#Winthrop Building

[rabbitcruiser]

Doors, Gates and Windows (No. 89)

5 North Square, Boston

36 Hull Street, Boston

Old State House, Boston

Winthrop Building, Boston (two pics)

129 Essex Street, Salem

Peabody Building, Salem

Salem Museum

The Gardner-Pingree House, Salem

Central House, Salem

[gmzriver]

Selena Gomez as Grace Bennett / Cordelia Winthrop Scott in “Monte Carlo” icons. 

like if you save or use :)

[z3r0-c001]

I had a dream about eating a bunch of mangos soaked in LSD then getting on a big sailboat in the Charles that got picked up by a huge gust of wind and landed in memorial drive and I had to try and sail it down the street to Harvard where the coast guard could help me get it back in the water. When the boat landed in the road I got my leg smashed btwn the side of the boat and a median at one but I made the conscious decision that it has not been broken by this. Also ermes costello was on the boat heckling me for my ability to drive a sailboat down a busy road.

[shiorimakibawrites]

Baking with Love

Last-minute final entry to Mandy's Sweater Weather Challenge presented by @she-likesorchids.

This one uses the prompts - baking/cooking together combined with the "You taste like cinnamon" and "Your hands are freezing."

Pairing: Matt Murdock x Reader

Word Count: 1,287

Summary: Matt Murdock and You make pumpkin bread and cookies.

Tags/ Warnings: Established Matt / Reader relationship, Tooth-rotting fluff

Tagging: @bellaxgiornata thought you might enjoy some Matty fluff.

Baking with Love

You sighed with relief when you entered Matt’s building. You were very happy to be out of the wind. It hadn’t been a long walk but your cheeks, nose, and ears felt like they had been scrapped raw by the biting wind. Your hands weren’t much better. You had tried to switch your tote between your hands so each got the chance to hide in your pocket but it hadn’t helped much.

The door to Matt’s apartment swung open just as you were about to reach for the knob. Matt, of course, having likely between aware of your approach for at least a block. He did this trick all the time but it still managed to make you jump each time. Judging by the grin on his face, Matt found your reaction just as amusing as he always did.

Along with any other time he sneaked up on you. Which happened a lot. Because in addition to being a lawyer, Matt was also a ninja. You keep threatening to make him wear a bell. Which only made him laugh harder. He is so lucky that he’s cute.

He looked especially cute today. First, he was smiling wide enough for the dimples to come out. That was always going to be adorable. Second, since he was at home and neither of you was planning to go anywhere until later, he hadn’t put on his dark glasses. So you got to see his lovely hazel eyes sparkling with mirth. Third, he was wearing a snuggle sweater.

Cable-knit and dark brown in color, it looked incredibly soft. You hoped you’d get to find out later. There were plans to snuggle together on the couch under the blankets, after the baking was done, but you knew how easily those plans could get disrupted for either lawyer or vigilante reasons.

If the former, you would sigh but accept the situation. Unless it was Burke, Winthrop, & Associates being themselves again. If you had to spent your snuggle time working through another pile of motions that dance right up to the edge of being frivolous from those bastards, you might actually kill someone.

As for the later . . . Daredevil might end up being the last of their worries. You might not have Matt’s fighting skills but you had connections. The benefit of feeding the local vigilantes like the semi-feral cats that they are. You could delegate your vengeance.

You also enjoyed how that sweater clung to those board shoulders and hinted at the solid muscle of his torso. That he had paired with jeans that showed off his perfect ass was just a bonus.

“Good morning, sweetheart,” Matt greeted you as he ushered you into his apartment. It was toasty warm in there. You sat down your tote on the bench and flexed your hands. Then winced. It might have been a short walk but it was long enough and air was cold enough to leave your hands stiff and aching.

You did another little startled jump when your hands were engulfed by Matt’s hands. His big, wonderfully warm hands. He started massaging the backs of your hands with his thumbs.

“Your hands are freezing,” he said. “Still can’t find your gloves?”

“No,” you said. And sighed. “I’ll find them eventually. I know they are somewhere in my apartment. They have to be.”

“Not giving up?” he asked, almost casual. As if we weren’t discussing the gloves he had given you for Christmas. The ones you distinctively remembered packing when you put away your fall and winter clothes this spring but were inexplicably missing from the box when you opened it last week.

“No,” you said firmly. “I really like those gloves. I’m not giving up on them.”

You silently prayed that Matt got the message that you weren’t just talking about your gloves.

“Thank you,” he said softly, squeezing your hands and looking a little misty-eyed.

You smiled. Looks like he got it. You squeezed his hands back. “Hey mister, where’s my kiss?”

He laughed as he dropped your hands in favor of cupping your face. His thumbs stroked your cheeks, then he leaned in and pressed his lips against yours. It was a slow but thorough kiss. The kind of kiss that soon had your hands gripping his upper arms. That sweater was just as soft as it looked. Definitely going to kill anyone who prevented snuggle time.

The unfortunate need for air meant the kiss had to end. You tried not to pout about that.

Matt kissed your forehead and murmured, “You taste like cinnamon.”

You hummed, then remembered. “The coffee cake has cinnamon in the streusel topping.”

“And you didn’t bring me any?” he asked with a mock pout.

“Sorry but I was running out of space in the tote,” you said. You leaned up and kissed his forehead. “Maybe one of these cold night, Daredevil will come to my apartment looking for a little snack.”

“Maybe he will,” Matt said with a grin. A grin that shifted into something coy. “And afterward, he might also have some cake.”

