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coffeeandcalligraphy · 4 years

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Weeping Statue | Feeding Habits Update #6 & let’s chat about quitting writing

Hello! Are we back for another Feeding Habits update (finally)?? Let’s chat chapter 7, Weeping Statue.

Just a reminder: This is my original work and plagiarism of any form will not be tolerated.

Can we talk about struggle? Because this chapter was IT. I believe I started it in late July and finished it earlier this month. I’ve taken my time with chapters before, but this was next level--the amounts of changes I went through in one chapter was astronomical, and reminded me of drafting chapter three earlier in the summer. I went through so many stages writing this chapter: from enjoying it, to feeling no joy from writing at all, to nearly quitting this book altogether!

Scene A:

Harrison and his mother Suzanna simultaneously avoid each other over breakfast after he failed to return home the night previous

She lowkey calls him out (calling out his denial of missing Lonan)

Scene B:

Harrison goes to a farmhouse owned by Theodore Harvey, a friend of his mother’s, to drop off the rescued litter of kittens from chapter 6. He realizes he is missing one kitten and concludes Reeve has stolen one after dinner the night previous.

Scene C:

Harvey invites Harrison inside for coffee where he admits his coffee machine is broken.

Harrison fixes the coffee machine, and is hired by Harvey to flip the rest of the farmhouse as he and his wife are moving.

Scene D:

On his way home, Harrison stops at a gas station where he buys a bouquet of tulips for his mother, a dog collar for the puppy he found in the kitten litter, a pack of gum, pastries, and sunscreen before heading to a beach.

At the onset of a lightning storm, Harrison swims in the ocean and has an epiphany--he decides to accept his miserable life (a development!)

Scene E:

After the beach ordeal, Harrison returns to his apartment ready to accept the plainness of his daily life when an old ghost from his past (his! ex!) Lonan appears to be having dinner with Suzanna

This chapter brought so many things. A) many... breakdowns lol (I cried a lot!), B) many false epiphanies that wound me back into ruts, C) a desire to quit this series that was just as terrifying as it sounds and D) an ideology I never would’ve gotten on my own. Just have to thank my sister Sarah for telling me a few weeks ago after I insisted that I knew what needed to logically happen but couldn’t write it no matter how hard I tried. She said: “It’s not about what works, it’s about what you want” << literally changed my philosophy on writing, even as someone who tries their best to advocate for care and enjoyment in writing. Not sure if it’s because of the timing when she said this, but I’d probably never had made it out of the rut without having this said to me.

I was *not* planning at all to have my boys reunite so soon in the book. Technically, it is not very soon and we are almost done the book, but for some reason, I really didn’t think it would work so early because I felt Harrison’s POV was so undeveloped already (I still think it is). HOWEVER, the fact of the matter is: it was not working at all. I knew exactly what I needed to do to get to point A to Z but the thing about writing is, it is not formulaic! I tried to make fit what I thought worked, but as time progressed and I immensely struggled, less and less did I want what worked. Writing was miserable and that’s not what I want writing to be for me. So I took Sarah’s advice, and I did what would make me happy, and that was, and has always been, seeing my boys interact.

Now that I’ve finished this chapter, I’m not sure if I made the right decision! I have yet to write the boys interacting so I don’t know if it will work, but what I liked about this method is that it freed me from this constriction I’d written myself into and opened a new avenue to do something that DOESN’T “work” for the story but that does work for me. To me, this project, this series, is more important to me than making something “work”. Sustaining my health and happiness (which were declining on the path I was on) is critical for me and my writing journey.

EDIT: by the time I’m editing this post, I have written the boys interacting and haha yep this was the right decision! Was doubting myself for a sec, added in a lil robbery, and now it’s all good (oops)

Excerpts:

I don’t have too many for you because this chapter does need an edit to “set” it in place (right now it feels like liquid Jello that has been in the fridge but is yet to set up). I know it needs one more scene but I cannot :) write :) what :) it :) needs :) no matter how hard I have tried, and so I am giving that section of the story a break instead of over-kneading it and toughening up the dough unnecessarily.

Here is part of the opening scene! There are things I don’t like about this but I am trying not to self-hate, so !!!

The next morning, Harrison gets up at dawn to drop the kittens off at the farm, and Suzanna makes coffee for one. This is unusual for both—Harrison rarely leaves the apartment, and Suzanna always makes coffee for two. In his room, Harrison combs his hair and twists his earring, its blue gem pearling in dribbles of sunlight. In the kitchen, Suzanna stirs coffee like it’s wronged her. Harrison dabs cologne onto his throat and blinks off his hangover. Suzanna flecks her spoon onto the tabletop so it leaves an egg of amber on the surface.

When he approaches the kitchen, Harrison pretends he does not see his mother and his mother pretends she does not see him. They move like this, repelled, one moving left, the other moving right, one opening the top cupboard, the other opening the bottom.

Harrison stops at a convenience store and buys a hodge-podge of things (also the beach scene which yes mirrors the last scene in Lonan’s POV hehe I indulge myself):

He picks up the best bouquet of fuchsia tulips, a collar for the dog he left in his bedroom even though it’ll be weeks until she’s big enough to fit in it, a pack of spearmint gum he doesn’t need, a package of pastries, and a tube of sunscreen—SPF 30. He almost drops every item at least once on his way up to the register, and definitely drops them when his receipt is spitting from the machine and the store clerk says she likes his earring—is it vintage—and he nearly vomits in the parking lot, trained against the hood of the taxi—is it even his taxi—the plastic bag teetering from his wrist, rain coiling against his cheek, the air so humid, his clothes so heavy, it is no wonder the next place he ends up is the beach.

It is never smart to swim during a storm. If he thinks hard enough, his mother’s voice warns him to keep from the shore, stand behind the yellow line, stay safe, stay where you are, don’t run under a tree, and even more, don’t run into the water. He does everything wrong in an even worse order—dollops sunscreen into his palm before opening the pastry so his teeth freckles with zinc, chews the gum and the pastry at the same time so his tongue becomes a slime of crumbs, rests the tulips too close to the shoreline so they wilt under a wave, misplaces the dog collar in his own left hand, and dives into the water fully-clothed.

Harrison getting very angsty about Lonan’s future (which he’s predicted completely wrong haha):

He will die alone. Reeve will not think of him again and he will deserve that. Somewhere in the city with the missing kitten, drinking bottles of holy water because there is no drink more fitting for a woman so sacred. His mother will miss him only briefly, and then return to her daily life of no longer needing to clean up after him. Maybe she’ll find the tulips. Put them on display until they wither, then use their carcasses as fertilizer. Save electricity. Use the coffee machine less. Downsize to a smaller, cheaper, prettier apartment with arched walkways and stained-glass windows. Harvey will think he is a fluke who missed his first day of work and will never think of him again. The dog isn’t old enough to recognize him. Suzanna will give her the collar. And Lonan will continue his life in Las Vegas, tottering after Eliza, refilling her wine, getting neon at house parties, watching French silent films without captions because he’s probably learned another language, cut his hair, gotten a tattoo, learned how to cross-stitch, bought life insurance, a yacht, a coastal summer home, learned how to play the mandolin, perfected his lamb sous vide. He’s probably married. Him and Eliza family-planning. He’ll expand a future, and Harrison will do the opposite. There is something freeing in being unmissed.

Lightning snaps across the sky like a wishbone, sounds like the prick of tambourines from under the water. Everything turns violet—the clouds, his skin, the waves. Tomorrow will be a better day, as he sinks lower into the current, tomorrow will be a better day, as the light fades and dissolves into blackness, tomorrow will be a better day, as seaweed wraps his throat, as the freezing water impales his ribs, as he burrows under and simultaneously, rises up.

This next part comes right after!

In the stomach of a tidal wave, the sky is so much bluer. An unrolling of cyan like fractals of a baked marble. There is so little to remember. No grocery lists, no fresh turmeric, no shift of portabella mushrooms. No outstanding to-dos—no kibble to by, no resume to update. Harrison folds in blue and lets it gorge his eardrums. He gives his body to that wide chasm of water and breaststrokes not into a second life, but a third.

Here is the last bit:

He buzzes back into the apartment at 3:00AM, tracking in saltwater and SPF, puff-pastry gummed to his palm, a dog collar wound around his ring finger, a sheath of tulips shedding into the elevator behind him.

He hits every floor button twice and is undisturbed when the elevator lurches and reopens in sixty-second intervals. A man rotating a jade cuff on his wrist gets on at the fourth stop and gets off at the sixth. A woman wearing a lynx cape gets on at the eighth stop, breaks up with two girlfriends, and gets off at the eleventh. Two children in coveralls tail in after she leaves and throw jacks at each other’s eyes until one of them bleeds, and by then, they are on the fifteenth floor and the children are leaving like they have not left behind accidental shell casings. On the sixteenth floor, a deer head chihuahua patters in with no owner and barks at the door chime the moment it releases and lets him out. A mother and daughter shell pistachios on the twentieth, a maintenance man introduces himself as David though his nametag says Maxwell on the twenty-second, a flock of teenage girls in whirl about a new way to blend oil pastel on the twenty-third. So it is no wonder by the twenty-fifth floor, Harrison misses his stop and becomes one of these people too—the man with zinc down his eyes like a weeping statue, juggling pastry and a dog collar and a seedy bouquet of tulips.

He tracks seawater in that hallway, parts of him scattering with the zinc, the petals, the crumbs. Like a way to get back home even though he hasn’t started at his destination, he moves through the labyrinth of halls, both starving and nauseated. Tomorrow he will rise at dawn and taxi to Brooklyn and hammer four nails into two pieces of plywood and repeat. He will feed his dog. Learn how to cook something that will impress his mother, something French that he can’t pronounce like brasillé or oeufs cocotte. Find liberation in the constrict of routine or at least pretend to. It will be good for him, the rising, the taxis, the hammers, the nails, the dog food, the cooking—it will all be good.

By the time he gets to their door, his fingers are oiled and dripping with sunscreen. Rising, taxis, hammers, nails, dog food, cooking. He nearly drops the house keys. Rising, taxis, hammers, nails, dog food, cooking. Tomorrow will be his arrival. Rising, taxis, hammers, nails, dog food, cooking. His beginning swelling as he turns the lock. Rising, taxis, hammers, nails, dog food, cooking. There is no other way out.

The apartment is dark when he tracks in. The scent of cinnamon steeping the air like Suzanna’s pulled a saucepan of papas off the stove. At first he doesn’t hear it, but he should, the voices leafing the kitchen like a flit of moths. He steps out of his shoes but never sets anything down, even after he passes the coffee table. Two plates ringing the centre, streaked with and caldeirada and bayleaf. A pitcher of lemonade sweating onto the glass. It is almost like he never left, like he and his mother shared dinner, sipped from each other’s cups, cleaned the tines of each other’s fishbones. And he almost believes it. He never went to the farm. The kittens are where he left them, just a few feet away, not in Brooklyn. He doesn’t have a job to tend to. He never fixed the coffee machine. He didn’t go to the convenience store. He is not slathered in sunscreen, not holding a dog collar or pastries or a bouquet of tulips. He never dove into the ocean like it was some port to asylum and didn’t emerge soaked and walking half-dead to his apartment because he never left. This reality is so easy to believe, he is unfazed by the voices and how they get louder when he reaches the kitchen, when one says “Were you shopping for the apocalypse?” and the other one chokes on its drink and apologizes for its rudeness and stares at him in daydream, those eyes like forget-me-nots, gas fires, seafoam, the wing of a starling, his drop earring.

Harrison is grateful he is soaking wet when he enters that kitchen and Suzanna and Lonan sit at the table sharing a box of petit fours. At least he has an excuse when he drops everything.

That’s it for this update! The tea starts HERE!

--Rachel

#writing #amwriting #writeblr #writerblr #writingupdates #fostered #mothwork #feedinghabits

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sirtadcooper · 3 years

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Maths time strikes back: multiples of 9 for the weird asks if you would be so kind! 😄

I asked for that didn’t I?

9. favourite smell in the summer?

This is kind of weird but… I love the smell of sheep? I find it comforting. If you ever hug a sheep you come away with this smell. To me it’s not unpleasant, it’s the natural oil in their fleece that helps to waterproof them. Stroke a sheep enough and your hands come away black with the stuff... I’m not selling it as being a nice thing but it is.

18. ideal weather?

I love a sunny day when I can sit comfortably in the shade (again, surrounded by sheep to hug), but it’s not so hot that I turn into a sticky mess. I love these days because the sunsets are always spectacular. (Shoutout to the complete opposite - a snowy morning is pretty great too.)

27. favourite activity to do in cold weather?

If there’s snow or frost I’m out with my camera, otherwise I just like to sit and do nothing on a really cold day.

36. what is the first meme you remember ever seeing?

The first meme that I remember seeing is Do She Got a Booty? (She Do) but it was this version:

I originally pronounced meme me-may because I thought it was a French word. This lasted for several months.

45. which genre: sci-fi, fantasy or superhero?

I like sci-fi the most out of these, I think. Superhero isn’t bad either, but for some reason I could never really get into fantasy.

54. what did you learn from your first job?

I’ll let you know when I have had one!

63. five songs that would play in your club?

The Macarena by Los Del Rio, and actually just any of the songs from that CD I had growing up that had a DVD with it to teach you the moves to the songs. I can’t remember what all of the songs were but another one was definitely The Cha-Cha Slide.

72. worst subject?

Maths actually, excluding P.E., but is that really a subject? I called it P.T. (Physical Torture).

81. fireflies or lightning bugs?

Fireflies sounds prettier to me and you would not believe your eyes.

90. luckiest mistake?

I can’t think of a big life-or-death moment, but every edit I post is a series of lucky mistakes.

weird asks | send me an ask

#thanks for sending these bless you!#i forgive you for the maths #i haven't checked but i think i got the numbers right #ask #phantomviola

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jazillia007 · 4 years

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Make Yourselves Forget That The Plague Is A Bitch: Book Edition

Tagged by: @sothischickshe - thank you so much, dear! <3

What’s the most recent book that you’ve read and absolutely fell in love with?

“A Winter’s Promise” by Christelle Dabos.

Do you keep track of how many books you’re reading every month?

Only partly. I have big respect for people who write journals on what they read, how many books they read including number of pages/words, genres and so on. I’m too lazy for that and also I don’t see reading as a competition. I think if I happen to not read at all for a month there is a reason for it. I have enough books on my SUB but I won’t force myself to read them to increase my numbers.

What’s your stance on the debate as to whether or not we should dissociate the artist from their art (artist = writer in this case)?

I mean the writer makes the book, his/her personality creates the book, the book is literally (consciously or unconsciously) a mirror of the writer’s mindset, personality, opinions and so on. I think it’s difficult, at least for me, to separate that. But I also wouldn’t necessarily want to meet the writers because it might destroy the illusion I have of them through their books or interviews and so on. I also have a strong opinion about certain popular writers who keep “updating” their universe on their twitter accounts. I’m sorry but that just not canon.

But I also think it’s fine if people choose to do so, to solely enjoy the book. I do that as well with certain genres.

What do you do when you can’t focus on a book?

I stop reading. I had a real bad reading slump last year and that’s not good, especially when my job is selling books. But I don’t force myself to read something I’m not enjoying. If I’m in the midst of a book and there is a point the story is stalling or I’m not feeling it, I do anything else and come back later to it.

Do you pay attention to the gender/ethnicity/race/sexuality of the authors you’re reading, aka do you actively try to read books written by diverse writers?

I’m aware and I think it’s important but I’m not buying books based on that. I also kind of don’t like it when writers use that as bait so people buy their books. I like it when it’s coming up in the book in a natural way. Like in Stephanie Perkins’ book “Lola and the Boy Next Door” Lola’s parents are two men but it’s not addressed like “Oh look she does have two dads!”. And that’s what I enjoy the most when it’s organic so to speak.

Paperback or hardcover?

Mostly hardcover but that means I can never move somewhere else because who is going to move those hardcover with me? But honestly, if the cover of the paperback is prettier I might purchase that instead.

Which language would you like to learn just to be able to read its untranslated literature?

I would like to be able to read French but on the other hand I’m not the biggest fan of French literature (literally people writing about watching their parents die etc. isn’t really my thing). But I would also like to improve my understanding of literature Korean. That language is so complex and layered.

Pick up the book that is closest to you. convince me to read it in less than 10 sentences.

“A Winter’s Promise” by Christelle Dabos. A French young adult fantasy novel which will be finished in 4 books. Set in a magical world it starts off with a very cliché trope of the female protagonist Ophelia to be married to a man from the North, Thorn. But it ends up being a fascinating journey through a rich magical world with political intrigues and a very unconventional love story. It’s definitely slow in the beginning but the story and the characters unfold beautifully. A book I fell in love with right away and I can’t wait to finish the series.

Tagging: @goldfishangie, @lunafeather, @medievalraven, @fairhairedkings, @mego42, @jimmyhopper, @inyoursheets, @riosbeth, @riosnecktattoo, @deadlyladynightshade, @hopelikethesun and everyone who likes to do it! :D

#about me #thanks for tagging <3 #books #book asks #ask memes

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ahmeddocuments · 4 years

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Day 6, (Paris: Downtown; Place de la République, Place de la Bastille, Palais-Royal, Pont Alexandre III, Eiffel Tower, Gare de Lyon), 30-9-2019

Written by Ahmed Hassan, edited and corrected by Aya Ashraf.

I just woke up and it’s my last day in Paris. That feeling is always aching my soul yet I always plan to have all of the new places right after Paris just to feel less pain leaving this city behind. Today I’m doing nothing except visit some new places I haven’t visited before, meet a friend from Brazil and then start preparing for my departure to Italy.

I started moving from home at around 7:30 AM, It was that early because I wanted to say a fine goodbye to the city. For a change, I wanted to try taking the bus to the City, discover how it feels going through the suburbs of Paris to reach the city. Took a bus near the Aulnay-sous-Bois train station and switched for another bus till I reached my first destination; Place de la République.

At the center of the square is a bronze statue of Marianne, the personification of the French Republic. The square is well known for being a protesting spot as it can contain large numbers without severely affecting traffic.

I proceeded to Place de la Bastille, another spot I wanted to visit, the place is another square centered by July column, topped by a gold Génie de la Liberté.

The Bastille square in Paris is where the Bastille prison stood until the storming of the Bastille and its destruction during the French Revolution, and with no remains in sight at the moment.

I started moving by bus to Gare du Nord. A very interesting benefit of having a free day without itinerary is how free it feels to switch to buses or walking instead of quicker transportation methods like trains and metros. It gives you that feeling of being a resident for a while, even if it was only for a couple of minutes. One of the priceless benefits of travelling is remaining silent, observing and actually listening to nothing but street noises. I can’t remember that I’ve put headphones and listened to a song during the 33 days I’ve been outside Egypt. You don’t need to escape anything anymore, you’re just there to feel and enjoy the moment, and be proud of the present that’s happening and achieving everything you’ve ever planned and dreamed of.

Trying to waste time before meeting a Brazilian friend of mine, I had another walk from Gare du Nord. I passed by Église Saint-Vincent-de-Paul, the scene looked cinematic; people were sitting on the stairs leading to the building entrance in the middle of a Parisian street, and behind them a very symmetrical building of the church itself.

I continued my long walk and passed by the Opera again, nothing looks the same when you’re saying goodbye. I mean, I still remember how it felt leaving Paris the year before. The feeling is indescribable when you’re looking at anything knowing it’s the last time to do so. The image below might seem like a regular picture of a street in Paris, but it was me observing that golden statues, street noises and beautiful buildings for the last time for a long time.

In realization that I’m closer to visiting Palais-Royal, I started moving to the Palace to check another place I’ve never visited. Palais-Royal is a former French royal palace, and now it’s the headquarter of Ministry of Culture, the Conseil d'État and the Constitutional Council.

The Palace is famous for tourists for Les Deux Plateaux, which are rows of columns with different heights put in an old parking lot. The columns were put in this place between 1986 and 1985, and it’s been a touristic spot since then.

I mean come on, this looks like fun!

The palace also features very fine gardens, which I like to describe as gardens inside a building inside a city.

And like Versailles, the gardens had this set of trees aligned in a very symmetrical scene.

I was about to leave the palace, but couldn’t do it before stealing another symmetrical shot. (Okay it’s not very symmetrical and i’m personally hurt the lanterns aren’t perfectly aligned lol)

Moving on, the Palace’s exit was right in front of the Louvre’s side entrance. And no matter how stunning and breathtaking the main entrance with the pyramid looks, the side entrance fits the authenticity and classic side of the Louvre.

I started walking along the Seine, Moving towards Châtelet. I passed by Pont Neuf, Notre Dame, Fountain Saint-Michel, Hôtel de Ville, Centre Pompidou and ending my long walk at Les halls, the famous mall in Châtelet. I had a fast meal at a Burger King nearby, then started moving again to the Louvre.

