregnant,” she said. Because she remained on the U.S. ski team roster, she retained access to her health insurance, and most of her sponsors continued their support, in exchange for appearances, social media plugs and other publicity. She resumed training about three weeks after her son, Breck, was born in April 2016, with the support of her husband, Jeff Ellis, who parented while she trained. Having a husband who is willing to take on parental duties and, most importantly, to do so “unbegrudgingly” has been “a huge piece of the puzzle,” Randall said.

There’s no such thing as a part-time return to work in elite sports, which usually require multiple training sessions each day, along with naps, massages, full nights of sleep and other recovery rituals. Of course, sleepless nights are almost a given for the first years of a child’s life. And Randall said that knowing Ellis will “take care of those night-time wakings before a race really helps.”

She noted that her peers in Scandinavian countries have the benefit of paid time off for fathers as well as mothers. (Of the 35 countries that are members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.S. is the only one without paid maternal leave.)

Paid maternal leave policies around the world

Among countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2016

Country Length of paid maternity leave, in weeks 1 Greece 43.0

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2 United Kingdom 39.0

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3 Slovakia 34.0

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4 Czech Republic 28.0

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5 Ireland 26.0

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6 Hungary 24.0

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7 Italy 21.7

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8 Estonia 20.0

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9 Poland 20.0

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10 Australia 18.0

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11 Chile 18.0

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12 Denmark 18.0

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13 New Zealand 18.0

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14 Finland 17.5

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15 Canada 17.0

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16 Austria 16.0

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17 France 16.0

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18 Latvia 16.0

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19 Luxembourg 16.0

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20 Netherlands 16.0

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21 Spain 16.0

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22 Turkey 16.0

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23 Belgium 15.0

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24 Slovenia 15.0

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25 Germany 14.0

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26 Israel 14.0

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27 Japan 14.0

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28 Switzerland 14.0

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29 Iceland 13.0

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30 Norway 13.0

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31 South Korea 12.9

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32 Sweden 12.9

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33 Mexico 12.0

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34 Portugal 6.0

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35 United States 0.0

Source: OECD Family Database

Randall’s Finnish peer Aino-Kaisa Saarinen had a child around the same time that Randall did, and she told me that her country has a mandatory four-month paid leave for mothers, which she started a month before her due date. After the baby was born, she and her partner received further benefits, including leave that they could split as they chose between the parents. “In our case, the dad took all that,” Saarinen said. (Not to mention the paid leave that fathers are entitled to.)

Randall has competed in the predominantly Europe-based World Cup without that kind of paid leave but with Breck in tow for the past two seasons. It hasn’t always been easy. Although she emerged from childbirth without any serious complications (not all women do, as tennis star Serena Williams’s story demonstrates), the snap in her muscles didn’t return right away. And during her time off, the U.S. team “had gotten so strong,” Randall said. She sat out the second World Cup weekend after her return because she wasn’t skiing as well as her teammates.

There have been many men who’ve continued competing after adding a child to their family, said Chris Grover, head coach of the U.S. cross-country ski team, but very few women. “Many of these guys are not primary caregivers and tend to come to the races Thursday and head back home on Sunday night or Monday,” Grover said. And while fathers may experience sleepless nights just like mothers do, they don’t need to physically recover after childbirth.

Randall and her husband have built their work and family life around her job. Ellis secured a job as a media coordinator for the ski federation, which allowed him to travel the World Cup circuit with her. “He got the job so that we could see each other in the winter,” Randall said.

Randall breast-fed her son until about a month into the racing season. Realizing that there would be at least four mothers coming to the World Cup with babies, the ski federation worked with the athlete commission, national ski federations and organizing committees to make formal recommendations encouraging race venues to provide a “baby room” with appropriate provisions so that moms can breast-feed and care for their infants as needed. Randall thinks she used these rooms much more than others in her cohort of new mothers. She said that may be because the others live in Europe, where most of the races take place, and can travel back and forth between home and races on a weekly basis.

In Finland, Saarinen benefits from laws that guarantee child care facilities will be available. “The government also pays for most of it,” she said. That’s not all. “We also get child money from the government, which is about 200€ per month, a baby box with 48 items, and free and mandatory monthly health checks for baby and for the mom.”

Things are different in the U.S. According to a 2015 Pew Research Center survey, 62 percent of parents of infant or preschool-age children report difficulty finding affordable, high-quality child care in their community, regardless of their income.

Because Randall and Ellis are both working while on the race circuit, their parents and some friends have stepped in to provide child care, but paying travel and accomodations for these helpers isn’t cheap. In part because of the cost, Breck won’t be accompanying his parents to Pyeongchang. After calculating that it would run something like $15,000 to $20,000 for them to bring him and a caretaker along, they decided to send him to his grandparents’ house in Canada instead.

As well as things are working out for her now, Randall acknowledges that her current situation is not sustainable. And it probably wouldn’t be scalable to the whole workplace either. Grover acknowledged that it’s difficult to imagine a ski team traveling around Europe with all the coaching staff’s kids, in addition to the team athletes.

Randall plans to retire from racing after this season but will remain in the sport. She is president of the U.S. branch of Fast and Female, a group that encourages girls to participate in sports, and she’s running for election as an athlete representative on the International Olympic Committee Athletes’ Commission. After two decades of competition, it feels right, she said. Success in a career like sports requires giving it your all, and that means family life can’t always come first. For a parent who wants to substantially take part in parenting, eventually something must give.

from News About Sports https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/what-a-badass-olympic-skier-can-teach-us-about-work-life-balance/