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the-fiction-witch · 4 years

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Story P1

REAL LIFE COUPLE: TBS X READER RATING: ADORABLE AF

I sat in the comfy chair sipping my cup of tea as they set up the mics and such and such the magazine interviewer sat in her own chair and finished with her notes.

"We good?" she asks

"Yeah were good to go Lina" the sound engineer nodded

"Okay, hit me up" she smiled "sorry, are you good" she asks

"Yeah I'm good" I nodded putting my tea down "It's alright I'm use to it" I shrug

"Okay, two... one" the engineer nodded and I could tell the set up was all now on.

"Okay, today in the rambling corner we have an very special guest, Welcome to the corner Mr Thomas Brodie Sangster"

"Hello" I smiled "Pleasure to finally be here, we've been talking about this for like six months"

"I know, I am very happy to have you in my corner. shits been busy"

"It has, yeah"

"Frist things first as always on the rambling corner, the rules. You can swear, you can talk about whatever you want, you can tell a question to fuck off if you feel like it"

"Good. those are good rules" I laughed

"But I think we both know what is going to be discussed"

"Yes I do"

"Good, then lets get started. Now you are coming up to your one year wedding anniversary, My first question is. Do you still feel like a nnewly wed?"

"Uhhh... sort of, I think I'm getting use to it" I smiled fiddling with the ring on my finger a little "There are things I'm not use to yet. This is a primary one" I said showing my hand "I have never been someone to wear jewellery well.. I do, but not on my fingers and its something you strangely do have to get use to, it's a very physical weight you now carry around with you it's very much a constant reminder of her which I do like"

"Have you already lost it?"

"Yes. I lost my ring once. we had been married... ooohh about a month and I was working in our garden I was doing some weeding and general gardening and I took it off because I thought I'm not use to it yet, I really don't want to get it dirty, or damaged, or even worse loose it. and when I was done I had forgotten where I left it and Yeah I lost it for about half an hour"

"How was that? did y/n kill you?"

"No she didn't know. I didn't tell her I couldn't find it" I laughed "I don't think I have ever in my life felt... such intense panic, it was literally the heart racing panic when you pat your pocket and you don't feel your phone or you don't feel your keys but times a hundred"

"Obviously you found it?"

"Yes. It was on the windowsill. where I left it"

"Anything else your not use to? I imagine living together was a big adjustment" "Uhh yeah sort of. We hadn't live together before we got married which I know is a little... yeah my mate jack actually said I was nuts when I told him ohh me and y/n are engaged he sort of looked at me and went ' Thomas you haven't even like lived together yet how the fuck are you engaged', and I had never lived with a partner before, she had I hadn't. But luckily we had always spend to much time together it wasn't like odd for the other to be around." I explained "Her stuff was odd. that's something I think because I've never lived with a partner before and she moved in with me it was just sort of... ohh I need to move all my stuff and rearrange my house because it's not my house anymore it's our house"

"So do you still feel like a newlywed"

"No. I don't think I ever really did. Luckily we are very similar people and I think we have just... always been an old married couple, People have been saying that about us before we where even dating"

"Do you think the honeymoon phase is over? are you like in your sweats around each other and all that?"

"Uhh We are but we have kinda always been like that, I literally think sitting in her flat in our sweats watching lord of the rings was our second date"

"was it?"

"Yeah, extended editions as well, But no I don't think the honeymoon phase is over, I don't think we really had one, I mean the honeymoon was but we had a very long honeymoon."

"Where did you go on honeymoon?"

"we went down out of London, to the coast and then around the west side of the UK went up to Scotland explored all the islands up there then came back down the east side of the UK visited all her family, visited all mine, and then back home. and we did all of that on the motorbike stopping at little hotels, it was amazing but that took us several months to do"

"that sounds amazing"

"It was, it really was, so much ice cream though, every sea side town we stopped in we had to get an ice cream and it got to the point I kinda hated ice cream and I still don't love it as much. Ice cream is nice, twenty ice creams over the course of a week is... too much"

"If there is one thing you could change about your wedding day what would it me?"

"Oooh.... I have no idea. I wish I had seen her before the alter. which I know is bad luck, But I wish we had a little seeing each other first because I was extremely nervous and I think it would have calmed me down a little, plus I got dressed with my guys and then because we had to weight for the guests and such to sit and get sorted we both ended up sat in hotel rooms for an hour or hour and a half just like chatting shit and playing videogames because we where waiting around for everyone so It would have been nice to have chilled out together again it would have calmed me down a little"

"what's a wedding secret?"

"Uhhh a wedding secret? Okay this isn't a secret from y/n, y/n knows this obviously. but it is a secret from our wedding parties."

"Ohhh?"

"The secret is, that the day of the wedding as previously mentioned I was in no polite terms shitting myself. and we where about... an hour out from what we called open doors when they where going to start letting everyone into the venue, still a good couple of hours out from the actual wedding, and I was very very nervous. and for contest I'll add, Me and y/n hadn't seen each other in almost a month, she went to stay with her family and hung out with mine and then we went on our respective parties. she went to Napa in Cali they stayed in a villa on a vineyard with all her friends. which as well was a way better party then mine. I just stayed in London with my mates," I laughed "But we hadn't seen each other in almost a month, we hadn't really spoke because obviously all my friends where like 'oohh no Thomas put your phone away your not chatting with y/n that's the whole point of us partying, because your two aren't married yet' and her friends obviously didn't really want her to talk to me very much for the same reason 'Ohh you have forever to talk to Thomas, you guys can talk forever after this, this is your last big party being unmarried' so we hasn't really spoke either and I got very very jitteray about this time, and I did.. a bad thing"

"Ohh? what did you do?"

"I said. to my party. Look guys I need like five minuets you have fun with your game and stuff I just need like five minuets on my own" I explained "and I went and locked myself in the smaller of the two bathrooms in our hotel suite, and I rang y/n."

"You what? on your wedding day?"

"Yeah, I rang her, and she luckily wasn't in her dress yet so she also went and locked herself in the bathroom and we just kinda cried at each other. I basically did a smaller more teary version of my vows over the phone in a hotel bathroom to her, I don't know what anyone who might have heard us thought. I think if someone heard us they would have thought we were breaking up or something. but that's a secret know one knows we did that"

"what is the best image from the wedding in your opinion?"

"Ohh thats easy, we had such amazing photographer and videographer. yeah we have a full wedding video off all the parties, all the prep, the ceremony, and the reception, it's really long I think I've only sat though it once all the way though, but the best is this perfectly timed picture that I think Maggie got? or make luke I don't remember who got it. but they stood at the doors so the bottom end of the isle and they managed to get this huge wide shot of everyone in there seats, the groomsmen and bridesmaids all looking perfect there not even like a blink on anyone and our wedding parties each had six people, and its right at the exactly you may kiss the bride it looks like a photo from a set, like from a film. It looks staged because it looks so good it but just was so perfect and it's very proudly on the wall in our house, above or dinning table."

"any others?"

"Uhh there's one that's on the video that we stopped and like basically screen shoted from the video of y/n, behind the isle doors so not in yet, of her dad helping her fix her dress so she wouldn't walk on it, holding her hand ready to walk in and her mum like fixing her vail a little and I think it's such a beautiful picture and she really like it as well, I don't have one like that. I think the only picture of my dad at my wedding without it being burry or just like the side of his head, is either our actual posed pictures or one at the recipient of him doing his toast with a bottle of jack Daniels in his hand"

"Did you like her dress?"

"I love her dress. it was so beautiful. and it still baffles me that she made it"

"did she?"

"Yeah she went around lots of stores and just couldn't find what she wanted at all, she said no dress she could find matches what she dreamed off and what she had in her head so she literally just went bout got lots of fabric and she made her wedding dress" I explained "which was amazing because it means truly there is no dress in the world the same as hers and it fit her perfectly, and more then anything she was happy, she didn't have to settle for a dress."

"How much did it cost?"

"I think she said, taking out like her time to make it. I think she said it cost her maybe like one hundred maybe one fifty for everything, the fabric, the cotton, the lace, and everything else. that's all it cost her. Yeah it is more then that if you could the man hours it took for her to sit and sew it but she took it before we got married to her friend who worked at a wedding dress shop and they valued the dress for something like sixty to seventy thousand pounds that's what they would sell it for at a minimum. so I think she did good"

"that's impressive"

"she tailored my jacket as well, she like measured me up and made sure it fit right, that was just before she went to Cali, I think literally the night before she flew to Cali for her party, she was sewing my jacket making sure it fit me right."

"What wold you have done if she hasn't?"

"I would have had a suit jacket that was slightly too big. which would have been a bit awkward because it was way too long in the arms for me, it fit... okay in the body it wasn't massive It did need tinkering with but doesn't everything. but the sleeves like my hands where were the forearms where meant to be I had like a full twenty centimes between my hand and the end of the sleeve"

"What was your party like?"

"we just went out and got beer, got a take away, watching break bad, went on a motorbike ride. it was very boring compared to y/ns party in a vinery. Kinda' wish I'd gone with her"

"How did you and y/n start dating?"

"Aw this is a fun story."

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prettywordsyouleft · 4 years

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Band Sessions: Dowoon

Pairing: Yoon Dowoon x reader

Genre: band au / university au / fluff

Warnings: none

Word count: 2681

Thank you to everyone who supported Band Sessions.

Index: Jae | Sungjin | Young K | Wonpil | Dowoon

It was the biggest scoop thus far for you to take on as a reporter for the campus newspaper. You had only transferred to this university at the start of the semester, and since the roles in the editing room had been well established before you came along, you had been lucky enough to be writing a weekly column as it was. Still, there was only so much of your journalism skills you could exercise in the highlights reel you had been assigned to.

So when a seasoned writer for the paper, Maggie, had fallen over skiing in the weekend, well, you had been worried for her, of course.

And secretly grateful for the opportunity to snag some of her workload.

“This is a big deal, Y/N. Day6 won another band competition on Friday night and we need someone to interview the members and write about their growing population on and off campus as a band.”

“I can do it,” you assured your editor-in-chief with a confident nod.

Gerrie sighed and looked around at the rest of the hustle in the office and then back at your face. You could tell he was hoping he could rely on someone else, perhaps someone who had already proven their talent in his eyes.

But this was going to be your moment. You had been accepted onto the newspaper team because of the stellar recommendations from your past university. There, you had usually held the third most important story of each edition. You had even saved the dying campus cafeteria after writing about their surprising culinary art.

So writing about a campus band would be a piece of cake.

“Alright, you have four days to interview them and present your article to me. It’s running in our next release.”

“I’ll get it to you on time, Gerrie,” you confirmed and picked up your notebook you had been scribbling in, shifting up out of the chair in front of the senior.

“Y/N,” he called out and you stopped to look back at Gerrie. His gaze pierced yours. “Don’t mess this up, I’m counting on you.”

“I won’t let you down, boss.”

Returning to your desk, you let an elated smile cross over your lips momentarily. You were wired up, excited to finally let your reporting prowess shine. Glancing down at the name written in the middle of the page of your notebook, you picked up your pen and circled Day6 a couple of times.

Oh yes, this would be amazing.

Once you found out who Day6 even was, that is.

Thankfully, it was never all that hard to research anything and your lack of knowledge about the five member band had been replaced with notes on all of their current accolades, how many gigs they had played this year, a fansite address, and most importantly, where their studio was located. You had even contacted the band over their official Instagram account and arranged an interview for the following evening. On your way over, you hummed along to one of their songs, Better Better, playing on Spotify through your phone, feeling more than ready to meet the band now known as regional finalists.

You could tell upon the studio door opening that this title was a big deal for them.

Sungjin, their leader, laughed heartily after greeting you, clasping his hands together and looking towards his members as he gestured for you to take a seat. “I never thought we’d be interviewed by the school paper.”

“Given you were interviewed by the local news station, it can’t be all that bad to have me here today.”

Having memorised all the members’ names, you smiled at Wonpil when he bashfully smiled, waving his hands around to dismiss the notion. “No, we’re really happy. Thank you for thinking of us!”

“Dude, you’re shaking, are you really happy?” Jae teased and leaned forward in his chair. He attention then switched to you. “You’re not taking a photo of us tonight, right?”

“No, I can use a photo from your latest gig, if you’d prefer. Your manager has sent me more than enough photos to pick from,” you offered and he somewhat relaxed, a lazy smile crossing his lips. You smiled knowingly, he definitely had a relationship with their manager as you suspected from her glowing conversation about the lead guitarist in particular.

Clearing your throat, you launched into your prepared questions after confirming it was alright to record the interview. It didn’t take long for Brian and Jae to take over, answering what you needed to know with relative ease. You picked up that whilst Sungjin was the leader, answering questions on the spot was more Brian’s forte. Still, the former was present, throwing in some witty remarks and making sure his younger members did participate.

You noticed that every time Dowoon talked, his ears would turn pink and he’d chuckle a lot. It was rather endearing, and you wondered just how many of their fans liked his shy persona. You could almost guarantee he was the type to get embarrassed being stopped on campus for a signature or photo.

“Oh yeah, he’s totally the type,” Jae confirmed with a laugh at the expense of the drummer. And then he nodded. “But Dowoon is the dark horse of our team.”

“Without a drummer keeping you all on time, how can you effectively work together,” you agreed, smiling brightly at the student now almost as red as Wonpil’s shirt. “How do you feel about the term Jae mentioned?”

Dowoon rubbed at the back of his neck awkwardly and then grinned. “Well, uh, I guess I’m kind of important.”

“Kind of?” Brian echoed with a laugh. “You’re definitely important.”

“Shall we go as far as to dub you the most important member?” you offered with an encouraging smile and Dowoon shook his head. “Come on now, if you don’t keep the time, then how can you play together as in sync as you do?”

“I guess that makes sense.”

You clapped your hands together and beamed at the rest of the group. “Thank you so much for your time today. I’m looking forward to your future achievements. And the show this weekend, as well.”

“Oh, you’re coming?” Sungjin asked and you nodded.

“Sweet, if your article goes well, you can come to the after-party,” Jae offered and shrugged when Wonpil gaped at him for suggesting it on those terms.

You merely chuckled. “Well I’ll consider myself invited since you all made it easy for me to write this up, I can tell.”

You thanked them all again for their time and then headed towards the door to the studio, smiling back at everyone before stepping out.

You felt relieved. Not only had the interview gone well, but you already felt inspired to draft up your first copy of the piece. Hurrying towards the elevator, you only hoped that your hands could keep up typing the thoughts now swirling around in your mind.

“Well, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m super impressed,” Gerrie announced when you handed in your article for submission. You beamed with his compliment, watching as he tried not to smile at you when he looked up. “I guess the highlights reel was not the right place to put you.”

“No, I think it humbled me.”

“Well, I’ll have to do some rearranging of the team. We’ll definitely need more of your articles running in the paper, Y/N.”

Thanking him repeatedly, you waited until you were out of the office before you began to celebrate. Pumping your hand up into the air, you let out a cheer, did a little dance on the spot and then patted your own shoulder.

When you were done singing your praises, you looked up and found someone watching you. Instead of feeling embarrassed, you grinned happily and approached the tall man whose ears were now the same colour as your blouse. “Destiny called you here, right?”

“Who’s Destiny?” Dowoon wondered and then eyed you carefully. “Are you alright, Y/N?”

“Never been better.”

“You ran around in a circle,” he pointed out with a small smirk. So he had enjoyed the performance you had just put on.

Nudging him playfully, you couldn’t contain your happiness. “My scoop on Day6 was a hit. I was complimented by the steely Gerrie Moore. That is not an easy feat and it’s all thanks to you.”

“Really?” he genuinely enthused and grinned. “Let me buy you a celebratory coffee then!”

“Only if you allow me to buy you a piece of cake to say thanks for helping me out,” you compromised and Dowoon laughed, nodding once.

“Are you free now?”

“Didn’t you see me just run around in a circle? Do you think I could possibly be up to anything more productive?” you mentioned with a laugh and Dowoon chuckled.

“Well then, coffee and cake it is.”

You had believed that conversation with Dowoon would be hard to achieve. Admittedly, at first, he had seemed shy. But he persisted through in asking you how you had been and you easily steered the conversation towards your hobbies and interests.

“You know, I’ve always wanted to learn the drums,” you mentioned and Dowoon’s eyebrows arched curiously.

“Really?”

You nodded. “Of course. How cool would it be to vent your annoyance by banging something?”

“There’s more to drumming than just banging at the instrument, Y/N. It takes a lot of skill.”

“Of course there is,” you agreed and then leaned over the table towards him. Dowoon eyed you cautiously. “Reckon you could show me sometime?”

“You… you want to learn?”

Nodding eagerly, you pointed to the exit. “Are you free now?”

“You just do everything on a whim, don’t you?” he asked with a laugh and you shrugged.

“When I have an idea, I want to follow it through. So, can you teach me?”

“I bet after thirty minutes you’ll never want to drum again,” he proclaimed and you gaped at Dowoon, rolling up your sleeves as if you were preparing yourself to prove him wrong.

You smirked. “I’m competitive.”

“I can tell.”

“Come on then, let’s go so I can prove you wrong!”

You did in fact, last longer than thirty minutes. But you had to admit, it was a whole lot harder than you expected. Most of the time, Dowoon had you simply kicking the bass drum in a stable rhythm. That was relatively easy until your leg tired.

Dowoon smirked. “It’s not easy, is it?”

“I can do it,” you corrected, heaving in a deep breath and trying to regain your tempo. When you had it, you smiled smugly and gestured for what was next.

“Y/N, most people learn the basics for weeks on end. You need to build up your leg muscles on the kick drum first.”

“No I want to try and incorporate my hands too!” you bit back, looking at the drum kit before you. Pointing at a part of it, you looked over at Dowoon. “This is the floor Tom, right?”

“You know your parts,” he replied with a surprised smile.

“When I research something I have an interest in, I like to know all the facts,” you commented, heaving in another breath.

Maintaining this beat was a lot harder than you wanted to let on.

“Oh yeah, is that how you knew stuff about us?”

“Of course. A reporter’s job is to find the facts and bring the story to life with them.”

“So you know about us?” he repeated and you glanced in Dowoon’s direction, your focus narrowing as he rubbed at the back of his neck. “I bet you know a lot about Jae and Brian. They’re popular with the fans.”

“Your favourite colour is red, you have a dog and a cat, you love most types of meals with meat in them and you strangely like green tea ice cream.”

