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press-x-tojason · 3 years

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Giant Bomb is dead, and I care way less than I thought I would. Probably because 83% of the people who I ever cared about had already left or died, or were already relegated to reduced content roles.

Honestly, though, the writing’s been on the wall for a bit. They haven’t had anything worthy of paying for premium in several years, and, even though they’ve had well over a year to figure out a plan for the COVID era, they maybe made it a month with their plans to have a series of streams daily. I actually managed to forget I followed them on Twitch at all, for about 4 months, because they only streamed the podcasts and the occasional former Harmonix employee (who was literally paid to make content with their games while employed at Giant Bomb, which was funny because he blocked me on Twitter for making a post, addressing no one, back in 2014, which was asking about the legitimacy of the leaked list of “games “””””journalists”””””” who had taken money from publishers for positive reviews, a list which included him and multiple then-coworkers. I didn’t follow him, he didn’t follow me. He was manually searching the keywords, because he was, and is, a prick.) solo Rock Band stream in the last 8 months or so. Even when Jeff would manage to do one of his 20 streams from home a year, it would be on his own channel. There was just no content. And they’re surprised their “pay for our unique premium content!” model failed. They always “feigned” anger at Dan for “making” them do the Mario Party Parties, and literally never promoted his and Drew’s Metal Gear series after the first game... but I bet that, when only those, UPF, and the ad-free versions of the podcasts were premium features, those two series were keeping them afloat. Well, that and the remaining goodwill they miraculously managed to hold onto for a few years after Ryan died. Shit, I follow several people who are GB staff-adjacent, and... I can’t think of the last time they mentioned anything that happened on-site. Even the people who’ve been directly supporting them for over 10 years were out.

But yeah, the site is super dead. They pretended in the announcements like they’re going to make a go of it still, but... you’ve got like 4 content people left, and the only one people give a shit about is Jeff. You just saw 3/4 of the side of the site that was still trying these past several months jump ship in a 3 month span. One of those was, by nearly any definition, a founding member. Of which you had already lost one, and are losing another from the main side. Jeff’s been way less active until the last week or two, probably because he heard they were leaving and was like “oops, should probably check on the ship that’s been sinking for years!” Then you have Jason “The Human Mumble” Oestricher, the charisma vacuum, whose legitimate public-facing reaction to first hearing that all but one of his GB predecessors were going to be gone. was, and I quote, “Hoo Boy.” Ben and Jan are the definition of “fine”. They would have been great, as they are today, as secondary members 8-10 years ago. But carry the site, they cannot. They’re down to, what, 5 named members now? It hasn’t been that dire since the beginning of 2009, before they hired Drew, when they hadn’t even started the P4 endurance run. You know, that surprise massive, internet-changing thing that essentially popularized the Let’s Play concept, loosening its definition and making it something that could be as personality-driven as game-driven, made simply to give them something to put on the website, beyond the rare review and, slightly later, quick look. This kinda illustrates the problem with modern Giant Bomb. When they were figuring shit out, flying by the seats of their pants, they came up with great shit, and they gave enough of a shit to make it happen. 0.000% chance they do a 10 hour Thanksgiving Kinect stream if the Kinect was new today. 0.000% chance the core members would have done an endurance run in the last 10 years if CT and Shenmue (which I haven’t watched) weren’t driven by the younger members. And you could see it in the fact that they never made a real, true mobile app. The number one thing that would have made them indispensable this past decade, an app to integrate premium features, the podcast, their video player, etc. all in one place in a mobile-friendly package, that could sync with the website... and they never even raised the idea publicly. I wonder how much of the innovation was the group think-tank of the first 5 years. Beyond Dan’s couple major contributions, I don’t think they added a single new type of content after 2012, which... still means the last 6.5 years lacked any semblance of innovation. I guess that’s a big part of why I fell off tremendously quickly after late 2014. There was just nothing new, and believe me, I was looking. I wanted reasons to stay watching. I supported them with my dollar. I believed in those brave early days. And I went back yesterday to watch the DP endurance run from VJ again. I still miss that rapport. And really, that hurt, too. Vinny moving back east, less than a year after Ryan passed... short term, it was fine. You had more people than ever to cover the gaps. But the spark was gone. The chemistry made the site. When I think of Giant Bomb, I still think of Jeff, Vinny, and Ryan, first and foremost. Those early podcasts, the NintenDownloads, the crazy tangents that everyone could seamlessly follow up on(well, except Brad, because he essentially slept through most of the podcasts, unless he was talking about the thing he did that week), the weird high-concept GOTY stuff... it wasn’t perfect, but you were entertained. You laughed. You were engaged. It never felt like you were watching them working, even though you could see the work they put in. It felt like, when they released something, you were experiencing a group of legitimate friends doing what they wanted to do anyways.(And boy have I seen enough groups do everything they can to NOT be enjoying doing that, and break up as a result due to hating the jobs that they chose to do).

Part of me would love to make it as simple as “Ryan died, and so did the original spirit”, and... to a degree, it’s true. If you go back to any retrospective they’ve done about the founding of the site, or the podcast they recorded after Ryan passed, you can’t help but recognize that Giant Bomb never happens if these core members don’t all quit their jobs, led by Ryan, because they respect their boss/manager, Jeff, and know he’s doing the right things(for them, for the reader/viewer, etc.) ahead of what GameSpot management wants him to do. Jeff could have been left in the wilderness, trying find a spot elsewhere, with the rumor going around between executives that Jeff wasn’t going to help them promote anything, essentially killing their revenue. He would have been done in terms of getting employed by a major site. But Ryan first, and soon after, Vinny and Brad, gave up their jobs to make this fledgling little project go. As much as the ERs brought me in and gave the impression that Jeff and Vinny were the long-standing duo, no, it was Ryan who was Jeff’s partner in crime. And, 8 years later, I can comfortably say... Giant Bomb never recovered from losing him.

But it was so much more. Everything that set them apart slowly went away, in time. I don’t think they’ve posted reviews for games in consecutive MONTHS since 2017; 2018 at the latest. They have done one Endurance Run in 9 years. They have not had a meaningful live event in 6 years. Unprofessional Fridays were more formulaic and lesser in volume and frequency after the major players started moving east. The lack of coordination between coasts killed the camaraderie, to the point that I think one of the last 5 true gameplay crossovers was their series of 2016-2017 PUBG shitfests. I remember when Vinny starting GBEast was supposed to be the start of a new era of content, and... it was, but not in a positive way, like it sounded. When half of each side seemed to constantly have no interest in making anything, nothing got made. But I guess that’s what happens when your second in command in one of your headquarters is just a former marketing grunt with an attitude problem, and the guy with the biggest ego on the team is the one who refuses to move to join either side, and just pushes out the most self-important drivel as a header to what were literally just copy-pasted articles from other sites every week while sitting at his desk, dreaming of the days Gawker would pay him to plagiarize political drivel instead, because that’s what really gets the soulless clicks. One of your founding members becomes depressed due to losing his two closest work friends, one for real, one to a 3000 mile separation, within a year, while the other one who is left virtually stopped playing anything but DOTA 2 for 2 years. Suddenly your most prominent personalities are the 2 new guys(one the aforementioned charisma vacuum, the other a walking mark) and your previously-mostly-off-camera producer who is best known to the wider Internet for... blinking. So, yeah, lifeless. And NOW, all you’ve got is old melancholy dad, charisma vacuum dad, and the two ADHD kids whose defining trait is that they choose to exclusively refer to their partners as “my partner” in voices that make it sound like they are embarrassed to have partners, while also talking more about what their partners are doing than what they do. It’s confounding.

But yeah, TL:DR: RIP zombie Giant Bomb. Glad you’re finally getting taken behind the shed. It took 3 years too long, minimum.

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mintycanoodles · 5 years

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mmmmmmaybe a Cupcake Wars au where the Graduation Kiss never happened and Bitty and Jack went their separate ways never able to shake the feeling they missed out on something big and maybe neither of them really get over it but what can you do but waste countless sleepless nights thinking about what if’s??

so a handful of years down the road Bitty has his bakery and Jack is the darling of the Falconers but is a walking talking PR disaster who never really grew out of the hockey robot thing. so.

The Falconers are having some sort of Thing and get involved with Cupcake Wars to promote it. And who gets guest judge duty? To work on his public persona and media navigational abilities? Jack of course.

And who, of course, is one of the contestants??? Bitty duh so Bitty goes, and iirc contestants aren’t told the theme or guest judge beforehand so the drama bomb that drops when eyes meet and repressed feelings get tapped into and yeeesh now that’s what I call Awkward.

so. Despite two participants with major internal and interpersonal drama happening, the episode actually goes mostly smoothly. Neither Jack nor Bitty mentions it to anyone on the production team because whose business is it anyway and obviously no one did any homework on them so they?? act like they just don’t know each other???????? It’s not like they can sneak off for five minutes and hash it out so both just. Try not to interact directly too much but come on you know things happen.

Bitty can’t exactly forget Jack’s favorites and Jack cannot even begin to be unbiased (not when every taste he gets of Bitty's baking feels like home again, even after all this time). Jack may or may not fight the judges at every critique aimed at Bitty’s cupcakes, but Bitty hardly needs it, he solidly trounces the competition and wins. And gets invited to the Falconers Thing. Which works out pretty great in Jack's eyes.

Except it doesn’t. Bitty avoids him all evening? He cold shoulders Jack the whole time and Jack kind of gets it, the cameras are still rolling and they can’t exactly catch up now but still? Before Jack gets anything approaching a chance to talk Bitty packs up and he’s out of there as soon as he’s contractually able to.

So Jack may or may not eat his feelings in cupcakes over it. It feels like another missed opportunity and it stings and he wonders how he keeps getting it so wrong.

According to Georgia it’s an unqualified success. She watches the footage, pats him on the back for going through with it, and says something offhand about how well he got on with a few of the contestants (one in particular she notices. she doesn’t mention it). Jack gets in a funk over it, but there’s nothing to do but forget about it until the episode airs.

No one, definitely not Georgia, definitely not the PR department, is prepared for the chaos the premier causes. It’s not immediate, the episode comes out on a quiet Tuesday and the Falcs do some promotion for it, but not much, so some of Jack’s diehard fans watch it but they’re not expecting any kind of major major response. It was supposed to be something small and light to soften Jack’s image and work his media relations muscles. Who even watches Cupcake Wars anyways???? Plenty do. And they go nuts for the episode.

People who have no idea who Jack is, barely an idea what hockey even is, see Mr. tall dark and Canadian and see too exactly what Georgia had seen. Bitty and Jack and all the special attention paid to the little southern baker boy.

It’s, of course, obvious to anyone with eyes the sparks between them, the lingering looks, how Bitty can barely stop from grinning when Jack lists off his every favorite part of Bitty's cupcakes but has monosyllabic responses for the other contestants. As subtle as the two thought they’d been, they really hadn’t and it’s only a matter of time before it’s trending on Twitter and every lovelorn Cupcake Wars fan is writing RPF and subtweeting the Falcs and Bitty's account about it.

This is not exactly the public image Georgia had been hoping Jack would cultivate. They try to put out the fires, calm things down and make a few #relatable Twitter posts about it that the PR interns cook up. Georgia wheedles the real story out of Jack, and it throws her off kilter actually, once he fesses up to a few details that would make the collective heads of the internet reel, but she’s a professional. The PR team is a crack squad. They get things under control.

Until, of course, some intrepid fans uncover The Truth.

Mamely, how Bitty and Jack totally knew each other because they were totally on the same hockey team in college??? And had totally set records together and there were totally pictures still archived on school websites of celebration hugs and even a few traces left of a senior photography project that featured one Eric R. Bittle (and others) in touchingly intimate portraits???? and uhhhhh explanations????????? are needed?????????

#cupcakegate takes the Twitterverse by collective storm. Kardashians whom??? Bitty gets bombarded, the Falconer’s can’t make a single post about a home game without demands for updates on the drama and Georgia is nearly drowning in it all but wading through it like a champ.

The PR department reaches out to Bitty in an email that Bitty never responds to, his stomach too tied up in knots over all this debacle is bringing up, but he feels like this is partially his fault. He tries his best. He does a tell all vlog to set the record straight.

He tries to keep it simple, stick to the main points.

Why didn’t they say anything? Why act like they didn’t know each other?

Neither of them knew the other would be there (truth) and they didn’t want to disrupt filming or make it seem like Bitty had an unfair advantage.

Are they currently romantically involved?

No (truth).

Had they ever, at any point, back in college, been romantically involved?

No (truth?).

Was there anything, anything at all behind the long looks and soft gazes? A single spark? An ounce of unspoken, hidden attraction?????

No (lies).

Bitty bears his heart a little, gets going on a tangent on their relationship back in college and how much Jack helped him through and what a good team they’d been and how he’s a little sad he and Jack drifted so far apart (lies, it hurts, it’s never stopped hurting) but he’s happy for Jack and really proud of him and glad he got the chance to see him again and wishes him the best (truth).

