#because i only think of circuses happening in like the 20s | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ichayalovesyou · 4 years ago

Text

Why Bones & Spock NEED Each Other (Grief)

So over my tenure in this fandom I’ve seen some one sided stuff about Bones being mean to Spock, and vice versa and I’m like

Thing is y’all: You’re both right, but you’re also both wrong!

Bones is mean to Spock you’re right! But you know what? That’s a good thing!

Spock is mean to Bones because of course he is! And guess what? That’s also a good thing!

They both need it, and they can only get it (safely) from each other! What they have is (in a weird way) healthy! But it’s only healthy for these two specifically because they understand each other so well!

Prime examples? Somebody has died or gone missing (usually Jim)!

Let’s talk about how Spock & Bones grieve!

Let’s address how each character (generally) moves through the 5 stages of grief

Bones: Anger, Denial, Depression, Bargaining, Acceptance

Spock: Bargaining, Denial, Depression, Anger, Acceptance

They are each individually perfectly equipped to handle each other’s grief (or refusal to grieve)!

Bones initial reaction to death is usually Anger, he blames himself and anyone in proximity. Quickly followed by a weird form of denial, in which he doesn’t deny someone is dead, but he denies that other people think the person is gone and that they felt it when it happened because he’s dunked so hard under his own grief his usually high empathy has switched off.

Now, Bones is highly familiar with grief as a medical professional (and having lost his father). He establishes how important and deeply believes in that process in And The Children Shall Lead.

I think Bones is acutely aware of how he grieves, and is equally aware that throwing these feelings out at just anybody could really hurt them.

But Spock isn’t just anybody, he’s a (half) Vulcan, it’s like shouting at a brick wall, Bones knows Spock can take it. I also believe Spock understands that this state is temporary, which is why he handles it with such grace.

What happens when Bones isn’t able to go off at (not truly “on”) Spock is that Bones keeps that anger to himself and gets bordering-on-suicidal (Depression phase of grief). It happens in Miri (self injection), For The World is Hollow & I Have Touched The Sky (trying to stay behind), and The Empath (the whole freakin episode). Jim is good for comfort, but Spock is good for a slap in the face reality check.

They both know that. It’s why they’re still friends despite how much shit they throw at each other

Not only that, but Bones (almost) ALWAYS apologizes, from their worst fights I can rattle off:

“They were wrong, and I was wrong I’m sorry” (Paradise Syndrome)

“Pawns huh? Well if it makes any difference, this pawn is extremely sorry.” (Day of The Dove)

“Spock I- I’m sorry, it does hurt doesn’t it?” (The Tholian Web)

And that’s not including implied/non-verbal apologies.

Bones needs Spock to help him grieve because otherwise he’s gonna take an emotional nosedive toward attempted Martyrdom. Spock’s stoicism punctured by occasional genuiness helps Bones move to the Bargaining stage (making peace with Spock and everything that’s happened) and later Acceptance.

The inverse of this is also true so let’s address how Bones uses his belligerent nature to jump start Spock’s healthy grieving process!

Bones grieving style (and his confrontational nature in general) is uniquely suited to make Spock honor his Human side, his emotions in the matter. Because we know a softer touch (like Jim’s) while more comfortable for Spock, seldom cracks open that wall of emotional repression unless Jim’s in danger.

Bones doesn’t give a shit, and that ultimately a good thing! Both he and Spock constantly need to be directly shoved against their default reactions to interpret things in a balanced way, which is why they’re perfect for each other.

Without Bones, Spock would never let himself grieve, ever. We also know that, more deeply than Spock, Bones understands grief and how to move through it, he’s familiar with loss (which is why I think he’s so quick to accept someone is dead whenever it happens, it’s the reaction of someone whose had to lose a lot of people and is more comfortable grieving than hoping). There’s a lot of evidence for this in Gamesters of Triskellion & Return To Tomorrow.

He also honors Spock’s human half a lot more than Spock does, it’s one of the fundamental power sources for Bones & Spock’s “the racism’s mutual” banter. And it is mutual, I feel like people forget how often Spock compares modern humans to the worst examples of their/his ancestors and treats them as inferior out of internalized hatred and the general xenophobic attitudes of Vulcan culture. Bones of course responds in kind, usually in cockamamy insults, he’s not as well versed in Vulcan history as Spock is in Human. Although I admit Bones does start it a lot, I think arguing accounts as a love language for him lmao.

So when Bones sees Spock trying to stunt and stifle his grieving process, especially since Bones knows he’s at least partly human and it is affecting Spock’s judgement, it hits literally ALL of Bones nerves.

Bones uses reverse psychology to get Spock to admit he is human and he has feelings ALL THE TIME especially where Jim is concerned. Bread & Circuses, The Immunity Syndrome, The Tholian Web & Requiem for Methuselah!

Spock will absolutely refuse to grieve or at least move on from the self-destructive bargaining/denial loop he gets trapped in unless Bones smacks him around a little. Just like how Bones will get self-destructive unless Spock recenters him via logic.

Again, I think on a subconscious level they both know that, and it’s why they never take each other’s smack downs to heart.

An excellent example, Chekov’s “death” in Spectre of The Gun:

Spock isn’t grieving, but everyone else is, Spock was close to Pavel but isn’t letting himself feel it, which could later backfire. Bones is currently grieving, but there’s no time to grieve because they’re all gonna die in 20 minutes if they don’t find a solution to their dilemma.

Transcript & Breakdown:

Bones: You talk about another man’s [Jim’s] feelings? What do you feel Spock?!

Are you grieving? He was like son to you you’re not acknowledging it, again.

Spock: My feelings are not subject for discussion Doctor.

No, and I’m not going to, leave me alone.

Bones: Because there are are no feelings to discuss!

Well I’m grieving! And I’m gonna reverse psychology your Vulcan ass until you start your grieving process so that I can move on!

Scotty: Mr. Spock Chekov is dead! I say it now and I can hardly believe it, but you worked closely with him! That deserves some memorial!

Bones: Spock will have no truck with grief Scotty, it’s human.

Alright, that first comment didn’t work, maybe “insulting” him will get that thick head of his to acknowledge his feelings.

Jim: Bones! Scotty!

Spock: It’s quite alright Captain, they forget I am half human.

Fine, yes I am grieving for Pavel in my own way. Are you satisfied Dr. McCoy?

Bones: [looks surprised and thoughtful, satisfied with Spock’s answer]

Wow, you said you were human without any disgust this time... huh... good job.

Scotty:[looks ashamed]

The 5 o’clock duel bell rings.

#star trek #star trek tos #spock #bones #spones #grief #tw suicidal thoughts #tos #the tholian web #spectre of the gun #the Empath #Miri #for the world is hollow and i have touched the sky #bread and circuses #the paradise syndrome #day of the dove #meta thoughts #meta #meta analysis

300 notes · View notes

hogarthwrites · 3 years ago

Text

the misadventures of nathan and samuel morgan

pairing: none

genre(?): flashback, siblings, coming of age

warnings: none that i can think of

words: 6,244

summary:

"If this whole treasure-hunting thing doesn't work out, maybe we should join the circus." "Not when they have clowns." "Wow. Still not over that?" "No one is."

note:

this is a short story of the drake brothers' time in the orphanage because i think about it a lot. nate was 10, sam was 15.

“It'll be fun,” Sam had said. “I promise there'll be magicians too.”

Nathan Morgan clutched his magician’s hat that Father Duffy gave him in his little hands. He'd just turned ten and he was obsessed with all things magic. The other kids were outside for recess but he'd asked his older brother, Sam, to spectate the new magic tricks he'd learned from a book – another one of Father Duffy’s birthday-slash-Christmas-slash-New Years gifts to him.

Sam was supposed to be in detention, but had snuck out when the elderly nun watching over him had fallen asleep. For once he thanked God for the chance to escape because his hand was starting to cramp from writing “I will not smoke in the chapel” (which was false, he had tried to reason with Sister Catherine--he was smoking behind the chapel) on the blackboard over and over again. At fifteen, he was tall and lanky, a trait he'd inherited from his father. He hated the orphanage and did everything he could to get kicked out somehow.

A week before Nathan’s birthday, Sam found a flyer for a circus coming into town that month. The last time he went to one was before their mother died, but he remembered how fun it was and he knew he just had to take Nathan.

“I don't know,” the younger Morgan brother stared down at the hole in his sock, where his big toe peeked out. He didn't have a magician's cape so he wore his blanket around his shoulders, making him look smaller than he actually was. “Won't you get in trouble for sneaking out again?”

“Who says I'll get in trouble?” Sam shrugged. “They won't know.”

Nathan was still hesitant until Sam sighed and pulled out the tickets from his pocket. The little boy’s eyes lit up at the bright red and blue tickets, wiping his pudgy hands on his pajamas before taking the tickets from Sam. He read the print on it:

Come one! Come all!

Barns and Barney Circus

Wednesday

January 7, 1986

4:00 p.m.

Boston

“I told them you were nine so the other ticket could be free,” Sam grinned.

That was how young Nathan found himself clinging onto Sam’s denim jacket as they stood in line to get into the large blue and white tent, lights illuminating the field it was on. He had told one of the nuns he was feeling sick and faked a fever and a coughing fit so they'd feel sorry for him. They let him stay in bed all day so as soon as he was alone and all the other kids were downstairs saying grace before supper, he stuffed his pillows under his blanket to give the impression he was still in bed, grabbed his magician’s hat and snuck out the window. Sam on the other hand gave no excuses.

“Wow, that's a cool hat you've got there, sport,” the man collecting tickets winked at Nathan. He wore a velveteen suit and had a swirly mustache that reminded Nathan of the villains in the comics he'd read. He shyly hid behind Sam.

“It's his first circus,” Sam handed the man their tickets and took Nathan’s hand to lead them to their seats. “Relax, Nathan. Circuses are so fun.”

Nathan sat next to Sam, looking around as people began to fill up the tent. The lights suddenly dimmed and a spotlight illuminated the middle of the ring. With a poof and lots of smoke, the man in the velveteen suit from earlier appeared. Nathan leaned forward in his seat in awe.

“Is he a magician?” He whispered to Sam.

“Of sorts,” Sam whispered back. “He's the ringleader.”

“Oh,” Nathan turned his attention back to the man.

“Good evening, ladies and gents!” The man’s voice boomed throughout the tent. “Welcome to the Barns and Barney circus here in wonderful Boston to start the new year with a bang!”

Entry of the Gladiators started playing on the speakers as performers came out onto the ring one by one; acrobats, tightrope walkers, dancers, jugglers on unicycles, magicians, a man with a chimpanzee on his shoulder, and many, many clowns.

Nathan was suddenly nervous as he watched the clowns in their colourful wigs and various mismatched outfits entertained the guests. He couldn't understand why, but they unsettled him. He glanced up at Sam, who looked excited at all the acts, but otherwise unphased by the clowns.

The trapeze acts started the show, with spectators ooh-ing and ah-ing at acrobats flying across the room. Then came the jugglers performing comedic acts that made everyone laugh, especially Sam. The show kept going on, and Nathan began to let himself enjoy it, eyes bright at all the acts.

Then came the clowns.

“What was that?” The ringleader leaned towards one of the clowns dressed in a bright blue costume and a large red wig sporting his head. “You want a volunteer?”

Nathan shrunk in his seat as other people raised their hands, yelling “Me! Choose me!” No way did he want to be near any of the clowns.

“You there!” The ringleader pointed in their direction.

Sam pointed at himself in confusion and the ringleader shook his head.

“The little magician sitting in the third row!”

Nathan’s heart began to pound quickly, his hands shaking.

“Go! Go!” Sam egged him on.

His legs felt like jelly as he stood up and hesitantly walked towards the ring, one of the pretty acrobats leading him there. He began to sweat as he was suddenly surrounded by clowns laughing and fooling around.

“And what is your name, young magician?” One of the clowns asked.

“N-Nate,” he stuttered a little too quietly. “N-Nate the Great.”

“Nate the Great!” The clown bellowed, receiving a few giggles from the audience. Nathan wanted to disappear at the very moment.

Suddenly he was surrounded by clowns laughing and dancing, their bright clothes, wigs, and makeup making him uneasy with every passing moment. He looked around for Sam in the audience and saw him giving a reassuring thumbs up, but it didn't help. The world felt like it was spinning around Nathan and the next thing he knew, he felt his jeans get wet.

There were gasps in the crowd, then laughter. Nathan looked down and to his horror, he had wet himself right there. In front of maybe a hundred people. He closed his eyes tightly.

Wake up, wake up, Nate! He wished and prayed it was just a bad nightmare, even muttering the prayers Sister Catherine made him memorise.

Hail Mary, full of grace...

But when Nathan opened his eyes, he was still surrounded by clowns, but they curiously looked at him, no longer laughing.

He closed his eyes again. Reciting the prayer over and over.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

“Nathan! Nathan!” He felt someone tug at his arm and before he knew it, Sam was dragging him out of the tent.

Nathan felt like he couldn't breathe as he sat on the grass, tears streaming down his face. Sam quietly sat next to him on the grass with a grunt.

“You okay?” Sam nudged him.

“No,” Nathan sniffled. “I don't wanna go to another circus ever again.”

“Okay,” Sam shrugged off his jacket and handed it to Nathan. “Here, wrap this around your waist.”

They quietly sat together as Nathan tried to calm himself down. It felt like no matter how much he tried, he couldn't breathe at all. Sam worriedly watched his little brother, a little guilty for letting him go through whatever happened with the clowns. He made a mental note to watch for cues of whenever Nathan felt uneasy about something.

“Uh, excuse me?” A man approached him. He wore the same blue clown costume from earlier, except he didn't have a wig on and no makeup.

“What?” Sam snapped.

“I just wanted to apologise for what happened… In there.”

Nathan kept his head between his knees, too afraid to look up.

“Here,” the man handed Sam a pair of sweatpants. “It might be a little baggy, but it's better than a wet pair of pants.”

“Thanks.”

Sam hesitantly took the pants from the man before he bid them farewell.

“Is he gone?” Nathan mumbled.

“Yeah, he's gone.”

Nathan looked up and was relieved to see just Sam, holding a pair of sweatpants.

“I can't wear that! That's clown clothes!” He protested.

“You'd rather walk around covered in piss?”

Nathan frowned, looking down at his soiled jeans. It did feel very uncomfortable and it wasn't helping that the wetness made him feel colder.

“Fine,” he grumbled, taking the sweatpants from Sam and stomped behind a tree. “Don't look.”

“Ew, no way in hell,” Sam rolled his eyes, turning away to watch the pretty acrobat who stood outside the tent, smoking a cigarette. He considered going up to her to ask for a cigarette, and if he was lucky, her number.

“It's baggy,” Nathan emerged from behind the tree, holding the sweatpants up.

“Just roll the top until it kinda fits.”

Nathan sighed, quietly mocking Sam. “Roll the top until it fits.”

“I look stupid.”

Sam turned back to look at Nathan awkwardly standing by the tree, the sweatpants were baggy and rolled up at his waist and ankles. He suppressed a laugh, instead he awkwardly stood and bit at his nails.

“No, you look fine,” he nodded. “Come on, let's get some ice cream then head back.”

They walked to an old fashioned drug store and ordered two ice cream sodas. The only other people there were the elderly man at the cashier reading a newspaper and a guy probably in his early 20’s who served the ice cream and sodas.

Nathan was still bummed out as he picked at a maraschino cherry. His magician’s hat was on the counter next to him and he pushed it away.

“My career is ruined.”

Sam chuckled. “Come on, no one in there is going to remember that.”

“I'll remember it,” Nathan sighed. “No more Nate the Great.”

“Don't be so dramatic,” Sam picked up the hat. “No one else in the orphanage can pull Mr. Wiggles out of a hat, right?”

Nathan nodded. Mr. Wiggles was a stuffed bunny that one of the younger boys, Ralph, owned. A lot of the younger ones always enjoyed Nathan’s tricks before bed.

“Can't let Ralph down, can we?” Sam nudged him before stuffing a spoonful of ice cream in his mouth. He immediately regretted the instant brain freeze.

“No.”

Nathan took the hat from Sam who was still recovering from the brain freeze and he took a deep breath before hesitantly placing it on his head. The laughter, the wetness, and especially the clowns all came back to him and he tossed the hat on the ground with a yelp.

“Seriously, Nathan?” Sam sighed as he picked up the hat.

“I can't, Sam.”

Sam simply gave him a pat on the back. “No more circuses.”

“No more clowns.”

