#day 1 of posting random things i found in my memos

[cherileam]

Poetry is easier than writing stories

The words flow out easily

While writing something with

A thousand different explainations

But prose-

The explaination is required

The words strung together to make a message

The life put into them

The thoughts

The soul

The part of you you want to hide

Put out there without

50 different subtexts to hide it

That is

Quite a nightmare for someone

As closed off

As me

[steve0discusses]

S5 Ep 3: Apdnarg is Really Hard to Spell

 Yo guys, people are getting vaccinated, the sun is parting through the clouds, and I felt so nice that I even stopped listening to quite so many throwback 00′s BTS mashups (and yet I keep clicking on these dissonant catastrophes thinking “this time it’s got to be better. This time they’ll figure it out.” and like, no. Turns out you can’t match Brittany’s Toxic with BTS’ Black Swan. You can’t do that.)

This must be a sign that things are getting better. If anything, it means my personal tastes are improving. I mean I only clicked on like 3 “Dark Academia” Playlists where I could pretend I’m some sort of spooky witch in an abandoned library with a bad music player and basic taste in classical music (like can we ban Satie from Youtube for a little while?). Hell, I might even do a prompt update to this blog!

Yeah, you heard me, I’m actually going to stay ahead of the update schedule for Yugioh Abridged (maybe. I haven’t actually watched cuz of spoilers, I just noticed the thumbnail pop up on Youtube and was like “Damn it, they came out of hiatus??? I got hurry UP.”)

Anyway, speaking of the sky parting.

I’ll have you know my bro said this is actually more like a circumcision and it was one of the worst thing I have ever heard.

We get a chance to take in this lineup of confusing and varied character designs, and Joey. who is...still Joey.

The animators probably had to hold a strike in order for them to put Yugi in the audience, lets be real. There are TOO MANY PEOPLE in this shot and one is wearing a turban where you draw every single wrap. I hope those artists charged by the line.

Tea has a subplot where she’s just very frustrated with everyone she knows. They have been traveling together for like many weeks and got trapped in a foreign country so I get it. But at the same time, it’s kind of hard to picture Tea with female friends.

Because right now you got this 12 year old child, the other duelist who does not care about anything besides cards, and Kaiba’s 3 dragon cards that we’ve all collectively decided are female.

Hell it’s almost like the writers are asking themselves why Tea is here. Maybe they forgot. There’s no more ghosts to bus, no more people to knock out with her ass with random Olympic feats. Tea’s just sidelining.

(read more under the cut)

Mokuba is a itty bit bit taller this season, and so I guess that means he can legally climb on top of the cherry picker in order to give a riveting speech.

Really says a lot about Mokuba that he is so unphased about talking to, I dunno...an entire planet of people. Kind of a shame we never see this courage from Mokuba used for anything other than talking really, really big and giving everyone around him a really hard time.

Mokuba takes a moment to dunk on Yugi Muto, as is Kaiba tradition.

And then introduce the first pair of duelists, which obviously must be between the few people in this tournament that we actually know and care about.

Thankfully, in between last episode and this episode, Yugi has figured out who his own Grandpa is. This is a relief, because Yugi is such a mess, that I was fully convinced it would take over half a season for him to recognize it. I mean how long did it take him to figure out he shares a body with a ghost? Like half a season?

Instead Yugi recovered gracefully from not recognizing his grandpa, but it’s not like he bothered to tell anyone else, so the rest of our cast is just gonna be like “Is he my hairdresser? The guy who delivers my mail? Who is this guy who made absolutely no significant changes to his outfit or voice?”

Like sometimes this show goes full Spongebob silly kid’s show and you never know when to take it seriously or not. They might be sacrificing the entire cast next episode. I really don’t know. But for now their big concern is who is grandpa??? Like an innocent card version of “Are you my Mother?”

Faced with public speaking, Yugi decides to have a melt down.

We have seen him face monsters, we’ve seen him on TV dozens of times, he’s been in multiple competitions...but give a speech? Of course he can’t do that. The kid doesn’t attend enough school to know how to do that. Them’s learning skills.

And that was when a newly assembled wife-jet spliced through the sky like a souped up razer scooter and deposited 1 fully equipped Seto Kaiba in a Buzz Lightyear jetsuit.

THE RECOVERY.

Seto always watching over his Brother, ready to save this awkward party if it kills him (and it really should, that suit is held together by two seat-belts), making sure to get on that platform before Yugi starts going off about how he’s half an Ancient Egyptian. (Ah, life before social media. You could just be hella famous and also half a dead dude and people would just not know. I kinda miss the time before I knew literally everything about everyone.)

Please admire how close those flames are to setting Mokuba’s heavily hairsprayed mane completely alight. It would be an unforgettable spectacle.

These were absolutely just random ass jet packs that Gozaburo Kaiba made to kill hell tons of people, right? Like Seto found it in the family cabin, clutched to the heart of some crispy fried corpse and was like “neat! Mokuba! I found a cool toy!” and just plucked that thing out of that skeleton’s clutches and has been flying around for months?

Like this is Seto Kaiba’s Butter Glider, right?

Seriously what type of vehicle license do you need for one of these things? RIP My ‘Seto only has a scooter license’ headcanon.

Which I’m only even thinking about because I’ve had to try and make an appt with the DMV for days to get a freakin REAL ID. I went to sleep in 2019 and I could fly on a plane. I woke up in 2021 and it’s like “Want one last screw you?” and just...can 2020 please stop screwing me over? It’s March.

Anyway, the Jet is removed soon after, so no, this is not part of his new outfit. He goes right back to his Post-S4-Trauma-Normcore.

After wrestling this competition out of his brother’s hands and confusing everyone in the audience, Roland must have gotten the memo to cut the microphone before Seto got too excited and we were quickly ushered on to the next stage of the tournament.

One sec...the BTS Mashup playlist I just clicked on did a Black Swan X 7 rings mashup and it’s the worst thing my ears have ever heard.

Holy crap. I had to actually turn down my volume. Like...Ariana Grande already has music that has way too many overlapping singing parts on it--and then lets just stick a 52-person boy band on top? That’ll fix it. Yeah. Go ahead.

Wow. Even I had to change the song and you know how much I enjoy pop culture mistakes.

Spot the Mickey but like a million times easier because it’s a Massive Dick Shaped Dragon.

Yep. That’s my grocery shopping outfit. Except maybe not a lab coat and a duel disk. Wish I had a duel disk, that would make social distancing just a hell ton earlier. Just a “Yo, only one person in checkout, please” and then bap them on the head with a propelled discuss/hologram.

Anyway, Grocery shopping/Doctor man dueled the Purple Hair Boy, and considering that Purple Hair got screen time and shook Yugi’s hand once--I think that Doctor man doesn’t stand a freakin chance.

Good. I hate him.

Also, every time he breathes he’s gonna fog up his glasses. I have experience in this area. He can’t read his own cards in the same way I can’t read my phone if I’m in the refrigerated aisle.

So the way this tournament works, is everyone has to sit in the stadium to watch the show. Kinda like showing up to a football stadium just to watch a recorded TV monitor...but then again...that is how it feels to watch a football game at a football stadium when it’s live (at least with the tickets I usually get.)

And as we watch Grandpa waiting for his competitor, we find out that his competitor (Joey) is too busy eating snacks to give him the time of day.

Why do cartoon hot dogs always have lettuce? Is that seriously supposed to be relish? Or is there a place in the world where you put lettuce on your hot dog?

Sorry, bro has just informed of his favorite hot dog order, which is absolutely terrible so I will share it with you: a Five Guys hot dog with ketchup, mustard, pickle relish, onions, mushrooms, pickled peppers, and you guessed it--topped with freakin lettuce.

My own kin. How am I over 30 and just finding out that my baby brother thinks it’s normal to walk into a restaurant with normal god-fearing law-abiding people and order lettuce and mushrooms on a hot dog?

I have fully failed him.

The rest of this episode is watching both Joey Wheeler and Mokuba have a shared panic attack while Seto does freakin nothing.

Please remember that Seto has both a jetpack and a dragon wife plane and could have easily solved this problem. But nah.

Then again, Seto Kaiba has given this crew so MANY rides, that maybe he’s tired of being the Soccer Mom for the team?

Like they don’t actually say this episode, but Seto was the one in charge of like...this entire place, do you think he made the 2 for 1 special just to get Joey where it hurts the most? Or does it actually not take any subterfuge to screw Joey Wheeler because he’s just naturally this way?

Like Mokuba wasn’t there when Joey was told “stay right here, and then we will all go together to fight Dartz” and Joey was like “I’mma save Mai from herself although she told me not to!” and then he Hella Died. But, Mokuba did see the result, AKA, Joey’s dead body being carried on the back of Tristan. Maybe Mokuba never realized that Joey died because he went out of his way to be late?

Lets do a tally of every time I can recall with my dodgy memory that Joey was threatened to be DQ’d/pretty much was DQ’d either by his own fault or no fault of his own

-When he wasn’t allowed to go on the boat to Murder Island because he was a stupid nobody kid who did not have a dueling glove

-When he wasn’t actually supposed to be in Pegasus’ tourney and was, in fact, secretly using half of Yugi’s entrance ticket the entire time

-when Bandit Keith stole the ticket that Joey got from Yugi so then Joey had to borrow Mai’s ticket although she had just used it so it really shouldn't have counted. Because, really anyone could have just piggy backed off of each other’s ticket until the whole boat went through that castle.

-When his account was hacked to get entered into Kaiba’s tourney when Kaiba very clearly told him he could not apply solely because he was Joey Wheeler.

-When he was late to his sister’s eye surgery because he got mugged by Marik’s Rare Hunters, so she almost refused to do the surgery.

-When Joey got possessed by Marik, and as Marik, threatened to murder everyone else in the tournament including both of the Kaiba brother’s who’s tournament it was, and then chained himself to Yugi Muto to throw both of them to the bottom of the ocean.

-I think there was a point when he threatened to attack Kaiba in Kaiba’s own tourney while not possessed? Like several times?

-when he got struck by Lightning and almost did not stand up fast enough after being struck by lightning, which is apparently a type of DQ in Duel Monsters.

-When he tried to save Mai from getting hit by a fireball, but then Yugi did it instead, and then so many people were standing on the dueling platform that Kaiba couldn’t possibly DQ them all.

-When he entered the restricted area of the blimp in order to hassle Kaiba into landing the Blimp, which Kaiba did not do.

-When Marik killed Joey before Joey could press the “go” button on his duel disk to play the card that should have won Joey the match.

-When he was dueling a lawyer in a digital universe but then the dice was like...weighted? So Noah had to walk over and be like “The hell is this weighted dice? This is my perfect digital world? How did you even do that?” and then Joey won because the match was no longer legit.

-When Joey yelled at Noah too much and so Noah turned Joey to stone for being a rude ass spectator

-When Mai was like “Wheeler and Valon, listen closely: do NOT murder each other” and then Joey did a murder on Valon so she was like “I guess I have no choice, I was very clear” and killed Joey straight up.

-When Joey decided to block Seto’s fireballs while Joey Wheeler WAS a playing card, somehow disrespecting both Dartz and Seto Kaiba at the same time.

-When Joey was playing cards but then got absorbed into a giant Leviathan and basically couldn’t play anymore after that.

-There’s probably hell ton of S0 stuff I just haven’t seen yet.

-This episode

And Joey runs fast for a montage of wacky things that really have no business being in a theme park. Things like this:

(remember when Bakura almost died from a rock that ended up being a balloon? It comes full circle.)

The stuff that the Kaiba brother’s think is normal and fun.

Anyway Joey fights off a bunch of hologram snakes and bats and everyone is like “Should we tell him it’s just holograms???” And it’s like wow, guys, how many times have these ‘holograms’ straight up murdered Joey Wheeler and everyone else on this cast? Too many? Because I have a google doc with so many deaths on it. 7,805,844,048, to be exact.

Anyway, he gets there with five seconds to spare and Mokuba’s like “well at least you were still entertaining while we filmed you in front of a live audience being a total spaz for 15 minutes straight, so I’ll let you go.”

Grandpa and Joey start playing, Joey completely oblivious that this is just an older Muto, while Hawkins walks up awkwardly and is like “hey guys. I’m so sorry about this.”

(welcome to my font choices, for those new here, I have to make weird font color choices to make sure it’s legible for the colorblind and also for the non-colorblind. This one is not much contrast, so I may change it up in the future, but for now, this is Grandpa Muto’s new font. I apologize to every graphic designer reading this. Please don’t tell anyone who has ever hired me for graphic design about this blog.)

What’s funny about this exchange is that after they find out that Yugi’s Grandpa is Apdnarg (HOLY my brain cannot get around the spelling for that, and I will not change it in the caps. I cannot do a ‘pdn’ ever again), they don’t stand on his side of the field or anything. Hawkins is legit Solomon Muto’s only fan during this exchange and like...damn. Way not to back your Grandpa, Yugi.

Yugi immediately strides up to Mokuba to non-confrontation-ally inform him that he has stepped over a line and Mokuba is like “what are these things you say called ‘lines?’”

According to Mokuba, Solomon Muto begged him to be in the competition so he could relive his glory days (glory days making no sense here, because the game has only been released for the past 15 years, so glory days is like...the before times that can only be referring to disgraced archeologists and Pegasus ((who is, in his own way...a disgraced archeologist, too))) and Mokuba was like

“You trained Yugi Muto, right? Hey that’s good enough for me. This drama is gold. People will eat it up. Hell yes. Don’t be afraid to abduct him a little bit. Maybe trap a couple people in a digital hellscape for a little while? Now we go by Pegasus house rules here, so fire as many lasers as you want, but just make sure not to hit anyone in the face. Oh man, we are going to be swimming in cash. Love it, Muto Sr, love it.”

But I dunno, I feel like Grandpa won’t make it past next episode. It is Joey. We kinda need him to make it past Ep 4 of the arc. If Grandpa Muto becomes the new Joey Wheeler, that will be a weird transition for this show to make.

But that’s all for today, as always, here is the link to read these in chrono order becuase there’s SO MANY that you don’t need to read backwards--don’t do it--just use the chrono tag (and I don’t know if you can add compound tags, but I did separate the Season from the Episode, so if you write S4, it should only pop up stuff from S4. I didn't’ do that to seasons 1-3 though because I just...didn’t.)

https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/yugioh/chrono

And because I brought it up: here it is, the best BTS Mashup that I found on my deep dive. Like legit--this one isn’t a mess:

Most of other ones are horrible in a fascinating way. Like I’m not even a BTS fan, I think I sort of age out of that metric, I’m just bored and quarantined. And lets be real, we all appreciate a good bop when we hear it.

[pluvillion]

wrote this from my notes earlier. thought i'd post it here as well in case some of you guys might relate to it.

-------

i know this question sounds very weird and random, but do you guys care about how long a band has been active in making music? like, does it matter to you if the band is already two decades old and you fear that they'll break up sooner than you think due to the band's age? do you also care about the band members' ages?

this is gonna be a long one... but this is me with Ice Nine Kills; a band i recently just discovered. i'm the type of person that quietly whispers "i wish i was there when the band was just starting out" to himself but in INK's case, the band was formed literally two years before i was even BORN. Ice Nine Kills were formed in 2000 and started making music in 2002, so i genuinely had NO SINGLE CLUE what they were doing when my mom still changing my diapers. to put it into perspective, Spencer was 17 when Ice Nine Kills started making music in 2002, he's now 35 and will turn 36 in November.

now that i look back at the early 2010's, i wonder what what would've happened if i already discovered INK by then (Spencer's in his 20's). i guess being a kid at 5th grade with basic music tastes didn't help - i was only listening to Vocaloid and Vocaloid ALONE right before i discovered 5SOS in around 2013-2014... i wasn't even a fan of metal/metalcore that time because everyone around me claimed the songs as "the songs from the devil" or whatever stigma they kept sharing to others. i myself wasn't fond of it either because i preferred colorful and poppy music.

