#do you even know!!! do you even know that they put the dwarf dyke in a pokéball!!!

[wilberave]

STILL NO JAINA MURPH IM GONNA KILL YOU

[tealin]

Basler to the Beardmore 2: Errands

As always, no matter what Tumblr does with it, this post is available in its intended presentation at twirlynoodle.com/blog along with the rest of my Antarctic travel diary.

On this flight to the heart of Antarctica, I was only a hanger-on.  We had two errands to run before entertaining me and my historical interests, the most important of which was restocking a fuel depot at the base of the Transantarctic Mountains.

There are many busy science teams in Antarctica, and while some renewable energy sources are starting to be used, the fact is that everything runs on a reliable supply of fossil fuels, mostly petrol.  The aircraft that keep people and their essentials moving around the continent have a network of fuel depots, both for relay stops and for emergencies.  Contrary to some conspiracy theories, anyone can fly to and around Antarctica if they have the money and resources to get there, and many do.  As the national science programmes have a very tight margin, and their fuel depots are expensive to maintain, they cannot afford jet-setters raiding their supplies, so the locations of these depots are kept secret.  Therefore I am not going to tell you where our first stop was.  The chances of a private pilot reading this blog are slim, but it may be possible to deduce from my photos where this particular cache is: if you are that outlier, I hereby ask you please to do the decent thing and leave the fuel alone – or if you absolutely must access it, then let the USAP know what you've taken and make good on it as soon as you can.  Everyone in Antarctica looks out for each other, and that includes you.  OK?  OK. 

So, we've taken off, and done our acrobatics to get the skis up, and are now facing a couple of hours' flight time before we reach our primary destination.  There is, quite frankly, nothing between Williams Field and the Transantarctic Mountains, besides hundreds of miles of the Ross Ice Shelf. This was known as 'The Barrier' to the early explorers, because when James Clark Ross sailed down to explore in 1840 it was a great while wall that prevented his ships from going any further. In later years it wasn't so much a barrier as a highway – clear and flat, and not much off sea level, it provided a route deep into the high latitudes without the perils of the high windy Polar Plateau.  Among people who frequently travel out there, it is sometimes referred to as 'the Flat White' – my impression is that this term came from the Kiwis, and the espresso drink of the same name is also antipodean in origin, so I wonder which came first.  It is undeniably Flat, and White (though the refraction of sunlight through ice crystals makes it look anything from peachy to periwinkle, depending on the angle), but none of its various names communicate just how big it is.

I have flown over the Canadian tundra many times, and over the Greenland ice cap, but the view from 35,000 feet is like looking at satellite view in Google Maps compared to flying at cloud level, where the parallax with the horizon gives you a much keener sense of distance.  The Barrier is BIG.  In fact, 'big' is too small a word to communicate it.  'Massive', 'mammoth', and 'gargantuan' are more melodramatic than descriptive.  Its vastness puts all of human consciousness, never mind vocabulary, in proper perspective.  For my money, it outdoes the night sky as a visual approximation of infinity. 

Getting a sense of its size, especially in a still photo, is difficult without an object for scale.  For your education and my good fortune, we happened to fly over the RAID convoy as they made their way from the Minna Bluff site to where the Ross Ice Shelf meets the Antarctic continent.  Rapid Access Ice Drilling has been supporting various scientific projects for a few years now, whether their interest is in the ice itself (its trapped air gives a record of Earth's atmosphere in millennia past) or what's underneath (marine environments far removed from the open sea; the bed of an accelerating glacier).  Their units are about the size of a shipping container, and are pulled by enormous tractors, so if they are this dwarfed by the Flat White, imagine how much more puny a sledge party would be. 

Before too much longer we were at the depot.  Landing at an Antarctic field airstrip is even more complicated than taking off: we circled once, to do a visual check, then skimmed it with the skis to make sure no hidden crevasses had opened up since the last time someone landed here, then finally touched down for real on the third go-round.  The plane crew rapidly got to work unloading the fuel drums; I offered to help but was assured I wasn't needed, so spent the time taking photographs and mucking around in the snow.