Nathan crawled into his bed in a fresh pair of pajamas but he couldn't drift off to sleep. He knew he was a lot safer inside the orphanage, surrounded by the other boys who he shared the room with, yet the image of the clowns and the audience laughing was stuck in his mind. He tossed and turned in his bed, wishing Sam wasn't assigned to a different room so he'd have someone to talk to.

Over the next few days, Sam tried to avoid bringing up the circus around Nathan, but he still felt a bit bad about it. Nathan stopped wearing his magician’s hat and cape, opting to sit alone in the library reading comic books instead of performing tricks in front of the other kids. Of course, Father Duffy noticed.

“Samuel, I need to talk to you,” Father Duffy approached Sam as he sat on the bleachers.

Sam instantly put his cigarette out, crushing it under his sneaker and sheepishly turning back to the Father.

“Heyy, Father Duffy, I was just trying out that cigarette that Edward gave me, by the way,” Sam sheepishly said. “It was disgusting. People should never smoke. Did I mention Edward gave it to me?”

“Samuel,” Father Duffy sighed as he sat next to him on the bench. “I wanted to ask about Nate.”

“My brother? What'd he do now?”

“Well, it's what he hasn't been doing that's got me worried. He seems… Quieter than usual?”

Sam stayed silent. He shrugged, feigning innocence.

“Have you noticed it?”

“Well,” Sam stood up and paced. “He hasn't… Been playing with those magic thingies…”

“I'm just worried he might be depressed about something, Sam.” Father Duffy was always worried about either of the brothers getting too depressed after learning about how their mother passed. He reached into his pocket and gave him a ten dollar bill. “Can I trust you to go out and get him a nice magician’s coat?”

“Yeah,” Sam gingerly took the bill and stuffed it in his pocket.

“I'll get Sister Maureen to take you to the market tomorrow morning,” Father Duffy said. “And for the love of God, stop smoking. It's terrible for your lungs.”

“Thank you, Father Duffy,” Sam muttered as he walked away, lighting up another cigarette as soon as the priest was out of sight.

Sister Maureen was a stout Irish woman in her forties who always looked cross, but Sam felt like he got along just fine with her. For one thing, she had Fight For Your Right by the Beastie Boys loudly playing on the radio as she drove him to downtown Boston. This pleased Sam. He liked the Beastie Boys.

“Now don't you be taking your sweet time in there or I'll throw you in detention,” she said in a monotone voice as she parked the car. “Be back in half an hour. I'll be at the store.”

“You got it, Sister,” Sam winked before he got out of the car.

He still had the Beastie Boys song in his head and despite being in his uniform that consisted of a white button down shirt, a pair of black slacks, and a blue vest that had “St. Francis Academy” on the left chest, he felt cool. He felt the bill in his pocket as he made his way to the closest department store.

“Cool,” Sam smiled into the mirror as he tried on a pair of aviators. He looked at the price. Five dollars. If he was going to get Nathan a nice gift he could use for magic, he wouldn't have enough. He considered his choices; he could do the right thing and just buy what Father Duffy asked, or he could treat himself to a nice pair of sunglasses and still find Nathan a nice gift.

He was about to make up his mind to do the right thing when he looked out the window and saw an open-air market across the street. Maybe he could find something there. There was the usual local produce as Sam strolled around, hoping there would be the odd stall with weird antiquities. Instead, he came across an elderly woman with rabbits in a cage. This gave Sam an idea.

“Hey, lady, how much for a bunny?” He asked her.

“Just four dollars, dear,” she sweetly smiled.

“Sold!” Sam pointed at a fat white bunny munching on a carrot. “I'll take that one.”

“For feck’s sake,” Sister Maureen simply gave Sam a weird look as he climbed back into the car with a little cage in his arms and a shiny new pair of sunglasses. “Did you get what you needed?”

“Oh yeah,” Sam nodded. “Let's roll, Sister Maureen.”

He felt even cooler when No Sleep Till Brooklyn played loudly as the nun drove back.

Nathan was lying on the ground, focusing on his drawing of Indiana Jones. He'd finally got to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark when they showed it at the movie night a couple days ago, and he was intrigued. He began imagining himself as a swashbuckling explorer again.

Sam poked his head into the room, scanning the room for his little brother.

“I have something for you,” he walked over to Nathan. “A late present.”

He pushed his sunglasses up and plopped down on the floor and placed the little cage in front of Nathan.

“No way,” Nathan gasped, pushing his sketches away to hold the bunny in his hands. “Is this allowed?”

“Father Duffy paid for it,” Sam gave a nonchalant shrug.

“I'm gonna name him Doc.”

“What's up, Doc?” Sam laughed as Nathan left the bunny to him so he could grab his magician’s hat and wrapped his blanket around his shoulders. A crowd of three to four little boys ranging from ages five to nine who were loitering around the room had gathered around, curiously looking at the brothers and whispering to each other.

“And now,” Nathan addressed the crowd. “The return of Nate the Great!”

He gestured for Sam to stand up.

“I shall now introduce the bunny, Doc, who I shall pull out of my hat!”

Ooh!

Sam stood behind Nathan after secretly giving him the bunny and he put the sunglasses on again.

“Abra cadabra!” Nathan quickly popped open the top of the hat and slid Doc inside.

“You don't have a bunny!” One of the smaller boys called out as he picked his nose.

“Then what do you call…” Nathan stuffed his hand into the bottom of the hat and gently pulled Doc out by the ears. “This!”

Aah!

Laughter filled the room as Nathan went through his routine of magic tricks, now improved with an even better assistant, Doc.

“Now, I like the sound laugh–” Father Duffy stood at the doorway and froze when he saw the bunny in Nathan’s hand. “What is that?”

“A bunny!” Sam grinned. “Isn't it just the best present?”

Father Duffy slumped against the doorway and sighed. Oh, Samuel.

“That's very nice,” he muttered. “Sam–can I speak to you in the hall for a second?”

“Sure thing, Father,” Sam followed the priest out into the hall and closed the door to the room where Nathan was showing the boys some card tricks.

“A live animal, Samuel?” Father Duffy crossed his arms. “I asked you to get him a cape .”

“ Oh ,” Sam hummed. “I swear I don't remember you saying anything specific, so I chose the gift I thought would be best for him.”

“You do know you boys aren't allowed to keep pets.”

“Come on, Father Duffy. Don't sweat it. We'll keep Doc out in that old cage near the garden.”

“Samuel, I don't trust you with an animal like that.”

“That's a low blow,” Sam looked up at Father Duffy through his shades. “But fine, it's Nathan’s pet now. He’ll take care of it.”

“Is anything the matter?” Nathan peeped out the door, the bunny still in his hand. “Is Sam in trouble again?”

“I was just telling your brother how it's a lot of hard work to take care of rabbits,” Father Duffy turned his attention to the younger Morgan brother.

“I'm sure there's books on rabbit care in the library,” Nathan held up the bunny. “I named him Doc.”

“That's nice,” Father Duffy sighed. “Fine. As long as you promise to clean up after him and to feed him yourself. Okay?”

“See, that's why you're my favourite priest,” Sam gave him a playful punch on the shoulder. “Was that a sin?”

“Shades, Samuel.”

Nathan loved Doc. He's never had a pet before so he made it his mission to prove to himself and to Father Duffy and Sister Catherine that he was responsible enough to take care of the bunny. Apart from Sam, Nathan didn't really have any other friends, and he wouldn't really call Ralph-- who was just six -- a friend. Sam was in the highschool section of the orphanage so when Nathan had no one else to talk to, he'd sneak off to Doc’s cage to talk to the rabbit and to draw. He must've drawn Doc a thousand times that first month. His drawing studies of the rabbit eventually evolved into Super Doc, a series of comics about a superhero rabbit fighting off villains that all looked like clowns.

“Whatcha drawing there, dingbat?” Edward, one of the older boys approached Nathan. He was large and had his black hair slicked back, making him look like a cockroach. He was in the highschool section too and was just a year younger than Sam. Two other boys, Jay and Danny, were close behind, giving Nathan menacing grins.

“Shouldn't you be in algebra? Or did you flunk that again?” Nathan quickly shut his notebook, but Edward grabbed it from him.

“Super Doc?” Edward laughed. “More like Super Dork, am I right?”

“You're just like your brother,” Jay, who was smaller and leaner, poked Nathan’s shoulder. “A friendless loser.”

“At least we aren't stupid,” Nathan tried to reach for his notebook. “Give it back, Edward!”

Edward tossed it to Danny, who stood six-foot-two at the age of fourteen. The taller boy laughed and pushed Nathan away. “Loser.”

Blinded by rage, Nathan kicked Danny in the shin, causing him to drop the notebook as he doubled over. Nathan picked it up and stuffed it into his backpack before landing a punch on Edward’s cheek.

“Scrawny little punk,” Edward pushed him on the ground, making Nathan fall with a grunt. “You're gonna regret this.”

Jay and Danny pinned Nathan down as Edward grabbed a fistful of sand. Nathan kicked and yelled, knocking off Jay’s glasses in the process. He closed his eyes as Edward’s fist neared his face. It happened enough for him to anticipate, and he wasn't looking forward to eating a sand and knuckle sandwich.

He heard Edward grunt and the sound of someone falling on the sand.

“You get away from him, you assholes!” Sam yelled. Nathan opened his eyes and saw Sam throwing punches at Edward and Danny.

Nathan turned to Jay and punched him square on the jaw. The older boy held his jaw in pain.

“What the fuck?”

“That's right, Nathan!” Sam yelled as he dodged a blow from Danny. He almost looked like he was having fun. “Jab, jab, hook!”

Jab, jab, hook . Nathan repeated it in his mind over and over again. He mimicked Sam in his movements, anticipating Jay’s every move. Jab, jab, hook.

“Oof!” Nathan flew back as Jay hit him in the eye.

“Stupid kid,” Jay pushed him and he bumped into Sam, who frowned.

“Come on, Nathan. Fight’s not over.”

When Sam was distracted, Edward threw another punch at Sam’s cheek and threw him down on the ground. Sam groaned as he tried to get up again.

“No one wants either of you,” he kicked sand at them and the other boys followed. “One day you’re going to get kicked out, Morgan, and no one's gonna remember you and no one's gonna want you, you insignificant little freak.”

Nathan’s blood boiled. He wanted to stand up and fight Edward again, but his eye was throbbing.

“This isn't over, Gilbertson,” Sam gritted his teeth. “I'm gonna kick your ass.”

“Loser,” Edward kicked sand at them again before walking off.

Sam sighed as he laid back on the dirt floor and put his shades that were hanging on his vest on. He lit up a cigarette and puffed a few angry smokes.

“Thanks,” Nathan mumbled.

“Yeah. Don't mention it.”

“I hate it here, Sam.”

“Me too.”

Nathan buried his face between his knees and Sam worriedly looked up.

“Hey, none of what he said is true, alright?” Sam said. “That bozo doesn't know what he's talking about.”

The younger Morgan brother said nothing.

“That was badass, though. Did you see Jay?” Sam suddenly laughed. “When have you ever seen a ten year old beat up a thirteen year old?”

“Maybe if the magician thing doesn't fly, I'll try out boxing,” Nathan said.

“Yeah!” Sam grinned as he sat up. “I'll be your boxing coach.”

“I'll beat Edward and all those clowns up myself then.”

“Attaboy, Nathan!”

They laughed and watched the clouds roll by until they fell asleep from exhaustion. Nathan dreamt of Doc saving him from a pack of bully clowns.

Something was wrong. Something was very, very wrong. Doc was nowhere to be found. It was late in the evening and Nathan had been practicing some tricks in the activity room when the rabbit disappeared. He immediately went to Sam (who was, for some reason, asleep on the bleachers outside still in his uniform) for help.

“Well where did you leave him?” Sam stood in the middle of the room with his hands on his hips while Nathan rummaged through the pillows on the sofa.

“Here!” The young boy pointed at the sofa. “At least he was here before I went to pee. I didn't think he'd leave.”

“He's a chunky rabbit. He wouldn't have gone too far,” Sam walked towards a bulletin board filled with artworks from the other fifth graders in Nathan’s class. He chuckled at a blob with green eyes. “What the hell did Bobby draw?”

“You could be helping me, you know,” Nathan threw a throw pillow at him.

“Oh no, he's your pet.”

Nathan rolled his eyes as he crawled around looking under the couches.

It was then that a loud yell came from across the hall.

“Nathan!”

Father Duffy barged into the activity room in his pajamas, holding Doc in his arms.

There were little rabbit droppings on the priest’s bedsheets, to Nathan’s horror and to Sam’s amusement. Sam tried to suppress a laugh, but he ran out guffawing.

“Oh crap,” Nathan gulped. “I'll clean it up. I promise, Father Duffy.”

“This is the last straw,” Father Duffy was exasperated. “Nate, you promised you'd keep the rabbit outside in its cage.”

“I just took him in to practice for the talent show tomorrow.”

“One more talent show, Nate,” Father Duffy sighed. “Then the rabbit has to go.”

“What?” Nathan ran after him as he left the room to get a cup of tea. “But he's my rabbit.”

“I know, but it's getting out of hand. Oh, Sister Catherine!” Father Duffy called to the nun who just came out of one of the offices.

“Yes, Father?” Her eyebrows knitted.

“Please help Nathan get new sheets. His pet left a little surprise on my bed. I need some chamomile tea.”

Sister Catherine worriedly looked at the rabbit in Nathan’s arms. “A… Pet?”

“He's nice,” Nathan said quietly.

“Then make sure Nathan and Sam are in their respective rooms after,” Father Duffy yawned and made his way to the pantry. “You’ll know where I'll be.”

The boys had the tip of their ears pinched as Sister Catherine led them to the laundry room and handed them fresh sheets. She stood by the door as she watched them clean the rabbit droppings off with a tiny hand broom.

“Father Duffy wants to get rid of Doc,” Nathan whispered as he tugged the other side of the bedsheet.

“He's just saying that,” Sam scoffed.

“No, I think he's serious.”

“Well, what am I supposed to do about it?”

“Can we hide him or maybe set him free?”

“Nathan,” Sam gave him an exasperated look. “He's a rabbit. He's prey to almost everything. He's as good as dead out there.”

“I can't just let him take Doc away.”

“Okay, fine. Let's clean this mess up then I'll think of something.”

Sister Catherine made sure Nathan had put Doc back in his cage before making them go back to their rooms. Sam had said nothing else regarding the rabbit, and it made Nathan anxious. He almost forgot about the talent show.

The next morning, Nathan threw on his uniform and stuffed his makeshift magician's costume in his backpack and ran to Doc’s cage before his first class. The rabbit was still there, munching on vegetables that Mr. O’Reilly, the gardener, probably fed him earlier.

“Big day, Doc,” Nathan took him out of the cage to clean out the droppings and the leakings. He couldn't help but give him a quick kiss on the head, ignoring the strong smell of rabbit. “This is the performance of our lives and hopefully not the last one too.”

He reached into his pocket to grab a handful of pellets and sprinkled it into Doc’s food bowl. “Eat up, big guy. I'll see you in a few.”

Sam trudged to his pre-calculus class, lazily copying down last night’s homework from one of his roommates. He barely slept and all he wanted was to crawl back into bed and sleep the day away. He kept thinking about what he was going to do with the damn rabbit. Sam wouldn't admit, but he was fond of it. He wasn't always around for his little brother and he still felt bad about the whole clown fiasco, but at least the rabbit gave Nathan some comfort.

He thought about giving the rabbit away to a pet store, but what pet store would want a large rabbit like that? He shuddered to think of Doc ending up as rabbit stew somehow. Then he remembered the old woman he bought Doc from at the Haymarket market. He prayed she'd be there after the talent show that evening. He didn't have a Plan B.

“Abra cadabra!” Nathan repeated over and over, trying to decide which one sounded better. Ralph was on stage doing some kind of yodel and he was just waiting to finally be called up on stage.

“Alright, Nathan, here's the plan,” Sam appeared from around the auditorium. “After your performance, you meet me at the roof with the door that'll lead us out the West Gate. We're gonna catch the T to Haymarket and pray to god the old lady selling the rabbits is still at the market. Understand?”

Nathan sadly nodded. He didn't want to think about how he had to part with Doc soon.

Sam put a hand on his shoulder. “This is the best thing for Doc.”

“I guess so.”

“It'll be fine,” Sam gave him a playful punch on the shoulder. “See you later, little brother.”