Dowoon blinked, and his ears turned red. “You know all that?”

“What, that’s just after a simple search from your fansites. Kind of crazy to think you have fans compiling lists like this, huh?”

“I’m grateful,” he mumbled and you nodded.

“I thought you would be.”

“Do you know anything else?” he wondered, his hand mindlessly playing with the cymbals. You examined his motion for a moment before giving up on kick pedal, collapsing over the snare drum.

“I know that my leg is about to fall off,” you heaved and Dowoon chuckled. Looking up at him, you smiled. “And that you have a nice talking voice. Your laugh is really cute too. And when you smile, I almost forget what I’m talking about. At the interview, you were the one I wanted to hear from the most.”

“Really?” Dowoon tried not to grin but it spread across his lips all the same. “You like talking to me?”

“I do. And admittedly, you were right. I don’t think I’m cut out for drumming. You’re super talented, Dowoon. I just wanted to spend more time with you.”

“Why would you want to do that?”

You chewed on your lip with hesitation. However, you were known to be bold with all your thoughts. It was how you were an excellent reporter. Sometimes, the risks you took were worth a moment of feeling out of your depth.

“Well, I saw what your ideal type was listed as and hoped I matched up well enough for you to want to spend time with me. And maybe go out on a date?” For a moment, Dowoon was frozen. You weren’t even sure he was breathing still and you watched carefully to ensure he wasn’t going to collapse or anything. And then he seemed to come back alive again, unable to control his emotions. His eyes were bright and he swapped between chuckling and grinning giddily. His ears were pink, as was his neck too. He seemed to be overheating.

Reaching out for his hand, you squeezed it, hoping he would calm down a little. It seemed to work, even though Dowoon had rested against the wall to hold himself up. “You’re bold.”

“I told you, when I show an interest in something, I need to know all the facts. There’s no point in me trying to play coy with you when I like you. But, if you don’t feel the same-”

“No, I definitely do. I just… you really do match my ideal type. I’m kind of surprised that you actually exist.”

It was your turn to blush finally and Dowoon seemed to like this a little too much. “Hey, about that after-party this weekend…”

“Want to come as my date?” Dowoon asked before you could suggest anything and you nodded happily, swinging your still linked hands back and forth gently.

“I’d really like that.”

“Can I request something though?”

“What?”

Dowoon grinned. “I don’t know nearly as much as you do. Reckon you could write up a facts list like the one you found on me? That way I can learn about you too.”

“Don’t you want to find out slowly like how most people do whilst dating?”

Dowoon shook his head. “If you’re going to know all you do about me first, I want to level out the playing field.”

“I’ll have it to you by tomorrow then,” you answered, standing up from the drum kit. You weren’t prepared for how weak your leg was, and stumbled, Dowoon reaching out to catch you. Your hands went to his middle and your eyes snapped up to his.

“Oh,” you commented, blinking slowly. “I guess that’s true too.”

“What is?”

“That drummers tend to have really good bodies.”

“Y/N!” Dowoon spluttered and then laughed. “Maybe you know too much.”

“It’s my job to know a lot about things,” you countered and Dowoon nodded. You then slipped your arms around his waist, nestling into his body. You waited to see what his reaction would be but he didn’t pull away, his arms gingerly sliding up to pat you gently.

“Let me catch up. I want to know a lot of things about you too.”

_________________

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graphicabyss · 4 years

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?人 NEWS

I wrote an enormous post, or rather an essay, concerning NEWS, Tegoshi, and everything that went through my mind in the past month. Honestly, it’s mostly my way of coping, getting it out of my system and sorting out my thoughts and feelings. But I decided to also post it here for those who might want to read.

It was a long time coming. The rumours were lurking around for years and a month ago they bloomed. And yet, the full realization is yet to dawn on me. When something devastating happens, our mind tends to shake off the pain by either exonerating the beloved person who hurt us, or blaming them and distancing away from them. It's really hard to stay objective. But I'll try.

Coming into this fandom, I prepared myself for disappointment. Once I was a TVXQ fan. You know, the 5-nin TVXQ that was going to be "together forever" and all that. So I wowed never to get that invested in a pop band. When NEWS came along, I tried not to get too attached. I knew it would hurt me, sooner of later. And for awhile, it worked. But, as years went by, I knew I lost the battle. We humans need to cling to something. Thus, nearly 7 years have passed.

To me, Tegoshi has always been a key component. He was the one that led me to NEWS. Or rather, how pretty he looked in a dress. Tegoshi always kept me interested. Sometimes he excited, sometimes he annoyed, but he was never ever boring. He was made of contradictions, both in words and in actions. Nothing ever adds up with him. He made me want to understand him but I could never quite grasp it. Thinking about it now, perhaps it was because he doesn't really understand himself either.

In these years, I had several crisis points where I considered leaving the fandom, all caused by something shitty Tegoshi said or did. But every time I bounced back. Of course, I didn't do it for him. I did it for myself. However, his selfishness has always been offset by his kindness. The last time was him crying at the end of Neverland tour and how sorry he looked. Till the end, I wanted to believe that his common sense and loyalty won't let him do something reckless and stupid. Yet, here we are. The interview he gave to Bunshun led me to believe that he would do the right thing. He said he would show his gratitude to JE and would definitely make his fans happy but now it's the furthest thing from the truth. The fandom is disappointed, confused, angry.

Some people say to get over it, that Tegoshi was meant to leave or some shit. But I think those people fundamentally misunderstand the heart of the problem. It's not that he left that infuriated the fandom. It's how and when he left. Most fans would support his decision to leave if the transition was done properly. He owed us that much. A proper apology. A proper gratitude. A proper farewell. The announcement had me in disbelief. I expected him to at least finish the contract, do the Story Tour, no matter how long it takes, and show the members, staff and the fans the respect they deserve. To cut it short feels like a violation. At the very least, we need a closure. The last goodbye. The last concert. The last something. He just left JE after 17 years like it was nothing.

More than anything, what he did seems so stupid. He had it so fucking good. He was always in the spotlight, both on stage and in TV shows. The other members did most of the offscreen work allowing him to shine. He was supported by endlessly patient members and staff. He had the freedom to choose and all the work he wanted for each of his passions - ItteQ, Soccer Earth, OpenRec. And he had fans that always supported him, no matter how many scandals he had.

What was so important that he had to give up on all the amazing benefits he had? To betray all this trust? And on top of it, at a time like this? When all world is going through so much shit? When the fans need moral support more than ever? What were the "dreams" that he talked about?

The ability to rant on Twitter? Making duckface selfies? Fucking around? Assembling a shitty rock band? Performing with strippers? Some kind of unique business opportunity? He talked for years about wanting to perform overseas or hosting fan events but right now these things are offlimit anyway. Why couldn't he at the very least explain his decision properly? Just that alone will definitely hurt his further career in the long run. The press-conference lasted 2 hours but it answered none of the questions that really mattered and there was no remorse. Though at this point, I can't trust anything he says anyway. He created his Twitter account the the evening it all went down and didn't bother explaining himself. He just jumped off the ship and let other people deal with the damage.

Even now, it all seems like some kind of bad dream. Then again, all of the 2020 does.

When I first saw "手越退社" trending on Twitter back in May I felt like I was spinning into a downward spiral, like all air was sucked out of me. And it wasn't the "oh, no! what will the band do?" I never went to a NEWS concert and never brought any merch. To me, it wasn't really the feelings of a fan whose band faces a crisis but rather that of an entrepreneur who invested too much money into one asset and watched it plummet.

Fandom stuff is a currency that can devalue in a blink of an eye. Its valuable as long as its core message is intact. This is why I can't stand people being petty over scans or videos. I share when I can knowing it will make someone happy because I know that tomorrow that someone might move on. When I stumble upon old closed journals with password-protected downloads they feel like ancient abandoned temples. The treasures in them turned to dust.

4nin NEWS were based on unity, the combination of 4 unique characters. Four components, each of them essential. Now that concept failed. It's like standing in front of a collapsed building. I try to assess the damage. How much of it can I salvage? Repurpose? How much is lost and needs to be cleaned up? Should I even bother?

What do I do with hundreds of live performances and TV shows, in HD, lovingly downloaded and stored?

What to make of thousands of scans, magazines, pamphlets, almost each image edited and sorted? Thousands more stored neatly in folders, waiting to be posted. Countless screens and gifs.

What of the member ai fanvideos that gained over 100k on Youtube bringing joy to so many people? I already got the first heartbroken comment saying "we won't ever see them like that again, will we?"

What to make of my unfinished stories? Honestly, it's one of the things I'm most proud in my entire life. Now their future is uncertain.

Do I take down the poster on my wall? The CDs on my shelf? Soon I will have to looks at my enormous stash and decide for each item. Things that once brought joy now cause pain.

NEWS weren't selling music, they were selling ideas and dreams. The cute band photos now cause hurt and anger. The uplifting songs about unity won't be convincing. All the concerts lost their charm.

Am I being too dramatic? Probably. Perhaps the issue itself may seem trivial to an outsider but our grief is real.

Tegoshi keeps saying he loves NEWS and adores the members. But to me, loving is doing everything you can to avoid hurting the ones you love. Perhaps he means it, but that love will never compare to the love he has for himself. Despite what he says, I doubt we'll even see them together again and I'm not even sure I want to. I knew apart from Koyashige, the members aren't really that close personally. Tegoshi is shallow and seeks popularity more than anything. I'm sure than now he'll hang out with even shadier characters than before. The members used to provide him with the much needed tough love. Now, with nothing and noone holding him back, he'll give in to his overblown ego.

I'm not sure how I feel about NEWS continuing as 3. I mean, I support their decision and that's probably what most fans want but to me, I don't know if it'll work out that well. They were already a band with a lot of luggage and now, just like in 2011, they are a band that induces pity. They would have to rearrange so much to try and fill this huge gaping hole. Not to mention they will struggle vocally. No songs, no choreography can be unaltered. It might be better to go on within the agency doing their own things. But then that would just mean Tegoshi was indispensable and all the work they put in will be wasted. The Story must be competed.

In the past week I went through various stages of grief. The anger was strong and so was disbelief. Now it's finally subsiding, giving way to acceptance. It won't come soon but I'll let all the emotions run their course. The fact is Tegoshi remains very entertaining and the temptation to keep following him and rant about him is strong. I probably wouldn't even fight it if he were to leave with at least a shred of dignity. But with the way things are, I refuse to support him in any way. And I will at least try to phase him out as much as I can as I realize that even my anger is playing into his hands as he wants nothing more than attention, good or bad. Instead, I'll try to focus on those who do deserve support.

I'm not yet sure how to proceed with the blog and everything else but I'll take my time and figure it out. The truth is Tegoshi was one of the two major things that have kept me here for so long. And no, the second reason is not Shige. It's the people. Out of all the fandoms I've been in over the years this one really felt like home. I met so many amazing people here, even though many of them have since moved on. I felt accepted and appreciated.

This week has been an emotional roller-coaster. But today I feel fine. I have a dozen reasons to be depressed. But I'm not miserable right now because of the fandom. I've had about 10 people write to me within several days. Some of them I haven't talked to in months, some I've never talked to before, and some from other fandoms. They reached out to share their thoughts and feelings, and I appreciate it so much. I felt less alone. I felt a sense of solidarity, a sisterhood. Many agreed with me and it was touching but even more touching were the people who didn't necessarily agree with me and still wanted to hear what I had to say.

Perhaps it's patronizing but I feel like right now the best I can do is stay connected and go through this together. If I can help others, through informing, making someone smile, or supporting emotionally, it's all worth it.

#musings

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fairyjeff · 4 years

Text

Wing Club || Lydia & Jeff

TIMING: Present, possibly before mimes? PARTIES: @inspirationdivine and @fairyjeff SUMMARY: Lydia and Jeff meet, and it defies all expectations.

It was safe to say that Lydia’s first impression of Jeff had been rather underwhelming. Their first conversation had been disappointing and frustration. This just went to show, though, that one couldn’t judge a book by its cover, or a painting by its varnish. He’d coped much better than she had with the beast in the woods. By their third conversation, Lydia had to admit she was not just impressed but intrigued by the gancanagh. In between the human in her head and Regan (as well as, if Lydia was completely honest, Deirdre recent strangeness), she could do with a drink and hopefully decent company. She sat at a booth in the bar, waiting for those tell tale chiming bells, and the fae who would come with it.

Jeff was uncertain of what to make of Lydia. Then again, he was uncertain about this whole Fae thing to begin with, and the whole Regan-fairy thing was going to give him an ulcer. Even as he went into the bar, searching for Lydia, he was still thinking about it. Deirdre was still mad - or at the very least grumpy - and he was still concerned that Regan was going to yank off her damn wings. Still, as he found lydia and that tingling bell feeling happened - which he could now identify as that feeling that Deirdre told her about. It was a nice feeling, he supposed, and now it made sense. “Lydia?” he said, raising a hand in greeting as he slid into his seat. “Nice to see you under better fuckin’ circumstances. How ya doing?”

“Jeff, lovely to meet you properly. Can I buy you a drink?” Seeing him in real light, Lydia could see the Gancanagh in him. Not the tongue nor the fingernails gave him away, but he was an incredibly beautiful man, although from their conversations online, his style of charisma might not be suited for her. But then, she was from a different generation. Indeed, she favoured humans who would describe themselves as old souls. “I’m doing quite alright. I won’t hide that I’m concerned about Regan and Deirdre but there’s only so much I can do about that. I’m looking forward to an evening of drinks and good company. How are you?”

“Only if you let me buy the second,” Jeff said easily. Lydia seemed somewhat easier to talk to than Deirdre, sometimes, but Jeff was pretty sure that was only because he had behaved himself thus far. He was trying not to use the ‘fairy’ term anymore, really. He succeeded mostly online, but that was just because he could edit things before he sent them. He still wasn’t sure what the big fucking deal was - if it looked like a fae, and felt like a fae, then it was a fucking fairy. Same thing. “There’s not much anyone can do until they sort their shit out,” Jeff agreed, sitting back in his seat, grinning at her. “I’m alright. Working long shifts, you know. Glad that stupid mime backed off from my window.”

“Sounds like a deal,” Lydia replied, slipping out of her seat to go get him a lager. It was times like this that being almost weightless on the ground gave her an advantage - her shoes didn’t stick to the alcohol soaked floors as she walked, and by the time she’d returned she was glad Jeff would be the next one facing the wall of people by the bar. “No. They’ll get there eventually, and all we can do is support them.” She smiled back. “Right. You’re a bartender, do I remember that right? I’m sure it’s plenty of work.” But then she leant forward, frowning. “What mime?”

He patiently waited for Lydia to return with the drinks before he took a hearty sip. “You’re right, I am a bartender,” Jeff nodded. “Eventual bar owner, fucking maybe if I play my cards right and open my own joint.” He shifted slightly in his seat. “What do you do? I don’t think you told me?” But his face darkened slightly at the question of the mime and he leaned forward too. “The goddamn mime that was pressing its face against my windows at night! I don’t know how it got to the second floor outside my bedroom but there it fucking was! For like two weeks straight. Scared the shit out of my poor Lettie - my dog, she’s a mastiff - and I damn near broke my hand punching my window out trying to get it. Stupid thing, those thing are outta fucking control. You hear they stabbed a guy? Poor bastard.”

“That’s lovely. I have no doubt you’ll get your own place soon enough,” Lydia replied, sipping at her martini. “My main work is art restoration and conservation. I take painting and return them to how the artist intended for them to be seen. Most fae of my species end up in the arts somehow.” As he leant forward, so did she, eyes widening slightly. “I did hear about the stabbing. Staring into your window… that’s horrifying, no wonder you tried to punch it. Thank god it stopped.”

“Oh, you fix paintings and save them and shit,” Jeff said, impressed immediately. “I’ve seen that - not in person, but on tv.” His mom liked watching those damn specials where they showed you how to do things. He usually fell asleep, but he had watched that one. Jeff also didn’t think he should mention that particular bit. “Oh, your - are you not… like Deirdre?” He asked. “Ah, wait, is that fucking rude? Sorry.” He apologized, before he shifted to pull his phone out of his back pocket. “And seriously, that thing was out of fucking control, and it wasn’t even me. Look at this -” He pulled up a photo of his very large dog, Lettie, curled up in his bed. “She has her own bed and she’s still camped out in mine. Damn thing scared her half to death.”

"Yes, exactly," Lydia agreed with a smile, proud of her work and unafraid to show it. "It is better viewed on the TV than in person. Much less repetitive that way." Her Martini was vanishing fast, Lydia thought as she had another drink from it, although that had little to do with the company. "No, that isn't rude at all. I'm a Leanan-Sidhe. Some people might call me a muse. Simply put, I inspire people to create art. And much like you, in turn, I feed on people." Lydia's voice had dropped low as she explained, leaning in very close so that he could hear. Once she was done explaining, she retreated slightly, so that it would look to onlookers only as if she had whispered a dirty secret or promise to him. She tilted her head as he pulled out his phone curiously. "She's beautiful," Lydia replied, tucking her hair behind her ears as she smiled softly. "Poor girl. I bet she keeps you busy."

Jeff was interested in Lydia, she hadn’t been like he had expected at all. She wasn’t trying to lecture him about how fae should or shouldn’t be, though somewhere deep down he was pretty sure he shouldn’t ask. It was probably easier that way - the not knowing. Jeff leaned in a little closer to listen. Leanan-Sidhe. Well, he couldn’t say he fucking heard of that before. That didn’t matter. She fed on people too? He looked at her, shocked, before glancing back at the dog on his phone. “Oh, yeah. She has some separation anxiety so I usually have a dog sitter come around when I work the fuckin’ really long shifts,” he said, absentmindedly, before taking another drink, before he noticed he had definitely finished all his.. He glanced at her Martini. “You want another?” he asked, looking at her. “And then can I… ask you a few questions?” He lowered his tone a little. Jeff wasn’t used to talking so quietly. “If that’s alright?”

“That’s real sweet. Hopefully she’ll grow out of that in time,” Lydia replied warmly, her gaze following the photo until he tucked it away, finishing her own drink as he emptied his. Half his size and determined to keep up, but then Lydia had much longer to build a tolerance, although she had no doubt that he’d outdrink her if it came to it. “Yes, I would. If you’d prefer, there’s a private room upstairs. We might be able to speak more freely there, and you can ask the questions you’d like.”

