#and i spent the next two hours booking different tickets online and just handling things that had to be suspended before

[lordendsavior]

.

[ladyanaconda]

Helluva Dad Vol. 1: Murder Family

"Dad, dad, dad! Wake up, dad!"

Striker grunted as he covered his head with his pillow, but it was no use as the intruder hopped on his bed. "Kiddo, unless there's a wild animal or a homeless drunk inside the house, go away and let me sleep."

"Daaad, you promised that you'd take me along to the living world this time!"

Striker took a peek at the clock on his bedside table. "Not at 5:36 AM, boy. Couldn't you wait until I'm actually awake?"

"What am I supposed to do 'till then?"

"I don't know, use your imagination."

"But dad-" Out of patience, Striker bared his teeth at his son, tail rattling. Jake raised his hands defensively. "Okay, okay, I'm leaving."

Once the door closed shut, Striker went back to sleep… For about thirty seconds, that is, until the door slammed open and Jake jumped into his bed again, screaming in fright and knocking the air out of his father.

"What the fuck, Jake?!" Striker all but shrieked.

"There's a spider in the living room!"

"... What?"

"Spider!"

"And why didn't you squash it?!"

"It's a big spider!"

Striker's eye twitched. With an irritated grunt, he got off the bed, rolled up a porno magazine on his bedside drawer, and stomped his way towards the living room, Jake trailing closely behind.

"I can't believe it, A son of mine is afraid of a tiny, insignificant…" Striker trailed off and stopped in the doorway. A hog-sized hellantula was tearing the couch apart with big, sharp mandibles. "Boy, go get the rifle."

Once the issue with the spider was taken care of, Striker found himself unable to go back to sleep after the fiasco, so he went to the kitchen and poured himself a big cup of black coffee before making breakfast. Thankfully, Blitzo wasn't inside his fridge this time around, though he made a mental note to go get some more groceries.

As he served the fried eggs and wild hog bacon, Jake walked into the kitchen. He was covered in sweat like he had spent an hour lifting five-ton weights. "Dad, wouldn't it have been easier if we cut up the spider's carcass and take it out piece by piece?" he whined.

"And make a bigger mess I'll have to clean up? No, thank you." Striker placed one of the plates in front of his son. Jake frowned.

"Puaj. Tomato."

"Stop complaining and eat, boy. It's good for you."

They are in silence for the first few minutes. Striker would subtly glance in Jake's direction every now and then, smirking internally at the boy's expressions while he begrudgingly ate his vegetables.

"So, ready for today?" he asked casually.

Jake's expression brightened. "How's the living world like? Is it cool? Does it look anything like hell?"

"You could say so. The only difference is that there are humans living there instead of demons."

"Humans? What are those?"

"Well, you've seen the clients at I.M.P, right? They used to be humans during their lifetime. When they died, they came to Hell and became Sinner demons because they did bad things in life. However, some of them have..." Striker toyed with his bacon as he thought of a proper word. "...pending business with someone in the living world. Our job is to finish that business in the client's stead.

"So… The people who go to I.M.P. are dead humans who want to fuck up someone who fucked them up in the living world?"

Striker snapped his fingers. "Bingo. You're getting the hang of it, kid."

"Hey, dad, think I could use the-?"

"No."

"Hey, you didn't let me finish!"

"Sorry, kiddo. I thought you were going to ask if you could use the blessing-tipped rifle." Striker replied, his eyes reflecting off the knife he was using to butter his toast.

Jake laughed nervously. "Speaking of which-"

"No."

"Come on, dad! When will you let me use those?"

"When you're ready, not a second sooner."

"And when will I be ready?"

Striker dropped his fork to place a hand on Jake's shoulder. "We'll both know. Until then, finish your breakfast."

*HB*

"Moxxie, stop shaking. You're gonna shoot our only hellhound!"

"Wow, I feel so loved here."

Striker watched, uninterested, as Moxxie pointed the crossbow with shaking arms at a photo depicting a human family. "If this were real, he'd already been dead."

"You're not helping, Striker," Millie growled before focusing back on Moxxie. "Just take a deep breath, and let it out."

"But it's a family. Under what circumstances would we ever need to kill a human family?"

"Who knows? Maybe if that's what the client wants." Striker said matter-of-factly as he polished his pistol.

Moxxie wasn't convinced. "Maybe like a shitty dad, or a mob family. That's understandable. But to eradicate an entire innocent-seemingly in this instance-upper middle-class family bloodline?"

Loona frowned. "Hey!" You don't know they're innocent! This kid probably sets dogs on fire, maybe this girl gets off bullying Australian kids online, and this guy…"

"That guy definitely watches," Jake added grimly.

"Couldn't have said it better, little guy." Loona shared a fist bump with the impling.

"Exactly! Humans are full of secret nasties. It's why so many of them end up here."

"But-"

Striker had enough. "Allow me, Mildred." he stomped his way to Moxxie and picked him up by the throat. "Look, wimp, guilty and innocent aren't our business. We're assassins, not charity workers. Killing a target," he swiftly aimed his pistol at the photo and fired a clean shot at the woman's face, leaving a hole in its wake. His point made clear, Striker locked gazes with Moxxie, hissing. "Now pick a bloody target before I throw you out the window."

Moxxie fell to the ground with a loud thud. Millie handed him the crossbow again; he aimed the tip of the arrow at the father's face, trying to imagine it was Striker.

"I just think it's a bit excessive and we could be a bit more selective, is all."

Blitzo slammed the door open at that precise moment, startling Moxxie into firing the arrow. It bounced all around the room, hitting the computer, making a second hole on the photograph, and striking the bottom of the eel tank. Moxie jumped into Millie's arms while Striker quickly picked Jake up from the eel tank when he noticed it wobbling.

"Daad, I nearly had it!"

Blitzo caught the arrow just before it struck the client's skull. "...our newest client!"

The eel tank fell and shattered, spilling its contents all over the floor. The eels burst into electricity, setting the entirety of the room on fire.

Striker frowned at Jake, who was stunned into silence. "To think that could have been you."

"Damn it, Moxxie! I just bought those eels!"

They were forced to evacuate the building as the firefighters arrived and did their job. Striker was sure that this little incident didn't leave a good impression on the client, but surprisingly she didn't cancel. Guess she really wanted that person 86'd.

"Way to go, jughead," Jake told Moxxie sarcastically as they watched the firefighters carry the eels into their truck.

"Shut up, you little brat," Moxxie murmured.

Millie frowned at him. "Mox, don't talk to Jake like that!"

"He started it!" Striker rolled his eyes. Moxxie is 'supposed to be the adult who shouldn't stomp down to a child's level.

Wait a minute. "Did anyone save the fancy book?"

"You mean our only ticket to the other side?" Luna slipped out the blue, fancy-looking tome from her clothing without bothering to look up from her hellphone. "Yeah, got it."

"And that's why you're my favorite, Loonie!"

"I thought my dad was your favorite." Jake pointed out.

"Who says I can't have two favorite people? Your dad's my favorite employee and Loonie here's my favorite adopted daughter. You get a tweat now!"

Millie drew the chalk pentagram on the nearby wall. The lines glowed an eerie red color as the circle expanded and the area inside transformed into a forest. The portal was open.

"Cool! Can I draw it the next time?"

"Maybe. Let's get this over with."

Striker would never admit it out loud, but he found these trips to the living world… relaxing. The air smelled cleaner, like trees and nature instead of sulfur, ash, and lava-like Wrath. Its landscapes were more varied, prettier, and calm, at least compared to Hell's ecosystems. This place was particularly breathtaking; a wide lake surrounded by forest and mountains with the sun setting, giving the sky reddish colors that reminded Striker of Bombproof's mane.

Jake seemed to be having similar thoughts. The impling was looking all over the place, eyes wide. "Whoah…"

"Hey, hey, hold your horses!" Striker picked his son up by the shirt before he could dart into the woods. "Where do you think you're going?"

"I wanna look around, dad! This place is so neat!"

"It's your first time on the surface, right? Don't worry, Jakey!" Blitzo pulled Jake into a hug. "Just stick close to uncle Blitz and everything will be fine!"

"Sides, you and I got a very important job! We're going to keep an eye on... Well, the house, just in case something goes wrong!"

Jake raised an eyebrow. "Come on, Millie, I might be a kid but I'm not stupid."

"Oh, I know you aren't, Jakey." Millie chirped, ruffling the boy's hair.

Blitzo, Striker, and Moxxie silently moved closer to the house and leaned against the wall. The former two peeked through the window. It seemed like a normal-looking household with a mom, dad, and two kids. The target was coming out of the kitchen, platter in both hands.

"That's gotta be her." Blitzo chuckled darkly. "Ready to do your cowboy thing, Striker?"

As he was about to point his rifle, Striker glanced sideways to Moxxie. The cowboy sneered. "Actually, Blitz, this one's far too easy. We should let Moxxie have her."

Moxxie blinked. "Me?" he asked hopefully.

"Well, I don't see another Moxxie around here, do you?"

"He's right, Mox. This one's simple enough for you to handle."

Moxxie's face fell after peering into the house. "It's just a happy mother who just got out of the hospital."

"You snooze, you lose, Mox."

Striker readied his rifle, taking a few steps back to aim. He set his eyes on the blonde human female, licking his lips in anticipation. "I've got you, bitch."

"Wait, are we actually killing a family?" Moxxie asked.

"No, don't be a puss. We're just killing a mother." Striker positioned the rifle as it clicked.

"Yeah, we're ruining a family," Blitzo added cheerily.

"B-But… hold on, hold on. Let's just think about it."

He was pulling the trigger when the rifle was suddenly pushed upwards. The movement made the bullet miss its target by a few inches, hitting a mirror instead.

"Why, you-!" Striker grabbed Moxxie's throat, hissing and rattling his tail.

"What the fuck was that, Moxxie?!" Blitzo snapped. Moxxie seemed to go into a panic attack of sorts, prompting Striker to release him.

"I'm sorry!" he cried, tears in his eyes. "They just seemed so wholesome and happy, I panicked!"

Striker rubbed his temple, murmuring under his breath while Blitzo facepalmed. "Get the fuck over it, you baby dick-!"

PAM!

Striker roared in pain as a bullet blasted through the wall, hitting him in the arm. He gripped the wound as blood scurried out of the wound. Fuck, and on his aiming arm!

"New hole! Scatter!"

"Dad!"

Jake's voice brought Striker out of his daze. The last thing he saw before something struck his head was Millie picking his son up and fleeing the scene. Everything went black afterward.

…

As consciousness returned, Striker felt as if he had been trampled over by a stampede. His head hurt like hell and his wounded arm was no better. He tried to move but found himself unable to. Something was binding his hands behind his torso.

"Striker! Wake up, partner!"

"Wha…? Moxxie?" As his eyes got adjusted to the darkness, Striker realized he was tied up in a bizarre chair, hands tightly bound behind his back. Moxxie was in a similar dilemma on the chair to his right. "What the fuck?!"

"Thank satan you're awake! We're in deep shit!"

"You think?" Striker hissed. "Moxxie, I swear, if those bloody humans don't kill you, I will!"

"Hey, you can't blame me for us getting caught!"

"Oh, really? None of this would be happening if I had hit the target and been done with it! God damn it, Moxxie, I had a clean shot and you made me miss!"

"H-How can you kill a mother and leave orphaned children when you have a kid yourself?!"

"Because that's what we were paid for, for Satan's sake!"

They could have continued to argue if it weren't for the two presences in the room. As they looked around, they saw the two kids from before. He might have confused the little shits with implings if they had horns and red skin; their glowing red eyes and devious sharp grins would make the sadistic smirks of the Princes of Hell look like nervous smiles.

Moxxie chuckled nervously. "Well hello there, little ones. Aren't you cute?"

The children spoke simultaneously in a low, almost inhuman voice. "It's nice to have new critters to play with."

If he didn't know any better, Striker might have thought they were in the Cannibal Colony back in Hell. The entire room was adorned with human heads, limbs, and even organs. The 'food' on the table consisted of a roasted fully-grown man with livers and kidneys as side dishes.

"Moxxie, when we're out of this ordeal, I'm going to fucking pummel you." Striker hissed.

They struggled against the ropes, but the kids had made a surprisingly good job with those knots. They were good enough to impress even Striker himself, and he was an ace when it came to tying up knots. Sadly, there was little he could do with an injured arm and Moxxie's wimpy little arms were hopeless. Striker growled. If only he could reach his knife…

A light outside the window caught his eye. Then a second appeared, then a third, fourth, as if someone was lighting up torches. Striker paled.

"Jake!"

"Millie!"

Both imps shared a concerned glance. The girl pulled out a serrated knife on Moxxie; to Striker's surprise, the wimp pushed the chair backward and fell on top of her. He took advantage of the distraction, using his tail to pull his knife out of his boot and expertly slice through the ropes. Once free, Striker sent the boy flying against the wall with a kick. Moxxie, too, had managed to free himself with the girl's own knife.

Striker tipped his hat with his good arm. "Not bad, wimp."

"Can you move?"

"I'm not limp, it's just a scratch." Striker wrapped his red bandanna around the wound and pulled out his pistol. "Now let's blow a hole through that bitch's skull."

*HB*

Jake had never been so frightened in his entire life. Well, maybe that time when he nearly got eaten by a serpent, but it was different. At least his father had been there to save him. But this time it was him who got hurt and there was nothing Jake could do to help. He tried to save Millie when she got K.O.'d, but he stood no chance against a fully-grown human and was knocked out as well. When he regained consciousness, he found himself tied to a stake in-between Millie and Blitzo.

"Striker had that fucking shot. Goddammit, Moxxie."

The crazy woman was cackling evilly as she held up a torch. "Satan! We return your filthy creatures back to the pits of Hell! May the root of evil remain honored as we continue thy work!"

The torch landed a few feet away from the logs, setting them aflame. The fire rose up around them as Martha laughed maniacally… until she realized they weren't screeching in agony. Blitzo snorted.

"Yeah, that's not exactly how it works, lady. Sorry, your fire doesn't actually hurt us, but I mean I could fake it if that'll get your dick hard."

Jake blinked. "She's a dude?"

"Grown-up stuff, kiddo. You should ask your daddy about it."

"Well, I'll just shoot you in your smart ass mouth!" Jake gulped as Martha pulled out a rifle on them.

"That would be more effective."

"Blitzo!"

Jake closed his eyes shut, whimpering as he heard the familiar click on the rifle. There were two gunshots, but he heard no screams from Blitzo, Millie, or his own throat, and no searing pain. Jake opened an eye warily. There were two smoking holes in the sockets where Martha's eyes once were. Her body collapsed to the ground, lifeless.

A few steps back were none other than Moxxie and dad, both holding their pistols.

"Moxxie! Striker!"

"Dad!"

"You're not getting your god damn paycheck for this one, Moxxie!"