Of COURSE this only makes things worse. Bless Bitty's heart but he has zero self awareness when it comes to Jack and his clearly lovesick vlog brings avid followers of the whole debacle to new emotional heights. People are invested. The drama continues.

It comes to a head when Jack himself braves the world of Twitter, finally, to try and hash things out privately with Bitty so he logs onto the dusty old handle Georgia created and verified for him ages ago that he’d, bless her heart, just never gotten the hang of. He knows Bitty's handle from all this hullabaloo now so he opens up a message, stares at the blinking screen for about a minute, then promptly has a breakdown.

Everything comes back to him. Every warm moment they’d shared back in college. Every time he felt Bitty there for him and every inch of home and safe Bitty ever gave him.

And how he never told Bitty how he felt (lies. still feels). How he’d let that slip right through his fuckup fingers.

It takes him two weeks to draft the message. That’s ages in internet time, so things die down a bit in the interim and other celebrity dramas unfold so Jack finally stops getting pestered about it by every pap and chirped by every team mate. He’s glad they’ll never put him on reality baking competition show duty again but is it worth it? (yes. yes it is)

It gives Jack plenty of time to stew and stew he does, until he’s finally able to write out a pretty succinct summary of everything he never got a chance to say.

It boils down to a couple main points:

Bitty was probably the best thing that ever happened to Jack. Bitty made him softer and better able to handle things and just gave him the safety net he needed and he would always be grateful to Bitty for that.

Jack had also never meant for them to drift apart, he’d always wanted to stay in touch, actually, he’d always wanted so much more than that but Jack knew Bitty didn’t feel the same way, so Jack created the space between them and he was sorry he’d been such a poor friend and had gotten it so wrong.

Jack hoped, maybe beyond hope, that it wasn’t too late. Jack asked if they could be friends again, that he missed Bitty, and he hoped to hear back from him.

Jack is rather proud of himself for all the emotional eloquence that goes into the message. He thinks Shitty would be, too. Of course, it is kind of annoying he has to split it up into so many pieces and tag Bitty's account in each one so they’ll send to him, something about a 140 character limit? Jack doesn’t really get it, but social media isn’t his thing. So he sends his piecemeal message and waits patiently for Bitty to get back to him.

Georgia regrets ever trying to get Jack any amount of media exposure.

Jack’s not so private love letter is screen capped, saved to hard drives, printed into longevity and takes the internet land by storm all over again. Jacks completely oblivious to it until day two or so when Shitty, Lardo, and every person he knew at any point at Samwell bomb his phone. Georgia does her best, she really does, but it’s the last straw for the PR team. They’ve long since collapsed in a puddle of tears and Georgia has to coordinate the disaster relief effort herself and enforce the media lockdown until they can just deal with this and Jack, it’s okay, we’re all here for you and your sexuality is valid but honey, no more internet for you. Georgia does take the thread down but its too little too late and there is going to be a million and one interviews about this and she hasn’t slept in days and-

and Jack feels bad for her. He feels a little embarrassed his personal business is so out in the open like that but. Well. It’s his own fault. He should have probably asked a few more questions about how to work Twitter. But deep down? It’s a huge weight off. He’d never exactly planned on coming out publicly because he never really thought he’d have anyone who would make him consider it but. Well. He’s said what he needed to say. About time.

He lets Georgia tell him what to do and what to say to whom. He does a few interviews, nothing televised, just a few online publications. It takes several more weeks for any of it to approach any sort of calm again, but eventually, an equilibrium is reached. And then, only then, does Jack get a call from a number he doesn’t have saved yet.

“Hey, Jack,” he hears in a thick southern accent when he picks up, and it doesn’t, not at all, send a shiver of pure warmth all the way down to his toes (lies, all lies).

“Bittle-Eric? Bitty. Hey,” he says. Bitty laughs.

“I think maybe we should talk. Would you, maybe, want to meet up for coffee sometime?”

“Yeah. Yeah, of course, I’d love that.” (truth)

#zimbits #omgcp #whoops i slipped and wrote a fic?#this was just supposed to be an idea but then it kept happening #a cupcake wars au that no one asked for but here it is anyway #and i shall call it;#All is Fair in Love and Cupcake Wars

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tswiftdaily · 5 years

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New Reputation: Taylor Swift shares intel on TS7, fan theories, and her next era

Snakes begone. The 29-year-old superstar is back with a new album and a new outlook on life. We go inside the pop monarch's latest chapter.

THE PALM TREES ARRIVED IN FEBRUARY, seven in all, set against a pastel blue backdrop with superimposed stars. It appeared that a new Taylor Swift era was upon us — that the old happy-go-lucky Taylor was not, in fact, dead. Or did it? It wasonly an Instagram photo, just one more picture in an infinite content scroll. But it also came from a pop star known for prodigious hint-dropping, whose fans turn every piece of info into an online archaeological dig.

As expected, the summery post sent Swifties sifting through each detail with a fine-tooth comb. What did the trees symbolize? An overdue vacation? A recently purchased beach house? A secret palm-frond collection? Or maybe, as many surmised, it was new music. One Twitter user predicted that the number of stars in the background of the photo hinted at a single drop: “There’s about 60/61 [stars]️. There’s 61 days until April 26, FRIDAY, a SINGLE RELEASE day!” Another said it was the unofficial announcement of her next LP: “Okay so in this picture there are 4 palm trees on the left (4 country albums). There are two palm trees on the right (2 pop albums). There is one large palm tree in the middle. This represents her new album.” These may sound like ludicrous conspiracy theories — for the record, they were mostly correct — but they fit firmly within the Taylor Swift Musical Universe (it’s like the Marvel Cinematic Universe but with more guitars and fewer Stan Lee cameos).

“I posted that the day that I finished the seventh album,” says Swift about the photo. “I couldn’t expect [my fans] to know that. I figured they’d figure it out later, but a lot of their theories were actually correct. Those Easter eggs were just trying to establish that tone, which I foreshadowed ages ago in a Spotify vertical video for ‘Delicate’ by painting my nails those [pastel] colors.”

It’s now April, and the 29-year-old pop star is in a Los Angeles photo studio, giving her first sit-down magazine interview in three years. She wants to discuss the art of placing hints inside her work, as well as the upcoming record, which she recorded as soon as she finished the Reputation Tour. She’s also keen on detailing her own obsessions, talking up the TV shows, books, and songs that help shape her outlook on life.

Over the past 13 years, Swift has perfected the pop culture feedback loop: She shares updates about her life and drops hints about new music, which fans then gobble up and re-promote with their own theories, which Swift then re-shares on her Tumblr or incorporates into future clues. It’s like a T-Swift-built Escher staircase of personal memories and moments that tease what’s next. “I’ve trained them to be that way,” she says of her fans’ astute detective work. Swift is a pop culture fanatic herself (see: the jean jacket she’s wearing on the EW cover) and has an innate understanding of the lengths her audience will go to be a part of the original creation. “I love that they like the cryptic hint-dropping. Because as long as they like it, I’ll keep doing it. It’s fun. It feels mischievous and playful.”

Through this approach, Swift has designed the ultimate artistic scavenger hunt — and it’s easy to get swept up in its drama, even if you don’t listen to her music. Her moments aren’t always hidden, either. Sometimes Swift highlights aspects of her world just so fans feel like they’re on the journey with her. Like the time in March 2018 when pop singer Hayley Kiyoko was accused of shading Swift after mentioning her name during an interview. On Tumblr, Swift re-shared a fan’s post, adding commentary that defended Kiyoko, which immediately dispelled any conflicts between the two artists; Swift’s post subsequently received more than 29,000 notes. Four months later, she invited Kiyoko on stage during the Reputation Tour to sing her hit “Curious.” Kiyoko returned the favor when she had Swift join her that December at a benefit on behalf of the LGBTQ organization the Ally Coalition to perform “Delicate.” Fans of both artists were elated by the mutual support.

The feedback loop also extends outside of music. In October 2018, Swift broke her silence about politics by publicly endorsing two candidates for office in her adopted state of Tennessee, while encouraging her followers to register to vote. She kept up the civic momentum through Election Day when she asked fans to post selfies after voting; Swift then eagerly re-promoted her favorites on Instagram stories.

This practice of sharing and re-sharing and sharing again is why listeners consider Swift one of the world’s most accessible pop stars, someone willing to not only interact with her audience but invite them to secret listening sessions, or make the occasional surprise visit to their wedding or prom. It’s a symbiotic relationship, one that, as Swift tells EW, helped her dig out of the darker era of reputation. “It’s definitely the fans that made that tonal shift in the way I was feeling,” she says. “Songwriters need to communicate, and part of communicating correctly is when you put out a message that is understood the way you meant it. reputation was interesting because I’d never before had an album that wasn’t fully understood until it was seen live. When it first came out everyone thought it was just going to be angry; upon listening to the whole thing they realized it’s actually about love and friendship, and finding out what your priorities are.”

Then, during the Reputation Tour, she had an epiphany: that despite the caricature that she thought had been created of her, there were many people who saw what others had simply refused to. “I would look out into the audience and I’d see these amazing, thoughtful, caring, wonderful, empathetic people,” she says. “So often with our takedown culture, talking s— about a celebrity is basically the same as talking s— about the new iPhone. So when I go and I meet fans, I see that they actually see me as a flesh-and-blood human being. That — as contrived as it may sound — changed [me] completely, assigning humanity to my life.”

At tour’s end, she channeled that positive energy into the studio, recording the new album in just under three months. But the fast pace won’t mean a short LP. Swift confirmed that her seventh record (she hasn’t announced a title yet; the working nickname among fans is TS7) will include more songs than any of her previous releases. “I try not to go into making an album with any expectation,” she says. “I started to write so much that I knew immediately it would probably be bigger.”

The project will also feature a mix of old and new collaborators (on the candy-coated lead single “ME!” Swift brought in Panic! At the Disco frontman Brendon Urie and coproducer Joel Little, both of whom she had never worked with), but she is unsurprisingly coy about doling out much more information, as if doing so would break the carefully honed T-Swiftian feedback loop. “There’s a lot of a lot on this album,” she says. “I’m trying to convey an emotional spectrum. I definitely don’t wanna have too much of one thing…. You get some joyful songs and you get the bops, as they say.” There’s also, she adds, some “really, really, really, really sad songs,” but “not enough to where you need to worry about me.”

She gives us one more clue: The true distinction between TS7 and reputation is in the delivery. “This time around I feel more comfortable being brave enough to be vulnerable, because my fans are brave enough to be vulnerable with me. Once people delve into the album, it’ll become pretty clear that that’s more of the fingerprint of this — that it’s much more of a singer-songwriter, personal journey than the last one.”

The past month has seen a deluge of Swift activity, from the release of the new single to dropping more hints in interviews about the record and its title, which is apparently hidden somewhere inside the “ME!” music video (current fan guesses include Kaleidoscope and Daisy). But if the Easter eggs from the pop star seem like a business-as-usual routine, she says this album does indeed mark a new era of her life, where she’s been better able to prioritize what’s important to her.

“Our priorities can get messed up existing in a society that puts a currency on curating the way people see your life,” she says. “Social media has given people a way to express their art. I use it to connect with fans. But on the downside you feel like there are 3 trillion new invisible hoops that you have to jump through, and you feel like you’ll never be able to jump through them all correctly. I — along with a lot of my friends and fans — am trying to figure out how to navigate living my life and not just curating what I want people to think living my life is. I’m not always able to maintain a balance, and I think that’s important for everyone to know about. We’re always learning, and that’s something that I also had to learn — that I’ve got to be brave enough to learn. Learning in public is so humiliating sometimes…. Do I feel more balanced in my life than I ever have before? Um, probably yeah. But is that permanent? No. And I think being okay with that has put me in a bit of a better position.” Strong words to live by, to quote, to re-share, to tweet back to her, and see if she’ll respond.

(x)

#taylor swift #ew #interview #article #ts7

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mostlysignssomeportents · 5 years

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Pluralistic: 17 Mar 2020 (Punch Brothers and Masque of the Red Death, 2020 Census (ACT NOW!), Disaster Socialism, Scalzi's canceled tour, my Twitter account was (briefly) nuked, writing advice, Our Plague Year, Inception-level patent troll covid fuckery, tips for parenting kids stuck at home, Brave files GDPR complaint against Google)

Today's links

The Masque of the Red Death and Punch Brothers Punch: My latest podcast is Poe/Twain bathos crossover.

Fill in your census online: Otherwise you and people you care about literally won't count.

Naomi Klein: this disaster has no room for disaster capitalism: It's our moment to seize.

Scalzi's canceled bookstore: Support your local indie bookseller, especially now.

My Twitter account was suspended: I got in trouble for putting trolls on a list called "Colossal Assholes."

Talking digital writing careers with the Writing Excuses podcast: Covering a lot of ground in 15 minutes.

A new anxiety podcast from Nightvale's Joseph Fink: Proud to be in the debut episode.

Patent trolls try to shut down covid testing: Monkey-selfies, Theranos, Softbank – it's a garbage matrioshke!

