#I really can't explain it enough

[the-woild-is-ya-erster]

UM WEST END NEWSIES????

so I saw the Wembley Park Theatre production last night and if u don't wanna be spoiled dni

But if you have no chance of seeing it here are some of the little details <3

First of all the casting was perfect???

Michael Alomka dove into a more sensitive part of Jack - and it was super interesting

Katherine was so much more headstrong and it was suchhhh a new flavour of her - Katherine has never been one of my favourite characters but god she was so strong and wild and unduly it was brilliant.

Ryan Kopel as Davey has to be my standout tho - he seemed much younger in the role than BF did, and much more uncertain and afraid - I loved it - and his development oh my god he became boisterous and ahhhhhhhhh

Docket as Crutchie was brilliant he was much less happy-go-lucky than AKB was and oh it worked - he was frustrated and angry and real.

AND Crutchie played a much larger role in the leadership of the strike here!! Just through little interactions and stuff but it was coooollll and he even seemed to form a friendship with both Kath and Davey

Even the kid playing Les was brilliant and I usually don't like Les all that much - but the kid I saw was brilliant

KATHERINE WORE A CROWN MADE OF SPOONS IN KONY

The Newsies would swing out on lamps and ropes over the audience and oh my godddddddd

THE BROOKLYN NEWSIES WERE GIRLS (and it added balance since earlier they'd been the bowery beauties so it changed them up and showed the power of women plus finally included girls in the strike, sometbing 1992 and bway missed) AND THEY WERE SO GOOD

Jack and Katherine had Beatrice and Benedick vibes from Much Ado - that's the only comparable thing, they were so brilliant and the chemistry was so goooodddd

Ngl it probably didn't have enough Javid content for you addicts.

Butttt there was a hug when Jack tells Davey they won the strike that is so good. Davey can't retain himself, he jumps and hugs Jack and then picks up and whirls around Les

'we are inevitable' was delivered PERFECTLY I can't even explain

There are so many stunts and jumps and tricks and we all knew the dancing was gonna be perfect but dear god it still got me

And finally, my favourite thing, THE SET

I was sitting stage right in Woodside (I think) and if u can get tickets like that it is so worth it. The actors are running up behjind and beside you

There's even a little slide for the escape from snyder

And they utilise the scaffding part of the set super well

There are lamps that lifted up for ariel tricks

And so much more

Even a fuckin zip line!!!!!!!

okay you've nearly made it to the end

There were a fewwww lyric changes buttt the orchestrations were changed quite a lot to make room for more dance and honestly? I think I prefer broadway music wise

THEY ALL STAND UP AND SAY THEIR NAMES IN SEIZE THE DAY <3

The Pulitzer's set was built in newspapers to show class and how the Newsies have built their entire empire etc

And all the set was moved on and off by the Newsies, too, again to show class and how the Newsies (and working kids) run the world, really

Finally

Yes, Race was perfect.

[starry-bi-sky]

I am loudly pushing the batdad agenda i am loudly pushing the— DPxDC Prompt

“Woah. You look like shit."

Granted, that’s probably not the first thing Danny should be saying to the guy that just bit the curb, but in his defense; he’s not running on 100% right now either.

The man -- tall, towering, and broader than Danny is tall -- whips around on his heel, black frayed cape flaring out impressively. Danny would've whistled in appreciation, but he takes the time instead to wipe the back of his hand across his mouth, smearing the blood running from his nose across his cheek.

"Sorry." He blinks widely, not even flinching as the man with the horns zeroes in on him. "That was rude of me. I have a really bad brain-to-mouth filter; Sam says its what always gets me into trouble."

And she's not wrong either, per say. His smart mouth is what landed him in this situation -- with blood blossom extract running through his veins and cannibalizing the ectoplasm in his bloodstream. Thanks Vlad.

The man grunts at him; a short, curt "hm" that shouldn't make Danny smile, but he does because he's somewhat delirious and probably concussed. The man keeps some kind of distance, sinking towards the shadows of Gotham's alleyway like he dares to melt right into it.

If it's supposed to scare Danny, it doesn't work. Danny's never been afraid of the dark; he's always been able to hide himself in it. He blinks slowly at the mass of shadows.

"You look hurt." The shadows says, blurring together around the edges. Danny squints, and licks his lips to get the blood dripping down his chin off. Ugh, he hates the taste of blood.

