#The main difference is that I have to cross all of the Atlantic this time instead of just the channel

[salvadorbonaparte]

Moving to the US still feels surreal and there are days where I'm certainly anxious about the election and the gun violence and the general state of the country and even just the far awayness but I also know that I can't let anxiety rule my life

[jokeroutsubs]

Špancirfest and Joker Out: Interview with Kris for Radio Maribor's 'Musical radiogram'

On 1.09.2023, Slovenian radio station Radio Maribor broadcasted a program about Špancirfest in Varaždin, where Joker Out opened for Franz Ferdinand. The program also featured an interview with Kris Guštin, which you can listen to in the audio file above, or at this direct link from 28:30 to 38:00.

English translation below:

This is the radio show 'Glasbeni radiogram' ('Musical radiogram') in which we checked how our Eurovision representatives are doing. A few months after Eurovision we saw them on the main stage of a Croatian music festival "Špancirfest" where they performed as the opener for the group Franz Ferdinand. We spoke to the guitarist, Kris Guštin.

Kris, today I caught you at the concert in Varaždin, how are you feeling after the concert?

Kris: Well, I'll say unbelievable, for multiple reasons. Because, well, for us it's always surprising and an honour when we come abroad, even if it's just across the border, that people come to our concert and especially that they sing our songs in Slovene. It's incredible, on the other hand, this is the first time we opened for a... global name, global stars. Up until now we were openers only for Yugoslavian bands, which is of course an honour on its own, but today was the first time we introduced ourselves as an international opener. So a great memory for sure.

Have you met Elvis Costello in person or only through a video chat?

Kris: Unfortunately only through video chat, I'm pretty sure that since the collaboration happened he hasn't crossed the Atlantic ocean, so there hasn't been any time.

It seems that after thirty years, this border for musicians between Slovenia and Croatia finally opened.

Kris: Yes, it seems so, although we don't want to say too much right now because everything is still new. We need to know how this is going to work in the long run, but we couldn't be on a better track right now and that's what's currently guiding us.

In Croatia you have two concerts coming up in Zagreb, concerts in Rijeka... it seems as if this concert in Varaždin is the perfect springboard for Croatia.

Kris: It's true, we've never preformed in this part of Croatia, but I'd say the perfect springboard for us was at Šalata in Zagreb, where we opened for Buč Kesidi. I'd maybe say that it wasn't so much of a physical springboard, but it did change our perspective, as we saw and realized for the first time that we can attract an audience in Croatia and can afford to have a concert such as Tvornica kulture, which was something we were scared to do before.

With Slovene lyrics?

Kris: Also with Slovene lyrics. We do currently play all of our songs in Slovene, except for the two songs which are already in Serbian

It seems like yesterday when we played your song for the first time on Radio Maribor. A few months later you won at the festival Frišno/Fresh. This year Frišno/Fresh is coming back, but this journey has been, there are no other words than just unbelievable, dreamy.

Kris: By all means, the first Frišno/Fresh was a nice memory for us. At that time, our song was performed by a big band for the first time. Winning was a great honour as well, of course. I can also say that just today I voted for new nominations for Frišno/Fresh.

Should we reveal who you voted for?

Kris: I mean, I don't have any reservations about it if you don't. I voted for our really good friends and excellent musicians, MRFY, because 'Tobogan' ('Slide') was definitely one of the best songs from last year.

I talked to your audio engineer, Sandi, about how concerts at home or close to home are different from those abroad. You were in England, concerts in Sweden and elsewhere in Northern Europe are still to come.

Kris: I am going to say that the audience abroad is different in the sense that even if they don't know you, they gladly and really quickly give you a chance and they listen to you. If you have something to give, they figure it out quickly and they take it. On the other hand, maybe we dare to do more on stage, we go out of our comfort zone, because we are put in an unknown situation and it brings out our animalistic side, our more energetic selves.

A lot of times it seems that the home audience can act stepmotherly.

Kris: Well, not on our concerts. I think that for us, Slovene audience is always great and irreplaceable, for sure. I can't really say which one is my favourite, each has their own charm.

Now a guitar question, we are both guitarists. Sandi told me that when you are abroad, a long way from home, you rent at least the amplifiers. But playing on your own amplifier is still the best, no?

Kris: Definitely, performing when we can provide all of our gear is the best. This is sadly not possible abroad because of the flights. But we are lucky to be playing on relatively standard gear, which we can get anywhere in Europe and everywhere really. These are Fender, Vox amps and Ampeg for the bass, so it's not like we are suffering abroad because of this.

You could say classic gear, for a modern sound.

Kris: Yeah, we've always kind of gone from retro, from retro stuff, to modern sound.

You're about to play a sold-out concert in Stožice; Stožice may seem like a small milestone from the outside, when you've already conquered international stages.

Kris: Maybe it looks like that at this point, but we definitely don't see it that way. Stožice is the biggest thing an artist can achieve in Slovenia, apart from the Bežigrad stadium, which is unfortunately no longer available.* And the fact that at our age, at a relatively young age, as a young band, we managed to sell out this venue, is an incredible achievement for us, regardless of what's happening abroad. It's a great honour and for two, three months now, since I've realized that it's coming around the corner any minute now, I've been waiting impatiently for the moment when we can finally go on stage.

You yourself grew up in Ljubljana or close to Ljubljana. What would it really mean to you, to perform in the Bežigrad stadium?

Kris: There has been talk for years about its revitalisation, the reopening of the stadium, especially for cultural events. It really is such an iconic place, where, let's say, world famous names have performed, but also Slovenian ones. In fact, the Bežigrad stadium is of particular importance to me, because I don't just come from Ljubljana, I come from Bežigrad, and the Bežigrad stadium is definitely the most important symbol of our city's district. We are all very attached to it. And I have to say that I feel really, really sad because for us, for me and for Bojan, who are proud to call Bežigrad home, there is no longer an option for us to perform there.

If you were here today as a listener, and not as Kris Guštin, if you were just a listener from Bežigrad, who would you come to listen to, Franz Ferdinand or Joker Out?

Kris: Yes, definitely Franz Ferdinand. I've asked myself that a number of times. If I had heard us play, and I weren't in the band, whether I would have liked it or not. When we make music I love it, but you never know what it would be like on the other side. Franz Ferdinand are, of course, a legendary band, even if we didn't really listen to them that much, they've influenced our sound because they're one of the main creators of the British sound of the twenty-first century.

Franz Ferdinand are, I mean, famous, but with every new album, even though they haven't released a new album for five years, still modern; despite, let's say, adding an electronic sound, they're still authentic and you can still hear their sound, can't you? How do musicians manage this? Your third album is coming up soon. How to maintain your sound, but still be progressive, different, modern?

Kris: It's hard for me to give one single answer to that, because I don't really know myself, what is the deciding factor. I think it's easier to stay true to what you've always done, and it's harder to upgrade it every new album, every new cycle. We're always trying to push ourselves out of our shell, out of our comfort zone, with every new single, with every new album, that represents a new chapter in our sound. And here we are, we were in the studio two weeks ago, and we recorded a new single, which is going to be quite different from the previous tracks, and we've also indulged in some new instruments.

Kris, thank you.

Kris: Of course, thanks to you too.

*Bežigrad is one of Ljubljana's districts. The stadium in Bežigrad is the oldest stadium in Ljubljana, built by famous architect Jože Plečnik, and used to host Slovenian national football team's matches, as well as musical and other events. It's in need of renovation, but due to disputes about the current owner's renovation plans, it has been closed and falling apart since 2008. In 2003, Slovenian band Siddharta famously performed a concert there for an audience of about 30,000 people (in comparison, the Stožice arena has a capacity of about 12,000 people).

Translation cr: drumbeat, @joyridinglove, and another member of jokeroutsubs

[frangipanilove]

I don’t really understand how Beth would’ve ended up in all these different places. Is it because of the Commonwealths? The CRM? I’m confused and hate to say so cause it should be obvious but I’m feeling lost on it. I guess I should just trust “Beth is alive” and we’ll see her again. Just frustrating how long we’ve waited for her.

Hi friend, sorry it took me so long to get to this. I’ll try to answer, even though it might not be the kind of answer you had hoped for. I’m not really sure what you mean by “all these different places”. I personally don’t have any fixed opinion on exactly where she will show up, geographically. I expect there to be lots of hints and symbolism referring to her in Daryl Dixon season 2, but that doesn’t necessarily mean I believe she will literally show up. She might, but I’m not relying on it.

If your question is about the logistics of world travel, I don’t think that should be a problem. For starters, remember this is fiction. If tptb wants something specific to happen, they can just write it. We’ve seen that technology for world travel exists in this universe. We’ve seen advanced military technology like chinook helicopters, that were able to cross the North American continent without any issues. We’ve seen Daryl cross the Atlantic on a boat, we’ll see Carol do the same with a small plane. In FTWD we once saw Strand communicate with an astronaut on the International Space Station. Also in FTWD, we once saw them rehabilitate an old aeroplane and fly it out of a nuclear waste zone. We’ve also seen them travel by using a hot air balloon (shaped as a beer bottle, no less, and I’ve written about the incredible symbolism of that elsewhere)

For what it’s worth, people were crossing oceans centuries and millennia ago, and while I don’t think Beth’s on a viking ship or a balsa raft, humans have always migrated, and I don’t think a zombie apocalypse is enough to stop that drive. People will travel if they have a reason to, in real life, and certainly in fiction.

Tptb have also dropped hints of international trade throughout the seasons, with references to coffee (which only grows under very specific conditions), exotic fruits like pineapple, and also sugar cane. While none of that guarantees the presence of an international trade network, it does indicate the existence on one. At the very least, it renders it plausible that one COULD exist.

Also, Major General Beale from TOWL mentioned the CRM has spies everywhere, and I don’t remember his exact words, but I believe he mentioned overseas territories. So I wouldn’t worry about the logistics of travel. If TPTB want Beth to show up somewhere specific, they can just write it.

But there’s one thing we have no real insight into, and that’s the business part of the equation. Remember, TWD is ultimately a business, and if Beth is to come back, it will be because someone made the business decision to bring her back. And we can’t know what goes on behind closed doors at AMC. We can’t really know why she wasn’t brought back a long time ago, and we can’t know IF she’ll be back at all. We can’t really know for sure that EK even wants to come back. We can speculate, analyze interviews, social media posts etc, but it will still only be speculation and our subjective, biased interpretation.

And that’s what we do in TD, right? We watch the show and look for ways in which the symbolism tells us Beth is coming back. There’s an extensive symbolism framework present in TWDU that would help facilitate her return, and I like to believe it’s there for a reason. But ultimately no one can know for sure.

So I’m afraid I can’t guarantee that Beth 100% for certain will be coming back. I watch the show and I offer my interpretation of the symbolism, but you’ll never hear me make any promises, because I don’t think anyone can.

I understand the frustration, but for me, I’m a fan of the entire franchise, I love the main show and the spin offs and the entire TWDU, and I’ll continue to watch my favorite show regardless of whether or not Beth comes back, and that helps. I’d love for her to return, and I do believe that’s the story the symbolism is telling us, but I enjoy the show immensely regardless.

I hope this helps, but I’m sorry if it wasn’t the answer you were hoping for. Would love to hear more of your thoughts though 🥰

[panzershrike-pretz]

Hey guys! I was bored and decided to draw some brazilian little babies! Enjoy💕💕

There'll be a bit of info about 'em under the cut! (And also the folklore behind the Boto!)

CUTIA - agouti are tiny rodents that can be found in most of North, Central and South America; Here in Brazil there's 9 different types of these little guys and i've been fortunate enough to cross ways with 'em, since they're everywhere xD

BOTO-COR-DE-ROSA - amazon river dolphin is famous for it's appearance in brazilian folklore. It says that during the night, they take the form of a very handsome man and seduce girls to spend the night with him. By the morning, he's gone and the girls are left pregnant with it's child. People say that this story was created because girls wouldn't admit they slept with someone before marriage lmao.

GRALHA AZUL - azure jay is the animal symbol of the state of Paraná. They are very important to our ecosystem, as they're responsible for spreading pinhão (pinion? Pine nut? Idk) seeds. Unfortunately, their population is declining and with it, the araucaria forests, which provides their main food.

ARARAJUBA - golden conure is a medium parrot native to the Amazon forest. Their colors are bright and resemble the brazilian flag.

SOLDADINHO-DO-ARARIPE - araripe manakin is a small endangered little guy. It's red cap gave it the name that, from portuguese to english, translates to "little soldier of araripe". It is from Ceará and some other states in the north-eastern region.

ARARA MILITAR - military macaw gets its name from it's green feathers. It's native to Mexico and the South America, and considered a vulnerable species. Apparently its not actually brazilian but i didn't know at the time i drew it xD.

MICO-LEÃO-DOURADO - golden marmoset is endemic to the brazilian atlantic coastal forest. Unfortunately, they're endangered due to loss of habitat, poaching and the illegal pet market.

GATO MARACAJÁ - margay is a small and nocturnal cat. They spend most of the time in trees and are able to turn their ankles 180° degrees, managing to grasp branches extremelly well.

JACARÉ-ANÃO - dwarf caiman is found in most of the north region of South America. It is the smallest of all crocodilians (and my favorite).

PIRARUCU - arapaima is one of the largest freshwater fish and can be found in the Amazon River. They where introduced to East Asia and are now a invasive species- welp, they're a delicacy anyways soooo (never tasted them, but people say they're good).

CACHORRO-DO-MATO - bush dogs have a big range of living but are rarely seen. Their species was, funnily enough, found first as fossils and then as the living thing - people thought they were extinc lol. Their closes living relatives are the Maned Wolf and the African Wild Dog.

[theloniousbach]

AUTUMN IN NEW YORK 2024

Bill Charlap told the story of composer Vladimir Dukelsky meeting George Gershwin who suggested he write popular songs as well as the works, not unlike Gershwin’s own, with sufficient “classical” ambition to be used by the Ballet Russe. As Vernon Duke, Dukelsky wrote April in Paris and, most notably here, Autumn in New York. It is an awfully good jazz standard, one with sufficient features to be a starting place in a video tutorial I keep meaning to pursue. It also is a peg to hang this travelogue but also to hope that it can become a habit to go to the metropolis over Fall Breaks in years to come.