“She’s still really little, which I know is a little hilarious but…” Jeff shrugged slightly, grinning at her. He nodded, glancing up. “Yeah, that’d probably be good, I’m not the best at keeping my fuckin’ voice down,” he said apologetically, before sliding out of his seat. “Let me go get us refills and we can go.” Jeff knew how to face a wall of people at a bar by practice, and he, after dodging a pack of drunk Karen’s that wanted to latch onto him, quickly returned to Lydia’s side with a new martini and a beer. “Shall we?”

As Jeff picked up the drinks, Lydia pulled her fur coat back on and rearranged the contents of her purse so that she could find her makeup mirror, to check the state of her mascara. She turned just as Jeff returned with her martini, sitting up a little as bells rang inside her. “Thank you dear,” she took the martini, handed one of the waitstaff a crisp hundred dollar bill, and in return accepted a key to the “staff only area”. Upstairs was a quiet sitting room, with a bottle of whiskey set on a side table, with multiple couches for sitting on. “So, Jeffrey, what did you want to ask.”

Heading upstairs, he was surprised to see the “Staff Only” on the door. But if Lydia had a key and no one was coming to tackle them like he would have if someone pulled this shit at his bar, it was probably fine. He leaned against the armrest of one of the couches, looking at her as he drank his beer. “Jeffrey is what my mother calls me when I’m in trouble,” Jeff said, grinning. It was easier now that they were alone and he didn’t have to focus on lowering his voice. “You said you - you feed on people?” Jeff said, curiously. “What does that mean?”

Lydia sat in the opposite arm rest, smoothing down her skirt as she set down her martini, eyes all on him. “Jeff, then. I’ll keep that in mind,” she replied with an equally easy grin. She shifted her back just slightly as the glamour slid from her skin and eyes, but not yet from her wings - if only because sitting with her wings was a rather challenging endeavor. “Like how you eat body heat and happiness, I feed on the life in other people through touch. Usually through a kiss, although it can be via the chest.”

The glamour dropped and Jeff stared at her in surprise - if only because he hadn’t known she had been glamouring them to begin with. “I - oh,” he said. “Sorry. I don’t mean to fuckin’ stare, that’s rude -” He apologized, rubbing the back of his neck. He shifted though, wondering if that meant he was supposed to drop his own glamours. He didn’t, not just yet and listened to what she said. Feed on life… Hm. That sounded pretty fucking similar to what he did, though he didn’t do it through kissing. “Like me,” he said, pointing to himself. “How do you… manage it?” He asked carefully. “Do you have pheromones?”

“You’re fine.” With hair that looked like black pearl without the glamour, faintly luminescent skin and long pointed ears, Lydia did not look human without the glamour. She could not be mistaken for it, even without the wings. “No, not pheromones. I was raised to call it venom, but I believe the more technical term is a hormone. When I kiss someone, they become loyal to me, and find it painful to be apart from me. That lasts for a few days, or until I reject them.” Lydia took a heavy drink from her glass. “It isn’t affection or desire, but some people don’t know the difference.”

Jeff couldn’t help staring - it wasn’t that it was bad, no, it was just… different. He certainly didn’t look like that when he took his glamours off. His silver tongue and shadow and wings were all that he had to hide - the nail thing was carefully concealed by his expensive manicures. It was sort of a shame that Lydia had to hide that. “Venom,” he repeated, taking a long drink himself. He sat back, processing it. And then, finally, he asked, “Is it hard? To have relationships with people?”

She didn’t watch him as he considered it, letting her eyes slide around the room. It was so much to take in, especially for so young a fae. Or at least, so recently aware. When his next question came, it caught her by surprise. She looked back at him, her gaze soft. “Friendships? No. Romance? Of course. Because it’s a component of my saliva, it is impossible to truly fully control. I don’t kiss the people I like, which can be quite the deal breaker. Except for fae, of course.”

Jeff frowned. “I’m sorry,” he apologized. That had to be hard for her. She was so limited when it came to that department, just like he was. Except he didn’t get to have any other friends without wearing oven mitts either unless he learned to truly control himself. And really, he didn’t see how the hell he was going to do that when he’d been trying so hard for so long. “Well, I know the fucking feeling, at least.” He raised his glass slightly towards her, in solidarity, before he took a long drink.

“Don’t be. I’ve learned that people who can’t accept that, aren’t worth having in my life anyway,” Lydia replied softly, standing up so she could stand beside him. He was probably one of the tallest fae she knew, Lydia thought briefly as she looked up at him. “I’m sure you do, better than most fae. I know you’re also struggling with control, but that is something we can work on, if it would help.’

Jeff considered for a moment. That seemed true enough. People who couldn’t accept others for who they were weren't worth it. But Jeff was starting to realize that there were far too few people who were worth it. He looked down at her, considering. “I pheromones a friend when I was making dinner for her,” he said, a little glum. “I should have worn oven mitts. I just don’t understand how to … do it. I figured the glamour shit out early. But this…” He shrugged. “I need help.”

“I’m sorry, Jeff,” Lydia replied. “How did she respond after it had worn off? How long do they take to wear off?” She touched his arm reassuringly. “It is doable. I realise our situation isn’t the same, but it is comparable enough that I believe that I can help. There is nothing about your biology that should make you so glum.” She even had ready made humans for him to practice on, if the need came. “Not to mention that you have lovely hands and it would be a shame to cover them with oven mitts.”

He almost inched away when she touched his arm, but didn’t. Jeff reminded himself as he looked at her true face that she wouldn’t be affected by contact. “She’s still my friend and they wear off… It depends on how long the contact is with them, hers wore off after twenty minutes or so after I shoved her out.” Everything that Lyida was saying was a comfort to him, though, something he hadn’t had in a long time. Nothing she said had made his stomach twist in revulsion like it had when he talked about this stuff to Deirdre. He didn’t think that maybe one was being more honest than the other, because they were Fae. Fae couldn’t lie - at least, not without consequence. He looked down at his hands, and considered a moment, before gently patting her arm. “I’m glad I met you, Lydia.”

#para #para lydia #lydia #wing club #okay but this was so much fun i love immo and i love lydia #wickedswriting

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cozcat · 5 years

Note

What was so disappointing about the HDM movie? I've never seen it, I've just seen people talk about how it was universally hated, was it that bad?

So this is not an exhaustive list... I’m sure many people can add onto it and I’ll probably stand by what they say because this movie was disappointing in so many ways. And bear in mind that this is from the perspective of someone who read the books first - I fucking hate this movie, but I know people who saw the movie before reading the books, and while they know it wasn’t a great adaptation, it was what introduced them to the series, so there is that attachment. I just have hatred.

(Also bear in mind - I know that it got screwed in the edit, and so my blame is not directed at Chris Weitz or anyone else involved in the original cut. But it is about the final product. Because that’s what we got. No amount of promises of what could have been make the end product better.)

But anyway. This got long. Spoilers for the full series.

It removes the ending. I think this was the biggest one - we’ve yet to see the final episode of the TV show, but in terms of the main plot of the first book, we’ve already passed where the movie ended. It cuts off what is a massive plot twist - the shock, the betrayal, the catalyst for Lyra’s journey going forward. (And it was cut off so late in the process that clips made it into the trailers, and photos made it into the merchandise - I found a visual companion at an op shop recently that includes Asriel’s intercision machine and a photo of Lyra in Cittagazze.) It gives the movie a generic happy ending. They did intend on including it at the start of the sequel that never happened - but their intentions don’t matter when you’re twelve years old and sat there wondering where the fuck the ending is.

It strips away so much of the meaning from the series. The anti-religious sentiments are fairly subtle in the first book, but they’re incredibly important to the series. They were trying to appeal to a conservative Christian audience threatening the movie with boycotts - and it didn’t work, so instead, fans of the series knew what was missing and weren’t happy, but the audiences trying to stop the anti-religious message weren’t happy either. The message becomes so much more important in the books going forward that I don’t know how they planned on making the sequels when they quite literally wage war against God.

It wasted so much potential. Well-respected cast, incredible (for the time) special effects, amazing source material, looked good in the trailers. And then we got that. The cast were underutilised, the source material was stripped of all meaning, the edits were down to singular lines being redubbed in post-production, just to sanitise it.

The original product could have been so much better. Chris Weitz tweeted the original draft of the script and you can tell immediately how much better and how much closer to the source material it was. And it’s depressing to see how much love and care were going into this movie, when it’s barely discernible in the end product, and it’s those who loved it and cared about it who bore the brunt of the blame. Chris Weitz, the cast, the crew - they weren’t out to make a generic spiritual successor to Harry Potter that gets a middling reception and no sequel, but that’s what we got in the end.

And for me, personally, my own complaints. Where I won’t name actors while I slag them off, but you know exactly who I’m talking about.

The cast weren’t actually all that good. My favourite character in this series is Marisa Coulter - and seeing her reduced to a generic one-note villain performed by somebody who had to be begged to take the role was just not good. (Seeing this article recently was fairly vindicating, gotta say.) I can barely even pass judgement on their casting of Asriel, as he’s in it for about two minutes, and we never see him in the actual big defining moment for his character in the first book. Recasting the voice of Iorek was a mistake and in the end he just sounded wrong. Lee Scoresby - one of the most widely praised castings - was passable, but I’ve honestly just grown jaded with the amount of people slagging off their casting choice in the show because of their comparisons to a man who was in the movie for ten minutes (and who didn’t fit the book description anyway so why does this need to keep coming up as an argument in his favour). Dakota as Lyra was probably their strongest casting, which is a good thing as she’s the one carrying this whole damn thing, but it’s not nearly enough to make up for everything else.

The aesthetic felt empty. I don’t think I’m alone in having had the Victorian-steampunk aesthetic sit in my brain whether I like it or not, but on rewatching the movie, it felt so empty. It looked cool, but there’s no reason for their world to be like that - I’ve been trying to avoid comparisons to the show in this writeup, but this is one where it feels apt, as the our-world-but-slightly-back-and-to-the-left aesthetic feels much more fitting than something so dated. It’s another world, that is happening at the same time, not our world but in the past. And yes, it’s a world that has had its technological and industrial developments stifled, but things still have had that time to develop - it’s not going to look like our world prior to the industrial revolution but with glowy things.

It felt dumbed down. Let’s rearrange the plot so that we have the big showy climax at Bolvangar later on, even though it makes so little sense! Let’s not kill Billy, because that would be sad, and pretend that his lost daemon is like a lost pet and that’s all the emotional depth there is to it! Let’s rename one of the bears, because nobody will remember the difference between Iorek and Iofur, and that’s the standard we’re setting for our audience!

And sure. They did some things well. Dakota was a great casting, the daemons were everywhere... okay I’m out of things that I liked. But this was a massive source of disappointment to me at twelve years old, and it was a massive disappointment to so many people who were hoping for a beautiful adaptation of a beloved book and who got a generic fantasy movie instead. I think the biggest thing in the favour of its failure is that because they couldn’t make any sequels, the rights lapsed - and we’re getting the TV show, which is giving it so much more justice, so much more depth, so much more room to breathe.

#ask box #anonymous #reply #hdm #yeah this is in no way a complete list so if anyone fancies adding on please do #myhdm

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flamboyant-king · 5 years

Text

Hello, have the scripts for comics I wanted to make when I first started using Lewn, got L!Azura, Taku got brave bow+, and Joji ‘retired.’ But, you know, my hands can only draw so much.

So this is context for comics and relations at the moment, in case yall are lost since I didn’t DRAW THESE.

--Jeorge meets Lewyn--

(Game context: During a grand conquest, my units were dying left and right because of poor placement. Lewyn was trapped behind a wall so he would only defeat the units that spawned right in front of it. Jeorge got closest to the fortress, but he couldn’t kill the Corrin standing there in one hit. So I used his turn to break down the wall and Lewyn hath been released.)

Jeorge: [running towards the fort] Where the Hel is everyone.

[aims at Corrin]

Jeorge: Damn. [Stops in front of a wall] Her defense is too high.

[melody playing from behind the wall]

Jeorge: ...Lewyn?

Lewyn: How are you, Jeorge?

Jeorge: Have you been hiding there this whole time?

Lewyn: I can’t believe you think that lowly of me.

Lewyn: The area you’re standing in is empty because of me.

Jeorge: [patting the wall] Well, I need more than one area cleared by you.

[one brick pushed out and the wall crumbles]

Lewyn: Now, why did you go and do that...

Jeorge: [pointing behind to Corrin] Get rid of her, please.

Lewyn: Only because you asked so nicely~

[meanwhile]

--New Bow--

(Game context: I gave Taku brave bow because... Idk seemed like a good idea. he’s like not fast at all but I was giving him a lot of bows)

Gordin: KOUHAI! TAKUMI KOUHAI!

Takumi: I told you not to call me that.

Gordin: Then what do I call you?

Takumi: MY NAME.

Gordin: Okay! I have gift for you, from senpai to Takumi!

Takumi: Brave bow?

Gordin: You said that you’re fighting for two. That means twice as many arrows!

Takumi: Oh...thanks. I’ve never really used this before.

Gordin: [GASP] THAT MEANS I HAVE TO TEACH YOU!

Takumi: No, you do--

Gordin: I AM YOUR SENSEI, YOU ARE MY STUDENT!

Takumi: He’s not listening...

--New Training--

Gordin: [pacing about] This is all so sudden. From senpai to sensei in a blink of an eye.

[turns around]

Gordin: Since you know all the things Mr. Jeorge has taught me, that means I have to teach you my own methods!

Takumi: Yippee?

Gordin: [rubbing chin] The leaf thing is outdated. That means I must make a new curriculum.

Gordin: Shoot through here. [okay hand]

Takumi: What?

Gordin: It’s just like a target except with the risk of injury.

Takumi: I’m not doing that.

Gordin: Do you have confidence in your aim!

Takumi: I do but the risks are to--

Gordin: DO IT!

[shoots arrow right into gordin’s palm]

Gordin: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Takumi: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

[Gordin and Takumi screaming in the background]

Niles: [behind a tree] Ah, so Jeorge was actually a babysitter...

--The Real Doubler--

Lucius: What are you two doing? You’re lucky Leon came and got me!

Leon: If I didn’t get you, Niles would have just let them stand there screaming for hours.

Niles: And I would be laughing for all those hours.

Gordin: [sobbing] I’m sorry Takumi, I’m a terrible teacher. How can I teach without my good hand!?

Takumi: Eh...you were just excited to help me. I really appreciate you giving me your bow. Maybe we can train together when you’re all better.

Takumi: As equals, not student and...sensei.

Gordin: That sounds nice. But if I can’t teach you won’t be able to shoot double the arrows.

Kravice: [offscreen] That’s where you’re wrong!

Kravice: [on Legendary Azura’s ride] Sup guys, guess who finally learned the importance of dancers!

[a day, maybe, later]

--Aether Keep Rearrangement--

(Game context: Aether Keep editing is fun, just nothing but traps.)

Lewyn: Hello, Jeorge, enjoying your “break?”

Jeorge: Barely. I still hold the job as representative, so I still have to deliver messages to other realms, assist in gauntlets, and defend this place from invaders.

Lewyn: At least it’s cozy up here. [counting on his fingers] Got an inn, a park, places to shop, hot springs, and a library. What’s really missing is somewhere to eat.

Jeorge: It’s far from relaxing. The set up of this place changes constantly. Not to mention the traps.

Lewyn: What tra-- [Lewyn promptly falling through a trap door]

Jeorge: Lewyn!

Lewyn: [freaking out] WHY IS THAT THERE!? WHY IS THAT JUST THERE!?

Jeorge: Blame Kravice. He says it’s ‘fun.’

Kravice: [offscreen] I actually said ‘funny.’

Kravice: [on Azura’s ride] I get a lot of great snap shots with all my set ups.

Kravice: [turning around the tacticians tablet revealing a photo of Lewyn on top of Jeorge] Who do you think would benefit more from this? Anna or Nina?

Lewyn & Jeorge: >:^\

[A week or so later]

--Quadrupler--

[four arrows in the target]

Gordin: And in one swift motion you’ve shot 4 arrows into your foe’s back!

Takumi: I honestly thought my hands would be too small to hold all the arrows.

Gordin: If I can do it, so can you! [jazz hands]

Kravice: [offscreen] Taku!

Kravice: [Azura safely lands her horsey] I need you to come with me!

Takumi: You...need me for something?

Kravice: I’m gonna nab me another Michalis, so I need some fliers

Takumi: But we learned last time that arrows have no effect on him.

Kravice: [sparkle] That’s why we have Azura.

--XD--

[in the skies]

Ryoma: Takumi, you’ll have to take care of Michalis.

Takumi: But why? You’re more suited for this.

Ryoma: Look around you, Takumi, this is the only viable option.

[cuts to Michalis covered in arrows with hp bar at exactly half]

Takumi: Even with Azura’s boost and all these arrows, I barely got him to half HP

Azura: <:^) Cheer up, okay. [gives taku another turn]

Takumi: [zoom in on stats] :0

Takumi: [turns to azura] XD

Azura: ....Okay, maybe tone it down a bit. [that finger pinch thing]

(game context: I have a video of a damaged taku getting danced by azura and it’s just exactly this)

--New Rep--

[Krav barging through the front doors, triumphant]

Kravice: Oh baby! I can’t believe my strategy actually worked! Good job out there, Taku!

Takumi: I...I gotta go! [runs away, redfaced]

Kravice: Compliments really do drive him crazy...

Alfonse: Kravice, I have urgent news.

Kravice: Okay? What is it.

Alfonse: Jeorge is stepping down as our representative.

Kravice: WHAT! BUT WHY!

Alfonse: He said...he’s tired of you.

Kravice: ...ouch...

Alfonse: We need a new representative. Someone who can bring up morale and encompasses the spirit of our castle!

--Camus’s Tit--

Kravice: [pacing the tactic’s room] I started learning to strategize for him and now he’s bailing like that!

Alfonse: I don’t think your tactics are the only reason.

Kravice: I’ve done nothing but give him the worlds!

Alfonse: Well you’ve also killed him over two hundred times and fatally injured him twice that much

Kravice: But that’s less frequent now that I’m strategizing!

Alfonse: To be honest, Jeorge tolerated you much longer than I could’ve under your orders.

Kravice: What are you trying to say, Al.

Alfonse: You are...you...should really consider finding a new representative.