The first thing that struck me was how beautiful the mountains were in colour.  The best photos I've seen of them have been black and white, so the rich variety in shades was remarkable.  What you can't see in this small photo was how the lighter rock was banded with strata of blue-grey and orange-brown sandstone, giving it a luxurious marbled effect. 

I've read a lot about how conditions on the Barrier are so much different than on the coast.  This was far deeper into it than I was ever expecting to set foot, but I was surprised how tame it was.  Now, it was an idyllically calm and sunny day – had it been any different we would not have been there – so the only time I realised that it was actually much colder than McMurdo was when a slight breeze wafted past my bare hand and broke the warm spell that the sunshine had cast.

 What was different was the snow.  Around McMurdo, the snowbanks which did build up had been repeatedly blown over with volcanic dust which warmed up in the sun and made the snow gritty, icy, and rotten – if you live in a snowy city, think of the texture of snowbanks alongside busy roads.  Out here, there was nothing but snow, all the way down to where it became ice – powder blown off the mountains, maybe even off the Polar Plateau, deposited here to be compacted in the sun and polished by the wind.  The crust made by these processes was smooth and, in many places, thick enough to support my weight, so I hardly left a footprint – a 'good pulling surface' as sledgers would have it – but without warning there would be a thin spot where my foot would break through and sink in the sugar-like snow below.

Before long, the crew had finished their restock, and playtime was over.  After our exciting takeoff manoeuvres, we started climbing the mountains to the second of our tasks for the day. 

The Transantarctic Mountains, according to our pilot, are still something of a mystery.  They are a very high mountain range, but unlike the Rockies for example, they show little or no sign of buckling or other geological forces – they seem to have been lifted whole, keeping their layers of sandstone and coal and fossil-rich deposits mostly flat, with occasional intrusions of igneous rock. The range acts as a sort of massively oversized dyke, holding back the miles-deep polar ice cap from spilling over West Antarctica, the Ross Ice Shelf, and the Ross Sea, as the mountains cross the continent.

Ice appears to be solid, but it actually behaves more like a stiff jelly or fondant icing – if it finds a change in altitude it will flow, very slowly, downhill.  This is what a glacier is: snow gets deposited over many years without melting, turns to ice, and when its volume can no longer be held at elevation, starts to creep down the valley. The ice of the Polar Plateau finds gaps in the Transantarctic Mountains and pushes through them, forming glaciers which pour out onto the Ross Sea and, merging, form the Ross Ice Shelf.  The Beardmore Glacier is one of the largest of these, but there are hundreds of smaller ones, and many tributary glaciers that feed these.  In flying over the lower Transantarctic Mountains, there were plenty of opportunities to see ice dynamics at work: 

Our destination was up near the head of a narrow glacier, where it broadened out into a snowy plain called the Bowden Névé – névé being a term for young snow which has not yet compacted into glacial ice but is in a position to do so.  This was CTAM (pronounced see-tam), a geology camp established to be a hub for teams doing work in the Central TransAntarctic Mountains. The névé afforded an open, soft, flat place to land planes carrying supplies and people, who could then move on to less accessible places overland.  At least, it did, until a wind event a few years ago scoured deep furrows in the landing strip.

As we flew over, doing the visual check, I was astonished the site could be spotted at all, as it was only a small clutch of bamboo poles in the vast expanse. 

Having proven that the landing strip was landable, the next task was to see what condition the building was in.  What building, you ask?  Why, the one completely covered in snow, under the markers.  Once upon a time it was a couple of modules standing on the surface of the glacier, but Antarctica gradually swallowed them up, so now one has to dig down through the snow to reach the roof hatch, eight feet above the floor. 

On the way from the Basler to the camp site, I was treated to one signature snow effect I had missed out on, at the depot.  'The Barrier Hush' is frequently mentioned in journals: it was described as a 'whoosh' or a 'hush-shh-shhhh' that sighed out from underneath the walker as he broke through the top crust into a pocket of air underneath, where the loose snow had settled after the top crust was formed.  The pocket could sometimes extend quite a long way from where the crust was broken and the sound followed the exchange of air as far as it went.  It would startle the ponies and excite the dogs, until they learned there was nothing to chase and catch.    