Welcome to Horrorwood: The Silver Scream 2 will be released next month and i'm excited for it... but somehow i wish i discovered them earlier in, say, 2017 or 2018 when The Silver Scream was newly released. i missed out on A LOT just by that album ALONE. heck, maybe even way back in 2013 when they covered Adele's "Someone Like You" would be nice... at least i can proudly tell others that i've been listening and loving the band for almost a decade like i do with 5SOS.

tho, considering Spencer's the only founding member left (most members from the 2000's are gone and only a few from 2010's stayed) and how they recently just joined Fearless Records, i'll make myself believe that the band just started having a steady uphill pace in the early 2010's (which is actually the case) and their name is just starting to be known by everyone. at least that's enough to diminish the fact that i'm as old as the band.

i'll encouter this same phase again with a new band that i'll discover, that's for sure; but honestly, all that matters here is that i love their music and i'll keep supporting them. the fear of them breaking up WILL be there, that's unavoidable, but as long as nothing terrible happens, i'm pretty sure the band will stay as is. if they're still active and is teasing/releasing new music/content, there's nothing to worry about. also, Spencer's almost in his 40's (good lord), but i'll be 23 years old and out of college before that happens and it'll already be 2025. who knows what'll happen before then? i hope Spencer still keeps Ice Nine Kills in his 40's tho 😂

hey, maybe someone out there is making the same note as i do but they're saying how they wish they discovered 5SOS earlier instead of discovering them just last year.

(i'm using this reasoning to prevent myself from sulking terribly because i didn't discover a band or an artist earlier haha). maybe someone in the NEAR FUTURE would write another similar note regarding a now-disbanded 5SOS from the year 2060's instead. who knows?

y'know, with what i said above, sometimes i wish i was born earlier. i can (or maybe can't) only imagine what's happening today if i was already, say, 24 years old or so.

anyways, i thought i'd vent with this note because it's been boggling my mind since this morning. i know i'm thinking about this too much but i just wanted to let this all out instead of letting this shitass of a brain ruin my mood day by day. i keep thinking about time a lot, don't i?

i don't even know why this thought popped up in my head in the first place. is it because most band members of the bands i love right now are in their 30's? is it because Spencer's almost in his 40's? i legitimately have no idea. the thought just popped up in my mind last night as i was watching the lyrics video for "Enjoy Your Slay" and it stayed there bugging me until now as i write this.

one thing's for sure tho, i'm very VERY thankful YouTube recommended me their MV for "SAVAGES" back at June (they somehow got the memo for my love of horror, blood, and gore). i now love Ice Nine Kills and i will keep listening to them even it's already 2030. yeah, i wish i discovered them sooner but hey, i'm here now! can't wait for Welcome to Horrorwood: The Silver Scream 2! i'm pretty sure they'll continue making those short movies to pick up where The Silver Scream 1 left off (which will span for over a year or two or even more i bet).

edit (08/09/21; 6:35 pm): i just looked it up and i learned that Dustin Bates from STARSET (the band that i love so much because they talk about astronomy and science in their songs) is only a year younger than Spencer Charnas from INK, so i guess this completely nullifies whatever the fuck i wrote in the paragraphs above but hey at least my brain has calmed down from that certain thought now. i can finally sleep in peace. four to five years is still a lengthy way to go and i hate myself for not thinking that earlier 😂

[sophfic27]

The Mysterious Watch (You know the one)

Fandom: Doctor Who

Summary:  I know what you’re thinking. The woman you’re with — yes, she is me, but no, she’s not ME. Long story short, I’ve temporarily made myself human. The woman you see has no idea she is the Doctor, and for the time being, you can’t tell her. Right now, her name is Joanna — she is a UNIT Field Operative currently investigating some aliens known as the Ralmaeth. I need you to keep an eye on me, if I’m reckless, don’t let me get myself killed. I have faith in you, Yaz. The Doctor

Pairing: Thasmin (Thirteenth Doctor x Yaz)

Notes:  I have not written a Doctor Who fanfic in something like 7 years, and that was in middle school, so we do not speak of it, but I was struck with inspiration to start this. I have the rest of the fic already mostly planned out, so I'm hoping to have pretty regular updates with this. I posted this on AO3 and just now remembered I have this blog for fics so. It’s here now, too. Hope you enjoy!

Read on AO3

Next

Chapter 1: Meeting Joanna

Word Count: 1,578

Yaz sat at the little table in her family flat, scrolling absentmindedly through her phone. The Doctor had dropped her off here three days ago, and she was starting to get restless waiting to meet up with her again tomorrow as they had agreed. She blinked at her phone as it came to life, ringing, the Doctor’s name appearing on the screen as if by thinking about her she had somehow willed her to call. Or perhaps she had read her mind.

Yaz picked up a few moments after the phone started ringing and was greeted by a familiar voice on the other end. “Hi, Yaz!” said the Doctor, bright as ever. Yaz barely had the chance to say hi back before the Doctor continued, “Listen, I know we agreed on tomorrow, but I kind of need to move our meeting up a little,” she explained. There was a lot of noise in the back of the call. Yaz could hear rattling and the familiar whoosh of the TARDIS engines. The Doctor was in flight, and from the tone of her voice, it seemed like she was in a hurry.

“Uh, sure,” Yaz replied, “everything okay?”

“Oh, fine,” the other woman called back, “totally. Bit of a rush, but overall, brilliant.” She was rambling. Yaz could picture her scurrying around the console madly while on the phone. The Doctor went on, “What time is it for you?”

Yaz glanced at a nearby clock quickly, “11:30, why?”

“How does an hour sound?”

“For what?” Despite asking, she got up to get her stuff anyway, an hour wasn’t a lot of time for whatever the Doctor was about to say next.

“I need you to come meet me in an hour. I’ll…” she paused for a second, “I’ll be at a hotel. The Bronze Shroud Hotel, room 310. Meet me there.”

“At a hotel?” That was new, “why not just meet at the TARDIS like usual?”

“No time to explain, Yaz. Bronze Shroud, room 310, be there?”

Sensing she didn’t have much of a say, she agreed to meet her.

“Perfect,” the Doctor chirped, “now I have to go, I’ve got some things to… prepare. See you soon. And, Yaz…” she hesitated for a moment, and finally, “good luck.”

“Luck? With what?” but she had already hung up. Yaz looked at her phone, bewildered. She shrugged and gathered her stuff, and typed in the name of the hotel the Doctor had mentioned on her phone’s GPS.

An hour later, Yaz had parked and was making her way up to the entrance of the hotel. It was nice, about four stories high, and surrounded by nice bushes on the path. She made her way through the lobby, noting the check-in desk on her left, and the entrance to the bar and restaurant. She looked around to find an elevator and made her way over. When the doors slid open, the back of the elevator was a mirror, and Yaz found she was face to face with herself. She pressed the button for 3 and waited. The trip was short, and she was soon in front of room 310. Still a little confused, she raised her fist to knock on the wooden door.

A few moments passed, and a familiar voice came from the other side. “Who’s that?” she asked abruptly. Yaz could tell she must be just beyond the door.

She eyed the peephole with slight confusion, and called back, “it’s Yaz.” She waited for a moment, expecting the door to swing in, and the Doctor to welcome her in and explain everything.

Instead, “Y-A-Z?” the voice called back with it’s thick, northern twang.

Yaz blinked. “… Yes?”

There was another beat before the door rattled slightly, the sound of disengaging locks. Finally, it swung open to reveal… the Doctor? But she was dressed in a black leather jacket, dark jeans, and combat boots, and her hair was styled wavier than usual. And she was wearing makeup. The Doctor never did that.

She looked Yaz up and down and spoke finally, “I thought they might be initials,” she said simply.

Yaz blinked again, more confused by the second. “What?”

“Yaz. Y-A-Z. I thought they were initials,” she dug into her pocket and produced an envelope, smoothing it out slightly. “I’m Joanna. Jo to my friends. If I had any,” she said, “nice to meet you.”

Yaz stared at her, “meet?”

The Doctor — Joanna? — held the envelope out to Yaz, “I’m supposed to give this to you, apparently.” She waited expectantly for Yaz to take it.

Completely lost, Yaz reached out to take the envelope. As she took it, she noticed the Doctor was wearing a few random silver rings. Those were new. She examined the envelope. Scrawled across it were two sloppily spaced sentences. “DO NOT READ.” The words were underlined angrily. Under them, it said, “Deliver to YAZ.” With her name capitalized, it did look like they could be initials. But that didn’t answer even the least pressing of her questions.

She slid a fingernail under the lip of the envelope, but was interrupted by the Doctor saying “you gonna read that in the hallway?” Yaz looked up at her, she was stood in the doorway, arms crossed over chest, giving Yaz a sort of amused look. She moved to open the door more to let Yaz into the room. Yaz stepped in and looked around while the other woman clicked the door shut behind her and slid the locks back into place. The walls were covered in pictures, documents, and pages that seemed to have been torn out of a notebook and taped up. It was like something out of a film, the only thing it was missing was a bunch of red string. She saw there were a few open files sitting on the desk as well and a laptop pushed into the corner. The Doctor stood beside her, her arms crossed again.

Yaz glanced back at her and gestured to the wall, “what’s all this?”

The Doctor surveyed the chaos. “Our mission,” she stated. She then turned her attention back to the envelope in Yaz’s hand. “You gonna read that letter? I’ve been carrying it around for days, I want to know what it says. Although I’m not the one who’s supposed to read it. So…” she nodded to punctuate her point.

“You’ve been carrying it for days? But you only called me an hour ago?”

The Doctor stuck out her bottom lip in thought and shook her head slightly, “no, I didn’t,” she replied, “this is the first we’ve talked.”

Yaz stared at her again. Finally, she opted to just read the letter and give up asking questions. She broke the seal of the envelope as carefully as she could.

She drew the letter out and unfolded it. It held the same handwriting as the envelope.

Yaz, Don’t Read Aloud

“So?” said the Doctor, “I’m curious to know what I’ve been carrying.” “It says not to read aloud,” replied Yaz.

The Doctor looked slightly dejected, but then shrugged. “Damn. Makes sense, though. In case someone is listening.”

Yaz looked back down and continued to read.

I know what you’re thinking. The woman you’re with — yes, she is me, but no, she’s not ME. Long story short, I’ve temporarily made myself human. The woman you see has no idea she is the Doctor, and for the time being, you can’t tell her. Right now, her name is Joanna — she is a UNIT Field Operative currently investigating some aliens known as the Ralmaeth. The thing is UNIT doesn’t currently exist, their operations were suspended, but she doesn’t know that she’ll just think her mission calls for total radio silence to UNIT because the Ralmaeth might intercept any transmissions or messages.

This is where you come in, the Ralmaeth would be able to sense me coming, we’ve crossed paths before, so I’ve had to disguise myself for this, but they need to be stopped. Now in this form, I’m not as durable as usual, so I need you to keep an eye on me, if I’m reckless, don’t let me get myself killed. And don’t let me get you killed of course. She’s expecting you to be a fellow operative teamed up with her, so she’ll trust you. Ask Joanna to brief you on the mission and she’ll tell you what she knows. Help her investigate, help her stop them. When you’ve done that, I have one last task for you.

She’s carrying a fob watch. She won’t really think about it or even really notice it, but when your mission is done, I need you to have her open it. That’s how I’ll return to normal. I have faith in you, Yaz.

The Doctor

P.S. Obviously, don’t let Joanna read this. Tell her it was just a quick memo on the mission or something.

Yaz looked up at the woman in front of her. Joanna. The Doctor, but human, and unaware of the Doctor. She folded up the letter and pushed it into her jacket pocket.

Joanna raised an eyebrow. “Just a memo on the mission,” she recited the excuse from the Doctor, “can you brief me on what you know about our mission and the Ralmaeth?”

Joanna smiled, a glint shining in her eye, “Absolutely,” she replied and made her way to the wall of pictures and documents.

This was going to be interesting, Yaz thought.

[airariaira]

Quatrième - 04/03/2020

Alright, strap yourselves in lads, because I left the writing of this about a week later than I usually do so this post will probably be a bit of a long one. First of all I’d like to say again that yes, I feel that my French is improving quite a lot with each day here - even if I’m not perfect, but confidence is growing and I’m definitely more confident in saying the things I say often.

Now, let’s go back to the 13th of February. My journal entry from that day seems a bit of a negative one, because I was writing about my conflicting feelings that sometimes pop up - whether I should allow my classmates to approach me first and thus seem like the quiet and awkward exchange student, or whether I should approach them first and feel like I’m pushing myself on them. It feels a little overwhelming sometimes to be surrounded by so many cool French people when my language skills often can’t keep up (and perhaps a bit the same with my social skills too 😂). Sometimes it feels like I’m wasting the opportunity right in front of me when I don’t have the confidence to strike up a conversation. As mentioned by Alex in his blog, I know I shouldn’t keep myself at a distance from my peers, but it’s so hard not to fall into the trap of doing that when 1. I’m leaving in only a month (oh my goodness, it’s so soon 😱), and 2. the past two weeks have been holidays and I haven’t seen any of them at all (reasoning for that is distance, being busy, and/or the fact that the week following the holidays - this week - is their BAC blanc exams, which is prelim exams for all you NZ ppl).

The 14th was a better day. Of course it being Valentine’s Day, the Cœur de Troyes is a major attraction on that day. I should have wandered by it to see it all dressed up. That morning I was late to school (great first time French school experience...) I was close to catching the bus, but just not close enough.. How frustrating it was to watch that bus leave without me right before my eyes. I caught the next bus, but it turns out that my bus card had run out that day. However, the bus had already left so I took that ride without a working bus card (oh heck, is that police sirens I hear?) So all in all, that was a day of many bus hardships. Because of all that, I walked home and it was actually really lovely to take the chance to admire the city again. Sometimes I find myself getting a bit comfortable and I have to remind myself that omg I really am  a c t u a l l y  in France right now! 

On Saturday the 15th I went to the market with Marie. The market here is so cool. Lots of bustling people buying all the things they need for the week, there’s live chickens, cheese of course, clothes, a whole lot of other random stuff... The market is a pretty big thing in French culture so I enjoy going and seeing it. That afternoon we drove to pick up Antoine from a friend’s house, who lives a few towns over. It was a really nice day, so the sun hit the rolling countryside really nicely that day. We also drove through some small towns I hadn’t seen yet, and they were very cute. I’ll never stop being impressed by all the beautiful old buildings in France. That evening I made a silly language mistake and mixed up the words for packing bags and doing the dishes, so now whenever I hear one I think of the other. 😅

Sunday 16th had us travelling down to Marseilles for out 5-day holiday. It was a 7 hour drive, but we took the whole day because we stopped off at Marie’s sister’s place for lunch. She and her partner live close to where Alex is placed, so I took this truly wonderful quality photo to demonstrate to him whereabouts I was:

For lunch we had raclette, the weather was very nice, and so was the company. Marie’s sister’s husband’s children were there too. Last minute, it was decided his daughter Ambre would come along on the holiday with us which was nice. So we switched to a bigger car and set off again. When we reached Marseilles it was almost pretty much dark, but I could still see the countryside - different but really nice. The city is an eclectic mix of old and new, and there’s even a Hollywood style sign (like in Wellington!) here’s another definitely really great quality photo...

Some of the highlights from our trip to Marseilles:

Visited the museum (called Mucem)

Place des Pistoles

The Cathedral

The Notre-Dame of Marseilles

Picnic on the beach

Visit to Cassis

It’s very easy to get around Marseilles, because there’s a card called “le ticket” which you can access not only the Metro with, but also the busses, which is very useful. The Metro system is also a lot more simple than the one in Paris, because it only has two lines. The city is also quite pretty because it’s this nice mixture of old buildings, street art, flowers and plants overflowing from balconies, sculptures, and sunshine of course. People’s accents in the south are also a bit different to in the places further north, so that was interesting for me to experience too. The first day (Monday) was a bit rainy, so we decided to visit Mucem, which was nice. The museum was incredible. The two exhibits I liked the most were one on voyages and travel, which had a mixture of different art pieces that I really adored. One of them was this light globe, which seemed cool... Until we noticed that the rug in the foreground had left out New Zealand! Typical 😂

The other exhibit I really liked was one on the life and work of the famous and very celebrated French author/poet named Giono. He was a part of the world wars, so a lot of his work is descried as being often very haunting. I hope to be able to read some of it sometime. I wish I could have stayed in the museum for longer and committed the exhibits to memory. After seeing the exhibits, we headed outside onto the roof, where there’s a pretty herb garden and a gorgeous view all around you of the city and the sea.

The following days, the weather was a heck of a lot better, with the sun out and about I almost forgot it was winter at some points! On Tuesday we visited a pretty old part of town, and walked along the Place Des Pistoles, which is an area of streets dedicated to street art. it was very pretty, and I guess you could say it felt ... right up my alley 😏

After that, we went to the Catheral which was nice - it was very very big inside, and the weather at that point was very very windy outside.