The sky was very colorful and a bit clear that day, I had an amazing time sitting near the fountain of Jardin des tuileries. A fountain, ducks, fine architecture, good sky view, all in an indescribable harmony creating a scene I’ll never forget.

I finally received a notification of the arrival of Samuel, that Brazilian friend i’m meeting. We’ve met on Couchsurfing and agreed to tour the city together. He had just arrived from Madrid to Paris so he depended on me to show him around. In one trip, I showed the city to two people who briefly described me as a “local” because of the way I fully memorized city information like the landmarks and the streets.

We met and started to introduce each others, he started complementing my Instagram posts and telling me he’s been dying to see Paris the way I show it in my pictures. I was extremely happy because I’m someone who’s very proud of his Instagram account, I count it as one of my strongest assets of memory preservation. When I introduce or share this account with people, I always tend to mention that it’s like a museum for Ahmed Hassan, as my photographs capture my timeline for the past few years, showing the development of tastes and interests, also what i’ve lived, witnessed and documented during this time.

Continuing our conversation about pictures, Samuel asked me to photograph him near the Louvre. He was amazed of how he pays no effort in explaining what exactly he needs to see in the captured photos. We started discussing various topics like cultural difference, travelling and photography. Samuel wanted to visit the Eiffel tower so bad and start posing for photos next to it. He asked me for good shots for it, I suggested we take a walk along the Seine, crossing Pont Alexandre lll, passing by Les Invalides till hitting Champs de Mars right behind Eiffel Tower.

The below photo was the last photo I took for the Louvre, It was me saying goodbye to on of my favorite places on earth.

Moving from the Louvre, we walked and talked along the Seine, capturing some fine scenery for the landmarks, showing it all like a postcards you wanna receive so bad.

Below is Musée d'Orsay

Pont de la Concorde

And finally one of the best -and saddest- pictures ever, a sunset in Paris. Why saddest? It’s my last sunset there. It looks like an oil painting that has a presence that never fades, or even fails to remind you of what you’ve felt taking such picture.

We passed by Pont Alexandre lll, and the bridge never fails to be impressive at any time of the day. The timing was perfect because we got to capture a golden bridge under golden weather.

It’s my favorite bridge in Paris, and It never fails to remind me of the first time I recognized it in Adele’s “Someone like you” music video. I’m no drama queen, or maybe sometimes I am haha, but I slightly felt the same that day walking there, and yeah, nothing is the same when you’re saying goodbye. I’m intending to describe more on that matter, you feel like you’re aching in a way that doesn’t show a physical pain, everything you’re hearing sounds the same, yet you feel it’s distorted. It’s complicated, Anyway, here’s another picture of the bridge capturing Les Invalides.

Moving forward, He asked for amazing places to capture the Eiffel tower inside the city itself, so I suggested the below location I initially used for my Trip in 2018.

We continued walking towards Champs de Mars and when we arrived, Samuel was astonished of how the tower looks marvelous the closer you get closer, we arrived there a few minutes before it got all lit so we captured both moments.

And same way with the lights starting to glow

We got closer for a better shot, and captured one of my finest Eiffel tower photos ever!

We again moved to the Seine to pass to Trocadéro to capture my last photo of the tower, which started to light in purple in solidarity with Breast Cancer Awareness Month that occurs annually in October.

So, That was it. I said goodbye to Samuel as I had to move to prepare my luggage and head towards Gare de Lyon for my 6 AM train, which was pretty early to be there almost 7 hours before the train, but me and Mohamed thought it should be better for him not to pay another night for a few hours, and it was risky to depend on getting there on time less than one hour after the public transportation starts the next day.

On my way to Islem’s home though, I was stopped in the metro station and got fined 35 Euros for violating the Metro’s rules of having an image and a name on my transportation Card, the whole situation didn’t make my Paris ending any prettier, It was scary and worrying being stopped by metro officials, yet I gotta admit it was my fault as I was notified I should update both the photo and the name 5 days earlier.

Arriving at Islem’s, My luggage was Pre-Packed, I just showered and collected my belongings and started moving, I thanked Islem for his GREAT hospitality for the second year in a row! It was almost 11 PM when I started moving, I stopped and took a last look at the house before for my last RER ride to Gare de Lyon.

I arrived at Gare de Lyon, Mohamed arrived a couple of minutes after. We were ready for our more than 6 hours time of waiting. We tried to discover the station, discovering that, obviously, every single shop or store is closed. The only available items to purchase are the snacks of the vending machines. The only thing that broke the silence that night is a man playing piano closer to midnight.

We stayed and talked about what we’ve progressed so far in the trip, which is completely nothing to what’s coming up a head, before we were ordered by station security to exit the station as the station is “Closing” till the morning. That was another bullet to my head that night. We roamed the scary streets surrounding the station at night searching for any café or restaurant that might be working after midnight with no luck, we even tried our luck with fancy hotels like Holiday Inn to try and stay for a drink or something in the lobby which was refused as well. It was a scary couple of minutes before we decided to head up to the Station’s door and try our luck again, The security asked us to come back in and wait for the train as he’s been searching for us for a while to tell us to get back inside. We were a bit relieved knowing that we’ll be in a safer situation, we faced another hazard of creepy Algerians who were roaming the station searching for a cigarette or a lighter to smoke weed. We ran into a Brazilian guy and his dad. They only spoke Portuguese so I used google translate to communicate. They were both heading to another French city and they were terrified by the creepy Algerians roaming the station. We stayed together for an hour or two, talked for a while. I gave him a souvenir of an Egyptian coin which he was crazy about given the fact that he was a coin collector.

It was finally around 5 AM when we noticed that our train was already in the station since before midnight, not ready to be entered though but we were finally that close. The doors are finally opened near 6 AM and we got on, in separate cars unfortunately but still, safer than ever.

Before the train moves, I wanted to take a moment to appreciate the Paris effect it has on me for the second year in a row now. The city attracts my senses and brings out the best of me, I’m thankful for it as it captured my first experience as a tourist the year before, and it’s the only city I visited twice, and intending to include in every Europe trip I’m intending to pursue. The city also confirmed and enriched my passion for architecture and art. Unlike most Egyptians, I don’t find it an ordinary “overrated” city, I find the streets talking with history and beauty, the bakeries are running and keeping history of recipes, preserving a significant European cuisine. The fact that I remember leaving the city in the two years I visited leaves me speechless. In both trips, Paris was the start of my tour, and even though it was followed by GREAT cities and countries after, It still doesn’t feel the same.

The train started moving and I finally felt safe and calm enough to sleep, The ride takes around 7 hours to Milan. I tried to ditch the previous night away and think about the amazing Italy adventure coming up ahead, the first country I’ve ever wanted to visit. I napped for an hour or two before the Police officers started passing and checking our passports, it’s a normal procedure for intercountry trains or transportation in general. Everything is going well and smooth now, Let’s hit Italy!

Self reflection:

I’m finalizing this blog post on October 9th from Egypt’s North Coast, nearly after three months of not blogging because of the heavy work load I have. And even though it’s all still packed with no time to take a proper break, I found a way to return and preserve moments like this because it’s all still there. Once I started writing, it took me less than a day to finalize the whole post.

So, hmm, a self reflection. I’m currently unaware of my feelings towards anything, I feel better than the last time I blogged, but I currently have a general understanding that everything isn’t worth the effort of thinking anymore. That doesn’t mean I’m not thinking anymore, Haha -I wish though-. by going through 2020, I’m developing weird facts about how everything should be understood and acted upon. Starting from relationships, work, personal spaces, caring, and everything. I feel like I’m still discovering these things for the first time, like a kid learning to walk in his first year. Nobody told me getting ready to turn into a 30 year old has a reset button of your whole belief system. You go through the same things you go through on daily basis, but with growing mind and easier letting go abilities. You go and evaluate friendships, actions, hobbies and whole life style, you check how responding differently can leave your mind in peace, how going an extra mile doesn’t always bring what you’ve been missing or expecting, how being a selfish person is not as bad as it’s been showed to us growing up.

Now we’re less than three months away from the end of 2020, I gotta say it’s still hurting me revealing all my scars at once to myself in one single year, and at the same time I’ve never been more thankful for such an evolution of thoughts in the same year. If I’m allowed to say a piece of non-cliché advice, I’d say go selfish to liberate yourself from the restrictions that keep you from discovering who you really am. Instead of unrolling yourself as a carpet for others to grow with whoever they wanna be, be your own red carpet.

Be your own superstar.

#Paris #France #Tourism #Travel #Travelling #Love #Adele #Someonelikeyou #Reflection #Louvre #Art #Tour #Eiffel #Tower #Bridge #Pont

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thelivebookproject · 4 years

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Make yourselves forget that the plague is a bitch BOOK edition

I was tagged by @anassarhenisch, thank you!

What’s the most recent book that you’ve read and absolutely fell in love with?

Becoming, by Michelle Obama.

Do you keep track of how many books you’re reading every month?

Yes! I love lists, so I keep a yearly list of my reads, and also on Goodreads.

What’s your stance on the debate as to whether or not we should dissociate the artist from their art (artist = writer in this case)?

Mmmmm depends on the author: if it’s a historical author then I think we should treat them with an understanding of their times, but still make note of their “faults”.

If it’s a modern author, then it depends on 1) where, when and how they have screwed up, and 2) whether they have apologized and are conscious of their wrongdoings or not.

What do you do when you can’t focus on a book?

I change my activity and then come back.

Do you pay attention to the gender/ethnicity/race/sexuality of the authors you’re reading, aka do you actively try to read books written by diverse writers?

In the last two or three years I’ve tried (and managed) to read more female authors, but it’s true that I haven’t really paid attention to their ethnicity or sexuality. This year, apart from my female authors bias that I’m not quitting, I’m trying to read more “diverse” authors in terms of origin (aka stop reading only Americans), but it’s hard. And I don’t look up authors based on their sexuality! I don’t even care about that, to be honest.

Paperback or hardcover? why?

Hardcover because they’re prettier.

Which language would you like to learn just to be able to read its untranslated literature?

Mmmm... No idea. Perhaps improve my French so I can read classics, because right now I manage okay with contemporary novels and less okay with fantasy, but classics are very far away!

Pick up the book that is closest to you. convince me to read it in less than 10 sentences.

How They Rule the World, by Pedro Baños: non-fiction, short chapters, opens your eyes to how politics and economy dominate the world, and what strategies politicians and military leaders use. You learn a lot, and come out smarter!

I leave this an open tag because again I have seen this making rounds so I don’t know who to tag.

#thelivebookproject #book tag #may 2020 #bookblr

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surveys-at-your-service · 5 years

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Survey #214

“if you are dead or still alive, i don’t care.”

Do you wear perfume or cologne? Very very rarely. Typically if I have to go somewhere formal or something. What was your favorite grade in elementary school? Probably 5th. Do you own a debit card? No. A credit card? No. Are you in debt? I don't pay for anything that could cause me to be in debt. When is your birthday? February 5th. What song are you listening to now? "I Don't Care" by Apocalyptica. What was the most traumatic experience of your life? The breakup with Jason. Have you ever lost a friend to drugs or alcohol? Kinda. Who was your childhood best friend? Her name was Brianna. Are you still friends now? We just drifted apart. If not, why? ^ Do you believe in Karma? Nope. What do you thinks happens to us when we die? I don't pretend to know. I hope some sort of eternal peace for those deserving, but who the hell knows. What age do you think you’ll die? Idk. 70s/80s? My grandparents lived pretty long. About how long was the last book you read? I haven't a clue. Have you ever read a play before? Yeah, in school. A play not written by Shakespeare? I don't think so. Have you ever read a play outside of school? No. Have you ever edited Wikipedia? No. Have you ever edited any other wiki? A lot... I'm one of the admins at the Silent Hill wiki, a content mod or something I don't remember on the SotC one, and I occasionally edit the meerkats wiki, which is an atrocious mess that I try to clean up where I can. Is there a website [besides social networking] that you check almost daily? A lot. Do you use your phone as an alarm? Yep. Do you listen to music while you sleep? No. Do you get scared when you know some virus or sickness is being passed? I don't get "scared," just very paranoid of germs. Are you realistic? In some ways. Do you own a romper? No. What popular social media platforms AREN’T you on? Snapchat, and then I have a Twitter solely to like Mark's shit lmao. What does your computer’s slow-loading cursor look like? It's a spinning light blue ring. Do you prefer Microsoft Word or Pages? I've never heard of the latter, so. Would you rather have a trampoline or swimming pool? A pool, please. Do you have the same favorite colors you had when you were a kid? Pink, yes. What do you like to put in your tea? N/A What do you like to put in smoothies? I don't really drink them. Do your stuffed animals have names? Some. What was the name of the first porcelain doll you got? Bitch miss me with that haunted doll shit. Do you sell any products? If so, what? No. Do you know how to knit? No. Do you have an inspiration board? I have one on Pinterest of hair colors I like. Do you have a colored teddy bear? Maybe up in the attic somewhere. On what day is your local grocery store the busiest? I'm sure it's the weekend. What day do you usually go grocery shopping? Mom doesn't have a designated "day." Do you own a bobblehead? No. What do you make wishes on? Nothing. Wishes aren't magic. Well, I do on birthday candles, but that's only as a tradition sorta thing. What’s the best natural pain reliever? It depends; sometimes nothing natural works. What’s your favorite Paramore song? "That's What You Get," probably. Do you like scrambled eggs? Yes. Have you ever made a recipe you found in a magazine? No. Have you ever done a craft that you saw in a magazine? I don't believe so. Are you bitter about anything? I am permanently and inexplicably bitter towards my former primary doctor that fucked up my entire body thanks to keeping me on a medication and her being an ignorant fuck to the side effects, apparently. What is your favorite color for cars? Burnt orange. What is your favorite color for bridesmaid dresses? *shrugs* If applicable, what’s your favorite dance costume that you’ve had? It was some sort of black dress-ish thing. I can't remember clearly. What’s your favorite flavor of mouthwash? Minty? Just ffs don't have alcohol in it. Do you drink CapriSuns? If there's nothing else to drink, sure. Do you prefer caramel or peanut butter? Peanut butter, I think. Do you like strawberry shortcake? No. Do you like butterflies? Yeah, they're my fave insect. Do you know any dances? Only the ones that literally tell you what simple move to do lmao. Did you go anywhere yesterday? No. Do you like yellow or blue more? Blue. Do you wear rings? Only one. What’s the last you got out of the freezer? French toast sticks for lunch yesterday. How often do you go for walks? Never, sadly. Walking along my road is scary with how busy it is, I CANNOT handle the heat, and for the time being, I can't walk far at all with my knee problem. Do you go on the computer or watch TV more? I say enough I don't watch TV, but I'm always on my laptop. What is something you’ll never eat again? Why? Brussel sprouts. 'Cuz they're fucking disgusting. What is currently happening that is scaring you? Abortion rights being taken away/wrongly modified is pretty scary, honestly. What would be your personal hell? The Christian Hell because fuck that heat lmao. What made the ‘weird kid’ at your school weird? He, I shit you not, would not say a word, but if he absolutely had to speak, he kept it very very short and quiet. He was always looking down and isolated himself. I felt really bad for him; he was so obviously depressed, but I was always too unsure of how to approach him and try to be a friend. What is a word you personally find offensive? "Retarded" when used incorrectly. What instantly puts you to sleep? Instantly go to sleep??? Please teach me how. What song is in a language you don’t speak, but you love it anyway? Well, I don't speak German fluently, so like, a shitload of Rammstein songs. What is something you would like to do if you weren’t judged for doing it? Tbh cosplay sounds so fun. What’s a movie you think everyone should watch? Why that one? Johnny Got His Gun. It shows just how fucking disgusting war is. What was the most unexpected good thing that’s ever happened to you? Senpai Noticed Me. What is the funniest fact you know? Idk. Oh, I might be mistaken, but I think the guy who invented the segway died via driving off a cliff on a segway. Big 'ole oof. What’s the kindest way a stranger has treated you? I remember as a little kid, the people in front of us in line at McDonald's paid for our meal. What is the biggest design flaw of your body? I have this random, deep dimple on my right ass cheek like what the fuck. What is the strangest thing you have ever felt? OKAY SO when I was in the process of having my ears cleaned back when I had that wax adhered to my eardrums, one step was having warm water like pounded into my ears, and it somewhat tickled but also felt oddly good, and it was just really weird. What makes someone immediately unlikable? Acting like they're above everyone else. Who’s a villain you sympathize with and why? Darkiplier hunny my poor husband. I won't answer "why" because yeah spoilers. What is something you regret to NOT have done? Fuck it, I wish I'd had *complete* sex w/ Jason. I was in love with him, and I'll probably never experience genuine sex again so like- What’s the weirdest thing you put in a microwave? Idk? What movie changed your life for the better? I'm not sure. Oh, wait, I remember when I was still Christian, God's Not Dead really touched me, but we know how I am religiously now. What’s something your relatives don’t know about you? Many probably don't know I'm bi. What’s something your parents did, which you have sworn never to do? Have children before marriage. Back when I wanted kids. What’s the most annoying thing your pet does? My cat is obsessed with trying to lie on me as he'd done as a kitten, but then I can't see over him to see the laptop. Teddy scratches a lot and won't listen to "stop" for anything. What’s the biggest sum of money you’ve won? Uhhhh. I have no clue. Have I ever? Idk. Have you ever smoked weed on April 20? No. Tell me about the last event that made you really, truly happy? Oh boy. Can you name three good things about your most recent ex? He's funny as fuck, super intelligent, and hard-working. Have you ever thought about how the world will end? Yeah. What object do you own that has the most sentimental value to you? The pebble I got from my partial hospitalization program. What’s the best memory you have of your father? Him teaching me to ride a bike. What was on the last sandwich you ate? Ham, cheese, and mustard. Do you prefer gold or silver jewelry? Silver matches more things, but I'm allergic to it. I find gold in general prettier, too. Have you ever gotten back together with an ex? No. What is your favorite Thai dish? Never tried Thai food. When was the last time you made out with somebody? February. Are there any candles in your bedroom, and what scent are they? No. When was the last time you went to a birthday party? Last month for my niece. What pet names do you use with your significant other? A whole lot. What brand is your toaster, if you have one? We don't have a toaster, but a toaster oven. I don't have the slightest clue what brand it is; it's ancient. Have you ever dated a smoker? If not, would you? No and nope. What’s the name of the store you usually get your groceries? Wal-Mart or Harris Teeter. Would you rather travel to Japan or Scotland? Oh man, I don't know! I guess Scotland. Does your house have a porch/balcony? We have a decently-sized back porch. There's a front one as well, but it's tiny. What was the last movie you saw and who did you watch it with? I watched The Shining by myself. What’s your favorite type of bread? Pumpernickel. Do you share a middle name with any of your siblings? Yes. Can you cry on command? If so, have you ever used it to your advantage? No. What time does the sun go down where you live at this time of the year? Like, 8:30-ish. Would you rather pay to get your nails done or do them yourself? If I literally had to get them done for whatever reason, I guess I'd pay. Me doing them myself would be a nightmare, especially with tremors. Did you ever fail your learners/drivers test? I haven't taken it yet. Do you have any stickers on your car? I don't have my own car. Blackberry, Droid, or iPhone? iPhones. Do you like diet soda? NO. I don't just not like the taste, but the artificial sweetener gives me crazy headaches. Do you watch Pretty Little Liars? No. Have you ever gotten a speeding ticket? No. How old were you the first time you drank alcohol? I don't remember. WAIT shit dude, I was young. I grew up going to a Catholic church, and during that "eating the blood and body of Christ" thing (I forgot what it's called), we sipped real wine. Yes, even the kids. That shit was NOT grape juice. Name someone you’ve become a lot closer to recently: No one. What was the last fight you had with your parents about? Dad, I've got no clue. Mom, about her constantly shit-talking my dad and I no longer wanted to hear any of it in my presence. Does your car have a sunroof? N/A Did you ever have braces? Yes. Are you from the South? Yes. What does your last status on Facebook say? It was something about the bullshit Alabama abortion law, I believe. I barely ever ever make my own statuses. Do you tip your server when you go to a restaurant? I never can because yeah, no money, so I can't even pay for the meal. If I could, of course I would. Have you ever snuck out of your house? No. Are you friends with people on Facebook that you actually hate? No? Name your favorite Ke$ha song: I guess "Take It Off." What’s your favorite place? Ah man, the tattoo/piercing parlor I go to. What was the last comic book you read? It was one of the Silent Hill ones on the app years ago. What’s the worst trouble you’ve ever gotten into? Probably when I ran away from home in like middle school. Do you know anyone your age who has a child? A good number, but I mean I'm 23 so that's not exactly strange. Ever had a friend online for a long time without seeing a photo of them? A few. The last time you threw up, what caused it? Medicine that was known for nausea. Did you have any foreign exchange students at your high school? I don't think so? Any foods from other countries you would like to try but haven’t yet? Not off the top of my head. Do you think the world would be more peaceful without any religion? Maybe. Probably. Idk. Have you kept the same icon here for a long time? Yeah. I don't really take pictures of myself, so. Why did you choose your icon, anyway? It's the most accurate representation of how I look on the daily. And it's not horrendous. Does it hurt your feelings when people talk shit about things you love? Sometimes. It doesn't hurt my feelings, but rather it makes me deathly embarrassed because I feel stupid for liking it and like they're making fun of a part of me. Can you be friends with people with opposing political views? Yes. Are there any fandoms you used to be in, but left? I don't think I exactly "left" them, just lost big interest, like Rhett & Link/GMM. I still love the guys, but I don't watch them anymore. Warriors is another example. Do you prefer ruffly or regular potato chips? Ruffled. Do you write down your own recipes, or just commit them to memory? I don't cook. Can you do any impressions? No. What color do you want to dye your hair? Currently I want to dye it lilac, but I can't afford a professional to do that. What is a food you enjoy, but don’t have very often? Shrimp. Favorite fictional world? Wonderland. Do you carry pepper spray? No, but I want to. Have you ever had to use it? N/A Have you ever been kicked out of a public place? Why? No. Do you donate to any associations that care for animals? I don't have my own money. Have you ever worn those Drunk Goggles? Yes, in D.A.R.E. Can you agree to disagree, or usually get upset over conflicting views? It depends on the topic, but it's generally very easy for me to agree to disagree. Rodeos – entertaining, or cruel? Animal abuse. Who is the best female rocker? Why? Ohhhh good question. I like Lita Ford, for one; great singer and she fucking slays the guitar. She seems cool, too. Do you care what kind of toilet paper you use? Not really, no. Do you still have any decent arcades nearby? No. Bullfighters who get gored kind of had it coming, right? Yes. They fucking deserve it. Have you ever accidentally found porn when looking for something else? Thank God no. What do you like on your burger? Cheese, ketchup, mustard, a little bit of mayo is fine but not mandatory, pickles, and very little onion is okay. What do you NOT like on your burger? Lettuce and tomato. Do you like 'loose meat’ sandwiches? Like sloppy joes? Yeah. Have you ever seen an unwrapped mummy in person? No, but that'd be pretty fucking cool. What things have people shamed you for? Besides the obvious disagreements like political subjects, I don't know. Do you always reply to private messages? (On any website) Yes, unless it's spam or advertisement. Are there any 'adult stores’ in your area? I wouldn't know. Have you been inside of them/shopped there before? No. Who was your favorite actress to play Morticia Addams? Anjelica Huston. What is the next film you want to rewatch? Idk. I don't really watch TV or movies to begin with. What is the next film you want to see for the first time? I've been wanting to see Jacob's Ladder for a very long time, but I have to find a time I actually *really* feel like it to possibly enjoy it. A movie you love even though it’s cheesy? I'm sure there's something, but idk. Share any song lyrics you misheard? When I heard "Purple Haze" by Jimi Hendrix for the first time, I swore the lyrics were "excuse me while I kiss this guy" instead of "kiss the sky." What was the last song you heard for the first time and enjoyed? I both enjoy "Bad Girl" by Avril Lavigne and see it cringy as fuck at the same time. Who are some of your favorite female fictional characters, and why? Heather Mason from Silent Hill 3 is up high 'cuz she's a badass, CYNDER FROM THE LEGEND OF SPYRO SERIES BECAUSE SHE'S COOL AS ALL HECKIN' HECK AND ALSO #AESTHETIC, and I've fallen more and more in love with Tyrande Whisperwind from World of Warcraft now that she's become vengeance-crazed and more interesting than she already was. Oh, and then there's Bayonetta. Why? You know why. A character (in anything) you wish hadn’t been killed off? In recent news, BRING BACK STAN THE MOTHERFUCKING WATER MAN, MARK. Have you ever had to hit up several stores in search of one item? What was it? I'm sure I have at some point. Do you have any calluses on your feet? From when I used to walk outside for hours, you have no idea- What was your last big purchase? A plane ticket. Have you ever eaten grits? I HATE THEM SO MUCH. Do you always dress right after a shower, or do you like to chill in your towel/robe for a while? I put clothes on right away. Have you ever looked up your state’s laws and read them? I don't think so. Have you ever had to talk to a lawyer? I feel like I did have to once for something...? Have you ever been in pain so bad you passed out? No. I sincerely don't know how I didn't when I had to get that cyst drained, though. I have no words for that pain. Can you have kids? Well, physically, yeah. Doesn't mean I ever will or even want to. If you could get rid of one of your allergies, which one would it be? POLLEN. Do you have any cousins that look like you? No. Who do you know who is dating someone that looks way too old for them? Idk. Have you ever gone on a Facebook deleting spree? Yeah. What's a good example of "don’t knock it till you try it"? Waffles with peanut butter spread over them with syrup. What is surprisingly painful? Hm. "Surprisingly." OH, something I say as well as many others: Getting your nose pierced is more painful than you'd think compared to other piercings. Which person shaped you the most? Probably Jason. Or Mom. Have you ever been 4-wheeling? Yes. Do you live anywhere near the woods? There's a wooded area beyond the field. Do you have any important anniversaries you celebrate? Mine and Sara's. Can you rap? I don't even have to try to say no. Do you know how to use a DSLR camera? Yes. Tell me about the sickest you’ve ever felt. Oh man... I remember in elementary school, 3rd grade I think, I had the weirdest 3-day "sickness" where I felt every single moment like I was right on the very verge of vomiting. I went to the ER on the third night, but they couldn't detect what was wrong. Next day, I woke up miraculously fine. Those days were horrifying for someone who is terrified of vomiting. Any important birthdays coming up? My nephew's isn't far off. If you could play one instrument flawlessly, what would it be? Electric guitar. Have you ever heard of Hollywood Undead? Do you like them? I love some songs, like others, don't enjoy or care about a handful, and then truly haven't heard most. Have your friends ever told you something really personal? Was it weird? Well yeah, close friends do that often. It's not weird. Has anyone ever called you a coward before? Who called you that? No. Have you ever written a whole song before? What was the title to it? No. Are you a Jeffree Star fan? Or no? Do you think he’s awesome/dumb? I loooove that funky alien man. I find his work ethic incredibly inspiring and he seems so super accepting and is just very radiant and positive. Has your grandmother ever made you anything? Not including cookies. I don't think so.