I was walking some way behind the plane crew as they made for the camp with shovels, and suddenly heard what I thought was a small whirlwind – a sharp and intense, almost whistling sound that seemed to race across my path.  This being the sort of place one would expect to see dust devils (or snow devils, I suppose they would be) I looked around to see where it was, but the air was as still up here as it had been down on the ice shelf.  It was only after the second or third time it happened that I realised what it was – it was so completely not how I had imagined the Barrier Hush to sound.  If you make a little whirlwind sound by whisper-whistling whshwshywshwhwwsh with your lips really quickly, that's what it sounded like.  Having heard it, now, I can completely understand how the dogs would have thought there was a small creature scurrying around under the snow.  It sounded much more animate than it had been described.  I felt so lucky to be let into that secret. 

The crew got the hatch open and the first of them climbed down into the pitch darkness to report everything OK.  The rest followed, and invited me along, but I am not the most coordinated travelling artist, and couldn't see a way down for me that didn't end in a concussion.  So I stayed above while they explored the submerged camp, and enjoyed the view.  It was really spectacular – not just the stunning mountains but the thin, brittle blue of the sky and the hardness of the sunlight, as if the whole world were a taut drumskin. 

And, best of all, from here the horizon was the Polar Plateau – another Flat White stretching to the South Pole and beyond.

[davidmann95]

So do you think Superman & Lois will be actually good in a Flash S1 way or just pure cheese like Legends of Tomorrow? What do you want from the show?

‘What I want’ is a little complicated to publicly assess, because I’ve already read the script for the first episode and thereby have something of a decent sense of the tone, basic setup, and several of the characters. It absolutely seems like it’s touching on just about every angle I’d want it to to one degree or another though, other than missing some levity that’s I think more than safe with a Superman show to assume will emerge over time. Judging by said script though, genuinely very good for the most part, so what I want at this point is for them to keep doing what they’ve been doing between that and his past appearances. Just throw on top the family getting into a hijink or two and fighting Solaris, and I’m golden.

Anonymous said: Why do so many people seem to dislike Tyler Hoechlin as Superman ? The major criticism is that he seems like a Christopher Reeves ripoff, but putting aside the fact that he really isn't, I thought people liked Reeves Superman.

It seems to break down into two major schools of thought (not that everybody who doesn’t dig him falls into these categories), both of which seem to have emerged gradually over time given when he first showed up the response was almost universally positive:

1. Folks who flatten out him playing a fairly classic-flavored take on the character into him doing a hollow Reeve riff. There’s a subset here of Snyder folks specifically who see him as not only essentially ‘stealing’ limelight and love from Cavill’s Superman, but believe he’s been built above all else around doing so. Suffice it to say, I think there’s way more to him than that.

2. Folks who consider him ‘weak’, whether resenting his position to date as a supporting character and how thereby in Supergirl she’s consistently positioned as an equal or greater hero, or literally critiquing Hoechlin’s physical condition as being insufficiently ripped to play Superman.

Uh...I guess I’ll concede that if you consider bicep size a barometer of quality in your Kryptonians - I do not, if his appearance had to be proportionate to his strength he’d probably dwarf Jupiter - he probably won’t be able to work out 6 hours a day every day for however many years his show runs to keep up with Cavill, but bro still looks like he could tear me in half. As for his narrative role, of course he says Supergirl’s better than him whether you agree or not, he’s Superman and he’s a nice guy who sees the best in people, and of course he hasn’t been getting the big wins yet when he hasn’t been a lead. They’ve still gotten his character right in ways no other mass-media adaptation has touched, the rest’ll follow.

(And for that matter: he fights on even terms with a future Christopher Reeve Superman while at a disadvantage, and of the 50+ superheroes who stick their heads in during Crisis on Infinite Earths is one of the *three* who manage to actually land a hit on the universe-devouring Anti-Monitor. I’d say he’s just fine in the power department.)