Kravice: Fucking! Camus’s Tit!

(context: That was my ingame name for a bit pshs)

[nowaki’s castle]

Nowaki: Hello--

Camus: [one(1) boob exposed] I have come with greetings from afar.

Nowaki: [slowly closes door]

(watching from afar)

Alfonse: I don’t think--

Kravice: Why do you take things so literally!

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

I didn’t write a script for these next parts but here’s what was gonna happen:

Sentimental stuff, Jeorge passes the torch of representative to Taku, Krav approves, big ol ModFam moment and Party.

Month or so later, Jeorge starts getting bored just relaxing in the Aether keep and wants to travel still. He finds out he’s going to be in a gauntlet, and since Taku is representative at the moment, he’s the one to assist Jeorge in the gauntlet. You all know what happened with the gauntlet. <3

Jeorge comes back out of retirement but only for guantlets and just scouting worlds. He has an attachment to gauntlets pssh. Taku vows to protect him from getting hurt. They agree to be equals and protect each other when Jeorge decides to join battle.

For now, Jeorge chills in the Aether Keep with the Reserves (Lucius, BK, Lewn, L!Azura, etc) aka: units I use when I have to because they’re actually kind of built. Although, I’m using Lewn more and more because of his stupid infinite.

That’s how the plot/timeline is going so far. I have so much story to tell but agh my hands, but I hope these scripts are good enough context for why character focus and groupings are shifting and stuff.

#script #fire emblem heroes #jeorge #lewyn #azura #takumi #gordin #kravice #alfonse #others are there or referenced but we focusing on main parts here

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dramallamadingdang · 5 years

Text

Time for replies!

These be for @princesspiratecat, @jennamaxon, @criquette-was-here, @nimitwinklesims, @eulaliasims, @greatcheesecakepersona, @alienbirthqueen, and @niamh-sims...

princesspiratecat replied to your photoset “Tree’ing a bit. :) Mostly to break up the monolithic terrain texture...”

This actually reminds me of where I live, Lake Arrowhead in Southern California when it's dry. Except I don't see a lake.

alienbirthqueen replied to your photoset “Houston, we have a terrain. :D FINALLY! OMG, what a ginormous pain in...”

this is so gorgeous!! it reminds me a lot of northeast california/nw nevada, which is where i grew up of course haha

Yeah, it’ll work pretty much for any desert-y place in North America. Like, anywhere from the Okanagan Desert in Canada, to the less mountainous parts of Montana down to New Mexico and west to the more interior parts of California, Oregon, and Washington in the US, and then down into interior northern Mexico. Mostly my inspiration for the look of the place is the Great Basin (so Alienbirthqueen is right on!) and Chihuahuan Deserts, though. Not so much the Mojave or the Sonoran because those are generally flatter (and lower in elevation and therefore much hotter/drier) and the vegetation is different. Like, there’re no saguaro cacti, which is the signature plant of the Sonoran, of course. But the Lake Arrowhead area (or the Lake Tahoe area) can work, too, given that I’m adding pines to break up lot-view textures. :) In that, it resembles my home turf in SW Colorado, as well.

Except yeah, no water. The place may or may not have some on-lot water, though, which wouldn’t be big enough to be a lake. I’ll imagine it/them to be springs magically stocked with fish. But I haven’t decided on that yet. I mean, I DO like to build my fishing spots, but I’m trying to go for some authenticity here, trees notwithstanding. ;)

Anyway, basically any higher desert area that’s not a “sandy” place will do, at least with the season set-up I’m giving the place. (Which of course can be changed to make it whatever anyone wants.) It has spring and autumn...mostly because I like to use season-enabled trees/shrubs so that there’s a visual change with the seasons. I get kinda visually bored, if you will, otherwise. :)

jennamaxon replied to your photoset “Tree’ing a bit. :) Mostly to break up the monolithic terrain texture...”

Rest rather green - much better in the second pic. For a moment, I thought you were frowning at the rubbish cart

Well, if we’re being all green and environmentally-conscious, rubbish is bad, right? :) But no, just frowning at the uber-green trees, I’m afraid.

criquette-was-here replied to your photoset “Tree’ing a bit. :) Mostly to break up the monolithic terrain texture...”

Oh, this neighborhood makes me want to create this type of climate setting too! Somehow it feels like a place from a good old 90's road movie. Love the new texture for the pines. Looks way better!

Well, that would certainly be different for you! All your neighborhoods and pics are so green and European and pretty. Which isn’t a bad thing, of course, but I’d be very interested to see what you’d do with a more desert/wasteland sort of environment....

nimitwinklesims replied to your photoset “Houston, we have a terrain. :D FINALLY! OMG, what a ginormous pain in...”

Cool cool cool! It looks so much like your photo!

That’s what I was shooting for. But I tell you what, it was hard! I couldn’t figure out how TS2 decided which terrain images from the terrain default to paint where. It just seemed kind of random, and in some of my attempts, when put into TS2, the terrain was only using 2 (of the four) images in the terrain default, which looked really weird. So in the end, I put in an existing terrain, and then redid the road structure and resculpted most of the hills and such. Then, I still had to edit the terrain default to rearrange the images to suit this particular terrain to get it to look how I wanted. So it was more complicated than I’d envisioned. I could’ve probably put more time into figuring out what was going on with all that, but I just wanted to get ‘er done so I could start building.

eulaliasims replied to your photoset “Aw, c’mon, you didn’t really think I wouldn’t do rocks, did you? :)”

oh, this looks fantastic. I love the scrub--that's always something I've felt some desert neighborhoods need. it adds a lot!

niamh-sims replied to your photoset “Houston, we have a terrain. :D FINALLY! OMG, what a ginormous pain in...”

That looks fantastic! I love the scrubby scrubs- perfect for that environment!

Yeah, for this kind of desert -- the American kind, as in all of North and South America -- there’s gotta be scrub. Pretty much the only American desert that doesn’t have scrub is the Atacama in S. America, since it’s like the driest place in the Americas. :) But even it has some scrub in places. I mean, this ain’t the Sahara or Arabian deserts!

The lack of scrub really, REALLY bothers me in Strangetown, since that’s obviously supposed to be inspired by Roswell, NM. I am still going to play that neighborhood one of these days, but it has to undergo major terrain/deco renovation before I’ll be able to look at it without screaming bloody murder. :)

greatcheesecakepersona replied to your photoset “Houston, we have a terrain. :D FINALLY! OMG, what a ginormous pain in...”

Lovely! Now all that's missing is the Breaking Bad van :)

HAH!. Yeah, I’ve never watched that show (though it’s on our list to watch), but I know that it’s set in New Mexico, though I don’t know if it’s actually filmed there, so...yeah. :)

nimitwinklesims replied to your post “You sound like such a cool person! It's really nice to hear about...”

I often have a hard time keeping the classical composers apart (I'm embarrassed to admit), but Smetana's Ma Vlast always makes me cry -- it was played at my Czech grandfather's funeral... It's heartwarming to read that you like the Czech composers a lot. I'm Dutch but because of my děda I have a fondness for Czech things as well. Also, sort of related, I have played Händel's Harp Concerto at one point (when I was still taking harp lessons).

Yes, Ma Vlast is one of the best pieces of music ever written. IMO, at least. :) I’m not a person who’s into patriotism/nationalism, but I do tend to love music that has a concrete feeling for place, both physically and emotionally, and Ma Vlast has both. It’s why I love stuff that incorporates folk music from a particular country or area, because of that sense of place and time, and the Eastern European composers tend to do that really, really well, which is why I find myself drawn to them. Aaron Copland did that well, too, for American themes. Appalachian Spring (with its incorporation the Shaker “Simple Gifts” song) and the Billy the Kid and Rodeo ballet music and whatnot. Great stuff. I think that this is why I was ultimately drawn to film/TV scores, both in terms of performance and my own compositions. Film scores are designed to have a sense of place and character and sometimes history about them. So I guess it’s not surprising that that’s where I ended up spending more time, professionally speaking.

That said, for all that I am a classical musician, I’m not a walking compendium of knowledge about all of classical music. Certainly not now that I’ve been away from school/academia for *cough* like 30 years now! I have forgotten much of what I did once know, but frankly my knowledge was always pretty specialized. I know much about the body of work of specific composers in whom I have an interest, but much of the rest...I don’t care to know about it, frankly. All the baroque stuff? Meh. I mean, there’s bits of it that I like -- Handel wrote lots of good stuff, for instance -- but much of it just sounds all the same to me, and I’m just not interested enough to know more. Like, while I appreciate his technique and innovations and all that, I just don’t much like Bach’s music, for instance, and I took/take a lot of ribbing for that, but...I like what I like, and the rest of it I’m content to ignore. Which is pretty much my attitude in general, when it comes to music. *laugh*

jennamaxon replied to your post “You sound like such a cool person! It's really nice to hear about...”

The Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis is an outstanding piece of music. Real hair on the back of your neck stuff. If you like 20th C English choral - my recommendation would be Holst's The Evening Watch. I heard (and sung) it first at college. I was breathless after the first listen.

You know, Holst has a lot of good stuff that no one seems to know about. :) If the average person knows any Holst at all, their knowledge tends to begin and end with Mars and Jupiter from The Planets. Which is a shame. I need to listen to more of his stuff, myself, now that you mention it.

#princesspiratecat #jennamaxon #criquette-was-here #nimitwinklesims #eulaliasims #greatcheesecakepersona #alienbirthqueen #niamh-sims #replies

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alexandergarciahitegd-blog · 6 years

Text

First Journal for Web Design Spring 2019

1/18/2019

My History with Web-Design:

The first time I ever considered web design was last semester during the intro to design class where we were told to design one. It was horrible, I had no idea how to even approach it and ended up just throwing pixels at a screen until I technically put in enough work to justify turning the project in. I never even thought about websites before then as I always saw them as inconvenient mediums to whatever content I wanted. This reminded me of when I first started in graphic design and literally couldn’t tell the difference between Futura and Baskerville by just looking at them because of how new this field of design was to me. The panic of the oncoming slaughter that would be known as class 576 pushed me to research as much as I could into the field, especially in how to physically make the websites with code. I focused on code in part because of my experience in Adobe programs. Before I can make an illustration in Illustrator, I need to know the mechanics of the program so that I can work at the speed of thought without being stumped. I saw learning how to code as just the web design version of that, though to a certain point I think I was confusing being able to do whatever I want in the browser with being able to design things that are worth making.

I’m coming into this semester very excited for learning how to design for the web.

The First Project Process:

The assignment was to make a website focused on three things that were our favorites in a category of our choice. I may have misunderstood the prompt a little as I thought we were supposed to make a site to house three article listing three of our favorite things in three different categories, rather than one website acting like the article itself listing the three favorites in only one category that the website is entirely dedicated to. I started in my sketchbook before touching the computer just to get some ideas out before I jumped into the computer with no direction and find myself a deer in the Adobe RGB headlights.

Making the initial wireframe in Photoshop was not an issue, save for some elements that found themselves on the same layers as each other which made editing later difficult because moving objects in Photoshop is difficult when they’re sharing layers. I wrote the colophon in my notes as analog paragraph styles instead of trying to work with whatever nightmare Photoshop’s version of styles must be like. I eventually started doing the text in Photoshop to save me the trouble of having to replace everything from InDesign everytime I wanted to change anything, as per Michael Jared’s recommendation.

The problems I started having in Photoshop was when I started working with photos. Usually, I love using PS for photo editing and photo-comps but using it as a layout software is frustrating as each resizing requires manual rearrangement of everything on the page. Making things more difficult was the problem of multiple objects being on the same layer coming back, as they had different rules for how they need to move I needed to constantly code switch between the free objects and the layered ones.

After there were a few basic sketches done using shapes and a system of values to denote the difference between images, texts, and sections, I started populating the file with content, slowly phasing out the shapes. I’m embarrassed to say that the design decisions I made were solely based on the intuition that I don’t have. I decided on a landing page design of a bleed image with some big text over it because that’s what I see on all the web design Instagrams, which is pretty much the only place that I get around to seeing any web design examples for my still shallow internal visual library. The placement of the text and images in a strict and boring grid was based on instinct and my incompetence with working in Photoshop for this purpose completely stunted my ability to explore any other options.

The minimalism in my designs come from my instinct to remove anything unnecessary out of a fear that the alternative is just a mess of content and design elements that I wouldn’t know how to make work. I’m retreating into minimalism because I’m often at a loss for ideas, inspiration, and confidence. I think this has worked out for me a lot in the past as I understand the way to make low detailed content work is to make sure there’s more attention given to each piece of that content, but at the same time I don’t want it to be something I have to do, but rather something I want to do. There is also the issue that I often find my work to be very boring and derivative. The landing page above just reminds me of YouTube, the website that I’m on the most. During the wireframe portion of this design, I was feeling very confident in it and I loved the way it looked. That is until I realized how simple it was and reflected on how little exploration I really did. I fluctuate drastically between feeling overly arrogant and wondering how I could ever survive in this program, something that I expect a lot of designers could relate to.

The image above is of the splash page for the website.

The image above is the article featuring my favorite music genres. The part of the project I’m still mostly proud of was my work with data-bending. I love the process of designing procedural rules for how art should be created rather than creating the final product itself. I put images into Audition and edited them using soundwaves similar to the genres I was showcasing as my favorite to demonstrate how they look in the context of the image I used here with basic shapes and colors. What I wanted was to mix specific songs with the image to produce a more specific result. When I figured out how to do that the final product did not look very good because of hardware compromises I had to make. When I tried to use the image at the highest quality it was 1 hour and 45 minutes long, which meant the song had to be just short of that in length to be mixed properly. I still don’t know if this would work in producing something aesthetically pleasing, you never do until you see the result, but I would like to have experimented with that if my computer had enough RAM for the operation. It’s normal for only 1 in 10 images mixed with sound to look any good at all in my experience, which means experimenting many times in a short time frame is critical to using the medium effectively.

On Code:

I’ve been reflecting on my resistance to learning a bunch of new programs for future projects. I think a part of it is that I struggle to learn new programs through experimentation, but rather extensive tutorials that walk me through the sensory overload of icons, options, and settings. Before the semester I put so much time into making code the thing that I learned that I was a little disheartened to learn I would have to do the same for a bunch of other programs, but I think it will be fine. When I decided to learn code I promised myself I would never limit my design to what I could do with code, but rather learn how to do it later, and as long as I approach these programs with the same philosophy, then while it might be frustrating and time-consuming to learn how to do what I want, it should be more than doable since they are designed for web design, unlike Photoshop. Apparently, engineers think Photoshop is designed for this kind of work, they’re wrong and that’s why I’m not an engineer, that and I’m bad at math.

One of the things I did in preparation for this class was learn how to code. I started to do this because the idea of using illustrator and XD to make images of the idea of a website rather than actually making the website frustrated me and sounded like it was adding extra unnecessary steps. I was approaching code the same way that I approached any adobe program, it was just something I learned the mechanics of so that I didn’t have to learn while I designed or limit my designs to what I knew how to code. This is the same as in illustrator or Photoshop where I need to sketch out a design and hope that it’s possible to learn how to do in the program. The key with code, that I didn’t realize before I started learning it, is that there are almost no limitations or hoops to jump through. If I want to do something with the website, I just type it and it happens, and if that something is complicated then instead of spending an hour on google looking for a setting that lets me do in like is Illustrator, I just break it down into smaller steps and do it. It makes me feel like I’m no longer being limited by the technology when I code because it’s so clear what I can and can’t do.

It’s not that I think my first project would have been leaps and bounds better without Photoshop, I don’t mean to blame Photoshop for my shortcomings with the design, but there were some things that I simply couldn’t do because I couldn’t figure out how the makers of Photoshop wanted me to do it, such as changing the colors of shapes, and Google was no help on this issue. The other reason that coding has felt natural to me is how intuitive it is to start with nothing and build out. In the Creative Cloud, I am given every tool to use right when I open the program, and it’s information overload. I often have nowhere to start and in worst cases, I get genuinely claustrophobic because I don’t know what I’m looking at until I spend at least 10 or so hours being walked through the interface by tutorials. Coding is the exact opposite workflow. Instead of starting with everything and adding rules, slowly making everything more organized and follow those rules and hoping you don’t miss anything, coding starts organized and with every rule and restriction you could ever have because of the defaults, and I work at my own pace to slowly usurp those defaults and write my own rules for how the website should be. It forces me to set the foundations for the design and work out, rather than forcing every idea I have into one document like I tended to get myself in trouble doing in the past. It also forces me to keep the design structured. When it’s in code I feel like there’s a backbone to the site, and I’m building the body on top of it, as opposed to InDesign which feels like I’m just throwing pixels at a screen blindly and hoping that it works. My brain just responds better to the amount of control you get with coding things, which is not something I expected when I first started learning it.

The disadvantage of code is a significant one. The organization and the foundational nature of it does not lend itself well to exploration. If I want to change something fundamental about the design, then I would have to do a significant amount of reworking, whereas with Photoshop I was able to change the core design ad hoc until I liked it. I had very little issue doing my initial sketch, or wireframe, in Photoshop, and I think it’s necessary to start with sketching in a notebook and then moving to a sketching application. So, in an Ideal world I would do the sketching and wire-framing in my sketchbook and Illustrator, and then make the final version in code where I’m not limited to what Illustrator is okay with me doing. I am hoping that Adobe XD will provide the best of both worlds. Where I can change things on the fly without cutting and pasting a ton of text and hoping I didn’t make a mistake when doing so, which is what Illustrator provides and being functionally structured enough that I don’t get overwhelmed, which is the benefit of code. I intend to try coding my websites after making them in these prototyping programs to polish my skills in code and to boost my self-confidence, but I will not make it a priority until it’s time to make fully functional websites, at which point I’ll get Susan to teach me GitHub.

Wrap-Up:

As I said before, I fluctuate between being overly confident and feeling like there’s no way for me to survive in this program. When I was coming into this class I was in the overconfident stage, and after critique where I saw everyone else's work, I’m shifting into the other stage. Based on the work that I’m doing in this class and in Typography 2, I’m starting to feel concerned that I haven’t actually improved in the past 8 months or so, but instead just learned a couple of rules to make something look good despite not having a great concept behind it. Whenever I do something that I’m very proud of It’s usually an accident that I run with, which is an observation I’m not totally uncomfortable with. I know that I’ve improved at least some despite my doubts, and I’m proud of my ability to see the beauty in mistakes when I’m working that often leads to the final works that I end up being the proudest of.