As Moxxie untied the ropes, Jake jumped right into his father's embrace, wrapping his arms around his neck. Meanwhile, Moxxie and Millie hugged and nuzzled each other affectionately.

"I'm sorry, sir. I compromised our objective and put us in harm's way. It won't happen again. I promise."

"Apology accepted." Blitzo pulled Moxxie into a hug, but Striker noticed he was whispering something threatening (apparently), judging by Moxxie's expression.

He waited until Blitzo let go to punch Moxxie with such force that he fell to the ground.

"What the fuck, Striker?!"

"I keep my promises, Mox."

*HB*

Striker wasn't very fond of parties. Frankly, he just wanted to go home, fall to his bed, and sleep, but Jake begged him to stay a little longer to eat cake. After what the boy just went through, he didn't have the heart to say no, so he conceded. Besides, the look on Moxxie's face was fun to look at. He had no idea what put the wimp in such a mood, but he had the feeling it had to do with what remained of the target's bloodline.

"You sure you can ride back home with that arm? I wouldn't like to lose my best shooting asset!" Blitzo protested as he climbed onto Bombproof's saddle, Jake seated in front of him.

"Big deal, it's just a scratch. Nothin' to worry about, Blitz." Striker grabbed the reins with his good arm, the injured one resting on a sling.

Bombproof moved at a slow pace, so it'd take them longer than usual to get home. Millie had once suggested that he and Jake move to Imp City; there was a vacant apartment in the building she and Moxxie lived in and she'd be thrilled at the idea of being neighbors (Moxxie, of course, didn't share the sentiment). Striker regretfully declined the offer (to Moxxie's relief). He was a country person at heart and would rather stay in Wrath. Besides, he wanted his son to experience the ups and downs of rural life.

A loud yawn made him look down. "Tired?"

"No, just resting my eyes," Jake said simply, but the exhaustion in his voice said otherwise. Striker chuckled.

"How about you 'rest yer eyes' for a while, then? I'll wake you up when we get home."

"Really, dad, I'm not tired…" Jake trailed off as he leaned back against his father, resting his chest against his chest.

Striker smiled a bit as he ruffled the boy's hair. "Surely not, kiddo. Surely not."

[duchesschameleon]

being alone vs. loneliness

summary: there's a difference between being alone and loneliness. seven months in Paris shows Emily how true that is.

AO3 link | word count: 1758

(a/n: this is pretty much a character study of Emily Prentiss after her "death" through when she first comes back to the BAU in season 7. it is my first Criminal Minds fanfic as well so I hope I did the character justice! unbeta'd but proofread by me)

It doesn’t bother her is the thing, being alone. Emily had grown up in a world, a family, where being on her own was not out of the ordinary. She can handle being alone.

But this is different. This is being completely alone and isolated from everyone in her life. This is Paris, with new identities and an assignment and an undeterminable amount of time before she sees a familiar face again. If she gets to see a familiar face again.

She clutches the mug in her hand, letting the warmth permeate her hands and hopefully her heart.

There’s being alone and then there’s this. Loneliness.

And loneliness is so much harder to handle. JJ had said that the team is looking for Doyle, that they’ll find him and bring him in somewhere he’ll never escape and Emily will get her life back. But Ian Doyle escaped a prison no one knew existed in North Korea. She knows there’s no prison on Earth he won’t find a way out of. This is her new reality, her new life. And that means no more BAU.

She inhales sharply, the ache in her chest growing and gnawing at her heart. No more being blown away by the sheer amount of knowledge Reid has, or throwing quips back and forth with Morgan. No more girls’ nights with JJ and Garcia, shopping and drinking coffee and reveling in the fact that they aren’t at work for once. No more joking with Rossi, begging him to cook for the team at least once. No more looking out for Hotch and making sure he gets home to Jack at a reasonable time. No more Aaron, no more working together and having each other’s backs and grabbing a late dinner because they both stayed at the office too long. No more invitations to his place for dinner because she doesn’t have human food in her apartment and he does need to get home to Jack. No more Sergio keeping her company and filling the empty spaces of her home.

She closes her eyes against the tears that have pooled up, letting a few fall before she wipes them away and steels herself against these emotions.

Wallowing will not help her establish a new life and new patterns here. She has an assignment, a file folder from JJ and a life to lead in Paris. She can mourn the loss of her team, her family, but she has a job to do as well. She can’t wallow in what she lost, not right now. Right now, she has to get ready to leave the apartment and get to work.

3 weeks later

Emily’s head snaps up, searches for her pinging phone. It’s a new one and she’s still adjusting to it, but sure enough, there’s a familiar notification on the screen. A smile tugs at her lips as she swipes open to the online scrabble app she’d found. It’s part of her routine, part of settling in. Playing a familiar game with someone who knows where. All she knows is “cheetobreath” just hit a double word score and Emily’s next move needs to be a good one.

It’s not everything and it doesn’t soothe the ache in her chest much but its something. It’s a start, a new thing to fill her time while she traipses around the city conducting surveillance and working on her new job.

It’s a chance to adjust to her new life. No, the newest part of her life. This is her life.

If Emily’s learned one thing, it’s that her life cannot be cut and defined in pieces. Nothing is that clear-cut. Her life with Interpol bled into her life with the BAU and now that life permeates her life here in Paris. Lauren Reynolds, Emily Prentiss, any of the identities handed over to her three weeks ago…they’re all the same person. Her feelings from each part of her life, each iteration of her, stay with her. She knows that. She can’t cut herself off from them completely so she’s learning to live with them.

To live with the grief of losing six friends. Seven, she reminds herself. Ashley was part of the team too, long enough to make an impression and for Emily to miss her. So she acknowledges those feelings, doesn’t simply shove them in a box to forget about and never speak of again. She might be a compartmentalization queen but that does her no favors if she lets the grief and loss fester instead of dealing with it.

So she builds new routines, finds her new normal. Online scrabble finds its way into that new normal.

And if she has a constant partner named “cheetobreath,” well, that won’t hurt anyone.

Seven months later

It’s the one phone call that could make Emily drop everything and run, no matter the consequences. It’s the one reason why she’d return to the states now, seven months after her “death,” when she knows Doyle isn’t dead. That even though he truly thinks her dead this time, she’d be willing to blow that cover. The best cover in the world and she would willing reveal the lie to him for this one thing.

Something happened to Declan.

The moment she received Tom’s call she was in motion, grabbing her go-bag and tote before heading out of the office, using the other phone she has to book her ticket, filling in information from one her aliases that has become second nature to her. Tom tells her he’s flying back as well, but that she’d probably beat him to DC.

Her mind races at that, thinking about how to best find Declan and putting together a plan for when she lands. He’ll be okay. Doyle won’t be able to find him. Even if she had blown Declan’s cover months ago when she was bleeding out in Boston, she knows that finding him, that getting to him will be impossible. Louise is the only person in the states who can get Doyle out of school right now.

And then she lands and there’s a message on her phone from a name she hasn’t seen in months.

From Hotch: Doyle’s in custody at the BAU. It’s time.

And so she shifts, getting into a cab and heading to Quantico. It’s time, after seven months, to reclaim the one thing Ian Doyle took from her.

Her life.

Seven months ago, Ian Doyle killed Emily Prentiss and the woman who landed in Paris with JJ has spent those seven months hiding from him, from the people she knew, and running. She knows that in reality, Doyle had taken her way of life and she was very much so just a changed woman but going back to the BAU feels like a step in reclaiming her life. Like its time to stop running and time to start living again.

As the cab races down the highway and heads to Quantico, Emily is hit with a multitude of emotions. She’s excited to see the team again, her family again, but she knows it will all be different. It has to be. She’d died. There was a funeral. JJ and Hotch told her about it when they visited her at Bethesda to let her know the plan.

She’d come back one day but for now it was safest for everyone to think that she was dead. It’s the best cover and the best way to keep her safe until they find Doyle.

The team thought they were looking for her killer, to avenge her death. And now in 20 minutes she would walk into the conference room alive and well and show them that the last seven months have been a lie and they’ve been hunting down a criminal who hurt her, not someone who’d killed her.

She takes a shaky breath, calming her nerves. There’s so much happening, and it seems like it’s filling the void in her chest, but she knows it’s only temporary. The team will react in different ways and most likely avoid her until they believe she’s really back and alive. It might feel like her loneliness is subsiding, that she can once again chose to be alone instead of forced into isolation, but she knows it’s an illusion.

The loneliness will continue.

A month later

The loneliness does continue. But it also is alleviated a bit by Hotch and JJ. The two who knew the truth and can more easily accept her back into the fold. She finds herself spending more time with Hotch as time passes and she settles back into her life in Quantico.

It’s not the same, it’s not her old life, but it is her life again. She is Emily Prentiss, member of the BAU. And that feels right. This is her life, not running around Paris with a folder full of identities.

And Aaron helps her make the transition. She starts coming over for dinner again, seeking out companionship after seven months of loneliness. It allows her to see Jack for herself and yes, he cries and needs it explained that just because Emily came back it doesn’t mean Haley will. That had been a rough night for all involved. Emily ended up staying the night, all three of them cuddled up on Aaron’s bed, needing the reminder that sometimes people do come home.

It breaks her heart and Emily tried to spread that reminder more around the team. She gives Rossi advice, listens to Spencer, and goes through a recertification for Morgan. She does what she can, to remind them that she came home and she is here.

Aaron calls her out on it and knows that the transition back to her life can’t be easy. So he’s there for her. He keeps inviting her over for dinner, makes it an open one. She can take him up on it anytime she wants, no pressure. She draws back a little, clearly exhausted from trying to be there for everyone on the team and overextending herself, but he’s still there to make sure she goes home at a reasonable hour and eats and takes care of Sergio.

It isn’t everything, she’s still lonely but its better. The ache that had seemed to permanently settle in her chest is starting to heal. Aaron’s a constant and JJ too, always having her over and making sure she’s okay.

Slowly but surely, Emily goes from being lonely to choosing when she wants to be alone. That distinction is back in her life.

[tjkiahgb]

Cyrus’s Doppelgänger: An Investigation

I’m reminded of a joke from an old episode of The Simpsons.

In the episode, Homer takes a job in a different town. Shortly after he and the family arrive at their new house, his eccentric boss, Hank Scorpio, shows up to greet them. He talks about his moccasins and tells Homer he left him a pair, but if Homer doesn’t like them, then neither does he. He takes his moccasins off and tosses them away.

This exchange, which lasts all of five seconds, has led to years upon years of furious debate on the internet, which is weird because normally the internet just lets stuff go.

What did Homer mean? Did he say “Yes, once” because he just saw that very thing happen moments ago and the joke is about him being stupid? Did he mean he saw that same thing happen prior to that day and the joke is about the randomness of life?

The whole thing is so vague and absurd that the answer isn’t clear and both choices can be considered workable solutions.

Why do I bring this up?

Because I believe Andi Mack has a similarly ambiguous joke.

One which has caused a lot of strife.

One which has been on my mind for well over a year.

One which I determined I needed an answer to.

This called for an investigation. And not just any investigation. A cool, trendy, documentary series-style investigation, with multiple parts split up by stylish titles.

After half a year of research -- reviewing hours and hours of tape, conducting hundreds of interviews, and reading some notes -- I believe I may have found an answer.

This whole mystery begins back in episode four of season two. Titled “Mama,” the episode was directed by Eyal Gordon and written by series creator Terri Minsky herself.

In a scene that occurs about midway through the episode, Jonah teaches Cyrus how to skateboard and he says, “You’re one of a kind, Cyrus.”

To which Cyrus responds...

Stop and think about this for a second. What exactly is the meaning behind this joke?

I believe before we can begin to investigate any possibilities, we have to first look at the definition of the word “doppelgänger.” And the best way to do that is to go to the source.

One of the earliest English dictionaries ever produced is A Table Alphabeticall, published in London in the year 1604 and written by Robert Cawdrey. There are no known images of Robert Cawdrey so I made one.

Cawdrey’s dictionary still exists today. It is kept in the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford.

Now, I’m not a professional investigator, but having watched quite a few of these documentaries, I knew the best move was to always follow your instincts. So I followed my investigator’s instincts and booked a first-class ticket on a non-stop flight to England to see the dictionary.

Well imagine my surprise and disgust when the stuffy librarians at Oxford wouldn’t let me handle the dictionary or highlight the passages I wanted. I tried to explain to them what tumblr was and they didn’t get it. They told me I couldn’t have their precious little dictionary even after I told them I came all the way from America for this!

And then someone started trying to tell me that Cawdrey’s dictionary was published almost 200 years before the invention of the word “doppelgänger,” so even if I could dig through A Table Alphabeticall, I wouldn’t find it in there. Let me tell you, I did not take that well. There was a lot of yelling on both ends and then they called security on me.

Long story short, I returned to America $12,000 in the hole and no closer to solving the mystery.

Once back in America, I decided to go to the Merriam-Webster website and look up the definition and take a screenshot of it.

I tried to make it look old-ish though. It looks like a scan from an old book, right? Okay. Cool.

Now, look at those definitions. The word “doppelgänger” is literally German for “double-walker.” Keep this all in mind as we move forward. We’re not talking about shared interests here. We’re talking about clones, we’re talking about mirror images, we’re talking about twins separated at birth -- things of that nature.

We’re also talking about ghosts? I don’t think this is a ghost thing though, so let’s ignore the second definition.

It’s also, I guess, just literally anyone who has the same name as you? That’s ridiculous. So, what, every John Smith has millions of doppelgängers? Dumb. So dumb. Ignore that definition, too.

Let’s just hone in on the one about seeing your look-alike.

So, when Cyrus says he’s met his doppelgänger, who is he talking about?

Fans, in discussing this joke before, had considered Iris as a possible solution.

In fact, it’s sort of commonly accepted that Cyrus is talking about Iris because she was still a part of his life at that time so she could easily be on his mind, and they share a lot of similar interests.

And, frankly, she’s really the only person this joke could’ve been about, if it was a reference to someone we’ve actually seen in the show.

But let’s think back to the definition of a doppelgänger. Does that really sound like it’s describing Iris? Again, this isn’t about those shared interests. This isn’t about how much you gel with someone. This is about seeing your visual counterpart.

For a refresher, let’s take a look at both characters from an earlier episode.

Now, the differences are subtle but I think if you really look closely you can tell they aren’t doubles because they look like entirely different people.

I believe we accepted Iris as the answer because she was there. It was convenient and it allowed us to move on. But thinking about it now, it was clear that choice was just to provide us comfort. That doesn’t mean it was correct. Far from it.

So, no, Iris clearly isn’t Cyrus’s doppelgänger. And if that’s the case, then who might he be talking about?

There had to be another answer. But what?

The trail went cold for several months.

Until one day I was rewatching the season two episode, “For the Last Time,” and found a game-changing clue.

In “For the Last Time,” Cyrus and Andi prepare a time capsule for Buffy before she moves away.