Anonymous said: Three part question: 1. The CW shows won’t be able to start their next seasons until at least next year; what would you like for them to focus on fixing either individually or as a universe in the meantime? 2. The next crossover will be between Batwoman and Superman; what do you hope that ends up being and if you had to pick one character from each other shows to join in, but NOT the mains, who would you pick? 3. On a scale of 1 - 10, how smoldering is Hoechlin in that Superman & Lois promo?

1. Okay, entirely non-spoilery: having read the script as I said, the main thing they need to do is get some 15-year-olds in there with red markers to take to the kids’ dialogue. It’s not a worst-case scenario, Jon and Jor and Sarah have good moments, but it’s clearly teens as viewed in shows about adults rather than teens as depicted in shows about teens, and if they’re gonna be co-leads that can’t fly.

2. This is 100% where they’re gonna debut Bruce. They could have teamed up Superman with Flash for that old-school JLA action, they could’ve returned to the World’s Finest dynamic they established with Supergirl and Batwoman, but instead they’ve paired up two characters where the only thing they have in common is that they both know Batman. Sadly they will probably be COWARDS and not use Conroy again EVEN THOUGH HE HAS SAID HE’D LIKE TO COME BACK, and that it’s a two-parter probably shoots down my theory that Bruce would be introduced via an adaptation of Metal (Batman being gone because he’s trapped in the Dark Multiverse being tortured by Barbatos and in need of rescue by Batwoman and Superman, the introduction of Batman to the universe introducing ALL the Batmen) - while an eventual adaptation of that seems inevitable, especially given Red Death has already been namechecked, it probably won’t be as a relatively measly two-parter.

My idea I’ve floated on Twitter however as a joke that I’ve become increasingly, quixotically serious about overtime however is still very much doable: since CW Oliver Queen is just Batman, make CW Bruce Wayne Green Arrow. Have him grow a Van Dyke and make offensively spicy chili and rail against the fat cats on Wall St.; seriously, him having divested himself of his assets because he realized it’s impossible to be an ethical billionaire is a better answer to what happened to Batman than whatever these shows will actually come up with. And I don’t know what a boxing glove batarang looks like, but I want to find out.

Or also someone suggested on Twitter that it could be Clark playing Super-matchmaker getting together Kate and Maggie Sawyer, and I’d also be fine with that.

3. I’ll give it a passable 6, but he’s clearly not really trying.

[yulelog]

evens up to 32 for a ship of ur choice?

HMMMMM i will do braylen/leliana!!! sweet sweet dyke dwarf warden and her wife

under a cut becos long probably

2. Which one spends all day running errands and which one says “You remembered [thing], right?”

BRAYLEN ISTHE ONE RUNNING ERRANDS AND LELIANA REMINDS HER THAT SHE FORGOT SOMETHING

4. Who in the OTP would be more ready to sacrifice themself for the other?

braylen probably :- ((( she would gladly die to make sure leliana could be safe

6. Who hogs the blanket?

BRAYLEN..... the surface isnt as hot as orzammar!! she gets cold!!!

8. Who does some crazy stunt to try and impress the other and who ends up driving them to the emergency room after it backfires?

braylen. shes so fucking stupid im sorry

10. Who takes a selfie when the other one falls asleep on their shoulder? / Who takes photos of the other while they sleep?

i think leliana takes selfies when braylen falls asleep on her!! and i think theyd both occassionally snap a pic when the other was asleep hgfjdsdfgh

12. Who knocks on the other’s door crying at 4am?

HONESTLY... I DONT REALLY KNOW.... i think braylen might be more likely to do that??

14. Who talks to the other while they are sleeping?

both of them!! i can really easily picture leliana mumbling in orlesian to braylen then she sleeps, and braylen saying sweet things to leli!!