You felt your face get warm. Along with the first stirrings of arousal. Your voice was a little breathy when you answered, “Sounds like a plan. I look forward to seeing it in action.”

Matt smirked, the cocky smug one. He knew the effect he was having on you. But he let his hands fall away from your face. He stepped to the side of you and reached the tote bag. Curiously weighted it in one hand.

“What’s all in here?”

“Cookbook, mini-loaf pan, cookie sheets, parchment paper, pumpkin puree, apples –”

“I thought we making pumpkin bread?”

“We are but I saw a recipe that I want to try for apple cinnamon oatmeal cookies. Thought that we could make those too.”

“Those do sound good,” Matt said with smile.

You both got to work.

Since the whine of the motor in your hand-mixer, especially at point-blank range, made Matt wince, the butter and sugar would need to be creamed by hand. Since Matt had giant arm muscles and superhero stamina while you didn’t, you gave him that job.

While he did that, you peeled, cored, and chopped apples. Then tossed them with a little lemon juice to prevent them from oxidizing and because it enhanced the favor of the tart apples. You might occasionally gotten distracted by Matt’s . . . everything.

Like that play of muscles under that sweater while he did the creaming.

Or his ass when he had to bend down to retrieve a larger bowl – you had underestimated how big of a bowl you need for the pumpkin bread dough. Which, it seemed to you, happened a lot with pumpkin. At least it wasn’t pumpkin pie. You always seemed to end up with more batter than you had pie shells.

But what caught you eye the most was that sweet, dopey smile that kept returning to his face. This was the most relaxed you had seen Matt in a while. You supported what he did but that didn’t meant you liked seeing him frustrated and stressed.

But the soft, loving look in his eyes after you kissed his forehead and said “I love you” that – that really made your heart flutter. And it was in that moment that you knew you wanted to marry him.

Matt’s predication proved to be accurate. The cookies were delicious. You are definitely adding those to your fall treats, you thought as you snuggled against Matt on the couch. Your predication about the sweater was also accurate. It was wonderfully soft.

“What are we watching, sweetheart?” Matt asked. It was your turn to pick the movie.

“Hocus Pocus.”

Ending Note

They are making the pumpkin bread and cookies for Foggy, Karen, Marci, Claire as well as their circle of vigilante friends – the Defenders, Frank Castle, and Spider-Man.

[wawamouse]

Oz Rewatch 3: S5E04: Next Stop Valhalla

Storylines

Jaime tries to kill Guerra and is killed instead; Miguel feels guilty; Alicia Hinden comes to Oz with the dog training program; Augustus, Penders, and Miguel are selected

Miss Sally’s Schoolyard to become Sallycise; Brass confirms to Rebadow he bought the lottery ticket; Martinez hits Brass with a shit cocktail; Gloria tries to get Martinez put in the hospital and then beats him up when he keeps touching her face

Beecher and Schillinger fight during an interaction session; Schillinger antagonises Schibetta;

Peter Marie visits Keller; McClain visits Keller

Winthrop and Guenzel arrive at Oz; Guenzel is taken under Beecher’s wing while Winthrop becomes a prag for the Aryans in Unit B

Frank Urbano arrives at Oz; Beecher asks Pancamo for the Italians help in protecting Guenzel; the Aryans and Italians get into a fight

Gloria tells Ryan he has to tell his mother about his crimes; Ryan breakdances instead; Shupe tells O’Reily that Li going to rape his mom; Ryan and Cyril kill Li

Augustus continues to grieve his mother and ends up breaking his sobriety

Omar annoys Emerald City and Said with his singing, McManus gives him a supply closet to practice in; Redding demands Omar use it to sell drugs; Lalar and Arif complain to Said that he’s neglecting his role as leader; Robson tortures and kills Lalar

Sister: That’s why they gotta stop announcing everything they do in this show, like...

Sister: I feel like [Norma’s] just dead at this point.

Sister: I feel like they’re leading up to him being like a mass shooter or something. Me: You think he’s gonna snap? Sister: He seems like the type...

Sister: …I think being free would making him happy. I mean, [Toby] had that whole vision about being free that did not include [Chris], so I think he’ll be fine.

Sister: You can just tell them anything and they’ll let you through…

Sister: What’s wrong with this guy? What’s he in for? Me: Hate crimes… Murder, officially, I think. Sister: Hate crime? What’s he sniffing people for? Me: He's just a perv...

Sister: …That’s so gross… In my sickened state*, I can’t even summon a bleugh. Me: [Retching noise] Sister: Thanks. (*We got some booster shots yesterday and Sister always gets sick afterward lol)

Sister: When are they going to address that guy whose wife also died? Me: Never. Sister: So why did they introduce her?! To spout off some facts and get shushed by the priest?? Me: Maybe there was originally supposed to be more of a story to it and it go cut. Sister: No, they just wanted to do their little after school special moment and then not deal with it. You know, if any of the Muslims should be having the issues in these episodes, it should be the other guy (Arif), not Mr. Said... Me: They could have issues together. Sister: Yeah. Kill the Nazi helper dude. The one who's egging everything on. Schillinger doesn't even really do stuff on his own anymore. Before, he didn't want to fight and wanted to become a Jesus freak and it was always that guy whispering in his ear. And now look.