How to live with your kids: "Working and Learning from Home with Young Children."

Brave files GDPR complaint against Google: Sharing data between Google services is a no-no.

This day in history: 2005, 2015, 2019

Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

The Masque of the Red Death and Punch Brothers Punch (permalink)

My last podcast featured the Macmillan audiobook of my novella "The Masque of the Red Death."

https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/13/the-masque-of-the-red-death/

For this week's podcast, I decided to read Poe's original 1842 story, "The Masque of the Red Death. It's some next-level gothic stuff. Neil Gaiman is right: Poe must be read aloud!

https://www.poemuseum.org/the-masque-of-the-red-death

As a chaser, I close this week's podcast with a reading of Twain's classic, gothic, comedic "Literary Nightmare," better known as "Punch, Brothers, Punch," easily the best story ever written about an earworm.

Warning: earworms.

https://americanliterature.com/author/mark-twain/short-story/punch-brothers-punch

The two pieces work incredibly well together, making a bathetic cocktail!

Here's where to get the podcast:

https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/16/the-masque-of-the-red-death-and-punch-brothers-punch/

Direct MP3 link:

https://archive.org/download/Cory_Doctorow_Podcast_333/Cory_Doctorow_Podcast_333_-_The_Masque_of_the_Red_Death_Punch_Brothers_Punch.mp3

Here's the RSS for my podcasts:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/doctorow_podcast

Fill in your census online (permalink)

Guess what's happening on April 1, whether or not the nation is on virus lockdown? The 2020 edition of the decennial census, arguably the most consequential administrative task in the US government.

https://my2020census.gov/

You don't have to wait until April 1. Here's that URL again. Whether or not you've gotten a census card with a code, you can and should fill it in.

https://my2020census.gov/

From danah boyd: "Everyone who lives in the US (regardless of nationality or visa status) is required to fill this out. Children under 5 are often forgotten. Same with long-term house guests. Immigrants, black men, and indigenous communities are often undercounted too. If you want to make sure that your community gets its fair share of funding and political power, make sure to get everyone in your community to fill this out. The more people missing, the more you lose out."

If digital isn't your thing, call:

English 844-330-2020 Español 844-468-2020 普通话 844-391-2020 粤语 844-398-2020 tiếng Việt 844-461-2020 한국어 844-392-2020 pусский 844-417-2020 العربية:844-416-2020 Tagalog 844-478-2020 Polish 844-479-2020 Français 844-494-2020 Kreyòl Ayisyen 844-477-2020 Português 844-474-2020 日本語 844-460-2020

If you're reading this, you're on a device that can be used to fill it out.

Naomi Klein: this disaster has no room for disaster capitalism (permalink)

In The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein coined "disaster capitalism" to describe how, during a crisis, "ideas lying around" about how to enrich the few and take away our rights come to the fore.

In this short doc, she applies the theory to coronavirus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niwNTI9Nqd8

The shock doctrine is well underway: privatizing social security, closing borders, maybe canceling elections.

But as Klein points out, disasters don't always precipitate oligarchy. The Great Depression catalyzed the New Deal and transformative change.

This is moment to seize. We have "ideas lying around" that are better than exploitation and oligarchy: ideas like a $15 minimum wage, an inclusive government, evidence-based policy free from corporate influence, Medicare for All, and, most of all, the Green New Deal.

Scalzi's canceled bookstore (permalink)

John Scalzi has had to cancel his tour for for The Last Emperox, a book in The Collapsing Empire series. It was the right call for him (and Tor Books to make).

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2020/03/16/important-news-about-the-last-emperox-tour/

Even though it was the right call, it comes at a cost – to John, to Tor, and, especially, to the indie bookstores that rely on author events to keep the lights on. That's why John has urged his readers to "Keep your pre-order at your local bookstore, or make that pre-order at your local bookstore. Your local bookstore needs you right now."

He also suggests that you consider ordering a signed limited edition hardcover from Subterranean:

https://subterraneanpress.com/last-emperox

And John will be going into his local indie to sign books for mail order for so long as it's permitted:

http://www.jayandmarysbooks.com/

Indie booksellers aren't the most endangered or hardest-hit among those who will be devastated by the virus, by official incompetence and indifference, and by monopolism and corruption, but they will still be VERY endangered and VERY hard-hit. They need your support.

My Twitter account was suspended (permalink)

My Twitter account is back!

Here's what happened:

I woke up yesterday morning and discovered that my account was locked. There was no explanation, either in the app, the site or my email for this. I contacted everyone I knew at Twitter, and everyone who knew anyone at Twitter. At 830AM Pacific – about 5h after the suspension – I got an email from support – saying I'd been suspended for having a list to which I add trolls called "colossal assholes."

I'm not sure that this qualifies as a ToS violation (I gave up reporting trolls who called me much worse, because Twitter inevitably replied that these epithets were not prohibited), but it's super-weird that they suspended me without warning or explanation. Also weird: I could not rename the list while suspended, only delete it (I tried to rename it "thoroughly unpleasant individuals").

Weirder: "Colossal assholes" got me suspended, but not its companion list, "Toe-faced shitweasels"

Thanks to everyone who contacted Twitter on my behalf, and for the Twitter folks who lit a fire to get that suspension explanation email sent my way.

All of my followers were deleted. Twitter tells me they'll reappear over 24h or so, but more than 100k are still missing. If you're interested in seeing my future tweets, please double-check that you're subscribed.

Also, in response to Twitter's sensitivity about "colossal assholes" as a listname, I've renamed and expanded my lists.

Potent emetics

Tissue-thin bad faith

Foolish timewasters

Beneath contempt

Odious nonsense-spewers

Confederate gravy-eaters

Toe-faced stenchweasels

Hilariously inept lackwits

Probably bots

Thick as two short planks

Raving conspiracists

Sociopath climate deniers

Dim bulb centrists

Inept MAGA trolls

Red scare bedwetters

Talking digital writing careers with the Writing Excuses podcast (permalink)

Back when cruise ships were a thing, I went out on the Writing Excuses Cruise as an instructor with Mary Robinette Kowal and friends. While there, we recorded an episode of the Writing Excuses podcast.

https://podplayer.net/?id=99014840

In a mere 25 minutes, we pack in a lot of material: how to break into the field, what a publisher's job is, how "digital is different," self-promotion, not being an unlikable weirdo when you're self-promoting, technology's role in shaping artistic success, and more.

Here's an MP3:

https://writingexcuses.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/WX15_11_digital_is_different.mp3

And here's the RSS to subscribe to the podcast:

https://writingexcuses.com/feed/podcast/

A new anxiety podcast from Nightvale's Joseph Fink (permalink)

Our Plague Year is a new podcast from Joseph Fink of Welcome to Nightvale fame. It features short spoken-word essays about this extraordinary, scary, uncertain time.

https://ourplagueyear.libsyn.com/

The debut installment just went live and I was proud to contribute a piece to it, "Don't Look for the Helpers," which PM Press will be publishing in text form shortly.

https://ourplagueyear.libsyn.com/the-lesson-of-a-plague

Also in this episode: "Social Distances" by Nisi Shawl.

MP3 here:

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/ourplagueyear/The_Lesson_of_a_Plague.mp3

Patent trolls try to shut down covid testing (permalink)

It's nearly impossible to sum up all the terrible in this story about a patent troll who is attacking America's ability to make and distribute coronovirus test-kits.

Labrador Diagnostics LLC is a patent troll (💩) that bought two of Theranos's patents (💩💩). They're a shell company spun up by Fortress Investment Group, Softbank's (💩💩💩) giant patent troll (💩💩💩💩). They're suing Biofire, a company that actually makes things (as opposed to Labrador, which only makes lawsuits). Which things are Biofire making? Covid-19 tests (💩💩💩💩💩).

They're represented by Irell & Manella, a lawfirm that previously claimed to represent a monkey. No, really. (💩💩💩💩💩💩)

It's inception-level terrible, a grifty shit burrito encased in a shit-flour tortilla, wrapped in a layer of shit-foil, and served in a go-bag of shitty, shitty, shit.

This is the kind of shit-matrioshke that could wipe out our species.

How to live with your kids (permalink)

I'm really impressed with Erin Kissane's "Working and Learning from Home with Young Children" – an important sanity check for anyone ramping up a new way of relating to our kids.

http://incisive.nu/2020/working-and-learning-from-home/

"Don't be Captain Homeschool on day one" is definitely a lesson we've already learned the hard way, and I'm excited to try out its antidote, "Rhythms > schedules":

"A simple rhythm is resilient, so when something goes sideways, recovery is much simpler."

Also impressed by the accompanying "rhythm chart" (something something "rhythm method" something something "parenting").

"Hold a morning household meeting" is something we're definitely doing, albeit awkwardly because we're taking advantage of the school break to let our kid do the sleeping in she never gets to do otherwise, so we're already up and about by the time she's ready for this.

Also impressed by the recco for the Raising Free People podcast, for unschoolers, free schoolers, Adlerians and democratic parents.

https://www.raisingfreepeople.com/podcast/

Brave files GDPR complaint against Google (permalink)

It's long been obvious that US Big Tech companies are unserious about their GDPR compliance, taking cosmetic, pro-forma measures that don't really engage with the substance of the rules (those rules demand nothing less than a top-to-bottom industry restructure).

EU regulators have been slow to punish them for this, but the GDRP affords standing to many private actors to demand action for noncompliance, which is how it is that Brave has filed GDPR action against Google.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/brave-browser-delivers-on-promise-files-gdpr-complaint-against-google

The complaint's substance is that Google is collecting data through its many products, divisions and services and merging that data on the back-end, which the GDPR expressly prohibits without meaningful, opt-in consent (and you can't deny service those who don't consent).

Brave published a study that analyzed Google's communications with users, partners, regulators and customers and showed that these are effectively an admission of the kind of "data-tying" that the GDPR bans.

https://brave.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Inside-the-Black-Box.pdf

I continue to use Brave and Firefox as my daily-driver browsers; I'm impressed with the quality of both, and how much better they make the web.

This action by Brave might trigger the kind of reckoning that the GDPR was meant to provoke — at long last.

This day in history (permalink)

#15yrsago ETECH Notes: Life Hacks Live! (Danny O'Brien and Merlin Mann) https://craphound.com/etech2005-lifehacks.txt

#15yrago Sterling and Steffen's SXSW keynote https://web.archive.org/web/20050318074350/http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/002353.html

#5yrsago The Glorkian Warrior Eats Adventure Pie https://boingboing.net/2015/03/17/the-glorkian-warrior-eats-adve.html

#1yrago China's "pawn shops" have loaned $43B, mostly secured by real-estate https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-12/china-is-said-to-scrutinize-43-billion-pawn-shop-lending-boom

#1yrago Chinese enthusiasts are serving global Thinkpad fans by making modern motherboards that fit in classic chassis from the Golden Age of the Thinkpad https://geoff.greer.fm/2019/03/04/thinkpad-x210/

#1yrago Majority of London's newly built luxury flats are unsold, raising the spectre of "posh ghost towers" https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/jan/26/ghost-towers-half-of-new-build-luxury-london-flats-fail-to-sell

#1yrago Myspace lost all the music its users uploaded between 2003 and 2015 https://www.reddit.com/r/techsupport/comments/7uiv8b/myspace_player_wont_play_songs_and_i_want_to/

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources: Kottke (https://kottke.org), Slashdot (https://slashdot.org).

Currently writing: I've just finished rewrites on a short story, "The Canadian Miracle," for MIT Tech Review. It's a story set in the world of my next novel, "The Lost Cause," a post-GND novel about truth and reconciliation. I've also just completed "Baby Twitter," a piece of design fiction also set in The Lost Cause's prehistory, for a British think-tank. I'm getting geared up to start work on the novel next.

Currently reading: Just started Lauren Beukes's forthcoming Afterland: it's Y the Last Man plus plus, and two chapters in, it's amazeballs. Last month, I finished Andrea Bernstein's "American Oligarchs"; it's a magnificent history of the Kushner and Trump families, showing how they cheated, stole and lied their way into power. I'm getting really into Anna Weiner's memoir about tech, "Uncanny Valley." I just loaded Matt Stoller's "Goliath" onto my underwater MP3 player and I'm listening to it as I swim laps.

Latest podcast: The Masque of the Red Death and Punch Brothers Punch https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/16/the-masque-of-the-red-death-and-punch-brothers-punch/

Upcoming books: "Poesy the Monster Slayer" (Jul 2020), a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Pre-order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627?utm_source=socialmedia&utm_medium=socialpost&utm_term=na-poesycorypreorder&utm_content=na-preorder-buynow&utm_campaign=9781626723627

(we're having a launch for it in Burbank on July 11 at Dark Delicacies and you can get me AND Poesy to sign it and Dark Del will ship it to the monster kids in your life in time for the release date).

