#a very curious person that likes learning about basically any shit i find even remotely interesting

[haemosexuality]

this woman from mag 130 is just like me fr

[voidcat]

— Seijoh 4 & dom!reader

a/n: this is legit my first time writing nsfw so yea b kind pls. I was getting tired of sub!reader stuff and I’m not the most sexual person but yea have a lil dom!reader w the boys,,, as a treat,, I’d also like you all to know that Nicole enabled this... thanks for supporting the sad horn knee hours wife<3

mostly gender neutral reader but i just realized i used nicknames “miss/mistress” few times so yea

Hanamaki Takahiro:

Oh boy is he excited!.. the moment this slips out of your mouth, he is fuming, vibrating from where he’s sitting and can’t wait to get home.

He is always open to try new things. Back in the day you two tried a thing or two but you were unsure how he’d act so you downplayed often... but now that knowing you’re a dom, the things you can do with the trust you share, shit, did it get hot in here?

On random days, he’ll just go “hey babe what do you think of this?” And show you a page of strap ons, for you to choose. some days he’ll practically beg to be pegged. he loves your demanour when you’re in charge, the air within you when you’re the one in control is, comforting but each night a new adventure and he just can’t get enough of it, of you.

Probably the two of you start with a basic list of things to try and see what he is into. When it comes to spanking, you warn beforehand again and say you’ll do it only once. Holding back yourself and smacking him as lightly as you can, you watch his face for any changes. The moment your hand makes contact with his skin, he lets out a “yelp!” and you stop right there, growing worried. Instead of a face in pain, teeth clenched and brows furrowed; he has the most satisfied and flushed face, eyes half closed and glossy and mouth slightly open. “Do it again babe, but harder this time? Please?”

He probably gets on your nerves on purpose & loves it when you call him a brat or your good boy. Some days he’ll just call you to hang out at his place and when you arrive, you find him spread on the bed, touching himself, his eyes on your figure, staring right into your eyes “hope I haven’t disobeyed or crossed any lines Miss” (he’ll be pissing you off on purpose during your movie nights and let you teach him a lesson right on the couch, the counter or the table...)

Def calls you praises and names (especially titles, telling you over and over how much he loves and enjoys you, how he loves to be drowned in your presence, begging you for anything, even the tiniest bit of a kiss. 

He likes to shower together after a long night and wash each other’s hair, gently massaging your scalp and placing kisses all over your shoulders and the top of your head; whereas you gently kiss the places you’ve bitten and bruised, smothering his face with kisses.

Oikawa Tooru

This boy here, loves to act tough and all but let’s face it, he is a switch. It’s a typical Never Have I Ever game and at one point bedroom talk enters the game. He takes notes of the things you drink to, curious and you swear you catch a spark of excitement when you make it plainly obvious you’re a dom. Although that spark leaves as fast as it has appeared and you brush it off as a play of light.

That night when you return home, he practically jumps at you, a little rougher than usual and you’re sure why. Letting him pin you to the wall, hands roaming your body greedily, you let him live out the fantasy. The kisses now rough, one minute his lips on yours, the next on your neck, shoulders, collarbones... desperate to sink his teeth in and leave some marks. You think to yourself, that’s enough.

Next thing Oikawa knows, he is the one pinned to the wall, his wrists pinned above his head. With your unoccupied hand, you graze your finger lightly on his figure, jaw, neck and chest. “Someone is feisty.” he won’t tell at first but definitely got a thing for being marked and marking, and honestly? you don’t need him to tell you that.

orgasm denial!!! lots of it!! first two times you take pity on him and let him but the third time? the smug bastard is so sure you will let him come again but surprise!, as soon as you come, you leave him high and dry. he tries solving the issue by himself (which only makes things worse) after like 5 days of no orgasm on his part, he finally gets the clue, is on his... better behaviour; once you allow him to come, the days long of wait is worth the pleasure but he learns not to test you like this again. (however, this won’t stop him from disobeying you few more times just to get you to be rougher)

public teasing!! pda is already a given but you guys use remote controlled toys some days (usually you have the remote and he is the one who does his best to keep quiet) the driving and being near the edge of his climax is painful but he manages to hold himself until you two return home (or find a safe place to take care of it) and the endless wait and your cruel play with the toy’s settings is worth the wait. oikawa shivers every single time.

besides these, he likes to dress up and put on make up. and he is quite picky when it comes to lingerie the two of you wear, he checks the fabric qualities and colors beforehand, after all you only deserve the best of the best. he’ll be picking palettes to compliment your features best, loves using highlighter and always picks a dark shade of lipstick for each other; just to see how many times you’ll have to reapply until you’re both covered in its colors.

Iwaizumi Hajime

Ok so I know he has the brute facade going and everyone thinks he’s a dom but hear me out: actually quite soft switch/sub-leaning iwachan

Its a night out w the gang and during a drinking game oikawa makes a snark at you being such a dom in the streets AND in bed. to this blood rushes to Iwa’s cheeks and not many pay attention to it, bc he gets blushy easily plus he has been drinking too. but his mind? Oh he’s for sure imagining scenarios on what you could do to him.

Orgasm denial isn’t much of a thing because he’s very obedient. he’ll do his best to please you and follow your each and every word, watch your lips to hear your next words. for him, your word is law at this point... it’s almost impossible to deny him or those puppy eyes and those sweaty arms anything. He will call you ma’am, mistress, your highness, my goddess... whatever you wish and do not wish for. He loves praising you and ramble about how perfect and holy, etheral and magnificent you are.

lowkey into being tyed up, handcuffed and/or bondage. absolutely loves seeing you in full control. some days you won’t even bother to get undressed while he’s squirming under your touch fully stripped, begging for the tiniest bit of release. sometimes you’ll do the smallest gesture of taking control and he’ll be drooling, not even joking, this man LOVES IT when u take the ropes into ur hands (both metaphorically and literally) loves to lose control and wait for you to do whatever your heart desires, he wants to be what you desire.

(lowkey got a “corruption kink” too) when you two decide to shake things up a bit one day, you bring up some games, activities and kinks (mostly stuff he has only heard of) and, and he’s hard on the spot. lowkey into you wearing leather and gagging him up, his hands tied. he doesn’t mind blindfolds but watching you is so breathtaking, he even does his best to blink as little as possible. he loves it when you ride him to the point of orgasming for the 6th time that day, he’s ready to do anything for you, be your good boy and please you til world’s end.

very very good at oral too, his arms arent the only muscles he’s good at using, he loves your taste, your fingers in his mouth, his fingers in your mouth and in you. feeling your warmth however you want is enough to be content.

not something you do often but having sex in front of the mirror, seeing you in different angles drives him crazy, watching you covered in sweat, shining, panting, telling him how good you are is enough to make him drunk. but still he prefers to be chest to chest, you in his lap, riding him as he holds you to his chest, feeling your skin against his, burning with each move, rubbing against each other.

Matsukawa Issei

of all his relationships and hookups, Issei always encountered subs. few times his partners were doms, they were still submessive to him so when he finds out realizes you’re a dom, needless to say, he’s intrigued...

it kinda starts off with sex in front of a mirror one night, your back pressed against his chest, you’re riding him as his face buried in yourneck and his hands howering over you and suddenly, you grab his hands and out them at his sides, hold his chin and make him look at the mirror: “now watch hoe good i’ll be fucking you and your brains out until you won’t get a coherent sentence out.” you whisper in a low voice and do you deliver as you’ve said? but he got tricks up his sleeve too...

Most of the time, it’s rough and the fire play as well as powerplay takes most of the time. There’s always a battle for dominance, which leaves you both covered in marks and bruises. To say neither of you like it, would be unfair, especially when he disobeys you or flirts with other people beforehand, stepping on your nerves on purpose. (the quiet moans he lets out as you bite his neck, his collarbones, his earlobe, chest and thighs is an indicator if you ever need one.)

And thighs! Lots of thigh biting, massages, rubbing with fingers, or just squeezing the others head inbetween thighs is a given during oral and any foreplay that involved pecks and love bites in that area.

And as it is rough, you two always take your time, having a gentleness to jt in your own way. Be it a soft kiss out of nowhere, a certain way of bucking your hips or thrusting his hips into you. And as things are rough, it’s also when you get to let it all out, be yourself, unstrained.

Some days you’ll drop by his current job, or he’ll stop by at your place, and if he sees you in a headspace that’s too distracted, bothered or irritated by something, or just down; he’ll pick you up, wrapping your legs around him, pressing to you and nibbling on your neck and literally fuck your frustrations out. Those times he lets you take the ropes into your hands but if you’re not up for even that, he’ll take the charge on the spot, and leave clear marks to keep your mind off things for days. And in return, you’ll leave claw marks on his back, tug at his hair and press him to yourself until all you can feel is him; some days you’ll flip the both of you out of nowhere and press his head against your chest, hold his hands behind his back and guide him with your body, his muffled breathes tingling your chest, the nape of your neck and your lips; until your skins red, lips bleeding and gentle purples decorating all over you.

(and he’s a sucker for it. some days he’ll go in town to get something for you to use on him and drop at your place without a card or a name. If asked, he always denies, claiming he’d not get you things to make it easier to control him but the sight of you holding a whip and he can feel the blood rushing already, tugging at his belt and your tshirt. He hopes it’ll be just like that one time you pressed against his dick with high heels, making him beg to come.)

tags: @myelocin​ @atsumu-brainrot​

[aspicystrum]

Embarrassingly, last night I wrote an exceedingly long and sickeningly heartfelt email to some Netflix people (executives? Idk) based on advice from #saveteenagebountyhunters. It felt important, so I decided to share.

Hi there, friend. 

I don't usually do this, because writing in to a studio about a show that you just watched seems a bit over the top, and potentially just a drop of salt water in a river that somebody has already built a bridge to get over. 

However, on the off chance that this email might make a difference, I just want to say that it would be really, really, super-mega-cool if you guys changed your minds about renewing Teenage Bounty Hunters for another season. I finally got around to watching it this week, and I want to firstly, congratulate you for such a stellar piece of work, and secondly, implore you not to leave it unfinished. Not only is it fantastic and hilarious, but I also think it's kind of important, and I'm going to apologise in advance for the length of time I'm going to spend on telling you why. 

I'm definitely not a teenager anymore, but I was definitely a young christian questioning her sexuality when I was a teenager, and there was just nothing remotely like this on TV at that time. If there had been, I think it might have been a bit easier for me to figure myself out. Much easier, even. I dislike clichés, so I don't like that I'm basically saying the same thing that most queer people over 30 are saying about new media featuring queer representation, but the thing is, there's a reason that we're saying it. And Tropes Aren't Bad. The only thing that was around when I was growing up that had any gay women in it was porn and the L Word. Buffy too I guess, but I never got into it when it was airing (I'm not even sure if I'd have been allowed to watch it, to be frank) and later on, I wasn't interested in the drama and heartbreak. And of course, because I was a young christian, I thought porn was bad (I mean, it's terrible if you're looking for accurate romantic representation, but it's certainly not morally wrong like I thought it was) and because I don't live in the US, I never came across the L Word until I managed to pirate it in university. And while the L Word was massive and so important for representation and visibility... Honestly, I never really liked it. I didn't relate to a bunch of lesbians having sex and being bitchy in LA.

But Teenage Bounty Hunters? Shit. That would have been young Alex's obsession. Or lifeline. Cup of tea. Addiction. Breath of air while feeling like I was drowning? I don't know. Pick one. All of the above. I grew up going to an Anglican, semi-private high school. So while lesbianism wasn't wrong per se; (God still loved the gays - they weren't wrong for loving who they did) it definitely had to be wrong for me. Because it also sure as hell wasn't good. It was definitely no path to happiness. Lesbian was an insult that you used against girls you didn't like on the opposing soccer team. It wasn't until I went on exchange to France when I was 17 that I met girls who were out and proudly, wonderfully, sweetly dating. It's not even like it was illegal or anything, or that the LGBT+ community weren't tirelessly working to be visible and represented. I live in New Zealand. Generally, we're a pretty open, progressive, liberal country. I like to think that most of the time kiwis make pretty sensible decisions in terms of governance (though, believe me, there's always room for improvement). But, there's a difference between what's allowed, and what's socially acceptable. Especially in high school. Especially when you bring religion into the conversation. Or politics. It just wasn't done. Even in public school, you'd be asking to be an outsider. 

So I can't satisfactorily express how incredible it was for me to experience the relationship and character arcs of April and Sterling. A couple of staunchly christian girls, falling in love and unashamed of that. Albeit fucking scared. Their storyline resonated with my queer little soul. I was Chapel Prefect in my final year at school. I was an overachiever like April, and I had no idea how potentially gay I was, like Sterling. I wanted to kiss boys and sort of ignored all the crushes I had on the girls I went to school with. I wanted to be a good student and above all, a good person. I believed in a god. In fact, I wanted to believe in a purpose for existence and God so badly, that I chose to continue to believe, even while I wanted to kill myself in my first and second year of university because I felt like I was a bad student and a bad person. I still believe and it still keeps me alive from time to time.

All this is a very dramatic and unfortunately slightly sad way to say that you've got something incredibly special in Teenage Bounty Hunters. And that's just from one perspective. There's so much else that the show brings to the table. So much that it has the potential to. I could talk about racism, or adoption, or classism, or so many other things that I don't really feel I have the experience or understanding to give voice to, and do them justice, but you get the picture. 

Finally, I just want to say, I think I got my first recommendation for this show after you'd actually officially cancelled it. And it wasn't from your algorithm, it was from a male co-worker. Somebody I wouldn't have expected to recommend something like this show. Both based on judgements from before and after watching it. And I'm not going to lie, I heavily judged the title when I heard him talk about it, because I thought it sounded pretty frivolous and mindless. But certainly after searching for the show (I'm kind of shocked it was never recommended to me actually), and watching the trailer, I was immediately interested, because it's fucking hilarious. Now, after watching it I'm curious to know what he liked about the show too. So if your algorithm is designed to target viewers you think might be in a show's intended demographic, I feel like it needs tweaking. Also, I feel like you need to give more than two months grace-time for a show after releasing it, before you decide to cancel it. It's kind of tragic finding out about and deciding watching a show even though you know it's cancelled and then having your suspicions confirmed about you loving it. Very Fox and Firefly. Congrats, I guess? 

Anyway, I do genuinely want to say thank you for the work that you do and the joy that you've brought me and others through Netflix. I do hope the decision does get reversed, but it is a small hope.

If you made it this far, thank you very much for reading all of this. You're clearly a generous person with your time. 

Sincerely, 

Alex

[bitchiha]

Ok I know these characters are not the main ones but can I request some relationship hcs for Genma, Ibiki and Omoi? You can totally exclude some of them if you don’t want to write for them 🙈

A/N: Girl!! Thank you for this!! I honestly never thought about writing for these characters before, which is kinda weird bc I love all of them?? Anyways, without further ado..

✎ Relationship Headcanons!

Genma Shiranui

Ugh this man gives me tingles LNDJSJS He’s gives me immaculate vibes and he looks so cool all the time, but... you are the one thing that can really rattle this mans cool confident exterior down to the bone.

I think he has a baddie type. Like you know what you want, confidence, just bad bitch energy to the max!! Uhm also I feel like he digs long legs and girls who are taller than him. If you’re a baddie who’s tall and confident he’s floored. But even if you are short, it doesn’t matter as long as you can wipe the floor with him LMFAOOO. He likes Instagram baddies I’m sorry it’s true.

He strikes me as a smirky / flirty type of boyfriend. Like he’ll really fluster you up and have this cocky smirk the whole time he’s doing it. But you know how you can get payback that works every. single. time? If you take that toothpick out of his mouth and slip it into yours and walk away. He’ll stand there with his jaw to the floor like mhm, Yah, she just did that.

I feel like he also goes batshit crazy for nicknames, like he will call you any sort of pet name ever. Princess, babe, baby, (baby girl irks the fuck out of me so I’m not putting it here w/out saying that), honey, love, cutie, darling. But he likes it if you just call him the classic names like babe or baby, he does have this thing for being called darling though. Like if hes being a little shit and refuses to get the tv remote for you just plead and add the word “darling” To the end of the sentence and boom! Your wish is his command.

For cuddling I see him as more of a switch. Like he can be the big spoon some days and wrap you up in his arms and legs, but then he can also be the little spoon, really loves when you’ve got your leg around his waist or if youre playing with his hair.

He loves neck kisses, like he loves them. He really likes giving them, hes the type of person to purposely give you hickeys in noticeable places just to watch you struggle to cover them up. However, he loves receiving neck kisses too. Make sure to leave him a hickey for payback.

Another thing about Genma is that he’s super funny, like he can make you laugh until your ribs get tough. So he’s good at cheering you up and helping you loosen up in tough situations. Like he can lighten the mood instantly. This is great because if you two are ever arguing or if you’re in a bad mood he can just say a few jokes and get you laughing in no time.