16. Who bakes the other a cake and puts a playful insult on it?

leliana does

18. Which one of your OTP overdoes it on the alcohol and which one makes the other stop drinking?

leliana gets drunk faster but braylen is statistically more likely to get Actually Drunk. so probably braylen overdoes it and leli makes her stop HFJKDSDFG

20. Who is horny all the time?

both

22. Which one gives the other a piggyback ride when they’re tired?

braylen would but shes too short

24. Who is the morning/night person?

leliana is the morning person and braylen is the night person! braylen likes to sleep in but also is more used to being awake while its dark

26. How good would your OTP be at parenting?

VERY MUCH I THINK!! theyd have a very wholesome family with protective mama leli and fun strong butch mama braylen

28. Who is a fussy eater and who will eat food even if they’ve dropped it on the floor?

leliana is a comparatively fussy eater next to braylen. braylen will eat virtually anything she more or less had to as a survival tactic being casteless in orzammar

30. Who reminds the other to put on sunscreen before going to the beach (or pool)?

leliana has to remind braylen... braylen is too reckless

32. Who keeps getting threatened by the other’s overprotective older sibling?

braylen is the only one with a sibling so.......

i dont think itd be continuous threatening though. just one warning from her sister hfjdksdg

[badgerslick]

Jeeves Peeves & Nocturnal Emissions - Ron's Pathetic Emails

My friend Ron has a bad habit of sending me emails that only he finds interesting. He also sends them to his 'friends'.  As far as I know they haven't complained to him because they don't wanna hurt his fragile feelings. Me, I don't care. Later I'll submit to you our correspondence that ended this boring garbage. Here are some examples of what this 'relic' forwards.     1.  History of screwdrivers 2.  How to make tiny wood motorcycles from Popsicle sticks 3.  Buying a new shovel guide 4.  Cutting a vase in half with a saw (why not break it with a hammer?) 5.  Washing dishes without a bra (Ron has a not-too-subtle deformity that requires him to wear a dwarf bull dyke training bra 6.  Planting a 100 acre field with the new John Deere rolling seeder 7.  Buying fish at the market (I find this strange as he doesn't eat seafood) 8.  Inside a fast elevator 9.  How to water domestic cactus plants with an eye dropper 10.  Why I use superglue instead of band aids As you can see, he's a hands-on kinda guy. 11.  Ballet slipper confidential (no comment) 12.  My Czech grandma's stuffing recipe (Note to Ron:  I'm sure the original recipe didn't have 28  ingredients and wasn't cut with Swiss Army knife attachments) 13.  Beginners guide to door hinge replacement 14.  A 2 minute walk down a deserted alley 15.  Pyro-surgery in your kitchen:  a new way for burning unwanted flesh with a soldering gun 16.  Drill press maintenance for the vision-impaired handyman 17.  Backing up your vehicle on a main street while its raining 18.  Complaining about other people's driving habits continuously (very long repetitive video) 19.  How to buy Kansas farmer shirts in foreign countries 20.  Green fungus foot callous removal with repurposed kitchen appliances (warning:  quite   graphic) Had enough?  Just be glad you are only reading the titles and not watching the videos. 21.  Fly swatters, fly paper and repellents. Ron's guide for eating at his favorite cheap restaurants 22. From girlfriend to longtime roommate:  how to tease, torment and ignore your partner 23.  A monotone sings retchedly slow songs (better than sleeping pills) 24.  Watch me run up and down escalators for no reason 25.  How to bite, play and regurgitate food products in one easy motion (not for the faint of   heart) 26.  Time lapse of 'How I wore the same sandals for 10 years' (don't eat at least 30 minutes   before watching) 27.  A carpenters guide to wasting as much time as possible 28.  My exciting world of photographing earlobes 29.  Replacing new socks with new socks 30.  Toilet repair while taking a dump I had to put an end to these videos. So what follows is our correspondence. It started with a photo of a 75+ knarled naked crone with disgusting tattoos all over her body. His comment was he found his 'girl' after 50 years. Jeeves:  I can't sugarcoat your disgusting lack of what you think other people find entertaining.             There's gotta be a website/chat room that has like-minded social outcasts such as              yourself that you can communicate with instead of normal people such as myself. All              of your ilk can make each other even more mentally ill on a daily basis. Ron:  I remember doing her on the lawn at Woodstock! Jeeves:  What's pathetic is she probably looked that way then. How did her feet taste? Like              muddy grass clippings?  Yum...yum...yum...you sick bastard! Ron:  Fu*k you!     So what video did he 'gift' me with next?  'Seniors in a German retirement home' calendar.  I can't make this stuff up! Jeeves:  Yeah...super... My life wouldn't be complete without something of no interest being sent              to me from you on a daily basis. By the way... Try forcing yourself away from your                                          endless searches for crap that no one gives a damn about?   Ron:  I shall delete you from my contact list immediately.                                 XMas came early this year............Jeeves   