"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother book, Oct 20, 2020. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250757531

"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583

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path-of-my-childhood · 5 years

Text

New Reputation: Taylor Swift shares intel on TS7, fan theories, and her next era

By: Alex Suskind for Entertainment Weekly Date: May 9th 2019

Snakes begone. The 29-year-old superstar is back with a new album and a new outlook on life. We go inside the pop monarch's latest chapter.

THE PALM TREES ARRIVED IN FEBRUARY, seven in all, set against a pastel blue backdrop with superimposed stars. It appeared that a new Taylor Swift era was upon us — that the old happy-go-lucky Taylor was not, in fact, dead. Or did it? It was only an Instagram photo, just one more picture in an infinite content scroll. But it also came from a pop star known for prodigious hint-dropping, whose fans turn every piece of info into an online archaeological dig.

“Our priorities can get messed up existing in a society that puts a currency on curating the way people see your life,” she says. “Social media has given people a way to express their art. I use it to connect with fans. But on the downside you feel like there are 3 trillion new invisible hoops that you have to jump through, and you feel like you’ll never be able to jump through them all correctly. I — along with a lot of my friends and fans — am trying to figure out how to navigate living my life and not just curating what I want people to think living my life is. I’m not always able to maintain a balance, and I think that’s important for everyone to know about. We’re always learning, and that’s something that I also had to learn — that I’ve got to be brave enough to learn. Learning in public is so humiliating sometimes… Do I feel more balanced in my life than I ever have before? Um, probably yeah. But is that permanent? No. And I think being okay with that has put me in a bit of a better position.” Strong words to live by, to quote, to re-share, to tweet back to her, and see if she’ll respond.

You can read the original article HERE.

#the whole thing =)#taylor swift #interview #entertainment weekly #by taylor

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kaleid-tay-scope · 5 years

Text

New Reputation: Taylor Swift shares intel on TS7, fan theories, and her next era

Snakes begone. The 29-year-old superstar is back with a new album and a new outlook on life. We go inside the pop monarch's latest chapter.

Alex Suskind

May 09, 2019 at 12:00 PM EDT

Peggy Sirota for EW

THE PALM TREES ARRIVED IN FEBRUARY, seven in all, set against a pastel blue backdrop with superimposed stars. It appeared that a new Taylor Swift era was upon us — that the old happy-go-lucky Taylor was not, in fact, dead. Or did it? It was only an Instagram photo, just one more picture in an infinite content scroll. But it also came from a pop star known for prodigious hint-dropping, whose fans turn every piece of info into an online archaeological dig.

You Might Like

Amy Poehler and Maya Rudolph on How To Be a Wine Snob

#Taylor Swift Entertainment magazine #Taylor Swift ts7 #hottttttt #hottty swift #ME!

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blauregen · 6 years

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fav ♀-releases in 2018 (in no particular order)

so, since i started this list like this last year too, here we go: i know little to nothing about music, i have weird (may i say b a d) taste and my reasonings are - as expected from a subjective list - Super personal ,, also i dont follow every female k-artists so there are definitely blind spots for me too! that said ... LETS GET GAY! LETS GO LESBIANS!

Wind (바람 ) - Heize

suprise surprise, its Heize again. i was rarely this excited about a comeback this year as i was about Wind ... i adore this mini. i really love Heize’s voice, especially now that she is playing around with rapping And singing more than ever, its just ,, i hear her voice and i just, immediately calm down and feel a warm glow in me rising and --- this is getting really cheesy, isn’t it.

my fav tracks have to be Sorry and wish you well (feat. DAVII), however i can listen to this whole album without a problem - of course Jenga as the title was amazing as well, Dahye’s voice works really well with Gaeko’s as well. additionally i loved the ~design for this album, the photoshoot is stunning and the whole aesthetic is very much up my alley.

AND SINCE WE R ALREADY TALKING ABOUT DAHYE:

+ First Sight (첫눈에) - Heize

as expected, i love her winter single release as well. again, a Lovely mixture of her singing and a solid very groovy amazing rapping part. i did like her mini a lot more lyricwise (lots of it is really sad but Sorry has such smart lyrics!!!), however as a “”simple”” winter release that is meant to fit this season, this is amazing.

...... also have i mentioned how Beautiful she is, jfc.

Deine - Ha:tfelt

Oh Boy. Here we go.

this is hands-down my Favorite Release of this whole year. i don’t know if its clear, but i adore yeeun. i adore her as the person park yeeun, who is an activist and very outspoken about her position of a woman in the industry, her experiences in one of the most successful girlgroups Ever, her views on feminism and sexism, the fact that she collabed with a drag organizer for her exhibition, etc etc etc. however, i also love yeeun as Ha:tfelt and adore her music. Pluhmm is such a sensual, fun and soft and yet strong song about her Own Desires and a woman that Wants to flirt and be in love and have fun and Be sensual and its so so so lovely and warm and playful and confident? i died a little at the MV because Ha:tfelt is a Woman and is portrayed as such, she is sensual and sexy and its portrayed by yeeun dancing around a flat in the sexiest dress and feeling herself and. its just Wonderful. so wonderful. i love her. Cigar is super touching too, very smooth and slick and polished and yet it has a vulnerable touch to it and is just ,, such a good song ....... thank u yenny.

Warning - Sunmi

ANOTHER AMAZING WOMAN. if i had to choose a soloist that is more active and actively promotes and performs on music and award shows etc, i’d definitely go for Sunmi. first of all: sunmi is outstandingly hardworking, talented, tough, brave, but also so so so kind and sweet and self-aware (seriously her twitter account is my social media highlight of this year, she is beyond ADORABLE and wonderful and funny) and of course she is fucking beautiful. this album is AMAZING - i can listen to the whole tracklist without skipping a single song. i adore Siren (aesthetically its my favorite title track of hers, though i do think Gashina is a little more catchy, esp together with that choreo - but i Love Siren’s horror-esque MV with the, well, siren-mermaid-imagery, so good!) but personally my favorite SONGS are ADDICT and Black Pearl - both sound very different actually, one being completely in English, but it just shows how well Sunmi can pull of different styles. god ... have u seen her on stage? shes a m a z i n g.

KHAN - I’m Your Girl ?

I started following Euna and Minju already before they debuted ... but what really made me fall in love with both their voices, be it singing or rapping (cause both are quite good at both ,,) was their DNA cover! generally the fact that they keep posting really cool covers on their youtube channel is beyond lovely and these two really managed to make me like a version of DNA ... (probably my least favorite BTS title track, lmao ,,)

their actual debut was just lovely. the song is great, soothing and super smooth and groovy and easy to listen to, their voices are stunning in it, the MV is VERY GAY, the choreo is fun and their outfits for promotion stages were such a lovely fresh wind and i really enjoyed seeing them perform a LOT. i just really like that KHAN already is quite unique and m so so so looking forward to future comebacks!

BBIBBI - IU

no highlight list without Jieun. the lyrics to this track were solely written by her and it shows - IU is an outstanding songwriter, i adore her hard work and experience and talent. the sound of the track itself is fun and bubbly and groovy and Very catchy, but my highlight is how this conflicts so beautifully with the lyrics that are quite ... critical and rough and basically show a very very sweet lovely middle finger to the rumour-netizen-culture around her ,, i am super excited for future full releases from jieun, though i still listen to Palette a lot and think she should take all the time she needs!

Bad Boy - Red Velvet

sadly, i didnt not really enjoy Red Velvets later release this year and neither did i really dig their summer release, but what i do adore to the moon and back is their The Perfect Red Velvet - The 2nd Album Repackage, though thats a lil bit of cheating since i already mentioned their Perfect Velvet album last year ,,

Bad Boy is my favorite title track of theirs this year, the styling is OUTSTANDINGLY GOOD MY GOD and the sound is just, smooth and cool and sexy and just ... damn.

also, Red Velvet definitely has some of my favorite jacket photoshoots of this year, the quality and beauty of their photos is amazing, i could spend hours just looking at those ......... and maybe i did.

What Is Love? - TWICE

the nations girl group powered through this year and released so many catchy awesome songs that i had a hard time choosing one ,, but What Is Love is definitely my MV highlight of the year and also the song itself is so so fun and lovely and cheerful and just makes me feel happy ... thank u for making me happy, TWICE!

You And I - Dreamcatcher

i have to admit: Dreamcatcher is not really my sound. their tracks remind me a little too much of Very Loud Stressful Anime Openings, so i accept that its just not my music taste ,, HOWEVER i actually really really like You and I. the song is very catchy and has this one part right before the chorus that i really love, its a very cool mysterious “dark” awesome track. moreover though i love the Whole Package that is Dreamcatcher (again, this horror-esque style of theirs is Really Up My Alley) - their styling and choreos are so clever and SEXY and goth-y and different, its just so fucking fun to watch them perform, especially the Choreo to You and I is so so so so so cool!

(also they r somewhat of a lesbian cult and m Very Appreciative of that, my god.)

LOOΠΔ - just, the whole thing.

SO - it took me until this year to really get into Loona. i knew them beforehand and was intrigued by the unique pre-debut “schedule” that their company was doing and checked out some songs but never got into them deeper. however, this year i truly listened to the Broad Amazing Variety that Loona offers and i just Have to include them here. all the girls and the subunits are super interesting and diverse and i love how especially the solo songs all sound different and lots of things were tried out and the AESTHETICS ARE OFF THE CHARTS. their full group debut was a little too ... they played it too ~safe for my taste, however i still adore lots of LOONA songs and can only recommend them!

(my favs are So Boring, i love Egoist and Heart Attack and Singing in the Rain and New and ... i’ll get back to this once i develop an actual Interesting opinion lmao)

i Can’t possibly end this list without some honorable mentions, because girls are amazing:

- (G)I-DLE are amazing rookies and performers and just such an awesome new girlgroup. Soyeon’s stage presence is just ,, wow, she is such a good rapper and performer, but the other girls are also so amazing and m so glad they are so successful and loved so far. favorite track of this year is def HANN (Alone), though all their songs are mighty good.

- Oh My Girl. maybe i dont listen to their songs as much but m in deep love with their visuals and stages and man ... call me, Yooa, please, m free almost every night.

- fromis_9 had such a cute quirky hyper Love Bomb comeback, i loved it!

- Momoland similarly had such catchy fun songs, i gotta mention them too!

- Hyuna - i love Hyuna and i wish her all the best and happiness and love and success and i hope to see her on stage again soon! (i especially loved her in Triple H, since i was actually quite a fan of that trio and the retro funky sound they went for ...... big sigh @ cube)

- Yubin ... again, not really my sound, but man. kill me Yubin, just do it, cmon.

- EXID is back to OT5! m so happy!!! I Love You was really fun, but I definitely enjoyed DDD last year more ,, but i still wanted to mention them, such a fun, diverse, different girlgroup that offers lots of different sounds and visuals and stands out to me a lot, so so good!

- Chungha ... m still in the process of falling in love with Chungha but oh god .... have u seen her? her dancing skills are out of this world, her beauty is stunning, she is so so sweet and kind and tough and her songs m so eager to properly discover and also a rly niche point but: I LOVE HER ALBUM DESIGNS SO SO SO MUCH.

- Minseo is another new amazing soloist ,, i discovered her at first through my fav photographers instagram (@ mu_gung) who took just. outstanding pics of Minseo but i also Adore her voice and she has done Amazing covers as well, her Why So Lonely is my absolute favorite and id dare to say i like it just as much as the original ... check her out, her MV visuals and concepts are Super interesting and beautiful and fun as well!

and many many many many more that i missed or forgot!

just know: girls are the best.

#heize #hyuna #ha:tfelt #iu #exid #yubin #momoland #oh my girl #gidle #loona #dreamcatcher #red velvet #sunmi #minseo #chungha #text

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mywild · 5 years

Text

New Reputation: Taylor Swift shares intel on TS7, fan theories, and her next era

-Taylor Swift for Entertainment Weekly (x)

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makistar2018 · 5 years

Link

Peggy Sirota for EW

New Reputation: Taylor Swift shares intel on TS7, fan theories, and her next era

Snakes begone. The 29-year-old superstar is back with a new album and a new outlook on life. We go inside the pop monarch's latest chapter.

By Alex Suskind May 09, 2019

Entertainment Weekly

#taylor swift #entertainment weekly #2018.08.18 #2019.05.09 #ts7

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latinalesbi · 6 years

Note

I’m new to the fandom. Please clear this up. Are you a blog about the characters or about the actresses, or both? Do you know Teri & Sherri personally or are these your opinions & others’ opinions & actual insight? Do you have any objective criticism you’d like to share, regarding Teri and/or Sherri’s acting abilities? There seems to be a lot of fans that believe these 2 people are perfect. In my opinion, I think part of the fandom has confused the characters with the actors. Thanks

qI am a blog about Stef and Lena and Teri and Sherri, mostly as they relate to each other. I am not really interested in every minutia of their career. I do not know either personally and my opinions are my own. I have accurately predicted the show in the past because of keen observation.

I have in the past criticized acting when I think it deserves it. I think they are generally terrific actresses with much more talent than anyone else on The Fosters. I think people in general tend to confuse the characters with the actors. That is why I will always be primarily a fan of characters because people aren’t perfect and they make mistakes.