"I am." He says, "My godfather poisoned me. M'dying." The agony of the blood blossom eating him from the inside out looped back around to numbing a while ago, so all he feels is half-awake and dazed.

"Hey," Danny stumbles forward towards the man, a bloodied hand reaching out to him. "You-- you're a hero, right? You're not attacking me; which is more than I can say for most costumed people I've met." Maybe it's a poor bar to judge someone at, but he's already established that Danny's not in his right mind.

The man makes no change in expression, but Danny realizes blearily that it's hard to tell with the shadows on his face. He stays still long enough for Danny to latch onto the cape -- stretchy, but almost soft under his fingers.

He looks up blearily into the whites of the man's eyes. "Can you help me? I don't-- I don't wanna die." Again. He doesn't wanna die again. He blinks slow and lizard-like. "I mean- I'll probably get to see mom and dad again, but I told them I'd at least try and make it to adulthood."

There's a clatter down the street, and Danny's ghost sense chills up his spine and leaves a bitter, ashy taste in his mouth. He immediately knows who it belongs to even before the deceptively gentle; "Daniel?" echoes down the way.

"Daniel? Quit your games, badger, Gotham is dangerous for children."

Danny's mouth pulls back, and blood spills against his tongue. "Please." He rasps, and grabs onto the shadow's cape with both hands. "Please. He's going to kill me. Please--"

"Daniel? Is that you?"

His lips part, dragging in air to plead with the darkness again. He doesn't need to, the whites of his eyes narrow, and the cape whirls around him before Danny can blink. Soon swaddled in shadows, the Night lifts him up, and steals him away.

[edorazzi]

Page 25 of my Miraculous Mentor AU comic A Matter of Trust! In which Felix is offered a downright horrifying solution to get rid of his Miraculous early, and Plagg explains the rules behind the magical bond! 📜💋

Index | Start | Prev | Next

Weekly updates each Sunday! You can also read ahead early on Patreon (with three brand new pages tonight, totaling 30!), and/or buy me a Ko-fi if you'd like to support my work! 💖

[thekittyokat]

Hi! Please please please, could you tell me more about your coffin chain ideas?/nf

I am obsessed but barely anybody has jumped onto the ship yet and I am VERY new to the fandom so I wanna wait with making it myself until I know more lol. You are lowkey fueling this entire operations and I wanna thank you for that either way.

(rubs my paws together) you have no idea what you've unleashed anon i've been holding onto this ask specifically bc i've been sapping dopamine from it like a little leech waiting until i had time to hastily doodle up a little dynamics timeline for different stages of the ot4

i REALLY hope this makes sense . i feel the need to say this every time i post abt coffinchain but my ideas are rly specific and i've had time for them to infect my brain like mold so i'm defo ready to accept this all being rly niche and really just for me and like 3 other people

buuut if this little peek into my mind speaks to ANY of y'all i absolutely encourage implore and beg you to send me asks and ideas and whatnot about these 4 bastards literally whenever you want!!

TL;DR one half of the trauma bonded couple reaches out and forms an immediate kinship with the big scary guy that no one likes & convinces his petty boyfriend to let him fw them. then he starts bringing his deranged fbi otter around they start double-dating only for it to become a situationship and then the worst polycule ever

[scarletfasinera]

I hate when people are like "I already didn't like xyz so it's not difficult for me to boycott it unlike those loser customers that actually Liked the thing which I could never understand bc I was never a customer uwu" bc like. That literally isn't boycotting lmao. That is just Never Being A Customer In The First Place, which means nothing actually.

Boycotts are primarily about applying pressure (or completely making it impossible to operate) via financial/commercial/economic impact. AKA it's about money and capital.

If you already weren't spending money on a product/franchise/company, then you were already never part of their sales data, and you just doing nothing & making absolutely no change to your daily life and just continuing to not be part of their sales data as normal, has literally no material impact. You were already never a factor. The people who WERE customers & WERE part of the sales data & ARE withdrawing their money from those sales figures actually ARE making a material impact.

"Supporting" something isn't about vibes or thoughts or feelings or you telling your best friend how much you like a thing, "support" in a meaningful sense is specifically material. It is financial. Refusing to continue supporting something means taking the money you were previously spending on it & putting it elsewhere. If you were never spending money, you were never supporting it, and therefore it doesn't make any difference if you continue to not support it. Boycotting is something CUSTOMERS and CONSUMERS do.