It was bright and crisp but not too cold. It seemed so inviting and my thrill for first nighting was to see Bill Charlap and Noriko Ueda at Mezzrow’s, part of the Small’s Live operation whose streams coming out of Lockdown give me the chance to be a regular on the New York jazz scene. I’ve written about the impeccable performance with one of my typical souvenirs. That note also included clues to remember being in the cozy room among a small but consequential audience. It really was a pilgrimage. Because it is a religious act, I want it to become ritualized. I put my hand on the railing into the sister club, Small’s, and walked by the Village Vanguard. It’s a simple matter to take the 2 or 3 train between Franklin Ave in Brooklyn to 14th Street in the Village.

That first night though I was tired and not fully combobulated from walking around the Village, eating an Indian Kati Roll and then a slice and a half of Joe’s Pizza. I was glad that Ellen prevailed on our hosts so that they waited for my show to let out and we could all go back to Brooklyn. But, I won’t need supervision next time.

That Kati roll was lamb and that, somehow, is our Dear Boy’s preferred protein. We had it three different ways as part of a memorable Yemeni meal, well worth the hour wait on Atlantic Avenue. That hour on the sidewalk outside was fascinating as young and not so young men postured for one another while socializing and, undoubtedly, making deals. It all had the feel of a cafe or coffee shop on the edge of a Middle Eastern market. Bread appeared as soon as we finished tearing up the last of the flat, but the sweet tea (and water) required going to the stand by the counter. Other meals included eggplant shashouka, a pastrami lox everything egg bagel, and a meatball sandwich whilst Sam had lamb chili.

We walked quite a bit on the second day including traversing the Panama Day parade near Franklin and Eastern Parkway to get to the Farmers Market at Grand Army Circle (apples, cheese, and a wonderful sourdough bread). We ran out of steam at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden, but I have now finally seen it and have a strong impression.

As with the jazz shrines, coming back regularly can make this evermore familiar with multiple visits. We didn’t really get into Prospect Park this time and I have yet to go to the Brooklyn Museum, but we will as we apply the Door County ethos to these visits and take our time to get a sense of the place.

Brooklyn grows on me. There are lots of people but it is not as overwhelming as Manhattan. People clearly live there and commercial streets have brownstones nearby on the cross streets. Still, there is inevitable peopling just sitting on a subway car and engaging at a farmer’s market.

So taking our time later in the visit paid off. Our main purpose was to see Sam in his element—his nicely rehabbed apartment, his shape note singing (where he is now one of the elders), at his (virtual) work which is incomprehensible on several levels but clearer for being there.

With E worrying over me about getting back from the Village matched by me concerned at her getting light headed and dehydrated at the BBG to watching how Sam has inherited his own versions of this worry, it’s probably fitting that I watched Inside Out 2 on the plane flying back and saw Joy fret that maybe what it means for Riley to be an adult is that there is anxiety and less joy. I thought the plot truncated/telescoped some of the internalized character development, so it wasn’t quite as magical as the first one.

But it’s all Autumn in New York and I’m ready to live it again.

[danielleverboski7h]

Mystic ct real estate

Nestled between the larger towns of Groton and Stonington in Connecticut is the little town of Mystic.

Over the past 130 years, the shipyards in Mystic, Connecticut, have manufactured over 600 different types of vessels. Ultimately, the future city's location was decided upon in 1784. Founded in 1784, Mystic, Connecticut, is still a relatively young town. The town of Mystic, Connecticut's advantageous waterfront position is one of the main factors contributing to its booming prosperity. The historic whaling ship Charles W. Morgan is located at Mystic Seaport in Connecticut, USA. We had no idea what class of spacecraft it was, so we had no idea where to look first. The hotel has experienced numerous renovations over the past few decades. The Mystic, the country's longest river, is an excellent starting point for a cross-country ski trip. At Fishers Island Sound's mouth, the Atlantic Ocean and the Mystic River converge. Rather than emptying into the ocean, the Mystic River drains into Long Island Sound. Ships may cross the Mystic River, which links the two continents, thanks to a tiny bridge. Mystic ct real estate, CT We weren't separated by a great distance in space and time. The loanword "missi-tuk" originally meant "river whose currents are churned up into waves by the tides or the wind." Old English is where it originated. This older meaning is where the word "mystic" originates in our present usage. The term "mystic" was frequently applied to this type of river by ancient writers. The term "mystic" was long out of common usage among native English speakers. This circumstance gave rise to the word "mystic"'s original meaning. There are several different modern meanings associated with the term "mystic". At the moment, 4,205 people reside there.

I regret deeply that my understanding of the function of a constitutional state may have been flawed. Please don't hesitate to ask Daniel for assistance if you need it. Communicating with him is entirely voluntary. All skill levels of entrepreneurs are welcome to our assistance.

Without their help, it may be quite challenging to buy or sell a home in the Mystic, Connecticut area.

In the Mystic, Connecticut, real estate market, it is critical to collaborate with a real estate agent that enjoys a positive reputation with both buyers and sellers. This is because there is fierce competition in this field. No matter how the market behaves, you can be confident that you will profit from this plan. Look no further than Danielle Verboski if you're searching for a real estate agent in the Mystic, Connecticut area. Because of her extensive knowledge of the issue, she has gained respect in the industry. Real estate brokers have an obligation to handle their clients' properties with the utmost care if they hope to sell their homes swiftly and for a fair price. If you adhere to these recommendations, you'll have a far higher chance of selling your things for a fair price. In certain situations, the market can even react favorably to such a price increase. Danielle, who is quite knowledgeable about the local real estate market, is offering a generous price for this house. If you strictly adhere to these directions, the issue ought to be resolved. If all goes according to plan, we ought to be able to finish the contract fast, make money, and control expenses. The loyalty of Danielle's clientele is a major factor in her professional success. If she achieves her objective of being the most renowned person in history, that may be her big break.

She offers to do the commercial interview in her home; you might want to consider taking her up on it. Danielle will market your home with both traditional methods and innovative approaches if you decide to go with her. Though she will be sorry to leave her loved ones behind, she is eager for her vacation. Danielle is naturally gifted in both public speaking and business. She says no one has ever made something like that. She guarantees that she will take all necessary steps to raise the selling price of your house. Your income will skyrocket if you hire her. Her multilingualism, sharp business sense, and unwavering dedication to her work all contribute to her skill in negotiations. She has matured and evolved from her mistakes in the past. It could have been a turning point in her professional life. One of her many admirable traits is her ability to simplify difficult concepts and encourage people to persevere through difficult times. These explorers appeared to be constantly exploring new territory.

Please do not hesitate to contact Danielle Verboski for any of your real estate requirements in the Mystic, Connecticut, area. If you need any assistance selling your house, you ought to get in contact with her. For firms, new software, customer service, and advertising may usually pay off. Her innovative ideas and positive approach will guarantee the company's success. Danielle should be consulted before making any significant changes to the house.

[cotieguzman]

From Vegas to Washington Capital

It is weird how sitting down to talk about this story suddenly felt really hard despite there only being happy and positive memories attached to this experience.

His name is Marc.

I met Marc when I did a random trip to Vegas with an old friend of mine, Dave. We stayed at The Flamingo because we were able to score hotel and flight deals through WestJet. It was honestly a blast because The Flamingo has the best out door pool in all of Vegas (IMO)(minus children - bleh).

One of the nights I got right drunk sitting at a flash bar - or wait... maybe we were at the Piranha (a gay bar). Either way, the drunk part still holds. As one does, once the night comes to a finish, drunk, and in a new city, you end up clamoring onto Grindr or Scruff in hopes that your lowered standards don't wind up as a shame story.

This story is far from that. In fact, I can say with full confidence that I am still in love with him all these years later.

I suppose that's what happens when you get to live a fantasy out loud twice with someone you're attracted to with liminal behavior at maximum.

Marc was staying at Caesars palace which was located across the street. Now, for anyone who has not been to Las Vegas, crossing the main strip into another hotel is not a quick walk over. You have to leave your hotel, navigate leaving the casino attached at the bottom, cross the actual strip itself, enter into another casino and navigate a completely new hotel to find one room amongst thousands. Then the bow-chicka-bow-wow can start.

First, let me describe Marc. He's kind of a hipster who dresses nicer and with a stronger sense of self. He is a ginger-blonde with a full chest of hair. He is kind of thinning but it looks good on him. He is kind of scruffy and has the best face. About 5'8'' (from my memory) and has one of those sexy dad bods you just want to rub yourself all over and cuddle into.

SIDE BAR: I just spent the better part of an hour looking for the ONE photo of Marc and I. I always fucking misplace it and I was going to add it to this post so I could have it somewhere I knew I could find. I hope to find it again one day.

When I get to the hotel that he is staying at turns out he is also drunk. We both have somewhat unfulfilling sex as our aim was to get off but we both found ourselves unsuccessful due to how intoxicated we were. He invites me to spend the night with him which was an obvious yes.

The next morning, we had very memorable sex.

Like I always do, I think to myself " What if..." and we exchange Instagram handles so we can follow each other.

I want to stay in contact with this guy even though I know that he is an American who lives on the other side of the continent.

However, we end up staying in contact for some time.

I want to say a year or so later I tell him I want to go and see him. We discuss and choose a time where this is a gay event happening called M.A.L. (Mid Atlantic Leather). It is a big deal for leather lovers from all over the world.

That was the deciding factor and the tickets were booked.

Washington capitol was going to be cool to see. The white house and being in a new city all together. And, guess what? We also made sure we had enough time to do a road trip to New York for a few nights. This was my first (and still only) time in New York.

Now I am really excited for this trip.

At this point I already know that I have feelings for the guy. I am traveling across the continent into a different country to spend almost a week with someone I have a major crush on purely based on a one night stand and some casual conversation on Instagram (I am willing to take risks if it is worth it to me).

Washington capitol is beautiful. Trump was president during this time so I ignorantly thought the people would be a little more crazy but I found myself feeling at home pretty quick. To my surprise, when we went bar hoping we managed to head into three different gay bars out of at least 3 more that I seen that all had niche demographics of people hanging out in.

I remember telling Marc often that I felt very grateful that I could be there with him. And I was! Grateful, that is. It felt like one of those magical hallmark stories where you meet someone, fall in love, hold hands while walking down the street and everything. I was more than grateful, actually, I was falling in love.

Also, guys, the sex was the bomb. I have had sex with over... at least 500 or so people (to date) and I still think of my experience with him as some of the best sex ever. Granted, I didn't know I was falling in love with him yet. I am confident this played a very large role in this.

He was a great cuddler. The kissing?! I still remember how he tastes and crave the connection our mouths made. A firm and passionate mouth that makes you feel like he wants no one else other than you. He loved to eat my ass like it was his last supper while I laid there huffing on poppers. Talk about paradise!

The M.A.L. event was pretty amazing. It was this event that rooted my love for the leather community. Albeit, I am still a baby when it comes to the leather community. I do know my fascination and love for leather will never go away. I saw my first pup pen. Actually, I think this was my first introduction to pups and pup play now that I think about it.

SIDE BAR: This is my third sit down to work on making this post (this story holds a lot of weight to me). While making this I had to reach out and tell him I was thinking of him. We have fallen out of contact. Still no reply a few days later. I find solace in knowing that he thinks of me once a month when he pays for his invoice for online personal training. *sigh*

For anyone that is curious, I am a great road trip partner. I love chatting, listening to music, stopping for food and sight seeing and if (only if) the connection is right, we can stop on the for some road side sex.

I loved the drive to New York. Turns out Marc and I have very similar tastes in music. Maybe one day he would be interested in going to a music festival. I am always looking for reasons to gtfo of this place.

We stayed at this really cute boutique hotel that we found at AirB&B for a fantastic price. They had unlimited wine and beer between 7:00PM and 9:00PM every night that we were there. I had heartburn I drank so much wine. I was even able to help two older ladies who were clearly on a best friends trip navigate how to use a computer because they were old fashioned and preferred having a printed flight manifest rather than one on their phones. I was able to do this all in Spanish in front of Marc. I wanted to impress him.

I am circling back around to the sex. I can't get over it. We fucked at every chance we could get. Truly, if there was a negative to express between our dynamic it would be that he is a strict top and I am a verse. Neither here nor there considering the orgasms were that memorable.

I had a list of three things I wanted to experience while I was there.

I wanted to see the MoMA

I wanted a New York slice of pizza

I wanted to see a fucking New York rat

The trip to the MoMA was the most memorable experience in an art museum I have ever had in my life. Did you know that Marc lived in New York for 10-years? Did you know that he had a background in art? Like... not an interest but a formal background. My experience walking through the museum was like walking with a personal tour guide who set up the fucking museum itself. He had such vast knowledge of the art, artists, the exhibits and how, what, and why they were set up as they were. We would walk into an exhibit and he would immediately explain the relationship between the two artists being showcased in the museum and why the art was displayed as it was. He knew so much about art and it interested me to listen to him go off because it interested him. I liked listening to him speak. I was so impressed by him. Here I was excited that I was going to be able to see Starry Night but the experience left my soul feeling full.

Of course we checked out Time Square but even cooler was this recommended pub that Marc new about off Time Square that had been there since its inception. It was this long skinny old pub. When you walked in it felt old immediately. Pictures all over the wall of all these famous people who had shared a drink there. Mismatched tables and chairs and if I remember correctly it had a distinct "boxing" theme. I remember taking a candid photo of Marc that I will never see again but I remember him in it.

I remember him wanted to show me a recreation of the Arc Du Triomphe. We had gone a little bit out of our way to see this all while eating my slice of New York pizza. I remember him showing me and I couldn't help but laugh out loud because I had recently gone to the Paris Gay Games where I say the real thing! This was the single part of the entire trip I regretted. I wish I didn't laugh because I remember seeing him deflate a little.

The drive back was a little more solemn. We only had one more night together and we were going to spend it holding each other in his bed. The whole experience was bitter sweet, romantic, a fantasy.