“Sure,” Nathan sighed as Sam ran off. He kneeled in front of Doc, whose beady red eyes wandered around, his wet nose in the air as he sniffed around. For a second, a wave of sadness hit Nathan and he let himself shed a few tears for his best friend.

“Now for our next performer…” Father Duffy stood on stage, looking at the little faces in the audience. Some were bored, some looked excited to see more performances. “The very magical Nate the Great!”

Nathan took a deep breath before stepping out into the limelight, squinting at the bright, hot light. Ignoring the expecting gazes, he set his table up, making sure Doc was secure near the little trap door he could pull him out of (he spent a few weeks making that table in home improvement class).

For a second, he felt his heart race as he remembered the clowns and the audience at the circus laughing at him. He glanced down at his trousers. Not wet. Good start.

“Go Nathan!” A single voice yelled. It sounded like Sam, but as Nathan peered out into the audience, he couldn't see him.

“Welcome, my fellow schoolmates! My name is Nate the Great and I'm here to amaze you with magic!”

He began his routine: starting off with a floating card trick and bending a spoon. The audience which he now realised was mostly other boys in the grade school, ooh-ed and aah-ed with every trick. Nathan asked Ralph to come up and volunteer to have a coin vanish from his palm and reappear from his ear. The six year old laughed throughout it.

As he went on, Nathan’s confidence went up, and finally it was Doc’s turn to help him amaze the crowd.

“For my last trick I'm going to pull out a very special friend of mine,” Nathan took his hat off and showed the inside of it to the audience. “As you can see, there is nothing in my hat.”

Wow!

Nathan gave a cheeky grin as he strategically placed the hat on the table, opening the secret door quickly. “Abra cadabra!”

He gently pulled the now rather large Doc out of the hat and held him up for the audience to see. The little boys laughed and cheered at the appearance of a live animal. They were reminded of a trip to the petting zoo just a month ago, where they plenty of bunnies like Doc.

“Thank you!” Nathan grinned as he held Doc to his chest, bowing down a few times until Father Duffy ushered him off the stage.

He was still thrilled as he left the auditorium, smiling at himself and the recent memory.

“We did it, Doc,” he whispered at the rabbit, giving it a kiss between its fuzzy ears. He took out a few baby carrots and gave them to him. As much as he tried not to, tears still dripped down his cheeks.

Sam leaned by the door on top of the roof of their rendezvous point. He was getting antsy and Nathan was taking too long to get there. It wasn't Nathan’s intention to get there too slow, though; it was hard to climb the usual route with a fragile creature in his backpack.

“What took you so long?” Sam rolled his eyes as Nathan climbed over the railing.

“Why are you in such a hurry? They're busy with the dumb talent show.”

“Whatever,” Sam opened the door. “Let's go.”

It was quarter past 6 PM when they got to Hanover Street, briskly walking to the open-air market. Most of the vendors have already packed up and some were cleaning up, happy to be done with the day.

Sam was suddenly nervous. The T ran slower than he remembered (the last time he rode the subway was before their father left them in the orphanage), instantly hating all the station transfers and the waiting. At this point, he was praying the old woman would still be there.

Nathan tried to keep up with Sam, but he couldn't keep up. Sam had told him to keep his eyes peeled for an old woman with rabbits, but all he saw were empty stalls and boxes of fresh produce.

“A bunny!” A girl just a few years younger than Nathan ran up to him. She had blonde hair tied up in pigtails and soft brown eyes. “What's his name?”

“Doc,” Nathan smiled.

“He's so cute!” She squealed. “Will he bite?”

“Not at all.” He took out a piece of cabbage from his pocket. “Here, you can feed him.”

The girl giggled in delight as Doc ate from her hand.

“There you are!” An older woman who Nathan assumed was the little girl’s mother ran up to them. “Let's go, I got the strawberries we can snack on tonight.”

“Look, Mom, it's a cute rabbit,” the little girl said.

“That's nice sweetie, but we have to go,” the woman took her hand.

Just then, Sam walked back to Nathan with an annoyed look on her face. “She's gone. Saw her drive away.”

“He needs a home, you know,” Nathan told the woman and the girl. “He's talented and he'll keep you safe and happy.”

The little girl’s eyes went wide. “Mom, please, please, please, please !”

“We already have Peaches, honey.”

“Peaches is a fish . I can't kiss a fish.”

“Lady, this rabbit is one of a kind,” Sam stepped in. “He's magic .”

“Oh, brother,” the woman groaned.

“I swear ever since we got him, good things have just been happening,” Sam shrugged. “If we weren't stuck in an orphanage, we could've kept him.”

“You're orphans?” The lady looked at them, finally noticing their clean cut uniforms.

The brothers gave her their best puppy dog eyes, knowing how well it always worked.

“I promise I'll take care of him!” The little girl tugged at the woman’s coat.

She sighed, a sign the boys knew all too well meant she'd fallen for it.

“Okay, we'll take the rabbit,” she said wearily and the little girl squealed loudly.

Nathan held up Doc and smiled at the rabbit, blinking back tears. He thought of all the times they spent together and cherished this last moment.

“Thank you,” he whispered before gently placing him in the little girl’s arms.

“And here,” the woman handed him coupons. “You can use this at any food store at Quincy Market.”

“Thanks,” Nathan smiled. “Please take care of Doc.”

“We will,” she nodded.

He stood, watching mother and daughter leave with his best friend. He sniffled, finally letting his tears roll down his cheeks. Sam gave him a comforting pat on the back.

“He's found a great home, Nathan.”

“He had a home with me.”

“Well now he has a home where he can just be a happy little rabbit and not worry about getting kicked out at the smallest of sins.”

Nathan nodded. “He'll be okay right, Sam?”

“Sure he will.”

“What's next for us?”

Sam tapped his chin in thought, then the coupons in Nathan’s hand caught his eye.

“We can get coconut macaroons.”

#nathan drake #samuel drake #uncharted fanfiction #no romance #just a lil story

15 notes · View notes

jq37 · 5 years ago

Text

The Royal Report– A Crown of Candy Ep 3

Keep Sharp

On the Road Again

Welcome back to Calorum you guys. We last left off witnessing an actual miracle as a group of cheese assassins masquerading as meatlanders (and Brennan by proxy) failed to kill a single Candian, Tartguard included.

Now, everyone is picking up the pieces. Amethar is still messed up from the fight so he’s being tended to. Liam and some of the NPCs are working on clearing the tree from the road. Ruby, still covered in blood, is in one of the carriages and when she uses Prestidigitation to clear the blood from a circus flyer she was carrying, Calroy walks in and grabs her hand to stop her as a reflex. He quickly drops her hand--very bold move to grab one of the princesses like that--and tries to impress on her that the rest of the world isn’t like Candia and she really really needs to stop with the casual magic when they’re on the road. Ruby is really naively taken aback and frustrated by this information but Calroy describes it like it’s business as usual. Her aunt, Lazuli, has the title of Archmage but the official position is that the title is an archaic holdover from less enlightened times and she was simply a really good alchemist--even though everyone knows that’s untrue. That’s politics bay-bee! Lapin joins the conversation (along with Theo shortly after) and says that if people knew where he got his powers from, he’d be dead (which seems a weird thing to say with Calroy in earshot).

Outside, Liam is chopping up the tree and finds these little peppermint acorn things called Heartseeds which are basically concentrated, ambient, magical energy that can grant small wishes. Preston eats them and gains a fly speed of 40 (but it’s like he’s a firework--he has to land after 40 feet). Jet finds Liam and asks for help with keeping an eye on Ruby. She’s pretty shook after seeing her almost die. Liam is down to do it for nothing (the kid just wants to be included) but Jet insists on being in his debt and--always on brand--he just asks for some cool seeds. She also finds a meat shield that’s made out of gross, burnt, stuck-to-the-pan meat bits that she names Burnt Ends.

They get going again and in the PC wagon you have all the PCs but Jet (who is outside with the guards and Grissini) along with Cruller and his wife--Lady Donetta. She chats with Grissini for a little bit while the adults try to get her to get in the carriage. She’s finally swayed by Ruby but when she comes in she says she wasn’t (just) flirting. She was trying to get intel on how in trouble Ruby was. Liam offers that he speaks Ceresian so he can spy if they need him to and also did anyone have any dreams last night? Theo--who is trying to keep everyone alive and was like so close to being impressed by Liam--along with Lapin and Cruller try to get everyone back on track but Ruby--defiantly--is all, “They’re not gonna kill me. I’m a princess!” Theo points out that someone almost killed her literally ten minutes ago and Cruller points out that death isn’t the only bad thing that can happen to a person. She could get forcibly put in a monastery for instance. Jet is not even having that in hypothetical-land and says that as the heir princess, she would lay the smackdown on anyone who tried to do that.

It looks like things are about to dissolve into overlapping gibberish but Amethar does the dad thing of putting his foot down and yelling at everyone to get along before taking a dad nap passing out from his injuries. Lady Donetta patches him up while Cruller once again talks about the importance of politics. It’s not just them that have to play this game. The Meatlanders are polytheistic generally but all Bulbian on paper. Jet thinks this whole song and dance is ridiculous and should be changed once she has more sway in politics, but she’s willing to shut up for now. She’s also willing to keep Lapin’s secret, but him bringing it up sparks Cruller’s interest. Lapin tries to gloss over it but Liam chimes in that he’s sorry about breaking his teacup. Lapin shuts him up (Liam on a low Insight check thinks he hates him) and rolls a 14 to get Cruller off his back.

Secrets and Lies

As they cross the border into Fructerra, Sir Theo invites Ruby and Jet out for some fresh air and they invite Liam which he goes along with even though it’s clear he wanted to talk to the sisters alone. As soon as they’re out of earshot of everyone Theo turns off the scold and says that regardless of everything they’re all saying, Ruby absolutely needs to keep studying magic. He says that he was a ward of Lazuli who taught him some magic (including animating Sprinkle) and he has a whole-ass lore dump for them that he was planning on subtly revealing over time but now’s the time for getting everybody up to speed ASAP not mentoring from the shadows:

He says that Lazuli--who, like Ruby and Jet, wanted magic to be acceptable and not relegated to the shadows of one kingdom--was doing arcane research into wild stuff like immortality that would have advanced the world a lot further than its current state. She died sacrificing herself in a battle where she was the only Candian casualty. Theo was there and, before she sent him away, she said that she needed to do it to, “save [their] people and save [their] world.” He didn’t get what she meant and why that would be literally the hill she--a princess and Archmage--would choose to die on but he knows she would sometimes have visions of the future and he thinks she might have known Ruby was coming and needed to ensure that timeline happened. Ruby--who is outraged that this is the first she’s hearing of all of this and shocked that Theo is suddenly cool (“I've always been cool! All of us are cool!”) still doesn’t want to do all this “book stuff” or embrace any kind of magical destiny and even Jet is like, “Come on girl.” Anyway, Sir Theo tells them they just need to be chill and lowkey and he’ll hook them up with magical training and banned books for Jet. He also promises to teach Ruby the Find Familiar spell.

Liam helps Lady Donetta with herbal remedies for Amethar and he comes back at full health. Amethar gets to talking about Liam’s dad who he says had Liam’s knack from nature stuff and taught him (Amethar) how to fight. Calroy chimes in that his dad and Amethar fought together in the Ravening War. He also says that Liam being a hostage (he outright calls him a hostage) is what lets his dad not join the Concord (the kind of ride or die, post Ravening War pact everyone else is in) and remain an independent rebel state. Apparently, he seceded because, King Jadin (Amethar’s Dad--the past king), would not uphold Candia’s alliances. Liam’s dad (Duke Joren Jawbreaker) turned traitor to go fight with their Dairy Island allies.

It takes another couple of days to get to Comida and, on the way there, Ruby learns and casts the Find Familiar spell--netting her a butterscotch falcon that she names Yak after the noise he makes. She hopes he’ll be friends with Sprinkle because Siobhan knows that the second real objective of every D&D campaign (after making friends) is acquiring pets and having them play with each other (which is in direct opposition to the DM goal of not letting any of your players have any pets).

Cruller checks in with Theo about the secret magic lessons and also says that he’s looked into it and the imperial soldiers who saw Ruby do magic are gossiping. Grissini is shutting some of it down so it’s not spreading like wildfire but it’s really just a matter of time. Cruller tries to get more specifics about what Jet and Lapin were talking about (his Sugarplum magic) and Theo dodges the question. Cruller says that he can be more helpful if he’s in the loop but doesn’t push further.

Faces and Names

We have made it to Comida and, after a quick House Rocks family heart to heart, it’s time for a parade of a BUNCH of new characters:

Manta Ray Jack: Man at Arms of House Cheddar and one of Amethar’s Ravening War buddies. A literal 2 foot tall cube of cheese. He also has a tattoo of a Manta Ray on his arm which isn’t important to the plot but is important to me that you know.

Sir Morris Brie: Knight of House Cheddar, Master of State to the Duchess (who we’ll get to next) and another Dairy Island buddy of Amethar.

Duchess Primsy Coldbottle: A literal bottle of milk, 16-year-old regent of House Cheddar (Duchess of Lacramor specifically) and ruler of the Dairy Islands. On a nat 20, Ruby knows that Prince Tarthur Cheddar was the prince during the Ravening Wars but died. She also knows about…

Captain Annabelle Cheddar: (Captain of the Colby) who is this cool, naval, battle-ready lady that Ruby sees hanging out with a bunch of solider women fighters and having a great time while Primsy is talking to her advisors. Apparently, Anabelle should be the rightful heir to the Dairy Islands but was stripped of her title because she refused to marry (hmm) which Ruby thinks is sick as hell. She goes to chat her up and finds out that she’ll be fighting in the Melee part of the tourney.

Senator Augustus Ciabatta: A full bread person who’s a senator from the very populous Ceresia and he’s throwing coins to the people from his palanquin. (I want it on the record that I feel an episode called Bread and Circuses coming.)

Prince Cabbage: The adult son of King Cabbage. His palanquin is the second largest. The largest belongs to...

Hierophant Rex Belizabeth Brassica: She is basically the Bulb Pope. She’s like a green woman with broccoli hair. She and Lapin have met before before she became pope. They quickly talk and she invites him to tag along as they pay their respects to the Emperor. He agrees to go. She’s followed around by Archbishop Onionpatch (another Primogen from Greenhold in Vegetania).

Theo is a little nervous about Amethar cozying up to all these dairy people considering the attack but Amethar insists he can handle himself. There’s a big feast set up and Amethar goes to talk to Primsy who is just super sweet and seems to know she has a lot of responsibility that she is trying her level best to uphold. She’s like the anti Jet and Ruby and Brennan...if something happens to her...I swear...

Anyway, Theo is scanning the room for trouble and he sees (1) That Anabelle is looking at Amethar forlornly from across the room (maybe like she wishes she could be in the room where it happens so to speak?) and (2) there is a young Dairy nobleman stealth flirting with Primsy. Amethar asks Sir Brie about the attack and he says they had nothing to do with it. They don’t have the resources after the war which was fought largely in the Dairy Isles. He seems to blame Anabelle at least partially for the diminished power of House Cheddar based on the dirty look he shoots her when he mentions the state of the state. Amethar reiterates that the alliance between Candia and the Dairy Isles is solid and Manta Ray Jack pops in to casually drop that Amethar had a war girlfriend (lover? idk what the proper terminology is here) in the Far East Isles back in the day so I’m sure that’s gonna become relevant at the worst possible moment.

Brennan also curses us by unleashing Thad (Jet’s avocado pen pal boyfriend) onto the story and as soon as Jet re-meets this poncy, French-y, horny, avocado she’s like “I made a huge mistake” and later gets him to “meet her outside” so she can ditch him.

Theo goes with Liam to check up on Primsy because he’s concerned with whatever is going on with her and that cheese boy who he learns is her traveling companion--Lord Stilton Curdeau. And it’s covered by cologne but his cheese stink is familiar. He wants to alert Amethar but Amethar is currently eyeing Basha Myaso (Warlord of the Beef Clans and ruler of all of the Meatlands) who is glaring at him. On Calroy’s advice, he squares up with Basha who implies that Candia is responsible for the false flag attack. Amethar tells him to “watch [his] fucking mouth.” Diplomacy!