I had a lot of plans of doing a ton of self-directed projects this semester considering I have plenty of time for it, but after a couple weeks I’m deciding to cut those expectations of myself down in favor of focusing much more heavily on my classes and developing specific side skills that I’ve wanted for a long time, such as the ability to code and draw. I’m also making it my goal to become more proactive on social media and build a designer presence there to the best of my ability. With all that and finally getting the new computer I’ve wanted for so long this weekend, I think it’s been an acceptable start to this semester.

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thepandemicinterviews · 4 years

Text

Steven, August 11 2020, Sydney

After editing this interview with Steven (I struggled to edit anything out, so apologies in advance for the length), I put on Side C of Norman Fucking Rockwell and blasted “California” in my room.

Oh, I'll pick you up If you come back to America, just hit me up 'Cause this is crazy love, I'll catch you on the flip side If you come back to California, you should just hit me up We'll do whatever you want, travel wherever how far We'll hit up all the old places We'll have a party, we'll dance 'til dawn I'll pick up all of your Vogues and all of your Rolling Stones Your favorite liquor off the top shelf I'll throw a party all night long

Another great line: I've heard the war was over if you really choose.

I love to hate on America, yet I also understand its allure and fantasy. I can’t help but think about this “war” as Covid, and the insular, ignorant, optimistic American population choosing that it’s over. I can admire their raging belief in the unreal. This is what Hollywood was built on.

Searching America in my notes, I see that in June 2016 I wrote a list of movies I liked. Among them: Heathers, Mulholland Drive, American Beauty, Dazed and Confused, Doom Generation. What do these films have in common? They all, I think, capture a particular American delirium—the how far will you go to experience beauty, never mind how false it is. A note from May 2018 simply reads “America—land of delusion”. In July 2018, when I was in Paris, I jotted down a few things from American writer Jenny Zhang’s talk outside Shakespeare and Company. Notably: “The utter abusiveness of the American dream.”

It’s difficult these days to look at any news stories regarding American politics and coronavirus without wanting to laugh, cry, and vomit all at the same time. But then you think of the 300 or so million people who have to live there, under Trump. Some obviously blinded by misinformation and their sheer lack of critical thinking skills, but the others? I draw a blank—I feel like punching something on their behalf.

Steven moved to Los Angeles at the beginning of this year to pursue a life of excitement and wonder. It was all lined up—it was finally happening. He was meeting celebrities, getting jobs, doing everything that Lana del Rey would have wanted for him. Until Covid hit, and the red carpet was no longer. Fast forward (or slow forward) to the end of March, and he’s in hotel quarantine in Sydney, getting lambasted by Boomers who are complaining about him complaining. Steven is an example of someone whose life has been forcibly upended by this evil virus. Or, to put it more lyrically, his dream was shattered by something so devastatingly real that no amount of cheery American humour could repair it. His is a story of profound rearrangement, but there is a happy ending: safety.

C: Hi Steven. So this isn’t the first time you’ve been interviewed, right, about your experience?

S: No! You heard that I made my way on the news a couple of times?

C: I knew that you had interviewed for, was it Sydney Morning Herald?

S: Yeah, so I work for Channel Nine so I’ve got a few friends at Sydney Morning Herald and around in the Channel Nine world, I guess. I did one for that newspaper, I did one for 9Honey. I was on the news a couple of times. I mean, my whole experience coming home was documented through a few different news stories. And I did a few interviews on radio, 2GB, ABC Radio, Today FM and Kiis FM. So it was a lot. A lot of media. And the Today Show, but that’s my show, that’s what I usually work on, so it was more just like, Steven can you come and do a segment with us? And I was like, let’s do it!

C: Was that in person? Or while you were in quarantine?

S: Yeah, so coming home I was one of the first groups of people to be put in hotels. I got sent to the Ibis hotel, got put in a very small box for two weeks. Went a little crazy. But yeah, the morning after I got there is basically where I did all those interviews from. I’ve never really done remote interviews either, so it was a lot of getting used to for a lot of us.

C: Were you happy to do the interviews?

S: Totally. So, coming home was pretty shit to say the least. For at least those first few days when I was coming home I had something to do. On the plane back home, I had to document stuff for the newsroom.

C: Wow, so they were lined up before…

S: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I was in contact with the newsroom all the way, because it was a six hour bus ride from the airport to the hotel, because of just how slow the process had to be. So throughout that entire time, I was talking to the newsroom, and they go, Do you know which hotel you’re going to, we’re sending a reporter there. So as soon as I got off the bus, I found the lovely Tiffiny Genders from Channel Nine, she’s incredible. Ran up to her, and the police were trying to be like, Don’t leave! And I was like, I’m just going here! So we were trying to really make time to meet up for all of these moments in-person if we could, and eventually two weeks later when I got to leave the hotel, we did a follow-up with some more reporters that were there to see me hug my family as I left the hotel. So it was a lot, but it did give me something to do which is what I really needed because once it all calmed down after a few days, that was the beginning of the end for me [laughs]. I started to go a little crazy.

C: Right, so [what was it like] during quarantine?

S: When I didn’t have anything to do, your brain wanders, especially when you’re in a two-metre by two-metre box and your only view of the outside is the same unchanging view of Darling Harbour. Which is beautiful, but I never want to see it again, not for a long time. Eventually when the only thing you have to do are your Animal Crossing chores, you start to go a little crazy. And I did! There was one day where I locked myself in the bathroom of the hotel room I was in, took a bottle of wine from the morning, until like eight hours later. I was very water wasteful that day, unfortunately. But I had an eight hour shower, where I just sat in there, got drunk. I say that I was singing, but it was more that I was screaming the lyrics to “Take Me Home, Country Roads” over and over, and apparently the police who were stationed on every floor of the hotel were banging on the door for a few hours, wondering if I had died. That was probably my craziest day. That’s probably the craziest I’ve ever been in my life.

C: How far into quarantine were you at that point?

S: To be honest, time stopped making sense. It was very strange when it came to time. I believe it was about halfway through, though. But the days bled into each other a lot in that hotel room. Because at some point I just closed the blinds as well, so I was going off my own body clock for a long time. I didn’t have the sun to tell me what time it was, what day it was. That was probably not good either. No, time didn’t exist for a little while.

C: How did you feel when you finally left that room?

S: Oh my god, it was something else! When the date came where they could finally tell us when we were leaving, it felt like this weight had been lifted off me, because I think the reason why I went a little crazy as well was the uncertainty of when exactly are we going to leave. So as soon as they told us, my spirits were already lifting and I was ready to just go. It did take some physical readjusting, I’ll tell you that, because the size of the room – I didn’t have much room to walk around, or use my legs really. So I actually had to get used to walking down the hallway before I left. But to be honest, leaving the hotel was kind of the same as going in, because the media circus kind of happened again. I started doing quite a few more interviews, for Channel Nine and for Channel Ten, did a few more news stories, and as soon as I left, I had a camera in my face and photos being taken by a journo, and just so much was happening. I was like, OK, let’s turn the media face back on, let’s do this. So leaving felt the same way as coming in, but going back home felt like a nice warm hug that I hadn’t had for quite a while. Because the whole process of having to move back home only two months after leaving home on a plan of staying away for twelve months felt pretty shit. It felt like dreams were being crushed [laughs]. So readjusting and going home, actually getting a hug from my family, was wonderful. And that’s what going home felt like as well, for quite a while. Having a nice warm blanket wrapped around me.

C: Lovely. When did you decide that you had to come back to Australia from the US?

S: So it was a bit of a weeklong process, I think, for me to come to that decision. As you’re well aware, it was a long process from when things started to get serious to when borders were being announced to be closed, to when Scomo announced that we’d have to go to hotel quarantine, and all of that. And I was keeping up to date with it the entire time, because I wasn’t sure what was going on, and I wanted to keep an eye on it just in case I maybe did have to come home. But I remember the day I came to that decision, I was having a very depressed bath, with another bottle of wine in the apartment I had moved into in Burbank in Los Angeles. And I just randomly got a call from my mum, and as soon as I picked up, all she said was, I think you have to come home. This doesn’t look like it’ll get any better. And that’s just when the tears started and I was like, yup. So that was the moment that we decided, and it was about one week before I flew out, and it was a little risky as well, because the flight that we did book, one of the only ones that we could’ve booked, was the very last flight from Los Angeles to Sydney. On Virgin Airways as well, which means I think it’s the very last Virgin Airways flight from LA to Sydney in history. And it was a little bittersweet too, because it was probably the greatest flight of my life. It was the most comfortable flight I’ve ever had, because it was very socially distanced, and there was an overabundance of food, and the flight attendants wanted to give us a great experience, so I was very comfortable. But unfortunately the saddest flight, but also the most comfy. But yeah, I do physically just remember sitting in that bath, getting a call from my parents, and just coming to terms with, oh no.

C: It’s bigger than me.

S: Yes! I can’t just ride this out here. Originally, I did think that, you know, maybe I can go home for a couple of months, because my Visa will still be valid if I get to go back a couple of months later. I can stay until January, basically, so hopefully this all blows over in a couple of months and I can just come back to my apartment in Burbank and get those jobs again. Nope. It definitely doesn’t look like I’ll be back for a long time. But I think I’ve come to terms with that now. It sucked; coming to terms with it sucked. I do remember another day when I realised this was going to be a thing though. When I started paying attention –

C: Do you know what time it was? What month?

S: It was mid-March, it was right before – I was going to go to this premiere for Reese Witherspoon’s new Hulu show. I can’t even remember the name of it at this point, but I was super excited for it. I went out the night before to go buy some fancy clothes for the premiere, for red carpet. And as I was leaving the shopping centre that night, that’s when I saw the email that it’d been cancelled. Due to social distancing rules and everything, and that’s when I realised, oh, this is big. Oh no! That was the first moment for me. And then the next moment was Scomo saying forced quarantine.

C: It all happened so quick. Like mid-March to end of March I think were the longest two weeks of my life.

S: Literally! Tell me about it. Those two weeks felt like months! When I think about my time living in Los Angeles, it amounted to about two months in general. It felt so much longer because of that final fortnight. And then also the fortnight in the hotel, where I was kind of in this in between limbo world where I wasn’t away, but I wasn’t at home, and all of that. But those specific two weeks where things were still being decided? Everything was so uncertain? It made me age so much [laughs].

C: Yeah, I feel like everyone was coming to terms with the fact this that is a thing –

S: Yeah, collectively. I’ll be honest, being so in contact with everybody at home at the time, and also being in the Los Angeles community – Australians definitely came to terms with it a lot quicker than Americans did.

C: Because it wasn’t already happening, like we weren’t in the thick of it yet, so we had time to come to terms with it. But what was happening in Los Angeles at the time you were about to leave?

S: A lot of denial. I still remember, on one of the shows I was on, one of the crew members just saying, It’s a damn panic, not a pandemic. Over and over again. And that was very much a lot of the sentiment of a lot of people. There was still a lot of people that were like, yes, we should be wearing masks. Some people thought that wearing masks was a sign of hysteria, and we shouldn’t because of blah blah blah. I did push a lot of these memories away at the time because it was a little stressful. Just because I couldn’t believe that people weren’t taking it seriously. And I did get to the point where I really really did not feel safe. Not in the same way where, when I came home, if I wore a mask and gloves and sanitised and went out when I needed to – you know, there’s a level of not feeling safe with that. Even as much as I could prepare going out in LA, I could never feel safe. Just because of the sentiment I knew that was growing. And then there were a lot of fights over toilet paper right outside of my apartment where there was a small supermarket. And that’s when I was like, ah, Americans are crazy.

C: I think that was happening here as well [laughs].

S: That’s true! I did see the news eventually. That’s when I was like, people aren’t really taking this seriously in the right way. The sentiment was a lot of denial and then a lot of hysteria.

C: There was a lot of talk of people, like yourself, who were in the news about the hotel quarantine, complaining too much.

S: Oh, I could talk about this for ages! So I’ll just start off by saying that I got a couple of death threats.

C: Really?

S: Yeah, just a couple. A lot of very direct messages which were pretty much harassment. And oh, so many Facebook comments on the public posts that Channel Nine put up of the news stories. I felt like I kind of became ground zero for, you know, Zoomers and Millennials complaining about quarantine. Just to defend myself, I didn’t really complain myself, at all. I laughed at how small the hotel room was, and I did say I’d rather be with my family, but if this is what is the safest option then I’m happy to do that. But oh my goodness, do Boomers love to take young people that aren’t completely happy with a situation and blow it up out of proportion. The only people I actually saw complaining myself were older people, which is kind of ironic. I do think there were some elements that were worth, I guess, complaining about. Them being the way it was organised. I didn’t have anything against the forced quarantine itself. I thought that it was actually a very good measure to keep things under control, especially internationally, and I was happy to do it. Except that it wasn’t exactly experts running it or making decisions on a day-to-day – medical experts, I mean. It was whatever police officer was in charge at that hotel on that day. So it was different at every hotel. It was different every day for at least three-quarters of the two weeks I was there. I think by the time I was ending my time there, they had started to formalise rules or something. But you could tell it was extremely rushed, they hadn’t talked to me. And yeah, I wasn’t a big fan of the police officers that were running the joint either. It wasn’t a great time. But the idea of forced quarantine I have nothing against. Nothing against. Other things – I mean, I’m happy to complain about how small that hotel room was, because it’s not made for two-week stays. I mean, they had to use that hotel and I completely understand that, but it’s mainly made for – the Ibis hotel is made for one-night business stays and men cheating on their wives, usually. That’s what it’s built for. And it’s not made for, you know, some twenty-three year old person living in there for two weeks, with no human contact. But once the comments started, they got a little heavy. I laughed at all the ones – there were hundreds as well – on Facebook, on the actual news story itself, because it was all country bogans that were like, the kids don’t know how well they have it, they’re in five-star hotels and they still find time to complain, and blah blah blah. But then there were a few people who tracked down my Instagram and found my Facebook as well. And those messages I didn’t really appreciate. Especially the ones that were just straight up death threats. One of the death threats I was actually a little impressed with because it was very succinct. It was just a GIF of a noose. That was pretty straightforward. But I was told to report – tell the police officers at the hotel that people were sending me death threats. But of course they did not help at all.

C: They didn’t do anything?

S: Of course they didn’t. ACAB [laughs]. But I was told by the newsroom to report that. But I thought the comments were quite funny, in general, because Boomers do love to target young people. Though, my family took it as a personal attack, and started defending me in the comments! Old 2010 keyboard warrior style. It was fun to watch. Kept me entertained for a little while in that hotel room.

C: How were you mentally throughout that? Do you feel like you’ve bounced back from it now?

S: Yeah. At first, especially once I got to leave and start dealing with the emotions of what had happened – not being able to do this really huge thing that I’d planned to do. Moving overseas and starting a new life and pursuing a career overseas was a pretty big thing that I’d had to plan for quite a while. And having that cut short by something that isn’t your fault – it’s a very confusing feeling. For a long time, I was so fucking sad. I spent a long time just lying in my parents’ living room on the makeshift bedroom that they made for me. Just wallowing for a while before considering what the future would look like. Because at the time I wasn’t certain if I could go back in a couple of months, and slowly things looked like that wouldn’t be happening, and I’d be home for the foreseeable future. Coming to terms with that was extremely hard. I’m very lucky because I’ve had access to therapy for years, so once I was able to start seeing my psychologist again, things started getting better mentally for me. But also being home when a time is so quiet as well, when no one is really able to do anything – it can make things worse and better in some ways. The things that did make it better, when it came to coming to terms with what this year would now look like, was being able to see people that I really cared about. Like Nicola, for example. We ended up spending a lot of time together in those first few months of me being home, and that made me feel really grounded. Which she does just in general. And being able to see friends who I didn’t think I’d be able to see for an entire year, eventually when that was possible. It helped me feel really comfortable with being home again. Also the fact that America seems to not be dealing with this well in the slightest, does make me feel very confident in my decision to come home. And all those elements combined, I feel like now, just in the last month or so, I feel like I really have bounced back. Now that I can start thinking about my life and my future again, in not so much certain terms, but not wondering if I’m going to be bouncing between countries again. That was the hardest part. Not knowing if I was going to be back in America. But I’m happy to be in Australia forever at this point. And I’m not so much planning for the future, but I do feel comfortable with whatever that future’s going to be at this point.

C: Seeing America’s response to the pandemic – does that change how you feel about possibly moving there one day?

S: That’s a big question! My relationship with the United States is more about – I’ve loved the idea of it and I’ve always loved living there because of mainly the people. I’ve always meshed well with the locals of whatever city I’ve moved to. I loved living in the Midwest in Chicago, and I loved living in California, in Los Angeles, mainly because of the people and the friends that I met. America is such an eclectic mix of people. I don’t have so much faith in their government when it comes to helping their people, though. I still love the idea of moving there when it comes to a future career and developing that further. And I don’t ever want to strike that down just because of a terrible government’s terrible response to a terrible pandemic. But it definitely has made me feel better about being home right now and not living there at this moment. If I could go back in time a couple of months and tell myself anything, it would be, you’re going to be happier if you move back home. Because I can probably guarantee that to a different version of myself that’s still there, that I’d be extremely depressed and worried. I mean, financially as well, it kind of became a necessity for me to come home. Without being able to work, and with the Australia Dollar just nose-diving, eventually I’d have to come home anyway. I’m not a big fan of their response to this pandemic. It’s been atrocious and terrifying. I’m every day scared for my friends that are still there, and every day the people that I met in the city have slowly moved out of Los Angeles back to their original homes if they had that, or back to wherever their parents live in the suburbs, or to other states. It scares me.

C: There is a real danger just living under a government that doesn’t care about you. Compared to here, I feel like we haven’t reached the point where we feel unsafe because, you know, the lockdown in Melbourne shows that they do care about their people in a way that Trump doesn’t.

S: Yes, exactly. The American federal government especially, and a lot of state governments, are very translucent in how much they really don’t care how many people die. To the fact where getting the disease has become slightly normal? At least with the circles that I fell into and have kept in touch with. A lot of the people that are amongst that have normalised the fact that you just might get the disease. That’s just how it is now. And having that normalised, I think, is very much a reflection of the fact that the government does not give a shit if you die, or if you get this disease or not. They just need the wheels to keep turning. God, I wish people like Jacinda Ardern could just rule the world instead, but unfortunately not. It is extremely, just, terrifying because of how normal it is for the American people to understand that their government really doesn’t care about them.