I wanted to leave knowing I was going to see him again. I didn't know that it was going to be the last time him and I ever seen each other in person again. So far this stands true.

The flight back was quiet. I was fortunate enough that I ended up sitting alone because I wasn't able to hold back my tears for most of the flight home. I missed him immediately. I also knew I was coming home to an empty room. However, I was coming home with my heart overflowing.

[atlanticcanada]

St. Stephen residents head over the border for cheaper gas

With the federal governments carbon tax and clean fuel regulations now in full effect, gas prices in the province of New Brunswick have soared to as much as $1.74 a litre.

Residents of St. Stephen, N.B., are taking advantage of being a border town in these tough times, with many hoping over to Calais, ME, to get fuel at below $1.30 a litre.

“I’m saving at least 25, 30 bucks a fill up,” said one St. Stephen resident.

“I save about 40, maybe 40 to 50 dollars in gas each fill up,” another resident said.

Not everyone is as eager to hop to the states for cheaper fuel, at least not every fill up.

“We maybe go over once or twice a month to get our gas over there,” said one lady. “And then generally it is in St. Stephen.”

Grocery prices in the Maritimes are also at an all-time high thanks to inflation, but residents aren’t as keen on getting their food for the week on the other side of the border while grabbing gas.

“It depends on the price,” said one resident. “Depends on how much difference in the dollar there is.”

“The only thing with groceries over there is they have better variety,” said another when asked.

The majority of area residents said outside of dairy and a few other products, the prices are more or less the same in St. Stephen when compared to Calais.

“You really have to know your prices before you go over for groceries,” said one lady who holds a dual citizenship between Canada and the U.S.A. “You really got to be careful because you are paying the exchange. Plus then you get to the border and now they pick and choose what is grocery. Anything you can eat before you come across like a salad isn’t consider grocery.”

“I bought two boxes of waffles in St. Stephen here and it was seven dollars,” said one man in comparing the prices between the two countries. “The same box over there was $3.59 American so by the time you change your money over it’s costing you more over there.”

Doug Harper owns Harper’s Exotic Animals & Pet Supply right next to the border crossing. He notes he has continued to do his shopping in St. Stephen.

“If it means me paying a dollar or two more to get us out of this situation I’ll shop here locally,” says Harper. “Spend our money locally as we want to help our own community.”

St. Stephen Mayor Allan MacEachern said residents heading over to Maine for their gas and groceries is nothing new. With prices being what they are on the Canadian side of the border, MacEachern notes residents are more likely than ever to cross over to Maine for their necessities.

 For the latest New Brunswick news, visit our dedicated provincial page.

from CTV News - Atlantic https://ift.tt/9qRKY3c

[danishmuseuminterns]

Couldn't Be Happier

By Anders Tornsø Jørgensen 

Being an intern in a foreign country often means postcards and gifts, but also visits from family and friends. I have been so fortunate that loved ones in my life actually wants to cross the Atlantic in order to visit me. This time my very special lady friend, Laura, came to experience the wonderful Midwest.  Our trip included a visit to Chicago, the most populous city of Illinois and the third-most populous in the United States. Last time I was in Chicago was back in September where I attended the Scandinavian Day Festival in South Elgin, IL. However, Chicago looked very different upon my return, being very affected by the season. This time, Chicago was filled with gorgeous Christmas decorations, the weather was cold, the wind was icy, but as always, the city was vibrant, grand, and majestic. “I adore Chicago. It is the pulse of America.” I wish I came up with that sentence, but that’s how French stage actress Sarah Bernhardt described this goliath of the Great Lakes. 

The main goal of our Chicago-bound trip was to see the musical ‘Wicked’, but also to explore the crown jewel of the Midwest. As a birthday gift, and probably also as way to get Laura to America, I bought two tickets to ‘Wicked’ as Laura is a huge musical aficionado. The Windy City has always had a very special place in my heart, so it was wonderful to experience the city with a very special person because it gave me new a lot of new perspectives on one of my favorite American cities. Anyway, here we go! 

We took the Amtrak train from Omaha, leaving way too early in the morning. However, the early train departure meant that we wouldn’t arrive too late. The train ride was about 10 hours, but luckily, we could sleep along the ride, and we were loaded with delicious snacks, including a bag full of homemade aebleskiver (mange tak, Lisa!). We also spend time watching ‘Hamilton’ – a favorite musical of Laura and I. Normally, I am not a big musical fan, but ‘Hamilton’ ignited an interest the first time I watched the live stage recording version on a streaming service. Mainly I liked its great narrative of early American history and its top-notch lyrics. It always makes me wonder how they come up with these short and sharp sentences of truth. Combined with Laura’s passion for musicals, I couldn’t wait to get to Chicago to see ‘Wicked’ and experience my first live musical. 

Finally, after sitting in front of a bunch of sweet, but very noisy children with parents who, with all the respect, had given up parenting, we arrived to the Chicago metropolitan area, also known as Chicagoland. The last stretch feels like eternity, because the area is so huge and continues on forever. Encompassing 10,286 square miles, the metropolitan area includes the city, its suburbs and hinterland and actually stretches into parts of the neighboring states of Wisconsin and Indiana. After passing through suburb after suburb, we could finally see the magnificent skyline of Chicago and our train stopped at the Union Station, which is located right in the heart of Chicago.  

I recommend, even if you don’t travel with train, to visit Chicago’s Union Station because it’s one of the finest and most iconic train stations in the United States. There are many union stations across the U.S., and it’s usually a name given to stations that were shared by several railroad companies. In 1925, when the present building was finished, the Chicago Tribune wrote the following: “In respect to both architecture and utility, the new station is one of the most impressive in the world.” The architectural part still rings true to me. My favorite feature of the building is the historic Great Hall, which is where people sit and wait for their train to arrive. Enormous wooden benches are placed around the room along with tall majestic columns and interesting statues – together it all forms a room perfect of reflection. The two most interesting statues at the station are named ‘Night’ and ‘Day’, symbolizing the 24-hour operation of the railroads. ‘Night’ holds an owl, while ‘Day’ holds a rooster. Because of the season, a large Christmas tree was placed in the center of the room, beautifully decorated with train signs. It doesn’t really get better for a train fan like me. If you look closely to the photo I have attached, you can see the green-colored statues of ‘Night’ and ‘Day’ behind this Christmas miracle. Also, here’s an exciting note: If you have ever watched the classic gangster film ‘The Untouchables’ from 1987 featuring Kevin Costner, Sean Connery and Robert De Niro, then you may remember a unique shootout scene from this very train station. 

Anyways, we left Chicago’s Union Station and began walking to our hotel, which included a trip around the Loop area and along Michigan Avenue, including the so-called Magnificent Mile, enjoying the beautiful skyscrapers and institutions of Chicago. The Loop area is bounded by elevated tracks, which combined with the cars and skyscrapers, makes the city feel so energetic. Walking is always the best way to experience a city if you ask me, because it gives you time to stop and explore whenever you see something that gets your attention. After checking in at our hotel, we went down to a nearby Giordano’s, a pizzeria chain that specializes in Chicago-style stuffed pizza. While waiting for our food (it usually takes 30-45 minutes to make a Chicago-style pizza), we spent some time looking through our guidebooks, getting lost in all the greatness that Chicago offers. It had been long a day, so we went back to our hotel after indulging in a mozzarella overload of a pizza. Many Chicago-style pizzerias actually ship pizzas across the nation, so you don’t even have to visit Chicago to try it. However, be warned: A small sized pizza is usually enough for two persons. 

Next day was the big one: We were going to see ‘Wicked’ in the evening! But we still had a whole day in front of us. During the first part of the day, we visited the Art Institute of Chicago.  This national treasure was founded in 1879 and is considered to be one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. One of the best areas of the museum was, if you ask me, the American Art collection, which contains iconic paintings like Edward Hopper's ‘Nighthawks’, and Grant Wood's ‘American Gothic’. The works of Grant Wood has been growing a lot of me since I arrived in Iowa, which is the native state of Wood, but also because I visited the actual house that inspired this uniquely American painting. It was also really interesting to see Georges Seurat’s ‘A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte’ in-person. If you have ever watched ‘Ferris Bueller’s Day Off’ from 1986, then you know what painting I am talking about – and if you haven’t, then you really should watch it because it’s still a pretty great movie. However, my all-time favorite was the ‘Hartwell Memorial Window’, which absolutely took my breath away. It’s a stained-glass panel inspired by the view from the artist’s family home near Mt. Chocorua in New Hampshire. The colors combined with the peaceful landscape create something very monumental and majestic, making the viewer feel so small. This could also be due to the size: it’s 23-foot-high and 16-foot-wide! However, if you want to see something small, but at least as interesting, then you should go down to the basement of the museum. Down there you can enjoy the Thorne Rooms, which is a series of miniature rooms that offers the visitor detailed views of European interiors from the 16th century through the 1930s and of American furnishings from the 17th century to 1940. 

After making our way through the huge Art Institute of Chicago, we went to visit another Chicago landmark: Portillo’s! This place specializes in serving Chicago-styled hotdogs, so we went all in and ordered the following meal: a Chicago dog (topped with yellow mustard, chopped white onions, cartoonish green sweet pickle relish, a dill pickle spear, tomato slices or wedges in a puppy seed bun), a Maxwell Street Polish (a Polish sausage topped with grilled onions and yellow mustard), and a chili cheese dog (a hotdog covered in American cheese and topped with chili and chopped onions) along with onion rings. My favorite was the Maxwell Street Polish, but the traditional Chicago-style hot dog was also really interesting because of all the different toppings. Actually, Chicago dogs are sometimes described as having been "dragged through the garden" due to its many different toppings. It feels very fresh. While I do love Portillo’s, my favorite spot to grab a Chicago-styled hotdog is actually a small chain called Devil Dawgs. 

Next stop on our program was the James M. Nederlander Theatre in Chicago's revitalized Loop Theater District, where we were going to see ‘Wicked’. The beautiful neon light outside was fascinating, and the building was even prettier inside with an exciting East Asian theme. Previously known as the Oriental Theatre, it opened in 1926 as a movie palace and vaudeville venue, but presents live Broadway theater today. It’s also located close to the Cadillac Palace Theatre, CIBC Theatre, the Goodman Theatre, and the Chicago Theatre. 

The musical ‘Wicked’ by legendary musical icon Stephen Schwartz is based on a novel by Gregory Maguire named ‘Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West’ from 1995 and puts focus on Elphaba, a.k.a. the Wicked Witch of the West. The plot begins before L. Frank Baum's 1900 novel ‘The Wonderful Wizard of Oz’ and its 1939 film adaption with iconic Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale. However, ‘Wicked’ also intervenes with the original work and expands many of the beloved characters’ background stories, such as the Scarecrow, the Cowardly Lion, and the Tin Man. Basically, it’s the Land of Oz before and after Dorothy arrives and turns everything upside down.  

I couldn’t be happier with my first American musical experience, and I can guarantee you that it won’t be my last. I enjoyed all the of the amazing chorography, singing, and humor, but I was mostly captivated by the interesting themes. ‘Wicked’ takes the traditional one-dimensional villain, the Wicked Witch of the West, and puts her in a sympathetic light. This makes the audience wonder about the question of the nature of good and evil as we witness her upbringing and transformation. ‘Wicked’ also raises interesting and relevant themes of otherness, discrimination, and racism, which is reflected both by how the protagonist is treated by others due to her green skin color, but also by how the rights of animals are being stripped away and how animals, who were once considered equals in the Land of Oz, are being oppressed by tyrannical forces. These themes are as always relevant in contemporary society, especially in these recent years. 

The next day was spend exploring Museum Campus and Grant Park. We took a bus out to the beautiful Art Deco-styled Adler Planetarium, which was actually the first planetarium in the United States. Its location provides one of the best views of the Chicago skyline along with the powerful Lake Michigan. Chicago is blessed with one of the most glorious skylines of any American city, and to be honest, there’s not a bad view of it. Each perspective offers something different, so it’s always fun to try new spots. In general, the efforts that Chicago have made to beautify itself is remarkable, but also the efforts to preserve their rich legacy of great architecture has been successful. Today, this gives the city an interesting mix of new and old. After the Great Fire of 1871 destroyed one-third of the city, reconstruction began. This gave birth to a new sense of building innovation that would eventually result in a series of new structures that were dubbed skyscrapers. Actually, skyscraper became the popular term for the new high-rise buildings that began to emerge in especially Chicago and New York’s Manhattan during this period. These tall buildings were of a size not previously known. My favorite building is the Carbide & Carbon Building, an Art Deco miracle with its black, dark green, and golden colors. According to rumors, the architects supposedly designed the building to resemble a dark green champagne bottle with gold foil at the top. Another special building is the Wrigley Building, which in honor of Ukraine’s fight for freedom, was displayed their flag along Star and Stripes. 

Anyways, back to our trip: Next stop was the John G. Shedd Aquarium. We were both captivated by our visit to Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo & Aquarium the week before, so why not visit one of the nation’s finest aquariums? Also, Laura knows a lot about our water-based friends, so that only improved my experience and knowledge when she passionately shared fact after fact. Also, the building itself is also stunning and reflects Chicago’s strong architectural heritage. I was mostly fascinated by the beautiful jellies, while Laura fell in love with the beluga whales, and I admit, I also developed a weak spot for those majestic creatures. Afterwards we went to Millennium Park, where we saw the official Christmas tree of Chicago. The lights along with the star on the top of the tree matched the flag of Chicago, which was a cool detail. We also enjoyed watching people ice-skating around this winter wonderland. Next, we visited the Christkindlmarket, a German-styled Christmas market, where we could enjoy the smells of German delicacies such as bratwurst and currywurst, but also some creative stands, including a shop with cool lighting stars. Our day ended at Navy Pier, where we went out to the end of the pier and looked into Lake Michigan, seeming so endlessly from our point of view. 