[the-plxce-to-be-archived-blog]

September 1st, 2017. The boy sighed, slowly walking through his high school halls headed toward the cafeteria as he wrote page after page in his journal, getting it all off his chest. Every feeling, thought, frustration, just like he was taught. Dear journal; I believe I’m a good person. Y’know, I think there’s good in everyone. But here we are, first day of senior year! I look around at these kids I’ve known all my life and I ask myself; what happened?

The boy - Philip - jerked his head up as he heard shouting and swears, pressing his back to the lockers just as some asshole jocks stormed by, not even noticing him.

He scowled, listing the insults he’s heard over the years from everyone to each other as he continued to write in his journal. Freak, slut, burnout, bug-eyes, poser, lard-ass!

We were so tiny, happy and shiny, playing tag and getting chased! Freak, slut, loser, shortbus! Singing and clapping, laughing and napping, baking cookies, eating paste. Bull-dyke, stuck-up, hunchback! Philip continued on his way to the cafeteria, carefully dodging the students around him.

Then we got bigger, that was the trigger, like the Huns invading Rome- He bumped into someone briefly, jumping and moving around them as he said a quick, “Sorry!” He quickly carried on his way, biting his lip as he wrote vigorously. Welcome to my school, this ain’t no high school; this is the Thunderdome! 

Hold your breath and count the days, we’re graduating soon. White trash! College will be paradise if I’m not dead by June! But I know, I know life can be beautiful. I pray, I pray for a better way. If we changed back then, we could change again, we can be beautiful...

Philip stopped to see a jock shove another kid down to the ground, furrowing his brows as he added to his words, just not today before stepping over and offering the other a hand - the boy he recognized as John Payne Todd, “Hey, are you okay?”

“Get away, nerd!” He huffed, smacking his hand away and getting up, fixing his shirt and going on his way. Philip just cringed and went into the cafeteria, balancing his book more on his upper arm as he picked up and held a tray with one hand. Freak, slut, cripple, homo, homo, homo!!

Philip sighed, writing as he went down the line slowly, letting the lunch lady put some frankly gross looking food on his plate and he took an apple to put on his tray before getting to the end of the line, slowly walking through the crowd of students to get to his table in the back.

Things will get better soon as my letter comes from Harvard, Duke or Brown. Wake from this coma, take my diploma, then I can blow this town. Dream of ivy-covered walls and smoky French cafes. 

Philip stopped as he bumped into a bigger boy, making his way around him and ignoring his hiss of, “Watch it!”

Fight the urge to strike a match and set this dump ablaze! Then suddenly his lunch tray was hitting the ground. He looked up with a frown as the older boy spoke in a patronizing tone, “Ooops!” He stared blankly at the other boy before writing more in his journal and reading it aloud, “Sahil Lee; third year as linebacker and eighth year of smacking lunch trays and being a huge dick!”

Suddenly Sahil was right up in his face and the boy’s eyes widened as he backed up slowly. “What did you say to me, fag?” Philip swallowed and backed up, holding a hand up. “Uh, nothing!”

He was silent then, waiting until Sahil nodded in satisfaction and walked away before he sighed and picked up his apple before sighing as he looked at the mess between his unopened soda, his apple, the tray and the container of pudding among other things. But I know, I know, I know.. Life can be beautiful. I pray, I pray, I pray for a better way. We were kind before, we can be kind once more. We can be beautiful...

Suddenly there was a tapping on his shoulder and Philip screeched, jumping and turning to look with wide-eyes at his friend. “Ah! Hey, Lucky!”