I thought Sherri did a mediocre job with the intimacy through most of season 1a. I have also objected when I detect more Teri than Stef. I do think they are quality people who upheld the integrity of the characters as much as they could.

Anonymous said: The only Callie we acknowledge is Calliope Iphegenia Torres

I mean, sure, I wasn’t a fan but you do you!

Anonymous said: I have to agree with the "disgruntled fan" about Teri. She did not bother with fans on twitter for a long time and then all of a sudden when she wants some money we are "family and friends". It will be interesting to see that once she has raised the money if she disappears again.

I tend to think it’s more about the show being over but we shall see. I didn’t spend my money on her “friend” so I am glad she came back because I got some fun Sherri Polo interaction.

Anonymous said: PP: ‘We told pretty brave stories on The Fosters, but there's no moms to save the day. There's no one telling you it's going to be OK. You have to go find somebody who sees you and gets you to support you on that journey," Paige tells us. "That freed us up for them to make bigger mistakes, have bigger victories, surround themselves with people on similar journeys. I am so excited what this soup cooked up to be." Dumping the moms freed them up- he is such an ass I tell you, worst of the 3 stooges

I can’t stand him. The thing is, shouldn’t the mom’s journey have been as exciting. They’re free from their parents too. They could be having big victories too. I wish they were honest and just say we wanted young women being sexy because the network things that’s what sells.

Anonymous said: Logging off all things The Fosters,Stef & Lena etc for the next few weeks. The 1st ep of their new show will do well, people will be intrigued. The pushing of the guest appearances as if they are happening straight off the bat helps them no end. Still wish Teri &Sherri had said no to appearing, hate them being a side show. It still feels so underhand what went on. The rest of the cast deserved much better. They didn’t appreciate Teri&Sherri and bet they kicked themselves after Noah got popular.

I have isolated myself well on social media. I barely interact right now anyway. I am pretty busy. Oh, I am certain that Freeform regrets the day they offered those two the show and not Noah. It makes me laugh. After seeing that clip, I can’t blame Teri and Sherri for wanting to work together again, but I can’t help thinking it would have been better if they hadn’t contributed.

Anonymous said: The promo for Good Trouble is so contrived. You’ve got the interviews with the creators and Cierra and Maia sort of airbrushing the Fosters out of your mindset- Good Trouble a new show etc. Compare this with Freeform purposely promoting episodes containing the guest appearances that are actually weeks away from airing, its hilarious. I mean of course they would do it, why not, but it’s just funny. Watch Noah get multiple episodes next season if he’s free(they’re guaranteed a 2nd season it’s FF)

Freeform is ridiculous, they keep promoting people who aren’t on the show. This amount of guests on a brand new show can only dilute the so called main characters, as yet unknown to the fans. They did this with the fosters in latter seasons but we cared intensely about them from the first season alone. I don’t see Noah agreeing to anything much next season. I am sure he’ll be busy.

Anonymous said: Did you ever watch Life Unexpected on the CW? I loved it. The cast behind the scenes was what I believed the Fosters cast to be. I still follow some of them on IG and they all catch up all the time, young and old, it’s really sweet. I doubt this will happen with The Fosters cast. It’s really sad. Even our harmonious little fandom online got split down the middle. Brallie fans got baited, Stef and Lena fans sidelined etc. Long live seasons 1 and 2 the good olde days 😜

I have not.k I don’t really watch much tv. Yeah, I think people didn’t walk away from the show with a good feeling and that’s mostly because of this spin off. Yuck.

Anonymous said: Thanks for keeping us updated. Not watching any of the spin off. I’d probably enjoy it but I just can’t bring myself too. Anything Peter and Bradley are involved in now is just bleugh to me. I’ll wait for your YouTube clips :) Let’s hope we get some new projects from our favs this year and say goodbye to the sh*tshow it all became. Jx

Yes worry not, Stef and Lena scenes will be available through my youtube or here. You won’t miss a thing. Like, not much will make sense because I am not watching the show, but just seeing teri and sherri together will be a treat.

#gt #Anonymous

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citruspeel · 6 years

Text

to gold be the gory

How Golden Kamuy Outshines Competition

A Review

“GORUDEEEEEEN KAMUUUUUUY!”

That’s how I first heard of Golden Kamuy – a male voice screaming its title in around 2-minute intervals. I was busy slurping ramen in the communal eating tent in Odori Park when it blared in my ear. All through the day, they played its trailer on the tent TVs over and over again. It seemed interesting, and it was quite apt to see it being promoted there - after all, we were surrounded by snow, in Hokkaido, where the story was set. I kept seeing it in bookstores and its artwas eye-catching. But as soon as I was back on home soil, my interest was gone.

Life caught right back up with me, so I forgot about Golden Kamuy completely. Not until I saw some artists I follow post amazing fan art of it on Twitter. They were all singing it praises and the official art was beautiful, so I thought, ‘aw heck, why not?’

Let me tell you: there are no reasons not to.

SUGIMOTO, THIS ISN’T SHOUNEN ANYMORE

I’m what you call a…sporadic manga reader. I’m not up to speed with manga trends and it can take me a while to catch up. I read stuff that get my attention and when they’re recommended by my friends (I still haven’t touched Boku no Hero Academia or Shokugeki no Soma, though). I also don’t limit myself to just one genre. There are months that I devour shoujo/josei manga, like Hana Nochi Hare and Dame na Watashi ni Koi wo Kudasai. Then I’d switch over to read through volumes upon volumes of shounen manga (hi, Gintama, Haikyuu). Then there are periods wherein I just don’t read at all, devoting my time to other activities instead.

Golden Kamuy, brainchild of artist Noda Satoru, is probably my first real foray into the seinen manga territory. The art, the storyline, the comedy, the stakes – every page told me that I wasn’t reading shounen anymore. Dick jokes weren’t dealt with caution. Gore was done with no shame. Raw Japanese scans didn’t have the hiragana reading aids. Strangely enough, it brought me back to all the titles I used to read when I was young. It made me realize all the stuff I was reading back then were very edgelord-esque and middle-school-syndrome-ish - the stuff of nightmares. Body horror, violence, gore, debauchery – CLAMP and Kaori Yuuki had primed my teenage self for all of them.

But at least, now, the edginess was dealt with a more mature hand.

Hence it was no surprise that Kamuy ignited a sense of familiarity. I had mellowed down when I grew up (it saddens me that I really am quite a grown-up now) and, in turn, settled for fun, cheerful, romantic manga (to keep the dreariness of everyday life away, I guess haha). I got used to leisurely pacing and lighthearted comedy. Reading Golden Kamuy felt like I skydived into the unforgiving arena I had left – an arena that had been made fresher, better.

SO FRESH, YOU’RE EATING IT RAW

What makes Kamuy an instant hit is its interesting combination of rarely-used elements. Post-War, Meiji-Era historical, early 1900s, hunting, Hokkaido, Ainu culture: can you really find another title that uses said mix? It’s no wonder people are attracted to the series.

It also helps that the art is just spectacular. Noda’s artistic skill shines through every page, chapter, and volume cover. His poses are dynamic, his coloring brave. Sometimes the color combinations he uses just scream modern, serving as nice contrasts to the story’s historical, traditional setting. His character designs are unique and fresh – more so their personalities. Sugimoto’s facial scars are refreshing to the eye; Tsurumi’s half-corrupted face paired with a metal plate is a design I’ve never seen before. His art style brings out his designs to life in a way only he can – we’ve all seen cross-dressing men and shaved-bald convicts before, but still he was able to make Ienaga and Shiraishi look striking.

The research that he has done to make the story believable is commendable. He even has his own Ainu and Russian language consultants. Each detail he adds in shows that every page is a product of hard work. He even features real buildings in Hokkaido and Otaru (I’ve also been to Otaru and it was nice to see it in the manga!). The information we learn from Noda’s usage of the Ainu culture, hunting practices, and military details – all of this, weaved in with an intricate, explosive plot, give us a series that feels…whole. Complete.

Kamuy also spreads word about the Ainu culture in a fun and entertaining way. I haven’t heard a lot about them in the series I’ve encountered – I’ve only heard of them through Rurouni Kenshin. Nothing since then. To see them in the spotlight is a breath of fresh air. Even the Ainu themselves feel the same way – apparently they told Noda that they didn’t want to be portrayed as discriminated anymore. They wanted strong Ainu characters, and boy, did Noda deliver.

NO-PARDON PLOTTING

Because of its seinen status, you can tell that Noda has no qualms about plotting and story structure. We’re given heavy-hitting story elements right off the bat: war vet undertakes a legendary treasure hunt to help the (stolen-by-his-friend) love of his life, requiring him to track down 24 of the most dangerous insane criminals to have ever walked Japan. It’s throwing punches right from the get-go. Kamuy doesn’t baby anyone (except for bear cubs). With its pacing, convoluted plot and bevy of interesting characters, it challenges the reader to not just enjoy, but to keep up. It’s unapologetic in everything that it does – character, story, and art.

CHARACTERS

Immortal War Vet, Morality Pet Minority Action Girl, Escape Sweet-tooth King, and so forth. They somehow fulfill stereotypes but at the same time, Noda manages to twist things to a whole new light. His milieu, too, aids in solidifying the characters he writes – the setting itself makes them unforgettable.

It is also in his cast that we see how unapologetic Noda is. Considering that Sugimoto is to track 24 of the most dangerous criminals in the country, Noda doesn’t shy away from showcasing every kind of evil that can exist within humans. We tackle lust, greed, wrath, and avarice with a dash more reality compared to the caricatures we often see in shounen manga. Those faint of heart and innocent countenance will have a hard time stomaching Noda’s cast as it unfolds. The more I read, the more I believe Noda probably has a subscription to the Crime Investigation channel (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing). Truth be told, humans are very much capable of evil, and I’m not surprised that some of his villains are actually modeled after real-life criminals.

Notable characters:

IENAGA - a cross between Erszebet Bathory (a countess who was known to kill virgins and bathed in their blood to remain beautiful) and of H.H. Holmes, a real-life owner of an actual murder hotel in the US during the 19th century. Ienaga’s first dungeon appearance made me flashback to some of mangaka Kaori Yuki’s ornate gorefests such as Count Cain, Angel Sanctuary, and Ludwig Revolution. Noda felt no shame when he drew each and every one of Ienaga’s murderscapes.

HENMI KAZUO – this one really made me blink when I was reading it. Serial killer Henmi Kazuo is an exploration of the depths of human depravity. Imagine, being stimulated by gore and the act of clinging to life the same way his brother did when a bear ate him. Damn, writing that sentence made me realize Noda just straight up doesn’t baby his audience. This is the stuff Netflix series Mindhunter would kill to have. This also would really need some real guts (pardon the pun) to execute.

SHITON – he also made me stop in my tracks. Shiton, a full-on bestiality-practicing scientist, was something I’ve never read about in any other manga at all. I’ve read about murderers and criminals and incestuous personalities (Kaori Yuki and George RR Martin weren’t shy about it at all), but this character was just sick. He’s a special type of crazy (although to be perfectly honest I am sure that somewhere in the world some sick human is partaking in stuff like this), and for Noda to actually use him in his manga just takes courage. He just has the balls to make you think twice, but hey, when you’re in seinen territory, everything seems to be a free-for-all. And let’s be real frank here – there’s just another level of human debauchery in real life that most people won’t even be able to stomach hearing about.

TSURUMI – Tsurumi is the stuff of legend. He reminds me the most of Col. Hans Landa in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds, but with his insanity turned up into eleven. He also has shades of Leonardo’s character in Django Unchained, as well as other manic-type ‘villains’ that we’ve seen in other series. But his impulsiveness and flamboyant nature places him a cut above the rest. Noda also draws him so dynamically (seriously!) that whenever he appears, your eyes are just drawn to him.

Plus, I have to say that I’m really impressed with the level of real-world research that Noda uses in developing his characters. Tsurumi says that he has lost a part of his frontal lobe, which in turn affects his temper and his violent tendencies. This is actually true in real life, and has been seen in a high-profile murder case involving a famous football player in the United States. Because of the repetitive head injuries that the player received playing the sport, his own personality/temper had changed, and resulted him in killing his girlfriend in cold blood.

Of course we have the holy trinity of Sugimoto (classic lovable romantic badass war vet protagonist), Asirpa (butt-kicking girl-child) and Shiraishi (adorable slinky/comic relief), all gems in their own right. Noda has endeared them to us with the heartwarming dynamic between Sugimoto + Asirpa, plus Shiraishi’s antics. Character-wise, they seem to follow a specific trio formula that works in almost anything. Harry-Hermione-Ron, Gintoki-Kagura-Shinpachi, Naruto-Sakura-Sasuke. While his main character trio wins people over, his supporting cast can also shine bright on their own. Some great examples that come to mind are Ogata, Tanigaki, and Monkey-Scream Guy Otonoshin (even Tsukishima is memorable! He even has the Voldemort nose, doesn't he?).