He’s also the type to show off his relationship. Like if you aren’t a ninja, he will show you off to all his ninja friends and brag about you whenever an opportunity presents itself. If you are a ninja though, you would make the most badass duo on missions and he will flaunt it to his comrades almost obnoxiously. Ebisu gets annoyed the most.

So yah, he likes showing you off but don’t forget to show him off too! Like really show him off to your friends and get him all confident about himself. Feed his ego bc he will repay you for it later ;)

With all that being said, it’s safe to say he also digs pda. Like he doesn’t mind kissing, hand holding, wrapping an arm around you, just being affectionate overall. I mean he won’t be too crazy like he won’t shove his tongue down your throat or anything, but like a quick kiss never killed anyone.

Ibiki

I think one of the best and worst parts about dating Ibiki is that he can literally read you like a book. So he knows when youre feeling upset or uncomfortable or literally anything. It’s good because he can get you to open up about something that’s bothering you and be able to help you. It’s bad because he can end up pestering the shit out of you until he finds out what’s wrong.

Anyways, he’ll be a good gift giver, like he picks up on the way you look at a certain dress in a shopfront window, or how your gaze lingered a second longer than normal on a bracelet a passerby was wearing. Then boom, the next day you’ve got it.

I know he’s a tough guy, but look at the gif! LOOK AT IT!! He has that soft spot. Also remember that episode when we met his brother? I seen a glimmer of that soft spot! He will be gentle and caring with you 100% like I see him giving you sweet kisses when you’re at home together, playing with your hair, things like that, but only when you’re alone.

He can also be a tough love kind of guy sometimes as well. If you aren’t a ninja he will want to have you learn basic techniques for defending yourself. He may even teach you some ninja basics and a jutsu or two, just so you can protect yourself when he’s away on missions. If you’re a ninja he will teach you more complex jutsus.

In public he prefers to keep the relationship discreet because I mean, he has enemies. He’s not gonna want them to go after you in order to get to him. So at the most, he’ll put a hand on your back when you’re in public. But like I said, when you’re alone together he’s super affectionate.

He’s probably not like the best big spoon in terms of cuddling though, like I think he may accidentally crush you. And anyways I see him liking you being the one laying on him or draping a leg over him instead of the other way around.

His favourite types of kisses to give you are kisses on the top of your head and forehead kisses. Like before he leaves on some very important mission, he’ll give you a kiss on the top of your head. In the mornings when you two wake up he’ll give you a kiss on your forehead.

If you want to melt this guy though, you should give him kisses on his scars. Especially the ones on his face. He also likes when you trace your fingers over them. It makes him feel comforted and he’ll probably fall asleep while you do so.

Ibiki can be a hype man, but in a different sort of way. Like he won’t be cheering you on the loudest, but he’ll be the one who gives you the best advice behind the scenes. Like if you’re going on a difficult mission, he’ll tell you how smart and strong you are and how much of an excellent ninja you’ve become. Then he’ll slide some advice in on strategies with the information you told him.

I think he’s the best at helping you wind down after a mission, but he’s not there to do it very often because he’s busy a lot. When does though, he greets you at the door, runs you a bath and makes you something to eat. Then you can lay in bed or on the couch together and you can tell him all about the mission. Also if you return the favour when he comes back from missions, he will melt again.

Supportive and helpful bf, 10/10

Omoi

You love him, you really do but sometimes his over analyzing situations problem really gets on your nerves. Like he can be like “you wore a light sweater instead of a heavier one, does that mean you don’t want to stay out that long?” And ur like: bruh I just wore this sweater because it looked cuter.

He can also be more negative in situations (he’s cautious so he wants to always factor in the worst worst worst case scenarios) so it would be amazing if you could balance him out without getting hot headed with him. Like giving him some positive things to think about instead of focussing all on the bad will get him to be more reasonable, but only if youre the one to say it.

Will also 10/10 force you to listen to Bee’s rapping with him. If he’s forced to stay and suffer through front row seats of his masters horrible rapping, you best believe he’s making you suffer too. It’s a relationship afterall, so that means he’s gonna constantly drag you into things that are kinda crazy.

He gets lost in his thoughts a lot so you sometimes gotta keep him on track. Like you may have been talking about what you should eat for dinner, but he ends up talking about agriculture, so you have to cut in and make the decision yourself.

All his wild imaginative thoughts get you curious so when you’re just hanging out on a lazy day. You’ll set him on a ramble and he could just talk and talk and talk and you’ll nod your head until your sleeping quietly on his shoulder. He won’t notice until he asks you if you agree or something and you don’t reply. He would have been offended if you weren’t so cute.

Also, you wanna know what gets him going? So, sorta like what I said about Genma, If you just take that lollipop right out of his mouth and put it in yours... he’s gone, you’ve just sent him into another dimension and you probably can’t bring him back, it’s also a good way to get him to stop talking.

Man, Omoi just likes kissing. Like he doesn’t care what kind of kiss as long as its a kiss. He likes giving quick kisses on your lips and also on your cheek and likes when you do the same for him.

I think he likes being the big spoon when you’re cuddling but he doesn’t mind either way. Like if you wanna attach yourself to him one day then he will let you. He likes to talk while you’re cuddling too and probably ends up with his forehead resting in the crook of your neck. That’s like his go to spot.

He has a very good imagination so the two of you are always going on cool dates. Some of them turn out amazing, others result in you two running for your life. It’s never a dull date, though!

This also means he can get you the oddest gifts. Like sometimes he can really hit the mark with some really cool necklace or gadget, and other times your like: why did you think I would need a slug statue? Or like he’ll get you some obscure poster and it won’t even match your rooms colour theme. It’s okay though, it’s the thought that counts and even then, the gifts are still cool. I mean you can put the slug statue on your balcony, it’ll look nice there.

He doesn’t mind pda, I think he’d be really affectionate tbh. He loves slinging an arm around your waist or shoulders, or giving you a quick kiss. Like Genma, he doesn’t mind showing off his s/o. Like yes! All the villagers can admire this badass duo.

It may kill him, but he would ask Karui for relationship advice. She would probably just mess with him for the most part. That being said, Karui and you will get along 1000%. Lowkey likes you more than Omoi.

He needs to know you can take care of yourself in the event of an enemy attack, so he lowkey might surprise you with a sneak attack at random times, just to make sure you’re prepared. Like you could be watching tv at home and he just sneaks up on you and is like “boom! This is an enemy attack? Whatcha gonna do?” At first you would get scared, now you just sigh and walk away.

“What? So you’re just gonna walk away from the enemy? That’s not how this stuff works!”

[niceandspicehotel]

Kyra Ocs!

            ❝Oh! Hello there, would you like some flowers?❞

                                             『Basic Info』

↬ Name: Lily

↬ Age:23

↬ Sexuality: Pansexual

↬ Likes: Baking, flowers, painting, her friends

↬ Dislikes: Rude people, burnt food, when people won’t leave her alone even when she tells them to, people who think their opinion is the only one.

↬ Pronouns: She/Her

                                        『Get to know her!』

↬ An absolute sweetheart with big mother energy. Never fails to see the good in people. 

↬ Lily is a social butterfly who loves getting to know people no matter who they are. She believes that no one is truly evil therefore people think of her as naive and carefree.

↬ She will always make sure you’re alright and will do anything to cheer you up if you’re ever feeling down. The last thing she ever wants is for her friends to feel sad.

                                           『Random facts』

↬ She grew up in a foster home and loves her family.

↬ A people pleaser and perfectionist, she has a need to be perfect around everyone in her life, therefore, developing atychiphobia (fear of failure).

↬ She tries to avoid smoking and drinking but will do so when highly stressed.

↬ She loves drawing flowers especially carnation as it is her favourite flower.

↬ Food fanatic, will go to a completely different state and maybe country just to try the food there.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

      Tw: Mention of abuse, guns, hurting people and gangsters. Please skip Rose’s character section if you feel uncomfortable with these topics ^^

❝Hm? Oh, you wanna talk? Didn’t think I was an approachable person, have a seat. ❞

                                           『Basic Info』

↬ Name: Rose

↬ Age: 22

↬ Sexuality: Bisexual

↬ Likes: Action movies, fantasy books, coffee

↬ Dislikes: Assholes, people who insult/hurt her friends, bugs, messy places, hookers

↬ Pronouns: Doesn’t care

                                                『Get to know them!』

↬ Had a neglectful father and her mother left when she was young so she only saw her brother, Cane, as her actual family.

↬ She spent a lot of her young years with gangsters around her area making her well known among the community.

↬ Despite it all, she’s loyal and can be sweet if you’re nice. Once close to her, she will protect you and hurt anyone who does anything remotely bad. The person better hopes they didn’t piss her off until she can put them in a hospital for a long time.

                                        『Random facts』

↬ She wears red colour contacts because she likes them for an aesthetic purpose.

↬ She developed a scar around her neck when she got into a fight with one of the gang members who wrapped a rope around it. Luckily, she defeated them quickly.

↬ She’s a gun enthusiast, always studies guns and practice it (in safe places ofc) whenever she had the chance.

↬ Has an extremely short temper, she will try to control herself but if she doesn’t and gets angry at a friend, she will feel bad and apologies multiple times alongside buying them something nice.

↬ Dislikes hookers because she found out her mom was one and it was the very reason why her mom left her family.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

                 ❝Were you staring? Don’t be afraid, I don’t bite.❞

                                        『Basic Info』

↬ Name: Cane

↬ Age: 27

↬ Sexuality: Homoromantic Asexual

↬ Likes: Making music, clubbing, fashion

↬ Dislikes: People taking advantage, shallow people, beer 

↬ Pronouns: He/Him

                                     『Get to know him!』

↬ Unlike his sister, Rose, he spent his time making music with whatever he had at that moment, whether it’s a couple of beer bottles or just the table.

↬ Extremely laid back and chill, he just tries to enjoy as much life as he gets. He does still take care of his health though.

↬ Will take you to the lots of hidden gems in the city as he likes enjoying things with someone else. Does his best to make sure you have the best night of your life by taking you to all kinds of places.

                                        『Random facts』

↬ He dyed his hair magenta as a dare but ended up liking it and keeping it that colour ever since.

↬ He refuses to have any kind of beer as it just reminds him of back home so he tries to avoid bars if he can.

↬ Has a soft spot for animals plushies, has a bed full of them. If someone gets him one, he will forever love them.

↬ Sucks at remembering things so don’t ask him to do you a favour that involves trying to remember to turn off the stove or something as that person might have their house burned down or worse.

↬ A hardcore party person since he often does gigs at clubs and will get his friends to drink as much as him causing them to possibly vomit or faint. Will take responsibility but might tease them the next day.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

    ❝Oh hey! Name’s Jasmine, hope you’re awesome- Wait no I don’t mean it like that, I bet you’re already awesome- Imma just stop talking❞

                                              『Basic Info』

↬ Name: Jasmine

↬ Age: 24

↬ Sexuality: Omnisexual

↬ Likes: Cafe, writing, jogging

↬ Dislikes: Loud places, discrimination, dogs

↬ Pronouns: She/Her

                                        『Get to know her!』

↬ Clumsy af, most people make sure to steer her away from dangerous objects so she doesn’t hurt her or anyone in the place. She truly doesn’t mean it she swears! She just has no idea how she can trip while walking normally.

↬She’s extremely cheery and optimistic, no matter how much shit life throws at her, she’s somehow standing up great as ever. People look up at her due to that.

↬Major crackhead energy, she is the type of person who will make you laugh if you’re down whether intentionally or not. She likes seeing her friends smile so she doesn’t mind a bit of humiliation every once in a while.

                                         『Random facts』

↬She doesn’t like dogs cause she thinks dogs will bite her the moment she puts out her hand. Plus she pissed a dog off once by accident when she was small and the rest is story.

↬ Actually doesn’t like her freckles and tries to cover them up with makeup sometimes.

↬ She enjoys going to the park especially after it rained as it is cold and the aftermath rain smell is wonderful to her.

↬ She can’t cook or bake which is why she often spends her time in cafes. Lily has been trying to teach her to bake and still hasn’t given up ever since despite the bad attempts.

↬ Noises distract her a lot therefore she avoids a lot of noisy places.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

         ❝Sorry? Oh! Hi. I...am not sure what to say...nice to meet you..?❞

                                                  『Basic Info』

↬ Name: Iris

↬ Age: 25

↬ Sexuality: Lesbian

↬ Likes: Relaxing, watching romance films, staying in bed

↬ Dislikes: Large crowds, people overtalking her, confrontation, small conversations

↬ Pronouns: She/They

                                           『Get to know them!』

↬ With Iris introvert and shy personality, they find it hard to make friends and often stick to people they already know.

↬ She spent most of her life away from people as she often experiences social anxiety if things get too overwhelming.

↬ At first, they will be quiet and not say much but the closer you are to her, the more she will speak and tell you about her interest. They are great at listening and will always be there to listen to your rants or problems.

                                              『Random facts』

↬ She is actually very curious and is willing to learn new things every day.

↬ Watching the sunset/sunrise is one of their favourite activities. Bonus if someone they is comfortable with watches with them and they both have chocolate drinks on the table.

↬ When people compliment her, she gets extremely flustered and will try to change the topic.

↬ Found out she likes girls when she was dared to kiss one guy and one girl and ended up liking the girl kiss.

↬ Scatterbrain, always somehow loses their stuff and finds it at the most obvious spot after an hour of searching.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I will add more characters in the future when I can <3

[ais-n]

Why do Boyd/Hsin work? (anon ask)

I moved this ask over from a different place where the person sent a number of questions, as they were unable to get it to fit in tumblr’s space restrictions. In case they didn’t want their name known, I’m referring to them as an anon. But I thought they had good questions others may be curious about as well so I’ll be putting them (and the answers) over here.

ANON ASKED:

I think you mentioned somewhere that at some point during the writing process you guys thought that Boyd and Sin would fall for each other, and that’s how the idea was born. Why do you think, personally, that they fit so well as a couple, and what made you decide that they would fall for each other?

Yep, you remember correctly :) So basically we started ICoS just to fuck around, honestly, because we were bored. Because we didn’t figure it would become a thing, we thought that rather than wasting all our energy/motivation/excitement on character creation and some in depth setting on another world or something, we’d be best off doing something in our world, kind of our times, kind of dystopian, and then to pull in characters we had created for roleplaying games elsewhere that we didn’t get to play as fully as we wanted, or we thought would be fun to play more here.

Sin came from one game, Boyd from another. We knew Sin was going to be "Sonny’s” main character pretty early into it, if I recall correctly, but I didn’t know which of my characters I wanted to bring over. I initially threw out Boyd as an option because I thought the juxtaposition would be really funny, and because I liked him as a character but he barely got anywhere in the other rpg. (Lou came from that RPG too, btw, as did Vivienne and Cedrick of course)

The point at which we realized they would fall for each other was practically right away - we wrote like, I don’t even remember, 4 scenes or something? And already they were seeming like they had great chemistry and wanted to flirt and just somehow, bizarrely, felt like they would gravitate toward each other. 

I don’t know how to explain how we knew without probably sounding like a lunatic, but to me characters are people - and most of the time, I kind of take my cues from them as to what they think, what they would do, how they feel, etc. I know they aren’t real, I know they don’t exist in our world, but maybe I just get interested in the psychology of characters and because I’m an empathetic person, maybe I just naturally start thinking of them in terms of what they want and how that affects what I had thought I had planned for the story.

It was just one of those things where we realized as soon as we had those two characters in the same room as each other, as soon as we tried writing a scene that we had intended to establish them as partners who didn’t get along and who didn’t trust each other and who would never be particularly close, we realized both of them kept somehow responding to the other character in a way that showed they had chemistry and they would like each other. Maybe even love each other, given the chance.

So we started writing the story over again, reworking it this time with the knowledge that they wanted to be a thing, so now it would be a story with a romance, instead of just a story. But being that they were both super messed up, of course that whole journey to love in any way that’s even remotely healthy was a process in and of itself.

(Sorry for rehashing all that since you remember that - but wanted to say all that for anyone who hadn’t seen the context on the previous posts where I talked about that)

As for why they fit so well, honestly I think it’s because of their base characteristics and their default tendencies, and a lot of it too is their backgrounds. It seems like their backgrounds were made to create characters that fit each other so well as a result but that was totally a coincidence that they each already had backgrounds we’d individually decided which ended in life experiences forming the characteristics that drew each other to them.

So, for example, Sin doesn’t trust almost anyone in the beginning of the series; he’s used to being used, he’s cynical, he kind of hates people, and he just doesn’t have much faith in humanity or humans because people have shown him time and time again that they will turn on him if given the chance, or they don’t really see him as a person, or they do but he can’t help feeling like they have an ulterior motive in it all. Then Boyd comes along, and he doesn’t have an ulterior motive whatsoever; he just genuinely does not have any preconceived judgment of Hsin, he doesn’t care either way about him at first, he doesn’t treat him like shit like so many other people have Hsin’s whole life. He just kind of treats him like a person, for good and for bad. Which means they have arguments and they have good moments. They find they have similarities in some things and are way different in other.