Following that, we continued with the church thing and went to visit the very high-up Notre-Dame of Marseille. Because it’s so high up we were able to take a bus thank goodness, and there was also a gorgeous view of the city below us. 

The inside was incredibly extravagant and shiny...

On Wednesday we went for a picnic lunch on the beach. We definitely earned it, as we had many bus mishaps on the way there! It was a very sunny day, but the wind was very strong on the beach. We also amassed a small army of seagulls, pigeons, sparrows, and other miscellaneous birds while we were eating. This is the view back from the shore:

There was also this dude here across the road from the beach:

Thursday was a wonderful day. It was also the half way point of my exchange, whaaaat!? We drove out to the pretty nearby village of Cassis. It was even warmer there - so warm I didn’t even need to wear a jacket! We went on a short walk first, and got some nice views of the cliff-faces, water, and boats below:

(Cassis has always been a boating/fishing area. I can see why, with how beautifuul the water and the weather is!)

^ Ambre, Lola and I

Halfway through the walk, we stopped on some warm rocks for a rest and some lunch. It was really nice in the sun.

Lola, myself, Lola, and Olivier.

Clearly I missed the peace sign memo AND the cup holding memo!

After that, we wandered around the town a litte bit. It is truly a beautiful place - I couldn’t really believe I was seeing it all with my very own eyes.

There were also a few groups of people very intensely playing games of Petanque. I think Dad and Lisa would have appeciated that. We then had icecream while looking over all the boats. It feels very odd writing about the nice weather there when currently as I am writing it is 6pm and suddenly very rainy! That evening, we had dinner at a friend of Marie’s. It was very nice, and their family was lovely and welcoming. I did gett a little overwhelmed at one point because there was a lot of rapid French being spoken by a lot of different people all at once and it was difficult for my tired self to keep up after a big day. However it was still enjoyable. Us younger ones got along pretty well. It’s a little weird, meeting all these nice people here while I’m exchange and realising that I may very well never see some of them again... On Friday the 21st we drove back home, stopping off to drop off Ambre and to have some lunch there too. 

That weekend was quiet. On Sunday Marie’s mother joined us for lunch. We then went to the house in Geraudot for a short while, then went for a walk along a different, bigger, lake nearby. I would love to see it in the summer, when all the restaurants and things were open, people camping just across the road, the golden sand in the sun... Here’s a picture from the ride home to demonstrate why the landscape here sometimes gives me (coming from Blenheim surrounded by hills) shellshock. Tell me, am I living in that Window’s screensaver we all know and love?

On Monday evening I went to watch my first sports game ever - a French football game (sorry Kiwi rugby diehards). The Troyes football team is called Estac. The game felt a little slow at times, but other times I found myself getting pretty into it! A good experience in general.

On Wednesday evening, three friends of Lola’s came for an early overnight celebration for Lola’s birthday. We played a game called “Ta Mere En Slip”, which is a little like “Heads Up”, but with a person and an action to guess. Here’s a photo from that:

Thursday 27 February - Paris no. 2

On Thursdays, usually Marie works in Paris, taking an early train there and an evening train back. We decided that it could be a cool idea for me to travel over with her and spend the day by myself. It was an... interesting day, to say the least.

We had an early start, took the train, and then recharged my Metro card once we got there. All good, mostly, except until the card didnt work, which was a little awkward and confusing 🙄 After getting through that, Marie and I parted ways; she on her way to a meeting at work, and I on a metro to the Louvre. I had some trouble with the many confusing lines once I got there, and another tourist even asked me if she was in the riht line, to which I replied that I was sorry I was also rather confused! I hope she found her way in the end, because we were both very much in the wrong line but for different reasons. I found the correct line for me, and then I was in the Louvre! I ended up spending upward of three hours here, there was so much to see. Beautiful paintings that are so nice to appreciate in person, Greek and Roman sculpture (my inner classics nerd was wilding, it was great to see these things that I’d studied up close), some gorgeous neoclassical and otherwise French sculpture, beautiful extravagant objects from past French royalty, even Eastern and Egyptian antiquities. There was just so much and of course it was impossible to see it all (though naturally I tried - my sore feet did not thank me later). That moment of awe you feel when you see something that you truly ove is near indescribable. Here’s some photos of some of my favourite things that I saw:

A bust of Alexander the Great

Some very  impressive, large paintings

The very very extravagant ceiling in one of the gallery rooms

A view of the pyramid, the little doll people, and the not-so-great weather outside from the beautiful objects area with all the past belongings of French monarchs

A nice piece from the French sculpture area

I got pretty lucky with my trip to the Louvre for a few reasons. One was that my ticket was for the morning at opening time, so I managed to get in before the worst of the crowds. Pretty awesome being able to wander around without being hindered too badly by lots of other people also trying to get as close as they possibly can to every piece. The other reason I got lucky was because the Louvre is now closed. It closed on Saturday the 29th of February, and remains closed now, it being unclear when it may open again. This was following an announcement of a nation-wide ban of gatherings of more than 5000 people in a confined space. The Louvre, of course, falls under this category.

Anyway, after that very long musemum trip, I was happily full with appreciation for art nd culture, however I was also very hungry and thirsty (no drink bottles allowed in the museum haha). So I went outside and got myself a bite to eat from a bakery stall outside, which I had overlooking the pretty garden outside (yes it was raining a bit and the bench was a little damp too, so yes I sacrificed my rain jacket to sit on). The interaction I had with the person at the bakery stall felt like the most natural interaction all in French I had had with a customer service person so far. I think that was the proudest I’d ever been of myself simply for ordering a sandwich! 😂 It was nice to just sit down with my food and admire my surroundings and people watch for a while. I could even see the Eiffel tower fro my spot, which was nice. I then wandered all the way through the garden, admiring the flowers and fountains and sculptures and the many many empty benches. I’d love to see how it looks in the sun - I bet those benches will be pretty well occupied in the springtime. After that I went on a mission for toilets and discovered the truly wonderful and fantastic thing that is Paris’ tendency for toilets that cost money to use. After that delightful exprience I headed to see the Obelisk. I may have been walking against the wind and rain, but the area was still pretty. 

I then walked all the way down the Champs- Élysées (my poor feet), until I reached the Arc de Triomphe. It was by then only the early afternoon and I realised I was at a bit of a loss as to what to do. I had options, of course, but the travel to them on the metro or busses or otherwise seemed confusing and I had the added issue of not having any data or wifi to use google maps with. (Next time I am definitely getting some data - that would have solved a whole lot of problems 🙄). Long story short, one thing led to another and I ended up stressy ugly-crying with a burger I didn’t want in a McDonalds just so I could use the wifi to try and make sense of the metro system, while messaging Marie. Then to top it all off, my bathroom grievances continued because, naturally, the bathroom in that restaurant was another one that costed, and I had spent the last of my change on that burger. Dang. Anyways, I decided to go down to the metro to try and find my way to the Montmartre church. However, my metro card problems continued, my confusion of the metro system continued, and I ended up on the phone to Marie who said she would come meet me. I felt very bad that she left work for me, she said it was all okay, but naturally I still felt bad. She found me eventually, a littel tearstained and very embarrassed, and we headed on the metro to Montmartre together. She tried to explain the metro system to me a bit more, which was good and I feel like I’ve got a liiiittle bit of a better handle on it now.

On the steep walk up to Montmartre there were lots and lots of tourist shops, and then a lot a lot of stairs, with some street art on the walls which was pretty cool. The church was very pretty. We didn’t go inside, but the outside was very nice. All the surrounding fences were cooovered in lovers’ padlocks

The viewn was also very nice. Paries views (and I think French views in genral?) are always interesting. A mix of that classic Parisian architecture, you know the one -modern buildings, well-known monuments, building cranes, oooold old buildings and monuments, and sometimes the odd bit of big street art on the high-up walla. It’s never the same view you expect to see. 

After that nice wee trip we went to grab a coffee and stop off at the cafe’s toilets before we headed home. However, toilet grievance number 3 hit us suddenly because the toilets were out of order. After that we decided to head to the train station and leave a littel earlier than originally planned. I was so tired after a big day I couldn’t help but fall asleep on the train 😂 Once we were back home I recounted my metro meltdown and we all decided that perhaps public transport (missing train stops, being confused by the metro and bus syetems...) is simply not my strong point, lol. Anyways, despite the stressy moments of that day, all in all it was a good experience, and the good moments were really enjoyable. I’m not going to letit deter me, and I hope in the future I’ll have more chances to explore the city and improve my knowledge of how to get around.

Saturday the 29th was a good day. We had gratin dauphinois for lunch, which was cool because it reminded me of my Nanna because it was one of her specialties, and it reminded me of the one time I made it for a culture project for French class. That afternoon, Marie and I headed back to the museum with the section on bonneterie, because there’s a new exposition there at the moment. It’s on the brand of socks called Doré Doré, celebratng it’s 200 year anniversary (weird that a sock brand in France is older than the entire government in New Zealand), and the factories have been based in Troyes since the beginning. It was cute, and a littel funny with all the little socks and things. There were lots of these big sock wall decorations outside the exhibit:

Sunday was the last day of the holidays. In the morning Marie, Lola and I went to the bakery to pick up Lola’s birthday cake. Her birthday isn’t until the 7th, but on Sunday afternoon there was some family coming to celebrate. It’s funny when we go into any store, every time the cashier assumes I’m a separate customer, so I’m now well practiced at saying oh no thank you we are all together. For lunch, Marie’s mother, brother, his partner, and their young son Jack-Jack came around. There was nice conversation, nice food, and then a game of ‘Ta Mere En Slip’. They’re all very nice, and it feels easier now than every for me to speak French with groups of people. It’s still hard sometimes, but it’s much better! 

Yesterday was interesting. It was sort of the first day back at school. I got up early, Marie took Lola and I to school as usual... However I had neglected to check what the case was with the BAC blanc exams this week. Turns out that no, there is no classes at all, and it is in fact just tests all throughout the week. So that was an interesting time for me, turning up there and my classmates finding it funny I was there at all. So I just headed back home after spending a little while in the school library, and sike! I have, in some ways, another week of holidays... I’m thinking I might do some more exploring, go back to the museum, I could go to the movies and try watching something in French again, I could write some postcards or things home... Today I’ve just been writing this blog entry this morning, I’ve gone out to eat pizza for lunch with Marie, but the weather today is lovely (much better than the rain last night), so I might go do something. I am in absolute disbelief that I have less than 4 weeks left on exchange. Where did the time go? I swear I must comment on how fast the time is going by at least a few times a day at this point. But wow, it really is going fast.

Until next time!

[bandomgay]

My brain to yours pt.1 b.u

Tw: blood,gore,self harm,violence,hallucinations,slight mention of an ed

Au: hey babes this is gonna be my 5th time trying to post this and i want death so bad...however if there is any confusing things or typos or things seem to quickly paced im sorry thats just my brain babey! Enjoy...i guess

Word count: 1,894

It all started when he was about 6 years old, he never spoke ever,not that he couldn't he just wouldn't, his parents were worried about his development,however nothing was ‘wrong', he had a quite developed thinking process for a child, but it wasn't a good one for his age nor was it a normal one,no child should be so terrified of talking to people and being thought lesser of as his voice shook violently while trying to say the easiest of sentences.

he understood people to early into his young life ,he got the memo that everything was too stupid and too hard to understand so he gave up . his mother took him back and forth to hospitals and child psychologists ,his mother scared for what was to come of him could this weirdness she didn't even have a name or diagnosis for develop into something more as he grew? She thought, would he be normal? Would he be like the other children who laughed and giggled at the littlest of things? Would he be happy like them? She had decided to push her concerns into the back of head deciding that maybe he was just awkward it's okay to not fit in hes a fucking 6 year old boy maybe it's not that deep.

he was now in the 3rd grade now and teachers became more and more loud and responsive with their problems, he thought maybe whatever bad stuff they had going on at home they just needed to vent threw aggressiveness and shaking hands and restless mornings,but however it was their screams he didn't care for, he looked them in the eye wondering what he had done wrong, however he didn't care enough to continually think about it, but he realized slowly that couldn't feel anything like the red faced teacher did, he’d envy the poor mannered teachers feelings if he could, just how they could get so angry and fed up with kids who were disgusting and vile and how he never felt that…... he never felt anything at all .Now he was in the 5th grade he had to repeat the 4th grade due to staggeringly low grades and his failed attempts at homework he never seemed to have remembered. Things were getting hard to remember, so hard to remember what the teacher had said in the classroom that seemed to fade away after he was picked up by his mom and the sheer silence of the drive home and his mothers sneaking looks into the mirror with furrowed eyebrows at her son who never told her how his day went.

In school it was just so easy just to drift off in the land of dark swirls and dark worlds filled with make believe that he couldn't separate from the real world that never seemed to go away and darkness he felt comfort in his head till he heard nothing but the disgusting laugh of a teacher who had looked as if she wanted to deck him in the face ( he imagined about 3 different scenarios of how that actually could have occured, he held back a giggle and a sly smirk) as she snapped her wrinkled hands in his face “earth to brendon” he heard the aged feminine voice laced with anger repeat twice but he had failed to tune into the first reminder he was too dissociated to notice, he came too but didn't understand her reasonings of not just leaving him alone and let him rot and break free and he soon heard the fits of laughter coming from children he knew he was too weak to stop.

he wanted to do terrible things to everyone in that very room including himself, a dark desire he couldn't contain from his mind but he never followed through with these type of thoughts. he could never seemed control them he thought of them like messages being sent from an unknown source in the back of his head that had an invisible connection to someone he could see but nobody else could he dared himself if he could just pull at the cord in his head he wouldn't have those those thoughts, the figure never showed up in the same form it could be the shadows of dirty rain water coming from outside showing like a projection on the dingy beat up wall rising above him to claim a mental dominance , or the rotten stain of mold on the bathroom floor that now seemed to have a charming glow yet secretive smile or the bag of dirty clothes that sat high up on its rounded edges now smiled at him and watched him threw the night .

now it was the 7th grade and things had went to shit,it was already shit but it had gotten no better, fits of depression had left him wanting to call a hitman on himself and letting himself be cut open so all the organs in his body to be shot out of him or rip his jaw and everything behind it out of his body but he was too fatigued to think about it anymore his brain seemed to have stopped working back in the 6th grade, he could never think clearly a heavy fog on his brain he could never do much for himself he found the most simple of things he couldn't do, he couldn't pay attention, he felt dizzy at random times becoming feverish and not thinking about why because he couldn't think he thought process lessen and lessened with every passing day until all there were was thoughts of gore and death,sadness and the never ending thought of killing anyone or anything that had managed to make him want death even more.

he just continued to fade in and out of reality staring into the wall for to long or unknowingly staring at the couple of people who he thought was calling him pathetic and worthless with the contradictory voice telling him he's so much better than the disgusting people he saw and that they didn't deserve to smile they don't deserve happiness even though they’d never even spoken a word to him, they were never mean to him. he started pinching,stabbing,pulling at his hair,clawing at himself hard trying to see if he could care that he'd just hurt himself he continued to hurt himself hoping somewhere in the back of his mind he start to feel things, to show him he's real everyone sees him, but his inner self knew what he was doing he wasn't just trying to see if he was a real person he was punishing himself because he couldn't do what the rest of the real kids could do he couldnt plop himeself in a hard metal chair and take a test without thinking about what a disgusting person he was, without hearing them say he wasn't shit that his brain is mush that he couldn't understand the easy directions how he could get so angry and mad without hesitation how he could imagine killing his parents im cold blood… he stomped on his own foot,why is he thinking about this why is he thinking about this why, they creeped back up on him showing him images of his brother and sisters dead and gutted his parents choking on blood and vomit pale and dying, he hated himself for thinking these things,but if it was possible for him to be completely honest with himself he didn't care if they had died or not he just didn't have the ability to care.