Pursuing my newfound love for animals (Laura always liked animals, so I guess she has influenced me), our final day were spent visiting the Lincoln Park Zoo, which is a free admission zoo located on the North Side of Chicago. The North Side feels very different than the downtown area, and is one of the richest areas of Chicago. Surprisingly, my favorite animal was the beavers, who were playing around when we saw them. Also, I find it fascinating how they build dams, which protects against predators and holds their food during winter. Afterwards we took a walk to the nearby North Avenue Beach where we defied the cold weather and the harsh wind and went out on the pier, giving us another beautiful view of Chicago – I do love those views. However, I finally understand why they call it the Windy City, because Mother Nature sure send some powerful blows our way. Then we took a bus back to the downtown area and went for a walk along the riverside. When we came to the DuSable Bridge, police officers told us that the area was closed. However, when we returned to the street level, many people were gathered, and we decided to go explore what was happening. It turned out that a large Christmas parade was happening, and we decided to stay and enjoy the show, which included Santa Claus riding his sleigh, but also a brilliant firework show. 

After the parade we had one last thing on our bucket list to do before leaving Chicago. Our guide book had mentioned a certain bar called the Signature Room of the John Hancock Tower, where you could enjoy a drink while having a pretty magnificent view of Chicago from the 96th floor. It was a Saturday night, so we thought it would be jam-packed with people, but we walked right into the place and had ourselves a drink, both feeling on top of the world after conquering Chicago. 

The next day, early in the morning, I followed Laura to the Midway International Airport. It was a bit difficult to say goodbye, but at least I know we’ll soon meet again back home. She flew back home to Denmark, while I spend my last day around Chicago’s South Side, mainly just visiting the Museum of Science and Industry and enjoying the gilded bronze ‘Statue of The Republic’ in Jackson Park before going to O’Hare International Airport in order to return home. However, I always try to stop at Margie’s Candies, an old school ice cream place, located along the subway route to O’Hare. And what a perfect way to end this adventure with a big bowl of ice cream covered in hot fudge.   

It was quite special to explore Chicago with Laura. It's my favorite American city with my favorite person. Despite being a good travel companion, I truly enjoyed spending time with Laura, but also to introducing her to my MoDA Family. Our 10 hour Amtrak trip flew by, and so did our 10 days together. I'm a pretty lucky guy for having such a special lady friend, who would come all the way to visit me. I know it's not Christmas yet, but that was the biggest gift I could ever wish for.

[stupidbeecandle]

Can you tell us more lighthouse strories? :)

Hmm. I made a few other lighthouse stories but I think a lot of them are harder to track down these days? I should probably just make a pinned post.

Stories: The lighthouse and the watch house were right next door to each other the same way you might put a shed out back if your shed was a three-story glowing tower that screamed at a decibel level akin to violence at predictable intervals. There was a white painted line, or maybe it was yellow? On the rocks in a circumference, you were never to cross because beyond that line the noise could permanently deafen you.

The house we stayed in had a rich history of tear-downs and rebuilds. The Atlantic ocean is not fond of houses and does its very best to destroy them with ice, tides, and occasionally very large rocks. It was two stories, downstairs there was a kitchen, a living room, and a gear-storage room where we had a bunch of fancy-schmancy equipment set up and either running, or ready to take out and run. Upstairs were the sleeping quarters but it was weird. At one point the house had belonged to a family with normal bedrooms, then some new owners came in and boarded up the upstairs into two gendered halves so that boys and girls couldn't touch each other in ungodly ways. Then some door-holes were cut in those shodily put up barriers so the upstairs kind of had a spirit-halloween popup store vibe with the construction.

No heat, no electricity or running water. Water was usually packed in on ships and the bathroom was converted to a compost system that was actually fairly well done. Fire stove and gas appliances that we shipped gas in with kept the downstairs super cozy so often we just slept there instead even though it was cramped and sometimes we wanted to kill each other. One of my teammates had the nastiest unwashed white girl dreads Id ever seen because she didn't take advantage of any of the camp hair-hygene options available and kept trying to convince us to dredge our hair with seawater and tie it in knots. Blessedly I had lost my sense of stank by a few days into expedition mode.

Once I lost my hat in the wind and it blew into the circle zone of bodily harm near the lighthouse and I timed my sprint so I could run in, get my hat and get out before it could go off again in what was a spectacularly stupid move, exactly the half brained shit you would expect from an 18 year old with no thoughts in her head.

The moose washed up but so did a leatherback turtle which took a lot longer than the moose to clean and prep. We never killed animals but we often recorded the contents of dead ones and used/sold/donated bones and things to museams, researchers and various societies. We all hated the turtle, while the moose brought us together in a task of madness and hubris, no one wanted to touch the turtle and it was the most cursed task on the island for some time.

Various sea birds (assholes) were the main species living on the island. You had to walk with one hand raised above your head in a fist at nearly all times when they were nesting because the assholes were stupid and would attack the highest part of your body thinking it was your head. You would wear a glove or use an umbrella if you knew you would have to be out there for more than a few minutes.

All of the food was vegan and I hated it. We had a joke that if you threw the vegan scrambled eggs on the ground they would bounce higher than the hight you threw them from. They didn't bounce that high but they did bounce suspiciously high.

The other lighthouse I stayed at had a fancy helipad we could all sit out on made of wood. On off days we would sun ourselves. For some reason despite only a 3 hour difference between the islands great duck island was green and sometimes nice while great rock island was grey and bitterly cold.

Thgis lighthouse had electricity but still no plumbing. It was a much larger research station with at least one permanent resident but I didn't stay long. they studied burrowing owls, horribly invasive rabbits, ruins from early new england settlers and a now feral cow population the settlers just left for some reason.

Its bizarre to be warned about the dangerous cows that lurk in the woods nearby and how they can appear and disappear into the trees faster than you will realize it. It is even more bizarre to be walking in the woods planting your little pink flags to mark burrows when out of nowhere there is a huge godamn cow in front of you that is blessedly more afraid of you than you are of it as it slowly backs back into the trees and disappears.

Loved the research lighthouse life and the cool stories I got to be a part of. Unfortunately decided that it was not what I wanted to dedicate my life to for various reasons tumblr wouldn't find interesting.

For people who are super interested in lighthouse adventures, look up college of the atlantic where I was a student when I had my cool lighthouse adventures (they have a kickass program)

For people who just want to get the fuck away from everyone, enjoy some nature and live a nice quiet life I much more highly recommend checking out forestry jobs.

[blind-rats]

The Rise & Fall of Joss Whedon; the Myth of the Hollywood Feminist Hero

By Kelly Faircloth

“I hate ‘feminist.’ Is this a good time to bring that up?” Joss Whedon asked. He paused knowingly, waiting for the laughs he knew would come at the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer making such a statement.

It was 2013, and Whedon was onstage at a fundraiser for Equality Now, a human rights organization dedicated to legal equality for women. Though Buffy had been off the air for more than a decade, its legacy still loomed large; Whedon was widely respected as a man with a predilection for making science fiction with strong women for protagonists. Whedon went on to outline why, precisely, he hated the term: “You can’t be born an ‘ist,’” he argued, therefore, “‘feminist’ includes the idea that believing men and women to be equal, believing all people to be people, is not a natural state, that we don’t emerge assuming that everybody in the human race is a human, that the idea of equality is just an idea that’s imposed on us.”

The speech was widely praised and helped cement his pop-cultural reputation as a feminist, in an era that was very keen on celebrity feminists. But it was also, in retrospect, perhaps the high water mark for Whedon’s ability to claim the title, and now, almost a decade later, that reputation is finally in tatters, prompting a reevaluation of not just Whedon’s work, but the narrative he sold about himself. 

In July 2020, actor Ray Fisher accused Whedon of being “gross, abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable” on the Justice League set when Whedon took over for Zach Synder as director to finish the project. Charisma Carpenter then described her own experiences with Whedon in a long post to Twitter, hashtagged #IStandWithRayFisher.

On Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, Carpenter played Cordelia, a popular character who morphed from snob to hero—one of those strong female characters that made Whedon’s feminist reputation—before being unceremoniously written off the show in a plot that saw her thrust into a coma after getting pregnant with a demon. For years, fans have suspected that her disappearance was related to her real-life pregnancy. In her statement, Carpenter appeared to confirm the rumors. “Joss Whedon abused his power on numerous occasions while working on the sets of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ and ‘Angel,’” she wrote, describing Fisher’s firing as the last straw that inspired her to go public.

Buffy was a landmark of late 1990s popular culture, beloved by many a burgeoning feminist, grad student, gender studies professor, and television critic for the heroine at the heart of the show, the beautiful blonde girl who balanced monster-killing with high school homework alongside ancillary characters like the shy, geeky Willow. Buffy was very nearly one of a kind, an icon of her era who spawned a generation of leather-pants-wearing urban fantasy badasses and women action heroes.

Buffy was so beloved, in fact, that she earned Whedon a similarly privileged place in fans’ hearts and a broader reputation as a man who championed empowered women characters. In the desert of late ’90s and early 2000s popular culture, Whedon was heralded as that rarest of birds—the feminist Hollywood man. For many, he was an example of what more equitable storytelling might look like, a model for how to create compelling women protagonists who were also very, very fun to watch. But Carpenter’s accusations appear to have finally imploded that particular bit of branding, revealing a different reality behind the scenes and prompting a reevaluation of the entire arc of Whedon’s career: who he was and what he was selling all along.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer premiered March 1997, midseason, on The WB, a two-year-old network targeting teens with shows like 7th Heaven. Its beginnings were not necessarily auspicious; it was a reboot of a not-particularly-blockbuster 1992 movie written by third-generation screenwriter Joss Whedon. (His grandfather wrote for The Donna Reed Show; his father wrote for Golden Girls.) The show followed the trials of a stereotypical teenage California girl who moved to a new town and a new school after her parents’ divorce—only, in a deliberate inversion of horror tropes, the entire town sat on top of the entrance to Hell and hence was overrun with demons. Buffy was a slayer, a young woman with the power and immense responsibility to fight them. After the movie turned out very differently than Whedon had originally envisioned, the show was a chance for a do-over, more of a Valley girl comedy than serious horror.

It was layered, it was campy, it was ironic and self-aware. It looked like it belonged on the WB rather than one of the bigger broadcast networks, unlike the slickly produced prestige TV that would follow a few years later. Buffy didn’t fixate on the gory glory of killing vampires—really, the monsters were metaphors for the entire experience of adolescence, in all its complicated misery. Almost immediately, a broad cross-section of viewers responded enthusiastically. Critics loved it, and it would be hugely influential on Whedon’s colleagues in television; many argue that it broke ground in terms of what you could do with a television show in terms of serialized storytelling, setting the stage for the modern TV era. Academics took it up, with the show attracting a tremendous amount of attention and discussion.

In 2002, the New York Times covered the first academic conference dedicated to the show. The organizer called Buffy “a tremendously rich text,” hence the flood of papers with titles like “Pain as Bright as Steel: The Monomyth and Light in ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer,’” which only gathered speed as the years passed. And while it was never the highest-rated show on television, it attracted an ardent core of fans.

But what stood out the most was the show’s protagonist: a young woman who stereotypically would have been a monster movie victim, with the script flipped: instead of screaming and swooning, she staked the vampires. This was deliberate, the core conceit of the concept, as Whedon said in many, many interviews. The helpless horror movie girl killed in the dark alley instead walks out victorious. He told Time in 1997 that the concept was born from the thought, “I would love to see a movie in which a blond wanders into a dark alley, takes care of herself and deploys her powers.” In Whedon’s framing, it was particularly important that it was a woman who walked out of that alley. He told another publication in 2002 that “the very first mission statement of the show” was “the joy of female power: having it, using it, sharing it.”

In 2021, when seemingly every new streaming property with a woman as its central character makes some half-baked claim to feminism, it’s easy to forget just how much Buffy stood out among its against its contemporaries. Action movies—with exceptions like Alien’s Ripley and Terminator 2's Sarah Conner—were ruled by hulking tough guys with macho swagger. When women appeared on screen opposite vampires, their primary job was to expose long, lovely, vulnerable necks. Stories and characters that bucked these larger currents inspired intense devotion, from Angela Chase of My So-Called Life to Dana Scully of The X-Files.

The broader landscape, too, was dismal. It was the conflicted era of girl power, a concept that sprang up in the wake of the successes of the second-wave feminist movement and the backlash that followed. Young women were constantly exposed to you-can-do-it messaging that juxtaposed uneasily with the reality of the world around them. This was the era of shitty, sexist jokes about every woman who came into Bill Clinton’s orbit and the leering response to the arrival of Britney Spears; Rush Limbaugh was a fairly mainstream figure.

At one point, Buffy competed against Ally McBeal, a show that dedicated an entire episode to a dancing computer-generated baby following around its lawyer main character, her biological clock made zanily literal. Consider this line from a New York Times review of the Buffy’s 1997 premiere: “Given to hot pants and boots that should guarantee the close attention of Humbert Humberts all over America, Buffy is just your average teen-ager, poutily obsessed with clothes and boys.”

Against that background, Buffy was a landmark. Besides the simple fact of its woman protagonist, there were unique plots, like the coming-out story for her friend Willow. An ambivalent 1999 piece in Bitch magazine, even as it explored the show’s tank-top heavy marketing, ultimately concluded, “In the end, it’s precisely this contextual conflict that sets Buffy apart from the rest and makes her an appealing icon. Frustrating as her contradictions may be, annoying as her babe quotient may be, Buffy still offers up a prime-time heroine like no other.”

A 2016 Atlantic piece, adapted from a book excerpt, makes the case that Buffy is perhaps best understood as an icon of third-wave feminism: “In its examination of individual and collective empowerment, its ambiguous politics of racial representation and its willing embrace of contradiction, Buffy is a quintessentially third-wave cultural production.” The show was vested with all the era’s longing for something better than what was available, something different, a champion for a conflicted “post-feminist” era—even if she was an imperfect or somewhat incongruous vessel. It wasn’t just Sunnydale that needed a chosen Slayer, it was an entire generation of women. That fact became intricately intertwined with Whedon himself.