I think it’s the fact that Boyd was willing to judge Sin on Sin’s actual actions and actual words instead of basing things on fears, rumors, or the like, that over time made Sin realize Boyd was different. Similarly, how Boyd stood up for Sin even at his own personal detriment, when no one else had in quite the same way. The fact that Boyd cared so little for himself he was even perfectly comfortable sacrificing himself for Sin’s benefit even when they weren’t friends. I think that the fact that Boyd didn’t give a shit about anything, that he only was interested in seeing Sin for who Sin was and not what everyone thought him to be, was something that really spoke to Sin and helped him slowly come out of his shell. And made him feel comfortable starting to trust others on his own terms, and even fall in love, and feel safe doing so in the long run. 

As for Boyd, he also was used to a certain treatment in his life, which was at times indifferent, at other times even cruel. He was used to people judging him by his looks, his family, all sorts of things. He was used to people hurting him. And he was used to losing the only people who had cared about him. He was, in short, used to suffering. He just wanted to die and be done with it all.

Similar to how Boyd didn’t judge Sin for what others judged him as, Sin didn’t seem to treat Boyd the way he was used to - or at least, not for the same reasons. Over time, it let him feel like it was okay to be himself; that he wasn’t inherently wrong for being born, or for how he was born, or for being alive until now. I think for Boyd the fact that Sin was so ridiculously strong and powerful was a relief; it made him feel, on some level, that he wouldn’t break and destroy and kill Sin just by being in his life, the way he felt he had for his dad and Lou. 

In the end, I think they both just happened to be the right kind of person to make the other person feel like it was safe to slowly grow into who they were at the core of themselves without all the trauma of the past being the only thing that dictated their present. They each ended up being the right collection of characteristics to let the other person feel loved, and feel safe loving in return.

Of course, because of all that trauma and everything else contextually in their lives, the process of coming to that realization was a long one, and had a lot of ups and downs, and a lot of unhealthy behavior along the way. They aren’t always the healthiest for each other as they grow, but I do think they were what each other needed to, in the very long run, trust in the world to some extent, and through that learn to trust in themselves.

[melo-yello]

Baking with the Wakandan Royals would include:

A/n: I've been watching a ton of baking shows lately so I've been mad inspired to write some domestic headcanons.

*I added Shuri

T'Challa

If you mention to this man you're thinking about baking he's already checking for necessary ingredients quantities and locating the measuring cups

T'Challa's need for order and a systematic approach to life can either be really helpful when you're baking or really annoying

This man takes pride in prepping the pan

I mean oiled, floured, and lined with parchment

T'Challa didn't come to play. He got a cake stuck one time and he's never been the same

I'm tellin you he's a complete ace when it comes to measurements

This man will measure, level, sift, and whisk together the dry ingredients in less than 90 seconds

"Here you go, Love." handing you the bowl and kissing your temple

He even will have the separate little glass bowls in various sizes like he stepped out of his very own cooking show

T'Challa is definitely the clean as you go type

Boi is washing dishes almost as fast you can make them

I've got that, Sweetheart." snatching up dirty bowls and taking them to the sink like clockwork

You already kno he's a stick to the recipe type of guy

You kno better than to tell him "We can just eyeball it" or end any measurement/cook time with "or so"

He will absolutely lecture you on the acute chemistry of baking

After so many times of 'sneaking' in extra pinches of 'this' and 'that' and him catching you'll be forced to put him out to stop his constant meddling

"Challa, I swear to Bast if you say one more thing about the 'balance of baking' and don't get yo ass outta this damn kitchen, Shuri will be an only child!"

He occasionally peeks back in offering his two cents before you glare at him and he slinks back to whatever he's preoccupying himself with

Once everything out of the oven and cooled you can't help but smile and bring T'Challa a goodie for all his efforts and help even if he's kinda a pain

Erik

He will 100% be minding his own business until he peeps you in the kitchen baking something

He immediately steps in to take over whether he knows what you're making or not

Deadass has slid across a counter, swiped the bowl, stuck the landing and been like "Ok Ma, what am I makin?"

Boi will even take your apron and do it smooth as hell too

The first time you thought he was trying to be freaky by grabbing ya ass and kissin all down ya neck in the kitchen but before you knew it the apron was untied and around his neck and he was stirring the bowl that was just in front of you

Growing up basically raising himself and being bounced around from relative to relative made learning to cook essential and he's a pretty damn good at it

And he knows it

Erik deadass cooks like somebody's Auntie

"Baby, lemme go ahead and do that." Is something you'll hear every step of the way

He'll just stare at the recipe for .5 seconds then be like "Do that shit, That shit right there and it'll be bland as hell!"

Erik starts off measuring but gradually shifts into eyeballing everything

He's prone to add pinches of different spices that are no where to be found in the recipe

Erik refuses to cook in silence and will always throw on one of his playlists

Y'all bop all the way from TLC to Daniel Caesar to Anderson. Paak

When all the baking is done Erik loves to humble brag about his baked treats

"Yea me and Bae, kilt that shit." Or "Oh you know, Babygirl can throw down"

That is until his cousin says something

T'Challa: "These are great."

Erik: "Damn Straight it is, T'Chump! Didn't kno my baby could FUCK it all da way up! Who you think taught her that! Who!"

M'Baku

*nervous laughter*

M'Baku has an enormous sweet tooth but can't bake to save his life

Not that hasn't tried but most of those trails ended in flames

Since then the great gorrilla has been banned from most of the palace kitchens

Naturally when you ask "Baku, help me bake some cookies."

He's a little hesitant

M'Baku tries to explain to you that his strong suit is really savory and much rather do anything

He really hates that he's not naturally good at it like most things he does (fighting, leading, flirting, etc.)

This gets him out of helping the first few times before you drag him in kitchen promising "Trust me, I can teach you. It can't be that bad."

With M'Baku's help be prepared to remake batters at least twice

He's either heavy handed or extremely light handed there's absolutely no inbetween with him

He's gonna apologize each time he messes up no matter how many times you tell him it's fine

You put him on mixing duty but he gets bored so he starts distracting you

"Oh that look absolutely scrumptious, My Love." grabbing your ass as measure out brown sugar

"That tastes amazing, My Queen." giving you bedroom eyes as he sucks your finger clean of the batter you were about to taste

"You smell like heaven, Dear Heart." nipping at your neck as you place a pan in the oven

This is also the kinda man that eats as you bake

As soon as they hit the cooling racks he's bodying half of them

Putting up high doesn't work either when your mans is 6'5" and can reach all your hiding places

Only on rare occasions do you actually have sweets to show for you efforts if you only make one batch

3 seems to be the sweet spot since M'Baku eats half of 2

He actually does pay attention when you show him how to do things correctly and each time he makes fewer mistakes and he's so proud of himself

Shuri

Shuri is allergic to anything remotely domestic. Not that its difficult she just isn't interested

Mysteriously she always has all the software updates to do when you ask "Wouldn't it be fun to help me bake something?"

"Yes, My King?!?!" Shuri yells running down the hall after a very confused T'Challa that tells back "Stop calling me that!" as the two run in the opposite direction as you

She's definitely not above making up tech tasks to get out of being forced into baking

"Oh I'd love to but I need to check... Erik's torso to make sure he's healing ok. Too bad he's shy so you can't come." She shrugs pulling Erik into lab before he can get in a word

Or "Oh yes Sergent Barnes, I do have time to look at the mechanics of each synapses of every nerve ending in your arm. This could take a while." practically tackling Bucky as he enters the lab

The only way to get her there is by treachery

"Shuri, come quick! The stan mixer is smoking you have to fix it. Or I'll never bake again." is enough to get her to bolt out of the door and into the kitchen

There's no way she can let your Double Fudge Sea Salt Pecan brownies vanish from her life

"This mixer is absolutely fine, Y/n. Don't scare me like that ev..." trailing off as she turns to see you locking the door to the kitchen

"Noooooooooooooooooooo!"

Once she finds that all exits are blocked off

Vents, windows, and personal secret passages she has installed for times like these

She starts offering 'helpful' advice to really 'expand' your baking horizions

"I'm telling you, Y/n, 1 and 1/4 teaspoons of white vinegar would really help these sweets raise to the ocassion." as she presses record and steps back

You soon learn after several batter explosions and looped videos and gifs sent across the Insta, Twitter, and Snap she can't be trusted

"Oh come on,now! How was I supposed to know it was going to do that?" Laughing as you glare at her wiping yet another batter blow up off your face

Before you accept her advice now it is questioned with "And if I add that it won't end up in my face?"

Shuri will pause then offer something else because she's no evil just mischievous

She pretends to be bored out of her mind the whole time even though she's mentally pocketing all the little steps so she can later try by herself

Every once in a while she'll hit you with an absolutely old school but completely clutch trick you've never heard of before (most likely something she picked up from cooking with Queen Mother) and you pause to look at her

Like "Where the hell did that come from?"

She just shrugs and offers some off the wall flavor combo to throw you off her trail

"Chocolate and peanut butter? Boring. How about anasis and chardonnay." genuinely curious about the combination

Shuri loves to experiment and play with structures and variables esspecially in the kitchen

So tell her your trying to make a souffle or flan and she's there automatically no plots involved or locked doors

Afters all the sweets and practical jokes are out of the oven and cooling and the doors are unlocked

Shuri takes a treat or two and hums looking satisfied with your team work "This was actually fun." mouth half full and gives you a quick hug before leaving

Ever so often she'll come of her own prompting to you wanting to be shown how to make a cookie or some other baked good

And you do but as soon as they're done

She steals like 75% of the goodies as you check some of the few left in the oven and splits them with M'Baku who was already waiting at the door and they run down the hall like small children

Always leaving a note "XOXO, Princess Shuri" and scribbled in the biggest calligraphy that is usually saved for royal documents "Thx from Great Gorrilla,M'Baku" at the scene of the crime

[zanesgirlfriend]

Brownie Batter | Natalie Mariduena

Description: Natalie and the reader meet and get stuck at David's for their first date.

Requested?: Yes by anonymous : could you do a natalie x reader where the reader sees natalie drumming on hollywood blvd and thinks it’s great so they end up going on a date or something

_______

Freshly single, Natalie tried to put herself out there. This included doing more of the stupid things David asked her to do. Today she was drumming on an orange Home Depot bucket on the side of Hollywood Boulevard.

Y/n had just got off of work and was walking down the street towards her car when she saw Natalie. She was wearing a pink and red tracksuit and a grey jacket overtop. Her hair was shoulder length and straight as a pin, and she wore big round glasses.

That girl is gorgeous.

She watched Natalie drum and smile out into the street. She looked so happy and cute. Her walking slowed down as she approached, and she almost stood still when two girls asked Natalie for a picture.

Is she famous? Should I know her?

"Natalie! Was the drumming that good?" David screamed out of the window of his Tesla. She watched the dimples appear in Natalie's cheeks as she laughed. The two boys drove around the block again as y/n continued to walk towards Natalie.

"Are you playing for tips?" She asked Natalie, stopping in front of her. Natalie laughed and looked up at the girl

"No, uh, my friend is filming a video and. . ." Her mouth stopped moving as she noticed how pretty the strange girl was.

"I saw those girls take pictures with you. I feel bad that I don't know who you are." Y/n tried to keep the conversation going. She wished shs knew who Natalie was.

"Oh, it's okay, my friends are famous, I'm just kinda there." Natalie looked the girl up and down.

"I bet people like you a lot, then." She leaned against the wall of the building behind them.

"Why do you think that?" Natalie asked her, genuinely curious.

"The less you know about a person, the more you like them. You just seem like you don't put yourself out there too much, which makes you mysterious. Not to mention that you're also gorgeous." Y/n flirted with her. Her voice was calm and filled with admiration as she looked at Nat.

"Stop, you're prettier than me!" Natalie retorted. Y/n decided just to take her shot.

"Do you wanna go get a smoothie or something? We don't have to go now, I know you have important drumming to do, but maybe later or tomorrow or something?" Her voice sped up as she got nervous. She didn't want to let this girl go. Natalie thought about it for a moment before responding.

"Yeah! Let me get your number." She pulled out her phone and went to her contacts. "I'm Natalie, by the way." She handed the girl her phone.

"I'm y/n. It's nice to meet you." She smiled at Natalie as she entered her phone number.

A few days later the two girls enjoyed smoothies as they took an afternoon hike. They talked about life and got to know eacother more and more. They learned about eachothers jobs and friends and talked about previous relationships. Y/n also found the balls to ask Natalie on a date. Natalie said yes.

Y/n nervously knocked on the door, a single rose in her hand. Natalie answered the door and brought y/n in for a hug. "Is this cheezy?" Y/n gestured to the rose, her red cheeks almost the same color as the flower.

"Yes, but I like everything with extra cheese." Natalie joked and welcomed her inside.

"You two are gross." David said as he walked into the kitchen.

"David, shut up. You're just jealous that I'm going on a date and you're not." She rolled her eyes at him as they walked into the kitchen as well. David scoffed and moved on with what he was doing.

"I gotta go, have fun on your date!" David was putting his shoes on now, obviously in a hurry.

"Bye!" Y/n waved, happy to have Nat all to herself now. She placed the rose on the counter and looked around the house. "The movie doesn't start for like two hours, did you wanna go get dinner first?" She turned to look at Natalie, who was already staring at her.

"What if we make brownies?" Natalie suggested. "I've had the mix for a while and I think it would be fun. Oh, and then we don't have to spend a bunch of money." She pulled the brownie mix out of a cabinet and glanced at y/n. She smiled at Natalie and nodded. "Get the eggs out of the fridge, I'll get a bowl." Natalie instructed. Y/n opened up the fridge and was amazed.

"Woah, I've never seen a fridge so organized? How do you do this?" She scanned the many shelves of drinks before finding the carton of eggs.

"David's really anal about it. Organizing the fridge was the first thing I learned how to do when I moved out here." Natalie pulled a whisk from a drawer and placed it on the counter.

"You have such an interesting relationship. I couldn't imagine my boss basically being my brother." Y/n watched as Nat preheated the oven.

"Well he was like my brother way before he was my boss, and a lot of people just don't get that. I think because I've known him so long, that I have a better understanding of how he wants things to be done, and he knows that too." She explained as the two cracked eggs into the bowl. They continued talking as they made the brownie mix, falling harder and harder for eachother.

"They always say not to eat the batter but I can't help it." Y/n sucked the batter off of her fingertip.

"Ew, I couldn't do that." Natalie's face scrunched up as she watched.

"Why not?" Y/n's head cocked to the side in confusion.

"I don't wanna get salmonella or something." She reasoned. Y/n rolled her eyes and dipped her finger in the batter again. She waved the chocolate coated finger in front of Natalie's face.

"Come on, Nat, one little taste never hurt anybody." Y/n teased. Natalie smiled upon hearing y/n call her Nat.

"Okay, fine, but if I die, it's your fault." Natalie placed her lips over the chocolatey finger, gently sucking as she pulled away. The two girls were very close to eachother now.

"That wasn't so bad, was it?" Y/n was almost whispering. She didn't wanna ruin the moment.

"You have chocolate on your nose." Natalie giggled and wiped the chocolate with her finger.

"You have chocolate on your lips." Y/n leaned in, tasting the chocolate as their lips collided. It was the sweetest kiss Natalie had ever had. Literally. They kissed for a few seconds, pulling away before things went too far.

"Did you get it?" Natalie asked, hoping there was a little more chocolate left.

"No." Y/n leaned in again, this time pressing Natalie's back against the counter.

They eventually finished the brownies and watched the sky outside as they baked. They laid on two chairs, holding hands across the gap between them as they talked about space and the universe. When the brownies were done, they decided they should get going so they wouldn't be late to the movie. The two girls hopped in Natalie's car and buckled up.

"Oh, shit." Natalie looked around her car for the clicker that opened the electric gate.

"What are you looking for?" Y/n asked.

"The clicker for the gate, it's grey with some white buttons on it. Do you see it anywhere?" Natalie opened up her center console to try and find the remote. Y/n set eyes on the clicker near her feet and picked it up.

"Here it is!" She handed it to Natalie. A breath of relief came from Natalie as she clicked the button. Nothing happened. She clicked the button a few more times to no avail.

"I think the battery is dead. I think there's an extra clicker inside too." Natalie unbuckled her seatbelt and ran back inside. Y/n checked her phone for a minute as she waited for her date to return.

"Did you fix it?" She asked as Natalie hopped back in the car.

"Bad news." Natalie turned her car off. "We don't have any more batteries, and I can't find the other clicker." She pulled her phone out as y/n hopped out of the car. They walked back inside as Natalie called David.

"Is there no other way to open the gate?" Y/n asked and Natalie shook her head.

"David, where's the extra clicker for the gate?" She sounded irritated but still calm. "Oh, so we're stuck here?" The two girls sat on the couch. "Okay, well I'll see you later. Bye." She sighed.