In the scene in which the two place objects into the time capsule, Andi chooses to add a picture of them at Costume Day in the 6th grade.

There! Stop!

Zoom in and enhance!

More! Zoom in and enhance more!

Not good enough! Zoom in and enhance more!

Dammit! I thought. Why was this happening to me, of all people? I was running an investigation, not a tile art workshop! How come when I shouted “enhance” at my screen it didn’t enhance?!

Faced with a dilemma, I did what any veteran investigator would do: I threw more money at the problem. After spending $2,300 on a completely new computer setup in an attempt to enhance, failing to enhance once again, and then spending two days going back and forth on the phone with IT specialists, I was told “enhance” was not a thing.

My inability to enhance was another tremendous blow to the investigation.

Or it would have been, except that the picture appeared another time in the show, in the season one episode, “Terms of Embarrassment,” when Bowie put it in his video for Andi.

Should I have started this chapter with this picture? Probably!

But I wanted you to know I had to suffer through several long conversations with IT nerds where they were constantly rude to me about what I could and could not do on a computer. They kept making snide remarks about how I spent way too much on a setup I didn’t need, and I kept telling them I called to get tech support, not a lecture. It was very trying.

Anyway, now that you know that, let’s “enhance” this picture.

Just as I had thought: Cyrus Goodman, wearing a costume.

But what was that costume? Who -- or what -- was he dressed as?

The hard work began again. After weeks of research, during which I spent thousands of dollars purchasing and reviewing Blu-ray movies and television show collections, I was finally able to make an educated guess. His costume appeared to be the fictional character Bunga.

To confirm, I went looking for official Bunga costumes on the internet.

I found only these toddler-sized ones:

Not a match to Cyrus’s costume. A set-back to the theory to be sure.

However, I assumed that Cyrus, since he is marginally larger than a toddler, also ran into the same problem I did and therefore had to make his own Bunga costume.

Luckily, if you were looking to make such a costume, there are a few pictures online of homemade Bunga costumes that could help guide you in the process, like this one I found from an enthusiastic fan on Pinterest.

Seemed like a match to Cyrus’s costume. The theory was back on track.

All of this led to the next important question the investigation needed to answer: who is Bunga?

Bunga is a character from the animated TV show, The Lion Guard.

This is Bunga.

According to one of the greatest sources of man’s collective knowledge, The Lion Guard fandom wiki, Bunga is Timon and Pumbaa’s adoptive nephew.

This raises a lot of questions, not the least of which about the nature of Timon and Pumbaa’s relationship.

Also, can you just adopt a nephew? What legal rights does that give you? Those of an uncle? What are those? Is that just the right to pick up your nephew from school when his parents are busy? The right to drink too much at a family gathering and start talking politics? The right to take your nephew to a horror movie he’s too young to see that’s going to give him nightmares for the next decade?

I interviewed several lawyers who told me Avuncular Law was not a thing. They also didn’t want to go on record answering hypotheticals about talking animals adopting each other. This didn’t really impede the investigation in any way, but it was wildly unsatisfying on a personal level to not get these answers.

Anyway, The Lion Guard fandom wiki tells us that some of Bunga’s personality traits include: “[having] a soft spot for baby animals,” “[being] somewhat of a comedian who likes telling jokes to his friends in which they sometimes find funny,” and “also at times, Bunga can be clever at times.”

Bunga is also considered very “brave.”

All told, it’s easy to see why Cyrus might be drawn toward Bunga. He shares some of his lighter traits, while he also likely admires Bunga’s courage.

So we know that Cyrus watches The Lion Guard and likes the character Bunga.

But what does that have to do with anything?

Well, if you dig a little deeper, here’s where the connection gets interesting. According to IMDb, Bunga is voiced by Joshua Rush.

Now you’re probably asking yourself the same thing I was: who is Joshua Rush?

Joshua Rush is an actor.

According to IMDb, he’s 5′7 and a half, bilingual, and also, Alec Baldwin once played a character named Joshua Rush in the 1980s.

I don’t know what that means.

What I do know is this: on Joshua Rush’s IMDb page are a collection of pictures of him, and that’s where I found the most staggering turn in the investigation yet:

I let out an audible gasp upon seeing this.

Now, mind you, I’d been so deep into researching this post at this point that hadn’t slept in well over four days and I was on so much cough medication I forgot shapes, but this was still absolutely shocking to me.

Look at these two side-by-side:

The image on the left is a promotional still from Actor Joshua Rush’s IMDb page, the image on the right is of Cyrus from a season one episode.

Now there are obviously some slight differences, like their facial expressions or where on their shoulder they rest the strap of their satchel, but besides that, Actor Joshua Rush’s likeness to Cyrus is stunning.

In fact, you might almost say he’s a mirror-image, a double, a... doppelgänger?

So that leaves us with the final question to be answered: has Cyrus Goodman met Actor Joshua Rush?

Picture, if you would, a voice actor meet and greet. Do you have the image in your mind?

Are you thinking of a convention center?

Are you seeing fans lined up to meet voice-over artists? They stand around for an hour or two awaiting the opportunity to shake a hand or take a selfie or get a headshot signed by one of their heroes.

Now imagine Cyrus Goodman being one of those fans. Waiting for a chance to meet the voice actor for his favorite character on one of his favorite shows: The Lion Guard.

He gets to the front of the line and sees the actor. Maybe they shake hands. Maybe Cyrus says something nice about his acting ability. Cyrus notes their similarities in his mind. Wow! We look so oddly alike! he thinks. There’s a German word for this exact situation. I’ll have to look it up later. But not in Robert Cawdrey’s A Table Alphabeticall, because I guess it’s not in there or whatever.

Perhaps, he also thinks, this could be an interesting little anecdote I might one day share with a friend while he teaches me to skateboard.

He departs shortly thereafter and leaves the convention center. The two never cross paths again, but Cyrus always remembers.

It’s plausible.

It’s definitely plausible.

But it’s not certain.

And unfortunately, plausible but not certain is where this story ends. Speculation is as good as we can do. I doubt we’ll ever get confirmation about this.

As best I can tell in my research, Actor Joshua Rush is one of those reclusive celebrity types like J.D. Salinger or Daniel Day-Lewis or Joffrey from Game of Thrones. Very quiet, reserved. Probably lives on farm somewhere. No social media accounts or anything like that. Definitely not the type to troll an entire fandom on tumblr with incomprehensible emoji clues. Make you spend several hours trying to figure out what 🌭 means like I’m some stupid modern day hieroglyphologist. Sausage? Relish? What does a burger have that a taco doesn’t?! It’s two in the morning and I’m fifteen paragraphs deep into the Wikipedia article for sandwiches, poring over the words like I’m on the precipice of discovery, like learning that “Oreos and Custard Creams are described as sandwich biscuits (UK/Commonwealth) or sandwich cookies (US) because they consist of a soft filling between the baked layers” is going to be the key to something, that it’s going to be meaningful to me in some way. Well guess what? Not even close! It’s fine. I’m not still mad about this. It’s fine.

I’m fine.

Dan Castellaneta, the voice actor for Homer Simpson, once told Buzzfeed he improvised the “Yes, once” response intending it to mean that Homer had previously seen someone say goodbye to a shoe. But, he admitted, the other interpretation was funnier.

And so that was that.

Years of debate settled with a whimper. The official version? The better version? There was zero forethought put into it. The joke was whatever you wanted it to be.

One thing is for certain, hearing from the actor didn’t help anything. In fact, it probably just made things worse. So I’ll tell you this much, the last thing any of us needs is for Actor Joshua Rush to ruin the mystery by weighing in on this. I never want to hear from him on it.

Never.

Never.

Because maybe it’s for the best we never get a concrete answer. The joke is whatever you want it to be. We are the makers of our own reality.

Me personally? I spent half a year working on this and I’ve learned to live in the mystery. To me, Cyrus’s doppelgänger exists and it doesn’t. It’s answered and it’s still a mystery. It’s Iris, it’s Actor Joshua Rush, it’s you and it’s me.

It is everything. And it is nothing.

And I accept that.

Or perhaps... perhaps I just tell myself I’m okay with that answer so I can try to sleep again at night.

[clansayeed]

Bound by Destiny ― Chapter 3: The Evidence

PAIRING: Kamilah Sayeed x MC (Nadya Al Jamil) RATING: Mature

⥼ MASTERLIST ⥽

⥼ Bound by Destiny ⥽

Nadya Al Jamil (MC) has been struggling from the day she moved to Manhattan, but her new job as assistant to the mysterious CEO of Raines Corp was supposed to turn her luck around. Until she finds herself caught in the middle of a war involving the Council of Vampires who secretly run the city. An evil from the birth of Vampire-kind stirs beneath, feeding on the conflict, and finds Nadya bound to a destiny she never asked for.

Bound by Destiny and the rest of the Oblivion Bound series is an ongoing dramatic retelling project of the Bloodbound series and spin-off, Nightbound. Find out more [HERE].

⥼ Chapter Summary ⥽

Everyone said nothing good would ever come of falling into an online video rabbit hole. Unfortunately for Nadya they were right.

[READ IT ON AO3]

She doesn’t see hide nor hair of Katherine in the days following the Gallery, and can’t help but suspect that’s kind of the point. Adrian doesn’t mention her name, her presence, or the fact that he essentially ditched Nadya at an event full of strangers to conclude whatever business he and Kamilah had with her.

He does make it up to his secretary just as he said. When he picks her up Monday evening there’s a sample box of gourmet cronuts from a news-featured local bakery with a reservation line as long as the one to get a photo on the bridge where King Anton proposed to Princess Caoimhe. Before she can message Adrian what he wants for dinner on Wednesday there’s an email from security downstairs about a food delivery — which just so happens to be from one of the best Brazilian steakhouses in the city. And just when she doesn’t think he could be any more impressive (or desperate for forgiveness) he sends her off Friday near-dawn with front-row tickets for her and Lily to Saturday’s evening performance of On Summit Blackspine.

“No — nope, no freakin’ way.”

With his hands in his pockets Adrian is like a wall of generosity. He simply won’t take it back. “I insist. You two were looking at tickets anyway, right?”

“Well, yeah,” she splutters, acts like she has no idea how to hold two small pieces of paper, “but we were looking at tickets, like, a year from now, and… way way up in the nosebleeds!”

Adrian completely disregards her protests; even when they start to venture into ‘why were you listening to my lunch break phone call’ territory. He doesn’t seem somber — like he’s genuinely repaying some sort of debt — at all. In fact she’s never seen anyone look so excited about something they won’t be partaking in.

He joins her in the elevator ride down but doesn’t have any of his usual things. He’s staying late but won’t hear a word of her offering to keep him company.

Before the revolving door separates them Nadya plucks up her courage and turns on her heel to look Adrian in the eyes. He startles back, but his composure is never more than a hair’s breadth away.

“You know you don’t have to do anything, right?” It’s as sincere as she can make it; any more emotion between them and she might as well be bawling into his tie.

“What do you mean?”

She groans in protest. “Adrian, you know exactly what I mean. All this stuff —” her gesture is open, vague, but he’s a smart guy, “— and whatever you have in mind about making it up to me. You don’t have to do any of it. Please tell me you understand that. I mean it. I need to hear you, like, verbally say it.”

He laughs in that familiar kind way of his; even puts on a squared jaw and teasingly stern frown when she swats his arm.

“I understand, Nadya, I do. But I can’t help it. I left you on your own most of the night, and didn’t even tell you when I was leaving. Just let me do this, please?”

Eventually his kicked-puppy eyes break her resolve, but only just. “Fine. But this is it, Raines. No more apology gifts.”

“Alright, alright! No more. Though returning the Maserati might be an issue…”

Nadya’s heart falls into the pit of her stomach. “The wha —” But Adrian’s awful at hiding his smile, even worse at hiding the shit-eating grin it grows into, and though he could probably dead-lift her without a second thought she hopes the numerous smacks she wails on his arms do some kind of damage.

He waves her off, calls out “Tell me all about it Monday!” and she’s the one left watching him retreat back into the building.

While riding the subway Nadya’s thoughts wander — and not for the first time either — to whether or not other Manhattan secretaries had such eccentric bosses. Doubtful.

There isn’t time the next night to think about Adrian’s oddities — all thanks to Lily. If she spent the whole evening worrying about work and why her boss was so nice it was a guarantee that her roommate would use any physical force necessary to snap her out of it.

“I can’t believe you had all day to catch up and you spent it rewatching AME!”

While they certainly aren’t dressed up to rival those she’d seen at the Gallery, Nadya and Lily are still the best-dressed things to grace the subway in a long time. Nadya had been ready to call a rideshare until Lily so graciously reminded her how expensive drinks and snacks were likely to be at the show — and they already had subway passes.

“The stage show debuted last year,” Nadya argues defensively, “it’s not like they’re gonna edit the script for every new episode that airs.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I’m pretty sure.”

They compare notes of knowledge and trade fan-theories on the ride; every time Lily riles herself up over the book plots Nadya has to pat her shoulder and remind her to use her subway voice. It may have been way too much for Adrian to spend on someone who managed his datebook but she couldn’t deny how much she missed hanging out with her best friend.

“Check it out,” Lily whispers in her ear, and Nadya turns her attention away from the seating chart above the door to the sight of Lily’s dress shirt unbuttoned and spread Superman-style; revealing her collector’s edition The Crown and the Flame book-cover tee; a memory from their first Christmas together.

It sends them both into fits of giggles — the attendees around them may be averse to laughter and joy but they certainly were not. The doors open soon after and they take their seats — smack dab in the middle of the front row.

The lights dim, the curtains part, and all the reviews Nadya read about how ‘difficult and underwhelming it was to bring something filmed on-location and with tons of CGI to the stage’ can go shove it because the Five Kingdoms are beautiful.

Lily steals her phone Monday afternoon for a quick text. Nadya doesn’t think much of it — they’ve lived together long enough with little boundary — until she’s about to go down and wait for Adrian on the curb but instead he’s blocking her path in the doorway.

“Uh…?” The confusion doesn’t last long — not when Lily practically assaults Adrian with one of her signature bone-crushing, spine-deforming, lung-shrinking hugs. She praises a litany of gracious thanks so fast she’s out of breath before Nadya can pull her off.

To Adrian’s credit he’s not phased in the slightest — back again with that silly grin. “Well that solves my mystery,” presenting his phone screen to them both, “because when I saw how the text was signed I thought you confused me for someone else.”

When she takes the phone and spots the ‘xoxo’ signed at the bottom of Lily’s request for Adrian to meet her at the door, Nadya’s cheeks burn scarlet.

“I’m gonna kill you.”

“I figured.” Though Lily doesn’t seem ashamed in the slightest. “I just wanted to thank him in person. I had the chance, so I took it.”

“I take it that means the show lived up to the hype?” Adrian looks between them eagerly; and even Nadya relents and nods.