Sister: How we know he’s not gonna build a bomb in there? … Oh, I guess they took away all the cleaning supplies…

Stray Thoughts

Sister says Jia Kenmin and Li Chen’s plan to provoke Ryan so they could kill him in self defense was really not thought-out

Sister is convinced that someone is going to die for one of the dogs

Sister believes that killing Robson would get rid of most of the Aryans’ bite since she views him as being the worst out of all the Aryans

Final thoughts

The scene where Robson and what’s his face torture Lalar is the toughest scene to watch in the entire show, imo. And it pisses me off (like, I’m actually getting mad thinking about it right now, lol) that Robson gets more expansion in terms of character as the show progresses, too, because whooooooooo gives a shit about a Nazi?! They still haven’t followed up on Arif’s wife LMAO. Also Urbano gets introduced this episode and they don’t end up doing shit with him, really, either. But let’s learn about this asshole!!

Sister: I feel like they’ve run out of storylines with the Muslims and are just repeating past ones. Wasn’t it [Arif] who was the one complaining about Said’s leadership the last time? And then he couldn’t handle it which caused the whole thing… and now he’s doing it again? Me: I think they just don’t like when Said helps other people. They complained when Said was spending time on Beecher, too… Sister: Yeah, [Arif] is so needy… He’s like “you’re spending too much time with your roommate who you have to stay in a cell with” and also every time he is around, [Said] just wants [Omar] to be quiet anyway…

[urbs-in-horto]

From the family photo collection. My Mom was raised in the neighborhood near Leland and Winthrop in Uptown. Somewhere in the area was a backyard grotto, with rockwork terraces and miniature buildings. In researching the possible location of the images I learned that there were a number of these backyard grottos in Uptown in the 1930's and 40's. Never was able to pinpoint this one's location.

[danses-with-dogmeat]

D.W.D. Kinktober 2023 Character List

Hey y'all! Alright, so the poll (i.e. majority vote) says that I'm just to post the characters for this spicy October season event, so that's what I'm gonna do! Thank you all so much for voting! 😁

Also, this is your preliminary warning if you're a minor and you follow me, or if you're uncomfortable with/ just don't like explicit/nsfw content, that I will be posting mainly things pertaining to those subjects all throughout next month! So please, if you are underage, I love you, thank you for being here, you're amazing, but please do not interact with my NSFW tagged content (I always use the tag dwd.nsfw if you want to just block that tag). Thank you! ❤️

So, without further ado, the characters for this year's Kinktober are just below the cut!

So, this list comes predominantly from the series of alphabetical character polls (in the form of the 2nd and 3rd placers). I also didn't want any repeat characters from last year, just to keep things unique and interesting, so that was taken into account as well. Lastly, I wanted to adhere to the Official Kinktober List as much as possible, so some characters were chosen to meet very... ah, particular criteria. And while this is my official list, things are still subject to change (but I think characters are likely to stay the same no matter what else changes). Any who, here they are!:

Fallout 3:

Amata Almodovar

Dukov

Eulogy Jones

Clover

Flak & Shrapnel

The Gary(s)

Harold (& Bob)

Uncle Leo

Reilly

Sarah Lyons

Winthrop

Fallout New Vegas:

Beatrix Russell

Caesar

Dazzle

Julie Farkas

Legate Lanius

Neil

Red Lucy

Rose of Sharon Cassidy

Rotface

Fallout 4:

Curie

Edward Deegan

Glory

Kent Connolly

Pickman

Proctor Ingram

Tinker Tom

Vault Tec Rep

Yefim Bobrov

There's also not exactly 31 of them, just because I felt it necessary to build in a couple "off days" of writing because... well, mental and physical health reasons 😅 but either way, I hope y'all are excited as I am! I know some of these folks are less popular and others are... unorthodox, but I hope y'all have a good time with it, and maybe find love for a character you didn't know as well before? Idk, I do think it's gonna be loads of fun though 😁

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Christopher F. Rufo

Published: Dec 18, 2023

Harvard president Claudine Gay has been embroiled in controversy for minimizing Hamas terrorism and plagiarizing material in her academic work on race. Both scandals have discredited her presidency, but neither should come as a surprise. Throughout Gay’s career at Harvard—as professor, dean, and president—racialist ideology has driven her scholarship, administrative priorities, and rise through the institution.

Over the course of her career, Gay quietly built a “diversity” empire that influenced every facet of university life. Between 2018 and the summer of 2023, as the dean of the largest faculty on campus, Gay oversaw the university’s racially discriminatory admissions program, which the Supreme Court found unconstitutional. Even after the court issued its ruling earlier this year, Gay said that it was a “hard day” and defended the university’s policies, which were deemed discriminatory against Asian and white applicants. Gay promised to comply with the letter of the law, while remaining “steadfast” in her commitment to producing “diversity”—a not-so-subtle message that Harvard would find a way, as the University of California has done, to evade the law in practice.

While affirmative action has been a longstanding practice at Harvard, other programs led by Gay were new. Following the death of George Floyd in 2020, Gay commissioned a Task Force on Visual Culture and Signage, which released a series of recommendations the following year for engaging in the “historical reckoning with racial injustice.” The recommendations included a mandate to change “spaces whose visual culture is dominated by homogenous portraiture of white men.” In particular, the report maintained, administrators should “refresh” the walls of Annenberg Hall, which “prominently display a series of 23 portraits, none of [which] depict women, and all but three of [which] depict white men.” Who were these white men and why were they honored in the first place? The report does not say—their race and sex alone provided sufficient justification for their banishment.