Meanwhile, Lapin is with the Pontifex in the Great Food Pyramid (which is, of course, a thing). She introduces him to Sir Keradin Deeproot who is this super buff super intense carrot Paladin. We learn that Lapin isn’t an archbishop and his title of primogen comes from his status as a “miracle worker”. Apparently, Miracle working is very uncommon even though the Bulbian church is so massive. When asked, Onionpatch says that things in Vegetania are fine except that King Belvedere Cabbage is infirm. Another Priogem--this one of Cersia--joins them, the Archbishop Fettucina Alfredi who is this very classically beautiful looking, toga wearing woman with glowing eyes--she’s also a miracle worker. Lapin is like, “Oh fuck,” because if she’s magic too then she might be able to tell that he’s not actually on the level.

Lapin veers away from Alfredi and chats up the Pontifex who says Brightgarden is OK but they're currently dealing with a murder of an archbishop in the Meatlands (the Archbishop Raddica). Lord Basha is looking for who did it and the Pontifex wants them brought to justice ASAP. Alfredi brings up the attack on the road and wonders about the rumors she heard about strange magic. Lapin, sweating bullets, lies and says that he thinks it was the work of the Bulb. On a 14 Deception from Lapin, Alfredi thinks lavender fog would be a weird Bulbian intercession. It sounds more like something a false good she’s heard about from Candia would do. What’s her name? The Sugarplum Fairy? Lapin, with a 25 Persuasion check, is able to wave that off as primitive backwoods things that he’s working to stamp out in Candia. That’s enough to get the Pontifex on his side and they go up to see the Emperor.

Outside of his room is his daughter--Lady Plumbeline Uvano--who is lowkey very upset about something. She greets them and then takes the Pontifex in to talk to the Emperor while Lapin waits outside with Alfredi and Kerradin. When she’s done paying the respects of the church, the whole holy crew goes back to the party. Before Lapin splits off, the Pontifex does a little pull aside with him about Candia’s role in the war and how she thinks, with him at the helm, Candia is in good hands.

At Sir Theo's suggestion, Amethar has the Candy Crew stand with the Cheese Peeps during the announcement of the tourney which is a big deal because it’s a symbol that the alliance is still on even though they were attacked by cheese bandits. Primsy introduces herself to the princesses and gives them cool, milksilk handkerchiefs she embroidered herself with a candy cane crossed with a cheese cube on a stick with their house words: There is Strength in Sweetness. She doesn’t have one for Liam but gives him hers (it has her house words: Keep Sharp) on the condition he joins the archery competition and fights for her. With not a 15 between the 6 of them (even w/ multiple help actions) none of the PCs have presents for anyone else.

The tourney is announced. There are three events, each with a dope prize. Winner of the melee gets a boon from the emperor at the end of his rule. The winner of the archery contest gets a seat on the Cornucopian Council, the title of Master of Arrows, and is made advisor to the next emperor (which seems like a LOT to put on a person whose main skill is “can shoot arrows well” but OK sure). The winner of the joust gets to name a candidate for Emperor from any class or house they wish and their choice must be considered. Ruby and Liam join the archery contest. Theo signs up for the joust. Jet is hesitant but Amethar convinces her to join the melee with him. She also scratches “The Dairy Islands Rule!” into a piece of wood for Primsy and she’s charming enough that Primsy doesn’t think it’s a slipshod afterthought.

An imperial courier shows up and tells Theo the Emperor wants to talk to Amethar. He brings all the PCs and Calroy. Lady Plumbeline is still outside her dad’s room and she’s still pissed. On a 24 Insight check, Theo can tell that--as I suspected from episode 1--she is pretty ticked that she has all this institutional knowledge and competence and experience but, because of an arbitrary rule, she can’t take the throne. She tells Amethar (who she met when she was a teen) that they need to limit how many people go in as to not overwhelm him. He takes Lapin and Theo (who gives Sprinkle to Jet) and goes in to talk to Uvano.

Uvano, as we already know, was another Ravening War buddy of Amethar’s and another person he’s seen piss and shit--which we learn because that’s apparently how Amethar classifies who his best friends are. They talk the way old buddies do and Uvano asks what he would say about his life taking a surprising turn. Amethar says that if it was anyone else asking, he probably wouldn’t be on board but for Uvano? He’ll do it. That’s just what he wanted to hear.

And that’s where we end the episode without rolling initiative because the combat in the next episode is all fun and games and to quote Lou Wilson--who I suspect is about to become the wrongest person in D20 history--“It’s all sparring. Nobody is going to get killed.”

Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuure.

You Should Know

Country Accents seen to be as follows: Dairy (Scottish), Meat (Russian), Fruit (French), Grain (Italian), Candy (American/British)

In the long awaited sequel to “Kristen Has -3 Dex,” Liam has a -2 to Charisma.

Ruby speaks Lacra (Dairy-speak).

The Meatlander gods include The Great Cow, The Great Boar, and The Great Hen.

The head beef dude has a super jacked T-Bone steak wife who I assume we’ll get a name for during the melee next episode. Update, courtesy of @fjordgofurther--we did get a name this ep. Her name is Scravoya.

The Bulbian concept of hell/the devil involves the “Hungry Ones” which just serves to underline that Brennan really did think this crazy thing all the way through and still decided to not do it but to DO it.

Everyone levels up every episode I believe since D20 uses milestone leveling for the main seasons but Ruby and Jet leveled up twice to level 3 to help catch them up a little now that they have a story reason to be stronger.

Things I’m Concerned About

Uvano is only in his 60s. Like, people die in their 60s but that detail casually mentioned in a setting like this always brings up the possibility of poison or some other kind of sabotage.

The second Brennan mentioned the daughter of Uvano in passing ep 1, I clocked it and the situation is basically what I was anticipating it seems. Like, of course she’s pissed. I would be too. I wonder if either the boon or the chance to offer up a candidate could be used to override the Concord rules? Either way, gotta keep an eye on her. Also, I noticed the little flippant remark she had for the Pontifex (“This is Fructerra, I’m dressed for court.”) and I don’t know if that’s distaste for the church or something more personal but it seemed interesting enough to mention.

I know that the improvisational nature of D&D means that there’s not foreshadowing in the same way that you have in something fully set like a book or a movie but every time the Rocks family gets together for a sweet (ha) conversation (“We just want to protect you, Pop.”) I am just more and more sure we are being set up for a fall.

Lou Wilson’s defining trait as a D&D player is doing what his character would do and letting it play out to its logical conclusion, consequences be damned--consequences be welcomed even. And Amethar is--como se dice--no Calroy when it comes to politics. I can’t imagine these facts at up to any kind of happy sum.

Also, speaking of, I wanna trust Calroy, but I can’t. He’s too good at this. He’s too competent. He knows too much information and Amethar trusts him too much. Hope he proves me wrong but I will not be made a fool of by a slice of cake. Do you hear me Brennan? I REFUSE.

I've only had Primsy for a week, but if anything happened to her, I would kill everyone in this room and then myself. No but, seriously, if she is just as she appears to be (and this is GoT so I guess it’s not off the table that she’s secretly like bad and it would have taken a 30 Insight check to find out) then MAN I am so scared for her. Characters who are just trying their best to do a good job are my Kryptonite and she is as much in the wrong genre as the twins are. Moreso even.

I’m concerned Amethar has a cheesecake baby somewhere out there that’s gonna end up being a Problem. Oh my god what if one of the twins dies and their backup character is Amethar’s illegitimate kid?

The Bulbian Church has so much power but so little magic which seems...odd. Also, just curious, what is a Paladin without divine magic? Isn’t that just a fighter?

I very much vibe with the concept of Alfredi as a character but lol I was STRESSED for Lapin during that whole conversation and I feel like that’s gonna be my default state for him all season.

I’m concerned (or maybe just suspicious) that there’s more to the backstory with Theo and Lazuli than we heard. That little extra narration from Brennan about swearing he could feel her smile? Mmm, OK.

Five More Things

The character art for this season cracks me up because Brennan clearly gave the artist for this season two lists and one list was labeled “Hot” and one was labeled “Ridiculous” and that’s how we got characters like Primsy and Calroy in the same scene as Anabelle and Grissini and the funniest part is Brennan’s absolute refusal to play any of these characters like they’re any more or less ridiculous than any of the others. He’s like, “The hot pasta woman is valid and the talking cheese cube is EQUALLY VALID.”

“Not this season. Not season five.” Very bold of Brennan to be outraged about Emily trying to ride a living sprinkle dog like that's the ridiculous thing about a world with a living sprinkle dog.

The Sucorsi Road running into the Glucian Road for Sucrose and Glucose is the kind of worldbuilding detail that I love.

I was gonna be so mad at Brennan for the nonsense that is the name “Belizabeth” but he said on Adventuring Party that he was specifically dunking on GRRM with that so he gets a pass this time.

You know that famous Pixar meeting/lunch where they came up with Bugs Life, Monsters Inc, Finding Nemo, and Wall-E in one conversation? I bet Brennan had a similar brainstorming sesh where he came up with Garthy, Anabelle, and two other thirst traps that haven’t been introduced yet. Like come on. He described her hair as, “princely”? Brennan is trying to kill some of y’all.

#dimension 20 #dimension 20 spoilers #a crown of candy #a crown of candy spoilers #the royal report

98 notes · View notes

helly-watermelonsmellinfellon · 6 years ago

Text

Fantastic Beasts: CoG Thoughts and Observations

*SPOILERS* Press ‘J’ if you want to skip to the next post.

Grindelwald is a badass. I don’t even like him and yet he’s a fucking badass. He was in fucking prison for 6 months and they had to change his guards multiple times because he’s so damn charismatic that he kept luring the Aurors to his side!

He then got out long before he was supposed to be transported and literally took out everyone on the transport team. And he drove the damn carriage and without even looking behind him, directed bolts of lightning to take out some of the Aurors on their brooms.

He did not come to play.

Newt is still my adorable child. He’s so awkward and still feels like he did in the first film which is great. A lot of people whined about how he wasn’t ‘manly enough’. Because Newt shows compassion on the regular and is more soft-spoken and not interested in ‘manly professions’ or some shit, so he doesn’t fit the ridiculous type of masculinity Hollywood shoves down our throats and dudebros can’t relate to him.

“There are no strange creatures, only wicked people,” is a great line and should be used in reference to animals as well since some people still walk around acting like sharks and pitbulls are evil incarnate. I really love Newt.

Leta knows him well enough to know what he’d say in response to her comment. They have an awkward air of camaraderie about them.

Newt stood up to a teacher with that line of his and got a month’s worth of detention. Leta left a dungbomb in his office to get back at him so she could join Newt. Good friends fight the intolerant assholes in charge of your education together.

Theseus gives off this smarmy vibe. I seen people praise him as a good brother but at present just the way he stands annoys me. And it makes me sad that Newt feels like he can’t be himself in order to be rightfully treated like a human being should be treated.

The dude playing Theseus really does resemble Eddie though, so props for getting that right at least. I can believe they’re siblings.

As usual the Ministry is useless. Grindels is literally the reason NYC got fucked up. Him and his messing with Credence. Newt made some mistakes but actually worked to fix them and then saved all their asses in the process. Why is he getting blamed with misinformation? Even in the 20s Magical Britain’s Ministry is full of morons.

There’s a black dude in a high Ministry position. I think there are more POC in this film than all the HP films combined, jfc. ‘bout time!

Also, they never told Newt that Credence is alive and are now using that fact as a way to try and guilt-trip him into joining the Ministry. Cleverish I suppose, but I still don’t like them.

Some dude just referred to Credence as an IT. wtf? Credence is a wizard who, because magical people suck at getting abused children the help they need, ended up a massive mess. He’s not some thing to be treated like shit!

The brothers are arguing and Newt starts spouting off things he’s mostly likely heard from Theseus and his parents. I will admit Theseus seems less annoying now that he’s spoken a bit, but the fact that Newt starts saying, “Okay, right, here we go, selfish, irresponsible-” speaks of somebody who is used to being compared to another and having what others consider to be ‘faults’ shoved in his face and complained about. That sucks a lot.

Okay, Theseus isn’t as annoying as I expected him to be. He does seem to care for Newt and understand how his mind works to an extent. He isn’t offended that Newt doesn’t go to hug him back. Newt is just awkward with physical contact from humans. He’s always seemed to be on the spectrum for me and I’ve only recently found out that others feel the same, which makes his character more interesting imo.

Grindels is in lift shoes! Needs that extra height that badly? 5′10 isn’t short or anything but he really needed that lift to 6′0″? XD

At least Grindels and the Gang are only using AKs(silently btw). I don’t get why everyone always acts like AK is the absolute worst spell in HP when literally it’s just a quick and painless death. There are a bajillion others spells that are actually terrifying.

Newt easily noticing that he’s being followed and fucking with his stalker is the best. People who say Newt is weak are effin stupid.

I would not take the hand of some random glove hovering in my face. Now way, no how. idc who it might belong to, that’s some shady shit. I don’t trust people.

Though we have to admit that the glove forcibly Apparating him, even if it’s a small distance is pretty cool. Dumbles annoys me but as Phineas Nigellus will say in the future, “He’s got style.”

The fact that Newt knew it was Dumbles makes me wonder if Dumbles has done this before.

Dumbles literally just summoned a big ass fog to cover the city! I don’t like him but he keeps impressing me! It’s annoying! Stop it!

“A Phoenix will come to any Dumbledore in desperate need.” Interesting.

A wizard doing sleight of hand. Oi vey. Dumbles is a drama queen to the umpteenth degree.

God he was a cryptic asshat even back then. It’s very easy to believe this dude becomes the Dumbledore we all know. I think people are just bitching because they refuse to see Dumbledore for who he is. Lots of people whining about ‘how manipulative Jude’s Dumbledore is’ not realizing that HP-Dumbles is literally a Master Manipulator.

Baby Nifflers are effin adorable and I love how well Newt knows them!

Newt literally has someone working for him. And he’s been nothing but reassuring in his own way. He especially tells her to avoid the Kelpie because he doesn’t want her to get hurt. I have seen several people whining about him ‘being mean’ to her and I just have to ask, are y’all fucking stupid? He knows his creatures and when he tells her to not go near one alone because of how dangerous it is and she might lose a finger, he’s not being mean. He’s being a responsible employer. I know some of your bosses don’t give a shit about your well being, but Newt is actually a decent bloke. Chill the fuck out.

She’s flirting with him and is really bad at it. But it’s kinda funny at the same time.

Also can we just stop and talk about how talented Newt is that he can create such realistic habitats in such seemingly small and cramped places? He’s really good at magic.

Queenie and Jacob are cute. And to all the people whining about how ‘unnecessary’ he is to the plot, can y’all chill? He is there for a reason. To show how fucked up MACUSA is when it comes to dealing with Muggles. Queenie will literally be imprisoned if they find out she’s with a Muggle. It’s ridiculous and his character is supposed to show how even the American wizards are messed up.

Queenie calling Newt, ‘honey’ is sweet. I swear she’s the Molly of this new group of friends. Seems like she wants to take care of people and just adopts everyone who comes along.

God, even the magical gossip rags are shit even back then. They deliberately made it so it looked as if Newt and Leta were a thing. Though tbh nothing really happened between Newt and Tina in the first film so her being all offended over him possibly marrying another woman is ridiculous.

These weird shots that are supposed to be directly from someone’s point of view are a bit annoying, I must admit. It’s kind of like watching through a somewhat less annoying fish-eye lens, but still annoying anyway.

Newt is very smart. He notices very quickly that Jacob is out of sorts and that he hasn’t been acting normally. He deduces very quickly that something is up and then stops it.

I really like how level-headed Jacob is about everything considering all the crap he’s just thrown into. He cares enough about Queenie to not want her to be imprisoned/possibly killed for breaking a stupid law. I got really emotional at that part because MACUSA is full of idiots.

Jacob is right though, she’s not being sensible. There’s a lot at stake and it isn’t smart for them to marry yet no matter how much they want to.

Jacob looks at the bird thing and then’s just like, “I got my own problems.” He’s been through enough shit to just not care atm.

And now everyone’s basically going to Paris anyway.

Walking through weird barriers into new places should no longer impress me but it still does!

The magical circus looks kind of awesome but the I’m also not a fan of how circuses are handled. So it’s this cross between amazement and annoyance at the inhumane way animals(in this case creatures) are being handled.

Literally, they are kept locked up in filthy places, I am unhappy! Also Claudia Kim, who portrays Nagini, is so very beautiful and I am so very gay.

Nagini’s hair has that little serpent-like curl at the end as it rests against her neck. It’s such an awesome little detail to throw in there.

Her transformation is really cool btw.

Wow! You treat the creatures like shit and mock them, and get all confused when they attack you? I hope pain was dealt.