"What'd he say?" Y/n's hand landed on Natalie's knee.

"His clicker died too, so he took the extra one, and he won't be back for a few hours, so we're stuck here." Natalie laid her head on y/n's shoulder. "At least I'm not alone though."

"We have the whole house to ourselves for hours. What are we gonna do?" Y/n asked with mischief in her voice.

The two girls played patty cake, watched Netflix and built a fort. They also went through everything Natalie owned and tried on half of her closet. They ate brownies and watched the sunset and laughed about the stupidest things.

"This was a better first date than I'd planned. I'm kinda glad we got stuck here." She laced her fingers with Natalie's as they laid on eachother in their fort.

"Me too." Natalie's eyes were closed as she spoke.

"Remember what I said when I walked up to you last week? I think I lied." Y/n asked.

"Do you mean when you called me gorgeous?" Natalie laughed at her own joke.

"No, you are gorgeous. I meant when I said that you like people when you know less about them." Y/n started to close her eyes too.

"You think you lied about that?" Natalie was very confused.

"Yeah, because the more I know about you, the more I like you. In fact, I just wanna know everything about you, then I would like you even more." She hoped her words made sense.

"I like you a lot more now than I did a few days ago, so I think you did lie." She almost drifted off.

"Yeah, I did, but I'll never lie to you again."

"Promise?" Natalie's eyes opened as she stuck her pinky out.

"Promise." Y/n linked their pinkies together to solidify the promise. They both fell asleep in eachothers arms. The couple slept peacefully and dreamt of eachother, only awakened by the sound of David 'aww'-ing at them.

[poppytheorist]

Me Laughing

must’ve been one hell of a joke

Preamble

So, I was in the middle of writing a piece on [redacted] when Poppy released a 27-minute video of herself laughing. Naturally, that took priority. Sorry for my absence, this post took some time. And by “some time,” I mean “45 hours.”

This may be the best thing I’ve written, but it’s also the most insane thing I’ve written. In fact, I would label this post as ‘maddening.’ It’s possible you won’t be able to look at Poppy the same way again. I know I don’t. You can’t unread this, readers beware, [other dramatic warnings], etc., etc.

Descend when ready.

…

…

…

I thought “Concrete” was pretty #wild, but “Me Laughing” takes the cake. This video is pure lunacy, and I mean that somewhat literally since Poppy does laugh at what appears to be nothing for almost half an hour.

Due to the sheer insanity of “Me Laughing,” I’ve put together a handy little collage to help readers follow along. Behold: my barely passable Paint skills!

the pic for Section 4 basically explains everything

Before we begin, I need to address a few things. There’s at least, like, nine people who read this stuff, and while I can’t say that I envy you, I can say that I appreciate you. Thanks for sticking around.

However, there’s a funny thing that happens when you know you’re writing for an audience. You feel pressured to adapt your style. I feel the need to be a little more careful about some of the things I say, but that’s probably for the best. Hopefully this extra care will result in more coherent posts, but I doubt it.

This post will be long. Partially because “Me Laughing” is long, partially because I’ve padded this out with shaky theory about how the world works. Guess that’s no different than my other posts, but still, feel free to tune that out if you’re just here for the Poppy stuff, though maybe you’ll find some of it interesting.

I tend to write authoritatively, which may be misleading because I’m not always confident about what I’m saying. I simply enjoy taking things to their natural conclusions. Typically, there’s something interesting at the end. Or, at least, a premise insane enough to make writing about it enjoyable. See, for example, my post on “Concrete.” This post won’t be much different, maybe just a little crazier.

Now, I’ve got a funny feeling that some people may think I am “reading too much into this” or that Poppy’s work “isn’t that deep.” Hey, I get it. Those objections are completely understandable. I was once there myself, but now I’ve moved away from thinking that way. I’ll do my best to explain why.

From what I’ve seen, aesthetics (roughly: the study of art) is a total battlefield. Nobody agrees on anything, everybody thinks that only they can ‘properly’ understand art and that everyone else is wrong. There’s people who think beauty is objective, there’s people who think “no, that’s stupid, beauty is obviously subjective,” and there’s even the people who outright deny that aesthetics exists. Recently, we also had the pleasure of witnessing the aesthetics debate become another facet of the everlasting culture war. Think a line from “Play Destroy” sums my thoughts about that up: “oh boy!”

Needless to say, it’s a massive shitshow.

Despite my rather war-torn depiction of modern aesthetics, it might be a good thing that we can never ‘understand’ art. I hear that’s, like, part of the point. If art was ever ‘solved,’ well, we’d be faced with the idea that there is nothing ‘special’ about being human, that we’re just sacks of meat bumbling around with no purpose. Then everybody would, like, die or something. Truth hurts, art heals, let’s stay alive.

Anywho, I mention all this because there’s no rigorous way to determine how ‘deep’ a song (or any piece of art) is. You can’t just take a stick, poke it into some art, and say: “yep, this Poppy song is 75 [metres/fathoms/hands/whatever nonsense unit] deep!” Besides, nobody even agrees what ‘artistic depth’ means, and most attempts to define it flounder. If you listen closely, you can just faintly hear Goodhart laughing.

This is also why people who think they can ‘objectively’ analyze art are dogmatic blowhards. Any amount of rigorous thinking reveals that our standards for what make art ‘good’ or ‘bad’ are entirely baseless. No, seriously, it’s a case of channeling your inner Socrates and repeatedly asking ‘why’ until the other person throws their up their arms, leaves, and stops answering your texts.

We don’t even know what art is, so thinking you can ‘understand’ art and judge its ‘depth’ is pure arrogance. At least, until someone finds a way to math that shit. “Sounds solipsism.” Well, ya gotta start somewhere.

Now, does this mean we should also throw up our arms, say: “screw it” and return to binging Netflix and eating foods that you know aren’t good for you but you eat them anyways because they make you feel good and that’s what you need right now? Well, no, actually.

Even if we aren’t 100% sure what art is, or what we should do with it, there are some theories on art that I would call: “pretty not-terrible.” Some people have spent their entire lives thinking about these things and their insights are fascinating. However, I’m not here to talk theory. If you want to learn more, go pick up a book or something, nerd.

Anyway, one time this German guy said: “without music, life would be a mistake.” He also said that looking at things from multiple perspectives is pretty neat, so that’s what we’re here to do. Turns out art is kinda fun and spending a bit more time thinking about it pays dividends.

See, art just wants to be understood and so does Poppy. I want to give her and Titanic the benefit of the doubt and take them seriously as artists. While I don’t think everything they produce is God’s gift to earth (see: [redacted]), I do enjoy the majority of their work. Plus, the abstract and absurd nature of their content means writing about it is a blast.

Whether I truly believe any of the interpretations I come up with is irrelevant. Hell, I’m not even sure half of what I say even remotely resembles what Poppy and Titanic envisioned. But, that’s not the point. Shallow readings are a dime-a-dozen, see: Genius; I’m here to provide something better. To show that Poppy’s work, or any art, really, can be a whole lot more fun if you spend even just a teensy bit of time analyzing it. Hopefully I can also provide some of the tools to do so.

Enough rambling, let’s get into it.

Intro

At first glance, “Me Laughing” seems like Poppy doing cute ASMR for 27(!!) minutes while simultaneously trolling anyone who expected a video titled “Me Laughing” to be about anything different. Sure, but that reading gets a ‘B’ for ‘Basic.’

Yes, Poppy and Titanic often troll their audience. See: “A live Interview with Poppy.” But the trolling is both part of the delivery of their message and part of the message itself. So while “Me Laughing” looks like a simple ASMR troll video, I’m going to argue that it’s not.

Previously, Poppy released videos like “Delete Your Facebook” and “I’m Poppy.” Fun vids, but they’re made of looped clips. Thirty seconds in and you’ve watched the whole thing. Consider: “Me Laughing” is 27 minutes, but no parts are looped, it’s all original. As always, I’m just here to ask: why?

Since “Me Laughing” is not made up of looped clips, but is instead all original content, there is an inherent progression to the events. Each segment is unique, and when considered sequentially, pieces from each section build on each other to produce an artistic whole.

Yes, that’s a fancy way of saying it has a ‘story.’

Also, if you’ve watched the video, you’ll know that something just feels ‘off.’ If “Me Laughing” was ‘just’ Poppy ASMR, why does she constantly focus on a single point in the distance? What’s with Poppy’s frequent stares into the camera? And why the fuck is she wearing latex?

Clearly, something else is going on.

Detailed Summary

Let’s recall what actually happens in “Me Laughing.” Hopefully this recap will convey a sense of what ‘else’ exactly is going on and make the insane claims later on in the analysis a tad easier to swallow.

“Me Laughing” starts off pretty normally. Sections 1 and 2 are mostly Poppy laughing, as promised. Even in these early sections, however, we can still pick out some peculiar things.

In Section 1, and throughout the video, we see Poppy looking upwards as she laughs, as if she was remembering something funny that happened. Or as if she was thinking about something for a while and suddenly found it hilarious. “Maybe Poppy just looks upward when she laughs.” Doubtful. Try doing it right now. Feels weird, right? Whatever, moving on…

Next oddity: there’s a strange transitioning shot at the start of the video and between Sections 1 and 2 where the camera sweeps over Poppy’s latex-ed body. “Well, maybe Titanic just thought it would be cool to do it like that.” Yes, but why did he think it would be cool? Why that transitioning shot, out of all the possible ones? What purpose does it serve?

Also: Section 1 was a very steady shot, probably filmed using a tripod, or whatever fancy word camera-people use. However, the shot for Section 2 is shaky. Like, weirdly shaky. Maybe even too shaky. And this isn’t the only section filmed this way, half of “Me Laughing” is too. “Well, maybe Titanic can’t hold a camera steady.” No, that doesn’t seem right. We know Titanic can, in fact, hold a camera steady, or, at the very least, he possesses the means to take a steady shot. See: literally all Poppy videos. No, the shaky-cam is intentional. Again, I’m just here to ask: why?

Now, I don’t mean to tip my hand too much here, but to me, the camera’s sway resembles the unsteady gaze of a curious observer. Perhaps one who is timidly stepping around the beheld, drinking in all the angles. Recall my post on “Touch Poppy.” With steady camera shots, it’s easy to forget someone is on the other side, but with unsteady shots, it’s downright impossible to ignore, e.g., “wow, that shaky-cam is really noticeable. What is this, a shitty sequel to the Blair Witch Project?” Perhaps these sections were filmed this way to emphasize the presence of an observer. As for why such a thing would be emphasized—well, we’ll get to that.

Around the 3:30 mark, Poppy shakes her head and clearly utters a, “m-mm,” as in, “nuh-uh, no way.” This gesture is repeated throughout the video. I’ll let you think about that one.

The video continues, and at 3:52 the camera lazily pans down, focusing on Poppy’s body and cutting her head out of the shot for several seconds, similar to the transition shot from Section 1 to 2. Thirty seconds later, the same thing happens. Guess this isn’t just Titanic diversifying the shot composition. It’s also about this point where attempts to pass “Me Laughing” off as anything resembling a ‘normal’ video start to fall apart.

Poppy’s sitting position in Section 3 is both clever and hilarious. It shows her whole get-up, highlighting how absurdly tall her platform shoes are. She also flip-flops her feet back and forth several times as if to further emphasize her mega-shoes. Why would she wear such crazy shoes for a simple video of herself laughing?

That’s not all that’s ‘off’ about Section 3—this is also the first section where Poppy stares at a spot in the distance for a prolonged period of time. In several instances, she quizzically tilts her head to the side, not unlike a faithful dog trying to decipher commands from her master. At 6:23 we also get a clear “huh,” a noise of acknowledgement, of understanding. Further, Section 3 has several stretches of silence where Poppy is no longer laughing. She just sits there while you watch. It’s… unsettling.

Section 4 is shot in a similarly shaky-style to Section 2, but this time with Poppy sitting down. Also, we see instances of Poppy focusing on something off in the distance both when she is laughing and when she is not, as was the case in the previous sections. However, there are some weird things about Section 4 that set it apart from the others and further develop the video.

Around the 8:38 mark, Poppy utters a “mm-mm-mm” sound while shaking her head and staring off into the distance. It’s fairly clear that she is communicating with something off-screen. Perhaps entities that are invisible to us. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say these off-screen entities are the things making her laugh.

We will see more evidence of Poppy supposedly communicating with invisible beings later, however, this is bordering on fetishizing Poppy’s lore as opposed to analyzing her artistic message. If you’re half-learned on Poppy lore (which, you better be, considering the fact that you’re reading this), this would be like focusing on the identity of ‘They’ instead of the significance of ‘They.’ Another example would be focusing on the ‘origin’ of Poppy, e.g., is she an android? Who is her creator? Etc., instead of asking why someone would create the artistic work of Poppy in the first place and/or considering the implications of said work.

If you’ve read anything else I’ve written, perhaps you’ve noticed that I try and stay away from acknowledging that Poppy even has lore. I want to take Poppy seriously, not literally. Or, in “pretentious asshole” terms, to consider her work artistically, not canonically. There are many reasons for this and I didn’t just get here randomly overnight, but that’s for another post.

Edgy ranting aside, there’s another part of Section 4 that I’d like to point out. Before this section, there was only a single instance of Poppy looking into the camera (happened in Section 2), but in Section 4, she frequently looks into the lens, acknowledging that an observer is present. She shoots this observer a flurry of dark and mischievous glances. Then she laughs.

Section 5 features more head shaking, distant staring, etc., but it is also a relatively sad section. Poppy laughs very little, and frequently looks down. Yes, a pun. Poppy has been laughing for most of the video, so why, all of a sudden, does she seem so sad?

Section 6 is shot shakily and close-up. I mean, really close-up. Like, right-in-her-face close-up. To the point where the camera is often out of focus. We’re also given a blatantly voyeuristic sweep over Poppy’s chest as the camera shifts position around her. Further, there are several instances where Poppy looks deep into the camera, with what I refer to as a “model pout,” where she slightly parts her lips and opens her eyes wide. Recall my post on “Computer Boy” where I talked about the fan-idol relationship. That lustful look? It’s for you, except everybody knows it’s not.

Quick note: I will elaborate on this when I talk about “You’re Too Close,” but it’s important to stay mindful and know that despite some uncomfortably voyeuristic shots in “Me Laughing,” it doesn’t necessarily mean that the video, or anyone who worked on it, is, y’know, perverted or something. Depicting the voyeuristic nature of idolism is how we talk about the voyeuristic nature of idolism, the same way that depicting racism is how we talk about racism.

The problem is that nowadays, we are trained to think quickly, not critically. Your initial response (also called your ‘knee-jerk’ response) to Poppy’s work shouldn’t be your final response to it. It’s important to consider context and think carefully. Ask yourself: why would Poppy choose to show you this? What does she want you to think about? What is she trying to tell you?

Section 7 is where things start to get really fucking weird.

Previously, I said that there was something darker lurking in “Me Laughing,” and Section 7 is where this darkness begins to manifest. The segment starts with Poppy having another one of her imaginary conversations with demons or whatever where she nods her head and gives some “mm-hmms” in agreement. Shortly after, she looks right at the camera and laughs in your face. Not only is her laugh absolutely maniacal, but it seems completely sincere too. This section really relates the feeling that you are not in on the ‘joke’—maybe the joke’s about you.

Section 7 also provides a sense of violent foreboding: a creeping feeling that something is going to happen to you, but you don’t know what that ‘something’ is, and you have absolutely no power to stop it. What really drives this sense of helplessness home is the way the scene is shot. At one point, the camera spends a few seconds just looking at Poppy’s hand. This emphasizes your lack of control. You are completely at the mercy of the camera’s whims. You only see what is shown to you. Then, as the scene closes, the camera is put down in front of Poppy, and, after a few tense seconds, she slowly reorients her body and starts crawling towards you. Luckily, the camera is picked up before she reaches it—you were saved, but what if you hadn’t been?

Oh, right, I forgot to mention: Poppy didn’t laugh much in this section.

Section 8 is a more amped-up version of Section 6. We get Poppy staring deep into the camera for almost the entire scene’s duration. Her lustful gaze relates a feeling of vulnerability, like you are spying on a defenseless little girl, but at the same time, it feels like she is giving you one last dose of what you want before she brutally murders you.

Section 9 is fairly straightforward. We have Poppy staring at a fixed point in the distance as if she is receiving orders from her alien overlord. We also get several rapid glances toward the camera, as if her orders somehow involve you, or as if she and someone else are sharing gossip about you right in front of your face.

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…And then Section 10 happens.

Poppy says: “goodbye.”

In Section 10 we have a bit of a climax. No, not that kind of climax. Well, unless this essay is really doing it for you.