In 2022, Gay implemented an initiative at the Faculty of Arts and Sciences for “denaming” any “space, program, or other entity” deemed racist by the faculty and administration. According to the report, commissioned by then-president Lawrence Bacow, these decisions would be “based on the perception that a namesake’s actions or beliefs were ‘abhorrent’ in the context of current values.” In other words, Harvard would use the standards of present-day social-justice activism to pass judgment on men who lived hundreds of years prior—at best, an ahistorical and deeply ambiguous method. As part of this project, Gay sent an email to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences community soliciting “requests for denaming,” promising to address the situation “through the lens of reckoning.” Since then, the university has grappled with denaming multiple buildings, including Winthrop House, named after John Winthrop, governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and his great grandson, also John Winthrop, a Harvard professor and president.

As president, Gay leads a sprawling DEI bureaucracy—officially, the Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging—that seeks to influence how students speak, think, and behave in relation to race. Though the university deleted nearly all DEI materials from its website following President Gay’s disastrous congressional testimony related to the Hamas terror attack, I have recovered some of these documents through an Internet archive. Harvard’s DEI administrators encourage students to internalize the basic narrative of critical race theory: America is a nation defined by “systemic racism,” “police brutality,” “white supremacist violence,” and the “weaponization of whiteness.” In another resource, students were invited to “unpack” their “white privilege” and “male privilege,” and to consider their “white fragility,” which stems from “the privilege that accrues to white people living in a society that protects and insulates them from race-based stress.”

What is one to make of Gay’s record as a whole? She is hardly a “scholar’s scholar,” as the university magazine tried to portray her, having published, according to her curriculum vitae, just 11 academic papers—nearly half of which include plagiarized material. Nor is she a competent administrator, having botched the response to rampant anti-Semitism on campus and, by one estimate, lost the university more than $1 billion in donations. But she plays one role perfectly: the dutiful racialist, skilled at the manipulation of guilt, shame, and obligation in service of institutional power. For instance, she wrote last year in a message to the campus announcing a report on Harvard’s historical connection to slavery: “We have been excluded and denigrated for centuries from an institution where we now work, study, and lead. Our presence here should not feel so extraordinary. But now we see it was anything but inevitable.”

The irony: Gay was, in fact, somewhat inevitable. In the long season of racial guilt and animus that followed George Floyd’s death, the university was desperate to recruit a “first,” as Gay put it in her inaugural address, and disrupt the university’s nearly 400 years of whiteness. As Harvard is now learning, however, naming as president someone who sees race and sex not as incidental human attributes but as ideological constructions that must be imposed on the institution comes with a significant downside.  Consequently, Harvard’s trustees find themselves in a bind: they hired Gay in large part for her identity and cannot fire her for the same reason. They seem resigned to muddling through the “racial reckoning,” however long it lasts and whatever further damage it inflicts on America’s oldest university.

[jellicle-chants]

@ride-a-dromedary Since you asked, here's my beef with Hugh Jackman Meredith Willson's The Music Man Sutton Foster. (No really, that's what the soundtrack album cover looks like.) Basically, I think the revival did a terrible job of capturing the soul and energy of the original show. If you want to read my protracted rant about it, then by all means, continue below.

(Note: I'm mostly going off of the movie adaptation to count for the "original" since it's the version I'm used to, but I also listened to the OBC recording occasionally to see what was shortened for the movie.)

I think the first big thing I should mention is that Hugh Jackman is simply a terrible choice to play Harold Hill. No offense to him, but in my eyes he's always been better at playing a character who seems very charismatic but is actually a bumbling fool (i.e. PT Barnum). Harold Hill might be a conman, but his whole livelihood revolves around getting people to believe that he means what he says and then believe that, too. You need an actor with an incredible amount of charisma and presence to be able to pull that off, and IMO, Jackman is not that actor.

He's also (again IMO) really just snoozing his way through this recording, especially on 76 Trombones! He's dropping R's left and right (to the point where it almost sounds like he's making the effort to sound Southern) and they had to add in a trombone sound behind his mimicking one because it sounds SO dull. Then he mispronounces "Creatore" somehow?? I know that's the littlest thing to get upset over but it also just shows how little this show's creatives know or care about what this musical is all about (more on that later).

And then: they do the MMM thing from Cats 2019. AKA, where they drop out all of the orchestra and sing the biggest song, probably the song that the most people in the audience will know, in a really annoying, slow build-up that entirely kills the flow of the piece. Speaking of killing the mood, the dance break in the middle of the song really does that as well. "76 Trombones" is about the farthest you can get from broke, so I have no clue why they tried to "fix" it in this way.

My least favorite Hugh Jackman song from this soundtrack, however, is not 76 Trombones, but Marian the Librarian. Just from the off, this is one of my favorite musical theatre vamps ever and they absolutely ruined it by playing it at like twice the normal speed. It also starts in the wrong key and then keys up again (???) before he starts singing, and from there it only gets worse. He basically gets every single vowel he possibly could wrong (my favorite being the classic Brit-as-American "Watt can I do") and just trips and falls through the entire song extremely uncharismatically. He says "li-berry" at one point, for goodness' sake! Please, if you haven't listened to the original Robert Preston version of this song (either from the movie or the show), go do it now and then listen to the mockery Hugh Jackman makes of it. It's so obvious that Preston has such a better command over his voice and sound that it makes Jackman sound like he has no clue what he's doing.

Sutton Foster is not nearly as bad as her co-star, although I think she's also miscast. Obviously a Shirley Jones-style voice is really hard to recreate these days, but she's just got such a bright singing and speaking voice that if you had told me in 2021 that she was going to be playing Marian I would've thought you were bad at fancasting. I think she still does a fine job with the poor directing choices she was given — a true professional.

OK, some quick things before I get to the most infuriating part of this revival.

It was also very bold of the creatives to not only keep My White Knight, which is one of my always-skips of the original, but to also add another one in in "Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean".