What is it with all the bad guys in everything having to incorporate skulls into their dirty business? Is this supposed to be a play on the whole skulls and crossbones thing meaning death?

Though Grindels does make it more interesting than some wiggly tattoo at least.

Dumbles is considered the greatest threat to his cause when he’s practically been doing nothing but playing teacher. That’s some high praise I suppose.

He’s already known as ‘The Great Albus Dumbledore’! What did he do to gain such belief in his prowess? He’s like 46!

Newt’s asking Jacob for advice on what to say when he sees Tina again, and Jacob gives him great advise. “Best not to plan these things.” It’s good. And then Newt��s like, “She has eyes just like a salamander,” and Jacob’s tune changes immediately! XD “Don’t say that!”

Jacob is a good friend. I really like him!

Jacob’s reactions are the greatest because he’s literally like an in-universe representation of the fandom when we saw magic in the movies for the first time!

Do people know that Eddie Redmayne actually licked the ground?

Newt talking about how narrow Tina’s feet are and Jacob just being like, ‘okaaaaaaay’ is the best!

Queenie must be so lost. Hearing all these thoughts and not knowing the language they’re in. And it must be stressful to not only be in an unfamiliar place but also be completely unprepared for everything going on.

That is the perfect moment to trick her. Literally, I don’t get how people can’t see that she’s emotionally vulnerable and a prime target for manipulation right now.

Credence is just a mess. He needs friends. Glad Nagini seems to be filling in that role but honestly he needs a few more. Those who are ‘cursed’ in essence, like he is. So they’ll understand him.

I really love Jacob’s character. He’s just so amazed by magic and all the things it can do. ^-^

Newt! Knows how to tame and capture creatures he’s never even met before! Zuowus are cute imo.

Hedwig’s Theme, I am crying!

Also, Hogwarts brings back my feels.

Very confused about the McGonagall thing unless this involves time-travel which idk how advanced that was at the time.

The fucking Aurors just break into the class and Head dude’s like, “I can go wherever I please. OUT!” And all the kids just standing there and look to Dumbledore for direction. It’s fucking hilarious that they won’t even listen to the dude who could imprison them with whatever excuse he can make up.

Now, there seems to be students of all ages in this classroom, which makes me wonder if it’s actually a class or Dumbledore has a Dueling Club set up, because he’s literally teaching a Gryffindor how to not make the same mistakes in a duel, right before owning his ass. idc what anyone says, no class of 17/11 year olds will have multiples students the size of first/seventh years in it. People are either really really tall or really really short. So I vote for a Dueling Club happening.

The Gryffindor who just lost the duel gets up in the dude’s face and is like, ‘he’s the best teacher we’ve got’. Props.

Dumbledore is way better than this Travis dude. And I mean by power and presence. I don’t like him any more than I do the Travis dude. Meaning not at all, But you get what I mean. Dumbles is far better for the good guys than this hoity toity asshat who thinks that because he’s Head Auror he can do anything he wants. Him ignoring Dumbledore’s warning is going to get a lot of people killed.

“We were closer than brothers.” How else can anyone take that? What is closer than a familial tie? A romantic one! Duh!

He’s banned from teaching DADA. But he isn’t banned from teaching any other class! Travis should have been more specific! This is probably how Dumbledore ended up teaching Transfiguration during Tom’s time at school since he doesn’t fight Grindels until 1945. I love loopholes!

Are the candles in the Great Hall just lit all the time?

I for one, think that ‘Talk Shit, Get Hit’ is a very wonderful saying to take to heart. So when people were talking shit about Leta, she damn well deserved to tear them a new asshole over it! I applaud her for cursing that gossiping little bitch’s mouth shut in the corridor. She deserved it. I am a blood-thirsty bitch!

Young-Newt literally looked like a young Eddie Redmayne. Superb casting on that part, God damn! He even got all of Eddie’s chosen mannerisms down!

You know, I’m not shocked that Leta’s being harassed by Gryffindors. The whole school treats Slytherins like shit the moment they’re Sorted. Even when they aren’t raised on the magical side and know nothing about Slytherin’s reputation.

I have mentioned how annoying I find the weird fish-eye-like lens view, right? ‘Cause it’s annoying me again.

BTW, I will always firmly believe that Hufflepuff/Slytherin friendships are the strongest. That is a deadly combination right there.

Albus admits that he didn’t love Ariana as much as he should have. Age does somewhat remove that veil from the eyes, doesn’t it?

I really, honestly think that people just decided that anythngn they saw in this movie was going to be horrible and that’s why y’all are being a bunch of whiny bitches over everything. Queenie didn’t just up and decide hey, I’m joining Grindels! She’s honestly at the end of her rope and is getting manipulated. Y’all are fucking ridiculous. Don’t pay for tickets if you intend to find fault in everything the movie has to offer.

The good sis stands up and points her wand at Grindels despite knowing full well she wouldn’t be able to do shit to him. Temerity ftw.

You gotta give Grindels some props. This dude knows how to play on everyone’s soft points. He just sees them and immediately goes in for the kill. Was Voldy like this in the 70s? It makes more sense that people would follow him if he acted like this before ‘dying’ the first time. ‘Cause after his resurrection he wasn’t follow-worthy imo. Too frantic and mad to take seriously.

He literally tells her that she’s an ‘innocent’ and that ‘he doesn’t wish her harm’. He then tells her to leave, which puts her under the impression that she’s safe from him and can make her own choices. This is a prime manipulation tactic because she’ll come back eventually once she remembers that he supposedly gave her a choice and no one else will. She told Jacob he wasn’t giving her a choice, and now Grindels, the supposed bad guy, is doing just that. And he makes it like he understands her suffering in her desire for love without restriction. Even good guys make mistakes. Y’all want to kiss Dumbledore’s ass for every shit thing he did by saying he was trying to save the world, so you can get over Queenie having a lapse of judgment during an emotionally and mentally trying period.

Ah, the Mirror of Erised, in which you see your heart’s greatest desire. And Dumbledore sees him and Grindelwald alone.

Also, I’m just saying that pressing their hands together would have been enough to make the blood mix. Linking their fingers is not necessary at all.

Finally it’s just Grindelwald as he currently is, staring him down with an innocent expression. And Dumbledore’s sad smile is the only thing we see as the scene fades to black.

Newt is so good with creatures, I love him!

Every time he comes out of that case I am reminded of how slight Eddie is.

Newt asks Jacob to get the tweezers from his bag, but after the mishaps in the last film where British and American English were proven to be different to a degree, he goes on to explain what they look like and both Tina and Jacob are like ‘we know what they are, dude’. XD

They disinfect the unconscious dude, Tina gets her info and heads off. And Jacob tries to get her to come back and then looks at Newt and is all, “You didn’t mention salamanders, did you?”. XD

Upon Jacob’s insistence he goes after Tina and tells her she’s different from other Aurors because she’s got Middle Head, in reference to the middle head of a Runespoor which is said to be a Visionary/Dreamer and doesn’t argue like the heads on either side of it. Tina doesn’t want to kill Credence like everyone else which makes her a different kind of Auror.

So that whacky black shroud that covers the city is Grindels’ way of calling his peeps together?

Grindels’ appears before Credence and tells him he ‘wants nothing from him and wants everything for him, that Grindels never had’. He and Dumbles are perfect for each other. Master Manipulators. A certain kind of Dynamic Duo. Grindels even uses the whole ‘my boy’ thing!

The shot is on Jacob. His stomach growls and it pans down and then up. And Flamel is right behind him when it comes back up! Shit like that always gets me in films! The only kind of jumpscare I’m not into. I don’t like my back being exposed so shots like this kill me.

The Flamels don’t keep food in their house. What exactly was the exchange for living so long? Like, I just thought the Stone kept them youthful and stopped their aging, you know? Apparently they have no need of food. Wouldn’t living that long be boring as hell when you can’t even enjoy the basics of life?

“You don’t look a day over 375.” I love Jacob! XD

Seriously though. Nicki looks like he’ll fall apart at any moment. Is living forever like this really worth it?

Nicki “Hasn’t seen action in 200 years,” OMG!

Newt Polyjuices himself into looking like Theseus and calls him ‘an Auror and a hugger’ in this long-suffering but fond tone.

Theseus and Leta are literally right there too!

It was all going so well and then Theseus looks down and isn’t it always like that? The plot must continue on somehow? I’m dying! XD It was a good plan until that happened.

Tina gets him down with a flick of the wand? The War Hero? Really? Good for her!

Newt is such an awkward turtle. I love that they didn’t insist upon Eddie changing up the way he portrays him!

Newt describes Tina’s eyes as “Having and effect in person. Like fire in water, dark water,” and if that isn’t the nicest way to describe dark brown eyes idk what is. HE’S TRYING SO HARD NOT TO SAY THE SALAMANDER LINE! XD

SHE SAID IT INSTEAD! XD How she got that I have no idea. I don’t know shit about salamanders.

And Leta finds them and runs with them. I wonder if Tina is feeling awkward.

He’s known the Zouwu for so little time and it’s already cuddling up to him! The Snow White of fucking wizards, everyone! He is a cinnamon roll and must be kept safe!

Honestly I am proud I kept up with the whole Lestrange family tree business because holy shit it was convoluted!

The Lestranges are so sexist. Only the men get recorded on the family tree, what bullshit. Leta’s father Raped her mother via Imperius and never loved her. Frankly, a child being jealous of a new sibling that he did love shouldn’t be surprising. Kids make mistakes all the time and hating her for making a rash decision she didn’t fully understand at that age, is ridiculous. She didn’t even mean to get him killed. It’s not like she’s some super horrible person for that.

Newt gets this! He literally gets it! And she tells him “You’ve never met a monster you couldn’t love”. I hurt. She’s not a monster, she’s a fucking human being who made a grave mistake when she was like 7 and it haunted her for the rest of her life.

Nagini doesn’t trust Purebloods because, “They kill the likes of us for sport”. Her life must have sucked.

And here’s where is all leads up to. The literal Crimes of Grindelwald. And not in the sense of law-breaking, although there has been a lot of that. The title means in reference to an act of of great offense which isn’t illegal but still considered morally reprehensible, against another person or persons. He’s spent this whole time manipulating the hell out of everyone and doing things both illegal and simply sinful. Lying isn’t against the law, but the way he’s doing it is wrong, and it helps him commit his ‘crimes’.

Also what the hell is with evil people and graveyards/tombs? Is this a requirement in joining the dark side?

Grindels finds muggles “Not disposable but of a different disposition.” He’s really workin’ it because he knows the kinds of people who showed up to this little speech thing of his and he’s getting all of them at once.

He’s literally showing them a vision of what will happen in WWII with the bombs in order to scare them into joining his side. It’s what will ‘rise up’ from the muggles, and Jacob understands it instantly. Scare tactics ftw! He has a point in a sense. Could we really say that the leading governments of our world wouldn’t try to enslave magicals in order to have the most power over all other countries?

The Aurors are called down to face the crowd and Grindels knows just what to say to stir up feelings of distrust. Though they’re cops so it’s not shocking. They’re all power-hungry and with the experience a lot of the people have with Aurors, plus Grindels sweet-talking them all, of course some chick just up and moves against them and get murdered on the spot. Not even detained. Cops kill first and ask questions later, not shocking magic ones do the same.

Auror used an AK without hesitation. But you know, everyone says that is the most evil spell in HP, right? And no one, not even Aurors, should use it?

And as expected, it all plays in Grindels’ plans. I’m not shocked. “Spread the word. It is not we who are violent.” Right after an Auror just murdered someone. Talk about playing on the emotions.

The fire Grindels’ conjures is blue, compared to normal fire. Which means it’s hotter. Voldy’s fire was also blue. Is this just because they’re magically powerful or are both Dark Lords?

Grindelwald uses magic like he’s a conductor. It’s interesting because everyone else but Voldy has only ever had a death grip on their wands. Voldy holds his wand more gracefully and loosely.

Nagini does not side with Grindelwald. And she has a point. He knows what Credence is, not who he is.

Okay, so a lot of people died in the blue fire, but Newt was able to hold the fire off from consuming him several times. My child is so powerful! He’s just never violent with it! *APPLAUSE*

Queenie’s desperation makes me so sad. She and Jacob love each other but go about it very differently.

I can’t tell if Leta was saying ILY to Newt or Theseus. Maybe to both but with different meanings? Romantic Love isn’t the only kind of love out there. One is her long-time friend whom she could have romantic feelings for if their bond is deep enough. The other is her fiance though her bond with him doesn’t seem that deep. Confusing and shot deliberately like that to confuse us too.

She tries to kill Grindels knowing it won’t work. I like Leta. I don’t get why people don’t like her.

He’s literally using his fancy Fiendfyre to destroy Paris. This dude aims big!

Flamel is a genius and a bunch of people, most who aren’t trained Aurors, just had to put out some powerful magic that would have destroyed a whole city.

Newts hugs Theseus!

The Niffler lives and got the Blood Pact thing from Grindels! How did he not notice it?

Queenie’s skills are very useful to Grindels in how to deal with Credence without scaring him off. He knew what he was doing in manipulating her to his side.

Grindels and Dumbles agreed not to fight one another. Wonder what would happen if they turned their wands on each other with intent to do harm. Pain? Or maybe... their spells being directed elsewhere by some unseen force and hitting nearby things(*cough* Ariana *cough*)?

So here’s where I am confused but I have many thoughts. A.) Percival Dumbledore died some time after 1890 but no date is given. He was in Azkaban during the time and immoral things happen in prison. He could be the father. B.) Kendra Dumbledore died in 1899 and Credence was born ‘circa’ 1901(meaning around that time frame but no specific details are known) so she could have birthed him. Albus wouldn’t know since he wasn’t very present at home and was distant to his siblings. Kendra isn’t actually a Dumbledore but she had the name, Credence doesn’t know the details, and Grindels could have sent the Phoenix in some way. C.) Grindels is just lying altogether but he’s really believable. D.) He used the word ‘brother’ to mean family, like how he addressed the people as his ‘brothers and sisters’. His fellow magical people. So perhaps he meant as in like Credence’s kin. So he could be a child of Aberforth who would be old enough to sire a child(teens do it all the time), or of their Aunt Honoria who could have had a kid for all people know.

Dumbles is the one to tell us all about the Phoenix thing first. Grindels strengthens that fact later on, making it not just some children’s tale. It’s all left to us to wonder if he’s lying about Credence or not.

I observed a lot.

So for the cinematography, it was really well done save for the fish-eye lens crap. I really didn’t like that. But I am a sucker for panning from above. Also clever use of the camera while certain people speak. Angles can do wonders to tell a story.

I thought the plot was very easy to follow. I’ve seen people whine about it not making sense but literally, in stories about multiple people, the POV shifts. A lot. In order to understand why everyone is doing what they are doing, you need to know what is going on from their ends. So yeah, why is everybody just randomly in France of all places? Paying attention lets you find out!

I do have one really big annoyance and it’s more for it taking this long instead of it happening at all. In the original HP films there really aren’t a lot of non-white actors portraying characters, even if they’re just extras to fill in for other students and such. In this film there were extras of all kinds of nationalities. I saw a lot of Black and Asian folks just filling up the background. And I’m glad the universe now seems more realistic and diverse. It’s just annoying that the most diverse of all the films in this fictional world, is the newest one and kinda makes the others a bit disappointing since the 20s were less progressive than the 90s.

My initial opinions on certain characters did change. Naturally I hate Dumbledore as a character no matter what but he’s more interesting than before. And I don’t really like Grindels all that much but he is a badass and watching him is interesting. Theseus and Leta grew on me with such little time. I cried for both of them. I’m disappointed but not shocked or angry at Queenie’s actions. I cried for her too. Flamel creeps me out still. I like Nagini. She’s been through some tough shit and is mildly distrustful of everyone. And now she’s away from possibly her only friend(I got not romance vibes between she and Credence btw).

I liked all the story-telling. There were a lot of creatures. A lot of talking. A decent amount of action. And humor spread out here and there for some levity.

I thought it was a fine film. It was good. I’d re-watch it with the first without hesitation. I had moments where I laughed, moments where I cried, and moments where I wasn’t sure what I was feeling at all.