The first interpretation of Section 10 is fairly basic, Poppy is waving goodbye because you’re about to die. Obviously, whatever scheme she and her invisible monster friends cooked up is going to be carried out, and it’s probably going to result in the destruction of everything, yourself included. This is sad, probably, but she seems to find it highly amusing. Again, I’m not a fan of obsessing over canon or lore, so I’ll tackle this one slightly differently in the analysis, but I do think this reading of “Me Laughing” is at least semi-faithful to Poppy and Titanic’s vision. This interpretation also serves as a very nice teaser for P3. I mean, if “Do you disagree?” has told us anything, P3 will have a lot of destroying.

The next reading of Section 10 involves the objectifying nature of idolism. Yes, the $5 words are starting to come out, brace yourself. Anyway, in this section, Poppy giggles as she waggles her hands around, back and forth then forth and back, as though she is using her hands for the first time. Almost like a shiny, new automaton discovering its motor functions. It’s cute, but silly. And by silly, I mean overly silly. You have to remember that Poppy is played by a woman in her mid-20s. Reminds me of some lines from “Hard Feelings”: “my arms and my legs are so stiff / Is that the way you wanted it?” Or, rather, is this how you want her to act?

At the end of the section, the camera moves right up to Poppy’s face and she looks at you and just… stares.

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And stares…

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And stares…

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She knows.

Finally, we get to Section 11, which would be my main argument against the totally boring ‘Poppy communicating with demons’ reading. Poppy is seated, again, with her arms wrapped around her thighs. Note again the sense of her smallness and vulnerability transmitted by her sitting position. Also note the way the shot is filmed, with the camera looking down on Poppy and frequently swooping in for close passes.

And then, in the last two seconds, something really bizarre happens. For a brief moment, some foreign object enters the shot, just in the very corner. Now, I’m about to make a weird argument, be wary of it. Other than the random piece of equipment entering the shot, “Me Laughing” does not end off on a noteworthy moment. Just Poppy sitting there, looking up at the camera. Plenty of instances of that. The video could have easily been trimmed by 2 seconds and nothing would have changed. We can also (probably) assume that somebody carefully reviewed this video before it was uploaded.

We’re left the possibility that those last two seconds were left in the video for a reason. And that reason is—

Hey, wait a minute, was that a mirror?

Analysis

“Me Laughing” is a really interesting video, and you can have a lot of fun if you spend some time looking into it, so that’s exactly what we’re going to do. We’ll tackle it from several different angles, watch for the switches.

Quick words of warning here: I’m about to use the words ‘parody,’ ‘satire,’ and ‘sarcasm’ interchangeably, a practice some would refer to as: “really fucking lazy.” Frankly, I don’t give a damn, I’m not a professional, I’m going to type my silly words anyway and you can’t stop me.

As content loses any sense of shame in attempting to draw your attention, nuance withers away and it becomes harder and harder to differentiate parody from parodied. For example, is “Old Town Road” criticizing the state of the music industry or embracing it? Now, I’m positive that Lil Nas X has the self-awareness of my pug when he’s lapping up his own boogers, yet I personally couldn’t write a song that so perfectly encapsulates everything wrong with modern music. So, is “Old Town Road” a parody or not?

This is where someone ripping off Westworld would say: “if you can’t tell, does it matter?” to which I would answer: “yes, yes it does.”

Context may be fleeting, unreliable, and arguably nonexistent, but I still believe it’s possible to differentiate parody from parodied, it just takes a little more effort. See, I think “Me Laughing” is satirical as hell, especially considering its context within Poppy’s body of work and how it compares to mainstream internet content.

First, consider that the frankly-titled video “Me Laughing” was hyped up for three days before it ‘premiered’ on YouTube. Hilarious, but also incisive. Who waits three days to see someone laugh? “Well, I did.” Ah.

The sarcastic nature of the video also shines through in the description, which reads: “A motion picture starring Poppy.” There’s a tired, yet necessary, statement here on the continuing degradation of internet content. What won’t people eat up?

We all know Poppy’s no stranger to sarcasm. See: “Bleach Blonde Baby” or “Poppy loves Politics.” She will often refer to her videos as “high quality internet content,” while uploading videos of herself eating cotton candy or ‘ooo-ing’ at things. With “Me Laughing,” a video where she laughs for 27 minutes, Poppy further questions where the line is regarding what content people will happily consume.

Fun story: I’ve seen people call “Me Laughing” ASMR. In fact, I think I did, at some point. Huh, I should probably change that. This isn’t totally wrong, but know that “Me Laughing” takes so many shots at ASMR you’d think the video shared a set with Sicario. And, if that’s the case, they could have saved some money and just filmed the video in my neighborhood haha… hah… ha… (seriously though I’m in danger)

Considering “Me Laughing” as a genuine ASMR video would obviously be antithetical to Poppy’s entire body of work. Recall lyrics like: “Poppy is an object.” No, “Me Laughing” is much more than simply Poppy recording cute ASMR.

Poppy has been questioning the nature of people’s ASMR obsession since her first YouTube video, “Poppy Eats Cotton Candy,” where she had the mic uncomfortably close to her throat so her little gulps and coos were clearly audible. What leads to people wanting to hear these things?

Zoom out: many of Poppy’s videos are about obsession. Forget that and the point will fly right over your head. Let’s now reframe the question: why would people want to hear such intimate sounds from Poppy? Answer that and “Me Laughing” will make a lot more sense.

What I’m about to say next will be very dense because it will outline the thesis of a large part of Poppy’s work. Sorry, hopefully it’s still readable. I’m still developing my interpretations of her work, and I promise to expand and explain them more in the future.

I’m also sure some fans will want to stab me in the neck with a rusty spoon for this post because it’ll appear like I am directly criticizing them. In reality, I am actually insinuating that Poppy is criticizing them, but nuance is dead, knee-jerk reactions reign supreme. Whatever. If you react that way, it means you’re so eyeballs deep in obsession that you fail to realize why Poppy courts your obsession in the first place. Poppy’s work entices fans to obsess over her, but it also berates those who do so.

Note that this is all as a means of criticizing the status-quo. And guess what: fans are part of the status-quo. It stings when you realize your idol’s criticisms are actually about you, but I’m not convinced Poppy is malicious. She wants you to be a better person.

This is my best estimate of her thesis: the nature of the objectification of celebrities is rooted in a sexual obsession—that is, a desire for their bodies. Pun intended. Objectification stems from fantasizing over what the celebrity shows you, which is almost always physical, or at least results in the fantasy manifesting itself as a physical representation.

In other words: “everybody wants to be Poppy.”

Poppy recognizes the inherently sexual obsession with figures in the ASMR community. She wears latex in “Me Laughing” to draw attention to this. It’s as if she was saying: “this is what you’re here for, right?”

Note that obsession is inherently progressive. It grows and grows, eventually leading to fans voyeuristically observing the objectified person’s intimate bodily functions. This culminates in “Me Laughing.” Poppy knows what you want, but as payment, she’s going to leave a nagging feeling in your brain that somehow you have done something wrong. That you shouldn’t really be watching this video, but she knows you are.

Recall Titanic’s comments about making people slightly uncomfortable. Consuming is harder with a lump in your throat. The key to understanding Poppy’s work is to ask why she wants you to feel uncomfortable. What about your behavior does she want you to realize?

Earlier in the post, I mentioned that I’m not a huge fan of the whole ‘Poppy talking to demons about destroying the world’ reading because it comes dangerously close to obsessing over her lore. Lore is like history without the usefulness, so I’m going to ignore it. Regardless, I said I would use that interpretation for something more interesting, so I’d like to ask:

What makes someone want to destroy the world?

Throughout “Me Laughing,” Poppy shoots dark glares at the camera. There’s something sinister in her eyes, something genuinely evil lurking in her gaze. We know she obviously has an immense disdain for the status-quo. What else would lead to lyrics like: “down, let it all burn down / burn it to the ground”?

Preceding any cries of “viva la revolución!” or “apocalypse, now!” is an implicit judgement that what is left of the world is either not able to be saved, or not worth saving. That tearing everything down and beginning anew is preferable to salvaging what remains. To reach such a mindset, one would need to see modern society with such disgust and be so disenchanted with our current world that it no longer appears worth preserving. One would also need to have given up hope on the ability for people to come together and solve their problems. To have lost hope in humanity’s ability to adapt and overcome. To think that perhaps our problems have become too big for us to solve, that perhaps we have finally dug too deep a hole to climb out of.

Again, people don’t reach a hopeless mindset overnight; it takes many steps to descend into the darkness. But, the numpties on r/GetMotivated tell me, “every journey begins with a single step,” so let’s take one together.

In a tweet, I mentioned that “Me Laughing” was also about absurdism. No, that wasn’t a typo for ‘absurdity.’ I may write ridiculously deep-dives into Poppy lyrics and lore, but I try not to waste words.

Anyway, let’s play a game. I call it the “imagine something real quick because I need to prove a point” game.

Imagine being stuck in a system. Yes, it’s cliché to use the word ‘system,’ and any time you do, it carries the connotation that you are some conspiracy nut, e.g., “you can’t trust the system man!” I understand all this, please just bear with me and let me use the word, it’s useful. Anyway, you don’t like the system because a lot of the system is bad and it’s slowly, but surely, getting worse. The cracks are starting to show and the whole thing is poised to come crumbling down. Okay, that’s not good, you want to tell people about this. To warn them. However, in order to obtain a sizable audience for your message, you need to first succeed within the system, and to do that, you need to play by the system’s rules.

Okay, no sweat, you release some pop songs. There’s a couple of them that people really dig. Unfortunately, the songs people like don’t contain much of your message. They have a watered-down version of it at best. That’s a little sad, but oh well, at least you’re getting some sort of message out there. Hey, maybe if you make the music video really weird, people will realize there’s something more going on! Hm, that didn’t seem to work either.

So you release some YouTube videos too. Some of them are pretty biting, especially that one on politics. Should get people thinking, right? Hah, no, wrong. People like them, yes, but not for the reasons you want. They like them because they’re “weird” and “addictive” e.g., “its 3 AM on a school night and I’m still watching Poppy videos why can’t I stop lolol.” Imagining that the videos contain some sort of Illuminati-esque hidden message to decode is preferable to examining the real-world implications of the work. Plus, like, there’s experts for that, right?

Anyway, a couple albums and hundreds of videos later, you have a sizable following, sweet, now you can transition to doing what you’ve always wanted to. Change the persona to something a little truer to yourself. Make your message a little clearer. Finally, you have the power to change the world like you always promised you would.

Uh-oh, Houston, we’ve got a problem. Your audience listened to you for X, but now you’re giving them Y. It’s not a total loss, though. You have a lot of loyal members in your audience, and they like your new stuff too. Doesn’t matter what you make, they’re loyal, they’ll watch/listen/whatever to it. Their dedication has become investment which has become even more dedication. In fact, they’ve been following you since the start, when you were first trying to get big. “Yes, but I was trying to get big because I wanted to spread a message and to do that I had to make compromises to grow an audience so people would liste—“

They also have their own ideas of what you’re saying, plus, like, they make neat art, here, check this out, please give this a listen, look at this, read this, please, please? “Hey, nice article. Wait, the next one is how many words?!” And you keep every piece of fan art because it really does mean a lot to you. “Wow, I appreciate it, that’s beautiful, thank you. Oh, what? There’s even more?” Hey, if you have spare minute, could you give a shout-out to my friend? It’s her birthday. “Sure, hold on…” It’s also my birthday tomorrow, could you give this post a like? “Um, okay, just give me a minut—“ Also, could you answer my DM on Instagram? It’s important. And after that there’s only 100 more to answer! kk thanks! “Wait… one second… whoa!”

Now you’re releasing Z, hopefully that will get your message across…

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Wait—what was your message again?

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Oh no.

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Somewhere along the way, probably between performing [this] and signing [that], the essence of your message was lost. Whatever remains has been drowned out by the noise of the system. If we’re talking decibels, notifications are loud, problems are whispers, and these days everyone’s got ear plugs.

Thinking about problems is hard, thinking about them for too long is sad, being sad is uncomfortable, hey, look, Taylor Swift just dropped a new album, that “Lover” song is dope, let’s look at memes.

So, you want to change the system. But to change the system you need power. To get power, you need an audience. But the only way to get an audience is to make content that gets rewarded by the system. And the content that gets rewarded by the system is that which is easily digestible for a large audience, i.e., devoid of substance. I mean, I don’t know about you, but I don’t think “Turn Down for What” resulted in much positive social change. “Well, maybe the system should reward content that is creative, challenging, and conscientious instead!” Ah, yes, I see what you mean. So, you want to change the system…

Pass the mic, Camus, I’ve got a real knee-slapper for ya. Oh, right, guess I’ll just grab it myself.

These days, we’re faced with a new kind of absurdism, one which involves recognizing that societal systems are getting worse and need changing, while simultaneously recognizing that you are chained by said systems, and thus, powerless to change them.

This new absurdism describes the maddening exercise in doublethink where people wrestle with the knowledge that they should be Making The World A Better Place but also the knowledge that they cannot possibly live in a way that satisfies such capitalized phrases. The end result is a mental tearing fueled by impossible societal expectations and the inevitable guilt of failing to live up to them.

After a while, people stop fighting. They give up. They give in. When enough people throw in the towel, all that’s left is to hold on tight and enjoy the ride, e.g., the trajectory is set, all aboard, no, there aren’t enough seat belts for everyone, must have been one of those damn cost-saving initiatives.

“Yeah, that definitely sounds absurd. So… what do we do about it?”

Well, sometimes all you can do is laugh.

[maureenbrown]

very basic timeline of spy au

saphael past

simon gets assigned job by luke and says his goodbye to the sh gang (minus magnus for now?)

he flies over to raphs location and introduces hmself. and they meet and such.

so then its just super lowkey. simon makes contact with base to let them know hes okay

then they have dinner my god already so romantic i hate them

but then raphael leaves to see his lil bro (hes engaged!!) and to cover someones shift at work

he returns back to see simon still working bc “im a night owl” and then falls asleep on simon

simon smiles and gently closes his laptop and goes to sleep too. he drapes a blanket over them first and sets an alarm for raphael

raphael wakes up in the morning and has such a cheesy smile on his face like wth

but he gets up and then makes breakfast for him + simon for when he wakes and leaves

simon wakes up and is like?? what happened?? but sees the food and is like! AWWW

anyways he goes about his day but also gets kinda bored and he isnt sure where the tv remote is so he starts watching on his laptop

raphael walks in to see a nerdy boy crying as he yells “GO GET HIM” at his screen and is like??

simon tells him to come over obv. and raphael just says no and angrily stalks upstairs

and simon is curious. so he goes upstairs and is like what happened

and raphael doesnt say shit bc hes still a stranger

so simon just brings his laptop and he sits next to raphael even tho hes still at a distance they watch some movie

and honestly its so nice. and once again they fall asleep on each other.

anyways this adorable thing keeps continuing until THE FRIENDS come over

and simon is like!! gotta impress them even tho he and raph arent dating yet

but his friends come over for dinner and are all sizing up simon like. is he good enough and who tf is so special they would make raphael smile

they decide they like him. very much.

more just getting to know each other until one day simon is like. i want a tour of the city gimme

so thats what they do bc its raphaels day off or w.e.

and theyre going around and being SUPER cheesy but its fine. its not like raphael cares

theyre getting to know other random facts about each other like fave __ bc simon points to things and is like!!!!!!

then. they find vidia and just cant leave

he sits down and is like. i’ll wait for the parent to come so the baby isnt all alone

and raphael is about to say that no one is going to come this baby was/is abandoned

but he doesnt have the heart so he sits down next to him

is ofc v good with babies. simon is not but its fine

but it gets to be night and no one came but simon is adamant. so they stay ALL FUCKING NIGHT WITH THIS BABY (except for one time when they left to get food)

and again. no one comes so theyre about to leave but then raphael says fuck it and they take the baby with them (they’ll real with the legal stuff later)

and ofc simon is still simon so hes like. we need to name her, and also put up posters JUST in case

they do that. but for naming they are very very argumentative.

raphael says the last name is rose bc they found a rose next to her and she has such a nice rosy face and simon agrees

simon wants to name her something disney related like vidia [bc he saw it recently and it was THE BEST]

raphael is like no?? lets name her something proper.

they still argue but decide to call her vidia SOMETHING rose

w.e. they continue and then it hits simon...soon hes gonna leave

and he realizes he doesnt wanna leave. not raphael or vidia

anyways they keep tiptoeing around this love thing they have

and they keep falling for each other as time goes on

eventually one night vidia is sleeping and theyre just watching some show

and theyre cuddling and raphael just leans down and kisses the top of his head

and simon...doesnt move away

he looks up sure. and they make eye contact and slowly come in closer...theres music playing from the show...their lips meet...

they start a relationship

nothing really changes they just...kiss more

and then raphael is like?? i gotta take you on a proper date FUCK

so they go clubbing bc simon insisted

simon gets rlly drunk and like. hooks up with some guy he thought was raphael but in the morning realizes HE WASNT FUCK

he tries to play it off tho and lie to raphael

“i woke up in a parkng lot” or smth but he lies

he doesnt tell about his hooking up no....someone else does

and raphael gets SO angry

not at the hooking up but the lie and betrayal

he doesnt talk to simon for weeks

they have this weird relationship where they work together for vdia but not together...