He couldn't look people in the face without seeing these images of grewling faces pushed together in piles of pink and red flesh crawling into each others organs which looked rotten and distorted, why was he seeing this things these disgusting things these things… he wouldn't admit to himself that everytime he looked in the mirror he tried not to vomit he tried to hard, he bashed in the mirror bloodlying his hand, his hiss echoing in the empty bathroom he couldn't go to the nurse he couldn't look her in the eye and see her like that, besides he was on the first floor and he was too weak to go all the way to the fourth floor he knew he would pass out, he felt something pooling in his stomach it was anxiety he felt the cramping in his stomach and the salivating in his dry mouth, he vomited into the sink, he hasn't eaten anything in about 3 weeks so the pain of dry heaving for almost half in hour into the sink made him dizzy and ultimately pass out. he had now awoken to bright lights that made him nauseous and whimper, he was in the hospital again. he tried so hard not look the nurses and doctors in the eye and seeing horrific images in his mind of them dead, rotten maggot filled and bloody be he regained his ability to see the normally after a while.

“Brendon honey…” his mommy's voice was there “mommy...hi mommy” he said in a broken whisper. She had realized he never calls her mommy unless something's wrong he wasn't aware that he was, he turned to the right finding an iv carefully placed into in scarily pale arm “honey...they found you in the bathroom your hand was cut up...you where passed out what...t?” she silenced herself for a moment seconds later starting up again. “They found you in the bathroom..the mirror was broken and your hand was cut pretty deep and passed out” he mouth trembled a bit, she moved his sweaty bangs out of his forehead, he felt wetness on his skin his own uniform shirt clinging to his skin he was sweating.

He didn't feel real he didn't respond properly to what she had said he only looked away.. And said “dizzy….everything hurts…” he was so surprised he felt something but if feeling was like this he didn't want it. “I d..don't wanna feel like this..can you make it stop mommy please?!” Nani was absolutely terrified she'd never been so scared for her little boy, “its gonna be okay,sweetie...i swear..to god i swear…” in this moment if she was honest she didn't believe there was a god, no god would do this to her son, she turned around after hearing the door and hard footsteps.

“Hello ms. Urie im dr. Yakima, i will be assisting and diagnosing your son” she nodded softly wanting her son to be okay. “Hey son,open your eyes for me,i'm here to help” brendon heard a much more distorted version of what the doctor had said than nani did, but then again he was fading in and out. He handed her pills and said firmly “these are anti-nausea and pain killers i'm gonna give these to him and he will feel much much better i promise..” He was right it with his cocked up eyebrow and charming smile that sparkled with calmness and reassurance that worked its way into nani. the medication  worked but not instantly. “Sit up honey..” She said softly, he followed what she said slowly with a wrecked groan and intense muscle pain however there was no rush.

[imagineyneyjr]

Imagine #16 Maluma or Neymar? -Part 2

| PART 1 | 

"I swear Gil, he looked so hot!" I told him dreamily, remembering the moment Maluma walked into the room, "He was so nice too and I can assure you he was flirting with me." "Hmm, how so?" He asked me, his voice still hoarse. "Well, he told me he'd slide in my dm's and he kept looking at me." Gil laughed at me.

I was over at Gil's the next day to tell him everything about the concert and what had happened.

"And how did you get along with Neymar?"  He asked me curiously and then continued eating the soup I cooked for him.

"Neymar... hmm..." I thought about it for a while, "He's a nice guy. Yeah, he knew how to keep a conversation going and he was extremely chill about everything. I think I've gotten to know him a lot better and we've grown a little closer." Gil grinned, "A love triangle, how exciting."

I gently smacked his head, "Idiota. I am not in love with either."

I spent the day at his apartment and around 9 o'clock I headed back home. I had to attend another class tomorrow at college which meant I had to wake up at 7. Lord help me.

~~

A couple of weeks had passed since the concert and today marked October 27. I had seen Neymar a couple of times at Gil's and other than that we exchanged phone numbers.

Maluma on the other hand, we had exchanged a couple of messages via Instagram's direct message. A couple of days after the concert I still hadn't heard from him, therefore I seriously thought he lied and forgot about me. As a result I still wondered how he found my Instagram. Anyway, we switched to Whatsapp later on since that was more convenient. We talked about random stuff; like music, sports, his tour and my life in Barcelona. He told me his tour had ended a few days ago and he would be back in Barcelona by tomorrow, because he was going to record a song with Shakira.

The familiar ringtone of my phone could be heard throughout my condo. I lazily grabbed it up from the coffee table in front of me and paused Stranger Things. Slightly annoyed I picked up not bothering to look who was calling me this late.

"Hello?" I spoke.

"Hola Y/N, did I interrupt you?" The sexy voice I heard made me regret not looking at the called ID. It was Maluma. I hadn't spoken to him, we only texted each other. I sat up straight and answered him quickly, "Hi Maluma! No, no. Not at all. How are you?" "Better now I hear your voice." I could picture the smirk on his face right now. I laughed, "Then I've done my job. Why are you calling?" The words left my mouth as if his call was bothering me. "You don't want me to call you?" He asked offended and by his voice I couldn't tell if he was joking or not, "No, of course not. On the contrary!" "I knew what you meant," he chuckled, "I was just playing with you." I let out a sigh of relief and he continued talking, "I actually called you, because Shakira invited me to her Halloween party and I would like it if you'd be my date." His words made my heart flutter out of joy. I thought about it for a second since I knew I had some exams coming up soon. "Yes! Sure, I'd love to. I just need to know when it is with reference to my upcoming exams." "I believe it's the 31st, on Halloween itself." "That's perfect." I beamed. We ended the conversation shortly after and I continued watching Stranger Things just to be interrupted again. I let out a huff. I checked my phone for the message I received and saw it was Neymar asking if I was still awake. I replied to him and in a split second he replied back. I shouldn't have said something, because he just put me in an awkward position.

Are you free the 31st? I was wondering if you wanted to be my date for Shak's Halloween party.

Well fuck. I had already agreed going with Maluma and I couldn't just ditch him, he asked me first after all. This situation was messing up my feelings. What was I supposed to tell Neymar?

I typed about ten different messages in my memos and eventually settled on the one that was most subtle:

I'm so sorry, Ney, but Maluma already asked me to go with him and I said yes. If he didn't ask me I would've gone with you. Sorry. I'll see you there.

I hit sent and it took him a good 5 minutes to answer.

I understand, don't be sorry! See you there then. Good night, Y/N.

I replied to him and went to sleep.

~~

The next few days passed by quickly and before I knew it it was Halloween. I met up with Maluma twice, both times for lunch. We got to know each other better and the thing I most definitely picked up on were his skills in flirting. He's so smooth and he still manages to make it sound genuine. That guy never fails to amaze me honestly.

I was getting ready for the party and Maluma and I both decided to go as vampires, therefore I was wearing a long red and black gown with some lace and a high collar. For my make-up I had dark red lips along with a dark smokey eye just for effect. I put on black pumps and I was ready to go. Maluma was supposed to be here in five minutes so I decided to play a game on my phone while waiting for him. Within less than two minutes I heard the door bell. I locked my phone, grabbed my clutch and opened the door to find Maluma dressed up as a rather sexy looking vampire. He held a beautiful bouquet of flowers in his hands, "Ay mi Dios, you look gorgeous, Y/N. These are for you." He smiled at me.

"Thank you and for the flowers too! They are beautiful." I gushed and opened the door wider so he could come in. "I'm just quickly gonna put these in a vase." I smelled the fresh looking roses whilst searching for a vase. I heard him close the door and he followed me. It took me less than 5 minutes and I was done. I turned towards Maluma who was watching my every step. I gave him a hug and a kiss on his cheek and thanked him for the flowers again. We then finally left my house and headed towards Shakira's. While he was driving and talking about his new song with Shakira I couldn't help but steal glances at his handsome face. I noticed there was some lipstick on his cheek from earlier. I leaned over and softly swiped it away with my thumb. Once I was done he gave me a confused look, "What was that for?" "Lipstick." I chuckled. He smiled and put his left hand on my thigh and kept it there the whole ride, "Gracias, mamacita." We arrived at Shakira's house and it was huge but insanely pretty. Maluma opened the door for me and I got out. We linked arms and walked towards the front door. He rang the bell and Shakira opened the door. They greeted each other before Maluma introduced me, "Shakira meet Y/N, my stunning date. Y/N meet Shakira." We hugged and talked a little bit before heading inside where everyone was. The house was decorated with lots of 'scary' stuff and such and there were a lot of snacks too. I barely knew a person at this party though, could be because everyone was dressed up or wearing masks. I remembered talking to Gil earlier on and he mentioned he'd be here too. I wondered if he was already here. We had some drinks and talked to some people. The party was in full swing and it seemed like everyone was having a great time. Maluma and I were now on the dance floor slow dancing to some romantic song. I whispered something in his ear, "So do I call you Maluma or Juan." His gaze met mine and we locked eyes, "Whatever you prefer, baby." "Juan it is then." I winked. I thought about suddenly being surrounded by all these famous people and got deep in thought. "What are you thinking about?" He looked at me. "Nothing really. Just thinking about how I ended up in a house full of celebrities and most of all how I ended up being in your embrace." I saw a smirk appear on his face, "You like being in my arms, don't you?" I chuckled, "You're so full of yourself." He let out a chuckle himself, "You love it nevertheless." I shook my head at him, "Maybe I do." The song finished shortly after and he excused himself to go to the bathroom.

I was left alone and walked around the place when I saw Rafinha, a close friend of Neymar's and I think I've seen him once or twice. I was about to walk up to him when I felt a strong grip on my one of my arms, obviously it had to be a guy, and whoever it was pulled me along with him. He led me to a private place where the loud music was now just background music. He was dressed up in a batman suit along with a mask, hence why I couldn't make out the person's face. He pinned me against the wall and whispered something in my ear, "Maybe not my date, but I had to get you alone for some time."