#survey #quiz #questions #bored #random

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bestcrossbows2018-blog · 5 years

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Legendary Skyrim Crossbows At Skyrim Nexus

This mod adds in crossbows as a full DLC style growth to Skyrim. There are crossbows for each materials type, artifact crossbows, faction crossbows and they have been added seamlessly into the whole of Skyrim. Enemies will now have an opportunity of utilizing crossbows and you'll find them similar to you would another type of weapon. - DLC necessities Nexus necessities Off-site requirements Mods requiring this file Author's instructions Because of the property that had been graciously allowed for use this mod has to stay Nexus only. Translations are welcome only if they're posted as simply the .esp file and have this file as a required download for the .bsa. When you make a translation please notify me so I can add a hyperlink here. File credits -DJjojo for Crossbows Basic Collection, Nightingale Crossbow, and Carved Nordic Crossbow -scot for Crossbows -Elsys656 for Stalhrim Crossbow Joolander for Torch Bolts and Arrows Jokerine for brand new Iron Crossbow Looks madcat221 for Dawnguard Crossbow Explosive Bolts Visualized Daiyus for An NPO Module - Crossbows bigdeano89 for better quiver meshes Faction Crossbows SE by Deserter X Ghosu - Auriels Crossbow and Swords Ghosu - Horker Bow and Crossbow nsk13 for the Nightingale bow and crossbow property Assassins Crossbow by HyPNOS Wooden Crossbow by gutris1 Bolts and Arrows of Dagon by giggity12345 Enhanced Crossbows Enhancement by MadCat221 Steel Crossbow and Crossbow Bolt Recolor by Mythos214 Silver Crossbow Bolts by Aegis Runestone HD Steel Crossbows by Cat_Woman1989 GratuitousLurking for testing MisterB1969 for leveled checklist recommendation Donation Points system This mod is opted-in to receive Donation Points - Portuguese - Italian - French - Chinese - Mandarin Translations accessible on the Nexus - Version 2.5 - Removed the Daedric bow and crossbow from the assassins chest. Added an Assassins crossbow to the assassins chest. Removed any tint and agro edits from the npc's. Removed the random edit to the faction of generic Dawnguard missile enemies. Changed to Dawnguard Crossbow and Dawnguard Bolts for the Dawnguard crossbow using members. Changed the wording of the Assassins word. Generic Dawnguard missile enemies now have silver crossbows and silver bolts. Generic Dawnguard Hunters now have a typical hunter crossbow, hunters bolts and a handful of hunters hearth bolts. Reworked the Torch arrows leveled lists. Added a Bound Crossbow. Bound Crossbow can make use of all included bolts. http://bestratedcrossbow.com - Fixed all the meshes. Version 2.Four - Fixed the missing images for the nightingale crossbow. Changed the leveled lists for bandits torch arrows. Typo fixes. All crossbows now have there attain changed to .5 for punching. Removed all breakdown recipes through widespread complaint... Regenerated bash tags with a greater script. All nif recordsdata have had updates performed to tangents and bitangents. USKP is now a requirement. Version 2.Three - Fixed all crucial values. Checked the bsa file and file paths. Re-added the lacking ini file. Version 2.2.2 - 2.2 acquired all corrupted and messed up. Same fixes and double checked. Version 2.2 - Fixed forsworn missile weapon leveled lists. Version 2.1 - Added some better textures for a couple of the extra normal xbows (Iron, Dwarven, Steel) Added matching meshes/textures for Auriels bow and quiver to match the xbow and bolts. Changed Auriels bow and crossbow to greater Daedric style damages. Some cleaning. Version 2.Zero - Complete overhaul of the whole nif's and textures. This resulted find a handful of points and fixing them. A few crossbows did not have the intended texture. Some bolts were made much prettier. Another bolts have been made extra constant in selection seems to be. Some small recreation play points discovered and fastened (More bolts are retrievable now) Moved the crossbow in the Palace of the Kings. (Cloaks of Skyrim used that spot) Added better crossbow shoot sounds and bolt impression sounds. Personally examined the depth of each bolt. (No I cannot change them ever again! Period...) They are a bit deep however they are approach an excessive amount of of a pain to vary always. Thanks Gr3YFoX Version 1.5 - Removed redundant scripts. Tweaked leveled lists for imperials and stormcloaks. "Should" be more balanced now. Tweaked leveled lists for Stalhrim, Stalneisti and Staledur. The variants will now present at the identical time as the original. SSE modifications - meshes ought to be higher placed now. Version 1.4.6 - All Enhanced variations have key phrases redone to work higher in crafting. Assassins Soul Trap Bolts Damage fixed. Auriels Legacy Chest has a spare Ancient Falmer armor set in it. Changed Auriels Crossbow magical enchantments it ought to behave higher now. Minor Changes to a handful of damages, weights, supplies for continuity. Version 1.4.5 - Added a alternate Nightingale Crossbow. Fixed the smithing requirements of the Stahlrim variants. Fixed the stats on the Stahlrim variants. Added bolt depth to all bolts. Moved the hunters bolts closer to the physique. Tweaked the Horker Crossbow it was too powerful. Fixed the silver bows leveled list now they are going to only get one or the other. Removed description from all weapons now enchantments will present. Version 1.4 - Fixed meshes\textures for silver bolts, horker bolts Changed Silver bow to now have a mild and heavy version: Light Silver Bow .85spd 12 Heavy Silver Bow .7spd sixteen Added Stalneisti and Staledur variants to Bows\Crossbows and Arrows\Bolts Ore is added to a barrel at Baldur's forge and Solsthiem smith will promote the ore at later ranges. Tweaked leveled lists some also. Version 1.3.1 - Assassin Paralysis Bolts and Nightingale Poison Bolts had each others elements swapped. - 3 of the Assassin special Bolts required steel bolts for ingredient been Assassin Bolts as an alternative. - Auriel's Legacy chest is now locked. Get the important thing from the Arch-Curate Vyrthur. Version 1.3 - Changed the meshes and textures of - Dwarven, Steel, Silver, Hunter and Iron for matching and better seems to be between regular and enhanced version. Added Dragonscale Bolts\Arrows (Slightly weaker Dragon ammo) + Dragonhoned Botls\arrows (Think arrows and bolts made with solely Dargon Bones and Scales, slightly stronger) Now you might have extra makes use of for Dragonscale. Fixed the incorrect cubemap of Dwarven Crossbow. Nerfed Hunters Fire bolts they had been approach too powerful for whats alleged to be a fundamental hearth bolt. Fixed recipes for Assassin and Nightingale ammo for continuity with different enchanted bolt recipes. Changed among the substances around for better lore. Changed the realm of impact for the paralysis bolts. (You could super simply paralyze your self with them) Fixed the leveled checklist entry for elven bolts. Because of the1yunico for good bug reviews. Fixed the recipes for items having the improper condition and not showing up. More Typo corrections. Complete housework on editor id's (Renamed them all for consistency) More balance tweaks applied. Horker Bow collision fixed (Thanks icecreamassassin!) Most of the arrows and bolts now spin in flight. Tested drop-means of all the things in each oldrim and SSE. Removed the CroAxe. Completely new model for the Stalhrim Crossbow. Hunters, Dark Brotherhood, Thieves, Assassins and Nightingales weapons are all silent. All different crossbows make normal noise. Silver bolts and arrows ignore weapon resistance. Some values were modified for higher stability. Version 1.2.2 - Removed the whole customized crafting class concept. Version 1.2 - Completely reworked the whole Assassins Crossbow (Read the reference part!) - All enhanced crossbows had the improper condition and were exhibiting earlier than the best time. - Fixed some key phrases. - More typo fixes. - Retested all objects and menus all of them show high-quality in my sport. Version 1.1.1 - Typo fixes. - Reworked the Nightingale handbook. - Added the lacking texture units for explosive bolts visualized. - Fixed the dwarven bolts not showing up and being retrievable. Version 1.1 - Added Hunters Crossbow, Hunters Crossbow Enhanced and Hunters Bolts with a hearth version. Hunters Crossbow and Bolts added to leveled lists. Added Assassins Crossbow and 5 Custom Assassins Bolts. Flames, Paralysis, Soul Trap and Sub-Zero. Nightingale craft-able crossbow\bow now have the added requirement of "Trinity Restored" being full. Books have had values lowered are not talent books and typos fixed. Placed a chest in High Hrothgar that comprises all manuals as a backup. There is now a faction crossbow of the appropriate sort near each manual. Went over the CCOR and WAF key phrases again. Re balanced the Crossbow damage, they know d0 25% more harm than regular bows. Lowered the stagger likelihood to 25% from 50%. Re balanced the values of the crossbows. Added our first distinctive merchandise! (Bleakfalls Barrow) Speeds, gravity, and a pair of knowledge flags needed mounted in the projectile knowledge area.

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thewitchwithoutvoice-blog · 6 years

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REINTRODUCING

Aoi Shibunuri

“If I told you about her, the princess without voice, what would I say?”

Hello everyone! Aoi has gone through a bit of a change, and by that I mean she’s an entirely different race now. She was a Raen but I just wasn’t really...feeling it. I tried giving Midlander a go for a few days and holy biscuits does it feel amazing. Also Hyurs...under appreciated. So, I already posted one of these for the Raen Aoi, but I can’t for the life of me figure out how to edit the post itself so I will be reposting it instead of reblogging so that it isn’t a nasty block of text on top of another. There won’t be any changes really, expect for some physical changes. She’s still the same person, just a Hyur now. Thank you for taking the time to read this ^^

NAME: Aoi Shibunuri

AGE: Twenty-Six

RACE: Hyur (Midlander)

GENDER: Female

SEXUALITY: Demisexual

DISABILITY(s)?: Yes, she is mute from birth.

MARITAL STATUS: Single

SERVER: Balmung

physical appearance ––––

HAIR: Dark brown. Slight wave near the ends of her hair. She had shorter hair but it has grown quite long since. It has reached a bit past her hips currently. She likes to keep it down most of the time but sometimes styles it with the casual half up half down, sometimes a half french braid, leaving the rest to flow down her back. If she’s working, she likes to tie it up into a bun or a ponytail.

EYES: Watercolor gray, depending on lighting, they can look endless and pitch dark.

SKIN TYPE: Darker shade of caramel with very soft skin and vitiligo from head to toe. She has flecks of moles here and there throughout her body. She enjoys bathing in oils so she has a healthy glow to her skin.

HEIGHT: Five feet Two inches

BUILD: She has a small amount of tone to her body, a bit thin with wider hips and a full top, an hourglass figure to be precise.

DISTINGUISHING MARKS: Head to toe, she has Vitiligo. She has two beauty marks on her face and then one on the edge of her lower lip on the left side.

COMMON ACCESSORIES: Flowers, she enjoys having flowers in her hair and always seems to have fresh ones. She usually has her nails painted with rings adorning her hands. She always has one special ring she does no take off for any reason other than in her home, she was told it was her mother’s. Anklets, the prettier the chiming bells, the more skip to her step. Occasionally, she’ll wear a necklace, but not too often. She carries a satchel with medical supplies, herbs, potions, inkwells, gauze, quills and her journals. She also carries a one-handed wand on her person at all times in case of emergencies.

personal –––-

PROFESSION: Wandering healer/conjurer currently. It has been about a year and a half since she retired from the Adders as a combat medic. If she isn’t wandering, she always takes the time to visit home…Gridania. The Central Shroud is one of her favorite places to be, she’ll often mediate there, gather herbs and supplies, or enjoy being around the greenery.

HOBBIES: Reading, her head is always in a book. Her home is filled with books, stacks here and there in messy piles. She enjoys taking care of plants, much of her home is filled with them so often she will be watering them and possibly getting more (even though she knows she shouldn’t). Aoi enjoys dancing, she can get lost in it, but it is something she does when she is alone. Aoi plays the harp as well, she learned at a young age and finds it soothing when she feels stressed or anxious.

LANGUAGES: Common and Sign Language

RESIDENCE: Her home is a small apartment that she occasionally visits in between her wandering, she is not one for having large homes, she enjoys having a smaller space. It is filled with plants and books, in a corner, she keeps her large harp so that she can entertain guests. (But really...oocly I was given one by a friend in Shirogane but icly, I like it in the Lavender beds as she very much loves Gridania).

FEARS: Drowning. She never learned how to swim because she was so caught up in her studies while growing up, and whenever she was prompted to, she brushed it aside. She has other tiny little fears such as neglecting her duty of traveling around and healing and caring for others. She is not a big fan of insects such as spiders, anything creepy crawly makes her uncomfortable. Heights make her extremely uncomfortable as she can be clumsy, that and she feels dizzy being in high up places. She doesn’t like the feeling.

relationships –––-

SPOUSE: N/A

CHILDREN: N/A

LOVE INTEREST(S): It is...complicated.

PARENTS: Both mother and father are deceased. She was raised by her aunt from a very young age of about a year old.

SIBLINGS: She has no brothers or sisters, she grew up as an only child.

OTHER RELATIVES: The only living relative that she is aware of, is her aunt.

PETS: She has none currently, but she won’t easily admit that she kind of thinks her plants as pets.

traits –––-

extroverted / introverted / in between

disorganized / organized / in between

close minded / open-minded / in between

calm / anxious / in between (depends on situation)

disagreeable / agreeable / in between

cautious / reckless / in between (depends on situation)

patient / impatient / in between

outspoken / reserved / in between

leader / follower / in between

empathetic / unemphatic / in between

optimistic / pessimistic / in between

traditional / modern / in between

hard-working / lazy / in between

cultured / un-cultured / in between

loyal / disloyal / in between

faithful / unfaithful / in between

additional information –––-

SMOKING HABIT: never / sometimes / frequently / to excess.

DRUGS: never / sometimes / frequently / to excess.

ALCOHOL: never / sometimes / frequently / to excess

possible hooks –––-

- If your character is an Adder or was associated with them, she was a combat medic for them before she retired! She will most likely approach you if mentioned, badger you if you are taking care of yourself and properly getting rest in between missions or shifts.

- If your character is mute or selectively mute and knows sign language (or just knows sign language in general), she will automatically approach with clear excitement in her eyes and a big smile! Her main form of communication is through writing, she does not meet many who know sign language so when she does actually meet those that do, it is a shock to her, a happy one!

- She is a wandering medic, so she is always aiding those that are in need of assistance, be it healing, child birth, or a serious injury, she will approach, very worried but ready to get to work immediately.