it makes simon go crazy and he almost leaves

but he also gets sick of it so he gets raphael to talk

and they kinda make things better. they arent the same but they amend it a bit

then!! they also gotta go to a wedding (raphaels lil bro)

and simon is a p r o he gets the job DONE

he kills valentine and has a dance with raphael so a+ work tbqh

he lets his orginzaiton know. but asks for one more week to stay bc raphael

but then he overhears raphael talking [to camille whos also at the wedding] and learns that raphael is an assassin

but he refuses to believe it. he also goes home tho and the car ride is super awk but he refuses to believe it. or talk about it

when he gets home raphael goes into the shower and simon just. cant let go of the feeling. he goes into raphaels room and goes digging

finds a file. on him

raphael walks in and is like?? the hell are you doing but simon is so angry

he yells he screams he throws things and then he picks up vidia from the little crib and runs. just runs and runs.

he finds a bus stop and gets on it still running. from raphael. from everything.

he makes contact with lydia who get shim to a house

the end

the beginning

simon and vidia are chilling

when like simon gets scared suddenly and orders her to upstairs

its too fuckng late and someone breaks open the door

someone being raphael

vidia gets knocked out and when she comes to shes so ???

and raphael is cryptic like hello child who is my daughter

and vidia is just. not taking it. and is jsut really confused

but then a bomb suddenly goes off and simon thrusts her towards raphael

and they run

she gets knocked out for like the second time that day

when she finally comes to again raphael is bandaging himself up

(she is already bandaged up)

she demands to be let go and is just. no she doesnt know this person she needs to go save her dad

and he gives like a hallow laugh and tells her that there is no saving her dad

hes gone most likely

but vidia is still held in disbelief and just doesnt believe any ofit

in fact she doesnt even know whATS happening and so very slowly he tells her

well about the spying and that he and his father had a disagreement

(he doesnt say shit about camille)

she still is just very adamant on leaving and doesnt believe it (refuses to) and so she still demands to be freed

he frees her and lets her go

she walks around bandaged and so confused/lost as to where she is

she meets a nice lookng girl and asks for directions

the girl offers to how her the way and walks along with her

she asks what vidia is doing all alone and very hesitantly vidia just says that she + her dad got hurt and separated

they walk and the girl says that yeah shes an orphan too and you know. gets more information out of vidia

they get to the house [remains of the house] and just. everything is a mess

and she sees raphael arrogantly standing and is s o angry

and is about to tell him off

but all he does is hand her a file where there are actual pics + documents

and just. a part of vidia knows its makes sense with all the closed doors and whispers

and raphael also gently remains her that he’ll let her keep running if thats what she wants but he’ll still be following her/watching her

and vidia is just. really tired but shes also really curious and she kinda agrees

they go to the hq [aka hotel dumort] and vidia gets her own private room and wanders around for a bit

she gets so lost because everything is so big but finallly finds like. the kitchen and remembers oh shit i gotta eat

she eats

soon enough guess who comes strolling in?? lita

and vidia is so caught off guard and also so annoyed?? LIKE WTH

lita smirks and takes an apple watching her

she briefly explains with a smrik that shes a con artist. she knows how to manipulate and vidia get sso angry its so funny

i need more plot points but basically they train her and she gets to know lita + raphael and she finds out more about her past. and about the other relatives that know about it and is just so !? and then she also goes around stealing and fighting corrupt and fighting her father

[gotgifsandmusings]

Will you be doing a write up about your thoughts on Solo? Really curious and excited to hear your detailed thoughts on the movie and why you thought it was so bad!

Ideally I’d have had time today for a very thorough write-up or video, but I can at least give my quicker take now.

FULL SPOILERS FOR SOLO BELOW.

I mean...we know where the character ends up.

But still.

FULL SPOILERS FOR SOLO BELOW.

Here we go.

The unofficial tagline of this movie should be, “hey, if you think SJWs are ruining Star Wars, this is the film for you!” Or maybe “If you’re still really really angry about the EU being nixed, come watch Solo.” And most definitely, “If you feel TLJ ruined the integrity and fiber of SW by ‘shitting on the fans’, pandering to liberals, or giving us Rose Tico, grab a bucket of popcorn!”

(And yes, I know TLJ is polarizing from all sides of the fanbase.)

This was, without question, a movie that plays into all the worst instincts of the white, male gatekeepery segment of the SW fanbase. And I mean, it’s a fucking Han Solo prequel; I sort of expected misplaced badass worship going into this, because most people seem to miss that Han is an adorable puppy dog.

Now, to be clear, I honestly went in with an open mind. I was never particularly excited this movie existed, since Han is the second most boring choice from the OT for a prequel (Luke clearly being the first). However, after learning Ron Howard took over and seeing the trailer, I had a feeling that while I wasn’t likely to love this movie, it might still give me a fun ride.

It was so weirdly not fun at all. Like, it’s paced very strangely. We’ve got Han’s opening sequence where he escapes Corellia (and leaves his gf behind), a sequence that sort of catches us up to his time as an imperial soldier (they mention him getting kicked out of the navy in one sentence, and given that’s where he learned to fly, it felt strange) and defects because he hates these purposeless horrifying wars (that’s why you always bring a clone!) and meets Chewy in the process (oh hey he happens to speak Wookiee), a train robbery sequence where we watch Thandie Newton get squandered and we’re not given any real reason to care about this being successful (they tried with some bullshit that he could go back to Corellia for his gf with the money, but that relationship was never exactly established), the Kessel run team assembly and run after meeting the Crimson Dawn organization (and surprise...his gf!), and then what I guess is the final showdown following the Kessel run that involves “betrayals” with people who never promised each other anything, set-up for a Qi’ra spinoff with Darth Maul (??), Han being totally onboard with the rebellion but he won’t go with them for reasons, and then the final winning the Falcon scene to fill in all the gaps, as he heads to Tatooine to go work for Jabba right away.

So, there’s all these pieces, and it kind of has the feeling of playing through a level in a video game. You’re sitting waiting for the next cut-scene, because during the mission itself, there’s not any reason to particularly care about the stakes. I suppose you vaguely want Han to survive, and Lando, but there’s really nothing that this movie seeks to say or explore other than “here’s what happened.”

Which just...isn’t centered around a character worth that exploration, I’m sorry. Han begins the OT as a “look out for myself” struggling smuggler, and very quickly finds himself compelled by something greater than himself. This movie couldn’t get him there, but then they couldn’t think of a reason how to not get him there, so he just randomly chooses to go off and be a pirate.

The one tenuous thread is “trust nobody,” and surprise surprise, his romanticized teenage girlfriend has ambition in a crime organization and after telling Han she’s going off with him, she doesn’t. But there’s nothing that connects that moment to Han then going and giving over the fuel to the Rebel Alliance that had showed without asking for anything in return. Also, after that moment, Han is stranded on a planet that has nothing but desert lean-tos and an oil refinery. The whole movie he was just trying to get to a place where he could be ‘free’ and ‘explore’ or something (like a Disney Princess?), driven by his great love. There’s really nothing that would have logically stopped him from becoming a rebel at that point in time. Was it distrust? Because then why did he just hand over the fuel out of the goodness of his heart? 

Sorry, this is a rabbit hole. Things happened because they happened. The great untold story of Han Solo is apparently “I got dumped by a girl I didn’t think would dump me, and that made me a sad loner for 20 years.” To be frank, there’s really nothing that particularly connects this character to Han Solo in ANH. Other than significant dice ownership, I guess.

What makes it worse is that there’s so much idiotic “AHA, we filled in THIS moment!” Like, the music literally swells any time something ~iconic~ from the OT happens. Han gets handed his blaster (it’s literally a random gun) and we recognize it. MUSIC!! Chewie sits in the copilot’s seat. MUSIC!!! The dialogue is even clunkier than that. “Chewbacca, huh? I’m going to need to think of a nickname for you.” “You’re the good guy, Han.” “I know a gangster on Tatooine who always is looking for work.” I have never groaned or rolled my eyes more during a film than I did for this one.

It’s the anal “every detail needs explanation” style of writing that plagued the EU, and kind of led the SW fandom to that stupid, curative gatekeepery vibe it held for so long. Not one single thing actually pushed on any ideas of the OT, or took a remote risk, or was even inventive. 

Then there was the very angry stick the writers decided to shake. You know who sucks? SJWs. Let’s make them a big ol’ joke! So we had a droid that was for droid-rights, in a very “played for laughs” kind of way. At one point Lando asks if she needs anything, and she says “equality?”, and he just rolls his eyes. At another point she starts a droid and slave revolt on Kessel, and he’s like, “oh that stupid droid is at it again!” Quite literally a straw-feminist who got in the way, was so shrill and annoying with her demands, and then got herself blown up. Lando even full on says he would have had her memory wiped, but she has useful navigational information.

And really, the whole movie just felt pandering to the fans who would appreciate those jokes. The ~sanctity~ of Star Wars and Han wasn’t touched or questioned in any way, and written with such self-congratulatory dialogue it was legitimately embarrassing to watch.

My favorite example is the Darth Maul scene. It’s not really work getting into, but at the end, Qi’ra talks with him via hologram, and he’s the leader of a crime organization sorta in league with the empire. (Does he know Palps was Sidious?) It’s very clearly Maul, but first he lowers his hood. Get it? Then he stands up and shows us his robot legs. Get it??? Then he force-calls his lightsaber to him for literally no reason, because the conversation is basically her pledging her devotion and not needing to be convinced or threatened in any way. THEN he lights it up and it’s his iconic double-sided blade. GET IT????

I could not stop laughing, and Griffin ended up having to poke me in the sides because I think the people in the row were starting to turn around. 

I honestly think this is a worse film than the prequels. There was no reason for it to exist, and no story it was even trying to tell. Lucas’s story was pretty terrible for Anakin and the rise of the Empire, but at least it existed. It also felt kind of revenge-fic-ish in a way that’s sort of hard to articulate.

Donald Glover was the one shining spot of the movie (even if he uncomfortably had to roll his eyes at the concept of equal rights), and it really just makes me sad it wasn’t his prequel in the first place. 

Also, Qi’ra is the most non-character character I’ve seen yet. She has pretty much no personality, and then the big ~reveal~ at the end that she betrays Han is kind of like, “okay?”, since we have no grasp on what she’s been up to, or what her motivations are at all. We know she thinks Han is hot. That’s it.

Anonymous said to gotgifsandmusings:

Is Solo trying too hard to be Guardians of the Galaxy?

No, it demands to be taken seriously. Which is not helping its cause.

I guess this ended up being longer than I expected. I really was in the mood to see something that was just kind of, “eh, this isn’t great, but it’s fun enough,” and at worst I expected it to be in the “meh” category. Instead, I was actively cringing in my seat. My best hope is that I can appreciate it ironically in a few years. 

[complexmagrparchive]

                       EVIL IS WHATEVER DISTRACTS

NAME › Natalie Eunseo Howard/ Natalie Kim   D.O.B. › 08 17 1991 (25) OCCUPATION › Freelance Photographer/ Receptionist INSTA › @dysofbngwld​

content warning: alcoholism

PORTFOLIO

( Basically her style is based on JDZ Chung’s work so in no way am I claiming credit for any of the work but that’s who the actual photographer of these pieces are.)

Portrait A, for Dazed Korea

Portrait B, for Complex

Portrait C, for personal portfolio

Landscape A, for personal portfolio

Portrait D, for unreleased photobook

Portrait E and Portrait F, for Complex

Portrait G and Portrait H, for Nylon Korea

DETAILS

born to an american soldier and a young korean woman in busan.

father leaves the family, is never heard from again.

mother remarries, gives birth to siblings. natalie gets lost in the mix.

gets into art high school in seoul for drawing, stands out little among peers.

drinks for the first time as a teenager, likes it more than she should.

takes photography up as a hobby, posts to blog and slowly gains notoriety.

gets into hongik, continues to not stand out among peers, drinks more.

begins freelancing as a photographer, drops out of college.

spends too much time drinking/partying and not enough time working. sets foundation to ruin her own life.

comes to the realization that she’s probably ruining her life with destructive behavior.

A guy tells her about a condensed version of the twelve step plan, for new year’s she tells herself she’ll give it a try.

Step one; admitting that one cannot control one’s alcoholism, addiction or compulsion.

“Hi, my name is Natalie and I’m an alcoholic.”

The group greets her back as a collective, and it’s only when she looks around the room desperately searching for kind eyes to connect with that she realizes she’s the only person under thirty in the room.

Alcoholism, she notes, is not an issue faced by the average 25 year old.

“I like drinking because it makes me feel invincible, and I don’t get that when I’m sober.”

There’s the distinct throb of her own heartbeat that drowns out any noise. The group claps and Natalie takes her seat but her heart echoes too loudly in her ears and she can’t begin to focus on the next person speaking or anything that happens during the intermission.

She only knows two things for sure: she’d kill for a drink right now, and she’s never coming back to this circle of fucking losers.

Step two; recognizing a higher power that can give strength.

JESUS LOVES YOU!

It’s a gaudy sort of flier, with the words written in bubbly rainbow and a teenage girl all but shoves it in her hands as she tries to make her way past the ensuing crowd of forceful christian teens trying to spread the good word in some shit-stain sidewalk in Hongdae.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life” The rest of the flier reads, and it’s enough to make her laugh.

For God so loved Jesus he sacrificed him for the sake of the ungrateful humans who turned their backs on his majesty.

For God so loved Natalie he had her father abandon her physically, and her mother emotionally.

For God so loved Natalie he gave her younger half-siblings more wonderful than she could ever be and a group of friends with more talent than she could ever hope for

For God so loved Natalie he made her a jealous, insecure woman who self-destructs the moment anything remotely good begins to happen.

God doesn’t make mistakes, and the bible says he loves her as much as he benevolently loves anyone else. But Natalie’s ready and willing to call bullshit.

The flier crumples up in tight pale fists and she chucks it into the street, praying a puddle destroys it before God’s love has a chance to ruin someone else’s day.

Step three; examining past errors with the help of a sponsor (experienced member).

“Do you think I’m a fuck up?”

Phone cradled between her shoulder and her face she swears she can hear the hesitation in his breath as he sighs loudly into her ear.

“This is really what you want to talk to me about at 3 a.m.? Shouldn’t you be editing photos right now, not indulging in an existential crisis?”

His voice is still rough and raspy, and Natalie is sure that before she called he was nearing his REM cycle and dreaming about something wholly more pleasant than spending the wee hours of the morning talking to a girl with a lack of boundaries or consideration for others.

“I’m editing the photos right now. But I started thinking about it and I got curious.”

He sighs again, more softly.

“Natalie go to sleep. The photos can wait, you’re ahead of the deadline this time. Hang up your phone, put the wine bottle away, turn off your laptop, and go to sleep. Don’t worry about stupid shit this late at night, you’ll only stress yourself out.”

“I’m not drinking.”

“Really? Well good for you. Now go the fuck to sleep.”

It’s her turn to sigh.

He’s too damned nice and she hates him for it. Maybe that’s why they could never work out romantically, maybe that’s why they barely work out platonically. He’s beating around the bush avoiding the ugly truth that they’re both very much aware of.

“I’ll hang up after you answer my question.”

The line goes dead for a moment, and it’s only the steady subtle sound of his breath that makes her realize he’s still there

“I don’t think you’re a fuck up— ”

“ —Bullshit.”

“Shut up and let me finish for once. I don’t think you’re a fuck up. Do I think you’re a person who fucks up a lot? Yeah, anyone with eyes can see that. But do I think you’re a fuck up? No. You’re just some girl who’s kind of selfish and likes to make herself suffer and cut herself off from people who care about her. You’re also a girl who doesn’t respect my sleep schedule, but no I don’t think you’re a fuck up. Now will you let me go to sleep.”

The total honesty of it shocks her. Granted, it’s what she asked for (what she craves), but the reality of it catches her off guard.

“Okay.”

Her voice is small and timid and suddenly she can’t seem to be bothered about the pictures staring back at her from her computer screen anymore.

“You’re not a fuck up, you’re just a person who needs some work. Don’t get yourself so down, just go to bed and don’t forget to send me those pictures sometime tomorrow. Good night.”

The line goes dead before Natalie can muster a reply.

Step four; making amends for these errors.

After a decade, her mother’s house is more or less the same.

The same family portrait of three handsome children paired with two proud parents and an awkward gawky girl standing alongside adorns the living room wall. The same cream colored couch with hard, uninviting immaculately clean cushions. The same god forsaken coffee table whose corners only serve to gouge and bruise Natalie’s skin.

She’s been gone from Busan for ten years, and yet nothing’s changed; her mother’s kept a time capsule all of these years.

“What’s this?”