Grade: A

#Fantastic Beasts Spoilers #FBAWTFT #HP #omg #Fantastic Beasts #Crimes of Grindelwald #Crimes of Grindelwald Spoilers

252 notes · View notes

pomhearts · 6 years ago

Text

50 Questions Tag

uwu i was tagged by @mias97! thanks sweetie!

ill put this under a read more because its pretty long :’)

1. what takes up too much of your time? homework and classes :’)

2. what makes you day better? being able to talk @felegs easily makes my day 110% better

3. what’s the best thing that happened to you today? i got to play dnd with my friends today and thats always one of my day’s biggest highlight on sundays

4. what fictional place would you like to go? uhhhh i wiukd kive ti hope into the world of the Night Circus? like circuses popping up suddenly and randomly and showing cool magic?? i love

5. are you good at giving advice? i am yeah im a very motherly psyc major with too much experience under my belt so im usually really great at helping people

6. do you have any mental illness? i do yes~

7. have you ever experienced sleep paralysis? no luckily god i cant imagine ever going through that

8. what musician inspired you the most? Garret Rapp and Tablo

9. have you ever fallen in love? i have yeah

10. what’s your dream date? night time beach or park adventure

11. what do others notice about you? my motherly nature :’) i’m always immediately told how kind and uplifting i am upon meeting people

12. what is the annoying habit you have? i tend to bite on my lip or tug on my piercings way too much

13. do you still talk to you first love? god luckily not i hope this answer never changes

14. how many ex’s do you have? .....six? official ones? but also 3 of them i dated 2-3 times it was v toxic and like 4 of them really fucked me up emotionally so~~~

15. how many songs are on your playlist? usually range between 6-10 because thats how long it typically takes me to shower and thats the only reason i make them but my longest currently is 337 because its my high school throwback one lmao

16. what instruments can you play? guitar!

17. who do you have the most pictures of? my dog lmao

18. where would you like to go before you die? Seattle, Washington, Boston, Massachusetts, Florence, Italy again and Athens, Greece

19. what is your zodiac? capricorn

20. do you relate to it? oh definitely sadly im very stereotypical for my sign :’)

21. what is happiness to you? not to be like... cliche? but im most happiest when the people around me are safe and happy

22. are you going through anything right now? mmmm im struggling a lot with school and mental health but? thats life i guess?

23. what’s the worst decision you’ve ever made? i??? dont know??? i have a lot of shit i really regret saying/doing but i dont know which would be considered my worst decision? actually no i know its having given my mom a second chance to be back in my life when i was in high school

24. what’s your favourite store? mmmm bath and bodyworks. im a big slut for candles and they have many

25. what’s your opinion on abortion? im pro choice man its your life no one else should dictate what you do with it

26. do you keep a bucket list? kinda? yeah i guess lmao

27. do you have a favourite album at the moment? Dawn by The Rose and 4 Your Eyez by J. Cole

28. what do you want for your birthday? ideally? to see vivi. realistically? to get drunk and just forget about responsibilities for a bit

29. what are most peoples first impression of you? super kind and attentive lmao

30. what age do you seem according to most people? either 12 or 21

31. where do you keep your phone while you’re sleeping? in my hand near my ear because i cant sleep without music but i also try to keep my music low enough that my roommate wont hear it

32. what word do you say the most? interesting

33. what’s the oldest age you would date? probably like 25??

34. what’s the youngest age you would date? 18? 19?

35. what job/career do most people say would suit you? psychology, teaching or being an editor

36. what’s your favourite music genre? probably rnb or hiphop/rap

37. if you could live in any country in the world, where would it be? as much as i absolutely hate this country, id probably want to stay in America

38. what is your current favourite song? Glue by Planetarium Records or I’ll Still Have Me by CYN

39. how long have you had this blog for? this blog I’ve had since June

40. what are you excited for? going home and seeing my dog next month :’)

41. are you a better talker or listener? oh definitely listener

42. what is the last productive thing you did? .....i studied thursday morning for the exam i had that day??? i took this weekend off form college and avoided almost all my responsibilities tbh

43. what do you want for christmas? ideally? a rat. realistically? i dunno i asked my aunt to buy my Tablo’s two books and Ikon’s Return album so?

44. what class do you get the best grades in? English courses in general but I’m currently getting the best grades in my Social Influences class

45. on a scale from 1-10, how are you feeling right now? probably like a 4? ive been getting really shitty sleep lately and i think its finally catching up to me and i have a bunch of homework and studying to do so :’) im feeling like crap

46. what can you see yourself doing in 10 years? hopefully graduating with my psyd and working at a hospital in seattle?

47. when did you get your first heartbreak? mmmm probably when i was in 7th grade? that year was real rough and just had back to back heartbreak in romantic and platonic senses lmao

48. at what age do you want to get married? lmao never i don’t want to get married i don’t see a point in it and also the thought of being that fully committed scares the absolute crap outta me

49. what career did you want to have as a child? this is gonna sound weird but from 5-8th grade i really wanted to be a homicide photographer???

50. what do you crave right now? sleep but also caffeine and attention :’)

i dont really,,, have the spoons to think of people to tag lmao so for today, im not gonna tag anyone. if you see this and wanna do it then feel free to tag me but i leave my usual bunch alone for tonight lmao

#uwu thank you for tagging me!!#this was... a lot lmao #theres a lotta info about me on this wowow #i meant to post this earlier today but i knew it was gonna take me too long to do before dnd #so i decided to just wait until i got home #and now here we are lmao #tagged

1 note · View note

lovemesomesurveys · 6 years ago

Text

1. Do you enjoy rhododendrons? I have no idea what that is, but from what I gathered from the previous person’s answer, it’s either a flower or a tree or something that grows on trees. Something like that. 2. Have you ever met someone who supports nazism? Noo. 3. If you’ve ever been to another country, what was the best thing you did there? Just some sightseeing stuff.

4. Which is your favorite print: Plaid, animal, stripes, spots, other? Plaid.

5. Have you ever owned a cell phone for over a year? If so, was it still working well? Yeah. I don’t get one every year.

6. What’s the worst sickness you’ve ever had? That one time a few years ago when I had bronchitis. It was actually awful. It felt never ending, it kept me up at night, and my stomach muscles even hurt from coughing so much.

7. What do you enjoy more: Fairs or circuses? Neither are my thing. 8. Is your favorite animal something you can have as a pet? I can have dogs as a pet but not giraffes. 9. Are you good at gardening? I don’t garden. Definitely not my thing. 10. What was the last classic novel you read? Did you enjoy it? Hm. I’m not sure about that.

11. Do you think you would actually read any of the epic poems, such as Beowulf or The Iliad? I’ve read both for required reading in high school.

12. Are you the type of person who feels guilty after eating junk food? Nope. 13. Tell me about a time when you felt like you had no real friends: I feel that way now, but that’s completely by my own doing.

14. Have you ever felt betrayed by someone? If so, what did they do to make you feel that way? Yes. I’ve gone over the Joseph situation countless times now. 15. Which is better: Xbox 360 or PS3? Or are you someone who doesn’t care? I don’t care. 16. Have you gotten registered to vote yet? Yep. I have been since 2008. 17. What do you like best about your favorite actor? How about favorite actress? He’s super talented, gorgeous, sweet, and a goofball. He’s just great. 18. Tell me how you’re feeling in another language: Estoy cansado. 19. Would you rather drink water all day or Coca Cola all day? Well see here’s the thing. I do drink water cause it’s just something we gotta do, but I also drink soda. BUT for me drinking Coke all day would only actually be one soda because I take so long to finish one, so it’s not as bad as it sounds.

20. Name three movies which have a soundtrack you really love: Guardians of the Galaxy volumes 1 & 2, and Sweeney Todd.

21. Do you think Gatorade tastes refreshing or just gross? I liked it. I haven’t had any in years, though.

22. What’s the scariest video game you’ve ever played? Nothing scary.

23. Do either of your parents get angry over small things? My dad does sometimes.

24. What is the most dramatic TV show that you watch? Riverdale.

25. Do you still watch VHS tapes? Nope. 26. Have you ever visited one of the states that doesn’t have sales tax? Was it a nice change? No. 27. Have you ever had Dutch Brothers’ coffee? Yep. 28. What are your grandparents like? Are they nice or mean? Both sets of my grandparents are great. My maternal grandparents have passed away, but I was especially close with my grandmother. I spent a lot of time with them. My paternal grandparents live in another state and we only see them when they come to visit every summer. I saw them a lot when I was a kid and they lived in the same city. My nana and I text (yes, text), though.

29. Do you own any pet fish? What kind of fish are they? Nope. 30. Do you have a turntable and vinyls that you regularly play? No.l 31. What is the most irritating thing that a boyfriend or girlfriend has ever done to you? Bleh.

32. Have you ever thrown up from being so nervous? What was happening that made you so nervous? No, but definitely felt like it.

33. Would you rather be uncomfortable but fashionable or comfortable but unfashionable? I just want to be comfortable. I don’t think it means I can’t look decent. It’s comfortable and cute.

34. When was the last time you took your pet to the vet? What was wrong with it? She went a few months ago after a major scare.

35. Have you ever known someone who was in an abusive relationship? Yes. 36. If you smoke/drink/do drugs, do you feel insulted when someone tells you that it’s bad for you? I don’t do any of that.

37. Do you like skiing or snowboarding? Never been.

38. Do you find government buildings dreary and uncomfortable? I don’t pay much attention to them. 39. Name the last horror story you read. If you can’t remember any, name the last horror movie you saw. Disturbed by Jennifer Jaynes.

40. What happened the last time you were embarrassed? Hm I don’t even know.

#personal #text #survey #surveys

1 note · View note

chill-that-ur-inmyhead · 4 years ago

Text

stand by me

1 - Are you one of those people who can watch TV shows and movies over and over again without getting bored? yes!!! I prefer to water my favs over trying something new, I’d really have to be interested to watch something else

2 - If you drink coffee, do you like it plain or would you rather have something like a latte or something flavoured? latte for sure, preferably a matcha latte (from pret :))))))

3 - How did you used to dress ten years ago? Do you dress in a similar way now? so aged 11, a lot of stretchy jean jeggings and colourful tops, no elaborate accessorising, very simple and basic and most importantly comfortable

4 - When you’re grocery shopping, do you buy known brands or are you happy to go with the generic store version? I can go both ways

5 - Do you have a close relationship with any of your cousins? not really

6 - Who was the last person to sleep over at your house? Does this person stay over often or was it more of a one-off? I had a one night stand last year

7 - Does bad weather put you off going out if you’ve got plans to do so? Have you ever cancelled plans due to the weather? depends if the plans are spent outside but if we are going to a bar or restaurant then the weather wouldn’t stop me

8 - When you’re on vacation, do you prefer doing the typical tourist things, or would you rather explore somewhere off the beaten track? typical tourist things but once they’re done I could go off the beaten track

9 - Did your family travel a lot when you were younger? we went to places around Europe but never outside of it

10 - When was the last time you went shopping for clothes? Did you get anything decent or find any bargains? shopping online for clothes, literally had a delivery yesterday, I needed a raincoat

11 - Is it true that accessories can make or break an outfit? for sure, I wish 11 year old me knew a bit more about accessorising!!

12 - What is your worst memory from high school? What about the best? worst memories were probs fighting with my friends, it was an awful stressful feeling but the best memories is laughing around with those same friends!

13 - Is there any trait in a potential partner that would be a total deal breaker for you? different sense of humour probably

14 - Do you insist people use coasters if they’re putting drinks down in your house? nope but I think they do automatically

15 - Have you ever been arrested? Were you guilty of whatever it is you were arrested for? nope never

16 - Name five items on the shelf nearest to you: vinyl player, ben e king record, camera, camera bag, passport

17 - After meals, do you wash dishes up right away, or do you leave them in the sink and do a whole days worth at once? leave them on the side for the dishwasher

18 - What websites do you find yourself spending the most time on? recently, netflix, asos, twitter, tumblr, redit, insta,

19 - Do you still download music and TV shows? sure if I’m going on a long journey I download them to listen to offline

20 - Does your phone have a good battery life? How long does it last before you need to charge it again? depending how much I use it but I can usually get through the whole day before I charge it at night

21 - When was the last time you hit snooze? this morning

22 - Did you ever play The Sims? Which expansion pack was your favourite, if you had any? I used to play Sims castaway but it was ages ago

23 - Are there any popular film series or TV shows that you just don’t get the appeal of? cooking shows, I find them quite boring and they make me hungry!

24 - As a child, did you receive pocket money or an allowance? How much did you get? Was it dependent on you doing chores of some kind? yes I think it was £10 a week or something, nope no chores I guess I was lucky

25 - Do you think your parents did a good job of raising you? Would you do anything differently with your own kids? I’d try and go outside of europe for holidays, but I guess that will depend on my finances and what my children are up for

26 - If something is bothering you, do you have to fix it right away? my brother is talking to his friend and its really annoyingly loud

27 - Are there any household jobs you enjoy doing? If so, what’s the reason that you enjoy those things? hoovering my room and seeing my floor become cleaner

28 - Do you still live in the area you grew up in? Would you like to live somewhere else one day? Where would you go? I had to move back home after uni but I really want to go back to London once everything resumes

29 - Do you smoke, drink or do drugs? How old were you the first time you tried those things? Do you want to quit? drinking happened at 15/ 16 and marijuana at 17

30 - What’s one thing that really grosses you out? Is it something you have to deal with anyway? How do you cope? hair in the shower drain GROSS or I guess anything in the shower drain just grosses me out

31 - Have you ever grown your own fruits or veggies? Did it work out okay or was it a bit of a failure? my padre does! tomatoes and blueberries, used to grow raspberries

32 - Could you ever raise animals only to kill and eat them later on, or would you struggle to kill a living thing you’d formed an attachment to? If it is my last resort you gotta do what you gotta do

33 - When was the last time you painted your nails? I got my nails done just before lockdown happened last week

34 - If you regularly sit in the same place (on your bed or the sofa, for example) do you have a cupboard or something to keep supplies in so you don’t have to keep moving all the time? I have a snack tin next to me and a jug of water, been thinking about moving my spare kettle into my room to make teas instead of having to go downstairs but that would be the height of my laziness

35 - Have you ever been a witness to a crime? Did you have to make a statement to the police? nope

36 - Do you prefer Harry Potter or the Lord of the Rings? Harry Potter ofc

37 - Do you like to air your house or room out every day to stop it getting musty? in the summer yes

38 - Have you ever visited a landmark or place made famous by a TV show or film? Did you go there because it was featured on TV? not yet but I want to

39 - Who taught you how to tie your shoe laces? parents

40 - Do you have any pets? What are they all doing at the moment? I don’t but wished I did

41 - Do you prefer sweet or savoury snacks? sweet

42 - What’s the most painful place you’ve ever had a spot? Was it a big relief when you finally managed to squeeze it? forehead spots can hurt like a bitch

43 - Talking of spots, have you ever watched videos like those by Dr Pimple Popper? Do you think that kind of stuff is cool or gross?

44 - When was the last time you attended a bonfire? literally last week, dad had a bonfire for 5th November to remember his mother

45 - Is there anything you wish you enjoyed, but you just struggle with for some reason? Maybe you hate the crowds or the noise? I wish I liked running

46 - What’s worse - someone constantly blowing their nose or someone who’s constantly sniffing? sniffing

47 - Do you have any genuine phobias? What are they and have you ever done anything to address them? nope

48 - Do you hate the feeling of being sweaty and dirty from exercise? Is this something that’s put you off working out in the past? I don’t like that it makes my hair gross and that sometimes prevents me from working out

49 - Is there anything “normal” that you have a real aversion to? Like a certain noise or smell or taste? I’m not fond of fireworks, high risk low reward imo

50 - If you’ve made plans with someone and you really don’t want to go when the time comes, do you suck it up or make an excuse? I usually don’t make plans that I don’t wanna go to, I’ll make plans that I can be excited for

51 - What’s your favourite thing to do with each of your parents? Do you get a chance to do that regularly? Used to go for lunch with my mum most weekends but that doesn’t happen anymore

52 - If you were to adopt a pet, is there anything that would put you off, like a certain colour or breed? If I was to adapt a dog it would be a golden retriever otherwise I just wouldn’t get a dog, for a cat I’m less picky, just no completely white cats and no hairless ones.