- These are just some thoughts I’m throwing out there, situations that I think my character would respond to, to give an idea (it’s super early and I haven’t slept..so they are not the brightest ideas). I am open-minded, if you are interested, don’t even hesitate to throw some of your ideas out there too, I would love to hear what you have to say as well! Working together to come up with an awesome hook or plot is the best part! ^^

what I’m looking for ––––

- Honestly, any kind of contacts! Be it friendships, job offers, rivalries, etc! I mentioned above that I was also looking for an RP FC so, if any of you are in need of a healer (additionally an alchemist, gotta level that up for RP purposes, same for botany), shoot me a message and give me some information about your FC and what you’re all about!

- I mentioned that I’m an open-minded person, so if you got ideas, shoot them my way, I love seeing what people can cook up, and it helps give me an idea of what I can too depending on the person(s) that approach me (character-wise, like personalities, backstories, what sort of plot you’re informing me about and how Aoi would fit into it).

✓ Will do temporary incapacitation, temporary imprisonment, walk-ups

✓ I don’t mind doing RP that is a bit dark, I like being pushed in different directions and it’s fun to explore. Things revolving voidsent (very little knowledge of it though, if you have the patience to give me some lore tips and pointers, I don’t mind one bit), drugs/violence/alcohol/language, I don’t mind at all, as long as it comes naturally with roleplay.

- As for longterm RP, I am not too sure about it, one way to find out is talking to me about it and giving me an idea of what you had in mind (especially if they involve long-term incapacitation, long-term imprisonment, or long-term disfiguration).

- I don’t mind lore bending at all, not one bit, as long as it isn’t anything too crazy or displaced. It is fun to be creative! So as long as it works and flows nicely with everything.

✗ I will not do ERP or anything involving rape. I don’t at all mind having my characters naturally building a romantic relationship (comes along with roleplay, fan of slowburn sort of stuff), but ERP is not my cup of tea so I’m putting this out there now, don’t ask me later, my mind won’t suddenly change.

oocly, I am –––

I am a fairly chill roleplayer, I enjoy in-game roleplay but I don’t mind at all if you would like to use Discord as well. It’s very convenient! I enjoy all sorts of RP as I mentioned above, if you would like fast-paced, I will do my best to keep up and adapt, I am more of a paragraph roleplayer and enjoy putting in a lot of details into my posts, but like I said, I can adapt, I’ve been roleplaying for about 11 years, I’ve been all over the place.

Don’t worry about responding to me asap or roleplaying with me constantly, like I said, I’m a laid-back person, plan with me, gush about characters and stuff, take your time. There is no rush, after all, we’re all here to relax and have fun! So if anything is troubling you, don’t hesitate to approach me about it!

I am on CST, and am usually on most of the time, my sleep schedule is all over the place so I’ll be on during the day, afternoon, night…like I said…jumpy sleep schedule. >w<

you can contact me via ––

Tumblr Messages!

Discord: Aoi Shibunuri#4857

In Game: Aoi Shibunuri

PS: Totally didn’t nab this from my friend, @ijazrahalffxiv, *sweats*, I don’t really know where he got this template from so the mysterious template shall continue it’s journey onwards!! Thank you for your time :D

#repost #ffxiv hyur #ffxiv #ff14 #balmung #balmung server #balmung rp #lfrp #lffc #race change #hyur #female hyur #hyur midlander #ffxiv rp

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jerseydeanne · 6 years

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There is hope after a Narc relationship, don't give up. friends and family are who you really need.

If you’ve ever been in a relationship with a narcissist or had someone in your life suffering from one, you will know of its devastating effects. In fact, when a highly capable, decent human being suddenly hits a rock-bottom after beginning a relationship, you can usually assume that their partner is a narcissist–that’s how debilitating narcissistic relationships can be. My first boyfriend was a narcissist. Despite my age at the time, I had never been in a serious relationship before, because I had a good reason to thoroughly vet and test men who approached me; so, needless to say, I was very naive about love and the dating rituals themselves. During the two-year-long on-and-off relationship with this man, my heart was in utter shambles. I cried when we were together because he was making me miserable, and I cried when we weren’t together because I missed him. Even when I regained my senses enough to end things with him, I missed him so badly that my best friends and roommate remarked that I was calling out his name in my sleep. It took me quite some time to fix myself; during this time, I wrote countless journal entries to remind myself how I should be treated in a relationship; funnily enough, many men that followed him fit these criteria; in

fact, they were the very anti-thesis of my narcissist. : Back then, I used to be the one whose calls went unanswered when my then-boyfriend went radio-silent on countless Saturday nights doing God-knows-what. The men that followed either always picked up my calls or immediately called back. : Back then, I used to be the one to secretly cook for him many mornings using a Crock-Pot in a dorm that banned such cooking appliances. The men that followed baked cakes for me (though I turned them down), cooked dinners for me, and brought homemade meals to the hospital for me. : Back then, I used to be the one who would see him off at the airport, the train station, the bus stop, wherever. The men that followed not only saw me off at these places, but took troubles of travelling with me to my destination. : Back then, I used to be the one who would fit around his schedule. The men that followed would re-arrange their schedule and THEY were the ones who flew or took trains or drove several hours to come to see me. : Back then, I used to be the one to tell him how much I loved him and shower him with ‘I love you’s when he was never ever able to say them back. The men that followed were quick to say those words and quick to assure me of their sincerity. What, or rather who, prompted me to write such contrasts was a Frenchman who just asked me out. He and I met several months ago at a cafe, and he called to see when I had my day off. He wanted to cook French food for me, because he knew of my idyllic sentiments toward France. Ironically enough, he shares his first name with my narcissistic ex, and I had a striking realization during our conversation. All along, I thought I was looking for a man who fits my criteria I wrote in those journal entries; but I wasn’t. If I were, I would have been happy with receiving such wonderful treatments from many men and would have had relationships with several of them; but, again, I wasn’t. I was never the type of woman who sought after admiration from multiple men; all I ever wanted was a whole heart of that one person who can make my heart skip a beat. I knew I would know who it is, because I follow a very wise advice I once heard that “You know when you know, and if you don’t know, then they’re not it." Furthermore, I knew deep down that even if I were attracted to some of these men, none of them were offering their whole heart; and I deserve better than a measly portion of a heart. I can confidently say that I "knew” of my suitors’ superficial interest, because none of them were able to answer a very important question correctly. You see, after my relationship with my narcissist ended, I developed a habit of asking the men who ask me out why they’re interested in me or why they liked me; it’s a way for me to weed out narcissists. I’ve pretty much heard of every response possible: those who want to flatter my ego tell me that it’s because I’m “perfect” and “beautiful” and “smart”; those who want to play to my emotions tell me that it’s because I’m “nice” and I have a “sweet smile”; those who want to be macho tell me that it’s because they “don’t want someone else to take away what’s theirs”; while these answers may have been genuine, none of them were correct; none of them CAN be correct, because they weren’t supposed to be able to answer that question. If their interest were genuine, they would have understood the kind of person I am. They would have recognized that I’m wise enough to understand that these sweet-nothings may be EXPRESSIONS of love, but never REASONS for love. They would have known that I’m aware of the FACT that there will always be someone prettier than I am, smarter than I am, and nicer than I am. True love can’t be solely based on a quality, no matter how good it may be, of that person, when there are others who share the same exact quality; it’s that person’s heart that you fall in love with, and you can’t put a label on that. My relationship with that narcissist was traumatizing for sure. Even when I tried to date someone again shortly after that utter failure, I couldn’t maintain it; hence, my respite from dating. During my time of recovery, I resented that pathetic excuse of a man and berated myself endlessly for falling for him when my family and my best friends were so strongly against him. I couldn’t see the silver lining for a long time, yet I can see now that God taught me a lot of important lessons when this relationship ended. : I learned to appreciate my family and friends a lot more; they stuck with me through thick and thin even when I was spell-bound by my narcissist; they never gave up on me and they constantly reminded me of my self-value. I trust them wholeheartedly now and thank God for keeping them in my life. : I learned that it’s always better to be lonely because you’re alone than being lonely in a relationship; you should never have to explain yourself to your partner to be understood; they should never make you feel like you have to defend yourself against them. : I learned to trust my gut instinct a lot more; if they love you, you will feel it in your heart; don’t doubt your heart when it comes to love; if you have to constantly convince yourself and remind yourself of your partner’s “good” qualities to stay “in love,” ask yourself if love is a matter of the heart or a matter of the intuition. : I learned that I feel suffocated when I’m in relationships. I value my freedom more than I realized, and the only person worth giving up my freedom for is a man who can love me the way I love him. I’m not obligated to stay with someone I’m not in love with, and no one has a right to guilt-trip me into being in a relationship with them. : I learned that I don’t have to settle when it comes to love; I don’t need some conditional love from a fellow human being when I’m receiving the ultimate unconditional one from God; unless I know in my heart that he’s the one, I don’t have to go out of my way to make something out of nothing. Narcissists will turn your life upside down, but if you choose to look beyond the heartbreak, it can be an eye-opener. You can learn more about yourself through the experience and learn to love yourself the way you haven’t been able to before. If you want to grow from it, you can even share your own experience and try to help others who are going through what you once went through. In fact, many of my earlier submissions were not originally intended as commentaries on this debacle. They were edited from my private journals, written to comfort myself long before this farce. I never thought going through such heartbreak in my private life would have helped me see this situation from a whole different angle, but here I am. Like I said in the beginning, narcissists can kick you down to a place you’ve never been in before. But one good thing about hitting rock bottom is that you have nowhere else to fall; the only thing left for you to do is rise. Keep the faith and move on. Another day you live is another day of victory. -Roseberrycupcakes (RCC)

RCC, good to hear from you, thank you for sharing your experience with us. We can all learn and support one another through writing. I wonder if we can delve into what makes these people turn out this way?

Thank you, RCC 💖💖💖

#PrinceHarry #submission

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chromalogue · 7 years

Photo

[Image description: two photographs. The first is a slightly blurry closeup of a freshly baked French tarte à la tomate, a pie made of cheese topped with tomato slices and basil and more cheese. It looks a bit like a pizza, but I’m serious, that is an obscene amount of Swiss in there. The second is my parents’ kitchen table, on which I have arrayed my netbook, a tall orange coffee cup, a plate of three chocolate chip cookies, no fewer than two salt shakers, a thick stack of papers titled “Special Council Agenda,” and a second thick stack of papers liberally festooned with knockoff post-it notes.]

61/100 days of productivity, because I’m not counting Friday or the weekend, not that they weren’t productive, but I just can’t.

Goals for today:

ACADEMIC STUFF

sign my contract; send it in

LANGUAGE STUFF

1 Icelandic module

10 Duolingo modules

COMMUNITY STUFF

go to the Town Office and request a copy of the draft Town Plan, the better to speak to it at the town planning meeting, because they gave a link to it in the e-mail but the link they gave is the link to the entire town site, and I combed it for two hours and could not find the plan

read the Town Plan

edit the remaining three pages of minutes

send them to the chair

LEISURE STUFF

NaNoWriMo to 23 334 words

something physical

What I got done:

signed my contract

found out there’s a conference in Kingston I should probably get in on, and the proposals are due in two days

went to the Town Office and got a copy of the Town Plan, and explained that I’d searched for it on their website for two hours, but the clerk seemed to take this as an apology for not being able to handle it myself rather than an indicator that they should have linked to the document itself

had a nice walk

read the Town Plan and accompanying edits--all 150 pages of it

edited the remaining three pages of minutes

NaNoWriMo to... 17 800? I don’t know, I’m not on that computer, but I’ll do more before I go to sleep, even if it’s just a few more words

3/4 of an Icelandic module because the fourth quarter wants me to write 500 words on the horse and horses are boring and it’s after 6 and I feel like 300 of those 500 words could just be the word “horse” in different cases with different inflections or declensions or whatever and I swear you try to write an essay in a language you barely know after reading 150 pages about traffic and flood plains and urrrrrrgggghhhh

15 words in Icelandic about horses because a) I’m a sucker and b) that’s all I can string together on my own and I’m not bothering to check Google Translate until tomorrow

3 Duolingo modules, plus the 5 left over from yesterday, and counting

trying to make myself e-mail the minutes to the chair, and it’s like trying to think through a wall of porridge

I think I have to not so much put 100 days of productivity on hiatus as formally acknowledge that I’ve been on hiatus pretty much since November started. One of the things I found it useful for was reminding myself that I really was productive on days when I didn’t feel like it, when I couldn’t cross something off my to do list because I hadn't finished the whole thing, but I'd done a LITTLE. (And I know that I could just take a picture and upload it with the date and however many days it’s been, but uploading the picture as at least as much work as this wall of text, and the wall of text is the part that’s helpful to me.)

These days, I'm feeling less of a need for that kind of validation. The year is getting to be really busy. My calendar is filling up. I've got a proposal due in two days and another at the end of the month. I've got an online Dutch course starting on the twentieth, and chocolates due on the twenty-first. I just agreed to fill four racks of wood for my aunt and uncle and to build a giant brain out of balloons for the local Santa Claus Parade. A stranger approached me at the hardware store and asked me if I could contribute to a couple of her church bake sales. I am a staunch Pagan, but I said sure.

NaNoWriMo is a beast goddess, though. There can be no bad days. There can be no rest days. There's no counting the time spent doing research I didn't anticipate in the planning stage as work, because research is not words. There's no setting it aside for a day or two to focus on my genuine obligations to people. There's no doing half of it and it's okay because I'm still making progress. It is utterly merciless, and I find myself falling further and further behind. I'll probably feel different next October, but right now I want to go on record as saying, this challenge doesn't feel like a very healthy way for me to work. The things it pushes me to do are things that I worked very hard to stop letting other people do to me. It's starting to feel like damage.

If I drop everything I can possibly drop (i.e. THIS) and focus on NaNoWriMo, I will still probably fail. If I just keep trying to juggle everything, I will definitely fail, and I'll probably make myself sick.

So: 100 days of productivity is on pause as of now. I think I'll take it up again at the beginning of December, when I have prettier products to show off than a disturbingly low word count.

#100 days of productivity #something had to give #the terribleness of everything right now suggests the involvement of hormones #but I also know to put on the brakes when something is getting to be too much

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jaroslavlewis · 7 years

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30 Kisses: Heiji and Kazuha- Bond of Steel

30 Kisses: Heiji and Kazuha

Title: Bond of Steel

Author: Jaroslav Lewis

Fandom: Detective Conan

Theme: #13-excessive chain

Summary: Heiji and Kazuha just always end up getting chained together in all worst ways possible, because what is red string of fate when you have a strong chain of handcuffs to connect both of you?

Warning: Rated R for sexual themes

Disclaimer: I don't own Detective Conan or any of Gosho Aoyama's characters. I simply kidnap them when I'm bored and make them binge watch K-dramas with me. Don't worry I make popcorn for them too.

The first time Heiji and Kazuha were handcuffed together was way back when they were kids. Two innocent seven-year olds snooped into their fathers' stuff and thought that the game of cops and robbers would be a lot better if they used cool, real cop stuff. The poor kids apparently, didn't have the key to unchain themselves and had to wait until their fathers came back from work. By the time Police Chief Criminal Investigator Toyama Ginshiro and Police Super Intendent Hattori Heizo had arrived, Heiji and Kazuha had already done a lot of things together (Granted, they hadn't gotten much choice.), some of them were far too 'intimate' and embarrassing to even bring up as they grew older. But of course, at that time, childhood innocence had no room for any malice. The young boy and the young girl were after all just two curious little children, two playmates who had a little fiasco while playing with their fathers' work stuff. Of course, Heiji and Kazuha got into a lot of trouble for what happened. They had a long sermon from both of their fathers about how they shouldn't be snooping into police stuff and that kids should never be playing with handcuffs. It did not however, take long for the two police officers to receive a long nagging lecture from their wives about how responsible fathers shouldn't be leaving their things within children's reach. All was good in the end. The little incident had become a fond old memory to both the families as the two kids grew up. It had become something that both of their families laughed and made an inside joke about.

It happened the second time when they were seventeen years old and it was unlike the first one. It wasn't an effect of curious innocent child's play but rather, involved a lot of violence, death threats, secret codes, being locked up in a dark, dusty attic, and a huge, nasty old woman pushing Heiji to the creaky wooden floor as she pointed a gun to his head. It was an image Kazuha never wanted to see, the same way that her cries and screams of fear were sounds Heiji never wanted to hear, ever again. It was all the more reason for both of them to swear that they would never be stuck, handcuffed to each other once more.

But for the third time, Heiji and Kazuha were yet again in another handcuff entanglement. It was of course, still as they remembered, uncomfortable as ever, though not as horribly unpleasant as the second time, but it was in no way as cute as the first time. Sure it involved sheer curiosity, not to mention, a different kind of exploration, but it was in no way innocent as the little childhood memory they once had.

It started with a nice candlelit dinner Kazuha had prepared for their wonderful evening. For their 3rd wedding anniversary, the couple decided to have a simple but romantic date night at home. Kazuha fixed up a full-course meal of bacon-wrapped asparagus for the appetizer, tomato-basil lasagna and spinach and cheese-stuffed chicken for the main course and home-made no-bake strawberry cheesecake for dessert. Heiji offered to do the dishes as he figured it was important that he did his share of household chores since Kazuha had already done the cooking. After the dishes were done, the couple handed each other their anniversary gifts. Kazuha got Heiji a limited edition, leather bound, 3-volume set of Ellery Queen's "Masterpieces of Mystery". Heiji on the other hand, got her a 14 karat white gold, heart-shaped locket with elegant diamond embellishment. Inside the locket were the pictures of their fraternal twins, Mikan and Midori on either sides of the locket.

Surprises were surely not over for both of them as they had a few glasses of wine and from there, things started to heat up. Heiji crossed over to Kazuha's side of the counter. He stood behind her as he offered to put the locket around her neck. He paused to stare at the soft, smooth skin of her nape that was exposed since her hair was styled in a neat French chignon up do. He lifted his arms and brought the necklace up to her neck and then hooked the chains together at the back. She stood still as she felt him lean closer to her. She gasped as he kissed the sensitive junction between her neck and her shoulder blade. His lips brushed gingerly against her exposed skin, making her shiver.

Kazuha grew weak against his touch. She leaned closer to him and pressed her back against his chest as he wrapped his arms around her waist, hugging her from behind.

"Just so you know, I actually have another present for you." She said between her raspy breathing as he left open-mouthed kisses against her neck and jawline. She felt him smirk against her skin before he pulled away, only to press his lips near her ear.

"You're just so full of surprises arencha'?" He whispered in a low, dulcet tone, sending goosebumps to creep on her smooth skin. She then, turned around to face him and looked into his emerald orbs as she smirked.

"Well, what are you waiting for? Why don't you peel off the 'wrapping paper' on this one to see what I have for you?" She said playfully, as she wrapped her arms around his neck. Heiji smiled softly as placed his left hand on the side of her waist. He lifted his right hand to tuck the stray hair that had left the confines of her neat bun, before sliding it to her back to tug at the zipper on the back of her dark green, v-neckline, bodycon dress that hugged her curves perfectly.

"Careful. First layer of the 'wrapping paper' is special, not to mention, very expensive." She remembered to warn him since the particular dress was her most favorite among her wardrobe.

"Oh, I should know. I paid for it after all." He said smugly as he started to pull down the zipper of her dress in an ever so slow and teasing pace. His fingers brushed against the skin of her back that was slowly being exposed, making her shudder against his light touch. Kazuha on the other hand, had started to loosen his dark green tie and was slowly working her way through the buttons of his white, long-sleeved button up shirt.

"Ahou." She teased. The old, odd "term of endearment" was never lost in the years of their relationship.

Heiji smirked at her little remark before he leaned in to press his lips against hers in a soft kiss that didn't stay so for long as his right hand moved from the small of her back up to her chin, gently teasing it down to part her lips and allow himself easy access which she granted to him right away. It didn't take long for them to become both intoxicated with the faint taste of red wine on each other's lips.

Lost and drowning in the intensity of their kiss, their movements became driven by sheer passion. Kazuha hadn't even noticed that Heiji had already hoisted her up from the ground even as she willingly wrapped her legs around his waist. Upstairs they went and without breaking their heated kiss, Heiji pushed her to the wall next to the door of their room. With a click of a door knob and one soft push of the door, Heiji entered their dimly-lit bedroom with Kazuha still in his arms. He pinned her to the nearest wall and soon enough her feet were gently placed back on the ground as she held onto him and used the wall to support herself since her knees have gone weak because of his kiss.