SO STOP FUCKING BRAGGING ABOUT IT & STOP MAKING FUN OF PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY ARE BOYCOTTING FOR "EVER LIKING XYZ TO BEGIN WITH" & STOP SPREADING THIS FALSE IDEA OF HOW BOYCOTTING WORKS LMAO sorry for capslocking I remembered I was annoyed

I just hate this low-morale mean-spirited bullshit some people do in the notifs on boycotting info posts where they arbitrarily moralize about something they just don't understand so they can pat themselves on the back for doing literally literally nothing AND inadvertently spreading misinfo in the process. Be quiet. Go do something that matters. There are plenty of posts going around, including from Palestinians themselves, with lists of references for how to help Palestine & other similar causes for people currently in crisis, please please do something For Real instead of boasting online about your fandom superiority complex as if it means anything.

[sholmeser]

so like it’s 1999 and solid snake is in zanzibar land and gray fox tells you that all he can do is fight. it’s all he has and it’s probably all you’re ever going to have, too, because deep down you know your father is right, you know he is right as you click the lighter and burn the flesh off his skin, you know he is right when he tells you, this will never go away. i am always going to be a part of you. it’s 2005 and solid snake is in shadow moses island, alaska and gray fox tells you that’s good, snake. hit me harder. do it more. that’s good. when you meet meryl you kill the guards, and then snake thinks he loves her, so you kill psycho mantis for her, ocelot tortures you and you withstand it for her, you beat liquid to a pulp for her and while his blood is on your fists he smiles and tells you that you two, you’ll always be the same. gray fox means violence means meryl means violence, so what’s love if not that? what is it if not the feeling of broken bones under your knuckles, if not the smell of your father’s burnt flesh? but she's too young, she doesn’t understand you and she couldn’t if she tried, because she’s eighteen years old and doesn’t know any better and doesn’t understand that after you sleep with her you’re going to get up and let the pillow grow cold, she thinks you’ll tell her everything and when you don’t, because you can’t, she’ll leave you. you kill him with your fists and for her you destroy shadow moses and you hear him say to you again that’s good, snake, that feels good, do it harder. but it isn’t a coincidence that in mgs1 you meet otacon at the same time you meet gray fox. otacon who is so scared of battle he pisses his pants and otacon who cries over a woman who could never love him back and otacon who thinks good people like dogs, kind people like dogs, otacon who passed you a meal, ready-to-eat and a bottle of ketchup across the bars of your cell and when you ask him why the fuck are you here if you cant help me he says to you, i thought you might be hungry. otacon who gives you her handkerchief that was once her mother's and will be hers once again when she dies, when you rest it atop her glazed-over irises, a cycle of love. she was a good person, snake, and so are you. she liked the wolves and you do too. otacon who cries over his baby sister’s little body, who blames himself for being seventeen years old under the touch of the woman who should have been his mother. otacon who when it's 2014 will make you the solid eye and the octocamo suit and the mk. ii to keep you safe and say to you, don't hurt anyone, snake. will say to you: i'll follow you wherever you go, like this. otacon who blubbers like a baby and cries too much and who, when it's 2009 in new york city, you have to say to, go rescue the hostages, because if you don’t he’s going to crumple in on himself, a dying star. this is how you love, you don’t say to him, and how i love, because you showed me how. wrap your arms around his shoulders and hope it’s enough.

[tinybro]

jasico server was chatting about the cupid scene and jason getting nico's memories blasted straight into his brain and how jason being shot with one of cupid's arrows while with nico and this was just never brought up in canon again and now i'm thinking like...what if that's just how cupid's arrows work? not by magically manifesting love for someone out of nothing, but by giving someone the perspective that'd make them fall in love naturally? jason gets a front row seat to nico's memories and instantly understands him intimately and can trust him completely without any doubt or suspicion

so what if jason, after slowly realizing he's totally in love with nico, just thought back to the arrow incident and it made him second-guess everything? because maybe he's only feeling this way because cupid hit him with an arrow with only nico was around and it's no different than any other god messing with his love life

[mokeonn]

Before I go to sleep I leave you all with this piece of advice: sometimes you don't actually have to answer big political questions, sometimes you can just say "I am not smart enough to know that, I just know the small things I do to help." Like you can often times completely avoid making a fool of yourself if you just say you don't know.