53 - Would you ever like to give circus skills a go? What would you be most interested in trying? trampolining looks like fun

54 - What are your thoughts on circuses that allow animal performances? shame shame I know your name

55 - Are there any habits or traditions you’ve picked up from your parents what you’ve carried on in your own home? I don’t have my own home yet but I’m sure I will

56 - Are there any remakes that you think are better than the originals? the shrek series and Ice series are strong contenders

57 - How about cover songs? Do you prefer any of those to the original versions? I used to only listen to the glee version of songs, it was so weird hearing the original

58 - What’s the first movie you remember seeing in the cinema? What about the last? HSM 3 when I was 9 and Pixie at 21

59 - Do you listen to more music, or watch more TV? Is this something that’s changed over the years? over lockdown I’ve been really into blasting my music but before then I deffo wated more tv

60 - Do you have any weird fears or worries? Like thinking you’ve forgotten to lock a door or blow out a candle? What do you do to reassure yourself you’ve not forgotten? whenever I go somewhere I have to triple check I’ve not left anything - it almost happened to me a couple of weeks ago with my purse and thank god I triple check because I saw it and thought that would have been hell for parallel universe me

#14/11/20

0 notes

btvs · 7 years ago

Text

all of britney spears’ songs are gay, and here’s why:

a list of all of britney spears’ singles from her albums, and why they are gay. these are just the examples because i cannot include every single song of hers on here.

1) baby one more time. this is kind of an obscure one, where you have to look a little deeper for clues. the first one is the amount of times she says “baby.” of course, baby can be a term used towards men, but one of the times she says it, she includes “pretty” beforehand. “pretty baby” is definitely a pet name i have never heard used towards a dude. another lyric from the song is “give me a sign.” this is referring to how gay people need to give each other a sign to let the other know that they are also gay. last of all, britney “still believe[s]” that the girl she is crushing on is a lesbian.

2) sometimes. this song is about britney struggling with internalized homophobia. she expresses, “sometimes i run, sometimes i hide [...] but all i really want is to hold you tight [...] baby, all i need is time.” britney describes how she needs time to think about her feelings and if she is really ready to be in a relationship with another woman.

3) (you drive me) crazy. the level of gayness in this song can be easily shown in the music video, because the hot guy and hot girl are both shown equal amounts of time. watch it and you’ll see what i mean.

4) born to make you happy. this is a very sweet, romantic song, which could only mean one thing - it’s gay.

5) from the bottom of my broken heart. the lyric, “you were my real love, i never knew love till there was you,” shows how britney was unsure of her sexuality until she found this person, and she learned what love was when she discovered that being with a girl is what made her happy.

6) oops! i did it again. this song portrays britney’s frustration when a man falls in love with her, because she knows she is not attracted to him no matter what. she did not intend for this to happen because she does not care about men.

7) lucky. although britney is lucky in this song, she could also be singing about a girl she loves named lucky. the other option is that since she is “[crying] in her lonely heart,” she is sad because she doesn’t have a girlfriend.

8) stronger. in this song, britney has ended homophobia and is stronger because of it.

9) don’t let me be the last to know. here, britney has a crush on a girl who is embarrassed to admit she is also in love with britney because of her internalized homophobia. britney is thinking, it’s okay to be gay!

10) i’m a slave 4 u. one lyric in this song is: “always saying little girl don’t step into the club, well i’m just tryin’ to find out why ‘cause dancing’s what i love.” britney is talking about a gay club and how she is unsure why people are judging her for going to one when she just wants to have fun.

11) overprotected. this song is clearly gay, summed up in this one line: “i'm so fed up with people telling me to be someone else but me.” britney is sick of society telling her that she should be straight!

12) i’m not a girl, not yet a woman. in an interview, britney said, “[...] it’s a personal song about that transitional stage in life.” by “that transitional stage” she means realizing that she is gay.

13) i love rock n roll. this is a cover of a joan jett song, and therefore, gay.

14) anticipating. the lyric “got to show me you got everything that i need” hints that what britney needs is a woman.

15) boys. although this song is titled “boys,” britney’s lyrics show that this song is about a girl. “those lips and your brown eyes, and the sexy hair.” these are features that are usually the ones that are noticeable on girls, not boys. additionally, the last line is “can’t live with em, can’t live without em.” this quote literally is a phrase men use that actually begins with “women,” aka referring to how they can’t live with or without women. britney literally took a term about women and used it in this song.

16) me against the music. this song features madonna, queen of gays. close to when the video was released, madonna and britney had their famous kiss. in the music video, britney and madonna actually almost kiss again.

17) toxic. the music video was inspired by sydney bristow from alias which is claimed by gay people. it’s a gay people tv show, and toxic is a gay people song. gays love it. straights hate it.

18) everytime. this song is very deep and depressing. conveniently, deep and depressing is gay people’s specialty! this means the song is gay.

19) outrageous. apparently, the lyric, “outrageous. let’s be it, girl” is referring to how britney and madonna should team up and be outrageous (controversial) together. if you know what i mean. ;)

20) my prerogative. britney is fighting for gay rights!

21) do somethin’. “i see you looking at me like i'm some kind of freak.” britney subtly addresses a lot of homophobia in her songs.

22) someday (i will understand). the music video is in black and white. you know what other music video was in black and white? vogue by madonna. a gay classic.

23) gimme more. in the music video, britney is shown pole dancing with some other women. looks gay to me!

24) piece of me. “you wanna piece of me?” is the question britney asks throughout the song. the message can be interpreted as a gay metaphor, and she is saying that gay people are awesome too.

25) break the ice. the music video is basically anime. gay people watch anime. also, there are no pronouns in the song hinting that it may not necessarily be about a man. this theme is actually in many of britney’s songs.

26) womanizer. “[‘womanizer is] basically saying, ‘we know what you’re up to.’ it’s about guys cheating on girls. it’s a girl anthem. that’s why i like it. so hopefully the fans will see it that way too!” queen of feminism. she really does hate men!

27) circus. britney spears invented circuses, which are gay culture.

28) if you seek amy. this song, without a doubt, is extremely gay. britney is looking for her girlfriend, amy. britney also states that all of the boys and all of the girls want to fuck her. and she is okay with both of those! this song was also released on my birthday, which adds points.

29) radar. she might as well just say “gaydar,” because that’s the only radar people talk about and clearly what the song’s message is. gay people can notice other gay people!

30) 3. the music video shows britney being somewhat sexual with a woman. although the song describes this threesome as britney and two men, that’s not what kevin federline says britney likes.

31) hold it against me. this song is literally about katy perry’s body. although it was originally meant to be performed by katy herself, the message still stands. britney sings about how she wants katy perry’s body. maybe britney was the girl katy kissed and liked!

32) till the world ends. because there are no pronouns in this song, we really will never know if it is about a man. maybe, maybe not. probably not. if they’re dancing till the world ends, only women can do that because they’re better dancers... facts only!

33) i wanna go. britney uses a very weird repeat/echo of a word in this song - uncontrollably (lably, lably, lably). only gay people can pull that off.

34) criminal. in this song, “criminal” is a gay metaphor. she is singing about being in love with a woman like it’s a bad thing because she is again addressing homophobia. she doesn’t want anyone to worry about her being gay.

35) work bitch. bitch is a gay people word that gay people say. britney says bitch 20 times in this song. that’s like, probably a record. also, the music video is kinda gay.

36) perfume. if you ignore the real message about britney being jealous/worried that there is someone else interfering with the relationship, it sounds kind of like britney is actually in love with that woman. she wants the woman to smell the perfume that britney wore especially for her.

37) make me. we all would like to forget about this song.

38) slumber party. this is possibly britney’s gayest song, after “if u seek amy.” the music video is extremely lesbian and shows britney basically making out with tinashe. britney also said, “i think a lot of girls are gonna have a lot of sleepovers to this song, it’s definitely a song you wanna take you and your girlfriends go out and just have a great time - eat a lot of pizza and talk about boys and just be really naughty.” remembering what was in the music video makes this quote sound a lot more gay.

#i spent like 2 hours on this #also disclaimer this is only half serious #if there's any spelling mistakes in here i will die #m #britney spears #ok to reblog

341 notes · View notes

orcinus-ocean · 8 years ago

Photo

The case for captures

Captures, collections, kidnapping, whatever you call them, are one of the most controversial topics about cetaceans in human care. I have been asked about this a lot lately, since with the recent reveal of the nine whales at Ocean Kingdom, people noticed I was far less disgusted by this than almost everyone else. And since it’s a bit too long and complicated to take in one personal message for everyone who asks, I’m making this post.

I don’t expect to persuade or convince anyone by writing this, I’m simply writing it to make my case and because several people asked.

My views on this started out as pretty much everyone else’s. It’s a terrible thing to do to animals we profess to love and care about, and in our modern, enlightened world, we know better. Taking animals away from their pods, subjecting them to the enormous stress of being placed in an alien environment, and risking them becoming stuck in nets during capture and drowning, is indefensible and completely unnecessary, especially since we already have many of them in captivity to begin with.

Since then, over the last couple of years, I have become a bit more nuanced in my view and not quite so black and white, in an issue most people think should be black and white.

First off, the alleged extreme stress the animals suffer during capture. There’s no doubt that being corralled, netted and lifted onto a boat by strange creatures from an alien world must be very stressful.

Some say it is cruel because ��it is the first time they feel the weight of their own bodies”, but that isn’t necessarily true. We already know there are populations of at least both killer whales and bottlenose dolphins who hunt by willingly beaching themselves. Although that is still different because then they are taught that by their mothers in untraumatic circumstances, and do it willingly, rather than being lifted out of the ocean under very stressful circumstances.

Anyhow, similar or not, I don’t think the temporary stress of being lifted out of the water for the first time is an argument enough to not do it. We sometimes have to subject any animal to stressful or even traumatic handling, we need something more to argue against the collections of wild cetaceans, especially as a price against the benefits.

Separating animals permanently

So, what about “tearing” the animals away from their families? Surely that is terrible enough to make it inhumane and unethical? Now cetaceans are extremely diverse and not all species and populations have the tight-knit, lifelong bonds of the resident killer whales in the Northeastern Pacific, a very common misunderstanding.

Photo: WinkyintheUK

We know that the Northern and Southern residents of Washington and British Columbia stay with their mothers all their lives, males and females alike, and that is the very specific social structure that they have found works for them. Because they are among the most well-studied populations of marine mammal in the world, and so well-known, people frequently believe ALL cetaceans live like this, or at least all killer whales. This is as far from the truth as them all looking the same or eating the same prey.

For example, Icelandic fish eating (resident) killer whales have the males leave the pod when they grow up. The transient killer whales of the American west coast live in very loose, smaller groups, without the tight family bonds of residents, and adult males sometimes live completely alone. This is not biology as much as taught behavior, “culture”.

Photo: Brian Walter

Bottlenose dolphins too have much looser pod structures than Pacific resident killer whales. Males live alone or in very small groups, apart from the females, who live together in small pods along with their young offspring. Even these associations between adult females are loose however, with individuals going back and forth between groups often, sometimes on a daily basis.

I thus don’t think it is some unforgivable crime to separate some of these animals permanently, since they are unlikely to miss and grieve each other in the way humans would.

Furthermore, we frequently move animals between captive facilities, for breeding, for social cohesion, etcetera. That is naturally less stressful than capture since it is simply an animal or group of animals being moved from one artificial facility with humans to another, but it still means that two animals that knew each other, perhaps grew up together in the same group, will never get to see each other again, which also makes it a weak argument against wild capture.

Mortality rates

But if we’re talking about killer whales specifically, since they’re both the most controversial and at the same time the easiest to get reliable data on, how many died soon after capture? There is no doubt that capture and moving between facilities both put a lot of stress on the animals, and mortality was the highest within twelve months of capture. Note that this was in the 1960s to 1980s, and does not necessarily have to be the same today. We won’t know the mortality rates today until we know what happened to all the Russian whales.

I found before that 25% of killer whales caught from the 1960s to 1990s (only Argentina and Japan in the 90s) died within twelve months of capture, and I think this is an indefensible statistic. But then I checked the rate per facility, which of course makes for very small samples, but it looks like this:

(Facility: Survived/Died = %) SeaWorld: 14/2 = 12.5% (So 14 survived at SeaWorld, 2 died out of 16, 16 / 2 = 8 = 12.5%) Marineland Antibes: 6/1 = 14.2% Marineland Ontario: 5/3 = 37.5% Marineland of the Pacific: 6/1 = 14.2% (That one whale was Wanda, the first killer whale ever caught, who was also very sick when found and died only after two days) Marine World: 4/1 = 20% Sealand of the Pacific: 6/2 = 25% Kamogawa Sea World: 10/0 = 0% Nanki Adventure World: 6/4 = 40% Taiji Whale Museum: 3/2 = 40% Mundo Marino: 3/1 = 25%

As you see, SeaWorld, Marineland Antibes and the defunct Marineland of the Pacific had a lower than average mortality rate for newly caught whales, and Kamogawa had their ten whales (Chappy, Jumbo, Caren, King, Patty, Maggie, Bingo, Stella, Oscar and Bubba) all survive their first year. Meanwhile, at Marineland Ontario, Nanki Adventue World and Taiji Whale Museum, it looks much worse.

These are mostly very small samples, but out of the 75 whales here (I obviously excluded a lot of smaller facilities, this is nowhere near the entire population), a total average of 21.2% died within twelve months.

Again, this is quite terrible and until we know more about the Russian whales captured since 2012, we can only speculate and hope that it is much lower today.

The same goes for the captures themselves. Allegedly, eleven whales died during the captures in the Pacific northwest, when they got entangled in the nets and drowned. This is also unacceptable, but should be able to be eliminated entirely, and I’ve been told (no source on this) that they’ve been working to make captures more humane in Russia, than what was done elsewhere in previous decades.

I believe this, because not just avoiding animals drowning during capture (something that would be very counter-productive to whale hunters who have a strict quota on them), they seem to not be in the business of hauling whales onto boats and letting them lie there, suffocating under their own weight, but instead putting them in stretchers filled with water, something I see as a huge improvement.

Again about stress in general, we shouldn’t generalize between species. Killer whales and bottlenose dolphins for example, seem very adaptable and interactive with humans by nature, as are false killer whales (described in the late 1960s as more adaptable to captivity than the smaller dolphins) and pilot whales. Compare this with Dall’s porpoises and common dolphins for example, which live far more specialized lives and don’t take to captivity as well.

Emptying the oceans

Another objection to taking animals out of the wild, other than the stress it puts on the individual animals themselves, would be that it may deplete the wild populations. If we profess to care about the survival of the species and individual populations as one of our chief concerns for taking them into human care in the first place, we can’t go out emptying the oceans of whales.

There is no doubt that the capture of just over 30 whales from the Southern residents between 1965-1973 was a very hard hit on the population. However, in those days we didn’t know they were endangered, we didn’t even know there were unique populations of killer whales, and there were no quotas; fishermen could take as many whales as they wanted and sell them to anyone.

The Russian population is known to contain between 700 and 800 whales, and the quota in 2017 is set for a capture of a maximum of 10 whales, but in the years of 2012-2016, only 1-6 whales have been taken per year, or 0.125-0.85% of the entire population, per year. They are in no way threatened or endangered, and this commercial capture will not make them so.

Compare this to a quota for 800 beluga whales in the same waters, mainly for food for indigenous people, but also for selling. This is out of a population of only a few thousand whales.

Why?

This might be the biggest question. Why do it? What’s the benefit? If you are under the very common misconception that whales, dolphins and other wild animals are simply kept for human “entertainment”, obviously seeing a top predator taken out of its natural habitat to be put in a pool to balance balls in front of an audience is very upsetting to you. This may have been true in the past, and still is in some parts of the world (see traveling marine mammal circuses in Russia for example - none of those will ever own a killer whale however), but it is a completely different world from a modern zoological facility.

These animals aren’t being captured for “entertainment”, though since the public mostly sees them performing in shows rather than in their off time, that is easy to believe. They are there for (beware, fancy words ahead) captive propagation and display of their species, meaning the breeding and showing to the public of a wild animal species people wouldn’t otherwise ever see, and in our world of increasing disconnect from nature, people need to see the very animals they can help either make extinct or protect for the future, face to face.

Even aside from being viewed by the public and inspiring them to care for these species in the wild and their environment, zoological facilities play an irreplaceable part in research. Without the likes of SeaWorld and their immensely successful breeding program, we wouldn’t know a fraction of what we know about killer whale biology and behavior today, and thus would be unable to protect them in the wild. As a species they aren’t endangered, but several populations are endangered, critically endangered, or even functionally extinct. And a top predator can only function with a healthy ecosystem beneath it.

Protect the top predator, and you save the entire ecosystem.

Photo: Antony Pranata

But I’m not here to sell you on the benefits of keeping cetaceans in human care. I’m assuming you’re already okay with marine mammal aquariums like me, visits marine mammal facilities and are as upset by the ending of breeding programs and anti-animal activists implementing bans as I am.