“It was amazing.”

“They had a full. sized. dragon puppet. Of course it was amazing!”

They’re running an hour late — Adrian insists it wasn’t any trouble but when Lily’s highlights became ‘recounting the show scene-for-scene’ Nadya had to get them out — but even the CEO’s reassurance falters when the elevator door opens to Nicole standing tersely in front of his office door.

All these months and she still doesn’t understand the dynamic between Nicole and Adrian. He’s her boss, both their boss, yet sometimes it feels like Nicole is the one ordering him around, keeping him on task — a feeling curiously accompanied by her presence in the general vicinity.

Today is no different. Her frown turns into barely-expressed rage as she looks between them. If she held her files any tighter there might be nail-shaped punctures in the paper.

“You’re late.” Nicole gives a terse click of her tongue and strides between them — parts them physically — towards the waiting elevator.

Adrian glances at his watch. “Not by much. It’s not as though Lester is clamoring to see me.”

“A certain degree of professionalism is required when handling… delicate matters such as these.”

While they argue, Nadya starts slowly inching towards her desk. Tries to make as little noise as possible as she lowers her purse down and starts taking out her work. Either it works or she’s suddenly magic because they continue to bicker on as though they’re alone up in his office.

“I don’t know anyone in the world who would call Lester Castellanos delicate, Nicole.”

The elevator door tries to close behind her but her heel wedges in the gap and forces it open. It feels like a metaphor to Nadya.

“You know very well that’s not what I mean.”

Adrian raises an eyebrow. “Then what do you mean?”

There’s no questioning the spiteful look Nicole flashes behind him. Gaze pinned straight on Nadya with a crinkle in her otherwise perfect mask of stone-cold witch.

“Not here. Downstairs.”

She’s a little more than half surprised that Adrian doesn’t pull the cinematic-cliche ‘anything you need to say, you can say in front of Nadya’ line. But it wasn’t a full surprise — there were just some things she wasn’t privy to yet. The fact that she knew as much as she did with less than a year under her belt was astonishing to say the least.

Instead, Adrian casts half a look over his shoulder. His eyes not quite meeting hers.

“Very well.”

Then they’re both standing in the elevator — Nadya watching it close from the other side.

It’s either a trick of the LEDs or Adrian looks apologetic before the door shuts with a soft ding.

Lunch — the midnight version of it — rolls around and Nadya tries not to seem so obvious in how she sneaks glances at the lift. Hoping, willing it to open. It’s almost maddening. Almost; until she replays the pair’s confrontation for the umpteenth time in her head and catches something she missed before.

Her fingers fly across her keyboard; pb&j abandoned in front of her.

Lester. She knows that name; can still hear it in Adrian’s voice clear as day.

“What have you contributed, Lester?”

The browser isn’t even finished loading her results when the unease settles in. What was once a tightly-wound ball of panic that kept her from even looking in Adrian’s direction had dulled, yes, but somehow that just made things worse. There had been a chunk of time in which she really considered Adrian might be involved with killers; or that he may very well be one himself. His charm wasn’t the only thing that disarmed her — because Adrian’s charm didn’t have the same luster it did when she first started working for him.

Nadya remembers the smile he gave her as he reassured Nadya over her interview jitters. It was something easy, practiced. It was easier to fake something around someone you didn’t know — that’s how she’s lied her way through the confidence to report directly to such an important member of the industry. Now — things changed; well hadn’t they? From daily drives to silly quips hiding behind a chocolate fountain. They’d grown close.

Somehow she hopes that means it’s harder for him to lie to her. It’s certainly harder for her to see him as a murderer. Kamilah Sayeed, on the other hand…

Lester Castellanos looks exactly like a man named Lester. Either his mother was psychic or he decided to grow into a name that oozed lecherous intent. Right off the bat a few clicks here and there on her screen outline his meat-packing company (along with several FDA violations and one unionizing strike three years ago) and how his ‘father’ ran it before he took over after Y2K. Only there aren’t any photos of Mister Castellanos with his father… or without him, actually. Plenty of local news rags have snapshots of him with a pretty (paid) girl on each arm; coming out of a Lacroix spring debut, donating to Senator Vega’s reelection campaign, having some small branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art named after him for his generosity.

Nadya’s so close to giving up — to associating Adrian and Lester as businessmen of the same tycoon-ishness — when a grainy streaming rabbit hole catches her eye. Not that she’d ever admit she was looking so intently but that maroon pantsuit? Hard not to recognize.

Probably doesn’t help that she’s had more than a few dreams about it…

It’s been ages since she’s watched anything that wasn’t taken on some form of camera phone. But the date stamp in the corner and the slight lag between audio and visual definitely mark this as a remnant of the bygone VHS-era. Probably when Lester was inducted in as CEO of his company.

There. She spends what feels like hours pausing, rewinding, dragging the player to a specific spot and having to time her two-fingered assault on the keyboard just so but the victory is sweeter than she could have imagined.

Behind Lester’s flouncy gestures for some speech about bringing ‘old industry’ back to Manhattan — the flicker of maroon. And beside Kamilah’s pixelated waves of dark hair stands a figure two heads taller and with cheekbones definitely made to exist in the time of high-definition photography; distinctive even from a distance.

Adrian’s grainy figure leans down and whispers something in Kamilah’s distorted confidence. Maybe she laughs; maybe she frowns. She doesn’t look away from Lester’s speech.

And in the corner: [03 JULY, 2001]

An uncharacteristic calm falls over her. Maybe she’s done enough freaking out for the day — or over Adrian Raines, for that matter — and she’s numb to new information. She deletes her browser history — doesn’t think it’ll do much good if anyone really wanted to see what she was looking at — and clocks back in. Loses herself in the work. For once in Nadya’s life the mindless, soul-sucking tedium of an office job is a good thing. Doesn’t really need much brain power, makes it so she doesn’t pay attention when the lift door dings and Adrian returns from his meeting with a slump in his shoulders.

That is until he looks over her shoulder.

“You’re already working on the MacCombe spreads?” He sounds surprised.

“I finished all those return calls—here —” she hands him three neon-pink post-its with different names and dates scribbled on them, “— don’t worry about memorizing them; I’ve updated your datebook with the appointments. Though this one, Volenti, is a lunch at some rooftop Italian place, so I’d avoid the morning coffee.”

She expects him to pay it all little mind. After all, this is what he’s paying her for: clerical nonsense, not to be his friend and a pesky detective on the side.

But Adrian’s all about subverting expectations; plucks the note from her fingers and frowns at the time.

“I can’t make it that day. I’m booked up all afternoon.”

Nadya quickly pulls up both his digital datebook and brushes aside an open folder to the desk calendar she has color-coded to the nines. Even Adrian’s eyes widen at the sheer mess of her incoherent organization.

“Uh, no you’re not?” Which isn’t so much questioning her boss as questioning her own appointment-making skills.

“I am. Tell Mrs. Volenti she’ll need to change it to a dinner reservation.”

“Well maybe we can squeeze—”

“Nadya.”

She looks at his face for the first time since he returned. When Adrian realized ‘professional personal space’ wasn’t really her forte — a habit picked up from living in close quarters with Lily, no doubt — he started testing his own waters until it wasn’t uncommon for both of them to just reach over one another without a second thought.

He takes up that personal bubble, now; towers over her in a way that makes Nadya shrink back in her chair slightly.

She’s never heard that sort of tone from him before. Harsh, cold, almost mean. Nadya shivers.

The hard look in Adrian’s eyes softens instantly. His tone stays firm.

“Change it to a dinner reservation. And book me up for office calls that day.” Then, as if their friendship is an afterthought; “Thank you.”

His office door closes behind him absolutely silent — she can just imagine him being as delicate as possible with the creaky old wood.

Nadya takes a few minutes to collect herself in her personal bathroom. She emerges, still counting down from one hundred, and grabs the note with Volenti’s number to reschedule.

“BOOM! HEADSHOT!”

Nadya looks down at her pint of ice cream with a grimace. No matter what the commercials said, they were liars: lactose-free ice cream was a crime against humanity.

“Did you see that? I’m pretty sure I couldn’t replicate that move if I tried.” Lily talks half to herself half to her one-person audience as she studies the controller in her hands. She brings it close and strokes her thumb over the joystick.

“Tell me your secrets… please?”

The controller vibrates — makes Lily scream in response. Then a horde of zombies swarms in on her character on the television screen and she scrambles to return to diligent gamer-mode.

Maybe time passes, or maybe Lily suddenly has the ability to teleport. Both options are equally likely as one minute Nadya successfully tunes out the groaning roar of digital catastrophe and the next Lily’s plucking the barren spoon from dangling awkwardly in her mouth.

“Hello? Ground control to Al Jamil; can you read me, Al Jamil?”

It takes Nadya a moment to blink away a sluggishness she didn’t know she had.

“You say something, Lil’?”

“I mean,” she seriously thinks it over, “nothing more than my usual gaming banter — which is still worthy of an epic quote-book. How was your trip to Planet of the Mush-Brains?”

Crouched in front of Nadya’s armchair, Lily steals a bite of melty ice cream — cringes at the lie that is ‘lactose-free’ maple pecan but forces herself to swallow it.

There’s a quip about the squishy mess that would be planet Mush-Brain on the tip of Nadya’s tongue. Instead she looks down at her half-reflection in her roommate’s smudged glasses and erupts in gooseflesh.

“Can I ask you something weird?”

“Weird on a scale of…?”

“Weird.” Nadya confirms. Lily grins.

“You fuckin’ bet.”

There’s a pause where she breathes in deep, tries to process the words about to come out of her mouth, and she goes for it.

“Do you believe in vampires?”

They’ve lived together long enough now to go through all the theories, discussions, and conversations generally reserved for the butt-crack of dawn or when midnight seems to stretch on forever. They’ve bought matching sleeping bags and sometimes have camping nights in the living room (though Lily is forever banned from buying candles — because sometimes ‘the aesthetic’ just isn’t worth possibly burning down an entire apartment building); laid head-meet-toes for hours and talked about the things that made them who they were; what they dreamed about, their genie wishes, and the things unproven that they still believed in anyway.

Vampires included.

Lily props her chin on Nadya’s knee and blinks slowly. She reminds Nadya of a cat sometimes.

“Sure,” she shrugs, “I guess. Are you talking about that video that went viral about that Norwegian metal band that said they drink each other’s blood before gigs?”

Nadya blanches. Some things should just never be said with a straight face. “No! What?! Who—where do you find these things?”

"The internet.”

“Right — I mean — no. Not Norwegians. Like… actual vampires.”

It’s stupid; ludicrous even. It’s not something she’s even going to go through the process of explaining out loud because some things even Lily might find absolutely bonkers. And she once went on a date with a Flat-Earther.

Maybe her roommate’s actually taking her seriously because she takes a long pause before answering.

“Sure, I guess. Depends on what kind.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, what lore are we talking? And also, is this a sleeping bag situation?”

Nadya wants to say yes. She wants them to push the coffee table aside and lay down together so she can vent every crazy idea she’s processing — and then some. But the room looks lighter than it did a few minutes ago and when she glances at the stove clock her heart sinks. 06:08 glaring at her in bright ugly red. Lily ‘Freakin’ Superhuman’ Spencer is no stranger to pulling all-nighters before work but Nadya has a feeling if she unloads now it might tempt her roomie to call out to stay by her side.

And while the company would be nice there was one thing she liked just a little bit more: being able to make rent.

“Nah,” she’s not convincing anyone, least of all her best friend, when she waves it off and jostles Lily onto her rear end by standing, “I was just thinking weird things.”

But now Lily’s caught the scent. Leans in sans personal-bubble as Nadya puts the melted ice cream away.

“What kinda weird things? When did you start thinking them? Who made you think weird things?”

“It’s nothing, Lil’.”

“Obviously not.”

“And you’re suddenly Sherlock Holmes…?”

“I talked to my controller, Nadi’. And you didn’t stop me.”

“Well as long as you weren’t tonguing the joystick.”

“Ew,” Lily recoils, “you know I don’t do sticks. Stop changing the subject!”

But it was just enough to get Nadya time to slip out from under the gaze of nerd-glasses scrutiny; she’s already closing her bedroom door. Lily never could resist a lesbian quip.

“Good luck at work!” She calls, and leans against her door with a heavy sigh. Nothing’s stopping Lily from knocking until she answers, or more frighteningly; nothing’s stopping her from breaking into a rendition of the song from Frozen.

But Lily respects her space. She’s just crawled into bed when she hears a call of “See ya!” and the front door slamming shut.

She texts Adrian half an hour later calling in sick. She gets sick time, right? Of course he answers when she’s on the cusp of real sleep.

[TEXT]: Are you alright?? -Adrian

[TEXT]: yeah Lil gave me her cold. sorry. can I do it like this or do I have to call hr? [TEXT]: please don’t say I gotta call nicole

[TEXT]: No this is fine. I’m sure I can survive one day. -Adrian [TEXT]: Actually take a long weekend. See you Monday. Feel better.

It’s more than she asked for so why does something uncomfortable settle in her gut? She stares at the text chain, squints until her eyes begin to blur the words, and then it hits her.

No ‘Sincerely, Adrian.’ Whatever he’s doing this early (which, honestly she’s surprised since everyone has to sleep sometime but not him, apparently) has him occupied enough not to be, well, himself. And there’s a part of Nadya that feels like if she sends him a message asking about it he might very well respond. Her fingers hover over the buttons on screen long enough for her hand to prickle with pins and needles.

She turns off the ringer, tucks the device under her pillow, and forces herself to sleep.

They are grown-ups, thank you very much. They have grown-up jobs and grown-up bills and grown-up credit cards and checking accounts and monthly interest fees. And while most of grown-up life sucked a big one, having jobs that only operated during the business week was a small perk in a sea of ‘wait, I didn’t ask for this.’

Lily doesn’t bring up the ‘V’ word all weekend. They aren’t best friends for nothing — Nadya’s way ahead of her and knows when the questions itch on the tip of her tongue. Doesn’t help that Lily’s magically, totally spontaneously decided to bring out her old copy of ‘Blood Suckers 3: Fast-Forward’ to brush up on her apparently rusty vampire-cyborg slaying abilities.

With a grocery-store pizza crisping in the oven and the tinny sounds of the cybernetically-enhanced undead wailing their deaths throughout the entire apartment things feel… normal. They feel like they used to. Before Adrian, before Raines Corp., before her internet browsing history was shamefully filled with the beginnings of research into the possibility that the creepy spookies might be legit.

There’s only one job that has followed the pair of them into grown-up life: knowing how to take care of each other. They were a bit rusty — but still got the stuff.

Lily’s eyes are glued to the screen, thumbs twitching on the joystick and slamming into buttons because hitting them harder made the little in-game avatar attack faster—obviously. Nadya can’t stop watching in amusement as she scoots, inch by inch, towards the edge of the couch in anticipation for this level’s boss battle.