[everyryuujisuguro]

[pekoeboo]

ugh. some thoughts.

really been trying to find the joy in drawing/writing again and honestly it's been such a challenge. friends have told me it's most likely depression that's making it hard to feel motivated and tbh they're probably right.

hoping to get back into being creative in the way I Want to be at some point tho. I miss it. there's still so much with my stories and characters that I haven't been able to share or explain and I wish I knew how without it feeling like this daunting, impossible task.

I don't know when I'll get around to actually sharing art again (or writing, if ever). was hoping that I'd manage to get some of my mental and physical issues in check recently for just long enough to get back into the swing of being creative, but that hasn't seemed to work. everything feels bad, both artistically and physically. I'm struggling to keep up with the frantic pace at which my brain comes up with story concepts and intriguing character interactions, even tho everything in me wishes I could turn it into tangible artistic expression so I can get it out of my head and share it. it used to be easy. I don't know why it's not now.

I'm just . tired, I guess.

[roboticutie]

It's a side-mission that I don't think many end up doing, at least from the lack of talking about it I see, but still. The figurines. If you succeed a check in the pawn shop, you can take a figurine of a headless soldier on a horse. If you've done that, when you inspect the stained glass Dolores Dei you can get the task to give her any and all figurines you can find. Perhaps you can one day. Even when you get this task, though, it feels odd- it confuses your Logic because Dei has long since passed, but... Maybe you can give her these gifts somehow? You can find another figurine in the unplayable Wirral expansion pack (I only found it bc I didn't know you couldn't play Wirral w Kim). There are only these 2, according to the wiki, and I have not found more.

This task is another moment where the writers really manage to emulate that feeling of not only loss, but lost-ness that you get a few times in the game. When I did this task I thought it would be something extraordinary, maybe vaguely supernatural as there are a few things confirmed to be unexplainable happening with and around Harry, y'know? I had hope and intrigue and didn't even realize how strange and rare it must be to get this task on accident bc after typing it out I realized the starting parameters were VERY specific and easy to miss, actually. And I was so excited to find who to give it to, maybe a lost shrine, or someone reaching through a spot of pale and time, maybe when I found 3 or 5 I could lay them at her shattered feet and look behind the glass, something odd and unexplainable.

Then I met her in the dream. And just before it ended I was reminded that I'm supposed to give Dei the figurines. And that's when it dawned on me what Harry had forgotten, and I knew what he'd done to his memory of Dora by combining the two, and... It was so sobering and desolate. It felt the same way the end of a party feels, when you're the last to leave. The balloons are still up, but there's streamers on the floor, crumbs on the plates, bowls of snacks emptied, walls that held and echoed laughter are silent. The after image of something amazing, left only with the memory and the knowledge that that moment will never, ever happen the same way again.

You fulfill this task by giving all found figurines to Dora in the final dream.

And it does nothing. It doesn't work. Nothing will work. She would have liked them once, but like Dei, that Dora is dead. She died years ago and the Dora that remains is far, far away now.

Just like when I had no idea the carriage was Harry's until Kim spelled it out for us 2 hours later after chatting and whistling and relaxing; the figurines made what Harry was feeling and going through dawn on me so personally. I can't explain it in words well enough. I was so disappointed the figurines weren't some greater purpose, I was sad this was all we were holding onto them for, I was disappointed in Harry for trying to use trinkets to win her back, I was upset that they didn't do anything good, she didn't even want them; and I knew that's what Harry felt in that moment, too.

It's a level of "Show, don't tell," that not many writers set themselves up to be able to achieve. Even in this game there are only a handful of moments that are able to put you into Harry's headspace so precisely, and all of them are very specific and rely heavily on context given or lost on the player. It's impressive. I think about those figurines a lot.

[iridescentis]

i have to try so hard not to get upset when i have conversations with my family about love and sexuality because i know they will never understand anything outside of amatonormativity but fuck it hurts

being told that i will never have a best friend who will want to be with me forever because 'everyone will eventually leave because everyone wants to fall in love and build a family' just gets to me even though i know there are people who want that but it's just so hard to remember when no one in my life does

[ravinoforre]

Took all my courage to respond to the below post on Twitter (after once again deleting it in fear first lmao), but since *this* is the site I'd decided to use as my dumping ground for cringe, it's only fair to post the same here too.