Why the hell is Pick-A-Little so slow??? It's a patter song, folks, it's supposed to be peppy.

I guess they directed the poor kid playing Winthrop to exaggerate the lisp as much as possible (could they have considered maybe just hiring an actor with a lisp instead?) because it straight up sounds like he's putting it on as a joke most of the time. 😬

I think the new lyrics to "Shipoopi" are cringe. Is it that hard to suspend your disbelief that people in 1912 had antiquated views on relationships? Is "hussy" really even that bad of an insult anymore? This song also gets the slowed down + long-ass dance break treatment, God save me.

So, if you're familiar with The Music Man, you might have noticed that I haven't yet mentioned a few key songs/moments. This is genuinely the part of the story of this revival that makes my blood boil. If you're unaware, 4 side characters in The Music Man make up a barbershop quartet, played in the original Broadway production and movie by the Buffalo Bills, a pre-existing quartet who Willson had become friends with even before writing the show. The Bills get multiple songs in the show, all sung in the barbershop style, and they all show off the iconic barbershop effect known as ringing chords, created from the quartet's just tuning. (I don't know enough about music theory to get into the weeds about this, but suffice it to say that barbershop singing and musical theatre singing are not interchangeable).

Apparently, when the revival was first being produced before the pandemic, a barbershop quartet called Category 4 was approached to play the quartet members. Great! Then, allegedly, post-pandemic, it was, to quote a spokesperson for the revival, "in the best interest of the show" for them to suddenly cut ties with Category 4, which would have broken contracts Category 4 said they signed. Less great. Instead, the 4 men credited as playing the quartet are Phillip Boykin, Eddie Korbich, Daniel Torres, and Nicholas Ward. I say "credited," but keep in mind that the OFFICIAL cast recording on Spotify does not credit Nicholas for "Sincere" AND "Lida Rose" (where Phillip's name is also misspelled), and on the two songs he is credited for, Spotify seems to have him confused with a violinist/conductor of the same name.

I bring this up to say that I don't blame these men for the situation Category 4 was put in — it seems the producers or someone else behind this production is extremely sloppy and willing to cut corners, including casting four musical theatre singers as a barbershop quartet. Because of this mindset, the songs are distinctly missing those ringing tones that are present in the Bills' versions, replaced with what I can only describe as "tricks" to make it seem like the harmonies are ringing, like a heavy overuse of dynamic changes, especially sforzandos. There's also at least one moment where one member (I think it's the tenor?) straight up sings the wrong note and completely changes the chord. Obviously I don't blame him for not being good at a singing style he literally isn't a professional at, but if there were at least one person in the booth familiar with barbershop or the original song, it hopefully would've been re-recorded.

And that's what hurts me the most — Meredith Willson was a huge fan of barbershop music and the Buffalo Bills especially, and now the music he wrote for them is being butchered by people 60 years later who want to make a quick buck. This revival has "cash-in" written all over it, from stunt casting the leads regardless of how well they fit the roles to not bothering to get actual professional barbershop singers to play a barbershop quartet. It's a soulless attempt to resurrect a great musical that didn't need to and shouldn't have happened.

[kc-the-writer]

Family and Preferences for Wisteria and BP3 and a big margarita for you (your pictures are to die for) 💛💙

Mmm... thank you! Now, I just need the sunshine to come back!

their parents names: 

Bradford Elijah Pendleton II and Anne Pendleton. Trip can’t remember his mother and was raised mostly by his boarding school and his godfather (turned unofficial stepfather, Gilles) 

Jay Livingston and Rose Winthrop, of the Lennox Winthrops. 

their siblings names:

Bradford Elijah III was an only child; thus, he should not have had to fight for his right to the company, but… here we are. He will do whatever it takes to keep The Pendleton Tradition alive. 

Wisteria was the youngest among her sisters, Violet, Poppy, and Lily. 

favorite childhood memory:

Bradford Elijah III loved swimming with his godfather at Saratoga, but he mustn’t recall such times… warmth felt for Gilles will only delay his plan to take the company from his control. 

Wisteria’s favorite memory was the first time she was allowed to attend the art museum without her parents. 

favorite childhood toy:

Always fond of the water, Trip loved his toy boats.

 Wisteria was trained in needlepoint and watercolors but would secretly indulge in building blocks when she got the chance. As New York grew around her, she wondered what it might be like to create her own great palace.

embarrassing story:

Bradford Elijah III  was raised by talented athletes, but this gene was not passed to Little Trip. Gilles told him he might be better suited to the arts, but Trip's attempts to paint were worse than his attempts at playing ball.  

Wisteria Livingston attended a luncheon at the Pendleton home. Accustomed to English service, she ate the entirety of her soup with her teaspoon. She never recovered from the shame of feeling unworldly and out of place when Gilles pointed out the differences between French and English dining. 

favorite family member:

Bradford Elijah III liked his Grandfather, Bradford.

Wisteria loved her sister, Poppy. 

a story about that family member:

Trip never knew which of the stories the befuddled old Bradford told about the family origins were true, so he took them all as fact. 

Poppy was invited to all of the best parties and only the best parties. Fashionable women tried desperately to set her up with their eligible sons, but Poppy insisted the sons meet Wisteria. Poppy’s eye was on the fashionable women, themselves.

(Do you feel judged, looking at them? I do!)

what they prefer:

coffee or tea?

Tea

Coffee

showering in the day or night?

Morning

Day and Night

taking baths or taking showers?

Showers

Baths (this is actually a thing with her; she is NEVER clean enough for her own comfort)

tv or movies?