Seemingly every interview involved a discussion of his fondness for stories about strong women. “I’ve always found strong women interesting, because they are not overly represented in the cinema,” he told New York for a 1997 piece that notes he studied both film and “gender and feminist issues” at Wesleyan; “I seem to be the guy for strong action women,’’ he told the New York Times in 1997 with an aw-shucks sort of shrug. ‘’A lot of writers are just terrible when it comes to writing female characters. They forget that they are people.’’ He often cited the influence of his strong, “hardcore feminist” mother, and even suggested that his protagonists served feminist ends in and of themselves: “If I can make teenage boys comfortable with a girl who takes charge of a situation without their knowing that’s what’s happening, it’s better than sitting down and selling them on feminism,” he told Time in 1997.

When he was honored by the organization Equality Now in 2006 for his “outstanding contribution to equality in film and television,” Whedon made his speech an extended riff on the fact that people just kept asking him about it, concluding with the ultimate answer: “Because you’re still asking me that question.” He presented strong women as a simple no-brainer, and he was seemingly always happy to say so, at a time when the entertainment business still seemed ruled by unapologetic misogynists. The internet of the mid-2010s only intensified Whedon’s anointment as a prototypical Hollywood ally, with reporters asking him things like how men could best support the feminist movement. 

Whedon’s response: “A guy who goes around saying ‘I’m a feminist’ usually has an agenda that is not feminist. A guy who behaves like one, who actually becomes involved in the movement, generally speaking, you can trust that. And it doesn’t just apply to the action that is activist. It applies to the way they treat the women they work with and they live with and they see on the street.” This remark takes on a great deal of irony in light of Carpenter’s statement.

In recent years, Whedon’s reputation as an ally began to wane. Partly, it was because of the work itself, which revealed more and more cracks as Buffy receded in the rearview mirror. Maybe it all started to sour with Dollhouse, a TV show that imagined Eliza Dushku as a young woman rented out to the rich and powerful, her mind wiped after every assignment, a concept that sat poorly with fans. (Though Whedon, while he was publicly unhappy with how the show had turned out after much push-and-pull with the corporate bosses at Fox, still argued the conceit was “the most pure feminist and empowering statement I’d ever made—somebody building themselves from nothing,” in a 2012 interview with Wired.)

After years of loud disappointment with the TV bosses at Fox on Firefly and Dollhouse, Whedon moved into big-budget Hollywood blockbusters. He helped birth the Marvel-dominated era of movies with his work as director of The Avengers. But his second Avengers movie, Age of Ultron, was heavily criticized for a moment in which Black Widow laid out her personal reproductive history for the Hulk, suggesting her sterilization somehow made her a “monster.” In June 2017, his un-filmed script for a Wonder Woman adaptation leaked, to widespread mockery. The script’s introduction of Diana was almost leering: “To say she is beautiful is almost to miss the point. She is elemental, as natural and wild as the luminous flora surrounding. Her dark hair waterfalls to her shoulders in soft arcs and curls. Her body is curvaceous, but taut as a drawn bow.”

But Whedon’s real fall from grace began in 2017, right before MeToo spurred a cultural reckoning. His ex-wife, Kai Cole, published a piece in The Wrap accusing him of cheating off and on throughout their relationship and calling him a hypocrite:

“Despite understanding, on some level, that what he was doing was wrong, he never conceded the hypocrisy of being out in the world preaching feminist ideals, while at the same time, taking away my right to make choices for my life and my body based on the truth. He deceived me for 15 years, so he could have everything he wanted. I believed, everyone believed, that he was one of the good guys, committed to fighting for women’s rights, committed to our marriage, and to the women he worked with. But I now see how he used his relationship with me as a shield, both during and after our marriage, so no one would question his relationships with other women or scrutinize his writing as anything other than feminist.”

But his reputation was just too strong; the accusation that he didn’t practice what he preached didn’t quite stick. A spokesperson for Whedon told the Wrap: “While this account includes inaccuracies and misrepresentations which can be harmful to their family, Joss is not commenting, out of concern for his children and out of respect for his ex-wife. Many minimized the essay on the basis that adultery doesn’t necessarily make you a bad feminist or erase a legacy. Whedon similarly seemed to shrug off Ray Fisher’s accusations of creating a toxic workplace; instead, Warner Media fired Fisher.

But Carpenter’s statement—which struck right at the heart of his Buffy-based legacy for progressivism—may finally change things. Even at the time, the plotline in which Charisma Carpenter was written off Angel—carrying a demon child that turned her into “Evil Cordelia,” ending the season in a coma, and quite simply never reappearing—was unpopular. Asked about what had happened in a 2009 panel at DragonCon, she said that “my relationship with Joss became strained,” continuing: “We all go through our stuff in general [behind the scenes], and I was going through my stuff, and then I became pregnant. And I guess in his mind, he had a different way of seeing the season go… in the fourth season.”

“I think Joss was, honestly, mad. I think he was mad at me and I say that in a loving way, which is—it’s a very complicated dynamic working for somebody for so many years, and expectations, and also being on a show for eight years, you gotta live your life. And sometimes living your life gets in the way of maybe the creator’s vision for the future. And that becomes conflict, and that was my experience.”

In her statement on Twitter, Carpenter alleged that after Whedon was informed of her pregnancy, he called her into a closed-door meeting and “asked me if I was ‘going to keep it,’ and manipulatively weaponized my womanhood and faith against me.” She added that “he proceeded to attack my character, mock my religious beliefs, accuse me of sabotaging the show, and then unceremoniously fired me following the season once I gave birth.” Carpenter said that he called her fat while she was four months pregnant and scheduled her to work at 1 a.m. while six months pregnant after her doctor had recommended shortening her hours, a move she describes as retaliatory. What Carpenter describes, in other words, is an absolutely textbook case of pregnancy discrimination in the workplace, the type of bullshit the feminist movement exists to fight—at the hands of the man who was for years lauded as a Hollywood feminist for his work on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.

Many of Carpenter’s colleagues from Buffy and Angel spoke out in support, including Buffy herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar. “While I am proud to have my name associated with Buffy Summers, I don’t want to be forever associated with the name Joss Whedon,” she said in a statement. Just shy of a decade after that 2013 speech, many of the cast members on the show that put him on that stage are cutting ties.

Whedon garnered a reputation as pop culture’s ultimate feminist man because Buffy did stand out so much, an oasis in a wasteland. But in 2021, the idea of a lone man being responsible for creating women’s stories—one who told the New York Times, “I seem to be the guy for strong action women”—seems like a relic. It’s depressing to consider how many years Hollywood’s first instinct for “strong action women” wasn’t a woman, and to think about what other people could have done with those resources. When Wonder Woman finally reached the screen, to great acclaim, it was with a woman as director.

Besides, Whedon didn’t make Buffy all by himself—many, many women contributed, from the actresses to the writers to the stunt workers, and his reputation grew so large it eclipsed their part in the show’s creation. Even as he preached feminism, Whedon benefitted from one of the oldest, most sexist stereotypes: the man who’s a benevolent, creative genius. And Buffy, too, overshadowed all the other contributors who redefined who could be a hero on television and in speculative fiction, from individual actors like Gillian Anderson to the determined, creative women who wrote science fiction and fantasy over the last several decades to—perhaps most of all—the fans who craved different, better stories. Buffy helped change what you could put on TV, but it didn’t create the desire to see a character like her. It was that desire, as much as Whedon himself, that gave Buffy the Vampire Slayer her power.

[palmett-hoes]

i said in this post that i have original characters and backstories for neil's extended family. it took me,, a really long time to write it all down. it's been a full month since the original post, and this is still just a run through of things, not full prose, which i might be interested in doing one day but not anytime soon

now, some things to note about what i'm writing, why, and how. methodology, basically. this might not have come through yet in my posts, because i just don't post about my half-finished ideas, but i research a LOT. i like to base what i write about on real life, even if it's just headcanons and fanfic

also, i love helping people with research, so if anyone wants help with research for a fic or just their personal headcanons or anything hit me up!!

as a white person who wants to write characters from different ethnic backgrounds, i feel i have a responsibility to really do my due diligence and research as much as possible to consider things from every angle. and part of that for me is making sure that every character of color has a backstory. they don't just appear somewhere, i have to give them a reason for being there and a story for how they got there, even if that's not what i write their STORY about. people, come from places, basically. i follow a lot of demographic census information and population averages, as well as a lot of history, from as general as transatlantic trade in the last 500 years to as specific as the changes in a single city in a certain year

talking to other writers in the fandom i know i'm a little overzealous, but this is what gives me peace of mind to feel like i am putting the effort in to get things right

so anyway, as for what that means here:

i like writing neil as mixed black/jewish. it works well thematically for his character, as well as just what FEELS right for how i visualize him in my head

only, that can't simply come from nowhere. we know who his parents are. they need to also be poc for neil to be one, and they're a complicated pair to handle in that lens

one choice i made about that, for multiple reasons, is that everything about neil's parents' backgrounds should mirror each other. it can't simply be that one if them is black and one is jewish, or even that mary is both and nathan is white, because that says something i don't want to say any way you slice it. additionally, i want both facets of his ethnicity to be important to neil, and i feel as though he would want to ignore the half of himself from his father.

so: they both have to be mixed, giving them a sort of,, ideological equal footing, as it were. that way, i can also write three different experiences, rather than accidentally implying that This is what being black is, or This is what being jewish is, or This is what being mixed is. and that's also important to me, even if it's just in my head or not even directly addressed. it's still a big consideration of mine anytime i write about any of them

now, finally, onto mary and nathan! i'll put it below a cut because this is already long enough, the under-the-cut is much longer, and i don't want to wear out your thumbs if you don't care

mary hatford

canon timeline, neil was born in 1988. as a tentative number let's say mary was around 30 when he was born, meaning she would be born in the 50s. say her parents were roughly the same age, so they were born around the 20s

like i said, what's happening where in history is very important to me for building these backstories, and major historical events tend to have a lot of influence on population shifts. and well,, jews and europeans in the early-to-mid 20th century? there's no getting around involving world war II. nothing explicit, but it is mentioned and part of the story

mary’s paternal family are the hatfords. they're from the british west indies, largely jamaica, but they've been involved with shipping and trade all over the trans-atlantic region for generations.

they have a complicated relationship with the british empire, having both worked for them and against them at various points, sometimes both at once. similarly, they've tried multiple times through the generations to relocate the family to england permanently, but have been turned away or pressured out

they associate england and the british empire with power, and they both disagree with and desire that power in degrees which vary person to person. they do have a general idea between them though that living in england is a sign of status and authenticity, and while they don't want to leave jamaica permanently they do want their center of power to be in england, and there is a deep resentment against the anglos for not allowing them to stay permanently despite their wealth and influence, the fact that their work will always be looked down on and seen as lesser

i did come into building the hatfords with the primary idea of them being black british, and looking into the organized crime connection second. them being jamaican/west indies is a reference to the jamaican posse, who have a large presence in the london crime scene, although that's really the only connection. the hatfords aren't really yardies in any sense

the hatfords' status as organized crime is a little iffy. mostly they skirt the line between legal and illegal, owning legal trading companies and doing plenty of legal shipping. their main business in the criminal underworld is being middlemen moving supplies for other groups. they have a lot of contacts, and they serve an invaluable role in international smuggling, but they rarely get their own hands dirty. they move things from one place to the other and don't question too much what it is, though they don't deal in people

mary's father is named samuel hatford (first name in reference to samuel bellamy, the gentleman pirate king of the early 18th century). he was born in England, raised largely in Jamaica, then moved back to England as a teenager/young man. he's light-hearted and a bit idealistic for someone from a crime family, seeing the best in people even when they're cold and often believing in principle over profit, which at times put him in conflict with what's best for business

he almost enlisted in world war II, but instead convinced the family to work as weapons and supplies runners supporting the Allies and guerilla resistance groups

mary's mother is named cima ben nahman (ladino/judeo-spanish/sephardic names, doesn't really reference anything or anyone in particular). She's is an algerian jew. Born in algeria (city undecided, though algiers had the largest jewish community at the time), she moved to france for a few years as a young woman, probably for education. she joined anti-fascist organizations which became resistance groups once germany invaded

she's stoic, and has a ruthless mind for strategy. like most algerian jews, she's caught between her home country and its colonizer. the french empire played the algerian muslim majority against the jewish minority as a way to create infighting and distract the algerians from uniting and turning against them, but the algerian jews also then became reliant on the french for protection. (it's a really, really complicated situation)

cima sort of hates them both, both algeria and france. her only allegiance is to being jewish

(contrast this to samuel, who feels that he is BOTH british and caribbean, even when those two identities may be in conflict)

cima and samuel met when samuel provided weapons and supplies to cima's militia group. he took particular interest in them and went out of his way to help, above and beyond the other groups the hatfords were supplying

in the waning period of the war, cima was seriously injured, i'm currently thinking a land mine accident. she survived, but her recovery was slow. she lost an arm and had burns across half her torso, neck, and face. samuel brought her to england supported her through her recovery. in the hospital, they spoke a lot about why they each chose to fight, and the ways they did because neither were formal soldiers fighting for a country. samuel was in many ways fighting for an ideal, while cima was fighting for her people. cima also talked to him a lot about judaism and religion during this time, which samuel took an interest in. eventually, cima decided to stay

they got married. samuel converted, which was somewhat controversial with his family. however, cima agreed to join the family business, where she became an integral but sometimes ruthless member. after algerian independence, she brought some of her trusted family and community into the fold as well, some moving to england and others to france

both cima and samuel believed very heavily in responsibility, though what it meant for each of them was different. cima believed in preparedness and follow-through, samuel believed in family and protection, doing what's right outside of the bounds of the law. this contributed a lot to how they raised their children

when they were born, mary and stuart were raised in england (and i like to think they have an oldest brother). the hatfords were a big family, and influential, although careful about balancing the legal and less-legal sides of their business. the ben nahmans were smaller, and most of them were in france so mary and her brothers saw them less often. they were raised very religiously and culturally jewish, though close with the caribbean side of their family too, as well as being the first generation who were born and raised in england. this put them at a cross-section of three very different cultures, and was where mary first learned about changing and blending in with different groups

mary was the youngest and a little bit spoiled by her father, aunties, and uncles. her mother however was much less tolerant of her. clearly very affected by her time in the war, cima became extremely distrustful and suspicious, and tried to instill in her children a similar sentiment of secrecy and self-sufficiency, avoiding attention and casual relationships. she could be harsh on them, especially mary, who was the most resistant to this

growing up, mary was irresponsible and fun-loving, goading her brothers and cousins, getting in trouble, and starting fights. she didn't understand the tenuous balance of being organized crime, and at times put the whole family at risk by overestimating their sway. her mistakes affected the whole family but it was usually her mother who confronted her about them first and most harshly

she resented her mother's control, and didn't understand the reasons behind it. she also couldn't differentiate between the boundaries her mother sets as a result of her own trauma, and the necessary boundaries she set for the safety of the family, viewing them as one and the same, and leading her to hate any kind of control exerted over her

really, a lot of cima's character is just who mary ends up becoming after being married to nathan and being on the run. i like the story of a child becoming the parent they once hated. rather than learn from her mother, both her failures and her successes, mary becomes her, doomed to make the same mistakes. this is also why cima is wounded by a landmine, because mary dies in fire