First doodle is one I've posted here before, the other two have been in hiding a while.

huhuhghhhh

[batsplat]

hiii your weekly sete ask:

wow his 2005 season was really Cursed affggghjk. like what do you mean he’s 7th with 7 retirements (more than that years top 4 combined) but also is the only guy aside from valentino in top 7 to not finish lower than 5th place…..

valentino was the curse really worth it being runner up to capirossi and melandri TWICE and in a row (joking)

haha... yeah... 'retirement' in motegi... definitely wasn't so eager to seal the title at honda's home race that he made an ill-advised overtake attempt on melandri and cleared them both out... two completely unrelated dnf's... haha...

anyway!! yeah!! valentino would make that trade with you all things considered - always got on well with capirossi, with melandri admittedly you have the whole drama of melandri thinking valentino switched up towards him... but tbf you do have to say valentino was impressively dogged at keeping melandri's first win at bay for as long as possible. the six races valentino doesn't win that year are estoril (very wet, kinda just settled for second), laguna (unfamiliar with the track and would never be one he really liked, finished behind the two americans who knew the track well), motegi (crazy how we'll just never know how that dnf happened... oh well let's move on), sepang (a bridgestone-dominated weekend, sealed the title there though), turkey (hampered by a poor start) and valencia (my god is he mid there, also he tried to smash himself up before the race which I swear he does like. repeatedly at that specific circuit. guess he knows he has the off season to recover)

the way the curse shakes out is that for the rest of sete and valentino's careers, whenever they both finish a race valentino is ahead. not a single exception! not one! but the thing is, right, sete's actual finishing position of seventh in the championship in 2005 is extra cruel because it... just is not representative of how competitive he was that season? this is where it becomes useful I have my 'curse tally' notes... 2004 we've already covered, 2006 is more depressing than fun (how is your luck so bad your ambulance crashes into a bus fifty metres before the hospital entrance), but 2005? oh yeah that sete season is fucked. do you know who won the best qualifier award that year?

narrator: he did not win his home race on sunday

you can also read the qualifying prowess from the average grid positions, and it's not even particularly close. sete averages 2.82 for the season, ahead of valentino at 4.12 and hayden at 4.29. he bags five pole positions, exactly as many as valentino. his average finishing position when he actually makes the chequered flag is 3.6, the third best that year behind vale's 1.44 and melandri's 3.5. unsurprisingly, 2005 is the only season this century where the strongest qualifier does not win a single race. that just isn't a thing that happens!! it shouldn't happen!! this is not a man who was suddenly slow. he also hadn't been particularly crash-prone in his previous honda seasons... one dnf in 2003, two in 2004... and seven in 2005. a nightmare

which raises the question... okay, not winning races is one thing, but what the fuck happened to sete? if you're not just slow all of a sudden, how are you suddenly dipping from p2 to p7 in the championship standings? so. *cracks knuckles* *gets out notes* let's go one by one and tally up exactly how sete's season went wrong (parentheses used to indicate grid positions, e.g. 'g2', and finishing positions, e.g. 'p2')

jerez (g2/p2): after a feisty start, sete leads the entire race up until three laps to the end - when valentino executes his overtake and looks all set for the win. but valentino makes a mistake on the final lap that lets sete back past, and he's frantic in his attempts to correct the error... it looks like sete might have this one won, until valentino steals it from him at the last corner, barging him aside with one foot off its peg. (more on the final lap here.) valentino's victory, immediately controversial, is followed by various post-race theatrics as the spanish crowd voice their displeasure and valentino rubs it in their faces. on the way to the podium, valentino breaks the fourth wall to mock sete for clutching at his shoulder - which he is then forced to walk back in estoril as it turns out sete had actually been injured (clips here). more on this, from broadbent's 'ring of fire':

(details of the gresini/zerbi dispute included below the cut)

estoril (g2/dnf): an increasingly wet race - conditions in which sete has always been excellent in (first 500cc race was won in the wet too). sete's shoulder is still injured from the jerez collision and he'd crashed that weekend already, but he leads comfortably at the start... it's always tricky to be in the front in those conditions and he ends up crashing out of the lead in lap 16 out of 24. would valentino have been so comfortable settling for the podium if sete had still been in the race?