“Die cyborg scum! For a third and final time!”

Any harder and she might actually break the triangle button. But Nadya doesn’t get time to warn her — not with the sudden shrill screech of the smoke detector.

“The pizza!” She’s up in a flash — yanks the pie way from the heat where it falls lamely on the floor and spews blackened bits all over the tile. The alarm chirps on out of spite.

Nadya waves a dish towel at the collecting smoke — god she really loves Lily to death but the fact that she’s the only one picking herself up to do anything is frustrating to say the least.

“Lil’! Open the windows! Please?!”

It’s enough to pull her roommate out of the distant and horrible year of 5048; then a mad dash to unlatch the fire escape window. Winter forces in like that time Lily thought they could rent out their couch space to gap-year European students. She’s chilly but effective in sucking the smoky air outside. Snowflakes flutter in but vanish on contact with the decades-old carpeting.

Above them; the sudden THUD THUD THU-UD of unfortunately all-too-familiar workboots. Then a shrill voice cuts through the aged plaster holding their building together by a thread.

“What’s that awful noise?! Marty, stop stomping you fucking idiot! I’m tryna watch my show here!”

“It’s those dykes downstairs!” Marty’s delightful holler suddenly grows sharp — echoes from his open window to theirs, “CUT THAT SHIT OUT! You ain’t takin’ us to Hell with you!”

Like a holy sign the detector ceases; angry red blinking slowing down into green, false-alarm peace.

Lily glares at the white plastic in contempt. “Rude neighbors I can live with — but a homophobic smoke detector? Nu-uh. Where’s my bat?”

While Nadya tries to dissuade her from beating them into a replacement fine Marty resumes his best lumberjack impression above them. The hazards of living somewhere with rent security.

The bat may have just been a comic-con prop but there’s nothing comical about the slew of rusty nails sticking out of the business end at odd angles. It takes a solid chunk of time to talk her down, talk her into unleashing her aggression back on Lestat-meets-the-Terminator.

After a bit of sleuthing — and with pizza crust char smeared on her cheek — Nadya holds out the culprit with all the conviction Law and Order could teach: a chunk of the plastic wrapping melted into a gloss on top of a pepperoni.

“I’ll have to call the store in the morning.”

Lily snarls at her game with new vigor. “Why?”

“Because — we caught it. What if there’s a bad batch?”

“I mean, maybe. But you don’t know that.”

“Neither do they unless I say something.”

“So…” Hunger stakes both Lily and her boss battle; ‘PAUSED’ flashing on the screen in bright blocky letters while Lily pushes up her glasses, “no pizza?”

The air hurts her face. Why did she willingly choose to live in a place where the air hurts her face?

There’s definitely an open pizza joint a few blocks over — you don’t have enough money to geomap the entire world and lie about late-night pizza — but not only are people like Nadya one of the reasons food delivery services were invented, she’s just not as familiar with her neighborhood as she once was. At the moment she blames Adrian for that.

“Stupid ritzy lunch deliveries,” she mutters, keeps her lips moving and tries not to lick them and ohp—there it goes, now her lips feel like she’s well on her way to frostbite, “stupid fancy dinner hotels, stupid employee-only rooftop restaurant, stupid DiGeronimo’s plastic-riddled pizzas of death.”

She’s glad there’s no one around to listen to her muttered tirade. Some things a woman just has to complain about alone.

“Why am I the one out here anyway?” she asks no one in particular — the snowflakes picking up speed around her, maybe, “I can’t even eat the darn pizza! — Then again I was totally gonna eat the pizza. Hey, universe, if you’re listening, I was gonna eat the pizza. I was gonna be punished enough. So like… let up on the ice age, will ya?”

The universe doesn’t let up on the ice age. If anything it feels like the snow drift is picking up speed. Flakes turn to fat droplets on her glasses that distort the world around her. Cupping her hands over her mouth does no good — can’t exactly see with fog over her lenses.

Huddled under the drooping awning of a closed bodega, her shaking hands fumble around for her phone and the map. “Nooo… how did I end up on the wrong side of the friggin’ park?!”

Lily will wait for her cheesy delight, she decides — kicks the sticky snow from her boots and trudges across the street towards the park entrance, she will wait until I’ve regained feeling in all ten fingers and all ten toes and not a minute before.

It’s all very Every Crime Serial Ever. Literally, Nadya swears she’s seen at least a dozen winter-themed episodes start with a young woman taking a shortcut in a dark park. But there’s more on the line than empty stomachs and another night of instant ramen now. Now; it’s a point of pride. It’s about making it out into the storm and returning, victorious, from the highest peak with tales of wonder and mystery.

So she keeps to the snowed-over pathways even when the cold wet starts to seep into her thick fuzzy socks — keeps under the glow of lamp posts the city abandoned a long time ago where she can find them. Distracts herself with thoughts of delicious melty cheese and sneaking a few mushrooms onto Lily’s side before she gets back to the apartment — and wonders if the delivery driver might take pity on her poor frozen soul and drive her back to her block rather than making her return with a pizza-sicle.

That’s the problem with expecting something bad to happen, though. When you expect it you do everything in your power to not think about it — to not run around freaking out over every fallen leaf and garbage-diving raccoon. There’s definitely a difference between using smart caution and just straight up stamping down every bad feeling rolling around in your gut.

Nadya, unfortunately, is prone to the latter. Years of jeers and teasing and being called irrational will do their damage eventually — and for her they come together as the knowledge that she shouldn’t be doing what she’s doing but not enough wisdom to turn back.

There’s a loud crash. Nadya screams loud enough to warm up her insides. Her keys held tightly between each knuckle in self-defense on one hand and phone ready to emergency dial with the other. Fear creeps in at the edges of her vision; makes the darkness outside the safety of the lamp’s light appear alive, undulating, thriving off her terror.

In the dark void between one lamppost and the next a hollow metal creaking grows closer—closer—closer—and she’ll never tell a living soul (that’s a lie, she’ll probably tell Lily when she stops having nightmares over this mess) but she might have accidentally unclenched her legs a little too quickly as an upended garbage can rolls a path through the fresh snow with the contents painting a trail behind.

I’m a good citizen, dang it, but I wanna keep my fingers. Because what horror movie starts with the victim being ripped to shreds while she’s saving the environment during a polar vortex?

The distant Lily-adjacent voice in the back of her head quips something like “holiday horror movies, duh!” but it’s too quiet — too soft over the sudden primal roar that carries on every gust of winter wind.

She’s cold. She’s afraid. There’s the strangest taste of almonds on the back of her tongue?

Then everything is warm and dark. She briefly considers crawling out of bed to have Lily remind her to pack a lunch in the morning.

Instead she welcomes sleep.

[wildlyplanted]

Part 3 of 3: “Leaving Prague, Berlin, I love you and Final Reflections & Tips” – Budapest | Prague | Berlin Travels

The next day as we were leaving Prague we saw a RegioJet bus parked inside the bus terminal and a sign above it that said tickets can be bought at “blah blah” window. That sign would have been useful inside the bus station ticket area because we would have loved to travel with RegioJet again. Flickbus got us to Berlin safely, but I would never ride with that company again. The outlets didn’t work, and the seats were not comfortable.

Moving on to our accommodation. Once again, we did not make reservations beforehand. Once we arrived in Berlin, we took the subway to Hauptbahnof station (Central Station), where we sat for coffee and browsed on Hostelworld for options. We knew we wanted to be within close distance to Hauptbahnof station because that’s where we needed to catch the airport bus (btw, we both ended up getting an uber to the airport) and we each had morning flights -- side note: My travel buddy had to leave Berlin the day before me. I was so sad, even though it was just a day without her. After traveling solo in Ecuador two years ago, it was nice to have someone to share in all the various experiences of travel.

We settled on Heart of Gold hostel, which is centrally located in Berlin Mitte. I loved that we ended up in a completely different part of Berlin than where we stayed before. This hostel is located in walking distance to a number of sites and attractions including Brandenburg Gate, Reichstag Building, Museum Island and TV Tower.

Heart of Gold is a 10-minute walk from S+U Bahn Friedrichstraße station and around the corner from S Bahn Oranienburger Straße station. Although this hostel didn’t necessarily feel like the atmosphere was that social, I feel like if we stayed longer, we may have had a different experience. We stopped in the kitchen a couple of times during our first evening and we found people cooking and enjoying themselves. They were friendly, but we didn’t have time to stay and socialize, as we wanted to go have dinner on our last night traveling together. Also, it was cold, so the lovely courtyard/beer garden just outside the main lobby wasn’t really being used by guests. The hostel sells beer and wine (I’m not sure if cocktails were available) in the lobby, and complimentary coffee and tea is available all day, so there’s a café type of vibe that was nice. I imagine that in the warmer months, the courtyard/beer garden is buzzing.

*I failed to mention in the first blog that there are vending machines with beer for purchase in the lobby of PLUS Berlin hostel. Comes in handy after the hostel’s restaurant has closed.  

Coming back to Heart of Gold, we arrived there in the early evening. Check-in was fairly easy; I had to use my phone to go online and fill out a reservation form that took all of five minutes (they have wifi of course). Once that was done, they were able to check us in and send us on our way. One thing I noticed is how secure the hostel is. There are multiple floors and your key will only allow you through the lobby security door, onto your floor and into the kitchen. You can’t access other floors (we tried). Another side note -- You must leave £5 per key at the front desk, which they keep if you lose your key.

We were in a 6-bed mixed dorm that was spacious with a view into the courtyard/beer garden. This hostel is comfortable and clean with full private bathrooms (toilet, sink and showers were nicely spaced out within one room, and the shower was very roomy with good water pressure).

We had dinner at Peter Pane (my food was ok, nothing special – I had a vegan burger). The atmosphere was lively, and I liked the vibe, so I would visit again and order something completely different next time.

The next morning, my travel buddy left me and I was on my own for my last full day in Berlin.

I had the best lunch at Cappuccino Grand Café which was a five-minute walk from the hostel. The ambiance was beautiful, and I sat facing the large front window, which was great for people watching. I had a delicious cappuccino, a lovely tuna salad and fresh pressed cucumber juice to finish off.

I spent the rest of the day exploring Museum Island, I passed by Brandenburg Gate, Berliner Fernsehturm (TV Tower) and Alexanderplatz, and finished my day at Checkpoint Charlie.

In the evening, I was hoping to have dinner at this small cozy restaurant I spotted near the hostel, but they were booked with reservations, so I ended up at the lackluster Grand Bar Café Restaurant.

With all that said, I’ll be back in Berlin very soon to explore more of the city and to see some of the sights, like East Side Gallery, that I didn’t have a chance to visit this time around.

That’s the saddest part about traveling, not always being able to see it all. I continue to pray for opportunities to travel slowly and for longer periods of time so I can have a more authentic experience and feel like a local.

Final Thoughts:

For this trip (all three cities) I had no concrete plans. Although I looked up the main attractions and skimmed through recommendations from some great blogs, I was not tied to things I needed to absolutely do. The only thing I wanted, was to walk a lot and see as much of the cities, and their architectures, as possible, which I did.

Before leaving New York, I set positive intentions and I knew in my heart I was going to love all three cities. I was very much going with the flow, and that attitude really helped because right at the beginning of our trip, the unexpected occurred – our flight NYC to Berlin was delayed 6 hours so we missed our connecting flight to Budapest the next morning and we ended up staying in Berlin overnight (do not regret). Getting through security and check-in for our flight to Budapest was a bit of a disaster, but despite that, I was determined to navigate through it and guide my experience and choose my reaction rather than allowing the experience to guide me. I would not have been able to do that if this was several or a few years ago. My life experiences over the last several years have had an impact on how I perceive and receive life (more about that in another blog). That morning was a calamity, but our first night in Budapest was epic and made up for the non-sense we experienced.

Travel can bring out the worst in people, because there are so many factors that can alter plans and there is the potential for unwanted experiences and outcomes, and I know it’s easier said than done, but your attitude and thoughts really does play a factor in your experiences; in how you observe the experience, and how you move through the event.

Hostel Tips:

*The kitchens in three out of four hostels, we stayed in, were stocked with cooking supplies and utensils so you can purchase groceries and cook your own meals. I think this is fairly standard, but it’s something you can ask before booking if this is important to you.

My Personal Tips:

Pack flip flops for the shower and to walk around in while inside. I would never go barefoot at any point. Some people have no problem with walking barefoot or not using shower shoes, but I’m not one of them. I do the same for hotels, since they are not any cleaner than a hostel would be. If anything, some hostels are probably cleaner than hotels.

I pack 2 non-cloth reusable bags. One for my toiletries and everything I’ll need to shower, which I hang next the shower or in some instances, I had to hang it inside the shower stall with me (wrap one handle in the top corner of the shower door, close the door and let the bag hang inside. I do this to easily access everything I need while keeping them all inside my bag and off any surfaces. If water gets inside the bag, I drain it out at the end of my shower. When I get back to the room, I remove my things and hang the bag to dry.

I use the second bag for my clothes and everything I need (moisturizer, deodorant, etc.) once I’m done in the shower.  

*It may be a good idea to stop at the front desk and let the person on duty know you’re going out for the evening. Having an emergency contact on file is also a good idea. In Prague, our hostel’s office closed in the evening so sometimes this isn’t possible. If you feel comfortable, let a hostel mate know that you’re going out and where. In our all-female dorm in Budapest, we shared where we were going with each other, so we kind of all had an idea about where someone could be. I remember our first night when one of our roommates who also arrive that same evening didn’t reappear, we kept it in mind to ask about her if we didn’t see her the next day. She did return and turned out that a friend of hers was also in the city and she was with them.

*Travel is meant to be fun. Just remember that being smart and safe is also a part of travel. Never do anything questionable just for the heck of it, or just because you’re on vacation.

*Respect the culture and people around you (I hope this goes without saying).

Where you can find me/how to contact me:

IG: wildlyplanted (check out photos)

YouTube: Wildly Planted ( I uploaded short video and photo reels)

Email: wildlyplanted@zoho.com

[itsyokythings-blog]

My Five Acres. Travel. Adventure. Yoga. My Five Acres. Travel. Adventure. Yoga. - Travel. Adventure. Yoga.

I’m a big believer in taking chances and getting out of my comfort zone. But it always pays to be a little prepared. A single can derail your trip — or your entire life! Read on to find out what happened when I left too much to chance on a trip to Cambodia and Laos.

What’s in this post?

1. 3. 5.

It was scorching hot outside but inside it felt like my organs were freezing over.

The shivering was like none I had ever witnessed, never seen portrayed on TV, certainly never experienced. It felt like an earthquake — a shaking so deep and powerful it could only originate from the planet’s core.

But unlike an earthquake, this shaking went on and on and on… each new wave was followed closely by a pounding nausea, so fierce that I couldn’t even breathe through it.