Noda’s principle of mixing reality with caricature is also evident in his character designs. With every cast member we meet, it’s clear that Noda is far from being a sufferer of the six-faces-only syndrome. His designs do sometimes border on the impossible (Monkey-Scream guy’s eyebrows, really?), but it’s not a bad thing. If anything, it makes the visual experience of reading the comic even more worthwhile.

THE ART

Noda is a great manga artist. Let’s start with that.

Just look at these covers!

This coloring + color schemes!

This character design!!

I’ve been raving about his character designs for a few paragraphs now but it’s just really that good. I love his eye for composition and his impeccable framing for action and comedy. I’ve always thought that framing comics need special planning – especially action + comedy ones. You have to ensure that the first thing the reader sees in the next panel will make the action/joke understandable and clear. It takes great skill to decide what the reader sees and doesn’t see. Through Golden Kamuy’s 158 chapters, he makes use of this skill to make us laugh whenever Asirpa’s badgering them to make citatap, or when there’s a new animal part to eat, or when Tanigaki’s out showing nudes of himself to people. If the pages weren’t framed well, the jokes would’ve fallen flat. Let’s also not forget his adeptness in drawing facial expressions. This manga just does faces so well.

(Just look at Asirpa! collage c/o the Golden Kamuy reddit)

His fight scenes are also top-notch. You just know that Noda, as a mangaka, isn’t knocking about. The flow of action in every page is just downright superb. It also shows his mastery of human anatomy – and his courage when it comes to gore. His use of crisp blacks and whites, solid lineart, thick, expressive color give us pages that are fresh and clean...I’d be a fool to dismiss his technique, because his (and his studio’s, I guess?) skill just shines through every page.

He’s also not shy when it comes to details – which is admirable. After all, it takes some great dedication for someone to give his main character distinct facial scars that will require repeated drawings in almost every single page (and give his heroine a detailed headband). It makes me wonder just how he does it with a weekly schedule. His color pages look like they were done digitally, but I still have doubts whether or not he does his chapters by hand.

THE HEART

It took me just a few days to wolf down Kamuy. It was a romp right from the start – nail-biting, stomach-clutching, hair-raising. A truly entertaining piece, if you will. But if there’s one thing I’ve noticed with Kamuy, it’s that it somehow lacks heart.

Don’t get me wrong – it’s great! I love it. It’s superbly crafted, beautifully drawn, amazingly detailed. It’s one of the rare titles that I’m actually thinking of collecting. But it’s also a title that seems to drip technique. Like the author made it for the sake of drawing an intense, gripping title, but somehow solely for that purpose. It’s a career-conscious showcase of ability, a manufactured adventure in the truest sense. I couldn’t see the earnestness I found in Sorachi Hideaki’s Gintama, or the relatability of Nakahara Aya’s Dame na Watashi wo Koishite Kudasai. Full Metal Alchemist showed Arakawa Hiromu’s passion for muscled men, her interest in alchemy, and views on family, while Haruichi Furudate’s love for volleyball, sportsmanship and camaraderie is undeniable in Haikyuu!!. While I do like the backstory that Sugimoto is somehow based on his real-life war-vet grandfather, I find it a bit sad that it seems to lack that personal touch I’ve always liked seeing in other manga.

But it doesn’t mean that it’s not great. I will still recommend it to everyone I know. Awesome story, great art, refreshing comedy. By all means, read it! (Not sure about the anime, but I keep hearing reviews that we’re better off with the manga). Golden Kamuy is a title of both style and substance – whether it’s about the gore or the gold, I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.

Then let me know if you agree with my upcoming post, an analysis of Sugimoto and Asirpa.

Photos c/o reddit + our lovely scanlators + Satoru Noda

#Golden Kamuy #Sugimoto Saichi #Sugimoto the Immortal #Asirpa #Noda Satoru #Manga #Review

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my-little-yellowbird · 7 years

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Fangirl Asks...

I know, I know. This has taken me 5-ever to complete. Thank you to @bbcshipper , @elasticmonk , @fourteen-teacups @thatginchygal and @like-an-officer-and-a-sergeant for tagging me in this fandom questionaire. I really enjoyed doing it, and got kinda loquacious with my response. This is definitely worthy of a Reaad More break!

@bbcshipper asked:

1. How much do your real life friends/family know about your fandom life? My family knows, or think they know. Friends, nope. They know I’m a fan, but have no idea of the extent of my madness. I hold back with “normals.”

2. Have you ever embarrassed yourself fangirling? I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.

3. What’s a recurring theme of fanfictions of you OTP that you find annoying/dislike? Live and let live, and all, but I avoid nun smut.

4. What are some prompts/ideas you might want explored more in fanfic? (asking this one for some ideas, hope that’s okay!) I love fluff, of course, but I really enjoy fics that explore the real-world, ordinary problems and compromises that come with marriage.

5. What’s the meaning behind your tumblr name? There’s an Everly Brother’s song of the same name, and my Grandmother used to sing it to me. I commissioned an artist to make a stained-glass yellowbird and its become a sort of talisman.

6. Favorite moment(s) with your OTP? The hand kiss, the misty road, “What’s she like?” the so-sexy almost kiss in the tent, Teddy’s birth (I know. Don’t @ me. I complain about the story arc, but I’m not heartless)

7. How far would you travel to meet your OTP in real life? If I were to meet them IRL, I’d have to pretend I was someone else. I’m not good with worlds colliding.

8.Do you have a playlist for your OTP? (again, looking for ideas!) Sorry, not really. I’m terrible with playlists. There was an old Youtube video featuring Pink and Nate Ruess of “Just Give Me a Reason” that gets to me.

9. What about your real life would shock your OTP? Shelagh might find it odd that Patrick looks remarkably like Mr. Birdy.

10. What have you learned from being a part of the fandom? I’ve learned a great deal about how different people cope with anxieties.

11. What’s the best thing about your fandom? My friends.

@elasticmonk asked:

1. What was your first fandom? Call the Midwife is my first true-blue, throw-yourself-into-it fandom.

2. What’s your favorite thing about your main fandom now? People get me.

3. What is your main fandom? Turnadette (sorry--do people actually have others? jk)

4. Who is your favorite character of all time? I can’t think of one, honestly, but I’ll say Molly Weasley, because of the next question.

5. What three quality’s do you think you share with your favorite character (of anything)? Molly Weasley is devoted to her family, not afraid to love them and not let them get away ith nonsense, and brave enough to stand up for right.

6. Where would you like to see your OTP vacation and why? I’d like to see them at the beach in Torquay. If Shelagh could wear the yellow swimsuit with the white band across the top, that would be ideal. In fact, if they could live out any of my fics, I’d be a very happy bird.

7. What’s your favorite gif from your fandom? I don’t know how to post an annotated gif mid-post, so I’ll just describe it. It involves tiptoes, dancing, and a giant hand sprawled across a tiny back.

8. What’s your favorite picture from your fandom? NGL

9. Who was your first OTP? I guess I shipped Jo and Prof Bhaer as a kid?

10. When did you start your main fandom? I lurked through 2013 and into 2014. I was very wary of the internet world, so when I finally identified myself, my palms were sweaty! (My very first post was my first fic ever!)

11. AU or canon complaint fanfiction? Canon-compliant, but I will read AU if it’s done in a way that sheds a new light on the characters.

@thatginchygal asked:

1. What was the first fanfic you ever read? I can’t remember the first Call the Midwife fic I ever read. It was all such a blur!! But...I think the first ever fic-like thing I ever read was a published Star Trek novel by A.C. Crispin, entitled Ishmael. It was a mash-up of Star Trek and Here Come the Brides. So, so right.

2. What was the first fanfic you ever wrote (if any)? Not Listening

3. Your last text message is the title of your next fanfic. What is it (and a brief summary)?

“I got you a glow stick.” It was for a candlelight march. I wonder...now i may have to do some research into marches in London in the early 1960′s...Or reinterpret that text for an altogether different purpose...

4. Do you keep your fandom interests a secret from your RL family/friends?

No, it’s not a secret. At least, not generally. My feeling is, I have nothing to be embarrassed about, so if they want to see, then go look. If they have a problem with anything they see, that would be on them. Fortunately, their respect for my right to have something just for myself--added to a little bit of fear of what they might find--keeps them away.

5. What is one of your favorite scenes between your OTP? I think Im going to pick the almost kiss in the tent. It’s SoMarried!! and very sexy. But you know, add about 100 more scenes and I’m good.

6. Do you have a playlist for your OTP? Sorry, no.

7. Why do I suck at coming up with these questions?? You’re better than I am!

8. Would you want to live in the ‘world’ of your favorite fandom? Maybe visit? Probably not. I’m content to watch from here.

9. What is your favorite piece of fandom merchandise? Oh, this is so easy. I have the companion books to the series, a boatload of Nonnatun Holiday cards, my Yellowbird stained glass statue, but what I love the most are the crocheted Yellowbird my friend Soph made me, and the Yellowbird Christmas card Mushy sent me this year. It’s framed!

In the fall of 2015, a group of lucky Nonnatuns went to a CtM panel that featured Heidi Thomas, Stephen McGann, Jenny Agutter, Emerald Fennell and Dame Pippa Harris. A week later I recieved this promotional post card in the mail:

I have to admit, I was a little teary when I saw it, mostly because I was so touched that in the midst of their own fun, two friends had me in their thoughts. They told the panelists about me, and how their show had helped to build friendships. Everyone signed messages to me on the back. I’m pretty sure HT’s message included an invite to tea.

10. Have you ever drifted away from a fandom only to be sucked back in (perhaps by a new season or change of storyline)? Not really.

11. Do you prefer canon-compliant fanfic or AUs? Definitely Canon-compliant.

@fourteen-teacups asked:

1. How did you come to join your first online fandom? Blame Call the Midwife.

2. If your first fangirling obsession pre-dates access to fandoms, what was the show and/or your OTP? In college, a friend was a huge Start Trek fan. By default, I got interested (alas, not obsessed).

3. If your OTP came to visit you in your town (in present day) where would you take them? We have a lot of parks suitable for camping. I could take them there to see a lovely site, then bring them back to my house for a nice cuppa and fresh sheets.

4. What three things do you have in common with your favorite character?

5. What prop would you most like to have from your favorite show? (I borrowed this question from a behind the scenes CtM interview.) The photograph of the cricket team on the surgery mantle and Shelagh’s long-lost sunflower brooch.

6. Same question but for an article of clothing. I want the Tan Overcoat of Love.

7. Where would you like to see your OTP go on vacation and why? See Elasticmonk q6

8. Do you have a) multiple OTPs; or are you b) a one-OTP-at-a-time person? I have a great appreciation for many OTP’s, but for me, there can be only one.

9. In question 8, if you answered a) list your top three OTPs; if you answered b) what was the OTP you dropped for your current one?

10. If you lurked in your fandom before joining (or even if you didn’t), is there a fellow fan whom you consider “famous” in the fandom that makes you fangirl whenever they comment on your posts? I was desperate for @this-unruly-heart to notice me! One day she messaged me asking if I was the one who wrote a "Letters” fic that she loved.

11. Was there a particular person who was especially welcoming and/or helpful when you first joined your current fandom? Many of the Nonnatuns of old that were supportive of my early efforts have moved on to other things, but the boost they gave to my confidence was immeasurable. Oh, and Sarge, too!

@like-an-officer-and-a-sergeant asked:

1. When did you start taking part in fandom(s)? I dipped my toe into the Star Trek fandom back in the late 1980′s. A dear friend was a huge fan, and her enthusiam was contagious. Sadly, she died in December 1988, and I had to leave fandoms behind. Then, in 2005 we moved away from the very close world we had built, and I was lonely. I started to look around for period dramas to watch and stumbled upon North and South. I was unbelievably grateful it wasn’t the old Civil War mini-series, and I started to read everything I could find. I came across C-19, and found fanfic as I now know it. As much as I enjoyed it though, I wasn’t ready to participate as anything other than a lurker until Call the Midwife came along.

2. Which fandoms? Sorry, I think I answered that in th eprevious response

3. How long did you stay? Ibid

4. Did you write fanfics? Yes, although sometimes I need a kick in the butt to make sure it doesn’t become a past tense thing.

5. Any memorable funny event in your fandoms? So many ridiculous things have happenned here. Hiatus Challenges, Limericks (!!!), Twitter responses (remember when HT used to answer our questions? Flat/house! Names!), Nonnatun Holiday Card Exchanges...It seems that the funniest things would come out of nowhere.

6. Did you get long-time friends? (even as Real People)? Definitely. There are people I have met here that I feel I know as well or better than people IRL. And one poor soul has had to bear meeting me in person and somehow still continues to be my friend.

So here are my questions.

How has fangirling made an impact in your life?

What makes fangirling most worthwhile to you?

What have you learned about yourself by being a part of a fandom?