What seemed like eternity was soon put to a pause when the two pulled away for some air. Both panting, Heiji and Kazuha gazed into each other's eyes. It took a few beats for them to move again to step away from the wall and advance closer to the bed. As soon as the back of Heiji's leg hit the edge of their bed, Kazuha worked her way into sliding Heiji's shirt off of his shoulders. After the harmless shirt was tossed to the ground, Heiji pulled Kazuha closer to him again to plant a soft kiss on her forehead as his hand went by the back of her head to pull the one hairpin holding her long brunette hair up, untangling it from the confines of her French chignon up do as it pooled down her shoulders.

His lips brushed gingerly against her jawline and then down to the sensitive spot on her neck as he pushed her hair to one side and tugged at the straps of her dress which right then, moved down her shape and fell smoothly on the floor.

He pulled away for a moment to gaze at her exposed beauty and noticed that she had decided to wear something special for him that night. Heiji was in a daze and entrapped in her charm. Butterflies fluttered chaotically inside Kazuha's stomach as she felt his eyes on her. She had been exposed to him several times before. They were husband and wife. It was no big deal. But for some odd reason she still felt the same feeling as when they had their first night together. The tension in her heart was still there. Unknown to her, Heiji also felt the same. No matter how many times he has seen her, she'd always look the same. Beautiful as always. Like the first time he saw her. Like their first night together.

"The second layer's prettier, though. Too bad, it has to go." Heiji teased, breaking the silence between them. The grin on Heiji's face grew wider as Kazuha's blush grew redder with his statement. She was about to call him an ahou yet again when her retort was cut off and lost in another passionate kiss.

Her thoughts were about to get clouded again in pure bliss when something snapped in her.–An idea that sparked from pure curiosity. A part of her was hesitant, but instinct told her to feel otherwise. There wasn't much time to think. Heiji was distracted, trying to distract her, hands lost control in wandering touches.

It was a little game, a battle on who loses focus first and Kazuha swore to never lose to him again. She was going to have it her way this time. And so, it took her all the self-control she could muster to get her plan together and she acted fast.

As Heiji busied himself trying to figure out the intricacies of her little outfit, Kazuha's hand sneaked through the back pocket of his pants to take out a cold chain link of hard steel. She smirked against Heiji's lips. Just as she thought, he had kept them there. He had always placed them there for work. Heiji rarely had any use for them. The police officers always took care of the arresting. But tonight, Kazuha was sure to make good use of them.

Clink.

The evident sound of metal chains clashing shook Heiji's awareness of his surroundings and made him jerk back, putting a short end to such a pleasing kiss.

"K-kazuha?" He blinked back, with eyes albeit startled, were glassy with desire.

And though being a detective skilled in Kendo has sharpened his senses reflexes so well, his capacity to think vanished in the moment and in the beautiful sight of her before him. In one swift move, he was pushed to the bed by such a petite, pretty lady.

As his head hit the headboard, Heiji reminded himself that it was never good to underestimate her. Looks can be deceiving. Aikido has made her strong. It didn't look like it, but like him, she was also a skilled martial artist and could easily flip men and beat them to a pulp.

But she was such a sweet, lovely wife that it made him forget such fact about her at times.

Startled by her newfound boldness and attracted to her beauty, Heiji watched her every movement as she climbed the bed and positioned herself on top of him. Kazuha smirked as she dangled the handcuffs she took from him, right in front of his face. It took a few seconds for him to fully process what was happening.

Click.

Before he could even protest, Kazuha had already handcuffed his right wrist and she grinned in pure success. The shocked look on Heiji's face satisfied her even more.

"Wait- "He tried to stop her but to no avail, was cut off as she pressed her lips against his as her free hand slid down his bare chest, touching him in the right places. Her lips moved to his jawline and then to his neck and all thoughts of his were lost in the hazy cloud of arousal that took over his mind. And then she started moving again, getting through with her plan as she thought she figured him out. But Heiji was smart enough to play her game.

So he fought back because there was something he had to tell her, but what was it again?

He kept forgetting about it. She was so damn good at distracting him.

And she fought as well. She was sure as hell determined to win in their battle for dominance and god was she strong.

Heiji struggled and swung his hand that bore such a peculiar silver bracelet. And then...

Click.

The other side of the handcuffs swung and caught Kazuha's left wrist perfectly.

Kazuha's light green eyes widened in shock. Heiji gaped.

"Crap." He muttered.

"No worries. We could unlock it with the key and play this little game longer." Kazuha said, giggling flirtatiously as she tried to give him ideas, but the detective of the west seemed to have drifted to another place, lost in his thoughts.

She stared at him for a while and she read him. She didn't have to be a detective to figure him out.

"Heiji…"

He failed to respond as he stared at their tangled wrists.

"Please tell me you have the key to unlock this thing."

Heiji gulped and prepared himself for the scolding of his life. But she was silent and he waited.

"Say Kazuha…" Heiji said, breaking the awkward silence between him and his wife as he sat on their bed, shirtless with his wife on his lap, facing him. Her legs were on either sides of his waist, straddling him.

He gazed at the beauty that is her. She was clad in provocative, lacy, pale pink lingerie that complimented her fair skin so stunningly. She looked undeniably alluring in her outfit but her face showed an innocent, half-furious, half-embarrassed expression. Her lips were pouted in the most adorable way possible and her cheeks were flushed crimson red. Her eyebrows furrowed in a frustrated manner as she refused to meet his gaze. Cute and sexy were both contrasting together but Kazuha seemed to be a combination of both, a fact that Heiji couldn't help but marvel at.

Under normal circumstances, Heiji could've easily surrendered to primal, animalistic urges. Screw self-control and reason. He could easily flip her and pin her to the soft mattress of their king-sized bed as he kissed her senselessly, but instead both of them stayed still in their intimate position. He kept his gaze on her as he waited for her to say something but words refused to come out of their mouths as uncomfortable silence continued to fill the air. He felt the lump in his throat thicken as his mouth went dry while they both waited on each other. Heiji figured, he couldn't keep their game of stillness going on forever and so he decided to speak up.

"Remember when we were little our dads told us to never play with handcuffs?" He brought up, clearing his throat. The statement increased the level of awkwardness that surrounded both of them. Kazuha's furious light green eyes darted a glare towards his dark green ones. Heiji yelped, anticipating a loud retort from her or maybe a hard smack on his head, but instead she simply rolled her eyes in annoyance.

"Yes." She hissed under her breath as she looked away from him again to hide the guilty expression on her face.

"I think now's the right time to say that we should've just listened to them." Heiji said, stifling a laugh. He also took a mental note not to make jokes during embarrassing situations. It surely did not lighten up the mood.

His gaze then travelled to her left wrist that wore a peculiar accessory of a hard steel bracelet that was connected by a short link of little chains that were attached to an identical steel bracelet wrapped around his right wrist.

"As I have recalled, they only said 'children should not play with handcuffs.' They could've warned us that it's not for adults too." He added, unaware that he had just said his thoughts out loud. He was surprised when Kazuha, who seemed to have lost her cool lifted her left hand in attempt to hit him, but was immediately stopped with the restriction of the handcuffs that connected her wrist to his.

"Ahou." She muttered under her breath as she gave up her attempt at hitting him hard with her hand that was closer to him. Her dominant hand was free, but she suddenly didn't feel like exerting much effort anymore. After all, to say it was kind of her fault was an understatement.

Under dim light, Heiji could still see Kazuha's beautiful peridot orbs that were teary with frustration and annoyance. He immediately took the hint. He could be such a moron about a lot of things but seeing her crestfallen, especially on the night of their third wedding anniversary was not something he'd like to see. So, he decided to diffuse the situation before everything went haywire.

"Okay, let's not panic." He said calmly as his freehand touched her shoulder. Being a detective, Heiji had well-mastered being calm during desperate situations. Age has also matured him in different ways. Over the years, he had learned to manage his hot-temper and impulsiveness and he figured at such times, his newfound self-control did come pretty handy.

"Do you have a hairpin or something we could use to pick the lock?" He asked.

"Inside the first drawer of our night stand." She answered and immediately he moved his right hand to reach the drawer by his right side, forgetting that it was chained to his wife's left wrist. Such action caused Kazuha to grit in pain as her left wrist was dragged carelessly and obliviously by Heiji's force and sudden movement.

"Careful!" She whined.

"Sorry." He said as he shifted his position so that he wouldn't injure his wife's wrist as he reached for their side table drawer.

Kazuha watched intently as Heiji started picking the lock. She silently prayed that picking the lock would work, but Heiji seemed to be struggling with it.

Heiji on the other hand, had started to wonder where his wife started getting ideas. Unbeknownst to him, Kazuha had been thinking about it since they came back to Osaka after their recent visit to Tokyo.

The bookstore from where Kazuha had to buy her anniversary present for Heiji could only be found in Tokyo and only shipped items within the city. So, she asked Ran to take the delivery and cover for her in the meantime. She also figured that it would also be a good opportunity to visit her and Sonoko again to catch up. Ever since the twins came, she and Heiji hardly had any time for anything else. All their hours were spent on their respective careers and on their son, Midori and their daughter, Mikan. Kazuha was thrilled that Heiji did not get suspicious with her motives and that he did not get any ideas about her surprise. She could barely keep anything from him. –One of the cons of marrying a great detective.

Unknown to her, Heiji had a different motive as well. Turns out, he too was also going to buy Kazuha's anniversary present in a store in Tokyo. Heiji had found a good place (thanks to Shinichi's help), to buy the locket. It was the only piece and was sold only in that one store in Tokyo. So, when Kazuha asked him if they could come to Tokyo to visit Ran-chan, he did not have any second thoughts about saying yes. It was the perfect fool-proof plan. –Kazuha, Ran and Sonoko catching up, him and Kudo catching up as well while they go to the store to check the locket out. It would be great, like hitting two birds with one stone.

And so while Heiji and Shinichi were out, there Kazuha was in the living room of the Kudo mansion with her two closest friends catching up with some tea and cake that Ran had prepared. By their side, in a playpen for the toddlers were Mikan, Midori and Conan.

"Thank you so much, Ran-chan for doing this for me. You're a life saver!" Kazuha said as Ran handed her the package Kazuha had asked her to keep for the meantime.

"No worries. I had to keep this from Shinichi because that guy tells Hattori-kun everything. But other than that, it was no biggie." Ran said as she settled the parchment she had kept for Kazuha on the table and then poured tea into Kazuha's cup. "I'm really glad this opportunity came and you finally had the time to visit us, Kazuha-chan."

"I know right? I miss you both a lot. Heiji and I have been very busy. Him with the cases and me with the kids in the hospital, both of us with Mi-kun and Mi-chan. The twins are really a handful." Kazuha said.

"Tell me about it. Conan's been keeping me and Shinichi up every night. I could only imagine you and Hattori-kun's struggle with Midori-kun and Mikan-chan." Ran agreed. "But still, everything's all worth it. It's all rewarding in the end, ne?"

Kazuha turned at her cute daughter and son playing with Ran's toddler and smiled.

"Yeah. It sure is." She giggled, before bringing the cup of warm chamomile tea to her lips.

"Aww, you two. Look at both of you being such great mommies. Gosh, you guys grew up so fast. I'm a proud friend to be honest, but a little out of place since I can't relate." Sonoko joked, pouting before she brought a bite of the slice of Ran's lemon chiffon cake with cream cheese frosting up to her mouth after she had punctured it with a dessert fork.

Ran giggled at Sonoko's remark before she lightly hit her friend's rib with her elbow.

"You and Kyogoku-san have been married for some time, now. Don't you think it's time to fill your mansion with mini versions of you two, running around?" Ran asked and Sonoko shrugged.

"Hmmm, we'll get there I guess. Makoto's brought it up too and we've talked about it. I'm not against the whole idea, but for now I'd just really like to enjoy my married life with my hubby." Sonoko replied with a smile. "Besides, I want to watch and learn from you guys first. For now, I'll just be the cool and fab aunty who'd spoil Conan, Midori and Mikan."

"Anyway, what are your plans for the wedding anniversary, Kazuha-chan?" Sonoko then asked curiously as she turned to their Osakan friend and gave her a knowing wink, making Kazuha blush a light pink shade.

"Eh? Well, not much. Heiji and I are just gonna have a nice dinner at home with the twins. Shizuka-kaasan will be going to Sapporo with Heizo-tousan for an event and my parents will be going to Hokkaido to visit some close relatives. We can't leave Mi-kun and Mi-chan with anybody else." Kazuha answered. The hint of disappointment in her tone didn't go unnoticed by Sonoko and Ran. But immediately, she decided to shrug it off with a smile. "It will be fun. It will be the first time we'll be celebrating our anniversary with the twins."

Somehow the last statement felt as if Kazuha was trying to convince herself. Not only did it sound like that to Ran and Sonoko, but to Kazuha herself too. It seemed wrong in a way, but no matter how she tried to deny it, she strongly felt it. It was the truth and she felt like an irresponsible parent for feeling so.

"Something tells me you're a bit upset about this." Ran scooted closer to Kazuha's side, coaxing her to tell the truth. "Come on, we don't have to be detectives to figure you out, Kazuha-chan."

"Well, I was honestly looking forward to spending some time with Heiji. Alone." Kazuha confessed sighing. Her cheeks have gone a darker shade of red due to embarrassment. She brought her teacup up to her face and took another sip to hide her blushing face. After taking a long sip from her cup of tea, she placed it on the table again and looked down at her lap to avoid Ran and Sonoko's gaze.

"I mean, I know right now, my priority should be Mi-kun and Mi-chan and I love the twins so much. I don't want you guys to think that I'm being a bad mother, ya' know. But the thing is, I rarely spend time with Heiji now and I kind of miss him." She continued shyly.

"Other than that, there's something that has been bothering me for the past few weeks now. I know it's silly but I've been really bothered by something my colleague said about relationships losing spark and all. And to be honest, things between me and Heiji have been a little…bland, ya' know…" Kazuha added, mumbling her last sentence almost inaudibly. It was then that she realized how much she had blubbered and she felt even more nervous and embarrassed with what she said.

"It's normal to feel that way. Sometimes, we also need a little break from parenting." Ran assured as she gave her friend a pat on the back.

"You know, if you really want to spend time with Hattori-kun on your anniversary, Shinichi and I could babysit the twins for you guys. We could come to Osaka that day and rent a villa overnight and you can drop Mikan-chan and Midori-kun there before you celebrate your anniversary." Ran suggested, putting a hopeful but a bit hesitant smile on Kazuha's face.

Of course to Kazuha, the idea was great and she knew very well that she could trust Ran with her kids. Ran was the queen of all mothers for goodness' sake. Even during their teens, Ran had already been a great "mom" and for so many years Kazuha looked up to her and admired her parenting skills. However, she did not want to be a nuisance to Ran and Kudo-kun. She knew very well that they have their own affairs to deal with. Shinichi was a successful detective in Tokyo and Ran has been busy with her career as a lawyer, also assisting her mom in their law firm. The couple also have a toddler of their own to take care of. Furthermore, Mikan and Midori can be quite a handful and she very well knows that.

"Gee, Ran-chan. I mean, I don't want to trouble you and Kudo-kun…" Kazuha said hesistantly.

"It's no trouble at all. Shinichi and I love having Midori-kun and Mikan-chan around. Besides, Conan could really use some playmates and we could really use an out of town family trip." Ran said sincerely. "What do you say?"

"Well, if you say so, then it's really tempting. But I guess, I'd have to discuss this with Heiji first. And you should probably ask permission from Kudo-kun first." Kazuha pointed out, before taking her first bite on Ran's lemon cake which she found really delicious and took a mental note about asking her for the recipe.

Somehow, she felt lighter and more relieved with Ran's words but it didn't take long for Sonoko to interrupt and set the mood back to awkward and bring the topic back just when Kazuha and Ran had thought they had finally settled the conflict.

"Bland you say huh? You don't possibly mean like no sex, right?" Sonoko blurted as if it had been the only thing she was thinking about since Kazuha stated her dilemma. Kazuha choked on her cake and Ran almost spit the tea she was drinking at their friend's blunt statement.

"It's not like that!" Kazuha snapped defensively after she had painfully gulped the cake down her throat.

'Eh… So, maybe it's kinda like that.' She silently thought to herself.

"Sonoko!" Ran hissed, scolding and Sonoko simply snickered playfully. The redness on Kazuha's cheeks had come back just when it had started to subside.

"What? We're all grownups here. And the toddlers are way too young to even understand what we're talking about." Sonoko argued jokingly. Ran shot her a stern glare which Sonoko shrugged off with a huge grin on her face, just like she used to do when they were in high school.

Sonoko then turned her attention to Kazuha who just looked at her with big, round clueless light green eyes.

"Tell you what, Kazuha-chan. If you really want it to be less bland with Heiji, I suggest that you kick things up a notch. Spice things up. Get creative." Sonoko stated, nonchalantly before she gave Kazuha another wink. Slowly, the uneasiness had started to transform into curiosity. Unknowingly, she found herself getting interested in what Sonoko was bound to suggest.

"How do I do that?" She asked, turning her full attention to Sonoko.

"Experiment. Use your imagination. If you ask me, there are plenty things you can do, considering your husband's occupation and interests. Isn't that right, Ran?" Sonoko replied as flashed Ran a sinister grin, causing the latter to turn as red as Kazuha had earlier.

"Sonoko!" Ran whined, hitting her friend with a throw pillow. Sonoko smirked, teasing her friend, knowing exactly how to push Ran's buttons.

"Anyway, Kazuha. Any fantasies of Heijji, you know of? You can use that to your advantage." Sonoko said, before taking another sip from her tea.

Kazuha's thoughts started to drift as she thought hard, but there isn't anything she could come up with.

"Not that I know of, no." She sighed, disheartened. Sonoko figured, Kazuha was a lot more difficult to play than Ran, but she wasn't going to give up.

"How about you? Anything you want to try with Heiji?" She asked, her lips forming an amused, teasing smile as she observed how Kazuha turn red again.

Bingo.

Kazuha's mind on the other hand, drifted to Sonoko's words earlier.

"If you ask me, there are plenty things you can do, considering your husband's occupation and interests."

"Well, looks like I sparked something in you." Sonoko remarked, proud with her work before she sat back and took another bite on her slice of cake.

"Don't listen to her, Kazuha-chan." Ran said, before shooting Sonoko another scolding glare, knowing just how Sonoko's mischievous ideas could cause a lot of ruckus. "Sonoko, don't give her such ideas."

"Yeah right. Says the wifey who dressed up as Irene Adler for her Sherlock Holmes-nerd hubby." Sonoko shot back with a tone filled with so much sarcasm as she rolled her eyes. Suddenly Ran was silent again and looking away trying to hide her crimson-red cheeks. Sonoko couldn't help but become even more amused.

"Didn't you say, Shinichi looked really hot smoking that tobacco pipe?" Sonoko teased, grinning as childishly threw a throw pillow at her. Ran on the other hand, wanted to disappear into a puff of smoke to save herself from further embarrassment.

"How come I never knew about this, Ran-chan?" Kazuha asked curiously as she raised an eye-brow at the Kudo-wife.

"Sonoko, we promised never to speak about 'that'" Ran retorted.

"Besides, shouldn't we be focusing on Kazuha's plans, instead." She added, immediately changing the topic to divert the attention towards Kazuha.

"So, what do you think, Kazuha-chan?" Sonoko asked as she raised an eyebrow mischievously.

"I think it actually sounds like a good idea…" She answered, mumbling it absentmindedly as her thoughts drifted to an idea that had just sparked in her head.

"Ouch! Be gentle, Heiji!"

"I would if you would just hold still."

"I don't think you know what you're doing."

"Yeah right, as if you would if you were in my place."

"THIS WAS SO NOT A GOOD IDEA." Kazuha groaned as she watched Heiji pull and tug on the pin that was stuck to the lock of the handcuffs.

"Ya' think?" Heiji muttered sarcastically, losing his patience. "Ya had to use the handcuffs. Ya' could've used my belt or my necktie or somethin' but ya' had had to use these handcuffs."

"Shut up! Don't ya' dare be sarcastic with me. You were the one who left the keys!" Kazuha retorted accusingly.

'Besides, your belt and tie wouldn't be strong enough to hold you down.' She silently thought to herself.

"You were the one who freakin' tried to handcuff me!" Heiji argued as he turned his attention from the chain of hard steel to his stubborn wife.

"Well, you never told me you didn't have the keys!" Kazuha reasoned out angrily. Of course deep down, she knew it was her entire fault but it still hurt her pride. Furthermore, she was a bit tad upset with how her plan failed and Heiji tended to rub it in.

"Dammit, Kazuha! I was trying to tell you! You were distracting me!" Heiji's tone rose and there was a long pause between them. His emeralds met with her peridot orbs briefly before she broke their eye contact. He blushed, realizing he had snapped and slipped.