Plays

Operas

writing or reading?

Reading, both. 

platonic or romantic love?

Convenient love. 

iced tea or lemonade?

Lemonade, both. 

ice cream or smoothies?

Ice cream, both

cupcakes or cake?

Croissants

Roasted nuts

(sorry, they’re entitled AF, and shameless about ordering off-menu)

beach or mountains?

Beach in the mountains, both. 

[pcttrailsidereader]

We Are Not Alone

A few years ago we were hiking the PCT in Rockland Basin near the Domelands in California. As we ascended from the basin toward Bear Mountain my hiking partner Rees easily marched ahead. For the record, he is faster/stronger than I am on the ups while I am a little faster on the downs. I had drifted a good distance behind Rees as we began this four mile climb.

As I reached what turned out to be, to my a dismay a false summit, I could see Rees sitting by the side of the trail. I was elated to have caught up to him. He greeted me with the news that as he reached the top he had been met by a wild cat...likely a Bobcat. They had checked each other out until I approached and the feline skittered away. I was disappointed to have missed this encounter. It did remind both of us that there were other beings we are sharing the trail with.

The Seattle Times published an article in their Pacific Magazine describing one more effect of the fires we have experienced with consistent frequency here in Washington state. Specifically how these fires have devastated Lynx habitat. However with careful management may also create potential opportunities for this native wild cat. The Canadian Lynx population is slowly coming back in Washington. This includes places where the PCT makes its way ever closer to the Canadian border. I found this article hopeful and like the encounter above Rockland Basin, reminded me of yet another being we share the trail with. The article follows below.

WINTHROP, Okanogan County — On a subfreezing morning in March, Carmen Vanbianchi is crouched in the snow, cramming chunks of roadkill deer into a pouch she calls her meat purse.

She wrenches the zipper closed, then lines up a half-dozen tiny bottles of scent lures — pungent concoctions laced with urine, glandular extracts and mystery ingredients meant to attract wildlife. Some are so skunky, staff at the local post office told Vanbianchi she could pick up her next delivery behind the building.

But when you’re trying to nab Washington’s most endangered native cat, a little stink is the least of your challenges..... link to article here

[intonightcity]

xxx Migrating some muses from solo blogs here as they fit/connect in with the story I'm building. Along with the obvious interconnection with Landon ( @wynterlanding ) who has a lot of plots & stories he covers in this city OR in the Hollywood verse is connected to a lot of the entertainment & beyond districts. Particular muses here are also part of his backstory, as well as the backstory of his twin Lance Wynter, which adheres to one separate universe in particular etc.

Muses established from blogs a long time ago but moving here include:

Dawn Black. Model & Adult Star. Esme's ex gf. Kristen Stewart

Lucian Craven. Owner of Diamond Casino & Head of Severin. Abel Tesfaye

Esmeralda Domingo. Diamond Casino Manager & Assistant. Shay Mitchell

Cristobal Mardones. Gold & Gloss CEO. Esme's ex bf. Pedro Pascal

Nadine Moore. Doctor of Pathology at Dawn's Light Hospital. Freema Agyeman

Jade Winthrope. Forensic Analyst at Night City PD. Shailene Woodley

[sticksbatnix]

Experiment Gone Wrong

Stewart’s stomach hurt.

He didn't mind it at first, he ate a snack right before he went back to studying.

Nothing seemed to be wrong afterward, just a few more hours of studying before bedtime. One class over another, another note and another, and one recording of the lesson repeated until every word is engraved into your brain.

Everything was fine.

Normal even before a sharp pain sprang through stopping the teenager’s numbing routine.

Stewart hissed, hands holding onto his stomach as he hunched himself over. Bile rose at the back of his throat, a wave of nausea ran through his body, and his body shook with uncertainty.

No.

Not now.

Why now?!

Stewart got out of his chair, stumbling over with his two left feet, one hand over his mouth, and the other moving anything out of the way. He burst through his bathroom door, legs failing him as he fell onto the cold floor. Not minding the pain that ran through his knees, the blond rushed to open the toilet seat and finally let out what was been inside of him for so long.

Clumps of, at first, the teenager considered to be the remains of the snack he ate a while back. But was shocked to see clumps of hay fall out of his mouth and fly down like paper onto the toilet water below.

He paused, face scrunching up in confusion before another round of pain ran through him.

Stewart yelped, his body seizing up in shock before he fell over at his side. He opened his mouth to throw up again, maybe screaming at how much suffering he was in before hay had clumped itself at the back of his throat. He choked, struggling to breathe as his body, once again, shook in agony at this unknown source of agony.

Stewart reaches his hand over at his bathroom counter, his fingertips stinging as bugs had bitten him. He perched himself up, vision blurred by his tears, the teenager struggling to keep himself together as his body ached to no end. It felt like something was going through his skin, like millions of bugs were begging to get out in any way they could.

It hurt.

My God, did it hurt!

But once Stewart opened his eyes, once again, blinking away the tears or whatever was covering them by now. He must have been sweating, the pressure building up and around and inside of him. If he could, he would pray but all that went through his mind was trying to see what was wrong with him.

The moment he saw himself was when he completely stopped.

An agonizing scream rang through the Winthrop household, two of the three family members all looked over in shock. Mrs. Winthrop had a look of disdain on her face while two of her children had a look of worry on theirs.

She looked back at her children, and immediately they looked back into their books.

“Ignore him.”

And they did even when the two wanted to see what was wrong.

It must have been a few seconds that passed before a loud thud was heard. And another and another and another and so on.