---

nathan wesninski

nathan was HARD to come up with a story for, mostly because,,, WHY THE FUCK DOES THIS GUY WORK FOR THE JAPANESE YAKUZA

wesninski is a VERY polish name. the japanese-polish connection is,, not super strong

so anyway, working off the idea of the wesninski family being a polish jewish one, WHERE is he going to meet a japanese crimelord to get into a multi-generation debt/business arrangement with?

turns out, the answer is brazil

brazil actually has a large jewish population (roughly 10th largest in the world). it began with its colonization by the portuguese, but the 19th century to modern population largely comes from central and eastern europe. brazil ALSO has the largest japanese population outside of japan

also this story ended up being WAY more detailed and prosaic than samuel&cima's story, which is basically just bullet points. there's no reason for this i love both stories very much just for some reason the words flowed for me here and not there

to avoid having a second jewish story where wwII is prominent, the wesninskis get a page out of my own family's book: nathan's grandfather (neil's great grandfather) came to the americas fleeing the russian pograms around the turn of the 20th century

so

Wesninski came to brazil (city undecided, have a lot more research to do about individual cities in brazil). he had waardenburg syndrome(a hereditary genetic condition that can affect eyes and hearing) which runs very strongly in his family (his son, nathan, and neil will all inherit it), and he is completely Deaf. while he came to brazil alone, in his new home he connected both with the local jewish community and the local deaf community, and eventually marries another Deaf Jewish woman

eventually they were able to establish a kosher deli and restaurant in the city, one which became a common hangout for the Deaf community. then one day (probably around 1915), a group of japanese men came in, and kept returning

these were the moriyamas, recently arrived from japan, in a place with very few japanese people and businesses. they liked the wesninski deli because they didn't share a language with anyone in there, couldn't even be heard by most of them, and it would also be difficult for the authorities to question them. two layers of protection for a crime family in a vulnerable place

wesninski and the moriyamas were amicable to each other, but as they didn't actually have a way to communicate that was the extent of it. but the moriyamas were polite and payed well and didn't bother the other customers. als, as a jewish establishment, they had a lot of education resources, which were helpful to the moriyamas in learning about brazilian society, including beginning to understand portuguese

now, in japan, the moriyamas were a small yakuza family. they got driven out by their bigger and stronger and more established competition around the time when japanese immigration to brazil was just starting, so that was where they went. though they had little option in where they ended up, they also had little competition in establishing their business

i still have a lot of research to do about the moriyamas. about both how the yakuza operate and about how brazilian organized crime works, and about life in brazil for early japanese immigrants. so a lot of the moriyama details are pretty vague

now the wesninskis had a son, meyer (nathan's father. name in reference to meyer lansky, famous american jewish mobster of polish descent) who was around 14 when the moriyamas arrived. he himself was not fully deaf like his parents, though was hard of hearing and raised in the Deaf community. as he goes through his rebellious teenage years, well, the gangsters are right there

in the early days the moriyamas were still more concerned with mostly the japanese enclaves, but they had aspirations of expanding. meyer wasn't japanese, but he was helpful to the moriyamas who came into the deli to study. he was perceptive and bold, could keep a secret, knew his way around knives from working in the deli, and knew the city. he was a good asset to them, and he was interested in causing some trouble

over the next ten years or so, meyer got increasingly more involved, alongside the moriyamas becoming increasingly more established throughout the city. he goes from someone who helps out occasionally and relays information beyween parties to getting involved with minor shakedowns, bribery, evidence disposal. by the time he's in his 20s he's thoroughly enmeshed

his parents were older when they had him, and his father died relatively young, leaving meyer the store and his mother to take care of. they were vaguely aware of his connections to the moriyamas and didn't approve of what he did with them but he also kept the worst from them, and was always a diligent son, and the only one they had. he assured them no matter how far he went that he wasn't "really" part of the gang

"yakuza have tattoos, and see, ima? no tattoos. i'm still a good jewish son, not a gangster"

now the problem arises when meyer falls for camara da machado, a young Deaf woman who frequents the store

(based on/inspired by/FC yaya dacosta (where the name comes from) and rutina wesley)

she was a Deaf girl born to a hearing family who struggled to give her the support she needed, maybe even just a single mother, and she'd spent a lot of time alone at the deli from a young age (12-ish?). she was shy and quiet and a little bit of a shrinking violet, but the wesninskis became very fond of her. she started tentatively helping them out around the store which became a job. she was often included in family meals and holidays, and always had a bed in their apartment above the deli if she needed one, and more than once had helped patch meyer up after he got in trouble to hide the extent of it from his parents

she was a couple years younger than him but he'd always been sweet on her. and she'd had a crush on him from basically the moment she'd layed eyes on him. they'd known each for years and camara was basically family, and then one day when they were both in their 20s it just suddenly clicked for them

so meyer and camara fell in love. meyer was head of the house, had to keep the deli running, and had his mother, camara, and possibly camara's mother (undecided at this juncture) to worry about and he decided he didn't want to continue working with the moriyamas in case it dragged his family into danger. being a gangster was a fling of youth and he was ready to grow up

when he informed the moriyamas of this though, they,,, did not agree.

while MEYER might not have considered himself part of the gang, THEY didn't think he just got to walk away. he'd worked with them for too long and knew too much. there might even have been a desire to tie him to the family permanently through marriage. and well,, one man against a growing criminal empire can't do much

it was a huge shock to him, and made him truly realize how naive and reckless he'd been. he'd been a dumb kid who wanted to start some trouble, the moriyamas were career criminals. they expected that once you were in, you were in for life, and they did not take kindly to meyer disagreeing with this

he didn't know how to explain this to his family... so he didn't. they'd all told him they wanted him to stop, but he'd meant for the announcement to be a surprise. after learning that he would not be permitted to walk away, he chose to just hide it and continue with business as usual

it worked for a while, maybe a few years, a time during which the moriyamas were getting a lot more brutal as they got more established and increasingly looked to expand, putting them in competition with other gangs and greater law enforcement, until they were a true crime empire spread across whole regions of the country. meyer had lost a lot of esteem in their eyes by asking to leave, leading them to put him under increasing scrutiny and giving him more incriminating tasks, to ensure that he would be incriminated if he ever tried to turn them in. it's during this time that he first had to kill for them

then camara got pregnant

and meyer was terrified. he didn't know how the moriyamas would deal with a kid. the only marriages and children he knew of within the family were endorsed by the boss, many arranged by him, and he knew his wouldn't be approved. yakuza wives were heavily involved with the business too, and he absolutely did not want that for camara

he broke down and told her everything. she's horrified, and furious that he kept it from her, but she didn't want to give up her baby. it would be hard, but she believed they can keep it hidden, and if the moriyamas found out, maybe it wouln't be so bad?

(spoiler: it would)

they have a son, born natan da machado, under his mother's name

meyer and camara never got married. meyer was going to propose after he left the moriyamas but that obviously didn't happen. marriages were supposed to be blessed by the boss, and meyer never dared to ask. they already lived together, anyway

but with natan, they decided that meyer couldn't acknowledge him as his own. in the deli or in the streets, he didn't acknowledge natan. he was camara's bastard son, and meyer didn't want anything to do with him

it was a flimsy disguise at best. natan was mixed, but there was a strong enough resemblance to his father. even if his hair was a darker red or he had brown skin, they had the same eyes

they tried to keep him away from the moriyamas as he grew up, hoping they wouldn't see him and make the connection, but they also kept him very hidden in general, just in case. he spent a lot of time inside, with his grandmothers

and that was how natan grew up, feeling like a secret, his father cold and distant, only acknowledging him in their apartment. cut off from other kids his age. a hearing boy in a Deaf family (natan himself was HoH but still had most of his hearing. meyer and his maternal grandmother could both hear, but they had gotten out of the habit of it and mostly communicated through sign)

natan developed a deep feeling of resentment towards his father and shame about himself from a young age. he felt like a mistake, defective somehow. so wrong he had to be hidden away from everyone

there's only so long that you can hide a child, though, and when natan was around ten the moriyamas found out about him, and they were not happy.

they didn't like split attention or loyalty. they kept children and family under very tight wraps. they should be one hundred percent enmeshed in the moriyama empire, raised to be loyal and helpful in whatever way they were needed. the fact that meyer wanted and was willing to leave for this family, and then hid his son, was a huge betrayal

still, they gave him an opportunity to prove his loyalty: kill camara or the moriyamas would kill them all: her, natan, meyer, and both their mothers

but meyer couldn't do it, and instead he told camara to run and hope they didn't actually care enough to chase her down. and she did. and she couldn't take natan with her. (i haven't fully fleshed out why yet, currently thinking that meyer was given this ultimatium when they already had natan)

so camara left her son, and got away

i built the story of mary's mother as a reflection of mary's story if something had been different, and i built nathan's story the same way. his wife takes her son and runs away with him when the moriyamas try to take him from her. nathan's mother was in the same situation and left him behind

over the next forty years of his belonging to the moriyamas he gets to marinate in that resentment. from the father that ignored to the mother who ran away from him, he internalizes it as being something wrong with him, not the circumstances. the more he's taught to torture and kill and the more he excels at it, the more this belief gets cemented. he's good at killing, he was meant to kill. he's twisted and broken and wrong inside and he always was and his parents always knew

and then when it happens again but differently this time he throws away a decade and millions of dollars and his standing with his boss to hunt down his son and his wife because he didn't get to run away so why should they? why does mary love nathaniel more than camara loved natan?

from here, the exact detail's of nathan's story aren't quite solidified. whether he was raised by his father from then on or by his grandmothers (or whether his grandmothers left with his mother) or whether the moriyamas put him somewhere else entirely, but from then on he lived under the moriyamas' direct supervision, and they taught him how to turn a knife on a man

they took his mother's name from him, though, so he's natan wesninski, not natan da machado, because they own the wesninskis now

and when the moriyamas decided to expand beyond brazil when natan was a young man instead of a child, and settled on the east coast of the US, they renamed him nathan, because it sounded more "american"

---

so that's it. obviously there are still a lot of unfinished details in both stories, but they're strong enough at this point to stand on their own and i haven't changed or rethought a lot of the major details in a long time

i've become extremely attached to these OCs and their stories, and i hope they interest other people too. some day i'd like to write them out in prose properly, along with the story of nathan and mary meeting, but that'll be a while away considering the pace i move at

so until then i just wanted to put this out there

[greengrayeyeswrites]

shit-faced in love (chapter three)

Title: shit-faced in love

Pairing: Corpse Husband x OC (fem!youtuber!reader)

Word Count: 1,151

Warnings: Mental Health/Mental Illnesses are a big topic in this story. Mentions of depression, bpd and other mental illnesses. Angst, Fluff.

Note: This may be a Corpse x OC story but feel free to insert yourself into the main girls role. If Corpse ever announces that he doesn’t like fanfics about him, I’ll delete this.

Prologue — Chapter 1 — Chapter 2 — Chapter 3 — Chapter 4: Here

— — —

Imogen’s hair was messy, her make-up was smudged and her feet were feeling weird. She looked for the outside area of the airport so Buddy could go to the toilet. Her mind was racing, while she waited for Buddy to finish his business.

Then she searched the sleeping capsules and booked one for three and a half hours. Finally on her own in her own, private capsule the twenty-eight year old could finally relax.

She laid on the little bed, checked her social media and soon fell asleep. The jet lag was killing her. She flew eight hours into the past and it took its toll on her.

Buddy was lying on the floor on his cushion and was gently snoring away. Imogen’s whole body relaxed, while she laid on the bed, the quilt covering her whole face. 

She was glad she didn’t have to go through security once more. Her checked-in luggage was already on it’s way to the next airplane. 

Imogen almost slept through her alarm, when Buddy wouldn’t have woken her up with a wet kiss on her cheek. She exited the capsule and went to the closest restroom to refresh her and fix her make-up. 

Looking fresh and clean she entered the next airplane. The flight to Houston only took three hours and Imogen reached the lone star state at 3:30 am. 

To call Imogen tired and fucked was an understatement. The woman was completely wrecked, and felt sleep deprived. She had been flying through different timezones and was wrecked.

She almost fell asleep, while waiting for her luggage. But Buddy woke her up right when her carrier rolled past her on the treadmill. She quickly took it down and went to the rest room once more, freshening up.

She didn’t want to stand across of Baylee looking like a homeless person. She redid her whole make-up, put some peach-colored blush on her cheeks and redid her eyeliner, the wing looked even more pretty than before. 

With some finishing touches she looked at Buddy and nodded. „Ready to meet Baylee in real life?“ She asked the dog, that only tilted his head. 

Walking through the doors to the arrival hall, Imogen’s heart started beating faster and she nervously looked around.

She had facetimed with Baylee a lot and have seen her pictures. She knew how the woman looked like; yet here she was nervous about meeting Baylee for the first time.

Imogen’s hands were shaking and she held tight onto Buddy’s leash, when she saw a sign that said her name SAD-MOGEN the sign said and Imogen chuckled. 

She looked at the woman holding the sign and immediately recognized her. It was Bayle Macasa, her best friend. The smile on her lips was even prettier in real life than through the screen. 