Heiji tried to bring his focus back on the picking the lock again, but he had lost all capacity to think. It was not helping that his hormones were pumping through his stream, messing with his head. He was too frustrated to calm down. And despite how annoyed he was with how his wife was being so difficult and troublesome, he couldn't get over how irresistible she was. And god, was she so damn beautiful arguing with him that way. Even if she did tick him off at times, the way she frowned and pouted her lips was so cute, it turned him on. She was so mesmerizing in such a crazy way. Oh, how Heiji wished he could just pry the stupid handcuffs off right away and take her. But damn was that thing too strong. Screw Osaka Prefecture Police Department and their damn security.

Kazuha on the other hand, felt really guilty of the whole situation. It didn't take a while for her to feel guilty about arguing with Heiji. She knew it was her fault for having such foolish ideas. And she wasn't quite sure if she and Heiji were still in the mood to even continue from where they left off. The whole thing was just crazy and it exhausted her. She just wanted to get the thing over with and save herself from all the embarrassment. She felt stupid, for embarrassing herself in front of her husband on such a special evening and now, there they were bickering again, on the night of their wedding anniversary.

"All I wanted was a romantic evening with Heiji. Is that too much to ask?" She sighed. It took a few seconds for her to realized that she had just spoken her thoughts out loud and before she could even shrug it off, Heiji had already forgotten about the handcuffs he had been trying to unlock for some time, now. His gorgeous dark green eyes (that Kazuha loved so much) were all on her as his expression softened. Kazuha bit her lip shyly as she looked down at their handcuffed-wrists, the little mess she made.

For the past few months since Midori and Mikan came, Heiji and Kazuha's relationship had taken a 180 degree turn. It was all good, but very different. Life with the twins was a whole lot of fun. They were double the bundle of joy, but of course, also double the responsibility. A lot has changed since especially their priorities. Being good parents was now at the top of their list of many things to do. Then, there were other kids Kazuha had to attend to, since she has been a successful resident pediatrician at the Osaka Women's and Children's Hospital. Meanwhile, Heiji had his numerous cases to solve. Suddenly, they barely had time to do the things they used to do back when it was just the two of them.

But there were some nights when they'd still try.

"Night's still young and the twins are fast asleep." Heiji whispered suggestively in his wife's ear as he lay and tuck himself in bed with her and then scooted closer to her. His arm snaked teasingly around her waist before he roughly pulled her closer to him and pressed a kiss on her bare shoulder.

"Heiji… We have work tomorrow. I have a scheduled check up with one of my patients, early in the morning and Otousan wants you early in the headquarters tomorrow." She protested, reminding him as she turned back to a book she had been reading to ready herself for sleep. Though she had completely lost focus on what paragraph she stopped when Heiji had interrupted her. Also, the suggestion felt tempting and she loved the warmth of his body against her so much.

"It's still early. So, I suggest you put that damn book away so we can get started. Besides what's so interesting about that book for you to neglect you to neglect your own husband, anyway?" He asked giving her the cutest face he could do to capture her full attention.

"I should ask the same thing about Ellery Queen." She said, giggling she settled her book on their night stand, soon for it to lay forgotten as she gave him the attention he wanted. Heiji chuckled triumphantly as he shifted his position so that she lay trapped in his arms as he leaned in to capture her lips with his.

Just when things started to heat up, a soft baby's cry filled the speaker of the baby monitor sitting by their night stand. Immediately, the couple pulled away from each other, a bit disappointed. But such feeling was lost in urgency as both of them hopped out of bed to dash to the twins' room to find Mikan, awake and soon followed Midori who was interrupted in his deep slumber by his sister.

Heiji picked Mikan up in his arms and Kazuha held Midori.

"It's okay, princess. Daddy's here." He said softly as he looked into his baby girl's dark green eyes that were very much similar to his. It was the only physical feature she inherited from him. She takes after Kazuha so much, which was one of the reasons why Heiji's pretty much wrapped around the infant's finger. The baby girl's crying had started to subside upon hearing her father's voice. She rested her head on her father's shoulder. Her little arms were pressed against his chest and her eyelids started to grow heavy, drooping sleepily as Heiji gently rocked her back and forth.

Kazuha on the other hand, handled her irate baby boy who was being moody about waking up to his sister loud cries.

"Yosh, yosh." She hushed at her son softly. "You take after Heiji so much. Not only did you inherit his looks but his temper as well hmmm?"

Kazuha giggled as she gazed at the toddler version of Heiji in her arms. Midori had Heiji's same dark skin and jet-black hair. It was only Kazuha's light green eyes that he inherited from his mother.

"Ahou. What's that supposed to mean? You throw quite a tantrum too." Heiji argued as he walked closer to Kazuha, still holding the sleeping Mikan protectively with his right arm. Kazuha simply smiled, shaking the argument away as she rocked Midori in her arms, humming him a soft lullaby.

"Sorry, buddy. I'm sure your baby sister didn't mean to wake you up in your sleep." Heiji said as he ruffled his son's hair with his left hand.

"Look at you, playing favorites already." Kazuha scolded playfully after she had briefly paused her lullaby.

"I don't play favorites. Midori is older than Mikan for about a few minutes which makes him the elder brother. He should understand because he's older than her. When they grow up he's gonna protect her from all the sneaky boys trying to make a pass at her." Heiji reasoned. Kazuha on the other hand, rolled her eyes and then continued to sing Midori a lullaby and it was enough for Heiji to become mesmerized by the sound of her voice as well as the sight of her gently taking care of Midori. Heiji couldn't quite explain it, but Kazuha looked even more beautiful with their baby in her arms.

It took a few more minutes before Midori fell asleep in Kazuha's arms. The little boy could be quite difficult at times. Not long after, the two parents gently tucked their babies to bed and then they went back into their room as well (finally).

But as soon as their backs hit the soft mattress all thoughts of continuing their cut-short make out session was gone. Putting the kids to sleep made them want to crawl into deep slumber. Kazuha snuggled closer into Heiji's arms and it did not take long for them to fall asleep, tangled in each other's warm embrace.

Morning followed and after a goodnight's sleep, the two woke up quite nicely. Stirring awake as the sun's rays touched her face, Kazuha's eyes met Heiji's. Turns out the great detective of the west had been lying awake in bed for some minutes now but chose to stay where he was so that he could just watch her sleep.

"Ohayo, Tantei-han." She greeted him thoughtfully, beating the sun's brightness as she smiled.

"Ohayo, Dr. Hattori." He greeted back. The deep sound of his just-woke-up-voice was enough to send chills running down her spine. "So, it's still early. Want to pick up from where we left off last night?"

Despite how awfully numb and dead Heiji's whole body was due to sleep, he had managed to make a move on her already as he flipped over her so she was trapped between him and the mattress.

"Ahou. We didn't even get to start last night." Kazuha said, giggling as her husband had started planting soft kisses against the exposed skin of her shoulder blade and neck. "Heiji, we're gonna be late."

"Relax. A few minutes won't hurt." Heiji protested as he pulled away from her, only to lean in again to press his lips against hers in a fierce kiss that was enough to leave both of them breathless.

"H-Heiji. We have work." She tried to protest as his lips left hers to trail kisses against her jawline while his hands had started to creep up underneath her camisole, touching her bare skin. His hot breath against her neck and his hand gliding against her skin were enough to make her weak.

And then the faint sound of the twins cooing filled their baby monitor. The two snapped out of their hazy thoughts and pulled away from each other.

"Whoops. That's our cue." Kazuha said as she lightly pushed her husband off of her. Heiji sighed.

"I cannot catch a break here, can I?"

"Sorry, Heiji."

Apparently, mornings weren't kind enough to give them a chance either.

And so when Kazuha had "the talk" with her colleague, she couldn't help but be a bit alarmed.

In the clinic, one of Kazuha's fellow doctors just openly discussed her recent divorce. The woman was of course, forlorn about the incident but still handled it with much grace and maturity. Kazuha on the other hand felt down about it. She just couldn't imagine how a couple who chose to commit to each other in marriage would just grow apart and throw away their relationship. It was too difficult for her to process.

She thought about Heiji and the possibility of him getting tired of her and drifting from her and it broke her heart. She just couldn't imagine her life without him. He had always been her partner in life. They had a bond of steel and she chose to believe in it.

"When you're way past the honeymoon stage and the spark's gone. The marriage becomes bland. Soon your relationship grows cold and everything just changes. Time changes people." Hanare-san, Kazuha's colleague said as she shrugged. There was a hint of remorse in her tone and with the way she looked into Kazuha's eyes as she said such words. "But of course, I guess it was my fault too. I didn't give him much of my time. I got really busy…"

And since then, her statement had left a mark in Kazuha.

Kazuha on the other hand, hoped that her and Heiji's bond of steel was strong enough to hold their relationship together.

She noticed Heiji's left hand move. His thumb and index finger cupped her chin, lifting it so that she looked up at him. Her peridot orbs were filled with worry.

"Heiji, do you think we've already lost our spark?" She asked. "Please answer me honestly."

'So, all of this was because she thought that she and I…'

Heiji was caught off guard with her question. He never thought that she would get such ideas. Of course, he had been aware that he and Kazuha hardly have much time for each other and truth be told, he missed spending time with her. But it never bothered him that much. He understood very well. She loves the twins and she loves her career but it never meant that she doesn't love him just as much. He knew it was the same with him and that she understood it very well too. After all, they were already parents. They had grown and taken their relationship to another level higher. He never knew the sudden change in their life had such an impact on her and that she has been having doubts.

"It's just that lately, I have been Midori and Mikan's mother, a doctor at the hospital, but not so much Heiji's wife." She confessed.

"Ahou." He smiled softly at her as he teasingly poked at her forehead, causing her to flinch. "A spark only lasts for a brief moment. A bond of steel on the other hand, lasts a lifetime."

"Heiji…"

"Hey, I promised I wouldn't let go right?" He reminded her as he lifted his right hand and turned it so that the back of it showed. "Kazuha, I held onto that cliff holding you long enough to know, that I was never gonna let you go."

Kazuha glanced at the small but evident ragged line on the back of Heiji's right hand, right next to the knuckle of his index finger. She recognized the scar very well, after all, she was the one who gave it to him, in an attempt to save him from falling from a cliff with her. Her eyes then travelled the gold band on the fourth finger of his right hand, very much identical to the one she wore on the fourth finger of her left hand.

"And remember, you promised not to let go either." Heiji reminded as he grinned and gazed at the shining gold band on the fourth finger of her left hand, the hand he once held and chose to held onto for life.

"Of course. You told me you'd kill me yourself if I didn't hold on tight." Kazuha smiled, knowingly as she reminisced an old fond memory of holding onto Heiji as they both escape the bombed ruins of Satsuki hall in Kyoto after her catastrophic final match in her first Karuta Tournament against Momiji Ooka.

"Ne,Heiji... I'm sorry I got us into this." She apologized as she used her right arm to pull him for a hug which Heiji willingly returned with his unrestricted left arm.

"Funny, how we always end up in these weird situations." He remarked, smiling as he rested his chin on her shoulder.

"And bicker over the pettiest things." She added, chuckling softly.

Heiji then pulled away from such a satisfying embrace to gaze at Kazuha's face. He raised an eyebrow as he tucked her bangs behind her ear using his freehand.

"Hey, I've been bickering with you all my life and look where it got us now? Married with two kids and supposedly making baby number 3 if it weren't for these handcuffs." He teased, earning a light punch on the shoulder from his wife.

"You sneaky ahou. We can barely even manage the twins and you want a baby number three." Kazuha complained playfully. Heiji laughed.

"So, what do you say? How about we go down the garage and get some tools to take this thing off and pick up from where we left off? Hmm? Sounds good?" Heiji flashed her a childish grin, Kazuha knew instantly that she couldn't resist him. Also, it was still the night of their anniversary after all.

She was about to move so that both of them could briefly hop out of bed, when Heiji moved his arm and tugged at the chain of their handcuffs, roughly yanking her forward, pulling her to him so her weight crashed against his and her lips pressed against his for a sudden kiss. Her eyes widened in shock. She was still clueless when he briefly pulled away and pressed his lips against her ear, whispering, "You know what, on second thought, I think I can make this work. That is, if you're up for a challenge."

Kazuha smirked.

"Challenge accepted, Tantei-han." She whispered back in his ear, in a sultry voice that was enough to send him off the edge as he flipped them over and pulled the covers over them (with his free hand) for a long night of passion.

The morning after, Heiji used his tools in the garage to cut the metal chains of their handcuffs. Just when Kazuha had decided to dispose of them, Heiji immediately stopped her. He then took the broken chains from her and cut a small piece of them as a "souvenir" to be placed inside each of their Omamori pouches that held the old chains from their very first handcuff fiasco.

'He remembered.' Kazuha thought smiling as her husband reached up to her head and slid her Omamori necklace down to her neck before he wore his own as a necklace identical to hers.

La vena amoris or the "vein of love", according to the Ancient Greeks was the vein that ran directly from the fourth finger of the left hand to the heart. Such theory sparked the tradition of married couples wearing their wedding rings on the fourth finger of the left hand.

Heiji and Kazuha however, chose to defy such tradition, simply because their belief held a more valuable promise only the two of them share, a promise that had sprung from a chain of memories they've had since childhood. Heiji wore his wedding ring on his right hand because it was the hand that got handcuffed to Kazuha's. It was also the same hand that held hers and got scarred by her when they hang on the cliff for dear life. Kazuha on the other hand, wore her ring on her left hand because it was the hand that got handcuffed to Heiji's when they were little, also the hand that Heiji held and chose not to let go.

For the third time, Heiji's and Kazuha's same hands were handcuffed on the night of their third anniversary, as if reminding them of such promise, as if telling them that no matter how troublesome their relationship could get, they would always end up and choose to be stuck with each other.

Some couples have their red string of fate, but Heiji and Kazuha have something stronger. Theirs was a chain link of steel, a bond that was forged in fire, strengthened through time and bound to last for a lifetime.

A.N. Okay so it's 4am here and I wasn't able to proofread the latter part of the story. I apologize if there are typographical errors or grammatically incorrect phrases/sentences. I always end up writing such long one shots. I swear, I did not intend for this to be so long but an idea just sprung from another like an excessive chain. (LOL. Even used the theme in my Author's Note.) Anyway, I'm sorry it took a while for me to make this update. I actually intended to post a different story and use a different theme from the list. I initially wrote something for theme #27-overflow. I even finished halfway, but as I was writing, I realized there were loopholes and some of the ideas weren't thoroughly put together. It took a while before I decided to set it aside and write something else, while I was having a hard time piecing it up. So, I came up with this very mature KazuHei one shot. IDK if this could even be considered as smut/lemon/lime, but yeah, I tried. Sorry if it wasn't any good. I had a better grasp of the ideas on this one compared to the original second oneshot I first wrote, but I had a hard time writing the mature parts. So yeah, this was slowly and carefully created. I also did some research on the La Vena Amoris so that I could connect it well with the handcuff thing. Hahaha. I hope it didn't seem forced. I did some asking around with Kazuha's occupation. And many answered doctor or teacher since she's good with kids. So, I came up with pediatrician. Hihihihi 3 And yeah, I think it suits her well. Also, to clarify, this whole series is not meant to cover only a married Kazuha and Heiji. It just so happens that my two consecutive one shots are about a married KazuHei, because it's honestly fun to work on stories of them being married. I mean, there are just so many possibilities and I honestly like imagining them being more mature and intimate, 'coz we hardly ever see that in the series and the closest we've seen was the scenario in OVA 9. But I assure you, while I have quite a lot of married KazuHei scenarios in my head, I also have some present KazuHei/teen KazuHei scenarios to show you. I also watched Movie 21 last month and I've had some inspired ideas from it. Hihihi Notice, I included a certain reference from the movie here. Sorry for spoiling those who haven't watched it. TT_TT

Hope you guys liked this! Feel free to tell me what you think.

Love,

Omake 1:

"I hope the twins didn't cause you guys much trouble." Kazuha said as she took Mikan from Ran while Heiji took Midori from Shinichi.

"Oh, they were sweet little angels." Ran said as she lightly poked Mikan's cheek before she gave her a soft kiss on the forehead. Mikan cooed and giggled adorably.

Shinichi on the other hand scooted closer to Hattori as he ruffled Midori's hair.

"Oi, oi, Hattori. I love your kids and they were adorable, but you owe me one. Never forget that I babysat them just so you 'could get some'." Shinichi muttered in a tone so low only Heiji could hear. Heiji lightly hit him on the rib with his elbow, causing the latter to yelp.

"Yeah, yeah. You can count on me anytime on your and Neechan's wedding anniversary."Heiji whispered as he patted his friend's back.

"Well, we'll see you guys soon!" Kazuha said, bidding their friends goodbye as they proceeded to step out of Shinichi and Ran's rented villa.

"Come on Mi-kun, MI-chan! Say, 'Bye bye!'" She said to her twins as she moved Mikan's hand with hers in a waving gesture. Heiji also did the same with Midori's.

As Kazuha and Heiji lifted their hands the sleeves of their sweater were tugged down, allowing to show a little evidence from last night.

"Ne, Hattori, what's with that bandage on your and Kazuha-chan's hand?" Shinichi asked, curiously, being the keen detective that he is.

"What happened to you guys?" Ran asked worriedly.

"Just a sprain. A little accident, you know. Hahaha" Kazuha answered, laughing nervously.

"Yeah, housework could cause some accidents sometimes." Heiji added, defensively.

"Well, don't forget to put hot compress on that to prevent it from swelling." Ran reminded, innocently.

"Housework huh?" Shinichi said, suspiciously as he raised an eyebrow and then snickered at his friends' blushing faces.

Omake 2:

"Here's the new pair of handcuffs you requested, Hei-chan." Otaki-han said as he placed a fresh new chain of cold steel on top of Heiji's desk. The thing was still in a nicely wrapped package. All nice and new.

"I wonder what happened to the old ones they gave you, though. They were good as new. You barely even use them." The police officer said, causing Heiji to blush.

"The twins broke it." He lied, laughing nervously.

"Aren't your twins still infants? Those handcuffs are made of good material, Hei-chan." Otaki said, skeptically.

"Well, what can I say? Twins are a handful."

-Owari-

24 notes · View notes

tube-thoughts-blog · 7 years

Text

tube thoughts vol. 8

zero stars - terrible, 1/2 a star - dull, 1 star - folly, 1 1/2 stars - lacking, 2 stars - fair, 2 1/2 stars - decent, 3 stars - terrific

Kroll Show: Gigolo H-O-R-S-E *"Horse not whores."* 2 1/2 stars

Cinematic Titanic: "The Wasp Woman" a Roger Corman flick *"Anaphylactic schlock."* close to 3 stars with riffing 2 stars without

Max Headroom: Grossberg's Return *MTV Rocks the Vote for Hillary Clinton by getting its viewers to tune out and tune in to The Jersey Shore / Real World.* 2 1/2 stars

Blind Date (Deluxe Edition) *Raunchy reality show uncensored material and bloopers from the early 2000s. It's strange to see just how much the fashions have changed. That California douchebag & slut 'look' is a real time capsule (1998? - 2004?) of guilty pleasure to gawk at.* 2 1/2 stars

Swamp Thing: The Watcher *Redneck androids and a test tube Alice in Wonderland un-birthday.* 3 stars

Branson Famous: The Brangelina of Branson *In a town that's stuck in a rhinestone americana timewarp, a family of big haired and big belt buckle entertainers step all over each other in pointy boots in order to be the shining star in a fading industry of entertaining a dwindling crowd of retiree tourists.* 2 stars

==== My Big Redneck Family: Redneck Wedding

*Tater salad turned bad, but the "Shamepain" still tastes good, I guess.

Tom Arnold is giddy to host a reality show that's structured and shot like a sitcom similar to Modern Family.

The presentation isn't half bad, but it's the same lowest common denominator behavior for the camera and those tired, cliche confessionals that all reality shows are required to have.

At least Branson Famous is original in its confessionals which are tacky singing confessionals that turn into sing offs.

Also, I want to know how theme weddings like 'Redneck Weddings' are still considered to be traditional.