The older woman got up from her seat, not a smudge of worry on her as pure rage wrapped her senses. She cursed her firstborn, clicking her tongue as she rushed herself up the stairs. One child had risen from their seat and the other held them down, only a look given to another to not intervene.

The mother rushed to her son’s room, she hadn't bothered to knock as she let herself in.

“Stewart!” She screeched, one hand raised and the other crushing the doorknob beneath her, she stopped.

The room was a mess.

An absolute and complete mess.

The mother let out a sigh, eyebrows scrunched down, and mouth hung open. She could barely believe what she was seeing.

The expensive curtains were torn to threads, the clean carpet was ruined with dark stains, and the countertops were broken with a force like no other. It seemed like a hurricane ran through the room and ruin everything Mrs. Winthrop had worked so hard for.

And rage was all the mother would have for that unpredictable son of hers.

“Stewart! Stewart, where are you?!” She walked through the mess, raising her dress to prevent it from getting messy. “Stewart, so help me, if you don’t show up, I will drag you out myself!”

Had she seen the hay below her very heels?

The long scratch marks across the walls?

The horrid stench that ran through the air?

The blood that seeped through the carpet below?

Had she felt drops fall through the ceiling above onto her dainty head?

She gasped, looking up at what could have ruined her perfect hair. Her once rage-filled face then turned that fear upon looking over the creature above.

Even in the darkness, she could see and hear its pain. The agony of what was once human transformed into a being possibly not of this world or maybe was.

The burlap was torn, the hay spilled in between the stitches, claws digging through the ceiling for leverage, and the face.

My God, that face...

It looked like a skeleton almost, the skin outstretched and torn to no end, fangs stretched as far as they can go, and those eyes that can outshine the room if they could.

“Stewart?”

The being opened its mouth, and red gas foamed out and filled the room immediately. The woman rushed to the door, coughing, but was stopped by the creature falling to stop her. Its body hunched over the main entrance, it closed it with such force that it might as well shake the entire room.

The woman stopped, fear completely overtaking her entire body.

And as the creature came close to her cowering form, it whispered only one word.

“Scream.”

[shitty-fallout-art]

Can I get headacanons for how the companions (FO4) and ghouls (FO3) will propose?

for you, of course.

Extravagate measures, only the best for the happiest moment of both of your lives. Plans months, maybe even years in advance. An entire day is spent leading up to the moment, and its that drive to commit to every little detail that shows them that you are the one for them:

-Hancock, Snowflake, Codsworth, Tulip, Greta, Deacon.

More on the casual side of bringing it up beforehand and emphasizing the trust between you two rather than the romantism in the action. Perhaps a bit more on the traditional side. Estimated to happen but still a nice surprise when it does:

-Curie, Maccready, Carol, Doc Barrows, Gob, Nick Valentine, Piper, Winthrop.

Very much a serious and preplanned discussion between you too. No just asking out of the blue for your hand in marriage, but spending a very long time talking about yourselves and your wants and your possible future together. It might sound boring on paper, but its most honest and tender you've ever been with each other, and its a conversation that builds your relationship up stronger than ever:

-Danse, Charon, X6-88, Strong, Cait, Longfellow, Preston, Willow, Crowley.

Spur of the moment. The flames are hot and they are addicted to it. They never wanted something so much and so badly, and it can be very early or very late into your relationship when they ask. Its impulsive and raw, but they aren't doing it out of foolishness. They feel something strong and want it to come to fruition as soon as possible:

-Cait, Ahzrukhal, Quinn, Patchwork, Nurse Graves.

[perereiii]

Ok I need to get this out somewhere because the way Wednesday (show) displays pilgrims really irks me. needless to say, spoilers for the show under cut!

Ok. Let's start right off the bat in the psychic vision Wednesday had of Joseph Crackstone in “Friend or Woe” when he was trying to kill all the outcasts.

For reference, Joseph Crackstone is canonically a pilgrim that helped found Jericho in 1625. He’s seen repeatedly being a sadistic asshole that is willing to kill anyone who doesn’t fit in, no matter the cost. Below is a transcript of part of the scene.

[villagers] Burn her! Burn her! Burn her!

[villager 1] Devil Spawn!

[villager 2] Beast!

[villager 3] Witch!

[villagers] Repent! Begone! Witch!

[Joseph Crackstone] Stand aside! Goody Addams! You have been judged before God and found guilty. You are a witch, a sorceress, Lucifer’s mistress herself. For your sins, you will burn this night, and suffer the flames of eternal hellfire.

[Goody Addams] I am innocent. It is you, Joseph Crackstone, that should be tried. We were here before you, living in harmony with nature and the native folk. But you have stolen the land. You have slaughtered the innocent. You have robbed us of our peaceful spirit. You are the true monster. All of you!

[Addams slices a blade at Crackstone’s cheek]

[villager 4] Punish her!

[Joseph Crackstone] The Devil ne’er sent such a demon.

[Addams cries out as Crackstone slaps her face]

[Joseph Crackstone] And I will send you back!

[Goody Addams] No!

[Joseph Crackstone] You are abominations in the Devil’s grip! I will not stop till I have expunged this New World of every outcast. Godless creatures!

[Crackstone and the villagers walk away from the meeting house]

[Joseph Crackstone] Set it ablaze!

...

[Goody Addams] He won’t stop until he’s killed us all! ...He’s here.

[Joseph Crackstone] There will be no escape for you.

After that, Wednesday wakes up.