I am here to argue that it doesn’t make sense to be for the continued propagation of certain species, while still being 100% against the wild capture of healthy animals. The main reason being gene pools.

There are currently over 2000 bottlenose dolphins in human care around the world. Most of them unrelated, only a small number of the 500 in North America and 300 in Europe are closely related. This makes it entirely unnecessary to capture more bottlenose dolphins, as they have been breeding successfully since the 1950s, and the gene pool is huge enough to last indefinitely, if only facilities across the world made it their goal, rather than just catching new dolphins. (This is already the case in North America and western Europe, while the rest of the world is still buying dolphins from Japan and the Black Sea.)

Pacific white-sided dolphins have a population of just over 100 individuals in human care, only 14 of which were captive-bred and still not closely related, which gives them a fairly large gene pool if facilities in Japan (where almost all of them live) actually aimed for breeding them, thus making the capture of lags rather unnecessary as well.

Photo: Oceanogràfic, Valencia

Belugas, the same thing. There are over 200 of them in human care, but they are mostly spread across poorer facilities in Russia, China and eastern Europe. The US has about 30 of them that need new blood in order to continue, but Marineland Ontario has about 25 wild-caught whales and as many captive-bred at the facility, which they could share with the rest of North America, if only they wanted to. In any case, there is no need to let the American beluga population go extinct or become inbred, with the number of whales there are in parks across the world. Captures aren’t really necessary.

Now then, to the big topic... killer whales.

Outside of the Russian whales, there are only nine wild-born killer whales still alive (Corky, Lolita, Katina, Kiska, Kasatka, Ulises, Stella, Kshamenk and Morgan), only 2-4 of which will ever breed again and contribute to the gene pool (Kshamenk, Morgan, Stella and Ulises, though Stella is pretty irrelevant as she has six descendants alive now). I’m assuming now for the sake of argument that SeaWorld’s breeding program will never be reinstated, but that the semen of some males like Ulises may be used in other facilities.

The whales at SeaWorld’s parks now descend from Katina, Kasatka, Gudrun, Kandu 5 (though she was likely never going to get grandchildren anyway), Kenau, Haida 2, Winston, Orky 2, Kanduke, Kotar, Tilikum, Ulises, Kshamenk, Sharkan and Kim 2 (15 whales).

Photo: Loïc Ventre

Loro Parque, Marineland Antibes and Kamogawa Sea World have stated that they have no intention to stop breeding, so the genes of Kim 2, Sharkan, Freya, Ulises, Katina, Winston, Kasatka, Kotar, Gudrun, Kanduke, Tilikum, Bingo, Stella and Oscar are assured, as well as Morgan and Kshamenk. That makes for a gene pool of 16 whales.

There are rumours that there is stored semen around from Splash among others, which would add the genes of Kandu 7 and Nootka 5, but since this isn’t confirmed but only a rumour, I have to ignore it. In any case, it’s less than 20 base individuals, and the loss of SeaWorld’s breeding program means the loss of the genes of only a handful of whales (Haida 2, Kandu 5, Kenau, and Orky 2, the last three of which would probably never leave descendants).

I see many SeaWorld fans that are disgusted by the wild captures saying “this is because of the breeding ban, if SeaWorld was allowed to breed, these facilities could get captive-bred whales instead”. As you can see, the gene pool was never large enough to sustain the zoological population of killer whales indefinitely.

Even if SeaWorld hadn’t ended their breeding program, and even if Marineland Ontario’s killer whale program hadn’t been a total failure (adding only Kandu 7, Nootka 5 and Kiska to the gene pool), it still wouldn’t be enough without adding new blood.

And in any case, it’s not like SeaWorld was going to become the killer whale breeding center of the world, shipping their whales to new parks and aquaria across the world. The Loro Parque situation was unique and I doubt they would ever repeat it, even without the Blackfish debacle.

We can’t rely on occasional unreleasable rescues either, since when Springer was rescued in 2002, she was the first killer whale to be rescued anywhere in the world in 23 years. A young male was rescued by Kamogawa Sea World in 2006 but he died within days, and a baby, newborn Pascuala, was rescued in Mexico in 2007, but she died after Greenpeace blocked her transfer to SeaWorld, where her survival would have been assured.

When Morgan was found three years later, she looked just as bad as the Japanese male but survived of course, and she is the longest-lived rescued whale to date (the others who lived were all in the 1970s however).

Also, since the huge success of Morgan, it has become harder and harder to rescue killer whales (and only killer whales) in Europe, North America and New Zealand, rescue often being stopped or delayed by activists and pseudoscientist researchers who put their anti-captivity agenda before the animal’s well-being and chance of survival.

In any case, these events are so rare they can’t be relied upon as a way to add blood into a tight gene pool.

So there it is. If you want to have killer whales in human care for the indefinite future, if you realize the benefits of keeping them and don’t want to see them going away, it does not make sense to be against humane, sustainable captures of healthy wild animals.

Like I said at the beginning, I don’t expect to be convincing anyone here, but I do hope that wild captures can become less opposed and more accepted, if not supported, in the future. As usual, people oppose humane and ethical things being done to killer whales that we do all the time to other species, even cetaceans, and we don’t blink an eye, or are at least far less outraged. This does not make sense. Killer whales being huge, majestic and beautiful top predators, and a romantic “symbol of the wild” in people’s minds, does not make them worth more than other animals.

I want to see killer whales having a future in human care, and so the addition of twenty-something Russian whales to the gene pool, captured ethically from a non-threatened population, is invaluable. I am not ashamed of this stance in the slightest, and if you agree at all, neither should you.

#captures #Russian orcas #controversial #SeaWorld #Moskvarium #Chimelong Ocean Kingdom #my articles

30 notes · View notes

gizedcom · 4 years ago

Text

Column: A way to save the NFL season

NEW ORLEANS — Drastic times call for drastic measures and if these aren’t drastic times, well…

Yes, obviously with everything that has been going on in the world, sports has taken, rightfully, a seat in the corner.

But, soon all of those early release movies, Netflix and Disney Plus shows will run out.

So here’s my (fairly) safe way that I think they can play NFL football this year, get a lot of fresh programming on the air, accentuate safety and get paychecks to those professional football players who aren’t the Pat Mahomes and Michael Thomases of the world.

1- Shorten the season to 10 games

Sacrilege you say – look, the NBA has just made up a ridiculous way to finish the season and Major League Baseball is going to play 60 games, maybe. 10 games will be more than half a season. You’ve already eliminated two preseason games and the other two are dead men walking hoping for a stay of execution.

2- Teams play every other week – For 10 games, that makes the season 19 weeks. It’s 17 now, so that only lengthens it two weeks. Do the ‘no week off between the Championship Game and Super Bowl’ model that’s been used before and you lengthen the entire season by only a week. This is key as you don’t want to shorten the offseason too much as football players take a pounding. By playing every other week you increase the time to right the ship if a player tests positive (see below).

3- Anyone player who tests positive for COVID misses the next game (think of it as the COVID version of the concussion rule).

4- If a player or coach tests positive, every player gets tested every day. The average incubation for COVID is 5 days before symptoms start showing. Teams get ready after Monday night games by practicing Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays and traveling Saturdays. Theoretically, after a Tuesday game (again, see below), someone tests positive on Wednesday, the team gets tested daily, has remote meetings, physically trains at home or in shifts at the facility and gathers again the following Wednesday to start practice for a Saturday or Sunday game.

RELATED: Saints DE Cam Jordan donates $25,000 for laptops to New Orleans students in need

RELATED: NFL debuts face shield to protect players from COVID-19

5- Play only in your own league – See, the NFC would play one weekend, the AFC the next. No weeks without football on TV. The other advantage to staying in your own league is that if anything unforseen happens that requires a weekend not to be played, or a couple of games not to be played, only one league would have to figure out a solution. Even if the AFC ending up playing 9 games or deciding its champion by percentage points because not all teams played all games, it wouldn’t wreck both sides and you’d still have a legitimate champ coming out of each side.

6- Play six games against your division and four others in the conference. This will maintain integrity, lessen the chances for someone getting an inexplicable advantage in scheduling. Someone smarter than me can figure out which 4 teams you play, but you’d want it to be somewhat fair. Say a first place team playing a 1-2-2-3 and a second place playing a 1-2-3-4, third playing 1-3-3-4 and fourth playing 1-2-4-4 or something like that.

7- Increase the broadcast TV slots – Look, they aren’t playing high school football this year in all likelihood and if they do, they won’t let many (if any) fans in the stands. The NFL has traditionally avoided Fridays to avoid hurting high school – this one year won’t be a problem.

8- Play on Fridays (Saturdays if the colleges don’t play), Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays – The old bugaboo about not playing on Tuesdays won’t be there because you won’t play the next weekend. The networks will eat up the additional programming.

9- Play a game on Fridays, three on Sundays and one each on Mondays and Tuesdays.

10- Sunday night gets first pick when the new schedule comes out (no picking Saints-Tampa twice though), followed by Mondays, then Tuesdays. The two daytime games on Sunday would each have a backup game with the strongest going national and the weakest going regional.

11- This would make 6 broadcast spots per week instead of five that they now have. That’s a 17 percent increase in programming that the networks would probably gobble up due to the dearth of new sitcoms, reality programming and dramas.

12- The increase in TV revenue could help teams bargain with players and, while all will have to make a sacrifice, the 17 percent increase in TV money (NFL could probably get 20 because ratings will be through the roof) would allow them to pay players the equivalent of a 12-game season rather than pro-rate it at 10 games. The players would still lose 25 percent of their salaries and the owners would probably lose similar even with the 17 percent TV hike and ads over the empty seats.

13- One last thing on salary – any ‘total’ incentives, like, say, 5,000 yards passing bonus, would revert to a ‘per game’ incentive. Meaning divide 5,000 by 16, take that total and if a player plays in at least 7 games and hits that per game, they get the ‘pro-rated’ incentive.

14- Teams would have a minimum 11 days between games. No Tuesdays then Friday two weeks later for instance.

15- Because you aren’t worried about fan travel, conflicts with stadiums like concerts and circuses, each week the league could pick the best games for the optimal TV slots as long as the 11-day minimum is not breached.

Playoffs are another story. You could lengthen the season and put two weeks between each game, but that will really lengthen the season and, if you wanted football every weekend, eventually a team with only one week off would face a team with two weeks off.

The hope for the playoffs is that a vaccine is in place by that time.

Credit: Source link

The post Column: A way to save the NFL season appeared first on GIZED - Breaking News Worldwide.

from WordPress https://ift.tt/30lGt2m via IFTTT

#IFTTT #WordPress

0 notes

workingabroad · 7 years ago

Text

Celebrating Elephants around the World

“We admire elephants in part because they demonstrate what we consider the finest human traits: empathy, self-awareness, and social intelligence. But the way we treat them puts on display the very worst of human behavior.” ― Graydon Carter

Elephant populations across the African continent have been disappearing at an alarming rate in the past decades, in particular due to the increasingly lucrative business of ivory. The increasing amount of people on the planet is also putting pressure on wildlife habitats, leaving less space for wildlife like elephants to roam, and often resulting in human-wildlife conflicts. At the same time, tourists are riding elephants when travelling to in particular Asian countries, like Thailand, India and Sri Lanka. Not to mention the elephants that are suffering in circuses around the world for the sole purpose of entertaining people. It seems like no matter where we look, the elephant is suffering from the hands of humans.

To start off with the tourism industry. In the case of e.g. Thailand, the elephants were originally part of the logging industry, which became illegal in 1989. This left owners without any income, and the industry of tourist rides on elephants started. The demand for the rides became greater, and is now the reason why thousands of Asian elephants are currently part of the industry. Elephants are still continuously taken from the wild as young, and then beaten into submission. If you don’t know how elephants get submissive enough to actually carry people, I suggest you watch this video and get wiser (warning of harsh scenes). The process is called 'the crush' or phajaan, which has the sole purpose of beating the elephant's spirit and will to fight. This will happen to the young elephants whether caught in the wild or bred in captivity, as it never becomes part of the animal’s nature to carry people or being submissive. They carry you on their backs out of fear and not out of want. People are also under the impression that elephants are animals that can handle carrying people on their back for hours a day for decades. Just because they are large animals, it doesn’t mean their bodies are made for this type of work. Most elephants get spinal and back injuries from decades of carrying tourists on their backs. You can read more about the darker sides of the captive elephant industry here. Thankfully awareness campaigns are working and people are waking up. The tourism industry has gradually realised that animal cruelty doesn’t belong in the business. Whether it being elephant rides, dolphin swims or tiger selfies; any of these practices are increasingly being rejected by tourists, due to the increasing awareness around animal welfare. I’d only wish that the same pressure was applied to the volunteering industry, which seems to have been forgotten, despite several companies collaborating with elephant camps in Asia and Africa.

True elephant sanctuaries like our Elephant Sanctuary project in Thailand has the sole purpose of allowing elephants to live out the rest of their lives as elephant. They help owners to retire their elephants from work in the industry. They don’t buy the elephants, because what will the owners do with this money? Will they just go and buy a new elephant that will be taken from the wild, and thus keeping the vicious circle going? The project provides an alternative income for these locals by renting the elephants, and thus paying a monthly amount for the elephants to not work. Often, owners are happy to see their old elephant retire and be happy at the sanctuary, instead of having them work in the tourist industry. Many of these sanctuaries spread across Asia welcome volunteers and tourists alike to see elephants roaming free, and this should be the place you support on your travels! Just be aware that the term “sanctuary” is often misused these days, and do your research on the place you are going before supporting it financially! While you can find few places in South Africa where you can ride elephants, the most pressing issue for wild African elephants is of a complete different nature. Whether it being overpopulation, fighting for resources or the lucrative ivory trade, the elephant is often coming out short. However, in some countries it has been possible to work out a solution. An example of a project that is trying to mitigate elephant-human conflicts is our Desert Elephant volunteer project in Namibia. This rare population of Namib Desert elephants has grown in the past 20 years, from as low as 52 members to a current population of over 600 elephants thanks to conservation efforts. However, this has put lots of pressure on the water and grazing supplies of the areas, which are also occupied by farmers. The project has for almost 15 years managed to work with the communities and mitigate potential conflicts, by building alternative water points and protective structures around existing ones.

At this project, volunteers have helped build no less than 176 protection walls and around 10 alternative drinking points. Funds from volunteers have also helped contribute to their education project, which helps communities understand how to live safely with elephants. Around 2,000 local community members have taken part in it so far, and still counting! There wouldn’t be a sustainable future for the elephants without including the communities.

I have been so lucky to experience wild elephants in Africa, when I volunteered in Ghana. For a weekend, we went to Mole National Park. Our base was beautifully located allowing us to view the entire green and lush park from above. We got the opportunity to go in small groups with a ranger on a walking safari, and were taught about the animals we met along the way. For instance, did you know that one of the most dangerous animals to elephants are ants?! I’ll let you think about that one! Eventually, we made it down the hills to the plains, where rangers had found tracks from elephants. Not long thereafter, we arrived at a small lake. Here, I got to witness something I’ll probably never see again. A whole family of elephants bathing in the lake. They were in so deep that they only had their trunks above water to breathe and smell us humans from a distance. Eventually, they all came on land and I was only few meters away from an animal that I’ve always admired so greatly.

I didn’t realise until the next day, how fortunate I had been to see them up close. I think we all have the idea that wildlife is just going to act according to us. Maybe it comes from the fact that most of us will only ever see these types of animals in ZOOs, where you will be able to see them when you feel like. However, when it comes to Africa, guess what, they don’t act according to our schedules or wishes. The next day, a few other volunteers went to go on the walking safari, and the elephants were gone. I had been so lucky that the elephants were in our area at the same time as us. The fact that one elephant then decided to visit our camp the next day to eat off the trees by the pool, was just another lucky coincidence and example of how wildlife will go where it pleases! This was four years ago, and was happening at the same time as I was writing my thesis on the illegal ivory trade. In 2013, there was little research done on this topic, and writing your entire thesis on it proved somewhat difficult. I succeeded, yet being an active follower on the situation and plight of elephants, the future still hasn’t improved a lot for this amazing, intelligent and loving species. This is why I encourage YOU to be part of the difference that the elephant needs. People are the cause of the problems, and thus only by having enough people to stand by the solutions, will we hopefully be able to save the elephant for generations to come.

#elephant #worldelephantday #conservation #desert elephant #volunteer #working abroad #volunteering #travel #africa #asia #thailand #namibia #ghana #elephant sanctuary #blog #wildlife

0 notes