Sorry, queers, ya'll are weird, but cut off shorts, beer cans on the front row, and written vows about picking up tighty whiteys covered in trail marks so that the wife doesn't have to is considered a sacred ceremony.* sodomy or skidmarks I vote skid

2 stars

=============================================================

Newsreaders: How Sausage Is Made *A sausage making factory is turned into one of those pretentious millenials start up companies with a hilariously loose atmosphere, and it's visited and documented by a parody of one of those hipster nerd website's sexy cosplay chick who's one of those tries way too hard to be all about nerd culture wannabes. Also, Stevie, from Eastbound & Down, plays a lottery winner whose newly overly rich lifestyle makes him easy to despise.* 2 stars

X Files: Genderbender *The close knit community of Aphrodite and androgyne.* 3 stars

Hippies: Sexy Hippies *"I'm free. Nothin' worryin' me." Except for the fact that being a male, I think about sex every six seconds.* close to 3 stars

Impractical Jokers: Welcome to Miami *Beached Mer-man struggles in the sand for jelly donuts and an alligator is forced to wear a backpack.* between 2 and 2 1/2 stars

Jonny Quest: The Calcutta Adventure *Jolly Jolly Hadji* 3 stars

Son of the Beach: Fanny and the Professor *"Touch my mouth, Louise!" Heatwave haywire.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Rinse Dream presents "Party Doll A Go-GO #2" (1991) *Jungle boogie sock-it-to-me shin-dig squeal flick.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Freddy's Nightmares: Love Stinks --------------

*Nookie with no strings attached because Freddy cut them.* 3 stars

*Re-Animator as a yuppie pizza shop cannibal.* 3 stars

----------------------------------------------

"Meatballs Part 2" (1985) *PG rated sex comedy with E.T. and Pee Wee Herman.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Tales from the Crypt: The Man Who Was Death *After his state overturns the death penalty, unemployed electric chair technician William Sadler takes his executioner's blues to the street.* 3 stars

Morton Downey Jr.: Child Abuse *Mort shows off his devilishly red socks and lets people pour their hearts out about that once dirty secret of the family that has come more to light in recent years as something not to hide.* 3 stars

"The Town That Dreaded Sundown" (2014) *Three different time periods entwined into a true crime homage to drive-in slasher movies like Friday the 13th part 2. It's not perfect, but it's prettier than a postcard with red eye gravy spilled over it. Did I say postcard? I meant porkchop. A porkchop with red eye gravy spilled over it. Well, maybe not that pretty. Porkchop, mmm.* close to 3 stars

From Dusk Till Dawn, the series: Pilot Episode *Aztecs, snakes, Geckos, demons, Texas Rangers, Mexican cartels, and last of all 21 year old white chicks (how and why did they escape so easy? makes little sense.).* between 2 and 2 1/2 and stars

Rifftrax presents "Terror At Tenkiller" *"More like timefiller at Tenkiller." Pointless small talk, routine walking and driving, mundane lake activity, creepy jerks, generic background music, plus slight instances of side-boob.* 3 stars with riffing 1 1/2 stars without

Tim & Eric - Bedtime Stories: Baby *The true horror is seeing Tim & Eric amuse themselves by getting odd looking middle-aged men to perform absurd fetish acts. Dr. Steve Brule's manchild cousin Jordan gets scammed by Tim & Eric, and Roseanne's Laurie Metcalf makes a show stealing cameo.* 2 stars

Finding Bigfoot: Paranormal Squatchtivity *Bobo, Ranae, and the other two dingbats travel to some isolated farms and woods in Pennsylvania that look straight out of Night of the Living Dead. They're searching not just for bigfoot, this time, but boo bumps in the night. They also make a sacrificial offer to the bigfoot by dumping bloody guts and powdered donut dust on a rock.* 1 star for the spook and squatch stuff 2 1/2 stars for the natural lighting, non-nightvision, picturesque shots of rural Pennsylvania

Are You Afraid of the Dark?: The Tale of the Lonely Ghost *An early 90s mallrat Tiffany look-a-like bullies her "zeeb" cousin and nanny and meangirls clique until an encounter with a ghost girl from a mirror world.* 3 stars

Gargoyles: Long Way To Morning *gumption versus grouse* 3 stars

Farscape: A Human Reaction *Chricton returns home and finds out he no longer has one.* 3 stars minus maybe 1/2 a star for the twist

Wizards and Warriors: The Kidnap *Black magic and royal blood should never mix.* 3 stars

Friday the 13th, the series: Root Of All Evil *Exchanging currency for blood.* 3 stars

"The Granny" a film by Luca Bercovici (1995) *Stinking rich Stella Stevens has one foot on a banana peel and is pushed into the grave by the greedy inheritors of her wealthy will. An elixir, with a set of instructions similar to the handling of Gremlins, turns her into an Evil Dead inspired demon bitch. It's up to her mousey granddaughter, played by Shannon Whirry (who struggles to hide how sexy she typically is), to send her back to Hell.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Hill Street Blues: Up In Arms *Citizens against crime. Battlefield lovers. Troublemakers on the 6 o'clock news. Criminal turned Christian. Nude model and her ferocious dog of a man. Corrupt cop killed by razor wielding hooker.* 3 stars

------- Black History Month -- Non-Wayans Scary Movie -------------------

"Tales from the Hood" (1995)

*Welcome to my Mortuary: Some homeboys make a pick up of alleyway discovered drugs at a spooky funeral home ran by an eccentric mortician.* 2 1/2 stars

*Rogue Cop Revelation: Wings Hauser and some other pig cops go Rodney King on a political agitator while Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit" plays as the soundtrack. Exactly one year later, the zombified martyr gets revenge.* 3 stars

*Boys Do Get Bruised: David Alan Grier as an extremely convincing and scary abusive stepfather.* close to 3 stars

*KKK Comeuppance: Voodoo dolls terrorize a racist politician at a cursed plantation. I couldn't help but laugh thinking of those Lil' Penny Hardaway doll commercials from the 90s.* 2 1/2 stars

*Hard Core Convert: A murderous gangbanger won't repent when a Maya Angelou type puts him through Clockwork Orange style therapy torture to get him to see he's killing his own kind in the same way white society lynched his ancestors. It does pose the question of whether it's strictly his fault, but I'm not sure if Spike Lee and others involved aren't suggesting that young black men should use violence on whites instead. There's a lot of venom and hatred and propaganda in this piece. Maybe rightfully so, maybe not.* either zero stars or close to 3 stars

*Mr. Simms: A Mexican standoff Day of the Dead style between the homeboys and the mortician who turns out to be Satan. Welcome to 90's terrible CGI hell, muthafuckas!* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

-------------------------------

Red Shoe Diaries: Just Like That *A cute receptionist, who likes to love it up in an elevator, tries to have it both ways with a rich French guy and a pre-Friends slumming it on softcore late night cable Matt LeBlanc.* close to 3 stars

Hannibal: Ceuf *"Norman Rockwell with a bullet." Hannibal Lecter with a daughter. Molly Shannon with a screw loose (not much of a stretch).* 3 stars

--- Duck Dynasty: Bathroom Baloney

*Outhouse racing, because "SOUTHERN!"

We used to not have indoor plumbing, ya'll.

It's pathetic what A & E will go to in order to justify an hour of tv filled with the stupid nonsense these jerks say.

It's all about those advertising dollars, and we morons who give them views.

They're supposed to be down to earth folk and manly men, but the one called Willie acts like he's never used a grill or stove, like most of his audience would have had to in their lives, when he burns his fingers and squeals like a girl as he ineptly cooks balogna.

Balogna, a cheap and overly processed lunchmeat that has been a part of the diet of that America that they're so quick to latch onto, but most of this millionaire family turns their nose up at the idea of having to eat.

Duck Dynasty, a brand and a family that sell their garbage merchandise at a company (Wal-Mart) that ripped the heart, balls, and innards (all that would go into balogna) out of American smalltown business folk and replaced it with cheap Chinese manufactured goods and sent jobs overseas so that Duck Dynasty's main audience would have to be poor and eat balogna.

Sing it with me, for the land of the freeee and we used to live in caves...*

running from zero to 1 star

==================================================================

Weird Science: Airball Kings *Gary got game.* 3 stars

15 Storeys High: Ice Queen *God gave us gas.* close to 3 stars

Game of Thrones: season 3 episode 8 *Lambs seeing the dagger.* 3 stars

"Here Comes The Devil" (2012) *The Kids Aren't Alright after a truckstop Picnic At Hanging Rock.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars or 1 1/2 stars for the awkward and amateurish dubbing. The English speaking voice actors are so bland that they drain the passion out of the Spanish actors' performances.

American Horror Story: Asylum "The Name Game" *Rare birds Roche limit.* 3 stars or 1 star for the Glee style musical number

American Horror Story: Coven "The Axeman Cometh" *Ouija (weegee) and all that j-a-z-z.* 3 stars

"House of Dreams" an adult film by Andrew Blake (1990) *Splooge on the foot of a model wearing expensive high heels in one of those new age architectured Malibu beach mansions captured by an expensive perfume high-art pretentious photographer while a Pure Moods cd plays on a thousand dollar plus stereo system.* 2 1/2 stars

----- Black History Month -- Genre Crossover Bad Movie ------------

Cinematic Titanic presents "East Meets Watts" *"Fact: drugs IS comin' into the ghett-toe." but so IS "Rock 'em sock 'em mofos." And "You can tell by the clothes that they're wearing, that it's a fine line between Kung Fu & Disco."* 3 stars with riffing between 1 1/2 and 2 stars without

-----------------------

The Prisoner: Many Happy Returns *Number 6 becomes The Omega Man, Castaway, Bourne, The Fugitive, Top Gun, and then Total Recall'd.* 3 stars

Richard Linklater's "Waking Life" (2001) *"Let's have a *in quotes* Holy Moment."* either close to 2 1/2 stars if you're open to interesting thinking about life or 1 star if you're annoyed by pretentious people talking out of their ass about philosophy...

Bob and Margaret: Love's Labours Lost *Bob pines over his snotty secretary.* close to 3 stars

Northern Exposure: Soapy Sanderson *"Singing your own song," even if it's a murder ballad.* 3 stars

Fargo: A Muddy Road *Orthodox spiders.* 3 stars

X Files: Lazarus *Scully's old flame is shot and smolders out, at the same time as his Clyde Barrow type suspect suffers the same fate. The suspect's spirit snakes into Scully's flame's body and goes on the hunt for his Bonnie.* close to 3 stars

"The Taking Of Deborah Logan" (2014) *The Exorcism of Martha Stewart. Wow, a found footage flick with mostly sympathetic characters, an actual story, creepy scares, and somewhat decent editing.* close to 3 stars minus 1/2 a star for the vomit vision shaking cam finale. I don't know why this generation has such a hard-on for found footage. It doesn't make fiction more realistic, it just makes it more painful to try to watch.

Stephen King's "Kingdom Hospital": season 1 episode 8 *We didn't start the fire.* 3 stars

"Inferno" a film by Dario Argento (1980) *Like a cat on hot bricks.* 2 1/2 stars

Manimal: Night of the Scorpion *Caper in the Caribbean.* 3 stars

Rifftrax presents "R.O.T.O.R." *Imagine Alex Murphy replaced by Jeff Foxworthy.* 3 stars with riffing 2 stars without

Thundarr the Barbarian: City of Evil *Civilization ends in 1994, and a world of sci fi and fantasy emerges. So, it's like Mike Judge meets Jack Kirby.* 3 stars

The Outer Limits: The Voice Of Reason *A paranoid paranormal conspiracy theorist gets a closed door intelligence session with govt officials, where he shows off alien events from the first season of the new outer limits.* close to 2 1/2 stars

Son of the Beach: Eat My Muffin *Luke Skywalker as "Divine" Rod.* 3 stars

Everything Is Terrible -------------------

2 Minute Slaughterhouse Rock: "Death ain't shit. Impress me." - 2 1/2 stars

3 Minute Mankillers: "Ladies, and I use that term loosely." Acting, and I use that term loosely. - 3 stars

Pregnant Men!: "I rolled over and went back to sleep." - 3 stars

Out of the Wild: Teddy bears and Werner Herzog. - close to 3 stars

Ninja Magic Dragon Kid!: "Do you know Don 'The Dragon' Wilson?" Well, he's barely in this, but there's this 12 year old who does karate... - 3 stars

-----------------------

The Ben Stiller Show: season 1 episode 1 *Bono for breakfast. Judd Apatow, Bob Odenkirk, and others help make this one of the best, and sadly forgotten, sketch shows of all time.* 3 stars

--- Black History Month -- Social Justice zombie classic with commentary ----

Rifftrax presents George Romero's original "Night of the Living Dead" *Apocalypse and Arby's.* 3 plus stars with riffing 3 stars without

---------------------

American Gothic: Meet the Beetles *Sheriff Buck versus Bruce Campbell.* 3 stars

The Greatest American Hero: Here's Looking At You, Kid *Vanishing act with top secret space age equipment. Vanishing act, when it comes time to meet the girlfriend's parents.* close to 3 stars

---- Black History Month --- Social Satire movie ---

"CSA - The Confederate States of America" *Slavery, for an economically strong and stable society.* either zero stars or 3 stars

----------

American Horror Story: Freakshow "Show Stoppers" *Cooped up rage.* 2 1/2 stars

American Horror Story: Freakshow "Curtain Call" *This series whimpers to a close like a sad gypsy's fart or a tired hobo's bugle.* between 2 and 2 1/2 stars

Forever Knight: Dark Knight part 1 & 2 *Highlander meets the dawn of Seattle grunge meets Kolchak, the Night Stalker meets MTV's The Maxx.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Tales from the Crypt: Dig That Cat... He's Real Gone *"Dying for dollars." A death defying Houdini act where death isn't actually defied.* 3 stars

"Bad Girls" (1994) *Casserole western. At least Geena Davis isn't the lead.* between 2 and 2 1/2 stars

--- Everything Is Terrible ----

Camel Club Network: Joe Camel in tha nightclub. - 3 stars

You're A Hypocrite!: Grumpy theology getting off point and no fun. - 1 star

Watch the Jello Wiggle!: Thirty somethings determine the Teen Set. - 3 stars

Y'Know: No, I don't know, evangelical and or motivational white lady. - 2 1/2 stars

Truth or Dare: A deadly game for unstable yuppies.* 3 stars

--------

Are You Afraid of the Dark?: The Tale of the Sorcerer's Apprentice *Canadian junior high kids go "goth" over a Babylonian snake god.* 2 1/2 stars

--- Black History Month -- Prejudice Philosophy flick ---

Sam Fuller's "White Dog" (1982) *"Cure or kill the sickness."* either zero or 3 stars

---------

Morton Downey Jr.: Communism *Loudmouths, intelligence agents, government (U.S. & the U.S.S.R.) sponsored military groups in 3rd world hot-spots, and last of all "TRAITORS!"* 1 star

12:01 Beyond: Illegal Aliens ---------

*A man and his dog, living alone in the desert, are abducted by a ufo. that or the dog is an alien or becomes an alien?* close to 3 stars

*VHS quality trailer for the new War of the Worlds (not Spielberg / Cruise).* 3 stars

*TV rip promo for CBS showing of Sigourney Weaver in ALIENS.* 3 stars

*Mr. Lobo rambles about ancient alien conspiracy theories while an alien fires a electricity blaster behind him.* 3 stars

*Famous Studios' Superman in "Showdown": Superman framed with impostor.* 3 stars

*VHS quality rip trailer for the movie Hangar 18.* 3 stars

*TV quality rip for "Magic" 92 FM radio "The Superstar Space Cruiser" of radio stations playing classic rock albums.* 3 stars

*'The Tony Tomato Show' presents Heil Hipster performing in a Weezer 'Buddy Holly' esque music video.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

*VHS quality rip trailer for "Moon Trap." Killer lunar robots and Bruce Campbell.* 3 stars

*TV quality rip for an 1980s NYC Manhattan comic convention featuring a lot of classic Sci-Fi alien comic books.* 3 stars

*Ninja the Mission Force - Citizen Ninja: No rest for the Ninja. Not even a playground picnic.* close to 3 stars

*TV / VHS quality neon lazer graphics advertisement for Rochester's 95FM BBF.* 3 stars

*TV/VHS quality rip for an old 80s DR. Pepper commercial where a cowboy walks into a space bar cantina filled with alien puppetry creatures and orders a tall one. That is a Dr. Pepper.* 3 stars

*The "Saint of Insomniacs" Mr. Lobo sits by a Tesla type machine and greets a scary looking alien creature who is into probing.* 3 stars

*(feature movie) Cannon films presents - "Alien Contamination": Explosive xenomorph eggs, and a cyclops tentacle creature, in an exploitation flick.* 2 1/2 stars

*Vintage UHF tv advertisement for channel 6 XETV promoting 5, count 'em 5, classic episodes of the original Star Trek tv series.* 3 stars

*Vintage Fox tv affiliate WPGH channel 53 and its promotion of Alien Nation, the series' upcoming episode.* 3 star

*Vintage tv commercial for the OMNI sci fi "fact and fiction" magazine.* 3 stars

*Republic Pictures serial The Crimson Ghost in The Laughing Skull: Heavy water has leaks.* 2 1/2 stars

*Mr. Lobo may have been probed and payed 20 dollars for it.* 2 1/2 stars

*Grindhouse trailer for the flying frisbee alien leeches flick "It Came Without Warning."* 3 stars

*TV/VHS rip quality commercial for Diet Dr. Pepper featuring a Will Forte look alike living in a Raising Arizona / Joe Bob Briggs style trailer park with his sweetie and having a close encounter.* close to 3 stars

*Zolar X - Timeless (music video): The Ramones meets Mork & Mindy.* 2 1/2 stars

*Thumb Snatchers from the Moon Coccoon: Stop motion short about opposable thumb hatin' robot aliens and a Texas cow munching cowboy sheriff squaring off.* close to 3 stars

------------------

Cinematic Titanic: The Alien Factor *"Pissing Skittles."* 2 1/2 stars with riffing 1 star without

Everything is Terrible ----

*The Stinger: Pontiac feels that modern car concepts should be "wacky," "funky," filled with useless gadgets, and cost 2 million dollars to create.* close to 3 stars

*The Old New Age!: Puffy clouds and PBS philosophy / aesthetics / tunes.* 3 stars

*That Doll Looks Like Your Daughter!: Wholesome, loving, lifeless, and that uncanny valley...* 3 stars

*Reppies Agenda Revealed: Let's make a rainbow and do the electric slide, all for the glory of our New World Order overlords.* 2 1/2 stars

*Bully Bustin': "Sometimes, you gotta smack somebody."* 3 stars

-----------

USA Up All Night with host Rhonda Shear presents "Porky's 2" ----

*Win a piece of Rhonda's horrible (looks fingerpainted) artwork. Ha.* 3 stars

*Rhonda laments the flow of her particular pink piece of artwork.* close to 3 stars

*An operatic Korbel champagne commercial showing picturesque American life. yeah, maybe if you're drunk on Korbel.* 2 stars

*Turtle Wax magic and science to help shine your convertible using "science and magic." Available at K-Mart.* 2 1/2 stars

*Hurry to Sears for a 3 day paint sale.* 2 stars

*1 800 Collect will help you save on collect calls and it somehow helps a generic fake Yankee baseball player rob a homerun "Whatta save!"* close to 2 1/2 stars

*"Before Arnold, before Stallone, there was Skywalker." USA is showing the original Star Wars 8 / 7 central.* 3 stars

*Rhonda daydreams about 1950s romantic lifestyles and compares it to the 90s where she can't get a date, because all the guys are on dates with each other. Then, she reads fan mail about how much sexual energy she puts into her paintings, then she gives that painting away to said horny fan.* 3 stars

*Rhonda makes fun of male pushups in Porky's 2 as being "safe sex" and she shows off a horribly drawn portrait of her house with dog poop on the lawn.* 3 stars

*Rhonda cools off with a Snapple in a cheaply produced Snapple promo.* 2 1/2 stars

*Bluesy 90s slickly produced Greyhound bus travel commercial. I've taken a Greyhound bus trip. It's nowhere near this glamorous. It stinks, actually.* 2 1/2 stars

*The host of MTV Sports (whose name escapes me) is with Arnold in a Burger King BK TeeVee advertisement for the Summer of 93's biggest blockbuster "Last Action Hero."* close to 3 stars

*While a mom does some home repair, a toddler has a horrible gasoline accident and is shown in the hospital burn unit covered in bandages in one of those awful scary as shit PSA announcements from back in the day.* 3 stars

*GNC the authority on getting musclehead gym rats hooked on supplement taking pill addictions.* 2 star

*"Ever been curious about Hollywood girls?" Well, these babes dance luridly on the hosed down concrete floor of a large suburban downtown flat while dressed in leather and 60s biker hats in this phone sex 1 900 950 WILD commercial.* 3 stars

*Next is yet another phone sex commercial with girls looking straight out of Beverly Hills 90210. Wowza.* 3 stars

*Rhonda shows a classic "cut scene" from the Wizard of Oz "Suck my wand!" that just happens to have made it into Porky's 2. And Rhonda reads another fan letter in it which she continues to win over the hearts and views of fans for her offbeat sense of humor.* 3 stars

*Rhonda makes fishy faces with her self portrait.* close to 3 stars

*Then a hypnotic bumper with Rhonda twirling against a starlit background while wearing a one piece swimsuit / aerobics outfits. Wowza.* 3 stars

*never park your car without the CLUB anti-auto-theft device, especially if you live in a Texas Mexico bordertown. Ha. Whatever happened to those? I guess thieves figured out a way around the device.* 2 1/2 stars