Imogen slowly walked up to her, unsure of what to do. But once she stood infant of the smaller girl, the urge to hug her overwhelmed her and she crushed Baylee in a hug.

„I can’t believe I’m really here!“ Imogen almost cried, while holding Baylee in her arms. Her best friend, her backbone, her favorite person was standing right in front of her. 

„And I can’t believe you’re here!“ Baylee said and her voice send a shiver down Imogen’s spine. „Your voice is even prettier irl!“ The Irish woman was out of words, when she felt Buddy tug on its leash. 

„Oh, right!“ Imogen tugged on Buddy’s leash and the Siberian Husky walked a step forward. „Baylee, this is Buddy. Buddy, this is Baylee!“ Imogen introduced her dog to her best friend and vice versa. 

„Hi Buddy, it’s nice to meet you!“ Baylee bend down and let the dog sniff her hand, before she petted him. „Whoa! His fur is even softer than I imagined it!“ Baylee laughed and Imogen nodded. 

For a split second Imogen forgot that it was three in the morning. But while she followed Baylee through the George Bush Intercontinental Airport she started yawning. Baylee looked at the taller woman.

„You must be super tired“, the Filipina started and Imogen nodded. „I’ve travelled so many different time zones in the span of sixteen hours… I’m completely wrecked.“ 

Baylee laughed. „How about I drop you off at your AirBnB and we’re going to explore Houston once you’ve had a handful of sleep?“ Imogen looked at her dark haired friend and nodded. „That would be fantastic, Bay… I’m so sorry but Buddy and I are dead.“

The two women started laughing and walked to Baylee's car. „Completely understandable. It’s not everyday, that you cross the Atlantic Ocean!“ Baylee chuckled and opened the trunk of her Jeep. 

After they load the car and fixed Buddy’s car straps the two woman drove to Imogen’s AirBnB. Imogen had rented a beautiful, completely furnished Condo for her and Buddy in downtown Houston, close to the Memorial Park.

The owner of the AirBnB was super kind and told Imogen more than once that it was okay that Buddy was going to stay with her. 

Baylee soon found the condo and parked in front of it. „Whoa, that looks fancy.“ She grinned towards her best friend. „No wonder, for a rich YouTuber“ Baylee winked and Imogen blew up her cheeks. „I’m not rich… I just live comfortable…“ 

Money wasn’t Imogen’s favorite topic. She knew she owned more than normal twenty-eight year olds, but she worked hard for her money. She had deals with companies and had to advertise their products, to gain all that money.

„I know, I know… I was just kidding, Mo.“ Baylee grinned and climbed out the car. Imogen followed her and freed Buddy from the seat. The husky jumped out of the car and started sniffing the driveway of the condo.

The women unload the trunk and Baylee helped Imogen carry her stuff into the condo. Both women were shocked when they say the interior of the house. „Dang… this is beautiful!“ Imogen whispered and looked around.

The condo had a spacious living room with beautiful paintings all over the walls and beautiful furniture. There was a white dining table with green chairs. 

Imogen and Baylee both looked at eachother. „NCT-green chairs“, chuckled Imogen and Baylee nodded. „I bet Hyuck and Jae would like these chairs“, the twenty-five year old grinned. 

Buddy was sniffing around the house and went out to the backyard and pool area to do his business. 

After Imogen and Baylee looked through the whole condo, Baylee bid her goodbyes for now and Imogen hugged her. „Call me once you wake up, okay? I’ll come by with breakfast!“ The Filipina promised and Imogen nodded. 

Once Baylee left, Imogen went straight to the bathroom to wipe off all her make-up. After fixing Buddy’s cushion next to her bed, she fell asleep. 

She couldn’t wait for her American adventure to start.

to be continued…

Taglist: @wineandionysus

[itrvlr]

AN AMAZING STORY...

Here is an amazing story from a flight attendant on Delta Flight 15, written following 9-11

On the morning of Tuesday, September 11, we were about 5 hours out of Frankfurt, flying over the North Atlantic .

All of a sudden the curtains parted and I was told to go to the cockpit, immediately, to see the captain. As soon as I got there I noticed that the crew had that "All Business" look on their faces. The captain handed me a printed message. It was from Delta's main office in Atlanta and simply read, "All airways over the Continental United States are closed to commercial air traffic. Land ASAP at the nearest airport. Advise your destination."

No one said a word about what this could mean. We knew it was a serious situation and we needed to find terra firma quickly. The captain determined that the nearest airport was 400 miles behind us in Gander, New Foundland.

He requested approval for a route change from the Canadian traffic controller and approval was granted immediately -- no questions asked. We found out later, of course, why there was no hesitation in approving our request.

While the flight crew prepared the airplane for landing, another message arrived from Atlanta telling us about some terrorist activity in the New York area. A few minutes later word came in about the hijackings.

We decided to LIE to the passengers while we were still in the air. We told them the plane had a simple instrument problem and that we needed to land at the nearest airport in Gander , New Foundland, to have it checked out.

We promised to give more information after landing in Gander .. There was much grumbling among the passengers, but that's nothing new! Forty minutes later, we landed in Gander. Local time at Gander was 12:30 PM .... that's 11:00 AM EST.

There were already about 20 other airplanes on the ground from all over the world that had taken this detour on their way to the US.

After we parked on the ramp, the captain made the following announcement: "Ladies and gentlemen, you must be wondering if all these airplanes around us have the same instrument problem as we have. The reality is that we are here for another reason."

Then he went on to explain the little bit we knew about the situation in the US. There were loud gasps and stares of disbelief. The captain informed passengers that Ground control in Gander told us to stay put.

The Canadian Government was in charge of our situation and no one was allowed to get off the aircraft. No one on the ground was allowed to come near any of the air crafts. Only airport police would come around periodically, look us over and go on to the next airplane.

In the next hour or so more planes landed and Gander ended up with 53 airplanes from all over the world, 27 of which were US commercial jets.

Meanwhile, bits of news started to come in over the aircraft radio and for the first time we learned that airplanes were flown into the World Trade Center in New York and into the Pentagon in DC.

People were trying to use their cell phones, but were unable to connect due to a different cell system in Canada . Some did get through, but were only able to get to the Canadian operator who would tell them that the lines to the U.S. were either blocked or jammed.

Sometime in the evening the news filtered to us that the World Trade Center buildings had collapsed and that a fourth hijacking had resulted in a crash. By now the passengers were emotionally and physically exhausted, not to mention frightened, but everyone stayed amazingly calm.

We had only to look out the window at the 52 other stranded aircraft to realize that we were not the only ones in this predicament.

We had been told earlier that they would be allowing people off the planes one plane at a time. At 6 PM, Gander airport told us that our turn to deplane would be 11 am the next morning.

Passengers were not happy, but they simply resigned themselves to this news without much noise and started to prepare themselves to spend the night on the airplane.

Gander had promised us medical attention, if needed, water, and lavatory servicing.

And they were true to their word.

Fortunately we had no medical situations to worry about. We did have a young lady who was 33 weeks into her pregnancy. We took REALLY good care of her. The night passed without incident despite the uncomfortable sleeping arrangements.

About 10:30 on the morning of the 12th a convoy of school buses showed up. We got off the plane and were taken to the terminal where we went through Immigration and Customs and then had to register with the Red Cross.

After that we (the crew) were separated from the passengers and were taken in vans to a small hotel. We had no idea where our passengers were going. We learned from the Red Cross that the town of Gander has a population of 10,400 people and they had about 10,500 passengers to take care of from all the airplanes that were forced into Gander!

We were told to just relax at the hotel and we would be contacted when the US airports opened again, but not to expect that call for a while.

We found out the total scope of the terror back home only after getting to our hotel and turning on the TV, 24 hours after it all started.

Meanwhile, we had lots of time on our hands and found that the people of Gander were extremely friendly. They started calling us the "plane people." We enjoyed their hospitality, explored the town of Gander and ended up having a pretty good time.

Two days later, we got that call and were taken back to the Gander airport. Back on the plane, we were reunited with the passengers and found out what they had been doing for the past two days.

What we found out was incredible.....

Gander and all the surrounding communities (within about a 75 Kilometer radius) had closed all high schools, meeting halls, lodges, and any other large gathering places. They converted all these facilities to mass lodging areas for all the stranded travelers.

Some had cots set up, some had mats with sleeping bags and pillows set up.

ALL the high school students were required to volunteer theirtime to take care of the "guests."

Our 218 passengers ended up in a town called Lewisporte, about 45 kilometers from Gander where they were put up in a high school. If any women wanted to be in a women-only facility, that was arranged.

Families were kept together. All the elderly passengers were taken to private homes.

Remember that young pregnant lady? She was put up in a private home right across the street from a 24-hour Urgent Care facility.There was a dentist on call and both male and female nurses remained with the crowd for the duration.

Phone calls and e-mails to the U.S. and around the world were available to everyone once a day. During the day, passengers were offered "Excursion" trips.

Some people went on boat cruises of the lakes and harbors. Some went for hikes in the local forests.

Local bakeries stayed open to make fresh bread for the guests.

Food was prepared by all the residents and brought to the schools. People were driven to restaurants of their choice and offered wonderful meals. Everyone was given tokens for local laundry mats to wash their clothes, since luggage was still on the aircraft.

In other words, every single need was met for those stranded travelers.

Passengers were crying while telling us these stories. Finally, when they were told that U.S. airports had reopened, they were delivered to the airport right on time and without a single passenger missing or late. The local Red Cross had all the information about thewhereabouts of each and every passenger and knew

which plane they needed to be on and when all the planes were leaving. They coordinated everything beautifully.

It was absolutely incredible.

When passengers came on board, it was like they had been on a cruise. Everyone knew each other by name. They were swapping stories of their stay, impressing each other with who had the better time. Our flight back to Atlanta looked like a chartered party flight. The crew just stayed out of their way. It was mind-boggling.

Passengers had totally bonded and were calling each other by their first names, exchanging phone numbers, addresses, and email addresses.

And then a very unusual thing happened.

One of our passengers approached me and asked if he could make an announcement over the PA system. We never, ever allow that. But this time was different. I said "of course" and handed him the mike. He picked up the PA and reminded everyone about what they had just gone through in the last few days.

He reminded them of the hospitality they had received at the hands of total strangers.

He continued by saying that he would like to do something in return for the good folks of Lewisporte.

"He said he was going to set up a Trust Fund under the name of DELTA 15 (our flight number). The purpose of the trust fund is to provide college scholarships for the high school students of Lewisporte.

He asked for donations of any amount from his fellow travelers. When the paper with donations got back to us with the amounts, names, phone numbers and addresses, the total was for more than $14,000!

"The gentleman, a MD from Virginia , promised to match the donations and to start the administrative work on the scholarship. He also said that he would forward this proposal to Delta Corporate and ask them to donate as well.

As I write this account, the trust fund is at more than $1.5 million and has assisted 134 students in college education.

"I just wanted to share this story because we need good stories right now. It gives me a little bit of hope to know that some people in a faraway place were kind to some strangers who literally dropped in on them.

It reminds me how much good there is in the world."

"In spite of all the rotten things we see going on in today's world this story confirms that there are still a lot of good people in the world and when things get bad, they will come forward.

*This is one of those stories that need to be shared. Please do so...*

[shipwreckedwithcaptainmarrow]

- Pirates and Christmas -

Did pirates celebrate Christmas? How so, and how would it be tackled at sea? Christmas three-hundred years ago was very different than today, and even more so for pirates, the traditions of the Christmas tree had yet to be introduced by Germanic countries to the cultures warring over the West Indies, Santa Claus and his reindeer were unknown to English culture, and the emphasis of gift-giving also would be absent. What it was however was a time for church-going, caroling, feasts, family visits, and drinking. Christmas also was a ‘season,’ including what we now call "new years", that lasted for a total of 12 days, beginning on December the 25th, and going to “Twelfth Day”, which was January the 6th.   Christmas was a major social and religious holiday, and people abound in the New World primarily all came from Christian counties, and pirate crews often were a mixed bag of people, including Catholics, and Protestants, as well as Jews. While not unheard of for a pirate to turn their back on religion, many retained their faith. The media would portray them as monsters, less than human, but to themselves they were still the person they were before, and had no reasons to denounce their faiths. Pirate captain Bartholomew Roberts would eve wear a golden cross, observed the Sabbath, and even had a chaplain on board to perform Sunday services his crew were made to attend. As for visiting loved ones, that's a tad harder for pirates, with many originating from Europe and primarily operating along the Atlantic US Coast, the Caribbean and around the Indian Ocean. But pirate communities did exist, and pirates still established friends and new loved ones in various ports they would frequent. Its not to say some would unable to see them for the holiday, it's just more likely Christmas would be spent with the immediate 'family'; the crew. Decorations would be done during the time period with evergreen, boxwood, lavender, rosemary, bay and flowers, typically for churches but would also be done for private homes if they were so inclined. The greens and blooms celebrated the everlasting nature of Christ’s love. This isn’t to say that pirates would decorate their ship, but evergreen pines can be found everywhere on Earth except for Antarctica, incase they were so inclined to decorate a beach camp or the like. Pirates also often went ashore to celebrate, there are many many documented cases of pirates celebrating off-ship and in general carousing. As 1716's December came to a close, during the Christmas season, the pirate ‘Black’ Sam Bellamy would even take over the entire English colony on the island of Virgin Gorda in the British Leeward Islands for ‘several days of recreation and debauchery.’ The party was reportedly so successful that many of the male population joined his ranks when he left. Many pirates also had relationships and families in the New World, meaning some could have even ‘gone home for the holidays’. So, in summary, pirates had access to the décor, the main meal (see the link below to a previous post), the drinks and food, had religious individuals on board, loved celebrating, and some could potentially visit loved ones. There's no reason to not assume at least some, if not most, pirates celebrated Christmas at some point between the 25th and January 6th, if for no other reason than an excuse to push for an above average meal and an excuse to party. A few days back I also shared a post going into more detail onto what type of food would be served for a pirate Christmas as well here: :https://www.facebook.com/.../a.163204001.../236599294562185/ This post can be viewed at it’s original posting on my Facebook page for Shipwrecked with Captain Marrow in case you feel like sharing on Facebook, here: https://www.facebook.com/ShipwreckedWithCaptainMarrow/photos/a.163204001901715/238787204343394/

[izzielizzie]

Footnotes in the Story of Your Life

Nancy Drew never wanted to move from everything she knew in New York to an unwelcoming town in Maine, and she secretly refuses to enjoy her upcoming final year of high school, but that might not even happen when she and four Horseshoe Bay natives - Bess Marvin the socialite, Ace the stoic son of a single mother, George Fan the town foster child/screw up, and Ned Nickerson HBPD’s favorite ex-con - are accused of attempted murder. Nancy’s startled - when she said she wanted something interesting to happen she didn’t mean this - but soon she starts to notice that not everything is as it seems here (AU).