C: Yeah. And it seems like a lot of people don’t understand how restrictions could have prevented the spread.

S: A hundred percent. No, I completely agree. And in all honesty, I never really had a chance to have that kind of discussion with Americans when I was there because I was in the process of leaving at the time. But I feel like something that’s very similar to that, is the fact that they’ve been taught that things that could be good for them are not good for them. Such as restrictions and social distancing, safe measures. And I actually did get into a discussion when I was there before things starting going into lockdown, during the primary elections. Someone at a bar was just saying, having a government subsidise for university, getting Medicare, no one can do that! And I just put my hand up and was like, yeah, I come from a country where we have those exact things! And it gobsmacked that person for a minute. They were like, wait, really? You’re kidding! And I feel like if I got the chance to have that discussion with Covid restrictions, it would be the same result. But to be fair, it is a country of over 300 million people, so there’s always going to be so many differing viewpoints there, but it is so worrying how many of them are adverse to things that are good for them in the long run.

C: And how political that becomes.

S: Exactly. The fact that it’s all politicised is so strange. Like I’m not a big fan of our governments either, but at the very least, restrictions and safe measures weren’t exactly politicised the way that they are in America, which also terrifies me. These were kind of the wild things in America though, having the discussions with people and realising that a lot of them really just don’t –

C: Understand the context outside their own little – huge country, but…

S: But if they don’t have it, then other people must not, right? I feel like that’s the kind of mindset a majority of the people there must be in. To think that Medicare is this extreme version of socialism, like, I don’t understand. Oh well. America was fun though.

C: Did you have fun there while you were there?

S: I did! I really did. I’ve lived in, and I’ve visited America, many many times. This was my first time living in California, though. And I only got to spend two months there, but my God, it was a wild ride. The LA you live in, as opposed to the LA you visit as a tourist, is extremely different. And especially Hollywood the actual place compared to Hollywood the idea, extremely different. I just had a really fun time. I met a bunch of people, and I didn’t think I would be making friends with so many celebrities too.

C: Really? Who did you meet?

S: So probably the closest friend I made there was Grant Imahara from Mythbusters. He recently passed away which was very very sad. But he was extremely nice to me and was kind of the one who introduced me to so many of the other regular people and celebrities around Hollywood. Got me very involved. He was a very nice man. We met while doing karaoke at a Star Wars themed bar. Hollywood’s wild [laughs].

C: How’s your life been since coming back? Have you enjoyed the quietness of it?

S: At first, the quietness drove me a little crazy. It was definitely what I needed for a while, but eventually I did enjoy it. Like I said before, I spent a lot of that time spending more quality time with people I cared about. I feel like a lot of my close friendships grew a lot closer as well. And I got to do some things that I couldn’t really do before. Like one day, Nicola and I went to Centennial Park while it was empty, and basically had the whole park to ourselves. And I don’t think that’s ever going to be replicated. The quietness definitely grew on me after a while. And I’ve definitely grown with being okay being home in the last few months.

C: And now you’re about to start full-time work?

S: Yeah, that’s true. I’ve never had a full-time job. My last job was a meet-and-greet producer on the Today Show. Super duper fun, but at the moment we can only have five people in the studio at one time. My job revolved around our guests that we had on the show. We don’t physically have any guests on the show, which means for the most part, my role is now defunct for the foreseeable future. However, I’m still on the payroll, so as soon as I can go back, the possibility’s there. But waiting around, on JobSeeker as well, which I’m grateful for, but waiting around for so long was very tiring. It did give me a lot of time to spend time with my friends like I said, but the idea of going into full-time work is kind of nice. Having something to do now. I’ve never had a full-time job before, it’s all been freelance and casual. So having basically 9-5 weekdays for a little while, I feel like is going to be some structure that I’ve needed since even before I left for the States. Because even when I was there, I didn’t exactly have a structure at the time. It was very go go go, let’s find a place to live, let’s find some jobs, let’s meet some people. And coming home was just, let’s do nothing! So now that I get to have a very regular routine, I feel like it’s going to ground me a little bit. Something I’ve needed.

C: I think that was the case for Nicki as well, getting her two jobs. And having a period away from the freelancing lifestyle.

S: Like I said before, being able to spend with people like Nicola helped a lot because we could talk through things like that, like how can we help ourselves feel a little better during this time. What do we need? Seeing Nicola stress over jobs and work and it all kind of paying off has been great too. Hopefully I get a taste of the payoff as well [laughs]. Speaking of, on that note as well, not just about Nicola, but also the way that this has felt kind of comes down to some lyrics from a song that she showed me by the Mountain Goats called “This Year”. The lyrics are, I’m going to make it through this year if it kills me. And those goes through my head all the time. Ever since coming home, and the only time I feel like it’s finally stopped has now been the idea of having this full-time job and having a routine. Because now I feel like I really am going to get through this year.

C: Yeah, just a distraction from what this year represents.

S: Honestly, I’ve never been a huge fan of personifying years and saying, this one was the worst ever! Like, I remember going through 2016 and everyone was like, this year’s the worst, everyone’s dying this year and blah blah blah. I was just never a big fan of the idea of like this year’s bad. Until this year. This year’s bad [laughs].

C: Globally. Historically 2020 will be known as one of the worst years.

S: Exactly. I will happily personify this year. Very bad no good.

C: At least you’re not in America.

S: At least I’m not in America. At the very least, I’m in a country where I feel safer and more comfortable in, around people that care about me. Not new friends, but close, old friends too.

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inevitably-johnlocked · 7 years

Text

hey steph! im the anon who asked you i could submit anonymously! im so nervous right now, i can’t believe i wrote something omg ahaha. Here goes the first thing i ever wrote in my life, hope it’s not garbage!

It’s late. Sherlock and John are out of the house because the weather is kind of nice and they both can’t sleep. It’s been a couple of months since Sherlock confessed his love for John. John was surprised, because he thought their unspoken thing would remain forever that. He was okay with it, he still came home everyday to Sherlock and he still shared every aspect of his life with him, and to John that was enough. But now they’re walking in the streets of London, though not far from Baker Street, and their hands are intertwined like they were always meant to be.

John’s thumb is caressing Sherlock’s skin and thinking how soft it is and how lucky he is right now. This is the first time they’ve held hands in public, only because they seem to be alone in the street and there’s nobody to see them.

They’ve decided not to tell anyone yet, and to enjoy these moments of bliss together before the entirety England finds out and all hell breaks loose. The only person who has found out was Greg when he entered 221b without notice while John and Sherlock were snuggling in the couch watching some bad television, but he promised to keep it a secret. That did not stop him, obviously, from making a few jokes while at crime scenes, jokes only the three of them understood.

Suddenly, they hear the sound of a flash coming off and they are blinded by a light coming from some trees ahead of them. Someone just took a picture of the only consulting detective in the world and his blogger holding hands, running away afterwards. Sherlock doesn’t know what to do or to say; he stares down at John and all he sees is John with a big smile in his face.

John says, “Now people will definitely talk.” That sparks something in Sherlock, and it’s impossible for him to not smile back. He bows down to kiss John and runs his fingers on the cheek of his lover with the most tender of touches. John responds with a light grip on Sherlock’s hip.

It’s freeing for them both, to do this in a place that is not their house, though it is 3 in the morning and nobody seems to care – except that one person that now is going to be rich for selling that photo to all the gossip magazines. But all the same, they can’t stop smiling.

Sherlock stops, now with his hand on the nape of John’s head, and says “Let’s go home.” John leans in to the touch and agrees. Hell is about to break loose but they couldn’t be more peaceful, feeling like there’s is no place on earth they’d rather be.

(submitted by Anon!)

(referencing this post)

Hey Nonny!!!!

Firstly, I hope you don’t mind if I did some editing on this post for you! Stories are always easier to read if you break it up into paragraphs, and I’ve fixed the spelling and grammar errors on this for you (sorry, it’s a REALLY REALLY bad habit of mine... PLEASE don’t take offense, I’ve changed NOTHING else except incorrect spelling / grammar and paragraph spacing!)

Secondly, DON’T say it’s garbage! It’s simply a work-in-progress; even the best writers in existence all had to start somewhere! You can’t expect to be a professional on your first story! It’s always a learning process, and you learn to write a great story the more times you write and the more rewrites and drafts of it!

Thirdly, AWWW, this is so lovely! I do see some places for some rearranging of the text to get the story to flow better (never EVER hesitate to ask for help with grammar and sentence structure! English is such a nuanced language, and betas are excellent at helping beginner writers!), but you still wrote a very sweet ficlet, and is so very lovely for your first ever fic!! It made me smile, absolutely! It was very cute!

PLEASE, never EVER stop writing! You did a fantastic first try! <3

#steph replies #johnlock ficlets #stuff for me #johnlock headcanons #submission

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jessgartner · 4 years

Text

Leaving Facebook Part III: Goodbye to All That

Remember what it was to be me: that is always the point.

I'm in the final countdown to deleting Facebook, and not a moment too soon.

TL;DR:

Primary posts will be here

I'll be sending out a monthly Life Olympics newsletter

If you want email, mail, and/or newsletters, let me know where to find you

I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not.

The Wind-Down

I've backed up my data, I've collected contact info, and I've explored a variety of new platforms with varying degrees of success.

I've reached a tentative consensus on my plan for moving forward. It's a little more complex than I would have liked, but I'm settling into some new habits and I'll continue to iterate and refine over time. Here's where I've landed:

Nothing was irrevocable; everything was within reach. Just around every corner lay something curious and interesting, something I had never before seen or done or known about.

Consuming

I chose: Apple News. I slept on this for a while, for reasons I can't totally remember. I revisited it and spent some time customizing it and decided it's the best newsfeed for me for now.

Pros:

Free

UX is good and it's easy to follow publications/topics

iCloud syncing across devices + desktop app is hard to beat. The next best product I looked at (Thread News) only had a mobile app, which was a dealbreaker for me.

I follow mostly mainstream-is publications and there's a full database of sources that are easy to follow.

I haven't tried News+ yet but I like the option of it - a while ago I had a similar magazine aggregator from Conde Nast that I loved and this seems similar or better.

Cons:

Initially, I didn't like the Top Stories on the home page. I don't really love the CNN/ABC/CBS-type focus on 24-hour headline news and wish this was better curated from my interests and favorite publications. I finally figured out that you can limit the Home Page to publications that you follow, but it's not an obvious setting.

I hate that share/copy link produces an apple.news url instead of the native url; this is obnoxious.

Runner Up: Thread News had a really nice Daily Digest feature that curated from your favorite publications.

I chose: Pocket for random articles that I come across on Twitter, in Slack, or recommended through text messages, I save them to Pocket to read later.

Pros:

Free (with premium paid option)

Syncs across desktop, mobile, iPad app; app UX is nicely optimized across devices

Tagging (good for saving favorites)

"Article view" that clears out web junk for a streamlined reading experience

Chrome extension for easy clipping/adding

Cons:

None yet; it's simple and works the way I want it to

Runner up: Instapaper. It has very similar functionality to Pocket, I just slightly prefer the design of Pocket. If you like a really minimalist reading experience, Instapaper is for you.

Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss.

Creating

This one was a beast. I struggled for weeks to parse out exactly what I wanted on this front and which criteria were most important to me, because it became clear quickly that I wasn't going to get everything I wanted in one place.

I chose: Tumblr I initially wrote this off because the homepage/discovery can be nauseating without the right default settings. A tour of the mobile version convinced me to give this a second look: the mobile app is great and the posting experience is (pardon the cliche) delightful. I decided to give it a deeper dive behind the scenes and found that I was able to customize a lot of what I initially disliked. The auto formatting for photo, quote, link, and chat posts is charming and simple.

Pros:

Customizing themes is simple and there are a lot of choices.

I can use my personal domain

The posting experience is easy and relatively error-free

The tagging! I love my tags and they work so nicely. I was also able to find a theme that features tags so you will always have easy access to the latest photos of Darwin.

Great for multimedia posting

Built-in share buttons

Cons:

Not very good at importing content from other platforms; I manually recreated a few favorite posts, but otherwise pretty much had to start from scratch on content

No built-in analytics, aside from follower counts, which is not something I expect to care about or track. I set up tracking on Google Analytics, but I'll miss the built-in analytics that WordPress had. Since WP bought Tumblr, I'm hoping that they may eventually add these features to Tumblr

I just don't care about the social/discovery components here and I wish I could turn them off

Ads. I wish I could pay to make them go away.

Runner up: micro.blog For the first couple of weeks, I thought this was going to be my choice. I had a solid experience importing and archiving a lot of my content from WordPress, Instagram, and Medium. Unfortunately, once I started trying to use the platform on a daily basis, I ran into a lot of issues and challenges that gave me pause on using and recommending the platform. To be clear, a good number of these issues were either user-error or bespoke preferences due to my personal quirks on how I want to organize and share content on the Internet. Some of this is a result of it being a new-ish platform that still has some blind spots for non-developers; it's not a mainstream product yet and I'm not sure it's trying to be. Based on my personal preferences, I felt Tumblr was slightly better equipped for my use case. I'm still going to keep using micro.blog for a while in tandem with Tumblr to see if my preferences change and/or if the platform adopts some of the feedback I shared with regard to cross-posting and UX.

I chose: Drafts. One big challenge for me in this process was the desire to cross-post some content in multiple places while limiting where I post other content. I didn't want to fill my Twitter feed with cat pictures, but I wanted some little corner of the Internet for Darwin's biggest fans (my mother). Drafts is basically a universal text editor that pushes drafts of text to a variety of services, including micro.blog, Twitter, Day One, Google Drive, Evernote, WordPress, Gmail, and even text messages. It's highly configurable and I'm only just scratching the surface of its power. Creating text drafts here allows me to easily push drafts to a variety of different places with just a few keystrokes. It syncs with iCloud, has really robust tagging and filtering, and has mobile, iPad, and Mac apps. It's very cool.

He laughed literally until he choked, and I had to roll down the taxi window and hit him on the back. "New faces," he said finally, "don't tell me about new faces.”

Engagement

I chose: Twitter I've increasingly found Twitter to be a place where my friends/followers care about what I care about. The messages I care most about sharing are amplified. I can choose to unfollow, mute, or block people who are harassing or distressing me. I can follow people whose expertise I value. It can still be a cesspool at times but Twitter leadership seems to be taking steps to improve the platform - identifying misinformation, a conversation feature that limits replies, etc. For now, it stays.

Coming Soon: Substack I haven't officially started this yet, but I'm going to start a monthly newsletter that (allegedly) goes out the first Sunday of every month. I'm going to use roughly my annual Life Olympics format except there will be fun and exciting recommendations. Teaser: new Life Olympics categories will make their debut in the first installment on July 5! If you want it, make sure you give me your email address and you'll receive the first edition.

It’s easy to see the beginnings of things, and harder to see the ends.

All quotes by Joan Didion, Slouching Towards Bethlehem

Many, many thanks to Jason Becker for his recommendations, patience, and tech support on this project.

#home

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sinceileftyoublog · 5 years

Text

Prong Interview: Quality Control

Prong (from left to right: drummer Aaron Rossi, vocalist/guitarist Tommy Victor, bassist/backing vocalist Jason Christopher); Photo by Tim Tronckoe

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Prong’s not a one-hit wonder--not because they have more than one hit, but because despite its appearance on a Beavis and Butthead episode, you can’t really call “Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck” a hit. It doesn’t even have its own Wikipedia page. And as much as the band’s sole consistent member is concerned with their lack of hits, he--and they--are better than that.

Save for a five year period of inactivity, the Tommy Victor-helmed metal band has been making music for over thirty years, with some of its most inspired material coming in the 2010′s. The inspired Carved Into Stone and Zero Days were career highlights, seeing the band combine the heavy hooks and progressive riffs they’ve always been known for. (Before the release of those records, Victor was devoting time to Ministry, with whom he likely had a falling out, based on his words about frontman Al Jourgensen, and he’s also still the guitarist of Danzig) And now, the band has offered a five-song EP, released on the label that’s represented them the better part of the past decade, Steamhammer, to whet the appetite of fans for their next release, whenever it may come. Age of Defiance contains two new songs and three live recordings with the current lineup of drummer Aaron Rossi and bassist/backing vocalist Jason Christopher. Its three live recordings are not from Zero Days, let alone from this past decade. Instead, they included “Another Worldly Device” and “Cut-Rate” from their 25-year-old breakout Cleansing as well as the title track to its follow-up, Rude Awakening.

Speaking to Victor over the phone late last year, it’s clear he’s constantly reflecting on his entire career, where both Prong and the metal and music world were then and are now. On paper, his general observations may come across as “ok boomer” dismissiveness, but I can tell you from his tone that he legitimately ponders and is curious about his place. The conversation eventually turned into me expressing generalized, likely unearned pearls of wisdom about the state of things, and him playing the weary cynic. The whole time, it was enjoyable and illuminating.

Read the Q+A, edited for length and clarity, below.

Since I Left You: You released the Age of Defiance to tide fans over. What’s the history of the two studio recordings on it?

Tommy Victor: That’s a good question. [In 2018], in January, I came off a tour and wrote a whole bunch of songs. I think 11 I fully demoed in crappy home recordings. That was gonna be for a full-length record. We were trying to expand the life of Zero Days, so we put out the “Blood Out Of Stone” video and single. We had that in the works and thought we shouldn’t put out another album for a while. People tend to just listen to a couple songs anyhow. I thought a lot of songs off of Zero Days got ignored or overlooked. And we had put out a series of long players over a good period of time, so an EP sounded like a good idea. I just picked one song [from the demos, “Age of Defiance”], and thought the quality control has really been upped, because out of the 11 songs that were demoed, I was only picking one song out of this to really focus on. I liked that idea, so we recorded that one. Then I wrote a brand spanking new song specifically for the EP once it was decided just to do two songs, and that was “End of Sanity”. Completely new for this. I think the other songs are gonna go in the trash pile.

SILY: So that’s why you chose “Age of Defiance” to represent this release?

TV: Right.

SILY: “The End Of Sanity” you describe as a crossover track. It’s pretty catchy but still really heavy.

TV: Good. I always worry about that.