*Beautiful, portrait pretty mornings begin at 8, that is Super 8 motel, and that is also if you're a yuppie business man driving around the backcountry (what business is there out there?) with a cup of steaming hot coffee on top of your Ford Taurus rental car.* 2 1/2 stars

*Murphy Brown is smart, right? I mean... she does have her own witty tv sitcom... and she is spokeswomanperson for SPRINT long distance in this big budget commercial with 90s quirky aesthetics featuring the tops of bald mens' heads with cartoon floating graphics and a thinktank lab with a huge brain in a robotic device... huh?* 2 1/2 stars

*"What could be worse than the cost of a yeast infection? How about the cost of curing it?" Femcare for the cheap lady with downstairs troubles. Wow, did women really skip feminine healthcare because of high cost? Glad I was too young to experience the joys of a woman back then.* 2 1/2 stars for weirdness

*A leading zooologist explains the difference between sparkling polar bears (ones who ice skate in a skirt) and sparkling rootbeer cream soda A & W rootbeer.* 3 stars

*After a terrorist strikes... Silk Stalkings on USA.* close to 3 stars

*Sean Connery is a space cowboy... high noon in outerspace... Outland on USA.* 3 stars

*Rhonda's factoid of the week: close to 3 million gallons of oil produced in America, almost enough to style Jerry Lewis's hair.* 2 stars

*No touch tire care in a can really frustrates blue collar motorheads.* 2 stars

*"There's nothing worse than a foul smelling pair of shoes?" Wait, what about yeast infections? Odor Eaters knocks the skunk right out (literally) of a pair of old men's dress shoes.* 3 stars

*Tri Star pictures presents Weekend at Bernies 2, starting July 9th, 1993.* 3 stars

*"Even the best need attention, know what I mean?" So says a blonde skank on a cheap looking phone sex advertisement.* 2 1/2 stars

*Sluts "love sharing secrets" on another phone sex ad. Now, they just share selfies and butt in mirror photos on twitter / instagram and it doesn't cost 3 dollars a minute.* 2 1/2 stars

*Patty and her orangutan pal Roger try little Caesar's pizza and spaghetti.* 3 stars

*Tough actin' Tinactin for CGI fungal fires on the feet of jocks.* 2 stars

*"America's hot new number, 1 800 Collect." they've even replaced the Hollywood sign with a 1 800 Collect Sign. Boy, will they feel dumb, when they realize no one uses collect calls anymore. Everyone has a wireless plan. Dumb, 1993, get with the times, already.* 2 stars

*Rhonda gives away a foot sculpture to a female fan wanting it for her husband's office. I guess her husband, Al, has a foot fetish.* 2 stars

*Live & Loud Ozzy's new album straight from his 92 tour available at Record Town and Tape World.* 2 1/2 stars

*30 something moms in party cowboy hats use Suave miracle anti-perspirant to survive their rowdy munchkin kids' birthday parties.* 2 1/2 stars

*Nintendo's Kirby comes from Dreamland to the real world to prove that he's "One Tough Cream Puff" in an awesomely animated into live action commercial.* 3 stars

*"It's never too late for an intimate phone adventure." So, dude, bro, pick up your oversized cordless house phone with the extra long antenna and dial up some horny chicks for only 3 bucks a minute, man.* 3 stars

*Rhonda hangs out with her Bart Simpson doll and shows off her "Bart art".* 3 stars

*Models, on a beach, have lips that need protection from the sun's harsh rays. So, they use Blistex. But, they probably should get out of the sun, because they all look so dark that they probably have skin cancer already.* 2 stars

*"Continuous Action Formula!" soft & dri super solid lady deoderant will have the fellas fawning over any high class city chick.* 3 stars

*A sign language lady uses conceal and heal wart remover.* 2 1/2 stars

*"If you use gasoline the wrong way, your dreams will go up and smoke." Your kids will die as it's put in another scary gasoline fire PSA. Was there this huge problem with misuse of gasoline back in the 80s and 90s? Sheesh!* 3 STARS

*A soft saxophone, a tropical window scene with flowing curtains in the wind, and a creepy narrator on camera, in a white tuxedo, let's us know about Eve and her need to forget, which she can't do, on EDEN coming to USA....* close to 3 stars

*Rhonda is sad to say that Robert DeNiro isn't in Porky's.* 2 stars

*Rhonda really doesn't like Porky's 2 and recommends that if you wanna watch Porky's 3, then rent Porky's 1 and change the number.* 2 1/2 stars

*And finally to get to the actual film presentation... for this chopped and censored to the point of little coherency comedy...* between 1 1/2 and 2 stars

---------------

Son of the Beach: Miso Honei *Pink beam at Point Break.* 2 1/2 stars

--- Black History Month -- Inter-racial Adult Art Film --

Dark Bros. presents "Black Throat" *A dumbass honky, a new-wave negro pimp, and a trash-talkin' plastic rat go on the hunt for an expert fellatio hoe named "Madame Mambo."* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

--------

From Dusk Till Dawn: Blood Runs Thick *The original was a good movie, but it could have used a 14 year old girl's i-phone conversation with her boyfriend, an unintentionally funny fist fight between the Gecko brothers, rice-milk refreshment breaks, and cute pink bunny accessories to remind one of just how sweet having a daughter can be... oh, also Fez, from That 70s Show, dressed up like Kool Moe D in Wild Wild West.* 2 stars

Kung Fu: An Eye For An Eye *A woman's right to choose death. Honestly, however, a thoughtful commentary on revenge.* 3 stars

The Walking Dead: What Happened.... *Swing low, sweet chariot.* 3 stars

Everything is Terrible -----

*Aerobic Self Defense: Don't be a victim, attack from the rear.* 3 stars

*Time to get it on, T. Bone: Sidney Party Yeah Uh... or however you spell and pronounce Sidney Pottier.* close to 3 stars

*Tax Day!: I'm not sayin' that we should be anarchists, I'm just sayin' we should commit anarchy.* 3 stars

*Oldies vs. Hippies!: The early bird gets stoned.* close to 3 stars

*Mark of the beast: Government is evil, ignore the patriotic background music. Worldly goods are fleeting, seek salvation, and send us your money.* 3 stars

---------

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Painted Hills *Chewin' the scenery with Lassie.* 3 stars with riffing 2 stars without

--- Black History Month -- Black Cowboy Cinema ---

Fred Williamson in "Joshua" (1976) *Who is Joshua? to quote Joshua, "I'm my mother's son." Some bandits make the mistake of shooting his mama, in the back, before Joshua can reunite with her after the Civil War.* 2 1/2 stars

--------------

William Friedkin's "Sorcerer" (1977) *No futuro without risk.* 3 stars

"Glengarry Glen Ross" (1992) *Close the deal, you expletive-expletive-expletive...* 3 stars

X Files: Young At Heart *The curious case of Spooky Mulder.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

The Ben Stiller Show: Season 1 episode 2 *20 so years later, and Nick Kroll has almost the exact same show.* 2 1/2 stars

Everything is Terrible ----

*Learn to Fly: self levitate the expert way.* close to 2 1/2 stars

*Hunks Hunks Hunks!: "Smell the protein in this room."* either 1 star or close to 3 stars

*Here's How!: to be a show off.* 2 stars

*Greatest Song Ever Sung: Kathie Lee cares about the kids of genocide. Well, just kids in general, they sure are cute. Fuck adults in need, they're not as cute. Jesus was a kid too ya know. He was cute, too. "Like one of us," as a kid, but way cuter.* either zero stars or 2 1/2 stars

*4 Minute - The Alien Agenda - Endangered Species: Vote for Pedro for president of the X Files fan club.* 3 stars

----------

Viper: Ghosts *Reformed criminals, the paralyzed, holograms, and future cars -more than meets the eye.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

"John Wick" (2014) *"Everything has a price," but good action / fight choreography and a dead wife's puppy are priceless.* 3 stars

Hannibal: Coquilles *About as much fun as a tumor.* zero stars

American Horror Story: Coven "The Dead" *Satisfaction.* 2 1/2 stars

Black Sails: Season 1 episode 3 *Ship without a captain.* close to 2 1/2 stars

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Magic Voyage of Sinbad *"There goes a stupid, stupid man." Fake Sinbad, the father of modern socialism.* close to 2 stars with riffing between 1/2 and 1 star without

Rinse Dream presents "Cafe Flesh" (1982) *"A tableau of desire in decline." The perfect mindfuck Dear John paranoid love letter from the dawn of the AIDS-HIV era to the end of the 'Free Love' era.* 3 stars

True Detective: Who Goes There? *She done gone. Tyrone. Drugged out, deep cover.* 3 stars

Crossballs, the debate show: Reality TV No Survivors *"They fall in love in a hot tub, just like us."* 3 stars

Channel 4 in the U.K. presents Ban This Filth: episode 1 *Prudish, old ladies -the purveyors and "haters" (a term that I despise) of perverted behavior.* close to 3 stars

David Fincher's "Gone Girl" (2014) *An ode to the psychotic climate of hysteria caused by media jackals like Nancy Grace.* 3 stars

The Ben Stiller Show: season 1 episode 3 *To boldly go where Bruce Springsteen has never gone before.* 2 1/2 stars

Justified: season 1 episode 3 *"Seems like everyone here is from someplace else."* close to 3 stars

Swamp Thing: The Hunt *A rolling stone gathers some moss.* close to 2 1/2 stars

"Johnny Dangerously" *An exciting age of criminality.* 3 stars

Everything is Terrible ----

*Dana Carvey Is Rolling Over In His Grave: Have mercy, Church Lady.* 2 1/2 stars

*Creep Scientist Fantasy Karaoke: "It's nice to remember." Just don't make it weird.* close to 3 stars

*Cookin' Up Profits!: Elderly ladies are pie baking and financial experts.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

*Christian Puppets Are Selfish: Share everything, including yourself, with stuffed animal puppets of the faith.* 2 1/2 stars

*BEV!: "She'll kill us." during our middle aged lady step aerobic workout.* 3 stars

---------

Thundarr the Barbarian: Last Train To Doomsday *Can't keep a Gemini wizard under wraps. Plus, 1960s Marvel comic books become an instructional handbook for sorcery weirdos of the post-apocalypse.* 3 stars

Weird Science: Party High USA *School curriculum for those willing to stay stupid or hoping to become scumbags.* 2 1/2 stars

Max Headroom: Dream Thieves *In an age where people trade their dreams for dreams, Swamp Thing's Arcane is also an old friend / rival of Edison Carter.* 3 stars

"A Scanner Darkly" (2006) *We're all trying to escape, and we're all unknowingly being observed while trying. That's when we're unwittingly put to uses.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Night Stand with Dick Dietrick--- (1996)

*Fashion VIctims - Lowering High Fashion Standards: Getting heavy with emaciated models.* close to 2 1/2 stars for the topic's performance 3 stars for Timothy Stack's jokes

*Secret Lives... Exposing Ourselves: Hot For Teacher - A teacher moonlights as a porn star. "Say it loud, I'm practically black and I'm proud." - A light skinned black man is shocked to discover that he's half black and not Italian. The Perfect Mom & Dad turn out to be Dad & Mom* close to 3 stars

-------

Mortal Kombat - Legacy: Jax, Sonya, and Kano *TEST YOUR MIGHT at the Ace Chemicals / Skynet factory.* 3 stars

Freddy's Nightmares: Safe Sex ----

*A picky dweeb's Satanic attraction and death by wet dream.* 3 stars

*An outcast chick's obsession with Freddy goes too far.* 3 stars

------

American Horror Story: Murder House "Smoldering Children" *Familial putridity.* close to 3 stars

X Files: E.B.E. *Piss up an Idian rope trick. There's an 18 wheeler causing alien confusion as it travels a shadowy path across America.* 3 stars

From Dusk Till Dawn, the series: Mistress *Harbingers, whore offerings, and head-shrinking.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Banshee: season 1 episode 1 *A raccoon running from a rabbit. A -just out of prison- thief steals the identity of a deceased new sheriff to a Walking Tall type backwoods corrupt town.* 3 stars

American Horror Story: Coven "The Sacred Taking" *Thrill rides, terminal goodbyes, two way roads, and tingles of the cooch.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Red Shoe Diaries: Another Woman's Lipstick *Girl in guy drag and a David Lynch inspired striptease.* 3 stars

---- Valentine's Three Way Movie Feature ---

John Cassavetes in "Incubus" (1982) *Try a little tenderness. Try a little cursed bestiality.* 3 stars

Paul Verhoeven's "Basic Instinct" (1992) *Torrid 90s trash revisited.* either 1 star or close to 2 1/2 stars

Michael Ninn's "Fade to Blue" *Get 'yer kicks on Route 66. It's a stylized xxx religious experience.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

-----------

Werner Herzog's "Lessons of Darkness" (1992) *Scorched earth war disgrace, the Book of Revelation, and fossil fuel drudgery, danger, madness -all from an alien perspective.* 3 stars

Stephen King's "Storm of the Century" (mini-series) *Born in sin, the Weather Channel's Jim Cantore, come on in.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Fargo: Eating the Blame *Greenbacks, grasshoppers, gospel, and the gristle of a riddle.* 3 stars

"Winter People" (1988) *Milk, honey, and time a flowin.' Kurt Russell plays against type as a gentle clockmaker / Ichabod Crane type in a Hatfields & McCoys style hillbilly period piece.* between 2 and 2 1/2 stars

Cinematic Titanic: Legacy of Blood *"Tijuana snuff films are more wholesome."* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars with riffing close to 2 stars without riffing

Son of the Beach: South of Her Border *Labia & Johnson. Erik Estrada & Marsha Brady.* close to 3 stars (despite all the stale bean fart jokes, it manages to be funny)

Northern Exposure: Dreams, Schemes, and Putting Greens *"Wine 'em, dine 'em, stick 'em with the tab." ... or leave 'em standing in the rain at the 18th hole... or leave 'em standing at the altar singing showtunes.* 3 stars

Everything Is Terrible ----

Freedom Song: Show us yer tits fer freedom.* 3 stars

Fiddlin' With My...: Would you rather be in Branson with Shoji or would you rather be a mule?* 3 stars

Dreaming of Foxy Boxing: That cloud looks like a cat fight.* close to 3 stars

Dinner With The Abortionists!: "Ask your wife." quoting a slimeball abortion performing doctor.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

The Lottery Guru!: Hint, hint, you'll never win the lottery. Hint, hint, invest in firearms.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

------

Night Stand with Dick Dietrick ---

Illegal Aliens Star Search: Immigrant talent show for the prize of a green card.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars (3 plus stars for the Phil Hartman cameo)

Hooked on Hookers: Sexy Social Outrage.* close to 3 stars

------

Crossballs, the debate show: American Driving, Carmageddon *Defensive drivers on the defensive against aggressive comedians.* 3 stars

"Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man" (1991) *"Come on and take a free ride." - John the Baptist $T.M.$ If they make this movie for the millenial generation, it will be called 'Rob Dyrdek and the Starbucks Person,' and it will pack a limp wristed punch.* 2 1/2 stars

Hill Street Blues: Your Kind, My Kind, Humankind *Being true to one's self and the team.* 3 stars

The Walking Dead: Them *A deathdream last episode and now this episode has an exhaustion zombie fight, a pack of wild dogs, worm eating & dog eating, mysterious note and a gift of water at the point of dehydration, a backroad tornado out of nowhere, solace in a shack in the middle of nowhere, and a zombie siege on the shack that seemed to spell the end of everyone in the group (which turns out to be a dream? or did they all just die?). This second half of the season is taking a turn into surreal southern gothic.* 3 stars

"In Cold Blood" (1967) *The point in modern America where we all took a dreaded detour into a conscience of indifferent malice that we've been driving on ever since.* 3 stars

"Nightcrawler" (2014) *Hollywood really wants us to sympathize with their paparazzi plight. A success driven psycho is nihilistic about bringing skid row sensationalism to the Southern California suburban news market.* close to 3 stars

The Ben Stiller Show: Season 1 Episode 4 *Melrose changes people. Ben finds out this when Andy Dick turns into a hipster bitch on the back of a biker dyke's harley.* 3 stars

--- Black History Month --- Cultural Cliches Comedy ----

Melvin and Mario Van Peebles present "Identity Crisis" (1989) *Gianni Versace is my homeboy. Rest in peace, my gay nigga.* close to 2 stars

------

Ban This Filth: episode 2 *"I would rather live in a vast, treeless desert without filth."* 2 1/2 stars

Hippies: Hippy Dippy Hippies *"Painting the house of ideas, shit brown," like a pig would.* 3 stars

"The Satisfiers of Alpha Blue" a Gerard Damiano xxx film (1980) *In the future, in the ruins of a space age commune, survivors hump, day & night, like bunny astronauts. They have this calculator connected to the future internet, and surprise the internet is mostly for sex, where they can dial up and beam up "satisfiers" to fulfill their every sexual need. But is it enough?* 2 1/2 stars

Farscape: Through The Looking Glass *3, 5, prime. Red, yellow, blue. Dizzy, loud, and funny too.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Wizards and Warriors: The Rescue *"I wouldn't want to fight a dragon that I could see, let alone an invisible dragon." Yeah, that's right, an invisible dragon.* 3 stars

Cinematic Titanic: Frankenstein's Castle of Freaks *"It's like Clint Howard and Gentle Ben had a kid, and he's choking me!" It's also like Eegah! meets The Sinful Dwarf.* 3 stars with riffing between 2 and 2 1/2 stars without

American Horror Story: Asylum "Spilt Milk" *Nursing a grudge.* close to 3 stars

"The Babysitter's Club Video #1 Mary Anne and the Brunettes" (1990) *Scholastic and craptastic. Mommy / gossip / relationship training for young chicks who can't even get their darn ears pierced. Weird to see so many kids and zero adults in this Charlie Brown / Children of the Corn town.* 1 star

Jr. Christian Science Vol. 1 *One of Tim & Eric's weirdo friends hosts an early 90s public access educational children's show. A chore to sit through, but almost worth it for the moments where he loses his cool when the production doesn't go exactly his way, and it features some of the most awkward singing and puppetry ever combined.* 1 star

Mortal Kombat - Legacy: Johnny Cage *True Hollywood story, death of the action star.* 2 1/2 stars

"Constantine" (2005) *Keanu Reeves as a wanker. Shy LePoof as a hardnosed cabbie sidekick. Tilda Swinton in guy drag. Hollywood knows what comic fans want. They want their beloved characters americanized and the movie version to be filled with techno music and cgi in every single shot.* between 2 and 2 1/2 stars

From Dusk Till Dawn, the series: Let's Get Ramblin' *Soul cleansing, soul redeeming, power in the blood.* between 2 1/2 and 3 stars

Forever Knight: for I have Sinned *and sat in judgement.* close to 3 stars

"Exorcist 2: The Heretic" (1977) *Plight of the white wing dove. Not enough mood or scares, and too much of all of the following: pseudo science astral projection / mental flashbacks, jazz tap dance, big over the top special fx, traversing the globe, and Linda Blair vanity project / poor acting. James Earl Jones, Louise Fletcher, and Richard BUrton are great, though.* between 1 1/2 and 2 stars

Hannibal: Entree *"A bunch of psychopaths helping each other out."* 3 stars

American Horror Story: Coven "Head" *Proudly marching to the guillotine of perdition.* 3 stars

"Burial Ground: The Nights of Terror" (1981) *Eye-Talian style maggot-filled weapon-wielding zombies laying siege on a gothic mansion. Gore filled disembowling deaths, shot gun blasts to zombie skulls, smashing / chopping zombies / people to bits, and titty chewing. Gloriously over the top dubbing. And lastly a "child" or dwarf(?) actor that makes Bud Cort look normal.* 3 stars

Tales from the Crypt: Only Sin Deep *Pretty woman on loan from the pawn shop.* 3 stars

The Walking Dead: The Distance *Rick Grimes, the most justifiably paranoid man on the planet of the undead, will watch gay love, from the shadows, just to make sure someone's intentions are legit.* close to 3 stars

"Sticks and Stones" (1996) *Another of those generic mid-1990s coming of age / the dangers of handguns in a family home / absentee parents (too busy being a doctor more than a mom Kirstie Alley) / abusive white trash parents (father of the main bully) / dealing with school bullies and also brothers who are bullies too (Zack from Saved by the Bell. *barf* on both accounts) and the bullied (a young and pudgy Seth Rogen, you would think but the kid's name is Max Goldblatt along with his bully tackling overprotective daddy played by Gary Busey), complete with that wholesome Americana past-time of baseball as a connecting theme for this sentimental tripe.* either 1/2 a star or close to 2 stars

--- Black History Month --- Bon Voyage Film Feature ---

"Trippin" (1996) *A young brutha and perpetual slacker, during his senior year in highschool, is constantly escaping reality into his fantasies that often feature fly booty honeys.* 2 1/2 stars

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