shanghai (g1/p4): another wet race, this time at a new circuit. perhaps sete's confidence was dented by estoril, or perhaps he just wasn't quick enough in the conditions. he doesn't get the ideal start from pole, though he briefly runs ahead of valentino - before vale overtakes him and disappears into the distance. for most of the race, sete runs second, until eventually wildcard jacque overtakes him. with a few laps to go, sete's suddenly losing speed... it looks like he's dealing with some kind of mechanical issue and he's shaking his head down the straight. on the very last lap, his teammate melandri overtakes him for the final podium position. after the race, sete said he had already felt on the warm-up lap that something was wrong with his tyre, and that it was all he could do to minimise the damage and coax the vibrating tyre to the end

le mans (g4/p2): sete had won the two previous races at this track, beating valentino on the final lap in 2003 and extending his championship lead in 2004. this year, both sete and valentino get quite a poor start, and exit the first few corners seventh and sixth respectively. valentino starts his charge to the front before sete does - and sete's progress stalls for a bit when he makes an absolute hash of one of the chicanes. eventually, valentino is on the rear tyre of his teammate edwards, but takes his sweet time overtaking him.... sete hunts them both down, firing in lap records as he muscles his way to third, and valentino is quickly informed of just who is catching him. valentino overtakes edwards, but edwards quickly gets him back - which opens the door for sete, who slips past for second. the three once again converge and valentino eventually manages to get sete back. edwards runs it a little wide and valentino squeezes past, with sete able to take advantage of the open door to get through too. they quickly gap edwards and as sete stalks valentino, the commentators hype up the prospect of revenge, of 'payback time'... valentino takes a new circuit record on the final lap to hold sete off. he extends his hand for sete long enough that sete eventually acquiesces - in doing so affording valentino a courtesy his rival had not extended to him at sepang the year before

mugello (g2/dnf): this time last year, the first public cracks of the valentino/sete relationship were just starting to show. but a fight for victory between the two of them was not to be this time round. sete keeps p2 off the line; after some opening lap scrapping that includes a valentino overtake, sete is still in p2. then his teammate melandri rudely forces him wide while overtaking, so that sete briefly drops back to fourth - before muscling his way past capirossi and into third. he tussles a bit with biaggi... but ends up crashing on lap five. it already feels like curtains on any championship aspirations

catalunya (g1/p2): before the weekend, valentino says he believes melandri and biaggi, not sete, will be his main championship rivals. sete starts on pole, with valentino likewise on the front row. valentino gets a somewhat poor start... by the end of the first lap he's back in the mix at the front. the first few laps are frantic, with melandri leading most of them and making his teammate's life, uh, unpleasant - but eventually both valentino and sete make their way back and break away from the field. soon after, sete gets past valentino and leads the race. for a while, it looks like he's breaking away from valentino just a little... eventually, it becomes obvious valentino has just been biding his time. with three laps to go, vale eases past down the main straight into the braking zone of turn one, and immediately proceeds to destroy sete's circuit record on dying tyres. he wins the race fairly comfortably from there

assen (g2/p5): juan martinez, sete's crew chief, is taken ill on thursday with a migraine. he recovers to come back to the box on saturday, but unsurprisingly the team is on the back foot as a result. (remember, martinez used to work for valentino, and he is someone valentino explicitly blamed for what happened at qatar 2004.) sete starts reasonably well from the front row, second early on behind his teammate melandri before eventually falling behind hayden. meanwhile, valentino has gotten a typically atrocious start and gave himself a bit of work to do. sete eventually makes his way back past hayden - but unfortunately lets valentino through too. at the end of the seventh lap, valentino gets past sete at his beloved final chicane. after that, valentino goes on to win the race while sete languishes in fifth

laguna seca (g13/p5): sete executes a strong comeback ride, besides losing a duel to biaggi which I suppose is a new low. but the main thing I have to bring in at this juncture is one of my favourite sete's moments. this is from broadbent's 'ring of fire' again, in the context of the re-introduction of laguna to the calendar and the discussions around that. just remember that valentino has been tormenting sete for like, over half a year, and sete has not lashed out at valentino once publicly. but here... he finally snaps - and takes it out on the real enemy: marco melandri

quick friendly reminder that melandri was sete's teammate that year

donington (g2/dnf): the race is held in truly appalling conditions. sete - who, remember, was a known wet weather specialist - takes the lead early on. he crashes on the third lap, one of ten riders not to finish the race. after wobbling about in the front-running pack for most of the race, valentino eventually takes the lead before pulling comfortably clear. he mimes playing the violin while crossing the line; this was interpreted by some as mockery of his less fortunate rivals, which valentino refuted

before the race, valentino took another opportunity to twist in the knife:

"when I see gibernau I always want to arrive in front of him" uh huh

sachsenring (g2/p2): valentino had quite a few problems with his bike that weekend, with a tricky build-up to the race. initially, hayden gets the holeshot, as valentino starts piling up the pressure and sete gets stuck in traffic. but the race is red flagged - and while hayden again gets the holeshot at the restart, valentino quickly disposes of him and sete soon does likewise. sete swiftly overtakes valentino ("'take that', said sete gibernau, 'I mean business'" says one of the commentators) and leads from there, with valentino in hot pursuit. for a few laps, valentino ends up behind hayden - and once he gets past him again, he's seven tenths down on sete with six laps to go. valentino closes in and on the very last lap, sete goes wide into the first corner, letting valentino through

always thinking of the suggestion valentino was intending to overtake sete at exactly the same place he had been overtaken in 2003 (from here):

brno (g1/dnf): despite the summer break in between (where sete reportedly did a lot of training), this might as well have been a direct continuation of the previous race. sete leads out front as valentino determinedly muscles his way into second place so as to not let sete escape. on the very first lap, valentino overtakes sete - in a section of the track where sete was planning to overtake capirossi if capirossi got the holeshot (more on how forthcoming sete was being to the commentariat here and here, icl when I replied to those asks I didn't remember quite how bad it was). on the third lap, the two exchange a few overtakes, and then it's sete in front. valentino makes a mistake to give sete a bit of breathing room and almost let the pack swallow him up, but he escapes again to get on sete's tail. around halfway through, valentino takes the lead - and then, with just over four laps ago, valentino deliberately slows down and practically invites sete to go past, before slotting back in behind him. valentino takes the lead at the final chicane of the penultimate lap, setting the stage for a final lap showdown, except sete is beginning to lose touch... and then he slows down. sete has run out of fuel

japan (g7/dnf): all eyes on valentino - who starts from eleventh for his first matchpoint race - as he starts making his way through the pack. on the first lap, valentino's already made his way past sete for sixth. tragically, all footage of the race after this point was erased so we will simply never know what valentino got up to after this point in time, but sete reportedly crashed on lap eleven. "gibernau's wretched season continues, when will it end for sete gibernau... it's almost a year now since valentino rossi put that witch's curse on him at qatar and said he would never win another race, you've got to wonder..."

sepang (g2/dnf): as the riders storm down to turn one, sete and hayden make contact and barely keep their bikes upright - sete is knocked down to sixth. valentino ends up right behind him on the first lap once again, but gets stuck behind him for a little longer as sete works his way past hayden... before sete and nakano go down when the former attempts to overtake the latter on lap two. "sete gibernau's appalling season continues...." - sete begins to walk off before sinking to his knees in despair

qatar (g2/p5): back to the place where it all started. sete deploys some feisty riding to keep that second place off the line against both valentino and hayden. he takes the lead from capirossi on the third lap and valentino takes advantage to immediately force his way into second - ready to exert pressure on his enemy. but sete builds up a healthy advantage as his teammate melandri increasingly puts pressure on valentino. melandri and valentino exchange overtakes as sete's advantage ebbs and flows, eight tenths at one point while his two rivals tussle. could this really be the "resurgence of sete gibernau"? with six laps to go, valentino shows his front wheel to sete, but it gives melandri the opportunity to get past. as valentino attempts to return the favour, melandri cuts off his nose and causes valentino to almost run into the back of him - payback for motegi, which makes valentino run wide and almost fall back into the clutches of hayden. it looks like it will be a fight between the two gresini riders for the win as valentino is 1.2s back, but he quickly claws his way back into contention and is helped by the gresini duo scrapping. and when melandri has another go at sete, sete runs on into the gravel... "the man who has cracked once again is sete gibernau" "and I'm sure both marco melandri and rossi are smiling under their visors" from the commentary team - valentino snatches the win once again, with sete finishing a disconsolate fifth

phillip island (g3/p5): so much for another front row start, with sete getting battered around to fifth through the first few corners and quickly being pushed down to sixth by his teammate. from there, it's an unspectacular ride to fifth, as valentino claims another victory

turkey (g1/p4): another start from pole, but melandri gets the jump on him from the start. sete puts pressure on melandri and eventually gets back past to take the lead...... and then goes wide and runs it into the gravel. he recovers from sixth to a painful fourth. "you can just imagine valentino rossi grinning, can't you, behind his visor, when he saw that happen"