I tag: @elasticmonk @thatginchygal @fourteen-teacups @like-an-officer-and-a-sergeant @lovetheturners @hihereami @pellucidthings @gabolange @missouiser @ilovemushystuff @it-is-bugs @crinklybrownleaves @majsmom @missbergmans @miss-ute @snoopctm @mg-bsl381 @turnt4turnadette @cooldoyouhaveaflag @eatapinkwafer @weshallc @westcoastwilma @skerri @beatrix-franklin @alice1nwond3rland @sincerelygeertje @silentkw @flyingnonny @anamarialujan @purple-roses-words-and-love @bloghey131313 @poplarpatience @soibhanmannion @kaguyahime1224

and anyone else who sees this. My fingers are tired.

#fandom asks

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frontproofmedia · 3 years

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Gervonta Davis Scores 11th Round TKO Over Mario Barrios

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Published: June 27, 2021

ATLANTA (June 27, 2021) – Gervonta “Tank” Davis, one of the biggest stars in all of boxing, put on a career-defining performance Saturday night live on SHOWTIME PPV from the award-winning State Farm Arena in Atlanta, scoring a scintillating 11th round TKO over the previously-undefeated Mario Barrios to capture the WBA Super Lightweight Championship in the action-packed Premier Boxing Champions event. Watch the stoppage HERE: https://twitter.com/ShowtimeBoxing/status/1409005436347588612

“I made it tough. I definitely could have made it easier but I went up two weight classes and I got the job done,” said the 26-year-old Baltimore native, who was headlining his second SHOWTIME PPV. “I hit him with some clean shots, but I’m the type of fighter that wants to catch you with clean shots. I don’t just want to throw any type of shot. The shots I was throwing were missing, but eventually, I caught up with him.”

In a fight that lived up to its potential, Davis and Barrios combined to put on an unforgettable main event in front of a sold-out crowd of 16,570. After a slow opening four rounds in which Davis landed just 11 punches, the fight produced fireworks beginning in the fifth round. In the eighth round, “Tank” sent “El Azteca” to the canvas for both the first and second times of his career. First, Davis connected on a sweeping right hook that sent the former champion to the canvas. Moments later, a straight left hand by Davis dropped Barrios again. The brave Barrios rose to his feet, surviving Davis’ attempts to finish him in the eighth.

With International Boxing Hall of Famer and promoter Floyd Mayweather encouraging Davis in his corner, the southpaw came out rejuvenated in the eleventh round, realizing that the fight could be close on the scorecards. “Tank” dropped Barrios for the third time in the fight, this time with a left uppercut to the body. The bloodied Barrios rose again, only to be greeted with another barrage of punches from Davis. Referee Thomas Taylor stepped in to stop the fight at 2:13 of the eleventh round.

“I knew for sure if I catch him, I’m crackin,” Davis told SHOWTIME’s, Jim Gray. “So I caught him, and it showed. My coach was telling me to go to a jab style but I’m a southpaw so they know I’m going to that jab side. So I would try and bait him in. I faked like I was going left, and I threw my right. And my hook over top, and that’s where I caught him.”

In the final six-and-a-half rounds, Davis landed 85 punches. He landed 45 percent of his power punches (82/182), while Barrios more than held his own, out-landing Davis in six of the ten completed rounds.

“I knew he was hurt. I just had to catch him at the right time,” Davis continued. “Floyd [Mayweather] came to me and was honest and said I was down,” continued Davis, who was actually ahead on all three judges’ scorecards at the time of the stoppage. “So he said ‘show me that you’re great.’ And you know how we do it in the doghouse, baby!”

With the victory, Davis now holds world championships in three different divisions simultaneously, a feat only accomplished by a few other fighters in history, including Henry Armstrong and Canelo Alvarez.

“He has the potential to be one of the greatest ever,” said Mayweather. “When I first met ‘Tank’ when he was 14 or 15 years old, I told him I’d make him a world champion. And that you’ll be one of the best someday. I’m proud of him.”

“I’ve never been a hater. Congrats to ‘Tank’,” said Barrios. “He came here and did his thing. It was nothing short of an exciting fight and that’s exactly what both of us predicted. He was the better man tonight, but I’ll definitely be back.

“’Tank’ is explosive. He caught me slipping and it’s boxing. At the end of the day, one punch can change the fight. That’s exactly what I felt happened. Congrats to him.” In a back-and-forth co-main event, Orlando's Erickson "Hammer" Lubin (23-1, 17KOs) overcame some adversity to score the most important victory of his career over former unified world champion Jeison Rosario (20-3-1, 14KOs). The WBC No. 1-ranked contender at 154 pounds, Lubin scored a sixth-round KO (1:42) in the WBC Super Welterweight Title Eliminator. Watch HERE: https://twitter.com/ShowtimeBoxing/status/1408985806715371523

“I just followed the game plan,” said the 25-year-old Lubin, who improves to 6-0 since suffering the only loss of his career to 154-pound kingpin Jermell Charlo. “I would just go back to my corner after each round and Coach [Kevin] Cunningham and my team would just say, ‘Stick to the jab. Stay consistent with your jab.' I’m way faster than him and I knew he had good power and he was trying to counter me. So I would fade him out and use my jab consistently.”

In the third round, Lubin nearly put an early end to the action with a huge frame that had Rosario on the back foot. In the closing moments of the round, Lubin landed a right hook that had Rosario wobbling back to his corner after the bell rang. Miraculously, in the next round, Rosario was able to recover and completely turned the tables, wobbling Lubin with a left jab.

The action turned up even more in the sixth round. Lubin, sensing that Rosario was susceptible to the body attack, landed a vicious left-right body combination that sent Rosario to his knees in what ultimately proved to be the turning point of the fight. Rosario, clearly hurt, was never able to recover and Lubin finished him off moments later against the ropes.

“I started to hurt him in the body as soon as the first round started,” the 2016 “Prospect Of The Year” Lubin said. “I started with the body and I saw him grunt. So I was able to hurt him to the body. I just wanted to distract him with the jab, then go downstairs. And I was able to get him out. I knew even if he got up after the knockdown that the fight was over. I know I’m a great finisher and I knew I was going to get him out of there as soon as I saw him drop.”

Lubin landed 44 percent of his power punches (80/288) and 20 of his landed punches were to the body. With the win, Lubin puts himself squarely in the picture for a second-world title opportunity.

“I want a shot at the world title next,” he said. “I want everyone at 154 pounds. I’m No. 1 in the WBC but I chose to fight Rosario. I don’t duck anybody. I want to say that I fought everyone in my division when I win the world title.”

“Right now, I feel so bad,” said Rosario. “There is no lesson to be learned yet, everything is so raw still. I lost again, and it’s so frustrating. I was convinced I was going to win. The fight started to turn in the second round. I was just trying to keep up and listen to my corner. Lubin is a great fighter. He deserved to win. I hope he enjoys his victory.”

On the biggest stage of his career, Dominican Republic’s Carlos Adames (20-1, 16 KOs) rose to the occasion, scoring a highlight-reel third-round knockout over the streaking Alexis Salazar (23-4, 9 KOs) in the second fight of the pay-per-view. The time of the stoppage was 2:59 of the third round. Watch the KO HERE: https://twitter.com/ShowtimeBoxing/status/1408973939129393157

In the eventful and decisive third round, referee Jim Korb deducted two points from Adames for excessive holding. However, Adames made certain that the point deduction would have no impact on the fight’s result. He dropped Salazar with a lead left hook flush on the chin, a punch that Salazar never saw coming. The 25-year-old Mexican was able to get back to his feet, but Korb called for the stoppage when it was evident that a dazed Salazar was unable to continue.

“I was in control the entire fight, and that’s what reduced him to turning around at times,” said the 27-year-old Adames. “I was working with the jab to the body at first so that was working, and then I came with the left hook. I did my job and followed my strategy from A to Z and was able to succeed the way I wanted to.

“The key moment of the fight was when I managed to disrupt his focus. Once I was able to do that then it was easy pickings for me.” "I was feeling good in there and I thought I was winning rounds,” said Salazar, whose 15-fight win streak was put to an end with one punch. “But he started grabbing me and that's when he got me with an uppercut. That swung the fight. I just have to get back to work and keep looking for more opportunities.” In the opening bout of the SHOWTIME PPV telecast, the hard-hitting Batyr Akhmedov (9-1, 8KOs) scored a TKO victory over former world champion Argenis Mendez (25-7-3, 12 KOs) in a 12-round WBA Super Lightweight Title Eliminator. Mendez suffered a right-hand injury and did not get off his stool to come out for the ninth round. The official time of the stoppage was 3:00 of round number eight. “The fight went as planned,” said Akhmedov, who overcame the first cut of his career over his left eye after an accidental head clash in the second round. “We were expecting a tough fight like that. I've been out of the ring for a long time, so I needed to get those rounds in. My plan is to fight for the world title next. We knew he would be uncomfortable to fight and tricky. He was headbutting and elbowing me. It was good experience for me.” In the battle of Olympians, it was Akhmedov who pressed the action and was far busier from the onset. He went to the body early and often, landing 57 body punches, wearing Mendez down as the rounds passed by. The 30-year-old Akhmedov landed 115 of the 306 power punches he threw, while the 34-year-old Mendez landed 84 of his 223 power punches, including just 13 body connects. At the time of the stoppage, Akhmedov was ahead on all three judges' scorecards. "Mendez is a tough guy who fights top fighters,” continued Akhmedov. “We knew it wouldn't be a walk in the park. When I hurt him, my corner was telling me to slow down and take my time before going for the knockout.” “I started feeling (injured) in the second and third round,” said a disappointed Mendez. “My knuckles were broken and I couldn’t throw a punch anymore after I cut him with my right hand in the first round. I tried to keep fighting from the fourth round on, but to no avail. It was useless.” With the win, Akhmedov keeps himself in the running for top fights in the deep 140-pound division. Mendez drops to 2-4-2 in last eight fights.

(Featured Photo: Amanda Westcott/Showtime)

#HF #Gervonta Davis #Mario Barrios #Mayweather Promotions #Showtime Sports #WBA

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astorytellerforthatgirl · 7 years

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Bonding with “Ate Santa Claus”: A Maine’s Fan Generous Heart

I am a former silent fangirl of Maine since 2016 until she released the Open Letter. Recently around 3rd week of January 2018, I decided to be vocal about my support for Maine. Fangirling online is not a new thing for me so I am already familiar how to be objective, positive, and happy with my words. Rule of thumb is “Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate.” It worked for me all the times so I applied it as well here for the fandom of Maine.

I started tweeting first and I created this dedicated fangirl blog entry for Maine. Few fans immediately appreciate my written works for the Phenomenal Star. What warms my heart is the joy and gratitude I am feeling whenever I write about Maine are the emotions they felt too when they read my blog entries or tweets. I continued doing this regardless of how varied my ideas are and how sudden these topics crossed my mind. When a writer like me is not silenced by my thought and heart, it means I have to write it down. Hence, this Tumblr blog becomes the platform for all the things I want to say about Maine.

Almost a month after I am vocal about my support for Maine, an unexpected DM (direct message) in Twitter caught me by surprise. A fan of Maine randomly sent this message:

“Hello ganda good morning, I saw your post, dont get offended ha but I wanted to give you a gift sana. A Microsoft tablet RT, with detachable keyboard. Ung specs nia oarang ipad 4th generation. Its a refurbished unit :).. natutuwa kasi ako how you love Meng so much.” [sic]

I did not know what to say. Even if I wanted to doubt, my gut feeling is loudly telling me she has a pure intention in giving that gift. Since I know how to read people’s aura either through words or pictures, it’s easier for me to separate the those with sincere intentions from a bogus. It’s a skill developed by keen and observant writers since I get inspiration from anything or anyone for my writing and not just what I feel.

I simply know I can trust her.

She sent the DM last 3rd of Feb, 2018 through my only Twitter account (@rj1421). She offered me if she can send the tablet via shipping or we can meet personally. I chose the latter because when she said she’s an OFW working in an Asian country, I know how costly the shipping fee for a letter alone on international borders so how much more for a tablet. She said she will come home to her family soon and we can meet in that time. I agreed to her suggestion.

March 10, 2018 was the designated date for meeting Ate Santa Claus. I need to use a pseudonym to respect her wishes of staying anonymous. I was excited for that day because it will be the first time for me to have a cafe bonding with a fan of Maine. I want to hear her stories too.

She is very concerned about me. Ate Santa Claus keeps on sending me reminders about the security protocol of her AirBnB accommodation. On the day itself, she texted me to say that I must notify her if I am already nearby. She stayed nearby the busy district of Timog Avenue and Tomas Morato. I grabbed the chance to take a picture of Bahay ni Kuya. Also I hoped I can see the boutique of Francis Libiran (renowned designer of Maine’s majestic princess-like gown in Tamang Panahon) as I went there. I didn’t know it was a private compound and appointments should be held first. Few more minutes after, I reach the accommodation where Ate Santa Claus stays.

As soon as I saw her, I immediately thought she is around my age. I’m around late 20s. I was surprised when she said she’s way older than my guess. She has a youthful vibe. And to use my mama’s words in observing people, “maaliwalas ang bukas ng mukha niya.” I felt comfortable in an instant because of her warm and sincere aura. I just knew it but it is more than just the smiles, a genuine character simply exudes an authentic aura.