It was starting to dawn on me that something was seriously wrong.

Also don’t miss these posts:

20 unique experiences that you can do → 15 reasons to slowly → Could you handle being a nomad? →

sponsored stays in luxury beach resorts

and unsponsored stays in decrepit hostels, which was all I could afford on a blogger’s salary.

(Travel blogging is a fabulous job but it’s not exactly making me rich.)

On this trip, I had assigned myself the task of stretching my comfort zone and breaking out of it completely whenever possible.

I had learned to rock climb in Kampot, zip-lined for the first time in Mondulkiri, cycled to a remote island near Kratie, chased elephants through the forest outside Sen Monorom, and slept in a hammock in the jungle in Stung Treng.

Yup, that’s me learning to rock climb. It looks scarier than it was!

I was even getting good at striking up conversations with strangers in cafes — something I would normally never do.

After crossing Cambodia’s northern border into Laos, I checked into a riverside hut on Don Khon, one of the famous 4,000 islands created by a widening of the Mekong. I spent a few days cycling the islands, swimming in brown silty bays, and lying on my hammock for hours on end.

In retrospect, swimming here probably wasn’t the smartest idea but luckily, I didn’t contract Schistosomiasis.

One night, I had the strangest dream.

My body was filled with tiny wriggling black worms. They were racing through my body on the highways of my veins and I could see them wriggling just beneath my pale skin. When I looked in the mirror, I saw their inky black shadows behind my eyes, like something out of The X-Files.

Was it a warning? Or just a creepy nightmare caused by too much spicy Indian curry?

(This part of Laos is home to lots of immigrants from Tamil Nadu and they had been keeping me fed.)

Luang Prabang, revisiting one of our favourite cities of our two-year bike trip.

That morning though, in Pakse, a scrappy border town on the edge of Thailand, all of that felt impossible. All I wanted to do was curl up and dissolve into nothing.

Instead, I made a decision that probably saved my life.

I got out of bed, put on whatever clothes were convenient and booked a bus ticket to Ubon Ratchathani, in neighbouring Thailand.

My logic was this:

I’d probably be fine after a few days of rest but if I wasn’t, if I needed a hospital, I didn’t want to visit one in the poorest country in Southeast Asia. I wanted modern technology, well-trained doctors, and someone to speak English… and I had a much better chance of getting that in wealthy, relatively western Thailand.

I didn’t have much confidence in the medical care I’d get in Pakse, Laos.

A few hours later, I was on a mini-bus, this one headed across the Thai border. Only a few other people, one other tourist and a handful of locals, were going this direction — Ubon Ratchathani isn’t exactly on the backpacker trail.

I spent the bus ride in agony.

Busses are always cold in Southeast Asia. As long as the air con is working, the driver does his best to recreate Scandinavia in winter. This bus took things to a sub-arctic extreme.

Most people think of hell as a fiery place but I will always imagine hell as this bus. I experienced five hours of a cold so deep that I could almost feel my organs crystallizing into ice.

One day I was trekking in the jungle and a few days later I was in the hospital!

Of course, as always happens, I was feeling much better this morning. Just a little tired but not shivery or flu-ey. Even my nausea had mostly subsided.

The doctor took all my vitals and asked me a few questions in English — I could tell she had learned it in school but had likely not spoken it much since then.

After prodding me for a few minutes, she told me I was fine and sent me away. I wanted to believe her, so I grabbed a taxi back to the hotel, even though I knew she was wrong.

By that afternoon, all my symptoms were back with a vengeance.

That’s when I went online.

People always tell you not to research your symptoms online. It will only make you crazy, they say. You’ll decide you’re dying when you actually just have a cold.

I’m pretty sure that afternoon spent with WebMD, The Mayo Clinic, and all those other cheesy medical websites saved my life.

The next morning I was back at the hospital. This time, I insisted that I be tested for malaria.

The first doctor sent me away with a misdiagnosis and a cute lion plaster.

Today’s doctor all but rolled his eyes as he scoffed “Is there anything else I should test you for?”

An hour later, he was back, with an entirely different look on his face. It wasn’t pure panic but it was close.

“I’m admitting you immediately,” he said. “You have two strains of malaria.”

Once I was installed in my hospital room, wires connected, IVs dripping and machinery whirring around me, the doctor came back.

He explained that I had the two most serious types of malaria. I’m grateful that he didn’t tell me anything else right then.

When I tell people about this now, they seem to think that malaria is very common and isn’t all that serious.

But in this hospital, which neighbours one of the most virulent malaria regions in Asia, they hadn’t see a case of malaria for two years. They had to search around the neighbouring hospitals to even find the right drugs.

It was only later, after I was already cured, that I learned that the malaria I had had could cause blockages to the capillaries carrying blood to the brain, resulting in coma, brain damage, or death.

My hospital room in Thailand was very clean and well equipped. I even had WiFi!

That first night in the hospital, nobody was really sure if the malaria meds would be effective or not. There was a real chance that I would never leave that hospital bed — not until they carried me out.

My husband was in Europe, my parents in Canada, and everyone else I cared about was scattered around the globe.

Those three days in hospital and the following week of recovery in Bangkok were the hardest of my life — maybe of my entire life.

Not looking my best while struggling with malaria and waiting for my medication in Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand.

I’m lucky to be here, telling my story.

If you want to read about my what it was like to stay in a Thai hospital, read the article I wrote for news.com.au. There’s a whole other story there!

But here, I want to get on to the point…

Sitting on the Mekong watching sunset was fabulous – and also the perfect way to get mosquito bites.

Though I had been to both Cambodia and Laos before, I failed to research the areas I was going to very well. I haven’t been to a vaccination clinic for years and didn’t even think about what shots I might need.

(Most of my vaccinations are up-to-date and I tend to just rely on those.)

Since I had done so much ling by bike, I just assumed I didn’t really need to take anti-malarial pills. After all, I had never gotten malaria before, right?

As it turns out, if you look at malaria maps, the region I was ling in is one of the most malaria-prone regions in the world. Of course, I didn’t find that out until it was too late!

I should have consulted a doctor or a vaccine specialist before ling, even to a place I had been before.

Not doing so almost cost me my life.

SafetyWing. Unlike traditional insurance, they let you pay month-to-month, so you don’t need to know your exact end date. It renews automatically each month until you cancel it.

SafetyWing also give you limited coverage in your home country, so you can visit your family every once-in-a-while! Plus, they’re underwritten by a big insurance company, so the coverage is reliable and claims are handled by experts.

See if SafetyWing is the right insurance for you →

Getting malaria almost cost me my life. What it didn’t cost me — thanks to my insurance — was a lot of money.

Though Thai hospitals are inexpensive compared to Western ones, it still wasn’t cheap! I had two doctors and at least 5 nurses looking after me.

Me with the Thai hospital staff who saved my life when I got malaria.

The malaria medication they gave me was hard to find and not inexpensive. The head of the hospital came to see me every day and personally took care of me when I checked out. She even drove me to my hotel that night. That tells you just how much money they were making from my stay!

Since the hospital was so remote, I had to pay my entire bill when I checked out. After subtracting my deductible, my insurance company repaid the rest, plus they paid for my follow-up visits to the hospital in Bangkok.

It was a relief to know that I could seek out the best medical care, in the best hospital in Bangkok, and not have to worry about paying for it all!

If you’re getting ready to , don’t make the same s I did! Get to a vaccine clinic right away and make sure to get insurance!

♥  Happy adventures, Jane & Stephen

We’re not going to lie, it takes a LOT of work to create guides like this. But it’s easy to help us out! If you book or buy something using one of our personal links in this post, we’ll earn a small fee at no extra cost to you. Of course, we would never recommend anything we didn’t 100% believe in! Huge thanks in advance! –S&J

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[austinausten]

Technically, the Edinburgh Fringe was my 5th or 6th fringe festival.

My high school boyfriend took me to my first–the 2008 or 2009 Austin Fringe Festival–back before I ever thought about writing for the stage.

I’d never gotten into the Fringe spirit before. In Toronto, I go, I see a few shows, but I always feel out of place. Other friends wait for Fringe like it’s Christmas and I almost dreaded it.

Edinburgh was different.

Maybe it was the “participant” badge around my neck, the flyers for my show Transmission ready to be passed out, or the fact that I’d been waiting for this moment for THREE YEARS, but now I get it.

Listed below, in no particular order, are quick reviews of the 27 shows I saw:

Pixel Dust

The description did not appeal to me–one-woman show depicting a teenage girl’s struggles with her identity online–but the fact that it was a FuturePlay show got me in the door. Amazing physical acting coupled with projections that brought out the poetry of the story made this one of my absolute favorite shows of the Fringe.

The Poltergeist of Cockburn Lane

Wanted to fall asleep during this show, but couldn’t stop watching the boring train wreck. This light opera had fantastic source material–an actual court case where a ghost’s testimony was called–but failed to capitalize on it. A romance without the romance, it focused more on the scam artist who faked the hauntings by abusing his daughter.

Goodbear

Amazing sketch comedy. This was the only comedy show I saw at the Fringe and not my pick. But as all the sketches were located in the fictional Hotel Apre Dieu (After Life), it won me over and had me laughing so hard my cheeks hurt. Super versatile sketch comedy duo introduced us to all the guests and all the rooms in the hotel in just an hour.

Wondr

After Pixel Dust, I couldn’t wait to get back into the theater to see the alternating play. Same team, different story–this time about a single mom running the @wondrwomanuk twitter handle. The themes about how we use social to find a voice and intersectionality in feminist representation rang true–but it didn’t knock me off my feet like Pixel Dust. It didn’t have the same polish in execution or story.

Future Play VR Studio

Welcome to a dome filled with many new VR experiences, inviting you to explore. My favorites were the VR movie Dear Angelica (animated exploration of grief with Anjelica Huston and Mae Whitman as voices), The Guardian’s First Impressions (re-creating what an infant sees and hears in its first six months), and the audio mixing game Dato DUO. The most important thing I learned? The best VR movies are the ones that realize it’s no longer about creating for one POV–it’s about creating a world to explore.

Tom and Bunny Save the World

Zombie musical in a shipping container theater. It delivered on everything it promised to be–lesbians, odd British geographical humor, fake blood, and lots of gravy.

Speaking in Tongues: The Lies

Speaking in Tongues: The Truth

These two shows are acts 1 and 2 of the same Australian play. I accidentally saw them out of order, but I actually enjoyed it that way. It turned what would have been a linear play into a more abstract exploration of coupling, marriage, and fear. But the best part was the set-up: swivel chairs. The audience sat in the middle and we swiveled around to see the actors. I LOVED watching the other audience members just as much as the play. Maybe more.

Venue for Speaking in Tongues 1 & 2

Shipping container venue for Tom and Bunny

Time Machine

Really really boring one-man version of H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine. It claimed to be updated for the present day, but one reference to iPhones in a museum in the future doesn’t count as an update in my book. Also wish they had played more with the shadow effect made by the lights.

A Hunger Artist

Fantastic adaptation/re-telling of Kafka’s short story through puppetry, clowning, and even some audience participation. In a world where artists must often starve themselves–or make a performance of killing themselves–in order to fund their work, this rang really true. The connection made with the audience, even before we were called up on stage, was incredible. It felt like such an intimate performance in an almost full house.

Baby Mama

I didn’t want to see this show. But I’m glad that I met the director a few days before and realized that I needed to hear Mariah’s story. One woman story-telling about how a playwright got pregnant on accident and gave her child up for adoption to a gay couple. Amazing yet subtle structuring through lighting cues made this story genuine and deeply emotional, while still feeling very conversational. And in the last few moments, I definitely happy/sad cried.

Ouija the Musical

Ethically, this one needs a lot of work. If you are going to make the setting of your horror musical the same as the venue and cast your audiences as members, then you need to make it clear that everything that happens is part of the experience. Ethics aside, this horror musical about a seriously messed up band rehearsal in Wales did scare me. As a writer, I wish they had spent a bit more time setting up the characters and their connection to the witch and her child before people started dying. But for a student production, kudos for trying something bold.

Sasquatch the Opera

Though the title might sound silly, it gave me all the serious feels. Sasquatch falls in love with the daughter of a major scam artist who abuses his children and runs fake tours to see the “Sasquatch.” Opera, when done well, can take the absurd and make it relatable. I felt for the junkie older brother, the daughter who falls in love with the Sasquatch, and with the hairy beast himself. And live music? Perfect combination for a geek like me.

Seance

Best fifteen minutes of audio theatre–maybe immersive theatre–I’ve ever experienced. 13 minutes in total darkness locked in a shipping container. 13 minutes listening to a seance go on in your head–mostly. I knew it would scare me–and I screamed within two seconds of the performance starting–but I didn’t know that it’s story and entire production would impress me so much. Solidifies what I know about horror: sound is key.

The night sky after Sasquatch

Seance!

  Jane Doe

This isn’t the play you want to go see, but it’s the play that will care for you while forcing you to take a close look at rape culture. I didn’t realize that the Taylor Swift songs playing beforehand or the romantic comedy references were part of it until the end. Haunting. But because I had the chance to respond anonymously throughout in an online survey–I felt like it was a conversation, not a slow unveiling of true horror. Theatre that does change you.

Austentatious

After re-watching Emma on Netflix and hearing British accents again, I needed more Jane Austen in my Fringe experience. So I booked a ticket to the improv show that promised to perform a “newly-discovered Jane Austen novel” every day. Literary spies popped up in “What if Jane Eyre was written by [Jane Austen]” my afternoon, as well as a cross-dressing doctor, and I loved every second of it. Plus they made fun of my suggestion, “Emma and the Purple-haired Princess”!

The Fall

We met the creator/performers of The Fall in the Assembly gardens one night and promised to attend their show. Little did I know that these students would perform the most honest depiction of protest I’ve ever seen. I’m glad I bought their script. I’m sad I can’t just re-experience their show every time the news gets me down. Grahamstown will have to be my next international fringe festival.

And Here I Am

Serendipitous offering of tickets to this one-man show, part of the Arabic focus within the Fringe, led Steph and I into a Palestinian man’s story of growing up and creating theatre outside of the West Bank. Telling his own story, Ahmed Tobasi had such energy and vibrancy. There was not a moment to breathe or doubt his experiences in prison or first forays into acting. I only wish he had slowed down some of the incredible moments. I wanted to sit in them, even the painful ones, for longer.

Mobile Cinema

Exactly what it sounds like! We settled into a movie theater in the back of a rehabilitated research van to watch news reels of Edinburgh during the first Festival and throughout history. It really did bring history to life.

Ancient Shrines and Half-Truths

New Zealand performance group Binge Culture had its own audio tour, map, and app, too–so I had to try it out. Choose-your-own adventure with a map on the provided iPhone, I listened to descriptions of a place sort of like Edinburgh but not while exploring the Meadows. It wasn’t clear enough in its distortion of reality or in communicating its expectations for audience interaction either–but for me, Ancient Shrines did cause me to pause, look at the world differently, and interact with my surroundings.