valencia (g1/dnf): once again, sete starts from pole.... surely, surely he has to win one of these? valentino starts from fifteenth on the grid, which you'd have to say is as good a chance as you're going to get to catch a break from the man. sete is shuffled down to third on the opening lap but is right on the tail of melandri and hayden, setting the field's fastest lap on lap two. on lap four, sete slows down... "and the spaniard's wretched season could end in the only possible way, another disappointment at his home round and yet more misery for movistar" - an engine failure. his teammate escapes out front while sete works through his grief on the side of the track

so, having assessed the evidence in an appropriately scientific manner... well, yes. sete was kinda fucked. you have plenty of bad luck, you have races where he's simply not fast enough, you have races where valentino forces the issue and beats him in a straight fight, and then you have quite a few races where sete makes a clear 'unforced' error. it's not even necessarily the crashes that are most painful - with sachsenring, qatar and turkey standing out as real low points, times when he feasibly could have had valentino (as well as his teammate, who he also dislikes) beat. his wet weather dnf's will also have been a bitter pill to swallow, as well as valentino's lovely habit of snatching circuit records as he pulls clear from sete right at the end of races. and all the while, valentino is happy to taunt him with his failures, reminding sete again and again of how he is no longer the challenger he once was. all the while, the narrative of the curse gathered momentum, ever more likely to make its way back to sete. with every failure, the pressure grew. there's got to be at least ten races where sete on pace could have been in victory contention, five races where he bags pole, fourteen front row starts... not a single actual win. and that's how you put together a curse, kids

here's the gresini/zerbi dispute:

Movistar Honda team manager Fausto Gresini sent an open letter to the media on Thursday night in response to a private letter sent by FIM President Francesco Zerbi to MotoGP riders Valentino Rossi and Sete Gibernau following last weekend's clash during the Jerez race. Mr Zerbi´s letter had invited the riders to reflect upon the incident, and to remain as positive examples for all MotoGP fans - asking them to fight fairly and without will of revenge. The FIM President also wrote that he didn't see any infringement to the rules, but stressed that this kind of situation shouldn't be repeated. The comments made by Gresini were: "I fully agree with President Zerbi about the fact that sportsmanship is the most important thing. There's no room for bitter feelings between two great riders, but in the meantime, I'm still perplex." "In this letter, Sete and Valentino are treated equally as if Sete had some responsibility in the facts, and I can't agree with that. I believe there is a contradiction when the FIM president writes 'there isn't anything to reproach you for from a legal point of view', and then warns that what happened in Jerez must not occur again." "It means that we're still far from a situation where all have equal rights, in a sport as dangerous as ours," concluded the Italian manager. [here is the presidents response]: Dear Mr Gresini, I should not respond personally to your open letter given to the press, but through the intermediary of my lawyers; however, considering that I subscribe to the rules of courtesy and that I believe private life is a right that no-one can deny, I am not going to enter into a controversy - an easy one given the ridiculous arguments in your letter. The only thing that I want to stress and which, as a man, mortifies me is that I am mistaken in my judgement of men. And that I say on an individual level far more than on an institutional level. With much bitterness, Francesco Zerbi FIM President NB: I am sending this letter to the press because your employee, by violating all principles of education, more so than of law, did not hesitate to betray the confidence that had been granted to him.

like "with much bitterness" why is everyone in this sport so dramatic. what was everyone on this year

[themthistles]

i think that while micro labels can seem useful and affirming ultimately they're isolating and kind of an obstacle to your understanding of self. that's because you can never find a word specific enough. there will never be a label or two labels or even ten, twenty of them to perfectly capture and describe all of your thoughts, feelings, experiences, preferences, needs, interests, identities, etc. because you learn more and more about yourself every day and then you change and your wants and needs change with you. having to hop between labels, fearing that you don't 'fit' into a label anymore (both in your own and others eyes), worrying how soon your current label will wear out, questioning if you'll ever fully fit a single one. all that causes a lot of uncertainty and anxiety which could be avoided by just picking a more general thing and molding it according to what it means to YOU. because words will always mean different things to different people, you will never be understood immediately and maybe never completely by anyone but yourself and that's fine

[manichewitz]

an unfortunately really really frustrating part about seeing different companies/organisations/etc try to be more trans inclusive is that even if they're actually doing a great job, its fucking depressing to see how people need to be formally trained on how to treat me with respect. i'm reading this article right now about how theatre companies are trying to be trans-friendly and how people actually needed to like. take classes and talk to experts and get all this gender stuff explained to them in order to have an accepting workplace, meanwhile it's all things that i know about because they are the most basic aspects of my everyday life. its so fucking tiring