I furrowed my brows in realization, "Neymar?"

~~~~~ Part 2 is finally here! I hope you all can forgive me for posting it this late. And I decided to do a part 3 after all! :)) Tell me if you liked it or not! I’d love to hear some feedback. -N

[sourwolfstories]

what r some good long sterek fics pls help

Indelible Marks by billtheradish

The house never burned. The pack is strong. Derek will never need to be the alpha, and his sister is a troll. (Actually, most of his family is like that.)

Derek is an apprentice tattoo artist, and Stiles isn’t old enough to get ink of his own yet. But that doesn’t stop him from being interesting…

(This story is now out of buffer, but I will always announce when the next update will be, and am trying to keep to a regular posting schedule. Also, please be advised that this is essentially a rough draft. That doesn’t mean it’s riddled with typos, every chapter is edited, just that the overarching plot and side stories haven’t had a chance to be edited in full yet–but they will be. An edited version of this story will be posted eventually, so if the current length isn’t your cup of tea, just come back later.)

Home by TheTypewriterGirl

January seventh. Seven days since the start of 2015, and seven days since his father’s death.

The bastard, he thinks bitterly. The past year Derek Hale had made it blatantly obvious that he hated his scrawny guts, taking every given opportunity to shove him up against a wall, growl threats in his ears and roll his eyes whenever he stepped into the room, muttering some snide comment about how spastic or idiotic he was.

So why did he fucking volunteer to take him in?

Put Down in Words by paintedrecs

“Oh,” Stiles said, his voice coming out low and breathy, “fuck me.”

“I don’t think that’s on the syllabus, but we can check to see if there’s a spot open in any of his classes,” Scott said, grinning.

“This isn’t an actual professor, though,” Stiles insisted, unable to resist brushing his thumb over the sharp line of the man’s bearded jaw. He was laughing at something off-camera, the shot taken in three-quarters view, his coat collar casually rumpled and opened to reveal a sliver of a simple grey t-shirt. The whole thing was deliberately calculated to lend him a more accessible feel, and god help him, Stiles was falling for it.

*

When Stiles signed up for Dr. Hale’s intro to history class, he had two goals: knock out the credits his advisor was bugging him to complete before he graduated, and spend a few hours a week daydreaming about his sexy professor’s salt and pepper beard.

Derek, a few months away from turning forty and not sure when his life had started feeling so damn lonely, had never encountered someone like Stiles before. Bright-eyed, sharp-tongued, determined to throw Derek’s carefully cultivated world into disarray…and absolutely the last person Derek should be falling in love with.

Hallowed Grounds by damnfancyscotch

Everything in Beacon Hills is the same when Stiles comes home from college.

Well, except for the fact that he’s a published author now, Scott is halfway across the world with a travelling circus, Erica’s epilepsy has been cured, her boss offers him a job too, and there’s this weird black dog that seems to be following him around just to judge him.

Oh, and the murders, of course.

But other than that stuff… totally the same old BH.

The Boy and the Beast by Dira Sudis

In which events in Beacon Hills go rather differently from the start, and a Beauty and the Beast (ish) story ensues. (Scott is not a teacup and no one sings about their feelings.)

Love Thy Neighbor…He’s Hot by Triangulum

Derek and Laura seriously lucked out with Stiles as their neighbor. Yeah he can be loud, but he keeps it to normal hours, and he brings them food, they have movie nights, he’s so beautiful, and okay, Derek might be pining. The only problem is, Stiles has a girlfriend. And Derek HATES her.

OR

The one where Derek and Laura live next door to Stiles, and Derek has a completely out of control crush. A Sterek as neighbors one shot AU that got wildly out of control.

The Hollow Moon by thepsychicclam

It’s the summer after Stiles’ first year of college, and he’s working a crappy job and dealing with nightmares and anxiety - but he’s okay, he swears. He makes it through most days without too much trouble. Then, a certain werewolf comes back into town. Which Stiles doesn’t care about, nope, not at all.

After two and a half years, Derek returns to Beacon Hills with his small Pack. Though he tried to move on, something just kept drawing him back to Beacon Hills, he’s just not sure what. Now, he figures he can start building something like a life - but he keeps getting distracted by Stiles Stilinski of all people.

Permanent Fixture by linksofmemories

Derek is Scott’s older brother. Stiles is Scott’s best friend. Derek is falling in love with Stiles. This is a bit of a problem.

Wild Horses by thepsychicclam

Derek’s a drifter with no home, no destination, and no will to live. Stiles works on his family’s failing cattle and horse ranch while all his friends are going off to college. When Derek falls asleep in a random barn, exhausted and half-starved, he doesn’t expect to wake up on the other end of the sheriff’s shotgun. And Stiles sure as hell doesn’t expect his dad to invite the drifter in for breakfast.

Play Crack the Sky by WeAreTheCyclones

Excerpt from “Hale Pulls the Plug on the Future of Rock,” Rolling Stone, Issue 1203 – Oct. 2014“Fans and music industry vets alike are left reeling in the wake of bassist Derek Hale’s sudden departure from Smokes for Harris. At a time when the foursome from Beacon Hills, California seems to be on the cusp of rock superstardom after just one double platinum record, Smokes has everything to lose.”

Excerpt from “Smokes for Harris: Gladiator,” SPIN.com – Feb. 2015“Smokes for Harris gives in a little to the pop punk of yesteryear in their sophomore effort, but rather than pandering to fans of a lost era they elevate the genre in a way that hasn’t been seen in quite some time. Frontman Stiles Stilinski works double duty as singer and primary songwriter and proves that he can handle the task even without former bassist Derek Hale.“

Three Marks by sanam

"And then there was pain again, but this time it was in only three places—his arm, below his clavicle, and next to his heart, all on the left side. It felt like the skin was being sliced apart, ripped open, flayed off—And suddenly it was done.Derek looked across the room and saw the boy on the floor, looking about as bad as Derek felt.”

Derek and Stiles learn that bonding is probably best done with ridiculous amounts of video games and maybe a little bit of time.

Windows by dr_girlfriend

Derek has a new neighbor who won’t stop looking.

Excerpt:

“You’re blind,” Derek said flatly, the anger draining from him so suddenly he felt almost woozy. His vision cleared, his claws sliding back into blunt fingernails.

“Thanks for the memo, genius,” the kid said acidly. “I can still fucking defend myself, so don’t take another damn step.”

“Fuck, I…I’m sorry,” Derek stuttered.

“What?!” The kid’s brow crinkled. “I mean — what?! You’re fucking sorry!?” His lips thinned into a harsh line. “What, is this some kinda Hallmark movie where you’re discovering the error of your ways because you don’t want to rob a blind person?! That’s fucking condescending, man. I’ll have you know that —”

“Just, wait.” Derek interrupted what was apparently the start of a convincing argument as to why he should rob the kid after all, feeling his head start to spin. “This is — it’s a misunderstanding. I’m — I’m not robbing you. You’re — you’re safe, okay? I’m taking three steps back. Just — just let me explain.”

“Explain why you came busting into my apartment? Yeah, go right ahead, man, I can’t wait to hear this epic tale.”

Gravity’s Got Nothing on You by zosofi

“Three weeks,” Derek says.

“Still don’t want to,” Stiles says.

“I’ll pay you,” Derek says, and that… that has Stiles interested. Alf’s Antique’s may be a great job, but it’s not a high-paying job, and half of Stiles’s tuition is coming from financial aid, so…

“How much,” Stiles asks, “are we talking here? Because I know your family, dude. And it’ll be kind of awkward after.“

“My family thinks you’re some sort of fucking gift to the world,” Derek seethes, like he’s jealous, “they’ll probably be pissed at me when we break it off, so don’t worry about that. Five hundred bucks.”

“A thousand,” Stiles says, because screw ethics. Also, the Hale family is loaded. Derek can deal.

Dating Backwards by RemainNameless

Pornstars Derek and Stiles work for the same company. Derek only shoots with werewolves and Stiles only shoots with humans. That’s not going to change after they meet. It’s really not.(It might.)

Didn’t See That Coming by knittersrevolt

Stiles leaves Beacon Hills in the dust after he catches his husband cheating on him.

He finds his way to New York where he starts working for the Hale House Nursery, accidentally adopts a werewolf baby (through no fault of his own thank-you-very-much), and somehow starts training to be an Exorcist Emissary. So, in general, life was going good.

Then he hears that demons have found their way into his hometown. Can he face his inner demons and go back to save the day?

No Homo by RemainNameless

Stiles’ sophomore year starts something like this:3 FourLokos+ 1 peer-pressuring cat- 1 best bro to end all best bros= 1 Craigslist ad headline that reads “str8 dude - m4m - strictly platonic”.Derek is the fool who replies.

There’s Monsters at Home by calrissian18

“How did you get past the wards?” Derek had put them up, with Peter’s grudging assistance, after the Alpha pack had made themselves at home a few times too many.

The guy pulled a face. “You mean the wards a five-year-old girl with the mental ability of a goldfish could deconstruct?” He blinked wide eyes at Derek. “Gee, I don’t know. It’s bound to go down as one of life’s great mysteries.”

Derek despised him.

Prince Among Wolves by tylerfucklin

Looking for full day/evening sitter. 2 twin boys age 4. Must have exp. w/werewolves. Must be human. No pedophiles. No teenage girls. Pay negotiable.

Between Men and Lions by standinginanicedress

“I thought we could be friends,” Derek offers, to which Stiles gets an odd smile on his face.

“Friends,” he repeats, an odd inflection.

“Yes, friends.”

Stiles laughs, just barely. It’s more of an exhalation of breath than it is genuine mirth or anything else, and then he smiles. “I’m pretty good at friends,” he says with a tilt to his head, and Derek clears his throat and has to look away.

What’s Best For Everyone, Isn’t What’s Easy by gatergirl79

Derek is gone and Stiles is left holding the baby…well, a cheery three year old named Leah actually. While Derek searches for her mom, Stiles plays daddy. When the sour-alpha wolf returns with his ex in toe, things get strained between Stiles and Derek. Especially now that’s they’ve realized just what they mean to each other

[rainydawgradioblog]

PrEP School

Hello everyone! It’s Ricky. Okay this week I’m focusing my blog post around the central idea of “songs I would play if I owned and managed a small, obscure listening bar in an alley in Tokyo with egg shells hanging from the ceiling and experimental films being projected on the walls”. These are songs inspired by a time I went on a date with a boy at a small, obscure listening bar in an alley in Tokyo with egg shells hanging from the ceiling and experimental films being projected on the walls. We “met” on Grindr (obviously) and first got dinner at this really chic restaurant. It was one of those restaurants where you sit on the floor, and we were the only people there. The menu was hand written in Japanese on a seemingly antique paper scroll and above us was an erotic painting of a woman defecating on the floor. We couldn't read the menu because neither of us speak Japanese (he is from New York but just moved to Tokyo to be a “freelance graphic designer and image consultant”...whatever that means) so we just ordered something random. It ended up being a single piece of asparagus and like 3 baby corns. Literally that’s it. And it was almost $100. He paid for it and then we left to go to a bar I recommended.

Once we got to the bar it became apparent that it was very my moment and very not his moment. The music was an uncomfortably loud ringing noise when we got there, and it stayed that way for a long time. There is only enough room for 4 people to sit in there, but you could probably fit 10 if you wanted to touch each other. There was a video of a naked woman writhing around on the floor being projected on the walls and the one man who works there seemed really mean. I loved it! Eventually, The Crying Pill by Matmos came on and I literally had an out of body experience. I had never heard this song before, but I was living. I tried to Shazam it but it didn’t work so I took a voice memo of it instead. I told the boy that it was the best song I had ever heard and was so sad I wouldn’t be able to find it. He was not into the song at all but he was pretending to enjoy himself. Anyway, the date was like whatever. He told me he wanted to get face tats and was kind of boring. I never saw him again after that night, but the next day I was listening to my Spotify Discover Weekly playlist and that song came on! Basically what I’m getting at is that it was destiny for me to hear that song at that bar on that night. So now I listen to that song all the time and pretend I work at that bar and get to choose the music they play there. That was a really long introduction to this blog post but 1) you needed that context and 2) this is a blog so I’m not going to apologize for making you read.

The first song I would play at my bar is Plural by Sote. I’m listening to this song right now as I’m writing this and just realized this is my Sicko Mode. Like, this is that song you could throw on at any time and I will immediately drop to my knees. Oh my god, I have chills right now.

The next song I would play is Filament 1 - 1 by Sachiko M and Yoshihide Otomo. I texted this song to Ronan and Cole in our group chat saying “me wall twerking to this song” and Cole laughed at me. I wasn’t joking though, this song makes me want to wall twerk. This song would work really well in a bar/club setting because the only thing better in social spaces than loud music is unusually quiet music.

I also sent them Akuta by Sugai Ken, which would be queued up next. Cole referred to this song as “cave dwelling realness” and Ronan said “the cover of it is cute”. I agree with them and would add that it’s seductive and rousing.

When the clock strikes midnight I play Fantasy by Against All Logic. This song samples Beyoncé’s 2003 seminal masterpiece Baby Boy in the most major way possible. At this point everyone involved would be sweating. The title of this song has me thinking about fantasies. I’ve been fantasizing about being held captive in a large plywood box. If there are any psychology majors reading this please let me know what that says about me.

The next song is Frontier Control by Ausschuss. This is the type of song I would want to listen to while being held captive in a large plywood box. Should I expand on this plywood box fantasy? Yeah, I should. The box would be very large, like, big enough for me to run around in, and I’d be chained up in the center to a really chic bed. This would all be consensual, like I would sign myself up to be held captive in this box. It’s like performance art, I guess. Maybe there would be a peep hole in the box for people to watch me while I listen to this song.

Okay moving on from the box fantasy, the next song is Hard Screw by Metal Preyers. This song has the most beautiful Bon Iver-esque vocal, but like Bon Iver in an accidental K-Hole.

Next I would play Music of the Air by Tim Hecker. This song is actually dedicated to someone really special in my life. Recently my friends and I have been texting a prisoner, and we love him so much. My friend Saya found him on TikTok and got his number, and we’ve all been talking to him since. We still aren't sure how he has a phone in prison. I asked him and he said “bought it”. But it really doesn’t matter, he is so honest and has the sweetest heart (not to mention he’s gorgeous). He has the cutest chains, like he is fully iced out even in prison. He really enjoys talking to us, and even told Saya that he loves her and sent NSFW pictures to Lexi! I dream of one day taking him on a date to my bar in Japan. Until then, we’ll just have to communicate through a screen. This one’s for you baby, one year left until you’re free!

The final song of the night is YUNG RAPUNXEL PT.II by Azealia Banks. This is the perfect song to end a great night. My favorite part is when she asks “want a piece of candy?”. I totally want a piece of candy, do you?

Peace and blessings,

-Ricky

[silverfoxoath]

Of Enigmas and Games

Chapter 1.

My name is Darcy Lewis, and I have a secret that no one knows. Well actually I have several secrets. My main secret though is universally shared with several others. You see, one day, many years ago the four of us sat at our computers to play a game. Oh, but not just any game, no. We sat down to play a game called SBURB. Stupid, I know, but we were dumb kids who didn't know any better at the time.

Luckily two miraculous things happened, we had both a Time player AND a Space Player, and our session collided with the giant clusterfuck masquerading as the Alpha, Beta and Trolls mixed session, causing our ultimalely doomed session to be saved and allowing us to create our own universe, officially winning the Game. Of course, since we helped save the old universe the others decided that our new universe was viable and helped us create it, ultimately tricking the Game and "winning" officially.

When we started to figure out what we wanted in our universe, several things immeadiatly became clear, sylladexes and strife specibi had to be done away with, for everyone except us, the protectors of the precious new universe. Well okay, the new Alternia will still have strife specibi, they kind of need it with all those horrorterrors running amok. With massive effort from ALL the Space and Time players we completely abolish the Game from our new universe. Though since we created the new universe we did get to keep our godtiers.

After intense debate we decide to split up, each of us choosing a time and place to settle, posting it on our memo board to make sure everyone else knows so that no time paradox shenanigans happen accidentally, they of course still will happen on purpose, but at least we are now prepared for it. I myself choose to settle in the year 1999, in Amarillo Texas, of fucking course as soon as we enter our new universe the Game gifts us with one final FUCK YOU by de-aging us to 13 years old, aka the age most of us started playing.

Unlike the others, I had no guardian, and as such I was quickly scooped up by foster care and shuttled off to various foster families, each with new and differing rules. Since I had my sylladex I always had my weird iPod/computer/hologram projecting thing, of course I also had my iGlasses, which were my glasses combined with my iPod monstrosity, which I used to update the others of my status, regardless of time, due to shenanigans. Once I was settled in I researched our new universe, you see even though we created it, we didn't control everything that happens in its creation, we just gave it a series of demands I guess.

The first thing I discovered was that Superheroes apparently existed on this new Earth, specifically Captain America, even more specifically the Marvel Cinematic Universe Captain America. Over the course of each of us(from my session) settling in, various things became apparent for each of us, I found superheroes were real, the Prince revealed that the mafia was still around and could use magical fucking rainbow flames, the Seer revealed a world of actual magic, like actual spell magic with a school and everything, and our friendleader the Page revealed that supernatural creatures like face-shifting vampires were real. To me when all that stuff was revealed it made me think that I was stuck in a particularly bad fanfiction.

But anyway, after five years of utter bullshit and fuckery I turned 18 and decided to go to college. I chose to major in political science, just to see how much better we could have played the Game. As for universities? I chose at random, applying to places and when they were accepted I added them onto my wall until it was completely covered. I threw darts at the wall and the most landed on choice was Culver University. I quickly made arrangements to live on campus, informing my friends via memos, in case they needed me.

I spread my college year out, ending up as a 20 year old senior missing 6 college credits. Honestly that happened completely on accident, you see a pervy professor thought that he could bribe me with straight A's in his class in exchange for sex. I of course took exception to his disgusting depraved idea and tased him(because we all swore we would learn a non-lethal weapon to deal with idiots who didn't quite deserve to die, but needed a reminder to stop being so DAMN dumb.)

But anyway yeah I'm missing crucial credits I needed to graduate, so I started looking for a solution. Luckily I found an internship that accepted me, had all the credits I needed, and peaked my interest. It was for a Jane Foster, it seems she needed someone to help her with her project in New Mexico. I asked around about her and the only feedback I got was that she was "a star crazy idiot with foolish ideas." But I didn't care, crazy people have more fun, so I flew(in a plane) to New Mexico, posting on my memo what was happening so that the others wouldn't freak out when they couldn't find me at college.