Inside the Mobile Cinema

Exploring with Binge Culture

Buzz the Musical

At first I didn’t want to go to this musical about vibrators… but afterwards, I was very satisfied with my decision. It’s the traditional boy and girl break up, girl goes through journey of growth, and then when he proposes they give it another go–she chooses the vibrator instead! Two men got up to walk out during the show, but I loved every silly minute of it from the huge clitoris puppet to the shunned scientists who study female sexuality.

Coppelia

Collage is a great way to describe this circus/dance/performance. Inspired by one act of the opera Tales of Hoffman, Coppelia re-tells the story of the mechanical doll and desire that tore everyone who saw it apart. Sitting in the circus dance, surrounded by mirrors, I couldn’t help but ooh and aah at every movement and new line of poetry. I just wish they had edited out a few references–and the filmed aspects–to focus on the emotional core they had underneath.

The North! The North!

Story-telling one-man show about a land where England has split in two and it’s up to a young man and his sister to save the world from the evil “Prince.” Again, the projections and found object set won me over with their integration into the story. The twist at the end still wasn’t quite enough to make up for the male hero-focused story, but I enjoyed my hour inside Christopher Harrison’s modern fairy tale in an old veterinary school’s dissection hall.

Mouthpiece

Sometimes you have to go halfway across the world to see a show made my Toronto artists, because you were finally ready to see it. This amazing piece of physical theatre performed so much of the grief, frustration, joy, and anger it is to be a woman right now. Thank you.

Foreign Radical

Immersive theatre experience about the way the United States categorizes people as terrorists on official lists–and the ways we are all complicit in making these judgments. It was like playing a game show, but the players were strangers and the decisions being made said so much more than winning a prize. I was horrified at how easy it was to go through someone’s luggage to find evidence of terrorism and to watch a family of four argue to put an innocent man on the terrorist list. It wasn’t the best thing I saw, or the most haunting, but I did take a lot away as an American living in Canada from this experience.

Old Stock

In a time where our world is fighting over the status and future of refugees, it was an important reminder to look at where past refugees ended up. Like the two Jewish-Romanian refugees depicted in Old Stock. Plus another shipping container set (though the audience didn’t sit in it this time) AND some mad clarinet playing. I hope this comes back to Toronto so I can share it with friends and co-workers again.

Where I saw 3 Canadian shows… in Edinburgh.

Auld Reekie Ghost and Torture Tour

If I could pick a different tour that didn’t include the torture portion, I would. Otherwise, I saw an entirely different side of Edinburgh than the vibrant, artistic collage I’d seen all week. Down in the vaults underneath the city, I learned about the dark, diseased, dangerous past for Edinburgh’s less fortunate occupants where being homeless was a crime and they punished you in so many horrible ways. Thankfully Megan held my hand when the guide took us into a pitch black room and told a story about a man with a knife waiting in the corners…

Oyster Boy

I fell asleep in a lot of shows in Edinburgh. This is the only one I don’t feel bad about. A Tim-Burton-esque story told through puppetry? I thought, Great! But since the puppet only came out for the last few minutes and the acting was meh at best and obnoxious at worst… Also, as an American maybe I don’t get the appeal, but I didn’t understand why it needed to be set on Coney Island in the 1950’s. I’m surprised this amateur show garnered such misleading stellar reviews. At least I got to play with a puppy outside beforehand.

Lula del Ray

I watched the Manuel Cinema group make a movie before my eyes. With projectors and a combination of small 2D puppets and large 3D props, I watched a little girl grow up near rockets, fall in love with rock and roll, and leave her hometown to find out what her real passions were. I have to admit that, after a long few weeks in Edinburgh, I nodded off a few times–but only because it was so relaxing, mesmerizing, and beautiful.

How to Win Against History

The last show I saw at the Edinburgh Fringe was a new musical. I’ve listened to the soundtrack again on Spotify since I’ve been home–and it still makes me smile. It retells the true story of the 5th Marquis of Anglesey who spent all of his money putting on shows in the converted family chapel, died a pauper, and was almost entirely erased from history. Oh yeah–and he liked to wear dresses. It got a little slow in the middle, too repetitious, but some of the wittiest and also most genuine lyrics I’ve heard in a long time.

Can you believe it? I look at this list and still see the hundreds of shows I didn’t get to see…

Guess this just means I need to go back!

  Stay tuned for more updates on my show, Transmission, as well as my tourist review of Edinburgh!

Photo credit at top: FuturePlay VR Studio by David Glista

  Beyond a Theatre Review: 25+ Edinburgh Fringe shows 2017 Technically, the Edinburgh Fringe was my 5th or 6th fringe festival. My high school boyfriend took me to my first--the 2008 or 2009 Austin Fringe Festival--back before I ever thought about writing for the stage.

[mfaver]

Whelp I did a thing!

Hello Sunshine!

I did a thing this week, a thing I have been fighting ever since I saw “The Fantastic Beasts the Crimes of Grindelwald” last November. See I have my ticket and everything in my bullet journal.

Sighs. The two-month internal battle is finally over for I have given in. I finally picked up the Harry Potter books and started listening to them. My Dad, my best friend, and just about everyone else I know who is a Potterhead has said I should read this series. Maybe it was the movies that I didn’t like, or I just didn’t like the Harry Potter in the movies, because I went to see all of them with my dad when they came out, but for whatever reason, I just had no desire to read them. None, nope not going to read them. Fandom, “challenge accepted.”

Well, the first battle started with me scouring the internet for the books for “The Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them,” and I found that it was a guidebook rather than a novel. I still have plans on getting it, I love learning about the new creature. Who knows, I might learn something useful that I want to put in creature season of my book of shadow.

Now onto the second part of this battle not to read the Harry Potter books. After seeing the Crimes of Grindelwald I was all but foaming at the mouth to read or listen to the book that made such a good movie… Yeah, the book that is published for this movie is about the making of the movie. Cricket, cricket, cricket.  I was very disappointed when I found this out.

Fandom is dropping chocolate frogs and I follow them. Follow them into this wonderful world.

Thinking I could satisfy my craving with just doing the online Pottermore quizzes was a mistake. My house was Ravenclaw which was no surprise to me. I love ravens and even have a raven pendant I call Remmie.

Side note: I created Remmie was my raven kawmi for the “The Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir” fandom.

Gets yanked back to the Pottermore Fandom. Anyways! To me, Ravenclaw was a no-brainer for me. If I could bring a pet Raven to Hogwarts rather than an owl I would, or my owl would be dark as night. My Patronus is a buffalo, and honestly, I don’t know I feel about that just yet.  I’m not sure what the buffalo stand for yet but I’m sure I’ll learn as I make my way through the books.

My wand is hornbeam wood with a Phoenix feather core 11″ and Slightly Springy flexibility. I have to say I’m very happy with this want, and how it suits my personality. After doing a little research of the Pottermore site I found out that Hornbeam is often used for boundaries, enthusiasm, protection, solving puzzles. For those that don’t know I love thinking games that have lots of clues to them. Though on the Pottermore site it says that Hornbeam is loyal to one person, though it has to choose the person. As for the phoenix feather core, I find that I’m going to be one of those witches that like when objects have a personality of their own. I want to be able to trust in my wand and I know I can with this one. Oh, I almost forgot, if I ever get this wand in real life I have already decided to name him/her Nix. Short for Phoenix, I know not the most original but for some reason, it felt right to me.

  Honestly, that is where I started to lose to the battle. I was now willingly being brought into this magical world. Then there was the app, the Harry Potter Game app, yup there’s an app for that. I’m completely addicted to the game now and being the first year in it I join the Ravenclaw house which is no surprise. Chuckles. As I play through the game I’m starting to realize how little I know so I started talking with my dad. His words were, “Well I have the books you’re more than welcome to go read them.” Yup, so I grabbed the first book off the shelf so to speak. I am listening to them on audible and I’m just in love with the narrator he is doing a marvelous job. You always know who is speaking with how Jim Dale doses it.

I probably should have given in and read the books long before now but I made it. I’m a Potterhead now and I love this new Fandom!

My Harry Potter OC Profile

Character Name: Misty Gray Gender: Female Age: 12 Height: 5” Hair: Red Eyes: Green

Year: 2st House: Ravenclaw Blood Status: Halfblood Species: Human

Abilities: Animagus Wand: Wood: Hornbeam, Length: 11”, Core: Phoenix feather, Flexibility: slightly springy Patronus: Buffalo Pet: A raven named Remmie. He loves shiny objects and stealing them he is a bit like a Niffler in that way.

Personality: Misty is a peacemaker, though some might call her a pleaser that’s not the case. Despite her petite size she can handle herself if confronted. Always quick to give out compliments but just as fast to defend those she cares about. She tends to see the good in others, though most of the time she seems sweet Misty has a morbid/dry sense of humor. Misty enjoyed watching from the sidelines and watching the way people act with one another. Making friend is easy but having best friends is harder on Misty.

Backstory: Getting her Hogwarts letter was a shock to both her mom and herself but her dad’s shout of excitement showed how happy he was. He had lifted her air and spun her around their living room singing how much fun she will have, the friends she would make and how his years at Hogwarts were the best of his youth.

“Second to meeting your mother of course,” he said giving her mom a wink.

After many discussions, they made the move to London. Misty was excited that she would be able to use magic openly rather than just in her own home. Growing up in America Misty lived a happy childhood of a muggle. Though she was casting spells the moment she was able to speak full sentences, she could only do it in her home. Her fondest memories of where when her dad would take her out into the forest and he would have her flying in the air with a wave of his wand. Her mom would be following behind them with a picnic basket and lunch for all of them to enjoy. London was a bit of a cultural shock, at least in the wizarding community. Her mom, Ami was met with ridicule and distant for being a muggle where her dad, Markus, work for the Ministry became more frustrating because he married her mom. It was her dad who took her to Diagon Alley to get her books and materials when they arrived. While the books were different then the ones were dad used, she had already read all of his books as if they were novels, she would no doubt study these just the same. When she stepped into Ollivander’s wand shop it was like she fell in love for the first time. Misty could have spent hours in that shop reading one of her books and a hot cup of tea. Her dad had gotten a garnering wand for her to practice with at home but he told her this is where he goes his wand before Hogwarts and the one he still had to this day. When her wand was chosen for her she felt an instant connection with it and went so far as to call her wand Nixes for the Phoenix feather core. Her first year at Hogwarts she learned quickly to keep her bloodlines to herself, though still, it became public knowledge. The first few months became unbearable and she wanted to go home to America and had withdrawn into her self and stayed in her dormitory with her raven. When one day during broom lessons the first year like herself, but in the Slytherin house, clipped the tail of her broom. Having never been graceful Misty spiraled and lost grip of her broom, that stayed where it was in the air without her on it. Misty was a good fifty feet in the air when this happens and was about to plummet to death more than likely breaking every bone in her body. Wind blew around her in a whirlwind the braid she pulled her hair into pulled free. It was her breaking moment and a moment no one would forget. Pulling her hand from her robe she held it to herself.

“Arrests Momentum!” Misty cried with all her might waving the symbol at herself.

Her descent to the ground halted as she floated in the air here. Misty opened her eyes and let out a gasped as she saw the view from where she floated in the air and it was the perfect view of the Quidditch field. Professor Hooch flew up next to her breaking her eyes in the spectacular view of the Quidditch field.

“Ms. Gray get on.” She gestured to the back of the broom. Nodding quickly Misty maneuvered her body with her wand until she straddled the professor’s broom.

When both were grounded the professor checked her over and scolded the other student who made her lose her balance in her broom. Some of the girls in Ravenclaw gathered around her

chatting on about how cool it was she was able to use the spell to keep herself suspended in the air. After this event, she started being friends with some of her housemates as well as other houses and she helped them out with their charms and potions studies. She was quick-witted and loved studying.

Extra: –During her free time though she loves reading a good book, or sneaking off to fly with her raven Remmie on the Quidditch. The two flying around and doing tricks in the air with giggles and squawks. Her raven happens to be her best friend and is more intelligent the people give him credit for. Her favorite drink is hot chocolate with whip cream and a dash of cinnamon on top.

  Website:

Hornbeam Wood

A Potter Thing Whelp I did a thing! Hello Sunshine! I did a thing this week, a thing I have been fighting ever since I saw “The Fantastic Beasts the Crimes of Grindelwald” last November.

[kaliforniakanada-blog]

CALIFORNIA x 7

As most of you probably know, I’ve been to California several times over the past four years. In fact, If we’re keeping count, this past trip has marked my 7th visit - and while every visit is eventful in its own way, this one was different... This one felt less like a trip, and more like returning home. 

I’ve wanted to move to California since the first time I visited. My love for it only intensifies every time I step off the plane. But this time... This time, having gone alone, I was able to do things that are less touristy and more local. And I think it made me feel like I was experiencing what my everyday life will eventually become. 

There are two events in particular that I’d like to cover in this piece that I associate with my feelings of homeyness. The first is the night Kailen and I spent at The Viper Room, and the second is my experience getting a tattoo at Shamrock Social Club. 

I’ve been wanting to visit The Viper Room since the day I fell upon a picture of Johnny Depp wearing a beanie that bore the name. I spend a lot of time looking up useless information, so when I saw the picture, my curiosity led me to google. The Viper Room is a bar/venue that Johnny opened and co-owned in the early 90s. His goal was to have a place where he and his friends could hang out and play music without being bothered by anybody. And while he hasn’t owned it since 2004, the place has become a huge LA landmark. After all, it is located on the sunset strip and also happened to be the location of River Phoenix’s death following a drug overdose. 

While I was already set on visiting The Viper Room simply because of its affiliation to Johnny Depp, learning about River Phoenix’s death resulted in an even stronger interest in it. I somehow came across a book titled “Last Night at The Viper Room” which doubles as both a historical timeline of the venue itself and also a biography of River Phoenix. The book is great, and if you’re looking for something to read I highly recommend it. 

My addictive and borderline obsessive personality (see: my obsession with Ed Sheeran, Hamilton/Lin-Manuel Miranda as references) led me to develop an infatuation with the place, and every time Kailen and I go to LA I force her to drive by it so that I can stare at it longingly and/or take a picture standing in front of it. I was never able to actually go inside because Kailen only just recently turned 21. 

Funnily enough, I kind of forgot about how badly I wanted to visit it because I’d become so used to telling myself that I couldn’t. So when I remembered that I could due to Kailen mentioning it, my stomach turned over in excitement. We decided to go to LA on Sunday but didn’t really put much planning into actually visiting it because we were preoccupied with whatever else we did that day. When we came to a point where we were at a loss for what to do, The Viper Room popped back into our minds. We decided just to see what it was that was going on, and it turns out that it was an open mic / jam night type thing. We were pretty upset to find out that tickets weren’t available online anymore, but we decided to drive over and try our luck at the door. 