SILY: You still worry about how your music is gonna be received?

TV: Oh, absolutely. I’m an artist, but I’m not that much of an artist. I’m still insecure about a lot of the stuff. I do the best I can. That song, too, to go into the depths of how I come up with something like that. Apart from the demos, I recorded a bunch of riffs on my phone, whether on the road or hanging around. I spent the day going through all of them. I was like, “This one’s pretty cool.” I downloaded it off my phone and put it on the computer. Apparently, it was recorded during a Danzig tour. I rearranged it and came up with something completely different. There’s a lot of work that goes behind this. Then I added the other riffs on the spot. But I try to have a lot of quality control and effort put into this. And the lyrics are a whole other thing. I like to have the opportunity to do two songs. I don’t have this huge chore or task of doing 14 songs. This is great! I’d love this to continue, to put out a couple songs here and there. It’s been a lot of work but a lot less of a headache.

SILY: It’s the same work, but put into less songs.

TV: Yeah!

SILY: What would prevent you from doing that? The label release cycles?

TV: I’m confused about their whole release cycle. I don’t really know what their strategies are. Because I don’t know that, I think they’ve gotten the wrong idea that I’ve criticized them about it. I’m not; they’ve done a fantastic job with Prong. It’s just that I’m confused about how they decide what has to be done. I don’t really know. I know he told me this is gonna carry through this year, but we’ll see what happens.

SILY: From an artistic standpoint, coming out with a whole album as opposed to releasing one-off songs is different, but from the perspective of keeping people interested, people are used to these short bursts.

TV: I guess they are. Our label is an old-fashioned heavy metal label, which may sound wrong, but they have the metal integrity of full-length albums and vinyl. They don’t really care too much about what the pop world is doing. But I know R&B artists team up with other people for a constant barrage of singles. I don’t listen to those pop playlists, but I know billions of people do. It’s what people listen to these days, when you go to the gym. Whoever with whoever. These singles that come out.

You can make money from Spotify if you generate the type of digital-only releases these artists are doing. It’s a mythos to say nobody’s making money from Spotify. Yeah, metal bands are not, because nobody listens to metal. But in the wide scope of things, 15 million plays in a day, you’re making a good chunk of change. And that’s just on Spotify.

SILY: It’s also being counted towards the charts.

TV: Yeah, it’s Gold now. It’s ridiculous. Nobody sells 500,000 copies of a record anymore. There’s no place to buy records!

SILY: No big places.

TV: Yeah.

SILY: When I heard that this release was going to be two never-heard-before studio recordings and three live cuts, I expected the live cuts to be three recently released Prong songs. But there’s one from 10 years ago and two from the early 90′s. Why these songs?

TV: Well, it’s the 25th anniversary of Cleansing. As far as why “Another Worldly Device” and “Cut-Rate”, I don’t know. We could have done “Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck”. And I think “Rude Awakening” is one of those Prong songs that’s been overlooked a little bit, and it shows a side of Prong where people are like, “That’s a really good song!” but they don’t really get it. We rolled the dice with that one, sort of.

SILY: Do you play that one a touch slower live?

TV: Probably. Alexei [Rodriguez] would play fast, and Ted [Parsons] would play it fast. We’re probably a little slower now. It moves up and down. Sometimes, we’re trying to get the hell out of there at night.

SILY: When were these recorded?

TV: Several years ago. 2014 at the earliest, maybe 2015. I should know that.

SILY: Were they from different shows?

TV: No. The whole session was different shows, but I think those were all from Berlin.

SILY: What’s the story behind the album art?

TV: I’ve been dabbling with painting. I sent a bunch of my art to the art director, and this is what he came up with. I was like, “Wow, this is awesome!” I had done one piece which was my idea for the cover, which was nothing really that great, just a black canvas and sort of distorted Prong logo in red and that kind of lettering. He just went full force with [the image I gave him] and came up with the rest of it. I really like the color scheme--it was something really different. He really got it, he really nailed it. Nicolas Fritz is this guy’s name. He’s from Steamhammer. Normally, we haven’t gone with the guy from the label, but I thought, “I’m gonna give it a shot. I’m gonna start with something and send it to him and see if he can manipulate it.” He went in a totally different direction, and I really liked what he was doing.

SILY: What else is upcoming for Prong?

TV: More touring. There’s the European tour. We’re trying to get down to South America. If the Foo Fighters want us to go out with them in America, I’ll take that tour. Other than that, I don’t know what we’re gonna do. Three tours [this year] would be good.

SILY: Have you played the two new songs live yet?

TV: Good question. We have not! We were planning to. We just got off a tour; we were just out with Agnostic Front. Based on the shortness of our set time, we decided it wouldn’t be a good idea to be interfering with the show by playing new songs.

SILY: Have you practiced them a bunch?

TV: No. We need to start. We’re gonna do them on the next tour.

SILY: How was your show at Reggie’s?

TV: I think we were competing with someone of major significance playing elsewhere that night. I’ve never been to that venue before. We played a lot of places that normally we wouldn’t have played or never heard of.

SILY: In terms of metal, Queensryche was playing that night, but I don’t know who else. You never know why people don’t come out.

TV: It wasn’t a disaster, but somebody else of significance definitely played that night. I think it was just right after a festival.

SILY: Riot Fest.

TV: Riot Fest was that weekend.

SILY: Do you tend to play festivals at all?

TV: We try to. We try to get on ‘em. In Europe, we do. In America, for some reason, we’re bypassed. I do know the reasons, but I’m not gonna share that with you. In Europe, we do a lot of festivals.

SILY: I imagine Riot Fest would be receptive to a band like you. They’re not a metal festival and call themselves a punk festival, but they have metal. Slayer just headlined it.

TV: I don’t know what dictates these things. When we’re asked, we’ll do it. But right now, to beat down doors to get on these things, fly in, and make no money isn’t really that interesting to me.

SILY: You’d rather go on a tour where people are gonna come to your shows, even if small.

TV: I gotta keep an eye on finances. We’re not a bunch of kids excited to do things for nothing. I’m not gonna wind up broke.

SILY: Is there anything you’ve been listening to, reading, or watching lately that’s caught your attention?

TV: I’m always watching stuff these days. Right now, I’m watching Rebellion. It’s about the Easter Uprising. Good show. I watched El Camino. It was good; I wasn’t blown away by it.

Now, you’re really gonna get another side of me. We were dying to see this movie, and it did not disappoint, because the TV show was unbelievable: Downton Abbey. That was amazing.

As far as listening, I go back and forth. I listen to anything from Interpol to Death From Above 1979 to old Jeff Beck Group stuff. I went through a whole big jazz period, Ornette Coleman and Miles Davis. I’m really into musical theater, too. I was listening to the Rent soundtrack on the road. [laughs] Like, a lot!

SILY: Do your other band mates share your tastes?

TV: No one listens to anything publicly anymore. It’s just headphones. Everyone’s so isolated. Years ago, we’d jointly listen to stuff, complain, throw CDs out the window of the van. There’s no camaraderie anymore. Everyone’s on their own little agenda in their own heads.

SILY: I imagine that’s both good and bad.

TV: Uh...I don’t know. People are more intolerant of one another these days.

SILY: So they keep to themselves.

TV: They keep to themselves. I’m better off that way because I listen to podcasts that other people will definitely not listen to. There’s a lot of stupid shit out there, so that’s really what goes down. As far as music, though, it goes all over the place. Doom metal, some of it’s good, but I don’t pay that much attention to it.

SILY: There are so many different sub-genres of it.

TV: I was just talking about that to someone the other day. It’s disgusting. I don’t like that. Their audiences are too divided. It’s really a sad shame that it’s like that. It’s just the way it is. Doom metal people. People who only listen to hatecore bands or deathcore. Even industrial has a million different sub-genres.

SILY: It’s cool to take things in different directions but bad to be insular about it.

TV: Digital technology did this. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry can make his own record and put it up on Spotify. There are 30,000 releases a week or something now.

SILY: The good music’s out there, it’s just harder to find.

TV: Everything’s algorithmically done. The new Prong single, “End Of Sanity” is out, and automatically, unless you’ve somehow gotten in touch with the programmers, after the first week, it’s gonna get bumped down on some of the playlists. It just starts dwindling down, and your plays after a week have already gone down. It’s disappeared. Prong has the luxury of being a luxury band with a song that gets played on some of the other playlists, so we stay up there, but if it wasn’t for that, we’d be in the doldrums, that’s for sure.

SILY: I guess you gotta be thankful for that.

TV: I’m thankful for that. There could be more songs of that nature, but they seem to be concentrating on the one hit and that’s it. There’s Metallica, Godsmack, and a bunch of other bands. Rob Zombie, Tool, and everyone else suffers.

SILY: Or it becomes a token. You get these execs going, “Let’s make a diverse playlist, let’s put one metal song in there.” Who’s it gonna be? The most popular band.

TV: Oh, yeah.

SILY: Who do you consider your peers?

TV: That’s a really good question. I don’t really consider anybody. I think about that all the time. Not in a pompous fashion, but we just stand alone. A lot of people don’t get it or don’t like it; it is what it is. We’re not part of genre groups. It doesn’t fit into anything. The band we thought we were closest to--and we’re not--was Helmet, because we just toured with them a couple years ago. It was a great tour, and there’s a huge difference between both bands.

SILY: It’s funny you say that--in preparation for this interview, I was listening to an old song of yours on YouTube, and it auto-played into Helmet.

TV: Yeah. It’s the closest thing, but there’s a huge difference between the bands. There’s nobody that’s in the Prong realm. It’s completely on its own.

SILY: Do you like that?

TV: No, I do not like that. It’s out of my own choosing, that’s for sure.

SILY: You’d rather have a frame of reference or grouped contextually with other bands?

TV: It would help marketing-wise and popularity-wise, getting on tours, package deals, festivals, etc. It would have helped tremendously. But being this weird anomaly that stands outside the pack, it’s not helpful when you’re trying to get packages to tour with, and being on playlists, the way things are now, with everything so filed and separated. A band like Yes, years ago--I guess Genesis was somewhat similar--but they were popular. They didn’t fit in with anybody. Neither did Jethro Tull. To me, that’s progressive rock. Now, forget it. Especially in metal. It’s just ridiculous. It’s really bad.

SILY: At least you have the artistic integrity.

TV: I don’t even have that. I try the best I can. I don’t put out any old garbage. I try to have quality control. I’ve always been like that. When I was a kid, I had to study extra for tests. I can’t slam-dunk stuff. It doesn’t happen.

SILY: Sometimes it’s a blessing, sometimes, it’s a curse.

TV: It’s having a legacy of a career that’s what’s important at this stage. There are some bands with a huge legacy, but the last four records have just been, “What the hell is this garbage?” Like really bad. At least I can say with Prong--and maybe it’s because the early records weren’t that good--but the recent records aren��t that bad. A lot of people haven’t heard them, but I can’t be ashamed of them. I haven’t been mailing in any records lately.

SILY: I like Carved Into Stone quite a bit.

TV: We put a lot of time into that. It was a big project, major project. It took a year to put that whole thing together. I was out of Ministry, like “Fuck Al Jorgensen.” “Rio Grande Blood”, “Relapse”, and “The Last Sucker”’s riffs could have been Prong songs but went to Ministry. I just never made a fucking penny off of those songs, and they could have been put into Prong stuff. I shot my load on those, but I put a stop to it and went in and did Carved Into Stone and somehow salvaged that period of my life. [laughs]

Tour dates:

2/14 - Dynamo - Eindhoven, Netherlands

2/15 - Student Central (ULU) - London, United Kingdom

2/16 - Muziekodroom - Hasselt, Belgium

2/17 - Z-Bau - House of Contemporary Culture - Nuremberg, Germany

2/18 - Backstage Halle - Munich, Germany

2/19 - A38 Hajó - Budapest, Hungary

2/20 - Barrak music club - Ostrava, Czech Republic

2/21 - Arena Wien - Wien, Austria

2/22 - Legend Club - Milano, Italy

2/23 - Kiff - Aarau, Switzerland

2/24 - Garage - Saabrucken, Germany

2/25 - KufA e.V. - Braunschweig, Germany

2/26 - Kulttempel - Oberhausen, Germany

2/27 - Bahnhof Pauli - Hamburg, Germany

2/28 - SO36 - Berlin, Germany

2/29 - AJZTalschock - Chemnitz, Germany

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thejokersenigma · 7 years

Text

Joker x Reader - Deadly Voice Part 24

Yes! Another Part! Don’t hold out hope that they will always be coming out this quick - it’s only because I am suppose to be doing revision, but this is far more fun!

I’ve noticed my notes are decreasing on my writing so I hope I haven’t actually lost too many readers and people either aren’t leaving notes or just haven’t read it yet but I do apologise if my writing has got worse!

Anyway I hope you enjoy!

Masterlist

The car hadn’t even stopped on the bridge before the Joker had open the door and stepped out onto the road. He wasn’t in the mood for time wasting. Cars behind blasted their horns but he ignored them and they soon silenced when they recognised him. Frost soon followed on behind.

He made his way through the lunch time rush of pedestrians, the people parting before him when they got a look at him. The smarter ones immediately turned tail and strode away, some even running – not wanting to be anywhere near him or what he was going to do. A fewer more stupider individuals stepped to the side by remained to gasp and point, watching in awe as he stomped past them. He’d usually stop and give them a show – making them regret any gestures at him when they soon lost their precious fingers, and shutting their pathetic mouths with pistol. But he didn’t -you needed to be in the mood for these sorts of things. And for once he wasn’t.

A group of office works chatted in front of him, meandering along the bridge as they enjoyed their lunch hour. He pulled his gun out and growled at them, swinging the weapon around his finger. They turned at the noise, he noticed their eyes widen at the gun that spun around, a few of the women letting out screams and they all fled in various directions, pushing each other aside in their hurry. Usually he found this vaguely entertaining, but his temper remained – the turmoil he caused at Penguin’s club not enough to alleviate it.

When he reached the centre of the bridge he swung himself up onto the stone barrier without hesitation, hung his arms out to both sides and let himself fall into a dive as he plummeted into the depths of the river below, leaving Frost stood on the bridge watching the dark water in confusion.

I had wanted to put my plan into action as soon as I had thought of it – not wanting to wait around for Penguin to make my life any more miserable, or for the Joker to remerge and start his games again before he finely killed me.

This meant however that I didn’t have that much time to arrange things. I had managed to arrange everything for my grand disappearing act off the bridge, but my life from there onwards was less clear to me.

I had known that I couldn’t stay in Gotham - not even a city or two away. I didn’t even settle with the same state. I had been travelling for the last month between several cities and towns - never staying more than a few nights, always paying in cash - just in case anyone somehow came looking for me, or tried to tract my bank account.

I wasn’t poor. The money Penguin paid me hadn’t gone to much other than groceries – me not having much of a social life – so I had a nice cushion to fall back on now. Even so, there was a limit and I knew I needed a more permanent location for me to settle in and start my new life.

Which is how I found myself here.

It was a small town surrounded by cattle farm after cattle farm. The population of inhabitants was quite small – the cows almost outnumbering them. It was perfect really. I managed to rent myself a small farmhouse on one of the ranches and got myself a temporary job at one of the cosy pubs in the central market square – finally earning myself funds for my dwindling finances.

Life was going well. But it sort of wrong. Like I was on a really long holiday and I would one day have to return home and pick up my normal life. I felt constantly uneasy - like I was waiting on the edge for something to happen to change the life I had made.

I tried to distract myself by focusing on being more social. Up to this point I had been mainly alone – the only person I truly interacted with being the Farmer who rented my house to me – even that was only a wave and a good morning as he drove past my front door in the morning.

So I began to try to make some friends at the pub. It seemed to pay off. I became quite friendly with a few of the other waitresses/bartenders that worked alongside me, often going out for ‘girls night’ or getting lunch together. Still though, the empty feeling and restlessness soon returned when I was left to my own devices.

When I eventually felt like I could confide in my new girlfriends, I attempted to broach the subject. Despite their comforting words on the subject I felt like they couldn’t fathom my situation – and there was no way I could tell my true story. My suspicions of their understanding was confirmed when their solution was to point out ‘cute’ guys around the bar, and hook me up with their own boyfriend’s best friends. It didn’t appeal to me. I had considered the dating game as a possible remedy but no one appealed to me in this small town. Plus, just thinking about dating sent a familiar green haired man through my mind. I didn’t like to think about him.

If I began to think about him – even just his sweatpants - I immediately shut my mind down and thought about something else. I didn’t need that turmoil in my head.

There had been several incidences during my stay here thanks to my past. I had soon found out that the surrounding countryside was a prime spot for hunting – something I didn’t learn until I had heard gun shots ringing out through the streets and I had been the only one to dive for cover. I earned some funny looks for that.

This also meant that this time of year there was many large groups of intimidating men discussing weapons and choice shots. I couldn’t help but constantly keep an ear out for a familiar name – it reminded me all too much of the meetings I would attend with Penguin, where the goons would hunch around bragging about who had almost managed to land a shot on the Batman. The first time I heard a laugh like his I swear my heart stopped and I practically jumped 2 foot in the air, before instinctively hiding behind the nearest pillar in the room.

I was being ludicrous. I was dead to him – if he actually cared. Chances were we didn’t even know because he didn’t care enough to find it out. There was no chance he knew I was alive and no chance he would track me down. But what I found worse than my stupid reactions was that – every time he wasn’t actually here – I felt my heart drop.

It was absurd. But I was getting better, slowly.

That was until one late Sunday afternoon when I was clearing the pub up after the usual lunchtime rush, before the dinner shift started. There weren’t many people around – a few sat in the bar area, but known left in the main dining section – as I made my way around the old wooden tables, wiping them down with a grimy dishcloth and some disinfectant. As I rearranged the rag to a cleaner piece of material for the next bench, I noticed a newspaper folded on top of one of the stools at the next bench.

I picked it up without a second thought - thinking of causally flicking through it as I didn’t keep up on the news much, apart from the local gossip. I far preferred the quiet ignorant life I had adopted.

I read the name of the paper and dropped it instantly as though it had burnt me.

It was the Gotham Gazette – and a recent edition at that.

It’s going in the bin! I told myself firmly. I didn’t need to know anything that was happening in that city.

I bent down to gingerly pick it back up - as though afraid it might bite me - and folded it back in half to its original state. That when the headline caught my eye. “Continued Clown Chaos” it read. My intrigue got the better of me – despite my common sense telling me to drop it and run - and I unfolded it once again to take in the front page.