Title from “Tolerate It” by Taylor Swift

Nancy’s mother finds her sitting on her bed on the first day of summer with a framed photograph in her hands. Kate Drew softens at the sight of her daughter, her usually perfect posture long forgotten as she wilts into the bed.

“Nance,” she says quietly, and Nancy instantly looks up, her face crumpling. Kate crosses the bare room to sit next to her only daughter, wrapping a secure arm around her shoulder. “Moving must be hard, huh?” For the past month, the family of three had been packing up their New York home in River Heights, loading things into trucks as their friends came by with endless casseroles and ceramic dishes they didn’t know what to do with. Nancy, as social as her mother before her, had drawn into herself more and more as she made her goodbyes. 

“Liven up Nance,” Carson, Kate’s husband and Nancy’s father had said not too long ago as they ate the tuna casserole Helen Coring - Nancy’s best friend - had brought earlier that day as they put the contents of Nancy’s room into a U Haul truck. “We’re moving to River Heights Drive. Not that much of a change, right?”

Nancy had spent the rest of the night glaring at her father, resenting his audacity, and Kate had taken over with the reassurances. 

“Yeah. I just hate the idea that I’m missing senior year.”

“Well, you’re not missing it per say. You’re still going to school here.”

Nancy looks at the picture of her, Helen, and another friend named Burt at the junior prom, their arms around each other. Nancy sighs. She considers launching into a tirade about how New York and Maine are very different places and no she is missing school, the important parts at least, but she knows that this move is hard on her mother too, so she refrains. “I guess so,” she says, reluctantly putting the picture on the stand she had placed next to her bed. 

Kate kisses the top of Nancy’s head. “Good. Now why don’t you explore and I’ll see what casserole I can heat up.”

“Ugh Mom,” Nancy says, already grinning as she pulls her blue raincoat from one of the boxes on the floor in front of her.

 Nancy’s wanderings lead her to a small seafood restaurant with a great view of the Atlantic. Nancy’s not used to being this close to large bodies of water, and it’s making her a little nauseous. Her father, a native of Boston, assures her that she’ll get over the salt air smell, but Nancy’s not so sure. 

She looks up at the claw shaped sign, creaking eerily on its pole. The Bayside Claw Nancy reads. What a fitting name. And a fitting sign. Nancy’s about to turn and keep walking, since she’s not a big seafood person, but she sees a handful of well dressed men enter the restaurant. Nancy’s spent enough time in New York City to know when a well dressed person is just fashion conscious, or when they’re rich and up to something. These men are definitely the latter. Nancy pauses for a few moments to make sure that the men have had the time to settle, since she locked eyes with a young man with sandy blond hair and the beginnings of a goatee, and she doesn’t want him to think she’s following him.

Nancy is an unnecessarily paranoid person. 

She pushes through the doors of the restaurant and is nearly mowed over by a person the moment she steps into the dining area. “Whoah, I’m sorry,” she says, stepping back in time to see a woman with long black hair and an oversized cardigan stagger backwards, clearly discombobulated by well… everything. 

“Ugh, Victoria,” A girl about Nancy’s age in a green uniform grumbles. She catches sight of Nancy. “Sorry about that ma’am,” the waitress says, reaching down to haul the woman (presumably Victoria) off the ground. The waitress pushes Victoria out of the door that’s still held open by Nancy. “Go be drunk somewhere else!” The waitress - whose name tag reads George - turns to Nancy. “Can I help you?” 

Nancy freezes, not quite sure why to say she’s here now that she’s been spotted by this rather vocal waitress when she’s saved by another waitress, this time in yellow. 

“George, Mr. Hudson wants us to give his wife food,” the waitress says in a posh British accent. She’s holding a wobbly plate of fish and salad in one hand. 

George turns from Nancy to the new waitress, annoyance crossing her face. “Well what do you want me to do? Roll it onto a cart for her? Go bring it outside!”

“Mr. Hudson left his wife outside?” Nancy asks, without thinking. 

“Yeah, that fellow over there,” the waitress in yellow points to the sandy haired man Nancy had tailed into here. 

“And that fellow is both incredibly rich and able to give us a boost and my foster dad so maybe you should shut up and give Tiffany her food,” George snaps. Both Bess and Nancy flush. 

“Sorry,” Bess mumbles, stepping away and around Nancy to slip through the front door. Nancy’s a little jostled when Bess passes her, and she spins a little, turning towards the kitchen. She catches sight of a young man in a colorful Hawaiian shirt ringing the bell to signify an order. They lock eyes - ice blue on sky - and Nancy feels a wave of déjà vu pass over her, but she shakes it off. She turns back to George, who’s still looking at her, waiting for Nancy to say something. 

Finally, Nancy makes up her mind. If she’s going to be stuck in this tiny town she might as well do something to occupy her time. “Are you hiring?”

George looks her over. “Are you new here?”

Oh. So it’s that kind of tiny town. “Yes, my family just moved here.”

George nods. “Right. Well, we could always use a new waitress. We had one leave for college and Bess isn’t the brightest so…” George trails off, cocking her head. “Do you hear that?”

Both Nancy and George tilt their heads towards the front door of the restaurant, where they can hear muffled shouting. Both girls look at each other for a moment before Nancy spins and pushes the door open. George is hot on her heels, and after a few moments, a third pair of feet joins them. Nancy turns to see shaggy blond hair under a black cap and knows that it’s the boy from behind the counter.

Nancy stops suddenly when she sees Bess standing over a body, shock on her face. “Omph,” Nancy says as both George and the other guy come barreling into her. She stumbles, and George catches her around the waist. Nancy opens her mouth to ask the very obvious question hanging in the air- 

“Bess? What happened?” a decidedly male voice asks, taking the words straight from Nancy’s mouth. She looks up to see a tall boy with cocoa skin exiting a blue truck parked a foot behind Bess, the body, and the sleek car looming over the person Nancy can only assume is Mrs. Hudson. 

A strangled cry escapes George, and she rushes forward, dropping to her knees next to the woman. “Help her!” George says, looking up at the four of them as she lifts Mrs. Hudson’s head to rest on her knees. She cradles it in her hands like an injured bird. 

“What happened?” the Hawaiian shirt boy repeats. Bess is sobbing now. 

“I turned to go back to the restaurant and all of a sudden she cried out and fell! I don’t know!” 

Nancy, still not quite sure what in the world is happening, crouches next to George and Mrs. Hudson. She lifts one of Mrs. Hudson’s hands, feeling her wrist for a pulse. 

“She’s not dead,” she says as sirens come wailing towards them.

Fifteen minutes later, Nancy, Bess, George, and the two boys are sitting in the hospital waiting room with Mr. Hudson, George leaning against Mr. Hudson’s shoulder.

“The Hudsons have been her foster parents for the longest out of any of her homes,” Bess says, leaning over to whisper in Nancy’s ear. Nancy smiles at her. “I remember what it’s like being new. I only moved in with my aunt here in Horseshoe Bay last month. I used to live in London. I’m Bess by the way.”

“Nancy,” Nancy says.

“Welcome. Where did you live before?”

“New York.”

“City?”

“State.”

“Oh that’s nice. I love the city, did you go often?”

“Yeah, sometimes,” Nancy says as the waiting room doors swing open. She’s startled to see a man in a uniform striding towards their little group. He’s probably in his thirty or forties, and he’s got a no nonsense look on his face. 

“Are you the people found at the scene of the crime?” he asks in lieu of greeting. 

“Woah, woah, crime?” Mr. Hudson asks, standing up, startling George, who had been dozing on his shoulder. 

The officer turns to Mr. Hudson solemnly, putting a hand on his shoulder. “There was poison found in your wife’s system, Mr. Hudson, which means that someone had attempted to kill her.”

Everyone turns to Bess, except Mr. Hudson and the officers. 

Mr. Hudson stares at the officer for a moment before sinking into his seat, a look of genuine fear on his face. “Who would want to kill Tif?”

“Not me I swear!” Bess cries, latching on to Nancy’s arm. Nancy gently pries her fingers off her arm.

The officer shakes his head, ignoring the distraught waitress. “I’m not sure sir, but it’s our job to figure it out. Why is why I need to speak to these five.”

They all look at Mr. Hudson: Nancy, George, Bess, and the two boys whose names Nancy still doesn’t know. But Mr. Hudson’s face is ashen, like he’s going into shock. The officer motions at the young people. “Come along.”

The five of them look at each other uncertainly before standing and following the officer into the hall. Nancy catches sight of his badge: Chief E. O. McGinnis. 

Now, Nancy, being the daughter of a lawyer, should know her rights, and the right to remain silent is the biggest one, especially since she’s a minor, but she’s too confused and terrified to think straight. 

She’s being investigated for attempted murder. Attempted murder. God her mother’s going to kill her. 

The unlikely five line up against the wall. Chief McGinnis paces in front of them. “Alright. I’m looking at an ex-con,” he pauses in front of the guy from the truck. “The town screw up,” (this time he’s in front of George). “A city girl,” he’s in front of Bess now, who looks rather guilty in Nancy’s opinion. He moves to the fancy shirt guy standing next to Nancy. “An HBPD legacy and Nancy Drew.”

Except, that’s not what he says.

He pauses in front of Nancy, and tilts his head at her. “Who are you again?”

Nancy stares at him as the weird feeling of déjà vu hits her again. No. That’s not right. He knows who she is. 

But she doesn’t know who he is. 

Nancy feels her hands start to shake. Everything here is wrong. She should be sitting at the police station. She should know what’s happening. But she doesn’t because she’s being accused of attempted murder. 

But it shouldn’t be attempted. Nancy slides down the wall, her hands pulling at her skin where she can feel the ghost of a locket. 

My mother’s gonna kill me she thinks. But no, her mom’s dead. And Ryan isn’t George’s foster dad. He’s her dad.

This isn’t right.

This isn’t ri-

“Okay just give her space.” 

When Nancy comes to, she’s looking up into the face of the boy who had been working at the Bayside Claw. Nancy’s laying on the ground, her head against the cold tile. The boy gently slips an arm under her shoulders, helping her to sit up.

“Hey, are you okay?” he asks.

Nancy doesn’t know the answer to that. He can tell, so he tries a different question. “What’s your name?”

“Nancy Drew,” she croaks. He smiles.

“Hi Nancy Drew. My name is Ace Hardy.”

“Hi,” Nancy mumbles back.

“And that’s Nick,” Ace says, pointing to the boy from the truck who’s hovering on the outskirts of the circle of people around her. “I hear you’ve met the girls.”

Nancy nods and Ace gently slips his other arm under her knees, lifting her up in his arms like she weighs nothing. He walks her towards the waiting room, talking as he goes. “That, Nancy, was a panic attack. Have those often?”

Nancy leans her pounding head against his muscular shoulder. “No.”

“Well, first time for everything. Got anyone we can call?”

“My dad,” she mumbles. Ace nods to Bess, who rushes forward with her phone out. Nancy recites her father’s number, and Bess puts it to her ear.

“Hello? Hi, yes, this is Bess Marvin. I’m calling about your daughter. She’s in the hospital, she had a panic attack.” Bess is quiet for a moment. “Nancy Drew, yes.” After a moment, Bess rattles off directions and hangs up. 

Ace puts Nancy down on a chair next to Mr. Hudson. Nancy looks at him sideways. She’s about to say something to him when suddenly - as if her brain has been reset or something - she forgets what she was going to say.

“Want some water Nancy?” Ace asks. Nancy smiles at the unfamiliar boy. 

“Yes, please,” she says. He stands and heads to the water cooler, Bess taking his spot. “What did the officer mean by Ace is a legacy?”

“Oh, that,” Bess says sadly. “Ace’s father was a Captain on the police force. He was in a chase once when Ace was a child. His car got hit, and he didn’t make it.”

“That’s so sad,” Nancy says. 

“I know,” Bess agrees. “His mother is all he has. She’s a librarian, but she doesn’t make a lot of money. They just get by with her salary and the pension from the state. That’s why Ace turned down MIT. To work at The Claw.”

“That must be so hard,” Nancy says. She can’t imagine giving up her dream of going to Columbia. 

“It is,” Bess agrees as the doors to the waiting room are pushed open. Nancy sees her father and mother being trailed by an annoyed McGinnis.

“You can’t just take a suspect home! She has to be fingerprinted! She has to give her statement!”

Carson turns on McGinnis. “Excuse me, but my daughter is a minor and she’s had a panic attack.”

“We’re taking her,” Kate adds. She spots Nancy and rushes to her, crouching to put her hands on either side of her daughter’s face. “Nancy, baby, are you okay?”

“Yeah, just tired.”

“Okay, we’re taking you home, don’t worry, Mom’s here.”

It’s a simple statement, and normally Nancy would complain that it makes her sound like a child, but it relaxes her nonetheless. She slumps into her mom, letting the exhaustion and confusion sink over her. 

Kate runs her fingers through her red hair as Carson argues with McGinnis, who finally relents. 

“Fine, fine, you all can go if Drew is going. But I expect you back at the station at eight am sharp.”

Nancy is pulled to her feet by her mother, and before she moves, she puts a hand on Mr. Hudson’s shoulder. “Your wife will get better sir,” she says. Mr. Hudson puts his hand over hers. 

“Thanks.”

Nancy waves goodbye to everyone else before following her parents. As she falls asleep in the back seat of her dad’s car, all she can think is that something about this entire night is off.