The satoori that her mother spits out so incredulously sounds all too familiar and all too foreign in the same breath. They talk every now and again on the phone, but the power of her mother’s accent gets lost in the distance. In person it’s powerful and a glaring reminder of how far from a Seoul-girl Natalie really is.

“It’s money, Mom. I got a second job because I wanted to pay you and your husband back.”

The envelope sits on that damned contraption of a coffee table untouched, but Natalie can’t miss the way her mother’s eyebrow perks up in disinterest and the way her lips purse. It’s an expected gift,  unwarranted as it is. Her mother spent fifteen long years raising her and another ten sending monetary support to encourage reckless habits. It’s the least Natalie can do even if her mother isn’t interested.

“I’m making japchae for dinner. Your father and your brothers will be home soon, why don’t you stay for dinner. It’d be nice to have a full family dinner for once.”

In the reflection of the coffee table, she can see that fucking family portrait she’s spent years forgetting existed. Her mother sits on a chair and smiles brightly, with a cherubic looking baby sitting on her lap. Her mother’s husband stands behind the chair, one hand resting on the wicker, the other resting on his young son’s shoulder. Another boy stands to the side with the same twinkle in his eyes as the older boy and the beautiful baby. Then, off to the side, stands Natalie in all of her awkward gawky teenaged glory. Her features don’t match up with the children who mirror each other so well. Her forehead is too wide, her ears stick out too much, a face too exotic to fit perfectly amongst a family so proudly and obviously Korean.

She’d like to rip that potrait off the wall and smash it into the ugly table her mother adores so much.

“Can’t stay. I gotta catch a train back to Seoul today, I’ve got work later tonight.”

If she doesn’t look, she’s sure she’ll be able to avoid the guilt that undoubtedly will attack her if she meets her mother’s gaze.

“Okay then. Call me when you get to Seoul and let me know you got there okay.”

She’s out the door before her mother can dare say anything more.

The guilt finds her in the end anyways.

Step five; learning to live a new life with a new code of behavior

Knees caked in dirt and gloves now soiled, she can almost understand the appeal old women find in maintaining a lovely little garden. Her roses are starting to bloom well, and the lavender look nice in it’s lonely little corner. It’s a patrician hobby;  for those with enough money to afford the time to spend tending to pretty little flowers and enjoying the simple pleasures of life.

The sun bears down too hot on pale shoulders, and Natalie can’t help but sigh at the way her knees ache when she pushes herself up as she assess her work. It’s nice, but not nearly enough. If she works hard, by mid August the rooftop might look like the secret garden she’s got in her mind.

Her phone starts to ring the second she pulls her clammy hands out from their lycra and leather prison. Temptation has impeccable timing.

“Natty! Where are you, baby girl? I miss your crazy ass!” the voice on the other end clings to every syllable and there’s a familiar itch in the back of Natalie’s throat suddenly.

“Right now I’m on my rooftop putting away gardening tools.”

Laughter on the other end rings somewhere in between bemused and condescending in Natalie’s ear and she tries not to notice the way her fingers clench into a fist as her nails dig into the rough material of her gloves.

“What the fuck. Did you magically turn into an eighty year old while I was gone?”

“Something like that, yeah.”

“Okay well Miss Howl’s Moving Castle, come turn into a beautiful young girl again and come to my birthday party tonight. I know you couldn’t possibly forget.”

Her teeth clench tightly, and critical eyes begin to assess the garden again. The lavender looks to far off and lonely in the corner, she thinks she ought to plant some celosia nearby.

“I don’t know. I’m kind of busy.”

“Oh boo, I’ll be so sad if you don’t come. Don’t ruin my birthday Natty, I won’t forgive you if you do. It’s at that one club in Itaewon, our favorite one.”

“I’ll uh think about it.”

“Good.”

The line goes dead before she has a chance to give another half assed denial. Slipping her gloves back on she makes her way over to the corner of lavender. Another couple of hours in the garden won’t kill her, and neither will one night in Itaewon.

She’ll make one last great hurrah about it.

[tavoriel]

1, 2, 11, 12, 21, 22 for decribe your oc thing for mmm any of your dark souls protags?

Thank you!!  I threw in Jason from Bloodborne because he’s new & I love him.  I love to ramble about OCs, and I wanted to answer for all of them, so this got long!  Hence the readmore P:

^ Lucas, Fei, and Jason

1: their voice 

   Lucas is soft-spoken and polite, andtalks to people like she’d like to believe the best of them & she reallywants to be helpful and she’s afraid she might be bothering them.      Fei is sort of similar, but withoutas much heart to it; he does that to hold people at arm’s length more thananything, give the impression he’s friendly and boring as he figures out thesituation better.  Dark Souls II added alot to the lore about the undead curse coming with memory loss, so I’m assuming this is an issue for Fei but not so much for Lucas (?? FromSoft, what is the truth!).  Fei is sort of stuck between wanting to befriendly and relate to people, and wanting to avoid…SOMETHING that happened inhis past.  He’s pretty sure he’s notsupposed to trust people, he’s pretty sure he’s already learned that andlearned it well, he just doesn’t know why. And like HELL he’s gonna find out the hard way… again.     Jason is generous with friendliness,but he’s creepy and it probably puts people off.  Like imagine walking to your car in a parkinglot at night, and then you spot someone you wish wasn’t there just then, and thenhe says hi.  He’s more curious about what’sgoing on with people than genuinely interested in getting to know them, and itprobably shows.  He tends to have an airof knowing 30 more things than he’s letting on, but I don’t know if he evenknows 30 things, he is Not Brainy.

  2: their smile 

    For like a big reason to smile, Lucas is so bashful and so genuine.  She’s almost surprised she had instance tosmile, but so grateful!  She’ll take it,she’s so happy!  She probably doesn’tsmile too often when there’s no big reason to.

   Fei hides his emotions by default. He’ll smile mechanically if his calculations say to.  Having so many memories missing is a hugeback door he doesn’t want anybody getting through.  

   Jason’s always smiling, about those 30 things he doesn’t know about.

11: their family life 

    So Dark Souls starts out where the player character is locked up in anasylum that’s supposed to keep undead off the streets, and then they’re freedby a cool NPC and invited to go do an adventure instead.  I’ve decided that Lucas and her family allsuffered from the undead curse and were rounded up together.  Before the curse happened, Lucas wascompletely prepared to be a medieval housewife. That’s what she was raised to do, and that’s exactly where she wasprepared to follow her strong sense of duty. She has it in the back of her mind that she should rescue her family nowthat she’s free, but she hasn’t been able to find them (they all probably wenthollow a long time ago SHH DON’T TELL HER). She doesn’t know what else to do besides do her best to follow the paththe cool NPC picked out for her, as diligently as she would have followed theother path.  

   Fei’s family life was so heckin strict and awful, that’s a lot of whattaught him to be so mistrustful.  He justdoesn’t remember.  Not having thememories isn’t all bad, though; he has a lot less pain to carry.  And what pain he finds in Drangleic isstraightforward, and can be fought straightforwardly.  In this setting, he can win.  And he makes sure to.

   Maybe Jason was an orphan, maybe he was “just” neglected, I dunno, butthe warmfuzzies you hope for from family life were absolutely not thereremotely.  Jason is so messed up he doesn’tknow how messed up he is, he doesn’t know enough about what he’s missing tocompare it to what he has.  He’s awarethat life isn’t pleasant a lot of the time, and he’s aware that it seems to bemore pleasant for other people sometimes, even people who seem like they’reprobably in situations similar to his, but he just \(.u. )/ why worry aboutwhat you can’t have.  

12: their romantic life 

    Lucas isn’t seriously looking for romance.  She’s pretty close to going hollow and losingher mind, like all undead will eventually.  Getting out of the asylum and being aroundpeople helped a lot in terms of keeping her sharp, but unless the adventure curesthe curse like the one NPC said it would, she still doesn’t have much time.

   Fei has a distinct impression he’s caused a romantic partner some griefin the past.  Fei is a difficult person,and that impression is correct.  He’s notsure what happened to the relationship because the curse has worn down his memoriesreally well.  It’s hard to imagine how hecould still count as taken, especially now that he’s gone and dropped off themap to chase this curse cure, but he still isn’t positive he can say for surehe’s single?  To make matters morecomplicated, he’s pretty sure one of the NPCs reminds him very strongly of theperson he used to be with, and having feelings for her is just as obvious andnatural as having feelings for the mystery person from the past; what do!

   I’m thinking Jason is just self-aware enough to figure he hasn’t put ineffort to be datable and shouldn’t expect much interest.  I’m not sure how interested he is in romanceeither, whether this is innate, or ties back to not worrying about what you can’thave, or some mixture of both.  I think whattends to drive him (when anything does), is satisfying curiosities.  

21: how they react to pain 

    Lucas can take pain, but out of a sense of duty, not because she’sparticularly hardened!  She would prefernot to be in pain!  Who would want to hurtLucas though?  (Literally everything inDark Souls).  

   Fei can take pain because he’s gonna fucking WIN, step DOWN you piece ofshit skeleton.

   Jason’s sense of taking good care of himself isn’t really there.  He wants to explore this super interestingplace he woke up in, and getting better at hunting monsters is VERY satisfying.  It’s kind of secondary that it all comes withpain.  He’s never known security anyway, andit’s never been part of his life that people around him treat it like any kindof big deal when he gets hurt.  If hestarts to get too beat up, though, he’ll start getting sulky and really startto wallow in self-pity.  

22: what they’re like on two hours of sleep 

    Dark Souls & Bloodborne are basically games about characterspowering through a fantasy epic on negative three hundred hours of sleep haha.  All of the above is what they’re like on twohours of sleep because they don’t get to rest really :

[valisi-clark]

Qveertrash on AO3: “ Where did you get the idea of a sin-eater AU? The idea of sin-eaters is very interesting. They're like creatures that children get scared of. “ 

I’m answering this here under a cut because, of course, it’s a long ass story. The character limit on AO3 wouldn’t allow it. 

Thank you everyone who has supported The Sin-eater with your comments and questions and kudos and reads! 

It’s surprising to me, but my dad actually gave me the idea for the Sin-eater AU. About five years ago (way before I was even knew about Tumblr), I asked him what was one of the scariest/creepiest things he had ever seen as a kid. 

He told me that one of the things that scared him the most, when he was a kid, was an episode of “Night Gallery”. “Night Gallery” is the series that Rod Serling started hosting and writing after “The Twilight Zone” ended. It’s not quite as good as “The Twilight Zone” in my opinion. But there’s one episode called “The Sins of the Fathers”. 

My dad said the “The Sins of the Fathers” episode was one of the scariest things he can remember. I’ve watched it, and I agree. You can probably find the episode online for free now. Here’s a short summary of the episode: 

In times before electricity and running water, when people died, they called for the sin-eater. The sin-eater was shunned, basically exiled, and he didn’t have any social interaction with regular people. He’s unclean. But people still need him to rid the corpses of their loved ones from sin. 

The sin-eater marries a woman (how?), and he has a son. One night, a villager comes to their home and requests the sin-eater. The sin-eater’s wife says that she’ll send him. When the villager leaves, the woman goes to her young adult son and tells him that his father has died, and he has to eat for his father. But they don’t have enough money for food for the ritual. 

The woman tells her son to go to the house of the villager, steal the food, come back, and eat for his father. 

Naturally, this kid is freaked-the-fuck-out. It’s gross for one thing. Eating food near or directly off of a corpse? He does it anyway. He’s the next sin-eater. It’s his birthright. 

He goes to the house, steals the food, goes home, and eats for his father. The catch is that he’s not only eating his father’s sins. He’s eating all of the sin’s that his father ever consumed. All of the sins of the generations before him and whoever they consumed. While he’s eating, he’s also screaming. It’s unnerving and disgusting to watch. You don’t know why he’s screaming, but you can only imagine how that food tastes, what he’s seeing in front of his unfocused eyes, what he’s feeling inside of his guts every time he swallows. It’s terrifying. 

It’s also an amazing idea, and I fucking love that episode! It scares the shit out of me!

And sin-eating has been recorded as a real thing that people did. Not only in Europe, but also in Meso-America.

Here’s a quote from the short Wikipedia article about sin-eaters. This quote comes from a book called Funeral Customs, published in 1926: 

“Professor Evans of the Presbyterian College, Carmarthen, actually saw a sin-eater about the year 1825, who was then living near Llanwenog, Cardiganshire. Abhorred by the superstitious villagers as a thing unclean, the sin-eater cut himself off from all social intercourse with his fellow creatures by reason of the life he had chosen; he lived as a rule in a remote place by himself, and those who chanced to meet him avoided him as they would a leper.”

When I found these things out, I was absolutely fascinated. How is this custom so old (Meso-America), so recent (about 200 years), but I had to watch a fictional story to learn about it? Why didn’t I learn about it in Mythology and Folklore? I’ve read a lot of articles about sin-eating, but the Wikipedia page for it is so short? Have people purposely not recorded information about these people because they were so disgusted? Also, this quote says that the sin-eater chose this life? Is that something someone can actually choose? Is sin-eating the reason that we eat food after a funeral?! How does this affect my modern-day culture?!

I have so many questions about this custom and the people who lived through it. But sin-eating is still being used as a fictional character device because it’s so good! 

There are two types of sin-eaters: the kind that physically removes sin through the consumption of food and the kind that physically removes sin through some other means. 

John Coffey in The Green Mile by Stephen King is a sin-eater. I’ve read an article about that. 

When John Coffey removes the infection Paul Edgecomb, he’s technically removing the sin that accumulates in a human’s body as a flawed creature. There are sources that express the idea that sin becomes a physical ailment, sin leads to death through the accumulation of physical ailments in the body (religious texts, The Picture of Dorian Gray,  these two come to mind first). However, Stephen King steps it up a notch in The Green Mile by showing us the excrement process. When John Coffey releases that plague of black... insects? from his mouth, he’s excreting the sin that he’s eaten from someone. Therefore, he’s not storing it, and it won’t physically affect him over a period of time. Does that mean if he didn’t release it that the sin would physically affect him? Probably. Stephen King avoided that degeneration process by adding the release process. 

I’ve known for a while that I wanted to use sin-eaters in fiction, but I wasn’t exactly sure how to do it. 

At first, I imagined Erwin as a prince of a nation and Levi as the sin-eater? That crumbled so fast. Erwin’s characterization is difficult to fit into a monarchy because he’s so independent and compassionate. In strict monarchies, a prince may not even know how to dress himself. In the first plot that I thought about, the king (Erwin’s father) dies, and they call one of the royal sin-eaters. Erwin’s never seen one before. Levi shows up because the Ackermans are royal sin-eaters. But why would Erwin even be allowed to look at him? Because he’s curious?  Royal Guard Mike might agree to let Erwin look, but he’s definitely not going to agree to let Erwin build any sort of relationship with a sin-eater! That bullshit about royalty sneaking out to go see their lovers? Not a thing. A royal human is objectified. If something happens to King Erwin, the country would be in trouble, could be attacked before a new monarch is put into place. Erwin is an investment. And if he’s dependent on servants, how is he going to know how to sneak out with help? 

So I flipped it around. Make Levi royal. Make Erwin the sin-eater. Erwin fits into the sin-eater role better, but Levi doesn’t fit royalty, not unless he’s a militaristic king. The plot was complicated before I even started. So I backed off. 

I thought of the current plot a few months ago? And I sent the first chapter to @erwinsalive . She seemed to love it! And it made me happy to know that the world was so interesting to other people. She asked for more details, and I told her some of it. She made this face: ;-; 

That encouraged me to keep writing! I like that face! 

So then, I had to build the world. There were a few choices: How am I going to contain the sin-eaters? Solitary or together? I can put them behind a wall. Putting Erwin behind a wall always leads to something interesting. How are people going to recognize sin-eaters? Gloves with handcuffs built into them? But then when they escape, the gloves would be off. They aren’t going to keep people cuffed while they’re within the wall. I could separate the handcuffs, but eww... how are they going to keep their gloves clean? And it would be too easy to find a tool to remove them. That’s not enough conflict. It has to be more personal than gloves. Piercing? That could work. Levi’s knife work could come in handy if the metal is welded shut. Branding or tattooing? That’s the most traditional way to permanently mark government property, but.... then they would have to flay some of Erwin’s skin. Eww and oww. So let’s go piercing. Around the mouth area for the symbolism. Lips or tongue? Tongue. Then, if he pretends to be mute, he can hide in plain sight for a while. And also tongues... they’re great. A tongue bar with pieces that are gauged higher on either end. Then, you either have to cut the bar or cut the tongue. Done! 

Setting: Levi owns a tea shop with his Mom (dreams do come true), Fatal Sporadic Insomnia kills Kuchel (because those Ackermans don’t sleep well due to nighttime royal guard duty, and everyone knows it), Levi has to buy a sin-eater. The sin-eater is Erwin. Erwin feels guilty for even being himself. His emotionally tortured state fits into this skin. 

What about the sin-eater culture? Is Erwin’s going to have to eat his dad’s.... ugh! No, I can’t do that. It’s too sad. It’s too traumatic. I’ll never get him to rebel if I do that. I grossed myself out again.

