my friend and i were meant to go to a concert tonight but she was like “hey im not doing well financially so can we just not go?” and i was like i completely understand no worries! and just now i found out she still went, just with different friends and i am fighting the urge to jump in front of a subway train
i am so obsessed with how like. taken as read the ot3 are at this point. like on the one hand it feels like they've been building up to this for ages but on the other hand it kind of feels like i blinked and we skipped right past some Major Turning Point where everything got spelled out and we're just already in firmly Established Relationship-land. obviously tarvek is too well-protected for anyone to assassinate openly, look how angry his boyfriend and girlfriend are at the idea of anyone threatening him. at this point i'm half-convinced agatha's just going to refer to her boyfriends in passing to someone else and no one's even going to comment on it until van finds out twenty pages later and immediately starts making everyone pay up
while i know wwx somehow managed to invent being a passenger princess in a society without cars, i do think in a modern au he would have the most rundown car in existence. it's older than he is. he has to smack it multiple times to get the a/c to work. he lost one of the side mirrors and it was too expensive to track down a replacement so he just duct taped a hand mirror to the side of the car. the drain pipe scrapes against the ground when he goes over bumps. he has definitely lived in it at some point. it is, of course, named suibian
Honestly, I made that joke about Van’s ancient desktop, but it probably works better than new computers. And it made me think: god, Van must HATE planned obsolescence. Stuff that’s built to die? Stuff that’s built to fall apart in a matter of years just to force you to buy more? For a person whose whole deal is gripping tight to the past, to old technology that still works perfectly fine, to the idea of survival threaded through everything from the stories she tells to the machines she rents out? Yeah, dude. No wonder she hates her cell phone. Not only does it force the illusion of connection without actually granting intimacy, but it’s doomed from the minute you take the thing out of the box. For Van, the very idea has got to be offensive.
Stolen van Gogh Painting Worth Millions Returned in a Ikea Bag
The painting was stolen in March 2020 from the Singer Laren Museum.
A Dutch art detective has helped recover a missing Vincent van Gogh painting that was stolen from the Singer Laren Museum, east of Amsterdam, in March 2020.
The "Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring," painted in 1884, was stolen from the famous Dutch museum in a daring overnight smash-and-grab heist during the coronavirus lockdown.
Dutch art crime detective Arthur Brand, who has spent decades tracking down some of the world's greatest masterpieces, announced on Tuesday he had recovered the stolen masterpiece.
In a video posted on Brand's Instagram, the detective can be seen unwrapping the coveted artwork, holding it up as he poses for the camera.
"So here it is! The Spring Garden by Vincent van Gogh which was stolen three and a half years ago on Van Gogh's birthday from a museum in the Netherlands. We have searched for it for more than three and a half years," he said.
Brand said he was able to recover the famous artwork in "close coordination" with Dutch police, deeming it a "great day for all Van Gogh lovers worldwide."
The painting -- estimated to be worth between about $3.2 million to $6.4 million -- was handed to Brand by an unnamed man in a blue Ikea bag at his Amsterdam home, he said.
"Finally, it's here, it's back," said Brand, announcing he is set to return it today to the Singer Laren Museum director.
The recovery followed the emergence of "proof-of-life" photos of the painting circulating in online Mafia circles in June 2020, three months after the dramatic heist. One of the images showed the multimillion-dollar artwork -- which measures 25-by-57 centimeter -- flanked alongside a copy of The New York Times international edition and a book about a famous art thief.
In April 2021, Dutch police spokesperson Maren Wonder announced in a video statement that a 58-year-old man, named only as Nils M, was arrested in Baarn, Netherlands, on suspicion of stealing paintings by van Gogh and Frans Hals with an accumulative value of £18 million, or about $22.4 million.
"This arrest is an important step in the investigation," Wonder announced at the time. "Both paintings have not yet resurfaced with this arrest. The search continues unabated."
In a statement sent Tuesday, Dutch Police confirmed that the perpetrator was in custody and that the famous painting has been recovered, soon to be ready to be viewed by the public.
"The perpetrator is in custody and the painting is back. We are very happy with that result," said Richard Bronswijk, of the Dutch Police's Art Crime Unit.
"We know hat these types of items are used as collateral within organized crime. Intercepted messages have given us good insight into the criminal trade in these types of valuable objects."
The penalty for stealing a painting is imprisonment of 8 years.
"The search for Frans Hals' painting continued unabated."