The large photo captivated me. It was him, in all his glory. The Joker was crouched in the bed of a pickup truck, an assault rifle gripped in one hand, a revolver in other and he appeared to be firing into the street. The photographer had clearly risked his life to get this picture, but it had clearly paid off, managing to secure the shot of the clown racing away from the scene – mostly likely trying to avoid the Batman. I bet anything Frost was at the wheel and I caught myself smiling slightly to myself as I thought about how annoyed he would be that the Joker wasn’t holding on in any way in the back of the truck – meaning one wrong turn of Frost’s would send the insane man flying. And of course Frost would be to blamed. I smirked, resisting the urge to chuckle at the image of Frost cursing as he stirred the speeding truck as carefully as he could.

My eyes roamed over the picture and I felt my smirk fade from my lips as my gaze landed on his face. There he was. I couldn’t lie to myself. I missed him. My memories had been fading in my attempt to not think about him, but to see him again was like a fresh coat of paint over my mind’s eye.

I studied the image in front of me, drinking in every last detail – I felt like an addict getting a hit after a long painful withdrawal - God knows if I’d ever see him again. I couldn’t. I knew that. I shouldn’t be looking at this. But though my head argued my eyes remained glued on the photo.

His purple coat was flying out in front of him, partially hiding his dark shirt beneath and the gold chains that hung around his neck. His hair was dishevelled and strands stuck out where the image had frozen them as the air rushed past. The newspaper didn’t do the colours justice, but I could see where the light of the day caught a few of the strands making them an even brighter green.

A deep blood red grin stretched across his face, his metallic tipped teeth just noticeable between his lips.

But it didn’t look right. It sat wrong on his face, his usual creases and slight dimples not indenting his bleached skin. This wasn’t a smile. There was no jesting there. It was a terrifying rictus. It spelt out exactly how he wanted to see the world burn and suffer. His eyes were the same - the blue not the light, carefree brightness I remembered, but instead it was dark and stormy, mostly hidden in the shadow of his brow. There was no humour there, no true enjoyment of what he was doing. It was all forced.

Ok now I’m just being stupid! It’s just the lighting! I’m reading far too much into a bloody picture! I told myself sternly and tore my eyes away from his.

I turned my attention to the columns of black and white text. “Weeks after plunging himself into Gotham River from the South Bridge in a suspected suicide attempt, -

What?! Suicide attempt?! The Joker?! From the same bridge?! What was I reading?! That can’t be true!

- the criminal known as The Joker had continued his rampage on the city of Gotham.

Having already hit 13 other locations throughout the city including City Hall, Gotham National Bank, S.T.A.R Labs, The Gotham University Library and The Purple Umbrella – a club owned by well-known criminal business man Oswald Cobblepot (aka the Penguin).

Today marks yet another attack in the series that began just over a month ago. This time the main target appeared to be the Riverfront Centre in Old Gotham. Several are known to have been killed at the scene and many have since been transported to the nearest hospital to treat for severe injuries. The police are still unclear as to the motive behind the attacks and have so far not managed to find any links between the buildings struck by The Joker.

“We are looking into any possible connections between the incidences.” Answered Commissioner Gordon of the GCPD when questioned, “We also hope to identify some clues as to the location of so-called The Joker so we may apprehended him before any more damage befalls the city and its inhabitants.”

“This is a compl-“

“[Y/N]?” A hand landed on my shoulder making me jump, a quickly fold up the paper and hide behind my body as I spun around to face Hannah. I gave her a breathless smile in greeting. “Geez, sorry! Didn’t mean to make you jump,” she apologise quickly, “What ya’ got there?” she asked gesturing behind me where I gripped the newspaper partially concealed.

“Oh.” I said, reluctantly bringing the newspaper back into clear view, “Just a newspaper someone left behind.” I said, trying to sound as breezy as possible as I handed it to her. I could feel my chest still pounding from her sudden appearance, but I also knew it was partially from the shame of being so engrossed in the ex-Arkham resident on the front page that I hadn’t even heard her approach. Could she tell?

“Oh?” She questioned taking the paper from me and leafing through it, completely ignoring the headline. She pause part way through, seeing the name of the paper, “Gotham Gazette? Gotham’s a bit far from here in’it?”

I nodded, “Must have just been a traveller passing through.” I said lightly, acting as if I didn’t care in the slightest. She then closed the paper and noticed the front. Shit.

“Oh my God!” She cried reading through article. “I heard of this mad man – The Joker. Yeah, definitely looks like a bit of a clown!” She guffawed, “Gotta be mad to have all that makeup on!” She added as her eyes flicked over the picture.

“Most of it’s not makeup.” I pointed out without even thinking about it. It was the way she said it though. I just had the urge to defend him – not that he needed it – but it wasn’t really his fault he looked like that and the comment stung me for some reason. She looked up from the article at me, puzzlement etched on her face.

“Whattya mean?” She asked and I could see the light in her eye brightened, the same way it did when she sensed gossip.

“I mean… he uh…” I gulped, mortified by how tongue tied I had gotten over it and I couldn’t help the heat that was rushing to my cheeks, “I- um - I heard he fell in chemicals at some point – or something like that. That’s why he looks like that. I think.” I finished lamely gesturing at the paper in her hand and the large photograph.

She raised an eyebrow at me, “How do ya know that?” she grilled me.

“Well - um - I’ve been – I mean I - I used to – uh – I use to live in Gotham.” I managed to stutter out in my embarrassment.

“Oh dear! I didn’t know honey! Oh my God imagine living in that city! All that crime! I’ve heard terrible things – gangs and guns round every corner, drugs handed out like sweets! Gosh every other person you meet must be a criminal!” She looked at me with such pity and sadness I almost got angry at her. How dare she talk about my city like that! It wasn’t that bad when you learnt how to live there! …Well maybe not right now… I thought thinking back to the article I just read and the rampage the Joker seemed to be on.

“I mean imagine a city full of these crazy people!” She exclaimed shaking the newspaper, “These people need to be locked up in padded cells, not running around waving guns and explosives throughout a city!”

“Well it’s not like they haven’t tried.” I muttered to myself as she gestured at the photo as proof. My eyes followed her hand and once again gaze fell on the pistol the joker held. I blinked a few times, looked away and then back. No. I wasn’t going crazy. He had my gun. The one he had given me. I hadn’t noticed initially, but now I saw it – the slight purple accents could have meant it was one of his easily, but now I could just make out the word ‘Voice’ on the barrel and if I really tried the blur of black on the cylinder could form ‘deadly’. That was my revolver – the one I had lost into the river. Where did he get it? Was it from his ‘suicide attempt’?

“I mean, how messed up must someone life be to end up like that though?! I mean sure, fall in some chemicals and end up looking like a demented clown! But why then decide the best thing to do is to go on a riot through the streets with a machine gun?!” Hannah continued, questioning wildly, oblivious to my sudden realisation and looking at me for mutual agreement and outrage.

I wasn’t going to agree. She didn’t know him. Sure he was a psychotic lunatic and a murderer but she didn’t know anything about him. She acted like no one had stopped him before, like no one had locked him in a cell and tortured him. He was a bad person, sure, but he wasn’t the only one - and he certainly wasn’t the only one to blame for what he was now. Her narrow mindedness didn’t allow her to see any more than the killer before her on the front page.

“I try not to judge.” I snapped, snatching the newspaper back from her and heading to the back room of the pub. I stripped off my apron, gathered my stuff and headed out the door - I was taking the rest of the day off.

As I made my way back to the ranch, I couldn’t help but think it was a good thing I had lost my gun.

#joker x reader #deadly voice #deadly voice part 24 #deadly voice fan fiction #deadly voice fan fic #jokersenigma #jaredleto oker #joker fan fic #joker fan fiction #joker x reader fan fiction #joker x reader fan fic

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thefoolsloop · 7 years

Text

The mistress of your charms: SNM Shanghai, show no. 1

**(Spoilers for Sexy Witch and Bald Witch loops, but not for any 1:1s. I have deliberately - and sometimes accidentally - changed the order of events in the loops, and I’ve redacted details which aren't in the New York show or which are just too much of a spoiler. I’m not accustomed to writing about a show which most readers won’t yet have seen, so I’m trying to exercise self-editing while still giving a genuine flavour of the experience. If I mess up, I apologise.

The first draft of this write-up came to 3,000 words; so I have gone through and excised a great deal. There’s basically nothing left which I would consider a spoiler, but your mileage may vary so be warned.)**

I came to Shanghai on a promise.

In 2015 I had promised Miranda that if she was ever cast in Sleep No More I would come and see her. I was assuming of course that she would be cast in New York. Then, many months later, the news came through that Punchdrunk was mounting SNM in Shanghai, a city I had no interest in visiting. Sure enough, she was in the cast. And so were twelve other TDM alumni.

I don’t break a promise. And the thought of seeing not only Miranda, but Sam, Omar, Fania, Ben and many more besides, people whom I had followed loyally in TDM, people who made that show for me, who made the world of Temple Studios so real that in my mind it still exists, I still visit it every day - the thought of all that overcame my reluctance to travel and the limitations of my budget. Some experiences are so obviously special that to turn them down is to live a life of regret. And I’m done with regret.

So after three months of Mandarin lessons I find myself, in the company of @drinkthehalo and a tiny handful of other ex-pat enthusiasts, in front of a huge, gleaming building on a main road in the west end of Shanghai. A most incongruous setting for a Punchdrunk production, accustomed as I am to seeing them in unmarked warehouses, barely-opened museum archives, crumbling stately homes; but not at all incongruous for Shanghai, a rapidly growing city apparently intent on erasing anything old.

You're not guaranteed an Ace at the McKinnon, no matter how early you queue; but the gods are smiling on me, and I’m in first lift. I make it to the ballroom while the party is still happening. I don’t know who’s in the cast for today, of course; but as I advance towards the centre of the room, searching for anything I recognise, I immediately see them: those incredible green eyes. Thank you, sweet Lord Jesus (more on him, later) - Miranda is Sexy Witch in my first show.

(Photo from sleepnomore.cn)

She’s upside down. Macduff has her in the middle of a backflip. But the moment I lock eyes with her, she holds my gaze as she returns to upright. I’m here, I try to say with my eyes, I kept my promise, I’m here. I know, she says with her eyes, I recognise you. I knew you’d come. Then she turns her attention back to flirting with Macduff. I look around and my joy is increased - Fania is here, a natural choice for Bald Witch after her ice demon PA in TDM. Olly is Boy Witch - too big and tall for the part in my view, but clearly enjoying himself enormously. Omar is Banquo - more hair than when he was in TDM, and he looks handsome and full of life. I recognise American performers whom I saw in New York - Emily, Eric. A family reunion, like Christmas.

I follow Sexy’s loop as far as the 1:1 (which I lose to @drinkthehalo, but that’s OK, I was miles away from the right spot). I could wait, but I don’t know how long for. It might be better to get accustomed to the space first. It would also make sense to see a Sexy Witch loop in full, from the top. And maybe there’ll be someone else interesting to follow. So I wander upstairs, see how the rooms have been changed, how the space seems better used than at the McKittrick. The fourth floor is the same and yet different, somehow twistier, less like a High Street and more like a whole town. I glimpse Jude’s Taxidermist, but he swiftly disappears into a 1:1. I see Lily in a costume I don’t recognise. I find the rep bar - Shen Ni looks like a performer worth following. But the beat of the rave is starting and I have to get out of the way.

I wander around until reset time, then head to the lobby. Here are the witches; when Macbeth appears, the three of them climb the walls like spiders. It’s such a delight to see them together. Once they were bopping along to ‘Bulldog’ in Studio 5: Andrea, Dwayne and Faye. Now they’re spinning, plotting, enchanting Macbeth in a scene with a very different tone. It’s a class reunion - and somewhere Daniel’s Porter is lurking; like Frankie, only on the margins of the big scene but waiting for his moment later.

I attach myself to Miranda like a limpet, it seems to be the way here. The loop has changed - there are new moments among the familiar stuff. There’s a new scene which I daren't reveal but it suggests that the character of SW has been fleshed out further, given an extra strand, more motivation. Not just a witch any more, now an avatar of someone else. Wonder if this has been done for all the witches.

Wherever she goes, Miranda fills the room with her presence: impish, sly, teasing, powerful, her timing constantly perfect. As the ballroom scene comes round again, I wonder what must it be like to dance with her (I miss the chance this time). I remember how Leslie in New York felt so light I could have breathed on her and watched her blow away on the air. Miranda seems made of tougher stuff, it’s what made her Romola less of a doormat and - perversely - made her story even more tragic.

The rave approaches; I follow the witches into the room but then I must make my escape before the flashing starts (I mean the strobes, of course, there is no flashing of the other kind in Shanghai - which I don’t think matters much; I have rather a lot I could say about this, but this isn’t the time). I wait in the corridor; once the lights stop, I hurry back in to see the witches hold up their miniature trees to Macbeth. The parties split up, their followers disperse. Because I’m at the back of the rave crowd, all I have to do is turn around and I’m at the front for the bar dance.

Ah, Miranda’s bar dance...

(Image by @arfman, reproduced with permission.)

There are some works of art that are simply too perfect, too accomplished, too striking, moving, disturbing or compelling to be described. Once you start using words to convey them, they immediately become diminished. Miranda’s bar dance belongs in this category.

Doesn’t that sound absurd? Well, all I can say is in the context of the piece, coming at the point it does when the atmosphere is elevated by the rave, when Sexy Witch’s persona is so possessed by... something... that dance, in which she seems to express all the demonic mania, all the suffering, all the rage, all the bloodlust, all the pain that runs through this show from top to bottom, that dance is one of the stand-out moments in the entire production. I’ve seen five, maybe six Sexy Witches do that dance, and none of them could touch the way Miranda does it. And I’m talking about some seriously great performers - Leslie, Lily, Emily O. Every time I saw it in New York, each performer seemed to do it better. And then Miranda comes and tops the lot of them. And I really can’t put into words what it is that makes it so great; it just.... IS.

(I’m biased, of course, but I check with my fellow English-speakers post-show and there is consensus on this point.)

We run to the door of the Taxidermist’s, where she pauses. Something is happening. She reaches out into the distance. For a moment I assume it’s just another gesture, but her hand stays out. I’m halfway down the corridor, some way out of reach. Another hand emerges from the crowd, a Chinese person looking for an opportunity. Miranda shakes her head, ever so slightly, and the person drops her hand. It seems this is meant for me, after all, and I step forward. I can’t say much about this interaction because it would spoil too much, except that once again Miranda seems to discharge a mountain of emotion in the course of seconds, her presence filling the entire corridor, her personal magnetism enchanting the crowd. This open-air interaction has a stronger effect on me than the 1:1 (which I’ve picked up earlier, now that I know where to stand). I’ve never known a performer like this.

I simply must spend a loop with Fania, so I pick her up around the reset. I don’t remember the early parts of the loop (the penalty of doing a write-up a week later), so let’s cut to just before the ballroom scene. I’ve been following her closely for a while now, and she’s rearranging the trees in the room, almost hidden in their midst (one place where the McKinnon’s improved lighting levels don’t have an impact). Then she draws the curtain, takes my hand and we’re dancing. She feels as tall as me (she isn’t, but Fania seems to exceed her dimensions, so compelling is her presence) and I try to remember months of ballroom dancing lessons from decades ago. As we part she whispers in my ear something which I will have to redact, but which makes me nod conspiratorially.

I’m now seeing the party scene for the third time tonight, and the infectious good humour of the music is rubbing off on me: I’m tapping my foot, nodding my head in time. My face has a broad grin on it - perhaps Fania can see it, because she catches my eye and breaks out into a grin too. We do the odd eyeball at each other as my gaze follows her around the room, then the crowd disperses and she goes into her muscular, spasmodic de-wigging solo. This is, just as I had anticipated, a massively athletic undertaking and is almost the match of anything Miranda does.

But, as Fania goes through her loop, I’m hugely impressed yet also slightly surprised. After seeing her PA in TDM I was expecting Bald Witch to be another contemptuous ice maiden. But this Bald Witch is fiery, defiant, with much more warmth than I would have imagined - more like Andrea’s evil twin. And her relationship with the religious artefacts and imagery in her environment - of which there is a plethora, far more than in New York - is so violently sarcastic that I expect the flames of Hell to spring up around her.

The rave happens. I go upstairs to investigate the fifth floor, so transformed from the McKittrick that I barely recognise the features (on a superficial level it’s not that different, but it feels different). I get a glimpse of a powerful scene in the new story, which I had been tipped off about, but once I’m past that I realise the rave must have finished. Maybe I can catch Miranda again, although my focus is on what Fania’s going to be doing. I head for the staircase. I can’t find the staircase. I do find the woods, however. I wander through the woods, looking for the way out. I don’t find it. I do find myself back where I started, however. OK, try again. Stick to the right hand path. No, that doesn’t work. Good God, don’t tell me the woods have only one way in and out?

I won’t answer that question, but I will say that after a couple of accidental detours into the toilets I find myself at last on the stairs down. So I’ve missed a chunk of the loop, but I do eventually manage to find Fania. Bald Witch is having fun, upping the ante on the relationship with her Redeemer. There’s no redemption here. It would be a massive spoiler to reveal what she does, but there are moments in the loop which make me jump with shock. Then we’re downstairs for the finale. As the walkout music plays, she comes round to the front of the stage, offers me her hand to help her down, and holds onto it as we walk out into the Manderley. A fabulous Fania smile and a gentle kiss, and my first show is over.

Fania and Miranda are about as perfect a pair of female witches as I’ve ever seen. While I may not be an SNM diehard, and may have missed some spectacular combinations over the years, the relationship this pair has built up through their work on TDM has granted them a naturally symbiotic dynamic in which they flourish - and the presence of Olly merely tops this off (I would like to have given him more time as Boy Witch, but he just seems to me a more natural fit for his other roles, Speakeasy and Macbeth). I would give anything to be able to see them all together in the rave, but I can’t take the risk with my health, especially on my first night.

And what a first night. To see these wonderful performers on their own would have been heaven. To see them together, and on top form, is... well, again, words fail me.

#Punchdrunk #Sleep No More #SNM #snm shanghai #miranda mac letten #fania grigoriou #sexy witch #bald witch

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