Months passed as I went from antisocial, barely there intern, to social butterfly, internet obsessed Jane-wrangler. Everything shifted when Jane called in her mentor, Erik Selvig, in. I had two scientists to lool after, so I rolled up my mental sleeves and got to work making sure my scientists ate and slept in between breakthroughs and various anomalies.

The others were highly amused at my current occupation. Hal and Eli gave me all kinds of shit about it, saying that Jane and I were soul sisters. I told them to fuck off and go reprogram a robot and tell the crows I said hey, respectively. My best friend was super nice and sympathized with what I was going through.

[mittensmcedgelord]

The Truth Will Set You Free

The truth will set you free, but lieu of truth a different kind of lie can suffice.

Exhausted of vague plans and repetitious assurance, Mim seeks out Mikhaila in the hopes of getting answers no one else will give him. What he finds are more questions, ones with far sharper edges than he bargained for.

(This is so long. I am so sorry. This update has been sitting in my documents, waiting for @wandering-chronicler-blog to edit it for the 25th time before I posted. And somehow it kept getting longer. )

You’re a good human.

 You’re a good person.

 You’re as good as Morgan.

 You’re better than Morgan.

 It’s not that I’m not flattered, but I’m starting to think everyone is reading off of the same script. Igwe. Sho. Alex. Especially Alex. I’ve had that conversation with my brother so many times it’s starting to feel like part of the old sim. I used to think it was guilt over Morgan, but it isn’t just him. Almost everyone has the same thing to say to me. I haven’t spoken to Elazar yet, not privately, but the group emails and security memos were enough. It’s strange, to say the least. I haven’t been out of containment long enough to make that much of an impression, unless they’re all going by my responses in the sim. The Morgan I was in there probably deserved all the compliments I get. There are too many holes in that theory, though.

My sense of self-preservation is screaming at me. It picks threads out of the weave and tries to tie them together into something more solid. There was something in Alex’s office that hid his thoughts and brought me crashing down into myself. I can’t blame him. I’m a Typhon. I’m wearing Morgan’s skin, but I know what I am. He has every right to be afraid after what happened on Talos. It’s a reasonable, human response to a potential threat and I could ignore it if it didn’t feel like déjà vu. I’ve had that disassociated, claustrophobic feeling before. I didn’t tell Alex. If he’s going to keep things from me, I might as well return the favor. From now on, any new memories or feelings that surface are mine alone.

 I’m halfway down the shaft to the cafeteria when it finally hits me what that feeling was: The psychoscope. I put it on once. Only once. It was like having my thoughts wrung out of me until there was nothing left. I remember shaking, fumbling at the clasps to get it off. I blacked out at some point. That isn’t in any of my notes, though. All of the emails I found about psychoscopes are just Alex telling the people in the lab that I don’t need to wear one when I come down. I watch the lights, consider just hitting the button to take me back up to my room, and let it keep going.

 I’m walking out of the grav shaft mechanically. I’ve fallen into a routine again, even without the sim. At least it’s a routine of my own design. Every midnight I come down for udon and a can of coffee. I sit by myself near the vending machines. I listen to the other voices and absorb them. I know a lot of movies now. I know how to use chopsticks. I breathe in the collective consciousness of Talos 2 as if it could sustain me. Typhon feed on thought. In a way, I still do. I’m learning how to blend in. It’s a type of social mimesis, when you get down to it. I pick an employee at random, a young woman in a researcher’s uniform, and copy her affect. Before long I’m at ease, moving my fingers to a song I’ve never heard and humming. I look up from my noodles every few minutes, a second after she does, and stare expectantly at the nearly empty cafeteria. I’m not sure if I’m actually expecting someone, but I see Mikhaila out of the corner of my eye and something clicks.

 I need to talk to Mikhaila. She might not tell me everything, but she’ll tell me a different lie than the others. Maybe between them I can find the truth. I wish I could read her. I want to know why she tries so hard to look through me. Is it Morgan? Alex? Was she there when they put me together and did she see something they didn’t?

 “Doctor Yu,” she greets me as I sit down. One of the employees next to her, another researcher, looks away before leaving the table. His eyes never meet mine. I hear whispers. The people at the table are gone. Mikhaila continues to watch me. I’m shaking when I set the notebook down. My suit ripples along my hands like water and she’s polite enough not to say anything, though I see her clench her jaw. The weave is filled with her coworkers’ thoughts, hazy memories of a newscast about Talos 1 and the evacuation of earth to the martian colonies.

 “Still putting off your doctors’ appointments?” Her tone is accusatory. It’s a welcome change, though I wish it was from anyone but her. I don’t have to answer. I guess the look of shame is enough. Her lips tighten together and the corners of her mouth drop. Her eyes are soft. “You can’t keep doing that. You know there is a very good reason they schedule those.”

 She catches herself and bites her lip. Anger and embarrassment blossom across her face before fading. I wonder who she’s wearing. Whose skin got pulled on over Mikhaila Ilyushin’s? Her eyes move to my hand and I scramble to make the fingers divide into individual digits again.

 “And this is why you go to your appointments.” She drums her fingers on the table, spinning strands of gold thread where her emotions leave her. I touch one and pull it towards me, only for it to break. Mikhaila is staring at me, mouth open and a million silent words spilling out. I pick up my can of tea to make sure my reflection is still human. It is. When I look back up her jaw is set. “How many psi hypo do you use per day? On top of the water filters you have. Do you know?”

 “One or two. It depends on what I’m doing. More interaction with the crew means more hypo.”

 “You need them to be human.” It sounds like it’s a question, but her expression says she doesn’t want me to answer. She knows. I do. I run out, I stop being Morgan. I stop being Morgan, I become something else. Something that is going to have to actually feed instead of just drink a pitcher of tap water infused with psychotropic particles every few hours. I try to maintain eye contact, but her gaze is piercing. “You know what those hypo are, don’t you?”

 “I know. And I appreciate the irony of consuming typhon material in order to stay human.” I attempt a smile. It’s too wide. Too many teeth. I can feel how wrong my mouth is. Her fear moves beneath the surface of her face and I stop smiling. I come apart near her. I think Morgan did too, but in a different way. My hands move through the table. I don’t feel the bench under me anymore. Something whispers inside my head. I used to know the language it speaks, but now it’s nothing but a scratching noise and empty light. I nearly jump out of my seat when something slams against the table next to my hand. The can of green tea is crumpled in Mikhaila’s fist. The fear is gone. Anger. This one is anger.

 “You have no idea what you’re doing here, do you?”

 “Talking to you.” I run my tongue across my teeth, feel them smooth out and arrange themselves in order. My body is heavy, more solid than it’s been in days. I don’t like it. It has to stay this way until I leave, though.

 “On Talos,” she amends. “You have no idea what you’re doing on Talos.”

 “Alex said I was some kind of bridge between species. We’re working the details out.” I smile properly this time. It doesn't help.

 “When did you learn to write?” The question comes out of nowhere. She must have seen me taking notes on what she said. When I don’t answer the first time, she repeats herself. This time her words are bright, sharp. They burrow under my skin and give off sparks. I stare down at the notebook in front of me, the endless list of things that I think I know alternately underlined or crossed out. “You can’t use chopsticks, but you have Morgan’s handwriting. Do you know why?”

 “The cell lines?” Unsure. I sound unsure. She has a point and I don’t like it. I have to fight to keep myself as me. I imagine Morgan. I replay his voice in my head, telling Alex about growing a pair and committing. I replay his sense of self-assuredness and resignation. I take a deep breath as I straighten my posture. “Phantom memories aren’t the best studied side effect of Typhon modification, but they’re known to happen. It’s likely I only got a fraction of what Morgan knew from the experiment, the things that were important to him.”

 “You can’t fake his arrogance,” she snorts. “Morgan was arrogant because he was smart, because he worked hard to use that intelligence. And because he wouldn’t understand humility even if you installed it in him with a mod.”

 My thoughts are screaming. They warp everything in my vision, pulling away at the threads I try to carefully gather around me. My glove stops existing. She notices it, but her expression remains the same.

 “Ask Alex why you know how to write. And while you’re at it, ask him why he goes along with your insane desire to live in a simulation still.”

 “I don’t.” I hear the hum of the coral and, somewhere deep inside it, I hear my own voice echoed back to me. It sounds different than Morgan’s. Arrogance, but without the barbs. “I turned it off. Broke the clock. Reset my transcribe to sync with the station’s calendar. I spent too much of my life in a simulation already.”

 She smiles, but it isn’t kind. I’m getting the idea that Igwe’s Emotional Intelligence flashcards are full of lies. Every time I’ve seen someone smile, it hasn’t been happy. I don’t copy her. I feel my jaw tighten and my eyes lose focus. There’s empty space around her where the weave should be, those intangible threads that haven’t been made into solid coral yet. I can feel myself pulsing through them, my thoughts an invisible heartbeat for something much bigger than I am. And I can feel the threads tangle together. I exhale. She’s still smiling. I’ve decided I don’t like that expression. Humans have it all wrong. Animals bare their teeth to display a threat, but here they are thinking that it means friendship. The cards are lies.

 “What did I do to you?” There’s an echo in my voice, a crackle of static electricity. I shut my mouth and hope it was too quiet for the rest of the cafeteria to hear. It sounded like a phantom’s speech.

 “You? Nothing. Not this time. Not this you.” She regards me with the same rigid smile, the same bared teeth. Just once, the weave pulses around her and I hear the darkness move. “But maybe you should ask about the other ‘Mim’.”

 I want her to be lying. I want to tell her that she’s lying, that I know she’s saying this to hurt me because of some unfinished business with Morgan, but I remember the dreams.

 “You are so much like him, you know that? Maybe you can’t fake his mannerisms, but he’s still part of you.” She scoffs and glances at the table where Sho is. I should be over there with her, splitting a plate of eel rolls and talking about the latest batch of Fatal Fortress recordings I found. My feet won’t move, no matter how much I tell them to. Mikhaila turns back to me. “So quick to believe you’re a savior, that ends justify means. I’m sure they’ve told you otherwise. They always do. But how quickly did you believe them when they said you were the only one, the last great hope of humanity?”

 “Did anything I did in that simulation mean anything, anything at all to you?”

 There’s a pause. The world hums, gets desaturated. All I can hear is the first time I saw her outside of the sim and the way her voice sounded when she called me ‘Dr. Yu’. A thread breaks somewhere. My vision refocuses and, even though I know I haven’t shifted, I see the way I used to. There’s too many angles riding too close to each other. Starbursts of thought radiate around her, none of them hers. When she finally speaks, it’s deafening.

 “It meant that we tailored the testing variables right and adjusted your composition accordingly. You were a very receptive test subject.”

 “If you don’t like having a…” I stumble, my thoughts flicker away into the coral. I breathe in deep through my mouth and focus on Morgan. “If you’re so set against a Typhon based replica, why not just use an operator like April?”

 She doesn’t reply. Her eyes widen slightly and any emotion on her face disappears. As soon as I open my mouth again, she gets up and leaves. Her half finished dinner is left behind, along with her TranScribe. I shouldn’t have mentioned April. What did I think she’d do, sit back down and tell me a tragic story about a rogue operator? No. That wouldn’t be reasonable. I know she won’t tell me and that’s why I don’t follow her. I know enough to know that.

 I pick one of the blini from her tray as I wait for my body to forget Mikhaila’s presence. The threads are still moving, straining under the weight of my own scattered thoughts. I knew there were others. She told me nothing I didn’t know. So why does it bother me?

 I pick up the box of blini and stare at it for a while. I never learned Russian. I couldn’t have, not in the few weeks I’ve been awake. The Cyrillic letters come to me naturally. The names of the ingredients, the information, the slogan, and the Russian regalia are all familiar. I have never eaten blini. I never learned Russian.

 I don’t remember learning how to write either.

[viking369]

Music and Politics Rant

This is a long one. If you're looking for the TL;DR version, sorry oh denizens of Short Attention Span Theatre, there isn't one. This is cross-posted from my other blog. My oldest (Thing 1) and I recently had a debate over the relative musical merits of Kate Bush: I think she has merit, Thing 1 thinks she does not. It was one of those debates and ultimate disagreements that reasonable, educated people have that, far from being destructive, add the sort of spice to life to keep it from being an unrelieved death march. I'm not a fanboy for anyone, including Kate Bush. I long ago started thinking of her as the Charles Ives of pop music: a pile of interesting ideas that often deliver something significant but at least as often get in each other's way. Like Ives, people tend to either love her or hate her and have legitimate reasons for both positions, but tend to simply entrench for "reasons." And this sort of "debating" got me thinking (a dangerous prospect). The whole discussion with Thing 1 started when I watched a 2014 BBC documentary on Kate Bush. I thought it was pretty well done. It showed a number of intelligent, talented people who find merit in Bush's work. It interviewed Lindsay Kemp, who still had four years left in the tank at that point, and showed his influence on art rock at the time (basically everybody from Bowie on) (It also showed a couple of other things, perhaps without meaning to. It showed through Kemp's gestures the extent of mime vocabulary's influence on what might be characterized as "gay mannerisms", Kemp being a dancer and choreographer with heavy mime influence, having studied with Marcel Marceau. It also shows the difference between European artists and intellectuals and US pseudos. In the interviews, several people casually remark on having seen Kemp's "Flowers", based on Jean Genet's "Notre Dame des Fleurs". You would be hard-pressed to find any in the US to this day, outside of core LGBTQ+ culture, who have heard of Kemp, "Flowers", or even Jean Genet other than by reference.). And then toward the end it shows why rock critics as a group are ignorant, vicious little parasites. More on that below the fold, wherever the Hell that might be. Once upon a time I was in newspapers, and one of the things I did was write music reviews. It was a paycheck, and as I’ve noted elsewhere, I’ve always been closely involved with music. I wrote by two rules: 1) Be consistent, and 2) make it about the music on its own terms. On the first point, it doesn’t matter if the readers agree with you; they just need to know what to expect from you. If they know you don’t like a particular artist or a particular type of music, they can read you through the appropriate filter. The second point breaks in two. First, it’s about the music, not the people. I did not savage Van Halen because they were pricks who brutalized the little people who had to service their every whim. I went after Eddie Van Halen (who let’s face it was the real core of the band) who went shredding up and down the fretboard at random with no regard for chordal or modal structures (In fairness to Mr. Van Halen, he no longer plays like that and is a far superior musician than when every blockhead with a K-Mart electric six-string thought Eddie was God and gave us a generation of speed monkeys with zero musicianship.) (The speed monkey syndrome unfortunately spread to other instruments. It was the overwhelming norm among the Celtic fiddlers who followed Bonnie Rideout to Ann Arbor and insisted on playing faster than their talents, compensating by dropping notes out at random, and then blaming all the rest of us for all the ensemble issues. To all of you, I give an eternal, “Fuck you and the banshee of an instrument you tuck under your hiply stubbled chins and rape with your bows.”). Second, you have to put it in the music’s own frame of reference. It makes no sense to pan a Metropolitan Opera performance of Cosi fan Tutte because it isn’t a Black Sabbath concert. I realized early on that almost no rock music critics could grasp either of my rules (From this point on, you may assume that “Robert Christgau is a wanker” is flashing subliminally in the background.). From the beginning of such things, Rolling Stone has been the center of rock criticism (I just damned near wrote “crock recidivism”. I’m not a nice person.). It has also been the center of what is wrong with rock criticism for just as long. These guys were groupies. They were wannabes who couldn’t cut it, so they hung out with the guys who could, basking in the limelight. The reviews weren’t reviews, they were hagiographies. “The music must be great because I party with these guys.” “They must be significant because I party with these guys.” Everything was on a chummy, first-name-only basis (“Mick and Keith were really rockin’ it Thursday night.”) that became the norm for roughly forever (Cam Crowe slipped a screamingly funny joke about The Rocket’s review style in his movie Singles.). As tastes changed and their substance-abuse buddies died, faded away, or became arena bands (and now nostalgia bands playing the Peppermill in Wendover), Rolling Stone found itself unsuccessfully playing catch-up, jumping on every bandwagon that rolled down the street in a desperate attempt to get in front of The Next Big Thing and failing miserably. If it weren’t for Matt Taibbi, that rag would have no reason to exist. In the 70s other rags stepped into the breach, but they took the Stone’s style sheet and were all clones of one another. They couldn’t comprehend my rules, either. I remember one of these rags (probably Circus, but who honestly gives a shit at this point, they were fungible) going after every Harry Chapin recording because it “wasn’t rock.” Well no shit, Sherlock. Chapin wasn’t a rocker, he was a folkie, self-proclaimed, and condemning him for not being what he wasn’t was…well…not even wrong. Congratulations, rock critics, you just earned Stephen Frys’s second-greatest insult, right after “I almost care.” There was one exception to the Clone Wars: Creem. But that didn’t make it good, just different. Admittedly, Creem was covering a lot of things no one else was, including the early days of punk and all that was happening over at CBGB. But my gods the pretension. Memo to Lester Bangs: Just because you covered something doesn’t mean you invented it. Just because you came up with the label “punk rock” doesn’t mean you created punk rock. Punk rock was created by garage bands (US) and pub bands (UK) (I always envied the UK guys because no matter how, frankly, BAD you were, there was someone willing to book you. Here in the US? Not so much. Although you could always get homecoming and prom gigs if you were just another shitty cover band.) (Punk was spawned by my half-generation, the Late Boomers. The reason was simple: We were fucking sick and tired of the hypocrisy of the Early Boomers, our big brothers and sisters. They were the 60s Children, the Flower People, and they were still peddling that bullshit even though the wheels had fallen off the wagon and there was a global recession. They accused us of being self-centered for not “working for change” like them while they busily leveraged the huge advantage of having sucked up everything before we ever got on the scene. They took their 60s, corporatized, commoditized, packaged, and slapped a smiley face on them, and expected us to swallow it all without question. The problem was that we just didn’t believe hard enough in the dream. Meanwhile we were saying, “The fuck? Our dreams hit the wall at 110 per in Fall ’73! The wreckage is everywhere, but you dicks and everybody else is just stepping over it like it isn’t there!” We wanted to wave our private parts at them, so we did. Which is a long way of telling you Millennials that, if you lump the Early and Late Boomers together, your ignorance is showing. Yeah, there are plenty of Late Boomers who sold out [You hear me, Barry Obama? You sold us all out, but history will always remember you fondly because you landed between the Texas Turd Tornado and Hitler 2.0.], but we were the first ones to face the New Normal you folks are now dealing with. You need old wise men and women for your villages? Trust