How is sin-eating going to affect Erwin physically? In The Picture of Dorian Gray, the picture took all of Dorian Gray’s sins (a type of inanimate sin-eater), and the portrait was hideous by the end of the book. Will sin-eaters be affected? Will Erwin die young because he’s full of the sins of humanity? ..... I can’t do that. It hurt too much in canon. I’m not going to do that. He’s beautiful and healthy.

Therefore, sin-eaters aren’t real. They are a collection of unfortunate descendants of humans (immigrants) who were scammed by the government. “Eat sins for our people, and we’ll take care of you.” Over one hundred years later: “You’re fucking disgusting, and you are easily replaced and less than human. You will remain quarantined. The food we give you is now overpriced. We’ve just increased your taxes again.” 

And when I tell the story from Erwin’s point of view, you’ll see what sparked the fire of rebellion. I’m excited to write it. 

Thank you again for the wonderful question! I love talking about the writing process. I hope you find this, qveertrash! Thank you for your support! 

[adjectivebear]

1 to 6 for your Ryder!!!

Aww, you 1. The basics! Whats their full name, gender, and sexuality? Describe their general appearance and/or include a picture. Is there anything you canon beyond what the game allows?Grace Ellen Ryder is a straight woman, whose appearance can be best described as “remarkably unremarkable.” She’s of average height (5′5/165cm) and average build, and though not unattractive is not exactly pretty, either. She is the sort of person you would walk right past without noticing. (To her eternal saltiness, the Ryder genes express themselves far better on a male face, resulting in a stupidly handsome twin brother.)

2. Can’t always wear Initiative whites and blues, Whats their dress style like? Do they prefer casual wear, or being in armor? Is it the same as it was in the Milky Way? How, if applicable, has it changed since arriving in Helius?Grace prefers casual wear, and (having accepted that it’s not like anyone’s looking) tends to dress for comfort rather than style. Her daily outfits consist of the Mass Effect equivalent of jeggings and a plain t-shit/sweater and nondescript knit dresses, always worn with flat shoes. Unfortunately, she didn’t get to bring most of her clothes to Heleus, so it’s Initiative duds most of the time.

3. Do they have piercings, tattoos, or notable scars? Do they dye their hair, or is it a gene mod?None whatsoever. She envies the crazy hair colors other people can pull off, but she’s never actually tried it herself.

4. What’s their personality like? How do they feel about being Pathfinder? How do they change, if at all, over the course of the story?Honest, kind, and self-conscious, with a tendency to use humor as a defense mechanism and to drink away her feelings. She was not even remotely prepared to be Pathfinder, but is steadily growing more capable in the role, though, if asked, she will say that this is because she has no choice, not because of any actual skill or courage on her part.

5. What’s their preferred profile, or class? Were they naturally inclined towards combat or technical skills? Were they a developed biotic, or did they first experience it with SAM?She’s a biotic, and an Adept. She’s getting slightly better with guns, but still often has better luck charging in and deploying biotics.

6. Canon says they served in the Alliance before joining the Initiative, do you keep this canon, or have you made some changes? Explain their backstory either way.Grace joined the Alliance to pay for college, which she attended at Johns Hopkins University on Earth, concurrent with her Alliance training. She had just completed her undergrad program and was enjoying putting her education to good work at archaelogical digs when Dad and Scott announced that they were heading to a new galaxy. And though she liked where she was and what she was doing, she couldn’t very well stay behind without her only family.

7. Everyone’s got one… List their (or your) favorite powers, weapons, and armor sets. Any special reason for these choices?She (knowing that it’s a silly reason) finds the N7 armor, colored in white and teal, to be the most aesthetically pleasing. She makes ample use of Singularity, Throw, and Shockwave; they keep her from having to try to aim a gun properly.

9. What’s their favorite memory they have of their sibling? Of their parents?It’s hard to select a favorite memory of Scott, since they did so much together over the years. Her best memories of her mother all had to do with her biotics. She knows exactly how lucky she was to have parents who embraced her abilities rather than being unnerved by them. (And no, Mom, she’s not pissed that your eezo research is probably why she’s biotic in the first place.)

11. As they unlock the memories, how does this change, if at all, their view of their parents?Dad was always so reserved, so witnessing moments of naked emotional vulnerability feels extremely strange. And a part of her is bitter that Mom was the only one he was ever comfortable expressing the depth of his love for. She and Scott really could have used it every now and then.

13. Explain the way they feel about the rest of the Tempest crew?“I love you assholes” is said with some frequency.

15. What were their reactions to the Angara and the Exiles? How did learning there was a whole new species in Helius affect them? How did news of the rebellion affect them?She was practically vibrating with excitement over meeting the angara. How many people actually get to make first contact? And have it not end in trying to kill each other? There are so many things they can learn from each other, and maybe that combined knowledge can help all of them to branch out and find more homes in the Andromeda galaxy for generations to come. (Also, the angara are freaking adorable, and actually seem to appreciate it when she blurts out the unabridged truth, which is new.)As for the Exiles… it kinda sucks, but after seeing the state of the Nexus when the Hyperion arrived, she can’t really say she’s surprised people rebelled. It is what it is. She’s still convinced they can be swayed to work with the Initiative again, even if actually rejoining it isn’t in the cards.

17. Did Ryder fall in love? If so, with whom? What drew them to that person? Would their sibling approve?Grace started crushing hard on tall, dark, and British Liam about thirty seconds in, and it only got worse as she learned what a massive geek–and sweetheart–he is. Prior experience had taught her that a guy like that would never want anything to do with her, so she was utterly amazed when it turned out that he actually liked her back. Having never had a boyfriend before, she’s a bit bummed that the Initiative’s limited supplies means she can’t do any of the proper “girlfriend” stuff like cooking for him, but cuddling on the couch watching old movies and geeking out on alien worlds is a welcome alternative.Though she didn’t talk to him about it, Scott always knew how lonely his perpetually single twin was, so he’d be over the moon that someone loves her–especially a someone whose first suggestion when Scott wakes up would be to smuggle alcohol into Cryogenics because Scott probably really needs a drink. (Scott really does.)

19. How do they feel being in command of the Tempest? Whats their favorite part of the ship? Least favorite?She’s… getting the hang of it? Her favorite parts of the ship are her quarters and Liam’s makeshift man cave. Least favorite is the galley (which has nothing good in it, fuck, she would literally kill for some brownies and there’s no cocoa, no butter, and powdered eggs, goddamn it) and the med bay, in which she has spent far too many painful mornings hooked up to a saline drip after a night of stress-drinking.

21. How do they feel about their connection with SAM? What’s their views on AI in general? Knowing Milky Way history and the attack on Eden Prime and the Citadel a recent memory, did the Geth influence this view? Does their view on SAM change?It was weird at first, having someone else in her head, but she’s gotten pretty attached to SAM. (Yes, even though SAM made things super awkward around Liam at first and she had to quickly take it aside and explain that no, she wasn’t sick, these “physiological anomalies” are just the result of being around a guy she has a massive crush on.)

SAM makes her hopeful for the future of AI. They get a bad rap in the Milky Way, but SAM’s proof positive that AI can be done right, in a way that’s beneficial to everyone.

23. How do they feel about the Remnant? Are they worried? Curious? Simply accepting of what they can do with it?She’s incredibly curious, and champing at the bit to learn more about what they are, where they came from, and who–if anyone–made them, and why.

25. How do they feel about what they’ve accomplished in Helius? Are they proud? Worried? Do they feel positive about the chances for a cluster-wide unity? If they could change anything that had happened since everyone arrived in the cluster, what would it be and why?She thinks her team has done alright. Better than she thought they would, anyway. They still have a long way to go, and it’s not going to be easy, but it’s going to go a hell of a lot faster now that they’ve found friends in the angara.

She’s not sure she’d change anything she’s done (it’s not that she’s perfect, just that she thinks she’s done the best she could have), but if she had a way to go back in time and try to prevent the uprising, she’d take it. All the time they spend at odds with each other is time wasted.

[epchapman89]

Out Now: Meister’s Caffeinated History Of Coffee In New York

Out today from Arcadia Publishing’s American Palate imprint, a new coffee book by Sprudgie Award winning columnist and coffee professional Erin Meister. It’s called New York City: A Caffeinated History, and we think it’s the coffee book of summer 2017, weaving together an interrelated narrative of New York City’s history and ever-changing landscape with the city’s undying love affair with coffee.

Sprudge co-founder Jordan Michelman had the chance to read an advance copy of Meister’s new book, and sat down with the author digitally to learn more about the book’s lessons and creative process. If you love New York, or love coffee—or heck, both—this book is for you.

Hello Meister, thanks so much for talking with Sprudge and a huge congrats on your new book.

I want to start by asking a question I typically ask anyone with a new project. Who is this book for? Who is the ideal reader or user of this book?

I asked myself this question a lot while I was first drawing up the proposal and working on the early research, because this was not a book I really ever would have imagined myself writing. A few months in to the work, I was taking the Staten Island Ferry back to Manhattan after interviewing an octogenarian coffee broker out in the middle of basically “nowhere” by New York standards, and I stood on the deck, getting whipped around by the wind, looking out on the downtown skyline at night, and I fell in love with the city all over again.

I decided right then: This book is a love letter. You love coffee and you’re an ultra geek about it? There’s probably something in here for you, but really this is for anyone who just plain loves coffee and who loves New York City. If you love coffee but have never been to New York, I hope you love the city when you’re done reading this thing. If you love New York but don’t know a thing about coffee, hey, this is for you too. But you’ve gotta be ready to be in love. Or at least listen to me be in love.

NYC is a city in flux. I’m curious—how much (if any?) of these coffee landmarks are still around? I know you can still visit the Porto Rico on Bleecker, but have most of these iconic cafes and diners gone away?

Part of the magic of NYC is that it’s basically impossible to predict what will stay and what will vanish: A lot of the oldest companies eventually close and become something totally run of the mill, like a nail salon; others somehow endure against all odds. Porto Rico is a great example: The number of shuttered businesses up and down Bleecker Street is incredible, it’s a tough strip to make a living because rent is so high. Thankfully Peter Longo owns the building his Porto Rico flagship store is in, and his son is also in the business, so there’s some built-in longevity. Gillies Coffee Co., on the other hand, also used to have retail locations not far from Porto Rico, and closed them in the 80s when business dried up.

Lots of the really historic spots don’t exist anymore—the original Tontine and Exchange Coffee Houses don’t even have plaques, though there is a Gregory’s Coffee location at almost the exact spot of one of them, and good luck finding the Coffee Exchange building—but I feel like there’s always a kind of echo that exists in a place like that, where something you care about happened. I’ve definitely tracked down old addresses (Alice Foote MacDougall’s childhood home, for instance) and just stood outside the totally average-looking building just kind of imagining what they might have been like. There’s a beauty in that experience, too, I think.

As part of the release-week celebrations, I’m putting on an NYC Coffee History walking tour that will visit her childhood home, actually, as well as Porto Rico, Caffè Reggio (which still has the old espresso machine on display), the original Joe, the new Kobrick cafe, Ninth Street‘s roasting facility, and a Café Grumpy—a kind of mix of old and new. There’s definitely still plenty to visit, and places that are practically ancient and still open, doing good business.

Do you think the NYC $1 cup culture will ever change? Should it?

I absolutely think that the $1 New York coffee should and will always exist. Obviously my feelings on this are super complicated, right?

On the one hand I am completely positive that no coffee anywhere should be so cheap that you could sell it for $1 a cup and still make a profit. On the other hand, when you look at the demographics of coffee consumers in the city, and you look at the majority of people who are relying on those $1 coffees, there’s a kind of parallel there: They’re probably overworked, underpaid, trying to get by, surviving by wits, you know? That’s New York. So there’s something about the kind of balance that creates. It’s not ideal by any stretch of the imagination—coffee farmers should make more money, and coffee drinkers should have it within their means to pay more money for coffee, that would be the perfect circle—but it does capture a lot of the spirit of the place and that coffee culture for me.

If you took away those cups of coffee, what would those New Yorkers drink, Coke? I mean, anybody on earth can drink a Coke. But to stand on a corner with a blue bodega cup and a stack of napkins and an egg-and-cheese sandwich in a piece of foil, that’s New York to me, in a way, you know?

How did you approach balancing more recent history—Gorilla, Joe, Ninth Street—with telling a longer kind of New York Coffee history?

From the moment I got the assignment, I realized, “Aw shit, I’m definitely going to work on this for a year and by the time it comes out there will be tons of outdated stuff in it.” You kind of have to look at everything in New York as though it were ancient history, in a way, even if it’s still up and running and thriving—because you really never know.

The other fantastic thing about those three companies in particular, and Café Grumpy and that whole “generation” of specialty coffee, is that they actually are as influential as some of the much more historical things that happened in the industry there—they made (and make) an impact that’s felt as deeply as the founding of the Green Coffee Association, in a way, or in the invention of the modern roaster.

All of these individual acts and moments and companies feeds this larger huge “culture” that has become so distinctly New York, and that is both constantly changing but also constantly kind of staying true to a legacy of itself.

You’re very kind to some of the traditions outlined in this book — I’m thinking about the “creme de menthe” part on Porto Rico specifically, from page 101, where you outline the shop’s tradition of selling coffee with slivers of roasted almonds, etc. None of this is particularly “third wave”—does that matter? Were you intentionally trying to be, let’s say “quality agnostic” in telling these stories?

If there is one thing that I learned from doing the work here, it’s that “quality” is absolutely relative. I lived and worked in specialty coffee, in third-wave coffee, in New York since 2004: I went through my entire bratty barista phase there, with the disgusting too-ristretto shots and the terrible customer-service and the “we don’t do it that way” thing. I also learned about the finest coffees in the world there, I cupped for the first time and then for the umpteenth time and then led cuppings myself; I consumed who knows how many single-origin espressos; I taught extraction classes and helped people open coffee shops that only have pour-over coffee and don’t offer milk and sugar.

And you know what? I never—in all of that time—had the mind or heart open enough to meet the people I met and interviewed for this book, and to a person—Donald Schoenholt, Scott Tauber, Stefanie Kyles, Steve Kobrick, Peter Longo, Saul Zabar, Sterling Gordon, every one of them and so many others—they have forgotten more about coffee than I have even learned yet. Two years ago if you had mentioned Porto Rico to me, I’d have shrugged it off—whatever, that’s flavored stuff. Today, I look at that place and I can see the customers going in there, and the incredible experience they have (it’s a truly magical place from a customer-service standpoint), and I see how happy that coffee makes people, and I realize I’ve learned a lot about what I think quality actually means. It doesn’t always mean high-altitude high-density single-origin 20% extraction in special hand-thrown pottery. Sometimes it simply means, “Does something about this coffee bring me joy?” It’s not that I can’t recognize actual objective sensory coffee quality on a cupping table, but it means I have changed my views about what quote-unquote QUALITY is in coffee, absolutely.

Do I still want to go to all the really interesting innovative new shops doing super far-out quality-obsessed things, and have my mouth exploded? Absolutely. But there’s New York Coffee and then there’s coffee in New York, to me, and I’m going at both of those experiences with totally different expectations, and whether that speaks to “quality” or not I’m not entirely sure anymore.

I’m curious, did you do most of the work for this book from Minneapolis, or was it written in New York?

For about a year, I joked that I was commuting between Minneapolis and New York for work. I spent a lot of time going back East to take interviews and to do research, and I also did a lot of work remotely in Minneapolis. The New York Public Library is almost an embarrassing resource if you’re doing research like this: I’m so glad I still have my library card, holy buckets. Did you know that you can access the entire archive of The New Yorker online if you have an NYPL card? Or JStor?? I couldn’t have done this work without that institution, no question. Shout out to the New York Public Library, hands in the air!

If you were to write another municipal coffee history book like this one, which city would you choose and why?

Oh wow, I feel like I will absolutely answer this wrong! Everyone would probably say Seattle, right? I think that would obviously be a great book, but I would be really interested in New Orleans and San Francisco, because they’re both also big port cities, with a lot of the industry side of stuff in their histories, and very diverse immigrant populations that color the coffee-drinking cultures.

If you could hold a kaffeeklatsch with five iconic New Yorkers, living or dead, whom would you pick and why?

The five New Yorkers I’d love to put into a room together, pour the Scotch, and then sit back and listen to would probably be Truman Capote to keep things funny and bitchy; Jane Jacobs for the scrappy activism; Amy Sedaris because I actually still really need to apologize to her for the bunny thing; Neil deGrasse Tyson for the mind-blowing wonderment; and Theodore Roosevelt for the grandiose personality and probably to challenge NdGT to a boxing match. Actually maybe he’d challenge Amy Sedaris to a boxing match, and then I’d have two things to apologize to her for.

Thank you. 

New York City Coffee: A Caffeinated History is out now from American Palate. 

Jordan Michelman is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge. 

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