There’s a couple things wrong with this scene. Burning’s were rare, if ever, in pilgrim and even puritan societies. The idea of ‘burn the witches!’ likely ties to Joan of Arc, a French martyr that was burned at the stake. Even during the Salem Witch Trials, the 19 deaths were all hangings and one crush...ing. (tl;dr, the accused denied being a witch and was sentenced to being crushed between two stones) Goody Addams, creator of the Book of Shadows, would have been the only confirmed witch that Crackstone targeted. I do applaud to the realism of Crackstone killing Addams specifically because she claimed innocence however, as that is exactly what happened to many of the accused witches in Salem, as tragic as it is.

Crackstone’s course of action is also very strange, as the cost to build (or rebuild, in this instance) was high. I can’t attest to the accuracy, but this site claims that it was about £80.00 during the 17th century (not accounting for modern inflation), for the meeting house it cites. This is a costly repair for a relatively weak and trivial public stunt.

While the supernatural outcasts in the show are drastically different from outcasts in real life, outcasts typically weren’t... Burned, or hung, or anything of the sort. Anne Hutchinson, for instance, was considered an outcast for her more individualistic beliefs regarding faith and reaching salvation. John Winthrop opposed her ideas, and when he became Governor, she was eventually banished. This can also apply to the Natives—while a decent number of those who survived disease ended up dying at the hands of European colonists, others were simply pushed west, banished from their homelands.

The fact that Crackstone targeted outcasts instead of witches is odd as well—witchcraft was a much more justifiable reason to kill during the 17th century over simple ‘outcastery’. For instance, there was another witch trial in Wethersfield, Connecticut that predates Salem, with one accusation and death in 1648, two in 1651, and one accusation and banishment in 1669. You could do all of that with charges of witchcraft, however that would be a lot more difficult if you charged ‘being an outcast’. The other people in the meeting house aren’t confirmed or denied to be supernatural outcasts, simply “abominations in the Devil’s grip”, so it’s hard to know if they really were supernatural or not. Plot wise, having Addams as a supernatural outcast might let the viewer infer that the others are also supernatural outcasts, however, false accusations were widespread (again, look at Salem!) and they could have just as easily been the result of fallout of the discovery of a real supernatural outcast.

Another albeit nitpicky detail is the stereotypical black/white clothing choice of pilgrims. While pilgrims—and puritans, for that matter—sometimes wore the well known black/white combo, they also had other articles of clothing in many bright colours (puritans were more reserved and stuck with symbolic, muted colours). The pilgrims typically only targeted detailed clothing (ribbons, seductive styles, etc. were discouraged likely to display modesty).

All right. Now for “A Murder of Woes”, of which holds two prominent scenes of Joseph Crackstone. The first takes place in his crypt after he’s revived:

[Laurel Gates] I am of your blood. I have summoned you to rid the world of outcasts once and for all.

[Joseph Crackstone] My vengeance will be swift and true.

[Wednesday Addams] As will mine.

[Crackstone’s staff pulses]

[Joseph Crackstone] Goody Addams. You haunt me still. You will suffer the same fate you bequeathed me.

[Crackstone stabs Addams in the gut]

[Joseph Crackstone] Now burn in the eternal fires of hell!

[Crackstone twists the knife suddenly]

[Joseph Crackstone] Where you belong.

[Crackstone and Gates leave as Addams stumbles to the floor]

[Laurel Gates] Sweet dreams, Wednesday!

And then, the scene depicted in the prophecy:

[Wednesday Addams] Howdy, pilgrim.

[Joseph Crackstone] How canst thy heart still beat? What demon sorcery is this?

[Xavier Thorpe] Stay away from her!

[Xavier shoots an arrow at Crackstone. He flips the arrow around and shoots Addams]

[Xavier Thorpe] No! Oh my God!

[Wednesday Addams] I’m fine. Go. Get them out of here! Now!

[Xavier Thorpe] Ok! Come on, guys. Let’s go! Go! Go!

[Addams grabs a nearby sword and attacks Crackstone. Addams is pinned to the ground]

[Joseph Crackstone] I will send you back to hell.

[Crackstone is stabbed through the heart, and killed for good]

There’s... Not a whole lot to note about this, actually.

I do find his hypocrisy in condemning witchcraft while using magic-like properties while zombified rather comedic though. He quite literally became the very thing he swore to destroy.

[meret118]

When the Puritans set sail for New England in 1630, they likened themselves to ancient Israelites settling in the promised land. Liberated from the Church of England, which they viewed as too Catholic, they sought to reform the church and establish a new Christian commonwealth guided by their covenant with God.

“We must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill,” John Winthrop, governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, famously proclaimed on the journey over from England. “The eyes of all people are upon us, so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken and so cause him to withdraw his present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword through the world.”

Just seven years after the Puritans’ arrival, an Anglican lawyer named Thomas Morton published a book that threatened the young colony and its residents’ covenant with God. New English Canaan, a three-part text published in Amsterdam in 1637, is mostly filled with detailed observations about the region’s Indigenous people and descriptions of plants, animals and natural resources that could be commodified by white settlers. But a brief section at the end offers a withering critique of the Puritans and the society they were building, including their treatment of Native Americans.

Members of the Massachusetts Bay Colony—known to be a tightly controlled society—adhered to strict beliefs about how to live and worship. Women and children were taught to read so they could learn directly from the Bible, but few other books were imported. Public entertainment wasn’t allowed except for church services. Cursing was punishable by law. Despite harsh winters and conflicts with Native Americans, the Puritans believed their colony would survive if they obeyed God, and they were constantly on the lookout for signs from above.

More at the link.