me, we’re available in hordes.) As yet another aside, there were garage bands, and there were garage bands. None of us were very good, but most of us wanted to improve to something resembling competency. The early punkers simply didn’t care (Hell, a lot of them, such as the New York Dolls, were so bad they made The Kingsmen sound like conservatory virtuosos. And the Noo Yuck critics, apparently on permanent bad acid trips from frequent visits to Andy Whore-wall’s Fucktory, kept rubbing out one after another for them all. “Daringly campy!” “A raw, animal sound!” Shit-shoveling by rapidly deteriorating white guys desperate to continue being perceived as bleeding edge.). Fortunately, this only lasted a few years before a lot of the punkers decided it maybe would not be so inauthentic if they actually learned how to play their instruments. I don’t care what John Lydon continues to blow out his ass, Black Flag was never boring. But I really can’t leave the topic of pretension without a mention of The Village Voice, the self-proclaimed font of all things cool and hip for over six decades and running. In reality The Village has been overrun with gentrifying yuppie scum straight off the set of Thirtynothing since before Rudy Giuliani parked his malignancy in the Mayor’s Office, and The Voice has followed suit. And Robert Christgau was at the center of it all. It has never ceased to amaze me how someone so admittedly ignorant could be such an expert on everything. He admits he is “not at all well-schooled” (understatement) in 50s and 60s jazz, yet he has reviewed jazz artists such as Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman, and Sonny Rollins without any of that context and has declared Frank Sinatra the greatest singer of the 20th Century (A meaningless statement. How can you compare Sinatra and, say, Pavarotti? You can’t, and anyone with a lick of humility and two brain cells to rub together doesn’t even try.) while apparently ignorant of Nelson Riddle’s role in creating Sinatra’s best albums. He was an early promoter of punk, right through all the “authentic vs. poseur” wars, blissfully unaware that this was not a rebellion unique to punk but rather was a recurring fight in music, most recently before that in the “this is jazz/this is not jazz” that started with the rise of bebop after the Second World War, that caused a butt-ton of damage to the genre, and that Miles Davis was a pivotal player in until he finally got over it and put on that shiny red leather suit and released Bitches Brew, which Christgau unironically nominated to Jazz & Pop as jazz album of the year in 1970. He considers the New York Dolls one of the five greatest artists of all time. Please. The Dolls were influential, true, and for two reasons: 1) Their show was cheap and entertaining and so readily copiable and copied, and 2) their musicianship was so crude a half-trained baboon could cover it. Not exactly reasons to put them in GOAT contention. Finally, Christgau doesn’t like and is nearly completely ignorant of classical music. This tells me so many things, but two bubble immediately to the surface: 1) He has neither the music history nor the music theory to hold 90% (at least) of the opinions he’s been paid for over the last half-century, and 2) he’s a shallow little shit who needs to sit in a corner and STFU. And believe it or not, all that was just a warm-up to get around to John Harris. Toward the end of the Kate Bush documentary is a roundtable discussion of her latest album (Aerial) by several UK rock critics, including Harris. Harris makes the remark that the music sounds like something you’d hear in a department store and that it’s obvious Bush hadn’t been in a studio for 12 years. I’ll start with the statements themselves and then turn to their wider ramifications. Department store music? I’d like to know where Harris hangs out that this is the ambient Muzak. Let’s chalk this one up to hyperbole and move on to the “12 years” remark. He doesn’t really elaborate on this (not entirely his fault, given the roundtable format) so we can only speculate on his actual point. Do her pipes sound rusty? Not really. Does the technology sound dated? No (And trust me, I keep up. It’s not like I sit around listening to Sergeant Pepper’s going, “Oh wow, they played those tapes backwards!”), and even if it did, that would be one to lay on the producer and the engineer. Is the music dated? An ambiguous word, “dated”, but I’m afraid we’ve finally reached what Harris was driving at. By “dated” do we mean it doesn’t sound like other music being produced now? First, when has Kate Bush ever sounded like anyone else, and second when did sounding like everyone else become a standard of musical quality? It hasn’t and it shouldn’t, but I’m afraid this is the point Harris is trying to make. Perhaps, though, he meant this sounds like her old material. Saying that an artist is repeating themself is a helpful criticism, especially if you explain why you think so. Frankly that’s a point I can agree with; I find a certain sameness in her work since Hounds of Love. But that isn’t even remotely what Harris says. He says she sounds old-fashioned, which is never a useful comment, merely a pejorative one, and worse, a pejorative aimed not just at the artist but at the listener. You are listening to old-fashioned music. You are old-fashioned. You are outdated. Catch up! Under the best of circumstances, this is unmitigated bullshit. Coming from Harris, it is unmitigated bullshit that is part of a career full of it. Harris’s cred as a “serious person” essentially rests on his 2003 book The Last Party: Britpop, Blair and the Demise of English Rock (repackaged in 2004 as Britpop: Cool Britannia and the Spectacular Demise of English Rock) and the follow-up BBC Four 2005 documentary The Britpop Story. His thesis is that 90s Britpop was the last great shining moment for UK pop. No, really. At this point, let facts be placed before a candid world. The UK has been a popular music powerhouse for quite awhile, and by “powerhouse” I mean a global influence. Let’s start arbitrarily with Gilbert & Sullivan, pass the baton to Ivor Novello, and then to Noel Coward. The Second World War made hash of it all, and the post-war generation found that the US had stolen the baton, but rather than going gentle into that not-so-good night, both the rockers and the mods invaded the US and stole much of the thunder back. This continued into the 70s, whether you’re talking about arena bands, metal, prog rock, or punk, and on into the 80s, again whether you’re talking about power pop, synthpop, or New Wave. Big influences that can still be heard around the world. Compare Britpop. The whole point of Britpop was to be a calculated foil for Grunge and as safe and marketable as possible, the perfect theme music for the Tony Blair years. It has so little edge it couldn’t leave a mark on a piece of talc. Its influence has been negligible except as a template for profitable pap. In 1997 the whole sham came unraveled as Oasis released the bloated disappointment Be Here Now and Blur abandoned the field to join the US “lo-fi” movement. Their lasting influence is Coldplay, and let’s be honest, if Coldplay is your gold standard, I’m afraid you actually have a pyrite mine. But Harris thinks Britpop was the shining end of UK rock. There are a number of holes in this assertion; two are glaring. First, there are still plenty of new bands in the UK churning out good stuff (That Harris seems blissfully ignorant of these bands makes me wonder just who is out-dated and needs to catch up.). Look them up yourselves; I’m not falling into the trap of naming a few here. Suffice it to say they’re diverse, and you’re likely to hit on several you consider acceptable regardless of your musical tastes. They’ve even been having an influence in the EU, but we’ll see what Brexit brings (Influence in the US? Not so much since we have reached a level of insularity here that rules out anything beyond our borders having merit, in spite of having access to it all on The Interwebz.). And these bands have a Hell of a lot more to offer than the Britpop slag did. Which brings us to glaring hole two. As noted previously, Britpop didn’t really have an impact. None outside of the UK, and damned little in the UK on any time scale longer than the life of a mayfly. Britpop was a nothingburger with a side of flies and a So? Duh! Harris, though, raises this localized, ephemeral phenomenon and turns it into the last scion of the UK pop tradition. This should just be considered a bad case of the sillies, except that Harris’s new schtick is political commentary, especially for The Grauniad. In keeping with The Graun’s policies, his position is “Support Remain but maintain that ‘both sides have merit’.” Which raises his Britpop position from silly to ironic, because Harris’s thinking on Britpop (“It was important in the UK, ergo it was IMPORTANT!”) is just the sort of insular, UK=World mentality that made Brexit possible. Brexit happened, for the most part, because of a bunch of people who believed that, whatever the puzzle was, the UK was the only piece that mattered. Harris’s elevation of Britpop on so high a pedestal rests on the same belief, even though he’s a Remainer. So it’s unintentionally ironic. It’s symptomatic of a malignant mindset. And it’s still silly. And so I give you Christgau and Harris, Exhibits 1 and 2 in my case for the beyond-uselessness of rock critics. And the former is still being allowed to write revisionist histories of the music of the last half-century while the latter is still being allowed to…well…write. What a world.

[uwp01]

Literacy Narrative Draft 1

Cover Memo

Strengths:

I think one of my strengths is that I categorized my post into different sections that helps the reader easily get an idea of what that section will be about. I think the images also help with making the post feel more relatable and understandable.

Weaknesses:

I feel like the post is still visually clunky and text concentrated. I also feel like there’s not a good flow and that my ideas are very random and chaotic and don’t necessarily have a clear direction to them even though there’s a general categorization to them. Towards the end I feel like it gets repetitive as well. I also feel like the post sounds too formal to be a blog post. It sounds and looks more like an essay than a blog post.

Questions/comments/concerns:

What can I do to make the post look more like a blog post and less like an essay? How can I organize my thoughts so that the post flows better? I am concerned that my essay doesn’t fit (or barely fits) the prompt that was given because I talk about someone who was important to my literacy development but in a negative way rather than a positive one. Another thing to mention is that this is my second draft and not my first draft.

My Literacy Background

All my academic life, I have never particularly enjoyed English or writing classes. They’ve always been the classes that I was required to take or the class that everyone else took which inclined me to take them too. I have never been particularly bad at writing - I was always able to get something down on paper, turn it in, and get a relatively good grade on - but I never particularly enjoyed it, either. 

Throughout my academic writing career, I learned - just as everyone else did - the typical formula for writing an essay. An introduction with a thesis, three body paragraphs to explain your thesis, and a conclusion to sum it all up is the method that stuck in my mind. Just like everyone else did, I learned and improved my syntax, grammar, and vocabulary.

I’ve always felt that I’ve been an average, standard writer. Nothing more, nothing less. I’ve always done as much as it takes to get by. To this day, I still don’t know how to write a good intro and conclusion paragraph, how to tell if my essay “well written” or not, how to properly formulate an essay so that it has “good flow”, how to write a draft that’s actually a draft and not the final product I turn in, and many other things that comes with being a “good” writer. There was never a teacher or person who made a huge impact on how I view writing and literacy. Never a person I’ve greatly admired because they drastically changed my perspective from disliking writing to liking it. And never someone I could honestly say, “after taking that class, I’m a changed person.” With that in mind, there was a teacher that I had in high school who impacted my literacy development; however, not in a particularly good way. 

Mr. Campbell’s AP Lang Class

My junior year in high school, I took AP English Language and Composition because it was what everyone else my grade was taking their junior year and what was recommended to take to be “on schedule” for graduation. My teacher, Mr. Campbell, was one of my favorite high school teachers to this day. He was young at heart and did not conform to the standard teacher stereotype that was all about business, grades, and lesson plans. We often took class time to talk about current events and listen to him tell stories about his personal life. Mr. Campbell was also known for having the highest amount of students to pass the AP Lang exam out of all the other teachers at my school. After being in his class for the year, I understood why. 

Campbell’s method to getting his students on a passing route for the AP Lang exam involved two things.The first was to capitalize on improving his student’s ability to write a good rhetorical analysis essay - the essay that students statistically struggle with the most on the exam. The second was to touch up on, but not focus heavily, on other aspects of the exam such as the multiple choice section and the other two essays. Because of the heavy focus on the rhetorical analysis essay, it caused me to become very mechanical in my writing style by the end of the year. What I mean by that is that he ingrained a very formatted essay structure which lead me to never stray from it. We were constantly reading articles, watching videos, analyzing them, and filling out worksheets he created that helped guide us to writing a rhetorical analysis essay. This worksheet required us to find a thesis using a fill-in-the-blank thesis sentence maker, three rhetorical devices, three examples and elaborations of each device, and to conclude how the rhetorical devices used by the author affected the audience to help portray the author’s thesis. At first, this may seem like a good way to help someone get a lot better at approaching this type of essay. While this is true and was useful in preparing for the exam, I have noticed that it was more detrimental to my literacy development than beneficial in the long term. Taking that class, I did not learn how to “compose english” as the course title implies, but rather I learned how to pass an exam which proved to be detrimental to my later writing experiences.

My Literacy Reflection

After so many exercises and worksheets that I did throughout the span of that class, I found that all of the essays I wrote ended up sounding the same as if I had an outlined template of a typical rhetorical analysis essay and I was just filling in the blanks according to what writing or video I was responding to. Although the intense focus on becoming a better rhetorical analysis writer was helpful to me at the time, I have found that it has caused me to be stuck in this specific essay style that has transcribed to my current writing style. Writing became so mundane to me that I dreaded writing more than I already did because it became something that I had to drag myself through and get done for a grade instead of an opportunity to freely express my thoughts onto paper.

As much as I appreciated and enjoyed Mr. Campbell’s class, I cannot deny that he has caused me to conform to writing mechanical, structured, formatted essays which, in turn, limited my writing style. This writing style that I adopted from him restricts me from broadening my writing style from a typical “five paragraph essay” style into more complex and sophisticated style. To this day, I still try to fit my ideas into an intro, body paragraphs, and conclusion formatted essay instead of exploring new methods and patterns to writing. Like the reading “Unteaching the Five Paragraph” assigned for class suggests, I feel that Mr. Campbell’s class structure encouraged me to alienate myself from creating authentic writing, neglect coherence by limiting my incentive to effectively connect ideas, and to think less when writing and instead conform to a cut-and-paste writing structure. After taking that class, I have found that I always view writing as a negative and stressful experience that I have to force myself to get through rather than want to do which takes away the motivation for me to become a better writer now. 

My Current Literacy Reflection

Since getting to college, I feel that I have been forced to start taking steps to break out of this mindset and really push myself to become a better writer. Taking the UWP 1 class that I’m currently in has already been useful in helping me to break free from such stiff, structured writing through reading and writing assignments. I’m learning the value of the drafting process and this first writing assignment is proving to be a very beneficial assignment to start implementing what I have learned about drafting and put it to use. It is also helpful that this essay is loosely structured and greatly dependent on me to decide how I would like it to flow. I’m hopeful that this assignment - and more importantly, this class - helps me to realize what it means to be a good writer, what steps I need to take to get there, and how to always apply those concepts to my writing in the future.

[oldguardaudio]

PowerLine -> The silence of Susan Rice vs. Susan Rice responds, sort of

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Daily Digest

Nunes responds

Rebut this

The silence of Susan Rice

“Bubbles of Our Own Liberal Sentiments”

Susan Rice responds, sort of

Nunes responds

Posted: 24 Feb 2018 02:21 PM PST

(Scott Johnson)House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes was ready to go with his own response to the Democrats’ memo that I have embedded in the adjacent post. I have uploaded his point-by-point response to Scribd and embedded it below. It is a useful document. Moreover, by contrast with Adam Schiff et al., Nunes is a credible player. Consistent with my comments, he notes some of the Democrats’ rebuttals of points not made by the Republicans. In any event, here is his response.

Democrat Memo Charge and Response by Scott Johnson on Scribd

(more…)

   Rebut this

Posted: 24 Feb 2018 02:01 PM PST

(Scott Johnson)The powers that be have redacted and released the House Intelligence Committee Democrats’ memo rebutting the committee Republicans’ four-page memo. In a quick reading, among other things, I find it rebutting claims that weren’t made. The Democrats vouch for the credibility of Christopher Steele when the only relevant question is the credibility of his sources. The Democrats also challenge just about every point made by the Republicans.

The Democrats are overinvested in the synthetic collusion scandal. They stand by all the works of the Department of Justice and the FBI. To borrow a phrase attributed by Susan Rice to President Obama, they did everything strictly by the book. According to the Democrats, Carter Page deserves what he got. One wonders how it is that he remains a free man.

There is some new information provided. The FISA warrant on Carter Page was authorized and renewed three times by four different federal judges (see page 3). In a heavily redacted portion of the memo, the Democrats go to town on Page (pages 3-5). I infer from guarded comments made to the press by committee Republicans that there may be something to this. Chairman Nunes has released the statement below.

Nunes Statement on Release of Democrat Memo with point by point refutation. https://t.co/JjXyslktSz pic.twitter.com/P7UaGEQVsE

— Nick Short 🇺🇸 (@PoliticalShort) February 24, 2018

There is much more that could be said. We badly need the FISA warrant application and related representations in renewal proceedings redacted and released. As always, I urge interested readers to review the documents with your own eyes. I have uploaded the memo to Scribd and embedded it below.

House Dems’ Intel Memo by Scott Johnson on Scribd

   The silence of Susan Rice

Posted: 24 Feb 2018 09:13 AM PST

(Scott Johnson)By letter to Susan Rice dated February 8, 2018, Senators Grassley and Graham posed 12 numbered questions. I posted the Graham/Grassley letter in “Rice papers the file.” By letter dated February 23, 2018, attorney Kathryn Ruemmler has now responded to the Grassley Graham letter. I posted Ruemmler’s letter nearby this morning in “Susan Rice responds, sort of.”

Let’s take an inventory. I have italicized my accounting below, subject to further thought and analysis:

Question 1. Did you send the email attached to this letter to yourself? Do you have any reason to dispute the timestamp of the email?

Answered.

Question 2. When did you first become aware of the FBI’s investigation into allegations of collusion between Mr. Trump’s associates and Russia?

Not answered.

Question 3. When did you become aware of any surveillance activities, including FISA applications, undertaken by the FBI in conducting that investigation? At the time you wrote this email to yourself, were you aware of either the October 2016 FISA application for surveillance of Carter Page or the January 2017 renewal?

Partially answered.

Question 4. Did anyone instruct, request, suggest, or imply that you should send yourself the aforementioned Inauguration Day email memorializing President Obama’s meeting with Mr. Comey about the Trump/Russia investigation? If so, who and why?

Partially answered.

Question 5. Is the account of the January 5, 2017, meeting presented in your email accurate? Did you omit any other portions of the conversation?