“Hey!” Philip grinned at her as Lucinda and he both crouched down and she helped him pick up his tray and the scattered items from it. When they were stood back up, the boy pressed his pen to the page while she looked at him in confusion.

“Lucinda Laurens: My best friend since diapers.” She giggled and smiled softly, tilting her head as they grinned at each other. “We on for movie night?”

Philip beamed and nodded quickly, “Yeah, you’re on Jiffy Pop detail!” He said excitedly and Lucinda laughed again. “I rented The Princess Bride.” She said and he laughed as he spoke, “Again? Don’t you have it memorized by now?” She flushed a bit and grinned, shrugging. “What can I say? I’m a sucker for a happy ending.”

Suddenly a louder voice interrupted them, a tall woman walking over and smacking Lucinda’s lunch tray out of her hands. “Lucky Lame-ass! Ha!” She smirked, so proud of her stupid insults. Philip scowled, jotting down a few quick words,

Safia Lee: Quarterback. She’s the smartest gal on the football team. Which is kind of like being the tallest dwarf.

Then Philip stepped up to Safia, huffing and pointed at the angered Lucinda’s lunch try on the ground. “Hey! Pick that up! Right now!” Safia simply raised her eyebrow at Philip, far from amused by his attitude. “I’m sorry, are you actually talking to me?”

Philip snarled, jabbing her in the shoulder with his finger as he spoke, “Yes I am. I wanna know what gives you the right to pick on my friend. You’re a high school has-been waiting to happen. A future gas station attendant!”

Silence followed before she snorted and flicked Philip’s forehead, “You have a zit right there.”

High schoolers could be such children; that was easily told by the fit of laughter that passed over the cafeteria at Safia’s comment. Philip’s face flushed as he crouched down and picked up Lucinda’s tray for her, before he balanced his own tray on one hand again and began writing once more.

Dear journal... Why? Why do they hate me? Why don’t I fight back? Why do I act like such a creep? Why? Why won’t he date me? Why did I hit him? Why do I cry myself to sleep? Somebody hug me, somebody fix me, somebody save me!

Send me a sign, God! Give me some hope here! Something to live for!

Silence swept through the cafeteria and Philip looked up and cringed to see the three students enter. Oh no.

Jefferson, Jefferson and Jefferson.

He pressed his pen to the page. And then there’s the Jeffersons. They float above it all. Some students talked about how much they loved the three girls as Philip wrote.

Lucy Jefferson. Head cheerleader. Her dad’s loaded, he sells engagement rings! Some students talked about their hatred of the Jeffersons. Mary Jefferson. Runs the yearbook. No discernible personality, but her mom did pay for implants. Some whispered of their lust for the Jeffersons. And Martha Jefferson. The almighty.

The whispers continued as the three girls strolled in, easily getting to the front of the front line as Philip watched in disgust. She is a mythic bitch. They are solid Teflon - never bothered, never... Harassed. I would give anything to be like that. He sighed, noting what certain people whispered.

John Payne Todd would like to be their boyfriend. That would be beautiful...

If Anastasie Lafayette sat at their table, guys would notice her. So beautiful...

Lucinda simply wishes they were nicer. That would be beautiful...

Lewis Fredrick... Needs therapy. He’d like to kidnap a Jefferson and photograph her naked in an abandoned warehouse and leave her tied up for the rats...

What?!

Fifteen minutes later, Philip went into the bathrooms - unisex, thankfully, so no one had issues - and paused to see Lucy and Martha watch Mary throw up in a stall, both standing outside of it as they bickered, Martha huffing, “Grow up, Mary, bulimia is so ‘87.” Lucy cringed, speaking as well, “Maybe you should see a doctor, Mary.”

“Yeah, Lucy, maybe I should...” He furrowed his brows, stepping aside as their teacher, Mr. Washington stepped in to find his missing students. “Ah, Martha, Lucy.” The sound of Mary vomiting echoed again and Philip almost gagged. “... And Mary. Perhaps you three didn’t hear the bell over all the vomiting, but you’re late for class.”

That’s it.