We sat down in Coffee Bean to have more bonding time. I wanted to pay for my order but she told me she will take care of it. I did not feel meeting fan for the first time. What I felt in that moment is my own Ate came home to check on me. She is very caring even if she is not that much expressive.

I love our discussion about Maine. We are on the same page that Maine is the first Filipino mainstream celebrity we admire. Like me, she is also admires volleyball personalities. She shared her own story into which she said that she is thankful Maine reminded her that sometimes, we need to take care and decide for ourselves first. We cannot prioritize other things and people to the extent we are losing ourselves or we are just settling for mediocrity.

This story is about how she made a brave decision that I am sure most girls will not do. Ate Santa Claus told me she ended a long-time relationship. It is so long that you can round off the number to 10. She felt they are not growing anymore because as she continues to aim for new goals and development, they guy is complacent and settled with what he has for the past years. The guy even told her that she changed completely. I respect how she told me change is inevitable and what we can do instead is to change for good. They separated on a good note as the guy respected her decision too. Ate Santa Claus is already within the supposed marrying age that Filipino culture suggests but there she is, telling me she will not settle for less and with hesitations in her heart despite how long they have been together and even if their families from both sides are ready anytime for their big announcement. My respect for her deepen.

Another thing I admire about Ate Santa Claus is how much she loves her family. Like me, she wants to support her family in every possible way especially finances. Her heart is so huge that she did not mind allocating her salary for them and just keeping less for herself. OFWs really have a special spot in their hearts for their families. She wants to help them for as long as she can. I told her in the Bible, children who honors and respects their parents are favored and blessed by God.

To add more reminders from her, she told she wants to live her life to the fullest. This is why she balances her work and life experience. From time to time, she travels to different places. She is a wanderlust by heart. I was so amazed with all the local and international destinations she has been. She immersed in their culture too as she travels to connect more to the experiences more than what tourists want to do.

As our discussion went back to Maine, she told me that FUNgirling (haha sorry for the pun) should be FUN. It must not be stressful or problematic. We already have our own personal challenges and we should not add up the negativity to it. I laughed with her when she told me funny anecdotes about her fangirling to Maine. She told me she is not the type to socialize but here she is, inviting a Maine core fan group to practice a dance number in her airbnb accommodation for a fan-organized party. She invited me too to her place itself and I saw there the Maine fan core group cheering for Maine in ACTually. They were very, very nice too and it felt like a college reunion for me. As I was going home, two of them even accompanied me to the elevator. Little did I know that as soon as Maine herself thanked the SMU for their exclusive party for Maine, Ate Santa Clause with her Maine fan core group also celebrated there. I was like “Hala ate ang cuuuuute!! Dun pala yun pinapractice nila!! They need to wait first for Maine’s post before Ate Santa Claus can tell me it was for that party which they are practicing for.

Same like Santa Claus, I don’t like going to a crowd or a huge audience but she told me she just went to Broadway to see Maine, much to the laughter of her mom. haha! And recently she just shared how happy and worth it to be a part of the SMU birthday bash for Maine. Out of our love for Maine, we really do things we do not usually do before. Ganun talaga kapag pinahahalagahan mo. I love hearing all those stories about Maine from a fan whom I first met.

She grabbed the tablet and taught me the basics like how to detach the keyboard and how to use its stand. I am still amazed with this gift. Yes I know she is well off but as what I told Ate Santa Claus, not all those with the capacity to give has the willingness to give. Here she is, giving me the tablet wholeheartedly.

Sabi ko, “Ate how can I repay you?” She smiled, and said “Pay it forward”

I felt my tears forming at that moment. Thankfully my over-sized eyeglasses can cover my eyes. She has advocacy too and she wants me to continue doing my passion such as writing. In time, as she said, I will be able to help other people too. I planted her words in my heart so when the time comes I fell down again from failures and rejections, her words will be one of God’s assurance to remember my purpose.

I will never forget that day for sure. Two strangers become sisters because God used Maine to be our bridge. So this is how it feels like when huge core fan group becomes united that despite of the diversity, we can be one.

Ate Santa Claus. as soon as you read this blog entry, you may have already been back as an OFW. Thank you so much for sharing your personal and fangirling stories with me.

Just like you Ate Santa Claus, I will propel too in my career and passion as I support my family and strengthen my faith in God. And yes, I will continue reinforcing how much we all love Maine through God’s gift of storytelling in my heart, be it in creative writing or public speaking. Thank you po ulit from me, a happy kiddo RJ, your new little sister!

As for you Maine, look at what you have done. :) You become an instrument to remind us of the wonderful things Life has for us and to be always thankful to the Great Provider above. Thank you and God bless!

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#maine mainemendoza

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phoenix-inthe-fire · 7 years

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the things we do for love (makes it all the more sweet)

Kat decides to be brave.

Somewhere between her morning coffee and her lunch break Kat decides to be brave.

She browses plane tickets, hatches a half cocked plan like she does with everything in her life because she’s used to living spontaneously and in the moment.

“You’re insane!” Jane tells her later that night when she lets it slip that she’s thinking about leaving, “You just got a promotion, Kat, you can’t just leave.”

Sutton squints at them, eyes a little hazy because she’s had almost a whole bottle of wine. It’d been a hard day for her. “I think you should do it.”

Jane stares at her in betrayal as Kat points at her, “Yes! Thank you!”

Sutton merely shrugs at Jane, “I’d have done it for Richard.” She sighs sadly.

“You would not,” Jane grumbles, “You love your job too much.”

Sutton nods sagely and takes another sip of her wine, “But Kat doesn’t.”

Kat blinks, nods slowly, “I just want a change of pace.”

Jane looks like she wants to fight it more, Kat can see that she doesn’t quite understand, but then she sighs and lets it go because she trusts Kat to make her own decisions. “Alright,” She says eventually, “I’ll keep your office occupied while you’re gone,” She smirks.

And Kat guffaws as Sutton laughs and she knows they have her back no matter what.

She almost chickens out twice with buying the ticket.

She calls and hangs up and calls back and gets put on hold and before she knows it she’s spent two hours on something that shouldn’t have taken more than 15 minutes. Putting in her request for a vacation and finding someone to cover her department had taken her less time than it did to buy a ticket.

But then Adena calls her and they talk about nothing important but Adena’s voice is calming and so filled with longing that Kat finally books the ticket when they hang up.

Kat finds that bravery is a continuing choice. Because she has the time off and her affairs in order, has the ticket and a packed back but she stands in line at the airport for security and almost turns back.

What if Adena doesn’t want to see her? What if Kat had been reading into all their calls and texts and Adena just wanted to stay friends?

“Is this your first time going through TSA?” The voice startles her and Kat turns to see where it came from. It’s a blonde woman with large glasses and tired eyes. She’s carrying a singular backpack and her hair is an absolute mess atop her head but she looks excited.

“Yeah,” Kat laughs, thankful for the distraction, “First time sober at least. Is it that obvious?”

The woman laughs and Kat notices that her eyes are very blue, “Little bit. I’m Jenna by the way.”

Kat shakes her hand, “Kat. You heading to Paris too?”

Jenna laughs, eyes widening behind her thick frames, “Oh god no. California actually, to visit my girlfriend. I haven’t seen her in 8 months.”

Kat’s eyes go wide but Jenna eyes her calmly, “G-girlfriend?”

“Yeah,” Jenna shrugs her backpack higher up her shoulders, “Wanna see a picture?” Her smile is wide and Kat is nodding before she can even realize.

Jenna shows her her girlfriend, a tiny brunette with a lip and nose ring who stares at Jenna like she hung the stars in her sky, says her name is Shan and they met online.

“How do you do it?” Kat finds herself asking, “The distance.” She wondered what it must be like to fall for someone you’ve never personally met, be committed from so far away. She’s amazed at the idea of trusting someone so much and then it dawns on her that she never really worried about what Adena was doing with Coco. Not when Adena was calling her every night and telling her everything without a worry.

Jenna sighs and for a moment she looks much older than she should. “Lots of FaceTime calls, lots of texting. It’s hard, I’m not gunna lie, ‘cuz the time differences are ridiculous but I love her so much so if I have to watch her eat breakfast while I’m going to sleep then at least I’m the first thing she sees when she wakes up and she’s the last thing I see before I go to sleep.”

Kat blinks. “Wow. That’s- wow.”

Jenna laughs, “Too gay for you? Haven’t gotten that far in your own life journey?” She asks knowingly.

Kat laughs instead of freaking out and she’s proud of herself for it. “I’m on my way to Paris to see a girl I’ve only know for three months. She was supposed to be fixing things with her own girlfriend but.” Kat shrugs. She doesn’t know how to finish that sentence because even though they both knew why Adena left, all the possibilities of what they could be hung between them daily. They were constantly toeing the line between friends and something more and still getting to know each other in between.

Jenna grimaces, “Yikes, dude, that’s quite a situation you have on your hands.”

“Tell me about it,” Kat says with a roll of her eyes, “She’s the first girl I’ve ever had feelings for too.”

“Yeah,” Jenna says with a small smile, “Shan’s the first girl I’ve had feelings for too.”

“Really?” Kat asks curiously, “But you love her?”

Jenna bobs her head, “Everything I didn’t know I wanted in a partner, honestly, it kind of hit me out of the blue one day. She had told me she got asked on a date and I totally flipped, didn’t talk to her for like three days and holed up in my dorm room. It was horrible.”

Kat smiles, thinks about how her own feelings had hit her like a truck too. “Damn those pretty girls am I right?”

Jenna shakes her head in agreement, “Got us flying across the damn country. The things we do for love huh?”

Kat’s smile doesn’t dim a fraction. The things she did for love indeed.

Kat is sad to see Jenna go and she follows the girl on twitter and promises to DM her about what happens in Paris in exchange for having coffee when they both return to New York but she makes it through the rest of security and even finds her gate easily.

She feels calm as she boards the plane, excited even to see Adena again, no matter what waits for them after this.

When she gets off the plane in Paris, the air feels different, calmer even. She doesn’t even call Adena immediately, she finds a small cafe across from the airport and buys what she’s sure is coffee and a croissant. This trip is as much about her and her changing as it is about exploring this thing with Adena.

It isn’t until after she’s sent a selfie in the group chat and receives two back that she decides to finally call Adena.

“Kat,” Adena breathes when the line connects, always so pleased to hear from her, it makes Kat feel warm inside. She understands the feeling. “It’s so late in New York. Are you okay?”

Kat laughs, can’t really do much else to let the rush of emotions in her chest free, “I’m- I’m great actually.”

“That’s good, I am glad to hear it,” Adena sounds a little confused but none the less genuine, “To what do I owe this late night call?”

Kat grins, tilts back in her chair, “Do you remember when I called you drunk two nights ago and told you I wanted to be brave?”

Adena doesn’t respond for a second and Kat waits. “Yes,” She says finally, suspicious and hopeful all in one. Kat positively adores her.

“I’m in Paris.” Kat says, “Landed an hour ago actually. I decided to get some coffee and a-”

“This better not be a joke, Kat Edison.” Adena’s voice cuts in sharply, trembling even.

Kat softens immediately. “It’s not a joke, Adena, I really am here in Paris. I can drop you a pin if you don’t believe me.”

Adena inhales sharply and Kat hears a door slam before Adena is speaking again, “Yes, please do. I’m on my way to you.” and then she disconnects the call.

Kat is dutiful in dropping the pin and it makes her feel good that Adena is rattled by her presence, it makes Kat feel like whatever they have going on is something real and tangible and not just calls and texts and subtext.

Adena arrives quickly and her face is still caught in awe even as she draws near, like she still can’t believe Kat is in front of her even though she is.

Kat wraps her arms around her the second she’s in reach. Adena lets out a noise of disbelief, grin ear to ear as she pulls back just enough to see Kat’s face.

“You’re really here.” Adena whispers, her hands cupping at Kat’s cheeks.

Kat grins, grabs her wrists and turns her cheek to press a kiss to Adena’s palm. “I’m here. I wanted to be brave for you.”

Adena softens, strokes Kat’s cheeks, “Oh, my dear Kat, you have already shown me you’re the bravest of them all.”

Kat doesn’t wait any longer, she’s waited since the moment Adena left really, so she closes the small space between them and kisses Adena like she’s wanted to at the end of every one of their calls.

Adena melts into her and it feels a lot like coming home.

Kat can’t help but think it was worth it. If meeting Adena again after so long was always going to feel like this, then Kat could see why Jenna made trips so often, how the distance didn’t matter when they were together again.

“Come on,” Adena says, slightly breathless when the pull apart, giggling when Kat tries to chase her lips, “I have so many places I want to show you.”

And Kat follows her easily, is positive she would follow this girl anywhere and can’t wait to do exactly that.

#kadena #kat x adena #kat edison #adena el amin #jane sloan #sutton brady #my fics

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