Not answered.

Question 6. Other than that email, did you document the January 5, 2017, meeting in any way, such as contemporaneous notes or a formal memo? To the best of your knowledge, did anyone else at that meeting take notes or otherwise memorialize the meeting?

Not answered.

Question 7. During the meeting, did Mr. Comey or Ms. Yates mention potential press coverage of the Steele dossier? If so, what did they say?

Answered narrowly (“In the conversation Ambassador Rice documented, there was no discussion of Christopher Steele or the Steele dossier, contrary to the suggestion in your letter”).

Question 8. During the meeting, did Mr. Comey describe the status of the FBI’s relationship with Mr. Steele or the basis for that status?

Answered narrowly (see above).

Question 9. When and how did you first become aware of the allegations made by Christopher Steele?

Not answered.

Question 10. When and how did you first become aware that the Clinton Campaign and the Democratic National Committee funded Mr. Steele’s efforts?

Not answered.

Question 11. You wrote that President Obama stressed that he was not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective. Did President Obama ask about, initiate, or instruct anything from any other perspective relating to the FBI’ s investigation?

Not answered.

Question 12. Did President Obama have any other meetings with Mr. Corney, Ms. Yates, or other government officials about the FBI’ s investigation of allegations of collusion between Trump associates and Russia? If so, when did these occur, who participated, and what was discussed?

Not answered.

Susan Rice has lawyered up. For some reason or other, with respect to several pointed and important questions, she is resting on her right to remain silent.

   “Bubbles of Our Own Liberal Sentiments”

Posted: 24 Feb 2018 08:35 AM PST

(Joe Malchow)I think that I am like most American men in, every five or ten years, directing my reading deep into the Revolution and the Founding generation. It is impossible to resist the magnetic attraction of this period. It is not that the Founding Fathers were geniuses (though some were) or gods (though one was close). Instead, there seems to be something about the vacuum of the founding moment and the men who filled it that gave rise to a decades-long period of writing, speechmaking, and statecraft that was benevolent, intelligent, honest, and crafted to secure a true durability. Therefore these men, whose brains weren’t of course any better than the brains today, were so much less molested by self-deception, pieties, lore, and loyalties that they produced world-changing thought transcending everything else then existing.

It is a worthy subject for a later time why the American founding moment was so exceptional in human history. To be sure there have been many founding moments since, from Africa to Italy and many places otherwise. Mostly their results have been very sad. I wonder if it had something to do with the generalist liberal arts education received by most of the participants at the Continental Congresses, the Constitutional Convention, and the later House of Burgesses. There were lawyers, of course, and at least a few doctors (Benjamin Rush and Josiah Bartlett. Anyone else?). But by and large, they were well-read non-experts and family men. I imagine that today, Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School would be happy to supply your fledgling country with all manner Experts bearing Ph. D.s., each without the annoying encumbrance of a traditional family life or the cruft of knowing, say, Plato.

Anyway, here is something that John Adams wrote to Thomas Jefferson on September 4, 1785. Adams was in London and Jefferson was in Paris. It comes from American Sphinx by Joseph J. Ellis, who prefaces the lines I wanted to share.

In addition to their mutual animosities toward England and their common sense of indignation at the insufferable arrogance of the king, the friendship worked because Jefferson deferred to Adams. After all, Adams was his senior and had been negotiating with the French and English for five years. Jefferson’s deferential pattern began as soon as he arrived in France: “What would you think of the enclosed Draught to be proposed to the courts of London and Versailles?” Jefferson inquired. “I know it goes beyond our powers; and beyond the powers of Congress too. But it is so evidently for the good of the states that I should not be afraid to risk myself on it if you are of the same opinion.” The proposal envisioned reciprocal rights for citizens of all nations, complete freedom of trade and a reformed system of international law.

Yes, Adams replied, it was a “beau ideal” proposal, but unfortunately it was also completely irrelevant to the current, and cutthroat, European context: “We must not, my Friend, be the Bubbles of our own Liberal Sentiments. If we cannot obtain reciprocal Liberality, We must adopt reciprocal Prohibitions, Exclusions, Monopolies, and Imposts. Our offers have been fair, more than fair. If they are rejected, we must not be Dupes.”

I read that highlighted quotation from Adams and thought: only one modern politician would say something like that, and he is Donald Trump.

By the way, I returned to my books on the Founding this time because of the Broadway show Hamilton, which we have had the good fortune to see twice. It’s truly a wonderful work. (For a glimpse of why here are five random American teenagers reenacting the Act I song “Non-Stop.”)

   Susan Rice responds, sort of

Posted: 24 Feb 2018 07:12 AM PST

(Scott Johnson)Barack Obama installed Susan Rice as his National Security Advisor in recognition of her service to him as a knave and fool in the matter of Benghazi. As National Security Advisor she sent an email on Obama’s last day in office shortly before President Trump inauguration. Released in redacted form on February 12, the email is one of the most intriguing bits of evidence to have emerged in the alleged Russian collusion scandal. The email purports to memorialize January 5, 2017, Oval Office meeting including President Obama, Comey, former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, Vice President Biden and Rice herself regarding Russian interference in the 2016 election. What a crew.

Rice wrote:

President Obama began the conversation by stressing his continued commitment to ensuring that every aspect of this issue is handled by the Intelligence and law enforcement communities “by the book.” The President stressed that he is not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective. He reiterated that our law enforcement team needs to proceed as it normally would by the book.

As part of their oversight efforts, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Grassley and subcommittee chairman Graham obtained the email from the National Archives in response to their request for records of meetings between President Obama and Comey in the collusion investigation. Rice sent the email to herself with a copy to Curtis Ried (Twitter feed here) on January 20, 2017. Grassley and Graham were struck by the context and timing of this email and sent a follow-up letter to Rice. The letter reads in part:

It strikes us as odd that, among your activities in the final moments on the final day of the Obama administration, you would feel the need to send yourself such an unusual email purporting to document a conversation involving President Obama and his interactions with the FBI regarding the Trump/Russia investigation. In addition, despite your claim that President Obama repeatedly told Mr. Comey to proceed “by the book,” substantial questions have arisen about whether officials at the FBI, as well as at the Justice Department and the State Department, actually did proceed “by the book.”

According to the email, the meeting further took up the question whether Trump could be trusted with “information fully as it relates to Russia.” Andrew McCarthy authoritatively explicated Rice’s email in the NR column “What Did Comey Tell President Trump about the Steele Dossier?”

Susan Rice has now responded to Senators Grassley and Graham through attorney Kathryn Ruemmler. Ruemmler is the global co-chairman of the Latham & Watkins white collar criminal defense practice. She formerly served as White House Counsel to Obama.

Ruemmler’s letter on behalf of Rice asserts that denies that there was anything unusual about Rice’s email purporting to memorialize a crucial meeting two weeks after the meeting had occurred, on her way out the door. Ruemmler’s letter on behalf of Rice states:

The memorandum to file drafted by Ambassador Rice memorialized an important national security discussion between President Obama and the FBI Director and the Deputy Attorney General. President Obama and his national security team were justifiably concerned about potential risks to the Nation’s security from sharing highly classified information about Russia with certain members of the Trump transition team, particularly Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn.

In light of concerning communications between members of the Trump team and Russian officials, before and after the election, President Obama, on behalf of his national security team, appropriately sought the FBI and the Department of Justice’s guidance on this subject. In the conversation Ambassador Rice documented, there was no discussion of Christopher Steele or the Steele dossier, contrary to the suggestion in your letter.

Given the importance and sensitivity of the subject matter, and upon the advice of the White House Counsel’s Office, Ambassador Rice created a permanent record of the discussion. Ambassador Rice memorialized the discussion on January 20, because that was the first opportunity she had to do so, given the particularly intense responsibilities of the National Security Advisor during the remaining days of the Administration and transition.

Ambassador Rice memorialized the discussion in an email sent to herself during the morning of January 20, 2017. The time stamp reflected on the email is not accurate, as Ambassador Rice departed the White House shortly before noon on January 20.

While serving as National Security Advisor, Ambassador Rice was not briefed on the existence of any FBI investigation into allegations of collusion between Mr. Trump’s associates and Russia, and she later learned of the fact of this investigation from Director Comey’s subsequent public testimony. Ambassador Rice was not informed of any FISA applications sought by the FBI in its investigation, and she only learned of them from press reports after leaving office.

Ruemmler’s statement goes on offense about “concerning” discussions intercepted by Rice’s colleagues at the NSA along with the “distraction” routine practiced by lying Democratic liars. Ruemmler serves up a lame excuse for the tardiness of Rice’s email and slyly inserts a reference to the advice of White House Counsel. In substance, however, Ruemmler’s statement cries “nobody here but us chickens,” just as Rice’s email itself did. There seems to be a postmodern echo in here.

The Grassley/Graham letter posed 12 numbered questions to Rice. I posted the Grassley/Graham letter and the appended Rice email via Scribd in “Susan Rice papers the record.” Ruemmler’s letter to Senators Grassley et al. is embedded below. By my reckoning, Ruemmler’s letter answers to question 1, part of question 4, and narrowly responds to one or two others with a dollop of the Obama defense (she learned about it in the newspapers). For some reason or other — no excuse is offered on this score — Ruemmler’s letter declines to answer the rest of the questions submitted to Rice.

Susan Rice Response to Grassley-Graham by sonamsheth on Scribd

   PowerLine -> The silence of Susan Rice vs. Susan Rice responds, sort of PowerLine -> The silence of Susan Rice vs. Susan Rice responds, sort of Daily Digest Nunes responds…

[thecloudlight-blog]

New Post has been published on Cloudlight

New Post has been published on https://cloudlight.biz/2-tricks-to-make-ios-control-center-less-annoying/

2 tricks to make iOS Control Center less annoying

Apple launched Control Center in 2013 as part of iOS 7. It gives iPhone and iPad customers quick get admission to settings for aircraft mode, wifi, Bluetooth, display screen brightness among different things. But once in a while errant swipes inner apps and video games can release Control Center by accident — which can be demanding. If you go away your iPhone mendacity around pretty tons anybody consisting of children can get entry to Control Center out of your lock screen — which can be even extra disturbing.

But these annoyances are without difficulty remedied with a few brief adjustments. Go to Settings > Control Center. There you have got options: “Access on Lock Screen” and “Access Within Apps”.

Lock display screen

If you want to gain access to Control Center out of your lock display screen, leave “Access on Lock Screen” became on. But if you want to save you a person from gaining access to it out of your iPhone/iPad’s lock display screen turn this off.

For example, turning off lock display screen access will save you children from knowingly or unknowingly turning at the orientation lock or putting your iPhone/iPad into aircraft mode or putting a random alarm.

Within apps

If you hate having Control Center accidentally pop up while gambling a video game or the usage of apps, you may turn off “Access Within Apps”. The upside to that is that you may not see that black arrow poking up from the bottom of the display screen. The drawback is that this setting applies to all apps that mean that you may handiest have to get right to entry to Control Center from your own home display or lock display screen (except you disabled it).

Display RTF With Images on OSX and IOS Part 1

While it is clean to display text-simplest RTF on OSX and iOS – each NSTextView and UITextView will achieve this – if there are images embedded in the RTF both of the textual content visitors will forget about the pix in the formatted text.

While changing one in every of our applications to run on the OSX platform we had issues showing embedded pictures inside the database’s memo fields. The software program was originally written for Windows, which embeds pics without delay in RTF statistics using a percent keyword accompanied by diverse key phrases indicating the size of the picture, the dimensions of its goal rectangle on the record and the vertical and horizontal scale. More facts on those may be observed at Microsoft’s MSDN website online.

For example one of the images embedded in an RTF facts block reads;

pictwmetafile8picw4286pich2408picwgoal2430pichgoal1365

This decodes as;

Picture

WMF 8-bit document

Picture Width = 4286

Picture Height = 2048

Target Width= 2430

Target Height = 1365

The facts that follow the RTF header is ASCII Hex – this is every byte is written as 2 ASCII characters in the variety 0 -> F – and word statistics, in which it exists, is little-endian – the LSB (Least Significant Byte) is first, followed with the aid of the MSB (Most Significant Byte).

Looking at the first few bytes of the image records gives;

010009000003f85600000000de5600000000

This is part of the picture header and a short search of the Internet famous how to decode this;

The header is eighteen bytes in the period and is dependent as follows:

typedef struct _WindowsMetaHeader

WORD FileType; /* Type of metafile (1=reminiscence, 2=disk) */

WORD HeaderSize; /* Size of header in WORDS (continually nine) */

WORD Version; /* Version of Windows used */

DWORD FileSize; /* Total size of the information in WORDs */

WORD NumOfObjects; /* Number of gadgets in the statistics */

DWORD MaxRecordSize; /* The size of largest report in WORDs */

WORD NoParameters; /* Not Used (always 0) */

WMFHEAD;

FileType carries a cost which shows the vicinity of the metafile information. A price of one indicates that the metafile is stored in reminiscence, even as a 2 indicates that it is saved on disk.

HeaderSize includes the size of the metafile header in WORDs. This is usually 9.

Version shops the version quantity of Microsoft Windows that created the metafile. This value continually studies in hexadecimal format. For example, in a metafile created by means of Windows three.Zero, this object could have the cost 300h.

FileSize specifies the total length of the metafile in 16-bit WORDs.

NumOfObjects specifies the quantity of items which might be within the metafile.

MaxRecordSize specifies the size of the biggest record inside the metafile in WORDs.

NumOfParams isn’t used and is set to a price of zero.

There are lots more records on this image format at FileFormat’s website.

So we have evidence that the photograph facts embedded inside the RTF records have been stored in WMF format. This, lamentably, isn’t a local Mac layout so would require a few kind of conversion to display the picture. The subsequent aspect we need to discover is whether the image facts inside the embedded WMF records is a vector or bitmap photo.

The WMF format is largely a listing of commands for your computer’s snapshots card telling it a way to draw the photograph. In our case, we may be almost positive that the image facts is a bitmap as this is the way that our software saves embedded images in RTF memo fields. This is something we are able to take a look at with the aid of looking at the data information after the header;

Out of Control Yarn Stash

Not simplest do I actually have a yarn stash, but I have stash trash or trash. Bear with me as I resolve this phenomenon. Slash is my term for those little bits of yarn that simply don’t pretty make it to the trash. Invariably, as I entire a crochet venture, I actually have leftovers. These small, typically acrylic, balls and extraneous tidbits manipulate to build up through no fault of their own.

As they linger in my hand, I debate their fates. I dare no longer throw them away.

I reach for a clean-sided, zippered field (previously the home of recent sheets) wherein to imprison them. When the yarn “prison” receives complete, I make a striped hat with complementary hues. Sure, it might be treacherous yarn that rips up my palms or is not possible to paintings with. You know the kind. You exit and purchase something you idea looked lovely simplest to have it turn on you and emerge as your worst nightmare. The frugal person that you are, you can not throw it away. You stick it in a trash bucket and desire that a few day after you’ve got forgotten how merciless that yarn as soon as was, you may drag it out once more and give it a 2nd chance.

In the meantime, those nugatory jail balls (or yardbirds, in case you pick) turn on me and imprison me with their possibilities.

I launch a number of those rejects from their overcrowded, zipped up the prison and from them create hatbands and ornamental flowers, edgings and pom poms. These colorful lollygagging bits of fluff now tempt me in diverse ways, this is, as a possibility to spruce up my hats and different tasks. Now, instead of pooh-poohing small bits of yarn that I see as now not being worth of my time, I actively am seeking them out within the stays and used trash buckets of others. If I do not use all of them up, lower back they cross interior their clean lockup. Always searching for new creations and unable to relinquish the riffraff, I battle to finish off my stash and be free of its depraved, wicked recidivism.

How To Avoid Being That Annoying Passenger on a Flight

No remember what kind of flight you’re taking, how long your flight is or wherein airline you’re flying, there are positive styles of passengers who’re continually there to bother you. Or maybe you are that stressful individual for others. Be cautious and avoid being that annoying passenger on a flight.

Look at the individual in the back of you before reclining your seat:

If an airline has a reclining seat, use it however make certain you aren’t disturbing the man or woman sitting behind you. Look before you lie lower back to make sure you aren’t going to break the kneecap of the individual in the back of you. Put your seat up when the meals cart comes and depart it up until the flight attendants have taken away the meals tray.

Don’t consume aromatic meals:

You would possibly love the scent of your meals, however the different humans at the aircraft most probably do now not. Take some snacks, dry fruit or chocolates with you.

Don’t use the seats for balance:

As you stroll down the aisle don’t use the seat for balance rather, use the overhead compartments and slide your hand alongside it. Every time you clutch the corner of a seat you create an earthquake. You will recognise how demanding it’s miles if a person does the identical with you.

The Screaming Kids:

The screaming children spoil the reveal in for anybody. Malaysia airways now ban babies from its First-magnificence phase and a survey found that 70 percentage of British passengers need baby unfastened areas.So in case you are taking your child to a flight make certain your toddler isn’t always demanding every person, try and keep your infant busy. Entertain your youngster through displaying him different movies or his favorite caricature film.

Do introduce yourself for your seatmate:

We have heard humans whinge approximately the passenger subsequent to them who talks an excessive amount of. But it is right to exchange a few pleasantries with your seatmate on a flight. If your seatmate is fiddling along with his or her earphones, casually give up the communique.

Don’t stand in the aisle:

When looking ahead to the restroom do not stand in the aisle. We recognise you need to move, however hovering over a person sitting in an aisle seat would not make it any higher. Stay in your seat until there’s no line or until the man or woman in the front of you comes out. It would not appear now as frequently as it used to due to the fact airways have started out to police this themselves.