Philip pulled out a piece of paper from his bag, scribbling quickly on it before nudging Mr. Washington. “Actually, Mr. Washington, all four of us are out on a hall pass. Yearbook committee...” He trailed off as their teacher took the paper and read it over. “.. I see you’re all listed. Hurry up and get where you’re going.” He stated before giving Philip the paper back and leaving the room.

Frowning, Martha stomped over and took the paper, reading over it. “This is an excellent forgery. Who are you?” Philip swallowed and in a moment of nervousness, he saluted Martha as he stood up straight. “Uh- Philip! Hamilton!... I crave a boon.”

“What boon?”

“Um- Let me sit at your table at lunch. Just once. No talking necessary. If people think you guys tolerate me, they’ll leave me alone...” As Martha opened her mouth, Philip suddenly spoke up, “Before you answer, I also do report cards, permission slips and absence notes.” Hesitantly, Mary spoke up, “What about prescriptions?”

Martha smacked her sister’s arm lightly as she stood beside her, wiping her mouth with some toilet paper. “Shut up, Mary.”

“Sorry, Martha.”

Suddenly Martha took the shorter boy’s face in her hand, turning him side to side as she inspected the nervous kid’s face. “Hm... For a greasy little nobody, you do have good bone structure.” Lucy tilted her head, inspecting her as well. “And a symmetrical face. If I took a meat cleaver down the center of your skull, I’d have matching halves. That’s very important.” Then Mary spoke up with a huff, “Of course, you could stand to lose a few pounds.”

Then Martha smirked slightly and released his face as she spoke, “And you know, you know, you know? This could be beautiful. Foundation? Maybe some lip gloss and we’re on our way.” That honestly didn’t sound so bad, a light blush dusting his cheeks as the girls consulted it, “Get this boy some blush, and Lucy, I need your brush. Let’s make him beautiful.”

“Let’s make him beautiful.” Lucy confirmed, handing Martha her brush. “Let’s make him beautiful.” Mary repeated. handing her the makeup. 

“Make him beautiful... Okay?” Martha suddenly asked, looking serous at him, and Philip was surprised she even asked for his consent with it, but he smiled a little and nodded quickly. “Okay!”

The next day, chaos reigned in the halls as per usual; Sahil and Safia pushing around Lewis as they threatened him, “Out of my way, geek!”

“I don’t want trouble-”

“You’re gonna die at 3 PM!” Sahil hissed, shoving Lewis back into the girls and Henriette Lafayette and Ciara Mulligan both screeched separately, “Don’t you dare touch me!” Henriette huffed as Ciara pushed him away. “Get away pervert!”

Lewis groaned, looking toward the ceiling in dismay. “What did I ever do to them?!”

“Who could survive this? I can’t escape this! I think I’m dying!”

Then one of the girls called, “Who’s that with Martha?!”

They all looked to see the Jeffersons slowly walking in, basking in the attention with someone hidden behind them.

“Whoa. Martha, Mary, Lucy..." Some students said as Ciara added, “And... Someone!”

They continued whispering their names in shock as Ardan Mulligan and Theodosia Burr said, “And a hottie...?”

The whispering continued, then Lucinda broke up the whispering with a loud gasp, “Philip?!”

The whispers continued as Philip moved to walk beside the Jeffersons nervously, his little blemishes covered and his hair tamed and tied back behind his head, his clothes obviously brand new; a nice suit that fit him perfectly.

He smiled a bit at the sudden shock and obvious acceptance of everyone; no one daring to mess with him as he stood beside them. “And you know, you know, you know, life can be beautiful. You hope, you dream, you pray and you get your way!” He puffed his chest out slightly, taking a deep breath in pure excitement as he spoke.

“Ask me how it feels looking like hell on wheels... My god, it’s beautiful!” Some girls gasped and swooned at the sight of him and his eyes widened, a grin taking over his face as the Jeffersons smirked, glancing in her direction. “I might be beautiful... And when you’re beautiful, it’s a beautiful frickin’ day!”

Martha, Mary, Lucy, and Philip.

Philip, Philip, Philip, Philip!