“Go ask that guy!!!” Kailen said when this punk-rock looking dude walked out of the all-black building. 

“He’s halfway down the street now, I’m not going to chase him” I said in response. 

That exact scenario played out for like, 10 other individuals until finally one guy lingered around a motorcycle parked on the sidewalk for a while. I finally got up the nerve to jump out of the car and casually walk over to him without seeming overly enthusiastic. 

“Hey, do you work here?” I asked, to which he replied “I do tonight!”

“Band member. SCORE” I thought. 

I followed up with “I was just wondering if tickets are going to be available at the door tonight seeing as they aren’t online anymore?” 

The guy’s eyes lit up as he replied “Oh yeah, I think so. How did you hear about the event?” 

I explained that I didn't actually hear about this event in particular but that I’ve been wanting to visit the venue for years. His friend walked up and introduced himself, so we all exchanged names and I said I’d see them later when the venue opened. 

I was about to get back into the car when Rob, the guy I’d been talking to shouted “KATELYN! Come here!” I turned around and walked back towards him as he pulled two tickets out of his pocket and handed them to me. 

I thanked him profusely and reiterated that I’d see him later. I skipped back to the car and explained the entire exchange to Kailen, who was just as ecstatic as I was at the fact that I’d just somehow scored free tickets to a place we’ve both grown an interest in over the years. 

We sat in the car for about a half an hour, deciding that we didn't want to be the first ones inside because we’re awkward and wouldn’t know how to handle that kind of hypothetical pressure. Eventually, when we realized literally NO ONE had gone inside and the show was supposed to have begun, we got over ourselves and walked over to the doorman. He told us that was the back door and to swing around the side to get in. 

“WHAT??? This is the BACK DOOR? How the HECK did we not know that?” We said. 

This entire time I’d been posing for pictures at ~the back door~.

To be fair, it makes no sense that the back door would be located on The Sunset Strip and that the front would be on some random street who’s name I didn’t even bother to learn, but what can you do. 

We headed over to the front and made our way inside. 

It doesn’t look like much. If you knew nothing about it, you might even dismiss it as boring. But there was some sort of electrical current of excitement surging through my body, and I couldn’t believe that I was actually standing in a place that is a staple in Hollywood’s history. I was ecstatic. The entertainment was weird as hell, but I remained ecstatic for the duration of the evening. I asked the bartender for something fruity (because I am a wimp) and he handed over some concoction that literally resulted in me coughing after the first sip. I was like NOPE, and slid it over towards Kailen. 

Having been the only females in the entire establishment, Kailen and I got some pretty intense looks from the men scattered around the room. Normally, I’d find that type of thing unsettling, but in this case it was just plain hilarious. We hoped somebody would come over and fund our evening, and as it turns out, somebody did. I don’t like alcohol so I skipped out on the drinks, but Kailen got a free flow of it all evening and I was so stoked. Secondhand excitement. It was great, and it turns out one of the guys we met happens to be a production coordinator for a film company in Beverly Hills. We exchanged instagram usernames and after chatting a bit, he even offered to get me a gig at his work if I ever wanted one. WHAT? Yeah. 

All in all, our night at The Viper Room was unbelievably memorable for the sole reason that we got to live it. I was so full of anticipation after all these years that nothing could ruin it for me. Nothing. I felt so alive in that moment, and I’m so glad that I got to experience it with my best friend. 

The second thing that I consider a bucket list item that has been crossed off during this trip is the fact that I was ((somehow)) able to get a tattoo at Shamrock Social Club. 

When we got to LA on the day that we went to The Viper Room, I asked Kailen if we could swing by SSC just to see if I could somehow make an appointment with Dr. Woo (after several failed attempts over the phone from across the continent). I figured worst case scenario I could take a picture with him and that would cushion the blow if I couldn’t make an appointment. 

The guy sitting out front who I spoke to explained that he doesn’t work there anymore, but that all of the artists are trained by Mark Mahoney and that they’re all capable of doing the half needle, detailed, tiny tats that I’d fallen in love with at first sight. He also mentioned that they accept walk-ins and said that there probably would be a few slots on Monday or Tuesday. 

Tuesday came around and Kailen and I were discussing getting little K’s tattooed on our fingers to symbolize our friendship (it is pretty remarkable, after all). We shopped around different tattoo parlours in Orange County but came to find that they were all fairly expensive and I figured that if I was going to spend that much money on the base fare alone, that I’d prefer to splurge a little more and get one at the place I’ve loved since I found Dr. Woo on instagram a few years prior. I called SSC and spoke to Jake again (the guy I’d met outside) who said we should call back later to see if they’d be free around 9-10pm. I called around 6:30, and Jake said that they were pretty backed up and that the following day might be a better option. I explained that I was flying home at 1pm the next day and a few minutes later he got back to me, on instagram, with the words “can you be here within the next 30 minutes?” My eyes lit up as I ran to explain to Kailen that they had room but only if we could get there before 9. We got into the car and the GPS said it would take an hour in a half. For that entire hour and a half, I legitimately felt like I was going to vomit out of the window. I was so unbelievably excited that I would finally be able to get a tattoo at the parlour of my dreams on such short notice. I was seriously hoping that they’d have time to fit in Kailen too and that we could get our K’s, but the place is a little intimidating and not really very fitting for that type of request.

I was tattooed by Max Hanson who’s instagram is a literal portfolio of fine art. He explained to me that he’d been tattooing for about 3 years and I was seriously shocked to find that half needles HARDLY hurt in comparison to standard ones. The whole process took about 40 minutes and my leg twitched the entire time because I was still in shock, disbelief and amazement. I couldn’t process what was going on whatsoever. I was SO stoked. I still am, to be completely honest. 

While these two events may seem like nothing out of the ordinary to an individual who has no interest in or just never heard of these places, both were life changing to me and it still feels so surreal that I got to experience them. 

There is something magical about Los Angeles, despite the fact that its kind of dirty and big and weird and loud. I think that there’s a reason that people are drawn to it. It’s full of rock and roll / pop culture history and home to so many greats both past and present. I am completely, head over heels in love with it and also Southern California as a whole. 

Eventually, I will call it home. As a matter of fact, I already do... But eventually, I won’t have to say goodbye to it anymore. And when that time comes I’ll be drowning in happiness, in part because I will finally live where I belong, and in part because I will no longer be across the continent from my best friend (unless she decides to live in New York permanently in which case I will handcuff her to the Hollywood Sign). 

So as I said, while I’ve been to California 7 times now, this time was inherently different. This time was a firm confirmation that it is my end goal. 

Coming back to Montreal has never hurt this much.

[alotoftrips]

12 Job ideas that you can have while traveling around the world

Getting out of the comfort zone is probably one of the expressions you often hear, and travels among the first recommended variants. It does not mean, however, only experiences that you spend money. They are, at the same time, an opportunity to contribute with your skills and knowledge to a new context and to be paid for it. For 32% of tourists around the world, travel is the first option when it comes to spending money, according to the momondo.ro travel search engine. For those who wonder how it is possible to travel around the world and at the same time work to enable your next destination, we have prepared a selection of jobs that offer the freedom to travel and experience out of the everyday life .

How to Travel Around the World: 14 Steps (with Pictures) - wikiHow

How to Travel Around the World. Traveling around the world at once is often a cheaper option than breaking it down into segments. The secret is to plan carefully ...

1. Tourist guide You do not have to be born or raised in a certain place to work as a tourist guide. Instead, if you are fascinated by a corner of the world and you want to discover its stories, it should not take you more than a few weeks to teach it as if it were in your hand, then to gather around yourselves equally curious travelers to whom you share them in the history of the place for about two hours. 2. Teacher of foreign languages A certificate recognized by an English teacher or higher education in your field increases your chances of finding a job, but things are not nailed here either. More everywhere, however, you are asked for a bachelor's degree. Japan's JET program is just one example. There are also online applications to teach a foreign language. NiceTalk Tutor and Boxfish are examples of Chinese companies whose applications allow students to contact English speakers (or other languages) to practice conversations. The Tandem application works with students from around the world and, in order to be able to teach through them, you will have to prove that you have a language certificate. 3. In a bar / restaurant Maybe you've already worked in bars and restaurants years ago or you've always wanted to get out of your hands an à la carte cocktail. Moreover, it is an excellent opportunity to get in touch with new people in another country, to speak another language and, ultimately, to get to know you from a new perspective. 4. Content Writer If you count amongst those who write colleagues in school or among those who take a reading book with them, you may find a special pleasure in letting your fingers guide words on the sheet or on the keyboard. Just like the previous one, prepare your resume, ask left and right, patiently seeks the customers who need an inspired person to weave those enchanted words. 5. Teacher of dance, yoga or fitness instructor Perhaps you have not yet thought about sharing your weekly experience with the gym, but if you are passionate about the training you are already following, you are most likely prepared to start training as a trainer. The training courses and then the ones you organize can be in a place other than the one you live in, for example on an Asian beach surrounded by the eyes of other yogi students, or on a beach in America South, where the steps left on the sand are in Latin music. 6. Programmer If you are already familiar with code lines and online sites, you know that around 150,000 new websites are created each day and that specialists in the field are in great demand. Almost any business is present online and, as the limit of online is the sky, you can look for work opportunities outside your immediate neighborhood, having first a portfolio set up. 7. Web designer You'll never be the first traveler to win his graphic design bread. You need, by default, a handy laptop, aesthetic sense, and a few weeks / months of specialization, like, for example, tutorials and learning to handle programs like Photoshop or Illustrator. You will need to be able to juggle with terms such as CSS, Layers and HTML, and at the same time get the coding and the necessary for the good functioning of a website. 8. On a cruise ship Although work on a cruise ship is generally not easy and nights do not end too early, there are satisfying satisfactions. If you do not know what you can do on board, think of the following: translator, chef, animator, dancer / fitness instructor, babysitter, steward, spa receptionist, waiter, masseur, bartender. Moreover, the destinations you reach, the bustling ports that come in your way, can open up an unusually beautiful world. 9. Travel Photographer If you have studied or you are passionate about photography, and at the same time, your curiosity gives you every step of the way, starting with a personal portfolio. Then try to find customers, such as organizations, companies, travel agencies, and travel magazines. The second option would be to sell your photos on digital platforms; there are few who pay for good photos. For inspiration, you can read the story of a photojournalist working for National Geographic. 10. Artisan Have you ever thought that your inclination to create handmade items such as jewelery, accessories, leather products or other materials can be presented in the big city markets under the eyes of many travelers? It's probably not one of the simplest things to do in foreign spaces, but if you make art out of a few things you have, and when you hear the word "risk," you're thinking about the opportunity, you've added another source of income possible along your journeys. 11. Flight attendant Almost every day you are in another corner of the world; every morning, taking breakfast in another metropolis; to every work program, other faces, other cultures. All of this while you look splendid in uniform. Not only do you choose at the end of the month with a much higher than average salary, but if you really burn your travel flame and look for a stable job, an aviation career could be your daily adventure. 12. Virtual Assistant If you're looking all day with your laptop screen, if you caught on and you're interested in everything social media, design, content creation, digital marketing, you probably think about taking your laptop to the bottom arm and move you from the office chair to a hammock. All the more, if the hammock or the corner of the cafe where you want to continue working online, you imagine it in another city, in another culture, you are not far from the realm of possibilities. You can start working as a freelancer, finding the people who need your skills and who are willing to pay you from any corner of the world you are.

Couple who retired at 30 years and now travels around the world

Jeremy Jacobson and Winnie Tseng lived frugally for ten years to retire early and have time and financial opportunities to explore the world. How to Travel Around the World: 14 Steps (with Pictures) How to Travel Around the World. Traveling around the world at once is often a cheaper option than breaking ...

How to make money while traveling: Passion makes good money to travel a couple of young adventurers, who gave up comfort and do around the world.

How To Make Money While Traveling The World | The Huffington Post

Jun 30, 2016 ... The topic people have asked me the most about since I began my journey of preparing for full-time travel is how to make money while traveling ...

On 26 and 24 years, Jack Morris and Lauren Bullen are two real stars of the network Instagram. The couple travels to some of the most exotic places on Earth, post photos on social networking accounts and received fabulous sums of money from brand sites willing to promote through them, writes "Business Insider" . The two managed to gather together more than three million fans on Instagram, but two separate sites where public photos from their travels. Jack and Lauren were known in Fiji as they worked together and now live in Bali. $ 9,000 for a photo Morris said recently to "Cosmopolitan" that even won $ 9,000 for a single post on Instagram, while Bullen received $ 7,500 for a single photo posted. Jack added that is not associated with brands that pay for a photo less than $ 3,000. Moreover, the two rounded budget thanks to partnerships with various international brands. At one point, he gave Jack a company $ 35,000 for two days of filming five photos uploaded to Instagram's account. Lauren says she started with very few followers, but soon managed to form a community and brands have begun to contact. "I traveled a lot, but basically half month doing nothing. When brands have started to contact me, I realized that I could earn money, so I quit my job and given the freedom to do what I love, "she says. Instead, Jack's story is different. He left school at 17 years and engaged in order to survive. After five years he was tired of life she led and saved money for a ticket to Bangkok to travel with little money. "I had no plan and only I remained some money. Only the first night I spent in a hotel, "he recalls. After a few months, Jack had diminished incomes and began searching for a way to survive and not be forced to return to the old job. So it used Instagram, which then was released quite recently. "Instead I" grow "my Instagram account I made several niches which accounts repost images. I accounts for pictures of animals for fashion and cars. All have reached significant numbers of followers. Simply make use of images that circulate through the network, and then contact you repost brands asking them to invest money in them, "he explained. After two years, Jack's business paid off, but did not have time traveled. "I felt I could do this job and my room. All I did was spend a lot of time with phone and laptop in her arms. I forgot to do what I wanted, that is to travel ", he recalls. So he sold accounts you have, but one that had more fans. He resumed travel and live with the money coming from that account. Thus began posting photos of trips we made, quickly gaining many fans, and brands who wanted to promote. Soon he met Lauren in Fiji, and the two moved in Bali. "We were both the same, and he asked me to go with him in Fiji, which I thought was fun. I continued to do what we love to take pictures and create content, "says the girl. Then Instagram accounts of the two have become increasingly popular, and they began to travel more and show the world through their own experiences. "Brands have started contacting us more often after I start showing up only when you post photos separately. I have seen more value in torque, which is a target of the tourism industry, "said Jack. The two say they edit their pictures professionally, but not associated with any brand. "We work only with brands we like and which we believe are authentic. We will never promote something we disagree just for the money, "they say. Asked what is the key to their success, they say it is ... fun. "We both started doing this to have fun doing what we love. And it shows in our pictures. We had never expected to receive such sums of money for our passion. We feel fortunate. Sometimes we do not believe that what we experience is real, "they conclude.